Confession Chapter 53

"So, what do you want to do now?" Castle asks.

Kate finger-rakes her hair out of her face. "What I want to do is get drunk, but being in court counted as official business, not time off. Gates will be expecting us back."

"Yeah," Castle agrees. "Bracken is her sister's case. She'll be monitoring reports on how the proceedings went. But you know, with all the media vehicles packed in around this place, you're going to have a hell of a time trying to get your unit out. There's a serviceable café about three blocks over. We could take a stroll, have a coffee, and wait for the jam-up to clear a little."

Kate surveys the mass of vans and reporters doing standups relating the results of the hearing. "You may have a point."

Castle offers his arm. "Milady."

"Oh, are you a knight errant now?"

"I'd love to be errant, but there's too much of a crowd. Maybe later. I think for now we'll have to settle for coffee."

"I'm going to need a chocolate drizzle."

"Noted."

Two blocks into their walk, Castle recoils from an odor wafting out of a nearby alley. "Ugh! That stench is more than the usual overflowing dumpster."

"You're right," Kate agrees. "It's decomp. A dead animal, maybe."

"Beckett, what if it's of the bipedal variety? As offensive as it is to the olfactory sense, shouldn't we check it out?"

"Yeah, we, we should," Kate agrees, reaching into her purse. She pulls out a small jar.

"You carry wintergreen? I see that being prepared isn't just for Boy Scouts."

"You want some or not?"

"Please."

Smearing the protective scent on their upper lips, the pair carefully make their way into the alley. At first, all they see is a pile of what looks like garbage, but as they get closer a human hand is clearly poking out from underneath. "We can't disturb that until an ME gets here," Kate says, grabbing her cell phone from her pocket. "We'll need CSU too, and uniformed officers to keep onlookers from contaminating the scene."

Castle backs away. "Onlookers would either need strong stomachs or a faulty sense of smell. My nose and I will be delighted to keep our distance."

Lanie supervises as CSU slowly exposes the body, photographing each stage and collecting everything that was in contact with it. The victim is apparently male and started out as well dressed, as would be typical for the Civic Center area. "No wallet or ID. No use in taking a liver temperature," she declares. "This guy's been dead long enough to reach ambient and for rigor to subside. He appears to be in the bloat stage, which would mean he's been dead for 3-5 days. That's consistent with the odor. I can tell you more after I get him back to the lab."

Castle shakes his head. "Dead for at least three days and no one noticed?"

"He was under a pile of garbage, Castle," Kate reminds him. "There would have been no reason to go poking around."

"But the way he was dressed, he probably had a job, maybe a family. Someone must have missed him."

Kate nods. "Maybe someone did. We can check missing person reports for the past few days and see if anyone matches."

Kate points at the screen of her desktop computer. "Castle, I've got something."

The feet of Castle's chair scrape against the floor as he scoots it around Kate's desk to read over her shoulder. "Oscar Blumenfeld, a lawyer. Last seen offering a motion in federal court. Never returned to his office. With the condition the body was in, it's hard to tell about the face, but the height and hair color are right. So's the timing. And if you take the murder scene as a metaphor, there is no shortage of people who regard lawyers as garbage. Which would make the question: Who felt that way specifically about Mr. Blumenfeld?"

"If the body is Oscar Blumenfeld. We don't have a positive ID yet," Kate reminds him. "But his sister filed the missing person report. Maybe she can give us one."

A tear rolls down each of Liddy Blumenfeld's cheeks. "Yes, that's Oscar. You see the way the gray at his temples is uneven, more on the right than on the left? I teased him that one side was more distinguished than the other. Stupid, huh? And you can't see it under the sheet, but he has really long middle toes. He liked to wear cowboy boots when he wasn't working because they fit the shape of his feet better than regular shoes."

As Lanie uncovers the body's feet, Liddy lets out a little sob. "Yes. See? No one but my brother has – she sobs again – had feet like that. Dr. Parish, how did he die?"

"We haven't established that yet," Lanie explains. "There are no obvious wounds on his body. The lab is running a full range of tests. I'll know more when I get the results."

"Do you think he suffered?"

"I don't know," Lanie admits. "I'm sorry."

"I'm sure you're doing your best," Liddy says.

"You can count on it," Lanie assures her.

"Castle, what are you doing?" Kate asks as he studies the screen of his phone.

"Reading Oscar Blumenfeld's listing on LinkedIn. I would have thought someone bringing cases to federal court would work for one of the big firms. But he didn't. He had a one-lawyer shop, specializing in bankruptcy. Hmm, I can see someone wanting to kill a divorce lawyer, but a bankruptcy lawyer?"

"It would depend on what side of the bankruptcy you are," Kate says. "When my father was rebuilding his practice after – you know – he picked up some bankruptcy cases. There was a creditor who came to his office. Things got pretty heated. The client had so few assets that there was almost nothing to distribute. So he came out of it all right but the people he owed got a few cents on the dollar, if that."

"Yeah, I can see how that would engender some harsh sentiments. But you would think someone that pissed off would come after a lawyer with a knife or a gun, something that would shed some blood. That doesn't track with what Lanie has so far. Unless the killer can't stand the sight of blood. Ooh! That would make for an interesting scenario. I'll have to remember that one."

"Whether the murderer has a problem with blood or not, we should start looking at Blumenfeld's cases," Kate says. "The transcripts would be a matter of public record."

"The really juicy stuff may never have made it into court," Castle suggests. "But it might be in files at his office or his home."

"We'll try the office first," Kate decides, hitting a few keys on her computer. "It's on Worth Street, not far from the courthouse."

"Then maybe we can make a stop for your chocolate drizzle this time."

"Work first, Castle."

"I would never have expected you to say anything else."

Castle surveys the line of well-used file cabinets against the walls of Oscar Blumenfeld's office. "Lots of paper." He takes a seat in a desk chair in front of a laptop computer. "Maybe he had the files indexed on here. Damn, can't get in without a password."

"That's not going to make things any easier," Kate realizes. "We should start with the most recent cases. But it looks like the files are in alphabetical not chronological order."

"How about if I start at one end and you start at the other and we work towards each other to the middle?" Castle suggests.

"Works for me."