A Hole for Two
Chapter 20
Kate pulled herself up in bed as the early morning light penetrated the hotel drapes. Still half asleep, Castle instinctively reached for her. "Don't get up. Stay in bed. We haven't heard anything from Hendricks or Jordan."
"I still have a precinct to run, Castle," Kate reminded him. "Until we do hear, I should get some time in."
Castle propped himself on his elbows. "Given what we were talking about last night, I didn't expect as much enthusiasm."
"Enthusiasm aside, Castle, It's my job and I'm committed to do it."
"Then I'm committed to being your official coffee fetcher and whatever else I can do to help." Castle threw his legs over the side of the bed and reached for a robe. "In fact, I can start now. I ordered a fresh pot to be left outside the door right about now. I'll go see if it's here." Castle pulled in a wheeled cart with an insulated carafe of dark brew, a basket of fresh pastries, a bowl of strawberries, and an assortment of condiments. Kate reached for a strawberry, hungrily sinking her teeth into the juicy red flesh. "If you're that starved, I could order up some eggs or waffles or something," Castle offered.
Castle tracked a drop of juice making it's way toward her chin as she shook her head. "No time, Babe. We need to get going."
Castle silently mourned for what he would have liked to do about that drop of juice and nodded, reaching for a caffeine jump start. Looking over his aromatic cup, he regarded her face, detecting an almost imperceptible upturn in her lips. "You have something on your mind. Something good. Kate we're sharing now," he reminded her.
"Castle, it's just the beginning of an idea. It has to do with what we talked about while I was huddled under the bubbles last night. But it's not ready yet. When it is, I'll tell you Babe. I promise."
Castle put down his cup and framed her face in his hands. "I'll be waiting."
When the doors of the elevator opened at the 12th, Kate and Castle found themselves face to face with Ryan and Esposito. "What's up?" Kate asked.
"Captain, I just was going to call you," Ryan said. "There was a body drop, a real body drop. Someone dropped one from a helicopter, in the street right in front of your loft."
Kate climbed into the back seat of Ryan and Esposito's unit and Castle squeezed in beside her. Esposito used the gumball, and the siren screamed through the short trip to Broom Street. There were multiple cars piled up. Uniforms had already blocked off the area and were interviewing Eduardo the doorman, who looked pretty close to going into shock. "I'll take this," Kate told them, pulling out her captain's badge and waving them away.
Castle joined her, asking if there was anything he could get the distressed witness. Eduardo shook his head. "Gracias, Mr. Castle."
"Just take your time and tell us what you saw," Kate encouraged.
"There was this helicopter, black like in the movies, you know. It came down right over the street. I thought maybe it land in traffic. But then door opened and body fall out. Car couldn't stop in time. Ran over it. Cars ran into other cars. I go out, look at her, try to find pulse. Couldn't feel anything. I call 911."
"So the body is a woman?" Castle asked. Eduardo nodded.
Kate rushed over to where Lanie was just arriving. She stared down at the body. Tires had marked and crushed the torso, but the face was burned in Kate's memory, Charlotte Long. Any chance they'd had of flipping her on Hammett had been dramatically wiped out. Kate had been sent a message and a loud one.
Kate's identification could only be tentative. She hadn't known Charlotte personally and neither Charlotte's prints nor her DNA were in the system. Craig Frasier was able to confirm that she was the woman he'd met, but that yielded no additional information. The information gathered by Jordan Shaw and Hendricks had been rendered moot. Kate didn't like it, but her list of options to get to Hammett had been cut to one. Castle sat with her as she made the call.
The Secretary was guarded, regarding a possible clash with the CIA as problematical. However, he didn't regard pileup on a New York street caused by the dropping of a body of a CIA contractor in traffic as good for Homeland Security either. He told Kate he'd send an investigator to meet with her. The bad news was the identity of the investigator, Agent Mark Fallon.
"I could make myself scarce," Castle suggested, "that man really, really, doesn't like me."
"Maybe," Kate conceded, "but he was willing to acknowledge that you saved New York City from a dirty bomb, even if you didn't know what the hell you were doing. If he'd had his way in kicking us off the investigation, it could have been worse than 9/11. Much as he hated the way you strayed from his procedural box, he was grateful. So was I, and I probably would have been able to show you better if Josh hadn't shown up."
Castle sighed. "Don't remind me. I thought I'd lost you to Doctor Tall, Dark, and Pushy. But alright. I really don't want to be very far from you anyway. I was just planning to hide out in the break room or something."
The amount of gray at Mark Fallon's temples had increased but he still sported the same ramrod posture. "Congratulations, Captain Beckett," he offered, noting Kate's office. "I imagined that you'd either have to end up in charge or dead on another one of Mr. Castle's rogue operations."
"Believe me," Castle protested, "I'm in no hurry to put my wife in the line of fire."
Fallon regarded the wedding rings. "So I was right the first time. You two were together, or at least you got together. Congratulations again."
"Thank you Agent Fallon," Kate responded, "but we have other things to discuss. Did the Secretary brief you?"
"He did," Fallon confirmed. "But there's one thing I'm not straight on. You two have a confidential source that believes Charlotte Long was being run by this Edgar Hammett? This is a source so classified that it can't be revealed to me, but Mr. Castle knows?"
"Castle has been read into highly classified matters before, Agent Fallon. His unique set of skills has aided the CIA on at least one matter of which I'm aware. He was also read in on a case at the A.G.'s Task Force. But in this instance, the contact is actually his."
Fallon's eyebrows rose in skepticism. "You have a super-secret source in the CIA?"
"Believe me, I didn't ask for one," Castle assured him. "Our acquaintance happened. But in this case it's a good thing it did, because right now it's our only lead to who's behind the string of dead bodies Charlotte Long left in her wake, and who wants to add Kate and me to the collection."
"Mr. Castle, I have a vivid and unpleasant memory of your use of a questionable source, even if it did work out for the best. Are you sure this one is reliable?" Fallon pressed.
The Castles looked at each other, memories of manipulation by Hunt invading their common thoughts. Their nods to each other were almost imperceptible. "In this case," Castle answered, "I am."