Leo took the bags and his coffee. “Grazie, Giuseppe.”
I glared at them both. “So you know the cashier, and he lets you cut in line like this?”
“Something like that.” Leo gestured for me to follow him to a table.
I moved to the side only so I wouldn’t hold the line. “I’m not sitting with you, and you can’t keep doing this.”
“Doing what?”
“Bumping into me wherever I go.”
“Then you shouldn’t turn me down every time I ask you out. You leave me no choice.”
I rolled my eyes. “Can you give me my stuff please? I gotta go.”
He held the bag up as high as his arms allowed, which was way beyond my reach. “Come get it.”
Sometimes I hated it when boys had to be a foot taller than the girls they were interested in. It was sexy and even necessary, but now it was just unfair. “You know I can’t unless I borrow a ladder, so please…”
“I’ll give it to you on one condition.”
“I know the condition, and I can’t. Please stop being a douche.”
“Why can’t you? You’re single. I checked. And you obviously like me, too.”
“You’re so full of yourself, Leo For Now.”
He chuckled. “Look me in the eye and tell me, without lying, that you don’t like me, and I’ll never ask again.”
I wasn’t that good of a liar, and one dip in these blue eyes would ruin my chances before I uttered a single word. “Why are you going through all this trouble for a girl like me? It’s been like what, six months now since you started our accidental, silent meet-cutes? Aren’t you tired? Since the recital, you’ve asked me out eight times already, and my answer has always been no. Why won’t you go date someone…like you?”
“I’m not tired, and I don’t want someone like me or someone not like me whatever that means.” His arm dropped, and his gaze, dark and intense, held me in place. “I only want you.”
I faltered back a step, his fragrance overpowering the delicious smells of the bakery, his gaze sending a sweet shiver down my spine. “I…um…” I closed my eyes, snapping myself out of his invisible hold. “Unlucky for you, I don’t date. And don’t ask me why. It’s just the way it is.”
It wasn’t like I didn’t want to give boys a try. I wasn’t like Nicky. I needed to give normal a chance, for my sanity, at least. To get over whatever the hell he did to me. I couldn’t even put a name to it, but it ruined me. A healthy relationship would be nice. Therapeutic.
But I just didn’t know how to do normal or if I’d ever be ready. A boy like Leo, an experienced, rich, college boy who was obviously out of my league, couldn’t be my first.
When he said nothing for a while, I reluctantly opened my eyes to measure his reaction. He just stood there, staring at me, studying me, and then he breathed out. “Va bene. You don’t date, so we won’t date.”
Relief brushed me for a second before he opened his mouth again.
“But you do drink coffee, so you can have that with me.” He didn’t wait for my response. He walked and set his cup and my bag on the table, mumbling something in Italian—I understood enough to gather it was a coffee order—at the cashier.
“C’mon, Leo. Take a hint.”
“I did. I stopped asking, didn’t I?” He pulled a chair out for me. “It’s just coffee, Lina. Doesn’t mean anything.”
I knew it did, but one coffee wouldn’t hurt. Right? It might finally convince him I was a lost cause, and he’d stop trying. I hated how I had to turn him down every time. It needed to end. “I can only stay for ten minutes.” I took the seat he offered.
A server brought my coffee, and I thanked him, keeping it in the space between Leo and me as a shield on the table. He gave me his usual staring, not drinking his either.
“Are you gonna say something?” I wasn’t planning on doing the talking, but this was weird. The staring, even though I’d gotten used to it and maybe even started to like it, made me nervous and self-conscious. There was no way a boy like him would notice a girl like me, let alone like her that much. He was the full package, and I was…well, me.
“I like to look at you. You’re the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen.”
My face warmed despite me, and he smiled. He loved to say things like that so I’d blush for his amusement.
I cleared my throat. “Where do you go to college?”
“I study Economics at UChicago.”
“And why have I never seen you at Bellomo before this year if you’re an alumnus?”
“Because I’d probably left before you joined. How long have you been there?”
“Five years.”
“Yeah, I transferred a year before that. I…” He let out a deep breath. “Something terrible happened to my family that year. I needed to get away. My father and I moved to San Francisco for a while.”
I can relate. “I’m sorry. Family tragedies are the worst.” I didn’t want to pry or ask for more details. That might lead him to ask about my family tragedy. I wasn’t ready to share.
He stared back at me, but this time it was different. It was knowing.
“Oh my God.” I looked down, shaking my head. “You know about my father, don’t you?”
“There’s nothing to be ashamed of, Lina. With all due respect, he was a scumbag that deserved to be brutally murdered.”
I gritted my teeth, grabbing my bakery bag to leave. “I’m not ashamed of it. It was just nice, for one freaking second, to talk to someone who didn’t know about the worst thing that ever happened to me, the one thing that defined me everywhere, made everyone see me as that girl.”
“It doesn’t define you, not to me,” he said fast as if that would stop me from leaving my chair. “Lina, please, you have to believe me. This isn’t what I see when I look at you.”
I cocked a brow in a challenge, lifting my chin. “Then what do you see in the poor, orphaned and abused program kid, rich boy?”
He leaned forward, countering my move with equal determination to win. “Not that either. I see a girl, smart and beautiful inside and out, one that deserves to have anything and anyone she wants because she’s no less than any other girl, one that deserves to be loved for who and what she is. The only problem is, she doesn’t see herself the way I see her, but I won’t stop until she does.”
My lips twitched and my nostrils flared. This could be one of the most beautiful things any girl wanted to hear, but for me, it was infuriating and condescending. Nicky’s words echoed in my head. We don’t need boys or husbands or any of that shit. We don’t need saviors. Only each other. Baldi girls versus the world. “So what, you think you can save me? From myself?” I mocked, but on the inside, I was shaking like a leaf with fury and pain.
“Do you need saving? I would if you did, and not just from yourself.”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“There’s something that scares you, Lina. I don’t know what it is, and it’s driving me crazy. It’s the real reason you don’t want to let someone in or open up your heart.”