Out of the Dark: A Thrilling Romantic Suspense Novel (The Dark Series Book 2)

by Danah Logan

  "Madeline Cross," I finish for him. No point in pretending I don't know about her.

  "Yes, Madeline. She spoke to all of us at length and recommended for you to get therapy to deal with the trauma. We had already discussed this during the flight and suggested to your parents for you to stay with us for the time being. They knew I had access to the best specialists in their field. It was never meant to be forever."

  Specialists? That’s one way to sugarcoat it. I’m torn between fear of what else they have to say, rage for what happened to me, and curiosity. The number of questions assaulting my brain make my head hurt. "Why didn’t they just go to the authorities?"

  Heather looks upset. "To this day, we have asked ourselves that many times. Henry wanted to report you missing, but Emily wouldn't let him. He attempted it without her knowing, and when she found out, she threatened to take you away from him—when you came back."

  I’m so confused. I knew Emily didn’t want to report me missing because Nate threatened my safety, but threatening to take me away? Something isn't adding up. Pulling my hand away from Heather’s, I place it in my lap and decide to change the direction of this conversation. "So, they just handed me over, and then what?"

  Tristen blows out a long breath. "They did not just hand you over. We discussed this for hours. Henry refused at first; he wanted to run with you."

  Alone?

  Heather takes my hand back, and I have to force myself to not rip it out of her grasp. I didn’t notice that I’d been flicking my thumb against my fingers until she constricts the movement. "Sweetheart, you have to believe us when we say that all we wanted was to keep you safe."

  "What did you do to my mind? Why can I remember certain things and not others?"

  Heather sucks in a sharp breath, and Tristen closes his eyes briefly before leveling me with a gaze devoid of emotion. The only other person I have ever seen with this expression—or lack thereof—is George. A cold shiver runs down my spine.

  "I called in a favor with an associate of mine. We had worked together before, and I recently had consulted with him on another issue. He was—is—specialized in certain techniques." My adopted father seems to be struggling for the right words.

  "What. Techniques?" My mouth feels like it’s full of cotton.

  "It's called coercive persuasion. Though he also uses a unique type of hypnosis. It’s a rather delicate subject. Very controversial."

  Excuse me, what? A shrill voice screams at me in my head, and I flinch to myself. I must’ve misheard him. This cannot be happening. How is this happening to me over and over. Why me?

  Oblivious to the havoc his admission has stirred up inside of me, Tristen continues with his gaze trained at the floor. "He has the ability to arrange memories in an individual's mind. While under hypnosis, the individual is made to believe that certain events happened or didn't happen. With the help of persuasion, new memories are created. Those get connected by moving the memories around until they make sense again. There are several different techniques of persuasion, a lot of them not…pleasant. We consult him during operations when our regular tactics don’t work; he deals with the special cases. However, he never used those types on you." He amends the last sentence so quickly that it takes me a moment to process it.

  Well, if that isn’t reassuring, the same voice now snarls. But the sarcasm of the internal speaker has no effect on the overwhelming panic gripping every fiber of my body. The term coercive speaks for itself—it's forced. There is nothing voluntary about altering someone's mind, and the first picture in my mind’s eye is my kid-self being tied to a chair while someone messes with my head. I close my eyes and draw in slow breaths, exhaling at the same count. I need to calm down.

  A hand gently touches my knee. "Lilly, please look at me."

  Instinctively, my knee jerks away from the contact. I force myself to open my eyes and look at the man in front of me.

  "He was able to help you forget by moving your memories around while under hypnosis. He made you believe things to be the truth, while other memories got locked away."

  He tries to reassure me, but I can no longer listen to this. They violated my mind. I can barely contain the urge to jump up and run. George has to be somewhere close by; he would find me if I made it out of the house. But so would Lancaster, who is still camping out on the front lawn. I’m trapped.

  I stare past Tristen, not looking at anything specific, while I attempt to calm my thrashing pulse.

  "Where are my parents?" I need to change the topic. I can feel the bile rising in my throat and a fine sheen of sweat coating my skin. If he keeps talking about what happened to me, there is a good chance of me having a panic attack, and I can’t let that happen. Not in front of them. I can’t.

  Tristen peers at Heather, and an entire, yet silent, conversation takes place in front of me. Without looking at me, he says, "We don't know."

  Something is off. Something else.

  A new kind of agitation rises to the surface. "And you never attempted to contact them? I don’t believe that they would just abandon me—their only child."

  My adopted mother starts tearing up. I'm so freaking tired of these riddles, never getting the full truth. I clench my jaw in an attempt not to say something I may regret. Or give something away that I shouldn't. I fail miserably on both accounts.

  "So, you decided to brainwash me instead of finding real help? My mother handed me over without a second thought and took off? You make it sound like I was nothing to her. You say that Henry was upset. Henry wanted to call the cops. Not Emily. The man who wasn't even my father seemed to be the only one who actually cared. You guys tell me that you wanted to protect me. Well, fuck that. You manipulated me, lied to me, AND TOOK MY BEST FRIEND AWAY." My tone gets louder with every word until I’m full-on screaming. Heather mirrors my distraught expression, and Tristen's mouth hangs open.

  Instantly, Rhys bursts into the room, eyes wild. "What the fuck is going on?" I'm not surprised he was camped out right in front of the office. He's at my side in three strides, and his arms circle me protectively. My fists clench the front of his sweater, and I bury my face in his chest. I can’t face my adopted parents; I completely lost it.

  Tristen is the first to collect himself. His tone is a low growl. "What do you mean by ‘Henry was not your father’?"

  Shit! Fuck! Shit!

  Instead of waiting for me to answer, Rhys moves one arm around my waist and leads me out of the room.

  "This conversation is over." He doesn't leave room for discussion.

  "Where is the phone?" My heart still beats out of control, and my eyes are pleading for Rhys to hand it over.

  "Why? What's going on?" His hands grasp my upper arms.

  Rhys led me to my room. Den and Wes were about to get up from his bed across the hall to follow us when he shook his head and closed the door.

  I don't want to tell him what his parents allowed to be done to me; the relationship with his father is already damaged. If he finds out the truth about my memory loss, there is no way to repair it. Hell, I don't know if I can forgive them—again. Not anytime soon. But the need to protect Rhys from the knowledge is as prominent as the fact that I will never be able to get my old life back.

  "Please just give me the phone. I have to talk to him," I whisper. I need to tell someone what happened to me.

  Rhys scans my face, his internal conflict playing across his features like a movie on a theater screen. Eventually, he nods and points for me to sit down on the bed. I follow suit, and he walks back out. I don't look up and only assume he goes to his room. I stare at the floor beneath my feet, focusing on my breath.

  The phone appears in my vision, and I glance up at the somber face of my boyfriend—my home. Right now, though, I need the other home—my family. Two halves that make a whole.

  "Do you want me to leave?"

  I don't answer, and Rhys’s face falls ever so slightly before he smoothes his features. He turns on his heel and leaves me a
lone in what used to be my sanctuary. The door closes a little too forcefully, and my shoulders scrunch up at the sound.

  Almost robotic, I make my way to the bathroom, turn on the faucet and shower, plug in the headphones I grabbed from my desk in passing, and slide down the tiled wall. As opposed to the other times I had found out about a new lie in my life, I don’t cry. Ever since entering my room, I’m numb. I don’t know if that’s good or bad. Dialing Nate’s number, I wait.

  "Lilly? What happened?" The panicked voice of my brother fills my ears after the fourth ring. We had agreed not to contact each other. If I need something, I'm supposed to call George.

  I try to tell him what I just found out, but I can’t get the right words to form. So, I simply say, "They used persuasion." My voice sounds detached to my own ears, like listening to someone else.

  "Lilly, you’re not making sense. Where is Rhys?"

  "You can’t tell him."

  "Tell him what?" My brother’s worry morphs into anger. "What did he do this time?"

  "Not him." I draw in several breaths and force the words out through my clenched teeth. "Heather and Tristen wanted to talk to me alone. Tristen told me how they made me forget. They let someone brainwash me with hypnosis and coercive persuasion."

  "THEY DID WHAT?" The roar forces me to pull the phone away from my ear. I hear a door slamming in the background and a faint clicking of keys.

  "They said they wanted to help me. But I don’t understand why they couldn’t just send me to a therapist."

  "There is more. It makes no sense. They were not just protecting you from me."

  It's disconcerting how casual we can talk about my kidnapping these days. After everything that has come to light, it almost feels like the most trivial event of my life.

  How disturbing is that?

  "I know," I admit.

  "I’m going to put George on it. Tell me word for word what they said."

  Over the next twenty minutes, I do exactly that. I hear Nate type in the background, not sure if he's taking notes, but also not caring.

  After he ensures that our head of security will be in touch, we hang up. I turn all the water sources off and make my way back to my room. Logic tells me that I should feel something—the emotional onslaught of betrayal, rage, and disappointment. However, standing at the foot of the bed, my gaze wanders over to my desk and laptop on top. All I want is to tune out the world. Forget. Everything here reminds me of my life being built on lies. I left my new phone, the replica of my old one, including my music, at the vineyard. There was no way to explain the device to anyone once I returned. With the headphones still in hand, I grab my computer. It’s connected to my Spotify account, and I scroll through the songs until one jumps out at me, and I press play. Closing my eyes, I listen to "Castle of Glass" by Linkin Park blare into my ears.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  I wake up to "Master of the Pendulum" by Avantasia. It's my go-to song to get into running mode, and for a brief moment, I smile, thinking of the underground track at the vineyard. Then, the tidal wave of reality comes crashing back in. I blink my eyes open; my room is dark. Turning, I notice the curtains are not drawn. All I wanted was to block everything out for a few minutes, but I must've fallen asleep.

  I shut off the music and pull the headphones out.

  "Hey."

  Rhys’s voice comes from across the room, and I sit up with a start. Holy shit. Pressing my palm against my chest, I glance into the darkness. He’s sitting with his back against the door to the hallway.

  "Jesus. You almost gave me a heart attack." My tone is harsher than I mean it to sound, and I wince.

  His legs are bent with his arms resting on his knees, hands dangling down. He doesn’t look at me. "Sorry."

  I scoot to the edge of the bed. "How long have you been sitting there?"

  The silence between us stretches, and I narrow my eyes at him.

  "A couple of hours?" He won’t meet my gaze.

  "Rhys?" I push. What’s wrong with him?

  He finally lifts his head, and I suck in a breath. His eyes are puffy; even in this light, I can see it clear as day.

  My chest constricts as if someone has sent me to the ground with a push kick to the sternum, and I have the urge to rub the spot in the middle of my chest. "Come here." I hold out my hand.

  He stares at it for a whole minute before slowly pushing himself up and walking over to the bed. I clasp his hand and pull him down next to me. We sit side by side, my fingers around his, our legs pressed together, yet there are miles between us.

  "I feel like I’m losing you," Rhys confides with a raspy voice.

  Another kick. My eyes sting. "I’m so sorry."

  His next question shocks me. "Is it because of what they did to you? Because I'm related to them?"

  My heart breaks at the sound of disdain when mentioning his parents. I allow myself time to collect my thoughts, risking him taking my hesitation as a confirmation. But I don't want to lie to him.

  "I would never hold their actions against you. You've proven time and time again that I can trust you. From the day you told me the truth, you've put me first, and I know that it wasn’t easy."

  "What did they do to you?" Rhys speaks the words so low, so careful. He won’t look at me. I should reach up and make him face me—make him see that I mean my words—but at the same time, I can’t do it.

  I inhale slowly and hold the air to the count of three before letting it back out. "They told me why I couldn't remember. How it happened." I can't bring myself to go into more detail. I can't bear to burden Rhys with the knowledge. "Please don’t ask for more. I…I don’t want to lie to you."

  Finally, he turns to me, searching my eyes. "Why would you lie to me?"

  "Please trust me?" I whisper. Maybe I'll tell him one day when his relationship with Tristen is not on cracked ice anymore.

  His gaze moves back and forth between my eyes before he nods. He accepts my reply. Thoughts of I don’t deserve him, and he’s too good for me reverberate through my mind.

  "Did they say anything to you?" I swallow over the lump in my throat.

  "I talked to Mom for a while," Rhys answers quietly.

  "About?" I know it wasn’t the brainwashing, or he wouldn’t be sitting here like this.

  "Us."

  "Us?" My voice is three octaves higher.

  His eyes crinkle, and the shift in his expression makes my stomach summersault. "She asked me if we were serious."

  "Oh God. And what did you say?" The mortification is clearly written all over my features.

  "The truth. That there is nothing I'm more serious about. If Dad has a problem with it, it's his deal. You're eighteen in a week."

  My pulse quickens, and I know what he's insinuating. Would Tristen do anything about it? The only thing he could do, at this point, is make one of us leave. But let's face it, I have the financial means to support both of us easily. I don't know how Rhys would feel about that, but money for food and a place to live is at least something I don’t have to worry about. My nerves calm a little at the realization that I am not dependent on anyone—unless I want to be.

  "Did she give you the sex talk?" I smirk, changing course inside my head.

  He huffs out a laugh. "It's a little late for that. Thankfully, she knows I'm not a walking hard-on. When it comes down to it, I am responsible. Mom's cool; she's not oblivious to what's going on." He rakes his hand through his hair and looks at the ceiling. "Did I really just say that about my mother and sex?"

  I giggle. "Yes, you did."

  Rhys’s face turns somber again. "She did say, though, to not make any more rash decisions. We can come to her for anything." He shrugs one shoulder. "Essentially, Mom said she is happy for us. She’s known it would happen since we were little; we never had a typical sibling relationship. They would've told you the truth eventually—or part of it."

  "Meaning that I'm not their daughter, but not the rest." I grind my teeth.

 
"Yes." He doesn't sugarcoat it.

  Rhys touches his hand to the side of my face, his callused fingers caressing my cheek. The feel of his rough skin against my smooth skin makes shivers rock through my body in waves. His eyes roam my face, and he murmurs, "We can be together."

  The words echo in my mind, and everything else fades into the background. We can be together. The press release announced that I'm not a McGuire. Heather said she's okay with it—us. I don't give a flying fuck what Tristen thinks, adopted father or not. I can't even look at the man after what he revealed earlier.

  Leaning into his touch, I block out everything that came to light just mere hours ago—everything that has come out of the dark.

  Butterflies erupt in my belly, and my body vibrates with excitement. Licking my bottom lip, his eyes track the movement, reminding me of an animal tracking its prey. It’s in that moment that I decide I want this, no matter how screwed up my life is or how many secrets are still being uncovered.

  Right now, I am a normal girl in a normal relationship, doing what a boy and girl in love probably would’ve done weeks ago.

  Before reality can take this away from me, I rub my trembling palms against my thighs and stand. Stepping between Rhys’s legs, I remain far enough away to take in his expression as my thumbs hook into the waistband of my black leggings. Despite the darkness in my bedroom, I can see how his breath hitches as I slowly push my pants down. I bite the inside of my cheek, not averting my gaze from the boy in front of me as he follows my movement with wide eyes.

  "Calla?" His tone is full of awe.

  Leggings kicked off to the side, I clasp the bottom of my shirt and pull it over my head. I am so far out of my element and am solely acting on instinct. I never put on a new bra after this morning's shower incident, and I am in front of him in nothing but a pair of white lace shorts.