“I don’t know.” Linao grimaced. “I’ve been in prison. I’m not in the loop.”
“Who got you out of prison?” Velda asked. She wanted to know exactly who the people were who’d betrayed Aponi.
Linao frowned. Leaned back. “He’s burned now, so I suppose I can tell you. The prison administrator, Hyet Vadar. He was having an affair with one of the guards, against regulations and without the knowledge of his wife. We bribed him.”
“Why would he help you if it meant he’d be burned?” Ethan asked.
“That wasn’t the plan, but someone had obviously warned the military that an escape attempt was possible, because unbeknownst to Vadar, they’d hidden lenses all around my cell. The whole thing was captured on comms feed, and I almost didn’t make it out. He was caught red-handed.”
Well, that was something. Velda wondered who’d tipped the military off.
It gave her a lift, the thought that there were others aware of the problems and working against their enemies.
Not that it did her and Ethan any good up here.
She sighed and leaned against him.
“That’s right, keep pretending to be an innocent couple out hiking. I thought you’d drop the act after I outed you, but I see you’re keeping it up. Thing is, I don’t think the Caruso pick up on things like that.” Linao’s lip curled up in a smirk.
Velda shrugged, refusing to comment, and Ethan looped his arm around her shoulder and hugged her a little closer.
The whole ship gave a quick shudder and then the familiar pressure of a pinch pressed down on her.
They were pinching to the black, and she guessed they were headed to the mysterious Sylvester, who both Brink and Linao refused to talk about.
It would be interesting to find out who he was. She just hoped she and Ethan lived to pass the information on.
17
Ethan could feelthe eyes of the Caruson on them as they sat in silence. No one had said they couldn’t talk, and occasionally someone murmured something, but while they were in the pinch, everyone sank into their own thoughts, because it was a long pinch and no one had any idea where they were going.
Except Brink, Ritter and Linao, that was. And the captain, if he was still alive and on the bridge.
They had to know where the mysterious Sylvester was, in order to bring him the silver balls, and Ethan guessed he finally knew the name of the head of the Cores.
Sylvester.
He tried to remember if any of the execs and top bosses of either the Garmen or Lassan Cores was called Sylvester before both planets fell, but couldn’t.
For all he knew, Sylvester had taken control when some of the Cores bosses were killed—on either planet—after the Caruso turned on them, or in the fight with the VSC afterward.
Maybe that’s why he was so happy to keep giving the Caruso chance after chance, because they’d cleared the path for him to grab the reins.
Whatever the answer, they’d soon know, because the ship had just come out of its pinch.
Ethan watched the way the guards at the door spoke into their comms and then they parted to allow the captain to come stumbling in.
He had been injured, but like the guard with the arm wound, it looked minor.
The guard had eventually lain down on the floor, back up against the wall, while they were in the pinch, arm tucked close against his side.
But he was all right.
Ethan wasn’t sure how he knew that with such certainty, but he did.
But when the captain came in, his gaze went to the guard and he gave an exclamation of horror.
“He’s alive, Captain,” Brink said. “He’s just sleeping.”
