Emilia’s POV

The image burned into my vision long after the screen went dark. My own face. My own body. My own apartment.

But not my own eyes.

Those, in the photo, were wide and stripped bare—caught mid-reaction, like prey realizing the shadow in the grass wasn’t the wind.

The device was shook in my grip. I leaned my back from the wall, positioned just far enough from the window that if anyone was still observing, they would only catch a glimpse of my faint outline.

My ears pushed against the silence, seeking a change in the dark—an intake of breath, a step, the slightest rustle of fabric

Nothing.

I told myself to call the police. I told myself to lock the door again. I told myself to breathe. But my fingers found the card instead.

The silver ink on the back glinted faintly in the lamplight. I like your fear.

A sound tore through the quiet.

Not from outside.

From my kitchen.

It was the soft clink of glass, as if someone had set a cup down gently on the counter.

I moved without thinking, bare feet silent against the floor, my breath shallow enough to hurt. The hallway stretched ahead like it had doubled in length, shadows pooling in the corners.

The kitchen light was off. But the faint glow from the streetlights outside brushed across the counter—and I saw it.

A single tulip.

Blood-red, stem wrapped neatly in twine. Beads of water still clung to the petals.

My shop’s tulips.

I hadn’t brought any home.

The sight of the tulip was a punch to my chest. I stood there, frozen, eyes locked on the water droplets clinging to its petals. I could still smell it—sweet, faintly metallic.

My mind scrolled through every possible reason it could be here. None of them made sense.

I had locked the door. I had checked twice. I had heard nothing.

Yet here it was.

The tulip didn’t belong in my kitchen.

My hand hovered over it, but I didn’t touch. Something about it felt… tainted. Like the moment my skin met it, I’d be accepting something I shouldn’t.

I glanced toward the front door. Still locked. Windows latched. My pulse rattled in my throat as I stepped backward, my eyes scanning for anything else out of place.

The kettle had moved. Just an inch from where I had left it.

This wasn’t imagination. Someone had been here.

A knock came from the door.

Three soft raps. Measured.

I flinched so hard my shoulder hit the counter. My mind screamed don’t answer, but my feet disobeyed. I crept closer, each step like wading through syrup.

“Who is it?” My voice was barely above a whisper.

Silence.

I tried again, louder this time. “Who’s there?”

Still nothing.

I looked through the peephole.

Empty hallway.

A faint sound drifted in—the slow retreat of footsteps, but not along the corridor. Above. Somewhere in the floorboards.

My phone buzzed in my hand.

Unknown number.

Nice tulips. I almost left two.

The message blurred as my vision swam. I slammed the deadbolt harder, my breathing ragged.

“Stop,” I whispered to no one. “Just stop.”

I thought of Dante, his voice like low smoke curling around me. His gaze, sharp enough to cut. His persistence. His unnerving way of knowing too much.

I didn’t want to believe it was him. But I knew no one else who could cross boundaries so quietly.

I shut off every light and sat on the floor, knees tucked to my chest, waiting for hours until my body ached. When I finally slept, I dreamt of glass breaking and red petals falling like drops of blood.

Dante’s POV

She hadn’t touched the tulip. I’d watched from the shadows of the alley across from her apartment, waiting for her fingers to wrap around the stem.

She didn’t. That told me more than if she had.

Fear was an interesting thing—it either pushed people closer or forced them to build higher walls. Emilia had chosen the latter tonight. But walls… walls could be climbed.

I lit a cigarette and took one drag before flicking it into the street. The ember winked out as I turned away, already thinking of the next move.

She wasn’t ready to paint me yet. She would be.

Emilia’s POV

Morning came like a cruel trick.

Everything looked harmless in daylight—the tulip sat pretty on the counter, the kettle in its usual place. The night’s terror could have been a nightmare, if not for the text still glowing on my phone.

I considered calling the police again, but what would I say? Someone broke in and left me a flower? They’d ask if I had an admirer. I’d say no. That would be a lie.

Work was the only place that felt remotely safe. Customers, noise, routine—things that kept my mind from looping the same questions. But when I stepped into the shop, something inside me twisted.

On the counter, where I usually left my keys, sat another tulip. Yellow this time.

And beside it, my painting. The one Dante had bought.

No note. No explanation. Just my art, returned to me like it was a debt he’d decided to pay back in his own way.

I didn’t want to touch it, but my hands betrayed me. The texture of the canvas was familiar, my own brushstrokes like fingerprints.

Then I noticed it—someone had painted over a section.

A shadow in the corner of the scene, one I hadn’t put there. The shape of a man, standing just far enough away to be unnoticed unless you looked too long.

My phone vibrated. Same unknown number.

You missed me last night.

I held the phone so firmly my knuckles began to ache.

The words blazed on the screen, straightforward yet dense enough to cause my lungs to forget how to function.

My gaze flitted around the store. The morning sun gleamed off the front windows, customers came and went, while my coworker occupied herself with organizing roses. Everything seemed so usual. Yet, somewhere, someone had been near enough to me—near enough to be in my apartment, to set a tulip on my counter, to observe my every action.

And near enough now to place this painting here without my noticing.

I tucked the canvas away into the storage room, hidden from view. Every nerve in my body yelled that I ought to discard it, incinerate it, tear it apart—but I didn’t. It belonged to me, even with the shadow of the stranger included. Perhaps particularly due to it.

The bell over the entrance rang.

Dante entered the room.

He didn’t glance around. He remained unsmiling. His gaze met mine within moments, as if they had been aware of where to focus.

“Good morning,” he remarked, his voice as smooth as silk gliding over glass.

I despised how my heartbeat reacted, the warmth creeping up my neck. Fear and something else, intertwined in a knot I hesitated to identify.

"You've arrived early," I said, even though I didn't anticipate him coming at all.

His eyes darted to the counter, the vacant spot where the tulip once stood. “I enjoy mornings,” he stated plainly, moving nearer. “They are more subdued.” Individuals are less quick. "More straightforward to understand."

I stepped back. "You're advised to go."

He leaned his head. “Is that what you desire, Emilia?”

His voice hung on my name, as if savoring it.

“I’m not here to play around.”

"Nor am I."

The manner in which he expressed it gave me a shiver.