"Jane M. Lindskold - A Touch of Poison" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lindskold Jane)

A Touch of Poison
by Jane Lindskold

The author of over forty short stories and several novelsтАФincluding Changer and Legends
Walking-Jane Lindskold lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with her husband, archaeologist Jim
Moore. "A Touch of Poison" is set in the same world as her novel, Through Wolf's Eyes. She is
currently at work on another novel.

WATCHING the plump, dark-haired young widow working up to her elbows in bread dough, a dusting
of flour on her cute, slightly upturned nose, no one would have guessed that Adalia Baker had sworn to
kill a manтАФa man who trusted her.

Standing in front of the solid wooden table, Adalia kneaded the dough with concentrated fury,
rememberingтАж

They'd slipped in through her bedroom window. She'd left it open, hoping for some relief from the humid
summer night that plagued the city of First Harbor. Three figuresтАФslim, wiry men dressed in rusty black
clothing the color not of night but of shadows.

Adalia dozed lightly since her infant son, Jori, had only just started sleeping through the night. Light
sleeper though Adalia was, she heard nothing until a voice whispered in her ear:

"Make no sound, or you will die."

At the same moment.- a hand gloved in finely tanned leather pressed firmly against her lips. When Adalia
made no attempt to scream, the hand lifted, hovering a few inches away lest she suddenly change her
mind.

"You are Adalia, under-chef in the kitchens of this estate?"

"Chief baker," she corrected hotly, indignant despite a dreamlike terror that numbed her limbs. That
promotion had been hard won.

Her interrogator chuckled.

"Chief baker," he conceded. "Breads and rolls and pies and fine pastries, am I right?"

Adalia nodded. The man kneeling at her bedside must have had eyes like a cat's, for he acknowledged
her reply.

"Very good," he murmured. "We have a job for you."

"Me?" she squeaked.

"That's right. We want you to kill a man. The reigning Supreme Affluent."

"My master?"

"That's right." The reply came as a hiss. "It should be so very easy. Your needs shall be met."