The Easy Way Out

38

Driving the back roads with no specific destination in mind, Rachel had grown accustomed to light traffic and picture-postcard views of rural southern small-town life. She passed a haggard man at a roadside farm market with a sign reading: PEACHES and BOILED PEANUTS. She'd known people like him who had walked the hard road convinced that if they pressed onward day-by-day it would lead them out of ruin. Instead, the road ate them in small bites, the effort of walking diminishing them until they crumbled, believing the delusion that they had lived a life.

She withdrew a few french fries from the paper bag on the passenger seat and brought them to her mouth. For a girl on the run, fast food dining offered several advantages. The food was filling and inexpensive and could be purchased with cash. Drive-thru service sheltered her from the watchful eyes of servers and other customers. But the high grease content and low nutritional value of the food were taking their toll. She had more pressing issues on her mind.

She was tired of sleeping in the car, tired of the raging anxiety every time she opened the trunk. A safety deposit box was not an option. That would require a bank account, which was an impossibility for someone with no social security number or confirmation of identity.

In the past, she could carry a shoebox full of money or a pouch of jewelry in her overnight bag. But not four hundred thousand dollars in twenty and fifty-dollar denominations, weighing nearly forty pounds. Maybe another remote storage locker wasn't such a bad idea. Maybe she could--

A streak of black fur darting across the road triggered a reflexive action that drove her foot down hard on the brake pedal. As her tires screamed, scoring black marks on the roadway, she watched a dog disappear into the field grass.

A young boy in a Little League uniform, his eyes wide, face blanched with panic, gave chase. "Pepper!" he cried. "Pepper, get back here!"

She steered her car to the side of the road.

"Pepper!" he hollered on the verge of tears, tromping through the grass. "Pepper, come!"

"Leave the dog!" A man's voice hollered from a house across the street. "You're gonna be late for your game."

Rachel grabbed the foil-wrapped sandwich from her bag, exited the car, and jogged across the road. The runny-nosed kid didn't notice her until she came up beside him.

She unwrapped her burger. "This always works with my dogs." She gave half of the sandwich to the boy. In a loud, exaggerated voice she cooed, "MMmmmmmmm, this is sooooo good."

Catching onto her ploy he called, "This burger is awesome."

"Crinkle the wrapper," she said. "Mmmmmm." She chewed loudly. "Soooooo good."

The field grass rustled and when the dog emerged, Rachel threw a chunk of meat onto the ground, which Pepper eagerly gobbled up.

"He's a fine-looking boy," she said, scratching the animal's head, his tall black ears laying back against his neck.

"Rickie!" A man shouted from across the street. "Rickie, I said let's go!"

The kid knelt, hand-feeding his dog. "My pa. He's the one let Pepper run." He gripped the dog by the collar and started across the street, meeting his dad at the mailbox, which stood at the end of their rutted driveway.

"Who's that?" his dad asked, watching Rachel drive off. The kid shrugged.

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After three attempts, Blake was able to navigate the Chevy Tahoe reasonably close to the curb across the street from the Goodwill thrift store. Why anyone would ever need a vehicle the size of a battleship escaped him. And more concerning, the SUV was brashly conspicuous.