Lethal People: A Donovan Creed Crime Novel by John Locke

and pushed Monica out. Her body tumbled into a thicket and skidded to a stop. She staggered to her feet and managed to walk a few shaky steps before falling down to stay.
    Callie put the van in gear and steered it carefully through the underbrush and back onto the highway. She kept to the speed limit, drove south, and put the crime scene behind us.
    “A real fighter, that one,” I said, making my way to the front passenger seat. “She impressed me just now, the way she got to her feet.”
    Callie nodded.
    The van’s tires thrummed rhythmically over the patchy road tar. We passed a golf course on the right and an ambitious condo development on the left, which appeared to be unfinished and abandoned. The few residential community entrances we passed were camouflaged by foliage so dense and overgrown, even in February, I had to wonder what sort of people would pay these astronomical prices to live a half mile from the beach, among the spiders and mosquitoes, without benefit of an ocean view.
    “She had gorgeous hair,” I said.
    “Very stylish,” Callie agreed. “And classy.” She paused a minute before asking, “How long you think before someone finds her?”
    “This close to the plantation? Probably two days.”
    “You think they’ll notice the needle mark on the scalp?”
    “What are we, CSI? I doubt the ME will notice it.”
    “Because?”
    “I put it in one of her head wounds.”
    Callie thought about that and said, “She must have hit the wall head first when you threw her in the van.”
    “That’d be my guess,” I said.
    We rode in silence awhile, content to watch the scenery unfold. We were on A1A, south of Amelia Island, where the two-lane road cuts a straight swath through the undeveloped scrub and marsh for fifteen miles. There was a primal element to this stretch of land that seemed to discourage the rampant commercialization running almost nonstop from Jacksonville to South Beach. A couple miles in, we passed three crosses and a crude, homemade sign that proclaimed “Jesus Died For Your Sins!”
    “Monica seemed nice,” Callie said. “A little snooty, but that could be the money. Or the age di ff erence. Still, I liked her. She had great manners.”
    I laughed. “Manners?”
    “She had a premonition about the van,” Callie said. “But she didn’t want to o ff end me, so she came anyway.”
    I tried the sound of it in my mouth. “She was killed because of her good manners.”
    “I liked her,” Callie repeated.
    “I liked her, too,” I said, “until she peed on me!”
    I placed two bundles of cash in Callie’s lap. She picked one up, felt the weight in her hand.
    “I like this even better,” she said.
    We dropped the van o ff behind an abandoned barn a couple miles beyond the ferry boat landing. We removed the explosives from the wheel well in Callie’s rental car and positioned them throughout the van.
    “How much you have to pay for this thing?” Callie asked.
    “Four grand,” I said. “Not me, though. Victor.” Right on cue, my phone rang.
    “Is it … fin … ished?” Victor asked.
    “Just a sec,” I said. I climbed in the passenger seat, and Callie drove us a quarter mile before putting the rental car in park.
    “Are we far enough away?” I asked.
    “If we go too far,” she said, “we’ll miss the fun part.”
    She got out of the car and dialed a number on her phone and the van exploded in the distance. Callie remained out of the car until she felt the wind from the explosion wash lightly over her face.
    “You’re insane,” I said to Callie.
    “It’s done,” I said to Victor.
    Victor said, “Good. I … have … two more … jobs … for you.”
    “Already?” I retrieved a small notebook and pen from my du ff el and wrote down the information. The names, ages, occupations, and addresses were so di ff erent, it seemed as though they’d been plucked out of thin air. I asked Victor, “Do you even know these people?”
    “All … part … of a …