It still burns... but he stopped noticing it. Probably needs something stronger.

He doesn't bother and grabs the decanter, stiffening the muscles in his arm when he keeps leaning forward after taking a hold of it. He sneers and pours just above the right amount of the dark, amber colored liquid into the tumbler, setting down the decanter with a loud thud. He snatches the tumbler up, the scotch sloshing around, just teasing the edges of spilling out when he throws himself back into his office chair. He doesn't take the first, and last long swig to down the alcohol, instead, just slouches down more and lets his head fall back, letting his eyes pull themselves shut.

The light of his phone sitting in the desk behind the decanter catches his attention. He throws his head forward, and after catching up to his head that wanted to take him in another direction completely, he looks at the caller ID. He feels reminded of his responsibilities at the sight of who's calling, rolls his eyes and throws himself back into his chair. He knows why she's calling. His finalized manuscript is due in just a couple of days, and he still hasn't sent it to her. It's done, has been done, just... not important right now.

The phone lets out a short vibrate, letting him know that the call was sent to voice mail just as he lifts his glass to his lips, deciding to nurse this one for a change. He hasn't made the full decision that he's drinking to get drunk quite yet. But his arms do feel weighted, his legs don't feel supportive, and his equilibrium is anything but trustworthy right now. He's probably already past the point of no return. But he's holding his breath that he doesn't have to just take the plunge and be done with it.

His eyes drift shut a minute or two after Gina's missed phone call, his consciousness wanting to leave him. He feels like such a slave right now. A prisoner to his own morals. He wants to, just once, be able to break them, go against what they tell him to do. That's never happened before. The dull ache that he feels has never actually hurt before. He can't figure out why. Well... he could, but he doesn't want to find out where that rabbit hole would take him. Because it probably ends where every other one ends, with him being in the wrong, having to back pedal his way to being back where he started.

He hears the jangle of jewelry and the clack of heels coming toward his office from the living room. One of the two people he can actually stomach seeing right now, at least. He does wish Alexis were here though. She wouldn't say anything, she would just lean down and hug him. But his mother... "Darling, I just got off the phone with your ex-wife."

Castle opens his eyes but doesn't lift his head and looks toward his mother, standing in the threshold to his office. "Judging by the lack of blood on your hands, I'm guessing it wasn't Meredith."

Martha lifts her hands in the air and shakes her head. "No," she says, starting toward her son's desk and turning on the small lamp, "she said that your final manuscript is due on Thursday, and you won't return her calls."

He starts to groan, but doesn't let it get vocalized, lifting his glass to his lips again, taking a small sip. "It's done, just..." He says, tossing his glass forward toward the stack of papers sitting on the corner of his desk.

Martha groans, "Alright," She murmurs to herself, coming round to the other side of his desk, "I have seen the post-break up version of Richard Castle before, and this is not it." He says, sitting half way between fully sitting on his desk and leaning against it. He tilts his head forward, the head rush only worse now with the alcohol in his system. "You have been sulking in this dark office for four days, drowning yourself in alcohol, and- give me that!" She scolds as he starts to lift his glass to his mouth again.

He doesn't put up any sort of fight, and just lets his arm fall back down against the arm rest of his chair after his hand is empty. Martha sets the glass down on the far end of the desk, away from her son's reach, like any mother would with a cookie jar before dinner time.

"You're not writing, you're not returning Gina's phone calls." She goes on, a windmill motion turning her hand.

"You say that like it's new." He cracks.

"Alexis is worried about you." She says, her voice soft and worrisome, reaching down to touch his wrist. "Now I have seen you post-breakup before, Richard, and it is certainly not whatever it is you're doing to yourself right now."

His shoulders feel heavy and his gut churns. "I tried." He admits after a thick pause between them, his mother patiently waiting him out. "The night the case was over, I put on my best clothes, my best cologne, grabbed the keys to the Ferrari, ready to..." He lets his words fall as he tosses his hand in the air. "But then I looked in the mirror, and..." He forces his throat closed at the feeling of his voice breaking. He doesn't want to admit that what he saw was her, taking his arm with a bright, nervous smile on her face, but not a care in the world other than him. Either admitting it to her is more painful than him actually having to accept that that's why he couldn't go through with it.

He just closes his eyes and regains his steadiness with a few long deep breaths.

"Point is, you were right."

Martha pauses, lowering her head and lifting her brow. "About?"

He feels the same dull ache he's felt for as long as he can remember remind him that his heart is still broken. "I can't just shut it off."

"Have you spoken to her?" Castle just shakes his head.

"She's called a few times." Martha allowed him to leave it at that. Her son is hurt, and she is doing the compassionate thing by standing aside and not forcing him to face the women responsible for breaking his heart. And inside Castle's head, he feels his barriers being eroded, simply by the need to tell someone who will just listen to him, someone who won't judge him, who will do nothing more than let him get the words out. "It's not supposed to hurt this much."

"Having your heart broken does hurt, kiddo." She quips, sounding as if she's stating the obvious.

"But I've had my heart broken before. Why does it hurt so much now? Why is it so different this time?" He asks desperately, finally lifting his head up to look his mother in the eye, finding nothing but a loving gaze and a soft smile, her hands clasped together in her lap.

"Well... why is it different this time?" Asking him in a way that she knows he knows the answer, but was hoping that she'd say it for him.

He pushes the last bit of air out of his lungs before answering her, looking back down toward the hardwood floor of his office. "Because she was supposed to be different."

"Well, Richard, if nothing else, at least give her a chance to explain things."

That sets off something inside of him that has wanted to escape for days. He stands up quickly, enough to make his office chair shoot back a couple feet, and starts to stagger around his office. "I gave her a chance, I gave her a years worth of chances! She's had every opportunity to come clean, but she lied. She just lied. This whole time, she's being toying with me. I've been giving this my all, I've been trying, I've been holding my heart out there, I've bared my soul, I've been trying for four years to get that woman to see that I can be enough for her. But all she's done is make me realize that I'll never be enough for her!" He says, throwing his arms in the air.

"Richard..." She tries fruitlessly to stop him from shouting and get him to come back down.

"I am sick to the back teeth of her demanding so much out of me only to always come up short, and just demand more the next time. I can't keep doing that, Mother! No matter how much I'm in love with that woman, I can't keep doing this to myself." He feels tears burn in his eyes, some have probably already fallen.

Martha holds up her hands as she comes around from the other side of his desk, coming to stand in front of him. "You're hurt, I understand that, sweetheart. That was probably supposed to come out a few days ago, but Richard..." She slows, softening her voice, "are you really ready to just give up on her?"

Castle closes his mouth and cranes his neck. "Of course I'm not ready." He says in a voice, half breaking above a whisper. "But I have to. If this is how she's going to treat someone she considered to be her partner..." He feels something inside of himself harden at the words that form in his mind, "then that's not the kind of person I want to spend the rest of my life with." He says in the steadiest voice he's felt since this conversation started.

Martha, nodding her head, is disappointed... no, deeply saddened at the fact that her son is just giving up and seems to be just resigning to his fate, but can also tell that his mind is made up. "Alright, kiddo." She says, putting a motherly hand on his arm. "As long as you're sure."

He nods as the sound of his phone vibrating again cuts through the silence and calls both of their attentions. Martha is the first to react and take a few quick steps toward the phone. Once she sees who it is, she grabs it and turns back to her son. "Pardon the expression but..." She lifts his phone up to him, "speak of the devil."

Castle, his heart already stone cold, sighs. "And she shall appear." Martha lifts one of her brows inquisitively, but Castle just shakes his head and goes into the living room, while Martha lets out a long breath, having done what she feels is her best without forcing him to do something he's clearly not willing to do, and sets his phone back down onto his desk just as Beckett's smiling picture turns black on the screen.

"You've reached Richard Castle. Lucky you! Leave a message and I'll get back to you."

She feels disappointment, let down, and paranoia cloud her senses, but she focuses her energy on keeping it from showing in her voice. "Hey Castle. Listen, we got a body drop in Central Park. I'm headed there now if you want to meet me, but..." She takes a long pause, wanting to say something... neutral. "I haven't heard from you in almost a week. You know you can... talk to me if there's something wrong. We're partners, Castle. Uh..." Sensing she's running out of time on her voice message, she wraps up. "If you get this message, we could use your help. Thanks." She hangs up, throws her phone on the passenger seat, not missing that it's the seat that's usually occupied by her partner.

She comes up to Central Park, stopping her cruiser and parking it right next to the patrol cars who have their lights flashing. She waves at the uniform standing at the crime scene tape, her badge cupped in the palm of her hand. She steps through, seeing Lanie standing over a body with her metal clipboard on her arm, Esposito knelt down next to it, with Ryan off in the distance talking to a few pedestrians. "Hey Lanie." She says, not bothering to change her voice to mismatch her current clout of emotions.

"Hey." Lanie starts, and while Beckett is looking down, focusing on the jogger with a bullet wound in his chest, Lanie is focusing on her, and she can feel it. "What's up?"

She looks up to her, brow raised, feigning she doesn't know what she's talking about. "Huh-Oh... nothing."

"Nu-uh." Lanie sasses, waving her pen in front of her. "Where's Castle?" She asks, looking behind her for her partner, whom she knows isn't coming.

"Yeah," Esposito starts, standing up from the body on the ground, "this is the second body drop he's been a no-show to, what's up?"

"You guys talking about Castle?" Ryan chimes in.

"Mmhmm." Lanie hums with pursed lips, indicating that she knows that there's more than the 'nothing' Beckett led on to, but going back to filling out her report anyway.

"Yeah, where's he been? He's missed two bodies so far this week. He sick?"

"No," She shrugs with an unbelievable shrug of her shoulders, "he's probably just busy. He has the deadline for his next book coming up."

The trio in front of her seem to accept her lie, he's been done with it since before the bombing case last week. He's just been using it as an excuse to avoid Gina. "That sucks." Ryan adds, looking toward his own partner, who nods. "He's the only thing around here that makes this job fun." Ryan adds before turning and going back toward the huddle of uniforms he came from.

"What, I'm not fun?" Espo calls after him, throwing his arms out to his sides.

"You're not as handsome!" Ryan calls with a smirk. She enjoys the comradery between them for a moment, even shaking her head with pulled lips and a quirked brow when he looks over to her, hoping for reaffirmation from her that she doesn't provide as she runs with the joke... that isn't entirely untrue.

They go through the details of the case, and after Lanie loads the body onto a stretcher and promises more details after a full autopsy, Beckett nods, but Lanie catches her attention before she heads back to her cruiser. "Hey," Beckett turns and goes to stand in front of Lanie. "Is something wrong with Castle? Something I should know about?" She asks with a raised brow, the corners of her lips tucked in.

"Nothing, it's... I think the bombing case may have gotten to him. He hasn't returned any of my calls or text messages since we closed it. I'm getting worried." She says softly, looking down to the grass under her heeled boots. After a moment of being stared at by Lanie and not hearing a retort, she looks up, seeing Lanie just widen her eyes at her. Knowing what she's saying by not saying it, she nods her head. "I'll go by there this afternoon."

Lanie nods off to her side and pushes the body to the van to be loaded up.

She checks her watch, has a few hours till she's due at Burke's, the boys should have the canvass all handled, and she could use his help on this one. If nothing else, to liven her spirits. She climbs into her cruiser, headed away from the precinct and toward his loft, the snippet of paranoia cracking the ends of her nerves. She shakes the fears out of her head and relaxes back into her seat.

It's probably nothing.

A/N: Prompt has probably been done to death, but wanted to give my take. Let me know what you think. As with everything I write, I know where I'm going with this. Hope you enjoy. :)

(Also, I am open and in search of a "semi" co-writer. Someone to proof read, check spelling, grammar, vocab, whatever the case or situation may call for. I've gotten too many reviews complaining about it, and I can't catch everything, but you guys seem to. You can send me a direct message if you're interested, and we can discuss it. Thanks again for the support, reviews, praise, and comments. I really appreciate it.)