A Winter Wedding(79)
But he pushed that thought aside. What he’d been feeling when they were together before the fire had nothing to do with friendship. He wanted a real relationship, which meant that making love to her now was the last thing he should do. His plant had been severely damaged; he didn’t need to give himself any more reason to be angry or disappointed.
“What do you have to drink?” Brandon asked. “I hope it’s stronger than wine.”
“I’ve got some whiskey somewhere.” Kyle focused on Olivia and Lourdes. “You two planning to join us?”
“I can’t,” Olivia said.
“No, thanks.” Lourdes shook her head. “After breathing in all those nasty fumes, my stomach’s upset.”
Kyle handed a shot to Brandon. Then he gave Lourdes and Olivia each a glass of water and dropped onto the sofa. “What a night,” he murmured, and that started them talking about the fire again—how he’d found out about it, whether there’d been any chemicals left too close to other chemicals or Warren had been lying about where he’d been standing with his cigarettes, who’d locked up earlier and what Kyle’s next steps would be. He paid a lot for hazard insurance, but he’d never expected to need it. He supposed he’d call his agent in the morning, and his agent would explain what to do next.
“This won’t hurt you too much financially, will it?” Olivia asked. “I mean...you know Riley will drop everything to help you rebuild as soon as possible.”
“Riley has a wedding coming up,” Kyle pointed out.
She took a sip of her water. “I’m handling most of that, and it’s the slow season for construction. I bet he’ll jump right in. And if he can’t, I’m sure your clients will understand. It’s not as if you had any control over this. It was just an unfortunate occurrence. Could’ve happened to anyone.”
Kyle wasn’t feeling nearly as optimistic that he’d be able to throw himself on the mercy of his clients and expect any special consideration. There’d probably be a few who could wait, but... “I sell primarily to large commercial users, Olivia,” he said. “They don’t give a shit whether I’ve had some bad luck. They want their solar system to go in when it’s scheduled to go in. And if they can’t get the panels from me, they’ll get them from someone else. I’ll try to counteract that with some discounting to get them to hold out, but it’ll hurt my bottom line, even if the insurance covers the other losses.”
She grimaced. “But you’ve worked so hard. How long will it take to get the plant up and running again?”
“I have no idea.” He stared at the liquid in his glass. “They wouldn’t let me go in, even after the fire was out. Everything was too hot. And they were afraid more of the roof would collapse.” He wasn’t sure he could’ve tolerated the fumes, anyway. The firemen claimed they were toxic and, judging by the terrible stench, it was easy to believe. “It’ll take time just to determine the extent of the damage—let alone go through the process of getting everything fixed or replaced.”
“Could it have been faulty wiring?” Brandon asked.
Kyle’s curiosity about what they might be able to tell him suddenly overcame his desire to keep his suspicions to himself. “You don’t happen to know where Noelle was tonight, do you?”
The room stilled. Even Lourdes’s eyes flew to his face. But if Noelle had a believable alibi, he’d rather learn about it now. The thought that she might have sabotaged his success out of petty jealousy, resentment or revenge infuriated him.
“Why would you ask that?” Olivia said.
He attempted a careless shrug. “No reason. Just wondered if...if she managed to get her job back at Sexy Sadie’s, or if she came over to hang out with you or you met her for a drink—”
“Noelle’s been spouting off, saying some stupid things. I told you that before,” Olivia said. “But she would never purposely set your plant on fire, if that’s where you’re going with this. Why would she take the risk? What if someone was in the building? What if you were there, working late like you so often do?”
“I’m sure she could see that my truck was parked here. And all the lights were off at the plant, except for that one pole light outside.”
“She’s done some really dumb things, some thoughtless and selfish things. But she’d never go that far.” Olivia looked at Brandon for confirmation, but he surprised Kyle by frowning at her apologetically, as if he wanted to agree with her for the sake of support but couldn’t do it for the sake of honesty.
“I wouldn’t put it past her,” Kyle said, hoping to draw any fire Brandon’s lack of support might cause. He didn’t want to get his brother into an argument with Olivia just because Brandon saw Noelle the way he did.
Fortunately, it worked.
“You think it was her!” Olivia set her glass aside and rose to her feet.
Lourdes shifted as if she was tempted to say something but didn’t.
“No,” Kyle said. “Never mind.” Damn it. He should’ve kept his mouth shut. He couldn’t trust himself at the moment; he was too angry. “I’m sure she didn’t do it.”
“Now you’re just telling me what I want to hear,” Olivia said. “Well, you may think it was her, but I don’t.”