Chapter 3 Lila #2
“Maybe it is.” His smile holds. For a moment, the room feels smaller, lighter. I hope the song doesn’t end.
We stop near the French doors. A waiter passes with supplì, slender rice croquettes still hot from the oil, smelling faintly of saffron and salt.
I take one. It burns my fingertips. Teo shifts closer, his shoulder screening me while I blow on it and bite through the crisp shell.
The center stretches, molten and soft, a thread of cheese pulling until it breaks.
I finish it in two quick bites. He watches my mouth as if I’ve stolen his second drink.
“Balcony,” I say, tapping the brass latch.
“You will be cold.”
“I’ll live.”
He opens the door. Milan at night greets us with a rush that smells faintly of stone and car exhaust and winter.
The palazzo’s balcony runs the length of the room.
Lanterns hang at intervals, each with a falling candle that makes the stone glow.
A spire cuts the skyline in silver. A tram hums along the street below, sparks at the wire.
I lean on the railing and let the city climb up to me. Warm air from the ballroom brushes the back of my neck before surrendering to the chill outside. It feels clean after perfume and talk. Teo stands close enough for me to feel that he is warmer than the night.
“I have three parties after this,” I say. “A magazine dinner, a rooftop thing, and a hotel suite with a room-size speaker passing for casual.”
“Do you want to go to them?”
“No.” I laugh. “I want to eat pizza on a curb and not be photographed while I chew.”
“Then do that.” His voice is calm, almost amused.
“You say that like it’s simple,” I murmur, pulling the silk shawl tighter around my shoulders.
“It usually is.” He rests his arms on the railing, gaze following the tram’s sparks as they fade into the dark.
He shifts, and I see the line of a holster ghosting the inside of his jacket. It could be my eyes making up stories, a trick of shadow. It could be exactly what it is. I don’t look at it a second time.
“You never answered my question,” I say instead, turning so my shoulder touches the stone. My hip faces him. “What kind of problems do you make smaller?”
“The kind that grows teeth if you leave them alone,” he says.
“That’s vague,” I say.
“That is the point,” he says.
I tilt my head and study him through narrowed eyes.
“You don’t want to be in pictures,” I guess.
“You stand where you can see doors. You scan the room, and you count the people who aren’t looking at you.
You wear a suit that costs money, but your cuff has a scratch like you hit a wall this afternoon.
You don’t drink what you pour. You make problems smaller. ” I smile. “You are security.”
He considers me. “Close enough,” he says.
“For whom?” I ask.
“For people who need it,” he says, and his mouth flattens in a line that should turn me away. It doesn’t.
“You are not a bodyguard with a client list and a website,” I say softly. “You’re… something else.”
He looks out over the city. “You are good at seeing what is there,” he says. “Do not look too hard tonight.”
“Are you warning me?” I ask, half-smiling.
“I am suggesting you pick the part you want,” he says, and when he looks back at me, I feel seen, which is almost unfair. “You can have your pizza and your photo, but not always at the same time.”
“I don’t even like pizza,” I say.
“You do. They’re special here,” he says, mimicking me, and it makes me laugh.
The balcony door opens and closes, the party breathing in pulses behind us.
A musician steps out to smoke, sees us, and goes to the far end.
Laughter spills and fades. The quartet starts a new song.
I blow warmth into the cold air, turning it white for a moment.
I’m in silk, gooseflesh rising on my arms, and his jacket looks warmer than I’m willing to admit I want.
“Tell me about yourself,” Teo asks. “Do you always steal strangers’ drinks, or is that tonight’s trick?”
“Only when the stranger looks like he came to close a deal that requires a spine and a coat that fits,” I say. “And when his mouth looks like it forgot how to smile.”
“It will remember,” he says. His mouth moves, and mine forgets what to say.
I step closer so I can hear him without leaning, so the silk of my dress almost brushes his trousers.
The lantern above us burns low. The city lights paint his face in slices, gold on cheekbone, shadow at jaw, a streak along the bridge of his nose.
Treacle and honey are too easy. There’s something thick and slow and warm pooling inside me, an invitation that feels dangerous and gentle at once.
“If we stay here, someone will take our picture,” he says.
“We can go inside,” I whisper.
“If we go inside, someone will introduce me,” he points out.
“You could tell me your name,” I say, and don’t like how my voice catches.
“I did,” he says, the syllables level and unyielding.
I know better than to push. I also know better than to let a night like this end where it began, all sparkle and no story. I’m ambitious enough to chase a runway across three continents and stubborn enough to stand still when something worth having stands in front of me.
“Come with me,” I say. “There’s a hotel across the street with a lobby bar that pours drinks like they mean it.”
“I am working,” he says, his eyes dark.
“You can work from a chair,” I counter. “You can work from a couch.”
He tips his head. “You like winning,” he says.
“I like choosing.”
The wind lifts and settles. He takes a breath that I feel more than hear.
He looks past me through the glass at the crowd.
His eyes flick from the donors near the dais to the double doors and then back to me.
He’s counting, or measuring, or telling time without a watch.
The room inside calls him. The city outside pulls me. We stand between.
He shifts his stance, and I feel the decision before he makes it. He’s going to hand me the glass and the night and walk back into work. He’s going to step away and make himself smaller again, a man with no name tag and a suit that says do not ask. Yes, no. I pick the petals one by one in my mind
I am not ready to let that happen. I lean toward him, the city lights painting his face in gold and shadow, and say, “Don’t leave yet.”