Meeting Mycroft

The next morning, Layla woke up and changed clothes; she only put on a pair of track pants and a t-shirt with some tennis shoes. Out of one of her suit cases she unrolled a small gym bag that she kept; into that she placed a fresh change of decent clothes and some toiletries. Grabbing her wallet she took a cab back over to her apartment that she was still technically under lease for.

She needed to use the restroom and grab a shower….making a quick breakfast wouldn't go amiss either. She had to think about what her next plan of action would be. She knew she needed to get the place checked by an exterminator to be on the safe side. The electrical and plumbing (or lack thereof depending on how you look at it) would need to be seen to. Layla wanted to remodel the place a little bit. She didn't want to take away the Victorian charm of the home, nor did she want to ruin the feel of London itself that oozed from the walls; those were things she had fallen in love with as soon as she entered through the front door. But there were a few changes that would have to take place to bring her new place up to current standards of habitation. Hopefully, the past residents wouldn't mind too much.

It sort of made her smile as she sat eating her breakfast to think of how much she really missed being at 221 Baker Street. As soon as she walked in the door she felt like it was home….if you could overlook the dust and cobwebs, etc. Being there just felt….right.

Layla had never really had a home to speak of. She was orphaned as a small child and grew up in the foster care system in America. She had stayed with some nice families during her time….Some…nice families. They weren't always nice though. There were some that were actually not very good at all. Layla had learned about the dark side of the foster system, indeed about the dark side of the human race itself growing up that way. And even in the better families she had lived with, nobody ever kept her longer than a year, if that long. It seemed like nobody wanted her.

By the time she turned 18, Layla was on her own. She had no permanent adoptive family that had taken her in; she had aged out of foster care and was sent to find her way in the world.

Luckily she had done well enough in school to receive a scholarship to college and she took that and ran with it. Getting an education in computers and minoring in criminal justice, she was able to find work in the cyber-crimes field. She made good money doing what she did and it was rewarding in its own way, helping to take down all manner of sleazy criminals.

And that is what has led her up to this point. She had somehow or other gotten onto a case that had her going down several rabbit holes. It seemed as if there was a rash of particularly heinous crimes that had taken place. Weirder still, it seemed like they were all connected once you started following the money. At the surface nobody would notice it. A handful of murders, bank robberies, a bombing or two; the list went on. Nobody had caught on because they had not been digging. Apparently, she went too far.

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She had received things online; blips on her screen, emails that always led her to believe that she was going to be next. She overlooked them. She shouldn't have.

It was closing in on winter in DC. She had gone to her friend, Flavia's, apartment on their day off. The door was slightly ajar. This wasn't like Flavia. Being single women in the city and working in the cyber-crimes division, they understood how important personal safety was. Taking out one of the leather gloves that she kept in her purse, she used it to allow her to push the door open without leaving her finger prints behind or tampering with any that might have already been in place.

Entering the apartment a little more fully, she saw furniture overturned papers scattered everywhere; Flavia's laptop was destroyed…the screen shattered, parts of the hard drive had been bashed in. Likely, the entire thing was a total loss.

Walking farther still into the apartment, she came to the bedroom. There was so much blood. It looked like the walls had been painted with it. Flavia was lying across the bed. Aside from the fact that this crime scene was indoors and this wasn't the 1940s, it made Layla think of the murder of the Black Dahlia. There was so much blood and parts of Flavia's body lay strewn around the room.

Layla wanted to puke, but she couldn't even go use Flavia's bathroom, it was part of a crime scene.

Quickly she made her way out of the apartment the same way she came in, she was breathing heavily out of total fear. Once outside on the side walk she found what had to be the only pay phone left in the entire city of DC, using her glove again to dial 911. Once connected to the operator she posed as a neighbor to Flavia and began telling her that she thought there had been a murder at the address, she claimed she heard screaming. Once she was sure the authorities were on their way, she slammed the phone down and ran for the subway station nearby.

It was lucky for her that she had taken steps to withdraw quite a bit of money from her various accounts in at least a half dozen different banks around the city. Working the job she had, you learned not to put all of your eggs in one basket.

Once she had arrived home she grabbed the bag of money that she had been stock piling and grabbed a roll of cash, taking off back out into the city.

One of her first stops was at a local wig shop; she bought several of the high end wigs in blonde, brunette, and red hair. Next, she made her way to a couple of stores and bought several hundred dollars' worth of new clothes, including a few pairs of sun glasses, boots, handbags, and scarves to coordinate

Making her way back to her apartment, she kept a close eye on people around her. She kept to the subway, not trusting taxi-drivers. Someone had just murdered her best friend as a message to her; there was no way she was getting stuck in the taxi ride from hell. No, right now she felt safer in a large group. If it was hard for her to see the bad guys, logic dictated to her that it might be hard for them to see her.

Once back in her apartment, she showered quickly, washing her hair and braiding it out of her way and dressing in some of the brand new clothes, popping tags off of them as she went. She took the time to carefully pack her two largest suitcases, making sure to leave room for her wigs and other smaller items. Going back into her closet she pulled down the kit she kept that had her passport and other important documents. She tossed her passport and wallet into one of the handbags she bought along with a couple of ink pens etc. that would make it all look normal.

As she went she made a mental note of everything to make sure she didn't leave anything of importance around. Luckily she didn't have a lot of photographs or anything that was of personal importance. With no family, she didn't have to worry about anybody that could be harmed in her wake….well not again.

Taking a pair of rubber gloves out of one of her kitchen cabinets, she began to quickly clean the apartment. She scrubbed down the bathtub, bathroom sink, and the fixtures for both before moving on and taking a quick go at the kitchen counters and the sink fixtures there. In her bedroom she stripped the sheets off of the bed, rolling them into a tight ball and tying them shut in several plastic grocery bags; she grabbed most of her clothes and put them into garbage bags. After doing that she ran to the elevator and took that down to the first floor and tossed the garbage bags into the dumpster out back, along with the bag the sheets were in. With that all done she raced back into the building and took the elevator back up to her apartment.

Grabbing her suitcases and her handbag, she looked around the apartment one last time. It had been small, but it had been the closest thing to a real home that she ever had; she hated leaving. Closing the door, she took a chance and flagged down a taxi. It wasn't her first choice, but it was a necessary evil. She told the man to take her to Dulles International Airport.

After getting her there in one piece and actually being quite a charming older gentleman, Layla paid him four times what the trip was worth and told him to have a great holiday in case she didn't see him again. He graciously thanked her and told her that he sure hoped she had a great holiday as well; he couldn't help but notice the bittersweet smile that graced her lips.

Grabbing her two suitcases and racing into the airport like a house on fire, she made it to one of the desks and purchased a ticket for the next flight to London leaving that day. She didn't even have to think about it. She had wanted to go there since she was a child, and, if she had to move again quickly, London was easy enough to get out of. She could go to Paris, Rome, anywhere. London was a wonderful jumping off point if she needed it.

Once she got her baggage checked and was allowed to board she found her seat on the plane. Collapsing into the seat she breathed the first deep breath she had been able to take since finding Flavia's body, barely more than four hours ago.

As she tried calming her nerves she noticed a shadow settle over her row of seats.

"Do you mind if I share a row with you? It seems as if some bloke has taken my seat and I don't really have the energy to start a row over it."

So the man was British, not hard to imagine, considering this was a flight to London after all. And he was handsome, rakishly so. Dark brown eyes, mischievous gleam in them, a rather nice smile, darker hair that had started going slightly gray, leather jacket, slacks. Something about his face made him seem harmless enough.

"Yeah, go ahead. Though I warn you, I don't know if I will be good company."

"Been one of those days then has it? Just can't wrap your brain around it?"

"You have no idea Mr."

"The names Greg. Greg Lestrade." He held out his hand to her.

"Layla. Layla Adler. Nice to meet you Mr. Lestrade." She accepted his hand, giving him a firm yet friendly shake.