"Elizabeth Lynn - The Sardonyx Net" - читать интересную книгу автора (Lynn Elizabeth A)

-- Nakamura Kenji, _History of Chabad_

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*Chapter One*

Dana Ikoro, smuggler, stood facing Monk the drug courier across the floor of the starship
_Treasure_. He was furious.

Monk had ebony skin and a sleek, shaven skull. She wore silver leggings and ruby earrings, and
between her breasts dangled a shiny gold medallion, sister to the one Dana Ikoro wore around his neck.
She was well known on the dorazine circuit. She was two meters tall and Dana had to look up to her.

It was not a position he liked. He clenched his fists in his pocket and swore under his breath in
Pellish. Monk gazed at him, eyelids drooping evilly, ostentatiously bored. He repeated what she had just
told him. "The drugs have already gone?"

She nodded, slouching. "That's right."

He could see she enjoyed his discomfort, and it enraged him. "You want to tell me how you
managed to lose three thousand unit doses of dorazine?"

She shrugged. "I follow instructions. Instructions said, Wait for a ship carrying this code, hitting these
coordinates, at this time. I pick up the stuff from the robo, Jump here, wait. Twenty minutes ago,
_Lamia_ Jumps in, matches codes with me. I know _Lamia_. I know Tori Lamonica. We've done
business before. Codes match, we transfer. Twenty minutes later, you Jump through with the identical
code, the dorazine's gone. That's not my fault." She gazed over his head as she talked.

Jacked, Dana thought. Damn it, Lamonica jacked me!

He'd never been jacked before. Dorazine was prime cargo. Damn and blast it, he'd never _carried_
dorazine before! He'd had to buy equipment: the Drug spoiled at temperatures under 6 degrees and over
14 degrees Celsius. The special cooling unit had cost him five hundred credits, but he'd expected to
realize at least three thousand upon sale of the drug on Chabad. He was not only out his own money, but
he'd been made a fool of, and in the smugglers' canon, ridicule presaged poverty. He might never get a
second chance to run the drug.

It did not make him feel any better to know that he'd been taken by an expert. Tori Lamonica
boasted of her skill in jacking cargoes in every sector, planet, and Port of the Living Worlds. He
controlled his anger with an effort. This was Monk's ship; he could hardly tear it to bits as he wanted to
-- and Monk didn't care if he went bust as vacuum.

"Great," he said. "That was my cargo. Now what do I do? Got any suggestions?"

She smiled, showing perfect teeth. "Jack someone else."
 Dana bristled. "That's not my style. I'm no thief."

The tall woman yawned. "I wouldn't call Tori Lamonica a thief -- not to her face, anyway. Who
suckered you into this business?"