1023. Chapter 1023

After Sucker Punch

Episode 2.13

By

UCSBdad

Disclaimer: Have I ever mentioned to you that I don't own Castle? Rating: K Time: See above.

Authors note: I never have accepted Kate Beckett's rationale for not following up on Castle's lead on her mother's murder. So, I keep coming back to Sucker Punch.

Castle was so wrapped up in the chapter her was writing that he almost missed the repeated knocks on his door. He saved the chapter and ran to the door.

"Beckett? What brings you here this time of night?"

"We need to talk." She pushed past him and into the loft.

Before she could say a word, he held out his hand. "Take your coat?"

She was a bit flustered for a second, but unzipped her coat and handed it over so Castle could hang it in the closet.

"Castle…"

"I was about to pour myself a glass of Scotch. Would you like one? Or how about a nice red wine? I have one you'll love." He headed for his bar.

"Red wine, please." She called after him, then followed him.

He poured the liquors into two glasses and handed her hers.

"What do you think?" He asked with a smile.

"It's excellent." She took a deep breath. "Castle, you should stop following me."

His face fell and he downed his Scotch in one gulp.

"You're right. You had to kill the only lead to your mother's murder because of me. You're right, of course. I'd like to come in and say goodbye…."

"Castle, I knew I'd have to kill Coonan as soon as he grabbed the gun. I just needed the opportunity, which you gave me. I'm asking you to stop following me because I screwed up. Badly. You should find another muse. I'm by no means remarkable."

Castle frowned. "I hope saving my life doesn't count as screwing up? I was rather happy with that outcome."

Kate took a drink of her wine to settle her nerves.

"We've been getting information on Coonan. I read the initial report from the forensic accountant today."

"Any clue as to your mother's killing?"

She shook his head. "No, but in the last eight months Coonan got three payments of one hundred thousand dollars from a shady bank in the Bahamas."

Castle shrugged. "So? Coonan was a crook. I bet he got all of his money from shady banks."

"That was the amount Coonan charged for a hit. That means he killed three people after you gave me new information about my mother's killing. And I never even asked to see that information. Three people died, Castle and I did nothing to try to stop that. I'm not remarkable, Castle. I let my personal feelings keep me from looking into those people who were killed with my mom. And Coonan just kept killing."

"Beckett, you don't know those were payments for hits. They could have been…."

"That's bullshit and you know it, Castle. Please don't patronize me. And there's more. DEA has a pretty good idea of how much heroin Coonan was providing the Latin Kings. It was a lot. Heroin kills people, Castle. Even those it doesn't kill can be scarred for life. And we got some information on who Coonan was dealing with in Afghanistan. Some were terrorists that took a cut of anything that moved through their territory. Others were just warlords and drug gangs who were only interested in power and money. They killed people too."

She stared Castle in the eye. "I don't feel very remarkable now. How do I look to you?"

"Tall. And remarkable." She rolled her eyes, but Castle kept talking. "And the Latin Kings and every other gang in New York, excepting Finn Rourke's, can get heroin from anyplace. The Afghans would still be killing people if Coonan had never existed. You can't blame yourself for those deaths."

She slowly shook her head "Castle, I don't know if I should even be a detective after how badly I screwed up. And I certainly don't feel anything like Nikki Heat. She's a remarkable character. You should just write about her and not involve me."

She finished her wine.

"Thanks for the drink, Castle. I hope you'll seriously consider what I asked you to do."

He took her hand as she turned to leave.

"Just a second, Beckett. You've had your say and I listened to you. At least have the courtesy to hear my side."

He kept her hand and led her into his office, turning on his electronic murder board. Instead of the outline of the Nikki Heat book he was writing there was something else.

"Okay, Beckett, you didn't follow up on the information I got, but Dr. Murray and I did." He tapped the board." The first thing we looked into was the knife. As Murray said, it was favored by special ops personnel in Gulf One. And, since Semmes and Company have made over two hundred thousand of that particular knife since the late seventies, it' favored by a hell of a lot of other people. Knives aren't accounted for like guns. We got nowhere."

"Castle, I should have been doing this."

He shrugged. "Okay, but since I have connections and funds you lack, I'm sure I did a better job than you could have on your own." Seeing Kate had no argument with that, he went on. "With Dr. Murray's help, we expanded our search for more deaths like your mom's . Murray is a well known forensic pathologist. You'd be surprised what he can get. We found two more killings where there was a killing blow to the kidney followed by some random stabbings."

"Why didn't you tell me you'd found these?"

"You didn't want to hear about it and they led nowhere. One was in Philadelphia. A woman stabbed her cheating boyfriend in front of a dozen witnesses. The other was some crazy in Hartford, Connecticut who stabbed a bunch of people. They were nothing but coincidences. After that, we had no idea how far to cast our net, so to speak. There's no reason that a professional killer couldn't take a job in LA, or Hong Kong, or Cairo. And if he's a pro, there's no reason to believe he'd always use a knife, or that kind of knife. We'd have ended up looking at every unsolved killing on the planet. We had nothing."

He saw that Kate was nodding, so he went on. "Lastly, was your mom and the three other people killed about the same time. They were probably connected, but we can't prove it. "He took a deep breath. "Beckett, to check on them, I had to use some of my connections. People you would definitely not approve of and I had to promise them that no cop would ever know of what they did. You'll just have to take my word that we found nothing that would help us."

"What should we do now?"

Castle managed to suppress a smile when Beckett said "we". "I'll print out what I have here and bring it in tomorrow. I can go over the accountant's reports and you can go over my research. Maybe we'll find something the other missed. Okay?"

"Are you volunteering to do paperwork? Who are you and what have you done with Richard Castle?"

"I am not doing boring police paperwork. I'm doing boring research, which is different. Still boring, but different."

"Are you sure you want to keep following the not so remarkable Detective Kate Beckett?"

"Beckett, please remember, you're still tall."

She laughed. "Tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow."

Once Beckett had left, Castle poured himself another Scotch. Tomorrow promised to be a better day. A much better day.

Author's note: I'm about 8 thousand words into part three of After Much Ado About Murder, and because of the holidays, it's going slower than usual. And then I had this story idea. And another one. And then another story idea. But, worry not about Sir Richard and Lady Katherine. As the Absentia people say, you'll see them soon.