Finding home

Chapter 30 - Worries

Me and Alexis called to the phone number Billy had given me. I had put on the speaker so that Alexis and I could talk together. Before we'd gotten the phone Castle had come with the idea of us ordering chinese food so we had told him what to order for us while we were talking to Molly and Billy. I had seen Castle becoming a bit grumpy when I told him I was going to call Billy, as if he got jealous and I couldn't help but want to laugh at his reaction. Me and Alexis now sat in her room with my phone between us. To my surprise the phone almost immediately beeped with the tones telling us the phone we were calling was disconnected.

"That's weird" I wrinkled my forehead and Alexis looked at me with big eyes.

"What? Why doesn't he answer?" she asked and I tried calling the number again, making sure I had the right number.

The same thing happened again and I got a horrible feeling in my stomach. I immediately hit the number to the precinct, praying Esposito or Ryan was still there.

"Detective Ryan" I let go of a "thank god" when he answered. "Beckett?" Ryan asked, probably because he heard my voice.

"Yes, Ryan, can you do me a favor?" I asked and I could hear the worry in my voice.

"Of course! What do you need me to do?" he offered without hesitation.

"I need you to see if you can find Billy's phone number and see if you can trace it, either he gave me the wrong number without meaning to or he did it on purpose" I talked fast but slow enough for him to follow what I was asking him to do.

I heard the keyboard on his desk being tapped on and I didn't have to wait long for him to answer me.

"His cellphone has disconnected since two hours after you met. In fact, I can't find anything on this guy, except that he took out a big amount of cash right before he disappeared" Ryan said with a shocked and confused tone, which was exactly how I felt.

"What?!" I exclaimed, "call Laura Winslow! Ask her if she can contact him, if she might have some other information that we don't have" I told him and he hummed before we hung up.

"What's going on?" Alexis asked me and I could see she was on her verge to tears.

I bit my lip, not wanting to tell her what I know just yet. It might not be as bad as I was thinking. Maybe there was just something wrong with the information we had. But I had a bad feeling there was something more to it than I hoped.

"Nothing, nothing's wrong Alexis, the phone must've died while they were at the zoo" I lied and smiled as convincing as I could.

"You sure?" she asked with a quivering lip.

"I'm sure, don't worry Alexis" I said taking her into my arms, hugging her tight to my chest to be able to hide my face from her.

I knew she would be able to see the worry in my own face if she looked me in my eyes. I used the few minutes I held her to gather myself, to be able to continue to hide my worry. Once I felt like I had schooled my features and emotions enough I loosened my grip around my foster-daughter.

"Let's go see if your dad has ordered our food, I'm starving" I said in a teasing tone and she pushed away from me with a smile appearing on her lips.

I wiped away the small teardrops that had escaped her eyes. We walked down to Castle where he sat in the couch waiting for us. I could see he was a little grumpy but the minute he looked into my eyes I could tell he knew something wasn't right. When he opened his mouth to ask I quickly but discretely shook my head no to stop him. He quickly shut his mouth again but I could see in his eyes he would return to this later on, when we were alone.