Proof of my heart
Post ep one-shot for 6.17 In the Belly of the Beast.
Captain Gates eased her spectacles off her nose and glanced out of her office window into the bullpen. It was quiet, as it had been for a few days until yesterday's spectacular debacle. A couple of detectives were at their desks on the other side of the mesh screen and Detective Ryan was just disappearing into the break room with a couple of mugs – washing up at the end of the day she presumed. Detective Esposito had already left a few minutes earlier.
She rose and moved to the evidence boxes stacked on a trolley ready to be taken down to Archives. The top box represented Beckett's last case – Gates flinched mentally at that thought – no, not her last case, her latest case. It should never have been hers, should never have involved an off duty homicide detective on a case for narcotics. A case they hadn't properly researched except to know they needed a Russian speaker so that was how Beckett's name had come up.
Gates lifted off the lid, the evidence log lay on top, she skimmed down it. Item 247 - Handwritten note by Detective Beckett, (personal). Found in air vent, Bedroom 2.
During her debriefing Beckett had taken the opportunity, whilst Captain Fowler had left to make a phone call, to ask Captain Gates if she knew someone in the CSU squad currently combing the mansion for evidence. There was an item she had hidden which needed to be retrieved but Beckett didn't want it passed around a bunch of CSU technicians. Gates had called the team leader whom she knew slightly and he had promised to personally conduct the search. It was duly found behind the grill of the air vent as Beckett had described. Her blood was on it and the grill but the rest of the house had been wiped clean. What little evidence there was could not be linked back to Vulcan Simmons. The basement had been hosed down and washed with bleach, the few blood samples remaining in the drain were badly degraded and probably from multiple victims. CSU could not find evidence to prove Beckett had been tortured there, let alone who had carried it out.
Gates lifted out the crime scene photos and several evidence bags. Numbers 245, 246, and 248. Wait. She checked the log once more; the note should be in bag 247. There was no bag 247. She checked the log again, it had been signed off by Detective Ryan and she knew how thorough he was.
She also knew him.
She swung around; Detective Ryan was back by his desk just lifting his coat from the back of his chair.
"Detective Ryan," he jumped at the sound of her voice so close.
"Sir?"
"When evidence goes missing in my precinct, that is on me. When a detective under my command is sent into danger, that is on me. When a civilian consultant almost loses his fiancée, that is on me. Some things just don't belong in the evidence archives and that is on me. This one is not on you, Detective."
She held out her hand.
"I Sir. I..." She stared him down.
"Yes Captain," he reached into his inside jacket pocket and placed a plastic evidence bag on her palm.
"Go home to your family Ryan, they are your responsibility. I'll see this gets where it's meant to be."
Detective Ryan drew himself up, he'd been intimidated by his new Captain when she first arrived and he didn't mind admitting it but she'd treated them all fairly, left them to do their jobs for the most part and best of all allowed the team to stay together. He looked her in the eye.
"Thank you, Sir" he said sincerely.
Gates nodded, she spoke cop too, always had. She came from a family of cops. This 'Thank you' meant, thank you for taking care of this, it meant thank you for getting my boss back, it meant thank you for being my Captain.
"Good night, Kevin," she said quietly. Ryan blinked, she'd never used his first name before, somehow he didn't fear her anymore, but she had his respect.
Kate lay sprawled on the couch. She was covered by a warm blanket over a NYPD hoodie and sweats. Her feet were snug in pale blue Angora wool socks with non slip pads on the sole – a present from Alexis – but unusually that was the only part of her that felt warm.
Her head throbbed from the bruise over her eye, now a mess of blue and black and ugly green swelling under the grazed flesh. She was due more painkillers but needed to take them with food and Castle was still preparing dinner. She wasn't sure how much she could eat, her throat still raw and her chest still sore from the cold water burning in her lungs. She shivered forcing down the memory.
She'd had an appointment with Dr Burke earlier and talked it all through but it didn't feel the same. There wasn't the same cathartic release spilling out her worries to him now that she could talk to Castle.
But she was worried that she was imposing a too heavy burden on her fiancé. She had asked him to go and talk to Dr Burke as well. He seemed to be suffering as much as she was from his self-imposed guilt at not being able to help her and from his fears that the future they both looked forward too so much had so nearly been obliterated.
She'd never written a truer word than when she put down her feelings on paper for him. She'd never spoken a truer word than when she told him "Babe I wasn't alone. When they were interrogating me the only thing that kept me going was thinking about you."
She had refused to give in. It would've been so easy to plead for her life; to plead for her death but Kate wanted her life, her husband. She longed for their future and their children so she'd hung on, desperately hoping and believing her team would come. But she hadn't expected Elena.
There was a knock at the door. Kate swung her legs off the couch readying herself to get up but the multiple bruises and abrasions across her body elicited a groan as she tried to stand.
She'd taken quite a beating from being thrown into the van, kicked and punched in the basement and dragged through the woods, her wrists cut and bleeding from the over tight zip ties.
Castle was already half way to the door but reacted instantly at the sound, "Kate?"
"I'm all right. Get the door, are you expecting anyone?" she croaked, her voice rasping as she dragged air through her damaged larynx.
The Doctors had checked her out after Gates had demanded the paramedics took her to hospital but painkillers and rest was all they could prescribe. Gates had insisted she take at least a week's medical leave but the joy and freedom she'd felt just yesterday on a rare free day off felt like another universe, another time.
Castle had fed her chicken soup to sooth her throat and warm her up but she didn't like feeling like an invalid. It reminded her too much of the long road to recovery after shed been shot.
She just wanted to get on with her life but how long that could go on for she didn't know.
She knew that a reckoning with Bracken was coming; a reckoning with the man who might one day be President - and she was just a cop. She didn't have the power but somehow she would find the strength when the time came, because she would not be alone.
Bracken had to remove all those who knew about his activities. She didn't think Vulcan Simmons would survive once his usefulness was over. He knew too much of the scale and source of the funding for Bracken's political ambition. As soon as the operation was completed Elena would be sent after him, and someone would be sent after her. Bracken had no friends except those he bought. Beckett had friends who would give their lives for her if they could, if she let them.
The knock sounded again and Castle turned back, finally reaching and opening the door.
"Captain Gates!" His voice registered surprise and concern.
Gates stepped forward. "Tonight it's just Vicky," she told him briefly. "I'm sorry to interrupt your evening but I need to give something back to Beckett, to Kate," she amended quickly.
Castle waved her in.
"How are you, Kate?" she asked, seeing her best detective holding onto the back of the couch for support, a ghastly bruise showing against her too pale skin.
"I'm fine, Sir" Kate responded.
"No, you're not, and it's Vicky. Once again, I'm so sorry for what happened. "
Kate shook her head, "Not your fault Sir, Vicky." She stumbled on her boss's name.
She'd had to sooth all their guilt complexes on her return to the precinct and through the debrief that had gone on through the night. She knew how it felt to be helpless, she'd felt the same when Alexis was taken to Paris.
"CSU found what you asked for, the team leader retrieved it himself. He's very discreet."
She placed an envelope in Beckett's hand. "I'm afraid the evidence bag got lost," she smiled briefly. "The bag itself was evidence. You might want to know I had to get that off Ryan, you have a loyal team, Kate, loyal friends."
Kate nodded, she knew what was in the envelope and that Gates, Vicky, had broken several rules, several procedures to bring it to her.
"Thank you," she said, her voice cracking, "and you need to know you have a loyal team and friends too, Sir." Kate offered, remembering one of their earliest conversations when Gates had promised not to drag Montgomery's name through the dirt.
Gates acknowledged the statement with a wry smile; she knew there was more to this case than Kate had let on. She wasn't a Captain of detectives for nothing. She just hoped that when it came to the showdown, Beckett would come to her because she'd do anything within her power, use any resources at her command to help resolve it.
She turned back to the door. "I have a home to go to. Goodnight Kate, goodnight Mr... Babe," she said, hearing Kate's shrill of laughter as the door closed behind her. She'd known as soon as she'd inadvertently seen the wording on the note that she just couldn't resist the quip. The look of stupefaction on Castle's face had been so worth it!