Chapter Thirty-FourFor the first time today, I get lucky.
Instead of a cement floor, the admiral’s bloody corpse breaks my fall.
The agony from my ribs, though, makes me wish I weren’t so “lucky.”
In the next moment, Ariel looms over me.
My survival instinct kicks in, and I grasp her glasses, ripping them from her face.
Ariel’s eyes are filled with the same black energy I saw in the intact eye of the Johnny in the hallway.
I now recall where else I’ve seen this kind of energy, and all the pieces of this twisted mosaic click into place.
“You need me alive,” I say on a hunch.
Even if my theory is correct, I have no idea if talking to Ariel will work.
“It’s not personal, Sasha,” Ariel says, and her usually sexy lilt sounds androgynous and ancient, the words pronounced with a thick Ru
