Page 12 of Token

Like a lightning strike or a tornado, the name seemed to come out of nowhere but resonated in every single part of her being. “Token. I want to call itToken.”

She’d been one almost her entire life, but this time she was going to turn the meaning on its head and to everyone’s advantage.

At the kitchen island an hour later, Kennedy sipped on a brown cow float and Aurora on a glass of red wine, their euphoria having settled into alady badass bossesglow.

“Okay, I think we’ve got all we need right now.” Aurora closed the laptop and finished her wine. Their rudimentary business plan now resided on the computer’s hard drive and three cloud services, because it was better to be safe than sorry. They’d both learned that the hard way in college.

Kennedy turned and looked out the window. She grimaced when she thought about the subway ride back to Brooklyn. Maybe today she’d splurge and take an Uber. “And I should be getting home. Can’t be late tomorrow.”

The knock on the front door had her swinging her gaze back to her friend. “You expecting anyone?”

Aurora shot a glance at the digital clock on the wall. “Oh my goodness, it’s after seven. I almost forgot about dinner,” she exclaimed, sliding off the stool and rushing from the kitchen.

Still seated at the island, Kennedy puzzled over how, in the past hour, Aurora could have ordered food delivery without her being aware of it.

When her friend returned not even a half minute later, she brought company—in the brooding form of her brother Nate.

An audible gasp escaped before Kennedy could prevent it.

“Surprise! Guess who’s in town and brought dinner?” Aurora chortled, triumphantly holding up two Mama Napoli paper bags, the smell of garlic and tomato sauce already permeating the air.

“You know how I hate surprises,” Kennedy groused, glaring at her friend. “That took two years off my life. All I saw was a man behind you, and I thought we were about to be kidnapped or robbed.” There was a millisecond of truth in that.

“Don’t recognize me anymore, Kennedy?” His voice was arid dry.

As if.

To that, she put her best smile forward and played the part.“I certainly do now. Hello, Nate.”

The right corner of his mouth inched up a fraction. “Hello, Kennedy. I take it Aurora didn’t mention I’d be coming by?” If ever a voice matched someone’s appearance, it was Nate’s. Deep and broody.

It would be too clichéd to describe him as tall, dark, and handsome—his hair being dark blond and all. No, he required more nuance than that, as his features were too chiseled to classify him as a pretty boy, but those lips of his were...sin incarnate—a weakness of hers that predated their introduction. The only word she could use to describe them waslush, bringing favorable comparisons to the likes of Theo James. She also preferred men who possessed more lean muscle than bulk, and unfortunately, Nate fit that bill too.

The disconcerting truth was this: when it came to Nate Vaughn, she always felt like she swam a little too far from the shore, and being at best a mediocre swimmer, put herself at significant risk of drowning.

“Clearly not. The last I heard, you were wining and dining susceptible women all over France.” She’d learned long ago that wit and humor were her best defenses against him.

“Ihavebeen accused of spreading myself too thin.”

Too thincould also be applied to the current state of the barely there smile on his face. If prior experience hadn’t shown her that he did in fact have a sense of humor—not much but some—she wouldn’t be able to tell now.

Aurora claimed that since Nate started his company—in college, no less, because apparently Zuckerberg had set some invisible bar for all the serious techies out there—her brother suffered from an all-work-no-playsyndrome. Which left him little time for girlfriends. He certainly never brought any home, which was now his mother’s biggest complaint. A year ago, he’d decided it was time to expand beyond America’s shores and was now setting up a European office and warehouse in France.

“I don’t remember using the wordsusceptible,” Aurora said innocently as she placed the bags on the island and began unpacking savory container after savory container.

Kennedy sent her friend a chiding look. Et tu, Aurora? Can no one in your family take a joke anymore?

Nate wandered deeper into the kitchen, hands buried in the pockets of his cargo shorts. “Speaking of wining and dining, how many hearts haveyoubroken lately?”

Yep, that was her, Kennedy Mitchell,femme fatale extraordinaire, collecting and breaking hearts since puberty.

“Too many to count,” she answered breezily. “But I’ll be sure to let you know when I get the annual body count down under twenty.”

The corner of his mouth might have lifted at that. It was hard to tell, the movement was so fleeting.

“You should see the guy she’s dating now. She’s got him wrapped—”

Kennedy cut her off with a muttered sound of outrage and gave her friend a quelling look. “Aurora, boundaries,” she bit out in a sharply worded reprimand.