Sora had taken time to process the talk she'd had with Sam. She'd given herself many opportunities to smile stupidly over the kisses she had shared with Ravi that sill made her lips tingle on recollection. This was happening, somehow.

Over the course of several days Sora had progressed from disbelief that Ravi had actual, non-guilt-related feelings for her to uncertainty over the nature of those feelings. Was it lust? More? How much was more than lust? There was a potent attraction, to be sure, as well as a willingness to act on it. What did that really amount to?

She herself was reluctant to put a label on the emotion that prompted her to smile when she received a text from him. Does he feel like that when he hears from me? Casual affairs were someone else's privilege. Sora had her son, her company, and her reputation to consider.

Ravi had called twice in the interim. Once, he hadn't left a message and the second time was to invite her on a lunch date that a last-minute scheduling conflict forced her to cancel outright. She'd been stumped on how to apologize for that without their conversation becoming about...this. She had, therefore, performed her best trick to perfection; Sora had dodged.

Until today. She had to face what the future held lest she wait and find it held nothing.

Sora made her way to House of Misra right on schedule for lunch per their standing date.

"Hi, Nyna, I have an appointment with Ravi. Is it okay if I just wait inside?"

"Sure, he's in a meeting with Carter downstairs, but he should be out in a couple of minutes. Make yourself at home. Let me know if I can get you anything."

"Thanks."

Nyna left Sora in Ravi's office and shut the door behind her.

Sora took the time to survey her surroundings. It wasn't often she spent time in Ravi's office when the man was elsewhere. He tended to keep her absorbed when he was present, which meant she hadn't had much opportunity to notice what changes he'd made.

New pictures of Dhiren and Ravi in Rome had been added to the mix of family portraits featuring Jasmin and Hana, and one alone of a young Ravi embracing his late mother, Jivika Misra. He isn't giving any of them up. The Ravi who'd come back to L.A. wasn't the Ravi who'd left.

Caran d'Arche colored pencils littered his workspace in thirty bright hues. His trash bin overflowed with discarded professional-grade drawing paper. This is the studio of a master.Where confusion was channeled into art. Sora began to smile upon encountering a photograph of Dhiren and Tommy playing trucks on her floor.

Sora paused when she noticed a sewing mannequin standing beside Ravi's desk. It wore a dress in-progress, the skirt just about brushing the floor. The dress was breath-taking. All of Ravi's work tended to be works of art and everyone knew he had a particular gift for clothing the female form, yet there was something about this dress that called to Sora from across the room.What is it about this dress?

She carefully fingered the fabric. Cool to the touch. She skimmed the hand-detailing on the bodice where the black stitched embroidery underscored the supple richness of the silk.

"You like it?"

Sora jumped, spinning around to face Ravi. He was leaning against his office door and he looked as if he had been for some time. She hadn't heard him come in.

"It's gorgeous. I thought Misra had finished its couture shows for the season. What's it for?"

"Special delivery."

"Isn't the entire couture brand special delivery?"

"Yes and no. Some pieces are a little more special than others."

Sora saw that in the flattering cut of the silhouette and the deep emotional rouge of the fabric and the dramatic flourish of the skirt that would glimmer like lightning in a storm when the wearer walked. This isn't just Ravi being Ravi. This is Ravi caring.

There was some part of Sora that wasn't sure she wanted to like the dress after all. Love had gone into the making of it.

"Is it for Hana?"

"I haven't designed for Hana in years. Imogen handles most of her custom requests when she orders in-house."

"Ah. Things are still a little awkward between you two."

Sora twisted the strap of her purse.

"Things are likely to stay that way. She wants a reunion I can't give her."

Ravi sauntered past her to touch a loose stitch on the dress.

"You could."

He turned the mannequin to inspect the side zipper in search of something Sora couldn't fathom.

"Let me put it another way: She wants a reunion I won't give her. My feelings have changed. That was something I needed to admit to myself and, once I did, the decision not to get back together was easy. Telling her was not so easy."

"Hana hears what she wants to hear."

Finally, seemingly satisfied with his findings, Ravi set the dress form back to rights and turned to perch on the edge of his desk.

"Hana hears what I tell her and I'm often not as clear as I should be. I love her, I will always love her, she's Dhiren's mom, but I'm not in love with her anymore. That I was able to walk away from her on our honeymoon may be proof that I wasn't in love with her even then."

The tension radiating through Sora's body began to ease.

"Rome was good to you."

"Rome saved my life."

"Someday you'll have to tell me that story."

"Have dinner with me and I'll tell you all about it sooner rather than later."

"We have dinner all the time."

"Complete with dramatic and melancholy poetry readings and dancing?"

"I don't know, that sounds a lot like a date."

"It does."

"If you're on the rebound..."

"I've been single for close to two years."

That answers one of my questions about Rome.

"Technically, you just broke up with Hana." Two years was a blink in a love story that had lasted for decades.

"That's the Gallegos interpretation of events. By all other accounts, we haven't been an item for ages."

"Why me?"

"I care about you. You're loyal, steadfast, and bright."

"I sound like a talented dog."

He allowed his eyes to drift down her body in obvious appreciation.

"You don't look like one. You're dazzling. You're driven and compassionate. There's nobody in the world like you."

There was a lifetime of insecurity in Sora's past. Simple kindness, affection, admiration; all these gifts that should have quieted her mistrust heightened it.

"It would be so easy to be seduced by compliments."

"Here's what I want you get from me: There are worse things than to be loved."

"To be loved and abandoned is far worse."

"I agree, and yet I'm still here, waiting."

He sat before her, this knight who wielded pens and verse instead of a sword. If I can show him a fraction of what I'm too scared to voice...

"Ask me again."

"Have dinner with me. Let's listen to bad poetry being read while drinking overpriced espresso in a dive. The place'll smell like clove cigarettes and hashish. Everyone, including us, will be wearing black. We'll clap no matter how terrible the reading is because they'll be braver than we are and that deserves applause."

"You've thought about this. You've thought a lot about this."

"Would it be admitting too much to say I haven't thought about anything else?"

"You should have asked." Sora could never admit it, but she'd wanted him to ask her this for longer than it bore remembering.

"Rejection is a scary thing to think about."

Ravi Misra, frightened of me. This is surreal.

"I'm not saying no."

"But?"

"No 'but.' Let's go out and see what happens. I just want your word that I don't lose you if this doesn't work."

"You couldn't lose me."

"I could. Then, where would I be? Without you, I feel..."

"Lost?"

Sora nodded.

Ravi clasped her hands and tugged her close to nuzzle his cheek against her own.

"You're not lost."

Sora's breath hitched on the heat of his breath blowing over the shell of her ear. Trying to find solid ground this close to him was impossible.