Page 36 of Harrison Hyde and the Runaway Bride

“This is…” Harry clutched the box in one hand. “That’s an amazing thing to do. Thank you. I can log into the cloud, download my backup designs, my notes.” He wove straight through the fam to the stairway, talking more to himself than anyone else, and took the stairs two at a time. “I can search for the patent, check Carrie’s social, and Robert’s too, and…” He was still talking all the way out of earshot.

Maria shook her head, then looked at the amused faces of her relatives. And one by one, they looked back at her, their eyes full of questions.

Oh, heck, no. She wasn’t ready for that. “I’m gon’ um…” She searched her mind for a reason to go upstairs after Harry. “He’s gon’ need the Wi-Fi password!” She headed for the stairs herself.

“If the whole gang’s stayin’, we’re gon’ need to make use of the bunkhouse,” Uncle Garrett called. “This family’s outgrown the ranch house.”

“I call the bunkhouse for the cousins,” Trevor shouted, and her other cousins agreed loudly as Maria climbed the stairs.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Harry had changed into dry clothes— jeans and a T-shirt. There was a knock on his door before the new laptop had even booted up. He said “come in” without thinking or getting off the bed where he sat, back-to-headboard, tapping keys.

Maria came in with two foamy mugs and an iPad under her arm. She’d taken time to change, as well. She was wearing denim shorts, and a T-shirt that said, “too busy dancin’ to get knocked off my feet” over an image of sparkling shoes. “I was afraid you were bringing more food,” he said, jumping up to take one of the mugs. It was ice cold and foamy. He sniffed. “Root beer?” Then he took a sip.

“Homemade root beer. And yes, foodisa thing here. Anytime I stay, I have to diet for a month to make up for it.”

“That’s right, you don’t live here, normally,” he said.

“I was livin’ with my folks when I wasn’t at school. But now, everything I own is packed up, for my planned move to Bluebonnet Lane. Everything, that is, except the stuff I brought here, where I spent the whole week before the weddin’.”

“Right, you and your cousins were staying here, you said.”

“Yep. We wanted to spend the week together. So rare that Bubba gets home these days. We were here a lot as kids, every break from school, and most all summer. It’s the Brand family hub, I guess.”

“I get it.” He set his root beer down, then returned to his spot on the bed, pulling the laptop onto his outstretched legs. “I feel that way about Ithaca. Not with the generations of family in the same place, like you, but my family is there. I spent my whole childhood there. Every family event was held on the shore of Cayuga Lake. And those autumn trail rides… I can’t imagine fall without color.”

“I’ve never seen that, except in pictures. They don’t look real.”

“They’re real, but you can’t capture it in a photograph. The colors are more vivid, in motion with every breeze. You can feel autumn in New York. You cantasteit.”

She was studying his face. “I want to see it someday.”

He would love to show it to her, he thought.

Maria cleared her throat, lowered her eyes from his, and pulled a scrap of paper from her jeans pocket. “Wi-Fi password,” she said, handing it to him.

“Right. I’ll input that right now.”

“I thought I could help. Brought my iPad.” She held it up. Then she pulled the rocking chair closer to the nightstand where her root beer awaited.

Harrison keyed in the password, hit enter, and watched the computer connect. Then he logged into the cloud to set the machine up from his stored backup. “There. It’ll take a while, but it’s underway.” He looked over at Maria, in the rocking chair with her tablet, and found her eyes on him. They were almost always on him. There was something warm about the way she looked at him. It made him feel ten feet tall. “That was amazing of your cousins, going in on a laptop for me.”

“I agree. I had no idea they were doin’ it.”

He looked toward the door. “I kind of took it and ran, didn’t I?”

“You thanked them,” she said.

“I need to do something nice for them. For all of you.”

She lowered her eyes. “Not me. You wouldn’t be in this mess if not for me.”

“That would only be true if your good ol’ boy Billy Bob had been behind it. But I don’t think he stole the solar tile.”

“Billy Bob wouldn’t know it was worth stealin’.” She tapped her iPad screen to bring it to life. “What can I do?”

“It’s gonna take some time to download my backup from the cloud,” he said. And he set the laptop aside. “We could use your tablet to run the patent search.”

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