Kate Beckett, Investigator Chapter 4

Castle watches as Kate slips into a bulky sweater that's part of her Velma Dinkley persona. "What are you going to do when the weather gets warm and you have a harder time covering up your willowy curves?"

"I don't have access to the police gym anymore," Kate points out. "I might put on a few pounds."

"We can easily put in a gym here, with anything you want." Castle arches an eyebrow. "And there are much more pleasurable ways to burn calories. But seriously, Kate, how long are you going to be at Gidon?"

"As long as it takes. The lab results and quality checks I've been seeing have been consistent. They either go right to the line of what's legal or go over it slightly. And when they do go over it, we submit more samples until they just pass. Pushing the safety limits a little on one thing may not seem like that big a deal. But when you do it on everything, a lot of people are going to get sick and their homes could come crashing down on their heads. We can't let Nesgadol get away with that. And we can't let Mayor Gambitto drape his wife in jewels to help them do it. So I'll do whatever it takes for as long as it takes."

"That is truly admirable, Kate, and I love you all the more for it – which takes some doing. But we did say we'd talk about something else after you had a chance to settle into your new career. And somehow I don't see the ever-efficient cubicle dweller Ms. Dinkley having any interest in motherhood. So is that on hold while you play out your role, or what?"

"Castle, believe it or not, you sound like my father."

"Oh, no!"

"Well, Aunt Theresa has been leaning on him. But I won't have to be at Gidon forever – just long enough to gather evidence for an airtight case. And when Dad actually brings it to court, we can subpoena chemists, lab techs, inspectors – whatever it takes. And once I am done at Gidon, I can put Velma in a drawer for a while."

"No, no, no! I've spent enough time in Lanie's domain to be picturing the wrong kind of drawer."

Kate stretches up for a kiss. "All right, the closet. Then I'll be going around talking to the builders who've been losing jobs and trying to talk them into joining the suit. My time will be a lot more flexible and I can be Kate Beckett again. We can talk about it then."

"Pinky promise?" Castle asks holding out his little finger.

Kate rolls her eyes. "Pinky promise?"

"Well, we've already done the kiss part."

A smile pushes its way onto Kate's lips as she links her pinkie with Castle's. "Pinky promise."

"Ms. Dinkley, did you get the latest report back from Marley?" Elliott Wigdor asks, peeking into Kate's cubicle.

Kate hands him a printout. "It just came in, but Nesgadol isn't going to like it. The latest samples are over the limit for sulfur and Marley found lead and mercury too. The whole container load must be contaminated. There's no way they can use any of it. And it will have to be disposed of as hazardous waste."

Wigdor stares at the lab report. "I'll take care of this. Make sure I get all the copies of any paperwork connected to this load. There are several more loads due to come in this week. Just deal with those."

Kate nods. "Yes, Sir. I'll do that."

"Good girl," Wigdor says with a smile too forced to reach his eyes.

Dropping heavily into his desk chair, Wigdor reaches for the burner phone in his bottom drawer. He calls the only number programmed in. "Listen, Nellis, we have problems. The lab results from Marley on the last load are crap. But I can bury those. The bigger problem is the air monitoring data from the new building you're about to open, the one on the Upper East Side."

"I know what building you're talking about, Wigdor," snaps the impatient voice of Jacques Nellis, Nesgadol's unofficial fixer. "What air monitoring results? We didn't order any."

"No, but Lovaas, the tenant who is supposed to be leasing the first two floors, did. And the tests found white asbestos, the sh*t that's turned up in a lot of Chinese materials."

"So, what do we pay you for?" Nellis demands. "Quash the results. Say the samples were accidentally switched or something."

A whine creeps into Wigdor's voice. "I can't. The testing was handled by an outside contractor. There are too many records and too many techs who can confirm the data."

Rage roughens Nellis's voice. "And Lovaas isn't about to shut up about the results. It will use them as an excuse to pull out of their contract, and the other tenants we've signed up will pull out too."

"You'll have to have the whole building remediated, probably tear out a lot of what's in place already," Wigdor says. "That's the only way you'll ever be able to get any tenants in there."

"Which means losing a f***ing fortune while all that goes on," Nellis grinds out. "The guys at the top will never go for it. Look, we never talked about this. This call didn't happen. You just file your reports as usual. You get me, Wigdor?"

"I understand," Wigdor acknowledges.

While the fire department initially suspected arson when the unoccupied building in one of New York City's most expensive neighborhoods exploded, the cause was quickly put down to a gas leak. The fact that all the gas pipes were new and had been thoroughly inspected by both Con Edison and the city, didn't really matter much. The mayor did some subtle arm-twisting to end the investigation. Although the building was completely destroyed, no one had been hurt in the late night blast and the losses to the Nesgadol company would be covered by insurance. End of story. But not to Kate.

Velma Dinkley's sign-on allows her access to most of Gidon's test result database. Still, she has no administrative privileges. She can't change anything. She isn't authorized to conduct certain searches either. One building whose test results she can't access at all is the one that blew up. The materials came into the country before Velma Dinkley checked on the quality of shipments. Nevertheless, Kate Beckett heard enough chatter to know Gidon had handled them. But the project doesn't even show up in any directory – not one she can find anyway. The gas leak story just doesn't make any sense.

"So you don't believe it was a gas leak?" Castle asks over the red wine he shares with Kate in front of the fireplace.

"I'm not sure, but it doesn't smell right," Kate declares.

"So what are you going to do?"

"You remember what I told you about the characters my TO, Mike Royce introduced me to? One of them was a veteran arson inspector, Sparky Fletcher. He retired around the same time Mike did. But I think he's still a consultant on fire hazards. I figure I'll give him a call and find out what he thinks about that supposed gas leak."

"He does sound like an interesting character. I'd like to meet him. How about if we invite him out to dinner?" Castle suggests.

Kate grins. "If I remember right, he loves ribs."