He offered Letty a Dramamine. “You might want this. Even though I’ve got us on the backside of Egmont, facing into the wind, I can’t completely stabilize the boat.”

She shook her head.

“Okay, then. I need you to stretch out here with your feet together. I’m gonna wrap this chain around your ankles, then your middle, then your shoulders. It’s kinda damp and rusty, but there’s nothing I can do about that.”

The sun had slid even lower in the deepening purple sky and the wind picked up again, making whitecaps on the water’s surface. Letty crawled onto the bow and assumed the position. Joe worked quickly, winding the chain around her body. She felt the dread and nausea rise in her throat as he worked his way toward her torso, and she arched her back to let him slip the wet metal links beneath her body.

“Almost done,” he said. She turned her head and saw that he was kneeling beside her. “Try and breathe out of your mouth. It’s fixing to get ugly now.” He lifted the lid of the bucket and she gasped as the fetid smell of dead fish assaulted her nostrils.

“I’m sorry, but this was the best I could do on such short notice,” Joe said, as he dipped a rag into the bucket and brought it out, dripping with deep red blood. “Probably best if you close your eyes so you don’t see what happens next. And keep breathing through your nose.”

She did as he suggested, and flinched as she felt him dabbing her forehead, cheeks, and neck with the bloody rag. She heard the sound of liquid pouring from the bucket and gagged out loud as she felt the wet fish blood seeping into her hair and the collar of her shirt.

He patted her shoulder again. “Almost done, Letty.” Her eyelids fluttered open and she saw the flare of a match lighting and saw him touch it to the tip of a cigar. “What are you doing?”

When the cigar had burned down half an inch, he pinched the flame with his forefingers, then, holding the cigar in his left hand, he tipped his right pinky finger into the ash, then delicately tapped it onto her forehead and right shoulder.

“Bullet holes,” he said.

“Not too shabby,” Vikki said, leaning over to inspect. “But to be completely convincing, we could use some brain tissue.”

Joe rolled his eyes. “I’ll tell Wingfield I did the deed in a dark alley, then moved the body to the boat. Like any self-respecting hit man would.”

“Could you two quit admiring your handiwork and take the damned picture before I pass out from the smell?” Letty said, gritting her teeth.

“Turn your head to the side,” the FBI agent ordered. She held out her phone and began clicking the shutter, moving slowly around Letty’s body, photographing it from a dozen different angles.