The Rapunzel Dilemma Page 15

  At the first landing there was a door. She tried the handle, but it was locked. It was the same at the second landing. Lily was beginning to lose heart when she reached the top step and found herself facing a thick wooden door with a round bronze door handle above an old-fashioned lock and key.

  Hardly daring to believe her luck, Lily turned the key, seized the bronze ring in both hands and twisted it. The door swung slowly open and she stood for a moment on the threshold staring into the room at the top of the tower.

  It was as near to being circular as any room Lily had ever seen and it looked as though it had once been a study or a small library. On three sides the walls were lined with dusty wooden bookshelves on which still lay a few faded books. On the shelf nearest Lily, there was an old set of Twentieth-Century Plays, the covers blotchy and the pages curled with damp. A large brown water stain on the wall above the bookshelf and a rough plaster patch in the ceiling reminded her of the storm that had led to the tower being abandoned.

  It was a shame, decided Lily, because there was something about the room she liked: it was cosy and unexpectedly inviting. Somehow, she felt safe high up in the tower with no one to criticise her or accuse her of things she hadn’t done.

  On the opposite wall, a large arched window made of tiny panes of glass and latched in the middle let in the afternoon sun. In front of it was a window seat upholstered in faded gold velvet. On an impulse, Lily ran over and sat down on it, leaned back against the curved wall with Charlotte’s jacket on her lap, and gazed out at the view.

  Beyond the tower window, Bloomsbury’s rooftops stretched away into the distance and she could hear a bell tolling the hour from a nearby church steeple. She knelt on the window seat and pressed her nose against the glass. To her left she could see the lane far below and to her right she could see over the wall into the next-door building, where a rectangle of grass made a bright green patch in what she decided must be Pendragon’s main courtyard.

  Thinking of Pendragon made her think of Ronan, and she suddenly remembered her promise to meet him. She checked her watch and was dismayed to find that it was already past two o’clock.

  She leapt to her feet and looked around for somewhere to hide the jacket. Her eye fell on the window seat. She felt under the cushion for the wooden rim and pulled upwards. As she’d hoped, the seat lifted to reveal a large cupboard space beneath. Lily put Charlotte’s jacket carefully into the hole, closed the lid and bolted for the stairs.

  By the time she got to Pendragon it was almost twenty past two and there was no sign of Ronan. She was scanning the foyer, wondering where to go, when a porter appeared. ‘Can I help you, Miss?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes – I think so – um . . . I’m awfully late, but I was meant to meet Ronan Carver here.’

  The porter beamed. ‘That’s right, Miss. He said to take you to –’

  ‘I’m here, Dawkins,’ called a voice, and Ronan came striding down the hall. ‘You made it,’ he said, smiling at her. ‘Thanks Dawkins,’ he added, turning to the porter.

  ‘Always happy to help you, Mr Carver,’ replied Dawkins and disappeared back into his office.

  Lily touched Ronan’s arm. ‘I am so sorry I’m late,’ she exclaimed. ‘I got – I got caught up.’

  He smiled. ‘No problem for me, but are you okay? You look kind of stressed.’

  ‘Sure. Of course. I’m fine,’ said Lily firmly. ‘I had a little trouble, that’s all, and I – I had – That is – someone s–said –’ It was all too much. It was as if all the injustices of the last few months had suddenly combined to overwhelm her. She felt pummelled and exhausted and the shock of finding Charlotte’s jacket in her locker was the last straw. To Lily’s dismay, a tear rolled down her cheek. Almost before she knew what was happening, she was sobbing.

  Ronan didn’t say a word. He just took her hand, led her into an empty studio, and handed her a dry cloth.

  ‘Sorry, I don’t have a handkerchief, but, so long as you don’t mind a little dried paint, this should do.’

  Lily laughed and gulped and mopped her eyes. ‘I’m sorry. I’m being an idiot. I don’t even know where that came from.’

  ‘Stuff happens. Do you want to talk about it?’

  ‘I – I’m not sure,’ she said.

  She gazed through teary eyes into Ronan’s green ones. He was so unlike any guy she’d ever met. And the weird thing was that, even though he looked like a biker or a member of a street gang, she really felt like she could trust him. She didn’t know how or why she felt that way – especially when she’d only known him two weeks – but sitting there, her eyes swollen and her nose red from crying, Lily knew she could tell him things.

  The only problem was deciding whether she should.

  She stared down at the paint-spattered cloth in her hand and, for some reason, it reminded her of the drawing Ronan had done of her at the Depiction and how he’d ruined it by pretending to trip.

  Lily looked up. ‘I’m in trouble,’ she said at last.

  Ronan’s brows slanted together slightly, but all he said was, ‘How about I set up while you tell me what happened?’

  She nodded. He dragged a stool across the floor for her and she sat down and told him about Charlotte’s jacket and Phoebe’s quilt and Gemma’s clothes and the nasty notes on her locker. The only thing she didn’t mention was the tower.

  As she talked, he set up his easel, collected a paint palette and a brush, and began preparing a large rectangular canvas. He listened closely and when she’d finished he said, ‘So you think someone’s got it in for you?’

  ‘I’ve been trying not to think that,’ replied Lily. ‘It seems so paranoid.’

  ‘You’re not paranoid,’ said Ronan, dragging an enormous cushion from the corner. ‘Sit here,’ he said, motioning her off the stool. ‘Is there anyone at the Academy who doesn’t like you?’

  ‘Try almost everyone,’ laughed Lily bitterly, as he positioned her on the cushion.

  He looked surprised. ‘I thought things were getting better?’

  ‘Sort of. Classes are good but, apart from Max, most of the first years are still pretty cold. My roomies were thawing out – until someone left my pen on Phoebe’s quilt.’

  ‘So maybe someone doesn’t want you getting close to your roommates?’

  ‘Maybe . . .’ said Lily. She settled herself more comfortably. ‘Only, why?’

  ‘Lots of reasons,’ said Ronan. ‘If the Academy’s anything like this place, then you’re in an ultra-competitive, dog-eat-dog world over there. So there could be someone who doesn’t like the competition, or thinks you deserve taking down, or who has some other reason we haven’t even thought of.’ He leaned down and lifted her plait over her shoulder. ‘Can you take out your hair?’

  She pulled the band from her long plait and shook her hair free. The curls tumbled down her back and onto the cushion; Lily brushed several long tendrils from her face.

  ‘No, no,’ said Ronan. ‘Leave it just like that.’ He ran his fingers through her hair. Lily felt the goose bumps rise on her skin and she trembled slightly.

  ‘Are you cold?’ asked Ronan. ‘I can give you my jacket if you like.’

  ‘No. I’m good. Thank you.’ She rubbed her nose with the cloth. ‘Though I must look awful – all red and blotchy and puffy-eyed. Are you sure you still want to paint me?’

  He laughed. ‘It doesn’t matter how you look, I’m not planning on doing a realist painting.’

  ‘What does that mean?’ asked Lily, trying to distract herself from the sensation of Ronan’s hands in her hair and on her skin. He lifted the hair off her neck and held it up experimentally, then let it fall.

  ‘It means that I’m not going to paint you exactly as you look.’

  She groaned. ‘Let me guess – you’re going to paint me with both eyes on one side of my face and a weird nose and a head made of triangles and stuff?’

  He raised his eyebrows. ‘You mean like a Picasso? I could paint you like that – I love P
icasso’s paintings – but I’d rather do a more expressionist kind of picture.’

  Lily looked at him blankly. ‘A what now?’

  ‘Think Marc Chagall’s paintings. Like the one Julia Roberts gives Hugh Grant in that movie – what’s it called? – Notting Hill.’

  Lily’s face cleared. ‘Oh, I know, the wedding picture with the violin-playing goat.’

  ‘That’s the one. Chagall was big on trying to express feelings in his paintings.’

  ‘So you’re going to paint like Chagall?’

  Ronan shook his head and went back to his easel. ‘Not exactly. I don’t want to paint like another artist. I’m trying to develop my own style.’

  Lily nodded understandingly. ‘Like Picasso. He did that his whole life – invented styles, I mean.’

  He looked at her in surprise. ‘You know, I’d never have picked you for a Picasso fan.’

  Lily blushed. ‘I sound like I know more than I do. It’s my grandmother’s fault. She loves Picasso’s work and recently I made the mistake of criticising one of his pictures.’

  ‘Really? Which one?’

  She hesitated. ‘Oh, you wouldn’t know it. It – it’s never been on public display.’

  He stared at her in silence and she held her breath as she saw the understanding slowly dawn on his face.

  ‘Are you telling me you own a Picasso?’ demanded Ronan.

  She looked at him guiltily. ‘Not me, my grandmother.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Which Picasso does she own?’

  ‘They’re not well known, you wouldn’t have heard of them.’

  ‘Them?’ Ronan looked at her in disbelief.

  She nodded. ‘He used to visit her family sometimes – in the south of France – when Grandmama was young. One year he asked her to pose for him. She was eighteen and, I believe, very beautiful. He stayed about a month and afterwards he gave her two of the paintings to keep.’

  ‘I can’t even imagine meeting Picasso, never mind being painted by him,’ said Ronan.

  ‘Grandmama says she’s never met anyone like him before or since.’

  ‘I’m not surprised. There will only ever be one Picasso.’

  ‘Anyway, last summer, after I accidentally revealed how ignorant I was about his work, she made a point of teaching me a bit about him and his paintings.’

  Ronan considered his blank canvas. ‘Well, I’m no Picasso and maybe it would be better if your grandmother never sees this picture.’

  Lily laughed and was about to ask him why when the door opened and a blond boy with glasses came in. He looked at them nervously and said, ‘Oh, hey, Carver. I didn’t know you’d booked the studio.’

  Ronan looked up. ‘Hi Marcus. Actually, I forgot to write it on the sheet.’

  ‘Oh, okay. Right.’ Marcus shuffled his feet and then said in a rush, ‘I’m really sorry, Ronan, but old Matthews has got a bunch of us juniors meeting him here in about five minutes to work on our life drawings. He’s not happy with our progress and so he’s booked Vera for the whole afternoon . . .’

  Ronan threw down his palette. ‘Sod it! Okay, we’ll move over to Studio B.’

  Marcus gave Lily a sidelong glance and looked even more uncomfortable. ‘The thing is . . .’ he muttered. ‘The thing is, you’re not actually allowed to use unapproved models in any of the Pendragon studios.’ He glanced at Ronan apologetically. ‘I’m really sorry, but I think you’re going to have to find somewhere outside of Pendragon to paint your friend.’

  Ronan threw down his palette knife. ‘Dammit to hell! That’s all I need!’

  Lily looked at him in surprise. She’d never seen Ronan arc up before. She got to her feet. ‘That’s okay, Marcus,’ she said. ‘Thanks for letting us know.’ She smiled at him and he relaxed a little.

  She turned and stared hard at Ronan, who seemed suddenly aware of his outburst. He clapped Marcus on the shoulder. ‘Thanks for the heads-up, mate. I appreciate it. I sure as hell don’t need to get on the wrong side of Matthews again.’

  ‘That’s what I thought,’ said Marcus, nodding sympathetically. ‘He’ll be here any minute,’ he added in an undertone, looking shyly at Lily.

  She was already halfway to the door. ‘I’ll just head back to the Academy,’ she said. ‘Maybe we can do this some other time.’

  Ronan scowled. ‘I want to paint you now!’ he snapped.

  ‘Well, you’ll just have to wait,’ replied Lily, a little taken aback by his intensity.

  ‘I don’t want to wait.’ He followed her out the door. ‘I don’t want to lose this idea. Plus, I’ve got too many other art pieces that need to come online this term.’

  ‘Then why don’t you drop this one?’ asked Lily reasonably.

  His eyebrows snapped together and he glowered at her. ‘Sometimes I need to do my own thing. This place –’ he gestured to the space around them, ‘– has a lot of rules about what makes good art.’

  ‘Rules can be useful,’ ventured Lily.

  ‘Yeah, they’re especially useful for breaking.’

  ‘That’s not what I meant –’ began Lily, but he cut her off.

  ‘I know what you meant, but – to be honest – that’s exactly what I want to do with you.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Break all the rules.’ He stopped, and Lily felt the blood rush to her face.

  ‘Maybe we should just let it go,’ she said after a pause.

  ‘No, we just need to find some place private. I’ve got this idea in my head and I have to get it out.’

  ‘So paint at Pendragon,’ said Lily, beginning to feel a little irritated, ‘and use one of their models – Vera, or whatever her name was. You don’t need me.’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ he said bluntly. ‘Only you can make it work. I want you – only you,’ he added, and for the second time in less than a minute Lily felt her heart kick up a notch and her skin tingle with the sudden rush of blood.

  She pushed the feeling away. ‘Well, maybe you can’t have me,’ she said crossly.

  Ronan looked puzzled for a moment, then he reached out and picked up a curling strand of her hair. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I thought you understood.’

  ‘Understood what?’ demanded Lily.

  ‘Desire.’ He gently pushed the tendril of hair off her face and she felt his fingers softly brush her cheek. ‘Do you know that feeling of hunger that goes deep inside you and takes hold of your gut and won’t let go? It stays with you every minute, haunts your dreams and makes you feel like –’

  ‘– like you’ll never be happy until you’ve got what you want,’ said Lily, nodding.

  In that moment she understood desire as she never had before. She wanted to reach up, take his hand and wind herself into his arms. She wanted to feel his lips against hers, to kiss him long and deep and hard. She wanted to feel his hands on her skin, his tongue in her mouth and his heart beating next to hers . . .

  Instead, she stepped away and said, ‘Yes, I do understand desire. It – it’s –’ She wanted to say, It’s wanting to kiss you! Instead she said, ‘It’s wanting to show the world what I can do. To carry people away . . .’

  He nodded, apparently oblivious to the heat that rose within her and which she felt sure he must feel pouring off her skin.

  ‘Do you ever dream of playing a part so well that people stand up and applaud you?’ he asked softly.

  ‘Sometimes,’ she said, trying to calm the hammering in her chest and focus on his words, instead of his mouth. ‘I think most actors do.’

  ‘That yearning – that need – that desire – is how I feel about my art,’ he said. ‘Only, instead of wanting people to applaud, I want whatever I create to make me feel that way.’ He smiled. ‘I guess that sounds weird.’

  She shook her head. ‘No, actually, I totally get it.’

  He stared past her at some invisible scene and said passionately, ‘Sometimes I have an idea or a vision that gets inside my head and the only
way for me to get it out is to build it or paint it or sculpt it or carve it or do whatever it takes to make it real.’ He reached out, laid both hands on her shoulders, and gazed into her eyes. ‘You’re inside my head, Lily D, and I won’t be able to get you out until I’ve painted you.’

  Lily stared back at him. She didn’t really know if she could trust him, but she did know she wanted him. And, in his own way, Ronan Carver wanted her.

  She took a deep breath and said softly, ‘I think I know a place we could go.’

  CHAPTER 22

  As she made her way back to the Academy, Lily decided she must be insane.

  The Drake had warned her what would happen if she broke the rules and now she was about to take one heck of a risk and break them big-time!

  Spurred by Ronan’s vision and (she had to admit it) excited by his determination to paint her, Lily had told him about the tower and the room at the top with its window facing west.

  He’d been ecstatic. ‘Sounds perfect! We’ll meet there tomorrow night, straight after dinner.’

  Of course she’d told him it was out-of-bounds and explained how difficult it was to get inside because of Saunders being stationed at the stage door and what would happen if they got caught . . .

  ‘I’ll be thrown out of the Academy for sure!’ she’d told him.

  But he’d just smiled and told her not to worry. ‘No one will know. Saunders knocks off at dinnertime and, even if he were around, well, you can leave him to me. I got to know him last term when I was painting backdrops for Miss Potter, so we’re old mates.’

  ‘But what would I tell people?’ protested Lily. ‘They’d want to know where I’d been.’

  ‘That’s easy,’ he’d said, his green eyes glinting behind his black fringe. ‘You just tell them the truth!’

  She’d gaped at him and he’d laughed and said, ‘Probably no one will even ask you where you’re going, but if they do, all you have to say is that you’re meeting me because I’m using you as a model for my new art project. There’ll be no need to lie because they’ll just assume you’re going to Pendragon.’