Valentine's Day Is Killing Me Read Online Free PDF

speed records to get back to the restaurant, not to mention all the other stuff you’ve done for me.”
    “Scott, can we do this another time?”
    “Well, no, because once you clear me, our date will be over and you probably won’t go out with me again.”
    She snorted. “Probably?”
    “You’re hung up on the age thing.”
    “Other than working for a shitty greeting card company, name one thing we have in common.”
    “Well, we both like your cardigans.”
    “Scott, be serious.”
    “And we both like the way you kiss.”
    “Scott.”
    “And we both like to right wrongs, and play amateur detective. And we both like the collected works of Stephen King.”
    “How did you—oh. The bookshelf in my living room.”
    “Plus,” he continued happily, “it’s a huge turn-on, the way you can’t keep your hands off me.”
    “That’s because it’s a weird night—don’t let it go to your nipples. I mean, your head.”
    “Which one?” he asked innocently, and she scowled and smacked him on the leg.
    “Finally,” she muttered, seeing the sign for Tables of Content. With the ambulance gone, it looked a little less frightening, though there were still quite a few cars on the street. “Shit. No parking places.”
    “Park illegally. You are looking for a cop, right?”
    “Oh. Good idea.” She double-parked beside a nondescript sedan she hoped was an unmarked police car, and shut off the engine. “Okay, let’s go find Hobbes and remind her that you’re tall.”
    “Good plan, Holmes!”
    “Shut up.”

Chapter Eleven
     
     
    “Excuse me,” she said to the man in the dark suit. He was short, coming up to her shoulders, but impeccably dressed, although the red rose in his lapel was looking a little bedraggled. He was as smooth and bald as an egg, with dirt-colored eyes. “Are you the manager?”
    “Yes, but I’m afraid the kitchen is closed. If you’d like to make a reservation, I can—”
    “No, we’re looking for Detective Hobbes.”
    “Who?”
    “You know. The cop. About this tall…” Julie Kay held her hand up about an inch above her eyebrows. “Wearing a green, two-piece suit? Red hair, gun, badge? Weirdly cheerful?”
    “I’m sorry, miss, there’s no one here by that name.”
    Scott had been looking around the restaurant, where there wasn’t a trace of crime-scene tape or fingerprint powder anywhere. But there were several people running vacuums and setting tables. “Uh, dude, I don’t think you’re supposed to clean up this fast.”
    “Clean up?”
    “You’re messing with a murder scene. And where did all the cops go?”
    “What murder scene?”
    Julie Kay gaped at the manager. She was totally at a loss. “You could go to jail! Interfering with a crime scene, or whatever it’s called!”
    “Miss, I don’t know what you’re talking about, but if you and your gentleman friend don’t leave right now, I’m going to be forced to call the police.”
    “Great! Good! Call them! I’ll call them! What are you doing? You can’t cover this up! Stop cleaning up,” she shouted at the other workers.
    “What’s the problem?” Scott asked the manager, who had broken out into a light sweat. The lights made his forehead gleam like a star. “Afraid of getting a bad Zagat’s review?”
    “Sir, I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
    “But it’ll be in the papers. Reporters check on this stuff all the time. You can’t cover it up.”
    “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said again.
    “You’re full of shit,” Julie Kay told him.
    “Atta girl. You should watch out,” Scott told the manager. “She’s got a mean side.”
    “You’re standing there, all ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about’, and meanwhile, you’ve got a look on your face like you just bit into a rotten lime. So why don’t you cut the shit?”
    “Miss, do you want to make a reservation or not?”
    “Did you do it? Is that why you’re erasing evidence and pretending nothing