The Skeleton Takes a Bow (A Family Skeleton Mystery) by Leigh Perry Read Free Book Online

not going to start attacking people at random.”
    “We don’t know that.”
    “What do you expect me to do, Sid? Take Madison out of school? Homeschool her? She’d never go for that, not even if she did believe—”
    “Not even if she believed me?”
    “You were eavesdropping last night, weren’t you?”
    “Sorry. I didn’t mean to—I just wanted to get a book I left downstairs. But I heard my name, and, well, old habits die hard.”
    “I get that.” Before Madison had learned about Sid, eavesdropping had been his way of being part of the family. “I’m sorry Madison doesn’t believe you. Just give her time.”
    “I can do that; I will do that. But for now, her not believing me means she won’t be careful the way she should be with a killer on the loose.”
    “I just don’t see why she would be a target. And I have no idea what we can do to find the killer anyway.” He started to speak, but I interrupted him. “So this is what I think we should do. I want you to keep going to school with Madison, and I want you to eavesdrop like you’ve never eavesdropped before. If you hear anything that will give us a starting point, we’ll go from there. Okay?”
    Sid wouldn’t have been the skeleton I know and love if he hadn’t argued, but he finally had to agree because he couldn’t think of anything more proactive to do, either. If he did hear something, he would be able to let me know right away because instead of just sending his skull to school, we were going to put one hand and an old cell phone in his bag so he’d be able to text me if he heard anything important. During classes, he’d eavesdrop from Madison’s locker, and during rehearsals, he’d be listening from backstage.
    Despite having recently fussed because I hadn’t told her everything, Madison did not seem enthused by being let in on the plans that evening. In fact, she rolled her eyes when we explained the idea to her. The expression reminded me far too much of Deborah, which was probably why I played dirty and pointed out that if Sid had had a hand and phone the Thursday before, he would have been able to remind her to come get him. She wasn’t happy with me, but she agreed to carry out her part of the scheme.
    None of us brought up the fact that Madison didn’t believe Sid’s story.
    Even though I still did believe, I didn’t really think Madison was in any danger at school, even if Sid hadn’t been there to keep an eye out. Or at least an eye socket. But apparently my subconscious had other ideas—that night I had one bad dream after another.

9
    F or once, I was glad to see Monday morning. Normally I greeted it with dread. That semester I was teaching five sections of freshman composition at McQuaid University, and since there’s an unwritten rule that adjuncts get the most inconvenient schedules imaginable, I had classes on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at eight AM , nine AM , ten AM , and eleven AM . Naturally I had to change classrooms for each of those—adjuncts don’t get permanent classrooms. If I survived that, I had enough time to run by the adjunct office to check messages and go grab lunch before keeping office hours from one thirty to three thirty, which was always a mob scene on Monday because that was the day I handed back the previous week’s assignment—usually either reading response papers or essays—and announced that week’s assignment. That meant I usually didn’t shake loose from anxious freshmen until after four, which gave me an hour or two to catch up on accumulated paperwork and get home. By that point Madison was usually starving, so I’d throw together dinner, eat, clean up, and collapse. I sometimes skipped the cleaning part.
    I only had one McQuaid class on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I was stuck with the eight AM slot again, but at least it left me time for grading and doing paperwork.
    The routine was complicated enough that I lived in fear that I’d forget which day it was. The only good