A/N: Yes, it has been a long time. But this story is still going and it will keep going.

I don't own anything you recognise, just keeping myself entertained, and you hopefully.

Boulevard of Broken Dreams

Chapter Eight

Beckett sighed as she climbed back into the driver's seat of her Crown Vic, "He really was useless." Castle said with a sigh of his own as he sat down beside her in the passenger seat. Beckett nodded, before Castle continued, "You'd think he'd care that someone who lived in his building had been murdered, but he only seemed interested in making sure that there weren't any holes in the floor."

"Well there weren't any holes," Beckett replied, "The only holes I can think of at the moment are the holes in our timeline and knowledge of Cassandra's life." She explained as she pulled the car from the curb and headed back towards the precinct.

"What do you think is missing from these pages?" Castle asked, as he continued to thumb through the pages of Cassandra's makeshift diary.

Beckett turned to face him, "Are you asking me because you cannot think of anything sensible?" she questioned with a small smile.

Castle smiled back, "I did think that there might have been the answers to life's greatest questions, but somehow I just can't see it."

"And life's great questions would be what questions exactly?" Beckett asked, her eyes staring towards the busy road in front of them. "And if you say something about alien invasions and the American gangster age, you will walk back to the precinct." She added with a straight face, even though she felt like laughing.

Castle opened his mouth, but didn't say anything.

"Don't sit down."

Beckett stopped beside her desk and then turned and looked towards where the voice had come from, "Why?" she questioned towards her captain.

"Mr Swift needs to see you again. The tiara he mentioned to you this morning has turned up again." Montgomery explained as Beckett and Castle moved to stand next to him.

"Did he say where it was found?" Castle questioned, his writer's mind spinning a story immediately.

"No, but he did say that he wanted to speak to the both of you as soon as he could."

Beckett nodded, smiled and headed for the elevator once again.

"Detective Beckett, Mr Castle, thank you so much for coming back so quickly." Mr Swift said with a stressed voice as the two of them entered the jewellery store.

Beckett took a deep breath and studied the scene in front of her, there were no customers in the store and the only noise was coming from a small woman hunched in the corner sobbing her heart out. The woman was Maggie.

"Where was the tiara found Mr Swift?" Castle questioned, noticing that Beckett was in her studying the scene mode and he'd be most useful by asking a few questions.

"Just after you left, I went to see to Mrs Gregory, her daughter Sarah is having her birthday next month and her mother is keen to present her with a diamond encrusted pendant." Mr Swift explained carefully. "I had remembered a particular stone that my father had kept for the perfect setting and I was to offer it to Mrs Gregory. It is stored in the back storage safe."

"And the tiara was there?" Castle asked as he watched Beckett make her way over to the crying Maggie.

"Yes." Mr Swift nodded. "Maggie offered to retrieve the stone from the safe, she insisted in fact. But I was worried that she would bring the wrong one, you must understand that there are pieces in there that aren't to be shown to just anyone."

Castle nodded, "So you brought the tiara out in to the store?"

Mr Swift shook his head, "No, I saw it there and then left it. I was certain I'd never see it again. I pretended there was nothing amiss and continued to deal with Mrs Gregory, her daughter's present is going to be beautiful."

"Mr Swift asked me to clear the store of customers, without making a scene." Chris the security guard explained as he came to stand next to Mr Swift. "Maggie realised what was happening and began to cry, she hasn't stopped."

"Mr Castle," Mr Swift said carefully his voice small and worried, "please, you have to find out what is going on here. First Paulette, then Cassandra and now this, nothing like this has happened here before. Nothing."

"Maggie?" Beckett questioned as she knelt beside the crying woman, "Is there something that you need to talk about?"

Maggie shook her head, before she whispered slowly, "I did it to protect her. It was for her own good. I thought this would keep her safe."

"You moved the tiara to try and blame Cassandra?" Beckett questioned as Maggie moved her head upwards to face her.

"Yes." Maggie replied, her voice shaking. "I did it to protect her from him. It couldn't happen again."

Castle and Beckett stood in the observation room watching Maggie carefully. She had stopped crying and was busy smoothing down the ends of her hair. She looked calm, no sign of the woman who had shook the whole way back to the precinct. If Castle were writing her character, he would have written that she'd made a serious decision and was now willing to take the consequences of her actions.

"Maggie, you told me earlier that you took the tiara from where it was and placed it somewhere else. Is this true?" Beckett questioned as she and Castle sat down opposite her in the interrogation room.

"Yes." Maggie replied calmly.

"Can you tell us why?" Castle asked.

"I did it for Cassandra."

"For Cassandra?"

"Cassie was so much like Paulette, she acted like her, she looked like her, she thought the tiara was so amazing, just like Paulette did. The customers noticed how much she was like Paulette, I saw it. It wouldn't be long before he saw it."

Beckett and Castle looked at one another, could they have been right all along?

"Before who saw?"

"Michael."

"Mr Bancroft told us this morning he no longer visits Swifts', that he hasn't been there since Paulette was killed." Castle stated, he could see the story unfurling before his eyes.

"He may not have been inside but he's been there. He met Cassie once, he came to pick me up one night."

"And you needed to protect Cassie from Mr Bancroft because?" Beckett questioned, she could sense the breakthrough coming, she could feel that she'd been right all along, that Maggie was about to reveal that she'd been lying about his alibi.

"Because Michael killed Paulette," Maggie replied, her voice hiccupping as she said so.

"The alibi that you gave him?" Castle asked, his curiosity intrigued, he'd been right all along.

"I was with him, but we weren't at home."

"You were there?"

Maggie nodded. "Michael and I were meant to meet that night, he was supposed to be taking me out for dinner. We were having an affair, that part was true."

"When did this affair begin?"

"About six months earlier, the Christmas party. I didn't mean for it to happen but it just did." Maggie explained. "The night Paulette died he called and said he would be late and would it be okay if I met him at the restaurant. I told him it was fine and instead of catching a cab I decided to walk."

"You walked through the park?" Castle questioned, seeing the story take shape.

Maggie nodded, "The night was nice, there wasn't a cloud in the sky."

"He knew you would see him?" Beckett asked, shocked at the level of cruelty one man was able of.

"I called him to say that I was walking, he told me that he too had decided to walk. I met him in the middle of the park. He had scratches down the side of his face, he told me what he'd done and that if I didn't alibi him out he'd do the same to me, except he'd make sure that no-one ever found the body." Maggie explained, shivering. "I believed him, I believed he'd kill me, I was terrified."

"Paulette was your friend." Castle stated bluntly.

Maggie nodded once again, "But she was dead. I couldn't bring her back."

"There were no scratches on Mr Bancroft's face when we interviewed him the next morning." Beckett said, wondering what had happened to them.

"Before I worked at Swifts' I was a cosmetologist, I worked for a leading skin care company, I hid the scratches with makeup, it wasn't hard, they were only superficial and they disappeared quickly."

"Why did you take the tiara?" Beckett questioned carefully.

"I thought I could get her fired. That she would get the blame and then she'd be sent home and out of harms way. She was new, the last one to begin working there, I thought they'd blame her and then she'd be gone. I never thought she'd volunteer to be fingerprinted and that her honesty would make her more well received."

"But you couldn't get the tiara out of the building?"

"No," Maggie stated, "And I didn't want to. I didn't want it for myself."

"You said he met Cassie once, Cassie arrived in New York once Paulette was dead. How did they meet? Why did they meet at all?" Beckett questioned, confused as to the chain of events.

"Michael came to pick me up for dinner." Maggie stated.

"You went to dinner with him?" Castle questioned, not really believing what he was hearing. "This man killed your best friend, threatened you but still you kept seeing him."

"Yes."

"Did you continue to sleep with him?"

"Yes. Michael wanted it to look as if the affair was continuing, he needed to keep up the pretence if you came after him again."

"Did you sleep with him willingly?" Beckett asked carefully.

"Yes." Maggie replied once more, "I did what I had to do to stay alive."

"Are you still sleeping together?"

"No, not since he met Alexandra."

Beckett and Castle turned to look at one another again, each of them knew that the other was thinking of - the woman Bancroft had claimed he was with overnight.

"And he met Alexandra when?"

"Three weeks ago, give or take."

"Paulette was killed months ago, but you still continued sleeping with her killer?"

"I told you," Maggie replied, her voice full of certainty, "I did what I had to do to stay alive. Am I proud of what I did? No, of course not. But I am still alive. Do I hate myself? Yes, of course I do. But I am still alive. Was I a terrible friend? Yes. Do I wish I had told you this months ago? Of course. But people do what they have to do to stay alive and that is what I did."

Castle stared towards the small woman, he half expected her to burst into tears but her posture was resolute, he'd been right about his observations of her character, she'd made her decision and she was ready for the consequences and consequences would be forthcoming.

Beckett and Castle stepped from the interrogation room, leaving the resolute Maggie behind them. "What will happen to her now?" Castle questioned.

"The DA will most likely charge her with providing a false alibi, it depends on whether or not we can get Bancroft to admit that he threatened her." Castle nodded at Beckett's explanation, as she slipped her hand carefully into his and squeezed it tightly, "You were right."

Castle smiled, a hollow smile, "I was, but that doesn't bring her back. Nor does it solve what happened to Cassie, we know he didn't kill her."

Beckett squeezed his hand again, "It's a start Castle, and it's justice for Paulette. Her family will know what happened to her once and for all."

Castle nodded, "And that's what we do."

Beckett nodded back towards him and smiled, she was about to say something as her phone rang. "Beckett," she answered as Esposito began talking to her at a rapid pace.

Castle noticed the change in his girlfriend almost immediately; she let go of his hand and began to pace around the room.

"Castle," she said quietly, as she hung up the phone, "Bancroft has been found dead."