Kate Beckett, Investigator Chapter 35
"I'm surprised Gates agreed to let me ride along on your stakeout," Kate says from the back seat of Ryan and Esposito's unit. The two detectives exchange looks. "You didn't tell her, did you?"
Esposito swivels to face her. "It's five a.m. The captain doesn't get in until eight. There was no reason to wake her."
"I see," Kate says. "Well, for future reference, since Gambitto and his cronies got kicked loose after his influence peddling to Nesgadol came to light, Castle has a friend in the mayor's office again. They're not as close as he was to Weldon, but Castle did enough for Mayor Barstead's campaign to get to call him Sammy. So if Gates has a problem with our family involvement in this case, she'll probably keep it to herself. Besides, Soraya said Calen told her that if the builders show up, it's at 6:30 at the latest. With any luck, you'll be back at the precinct, and I'll be in class by 10. Actually, with no luck, we'll be out of here a lot earlier than that."
"Didn't Soraya tell us that Calen said the builder who is here a lot drives a black van?" Ryan asks.
"Uh-huh," Kate confirms.
Ryan points through the windshield. "Well, then check out that Volkswagen Transporter."
A man dressed in a generic work shirt and pants hops out of the driver's side of a black van. He opens the side door and signals to a group of waiting men to get in."
"We need to follow that truck!" Beckett exclaims.
"Beckett, Ryan and I are the cops," Esposito reminds her.
Kate feels heat flood her face. "Right. Sorry."
Esposito starts the unit's engine. "We got this."
Hanging back just far enough to avoid being spotted, Esposito follows the van to a construction site in SoHo.
"Looks like they're converting another commercial building to lofts," Ryan notes.
"The name of the contractor is on the sign," Kate observes, "Cracken Construction."
"We'll run background on it," Ryan declares.
"And I'll talk with my dad's clients and see what they know," Kate says. "If Cracken has anything to do with Calen's death, something's going to pop somewhere."
"Cracken Construction," Dev Shali repeats. "Yes, I've worked for them."
"Can you think of any reason why if Calen worked for them, he'd end up dead?" Kate asks.
"We all keep our heads down and try not to cause trouble," Dev says. "A lot of the builders hold it over us that with one call to ICE, we could be finished. Calen would have done whatever he could to avoid calling attention to himself."
"What if he saw something he shouldn't have, maybe something dangerous? Would he have tried to get it fixed?" Kate asks.
Dev shakes his head. "I don't think he would have dared say something to anyone from Cracken, but he might have tried to fix it himself. Before he came here, Calen was an electrician in charge of wiring many buildings."
"So if Cracken was putting in wiring that might have caused a fire, Calen would have tried to fix it?" Kate presses.
"If he could. But Cracken and the other companies that use men like us keep us working. If we get 15 minutes for lunch, that's a lot. And they don't like us talking either, except to acknowledge orders. So if Calen tried to fix something, he would have had to do it out of sight of the bosses."
"Which would not have been easy to do?" Kate queries.
"No. But maybe if he thought a boss would be distracted for a while…." Dev considers.
"And miscalculated how much time he would have," Kate guesses, "he would have been in trouble."
"Yes," Dev agrees, "he would have been."
"Writing another paper?" Castle asks as Kate pounds the keyboard of her laptop.
"No, researching a company that could be implicated in Calen Sisi's death. I had classes for the rest of the day after I talked to Dev about it. So I'm just getting to it now."
"Aren't the boys doing that?"
"I got information from Dev that they may not have. Since he's a client, I can't share our conversation. I'll need something independent to back it up before I pass the info on."
"How's it going?"
"Nothing so far that the boys can't find, but I'm just getting started."
"Any way I can help?"
"Maybe. Did the consultant you used when you were writing Firestorm ever say anything to you about fires originating from construction problems?"
"Accidental or deliberate?"
"Either one."
"Mostly, we were talking about using wiring to create a firestorm – but you probably figured that out. Still, she is a wiring expert, fourth generation in the business. So if you need that kind of insight, I can give her a call."
"Let me see what I can find on our company of interest first, then I'll let you know."
As far as Kate can tell, Cracken doesn't have much of a history. They converted one building before the one in progress. Inspectors found several issues, but nothing was classed as unusual, and the violations were fixed within the allotted time period. The building hasn't had any reports of fires or serious accidents. That's a dead end, but she figures that at least some of the powers-that-be in Cracken must have longer histories with construction.
Checking out the names one by one will be tedious, but she's not about to let the death of a client go. As passionate as she was about solving murders when she was with the NYPD, with the exception of her mother, she never really had a connection with the victims. Calen Sisi is different. Despite the little she'd been able to accomplish in addressing his immigration problems, she'd come to know him. She liked him. His death has a personal pang to it that most of the cases she investigated as a cop didn't. While she knows how competent Ryan and Esposito are, their closure rate is far from 100%. She's not about to see Calen Sisi end up on the cold case pile. Talking to Castle's expert would be a long shot, but she can use one.
Castle lays a fresh mug of coffee on the table next to where Kate is working. "Any luck yet?'
"Nothing," Kate admits. "I managed to get the list of principals and the official employee roster for Cracken. Of course, there's no sign of Calen on the latter, but there wouldn't be. Still, as far as I can find up to now, none of these people is connected to a fire or serious accident. But I've got more than a few left to go."
"I do bring some good news with your fresh brew," Castle announces. "I couldn't get my electrical expert, Lulu Tzenin, on the phone, but I did get an answer to my email query. She's happy to drop by for coffee early tomorrow before you have to go off to class – assuming that one of my cinnamon butterscotch coffee cakes accompanies the coffee."
Kate glances at the time at the bottom of her screen. "It's ten o'clock already. Are you going to have time to bake one?"
"I can do it in the morning. The batter takes less than ten minutes to put together, and the baking time is only 20. It takes less time than putting out my special pancakes. The secret is using both butterscotch and cinnamon baking bits, and our cupboard is fully stocked."
Kate grins. "Of course it is."