Shadow Duel (Prof Croft Book 9) Brad Magnarella (the best novels to read .TXT) 📖

Though the situation looked dire, I’d known this might happen. I released my hold over the many-many potion I’d drunk upstairs and felt it come alive in my system like a carbonated drink. And then fizz out.

Are you freaking kidding me?

The lights in the temple snapped on, and the shadow of my wife entered.

37

“Yeah, that’s him,” Vega said, holstering her sidearm. “Good work.”

The large man backed away as she strode forward, his and his teammates’ rifles covering me from three angles. But I was watching Vega. She was still carrying that hard, beaten-down look that made my heart ache. She stopped in front of me, fists on her hips, the lines around her dark eyes narrowing.

“Everson Croft,” she said coldly.

Ricki Vega, I thought, my lovely wife.

But I kept my mouth shut and focused on kickstarting the many-many potion.

“You’re under arrest for the murders of Bear Goldburn, Robert Strock, and Walter Mims.” Though her lower lip wrinkled, I knew she was as disappointed with herself as she was disgusted by me. She’d had me the night before, and I’d gotten away, gone on to murder two more as far as she knew.

“All clear!” the men called.

They returned from back rooms, a pair taking positions in the temple while the rest joined the group around me. Their eyes were hidden by their helmet visors, but their jaws were matching blocks of contempt. The huge guy who’d first spotted me looked ready to stomp me with his size fifteen boots.

But there was an odd glint in Vega’s eyes. It could have been that I was still semi-spectral from the stealth potion, but I believed it was something else. I didn’t know my backstory here—how my shadow had died, or if he’d even existed in the first place—but Vega would have investigated it, and she was trying to make sense of something.

“Want us to tenderize him before throwing him in the wagon?” the large man asked.

“No, I’ve got him,” Vega said, the hardness returning to her face. “Collect his things, but be careful. He was carrying explosives last night.”

As she reached for my arm, I said, “You didn’t check the basement.”

She stopped. “What did you say?”

I jerked my head toward the door behind me. “Your men searched every room in here. Why not the basement?” I was trying to buy time, more for Ludvig than myself—he hadn’t sounded as if he had many screams left. If I could convince her to breach the door, Eldred would have to suspend the ritual.

But Vega responded by pulling me roughly to my feet.

“You were ordered not to, weren’t you?” I said. “Told it was off limits? You have to be wondering why. Could it be that Eldred murdered those three men, and he’s killing a fourth down there as we speak?”

“Shut it,” she snapped.

The semicircle of men parted as she tugged me toward the temple door.

“The basement,” I repeated in a lowered voice. “Go look, and you’ll see what I’m talking about. He gave you my name because I was getting too close. He called you here last night and again tonight so I couldn’t stop him. Why else would I have come back? Look around at this place for crissake. He’s killing people for sacrificial organs.”

Vega tightened her grip on my arm, but had it faltered?

“Look, I know this isn’t what you signed up for.” The words came spontaneously, from a sudden need to connect with her. I was remembering Vega’s story about her father, a youth counselor who’d been killed trying to broker peace between warring gangs. When the entire 43rd Precinct showed up to his service, hats off, she knew at seventeen she wanted to be a cop. Gambling that some version of the story held true in this reality, I said, “I know it’s not what your father inspired—”

The stock end of a rifle cracked into my side, and I staggered to the floor. When I squinted up, the huge guy was looming over me.

“My wife told you to shut it,” he growled.

The throbbing became an afterthought as I stared between him and Vega. His wife?

“Jag—” she started to say, but the many-many potion chose that moment to activate. Like a pack of Mentos dropped into a bucket of Diet Coke, it frothed violently inside me. Vega and her husband jumped back as two likenesses of me ballooned from my sides and assumed independent form.

“The fuck?” Jag muttered, moving his rifle barrel across the three of us.

Two more likenesses popped from the existing ones, and then two more from them. In the span of seconds there were more than a dozen of us. But the duplicating was just getting started. In another moment, a mass of Everson Crofts blocked Vega and her husband from my view.

About freaking time.

As the temple filled with more of my likenesses, I gained my feet and squeezed my way through them and away from the Sup Squad. Shown to me by Gretchen just last month, the many-many potion was part manifestation, part enchantment. The likenesses weren’t designed to attack, just confuse and take up space. Great for arrests-in-progress. And they were duplicating extra fast now.

A shot sounded, but most Squad members were engaging them with punches and rifle blows. I tapped into three of the manifestations, and they met me at the door to the storage room. One was carrying my coat, the other my cane and shotgun. A third circled behind me and snapped the zip tie binding my wrists.

“Thanks, boys.”

I claimed my coat, donning it and pulling out a tube of sleeping potion.

Being manhandled was fun and all, but because I can’t have you guys following me…

I activated the potion and aimed it into the temple. As vapors began issuing from the tube, I summoned a force and swung the pink torrent that erupted back and forth, covering everyone and everything. Beyond the manifestations, I could hear members of the Sup Squad thudding to the floor.

I caught myself hoping Vega’s landing wasn’t too hard.

I