Title: Blood on the Dancefloor
Author: DancingStar
Crossover: PSI Factor/ Sue Thomas F.
Rating: 16
Pairing: Connor/ Lindsay, Jack/Sue
Special Guest: Rick Castle and Kate from "Castle"
Summaries: The team wants to celebrate Lindsay's birthday. A very mysterious murder ruins their plans…
Category: Crime, Mystery
Comments: Happy Halloween!
Blood on the Dancefloor
"Happy Birthday, Lindsay!", Claire said excitedly and Lindsay didn´t understand. It was evening and they stayed up in New York. They stuck in the middle of a case, but for today their work was ended.
"My Birthday was in May," Lindsay replied.
"We know," Peter, who now was also involved in the conversation, nodded, "I can still remember that the club where we wanted to celebrate your birthday burned down one day before. And when we had found an alternative date, you've got a cold." It was now the end of October, today was the Halloween night, and since May they hadn´t had the opportunity to celebrate her birthday. So, Lindsay decided to give in. A little bit amused she rolled her eyes and put on her jacket. "How I know you, you already know where we will celebrate my birthday."
"There is a nice new club in the city... Connor has the tickets!", Peter said and in that moment Connor was leaving the meeting room and closed the door behind him. Peter walked over to Connor, who was responsible for the tickets. A few days ago they talked about Lindsay's birthday and Connor said his cousin could certainly help them to get on the guest list of that new club. Then Peter asked him if he would mind to ask his cousin for the tickets. "Connor, do you have the tickets with you?", Peter asked and hoped Connor hadn´t forgotten.
"Of course I have the tickets with me," Connor was searching in his jacket pocket and fished out five small paper cards.
He handed Peter the cards, who swirled it in the air triumphantly.
"What do you want for your birthday?" Claire asked suddenly and Lindsay shrugged her shoulders helplessly. She had no particular wishes after her birthday had already been actually in May and she had bought everything she wanted.
"We have to hurry," said Peter and pushed Connor and the ladies to door of the mobile lab. He had noticed Connor's cousin had booked them a VIP lounge and if they wanted this, they had to be in the club at 10:00 p.m.
"Anton isn´t here yet. We should wait", Claire suggested.
"He called: He said he won´t come," Connor excused. Outside, they sat in Peter's car and he drove to the city. In front of the club, they met Jack Hudson, Sue Thomas and Lucy Dotson, who had come to New York for Lindsay's birthday party. "I think it´s very exciting to spend Halloween in New York," Lucy said. In fact, she even wanted to buy a costume, but it would have been very embarrassing to wear this on the plane. They would also only stay for tonight and tomorrow afternoon they´d fly back to Washington. Lucy remarked neither Connor, Lindsay, Peter or Claire wore Halloween costumes. Jack didn´t even wear the pilot's uniform, which he had bought. Lucy recalled how Sue had looked at him when he showed them the costume and she wondered why he didn´t wear the uniform now. Instead, they were all dressed to kill.
"Let´s go in", Lindsay suggested. They didn´t even had to wait at the queue: Thanks to their VIP tickets, they were allowed to walk past the queue and the bouncers let them in immediately. Inside, Sue was unsure: for her the dancing people moved in an eerie silence. Sue was deaf since childhood and she couldn´t imagine how the loud music might sounded. She felt how Jack suddenly grabbed her hand and smiled. "It's very dark in here," she told him and he squeezed her hand tighter, when they went up the stairs to their VIP lounge. There, it wasn´t less loud, but it was much brighter and they weren´t disturbed by other dancing club guests.
Their personal waitress came and asked them what they wanted to drink.
After they had ordered, Lindsay thanked Peter for the great idea and Connor for the tickets. Lucy agreed and turned around to Sue. "I am very pleased Sue came along."
They all knew Sue was deaf and she hated night clubs, because it was so dark in there and she couldn´t see her interlocutors. But today, she seemed very happy when she talked to Jack. Lucy was glad.
"I can´t believe that Peter actually persuaded me to come along," Connor said, "The last time when I was in a club, I was in college."
"And I can´t believe I celebrate my birthday now! I've never celebrated my birthday so late."
"You two are really ungrateful," Lucy noticed and put her hands on the sides. The waitress returned with their drinks and Lucy spent most of the time trying to complain, how ungrateful Lindsay was. "Would you please stop now?", Lindsay asked and finally shook her head. She put the cocktail on the table. "You come with me?", she asked Connor and he looked at her a little confused. She grabbed his hand. Connor put his drink away and followed her down the stairs and then to the dance floor.
It's close to midnight and something evil's lurking in the dark
Under the moonlight, you see a sight that almost stops your heart
You try to scream but terror takes the sound before you make it
You start to freeze as horror looks you right between the eyes
You're paralyzed
'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
And no one's gonna save you from the beast about strike
You know it's thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight ("Thriller" by Michael Jackson)
They left the club after three o´clock in the morning and Lindsay held on to Connors arm when she lost her footing on her heels a little bit. She giggled. "You've been drinking quite a lot," Connor noted.
"No," Lindsay disagreed and laughed, "I didn´t drink much more than you." She turned around to Jack and Sue. "Where do we go now?"
Peter had heard her question and he still knew a nice little bar in the area. "I tell you, this is...", Peters speech was interrupted by a scream. The cry came from the night club which they had just left. Next, the same woman´s voice was calling for help and the police. She cried also she had found a dead woman. Jack stopped and watched how some people rushed out of the club scared and when the crowd had calmed down, he showed the bouncer his FBI ID to enter the building once again.
Inside, in the hallway to the ladies room they saw a terrible sight: a young woman was with outstretched arms and legs on the ground. Ugly scars adorned her lower legs and her legs were supported by strong metal scaffolding, her skinny body was clothed in a dirty nightgown. "My God", Sue swallowed and ran back outside with Lucy. When Sue reached the front door of the club, she stopped, tried to catch her breath so her friends could catch her up. "Is everything okay?", Lindsay asked, worried, and Sue nodded.
"Her legs. Did you see her legs?"
Lindsay didn´t understand what should be wrong with the legs of the dead woman, except for they were covered with scars. "What about her legs?"
"These weren´t hers... The skin color on the lower legs is a shade too dark and doesn´t match with the rest of her skin color," Sue still rang for breath and when she spoke, Jack, Peter and Connor exchanged a worried glance and hurried back into the club, past some party guests who were about to leave.
They noted Sue was right. Although Sue was deaf, she was a very attentive observer. She felt a little better and was still sitting with Lucy at their car.
"I've never seen something terrible like this before," said Sue. Peter, Jack and Connor were still busy with the review of the crime scene.
"Me neither," Lindsay agreed. Another car stopped directly in front of them and Anton got out.
"Anthon, thank God you are there!", Lindsay was very relieved to see him. She talked to him on the phone about the incident and at first she apologized for disturbing him.
"Don´t worry", Anton tried to smile and of course Lindsay noticed something was wrong. She tried to cheer him up and she said: "If we stay a few days longer, we can seamlessly connect to our next job in Vancouver."
"Not me", Anton confessed, "Next week I'll get a dog from a shelter, because then I'll have enough time for a pet... I don´t wanted to tell you about my last day at work now, I'm leaving next Friday. "
Lindsay was aghast. This news came so suddenly. She looked at him always stunned when Connor came back from an interview with the press.
"Someone told to the evening news about the body... Well, it´s a bit scary," Connor tried to say the least and because Jack and Peter were still trying to find out where the police would bring the dead woman for an autopsy, Connor had kept the press quiet.
Peter and Jack came back. Anton, Connor, Lindsay, Claire, Sue and Lucy were still waiting in front of their cars which were parked not far away from the club. "They take her to Saint Maria's Hospital," said Jack, "The police says their storage facilities are limited at the moment." He shook his head.
"Saint Maria's Hospital?" Connor asked. He knew the name of the hospital from somewhere.
"Shall we go?", Peter asked. They didn´t know why they agreed.
During the ride to the hospital, Connor noticed how confused Lindsay was and suddenly she didn´t speak a word to them. "Is everything okay?", Connor asked anxiously, when they had to stop at a red traffic light.
Lindsay nodded cautiously. "Anton just told me he´s retiring next Friday."
"Is this true?", Peter asked. He and Claire were sitting on the back seat.
"He didn´t look like if he was joking."
Claire wanted to ask why Anton hadn´t told sooner, but at that moment they reached the hospital and parked the car in the parking lot. They entered the building and first a reception lady complained about Levi: The dog had to wait outside the door. As a service dog Levi, however, had access to all areas of the hospital.
They took the elevator to the pathology in the basement. There they showed their IDs. Anton and Claire and Jack and Sue were hoping they might get access to the dead woman, even though they show off their FBI IDs. But the director of pathology sent them away without having even once talked to them seriously.
"To be honest, I don´t know what we were thinking when we came here," Connor was a loss. The elevator took them back to the ground floor of the hospital and when they wanted to go home, they noticed a small crowd which had gathered in front of the main entrance door. There were patients from the emergency room, which also wanted to go home, but the electrical front door didn´t open.
"Excuse me," Sue stopped a nurse, "What's going on here?"
"I'm sorry, Miss. All doors of the hospital can only opened electronically. I guess our central computer is having a virus and therefore..."
"Do you think we have time forever?" , Peter now asked annoyed.
"I'm sorry, Sir," the secretary said, "Our engineers already try to fix this. I know you´re angry, but I can´t change it. You have to wait." The nurse also sent the other people to the waiting area and asked them to vacate the area around the main entrance door.
"We shouldn´t have come here," Lucy said. She walked to a small shop that was probably open 24 hours a day and bought a bottle of water. Peter admitted he would rather have a cup of coffee and because this small shop didn´t sell this, they searched for a coffee machine. They walked past a nurses' station which was decorated with Halloween- pumpkins.
"We don´t even know how the dead woman named," Jack said frustrated, "The police doesn´t even say her name."
"Her name was Eileen," a nurse said suddenly. She had listened to them and came to the reception.
"How do you know?"
"When I saw her in the news, it was clear to me. She is... She was the girlfriend of a patient who is with us because of meningitis. A photo of her is framed in his room."
"Can we see him?", Peter wondered if the boyfriend of the dead woman might knew who did this to her.
"That´s impossible," the nurse said now, "He needs rest and you must first talk to the police," she saw the worried glances on their faces when she mentioned this, "But don´t worry: He isn´t dangerous."
"Why should we then be worried?"
"Her boyfriend named Joe Myers", with these words she left and they looked a little bit puzzled.
"Joe Myers", Connor repeated, "I´ve heard that name before..." And then he knew: "I heard that name on the yesterday´s news: This is the man who tried to transplant his girlfriend the legs of another woman, after she lost her legs in a car accident. The police found the body of a woman with Mexican background in the basement of his house... The bad thing is: He says his twin brother would have killed Eileen."
They listened to him horrified, but they had heard of the case, too. Joe Myers confession had caused dismay in the whole country, but until then, nobody knew what had happened to his girlfriend. After Joe Myers and Eileen were obviously very close friends, it made sense for them who the perpetrator was.
"You think, he killed her?", Claire asked. But how did she come into the club? She suspected that Joe Myers had attached the tracks on Eileen´s legs in order to stabilize it until the wounds were healed.
"I don´t know... I've heard the victim bled to death. He is supposed to have kidnapped the young woman one night while she was jogging in the park. "
"We already know what happened to his girlfriend," Connor noted and with a strange feeling in their stomach his friends nodded, "Call me crazy, but all this reminds me of a book in the Nikki Heat series, which is written by my cousin", said Connor and Jack listened.
"Wait, Wait, Wait! Richard Castle's your cousin?", he asked incredulously and Connor nodded:" Yes, he´s several years older than me and..."
"Why didn´t you tell us about it?", Jack interrupted him and he turned to Sue, "Sue, did you know Richard Castle is Connor´s cousin?"
"No," Sue's voice sounded incredulous and Jack turned around to Lindsay, "Did you know that Richard Castle is Connors cousin?"
"Yes, he's one of my favorite authors and thanks to Connor I received a copy of his new book last month before it was sold in stores. There was even a dedication in the book... As far as I know he set us on the guest list of this club."
"Well, it wasn´t Connor's fault we came into this," Jack had to admit and everybody nodded, "Can our cousin help us?"
"If you talk to him on the phone, certainly," said Connor, "He and his wife are expecting their first baby and when I last phoned him, it sounded like he didn´t want to miss it under any circumstances."
"What now? We won´t leave the hospital can before someone fixes the electronic entrance doors", Lindsay said, "I won´t spend the night in the same building as the killer. And, moreover, without police protection..."
"I suggest we stay in the waiting room until someone fixed the doors."
"Like a Panic Room."
They thought this was a very good idea and so they looked for the waiting room: They were lucky because the waiting room was empty and they sat down and waited for someone to repair the door.
Outside, it was already a little bit dusky when Lindsay looked out of the window hours later. The lights of the tower block opposite glittered mysteriously and she rubbed her eyes wearily. Then she noticed that Jack, Sue and Lucy were talking to a man in police uniform.
Connor sat down beside her. "What are they talking about?", he asked.
"That´s not a good sign," she suggested, "After all, they´re talking to a policeman." She paused for a moment. "I don´t understand why Anton didn´t tell us earlier he wants to retire," she said.
"Maybe he doesn´t want a farewell party," Connor shrugged his shoulders helplessly.
"But he´s our friend", while she was talking, he leaned back in his chair.
"Maybe this is exactly the reason. Maybe he wants to avoid a goodbye full of tears. I mean... We´re like his family and his isn´t easy for him as well."
She nodded and yawned.
"I go get a coffee. You want to have a cup, too?"
"That would be very nice," Lindsay nodded and watched tired how Connor then left the room. She glanced at the TV which tried desperately to entertain the people in the waiting room. She just saw a report in the New York late news.
"Connor, you're on TV!", Lindsay exclaimed suddenly very excited and she heard how Connor ran down the hall and then stopped in the doorway. He saw a part of the interview in which he talked to a reporter about the happenings at the club. "You should occur more often on TV," Lindsay said when the interview ended and it was time for the weather forecast.
"Thanks," he grinned and she noticed he had come back without coffee, so he said. "Now I'm really getting some coffee."
She nodded and when he had left she noticed her eyelids were getting heavier. It had been a long day and she had drunk a lot, when they were celebrating her birthday in the nightclub. The chair on which she sat wasn´t very comfortable but she felt so tired and so she decided to sleep for a while. She dreamed how the dead Eileen walked through the hospital with squealing metal rails on her legs and a bloody nightgown to her body. The dream was so terrifying that Lindsay woke up. One hour had passed and she couldn´t see Connor. Meanwhile, Sue and Jack had ended the conversation with the police, but Lindsay had already forgotten. She had to wake Sue, who was also asleep. "Sue?", when she said this she gave her a nudge and Sue almost jumped up, "Do you know where Connor is?"
"No, I... I thought he wanted to get some coffee."
Lindsay thought the same and she believed it was impossible to take an hour to get a coffee. "Come on, let's go find him." Lindsay and Sue got up and walked to the door of the waiting room. It was almost scary: The hospital corridor was dark and nobody was there. At the end of the corridor a broken halogen lamp struggled with the darkness and flared indignantly.
"Levi, come on," Sue called softly after her dog so Jack, Lucy, Claire and Peter could sleep and the golden retriever hurried over to them. The next coffee machine was located down the hall and they suspected Connor was there. Curiously the two peered around the next corner and found put this corridor was empty. "Are you sure this is the right hallway?", Sue asked and Lindsay nodded. She was quite sure. Together they walked down the empty, dark hallway, when they nearly collided suddenly with a different person.
Lindsay and Sue screamed, Levi barked.
"Connor, it's you!", Lindsay said relieved and Connor didn´t understand her excitement: He looked at her quizzically and held four cups of coffee in his hands. Lindsay's heart still beat fast: "How can you scare us like that?"
"I'm sorry," he apologized.
"Where have you been so long?"
"I was looking for a working coffee machine," he stepped aside, "The coffee machine on this floor doesn´t work anymore."
"Pretty lousy, because that is the ONLY coffee machine on this floor", Sue stated and Lindsay gave the coffee cup she received from Connor to her.
Now Connor recalled Sue and Jack had been talking to a policeman an hour ago, "What about the policeman?"
They walked slowly back to the waiting room. "It was Detective Hartland. Jack knows him. He´s the lead investigator in the case of Joe Myers and he asked for our help because we are working with the FBI."
Lindsay wondered what exactly should be investigated by Jack and Sue.
"...Anton already took a DNA sample of Joe Myers to the lab and compared it with the DNA traces on the dead body," Sue told, "I don´t think it´ll take a long time till the results are ready. He sent the samples to the lab an hour ago and..."
Again, they almost collided with a figure: This time it came from the dark corridor to the left of them. Sue, Lindsay and Connor cried out and the rest of the coffee cups in Connors hands were shaking like an earthquake. "Anton!", Connor looked at Anton warningly and he immediately apologized.
"The lab results are back," he said and he seemed to be unhappy, "The lab found female DNA, related with the DNA of Joe Myers, on the corpse."
"What?", Sue and Lindsay were horrified, "That would mean, Eileen was killed by a woman."
When the night was over, the technician was still busy with trying to open the front door. Jack and Sue watched him from a distance. "I can´t imagine this is the only entrance door," Jack said sulkily to Sue.
"It isn´t," she assumed, "There are certainly still exits, entrances for the staff..."
"Why don´t they let us out through these doors?"
"Because there is no acute danger," Connor said. He stopped beside them, watching as well, how the technician used a program on his laptop and tried to unlock the door. The technician shook his head helplessly.
"Come on, we´ll talk to Joe Myers." Connor left and Jack was surprised that the doctors had allowed visiting Joe Myers.
While they went to the room where Joe Myers was staying, Sue noticed a very strange feeling in her stomach. "I'm afraid," she confessed to Jack.
"You don´t have to come with us."
"No, don´t worry. I'll make it, "Sue nodded bravely, but she saw Lindsay's glance before they entered the room and she realized she wasn´t comfortable with the idea, to be in the same room like such a brutal killer. The two men of the hospital security in front of the room didn´t seem to reassure them, but they tried to hide it.
Joe Myers raised his head when he saw them. "The FBI", he murmured with a very harsh voice, "I recognize the FBI because of the poorly tailored suits you wear."
Peter was confused, but he noted Myers was talking to Jack and Sue. Then he saw Levi. "What is the dog doing here?"
"This is a Service Dog. He ´s allowed to be here", said Sue and Jack turned around to her.
"You don´t have to apologize for Levi," he sent her in sign language and Myers immediately understood.
"She´s deaf, isn´t she? My twin brother is also deaf."
"Why did you kill Eileen?", Jack asked harshly.
"Detective Hartland probably came to an end with his great ideas when it´s about Eileen's death, isn´t it?", an almost smug smile appeared on the face of the sick man. He might was right, but Jack knew his old friend Hartland was a good cop.
"I´ll just ask one more time: Why did you kill Eileen?"
"I didn´t kill her. My brother gave her new life, improved her."
"Did Eileen die because you tried to transplant her legs from another woman or did she die after that?"
"I said, my brother did that!", Joe Myers was breathing hard, but now he saw Lindsay.
"You are very pretty," he said to her and Connor didn´t like the way how Joe Myers stared at her, "You and the little FBI agent would be a perfect mix for me."
"That's enough!", Connor defiantly crossed his arms over the chest and looked at Joe Myers angrily. "We know you killed Eileen." Connor pushed Lindsay almost protectively behind him.
"You're bluffing," Myers asserted. In fact it wasn´t sure at the moment if was Eileen's murder, but all the evidence were against him. Except for the DNA sample, which Anton had taken.
"I´m not bluffing and you know," Connor was surprised how well he lied. He lied so good, he almost believed it.
"You´re not an FBI agent," Myers said to Connor, "But you aren´t sympathetic as well. Maybe I would love to talk to the two blonde beauties by myself."
"We leave now," Jack hated when someone was talking about Sue in this way and Connor was the same: He hated the look with which Myers looked at Lindsay from top to bottom.
They left the room. "Are you alright?", Jack asked and Sue nodded depressed. He gently grabbed her hand.
When they had calmed down, they walked together back into the Family Room where Anton, Claire and Peter were waiting. Claire was reading in a folder which they are clearly identified as Joe Myers police file. Anton just talked to a nurse who handed him a yellow folder. The folder was labeled with "laboratory."
"You ordered a new test?", Sue asked and Anton nodded.
"I wanted to be sure that the lab was right," he said. After all, he was present when a nurse took the blood sample of possible killer and he had no explanation why the lab suddenly found out the sample was filled with female DNA. He wondered how Joe Myers did that. Once, Anton watched in a crime report on TV how a killer, who was also a physician, planted a vial of another person´s blood under his skin and when the police then took a blood sample it contained of course the wrong blood. Because he feared something similar was going on, Anton had ordered another blood test: This time he took the blood sample, brought them to the lab and kept an eye on the small container. When Anton saw the result this time, he was still perplexed: The blood showed clearly male characteristics and for a second Anton asked if he would have been happier if it had again female characteristics.
"One thing is sure," Lindsay said when she briefly looked over his shoulder and saw the test results, "He never had a gender reassignment."
"Maybe he is schizophrenic," Claire suggested.
"That wouldn´t explain why female DNA was suddenly found on the corpse."
"But it would explain why he claimed he had a twin brother," Claire argued.
Sue had an idea. "Have you ever heard of chimeras?", she suddenly asked, "I recently read in a magazine about it. Chimera is known in medicine and biology as an organism that is composed of genetically different cells or tissues."
"I know what she wants to say", Anton recognized immediately.
"As far as I know, the breeding of human-human chimeras is prohibited...", Connor began, "By law, the chimeras have to be destroyed after two weeks and the embryos shouldn´t be planted."
"Maybe he´s a chimera and doesn´t know about that," Anton suggested, "I already asked his mother about the family: Joe Myers doesn´t have a twin brother and he doesn´t have a sister, but he has an older brother who suffers from cystic fibrosis..."
"And?", Peter asked, confused. He didn´t even know what that was.
"This means, Sue could be right: researchers believe that cystic fibrosis could be treated if they had a better understanding of embryo research... Maybe Joe Myers is a so-called rescue sibling."
Sue didn´t understand what he meant. Anton then sat down at another chair. "Many people which are chimeras and carry the genetic material of themselves and their fraternal twin, which were fused in a very early stage of cell. This can lead to different DNA results, like in our case."
"If that's true," Sue began, "Then Joe Myers was actually the murderer."
"We shouldn´t wait longer for one second," Jack decided. Quickly he went to the room in which Joe Myers was still housed and opened the door. Joe Myers´ bed was empty, the machine that would monitor the heart rate was off. The two security guards who were stationed outside his door, hadn´t noticed of his escape.
That evening they celebrated Lindsay's birthday at Pizza Lightning's, best pizza in town. Because yesterday was the Halloween night, the pizzeria was still decorated with pumpkins, creepy ghosts and skeletons. Of course they were disappointed Joe Myers had fled, but Jack was right: the policemen had to do their work now. Surely they would find him, because the seriously ill man couldn´t get very far. However, they didn´t understand how it was possible Joe Myers could escape unnoticed from the 10th floor. Peter and Connor suspected he had jumped out the window and landed on a truck which drove along the road at this moment.
They were also more than relieved to be able to leave the hospital finally: The technician had managed to unlock the door.
"We wish you a Happy late Birthday," Sue said and handed Lindsay a gift.
"It's very nice you're still in New York for one more day and come to my party," said Lindsay. She was also happy she could persuade Anton to come along.
In this moment Peter interrupted their conversation: He put a large, heavy box on the table in front of them and asked Lindsay to open the gift. She tore the wrapping paper carefully aside.
"A microwave?", she asked when she had glanced into the box.
"You said you wanted a new microwave," Peter replied.
"But not for birthday!"
"Women!", Peter grumbled, "It´s always the same..." He was angry and because he was terribly offended, Lucy asked him for a drink at the bar.
"What was Connor´s gift?", Sue asked when Lucy and Peter had left.
"I got these earrings." Lindsay pointed at the earrings she wore.
"What happened between you and Connor...?"
"Actually, we're just good friends." Lindsay didn´t like that Sue apparently knew more than she admitted and so she tried to talk about different things.
"Oh sure!", Sue didn´t believe a word, "Connor was pretty jealous when Joe Myers announced in the hospital, you were very pretty."
"He wanted to protect me... Joe Myers had been flirting with you, too," Lindsay began, but she was interrupted by Lucy, followed by Peter who returned from the bar with a few drinks. They handed out the drinks. "To Lindsay's birthday!", Lucy said and lifted her glass. Lindsay noted that Connor wasn´t here. She asked Peter if he knew where Connor was and at this moment Sue told her she had found him. Excited, she pointed to the door: Connor entered the pizzeria, but he wasn´t alone.
"Is that...?", Lucy asked and she noticed how her voice broke. Behind Connor, a dark-haired, smart dressed man was walking, who held the hand of a very pretty woman.
"Oh my God!", Jack gulped, "This is Richard Castle." He could hardly believe that Connor had invited his cousin to Lindsay's birthday party.
Connor kissed Lindsay´s cheek in front of their friends and she was still too confused to say anything about he had invited his cousin. With a little strange smile on his face Connor asked if she wanted a drink, but she merely nodded.
Castle finally stopped in front of the group. "Who of you is Lindsay Donner?", he asked, eyeing Lucy, Sue, Lindsay, Claire, Peter and Jack, who stared at him stunned.
Jack was the first who answered. "Um, I..."
"I'm pretty sure you´re not Lindsay Donner," Richard Castle said to him and all the others were too shocked to laugh or respond. Lucy finally gave Lindsay a little push and she went one step forward. "I'm Lindsay Donner," she replied.
"Do you mind that Connor invited me and my wife?"
"That's okay!", Lucy exclaimed suddenly, "Sit down to us, we were about to have dinner."
They still couldn´t believe the famous author Richard Castle had actually taken Joee for them to have dinner with them. Lindsay and Sue liked his wife right away: Her name was Kate and she told the baby would see the light of the world in a few weeks.
"Wait a minute," Peter stopped them before they all start with dinning, "Where is Connor? He's just gone."
"He´s not", Lucy said, "He's on stage."
"What is he doing...?"
"I can´t believe I'm really doing this," he said into the microphone in the spotlight and when he sat on a barstool, Peter called to him to play Classical Gas. Lindsay was amazed he was able to play the guitar.
"I'm not going to play Classical Gas," Connor said, "Instead, I´ll play the favorite song of the wonderful Lindsay Donner, whose birthday couldn´t take place five months ago."
Connor adjusted the microphone and the guitar. "Shall we help you?", Lucy and Claire jumped up from their chairs almost euphoric and declared themselves and the unwilling Lindsay and Sue to be the singers (Sue wasn´t singing very loudly). They sang and it was still a nice, late birthday...
You hear the door slam and realize there's nowhere left to run
You feel the cold hand and wonder if you'll ever see the sun
You close your eyes and hope that this is just imagination, girl!
But all the while you hear the creature creeping up behind
You're out of time
'Cause this is thriller, thriller night
There ain't no second chance against the thing with forty eyes, girl
Thriller, thriller night
You're fighting for your life inside a killer, thriller tonight
Fin
