Shared Obsession Chapter 86
"Hey! Yo! Beckett!" Esposito calls as he strides up to the murder board. "Haverstock's story checks. John Allen was laid off eight months ago when the AIG crisis hit."
"What about Albuquerque?" Kate asks as Ryan joins them.
"No record of a John Allen coming back from a flight in the tri-state area," the slighter cop responds.
Castle strokes the stubble forming on his jawline. "It makes you wonder what else he lied to his wife about."
"Sandy obviously didn't know what was going on. So how did he pay his bills – or enough of them to pull off his lie?" Kate puzzles.
"If he was expecting the big score he hinted at to Haverstock, maybe he wasn't doing so well with that," Castle suggests.
As reported by a building manager, the body of John Allen lies in an alley as if thrown out with the trash filling a line of receptacles. "What happened?" Beckett queries as she approaches Allen's remains.
"Someone operated on him," Lanie replies. "They cut him open and took all of his organs out."
"You mean I was actually right about organ snatchers?" Castle asks.
As Lanie pulls away what's left of Allen's slacks, groans echo off the concrete.
Castle regards Allen's shredded internals. "Somebody hated his guts."
Lanie looks up from her table as Kate and Castle arrive to view what's left of John Allen. "The guys who did this were not surgeons," she explains. "The cuts were sloppy. Looks like they used box cutters and kitchen knives."
"Any idea what they were looking for?" Kate asks.
"I did a tox screen. Nothing showed up in his bloodstream. But there are traces of cocaine in the body cavity."
"So he was a mule," Kate concludes. "He swallowed balloons or condoms with cocaine, but died before he could deliver them."
"So the intended recipients reclaimed their property with the world's harshest laxative," Castle picks up.
"But if this is about drugs, why would someone kill him before he could pass them on?" Kate wonders.
"Maybe the killing wasn't about the drugs," Castle suggests. "Perhaps Allen was doing something else – something that went sour – to keep up his front. The drugs might be the ever-popular red herring."
Kate points to the hollowed-out body. "Hell of a big herring, Castle. But in any case, we have to follow the clues we have. What else, Lanie?"
"None of the prints from fuming the body matched anything on CODIS. And it looks like whoever cut him up wore gloves. But Castle, the bruises we were talking about before the body snatchers hit the van have emerged. Take a look."
Castle gazes down at Allen's neck. "The mark from the right pinky is almost non-existent as if the killer couldn't apply pressure with it."
"Right," Lanie agrees.
"So we're looking for a killer with a bad pinky," Kate concludes.
The first sign of mischief Kate's seen in a while twinkles in the blue depths of Castle's eyes. "Or perhaps he's just fancy and holds it up when he kills."
"What?" Lanie asks.
Holding up his own pinky, Castle mimes drinking from a cup and saucer. "You know, like tea."
"Beckett, what I don't get is how a middle-aged insurance actuary with no history of drug abuse or any criminal record at all becomes a drug mule," Castle ponders as he settles in beside Kate in her unit. "He couldn't just answer an ad on Craigslist. He'd have to have someone vouch for him to some people, bad people."
"Castle, cocaine use is hardly unknown among middle-aged white-collar workers," Kate points out. "They just don't get busted for it as often because they don't fit the profile of guys the cops stop and frisk."
"Because it isn't just their collars that are white?" Castle asks.
"That's part of it – maybe a lot of it. But they also don't tend to cause trouble. They don't steal to support their habits and they generally keep a low profile. And it's not as if Narcotics can just walk into an office building and start searching desks. As long as they don't attract attention to themselves, they can get away with it."
"Until someone like John Allen can't get away with whatever he was doing to fill the family purse."
"Yeah, but if we're going to figure out what happened, we need to check in with the boys."
"Beckett, Simmons's permanent demise could take place at any moment. This is taking too long."
Kate puts a hand on Rick's thigh. "I know it seems that way. But we are making progress. And right now we have to keep following the trail.
Esposito drops the receiver of his landline back into its cradle. "Just got off the phone with Homeland Security. Passport records indicate John Allen coming back from Mexico, not New Mexico."
Kate catches Castle's eye. "Middle-class white guy with no criminal history. Customs wouldn't have looked at him twice."
"The man had skills. Why would he do something so stupid?" Esposito questions.
"Because he had to," Ryan replies. "I just went over the financials with his wife."
"How bad? Kate asks.
Ryan taps a file. "They've mostly been living off credit cards for the last six months. But he did a good job of hiding it. She thought everything was fine."
"Well, if he wasn't going to work every day, where was he going?" Beckett queries.
"Applying for jobs. I found hundreds of cover letters and resumes on his computer."
"I don't understand. Why didn't they just sell the apartment?" Kate asks.
"The value of it crashed when everything else did. It wasn't worth the mortgage," Ryan explains.
"How about life insurance?" Castle inquires. "Most guys with a family try to take out a policy. Alexis will get a tidy windfall when I kick the bucket. And as an actuary, Allen must have been able to get a good deal."
Ryan taps the file again. "Stopped making payments about four months ago." Ryan's phone sounds, and he walks away to take the call.
Castle starts pacing the aisle between the desks. " You know, I get desperation. I get needing money. But we still don't have a clue where he jumped aboard the mule train."
Ryan hangs up and starts back toward the group. "That was CSU. They finished checking out the dumping scene. Our perps wore gloves. The only prints they could grab off the car that pulled up to the building belonged to the owner who reported it stolen last night. Looks like we're not going to be grabbing a break on this one."
"Bro, how about that glove you found in the alley?" Esposito asks.
"I dusted that myself." Ryan shakes his head. "Nothing."
"Did you dust inside?" Kate inquires.
"The inside of the building near the alley? It's got 100 offices. There would be like a zillion prints in there."
Kate rolls her eyes. "The inside of the glove. Did you dust the inside of the glove?"
Ryan and Esposito look at each other. "Uh-uh."
"Boom! Got a hit!" Esposito announces affixing a photo to the board. "Name's Luther Whitehead. Busted twice for possession with intent and once for conspiracy. Pled out on all three."
"Our legal system at work," Castle comments drily.
"Did a nickel upstate on a gun charge and is currently out on parole," Esposito continues.
Kate nods. "Something tells me his parole is about to be revoked. You got an address?"
Esposito grins. "Yup!"
Castle points through the glass at two men just led into the box. Aren't you going in to grill them?"
Kate's hands curl around her black folder in frustration. "According to the officers who picked them up, the first and only word out of their mouths was 'lawyer.' I have to wait for him to get here. But I thought I'd take the time to pick up on their body language. And you saw the men who took the body. Do they look like the same guys?"
"I wasn't seeing much of anything except a gray haze," Castle admits. "Lanie would be a better witness than I would."
"She told me she saw masks and guns – big guns. That was enough."
"Tick, tick. How long until the shyster is supposed to arrive?"
"I don't know. We'll just have to wait."
Castle starts pacing again. "That seems to be the mantra for this whole damn case."