There is something to be said about loyalty. He knows that there are three cops who are going to be forever in his debt. But what he has issues with is the fact that they summoned him to a meeting. Nobody summons him to anything… ever.

William Bracken has it all. He had used the district attorney's office to further his career from an unknown defense attorney to possibly being the leader of the free world. He had made a name for himself defending the lowest of criminals in New York City. When the District Attorney for New York County (Manhattan) received Brackens' application to become an ADA, he did his research and approved his application to become an ADA so fast that there was no time to properly vet him. The price he paid was the fact that he would never lose another case to Bracken again.

To Bracken the ADA position was a stepping stone if you will, to attempt and attain the ultimate office, that of the president of the United States. But for now, he was simply the junior senator for the State of New York. The transition from assistant district attorney to state senator was pretty much seamless. He now has more power than he knows what to do with.

With no more than a vote of confidence, he was appointed to two committees by senior senators who saw something in him. One was from California and the other was from Texas. Be it his drive, or his sharp eye for detail, or the effort he put forth for the people who voted him into office, whatever it was they nominated him to these committees and seconded his appointment. This was unheard of and highly unusual bordering on being against the current rules of the senate. Since no other senators had challenged the appointment, it stood.

Bracken had used his current office as a junior senator to his advantage. The two committees he sat on gave him power beyond his wildest dreams.

He has been appointed to the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee and The U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. It was with the latter committee that he would make his biggest impact…. In his own life. Not those of his constituents.

He wasn't given the free rein that he thought he would have on this committee, due to him being so green, but he did have ways to get around most of that. His first order of business was to eliminate certain parts of his past and being on the committee gave him the opportunity to remove elements of his old life in New York. Knowing that he had most of his old life erased when he was in the District Attorney's office, now he needed to get away with more.

He had taken a hell of a risk in keeping Simmons on his payroll as his eyes and ears on the streets of Washington Heights. Simmons decided to expand his empire without clearing it first with Bracken and take over a rival's territory in midtown Manhattan and then took over the entire borough of the Bronx. The way Simmons was planning it, he would make the Bronx his base of operations and run everything from drugs to women to guns from there.

He needed to be dealt with swiftly and now he was able to dispatch better assassins to do the job. Ah, the perks of being a senator.

Along with his other recent eliminations of certain New York City residents, Simmons would meet with a terrible accident, one that he would sadly not survive. The issue he had now was finding a reliable man or woman for the job. Since the DC area is still relatively new to him and he does not yet have his tentacles embedded into the District's seedy underbelly, thus this will take a little time. Good for Simmons because his life expectancy has just been extended, bad for Bracken because he will need to do his due diligence in the way of research for the perfect assassin.

But before he could find an assassin to hire he needed to deal with the three loose cannons in New York. He would need to eliminate two of them but which two he hadn't decided on yet. His moles in the department had informed him that Montgomery had foolishly installed security cameras at the 12th in the archive storage area and was keeping tabs on a new detective. One who coincidentally had the same last name as one of the thorns in his side he recently dealt with. Beckett. Roy was protecting her and he knew it. This made his choice of who to take out a lot easier. Raglan and McAllister will pay the price for Montogomery's lack of judgment. Montogomery will pay the ultimate price in the long run, but he needs to plan his demise with care. It would raise suspicion if three NYPD personnel would die all at the same time.

His sources in the department also tell him that Raglan is dying slowly from lung cancer. He knew in the long run that he was doing him a favor by taking him out sooner before the cancer ravaged his body; he might even start talking about his part in the past crimes he participated in. This would be unacceptable so he would be the first to be eliminated.

After researching the currently available people who could get the job done for him, he had set up the contract for Raglan with all the parameters for the hit. Ragland would be taken out close to his home. He would be taken out with a sniper, and he would be taken out when he least expected it. After that, all that was required was for him to send payment to a Cayman account. He transferred cash from three different accounts to cover the fee for the assassin. All three accounts were accounts that he had control over and no one else knew about. The amount of payment for the job was under $30,000 and would not raise any red flags with the Cayman government or the IRS because he would withdrawal under the reportable amount from three separate accounts. With his first hit taken care of, he researches McAllister's situation. He knows McAllister retired down to the Myrtle Beach area so taking care of him would be a walk in the park for an assassin. But still, he will do his research just to be sure. He'll wait about a month and a half before he attempts to make contact with the assassin again; he just wants to make sure that Raglan's death will be old news by the time he orders McAllister's hit.

Roy needed to get ready for the meeting with Bracken. He had always taken precautions with everything he did with the man but tonight would be different. He would add an additional layer of protection. He would attend the meeting wearing a wire. He had a feeling that when McAllister called for the meeting this would be his last request. Bracken would not let the fact that a subordinate had requested him to be in New York for a face-to-face meeting that could have been done over the phone. The only problem that he could foresee was the fact that all of them were not long for the world himself included.

He had finished placing the wire under his shirt and ran the microphone up to the knot in his tie to get the best sound capture. He knew that timing was the key to get Bracken to admit what he had ordered done in the past but Roy had a plan to get him talking.

He would play on what would be equal to whatever compassion he had left. He would use Bracken's family as leverage. He knew his wife was just as active in politics as he was. And his son, although young, well he would use him as well. Blackmail is such a dirty business. What man wants to see their son injured or God forbid even killed? All he has to do is mention his wife or son and that will get him pissed off enough to start talking about how he took care of all his problems in New York before he left for D.C. If he pulls on his heartstrings hard enough it might help him open up to just about everything. That and the fear that he might be outed for his wrongdoings.

But the fear that he might be outed for what he has done in the past might make him suspicious. Whatever the case may be, Roy needs to get this information as soon as possible. He knows that his time on this planet is becoming very short and he needs to do some cleaning up of his own.

Rick knows that without Beckett he has no lead character. He still won't tell her that she is the basis for his newest character. But he is also sick and tired of sitting in the conference room typing on his laptop. He needs to be out in the field where the real action is happening. This way he can give his character a better background and have more of a fighting chance to the book becoming a best-seller.

Tomorrow he will come early into the 12th precinct to have a talk with her about his parameters in the field. He knows he can't be with them directly but he can observe from the car. At first, that will be fine but soon maybe after a week or two it will all change and he will invite himself along on whatever they're doing next. He will worm his way into whatever is going down. Just as he thinks about what she will think about him being in the field, there is a knock on his door.

By the time he gets to the door and checks the spy hole, he sees that it's a UPS delivery man with a very big box. He opens the door and greets the delivery person.

"Good afternoon. Is that for me?"

"If your name is Rick Castle then yes this is your package. You paid a fortune to have this delivered overnight."

Rick extended his hand to take the box from the delivery driver but the driver instead places the box on the floor between his legs and produced an electronic tablet for him to sign before he delivered the package.

"I'm sorry sir but you have to sign for this before I can deliver it. Company policy." The driver states.

Rick signs the tablet and hands it back to the driver. The driver puts the tablet in his pouch on his hip, picks up the box, and hands it to Rick. Before he leaves Rick the man receives a twenty-dollar bill as a tip.

He's like a kid at Christmas. He takes the box to his office and tears it open. The company that he ordered his new body armor from is called Point Blank in Florida. He ordered the Endeavor ODC II. It cost well over 1500 dollars but the shipping to get it here in less than twelve hours was steep. But he feels that this is the best option when he is out in the field just in case. He should get a laugh from her because where her, Esposito, and Ryan's vests have POLICE in white block letters across their vests, he had the company apply WRITER in block letters across his. He can't wait to see the look on her face when he pulls it out of the trunk of her unit and puts it on. This is why he was planning on getting to the 12th early so he could drop off his vest before she arrived.

Roy finished everything he needed to have done before he left his home. He knew that Raglan and McAllister were going to be waiting on him to arrive. And he knew Bracken would be the last one to show up.

He gets into his police-issued car, starts it up, and leaves for the location they will be meeting. This is Raglan's idea of cloak and dagger. Every time they need to meet with Bracken or someone from his organization it's always a secret until the day before. He's not sure on whose part that decision falls on and he has no idea but he wouldn't doubt if it was Bracken.

As he pulls up and parks the car he sees that what he thought earlier was true. Raglan and McAllister are both waiting in their cars for him.

"Montgomery what the hell took you so long?"

"What are you talking about McAllister? It's not even 7:48. The meeting is scheduled for 8."

"You know that I always do a preliminary sweep before we even think about meeting with this guy. I'm not going to be the one that gets shot through the head because I didn't pay attention to my surroundings."

"McAllister you won't have to worry about getting shot through the head. He will take you when you least expect it; you'll never even see it coming. What you should not have done was not demand that he come here to meet with us. I'm pretty sure that what you wanted to talk about could have been done over the phone but you had to have him in person here in Queens. Not a good move."

"Roy, you know that he is going to go down and he's going to go down hard. We need assurances that he will take care of us when that time comes."

"John, don't you realize that he has already taken care of all of his loose ends here in the city except for the three of us. And then there's Vulcan Simmons. But I have a feeling that the man will not be around to see the light of day anytime in the near future."

Raglan finally chimes in with what he thinks is going on.

"Roy, he will never kill Simmons. He's too valuable a tool to him. He can smuggle in heroin, opium, and whatever other drug you might want to buy. And on top of that, I heard that he now has a methamphetamine lab set up in the Bronx to cook up even more drugs."

"And the both of you don't think that he will take us out? I have news for you: we're already dead men. So if I were you I would get your affairs in order because I'm pretty sure that he already has contracts out on all of us."

Just as Roy finished his sentence McAlister pointed down the street where a black Cadillac Escalade pulled up in their direction. The driver gets out of the SUV and opens up the left-side rear door. Two other armed men have already taken up position behind the Escalade and in front of it. When the door completely opens Bracken steps out knowing the location is secure.

He gives the three men standing on the sidewalk in front of the office building a look that says don't fuck with me.

"Gentlemen, I didn't fly up from D.C. for my health! Let's get on with this meeting. I don't have all day." Bracken passes the three men then opens the door to the storefront office.