Page 10 of The Accidental (Redemption Inc.)

Five

Just as she exited the front of UTT each night, Feb entered the same way each morning. Cruising through her dining room and soaking in her concept and creation first thing reminded her why she was there and what she was doing. It calmed and centered her.

As she pushed open the front door on Valentine’s Day morning, she needed that calming, centering effect more than ever.

She was a ball of nerves over the evening service ahead and a live wire ready to spark over the date that would follow.

Would the Render critic show? Would he give them a star-worthy review?

Would everyone else dining with them tonight also enjoy their experience?

Would she get to experience more than a heated make-out with Dylan after?

Even an extended session with her vibrator last night when she’d gotten home had failed to take the edge off, her dreams filled with parted lips, dirty words, and rosy pale skin. Not to mention sex on every surface?—

A cleared throat interrupted her stroll down fantasy lane.

She glanced up.

Calm and centered vanished.

The large round table at the center of the dining room was occupied by a group of severe-looking individuals. Attractive, all of them, but also intense, their unfamiliar gazes focused on her.

Well, not entirely unfamiliar... “Dylan?” she said to her bartender and future date who was sitting directly across the table from where she’d entered, the center of the gathered group. “What’s going on?”

“Jax,” they replied.

Odd, but name preferences seemed the least of Feb’s worries at the moment. “Okay, you want to go by your last name, sure...”

“Not my last name,” Dylan said, holding her gaze. “Jax is my first name. J-A-X. And this is my family, some of them.”

Feb swept her gaze left to right, trying and failing to see Dylan in any of the people on either side of them, but then she remembered how Dylan had been kicked out at home.

How they’d landed in a shelter where they’d found their chosen family.

But even then, the Dylan sitting at the table in their usual preservice nerd attire did not match the attire or attitude of the other people around the table.

They looked far more like the Dylan that Feb was used to seeing behind the bar.

“Why don’t you have a seat, Ms. Winters?”

Feb’s gaze snapped to the Black woman to Dylan’s left.

She was the boss lady. Feb knew it the same way she immediately knew who was the head chef in any kitchen.

The scary, hot blond in leather on Dylan’s other side was also a boss lady.

Maybe not in this particular instance, but an air of authority swirled around her too.

And she seemed vaguely familiar? Hard to forget those ice blue eyes, the sharp lines of her dainty face, all that blond hair.

Feb would swear she’d met her before. Had definitely seen her leather jacket on Dylan before.

Had Dylan taken it? Was that what this was all about?

Seemed a bit extreme, but so did these strangers.

She slid into the empty chair across from Dylan. “Are you in trouble?” she asked them.

“No, but I’m afraid you are. More than we intended.

” They averted their gaze, face angled away, but not before Feb caught the regret that streaked across it.

Recognized it as the expression, the uneasiness that had weighed on Dylan the other day.

Feb’s stomach sank, then sank further as Dylan slumped in their chair, silent.

Boss lady took that as her cue. “I’m Melissa Cruz,” she introduced herself.

“And this is my work partner, Braxton Kane.” She nodded at the white man on her left.

He looked an odd combination of tired yet determined.

He also kept a watchful eye on Dylan, and if Feb wasn’t wrong, his hazel gaze was tinged with sympathy, his demeanor with protection.

Given he looked around fifty, a father figure, maybe?

Before Feb could ponder further, Melissa spoke again.

“Jax works with me and Brax at Redemption Inc.”

“And we’re the rest of Jax’s family,” the scary blond said.

“Helena?” Feb said, the name coming to her out of a whiskey-soaked memory from that night after service when she’d wanted so badly to kiss Dylan. Dylan had put her in a car home instead—Helena’s car.

“Good, you remember.” Helena’s smirk reminded Feb of a viper.

Yeah, she was the scary boss lady. “Grumpy on the end over there”—she pointed at Brax—“is also my brother-in-law. Mr. Hair”—she pointed at the man to her right, who looked suspiciously like Mia Perri from AB’s—“is my other brother-in-law, Chris. We’re here for Jax, and we also have an interest in the target. ”

“What target ?”

“Jacob Pappas,” Melissa answered.

“The Render critic.”

“Is a cover,” Dylan said, reentering the chat.

“Right, I explained?—”

“Pappas is a cover,” Dylan said with a grimace. “So is his gig as a Render critic.”

Feb propped her elbows on the table, chin in her hands, holding up her very confused head. “I’m sorry, I haven’t had enough coffee yet for this conversation.”

Dylan pushed back from the table, the scrape of their chair over the cement floor loud in the otherwise quiet space. They circled the table to Feb’s side. “We’re bounty hunters,” they said. “That’s what we do at Redemption, and Pappas—the person he really is—is wanted by numerous parties.”

“Who is he?”

“It’s safer if you don’t know.”

She scrubbed her hands over her face, hoping the What-The-Fuck of this all would be gone when she dropped her arms. No such luck.

The four intense strangers were all still there.

And so was Dylan—no, Jax —beside her. Not a stress dream, then.

Definitely not a fantasy. This was reality, which brought a whole bunch of stress-inducing complications.

“So, what?” she said, glancing up at the person she thought she’d known. “UTT V-day is off now?”

“No,” Jax said. “We want you to go forward with the dinner.” They sounded as unenthused about that plan as Feb felt.

Melissa pitched harder. “We haven’t been able to pin down Pappas’s location until now. This is the best shot we’ve had at him. That anyone has.”

Feb slumped in her chair, gaze still on Jax standing beside her. “I should’ve never decided to do V-day.”

“Probably not,” they said with a wry half-smile. “But the Pappas thing is likely just bad timing. He’s a foodie. You’re a star. You and UTT were on his radar.”

Feb glanced around her dining room, imagining it later tonight, full of diners, servers, and chefs. “Will my people, my guests be safe?”

“My husband will be in the kitchen,” Chris spoke for the first time, his voice low and rumbly and with the local accent San Franciscans didn’t think they had.

“Put him on prep. He’s good with a knife.

” Helena elbowed him in the side, earning her a shit-eating grin before he turned his attention back to Feb.

“He can blend in and protect that area.”

“One person?”

“Hawes will do the job.”

“The rest of us will be out here,” Helena said.

“But there are no resos left,” Feb said.

“We paid off your diners.”

Spluttering, Feb could hardly manage embarrassment. Panic crawled up her throat and strangled her voice. “How do you know they weren’t critics?”

“ I know,” Jax said. “I hacked the critics’ identities and moved them to earlier seatings. Every real guest, including critics, will be cleared out of here by the time Pappas arrives.”

“You should also give your servers the night off,” Brax said. “For their safety.”

Feb opened her mouth to protest, but Jax anticipated her objection. “Tell them they’ll be paid,” they said, “but that the chefs will serve dishes tonight. You’ve done that before for special dinners.”

Feb scoffed. “And how are you going to keep my chefs safe? Or fool them into thinking you’re real diners?”

“We’ll be ready,” Melissa said with a smile. “We’re not only bounty hunters. Some of us like to eat too.”

Undeterred, the panic expanding around Feb was a tough balloon to pop. Eyes scrunched closed, she rubbed them with her balled fist and shook her head. “This is all just a bad dream.”

“’Fraid not, babe,” Jax said as they laid a hand on her shoulder. “Take a deep breath.” When Feb struggled, Jax squeezed her shoulder. “Try again, with me.”

When she’d managed three, Feb opened her eyes and asked the person beside her, “Is Pappas worth this? Really?” Jax, of all people, knew Feb was sticking her neck out with this meal, that she’d put the kitchen through hell the past week.

And now Jax and these people were adding a whole other layer of complication—of actual danger—on top of an already stressful situation.

“I can’t risk them,” she pleaded with Jax. “I can’t risk this.”

“I know how much this place, your people, your reputation mean to you.” They kneeled, hand on her bouncing knee. “Trust me.”

“How?” Feb croaked. “I don’t even know you.”

Pain streaked across Jax’s face, mixed with the earlier regret, but a blink later they locked it down. Raised their chin and tangled their fingers with hers. “Yeah, Feb, you do.”

“And that’s the last first seating served!” Lacey said as she twirled her way back into the kitchen, serving tray empty but for the smoke wand and glass dome they were using for tonight’s apple crostata with burnt sugar glaze.

Everyone cheered, a few others danced at their stations too, the kitchen heaving a collective sigh of relief. Everyone except Feb, who stood near the freezers at the back. She glanced at the clock; half past eight. Pappas—or whatever his name was—would arrive within the next half hour.