Nine
They rode to her apartment building in silence. The drive was tedious due to the rush-hour traffic so Castle remained focus on the pushy lane changers and constant stop-and-go flow of cars and trucks. He parked in front of her building and walked with her through the entrance. She said nothing to stop him, merely allowed him to follow her all the way up and inside her apartment. Upon entering, his eyes darted towards her desk in the back where the Jasmine Key book still sat on the corner and he thought about how different their day had begun.
"Can I get you something?" he asked her softly. "Dinner? A stiff drink?" he said, trying to keep it light.
She shook her head as she toed off her heels and flopped down on the couch, expression just as blank as ever.
He understood that she needed her space, yet at the same time the case was at a delicate and critical point, so he at least needed to try to get some information from her. He approached the couch and sat on the coffee table in front of it so that he faced her. He leaned forward, resting his elbows on his thighs and said, "I think it's time for you to tell me about your father's case."
Her head didn't move, but her eyes turned in his direction. "Isn't there a case file for you to read?"
He swallowed and dropped his chin to his chest, looking down at the floor. Of course there was a case file and he had yet to read it, but he didn't want to read what the detective's from oh-three though about the case; he wanted to hear it from her. "Is that what you want me to do?" he challenged, looking up to her from underneath his brow line.
Using her fists against the couch cushions she pushed herself upright and brought her knees up, crossing her lower legs over one another and resting her forearms on her inner thighs. She picked at her right thumbnail for a few moments before an easy smile crossed her face and she looked up at him. "I was always daddy's little girl—even before my mom passed. I had him wrapped around my little fingers. All I had to do was go up to him and smile and say, 'Daddy please? I love you.' And he'd cave just like that," she said snapping her fingers. Castle smiled at her.
"After my mom was gone we were even closer. Yeah, we had some rough patches during my teen years because he wanted me to have a curfew and I, of course, didn't but…we were close. We were always close. I went to college in Boston, but I still took the train home one weekend a month to visit him and of course I came home for holidays and breaks.
"My dad, he…he was kind of an insomniac. He used to work third shift managing one of those all-night gas stations, but after my mom he didn't want me to be alone in the apartment all night, especially when I was only twelve, so he got a new job—regular hours, but he was so used to being up all night and sleeping all day that he couldn't really sleep at night. At least, not for very long.
"Whenever he was really having trouble he would always go for a walk. Not just a little walk, either—he'd walk for blocks. Blocks. In the middle of the night. We lived up on 23rd and he usually kept close by, but I knew sometimes he'd wander further.
"I was, ah," she cleared her throat and ran her fingers through her hair. "I was just finishing up my junior year of school and I was so excited because I'd gotten an internship at the Times for that summer. I must have been up against hundreds of applicants, but I got it and I was just so excited to start. I'd packed up some of my stuff the weekend before and taken it back home on the train so that I only had two suitcases to take with me after my last exam.
"I finished my exam and I called my dad to tell him I'd be home for dinner. He didn't answer and that wasn't unusual because he was at work, but I didn't think anything of it. When…when I got home, there was a detective here waiting for me. Smith, Detective Smith."
When she paused her story, Castle waited. He knew how hard it was for her, so he didn't say anything; he just let her take her time. He could see the emotion on her face as she relived what he knew to be one of the worst days of her life.
"He, uh, he told me to sit down. He told me that he was with the NYPD and that something had happened. He…he told me that my father's b-body had been found in an alley. That is wallet had been taken and that they were able to ID him because he was wearing one of his shirts from work. He…he was stabbed t-three times in the abdomen and he-he died."
She looked up to Castle, tears steadily falling from her eyes as her bottom lip trembled. "He died," she told him. "And he was all I had left."
"Kate," he exhaled, moving from his position on the coffee table to the seat cushion beside her. He put one of his arms around her shoulders and she fell willingly against him, covering her face with her hands, but pressing into his shoulder with her forehead. "I'm sorry," Castle whispered in to the top of her head. "I'm so sorry."
He let her cry against him as he rubbed her back smoothly. He said nothing, but his mind was spinning. This wasn't a coincidence. This could not be a coincidence. Her father was killed around the exact same time as victim two. Victim two's body had been taken from the murder site, hidden for approximately twenty-four hours, and dumped at another location. Ten years later, a victim appears in the alley where her father's body was discovered. A victim killed by the same person as victim two. It wasn't a coincidence.
After several minutes, Kate's sobs began to quiet and her breathing grew steadier. Another minute after that, she stood and excused herself to the bathroom. When she returned, her eyes were still rimmed with red, but her cheeks were dry. She'd pulled her hair back into a ponytail and changed from a button-down shirt into a pullover sweatshirt. She sat back down beside him and examined his face. "Tell me what you're thinking," she said. When he looked over at her she added, "I know you have a theory; I can see it on your face."
He nodded and rotated his body a quarter turn so his shoulder was pressed in to the back of the couch and he was facing her. "Victim two was a change in the pattern. Her body wasn't found where she was killed. In fact, it wasn't found when she was killed either. Why? What if the killer was interrupted? Mid-kill or dumping the body what if someone interrupted him? What if your father interrupted him? Your father was a witness—a witness he couldn't risk—so he killed your father and then…"
Castle sighed and dropped his hands to his lap. "I don't know… Possibly the killer realize that if the bodies were found together the police would look for a connection, so he took the girl's body with him."
"But why not just dump it somewhere else that night? Why hold on to it?" Kate challenged.
Castle shook his head. "I don't know, but since he went back to the original pattern it may not matter."
"Sure it does," she said. "What did he do with the body? It makes sense not to leave the bodies in the alley together, because that would be an obvious connection, but why not just carry it a few blocks away? Where did he even take it—hide it—for twenty four hours? Why risk being caught carrying a dead body through the streets twice? How would you even accomplish that? These were full grown women, all well over a hundred pounds."
Castle skimmed his fingers over his chin and considered her words. She was asking all good questions—all questions he was thinking himself. Unfortunately, he didn't have answers. "We need to look closely at these three murders and see if we can figure it out. There has to be a connection. And you realize we're going to have to re-open your father's murder case." As soon as he spoke, she bit down on her bottom lip and turned away from him, staring blankly across her apartment. After a minute he asked, "Kate?"
"No I know," she said, looking back to him. "It's just…all these years I thought it was a random mugging, you know? The crime was never solved and that bothered me for a while but ultimately I made my peace with it because I didn't have a choice. Sometimes a random crime is just a random crime. I had no other choice but to believe it was random and there never would be any closure, but… But I…I never saw this coming."
Neither did I, he thought to himself. Scooting closer to her he said softly, "Think of it this way: this guy, Kate, when we catch this guy we'll have cau-"
"No," she cut him off. "Don't say it. Not yet. Not until we're sure."
He nodded his head in understanding. After a minute, he clapped his hands on his knees and stood. "Okay, enough of this for one night. I should go—leave you be."
"Actually," she said, looking up at him, "Could you stay a little longer?"
He sat immediately. "Sure, sure if you want. Do you…Can I do anything for you?"
"No," she sighed, leaning her head against his shoulder. "I just want to sit here." After a minute passed she added, "Castle?"
"Yeah?"
"Thanks."
