HIT GIRL
by Tia Louise
(c) TLM Productions LLC, 2018

Molly

Mist coats my cheeks as I stand, gazing up at the high-rise hotel.

The time for check out has come and gone, and I imagine housekeeping entering the space I meticulously cleaned and then quietly exited last night…

It’s possible they won’t understand right away that Dennis Langley, the former occupant of Room 1021, is dead.

Then again, it looks like they do.

Two police cruisers speed up silently like great white sharks and park around the corner.

I’m across the street, and I step farther back, passing through the foot traffic on the busy city sidewalk to a courtyard with a pop-up Starbucks. A few burned-out hippies are asleep on benches.

Are they called hippies now? They have faded dreadlocks and Goodwill clothes, but they’re not much older than I am.

By contrast, I’m wearing tight black pants, flats, and a beige trench coat over a black turtleneck. An unnecessary pair of dark shades is over my eyes on this overcast day, but I don’t remove them.

A man I recognize steps out of the building and pauses at the entrance to speak to two uniformed officers. His name is Hendricks; he’s the police chief. He was on the scene the night Lara shot Gavin.

Gavin ran an underground sex club specializing in fetishes, including sex with minors. It was where I first encountered Dennis in that room below the tattoo parlor.

When that party was raided, I ran after the leader. I was determined to kill him, but Gavin was too big and too strong for me. He saw me coming, and he knew what I intended to do to him.

He held me by the neck against the wall of his office, and for the first time in my life, I was certain I was going to die.

Joshua tried to save me, but Gavin knocked him out cold. Gavin hit him so hard that even as the heat burned my eyes and I felt my life slipping away, I worried Joshua would die too.

My heart broke…

Then a gunshot sounded.

As if drawn by the magnetism of my gaze, Chief Hendricks looks across the street directly at me.

It’s impossible he recognizes me, but he doesn’t look away. He returns my stare, and I hear the words of my mentor, Courage, above all things, is the first quality of the warrior.

I’m not backing down. For several seconds, I feel proud. I’m glad Hendricks is the one on the scene, because the minute he runs a background check, he’ll learn Dennis Langley was a known pedophile and child pornographer.

That’s right, Hendricks. I did what you couldn’t do.

And just like that, like the tide returning to shore, caution pushes me to fade into the background, disappear without a trace.

Not that I’m afraid to go to jail. I feel confident I could survive jail. It’s not that… It’s this weakness I’ve developed in the past year.

It’s Joshua.

My jaw clenches, and I fight the notion the way I do every time it tries to come up. I cannot be in love with Joshua.

I cannot be in love with anyone.

Still… it’s impossible to deny how my body, my heart, and my soul long for him. When he smiles, it curls the tips of my toes, happiness expands in my chest.

Lowering my face, I turn away from the scene of my crime. I put my hands in my pockets and walk with purpose away from here...

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