Carter Burnes was alone in his office. It was silent apart from the faint whirring of his computer and the dull pitter-patter of rain against the office windows.

His partner had left at 4 o'clock to help his husband to plan their ten-year old's birthday party. He'd been considering staying so that Burnes wasn't left with the case alone, but the Senior Detective had insisted that he go. Burnes was fine here himself.

It was 10 o'clock, which meant he'd been working for fourteen hours now. He took a sip of the lukewarm black coffee on the desk in front of him. It was very bitter, but when working hours like his, it was important to make sure not to ingest too much sugar, and so he'd switched to plain coffee long ago.

Carter had never liked to leave work unfinished, not when he felt he was awake enough to get more done. The Detective had been chastised for this kind of behaviour a few times by his Sergeant of course, but that didn't stop him from continuing to do it.

He knew that if he went home, he'd lie awake, restless for hours before managing to sleep. It was better this way; he was better off being productive than lying awake thinking about everything he could be doing instead.

He'd been hunched over this report for an hour now. It had been composed by him and eighteen others over the course of the last few morning briefings.

Burnes had been put on the CCTV analysis squad for this case, and had been given a large portion of CCTV footage from the hotel to work through with Gareth. Gareth had taken the stairwell footage, and Burnes had taken the lobby.

Burnes sat back, bringing his coffee with him. He raised the blue spotted mug to his lips. His daughter had bought him this mug, for Father's Day of the year before. It got him through a lot of his nightshifts, particularly when the hours dragged by.

If he was to be honest, he would have rather been at home, with his family, but by the time they all went to sleep, he'd be the one still conscious, awake and with his own thoughts.

He ran one hand over his face and picked up his phone. The Detective texted his wife, telling her he'd be home soon. He added two kissing emojis to the end and clicked send.

Then he turned back to the document. A week ago, he'd been at the scene of the suspected murder of Darius McGallogat, and since then, he'd focused on little else.

This case was his priority, it was his job to make sure everything was done properly, no one else's.

The report was almost half written up. There was still a lot he didn't know about what exactly had transpired on the night of the murder, but there was also a lot that he now did.

Lab recounts had shown that, as Carter and the rest of those on the case had suspected, the businessman had died of Cyanide poisoning. The source of the poison was yet to be discovered – tests of the wine bottle had come back negative for cyanide - but so far, Carter had made good headway, and he was confident that this case would be solved, eventually.

A few days after the incident, Burnes and Gareth had been placed on the CCTV team. They had reviewed CCTV footage from across the hotel. The cameras were old, and the footage was grainy, but Burnes planned to watch it all regardless.

At half past nine, Darius had entered the building with a woman. She had long hair, high heels, and a handbag. The colours were all unclear which, typically, made his job all the more difficult.

He'd watched them through the cameras in the hotel lobby, and then the two cameras in the stairwell. They'd taken the stairs because of the queue for the elevator. It had been the woman who'd pointed towards the stairs.

Carter had found that suspicious when he'd watched it. If this was a woman Darius had picked up from a bar, how would she know where the stairs were? He'd then realised that there was a sign on the wall to the right of the elevator doors, and that was when he'd taken a half-an-hour-long break.

When he had begun watching again, he had observed the footage of both people heading up to the fourteenth floor on the low-quality feed of two cameras on the fifth and tenth floors. There had been a third camera on the fifteenth floor, and that was how he'd seen them leave; through a gap in the stairwell that revealed Darius' side as he opened the door for his companion on the floor below.

This had occurred at around 10 o'clock. That was the last time he could find either person on any footage.

The Hotel security appeared to be very old. There were no cameras in any of its hallways, none in any of the rooms, or even in the elevators. The only cameras were in the stairwells, and in the lobby.

It was frustrating, but it was better than nothing.

The most peculiar thing about this case was that the woman had never reappeared.

Carter had checked all cameras, from 10 pm until two in the morning, when the hotel was completely desolate. She had vanished.

It was like she'd never been there at all.

Carter, of course, hadn't been satisfied with that information. He'd rechecked the lobby footage, focusing on anyone with long hair, taking note of those with a handbag.

There were hundreds of people scattered across the hotel. Between the hours of 8pm and midnight, the lobby was jampacked.

There had been an event on that night; a local band performing in one of food halls. Due to that, it was nearly impossible to find anyone.

There were times when there were less people, particularly from half past eleven until midnight. It was quieter then, but there were still a number of people, mostly couples, standing in scattered clumps.

Carter had run the footage in the Lobby again and again, cataloguing every person to have left the building after the time of the incident – approximately half past ten.

He had then taken the time to see when they'd first come into the building, and where they'd been when Darius had entered.

His main suspect at first had been a younger male who'd watched Darius enter the building until he'd reached the queue for the elevators.

But he'd left around twenty minutes later, and hadn't in any of that time left the Lobby.

There were also the odd few individuals threading through the crowd, but of them, only three had long hair, and six carried a handbag similar to that that Darius' companion had had.

Any of these people could have been a potential lead, of course, but Carter had been unwilling to get his hopes up.

Of those with a handbag, four were witnessed entering the hotel between 9pm and 2am, and three were witnessed leaving within that time too.

Two of the three with hair long enough to fit the woman Darius had arrived with had disappeared into the food hall, and had left hours later, or been observed entering the elevator, all long after Darius was dead.

That left one woman with long hair, and three of the women with handbags.

The two women with handbags had, within the hours of 11pm and 2am, taken the elevator with a male companion and weren't witnessed again.

The last woman with a handbag had initially arrived at around 8 pm, and had been observed entering the food hall. She'd left at 1am, and upon further digging, Carter had discovered that her name was Denise, and she was a hotel worker.

That alone didn't clear her of suspicion, but the hours at which she had entered and left made her being the culprit more unlikely, particularly since she'd stayed within the food hall until just before 1am.

That left the final woman with the long hair. At first, Carter had thought she'd disappeared too; he had been completely unable to find her leaving anywhere in his time frame, or at any point until 6am the next day.

It was only when the receptionist who'd been working that night was asked for a statement that it had been discovered that she was one of the performers, a woman called Elaine, and hadn't been found leaving because she'd went out the back entrance with the rest of the band.

That left him with nothing but a long report. Since it had only been a week, Carter wasn't quite willing to lose all hope yet.

He scrolled down to the bottom of the document. It ended with a list of statements and who they'd been gathered from.

There had been many people to interview, but none of them seemed to have known very much. A lot of the recounts were the same, too;

'Did you see a woman of this description leave the hotel between the hours of 10pm and 2am?'

"It was a busy night; we see a lot of people. The description doesn't stand out"

He couldn't blame the witnesses, of course. Burnes understood that it was difficult to remember every face.

Many a time in his lengthy career, he'd been called to court to give a statement regarding a case he'd dealt with up to ten years previously.

Each time, he'd had to rely on reports and various files to find out what he would need to know. He dealt with too many people in this job to correctly remember each case and the names attached to it.

He had also, years ago, worked as a Bartender to afford his first car. Back then, he would see hundreds of people every night, and each time he would only remember those who especially stood out. Everything tended just to blur together in these sorts of jobs.

No one ever stood out from the rest unless they did something of note, such as started a brawl, or attracted attention in some other such way.

So, he understood pretty well where the Receptionist was coming from.

It was just after midnight now, and Carter was satisfied that he'd done as much as he could for this case tonight. It was twenty-four pages long, and went into great detail. It was time for him to call it a day.

The Detective tipped the last of his latest coffee into his mouth and clicked save on both versions of the document he'd created. It was better to be safe than sorry; he'd made a habit of having two of every file, just in case.

He stood and stretched, ignoring the crackle from his spine that this movement caused. He'd been sitting for four hours, of course he was stiff. His hands were stiff, too.

Carter was glad he wasn't working the next day, he didn't feel like coming back to all of this so soon.

It was a well-deserved rest, even if he'd probably end up taking his kids to school. It was the thought that counted.