In lieu of a shrug, Lily rested her head against Ivy’s. “I don’t know. Maybe.” If she could be sure wanting it was wise. She poked her sister in the side. “But you do.”

“I do.” Only Ivy could combine a giggle with a sigh to spell pure bliss. “Clarke is everything I ever dreamed of, Lil. No. Actually, he’s everything I didn’t even know to dream of.”

“That’s just too sweet for words, you know. I’m not certain I can stand it.” The poke turned to a tickle.

Ivy shrieked with laughter and pulled away for a second—long enough to bat at Lily’s hand—and then settled back at her side. “He said today that he’d mentioned me in a letter to his mother. She’s coming to London for a visit this summer. He wants to introduce me to her.”

“Oooo.” Lily bumped their shoulders together. “You’re as good as engaged, I think.”

“In July, maybe. Maybe.” She grinned, looking so perfectly radiant. Blissful.

Lily had to squash down the surge of loneliness that swelled up. She couldn’t feel lonely now with her sister, her best friend, beside her.

But Ivy was in love. She’d marry. And married women didn’t live forever in the room next door.

And yet . . . never in her life had she seen her sister so happy. How could she be anything but happy for her? Tomorrow’s loneliness could just wait its proper turn.

“The important decisions, then.” Lily made a show of folding her hands in her lap and looking intently at her sister, all rapt attention. “Hemlines have changed since our last discussion of the perfect wedding gown. Should our sketch change accordingly?”

“Now that is a fabulous question.” Lunging to her knees, Ivy reached for the stack of sketchbooks that Lily had stashed on a low bookcase at the foot of their chatting nook. She was already flipping them open as she sat.

Lily let out a squeak when photos slipped and tumbled from the pages. She’d forgotten she’d stashed those in there, thinking to finish a sketch sometime.

“Oh, sorry!” Ivy gathered them up . . . and began to laugh.

Lily snatched them from her sister’s hands. “What?”

“You know very well what.” She pointed at the photos. Three of them, from three different days. All of Zivon as he stood in that way he did, with his hands clasped behind his back. Eyes not quite closed as they sometimes were, but distant behind his glasses. When he was listening. Picking out patterns. “You may say you don’t know how you feel . . .”

Huffing out a breath, Lily shuffled them back into chronological order, straightening the edges. “I was doing a sketch, that’s all.” To prove it, she flipped open the sketchbook Ivy still held until she landed on the one she’d started a few days ago.