You push through the heavy wooden door of the coffee shop tucked off a quiet side-street near Nevsky Prospekt, and the sudden warmth wraps around you like someone’s arms. The place smells of dark-roasted beans, cinnamon, and the faint metallic edge of old radiators working overtime against the February chill. Late-afternoon light filters through tall, fogged windows in pale gold bars across the scuffed parquet floor. A handful of people sit scattered at small round tables—students with laptops, an elderly couple sharing a single pastry, a woman in a red coat reading a thick novel. The low hum of conversation feels softer here, almost intimate.

The cashier is young, barely out of his teens, with acne scars and nervous hands. You order your usual and reach for your card. He stops you mid-motion, palm up like he’s warding off a blow. “It’s… already taken care of,” he says. His voice cracks halfway through. “And there’s this too.”

He slides a plate across the marble with the careful reverence of someone handling live ordnance. The cake is obscene in its beauty: five perfect layers of chocolate sponge soaked dark with kirsch, separated by glossy sour-cherry cream, the whole thing cloaked in a mirror-black ganache that reflects the overhead lamps like liquid obsidian. A thin band of twenty-four-karat gold leaf traces the edge, trembling slightly in the warm air rising from the espresso machine. One perfect amarena cherry sits at the peak, stem curled like a question mark.

You stare. “Who paid?”

The boy’s eyes flick toward the far corner, then snap back to you so fast it looks painful. “He said to keep it anonymous. It’s… something men do sometimes. For a woman alone.” He swallows hard. “But he also—he asked me to put you in the lottery. The prize draw. I need your phone number for the entry.”

There is no lottery. The lie sits between you like smoke. Yet the cashier’s hands are shaking so badly the edge of the plate rattles against the counter. Sweat beads along his hairline despite the cold draft sneaking under the door. Something—someone—has him terrified in a way that makes your own pulse kick up.

You hesitate only a second. Then you recite the digits slowly, clearly. He types them into the ancient tablet with one finger at a time, as though each tap might be his last. When he’s done he slides the plate closer and whispers, “Please. Enjoy it.”

You carry the coffee and the cake to the window table. The gold leaf catches every shift of light and throws it back at you in tiny, molten sparks.

That’s when you notice him.

He’s seated alone at the shadowed table half-hidden behind a tall bookshelf stacked with old art monographs. Blonde hair swept back from a high forehead, long enough that a few strands fall across his temple when he tilts his head. Eyes the color of glacial ice, startlingly pale blue, fixed on you with an intensity that feels physical. His hands rest on the table, long fingers laced together; on the left one a single heavy silver ring catches the light, no wedding band.

For a long moment the rest of the room fades—the clink of cups, the hiss of the milk steamer, the low jazz drifting from hidden speakers. There is only the weight of those blue eyes and the slow heat crawling up your neck. The first bite of cake is so rich it borders on violence: velvet chocolate, sharp cherry, the faint metallic shimmer of gold dissolving on your tongue.

He stands in one smooth motion, buttons the coat with a flick of his wrist, the fur collar framing his face like a dark halo. He crosses the room without hurry, footsteps almost silent on the parquet. He doesn’t speak. He simply looks down at you for three heartbeats, those pale eyes searching your face like he’s memorizing every line. Then he reaches into his coat pocket, withdraws a single white rose—still damp with dew—and places it beside your plate. No note. No words. Just the flower, stem wrapped once in black silk ribbon.

He had been watching you for more than a week now, that much was obvious. He turns and walks out. The bell above the door chimes once.