Silence follows as my brain catches up.
“This was her music room,” he adds.
I look up to the ceiling and see the strange placement of the white boards there. The room is bare. There is nothing down here, just the panels on the wall and a shelf holding a sound system. The thick carpet beneath my feet—which I assume is also for sound absorption—paired with the boards on the walls make the room look odd. As I step farther into the space, I feel as thoughsheis calling out to me, almost as if the echo of her is here in the room, bouncing off the walls.
Before I knew what was down here, I feared him. Now that Iknowwhat’s down here, I fear myself.
“Why didn’t you just tell me about this? Why did you try to frighten me?”
That’s when he moves. He is in front of me before I can say another word, gripping my naked shoulders.
“Don’t you see, Gemma? You letthemscare you.”
I try to understand what he is telling me.Them. There’s that word again.
“Who isthem?” I ask, determined to get an answer this time.
His eyes narrow as he drops his hands. “Everyone else,” he mumbles as he turns away.
I watch him as he moves across the bright white space. As Phillipe disappears through a door on the other side, I’m left wondering if I am supposed to follow.
Making my way across the firm carpet, I reach the small door where he exited. Stepping through, I notice right away that this room is different. It’s just as large. I assume that these rooms used to be the wine cellars. Phillipe must have converted a different space for that, though. As I move farther into the room, stepping onto hardwood floor, my eyes are drawn to the paintings hanging up on the far brick wall.
There, directly in front of me, are what I can only assume are the originals from Phillipe’s series. The six pieces he painted of Chantel are displayed at the opposite end of the dimly lit room. Each is larger than life, and each is illuminated with a picture light.
They are resplendent, and I am enraptured.
Phillipe watches Gemma from the far-right corner of the space. He purposely left the room in shadows so he could gauge her reaction unnoticed, wanting to witness the moment she first looks upon the collection.
He knows that seeing it in person for the first time is a shock to the system. Many have described it asbreathtaking, and now, it is revered ashaunting.
To him, though, it will always be Beauty.
Six portraits, each thirty-six by twenty-four, line the far brick wall in silent repose. Each is lit by a light secured above theframe, and each holds him ensnared whenever he comes down to look upon them.
Right now, however, Phillipe finds himself intrigued by a petite blonde shrouded in a white towel. She hasn’t seen him since she stepped into the room. As she makes her way closer to the paintings, he can sense her fascination with what is before her.
“It hurts to look at her, doesn’t it?” he asks as she turns to look at him over her shoulder. He pushes himself away from the wall and makes his way toward her. “She would play her violin in the room next door, and I would come down here to sketch.”
Gemma turns her head to stare at the paintings. “These are simply magnificent, Phillipe,” she whispers in awe. She takes a step closer before asking, “May I?”
Phillipe nods once and remains where he is. He tries to remind himself that there is no reason he should feel guilty about being bound by one woman who is becoming entranced by another.
“Guilty?” Her voice seeped into his mind. “What are you guilty of?”
“Everything,” he confessed as he stroked her cheek.
“Do you see the lights over there?” she asked.
He closed his eyes, blocking out what she was telling him. “You don’t see lights over there, Chantel. You can’t see anything,” he told her gently.
“Just like you can’t be guilty,” she whispered.
He watched her wet lips part on a soft sigh.
“Don’t let them make a villain out of you. Don’t let them break you.”
Leaning down, he pressed his lips to hers, knowing what she was trying to tell him, but the truth was that the lights were there.
