Lost Cargo Read Online Free PDF Page A

by the ornamental yew hedge, a hedge so wide and thick dinner could have been served on it, and entered the lobby.
    The gaslights winked behind her broad back as the brass door swung shut, but they had a first-rate view through the windows. The concierge didn’t look up from the phone.
    “That’s her building,” Travis said.
    The giant’s stony face revealed no clues to the grotesque feeding they had just witnessed, as though in spite of her size she was well practiced at blending into the urban wallpaper. She moved across the lobby and disappeared into the building.
    Burke turned on Travis. “She lives there. I don’t know what she just did, but you’re crazy. You’re goddamned crazy. Here you’ve got us following a what, somebody who steals groceries, a psycho with a dislocated jaw, some carnival freak. A rubber woman, somebody who swallows swords. She has something to do with those photos and you’re getting us involved in it.”
    “Hey, look—” Travis began.
    “She saw us.” Burke’s face grew red and a vein bulged on his forehead. “You went up to her in Union Station. She looked right at us, and she looked right at us again a few minutes ago. She knows we were following her. Goddamn you!”
    Travis stared at the metal table where the giant had been sitting and ran his hand through his hair. “I’m having dinner with my family,” he said, reaching for anything that sounded normal, but his words sounded nonsensical. “My sister and her husband are back from London. Hey, man, I had no idea.”
    “My time is valuable,” Burke said. “I don’t have time to waste an entire day following some nut all over D.C. I need to finish packing for my trip. Lexie, let’s get out of here.”
    She studied the tips of her shoes. “I’ll be home later.”
    Burke stared at her. “Well, I’m not leaving here without you. This is not safe. Come on, what’s this about?”
    She looked at Travis. “You think it’s in the woods behind that building?”
    "Someplace in those woods,” he said.
    Lexie tucked her hair behind her silver earrings. “She’s inside. She didn’t go behind the building. I’ll go with you. We don’t have to go that far.”
    “You’re not doing this,” Burke said.
    Two young women crowded by, one with her head bent over a cell phone. Lexie clammed up as though she didn’t want them to hear. Once they moved on, she turned to Travis. “When do you go to dinner?”
    “At six. I have four hours. You’re on.”
    “Let’s go then,” Lexie said.
    “You’re going to go searching around the damn woods for a UFO ,” Burke said. “You’re out of your minds. I don’t have time for this.”
    “I’m not a child,” Lexie said. “You can stop hovering over me. And if you want to go home to pack your socks, by all means, have at it.”
    “You’ll be glad I’m hovering over you when you run into that freak in the woods,” Burke told her.
    Lexie laughed and kept walking.
    They reached the stone building. The brass plaque by the driveway read Buchanan House. Travis felt his stomach turn over. The woman could be watching them, but the windows all had the blank sameness of drapes and mini-blinds.
    The place looked familiar. Yesterday he’d chased the dog across the grounds and down the overgrown path into Rock Creek Park.
    He took one last look at Connecticut Avenue. Late afternoon sunlight stretched across the sidewalk. The wide avenue crawled with cars heading downtown. Somebody honked a horn. Footsteps approached. A businessman passed by, hurried to the crosswalk, and disappeared in a crowd of black overcoats coming out of the Metro.
    The everydayness of it all tugged at his insides. Like someone in a boat slipping away from the dock, reluctant to let go of the rope and head out on an uneasy sea, he longed to hold onto that sunlit normality until the last second.
    Then he stepped on the path to the forest, followed by Lexie and her angry, worried brother.

Chapter 4
Into the