Page 19 of The Accidental (Redemption Inc.)

“Nah, that’s just what happens when we have to fend for ourselves.” A wink tossed over her shoulder, she picked up the tray of cocktails and sashayed out from behind the bar.

With her wild halo of curls pulled into a severe bun and her leather toned down in a less deadly, more sexy dress version, Avery looked more like a runway model tonight than an assassin, one who Jax knew had had an even rougher upbringing than them.

But like with them, the Madigans had taken Avery in and made her family.

And their family kept growing, Perris and Talleys too.

Maybe a Winters somewhere down the line, Jax idly—hopefully—thought as they grabbed two bottles of Gravity Stout and a pair of frosty pilsners from the under-bar fridge.

They set them on the tray with Feb’s whiskey, then headed out from behind the bar.

They were halfway to Lauren and Lette’s table when Holt radioed, “Ariel two blocks out.”

Definitely a good time to put Feb at ease. They slid in next to the chef at the side of the table. “Everyone good here?”

“You’re gonna bring Feb around after this is all over, yeah?” Lette asked as Jax set their glasses and beer bottles on the table. “She can hang.”

“I normally tell her to butt out,” Lauren said with a flick of her hot pink nails. She leaned toward Feb and in a conspiratorial whisper added, “Lette tends to mother hen. Runs in the family. Her brothers are the worst . But in this case, I agree. You’re cool. Please come hang with us.”

Feb laughed, charmed, as most folks were by the two best friends, Lette’s sweetness a perfect counter to Lauren’s snark, but when Feb’s gaze caught Jax’s over the whiskey glass, they heated like they had in the nook, giving Jax more hope. Maybe her hesitation had been about something else.

Hope and answers, though, would have to wait, a gust of the wintery-for-San-Francisco air heralding Ariel’s entrance. Jax tucked the drink tray under their arm and rested their hand at the small of Feb’s back, giving it the double-tap signal for time to go .

“I better get back to the kitchen,” she told Lauren and Lette. “But yes, I’d love to hang when this is all over.”

Jax walked her to the espresso station in the breezeway, hand remaining at the small of her back, enjoying the fit there. “I’ll take care of everything out here.”

Feb glanced over her shoulder, heat still smoldering in her gaze. “Take care of you too.”

Jax nodded, and Feb continued down the breezeway, passing Hawes striding the opposite direction.

Jax waited at the edge of the dining room, then accompanied him to greet Ariel.

Hawes showed him to his table, slipping him a comm device inside the menu, while Jax prepared the Manhattan he ordered.

It wasn’t until they delivered the drink that they noticed the gold band Ariel usually kept in his wallet on his left ring finger.

By the sharp inhale over the comm, Fletcher, in the van with Holt, glimpsed it too.

“Can I get you anything else?” Jax asked.

He spun the ring around his finger. “The lost years of my life back?”

“Only you can do that.” They nudged the Manhattan closer. “This might help in the meantime.”

“And whatever curry I’m smelling from the back.”

“I’ll make sure Feb gives you extra.”

And she did, of everything. The roasted chickpeas, the sesame and persimmon salad, the morel and pasta midcourse, each of which Ariel raved about, asking Hawes to tell Feb she had more than earned his Render review.

Her “fuck yeah” over the comms when Hawes relayed the message made Jax and the entire dining room, including Ariel, smile.

It was a shame he only managed two bites of the red chicken curry before Holt radioed, “Bogey incoming. Male, midfifties, six-two, two-twenty, dark hair.”

“That doesn’t sound like Fitzpatrick,” Jax said.

“We’re running facial.”

Ariel the foodie vanished, replaced with the professional, straightening in his chair and angling toward the door, knife within reach.

The door opened, the stranger—not Fitzpatrick—entering, but judging by the jolt Ariel tried and failed to suppress, the target wasn’t a stranger to him. Mixing a drink, Jax lowered their chin and spoke low. “That’s not Fitzpatrick. Ariel knows this person.”

The man didn’t wait for Hawes to reach the host stand. He walked straight to Ariel’s table, pulled out the chair, and sat across from him.

“What are you doing here?” Ariel asked.

“It’s what you want, isn’t it? The message in your Render review was pretty clear.”

“Yes, but why you?”

“Because maybe you’ll listen to me before you make a terrible mistake. Your family wants?—”

Ariel shot to his feet. “How do you know what my family wants?”

“Fuck, that was his CIA boss. Officer—” The bang of the surveillance van door cut off Holt’s words. “Fletcher! Wait! Fuck!” The door slammed closed, then Holt was back on the line. “That’s Officer Damian Barbas, and this is about to go sideways. Hawes, secure Feb.”

Jax forced themselves to ignore the scramble in the van and now in the kitchen and listened closely to the scramble playing out at the table on the other side of the bar from them. Ariel was on his feet, squaring off against Damian. “I repeat,” Ariel said. “What do you?—”

“Ariel,” the other man said, calm and stern. “Lower your voice and sit down.” He aimed his gaze directly at Ariel’s chair, effectively repeating the order. “You’re drawing attention. I taught you better than that.”

Good, Barbas didn’t seem to realize the onlookers at neighboring tables were more than casual observers.

Either Ariel recognized that too or the lure of answers, the opportunity to clear his name, was too powerful to resist. He lowered himself back into his seat.

“Was Fitzpatrick tailing me on your orders?”

“Not mine. Your family’s.”

He leaned forward and braced his forearms on the table. “And back to my original question: How the fuck do you know what they want?”

“They want you back. I vouched for you.”

“So you’re on their payroll too?”

“I’m not that dumb.” He stole Ariel’s wineglass, sipping as he settled back in the chair, legs crossed. “But there is a payday waiting for me, and you’re the ticket to getting it.”

“I gave up everything to bring them down. We spent years cutting them off. We were a team. And now you’re doing their dirty work?”

“Not the dirty part. I’m the bring-you-in-peacefully part. The other part, that would be when things get dirty.”

“We’ve got movement outside,” Holt reported. “Four bogeys converging. Talley, move your teams in.”

“Move to intercept,” Special Agent in Charge Aidan Talley radioed to his perimeter teams outside.

“Ariel,” Jax said; the team agreed they’d be the contact with him, given the trust they’d established with Ariel the past few days. “Wrap this up.”

“Did you sell me out?” he asked Barbas. “With the info Fitzpatrick provided?”

“I might have connected the dots for the higher ups at the Agency. Sold them a story about how you weren’t cutting off your family’s most lucrative ventures.” He finished Ariel’s wine, then tilted the glass toward his protégé. “You were avoiding those intentionally.”

“The only thing that was intentional was building a better case, like you told me to do.”

“But you didn’t do the other thing I told you, did you?” He glared daggers at the ring on Ariel’s left hand. “You just couldn’t leave him alone.”

As if his statement warranted an exclamation mark, gunfire erupted outside.

Barbas’s gaze whipped from Ariel to the street outside the plate glass window, then back to Ariel, who broke into a grin. “Thanks for clearing my name, traitor.”

Barbas bolted out of his seat, the chair falling behind him.

He stumbled back, nearly falling in his haste to flee, only to find himself hemmed in, everyone else in the restaurant now on their feet, in position and blocking his path to the door.

Wide-eyed, he whipped back around to Ariel. “What’s going on?”

“Bogeys contained outside,” Holt radioed.

Inside, Mel stepped forward. “Target is contained inside as well.”

“Nowhere to run, Damian,” Ariel said as Fletcher and Agent Talley strolled out from the breezeway, Feb on their heels.

Fletcher sidled to his ex-husband’s side and laced his fingers with Ariel’s. “You want to do the honors, Agent Talley?”

Aidan circled behind the team’s true target and produced a pair of cuffs. “Damian Barbas, you’re under arrest. You have the right?—”

“Fletcher?” Feb interrupted. She’d stopped halfway between the breezeway and the end of the bar where Jax stood. Head tilted, topknot bobbing, a confused expression streaked across her face. “There’s a red spot on your back. How did you get curry there?”

Jax whipped their gaze back to Fletcher.

Not curry.

The dot from a rifle’s laser sight.

Jax dove in Feb’s direction. “Sniper—get down!”