Page 7 of The Beast's Hidden Rose
Recognition flashes across her face. "I remember that day. The vendor gave me a discount because his son had just graduated from college and he was feeling generous."
I nod, surprised she recalls such a small detail. "You wore a white dress with tiny blue flowers. Your hair was shorter then."
Her hand rises unconsciously to touch her hair, now falling well past her shoulders. "You've been watching me for over three years, painting me, and I never knew?"
"I'm good at not being seen when I don't want to be." The understatement of my life. I've perfected invisibility, turned it into an art form as precise as my painting.
She looks around at the dozens of canvases bearing her image. "But why me? Why... all this?"
The question I've asked myself a thousand times, never finding an adequate answer. "I don't know," I admit. "I saw you, and something... clicked. Like recognition. Like I'd been waiting for you without knowing I was waiting."
It sounds insane, spoken aloud. But no more insane than the reality—that I've built my life around glimpses of a woman who didn't know I existed.
"So you followed me." Not a question. An accusation, but her voice holds curiosity rather than judgment.
"Observed you," I correct, though the distinction is meaningless. "From a distance. I never approached you. Never interfered with your life."
Until I did. Until I manipulated circumstances to bring her into my home, under my roof, where I could watch her every day instead of just stolen moments each week.
She seems to read my thoughts. "The job. This job. Was that...?"
"Arranged? Yes." My candor surprises her. Good. Let there be truth between us now, however ugly. "I bought the café where you worked. Had it closed for 'renovations.' Made sure Winters put the housekeeper listing somewhere you'd see it."
Her eyes widen at the calculated nature of it all. "You cost me my job so I'd have to find another one? So I'd come here?"
"I made sure you'd find a better one." No remorse in my voice. I'd do it again. "Higher pay. Housing included. References arranged to make sure you'd be hired."
"By you." Her voice has an edge now. "You manipulated my entire life to get me here."
"Yes." No point denying it.
She stands, still holding the explicit painting, looking down at it with new understanding. "And these? The ones where I'm... where we're..."
Heat floods my face, but I refuse to look away. "Fantasy," I admit. "What I imagined. What I wanted."
"What you want," she corrects, and the present tense makes my throat dry.
"Yes." One word, heavy with confession.
She puts the painting down carefully, then approaches the wall where most of the portraits hang. Her fingers hover near but don't quite touch a rendering of her laughing, head thrown back, sunlight catching in her hair.
"These are... beautiful," she says quietly. "Disturbing, but beautiful. You've made me more than I am."
"No," I say sharply, moving toward her without conscious decision. "I've shown you exactly as you are. You just don't see yourself clearly."
She turns to face me, and we're close now, closer than we've ever been. I could reach out and touch her. The temptation burns in my fingertips.
"This is madness," she whispers. "You know that, right? This isn't how normal people behave."
A laugh escapes me, harsh and unexpected. "I'm well aware I left 'normal' behind a long time ago."
"Why didn't you just... talk to me? Ask me out, like a regular person?"
The question is so simple, so reasonable, that it momentarily silences me. Why didn't I? The answer, when it comes, is shamefully honest.
"I was afraid," I admit. "Not of rejection. Of acceptance."
She frowns, not understanding.
