Page 45 of Sweet on You
15
Ronnie
It wasn’t even noon yet and it felt like I’d been watching Lex’s bakery for a whole week. Even though the fire was small, Lana, Tony, and I made the executive decision to call the fire department and make sure everything was safe and the outlet wouldn’t spark once more after we’d left.
I had no idea until that moment what a mess firefighters can leave. Everything about them is imposing—not that I’m complaining. I know their jobs are hard and dangerous. But their suits are giant. Their boots are hulking and leave footprints everywhere. Their helmets hit doorframes when they enter. It was madness.
Lana and Tony made more coffee for everyone and put out the leftover muffins from that morning. Not many of them nibbled, but even still, the chief seemed to appreciate the gesture.
Aaron Trivaldi, a fellow survivor from Maple Grove High School, came up to me, questions marring his brow. “Ronnie?” he asked when he saw me. “What are you doing here?”
“I was café-sitting,” I said and cringed as I looked around the café. Even though the fire hadn’t spread out into the customer area, the smoke certainly had, and it was like looking through a fog. “Obviously, I’m not meant to own a bakery,” I said, gesturing around.
Aaron chuckled, but his eyes were downturned as he sighed and looked around. “So, Lex isn’t here?”
I shook my head. “He should be back soon, though,” I said, glancing at the clock. He’d said he was leaving when we finally got through to him via his lawyer. And that was about an hour ago. He should be back any minute. I felt terrible having to be the bearer of bad news. I could hear how stressed he was. And knowing he was up there meeting his daughter for the first time… I hated that I added to an already intense day.
My heart ached for him. The bakery should have been the last thing on his mind. But he had a right to know that there’d been a fire here. And something had told me he would have been more upset if we hadn’t called him.
“What about the proprietor?” Aaron asked. “The landlord of the building? Has anyone notified him?”
“I called Nate and he’s on his way,” I said. Nate was a couple of years younger than us and went to our rival high school. Granted, Maple Grove only had two high schools… the public school and the private school, so it was a built-in rivalry. When you grew up in such a tiny town your whole life, you came to know everyone. And when an outsider like Lex entered the picture—everyone quickly learned what they could about them, too. It was just the way small towns worked.
Aaron snorted. “Nate. Why am I not surprised?” he muttered beneath his breath, which completely caught me off guard.
“Lex said Nate was a good landlord,” I responded, lowering my voice.
Aaron yanked his helmet off his head and set it down by his feet. “Sure, he’s good. If you want a landlord who collects your checks and leaves you alone, he’s your man. Maybe he should focus less on buying new properties and work on maintaining the ones he has.” Aaron’s gaze flicked to his chief who was standing in the doorway of the back room, talking with Tony.
Right on cue, Nate barged through the front door. He looked both wild and weary all at once. “What happened?”
Aaron turned calmly, hooking his thumbs into his belt loops. “I’ll give you one guess, Townsend.”
Chief came shuffling over between them and pointed to Aaron. “I think we’re mostly set here,” he said. “We can leave one or two men to talk with Lex and Nate, but the rest can go back to the station.”
Aaron sneered at Nate before turning to me and laying a hand on my shoulder. “It wasn’t your fault. It’s natural to assume an outlet is safe to plug into… and if it isn’t, legally, it’s the landlord’s job to get it fixed as soon as possible.” Then, he pointedly raised his voice. “Electrical problems aren’t something youwaitto fix.”
Aaron gave me a nod and sauntered slowly past Nate, glaring at him as he exited the café.
What a mess. Not only did I nearly burn down Lex’s bakery, but now I’ve gotten Nate in trouble, too.
The chief finished up chatting with Nate before he crossed over to where Lana and I stood, filling our coffees. “What the hell happened?” Nate whispered, looking over his shoulder at where the firefighters were finishing up. “Where’s Lex? I told him not to use that outlet until I could get the electrician out here next month.”
I winced. “Don’t blame Lex,” I said. “He wasn’t here and it was my fault. There was a post-it note, but it fell off.” I found it on the floor after everything had calmed down.
Nate sighed and pushed two hands through his blond hair. “I’m sorry for snapping. It’s not your fault. I’ve just been falling behind on everything and all my sub-contractors are busy.”
Lex came running into the bakery. His eyes met mine from across the room and for the briefest moment, he paused, then rushed over. “Are you okay? Is anyone hurt?”
I shook my head. “We’re all okay, Lex. I promise. It was a small fire, but we wanted the fire department to check it out… just in case, you know?”
“Yes, yes, of course. That was smart.” He looked around the seating and serving area of the café and waved some smoke out of his face. “Did the fire spread out here?”
“No,” Lana said, coming over and giving him a hug. “It was contained to the back room. Even still, the smoke spread like crazy.”
Lex walked quickly to each window, making sure they were all open. Then, grabbing a cinderblock, he propped open the back door to the small patio that was used for outdoor seating during the spring and summer. “Tony,” he said. “I have a couple of box fans up in my apartment. Can you grab them and bring them down?”
With a nod, Tony turned and ran upstairs.
