He chuckles.
“Not bad,” he says.
Campus comes into view as we round the final curve, and I’m surprised by the modernity of it all. Walls of glass and brick topped with cement make a dozen little boxes set into the hills that rise above us. They seem to be squatting all around a gray paved courtyard where the massive central building sits.
“Benvenut’alla nostra università,” Leo says, gesturing to all of it with his hands.
The contrast of the architecture from what I witnessed the night before has me reeling a bit as I follow him across the expansive cement space toward the double metal doors leading into a huge circular building.
“You will be assisting our summer course with the highest enrollment,” Leo tells me over his shoulder. “Pastore will approve this, naturally, when he returns—he told me you were up for any challenge.”
I nod, wishing that I could hear this approval firsthand, but asking Leo for further information seems like an insult after all thathe’s done for me. The sun catches the white in his hair and blinds me as he pulls open both doors to the main building. A rush of cold air smacks me and I hurry inside onto the tile floor, looking around at the high glass curves of the wall that stretches along my left side.
“This center circle houses the lecture halls,” Leo says, his shiny leather shoes making a satisfying click on the tile that echoes off the ceiling three stories above my head. I wish I’d worn my heels so I could make that sound. That sound is power.
He leads me to the right.
“Eccola,” he says, opening his palm toward another double door. “This is it.”
I take a deep breath and nod. This is what I’m good at—what I love—structure and school and impressing the hell out of people. Taking initiative and accomplishing more than asked. Plans and checklists and syllabi. Time to do my thing.
He opens the door for me and I step inside a huge semicircular amphitheater that stretches down and around to a center pedestal. I look over my shoulders to find that there are two balconies behind me on either side—like an opera house. Almost every seat in the space is full, and when the heavy metal door shuts behind Dean Leo and me, close to a hundred heads turn toward us.
“Salvete, studenti,” Leo says in his booming voice.
There’s a murmur of greeting and I lift my hand and give an all-encompassing wave. My hand freezes midair when my eyes land on the annoyingly handsome man standing at the pedestal at the bottom of the theater. In perfectly fitted gray pants and a crisp white button-down with a thin wine-colored tie, he no longer could be mistaken for the hired help. Behind him, a huge projector screen is alight with an image of Urbino at night. It is the exact angle of the city that this man showed me last night. It takes my mind a moment to understand why he of all people would be standingbelow at the epicenter of the lecture hall. His dark eyes widen and his lips part slightly as he takes me in, then he shakes his head once and narrows his eyes at the handsome older man standing beside me. And like that—snap—it all clicks into its dreadful, unwanted place.
On a breath, I hear myself whispering. “No. Nope. No. You’ve got to be kidding me. This is f—”
“I will leave you to it then, no?” Leo says loudly, drowning me out as he pats my back once.
I barely hear the sound of the metal door swinging open and closing behind me with a thud over the blood rushing up my carotid artery to my brain. The spin I felt last night at the table starts again.
“Welcome to art history,” James says into the microphone. “I am Professore Massini—”
I back toward the doors hoping I can get a moment to collect myself outside, but James has other plans.
“—and this is my assistant for the four-week course, Ava Graham.”
I wish his balls were within kicking distance.
NOVE
James
I don’t knock before barging into Zio’s office after class.
“You are completely out of line—”
He holds up one elegant finger and removes his reading glasses.
“Professor Massini, remember who we are here—in this place,” he says softly, gesturing to the tome-lined walls and the expansive window that overlooks the dorm-spattered hills.
I take a breath and turn to shut the door behind me. He’s right, of course. As always. It’s entirely unprofessional of me to attack the dean of academics about his choices. I should wait, attack my uncle upon arriving home, instead. But there’s no way in hell I can sit with this for another minute.
“She knows nothing about art,” I say, sinking into the leather chair across from him.
He tilts his head, questioning.
