My Name is Derek Storm
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: I don't own Derek Storm, either. Rating: K Time: An AU Season Four.
The newly named Rick Castle showed up bright and early at the 12th Precinct. He did not bring coffee and a bear claw to Beckett.
"Which one is my desk?" He asked.
"You don't get a desk. You sit in the chair next to my desk."
He stared at the chair for a moment, then sat down.
"Do I get a weapon?"
"No. You're not a sworn peace officer."
"Maybe not, but I'm good with a gun. Take me to the firing range and let me show you."
"That doesn't make any difference. You're still not a sworn peace officer." Seeing the look on Castle's face, Kate continued. "Look, if things get dicey, I'll let you have my backup piece. It's in an ankle holster on the right."
"Let's just hope that the first sign that things are getting dicey isn't when we both notice we're dead." He grumped.
Kate found that working with the new Rick Castle was different than working with the old. There were no jokes and no references to zombies, the Mafia, spies or extraterrestrials. However, he was very efficient and helped to solve a case.
The victim was one Harold Prine, a forty-five-year-old insurance executive who worked in lower Manhattan and lived in a condo on the Upper East Side. He'd been shot in the back of the head in a largely residential area that lacked both security cameras and traffic cameras. The murder weapon, a .380 Sig Sauer, had been found in a sewer drain near the victim. The sewage had eliminated any fingerprints or DNA. Prine still had his wallet, watch, phone and other valuables. The victim's wife, family and friends could think of no reason anyone would want to kill Mr. Prine.
"There's something a little odd in Prine's credit card bills." Castle said.
"What?"
"I went back one year. One the first Monday he goes to the bodega across from his office and buys a coffee, a newspaper and a doughnut. He comes back at lunch time and buys a sandwich, a drink and a cookie. That goes on for a week. Sometimes he buys a bear claw in the morning, sometimes he gets some fudge at lunch."
"So? He's a creature of habit. A lot of people are." Kate said.
'Yeah, but on the second Monday of the month, he buys his usual coffee and whatnot, and pays $40 dollars for something only described as merchandise. He buys more "merchandise" and at the end month, he's spent $200 on this mysterious merchandise. The same for all the rest of the months. He buys $200 in merchandise each month."
"Sex, drugs or gambling?" Kate suggested with a smile.
"Probably not gambling. Nobody bets $200 exactly each month. But we should go see what kind of merchandise that bodega sells."
Mary Gorsuch looked like she'd been crying, and she began to cry as soon as Kate identified herself.
"I'm not a prostitute, Detective. Hal gave me the money so I could pay for a place of my own. Otherwise, I'd still be living with my sister and her family."
"But you were having an affair with Mr. Prine."
"We were in love. He was going to marry me as soon as he divorced his wife."
"But he kept putting off the divorce?" Kate suggested.
"No. He went to his lawyer last week. He showed me the papers. He said he'd told his wife all about us."
"Do you know the name of the lawyer?"
"No."
A quick check of Prine's phone records showed several calls to a divorce lawyer. The lawyer confirmed that Prine had begun proceedings to divorce his wife.
The next day the case had been solved. Kate reported to Captain Gates.
"You got a confession from Mrs. Prine, Detective?"
"If you can call it that. When we arrived at the Prine residence, Mrs. Prine was there with her attorney and her psychiatrist. She recited an explanation of what happened, although she claims to not remember shooting her husband. She's setting up a plea for temporary insanity."
"How did she get ahold of an unregistered pistol?"
"She claims her husband got it some ten years ago after their place was broken into while they were on vacation. She said her husband bought it from some friend. She has no idea who the friend was."
"There seems to be a lot of amnesia going around these days." Gates said.
Kate made no response to that.
Kate went back to her desk and happily watched this Castle doing paperwork. He turned out to be good at it.
When he was done, he handed her the finished report for her to review and sign. He opened his mouth as if to speak, then closed it.
"Were you going to say something, Castle?"
"Do you mind if I ask you some personal questions?"
"I've never been able to stop you before." She replied.
He gave her an odd look but spoke.
"Are you and Castle a couple? I keep getting this odd vibe around here that you are, but that it's not something anyone wants to mention."
"No, we're not a couple. He's my partner and we're good friends. That's all." She did not add: "For now."
"Glad to hear it."
"Oh, why?"
"I'm not really in a position where I can get entangled romantically."
Kate was suddenly very glad that this was not her Castle.
"Afraid there might be a Mrs. Storm out there?" She asked, with a cold smile.
"Um, no. I don't think I'm married, but I have to concentrate on my job 100%. Anything that distracts me could get me killed."
"Logistics must be rough work."
"It is in the parts of the world I work in. Can I ask you something else?"
"Go ahead."
"What are you doing here?"
"I work here. I'm a cop, remember."
"That's not what I meant. You're a hell of a lot smarter and better educated than anyone in the precinct. You should be a lawyer, a doctor, running your own IT company or something. You shouldn't be a cop."
Kate remembered her Castle making a similar statement.
"I was a pre-law student at Stanford. In 1999, my mother was murdered. Stabbed to death. It wasn't a robbery or a sexual assault, but the police wrote it off as random gang violence. They hardly looked at it. It turned out that the cops involved were dirty, but I never found out how that fit into anything. The cops all died violently without telling me anything useful."
Kate explained all that had happened since her mother's death.
"That explains it, Detective. Do you think I could have a look at her file? You know, a fresh pair of eyes. And anything you might have found since then."
Kate thought for a second. It couldn't hurt and it might help.
"Sure. I can get you the file tomorrow. And I have a few things I've found since then."
But, the next day, Kate was sent off the DA's office to go over her testimony in an upcoming murder trial. Castle decided to work out in the Precinct's gym.
He was working with the heavy bag when a detective he'd seen around came up to him.
"You're pretty good on the heavy bag, Castle, but you need to do some sparring if you want to be able to hang with the big boys."
"You're one of the big boys?"
"Detective Tom Demming, Robbery. Care to spar a bit?'
"Sure. You do martial arts any?"
"All the time."
Demming was looking forward to taking the cocky writer down a peg or two. Several other cops stopped what they were doing to watch the fun. One, was Officer LT, who liked Castle. At least he liked Castle a lot more than he liked Demming.
When they faced off, Demming immediately saw that Castle had his left foot way too far out in front of him. He'd be off balance and easy to knock over. Demming dove for Castle's left leg, but somehow it wasn't there anymore. Demming went flying and Castle landed on his back. Demming felt a light blow to the back of his neck.
"If this was for real, your neck would be broken, and you'd be dead." Castle said, getting up off of his prone opponent.
Castle held out his hand to help Demming up. Demming tried to pull Castle down, but Castle went flying over him, kicking Demming's head as he went by. Castle easily rolled to his feet and let Demming get up by himself.
Demming wasn't quite sure how Castle had done what he'd done, but he knew the writer wasn't that good. Now he really wanted to hurt Castle.
Castle attacked from his right and Demming moved to counter him. Again, Castle wasn't where Demming thought he'd be and Demming found himself on his back with Castle on top. Castle rapped him smartly on the throat.
"Again, in real life, your larynx would be crushed now, and you'd die of lack of air."
Three more rounds went the same way, with Demming on the floor being "killed" by Castle.
Demming limped off to change into his street clothes and get back to work.
"I guess I can hang with the big boys." Castle said to Demming's back.
When Kate got back, everyone was gathered around LT.
"What's going on?" She asked.
"Demming and Castle were sparring in the gym." Espo said, "LT was there and was telling us all about it."
"Was Castle hurt?"
LT laughed.
"I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself. Demming never laid a hand on him, and Castle was tossing Demming around like a rag doll." He went on to explain each move to Kate.
Kate called Espo and Ryan to her desk.
"Castle just isn't that good in a fight. I've seen him." She said.
"He took down Hal Lockwood." Espo said.
"He jumped Lockwood from behind." Kate countered. "Do you think he really could be some spy named Derek Storm and not our Castle?"
"No way to tell." Ryan said.
Kate picked up Castle's coffee cup by the handle.
"His prints are on this. Have CSU run the prints through AFIS, but not to make any record of it. Just for us, okay?"
She handed the cup to Ryan.
But of course, the prints came back from AFIS as belonging to one Richard Alexander Rodgers, AKA, Richard Edgar Castle. The Team could plan ahead.
Kate allowed Castle to look at her mother's file and she also allowed him to go over all the information she'd gathered about the dirty cops and how that somehow connected with her mother's murder, and someone nicknamed the Dragon.
Castle made copies of everything and put it on his iPad. Once he had everything, he went to lunch at a place that was not a cop hangout. He sat in a booth and took out his iPad.
"Excuse me, sir."
Castle looked up to see three young women who appeared to be students at NYU, at least from the tee shirts they wore.
"Yes?"
"Would you mind if we sat in your booth with you. There are some creeps over there who've been bothering us." She pointed to four young men who were smiling at the girls and motioning for them to sit with them.
Castle worked on his iPad and the girls chatted. All of them had their own iPads or laptops out.
When Castle was finished with lunch, he paid for his meal and left. The three young women, who were definitely not college students, left soon after with all of the information Castle had gathered on Joanna Beckett's murder. Withing hours, the information was in the hands of the Team. Most importantly, the DNA taken from the sniper rifle used to shoot Beckett was in a database that was available to the Team.
TBC