Make sense of cold, recently-emptied department stores (7)
I believe the answer is:
decrypt
'make sense of' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'cold recently-emptied department stores' is the wordplay.
'cold' becomes 'C' (eg on taps).
'emptied' suggests removing the centre.
'department' becomes 'dept'.
'stores' indicates putting letters inside.
'recently' with its centre removed is 'ry'.
'c'+'ry'='cry'
'cry' placed within 'dept' is 'DECRYPT'.
(Other definitions for decrypt that I've seen before include "Decode" , "Break code" , "Use key" , "Make sense of" , "Translate from code" .)