Brooklyn Bones Read Online Free

hugged me and said, “No nightmares tonight,” and I hopped a bus home. Suddenly the walk seemed too much. All the way home, I dreaded dealing with my moody child, even with Darcy’s words still in my head. “She’s a teenager. She’ll be grown up someday. Trust me on this.”
    There was a note from Chris. “Went to bed. Please don’t make noise coming up! Uncle Rick called. I told him everything. He wants to change our locks and said to tell you he’s coming for dinner tomorrow and he’ll bring pizza. Wants a full report.” Good, I thought. Rick was the very person I most wanted to see.
    Before I went up, I glanced into the dining room, where the bright yellow police tape seemed to shine in the dark, and the dusty sour smell seemed to have spread through the first floor. Then I checked on Chris, who was already sound asleep, and went to bed, finally, wondering if I would dream all night about that sad little skeleton. That body had been hidden, buried carefully, it seemed, but hidden. Had there been a terrible accident?
    Or—I finally had to say the ugly words I’d been trying to keep away all evening. Had someone killed her?

Chapter Three
    I met Chris in the hall as she was making a middle of the night trip to the bathroom. She asked in a voice still hoarse from sleep, “They said the bones were a girl’s, didn’t they? Like, a teenager?”
    I nodded. “Honey, is that upsetting you?”
    She shook her head, mumbled, “Back to sleep,” and disappeared into her room. When I came out of my room in the morning, ready to leave for work, she was sitting on her bed, laptop open, pointedly ignoring me until she gasped and said, “Come look!”
    The screen had a headline proclaiming, “Real Life Mystery in South Slope?” It was followed by a couple of paragraphs beginning, “Why was NYPD removing what looked like a body bag from 2007 13th Street? Sources on this shabby block at the border of the Slope, tell us it is the home of a mother and teenaged daughter, and no one else is known to live there. Yet the body bag was seen being removed yesterday afternoon and there were cops in and out. Was there an accident during the ongoing renovation? And why is no one saying anything? Neighbors are naturally curious and even concerned.” It was signed with a screen name.
    “Who could possibly have written this? And what the hell is this anyway?”
    “It’s a bulletin board, Mom,” she said defensively. She must have heard my reaction in my voice. “Brownstone Bytes. You know, neighborhood news, gossip, restaurants, star spotting. I once saw a picture of Jennifer Connelly right there on Jamie’s block.”
    “That’s not the point! This is a…an intrusion writing about us and our home.”
    “Yeah. I’m like….” She looked at my angry face and finished with what I suspected was a second thought. “I’m really creeped out.” I had a hunch her first word might have been “excited.”
    “They have no right to give our address there.”
    “Uh, they do, mom. We had it in American history last year. First amendment?”
    That’s what you get when you struggle to send your child to an excellent private school. Better educated back talk.
    “Nonsense. Give me that URL. I’m sending them a complaint as soon as I get to work.”
    “Mom!”
    “What? I have to get to work.”
    “Could you wait maybe, until we can do it together? I’m afraid you might go too far? You seem, um, pretty upset?”
    That stopped me. I was annoyed, but I should not seem out of control to my daughter.
    “Ok.” I dug up a smile. “You think I might embarrass you?”
    She looked so relieved to be understood, I almost laughed.
    “You can be a little impulsive sometimes.” She managed a tiny smile of her own.
    “We can work it out later. But really, Chris, don’t you see why it isn’t a good thing?”
    She admitted she did, sort of; I reminded her to check in if she went anywhere, and that Joe would be there soon to get back to