Last Chapter: Waking up from a very sleepless night, Beckett analyses her breaking and entering and finds another message left by Castle on her answering machine. Back at the office, she learns Internal Affairs have an eye on her on a missing documents case. Her precinct accesses were blocked and her office searched after IA's passage.
CHAPTER SEVEN
"Give me the prints report Espo, will you? Twenty print matches, how is it even possible? I doubt the Wall Street Bull has that much prints on it in a day."
"That's because they put barricades around it." Esposito handed her the lab files of the Murdock case when they got to her office desk later that day. Beckett almost had forgot about the open case they were working before going to Castle's place and reporting his disappearance. Almost a week before, a body was found outside a downtown club, renown for being a biker's hang out. The man was found face down in a garbage can. The case file murmured "reckoning" from every angle, but as always, she refused to close any doors prematurely. She heard in the past week from colleges whispering behind her back that she was different since Castle was gone, less smiling. Although she found this case rather boring, it was no excuse to wrap this case hastily or let the tracks become cold. This man had lived and even if he had no family and no story, what-so-ever, he deserved justice. Just as much as her mother would. Just as much as every other homicide case touching their desks.
She put down her tea cup while it was infusing and still too hot to handled. She opened the files she had in hand.
Lab results for prints was twenty-five pages long. She skipped the introduction and summary of the file in the first few pages and got to the numerous result pages. They were separated in two columns. The left-hand column showed the print sample from the crime scene and the one to the right showed the match found in the database. Over each match, was the name of the individual and a short description of where the print was originally found. For some, pictures were attached. For several others, though, the prints were matched to unidentified prints from previous cases in the system. These prints will simply add up until the individual to whom it belong is caught and supplied his known prints to the data bank. When that'll happen —if it does, — the District Attorney's office could be charging the arrestee with more than what he came for.
"It's nineteen matches. What's with you?" said Esposito noticing her edginess like a red wine stain on a white shirt.
"Nothing."
"Nineteen, and that was just matches between the garbage can and clothing. They rejected the others prints taken from the can because they were either too partial or too random. Those," he tapped the file in her hands, "are from people that touched the can and the man's clothing. With a little luck, one of them did it."
"Maybe they all did it."
"The Murdock autopsy is scheduled for tomorrow morning. Hopefully it'll give us something to narrow it down even more."
"Tomorrow morning? Why did Gates authorized our week-end overtime with this case, if we have nothing to work with?"
"Nothing to work with? Let's bring those guys in, and shake them a bit, see what spills out. Are you sure you are okay? I get that you have a lot going on but the Beckett I know," he made a short pause to accentuate his point, "she would never talk like this."
With her head down, Beckett closed the manila file and handed it back to him.
She sensed it coming and kept avoided his stare. However, being the good partner he was, he didn't say a word. It was a cop thing; you needed to talk, there were shrinks for that. A good partner was to help you stand up, not help you understand why you could not.
She appreciated it. After a few awkward seconds of silence she spoke: "What's Ryan working on?" she nodded toward the blue eyed detective in the bullpen, working his office phone. She grabbed her tea cup from the counter, next to the espresso machine. It was now over-infused for her taste. She dropped the tea pouch in the garbage near the door as they walked out of the break room together.
"Not exactly sure," he answered, "by the way, I asked VICE for everything they had on Murdock and those names," again he made a gestured reference to the print reports now in his hands, "but their fax is down, they'll send it in as soon as they can."
Beckett apologized as she couldn't help but to yawn in his face.
"Heard about Castle's hidden message. Look, I just wanted to let you know that—"
"Please, Javi. Don't."
"Would you just let me finish?" he paused a second to make sure she would let him continue, "I was checking Castle call logs from last week. I wanted to understand the order of events."
She was certain he had noticed the numerous phone calls of a few seconds long left by Castle all week; the hung-ups. However, he had the professionalism not to talk about those. They were non-significant phone calls to the case, anyway. 'The case', the one they were all working without any official authorization to do so, she corrected. Once they found Castle in the hospital, still alive, this case slipped from their hands to the tenth precinct, into Detective Stephen Malcolm's robbery division. Well, at the very least, she was immensely glad this case didn't truly end in the Homicide division — of whatever precinct! She didn't know how she would have had handled it. Still, she was certain he would have liked the irony of the mystery author ending in the one mystery nobody could solve: instead of writing the perfect crime, he would have become the one. Yes, Castle would have certainly loved it, apart from the fact that he would have played the dead body in the story. Esposito kept talking.
"He called you on your cellphone two minutes before calling 911. He then called you home and your cellphone again. Looks like he had something important to say. Did he leave a message, by any chance?"
"Yeah, he left one on my answering machine, at home. It was another warning, but nothing hidden."
He paused. Beckett wondered if he was going to ask about it. He didn't. Instead he moved on to the next subject on his mental list.
"I actually have something better." He moved a step closer, "His building's cameras showed he left at 6:54AM that morning. The cams don't show from which door he came back, but the cam in his hallway shows him opening his apartment door at 7PM."
"I'll have to see that tape!"
"Thought you'd say that, it's in the meeting room."
"If Castle got inside using an exit door, wouldn't that trigger an alarm?"
"Normally yes, but, guess what, the old man said the system was down."
"That's his Superintendent you're calling the 'old man'?"
He nodded once and continued: "According to him, the alarms were brought down manually for a few hours for maintenance on the building's exit doors. They shut it down so it wouldn't bother the tenants."
"Well, were they down around the time Castle was shot?"
"The old man didn't know, but suppose so."
"We need to speak to the men that worked on the doors!"
Again, Esposito nodded down.
"Agreed. And if you're wondering how Castle figured out the alarms were—"
"Bet the tenants were informed of the work being done on the doors."
"Eh… Yeah. You sorta ruined it here."
"Sorry. We need to speak to everyone again, especially those who had the apartments around the exits door. Also, I want the name of everybody that knew the alarm was down."
"Sure." Said Esposito.
"Also, get Ryan or someone else and get me Castle's financial records and complete phone logs, I want to know what he did for the last two weeks."
"No problem. Also, Detective Malcolm called. He said he needs to talk to you."
"Why. What did he want?"
"Didn't say. But. Hey, I was going out grab a coffee, wanna come?"
"No, I'm gonna sit this one out, thanks."
"You sure, I heard this place is very loved by maintenance guys working exit doors."
"You mean, one of the men's gonna show up?"
"Positive. So, you want coffee now?"
"How did you?"
"I'll explain on the way. Come on."
He started walking and she followed without considering if she wanted coffee or not. Whether, this guy was going to show up or have reliable information for them, at least she now had something to sharpen her claws on.
As they walked towards the elevator, passing by the main office room, Esposito gestured 'You, Coffee?' to his crime partner, still on the phone. Detective Kevin Ryan raised his forefinger.
"What? When?" He said to the phone "Alright, alright, I'll tell her. Yes, I'm doing it right now. Thanks." He stood up before he even hung up. The awkward expression on his face didn't change, "Beckett, where's your phone?"
"It's right,—" she drowned her hands in her pockets, but she couldn't find it.
"I usually always have it. I must have left it—" As she tried to remember the last time she saw it, the image of her checking her voicemails in hope of having any left by Castle appeared. She then remembered having placed it to charge in the living room because its batteries were dead. She, however, did not remembered picking it up this morning when she left. She had called the phone company with her residential phone, in the kitchen, then she left with her cellphone still in the living room. Damn, she swore quietly.
"Okay, okay. Never mind," Ryan stopped her, "the hospital has been trying to reach you."
Suddenly, all her troubles flew miles away, she felt a wave of excitement rushing up her spine to the bottom of her skull. He was awake, she thought. "It's about Castle, " said Ryan, "They lost him."
She choked quietly as the weight of the World stepped on top of her shaky shoulders.
Heart in her mouth, she had to sit down. Quick or she would fall. The chair beside her office desk, the one Castle used to sit on every day for the last four years, was the one to catch her. For mere seconds, her ears replayed Kevin Ryan's last words and her eyes stared blankly at the empty space before them. It was seconds to the real world but long, lazy minutes to her.
To be continued.
What an awful way to finish a chapter, I know. I'm sorry. In the mean time (mean is the word) any theories? Thank you all for your precious reviews, and MEGA thanks to my Beta ;-)