“I’d say it’s not a bomb, but whatever’s in there’s got some weight to it.”

I glowered at him, then started in on my pockets, feeling around for my keys to use to make a dent on the tape.

Turk watched, caught on, and then reached behind to his waistband and pulled out a knife big enough to gut a whale. He handed it to me, hilt-side first, the hilt covered by what looked like crocodile hide. I shook it at him. “This? Right here? Illegal.”

Turk looked unimpressed. “Better to be judged by twelve than carried by six.”

“Step back,” I ordered. Reluctantly he took a tiny step back. I motioned with the mega-knife. “Three more. Big ones.”

Turk hesitated before complying. Only then did I take his knife, slit the tape away from the top of the box, reach over, and pull the flap back.

“Well, what is it?” Turk asked.

I began pulling plastic away. “Don’t know yet, so far it’s just a lot of . . .”

I heard myself scream; then I recoiled. Staring up at me from the box were glassy green eyes the color of Chinese jade attached to a face, a dead human face. The recoil was so strong, I lost my footing and landed on my backside. Like a crab, I skittered backward, fast, until my back hit the opposite wall. I squeezed my eyes shut, tried breathing, but I could still see the eyes. The stench of death was now shooting out of the box like the decomposing rot of a mummy’s tomb.

“Holy crap!” Turk yelled, holding his nose. He’d crept forward to take a look. “Is that a real head in there?”

I took a moment, then two more. It’s not like this was my first dead body. It’s just that you do not expect to see a dead person’s head in a box with your name on it, a box delivered to you, like a gift. I stood, shaking off the heebie-jeebies, my skin crawling.

Turk shook his head, frowned. “Man, that is not cool.”

I approached the box again, pulled back the flaps for a better look. The head was still there, the eyes, the rot. I covered my nose, held my breath. The head was detached from its body. I found the rest—legs, torso, arms—stacked up beside it like a cord of wood, bloodied, its cut edges jagged. I turned my attention back to the eyes. They weren’t quite so dreamy now. This was Vincent Darby, the man who’d threatened to break me in two.

* * *