Castle s07e23 Episode Script

Boom! Hello, I'm serious and brooding Richard Castle.
And I am friendly, accessible, ruggedly handsome Richard Castle.
Wow, Dad.
Could your head get any bigger? Can you blame me? I'm accepting the Poe's Pen Career Achievement Award.
It is the biggest honor a mystery writer can get! I am joining the pantheon of greats to whose heights I have always aspired.
So, which big head? Uh, I like the ruggedly handsome, smiling giant you.
I like the serious, brooding giant you.
Oh.
All right, Mother, you are the tie-breaker.
Which of these should be hanging behind me at the ceremony next week? Oh.
Darling, you know I refuse to play favorites.
I love both of my son's big heads equally.
All right, I am off to meet a friend of mine whose father just passed away.
Oh, Martha, I am so sorry.
Oh, no, no, don't be.
He had a rich, full life.
And, more importantly, he has a rent-controlled loft in Chelsea.
Which, if I play my cards right, could be mine.
Bye.
Well, there's the death-as-opportunity spirit we all love.
Oh, looks like we have an opportunity of our own.
Oh! Let's head out.
We'll go head-to-head later.
See where I'm heading? You know, with this award, you going for captain, we could be New York's newest power couple.
Oh, Castle, don't jinx it.
I haven't even gotten my exam results back yet.
It's you.
You aced it.
No, man, it was a guy with the ax in his heart.
He bled out in the Barcalounger.
We called him Lord of the Flies, remember? No, no, no, you're wrong, bro.
It was the pet shop owner whose wife fed him to the dogs.
What are you guys fighting about? Uh, the first case that Captain Montgomery partnered us on, Really, it's your manniversary? And I didn't get you anything.
There's still time.
You the folks from the 12th? I'm Trooper Collins.
Thanks for coming out of your jurisdiction.
Our victim's a Jane Doe.
It appears she was attacked in the woods and chased onto the road, where she was hit by that truck.
Because of the assault, we're classifying the death as a homicide.
Any idea where she was coming from? It's state game land.
Not a house for miles.
Any ID on the body? No.
And we ran her prints, but they're not on file.
We've got our teams out there searching the woods, but we found these tucked into her bra.
$50 bill, keycard, and a cash receipt.
From a coffee shop in the city.
Dated yesterday.
This card looks like a hotel key.
But it's not from anywhere around here.
We think maybe she was staying in the city.
We were hoping you could help us track down who she is and what she was doing here.
Yeah, of course.
Trooper Collins? These carvings on her face The crosses? Freaky, right? We think she was maybe running from whoever did that.
They look ritualistic.
Yeah, and it gets freakier.
Just as that trucker hit the girl, he says he saw something emerge from the woods.
Some thing? A dark figure wearing a mask.
What kind of mask? He was pretty shaken, so we didn't press.
We'll get a full statement from him once he's been treated.
Where is he? At the hospital in Woodbury.
Excuse me.
Trooper Collins, go.
We need to talk to that driver.
I tried to stop, I did.
But she just came out of nowhere.
Mr.
Walters, the trooper said you saw something in the woods.
Yeah.
It almost didn't seem real, like it was some kind of ghost.
Freaky as all hell.
Can you describe it? It wore a dark, ragged coat with a mask like a doll's face.
Like porcelain? Yeah.
It was white, with black where the eyes should have been.
Were there markings on it? Yeah.
Like what? Like streaked teardrops coming from the eyes.
Uh, and the face, it was, uh Bisected with two black lines, like a cross.
Yeah.
How'd you know that? Castle, what's going on? It was real.
What was real? Beckett, I've seen that mask before.
The sketch is from the truck driver.
You ready to talk about it? I was 11 years old.
Uh, my mother was touring with Pippin.
I was in New Hampshire, staying with the family of a classmate for President's Day weekend.
Their home abutted a few hundred acres of state forest called Hollander's Woods.
We were told never to go into the woods alone.
Somebody told you not to, so you had to do it anyway.
I walked for hours.
I was cold, completely lost.
And that's when I saw him.
A figure, clad in black, kneeling.
And after a few moments, he left.
And that's when I saw her on the ground.
Her? A body.
The first body I ever saw.
Her throat had been slit and those same symbols were carved into her forehead and her cheeks.
I touched her arm.
I remember thinking how cold it was.
Tell anyone what you've seen here today, and I'll find you and kill you.
Do you understand? Go! Why do you think he let you live? I don't know.
I waited till I got back to the city to call the police, from a payphone.
I was too scared to let them know who I was.
And who was the girl? That's just the thing.
They searched the woods with cadaver dogs.
They never found a body.
So you never figured out who she was? I checked local papers.
No one in the area had been reported missing.
When I got older, I checked with missing persons, even the FBI database for anyone matching her description or any crimes involving those symbols or that mask.
But there was nothing.
It was like it never happened.
And after a while I started to wonder if it had.
That day in the woods, Kate, that's why I do what I do.
I'm driven to figure out the story because I could never figure out that one.
Why didn't you ever tell me this before? I think I didn't want it to be real.
But it is real.
He's real.
He killed before, and he just tried to kill again.
I checked with the police department near Hollander's Woods.
Their logs do show that they received a call in February of '83 reporting a body.
But, after coming up empty, they assumed it was a prank.
Okay, what about the FBI database? There's been no other occurrences in the past 30 years of any assaults or murders with this MO.
Beckett, this thing that Castle says happened, it was decades ago.
Is he really sure about this? As sure as I've ever seen him.
Hmm.
So, our Jane Doe.
Anything on that coffee shop receipt? Yeah, a barista there remembered seeing our victim.
She wasn't a regular, but she'd been in several times in the past few days.
Was anyone with her? No.
She came in alone.
She'd get her drink, take a seat and spend hours staring out the window.
Okay, why don't we set up a canvass of the neighborhood? Maybe someone there knows who she is.
After all these years, do you really think it could be the same killer? We won't know until we find him.
Yo.
That keycard that we found on the victim? It was tracked to an extended-stay motel, out in Queens.
She paid cash for the room, didn't present an ID.
Registered as Jane Smith.
Not her real name, I'm guessing.
So we still don't know who she is.
Did she have a car when she checked in? No.
Cab dropped her off.
Which means someone took her to those woods.
How long has she been staying here? About two weeks.
Espo, check the drawers.
See if we can find anything to ID our victim.
Beckett.
Photos, all of the same woman.
And look at this.
License plate numbers.
Hundreds of them.
Along with the registered address of each vehicle.
Why would she have that? Look at the plate numbers.
Each one has the letters "X" and "Z" in it.
Our victim's looking for someone specific.
Yeah.
But who? I think I know someone we can ask.
I knew something bad would happen to Emma.
I was trying to find her, to stop her.
Mr.
Malloy, what was your daughter doing in the city? Two months ago, a friend of hers disappeared.
Emma was trying to find her.
Wait.
Was this her friend? Yeah, Zoey Addison.
And what exactly do you mean by she "disappeared"? Zoey had a boyfriend that was beating on her.
So she took his car and was on her way to stay with Emma, but she never showed.
A couple days later, the cops found the car by the side of the road with a busted radiator, but no sign of Zoey.
Did they talk to the boyfriend? Oh, yeah, but he was two states away with an alibi.
He reported the car stolen, so the cops just figured that Zoey was on the run and ditched it for another ride.
But Emma knew that Zoey wouldn't do that.
Not without calling.
So Emma took a leave from her cashier's job to try to find her, retracing her route.
Em found a waitress at a truck stop who saw Zoey get in the back of a white sedan.
With New York plates containing the letters "X" and "Z"? Yeah.
The waitress told Emma it had an oval sticker in its back window that said "NYC.
" That's what she was doing in the city.
She was trying to track the car Zoey got into.
Mr.
Malloy, do these woods mean anything to you? Is there any reason that Emma would be in them? Were they on Zoey's route, maybe? Somewhere near where she disappeared? No, Zoey was coming from Pittsburgh.
The opposite direction.
And all this time, no one's heard anything from her? Zoey didn't have family.
Hell, if it wasn't for Emma, no one would've even known that she'd disappeared.
That's why I could never find the girl I saw in the woods.
He targets people who won't be missed.
Hitchhikers, stranded motorists.
He asks them a couple of questions.
If they fit the profile, he kills them.
And if not, he's just some good Samaritan giving them a ride.
That's why he didn't kill me.
It would've attracted attention.
Thirty years.
How many times do you think he did this? Ten? Twenty? A hundred? I should've found a way to stop him.
Castle, you were 11 years old.
And what happened to you back then was terrible.
And I know that you're thinking of this case as a way to exorcise those demons, but we don't know what we have here.
We don't even know if this is the same person.
Of course it's the same person! See, Emma must've been able to do what I never could.
She tracked him down.
That's why he went after her.
I have to find this guy, Kate.
I need to end this.
Guys, is there any way to check police records from 30 years ago? See if there were any abandoned cars ticketed within a 50-mile radius of Hollander's Woods? Sure.
We just have to call all the municipal police departments in the area And wait for them to stop laughing long enough to beg them to check their dusty storage rooms.
You're serious? We need to know exactly what we're dealing with, here.
So, happy manniversary.
Detective Beckett.
A word.
Close the door.
Oh, yeah.
I just got a call from One PP.
They want me to take you off shift tonight for a performance review.
Um, sir, my review's not scheduled for another three months.
Do you think that this has something to do with the captain's exam? No, they don't ask for a meet to discuss exam results.
They notify you by mail.
So, what's going on? I don't know.
And none of my sources are talking.
But they want you there at 7:30.
Well, maybe it's good news.
Maybe you're getting an award, too.
Career achievement in homicide.
Yeah.
Okay, it's probably not that.
But still, it could be good news.
Well, then why is my cop sense telling me it's bad? Hey, guys.
Got something.
I was running those license plates on Emma's list, seeing if any of the owners have criminal backgrounds, when I noticed this car, registered to an address right down the street from the coffee shop where Emma went the day she was killed.
She was surveilling that car.
She must've thought it was the one that Zoey got into at the truck stop.
And when the owner of the car realized she was onto him, he went after her.
Whose car is it? That's the weird thing.
It belongs to this woman.
"Connie Lewis.
" But she's 72 and has no criminal record.
What's her address? There it is.
White sedan, "X" and "Z" in the plate, NYC sticker in the window.
Exactly as Emma's witness described.
Yeah, but how's a 72-year-old woman connected to all of this? You okay? After all these years, I may finally get some answers.
Mrs.
Lewis? NYPD.
It's open.
TV's on.
Mrs.
Lewis? Can you hear me? Mrs.
Lewis? Mrs.
Lewis? Mrs.
Lewis? Mrs.
Lewis? There were no outward signs of trauma or carvings in her skin, but until I get her back to the morgue, we can't rule out homicide.
How long has she been dead? Based on decay, I'd say about three years.
How did no one notice? Our killer did, and he used her car.
And maybe her place.
Beckett.
Look what I found in the kitchen.
The same matchbook that we found in Emma's hotel room.
If Emma was tailing the killer, she could have followed him there.
I tracked down Lewis's next of kin.
Only family listed is a son.
Found this number for him in her things.
Where's that from? North Carolina.
Okay, I'll handle the notification.
See what he knows.
Not much if he hasn't seen her in three years.
What kind of a son doesn't check on his own mother? Not all families get along.
My father didn't talk to his brother for 20 years It's empty.
Check for the phone.
It's been moved.
You inside, drop your weapon! There's a hole in the floor! You guys, he's below us.
Let's go! Hey! Noah Lewis, 52.
Did a stint in the Army back in the '90s.
Has no recent record of employment.
He told the neighbors that his mother was bedridden and that he was taking care of her.
So they just assumed that he was the good son.
Yeah, but the relationship was far from rosy.
Four years ago, his mother had him committed to a state mental institution after he threatened her with a knife.
So, I got in touch with the state-appointed shrink who's treating him.
He says that Noah has borderline personality disorder and exhibited violent tendencies.
So it's him.
Any record of where he was 30 years ago? We're a little bit more focused on where he is now.
We have teams still combing the neighborhood.
Put out a BOLO, but so far, nothing.
Your theory about the killer's MO may have just paid off.
You found something? Yeah, from February of '83.
The day after you saw that body, police ticketed an abandoned pickup truck they saw by the roadside, near Hollander's Woods.
The truck belonged to a farmer, who'd loaned it to a young woman, a migrant worker, to go out and make a supply run.
When the cops told the farmer that they'd found his truck, he assumed that she'd just run off.
So he never reported her missing.
No.
He didn't want to get her in trouble with immigration.
Did he remember who she was? Yeah, and he had a photo.
What was her name? Rosalita Campo.
We'll dig deeper into Noah, see if we can connect him to that area 30 years ago.
We'll find him, Castle.
I promise.
I'm supposed to head off to my review.
Do you want me to postpone? Uh, no, I should go with you.
I'll be all right.
I'll call you when I'm done, okay? Okay.
All right, bye.
Bye.
Hey.
Hey.
Are you busy? I can No, I was just, um, reading something I wrote a long time ago.
Dad, how old were you when you knew? Knew what? That you wanted to be a writer.
Since I was a kid, I guess.
Why? I'm finishing my junior year, and I have no idea what I want to do.
By the time you were my age, you'd already published your first book and now you're winning this amazing award because you followed your passion.
How can I be amazing if I can't find mine? Trust me, you will.
Or Or it'll find you.
And one day you will look back and you will realize that every experience you've ever had, every seeming mistake or blind alley, was actually a straight line to who you were meant to be.
And whatever you become, there is no question in my mind, you are going to be amazing.
And you know how I know? How? 'Cause you already are.
They're ready for you, Detective.
Take a seat.
So, Detective Beckett.
Says here you took the captain's exam.
Yes, sir.
What makes you think you're qualified to be Captain? My experience in the 12th Precinct has made me comfortable in a leadership position, and at this point What I mean is, what makes you think you're even qualified to be an NYPD detective? Sir? Your job is to enforce the law.
Yet you have repeatedly ignored it.
In Los Angeles, you investigated a case outside of your legal jurisdiction.
But You used your badge to pursue a personal vendetta against Senator Bracken, crossing the line and endangering the lives of others numerous times.
Sir, that man was a murderer You have withheld case information from superiors and flown in the face of authority whenever it suits you.
Not to mention your working relationship with Richard Castle.
Tell me, Detective, how often have you let your personal feelings for your husband dictate your actions in pursuit of a suspect? Sir, that is unfair.
I never let And when he went missing, you used your position and a great deal of the taxpayers' money to search for him, enlisting the aid of fellow detectives.
And, well, you are infamous for being the inspiration for the fictional NYPD detective Nikki Heat, who spends more time on her back than she does pursuing killers.
Detective Beckett, how do you expect to lead, or even continue in your current job, when it's clear you've exercised such poor judgment? Sir, if you would look at my record We are looking at your record.
You are not qualified for a captaincy, and, in my opinion, you are not qualified to be a detective.
Thank you.
You can go.
You're wrong, sir.
Excuse me? I said, you're wrong.
In every case you have referenced, I have not only successfully brought the killer to justice, but I did so with the utmost respect for the law and for the department I represent.
And regarding my relationship with Mr.
Castle, he has proven to be a brilliant partner and he's always had my back.
And as for his fictional representation of me, I'm proud to have been his inspiration, and I am proud to be his wife.
You asked, how do I expect to lead? By continuing to fight for what's right, not for what's easy.
My job is to protect the citizens of New York and I will do it by doing my job better than anyone else and getting results.
I don't cross the line, I put myself on it.
And if you have any other questions, then you can ask the families of the victims that I have served.
Detective Beckett.
Sit down.
That was an impassioned and powerful response.
In fact, it was exactly what we were hoping for.
This wasn't a performance review.
Then, why would you attack me like that? We wanted to see if you could defend yourself.
Kate, this was an audition.
For what? Your future.
We've been looking for someone like you.
Someone who isn't corruptible.
A certifiable hero, who the people can get behind.
Kate, you're bigger than what you're doing now, you know it.
It's why you went to DC, why you took the captain's exam.
You want a bigger stage, and we want to give it to you.
We think you have an amazing future.
Doing what? We'd like you to run for New York State Senate.
State senator? And they say it's just the start.
Apparently, the party has had their eye on me for a while now.
They think that people are looking for someone like me.
And what do you think? I don't know, Castle.
I'm a cop, not a politician.
Did I ever tell you that I was in Model UN when I was a kid? My mom was one of the chaperones.
And after watching me, she said, "You know, Katie, you can grow up and be anything you want.
" I just wanted to be her.
Just wanted to make a difference.
And you have.
The question now is, can you make a bigger difference? Castle, if you saw the way that they attacked me in that room And in a campaign it would only be worse.
You, Alexis, my dad, Martha, you guys would all be fair game.
We're a tough bunch.
So you think I could do it? I know you can.
They said that I aced my captain's exam.
I could probably have my own precinct within the year.
When do you have to decide? Soon.
Well, whatever you decide, I will back your play.
Thank you.
Beckett.
That matchbook lead paid off.
The unit that we put on that bar spotted Noah Lewis heading inside.
ESU just took him down.
They found him.
Where's my mother? Being autopsied.
I warned her, but she wouldn't stop running her mouth at me.
Now she doesn't say a word.
It's what she deserved.
And what about the others? Did they deserve what they got? We know what you've done, Noah.
Who you really are.
Tell us about Emma Malloy.
I'm not good with names.
You know her.
Where were you the night before last? Out.
Out where? Neighbors said your car was gone.
I took a drive.
Did you drive to the woods? And what about this girl? Zoey Addison? She was seen getting into your car, Noah.
Now, she's gone.
Mmm.
She's pretty.
Is she dead? I can't help you.
Where do you take them? The others? How do you make them disappear? We have your car, Noah.
Your house.
We will find evidence.
Did Emma find evidence? Is that why you went after her? Because she got too close? Is that why you shot at us? You were in my house! Don't you see? I'm the victim here.
I'm the victim.
What's wrong? It's just He's been getting away with it for 30 years.
I thought he'd be more formidable.
We have a problem.
I just spoke with CSU.
So far, they haven't found anything in the house or the car that links Noah to Emma or Zoey.
So we can't connect him to either of their murders? What about his mother's? Autopsy results indicate that she died of natural causes.
Right now, all we have this guy on is mishandling a body.
He shot at us.
Yeah, but he was hiding in the closet at the time.
He can claim he didn't know we were cops.
He can plead out.
Castle, we can't even link this guy to Hollander's Woods.
In '83, he was at a military academy, all the way in South Carolina.
It was President's Day weekend.
He could've been on vacation or just skipping school.
Except those records are gone.
So there's no way to prove it.
All a jury's gonna hear is that he was 1,000 miles away from New Hampshire.
Without evidence, we don't have a case.
The key to this is Emma.
We need to place his car in the area at the time she was attacked.
Let's coordinate with Collins and set up a canvass up there.
There's got to be a place he goes, somewhere out of the way where he puts the bodies.
You said that he was seeing a shrink? Yeah.
A, uh, Dr.
Van Holtzman.
You know, maybe Noah said something during his sessions that could help us.
Where do we find Holtzman? If Noah ends up walking, you're gonna have to have me committed.
Excuse me, we need to speak with Dr.
Holtzman, please.
Of course.
Just a moment.
Listen, if after seven years of your crazy theories you haven't already been committed, then I think you're pretty safe.
Hi, I'm Doctor Holtzman.
I understand you've been looking for me.
Yeah, I'm Detective Beckett.
This is Richard Castle.
We need to speak with you regarding one of your patients.
Noah Lewis? Of course.
Let me just finish with these prescriptions and I'll be right with you.
Okay.
Beckett, I know that voice.
From that day in Hollander's Woods.
It's him.
He's the killer.
Castle, that was over 30 years ago.
You can't possibly Kate, when he spoke I could feel the knife at my throat.
I will never forget that voice as long as I live.
Sorry about that.
Shall we talk in my office? Please, have a seat.
I wish I could say that I was surprised to hear what Noah had done.
But he was very troubled.
We did everything we could for him, while he was in our care.
Uh, Dr.
Holtzman, how long have you been treating Mr.
Lewis? Four years.
We got him stable after his mother committed him.
But a condition of his release were state-mandated sessions every month.
And what did the two of you talk about? Anger.
Intimacy.
His animosity toward women.
You went to Dartmouth? Yes, for undergrad.
Uh, when was the last time you saw Mr.
Lewis? A few days ago.
He was quite agitated.
He thought someone was following him.
I thought he was just being paranoid.
So I adjusted his meds.
And you had no idea that he was about to do something violent? None.
He's done this before, you know.
Abducted women, killed them in the woods.
Possibly for years.
How do you know? Witnesses.
When he does it, he wears a mask.
Now, why would he do that? Wear a mask when he kills them? I don't know.
If you had to guess.
What kind of psychosis would drive a man to do that? Something terrible in his childhood? The mind of a psychopath is not that simple.
But he kills them anyway.
So why would he need to hide his face behind this? Maybe he's not hiding it.
Maybe this is his true face, the monster he knows he really is.
And he wants his victims to see it and fear it before they die.
Maybe his real mask is the man he has to pretend to be every day.
His voice? I know it sounds crazy.
Because it is.
Castle, we already have a suspect.
Ah, the perfect suspect.
Because Dr.
Holtzman knew intimate details about his patients, he set Noah up to take the fall, just in case anyone got onto the murders.
And Holtzman was in New Hampshire, at Dartmouth, in 1983.
He's a family man.
Married to his wife for 24 years.
Kids, well-respected, never been arrested.
And witnesses, they saw the victim get into Noah's car, not Holtzman's.
I can't explain that yet.
But Holtzman is behind this, and Babe, the voice, is it possible you're misremembering? You've made this killer your personal boogeyman.
You said so yourself, you wanted him to be more formidable.
You don't believe me.
He's clean.
He has no connection to this case.
We've got nothing to go on.
Less than nothing.
All we have is a 30-year-old voice ID from a witness who was a kid at the time.
Look, Castle, we want to solve it as much as you do.
You know what? I expected this from these guys, just not from you.
Castle! I'm sorry.
You said it was him.
I believe you.
Except you're right.
There's nothing we can do.
We'd have to sit on him for years, hoping he makes a move.
This is not how this story was supposed to end.
I was thinking, how did he make those victims disappear without a trace? Well, he would have had to have taken them somewhere.
Somewhere his family didn't know about.
He'd have to have a lair.
A storage space, somewhere.
Too many things could go wrong.
There could be a flood, a nosy manager.
He would have to find a place over which he had absolute control.
So I did a property search.
It came up empty on him, but I did find this.
Farmland? Yeah.
Owned by Holtzman's parents, both deceased.
It's in a trust.
Holtzman is listed as the sole trustee.
It's possible his wife doesn't know about it.
It's only a few miles from where Emma was hit by that truck.
Tax records show that there's a barn on the property.
He must've held her there.
It's private, in the middle of nowhere.
The perfect lonely place.
Only I would never get a warrant.
And if I searched it without one, then any evidence I would find would be inadmissible.
'Cause you're a cop.
But you're not.
It would be trespassing.
You would be breaking the law.
But if you found something And I know how much this means to you.
So whatever you decide, I will back your play.
Looks deserted.
Well, this is the property line.
You should stay back here on this side.
Okay, but you're not going in alone.
Keep me on speaker, let me know what you find.
Right.
So, what do you see? Looks like he uses it for storage.
Creepy, creepy storage.
Beckett, he has the same car that Noah has.
Same color, same license plate, same sticker, everything.
That's how he did it.
So if someone spotted him, it would lead right back to Noah.
But you're gonna need more than that to call the police.
Look around.
He may have kept trophies from his victims.
You okay? Yeah.
Oh, God.
Castle? Castle, what do you see now? I see them.
Photos of his victims.
I see all of them.
Beckett, he's here.
He's inside.
How did you find me? I've been looking for you since Hollander's Woods.
The boy.
That was you? I should've killed you when I had the chance.
You can't win, Holtzman.
We know who you are.
It doesn't matter.
You'll both be dead, and they'll never find me.
Castle! It's locked! Beckett! Castle! Can't get in! The danger of facing your demons is that, sometimes, the demons win.
Castle, what's going on in there? No.
No! Castle! Beckett! God! Are you okay? You okay? Yeah.
Still more gruesome discoveries and many more questions at the rural property of noted psychologist Van Holtzman, as authorities continue to find the buried bodies of his victims.
I thought you were practicing your speech for tonight.
Oh, yeah, I was.
I just, um I couldn't help but wonder.
If it wasn't for him, for that day in the woods, would I even be here? Would we be here? Babe, we're not here because of him.
We're here because of who we are in the face of people like him.
That's why you write mysteries.
That's why I became a cop.
We're both trying to bring justice to this world.
Now, I'm gonna go and get dressed so I can be very proud tonight of who you are.
Murder, mystery, the macabre.
Tonight's honoree has mastered them all.
For years he's kept his readers under his spell with his electrifying prose.
I'm very proud to present this year's recipient of the Poe's Pen Career Achievement Award, my good friend, Richard Castle.
Michael Connelly, ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you very much, Michael.
And, um, my thanks to all of you for this honor.
You know, I've spent a lot of time the last few days thinking about how I got here.
The long hours.
The blank pages.
Most people think that writing is a solitary profession, that we spend our days in our imaginary worlds, fighting, loving, dying.
But we don't do it alone.
Because anything that's good in our writing comes from truth.
And the truth is, I'm here because of the people in my life.
Mother, you will always be a star in my eyes.
And, Alexis, you amaze me every day.
You two are my redheaded pillars of unconditional love.
To my friends at the 12th Precinct, you let me in.
Especially, you two, Javier, Kevin.
You made me your brother-in-arms, and I thank you for that.
And, Kate.
Seven years ago, I thought I would never write again, and then you walked through the door, and my whole world changed.
You were right.
You said I had no idea.
But now I do.
This is because of you.
Because of us.
Always.
That was a lovely speech, darling.
Oh, well, I was inspired.
Castle, who's gonna be your inspiration if Beckett becomes state senator? Yeah.
You won't be able to follow her around anymore.
Oh, I don't know.
Maybe I'll write a political thriller next.
Ooh, I would so read that.
Beckett, if you do run, I'll help with your campaign.
Thank you.
It's a pretty big step, Kate.
Have you decided what you're going to do? Not yet.
But whatever it is, I'm looking forward to the adventure.
One thing's for sure.
Things are gonna change.
Well, I know one thing that'll never change.
What we all have.
A toast.
To us.
To us! Cheers.
It's the precinct.
There's been a murder.
- What? - Oh.