Free Death Wore Brown Shorts (Happy Holloway Mystery Book 1) by Audrey Claire Page B

sold some stuff on eBay.”
    “What’s his handle?”
    Coty rolled his eyes. “Why would I know that?”
    Flynn stepped aside. “Okay, scoot. Don’t let me catch you in here ever again, or I’m having you arrested.”
    Coty fled, the fear of the law clearly in the speed of his movements. Annie put her hands on her hips. “Was it necessary to terrify the child?”
    “To scare him straight? Yes. Now he won’t think of breaking in anywhere ever again.”
    “How did he get in?”
    “Paul might have hidden a key somewhere, and Coty found out about it. I don’t know. The lock doesn’t look tampered with. I’ll have the landlord change it just in case. What’s on those papers you performed your contortionist act for?”
    Annie colored. Why did he have to remind her? “Just more of the code on the whiteboard. I don’t understand it.”
    “Well, I’ll take a look at the computer. You check these boxes.”
    “I don’t feel right about going through his things.”
    “They’re mine now. I give you permission.”
    Annie accepted that and started for the first box. The tape clung as if it was a matter of life or death, and she searched for and found a box cutter. While she worked, Flynn typed away at the computer keys.
    Neatly packaged inside the box was what Coty hoped for—a digital camera. Annie pulled it free from the bubble wrap and held it up so Flynn could see. “Maybe he was a bookie. This looks expensive.”
    Flynn held his hand out, and Annie handed the camera over. “Not new though. See that scratch? He might have gotten it for a deal. Coty said Paul sold on eBay. He might also have bought a few used items there. I’ll check the history.”
    “You know your way around a computer.”
    He shrugged. “Bachelor life.”
    “You mean your lovers don’t keep you busy enough?”
    He smirked.
    Annie checked the next box. More electronics. This time it was an old cell phone, several models back from the one she owned now. She checked inside the box twice and found no packing label. The box itself was also unmarked.
    “Buy low and sell high,” Annie speculated. “The entrepreneurial spirit is strong in this country.
    “Except someone murdered him.”
    “Might not be related.”
    “Or it might,” he countered.
    Annie was smart enough not to rule out Paul’s business getting him killed. She just liked to debate points with Flynn. He had a good head on his shoulders from what she had seen so far.
    “Here we are.”
    Annie set down the third unopened box and moved up behind him. She rested a hand on the chair back and leaned closer, her face near his. He smelled of soap and natural maleness, which teased her nostrils, but she focused on learning Paul’s online activities.
    “LadiesMan200901?” Annie read. “Really?”
    “I did say, he liked to string them along.”
    “I can’t reconcile it. Maybe I’m a poorer judge of character than I thought.” She considered everyone she knew and remade them in her mind into the opposite of what she knew their personalities to be—worse, into killers. Her head and her heart shrank away from the notion.
    “In my line of work and some of what I did in the past, I have seen the darker side to people. I’m cynical. You’d be surprised how many regular looking folks are criminally inclined.”
    Annie thought about her dad. In his case, he looked the part. She recalled those eyes and sometimes had nightmares about them. When she was small, people used to say she looked just like her dad, especially the eyes.
    To distract herself from the past, Annie scanned Paul’s eBay account. “He hasn’t bought anything except an old video game three years ago.”
    Annie straightened and scanned the room. Nothing stood out among the sparse décor and knickknacks. She rifled through the pages, trying to make heads or tails of the codes. Words and numbers in disjointed order, other notes that were so weird like “fichus” and “raven.” What in the world did it all