205. Chapter 205

After To Love and Die in LA, Again

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: I'd love to own Castle, but not enough to die for. Rating: K Time: See above

She stood at attention. "Officer Katherine Beckett, sir."

He looked up at her. They said she was the hot rookie and damned if she isn't. "First thing, Beckett, is you don't call me sir. You're not in the Academy now. You are a cop now. Sort of. And since you're a cop, I'm Royce and you're Beckett."

"Secondly, don't stand at attention. Ever. Look around you. Pay attention. Keep your head on a swivel, you just might see something that way." Royce looked at the papers in his hand. "Did you get all you needed at the morning briefing?"

"Yes, sir…Royce." She said, cursing to herself for her mistake.

He nodded and smiled. "Okay, get in the patrol car. It's November Two Nine, right over there."

Kate walked to the car and got in the passenger's side.

Royce drove. "I'm going to take you around the 12th Precinct's patch, let you get a look around. You were born and raised in Manhattan?"

"Yes."

"Now, put your window down."

"Down?" It was boiling hot outside and Kate had been looking forward to some air conditioning.

"Down." Royce confirmed. "Too many cops drive around with the windows down and the air conditioning on high. You can't hear anything that way. And you can't see anything if you keep looking straight ahead, Beckett. Keep your head on a swivel, understand?"

"Yes. Swivel." Kate looked around.

They drove for four hours with Royce showing her all the hot spots in the 12th area. Finally they stopped for lunch. Royce called it in. "Dispatch, this is November Two Niner, 10-7 at Dominics on 34th."

Once inside, Kate and Royce ate in silence. Finally, Royce spoke. "What are you doing here, Beckett?"

Kate looked up, not sure how to respond. "I was assigned here."

Royce frowned. "You were pre-law at Stanford. Freaking Stanford University. You ought to be trying to get into Harvard Law right about now. Why the hell are you in the NYPD?"

"My mother was murdered." Kate said, trying not to choke up.

"You're going to try to find her killer? You think that's a viable option?"

Kate nodded. "I'll find him here a lot easier than I will at Harvard Law."

Royce laughed.

…...

Kate followed Royce into the abandoned building. It stank. He caught the sickly sweet odor of rotting flesh. They were apparently the last officers there. Eight other uniforms were standing around a good way from the body.

"Okay, Beckett. Take a look at the body and tell me what you think." Royce pointed her towards the body lying on the floor.

She walked over and knelt by the body. The stench was unbelievable. She breathed through her mouth as much as she could. The woman had been dead for a while in a New York heat wave. Maggots were crawling out of her and she was putrefying. Kate began. "Caucasian female, age, maybe late thirties." She checked the arms. Needle marks, lots of them. "IV drug abuser." She took a guess. "From the state of decay, she's probably been dead about two days." She lifted the woman's sweater. "From what looks like a stab wound to the abdomen."

"Anything else?" Royce called from a good twenty feet away.

"Not that I can tell just by looking."

"Okay. You did good."

"Royce, you sure you didn't set us up, you bastard?" One of the cops said, handing Royce some cash.

"Royce always was lucky rather than good." Said another, also handing Royce money.

All of the cops there handed Royce money and all had something to say about Royce.

"Sore losers." He said with a grin.

"Royce, what the hell is this?" She asked.

"A test, Beckett." Said the shift sergeant. "When we get a nice, long dead body, we like to have a rookie look at it. To see how they'll react. Usually, we bet on how much they'll vomit. But Royce bet that you wouldn't have any problems with our little test."

"How'd you manage that, Beckett? Work in a morgue or something." Someone asked.

Kate shook her head. "I had to identify my mother's body after she was murdered." She said coldly.

Once they were back in the car, Kate turned to Royce. "Royce, what the hell were you doing in there? Did you think that was some kind of joke?"

"No, kid, I didn't. We have to know how our people will react to the worst that can happen."

"The money?"

He shrugged. "Anyway, I'm taking you to Remy's for burgers and a beer for dinner."

"Remy's. I've heard of it."

"Yeah. It's a cop place. But we don't let rookies eat there."

"But I'm a rookie."

"Not according to your training officer."

….

They were standing in a dark alley, waiting for Royce to come back, or for something to happen. She felt the hand on her ass. "Michaels, get your hand off of my ass."

He laughed. "You telling me you don't like it, sweetie?"

"Yeah. That's' exactly what I'm telling you." She said sharply.

"Too bad, honey." He squeezed her ass, hard.

Kate turned around and kneed him in the groin as hard as she could. "I told you not to."

Michaels had gone down on one knee, his face a mask of pain. "You bitch. I'll report you for this. They'll have your damned badge for this."

"You're going to tell the Captain that you grabbed her ass and then you got knocked down by a woman half your size, Michaels?" Royce asked, walking out of the darkness. "That'll make a good story. Every cop in the city will have a good laugh."

Michaels glared at Royce.

"So, did anything happen?" Royce asked very politely.

"No." Michaels grunted, got up and walked away.

"And if you try that again, when she's done with you, I'll go to work on you." Royce called to him.

Michaels gave them the finger.

"Thanks, Mike."

"Always, kid."

….

Kate sat on a bench in the locker room, hugging herself and crying. Royce sat down beside her and put his arms around her. "It's okay, kid."

She shook her head. "No it isn't, Royce. I saw the second plane hit the tower. That made it real to me. All those hundreds of people died and I couldn't do a damned thing. Then the first tower came down, I saw this wall of grey….I don't know what, coming to me. It hit me and I couldn't see and I couldn't breathe and I got on the ground and then I got up. I moved toward the building and there were people, some were running, some were just standing there. There was a woman…her whole chest was crushed. And as I got closer, I saw a fire engine, it had been rolled over and over and it was all bent and twisted and covered with debris. I tried to dig them out," Kate held up her bloody fingers, "but I couldn't find anyone. I couldn't find anyone, Mike."

"Cry it out, kid. And then we'll go out and do our jobs again tomorrow. Okay."

Kate nodded and kept crying.

….

"Captain Montgomery caught you in the records room last night looking over your mom's case file?" Royce asked.

"Yes." Kate replied.

"Well, what the hell happened?"

Kate shrugged. "He asked me what I was doing and I told him. He told me I shouldn't be there, then he asked me about her case and we talked about it a bit. He made some suggestions, but I don't think they'll come to anything. They were pretty generic."

"That's it? You don't have to see him this morning to get reamed out. Along with your long suffering training officer?"

"No."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Go back again tonight."

"Jesus, kid."

…

"Come on, Mr. Beckett. Almost to your house now." Royce said.

"Katie?" Jim Beckett slurred.

"Right there, Dad." Kate said, trying to keep from crying.

Royce opened the door and carried Jim Beckett into his bedroom and put him on the bed.

"Thanks, Royce." Kate said. She didn't know what else to say, she was so embarrassed.

"You've had to do this before?" He asked.

Kate nodded.

"Next time, call me."

"I can't do that."

"Hey! That's what partners do."

…..

Kate sat down next to Royce at roll call. "Take a look." She handed Royce a piece of paper.

"Detective Third Grade Katherine Houghton Beckett. Well, I'll be damned. Congratulations, kid. That must be some sort of record."

She shrugged. "I don't know. But I made it. Now I have to get into homicide."

"You'll make it, kid."

"I couldn't have done it without you, Mike."

"Sure you could have."

….

She shook her head to clear it of her memories of Mike Royce. She looked at his last letter and slowly folded it up and put it away. Then she looked over at Castle, asleep in the seat beside her. You're right, Mike. Now, if I can just figure out how to make it happen.