Free MANDARIN PLAID (Lydia Chin/Bill Smith series) by S.J. Rozan Page A

matter, I probably wouldn’t use it anyway. Photographer we use, he’s a brilliant guy, goes a little further than most of these wusses, gets an edge. I like my girls to have an edge. You, Mishika, you have an edge. I can see it.”
    I didn’t say anything, but Ed Everest smiled again, as thoughhe’d gotten the answer he wanted. “Call tomorrow,” he said. “I have a full plate but tell my girl that Ed said he wants to see you.” He was peering deeply into my eyes, totally focused on Mishika and her modeling future. Then his gaze was suddenly distracted, catching a glimpse of someone across the room. Probably it was someone more important than I. Well, who wasn’t?
    Ed Everest left his bar stool, squeezing my shoulder, saying, “Great, sweetheart. Mishika. Great. Looking forward,” and wormed his way through the crowd to find another face.
    Well, I thought as I sipped my drink. Well. That’s two people already today who want me to model. My mother would be so pleased.
    The bar stool next to me, so recently emptied of Ed Everest, now took on another occupant, a black-haired, red-lipped young woman in a cropped top and tight pants. Is this a uniform, I wondered, or is it just that no one but a model is willing to take the risk of showing that space above the waist where most of us have at least a tiny little bulge of flesh?
    The red-lipped woman lit a cigarette and cocked her empty glass at the bartender. He brought her another Perrier. Holding the cigarette not at her fingertips but down lower, between her knuckles, she took a drag, sipped her drink, and, without looking at me said in a raspy voice, “You’re new.”
    I already knew that, I wanted to say, Ed Everest told me. But instead I smiled and said, “Yes. Mishika.”
    “Mishika,” she repeated. “Yeah, okay. I’m Francie. Listen, Mishika. I don’t know what you know, but you probably don’t know much because you’re not dressed right and you’re not made up right and you need some work on your hair. Okay? So you’re new.” She drank some Perrier, leaving a voluptuous red stain on the glass. “What you need to know is, stay away from Ed Everest.”
    “He was just here,” I said.
    “What the hell do you think I’m telling you for?” She waved her cigarette impatiently. “He said he could help you, right? Said your look is different but he could do a lot with it, right? Tell me, Mishika, you see anyone else rushing over here to do you a favor and make you famous?”
    I had to admit that I didn’t.
    “No one will.” Francie sucked on her cigarette. “It doesn’t work like that. Anyone who tells you it does is lying. Ed’s clients,” she said, turning her eyes on me for the first time. They were an intense, luminous green, a contact lens green. “They’re not so interested in how you look
in
the clothes.”
    “Why are you telling me this?” I asked, still not completely sure what she was telling me.
    “You don’t believe me? You think I’m trying to screw up your career or something? You think I’m trying to keep him for myself?” She gave a short, nasty laugh. “Ed doesn’t want me. He doesn’t specialize in white girls.”
    She swigged down the last of her Perrier and climbed off the stool. “Suit yourself. Most girls don’t want to hear it. But don’t say I didn’t try.”
    She pushed through the crowd. It parted to let her pass and closed up seamlessly after her.
    I stared after her thoughtfully. Then I turned my attention back to John Ryan and Andi Shechter. They were still alone together, still talking, but Ryan’s gestures, the tilt of his head and set of his shoulders, had taken on a tinge of impatience. The bar stool next to me stayed empty, so I was able to sip my Perrier and watch.
    The music had changed from the Stones to 2 Live Crew, yesterday’s bad boys blending into today’s. It was louder now, less melody, more beat. Andi Shechter pressed out one cigarette and lit another. Her lips seemed tinged with a