Page 27 of Skins Game

She shrugged,finallybreaking eye contact with him, which he felt like someone snapped off the spotlight dazzling his eyes, and she studied the corner of the ceiling. She said, “All companies have concepts they haven’t acted on yet.”

“What’s yours?”

She fell silent, staring at the upper corner of the room.

Kingston followed her gaze.

The sword in the uppermost part of the room near that corner was a long, thick weapon, its steel burnished, hanging byits pommel with the blade pointing down as if to fall and stab the Earth.

He asked, “Is it that one up there?”

“Is what which one?”

He pointed to the oversized knife on the wall. “Is that the sword your next magical concept club is based on?”

Nicole looked down and away. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Your design for the club that other people call ‘magic,’ the Scimitar Edge, just happens to be named after your favorite sword. Now when we’re talking about your next design, you can’t stop looking at that sword up there. What kind of sword is it?”

“A broadsword.”

“Sounds massive.”

“Oh, it is. Broadswords are huge. I barely wrestled that one up onto the wall. Those hooks have six screws each into the studs.”

“Are you going to name the club after it?”

She snorted a laugh. “We were joking that we should design it for women, for the LPGA, because—get it? Abroadsword?”

“Oh, no-no-no.You are not roping me into an HR complaint with that opening.” But he was grinning, and so was she. “What are youreallygoing to call it?”

She sucked one side of her lower lip between her teeth as she smiled at him, obviously debating.

Kingston raised his eyebrows and leaned back in the chair, smiling harder at her.

Keeping up the grin wasn’t tough. She looked like a mischievous little kitten over there, practically wiggling its butt, convinced that you didn’t see it ready to pounce.

Nicole said, “Excalibur.”

Marketing strategies lit up Kingston’s mind. “That’sfantastic,and that’s why you want to call it the Legendary line.”

“Yeah.”

“Are there any other magical sword names that aren’t under copyright?”

“The Vorpal Sword from Lewis Carroll’s poem ‘Jabberwocky.’ The copyright onAlice in Wonderlandexpired.”

“Oh, that’s a good name.”

“Angrvaðall from Norse mythology, which has letters that shine brightly in battle but dim in times of peace.”

Kingston’s grin grew until his cheeks ached. “Hologram lettering that reflects in the sunlight. Brilliant.”

“Khanda, a sword that represents wisdom cutting through ignorance in Hindu mythology.”

His heart fluttered. “The marketing just writes itself. What else?”

“It really doesn’t matter what else because we don’t have the manufacturing capacity to make them,” she said. “Sending the specs to Dali Manufacturing is like flushing them down the toilet. There are a lot of other manufacturers in China, you know. Dali isn’t even one of the bigger ones.”