Thank you very much for the reviews KiwiSWFan and greyslostwho! I'll probably be updating once a day, so hopefully nobody gets really irritated when my story keeps showing up on the page for the newest updates. Anyway, enjoy the chapter!

Chapter 2

Suspicious Circumstances

"You are not going to believe this," Harry announced the following morning as he leaned on the desk. Nikki tore her eyes away from her work and raised an eyebrow. "A chimpanzee," he said simply.

She frowned. "What about a chimpanzee?"

Harry paced across the room and shook his head slowly, still not quite believing it himself. "We found a fingerprint on the body. It belongs to a chimp."

Nikki shifted in her seat and crossed her arms. "Are you saying this woman was murdered by a chimpanzee?"

"Possibly," he nodded and let out a laugh. "Imagine that! Murder by monkey!"

"No," Nikki shook her head before resting her elbows on the desk and looking back down to the papers in front of her. "Not a monkey."

"What?" Harry asked. "I just told you—"

"Chimpanzees are apes, not monkeys."

Harry contemplated that for a moment before giving his head a quick shake. "Whatever. Anyway, all the evidence we have points to a chimp. The injuries to her hands and face are consistent with chimp attacks, plus we now have a fingerprint. What doesn't add up though, is that she was stabbed."

"Chimps have hands," Nikki commented. "Could it have stabbed her?"

"I suppose it's possible," he nodded, leaning back on the desk and scratching his chin. "It's unlikely, but possible. Where would it have gotten a knife though?"

Nikki shrugged, trying to concentrate on the work she'd been doing before he interrupted. Glancing down to see she was no longer paying attention, Harry rolled his eyes and looked up at a buzz from the door.

"A chimpanzee, eh?" DI Curtis asked as Harry let him in.

"As strange as that sounds, yes," Harry nodded.

"Well," Curtis continued, "I've got some news too. We've got an ID. Her name is Lauren Todd, and here's the interesting bit. She was a journalist investigating the zoo." Nikki looked up, her curiosity getting the better of her. "Apparently she was an avid animal activist as well. She was out to prove the zoo wasn't taking care of the animals."

"That sure gives the owner a motive to kill her," Harry commented. "Do you think she could've been onto something?"

Curtis shrugged. "From what I can tell, those animals are in heaven. The zoo's even won an award for its enclosures."

Wandering across the room, Harry turned back to face him with a frown. "This is all sounding rather strange," he mumbled, mostly to himself. "The woman was killed by a knife, but also by a chimpanzee, both of which are nowhere to be found."

"I was questioning the owner of the zoo, Tom Little, when you called," Curtis added. "He claimed the zoo's only ever had three chimps, all of which are accounted for."

"Well, then why not get their fingerprints taken?" Nikki spoke up.

Curtis glanced over with a smile. "Good thinking," he nodded, pulling out his mobile. Typing in some numbers, he held it to his ear before glancing up to Harry and Nikki. "You two wanna tag along?"

Harry immediately grabbed his jacket and followed Curtis to the door. "Come on, Nikki," he said as he passed. "It's a chance for me to get you out of my seat." She gave an exaggerated roll of her eyes before setting down her pen and leaping up to join them.

Nikki stood with Harry in the hall at the back of the chimp enclosure and watched in wonder as one of the keepers got fingerprint after fingerprint through the bars from the seemingly docile animals. None of them stood out as particularly aggressive, but Nikki knew that they could be notoriously dangerous when they wanted to be. Having lived in South Africa as a child meant she knew all about the many stories of chimp attacks that happened farther north.

"Well, that's done," Curtis sighed, interrupting her thoughts as he approached with their newly acquired chimp fingerprints. "I'm gonna take these over to the lab right away. Feel free to take a look around if you want. This is still a crime scene and the zoo won't be opening again for a while, so you can have the place to yourselves."

"I think I'll take you up on that offer," Nikki agreed. "Harry?"

"Yeah," he said with a nod. "I'll stay as well."

Curtis turned to leave, but paused at the door. "Pop by Lauren Todd's flat when you're done. I'll text the directions. We've already searched the place, but maybe some sharp-eyed pathologists can discover something."

"I've never understood that term," Harry mumbled as they wandered outside. "Eyes aren't sharp."

Nikki ignored him and walked around to watch the chimpanzees from the public viewing area. She crossed her arms as the apes came back outside. "They don't seem like killers," she mumbled, eyes following the big male as he climbed lazily onto the wooden structure that sat in the middle of the cage.

"Neither do a lot of people who end up as murderers," Harry remarked as he moved to stand at her shoulder.

Letting out a quiet sigh, Nikki turned away and ambled over to the next exhibit. "Even if the fingerprints match, a chimp still couldn't get out of the zoo, kill someone, and get back in without someone seeing."

"Which means we'd be looking for a human suspect as well," Harry agreed as a wolf peered out of the bushes at them. They fell silent for a moment, but Harry soon broke the quiet with a joke. "What do you call a crate full of ducks?"

With a slight grin, she continued walking and said, "I don't know, but you're probably going to tell me."

"A box of quackers," he said in as serious a voice as he could muster.

Nikki couldn't stop a smile from spreading across her face and a giggle sneaking out. Her mood soon changed, however, when she spotted someone coming their way. He looked to be in his late teens and was wringing his hands nervously as he approached.

"Hi, uh, are you the police?" he asked, halting in front of them.

Harry sent her a glance. "No, I'm Dr. Harry Cunningham and this is Dr. Nikki Alexander. We did the autopsy on the woman found outside."

"Are you Charlie Little?" Nikki asked. "You found her, didn't you?" He nodded and his eyes wandered about, as if making sure they were alone. When he looked back to them though, he remained silent. "Did you want to tell us something?" Nikki pressed gently.

"Uh," he mumbled, unsure. Then, he quickly shook his head. "No, no. It's nothing. Forget it." With that, he spun around and beat a hasty retreat.

Exchanging a suspicious glance with his colleague, Harry crossed his arms as he watched the teen leaving. "That was odd," he remarked slowly.

"He knows something," Nikki muttered. "That much is obvious. I suppose we'll just have to wait until he feels ready to tell us."

Harry nodded silently, curiosity sparking inside him. "Shall we go?"