You Had Me At Christmas: A Holiday Anthology(63)
“Closed, like you said. And I didn’t see anyone on a horse or any model airplanes in the air. And the Wolf People weren’t doing tours, so I didn’t see any wolves, either. Nice gift shop, though. They seemed like a good cause so I bought a couple stuffed animals to give as baby gifts.”
“That’s too bad.” She didn’t know why he would be wandering this part of Idaho, especially when winter was setting in. A good storm would trap him here, in a place where he seemed to have no purpose other than to drive around. “Even if I don’t believe you’re here to see the sights, I don’t want them to be disappointing.”
Marc reached out like he was contemplating another piece of pork, then changed his mind. After wiping his fingers on his napkin, he eyed her. “Why do you think I’m here?”
“Drug dealer on the run?” she said, only half joking. “That’s the only reason I’ve been able to come up with that explains someone being up here with no discernable goals and three phones.”
He barked with laughter. “Oh man. I wish I’d recorded that.”
“Why?” she asked, surprised at how hard he was laughing. Her joke hadn’t been that funny.
“I’m sorry. I’m not laughing at your guess.” He lifted the back of his hand up to his mouth to slow his chuckles. “Okay, maybe I am laughing at your guess, but that’s because my friends will never believe it. I’m not the nerdiest person I know, but only because the competition is steep.”
“Then what do you do?” she asked, even more curious now. “Gun runner? Drug dealer? Transporting illegal hamsters? Those are the only reasons I can think for three phones.”
“Illegal hamsters,” he said, chuckling again and shaking his head. “What kind of TV do you watch?”
“Only the good stuff.” She was smiling now, too.
He paused, and she wondered if he wasn’t going to tell her what he did, if they would part as unknown to each other as they had been when he’d walked in the door. “Would you believe I developed a texting program for cell phones that sends encrypted texts via SMS and that I just sold it to the largest tech company in the world?”
“That doesn’t sound too far from the black market rodent trade,” she said as she leaned back in her booth, folded her arms, and evaluated him. He met her comment with his own forthright gaze. It wasn’t just the lack of smile on his face that made her realize he was serious, but his eyes were deep and true. If she had sold some tech thing—she had only the shallowest notion of what encryption even meant—to the company she suspected he was referring to, she would be bouncing up and down with joy, possibly even throwing money up in the air for anyone around to catch.
But for all his smiles and flirtations, Marc was made of different stuff. Or maybe such an enormous life change was more profound than Selina could imagine.
“I can pull up the articles on my phone, if you don’t believe me,” he said, reaching into his back pocket for one of those smartphones he carried. She thought she heard a faint tremble in his voice.
Money was serious business. Having been poor—or nearly so—her entire life, Selina knew that as a truth. But the hitch in Marc’s voice wasn’t just about the grave implications of money. It seemed important to him that she believed him. Not only because he wanted to be believed and thought of as honest, but the way his eyes focused on her made her think he needed her to believe him. The sudden realization made her blink.
“I’d, um, I’d like to see, but not because I don’t believe you. I’d like to celebrate your success with you. I’d be honored to celebrate your success with you.”
Misgivings flashed across his face, but then he pulled out his phones. He must have saved the links to the articles because it only took him three taps on the first phone to bring something up. He handed the phone to her. As she looked down at a Wall Street Journal article on the screen, she saw him touching his other phones out of the corner of her eye and setting them faceup on the table.
Selina had believed Marc—she really had—but seeing the article with dollar amounts, pictures, and details had the truth settling itself on her shoulders like a thick wool blanket. It should be comforting, and it definitely brought a warmth to her chest, but too much could feel like a burden.
She set the first phone on the table, and he nudged another one toward her. “I built the platform with a friend,” he said. “The money isn’t all mine.”
The next article was from something called Information Week. It had the same general content but with a slightly more techie and less business-related spin, as well as a different picture. The last article was from the New York Times. That article was the most detailed, including the sale in a bigger story about mobile security, hacking, and open-source software.
She pushed the two other phones away from her slowly, almost afraid to touch them. “This is a big deal.”
One side of his mouth kicked up in a proud smile. “Yeah.”
“And not just because of the money.”
He shook his head, his smile growing deeper. “The money is nice, but what my buddy and I did was revolutionary. With our competition, you have to have access to a data network to send encrypted texts. Using the actual cell network changes the game completely.” Excitement carried his voice a little louder in the last sentence.