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.
"Beckett."
"It's me, Kevin. Is Castle there with you?"
"Is Gates anywhere she can hear this?" Beckett demanded.
"No. She's at One PP for a meeting. No one else is around."
"He's here. I'll put it on speaker."
"We may be back to working for you. They found James "Jimmy Ducks" Piscatello dead in his car this morning. Single GSW to the back of the head. He was wearing a gray hoodie and khaki slacks. Under the hoodie was a Yankee's jersey, a Yankee's ball cap and a pair of sunglasses."
"How did he get the nickname "Jimmy Ducks?" Castle was curious.
"He'd go duck hunting with people. Sometimes not everyone came back from the hunt. He was an enforcer for Carmine Pirelli. Carmine was in charge of loan sharking for the Spolanos and then for the di Falcos. However, he left his bar at about ten last night and as of two hours ago, hadn't made it home. We figure that as a mob hit, this'll be put on the back burner by Gates."
"Any idea how the di Falcos made the two?" Kate asked.
"We sent photos out to every precinct and they showed them around. We suspect someone saw something we missed that led them to the shooter and his boss."
"Anything else?"
"Not a thing."
Kate hung up.
"I guess Mike di Falco is the smart one." Castle said. "We got all the camera footage, the precincts showed the photos around and someone made the two."
"We just might not want to mention that theory to Captain Gates."
Castle shuddered. "Never."
"And Vinnie the Scar used us."
"We have no proof of that. He's a retired gentleman of leisure now and Mike di Falco has plenty of people and money to do all the work without involving Vinnie. He may just have honestly wanted to help his favorite writer and his muse."
Kate didn't think so, but said nothing.
Then, Kate started gathering her things.
"What are you doing?" Castle asked.
"Getting ready to go back to work. I'm a cop, remember?"
"Beckett, by the time we drive back to the precinct it'll be almost time for us to drive back here. If traffic is bad, it'll be even later."
"That'll still give us time for several hours of work. We're leaving."
"A few lousy hours?" Castle grumped. "Can't you play hooky for a couple of hours? Didn't you ever ditch school when you were Rebel Becks?" He said ingratiatingly.
"Yes, I did, but that was when I was a high school student and not a homicide cop. I could call a cab, of course, if you don't want to drive back to the city."
"You're a hard task mistress, Beckett." Castle said, giving up.
"I can be, but I can be very, very soft and accommodating too." She replied in a low, sultry voice.
They got in three more hours of work at the precinct and when they went back to the Hamptons, Kate was very accommodating.
Espo met them with a smile when they returned to the precinct.
"Gates bought the idea that we can send this one off to the cold cases. Whoever whacked Jimmy Ducks is long gone and no one has seen Pirelli and I don't expect anyone ever will."
"What do we have on the Brown murder?" Kate asked.
"Nada. Absolutely nada."
"Okay, we'll have to go old school. Check traffic cams and security cams headed away from Hobbes house and have uniforms canvas the neighborhood. Maybe someone saw something."
Three days passed before they got a break.
"Beckett, we have something." Ryan said. "Tory found it and you're going to love it."
They gathered around the IT tech's computer as she explained what she'd found.
"Cool Tech is a hi tech store just off of Lex. They have not just security cameras covering the inside and outside, but all the video cameras they have in the store window are always on. One in particular is interesting. It's programming looks for faces and follows them. Pretty confusing at rush hour, with the camera jumping from face to face, but at four AM, there's not a lot of foot traffic. Look who we caught walking towards the Hobbes house."
Kate smiled.
"I love it. They lied. Bring them in and we'll have a chat."
Hours later the suspects were being interviewed by Rick and Kate.
"Ms. Blum and Dr. Davidson, do you know why you're here?"
"Because my clients are being harassed by the NYPD." That was Blum's lawyer. "Dr. Davidson has already told me about how upset you were when he dumped you. This is just your attempt to get back at him."
Kate held up a series of screen grabs.
"Ms. Blum, these show that you were out and going in the direction of Hobbes house on the night when you said you were home, in bed, asleep. Does this look like you were in bed, asleep?" Kate smiled. "This is a very sharp picture and I might add the video camera was made by SynTeq." She turned to Josh.
"Dr. Davidson, do you know how much trouble you're in for lying to the police?"
"I didn't lie. I thought she was in bed with me. You know how soundly I sleep. I didn't lie. I just made a mistake." He was starting to wonder just how much trouble he was in.
"Ms. Blum, would you care to explain?"
Blum wasn't at all rattled.
"I made a mistake as well. I thought I'd gone out for a nice long walk early Monday morning. But, obviously, it was early Tuesday morning. My bad."
"You managed to forget the day you went out that quickly? Really?" Kate said sarcastically.
"Can you prove she didn't make a mistake?" The lawyer interjected.
Kate ignored that and went on.
"Based on your untrue statements, we got a warrant for your phone records. Your phone has GPS tracking, did you know that? And it shows you went within two blocks of Hobbes' house. Your phone remained there for seven minutes. I think you left your phone there so you could break into Hobbes' house and steal the painting. Mrs. Brown caught you and you panicked and killed her."
"What you think is not evidence, Detective." The lawyer again.
"Do you want to bet a jury won't think the same way?"
"Fortunately, I have another theory. I ran into someone who also despises Jack Hobbes two blocks from his place. We talked for a bit and then went our separate ways." Blum said.
"And you never thought to mention this other person?" Kate demanded.
"I had thought it happened Monday morning and would be immaterial to a murder the next day."
"So who did you see?"
"My client will share that information when you agree that neither one of them will face any penalties for their mistakes in timing. In writing."
"I'll have to talk to my captain." Kate got up and left.
Kate didn't like it and neither did Captain Gates.
"But, Detective, given the amount of legal firepower she can bring, we'll be lucky to get the DA's office to take the case, luckier still to get a conviction, and if we do get a conviction, she'll probably get a small fine or maybe community service. Make the deal, but make damn sure we get more than just her word that someone else was there."
Kate went back in and sat across from the other three.
"We'll agree to your terms, with two provisos. Dr. Davidson, since you seemed to paint me as the villain in our breakup, and it appears you've said that my so-called vendetta against you because of this was the sole basis for my actions, I interviewed Drs. Sam Grant, George Meade, Frank Blair and Mary Chestnut. Would you care to refresh your memory by reading their testimony about who dumped whom, and who was so very upset about it?"
Kate pushed a stack of papers to Josh who just glanced at them.
"You broke up with me." He said softly.
"I'm sorry I didn't quite catch that. Are you saying I dumped you? And do you agree that you were the one who was very upset about it."
"Yes!" Josh shouted. "You dumped me, you skinny bitch. No one dumps Dr. Josh Davidson, certainly not some cheating slut."
"Thank you for clearing that up, Dr. Davidson." Kate turned to Ms. Blum and her lawyer. "We want more than just your word that someone else was present two blocks from Jack Hobbes home. What do you have?"
"Your killer had a phone, one that I recognized. The GPS is very hard to disable and if you know how to do it, you can turn the GPS back on and get a history of where it's been. I learned a few things from studying that bastard Hobbes."
Two days later, Kate, Rick, Ryan and Esposito stood outside their suspect's office. The information on the GPS had proven correct. It placed their suspect at the Hobbes home.
Kate knocked on the door.
"Marina Gorham, NYPD, open the door. We have a warrant for your arrest for the murder of Nancy Brown. There are officers all around your building. Your best chance is to surrender peacefully."
There was no reply, but after several seconds, a gun was fired from inside the office. Rick pulled Kate away from the door.
"Thanks, but there's no bullet hole in the door. "She turned to Espo. "Kick in the door ."
He was happy to oblige.
They found Marina Gorham dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. No one else was in the office.
"Call it in." Kate said. "Get the morgue wagon out here and a CSU team."
"She left a note on her desk." Castle said, then read it, without touching it.
"I'm so sorry. I would never intentionally harm a woman of color. It was an accident." He read.
"Bullshit." Ryan said. "Hit someone once when you're surprised, maybe that's an accident. Chase them and bash their brains out? That's no accident."
"Even when she's dead, she's trying to control the narrative." Rick said.
"A lot of good that'll do her, bro."
Captain Gates was happy.
"We may not have gotten an arrest and conviction, but One PP is happy with how things turned out in two high profile murder cases. Very good, people, but now get back to work. These may be over but we still have other murders."
Captain Gates was not correct, however. There was one more part to the Brown murder that had yet to play out.
TBC