Shared Obsession Chapter 110

Kate quickly ushers Castle back into the hallway. "Castle, Kyra Blaine is a witness in this case. For all that we know she may be at the center of it. So I need to know your connection."

"Is that the only reason you're asking?" Castle questions.

"It's the reason I have to know now. So, how – and how well – do you know Kyra?"

"We met in college," Rick explains. "Black Pawn had picked up In a Hail of Bullets and made it clear they wanted me to keep pumping out books. That wasn't much of a problem, because writing was pretty much all I wanted to do anyway – except for seeing Kyra. We were together whenever we could be, which wasn't always the easiest thing. Her mother hated me. And Kyra was a free spirit. She wanted to experience everything, see everything. She wanted to travel."

"And between school and writing, you were tied to your desk?" Kate guesses.

"To notebooks, actually. You know those old bound, black and white composition books with the grammar cheats and list of weights and measures on the inside covers? I started writing out my stories longhand in them when I was 11 and I was still doing it, and transcribing them on an old typewriter later. I always had a notebook with me, even on dates. Kyra was the only girl who didn't mind. She knew it was my passion, but she had one of her own that eventually took her away from me. I was supposed to follow her to London."

"But you didn't?"

"Didn't, couldn't, a combination of both. After that I spent a lot of time shut up in a little apartment, writing when I wasn't puking my guts out. But finally, I realized I had to move on. Unfortunately, it was to Meredith. Well, not entirely, unfortunately. If I hadn't, there wouldn't be an Alexis. I would never change that. But still, not my wisest move. You pretty much know what happened from there."

"More or less," Kate agrees. "But seeing Kyra again was a shock."

"Again, an understatement."

"So, are you going to be able to work this case?"

"I think I already am – tie bar. My eyes still work, and so does my mind, after a fashion."

"Do you want to work the case, Castle?"

"Yeah. Maybe it's affection or just morbid curiosity, but I want to find out who trashed my old girlfriend's wedding."

"And you want to figure out what kind of a guy got Kyra to agree to settle down?" Kate guesses.

"Maybe that too."

"All right, Babe. But if your feelings about Kyra start interfering with seeing the evidence straight, you're going to have to step away. You know that, right?"

"Yeah. I do."


In the hotel's reception room, Ryan takes a seat opposite the wedding's almost attendees. "And you are?"

"Sheila Blaine, mother of the bride," the clearly most upset person in the room replies.

"Keith Murphy. I'm the brother of the groom."

"Laurie Hill, maid of honor, friend of the bride."

"Ted Murphy, groom's uncle."

"Ruby-Osiris-Schwartzman. I was once married to Kyra's father's brother's uncle twice removed. And boy was that a mistake. Is the bar open yet?"

"Do any of you have any idea who might have killed Sophie Ronson?" Ryan inquires.

"Of course not!" Sheila insists while the rest of the group keeps their answers to simple nos.

"I heard that Sophie almost didn't come to the wedding," Keith offers. "She called Kyra up and tried to back out of being a bridesmaid."

"But then she called and said she'd changed her mind," Laurie adds.

"I warned Kyra that girl was too unreliable to be in a wedding party," Sheila declares. "But did she listen to me? No."

Ryan clears his throat. "Um, thank you very much. Next."

"That's everyone, right?" Esposito asks after the rest of the gathering has cycled through questioning.

Ryan looks down at his list. "I think so. Wait. There's a groomsman I didn't check off, Mike Weitz. Did you talk to him?"

Esposito checks his notes. "No."

Ryan locates Keith. "Mr. Murphy, have you seen Mike Weitz?"

"No, actually," Keith responds.

"Has anybody seen Mike?" Ryan calls out to the room.

Laurie Hill slaps her hand against her mouth. "Omigod! He was with Sophie at the rehearsal dinner."

"She's right," Ted agrees. "I saw them in the bar together after."

"You don't think something happened to him too, do you?" Laurie asks.


"No one's seen Mike Weitz since last night," Ryan reports to Beckett in the bridal suite.

"We checked his room," Esposito adds. "The bed's made, his tux is still hanging in the closet and the room key shows the last entry at two am."

"Two am, that's about an hour before our TOD window for Sophie. Any signs of foul play?" Kate asks.

"No, but his toothbrush and bags are still there," Ryan reports.

"Have hotel security start searching the premises," Kate instructs.

"Do you think we'll find another body, Beckett?" Castle queries.

"More likely he's our killer," Kate figures, "and he ran off after strangling Sophie. So let's put out an APB and get Mike's photo to all airports and train stations."

"I'll check back with the wedding guests, see if we can get a clearer picture of Mike and Sophie's interactions," Ryan offers.

Kate nods, "OK, thanks."

Castle closes his eyes. "Sophie and Mike are in the bar, It's late – or early – depending on how you want to look at it. But the bar is closing at two and gives a last call. So, Mike invites Sophie up to his room to, uh, continue their conversation. He kills her and uses her key to hide her body in her room. But they probably took the elevator, to get in a little snuggling on the way up. Is there video in the elevators?"

"Yeah there is," Esposito says. "We've had unis scrubbing it."

"Then we should check it for Mike and Sophie just before two am," Kate says.


Castle studies the video in which Sophie Ronson appears to be doing her best to rub as many body parts as she can against Mike Weitz. "There's a problem, Beckett."

"What, Castle? This fits right in with your story."

"It would except for one thing." Castle points at the screen. "Mike's not wearing a tie bar or anything that would have made the abrasions on Sophie's back. He might have been planning to do the nasty with Sophie, but I don't think he killed her."

Kate frowns at the images. "You may be right, Castle. But we need to find him. If he isn't the killer, he might know who is."

"You know," Castle suggests, "while we're waiting for Mike to turn up, we could look for clues of our own at the rehearsal dinner."

"How?" Kate adds.

"Video isn't just for elevators. These days it's used to memorialize most events of note. And I noticed a handy-dandy video camera in the reception hall. Perhaps there was one at the rehearsal dinner."


The camera zooms in on Mike Weitz. "No tie bar then either," Castle notes. "But he appears to be giving one of the obligatory embarrass the groom speeches."

"So there we were," a grinning Mike tells the crowd, " Greg had had too much to drink…."

"Is that Sophie next to him, looking away from the camera?" Castle wonders.

"Surfing tide," Mike goes on. "And that's when Keith decides,"–a cell phone goes off in the background – "he's gonna slow him down a bit. So he grabs a fire extinguisher…."

Sophie's hand reaches for a cell phone on the table.

"Ugh, who takes a call during a speech?" Ryan grouses.

"Right? Rude," Castle agrees.

"Wonder who she's talking to," Esposito puts in as Sophie disappears from the video.

"Pause that," Kate orders. "Does anyone else find it odd that Sophie would leave right in the middle of Mike's speech?"

"Especially if she was planning to play tongue hockey with him later," Castle considers.

"Maybe whoever called wanted to meet," Esposito suggests.

"Yeah, but who?" Castle questions. "Everyone at the rehearsal dinner would be sitting in that room."

Kate presses out of her chair. "Or maybe our suspect pool just got a little bigger. We need to check Sophie's phone –now."

"I hope we get luckier than she did," Castle murmurs.