Shop and Let Die (7 page)

Deb cleared her throat,
and asked hesitantly, “Are you doing any shops at the
Mall?”

I nodded, having just
signed up for one while standing in the coffee shop line. “A shoe
shop.”

She looked at my shoes.
“Your shoes are fine. You don’t need a new pair. Why don’t you
cancel this shop.”

“
Me canceling a shop I
already accepted would be like you deciding not to file an APB
because you ran out of fax paper.”

She shrugged. “People get
sick.” Her eyes didn’t quite meet mine.

“
What’s going on? You’re
being weird.”

She pressed her lips tight
for a moment before she said, “Make sure if you park close to the
mall entrance, you stay in the line-of-sight of the
windows.”

I knew I shouldn’t ask,
but I still did. “Why?”

Her voice dropped, and she
looked around for eavesdroppers before she said, “They found her.
The missing woman.”

An electric shock ran
through me, as I thought of the woman’s harried eyes and nice
smile. “Oh.”

She shook her head, saying
no more, her eyes on the young couple who had settled down two
tables away from us with coffee and a bible. They seemed too
engrossed in their discussion of the meaning of a psalm to care
what Deb had to say, but I admired her discretion.

“
Oh no. Anna is going to
be beside herself.” I told Deb about finding the folded-up flyer in
Anna’s pocket. I didn’t mention the mystery shopping connection,
though, for the same reason Deb was being evasive.

“
I’ve never seen the
captain so rattled. Pretty nervy, striking in the daytime — his
victims always seem to park close, but not in
line-of-sight.”

“
That leaves me out. I
usually have to park a mile away, especially this time of
year.”

“
Molly.” She sounded stern
and cop-like. “Keep on alert. Shopping is like catnip to this
freak, and you shop for a living. The victim was a—”

I held up my hand to stop
her from saying it aloud, in public. “Then you’ll be happy to know
my next destination is the job fair at the university.”

“
Good. Get a nice safe
office job. Leave the mystery shopping to those who’ve taken
karate.”

I looked around, but no
one had noticed her comment, least of all the barista who had made
me the coffee that was fifteen degrees cooler than it should have
been. Good. Deb could wear her uniform for her work, but I needed
an invisibility cloak to be good at mine.

My target at the job fair was the booth of a big corporation
I will not name, for many reasons, not the least of which is a
non-disclosure agreement.

They were easy to spot,
with the six foot high visual display. Point to them. The
literature available on the table in front of them was neatly
stacked. Another point.

No trash littered the
table. They were on a roll — until I approached and neither person
at the table bothered to look at me, or smile. The woman wore a
neatly tailored dark blue suit and an expensive haircut, but her
eyes were trained on the booth next to hers, where a tall,
unbelievably handsome man was in the midst of recruiting a
prospect.

My mystery shopping
experience helped me avoid gaping at the man, as well. I shrugged.
Life was unfair sometimes, and there were a few people who got way
too much in the looks, charm, and persona department. This guy
would have won the role of James Bond hands down, if he were an
actor, just on the chisel of his jaw.

I looked away, but stopped
short of interfering with the woman’s enjoyment of the view from
her table. How often does anyone stumble across that kind of eye
candy in one lifetime?

I turned my attention to
the young man at the table. He was dressed like a typical college
student, and he was focused on his smart phone. Playing a game.
Hamster Drop. I recognized it as one of the games I had to pry
Ryan’s fingers from so that he’d get his homework done.

It used to be the game
system could be locked away for special occasions, but now with
smart phones and tablets, there’s always a game ready to distract
and mesmerize. When I do a shop now, I often see a “Please put your
phone away while you order,” sign at the cash register. You
wouldn’t think people would need a sign to know that.

I hovered over one of the
expensive glossy pamphlets, waiting to be greeted. Time slowed to a
crawl as I tried to pretend I didn’t mind just standing there while
the seconds ticked, ticked, ticked.

The points flew away, one
by one, until, at last, as instructed, I made the first move. I
picked up a pamphlet and slid it across the table to the young man.
“Is this a good place to work?”

He didn’t look up from his
game. “As good as any.”

“
What’s your salary
range?” I persisted, following my script and wondering if the young
man’s t-shirt was something that should go into my report. It said
“kcuf ffo” in an elaborate scrawling print, and then asked, “Have
you looked in a mirror today?”

At that, he paused his
game and looked up at the professional woman. “Mom, can you stop
gawking at that Fed and answer this lady’s question?”

I saw the way the word Mom
broke the connection between her eyes and the good-looking man’s
profile. Instant, visceral, and abrupt.

Fed, huh? The man at the
next booth, with a parting shake of the hand to his new recruit,
glanced over at us, quickly, casually, but assessingly. Yep, he
could play James Bond in real life, never mind a movie.

The woman missed his
glance, having pivoted on one heel to glare at the young man.
“Connor…”

The young man sighed
loudly. “Fine. Katrina, can you please tell this lady what the
salary range is for new hires.”

As she turned her glare
from him, she transformed it into a smile of greeting to me.
Strained, but a smile. I guessed I could count that in the report.
“Naturally, salary is dependent upon experience.”

“
Naturally,” I nodded,
relieved to be back on script. “I just wanted a ballpark
range.”

Her smile lost its strain
as she, too, returned to script. “I’m Katrina, and you
are?”

“
Molly,” I said, using my
real name, as instructed.

“
Molly, what a lovely
old-fashioned name. Why don’t you fill in an application, and let
me review your experience. I’d be able to tell you a little more
once I have that information.”

She turned to her son,
“Connor, can you please bring up the application on the
tablet.”

He put down his game with
a sigh and picked up a tablet and tapped it a few times, until an
application form appeared. “Here you go.” He thrust the tablet at
me unceremoniously.

I had no trouble playing
the part of a reluctant applicant. “No thank you, I’m just getting
some preliminary information. I’m not ready to apply
yet.”

I could have wept with joy
when she kept to the script, despite her son’s trying behavior. “Of
course, here’s my card. You’ll find the application on-line when
you’re ready. Feel free to call me if you have any further
questions.”

“
I will,” I lied, and
turned away to see the handsome man at the next booth aiming an
unfairly devastating smile at me.

I stumbled toward him,
unable to resist the call of that smile. “So, is this a good place
to work?” I fumbled with a stack of brochures, not really reading
them. I needed to write down the details of my shop before I forgot
them.

“
Depends if you like spy
work or not, Molly,” he said without missing a beat.

I froze. He knew my name.
Had he guessed I was a mystery shopper? And then I saw the
understated signage on his table. Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Duh. Fed. Connor had been right.

Mr. Fed had simply
eavesdropped on Katrina and me as we talked. Not hard to do here,
in an almost empty room. The job fair was not that well attended at
this time of day. In a few hours the college students would awake
and be on the prowl for jobs.

“
Domestic only,” I joked,
hoping neither the spy, nor Katrina — who had resumed her gaping at
him as soon as I left her table — would ever learn that I was a
mystery shopper. “I spy on my kids.”

“
We’re looking to fill
domestic and international jobs.” He held out a brochure, and I
suddenly wondered what would happen if I took the brochure. If I
applied. If I got that “real” job that Seth was always talking
about. That spy job I used to dream about when I was a
kid.

I took the brochure and
politely pretended to read through it before I glanced back at him,
skeptically. “I’m pretty sure the FBI doesn’t need someone to drive
carpool for them.”

He gestured, and suddenly
there was a woman by his side. “My partner, Martie Grimes, can
attest that women, even moms, do get hired here.”

I started, feeling guilty.
I hadn’t even noticed her there, in his shadow. I smiled at her
extra-brightly, hoping she didn’t realize my
inattention.

Martie Grimes gave me a
sober nod. “True enough. I hope to practice some of my
bureau-learned techniques on my son when he’s a
teenager.”

We all three involuntarily
glanced over at Katrina and her son.

“
I’m glad to hear it,” I
said, “But I don’t think my family is ready for me to be a
full-time spy.” I smiled, so she’d know I didn’t mean it in a
judgmental way.

“
Well, if you ever have
any questions, you can call me.” She handed me her card, which had
her name on it. Martie Grimes. I wondered if it had made it easier
to get into the FBI with a name that could be a man’s or a woman’s
name. I didn’t ask.

The green-eyed Bond
look-a-like handed me his card, too. “I’m James.” He said. “James
Connery.” Then he grinned. “I think my mother and father have a
fine sense of humor, don’t you, Molly?” His eyes were quite
unfairly, quite vibrantly, green.

“
Yes.” My phone alarm went
off, alerting me of the time. I shook my head. “No, no. I have
children. A husband. I’m not spy material. I drive
carpool.”

I tried to hand the
brochure and the cards back.

“
Keep them,” he said.
“Just in case you change your mind.”

Martie said nothing. I
wondered if her silence was encouragement, or
discouragement.

I kept hold of the info,
and hurried off to the next booth, and the next. I had a notepad
out, and under the guise of making notes on jobs to keep Seth
happy, I wrote down the details needed for the real shop, on
Katrina’s company.

I had a respectable
collection of five business cards, twenty brochures, and three
applications, as I hurried out of the job fair, paying less
attention to the carefully crafted posters and table displays and
more attention to the fact that most of the people working the
booths looked less than thrilled to be there.

That’s the thing about
mystery shopping; it gives you a chance to check out a lot of other
jobs — and see just how little the people who had them actually
enjoyed doing them.

Back at home, Anna and Ryan collected and sorted into their
respective homework corners, I started the laundry first and dinner
second, feeling disoriented, as if I were wearing someone else’s
skin.

I’d begun the day trying
to imagine my dream man for a dating shop, talked serial killers
with Deb, and then played spy under the eye of a real live spy.
What would Anna say if I told her? Not that I would tell her. That
child worried enough as it was.

Seth came in with his
typical, “What’s for dinner?” and even that felt different somehow.
His eyes were a beautiful hazel behind his glasses, but they didn’t
look at me the way the Fed had looked at me. As if I just may,
possibly, be spy material.

I floated through the
dinner and bedtime routine like a zombie, not lost in thought, as
much as avoiding thought.

When it was time to do my
reports, though, I had to focus in and get them done. No report, no
payment, after all. I didn’t mention the FBI agent. It would have
been like taking points off because the woman was distracted by a
UFO.
That
would
be totally unfair.

I did mention the son.
Connor. I felt guilty about that, but she was the one who had
brought him along, and she was his mother, so she’d known him well
enough to at least suspect what a bad idea it would be. Mothers. We
always hope for the best, even when it is the longest long-shot in
the universe.

A longer shot than finding
a Greek God of an FBI agent at the next table. Or a UFO.

After the reports, I
decided it was time to figure out why I was still a little weirded
out by my dating site assignment, so I got onto my mystery shoppers
list and posted quickly.

“
Hey. Anyone else ever do
a dating shop? Felt weird even though I didn’t have to actually
post my stuff to the site. I am married, after all. But it was a
$20 bonus for a $10 shop. Couldn’t pass up the opportunity to
please my scheduler, could I? Or should I have? Do you think it
counts as cheating?”