Chapter 1

The most expensive gift Jacob Weiss ever gave me was an old three-hundred-dollar fountain pen.

Before he bought it, he checked prices at seven different stores and read through more than twenty reviews.

Then he told me, "In this price range, this one writes the best."

I took it with a smile.

After that, every birthday, he gave me refill cartridges for the same brand. He said it was the most practical thing.

One night I worked until eleven, and outside it was pouring rain.

I wanted to take a car home. He glanced at the price on the app and gently talked me out of it. "The rain surcharge is sixty-seven percent. Not worth it."

Then he mapped out a route for me. Two trains, one bus, and a little over a mile on foot after that.

Even the engagement ring. He took me to buy a lab-grown diamond.

"Same chemical structure. No reason to pay a stupidity tax for the word natural."

He always said these things in that gentle, well-bred voice.

So I never thought he was cheap. I only thought he was born rational.

Until Rosalie Winfield came back.

A jewelry store receipt fell out of the pocket of his coat.

A natural-diamond bracelet. Over a hundred thousand dollars.

I stared at those numbers for a long time.

The next morning at breakfast, I asked him, "Isn't a natural diamond a stupidity tax?"

Jacob looked up, his voice still mild.

"Rosalie has loved beautiful things since she was little. When I buy something for her, I don't need to calculate whether it's worth it."

I laughed. So it turned out an economics professor could make impulse purchases too.

It was just that the person he'd spend on without counting the cost had never been me.

……

My birthday fell on the twelfth day after Rosalie came back.

Jacob didn't forget.

At six thirty in the morning he'd already taken the eggs out of the fridge to warm up, and picked every ice cube out of my coffee.

I'd stayed up late the night before, and my stomach was off.

He frowned as he handed me the cup. "Don't drink it on an empty stomach. Eat the bread first."

There was a deep blue box sitting on the corner of the table.

I knew what it was without opening it.

I opened it. Sure enough, two boxes of pen refills.

"They changed the packaging this year." Jacob sat down across from me. "But the cartridge is the same. Don't be fooled by the so-called upgraded version. It's thirty-seven dollars more and the specs are basically identical."

I gave a small smile.

"How long did you research it?"

"Ten, fifteen minutes."

He said it casually, then reached out and touched my forehead. "I'll come get you at six tonight. I booked the restaurant. Last year you said you wanted their truffle risotto."

I paused.

I had mentioned it. Only once.

Back then he'd looked at the menu and said a plate of risotto was over four hundred dollars, the ingredients cost maybe a few tens at most, and the brand markup was outrageous.

I never brought it up again.

Seeing me look at him, Jacob smiled. "A birthday only comes once a year. Pay a little stupidity tax now and then."

Something in me softened a little.

For a moment, even the hundred-thousand-dollar bracelet didn't seem to matter.

Rosalie was a friend he'd known since childhood. She'd just come out of a failed marriage, after years abroad on her own.

Maybe I really was overthinking it.

At five forty in the afternoon, Jacob texted me.

【Come down.】

He was standing at the door of my office, a cake in his hand.

Not the place I usually got them from.

I glanced at the box.

"How did you know this one?"

"Rosalie recommended it. She said you girls all like this kind."

The bit of sweetness that had just started to rise in my chest went a little flat.

We'd been driving for barely ten minutes when his phone rang.

Rosalie.

The first time, he cut it off.

The second time, it rang again.

Jacob glanced at me.

"Let me take this."

I nodded.

The moment the call connected, Rosalie's voice came through, thick with tears. "Jacob, something came up at the gallery. The fire inspection failed on one thing, and the preview is tomorrow. My mind's gone completely blank."

Jacob's brows drew together at once.

"Where's the contractor who did the renovation?"

"I can't reach him."

"Don't panic yet."

He turned the wheel.

I paused. "Where are we going?"

"After I drop you at the restaurant, I'll go over and take a look."

"And you?"

"I'll come back once it's handled."

I didn't say anything.

At the restaurant door, he carried the cake down himself, and even bent to straighten my scarf.

"Go on in. Don't let yourself go hungry."

I asked, "What time will you be back?"

"Around eight thirty."

"Should the cake wait for you?"

He paused, then smiled. "Of course. The first slice is mine."

I believed him.

At seven, the food went cold.

At eight thirty, a server came to ask if I wanted it reheated.

At nine forty, the restaurant was getting ready to close.

I called Jacob twice.

No one picked up.

At ten oh seven, he finally texted back. 【The inspector's still here.】

Two minutes later.

【Don't wait for the cake, the cream doesn't taste good after sitting too long. Go ahead and eat.】

I stared at those words for a while.

The server asked, "Ma'am, would you still like me to light the candles?"

I said, "Go ahead."

I was the only one at the table.

As the candles came to life, Rosalie posted to her social media feed.

The gallery was lit up again.

Jacob stood at the foot of a ladder, shirtsleeves rolled up, steadying a very large decorative painting for her.

Rosalie's caption: 【Good thing that every time I look back, someone's there.】

I blew out the candles.

At eleven thirty, Jacob came home.

He saw the cake on the table, barely touched, and stopped short. "No appetite?"

"Mm."

"Why didn't you say so earlier? That bakery's sugar-to-fat ratio is high to begin with. I didn't even think an eight-inch was necessary."

I looked at him. "You promised to come back and cut the cake."

His hands stopped mid-motion as he took off his coat.

"Something came up."

"I know."

"Then why are you still angry?"

His tone was still patient. He even came over and stroked my hair.

"I'll have some with you tomorrow."

I asked, "Can a birthday be made up tomorrow too?"

Jacob gave a helpless little laugh.

"Effie James, since when did you start caring this much about formalities?"

He finished and bent to kiss my temple.

"Don't make a fuss. I remember your birthday, and I remember what you want to eat. Isn't that enough?"

It wasn't that he didn't care about me at all.

It was precisely because he thought he already cared that any further complaint from me made me the one who didn't know better.

And Rosalie never had to know better.

She only had to cry a little.

And he'd go to her at once.