116. Heard it on the grapevine

Fortunately, before Beckett can be further irritated by Ryan’s totally unreasonable absence despite the fact that he need not be in for another twenty minutes, he appears. She barely waits for him to get a coffee before she starts explaining her list and setting out what she wants done. Espo arrives a few minutes later and receives his own instructions.

Beckett acquires yet another cup of coffee and considers all the actions she can take. Since she can’t – yet, and she is counting down the minutes till she can – call NYU to see whether Petersen has shown up for work today, she looks at the rest, and starts on setting out her thinking for getting a warrant for Petersen’s and Ahlbrechtssen’s phone records. She won’t get it on her current (lack of) evidence, but she’ll want to be some way up the curve when she does have grounds.

Her diligence is helped by the knowledge that even if she could call NYU, Castle won’t be in for another little while – about two hours, most likely, he’s not notably keen on arriving before ten… hmm. Is that possibly because he’s spending time in a gym? The strength he’d rather pleasantly and very surprisingly demonstrated yesterday had to be produced somehow. Anyway, she can’t go see Petersen without him. It’s not worth the whining afterwards… Oh. And, she remembers, Montgomery had issued a direct order that she was to take Castle with her if she was working on a case. Um. Better obey that. She has no desire to have black marks on her file.

She’s so engrossed in her case that the first she notices of Castle is the presence of a large cup of coffee and the delicate aroma of vanilla syrup. Further investigation uncovers a bag containing a bear claw. Further investigation than that, in the form of looking round, reveals Castle, swigging his own coffee and exchanging compliments with the boys. She downs the coffee in three large gulps, interspersed with disposing of the bear claw, and is ready to roll.

“Castle, c’mon. Back to NYU. We’re going after Karlen Petersen again.”

“Will she be there?”

“She’s supposed to be on shift. They couldn’t confirm if she was in, but it’s worth a go. If not, we’ll try her apartment again. After that, we’ll start thinking about how to find her.”

“You think she’s avoiding us?”

“It’s a possibility. If she is, that’s pretty suggestive.”

Castle bounces out behind Beckett, made happy by her evident enthusiasm for the day and the case. He’d worried that she might be fretting about her father, but it looks like she’s turned her formidable intelligence and work ethic on to the new case, which is a far better home for it than fretfulness.   From the boys’ complaints, she had put in a morning’s work before they’d even got it, but it’s entirely probable (because he’s seen her do it) that she’d simply intensified her focus and ripped her case apart to re-order it into logical lines of enquiry in a much shorter time than that.

He fits himself into the car rapidly before Beckett can drive off without him – she appears to be that keen on getting going.

“You’ve had an idea, haven’t you?” he says.

“Names.”

“Names?”

“Both their names are Nordic. It’s worth a look. Anything might be a lead right now.”

Castle pats Beckett’s knee, being the only reachable bit of Beckett that won’t cause an accident, is growled at for doing so when she’s driving, which he counts as a hands-down win, and stays perfectly primly in the passenger seat until they reach the Silver Center again.

This time they go straight to the small office where lab techs apparently live when they are not taking care of labs and the scientists who work in them. A tall, nearly blonde woman of late middle age is cleaning up glassware in a large sink. It’s clear that she used to be fit.

“Karlen Petersen?”

“Who’s askin’?”

“Detective Kate Beckett.”

“And her partner. Rick Castle.”

“What’dya want?”

“We want to talk to you about Ricky Belvez. You knew him.”

“Sure I knew him,” arrives in a Minneapolis tone. “He was joinin’ the group here.”

“Why was he calling you so often?”

“Wanted somewhere to live. Told him about Brooklyn. Fitted his budget – ‘s a lot more expensive here than in Albuquerque, he said.”

“But he’s been here a couple of months. Why was he still calling you so often after he moved in?”

“Liked talking to me.”

Beckett thinks that’s a straight out lie, but she’s not going to start a fight now. Later might be a different matter.

“So did you tell him about the apartment he moved into?”

“Yep.”

“How did you know about it?”

Petersen’s eyes flick away and back again. Beckett observes it with interest, and unnoticeably kicks Castle gently when she thinks he’s about to speak.

“Heard it” –

“On the grapevine?” Castle says flippantly, swiftly followed by ow!

“Ignore him,” Beckett says. “How did you hear about it?”

“I heard from a friend of mine.”

“That’s how I got my apartment, too,” Beckett says. “Who was the friend?”

“Mike.”

“Mike? Michael Merowin?”

“No, not him. Mike Ahlbrechtssen.”

Beckett kicks Castle again as he opens his mouth, to keep him quiet.

“He’s a friend of yours?”

“Yeah.”

“How’d you know him?”

“I used to rent an apartment from him.”

That’s so plausible it’s got to be untrue. “Mmm? When was that?”

“Few years ago. Don’t remember exactly.”

“In Brooklyn?” Petersen does the eye flick again. “Or somewhere else?” Beckett says, with force behind it.

“Minneapolis,” Petersen says reluctantly.

“So you’ve known him a long time?”

“Yeah.”

“What was his problem with Ricky?” Beckett asks, innocently. Petersen falls right into the trap.

“That guy who was staying over with him. ‘S not right.”

“Which guy?”

“Ricky called him Troy.” Castle splutters, and grins widely. “He was there all the freakin’ time. Mike didn’t think it was right. An’ Ricky wasn’t allowed to sublet. No extras. So whatever was goin’ on, this Troy dude shouldn’t’ve been stayin’ there.”

“Did you ever see Troy?” Castle asks, evading Beckett’s toes.

“Naw. Ricky told me ‘bout him. An’ anyway, Mike’s got cameras in the hallway an’ on the door. Stops trouble.” She suddenly looks as if she didn’t mean to say that.

Now that’s something good to know. And Beckett has enough for a warrant for the footage if she needs one, because this Troy is definitely a person of interest. Considerable interest. Still, her instincts are telling her that there’s more to come from Petersen. It might be very interesting to get Ryan to run a search for Petersen – and indeed Ahlbrechtssen – around the Silver Center, particularly the loading bays, and around the apartment in Brooklyn. See who was where, when. Then she can find out why.

“Okay,” she says briskly. “Thank you for your time. If you think of anything else, give me a call on this number. We might want to talk to you again, so if you’re thinking of going away,” –

“Don’t,” Castle says. Beckett kicks him again.

“– tell me first.”

Petersen looks disconcerted by that last statement. Good. A little disconcertment on the part of her witness-suspects is just what Beckett likes. Nervous people tend to fret, and get careless, and then babble.

“I’ve got bruises,” Castle says plaintively when they’re on the way to Brooklyn to have another happy little chat with Mike-the-landlord. “Why’d you keep kicking me?”

“I didn’t kick you. I poked you with my foot to keep you quiet. She was nervous before we even started, and you joking would’ve relaxed her. I didn’t want her relaxed. The more she frets the more she’ll spill later.”

“Still,” he grumps, “you injured me. That wasn’t kind.”

Beckett gives that the answer it deserves. Castle waits in vain for words.

“If you’re not nice to me I won’t give you the benefit of my brilliant insights.”

“I can be very nice to you,” Beckett husks.

“I know you can be, but you aren’t being.”

“I won’t be nice to you if you play pedant.”

“How about if I play wolf?” Castle purrs.

“I might consider it. Should I wear a red coat? Am I likely to be eaten all up?”

Castle chokes, and recovers himself. “I’d prefer the red underwear to Red Riding Hood. We can discuss eating later.”

“How do you know I’m not wearing it?”

Beckett is, for the first time in weeks within Manhattan, having considerable fun winding Castle up and bantering back and forth. He chokes again. It’s very satisfying. As is – she checks quickly – the darkness of his eyes. Sadly, he is not quite reduced to a puddle.

“I don’t. Yet,” he says ominously.

“We’re watching the Espo-O’Leary show tonight,” Beckett says happily.

“You’re changing the subject.”

“Yep. Have you bought the popcorn?”

“Ryan said he would.”

“Yeah. He never does, though.”

“Sweet or salty?”

“Uh?”

“The popcorn.”

Beckett tongues her lips gently, in an unbelievably invitingly seductive gesture promising wickedness. She knows exactly what it will do to Castle. Sure enough, he growls.

“I like… salty,” she says lazily, and knows he’ll take her subtext without effort.

“That can be arranged, later. I like sweet,” he says in the same tone, and lets her take that meaning as easily. She emits a very tiny inadvertent noise.

Most fortunately, they are coming into the right part of Brooklyn and Beckett needs to concentrate on the traffic and the route to her destination. The cruiser remains quiet, though there’s a certain air of anticipation, swiftly doused as soon as Beckett switches the engine off.

“Mr Ahlbrechtssen, Detective Beckett.”

“What d’you want now?”

“What’s Karlen Petersen to you?”

“None of your business.”

“Riccardo Belvez is dead. Everything about him is my business. What’s your relationship with Karlen Petersen?”

“Grew up together.”

“In Minneapolis?”

“Yeah. So?”

“So who got here first?”

“Me. Got lucky with this place.”

“Karlen your girlfriend?” Castle asks. This time Beckett doesn’t kick him. This guy’s already nervous, and tag-teaming will make him more so.

“Was, once. We drifted.”

Castle thinks that he will not ever, never ever, say that about himself and Beckett. Not ever. From the look on Beckett’s face she’s not thinking about anything but her case, though.

“But not far enough that she didn’t get in touch when she got here.”

“Naw.”

“She told you Belvez was looking for a rental.”

“Yeah.”

“But once he got in, you weren’t so happy with his visitors.”

“No. I don’t allow extras, and that guy was there all the time.”

“Yeah, we’d like a look at him too. I want the camera footage, inside and out.”

“I want to see a warrant.”

“Sure. But if I have to go away and get a warrant I’ll make sure all your other tenants know that I’m looking at it. How’s that going to go down? And if I find a single code violation I’ll have the city down on you in a New York minute, Mike. So. Do you want to be the man who makes my life harder?”

Ahlbrechtssen cringes under the force of personality being projected. “Okay,” he emits.

“Thank you.”

Beckett stands up in a way that doesn’t so much imply as order the handing over of the footage. Ahlbrechtssen jerks to his feet and doesn’t quite run to his den to get it and hand it over. Castle watches his scared scuttle with respect for Beckett’s laser-like intimidation.

They leave, wrapped in Beckett’s considerable aura of complete satisfaction. Castle thinks that it’s because despite everything, she’s still the best in the business at what she does. He thinks, again, that Montgomery shouldn’t have kept her off new cases.

“Ryan!”

“Yo, Beckett?”

“We’ve got some footage. I want you to run it for our corpse, Karlen Petersen, Michael Ahlbrechtssen, and anyone from the lab group. Or anyone else interesting.” Ryan pauses. “What are you waiting for?”

“Nothing. ‘S just that Espo an’ O’Leary’ll be tearing up the mats in a couple of hours, an’ I wanna see it.”

“Better work fast, then. And if you get that finished, I want you to go back through the footage from round the Silver Center to see if you can find anyone matching up to the Brooklyn footage.”

Ryan looks disconsolate. Beckett is impervious – at least until she’s messing with the coffee machine.

“You won’t really make him miss it, will you?”

“No, but I’m going to let him think I will.”

“That’s mean.”

“Yep. It’ll keep him honest.” Her evil smirk hasn’t diminished in the slightest. “Coming? We’ve got work to do.”

They do indeed have work to do. CSU have opened up the four cans of shaving cream. Interestingly, there were as-yet unidentified prints on them. Beckett makes a snipped out enquiry and finds that the lab is – as ever, but annoyingly – backed up. Maybe tomorrow, she is told.

“I need those prints,” she growls. Speed is promised. Speedily.

“So what was the rattle?” Castle asks hopefully. “I want to know. I found they rattled, so I should get to find out what it was.”

“Hmm,” says Beckett, reading the e-mail. “Verrrry interesting.”

“What, Beckett?”

“Mmm. I didn’t expect that.”

“Beckett,” Castle whines.

“I see. Yes. That’s really useful. Hmmm.”

“Beckett! Stop it and tell me what CSU found.”

“Hmmm,” she says again, mischievously.

Castle leans in, drops his voice, and suffuses it with sheer sex. “Beckett, if you don’t stop teasing me I won’t stop teasing you later on until you’re so worked up you can’t even whimper.” Her eyes flare and just for an instant her body softens towards his before she turns her screen and lets him read.

He whistles sharply. “Really? That is so not what I thought. I thought it would be pills.”

“So did I. Chemist, rattles, gotta be pills, really.”

“But… why on earth has he got lens cases hidden anywhere?” Castle asks. There is a short silence.

“I’ve got it!” Beckett suddenly says. “Your John said they were into optical stuff. Optics equals lenses. Get John over here, Castle. We need to talk to him about this. He needs to look at this.”

Castle is dialling before she’s even finished the sentence.

“John, it’s Rick. Can you get down to the Twelfth Precinct? Beckett’s got something she needs you to look at.”

“Yeah, sure I owe you. Shall I name a character after you?”

“Oh, okay then. But it’s an honour,” he says disappointedly.

“See you. Bye.”

He turns to Beckett. “He’ll be here as fast as he can.”

“Yeah,” she says: fast acknowledgement, but Castle can see that she’s already past that, calculations shifting over her face and through her eyes, seeing the evidence and rearranging it. “Right. This isn’t about drugs, or homophobia, or anything like that. This is starting to look like industrial espionage. The only reason he’s wandering around with lens cases is because someone’s wanting what’s in them. How much is a better, cheaper fibre optic cable worth? Or something else? Espo!”

“Yo?”

“Espo, what’d you pay for a better rifle sight?”

“Much as I needed to. Anythin’ that gave me the edge.”

“Thought so. John said Verizon. Espo. Get on the phone to New Mexico and find out who was funding them. Soon as we’ve got that, we can see if there might be competitors who’d pay more.”

“Bet it’ll be the CIA,” Castle bounces. “We’ve uncovered an international spy ring.”

“I doubt it,” Beckett says witheringly.

Espo, recognising an outright order when he hears one, gets moving. Shortly he’s dialling. While he waits for the call to be answered, he contemplates the relative positions of Beckett and Castle, and adds them to his earlier thinking. The sum total is as clear as a target in his rifle sights. Whatever had been going on – and Espo is quite sure it still is going on, because it’s not at all normal for Montgomery to haul Beckett in and rip her a new one – Castle is protecting Beckett. It’s all in the positioning. And, of course, the not very well concealed expressions flitting across his face. Right now, that’s considerable admiration, which of course Castle should display, since Beckett’s the best cop Espo’s ever met, but under that there is some relief, and under that there’s something more.

“Hey,” says the phone, in a tone which suggests he missed the first answer.

“Yeah, thanks. Detective Esposito from…” and he gets on with the task.

Less than half an hour later, John arrives. By that time, Espo has established that the New Mexico group was funded by Raytheon. Castle, of course, is jubilant.

“See, Beckett? I told you there would be an international spy ring.”

“You said it would be the CIA. There are no CIA agents showing up here. There is a huge defence company who fund thousands of projects in all sorts of sectors.”

“I bet we find the CIA,” Castle grumbles.

“If we do, you can call your pal there and get some useful information.”

“Sophia?” Beckett blinks. She hadn’t appreciated that he’d been shadowing a woman. Castle notices. “I don’t think she’d tell me anything. We didn’t part on the best of terms.” He cringes slightly, and drops his embarrassed voice. “In fact, she threatened to shoot me in the guts if she ever saw me or heard from me again.”

“What did you do?” Beckett enquires, fascinated. “I mean, you’re a bit irritating, and smug, and you’re full of wild ideas that go nowhere, but shooting you in the gut is unreasonable.” She grins evilly.   “Shooting you in the leg I could understand. That might keep you out of trouble.”

“Um… I might have asked a few too many questions after she’d told me to shut up.”

Beckett raises an eyebrow. That doesn’t sound like it warrants shooting in the gut. On the other hand, she is perfectly reassured that this Sophia person won’t be laying skeletal fingers on the closet door.

“Er… and she might have been trying to listen to the wire feed at the time.”

Well, that makes more sense. The eyebrow descends.

At that opportune moment Professor Terrison arrives. “Hello,” he says mildly. “Rick said you needed me urgently?”

“Yes. We found these at Belvez’s apartment.” She hands over one of the lens cases.

Terrison frowns at them. “That’s odd,” he says. “Why would Ricky have these at his apartment? These get kept at the lab.”

“They were hidden,” Beckett says bluntly.

“Oh,” he says, clearly surprised. “We use these for transporting gels.” His yellow-tipped fingers delicately open one cap, carefully keeping the case level. “Hmm. I’d need to take them back to the lab to have a look at them properly, but I think these might be examples of his syntheses.”

Beckett looks questioningly at Terrison.

“Um…” he’s clearly trying to think of the least insulting way to explain. “Um… the results of those papers you found with the formulae on, well, he might have made the chemical the formula represents.”

“Okay. What do you need to do?”

A minute later she wishes she hadn’t asked that. A whole bunch of technical terms bounce around her ears and make no sense.

“Right,” she says after a moment or two more of unintelligible science-speak. “Basically you need your equipment to examine these things.”

“Yes,” says Terrison, stopped in his tracks.

“Fine. You can’t take them now. Chain of custody. We’ll need someone with you.”

Terrison shrugs, clearly completely oblivious to the implications of that statement. Beckett pushes him another few places further down the suspect rankings.

“Okay, Detective. Bring them round tomorrow, early, and we’ll put them through the works.”

“Eight do?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, then. Thank you.”

Terrison smiles and takes his leave. He is passed on the way by the mountainous form of O’Leary, sporting a sabre-toothed grin.