* * *
The little corner café two blocks from my apartment has become my unofficial office. The smell of fresh coffee and warm pastries usually helps me focus, but today my mind keeps drifting.
I sit at my favorite window table with my laptop open, half-heartedly updating client training plans. Spreadsheets forprogressive overload, notes on mobility work for Mrs. Patel’s bad knee, and a new glute activation sequence for Skeet.
My protein shake sits half-finished beside me. Every few minutes I catch myself staring out at the passing pedestrians, replaying the gym encounter on loop. Kirill’s deep voice. The way he’d said “Youwilltrain my nephew” like it was already law. The abrupt exit. The shower.
God, the shower.
My cheeks warm again just thinking about it.
I shake my head and force my attention back to the screen.
Focus, Teddy.
You have bills to pay and an audition next week.
Let’s do this…
The café door chimes in the background. I don’t look up at first—until a shadow falls over my table.
I glance up and recognize him immediately: the man who whispered in Kirill’s ear at the gym. Same dark clothing, same quiet, purposeful movement. He wasn’t smiling then, and he isn’t now either…
Without a word, he places a crisp white envelope on the table in front of me.
“Details for Bobby,” he says, voice low and clipped, carrying the same faint accent as Kirill’s. “Session times, address, payment information. Everything you need.”
I stare at the envelope, then back at him.
My irritation from earlier flares back to life, mixing with the lingering bemusement.
“Look, I appreciate the… confidence,” I say, keeping my tone polite but firm. “But I’m not sure I have room in my schedule right now for a new client. My calendar is pretty packed with existing clients, classes, and?—”
The man cuts me off with a slight shake of his head. His expression remains neutral, almost bored, but there is an unmistakable edge beneath it.
“This is not a request.”
He lets the words hang in the air for a moment, then continues…
“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll make room for Bobby. Kirill doesn’t take no for an answer.”
A chill runs down my spine despite the warm café. The casual way he delivered the warning made it sound like simple fact rather than a threat—yet it landed like one.
My optimistic trainer brain wants to laugh it off, to insist this is all some misunderstanding. But the dark energy I’d felt from Kirill that morning echoes in this man’s words now too.
Before I can respond, the man turns on his heel and walks out of the café without another word, the door chiming softly behind him.
I sit there, envelope in hand, staring at the space he’d occupied. Bemused doesn’t even cover it.
Irritated? Definitely.
A big part of me wants to march after him and tell him exactly where he can shove his non-request. Who did these people thinkthey were? I am a personal trainer, not some employee they can order around.
And yet…
I slide my finger under the flap and opened the envelope. Inside is a neatly typed schedule, a generous double hourly rate that makes my eyes widen, and an address in a very upscale part of the city.
Bobby Antonov, age nineteen. Goals: strength, discipline, confidence.
