Fragile Facade

by Sophie Davis

  That is where the fear comes in. Every time I pray for this to be over, I chastise myself.

  You want it to be over, Lark? Be careful what you wish for. This ending may be permanent.

  Eighteen

  Raven

  Confiding in Asher eased my mind. It also gave me a sense of urgency that hadn’t been there before. I needed to solve Lark’s clues, but the ones I’d uncovered just didn’t fit together.

  “Come on, Lark,” I muttered, after I’d finished my nightly ritual of brushing my teeth and washing my face. “Something helpful? What am I missing?”

  No answer came. Thank goodness. If Lark Kingsley popped up in the mirror and talked to me, I was out.

  The apartment was humid, even with the window air conditioner running on full blast. I stretched out in the middle of my mattress with Lark’s journal. Not wanting to fold the pages, I was using the note I found in Lark’s apartment to mark my place. Flipping to the next entry, I began reading.

  Not all of Lark’s journal entries were particularly interesting. Some days, she wrote about her classes at the overpriced private school she attended. Other days, she ranted about her parents. My favorite entries were the ones about Blake. The words leapt emotionally from the pages. I felt both the thrills and the sadness. There were a lot of reasons for someone like me—hell, for anyone—to be jealous of Lark Kingsley. She had everything that anyone could ever yearn for in a lifetime: beauty but concealed the most joyful aspect of her life. Lark lived both the highest highs and the lowest lows.

  Luckily, the next entry was about Blake. I settled into my pillows. Two sentences in, I was struck by how different the passage was from others about her boyfriend. Lark didn’t draw hearts or doodle “Mrs. Lark Greyfield” in the margins, but she typically used a certain tone when talking about Blake. It was noticeably absent from the first paragraph of tonight’s reading. Even stranger? She seemed to be describing their first meeting. Except, I’d already read about their first meeting. At least, I thought I had.

  summer was just becoming fall, and it was the first truly cold Morning manhattan had seen in months. i’d planned on using the treadmill in dad’s office for a morning Run, but when i went downstairs, i found the office was already occupied. dad was on an early-morning conference call with an auction house in london. seeing me dressed in my workout clothes, he’d waved me inside, mouthing, “come in.” i knew nothing would make him happier than if i went in and listened to the call. he was always advocating my taking an interest in our company. kingsley diamonds was still a family run business, so it wasn’t publicly traded. as the only child, the responsibility would one day fall on my shoulders to take the helm.

  but, unlike my parents, i didn’t exercise to stay in shape or sweat out last night’s Champagne calories. running was my great escape. it gave me the opportunity to be truly alone with my thoughts and block out the rest of the world. listening to dad berate the guy on the other end of the conference call was anything but relaxing.

  i whispered, “That’s okay, thanks,” to dad before closing the office door.

  i didn’t want to risk running into my mother and being detoured from going out to the park, so i headed straight for the front door without bothering to grab a jacket. best decision ever. because if i hadn’t gone, or the timing hadn’t been exactly what it was…i never would have met him.

  i’d just finished a lap around the reservoir, my ipod blasting hip-hop. i stopped to stretch on the steps. lost in the world of the mid-nineties, i was singing under my Breath, head bent over my leg so that my forehead was touching my knee. the deep pull in my hamstring felt good. i held the position through the refrain, and then switched legs.

  the steps were slick with morning dew, and the tread on my sneakers was worn. i lost my Footing. in the most ungraceful moment of my life, i was flailing backward, rushing for a date with the pavement. i remember thinking about how pissed my mother would be if i cracked my skull open. stitches and gauze bandages were not the season’s must-have accessories.

  and then his arms were around me.

  that first touch was Electric. tingles raced up my arms and down my spine. my face felt flushed. one heartbeat flamed hot, the next icy cold. in my ears, beyoncé was crooning. and i knew. even before those impossibly green eyes appeared above me, i knew that this moment was a turning point in my life.

  his full mouth, inches from mine as he leaned over me from behind, formed words i didn’t hear. i was lost watching his lips move and wondering what they would feel like on Mine. it wasn’t until he yanked out my earbuds that i heard his rich, amused voice asking me, “are you okay?”

  i nodded dumbly, but didn’t attempt to break free from his hold. looking back, i should be embarrassed by how badly i wanted those arms to hold me forever. but he wasn’t too quick to let me go, either. he guided me upright, though he left his hands resting on my hips. i felt his warm breath on the side of my neck. it was still fairly early, but other joggers were gliding past us on the path above. i barely noticed. the weight of his hands was all that mattered.

  “um, yeah. i’m fine. just lost my balance for a second,” i said, finally remembering that he’d asked me a question. somehow, i knew that the introduction of this guy into my life would mean i’d never be balanced again. or maybe that i’d finally found the equilibrium i’d been searching for.

  slowly, those strong hands turned me around, only breaking contact with the fabric of my shirt for a moment. i was eye-level with his chest.

  “blake,” he said, smiling down at me.

  “lark,” i replied. “thank you. that could have been extremely embarrassing.”

  he laughed, the sound deep and rich and wonderful as it rumbled in his chest. “nah. nothing a beautiful girl does is embarrassing.”

  i felt the heat flood my cheeks. people at school, my father, and random strangers told me i was Beautiful all the time. i believed them because my mother would have drained our bank accounts dry if i wasn’t. but when blake said it, i genuinely felt beautiful, despite my damp hair and my makeup-free face.

  since i was so used to people telling me how amazing i looked, i had a catalog of witty quips ready. but staring into blake’s mesmerizingly green eyes, all i said was, “Thank you.”

  “are you finished with your run? would you maybe want to grab coffee? there’s this great place not far from here, downtown downs. have you heard of it?”

  i had plans to meet annie and cam for a bottomless-mimosa brunch followed by retail therapy—cam’s latest relationship had ended in flames while we were out the night before. yet, suddenly, my friend’s broken heart didn’t seem so Important.

  “sounds great,” i told blake.

  he had also been out for a morning run, and wore black track pants with rathbourne academy printed down the side and a short-sleeved shirt. around his hips, he’d tied a track jacket that matched the pants.

  we made small Talk as we walked. blake told me that he played for rathbourne’s soccer team and, since they didn’t have saturday practice this week, he’d come to the park for a little exercise. i told him that i’d been desperate to get away from my parents for an hour, which was why i’d come to the park. he insisted i take the jacket from his waist when he noticed me shivering from the cold.

  twenty minutes later, we arrived at downtown downs, the cutest coffee shop i’d ever seen. we spent the day sipping lattes, eating Decadent desserts that my mother would never have approved of, and sharing our life histories.

  and that was how i met my soulmate.

  All traces of exhaustion fled as my brain scrambled to figure out what was happening. I reread the entry three times. Baffled, I flipped back through the earlier entries to find the one about the Met Ball. I was relieved to find that it existed. For a minute, I’d worried that I dreamt the story.

  After a fourth pass of the journal entry, I realized what I missed the first three. Lark was a smart girl, and all her followed basic grammar rules. This passage wa
s clearly different.

  The journal entry is a clue.

  “You sure are making me work for this, Lark,” I grumbled, grabbing a pencil from the nightstand. In my investigation notebook, I jotted down the only capitalized letters: M, R, C, B, F, E, M, A, F, B, I, T, D.

  Sleep refused to come as I lay there wondering what the list could possibly mean. With only a single vowel, it wasn’t an anagram. But what else could it be? The numbers on my cell glowed 3:02 a.m. when I finally gave up on the pretense of sleep. I debated knocking on Asher’s door, but decided it would be rather rude to wake him. We didn’t both have to be sleep-deprived. Instead, I decided to go to the one place I might find answers: Lark’s apartment.

  After pulling clothes on, I tucked my laptop and wallet into my messenger bag with the keys to Lark’s apartment and her journal. I spared my appearance a brief glance in the bathroom mirror. My bloodshot eyes and dark circles broadcast that I’d yet to sleep. I hastily pulled my hair into a sleek ponytail, fastening the shortest pieces with a clip to keep them from falling free.

  Driving the mile to The Pines, I found stellar parking directly across from the glass building. For once, Darrell was not on duty. His nighttime counterpart was a sleepy-looking security guard with a shaved head and a fastidiously groomed beard. Though I was prepared to launch into my cover story, the guard couldn’t be bothered. He probably thought I was somebody’s booty call. Ick.

  Tapping the visitor’s log, he muttered, “Name, date, and time, miss.”

  I didn’t see anyone on my way to Lark’s apartment. Frigid air conditioning welcomed me through the door. Flipped the light switch in the small foyer, I placed my messenger bag on the kitchen counter.

  “Where to start?” I mumbled aloud to break the silence.

  The quiet felt ominous. Shaking off my unease, I headed down the short hallway that presumably led to a bedroom and bathroom. I’d only seen the kitchen and living room so far.

  There were three rooms off the hallway. One was a moderately sized bathroom done in smoky-gray marble. A white shower curtain covered in large, red roses brightened the space, and the vibrant flowers lent a much-needed pop of color to the otherwise monotone bathroom.

  Opening the medicine cabinet above the sink, I found it empty. The shower appeared unused, and the liner still smelled like fresh plastic. Even the roll of toilet paper placed on the dispenser was untouched.

  Because the silence was still making me anxious, I left a trail of lights turned on behind me. It gave me a small degree of comfort as I continued snooping into Lark’s secret life.

  The next door led to a small guest room. A daybed was against one wall, covered in a white, brocade quilt and decorative pillows. The closet was small and empty. The walls were bare, too.

  Another dead end. I sighed.

  At the end of the hallway, I found the master suite. I held my breath and grasped the doorknob. My anxiety peaked as a picture of a dead body flashed into my mind.

  Nice, Raven. Perfect timing for that thought.

  Before I allowed myself anymore macabre ideas, I swung the door open. The bedroom was enormous. On the king-sized bed, a down comforter was arranged beneath enough throw pillows to fill my car’s backseat. Unlike the daybed in the guest room, I got the impression that this bed had been slept in at some point. I couldn’t put my finger on why, but I felt certain.

  The room smelled faintly of expensive perfume. The walls were still white and bare. A glass-topped desk with a large, flat-screen monitor caught my attention. Besides the computer display and an empty laptop docking station, only a thin layer of dust sat on the transparent surface. I sat in Lark’s leather desk chair, absently noting how insanely comfortable it was, and began opening the desk drawers.

  The first held a package of plain printer paper and a box of equally boring envelopes. I flipped through both to make sure they were all blank and nothing was hidden within.

  The second drawer was full of office supplies, and all looked brand-new. Underneath, I found an unlabeled manila file folder. Inside was one slip of yellow carbon-copy paper that had “Custom Order Receipt” printed at the top. It was a handwritten work order for something called Linus Systems. Under the “Item(s)” and “Description(s)” column headings, there were two lines filled in. The first item listed was a “Customized 3000XPS.” My eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when I noticed the price: Ten thousand dollars.

  What on earth had Lark paid that much money for?

  The second line read “Installation” with another thousand dollars added. At the bottom of the receipt, the words “PAID IN FULL” were written in all caps. Beneath that, someone had scrawled “cash.”

  I stared at the receipt, reading it again from top to bottom for any clues. Lark had been extremely careful to this point. Did that mean she wanted someone to find the invoice? There was no note attached, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t a purposeful clue.

  Everything is a clue, I decided.

  I left the receipt on the desk and resumed searching. There was nothing else noteworthy in the drawers, so I moved on to the closet. It literally could have fit my entire bedroom and the closet inside.

  Everything was neatly categorized, with jeans, slacks, and skirts arranged according to season on the left side. Tops were organized by sleeve-length on the right side, and sweaters were stacked on shelves. The back wall held dresses and more coats than I’d owned in my entire life. Racks of shoes lined the bottom half of the closet the entire way around, organized by occasion and season. I spun around in the middle of the closet, letting myself temporarily forget my mission and the missing heiress. I ran my hands over the soft fabrics, pretending for a moment that this was my wardrobe.

  That was when I noticed something truly strange: everything still had tags attached. It was as if Lark purchased an entirely new wardrobe just to collect dust.

  I tamped down a flare of resentment provoked by the discovery and reminded myself that we were from different worlds. People like Lark Kingsley—people who could afford to drop ten thousand dollars on one item and buy cashier’s checks for a year’s worth of rent—were the same people who discarded garments every three months. Though, from what I’d read, Lark seemed almost irked by this practice.

  Retrieving a small pad of paper and pen from Lark’s desk, I made an inventory of the items I found in her apartment. After writing down the receipt from Linus Systems and the wardrobe of untouched clothing, I moved on to the master bathroom.

  The tile was the same smoky-gray marble as the first bathroom. Lark had at least added a few personal touches here; a light-blue bathmat covered the floor, and scented candles were arranged on one corner of the tub.

  Fatigue was finally catching up with me, but I wanted to finish the initial search of the apartment before returning home. There was a dresser, a lingerie chest, and a nightstand that I still needed to go through in the bedroom. Then I wanted to do a quick search of the kitchen cabinets and drawers. Maybe Linus Systems wasn’t the only company Lark had hired to do some custom work.

  The dresser held pajamas and workout clothes, all with tags. At this point, I had no problem rifling through her clothes to look for clues. It wasn’t an invasion of her privacy, since she’d asked me to help. But underwear was where I drew the line. Even though they were clearly new, touching them felt wrong and icky. I did, however, make sure that no notes or false bottoms were hidden in the lingerie chest.

  It was in her nightstand that I found the next interesting item: a copy of The Great Gatsby. I let out an audible gasp when I first saw the well-worn book. Our mutual love of the classic novel shouldn’t have come as that big of a surprise. After all, I’d read in her journal all about a 1920s-inspired theme party thrown by Lark’s friend Taylor. The Great Gatsby was also required reading for most high school students.

  The most interesting item I found in the nightstand was an iPod. Since I was curious to hear what music Lark had listened to most before her disappearance, I set
it aside. Beneath the iPod was another book of sorts, though not in the traditional sense. This one made me groan audibly. It wasn’t a great work of classic literature, a New York Times Bestseller, or even the latest girly “it” novel. No, this was a collection of Sudoku puzzles. I hated Sudoku.

  I rubbed my eyes and fought the urge to close them.

  I’ll just rest for an hour, I thought. Lark wasn’t using the apartment, and she’d said to step into her life—no harm in resting.

  Stretching out on her bed, I grabbed Lark’s iPod and selected “Shuffle.” Sleep finally took me under as Green Day sang about a Boulevard of Broken Dreams.

  Nineteen

  Lark

  I hated the winter. Sunlight was too scarce, and the nights were too long. Why we continued to practice daylight-saving time has always been a mystery to me.

  Still, I was thankful for the cover of darkness as I set out for my evening errand. This task wasn’t on my typical to-do list; it wasn’t a charity board meeting, a Future Leaders gathering, or any other resume-building activity. Instead, it was one I actually cared about and that excited me.

  Slipping away from my friends had been tricky. The past few weeks, I’d been ditching quite a bit of quality time with the Eight to either see Blake or run one of my illicit errands. My absence hadn’t gone unnoticed or unacknowledged, though. Feeling bad, I glanced at my watch and thought about what my friends were doing.

  They’d be on their way to Ilan Avery’s house. All of us were spoiled to some degree, but none of us quite like Ilan. He didn’t have a bedroom or even a suite; he had a wing. Three levels, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a game room, an entertainment room, a library—it was absurd.

  Before I met Blake, I was usually tucked into the corner of the sectional after school, fingers wrapped around a mug of hot chocolate with just a splash of Bailey’s. That was the extent of my weeknight imbibing, though the same could not be said for the rest of my friends. Annie was the only one besides me who exercised any restraint, and the two of us took great pleasure in laughing at the antics of our inebriated friends. We sang loudly and laughed at retellings of the guys’ disastrous conquests. There was never a dull minute. They were idiots, but they were my idiots. I really did love them.