Chapter One Maddison McRae was not stupid Cheerful Maddison McRae was not stupid Cheerful yes and often optimistic and not a perfect yes and often optimistic and not a perfect straight-A student but stupid No Maddison was not stupid and Maddison knew a secret when she saw one Or perhaps more accurately she knew a secret when people went to great lengths to keep it from her Maddison was sitting cross-legged on her bed flipping flipping through an illustrated collection of Florida urban legends and letting her bowl of cereal slowly turn to mush Dawn was just breaking over Archer’s Grove Florida on the last Tuesday in the month of May and several people might have been murdered over the 5
course of the night Maddison had been up worrying the whole night because she liked most of those people It really just figured Maddison thought that she had managed to get mixed up in some sort of secret if it was a conspiracy or a society or just one of those secrets people kill to keep quiet Maddison wasn’t sure within one week of moving to a new neighborhood neighborhood Back in Fredericksburg she had been the co-founder and only sane member of a paranormal research club and had been locked in a battle of wills with an ex best friend from kindergarten and yet most of the time she had been bored The club had been nothing but lunch meetings and it had taken Maddison an embarrassingly long time to figure out that half the members just wanted an excuse to kiss in dark corners and Katie had just been generally mean In Archer’s Grove Maddison had volunteered to help the school secretary with data entry and stumbled into a massive secret that seemed to involve the archives her father half the Kingsolver family and a couple of ghosts Maddison was scowling darkly at her book while 6
trying not to upset the bowl of cereal on her quilt so she didn’t register the sound of a car in the drive until a door slammed even though she was listening for her dad Immediately after the door slammed the screen on the front door made a sound like a cat caught in a rocking chair then there was a murmured conversation between her parents a heavy sigh from her mom and the stairs creaked All the way up to Maddison’s attic room and her open doorway Mads her dad said leaning against the doorframe doorframe cereal on the bed He looked rumpled and as though he’d been running his hands through his hair but he didn’t look injured or you know dead and a lot of the worry Maddison had been refusing to admit she was feeling disappeared It was promptly replaced by the guilty realization that she’d just been caught misbehaving and when she took a large mouthful mouthful of chocolate crispies it was a gesture of defiance Her dad just smiled at her Maddison had once seen a character in a book described as having a wry smile and she finally had a name to put to what her dad did 7
