A Series of Steaks
Vina Jie-Min Prasad
You can get mad AND get even
I am reviewing only the story "A Series of Steaks", by Vina Jie-Min Prasad which you can find here. 7900 words, so either a long short story or a short novella. Clarkesworld calls it a "novellette".
"A Series of Steaks" is about a forger, Helena, who forges beef. That is, she makes artificial meat that looks like it came from a cow (or steer, more likely) and sells it to clients who pass it off as real beef. This is forgery and is definitely illegal. Helena is a disgraced student of Hong Kong Scientific University, where she learned how to print animal organs. Helena is the main character, but there is a second, Lily. I'm not quite sure where Lily comes from -- she feels to me like a character who might have been introduced in a previous story, but since this was the first thing I had ever read by Prasad, she's new to me.
The story starts when Helena gets an order that she wants to refuse, because it is beyond the capacity of her business. But the man commissioning it knows Helena's real identity and blackmails her. Helena hires Lily to take some of the load of this huge order. I can't really say any more without spoiling, so I'll leave it there.
It's a fun story with a delightful ending