NAME: Layla Covington
AGE: 28
SEXUALITY: Straight
OCCUPATION: Quasi-businesswoman, caretaker of her family's assets
HEIGHT: 5'7"
DISTINGUISHING MARKS: Tattoo of the Eye of Horus on the inside of her left wrist, a tattoo of the Eye of Ra on the inside of her right, and a white scar that runs diagonally across her right palm
FACE CLAIM: Alessandra Ambrosio
BEST KNOWN AROUND TOWN FOR: Coming from a wealthy family with a big old streak of crazy running down the family tree
HOME: Layla lives on a houseboat on Lake Greystone. It's a nice houseboat, but it's nowhere as near nice as the big house she sold when her parents died. Given how she hates swimming and the water, the town just figured it was another one of those 'family eccentricities'
ABOUT: Outwardly tough, Layla doesn't seem to give a damn what anybody thinks of her, though when the wind blows up off the Gulf and the waves start rocking that houseboat she lives on, that toughness of hers can crack like a pottery bowl dropped on stone, and she's been known a time or two to curl up sobbing like a little baby in the corner. A few years ago, right after her brother went missing, folks got worried enough about her caterwauling' during a bad storm to call an ambulance for her, and she was hauled off to the hospital. They say the doctors wanted to commit her to the loony bin, but quick as a flash some suit showed up claiming to be her lawyer, and the docs backed down.
Most of the time, though, Layla’s just a woman who has money and minds her own business. She does what she pleases, and isn’t inclined to explain herself to nobody. She takes care of the businesses her family owned, the rental houseboats and the cabins, the gift shops and what have you, not only on Lake Greystone but in other spots across the state and into Louisiana.
Her parents left everything to her and her brother when they died, except for their house which they left to her and she sold. The estate was still in probate when her brother’s overturned speedboat was found floating bottom-side up on Lake Graystone, and until he’s declared legally dead in a couple more years, or he’s found – dead or alive – she’s stuck, if anybody with more money in the bank than most folk in Pinebox earn in a lifetime, can truly be considered stuck.
Still, though she’s odd, as anybody will tell you, she’s pretty good to help out with charities and things, and when anybody gets lost on the lake or any body of water within a hundred miles, she’s right there, puttin’ up the money to hire boats and divers and what not to drag the lake. Seems like she don’t want nobody else goin’ through the agony of wonderin’ since her parents weren’t ever found when their boat went down somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, and then her brother …
‘Course, there are some that say that her brother ain’t dead at all. Everybody around these parts knew he was a dope fiend, money and breedin’ an’ all. Snorting, smoking, shooting … he got more than one good kid hooked on the stuff, not for needin’ the money, but just pure damn malice according to gossip. The Feds were closing in on him, or so the scuttlebutt goes, when he took his boat out on the lake, high, and just never come back. There was a lot of people that breathed a sigh of relief, though it would've been a bigger one if they knew for sure he was dead.
Layla agrees that he was one mean son of a bitch. She knows he's dead, and out there in that lake. She hears him sometimes, in the storm, and sees his shadow moving under the waves, like a fucking freshwater shark, just waiting for her to make a mistake.
As to what's happening in Pinebox, Layla's got it in her blood. Except in the storms, she pays it little mind. Everybody's got their demons, everbody's got their curse. As to what is the cause of it, she believes that it IS a curse, though the form it takes is different for everybody. It's all tied to the water, though, and for herself, she only drinks the bottled kind, and the filter she uses on the water that comes into the boat is special ordered, and replaced religiously once a week.
Her curse, of course, is her brother, but it goes back longer than that. Her family came by their money the old-fashioned way -- they screwed somebody for it, and it has something to do with the Lake. Knowing the particulars, however, isn't going to stop it, so she stopped bothering being curious quite some time ago.
WHAT SCARES YOU?: Deep water. Things that live under it. Things that are under it that ain’t alive. Bein’ sucked down into the cold depths, clawing at it until you don’t know which way is up and which is down.
HOBBIES: Fishing. Painting. Collecting just about anything, from fancy fishing flies to momento mori rings to rusty old bells off ships. Drinking.
EXTRAS: Layla has had a few relationships, mostly with men who were interested more in her money than her. To be fair, she seemed well aware of their motives, and used them for what she wanted out of them but gave little more. A few little gifts was the most they got out of it, other than whatever pleasure they took in her company. Local men that she's had little 'flings' with have fared better, with Layla helping them out with jobs, loans, even a place to live, but her help is always conditional, and there is always a time limit.
She has no patience with people looking for an easy ride. Nothing's easy - that's just the way it is, so they can damn well get used to it just like everybody else. The fact that they have a pretty face, a nice body, or are good in the sack doesn't make them any more deserving.
Her tolerance for alcohol is heightened. She's not a habitual drug user, but sometimes when the storms come, she's tried to get through them with prescriptions, a joint, some of the harder shit coming out of Mexico. Drugs made it worse. Much worse. Now she takes Tylenol when she has to and leaves the other shit (other than alcohol) alone.
