The Haunting Past (A Castle Fanfiction)

Part Seven: Developing Answers

By the time everyone regrouped at the precinct, the murder board had been stocked and the lab was stocked with forensic evidence to be looked at and catalogued. The hat and mask Javi had found had been taken to be tested from DNA left overs. The little lamb Murphy found was sitting in a box downstairs along with the other odds and ends of evidence from the case. Beckett had asked the nurse to run a tox screen on the two earlier victims and the woman happily obliged. The last man standing on his initial assignment was Ryan, who was still sifting through footage reel after footage reel with Tori.

The biggest kick of the day, however, was the mildly spooked look on Carpenter's face as he told them all what Jennet had warned. Espo happily informed him, "Bro, those kind of psychos live on instilling fear. I wouldn't hold any kind of weight to her statement. Trust me, the chick's just playing with you."

Carpenter argued, "Yeah, but you didn't see her in there. She knew that phrase. She knew the "Death is Silent" thing. It was obvious."

"Yeah, she knew it because she's in on this. She likes playing people and when she was offered a role in Isa's and Gerick's little plot, she accepted. She's. Playing. You." Javi flat out retold.

"You didn't see her."

"I don't need to see a psychopath to know their play book," Javi stated.

Beckett then interjected a questioned, "Anyone know where Burns is?"

Murphy answered, "No. You were the one delegating. What'd you ask her to do?"

"Nothing," Kate stated, "She wasn't here then either."

"Well when did we last see her?" Espo questioned.

Ryan then popped out, "See who?"

"Burns."

"Oh, she was here when we got the call that Castle beat Gerick and a while after that. Then she said she wasn't feeling well, I think. Or maybe it was something with her daughter. I'm not sure; I wasn't really listening. I just know that she left while you guys were out running errands and she said she'd be back the moment she could be." The group understood and then allowed Ryan to further speak on another matter. "So, there wasn't anyone obviously trying to scout on footage, but I found something else that you might want to see."

Ryan then led the five to the tech room where there was a still image of footage projected on the smart board. Ryan stepped in front of it and said, "Like I said, no scout, but I did find this." He blew up a portion of the image. That's when the faces became recognizable.

Beckett stated, "That's Judge Taylor with Coleman, isn't it?"

"Taylor?" Carpenter questioned, "Burns and I saw him fighting with Judge Hail a couple days ago. He didn't want to sign the warrant to let you talk to Isa."

"He knew about the warrant? And he knew Coleman?" Murphy questioned.

Harris furthered, "We knew Coleman was in on this somehow."

"If Taylor tipped off Coleman that we were coming, Coleman could have told Isa and Jennet. I mean, they were both his clients," Ryan suggested.

Kate then instructed, "Alright, dig up everything you can on Coleman. Find out how he got to be all of these people's attorney. Pull his financials and look for money withdrawals that might have bought him a bag full of coins when our masked man was at the arcade. Also, check to see if he visited the asylum in the last five days. I'm sure he's been to the prison, but he shouldn't have had a reason to see Isa or Jennet or any of his other clients for that matter. And someone snag a warrant to check out Coleman's office and house. If he's hiding something, I want to know."