Girl Gone Viral (Modern Love #2)(13)

“Good morning, Gerald.” She handed him the tray and he inclined his head.

“Thank you.” A man of few words, he left with his and Jas’s breakfast.

She went on to the next round of meals, cracking eggs, folding them into the batter, and warming the maple syrup. Her mood swung ever upward as the music lifted her and she created a meal for her friends. She found joy in cooking for people who were loudly appreciative of her efforts. Providing sustenance for others was her love language.

Katrina pulled her headphones off when she heard the loud sound of footsteps. Rhiannon. She’d known her best friend and part-time roommate for going on a dozen years. The other woman got her in a way few people did.

Except Jas. He got her real well.

Okay. No more thinking about Jas for the rest of the morning, that’s the rule. It was his day off, so it was her brain’s day off from him, too. “Morning,” she called out to Rhiannon, when her friend entered the kitchen.

Rhiannon yawned loudly. “Good morning.”

“Is Samson joining us for breakfast?” She critically surveyed the amount of food she’d prepared and considered increasing it. Samson may not be a football player anymore, but he ate like one.

“Nah, he left to go back to L.A. He’ll be scarce while I’m gone, he has some work to do with his foundation.” Rhiannon pulled her sweatshirt together and zipped it up.

After so many years, Katrina was well versed in what Rhiannon’s clothes meant, though her ever-changing wardrobe of hoodies and jeans might look the same to anyone else. The blue hoodie was her power sweatshirt, but it was also one of her more loose ones. Her travel power sweatshirt. “Ready for your trip?”

“As ready as I’ll ever be.”

“I loved India when I was there.” She’d traveled quite a bit in her youth. It hadn’t always been enjoyable or anxiety-free, and she was in no hurry to hop on to a transatlantic flight anytime soon—or ever—but there had been a few trips she was glad she’d taken.

Rhiannon went to the cupboard where the plates were stored. Katrina was aware she was biased, but she thought Rhiannon Hunter was surely one of the most beautiful women in the world, with her high cheekbones, glowing dark-brown skin, and big black eyes. She’d cut her hair recently, and the curls brushed her shoulders and framed her heart-shaped face perfectly. “I’m kinda nervous.”

That was a big admission for Rhiannon, who prided herself on being tough. “There’s no need to be nervous. We are prepared for this.”

Usually, Katrina didn’t concern herself with the day-to-day operations of the start-ups her fund invested in. Because of Rhiannon, she was more actively engaged with Crush, and had happily taken the lead on a lot of their tentative expansion into foreign markets. India had its own dating apps, but Crush’s arrival into the huge smartphone-armed population was an opportunity to expand their footprint significantly.

Rhiannon made a face. “I’ve been working on this Matchmaker merger so much, I feel like you know more about the expansion than I do.”

Katrina shook her head. “That’s because you’re used to being a hundred and forty percent prepared, so when you’re actually a hundred percent prepared, you feel underprepared.”

“How dare you utter the truth first thing in the morning.”

Katrina smiled and slid the last waffle out of the waffle iron. “There’s nothing about this company you don’t know. And honestly, I’m a phone call away.”

Rhiannon set three places at the table. “And thank God for that.”

Katrina smiled. She was grateful, too, that she’d reached out to Rhiannon with an investment offer four years ago, when she heard her friend had left her previous employment.

Do you have any idea how much a start-up costs? Rhiannon had asked her.

Do you have any idea how much my husband left me? she’d countered.

Rhiannon had never asked for that number, but it had been a lot. Hardeep had been a jeweler for the stars, yes, and that had brought in a tidy sum, but he’d also invested in a certain then-obscure search engine in the nineties.

Katrina had taken the multiple zeros she’d inherited and turned them into even more zeros.

“You’ll be gone for less than two weeks. Meet with the team we assembled, lay the groundwork, and we’ll be rolling in the rupees shortly.” Katrina slid her friend a sideways glance. “I’m surprised Samson’s not coming with you.” Rhiannon had only ever been a part-time roommate at best, but she’d been gone a lot over the last few months. Rhiannon had her own apartment in L.A., but Katrina suspected that her friend had been spending most of her nights with Samson.

“I asked him, but he’s got a fund-raiser he’s committed to, so it was a no-go.”

“Gotcha.” Inside, her inner romantic pumped her fist at Rhiannon’s admission. Awwwww. As far as she knew, this was the first trip Rhiannon had invited her boyfriend along on.

A loud yawn preceded Jia’s entrance into the room. The internet would be stunned to see Jia Ahmed in baggy cotton pajama pants and a sweater, her hair uncovered and in a simple braid, but the toned-down fashion and beauty influencer was still glamorous, the pep in her walk not diminished by the early hour.

She had put on makeup, though it was only a brush of eyeliner and a slight tint of lip gloss. In fact, Katrina didn’t think she’d ever seen Jia without some makeup in the five months since she’d come to live with them.