"Williamson, Michael Z - Freehold 03 - Better to Beg Forgiveness" - читать интересную книгу автора (Michael Z. Williamson - Freehold (BAEN) (v5) [htm jpg])

friend, spoke highly of her. They'd been on contract together.

"So we do what we always do. Bound to have some advantages and disadvantages," he said.

Ripple Creek Security sounded very sophisticated and classy. They charged accordingly, and paid their
operators likewise. But if need be, that sophistication devolved to six or eight nasty operators with guns,
who carried their principal to safety while shooting anything in their way. Their primary clients were
governments and multinational and multisystem corporations. It was said they rarely lost a principal, but
of principles, they had none.

"So what would be each?" Sykora asked.

"Oh," Alex replied, and engaged his brain from peripherally alert to responsive. "Likely to have decent
quarters for us, and lots of indoor time. Likely facilities to check incoming individuals. Likely to have
good control of vehicles and facilities . . ."

"Likely someone has a ChiNaTech Mark Fifteen missile with a microburst remote control aimed at the
palace, a few planted informants in the existing indigeneeous security, bugs and a horde of savages
outside?" Sykora asked.

"Elke, you've been doing this enough months that's a rhetorical question, right?" Alex asked back.

She nodded with a wry smile. She ate steadily and neatly from the tray, not in the ravenous fashion


Anderson had. She was always methodical and thoughtful. You had to be to work with explosives.

Anderson had. She was always methodical and thoughtful. You had to be to work with explosives.

Across from Bart, occasionally pulling the screen flat to see better, Shaman read the same maps upside
down. He was slim and looked the part of an executive. He was also a damned fine doctor with lots of
combat experience during Liberia's Third Civil War (or Eighth, depending on who did the counting),
more than once using rigger tape, rags, and a pocketknife to perform lifesaving surgery. Horace
"Shaman" Mbuto might leave you a scarred mess when done, but you'd probably be aliving scarred
mess, and reconstructive biosculp was covered under Ripple Creek's generous benefit package. Alex
wasn't sure if the native rituals Mbuto used alone and on patients were a religious matter for him or simply
an act meant to disturb and creep out observers, and wasn't going to ask. The man was one hell of a
cutter and one hell of a shooter with years of experience.

Last on the couch was Jason Vaughn, with his attention focused on his computer.

"What are you writing, Jason?" Alex asked.

"Letter home," Vaughn said tersely. Vaughn had a wife and kids on Grainne Colony. He'd probably
memorized the maps already, and his eyes kept flicking up and forward toward the flight deck, in nervous
habit. Vaughn was a pilot if need be, an armored vehicle driver if need be, a mechanical master, and very
professionally paranoid. He swung from reticent to lecturing, and if he said something was so, it almost
always was. Alex was glad to have him along. Great operator.

They were all great operators. That's why they got paid better than doctors, lawyers, and most