Chapter 5

The next morning Beckett woke up in bed with a smile. She was remembering last nights' kiss, she had even dreamt about it. Although the real kiss was much better than the dream. She got up, got dressed and went to work.

On her way to the precinct she wondered how the boys would react to her. What comment they'd say. As she drove she figured that she'd deal with it then. No need to make a big deal out of it. It was only a kiss, although when she and Castle had come back to sit with them the night before all their mouths were opened and no one said anything, it actually took quite a while before they started talking again

She got out of her car and headed towards the precinct, her phone rang.

"Beckett," it was Lanie

"Ok, you got a match. I'll be there as soon as I can." And she hung up.

Lanie had received the ballistic results she was going to be able to indentify to whom the gun belonged to.

As she stepped out of the elevator she knew that this was it, this was the moment she was dreading. Beckett saw both guys talking over what seemed to be the case. She walked over to her desk and almost waited for their reply.

As soon as Esposito saw Beckett he got up and said:

"Yo! Did Lanie call you? She got the results from the ballistics."

"Yeah I know she just called." She was standing there, waiting for them to say something, but it never came.

Esposito sat back at his desk and continued working. What the hell is going on? She thought to herself. After a few seconds she thought that maybe they respected it and thought she'd talk to them about it when the time came.

She decided to let it go and give Castle a call. But before she needed her coffee and then she'd call.

She got up and headed toward the break room.

A few minutes later she headed back to her desk when she saw Castle coming out of the elevator.

They both arrived at her desk at almost the same time. He had brought her a coffee, and put in on her desk.

"Oh, Thanks Castle. I got my own though you usually don't come in this early."

"Right, I thought I'd come in early today." As he sat down on the chair next to Beckett's desk. He sat and looked at her with a smile.

"Uh- Lanie called she got the results from the Ballistics, she wants us to come see her as soon as we can." Seeing Castle just sitting there made her stomach turn. She gave him a small smile. It was a mixture of shyness and nerves.

"Perfect, I'm ready when you are." Castle gave her a smile, he was happy and decided to let the world know.

After about five minutes they left the precinct. Once they were in the car Castle decided that he wanted to talk about it.

"Listen Kate, about last night... it was a great kiss." As he gently leaned into her as though to kiss her yet again.

Beckett stopped him.

"Castle. Yes it was a great kiss," as she bit her lip just thinking about it. "but it's not the time to get into that right now. We need to focus on this case and get the guy who did this. Once the case is over, we can talk all you want."

Castle nodded in agreement and went back in his seat as they smiled back at each other.

They entered the morgue and went up to Lanie.

"Hey Lanie, What are the ballistic results?" Beckett asked as she walked in.

When Castle and Beckett walked in there she was on the table and it hit Castle in the gut. After such a nice evening he had almost forgotten about it. But now seeing her lying there brought all the grief back.

Beckett and Lanie spotted the change in Castle's face. They both looked at one another not thinking that Sharon would have been lying there.

They all stood there for a few moments and Lanie started:

"Ok so ballistics came back." Lanie walked towards a computer which showed the results, "The gun was a Glock 17, and it had been tagged in the system from a prior assault. It belongs to a Sheldon Fergie, a former drug dealer. He's been out of jail for about a month. I don't know if he's your guy, but the gun is still in his name"

"Thank you Lanie. It's a start," Beckett as she went to talk to Castle who she thought was behind them but he wasn't

The girls hadn't noticed that Castle hadn't followed them. He had stayed back and looked at Sharon and he just stood there, watching her.

They both glanced at each other, both feeling terribly sad for him. He was a good man and didn't deserve to go through this. Beckett and Lanie both walked towards him, almost in unison, while looking at him. They let him take it all in, he needed time to process and they let him do so for a few more minutes.

"Castle," Kate said as she gently touched his arm for both comfort and to get his attention.

He looked up at her upset and hurt. His eyes which were usually of a bright cheerful blue were more dark and gloomy.

"We have a led, do you still want to look into it? You don't have to, if you'd rather go home I'll understand." Her gaze was gentle and sweet she didn't want him to feel obliged to do this.

"No, I'll come with you, I need to keep my head going, or else I think I'll go crazy." As he turned around and exited the morgue, overwhelmed by all the emotion.

Kate looked at Lanie and said :

"Thanks, if you find anything else let me know."

Lanie nodded back in agreement and Kate disappeared behind the doors.

A few hours had passed and the boys had been able to make Castle think about something else, they made his mind wonder on different things. He seemed back to his old self again, his posture had straightened and he seemed assertive. Beckett entered the interrogation room while Castle followed her in, sitting beside one another.

"Mr. Sheldon Fergie, I have it here that you did two years at Rikers? I see that you cut a deal last time only serving 2 years, for cooperating and, for a first offense. I also see that you had a Gluck 17 'accidentally' shooting someone. Is that right?" Beckett asked

"Yeah, I did but I didn't kill the guy. It was an accident." The man was scrawny with greasy hair. He looked like he hadn't eaten in weeks his cheeks seemed to go inward and his eyes gave the impression that they were going to pop out.

"Right, you got lucky only getting two years. You must have given a lot of information to get off that easily."

"Well, they wanted to know where the next big deal was going down and I gave them the time and date. If it worked they cut my sentence from eight to two years. So I gave them all the information they wanted." Fergie's eyes seem to widen as he went back in time, thinking about his old life.

As Sheldon was telling the story Beckett saw in his eyes what she hadn't seen before, the hunger to do it all; Sell the drugs, to be his own man, to cut the deals, she saw: the criminal.

"I see and where were you last night between the hours of 1:00-3:00am?"

"Are you asking me for my alibi detective?" he asked in a are you kidding me tone.

"Yes I am." Beckett said

"Ok fine. Last night I was at Sunny's Club until about 1:30am."

"Ok, and where did you go after?" Beckett asked

"I went home." His face was stern and he let nothing show.

"Well it turns out that our victim was killed at exactly that time. Now, what happened exactly?" Beckett knew that he was hiding something.

"Fine, I went to the Sunny's Club to talk to Molly. I had lent her my gun. She asked for it because she needed protection. I lent her the gun, knowing that she was always surrounded by drunk guys and sometimes some got pretty rough. I thought that with it she could at least scare them off." His expression seemed sincere as though he had been worried for her.

"Ok," Beckett nodded and continued listening.

"At first, I thought that the problems were her clients, but then I found out that she was selling drugs but was keeping the money for herself. As soon as I found out I went to the bar and warned her. I told her that stealing money from drug lords wasn't a good idea. I told her that she was putting her life in danger. I told her that she should think of another way to deal with her money problems. But, she completely ignored me she brushed it off as if it was nothing to worry about." His jaw was tensing up, her reaction was still pissing him off.

"Ok and what happened next?" she asked. Both Beckett and Castle we interested in what he was saying

"Well, after a few drinks I decided to head home, I saw that she didn't care and thought to myself that she'd have to deal with the consequences. So before leaving I glanced at the bar thinking that maybe I could try convincing her again but she wasn't there. I figured that she had already left. So I headed home. After walking a bloc or so I saw her. She was walking right there in front of me, so I thought I'd warn her again. I thought maybe this time she'd be more receptive. So I walk up to her and I take her by the arm. She started fighting me off. I kept telling her 'hey it's me Molly it's Sheldon' but she answered: 'I'm not Molly I'm Sharon.' And that's when I stopped and took a good look at her. She was wasn't Molly, but from far they seemed the same, both have long blond hair and almost had the same physique. I apologized several time for the mix up and walked off."

Castle was completely emerged in his story by this point his mouth almost open.

"Then I heard it, the gun shot. My first reaction was to run, so I got the hell out of there!"

"You heard a gunshot and didn't call the police?" Beckett said in her usual annoyed toned.

"Seriously? I was scared out of my mind. I was in the drug business before and when you hear it, you flee it! You don't stick around and try to help. Once I got home though it's the only thing I could think of, but I figured that someone would find her once the bar would close." He looked at his fingers, and playing with them.

"So...that's it? Why didn't you call the cops when you got home?"

"I don't know, I didn't know that it had actually hit anyone. Like I said when I heard it I bolted to my apartment."

"Ok, well we'll have to keep you in holding just in case we need to talk to you again."

Beckett got up, took her things and headed out the door.

Castle and Beckett walked back to her desk.

"You were quiet in there Castle, what happened?" as she looked at him with a concerned look. It wasn't like him not to ask questions or butt in.

"I-I didn't really want to ask the questions, I knew you would come up with good ones. I thought I'd just watch it unravel."

Beckett saw the look on his face and decided to drop it. He was obviously upset that Sheldon had mistaken Sharon for Molly...if she would have left the bar 5 minutes before or after she wouldn't have gotten shot.

"So now, we've got to get Molly back here...this should be interesting." Beckett mentioned. She now had the dirt she needed to really get to her.