Shattered Lies
Chapter 23
As the sunlight streaming through the bedroom window spangles Castle's face, he pulls Kate more tightly against his body, inhaling the fragrance of her hair. She stirs in the circle of his arms, eyes still closed, but rolls to face him. He studies her face, serene in the last vestiges of sleep. As Kate's lashes slowly lift, he can see her eyes - brown this morning with the tiniest hint of green. Her passion is banked for now. "So what does the scourge of New York's crime families have planned for today?"
Kate pulls herself up on one elbow. "Tying up loose ends. We never did pin down exactly which member of the Bratva was responsible for the murder that brought me into the case. I have a lot of interviews to conduct, and if I don't get anything that way, I'll start requesting search warrants to find the murder weapon."
"Sounds like a lot of work, but not nearly as much fun as the Russian roundup - minus the almost getting killed part. What can I do?"
"I have the paperwork on all the members of the Bratva we picked up. You can help me go through it, looking for likely suspects."
You mean someone who might actually have some skill with a knife as opposed to pointing large guns at shopkeepers and beating them up?"
"Uh huh, or anything else that pops out at you as a plausible storyline."
"Like coming to New York to exact revenge on someone who stole your fiancée in the old country?"
Kate plants a kiss on the tip of his nose. "I said plausible, Castle, and you don't usually find that kind of information on someone's rap sheet."
"That does take some of the fun out of it, but my rapid absorption of the printed word is yours to command."
Gleb paces his cell. No one has charged him with murder. The cops haven't even mentioned it, but the crackdown on the Brotherhood took place just after he performed the execution. It must have been what brought the forces to Brighton Beach.
He hadn't wanted to turn on one of his own. He didn't know what Glava perceived as a betrayal. The way things had been, the slight could have been unintentional or even imaginary, but he'd had to obey Glava's orders without question, or he would have been the next one marked for death.
Now the word is that Glava is gone, a coward who took his own life. Dobry was captured at the debacle at Russian Remembrance, and the FBI arrested Sergei on suspicion of racketeering. There's no strength in numbers. There is no strength at all. Whatever will come will come, and he's powerless to stop it.
Castle sticks his finger in his mouth to suck on a paper cut. "There's not much here, Beckett. Assault, extortion, a couple of petty thefts, possession of unlicensed firearms, but nothing that screams artful assassin."
Kate's forehead descends toward the bridge of her nose. "Have you gone through all the files yet?"
"There are few more but… bam! This guy was arrested by the transit cops when someone spotted a knife on him in the subway. He identified himself as a collector, and since he didn't threaten anyone, the judge let him go with a slap on the wrist. Kate, the knife was the same kind that killed our victim."
Kate reaches for the file. "Castle, this guy was only arraigned yesterday. He's a new fish at Rikers."
"Maybe we should offer him a little conversation as a respite from the tank."
"I'm planning on it."
Castle usually enjoys visits to Rikers. He loves watching Kate work and occasionally picks up tidbits he can use in his stories. But today the ride seems tedious. Some politician has descended on the city, making a mess of traffic so that a trip that usually takes about 45 minutes stretches to 90. Kate's too busy trying to find a path for her unit, to talk much, and he has way too much time to think.
She was great last night, helping him to push the demon of his parentage down into the depths of his mind. And the sex had been pretty terrific too, even if he was too wiped out to fully enjoy it. But now, the thoughts he'd repressed are beginning to resurface, and not just about his father.
He's let Kate know he loves her in every way that he can. That she's sexually attracted to him is obvious, but she's never said the words, or done anything, to let him know how much of a commitment to him she's willing to make. He can understand that she wants to keep her place. A rent-regulated apartment in New York is an almost impossible thing to find, even if the floors do creak and Castle can hear the guy next door singing in the shower - off key. Rick's more concerned with the walls Kate's constructed around herself, than any made of drywall or plaster.
She has the same unresolved issue influencing everything she does, down to the very reason why she works so hard at being a cop. Kate still hasn't found her mother's killer. Coonan is dead, but that just makes things worse. There's no trail to follow to the man who hired him. She says she doesn't hold Castle responsible for that loss, but he's not always sure he believes her. Could that be the reason she's still holding back that last piece of herself?
If it is, he'll be stymied until he can figure out a new lead in her mother's murder. There has to be something they missed - something he missed - that will help him trumpet down the walls of Jericho. Castle still has a copy of the file Esposito gave him from the archives. When he and Kate finish the day's crimebusting for the day, he can go over it again while she catches up on Temptation Lane. God bless the soap that, aside from solving her mother's homicide, is Kate's one obsession. While Lance Hastings has Kate's attention, Johanna Beckett will have Castle's.
The bridge to Rikers is just ahead. It won't be long now before Kate plies her skills across a table from Gleb Niznik, with Castle noting every word she says and every move she makes.
Senator William Bracken is proud of himself. He's managed to convince his constituents that he's a champion of the environment while simultaneously assuring the rural communities that he won't regulate the runoff from their fields or the effluents from their dairy operations.
It's a couple of years yet until he'll need to seek reelection, the joys of a six-year term, but that doesn't mean that he doesn't need to lay the groundwork now. The money is flowing from his drug operation into the Super Pac that will be funding his campaign. He'll have the money, but he'll still need the votes. Buying air time won't be enough to make his case. The liberals in New York City will love all the ecology crap, but the farmers are more interested in bread and butter issues, especially if the butter comes from their cows.
Bracken's managed to do enough behind-the-scenes wrangling to keep the regulatory pressure off the backs of the voters who will put him over the top, but he has to make sure that the eco-nuts are placated - or silence the voices that would make them twig to the double game he's playing.
It was a shame losing Coonan. The hitman was expensive but worth it. But Bracken has a new guy on board who makes Coonan look like an amateur. And he's cheaper too.