With quick promises to spend some time with her brothers over the next few days, Lila excused herself to go back to the hotel. He knew she needed to clean up and rest, but she probably also needed some time to herself to figure out what she was going to do now that her true identity was revealed. And he hoped she’d decide to make a go of it with him.
There was nothing left for her at that brownstone. He wanted to make the whole memory disappear for her. Carson would be Lila’s home now, if she would have him.
As they settled into the town car and prepared to pull away, a police cruiser pulled up. Carson watched the officers load Elon’s parents into the backseat, then drive off with blue and red lights flashing.
Lila turned her head into his shoulder, blocking her own view.
LILA DESPERATELY needed some time to herself when she finally made it to the hotel, time to digest all that had occurred in the last two days. Her entire life—past, present, and future—had collided in a way she never would have believed. Like a multiple-car pileup, all the facets of her life were crashing into one another, shattering into tiny bits and shards, leaving everything she ever knew in a state of disarray.
Anything she had ever subscribed to, believed in, or told herself had been crushed in three short days, and there was no simple way to reconcile that, let alone push on without misgivings. Lila needed to put the pieces of her short life back together, and figure out what she wanted moving forward. Neither would happen overnight, so she decided to give herself a break and mourn for the irrefutable loss of her parents, and the Sienna persona she had carefully constructed to be her suit of armor.
No matter what happened, she wasn’t going to be the same Sienna she’d been for the last several years, nor would she be the Lila of her past. Neither identity existed anymore, now that all she was and had ever been was laid out on the table for everyone to see.
Carson had said he wanted her. Wanted what from her? She wasn’t even sure who or what she was anymore.
Was she a good girl? A dirty stripper? Or just a nonbeliever?
As they approached their hotel, Carson instructed their driver to use a back entrance in order to avoid the media camped out in the lobby. For this alone, Lila would be eternally grateful. Forget how she looked, she wasn’t in the mood to reveal to the press how devastated she was as Lila, Sienna, or whomever they believed her to be.
She wasn’t even sure at the moment, so how could they know who she was?
Lila never wanted any kind of press coverage or notoriety, which was why she ran in the dark hours of the night. Sienna wouldn’t have wanted this type of information leaked to the press. Sienna heavily guarded anything other than the glitzy side of stripping, the perfectionism she brought to the industry, and her image at the Tunnel.
Lila and Sienna were two totally different women, one crafted to secure the safety of the other. They were light years apart when it came to their life experiences and expectations. Except when it came to Carson. He claimed to be able to see through Sienna, catching quick glimpses of the girl underneath.
It was true, at the core of each persona was Lila, the real Lila. Who that was at the moment, was anyone’s best guess.
With Lila being safe and all of her secrets exposed to those who mattered, where did Sienna fit? Could she go back to her life as Sienna Flower with the people who loved her more than the family she had been born into?
And if she went back to Vegas as Sienna, what would happen to Lila, the woman deep inside her soul?
Lila clung to Carson as the car came to a stop, afraid of the decisions she would need to make soon after she left the vehicle. She needed to understand who she was now that her past was behind her; frankly, something she never considered to be a possibility. Was she Sienna or Lila? Sienna had built a good life for herself over the last few years with decent people in it, and now she had Carson, so he said.
Carson. He fell for Sienna. He said he loved her whether her name was Lila or Sienna, but how could he know that? He had only just learned who she really was, where she came from, and why she ran away from it all. Escaped to a life she once would have called morally degrading.
Would Carson still love her now that her true colors were revealed?
Could she be Lila in real life with Carson and Sienna onstage to her fans? Would he accept that?
The woman winding through the hotel hallway, walking to her room at the moment would never say stripping or working in a place like the Tunnel was degrading. No, the Tunnel and the people that came with the club took care of and protected her when they didn’t even know what they were guarding her against. Those same individuals were on their way to see her at this very moment, to simply be with her, love her, and make it all better.