A/N: Thank you everyone for the reviews and follows. I focused this one on Kate emotionally a little bit more than the other characters to try and illustrate what she is going through now. In my other stories she was still an pretty involved in the investigations, but now for this particular one i am having taking a step back. She is in her second trimester so being the field is not a priority, and she has other precinct responsibilities. I hope people pick up on the mood swings and stresses she is going through. Like I wrote in the beginning where she said she made her career catching bad guys, now she is an administrator. Anyway I hope you enjoy the update and please keep the reviews coming. Sonogram about a chapter or two away and we will find out what the sex of baby Castle is. Enjoy

Chapter 1

12 Precinct Conference Room

Manhattan, New York

For Kate, she was bored and frustrated by the lack of pace this meeting was moving with. It was supposed to be a simple meeting with the community leaders listening to the complaints from them about crime in certain areas of the command, what the police were doing right and wrong, how they could work together and more importantly community outreach. By the end of the first hour she had reached her limit. With her growing baby bump and the switch finally to maternity clothes, it was getting impossible to sit longer than a hour before coming uncomfortable. And the worst thing about it, these meetings were more common place now after another protest by local groups over alleged police brutality video surface, albeit from another city. She had hoped the meeting would have been canceled so she could have joined her team and husband in the field, but that didn't happen today. So she shifted and tried to remain comfortable as the meeting dragged on. She looked out the conference room windows and saw her team and Castle arrive back in the lobby and head towards the elevator. Rick saw her and threw her a wave and a sympathic smile, despite it making her feel a little better, did no less than make her want the meeting to end now.

"Captain Beckett?" A local business leader asked her.

"Sorry Mr. Cortez. You were saying time being patrols being in your neighborhood is too varied?" Kate asked leaning forward in her chair.

"Yes I was; on average it should be every 20-30 minutes in most areas. But in my area it can be 30 minutes to an hour." Mr. Cortez remarked as he passed down his data down to Kate.

Kate took it and scanned through the information. It included streets, and cross streets, demographic breakdowns. Kate sighed. "Well Mr. Cortez, in that area of the precinct, it experiences higher than average crime, and since I have come on as Captain I have tried to detail extra resources when I can to alleviate the burden of the officers assigned there, but even then certain crimes do get priority."

"I understand that Captain I do, but four squad cars to an armed robbery six blocks over, when we get one." Mr. Cortez responded as Kate flipped to the next page. "Maybe because it is where white middle…"

"I wouldn't finish that statement Mr. Cortez. That robbery involved multiple suspects and its standard NYPD procedure to send all available units when officer request additional backup." Kate snapped at the man. She got up and set the data down on the desk. "I will look at increasing the patrols in your sector, but for fiscal reasons it may not be possible. For everyone's complaints and recommendations, I will study them and let you know by the end of the week. Thank you ladies and Gentlemen."

The room stood as Kate walked out of the conference room. Instead of heading for the elevator she headed towards the bathroom. Thankfully for her it was empty so she looked at herself in the mirror. She shook her head as her hands went to the bump and looked down. "It isn't your fault little one, it is part of being pregnant. Mommy is just stressed because off the crap I now have to deal with instead of helping dad and the team out."

Kate let go of the baby bump and headed to the stall.

Bullpen

"What was the Captain doing in the conference room Castle?" Ryan asked as they finally got everything out and after grabbing coffee to warm themselves up from being in the cold earlier.

"Meeting with the community leaders. I think she has budget meeting afterwards." Castle remarked as the precinct financial officer walked towards Kate's office and took a seat waiting outside for her to arrive. "Dead man walking."

The team chuckle at that as Russell looked over her notes. "Alright back to our dead man. Ryan, Ms. Potter?"

"Left a message on her cell, office and her editor telling her she needs to come in and talk to us." Ryan remarked as he walked closer to the murder board as Castle drew a line on the board. "Usually Russell does that, but you gotten pretty good at it."

"I learned from the best." Castle remarked as Kate walked on up and gave him a kiss on the cheek. "Budget meeting."

"Phil, give me a minute." Kate called to the man waiting outside her office who nodded. She then looked at her team. "What do you got?"

Russell looked at her Captain for a minute before getting up. "We just set up the board but mid 40's Hispanic male, no ID, stabbed multiple times, with possible COD extreme blood lost. We are waiting on a possible witness whose business card was in our vic's hand when he died."

"Who is the witness, and why aren't you pounding the streets trying to find this man's ID?" Kate demanded by placing her hands on her hips.

"Canvass is looking right now for the vics wallet Captain and the card belonged to…." Ryan started to say.

A familiar voice shouted across the bullpen. "Captain Beckett, is it true that the murder victim…."

"Oh god. Great." Kate stated as she started to rub the temples of her head. She turned to Ms. Potter. "Ms. Potter, my team called you in, and I am just getting the details myself. Please cooperate with them in anyway please. Phil lets go."

Kate moved towards her office, motioning the financial guy to follow her in before slamming the door loud enough to make most of the team jump slightly. Russell looked at Castle who just shook his head. Russell then turned to Sierra Potter. "Ms. Potter, please follow us to the conference room."

Castle and Russell led Sierra Potter into the conference room just off the bullpen and shut the door behind her. They sat down and noticed that Sierra took out her digital recorder. Russell pushed it back towards her. "This is off the record at least for a story. Ms. Potter, our victim had your business card in his hand. Did you know him?"

Russell passed over a crime scene photo of the deceased to Sierra who took it and looked at it for a moment. "Nope, but I handed out hundreds perhaps thousands of those cards to people for the purpose of my job."

Castle looked at Sierra for a moment. "Are you sure Ms. Potter? You barely looked at the picture."

"I am sure Mr. Castle. I contact hundreds perhaps a couple thousand each year. I don't remember everybody. Could I have met him and quoted him in a story yes, but I do know him."

Russell took all this down as the picture was passed back. "Ms. Potter we have to ask these questions you understand. Can you verify your whereabouts between 11 last evening and six this morning?"

"Am I really a suspect in all this?" Sierra exclaimed partly in shock but also in delight. Her head began to fill with a million ideas.

"Its standard procedure you should know because you railed against the department the past couple years, including a not so subtle article on my wife six months ago." Castle remarked as he looked at Sierra. The article was during the time of Castle's recovery, and accused Kate of bias in which how the Illyana Volkov take down was handled and allowing for the head of Russian Mob in New York to be disappeared before a court could have their chances to try the women.

"It's my job Mr. Castle, just like yours is to develop ideas for your next novel." Sierra replied to the jab with one of her own. She then saw Russell's face changing expressions as she was about to leap to Castle's defense. Sierra decided not to push. "I was at the office till 1130 or so, then I went home arriving around midnight and skyped with my husband till 2 this morning. I heard the phone ring, but the ring tone is one I use for sources so I let it go to voice mail. As far as checking on my alibi you can check my IP address or whatever, but my husband is still in Qatar."

"Don't worry, we can have ways of finding out." Castle remarked as he looked at Sierra, then at the digital recorder on the desk. "By the way anything said in here could be used in a court, so I would erase that if I were you."

Russell looked at Castle and then to the recorder. The recorder was indeed running but with the light out so not to give it away. "Next time you do that during an interview Ms. Potter, I will arrest you for obstructing an investigation."

Russell got up and motioned for a uniform that was walking by to come in. "Escort Ms. Potter out please. We'll be in touch."

Ms. Potter grabbed the recorder and not taking the chance they were bluffing erased the recording. Russell waited until Ms. Potter was on the elevator before turning to Castle. "What was that about?"

"The article she wrote about the Russian mob take down. It was close to the truth, but we couldn't tell anybody." Castle stated as they walked out into the bullpen and towards Russell's desk. He saw Russell's look. "Matter of National Security."

Russell looked at Ryan who nodded as he heard the tail end of the conversation, so she decided it was prudent not to further ask any questions. She turned to Ryan. "Ryan, Ms. Potter stated she left the office around 1130 arriving home at midnight and skyped with her husband till 2."

"I'll get a warrant to check with her ISP and her laptop or tablet." Ryan replied.

"I would also contact Esposito and have him chat with the husband to confirm this as well." Russell told him. Ryan nodded and opened up his computer to his email.

Castle looked at Russell with concern. "Are you sure you want to involve Esposito?"

"Unless you know someone else that can ask the questions Castle?" Russell smirked as her phone rang. She picked it up and listen for a moment. "That was Dr. Parrish, she found something on the body she wants us to look at Castle."

"Right behind you." Castle replied as he looked into his wife's office. She was staring at the notebook while rubbing her temple with one hand. He followed Russell grabbing his coat and heading towards the elevator.

Inside her office, Kate's headache was growing worse by the second. "Phil we ended the year with a small surplus, what do you mean it's gone already? That surplus was going to be used to pay for some overtime for an event and minor precinct repairs. I think I remember telling you not to allocate that funding."

"If it wasn't for the broken water pipe on the second floor we would still have the funding captain." Phil replied to the statement. Right before New Year's a water pipe burst causing a small flood in the narco offices downstairs. Fortunately facilities maintenance was able to quickly repair the broken pipe. "We lost the carpet, several computers which luckily were backed up, chairs, lockers…"

"Phil cut to the chase." Kate stated nearly at a scream. She wanted to be in the bullpen helping her team right now not behind a desk listen to the bean counter.

"Of the 13 thousand surplus we lost all of it to replace the stuff destroyed or damaged in the flood." Phil remarked.

Kate sighed. "Wonderful. Alright Phil go over the numbers again before I go to 1PP for my crime stats brief and maybe I can sweet talk accounting into not hitting our budget for this."

Phil nodded as Kate sighed and closed her eyes trying to relax before hearing her phone go off again. Digustly she looked at it. "Reminder, 1 PM Crime Stats briefing."

US Central Command

Doha, Qatar

Esposito walked towards the transient barracks of the US air base in Qatar. He was not looking forward to doing this but his team needed his assistance and he was willing to help, just wishing it was not this gentlemen who between him and his wife made the department and his team life a living hell. However as he climbed the two flights of stairs he felt like a detective again doing this and not a glorified police trainer essentially what this task force had been over the past months he had been a part of it. There was action they had seen, but for the most, the locals handled the training and the collection of information, while the task force helped to process and advised on the matters. Esposito shook his head and knocked on the door once he found it. Mitchell Potter answered the door. "Detective Esposito, what can I do for you this evening?"

"Potter, I'll be brief. My team in New York wondered if you talked to your wife between midnight and two am New York time." Esposito asked as he stood by the doorway of the room. Inside he noticed how clean the room was, knowing that locals were hired to maintain the transient barracks. "It's in reference to a case in which your wife's business…."

"Oh yeah she emailed me about that. One second." Mitchell remarked as he walked over and grabbed his tablet from the table and brought it to the doorway. He handed it over to Esposito. "If you check the building's Wi-Fi, I'm pretty sure that will match up to the time that says on my Skype."

Esposito looked at the time the call came through and made a note of the IP address of the tablet before handing it back to him. He held up a printout of a picture. "Thank you for your cooperation. Do you know this gentlemen?"

Mitchell studied the picture for a moment. "Nope but I like my wife got to know a lot of people as reporters."

"He had your wife's business card in his hand? Do you know anything about that?" Esposito asked making notes.

"No I don't, but I handed out thousands of cards so did my wife. We could have met him as we researched stories detective. Sorry." Mitchell remarked as he saw Esposito put the picture away. "Anything noteworthy?"

"Just doing my friends a favor since you are here and they need to confirm your wife's alibi Potter. Thank you for your cooperation. Have a good night." Esposito remarked as he turned away from the door and headed towards the office to check on the Wi-Fi registry.

Office of the Chief Medical Examiner

Manhattan, New York

"Thanks for coming quickly, but I thought you should see this before I cut him open." Lanie remarked as she led them to the body. She peeled back the sheet to reveal bruising on the man's chest and shoulders. "Some of these are a few days old, others were just forming."

Russell looked at the bruising closer. "Any chance this….."

"None, this man was taking a beating and it wasn't from the murder. Those haven't formed yet so we can't see them at least not under this lighting." Lanie remarked as Castle came over and looked at the clothing laid out on the table next to the exam table. "Castle those are marked for the lab."

"Lanie did you find an ID badge?" Castle remarked as he looked over the stuff on the table.

"No why?" Lanie asked coming over.

"He has a lanyard with a clip for an id badge here." Castle said pointing to the stuff on the table.

Russell looked up at Castle. "So our victim had an ID badge missing, and new and old bruising on his chest what looks like from beatings. What was he doing?"

Castle came over and looked at the victim. "And what does this have to do with the reporter?"