Guardian Angel
Chapter 23
"We should listen on your phone," Kate decides, "the sound is better."
"All right," Castle agrees, thumbing the speaker.
"You could have just left a message on the website," Coonan balks.
"That didn't buy me any action," a barely audible voice retorts.
"I had a setback," Coonan complains. "My surveillance device was disabled, and Beckett's in the wind. She obviously suspects someone's after her."
"So, she's been in hiding. How about that writer, Castle, who was chasing her tail? He might know where she is. Have you got an address on him?"
"Security building on Broome Street. Can't get in there without being seen."
Kate can hear a snort. "Then don't. Stake out the hack. Let him lead you to Beckett, then take both of them out. Are you with me? Problem solved. Listen, Dick, you charge way too much for your services for me to have to figure these things out for you. I want this done — yesterday. If you don't perform, there are others who can do the job."
"I've been cleaning up your messes for over ten years," Coonan protests.
"Long enough to lose your edge."
"I haven't lost anything," Coonan asserts. "Beckett will end up like her mother. And Castle can follow her to hell."
The tinny voice chills. "For your sake, you'd better be right."
Castle's fingers slowly uncurl from his phone as the feed from the bug quiets. "Kate, he's going to try to kill both of us."
"He's not going to succeed, Castle," Kate insists. "He's practically set up the trap for us. He'll be following you, but he won't hurt you until you lead him to me. Let him follow you right into the arms of the N.Y.P.D.'s finest. If he tries to draw a bead on you, Esposito, or an E.S.U. marksman can take him down from a half-mile away. But we want to take him alive so he can give us the voice on the phone."
Castle taps his finger on his cell. "A voiceprint could probably confirm it, but he sounded like Bracken to me."
"It was Bracken," Johanna confirms. "'Are you with me?'" was always his catchphrase."
"It sounded like him to me too," Kate remarks, "but to take down someone with that much power, we'll need more than a recording of questionable origin. Taking Coonan alive will be the hard part."
"Tranquilizer darts?" Castle wonders.
Kate giggles. "I can just see Esposito's face if I suggest it. Listen, will Alexis be all right if you stay at the hotel tonight? We have to be ready before Coonan spots you at your loft. And until then, we can't be seen together."
"I'll make sure Mother is with her. But I'm not sure who'll be keeping an eye on whom," Rick adds. "I can get a key for the smaller adjoining room. A lot of celebs find it convenient to use adjacent quarters for their bodyguards or assistants."
"Too convenient," Johanna opines.
"Sure, Castle," Kate agrees, a hint of disappointment nudging the back of her brain.
Castle nods. "And between the men's shop and hotel's sundries offerings, I should be able to get everything I need for a sleepover party. Hmm, maybe I should pick up a copy of "Teen Beat."
"I don't think that will be necessary, Castle."
"Kate, what are you staring at on your phone?" Rick queries, after putting the cart from their late-night snack out in the hall for pick up.
"A picture of Coonan. He doesn't look like a Dick."
"What? You think his mother should have named him Harvey or Oswald?"
"That's not what I mean. I picture hitmen as characters out of film noir or looking like John Malkovich. Coonan looks more like a guy who gets elected homecoming king. No wonder people buy his philanthropist front."
"It would make your job a lot easier if criminals always looked like criminals, wouldn't it? Malkovich is one scary looking dude, but Mother did a play with him and said he's a sweetheart. And there are a bunch of guys she's worked with who come across as heroic and are selfish sonsofbitches who stalk off to their trailers and shut down filming if kraft services has the wrong kind of tortilla chips. Most people wear masks of one kind or another."
"How about you, Castle? Is the devil-may-care playboy author just a sham?"
"Pretty much. I'll admit I enjoy good food, good wine, and looking at a pretty face, but none of those things are as important as the people who are dear to me. They never were. They just come with the bestselling writer gig. I'd rather watch a Star Trek marathon with my daughter than walk the red carpet with a supermodel — unless it's Iman. She tells the best David Bowie stories. But seriously, Kate, when someone comes off as too charming or accommodating, I get suspicious. That's one of the reasons I liked you instantly. You didn't try to enchant me with those beautiful eyes. You just shoved your badge in my face and didn't give an inch. It was refreshing. Still is, but we really should be turning in for the night. Coonan may start stalking me first thing in the morning if he isn't at my building already. We don't want to disappoint him."
"You're right," Kate concedes, "but I don't think I'll be able to sleep."
"Too wound up?" Castle asks.
"You never could sleep when you were excited," Johanna remembers.
"Not wound up, exactly. It's just every time I close my eyes, I see Coonan in that alley, holding a bloody knife and smirking at the body on the pavement."
"So don't try to close them. I had a trick I used to do with Alexis when she was a little girl. She was always afraid there were monsters under the bed. I'd look and tell her there weren't any, but she was scared that they'd come if she fell asleep. So I told her to keep her eyes open as long as she could, and I'd tell her a story. Then I'd make it the most boring tale I could think of. Within 15 minutes, she'd be out like a light."
"Castle, that's so sneaky, but after writing so much spine-chilling prose, can you still tell boring stories?"
"I think I still have a few. Would you like to hear about my 11th grade English teacher, Mr. Smith?"
"Well, the name is boring enough. Go ahead."
"Remember," Castle cautions, "You can lie on the bed, but don't close your eyes."
"Mr. Smith loved to mark papers. Every day he would use his favorite red pencil to find every missing comma and strike out the ones that didn't belong. One afternoon, when I had my usual afterschool detention, his pencil was missing. He looked everywhere for it. He looked under Lucy's chair. Then he looked under Jack's chair. Then he looked under Mandy's chair. Then he looked under Boomer's chair. Then he looked under Scott's chair. Then he looked under Mary's chair. Then he looked…"
Gazing at Kate's face, finally in repose, and noting the gentle rise and fall of her breasts, Rick gently pulls the coverlet from the foot of the bed over her. "Good night Kate."
In his somewhat less than V.I.P. level accommodations, Rick carefully opens his newly acquired package of Star Wars pajamas. He would have preferred looking more like Han than Luke, but beggars can't be choosers. Slipping between the cotton sheets of the standard queen bed, he wishes someone could tell him a boring story. With Kate next door, sleep won't come easily.
