Scarred Beauty Read Free Page B

give in freely to her emotions.
    ****
    Brad watched as she left the kitchen. She looked
flushed and embarrassed, two combinations he’d never associated with Noelle. He
grabbed his cup and went to the laptop still set up on the table. He frowned as
he noted the internet connection was still hooked up. Turning the screen saver
off, he checked the history to see if Noelle had been using his laptop. What he
saw had him frozen to the spot.
    He went to her door without thinking about what
he’d found.
    Knocking on her door, he called her name. When
she didn’t answer, he took a breath and went back to check out the sites she’d
been looking at.
    The escort agency had him in a panic. Did she
really need to seek out male companionship? The question was a stupid one. He
knew their friendship would never go beyond the bounds they’d set. He loved her
as a friend, but he didn’t find women attractive in that way. The man he’d seen
while they’d been shopping together with Noelle, who had been checking her out only
to recoil had been a shock to Brad. No other person had responded like him when
they’d seen her face.
    His heart ached for her. Closing down the
laptop, he made his way into his own room. Lying on his bed he sat and thought
about her situation. How would he feel knowing there wouldn’t be many people
who would love him with scars?
    Putting himself in Noelle’s shoes had opened his
eyes up to the daily life she led. She worked inside a studio they had
decorated together. Clients came to the apartment to buy her paintings, and he
sorted through the transactions. At twenty years old, Noelle was one of the
most talented artists he’d ever met. Her drawings bought to life so much
emotion, that simply staring at a drawing made him believe he was looking into
her soul. She refused so much in her short life. There were people out there
who would love to get to know her, but she cut them off. She wouldn’t go out
and live her life. Brad didn’t know how to get her to see past her scars and
embrace the life she could lead.
    Rolling over he glanced at the only picture he
had of her. They stood together, their first Christmas inside the apartment.
She’d not long turned eighteen, while he’d been approaching his twenty-first
birthday. Her hair was pulled back, the scars a light red across her cheek.
Later, after the picture was taken, he’d learnt how she’d gotten the scars,
which was why she refused to drive.
    Even as she smiled in the picture there remained
in her face something reserved as if she was frightened to let go.
    The woman who’d helped him to get his life back
was screaming for someone to love her. Only she wanted to find it herself.
    Closing his eyes, he allowed sleep to claim him.
In time he’d find a solution to their problem.
     
     

Chapter Three
     
    Noelle woke early the following morning. The
inspiration for a new piece of work hit her. She put on her painting clothes,
put the coffee machine on, and went to her studio. The only time she went in
her studio was when she wanted to paint. Going into the room when she felt
nothing achieved nothing with her day.
    She placed a new canvas on the easel and
prepared her brushes and paints before she began to paint. Then she let her
inspiration take her on her roller coaster ride. The reds and oranges mixed
together in a fiery scene of passion and rage, her innermost sensations as she
thought of the pain and hurt of her current situation. She knew while painting
the picture, she wouldn’t sell it. These paintings were for her to keep or to
destroy.
    Not long after the car accident which left her
with the scars, she’d begun to paint. Her therapist at the time had said it
would be a way to see inside to her thoughts and feelings, to see the true
depth of her character. The moment she began to paint, the therapy visits were
out the window. She refused to sit and talk to someone who didn’t get her.  
    This was the one room that Brad didn’t enter.