Monday night/early morning
There was no hint, no evidence, nothing that could help Sara and Sofia to find a killer. They worked another shift on the case and after that Brass and Grissom pulled both away to other, more important and recent cases.
Five nights later they met again and again it was again the house. This time Grissom was with Sara.
"Male body in the hallway." Sofia was in front of the door. "An old friend of us, Sara."
"Who?"
"Ben Benson."
"The real-estate guy? Don't tell me he wanted to stay a night in here."
"I don't know. If he intended to do so we have to find some clothes of him. I cleared the house but I didn't see anything."
"Did you look for it?"
"After I cleared the room, yes, I took a look around. No signs of anybody."
"Your ghost is really busy. Seems like there's no quiet afterlife." Grissom opened the door. Only a yard behind it was Ben Benson lying on the floor.
"He wasn't hung, he wasn't scared to death. Sara, do you know any ghost with a gun?"
"I don't know any ghost at all, Grissom." Sara got down next to the body. A bullet hole was right in the middle of the forehead of the man. Benson's eyes were wide open and full of surprise and shock.
"I suppose you didn't find a gun anywhere either, Sofia?"
"No, I'm sorry Grissom."
"Who found him?" Sara asked. Who was in the middle of the night in this house?
"Anonymous call about an hour ago. There're working on tracking it down."
"Ghosts that call the police. This is really a special ghost." Grissom took some photos of the scene. A ghost with a telephone and after there was no electricity in this house the ghost must have had a cell phone. A new generation of ghosts? One day they'd wear I-pods while they were gliding through houses and all you could see was the light of the I-pod.
"Good morning. Oh we're one more this time." David smiled at Grissom.
"Yeah this ghost gets a little bit too busy. And it started to shoot people."
"Ghosts don't shoot people." David said.
"Ghosts don't exist." Sara sighed.
"I'll go down the street, wake up the neighbors and ask them if they've seen anything."
"Whoever killed Benson came through the desert, they don't come down the street. There had been too much interest in this house, it would be stupid to drive from there to here, they are not stupid, they're damn good." Sara got up. "I'll have a look outside, maybe I can get another tire mark." No need for her to stay here, Grissom would work the house, some fresh eyes. Maybe he saw the hint, she was sure that was there, but she didn't find it.
"I don't want you to wander around alone, Sara." Sofia stopped her when they were outside. "There's only one officer at the moment, wait until there's another one, please."
"Sofia, if I wait I'll lose my evidence, the wind doesn't make a break only because we could use a break."
"You're such a stubborn pain in the ass." Sofia grumbled.
"Whoever killed Benson is long gone and won't sit somewhere in the desert waiting for a CSI to come along and shot them."
"The chances that anybody is out there waiting for you are under five percent."
"See." Sara wanted to go but Sofia grabbed her arm.
"That are six percent too less."
"You mean five percent. You can't get more than one hundred percent."
"For your safety I want more than one hundred percent, I don't let you go with only one hundred." Sofia whispered.
Sara felt a something like a hot shiver running through her body. What was wrong with Sofia? The detective had never been that anxious about Sara's security. Yes, Sofia took care of her, she made sure Sara wasn't in danger, told her off when the investigator walked away at a crime scene, following the evidence without an officer by her side, but there had never been a comment like that one.
Sofia cleared her throat. "I'll come with you, the neighbors will be asleep anyway, it's four in the morning."
"Alright." Sara took another second to observe Sofia. "Are you alright?"
"Yes. Why?"
"You seem to be very concerned."
"Somebody killed three people in the last few days I don't like that. Hearing you walking around alone in the dark, looking for this person is nothing that makes me feel comfortable. If I wouldn't mind you being here alone I think I took the wrong job."
"I think you picked the perfect job for you. Come on my serving bodyguard, let's find the case breaker and get famous as the new Ghostbusters of Las Vegas."
"I didn't know you're into fame, Sidle." Sofia chuckled.
"Bowie 1975, I love it."
"You're too young."
"It's the first song I can remember and then there was the remix 1990. I won't comment on that one." Sara smirked coy.
"A dirty little secret of Sara Sidle? One day you have to tell me about 'Fame 1990', investigator."
"Not your business, detective. Not your business."
"Our ghost shoots and makes phone calls, it also walks like a human." Grissom greeted Sara and Sofia when they came back.
"It walks? You've got a print?"
"I'm afraid it's still a smart ghost, it had some protection but yes, there's a print. Not too far away from the stairs outside. We'll need a shoe impression of everybody who was here tonight, compare them and all the impressions of the last two cases here."
"So it could be from one of us." Sara was disappointed. Gris-som had sounded like he was sure they had a lead and it was nothing more than a hope.
"There's no reason why one of us was walking there."
"Looking for evidence. We walked a lot around here."
"Talking about walking around. Where have you been?"
"In the desert. We've got an impression of a tire and if you ask me, it looks like it's the same car type we were looking for the last time. Different spot, definitely new. This Sedan has something to do with the house."
"We'll ask Misses Lennox if she knows anybody with an old Sedan. I'll get some picture of the internet in case she doesn't know what kind of car we're talking about." Sofia wrote herself a memo. "I called the nursing home, we can see her around nine in the morning. Are you prepared for a double, Sara?"
"Do I have a choice?"
"No. I'll take the house, you two can run the evidence and visit the witnesses." Grissom said.
"Yeah, fresh eyes. Will you stay here?"
"Yes, I want to search the house in daylight."
"Okay, I'll take the evidence to the lap and meet you in front of the nursing home at nine, Sofia."
"Good as gold. I'll get us an appointment with Benson's colleagues. He isn't married, his parents live in Kansas, I'll give them a call. It's about time to lift the sheet and find out who's hiding under it, playing ghost." Sofia got her shades of her pocket. The first signs of the sun were in the east, when she arrived in the city there'd be sunshine all over the city. Another sunny day in deadly spooky Sin City.