Father

Captain Montgomery made a quick stop at the Jersey Precinct before he set off to see
Beckett's father. On the drive he reflected on the day's events.

Jersey PD had called the Commissioner and the Commissioner had called him. He had
listened with shocked disbelief as he was told of their deaths. He couldn't remember
most of their conversation. In fact, he couldn't remember speaking at all. He did
remember hanging up the phone and looking out his door at Beckett's desk and at
the two empty chairs that would never be filled again. He had to close his door from
the view so that his anger and grief wouldn't keep him from doing his job, the job of
ripping the hearts out of his friends and co-workers just outside the door.

He understood that his people took risks in the field everyday. But this…this was cruel
and unfair. Cruel to the pair who worked so hard and risked so much to help others
find justice and closure, only to receive this as their reward. He would never understand
how life could be so unfair to them and to everyone they touched. He would feel this
loss forever. They all would. The two had burned like the sun when they were together.
He may have been the boss, but they were the light to which everyone was drawn. They
were the center of a universe they never knew existed. And now, those that they'd left
behind would slowly drift apart.

He pulled to the curb in front of a well kept but dated seventies ranch house nestled in
a suburb among other similar looking homes. It was hard for him to imagine the string
of events that had occurred in Kate's life to have brought her to this day. By all rights,
this idyllic start to her childhood should have guaranteed her happy domesticity, a
husband and children. Instead, she was struck by life and its cruelties a formidable age
and that one tragic incident had set in motion the truck that had killed her.

He turned off the car. Gathering his courage one last time, he made his way to the front
door. He rang the doorbell and waited.

The door opened and he was startled when he saw Kate's eyes staring back at him.
She had her father's eyes. He hadn't expected that. It left him at a loss for words.

"Can I help you?" Jim Beckett queried of the strange man who stood on his porch looking
confused.

"Excuse me…I was just…," he fumbled in his coat pocket for his badge. He held it up and
spoke coherently this time.

"Mr. Beckett, I'm Captain Montgomery… I work with your daughter at the 12th precinct.
I need to speak with you. May I come inside?"

Her father stood gripping both the door and door jamb. He lowered his gaze to the ground
at the captain's feet and it remained there for some time. Then with a sudden intake of
breath he backed into the hallway and motioned him inside. He led the way to a small dining
room and pulled a chair out for the captain.

"Have a seat."

He remained standing. "Sir, I…."

"I know what you're going to say," he interrupted.

"You do?" Captain Montgomery was confused. There was supposed to be a media blackout,
at least for a few more hours.

"I've been expecting this day ever since she graduated from the academy," He pulled out his
own chair and sat down with a resigned sigh. The captain took the offered seat and together
they sat in silence.

Jim Beckett had numbed himself to the inevitability of death, his own and even his daughters.
He had thought about it every day since his wife Johanna had died. Hell, he even welcomed
his own at times, but Kate had seen him through that. He could feel the numbness trying to
turn into pain as he asked his question.

"What happened?"

Montgomery met her father's bluntness with his own.

"They were involved in an accident on the Jersey turnpike this afternoon. An eighteen wheeler
jack-knifed in front of their car and they couldn't stop in time. They were killed instantly."

"They?"

"She and Richard Castle were both killed."

"The writer…she always talked fondly of him during her visits with me. I had hopes for the
two of them."

"We all did," the captain responded.

"Gone now," her father said flatly.

He pushed his chair away from the table and walked to a large china cabinet on the
opposite wall. He reached for another chair and pulled it over. Standing on the chair, he
felt behind the decorative molding that ran along the top of the hutch. When he pulled his
hand back he was holding a long cylindrical container with a metal top. He dusted the
container off with his shirt, placed it on the table and pried off the lid. Reaching inside he
pulled out a bottle of Jack Daniels. He turned back to the hutch and removed two short
cocktail glasses from inside and set them next to the bottle.

"She never found this one," he laughed bitterly.

He pulled the chair he had been standing on back around and sat down and eyed the
amber liquid. He slid the glass and the bottle towards the captain.

"Have one," he offered. "I'm sure you could use one. You look like hell,"

Montgomery grabbed the bottle and the glass and pulled them closer before spoke.
There was nothing more he could do here. He needed to leave. He needed to leave
and let this man start grieving the loss of his daughter. That would never happen as
long as he remained.

"Kate was like a daughter to me," he confessed as he stood up. "I've watched her
grow these past few years into the woman she was meant to be. If you want to know
her as I did, you can ask me any time day or night," he pulled a card from his wallet and
slid it across the table, "… call me."

He grabbed the bottle of Jack Daniels from the table and replaced it with the watch that
he'd been holding. He headed for the door before the man could object. As he closed the
front door, he never thought he would be relieved to hear someone crying. Back in the car,
Montgomery took her father up on the drink that was offered.