Since he had divorced Meredith, Castle felt lost. It wasn't as if she was the love of his life, but they had a daughter together and he wanted her to stop putting her career on top of it, what she didn't do. She had ended up sleeping with her producer just to ensure a role in a new movie. So she got the role, filed for divorce papers and moved to Los Angeles, giving Castle the solo custody of Alexis. During pregnancy, he had always knew she was not the type of woman who was meant to be a mother, but preferred to believe that once Alexis was born, it would change.
Now, three years later, he knew he was wrong. Meredith had left them for a year now, Alexis had just completed three years and still hoped that her mother would return. And that was the hardest part for him, have to put an end to his daughter's hopes. It wasn't news for anyone that he had writer's block, let alone for his mother. So whenever she could and knew he needed, Martha joined them. And that's what she did now. Agreed to babysit Alexis for a few hours so Castle could leave to do research. Apparently, one of his writer friends had given him an idea during a poker game. Even Martha thinking that the area where he decided to make the research dangerous, he decided to risk himself and said it could make a breakthrough in the book.
Castle was not stupid and knew that the area was dangerous, so he decided to go on a time that he thought it would have more people than the "owners" of the neighborhood. When he entered the alley, he could see why people feared that place, didn't have good lighting, had more garbage than it was "judged" necessary, what made him wonder how people who lived there could live with the odor that came from the alley. But besides scary, he found it intriguing. He could imagine his new character trapped in that alley, surrounded by one of the suspects.
He got swept away by his imagination and almost lost track of time, cause when he came back to himself, he noticed that there was a woman not far from him and that she was photographing the area, which Castle had to admit, it was a brave gesture. If any of the "owners" of the area caught her, they would probably teach her a lesson. Castle got curious and decided to go talk to her, but contained himself as soon as he saw some guys that looked like thieves, approaching. He hid behind one of the dumpsters and watched as they got closer to her.
What he didn't expect was that one of them would take a knife from his pocket, not knowing what to do, he picked up the phone and called the police, seeing that they stabbed her once, he left from where he was and when the thieves threatened him too, he warned that he had called the police and that was enough to make them run away. When the guys were away, he ran to the woman and putted his hand where she had been hit.
- Yo-you okay? – He asked with the voice shaking.
- Katie...
- Excuse me?
- I need you to call Katie.
- We will take care of you first okay?
- My daughter and my husband are waiting for me, call Kat ... – before she could finish, she lost consciousness and Castle could hear the police siren, indicating that the help was coming.