A/N: Thanks again to all of you readers, especially those who have offered helpful comments. I am revamping this narrative in response to those inputs; AND some ongoing training I'm receiving, and in preparation for an upcoming post of a whole new AU version of the Castle-Beckett story. But for now, I hope you enjoy the less choppy, plot-line tweaked, and somewhat improved version. We continue in season 2, episode 24: "A Deadly Game" with Castle trying his best to stay on Kate's good side while not giving up on his plan to invite her to the Hamptons.

Disclaimer: I do not own Castle – all credit goes to Andrew Marlow and the writing team for ABC's Castle; my thanks to them for providing a foundation for this little exercise.

3

On the way back to the precinct Castle tried to envision the appropriate moment to urge Kate to at least reconsider a trip with him to his place at the Hamptons for the holiday weekend. He was getting concerned because Kate was still the same mysterious, play it close to the vest Kate, but she had seemed subtly distant over the past few months with an even more marked change over the last couple of weeks. Well, she still enjoyed the attention and thoughtful gestures he bestowed upon her; and she still took the teasing and comments, laced with double entendre, pretty much as she had always done after the first month of her feigned 'I'm horrified' reactions had subsided. Yet something was at a stand-still between them. He had to admit it to himself. He had become very, very fond of Kate Beckett and he sincerely wished that things might progress to the next level. What was it going to take? He wished he knew.

Although Castle wasn't on the NYPD payroll or even on the roster, he had signed a really thick stack of papers, which constituted an agreement between him and the department for access and consulting purposes. The one perk it allowed him was an unreserved parking spot along with the other employees in the back of the 12th precinct. Other than that, he was just a frequent visitor. Upon arriving, he touched the access badge to the sensor and the gate slid open and as he drove through, he noted that the other homicide team members had already arrived so without further delay he made his way to the fourth floor, where the homicide department was located. As the elevator doors slid open, he could see from a distance that Kate was already seated at her desk. She appeared to be just finishing up with something on the computer, which he assumed was a quick entry in the electronic case files. He took the opportunity to slide into the chair beside her desk, the one in which he normally sat, and had called up a photo out of his cell phone's gallery of pictures, which was a view of the ocean from his deck at the Hamptons. She had sensed his presence even before he sat down. She looked up.

"Here's a view from my deck at the Hamptons . . . It doesn't get any better that that," he urged.

He looked up from the screen to study her expression. The proposition had not had the effect he intended. She wasn't mad or disgusted with him, but she had the look of maddening frustration on her face.

"What's wrong?" he sincerely wanted to know.

For the moment, no one else was clustering around her desk as was often the case. Both Ryan and Esposito were busy at their respective desks entering case notes from their observations at the crime scene. Finally, she replied:

"No, nothing's wrong . . . except I can't find anything about FastWater Global Services."

Apparently, the image of a beach holiday had not registered in her mind. She was on a mission. There was no sense in trying to push the idea any further at that moment.

"Oh, FGS . . . on the ID's," Castle sputtered.

"Yeah, the address on the ID said the office was on 1747 West 43rd Street . . ." she began, ". . . I looked, it's in the middle of the Hudson River," she concluded flatly.

"So, I assume you've run his name," Castle followed, trying to sound helpful.

"Yeah, there are about a dozen Caldwell's in the tristate area alone, but none of them match the victim's physical description" she countered.

"What about his fingerprints?" asked Castle, hoping these obvious questions weren't serving to infuriate her.

"Not in our system . . .," she huffed, ". . . Who is this guy?"

For a moment, Kate expected him to launch into another one of his CIA theories. When he didn't, she prodded him.

"You don't happen to know about any secret, underground, CIA facility beneath the Hudson River, do you?" she asked in a hushed tone as if they were being monitored.

He just shrugged. Before he could come up with a counter jibe or some play on words, the desk phone rang. The ID showed it to be Lanie's extension calling to inform Kate that she had found something that might merit their visit to the examination area. She assumed Castle would be in her company. Kate brightened somewhat with the discovery of a new clue, and together they got up and headed for the ME's office.

"Please tell me you've got an ID on this person." Kate called out to Lanie as they entered.

"No, but while I was going over the vic, I found this little baby," was Lanie's reply as she hunched over a bino-microscope. "We know the shooter tried to clean up after himself, but there was a bullet fragment still stuck in his ribs . . . I can't tell you the caliber but see these edges, it has the rifling pattern consistent with a Glock," she concluded proudly.

Lanie had also finished most of the photo documentation of the victim's body. She held up prints of the entry and exit wounds allowing the three of them to study the physical evidence. There were no signs of muzzle burns on the victim's chest; or any other indicators of shots from point-blank range. Castle noted, as did the others, that the shots were very tightly grouped on the victim's chest, even for shots fired from a distance.

"That means he's a very good shot," Castle concluded.

True enough. But since they couldn't guess the distance between the shooter and the victim; nor could they determine anything more about the ammunition from that small fragment without laboratory analysis, an estimate of the bullet's caliber could only be a huge, unsubstantiated guess that might lead the team off in a wrong direction and that explained why Dr. Parish hadn't offered more information.

Castle's initial theory of the victim being the target of a professional assassin didn't sound too farfetched at that point. They thanked Dr. Parish for getting to the examination so quickly and left the examination room. It was getting late in the afternoon prompting Castle to call it a day and head back to his apartment. He was disappointed that Kate hadn't accepted his offer, but at the same time she hadn't said a flat-out 'No', so maybe there was still hope. When he arrived home, he found the two women were still out somewhere, which left him little choice but to settle in and try to make some progress on his manuscript. There were three messages from Gina on his phone. He didn't return the calls. He moped about his office for another fifteen minutes with second thoughts as to whether he should call Gina and come clean with her about the manuscript. His mind drifted once again, but this time it was about the characters in the manuscript. The plot involving them wasn't heading anywhere faster than his plan to get closer to Kate Beckett. He set to work at making some general edits to the previous chapters. He started sketching a revised storyline and just about the time when he became fully engaged with the effort, Martha and Alexis returned, loaded with the results of their last-minute shopping trips. They continued to banter noisily about the upcoming summer experiences right on through dinner. Richard was happy to see them both happy, he mostly listened so as not to disturb the good mood. He continued to worry about how the coed dormitory arrangement was going to work out but said nothing more about the subject. They all stayed up until after midnight pursuing their individual activities.

Sunday dawned without much pressure to get anything done, still, around mid-morning Richard decided to check in with the precinct. The team had already been busy and suggested that he find his way down there to see how things were progressing. One of the things that had given them new energy was the discovery of the car that had been driven by the murder victim. When Castle had called, there was a discussion as to whether it was better to intercept it at the field location or just wait until it arrived at the city impound lot. Kate had insisted that they go to the field as soon as possible. She sent a text to Richard to meet them back at the location near the crime scene. It turned out that the car was parked about two and a half blocks away from the green zone they had visited the previous day. Meanwhile Esposito had tracked down details on the rental car company. At least their offices could be found at a real city address on dry land. Since Esposito still had the key fob in hand, he joined Ryan and Beckett for the trip to the field.

Castle hurriedly readied himself and found his way over to the site, arriving only a few minutes after the homicide team did. The key fob successfully opened the car and its trunk, which belonged to a company called Allied Fleet Services, Inc. The unit in question was on a long-term lease to none other than FGS. Kate wanted to know how they could rent a real car with a real contract to a company that didn't exist.

"Oh, it exists" remarked Esposito, ". . . just not here in NYC. All correspondence goes to a post office box in the Cayman Islands."

Kate was glad that someone had made some progress since the day before; she was inwardly sorry that it hadn't been her. The detectives began a search for more clues. Although this item was related to the murder, they did not use the services of CSU this time around, figuring that lifting finger prints would be time consuming and the results probably useless. There was nothing special about the outside of the vehicle except for obvious damage to the driver's side rear fender and the broken-out tail light. Castle quipped something about the renter needing the collision damage option. The search continued. Kate was looking around the driver's seat while Castle stood by and studied Kate, which was something he did whenever he got the chance. He was really enjoying his vantage point at the moment. Meanwhile Ryan was busy with the trunk. Esposito was checking the rest of the interior. The first item that raised eyebrows was found under the passenger's seat. Esposito extracted a serious gun of some kind, which looked like it might be of military issue. None on the team were familiar with it. Next, Ryan came forward with a banded stack of Euro's; with €5,000 neatly stamped on the band. The curious part was that the stack had just been tossed in the trunk. There was nothing else in there; not a bag or a briefcase was to be found. Finally, among a pair of sunglasses and the rental agreement for the car, a small pen case turned up in the glove box. Esposito handed it to Castle who was nearest at the moment; and then extracted himself from the car. The four of them stood there puzzling as to what kind of business the victim might have been into. Castle, of course, could not resist exploring stuff once he had it in hand, opening the case and finding a gold anodized ball-point pen; and along with it an American flag lapel pin. The pen was somewhat unusual. It had something like perforations around one area of the body, just above the grip. Meanwhile, as the homicide team was documenting their findings, Castle removed the pen and clicked it. Immediately, a recording began playback. Castle tried to explain that he really hadn't done anything. Kate motioned for him to be quiet for a change, so everyone could listen. The recording went:

'Good evening 223, the informant has been identified; allied contact will meet you at 1350 at the café Mulan; wear the pin, use the code phrase "Aren't you Steve's friend?"; response: "No, Steve is my brother"; Good luck 223.'

They stood there in silence hoping to hear more. Suddenly the pen began to emit a strong hiss along with grey smoke. The smoke quickly was followed by hot flames as if the pen had become a firework. Castle dropped it like the hot potato it had become. Kate looked at him with great amusement seeing that Castle was actually experiencing one of his crazy theories.

"Well now we know," she began with a wry expression, "Our vic's a spy."

From the evidence up to that point none could disagree with her. They secured the scene and took the evidence back to the precinct. Castle tagged along behind in his own car as he had the day before.

It was Captain Montgomery's weekend to be on call. A number of issues had been reported already that morning; so in response, he had made his way into the precinct office. He was on hand when Kate and the homicide team returned. Ryan and Esposito immediately went to their desks to begin entering notes for the case; and to get someone in the property room to document the latest items. Esposito took a brief moment to examine the gun before moving on to other things. It looked real enough, but there was something about it that puzzled even him. Castle by now had joined Kate and the two of them went to discuss the latest developments with Captain Montgomery. Kate had bought into the theory that the victim must have been a spy taken out by a professional assassin; maybe even an enemy agent. She inquired of Montgomery as to what they should do next. The captain advised them to just keep doing their jobs – to just treat it like a local homicide until someone from a government office with more authority than theirs told them otherwise. Fair enough they concluded. That meant they didn't have much time before they had to execute their next move. It was already going on 1:00 PM.

Kate asked Ryan and Esposito to keep working on more information regarding FGS. A PO Box in the islands wasn't going to be sufficient. She and Castle got a patrol car and headed across town to the café Mulan. Both the venue and the parking were easy to find. It was just going on 1:45 PM when they entered together. Since the victim was a male, Castle logically donned the lapel pin. The café was very nice. It had the concept of the Panera Bread chain cafes, but this was much fancier. There were about a dozen tables, mostly small round ones; and set for either two or four persons. The settings featured real china and real silverware along with linen table clothes and napkins. The layout and the décor gave it an almost European feeling. There were also a couple of sitting areas with some upholstered wing chairs and coffee tables in between. The two newcomers cast their collective gaze around the room. There were eight couples spread about the various tables. One table held a larger gathering. The sound level was muted. Castle fixed his gaze on a lone woman seated in one of the wing chairs. She was a trim blonde; maybe thirty-five years old. She was dressed formally, with a calf-length green velveteen skirt, pale cream-colored blouse, and matching green jacket. Her hair had been braided and wound into a bun at the back of her head. She had a serious look about her as she sipped tea from a china cup.

"That must be the one," whispered Castle.

"How do you know?" Kate inquired.

"She's the only one in here who's alone," he replied, as if everyone who dealt with spy capers should just know that.

He made his way over to her quietly while Kate remained near the entrance. The woman had not seen them enter and sensing Castle's presence, she looked up. She studied him briefly and saw the lapel pin causing her expression to change from placid to one of confusion crossed with concern. Castle tried the code phrase.

"Aren't you Steve's friend?" he asked as if it were something he did every day.

Upon hearing the line, the woman looked even more concerned; then frowned at him as he casually took a seat in one of the chairs opposite hers. Castle tried to pry further response from her.

"Go away!" she replied with an accent that sounded French.

Castle surmised that it was faked and discretely made his exit.

"That wasn't the one," Castle whispered to Kate when he returned to her side.

"I gathered that" she countered. "I don't know about this," she continued, ". . . I mean this clandestine meeting stuff . . . it all seems so old fashioned, why not just send someone an encrypted email?"

Castle thought about her point for a moment.

"Sometimes you just have to do things off the grid," he stated.

She nodded.

"Speaking of off the grid, I was serious about this weekend," he said casually.

She glanced at him. "You're actually asking me to the Hamptons," she replied.

"Yes. I promise no funny stuff. Just a friendly get away; it will be fun," he said enthusiastically.

"Some of us have to work for a living," she groaned.

"On Memorial Day?"

"Shh – Shh" she interrupted him.

At that moment a rather large man, dressed in a dark suit, was making his entrance alone. He had shaved his head completely bald. He was wearing the same lapel pin as Castle had acquired. They studied each other very briefly. Castle decided to go for it.

"Aren't you Steve's friend?" he asked his new audience.

"No, Steve is my brother," was the response.

'Now what?' Castle asked himself; clearly, he had not thought this out very well. The unidentified man continued with more information.

"The mark is on the move . . . if you can get a shot take it," the man expounded. "Just know that there are other agents in play . . . good luck 223," he concluded as he turned to leave.

"Wait!" pleaded Castle, "I need confirmation . . . my people need confirmation on the target."

Castle adlibbed hoping to either stall the man or get some clarification as to what he had just become a part. Meanwhile Kate was watching carefully as this unfolded. It was a good thing she was paying attention because the unidentified man reacted quickly to Castle's last request revealing that something was not part of the pre-arranged plans between the two. He became violent and demanded to know who Castle was as he pinned him against the wall near the doorway. Kate didn't let it get any further out of hand. She flashed her NYPD badge, identified herself, and informed the man his was under arrest for public misconduct. She handcuffed him but all the while, the man didn't look the least bit alarmed by this development. Kate called for more back-up and another patrol car to escort the man back to the precinct for questioning.

Richard Castle joined Detective Kate Beckett in the interrogation room back at the precinct. Their mystery man was not cooperating. They got his name: Hans Bremel, and that was about it. Kate used her combination of questions, taunts, suppositions, and threats to get him to start talking while Castle helped paint in some of the details. The suspect didn't budge on the issue. He played his position, whatever it was, to the hilt, continuing to look straight at them as he spoke.

"Listen, I've spent days in all the wrong places in Afghanistan with fire ants crawling in my privates . . . so I doubt that your polite but stern questioning is going to get you anywhere . . . so this is how things are going to happen. In about five or ten minutes you're going to receive a phone call from someone much higher than you. They're going to tell you there's been a misunderstanding; and that you will be required to release me. You will, grudgingly, but you will release me nonetheless, and you will watch me walk out of here never to be seen again," he concluded with an air of self-assurance that seemed real.

They concluded the interview on that note and Kate got on the intercom with a request to have two uniforms from holding escort their uncooperative guest to a nice cozy cell until the threatened phone call was received. Meanwhile Ryan and Esposito had been busy. They had either sent photos or had made some rounds and shown the photo of the victim to the managers and desk clerks at numerous local hotels and it had paid off. Someone at the Carter Regency Hotel had recognized him; although he had not checked in as Sean Caldwell. As soon as Kate heard of it she made for the hotel room, with Castle in tow, to see what clues could be found there. From what little information they had it seemed that something big was going down in rather short order and the last thing Kate wanted for the NYPD was more dead bodies on their hands. The hotel manager let them into the room. Their search turned up the expected hotel safe, to which Kate had the hotel manager apply the master override code in order to get at its contents. They found more fake ID's and passports. The search of the victim's personal effects as well as the rest of the hotel room continued, finally turning up a dossier tucked below the bed. It looked official and had been classified as 'Secret'. Kate opened it anyway. She found a photo of some dignitary taken in front of the UN building. According to the dossier, he was the minister of banking for the Republic of Luvania. Kate was starting to get worked up.

"This is big" she whispered, "I've got to call the state department."

"I wouldn't call the state department just yet," Castle responded. "Have you ever heard of the Republic of Luvania?"

He showed her the results of a web search he had just initiated on his cell phone. 'No results for Republic of Luvania' was on the display.

"I did quite a bit of research into world geography for several of my books and I know this is not a mistake," he went on.

"Okay, so then what is all this about? . . . I mean, guns, money, meetings, a hit on a guy from a nonexistent country" Kate went down the list.

"I think I know," said Castle with a wince, "This is a game!"

Hans Bremel had given a tremendous performance back at the precinct but now it was time for him to come clean. They discussed how to get to the bottom of this so-called game on the way back to the office. They had with them all the trappings of the game along with the rest of the victim's personal effects. When they arrived they immediately made their way back to the precinct's holding area. Hans was sharing a cell with a rather large, mean looking, street thug who was being held for unruly conduct until the paperwork was made final.

"Alright Hans, or whatever your name really is . . . it's time you started telling us just who you are and who gave you your instructions; and who put you up to this; otherwise you're going to be staying here a long time," Kate informed him.

He kept his stern look.

"Hey, you're really breaking the fourth wall here aren't you?" he questioned them.

The comment went over Kate's head. Castle had heard that term before, but said nothing except:

"Look, she's a real police officer; and you're in real jail here . . . so if I were you I'd start cooperating."

Hans looked back incredulously. Beckett nodded. Hans took a quick glance over his shoulder at his cellmate. The big guy just grunted agreement as to the situation.

"Hans, there's been no phone call," Kate said flatly.

The gravity of this finally sank in.

"You mean this isn't part of the experience?!" Hans inquired, his voice breaking, revealing his shock mixing with panic.

They nodded a 'No' in unison.

"Oh, it's an experience alright, but it probably won't have the outcome you were expecting," Kate finally replied.

As they were turning to go, Hans finally told them something about a Spy-vacations package. Castle had been right; it was all part of a game. With that hint, Esposito had gathered enough information to confirm the mystery man's story. As Kate and Richard made their way back to the office area he had found a website for the company called Spy Ventures, Inc. The web page advertised high end 'Spy-cations' packages for the thrill seeker. Their claim to fame was authenticity in every detail.

"Take a look at this," exclaimed Esposito, excitedly pointing to the web page on his computer screen as they approached his desk.

The team members looked over his shoulder as he combed across the web page.

"You want to imitate James Bond? . . . They've got a package; You want to participate in an assassination? . . . They've got a package; you want to make your entrance in a helicopter with guns blazing? . . . They've got a package," Esposito went on to enumerate the possibilities.

"I think we've got the point," said Kate. "Now where do we find these people?"

Fortunately for the team, there was an office address on 37th street; however, a call to the number listed only resulted in a voice mail response as to the office being currently closed and the hours of business for Monday through Friday. They considered sending a patrol car by the place just to see if anyone was actually there, but the dispatcher informed them that everyone was out on other calls. Kate decided it was something that could wait until Monday morning since it was already getting late in the day. Meanwhile Hans still had about another eighteen hours to go before he finished his holding cell experience courtesy of the NYPD. Richard Castle bid farewell to the team, but more importantly to Kate, with his usual question.

"Tomorrow?"

Kate replied "Tomorrow."

On his way home Castle kept wondering why Kate always chose to take the holiday weekend shifts at the precinct. He thought back to the past Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's Day and saw the commonality – she was always working.

A/N: This one was really fun to write, especially the dialog. Hope you readers thought so too.