Her mother's murder

On January 9, 1999, when she was 19, her mother, Johanna, was stabbed to death while on her way to meet with Jim and Kate for dinner. The detective in charge of the investigation, Detective John Raglan, was apparently never able to find the killer and attributed her death to a random act of gang violence. Kate, though, believes that there was more to her mother's murder than a random killing, thinking that the investigating detectives ignored every evidence that could lead them to her mother's murderer. He was later killed while trying to tell Kate very important information.

Her father took Johanna's death hard and became an alcoholic. She was eventually able to help her father get through it. She since wears her mother's wedding ring as a necklace for "the life she lost" and her father's watch for "the life she saved".

Johanna's death inspired Kate to become a cop: to be a detective that actually looks for justice for the sake of the victims' families instead of 'pigeon-holing' crimes the way Detective Raglan did in her mother's case. She also wanted a position in the force where she could investigate her mother's death further.

Richard Castle's books and the fictional shows Nebula 9 and Temptation Lane also apparently had its share of helping Kate get through her mother's death.

Partnership with Castle

In the pilot episode, Beckett leads the investigation into the murder of Allison Tisdale, which is staged in the style of a death scene described in the Richard Castle novel Flowers For Your Grave, along with other murders based on Castle's fiction.

Beckett is forced to have Castle consult on the case, and though she tries to contain his access, he repeatedly violates police protocol. Although the killer is apparently caught when he leaves his fingerprints on a note he allegedly sent to Castle, Castle convinces Beckett to continue the investigation based on a hunch, the two discovering that the killer was actually Allison's brother, setting up a mentally ill client of his sister—a social worker—so that he could claim the majority of their father's estate due to his father suffering from terminal cancer. By the end of the pilot, Castle uses his friendship with the Mayor to get partnered with Beckett under the pretense of conducting research for a new series of novels starring a detective based on Beckett.^[8] Toward the end of the fourth episode, Beckett's literary alter-ego is revealed to be named "Nikki Heat", much to Beckett's annoyance, who is described as "really smart, very savvy, haunting good looks, really good at her job. And kind of slutty."^[9]

Richard Castle

Beckett's relationship with Castle is strained from the start as she finds him to be annoying and reckless. However, she warms up to him after seeing how useful he is on cases, which he often solves by noticing things that no one else did. The two also begin to develop a strong friendship and to care deeply for each other.

In "Flowers for Your Grave", Castle gives Beckett a brief kiss on the cheek when he gives her an early release copy of his last Derek Storm novel. At one point, Beckett challenges Castle to guess why she is a cop instead of a more stereotypical profession. Guessing that she came from upper middle class, that she lost someone close to her, and that the killer was never caught. Seeing her watch him peg her closer and closer until he finishes, she is obviously bothered by his accuracy. Then, at the end of the episode, he asks her out and when she says no, he says, "It would have been great". She replies, "You have no idea."

In "Nanny McDead", Castle and Beckett are talking about Castle's marriages and Beckett says she's more of a "one and done" kind of girl instead of Castle's two divorces that have already occurred.

In "Hedge Fund Homeboys", for the first time, Beckett starts to soften up for Castle by joking with him about all the schools that he was kicked out of and now that he's become famous, they all claim him as an alumnus. Additionally, Beckett is starting to be able to 'read' Castle to know some of his 'looks'.

In "A Chill Goes Through Her Veins", Beckett first reveals to Castle that it was her mother that was murdered when she was 19 years old and how it happened.

In "Sucker Punch", Castle offers to pay $100,000 of his own money to set up a fake contract with the man who murdered her mother. However, they soon realize that they have been tricked and that the actual killer was someone to whom they had just granted immunity in exchange for the identity of the "real" killer. Castle is taken hostage at gunpoint and Beckett is forced to shoot and kill the suspect before she can find out who hired him to kill her mother. Castle, feeling guilty that she lost her only lead to save his life, decides to end their partnership, but Beckett asks him to stay because, when she finally learns who ordered the hit on her mother, she wants him there with her.

In "The Third Man", Castle observes that being excited about a man is unusual behavior for Beckett when he notices her playing with her hair while organizing a date with a fire fighter Lanie sets her up with. At the end of the episode, Castle and Beckett go to get burgers together as they discuss their boredom on their respective dates. As they walk out the precinct arm-in-arm, Beckett unconsciously plays with her hair, implying that she is interested in Castle. Further, Beckett only asked Lanie to set her up once Castle revealed he had a date.

In "Tick Tick Tick...", she is shown to be jealous of Castle's attention to Agent Shaw and her high-tech equipment. When Beckett becomes the ultimate target of a serial killer who is obsessed with her being "Nikki Heat", she is almost killed after he blows up her apartment. In order to protect her, Castle allows her to stay with him in his apartment, where she makes him breakfast as a thank you.

In "Love Me Dead", Beckett's relationship with Castle is further demonstrated by Alexis, who looks up to her and sees her as a friend and surrogate mother at times, even (secretly) asking her advice on a foreign exchange program to France. In "Wrapped Up in Death", Castle asks Beckett to look out for Alexis if anything happens to him, which Beckett promises to do. In "Under the Gun", Beckett also dispenses parenting advice, telling Castle that Alexis is entering her "wild-child phase", and jokingly makes references to some rebellious things she did as a teenager, which Castle is very interested in hearing more about.

In "A Deadly Game", Beckett is on the brink of telling Castle about her feelings for him when his ex-wife (Gina) shows up to go to the Hamptons with him, saying he'll "See [Beckett] in the fall". They do not share any communication whatsoever during the summer.

In "Deadly Affair", Beckett and her team find Castle at a crime scene in the season three premiere and arrest him for murder (which she gladly does because he didn't call her to inform that he was back in town), but after he is proved innocent she sets him loose. Beckett (possibly) "loses" a bet with Castle regarding who would discover evidence leading to the next stage of their investigation first- although they both received the evidence simultaneously-, which then results in him being reinstated as her partner.

In "He's Dead, She's Dead", it is revealed that Beckett has looked at the biography page of Castle's official website, and thus knows his middle name is "Edgar". However, his real middle name is Alexander, Castle having legally changed his name from Richard Alexander Rodgers to Richard Edgar Castle (in tribute to Edgar Allan Poe) when he began writing. This could be relevant because the daughter of the murder victim foresaw that someone with the name Alexander will save her life one day.

In "Anatomy of a Murder" Castle is having a discussion with Martha near the end and she states: "Would you be willing to break her out of prison.? Because, that, my boy is True Love." Later, when Esposito and Castle are bantering about being stuck in jail and Esposito says that Castle would have to fend for himself, Beckett says: "Don't worry, Castle. I'd get you out."

In "3XK" Castle is tied to a chair in an apartment when Beckett smashes down the door to save him. She states, "I'm so glad you're okay!". Later, at the end of the episode, Castle talks about how awful he feels that he let the killer get away and Beckett tells him that she knows how it feels. She then puts her hand on his knee and he puts his on top of hers as they sit there.

In "Nikki Heat", Beckett becomes jealous of the actress Natalie Rhodes (Laura Prepon) (dressed as Nikki Heat, the character Castle based on Beckett) when she sees her kissing Castle in the elevator. Unbeknownst to Beckett, Castle turned Rhodes down, because he felt that she was only acting out a fantasy he created (noting later to Beckett that sleeping with a woman posing as a fictional version of her would be too "meta").

In "Knockdown", Castle and Beckett get involved in a strenuous kiss as a way to distract a guard, but afterwards, it is clearly seen by both their faces and Castle's first comment that they felt something more. Later, during the final gun battle with 'Lockwood', he has Beckett targeted and is just waiting for her to show her face for a head shot. Castle becomes aware of it, sneaks up behind 'Lockwood', and jumps him just as he's about to shoot Beckett. With gusto, Castle knocks him down, giving him 3 hard punches to his jaw, knocking him out. Beckett notes his bravery to save her and is there at the end to help gently bandage his hand.

In "Setup", Castle and Beckett can be seen in a concealed tarp together after being exposed to high levels of radiation. Castle asks Beckett about her recent trouble with Josh (her current boyfriend) and she responds by telling Castle about how Josh has been away a lot, and how she wants him to be there for her. Unfortunately, a man comes and interrupts before Castle can say something to Kate that could probably change their relationship.

In "Countdown", Castle and Beckett are locked inside a giant freezer after raiding the location where a bomb is believed to be held. Fearing that they are both going to die as no one knows where they are, they eventually huddle together to keep warm, but are both very weak from the cold. Beckett thanks Castle for being there with her and Castle replies that he always will be. Beckett touches his face and says "I just want you to know that I. ..." but passes out before she can finish. Castle tries to wake her up, but he soon passes out as well. However, they are soon rescued by Esposito and Ryan. After finding the bomb later on near the end of the episode, Castle and Beckett realize that it is too late for a bomb squad. Holding hands, they look into each other's eyes and then with less than a second left, Castle yanks all the wires out, miraculously defusing the bomb as the timer hits 0:00. Relieved, he and Beckett hug. At the end of the day, Castle walks to the elevator, leaving Beckett and Josh to themselves. As Beckett is hugging Josh, she looks on at Castle until he's in the elevator. Castle looks completely heartbroken at the fact that they faced certain death twice and yet, neither one of them expressed their true feelings.

In "The Dead Pool", she is "courted" by another writer, Castle's protégé, for information and characteristics. At the end of the episode, Castle admits openly to being jealous, and she turns the writer down, calling herself a "one writer girl". When Castle thanks her, she replies "always".

In "Knockout", Beckett tells Castle he and she are "over" after his unsuccessful attempt to dissuade her from continuing her obsessive pursuit of Hal Lockwood, an assassin connected to her mother's murder. While they fight Castle tells Beckett that he doesn't understand what their relationship is; that they "nearly died frozen in each other's arms", kissed, held hands, and spend their free time together, but they never talk about any of it. He also accuses her of "hiding" in relationships with men she doesn't love. While delivering a eulogy at Montgomery's funeral, Castle sees in the distance the sun reflecting off what he realizes to be a sniper rifle that is aimed at Beckett. Before he can tackle her out of the way, Beckett is shot in the chest. As she's lying on the ground, Castle begs her to stay with him and says "I love you, Kate" before she passes out.

The season four premiere ("Rise") opens with Beckett surviving her injury after undergoing extensive surgery and even flat lining. When Castle visits her, she claims to have lost all memory of what happened and asks him to give her some time to process everything. She takes three months to recover, but doesn't call Castle during that time, in a mirror situation to that of the previous year, when Castle didn't call Beckett for the whole summer. When she comes back to work, she meets her new boss, former Internal Affairs member Victoria Gates, with whom she immediately has a confrontation after she learns that the investigation into the attack on her, as well as Montgomery's death, has been closed. She also learns that, while she was away, Ryan, Esposito and Castle got some information, and that a storage facility possibly holding important information burned down, apparently in an accident. She meets with Castle – who has left the precinct since Beckett isn't there – and tells him that she broke up with Josh during the summer, and that she feels that she can't have an actual relationship while the people that had her mother killed are still free. She attempts to continue the investigation of her mother's death, but Castle convinces her to try to give it some time, so that things may become clearer.

Beckett later confesses to her psychologist that she remembers everything upon getting shot, including Castle confessing his feelings for her, but does not admit this to anyone else. She refuses to pursue any relationship (including with Castle), until the man behind her mother and Roy Montgomery's deaths has been caught. In "Eye of the Beholder", Beckett is upset when Castle becomes interested in another woman, Serena Kaye, but refuses to acknowledge her feelings towards Castle, leading her psychologist to question whether she's worried that he will wait or that he will not.

Castle becomes worried about Beckett when they are working on a sniper case ("Kill Shot"), and realizes that she is suffering from PTSD from her shooting. He begs Esposito, who also once suffered from PTSD, to help her overcome it. To do so, Esposito has her hold the rifle that shot her and tells her that she has to make what happened a strength instead of a weakness. Later on, knowing that Castle was the one who talked Esposito into helping her, she thanks him.

In "47 Seconds", Martha encourages her son to tell Beckett how he feels; however, while Beckett is interrogating a suspect, she says "I was shot in the chest and I remember every second of it", not knowing that Castle is in the observation room and overhears it. Castle is stunned and hurt that Beckett has been lying to him the entire time about not remembering anything. He tells Martha that since she never said anything, he believes that it means she doesn't feel the same way. Although Martha believes that he should end his partnership now that he knows the truth, Castle decides to stay on the grounds that he wants to continue, as he wishes to feel he is doing something that matters.

In "The Limey", Beckett and Lanie talk about Castle, leading Beckett to admit her feelings for him. Her attempt to tell him about this (encouraged by Lanie) fails, though, as he appears with a flight attendant at the crime scene. Beckett is disappointed, but still refuses to talk to him about this.

In "Headhunters", Castle teams up with Detective Ethan Slaughter, clearly avoiding Beckett. She talks to her therapist about this and he suggests that maybe Castle is not ready to wait for her anymore. Beckett is devastated to hear this and is therefore happy when Castle ends his brief partnership with Slaughter.

In "Undead Again", the case Beckett and Castle are working on partly mirrors their own problems such as one witness claiming not to remember anything of a murder. In the end, Beckett tells Castle that she is seeing a therapist and is working on herself which causes the wall inside her to slowly come down. To this revelation, Castle says "I'd like to be there when it does" to which Beckett replies "Yeah, I'd like you to be there, too".

In the Season 4 finale, "Always", Beckett and Castle are forced to deal with their relationship when a murder they are investigating turns out to be linked to Beckett's shooting almost a year before. Castle, trying to get Beckett off the case, tells her he loves her and admits that he heard her saying she remembered everything. She is, however, angry that he hid important facts from her in order to protect her and refuses to back off from the case, causing Castle to end their partnership. Beckett is unable to resolve the case this time, though, and, in a near-death experience, realizes how much Castle means to her. After she resigns from her job, Beckett visits Castle, tells him she is sorry and when she almost died, all she could think about was him. After some hesitation on Castle's part, they kiss passionately and Beckett takes his hand and leads him to his bedroom to make love.

In the Season 5 premiere, "After the Storm", Beckett and Castle have consummated their relationship when Castle wakes up in his bed the next morning to find a semi-clothed Beckett walking into his bedroom with coffee. They speak about their night, with Beckett asking Castle if he liked it, to which Castle replies with a yes. They both agree that it was not a one time thing, but their conversation is interrupted when Castle's mother comes home, causing Castle to send Beckett to hide in his closet. Beckett then has to do a secretive "Walk of Shame" out of Castle's loft, so that Martha and Alexis don't see her. Castle then comes to visit her and she tells him it wasn't his finest hour and he says I'll make it up to you somehow and Beckett replies that they could go for a round 2.

In "Cloudy with a Chance of Murder", a suspect tells Castle and Beckett about the problems with secret romances and Beckett becomes concerned about having to lie to everyone about their relationship. To make things worse, a woman with the TV station invites Castle to dinner with her. Even worse, she goes to Castle's apartment to get it on with him and is only wearing her bikini beneath her clothes. Castle accidentally butt-dials Beckett and based on what she hears, she breaks into Castle's to find the girl on top of Castle with a bikini on.

In "Secret's Safe with Me", Martha reveals to Castle that she knows about Castle and Beckett. Castle then tells Alexis as well (off-camera). Near the end of the episode, Castle and Beckett share a romantic handshake "kiss".

In "Murder, He Wrote", Castle and Beckett decide to go to the Hamptons for a weekend. While they're there, they are about to go skinny-dipping in his pool and Beckett even fully drops her towel ... and then a nearly dead murder victim stumbles in, falling into the pool and drowns. Later in the episode, Ryan finds out about their relationship and keeps it from Esposito. Among other things, Castle speculates to Beckett that since Brad and Angelina are called "Brangelina", Castle thinks that they should be called "Caskett".

In "Probable Cause", Ryan tells Esposito about Castle and Beckett. Assumedly, Esposito tells Lanie off-camera also.

In "The Final Frontier", Beckett and Castle are called to a Sci-Fi convention to solve a case. Castle then discovers Kate loved the Sci-Fi TV Show Nebula 9.

In "Swan Song", During the video-taping of a documentary about an up-and-coming rock band, Castle briefly caresses Beckett's face and is caught on tape ... which might be fully reviewed by Capt Gates before it is released for publishing. In this episode we discover Kate hates cameras and she is very camera shy.

In "After Hours", Castle and Beckett have a dinner for their parents and themselves which goes VERY badly and only a call-away for a murder seems to save them from a dinner gone bad. This leaves them thinking that maybe they are too different for each other. Fortunately, events bring them back together and even their parents seem to have established a friendship.

In "Secret Santa", Beckett reveals to Castle that ever since her mom died, she and her dad don't celebrate Christmas anymore. However, at the end of the show, she relents and attends the Christmas dinner with Castle and his family when Castle says it is a good time to create new traditions. Esposito was supposed to be alone on Christmas Eve as his plans backfire, but he ends up spending Christmas Eve with a family which was part of the murder investigation.

In "Significant Others", Castle's first ex-wife Meredith stops by and moves in so that she can help take care of Alexis. This happens while Beckett is there and she is (secretly) hoping that Castle will say no. But, he says yes. This causes a lot of problems between them. Later in the episode, Meridith invites Kate to dinner. Castle is advised by Ryan and Esposito about how bad this can be for him. The girls really hit it off in their get-together and apparently, some secrets about Castle are revealed to Beckett. They leave on good terms, but Meredith tells Beckett that she finally left Castle because he was so unwilling to reveal inner secrets to her. This leaves Beckett wondering.

In "Reality Star Struck", Valentine's Day is coming up. Castle, in an attempt to surprise Beckett, puts a nice gift of a pair of beautiful earrings for her in her coat pocket, not realizing that it is actually Capt. Gate's coat pocket, – with a note from Castle to Beckett. Fortunately, the note only says, "You are Beauty Passion, and fierce Intellect. Be my valentine. Rick" and therefore, Beckett is not in trouble. At the end, it turns out that Beckett's gift for Castle is a drawer in her dresser just for him In her apartment, she then tells him to take off his clothes, place them in the drawer and to meet her in bed, to which Castle was very pleased about.

In "Target", Alexis and another girl are kidnapped and Castle assumes that Alexis was taken because she was at the wrong place at the wrong time. However, Beckett soon finds out that Alexis was the real target. When Castle goes to rescue her, Beckett fears for his life and when he returns home with Alexis, she tells Castle to never scare her like that again.

In "Scared to Death", at the end, when Castle and Beckett are toasting their success, she tells Castle that she knows this trick with ice cubes. This is probably referring back to the trick she was talking about near the beginning of episode "Poof! You're Dead". Plus, Castle's Bucket List indicates that his #1 is "Be with Kate". He says he put that on about 3 years ago. This also might link to that same older episode because during that episode, he officially breaks up with Gina.

In "The Lives of Others", Castle is at home with a broken kneecap and witnesses what appears to be a murder across the street at another apartment. Throughout the episode, he seems to be gathering more and more incriminating data, but Beckett, Esposito, and Ryan check on things at different times and cannot confirm what he saw. Ultimately, it turns out that it was a birthday present (he was born on April Fools' Day) and Beckett had her crew and Castle's family set up the entire thing on him in order to spring a surprise birthday party for him.

In the season 5 finale, "Watershed", Castle proposes to Beckett. She was shocked as she thought Castle was going to break up with her (after their fight the previous episode) and when Castle says they will make it work and they will be great she happily accepts in the season 6 premiere, "Valkyrie", and they try to make it work long distance (Beckett gets a job in Washington D.C.). However, in "Need to Know", Kate was fired after she tipped of the press, which helped an innocent Russian National escape from her crime ridden family and fumble the CIA's attempt at using her via blackmail. However, in the next episode, even without her badge, Captain Gates allows her to assist on the case and thanks to a connected politician, she was reinstated at the NYPD and was allowed to, once again, work with Castle so long as the two remained professional at work.

In season six, Kate and Castle often spend their downtime making wedding preparations.

In "Time of Our Lives", Kate and Castle finally get married in the presence of her father, his mother, and his daughter. In "Once Upon a Time in the West", they visit an Arizona dude ranch as both a murder investigation and a honeymoon.

In "Hollander's Woods", Beckett finally learns what pushed Castle to be a mystery writer and supports him as he tries to finally find out what happened when he was 11. Despite this, she doubts him when he identifies a serial killer by voice as the incident happened over 30 years before. However, to make up for it, she finds the probable location of the killer's victims and promises to support Castle if he decides to break into a barn on the property even though it is illegal as she can't legally search it. When Castle is confronted by the killer, Beckett is left outside helpless, but manages to get him her gun, allowing Castle to kill the man and save himself. When Castle gets an award for his writing, he credits Beckett as his inspiration and dedicates it to her as well as his friends.

In season eight, with the discovery of Loksat and Beckett's obsession over her mother's murder resuming, she ends her romantic relationship with Castle in order to protect him. However, the two eventually make amends and get back together. In the series finale, in a flashforward of seven years, Castle and Beckett are shown to now have three children together and they are still happily married.

Will Sorenson

In "Little Girl Lost", FBI agent Will Sorenson (Bailey Chase) turned up and were found to be Beckett's ex-boyfriend who dated her for 6 months, but broke up with her when he decided to go to Boston for his career. He asked Beckett to go back to him in the episode, Beckett answered that she "would consider it", but it was not mentioned again.

In "Death In the Family", Sorenson was in the car driving former mobster Jimmy Moran back to the safe house when the killer pulled up next to them and shot both Moran and Sorenson. Beckett later looked genuinely concerned at the news of his injury and waited at the hospital with Sorenson until she had to leave for work purposes, returning at the closing of the case laughing and enjoying her conversation with her ex-boyfriend.

Tom Demming

In "Den of Thieves", Beckett meets robbery detective Tom Demming (Michael Trucco), to whom she instantly takes a liking. It is later revealed that the two have started dating, eating together at work, and even sharing a cab. At the end of "Overkill", she shares a kiss with him, confirming that they are now in a relationship. However, in the season 2 finale, Beckett breaks off the relationship, claiming that it "isn't what [she's] looking for right now". Demming asks her what she is looking for and she merely looks away.

Josh Davidson

In the last scene of "Punked", Josh (Victor Webster) comes to the precinct and picks Beckett up to go motorbike riding (shown by her going to get her helmet). Prior to this, Beckett had not told anyone that she had a new boyfriend. In the next episode it is revealed that Josh is a biker and a cardiac surgeon.

In "Last Call", Beckett tells Castle that she and Josh had just been tucked up in bed with her laptop when his call came through to meet him at "The Old Haunt".

In "Knockdown", Castle arrived at Beckett's apartment and asked for Josh before he handed her flowers. Supposed this may suggest that Kate and Josh are possibly serious.

In "Countdown", Josh stays in Manhattan, as opposed to going to Haiti, causing Beckett to think they "have a chance". Josh saves both her and Castle from hypothermia. They embrace at the end of the episode, but Beckett seems distracted and longingly stares after Castle as he leaves.

In "Rise", Beckett reveals to Castle that, sometime during her shooting recovery, she broke up with Josh. She later explains to him that even though she really liked him, she can't be the person she wants to be in a relationship until she has full closure on her mother's murder.