Last Chapter: Ryan and Esposito come into the break room and unfortunately haven't found anything. Kate decides it's about time she called her father and clue him in on what's going on. In the meantime Ryan, Espostio, and Castle have been looking through the case yet again. Castle goes to check on Beckett. Who is a little frustrated with her father because he hides his emotions from her… sound like anyone else that we know? While she was talking to her father Kate got an idea. She thought it would be a good idea to bring Stephanie Miller's brother in because his investment in his sister's case would be like Kate's investment in her mother's case. When they share the plan with the boys they agree. When Beckett goes to call him Castle recognizes his name, Zachary Miller, he's seen it somewhere before (Dun Dun Dunnnn)


The Handy Dandy Connection Chart

Victim - Romantic Interest - Friend/ family that was interviewed

Victim #1 Bridget - Daniel Ethens Melanie (girl from when Espo was 'missing')

Victim #2 Caroline - Alex Kirsty Randy (The one Espo thought was hot)

Victim #3 Heather - Sean Leary - Todd (He totally hit Espo with a table)

Guy they arrested at the Bar: Doug Lawrence - Woman that he raped: Stephanie Miller

Brother: Zachary Miller


Chapter 52: Zach Miller

"Castle are you sure?" Esposito asked warily.

"I'm positive. He's in here somewhere." Castle insisted, already digging through the files to find the name.

Kate let out a breath. If he was wrong they were wasting valuable time, but when was the last time Castle was wrong …. About something that he read, she clarified.

When Kate grabbed a folder and started looking through it, the boys took it as their cue to join in as well.

Twenty minutes later, after flipping through page after page, they were still sitting there, running out of hope. Even Beckett was starting to doubt Castle's certainty.

She ran her hand over her face as she looked over the vast amount of paper work their investigation had amassed.

But then, just like that, Castle finally found what he was looking for.

"Aha! He said triumphantly, as Beckett put down her folder to see what he had found.

Castle laid the folder out in front of him and pointed to the name Zach Miller.

"Looks like we found our connection." Esposito added, peering over the desk.

"Yeah, it says here that Mr. Zach Miller is currently employed as a bar tender." Castle said, enjoying his victory.

"And Let me guess where." Beckett added, shaking her head. Could it be that easy?

And Castle nodded his head, confirming her suspicions that he did work at the 11 th Street bar.

"How did we miss that?" Ryan asked, turning to Esposito.

"We didn't know anything about Stephanie Miller before, why would we have expected a bar tender with no apparent motive?" Beckett asked.

"It says here that our boy Zach was scheduled to work the nights that our victims were there." Esposito said, reading what little information they had on him.

"Let's call the manager, see if Zach's is scheduled to work tonight." Kate said, nodding at Ryan.

"Already on it." He said, taking off to his desk to make that call.

Kate pulled up Zach's DMV photo on her computer, and printed copies for all of them.

He fit their DNA profile to a 'T', blonde hair, brown eyes, Caucasian, and male.

"What I don't get, " Castle said, "Is why if he knew what this guy looked like, and obviously he managed to track him down. Why not just kill him? Why go after the women?"

"I don't know Castle, you talked to him on the phone too. He didn't exactly sound sane." Kate said with a shrug. And then she got up from her desk to grab the pictures off of the printer.

"Yeah, but he doesn't sound like someone who's doing this on a whim." Caste said, following Kate who had just grabbed the papers off the printer and was now heading back towards her desk, "He has a reason, a method to his madness. I just haven't figured it out yet." He continued, squinting his eyes in concentration. As he followed her around like a little puppy, Kate was smirking to herself because he was always a little cute when he got excited about a case.

"With any luck he can tell us himself, " Ryan said as they walked by his desk, "I called the manager, and he wasn't very happy about being woken up , but he did say that Zach is scheduled to work tonight until close."

"Great, let's go." Kate said, pulling her firearm out of her desk draw.

She led the way down to the cruisers, flanked by Ryan, Esposito, and Castle who weren't that far behind.

They hopped into their respective vehicles and sped off into the night.

Neither Castle nor Beckett said much in the car. Both of them were too focused on what lay ahead to make small talk.

Kate pulled up in front of a building just a few doors down from the 11 th Street Bar, not bothering to find a real parking space.

Ryan and Esposito followed suit and pulled up right behind them. And as they did Beckett popped the trunk and went around back, Castle following her.

She pulled out their Kevlar vests and handed Castle his.

He had to hide his surprise. He had really just assumed that he was still 'grounded' for coming to the precinct without her, but he wasn't complaining, and he certainly wasn't going to be the one to remind her.

Ryan and Esposito, now with their vests on too, joined Castle and Beckett.

She handed them each a copy of Zach Miller's picture, and they all took a second to look it over.

"Got it?" Beckett asked as she slammed the trunk shut, ready to go.

"Yeah." The three of them chorused together ash they folded his picture and stuck it in a pocket.

Hands on their holstered weapons they approached the bar.

Kate quickly told them to follow her lead, before she pushed open the front door of the bar.

Immediately their appearance turned the heads of a few customers.

Beckett looked around, ignoring the stares, but she only saw one bar tender, and he was not their guy.

She quickly approached him and flashed her badge asking, "Where is Zachary Miller?"

"I'd like to know the same thing lady. He went out for a smoke a couple of hours ago, and he never came back." The bar tender answered her.

"Damn it." Kate said, running her hand through her hair in frustration. She hated this case.

"Does he do this often?" Castle asked.

"Skip out part way through a shift? Never." He said with an annoyed shrug.

"Ryan, Esposito, go check the back alley. See if he left those cigarettes back there." Beckett said.

The boys quickly took off for the alley, and Beckett pulled out her phone out of her back pocket, and then the paper with Zach's DMV information on it.

"What are you doing?" Rick asked, tilting his head towards her phone.

"I have his address and plate number here. I'm going to have a patrol car drive by and see if his car is at his building, and if it is to keep eyeballs on it, see if he comes back out." She explained as she typed the number into her phone.

"Oh." Castle said

While Beckett was talking to dispatch Castle had an idea, he pulled out his own phone and called the precinct, and then had himself patched through to the homicide detective that was on call that night.

Luckily it was Detective Snyder who seemed to like Castle.

When Castle greeted him on the phone Kate gave him a confused look that said, 'What the hell are you doing?'

Castle shrugged her off for now, and the good news that apparently detective Snyder had already been called out on an open and shut case. So he didn't really mind when Castle asked him if he would fill out two warrants. The first for Zachary Millers credit card and bank statements. And the second to search his residence.

The only thing that Snyder seemed worried about was having to wake up a judge, but Castle assured him that he had it covered.

When he hung up with Detective Snyder Kate was standing there arms crossed staring him down.

"What the hell are you doing?" She asked.

"Getting the warrants that we're going to need to search his place so that he doesn't get off on a technicality." Castle said his hands poised to dial another number, and hoping she wouldn't take out her frustration on his ear, and luckily for him she didn't.

In fact she was slightly taken aback. He was usually the one that wanted to just bust down the door, "Oh okay ….. So … who else were you going to call?" She asked, glancing down at his phone.

"Judge Markaway. He owes me a couple of favors. So, he can't get angry at me if I call and wake him up in the middle of the night." He explained.

"Oh good idea." Kate said, nodding. Who is this guy and what has he done with Castle? She thought.

"Snyder will meet us there with the warrant while his team goes through his financials." He added.

"Hmmm, I knew I kept you around for a good reason." She said, giving him a small smile.

The door opened and Ryan and Esposito came back in with an evidence bag containing four of five cigarette butts.

"Apparently our guy's a chain smoker." Ryan said, holding up the bag.

"Yeah he is, guy smells like a smoke stack." His fellow bar tender added.

"Call a uniform, and have them bring those over to the lab for testing." Beckett said.

"Already did." Esposito said with a nod.

"Good. We're going to Miller's apartment, and Detective Snyder is going to meet us there with a warrant." She said, catching them up to speed.

"You did all that in the five minutes we were gone?" Esposito asked.

"Yeah." Kate said matter of factly.

"How?" Ryan asked.

"Magic." Castle answered, without hesitation.

And all three of them turned to him and gave him a strange look.

Kate raised her eyebrow at him asking, 'really, that's the best you could come up with?'.

Castle shrugged it off.

But Ryan and Esposito both shook their head, they said clearly not buying it.

"Well, I guess you'll never know." Kate said as she walked past them to get into the cruiser.

A moment later Castle climbed in after, still laughing a bit, and Kate sped off towards Zach Miller's apartment.


Okay so not my greatest literary creation, I'll admit, but at least we are still moving along.

A big thanks to all of you!(As always) If you left a review I'm going to try to answer you a bit later today. My brain needs a break :)

Elizabeth