Vacant Voices (Blind Barriers Trilogy Book 3)

by Sophie Davis

  Curled in Lark’s—my bed—with my eyes closed, I listened to the two guys talking in the living room. Had the conversation not been so heated, their voices wouldn’t have carried down the hallway.

  “I don’t understand, why can’t you bring Lark back?” Blake asked.

  “Because Raven, not Lark, is the key to all of this,” Asher snapped. “The situation is complicated. We are on uncharted ground here.”

  “If this is ‘uncharted ground’, how do you know that Raven is the key?” Blake spat back.

  Asher sighed. “It’s complicated, man.”

  There was a long silence, and I wondered what each guy was thinking. Asher’s betrayal, his numerous lies, they cut deep. And yet, there was a part of me that trusted him. He’s here to help you. I believed that.

  “What about the clues? The scavenger hunt?” Blake pressed.

  He sounded so tired, so weary. My heart hurt for him. He was trying so hard to understand, just like me, what was really going on—the point of this, whatever this was.

  There was a loud bang—one of the guys hitting a wall maybe?

  “I don’t know,” Asher admitted finally. “The clues…they weren’t part of the plan. We think Lila, with help from Lark, set them up.”

  “Why?” Blake wanted to know.

  Me too, I thought.

  “Because they want Raven to know everything,” Asher said simply, but he hesitated for so long that I considered rejoining the guys so that I wouldn’t miss a single word of the conversation. Finally, Asher continued. “Personally, I think they want her to know how corrupt the Kingsley family is, how corrupt their business is.”

  “And do what with that information?” Blake asked. He seemed truly interested, intrigued even.

  That makes two of us.

  “I don’t know,” Asher admitted.

  There was another long silence. I pulled the covers tighter around me. I couldn’t explain how I knew, but deep in my gut I understood that Blake’s response mattered, a lot. Would he run? Would he stay and help me, help Lark, finish what our alter ego had started? I shook my head. There was no way he’d stay. My issues were too much to handle.

  My body shuddered, and I felt like a jigsaw puzzle still in its box, waiting for someone to come and put all my pieces back together.

  “How can I help?”

  All my muscles relaxed when Blake’s question reached my ears. He’s going to stay. He’s going to help us. Joy like I’d never know filled my heart. I threw back the covers and raced through the bedroom door, down the hallway, and into the living room. Both guys were standing, Asher with his hands shoved in his pockets and Blake with his arms crossed over his chest.

  They both turned to look at me. I knew my expression was crazed, my hair a mess from tossing and turning in the bed. But when I met Blake’s beautiful green gaze, there was love in his eyes. Tentatively, he unfolded his arms and held them open. My steps faltered as I stumbled over to him. He hugged me so tightly that it was hard to breathe, but I didn’t care. All I could think was: He’s going to help me.

  He held me at arm’s length and stared deeply into my brown eyes. So many emotions swirled inside of me, and I felt unsteady on my feet.

  “I know you’re Raven,” Blake said softly.

  I gulped audibly but remained silent.

  “But Lark, my Lark, is in there, too.”

  Tears burned the backs of my eyes.

  “I…I…this is so hard.”

  My knees buckled. What is he trying to say? Has he changed his mind?

  My muscles started to twitch. I blinked rapidly as my head began to pound. It was as though someone was knocking on the inside of my skull.

  Relax, just breathe. Let me in.

  The spasms stopped. I tilted my head to the side and let out a long, slow breath.

  “I understand if this is too much for you. I’ve wanted to tell you for a long time…but I was scared.” A jolt ran through my body, and I fought to control the convulsions. For the first time in my memory, I was both Lark and myself. She was there, she was talking to Blake. But I was there too. I heard and saw and felt everything: Lark’s love for her boyfriend; her terror at the possibility of losing him; her determination to right the wrongs of the Kingsley dynasty.

  “Lark?” Blake asked, drawing out the name.

  I smiled, my body still trembling slightly. “Raven is my way back to you. Please, trust her. Help her. She is me. Remember that, please.”

  Blake’s adam’s apple bobbed as he nodded. Another spike of pain ran down my spine, and then…Lark was gone, and I was alone.

  Determination glinted in Blake’s emerald gaze. “Where do we start?”

  Three hours later, with a smorgasbord of broccoli and tomato pizza, fried wontons, teriyaki shrimp, and spring rolls, the three of us sat in the living room with all of Lark’s clues spread out on the floor. Asher had a notebook in his lap, and he was attempting to form a timeline of events that led to our current predicament.

  A slice of half-eaten pizza in one hand, Asher announced, “Okay, here’s what we have so far….” He trailed off and glanced in my direction, as though making sure I could handle his next words. I nodded and gestured for him to continue. “Lark was eight when she witnessed Jonas being shot outside the gates of Kingstown. Shortly afterwards, she was brought to the Montauk Institute. That’s when David became involved.” Again he looked to me, and again I nodded for him to go on. “Lila entered the picture while Lark was institutionalized.”

  “How long was Lark at Montauk back then?” I asked, sounding and feeling detached from both the present and a past that I couldn’t recall.

  Why can’t I remember? I wondered. Some of Lark’s memories seemed to come at will, while eithers eluded me no matter how hard I tried to summon them.

  “About nine months,” Asher admitted. “She was unresponsive to normal therapy, which basically just means that she wasn’t ready to talk about Jonas or his death. David tried hypnosis to draw out the memories, but….” He shook his head. “It didn’t work. Lark had already buried them too deep. However, through hypnosis, Lila emerged.”

  He paused and took a bite of pizza. Blake was sitting beside me on the couch, close but not touching. He had a plate of untouched teriyaki in front of him. “Lila came to help Lark cope with what happened in Kingstown?” he asked, but it sounded as though he already knew the answer.

  How? I wondered, but then remembered the package I’d mailed to him. What the hell was in that package?

  “Yes,” Asher confirmed around a mouth full of cheese. “Lila began shouldering the burden of the memories Lark wasn’t ready to confront. It wasn’t long after Lila came into being that Lark went back to being a relatively normal child and was able to return home. Lark and Lila coexisted for years, and they were just fine. Lark continued to see David as an outpatient. From our observations, we know that Lila was fully aware of Lark and Lark’s movements, but Lark wasn’t aware of Lila yet.” He took another bite of pizza and swallowed this time before continuing. “Then, when Lark was in the eighth grade…something happened. She had a breakdown. Her parents brought her back to the Montauk Institute, and….”

  “And I was born,” I finished for him.

  It was weird; I was oddly calm. Lila was there, I felt her. She was the one keeping my emotions in check. But I was in control. I needed to maintain control, and Lila seemed content to take a backseat. Still, I didn’t push her away completely. I needed her no-nonsense attitude, her strength, to get me through this.

  It will take all three of us to complete this mission.

  “That is our current theory,” Asher agreed. “But you, Raven, didn’t show yourself to David until last year, when Lark was brought back to the Institute for a third time.”

  I did? Why can’t I remember the Institute or David?

  “Why? Why exactly was Lark institutionalized last summer?” Again, I spoke calmly, evenly, as though on autopilot.

  Asher took a long dr
ink from a can of soda, stalling for time. “It was at the request of the Kingsleys,” he said finally. “They realized that…that Lark knew about Lila. That she was starting to remember Jonas and Kingstown.”

  “And they didn’t want that?” Blake guessed, fiddling with his plastic fork but not actually eating any food.

  Asher shook his head. “No, they feared…they feared she was going to expose them…expose Kingstown.”

  “That’s what all the clues are for,” I said softly. “Lark wants me to expose Kingstown.”

  “I believe so.” Asher sounded tired, and he looked much older than normal. “I believe Lark spent most of her senior year of high school preparing to run away, preparing to live a life apart from her family.” He hesitated, before adding, “But there must have been a precipitating event, something that caused Lark to remember.”

  “A precipitating event?” Blake repeated.

  “Yeah, a trigger. Something that happened over the summer between her junior and senior years of high school.” Asher looked to me. “Do you remember anything from that summer? Or maybe something you read in the journal?”

  I shook my head. The journal entries had started after Lark began her senior year. Aside from the flashback to the Met Ball where she met Blake, there wasn’t much about her life prior to that.

  “She didn’t mention anything?” Asher pressed, sounding impatient and more than a little frustrated.

  “Dude, chill, she’s trying,” Blake snapped.

  Asher sighed and forced a smile. “Right. Right. I’m sorry. It’s just—we’ve never been able to figure out what caused Lark’s memories to resurface at that time.”

  “Does it really matter?” Blake countered.

  “Yes and no,” Asher hedged. “From a treatment standpoint, it would be helpful to know the trigger.”

  “Why? So you can stuff me back in a hole and make sure this doesn’t happen again?” I demanded, real emotion coming through in my tone.

  Asher had the good grace to blush. “I wouldn’t put it quite like that….”

  “That is what the Kingsleys want, though, isn’t it?” Blake insisted, revulsion plain on his face. “They want Lark to forget about Kingstown and Jonas. And then what? She lives the rest of her life ignorant to her family’s depravity?”

  Squirming in his chair, Asher set his plate on the coffee table, apparently no longer hungry now that he was the one being interrogated. “In the most basic of terms, yes that what the Kingsleys want.”

  “And you’re okay with that?” Blake demanded.

  “It’s why they brought Lark to Montauk,” Asher replied evasively. “I want to help Lark, Lila, and Raven live as normal a life as possible. That’s all.”

  Beside me, Blake trembled with anger. His lips were pursed and the vein in his neck was throbbing again. Is he going to hit Asher? I wondered. Not that I would have blamed him. I wanted to hit Asher.

  “The only way to help all three of them move forward is to revisit the past,” Asher continued calmly. “The more we know, the better equipped we will be to treat her.”

  He hadn’t actually answered Blake’s question, but I got the impression that Asher wasn’t okay with once again repressing Lark’s memories. I believed him when he said he just wanted to help us. It’s not his call, I had to remind myself. Which was true, of course. This was David’s show. My fate rested in his hands.

  Asher met my gaze levelly. “I can’t make you promises about how all of this ends. But ask yourself this: Why would we, David and I and our team at Montauk, risk a real-world, experimental therapy like this if we planned to repress Lark’s memories again?”

  It still wasn’t an answer, but he did make a good point. They could have erased Lark’s mind again the day they brought her back to Montauk. They could have erased her mind at any point in the year that she was institutionalized. Instead, they’d set up an elaborate rouse geared toward helping Lark—helping me—remember.

  “I know you don’t trust me, and I don’t blame you,” Asher continued. “In time, I hope that changes. I hope you understand that I have been trying to help all of you since David first brought me on to your therapy team. Right now, to keep helping you, I do need to know the event that triggered Lark’s memories.” His gaze flitted to Blake. “Not so that we can make sure to avoid a repeat in the future, but so you can have a future.”

  Did I believe him? Did I think he wanted to help me? I do, I realized. It’s not his decision, I reminded myself again. Asher’s intentions, good or otherwise, only mattered to a point. Ultimately, David would choose the best way forward. Somehow, I doubted that Lark’s wellbeing would be his primary concern, not when her parents were footing the bill. Up until that point, David had followed their wishes—what reason did I have to believe that had changed?

  As though reading my mind, Asher added, “David thought suppressing Lark’s memories was best for her. Lila taking those memories from Lark, it worked. Lark was able to move on with her life. But now that Lark is older, well…we need to try a different tactic. Every patient is unique, so what works for one might not work for another.” He shrugged, glancing from me to Blake imploringly. “What once worked for one patient may not work for the same patient down the road. That is what happened to Lark. So, we are trying something new.”

  The only way forward is through.

  The saying popped into my head, but I didn’t know where it had come from. Was it a slogan I’d read on a sign? A quote from someone famous? Or a motto David used with his patients? I didn’t ask Asher, just in case it was something David said often. Until I had more time to wrap my head around all of Asher’s lies, I wanted to ration the information I divulged.

  “All I’m asking is that you think back on the journal. Maybe Lark mentioned something that didn’t seem important at the time…?”

  I shook my head, frustrated with both Asher’s repeated question and my own inability to recall any useful information. “Honestly, I don’t know what happened that summer. Maybe Lark doesn’t either. I mean, maybe Lila is the one who knows.”

  Asher smiled thinly. “It’s okay. We’ll figure it out. You might be right. Lila has always been the one with the big picture.” He glanced at Blake. “Did Lark mention anything to you? Maybe something about Kingstown? Or the name Jonas? Did she meet someone named Jonas?”

  Blake hesitated, clearly still uneasy with the idea of potentially helping Asher and his team screw with my mind further. “It’s okay,” I told him, though I wasn’t sure that it was. “If you know anything that might help….”

  As much as I didn’t want David knowing too much, I wanted to know.

  “She never said anything about Kingstown to me, not that summer or later on,” Blake said after a long pause.

  “You spent a lot of time with her over those three months,” Asher prodded. “What all did you guys do? Just give us a rundown. It might spark Raven’s memory.”

  Blake blew out a breath and opened his mouth, but I held up my hand. “Hold on. How do you know Lark and Blake spend a lot of time together that summer?” I asked Asher accusingly.

  His response was so quick that it had to be true. Or he’s just a great liar.

  “Lark. While she was in Montauk, she talked about Blake a lot in her therapy sessions.”

  Blake looked at me as though silently asking whether I was satisfied with the answer. I nodded encouragingly and gestured for him to go ahead with his recap.

  “Um, okay. Let’s see. Lark took summer classes at Columbia, mostly intro business type stuff. I know she made a few friends, but no one named Jonas that I know of. We went on a few weekend trips together, one up to Niagara Falls, a couple to Cape May…one to Deep Creep Lake—all places where people wouldn’t recognize us. She spent one or two long weekends with her girl friends in the Hamptons, and a week with her parents on the Amalfi Coast right before they revealed the Kingsley Diamond to the world at their annual charity event….”

  He kept talking, but I stopped
listening. In the course of my investigation, I’d read and spoken about the Kingsley Diamond numerous times without giving it too much thought. But when Blake mentioned the famous stone, it was as though a missing cog in my brain clicked into place. Suddenly, I was no longer sitting on the couch in comfy summer clothes.

  I felt rather than saw the snug black dress hugging my curves. I smelled the perfume that I had dabbed on my wrists and neck. I heard Eleanor Kingsley’s voice inside my head.

  “Honestly, darling, this is our annual benefit, you really should be wearing a Kingsley Diamond design,” my mother said.

  The foyer of our Manhattan penthouse materialized around me. My mother and I were standing opposite one another, engaged in one of our usual showdown of wills. My father joined us a moment later.

  “Let her be, Eleanor.” He rested an arm around my shoulders. “Lark is perfect. Besides, tonight is about the Kingsley Diamond.” He gestured to my mother’s throat, where the impossibly large, exquisitely perfect, red diamond gleamed against creamy white pearls.

  “I thought tonight was about combating world hunger,” I said, a deep loathing I didn’t quite understand filling my gut as I stared at our family gem.

  My father laughed. “Of course, of course. But we are unveiling the most spectacular find in history, sweetheart.”

  “Raven?” Blake’s hand was on my arm. And just like that, I was back at The Pines.

  I turned toward the sound of his voice and met his gaze. “Yes, I’m here.”

  “What is it? What did you remember?” Asher asked, trying and failing to contain his excitement.

  “The fundraiser or whatever. That’s it. It was the first time Lark saw the Kingsley Diamond in person.” My tone was flat, though the words left a bad taste in my mouth. My hands started to shake. I felt Lila pushing her way in. No, I’ve got this. I’m fine, I thought, and she must have heard me, because my body stilled and the slight nudging in my mind stopped. “I think…I think it was seeing the diamond. It’s…it’s the same diamond that Jonas tried to steal—the reason he was killed.”