12th Precinct, Present Time
To Serve and Protect
Chapter 14 - The Search For Kate Castle
Kate had been missing now going on a little more than twenty-four hours. In any abduction, the first 24 to 48 hours was the window of opportunity to recover the victim unharmed, beyond that, finding the victim alive becomes problematic. Rick Castle was in deep despair. He could not lose his wife and mother of their three kids. His look betrayed his feelings. The normally handsome and put together Castle was showing distress by his unkempt appearance. He had not slept in the last 24+ hours catching only brief cat naps. He had called his mother to watch her grandchildren while he worked the kidnapping. Martha was more than willing to watch her three grandchildren.
"Castle bro, take a break. You've been going at it since Kate was kidnapped", Espo tells him.
"You're right Javi, let me just get some coffee", Rick says heading for their kitchenette. When he returns to desk it is with a freshly brewed cup of coffee.
"Rick, when was the last time you ate", Espo once again talks to him concerned about Castle's well being.
"I haven't, but I've had lots of coffee and soda. And then there was that candy bar from the vending machine I had hours ago", Castle says.
"Here grab one", Espo tells him holding out an open box of donuts just arrived which Ryan had ordered for them all.
"Thanks", Castle responds taking a donut and drinking his coffee as he sees the news being flashed on the TV screen they had on, monitoring for any news flash the media might put out on their case. Then Castle sees the news come across the screen that Russia had just invaded Ukraine. His thoughts immediately goes to his eldest daughter now on assignment there. That news stretches him to the limits of mental anguish but does not break him. What comes to mind then is a line he read once. He can't remember if it is from Shakespeare.
'When troubles come they come not as single spies but as whole battalions'
That concisely described his situation now. Despite, he sits back in his chair and enjoys the brief respite savoring his donut and drinking his fresh cup of coffee. He will let his fears and anxieties pass thru him and then be extinguished. He will put on his happy face once cleansed of his negativity and then will continue looking for clues to his wife's where abouts. As he does just that, his Apple cell beeps him with a notification of an email. He sees an unknown number on his phone with a video message. Getting a hunch he calls out.
"Just got a call with a video, can we put it on the big screen".
Shaw responds by snapping her fingers to gain attention and then pointing to one of her techs.
"Is that an apple cell phone?", asks the tech Jordan had fingered.
Castle responds with a head nod 'yes'.
"Got it", says the tech, "it's coming on the screen now."
Castle opens the video file and there is Fletcher with Kate chained to a chair. Kate is lewdly dress in a thin camisole and revealing daisy duke shorts. The camisole is skimpy and clinging tightly on her. It has Kate's upper profile suggestively peeking thru the thin fabric. Fletcher is being handsy with her and making it obvious. He touches her in a overly familiar manner. Everyone now has eyes glued to the screen. Rick is holding back his anger at what he is seeing.
"Castle", Fletcher speaks, "Iike the outfit I put your wife in? It's a sexy look and I loved dressing her in it. She turns me on so much that I will sample her charms later tonight."
Castle fights for control to remain calm and not yell out after what Fletcher says he intends to do with his wife. Kate is remaining still. She is not reacting to the way Fletcher is touching her, like she is some kind of affectionate pet that he owns. Kate can be seen constantly blinking at the camera. One might think it is a nervous reaction to her precarious situation, but Rick recognizes what she is doing. She is sending him a secret signal they had worked out if she ever was in such a hostage scenario. Rick concentrates on the screen giving it his full attention.
"I gonna let your hot foxy wife speak for herself. Talk, but mind your words woman!"
"I have fallen under this man's control. He has hidden me well and he will kill me if you try to find me."
"See Ricky boy, your wife is mine now and such an obedient and compliant pet."
With that the video ends suddenly.
"Son of a bitch", exclaims Espo.
"I'll kill the monster", yells Ryan at the screen.
"We have to find this animal and put him down", Anne and Tori say in chorus.
It then becomes a cacophony of sentences, all spoken out, all at once, from numerous people on the joint team. With the pod cast, Fletcher has caught the now growing disdain and horror of the whole team, and it will be his undoing.
"Relax people", Castle says, "did you notice that look from Kate? She was blinking, since when does Kate blink? It was a secret message to me from signals we worked out for just such an event."
Castle's words silences the crowd.
"So what was the signal about, Castle?", asks Espo.
"That she is sending me a message on her location and to look and listen well."
"Precisely", says Shaw, "Kate is following what I told her...that hubris is Fletcher's achilles heel. She played to that hubris and got him to send this video bragging about making Kate his own prisoner and captive pet. His big ego was on display here,with his manner of lording over Kate like he did. But we all know from his profile and history, that Fletcher has intimacy problems in the bedroom. Still he wanted to show otherwise. So Kate made him think that she would play along with him to making her an object to his control fantasy. She got to him and fooled him into sending the video. This so as to inflame us which inflates Fletcher's bloated ego. But the video also gave Kate a chance to get a nessage out to us, and she did just that. As much as Fletcher thinks he is in control here, Captain Castle is using his ego to assert her control of him. So Rick, what was Kate's message to you?"
"The words she spoke blink ng call attention to them with also use of verbal emphasis by her intonations when she said these words: 'under', 'hidden', and 'find me'. She is sending a code that she is 'under' something that is 'hidden' and that is where we will 'find' her."
"What does that it all mean then Castle?" asks Agent Armas.
"I am still connecting those dots here but not getting anything for now."
"I think I might have a clue that can help", says Ellis, who had been studying their video copy of the pod cast and the last frame of which she had been analyzing. She has that frame now on display on the big screen.
She goes to the screen and circles a portion of it, "Can we blow up this section here?"
"No problem", says an FBI tech.
The blown up screen shot comes up and shows the image of a very distinctive type of window.
"It's a window, but what kind of window?"
"None associated with any house or building I know of", Espo says tilting his head giving him a different perceptive of the window.
Every one else is doing the same. Finally someone yells out.
"It's a rail car window!"
Shaw, her mind quick to connect the dots, responds immediately, "I want on the screen five minutes ago all the abandoned subway lines in NYC."
All the lines appear on the big screen quickly.
"Now give me all those abandoned lines that had rail cars left in them."
Only one line shows up.
"Bingo, we got him. Activate the SWAT teams, let's get Fletcher before he decides to kill Kate!"
At Fletcher's Rail Car
Kate comes out of a disturbing sleep. She had fallen asleep on the chair that she had been chained to for nearly thirty hours now. As she awakens, her muscles ache in protest to her being chained, she sees Fletcher emerge thru a door. The door from a dividing partition that split the car into two sections. The partition wall was constructed to fit the curvature of the interior of the rail car. It was uniquely designed and built to fit the car precisely. Kate had marveled at how Fletcher turned the rail car into a functional and comfortable abode. She had deduced since being brought here, more than a day back, that her prison was a converted rail car. From the sounds of her place of captivity she had also concluded she was in or near subway lines. Perhaps one of the abandoned tunnels that also had discarded rail cars left in place when it was closed years back and the car left as is.
Several hours back, Kate, playing to Fletcher's ego, had convinced him to send a video to the 12th that would incite anger in them for their failed pursuing failed efforts to rescue her and send them a message that no one should mess with him. Her captor liked her plan. It had so appealed to his desire to show defiance to the police. Such a video would clearly show that he had their captain and he had dominance over the situation, despite their efforts to rescue her. It was a finger of defiance to his hunters, who wanted to capture him and put him away for life.
Fletcher had told Kate that if she was a 'good' girl and played her part in the video, he would let her live longer. Maybe until such time as she was no longer needed by him. This as a threat to her that she had to remain useful to him, or be killed right off. Kate knew this was her chance of staying alive, she had to play him to avoid being killed right off by her captor. She was buying time for the 12th and her husband.
As she goes over in her mind what she learned about the serial killer, Fletcher is entering her side of the rail car. As he does so, she notices that he has showered and looks quite striking wearing a robe with slippers. She had guessed that he is naked under the robe and she fearfully knows what that means. He wanted the equivalence of a wedding night with her. Subtle this man was not, his dress so advertising his evil intentions of what he wanted of her. She wonders what his side of the car was like that he could shower and look so ready to force her in bed with him. Kate, however, was not about to let that happen.
"So my captain", he says with derision, "for being such a good little captive pet and helping me send a F.U. video to the 12th, and to your husband, you get a treat."
She doesn't want to ask what it is, she knows what it is, but she has role played up to this point and it has kept her alive.
She puts on her game face and says, "So what is my reward for being a good little girl, Sir?". Fletcher had demanded of her to address him as 'sir' again asserting his control over her and she did so, again playing to his ego.
"Tonight we will make my message to your husband come true. Tonight you will let me sample your intimate charms!". Was this his way of t being seductive? It is not working. No match to Rick on that! Despite her revulsion to the serial killer, she plays along.
Kate saw this event coming that first time when he had undressed her with his eyes. She had steeled herself to playing nice to this repulsive man's fantasy by feigning cooperation to his evil and perverted urgings. She was buying time for herself so her husband could figure out where she was being held prisoner. She is inflating his ego knowing that Rick will decipher her hidden message to him from the video vlog. She had told Fletcher that the vlog would make her police colleagues at the 12th abhor him even more and give to them a symbolic 'up yours' with such a message sent to them thru her husband's cell. It had worked, Fletcher liked the idea of that video message to the 12th, taunting them, even daring them to find her.
But now things were getting more serious and complicated. Could she hold him off long enough to be rescued? She knew if worst came to worst she could physically take him down. Accepting that if her captor's profile was correct, he would have difficulty in carrying out a physical intimacy with her. In fact she was banking on it. That would be her chance to put him away when he is most exposed and vulnerable, yet struggling to take her intimately.
Kate comes out of her thoughts as Fletcher places a collar on her neck with a long dog leash. He unlocks her ankle restraints and has her stand up from her chair. That was a tricky move on Kate's part, having been chained in to that chair for more than thirty hours. She gets up on very weak legs and has to stand for awhile. Finally she finds her legs and Fletcher pulls on her leash to take her thru the door to his side of the rail car.
Once on his side of the car, Kate is amazed. It is a bedroom, complete with full sized bed, a make-shift shower in the corner, and a porta-potty next to that shower. The shower is so ingenious. Made from a cylindrical planter meant for a small tree or shrub and about two feet tall, it served as a 'bath tub' of sorts, to contain the water coming from a portable Buddy camping shower. They had used a 'Buddy' on a family vacation out camping in the Catskills. So Kate recognized the Buddy by sight. Around the 'tub' shower is a curtain surrounding it completely within a circle. The curtain is hung on a circular shower rod mounted to the ceiling of the car. The curtain keeps the water in and directs it to the tub when showering.
Once in this bedroom, Fletcher connects and locks in place her long dog leash to an overhead handrail of the subway car. He unlocks her hand cuffs. She could now move about freely in the bedroom but still was restrained by the leash from her dog collar which also was secured by a small but very sturdy pad lock.
"You are free to roam about in this room. Use the shower and toilet. On the small table there are toiletries for your use to include makeup and perfume. You are to wear the outfit I left there for tonight's session. I want you looking sexy and seductive, with a little bit of slutty thrown in for effect. Please me tonight by being a good pet yet again and I will keep you around until you no longer please me. That will be your incentive to keep pleasing men. After you cleanup, we will have dinner and then on to our session for the night".
With that comment Fletcher leaves the room to her and shuts the door. Kate now has complete privacy. The first thing she did was to use the porta-potti! Then she looks for a way to escape the room. The exit door at this end of the rail car is locked on the outside and the windows to the room are bolted in place. There is no way she can flee without significant efforts to disable all the security measures of the room. The padlock on her dog collar although small is well built and hard to pick, even if she had the tools. She concedes to her situation. She has little time to figure out how to breech the security measures so she goes back to her initial plan to play along with her captor until an opportunity comes up to take him down.
Deciding to stick with her Plan A, she examines what Fletcher left for her. The make up was her brand and matched her complexion. The perfume was also her favorite cherry scented perfume that drove her husband mad with desire for nights when she wanted to set a mood. The outfit was an extremely naughty and sinful, a revealing Victoria Secret teddy. Her captor had thought of all those items needed for a night of intimate intercourse. She is repulsed by the thought of the man forcing her into his bed for an unwanted encounter with him.
On a happier note, this Teddy was very close to what her husband would have her wear for an playful night together. Kate takes a deep sigh and then commences to clean herself up and ready herself for what is about to happen. She knows Rick will figure out her message to him. She hopes he does so in time so he can rescue her from this current situation. She is hoping it will not devolve into something much worse. She will play along with Fletcher and if need be, take him down. She will do so before she will submit to this repugnant man's most evil sexual perversions for her. She once again steels herself to what she must do.
