Moving Alexis to college proves to be more difficult than Castle would have first thought because she seems determined to take all her stuff with her. Martha already knows about Beckett and Castle and urges him to tell Alexis before she goes off to college. He tells her. Beckett isn’t happy with Castle because she is still under the impression that when they’re discovered, they won’t be able to work together any longer. Beckett sides with Alexis on the side of taking the stuff BTW.
The gunshot killed the victim slowly allowing her time to write the word ‘LIE’ which could be the killers initials or just grammatically incorrect as she could have meant ‘lay’. The investigators find a text message from the vic’s former boss calling her a liar and a thief. When they get him in interrogation, they find out that she had stolen four thousand from her boss and went to New York. Despite the motive, he just got in the city an hour before they called.
Castle answers Beckett’s phone which Laney says isn’t allowed. But after some quibbling she tells him that they have a partial print but no matches. Castle tries to pin down the significance of a stick figure memento he found in Beckett’s drawer while looking for a pen.
Ryan approaches with information that a cabby was going to take the vic back to an action site. Castle figures out that it isn’t ‘LIE’ its ‘317’, a unit which is being auctioned even as they speak. And this being TV, they manage to get to the bidding just as the auction is starting. After being informed that the auction is cash only, Castle produces two grand from his pocket. “I’m a bestselling author, why wouldn’t I carry two grand with me?” I’ll tell you this: when I’m a bestselling author, I still won’t carry that much money with me. When it looks like they’re about to run out of money, Castle gets an addition 16 hundred from a fan with the agreement Castle will name a character in his next book after the man’s mother (Beckett’s idea). Castle wins the auction by raising himself and everyone else gives up.
Castle is determined that “all this crap” is going to crack the case wide open. The address for the unit is fake so Castle figures they can figure out who the man was by his stuff. Captain Gates is pissed that he brought all the stuff into the precinct until she sees a doll in Castle’s hands that she’s been looking for since she was a girl. “Carry on.” I have a feeling this could curry favor should the relationship between Castle and Beckett be exposed. They determine that the unit belonged to the vic’s twin brother.
Tracking down the brother, they find out that Wendell was hit by a subway shortly after telling his sister soon everything, all their troubles, would be over. Solve one murder to solve the other. Sounds a bit like a book I’m reading, Frozen Heat. Wendell used to work for a New York socialite using the Wonder Twin alias they had found the unit under. Castle and Angelica debate how her name would be pronounced should the ‘g’ be silent. She has no trouble believing that Wendell was working under an assumed name but not so easy of a time believing that he had a record. “He was cleared of all charges”. The new theory is that he stole a bracelet from Angelica and that’s what was in the unit.
Castle is all excited about his ‘last night with Alexis’ dinner but then she throws a fit and says she feels like she’s being replaced by Beckett which is odd because she’s never done that with any of his other “super hot girlfriends.” Back with the squad, they determine Wendell had to have had a partner. And since only one guy stayed on past fifteen hundred at the auction site, they go talk to him. Felix tells them that a man had approached asking him to be his proxy which he declined. Felix talks to the sketch artist and Castle has found absolutely nothing.
Gates walks up to Castle looking really upset but instead tells him she thought Frozen Heat was “really good” and that she’s ordered the rest of the Nikki Heat set. Which loyal Castle fans as well, considering our boy is the featured writer of the month on Barnes and Nobel’s website. More case logic: they found the partner on video tape stealing a safe from Castle’s unit.
“Take your hands off your tool, Marco,” Beckett declares much to the sniggers of her supposedly adult compatriots when they find him trying to break into the safe with a blow torch.
Beckett and Espo are interrogating Marco who stole the safe. He spills to them that he was only hired to take down the alarms. He didn’t know that the bracelet was what was taken until afterwards when he saw it on the news and then he looked for the unit with Wendell’s name. Castle comes to the conclusion that Angelica hired Wendell to break into her own safe to commit insurance fraud so that she could pay someone off. This is enough to get probable cause and our dynamic duo nearly kiss but then remember their surroundings. Unfortunately.
With a warrant, they’re able to go back to Angelica’s and find out that she’s had the bracelet the whole time in her wall safe. Beckett notes that the bracelet has caused her a lot of trouble. Angelica claims a chicken-and-egg theory that she saw the apartment broken into and then formulated her plan to commit insurance fraud. Castle is left pontificating what would have been of value to the not-Wonder Twins before he goes to spend his last night with Alexis before she goes to college. Castle takes Beckett’s hand when they again want to kiss but again stop because of who might be watching and says “This is me gently touching your face bringing you in for a kiss.” And Kate replies while she strokes his hand, “This is me, kissing you back.” They both agree “Best handshake ever.” And the audience feels the same.
Castle drops Alexis off at college and she explains that she’s not upset about Beckett as much as the idea that even though she’s five miles away, he won’t be there when she wakes up. Castle tells her that if that’s where she needs him to be, he’ll be there. Alexis asks him to check one last time to see if there’s any monsters under her bed which despite his earlier quip that there are lots of monsters in New York, he assures her that there are none. Outside the college he finds the hint that whatever was stolen would be in the Gemini toy because the vics were twins.
Gates isn’t happy when he smashes one of her toys. She’s even less happy when he smashes the second one but inside it is a USB flash drive and a glass eye. Gates glares at Castle as the team goes over the crime scene photos from ten years ago. One of the photos contains a broken glass eye. Wendell was looking for a one eyed man.
Castle and Beckett walk into Angelica’s house to accuse the butler. Didn’t Castle say once that claiming the butler did it was the biggest cop out in the book? Ah well, I watch this show for the chemistry of the actors more than the plot anyways.
Beckett arrested the man and Gates declares “worthless bastard” claiming to mean the murderer but then goes back to hating Castle. Why doesn’t he just buy her new ones off of eBay? It would help if not fix the relationship. Castle says that he’s going to give Javie the climbing equipment and conceded that Kate’s stick man in her drawer is none of his business. And that’s why she tells him the story of the day of her mother’s funeral and how hard her father tried to make it better for her. It’s her reminder that even on the worst days, there’s a possibility for joy. Kate puts the toy back in her drawer after a handshake from Castle and Rick goes home to an empty apartment filled with Alexis’ things marked “Leave @ home.” Martha announces that she has decided to live with him so that he will “never, ever be alone.” Any excuse to keep the divine Susan Sullivan works for me.
Next week: a murder in the Hamptons.
