“I’ve already got suites reserved where the doll will be overnight. You’re welcome to come with me and use the other room, just like now.”
She pulled out her phone and scrolled through what looked to be a calendar app. “How many more days?”
“Tonight, it would be in southern Illinois. Tomorrow night in Cincinnati, then Columbus the next night. They’re not planning to meet her until Saturday. We’d drive back Sunday and Monday or you could fly back if you wanted. My treat.”
“I don’t have anything that I can’t rearrange until Monday. I really need to be home Sunday night, but I hate needing to fly home. That’s ridiculous. I’ll just call Christopher.”
“We could probably make it home on Sunday if we wanted to.” He hadn’t planned on it, not if Gigi was going to be with him. She’d want to take it slower.
“There’s an HEA TV movie that starts production Monday. I have to be there for that. It’s based on my sister’s book. I’m the liaison between the production company and local businesses to make sure everything runs smoothly.”
“I heard about that. In Trumanville, right?” He took a sip of his own coffee. Maybe he could have one of Gigi’s security drive the car back, and they could fly home on the royal jet. Gigi, as former queen, never flew commercial.
That was a thought.
He’d contact Gigi’s assistant and see what her plans were.
“Yeah. My sister sets all of her books in a fictional town similar to Trumanville. I have a friend who works for HEA TV. I’d sent her the book because I thought she’d like it, not to get Madi a movie deal, but that’s how it worked out. It’s been really good for Madi.”
“That’s wonderful.”
“I will need to stop by another superstore at some point. I didn’t get enough clothes for that long.”
“I didn’t either.” Even though he moved to Serenity Landing for college, he hadn’t shopped there with any regularity for clothes. He’d brought clothes from home or had them sent by the palace stylist who shopped in places far nicer than a superstore. First time for everything.
“What about breakfast? I’m hungry.”
“We can get something as soon as we’re ready to go. But she goes with us.” He nodded toward the likeness of his grandmother. “I don’t want to leave her in the car if we go inside to eat.”
“Or we leave her in the room and go down to the free breakfast in the hotel.” Lani raised her eyebrow at him. “Asking if you wanted to go together, or if I should head down on my own.”
Harrison smiled at her. “Good point. We can go down together, if you want.” Maybe the breakfast would be decent. He didn’t often stay at a hotel with a continental breakfast he enjoyed, but Kraz Suites was the best of them.
A minute later, they headed downstairs together.
On the way down, the elevator stopped at two other floors to let other guests on.
Lani moved closer to him with each stop. When her forearm brushed along the length of his, electricity sparked between them.
That was new.
Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.
4
Effingham was not exciting at all.
At least not for Lani.
The time with Harry was better than time spent alone.
But she refused to admit there was an attraction.
No.
After the two disastrous dates she was pretty sure Mrs. Braverman set up for her, she had no interest in dating anyone for quite some time.
Even if he was the cutest and politest of the bunch so far.
And the attraction she felt was pretty much off the charts.
The ride had been fairly quiet. Harry took a couple of phone calls. Thus far, Effingham consisted of them waiting for the woman to have a break at work.
Lani sat in his SUV with the door open and her shoeless feet propped on the dash as he took another phone call that had him wandering around the parking lot too far away to be overheard.
When he was done, he slid back into the driver’s seat. “Apparently, Queen Grace caught word of this project. She’s going to be there Saturday. The palace is trying to get as many of those who helped transport it there as possible. They’re paying for everything once we get to the Columbus area.”
“That’s really cool of them.”
“Everyone will get to meet Queen Grace, from the sounds of it.”
“That’s fantastic.” She should probably do some research into the royal family. She’d been meaning to but hadn’t yet.
But it was more work than she wanted to do at the moment. Instead, she played mindless games on her phone, over and over and over. Nothing that required lives. She hated games where she needed lives and refused to pay for more then wait hours to play again, so she just didn’t play those.
After a while, she got bored, though. Digging through her purse, she found her earbuds and plugged them in before opening the MyBingeFlix App.
“What are you watching?” Harry asked.
“The last season of Management on Mars.”
“Hasn’t it been out for a while?”
“Yeah, but my sister married one of the stars not too long ago, so I thought I’d watch it again. I only half watched it the first time. It’s much more interesting now that I’m related to one of them.”
“The Eli guy? I remember seeing something about it in the check-out line at the market.”
“Well, don’t believe everything you read in the checkout line, Harry Potter.” She didn’t start the episode just yet.
Harry rolled his eyes and chuckled. “Oh, believe me, I know better than that.”
“Good.” She’d known better than that even before Mia married Eli, but since then, she’d seen the outrageous stories. Her brother-in-law was a doting father - as soon as he found out he was one. His ex-girlfriend hadn’t told him she was pregnant then dropped the baby off with him while she flitted off to Milan for a job. The tabloids ran with a picture of him where it appeared he was proposing to Mia and next thing they knew, the wedding was being planned for a week later.
Now they were deliriously happy and raising their daughter together, while they fought for full custody of her. So far, his ex hadn’t put up much of a fight.
He reached behind the seat. “We can watch together on my iPad if you want. I haven’t watched the last season yet.”
When they couldn’t find a good way to watch together sitting in the front seat, Harry surprised her with an out-of-the-box idea. They put the seats down in the back of the SUV and found a way to watch back there. Queen Grace’s doll watched with them.
He even took a picture and sent it to someone.
After two episodes, Harry turned it off. “This lady is getting off work in half an hour. We should get moving.”
By the time they pulled up in front of the office building, she could tell Harry was getting antsy about something.
“What is it?” she finally asked as they waited. The woman had messaged him that she was off.
“I’m not sure I want to give it up. Why don’t I just drive it to Columbus myself? I don’t mind.”
“Because this is a group effort. You don’t want to deprive the rest of those who are trying to help of the joy that comes with it.”
“Right.” He seemed to make a concerted effort to relax, but it only partially worked.
A woman walked out of the building in front of them and scanned around.
“I bet she’s looking for us.” Lani climbed out of the car. “Clara?” she called.
The woman turned toward them and started their way. “You must be Lani and Harrison.”
“Harry,” he said holding out his hand.
“Pleasure to meet you.” Her smile widened before a concerned look crossed her face. “Where’s this doll? Is it creepy? It didn’t look creepy in the pictures.”
Lani laughed. “I thought the same thing, but no, it’s not creepy at all.” She opened the back door of the SUV, but the doll had be
en buckled in on the driver’s side. Harry unbuckled it and picked it up. Lani grabbed the suitcase that had been going with her and collecting souvenirs along the way.
Clara exclaimed over the doll, much as Lani had the day before. “Are you two going to be at the reveal on Saturday? The San Majorian palace contacted me earlier. They’re paying for my flights and everything.”
“We’re actually planning to do a sort of caravan,” Harry told Clara. “If you don’t mind. You’d be welcome to continue on with us from Carmi to Columbus.”
Carmi.
That was the small town in Illinois where the doll was headed next.
She’d been reaching for the doll to pick it up, but Clara stopped and looked at them. “That sounds really fun. I’m not sure I can get the next couple of days off on such short notice though. If you want to follow me toward Carmi in a couple of hours, I’ll let you know. Meet me back here about five? Maybe a few minutes later?”
Harry nodded. “We can do that. Meantime, is there a movie theater or something nearby where we can kill some time?”
He still seemed incredibly tense over Clara taking the doll, but at least he was letting go.
Lani just wondered why it was such a big deal for him. Shrugging it off, she wondered if there was anything good playing.
Standing just inside the doorway, Harrison couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
He stopped so abruptly, Lani ran into his back.
“What...?” she started.
“I reserved a suite,” he told her, stepping to the side so she could see for herself.
The place was clean enough, had two beds, but definitely not a suite.
He set his things down. “I’ll go to the desk and get a second room.”
“Thanks.” She went farther into the room as he headed downstairs.
An older man was checking in at the front desk, along with someone else in line, so he waited his turn, somewhat impatiently.
The first person took their key and left for their room as the next person stepped to the counter.
“I’d like to get a room for the night,” the man asked.
“I’m sorry, sir,” the clerk told him. “We’re completely booked. If you’d like to wait to see if we have a no-show, no-call by ten, I might be able to help you then, but I think the chances are slim.”
Great. So no second room, but maybe they’d gotten the wrong room and that would be fixed soon.
The man sighed and stuck his wallet back in his pocket, grumbling as he walked outside, phone in hand.
“Can I help you, sir? Mr. Cordova, right?”
Harrison stepped up to the counter. “I hope so. I booked a two-bedroom suite. I’ve been given a single room with two beds.”
The girl’s brows furrowed. She couldn’t have been more than nineteen or twenty. Whatever the issue, it wasn’t likely her fault. He needed to remember that.
“You’re in room 215, correct?” She tapped on her computer.
“Yes.”
“That is a two-bed suite, sir. We don’t have any two-bedroom suites.”
He closed his eyes and took a deep breath in through his nose then out through his mouth. “I was very clear that I needed separate bedrooms.”
“I’m sorry, sir.” She did seem remorseful. “We don’t have any more rooms. I’m not sure how the miscommunication occurred, but there’s nothing I can do at this point except offer you a partial refund. I’ll let you know if we have a no-call, no-show later, if the other gentleman doesn’t want it. I doubt it will happen though. We have a festival this weekend, and everyone is booked full for about fifty miles.”
He did the breathing thing again. That was too far away. “Thank you.” She wasn’t the one he’d talked to when he made his reservations. It wasn’t her fault.
After trotting back up the lobby staircase, he knocked on the door to the room. There was no way he was going to just walk in.
Lani opened the door, a puzzled look on her face. “Did you forget your key?” She stood to the side to let him in.
“No, but I didn’t want to presume.” He sat on the very small couch that was the only nod to the “suite” status this room held. “There’s no other rooms for fifty miles.”
She shrugged. “Okay. There’s a bathroom and two beds. We’ll be fine. I won’t tell my parents, because they’ll be super judgmental, but no one else will care.”
Harrison nodded slowly, not really seeing another option that didn’t involve sleeping in his car. “If you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.”
He also wouldn’t tell his parents but for different reasons. There was no way he wanted to see what the tabloids would do with this tidbit of information. His family had a reputation to uphold.
They’d spent an hour wandering around a superstore before the movie earlier in the day. He’d grabbed a couple of cords that, combined, would attach his iPad to the television. “We can watch some more Mars if you want. Or something else. That Seating show is recorded in Serenity Landing. It’s kind of fun picking out local places sometimes.”
“Mars is fine.”
Harrison tapped on his iPad until it was ready then plugged it into the television.
Lani had taken the bed closest to the window and the air conditioner. She fiddled with it before asking him what temperature he preferred. He said he didn’t care, though that wasn’t strictly accurate. He didn’t care enough to express an opinion at the moment.
They’d already had dinner with Clara and Jo earlier in the evening. It had been nice, having dinner with people who didn’t know who he was. Even nicer than dinner with people who knew but didn’t particularly care. There was still a bit of deference in those situations. Since he’d moved to Serenity Landing, he didn’t have many friends in the first category. Most were in the second - like his sister and brother-in-law before they moved, or the Bayfields and Langley-Cranstons.
Plus, they were all couples with kids.
He definitely wasn’t at that stage of life just yet.
Eventually, Lani went to the bathroom and got ready for bed. As she climbed under the covers, Harrison headed for the bathroom then did the same.
He lay there, in the dark, staring at the ceiling for the longest time. He’d never shared a room with a female he wasn’t related to, and he found it disconcerting in a way he really couldn’t define.
He must have drifted off, because he woke to the sounds of Lani trying to move quietly around the room.
“I’m headed down to breakfast,” she told him when their eyes met. “Jo said she was leaving about nine for Louisville. She said she’d come by here about fifteen minutes later.”
“I’ll be down in a few minutes.”
He watched as she left the room, then realized that, at some point, he’d taken his t-shirt off and the sheets were down to his waist. It didn’t embarrass him per se, but he wouldn’t want to make Lani uncomfortable.
With a groan, he threw the covers the rest of the way off and hurried through an abbreviated morning routine then made his way downstairs.
The first thing he saw was Lani.
Talking to the man who’d been checking in when Harrison went back downstairs.
Laughing.
Then came an emotion Harrison didn’t have much experience with, and he wasn’t quite sure what to make of it.
Jealousy.
5
After three days of traveling with Harry, today was the day Lani would get to be there when Queen Grace’s Coronation Gown Replica doll was given to a woman who helped create the original dress.
According to Harry and the three other people they’d had dinner with the night before, everyone who’d played a part in getting the doll to Sunbury, Ohio would be there.
She hadn’t been in contact with the San Majorian palace at all, but Harry told her they’d just talked to him instead, since the two of them were traveling together.
The others thought it was a little odd and so did Lani, but who was she
to look a gift-mini-vacation in the mouth?
Before she could head down for breakfast, there was a knock on the door to the third suite she’d shared with Harry.
Lani needed to answer it. She didn’t see him in the main room often, especially early in the morning. She guessed that meant it was her job to open the door, though she wasn’t expecting anyone.
A glance through the peephole showed an older woman who looked fairly impatient.
Lani flipped the lock thing to the side and opened the door a couple of inches. “Can I help you?”
She frowned. “I’m looking for Harrison. Is this the right room?”
Something about the woman seemed slightly familiar, but she couldn’t put her finger on it. Lani opened the door farther. “I think he’s in his room.” She stepped to the side. “Come on in.”
“Harrison?” the woman called as she brushed past Lani.
He came out of his room, his t-shirt in his hands as he pulled it over his head. Lani looked the other direction to avoid the torso that had already popped up in her mind unbidden after she’d seen him sleeping a couple of mornings before.
“Grandmother?” he barely sounded awake, but certainly sounded stunned. “What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you.”
He bent over at the waist to pick up... no. He just bent at the waist then stood up. Odd.
“You found me, Gigi.”
“I told you. No one over eighteen gets to call me that.” She perched on the edge of one of the chairs, her legs tilting to one side and crossed at the ankle. “Grandmother Grace will suffice.”
Was that a twinkle in her eye?
“Whatever you say, Gigi.” He leaned over and kissed her offered cheek. “What are you doing here, though?” He propped himself on the edge of the sofa nearest her chair.
“I wanted to see you before the presentation later.” She reached over and patted his hand. “I haven’t seen you in far too long.”
Small Town Girls Don't Marry Secret Princes: A Small Town Contemporary Christian Romance (Beaches of Trumanville Book 2) Page 3