Title: The Collector

By: greygoose70

Chapter Ten

Castle was halfway across the road when the shot was fired.

POW! And he went down.

The night was deadly quiet as Castle started across the road he had his sense of hearing on overdrive. He was just short of halfway when he heard it, the faint sound of a gun hammer being cocked. Figuring Miller would take a good second or two to aim he took a quick sidestep to his right. And that's exactly when Miller fired. Castle actually heard when the bullet went whizzing by his left shoulder so in order to make the act more convincing he dropped to his knees then fell to his side.

Hardly a nanosecond passed before the night air was interrupted from the barrage of gunfire from four Glock 17's as each weapon unloaded a clip of 9mm bullets into the area from which the shot that downed Castle came.

The night went silent again eyes and ears staring and listening for any movement or noise from the other side of the road.

Esposito was the first to move leaping up from his position sprinting across the road diving into the embankment on the other side. When nothing happened he got up and inched way to where Miller had taken up his position. Upon his arrival he found Miller on his back "clear, he's down" he shouted.

Beckett was on her feet running to Castle's side before Espo had shouted "clear", herself yelling his name, hoping upon hope that he hadn't been hit. When she heard him reply "I'm fine" she relaxed only slightly, she wasn't going to be sure until she saw for herself. Reaching him she knelt down took his face in her hands planted her lips on his and kissed him. Castle wrapped his free arm around her keeping her close returning her kiss with one of his own.

"I was so scared when you went down Rick, afraid the tree trunk didn't stop the bullet."

"It didn't Kate his shot missed; now can you help me get Nelson off my arm, he's putting it to sleep."

Next Day, the Precinct

Beckett, Esposito, Ryan and even LT are busy filling out the paperwork required for the case when castle arrived with coffee and donuts. "Break time" he announced heading for the breakroom. After depositing the donuts he went back to the bullpen distributing the coffees with Beckett being his last stop. "Here you are my dear detective, setting her grande skimmed latte two pumps sugar free vanilla on her desk, and your bearclaw."

"Thanks Castle" she told him with that special smile she reserved just for him.

Sitting down in his chair watching her as she pulled off one of claws slipping the warm almond paste and raisin filled goodness between her lips giving her usual hum of approval.

"You've got paperwork to do also Castle" she mentioned after devouring her pastry.

"Already done, emailed it to Montgomery before coming in."

"Well would you mind not bothering the rest of us so we can finish ours. I for one don't want to be here all day at it."

"Not a problem detective" he replied giving he a wink and smile then getting up leaving her to finish.

Castle entered the conference room where he found Jordan busy typing away on her laptop. He didn't say anything to her just pulled up a chair in front of the whiteboard with all the photos of the kidnapped girls.

"Something wrong Rick" he heard her ask the clicking of the keys never stopping.

"Yeah" being the only answer he gave.

The typing continued for several more minutes then stopped. Jordan got up from her seat, went around to where Castle was setting pulled out another chair and sat down next to him. "What's wrong?"

"This case. Something about it is wrong."

"In what way?"

"I interviewed all the girls personally. Asked for any kind of description they could give me. They all but one told me that he usually stayed in the shadows and wore a mask, but they could tell he was tall."

"Who's the one that told you something different.?

"Laetitia Casha. She said he couldn't be any more than five-eight maybe five-nine and he always played Tchaikovsky when he came to her, violated her." The last two words said with much disgust.

"So we've got another player."

"Yeah. Lanies examination of Stephanie Seamore showed she was basically raped, abused, manhandled. Same for Laetitia Casha. The other girls showed signs of intercourse but nothing brutal almost like it was consensual."

"You think he might have drugged them with one of the so called 'date rape' drugs."

"Possible I suppose but toxicology didn't detect any. And another thing why the postcards? What was the meaning for them?"

"Just to taunt us maybe."

"Then why the different signatures?" Castle answered then rising and pulling down the three postcard photos. "Look, they were all written by the same hand. The first one here signed by Shappho a woman. The second by Vatsyayan author of the Kama Sutra and the last by Casanova. Just doesn't make sense."

They had no idea how long they sat there staring at the three postcards when a voice from behind spoke "what you two doing?" It was Beckett.

"Theorizing" they replied simultaneously.

"Wow, I thought only Castle and I did that," Beckett responded with a mild snort.

"Must mean you guys are rubbing off on me." Jordan commented.

"If you've finish your report come have a seat, maybe you can help," Rick told her.

Kate pulled out a chair joining her two comrades asking, "what they were looking at."

After Rick explained everything to her she joined them in their examination of the postcard photos. "Well the only thing I see other than they were all written by the same person is that they were all entered into evidence by the same person, a Detective Carl V. Suskin."

"Not that unusual," Jordan replied.

"True," Rick said glancing down at the detectives signature. That's when something caught his eye.

TBC