The Woman in the Yellow Dress
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: I own neither Castle nor a yellow dress. Rating: K Time: Early season five. Others know Kate and Rick are a couple, but not Gates.
Rick smiled.
"And now we're all set. We should go home so we can get ready."
Kate wore a little black dress with a string of pearls that had belonged to her mother. Her badge and gun were in her purse. Rick wore a tuxedo.
They were met at the door by Allison who explained how the auction worked.
"Each of the pieces of art on sale have a price tag. That's their appraised value. So, if you bought that nice $10,000 Picasso sketch for $20,000, you'd be paying $10,000 for the art and making a $10,000 donation to the Children's Fund. Any questions?"
"None at all, Allison. Now, if you'll excuse us?"
Rick and Kate went to look for Sarah Blum. They had little trouble finding her.
"She looks different than in her mug shots." Rick said.
"Really?" Kate raised an eyebrow. "You do remember I've seen your mug shots."
"Ah, back when I was young and wild."
"Before you got old and completely out of hand." Kate shot back.
The two approached Ms. Blum.
"Ms. Blum, I'm Detective Kate Beckett, NYPD, Homicide. I need to talk to you."
The woman glared at Kate.
"This is a private, charity event. I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to leave."
Rick held out two tickets.
"But we both have tickets and we so badly wanted to come here tonight."
"We could always do this at my place, the 12th Precinct." Kate said with false sweetness.
"Oh, yes. You must be Rick Castle. No wonder they let you in."
Rick smiled back.
"Money does that."
"If you'll excuse me, I need someone here with me." Ms. Blum turned away. "Oh, Josh, will you come here please."
A tall dark haired man headed for them. It was Dr. Josh Davidson.
"Problem, Honey?" Josh said, taking Blum's hand.
Kate froze for a moment and then grabbed Josh's elbow.
"Dr. Davidson and I need to talk." She said, dragging him away.
Ms. Blum smiled at Rick. He didn't feel the smile was at all friendly.
"It looks like Detective Beckett's plans aren't going well."
"In what way?"
"She was dumped by the handsome cardiac surgeon and still hasn't managed to land the millionaire author. But she appears to be very determined." She smiled again. "Of course, I know all about your reputation. And hers."
"Oh?" Was all Castle could think of to say.
"Please, Mr. Castle. Josh isn't stupid. He knew that you and Detective Beckett were sleeping together when she was supposed to be his girlfriend. All those meetings with you at all kinds of odd hours. And she always came back looking…disheveled."
Rick had long since decided that anyone who let Kate Beckett get away was the very definition of stupid. But, he smiled back.
"Murders take place at odd hours and dealing with killers can be more difficult than, say, spray paining slogans on someone's house."
Blum's smile disappeared.
"And I know all about you. You're hardly a walking advertisement for monogamy. I imagine you're just leading the little slut along while she hopes that she'll end up as Mrs. Castle number three. And even if she ends up as ex-Mrs. Castle number three, she'll do quite well from the settlement. Enough to leave that stupid job as a cop. Why anyone would give up a chance to graduate from someplace like Stanford Law School is beyond me. Although I'm sure she now realizes how foolish she was,"
"Her mother was murdered. Certainly, you'd understand the idea of getting justice for your loved ones?"
"It's been over ten years and she's found nothing."
"It's been over seventy years for you, and what have you accomplished."
While Rick and Ms. Blum were talking, Kate was talking to Josh.
"Josh, this is a murder investigation. If you, or Ms. Blum, are in any way involved, I suggest you tell me right now. The fact that we once had a relationship won't make it any easier on you."
"I know better than to expect anything from you, Detective. And as far as either of us being involved in a murder, you're out of your mind. I suspect you set this little get together up just to embarrass me and Sarah. But it won't work."
"Just remember what I said, Josh. Remember it well. You won't like prison if you're covering up for her."
Josh just laughed and headed back for Rick and Sarah Blum.
Josh put his arm around Ms. Blum's waist while Kate stood next to Rick.
"Ms. Blum, will you please tell me where you were Monday night and early Monday morning. Say until about 8AM on Tuesday?"
"I was here getting ready for this event on Monday night. There were dozens of people who saw me. Josh and I left at about 10PM and went home. We went straight to bed and went to sleep at about 12:30 AM on Tuesday. We awoke about 8AM and got up about 9."
"I can vouch for that, Detective." Josh said.
"Do you know you have an amazing resemblance to Daisy Bell, Detective Beckett? That's quite a coincidence."
"As a cop I've learned not to believe in coincidences. Then again, as a cop, I've learned that the most unbelievable coincidences do occur. Such as an employee of Mr. Hobbes dying when someone broke into the house where he keeps a painting you lust after."
"I think we're done here." Blum turned away, then turned back to Rick. "Mr. Castle, you asked me where I was after my family's art was stolen over seventy years ago, I may not have Hobbes' wealth or his technical expertise, but I have a lot of friends and I'm working very hard to prove that he altered my grandfather's Toulouse-Lautrec painting of Daisy Bell. We're making some very promising advances."
Castle frowned.
"I'd think you'd have to buy and work on an awful lot of Toulouse-Lautrec paintings to prove that someone could change one. How many would be destroyed in failed attempts?"
"We're using cheap street art, of course, for the initial tests. When we're ready, I'll have a Toulouse-Lautrec painting ready to prove to the world how he did it. Then the real Daisy Bell painting will be mine at last."
Castle shook his head and smiled.
"Not really. All you'll be able to prove is that someone could change the painting. It won't prove that Hobbes ever did anything to it. And considering the numbers of art experts who've said it's just a brilliant forgery, I doubt you'll ever get that painting back." Castle smiled. "Now, if you'll forgive us, we'd like to look around."
As they walked away, Kate could feel the hatred in Blum's glare at her back.
"Are we done?" Kate asked.
"Not yet. I want to talk to Allison again."
They tracked down Allison.
"Can we talk?" Castle asked.
"About what? And is the lady with you the detective who's the inspiration for Nikki Heat? Is this about the murder at Mr. Hobbes' home?"
"About Sarah Blum, and yes, Kate is the inspiration for Nikki. And yes, it's about the murder. I'd like to know what you have these events with Ms. Blum? She threw a glass of champagne of Jack Hobbes, a multi-billionaire and I understand she's been insulting to other people. Why?"
Allison blushed and led Rick and Kate to a small alcove.
"Rick, you know how boring these things can be. All the men want to talk about is their stupid business deals or the latest toys they've bought. And the women gossip endlessly about who's sleeping with who. Last week Sarah Blum got into it with Nancy Godwin. She's a huge supporter of the Hudson University Art Museum, which has two painting that Sarah's grandfather sold in the US back in the 1930s."
"Which Ms. Blum says should belong to her." Rick added.
"Nancy gave as good as she got from Sarah, and people have been talking about it all week. We've never had such interest in one of these charity events before. People have been begging for tickets, but regrettably no one Sarah could yell at showed up tonight."
Kate shook her head.
"Let me see if I understand this. Sarah Blum is invited so she'll create a scene so people can gossip about it?"
"Isn't just delicious?" Allison said.
"That's not the word I'd use." Kate replied.
"Does Ms. Blum know that's why she gets invited to these things?" Castle asked.
"Duh! Of course, she does. It's great publicity for her and her cause. Do you have any idea how many museums have things, not just art, that are stolen? There are thousands of them." Allison turned on the smile. "If this has something to do with the murder of Hobbes' maid, do you two think you could go say something else to Sarah? It's awfully quiet here so far."
"We're done here." Kate said, grabbing Rick's arm and hauling him out.
Once back in Kate's cruiser, she let out a long, slow breath.
"If Sarah Blum is doing all of this as some kind of performance art, she's not the type that's going to lose it and bash in the maid's skull, is she?"
Castle thought.
"Maybe not, but it's not exactly proof of her innocence. She's still a suspect."
"Except she has an alibi." Kate grumped. "And it's with Doctor Motorcycle Boy to boot. Perfect."
"Um, speaking of DMB, Sarah said that he says he dumped you."
"That's absurd. I broke up with him at the hospital. He was all set to come with me to Dad's cabin to take care of me. I told him that neither of us would ever put our careers second for the other one and that it'd never work."
"Sarah said he broke up with you because he knew we were sleeping together."
"WHAT?" Kate screamed. "That lying prick! How dare he say that. We never slept with each other for more than a year after I broke up with him."
She slammed on her brakes and headed back to the gallery.
"Kate!" Rick said loudly. "As far as most people are aware, we're not together now. Going overboard on this could look bad to certain a NYPD Captain. Remember her?"
"Shit." Kate said, pulling to the side of the road. "You're right. The lying bastard is going to tell everyone I cheated on him and I can't defend myself."
Rick put his arm around her.
"Kate, there are people who think we've been sleeping together since the Tisdale case, if not before. There are people who think we'll never be together, that either you're just leading me on, or I'm just teasing you. There are people who think I'm sleeping with every female cop in the 12th Precinct."
"Every cop?" Kate said. "Including….?"
"Yes, including her, although I do my best to quash that rumor. There's even a rumor that we're time traveling CIA agents from the future."
Kate raised an eyebrow,
"How would a stupid rumor like that ever get started?"
"Actually, I started it, but it doesn't seem to be getting any traction."
She smiled.
"I wonder why not?"
When they got back to the loft, Kate quickly stripped. Castle stood there and looked at her.
"What?" She asked.
"Are you angry? Because sometimes when you get angry, at someone else, that is, you get…passionate."
"I am not angry. I'm not angry at what Dumb Motorcycle Boy said about me. I'm merely slightly annoyed. Now, take off your clothes and join me in the shower."
When Castle was too slow in getting undressed, she began pulling his clothes off until he was naked.
"Shower. Now, Castle." She said, hauling him into the bathroom.
An hour later, Rick and Kate were drying each other off with large, soft bath towels.
"I'm glad you were only annoyed." Rick said. "I might have been injured if you'd been angry."
"Don't worry. The bite marks won't show. To anyone but me."
She put on a pair of clean panties and a sleep shirt and crawled into bed.
"Time for bed, Castle. We have work to do tomorrow."
TBC