Triumphant: Chapter 6
DISCLAIMER: Most of these characters are not mine at all, but they are memorable. Thank you, Mr. Marlowe. The others? Yeah, they're mine
Tuesday Morning - October 28, 2014, 11:50 a.m., Still at One Police Plaza in New York City
"What are you doing here?" Castle asks the silver-haired man, who has developed this uncanny knack for showing up out of the blue – and continually knocking Richard Castle's life out of orbit.
"Your welcome, Richard," Jackson Hunt smiles at his son.
"For what?" Castle asks. He's on edge, still trying to slowly morph out of the role he has just executed flawlessly back in the conference room – much to the surprise of both he and his wife.
"I assume there is a reason you are here beyond just keeping tabs on Richard," Kate intervenes, her voice decidedly softer than that of her husband.
"In fact, there is Kate," Hunt tells her. "But first, we need to get out of here – and not through the front door downstairs, as you have likely planned."
"How did you know that?" Castle asks, almost regretting the question immediately.
"Because it's what I would have done," he smiles, "under normal circumstances. But trust me, right now, we are operating under anything but normal circumstances."
"Why are we getting off on the second floor?" Kate asks, now remembering that Hunt had pressed the button for that floor.
"Because if I am correct, there is a world-class assassin somewhere out there – waiting for you and Richard to depart this building."
He sees the sudden fear that clouds the detective's eyes – very quickly – before she throws the mask back on. He nods, impressed. He understands – it is the natural reaction of someone who has been hit by a sniper. That feeling – that memory – you can suppress it, you can hide it. But you can never get rid of it. It is always there – lurking, lingering, just waiting for the right – or wrong – occasion to resurface.
Like now.
The door opens on the second floor, and Hunt quickly disembarks, now tossing his janitorial garb aside. Beneath it – he wears black slacks and a black turtleneck.
"Let's go," he tells them, holding the door open. "We're running out of time."
Reluctantly, Castle and Kate exit the elevator car, following Jackson Hunt down the hallway to the stairwell once again.
"Who is waiting for us," Castle asks as they begin to walk faster, more briskly.
"Later, son," Hunt tells them both. "I promise – first of all, let's get out of here in one piece."
They move quickly down the stairs, as Hunt glances down at his watch. He counts off another few seconds out loud, as they exit the stairwell on the first floor. He holds his arm out, causing both Castle and Kate to stop behind them. Holding them in place, he glances down the hallway toward the elevator, and sees the contingent of press gathered there. Glancing at his watch one final time, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small remote and depresses the small red button.
The explosion in the empty utility closet next across from the elevator sends sheetrock and splinters of wood careening into the foyer. The members of the media gathered there scatter – some falling down protectively, others running for the front doors, but all screaming for their lives.
"Shit, Dad!" Castle hisses, gazing at the carnage down the hall.
"Time for that later, too," Hunt tells him, with a smirk. "For now, move it!" he tells them as he now pushes his son toward the side door that he and the detective had entered through earlier. They are dashing into the street as an unmarked black car quickly speeds up toward the curb, within fifty feet or so of the front doors just down the sidewalk.
"In, quickly!" he tells the couple, who comply without thinking now, falling into the back seat, both now looking to put distance between themselves and whatever the hell is happening back there. Hunt, however, stands at the curb next to the front passenger door, gazing toward the front door of the building. Reaching into his pants pocket, he finds the second remote, and without pulling it out of the pocket, he hits a button. The door they just exited through blows outward, this explosion somewhat larger than the first.
The plaza is in pure pandemonium now, with uniformed officers running toward the building, looking to help anyone injured in the multiple blasts.
Jackson Hunt, however, isn't concerned with the police. He is scanning the crowd, looking for that one person – a woman – who he knows will not be panicking. She will be similarly scanning the crowd.
He finds her eyes a few seconds later, at the same instant she finds his. She is as beautiful as her reputation – the blonde wig be damned. He has seen her in enough disguises over the past day to pick her out of virtually any crowd – now that he knows what to be looking for.
She slowly lifts an impressive knife to her forehead, offering him a salute, which he returns with a small smile and a nod of his head before sliding into the front seat.
"Get us out of here, Coop!" Hunts exclaims with a little more volume than he intended. He's not an idiot. He knows he will have to face her soon enough. But he wants distance between them when that happens. He doesn't know of many – if any – agents that could take this woman in close quarters. And the forty or so feet between them right now is far from enough.
The car screams away from the curb, drawing a few sets of eyes – but for the most part, is ignored by the mass of humanity trying to escape what certainly is another terror attack on the city.
"Okay, I'm a reasonable guy," Castle yells from the back seat, "but just what in the FUCK is going on here!?" he asks. 'You just killed people back there! Innocent people."
"That's doubtful, Richard," Hunt tells him with such calm that both Castle and Kate have to work to control the sudden trembling in their hands.
"I was very careful, very precise with the settings," he tells them. "Just enough to get us out of there. There may be a few bloody cuts, a few broken bones. But all in all . . ."
"Acceptable," Major Terrance Cooper remarks as he puts the car through calisthenics the vehicle was not designed for, scooting in and out of traffic.
"What?" Kate exclaims, but both men in the front seat ignore her.
"Think we're tagged?" Major Cooper asks Hunt.
"I'd be disappointed in her if we aren't," Hunt remarks. We can check the exterior once we get to the airport."
"Airport?" Castle asks, now for the first time truly alarmed. For the first time, he seriously considers the possibility that – like months ago during his absence – his father is responsible for the current carnage that has been assaulting the city for the past few days.
Hunt doesn't respond. Instead, he gazes out the window, lost in his own thoughts as he watches the river outside, as the car speeds up the FDR.
"Three minutes," Cooper tells the car at large.
"You're sure it's still here?" Hunt asks, a smile on his face.
"Please," the major replies with a roll of the eyes.
Minutes later, the car screams to a stop at the New York Skyports on the lower East River – a seaplane base that does casual tourist excursions, usually from May through September.
"We're here," Hunt tells his backseat passengers.
"Let's go," Cooper tells them, urging them along.
"Now wait just a minute," Kate tries to say, but she is dragged along by Cooper.
"Detective – if we meant you harm, you'd be dead," he tells her. "But I promise you, that's a possibility if you don't get a move on, and I mean right now."
"She's coming," Hunt tells them casually, as he stares at a yellow cab barreling toward them.
"You're right, we were tagged," Cooper agrees. "No other way she could have kept up with us."
"Who is this she that you're talking about?" Kate asks, as she moves toward the seaplane waiting in the water.
"Kate, if you don't shut up and move, you're going to find that the answer to that question has a finality about it!" Hunt tells her, forcefully. Something about his voice stirs both Kate and Castle into action. It is the first time she has heard or seen this look in Jackson Hunt.
It almost looks like . . . fear.
The foursome move quickly toward the aerial watercraft and begin to climb inside as the cab pulls to a stop and a woman dressed in all black disembarks. She clears the fence and is in a full sprint down the pier as the seaplane begins to pull away from the pier's edge, heading out into the river's open waters.
"Holy shit!" Richard Castle exclaims as he watches the woman in black stop at the pier's edge, her eyes focused on their craft through . . . binoculars?
"What's she doing?" Castle asks aloud.
"Getting information about this plane, so she can track us," Hunt replies evenly.
"How?" Kate asks.
"You don't want to know, detective," Major Cooper replies loudly so he can be heard, as he executes a climb and banking maneuver, pushing the craft toward the north.
"Where are we going?" Castle asks, holding Kate's hand tightly.
"Where we are going isn't your concern Richard," Hunt tells him. "Where you and Kate are going, however, is about fifteen or so minutes north of here."
"Where are you going to land this bucket?" Castle asks, glancing out the window at the waters below.
"Who said anything about landing?" Hunts says, as he turns and offers a smile at the couple behind him. "I have good news, and bad news. The good news is that we are taking you just across the border into Connecticut, where you are going to jump."
"What do you mean we are going to jump?" an alarmed Castle asks, his eyes growing larger. "That's not good news," he argues. "Jump where?"
"Out of this plane," the major replies, chuckling and exchanging a smile with Hunt.
"What's wrong with this plane?" Castle asks, now exchanging looks with Kate.
"Nothing is wrong with this plane, son," his father replies. "You just need to get out of here."
"I'm not jumping out of a perfectly good airplane," Castle argues, folding his arms across his chest. Even Kate finds it difficult to hold back a snicker.
"Detective," Hunts says, glancing back at Kate. "Kate . . . get him out of here. She can't know where we drop you off. That means no landing."
"Wait a second," Castle exclaims, now focusing on his wife, who sits next to him with a smile growing on her face.
"You know how to jump out of an airplane?" he asks, incredulously.
"Yes babe," she replies, hesitantly, before continuing. "I learned years ago . . . back at Stanford."
"Crap, Kate, don't you think that's something you tell someone before you marry them?" he asks, exasperated. "I'm a detective, I build walls around myself that you may need to knock down, I jump out of planes. What's so damn hard about –"
"So you two really did get married?" Hunt asks, smiling as he changes the subject.
"As a matter of fact, we did," his son replies defiantly. "Wanted to invite you. But oh, that's right. We had no freaking idea where you were or how to reach you."
"I sense a bit of hostility, Richard," Hunt remarks, still smiling.
Role playing at the police department aside, Richard Castle is definitely out of his element. Forced out of a building as it explodes, being chased by an assassin . . . and now sky-diving out of a perfectly good plane.
"Can we do this another time guys?" Kate finally asks, interrupting the bantering. "Why do we need to jump?" she asks, focusing on Hunt.
"Because she – the woman you saw on the pier – probably knows where this plane is right now," Hunt tells her. "And she is likely tracking where it goes. Jumping out will allow you and Richard to stay off her radar . . . and that way, even I won't know where you are."
"But you said just across the state line," Kate interjects, her mind now beginning to think more like the CIA agent's. "Why do we need to jump there?"
"Because the car I have stashed for the two of you is coming up in about ten minutes, after Coop circles around for a bit," he replies. "Hit the ground and don't tell me where you are going. That way, I can't give anything away if . . ."
He doesn't need to finish the sentence. At least not for Kate.
Castle, however, is another matter.
"What do you mean 'so you can't give anything away?' No one knows you or how to find you. Who is after us that has you so spooked?"
Hunt laughs aloud, as does Major Terrance Cooper. Even Kate cannot stifle her laugh this time.
"Spooked?" Hunts chuckles. "Good one, son."
He then turns to Kate.
"You know I'm right, detective," Hunt tells her. "I need you and Richard out of this plane. You'll land in a field and there will be a barn house at your drop site. The car is there. Use it to go wherever it is you and Richard need to go."
She stares at the CIA operative for a few seconds before making up her mind.
"He's right, babe," she tells her husband, as a look of relief crosses Jackson Hunt's face. "This way no one knows where we go. If he is this concerned, then I think we'd better listen to him."
"Tell me Kate, exactly when was it that you become the Jackson Hunt Fan Club president?" he asks. She knows the stress he is under. She knows that he has it inside him to do this. It's just he continues to try to suppress this new, unknown . . . and frightening side of himself.
"Just trust me, babe," she tells him, as she reaches across for the parachute that sits next to her husband. That's when she notices it.
"There's only one chute back here," she yells toward the men in the front seat.
"That's the bad news I was telling you about," Hunt admits. "You're going to have to buddy jump."
"What!?" Castle exclaims, looking back and forth between Kate and Jackson Hunt. And the damn major isn't even trying to conceal his laughter now.
Kate extracts the chute apparatus and finds the additional harness – and nods. Quickly, she strips off her coat, and begins to strap the chute on, ignoring her husband's whining as she hooks him up into the harness. It's made more difficult because of the size of the small seaplane. Finally hooked up, she begins whispering to him.
"You always said you wanted to join the mile high club, babe," she purrs into his ear.
"Inside the plane!" he yells back. "Inside the plane!"
"Thirty seconds, Kate," she hears Hunt yell back toward them.
"Thank you, Jackson," she tells him – and she means it. The more distance they have put between them and the city, the more she realizes that had he not shown up when he did, either Rick or she, herself, would likely be bleeding out at the police headquarters. She hadn't put it together until just this minute, as she was working to put the chute on.
"She's Russian, isn't she?" she asks Hunt, who cannot hide the surprise on his face.
"Yes, she is, Kate," he replies. "How did you –"
"Her name is Elena Markov," she replies. I met her . . . a while ago, under . . . very different circumstances." The look in his eyes is the confirmation she needs.
Just uttering her name, as her mind finally allows her to see the woman more clearly as she recalls the departure from the police headquarters, the blonde woman who stood out, calm amongst the panic, and the fearsome figure chasing them down the pier. She's Bracken's assassin. And that means . . .
"The pieces starting to fall into place for you, Kate?" Hunt asks her, giving her a knowing glance.
"Most definitely," she hisses, her voice hard again. It's an edge she's going to need for this jump.
"Good – keep that in mind," he tells her. "We're here."
Without another word, Kate reaches behind her, and opens the back door to the plane, and pulls Castle, who is already attached to her, even closer.
"Do you really trust me, Rick?" she whispers into his ear. Something about the seriousness of her tone focuses him into the moment.
"I do . . . with my life," he tells her.
"Good," she replies. "Then trust me now."
She suddenly falls backward out of the plane, pulling him with her, attached in his harness. His screams as he exits the plane – almost as high pitched as the plane's engine, leave the two remaining inhabitants of the plane laughing as they bank away, heading south.
The air is cold, and rushing hard at them as Kate turns her body and stabilizes them. She's saying something in his ear that he cannot hear because of his own screaming. She glances down, finding the open field below and pulls her shoot. They are launched upward quickly, which only intensifies the screaming from the large man attached.
Seconds later, as they begin to fly more gently through the air, he begins to calm down, as she begins to guide them toward the open field. She sees the barn house in the distance. So far, so good – everything is as Hunt had told them.
For a moment, she thinks about Elena Markov again. She immediately understands Hunt's concerns, without hesitation. Yes, Elena saved her life that night in the woods, but the woman also ruthlessly dispatched one of Vulcan Simmons' thugs so easily, so effortlessly – it was nothing short of both exhilarating and haunting at the same time.
If that is who they are up against, then they are truly in trouble. Kate has no illusions about her own abilities. While she doesn't really fear anyone – at the same time she is no idiot. She knows – and has known for a long time since that night in the woods – that there was a woman out there that she has no chance of defeating, if it ever came to that. She would probably never even see the woman coming.
Simmons' thug certainly didn't.
So yeah, as crazy as it sounded, Hunt's plan probably is the safest option for them right now. That is her final thought as she steers them to as soft a spot as she figures is available, and the two land in a nice jog before tumbling over together.
Seconds later, she hears the small chuckle from her husband.
"Okay, that was actually pretty cool," he tells her, his smile large and radiant.
"Oh I don't know, I couldn't tell from all of the screaming," she smiles in return.
"Yeah, he will probably decide we need to do this every weekend now," she laments to herself with a smile. She helps him extract themselves from the apparatus, and they bring it to the barn house with them. No need leaving it there. Just in case.
They find the vehicle exactly as Hunt had promised – unlocked with the keys in the glove compartment. They open the doors, ready to get in when Kate glances over at Castle, standing at the passenger door.
"Call Alexis, babe," she tells him.
"Now?" he asks. "Why do we –"
"Just trust me," she tells him. Again, something about her voice causes him to stifle any humorous sarcasm that begs to burst free. Seconds later, he hears his daughter answer.
"Hey pumpkin, it's me," he tells her, and suddenly, Kate reaches across and takes the phone away from him. She has walked around the car to his side without him noticing.
"Hi Alexis," she greets the young woman, putting her finger up to her mouth to Castle, and shaking her head.
"We need a big – and I do mean big and important favor, Alexis," she tells her. "We need you to pick us up at the train station in Stamford. Don't ask any questions just yet, Alexis – not until you are on your way. It will take you . . . maybe an hour, hour and a half. And Alexis . . . grab your father's gun. Don't leave without it."
The entire conversation causes Castle's eyebrows to raise to almost comical expressions. Kate explains seconds later as she hangs up.
"We have a lot to thank your father for," she begins, "but I don't trust him."
"Can't say that I violently disagree," he tells her.
Good, this will make this conversation easier.
"He said one of the benefits of us jumping here, and getting this car was to stay off the radar . . . even from him," she reminds him.
"And?" he asks.
"And I don't believe him," she tells him. "He's your father, I know, but he has proven time and time again that before anything else . . . even fatherhood . . . he is an agent. And as an agent, it doesn't make sense to allow you to leave and not keep tabs on you."
"Wait a second," he begins to argue. "He probably knew where we were all along. How would he know to be at 1PP today if he weren't already –"
"You receiving a subpoena to appear at police headquarters today was common, public news, thanks to the media," she reminds him.
They are quiet for a few minutes, standing by the car in the barn house, when he suddenly speaks up again.
"Let's check the car," he tells her.
"Forget the car, babe," she tells him. "We aren't going very far. That's why I had Alexis come to meet us down here. There is no way he will figure out which direction we have gone, when he comes back to find the car just a few miles away in Stamford."
He nods his head, both appreciatively and with sadness. For yet the umpteenth time, his father has proven to be trustingly untrustworthy. It is something that – someday – he is not going to be surprised by, or disappointed by. Sadly, that day is not today.
Kate sees the forlorn look on his face, and she knows where his head is. In some ways, she wishes that Castle's father had never come back into his life. Then again, had he not, then Alexis would probably be dead. She brushes the thought away, knowing that whatever happens, whatever pain the man manages to bring – it is worth it if for no other reason than Alexis.
Suddenly she begins to strip down, pulling the sweater over her head. She quickly inspects the sweater, before allowing it to drop the ground. She unbuttons her pants, and begins to slide them off, then realizes he is standing – paralyzed – next to her.
"Get undressed," she tells him. "For all we know, he may have bugged our clothes. We should check them out."
He can't contain the smile that crosses his face as he considers the woman he has loved for years. A familiar raised eyebrow warns her what is coming next.
"You know, Mrs. Castle," he begins, "if you wanted to see me naked in all my glory, all you had to do was ask. Although I do appreciate you coming up with a decent espionage excuse just as much."
"Are you going to talk, or are you going to get naked?" she asks, still smiling. "There was a time when all I would have had to do was –"
"Say no more," he promises her, and begins peeling clothes off at breakneck speed.
She glances at her watch, and smiles.
"Alexis won't be here for at least an hour. Probably closer to an hour and a half," she says, with a seductive smile on her lips as she releases her bra and closes the distance between them.