Page 11 of The Beast’s Hidden Rose (Obsessed #8)

ten

. . .

Iris

Afternoon sunlight slants through the library windows, turning the dust motes to gold as I wander among the shelves.

Guy is in town meeting with a gallery owner—a rare foray into the outside world that he insisted on making alone.

"Business," he said, pressing a kiss to my forehead before leaving.

"Boring details you don't need to suffer through.

" I didn't argue, secretly pleased to have a few hours to explore the house without his watchful presence.

For all that we've shared over the past weeks—bodies, histories, confessions—parts of the estate remain mysteries to me, rooms I've cleaned but never truly examined, spaces that might reveal more about the complex, damaged man I've somehow come to care for.

The library is my favorite room in the house, floor-to-ceiling shelves packed with everything from ancient leather-bound classics to contemporary fiction.

Guy's tastes are eclectic, unexpected—Gothic romances shelved alongside technical manuals on paint composition, poetry collections nestled between art history tomes.

I trace my fingers along the spines, enjoying the texture of different bindings.

Near the large desk in the corner, a section of art books catches my attention—oversized volumes on technique, biographies of famous painters, exhibition catalogs.

I pull one out at random, a heavy book on Italian Renaissance masters, and carry it to the desk.

As I set it down, I notice the bottom drawer of the desk is slightly ajar. I should close it and move on—even after everything, there are boundaries between us—but curiosity wins. I pull the drawer open further, expecting to find office supplies, maybe financial records.

Instead, I find sketchbooks. Dozens of them, neatly stacked, each labeled with dates on the spine.

My heart quickens. I know I should stop, should respect his privacy, but these are different from the paintings in his studio. Those were finished works, intended to be seen eventually, if only by him. These feel more intimate, more personal—the raw material of his artistic process.

I select one at random, the date showing it's from four years ago—before he ever saw me at the farmers market, before his obsession began. Safe territory, I tell myself, justifying the intrusion.

The book contains landscapes mostly, charcoal sketches of the estate grounds, studies of light through trees.

His technique is extraordinary even in these quick studies—capturing mood and atmosphere with a few strategic lines and smudges.

I flip through, admiring his skill, feeling less guilty as I go.

Until I reach a page that stops my breath.

It's me. Unmistakably me, though younger, with shorter hair. I'm sitting on a park bench, head bent over a book, completely absorbed. A half-eaten apple rests beside me, and my bare feet are tucked up under me in a posture I recognize as my own.

The date in the corner reads three years ago.

My hands tremble as I stare at the image. I remember that day, or one very like it. The summer after college graduation, when I was adrift, uncertain about my future. I used to spend hours in the city park, reading to escape my cramped apartment and restless thoughts.

I flip the page and find another sketch of me—standing at a bus stop, looking at my phone. The next page shows me laughing with a friend outside a coffee shop. Page after page of me, captured in moments I never knew were observed.

Three years. He's been watching me, drawing me, fixated on me.

A strange warmth blooms in my chest. These sketches aren't like the explicit paintings I found in his studio.

There's something tender about them, almost reverential.

The way he's captured my expressions, the careful attention to small details—the chip on my nail polish, the loose thread on my sweater sleeve, the way my hair falls across my face when I'm concentrating.

He saw me. Really saw me, years before we met. Not just my body or my face, but the quiet moments that made up my ordinary life.

I continue through the sketchbook, then reach for another, this one dated two years ago. More of the same—me in various settings, always unaware of being observed. In grocery stores, bookshops, walking down streets I recognize from my old neighborhood.

The realization hits me: he was there, in the periphery of my life, silently watching, capturing, preserving moments I would have otherwise forgotten.

How many times did we nearly meet? How many almost-collisions, near-introductions did fate deny before bringing us together here?

I should close the books, return them to the drawer, pretend I never saw them. But I can't stop turning pages, can't stop this archaeological dig into the history of his obsession—and by extension, into a past version of myself I barely remember.

There's something strangely comforting about seeing myself through his eyes. In a life where I often felt invisible, unremarkable, he saw something worth capturing, worth returning to again and again. What did he see in me then that others—that I myself—did not?

The most recent sketchbook contains studies for paintings I've seen in his studio—preliminary work for the more finished pieces. His technique evolved over the years, becoming more sophisticated, more emotionally resonant. But the focus remained constant: me.

I close the final book and sit back, mind reeling. Three years of observation. Three years of fascination. The depth of his obsession is greater than I realized, the roots going deeper into the soil of his psyche.

What does it mean for us, for whatever this relationship has become?

I'm not the innocent housekeeper who arrived a month ago, shocked to discover her employer's obsession.

I've become a willing participant in this strange, intense connection—even encouraged it, embraced the darkness in him that resonates with something in me.

The changes in me have been so gradual I hardly noticed them happening. The way I've come to crave his possessive touch, the thrill I feel when he calls me "his," the comfort I find in his unwavering focus. Normal relationships seem pale, tepid in comparison to the consuming heat between us.

Is this love? This twisted, intense, boundary-crossing connection?

Or something else entirely—something without a name, unique to us?

I'm so lost in thought I don't hear him return until his voice breaks the silence.

"Find anything interesting?"

I start, looking up to find Guy in the doorway, watching me with an unreadable expression. I don't bother hiding the sketchbooks—there's no point in pretense between us anymore.

"You’ve watched me for so long," I say simply.

He steps into the room, closing the door behind him.

"Yes," he confirms, coming to stand beside the desk.

The confession should terrify me. It's the behavior of a stalker, a predator. But the man standing before me isn't the boogeyman of cautionary tales—he's Guy, with all his darkness and damage and desperate need to connect in the only way he knew how.

"You really have been watching me for three years," I say, the full weight of it settling over me.

"The best years of my life," he says simply. "You gave my work purpose. Gave me something to look forward to, even from a distance."

I stand, needing to move, to process. "I had no idea. All that time, I felt so... ordinary. So unseen. And you were there, seeing me more clearly than anyone ever had."

"You've never been ordinary, Iris." He steps closer, finally giving in to the need to touch me, his hand cupping my cheek. "Not to me."

I lean into his touch, still holding the sketchbook. "Why didn't you approach me? In all that time, why just watch from afar?"

"Fear." The admission costs him, I can see it in the tension around his eyes. "Not of rejection—though that too. Fear of ruining the perfect thing I'd created in my mind. Fear that the real you couldn't possibly live up to the version I'd constructed."

"And has she?" I ask, suddenly needing to know. "Has the real me lived up to your fantasy?"

His eyes darken, thumb stroking my cheekbone. "She's exceeded it in every way. The real Iris is messy, complicated, stubborn—human in ways I couldn't have imagined. Perfect because of her imperfections, not despite them."

The tenderness in his voice undoes me. Five years of watching, of waiting, of wanting—and now he has me, the real me, with all my flaws and contradictions.

"Come with me," he says suddenly, taking the sketchbook from my hands and setting it aside. "There's something I want to show you."

He leads me through the house to his studio, that once-forbidden space that has become almost as familiar to me as my own room. Inside, he guides me to a canvas covered with a cloth, positioned on an easel near the windows.

"I've been working on this for the past week," he explains, suddenly looking nervous—an expression I've rarely seen on his face. "It's... different from the others."

He pulls away the cloth, revealing a portrait of me unlike any I've seen before.

In this painting, I'm not alone—Guy is there too, his arm around me, my head resting against his chest. We're standing in the garden behind the house, surrounded by late summer blooms. What strikes me most is the expression he's captured on my face—not the carefully constructed contentment I've worn for most of my life, but something raw, genuine.

Happiness, but with an edge of something fiercer.

And the way he's painted himself looking at me—like I'm the source of light in an otherwise dark world.

"This is how you see us," I whisper, stepping closer to the canvas. "Together."

"It's how I want us to be," he corrects.

"Not just in paintings. Not just in this temporary arrangement we've fallen into.

" He turns to face me, taking both my hands in his.

"Three years I watched you from a distance.

One month I've had you here, under my roof, in my bed.

It's not enough. I want more. I want forever. "

My heart stutters in my chest as I realize what he's saying. "Guy?—"

"Marry me, Iris." The words come out rushed, almost desperate. "Be my wife. Let me keep you, protect you, worship you for the rest of our lives."

The proposal hangs in the air between us, as unexpected as it is intense. A month ago, I would have called this madness—agreeing to marry a man I've known so briefly, a man with an obsessive fixation on me that spans years.

But the woman I was a month ago doesn't exist anymore. She's been transformed by his gaze, his touch, his unyielding devotion. In his presence, I've discovered parts of myself I never knew existed—a capacity for passion that matches his, a desire to be possessed that equals his need to possess.

"This is crazy," I say, but there's no conviction in the words. "We barely know each other."

"I've known you for three years," he counters. "And you've seen more of me in one month than anyone has in my entire life. The darkest parts, the broken parts. Everything I've hidden from the world, I've shown to you."

He's right. There are no masks between us, no pretense. He's laid himself bare—his obsession, his trauma, his desperate need for connection—and I've accepted it all. More than accepted, I've embraced it, found myself reflected in his darkness.

"What if it's not enough?" I ask, voicing my deepest fear. "What if this intensity burns out, or turns into something destructive?"

"Then we'll face that together." His hands tighten on mine. "I'm not promising perfection, Iris. I'm promising devotion. Commitment. That no matter how dark it gets, I'll never stop seeing you, never stop wanting you, never stop fighting for us."

Tears spring to my eyes, unexpected and overwhelming. No one has ever promised me such things. No one has ever wanted me with such ferocity, such certainty.

"Say yes," he urges, bringing my hands to his lips. "Be mine in every way possible."

The last rational part of my mind screams caution, reminds me of how this began—with secrets and manipulation, with an obsession that would frighten most people away. But that voice grows fainter by the second, drowned out by something deeper, more instinctual.

This man sees me. Really sees me, in ways no one else ever has. And against all odds, I see him too—the beauty in his darkness, the tenderness beneath his possession.

"Yes," I whisper, and then louder: "Yes."

Relief and joy transform his face, making him look younger, unburdened. He pulls me against him, his mouth finding mine in a kiss that feels like sealing a pact. When we break apart, both breathless, he presses his forehead to mine.

"Mine," he murmurs, the familiar word carrying new weight now. "Forever."

"Yours," I agree, sliding my arms around his neck. "And you're mine, too. Don't forget that part."

He laughs, a rare sound that fills me with warmth. "As if you'd let me."

He lifts me suddenly, spinning me in a circle that makes me cling to his shoulders, laughing despite the tears still wet on my cheeks. When he sets me down, he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small velvet box.

"You already had a ring?" I ask, surprised. "How long have you been planning this?"

"Three years," he says simply, opening the box to reveal a stunning sapphire surrounded by diamonds. "I bought it three years ago, when I knew for certain what I felt for you wasn't going to fade. Never dreamed I’d actually get to give it to you, though."

The admission should shock me, but nothing about his devotion surprises me anymore. He takes the ring from its nest and slides it onto my finger—a perfect fit, of course. He would know my size exactly, would accept nothing less than perfection for this moment he's imagined for years.

"It's beautiful," I say, watching the stones catch the light.

"It's nothing compared to you." He kisses my palm, then the inside of my wrist where my pulse races. "Nothing in this world is."

As the sunlight slants through the studio windows, painting us both in gold, I look at the portrait again—the two of us together, his darkness complementing my light, each making the other more complete. Then at the ring on my finger, tangible proof of his promise.

Three years he's been loving me from afar. Now we have a lifetime for me to love him back.