CBs

Chapter 1

Eyes closed, Kate reached out a hand to feel for Castle and found empty space. Yawning, she put on for her robe and went to find her husband. Castle was hunched over his laptop in concentration. "Babe, why are you still up? I thought you sent in the chapters you had due."

"I did," Castle confirmed. "I'm going over what we have on those kids that disappeared, trying to figure out what would have happened to them as if I were writing the story."

"Any luck?" Kate asked.

"In figuring out what happened to them, no," Castle admitted. "But I have found some similar attributes in their personalities, I'm just not sure where they'll lead."

"The team will be meeting tomorrow morning - correction this morning," Kate told him, catching sight of the time on the screen. "You can bring what you have and we can brainstorm. C'mon." Kate extended her hand. "The bed is lonely without you."

The corners of Castle's eyes crinkled as he rose to entwine his fingers with hers. "Can't have a lonely bed." They both slipped beneath the covers and Castle wrapped his arms around Kate as she spooned against his body, but his eyes stayed open as his thoughts still swirled.

Castle plunked three boxes of cronuts on the table in the conference room before returning to the break room to make a triple espresso. He'd functioned on less sleep - way less sleep - before, but he didn't want to disappoint Kate in front of the CBs, as the team had begun calling itself. The letters stood for captain's best, or was that beasts? In any case, he needed to deliver.

Stuck on a call with Deputy Chief Gates, Kate was the last one to arrive at the conference room table. "Let's do a quick round the room to see what everyone has," she suggested. "Let's start with Sergeant Seacrest."

Sylvie Seacrest unconsciously shook her thick ponytail off her shoulder. "I've surveyed the SVU cases. Unfortunately we've had some missing teens turn up seriously assaulted, but none of the ones Detective Morano presented in this case. If there has been sexual violence involved in this case, there's no evidence of it so far."

"Something to be grateful for," Kate commented as her husband breathed a sigh of relief beside her. "Garrett did you have a chance to analyze the computers and cell phones of the missing teens?"

"I did," retired cyber crimes officer Bill Garrett responded. "As Detective Morano reported at our first meeting, there wasn't anything in the emails or texts. But I did find one commonality. All the missing teens accessed a website called The Giving Heart. I couldn't see how that figured into their disappearances, but it can't be a coincidence."

"No it can't," Kate agreed. "Lopez?"

"This doesn't appear to involve gangs," Angela Lopez reported. "But I did find one connection, not a gang member, but the brother of one, Manuel Ramirez. Apparently the Fuerte didn't think Manuel was ready to be jumped in. He disappeared not long after they told him he'd have to wait. The Fuerte thought one of the other gangs might have snatched him, but none of them have claimed responsibility."

"Sergeant Lubens?" Kate prompted.

"If there's a robbery component, it's not a big one," Carl Lubens offered. "Several of the families reported keepsakes missing, nothing of real value. It was as if the kids who disappeared wanted to take something with them."

"Are you suggesting that the teens left willingly?" Kate queried

"It argues against abduction," Morano put in. "If they were snatched, they wouldn't have had the opportunity to grab anything like that."

Kate's brow wrinkled in thought. "Detective Chekov, any operations you know of that might have served as a lure.

The vice cop shook his salt and peppered head. "There are no signs that these kids were involved in gambling, and Morano has already eliminated prostitution."

"Ryan, Esposito, you have anything?" Kate inquired.

Ryan shrugged. "None of these kids has a connection to a homicide that we could find. Javi?"

"Even Manuel Ramirez hasn't been in serious trouble." Esposito added. "So far it all makes zero sense."

Kate could feel her husband moving restlessly in the chair beside her. "Castle?'

Rick cleared his throat. "I've been looking at all these kids, trying to come up with something that would tie them all together." He looked at Garrett. "Bill, I think the website you found is an important piece of the puzzle."

"How so?" Kate asked.

"These were good kids, in most cases very good kids. They were tutors, they helped out at their churches, they volunteered for various charities. I suspect even if we looked at Manuel further, you might find he had a helper type personality. That may be why The Fuerte weren't ready to accept him. They might have seen altruism as weakness. But that's just a guess. Here's what's not a guess. None of these kids were part of the in-crowd. They weren't popular. What they did, they did on their own. A website like The Giving Heart might have offered an attraction of some sort, a chance to belong to something bigger, with other kids who felt the way they did. Whoever runs it may have set it up as a lure."

Esposito grimaced. "A lure for what?"

"I don't know," Castle conceded, "but I'm willing to bet it had nothing to do with good works."

"Bill," Kate instructed, "I need you to track down everything you can on The Giving Heart. Morano, I need you to contact the kids' families and friends to see if they've heard any of the victims talking about it. Angela, talk to Manuel's brother and any of the other members of The Fuerte who might have heard Manuel discuss the site. And everyone, check through your past cases and see if The Giving Heart pops up anywhere. If you find anything, let the other members of the team know. Let's get going!"

The team members nodded their acknowledgment, before leaving the room. Kate grabbed Castle's arm and held him back as he started to follow. "You did a good job, Babe. You really helped tie everything together."

Castle ran a hand through his hair, unsuccessfully attempting to get it off his forehead. "That was at least as much Bill Garrett as it was me. But I'm glad we've got some kind a story now. I just hope it leads somewhere."

"It will Babe," Kate promised. "We've already made a lot of progress. But you should probably go home and catch a nap, if you can overcome that last espresso."

"So now you want to consign me to a lonely bed?" Castle pouted. "Not fair Kate."

"Castle, you know I've got a lot of things to do here besides run - what are you calling yourselves - the CBs. You haven't been to your PI office for a while. Alexis is back and I bet she's drummed up some business. Why don't you go catch up?" Kate reached behind him to grab the firm roundness beneath his jacket. "And then later we can open a bottle of wine and catch a nap together."

Castle gasped and then smiled. "Those kinds of naps I like."

Kate quickly scanned for curious eyes, to make sure her unprofessional behavior would not be observed, and pressed her lips to his. "Consider it a date."