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“Layla Sinclair” is dead, and the husk I’ve been hauling around is hollowed out on the inside, so I might as well be dead for real.
My new identity opened up a membership at a gym across the street from a Starbucks. Sometimes after a particularly grueling session I like to treat my new identity to a venti mocha frappe with extra whipped cream on top, because I figure the woman I see in the mirror at the gym likes it. She’s all for the sweet things in life and treating herself. No one else in the classes sees the emptiness in her eyes.
The emptiness is still there when I get home.
A new life and happiness still eludes me. But someone like me doesn’t really need to be happy. I doubt I could even recognize happiness if I stumbled across it.
The gym helps me work out my frustrations. I throw a fierce punch to the bag and send it swinging back as a dull ache throbs along my knuckles.
Uppercut, left hook. Right hook.
I just need the last person alive who I care about to be safe.
It’s the only thing that matters to me.
And he is, thank God. I checked on him through a back-end channel a few times before I realized that doing so put him in jeopardy if anyone ever found out. Devan had mourned the loss of his partner, though. Genuinely mourned, and that kinda breaks my heart.
Then again, with a less intense partner at his side, it seems he’s had more time for himself, to relax and do whatever it is he wants to do in the free time not spent chasing down leads for extra cases. Devan and his girlfriend even got engaged.
I pause and grab hold of the punching bag, breathing heavily.
I swear, I never thought he’d be soft enough for marriage. People sure do surprise you.
Devan is happy and safe. He’s the only one that matters to me.
Sure, it might cause him some lasting grief, if I mean anything to him like he means to me, but eventually he’ll heal even those holes from my absence and be all the better for it. Who needs an albatross around their neck?
After I’m done with my session I unwrap my hands and start wiping down mats at the gym in preparation. Not only does my new identity have a membership, but I’ve started teaching a self-defense class for women. It’s not great pay by any means, but it keeps me active and it’s enough to live off of.
I had found more cash than I knew what to do with in the bag in my room. The only bag I’d packed before I left.
He’dput it there.
I scrub down a forest-green mat and add it to the pile with the rest of the clean ones.
For a while, I didn’t touch the cash. Refused to use it because of the ties and what it meant. Instead, to get to this place, I’d used the last of what I’d saved myself and rummaged through the car for change before taking off on foot.
I left my wallet behind when I ran, along with my credit cards, license, badge. Everything.
But the bag, along with the cash, contained a new license and a shiny passport with my new name. I have no clue when he accomplished it or the source he used. I don’t want to know, and I don’t want to use anything he touched.
I had to work hard to demolish my self-constructed walls, to get to a point where I even let myself spend it. I finally let myself feel the freedom his money bought for me.
I take a beat, a breath, and glance at myself in the mirror. The woman who looks back at me is about as far from Detective Layla Sinclair as I can physically get. I’ve cut my hair off so that the pixie cut fans my face, added a few piercings, and a bright slash of pink gloss shines on my lips. Mascara. Shit, even the sports bra and yoga pants ensemble screams feminine, classy, cutesy.
It’s disconcerting and a little gross. It’s definitely not me. Or, at least, the old me.
For the first time, there are no anchors keeping me down. My father’s death and the mystery of it all is no longer there to press on me. I’m not constantly worrying about Devan, or Taney. Those pieces from my past life are gone. Poof.
Maybe I won’t ever find happiness. What the hell would I do with it, anyway? It’s not in my nature to be one of those people who take a stroll through a park and stop to smell the roses. Or whatever it is that makes people feel joy. I’ll never be one of those social media butterflies commenting on the beauty of life.
But freedom? I’ve found it now and cut every loose string. I didn’t know I needed it so badly.
I finish up at the gym, taking time to personally talk to anyone who comes up to me with questions.
All with a smile on my face.
On my walk home, the sun is shining and there isn’t a hint of yellow smog in the sky.
