Lots had changed in the Castle household in the final days of March. Since officially becoming Ruby's foster parents, Kate and Rick had made what felt like a thousand different scheduling changes and important decisions.

The first of which was deciding on Ruby's schooling. In the five weeks that Ruby spent in New Jersey, she expressed her dissatisfaction with the academic rigor of Lakewood Middle School. The school that she had attended before her father's death was quite far from the loft, so another school change was imminent. Kate had floated the idea of home schooling, but knew that it was important for Ruby to socialize with her peers. "How about Greendale?" Rick suggests. "Its where Alexis went for elementary and middle school. And it's private, so they'd be able to challenge Ruby the way she needs in English and History, and support her the way she needs in Math and Science." Kate agreed and they enrolled Ruby the very next day.

The second was to get Ruby re-established with the pediatric oncologist. The new medication Ruby had been prescribed was causing some serious side effects, and she wanted to try something else. Ruby's dad had spent every penny he earned to pay for Ruby's medical care, so Kate was confident that she was in good hands with her old doctor. They'd gotten on the cancellation list and now had an appointment scheduled in Mid-April.

The others were lots of little things. Kate adjusted her work schedule so that she could drop Ruby off at school in the morning and be home early twice a week to make family dinner. Rick had decided to cancel as many of his out of town appearances as he could, so that he could be home with Ruby as much as possible. The only event he wasn't able to cancel was one that was already a re-schedule from the previous year, so less than a week after Ruby moved in permanently, he hopped on a plane to New Orleans.

"What time does his flight get in tomorrow?" Ruby asks.

"Around 4PM," Kate says. "Which will be perfect."

While Rick was away, Kate and Ruby planned a fancy four-course dinner to celebrate his birthday, which was April 1st, tomorrow.

"Alexis and Martha will be here around 3PM, so you and I will need to have our preparations done by then, but after that, Alexis will be able to help," Kate explains.

"Not Martha?" Ruby asks.

"Her talents are better used outside of the kitchen," Kate chuckles. "She will be excellent moral support."

"Do you think he'll like his present?" Ruby asks. Among the other quirky, savant-like skills that Ruby possessed, she also taught herself how to crochet about a year ago, but she didn't have the money to buy yarn for her projects. When she asked Kate to take her to the craft store, Kate quickly learned that despite being out of practice, Ruby's skills hadn't missed a beat. She made Rick a crochet amigurumi beaver, New York's state animal, which Kate secretly thought was hilarious.

"No, no he won't like it, Ruby," Kate says. "He's going to absolutely love it."

Ruby smiles, beaming with pride over the first ever gift she'd crocheted for someone. Kate stands up from the couch with a yawn and arches her back as she stretches.

"Well, I don't know about you, but I am...so...tired," Kate says through another yawn. "So I think I'm going to go to bed."

"Kate, it's like...8:30," Ruby chuckles after checking her phone for the team.

"What can I say? It's been a long week. I'm tired!" Kate laughs. "You can stay up if you want to, I just won't be awake if you wanted to read before bed."

"Well, I'm not really tired, buuuut, I could read to you tonight instead?" Ruby suggested.

"Okay, but don't be offended if I fall asleep on you," Kate smiles. They both change into their pajamas, and Kate finishes her bedtime routine while Ruby ran upstairs to grab her copy of Deadly Heat. Kate pulls back the comforter and slides into her side of the bed. Ruby jumps onto Rick's side and slides over to rest in the crook of Kate's arm. She opens the book to the bookmarked page.

"Where were we?" Ruby asks aloud, then starts reading. "Chapter Six..."


"Ruby...Ruby..." Kate whispers as she softly shakes the sleeping girl awake. Ruby lets out a tired groan and gingerly opens her eyes, sensitive to the morning light.

"What time is it?" Ruby asks, looking around her bedroom in a sleepy haze.

"It's almost 8AM," Kate says. "Listen, I have to go into work for a little bit this morning. You can go back to sleep if you'd like, but I didn't want you to freak out when you woke up and I wasn't here. Martha is on her way now, so she'll be here if you need anything, okay?"

"You have to go to work?" Ruby asks. "But Rick's birthday..."

"I know, but I promise I'll be back before noon. Then we can get started on our four-course dinner, okay?"

"'kay," Ruby says, still groggy from sleep. "I'm going back to bed. Be safe at work. Love you, mom." She was out again before her head even hit the pillow, but she unconsciously knocked the wind out of Kate. That was the first time Ruby, or anyone, had called her 'mom', and she kind of liked it.

Kate closes the bedroom door as she heads back downstairs, when she feels another sneeze coming on. She'd felt her allergies brewing all week, as they often did in early spring, but when she got the wake up call from the deputy commissioner this morning, they'd hit her like a truck. Sinus pressure, sneezing, and a headache to boot, she felt amazing. She reached for another tissue and grabbed a bottle of allergy medication from her medicine cabinet to bring with her to the ME's office. As she blew her nose, Martha entered the apartment with a scowl that read of both concern and disgust.

"Katherine, you look absolutely dreadful," she exclaimed, as she greeted her daughter-in-law.

"Thanks, Martha," Kate laughed. "It's just allergies. I'll be fine once the medication kicks in."

"Oh, good, I know how excited you and Ruby are for tonight. Wouldn't want anything to dampen it," Martha says. "Speaking of, why did your boss call you in at 8AM on a Saturday morning?"

"Another body connected to a current case was discovered, so she said there are some things I needed to see at the Medical Examiner's Office. So I'm sure Lanie is thrilled to be at work this early, too," Kate explains. "I should really go so I can be back here ASAP. Thank you so much for coming so early, Martha."

"Nonsense," Martha says. "It's just some extra time for me to spend with my granddaughter-ish."

"Granddaughter-ish?" Kate laughs.

"Well, Ruby wasn't sure what to call me," Martha says. "I told her Martha was fine, but she said I was kind of her grandma, so I'm grandma-ish."

"Of course," Kate smiles. "Okay, I will see you in a few hours, hopefully less." Kate grabs one more tissue as she heads out the door.

When Kate arrived at OCME about ten minutes later, she was a little surprised to see that only Lanie was there waiting for her. As Kate walked into the lab that she's walked into a thousand times over the years, she did something she'd never done before. She wretched, nearly vomiting on the floor of the lab, as the stench of the room hit her nostrils.

"Kate, if you throw up in here after I got called back to work at 6:30AM on the weekend, I will actually kill you," Lanie says.

"Yeah, this is starting to feel like an April Fools joke, isn't it?" Kate said, pulling her shirt over her nose and mouth to block the stench.

"What is your problem?" Lanie asks, completely unfazed by the smell.

"That smell? That doesn't bother you?"

"It's nothing worse than usual," Lanie shrugs. "Here. Wear this. It'll close off your sense of smell."

Kate takes the mask, loops it around her ears, and pinches the nose piece until she couldn't smell anything.

"Good, now what's all that about?" Lanie asks. "You're never squeamish like that."

"It's not squeamish, the smell just really hit me, I guess. Anyway, now that we're both here, what do we got?" Kate asks, curious what was so important to the deputy commissioner that this couldn't wait until Monday.

"She was found at 3:30 this morning outside of the diner on East 75th and Third," Lanie says as she peels back the cloth that was covering their newest victim's face. She was understated but pretty, blonde, which was different from the first two. "Brooke Hallis, 28. Even though she was discovered at 3:30, preliminary says TOD was more like midnight, maybe even a little earlier, at a different location."

"She was dropped there?" Kate asks, her heart racing a bit faster as the case details begin to match with the other victims.

"Staged, is more like it," Lanie says, showing Kate a crime scene photo.

"If the deputy commissioner thought these cases were connected, why did she only call us in this morning rather than when they found the body?" Kate sighs.

"My guess is that she wasn't awake at 3:30, but when she woke up this morning and checked her messages, this one spoke to her," Lanie mused.

Kate rolls her eyes but refocuses on the woman laid out before them. "Did you check for...?"

"She had similar markings to Claire and Hannah," Lanie confirmed. "And something else. I hadn't thought about this much before, but see this scratch pattern here? At first it looks random, but the other women have it too, just on different parts of their bodies. It's subtle, but it feels like a signature."

"Shit," Kate scoffs. "We might have a serial."

Since the third victim was discovered outside of the 12th precinct's jurisdiction, Kate coordinated with the captain of the 23rd to transfer the case to her team of detectives. As the team waited for forensic evidence to be processed over the weekend, they were to canvass and re-canvass around all three crime scenes, and see if having a third victim in the pool created any ledes, any connections. After the game plan was settled, and it neared midday, Kate Beckett did the un-Kate Beckett thing, and left for home. She'd remain reachable in case anything huge happened, but she requested that the team make Head Detective Kevin Ryan or Lieutenant Javier Esposito their first points of contact. There was a twinge of nauseating guilt that came over her as she walked out of the 12th precinct, or maybe it was her allergies again, but she knew she had to get home to Ruby.

It was 11:38AM when Kate made it back to the loft. As she walked through the front door, she was greeted with Ruby yelling: "See Gram-ish, it's 11:38, so pay up!"

"Hey, Ruby, rude. What's the yelling about?" Kate asks.

"Martha didn't think you'd be home before noon," Ruby explains. "So she owes me 10 bucks."

"Et tu, Martha?" Kate gasps with a dramatic flare.

"Sorry, darling, but I'd seen that film before," Martha says.

"Well, I'm home, and with...22 minutes to spare," Kate laughs. "Was everything okay this morning?"

"Yeah, Martha even made breakfast," Ruby says with a chuckle.

Kate looks over to her mother-in-law with an impressed grin, but Martha puts her hand up. "Cereal, darling. You better be careful, Richard's sass seems to be rubbing off on your daughter over there."

"Oh, trust me, she was already like that," Kate says, scrunching her nose and sticking her tongue out at Ruby.

"Everything go okay at work?" Ruby asks.

"Yeah, you know, we might just have a serial killer on our hands," Kate sighs. "But you let me worry about that."

"Oh, Katherine, I should let you know that Alexis is going to be later than expected. She has to run an extra errand this afternoon, so she'll be here at 4 instead," Martha says.

"Okay, that's not a problem, but we do have quite a to-do list here," Kate says. "So, Rubes, are you ready to get cookin'?"

They organized the ingredients for their four-course menu and spend the better part of the next few hours chopping, cutting, and mixing. During their short lunch break, Martha poured a glass of wine (just for herself, Kate declined) and gossiped with her daughter-in-law and granddaughter-ish. She'd been on a few dates with a lovely jazz musician and the girls were always interested to hear about her romantic exploits. As the gossip mill carried into the kitchen after their lunch break, Kate and Ruby found themselves a bit less productive than before, but they were still well on track for their 5:30PM first course. When 4PM rolled around, Martha's phone rang and she happily announced that Alexis had arrived.

"She said she has a few bags down in the lobby, so I'm going to go down and help her bring them up," Martha announced as she opened the front door.

"Yay! This is going so great, Kate," Ruby cheered, looking at all they'd accomplished. Kate smiles but it was clear that something was wrong . "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm..." was all Kate said before she collapsed on the kitchen floor.

"Kate!?"