"Anything yet?"
Falling back to the P.I. office hadn't been ideal course of action, but after their interview with Estele and a secondary sweep of the street in front of the precinct, Esposito hadn't been able to find any reason not to return. He didn't like it, though; standing around idle while Ryan and Beckett were dealing with who-knew-what on their own didn't sit well with him. But he conceded that Castle was correct in reasoning that they might be able to speed up the process of getting an ID on the man who had paid off Estele for her parking space.
Although both women looked up at the question, Alexis was the one to answer. "Working on it. Hayley had to do some magic to access the archive for the camera footage, since it was already a week old, but we're going through it now."
"What about the comms?" Castle asked, earning a look of reproach from Hayley.
"We're working as fast as we can on every angle. From both what you've said and looking at traffic from the cell towers, it's obviously an isolated incident – and a purposeful one at that."
Esposito glanced at Castle. "So someone intentionally cut the precinct off?"
Hayley's head bobbed. "That's what it looks like. And given the proximity of your mystery man's van, plus the timing of him needing to park it there today…"
"We didn't see anything in the van that looked like signal-jamming equipment, though. Just fast food garbage and some other crap."
"What about the rest of the street?"
Espo shook his head. "Didn't see anything there, either."
"It's possible he took it inside one of the buildings," Hayley offered. "Wherever he is, I think it's a safe assumption that he has at least something to do with both the lockdown and the communication outage."
Esposito watched Castle's back straighten, his earlier tension returning at the thought. "Then we need to find this guy."
"Yes we do- oh!" Alexis called, looking up with excited eyes. "I think I got him."
Within seconds, the four of them had crowded around Alexis's computer, watching the late-90s model sedan turn a corner. They couldn't see the guy's clothing, but the dent on the front bumper matched the description Estele had given them.
"Can you get a clear view of the plate?"
"Trying. I'm going to cross-check this timestamp with one of the cameras a block or two away, and hopefully… yes!" Alexis clapped her hands together, taking a screenshot of the traffic cam and blowing it up to full screen.
"Now we just need to run the plate, and hopefully we'll get a name," she concluded, glancing in Hayley's direction.
The other woman nudged Esposito out of the way, leaning over her keyboard. "I am already on it."
Unorthodox or not, Hayley's methods were certainly effective. Within a few minutes he and Castle were striding out of the office to head downtown and pay Mr. Arthur Collins a little visit.
Of course, it wasn't that easy; as soon as they entered the engineering firm's masculine, but crisply decorated office, the admin at the front started throwing up roadblocks.
"I'm sorry, Detective, but Mr. Collins isn't here today."
"Would you be able to tell us where he is? It's important that we speak to him as soon as possible."
The woman smiled, but it didn't come close to reaching her eyes. "I'm sorry, I can't give out that kind of information."
"Not even when he'll be back?" Castle asked, lifting an eyebrow. "Is that because you don't want to, or because you don't know?"
Her already insincere smile turned sour. "He has a morning meeting. He'll be back this afternoon. I'm afraid that's all I can tell you." She turned back to her computer, letting the tap of her manicure on the keys signal their dismissal.
Frustration bubbled in Esposito's chest. They were stuck. Hunches and accounts from old ladies aside, there was nothing they could bring to the table to even get a judge involved.
They needed a new plan – fast.
"I have a delivery for Sandra! Delivery for Sandra."
Three heads snapped up, looking to the entrance of the suite to find an impressive display of flowers and balloons preceding a less impressive guy in an ill-fitting grey uniform. Lackluster messenger aside, the admin jumped to her feet, touching her hand to her chest on her way around the desk.
"You're kidding? This is for me?"
"If you're Sandra," the guy responded, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "Then yep."
"I didn't – are you sure this is for me?"
Esposito caught Castle's eye, jerking his head toward the hallway behind the front desk. His friend nodded, needing no further encouragement to take a careful step back, ducking out of sight as soon as Sandra's back was turned.
He waited, watching the admin gush over the "sweet and amazing" gift she had been given, mentally counting down the seconds until she realized that one of the room's occupants had gone missing. With any luck, the bored delivery man's glacial pace with the paperwork would buy them another minute or two, but still his finger hovered over Castle's name, poised to recall him and get the hell out of there.
"Thank you so much, again," Sandra gushed, signaling her willingness to move on with her day.
Esposito twitched, tapping his phone screen at the same time Castle's firm hand landed on his shoulder.
"Think I got something," the writer murmured, talking out of the corner of his mouth. "Let's go."
They covered the room in three short strides, skirting around the display to make a beeline for the elevator.
"Well?" Espo asked once the doors slid closed.
Castle grinned, brandishing a post-it note. "Found his notepad in the garbage, which seemed odd since it was almost completely full. So I did the old pencil trick, and this guy's name popped up: Adam Reynolds."
Esposito frowned. That name... "Wait, let me see that." He snatched the paper from between Castle's fingers, ignoring his grumble about paper cuts. "I know this guy. He works down in Robbery."
With another floor cleared, they had yet to even get a bead on the escaped prisoners.
Detective Hyun was frustrated, that much was readily obvious, and Kyle couldn't say he blamed him. Aggravation, along with the sense that something just wasn't right, had started to creep up his spine, too. The power hadn't been out for that long; even moving at top speeds, the likelihood that anyone had made it out of the building before Captain Beckett ordered the lockdown was slim. Which meant they had to be here, in the building somewhere.
"Another bust," he murmured, looking around the Narcotics floor one last time. Beside him, Krezel swore.
Yeah, he knew the feeling. A murderer was in their precinct somewhere, and they were busy playing hide and seek with him.
"We just have to keep moving," Hyun said, shaking his head. "There's nothing else we can do until we get these guys."
He was right, but that didn't make it feel any better.
"All right, let's go," the detective ordered, motioning for them move into the stairwell. "Keep moving down. Faster we move, the faster we finish."
The others nodded, following him without a word. Kyle watched Hyun and Krezel's heads swivel, checking for trouble both above and below.
"Clear," Krezel murmured, taking the steps with measured strides. Reynolds and Williams did the same, while Kyle took the stairs last.
Glancing behind him, he frowned. His uneasiness hadn't abated. If anything, it had spiked, wrapping itself around his heart with a squeeze.
Something was just... off, but he hadn't managed to put his finger on exactly what it was just yet.
His feet had just touched the bottom step when a shadow above them caught his eye. There was a window higher in the stairwell, but it was a gray day and light just didn't bend that way.
"Hyun," Kyle murmured, lowering his chin once he had the detective's attention. "I think–"
The shadow scrambled away, moving higher up the stairs, their footfalls heavy on the concrete. It was one of the escapees, it had to be.
"Go!" Hyun ordered, pushing past him and leading the group in pursuit. The others scrambled behind him, and Kyle watched as they took the stairs two at a time, wincing at the echo of the detective's shouts for the prisoner to stop.
"I got him!" Krezel announced, pulling past the others. "I got – Williams, what the hell?"
Kyle watched Mark ignore Krezel's call and dart ahead, gaping when the officer wrapped his fingers around the escapee's ankle and pulled.
The prisoner yelped, his eyes widening in shock as he went down. "Hey! Wait you're–"
His head glanced off the step and he slumped, out cold.
"Sorry," Mark grunted when the rest of the party joined him. Kyle made a note of the look Williams and Reynolds shared. "I just knew I could grab him fast."
Krezel continued to glare. "Yeah, and now we have to haul his unconscious ass to Captain Beckett. Are you gonna carry him?"
"Look, at least we got the guy," Mark argued. "We could still be looking."
"Alright, break it up," Hyun ordered, stepping between them. "Hernandez, you stay with these two. Let's assume he was heading upstairs to rendezvous, so head up there. Krezel, you're with me. We have a suspect to deliver to the captain."
Kyle nodded, forcing a deep breath through his lungs. "Yes, sir." He stepped behind Williams and Reynolds, giving the detective and their fellow officer room to hoist the prisoner off the steps. "Let's go."
"You're sure it's him?" Castle asked, following Esposito's quick climb up the steps to Adam Reynolds's apartment. He was getting winded trying to keep up with Espo's pace, but he wasn't about to tell him that.
Since getting the officer's name from Arthur Collins's office, the detective had been moving at warp speed, practically flying to the car and ordering Castle to sit down and hang on as they crossed the island to Queens.
"No, but it'd be a hell of a coincidence for Collins to have another Adam Reynolds's name on a paper in his office the same day the guy arranged to park across from the police station where Adam works."
Castle couldn't disagree with that. He didn't have much reason to, either. Instead, he put his head down and continued up the stairs behind Esposito. Just one more floor to go.
As rundown as the building was, the exterior walls still filtered out an impressive amount of noise from the street below. The interior ones, on the other hand? Not so much. The moment Castle and Esposito stepped up to Adam Reynolds's door, they heard signs of distress: bumping, muffled calls for help, a few choice words that – had they been more intelligible – probably weren't fit for young ears.
Esposito didn't wait to be told to kick the door in, storming into the apartment to clear it without a word or a look back.
"NYPD, anybody in here?"
Another thump answered the question.
"Here," Castle pointed, moving to a closet near the front door. Esposito nodded, taking position as Castle's fingers closed around the handle, turned, and pulled.
Adam Reynolds came tumbling out, his arms and legs bound, a strip of duct tape covering his mouth.
"What the hell?" Esposito squatted, holstering his gun before dragging the man upright. Castle winced at his less than delicate approach to taking the duct tape off, but Reynolds didn't seem to mind.
Reynolds smacked his lips together, clearing his throat and gesturing for Espo to untie his hands and feet. Castle straightened, ducking into the kitchen to get the officer a glass of water.
Once he had soothed his throat, Reynolds took a deep breath. "I was getting ready to crash after my shift last night and this guy knocked on the door. He said he was from the cable company. Service has been on the fritz lately and I didn't know if it was my box, or the wiring, or whatever, so I let him in. He must've drugged me or something, because the next thing I knew, I was waking up in the freaking closet, tied up and tasting duct tape."
Castle shared a look with Esposito before fishing his phone from his pocket and pulling up Arthur Collins's picture.
"Was this your cable guy?"
Reynolds nodded, taking another swig of water. "Yeah, yeah that's the guy."
"Talk about lousy service," Castle said, putting his phone away. "You might want to get your bill prorated for that."
Esposito rolled his eyes. "He wasn't from the cable company, Reynolds. His name's Arthur Collins. Do you know him?"
Reynolds shook his head.
"Know of him?" Esposito tried. Again, Reynolds shook his head.
"I've never seen him before in my life. What's going on?"
Castle sighed, rubbing a hand over his forehead. "He was staking out the precinct for some reason. He rented a parking space across the street, and he may have had a hand in jamming phone and radio signals to cut the precinct off from the outside world."
"What? Why?"
He shook his head. "That we don't know. But before he knocked you out, do you remember anything at all? Him looking around? Showing any interest in your things?"
"You mean like money?"
"Anything," Castle insisted. "Money, an address book, your log book," he trailed off as Reynolds paled. The officer got to his feet, holding onto Espo's arm until the unsteadiness in his legs passed.
Both Castle and Esposito followed him as he stumbled to his bedroom.
"It's gone."
"What is?" Esposito asked, crowding into the doorway beside Castle.
Reynolds shoved a hand through his dark hair, ruffling the already messy strands. "My uniform. My gun, my badge, my log book. All of it is gone."
Not for the first time since her morning began, Beckett found herself pacing. She had been on her feet far too often today, but she hated sitting idle in her office, scanning the frequencies on her walkie-talkie to see if anything worked. Without radios, it was all a guessing game as to what was going on inside her precinct, and without the phones, she had no idea what was happening outside, either. Although she assumed Esposito had contacted Castle after hearing from 1PP, she had no way of calling her husband to assure him that she was fine, and no way of bringing in any other backup. She couldn't even send an email at the moment since they had yet to regain internet access.
In the meantime, Ryan was running a background check on Officer Parker, trying to prove that their hunch was right, and the attack on her precinct was nothing but an elaborate murder. She would like to help him, but as Captain, her priority was to ensure the safety of her people. And she was starting to lose her patience.
"How's it coming, Vikram?" she asked on her third pass by the tech room, startling the analyst upright. His fingers never faltered, flying over the keyboard, even as he attempted to explain to her what he was doing.
"I think I've found a way to jam the jammer – effectively cancel it out – until we can find whatever's actually causing the signal blockage and remove it."
Beckett nodded. "So we would be able to contact our people, inside and outside?" she summarized.
"With any luck," Vikram confirmed. "I know I can do the radios – that's just a matter of finding the right frequency. It might take a few minutes extra to get the phones, though."
"We need both," she murmured, looking over her shoulder, hoping their secondary search team had returned with more information – or even better, the remaining prisoners and her people who were still unreachable. "So whatever you need to do, do it."
"Should just be another minute," he said, his voice taking on that far away quality that told her he'd slipped back into the zone without either of them noticing. That was fine; whatever got the work done faster.
She was about to slip from the room instead of continuing to stare at his temple when he slapped his hands on the desk.
"Done. Radios should be back up. Give it a try while I work on the phone side."
Unclipping the radio from her belt, Beckett hailed her people. "It's Beckett, report."
Releasing the button, she waited a beat only to hear silence in return. "Vikram, it's not–"
"Try again," he insisted, his fingers still flying over the keyboard. "Nobody turned their radios off, right?"
"They better not have," she muttered, depressing the button and barking for an update from anyone in range.
Within seconds, the radio in her hand sprang to life with people reporting in. Mentally, she went over the duty roster, making a note of those still unaccounted for after the roll call: Officers Hernandez and Krezel, and Detective Hyun. Hernandez had gotten off shift just prior to the blackout, so it was possible he had made it out before the lockdown, but given that nobody remembered seeing him leave, she was working on the assumption that he was still in the building.
Given that two levels were clear and the team had been moving onto a third some time ago, she didn't hesitate to redirect them. "We've still got two prisoners missing and two, possibly three of our own people who aren't answering their radios. Find them."
Pushing her hair off her forehead, Beckett glanced at Vikram. "Okay, what about the phones?"
He tapped a few keys before offering her a triumphant smile. "We should be back in business. Try it."
Thanking him, she spun on her heel, making a beeline for her office. She had a list half a mile long of people she needed to get in contact with immediately, but the first call was going to her husband.