Chapter One
Prologue

November 21st 2012

Jerry Tyson lay in the carefully concealed attic bedroom of his "girlfriend's" (her term not his, he didn't, nor would he ever feel anything for such a simpering submissive weakling) 200 year old farmhouse in Upstate, New York, west of Albany, contemplating his future and his next move.

Caroline had been in place to retrieve him, exactly where he had told her to be to do his bidding. She had pulled his broken body from the river and tended his wounds as she drove him to Albany and the hospital where she worked. She even saw to it that the police notification of his gunshot wounds was mishandled as a hunting accident. Then nursed him back to health, such as it is.

He hadn't allowed for the possibility of being crippled for life from the hundred foot drop from the bridge deck and the impact with the East River. Not to mention the two bullets that had not been stopped by his police issue body armor. One of which had lodged in his spine, cutting off the use of his legs.

Caroline had always been a means to an end. She had been very carefully selected from the mass of other weak willed prison groupies that, for whatever reason found themselves attracted to men like him. He had broken her to his will shortly after his escape from custody in the basement of this very house. She would never defy or disobey him as she no longer knew how.

Caroline's grandparents were wealthy, and as their only heir she stood to inherit everything. He saw to it they had a terrible accident on the New York State Thruway, then added a little "something extra" into their morphine drip in the hospital. The secluded farmhouse was an invaluable asset. From here he had been able to plot his torment of Detective Kevin Ryan and his revenge campaign against Richard Castle.

The fool had managed to foil his plan to slip away free and clear when he caught on to his game, in spite of the fact that even that bitch in the stripper heels had fallen for his patsy, hook line and sinker. That he, Jerry Tyson was in fact the triple killer.

His anonymity had been his shield and Richard Castle had stolen it from him.

For that, he had needed to pay.

He had a substantial inheritance from his mother's estate which he took great pains never to spend on himself. The bitch had left him everything, still wanted him under her thumb, even from the grave. He didn't want her money, he didn't want anything of hers. He would, however gladly use it to spit on everything she had ever paid lip service to believing in, which she beaten into him at every possible opportunity. He had more than enough money to fund his revenge against Richard Castle.

His plot had not gone as planned, however.

For reasons he simply could not fathom, the files he had added to Castle's laptop and the evidence he had planted in his home had not broken the bond of trust between writer and muse like he had planned it to. Beckett wasn't supposed to believe him, she was supposed to believe the evidence, all of which had been carefully crafted to point directly at Richard Castle. She wasn't supposed to find out that he had been framed until after his death in the tombs.

It was the linchpin of the whole plan, and it should have worked. He could not understand how his manipulations had not had the desired result. In anyone else they would have. In her grief stricken state it should have been child's play to manipulate her into "killing" him on that bridge.

He had wanted his anonymity back, his apparent "death" would give it to him.

Castle had queered everything by escaping from custody. His plan had unraveled from there. Even his exit strategy had been a flawed success. He was believed dead to be sure, but it no longer mattered because he was trapped in a broken body unable to fully enjoy his newly won freedom. He had simply traded one prison for another.

He was a paraplegic, trapped in a wheelchair for the rest of his life, only his sharp calculating mind still intact. A mind now dedicated to a single purpose.

Vengeance.

He would live long enough to know he had broken them, made them suffer. Not by killing them, that would be far too easy. Nor would he make the mistake of trying to break the bond between them. He would instead use that very bond against them. He would break them both by destroying what they cherish most. He would die knowing he had won.

They would live knowing their lives would forever be in ruins.

May 14th 2016

Morning for Richard Castle and Kate Beckett began much like any other since their marriage two years ago. A phone call from dispatch to Kate's cell phone informing her that a body had dropped in an alley at 5th and Lexington. She looked over at her husband and partner, still sleeping peacefully next to him. He always seemed so very peaceful when he slept, and she so hated to wake him.

They had taken yesterday off to mark the 3rd anniversary of his proposal on what they had dubbed "their" swings. She had said yes, and turned down the job offer in DC, though she hadn't expected them to make the full court press to get her to change her mind, even offering to include Castle, but she had made her decision.

She loved Castle dearly, but to this day, still harbored a small amount of resentment over turning down that job. Especially as she now seemed to be stagnating on the promotion grid here in New York. The move up or move out mentality had been in full swing at One PP, turning down that job had caused her a number of headaches, but she loved Rick far too much to let that get in the way of an otherwise happy, flourishing marriage.

They had put off setting a date that whole first year of their engagement, much to Lanie's consternation, and in spite of Ryan and Esposito's constant ribbing. (not to mention an office pool) Dr. Burke had suggested a very well respected couple's therapist and they spent that entire year working on their communication issues, their separate and combined insecurities about each other, and their equally debilitating and deep seated abandonment issues.

They worked through her issues with letting people in and his fear of marriage. They shed tears over her dead mother, his absent father, her father's bout with alcoholism and Meredith's infidelity (which had led to the dissolution of his first marriage) and the poor reasoning behind his second marriage with Gina and why it had been doomed from the start.

Every issue in their shared and separate pasts that might possibly creep up to interfere in their marriage when they finally walked down the aisle was brought up, dissected and discussed, including her resentment about giving up the job in DC.

Resentment that she knew now was entirely moot, given that it had been a ruse manufactured by Senator Bracken to get her out of New York to his own turf where he could kill her more readily. A plot that had only been revealed after Bracken had finally been taken down. All because the Attorney General had been caught accepting bribes and spilled his guts to a grand jury.

It had seemed anticlimactic that her mother had finally gotten justice second hand because of a corruption scandal, but not having her mother's case hanging over her head had finally set her free from the last vestiges of her walls.

She and Castle had gotten married six weeks later.

When they finally arrived an air of melancholy had settled over the scene, especially when LT caught sight of Castle. Before he could comment they had breezed past him and under the crime scene tape leading up to the scene, oblivious to what thy would find there.

Before they could approach the body, Lanie caught sight of them and rose to head them off.

"Kate...I don't think you two should go in there...especially not Rick." she said softly, she never used his first name, which set off the first alarm bells in Rick's brain.

"What is it, Lanie?" he said gruffly, his voice rising in fear, his mind going back to a white van four years ago, a large blood pool inside and Alexis was gone, "What don't you want me to see?"

The shorter woman tried to hold him back, but he brushed past her violently and Kate was out of position to get in his way as he quick stepped over to the covered body. He crouched down and lifted the tarp laid across it to preserve evidence to reveal the face of Martha Rodgers, her sightless eyes staring up into nothing and he recoiled back in shock and pain.

"Mom...no...mom...oh dear God...no...please no..." he muttered helplessly like a little boy as he staggered back into a dumpster and glancing off before backing into the alley wall where his knees finally buckled under his weight.

"No-no-no-no-no-no"

Kate was on him in an instant, cradling him in her arms like a small child. He was staring at his mother's dead face, almost serene in death.

"no no no no no no...oh god...mother...no.." he muttered silently over and over again as she knelt beside him, rocking him back and forth.

After a moment he shook free of her embrace and rose shakily to his feet, to once again kneel beside the lifeless body of his mother.

In a scene that would be burned into her brain for the rest of her life, Kate watched helplessly as Rick softly smoothed his mother's hair, gently slid her sightless eyes closed, and kissed her on the forehead and replaced the tarp over her face before he finally broke down sobbing as Kate gently pulled him to his feet and led him away from the crime scene and back down the alley.

Every officer they passed on the way back to her car took of their cap and bowed their head in a show of condolence and respect as she led a sobbing Richard Castle from the scene of his mother's death.

He would never again work an active homicide case.

There was no new evidence, other than an anomalous DNA sample at the scene that wasn't in the system, even fewer leads and a few weeks later the case went cold.

When Jerry Tyson read the sizable obituary in the paper for Martha Elizabeth Rodgers in the New York Times he chuckled out loud. From his sources he knew that Richard Castle had been taken out of play.

Phase one was complete.