“What project are you looking for files on?”

“Okada. And it’s the new files that Maggie sent on Tuesday. I saved them to my hard drive and then uploaded them to the cloud.”

“Amery doesn’t have a copy of them on her computer?”

“No. She hasn’t seen the specs. Since Ronin had to go to San Francisco, she thought she’d work on them tonight. She called me in a panic when she couldn’t retrieve the files, and I came down to help.”

That was weird. “Is there a chance your computer got a virus?”

“There’s always a chance, but I run the antivirus programs for that every Friday afternoon.”

“You did that today?”

“Yes. And nothing popped.”

“You didn’t do a hard backup copy on thumb drives or a file sharer for those files?”

“No. Okada is strict about that.”

Molly had been afraid something like this would happen. “Let’s start with your computer.”

For the next fifteen minutes, Molly walked her through each step, backtracking, but nothing happened except additional frustration.

If the heavy breathing on the phone was any indication, Presley had reached the freak-out zone. She said, “I hate this. Why can’t I figure this shit out?”

“Because if you were a computer-tech expert, you’d be working for a company that troubleshoots technical problems.”

“If we did our design work on a Mac, we wouldn’t have this problem,” Presley snapped.

“Bullshit,” Amery said in the background.

Molly held her breath, waiting for their ongoing argument to gain traction. When it didn’t, she said, “It’ll be fine. Just calm down.”

Amery kept yakking at Presley while Molly was trying to tell her what to do next.

“All right, all right, all right! Just stop talking at once, both of you,” Presley pleaded.

“Pres, since I’ll have you switch and try to access everything on my computer, I need to know that you’re thinking clearly. I don’t need you randomly clicking shit in a panic.”

A puff of air exploded in the phone. “I am calm.”

“Good. You’re at my computer now?”

“Yeah. What’s your main password?” Presley asked.

“OU812.”

“Seriously? That is a killer password. And now you’ll have to change it. Sorry. Okay, I’m on. What next?”

Molly walked her through three possible solutions and none worked. So she’d have to resort to telling them her secret. “Put me on speaker.”

“Done.”

“Hey, Mol. Sorry to pull you away,” Amery said.

“No worries. This party sucks ass. Anyway, see the mirrored tile icon on the screen? Click on it. Same password.”

“What is this?”

“A backup program in case the cloud doesn’t work. Wednesday night before I left I backed up yours and Amery’s hard drives and everything on the cloud to a different cloud. So you should be able to access it.”

The keyboard clicked. Then Presley said, “Motherfucking hell yeah. It’s all there. Every bit of it.”

“Molly, you are a genius, and I have no idea what I would do without you,” Amery said. “Seriously. You cannot ever leave.”

Molly laughed, but it felt damn good to be needed as an integral part of Hardwick Designs. “I’m not a genius; I’m just doing my job.” Which meant she never wanted to be accused of not doing her job, so in her paranoia, she had set up a third backup program—not that she’d admit that unless she absolutely had to.

Amery declared, “I’m giving you a raise. We’ll talk as soon as you get back.”

Holy crap. She hadn’t seen that one coming. “Okay.”

“You saved our bacon by going whole hog with a secondary backup,” Presley said.

Both Molly and Amery groaned at Presley’s pun.

“How are things going with Deacon’s family?” Amery asked.

“They’re a bunch of rich assholes, for the most part. We’re at a country club right now, and I want to stab myself in the eye with the tiny olive fork so I have an excuse to leave.”

“Try to remember you’re in love with him, not his family.”

“So noted, boss.”

Guilt prodded her. If Amery had forgone a trip with Ronin to catch up on work, then Molly should be in Denver working alongside her, not stuck in Texas, where she seemed to be of little value to anyone.

She needed to talk to Deacon right away.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

THE morning had started out with a bang, but this night was fizzling.