Shared Obsession Chapter 121
Carrying her black folder into the box, Kate takes the seat opposite du Preez, while Castle sits in the chair across from Lowell White, attorney at law. "So, Mr. du Preez, I understand you've agreed to talk to us."
"With the understanding that you won't violate his Fifth Amendment rights," White inserts.
"Of course," Kate acknowledges. "So, Mr. du Preez, hypothetically, hypothetically Mr. White, could someone have broken into your store, come down the dumbwaiter, and stolen a shipment of diamonds you smuggled into the country inside two black-tailed pythons?"
Du Preez glances at White, who nods. "It is possible, hypothetically," the snake importer admits.
"Well, that would be your problem, Mr. du Preez," Kate remarks.
"And I'm guessing a very expensive problem," Castle adds.
"My problem," Kate continues, "is that I have two very non-hypothetical bodies. You don't want to implicate yourself. I get it. I'm simply going to ask who would have known about such a shipment. Come on du Preez, they must have cut you out of a fortune. Wouldn't you want us to catch them? Who would have known? Who would you have told?"
"If the events you described occurred, I would have told no one," du Preez insists.
Kate frowns, opening her folder. "Mr. du Preez…."
"I would have picked up the shipment from the airport personally," du Preez claims, "and locked it in my office. And if these people did as you said, in the morning it would have been gone."
Kate holds up pictures of Doug Bishop and Anton Francis. "Do you recognize either of these men?"
Du Preez emphatically shakes his head. "I've never seen either one of them before, hypothetically or otherwise. That's the truth."
Castle distributes fresh coffees before grabbing a seat in the conference room. "Robbing a smuggler is almost the perfect crime. The victim can't go to the authorities without implicating himself. Even if we find the diamonds, du Preez can't claim them without ending up in the feds' arms."
"Someone knew that shipment was coming in," Kate asserts. "Someone had the job planned. Where are we on Doug's client list?"
"We ran every client Doug ever had. We got nada," Ryan replies.
"Just to be thorough, we showed their DMV photos to Mickey," Esposito adds. "None of them was our mysterious third man."
"Well, it would have to be someone du Preez would never expect," Castle says.
"Someone connected to the pet store? Maybe an old employee?" Ryan suggests.
"He would have had to know the shipment was coming in," Esposito points out.
"Yes, someone who knew his timetable," Castle agrees. "Maybe someone he'd sent to the airport before."
Kate smacks her palm against the table. "The airport!"
All the eyes in the room turn to her. "What about the airport, Beckett?" Castle asks.
"Run all the paper from du Preez's last shipment," Kate instructs Ryan and Esposito, "Customs, Fish and Wildlife, the shipping company – everything. I wanna know who knew what and when."
"Do you think someone at the airport caught on to Du Preez's smuggling? Decided to rob him instead of reporting him?" Castle queries Kate after the two detectives rush from the room.
"Yeah, I do Babe. And I think I know who."
Kate motions Melanie and Stan Kopek to seats in the interview lounge. "Thank you for coming in."
"Sorry it took so long," Melanie apologizes. "Stan was at work and you know what the traffic from JFK is like."
"I do," Kate acknowledges. " And you told me that the last time you saw your brother was at a party near the airport where Mr. Kopek works."
"That's right," Melanie confirms.
"So Mr. Kopek, refresh my memory further," Kate requests. "Where do you work out there?"
"It's been a long drive. Couldn't you just tell us what you found out?" Stan requests.
"Well, I didn't really put everything together until I remembered your wife's story about a party at the airport." Kate nods to Castle who holds up a document.
Stan pulls at his collar. "What's that?"
"It's a customs form, Mr. Kopek," Kate replies, "signed by you and authorizing the release of a cargo to a Mr. Noel du Preez."
Stan swallows. "Yeah, so I work at Customs. What's the big deal?"
"What's going on, Stan?" Melanie asks.
"I have no idea," Stan claims.
Kate leans in, her gaze skewering him to his seat. "I think you do, Mr. Kopek."
"You've been stuck in the same job for ten years," Castle picks up, "with no promotions, nothing except minimal cost-of-living raises. When you realized what du Preez was doing, smuggling diamonds, you said to yourself, 'Why should I give him up to those ungrateful bastards?' You could finally get something for yourself. So you told Doug that you had a way he could get his scuba shop. All he'd have to do is send out the phony prize letter and tickets to the Maitlands. You assured him no one would get hurt and you'd both be rich. But a squatter interfered with your plans. You wanted to take him out, but Doug went soft on you. You couldn't risk him losing his nerve and going to the cops. So you eliminated him."
"You recruited Anton Francis," Kate continues. "He was an old high school buddy. You even signed his yearbook. He still had it in his apartment. And he'd spent enough time in prison to have the contacts to fence the diamonds. But you didn't want to share, so you took him out too."
Melanie stares white-faced at her husband. "Stan, did you kill Doug? Did you kill my brother?"
"That's ridiculous!" Stan proclaims. "They couldn't figure out Doug's real killer and this guy…, he points at Castle, "makes up stories for a living. So he made up one about me."
"You'd have a hard time making a jury believe that, Mr. Kopek. You see, we have a witness," Kate reveals. "The squatter who saw you at the Maitlands, who you tried to kill at the Dysons' apartment, identified you. When we put that together with copies of the import permits you pulled, and the DNA the ME found on Doug's and Anton's bodies, even a junior ADA could make the case."
Melanie lunges at Stan, slapping him across the face. "You sonofabitch! And if they need me to testify against you, the nights you were gone, I will."
Mickey Carlson grins at Kate. "And you thought I made the whole thing up."
"I believed you," Castle says. "It was too ridiculous a story not to be true. But now that you've been busted for your squatting gig, and The Ledger's let you go, what are you going to do with yourself?"
"Since Detective Beckett got the DA to agree not to press charges, I lined up a job with a security company, teaching people how to guard against squatters."
"Going to tell them all your secrets?" Castle asks.
"Can't tell them all," Mickey says. "A guy's gotta have a place to live. Later, Man."
Kate stares after her former prisoner as he gets on the elevator. "He's going to do it again."
"Look at it this way, Beckett," Castle suggests, "maybe he'll help us catch another murderer. How about the big bad wolf? In the original Red Riding Hood story he ate the grandmother."
"Ugh! Humans are bad enough and…." Kate's phone blasts an alert.
"Who is it?" Castle asks.
"The Special Prosecutor's office. They want to see us."
"Both of us?"
"Uh-hmm. Tomorrow, in DC. They're going to send a car."
Castle strokes his already stubbly jaw. "This doesn't feel right, Kate. Can you call the office and check if it's legit?"
"Yeah, I guess. Do you think it's some kind of a trap?"
"Maybe. If I were writing the story it would be, and my Spidey sense is tingling."
"All right," Kate agrees.
The white-haired man studies his log of calls to Kate Beckett's cell phone. One makes the hackles on his neck rise. Not good. Not good at all. He'd better keep an eye on things.