Suck It Up: A Croft and Tabby Short (Croft & Tabby Book 3)

Suck It Up A Croft & Tabby Short 3 Brad Magnarella Copyright © 2023 by Brad Magnarella All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. Cover design by MiblArt bradmagnarella.com Table of Contents Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7 Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Chapter 10 Chapter 11 Chapter 12 The Prof Croft Series Free Books, Anyone? Author’s Note About the Author Croftverse Catalogue The Prof Croft Series PREQUELS Book of Souls Siren Call MAIN SERIES Demon Moon Blood Deal Purge City Death Mage Black Luck Power Game Druid Bond Night Rune Shadow Duel Shadow Deep Godly Wars Angel Doom SPIN OFFS Croft & Tabby Croft & Wesson 1 I stood my rolling suitcase on its end, leaned my walking cane against it, and knocked tentatively on Kayla’s apartment door. As I switched the pet carrier to my other hand, Tabitha groaned in annoyance. “I didn’t forget,” I preempted her. “Then what in the hell are we doing here?” “We had this conversation on the walk over.” “I was too busy trying to keep from getting motion-sick all over myself to hear whatever you were going on about.” I sighed. “I didn’t forget. I just didn’t see the notice.” My cat squeezed around inside the carrier until her green eyes flashed accusingly through the mesh door. “Yes, darling, because your mail pile is big enough to hide a body under.” She wasn’t wrong. I’d gotten in the habit of tossing my mail on the dining room table, every intention of opening it later, only to bury it in more mail. I vaguely remembered a postcard-sized announcement about a fumigation scheduled for the building, something to do with rats on the lower levels. But it wasn’t until my apartment manager banged on the door at ten that morning that I understood the fumigation was this weekend and I was supposed to have cleared out an hour earlier. “Just look at it as an unplanned vacation,” I said, growing antsy as I knocked again. Was Kayla even home? I would have called, but my line was dead. I imagined the overdue phone bill in the aforementioned pile. “A vacation?” she repeated flatly. “With her?” “Would you rather huff toxic fumes for the next two days?” “I’m very tempted, darling. She annoys me.” “Everyone annoys you,” I reminded her. “Well, she’s a special case, with all her babbling about her mystical insights and intuitions.” “She’s been surprisingly accurate,” I pointed out, though I still couldn’t figure out how, given that she was mortal through and through. But our last case, with the Babaroga, hadn’t been a fluke. “And that grating voice,” Tabitha continued. “Ugh.” “Hey,” I said quietly, “we’re not exactly bursting with options here. She’s the only one in the city who knows you can talk.” And I didn’t trust my cat to keep her mouth shut for forty-eight minutes, much less hours. “Well, why can’t we go somewhere nice,” she pouted, “like the Ritz-Carlton?” I looked down the flaps of my burned coat, past the frayed pants cuffs, to my scuffed shoes. “Sounds great,” I said with a snort. “Are you paying this time?” “Magic is wasted on you,” she muttered. Though I shook my head dismissively, I was going to have to start considering other lodgings. Kayla wasn’t home, and Manhattan’s lower-end hotels were only slightly less dangerous than its supernatural streets after dark. I was raising my fist for a final, futile knock, when the door creaked open. I blinked in surprise at the young woman standing in the shadow of the doorway. She looked like she’d been run over by a truck and resurrected as a zombie. Her ratty shirt and pants were torn, and the half of her face not hidden by a curtain of black hair was smudged with what looked like engine grease. She stared at me blearily. “I-I’m sorry,” I stammered. “I was looking for Kayla?” I leaned back to make sure I had the right apartment number. In a voice croaky with sleep, she said, “It’s me, Everson. Entrez.” I hesitated for a moment, but when she backed inside and waved for me to follow, I saw it was Kayla. What I’d mistaken for grease was a copious amount of dark makeup she’d apparently slept in. I couldn’t account for the rest of her look, including the aggressive lip piercing. What had happened to the hippie chick? “I’m sorry to just show up like this,” I said, edging in sideways with my suitcase and Tabitha’s pet carrier. “They’re fumigating my apartment, and I was hoping we could crash for a couple nights.” “It’s cool,” she said, locking the door as I stepped into her cramped living room. “I dreamt you’d come.” “Oh, yeah?” I said, not entirely surprised. But instead of elaborating, she collapsed sideways onto a loveseat and slung an arm across her eyes. “Just make yourself at home. Help yourself to whatever’s in the fridge.” She flicked her wrist toward the kitchenette. “I’d offer you a bed, but they’re all taken. I hope you don’t mind the other couch.” “Sure, sure, this is fine,” I said, sizing up the stained cushions. I’d been to Kayla’s apartment a month earlier, but it hadn’t looked like this. Gone were the colorful throw blankets, candles, and prayer flags, along with the crystal displays, dangling dream catchers, and books on feminine wisdom and nature magic. In their places were cast-off clothes, plates of half-eaten food, and walls of posters that featured scary-looking singers in screaming poses. A mist of stale cigarette smoke smothered whatever remained of her mystical-smelling incense. And then there was Kayla herself. “Is everything… all right?” I asked carefully. I relocated a coffee mug crammed with cigarette butts from