Citizen Insane (A Barbara Marr Murder Mystery #2) Read Online Free PDF Page A

have twenty minutes at least. You’re leaving because of my mother, aren’t you?”
    They exchanged glances. Roz spoke. “She scares us. She’s so . . . what’s the word . . .”
    “Tall,” Peggy assisted Roz with their excuse.
    “Yes,” agreed Roz. “And . . .”
    “Forceful.” Peggy slipped her thin sweater on so fast that it bunched up and hung all lopsided.
    “Forceful,” nodded Roz. “That’s a good word.”
    “Better than pushy and overbearing I guess.” I shrugged.
    “We’ll just slip out your back door. Ciao!” Peggy was gone in a flash.
    “See you at the bus stop.” Roz zipped out behind her waving.
    I gave her a dirty look. She slammed the sliding glass door just as my mother swished in the front.
    “Hello? Anyone home?” She hollered out, knowing perfectly well that I was.
    Before I could get my act together or hide, she was standing over me surveying the empty wine bottle.
    “Drinking in the middle of the day?” She shook her head and clicked her tongue. “This isn’t good. This isn’t good at all.”
    My mother commands quite a presence. She towers over my five foot eight inch frame. She’s a freakishly tall, big boned woman. Not fat, just big. Everything she does is big—she dresses big and lavish, she walks big, she talks big. As a young girl growing up, I felt dwarfed by the shadow of her character, only thankful that I didn’t inherit her monstrously large physical frame. Right now, I felt about three years old.
    I learned early in life that the best way to deal with my mother’s comments was to ignore them.
    “What brings you by, Mom?”
    “Do I need a reason to visit my only daughter and grandchildren?”
    “No, but you usually have one anyway.”
    “Nope. Nope. No reason.” She sat down while giving the room a cursory visual inspection. “Not really.”
    “Not really?”
    “No, but while I’m here, I might as well mention that I met a very nice, handsome, respectable and SINGLE man the other day. How about I set you two up?”
    “I’m married!”
    “You wouldn’t know it. When was the last time Howard was here, anyway?”
    Unfortunately, I didn’t answer quickly because I really couldn’t remember. He had been called out of town on lengthy assignments twice since Christmas. And more recently he’d been working some long hours, or so he said. Of course, I now knew he was probably working long hours romancing bodacious bimbos. I wasn’t going to tell my mother that, however. So I punted. “I just saw him a couple of minutes ago, as a matter of fact.”
    She didn’t seem convinced. “Howard should take a lesson from the way your father lived his life. Your father never would have left his family like this. He was a good, honest and dedicated family man, rest his dear soul.”
    My sweet father, who was a small man compared to most, died in his sleep three years ago, supposedly of sleep apnea. I always suspected that maybe my mother accidentally rolled on top of him in the middle of the night, smothering the life out of him.
    “Mom, Howard didn’t leave me. This is all my doing. I told him to live at the condo so we could explore our relationship through dating again. I thought we’d learn to appreciate each other again and make our marriage stronger.”
    “Dear, excuse me for being blunt, but that’s the dumbest idea you’ve ever had.”
    Sadly, she was right, but I would never admit that fact to her. I rubbed my weary eyes. “Whatever, Mom.”
    “What do you plan to do about it?”
    “I don’t know, but I don’t have time to talk about it now, I have to walk up to the bus stop. Amber and Bethany’s bus will be here any minute.”
    “Do you mind if I use your phone?”
    “Go ahead.”
    The sun had warmed the air nicely over the day. I stood on the front walk, closed my eyes, and took some deep cleansing breaths, concentrating on the joys of Spring rather than the woes of Barbara Marr.
    My silent reverie was shattered by a voice right next to my