Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 140604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 703(@200wpm)___ 562(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 140604 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 703(@200wpm)___ 562(@250wpm)___ 469(@300wpm)
Olivia was sexy in a bar fight. She didn’t hold back. She’d defended her men’s right to be free from sexual harassment caused by slightly drunk, overly bedazzled, small-town girls. “There’s a third potential explanation.”
“It was Scott or that high school ex, and they would have done it to scare her,” Ruby posited. “Scott was right there according to what Olivia told me.”
“He was waiting for the plane. It would have been easy to slash the tires and then wait to offer her a ride. And hey, let’s get some dinner on the way back. I’ve missed you.”
“Except he didn’t count on you.”
“Olivia wouldn’t have bought it.” He was sure of that. Even if they hadn’t been there the result would have been the same. “Not for a second. She would have been in that weird ride share long before she would have considered getting in his car. She would have walked first.”
“But he doesn’t know that,” Ruby pointed out. “I’m sure in his head, she would have needed him. Look, I’ve met Scott many times. He’s an arrogant bastard who has always managed to fail up. It’s like that with some men. They can be incompetent as hell, but they use the women around them to prop themselves up. Olivia did it for a long time. She thought he just needed more experience. Or he was stressed. He was excellent at talking her into things that weren’t good for her. He was basically a con artist, though not in a traditional sense.”
“Well, he was going after her money,” Garrett pointed out.
“Not really. That’s the funny thing. He was using her to get to his next job. I actually don’t think he would have married her. I think he was deeply intimidated by how competent she was at her job. Scott is the kind of man who needs everyone to look up to him. He won’t be with a woman who potentially outshines him, and he knew pretty quickly that he wouldn’t get past her parents when it came time to get serious.”
“Then why would he come back?” Garrett asked.
“Because that’s what assholes who figure out the world is not actually their oyster do. When they find out the oyster is poisoned and will kill them, they jog right back to the person who made them feel the safest. He’s decided the world is too much for him and he wants the easy life, and Olivia Barnes-Fleetwood represents that life. He thinks he can slide right back in because that’s what other women have taught him.”
“Why would he start a fire?” He had to complete this puzzle. He had the worst feeling that Olivia might be in actual danger.
“I don’t know that he did,” Ruby admitted. “I followed up on his alibi and it’s solid. He was seen coming into the motel at two in the morning. Security doesn’t show him leaving again until eight a.m. Someone took out the security cameras at the office but not the motel. I don’t see how he could have left without a camera catching him. I’ll be honest, it feels like a somewhat professional job, but one where they didn’t want to cover it up as an accident.”
“Why?” He couldn’t see the point.
“A couple of reasons I can think of. One we talked about before—to scare her. To send the little woman running into big strong man arms because she can’t handle all this stress.”
Garrett rolled his eyes. “Yeah, she handled it fine. Two?”
“To set her up. To make it look like she did it for insurance or some other reason. Three is the easiest explanation in the world. Money, or covering up something. Arson is often the blanket used to cover up something else. The question is what.”
He thought about Gladen. “Would Gladen be dumb enough to think she wouldn’t back up the evidence she had against him?”
“Gladen is desperate,” Ruby said.
That was when he saw a man and a woman slowly making their way to the parking lot.
“He can be desperate, but that doesn’t make evidence go away.”
“Aren’t you supposed to be a lawyer?”
“I specialize in contracts. I’m not an expert in criminals,” he admitted. Except he did know a bit about it. “He’s trying to bring in reasonable doubt. He can claim she made up the evidence because she was a scorned woman. It’s thin.”
The woman seemed drunk. She had an arm slung around her partner’s shoulders as she stumbled along in the shadows of the bar. The man seemed to try to pick her up, but she pushed at him.
Someone had too much to drink. He was happy Olivia didn’t see the need to go too far. When he left she was on her second margarita of the night, and that seemed to be her limit.
Because she wanted to play.