Gray
I had stood before a judge and agreed to spend years locked up in a federal detention center, but I wasn’t as nervous then as I was walking down the street to meet Layla. Maybe it was because then I’d known that when I finally walked out, I’d be a free man again, ready to start over with a clean slate.
With Layla, though, I wasn’t so damn certain. If I blew it this time, there wouldn’t be another chance. And I wasn’t sure I’d ever feel free of her, even if she was done with me.
I arrived fifteen minutes early at the Starbucks around the corner from where I’d planned to take her and got both of us a coffee, another thing we’d never shared—a simple cup of f*****g coffee—even though I knew exactly how she took it, because she’d written it in one of her letters.
She arrived right on t
