Page 35 of Beta Team-The Saviors: Part two
KEON
As promised, Blaze convinced the night shift staff to go along with the plan. When I asked what he did, Blaze just laughed, and I didn’t push for more information. Tivon put his men into place with the ambulance, and I insisted on riding in the back. I needed to see this go off without any trouble.
The doors to the ambulance open and two of the nurses roll the gurney inside. As soon as the doors are shut, I unzip the bag, and Ari’s eyes flash open.
“Goddamn, that sucked,” Ari groans. “I don’t know what was worse, the pain of being pushed on this thing, or the bag.”
“But you got out.”
Ari snorts and winces. “Yeah. That was interesting. Why the fuck did you guys send Blaze?”
“That was Kira’s idea,” I laugh. “We knew he could get the job done.”
“He damn near had them pissing on themselves to be cooperative. I’m glad he’s on our side.” I help Ari get set up on the gurney, and he sighs. “What the fuck are we going to do, Ke?”
“What we always do. Fight like hell, and win. There’s never been anything that keeps us down for long, and we aren’t going to start now. We play it smart.”
“How’s Tivon doing?”
“Fine. He's brought a lot to the table, and he’s fucking smart. Plus, he deals with Tyler’s ass with ease.”
“You think he’s a good fit?”
“With the Saviors?” Ari nods. “Yeah, I do. He’s definitely not afraid to take a stand. He protected Kira when I couldn’t. Do I agree with the way he went about that? No. But it isn’t anything that we haven’t done before. He’s one hundred percent in.”
“We need to have a meeting when we get back to the house. I need to be caught up on everything.” Ari catches my frown and grabs my hand. “Not because I don’t think you can’t handle it, Ke. Just because I want to be up to speed. I have no doubt that you could run this team better than me and right now, I’ll be out of commission for a while. After getting my ass chewed out more than once, I’m going to take my recovery seriously.”
“Which one got through to you?”
“All of them, but having Tivon read me the riot act really put it into perspective.” Ari chuckles. “And Jason calling me a prick.”
“You deserved it. I know this sucks, Ari, but we’re doing all that we can.”
Ari nods and squeezes my hand. “I know that. I was having a pity party and being an asshole to the wrong people. I need to focus that anger on my father and Abraham.”
We ride the rest of the way to the safe house in silence, and when we get there, we gently ease the gurney from the ambulance and wheel Ari inside. When he gets to the couch, I help him up and get him situated, propping his legs up on the coffee table. He’s pale by the time he leans back, but at least he’s here with us now. Kira sits beside him and kisses his cheek. Ariwraps his arm around her shoulders and pulls her into his side, kissing the top of her head.
“How are you feeling?” Kira asks as she snuggles closer.
“Tired,” Ari answers. “But it’s good to be back with you guys.” Ari nods to Tivon. “Can you get me up to speed?” Tivon goes through what we found out about the guy from campus and from Jason’s apartment. “So this is a team?”
“From what I can tell, yeah,” Tivon answers. “We’re still trying to find anything we can about the guy that ran you off the road, but so far, there’s no surveillance footage. We’re running facial recognition on the other guys, and when we get a hit, we’ll find him so he’ll talk.”
“Torture,” Tyler coughs, making Tivon roll his eyes.
“Your obsession with torture is a little concerning,” Tivon answers and looks back at Ari. “I want to run something by you.”
“Go ahead.”
“I still have guys in Israel. Guys I trust. I think the only way to get to Aharon is to separate him from his guards.”
“How do you plan on doing that?” I ask.
“By separating the loyalists from the ones who are just there out of a sense of obligation. He hides behind them, because he knows he’s made enemies out of the people from back home.”
“Could you set him up to be assassinated?” Gavin asks.
“We could. It wouldn’t be hard, but we can’t do that until we find Abraham. If Aryeh doesn’t go home to take Aharon’s spot, then it defaults to Abraham, and we can’t let that happen to our people,” Tivon explains. “But it’s an idea for the future.”
