She saw Castle and Daniel by her desk, gestured for them to come with her. The trio went into observation and found the captain there with such a look on his face that all he was missing was the popcorn.

'Daniel, I know you want to get back to Andrea but trust me you want to see this,' he told him as Dominick smirked at Ryan. 'There is no one better in the box than Kevin Ryan when a pregnant woman's welfare is at stake.'

Inside the interrogation room, the slim Irish detective had Julien and another uniform named Gibson standing post in the room. All three had stony expressions that showed not the slightest bit of humour. Dominick smirked once more, adding a sneer this time.

'You need some back up, there string-bean?'

'No, they're here for your protection.' Ryan's voice could have frozen titanium. 'And trust me, in a little bit you'll be thankful you've got them here.'

'What, you wanna try and fight me, little man?'

'No. I'm gonna kick your ass.' Ryan braced his hands on the sides of the table, leaned down so his nose was half an inch from the killer's. 'So let's start with Fiona Birk.'

'Don't know who that is.'

'Sure you do, she's the woman you and Gerry decided should die because she was Andrea's wedding caterer. She was a mother and a wife, she made cakes for a living and played a mean game of Texas Hold'Em. But you decided none of that mattered, all that mattered was getting even with Andrea, right?'

'Someone needed to send Andy a message, according to Gerry, but it wasn't me.'

'Huh, so that-' Ryan pulled out a still from Fiona's death video '-isn't you after you strangled Fiona Birk-' he pulled a smiling home candid from his file of the lovely woman before her death '-and were about to make this call to your sister-in-law?'

He played the recording and watched as Dominick shifted a little in his chair. Not so cocky now, are we, Ryan thought gleefully. 'Tell me something, Dom, does it keep you up at night knowing you're destroying innocent lives because two of your sisters are so twisted up with jealousy over the third one, or do you get off on it?'

'I never said I was the killer.'

'Oh, that's a stupid move. We know you killed two people and we also know that Andrea beat your ass down to the ground. That has to burn you got the shit kicked out of you by a girl.' Ryan deliberately turned his back on him to look in the two-way mirror. It was a move that said he wasn't worth the time of day; Ryan refused to call him a man, as he knew what a real man looked like and Dominick Fitzpatrick didn't fit the bill.

'She's just a dumb whore,' Dominick scoffed. 'She thinks she's gonna marry that loser Brick? He isn't even having sex with her.'

'He told you that?'

'Come on, look at her. Who'd want to fuck that sow?'

In the observation room, Daniel watched as Ryan's face changed from stony gargoyle to avenging angel and swallowed. 'I see what you mean by secret weapon, he muttered to Beckett, watching fascinated as the detective turn back to his suspect and Dominick visibly gulped.

'That sow?' Ryan said in a low, controlled voice, and for a moment Dominick thought he was looking at the Devil himself as Ryan's voice began to rise with every word. 'That sow someone would never want fuck, you say? The woman that you abducted, that you mentally tortured, whose family you hurt and scared, who beat the everlasting crap out of you until you were unconscious, is pregnant.'

It did the trick, as Dominick blanched like an almond, but Ryan was on a roll even as he mentally quoted his favourite line from Sin City - Gotcha you little bastard, let's see you hop around now. 'You snatched a mother and her unborn child off the street in broad daylight with the intention of killing them both,' he all but roared, 'and I swear on my children's souls if she looses her baby, if you put her and her fiance through the hell of losing their baby I will make sure you are charged with its murder too. I will put the word out to every lowlife in prison who got a fair shake from me and let them know you are a baby killer.'

'No-'

'You know what happens to baby killers in the slammer, right Dominick?'

'Please-'

'That's right, practice your begging. It only makes them enjoy it more when you plead for it to stop, because they don't play nice and just rape you. They make you suffer, make you feel every last ounce of pain and anguish you caused someone else, someone innocent who doesn't deserve to know how ugly the world can be.'

'I'm not a baby killer, I swear to you! I only did those other two for the money.'

'Everything has its right price,' Ryan sneered, 'you decided two lives should end because you were hard-up for a few pesos?'

'No!'

'Then tell me, no bullshit, straight from the start.'

In the observation room, they watched as Dominick started to spill his guts, and Daniel let out a shuddering breath. Beside him, Beckett put a supportive hand on his wrist while on the other side Castle clapped his shoulder.

'This is what we mean when we say you've been adopted. We take of our family.'

R&R&Enjoy