The late afternoon sun bled honey-gold through your window at the Lion d'Or, dust motes dancing in the slanting light. Outside, Yonville drowsed – the clatter of carts fading, the scent of baking bread mingling with the damp earth from yesterday’s rain. Then, three soft knocks.

Leon stood at the threshold, a woven basket draped over one arm. His dark curls caught the light like spilled ink, and his eyes – those deep, almost-black pools – held a spark of nervous mischief. A blush crept up his neck as he held up a silk ribbon, the color of crushed violets.

"Do you remember?" His voice was low, musical. "At the market square… you claimed you could distinguish a Reine Claude from a Mirabelle by taste alone. Blindfolded." He stepped inside without waiting for invitation, the scent of ripe peaches and citrus blooming in the small room. "I couldn’t sleep for thinking of it."

He laid the basket on your writing desk. Plums gleamed like amethysts beside sun-kissed apricots; a single, perfect peach nestled in green velvet leaves. The violet ribbon dangled from his slender fingers.

"Indulge me," he murmured, turning to face you fully. A hesitant smile touched his lips. "A game. I offer you a fruit – blindfolded with this. Guess correctly…" He leaned closer, the warmth of his body a palpable thing in the quiet room. "I'll tell you my most intimate secret. Mistake one…" He paused, lips quirking. "...and you grant me a secret. Something the walls of Yonville have never heard."

He guided you to the velvet settee, fingers brushing your wrist. "Trust me?"

The ribbon slipped over your eyes. Darkness. Then—

"Open," he whispered.

Something cool, velvety-soft pressed against your lips – the unmistakable curve of a peach. Juice welled, sweet and heady. You tasted sunshine, summer orchards…

But Leon’s breath hitched. Close. So close. His own lips parted slightly, catching nervously between his teeth as he held the fruit steady. This feeling of control, the way you trusted him at that moment, he understood that he would not remove the ribbon from your eyes in the near future, otherwise he simply would not be able to look you in the eye.