452. Chapter 452

After Sucker Punch

Episode 2.13

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: If I own Castle, there must be some mistake. Rating: K Time: See above.

Kate Beckett had been sitting in her car for twenty minutes, looking up at the building on Broome Street. I can do this. She thought. I can face down killers. I can do this. She checked her watch again. She put her hand on the door of her car. She waited for a few seconds, then opened it. Once out of the car, she walked quickly to Castle's building.

Castle heard the knock on his door and went to open it. "Beckett. What can I do for you?"

Kate wanted to say her piece and leave, but seeing Castle's smiling face stopped her. She tried to speak, but nothing came out.

"Let me take your coat." He offered.

Rather that say what she had come to say, she just nodded and allowed Castle to remove her coat for her and hang it up. It put off what she had to say for a few more seconds. Coward. She thought to herself.

"Would you like some wine?" Before she could answer, he headed for the wine rack by his refrigerator and spent a minute or so choosing a wine, getting two glasses before returning to her. "Do you want to sit on the sofa?" He handed her the wine.

She nodded and followed him to the sofa. She took a sip of wine and looked at him. I have to talk to him now. I can't stop now. She took a deep breath. "You were probably right about not following me anymore." Seeing the look on his face, she quickly added. "I'm not the detective you should be shadowing for Nikki Heat. I screwed up so badly, I should probably go back to being a beat cop."

"You have got to be kidding me." He said, very seriously. "You're the best detective in New York, probably the best homicide detective anyplace. There's no one else I could base Nikki on. No one." He looked at her with concern in his eyes. "What happened, Kate? Was it shooting Coonan?"

She shook her head. "It was everything. You found evidence about my mother's murder that I never found. What would Nikki Heat have done if Jameson Rook brought her new evidence on a murder? She would have been all over it. What did I do? I got angry at you because you intruded on a murder that I had come to regard as my own personal property. What kind of a cop does that? I'll tell you. A bad cop does that."

He shook his head vigorously. "You are not a bad cop. Kate, I've seen cops who…"

She put up her hand to stop him. "Castle, please let me explain. I did nothing. And worse, I insulted you and I got mad at you. I said things about you that I should never have said. Dick Coonan has been killing for ten years and I did nothing to stop him. He sold heroin for years. I did nothing to stop all the deaths from heroin overdoses or from people like Trucho and the rest of the Latin Kings. People have died all over Afghanistan because of the warlords who sold Coonan his heroin and who used his money to become more powerful." She couldn't look at Castle anymore. "I'm sorry, Castle. I'm so sorry for how I treated you."

Castle put his hand under her chin and lifted her face up so that she was looking at him. "So everything is Kate Beckett's fault? Bullshit. You looked through your mother's file for three years and found nothing. Do you know why you found nothing? Because there was nothing in those files. I know. I looked, too. So I went to Clark Murray who is one of those guys I know. And he helped me. And because he's the best, he found something. So, could you have gone to Dr. Murray and asked him for help? You could not because you never heard of him, and you couldn't afford him anyway. No one, I repeat, no one could have connected Dick Coonan with your mom's murder until Jack Coonan was murdered. And with no one looking Dick Coonan, no one could have connected him to heroin trafficking and the warlords in Afghanistan have been dealing in opium for centuries. You're a great detective and you did nothing wrong."

Kate managed to smile at him, ever so slightly. "I did treat you badly."

"That was partly my fault. I should have left you out of the loop. Gone straight to Montgomery or investigated on my own. I do know guys, you know."

"No!" She said sharply." You will never, ever investigate anything without me. Never. Do you understand that?"

He nodded. "That's more like it." Then he smiled at her.

She smiled back.

"What's next?"

She took a second to organize her thoughts. "I want to go over every piece of paper in Dick Coonan's records to see if I can find anything. If he was working for someone that Coonan thought I couldn't touch, there may be evidence of him somewhere."

"Okay, we can start tomorrow."

Beckett feigned a look of shock. "Rick Castle do boring police work? Do my ears deceive me?"

"Boring police reports filled with split infinitives, dangling participles and sentences that end in prepositions I cannot handle. Along with poor spelling and using words improperly. However, what I am all about is taking a mass of information and finding connections that other, lesser men, would not see."

"Oh?" She lifted an eyebrow. "You find me…lesser?"

"Lesser men. You couldn't possibly pass the physical for that. And, you are tall."

She nodded. "There's something else."

"What?"

"When we were at my desk, I said I'd gotten used to you hanging onto my pigtails and that if you repeated that, there'd be another shooting. I shouldn't have said that. It makes me sound like I'm embarrassed to let anyone know I like having you around. And I do like having you around. You're my partner and my friend."

Castle shrugged. "I think that everyone knows that already." He finished his wine. "Tomorrow, Beckett?"

"Tomorrow, Castle."

Leaving his loft, she saw a familiar figure standing by her car. She drew her Glock. "What do you want?"

Finn Rourke raised his hands. "Good evening to you, Detective. I just came to talk to you."

"You couldn't do that at the 12th Precinct?"

That caused Rourke to laugh. "No, Detective. I don't talk in police precincts."

"So, again, what do you want?"

"Dick Coonan killed one of my people. I can't have people doing that. I have to retaliate."

"You want to retaliate?" Kate had no idea where this was going. "Against who?"

"I can't retaliate against Dick Coonan, but I have to do something." Rourke stopped for a second. "You killed the man who murdered your mum."

Kate nodded.

"You did my work for me."

"I did not. I did what I was supposed to do. I did not do it for you."

"I know. But the result is the same. I owe you."

"You owe me nothing."

"I asked around about your mum's murder." Rourke laughed. "I can be a bit more persuasive than you can and I have a better idea who to ask about these things. However, it's been many a year and no one knew anything. But, people know I have an interest. Who knows what may happen?"

"This changes nothing between us, Rourke. I'm still a cop."

"Beckett. That's an Irish name, is it not?"

"I'm a New Yorker and a cop." She shot back.

"Good night to you, Detective." And Finn Rourke walked off into the darkness.