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“There was only one single thing of any value to me in that house. Worth more than everything else put together,” he finally says. His eyes flick to mine. “And I already got her.”
“Got her.” I snort. “You mean took.”
Elio grins lazily at me, the expression made crooked by his scars.
“Tom-ay-to, tom-ah-to.”
He still hasn’t explicitly told me if this bag and laptop is a gift or not, and I give up on trying to figure it out, at least for now. Rather cynically, I wonder, what’s a few thousand more on top of everything now?
We walk together into the building. It’s hard to feel through the coat, but even so it’s unmistakeable – the firm, possessive press of Elio’s hand on my lower back. The pressure there reignites the curling burn of pleasure from his kiss, and I try to focus on each step I take over the tiled floors instead of his touch and the stupid response my body makes to it.
Luckily, my first class is a lecture of about a hundred people, so Elio’s presence doesn’t cause any sort of problem. There are too many students in this lecture hall to recognize everyone, so no one really stands out as a stranger, but even so, countless eyes are drawn to Elio as he guides me into the room. He’s just so big, plus he’s older than about 95% of the people here. And he’s so commanding. Walking through the aisles and seats like he owns them.
I wonder how he does it. Even though people are looking at him more than me, my cheeks are on fire. This level of attention, just from walking through the room, makes me want to internally combust. But he doesn’t seem to feel it at all. There’s something magnetic about confidence like that. To go anywhere, be anywhere, and not care what anyone thinks. And it’s not like he belongs here – a filthy rich mafia murderer hanging out in a university lecture hall. He is extremely out of place. But it just doesn’t fucking matter. Because just by being here, he creates his own place. He slices his way through the skin of the world by doing nothing more than walking into a room that shouldn’t want him.
The heat bubbling in my veins gets even hotter when I realize that Elio is leading me to a seat in the middle of the front row. The green plastic seat is attached to the desk, but it swivels to allow people in and out. He grabs the back of it and turns it towards me.
“Sit.”
“I never sit in the front row,” I say, shifting back and forth on my feet. I need to get this freaking coat off. There will probably be steam erupting from me when I do.
“You do now,” Elio says. “I won’t have you slacking off in the back row.”
“Slacking off!” I whisper-hiss at him, all too aware of the fact I’m standing front and centre in the room. “If anything keeps me from giving the prof all my attention it is going to be you!”
“Glad to know I’m such a distraction.”
“No, not like that. I-”
“Seats, everyone!” calls out a voice from the doorway. Doctor Heaney, a musical historian, tosses her grey hair behind her shoulders as she enters the room. Elio doesn’t budge, still holding the chair in its open position for me. Biting my tongue, I plop myself into it, because at this point sitting in the front is preferable to marching to a whole new row after the prof has asked us to sit. Elio crams himself into the seat beside me, and it looks like he’s sitting on furniture meant for children.
Luckily, the lecture passes without incident. Somehow, I manage to cobble together a decent set of notes, even with Elio’s heavy arm slung across the back of my chair, his eyes endlessly gliding back and forth between what I’m typing and my face in profile.
I’m both relieved and disappointed when the lecture ends. Disappointed because, even with the weirdness of Elio beside me, I can’t deny how nice it is to be out of the house and in class again. And relieved because one and a half hours of him doing nothing but sitting quietly beside me with his arm around me watching me take notes made me feel like my spine was melting into my pelvis. Like everything inside me was molten and oozing. I’m almost surprised my legs are still solid and holding my weight when I stand up
There’s still one more class to go today, in a room just down the hall from my lecture. This one is a small seminar, and it’s the one that’s got me stressed. Unlike my morning lecture, this is a very small group of about fifteen students, and it’s the same group of students I had a seminar with last term. We all know each other, and the prof knows all our names. Walking in with Elio won’t be nearly as unobtrusive as it was last time.
When we get to the room, our professor, a short, grey-haired man with glasses named Doctor Frank is standing in the doorway, handing out the term syllabus to students walking in. I pretty much want to die every time I have to participate in class, but I do it in his seminar because he’s such a warm, kind, mentoring sort of person. He smiles when he sees me approach, and I can’t help but smile back.
“Deirdre! Hello, hello. Here’s your syllabus. Ah.” His bushy grey eyebrows furrow when he sees Elio trying to enter the room with me. “I’m sorry. Only students inside.”
Doctor Frank isn’t a tall guy, and he has to crane his neck back to look at Elio.
“Where she goes, I go,” Elio says smoothly. “I’m her emotional support monster.”
Doctor Frank’s brows furrow further. Which is understandable, considering how fucking insane Elio sounds.
“I don’t really know what’s going on here,” my prof says with a small shake of his head, “but I can’t let anyone in here who isn’t registered for the course.”
By now the students who got here ahead of me are staring from their seats, and I silently beg the floor to swallow me up.
“Let’s just go,” I whisper to Elio. Maybe I can switch my schedule around to only include lectures this term.
Or maybe I shouldn’t have bothered coming here at all.
But Elio acts like he doesn’t even hear me. In a quick, controlled movement, he swipes the papers from Doctor Frank’s hands.
“Excuse me, Sir!” Doctor Frank blusters, his cheeks turning red. Derek, one of the bigger guys in the class stands, apparently ready to step in even though he wouldn’t stand a fucking chance.
