This Evil Can Be Undone

"Opening Pandora's Box means creating evil which cannot be undone."

He sank back on his heels in the too-bright parking garage, stared at the dead woman marring the linoleum.

Sophia. Oh God, what had she done?

His hand reached out, almost involuntarily, and he brushed the hair back from her eyes. He had loved her, in a way, and she had been-

Not the person he'd imagined her to be.

He'd had a lot of that recently. Ellie Monroe had been seducing him for a part. Natalie Rhodes had turned out to be entirely too familiar a face at the drug treatment center. Westlake, a murderer. Sophia, a - a traitor to the country.

Sophia had put the gun to the back of his head and would have pulled the trigger, executed him the way she had Gage.

God, he had shitty judgment. It called into question every relationship he had. How could he ever be sure anymore?

He was alone.

Castle looked up, confused by that, and then realized Kate had run off with Danberg. No, not run off. She'd gone to stop the assassination attempt-

Oh, the little girl. The girl. Someone's daughter.

He staggered to his feet, but he didn't know where to go, how to go.

There was a body - her body - and he didn't know what to do.

He didn't know where to go from here.

Castle had still not shown up, and Danberg had snapped on handcuffs and hustled the Agent into a black panel van. They were waiting on the CIA team to show up, but she was keeping on eye out for her partner.

She'd expected him to follow, like he always did.

And then she realized.

"Hey, uh, has anyone secured the body?" she asked, her hands on her hips, standing outside the van.

Danberg had the passenger door open, peered again into the back of the van. "No. I didn't want to leave him. You wanna do that?"

She nodded. "I'll head back that way, see if I find Castle."

Danberg pulled out his phone and waved her off. "Go. I'll text you when the team gets here. Remember, no NYPD presence, you got me?"

"I know," she said, but she was already heading back for the white, spare space where she and Castle had been led to their deaths.

She found him outside in the hallway, sitting slumped in the floor with his head down between his knees.

"Castle."

He jerked and glanced up at her. "You get him? The girl okay?"

"Girl's fine. They never knew. We secured Agent Jones, hustled him outside."

She waited but he said nothing more. She moved and leaned against the wall, sank down next to him.

He lifted his head again. "I seem to be a pretty crappy judge of character."

He was so disheartened that she couldn't even take offense; instead, she reached out and wrapped her fingers over the top of his hand, squeezed.

He sighed, tilted his head back against the wall. "What the hell, Beckett? How did I not see that coming? Did you see that coming?"

"I hated her from the beginning," she admitted. "But not because I thought she'd betray the country."

He swallowed, didn't even seem to register the latent jealousy behind her words. Well, no, she wasn't jealous any longer. Amazing how finding out Sophia Turner was a double agent cured all lingering bad thoughts. Or well, bad thoughts in relation to Rick Castle.

"What did she say?" Castle murmured. "At the end. Before she almost shot me."

Beckett's lungs tightened; she hated that look on his face. Like despair. Sophia hadn't just betrayed her country; she'd betrayed him as well.

"I know it was Russian. You speak Russian."

"I-"

"Tell me."

"I don't - It wasn't personal. She said that this wasn't her country."

He closed his eyes; she found herself unable to look away. She wished she could prove to him that this woman, this dead traitor, wasn't worth it. She didn't deserve a moment of his grief, not a second more of the regret and shame she saw lining his face.

Beckett wanted to erase it somehow, that desolation.

Sophia had said, when they were alone, that she wished she'd never slept with him, that the longing had disappeared, that the longing was the best part.

Kate couldn't imagine that was true. Because the longing hurt, and having him, finally having him, would be a relief and a balm to them both.

And then his hand flipped under hers and their palms met, fingers entwining.

Balm enough for now.

She nudged him and he turned his head, shot her a look he knew was weak. Couldn't help himself.

When they stepped into the break room so he could make her coffee before he left, she stood at his side as he started the machine.

"You know, you probably shared with her your childhood fantasies about your father."

He shrugged, glanced at her. "Maybe so. CIA operative was high on the list," he said, wriggling his eyebrows, feeling even that fall flat.

Beckett brushed his forearm with her fingers, reached past him for a second mug. Apparently she was inviting him to stay for coffee while she finished up paperwork. He'd planned on drinking a few glasses of scotch and sitting in his dark study.

This might be a better plan.

"Castle, she just - she was being vindictive. The whole time. Surely you see that."

He nodded, but he didn't actually. He didn't see it. She'd been the same as always, sexy and alluring and playing with him. He'd always enjoyed that, at least before Beckett. Okay, well, he still enjoyed that - but only from Beckett.

The detective handed him the mug. "She kept getting me alone. Did you see that?"

Castle swiveled his head to look at her, stared while he tried to figure out what that meant. "What?"

"She singled me out. Kept saying stuff, trying to get under my skin."

"I - the stuff I heard sounded friendly."

Beckett's eyebrow quirked. "It sounded friendly because you're not a girl."

He felt a flicker of a smile at that, let her see it. "Good to know."

"I mean," she drawled, nudging his arm. So tactile today. "Girls know what's really being said. Girls are catty."

"Did you get in a cat fight with Sophia?" he gasped, tried to play it up just to improve his mood a little.

She played along, which made him happier than he expected.

"Oh yeah, Castle, we fought over you. In your dreams." She was even rolling her eyes at him. But the best part? Behind that sarcasm, he detected some shame, some truth to it. He'd thought maybe - and she'd been seriously jealous - and this was just too good.

"Thanks, Beckett. I feel much better."

She snorted at him, shaking her head, and moved to sit at the break room table. He finished off both espressos, didn't even burn his fingers, and then turned around with the coffee cups in hand.

She was watching him, and she wasn't quick enough to wipe the look off her face. He stood rooted to the spot for a moment, caught by it, a look he didn't know but might just have seen in the mirror before (love?), and then found his fumbling feet and put her coffee down in front of her, took his seat.

"So. I'm interested in hearing more about what she said to you. What catty things she said to you, specifically."

Beckett shrugged at him, wrapped her fingers around the white porcelain. "Not so much that she outright claimed you, but she let me know."

"Let you know . . . what?"

She didn't answer that, and he really hadn't expected her to. "It was a lot of lies, Castle. And I don't feel like sorting out what might have been the truth, if any of it ever was, from all the muck. So I've dismissed. I'm filing it away under false and letting it go."

"Do you want the truth?" he asked suddenly, and he knew he was stupid to offer it, seriously stupid, because their whole time together was a mess now, had been a mess then, really.

"I'm not sure you know the truth either, Rick." She held his eyes for a moment, an apology there, and then dropped them back to her coffee, picked it up to sip it slowly.

"Yeah. That's - damn." He rubbed at his eyes. "I was pretty much an immature asshole, though."

She huffed, laughter or indignation he couldn't tell. "You were that when I met you. I don't have trouble believing that."

He lifted his eyes to look at her, a little surprised actually, but she was already shaking her head.

"No. That's not fair. You only acted like an asshole. I don't think - I'm not sure you really ever were one, not deep down. Just putting on the rich, playboy act."

He grinned, felt the first real smile spreading across his face since yesterday. "Yeah?"

"Yeah," she murmured, then shook her head again. "But Castle, it was a really, really good act."

He laughed, sat back in his chair to study her, the soft fall of her hair in waves, the dark brilliance in her eyes, the array of her lashes, those sharp cheekbones that could cut a man if he wasn't careful, slice his heart to shreds.

"Next time someone from my past crops up, I'm listening to you."

"That's what you said last time," she mused, quirking an eyebrow. Didn't take a whole lot of the sting of truth from it, but it helped that she'd already cajoled him into a better mood.

"This time I mean it," he said, drinking some of his own coffee. "You - at least - are an infinitely better judge of character."

"You're not a bad judge of character, Castle."

"Oh, I beg to differ." He rallied a smile to keep his spirits up, watched her instead of the depths of his coffee cup. "Looks like I suck at it."

"No," she said, shaking her head. She sounded fierce, like she was fighting him, fighting for him. "You just have a trusting heart. And there's nothing wrong with that."

"A trusting heart? Well, it's not great when I trust all the wrong people."

"Trust me, don't you?"

The look on her face, intense and serious, made him shut up and nod.

"Trust me, and you'll be okay."

"I can do that," he said softly, and leaned forward to wrap his fingers around her wrist. The concern on her face melted into something tender, a smile behind her pressed lips and her knit eyebrows.

Yeah, Detective Kate Beckett had captured him, inspired him, pushed him, entranced him. And yeah, he'd been fascinated by Sophia Turner once too, but this-?

This wasn't in doubt.

Kate was most definitely different.

They were different.

And he was slipping back into melancholy.

"Damn me and my trusting heart. I'll have to get you to do background checks on all the people I know. Let you interview my publicist, my agent, and - oh, no - my accountants!" He tried for humor, but felt it falling apart even as he said it.

She shook her head. Her wrist slipped out from under his grip, her fingers taking its place, tightening around his hand. He saw the shock of fierce and unwavering possession in her eyes.

"Castle. I won't let anything happen to your heart."