Infidel Read Online Free PDF

sounds.”
    “It’s nothing like that. I wanted to apologize, about my mother.”
    “We all had them. Not worth apologizing.”
    “She shouldn’t have fired you. That was…” Mercia hunched up again, as if retreating. “I had a woman once who wasn’t as good as you.”
    “Hard to believe.”
    “I’m being very serious.”
    “If your mother’s hiring in my pay range, I’m not surprised she’s gotten some shitty service.”
    “Can I please come in? I don’t like standing around in this part of the city.”
    “We’re out of honey wine, and Ras Tiegans don’t drink buni.”
    “Put something in it, and I might.”
    “A runaway and a lush? Your mother’s going to enjoy feeding me to her security staff.”
    Nyx heard someone crackle through the hub filter behind her.  
      Eshe said, “What’s up front?”
    Nyx stepped aside to let Mercia in. “We’ve got another bug for dinner.”  
    Eshe’s eyes got big. “We’re ordering in?”
    “Go pick something up. Suha’s got petty cash.”  
    Nyx sat Mercia down on the padded bench in the receiving room. The kid pulled back her hood. Her eyes were reddened from crying, but not bruised. Nyx didn’t see any bruises on her bare arms or wrists either. Nobody had roughed her up—at home or on the street. Not tonight, anyway. So what was she running from?
    “Does this apology come with some dinner money? You Ras Tiegan girls don’t eat much, but I won’t hold it against you.”
    Mercia shook her head. “I only wanted to say I’m sorry. She shouldn’t have run you out like that. I saw what those women were.   I don’t think anybody else could have gotten out of that.”
    “Women are just women.”
    Mercia’s forehead wrinkled. “Those women were bel dames.”
      That particular insight was surprising. How could a Ras Tiegan girl spot a bel dame? “You seen a bel dame before?”  
    “I’ve seen one of those ones before, at the Queen’s palace. I told my mother I’d give a description to the authorities, but she didn’t want to make a charge.”
    “You remember the bel dame’s name?”
    Mercia shook her head.  
    “But you know she’s a bel dame?”
    “Queen Zaynab introduced them as a group.”
    “Which one was it? One of the ones by the bakkie or the one with the bag?” Nyx asked.  
    “The one with the bag.”
      The one Nyx had killed.  
    “Was that the only one who looked familiar?” Nyx asked.  
    “That’s the only one I remember,” Mercia said.  
    Nyx leaned forward and put her elbows on her knees, clasped her hands. If bel dames wanted Mercia dead, it wasn’t so much her business, but it was interesting. Ambassador sa Aldred had taken Nyx off watch, and the diplomat and her daughter would be heading back to Ras Tieg after the summit ended in a couple days. But a dead ambassador’s kid might trigger a bigger incident—something rogue bel dames might like.  
    She looked over at Mercia. The skinny kid was watching her with sorrowful eyes, like she was worried about how Nyx was taking the news. It wasn’t the sort of look Nyx expected from a girl being hunted.  
    “Your mother will hire you another bodyguard,” Nyx said. “If she ups her fee, she can get one better than me. You’ll be all right.”  
    The half-lie tasted fine. There were a couple of retired bel dames who could make good bodyguards, if the ambassador was willing to pay the fee. Knowing the ambassador’s pay rate, though, she probably wouldn’t parse out that much for a replacement, and Mercia would be left with some snot-nosed kid just out of university who wouldn’t stand a chance against three or more bel dames working a blood note. Just another soft, educated idiot.
    Nyx sighed. Ever since Nyx took Eshe in she’d had a soft spot for kids with shitty mothers. I must be getting old, she thought.
    “I know a few women I’d trust to watch after you,” Nyx said. “I could make some calls, maybe convince them to work cheap.”
    Mercia