Lone Star 02 Read Online Free PDF Page B

Moore working on it.”
    â€œAnd the cartel representative’s identity?” Jessie asked sharply.
    â€œThat too remains a mystery,” Lewis sighed. “I knew their old man quite well. Used to have a none-too-friendly-but-obligatory drink with him now and then. The cartel considered him adequate for paying Smith his bribes, and for balancing the ledgers at that bordello I mentioned, but Moore found out that cartel headquarters in Prussia considered their man not cutthroat enough to handle the next phase of their plan to crush us. Who the new man will be, and when he’s supposed to arrive, Moore hasn’t yet discovered.”
    â€œThis fellow Moore seems to have quite an inside with our enemies,” Jessie mused. “How did he manage it?”
    Lewis blushed, the mottled pink that suffused his cheeks rising all the way up and across his bald dome. Just then there came a knock at his door, at which he seemed inordinately grateful. “I think I’ll let Moore himself explain that, if you don’t mind, child.” He called out, “Come in!”
    Both Jessie and Ki turned to watch Lewis’s private eye enter the office. He was, indeed, as Lewis had described him, a slightly built fellow for the sort of rough-and-tumble work Jessie associated with the job of a private investigator.
    â€œMiss Jessica Starbuck,” Lewis began, rising to his feet, “may I present Mr. Jordan Moore. Mr. Moore, Miss Starbuck.”
    Moore approached to shake hands with Jessie. He was about five feet ten inches tall, Jessie guessed, and weighed about one hundred and forty pounds. She wondered fleetingly why a stiff San Francisco breeze hadn’t already blown him out to sea.
    â€œAnd this gentleman here is Miss Starbuck’s companion,” Lewis continued. “His name is Ki.”
    Moore grinned as he stuck out his hand in Ki’s direction. “What do I call you for short?” he asked.
    Ki smiled back at the slender man. “Whatever you call me,” he said softly, “I should do it very politely if I were you, Mr. Moore.”
    â€œCertainly, Mister Ki,” Moore replied, his inflection just polite enough so that Ki wasn’t quite sure if he should take offense.
    â€œPlease sit down,” Lewis said hurriedly, taking Moore by the elbow and guiding him to an armchair some distance away from Ki’s. “Cup of tea?” he asked.
    â€œThank you, no,” Moore replied. He took a moment to align the razor-sharp creases in the trousers of his black wool suit, and then sat down. He balanced his derby on the head of a porcelain figurine of a sword-wielding samurai.
    Jessie held her breath as she watched Ki stiffen with anger over Moore’s flippancy, then she herself grew angry. What arrogance! Moore ran his hand through his thick black hair, which he wore combed back, but without oil, and gave his derby a tap, to make it bob up and down on the samurai statuette’s tiny head. He then beamed his wide grin around the room, like a child looking for approval, Jessie contemptuously thought. His green eyes—the color of emeralds, the color of her own eyes, she realized distractedly—sparkled with amusement. Why, the man was in his thirties, but he acted like an insolent adolescent!
    â€œYou’ve come up with quite a good deal of information for us, Mr. Moore,” Jessie began. “I’m quite pleased with your work.”
    Moore glanced questioningly at Lewis.
    â€œMiss Starbuck is my employer,” Lewis said. “Need I say more?”
    Moore shook his head, smiling to himself. Once again, Jessie felt her anger flare, and then she grew doubly angry as Moore—still grinning—gazed at her until she had to blush.
    â€œI hope you have no qualms about working for a woman,” she declared.
    â€œOn the contrary, Miss Starbuck,” Moore replied, his voice clear and pleasant. “A private investigator often finds