Chapter 1- Rick Castle leaves the precinct to become a private eye
The shadows eased down into the car as it sped to the loft with Kate Beckett and Richard Castle in the back. The hum of the engine keeping time with the whir of the wheels in motion stayed in time the mood of the evening, and there was Kate smiling that smile like a woman who has just had the best time enjoying the company of good friends, her co-workers, and her man, yes, she thought as she reached down and took his hand in hers on that back seat, her man. She slowly lifted her eyes up from their intertwined hands expecting to see his warm face and those incredibly blue eyes smiling back at her but what she saw was a man who was lost in thought,
"Hey you", she questioned, "Where did you go off to?"
Castle slowly swung his head from the window from the shadows that had engrossed his thinking patterns and realized she was talking to him. God, she was beautiful. Her long brown hair twirling in front of her face and those sparkling hazel eyes, but her body, her body was his, and their love bought out of friendship made his heart glow. It was that friendship that had him thinking, this is not right, I should tell her, but he was afraid, afraid she would want to turn the car around and go back to help some heads role. If she could she would, but frankly this was out of her control totally and he wasn't as worried that she would blow up the precinct, figuratively, with threats of not staying as well. She could quit her job, she knew that, but she would and he wouldn't want her to, her job kept her connected to the satisfaction she got from helping her victims. Kate Beckett was one of the top rated case closing head detectives on the force in the NYPD and she was darn good at her job. No, she was fantastic and her bosses knew it but on the other hand these were the same bosses that had been around for her breaking of the law on so many levels when Bracken, so when he had been arrested they gave her the job she loved as a way to keep her at arm's length.
The car turned an abrupt corner and the driver mumbled something to the effect of "sorry" and Kate rolled closer to his shoulder. He sucked in a breath and drove right in,
"Captain Gates said I am requested not to come back to the 12th", he waited for the explosion.
"What? Why?" she responded
"She said that I broke too many lines when it came to my involvement with Dino, and that Detective Mc Bride was hit on his way to booking, he's dead and because I conferred with organized crime and that same organization more than likely killed Mc Bride, I am no longer allowed to work with you at the precinct" he hung his head in sorrow and waited for her response,
"Oh," he was surprised by her reaction and frankly did not understand why she was not immediately on the phone to Captain Gates.
"So, I guess no more riding along and wearing my special vest, I just don't understand it, what did I do that was so terrible that it could mean kicking me off, I mean…"
"Castle, remember, you were there solely because of the Mayor, a few pulling of strings, good publicity for the police department, and that Captain Gates was finally fond of you, "
"Yeah, but I also helped solve a lot of cases and,"
"Yes, but this time you went over the line and remember not all of our higher ups have been happy with you, or me for that matter, not since Bracken, "
"But we managed to keep a really vile and murderous person from going to the office of the President; you would think that means something,"
"Rick, look, take this time, we are heading into the holidays and things are going to get slow when it comes to deaths, it always does this time of year, nobody is willing to commit murder when everyone is all love thy neighbor, and all, so we take this time to figure out what to do, how to get you back in", she smiled and gave him a sweet peck on his cheek.
"You're not going to fight this, I mean I would have thought you would have gone all Defcon 5 on Gates and those higher up fools, I thought you would have wanted to keep me working with you forever, I guess I thought,"
"Rick, seriously, do you really think I don't enjoy having you around, bugging me to death every five seconds, "she smiled in that teasing Cheshire grin she loves to give him when she's kidding, "You crossed the line, let's see if we can get you to cross back over, I think we should just lay low and try to solve this one piece at a time."
"Okay, but I am NOT happy about this and I really think that…" he felt her hand slowly start caressing his thigh and his mind suddenly got caught up somewhere else, "Driver, home as fast as you can!"
"See, I knew I could get you to see reason", she giggled.
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The darkness shrouded the room as the small warm glow of the nightlight in the bathroom traced the walls and down to the carpet. Castle lay in bed caressing the arm of his sleeping wife over and over thinking of what had just happened. Kate was calm and yet again reassured him over wine that he was undoubtedly going to be back as soon as they could find a way, but still to him this was very serious, it meant no rising with her in the middle of the night to chase down a killer, no riding in the car building theory, or standing at a murder board, pictures haunting them and their coffee, trying to figure out the clues that the dead left behind. No, to him this was serious and although she seemed nonchalant about it now, it would wear thin when she got stumped, or wanted him there to bounce ideas off of, and just to be there with coffee. He had to figure out a way, a way to be there but not be there, but how, he was not a detective, he was not a cop or even wanting to be a cop, he was a writer, how could he be of any use other than shadowing, how could he worm his way back into their good graces without having to take courses and do beat work first? Then it struck him, Private Investigators, they held some clout, he remembered her old friend, well boyfriend, Royce, he could do that, go after killers and people avoiding the police, and PIs were allowed access to police departments and often helped local police find criminals who they had thought long escaped prosecution and jail time.
The more he thought about it, he liked it, Sherlock Castle, Private Dick, then he giggled and Kate squirmed under his strong armed hug, her hair now floating down across it, tickling the hairs on his arm, time to move even if it meant possibly waking her. He slowly tried to move his arm and she rolled over out of habit, she snuggled down into the covers even more and slid her left hand under the pillow while shifting her body to her left side, success, she didn't even wake up.
As he got up he slid his slippers on and padded across the floor. He reached for his robe on the closet door's back hook and slid it over his muscular frame. His feet made a scuffling sound as he hit the wood floor and headed to the chair at his desk. The computer slowly opened and the alabaster light flowed into the den like a soft glow of promise, he had felt this promise before when waking up to write at times when his mind raced with thoughts even though his body wanted sleep. This was important and it had to be done now, as soon as possible so that he would not spend the whole holiday away from the precinct he considered home.
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When Kate awoke to the buzzing of her phone it was 5:14 AM, she blinked several times to get the sleep to dissipate and answered,
"Beckett" she answered softly, "Yeah, okay, I'll be there soon"
She rolled over and caught a glimpse of Castle, sprawled out like a two year old with one leg off the bed jutting out of the covers, even though she was sure it was cold outside their loft was always cozy warm, their loft, she smiled. She slowly slid her body out from under the covers, no use waking him, he would just be mad, and then sullen because he couldn't go, she walked over the bathroom and quietly closed the door, oh yes, she would figure out a way because she needed him, he needed her, New York needed them both.
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It felt strange, the ride over to the scene, Kate did all of her usual preliminary scouting of the area, lower east side, industrial, three blocks away from the East river, the kind of area where not to many night strolls were made. Some working factories and some abandoned dotted the streets with chain linked fences that kept people out and in at the same time. It reminded her of the fire that Espo and Ryan almost lost their life in and she shuddered against the cold, thank you God for their lives being spared. She approached the body which apparently was hanging from the side of a garbage truck, the feet caught in the rungs that lift the can straight up to the back of the truck and dangling down backwards in motion as if someone wanted to string him up on display, his clothes were tattered and his flesh was torn depicting that he was tortured by his attacker, and just when she was going to get a good look at the face of the victim, there was a tap on her shoulder,
"Beckett, where's Castle?" It was the familiar voice of one of her best detectives, Havier Esposito, and the look on his face mirrored her exact feelings, he was looking for the one person who had barely left her side since he was back from his missing two months journey to God knows where,
"Why Epso, you miss having your little bro-mance experience with a little murder mixed in?" Beckett teased,
"No, I just wanted to…" and with that Detective Ryan slid up beside them and began his rambling,
"The driver of the truck said he was there when he came to pick up the truck, for his daily rounds, he's an independent commissioned driver that picks up waste here on the island in the south east, his truck was brought here yesterday by himself about 5 PM and locked up the whole night" Kate glanced at the driver who was visibly shaken and scared.
"Hey" Ryan asked as well, "Where's Castle?"
"What is this, locate Castle day, we have a murder, let's focus shall we?" Kate responded.
The gentleman received her drift that asking about Castle was on the table for now, so Kate quietly walked over to Lanie to see what the Medical examiner had to report.
"What have you got Lanie?" She interjected into Lanie's truly involved examination.
"We have a man who has two bullet holes, one in the back near the left clavicle, and the other on the front right near the sternum, he has been severely beaten with what looks like a whip with some other piece of instrument possible shards of glass or metal embedded",
"Like a cat of nine tails?" Kate interjected again,
"Possibly, but I won't know for sure until I…"
"Get it into your lab, ok please give me a full report, can you at least give us a window of time?"
"Luvidity seems to point to sometime around 3 AM to 5 AM," Lanie responded back. "I can also tell you that he didn't just die from the bullet wounds, he was purposefully tortured."
"Kate, come look at this, we looked into this guy's wallet which we found over to the left of the truck, and while we cannot identify the face, we have heard of this guy before, "Esposito interrupted,
"Who is it?" Kate looked over at her friend,
"It's Henry Jenkins", and with that Kate sucked in a deep breath of disbelief.