Shared Obsession Chapter 125
"He was a good guy – Cano," Fox declares. "He built that field because he wanted to give back. I think that's why he went to Cuba. He wanted to do something good. But I guess things hadn't changed as much as he had hoped for."
"What happened? Kate asks.
"He spent some time in Havana with the people. He came back pretty upset, and he told me to give the tourism folks back their bonus. First time I ever let a client give money back. But I figured, you know, Cano was reneging on a military dictatorship. These are not the people you want angry at you, especially having defected 18 years ago."
"He risked his life to leave. Why would you want him to be the poster boy for the new Cuba?" Castle questions.
Oh, I didn't," Fox claims. "I was surprised as anyone that he wanted to do it. And after everything I did to get him out back then. Have you heard this story?"
"No," Kate admits, a little surprised there was a baseball story her father hadn't recounted.
"You're gonna like this, Castle," Fox says, his overbright eyes shining even more. "It's like one of your books. "It was the '92 Olympics. The Cubans had just won gold in Barcelona, thanks mostly to Cano. And I wanted to get him to the States to play in the bigs. Now convincing him was the easy part. Getting him onto my plane, that was the hard part. We had to get past coaches and minders and finally – El Pulpo, head of state security. El Pulpo had his tentacles around everybody. And just as I thought we were home free, boom! El Pulpo. We were caught, sunk. A firing squad, I kid you not, was waiting for that kid back in Havana. You know how I got us past El Pulpo?" Fox proudly displays his wrist. "Rolex. I gave him my shiny new Rolex and he just looked away. It just goes to show you every socialist is a capitalist when backs are turned."
"So," Kate asks, "is it possible that Cano took the Cuba job because he needed the money?"
"Well, it's possible," Fox considers. "God knows those guys know how to blow through money and plus, he had that club with Tommy. That's just a money pit."
"So in regards to the Cuba job, who else went on the trip?" Kate queries.
Fox looks thoughtful. "A couple of low-level Cuban diplomats. I'll, uh, have Cynthia get you a list."
"So," Kate wonders, pulling her unit into city traffic, "what made Cano go to Cuba, and what made him change his mind?"
Castle shakes his head. "The story doesn't track, Beckett. And Fox is wrong about it sounding like something out of my books. But then you'd know that. Assuming Storm had anything worth bribing someone with, he'd give it to the orphanage, not some dictator's brutal toady. El Pulpo, if there was an El Pulpo, could have taken anything Fox offered and killed him anyway, as well as killing Cano."
"Uh huh, Storm would have staged some kind of diversion, probably blown something up, and then made sure Cano got to the States."
Castle grins. "Exactly. And another thing. If the club was sucking up Cano's money, how could he pay Wade back? With the kind of interest guys like that charge, he probably would have had to give him $400,000 or more. And Fox would have been aware of that kind of outlay. Fox is lying."
"The question is, why?" Kate replies.
"I don't know," Castle admits. "I don't know where we're heading, either."
"The morgue. I got a voicemail from Perlmutter while we were talking to Fox."
"Cause of death was cerebral hemorrhage as expected," Perlmutter announces.
"Any way to estimate the height of the attacker based on the angle of the blows?" Kate asks.
"Normally, yes. But in this case, the attacker's first hit landed a little south of the head."
"How far south?" Kate probes.
"Enough to make him a soprano."
Castle unconsciously covers himself. "Ow! Shoulda worn a cup."
"Lacerations around the patella suggest that Mr. Vega was on his knees when he was hit on the head," Perlmutter continues.
"So our attacker could have been anyone," Kate realizes.
"Man, woman, or child," Perlmutter confirms. "But that's not why I called you." He holds up a photograph of the body. "Among all the fresh bruising, we found significant sub-dermal bruises that weren't quite as fresh. The contusions were all fist-sized."
"He was in a fight," Kate concludes.
"A couple of days ago," Perlmutter agrees.
Castle points to the photo. "What's this shape right here?"
Kate leans in to look. "He was wearing a ring."
Perlmutter rocks back on his heels, smiling smugly. "Not just any ring, a championship ring."
"Left-handed ring finger," Castle notes. "Just like his old friend Freight Train Tommy Zane."
A text alert sounds from Castle's phone. "Alexis is home from school. She says she wants to talk."
"Go ahead," Kate says. "You can meet me at Zane's club later."
"So, what's up, Pumpkin?" Castle asks, watching Alexis drizzle three kinds of syrup on a sundae. "That's impressive, by the way."
"Thanks, Dad. It's about my genealogy project. Did you know Mom's family goes all the way back to the Mayflower?"
"That would explain her persecution complex," Castle responds, "although she didn't inherit any tendencies toward, certain, uh, inhibitions."
"Hey, those are also my genes you're talking about," Alexis points out.
"Well, look on the bright side," Castle urges. "Now that you know you're genetically predisposed you can seek early treatment – prevent future outbreaks." He grabs a can of whipped cream and squirts it straight into his mouth.
"Doesn't it bother you that you don't know who your dad is?" Alexis asks.
Castle swallows as quickly as he can. "Ah, so now are we getting to what is really bothering you?"
"It's like I have this family tree and there's this whole hunk of it missing. There's a whole part of my history that doesn't even exist. I mean, how could Gram not know?"
Castle takes a stool next to Alexis at the counter. "My first year of college, I uh, went to a party, met this girl, Allison. In the space of six hours, we talked, we danced, we fell in love. The next morning she was gone. I spent a year trying to find her, but I never learned her last name. There's not a week goes by that I don't think about her. I think it was like that with Gram and your father. She told me that in the night she met him, she loved a lifetime, and I believe her."
"Don't you feel like you're missing out, not knowing?" Alexis wonders.
"No, oh no. That's the beauty of the mystery. Right now my father could be an astronaut, a pirate, a humanitarian, a winner of the Nobel Prize. I mean, what one man could live up to all that?"
"Do you think he ate whipped cream out of a can?"
"I think," Castle says, picking up the can again, "that he invented whipped cream."
The white-haired man squirts the can of whipped cream directly into his mouth. Many times he's lived off emergency rations he ate that way, but whipped cream is so much better. And he can use the energy while he studies his reports on the Special Prosecutor's office. So far, other than the spoofed call to Kate Beckett, nothing looks out of place. But someone there was covering up for it. Sooner or later, he'll catch a break to figure out who. He hopes that it's sooner, much sooner.
Tommy Zane forces a smile on seeing Kate Beckett, but not fast enough that she doesn't notice. "Detective Beckett, Mr. Castle. What brings you here?"
"I always follow the trail to a murder, Mr. Zane," Kate explains. "And if what you told me is true, this was probably Cano Vega's last stop on the way to the park where he was killed. So you'll understand if we have some questions."
"Yeah, sure," Zane agrees too quickly. "Whatever you need."