CH8
Kate spent an hour with Lanie. Trying their best to console each other over what was on that DVD. Finally Kate had to head back up to the bullpen and Lanie had to get started on all the physical evidence that Castle had collected. It was going to be a long day, and probably a sleepless night for both of them.
Finally making it into the bullpen, "Find anything?" Kate asks Ryan after he gets off the phone.
Shaking his head, "Nothing so far. I'm just starting the search out past the local area. It's possible that he found personal help or is just sitting it out, waiting for it to cool off?"
"When you're done, take Espo, …" Kate stops. Force of habit she tells herself. "Take Karpowski with you and go check out his work address. What he does, who is friends are, who hates him." Besides me, Kate thinks. "And call DMV and find out what car he drives and get a bolo out on it."
"Got it!" Ryan turns back to his desk, ignoring the Espo comment.
"I'm going back to Castle's house. Find out how much he knows about this Jessica women. Where he meet her. Why would she call HIM for help." Ryan just nods. "Call me if you find anything." And Kate grabs her keys, and puts her gun in her holster, and heads for the elevator.
Reaching Castle's house she parks in the drive way and walks to the front door. Hesitating before ringing the bell. 'Please don't mention the kiss, please, please, please.'
After a couple of minutes the door swings open to reveal Castle, "Welcome Detective Beckett! Please, come in." Rick waves and steps back.
Kate enters and Rick closes the door. "Please, follow me." And leads her upstairs. "What brings you back to my humble abode?"
"I wanted to talk with you about Jessica." Upon reaching the top, Kate stops dead in her tracks. And only absently starts slowly wandering in the direction Castle went. Her mouth hanging open while her head is turning every which way. Trying to take the room all in.
"Can I get you water, soda, coffee, tea, wine, beer? Something stronger, perhaps." All the time thinking ME!
Kate barely hears him. She is still trying to take in what she sees. "Uhm, … water is fine. Thanks Castle."
As Kate walks toward the kitchen she runs her hand along the dining room table and chairs. The table appears to be made of one solid piece of wood. That has seating for 10 presently. The top has a shine she can see her reflection on the surface.
Reaching the kitchen, six burner gas stove with oven. Huge refrigerator (stainless steel, something about COLD, is the manufacturer?) Two bowl copper sink with authentic looking antique faucet. The countertop appears to be made of concrete? But the color of it puzzles her. It's not grey like concrete. Large mixer (Red), some kind of machine with teeth at the bottom? (pasta maker)
Her tour with her eyes is interrupted when Castle hands her a bottle of water out of the refrigerator.
"Thanks Castle" opening it and taking a drink while turning to look at the living room.
"What can I help you with, detective?"
"How do you know Jessica?"
Taking in a deep breath, Rick begins to explain. "When my house was under construction, my contractor had someone show up at the site and try and 'Alter his profit margin', so to speak. He sent me to someone who might know about this and possibly solve the problem."
"When I got there, Jessica was one of the 3 lovely young ladies at the reservation desk. I gave her my number after asking about the person I wanted to talk to." Conveniently leaving out the part about writing it on her chest.
"I had a nice conversation with him, who turned out to be a fan. Well, …. His wife was a fan at least. And we worked out the profit margin problem to our mutual satisfaction."
"When I met Jessica, she was shy, very quiet, a little too thin and had on way too much make-up. Practically theatrical make-up. I thought she was using it to hide something. I wanted to help. Someone that young, pretty and shy shouldn't be needing that much make-up, if I was correct in my assumsion."
"And you never saw or talked to her again after that encounter?"
"No, not until that evening that she phoned."
"How did you find out she was with me?" Rick asks, curious.
"I'm a detective. It's my job to know these things." Kate deflects.
"Have you watched to DVD I gave you?" Rick, changing the subject just a little.
Looking down at the floor and in a broken whisper, "Yes!" with a telling sadness in her voice.
"I don't understand how anyone can do things like that to another person!" Rick is now pacing the living room, into the dining and back to the kitchen where Kate is. And sets off on another tour.
"The kind of person it would take to do those things!"
"The things they did. She is going to be scarred for life!"
"How is she ever going to recover from that?"
"How is anyone going to be able to fix the damage?"
"To her body, let alone her mind."
"She is going to have nightmares for the rest of her life!"
"Hell I'm going to have nightmares!"
"None of this makes any sense. She seems a nice sweet young women."
"What could she have possibly have done to deserve all this?"
Rick is ranting, coming up with still more and more things to say. And doesn't appear to be stopping anytime soon. Kate is getting worried that he is working himself up into some kind of breakdown.
On his next pass by the kitchen where she is. Kate stops him, places one hand on each side of his face and gets up onto her toes and kisses him soundly on the lips. Just to get him to shut-up.
Rick quickly stops and it takes a moment for him to respond and start kissing her back. He places his arms around her waist and draws her in closer. Kate moves her hand off his face and wraps them around his neck.
Neither tries to deepen the kiss. It just remains one long soft kiss.
Finally Kate breaks from the kiss she started. She needs air. Yea, air. As in fresh air. Outside.
Removing her arms from around Castle and slipping out of his grasp. "I, need to, …. I, gotta go." And bolts for the stairs. "I'll see you later Castle."
Rick can't get his mind out of the clouds fast enough to stop her. The next thing he is conscious enough for is the sound of the front door closing.
Kate is leaning with her back up against the door she just closed. And talking to herself, "Damn, he's a good kisser!" 'I told you!' the voice in her head responds. "Oh, shut up!" And Kate heads for her car to get back to the 12th.
Meanwhile Rick has made it to the sectional in the living room. "I shouldn't get involved with her. I shouldn't. I just shouldn't." …. "But I can't help it!" …. "I'm sooooo screwed!" and leans over and places his head in his hands and his elbows on his legs.
Kate makes it back to the 12th and places a phone call to the hospital to check on Jessica. The doctors are still examining her and working on her wounds. She is told. Next she calls to check on Espo. Only to find he is asleep and she doesn't want to wake him just to ask how he is doing.
CSU will not have results until sometime tomorrow on the Vic's apartment. And Lanie will not be done processing all the evidence Castle gave her until tomorrow.
Castle!?
Why did she kiss Castle? Because he was in pain and headed for a breakdown. She tells herself. Still she didn't have to kiss him to get him to stop. 'Of course you did' says her voice. 'He's your favorite author. And he's hot and he's sexy. And he is a really good kisser'
"NO!" Kate calls out. Slamming her hand on her desk. Quickly looking around to see if anyone noticed.
'Face it. He is really good looking and a damn good kisser. And you want another one' stupid voice.
"I'm sooooo screwed!" Kate tells herself.
Ryan and Karpowski exit the elevator and head for their desks.
"Anything?" Kate questions. Thankful to be out of her head at least for a moment.
"Well that was a bust." Ryan tells her.
"He quit his job 3 weeks ago. Walked in one morning, and said he was quitting. Packed up his tools and left."
"He was not well liked by anyone at the shop. He mentioned once about how women were whores. And loved stringing men along with their games. He had no friends at work. Didn't go out for drinks. Didn't eat lunch with them. Just kept to himself."
"Worse, the address they had on file was a fake. Unless he actually does live at Yankee Field!"
"Shit!, ….. Karpowski, just to be thorough, go out to the Field tomorrow and see if anyone recognizes him. Maybe we'll get lucky and he likes baseball."
"And take a couple of baseballs with you. Maybe you can get a couple of autographs. Don't want it to be a total loss." Karpowski just nods.
"Go home Ryan. We'll start fresh in the morning."
Ryan nods and grabs his jacket. "I'm headed to the hospital first. Check on Javi."
Kate gets up and goes to her board and starts adding information to it.
'Whores. Vic who is missing something, Jessica is also missing something. But none appear to be related to each other. Jessica might have done the hack job to their Vic. But where did she get the tazer? And how did she know him, if she did at all? Why did our mystery guy shoot Espo? He's obviously willing to kill. Is Castle's guy he talked to, MOB? Jessica worked there. But if the Mob killed their Vic, wouldn't they get rid of the body? Unless they were sending a message. The Mob loves messages. Need more information on this possible Mob connection. Need ballistics on that bullet that almost got Ryan. And the ones that almost killed Javi. Need lanie to finish. Need CSU to finish. Need to talk to Jessica.
Oh, it was going to be a LONG day tomorrow. And then there is Castle. 'Yes, go kiss Castle. It'll all make sense after you kiss Castle' "Shut, …. UP!" Stupid voice!
Tired and nothing new to work with until tomorrow. Time to go home. Nice hot bath. A little wine and a good book. "NO, not one of Castle's books!" 'Chicken?' says the voice.
Rick meanwhile is in his study trying to come up with ideas for his next book. Since he killed off Derek Storm in the last one. Messy too. Brain parts and body parts all over everywhere.
"Hey Dad!"
"Hey Pumpkin! How was school?"
"It was fun. Teacher gave us a reading assignment."
"OH, a tough one for you, ha?" knowing full well that his daughter loves to read and can put most teenagers to shame with what she reads.
"I chose the book, DUNE, to read. Should be fun!" All 2,531 pages.
"How long do you have to read it?"
"One week." Alexis tells him sweetly. Knowing her father will have a cow. About how much book it is to read and tell about in such a short time.
"That's nice, pumpkin." Rick does not take the bait.
"What do you want for dinner?" Alexis looks crest fallen her dad has not commented about her choice.
"PIZZA!" she says excitedly.
"We had Pizza yesterday." Rick calmly tells her.
"PLEASE, DADDY!" using her tried and true puppy dog eyes she learned from her dad.
"You can have pizza tomorrow." Not falling for those eyes this time.
"How about Stir-Fry, with chicken or maybe shrimp?" Rick tries.
Thinking it over, Alexis scrunches her face. She does like seafood a lot. "Shrimp?" she cautiously asks.
"Deal! You go get washed up and meet me in the kitchen."
Alexis heads for her room, happy she at least won part of the battle.
After dinner they select a movie to watch and are part way thru when Ricks phone tells him he has received an urgent email.
"I have to go look." Rick tells his daughter. "Be right back."
"Ok, daddy."
Down to his office he goes to look at what has just come in.
Finding it and getting a shock, he taps the communicator on his desk. "Pumpkin, can you come down here. We just got something from 'The Silence'."
"Really?" Alexis says excited. And jumps up without pressing pause on the movie and runs downstairs.
"Who is it?" Alexis asks excited. "Who are we going to help?" At the doorway to his study and continues to enter further.
"Well let's open it and find out." And Alexis comes around to his side of the desk to see.
And a picture of a very beautiful women pops up with her name at the bottom. And a tag showing there are 2 attachments with it.
"She's pretty daddy." Alexis states as if it was obvious. Rick however is in a state of shock. With his mouth hanging open.
"Who's, Katherine Beckett? Daddy!"
'Pandora's Box pumpkin! A huge, going to get me killed. Pandora's Box!' Is all Rick can think.
