“Oh, come on! How many shithole motels does this city have?” I asked after an hour of driving.We’d pulled into an almost identical architectural stain as the blood covered one we fled.“A lot,” Six said as he turned to me. “Vegas, baby.”I groaned and reached for the handle.My hands shook as I exited. While the adrenaline had worn off, there was some residual aftereffects that prevailed. Weakness and fatigue being some of them. Luckily my ears had stopped ringing, but there was still a strange feeling in them.Once again, the room was out of date and well worn. I collapsed onto the bed as soon as we entered.The images of the dead gangsters were on my mind. I couldn’t shut them off. I’d seen enough death to last a lifetime since Six.Death chased him and the other Cleaners. And only I knew why Three was able to be taken out.“You aren’t as great as you think you are,” I said, my face half mashed into the comforter. “The Cleaners aren’t invincible.”He stopped unloadi

 The adrenaline was wearing off, the previous hour playing on loop. My ears hurt from all the shooting, and I probably had a little bit of hearing damage.“Was that a wetwork team?” I asked, remembering the term he and Jason used.He nodded. “They knew we were coming.”“Late?”“Four was here days ago. If he was killed there, there would be no reason to show up.”I stared at him. The gravity of what that meant was heavy. “So, there’s a leak in the system.”He nodded again. “That many men? They wanted to make sure I didn’t leave.”“Why?”His grip on the wheel tightened. “That’s the million dollar question. Two of us, maybe three, are dead. Hunted down and killed.”“You’re contemplating something,” I said as I studied his expression.The muscle in his jaw jumped. “You said Three probably drank the drugs.”“Yeah.”Six shook his head. “I just don’t see that happening.”“Why?”“We’re all very careful, paranoid, about where our drinks come from.”“You drank from the bar.

 I sat in a daze the next morning.No snarky remarks. Not even many words.There was blackness and a fracture and a huge ass identity crisis happening within me.The death Six and the Killing Corps dealt was real. It was rivers of blood and piles of bodies.And I was a part of it.I’d added a drop to the bucket that overflowed with red.Lacey was a different person from Paisley, and the lines between them were no longer blurred by obscurity. It was hard and absolute, and cracked, because I cracked. Because I saw for the first time what I had become. The difference between Lacey and Paisley.Lacey was a role I played, not the real me, but somehow I’d forgotten. Nothing of the last two months had been my life. The way I looked, the clothes I wore, the way I traveled, or the company I kept.I, Paisley, had killed people.They were people who were trying to kill me, so it was self-defense, but I couldn’t forget the high and the way I fucked Six after.“We’ve been here too

 When the sun began to set, we got ready. Six double checked the two guns he was going to take and grabbed two full magazines while I armed my jeans with my lip balm.“Where are we meeting him?” I asked as I slipped on my flats.He held the door open as I walked through. The car was parked right in front of the room.Once out of the parking lot and on the road, he finally answered me. “Up the coastal highway, past Santa Barbara. There’s an abandoned restaurant.”“Why was it abandoned?” I wasn’t really expecting a response, just curious.In true Six fashion, he ignored me. Instead, he kept his eyes glued to the dark pavement.Once out of L.A. and past the Santa Barbara area, the traffic decreased and it became pitch black. The exception was the moon shining onto the great expanse of the ocean to our left, leaving a streak of light on the water.It was an amazing view, the beam extending for miles. There were a few lights from boats, but otherwise it was empty.After about

 I stared into the mirror above the dresser, at my less-than-like-me new haircut, to go with my so-not-me dye job. If my eyes weren’t their normal bright blue, I would seriously question the reflection as being me.But it was me, or rather Lacey.So much had gone on the last few months that my entire twenty-eight years leading up to now seemed like an entire lifetime ago.Paisley Anne Warren lived a lifetime ago.I couldn’t tear my eyes away from the mirror, from the changes I’d endured that morphed me into Lacey Collins. But I could hear the life going on in the motel room. The TV spouting some news about something terrible, as they always seemed to do. There was the buzzing of the phone against the wood tabletop—an oddity since Jason’s death. The spray of the shower, and then the squeak of the knob as it turned off.Steam billowed out a minute later as the door opened, but Six didn’t come out. Instead, the next sound that filtered through my ears was another buzzing. My g