After an excruciatingly embarrassing few minutes of Beckett producing her badge, fumbling to unfasten Castle's handcuffs, and them both attempting to convince Detective Rika Karlsdotter that it had just been a bit of a practical joke between friends, Castle somehow finally managed to appease her with an offer of some chocolate brownies and freshly brewed coffee.

Castle and Beckett sat opposite Detective Karlsdotter and her colleague Detective Tim Burt, a tall skinny young man, on the sofas in the living room, with a huge plate of chocolate brownies on the table between them. Detective Burt, as you would expect from his size, took one brownie and nibbled on it. Detective Karlsdotter on the other hand, as you would also expect from her size, took three and wolfed them down. She was a formidable looking woman and presumably needed the extra brownies to feed her muscular frame because, although quite short, she more than made up for it in breadth. She was a woman not to be messed with and the last person to mess her around looked to be Detective Burt who sat in her shadow, quite literally, and tended to startle easily when she addressed him.

"So," she began, washing down the last of her third brownie with a swig of coffee and placing the mug back on the table with a thud, "you knew this man then, this Mr Moon?"

She smiled across the room at Castle but he was more focused on an irritating smudge of chocolate at the corner of her mouth which he had hoped she would have wiped away by now.

"Err," he lifted a finger to the corner of his mouth and wiped it, hoping that she would get the hint. "No, not vey well."

"But you based your book on him," she commented, not picking up on Castle's gesture at all.

"Well, vaguely," he replied, leaning towards her slightly and pointing to her mouth. She focused on his finger before raising her eyes slowly to his and gazing. He pulled back abruptly as if being scorched by fire and watched with unease as she slowly licked the chocolate away and smiled poignantly at him. His eyes flicked to Beckett for moral support but her mind was elsewhere, already sifting through a whole multitude of possibilities which would explain the events next door. She was sitting, staring out of the patio window doors as if towards the neighbouring house in an attempt to picture the scene.

"Vaguely?" Karlsdotter questioned.

He turned his attention from Beckett back to Karlsdotter. "I knew of him. Knew his name and that he was in real estate. I made the rest up."

"Matthew Starr?" Beckett turned to Castle suddenly, throwing him a look as if to say that she wasn't impressed.

"I still think it sounds better than Mark Moon," he replied.

She looked sceptical. "Couldn't you have been a bit more original?"

"Hey, I had to get my inspiration from somewhere," he said defensively.

"What contact did you have with the deceased Mr Rick?" Karlsdotter asked.

"Not much," he reconfirmed. "I was in New York for most of the year. When I was here he threw a few parties, so did I. Occasionally we met but I was more preoccupied with my own guests. I met him a few times but that was it; we never went beyond a few handshakes and hellos." He felt that he should have been able to say more and after a moments thought added, "There was one girl though, she worked at the local bar, 'Jimmy's'" She came to some of my parties and moved next door on a few occasions when the parties clashed. She knew some of the kids that worked there for Mr Moon, you know like house staff I think."

Karlsdotter nodded and seemed to make a mental note.

"I'd like to look around next door if that's okay with you," Beckett came out with suddenly, itching to figure out more.

Karlsdotter looked dubious until Castle piped up.

"Me and Beckett here are partners," he said, putting an arm around her shoulder. Beckett glared at it. "We work for the NYPD," he said proudly. "We get the bullet vests and guns."

Karlsdotter nudged her jacket aside to reveal a fire arm of her own.

"Oh," Castle said with surprise, "you have one too."

Karlsdotter nodded and smiled. "You can come…and look next door."

Castle wasn't sure how he felt about that enthusiastic smile from Karlsdotter but he jumped up nonetheless and announced that he was going to get dressed and would be ready in five.

As he rushed upstairs again and into his bedroom to change, his mind was racing. This case could be a lifesaver, for him at least, because surely Beckett would have to stay now. That would give him time to work on her, show her that he wasn't as shallow as she thought. He had to make her see that.

Whilst dressing, he also recalled with pleasure the few moments they had shared lying so close together on the sofa. He could still feel the soft contours of her body yielding underneath him, his hand on the softest, fleshiest part! But even more exciting was the possibility that she had been affected by his nearness too. On the surface, no. But he knew that was an instinctual, defensive response from Beckett: to push him away and use her police training as a means of warding him off. But looking at the evidence more closely, ironically as she herself had taught him to do, it had taken her many heartstoppingly intense moments before she had got around to pushing him away. Okay maybe she had taken that time to cuff him and that could explain why she hadn't moved sooner but the expression on her face couldn't hide deeper emotions. He could always rely on her facial expressions to give away something of how she felt… and her jitters, the shaking hand afterwards, was unmistakable.

Moving back down the stairs he saw them waiting for him in the entrance hall and he homed in on Beckett, reading her cell phone, watching Karlsdotter and Burt, figuring out something in her head. Was she thinking about the case, that she would have to stay and solve it? She was the first to look up at him as he descended the stairs and for an instant their eyes connected, a mistake on her part perhaps as she quickly glanced away and there followed few moments when that frown crossed her face again and she fiddled with her cell phone a little more than was necessary.

Castle led his guests outside, locked the house and they moved next door to the back of the building and the pool area where Mark Moon had fallen. At the electric gate at the side of the house they paused as Karlsdotter took time with the security code. Castle stood close behind Beckett, waiting for them to enter, and as he stood there his eyes focused on the small detail of her hair, the way it clung softly to the material of her shirt just beneath the collar and how the sun caught golden and copper strands, seeming to make them glow and shimmer in the light. Then Karlsdotter and Burt had passed through the gate so Castle reached forward in front of Beckett to hold it open for her. As he leant closer that scent of her perfume teased him again, it meant that she was close, and his hand was drawn to her waist to guide her through the gate… or steady himself, or …who was he kidding, just to touch her.

Then it happened again for an instant: the world slowed down and it was as if all his senses were finely tuned to her only. He could feel the gentle curve of her body against his palm, it was unmistakably feminine, and the heat of her body seemed to radiate through the material. He could see the profile of her face as she stared at the catch of the gate at the side of her and he noticed that strange, far away expression and stillness in her that he had experienced when they had been on the sofa. For a reason he couldn't fathom it made his heart thud just a little more. Without realising it, his thumb had begun to stroke small circles over the material of her shirt. He watched it with fascination, feeling the friction between the material and skin beneath. Then his gaze returned to the side of her face and he just caught it: her eyelids drifting down and remaining closed for an instant before shooting open again. She gave her head an abrupt shake and moved forward suddenly through the gate.

As they wandered through the gardens, Castle found himself in an uncomfortable state of near arousal, being extra sensitive to every stimuli around him but more specifically, extra aware of Beckett: her every move, stance, gesture, facial expression. Being behind her wasn't helping either, especially considering where his hand had ended up when they had been on the sofa, and as they walked around the garden he seemed to be developing a fascination for that part of her body. Just as soon as he forced his eyes away from it, he found them moving back. He had to stop this and cool down!

Beckett had made a few comments as they strolled through the gardens and pool area towards the house but castle hadn't concentrated at all on what she had said. He wasn't going to be much use to her in this state, he had to focus.

Taking in the scene it became obvious that there had been one hell of a party the previous night as the entire pool area was a mess of beer bottles, glasses, half filled plates of food, and toppled over chairs etc. And then there was the blood splattered spot underneath the house where the fall had occurred.

"It's not much like the scene described in Heat Wave," Beckett commented, looking upwards. "Okay the guy fell but would the drop even have been enough to kill him?" she pondered. It was hardly the bone shattering drop from a city skyscraper that caused Starr's death. The house was only three floors high!

"If it were a true copy cat killer they would have wanted to get all the details right, as much as they could," Castle pointed out, forcing his brain to concentrate on the case.

"That would be a problem if Moon didn't happen to be in New York in a multi-storey building at the time," Burt commented.

"Then the killer would have disabled or even murdered him beforehand and staged the whole thing to make it look as close to the original murder as possible. The circumstances are nothing near similar," Castle said, glancing around.

"As it happens we've already had some results back from forensics and there is evidence of strangulation as well as substantial grazing and bruises on the arms," Karlsdotter informed them, wondering if that would be enough for them to draw the right conclusions.

"So he was strangled beforehand and dragged," Beckett summed up, with a thoughtful hand to her mouth. Karlsdotter began to realise that Beckett and Castle were quick and efficient with minimal details. Did she feel threatened by that? Not at the moment but this wasn't their jurisdiction and if they waned in, it would have to be on her terms. "But then if the crime was premeditated, say someone who wanted to copy Castle's story, they don't seem to have done much to hide the fact that it wasn't the drop that killed him." Beckett added, turning to Castle for answers.

"You're right, it doesn't fit. It's not a true copy cat killer but it is someone who wants to make a point, get our attention," he responded.

"I'm assuming he fell from there," Beckett said, pointing upwards towards a bedroom balcony.

"You assumed right," Karlsdotter confirmed.

"Can we take a look?" Beckett asked.

"Sure, but there isn't much to see," Karlsdotter said, unlocking the patio door and leading them into the house.

The building was of a similar layout to Castle's house but perhaps slightly bigger and more lavishly furnished. It wasn't so much to Beckett's taste however as it seemed as if the owner was screaming out 'look at me, I'm rich' with his choice of décor. It was too overstated.

As they ascended the stairs Castle found his focus drifting again and once more his eyes took on a will of their own. Why hadn't he noticed before just how great she looked form behind? I mean of course he'd looked but… had he truly appreciated? Well now he was certainly making up for lost time! Maybe it was that he hadn't seen her for so long that now he was realising what he had previously taken for granted or… maybe it was those intensely physical moments on the sofa that had triggered off this obsession with her body he was finding himself struggling with.

Then Beckett was speaking to him, well her lips had moved so he assumed that she had said something. He nodded and agreed, hoping that agreeing was the correct response. It seemed to be. He couldn't even really remember walking through the bedroom but they must have done because they were now standing on the balcony. Damn it, he had to focus!

They stood next to each other, looking out across the garden with Karlsdotter and Burt hanging back in the bedroom. As they stood there he wondered if she was thinking anything similar to him. He doubted it however because at that point he had this insane urge to get another feel of what he'd felt on that sofa. In his mind he imagined reaching out and placing his hand there. No, no! He couldn't start thinking like that or there was a chance he might end up doing it!

He remembered going through a phase once at school during assembly time when it was extra quiet as the principal or a speaker was talking. He used to have these insane urges to stand up and shout something out. It was because everyone was so quiet and the fact that it would be such a daring thing to do that made it such an irresistible proposition. As time went by he struggled with this temptation during every assembly until one day the temptation became too much. A lecture on religious education was being given by one of the high school teachers who was focusing on the subject of belief. "What do you believe in?" he asked. It was more of a rhetorical question, meant to encourage the kids to reflect quietly. Castle on the other hand was not in a quiet, reflective mood. In a moment of madness he stood up and shouted out,

"Do you believe in rock n' roll?

Can music save your mortal soul

And can you teach me how to dance real slow?

Well, I know that you're in love with him,"

he sang, pointing from the teacher to Mrs Roberts, the school principal,

"'cause I saw you dancin' in the gym

You both kicked off your shoes

Man, I dig those rhythm and blooooooos!" he sang, playing an imaginary guitar.

Fortunately at that point one of the teachers ended the embarrassing spectacle by pointing to the kid next to him and shouting,

"Shut him up will you?"

The kid grabbed Castle by the sleeve of his shirt and dragged him back into his seat…

So… he concluded that, if he didn't get his mind off where he wanted to put his hand there was a fair chance he'd end up putting it there!

Beckett was talking again. He nodded and again she fell silent. More looking out across the garden and more thoughtful silence. He glanced behind him to see what the detectives were doing. Burt was at the far end of the bedroom, searching through some paperwork he had found on a shelf but disconcertingly Karlsdotter was watching him with a saucy grin. He smiled briefly and then it happened, Karlsdotter winked at him. His eyes widened in horror. He didn't want her; the thought repulsed him! Couldn't she see he had a thing for Beckett? It was then that he panicked and before he could stop himself he had moved his hand and…oh God, it was like school assembly all over again.

He turned back to the view and avoided looking at Beckett but he was surprised that she hadn't seemed to have moved. For one crazy moment he wondered what the possibility was that she hadn't noticed where his hand was? An eerie silence ensued until she broke it by saying, quite calmly,

"Castle,"

"Hmm," he replied, his hand growing hot on her jeans.

"What are you doing?"

After earlier that day he decided to go with the truth, well, part truth.

"Go with me on this," he whispered, "the ugly woman was winking at me." He thought it was a great, plausible response given the time he'd had to think of it.

She turned slowly to look at him in disbelief. "I don't care if a rhinoceros was winking at you, hand off, now!" she growled under her breath.

Rhinoceros wasn't far wrong!

"Spoil sport," he whispered, reluctantly dropping his hand and at the last second trying to commit to memory the feel of it there. It was possibly the last time in… well, forever he would feel it.

Beckett turned suddenly and leant to whisper in his ear. Ironically, the sensation of her warm breath and lips so close was as much of a turn on as the words she was saying were meant to be a turn off.

"Oh, and do that again once more and I'll break every bone in your body."

He wondered if sometime in the near future having every bone broken in his body would be worth another feel. Hmmm. Possibly.

"Well," she smiled at Karlsdotter and Burt. "Thank you for that. If you need any assistance from us you can contact me on this number," she said, producing a card from her handbag and passing it to Karlsdotter. Then she turned briefly to Castle before striding out of the room.

"Let's go, we need to talk."

He wondered what about? Not the damn contract again. Maybe how they were going to crack the case or maybe how they should forget the case for the afternoon and just jump into bed?

As he followed Beckett out of the room he was reminded of one time at school when the principle, Mrs Roberts, had come to find him in the rec room and summoned him back to her office. He had followed her sheepishly, not unlike he was doing now. He rather liked Mrs Roberts; she didn't look bad from behind either!