Mortal Allies Read Online Free PDF Page A

worked up about gay rights. There’s a certain amount of self-interest in all of us, and she sure as hell wasn’t being paid a fortune to handle those cases. In fact, it was public interest law, so she was making about half what I was. And I wasn’t making much, believe me.
    I therefore naturally, inevitably concluded that Katherine Carlson was a lesbian — though don’t think I’m so hasty and narrow-minded that I drew that conclusion merely on the basis of the cause she so ferociously represented. The fact is, I never once saw her with a boyfriend back at Georgetown. Her being angelically beautiful and actually quite sexy in an oddly chaste sort of way, guys talk about those things. Nobody else ever saw her with a boyfriend, either. Think about it. I mean, there’re lots of guys who could care less how grating a girl is — and please believe me, Katherine is grating as hell — as long as she looks great and puts out.
    Carlson sure as hell looked great, but there wasn’t a guy in that law school who could work up a smug smirk and say she put out. She was always surrounded by other girls, and most of them looked pretty masculine to me.
    I threw my clothes on the bed and stepped into the bathroom for a long-overdue shower. After I finished shaving, I wrapped a towel around my waist and lay down. I was damned tired and still hadn’t adjusted to being yanked out of the lethargic, unhurried pace of Bermuda. I closed my eyes and was just at that point of drifting off when the phone rang.
    “Hello,” I mumbled, or grumbled, or something.
    “Attila, I’m having a defense meeting in ten minutes. Be here. And be on time.”
    Then she hung up. She hadn’t said where she was having her meeting. She hadn’t said where she was staying. She hadn’t said who else was going to be there. I wanted to strangle her.
    I called the front desk and asked if she had a room here at the Dragon Hill Lodge. I was lucky. She did. In fact, only two floors down. I slipped on my battle dress, speedlaced my boots, and actually was standing at the door to room 430 on time.
    I knocked, the door opened, and an amazon stared down at me. I’m not exaggerating, either. She was staring
down
at me. She was easily six foot three, a lanky, stretched-out lady, with a long, narrow face, a huge, parrotlike nose, and spiky hair. She was wearing a flowered dress that hung down to her bony knees, but nothing was going to make this woman look anything close to feminine.
    I stared up at her a long moment. How could I not? I’m only five foot ten, and she’d moved up real close, like she wanted to accentuate her advantage.
    I nearly screamed in fright, only I’m too tough for that.
    “Who’re you?” she demanded in a gruff voice.
    “Drummond, Sean, Major, one each. Reporting as ordered,” I said in my most wiseass tone. When I’m scared out my wits, I get like that — blustery to the point of being obnoxious.
    She turned around and yelled, “Katherine, you expectin’ some runt in a uniform?”
    “Does he look sort of Neanderthalish and ignorant?” a voice yelled back.
    “Uh-huh,” she grunted.
    “That’s just Drummond. Let him in.”
    The amazon stepped aside and I warily circled past her. There were two other people in addition to Katherine and the amazon. One guy and one girl.
    The guy was improbably handsome. He was a few years younger than me, blond with sea blue eyes, perfectly white teeth, a slender build, and facial features that presumptive writers might describe as sculpted. Maybe I was predisposed, but I had the impression of a guy who was naturally good-looking who went to some lengths to be even better-looking; an effort that makes many manly guys somewhat squeamish and mistrustful, if you know what I mean.
    The other woman had short-cropped brunette hair that accentuated her delicate, almost tiny features. She was actually an inch or two shorter than Katherine, and was so slight of build that she was what my mother would call