Read Online Murder by Magic by Rosemary Edghill - Free Book Online

stop him before we’re all dead!”
    “Vito’s right,” said Joey. “We’re all in danger.”
    My cell phone suddenly rang, making us all jump a little. (Hey, if you thought someone was about to kill you that way, wouldn’t you be a little jumpy, too?) I pulled the phone out of my pocket. “Hello?”
    “Vito?” said Joey at the other end. “I’m coming from my mother’s, and I’m still in Brooklyn. Stuck in traffic. You’d better start the sit-down without me. I’ll get there as soon as I can.”
    My blood ran cold as I stared at the Joey sitting here with me, absently stroking his chin the way the real one often did. Choosing my words carefully, I said to the Joey on the phone, “Seen anything strange lately?”
    “Huh?”
    “Anyone familiar?”
    “Well . . . my mother, obviously.”
    “No one else?”
    “What are you talking about?”
    “Okay, good,” I said with relief. I like Joey. I’d miss him if he was the next one to die. “Listen to me very carefully.
Stay right where you are.
Call me back in an hour.”
    “But, Vito—”
    “Just do it!” I hung up.
    “Who was that?” asked Joey.
    I jumped him, took him to the floor, and started banging his head against the stone. “Vito!” he screamed. “Vito!
Stop!
What are you doing?
Ow!
”
    “Vito!” cried Father Michael. “Stop!”
    “Fucking maniac,” said Carmine.
    “Thought you’d get Joey Mannino, did you?” I shouted at the doppelgangster. “Well, think again, you bastard!”
    “This is one of them?” the priest shrieked.
    “Yes!” I kept banging its head against the floor. “And it’s gonna tell me who’s behind these hits!”
    Its eyes rolled back into its head, it convulsed a few times, and then its head shattered like dry plaster.
    “Whoa!” said Tony.
    I looked down at the mess. Nothing but crumbled dust, lumps of dirt, and feathers where the thing’s head had been. Then its body started disintegrating, too.
    “I think you whacked it, Vito,” said Tony.
    Father Michael poured the whole rest of the bottle of wine down his throat before he spoke. “Well . . . I guess this means that Joey is safe now?”
    “Not for long,” I said. “Whoever did this will make another one the moment he knows this one has been—wait a minute!”
    “Vito? What is it?” said Tony.
    “Maybe it’s not a
he,
” I said.
    “Huh?”
    “Think about it! Who would hit the Berninis
and
the Gambones? Who hates
both
families that much? Who wants all of us dead?”
    “You saying the fucking feds are behind this?”
    “No, you asshole! I’m saying the one person who hates both families equally is behind this!” I grabbed a handful of the crap that had been Joey’s doppelgangster a minute ago and waved it at these guys.
“Feathers!”
    “Vito, this is a very serious accusation,” said Father Michael, slurring his words a little. “Are you absolutely sure?”
    “Huh?” said Tony.
    “Just fucking follow him,” said Carmine as I ran for the same exit that the Widow Butera had taken.
    I kicked in the door of her apartment without knocking. I’d figured out her scam by now, so I expected the feathers, the blood sacrifices, the candles, the chanting, and the photos of Bernini and Gambone family members.
    I just didn’t expect to see my own perfect double rising out of her magic fire like a genie coming out of a lantern. I pulled out my piece and fired at it.
    “Noooo!”
screamed the Widow Butera. She leaped at me, knocked my gun aside, and started clawing at my face.
    “Kill it! Kill it!” I shouted at the others.
    Carmine said, “I always wanted to do this to you, Vito,” and started pumping bullets into my doppelgangster while I fought the Widow. Father Michael ran around the room praying loudly and drenching things in holy water. Tony took a baseball bat—don’t ask me where he got it—and started destroying everything in sight: the amulets and charms hanging everywhere, the jars of powders and potions stacked on