Author's Note: Hello to Brii Taylor, and thanks for the reviews afrozenheart412, Mahala, MSFanGirl, lily moonlight and jessicaflack, and Crowded Angels. Here's a superlong chapter for you all in thanks!

Chapter Eight

Miss Angell, or Jessica, as I discover a few moments later, is still shaking as I open the door to my office. Stella is sitting at her desk, carefully copying notes, when she sees us. She stands up so fast she almost knocks her chair over. "What happened?" she demands as I close the door behind us, double checking the hall before I do so.

"Couple guys took some shots at us," I explain, helping Jessica to a chair as Stella grabs a cup of water. "We're both all right, they couldn't hit the broad side of a barn."

"They managed to hit everything else, though," Jessica whispers from the chair. Her face is white, and Stella lays a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"They were just tryin' to scare us off," I say, and I explain everything I know to Stella. "They were usin' one of them new Tommy guns," I add. "They're brand new and the ammo doesn't come cheap."

"Which means whoever it was has some serious cash behind them," Stella says, and I nod. "You think it's Bedford?"

"Everything seems to be pointin' that way." I lean against her desk with a cup of coffee in my hand. "I want to go back to the Macy's warehouse before the parade. Bedford and Casey were both there, and they looked like they were tryin' to find something. I wanna know what it was. Maybe I can find some kind of motive for Andrew Bedford's murder."

"You think it was murder?"

"Call it a gut instinct," I reply. As I say it, the telephone rings. Stella picks it up. "Don Flack, PI….hello yourself…."

Has to be Mac Taylor.

"….sure, he's here. One moment." She sets down the earpiece and looks at me. "That's Mac," she says. "They got the autopsy results on Andrew Bedford."

"Stel, maybe you oughta take her in my office while I take this," I suggest. Stella helps an ashen Jessica Angell stand and walks her into my office. She pokes her head out the door, "You really need to get the radiator fixed," she grumbles, before closing the door, leaving me alone in the outer office.

I pick up the phone. "Yeah Mac, it's Flack."

"Andrew Bedford's autopsy results came back. He died from smoke inhalation."

"So he was alive when the fire started." I think for a moment. "Colleen Bedford went out for her meeting around six. The doorman says she asked to be let back in about eight. That gives us a two hour window for Dean Truby or someone to have gone in, set the fire, and left again."

"Sid Hammerback says it was about seven-fifteen when they left the Italian restaurant, and they were attacked shortly after." Mac is silent while he does the math in his head. "Truby could have set the fire and then robbed Mr. Monroe."

"Where was Junior?" I ask.

"He claims he was at the Macy's warehouse looking over some things for the parade preparations. A Miss Danville confirms it."

"So he couldn't have set the fire….doesn't mean he didn't tell Truby to do it. Okay, thanks Mac. Hey, are you having any luck trying to find the bastards that tried to air out my jacket today?"

"No luck yet. There's a million of those cars in this city, and no one caught a license plate."

"Course they didn't," I mutter. "Eight million eyes in this city, nobody ever sees anything."

"I'll keep ya in the loop," Mac tells me.

"Thanks, Mac," I reply, and hang up.

Inside the office, color is returning to Jessica Angell's face. I relay what Mac has told me about Andrew Bedford's death.

"Even if he'd been sleeping," Stella says, "wouldn't he have felt the fact that he was on fire? Why would he just sit down in his chair and take it?"

"Maybe he's a heavy sleeper," I suggest. "Hell, I don't know."

"Maybe he was sedated," Jessica offers quietly. Her knuckles are whit,e wrapped around her cup of water. "Someone could have put something in food or drink before he died."

I think about it. "There were no cups or plates in the office." I think about the cigarette. "And I don't think anything was in the cigarette."

"It could have been injected," she postulates. "We knock out the smaller animals at the zoo that way. And if he was burned badly, it would cover the needle markings."

"That makes sense," I say. "Stel, you stay here with Jessica. I need to go run by the zoo again and talk to Dr. Hawkes."

"Try his office in the main building," Jessica says. "He's usually there late."

I always knew this Hawkes fella was someone I liked, but I like him even more now that I know he's a workaholic like me. True to Jessica's prediction, Dr. Hawkes is working in his office when I get there as the sun is going down. I tap lightly on the open door, and he looks up from a stack of paperwork. "Mr. Flack," he greets me with a smile. "How can I help you?"

"Call me Flack," I say. "Got a few questions for you."

His eyes turn wary. "What do you mean?" he asks, suspicion in his voice.

I chuckle. "Nothing like that, Doc. You're just the only doctor I've met that I actually like."

Hawkes relaxes. "Fair enough, then. Ask away."

I sit down in the chair on the other side of his desk. He leans back and props his feet up on his desk. Yep, knew I liked him. "I have a case that I could use some medical expertise on," I begin. I outline the Bedford case, not naming any names. As I get deeper into it, though, I catch a smile tugging at Hawkes's mouth. "All right Doc, what?" I ask him. "You're smilin' like the cat that ate the canary."

"You're talkin' about the Bedford thing," Hawkes guesses. "It's been in the papers. Rich guy dies, people talk."

"So….you've read the papers then. Got any theories for me?"

At this point, Hawkes takes his feet off his desk. His whole body language changes. He's gone from relaxed to slightly tense, and I pick up on it instantly. "What, Doc?"

"Flack, do you know what ketamine is?"

"Unless it's a form of alcohol, no."

"It's a sedative. A pretty strong one. We use it to sedate the larger animals here at the zoo during surgical procedures."

"Did you use it on the tiger?"

"No. Khan was out when we found him in the morning."

I raise an eyebrow. "Eating Dean Truby killed him?"

"Bengal tigers eat other big cats, Flack. A human being was just a snack-sized appetizer for that cat."

I process that. And….I get nothing. "Okay, help me out here, Doc."

"Khan was unconscious when we found him. By then he'd already eaten most of this Truby person. I'm saying there was enough ketamine in Dean Truby that when Khan ate him-"

"-it knocked your kitty out," I finish. I whistle. "Wow." I wonder aloud, "I wonder if he hadn't been burnt to a crisp if we'd have found ketamine in Andrew Bedford."

That's when he gets real quiet. "Doc, you're actin' kinda twitchy over there," I say. "You know somethin'?"

He sighs. "I ordered a case of ketamine a couple weeks ago. When the delivery got here, there was a bottle missing. I just chalked it up to handling, and assumed it broke or was never packaged to begin with."

"So there's a bottle of stuff floatin' around out there that's strong enough to knock out a horse?" I ask. "Wouldn't take much to knock out a human, huh?"

Hawkes shakes his head. "Definitely not."

I stand. "Doc, you've been a huge help. One more thing-can you tell me where you got the order of ketamine from?"

Hawkes writes down the address. "I'm sorry, Flack. I didn't think it was important."

"You couldn't have known, Doc. It's all right." I take the slip of paper from him. "Thanks."

As I drive back to the office, I run through the facts in my mind. Andrew Bedford is drugged with ketamine, and Dean Truby sets the fire in his office to make it look like a stray cigarette caused the fire. Then he takes off from the scene, and along the way, tries to rob Sterling Monroe and Sid Hammerback. Then, someone decides Truby's a loose end and they drug him and then toss him in the tiger cage.

My mind drifts back to that day at the Bedford's penthouse. Junior sure seemed like he was in a hurry to get me out of there. So either he was afraid I was gonna muck up their carpet with my shoes….or he didn't want me askin' questions.

I change directions and head back uptown. I'm hopin' Colleen Bedford is home and Junior is not.