Page 24 of Vicious Deception
Grumbling, Axel slams the door shut and moves on to the next box. In this one, some of the switches are off. He reads the labels before flipping them on and shutting the door.
The two techs come into view, their tool bags in their hands. “Ready?” one of them asks.
“I just have to turn on the fryers.” Axel pulls something that looks like a manual out of his jacket as we move toward the kitchen again. When he turns on the fryers, they both beep loudly and continuously. “Oh, shut up.”
Peering over his shoulder, I watch as Axel follows the instructions on a page in the manual that’s already earmarked. He hits a few buttons, and I briefly see the word “OVERRIDE?” flash across the small screen.
Finally, the beeping stops, and Axel nods. “We’re good to go.”
“What did you do?” I ask.
“Fucked with the temperature sensors and told it to stop being so sensitive. The heating elements won’t turn off, so they’ll run hotter and hotter until the oil catches fire.” Axel gestures to the jug on the counter. “Then that lights up, and ideally, the whole place burns down.”
“And it’ll look like an accident?”
“No,” Axel says as he brushes past me. “It’ll look like a bad close and a catastrophic coincidence. Let’s move.”
I rush to keep up with him and the techs as they move into the dining room. The kitchen floor is slick, and I slip, barely catching myself. When I straighten, Axel is watching me with a judgmental stare.
“You’ve never worked in food service before? You’ve gotta be careful if you’re not wearing the right shoes.” He doesn’t wait for a response, stalking through the restaurant and out the door.
I don’t realize how hot I am until the cool night air washes over my skin. It seems like this job was thought through, but I was still worried about getting caught.
Axel locks up and hands one of the guys a piece of paper. “You’ll find the rest of your payment at this address.”
After that, we don’t stick around. Only once we’re closed in the SUV do I speak again.
“How long will it take to burn down?”
Axel shrugs. “Long enough for us to get out of here and then some. Now ask what you really want to.”
I swallow. “You’re the one who told Huxley where Ludo and Aubrey would be in Florida.”
“Correct.”
“You could’ve gotten her killed,” I grit out, my fists clenching in my lap.
“Huxley wasn’t planning on hurting her,” Axel says, and he sounds almost bored. “Doesn’t have it in him. He just needed leverage against Holloway, and keeping Ludo from expanding his business happens to also serve my plans.”
I wait, assuming Axel is about to make some type of threat. If he’s going up against Ludo inanycapacity, the fewer people who know about it, the better. I’m a liability he can’t afford.
But the threat doesn’t come. Instead, a humorless smile forms on Axel’s features as he pulls out of the parking garage. “You look worried, Hayes.”
“Are younotabout to tell me that if I reveal this to Ludo, you’ll beat me to a bloody pulp?”
“Don’t need to.”
“Oh?” Irritation rises in me, but also curiosity. What does he know that he’s not letting on?
“You could tell Holloway,” Axel says, his voice infused with lazy confidence. “But that’d give him a leg up on me, and I don’t think you want that. Whatever is going on between you, it’s more than just making some quick cash.”
“What makes you so sure?”
Axel snorts. “It’s obvious. If this was just about money, you would’ve helped Aubrey, gotten your cut, and bolted. Sticking around wasn’t worth the risk of getting caught—unless you wanted something else.”
“Maybe,” I say slowly, “but you burning down the Grille doesn’t help me. It’ll piss Ludo off, sure, but it doesn’t get us to safety or anywhere near close to it.”
“Not yet,” Axel corrects. “But this is just one step of many. Eventually, the only thing left of Ludo’s empire will be smoldering ashes, and I’m the last person he’ll suspect lit the match.”