Chapter Two
The next morning Kate woke up an hour earlier than normal. She had a difficult time falling asleep trying to figure out why this victim, who did this to him. She gave up on trying to fall back asleep and snuck out of bed. She had decided that it was best to take to Captain Gates without Rick around. She left him a note next to his coffee mug letting him know where she had gone and that she would see him later.
When she walked in the precinct it was like a ghost town except for one light one in one office. Captain Gates was apparently an early riser this morning as well.
Might as well get this over with. Kate thought to herself. She didn't like bringing up any issues that involved her fellow officers or those sworn to help. Cautiously she knocked on the captain's door.
"Come in." Gates called.
"Sir, could I have a moment to speak to you about something?" Kate asked.
"Of course Detective, how can I help you?" Gates replied as she closed the lid to her laptop.
"Sir, last night we picked up a case. An actor was killed on stage. The only reason we caught this case was because a friend of Alexis' was at the show." Kate started.
"And…get to the point Detective I have a lot of work to do this morning." Gates interrupted getting irritated.
"Well Sir, it's odd that I was called about this case by a witness because she tried to call 911 and the dispatcher told her to stop cranking the police and hung up on her. After speaking to several witnesses at least 17 others called 911 and got the same response. I was wondering Sir, if things have changed in dispatch and they are no longer taking murder calls seriously." Kate replied with a bit of bite behind her words.
"I will speak to someone about this right away Detective. It must be some mistake. I don't see how it's possible that they would ignore 1 call let alone 18. What do we know about the victim so far?" Gates asked getting into cop mode herself.
"Not much at this point. Aaron Summers, 30, playing the role of Barnaby for a dinner murder mystery play up at the college. So far we have no leads. The lights had gone out for the murder scene in the play and when they came up our vic was dead on the stage. As soon as the boys get here we should know a little more." Kate explained.
"Good, ok keep me in the loop. As soon as I speak to someone in dispatch I will let you know." Gates said with finality.
Kate let out a breath as she sat down at her computer. She enjoyed the precinct when it was quiet. She felt like she could actually think straight. She fired up her computer and went to the search engine. There didn't seem to be much on Aaron Summers as an actor. He did a few plays over the last 3 years. Other than that she couldn't seem to find anything that might point to why he would have been murdered. She hadn't noticed all the people that were filing in around her. Soon the precinct was at full staff. Including Castle who had taken up his normal seat next to her desk.
"Good morning Detective, missed you at breakfast." Rick said with a playful smile.
"Good morning Castle, I'm sorry I just felt like I needed to talk to Gates about something without you around irritating her even more." Kate replied with her own playful smile.
"Understood." Was all Rick said.
"Ah Esposito just the guy I needed to talk to. Were you able to get anything from your canvass?" Kate asked
"Not much, everyone we spoke to that was there was so focused on the show that they didn't notice anything going on around them. I did just look into his financials and phone records and there really wasn't anything unusual going on with those. As soon as Ryan gets done looking into family we planned on going to the victims home and see if anything comes up there." Esposito responded.
"Ok, good Castle and I will go talk to Lanie. See if there is anything that Aaron Summers can tell us about what happened to him." Kate said as she stood up and looked at Castle.
"Kate, are we planning on holding a séance? I should have brought my ritual candles." Castle chuckled.
"I meant if there was anything in his autopsy Castle. I didn't plan on talking to his spirit. Now if we have gotten the nonsense out of the way let's go." Kate replied as she walked away.
"Did you do something to piss her off this morning Castle? She seems a little more irritated than usual for the morning?" Esposito accused.
"Not that I know of….then again I don't always know when I did something stupid until she tells me…so we'll see." Castle answered as he followed Beckett.
When they got into the elevator Castle ventured a guess as to what was wrong. It turns out that she was just tired, and still irritated with the dispatchers for not doing their job. Silently he high fived himself that it wasn't his fault she was cranky.
Fifteen minutes later they stood in the medical examiner's office. Lanie walked them over to the table that held Aaron Summer's body.
"Did you find anything of interest Lanie?" Kate asked.
"Nope nothing….and I mean nothing. See this wound here?" She asked as she pointed to a hole near his heart. "This is a gun wound. Normally when there is a gun wound there is a bullet in that wound. However, I didn't find a bullet or a trace of a bullet. There is no exit wound so it should be in there." Lanie looked at Kate bewildered.
"An invisible bullet!" Castle exclaimed "How cool is that!"
"There is no such thing as an invisible bullet Castle, there has to be some other explanation." Kate said then turned to Lanie. "Is there some other explanation?"
"Not so far. I did find an odd chemical mixture in his bloodwork, but without further testing I can't tell you exactly what caused that. Right now Castle's invisible bullet is the best explanation I've heard so far. When I find something concrete I'll give you a call." Lanie said before walking out of the room.
Kate looked at the wound a little closer. It did look like a gunshot wound, so what caused it? They have no idea who would want to kill this guy, or what type of weapon he used. Usually by now they had an idea of what caliber was used at least. They didn't have a starting point and that was irritating her. "Let's go back to the precinct and see if anyone else has had any luck." She said before heading out.
When they got back to the precinct they were met by Ryan.
"There you guys are. I looked into Summers family and no surprise there isn't any. He did have a fiancé Meredith Black. She is in the conference room if you want to talk to her. Understandably she is really upset, but she isn't making any sense either." Ryan explained.
"What do you mean not making any sense?" Kate asked.
"She honestly is just sobbing so hard I can't catch a word of what she is saying. It all sounds like jibberish to me." He answered then walked away.
"Ok, ready to talk to her?" Kate asked Castle
"After you Detective." He replied.
"Ms. Black? I'm Detective Beckett and this is Richard Castle. I'm so sorry for your loss. Thank you for coming in to talk with us. I know this is hard but did Aaron have any enemies? Anyone that would want to harm him for any reason?" Kate asked.
"No, no of course not. Aaron was a sweet man, he got along with everyone in his theater troupe. He always came home in a good mood. He was generally a happy guy. At least he was until…." Meredith trailed off.
"Until what Ms. Black?" Kate urged.
"Please call me Meredith. He was generally happy until about two weeks ago. He came home after rehearsal and was just quiet. Like something had happened but he wouldn't talk about it. He didn't seem the same after that. It was kind of like he was pulling away from me. I wasn't the only one who noticed either. His best friend Aiden Michaels, his understudy, came over last week to ask me about it. It seems that Aaron was off his game so to speak. When Aiden tried to ask him about it he got defensive, said it didn't matter anymore and walked out of rehearsal. I don't know what was going on with him Detective. Please, please I need answers. I don't understand." Meredith finished as the tears started to roll again.
"We will find out who did this Meredith, I will do everything I can to bring his killer to justice. You have my word. Here is my card if you can think of anything else please don't hesitate to call." Kate stood up and shook Meredith's hand. Castle walked Meredith to the elevator and then came back into the conference room.
"So what have we learned so far. Happy go lucky guy, nothing odd going on in his financial life, seemed like nothing odd in his personal life until two weeks ago. What could have possibly happened two weeks ago to make him get irritable and defensive." Castle questioned as paced the room.
"Well Rick that's exactly what I plan to find out." Kate replied.