The Easy Way Out

49

The woman who used to be Rachel Ferris sat on a plastic chair tapping her folded sunglasses on her thigh. She watched an Asian woman in a lab coat pulling blue latex gloves onto her slender fingers. Everything about the room screamed clinical, from the seafoam green walls to the polished floor, to the heavy antiseptic odor.

Medical offices always felt to her like interrogation rooms, as though there was someone watching the proceedings from behind a two-way mirror hoping for a signed confession.

The laser technician opened her palm. Bailey responded to the gesture with a skeptical look. Wearing a polite smile, the tech brought her open hand a little closer and finally, Bailey offered her hand.

The woman directed her exam light onto the little heart tattoo. "You had this inked about ten years ago?"

"Something like that."

She ran her latex-encased finger over the tattoo. "I can see that it's faded quite a bit. In time, it'll fade even further." She released her patient's hand and then reached for a tube of lotion on a nearby shelf. "You could apply a medicated cream like this one a few times a week and achieve excellent results."

"How long would that take?"

"You'd see noticeable results in a few months."

"Noticeable results?" Bailey narrowed her eyes.

"In a year, you'd never even know it was there."

"I want it gone."

"Just to be clear." The congenial tone dropped out of her voice. "Even with the application of the numbing cream, the laser is still gonna pinch."

"You said that on the phone." Bailey straightened in the chair. "Are we doing this or not?"

########

Bailey stood on the balcony of her hotel room, elbows on the wrought iron railing, staring off into the bay, a glaze of longing in her eyes. A lazy breeze skipped across the water and rose up to tickle the hair against her temple, which she pushed away with a bandaged hand. She closed her eyes and inhaled the salt and warmth, listening to the hushed waves and the occasional cries of seagulls.

She thought about Blake somewhere out there on the run, hoping that he wasn't doing something impulsive and reckless with the money, a miscalculation that would bring the wolves to his door. He was angry, desperate, and hurt. Not an ideal mindset for making split-second life and death decisions. She knew that he was smart and resourceful but he was also vulnerable.

His old life was over. He could never return to Pittsburgh, to his home. Nothing good could come of that. She hoped that he was seeing with fresh eyes and smart enough to know better than to call his mother. Sentimentality can blind you and make you do stupid things.

She loosened her shoulders and lowered her head.

There were times when she felt so at ease with him that she almost forgot to pretend. It felt good to drop the shield every once in a while and just be who she was in the moment. At the time, those instances seemed insignificant and tranisitory but they had a way of stacking up and taking on a weight that began to feel meaningful and unlike anything she'd ever experienced. She had no way of knowing that being comfortable around him was not nothing.

She thought about what it felt like lying in bed, his face against her neck, drinking in all he could of her, his lips gently skimming her jawline before finding her mouth. And when he brushed past her ear, she knew that he was going to whisper, "Love you, girl," and she learned that she not only wanted him to say it but maybe even needed it.

Since she couldn't have the money, she was glad that he did. And maybe, while he was out there on the run, maybe there was a chance, the slightest chance that their paths would cross again. And maybe there'd be a chance for redemption.

She'd like that.