A/N #1: The case I'm going to start in this chapter is loosely based on something that happened to me. Last February, I had jury duty. They kept sending us out on breaks because they weren't ready for us to come into the courtroom. Finally, they sent us to lunch, telling us to return at 1:30. We came back, and were finally allowed into the courtroom. All of us entered the courtroom, except for Juror #36. He never showed up and nobody could find him. Now, we know that he probably got tired of waiting and left, not realizing that he's now going to be in trouble for skipping out on jury duty. But, I kept thinking, 'This would make a great 'Castle' story.' So, I decided to murder Juror #36 on paper. On a side note, the trial I almost got selected for involved dirty cops who were running a fake prostitution sting.

A/N #2: There's going to be another time jump in this chapter. And, you're going to meet Alexis' boyfriend, Daniel, who was mentioned in the previous chapter.

A/N #3: I want to send a shout out to two reviewers. First, thank you to the one who referred as identical twins as a double-yolk egg. The second is to the reviewer who backed my writing Kate feeding Lily pureed peaches at the end of Chapter 36.

FORGETTING

Chapter 38: The Case of Missing Juror #36

Four weeks later

Kate was in her office at the Twelfth, staring at the calendar on her phone, and trying to decide how to juggle meetings, Lily's various activities, and doctor's appointments into her always busy schedule. She had an appointment the next afternoon with Dr. O'Malley, where she and Castle were going to learn if the twins were identical or fraternal. Lily would be in school, so that wasn't going to be an issue. The four-year-old attended school half-days at Marlowe. Castle had already said that he could drop her off with his mother after the appointment, since he had meetings with Gina. Kate had a late afternoon meeting at 1PP, and they were having the family over to announce the news about the babies that evening.

Looking at her phone was exhausting. "Hey, Beckett?" She looked up at Espo, who was standing in her doorway. "I knocked, but you didn't hear me. We just got called to the courthouse. The dispatcher said something about a missing juror."

"Is the juror missing or has there been a murder?"

"I don't know. Ryan and I can go check it out. We'll call you when we find out."

"Okay. Thank you." Her phone rang shortly after Espo left. She smiled when she saw Castle's smiling face on her screen. "Hey, I was just thinking about you."

"And, just what were you thinking about?" She could practically hear his eyebrow wiggling up and down suggestively.

"Get your mind out of the gutter, lover boy. That is the last thing on my mind right now. The boys are on their way to the courthouse. We might have caught a case, but I don't know, yet. I'll try not to be home late, but you never know."

"I'll explain everything to Lily. Who died?"

"Uh, I'm not sure that somebody is dead, yet. They have a missing juror."

"Somebody decided they didn't want to stick around?"

"Maybe. That's what I'm hoping, anyway. I don't know. You're the novelist. You come up with some scenarios."

"He got beamed up by a UFO."

"You're losing your touch. Your scenarios used to be so much more entertaining than being beamed up by UFO's."

"Okay, I'll try to step up my game and regale you when you get home."

"I look forward to that. I know what you're about to say, so let me stop you by saying I'll try not to be too late. I know that I need my rest."

"Thank you. I love you."

"I love you, too. Give Lily lots of hugs and kisses from me."

"I will." He hung up and looked over at Lily, who was laying on her stomach on the living room floor, coloring in one of her many coloring books. "Hey, Sunshine," he managed to sit down beside her, "Mommy might be late tonight."

"Bad guys again?"

"Maybe. She doesn't know, yet. So, I was thinking. Why don't we invite Alexis and Daniel over? We can order a pizza, so mommy has something to eat when she gets home."

"Why?"

"Why what?" Castle was confused.

"Why do you want to invite Alexis and Daniel?"

"I thought you'd want to see Alexis."

"Is Alexis going to marry Daniel?"

"Probably. They're engaged."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that they have plans to get married in the future."

"Were you and mommy engaged?"

"Yes. I asked her to marry me at our special swings." Lily knew all about the swings. The playground was her favorite place to go. "We got married just over a year later."

"When did you have me?"

"You were born a little over two years after we got married."

"After mommy had her accident?"

"Well, we found out about you when mommy had her accident."

"What kind of accident? Did mommy fall? Did she have a car accident?"

"I'll tell you all about mommy's accident when you're a little older. Now, do you want me to call Alexis?"

"Okay."

"Thank you," he winced when he got up from the floor to get his cell phone.

***CCC***

"We weren't ready for the jury to come in, so we sent them on a break," the bailiff was explaining to Ryan and Esposito. "When the judge and attorneys still weren't ready, we sent the jury pool to lunch. When they came in after the lunch break, that was when we noticed that Juror Number 36 was missing. We waited 15 minutes, and then we paged him through the intercom. There's been no response."

"Could he be outside and just didn't hear the page?" Ryan asked.

"Jurors can be paged outside. A lot of them go out during breaks to grab a smoke."

"Do you have his name?"

"Yes," the bailiff consulted the clipboard in his hands. "Edward Miller."

"We'll have uniforms take a look around the courthouse to see if they can locate him. Do you have any other information on him other than his name? Contact information?" Espo asked.

"I'll get it for you."

"Thank you."

"In the old days, this would be a case that Castle would eat up," Ryan observed.

"The dude probably got tired of waiting to go into a courtroom and decided to go home. He doesn't know that he'll now get a summons for skipping out on jury duty," Espo groused.

"Not to mention, his name will just go back in the pool, and he'll get called up again."

"Detective, here's Mr. Miller's personal information," the bailiff handed Espo a slip of paper with Miller's address, and phone number on it.

"Thank you," Espo pulled out his cell and dialed the number. "It's going to voicemail."

"Do you want to send a uniform to his address?" Ryan asked.

"Detectives!" One of the uniforms called out from the outside doorway. "We found something!"

They followed the uniformed officer out into the frigid January day, over to a row of hedges at the far north end of the building. Behind the hedge, they found the badly beaten body of an adult man. "Here's his wallet," the officer handed Espo a battered wallet.

"Edward Miller. Let me call the M.E. and Beckett."

***CCC***

"A murdered juror? Wow, I bet Kate doesn't get many of those," Alexis' fiancée, Daniel Larkin, helped himself to another slice of pizza.

"No, I believe this is a first. But, I'm betting that you've seen a few of them while working for the Fed's," Castle shot a look at Alexis.

"No, not murdered jurors. Murdered witnesses, yes. I can't imagine who would want to kill a juror," Daniel took a bite of his pizza.

"Uh, Daniel," Alexis looked at Lily before turning her attention back to him. "Maybe we should talk about something else."

"Oh, of course. Sorry, Short Stuff," he apologized to Lily. "Are you excited to be a big sister?"

"Yes," Lily answered before looking at her father. "Daddy, can I move my bedroom upstairs?"

"I thought you liked having your bedroom next to me and mommy."

"I do, but the bab . . . the baby is going to be so little. I can do things by myself. My little brother can't."

"Oh, you're having a boy. Congratulations," Daniel smiled.

"Actually, they don't know the sex, yet," Alexis corrected him.

"But, Short Stuff just said—"

"Will you please stop calling her that? Lily doesn't like it."

"We haven't learned the sex of the baby, yet," Castle stepped in, hoping to avoid an argument between her daughter and Daniel. "But, Lily has her heart set on a baby brother, so we're rolling with it."

"Oh, okay."

"Daddy, I'm full."

"Okay, sweetie. Go and wash up."

"Can I wait up for mommy?"

"Why don't we wait and see? Hopefully, mommy will be home soon."

***CCC***

"Mrs. Miller, when was the last time you saw your husband?" Espo began his interrogation of Edward Miller's wife, Vanessa. The young woman was in her early 30's and approximately seven months pregnant.

"This morning. He had jury duty. I dropped our son off at school, and then I went to work."

"And, where would that be?"

"I'm a buyer for Neiman-Marcus."

"Did you talk to Edward after he arrived at the courthouse?"

"He called me at about eleven. He said that he was beginning to wonder if they were ever going to make it inside the courtroom. He told me that the jury pool had already been sent on two breaks. He told me he was going to go outside to get some air. I told him to just make sure he heard them when they called the jurors back in. I didn't want him to get in trouble. I don't know what I'm going to tell my son."

Kate was watching the interrogation through the one-way glass, listening to the words of the widow. The mom side of her felt for this woman suddenly being left alone with a young child and a baby on the way. But, she knew that the detective in her had to look at every person interrogated as a possible murder suspect. "Thank you, Mrs. Miller," the door opened, and Mrs. Miller walked out, followed by Ryan and Esposito. "If we have any further questions, we contact you." They watched Vanessa Miller get on the elevator as the doors closed behind her. "That's rough. Thirty years old with a seven-year-old boy and a baby due in a couple of months."

"You can feel sorry for her once you've ruled her out as a suspect," Kate reminded them. "Lanie called me with a C.O.D. Blunt force trauma to the head."

"Yeah, we kind of figured that out judging by the way his skull looked like he'd been hit repeatedly with a baseball bat," Ryan said.

"Why don't you guys call it a night? Pick things up again first thing in the morning."

"Sounds good to me."

"I'll be here early in the morning, but Castle and I have an appointment around lunchtime."

"Okay."

"I'll see you in the morning."

"'Night, Beckett."

***CCC***

During the drive home from her fathers' apartment, Alexis gritted her teeth while listening to Daniel prattling on and on about absolutely nothing. How could one person talk so much and not say anything worthwhile? She came to the realization that this relationship had been going nowhere for months. It was just like the situation with Pi so many years ago. Her friends had tried to warn her about Daniel, just like they had with Pi. 'Oh my god. Kate was right. It's a damn love haze.' She knew she couldn't do this anymore.

When they walked into their shared townhouse, Alexis watched Daniel go to the kitchen to get a bottle of water. "Daniel, can we talk?"

"What's on your mind, Red?" He asked, coming into the living room to sit down.

"Daniel, this isn't working, anymore. It hasn't worked for months. I thought maybe you're going away to North Carolina would help. That the distance would make me miss you. But, all I felt was relief."

"Alexis, I don't understand. Is there somebody else?"

"Why do you think there has to be someone else? For an FBI agent, you're so obtuse. You should be a pro at reading people. Yet, you can't even read my four-year-old sister."

"Is this about me calling her 'Short Stuff?' Come on, Alexis. She's a little kid. You know, a short little kid."

"Yeah, I get it, Daniel. And, I've told you repeatedly that she doesn't like it when you call her that."

"Okay, I won't call her that, anymore. I don't understand why you're being so defensive."

"Because, Lily is my family! Dad and Kate are my family! Listen, I'm going to go back to my dad's for tonight. I'll make arrangements to move my things out. Here," she held her diamond engagement ring out to him.

"I wish you wouldn't do this."

Alexis quickly left the house, wanting to feel something besides immense relief. She had also noticed that Daniel hadn't said one word about loving her. She rarely said those words to him. Those three words were words that she heard exchanged between her father and Kate constantly. But, she and Daniel rarely said them to each other. She got behind the wheel of her car and called her father.

***CCC***

"How long is Alexis going to stay?" Lily whispered to her father. "Is Daniel going to stay here, too?"

"I don't know. We're not going to ask a lot of questions. Okay?"

"But, Alexis already has a house."

"Lily," Castle's voice had a warning tone to it, so the little girl finally stopped asking questions and instead curled up into her father's side, watching 'Paw Patrol' on TV.

A few minutes later, Lily perked up when she heard her mother's key in the front door. "Mommy!" She squealed when Kate walked into the apartment.

"Hey, Sunshine," Kate scooped her up, mouthing 'What is she doing up?' to Castle.

"Lily and I made a deal," Castle walked over, retrieving the preschooler from her mother's arms. "I told her that she could stay up until you got home, provided that you weren't real late. Lily, go brush your teeth. Mommy and I will be in to tuck you into bed in a few minutes."

"Tell mommy that Alexis is spending the night," Lily whispered.

"I will," Castle put Lily on the floor.

"Alexis is here?" Kate hung her coat up in the closet.

"She's in her old room. I don't know what to say to her, Kate."

"Let's get Lily to bed, and I'll see if she'll talk to me. Come on."

A few minutes later, Kate tucked Lily's comforter around her, brushing her long hair back. "Did you catch the bad guy, mommy?"

"Not yet. The boys are still interrogating people."

"You'll get him. You always do. Daddy says so."

"Well, we know that daddy's always right, don't we? Go to sleep. I love you."

"I love you, too."

They left Lily's room and returned to the living room, just as Alexis was coming downstairs. "Alexis, are you okay?" Kate asked. "Your dad said you were here tonight."

"I broke off our engagement. I've been thinking about it for a while. I'd try to picture being with him for the rest of my life, and—"

"You couldn't see it," Kate guessed, watching Alexis nod. "How did Daniel take it?"

"That's the weird thing. He didn't beg me to stay. He was just as unemotional about my walking out as he is about everything else. Don't Feebies have feelings?"

"I'm not even sure they have hearts," Castle ad-libbed.

"Are you okay?" Kate asked.

"Yeah. I want to be upset about it, but I don't feel anything. Is that normal?"

"It's perfectly normal," Kate consoled her. "You know that you're more than welcome to stay here until you figure things out."

"Thanks, Kate. I think I'm going to go up to bed."

An hour later, Kate was laying in bed waiting for Castle to join her. "Do you think Alexis is going to be okay?"

"It's going to sting, but she'll land on her feet," she told him, watching him climb into bed beside her. "After all, she is her father's daughter."

"Tell me about your dead juror."

"I thought you were going to come up with some theories for how he came to be dead," she reminded him.

"Well, I was, but I got distracted by our daughter. Oh, speaking of our daughter, Lily wants to move her bedroom. She wants to go upstairs, so that the baby can be closer to us."

"She's such a caring little girl, Castle. Her empathy never ceases to amaze me."

"She's just like her mommy," he kissed her, laying back and feeling Kate settled on his chest. "Get some sleep."

***CCC***

When Kate stepped off the elevator the next morning, she spotted Analyst Tory Ellis standing at Esposito's desk, talking to the boys. "Tory, do you have something on our dead juror?"

"I finally got his cell phone records and let's just say someone wasn't a fan," she handed Kate the printouts.

"Wow," Kate read over the sheet of paper. "Who sent these text messages?"

"The number belongs to one Vincent Carino, the victim's brother-in-law," Esposito said.

"Bring him in. He definitely has some explaining to do."

"What time is your appointment?" Ryan asked.

"One o'clock. I'm going to leave here at noon, so we don't have to fight traffic last minute."

"Beckett?" Ryan appeared concerned. "Is everything okay?"

"Everything's fine. Hey, you and Jenny are still coming over tomorrow night, aren't you?"

"Yeah. You asked us to come over."

"Bring the kids. It'll give Lily someone to play with. Let me know when Mr. Carino gets here."

Kate was in her office doing paperwork in preparation for her meeting at 1PP when Espo tapped on her door. "Carino is in Interrogation Room One."

"Okay. Thanks."

Kate got up and walked to the observation room to watch the interrogation. Vincent Carino was in his early 30's and had the build of a longshoreman; a big neck, beefy arms and a rugged face. "Why were you angry at your brother-in-law?" Esposito asked, cutting right to the chase.

"I didn't have a beef with Eddie," he argued.

"The text messages that you exchanged with him right before he was murdered tell a different story. Let me read them to you," Ryan picked up the printout and began reciting from it. "'Where are you? Where's my money? If you don't pay me what you owe me, I'm going to tell Vanessa.' What money are you talking about, Mr. Carino?"

"I helped him with the down payment on their house. They were living in a cramped, two-bedroom walk-up. When Vanessa said that she was having the new baby, I offered to help them buy a house. Eddie has a good job, but he couldn't swing the down payment. I offered to help him, and he agreed to pay me back."

"Let me guess," Espo said. "He didn't pay you back."

"No. No. He did, for a few months. Then, in the fall, he stopped paying me. He told me that things had gotten slow at work, and he wasn't working as many hours. When I asked Vanessa about that, she said it was the first she'd heard about his work hours being cut. She said that he was leaving at the same time and coming home at the same time every day. I don't know where his money was going, but it wasn't going to me, and I don't think it was going to his wife and kid."

"Did Vanessa tell you that?"

"My mother did. She said that Vanessa had called her in December. The power had been shut off. My mother paid to have the lights turned back on, and she gave Vanessa some money so that she could buy Christmas presents for my nephew. I was brought up to take care of my family. Eddie was failing in that respect."

"Where were you at 9:30 yesterday morning?" Ryan asked.

"At work. Carino's Meat Market on 79th and Amsterdam. It's my family's business."

"Thank you, Mr. Carino. We'll be in touch."

They left the interrogation room, walking into the ob room where Kate was still standing. "It sounds like Juror Number 36 had some secrets," she looked at the boys. "Check out Vincent Carino's alibi, and then go to Mr. Miller's place of employment."

"Do you want us to talk to Vanessa Miller again?" Espo asked.

"Have her come in. I can talk to her while you're out."

"Beckett—"

"Espo, I can handle a simple interrogation," she gave him a pointed look. "Call her in."

An hour later, Vanessa Miller stepped off the elevator, looking scared and unsure. "Mrs. Miller? I'm Capt. Beckett. I just have a few more questions."

"I'm sure that I told everything to those two detectives when I was here yesterday. I'm trying to make funeral—"

"This won't take long," Kate led Vanessa Miller into an interrogation room. "We talked to your brother this morning," Kate opened the interview once she'd sat down.

"Why did you talk to Vince? He didn't kill Eddie."

"We talked to your brother because this is a murder investigation. We explore every avenue, no matter where it leads us. Your brother revealed that you and your husband were having financial problems."

"Who doesn't? We'd been through rough patches before. Eddie kept telling me that everything would work out."

"Did your husband have life insurance?"

"I don't know. Probably. Wait! Are you saying that I had him killed for his insurance money? Lady, I have a seven-year-old son and a baby on the way! Why would I leave my kids without a father?"

"Women do it every day. Where were you—"

"I told those two detectives where I was. Why don't you ask them? Am I free to leave?"

"Yeah, you're free to leave."

Kate put her head in her hands after the widow left the room. 'Oh my god, I'm losing my touch.'

When she walked into her office, she smiled when she saw that Rick was sitting behind her desk. "Hey," she walked over and bent down to kiss him. "Let me shoot a quick text to the boys and we can go."

"Lily has been squared away. I dropped her off with my mother, who I'm sure will have her singing show tunes by the time we pick her up."

"Was Alexis okay?"

"She seemed to be. She went to the office. I didn't get to talk to her before I took Lily to school. How's your investigation going?"

"I don't know. Things aren't what they appear to be, that's for damn sure," she sighed.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"Later. Right now, let's go see what kind of twins we're having," she took his hand and led him out of her office, locking the door behind her.

***CCC***

This time, Kate wasn't shocked when Dr. O'Malley turned on the ultrasound. The images of the two hearts beating were reassuring, a sign that everything was okay with her babies. Babies. The concept was still so foreign. She and Castle had been trying to have one baby for more than a year, since shortly after Lily's second birthday. Lily had been more than a handful as a toddler. How in the hell were they going to handle two toddlers? How was she supposed to nurse two babies?

"Are they okay? Is everything okay with them?"

"So far, everything looks great. Let me tell you what I see," Dr. O'Malley took a laser pointer and aimed it at the monitor. "This is your baby's placentas, and these are the amniotic sacs."

"If you say so, doc," Castle continued staring at the screen.

"Let me explain this so that you can both understand. Think of identical twins as a double-yolk egg. Two yolks in one egg. Fraternal twins have their own placentas, and their own inner and outer sac. Identical twins can also have their own placentas, but this is very rare."

"What are we having? Can you tell?" Kate asked.

"Your babies share a placenta, and one outer membrane, called the chorion. They each have their own amniotic sacs. But, they are identical. Which means, you'll either have two boys or two girls. I'll let you get dressed, and absorb what I've just told you. Then, we can talk."

After wiping the gel from her stomach, Dr. O'Malley and his nurse left Kate and Castle alone. "Wow," Castle finally breathed out. "Why am I getting flashbacks of 'The Patty Duke Show?'"

"Oh my god," Kate sat up. "Castle, how are we going to handle two babies that look exactly alike?"

"Hey," he put his hands on her shoulders. "We'll tackle it just like we did Lily."

"But, there was only one of Lily."

"Do you remember the Terrible Two's, otherwise known as Hurricane Lily?" Kate chuckled at the image her husband conjured up. "It's going to be okay. I'm so happy, Kate."

"I am, too. I'm just feeling—"

"I know," he pressed his lips to her forehead. "I know."

A/N #4: I hope I described identical twins correctly. One of my muses has twin granddaughters, who are known as mirror image twins.

A/N #5: In the next chapter, the case heats up and the family learns Kate and Castle's news.

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