At quarter to eight on Wednesday night, Castle's phone chirped and his pre-programmed alarm displayed on the screen. He smiled inwardly and swiped the screen to turn the noise off. He felt a fluttering in his belly as he saved the Nikki Heat document he'd been working on, shut his laptop screen, and stood from his desk; it was time to put his plan into action.

Somewhere around the afternoon of the second day of Kate being sequestered in his bedroom the idea came to him, and he immediately cursed himself for not thinking of it sooner. He then dedicated the next day to his research, reading dozens and dozens of articles, and even emailing one of the doctors he'd used as a source for medical knowledge in the past to confirm his ideas. The medical professional hadn't exactly been supportive of his notion, but that was okay; Castle had expected that. He was comfortable with the decision he made, though, and definitely wasn't turning back.

Walking a few steps forward, he paused at the entrance of the bedroom and observed Kate sitting cross-legged in the chair beside the bed with his iPad in her lap. On her second day there she'd confessed that she had not brought her laptop, thinking she wouldn't need it, but was now regretting that decision. The writer offered up his iPad as a substitute. She protested at first, but he assured her that he could go two weeks without it; he had plenty of other toys to entertain himself.

"Hey Kate?" he began to get her attention. She looked up, smiled, and then put the iPad down on the nightstand next to her.

"What's up?"

"I was just thinking…it's been six full days since you got here."

"Oh…yeah." She laughed and tucked some hair back from her face. "Yeah I guess it has been almost a week; time goes too fast sometimes, right?"

He smiled softly as that was his precise point for bringing up the subject he was about to. "Definitely. And did you know that all health organizations are consistently reporting that the majority of patients begin showing symptoms of illness two to five days after exposure. And, with each increasing day it is less and less likely for them to be symptomatic."

"I…I'd heard something about that…"

Despite her suspicious tone, he continued. "And that at this point, even if you had been exposed on the car ride over here, your odds of getting sick now are less than twenty percent."

She began to stand slowly from the chair. "Castle-"

"And I like those odds," he concluded before taking a step into the bedroom.

"Woah! What are you doing?!" She demanded, holding her hands out in front of her, as though that would make him re-think his plan.

In reality, nothing but Kate spiking a one-hundred-and-three-degree fever would have. He had thought about it for the prior few days, and with each day became more convinced it was the right decision. Kat was right there—right there!—literally seven-to-ten feet from him at any given moment. They were waiting out quarantine for what? A hug right at the fourteen-day mark and a shared family breakfast the next morning before she went back to work? No. it wasn't good enough. Not after all this time. Not after all the times he'd paced back and forth in his office thinking about nothing but her.

Dozens of NYPD officers were falling ill every day and though he practically refused to let himself think about it, many were dying as well. Young, seemingly healthy adults were dying due to the aggressive virus, which medical professionals guessed was because they not only had weakened immune systems due to exhaustion, but because many had heightened exposure due to being around many individuals who were ill.

Castle already knew that Kate was exhausted and, yes, she generally was quite healthy, but what if she was exposed to the virus through multiple sources all at once? What if she fell ill? What if, god forbid, she fell ill enough to need hospitalized, to be put on a respirator. She had, after all, had a traumatic shooting not quite a full year earlier; her body was still healing. If she had another catastrophic medical event before he was able to be with her—truly be with her—he would have been devastated. So, yes, he was taking this risk—one that was both a medical gamble, and not a guarantee she would reciprocate his feelings—but my god he had to try. He'd always regret it if he didn't.

"I've been thinking about it and…getting to hug you the night before you leave again just isn't good enough." He took two steps forward but, with surprising speed, she leapt up onto the bed and hopped down on the other side so that she stood in front of his walk-in closet.

"Castle, stop."

"No," he half laughed. "It's okay Beckett, I-"

"No," she said again, backing up until she hit the bedroom wall. "I could still be sick. I could be an asymptomatic carrier. There are plenty of examples of cases of people who never show symptoms but get members of their family sick."

"I'll risk it."

"Castle!"

As he moved to climb over the bed to get to her, she darted into his office. As he clambered back down off the other side of the bed he insisted, "Stop running away from me!"

"I'm trying to keep you safe!" He slowly approached her and she backed up until her thighs hit his desk and she shook her head sadly. "Please stop."

"But why? You don't have to protect me Kate."

"Yes, I do." She insisted, her voice lowering.

He felt the back of his neck prickle, for suddenly he realized their prior words might not just quality for that moment in time, with the terrible flu-like illness, but of their larger relationship status; the one they'd been dancing around for quite some time. "Why?"

"Because I don't want you to get sick..." Her voice cracked as she turned her eyes towards the ground and added, "or hurt."

He felt a cold sweat at his brow as he realized, yes, this was about more than just the virus. He stopped at the edge of the office and asked gently, "What are you talking about, Kate?"

She threw up her hands then brought her fingers to rub beneath her eyes. Shaking her head, she confessed honestly, "I don't know. Some days, I'm not even sure anymore what is going on with me or how I feel…despite all the therapy."

"Therapy?" he echoed with surprise.

She nodded. "I've been going since my shooting. Well I was going regularly…haven't had the time in the last two months obviously. I've done a few phone sessions here and there but—not the point." She shook her head then focused on him again. "For the past few weeks, I haven't had much down time, but I've used the time I had to think. Well, I've been thinking since my shooting, actually. Trying to figure out why I'm so scared. I guess it boils down to that I'm afraid that you could hurt me or I could hurt you; we could hurt each other and then where would we be? We wouldn't have our…our partnership. What we have now. The thought of losing you like that I…" She let her voice drift off as a tear fell from her left eye. Castle's breath hitched in his chest; he was hardly able to believe what he was hearing.

"But then…the past few weeks I've been missing you so much, I couldn't help but think that I'm crazy. Completely crazy, because it's absolutely ridiculous—how could I have ever thought that being alone was better than taking a risk on us? I guess…I guess maybe it took this time apart for me to realize because every day when I got up and thought about what I would do and how you wouldn't be there, you couldn't be there, and I didn't know when I'd get to see you again… everything hurt." She placed her hands in the center of her chest and pressed them there tightly. "It hurt so much, but now that I'm here I—oh! Castle! No!" She gasped when he suddenly stepped forward and cupped her face with his hands.

"Yes." He countered, brushing his thumbs on her upper cheeks, collecting the tears that had fallen there. Watching her cry and hearing her heart-felt confession made him realize he couldn't stand another moment apart from her. Cradling her cheeks, he sighed out, "The only thing I wanted to do for ten weeks was see your face."

Her lips curled slowly into a smile as she brought up her hands to lightly grasp at his elbows. "Me too. I was going to tell you later, after my quarantine but the truth is…I don't want to go ten weeks without seeing you again. I don't want to go ten days."

"Ten hours," he continued wistfully, as he'd had similar thoughts.

"No, I could go that long."

"Kate," he grumbled at her serious tone. She laughed, and he felt his heart swell so much that he was afraid his ribs would crack. Unable to take another second, he leaned in and pressed his mouth against hers.

She kissed him in return, but only for a moment. Pulling back with the shake of her head she sighed, "Oh, we shouldn't have done that."

"Why not?" he asked, thinking it was the greatest thing he'd done in the prior year of his life.

"Because now you have to stay in quarantine, too."

A smirk crept across his face as he let his hands drift down from her jaw, across the sides of her neck, and onto her shoulders. "Well…that was my plan all along…"

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "Oh, was it?"

"Mmhm." He hummed as his hands continued to travel their path until they reached her mid-back. He then used them as leverage to tug her closer. Thankfully, she didn't hesitate to throw her arms around his neck and kiss him again. He groaned and sunk into her, pulling her body against his and, god, this—this —was exactly what he'd had in mind when the idea came to him several days earlier. As long as Kate remained in quarantine so tantalizingly close, why shouldn't they make the best of it? And, okay, so any action towards intimacy, even if it was only a hug, would result in him being forced into quarantine as well, was that really a bad thing? Of course, his action was a bit of a gamble, because while he didn't mind—hell, was downright excited about—being stuck in tight quarters with her, that didn't mean she felt the same, but he had a hunch she might.

As thoughts of all the interesting quarantine activities they could partake in danced through his mind, Castle parted his lips in an attempt to deepen their kiss, but instead of welcoming the action, Kate pressed her hands flat against his chest and pressed him back ever so slightly. He obliged but gave her a rather confounded expression, which resulted in her frowning slightly.

"Wait. Please."

"What is it?"

She ran her teeth over her bottom lip, dipped her gaze briefly, and then confessed in a tone barely above a whisper, "I'm scared."

He breathed in a shuttered breath then pushed it out slow as he said, "Me too."

"Why?"

"Because I never wanted anything more than this—you." He told her honestly. In forty-some years he'd cared for many women—even loved a few of them—but not one single other person in the world had ever made him feel the way she did. Not one other woman had made him feel so inspired and joyful and challenged to be a better man. He was a better man, thanks to her, and he never wanted to be apart from her ever again.

She let out a noise somewhere between a gasp and a sigh, pressed her hand against his cheek lovingly for a moment, then rose up on her toes and hugged him tightly. He banded his arms around her waist, dropped his chin into the curve of her shoulder, and held her tight. They rocked gently together for almost a full minute before she pulled back, stroked his cheek again and asked softly, "Can we take things slow, please?"

"Of course," he smiled. Now that she had finally confessed her feelings to him the last thing he wanted to do was rush her and scare her away. "I—oh, hang on. Before I forget, let me tell Alexis and Mother that they can't come into the office now."

He (reluctantly) slid away from Kate's embrace and retrieved his phone.

"What are you telling them?"

He smiled at her briefly then continued typing. "That I'm quarantining with you for the rest of your time here."

"And for six days after."

"Wha...oh yeah." He hummed when he realized that he had to quarantine for a total of fourteen days now that he had been exposed to someone who had potentially been exposed. That meant he'd need to remain isolated in his room and office for six days after she left, but it was more than a worthwhile tradeoff to get to spend eight days with her.

When he finished sending the message, he looked up to see her wary expression. "If you get sick…"

"It'll be my fault, not yours." He assured her. Then, he stepped forward, snagged her waist with his hand and said, "As I said: it's a risk I'm totally willing to take. Now…what should we do? If you're not comfortable with me in the bed with you then-"

"No, no—that's fine." A smile spread across her face as she pressed her hands against his pectorals. "Actually, I…I'm looking forward to cuddling with you."

He grinned as he was so ridiculously in love with her, he was very much looking forward to cuddling with her as well. "Me too. I—oh." He stopped speaking when his phone signaled and incoming text message. He looked at it and laughed. "Alexis responded with the eyeroll emoji."

"She's rolling her eyes at us?"

He hummed. "Probably not. Most likely she's rolling her eyes at the fact that I told her she's now responsible for bringing us all of our food…"

Kate frowned. "Oh."

"Don't worry—when this is all over, I'll buy her a pony or something."

Kate laughed and then looped her arms around his waist to give him a hug. He pulled her close, resting his chin on the top of her head, and shutting his eyes with contentment; he was going to have a great next few days, he was sure of it.

The following morning, Castle opened his eyes to the most perfect sight he'd ever seen: Kate Beckett asleep beside him. She was on her back with her head turned slightly in his direction. Her left hand was up by her face while her right arm was buried beneath the sheets. Her mouth hung open slightly and she made a little snuffling sound when she breathed in that made his heart soar with joy. He blinked a few times to make sure she was real and not some sort of mirage, but once he'd convinced himself he tucked both hands under his cheek, bent his knees slightly and simply watched her sleep.

The prior night they'd sat in bed to watch a movie, the laptop balanced on one of each of their thighs as they sat lined up against one another. When the movie was over, they slipped beneath they changed into their pajamas (separately, to his slight disappointment) and spooned while talking about some of the creative ways he'd entertained himself while stuck in his apartment. They hadn't talked too much about them as a couple before they fell asleep, but he hoped to explore that topic more in the near future – just so it was certain they were both on the same page.

About ten minutes later, Kate began to stir. She stretched out her legs and curled her feet until a few of her toes cracked. Then she took in a deep breath, opened her eyes, and immediately let out a breathy laugh. "Are you…are you watching me sleep?"

"Maybe." He slid his hand towards her and stroked his fingers down her inner arm. "You're so cute when you snore."

She gaped at him and gave his hand a little shove. "I do not snore."

"Yeah, you were making this little snuffling sound and-"

"Stop!" she groaned.

He laughed, enjoying her embarrassment as he only found it more adorable. He slid closer to her, kissed the knuckles on the back of her left hand, and reached out for her waist. Thankfully she required no other encouragement to slide her body into his and cuddle up to him with her head on his upper chest and one arm draped across his stomach. He lay his arm across her back and shoulders, pulled her close, and shut his eyes. They lay there for a few minutes before he heard her chortle quietly to herself and he asked her what was wrong.

"Oh, nothing, nothing. I was just thinking to myself how many times I thought about being here, in this room, with you…and how I could not possibly have imagined this exact scenario."

"I'm sorry, did your fantasies not normally involve a global pandemic?" he responded teasingly.

"Not usually, no."

"What did you think about?"

She began to draw lazy circles on his sternum as she spoke. "Oh, I don't know…a lot of different scenarios. Most recently, when I would wake up in the mornings and think about going through another day, I'd think about how it might be bearable if I was able to see you or have you there with me."

He hugged her a little bit tighter as he said, "I felt the same. I was so worried about you all the time, worried about you getting sick."

"I do protect myself as best I can, Castle."

"I know you do, but as you said—it'd be more bearable if I was with you."

"I know."

They lay together for several more minutes before he asked if she was ready for him to ask Alexis to bring them their coffee. She gave an affirmative answer and then slid off the bed to reach out for the sweatshirt she'd left on the chair and pulled it on over her t-shirt. As he tapped out the message to his daughter, she sighed, "I feel so bad she has to do this for us now."

He turned to her, arching an eyebrow. "But not when I had to do this for you?"

"No." She responded without missing a beat. Then her expression broke and she added, "Kidding—of course I felt bad."

"You shouldn't. It's not like we're doing this because we're lazy—it's to keep us all safe, right? Besides." He slid towards her until he could reach out and grab her arms and pull her back on to the mattress, back into his arms. Nuzzling his face against hers he said, "I was doing this for you because I was desperate to see you—even if we had stayed more than seven feet apart at all times."

She smiled, rubbing her hand against his forearm. "Well that's very sweet Castle…but the same cannot be said for Alexis."

"No, she's doing it for financial gain."

Kate laughed just as they heard a knock coming from the office area. Alexis then called out, "Are you guys dressed?"

Castle exchanged looks with his companion before saying, "Why would I have texted you if we weren't dressed?"

"Just making sure," she said before walking into the office and putting two mugs of coffee on his desk. Then, from beneath her arm she pulled out a small satchel which she displayed out in front of her before putting it beside the coffee. "Your toiletries, Dad. I'll bring breakfast as soon as it's done."

"Thanks so much, Pumpkin."

"Yes, thank you for doing this, Alexis; so sorry to make you do extra work," Kate said to her.

Alexis glanced over at the snuggling duo, gave a little shake of her head, then spoke directly to Kate. "It's not a problem. Actually, it's the least I can do since now you're trapped in there with him."

"Hey," the writer whined while both women chuckled.

"That's true…I didn't think of that." Kate paused to look at her companion and shake her head in resignation. "You're going to drive me nuts, aren't you?"

He shrugged happily and pointed out, "No more than usual."

She hummed and gave his chest a playful poke. "I guess we'll see about that." Then, she slid out of his embrace and walked towards the office area that Alexis had vacated so she could get their coffees.

"You're not regretting having to be quarantined with me, are you Beckett?"

"No…Though this is a tight space for two of us."

"Nah," he said, gesturing towards the office with his mug of coffee. "I'm still going to work at my desk so we'll expand the quarantine zone out into the whole office, so it actually better. You'll get a window."

"That's true. Besides, I'm mostly teasing. After so much time a part, I'm looking forward to being annoyed by you."

He laughed at her grin then leaned in and kissed her lips briefly. "Glad to hear that, Beckett; glad to hear it."

The following evening, Castle crouched on his bathroom floor digging through the cabinets to make sure he'd found every candle stashed in every random corner of the bathroom by, yes, admittedly, his ex-wife. Gina liked to take candle lit baths and he'd been known to join her on occasion. She bought dozens of the things and though some had been thrown out, he knew there were some brand new ones stashed at the back of his linen closet. Maybe he should have thrown them away since she bought them, but since they were unused that seemed wasteful. Plus, at that moment, they were going to come in quite handy.

After twenty minutes of searching, he found five, which combined with the three he already had in the bedroom would have to do for his intended plans. He lit each of them and carried them one by one to line up on the dresser. Once they were all set up, he stood back and nodded with approval, quite pleased with himself.

If he allowed the emotion, he might have admitted to feeling slightly disappointed about this being his first official date with Kate Beckett. Had they the opportunity, he would have shown up at her apartment with a dozen red roses and taken her out to one of their favorite restaurants. Nothing too fancy or prestigious, but a place where they could have good wine and great conversation. Then, depending on the weather, maybe they would have gone for a walk, or maybe out for a sinfully delicious dessert. Or maybe he would have cooked for her—one of his favorite dishes that he knew she loved. Then they wouldn't risk being interrupted by an overzealous waiter or being seated next to a couple who got into a fight halfway through dinner (which had happened to him a surprising number of times). Heck, maybe they would have just had a movie night with some take out—something incredibly simple since, after all, though it was their first date it wasn't as though they did not already know a lot about one another.

Regardless, he wished the date could take place outside of the room she'd been cooped up in for over a week, but at least they were together—laughing, talking, and kissing. The kissing was his favorite part. Still, he wanted to do something special, which was why he'd come up with the candlelit dinner idea. Since Kate was reading by the window in his office, that afforded him the perfect opportunity to set the stage. Now he needed only to text his daughter the instructions for their meal and—

"Castle? What's all this? What are you doing?"

"Oh, um." He whipped around feeling a bit sheepish now that he'd been caught in the middle of his plan. "I was, ah…I was trying to create a first date for us."

"First date?" she echoed softly.

He shrugged and slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans. "Yeah… I mean, we can't leave this room, but it's been almost two days since our kiss so I thought that maybe I'd try to romanticize things a bit and we could have a candlelit dinner."

"Oh, Castle." She walked over and squeezed his elbow, then gazed around at the flickering candles in the room. "This is very, very sweet; thank you. It's…ah, I don't know. This whole thing is kind of surreal. Are we…I mean, are we dating?"

His brow wrinkled. "Aren't we? Or when you said you wanted to take things slow did you mean that we wouldn't define anything that we're doing?"

She shook her head. "No, I didn't mean that. I…well, I don't know what I meant actually." She let out a soft laugh and dusted her fingers across her brow. "All of this is a bit surreal, right? Being stuck in quarantine. Not being able to go out and have a nice meal at a restaurant because everyone is sick or worse. And not just that—we don't know when we'll be able to do it again."

"Yeah, I know; it's totally crazy. I certainly never thought I'd live through something like this, but…but at least we're together now, right?" His tone was a bit cautious because he wasn't entirely sure what she was thinking. Considering she had kissed him that afternoon he didn't think she was walking back her expression of feelings towards him. In his mind, when she requested to take things slow, that meant she didn't want to immediately begin their sexual relationship, and he was fine with that, which was why he was starting with the dinner. Admittedly, being that it was in the bedroom, it could have sent some mixed signals, but the location was more a necessity due to their quarantine than a strong suggestion for their post-meal activities.

Kate picked up his right hand, kissed the ridge of his knuckles, and then held his hand against her collar bone as she spoke. "Yes, Castle. We're together in the sense that I'm not dating anyone else. I don't want to be with anyone else, but the reality is: I have to leave in a few days and I don't know when I'll get two weeks off in a row again, so I might not be able to come back."

"But this quarantine won't last forever," he pointed out. The news was already beginning to speak about an endgame, some saying that it could come as soon as four weeks away, but the exact date was still uncertain.

"No. No, it won't, but it could go another month or two—maybe longer. Even after that, I'm in a high-risk group since I deal directly with the public all the time." She took a deep breath and shrugged her shoulders a little bit. "I guess what I'm saying is: if you don't want to start something then hit the pause button, I understand."

Slightly stunned she could think that viewpoint was a possibility for him, it took Castle a few seconds to respond. When he did, he cupped her face with both hands and spoke with as much sincerity as he ever had. "Kate Beckett, I've been waiting to be with you for a year—arguably longer. It wouldn't matter to me if we had these six days together and then waited year to be together again; I'd still want this time. I mean—I'd be really, really upset about waiting a year, but I'd still want this."

She shut her eyes and breathed out, "Waiting a year would be torture."

Grinning, he agreed. "Such complete torture." Then, he pulled her in and gave her a long kiss. "Now, if you give me a minute here, I'll finish up and we can start our date."

"You don't have to do anything else; this looks amazing."

He glanced around then frowned slightly saying, "I wish I could have brought you flowers."

"I don't need flowers."

"I just want everything to be really special."

She tilted her head to the side and asked, "How could it not be?"

He smiled loving that she had those sentiments, but still felt the urge to do more. "I just want to give you everything that makes you happy."

She slid her arms around his waist and looked up at him with as joy-filled eyes as he'd ever seen. "You make me happy, Rick. Being with you, our partnership; it makes me happy and thought it might not be this month the next, or even three months from now, I know some day we will get back to our partnership the way it was, and I can't wait. But I guess, in the meantime…" She sighed, glanced at the candle-covered bedside stand, and then back to him. "I can settle for some of this."

He squeaked in displeasure. "Settle?! You want to settle for—oh you're teasing me…" he grumbled when he noticed the growing smirk on her face.

She laughed and gave him a quick kiss. "Of course. This is far from settling. This…this is an amazing upgrade."

He skimmed his hands down her back, pulling her in even closer. "That sounds better. And I agree with everything you said. Now…let's make the best of quarantine." He moved his right hand to his pocket and pulled out his phone, but before he could begin texting his daughter she stopped him with, "What are you doing?"

"Telling Alexis she can bring our dinner."

"Oh, um." Her gaze darted towards the bed and then back to him. "It can wait a little bit, right?"

Catching her implication, his heart rate began to speed and he asked, "Really? Are you sure? It's not too-"

But she cut him off with her lips against his. He kissed her back and, when she pulled him down towards the bed, he didn't hesitate to follow.

A/N - Thank you all so much for reading! I wasn't sure if this would be "too soon" since probably most of us are still in some level of quarantine, but I sense from the feedback that was not the case so thank you and I hope you enjoyed this little Caskett pandemic tale

I do have a fic for the current ficathon...i've finished 13 of 14 planned chapter so i think it safe to say i will actually complete the fic... probably start posting around mid-May. Until then - stay safe and wash your hands :)