The caterwauling top forty hit in the background muffled as Jamie heard what sounded like a car door slamming shut.
“Jamie? Is that you?” asked Vince, sounding more composed.
“Yep. I need a favor.”
“Where are you? I don’t have a lot of contacts in prison anymore. And a women’s facility...”
“I’m not in prison. I’m here.”
“Here here?”
Jamie could almost see him pointing to the ground as he said the words.
“Yes. As a favor. Like I said.”
Vince sniffed. “How’d you get out? I thought they got you for life.”
“That’s not important. What’s important is that I need a favor.”
Honestly, it’s like talking to a child. Concentrate, Vince.
“Right. I got you. Whaddya need?”
“Two people killed.”
Jamie heard what sounded like a yip of surprise. “Aw, jeeze, Jamie. You call me, using my real name, and you want me to…” he paused and lowered his voice to a whisper “…to kill someone?”
“Someones. Two people. And I’d appreciate a package deal. And by deal I mean you’ll do it for free or I’ll tell the world where you are and give them addresses of your grandkids.”
“I have grandkids?”
Jamie winced. She’d forgotten he’d lost all touch with his family.
“No. I don’t know. I’m kidding. But seriously, I need two people dead, like yesterday.”
Vince sighed. “Come on. You know I don’t do that no more. I’m an old man now.”
“You killed Timothy Packard outside his home in Grand Rapids two months ago during a blizzard.”
The phone went silent again.
“Vince?”
“Mother of—will you stop sayin’ my name? The phone could be tapped for all I know.”
“I will if you stop disappearing.”
“Fine. Sorry. What do you want me to say?”
“Am I lying?”
“No.” Vince chuckled. “It was a hell of a shot. The winds were in the teens. How’d you know about that?” He stopped and then muttered a quiet string of curses, no doubt realizing he’d just admitted to a murder on the phone. “I’m out of practice with all this coat and dagger stuff.”
Jamie resisted the urge to correct his idiom. “I can see that.”
“But seriously, how did you know about Grand Rapids?”
“You know I keep track of all my little runaways.”
“Even in prison?”
“Minor inconvenience.” Jamie slammed on her brakes, realizing she needed to stop for a red light. The last thing she needed to do was break out of prison and then get picked up for running a red light.
“Why don’t you do it yourself?” asked Vince.
Jamie tilted back her head, embarrassed. “Because I promised my daughter I wouldn’t.”
Vince laughed, as she’d feared he would.
“Laugh again and I’ll kill you for fun.”
“I’m sorry. You gotta admit—” He cleared his throat. “Sorry. Anyway, doesn’t hiring me to do it count?”
“Not in my book.”
Vince sighed. “If I do this, this is it. You can’t keep comin’ back and holding WITSEC over my head no more.”
“Can’t I?”
“Come on, Jamie. What’s fair is fair.”
Jamie locked eyes with a woman crossing in front of her car, who apparently didn’t like how close she’d crept to the crosswalk before stopping. She flipped her off and the woman gasped and looked away.
“Fine. This is it. One last big favor,” she said.
Vince sighed. “Thank you. Who is it?”
“Do you want the information over the phone?”
“You might as well at this point.”
“I’ll text you the names and addresses. I’d like them at the same time please.”
“Are they in the same place?”
“Often. And it’s right here in town.”
“In Charity? Jeeze. I know a lot of people around here. I hope it isn’t anyone I know.”
“I doubt it. Oh, and it needs to look like an accident.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
Vince grumbled. “That’s not my thing.”
“I know. Sorry.”
“Okay. Whatever. I’ll figure it out. I’ll let you know when it’s done.”
“Thank you. Later, Edward.”
Jamie hung up and tossed her phone on the passenger seat, smiling.
This has to work.
This was Stephanie’s last chance. Jamie was getting old and she needed to train the next generation. If The Puzzle Killer continued, even with her gone or in jail, she’d have a legacy. She wouldn’t be a prolific serial killer.
She’d be a legend.
Her daughter had all the raw materials. She just needed molding.
But first, Stephanie had to let go of her ties to Declan and Charity. She had to say goodbye to the part of her that still felt things.
It made life so much easier.
Chapter Eleven
Mariska looked away, covering her mouth and nose with a hand. “This is disgusting.”
Darla, Gloria and she stood in the middle of the intersection hunched around a dead raccoon like hungry scavengers, no cars coming because it was three in the morning.
“You’re not the one shoveling,” said Darla, forcing down a gag reflex. The smell only told half the story. Shoveling a dead critter from the asphalt following its day in the Florida heat felt like peeling a Band-Aid off a raw wound. “Gloria, you have to have a better idea than this?”
Gloria ignored her and handed Mariska a trash bag. “Hold this open.”
Mariska looked at the bag as if Gloria had offered her a sheet of human skin.
“I don’t know...”
Gloria released the bag and Mariska grabbed it from the air before it could flutter to the ground. She mumbled what sounded like a prayer and rubbed the edge of it between her thumb and forefinger until she was able to open it. Snapping it out once, she let the bag swallow enough air to billow.
Darla offered her best I’m so sorry face, but as the cloud of funk rising from the raccoon wrapped around her head like a scarf, she felt her expression morph through fifteen different phases of
