Ravi had taken Dhiren rollerblading to make up for coming home early. They had plans to hike the next day, and to take Tommy sandcastle building that afternoon. Sora had absented herself from their itinerary early on. She'd encroached enough on their time together. She took this opportunity to hande some very necessary personal business.

That son of a bitch lied to me. I let him lie to me. Because as she'd told Michael, Sora had a tendency to trust the very people in her life who'd proven they couldn't be trusted.

She let herself into Sam's beach house with spare key taped to the mail slot.

"Every time I turn my head, you're up to something and none of it productive. What do you do all day?"

Anthony shut off his flatscreen TV. "I think. I brainstorm. I play the stock market. I make money, which is more than anybody can say for you these days."

"I make a great deal of money for myself and the company. Ask Tracy."

"Oh, we've spoken."

"Did she get your head on straight? We cannot have this amount of in-fighting, it damages our image and it's a blow to employee morale."

"Being in the red is a blow to the bottom line."

"That's propaganda. You shouldn't believe your own lies, Anthony; they always come back to bite you when you do."

"I'm trying to salvage my father's legacy."

"You couldn't stand your father. You're trying to line your pockets."

"Nothing wrong with profit."

"I never said there was anything wrong with it. In fact, I'm sure you've gotten perfectly adequate checks from Himura since your departure. Are they smaller than the hauls you're used to? Probably. But you can be sure that in time they'll grow-if you and Hana stop sabotaging me at every turn."

Anthony swilled his scotch. "I couldn't be bothered. You wanna run my company into the ground, you go right ahead. I'll be waiting to be called off the bench and fix what you decimated."

"I'm still not a stupid woman, Anthony. I put all my cards on you, because it made sense. Who else wants their way desperately enough that destroying my credibility wouldn't be too high a price? That's you. It was you, then; it's you now. What I failed to account for is your particular flair. Coming after me as a woman and mother isn't you; that has another type of person written all over it. That's Hana. You and Hana teamed up to oust me. Very clever." Sora might have applauded if loyalty hadn't guided her wrong again. "If only you'd had the good sense to stop when you were winning. That's where your partnership hit the rocks: you don't have the same ends in mind. You want the company, but that's not what Hana's after, is it?"

Anthony's jaw bulged under the force of him grinding his teeth.

"She's got you good. You're so far gone that you're going along with this, thinking she'll get him out of her system and devote herself entirely to you. That's...pretty sad, actually."

"What Hana and I do is none of your concern."

"Oh no, you're going to have to try another diversionary tactic. That one worked once, not twice. See, whatever your motives for being involved in Hana's little scheme, you are trying to undermine my relationship with Ravi and you need to stop."

Anthony grunted and wrenched himself out of his sprawl to refill his drink. "I served him some home truths piping hot. What's the matter with that? If your puppy love can't take it, it wasn't much to begin with, was it?"

Sora stared at his back, aware she'd offended his vaunted pride. She knew him so well.

"Do you hate me that much that you'd sabotage one of the best parts of my life just to see me suffer?"

Anthony favored himself with another gulp of bitter brown liquor. "There's nothing good about Misra. He's in this 'relationship' of yours to get back at Hana for straying from that fainting couch he left her on and finding better for herself. You're low-hanging fruit."

Sora felt each word like a slap to the face and tried not to let the sting show in her voice.

"God, did you ever love me or was I just one more errant stroke for your overfed ego?"

Anthony stood silent for a while, his great shoulders slumped. She had loved leaning against his back; he was the ultimate man and he had wanted Sora of all women. How she had loved him.

"I loved you, Sora. I loved the hell out of you. It was you that didn't love me. The person you wanted to love wasn't me."

"We'll have to agree to disagree on that." What hadn't they disagreed on in the end? "Anyway, I don't think that can be said for Diana. She seems very invested in you just as you are. What would Hana say about that? As her sister, I have some reservations about your inability to commit."

"You know, the problem with our marriage wasn't commitment, Sora. It was you."

Hana's self-delusion is catching.

"I'll take some of the blame for our marital struggles, I will. I was demanding and dictatorial. I wanted everything exactly how I wanted it with no room to negotiate; I wasn't open to compromise. Never mind that I was only asking you not to commit crimes on a regular basis because we had a son and I thought you might want to see him grow up. I didn't want you dead and I didn't want you incarcerated for the next sixty years. I wanted us to grow old together."

"That wasn't in the cards for us."

"I see that. That doesn't mean I'm going to watch you hurt my sister because 'commitment isn't the problem'. Figure out what you want, but leave my family out of your mid-life crisis."

"I'm Hana's family."

Sora braced her hand on her hip to keep from slapping Anthony. She and her sister would never again be close, but they were sisters and each other's family first.

"That hubris is what cost you your company. It will cost you everything else before long."

She left him sitting in the dark beach house with his alcohol for companionship. She had better places to be.

...

...

Sora fortified her nerves to speak to her sister. She knocked on Hana's open office door at House of Misra.

Hana's confusion was palpable. You are not the only one.

"This is a surprise."

"Yes, well, I just wanted to tell you something."

"What could you possibly want to tell me?"

"It's about Anthony."

"You disapprove of me becoming involved with him."

"Involved with him again. Let's not forget that this isn't new. But, that isn't the point I came to make. I don't have a say in any of this-"

"No, you don't."

"Regardless, I think you should be warned about him."

"Why do you care?"

"The same reason you care about Ravi after everything the two of you have lived through: you love him. And I love you despite a considerable amount of treachery on your part. Anthony is incapable of fidelity. You will get hurt if you pursue this relationship."

"Am I supposed to take you at your word despite this massive deception you've perpetrated against me?"

She should not instigate a game of tit-for-tat with me.

"You don't think you're being a little bit dramatic?"

"No, I'm not being dramatic, Sora. You made me bow and scrape and beg for your forgiveness when all along you had your eye on the prize of doing it right back to me."

"Not true. If you put a modicum of the focus you put into chasing your destiny into what comes out of your mouth, you would realize how ridiculous that is. Ravi chose to be with me, that was his greatest gift to me. He gave his heart to me to love and to cherish for as long as we last."

"You don't think the two of you will go the distance."

"Whether we do or we don't, we're committed to each other. How committed are you and Anthony?"

"Extremely committed."

"I'll remember that the next time you make a play for Ravi. I'll remind you. In the meantime, watch who you trust."

"You've taught me that lesson very well."

"Likewise. Oh, and Hana?"

"Yes?"

"If you attack my relationship or my company again, whatever proxies you may use, I will find out, and I will take extreme satisfaction in shutting you down. Sisters or not. Am I clear?"

"As a bell."

"Good."

Sora left Hana's office, feeling like she'd drawn even in some great battle as a sister but won in another, as yet undefinable way.

...

...

Sora arrived home to the smell of fresh French bread and basil beckoning her from the front door.

The coffee table had been moved from the middle of the living room to make room for a checkered picnic blanket. On top of the blanket sat a duet of place settings and wine glasses. There was a wine bottle chilling and lit candles placed strategically around the room to give it a diaphanous glow. A wicker basket sat to the side of the couch, no doubt the source of the sumptuous aroma welcoming her inside.

"Sora, you home?"

She turned to meet Ravi as he came out of the kitchen carrying a bowl of glistening strawberries.

"Hey. Am I interrupting something?"

"Nope." They shared a kiss. "This is for you. A romantic evening to ease some of the strain you've been under lately."

"What the occasion?"

"Me being an idiot."

She fixed him with a dubious look. "Did Aiko tell you to say that?"

He shrugged noncommittally. "It came to me."

"So Jasmin, Imogen, Aiko, and Evelyn told you to say that."

"And Nyna," he muttered.

"You're eating every single bar of mysore pak she sends us after the month we've had. All of them. And no foisting them on Tommy."

"Why not? He likes 'em."

"He likes them too much. The sugar high will drive us both insane."

He conceded without much further arguing. She kissed him hello properly in spite of her certainty that her son had at least a dozen lemon bars too many in his future. Ravi held her close with one arm whilst he balanced his strawberries in the other. This was the part of their relationship she could get used to dangerously easily, this coming home to him. They parted finally, standing brow to brow.

"I spoke to Anthony and Hana."

"How's Himura?"

He was making a point of showing disinterest in Hana. He did that for her; she loved him a tad more for thinking to try.

"Sententious and bellicose, the same as always."

"Do I wanna hear about this?"

"You need to hear it."

"I don't like him."

Sora helped herself to his strawberries, setting them aside on an end table for later devouring, and slid her arms around his neck.

"In case you were unaware, he's no great fan of yours either. You know, I've been so busy acclimating to being with a man that loves me and only me that I didn't stop to think that maybe you had some doubts, too." Ravi rubbed her back, not replying. She kissed his temple. "Ravi, I love you, whatever they have to say about that is irrelevant to us for that reason. Everyone telling us that we're wrong together will have to get used to this." She indicated their embrace. "We're not going anywhere. We'll show them."

"Living well is the best revenge."

"And we're well on our way to getting even."

She kissed him again and, don't tell Ravi, but it turned out to be better than dinner and dessert combined.