Page 48 of Lost in the Moonlight

“I’ll respond. I’ve been making a concerted effort to keep my phone with me.” It was the truth, even if it was Willow’s entrance into my life that had caused it and not the promises I’d made to my family.

After we hung up and I saw the time on the screen, I realized I’d gotten nearly five hours of sleep. For the first time in days, my body felt energized. Ready. Actually eating a full meal the night before had also helped.

I slid into a pair of basketball shorts and a T-shirt and headed for my home gym for the second day in a row. I’d work out, eat another breakfast sandwich, and then head to the gallery. I’d establish a new routine and shake the hallucinations that had taken hold. I’d throw off the dark trying to drag me down. If part of that routine just so happened to include walkinga pale-eyed, moonlit-haired baker to work and back home, so be it.

Two hours later, I pulled up to the curb outside the gallery to find a large canvas wrapped in a tarp propped by the door and a dark-haired, fair-skinned woman pacing in front of it. As I slid out of the Range Rover, she looked over at me with brown eyes hooded by heavy brows.

“Trinity, I take it?”

She nodded. “Thanks again for seeing me.”

I unlocked the door and punched in the alarm code while she drifted around, taking in the mostly empty gallery.

“It’s a great space for art,” she said in that same, oddly broken voice she’d had on the phone.

I nodded, lifting a chin to the painting she’d dragged in with her.

“If you don’t mind…” She hesitated. “I’d like to set a couple of the pieces up before you see them.”

“Sure. Take your time. I’ll head upstairs to the studio. Just holler when you’re ready.”

“Thank you. Really.”

“Don’t thank me yet. I only promise to be honest.” But I wouldn’t be cruel. You didn’t have to be cruel to deliver a critique. Some people didn’t understand that, using harsh words that often destroyed a person’s confidence more than not selling their work did. Although, both were still rejection, a kind of death to us creative types.

I made my way up to the third floor, leaving the door open so I’d hear Trinity when she called. After spending hours looking at the art books last night, I viewed my started pieces with a new, critical eye that could be both a hindrance and a blessing.

All the art I’d started still spoke to me. The play of darkness and lightness that existed in every corner of humanity was displayed on the canvas. The demon painting needed a partner piece. An angel. A hero. The duo would carry the same theme as the cemetery with the sharp shadows and Willow bringing the light. The yin and yang that had haunted my early morning frenzy in the office.

I itched to pick up my brush again but couldn’t afford to get lost in it with Trinity downstairs.

When she called out a shaky, “I’m ready,” I jogged down the stairs only to freeze once the art came into view. The center piece was larger than Trinity herself. I wasn’t even sure how she’d gotten it into the room until I saw a kid with a backpack lingering outside.

All three pieces she’d arranged were…breathtaking.

Real and fantasy combined.

A castle was brushed along the middle canvas. The light from the breaking dawn was reflected in windows shimmering like jewels. The forest crept close. Briar vines and thorns dangled with flowers edging over the ground. The castle itself was stunning, the marble sparkling as if diamonds were embedded in the stones. But the brilliance of the castle wasn’t the focus of the painting. Instead, it was the dragon curled around the top turret. I could almost see it breathing. Could almost smell the singed air as smoke drifted like fog from its nostrils. Could almost feel the slice of pain that would come from touching the cold scales gleaming with an iridescent light. It seemed real and yet completely magical at the same time.

The two canvases on either side showed the forest surrounding the castle. Dark trees and bright flowers. Cherry blossoms you could almost smell. And amongst the leaves andbranches, peeking out, dancing and leaping toward the castle, was a menagerie of animals, fairies, and gnomes.

As if my thoughts in the middle of the night had made their way onto the canvas.

If Lyrica had told me what the subject of the paintings was when we’d talked, I would have laughed and told her no way. If I’d seen it on a website, I wouldn’t have been much more inclined to reach out to the artist. In person, Trinity’s art seemed real. As if I could literally step into the forest or reach out and touch the diamond-studded stones of the castle as the dragon roared above me, wings shifting the air as he lifted off, crumbling granite and wood beneath mighty claws.

Except, that didn’t fit either because the dragon didn’t look as if it was ready to destroy the castle. Instead, it looked like it was protecting it. A lover shielding their partner.

And that was when I saw it—a woman with dark hair and dark eyes and a look of ecstasy on her face reaching from one of the turret windows to stroke scaly skin.

It was exactly what I’d imagined last night.

Reality and magic.

Fantasy and truth.

Humanity. Imagination. Hope.

Love.

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