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Chapter 3: The Hotel Monaco

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It was nearly four o'clock already when Sara arrived in front of the Hotel Monaco. Getting out of her black Chevy SUV, she was surprised to see that there was none of the usual commotion outside of the hotel, only a single detective standing at the door.

Vartann smiled, and as she approached, he held out a single red rose. "Merry Christmas, Sidle."

Surprised, she didn't know quite what to say but took the rose with a smile and lifted it to her nose as he filled her in.

"Okay, here's what we know so far," he said, reading from his notebook. "This woman has been missing for quite a while, but apparently no one realized it until recently. Her name is Sara and she's tall with brown hair, but unfortunately no one knows much more about her."

Her head popped up. "Her name is Sara?"

He chuckled. "Yeah. Weird, isn't it?"

'A little too weird,' she thought.

"Anyways, the most we really got is that she was first spotted in Vegas right here in front of the Hotel Monaco talking to an old friend. Safe to say they didn't work here, but apparently it was a happy reunion."

"Who reported her missing?" Sara asked.

"The guy wanted to stay anonymous."

"Any family to contact?"

"Nope," he shrugged. "None to speak of… or at least none that she wanted to speak of. Guy said she never really talked much about her family."

"Address?"

Again, he shrugged. "Sorry."

Stumped, Sara closed herself off momentarily. Looking around, she couldn't help but remember her own first time in Vegas. She had come per Grissom's request, and had found him right at this very spot tossing dummies off the roof. What was it that he had said that day? Thinking back, she smiled as it came to her.

"I'm a scientist, I like to see it. Newton dropped the apple, I drop dummies."

Sara smiled to herself.

'Well,' she thought, 'This Sara girl didn't drop dummies, but maybe she dropped a clue.'

"All right, Vartann. Any idea where to go next?"

"No clue. This guy didn't really have much information about her, but he did talk a lot about things they'd done before. I think there was mention of a skating rink in there somewhere."

She perked up. "A roller skating rink or an ice skating rink?"

"An ice rink. Probably the one across town."

"All right, let's go."

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