Richard Castle, Watcher (Castle/Buffy) (Complete)

New York, October 2009

Rick Castle woke up to a sight he had dreamed about for months: Kate Beckett, in his arms, asleep. In his bed too. And nude. And the night they had spent together… truly, his dream had not just come true but been exceeded. To think the proud detective would sneak into his room, at night, clad only in a short, thin bathrobe… that was something Nikki Heat would have done. Which meant, he thought with a smile, that he had judged Beckett’s character better than he had thought!

In that moment, the woman started to stir. He saw her slowly twist her shoulders, trying to stretch, and encountering resistance - his own chest, to be exact. Then her eyes opened, blinking. For a moment, she looked surprised, and he felt her tense and draw a sharp breath, then she must have remembered the night, and she relaxed - although not completely.

“Morning,” he said, in a low voice.

“Good morning.”

“The best.” He smiled. “It was… “

“A dream come true?” She smirked, but he thought there was just the slightest bit of bravado there. Not that he minded.

“Oh, yes.” He grinned. “When you ripped my clothes off… that was straight out of a fantasy.”

Her eyebrows moved in that adorable expression she showed when she was confused. “I ripped your clothes off?”

Rick pointed at the crumpled remains in the middle of the carpet. “My pajama top.” His author colleagues would be so jealous - a beautiful woman had literally ripped his clothes off.

She actually got up and picked it up, then held it out. “Two buttons were ripped off,” She said, cocking her head sideways and raising an eyebrow.

He had been watching her nude body move, bend down, and so his retort was a few moments late. “It still counts! Buttons are parts of the clothes, and they were ripped off.”

“Technically.” She stared at him, then chuckled.

He chuckled as well. He hadn’t felt this happy in a long time. They had bound the noose demon, New York was safe from the cultists, and Kate Beckett had finally realised, no, admitted, that he was the ideal partner for her. Now if Agent Secondbest would be transferred to Alaska, this perfect morning would become a perfect day!

“Dad? Breakfast’s ready!” he heard Alexis through the door.

Beckett gasped, and quickly pulled the pajama top on to cover herself.

“Don’t worry, the door’s locked,” he said. “You locked it yourself.” Not that it would have stopped Alexis - his daughter had picked a really bad time to show, at last, some teenage rebellion by learning how to pick locks from that damned vampire. Even though he might not be damned any more, after regaining his soul. Or after having gained a new soul - Castle wasn’t privy to exactly what had happened.

Kate sighed with relief, then giggled. “That would have been embarrassing.”

Rick nodded.

She frowned. “You do not seem relieved.”

“Alexis only doesn’t come in to call me for breakfast if she knows I’m, ah, not alone. In bed,” he added.

She shrugged. “I met Vi on the way, last night.”

“Ah.” Rick hadn’t known that. He wanted to ask how the redhead had reacted, but that would make him look like he didn’t know his Slayer well enough to know, or guess her reaction.

“She told me that if I hurt you, they’d never find my body.” Kate snorted. “She’s very protective of you.”

“They all are.” Maybe a bit too protective - after Gina, there had been a few girls who had broken up with him quite surprisingly. One of them even moved to the West Coast without having an appartment ready, as he later was told by a shared acquaintance. “Did she mention a shovel?”

Kate shook her head with a slightly puzzled expression. “No, she didn’t.”

“It’s a multitool. You can use it to bash the head in, and then to hide the body,” he explained. “And in a pinch, you can stake a vampire with the shaft.” Xander had had to do that, once, when he had dug up a grave with suspicious markings, and the ‘corpse’ had turned out to be a vampire trapped by said markings.

“Your family has a slightly morbid touch. And a more than slightly violent one.” She chuckled, sitting down on the bed next to him. “Usually, I’m the one with the violent stories to tell.” She wasn’t quite looking at him.

“Mh.” She looked damn sexy, wearing just a shirt. His shirt. With the top two buttons ripped off. He was late with his answer, again. “It’s worse when you have to hide it. Can’t talk about your real work, and people start to think you’ve got an alcohol problem, as often as you end up ‘falling down the stairs’.” Gina had tried to use that against him, once.

“I better get back to my room, and my clothes,” Beckett said. “As much as I like your reaction, I think your family would take exception to me appearing like this at your table.” She ran her hand down her front, chuckling.

And Rick had a new fantasy. A new dream to become real.

Kate narrowed her eyes. “You’re not thinking to use this in your next book, are you?”

“I always change the details, as you know.” Of course he’d use it!

“And what kind of details would you change?”

“I’m not certain, yet.” Maybe he should replace the bathrobe with a trenchcoat, and have Nikki walk from her apartment to his?

“Why do I have trouble believing that?” She was not glaring at him, but grinning, amused. She was probably even closer to the character based on her than he had thought.

“Déformation professionnelle?” he ventured, smiling.

She snorted. “I think I know you a bit too well.”

“In the biblical sense now too!” he said.

They kissed, and Castle was tempted to skip breakfast. And maybe lunch. He was quite certain Kate was tempted as well, judging by how she looked when they separated again.

“Maybe…” she started, with an impish grin.

He shook his head. “It would likely result in a visit from Vi, ‘to check up’ on me.“ Even Alexis might grow concerned - although in her case, she might legitimately worry about him.

Kate frowned, and he shrugged. “It’s a Slayer thing. They are a bit… territorial.”

“Great. It’s the stepdaughter from hell.” The detective shook her head, snorting.

He perked up - even if she was joking, if she considered Vi her stepdaughter, then wouldn’t that mean she was at least thinking of him as husband-material? Then she stood up, and his shirt slipped some, and he was distracted again.

Until she opened the door, and found her clothes, neatly folded, in front of it.

When she turned around and looked at him, eyebrows raised, he shrugged. “Alexis is more subtle than Vi.” When she sighed, he added: “She’s trying to be helpful?”

He didn’t comment on her muttered “Great. A fifteen year old stepmother.”

*****​

Breakfast was, as expected, a bit… wearing, was a good word. Alexis and Vi, even Martha, Rick could have handled without too much of a strain. But all the Scoobies? While he certainly didn’t regret anything that had happened, his day would have been even further improved if the Scoobies had taken the earliest flight back to merry old England.

“Who had ‘after we bag the noose demon’?” Xander asked, between taking large bites out of a croissant he had covered with a mix of honey and butter from his plate.

Dawn raised her hand, and Buffy groaned.

“How do you do this?” the blonde Slayer asked. “That’s the third time you've won the pool!” She was polishing off her third plate. Earlier, she had repeatedly complained that she’d not get a real breakfast in England, which had started an argument with Spike about what consisted a ‘real breakfast’. An argument the vampire had lost decidedly, on the grounds of both being English and a blood-drinking vampire, and therefore ignorant of the topic, as Buffy had declared.

“You were betting on when we would...” Kate’s voice sounded as if she couldn’t believe her ears. She seemed to even have forgotten the bear claw in her hand, halfway to her mouth.

“Yes,” Xander said, nodding. “It was so obvious, we mainly disagreed whether or not you’d do it during our visit, or after it.” He must have noticed the detective’s intent, since he hastily added: “Hey, we do that for everyone.”

“To everyone,” Dawn corrected him.

“Well… it’s sort of a welcome ritual?” Xander looked around.

“Hazing,” Dawn cut in again.

“Hazing is bad,” Willow said. “And it’s not really hazing. Just… good-natured teasing?”

“We’ll go with that!” Xander exclaimed. “Good-natured teasing. Willow nailed it again - she’s a genius, you know.”

While the Scoobies nodded to each other - Faith laughing openly - Rick consoled himself with the thought that compared to the Council, he was the epitome of maturity and wisdom.

“Anyway, enough of teasing the new old couple!” Buffy said. “Now let’s plan our next mission!”

“Next mission?” Kate asked, tensing up.

“Today’s shopping trip!” Buffy answered with a wide and - in Rick’s opinion - slightly manic smile.

He couldn’t wait to get to the Precinct.

*****​

 

New York, October 2009

“The big bad demon hunter, running from a shopping trip.”

Rick Castle pouted at the amused tone of Kate’s voice and turned his head to look at the detective on the back bench. “I’ll have you know that better men than me have fled when Buffy mentioned thinking of going shopping.” He also made a mental note to look into cars that seated three up front - his neck would be grateful.

The detective’s chuckling told him that he needed to work on his delivery. Vi’s snort didn’t help either. Weren’t those two supposed to be at odds with each other, instead of ganging up on him? He sighed. “It’s not actually the shopping by itself that made me vacate my own premises before I was press-ganged, but the consequences of being dragged along by the Scoobies to pay for it.”

“I honestly doubt that they’ll put a dent into your bank account,” Kate said. “I didn’t have the impression that they were like that.”

“Well… not unless there’s a weapon convention. You know how Slayers are about all kind of weapons. Vi’s purchases alone would be enough to equip a small army.”

“Hey!”

He smiled at his Slayer. “You know, when Ray says that you’re putting his daughter through college, he is not quite joking?”

“I’m a Slayer, I need my weapons!” she huffed.

“Of course. Although I think a line should be drawn when their weight surpasses what you can carry.”

“Pf! Says the man ordering flamethrowers in bulk!”

“I’m just stocking up in case I lose another one.” Rick cleared his throat. “Anyway - since New York actually has not changed their weapon laws to emulate those of Texas…”

“Which they totally should!” Vi cut in. “I can’t carry my minigun with me due to those laws!”

“You don’t actually have a minigun, do you?” Kate didn’t sound amused anymore.

“No, she doesn’t,” Castle said.

“Sure I do!” Vi protested.

“It’s not yours, it’s the Council’s.”

“I called dibs!”

“That’s not how weapon procurement works,” Castle said. “Besides, that’s between you and Xander.”

“He said you vetoed it!”

Castle had a few nasty thoughts about the other Watcher throwing him under the bus, or the Slayer in this case. “In any case, it’s not a practical weapon.” It couldn’t fire Dragon’s Breath rounds, and the ammunition didn’t last long enough for most fights. And it was too mechanically complex for a good field weapon.

“But it’s fun! And you always tell Alexis to have more fun!” Vi pouted at him.

“Note, please, that I tell that to Alexis. Not to you.” Rick said. “And in light of the recent revelations about her extracurricular activities, I am sorely tempted to change that.” Turn his responsible daughter into a budding burglar, would they?

“Pf!”

Kate was shaking her head, her face showing a mixture of amusement and exasperation, as Castle saw glancing over his shoulder. He cleared his throat. “It’s not actually the financial consequences that I’m dreading, but the social ones.”

He resisted the temptation to shake his head and sigh at the blank looks from both Kate and Vi. “Buffy wanted to use my ‘celebrity bonus’ to get VIP treatment in the boutiques.” Which his credit card would guarantee her anyway - they were not in England, after all. “That means news of a ruggedly handsome and rich author bankrolling the purchases of a group of nubile young women will make the rounds in New York’s society. At best, that means some tabloid will run the touching story of my reunion with the Sunnydale survivors I put up in my vacation home in the Hamptons after their town disappeared in a sinkhole. And that would draw attention to that particular event, and my involvement in it.” He saw that Kate understood - she had found out about his double life using that connection, after all. Her very ex-boyfriend was not quite as smart as she was, but he might get lucky and manage the same feat. “At worst, we’ll have to read about our impending break-up and my orgies with college girls not even a day into our relationship.” He smiled weakly when Kate’s eyes widened. “Welcome to dating a famous author in New York?”

“I didn’t think of that,” Kate said, as much to herself as to him, or so Rick thought.

“Getting cold feet?” Vi asked.

Kate glared at the Slayer. “No.”

“It’s not that bad, usually,” Castle said. “Remember the article about Nikki Heat, a few months ago?”

“Yes. I heard stripper jokes for a week.”

Castle made a note to avoid that particular topic. And he glared at Vi - her laughter wasn’t helpful right now. “Well… it’s really not too bad. Like neighbours gossipping, just on a slightly larger scale.”

“Slightly larger?” And the eyebrow went up.

“Well… with online communities spreading, even neighbour gossip can reach the other side of the country in minutes. All the intellectuals I know claim that newspapers are about to die out anyway.” He smiled at her. “You’ll get used to it before you know it?” He could see Kate take to it. She was not just beautiful and smart, she also had that je ne sais quoi.

“You’re not helping, Castle.” She frowned, then leaned back in her seat.

He didn’t give up that easily. “Well, there won’t be any journalists in the precinct. And if there are, I’ll have my lawyer slap them down with court orders so hard, their feet will pierce the core of the Earth!”

That made her laugh.

*****​

If he still had thought that visiting the 12th Precinct had been a good idea, then Castle quickly would have learned differently. He might not have to deal with nosy journalists and gossips, but the precinct housed trouble of its own. Namely, the Federal Ex and Esposito. A jealous man, and a lovestruck man.

Kate’s former boyfriend had been glaring at Castle ever since Rick and Kate had arrived. The agent hadn’t even taken one of the doughnuts they had brought with them - if Rick had learned one thing hunting demons and wrangling Slayers, then that bringing food was always a good idea no matter the occasion.

Or bringing a Slayer - Esposito hadn’t even glanced in Rick’s direction. The detective was busy flirting with Vi. Who was shamelessly lapping up the attention, and even trying to flirt with Ryan as well, even though Esposito’s partner was in a relationship, and not quite as receptive to Vi’s charms. Which, of course, the redhead took as a challenge. Slayers!

Castle shook his head and took another sip from his coffee. Or what passed for it in the precinct. Not for the first time he told himself he’d buy the precinct a better coffee maker. As soon as the Fed Ex was gone, so the jealous man couldn’t try to arrest him for attempted bribery or so. “You know,” he casually remarked to Kate, “I wonder why you haven’t arrested the makers of this… thing here.” He pointed at the machine.

“What for?”

“Attempted assault with a lethal weapon, I’d say. But at the very least it’s fraud - they are trying to pass sewage as coffee!”

Kate laughed. “Castle! Just because your palate is used to the most expensive italian blends doesn’t mean that this is bad coffee.” She took a sip from her own cup, then winced. “It probably needs a revision.”

“It needs to be put out of its misery!” Castle said. Then he tensed “Heads up! Fed Ex at nine o’clock, headed towards us.” The agent was walking towards the break room.

“He’s not our enemy, Castle,” Beckett said.

“I know. He’d be easier to deal with if he were.” That earned him a glare. “Too soon?” he smiled at her.

She shook her head.

The Fed entering the break room prevented further conversation.

“Kate. Castle.” He nodded at them and closed the door behind him.

Castle thought the man sounded even more stuck up and frustrated than usual. He looked angry too. No, livid. “Yes?” Rick smiled as sweetly at the man as he could.

“I’ve been reassigned.”

“Oh? To Alaska, I hope?” Castle’s smile slipped a bit when Kate stepped on his foot.

“I’ve been called back to Quantico. Apparently a profiler has deduced that our serial killer has left the state.”

So, that was the excuse the FBI was using, Castle thought, to avoid keeping agents working on cases the Council had solved for them. He smiled. “That’s impressive.”

“It’s bullshit,” the agent snarled at him. “I know you’re behind this. I know you’re hiding something, Castle. I don’t know what. But this smells. And if I ever find out that you’ve been protecting a serial killer…”

“You don’t honestly think that the government, the FBI even, would protect a serial killer?” Castle did his best to sound incredulous. He knew the government had done worse, in Sunnydale. “Please. That’s straight out of Conspiracy Theories Weekly!” He chuckled.

“I know a cover-up when I see it, Castle. I’ve friends in high places too, and they told me that this is coming straight from Homeland Security. If Langley is operating on American soil there’ll be a lot of unhappy people once it comes out. And it will come out. And I’ll be there.” He nodded at them, and left.

“Wow. He really is a sore loser.” Castle shook his head. “And he thinks I’m working for the CIA! Isn’t that cool?”

He saw her expression and winced. No, Kate didn’t think that it was cool.

*****​

 

New York, October 2009

“Oh, this is great! Did you know that…”

“Castle! If you won’t let me finish this paperwork in peace, then I’ll take the afternoon off.”

Rick Castle perked up. That sounded like a great idea!

“And I’ll drag you with me to Buffy.”

Or not. He pouted, but his lover was clearly not going to budge on this, so he had to settle for quietly surfing the web on his smartphone next to her desk.

At least the Fed Ex - and Rick would just have to use that nickname in his book, he thought - had had enough sense of dramatic tension to leave them alone after his more-than-a-tad clichéd ‘promise’. And since Vi, obviously determined to have more than one man willing to risk death by demon for her, had kept up her flirting with Ryan, Esposito was spending most of the day alternatively glaring at his partner and sighing at the redhead. And the Feds were dismantling all the nifty gear they had brought with them, and moving out of the precinct.

Now if only Kate wouldn’t be so focused on her paperwork, the day would be perfect. But it would probably take a small miracle for that, he thought. Or maybe not - Kate had surprised him last night already, after all. Maybe he should consider doing some overtime with her…

“What are you daydreaming about now, Castle?”

“Last night,” he said, smiling at her.

She actually blushed a tiny bit, and turned her head down to stare at her paperwork again.

Point Castle!

*****​

“So, what’s the plan?” Rick, leaning against Kate’s desk, asked sotto voce hours later, when the bullpen in the precinct started to empty.

“Plan?” Kate looked at him, wrinkling her nose while she kept closing the windows on her computer.

“You know, to deal with Esposito,” Castle whispered, leaning forward.

She looked at him as if he had said something stupid. “We take him to your home, and tell him.”

“That sounds rather simple,” Rick complained. “That would never fit into a novel.”

“Life is not a novel, Castle.”

“While I cannot disagree with that statement, I have to point out that life chooses to be far too much like a novel at the most inconvenient times.” Or a b-movie. Or a TV drama.

“Which doesn’t change the fact that simply telling them is the most obvious way to handle this.”

“Them?” Castle raised an eyebrow.

“Of course it’s ‘them’!” Vi was suddenly next to him. Long experience, iron self-control and the slight tiredness from spending a day at work kept Rick from yelping in surprise. “Ryan will now be willing to brave death by demon for me as well!”

Kate cocked her head to the side and gave Castle’s Slayer a flat stare. “He’s simply sticking with his partner. Not everything is about you.”

“Pf!” Vi sniffed. “Since Esposito is doing this for me, Ryan is indirectly doing this for me too!” She didn’t quite strike a pose, but Rick was certain that the way her leather jacket slid down her shoulders while she sat down on Kate’s desk and leaned back had been carefully calculated.

He had other things to worry about than his Slayer’s ego. “Are you certain?” he asked Kate in a low voice. “Ryan hasn’t shown any interest so far.”

“Ryan is Esposito’s partner. He won’t get involved in what he thinks is Esposito chasing Vi…”

“He is chasing me!” Vi cut in.

The detective continued unfazed: “...but he’ll notice once his partner starts moonlighting as a demon hunter. And since he’s a good detective, he’ll start to look into it.”

“You seem certain that Esposito will be hunting demons,” Rick said.

“I know him. Once he knows the truth he won’t be able to ignore that there are monsters on the streets of New York preying on people and just go on as before,” Kate said, standing up.

“He won’t be able to ignore me, you mean!” Vi said, pushing herself off the desk.

Kate ignored her and walked over to the desks of the two other detectives. Castle rushed to catch up with her.

“Esposito! Ryan! You two are invited to dinner at Castle’s,” Kate announced.

Esposito glanced at his partner, then to Vi, then at Kate before nodding. “Ok.”

Ryan though, looked confused for a moment, then asked: “Any special occasion?”

“To celebrate that the feds have finally left!” Rick said. He ignored Kate’s glare.

The two detectives chuckled, though Rick thought that Esposito looked a bit put out at Ryan being invited as well. That was Vi’s fault, of course - his Slayer had been flirting far too much with the detective.

Shaking his head, he took out his smart phone to call ahead and let the Scoobies now. At least Faith didn’t like cops, and would not hit on the two detectives.

Probably.

*****​

As soon as Rick entered his flat, a blonde Slayer made a beeline towards him. “Rick! We missed you today! Why do you work when you’re rich already?” Buffy pouted at him, both hands on her hip.

“B! He wanted to spend the day with his lover, instead of following you through more shoe shops than you count.” Faith shook her head. “Oh, those must be your guests.” She grinned at Esposito and Ryan, who were staring at the assembled Scoobies with obvious surprise.

“Exactly,” Castle said. “Everyone - Detective Esposito and Ryan. Esposito, Ryan - Buffy, Faith, Dawn, Xander, Willow and Spike.”

“Also known as the Scoobies,” Xander said.

“Or the British Invasion,” Vi said.

“Hey! We’re Californian, not British!” Buffy protested. “I’ve not been infected with Brit-ness.”

“Unless Brit-ney Spears counts,” Dawn added.

“Speak for yourself, I’m British,” Spike said.

“They’re lookin’ fine. Too bad they’re cops,” Faith said, making a show of undressing the two slightly shell-shocked looking detectives with her eyes.

“Faith!” Buffy whirled around to glare at the other Slayer.

The girl shrugged. “What? It’s a compliment.”

“You’re being rude.”

“You’re being a prude.”

Castle cleared his throat before the scene could degenerate further. “And this is my daughter, Alexis,” he said, gesturing at the redhead.

“Good evening, gentlemen.”

“She’s the responsible one in my family,” Rick went on. His smile slipped a bit when his daughter simply nodded sagely and with a slightly suffering air. It was true, but she could have acted as if it was a joke, at least!

“Wow, that’s a lot of swords and crossbows,” Ryan commented, looking at the walls as they made their way to the couches and seats.

“That’s nothing!” Vi said. “You should see my collection!”

Esposito frowned. He probably had realised that the Scoobies had, consciously or not, spread out again, almost surrounding the two detectives. Or he simply was irked at Vi’s flirting with Ryan, Castle thought.

Before the author could say anything, though, Buffy cleared her throat. “Alright. Let’s do the big reveal before dinner, so we don’t have to talk around the elephant in the room while we eat.” She grinned. “It also means we don’t have to waste any of that great pasta on Spike to keep up appearances.”

“Oy! I like eating.”

“Too bad! You don’t need to, and we have to prioritise food since it’s a limited resource.” Buffy smirked.

“My sister, the glutton.” Dawn sighed.

“Hey! I need the food!” Buffy protested.

Kate spoke up: “Can we skip the sibling squabble, and get to the heart of the matter?”

Rick saw that Esposito was paying close attention now, and Ryan’s surprise and amusement had given way to puzzlement and, unless Castle was very much mistaken, growing suspicion.

“That’s your job, Dad,” Alexis said.

“It’s actually Giles’s,” Buffy said, “But Rick will do in a pinch. He’s British enough.”

“I’m a red-blooded American!” Rick said. “I’m not even living in London any more.”

“You did live there, though, and you were a librarian, and a writer. That pretty much means you’re an honourary Brit.”

“My first wife would vehemently contest that,” Rick said. “But you are correct; I’d rather tell the tale myself than listen to someone else mauling it.”

“Good!” Buffy beamed at him, then blinked. “Wait, did you mean…”

Rick didn’t let her finish. He looked at the two detectives, sitting on the couch.

“The world is older than you know…”

*****​

As Castle had expected, neither Esposito nor Ryan took him seriously. They let him finish, at least, but as soon as Rick had sat down again, Esposito shook his head. “That’s a nice plot for a Fantasy book.”

“It’s the whole truth,” Castle said, smiling. “Vampires and other demons are real, and all of us here are fighting them to protect humanity.”

“That’s bullshit,” the detective said. His partner was silent and seemed to consider the matter, although Rick didn’t know if Ryan was contemplating if it could be true, or simply pondering how to get all of them institutionalised.

“No, that’s reality. But we anticipated your doubts, and so we’ve prepared proof.”

“Proof?” Esposito looked at him. “You’ve got a monster hiding under your bed?”

Castle wouldn’t get a better cue. He nodded at Spike. “Not under my bed, actually.”

A moment later, Spike had vamped out and was holding up both detectives by their collars.

“Madre de dios!”

“Holy mother of god!”

Castle was impressed by the synchronised reaction of Ryan and Esposito.

*****​

 

New York, October 2009

“As you can see, gentlemen, vampires are real. As are many other demons.” Richard Castle smiled broadly while Spike released the two detectives.

As soon as the vampire had taken a step back, Esposito, still coughing, drew his pistol. “You…”

His next words were lost when he gasped at his pistol flying out of his hands to the ceiling, then towards Willow, coming to a stop near her. The witch promptly proceeded to unload the gun telekinetically. “We don’t like firearms,” she said, looking at Ryan, who slowly lowered his hand, which had been almost to his own gun.

“Speak for yourself!” Buffy said. “I love my M60!”

“Well, of course you would! Mr. Gordo proves that you love pigs,” Dawn said.

“Firearms are an essential part of a well-prepared demon hunting force,” Xander added while Buffy glared at her sister.

“That doesn’t mean that we have to like them!” Willow said.

“Well, no… but we do it anyway!” Buffy said.

“You love all weapons. It’s a Slayer thing,” Spike said, changing back from his ‘game face’ back into his human facade.

So much for the dramatic reveal, Castle thought. He cleared his throat. “Any way, yes, vampires, werewolves, witches, werecats, lizardmen, bezoars, and pretty much every monster you have heard of in Fairy Tales are real. But for Leprechauns - those do not exist. Don’t ask me what the Irish thought when they made those up.”

“That strength… Madre de dios! Vi’s a vampire!” Esposito looked at the redhead with horror written over his face. “I’ve fallen for an undead!”

While Vi gaped at the detective, apparently at a loss for words, the Scoobies broke out in laughter and even kate was chuckling. Rick carefully wasn’t laughing. Vi was his Slayer, after all. And she had a key to his flat.

And, he noted with some alarm, she was close to losing her temper. He quickly took a few steps forward, putting himself between her and the unfortunate detective. “No, Vi’s not a vampire.”

“But she’s pale! And quick as lightning! And superstrong!” Esposito was looking past Castle, and growing quite pale himself, right then.

“Her skin tone is the fault of her Irish heritage.”

“Fault?!”

“Dad! How could you?”

“Genetics are no grounds for discrimination. Red hair and pale skin certainly are nothing negative! And I strongly object to labeling witches as monsters!”

Castle cringed when Vi turned her ire towards him, joined by his daughter and Willow. Even Ryan seemed to be glaring at him, but the detective with Irish roots still looked too shocked to tell. “I meant to say ‘that sublime skin tone is the result of good Irish genes!’,” he quickly added. “Moving on. Vi is not a vampire, she’s a vampire hunter. If you had read my books, you’d have realised this at once.” He frowned at Esposito.

“Slayers are the monster’s bogeymen. Bogeywomen, actually,” Willow cut in. “Or rather, bogeywoman, singular, since for millennia, there has always been just one Slayer. Which you would have known had you paid attention to Rick’s speech.”

“Esposito! You have seen her out in the sun multiple times!” Even Kate seemed exasperated.

“Well, I’ve been out in the sun once as well. Magic jewel protected me,” Spike said. “The Slayer freaked out.” He chuckled.

“The Slayer,” Buffy said testily, “kicked your ass and took the thing from you, and you had to jump down into the next sewer to avoid burning to ash!”

“Those weren’t the sewers!” Spike said. “Those were access tunnels!”

“Good old Sunnydale, were all infrastructure was built so light-sensitive monsters would not have trouble accessing the buildings.” Xander sighed. “A clear case of political correctness taken too far.”

At least, Rick told himself, the Scoobies’ antics had defused Vi’s anger, somewhat at least. He sighed. “I see I have repeat my explanation. Please pay more attention now.” Maybe he should test them afterwards. No, that would be too much work for him. He started the speech again. “The world is older than you know…”

“Hurry it up, Rick! Food’s going to be ready soon!”

Castle’s glare was utterly ignored by Faith while Buffy gasped. “Oh my god! She’s right - we can’t miss dinner! Xander! Do one of your long story short summaries!”

Castle would never laugh at Rupert’s complaints again, he told himself.

*****​

“So… Vi’s a supernaturally powered vampire hunter.”

“Yes.” Castle nodded at Ryan while he dished out more pasta.

“As are Buffy and Faith,” the cop continued.

“Yes.”

“And Willow is a witch.”

“And witches are not monsters or evil!” the witch in question said, lifting her plate towards Castle.

“They can be, though,” Xander added. “Like all humans.”

“And you two are normal humans who hunt demons.”

Castle nodded. “Yes.”

“Demons which have been hunting humans for centuries.”

“Far longer than that, actually. The records of the Council only reach back to the time writing was invented.” It wasn’t quite true, but it made for a very nice story.

“And this is kept a secret with the help of the government.”

“All of the governments, actually. Or most - I’m not certain how long we need to approach some of the newer states.” Rick didn’t think joking about the Council still waiting if these “United American States” would work out or not was appropriate here. “But I can assure you that we’re not doing anything illegal. We have treaties with the government. Secret ones, of course.”

“Of course.” Ryan was talking in a flat voice. Like Kate had when Rick had explained that, he remembered. It had to be a cop thing. Still, this was going better than he had thought. True, Esposito hadn’t said much, but Ryan at least was talking quite calmly for a man who had just had his worldview shattered, Castle thought. Talking over dinner helped, he had to make a note of that.

“And why is this kept a secret? Why don’t you tell people about this danger?” Ryan stood up, gesturing wildly. “Vampires murder people by the hundreds, and they don’t even know about this?”

Apparently, Ryan wasn’t the calmer of the two, Castle noted. He sighed. “We would love to tell everyone. But if we did, if humanity as a whole was aware of demons, then the consequences would be catastrophic.”

“What would be worse than hundreds of people being murdered - eaten even! - by monsters?” Now Esposito was getting into the argument as well.

“The Old Ones awakening,” Castle answered. “The end of the world, in short.” He nodded at them. “Our records tell us that the more people believe in them, the more powerful they become. That wasn’t that much of a problem at the dawn of time, when very few humans were around, but with billions of us around...” He shook his head. “We cannot risk that.”

“Yes. We’ve stopped far too many apocalypses already, we’re not letting you start another one!” Buffy said, nodding emphatically while waving a fork full of pasta around, sending some flying towards her sister. Since he knew how good Buffy was with anything thrown, he didn’t think that had been an accident.

Neither did Dawn, judging by her outraged expression.

“Apocalypes?”

Once again, the two detectives had spoken in unison. No wonder they were partners, Castle thought.

*****​

Rick thought that people generally should be more impressed with the fact that the Council had saved the world several times in the last decade when they were told about it. It wasn’t as if he often had the opportunity to inform others about his own part in preventing the end of the world - an achievement he was quite a bit more proud of than his success as an author.

No, instead of being at least a tiny bit awed, Esposito and Ryan were focusing on the fact that the world had been in danger of ending. He shook his head. Life wasn’t fair!

“You mean… you’re all that stands between us and the end of the world?” Ryan said.

“Yes,” Buffy said.

Vi was probably still put out with the detectives’ reaction to her, and simply nodded.

“Pretty much,” Faith said between shoveling dessert into her mouth.

“Indee...ow!”

“No imitating TV shows in a serious discussion, Xander!”

“Dawn! It’s obvious that they are taking this far too seriously!”

“It’s the end of the world! It’s meant to be taken seriously!” The Slayer’s sister was not budging.

“A bit of humour always helps!”

“No, it doesn’t! Have you forgotten Mrs. Henderson’s funeral?” Willow was getting in it as well.

“I still say that everyone loved my comment, they just acted outraged so they’d not be cut out of the will!” Xander pouted and folded his arms.

“The world is still standing, despite half a dozen attempts to end it in the last decade and half,” Castle said. “So, it’s obvious that we’ve been doing a good job.” He glared at Willow before she could correct him with statistics. The two detectives needed to trust them.

“There were more attempts to end the world than that!” Buffy complained. “We stopped a dozen in Sunnydale alone!”

“We’re only counting those with a good chance to succeed in actually destroying the world. Things that would just have wiped out a town or state don’t count,” Dawn explained.

“What? That’s so not fair! An apocalypse is an apocalypse, no matter how big!” Buffy huffed and pouted.

“If it’s too small it’s not really an apocalypse, Buffy,” Xander said.

“Exactly! And since it’s called an apocalypse, it is an apocalypse!” Buffy beamed, pleased with herself.

This time Castle didn’t stop Willow.

*****​

 

New York, October 2009

It took a few more demonstrations of magic by Willow - after she had stopped lecturing Buffy - and a bit of weight- or rather couch-lifting by a Slayer, until Esposito and Ryan fully accepted that this really was no trick, that there was a hidden world full of monsters and magic. Which, Castle made a note, sounded far too much like a roleplaying ad for him to use in one of his books.

The two detectives were currently putting a bit of a dent into his liquor cabinet. Which still needed a better lock, as his daughter had oh so helpfully pointed out.

“So… that’s why you’ve been following us around!” Esposito said suddenly, spilling some of Castle’s expensive single malt when he gestured with the glass in his hand. “You’re looking for monsters among our cases!”

“That actually not true,” Rick said. “We’ve been doing this for years before we met.” He smiled at Kate, sitting next to him, and wrapped his arm around her. “I’m following her around because she’s my muse for my next book.” And now his girlfriend. Lover. Future fiancée.

“And I’m still not pleased with having a character with a stripper name patterned after me,” Kate cut in.

“It’s rather sexist,” Willow added. She was drinking orange juice, hand- or more precisely, magic-pressed from organic oranges.

“It’s not sexist! It’s sexy,” Rick defended his work. “My editor agrees with me!”

“Your editor agrees with everything that she thinks will sell more books,” Alexis said. “That doesn’t mean it’s not sexist.”

“It means I’m a bestselling author,” Rick said. He wasn’t pouting. Not really. “Besides, the character’s character is far more important than her name.”

“It had better be,” Kate said, frowning at him.

She really was fitting in well with his family, Castle thought - she already was trying to influence his work like everyone else.

“Can we get back to the demons?” Ryan said, a bit testily in Rick’s opinion.

“Of course.” He smiled at the two detectives.

The detective pointed at Spike, who was munching on his blood-soaked weetabix. The vampire was doing this just to mess with the two men, Rick was certain. “You said vampires were corpses possessed by demons with the memories, but not the soul of the human who died. And that you hunted them mercilessly. What is the matter with him?”

“Ah, he’s an exception. He’s got a soul,” Buffy said. “One of two vampires who are not irredeemable monsters.”

“I earned my soul!” Spike said, licking his bloody lips. “Unlike the poofter, who was cursed with it.”

“And who might have lost his soul again when he went evil lawyer,” Xander said.

Buffy glared at both of them, before sighing. “Anyway - soulless vampires hunt humans for food and kicks. They don’t feel any remorse killing people. They love killing people.”

Spike nodded. “Yes. I lost count of how many humans I killed. And I enjoyed it.” He grinned, then noticed the glares from everyone and quickly added: “That was the soulless demon, not me.”

“Yes. Now you’re a souled demon,” Xander said. “Such an improvement.”

Esposito blinked. “Does that mean you got your soul back from… heaven?” He was rubbing the cross in his hands.

Spike shrugged. “I don’t know, mate. I know I got a soul, but whether it’s my original, or a new one… I’ll find that out once I die, I s’pose.” With a grin, he added: “I’m not planning on dying anytime soon, of course.”

“But...“ Esposito trailed off. “Does that mean you have met God? Jesus?”

Maybe there was truth to the saying that there were no atheists in foxholes, Castle thought. He didn’t know how to answer that - religion was a very complicated subject among the Scoobies.

“No,” Buffy said. “We’ve met a hellgoddess. And kicked her ass.” She sounded less flippant than usual, Rick thought.

“Holy water affects vampires, though,” Xander said. “As does a cross. Both burn them real good.” He turned to Spike.

“Don’t even think about demonstrating them on me,” the vampire snarled.

“But the mother goddess’s blessings work as well,” Willow added. “So, it’s not as Christianity is the one true religion! It doesn’t mean that it’s wrong, either,” she added, “but, of course, for all the misogynist dogma, and the intolerance, and…”

Castle cleared his throat. “Anyway - back to demons. Vampires are among the most common demons, but there are a lot of different demons, and not all of them are evil monsters.”

“Some are good monsters,” Dawn said.

“Although it’s better to be safe than sorry - don’t trust them as a rule,” Xander said, “unless you know them.”

“Oh, yes. We’ll need to introduce you to a few of the good demons,” Alexis said. “We wouldn’t want you to kill them by accident.”

“Speaking of killing,” Xander spoke up with a grin,” there are lots of ways to kill demons. Bullets sadly don’t work well on too many demons - such as Spike here - but fire works well enough, as does decapitation. Then there are the specific weaknesses of various demons...”

“Xander! We don’t know if they even want to hunt demons,” Willow said, frowning.

“They’ll need to know this for self-defense.”

“They’ve been fine so far without knowing about demons.”

“I’m not fine anymore,” Ryan said. “To know such monsters are out there…” He glanced at Spike. “Are you hunting demons, Beckett?”

“Yes. I kind of ended up dragged into this,” Kate said.

“More like you butted in.” Vi snorted. “Fortunately, I was able to keep her from getting herself killed.”

“It wasn’t quite like that,” Kate said.

“Unfortunately, I wasn’t quite able to keep her from hurting her head, which led to her memory loss,” Vi said, sighing theatrically. “Tragic.”

“As you can see, Vi’s not just fighting fantasy monsters, she’s also living in a fantasy,” Kate retorted. Her smile was more a baring of teeth, too.

Castle cleared his throat before things could escalate further. “Anyway. I can give you some special bullets that will hurt a number of demons, as well as some Dragon’s Breath shotgun shells.” He couldn’t resist to add: “A flamethrower would be more effective, but they are a bit hard to carry around.”

“Castle, you don’t… you don’t have a flamethrower?” Esposito said.

“Yes, he does,” Kate said. “Several, in fact. And yes, he actually has a permit for his various weapons.”

That started a discussion about the legalities of demon hunting. Unsurprisingly, Ryan took almost as long to accept that demon hunting was legal as Kate had, while Esposito was far more accepting.

*****​

“That went better than I expected,” Rick said, once he was - finally! - alone with Kate again. Not yet in his bedroom, alas.

“What did you expect?” Kate asked, gathering up the empty glasses. Alexis had offered to do it, but Castle had sent her to bed - she had school the next day, after all. Vi hadn’t offered, and hadn’t school, but Rick’s Slayer had gone out hunting with Buffy and Faith. And Spike had gone drinking with Xander, of all people. Castle had known the Scoobies for the better part of a decade by now, and still couldn’t make heads or tails of their relationships. And Willow had done the sensible thing, and headed to bed.

“More screaming, and shouting, and shooting,” he said. When he saw her frown, he added with a grin: “among the Scoobies.”

She snorted. After a moment, she said: “I’m surprised your mother hasn’t returned yet.”

Castle coughed. “I told her it was safe, but apparently, she has met a man in the Hamptons, and is staying a bit longer.” He should have expected that, knowing his mother. “So, do you think they’ll want to hunt demons as well?”

Kate hesitated. “Honestly?”

“Always.” he raised his right index. “Unless you’re about to criticise me. In that case, feel free to spare my feelings and lie.” He grinned, to show he was joking.

She rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. A little. Then she grew serious. “I don’t think so.”

“Oh?” That surprised him. He would have expected the two detectives to follow Kate’s example. Especially Esposito, since the man was a veteran.

“Esposito quit the army because he didn’t want to fight in the war against terror any longer. I doubt he wants to in the war against demons.” She put the glasses into the washer.

“Not even to impress Vi?” Men did a lot to impress women. Castle knew that from his own experiences.

“Didn’t you see him today? He hasn’t looked at her since the revelation.” Kate sighed.

“Oh.” Rick had missed that. “Can’t handle a girl stronger than him?”

“No. I think it’s the ‘superhuman’ part that is the problem.” The detective winced.

“I see.” Rick frowned.

“Do you think this will hurt her?”

“More her pride, I think.” Rick didn’t think Vi was interested in Esposito. Not seriously. But then, she didn’t have to, to be hurt by someone rejecting her for being a Slayer - she hadn’t chosen to be chosen.

He might have to talk to Esposito about this.

*****​

 

New York, November 2009

Rick Castle felt relieved - it was finally time to say goodbye to his guests. He liked the Scoobies, but two weeks of them would test the patience of a saint, and Rick would never be accused of being a saint. But finally, after two shopping trips that made the society pages in the newspapers, and probably the business reports, the Scoobies were boarding their flight back to London, where they’d be Rupert’s problem.

“Dad! Don’t smile that much! You don’t have to show everyone that you’re glad our friends are leaving!”

“Alexis! How can you think that?” He pouted at his daughter.

“Because you marked the day in the calendar a week in advance, and were ready to drive them to the airport hours before their scheduled flight?” Rick’s daughter was shaking her head at him.

“It’s important not to mix the dates up after they rescheduled their flight, and you know how bad traffic in New York is.” Rick smiled.

“You’re a bad liar, Dad. Not to mention that they are using a private jet, so they can’t miss their flight.”

He frowned at her. Alexis knew him too well. Which was generally a good thing, of course. “As a responsible parent, I have the right and duty to be glad that you’re no longer exposed to such corrupting influences.”

“Spike promised he’ll send me a list with more complicated locks to train with.” Alexis was smiling widely. “And Dawn already gave me access to the restricted section of the digital archives of the Council. And I think we both know what will happen if I tell Faith that you think she’s corrupting me.”

Oh, yes. Rick rubbed the bridge of his nose. “When I told you that a bit of teenage rebellion would be good for you, I didn’t mean that.”

“If I did what you wanted, it wouldn’t be a rebellion, Dad.” His daughter was smirking.

He sighed. At least Alexis was responsible enough to have resisted Buffy’s attempt to turn her into a clothes horse.

“New York is mine again!” Vi declared when the private jet of the Council had taken off, balling her fist.

“Ours,” Rick corrected her.

“Vi!” Alexis frowned at the Slayer.

“I’m just glad that they are back to protecting the other parts of the world,” Vi said, grinning, “since Rick and I are perfectly capable of protecting New York. Wouldn’t want to leave other countries defenceless. Besides,” she added, “Buffy’s shoe-shopping ate into my sword budget.”

Castle frowned at her. “Are you insinuating that my bank account is your personal shopping budget?”

“Yes!”

He glared at her, but his Slayer just giggled. As did his daughter. Story of his life.

*****​

Rick and Vi stepped out of the lift - the elevator - into the 12th Precinct with their usual gifts for the staff: doughnuts and coffee that wasn’t violating several regulations from the FDA. He’d gift the precinct a decent coffee maker for Christmas. Or have his agent do it. That way, it would probably be considered a business expense.

Kate wasn’t at her desk, though he saw that there were files spread out on its surface, so she was in. Rick hadn’t broached the topic of her moving in, yet. He didn’t want to appear pushy. Even though it would make so much sense, and would be far safer for her. And they would wake up together each morning.

“She’s with the Captain,” Vi said, unasked. He glanced at her, and she added with a smirk: “Yes, you’re that transparent.”

“I get no respect,” he muttered, shaking his head as he proceeded to Kate’s desk and his chair there.

“Aren’t you curious what they are talking about?” Vi asked, following him.

“She’ll tell me if it’s important.” And he could always ask Vi later.

Castle put the smaller doughnut box and two cups to go with coffee down on the desk.

“I’ll take this to the break room,” Vi announced, grabbing the rest. She was wearing her leathers, again, and walking like Faith.

Rick glanced over at the desks of Ryan and Esposito. Both were tracking the Slayer, but trying to act as if they were focusing on their work. He sighed. The two were adjusting to the reveal, but taking their time. At least they didn’t avoid Vi anymore. Or not too obviously.

Ah, there was Kate! He smiled at the detective leaving Captain Montgomery’s office. He frowned, though, when he realised that she didn’t look too happy, and held out her cup of coffee. “Morning, Detective.”

She grabbed the cup without a word. After a gulp, she relaxed. “Thanks, Castle.”

“I live to serve.” He took a sip from his own. “You don’t seem to be in a good mood.”

She quickly glanced around. “The Captain noticed that Esposito and Ryan seem to have some issues with us. And since I couldn’t tell him what their issues are, I had to evade his questions. Which he noticed.” She pressed her lips together for a moment. “As a result, he thinks that they are jealous of you, and that there’s a love-triangle involving me, you, and Vi. Or possibly a ménage à trois.”

Castle just knew that Vi, who had undoubtedly overheard them, would find this immensely amusing. Which meant the rest of his family would hear about this.

Which explained his relieved smile when Captain Montgomery yelled out of his office: “Beckett! You’ve got a case!”

*****​

As expected, Vi was chuckling for most of the drive to the scene of the crime.

“It’s not funny,” Kate said from the back bench of Castle’s Shelby.

“Yes, it is!” the Slayer said while passing a speeding pizza delivery car.

Rick could feel Kate’s eyes on the back of his head. He coughed. “For someone not involved, it could be seen as amusing, I guess.” And it would fit so well into his book!

“Castle! Do you have any idea what the rumour mill at the precinct will make of this?” Beckett hissed. “Or the tabloids?”

“Ah… the tabloids will keep Vi out of this.” His lawyer had seen to that.

Kate didn’t seem to as happy about this information as she should have been, to his surprise. “That still leaves all my colleagues thinking that I’m in competition with Vi for your affection!”

“You should be flattered!” Vi chuckled. “Not many can be considered competition compared with me!”

“I think the rest of the precinct has taken Esposito’s sudden loss of interest in you to mean you’re not that hot,” Kate said.

“What?” Vi turned her head to stare at Kate while taking the next turn. “Who is spreading that rumour? It’s so his fault for not being able to handle me!” She scowled. “Just because I’m faster, stronger and a better shot than he is!”

“It’s not that. He has trouble with the fact that you’re a magically powered demon hunter,” Kate corrected her.

Vi bared her teeth and turned her attention back to the road. “Damn bigots!”

It wasn’t exactly bigotry, Rick knew that, but he didn’t think that it would be a good time to explain the issues some religious people had with the supernatural. He exchanged a glance with Beckett, who winced a bit, then sighed. Maybe he could leave that to Alexis. It would be good training for her future Watcher-ness. Dear Lord, he still was using Scoobie terms! And English terms!

*****​

“Morning, Lanie. What do you have for us?” Beckett asked, stepping past the yellow tape into the side alley, past two uniforms keeping the gawkers away.

The medical examiner, bent over a man sprawled on the ground between two trash cans, looked up. “Male, twenty to thirty years old. Preliminary cause of death: Gunshot wound in the chest, no exit wound.”

Castle stared at the body. “He’s nude.” Sometimes you had to state the obvious, if no one else did it.

Lanie nodded. “Yes.” She probed the wound with a pair of tweezers. “I don’t see any fabric inside the wound canal.”

“So he was nude, or at least bare-chested, when he was shot,” Castle deduced. He looked up at the fire escape above them. “Maybe he was fleeing from a cuckolded husband.” Then Lanie pulled the bullet out, and held it up. It was deformed, and there was blood stuck to it, but Castle recognised a silver bullet. He had used them often enough himself. “Or it was a werewolf.” It just been the full moon, after all.

Kate frowned. “Wouldn’t he have been in his wolf form then?”

“Not if he was shot after changing back,” Castle said.

“I’ll have you a time of death once I’m back in the lab,” Lanie said. “Unless werewolf bodies in human form are different from normal bodies,” she added with a chuckle as she left for the ambulance. Perlmutter hadn’t talked to her yet, then, Castle thought.

“Do you think it’s a werewolf?” Kate said.

Vi bent down, sniffing the corpse. Castle looked around to check that no one was watching, and moved to block the line of sight anyway.

His Slayer stood up, frowning. “He smells like a wolf.”

“A werewolf!” Castle nodded.

“No, a wolf.”

“Or a dog?” Kate asked.

“It’s a wolf!” Vi said. “I know what they smell like.”

Her expression discouraged Rick from making a ‘raised by wolves’ joke. He would save that for his book. “So, we have a nude man, shot after the full moon, smelling of wolves.” He grinned. “This is bound to be an interesting case!”

Unfortunately, the others didn’t seem to share his enthusiasm.

*****​

 

New York, November 2009

“Do we have a name for our vic yet?” Richard Castle asked once they were back in the precinct.

“No. The uniforms haven’t found any form of ID nearby and his prints are not in the system,” Kate said without looking up from the file she was reading.

“There can’t be that many people in close contact with wolves.” Rick sat down on his chair. Which was not quite as comfortable as it could be, he thought. Maybe he could replace it with a more comfortable one.

“And how can we explain that connection? ‘Our human bloodhound smelled wolf’ will not go over well with the DA.” Kate shook her head.

“Hey!” Vi glared at them from two desks away, where she was trying to flirt with Esposito and Ryan.

Castle frowned at Kate. Both because she was reminding him of the problems of mixing Slayer powers with proper police procedure, and because she was riling Vi up with her bloodhound remark. Even though his Slayer did have a better nose than most breeds. He rubbed his nose. “Well… hopefully Lanie will find some hair or such on the body.”

“Which you’ll make more werewolf comments about.”

“Of course!” It was the best cover, after all.

“Don’t you think Lanie should know the truth? Since she’s working with bodies all day.”

Now Kate was looking at him. He sighed. “Perlmutter said he’d do it ‘when she’s ready’.”

“Don’t tell me that the Medical Examiners have their own secret organisation!” Kate was making that cute surprised face again.

“Alright, I won’t,” Rick answered. When he saw her expression change into a glare, he quickly added: “It’s not exactly an organisation. Just some… network, you might call it. Or maybe mentors is a better expression. Just some more experienced guys teaching the younger ones the ropes. I think.”

“I might have to talk to Perlmutter then.”

Castle hoped that talk would be more successful than his own with Esposito. Apart from assurances that it was him, not her, nothing had come of it. And Vi was still trying to ‘crack him’, as she called it. Apparently, it was now a matter of pride. Slayers!

“Anyway… what do we do if there is no wolf-trace on the good or bad man?” Rick played around with a pen taken from Kate’s desk until she grabbed it out of his hands.

“We’ll use the standard methods,” she answered.

“Which work oh so well,” he said, sighing.

“Not everyone has their personal supernatural…”

“Hey!”

“...organisation to help them in their investigations,” Kate finished, rolling her eyes at Vi.

“It’s not actually my personal organisation,” Castle said. “I work for them, not the other way around. Just saying.”

“You know what I mean,” Kate said, frowning some more.

“Yes.” It would be very nice to have an organisation of his own, of course. With special equipment and handshakes. Maybe not the handshakes.

Lanie calling Beckett interrupted his planning of an underground base.

*****​

“So… what did you find?” Rick asked when he and Kate entered Lanie’s office.

“Cause of Death was a silver bullet that entered his heart. Shot from far enough that there are no powder burns on the chest.” Lanie smiled. “DNA tests do not show anything out of the ordinary, and I have found no sign of anything inhuman in his anatomy. He’s not even particularly hairy. Nor has he eaten human flesh - his stomach contained the remains of a quite normal burger with fries. Sorry, Castle, but he’s not a werewolf.”

“The transformation is magical in nature, so he could still be a werewolf,” Rick said. Lanie rolled her eyes, and Beckett frowned at him. He coughed.

“But I have something for you, Castle: The man had contact to wolves. I found several wolf hairs on him.” She grinned at him.

“Oh! Maybe he’s a werewolf sitter?” Rick rubbed his chin. “It was the night of the full moon, after all. Such skills would have been in demand.”

“Wolves, Castle. Not werewolves,” Lanie said, glancing at Kate.

“A man can dream.”

“We’ll be looking into any zoo or wildlife preserve employees,” the detective said. “Coming, Castle?”

*****​

“You know, Lanie’s probably wondering why you didn’t shoot my ‘theories’ down as usual,” Rick remarked when Kate and he were back in the lift taking them back to her office.

She sighed. “I know that they are not absurd, which makes it hard to tear into them - unless I examine them with the knowledge that magic real in mind.”

He blinked. “You’re testing my theories?”

“Yes, Castle.”

“I am one of the foremost experts on demons, you know.” He grinned - he should have expected that.

“No one is perfect, Castle. And neither are theories.” She grinned back at him.

“Some come close though.” He smiled at her, until she understood, and blushed slightly.

*****​

“People always say that today’s youth is growing up far apart from nature. You’d not be able to guess that, seeing as we must have gone through a dozen zoos and preserves so far,” Castle complained - commented - when Vi stopped their car in front of the gate to the Adirondack Wildlife Refuge.

“You don’t sound much like a nature lover yourself, Castle.” Kate Beckett stretched - the drive up here had taken some time, even with Vi breaking traffic laws left and right.

“I do love nature!” he protested. “I’ve visited this area several times in the past, to be exact!”

“You mean you’ve been to Lake Placid,” Kate deadpanned, already walking towards the entrance.

“That counts!” Rick said, hurrying after her while Vi chuckled.

Kate rang the bell, and after a minute or two, a middle-aged woman in sturdy clothes appeared. “The refuge is closed on Tuesdays,” she said, not quite looking at the sign that displayed opening times next to the gate.

Kate flashed her badge, or her ‘universal door opener’, as Castle had once called it. “NYPD. We need to ask you a few questions.”

*****​

“Yes, I recognise this man. Martin Miller. He visited the refuge a few months ago. Half a year, actually. He wanted to buy some of our great plains wolves. Pups. We refused, of course - he was just one more of those enthusiastic ‘animal lovers’ who wanted to have wild animals as pets, usually keeping them in pens in horrible conditions.” The woman, who had introduced herself as Anne Smith, pointed at the fenced-in area behind her. “Wolves need more space than most people can provide for them.”

“We have evidence that he was in close contact with wolves, shortly before his death,” Kate said. “Do you think other preserves might have sold animals to him?”

“Not preserves, no.” Anne shook her head. “We all know better than that. What kind of subspecies was he in contact with? ”

“We actually haven’t determined that yet. Could we have some hair samples to compare?”

“We have samples of our own wolves, but you’ll have to ask other preserves and zoos for theirs.” Anne looked over her shoulder. “Do you want to see our wolves?”

“Yes, please,” Kate and Vi said, at the same time Castle said: “No!”

“Afraid of the big bad wolf, Castle?” the detective asked, with a grin.

“I’m not afraid of wolves.” He had dealt with werewolves, after all. “But I think we don’t have the time to visit them, and it’s their day off, right? We shouldn’t disturb them.” He glanced at Vi, but his Slayer was studying the fenced-off area in front of them, smiling wildly. Her nostrils were flaring a bit, even.

Unfortunately, Kate and Anne mistook that as enthusiasm. “You can stay here,” Anne said. “Or wait in the car,” Kate added.

They were off before Rick could object any more. He sighed. Why weren’t people listening to him?

*****​

“That was a disaster,” Kate said once they were driving away from the preserve. “Anne couldn’t understand why the wolves reacted that way. Fortunately, we could persuade her that we’d been contact with bears at another preserve, and that Vi had been hugging one.”

Rick glared at his Slayer, who grinned.

“I just wanted to check if our vic smelled like those wolves,” she said, with that innocent tone that hadn’t fooled him, ever. “He didn’t, actually.”

“And you wanted to show them who’s boss,” Rick said. Slayers!

Her grin widened.

“Like a dog,” Kate added from the back seat, and Vi’s grin disappeared.

*****​

“That’s probably the closest ‘out in the woods’ area to New York you can find," Rick commented a few hours later when they drew up in front of Miller’s address.

Vi sniffed the air. “Wolves. Same scent as Miller.”

“That was to be expected,” Kate commented, then approached the door. She rang the bell. No one answered it.

“That was to be expected as well,” Castle said, grinning.

“Someone’s running inside,” Vi cut in. “Towards the back.” And she took off, at Slayer speed, and disappeared around the corner.

Castle and Beckett exchanged a glance, and then followed. Rick wanted to comment that there was no need to run as well, but that would have made him look lazy.

As expected - again! - it was over before either of them arrived. Vi was kneeling on a young man, a teenager, Castle thought, holding him in a painful arm lock.

“Let me go! I haven’t done anything wrong!”

“Why did you run then when you heard the doorbell?” Kate asked, crouching down next to him and pulling his wallet out from the back pocket of his jeans. “Mister… Jeremiah Bancroft?”

“Jim. It’s Jim Bancroft,” the boy said. “And I just wanted to save the puppies!”

“The puppies?” Rick asked.

“He keeps them in the basement! A dozen of them!”

Which was, as they quickly found out, not quite correct. Miller had kept puppies in his basement. Emphasis on ‘had’. It was empty, but it was clear that the dead man had kept several wolves down there. There were pens - or cells. Food bags, mostly empty, and poop bags. Not empty. Castle gagged at the stench.

“Blood,“ Vi suddenly said, and moved towards a door in the back. It wasn’t locked.

“I didn’t think people took ‘puppy mill’ that literally,” Castle said a moment later, staring at the blood-covered tools and tables.

*****​