Beckett would have been lying if she said she wasn't waiting up for Castle that night, who's 'meeting' had ran far longer than what she could remember most meetings running. When the door finally opened and shut for the final time that night, she expected her husband to come to bed right away, their day inevitably early again. Instead, he moved as far as his office and sat down in his chair, opening his laptop.
She furrowed her eyebrows and slid out of bed, padding across the hardwood floor until she hovered at the entrance of the office. She crossed her arms over her chest and stared a moment longer, clearing her throat. Castle jumped and lifted his head slowly. "Oh, Beckett," he sounded surprised, the same kind of surprise she would have expected if this had been a year ago and he hadn't expected her to be in his bed that night. But they'd been engaged for months, now, and she'd been a constant presence in his bed for almost double that.
"How'd your meeting go?" She asked, moving around the chair to drape herself across his back, pressing her mouth against his cheek. He tried not to stiffen, to remember his father's words but they were ringing in his head like church bells. She laid her head against his and closed her eyes, hooking her fingers together over the centre of his chest.
"Oh, you know," he shrugged one shoulder carefully. "Mostly just Gina yelling at me for not having the next five chapters already written; it's going to be a long night," he tried to make a joke out of it, but it fell short.
"You won't be coming with me to the precinct tomorrow, then?" She asked, sounding more tired by the second. He shrivelled a little, hating that he should've known that she would have waited up for him, but he'd hid in his office at The Old Haunt for a few moments too long just to figure out what he was going to say when he came home. What was there to say?
He pulled her arms from around his neck and rolled around in the chair, tugging her down against him, pressing his mouth against her temple. She slumped against him, too tired to fight it. They'd done this before, her asleep against his chest while he wrote, but he knew she had an early morning so he rubbed her back and told her to go to bed, he'd be there in a few hours and she nodded, sleepily walking back to the bed and settling back down. He didn't move until he heard her snoring from the next room.
He felt bad for not being as open as he would've liked, but his mind was still reeling from everything that Jackson had told him. How William Bracken had hired him, how he'd befriended Beckett's mother months before her murder. It'd been cold and calculated and everything he'd ever idolized about the man he hadn't known was quickly crumpled into a pile of ash.
He leaned forward on his elbows, burying his face in his hands. He had no idea what to do anymore.
The next day, he came into the precinct later than usual, only to learn that there was a new crime scene and surveillance videos that showed Jackson Hunt there on the night that Ted Rollins was murdered. He watched it with horror in his eyes and instinctively jumped to protect him, although he wasn't sure why. The fact that his father was at the crime scene where this man had been killed couldn't have been a coincidence, even he knew that, and yet he jumped.
He tried to ignore the look of confusion and almost anger that crossed Beckett's face as she stared back at him. He diverted his gaze to the screen in front of him, staring at the crisp white hair. There had to be a better explanation than what he was coming up with; than what Beckett was coming up with. There had to be some semblance of an answer out there. He just had to figure out what it was.
"So what, he just happened to be there two hours after Ted hacked his company?" Esposito moved to save Beckett and help her; Castle knew that he'd be on her side, still wondered from time to time what happened between them but that wasn't the point in the case right then. No, it was the fact that his father already had one body on his hands and he wasn't sure if he could process if he had another.
In his experience with the NYPD, he'd learned, though, that it was almost never the first suspect that they dealt with. There was no way his father could be that careless. He'd gone fifteen years with Johanna Beckett's murder under his belt and actually managed to poke it on someone else in the process.
His stomach turned as he met Kate's gaze; bad example.
"I – see – Anderson Cross as the killer? It's the obvious choice." He tried to defend, but his defense is weak and even he knew it. He just had to try and get Beckett away from it all. His fiancée was headstrong, he knew, but maybe if he could talk to her and help her see things his way. But how was he supposed to? He was still running into a problem with being biased over everything. If he told her what he knew, he might never stop and end up spewing whom was her mother's killer in the same breath.
Both Beckett and Esposito looked unimpressed at him and he watched with hesitancy as Beckett told Tori to pursue the lead and get everything she could on Anderson Cross and his company. He felt a mixed sensation roll through him when, only a moment later, Tori declared that there was no site in his name. His father had destroyed everything and oh god, this looked worse than it was meant to, right? He wasn't losing his mind.
Beckett took a step closer to the screen, still featuring the side on shot of Jackson Hunt. "Who the hell is this guy? He's obviously not a banker." Her head cocked to the side the longer she stared at the photo and then, like lightening tricking the ground, she was away from the screen, eyes wide. "I know why he looks so familiar." She declared, stepping away from the screen and him and moving out of the room.
"Where are you going?" He called, desperately trying to grasp onto his sanity. There was no way… was there?
"To check something." She called as she left the room, chasing down the hall.
He can't even be surprised when Jackson doesn't answer his phone calls; can't even bring himself to be anything other than angry at the man because how on earth could he bring him into the middle of this? He was living such a happy life before he knew this man existed. His stomach twisted and turned the more he thought about the man he was instinctively backing up was the same man that killed the mother of the woman he loved.
He was such a damn fool for wanting all of this to be wrong, for still believing in him even though the evidence stood against him. The possibility that Castle could be wrong in all of this was substantial and he couldn't forget that, even as he stared at his text screen and begged Jackson to answer the damn phone and meet him at the park. He couldn't go back to the coffee shop; not with the sour taste it left in his mouth.
Esposito was in front of him before he pressed send, making him bounce back in shock. Esposito seemed defensive today, getting a little too close to his face for his liking – almost as if he sensed there was something extremely wrong with Castle. Castle only hoped he'd been better at hiding it all that it worked to confuse his co-workers and fiancée into thinking there was nothing wrong at all.
But then, Esposito informed him that Anderson Cross' office had disappeared entirely, there was no trace to him at all and he became desperate, slamming his thumb against the glass screen of his phone to finish the message and send it to him. His anger for sticking up for him didn't subside as he slid onto the desk across from the murder board and listened in on their speculation.
Beckett entered the bull pen a moment later, carrying papers in the crook of her arm. His eyes searched his partner for some indication that there was something he was missing. There had to be. "We've crossed paths before." She announced to the small group. And then she pasted a sketch of his father next to the sketch they'd received earlier and his heart sunk. "Check this out." She pointed at the sketch. "Remember this guy? Alexis's kidnapping last year."
His face dropped significantly as he stared at the picture. This couldn't be good at all. But still, somewhere in the back of his mind, he was trying to rationalize everything, trying to make it fit into the picture he was thinking of. There had to be some indication that all of this was a set up.
"Damn, that's right. Uh … witnesses kept seeing him pop up at locations associated with her abduction." Ryan interjected and for a moment, Castle hated him. He needed an explanation, needed for something in this case to point someone else out. But it didn't.
Esposito perked up too, bouncing off the energy from his partners that they seemed to be close to a potential suspect and Castle clenched his fists at his side. "At each one of those locations there was a dead body."
Beckett nodded to herself, turning back to the group. "So I sent the video surveillance to a friend of mine in the AG's office and he got a hit. Now he couldn't get into details, but he did say that this guy is a former CIA operative."
Castle caught onto her last word with a deep sigh nestled in his chest. Oh no, no. He didn't believe in his father only for it to all fall down on him. Jackson had told him he was still current with the CIA, had even went into detail that he'd started out as a sniper for them and had branched off to private businesses when he moved up. That was how he'd met Bracken. "Wait a minute," he said finally, clenching his jaw. "Former?"
Beckett narrowed her eyes at him, curious as to why he was questioning information that he'd just been told but she didn't bring it up in the middle of this. The group was entirely too excited from the new information, with the exception of Castle who'd slumped down, unacknowledged to everyone else. "Yeah. He, uh … he was disowned for an unauthorized assassination. He was sentenced to life, broke out, killed three guys in the process. This guy's wanted by our government. Now my friend said the rumor is he's working as a hitman. And if we get eyes on him the AG's office wants us to call them so they can send in a strike team." Beckett told the group and then Castle tuned out, staring down at his phone
We have some things to talk about, he typed to Jackson. Answer right away. Or I'll turn you in myself.
His phone buzzed in his palm a minute later. I'll be at your home shortly.
Castle watched as both Ryan and Esposito disappeared away from the bullpen and narrowed his eyes, wondering what they were chasing but he hadn't been paying attention. "Castle, did you ever see this man in Paris?" Beckett's voice made him jump slightly and he turned toward her, staring at the pictures.
Even though he was freaking out on the inside, he managed to give her a soft smile. "Not that I can remember. Why don't you text me those sketches? I'll have Alexis come over, see if she recognizes him." He began to move toward the door, but Beckett had other ideas, chasing after him with her voice and stalling him.
"You want me to come along?" She asked, and he knew that she was only asking to be polite but it made him crazy. No, she couldn't come along so he could go chew out his father. She couldn't know what he knew; not yet.
"Uh, no. No, no. I'll – uh … call you." He was scrambling for some words from the English dictionary to help him out, but he couldn't speak properly. His mind was rolling with thoughts.
"Are you okay?" Beckett asked, tilting her head to the side. Castle stared back, wondering if she was questioning whether he was being entirely truthful to her and he begged she wouldn't press anymore. He had to go home, make sure his mother was still at her class and that Alexis was nowhere to be seen if he had a chance at keeping this quiet.
"Yeah," he said finally, not elaborating and then turned, heading straight for the elevator.
"What the hell is going on?" Jackson was already waiting for him when he got there and after the man assured him they were the only ones in the home, Castle was free to let all the anger that burrowed within him go free. "What aren't you telling me about this Ted Rollins character?"
Jackson ignored him for a moment, standing from the couch and pressing a palm against his abdomen. "I didn't kill him," Jackson told him. "But he was onto me, he knew who I was and was ready to turn me into the authorities. Which would have been pretty ironic considering that he was the one usually being arrested," he laughed as though he'd told a joke, but Castle didn't find it funny. "Oh, relax, Richard, it wouldn't hurt you to crack a smile every now and again."
Castle just glared a little harder, staring at him until he saw red appear under his father's palm and the anger flashed to worry. "What's going on, Dad?" He asked; the sound foreign to his tongue.
"Oh, this? That's nothing," he pulled his hand away and inspected the spot. "I was just shot on my way here."
A/N: Thank you immensely to those whom have reviewed and alerted this fic. It means a lot. And I apologize for the delay with this chapter; Technical difficulties.