Sewed Up Tight (A Quilters Club Mystery No. 5) (Quilters Club Mysteries) Read Online Free PDF Page A

people in their yards or on the sidewalks.
    Funny thing, looking out through her peephole the other afternoon, she could swear she’d seen Moose Johansson right there on her street. Big as life, strolling down the sidewalk. Coming for her? She’d sat up all night holding her loaded 12-guage.
    Best she could tell, Moose had disappeared round back of the Beasley Mansion. Later on she saw the high school principal stroll down the street, pause, and lay down on the lawn. Then along came some scarred-up monster, a man whose face looked like it had been in a meat grinder. Then came Chief Purdue’s white cruiser, the red and blue lights on its roof blazing. And finally a CCMC ambulance driven by big ol’ Ben Bentley. She never did see what happened to Moose. Maybe he was still there inside the Beasley Mansion, waiting till the time was right to come for her.
    Well, she would be prepared, she told herself, cocking the shotgun.
     

 
    CHAPTER FIVE
    The Trouble With Freddie
     
     
    A manda Madison dropped by her mother-in-law’s big Victorian house on Melon Pickers Row, apologizing for popping in without notice. “I happened to be passing by,” she explained.
    That’s when Maddy’s antennae went up, for Melon Pickers Row didn’t lead to anywhere Amanda was likely to be going. The chair factory around the corner was not a popular destination unless you were an employee. And most of them found better access to the factory’s parking lot by coming in on 4 th Street.
    “Have a cup of coffee,” invited the chubby brunette. “I just baked some ginger cookies.”
    “Oh, I love your ginger cookies,” the petite blonde accepted, following Maddy into the kitchen. It was quite cozy, having been remodeled less than six months ago. Custom cabinets and pink granite countertops and a huge Sub Zero refrigerator that would hold enough food to feed Noah’s Ark.
    “Let’s sit over here by the window,” suggested Maddy. “It’s such a pretty day.” She pushed the plate of cookies toward her daughter-in-law. And the coffee had taken no time at all, using her new Keurig. A birthday present from Beau.
    “Yes, I suppose it is a pretty day,” Amanda admitted, almost reluctantly.
    “Sounds like something’s on your mind,” Maddy nudged.
    “Well, yes. There is,” the younger woman sighed. “I’m worried about Freddie.”
    “Freddie? I thought he was having a ball as Sparkplug the Clown. He likes entertaining the children, doesn’t he?”
    “Yes and no. He loves the children, but he misses his old job. Maybe not the job itself, but being a hero, a man who made a difference. Being a clown is somewhat trivial by comparison … at least that’s the way he sees it.”
    “Hmm. Is he fretting over his scarred-up face?”
    “He pretends not. But I think it bothers him to be – as he puts it – a monster who has to hide behind clown makeup.”
    “This is not good.”
    “No, Maddy, it isn’t. He’s been pretty difficult to live with. And I worry that he isn’t spending enough time with Donna Ann. She needs a father.”
    “You know I’m not a meddling mother-in-law. What would you have me do?”
    “Talk with him. See if he’s unhappy with me and Donna Ann. Try to find out what would make him the happy-go-lucky, self-confident guy that I married. Not some embittered curmudgeon who disappears for days at a time, off to who knows where, alone with himself.”
    “This is not good,” Maddy repeated.
    “He might listen to you. You’re his mother.”
    Maddy sighed. “Have another cookie, dear. I’ll do what I can.”
    ≈ ≈ ≈
    The Phantom – for that’s how he thought of himself – walked among the tombstones at Pleasant Glade. The engraved slabs stretched on either side of him like a garden of stone. He wasn’t worried about being spotted because Jasper Beanie was still sleeping off his late-night revelry in a cell at the local police station, and so the front gate remained locked to the consternation of those