Forty-Seven: Chapter 3
DISCLAIMER: None of these characters are mine, but they are memorable. Thank you, Mr. Marlowe.
Still Tuesday, March 27, 2012 - at the 12th Precinct in New York City
Kate opens the door to the viewing room, next to the interrogation room she has just left. Her heart is racing, as her mind still hasn't concocted any appropriate words for the conversation she knows is coming. Unfortunately, the conversation is going to be postponed.
She walks into the room, and it is empty.
"Dammit," she says aloud as she enters the room. She knows he was here. She knows it in her gut. He wouldn't miss a chance to watch her interrogate, and something tells her he was here. She glances through the window at Bobby Lopez, who still sits at the table fidgeting, his eyes widening with each passing few seconds. Her vision adjusts, and she sees the two large handprints on the window, and a quick height gauge tells her that they are probably his. Immediately her mind creates an accurate vision of his reaction, of him putting his hands on the window in despair, watching her. Watching her watch him.
Suddenly, Detective Javier Esposito walks into the viewing room, joining her, clearly confused as to why she is in here, rather in the interrogation room with the obviously frightened punk he sees waffling back and forth in the chair through the window.
"What are you doing in here?" he asks. "Shouldn't you be in there with –"
"Castle," she says quickly. "Where is he? Have you seen him?"
Something tells the detective that now is not the time for his usual playful banter, and so he answers quickly, proficiently.
"Yeah, a minute ago, and he was in about as good a mood as you are right now," he responds. "He came out of this room looking real funny. And I don't mean 'ha-ha' funny. He wasn't right."
"Oh God, Javi," she says softly, expelling pent up energy with just a few words. He sees the fear in her eyes – it's something new and different with her. He doesn't like it.
"What's up, Beckett?" he asks her, drawing closer. Yeah, something is clearly wrong.
"Where did Castle go, Javi?" she asks, now moving quickly toward the door, and making her way toward the elevator.
"No idea, Beckett," he replies, calling ahead to her. "He took the stairs, and was in a big hurry. Didn't say boo as he left, either."
"Javi, finish in there for me," she asks, jabbing her thumb back toward the interrogation room behind them down the hallway.
Not bothering to wait for the elevator, Kate sprints through the stairway door and takes the steps, two by two, holding on to the railing for dear life. She almost tumbles as she reaches the landing leading to the first floor, barely holding herself up as she rushes toward the door. She flings it open, eyes darting left to right as her head swivels back and forth, perusing the lobby area.
"Gone," she thinks, as she takes off running again, this time toward the door leading to the street outside. As with her partner before her, she shields her eyes from the sudden, obstructive glare of the sun beating down on her eyes. She has missed him just by seconds as she sees him slide into the backseat of the cab at the curb in front of her, slamming the car door quickly.
"Castle!" she cries out, too late, as the taxi pulls away.
"No!" she screams, when the typical, comforting honking of horns in the street pulls her back to the present. Scanning to her left, mercifully, she sees another cab – this one empty – coming towards her. She takes three quick steps into the street, her arms raised and flailing, flagging the taxi down. Pure serendipity.
She slides into the back seat, with quick, rifle-like instructions for the cabbie.
"Follow that cab, and I will pay any tickets!" she tells him, probably a bit too loudly, and clearly out of breath. She shows her police badge for emphasis. Okay, so maybe it is abusing her position of authority a bit. She gets over it quickly.
Seconds later, her cab is following the one Castle entered just seconds before, and her mind begins playing that unfortunate – and highly unwinnable – game of 'what-if'.
"You should have told him sooner," her mind teases, laughing at her.
"Shut up," she says aloud, causing the cabbie to offer a glance in his rear view mirror. Police badge or no police badge, this lady doesn't look all together.
"You should never have lied in the first place," another voice taunts. "How else did you expect this to end?"
Closing her eyes, she places her hands over her ears, desperate to silence the unrelenting barrage of voices in her head. They drive for a couple of minutes when Castle's cab in front of her makes a slow, easy left turn. She smiles, certain they are headed to Castle's loft. Yeah, this makes sense. He is going to hole up. It's certainly what she would do. She can't blame him in the least. But suddenly, his cab switches lanes, lurching, and makes a right turn.
"Where can he be going?" she wonders aloud, too softly for the cab driver to hear. Fortunately, her driver settles in one car behind, his eyes trained on the cab two cars in front of him.
"As far away from you as he can get, I can tell you that much!" the voice in her head laughs. She shakes her head, trying to kick the unwanted opinions out. She is not successful.
"And can you blame him?"
"If only he hadn't heard," she finds herself saying aloud. "I was almost ready. We were almost there. So close. So close."
"What's that?" Marco Divac asks, thinking she is saying that he is following the cab in front of them too closely. The Turkish immigrant has been driving cabs here for eight years now, and the stranger in his backseat doesn't faze him. This is New York, after all. And she has a badge. Perhaps this will turn into a great story for his mates down at the bar.
"Nothing," she replies quickly. "Nothing at all. Keep going."
Indeed, it is nothing. Wishing that he hadn't heard her in the interrogation room is the coward's way out. It's the same exit she has been taking for the past year. Avoiding the truth. Hiding from the honest conversation so desperately needed. It's the journey she has become so comfortable with that it has taken a soft slap from the universe to push her back on course. She knows that the only way to salvage this is going to be something she isn't good at with Castle.
Pure, unadulterated honesty.
There was a time, when she was younger, when honesty came easily for her. But that was a long time ago. That was before Johanna Beckett's murder.
"Isn't it time to stop using mom as your life preserver for every stupid decision you make?"
For once, the voice inside her head isn't taunting, isn't teasing, isn't laughing at her. She can hear the almost pleading sound that echoes in her mind, drowning out all other sounds.
"If you love him . . . if you like him . . . Hell, if you care for him at all . . . be honest. It will hurt. But it will also heal."
She nods her head at the sage advice from her internal voice, the silent monologue fading into the distance as she snaps her attention back to the present. They've been driving for almost fifteen minutes now, through the typically monstrous city traffic, and a minute later, Marco Divac makes a quick left turn, and banks hard into the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel, heading toward Brooklyn and Long Island. Her brow furrows deeper, now having no idea whatsoever where Castle might be heading.
The tunnel, which is a continuation of I-478 running under the mouth of the East River, is always a marvel to Kate. The longest continuous underwater tunnel for vehicles in North America, it takes just minutes to traverse, given good traffic, which she notices she has this afternoon. She's not claustrophobic, but something about being 'trapped' in this tunnel – even just for a few minutes – is always a bit disconcerting.
They exit the tunnel, and shortly veer to the right. The tall, familiar spires appear painted against the spring blue sky as the cab slows. Castle's cab is now a full half minute ahead, and she glances quickly to her left and her right as she sees Castle's cab come to a stop.
"Not here," she thinks to herself. "Surely not here. This can't be a coincidence."
She watches in horror, her heart skipping, as Castle exits the cab some one hundred yards ahead of her own. As her cab finally comes to a halt less than ten seconds later, she stays in the cab for a few additional seconds, staring mutely through the window at his retreating figure.
"No way," she finally says aloud. "How?!"
She shakes herself free, opening the taxi door, she tosses a fifty dollar bill at the cab driver through the small window.
"Stay here till I get back," she tells him. "Please."
She exits the cab, and takes off on a slow jog towards Castle's rapidly shrinking form.