Read Online Shopping is Murder (McKinley Mysteries Book 6) by Carolyn Arnold - Free Book Online Page A

you came out of, Bert.” They had decided to use fake names.
    Sean smirked at Collin. “She really does love me.” He patted the back of her hand and she removed it.
    “You should really get over yourself.” Sara jacked a thumb toward Sean and then crossed her arms. “He’s on my heels everywhere I go, but this here is my case.”
    Collin glimpsed at Sean and Collin’s tongue briefly touched his top lip.
    She had this made. “Please, Bert, just let me be and let me take care of this. You know you’re not going to get the credit this time. Actually, he rarely does.” Sara accentuated the taunting quality to her voice with a small pout and turned to face him.
    Sara picked up on Collin ’s rapt scrutiny of their interaction. It was the reaction they were seeking to elicit—the one that existed at the core of humanity propelling one to help their fellow man, or in this case, woman.
    “What is that I can help you with?” Collin asked.
    Sara pulled her focus from Sean and settled on the clerk. She let the act go and put on her business air. “There was a man killed here yesterday.”
    Collin ’s mouth gaped open. “Killed? I know one fell to his death. He was murdered?”
    “Still to be determined. We need to make sure the missus had nothing to do with it,” Sean said.
    Sara spun to face him. “Not we, me.” Her sour demeanor transformed to one of radiance when she faced Collin. When she was happy that she had his attention, she spoke. “I trust you can understand our company doesn’t want to pay out on his life insurance unless we know, for a fact, he wasn’t murdered by his beneficiary.”
    Collin held up his finger. “What is it you people need?”
    Enough of the charade.
    Sara jutted her hip to the right. “We need to see your camera footage.”
    “Our camera footage?”
    He was responding like a trained parrot, mimicking every word.
    “Yes,” she said with a smile.
    “What would you want that for?”
    Sean butted against Sara, and she made a flare about moving out of the way.
    “We believe that the killer is on there,” he said.
    “Yes, his wife.” Sara’s smugness had her shaking her head. “And then she wouldn’t get a penny. I, on the other hand, would make a tidy commission for the discovery.”
    “Oh, please.”
    A few customers had stopped their browsing and were whispering among themselves, the odd gaze aimed at them. Collin bobbed his head for Sean and Sara to follow him.
    He took them to a small office next to the change rooms at the back of the store. Once there, he steepled his hands and pointed them toward Sean and Sara. “Here’s the thing…I can’t show that footage to either of you.”
    Sara sashayed next to Collin and gingerly touched his forearm. She felt him quiver beneath her touch and watched as his eyes went from her hand up to her face.
    “You could do it for me, though, right?” She left his side and coerced Sean out of the room by putting her back to the clerk and forcing Sean to walk backward. She winked at him as she played tough.
    Behind her, Collin said, “I’m sorry. Even if I wanted to—and I do—I can’t. The manager is the only one with access to it.”
    Sara spun and shifted around him to see the computer. A screensaver with the store ’s name and logo danced across the screen.
    Collin followed the direction of her gaze. “Yes, I do have a password, but if he finds out I’ll be fired.”
    He? Sara ’s heart got lighter. If they were forced to come back tomorrow, she could use her feminine wiles again. Although, if she had to come back, they wouldn’t have worked today. Was she losing the touch?
    “And there’s a way he could track that?” Sara swirled a finger to take in the desk. “Even if you only took a wee peek?”
    “I’m sorry, but without a police warrant, I’m not even going to call him at home. He is in tomorrow at nine thirty.”
    Sara put on a pout. “If that’s the way it has to be.”
    “It is. I’m sorry.” He