Free Black Tiger by Jennifer Kewley Draskau

social advantage.’
    Pim threw back her head and began to laugh. ‘They must be mad! Surely everybody in Bangkok knows I’m Red Pim, the black sheep of the Premsakuls. If they dared, my family would throw me into the gutter! They already despair of finding a decent husband willing to take me on.’
    Chee Laan stared at Pim in surprise, and with new respect. She had never heard her speak so forcefully, hadn’t thought her capable of it. Despite her obvious, and somewhat tedious, overactive social conscience, she had always seemed to Chee Laan to represent the ideal of Buddhist womanhood: mild, modest, just a touch mealy-mouthed. Pim was the very antithesis of Salikaa, whatever Salikaa was.
    Chee Laan had encountered women of Salikaa’s type before, of course, tangentially—loud-mouthed fishwives bargaining raucously in the market at Pratumwan, or brawling with noodle sellers outside bars—but none of them had possessed Salikaa’s electrifying beauty, and Chee Laan had certainly never known their names or met any such person in the proper circles.
    Salikaa, unable to bear someone else stealing centre stage for more than two minutes, now dragged the attention back to herself. She yawned like a lazy cat, closing her eyes and showing the inside of her wide red mouth, even the little vibrating tongue at the back of her throat, shameless as a young animal.
    ‘At least you two have families,’ she said with a provoking casualness.
    ‘Why, haven’t you?’ Chee Laan obligingly took the bait.
    ‘Me? I was brought up by a bandit chief after he and his gang murdered my parents,’ she said, watching their faces for the effect of her announcement. After years of experience with her brother Pao, Chee Laan had learned not to react when people sought to shock her. Pim, on the other hand, did nothing to conceal her horror.
    ‘How terrible!’ she murmured sympathetically. ‘Kidnapped by bandits! Why didn’t you run away?’
    ‘Why on earth should I do that?’ Salikaa laughed scornfully. ‘My own folks were pathetic losers. I’m better off without them. Besides, when I return, I’m going to be the next Miss Thailand. I’m going to follow in Lady Asra’s footsteps.’
    Chee Laan, like everyone in Thailand, knew all about Lady Asra, the Siamese Cinderella. A very beautiful girl of undistinguished origins, who had become Miss Thailand and later Miss Universe, and went on to marry a Prince of the Blood. Every bargirl and waitress in Bangkok dreamed of becoming the next Lady Asra. Chee Laan cocked a sceptical eyebrow at this ludicrous ambition.
    ‘Salikaa, surely you wouldn’t want to become part of the beauty circus? It is demeaning to women. It reinforces stereotypes!’ Pim frowned in her solemn way.
    Salikaa laughed. ‘Demeaning? When I win, princes will beg to drink champagne out of my shoes! Perhaps even the Crown Prince himself.’
    ‘The Crown Prince is fourteen years old, Salikaa.’ Chee Laan rolled on her back and kicked her foot in the air, wearying of this conversation. ‘He is a baby. A child.’
    ‘You could never get near the Crown Prince, anyway,’ Pim pointed out reasonably, shaking her head. ‘You’ve no idea what court security is like. The old king’s favourite, the Black Tiger himself, is in charge of it.’
    Salikaa delicately lifted the hem of her white nightgown. The nightlight glanced off her thighs, toned and sinewy, glossy as polished cherrywood. Buckled round her inner thigh was a long skinning knife in a leather sheath. Before her companions could recover from their surprise, she had pulled it out and itched herself luxuriously between the shoulder blades, arching her back like a cat. ‘I know about Sya Dam, but I also know what bandit security is like,’ she said. ‘And, if one were to be received at court, gain an entrée through a dear school friend, so many possibilities would open up!’ She looked at Pim and her smile seemed to harden. ‘Thanks to you, Pim dear, I’ve already