Read All Hallow's Eve: The One Day It's BAD to Be Good for Free Online

that he’d already seen Mom passed out in the bathroom before.
    Maybe if Uncle Pax saw that, he would know what to do.
    Jeremy went to open his mouth, but Paxton’s phone rang. His uncle frowned, but answered, “Detective Prover.” His uncle’s face clouded over. “Yeah, hang on a second.” He turned to Jeremy. “Look, I’ve got to take this.”
    “Sure, of course you do,” Jeremy said as he opened the car door. “I’m sure some dead guy really needs your urgent help.”
    Paxton sputtered something, but Jeremy was out of the car. Some things never changed. His uncle’s first love was his job, and his mother’s first love was… Well, he’d rather not say what that was. He broke into a trot as he headed toward the far side of the school. He needed to ditch his uncle if he hoped to ditch school.
    “Jeremy!” a voice called from the quad.
    He looked around to find his best friend walking toward him. “Evan! What are you doing out of class?”
    His friend shoved his glasses up on his nose. “Mom had to drop off my history paper.” Evan indicated a car pulling out. “Was that your uncle?”
    “Yep. Get used to seeing his taillights.”
    Evan frowned, as if not quite sure how to take Jeremy’s words. Jeremy shrugged it off. If Uncle Pax wouldn’t bother to stick around, then why should Jeremy?
    “I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen enough of this place.” He turned to Evan. “Let’s head over to the pool hall.
    “Are you … are you kidding?” Evan gasped, looking ready for his inhaler.
    “Of course not! The guy watching the door owes me a favor. We can get in for free.”
    Evan’s eyes darted from Jeremy to his mother’s car disappearing down the street. “I don’t know. Mom will kill me if she finds out.”
    “Well then, let’s get some fun in before we have to make the funeral arrangements!”
    Evan only frowned, clutching his history paper to his chest. “But she drove all the way here so my assignment would be on time.”
    Jeremy wasn’t going to let a stupid paper on Napoleon get in the way of what he was certain would be the best day of his life. “It’s what, the end of second period, right? And your paper is due fifth period, right?”
    His best friend nodded slowly.
    “Then we’ve got two periods of unbridled fun!” Jeremy began walking backward, then broke out into a trot. “Are you going to seize the day, or what?”
    Evan’s face scrunched up, and he chewed his lip. “Well, they were just going to show a movie in English class.”
    “And you have free period after that. The librarian never calls roll. We gotta live the life that Diana Dahmer says is going to slip through our fingers before we know it.”
    Finally, Evan’s face broke out into a smile as he ran to catch up. “Just this once!”
    Jeremy whooped, but not too loud.
    You never knew where Sister Switzler was.
     
    * * *
     
    At a stoplight, Paxton dug around under his seat. There had to be something there. His fingers rustled up against plastic. With his face plastered against the steering wheel and his shoulder nearly dislocated, he finally grabbed hold of the edge of the package.
    Victorious, he pulled out… an empty cupcake wrapper. Worse, it was completely empty. At some other desperate point he had licked it clean of crumbs. Life really was cutting him no breaks today.
    He was about to take another try at the “under the seat” food lottery, but his phone buzzed in his pocket. Paxton glanced at the caller ID. Ruth. Crap .
    Sliding his finger across the screen, he answered it, hoping she didn’t hear the car noises. “Hey, partner.”
    God. Did he always sound so lame?
    “How is the canvas going?” she asked.
    Paxton cringed. All hopes that he was going to get out of this unscathed vanished. However, maybe he could limit the damage. “Not bad. Heading back to the station now.”
    “No, you aren’t.”
    “Um…” Paxton glanced around. How did she know? Then behind him came the blast of a