WOW you guys are crazy amazing. My e-mail exploded with alerts and reviews and it really made my day, so THANKS for the support!
I am aware of my problem with tenses, pointing them out only makes me try to fix them, so go right ahead :)
This is my first real shot at a case fic, so continuity is obviously important. Again, anything you catch that I may not have, please feel free to point it out :)
Alright, I'm done,
Enjoy -
"Where's the coffee?"
Castle slowed down and his eyes widened. "What?"
"The coffee, Castle, you went to get coffee." Kate sat back in her chair and gave him an amusing and curious look.
He looked around the precinct and grasped at straws. He hadn't actually gone to get coffee after his talk with Lanie. "Uh, they were, hm, closed. Shop was closed."
Kate raised an eyebrow. She didn't really care that he had disappeared, she was used to his strange ways by now, but it was funny as hell to see him squirm like he was at this moment.
"Really? At," she checked her watch. "two in the afternoon?" She looked back up at his wide eyes and forced herself not to grin.
"Well, yeah, it was all closed up and dark and the sign said closed." he regained his cocky attitude and Kate just smirked. "You want to arrest me again for breaking and entering, didn't think you wanted to play with your handcuffs with me." he wiggled his eyebrows but she didn't crack.
"So, there's only one coffee place in New York? There are at least half a dozen between here and the block down the street. All of them closed too, Castle?" she said slyly.
"Yes?" the answer was more of a question and Kate lost her battle with herself and grinned.
"Okay," she said and turned back to the cold case in front of her. She waited a beat and then, "How was your talk with Lanie?"
Castle shook his head and folded into his chair. "You're mean," he accused her.
"You started it."
"How did you know?" he asked incredulously.
"You do realize Lanie is my best friend? Of course she's going to tell me when you come to see her without me. What did you talk about?"
"What are you working on?" he changed the subject, silently thanking Lanie for not spilling the beans. He smiled when Kate smirked into her paperwork.
"Financial records for Charles and Morgan Cahill. Montgomery said until we catch a case, we can work on this." Kate slid a thin pile of paper towards Castle and kept flipping through her own little stack.
"Looks fairly normal," Castle commented, sifting through his sheets. "No obscenely large amounts of money, no debts outstanding, nothing suspicious coming in or out,"
Kate made an agreement sound in her throat and continued reading.
Castle whistled. "Wait a minute, do they have kids?"
Kate looked up and searched through her desk for a sheet of paper. "Yeah, twin girls. Why?"
Castle raised an eyebrow at his paper. "Looks like they're in college now; jeez, look how expensive this is!" Kate shook her head with a small smile and went back to work. She had to admit, to herself only of course, that she did smile a lot more when he was around.
"Why does this woman think we need to look over this case again?" Castle asked after a few minutes of silence.
Kate sighed. "She thinks maybe it wasn't so random. Or something. I don't know."
Castle's ears perked up at this. He put down his pile and leaned over a bit. "You don't know? Well, didn't you ask her?"
Kate wouldn't look at him. "Not exactly,"
"Detective Kate Beckett didn't ask any questions," Castle deadpanned, looking over her face. It was starting to tighten up and close off.
"No,"
"Why not?"
"Castle,"
"What, was she rude about it?"
"No,"
"Angry, did she threaten you? Force you into it?"
"Stop it,"
"We're looking over this case because she's the killer looking for glory? Oh, that would be a great story,"
"Castle," this time it was firm and she turned to look at him with an angry face. "Stop talking now."
Seeing she'd obviously had enough, he mimed zipping his lips and went back to the last of his stack. The air between them was tense and Kate's head bent over her work again, the only sound from either of them being the shuffling of pages.
"Okay, don't bite my head off," Castle said quickly 20 minutes later. "But these guys look clean."
Kate sighed and rubbed her forehead. "I know. Same with the autopsy. And the lead investigator, Frank Hobbes, retired last year with commendations. He was a good cop."
"Should we talk to him?" Castle asked.
Kate looked down at her watch. "Day's not over yet."
"Captain said you could work this until you got a call, right? Just take your phone,"
She bit her lip and considered. "Alright,"
Within an hour they were sitting with retired Detective Frank Hobbes in a diner down the street from the precinct with the file spread out between them.
"Thanks for coming Detective," Kate said, sliding the autopsy report towards him.
"Not a problem, this was one of my last cases," Frank Hobbes was older, with grey hair and wrinkled hands and laugh lines around his eyes and mouth. He was fit, though, with solid body mass that fit just barely into the booth, but he had kind brown eyes.
"Worked this and one more before taking desk jobs for the last year, retired just over a year ago now," he said, picking up the report.
"What do you remember about the case?" Castle asked from his spot next to Kate.
"I remember it was pretty open and shut, except that we never caught the bastard. Charles Cahill was in the convenience store with the cashier, a Samantha Robbins I think, when the guy came in, pulled a gun and told Robbins to empty the register. Cahill stood out of the way, Robbins emptied the register, and the guy went to go over the counter for something. Cahill rushed him and the guy fired then ran."
"CSU report says there was no trace evidence, no fingerprints or anything." Kate said.
"I take it you watched the surveillance tape?" both nodded. "The guy wore gloves, not uncommon in a robbery, and his skin was fully covered, so even in the scuffle between him and Cahill, there was nothing to scratch. The mask covered his head so if he wasn't bald, any hair was trapped by the fabric."
"So it was thought out? The guy was a pro?" Castle asked. Kate looked over at him and he shrugged.
"Nah, more like lucky. This guy was nervous or he wouldn't have let Cahill tackle him. Probably some dumb kid who's seen too many movies." Hobbes waved off. "He was no pro,"
"What about Cahill's wallet?" Kate asked suddenly. Hobbes frowned.
"What wallet?"
"Cahill left his wallet on the counter by the register when the guy started waving the gun around. Why didn't the kid take it?" Castle seemed to read Kate's mind.
"Well, credit cards can be traced. He probably was thinking he didn't want to get caught with a stolen credit card from the guy he just pointed a gun at," Hobbes answered, watching the two across from him.
"But you said he wasn't a pro," Castle said back.
"And if he wasn't a pro, he wouldn't have thought that far ahead, he would have just grabbed it when the opportunity presented itself," Kate cut in on Castle's sentence.
"And we would have caught him using the cards somewhere and this really would have been open and closed but he left it because-,"
"Because he either knew they could be traced or he saw Cahill's ID and figured out who he was."
"Do you two do this often?" Hobbes asked in amusement.
"What did Cahill do for a living?" Kate asked, ignoring Hobbes' comment.
"He worked at the airport, shipping and receiving. He checked incoming packages before passing them along to security."
"Smuggling ring? Drugs, people, exotic animals, the possibilities are endless," Castle said, sounding a little too excited.
Kate was still looking at Hobbes. "Did anyone interview the staff at the airport? Was he a good employee, ever get into any trouble?"
"We checked; he was a model employee. He caught drugs being smuggled in, a couple fruits and vegetables, illegal merchandise a couple times, even a little puppy once. He was good at his job. Coworkers loved him." Hobbes said, leaning back in the booth.
"Look, this was just a convenience store robbery; guy was in the wrong place at the wrong time and paid for it. It sucks, but there it is." he finished.
Kate's cell phone buzzed in her pocket and she answered it while Castle gathered up the pages of the file. "Beckett," she listened as Esposito talked on the other end of the line. "Got it, 20 minutes,"
"Body?" Castle said.
"Body. Thanks for meeting us Detective Hobbes." Kate held out her hand to shake Hobbes' and he stood at the same time.
"Please, I'm retired, it's Frank."
"Well it was nice to meet you Frank," Castle shook the man's hand as well, and they left the diner and headed to the crime scene.
It was getting close to 4:30 by the time Kate pulled up to the curb of the crime scene, Castle spinning wild theories about the masked thief from the convenience store the whole way.
The scene was between two buildings, one a night club and the other a small casino, on the way out of the city towards the suburbs. The alley itself was wider than normal, with two dumpsters on each wall for the establishments. There were smaller garbage cans and the back opened up onto a parallel street with an empty lot.
"Alright," Kate said as she and Castle came upon Lanie, Ryan and Esposito around the victim, uniforms standing around to keep bystanders from getting too close. "What've we got?"
The victim was covered by a sheet, but there was a dried pool of blood collected off to one side, opposite to where Lanie knelt, and they could see a hand peeking from beneath the covering.
The fingernails were painted emerald green.
"Woman, between 18 and 25 is my guess, blunt force trauma to the back of the skull and two shots to the chest. There are some older bruises on her upper arms too," Lanie said, pulling the sheet back so Kate could see the woman's face.
"Cause of death?"
"You know the drill honey, gotta get her back to the morgue first," Lanie said before moving to recover the woman.
Kate's hand on her arm shoulder stopped her. The detective kneeled down and tilted her head to one side.
"Castle, does she look familiar to you?"
Castle came closer and peered over Kate's shoulder. "A little,"
Lanie looked at the two of them and raised her eyebrows. "You two communing with the dead now?"
Kate shook her head and stood back up, forcing Castle to stumble away from her. "Ryan, any luck with a wallet?"
Ryan held up a cell phone with a cracked screen in a plastic baggie. "This is all we found so far. There's an old pipe towards the other end of the alley that Esposito is bagging and CSU is going over the area now."
"No purse?"
"Not yet, no witnesses either. We talked to the club owner and the casino manager and they say the alley between the two is dark, no streetlights. Even if the employees taking out the garbage had stayed out long enough, they wouldn't be able to see anything,"
"Alright, let's get her back to the morgue and round up the usual suspects. Let's see if we can fingerprint her and run her through the system, canvas the surrounding buildings and have CSU check the dumpsters for a wallet or ID. When we get back to the precinct, see if tech can get into that cell phone." Kate said.
Castle stayed quiet on the car ride back. He could feel Kate tensing up and he knew this case had the potential to be a hard one. They'd gotten back to the precinct after talking to the security guards at both the club and casino, the security at the building across from the alley (a small law firm) and checking out the empty lot at the other end of the alley.
It was well past 7 and they were all hungry and Esposito and Ryan were more than a little dirty after dumpster diving with CSU. And it was all for nothing.
Lanie had been able to have more luck and called Kate and Castle down to the morgue.
"What's up Lanie?" Kate greeted, pushing through the doors with Castle close on her heels.
"Well, I've narrowed down time of death to between 6pm and midnight last night. Cause was definitely the GSWs; one was a through and through to the left lung and the other nicked her heart. Death occurred within minutes."
"So the bullet that hit her heart you've got and there's one still in that alley?" Kate asked. She tried to ignore the fact that this young woman was shot while she was going to dinner with her father.
Lanie held up a pair of pliers with a squashed looking bullet clenched between the tips. ".45 caliber. Not too close, but not a long shot either."
"What about the blunt force trauma?" Kate asked.
"The pipe the boys brought back seems to be consistent and there is debris in the wound on the back of her head. I'm thinking it's rust from the pipes, but we'll have to wait for the test results."
"Was the blow enough to knock her out?" Castle asked. He really hoped it was. This girl wasn't much older than Alexis.
"Unfortunately no, it would have disoriented her, made her dizzy and unable to fight back. She would have had trouble walking or running away from the attacker. If the bullets didn't kill her, the bleeding in her brain would have," Lanie said sadly, looking down at the victim.
"Any hits on her prints yet?" Kate asked. She felt something coiling in her stomach.
"Not yet, but there might be something in the morning."
"Thanks Lanie, anything else?"
"Nothing under her fingernails or in her mouth, but there was a piece of paper in her pocket and a movie stub in her back pocket." Lanie held out a baggie with the papers inside.
The piece of paper had handwritten writing on it. 10pm, UES loc. $50
The ticket stub was for a 6:15 movie showing of 'Wizard of Oz' at a revival theatre.
"Thanks," Kate said and handed the baggie back. She and Castle left the morgue and headed for the elevator.
"So, what are we thinking?" he asked as they stepped inside.
Kate sighed and leaned back against the wall of the elevator. Her dad was dating, his friend's (she decided to refuse to say girlfriend) husband's murder may not be as cut and dry as they thought and now this girl's murder. Not to mention, for some reason she was familiar to her and Castle.
"I'm thinking this is going to be a long case," she finally settled on.
Castle looked over at her carefully and reached out a hand to warmly envelop hers. She didn't move her hand away and she didn't look at him. He held his breath as the doors slid closed and they started to move.
He released a silent sigh of relief when her soft fingers closed slowly around his and squeezed gently. He grinned and didn't say a word.
When the doors slid open to the bullpen again, Kate dropped his hand and walked out, face burning and a grin fighting it's way to her face. He was being serious about this!
She had a boyfriend. Josh. Josh. Motorcycle and doctor and wonderful Josh. But Josh was in South America. He was always working or out with friends or on call or in a different country.
Castle was always here.
To be fair, Josh was doing good work helping others and saving lives. And she was busy a lot too, being a cop. And when they were together, he was pretty close to perfect.
Except Castle always made time for her, even just to bug her or send her a stupid text.
Oh no.
"So, what's for dinner?" Castle's voice broke through her thoughts as they sat at her desk. She mentally shook herself and looked over at him.
"What?"
"Dinner, it's like 7:30 and I haven't eaten since that Chinese food at lunch." he repeated and continued. She looked distracted.
"Oh, uh, you can head home Castle, I'm going to stay here and go through missing person's reports." Kate turned on her computer as Castle stood. She was surprised he was listening to her until she felt her jacket being lifted off the back of her chair.
"Castle," she sighed and started.
"Nope, no amount of needling or threatening my life and body parts is changing my mind. You are coming over to dinner and you are not going to burn yourself out. Let's go detective, chop chop," he held out her coat.
"Come on Castle, it's still early." Kate tried. But her stomach betrayed her and let out an almighty rumble. She sighed and stood at his satisfied smirk.
"Fine. But if you-,"
"There will be no funny business, Beckett, I promise. Now hurry up, my stomach is starting to eat itself."
Kate turned her computer off again and pushed her chair back. She rolled her eyes when he wiggled her coat around. "Hurry up," he said with a small smile.
She shook her head and stepped into the coat.
As promised, there had been no funny business and Kate had to admit that she had fun. They'd gotten home in time to enjoy leftovers of Alexis' lasagna and the start of an old black and white movie. Castle had been the perfect gentleman and Kate had sat on one side of Alexis while he had been on the other.
The movie had finished by 11 and Alexis went off to bed, surprising Kate with a small hug goodnight and then Castle had waited with her by the curb for her cab.
She'd fallen asleep with a smile on her face and Josh as far from her thoughts as they could be.
The next morning there was a call from Jim Beckett waiting on Kate's phone at her desk. She called him back on and tapped her fingers while she waited for him to pick up.
"Hello?"
"Hey dad, it's me,"
"Katie, I'm glad you called. How's Charlie Cahill's case?"
Kate sighed internally and rubbed a hand across her forehead. "It looks clean dad, we're just going through everything again. It could take a while." There was no way she wanted to tell her father that the robber may have planned the death of Charles Cahill.
"Alright, just checking in. Morgan was asking on the phone last night."
Morgan. She didn't want to hear about Morgan. Kate was very aware of the fact she sounded like an obnoxious teenager, but at the moment she couldn't summon the energy to care.
"Well, I'm looking into it."
Jim could tell from his side of the phone that his daughter sounded uncomfortable with Morgan.
"Okay, so how was your day yesterday? I didn't hear from you after you left dinner," he changed the topic and practically felt the relief come through the phone line.
"Oh, just, Castle being Castle I guess. And we caught another case today, a young woman." Kate said. She didn't like talking to her dad about cases because she knew it made him uneasy, her being so close to so much death all the time. But she wasn't about to talk about Morgan.
"I see. And when do I get to meet this Castle?"
Kate was a little thrown by that; usually he told her to be careful, be safe, asked her if she really still wanted to be a cop.
"What?"
"Castle, Rick Castle; your partner. You always talk about him and I've met Javier and Kevin and Lanie, so when do I meet Rick?"
Kate blinked and frowned a little before answering. "Um, I don't know?" Suddenly he had her feeling like Rick was the boyfriend she was hiding at 17 years old.
"Really, Katie? You say he's saved your life and he's a good friend and you don't know when I get to meet him?" she could tell he was teasing her now and a smile slid onto her lips.
"We'll see, maybe after this case," she settled on instead of teasing back. "We're still on for lunch this weekend?"
Twice a week when they had time, that was the new rule they were trying to follow. They decided they didn't see each other enough and they loved each other. Sometimes it was awkward, those few moments they ran out of things to say, but it was getting easier to joke around and just be happy together.
"Of course, we're looking forward to it."
Kate heard the little slip. "We?"
She heard her dad sigh. "Uh, yeah. Morgan thought that dinner the other night was too short, that she made a bad first impression. I was meaning to call and ask if it was alright if she joined us,"
Kate squeezed her eyes shut. She'd met her dad for lunch on Monday this week, yesterday had been spent in confusion and paperwork and Wednesday wasn't looking so hot anymore either what with the new murder. Would she figure everything out by Saturday?
"Sure, dad, why not." It came out of her mouth before she could stop it. Castle was getting off the elevator down the hall and he met her eyes immediately and smiled. Some of the tension eased off her shoulders.
"Really? Well alright then, I have to go, but you be careful Katie."
"I will dad," she said as Castle sat down.
"Hello Mr. Beckett!" Castle called across the small distance. Kate shot him a glare but the effect was lessened by the tiny smile at the corners of her mouth.
"Yes, dad, that was Castle." Kate's cheeks flushed and Castle was more than a little intrigued as to what her father had said.
When she hung up, Castle just watched her with a wide grin. "He likes me already doesn't he?"
Kate shook her head. "Like your ego needs any more stroking," she shot back.
"Ah, so he does like me!"
"I didn't say that!"
"It was implied." Castle said smugly.
"Oh look, mom and dad are bickering!" Ryan's voice floated over from his desk and Esposito chuckled along with his partner.
Kate rolled her eyes and grabbed the coffee Castle held out for her. "Did you guys get anything else from the canvas?"
The boys stood and came across to their sparse murder board and took turns writing as they spoke.
"Witness from across the street at the law firm says he saw a couple people come and go from that alley on Monday night. Mostly teens and party goers, a few in uniform from the casino and one that may just give us a lead." Esposito was writing on the board and Ryan took over next.
"A Jason Reyes says he was working late, around 9:30, when a loud car pulled up across the street. He says its not so unusual, because of the casino and the club, but he usually looks because he's into cars. This one was a muscle car, modified, with bright blue running boards and a green stripe across the back. Two people got out and went into the alley and only one got back in before the car pulled away," Ryan said, holding out the man's contact info to Beckett.
"Okay, so whoever was in that car was with our vic, they got out and went into the alley, he kills her and drives away." Kate summarized, glancing down at the paper. She and Castle came up together and leaned against her desk to see the murder board.
"Which would mean our victim knew her killer. She was in the car with him. Did Jason Reyes say anything about how the two people getting out of the car were acting?" Castle asked from his spot next to Kate.
"No, but he did say that one of them was walking kind of funny, like they were drunk or wearing high heels," Esposito said, looking through his notes.
"So, maybe she was drugged and coerced?" Kate suggested, looking up at their information.
"I can say with 99.9% confidence that the CIA aren't involved in this," Castle said under his breath. Kate heard him and chuckled, nudged him with her elbow. He grinned back at her but sobered when Esposito turned to look at them with a raised eyebrow.
"Alright, so we have a witness that says a car pulled up and two people got out. They went into the alley and only one got back into the car. The vic was found with blunt force trauma and two shots to the chest. Lanie puts the TOD between 6pm and midnight and Reyes says 9:30, so we're within that window."
"We need a name," Esposito said after a few moments of silence.
As if on cue, Kate's phone rang and it was Lanie. "Let's go Castle,"
Ryan and Esposito went back to the board and running a background check on Jason Reyes while Kate and Castle headed for the elevator and the morgue.
When they entered, Castle was tempted to see if Kate would hold his hand again, but didn't dare try. He held his tongue against the comment about hand-holding he desperately wanted to say.
"Okay Lanie, what've you got?"
"Good morning to you too honey," Lanie teased with a small smile.
Kate rolled her eyes and spoke again. "Good morning Lanie, you look gorgeous today. What've you got?"
Lanie shrugged. "That was better. I've got an ID on your vic here." she handed Kate a file and the detective flipped it open.
In the file there was a picture of their vic without the physical aspects of death in an alley. She was darker skinned with big brown eyes and glasses. She had freckles and dimples and was smiling a little. It was a student ID card from NYU.
The girl's driver's license picture was attached as well and her glasses were gone and her smile was gone and she looked too much like the body in front of her for Kate's taste. It was the name that made her gasp.
Is it too early to ask who you think the victim is?
Side note, I'm not from New York, I'm not even from the US, so you won't find many street names or anything like that. Hopefully it still makes sense!
Reviews are love!
:)
