Castle: Beckett's Security Blanket
Chapter 16: Composure
A/N: Just want to give a quick thank you shout-out to you guys! You're seriously amazing! The feedback and alerts and PM's I've gotten for this story goes WAY beyond my expectations. We are seriously the best fandom ever and I love you guys. Now, onward and enjoy…
Beckett stepped off the elevator and onto the fourth floor homicide division shortly after receiving the call from Esposito that they had in fact obtained their number one suspect. She strolled through the bullpen of the twelfth with an air of confidence in every stride she took as she got closer to Esposito's desk where he, Ryan and Castle were all gathered, waiting for her arrival knowing full well that this was one interrogation she wanted to handle on her own.
"So" Beckett began as she stepped up to the side of the desk. Esposito was sitting leaned back in his chair with a pencil held between his teeth while Ryan and Castle both occupied separate corners of the desk, sitting perched on the ledges.
"Where'd you find him?"
"T.S.A. agent called him in actually" Ryan mentioned with a shrug. "Seems Sam was trying to get out of town and tried to use one of his many false aliases and credit cards to do it but since we put a hit on all his I.D.'s and credit cards for the names we found on him a flag came up when he purchased a ticket to Cabo San Lucas earlier this morning and airport security nabbed him at the gate. He must've spotted our detail on his apartment and decided the only option was to make a run for it"
"So where he is he now?"
"He got himself a one-way ticket into the box instead" Esposito chimed in with a grin, nodding his head over to interrogation. "We've got him ready and waiting for you"
"We've printed him already" Ryan continued. "Put a rush on them so we should have a lot more information on who this guy really is pretty soon. Did you want to wait him out for a bit?" he asked, though already knowing full well what her response would be.
"No" she answered without hesitation. "Let me feel him out a bit first, then we'll hit him with the hard stuff"
"Sounds good" Ryan nodded.
"Go get 'em Beckett" Esposito encouraged with a proud smile.
Beckett turned towards the interrogation room and began her determined walk towards it when she started to hear footsteps following very closely behind her. She spun around on her heel and instantly collided into body of the source of the footsteps.
"Castle" she groaned as she rubbed her nose that had slammed into his hard chest wall.
"Well, what did you stop so suddenly for?" he asked with an innocent shrug.
"What are you doing following me?"
"Um hello Beckett, in case you haven't noticed, I've been following you for four years now. It's sort of our thing, kinda thought you'd be used it"
She huffed in frustration. Of course he was right, but she thought she had made it pretty clear last night that she was done with this whole 'shadowing' thing. Apparently she needed to lay it on a little thicker for him because he wasn't going to budge. That could wait until later though she thought, right now the most important thing was the man sitting behind the double sided glass.
"Fine, just… don't screw anything up" she warned him before spinning back around and heading into the interrogation room, this time with Castle remaining a safe distance behind her as he followed.
"So," Beckett began as she entered the interrogation room and sat down on a chair across the table from their suspect while Castle followed and eased himself into the seat next to hers.
"Mr…" she paused for a moment and her brow furrowed in confusion. "I'm sorry, what shall I call you? Seems so strange, us being so intimately involved yet I don't even know your name. You however have seen where I work, where I sleep, hell you could probably even tell Mr. Castle here what colour my pyjamas are can't you?" she continued and Castle was impressed at the control in her tone. He wanted nothing more than to dive across the table at this guy and pummel him into the floor.
Still might, he mused.
Sam nodded with a slimy grin plastered on his face that Castle wanted to slap right off of him, however he took a breath and tried to regain his composure which turned out to be all the more difficult when Sam's gaze shifted to him and he leaned slightly closer to Castle across the table and began to speak.
"Light blue shorts and very fitting white undershirt" he began with a lick of his lips. "It was a warm night so she slept on top of the covers. She also does this thing with her nose when she breathes in her sleep, just the cutest little crinkle before she lets out a breath. I took a video of it with my phone, must've watched it a hundred times by now" he finished with a throaty laugh that would make anyone's skin crawl.
"That's enough!" Castle warned loudly as he pushed his chair back from the table and stood up, ready to charge at the slime bag if need be.
"Castle, sit down" Beckett commanded, her voice low and still very much controlled. Anger was seething through Castle's veins, his heart hammering in his chest as he tried to control his rapid breathing and he wondered if he was even going to make it through the entire interrogation without being arrested himself.
Not likely.
"Oooh, struck a nerve with this one huh?" Sam mused as his eyes followed Castle as he slowly took back to his seat. "Just calm down there chief, no need to get testy"
Castle glared across the table at the man before him. A man who, incidentally, didn't look the slightest bit like he would have imagined. He was fairly well dressed in a pair of light khaki pants and a white button down shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair was short, blonde and well kempt and he had light blue eyes that under different circumstances could have been described as kind. He certainly didn't look the profile of homicidal dirt bag.
There's a story here. Castle thought inwardly. Though he wasn't sure he wanted to hear what it was.
"Can you tell me your name Sam?" Beckett asked calmly once the room had settled.
"Which one?" Sam asked with a puff of laughter escaping his lips.
"The real one"
"Oh now where's the fun in that?" Sam groaned.
"Would you like to keep playing? Or should we just skip right to the part where you confess everything and I can get on with my day? It's up to you Sam, easy way or hard way"
"Oooh, hard way please" he smiled as he shifted his shoulders and sat up straighter in his chair in excitement.
Beckett was getting frustrated, Castle could see it in her eyes but she maintained her composure as she continued to size him up from across the table.
"Tell us about Jonathan Drake" Castle chimed in after a moment, wanting to relieve some of the pressure from Beckett.
"I'm sorry, who?" came Sam's response, along with a shake of his head.
"The man you murdered, Sam" Beckett responded before opening the manila folder in front of her and sliding an image across the table. "Maybe this will jog your memory" she said as she pushed the picture of Drake's lifeless body towards Sam.
"Hmmm" Sam began in a mocked tone as he held the picture up in front of him, his finger tracing around a pool of blood in the photograph. "Yeah, can't say it rings a bell" he shrugged before pushing it back across the table.
"What about this man" Beckett began again, shuffling through crime scene photos in front of her until she found the one she was looking for and slid it across the desk to him. "Glen Novak, he was shot in a park in New Jersey, you were there Sam"
"As a witness" Sam huffed. "I was cleared from that investigation Detective"
"The killer was never caught" Castle argued.
"Damn shame isn't it? Doesn't mean I did it" Sam shrugged smugly.
"And this man?" Beckett asked once again; this time pushing him a photo of Darren Fitz.
"I'm real bad with faces" he replied cheekily. "I suppose I killed him too did I?"
"Nope, he's still alive" Beckett replied confidently. "He's an eye witness that's going to put you behind bars for good no matter how much you try to run me around in circles"
"Are you sure about that?"
"Of course I'm sure. He's seen your face Sam, and-" she went to continue before Sam abruptly cut her off.
"Not about that, I mean, are you sure he's still alive?" he asked ominously in a gruff tone that turned into a low and wicked laugh that sent a shiver down Beckett's spine.
She swiftly pushed her chair away from the table and stormed out of the interrogation room with Castle hot on her heels behind her, letting the door slam shut behind them causing the large pane of glass to rattle in its wake.
"Do we still have eyes on Fitz?" Beckett shouted out to no one in particular, anyone who was listening really and if weren't such a dire situation it would almost be comical at how quickly everyone scattered to their desks and began placing calls and typing away furiously at their computers trying to get answers for the Detective who was clearly at the end of her already painfully short fuse.
"Beckett!" Ryan's voice carried across the bullpen as he jogged out of Gates' office and towards her and Castle with a file folder in hand.
"Prints came back on Sam" he explained as he reached their sides and handed Beckett the manila folder.
"And?" Beckett asked as she began flipping through the pages; Castle not-so-subtly hovering over her shoulder to get a glimpse as well.
"Well his real name is Samuel James Dawson, he's originally from some little farm town in Iowa" Ryan began as he nodded his head towards the folder. "He was married, once upon a time" he amended before continuing "until about ten years ago when his wife, Allison Dawson was killed"
"Killed?" Castle asked to clarify.
"Murdered, actually" Ryan confirmed. "Looked like a home invasion gone awry but the killer was never caught. Sam was a suspect of course but they couldn't prove that he did it and he had an alibi so after a few months they dropped the investigation and it remained an unsolved. Sam Dawson was checked into a mental institution a year after that but he escaped 18 months later and was never seen or heard from again. It was like he just vanished"
"Until now" Beckett mentioned softly; her eyes still roaming the notes in Sam's file.
"Until now" Ryan nodded.
"Good work Ryan" Beckett mentioned, finally bringing her gaze up to look Ryan in the eye. "Go get Espo and see if you guys can track down Darren Fitz, Sam is eluding that he killed him too but he could just be trying to get a rise out of us" she huffed.
"He's got that down to a science" Castle grumbled mostly to himself.
"Let me know as soon as you find him alright?" Beckett directed towards Ryan who nodded immediately.
"I will" he confirmed before jogging off back towards Gates' office where his partner was waiting for him.
Beckett turned and headed back towards interrogation again but stopped abruptly when she reached the door and turned back around to face Castle.
"Castle…" she began with a sigh.
"I know" he began eagerly before she had a chance to continue. "I'll behave myself this time, I won't let him get under my skin like that again. Please Kate, don't kick me out" he begged.
Kate.
That was exactly the reason he couldn't be in there with her she thought to herself. This was just as personal to him as it was to her and she couldn't have that right now. She had to do her job and it was next to impossible to keep her emotions in check with him sitting next to her, knowing how he feels about her and knowing how every word that comes out of Sam's mouth about her is like a knife to his chest. It was in her job description to keep personal feelings out of the interrogation room, not his.
"Castle just… stay here, alright?" she found herself sounding angry which was not at all her intention but now wasn't the time to attempt at an apology or to explain her reasoning and judging by the taken aback expression on his face at her words she had at least gotten through to him, even if he may be taking the message a way other than intended she had more important things to deal with right now so she simply left it at that and turned back into the interrogation room leaving him standing alone yet again on the other side of a closed door.
A/N: I just have to say a huge thank you to all those of you (and there were a lot of you!) who followed the end author's note on the last chapter and checked out my Castle fake movie trailer "Trust". I got so many new comments and PM's about it and a few of you mentioned it in your reviews too which was just outstanding to hear! Anyway, I thought you all deserved another treat to maybe keep you busy while I update again… I've made another trailer, this one is called "Abduction (a Castle fanmade trailer)" and is about if Castle and Beckett were married, had a son, and he was kidnapped and what they go through to get him back. Anywho, if you're interested you can find it on YT by putting the title in the search bar :)
I will try and update again soon. Next we will finally be able to put the case to rest and move on to the Caskett conflict as we work towards a resolution :)