A Different Shade of Pale

Chapter 21

Castle tried to sputter an answer while Kate stared at Jordan open-mouthed. "You can close your mouth, Detective," Jordan told her matter-of-factually. "It's pretty obvious. New Yorkers have very small personal spaces anyway, but the space between you two is even smaller. Also you both seem to have used the same shower gel this morning, very nice by the way."

"Wh - why is that relevant?" Castle finally managed to spit out as Kate blushed a bright red.

"Because it affects the dynamic of your working relationship, how much attention you'll be paying to each other as opposed to the case, and whether you'll miss a clue because you'll be too busy looking at each other," Jordan explained calmly, "so how long?"

Beckett swallowed. "Um, just a couple of months. Castle got sick because of a case we were working on and he needed... so I... and..."

Jordan nodded. "I get it. So you're still in the honeymoon stage, so to speak. Well I'll be watching to see how much it interferes with your performance. If I think it does, especially since you seem to be an obsession with this killer, you're sidelined, both of you. Do you hear me, Detective?"

Beckett's eyes hardened as they met Jordan's. "Loud and clear."

"Agent Shaw, you have nothing to worry about," Castle put in. "We actually enhance each others' performance. Oops! That didn't come out right."

Jordan was not quite successful at suppressing a smile. "We'll see, Mr. Castle. Now my people will be sweeping this place."

"My people are already doing that," Beckett protested.

"Well I have a lot more of them. And," Jordan added, "we have much better toys. So we'll be finishing your sweep and setting up our headquarters in your precinct. Your captain has already been informed."

"Bet Montgomery loved that," Castle muttered as Jordan moved away.

"It's politics, Castle. He'll go along with it. He went along with the mayor sticking me with you," she recalled, her mouth softening.

"Well that certainly turned out well," Castle offered. "Maybe this will too."

Castle stared in admiration at the smart board in the conference room the FBI had commandeered as their war room, until he shivered. "Did they turn down the heat in here?"

Kate regarded him with concern. "No Castle, if anything, it's warmer because of all the extra equipment. Morris warned you might get some kind of a relapse of that Romanian parasite from time to time. Maybe you should go see him, or at least go home."

"And miss this? No way," Castle declared, buttoning his jacket and deciding that if he got a chance, he'd sneak one of the pills Morris had left him. "I'll be fine."

"Okay," Kate agreed reluctantly, "but if you get any worse, you are going home, if I have to send you in a squad car."

"Understood Detective," Castle responded.

"So tell me about Agent Shaw. You seem to have followed her career very closely."

"Why Katherine Beckett, you sound jealous," Castle observed. "In fact the two of you are a lot alike. She's like the federal you. She cracked the Hudson Valley Strangler case when she was just twenty-five. Somehow she profiled that the perp was driving a Yugo, saved a girl's life. I have a natural admiration for that, just as I do for your prodigious deductive skills. But in case it escaped your sharp powers of observation, she's wearing a wedding ring. I don't poach and I don't cheat, Kate. You're the only supercop I want in my life."

Kate touched his arm. "Alright Castle, I'm sorry. Her equipment is collating a lot of data faster than we ever could. I understand why you find it exciting."

A computer beeped. "We have a suspect," Jordan announced. "A pinky print showed up both at Grand Central Station and on the victim's purse at the carousel. It belongs to a Donald Salt, a two-time loser on parole for manslaughter. And we've got an address. Let's mount up."

"What's wrong?" Castle asked as he and Beckett viewed Salt through observation as the unis secured him in the box.

Beckett chewed her lip. "It doesn't make sense, Castle. Jordan pointed out that this guy is smart. And he plans carefully, like the letters Lanie found on the second set of bullets: will. Nikki will what? The way he's teased us, taunted us, his overblown ego, it just doesn't jibe with someone who's been caught twice. There's something else going on here."

"Then we should get in there and find out what it is. Jordan is a profiler. You," Castle pointed out giving her a little punch in the arm, "are a master interrogator. Strut your stuff."

Beckett strode into interrogation and seated herself opposite Salt, staring coldly into his eyes. "So Donald, you like sending me messages."

Salt laughed. "I didn't send you anything, Detective. But the guy who borrowed my pinky print did."

"What are you talking about?" Beckett questioned.

"I was trolling Craigs list for... well never mind what, and I found this guy who wanted to take a cast of a pinky print of a recently released felon. He was offering five thousand bucks and all I had to do was suffer through the indignity of a false arrest and give you something. You can check. For the last few days I've either been at work or perched all night on a stool at Murphy's bar. I couldn't have killed anyone."

"What something?" Kate demanded.

"It's in the envelope they put all my stuff in when your guys brought me in," Salt told her.

Beckett nodded to L.T. to retrieve Salt's effects. When the tall cop brought them, she slipped on a pair of gloves and dumped them on the table out of Salt's reach.

"That's it," Salt pointed to a folded sheet of paper.

Beckett unfolded it and held it so Castle could read it. "This is just a series of numbers."

"It's a code, Beckett," Castle asserted, "look how the numbers are grouped."

"You're probably right. We'll check this bozo's alibi..."

"Hey!" Salt objected.

"We'll check this bozo's alibi," Beckett repeated, "but this may be another job for Agent Shaw's magic board."

Jordan Shaw drummed her fingers in frustration as she watched the numbers roll down the board. "It doesn't match any code in our data base. We need a reference, but what?"

"Wait a minute!" Castle exclaimed, pointing. That left column, all the numbers are less than three hundred. And the right column, the numbers only go up to two-sixty. It's Heat Wave! When you typeset a manuscript there are usually about three hundred words to a page and Heat Wave is less than three hundred pages." Castle grabbed one of the copies Jordan had provided for her retinue and started looking up words. "I - will..."

"Wait a minute," Jordan's partner Avery interrupted, "uploading now."

Beckett read the words as they scrolled across the board. "I will kill someone else before midnight unless you stop me." She checked her father's watch on her wrist. "Midnight, that's only eight hours away. He's daring us - daring me - to stop him."

Castle brought Kate a steaming mug as she sat on a desk staring at a whiteboard where she'd posted all her clues. "Maybe this will help."

Kate shook her head as she wrapped her hands around the warm ceramic. "I just can't get it, Castle. I can't find the connection. The description we got from Salt is useless. It's nine o'clock already. He's going to kill again and I can't stop him."

Castle slid in beside her. "Kate this isn't on you. I wrote the book. If it's anyone's fault, it's mine."

"Castle that's ridiculous. The man's a psychopath. No one is making him kill. He's the only one responsible." She stopped as Castle looked down at her with a raised eyebrow. "Okay, I get your point, but that doesn't bring us any closer to catching him."

Avery poked his head out of the war room. "We've got something."