Here's the rest of the story. Thank you everyone for following along and showing so much kindness. I hope you enjoyed the story.
The next morning came unbearably fast and Beckett felt every muscle and sinew in her body protest as she headed to the break room for another coffee refill, her eyes dry from burning the midnight oil longer than expected.
But with any luck, the extra work might lead to the case break they so desperately needed by now.
Ignoring her aching neck and the terrifying memories associated with it, she headed over into the large interrogation room for the debriefing with Vargas; Ryan and Castle already in their seats, the Lieutenant not far behind as he pulled back his chair and sat down, a thick file in front of him.
"Good morning, everyone.", Beckett greeted, her voice hoarse, the rest of her body begging for some much-needed rest that was still outside of her realm.
"I can only agree, detective.", Vargas charmed with a relieved smile, "I was glad to hear the news. It's the best outcome there was. I am glad it all worked out and Detective Esposito was safely…apprehended."
"Yeah, me too…", she replied absent-mindedly and sat down, hands resting above her case files and the findings of the previous night, "I am sorry, Lieutenant Vargas, it's been a few intense hours here. Just how much did they tell you about Detective Esposito?"
"Just that he'd been found and is at the hospital. That's all I heard. Is there more?"
"There are a few more details we're still trying to figure out in all of this…", Beckett began and glanced over at Ryan, the detective understanding the unspoken cue and dug out the lab report, "You see, we found traces of highly chlorinated pool water on Espo's clothes and in his lungs, as though his head was held under water. He had bruises on his throat where he'd been choked. It seems that he was in a fight before he was found."
"That wouldn't surprise me. It's possible he got into a scuffle with somebody while he was looking for his last target.", Vargas replied and studied the paperwork with disinterest, before glancing back up into the round.
"Yeah, you see, we have a different idea there. We think that the programming call Lafayette made to Espo's answering machine wasn't meant to force him to kill Beckett. It was meant to have him kill you."
Castle's voice was sterile when he said that, stripped of all emotion as he glared back at the other man.
"Me?", the military Lieutenant gasped and held a hand to his chest, "Why would Lafayette send a soldier to kill me."
"A few reasons actually.", Beckett continued from her side of the table, "Starting with…the substantial investments you made into his program last year, just before Lafayette was fired from the hospital and started his own clinic. We didn't pick up on them because we just looked six months into the past, but your affiliation with Lafayette goes back a lot farther than that. Naturally, you were smart enough to use cashier's checks, but you see, we checked your withdrawals against the deposits made to Lafayette savings account at that time and found the matches. Next, we checked for any banks or cash advance stores near your apartment in Washington and viola, Rico's Cash Today was the winner. Matter of fact, their security camera showed you during several visits preceding a payment to Lafayette and when we issued the warrant, they were able to trace your checks to the account in question."
"I don't know what you are talking about. This was quite a while ago. A lot of information can get misconstrued in that timeframe…", Vargas began, only to have Beckett waive him off.
"It's been a long day and I have no patience left for this.", she growled and pulled out another lab report, "We also found your fingerprint on Esposito's throat, so you were the one attacking him. The water found on his clothes is an exact match to the water found in the pool of the cheap motel you are staying at. As a matter of fact, we found your fingerprints all over the pool ladders and screen doors. You see, for the longest time that made no sense to me. After all, you supported the program, so it's not like you would want to stop Esposito from killing me. He was your best experiment to date. You finally had a solid idea on what mixture of pills and hypnosis treatment it would take to break the best of the best. You were on solid ground when it came to presenting your questionable program to the highest bidder. And then it struck me. After Anderson and Harrison were killed, you were the last person involved in this thing besides Lafayette. And the doctor wasn't planning on splitting his profits. So instead of me, he sent Esposito out to kill you."
"You…you are out of your mind.", Vargas complained and stood up, ready to storm out the door if it wasn't for Gates meeting him halfway, the captain's face a crimson shade as she walked into the interview room.
"Sit back down, Lieutenant. This debriefing isn't over.", she ordered, her angry glare never leaving the other man as he slowly dropped back into his chair.
"This is a misunderstanding. It was all set up through the military. I was to be undercover, see if I can work my way into Lafayette's program and stop him before any sensitive material gets into the wrong hands."
"Safe it for the jury.", Ryan scoffed, visibly disgusted, then smiled vindictively, "You see, once we had sufficient evidence, we sent a team over to search your hotel room and go through your laptop. And we found an encrypted folder in your hard drive that was sent over from a computer matching the IP address of Lafayette's desktop. It entailed a step-by-step process of his hypnosis technique. And you opened that document yesterday afternoon, because you wanted to reprogram Esposito to kill Beckett instead. The document talks about instilling an initial shock response whether it is from a blow to the head, an electric charge, a potential near-death experience. Once the patient was in an intense shell-shock type of state, it would be easier to rearrange the programming within the guidelines of the initial hypnosis treatment. You even printed out the exact words Lafayette was using for his indoctrination. So, all you had to do was wait for Esposito to show up and go after you, and instead, you attacked him, put his head under water long enough that he stopped fighting, and then you tried to program him to kill Beckett. But guess what, you jackhole. It didn't work."
"You are crazy if you think you can make any of this stick. You got your detective back and Lafayette is dead, so now you're trying to pin the tail on the donkey but that won't work.", Vargas replied arrogantly and glared back at Gates, "I didn't realize you guys have such an overactive imagination."
"Not overactive at all, Lieutenant.", Gates replied and stepped closer, one hand resting on the interview room table, "You see, I made some calls to the DoD once we found out what is going on. Turns out, they've been keeping an eye on you as well and they know of your Chinese contact back in Washington, Hwoung Zhu is his name, in case you have trouble remembering. He works as an outside contractor for a local IT firm but on the side, he's pretty loyal to his home country. So loyal, that he was working as the liaison between you and their military leadership. Now your friends at the DoD had a long hard talk with him last night and wouldn't you know it, in exchange for a plea bargain, he was ready to spill the beans on you and Lafayette. We even have emails and text messages that he exchanged between you and our dearly departed doctor, giving detailed accounts of DMM for ground troops involving hypnosis and a mixture of mind-altering drugs. Captain Brewer was deeply disturbed about the degree of your involvement and requested that we hand over all pertaining information on this case to the military so that you can be properly charged. There are four MP's waiting outside this door to put you back on the first flight to Washington, so get out of my city, you sick son of a bitch."
