Page 69 of Brody
There was no time for second-guessing. Holding tight to Ellis’s hand, I pulled him up the stairs with me.
The trapdoor had a complicated latch. For a moment, I feared we were trapped, but the latch turned easily under my hand. Sounds of grinding stone and moving gears echoed through the tunnel as the trap door opened. It split down the middle and slid aside like a pair of elevator doors, blinding us with the sudden glow of daylight.
The trap door led into the bottom of a large stone box. Luckily, it was only a couple feet tall, so climbing out wasn’t a problem, butEllis’s foot snagged on the edge of the stone as he stepped over and sent us both crashing to the ground.
I kept Ellis close, letting my body take the brunt of the fall. The force of the impact knocked the air from my lungs. When I shook off the blow enough to look up, I found a pair of sturdy black boots standing right in front of me.
“What the hell have you gotten yourself into?” someone demanded.
I knew that voice.
Looking up so quickly I nearly snapped my own neck, I called out in surprise.
“Creed!”
It had been months since I’d last seen the man through anything other than a screen, but he looked exactly the same. Same dark hair, same stern face, and the same intimidating build, as if he could block out the sun with the width of his shoulders alone.
And, at the moment, there was a very familiar scowl on his face.
“I leave you idiots alone for a few months and you’re getting chased around by murderous cults. I shouldn’t have even bothered coming. You and Magnus deserve to get shot.”
My joy at seeing my old friend was momentarily pushed to the back of my mind as I remembered our current situation. Looking around, I realized we were back in the Milford sisters’ hidden mausoleum, and Ellis and I had just crawled out of Poppy Milford’s tomb.
“What are you doing here?” I asked Creed, not sure if I was demanding to know how he’d found the hidden mausoleum, or what he was doing stateside at all.
Last I’d heard, he’d been captured by the enemy somewhere overseas and had possibly been rescued. Now, suddenly, here he was right in front of me, on the other side of the globe from where he was supposed to be.
Before Creed could answer, voices floated up from the opening to the staircase inside Poppy Milford’s grave. The cult members were still following us.
Creed held out a hand, palm facing toward me.
“Wait here. I’ll take care of it.”
Just before he disappeared into the darkness of the underground tunnel, I saw him pull out a gun from his belt and knew how he planned to “take care” of things.
Ellis latched onto my arm, plastering himself to my side. “Brody, who... What’s going on?”
He was shaking from head to toe, and for the first time since we started running, I realized he still held the gun he’d used to save me.
“Hey, Ellis. It’s okay. I can take that now.”
The metal of the gun practically rattled in his hand, and it was a miracle he hadn’t accidentally pulled the trigger by now. I had to help him pry his fingers off of the handle, and then shoved it into the empty holster on my own belt for safekeeping.
Down inside the tunnel, people started shouting, and a gunshot rang through the air.
“Come on,” I said as I led Ellis away from the open tomb. “Let’s get out of here.”
Outside the tunnel, we were immediately greeted by Deputy Hillard, who came running up to us with several officers in tow.
“That man, Creed Landry, where’d he go?”
Still shocked from the sudden turn of events, I just pointed back inside the mausoleum.
Deputy Hillard sighed and hurried his people into the mausoleum. “I told him to wait for us. This is a police matter. We need to be the ones to handle it.”
I could have told Deputy Hillard that his orders were pointless. Creed would never stay behind while people he cared about were in danger. Even our commanding officers had trouble keeping control of him, and he probably would have been dishonorably discharged long ago if he wasn’t so good at his job.
However, Deputy Hillard and the other law enforcement officers were already charging into the mausoleum before I could say a word, and didn’t bother shouting after him. He could learn for himself how impossible Creed could be.
