Castle

Previously on "Castle"...

He's not in the car!

He was found adrift 80 miles off the coast of Delaware

in a dinghy owned by Henry Jenkins.

On the ground!

Put your hands where I can see 'em now, now!

If you don't know Mr. Castle,

then how did he end up in your boat

in the middle of the ocean?

He's been missing for two months.

See if you can find any evidence of where he's been.

I did find a key.

It has "38" stamped on it.

NYPD. I'm here to see Henry Jenkins?

I'm Henry Jenkins.

I met a different Henry Jenkins.

Whoever did this to me

faked Jenkins as part of the setup.

He's somehow in the middle of this.

Moving together. Keep that top down. Quick.

Legs press off that footplate.

Press and set.

Press, set.

Press, set.

Hold water. Hold water.

What is that?

Gruesome murders, chills and thrills...

it's what author Richard Castle is known for,

and he's delivered yet again with two new books...

"Wild Storm" and "Raging Heat."

Thank you for joining us this morning.

My pleasure.

But perhaps the bigger mystery is the one that surrounds you.

Your disappearance made national headlines.

Months later, you were found in a dinghy at sea,

yet you claim to have no memory

of where you've been or how you got there.

Yeah, I know it, uh... it sounds crazy, even to me,

and, uh, we're still looking for answers.

Well, your critics seem to have some.

It's no secret your last book, "Wild Storms,"

slipped off the best-seller list.

Isn't the most logical explanation

that this is all a publicity stunt,

a way to make headlines to drum up book sales?

I assure you, Brooke, it was no publicity stunt.

I would never do that to my family or my fiancee.

Speaking of your fiancee,

you vanished just moments before your wedding.

What do you say to fans

who chalk your disappearance up to cold feet?

Well, I would say

that they don't know what they're talking about.

So the wedding's still on.

Well, we've been through a very tough experience.

We're still trying to make sense o-of everything, actually.

And I actually just... I-I...

I came here to talk about my books.

And if this were one of your books, Mr. Castle,

wouldn't you find the plot a little hard to swallow?

I mean, amnesia, really?

Well, this isn't a novel, Brooke.

This actually happened.

And no one wants the truth more than I do.

And I can prove it.

I'm offering a reward... $250,000...

to anyone who can give me verifiable proof

as to where I was and exactly what I was doing

during the two months I was missing.

That wasn't an interview.

That was an ambush.

And what were you thinking offering a quarter-million-dollar reward?

Genius, right? I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner.

Well, maybe because you knew it was gonna lure crackpots and opportunists,

and instead of going after real leads,

we're gonna be chasing thousands of half-baked tipsters

playing the Richard Castle lottery.

What real leads?

So far, we've had nothing but dead ends.

And I'm tired of not knowing.

No, to find a needle in a haystack,

do we not first need a haystack?

Yeah, but not a haystack full of nutjobs.

You saw that interview. No one believes me.

But somewhere out there,

someone knows where I was and what I was doing.

You ready for this?

A mystery I might be able to solve?

It'll be a relief.

- Hey, Castle. Welcome back. - Thank you.

I hear the east river's a little more polluted than usual today.

Yeah. A crew team,

they found the body in the river wrapped in plastic.

Someone probably dumped it hoping to make it disappear.

They didn't weigh it down enough.

So, who's the victim? Well, he didn't have an I.D. On him,

but we matched it to a missing-persons. Wallace Williger, 45,

owner and C.E.O. of Williger toys.

- Makers of Sunshine Sarah? - Sunshine Sarah?

She's a spunky, redheaded rag doll.

Alexis' favorite when she was growing up.

- Wouldn't go anywhere without her. - When did he go missing?

Last Friday, so four days ago.

His wife, Samantha, said he went off to the movies and never came back.

Ooh.

- Something I should know? - Oh, Beckett didn't tell you?

Yeah, yeah, your disappearance kind of drove them back together.

Life being short and all that.

Oh. Disappear for two months.

So, the prelim exam indicates his neck was broken.

Probably after a struggle given his defensive wound.

Luckily, his body was wrapped when it went into the water.

I may still be able to pull the attacker's DNA

from under the victim's nails.

Wait. How long has he been dead?

At least a couple of days.

What happened to his face and hands?

They look like they've been burned.

Honestly, I don't know,

but the rest of the body wasn't affected.

I'll know more when I get him back to the lab.

I had that sick feeling when he didn't come home, but...

You hope.

Mrs. Williger, was there anyone

that would've wanted to do your husband harm?

No.

He made toys for a living.

He was a decent man.

But...

But what?

These last few weeks, he had been having a hard time.

Ever since Annie died.

Oh, I'm sorry. Um... who's Annie?

Our labrador retriever.

And after she died, Wally started working late,

coming home after I was asleep, like he was avoiding me.

Did you talk to him about it?

I tried. He said everything was fine.

He was just working on an important project.

And what about the day that he disappeared?

Did he say anything that would indicate he was in trouble?

No. He was happy.

He told me he loved me,

said things would be... better soon.

You know, seeing her, I can't imagine what it was like for you

all those nights, not knowing.

I was lucky. You came back.

Hey.

So, we took a look at Williger's phone and financials.

There was no activity on the day he disappeared.

If he was on his way to the movies,

either he didn't make it there or he paid with cash.

Canvass local theaters, see if anyone saw him.

And take a look at his records for the past couple of weeks,

see if there's anything out of the ordinary there.

Castle and I are gonna go to his office

and check if there were any problems at work.

Right on.

Mr. Castle.

Just what in the hell do you think you're doing?

Did you give that TV station the precinct number?

I'm not gonna give them my home phone. That's private.

The NYPD is not your personal secretary.

Did you know how many man-hours

this little stunt of yours is costing us?

The phones have been ringing off the hook!

Did you hear that?!

Ringing off the hook?

We have leads.

What just happened?

Castle, what were you thinking?

"The supreme art of war

is to subdue the enemy without fighting," Sun Tzu.

The tactical smooch is just one weapon in my vast arsenal.

Well, employ it again, and the enemy might go nuclear.

Okay, but somewhere in this pile is the answer to where I was.

I can feel it.

Look, Castle, I know how important this is to us,

but you have to realize, this is a long shot,

and I don't want you to be disappointed if it doesn't pan out.

Toys.

Wally built this place from the ground up.

Seems impossible that he's gone.

Miss Stoller, was everything okay here at work?

Did he have any conflicts with colleagues or business rivals?

Not that I'm aware of.

And as VP of the company, I'm sure I'd know.

I understand that he was under pressure the past couple of weeks,

that he was coming home late.

- Who told you that? - His wife.

I'm sorry, but that's not true.

I mean, he may have been under pressure,

but it certainly wasn't here at work.

So, he wasn't staying late?

No, just the opposite.

He was leaving early several days a week.

I did not realize this would be on.

Sorry.

Do you know why he was leaving early?

No, he said he was taking care of some personal things.