Charlie had no intention of walking up thirty-four flights of stairs, she'd just wanted a moment alone. The glare of the fluorescent lights was harsh, the air stuffy and hot. She jogged up a couple flights of stairs for good measure, then sat down for a minute to catch her breath. She pulled out her phone and unlocked it. There were two texts and a missed call. Charlie ignored them, dialed her sister's number and put the phone to her ear. She held it there with her shoulder and put her hands out in front of her, palms down.

Emma picked up on the second ring, her voice bright and anxious. The first few questions were normal, and Charlie told her sister how her day was going so far and what the weather was like while she examined her hands. There was a pause, and then Emma finally asked Charlie the loaded question.

"Are you, you know—okay?"

Charlie rubbed the knuckles of one hand, curled and uncurled her fingers. There was no twinge of pain, no bone deep throbbing. "So far, so good."

"Detective Parker?" A technician with a clipboard balanced on her hip was waiting for Charlie on the thirty fourth floor.

"Yeah?"

"Detective Taylor wanted me to let you know there's evidence waiting for you over in processing."

Charlie asked the technician where processing was, then thanked her and headed off into the maze of the lab. There was a brown evidence bag waiting for her on one of the clean white tables. Charlie donned a lab coat and a set of gloves. She broke the red seal on the bag and looked inside at a clean white jogging suit.

"It belongs to the witness," Mac said from the doorway. He removed his coat in exchange for one that matched Charlie's, then joined her at the table. Charlie pushed the box of gloves to him and started pulling things from the bag. They split the clothes, and Charlie worked on one side of the table while Mac worked on the other.

"How was the walk?" Mac asked.

"I gave up, about eight floors up. Took the elevator the rest of the way," Charlie admitted. It wasn't necessarily a lie. Charlie had left the stairwell as soon she'd hung up with Emma.

"They don't make buildings like this in Florida, do they?" Mac said. He'd already laid out the sport's jacket and started examining one sleeve.

"No," Charlie said. "They definitely don't. I don't know how you guys stand it. This whole city is so…"

"Tall?" Mac suggested.

Charlie shook her head. "I was thinking claustrophobic." She got to work on the witness's pants, looking for any stains or other trace that might be stuck to the material.

Mac only smiled. "You'll get used to it."

"That's what I'm afraid of," Charlie said. They settled into a comfortable silence and finished at roughly the same time. There were a couple of foreign fibers on the jogging suit and one small stain on the pants. They swabbed each sleeve of the jacket for gunshot residue, but both came back negative.

"So he didn't fire a gun," Mac said. "The witness isn't our shooter."

"It still doesn't explain why he lied about finding the vic."

"Or," Mac looked at the suit laid out on the light table. "What he was doing near those lots at all. This suit is clean. If he'd been jogging in it as he said he was the cuffs of the pants would have dirt or dust on them."

"It's just like the warehouse," Charlie said. "Somebody cleaned up the warehouse, somebody cleaned up the witness. But no gunshot residue, he didn't fire the gun."

"What are you thinking?" Mac asked. Charlie pulled a stool over and sat down, putting her feet up on the rungs. Mac's question didn't feel like a question, it felt like a test.

"Fletch is our mastermind, right? He has knowledge of the warehouse from his day job and decides to use it to set up some kind of drug deal. We know he has ties to that world, so it fits." Charlie flicked a glance at Mac, but his dark eyes were unreadable.

"It was premeditated," Charlie continued. Mac's brows rose at this. "Fletch is dealing to the vic, so the witness was either working with or for Fletch, or he was a friend of the vic. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say he probably wasn't a friend of the vic."

"Why not?"

"He's not dead. Say Fletch is our shooter. He wouldn't shoot our vic and not the witness if they were together. He'd have shot them both."

"What if the witness was another buyer?"

Charlie shook her head. "Unlikely. What motive would another junkie have for reporting the murder of a fellow junkie? Not to mention the fact that the witness's clothes are incredibly clean, suggesting a cover up or change of clothes. Which, supports the theory that the whole thing was premeditated. We only found drugs on the victim and one lone hundred dollar bill. Doesn't seem like a sale so much as a collection. The vic was paying Fletch for a sale that had already gone down. Fletch must've known that the vic wouldn't be able to pay it all. Brings a gun, puts our vic down."

Mac tipped his chin up appraisingly, and Charlie began to think she was off the hook. "What about the witness? Why was he there if he wasn't buying drugs?"

"He could have been Fletcher's muscle," Charlie said. "In case things went wrong. Fletcher brings the witness along as back up to make sure our vic doesn't pull a gun of his own and try to off Fletcher. When it's done, Fletcher goes to his day job, has the witness clean it all up."

"Not bad," Mac said after a moment. "Get to work on the stain and the foreign fibers, I'll page you down to autopsy when Sid is ready for us." Mac tore off his gloves and started taking his coat off.

"Hey Mac," Charlie said as he began to walk away.

"Yes?"

"Did I pass?"

Mac smiled, "So far, so good."

Reviews, questions, compliments, and true stories of adventure are all welcome and appreciated. Please let me know how you like it so far, how you feel about the characters, and whether or not you find the current case interesting. :)