The Prof Croft Series: Books 0-4 (Prof Croft Box Sets Book 1) by Brad Magnarella (best business books of all time txt) 📕

Tabitha went airborne in a yowling series of somersaults. She hooked her claws into a set of drapes, bringing the whole apparatus crashing down behind her divan. A string of choice words told me she was all right.

Panting, I rolled in a small pond of black gunk onto my side. As the tail end of the geyser spattered down, a creamy white light fluttered around my vision. I’d come really close to my limits with that invocation, but I’d know in a few seconds just how close. I could all but hear Thelonious’s smooth, jiving voice, anticipating his night of carousing.

“Not now,” I begged as his light washed in like the surf. “I’ll let you out another time. I promise.”

I’d begged before, but it never did any good. Thelonious was a force beyond sympathy, beyond reason. But whether it was for the urgency of my plea, or that I had just enough fumes in my tank to forestall him, the creamy white light began to withdraw. At last, it fluttered out entirely.

Thank God.

I pushed myself up, groaning. But did that mean I would have to let him out another night? I wiped my sword against a pant leg and sheathed it in the staff. I’d worry about whatever bargain I might or might not have struck with Thelonious another time. Right now, I had to get to Detective Vega and her kid and then to the cathedral.

“Wh-what in the world happened out here?”

I turned to face Meredith, who was standing in the bathroom doorway. As she stared over the trashed and tar-splashed apartment, it looked as if she was considering retreating back into the bathroom and relocking the door.

“Everything’s fine now,” I assured her. “Just a couple of pranksters.”

“Pranksters?” Her gaze fell to my right shoulder. “You’re bleeding!”

I looked down as if noticing the sopping mess for the first time. “Well, I’ll be damned.”

“We need to get you to a hospital!”

“All right, but let me grab a few things.”

I climbed the ladder to my lab. There was no time to cook potions, but I dropped the bottle of holy water and a few spell implements into my coat pockets. Otherwise, it was going to be my sword, staff, necklace, and whatever power remained in me, which was almost none.

By the time I descended the ladder, Tabitha had extricated herself from the drapery and was perched on the divan, trying to smack the taste of shrieker from her mouth. The black pools had all but evaporated, but the scent hung in the air like an evil mist. I gave my cat a thumbs up before striding toward Meredith, who was exclaiming over the ruined hallway.

“I’ll be here when you get back,” Tabitha murmured, referring to the lack of wards.

It took me a moment to realize she had also voiced her confidence that I would be coming back. My eyes threatened to well up. Sometimes all a person needed was the begrudging love of his cat. I opened my mouth to say this, but her slitted eyes suggested I not push it.

“And I’ll have goat’s milk,” I amended. “You’ve more than earned it.”

That got half a furry smile.

41

Meredith and I arrived on the street at the same time police lights appeared down the block. Before the car’s jouncing high beams could hit us, I pulled Meredith around the side of the building, into an alleyway.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “That’s a police car.”

I peeked around the corner. Though the shrieker battle felt as though it had lasted an hour, it had only been ten or so minutes since I’d spoken to Vega on the phone. And here were Dempsey and Dipinski, as promised. With a finger to my lips, I signaled for Meredith to keep behind me.

Confusion creased her young face. “They can help us,” she whispered.

“Trust me,” I said. “They can’t.”

The squad car jerked to a stop against the opposite curb. Dipinski emerged from the passenger side and squinted around. I had absorbed a little light from our space to be safe. The boy-sized officer looked past the alley, then adjusted his too-large hat as he waited for Dempsey to kill the engine and join him.

They started across the street at a jog, Dempsey snapping his keychain to his duty belt. With the point of my cane and a soft incantation, I undid the leather clasp, then caught the keys before they clattered to the street. Using the same low-level force, I lowered the keys gently the rest of the way. Dempsey didn’t break stride. I waited until the building door knocked closed behind the officers before pulling Meredith into the street.

“Know how to drive?” I asked her.

“Yeah…?”

“Good.” I scooped up the keys and handed them to her. “I need a driver.”

At about the time I estimated Dempsey and Dipinski were emerging from the apartment building, Dempsey slapping his empty key holder, I had Meredith take a sharp left onto Delancey Street.

“Where are we even going?” she asked.

She was driving the police cruiser only slightly faster than my late grandmother, but at least she was driving. That had taken a little convincing, but she had consented—for no other reason, I suspected, than I was a favorite professor. I was abusing the teacher-student relationship big time, but seeing as how tomorrow’s hearing was going to be career ending for me anyway, I didn’t feel I was risking an awful lot. And with tonight being potentially life ending…

“The Williamsburg section of Brooklyn,” I answered.

“Brooklyn? Is that where your primary physician is?”

“It’s where a police detective lives.”

She stole a glance over her shoulder. “Couldn’t those guys back there have…?”

“It’s a long story, but no.”

“What about your arm?”

“It’s not as bad as it looks.”

When I didn’t offer anything more, Meredith trained her frowning face on the approaching suspension bridge, hands at ten and two. I sat back. The shoulder that had dislocated throbbed in a cold ache. The one that had been gnawed on flashed with hot barbs. I managed to