A/N: Ba-ba-bum .. Another chapter. I'm telling you guys, I can't help myself. Thank you again for the lovely reviews. Consider me heart-warmed. Oooh and since ya'll are awesome, here's a teaser. Next chapter brings major fluff. ;) The more readers & reviewers, the merrier. Happy reading!

Disclaimer: I do not own Castle.

Chapter 13

This time even Beckett was surprised. "Are you saying that the psychiatrist lied too?"

Castle shook his head. "He didn't lie. In fact, it's what he told us about MPD that got me to think about it in the first place. The liar here is still Daniel Smith."

"How so?" Gates asked.

"We first heard from his best friend, Sanders, that he had MPD. A fact that Sanders himself came to know after their fall-out. Daniel *wanted* him to know. Sanders told us that he confronted his superiors about Daniel's MPD and that they acted as if they had no idea about what he was saying. They weren't acting. They really didn't know what anything had to do with MPD because their psychiatrist hadn't diagnosed him as having it. Sanders said that he'd been reported in for aggressive behavior and that's why he had to go to the psychiatrist in the first place. Now I'm not sure, but I think that when he came up with the whole MPD thing is when he voluntarily dropped from the lab onto the field. The rest of it – mood swings, aggression, all of it was an elaborate drama that Sander's completely fell for. Sanders would not have known much about MPD and wouldn't have bothered to find out."

"That's why Dr. Ford looked confused when we asked him about MPD" Beckett said. She explained to Gates "We couldn't ask him directly because of the physician-patient confidentiality clause." Gates nodded.

"Back to what Ford said, MPD is when a person has two or more personalities usually diametrically opposite and there are periods of memory loss. Again, I bet if you called Sanders or any one from his contingent to ask them whether Smith complained or showed signs of memory loss, they would say no."

Like before, Gates instructed Beckett to confirm this fact. Beckett made a quick job of it and to no-one's surprise, Castle was right yet again.

Beckett spoke "All this while Nathan had told us exactly what we needed to know. When he described Daniel he said things like Daniel was smarter than him, not as emotional as him, always good at manipulating people."

Castle nodded. "He didn't say it directly, but I think deep down he knew that there was always something off about his brother. It's possible that he has an inferiority complex that doesn't let him acknowledge it."

"I still don't get what the symbol or White has anything to do with this." Gates said.

This time Beckett spoke "Nathan said that he didn't know Dr. Wilkins personally. He also said that the project that came to them was not going to be theirs initially. With a little digging I found out that Auctagnitio's little project was being funded by none other than Turbofuels. I spoke on the phone to the new director of Turbofuels a couple of days ago. He said that Wilkins had given the orders to pull the funding from the university and directed it into Auctagnitio instead. At the time we thought it was just another wayward connection. But it turned out to be the primary motive. It's also probably why Wilkins was tortured and killed but White wasn't."

Gates nodded again.

"That brings us to your question about the symbol. Nathan told us that Daniel was learning a whole bunch of stuff in the few years before he picked up his career again. One of the things he learnt was welding. Then the question is, why that particular symbol? Again, he gave me the answer, inadvertently." Castle said.

Beckett added excitedly "You were looking through his books!" Gates looked confused again, so she explained. "The symbol served one purpose only - to throw us completely off the trail by blurring the motive."

Castle nodded. "Yup, I noticed that all his books were mystery novels revolving around Celts and Pagans and such. He'd probably gotten the idea from one of those. Of course I didn't realize it then, I still thought that his crazy-other personality was an ecoterrorist fueled by these books."

"Good work you two. I think what we have now is less circumstantial than before. I'll start the process of acquiring a warrant for his arrest" Gates said as she turned around and went towards her office.

After she was gone Castle turned to Beckett with a stunned expression on his face. "Did she just compliment us?" he asked with raised eyebrows.

She had to fight off her laughter. "Yes Castle, she did." She looked to make sure that Gates was busy and then touched his arm. She let her hand slide down his arm to his hand and gave it a small squeeze. "You deserved it, Castle. You were brilliant."

His mouth was open. 'What just happened?' he thought. He didn't know whether to be stunned that Gate's praised him, that Kate did or just that Kate's hand was on his. He dumbly opened and closed his mouth a few times, not being able to work his vocal cords. It was probably that Kate just touched him then.

Beckett must have realized from his face and general inability to speak. She took her hand away, smirked at turned to go back to her table to call the boys for an update but not before once turning over her should to say "What's the matter Castle? Kate got your tongue?"

He made the mistake of having a sip of coffee that very moment. He gasped, eyes watering, stuck out his tongue and started fanning it. He managed to choke out "Why is thing still so ho-hot. I was talking for the past 1 hour. And WHAT did you just say?"

"Cat got your tongue, Castle. It's an expression. What kind of author are you?" she replied.

She was very convincing and very conniving. She looked back into her paper work and said with a very steady voice "You should really wait for your coffee to get cooler before drinking it Castle." Only she knew how hard it was to fight off a smirk. But *she* made the mistake of thinking on the words that she just used on Castle as a weapon and further thought 'Someday I will get your...', she didn't let the thought complete, instead donning an expression of utter horror. This must have convinced him of her innocence. 'Great' thought Castle, 'Now I'm having auditory hallucinations. It's getting hot in here.' He tugged at his collar before gathering himself to reply to her question.

"Ummm. No, no. I was just thinking about how I wouldn't have pieced any of it together if you hadn't mentioned Occam's razor" he said as he made his way to his chair next to her.

"Oh yeah! I meant to ask earlier before we were interrupted. Just how did Occam's razor trigger all of that? None of it sounds remotely like the simplest solution."

"When you said it, the first thought that crossed my mind was that Daniel Smith was a psychopath seeking revenge. The rest of it just fell into place." He shrugged and smiled at her sheepishly getting him a beaming smile in return. She was going to make a call but she couldn't not look at him right now. Her writer man who just solved the case. He was staring at her too, longing for her touch again, but eye-sex would have to do for now.

She finally looked away and made the call. Esposito and Ryan had been there for hours but Daniel Smith hadn't gotten out of his apartment yet, although they had established for sure that he was home. She told them that the arrest warrant was in process but that they wouldn't move on him till he revealed his other place. It would be easier to convict him if they had the hard evidence after all. She told them what Castle and she had figured out – in something of a miniature form even of a summary – and that they would be joining in the stakeout later as well. When she noticed out of the corner of her eye that Castle had heard her and was yet again jumping in his chair she smiled into the phone and said "When we come there you guys take a break and pick up again later in the night. If he doesn't move today, we'll figure something else out by tomorrow."

"This is awesome!" he said, clearly unable to contain himself anymore. She had to respond to his smile with hers. She felt sure that if she were to try counting, she'd count at least 28 of his 32 teeth – his perfect, clean, shiny white teeth. She shook her head at herself.

"Now what?" he asked.

"Now we go home, have dinner really quickly, grab some stuff we need and relieve the boys in about another hour's time" she said as she put on a jacket. He had his special reserved-for-Kate-only look on when she looked at him but she couldn't think why. His eyes were soft and he had on an equally soft smile because – and he didn't point it out to her – she had called the loft home. She still wasn't in a hurry to get back to her own apartment and he was in no hurry to let her go.

On the way home they picked up Chinese so that they'd save on cooking time. They ate quickly once they reached the loft and changed into less conspicuous clothes. A dark t-shirt, a pair of jeans and a cap for him and the only wearable t-shirt - the rest were big ones to sleep in - she'd carried to the loft, jeans and one of his caps for her. He quickly called Alexis and Martha since they still had a little time. They grabbed some stuff like she'd said which included a set of high-tech binoculars ("Why do you even have these? Never mind I don't think I want to know" she'd said), some more food and water on his insistence ("Beeeeckeettt! It's a stake-out. We have to have food" he'd whined), their now-charged cell phones and a couple of other things.

They didn't take either of their cars. The Crown Vic would have been obvious and a Ferrari probably more so. Instead he called one of the car services he frequently uses to get them an inconspicuous dark sedan which they delivered within twenty minutes to his loft. She drove (duh!) to the same spot Rsyposito were at, making only one pit stop to get themselves coffee ("We have to stay up" she justified to him). Ryan and Esposito went home to rest and promised to be back in a few hours. They'd found a good little spot that Castle and Beckett now occupied. It was just at the corner from the street that his building was on. If anyone would have tried to peer into their car, they'd only have seen themselves because Castle had asked for a car with extra-tint. They still would have taken the extra precaution of ducking of course but this was a good stake-out car, Beckett thought.

She was looking through her binoculars at his apartment windows. The curtains were in place. He didn't suspect anything as yet.

"Beckett" Castle said softly.

"What Castle?" she asked him while still peering through the binoculars.

"I need to pee."

"You just went before we left the loft Castle!" she scowled at him.

"Yeah, but then we had coffee. Caffeine can act as a diuretic, you know. And it's cold." He added with a faux-shiver and completely fake clatter of his teeth.

"Fine" she huffed. "Go round the back, find some store or something and try and be inconspicuous about it."

He didn't need telling twice. He walked the few steps from the car and broke out into a run once he rounded the corner. She smiled and thought he must really need to go. He must have come back running too because he was back quickly – and not empty handed.

When he sat back in the car she asked "What's that Castle?"

"I had to buy something to use the bathroom. So I bought us cookies." He smiled as he handed her one.

She took the cookie because he all but shoved it in her mouth. Then she blinked several times and said more to herself than to him "It's going to be a long night."

After swallowing the bit of his cookie he said with a wide smile "I know, right?"

Post A/N: So, I hope you caught the edit. It was the 'Kate got your tongue part'. *sniggers* and the throwback to their oh-so-hot ad. Credit for that extremely hilarious and completely graphic (:P) line, goes to my intelligent friend, fellow Castle fan: kidchaos293. I swear I shook with laughter when you told me.