774. Chapter 774

After A Death in the Family

Episode 1.10

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: Don't rat on me and tell everyone I don't own Castle. Rating: K Time: See above

Author's note: I never did like Kate's rationale for not looking into her mother's murder, so I'll do a bit of AU.

"It's about your mother."

Kate took a step backwards, shock plain on her face. Then she turned away from Castle and ran from the hospital.

"Kate. We need to talk. I have new evidence." He called after her, then started after her. She looked back and began to run. By the time he got to the parking lot, she was gone.

Castle took a cab to Beckett's apartment and knocked on the door.

There was silence, then, "Who is it?"

"It's me."

"Go to hell."

"Beckett, we need to talk."

The door flew open. Castle could see that not only was Kate Beckett furious, but she'd been crying. "No, Castle, we don't need to talk. You need to listen. For once in your god damned life you need to listen. Is your book so important that you just had to do the one thing, the one thing that would hurt me the most? The one thing I told you not to do?"

"It's not about the book."

"Castle don't lie to me, you'll just make me angrier."

Castle looked past her. "I can see my books in your bookcase. And I know you've read them. Do you really think I'd need to look at your mother's file to write a book about a murder?"

"I don't know what, if anything, goes on inside your head, and as far as your books go, they're headed for the trash where they belong."

"I have new evidence about your mother's murder. And you don't want to see it?"

"No, Castle, I don't. Do you know why? Because I get sick to my stomach just thinking about some killer making a deal, or finding some loophole, and getting away with a slap on the wrist for her murder."

"B.S. I don't believe that for a minute."

Beckett slapped Castle as hard as she could. "How dare you! How dare you say something like that to me?"

"You're sick about some guy getting off with, what, five or ten years in prison, but you're okay with the fact that he's running around right now, having a great time, eating at the best places, having nonstop sex and laughing at you because you don't want to solve your mom's murder."

Beckett's face turned white. "Get out right now." She said in a low, dangerous voice.

"Fine, I will. And when you throw my books out you can throw Dr. Murray's report on your mother's murder and the others out with them." Castle threw the reports on the floor behind her.

Beckett slammed the door in his face. She picked up the files he'd tossed in her apartment and headed for her bookcase. Then she stopped and looked down at the file in her hand. She had been cop too long to ignore evidence. She sighed and headed for her kitchen table.

The next morning she went straight to the morgue to see Lanie.

"What happened, Kate? You look awful."

"Do you know a Dr. Clark Murray?"

"Know him? No, but I know of him."

"Is he any good?"

Lanie laughed. "He's about the best there is, honey. Why are you interested in a forensic pathologist?"

Kate explained what Castle had done and how she had gotten the report from Dr. Murray. "Can you look over it? Please?"

Lanie took the file and read it over. "It looks good, but without seeing the other ME's reports, I couldn't give you a definite thumbs up. But I will tell you this. Dr. Murray is good, really good. If he says this is what happened, I'd bet he's right."

Castle came in later and put a cup of coffee down on her desk. Noticing his chair was gone, he sat in an empty chair near her and left her alone. After a minute or so, she sipped at her coffee, but didn't look at him. Finally she spoke. "How did you get ahold of my mother's file?"

Castle already had a lie prepared for this. "The guy in the records room has to pee sometimes. I just waited until he headed to the little boy's room then I popped in, grabbed the file and left. It took a while to find it, but when I left I just smiled and waved to him. He probably assumed I had a good reason to be there. Don't get mad at him, okay?"

Kate sat there without replying for a long while. "Why did you look at her file?"

"You have a very good poker face, Detective Beckett. But it's not perfect. Every once in a while it slips and I see your pain. The pain of your mom's death, and your father's alcoholism. And I see the pain you experience every day from having to deal with the murder victims and the people they leave behind. I had to do something to try to take some of that pain away."

"Even knowing that what you did would mean we were through?"

"Yes. I had to tell you no matter what. Somehow making you happy has become important to me, Beckett."

Kate sat there for a long time while Castle sat and wondered what would happen next. Finally, she spoke. "I'd like to meet with this Dr. Murray and go over all of his findings. I'd like Lanie to be there." Kate waited a bit before adding, in a low voice, "And you."

"I'll call him."

Castle had to beg, but he managed to get an appointment to see Dr. Murray the next day. The four of them met at Dr. Murray's office in Midtown Manhattan.

"Detective Beckett, I'm sorry for the loss of your mother and I know this is difficult for you. I'll try to be brief."

Kate shook her head. "No. I want every scrap of information you have."

"Very well then. Let me start with your mother's case."

Two hours later they left Dr. Murray's office.

"What next?" Castle asked.

"We look at the files on the other three murders." They tracked down the old cold case files and when Castle and Beckett returned to the bullpen, he was happy to see his chair back in its usual place. By the time they got through with the other files, he wasn't so happy.

"These are terrible reports. There's hardly anything in any of them."

"But that's all we have to go on."

"We could talk to this Detective Raglan, or the other investigators."

Beckett shook her head. "I talked to Raglan when I first joined the force. He was sympathetic, but no help. There was no DNA, no fingerprints, no nothing. It was January, Castle. There was no snow, but there was wind. Anything there might have blown away. As for the other detectives, the time to ask questions was ten years ago."

"We know they are connected. Two lawyers besides your mom and a documents clerk at the courthouse."

"They're connected, but we don't know how. If this was a professional hit, the hitman could have killed four different people for four different reasons."

They spent two weeks trying to find some connection or other evidence and found nothing. They ended up sitting in the bullpen at the end of one day.

"There's nothing here, Castle. We've hit nothing but dead ends."

"I'm sorry, Beckett. This is all my fault. I hurt you for no reason, it seems. "

"At least I didn't go back down the rabbit hole again. I think having you with me this time kept that from happening."

"But I hurt you badly and we got nothing out of this. If you want me to leave, I'll understand, but I need to tell you how sorry I am that I hurt you. I really think I should stop shadowing you before…"

"Castle, are you trying to get out of bringing me coffee every morning? You know I depend on you for that."

Castle suppressed a smile. "You do inhale a lot of coffee, Detective Beckett. And I'm just a poor, struggling writer."

"Just for that, you're taking me to dinner at Remy's."

"Are you going to have coffee at Remy's?"

"I'm going to have coffee and a strawberry milkshake. Maybe two coffees and two strawberry milkshakes."

"Two of each?"

They were still talking as the elevator closed.