Chapter Five: This Year's Girl
Author's Note: About the preview for "Castle: The Blue Butterfly", three things: 1: HA! 2: World's. Best. HAT. 3: W-T-F…and how can I get in on it? Hm, guess that's four…
ON WITH THE SHOW!
Castle arrived at the 12th Precinct relatively late the next morning, which was a Thursday and raining. The minute he reached the detectives' bullpen and caught sight of the expression on Detective Beckett's face, however, he considered turning around and standing in the rain instead, where it might be safer and on average better for his health. His lovely muse and partner-in-crime-solving was wearing an expression that, in a lesser woman, heralded the throwing of china dishes at walls and much screaming at anyone nearby. She was clearly not having a great morning.
To make matters worse, Ryan and Esposito were neither at their desks nor, to Castle's hurried perusal of the area, anywhere to be seen. In the moments between taking stock of the situation as he stepped out of the elevator and marshalling his courage to approach Beckett's desk, he wondered if the boys' absence was contributing to Beckett's growing bad mood because she had no one with whom to confer and joke, or if they had vacated to avoid her temper.
Luckily, Castle had adhered to the unwritten Law of Being Late and had come armed, although coffee mugs made for inefficient shields and the paper bag he was carrying contained no effective ammunition. Instead, it was full of breakfast—the person late to a meeting should always bring food as an excuse for his or her lateness. Although he had to admit it was more like brunch by now.
As he eased his frame into his usual observer's chair, Beckett barely spared him a glance out of the corner of her eye as she listened to whoever was on the other end of the telephone connection. He had proffered coffee the moment she so much as acknowledged his presence, and she was not in such an ill temper that she was willing to pass up caffeine that she clearly desperately needed. Sipping the hot but delicious liquid gingerly as she waited for it to cool to a safely drinkable temperature, Beckett attempted to extract herself from a conversation that she clearly didn't want to be having—if 'conversation' was even the word for it. Castle was pretty sure a conversation involved an exchange of ideas—sometimes even complete sentences. He could hear the tone of voice from the phone line even if he couldn't make out any words, and it sounded like his dear Detective was being subjected to a rant.
After listening to several frustrated repetitions of "Yes, Mrs. Morris" and "No, Mrs. Morris", Castle extracted a foil-wrapped breakfast taco from his paper bag o' to-go breakfast, spent a few moments getting a napkin just right, and handed her the unwrapped breakfast snack. Although not a foodstuff generally associated with Manhattan, breakfast tacos were becoming briefly popular in the city for that very reason. Once they became commonplace, of course, the very people who were so eager to introduce them would lose interest and let them fade into obscurity again…until the next resurgence a couple of years later. Castle had gotten these from one of the few delis that had kept the item on their menu since the last fad. They'd spent the time getting the egg-and-cheese-and-bacon confection just right.
The breakfast taco did a lot to lighten Kate Beckett's mood, although not as much as the napkin on which Castle had scribbled want me to pull the fire alarm? in an offer to rescue her from the obnoxious woman she'd made the great mistake of calling. It was with great and real regret that she shook her head no, because she knew he would if she'd agreed it was necessary. It would have given her an excuse to hang up, though.
"Thank you, Mrs. Morris," she finally lied firmly, "you've been very helpful." Placing the phone back on its rest, she considered putting her head down on her desk and closing her eyes for the rest of the day. This cunning plan was foiled by the fact that the space was occupied by files, desktop computer and keyboard, coffee mug, and the second breakfast taco Castle had just thrust under her nose.
Well, the first one had been good, and she hadn't eaten more than an apple for breakfast over five hours ago. Also, she didn't have the heart to turn it down—and if she did, the boys would eat them all once they got back. She could only hope they'd have more luck than she had.
"Are you alright?" Castle asked, taking a breakfast taco for himself and biting into it. Through a mouthful of egg and cheese, he continued, "Who was that?"
"That," she replied, "was Stephanie's closest living relative, her aunt; a Mrs. Louise Morris of Irving, Texas. After nearly forty minutes on the phone with her and her equally pleasant husband Simon, I can tell you with absolute surety that I would have left them both as soon as possible too."
"Stephanie was a runaway?" Castle's fertile writer's mind instantly started conjuring up shady figures met on the road, desperate struggles to survive, shady characters navigating an unforgiving—
Beckett interrupted his mental construction work, recognizing the look in his eyes and moving to cut it off before it got out of hand. "Not technically. Stephanie was raised by her aunt and uncle after her parents died in a car crash when she was five. After an adolescence that sounded perfectly normal to me but which Mrs. Morris describes as a period of" Her voice took on an incredulous tone. "and I quote 'dissipation and idleness', Stephanie—"
"Ah, sounds like good times," Castle chipped in, staring into the middle distance with a reminiscing smile on his face.
"—packed up and left at the age of nineteen. The last Mrs. Morris heard of her niece, she was 'consorting with devil worshippers, hellbeasts, and witches'. That was actually the last useful comment I got from her. The other twenty minutes were condemnations of Stephanie and her utter conviction that her niece had chosen a life that would inevitably have led her to death and damnation."
Castle couldn't imagine dismissing a child so callously. "That was it?"
Beckett turned a disbelieving gaze on him. "Ten minutes of confusion and thirty of condemnation wasn't enough? Next time you can call her."
"No, no," he hastily corrected, "I mean—wasn't she upset to know her niece had been murdered?"
"Not noticeably," Beckett shrugged, finishing off her breakfast taco, balling up the foil wrapping, and sinking it in a nearby trashcan that wasn't the convenient one under her desk. "Actually, she sounded like any number of parents who were disappointed with how their kids turned out. Sometimes we get relatives in here who are just relieved the embarrassment—or in some cases, the fear—is over with. I've got to say, though," she added, grimacing, "most of them don't sound quite so pleased."
"So, no leads from the relatives then?" Castle concluded. "Unless she killed Stephanie in an attempt to remove a relative she finds shameful? And you're giving me that look again."
She was. "That's worse than thin, Castle. Besides, I asked, and Mrs. Morris insisted that she hadn't heard from or seen Stephanie in nearly four years, and hadn't wanted to, either. There's no way she'd know how to drug Steph to weaken her, and she apparently didn't even know Steph was in New York. It took me a few minutes to persuade her I was a detective and that I wasn't trying to sell her something."
"Ah." Thinking it over, Castle took a moment to check out the murderboard. The timeline now read Steph leaves Krimsonn at 11:00 PM. The next entry was watchman arrives at 12 AM, and watchman leaves at 1. In between the two was a notation to check into teens drinking? Time of death spanned 1:30 to 3:30, and then the field was wide open until 6:45 AM Wednesday, which was when her body had been found.
"What about the number Leesha and Perrin gave you?" Castle asked. He remembered that the two Slayers had given Beckett the phone number of one of Steph's close friends, although he couldn't at the moment remember which one of them it had been.
Beckett sighed and wished there was more coffee. "I called her yesterday to get her to come in for an interview. She promised to call me back in an hour. It's now today and not only have I not heard back from her, I've left her a dozen messages. She's not answering her phone anymore."
"Maybe something happened to her. Maybe someone's going after not only Steph, but her friends too. Maybe they all know something the killer can't have getting out. Maybe she killed her friend and she's on the run. Maybe—"
"Castle!" Beckett cut him off. "While you're at it, why don't you include 'maybe she's ignoring me because she's convinced it's a private problem that the group will solve without any interference from outsiders'?"
"That's a big 'maybe'," Castle commented, considering that.
"Yes, but it's the more probable one. I didn't know Steph very well, I realize that, but one of the things I did get to understand is that it's a private world. I suppose when talking about your daily life to strangers gets you laughed at and convinced that you're insane, you learn to just rely on the people around you, people you already trust."
"Sounds lonely."
"Do you think? I think it sounds anything but—if you're surrounded by people you know will be there for you, why would you need to tell strangers about your job? Everyone you need is there with you already."
This philosophical musing was interrupted by the arrival of Ryan and Esposito, who had tracked water halfway across the bullpen floor on their way to greet Castle, report in, and raid the free food. (A brief scrimmage ensued over the distributions of the breakfast tacos with bacon.)
"Well?" Beckett enquired when the guys had settled the ownership of the bacon tacos.
"The guy from the dojo is blowin' in the wind," Esposito reported, munching. "Dropped by his apartment, no one home. Neighbors said he hasn't been home in days."
She grimaced. "We don't have nearly enough for a warrant, but let's put out an APB on him anyway."
"Called it in from the car," he assured her. "Also, Ryan did some checking, and found that more recent picture we wanted."
Ryan swallowed a mouthful hurriedly and added, "It's really close. The guy from the gym and the guy from the coffee shop—if they're not the same dude, they've gotta be related to each other. While we were out, I also got back in contact with the woman from that gym who quit her class because she didn't like Steph, but no dice."
"Alibied out, huh?" Castle asked.
"Emergency room," Ryan told him, and Beckett and Castle groaned. "Cut into her hand with a paper slicer at her office, working late. According to one of the nurses, she had a bad allergic reaction to the stuff they used to clean out the cut and she was in hospital for the entirety of our time-of-death."
Castle immediately jumped on this. "Are we sure it was a paper cutter? Maybe she attacked Steph, got cut, and we didn't see the blood for the, well, the blood." That metaphor hadn't worked out quite the way he'd imagined.
"Absolutely sure, bro. Six other people at her office saw her do it. And that was around 9 PM, hours before our vic was attacked."
"Oh." Esposito had a point.
"Anyway," Beckett cut in, "wasn't there another person who quit the class? A student?"
"Yeah, but we haven't been able to re-interview him yet." Ryan shrugged. "Maybe he's in class."
"You mean there's actually a student who turns their phone off while they're at school? Not any teenager I know," Castle said. "Well…maybe Alexis. But I doubt it."
He thought about it some more. "What I'm wondering is, where did our killer get the medical equipment?"
"Medical equipment?" Ryan asked. Beckett, seeing his point, turned to her computer and started a new search while Castle explained.
"Right. She was poisoned, it's true, but the actual murder weapon was whatever sort of surgical tubing you can plug into a major artery and have the heart do all the pumping out for you. I mean, how many PG-rated uses can that have? Maybe if we can find where he or she got it—"
"Nope," Beckett interrupted. "I've got so many results here it looks like every other corner drugstore sells surgical tubing, or something that would work in the same way." He looked despondent. "Still," she consoled him, "if we get a viable suspect, I suppose canvassing drugstores with their photograph could help narrow it down."
"What about the relatives?" Esposito said to her. "Any help there?"
She glared. "Don't ask. No help. For us, or anyone. They were not cooperative, and not at all friendly." Changing the subject, Beckett pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. "Time to try calling the friend—Danielle—again. Maybe she'll answer this time."
Astonishingly, Danielle Turino did take Beckett's call, and after some time was persuaded to come in and talk to the police—eventually. While they waited for her to show up, most of the afternoon was filled with busywork that felt like it was getting the case nowhere. When she finally did put in an appearance, she was not particularly happy to be there, and made no mystery about it.
"I can't tell you anything that will help you," she led off the moment Beckett entered the interview room, Castle a half-step behind. "Why can't you just leave me alone and let us solve our own problems."
Beckett, however, had no intention of letting her control the interview. "Because it's not your problem anymore," she replied calmly but firmly. "It became my problem the minute she was found in an area I'm responsible for, Miss Turino. And as it happens, she was my friend too."
The brunette glared, not backing down. "No she wasn't," she flatly contradicted. "She never even mentioned you, not to me, not to us. You say that, but it doesn't mean what you think it does."
There was a joke there. Castle wisely refrained from making it.
"Don't you stand there and tell me she meant anything to you! She was my friend, and I would have done anything for her."
"Fine. Then help me solve her murder." As Danielle glared her way through that, gradually backing down, Beckett and Castle sat down across from her.
"How long did you know her?" Castle asked gently.
She turned a lower-wattage version of the glare on him, but her heart was no longer in it. "About three years now. It was just after she moved here. I was dating this guy…he was a real jerk, but that's easy to say now. Back then I was really low—y'know? He was always into stuff, and one time he got too deep into some dangerous stuff with some…" She paused, evaluated him, and flicked her gaze over at Beckett, then back to him, evaluating. Castle tried to look trustworthy and open-minded. Which he considered himself to be anyway, so he stopped trying and just listened.
"People," Danielle settled for. "And no, don't ask me what kind of people, because you won't understand the answer and it doesn't matter anyway. They were the kind of people who don't like not getting something back, let's put it that way. Bastard tried to trade me to them to settle up!"
Danielle gritted her teeth. "Bastard," she muttered again. "Steph had only just moved here, but it was a big thing going down. She had been looking for them—she stepped in and kicked ass. Saved my life—'cause you bet those creatures weren't going to let me go around the next corner. I owed her, so I help her out."
She gulped. "Helped her out. I—" Incipient grief turned right back into anger. "What do you think you can do, anyway? Whatever did this is something from the underworld, and what, you're going to arrest it? Put it in jail—on trial? We're going to find it and kill it, and the police can't help! Can I go now? I've left everyone else doing research, and I should get back."
"Research on what?" Beckett asked curiously.
"It's research," Danielle said as if this should be obvious. "You have to do research. I mean, you could just walk out there and hack down everything you see, but you're going to get really tired if you try, and then something…kills you…" She trailed off.
"You mean you actually have information and databases on…things?" Castle approximated. "That's cool. I'd love to get a look at that."
Danielle cracked the first smile either of them had seen on her—a small expression, but progress. "You say that, but it's really boring if we're looking for something that isn't online yet—or don't know what we're looking for and just have to look at everything. That's a project—they're working on that."
"You say 'they'," Beckett asked, "but who exactly is 'they'?"
"The Slayers. And anyone else involved with them; it's a big project that's been going on for at least four years, maybe longer. Someone—actually, probably a lot of someones—got tired of tracking down old books in odd languages. The database they're setting up is so much faster, and if the books get destroyed, well, the information survives. Besides, everything else is on computers, and this is the Second Age."
"The what?" Castle asked. This clearly meant something to Danielle that it didn't mean to him.
"Slayers divide time into three sections so far," she explained to him. "The Second Age just means 'the present', starting about four years ago. Saying 'this is the Second Age' can mean anything from 'time to update traditions that don't work anymore' to 'I'm in charge now, get out of my way'. It depends on who's talking and what they mean."
Beckett was stuck in the position of wanting to know more but not knowing how to ask, or even if she would believe what she learned, but she knew she had to step in before Castle and Danielle went off into an in-depth dissection of what the other two time periods were and what it all meant. "Can you tell me what you're researching, in terms that I can use to other people?"
The brunette twisted her fingers together. "And then I can go?"
"Danielle, please."
She shrugged. "Leesha says, maybe smuggling? Of…um, things that shouldn't be in circulation."
The detective waited for her to follow up on that, but nothing more was forthcoming.
"You know where Steph's body was found, right?" Beckett asked tentatively. When she received an affirmative nod, she asked, "Do you know why Steph would be in that area? Had she told you about anything that was worrying her in particular?"
Danielle shook her head no. "Patrolling takes her all over the place. She didn't know all the back corners and hideouts—Manhattan's a big place—but she spent enough time out on the streets to be able to find a lot of them." After a moment's thought, she added, "She was in a bad mood lately, but I thought it was just because some guy called her and she got upset. Hung up on him and stormed off to hit something—which isn't unusual," she hurried to assure them. "Slayers are fighters, so what looks like aggression to most of us is just normal for them."
"Who called her?" She pulled out her pad in the hopes that Danielle had a name for them to follow up on.
The girl's face betrayed only uncertainty. "Some guy…" she vacillated. "Steph was really upset—she was all snarling that 'how did he get that number' and she 'never wanted to hear from him again, the old creep'. But she never told me who it was. I can ask…maybe she told someone else. She spent most of last week sulking, but she cheered up over the weekend."
"That was when she made that phone call," Castle muttered to her, and Beckett nodded—as long as Danielle, one of Steph's closest friends, was here, she may as well ask.
"I guess he never called back," Danielle was going on, but she stopped as she sensed their line of questioning had changed. "What?"
"Danielle, we've looked into Steph's phone records, and last weekend she made a couple of overseas calls to Stockbridge, England. There was a note in her apartment reminding her to call someone named Buffy Summers—do you know her?"
"We tried calling back," Castle put in. "She wasn't home, so we really need to find out what they were talking about."
Danielle's eyes had gotten big. "I've heard of her," she explained, "but we've never met. Steph and the others, they tell stories about her, and I have no idea which ones are true. I know that Steph respected her a lot. If they were talking, there's no way it wasn't important. But I'm sorry, Detectives, I didn't know it was so bad Steph had to call for help." Her face crumpled as she heard the words she was saying. "Why didn't she just talk to me?"
Another look at Steph's phone records revealed a number that took on new meaning. Last Monday, Steph had gotten a two-minute call from her aunt and uncle's Texas number.
"He failed to mention that," Beckett said grimly. Calling back yielded only an answering machine, and she was forced to leave a curt message and hang up.
"No one in this case wants to answer the phone," Castle joked feebly, and Beckett shot him a cold glare. Holding up his hands in surrender, he presented a peace offering—the lead he'd thought of when Danielle had mentioned smuggling of what he had assumed to be dangerous artifacts. (He had actually thought the phrase dangerous magical artifacts, but had decided not to take that tack with Beckett…just yet.)
"Her financial records included some pawnshops, but didn't say what she bought. Now, we thought weapons because that's what she had in her apartment—the crossbow, by the way? Still very cool. I wonder if I can have one."
"Castle," she said, in that tone that was on the edge of being a warning, "if you put a crossbow bolt through the windows of your loft, I am not going to come bail you out of jail—and I'll ask Martha and Alexis not to either."
He made a face at her—that had been his backup plan. "Ah, ah, bear with me, Detective. We assumed weapons, but what if she was buying something else she couldn't get legitimately? What better place to look than a place where people sell all sorts of things, sometimes even things they don't know what they are?"
She liked it. She didn't say so, but he knew the look on her face. "Something that was dangerous… Or maybe something that someone wanted back?"
"So…" Castle wiggled his eyebrows at her. "Shall we make more phone calls, or go check out some pawnshops?"
Beckett reached for her coat as Castle bounced out of his chair and headed for the elevator. Halfway there, they were intercepted by Ryan and Esposito.
"Heads up, guys," Esposito hailed them. "Just got back that print on the beer bottle CSU found in the same building as our crime scene."
"Yeah, after they lost it, and had us digging through file cabinets to find where some idiot had misplaced it for an hour and a half," Ryan complained from behind him, waving the file folder illustratively. Evidently they'd found it.
"Any matches?" she asked them.
"One, and luckily it was already in the system from a drug arrest on a juvenile. Local high school kid, we're just going to go pick him up now. But that's not the best bit," Esposito gloated. "You want to tell them the best bit, bro?"
"Oh no, you tell them. I insist."
Castle turned to Beckett. "While Alphonse and Gaston invite each other to cross the street first all day, shall we just read the file?"
"Sometime today would be good, guys," she grinned, making a snatch for Ryan's file folder. He pulled it out of reach, and, taking the hint, flipped it open.
"Our beer-holding high school senior is not only in the same class as the kid who quit Steph's martial arts class, but they've also been on the same basketball team for two years."
She gestured them all towards the elevator. "Well, that's two good leads. Let's go."
Perhaps they had been making more noise than they thought they had, because Captain Montgomery put his head out of his office and beckoned to them. "Just a moment, you lot. Come over here for a second."
Exchanging glances, they trooped back to and reassembled in the captain's office, shuffling around a bit to fit everyone in.
"Fill me in," Montgomery invited them all.
Beckett started a summary of the case so far, and the guys chipped in and added things whenever they saw something missing. "The last place our victim was seen alive was at a coffee shop called Krimsonn around 11 PM Tuesday night. We've confirmed that she was drugged several hours before she died, with a common prescription drug that weakened her physically. After it took effect, she was drained of blood through what we believe to be surgical tubing that was inserted into her carotid artery."
"Looking at the splatter pattern again, in the pictures from the crime scene," Esposito added, "the blood was probably decanted into some sort of container and poured over her after she was dead."
She resumed, "According to her friends and some of the people who knew her, she had been worried about something during the week before she died. We don't know exactly what that was about yet. Although her aunt and uncle claim they hadn't spoken to her in years, he called Steph last week, which one of her friends confirmed distressed her. She also made some calls to an overseas number, and I'm hoping that the person she called will get in contact with us. Her friends seem to think that whatever that phone call was about was important. We're also looking into the place where she worked."
This was Ryan's cue. "She worked at a downtown gym that taught martial arts. We've found three people who might have had a grudge against her, but one of them alibied out immediately. One of the others is a close match for a guy she threw out of that same coffee shop over a month ago when he hit one of the employees. We've put out an alert on him, but so far nothing's popped. The third is a high school student, who—"
Montgomery held up a hand. "I heard that part…and about the pawn shops Castle wants to check out. What about her friends? How are they involved?"
"Her friends are running their own investigation into matters we have no jurisdiction over and could never present to the D.A." explained Beckett wryly. "They've been less than forthcoming with details about Steph's recent activities."
"Although," interrupted Castle, "that may be only partly because they think they can take care of things without any help from us, and mainly because they think we'll either think they're crazy or won't believe them."
The captain's eyebrows went up. "Well, they're probably right, Castle. Now, you do know you're going to need legal authorization before any store will let you look into their purchase records? Or were you planning just to walk in and ask?"
Beckett checked the time. "Sir, if we have to write up warrants for every store on her financial records before the D.A.'s office closes for the evening…" She thought fast. "We can probably get them written and submitted, but Ryan and Esposito, you'll have to help. Guess your interviewing of that kid will have to wait. As will the pawn shops, Castle," she added as Montgomery waved them back out into the corridor. "There's no way they'll be approved this late in the day. We'll have to go tomorrow morning."
"How can I help now?" Castle asked as they all hurried back to their chairs.
She passed him the printed file. "Read us store names, Castle, and addresses if they're there."
In the end, both lines of investigation were postponed until the following day. Castle was glad to get home in time for dinner—if only because he was quick enough to stop Martha from putting an abominable amount of peppers in to cook with the chicken—but wished that they'd been able to get somewhere with the shops. He spent the evening wondering about what Steph had found or found out that had so enraged someone they had killed her for it.
Castle couldn't resist the urge to fill his family in on the case so far. "What do you think we'll find?"
"Treasures," Martha declared. "Some stolen piece of artwork or fabulous jewels."
He took the spatula away from her before she could hurt anyone with it, "Mother, you know I'm obliged to ignore any suggestion that contains the word 'fabulous', right?"
"Except when it comes to food," his daughter pointed out.
"This is true," he acknowledged, handing Alexis a plate. "Fabulous food is acceptable."
"Maybe she bought something cursed," the teen speculated. She paused, thinking, and laughed. "Like a Mayan mummy, right Dad?" He swatted at her with the spatula, forcing Martha to take it back. "No, I'm joking," she assured him. "Besides, that just sounds silly."
Her dad shrugged. "Honey, in this case I'm not sure what sounds silly and what doesn't. Her friends keep insisting that Beckett and I just don't understand. It's like they live in an entirely different world."
"Well, how are you supposed to solve anything if no one will talk to you?"
"Beckett is determined to believe that whatever's behind this case is something we can prove objectively, and that our killer is just another sad human being."
"Well, I don't care if whatever killed that poor girl has fangs or if they've got a gun—just don't let the monsters get you, kiddo."
"Good rule for life, Mother."
On Friday morning, Beckett arrived at her desk fairly early. The warrants for the pawn shops had been delivered to her desk as she had requested, so she left them there and went to make herself a small cup of cappuccino that she could enjoy in private before everyone else came on shift. Most of the overnight staffers had already left, and the only people remaining were an older detective steadily typing up a report at his computer, steadfastly ignoring his surroundings, and a patrolwoman who checked in with Beckett that she wasn't needed before leaving.
She was sure that any minute now the phone was going to ring, but it didn't happen. When the routine was interrupted, it wasn't because of a murder being phoned in.
Finishing her coffee, Beckett headed back out into the bullpen. She stopped short in the doorway, staring at the stranger in the room.
The young woman was clearly not a cop, but she was looking over Beckett's murderboard with the assurance of someone who had every right to be where she was. She stood with her arms folded, hazel eyes surveying the summarized information and the crime scene photos, as well as the lists of witnesses and possible suspects. Her highlighted blond hair reached just past the collar of her long jacket, and one booted foot tapped gently on the floor.
If Beckett didn't know better, the woman's attitude would have seemed as if she belonged, but she wasn't buying it. "Excuse me," the detective said, walking towards the intruder, "I don't want to be rude, but what are you doing up here?"
She turned that gaze on Beckett, not intimidated in the least. "You've been trying to contact me," she said. "You must be Detective Beckett."
"Well, yes, and you are?"
"Buffy Summers. You called my family a couple days ago, looking for me. They told me about Steph. This is interesting." Beckett's confusion must have shown on her face, because she added, "The board. Andrew would love it, but I don't think I'll tell him about it. He'll just want one. Do you always do this?"
"Usually," said Beckett. "I was expecting you just to call back—you didn't have to come all this way."
"Well, I was actually only a night's drive away," the Slayer explained, taking Castle's chair uninvited. "As soon as I talked to Willow yesterday evening, I figured I should be here."
"You've been driving all night?" Beckett asked. To cover her texting where are you? to Castle, she offered, "Would you like some coffee?"
"Thanks, I slept in the car," she replied absently. "Leesha and Perrin are the other two here, aren't they? I'll need to go talk to them."
Attempting to regain control of the conversation, Beckett tried to redirect it to the reason they'd contacted her in the first place. "I understand that Steph called you last weekend." Her phone buzzed. Castle had replied, be there in a moment. I'm in the elevator.
"Yeah, that's right," Buffy confirmed, dragging her attention back to Beckett. "She was very upset."
"So we've heard. Everyone seems to think that her contacting you means there was some sort of emergency." The detective heard the faint bing! of the elevator, heralding Castle's arrival.
"She was going through something she'd never had to handle before," Buffy began to explain. "I had—far too often—so she—"
At this point, she was interrupted by Castle's greeting of "Morning, Beckett!" as he entered with the usual coffee cups in hand.
Now, Beckett might have expected her unexpected guest to be somewhat surprised by his arrival: she hadn't known he was there and Beckett had said nothing about working with a partner. What she did not expect was for the Slayer to jump out of her chair and back away as if she had seen a ghost. Something that looked a lot like a knife had appeared in her right hand, and she raised it defensively across her body, poised to stab or slash.
"You!" the Slayer snarled at Castle, who backed up so quickly he nearly tripped over his own feet and whose attempt to raise his hands in surrender and/or defense were foiled by the coffee mugs. "How the hell are you here? I killed you!"
Next Chapter: Explanations for all.
Author's Note on Plot: Having set up the mystery, Buffy's arrival at the 12th Precinct means we can now move on to solving it. Expect to see things come together. This is also where we move into realms where my not having read the comics may actually matter, and the adjacent realms of Le'letha Makes Things Up and Prepares to Justify Them.
Author's Note on Food: I've just noticed that there seem to be an awful lot of breakfast tacos in this story. My only excuse—I don't even like breakfast tacos—is that I am from Texas, where breakfast tacos are as common as bagels and possibly more so than donuts. If you've never had one, they're made of egg and cheese and generally something else like bacon, ground beef, or potato, wrapped up in a tortilla. They're very portable and very popular here. I have no idea how common they are outside of Texas, but if we can have Indian cuisine and Japanese delis in Texas, I'm sure they can have breakfast tacos in Manhattan.