"Linda Evans - Time Scout 2 - Wages of Sin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Evans Linda)

bills waiting for your tour to leave; timecard automated dispensers (hooked
into the station's database and set up to match retinal scans and replace the
original's temporal-travel data for those idiots who'd lost theirs); and of
course, timecard readers (at the entrance and exit of every gate, to scan
where and when you'd already been in a desperate effort to Prevent some fool
tourist from shadowing him- or herself).
There were also shops and restaurants, on multiple levels, many with
entrances by balcony only; bizarre stairways to nowhere; balconies and girder-
supported platforms suspended three and four stories above the floor;
barricaded and fenced-off areas marking either unevenly recurring, unstable
gates or stable but unexplored gates; and-the piece de resistance, multiple
hundreds of costumed, laughing, drinking, quarreling, fighting, kissing,
hugging, gullible tourists. With fat wallets just waiting for someone's light-
fingered touch ...
Just now Commons looked exactly like the North Pole might if Santa's elves
had gone quietly mad on LSD in the process of decorating the workshop. He
breathed in the smell of celebration and money and grinned up at the whole,
gaudy, breathtaking length of Commons, loving every bit of the craziness that
always overtook Shangri-La Station this time of year.
"And what," a woman's voice said practically at his elbow, "are you
grinning about, Skeeter Jackson?"
He looked up-then down-and found Ann Vinh Mulhaney, TT-86s resident
projectile weapons instructor. Ann was so petite she was smaller than her
teenaged son. Barely came up to Skeeter's biceps. She was, however, the second
or third deadliest person on station, depending on whether Kit Carson had
showed up at the range for some shooting practice most recently, or whether
Ann had (since Kit's last target practice) hit the gym mats for a series of
sweat-building katas and bone-pounding sparring sessions against Sven Bailey,
the station's widely known Number One deadliest individual.
Skeeter felt ridiculous, towering over a woman who terrified him down to
his cockles. Uh-oh. What do I do now?
Oddly, Ann was smiling up at him, like that famous painting of the Mona
Lisa. Like good old Mona, Ann revealed absolutely nothing in dark, knowing
eyes. The strange little smile on her lips did not touch them. For a moment,
he was actually cold-sweating scared of her, despite at least a foot and
several inches height advantage and a good chance at outsprinting her, even in
this crowd.
Then something altered subtly and he realized the smile had just turned
friendly. What does she want? Does she want to hire me to steal something,
maybe, or bring her back a special souvenir as a surprise for somebody?
Skeeter not only couldn't understand how Ann's husband could actually live
with that deadly little viper, he honestly could find no sane reason why Ann
would even talk to him.
She looked him up and down, then met his gaze. "Heard you were going
through the Porta Romae."
Uh-oh. He answered very carefully, "Uh, yeah, that was sorta the plan. Me
and Agnes, you know."
She just nodded, as though confirming the cinching of a wager with someone
about what Skeeter Jackson was up to now.
He relaxed. Settling a wager was all right. Ann was certainly entitled to