Author's Note: Thanks to phnxgrl for her review! And now for the chapter. I was having a hard time writing this chapter, so this is a short one. Writer's block sucks. Anyway, enjoy!

Disclaimer: Sadly, I do not own Castle or the characters. Just borrowing them for a while.

Chapter 10

Beckett strode into the bullpen and went straight to the boys desks. "What was on it?"

Esposito hit play on the tape player. Maxwell Robinson's voice sounded smug. "Angela, I want you to wire $50,000 into Jessica's account; with any luck, it will look like she was accepting bribes. Because of Watson's death, the cops are poking their heads around, which means that the scam won't go unnoticed for too much longer. Jessica probably told them about it, so I want her to look just as guilty as all of us will."

Angela sounded calm. "Is there any specific date that you want the money to have been deposited on?"

Robinson sounded impatient. "I don't care; just make it before Watson's death. And make it from the 'investment' account."

The door opened. "Yes, sir."

Esposito paused the tape. "We checked 'Jessica's' account. There were no deposits of that kind of money from the scam account."

Beckett looked confused. "So?"

Esposito started the tape again. Angela's voice sounded nervous now. "Jason was just found dead and the cops are saying it was by the same person who killed Brian. I thought Jessica had killed Brian, but now I'm sure that Max is the one ordering the hits. I fear I'm next, so this is probably my last recording. I never made the transfer that Max told me to make. He is hoping that the paper trail ends with me and he wants it to look like I bribed Jessica for some reason. But if this does break badly, I want Max to look as guilty as he is. I'll give these recordings to Jessica, she'll know what to do with them, and she's probably the only person I can trust now."

Esposito stopped the tape. "We checked all of the accounts for Alex that Hardy and Drew sent over. She has never received a deposit in the size that Robinson claimed went into her account. He didn't know that the 'bribe money' was never sent."

Ryan hung up his phone. "CSU went through everything at Alex's apartment. She doesn't have anything that suggests a knowledge of, and/or connection to, an assassin named Shadow Fox or Rathborne. Her office is clean too. And they also finished dusting the ladder for prints. There are far too many to separate out anyone in particular. But they did find Alex's blood, so you were right about the direction of Shadow Fox's escape route."

Beckett shook her head. "Robinson lied to us. Get him back unto the Interrogation Room; I want another chat with him."

Castle brought two coffees from the break room. "Here you are, gentlemen. Esposito, I don't want to here anything about me never making you coffee. This is the second time this morning and the third time this week."

Beckett smirked. "What's wrong, Castle? Is solving a murder too strenuous? You decided to become Espresso Maker Extraordinaire?"

Castle sat down on the edge of Ryan's desk. "No, I lost a bet. They got a warrant for Angela's office safe this morning; I told them that they wouldn't find anything, but they found that tape shoved in the back. So I now have to be their coffee runner. That was until you got here. What are we going to do now?"

"You are going to watch me talk to Robinson again. Will he be up from holding soon?" Ryan nodded. "Good. Castle, could you be so kind as to get me a coffee?"

Robinson looked less refined in an orange prison jumpsuit. His lawyer was also present, and he looked less than happy.

Beckett took a seat and opened her folder. "You lied to me, Mr. Robinson."

Robinson was back to being defiant. "About what?"

Beckett sat back and crossed her arms. "About the bribe money that you said was wired to Jessica's personal account. We've checked; she never received $50,000. Ever."

Robinson shook his head. "That bitch."

The lawyer automatically went into defense mode. "Max, I would advise you to stay silent…"

Beckett interrupted his pleading. "Strappfield, your client is already facing life in prison in four different states. Now, Georgia and New York are not…"

Strappfield interrupted, and he was confused. "Four states? My client made a deal with New York and Georgia…"

Beckett interrupted the lawyer. "And he admitted that he hired Rathborne to have two other people killed; an accountant in New Jersey, and a lawyer in Massachusetts. Both Massachusetts and New Jersey are states without the death penalty. As I was saying, Georgia and New York have agreed to take the special circumstances off the table, so he will be serving a life sentence. Whatever else your client has to say will not put the special circumstances back on the table. Although lying to a police officer is a way to ensure that your prison stay will be anything but pleasant. Would you like to try again, Max?"

Robinson was still mumbling about the revelation. "Angela told me that she made the deposit."

Beckett played Angela's last recording. When it ended, she turned it off. "No, she didn't. She wanted to make sure that you would get caught for what you did. Now about Shadow Fox…"

Robinson became insolent again. "I told you everything I know."

Beckett leaned forward on the table. "You see, I think you lied to me again. And you want to know why? Because we have searched everything about Jessica and there is nothing that ties her to an assassin. So how did you really get Shadow Fox's number?"

Robinson heaved a resigned sighed. "Rathborne gave me the number when I hired him to kill Gleeson, the employee that threatened to expose the scam. He said he was getting ready to retire and suggested that I give all future jobs to his protégé."

This answer made more sense, but Beckett acted as though she was skeptical. "And you expect me to just believe you."

"I still have the email. Check it."

Beckett stood to leave. "I will."

Ryan hung up his phone. "I.T. just confirmed that there was an email from Rathborne that mentioned Shadow Fox. It looks like the email had a sleeper virus attached to it though, because it crashed the I.T. computers before they could get the number."

Castle shook his head. "You know, I would put the special circumstances back on the table just for that."

Beckett wanted to kick him. "He's not the one who would have attached the virus. Rathborne probably did it to prevent the police from intercepting too much information. He was protecting himself, and by extension his protégé. His death didn't kill the virus."

Esposito walked up. "Here are the photos of Alex's defensive wounds. And this is the sketch based on her description. There isn't much detail."

"But it is a start." Beckett put the photos and sketch on the board. "Get this out to all precincts. Maybe they'll have some luck with finding the guy. How is she doing?"

Esposito shrugged. "She's doing okay. She's on some painkillers and she had to get a lot of stitches. But the doctor says she'll be fine and there shouldn't be much scaring. She'll be released tomorrow."

Beckett nodded and sat on the edge of her desk. "Good. She's had a hard enough life; she doesn't need to add this on too. Is Hardy and Drew aware of the situation?"

Ryan came over. "I just gave them an update. They're not happy that we let the killer get past us, but they're glad that she lived and that we are doing everything we can to keep it that way. I.T. however is livid."

Beckett stood up. "Yeah, well, we can't please everyone. How bad was the crash?"

Ryan shrugged. "Lots of information lost on the internal servers, but they saved case files off site, and those files don't appear to be damaged. Oh, and Mr. Robinson has been processed. With his confession and our confirmation of that information, he's on his way to Rikers. He should be officially in his new home by tomorrow. Too bad we couldn't catch Shadow Fox too."

Beckett smiled. "There's always tomorrow. It's getting late, let's call it a night." Beckett and Castle grabbed their coats. "See you in the morning."

A/N: I never realized that wrapping up a case that is only half solved would be hard to write. I guess I just like it when all the loose ends are tied up. On the other hand, I know how I'm going to reveal who Shadow Fox is, but it's not time to do so yet. So, in the meantime, I plan on writing non-Shadow Fox related crimes. If you have any ideas for cases that Beckett and Castle should investigate, let me know. You can give me a complete overview of the case, or just the crime scene and victim information. I'm open to any questions, comments, suggestions, and donations ;-) that you might have. I look forward to seeing your ideas! Thanks for reading.