Shared Obsession Chapter 148
Kate hangs up her desk phone. "The cab company said they sent a taxi to the bar at 10:45 on the night of the overtime Knicks game."
"You got the drop-off point?" Castle asks.
"Yeah, West Village, corner of Varick and Downing."
"Could that be where he actually lives?" Castle wonders.
"Yeah, but I bet 50,000 people live within walking distance of that corner," Kate replies.
"We could canvass local businesses," Castle suggests.
Kate slumps in her seat. "For an average-looking white guy? Ben Conrad picked a bar with no video surveillance. We don't even know what his killer looked like."
Shaw strides over from the smart board. "Looks aren't the only way we have to identify him. We also have behavior."
"How can we identify him through behavior?" Castle questions.
"Well, originally, as you pointed out a couple of times, Mr. Castle, his behavior seemed inconsistent. But that was because he was pretending to be someone else. We know a lot more now. He is a show-off, a game player with an exceptionally high IQ. But it's not enough to be smart. He has a pathological need to validate it, which tells me he belongs to an organization like Mensa or Prometheus. He is a chameleon, so we can assume he is living under a stolen identity. And he is – literate. He has already shown certain dispositions in his behavior toward Nikki Heat. So we've drawn up a list of periodicals and magazines that he likely subscribes to."
Castle scans the list. "I get half of these."
"Yes, and you also kill people for a living. In your books," Shaw hurriedly adds.
Kate checks the list. "This is a pretty wide net."
"So are Varick and Downing and Mensa and high IQ societies," Shaw replies. "But put them all together and sometimes we get lucky."
"Like the parking ticket that nailed the Son of Sam killer?" Castle queries.
"Oh, it's not always that neat," Shaw cautions. "You just keep adding pieces of the puzzle until a picture emerges."
"We did that to get Conrad," Castle points out. "Unfortunately it was the picture on the wrong box."
"Hopefully we've got the right one now," Shaw says, as Avery waves from the war room.
"We collated subscription information from profiled periodicals as well as member lists from high IQ organizations within a one-mile radius of the Varick and Downing area. We got 17 hits."
"Run the names through our database," Shaw instructs. "Most serials have some indication of violent behavior – criminal or psychiatric records."
"Aren't psychiatric records supposed to be confidential?" Castle asks. "I can't imagine what everyone I know who's seen a therapist would think if they knew the records would end up in an FBI database. And how many people would avoid seeking the help they need if they thought Big Brother was watching?"
"We just have the ones associated somehow with a possible crime," Shaw assures him.
"Possible crime? Which means you could be innocent and in there. Or worse, you could pal around with unsuspecting cops and never be in there, like the Ohio guy who ate his victims."
"It's not perfect, Mr. Castle," Shaw admits, "but it's what we have."
"Negative for any matches," Avery calls out.
"Which I suppose makes your concerns moot, Mr. Castle," Shaw says.
Castle turns to Kate. "Not really, but I don't know whether to be disappointed or grateful."
Shaw pushes forward on the investigation. "I'll have our teams interview the seventeen and…."
"Huh!" Avery interrupts.
Shaw whirls around. "Huh, what?"
Avery points to a photo. "This one, Chris Doherty. We've got a recent driver's license, but according to his social security number, Chris Doherty died six years ago."
"He's living under a stolen identity," Kate realizes.
"So where did our dead guy supposedly live?" Shaw inquires.
"His address puts him half a block from Varick and Downing," Avery announces.
"Let's roll!" Shaw commands.
With the exception of allowing Kate and Castle to go along, the breaching of Doherty's apartment is almost a replay of the FBI's entrance to Ben Conrad's abode. With a shouted "Go, go, go!" a battering ram knocks in the door, and a chorus of clears sounds as agents check out the rooms.
With dropped jaws, Avery, Shaw, Beckett, and Castle survey the killer's domain. Text-covered sheets of paper hang by strings from the ceiling. A large picture of Kate, constructed from pieces of newspaper almost covers a wall.
Kate stares at tokens she doesn't recognize, forming a display on a table. "He's done this before."
Castle opens up a copy of "Heat Wave' lying nearby. "Hey, I signed this. 'To Scott, write what you know.'"
"Scott," Shaw repeats, "do you remember him?"
"I've signed hundreds of books. But for me to have written that, instead of a generic 'Good luck,' or something, he must have talked about wanting to be a writer. I get a lot of that too, but…." Castle closes his eyes. "Yeah, there was someone who might have been our faux Chris Doherty. A lot of fans are admiring, some almost obsequious. But this guy had a smirking superiority about him like he already knew more about writing than I did. That's probably why I put it that way."
"I don't suppose he gave you a last name?" Shaw asks.
"No, but fans almost never do. If he was already planning something, he might have known it would be suspicious if he did." Castle picks up a sheaf of papers held together by a binder clip and starts flipping through it.
"His manifesto?" Shaw asks.
Castle shakes his head. "His manuscript."
Kate goes over to look. "Dead Heat?"
Castle starts reading aloud. "Heat examined the bullets, each carefully engraved with a letter. She arranged them like Scrabble tiles until they spelled out her name."
"You were right, Castle, about him playing from a book," Kate says.
"And he was trying to turn it into his own live-action movie," Castle picks up.
Shaw holds up another manuscript. "He was writing about his murders long before Nikki Heat. He called this one 'Night Terrors.' Looks like it was about killing prostitutes in Seattle."
Castle rubs the stubble forming on his chin. "I remember that case. I thought they caught the guy."
"Not so much caught as found dead," Shaw corrects. "He hanged himself."
"Another patsy, just like Ben Conrad. But that means he repeats his plots. He's not as creative as he thinks," Castle assesses.
"He gets away with murder. Why would he risk exposing himself by writing about it?" Kate wonders.
"Writing is probably a symptom of his psychosis, like taking his little trophies. He both memorializes his deeds and distances himself from them by writing about them," Shaw proposes. "Then along comes Nikki Heat, tailor-made for his psychosis, one part fact, one part fiction. Who better for him to challenge?"
"He must have known by going after Beckett he'd tip his hand that Ben Conrad wasn't the killer. Why risk it?" Castle questions.
"It's part of the thrill," Kate asserts. "He needs to escalate to feel alive."
"Or," Shaw offers, "he's a psychotic obsessive-compulsive who's already decided how it has to end."
"With Beckett dead?" Castle presses.
"Agent Shaw," Avery interrupts. "We dusted for prints. The problem is, there aren't any."
"That's not possible," Kate insists. "You can't live in a place without leaving prints."
"Unless he doesn't have any. We're back to his profile as an arsonist," Shaw says. "If he likes to play with fire, maybe he burned them off."
Kate's gloved fingers fist. "Without prints, we can't get an ID."
"We don't need an ID," Shaw responds. "Put everything back where you found it. Let's un-ass this place right now. He's got to come back sometime."
"Hopefully, not before Avery's guys clean up all their fingerprint powder," Castle murmurs to Kate. "When I was twelve I ordered a Crimebusters kit out of the back of a Detectives Comic. You wouldn't believe the mess I made. It took me days to get all that stuff up. And the lock on this place will never be the same.
Kate gazes around at the useless dustings. "Hopefully, before the killer notices, we'll be on top of him."
