Too Close

Chapter 84

Castle squints at the rough-hewn sign on a dilapidated wooden gate. "No trespassing, strictly enforced. I wonder if Warburg has dogs or something?"

"I don't see any pawprints or hear any barking," Kate notes. "This fence isn't strong enough to keep a Chihuahua in. I'll be damned if it's going to keep us out."

Rick gazes skeptically at the open expanse ahead of them. "All right, but I have a bad feeling about this."

"Castle, I have my service weapon and my backup. I even have pepper spray. And you heard Del, Warburg doesn't want innocent people to get hurt."

"He may not consider trespassers innocent, but lead the way. I've got your back."

The rickety gate creaks as Kate pulls it open and starts down a barely marked path. "See, no dogs, no armed guards. The sign is just a …"

Shielding his eyes from the sun, Castle looks up to spot the source of buzzing overhead. "Kate, it's a drone — and not the version they sell for Christmas at Best Buy. That's almost a full-sized airplane and…"

The sound of gunfire fills the air as the drone dives. Crouching, Kate pulls her gun and aims at the source of the shots. Castle ducks as the drone swoops in, reaching for the small weapon Kate keeps in her ankle holster. "Damn! I feel like I'm in a scene from North by Northwest except there's no director around to yell cut." Castle fires upward, and the drone plummets, crashing in scrubby grass.

Kate swipes her arm across her forehead. "Good shot, Babe."

"All those hours keeping you company on the shooting range were good for something. I don't hear another drone."

Kate starts down the path again. "Neither do I. Let's find Warburg."

From the doorway of a tumbledown house, Warburg gestures angrily at Castle. "That was my best drone!"

"It was shooting at us!" Castle protests. "And anyway, how do you know I was the one who shot it down?"

Warburg rolls his eyes and hisses his exasperation. "It has a camera. How else would I fly it? And it was shooting blanks," Warburg argues, "you were in no danger. I was just trying to keep you away, but I suppose it was inevitable that the feds would find me sooner or later."

Kate holds up her badge. "We're not feds, Mr. Warburg. I'm Detective Kate Beckett from the N.Y.P.D., and this is Mr. Castle."

"Oh right, I've seen the pulp Castle turns out. Personally, I prefer literature. Aren't you a long way from your jurisdiction, Detective Beckett?"

"We're investigating the death of Dale Tanner. Do you know who he was, Mr. Warburg?"

Warburg's front teeth dig into his bottom lip. "Dale's dead? I didn't know. I buy the local paper once a week when I pick up supplies, but I ignore most of what's posted on the net, and I don't listen to news broadcasts. They're mostly propaganda anyway. How?"

"He was sitting in his car, and a drone dropped a bomb in his lap," Kate replies. "We believe the drone was hacked and are hoping that you'd be able to tell us how that could be accomplished."

"I may be the only one who can," Warburg responds, trembling slightly. "You might as well come in. I'll explain." Warburg leads the way into a room containing his computer system. "This is behind layers of firewalls, and I log every ping. My code is secure."

"What does your code have to do with Dale Tanner's death?" Kate presses.

"I wrote the code for a program to hijack drones."

"Why would you do that?" Castle asks.

"Let me show you something," Warburg responds, rapidly typing on a keyboard. "This is a video taken by the camera on a drone — a human-piloted drone — of a road in Afghanistan. The drone was on a mission to take out terrorists known to be running caravans in the area. But the pilot pulled back and never fired at that line of vehicles. Do you know why?"

Castle shakes his head.

Warburg freezes the video and points at the lead car. "You see those red dots? They're roses. This wasn't a terrorist caravan; it was a wedding procession. If the pilot hadn't realized that, the bride and groom would have never lived to say their vows. The DOD wants to fly drones without any human controls, dumb robots that couldn't tell a rose from a blood spatter. I was writing the software when I saw this footage, and I knew that I couldn't let the project go forward. I stopped it for a while, but I knew that they'd get it going again, so I developed a program to keep anyone from pursuing drone warfare."

"What did Dale Tanner have to do with that?" Kate prods.

"I sent him the program. I wanted him to use his website to release it to the world, but he refused. He said that the wrong people would get their hands on it and use it to kill the innocents I was trying to protect."

Air whistles through Castle's tight lips. "Looks like he was right."

"Tanner wouldn't have used the program against himself. Who else did you send a copy to?" Kate queries.

"No one," Warburg insists. "I only sent it to Dale." The sound of vehicles approaching penetrates the walls of the house. "Damn! You did bring the feds."

Kate looks out the window at a line of black SUVs. "Stack must have had us followed."

"I congratulate you on your ingenuity, Detective Beckett, Mr. Castle. I knew you would never give up and could lead us to Warburg," Stack confesses as the handcuffed programmer is loaded into an SUV.

"The FBI couldn't find Warburg, so you used us as hounds to track him down," Castle accuses.

"Which was obviously a good decision on my part," Stack returns. "And I do appreciate your roles in closing this case."

"Then I have news for you," Castle informs the agent, "the case isn't closed. Warburg didn't do it."

"Castle may be right," Kate interjects. "Warburg may not be the only one who could redirect that drone."

"Detective Beckett," Stack declares, "unless you have some hard evidence implicating another player, Warburg is our suspect."

Castle slams his palm against the dash of Beckett's unit as she starts the drive back to New York. "This bites, Kate. I'm sure Warburg didn't kill Tanner. After the story about the roses, I don't see how he could have it in him."

"You could be right, Babe, but we don't have a case against anyone else."

"Kate, we never followed up on the woman Dale had his tête à tête with, in the park. And we don't know who else Tanner might have given the program to."

"You're right, Castle. We should have been looking at this case the way we usually work a homicide — start with the victim's close contacts and work out. We figure out who would have known about the program and also wanted Dale dead. When we get back to the precinct, we'll redo the murder board and start from scratch with whatever Ryan got on Dale's mystery woman." Kate colors as her stomach emits a loud growl.

"Maybe we should stop for something to eat," Castle suggests. "It's going to be hours before we get back to New York, and if we don't feed you, we'll have a noisy trip. Ooh! There's a sign for one of those places with the great nut logs. We can grab a meal and bring one back to the 12th to energize the boys."

Kate's stomach rumbles again. "I guess we should."