She had a sinking feeling she knew what had happened, and if she was right, giving the woman her clothes had cost that woman her life. But—no. She wouldn’t think about it. Couldn’t. If she lost focus now, she’d end up just like the homeless woman.
She had to lie low for a few days. Thanks to a donation from Vaughn’s wallet, she had enough cash to stay in this motel for a week if need be, then she’d make her way to Atlanta. It wasn’t ideal, wasn’t where she’d hoped to land, but she’d make the best of it. Find a new name, a job, and in a couple of months, when she had enough money squirreled away, she’d head west again.
Alone.
Her heart twisted, and she dropped the blind, shook her head at herself for the stupid thought. Of course she’d be alone. She’d been alone all along. Vaughn was working for the very people who wanted her dead. He didn’t care about her.
God, that hurt.
Why did it hurt so bad?
She dashed away tears she didn’t want to cry and checked the time on the bedside alarm clock. Time to say good-bye to Sage Evans for good. Thanks to L’Oreal, the new her would have hair the color of rich mahogany after she rinsed the dye out in the shower. Once she settled in Atlanta, she planned to buy extensions to lengthen the short bob until her hair grew out again. Maybe she’d find herself some colored contacts to turn her blue eyes brown.
She’d fade into obscurity, disappear, and this time, she’d make sure Vaughn couldn’t find her.
God. Vaughn. What had she been thinking? She’d opened up to him. Come close to letting him see the real her. The part of her identity she couldn’t let anyone but herself see. How was she supposed to disappear if she wasn’t committed to staying invisible?
She checked that the door was locked and chained shut, then went into the bathroom and stripped off the sweatshirt and yoga pants she’d bought at the same drugstore where she’d found her new hair color. She started the shower, tested the water, and stepped under the spray. Water sluiced down her body, carrying away dye as red as blood and pooling in the tub around her feet. She shut her eyes—didn’t want to see it—and scrubbed at her scalp with the entire bottle of the motel’s complimentary shampoo.
It took a while to get all of the dye out of her hair, and the water started to run cool. She shut it off, climbed from the tub, but kept her back to the mirror until she had a towel wrapped around her head. She didn’t hurry to dry off, took her time because she wasn’t ready to face her new reflection yet.
This part of swapping identities always made her nervous. Not because she might screw up her hair—any mistakes she made could always be fixed—but because she never knew who would be staring back at her in the mirror when she got out of the shower. She was afraid that one of these times, she wouldn’t recognize the reflection, and then she’d have truly lost herself. She didn’t want that. Although she could never go back to the girl she used to be, she didn’t want to lose the core of herself, either.
Finally, she was dry and had no reason to put it off any longer. She faced the mirror, sucked in a deep breath and held it as she untwisted the towel from around her head.
She was…still her.
Maybe it was silly to always expect a stranger, but the relief at seeing herself was overwhelming and left her a little lightheaded. She let out a ragged sigh, gripped the edge of the sink, and blinked back tears.
How many more times would she have to do this? How many more times could she take? She barely remembered who she’d been before this all started, and every change was harder than the last. She was tired, but she couldn’t stop. The day she stopped running was the day she died.
She straightened and gazed at herself in the mirror again, speared her fingers through the damp spikes of her hair. The color was lighter than she wanted, an eye-catching red-purple rather than brown with deep red undertones, but it’d have to do for now. She’d let it air dry, let her natural wave do its thing, and once she had the colored contacts and maybe some fake glasses, nobody would recognize her as either Sage Evans or Lark Warren.
But who was she now?
She’d bought a newspaper at the drug store for the express purpose of mining the obituary section for a new name. It’d be easier to find a name if she had internet access, but she had to take what she could get.
She opened the bathroom door and stumbled backward a step in surprise. Vaughn lounged in the chair by the window, the newspaper spread open on the rickety table in front of him.
“So what’s your name now?” he said casually, as if asking about the weather. He glanced up at her, then consulted the paper again. “You don’t look like a Dorothy or Eugenia. Oh, here we go. Hazel A. Woods.” He gave an exaggerated wince. “It’s kind of an unfortunate name, but it fits your pattern.”
She crossed her arms in front of her, keenly aware she wore only a towel. “I’m not telling you. How did you get in here?” She looked at the door, saw the chain hanging broken from the wall. Of course. Vaughn Wilde didn’t know the meaning of the word finesse.