by Leanne Brice
I realize I’m hanging my head, whether in sadness or shame, I’m not aware, but I do feel pretty stupid. I’m also unwilling to believe her fully—some people are trustworthy, right? Even if they’re few and far between? Taylor makes it sound like trusting is pretty much a lost cause.
I try not to think about all the evidence I’ve gathered over my short lifetime that actually backs up her claims. My mom, my foster homes… I pretty much haven’t been able to lean on anyone for too long.
I realize Taylor’s voice has softened as she speaks again.
"Obviously, you can’t do everything on your own, A, but to get people to stay true to you temporarily, you pretty much have to sweeten the deal. Promise more of where that came from—whatever you decide is most valuable. In this case, it was money. Maybe the kid still would have fled, but you would have increased the chances he’d carry out his part by appealing to simple logic. You could have offered twenty dollars now, thirty dollars when it’s done. Simple."
She rubs my shoulders in a comforting gesture.
"Don’t give in to your emotions like that—you feeling sorry for the kid compromised your ability to do proper business. Always remain logical when you’re the one dealing the cards, even as you prey on others’ emotions when you’re working with what you’ve been dealt. If you’re going to default to anything, default to logic. Is the kid more likely to take the money and run, failing to play a part in your distraction? The answer, according to probability, is yes. Therefore, the next question should be, ‘how can I appeal to the reasonable, greedier part of his brain?’ How can I make him see it’s worth it to work with me? The answer is pretty much always: offer more. Could be money, could be shelter, could be food. Could be companionship. If you don’t want to be done with them and have them take off on you, offer more.
She pauses.
“Of course, that doesn’t mean you actually have to follow up on whatever you promised. Once they return, the ball is in your court. Depending on your next immediate or even long-term goal, you can either continue the cycle or disappear yourself."
Basically, you can’t count on anybody.
I kind of knew it before I met Taylor, and somewhere along the way, she distracted me from the truth.
At the very least, Taylor left me with a final lesson, the most important one of all: trust NO ONE.
Best to use people for whatever they can give rather than give them a chance to take from you when you let your guard down.
I finally leave the bed and search the whole room, from the bathroom to under the bed to the closet and find myself panicking even more as I realize she didn’t leave me a goddamned thing. She took everything I stole from Axel, plus everything I brought with me from L.A.
She took my tools of the trade: my fake IDs, my burner phone, the quickie disguises.
I knew she’d robbed me of the cash and watch, but I just figured she would have dumped my backpack somewhere, leaving me my own shit at least.
But that’s all gone too, even the disguise I came here in—the wig, the glasses.
I didn’t bother putting in brown contacts when I left the suite I shared with Axel, so my supply of those are also gone.
I’m left with only what I have on. What I really look like.
The panic is taking over quickly and I know I’m about to lose it, so I start taking deep breaths, consciously focusing on the act of deep breathing for a few moments to calm myself down.
I need a clear head now more than ever.
I guess this is the first time in a long while I met up with Taylor with everything worth a shit to me on me.
I should have left something behind in my L.A. apartment, something I could hide somewhere I know my roommate wouldn’t look and later show up for, claiming I accidentally left it behind. Some emergency stash.
Again, in yet another way, I broke a cardinal rule: never put all your eggs in one basket.
You should never put all your money in one place, and you should never put all your trust in one person.
I made it easy for Taylor to bleed me dry; I never figured out how to squirrel away for rainy days.
You’d think with the hauls we take in sometimes, we’d be able to save a good chunk here and there, but this sort of life teaches you it’s best to live in the moment.
You learn you can never really feel safe, that even if you squirrel away savings, risking opening bank accounts with all your real information attached, your assets can be frozen, garnished for taxes or something. Or someone might find out you’re using someone else’s ID and social security number, and you’re suddenly in a lot more trouble than no longer having access to that money.
Or you can come home and find the money you hid in your mattress or floor board or stuffed animal gone.
At any moment, your careful saving can turn into heart-plummeting loss.
So you learn to be prepared, all right—prepared for the worst.
For me, that pretty much takes the form of living it up while I can.
I’ll never forget this girl I met on the streets—Alicia.
She had all these plans. Despite her dreary circumstances, she talked brightly, hopefully about the future.
She had a stash somewhere—a stash that would save her, she was sure of it.
She happily talked about what she would do with it.
But the ex-boyfriend she’d fled found her and beat her to death.
She never got to use that stash, amongst other things. It probably could have helped her had she used it up getting further away him.
Obviously taking the future into consideration makes sense, but in some circumstances, you realize the future is promised to no one.
It’s up to you figure out how to do whatever you want with what you have right now.
At some point, I want to live on the record, but that’s clearly not in the cards anytime soon.
I’ve had legit jobs—babysitting, cleaning—and I know I can transition to a more legal lifestyle, but Taylor always found a way to pull me back in.
Like now.
I’m pretty much back to square one.
I feel so incredibly stupid, so immensely gullible. A feeling I’m not used to being on the receiving end of.
I’ve been had.
I realize I’m more upset about losing Taylor than my stolen goods, and even my ‘work supplies.’
Taylor was my only friend and I had considered her a true friend. I never suspected she didn’t grow an attachment to me as I did to her.
She faked everything between us—a connection never formed.
Tears continue to sting my eyes but I absolutely refuse to cry.
Nope—not letting her do that to me too.
Tears help nothing and will only make me feel weak when I now need to be stronger than ever.
I swallow back the tears, steeling myself against the emotions threatening to take over and eventually, my breathing returns to normal, and my brain is starting to think up a few plans.
Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t be so worried about where my next meal is coming from or anything, but on top of Taylor’s betrayal, the full realization of how she left me starts to wash over me.
Taylor completely cleaned me out, taking things she didn’t even need, so it’s not even about her survival, is it?
It’s like she was deliberately setting me up to fail spectacularly, like she’s hoping I get caught in the simplest of ways due to lack of resources, but I refuse to believe that’s the case.
She probably thinks I’ll figure out a way to track her or lead someone to her with the number she’s been using, which I certainly didn’t memorize—I just plugged it in; we change them often enough. Maybe she took the IDs because her fingerprints might still be on them. Maybe she completely cleaned me out just to help cover her tracks, and it’s ultimately about survival after all.
The result is the same—I have nothing.
She taught me that too, by the way—get rid of all physical ev
idence. Leave nothing to chance—even if it seems like overkill, do it. Better safe than sorry.
I’ll have to get a new ID. New wigs, contacts.
With dry eyes, I consider my next step.
Yet again, I’m on my own, but I’m practiced—I can do this easily.
It’s funny how many lessons my mom taught me that later got enforced by Taylor but in more real-world, concrete ways.
I guess in a way, it’s natural that that’s where I head next. Now’s as good a time as any.
Maybe I’m looking for more clues about me from her.
Maybe I just want to remind myself there’s somewhere I belong.
At the very least, I can get some kind of closure.
Either we’ll get along and be friends or something, or I’ll finally take Taylor’s advice and harsh final lesson to heart and close my mother off for good.
She is, after all, the best example of why you can’t rely on anyone.
I mean, if you can’t depend on your mom, who the hell else can you trust?
I start formulating my plan.
The room is paid for for at least one more night—at least there’s that.
Hopefully, I won’t need it.
I memorized the heck out of my mom’s supposed location according to my research.
I figured out various ways to get there from various start points.
I might not have any cash or credit at this time, but I am never short on assets.
Free rides are pretty much Conning 101; transportation is one of the easiest things to figure out, especially when you look like me—a youthful, petite frightened-looking blonde disarms most people.
Without my disguises, I’ll end up risking being identified by people who will most certainly remember the blonde girl they gave a ride to, but I don’t have much choice at this point; I don’t have time to dye my hair or risk drawing even more attention to myself by trying to walk out of a store with a new wig using the five-finger discount.
It’s funny—this time, there’ll actually be some truth to the lines I’ll give my good Samaritans.
This time, well, I actually am a frightened girl out of money trying to get home.
I shower and wash and condition my hair so I’m nice and fresh, discarding my underwear but putting my other worn clothes back on since I don’t have any other options.
Before leaving the motel room, I rehearse several approaches, running over various scenarios and characters in my mind.
I don’t need anything elaborate—it’s my mom, after all.
Obviously, I’m not gonna tell her what I’ve really been up to—unless it seems she’d like to hear it because she can identify; maybe she has the same streak in her.
Nah, I’ll probably just present as the perfect daughter—healthy, attractive, well-adjusted, independent, and smart; it’s the safest bet.
My current outfit is casual and cute—not super conservative, but not slutty.
I’ll try to brush my hair somehow, but you know what? I look just fine overall.
My natural state seems to be the most irresistible to others.
I wear it when I’m just being me, no plans to approach anyone as I head to the public library or wherever I decide to take a stroll on my day off. But boy, do people approach me—usually with warm, friendly smiles.
As I am—fresh, young, and natural, minding my business—is the most irresistible look of all.
Hopefully, my mom finds me just as irresistible.
Chapter 9
Axel
"Back so soon?” Scott asks with a distinctive mocking drawl.
I fake a laugh.
"It’s been forty-five minutes, at least. Not exactly a quickie.”
Nate is looking at me like he knows something went down and I avoid his eyes.
"Anyway, after tonight, I’m probably done with that one. She was fun as hell, but ..."
I shrug my shoulders casually, ignoring the pang in my chest.
"Lucky for me, she checks out in the morning so I get the place to myself and I get to take a new bird back there. Why bring sand to the beach, right?"
Shit, I might be giving myself away—even I can hear the strangeness in my voice, like I don’t believe my own words.
“That’s quite a turnaround,” Pete says. “One minute, you have a real connection, the next, you’re done? What happened? Did you find out she’s married or something?”
I shake my head, although damn it—that was a good cover. Why didn’t I come up with that?
“Did she tell you she prefers girls and was just experimenting?” Scott joins in with a lecherous smile.
I shake my head again, wondering how to put the brakes on this game of twenty questions.
“She’s just… not as special as I thought. I’m sorry, guys—I got temporarily blinded by big beautiful eyes and perky tits. She had, like, the perfect body, and I don’t know if I’ve ever come so hard. So excuse me—things got a bit fuzzy with tail like that. But after I hit it again just now, once we got done and she got to talking more, I realized I’ve been there, heard that. She’s just another airhead. So yeah, that connection I felt was just lust, apparently. You’d think I’d know it better by now. My smaller head tricked my larger one into thinking more was there than there is, that there was more to her than a cozy lay.”
“Bummer,” Scott says. “I was actually looking forward to meeting her after all noise you made about her,” he says. “At the very least, you’re sure she’s still smoking hot, right? Or did the sight of her naked body before you trick you into thinking she was special in that way too?”
I suppose his comment was innocent enough, but his previous crack is still fresh in my mind and rage fills me.
Why should I care if he gets a crack at her?
But I can’t stop the anger radiating through me at the thought of him getting a look, then a taste. Even though it would serve him right if he got robbed blind as well.
“No, she’s definitely super hot—I’m not exaggerating about that—but that’s about all she’s got going for her,” I say with a shrug of my shoulders.
“Well, what more do you need?” Scott pushes. “Not like you’re gonna marry her. Fuck her till you’re tired, then grab the next bird.”
I ignore him.
I can see Pete’s fixing his mouth to dig further, but luckily, a sort of plain but curvy looking brunette comes over, all smiles, with her arms linked with an even plainer, lanky, curly-haired, freckle-faced companion.
Of course, the duo heads straight for Pete.
“Forgive me if I’m wrong,” the brunette says, “but you’re, like, a famous athlete, right? Football?”
As upset as I am, my mouth twitches with restrained laughter.
I mean, this girl didn’t even try—most just throw a name out there; they take a wild guess.
Blair Underwood. Taye Diggs. Idris Elba.
I don’t blame them, even when they’re way off with the difference in height or build because Pete totally looks like he should be some star; his face was made for the screen.
I wait for his You got me smile, and when it comes, the girls have a mini-freakout.
“Can we have your autograph?”
He nods and signs whatever they hold out to him, then writes a name after they ask him to do that.
I wonder whose name he used?
Probably doesn’t matter. He could’ve made one up and they probably won’t bother to check.
I watch with great interest to see what the girls do next.
Sometimes girls unabashedly offer to take him back to their room or whatever, and sometimes they leave after the autograph or photo.
Other times, like right now, they try to be slick, but I see when the curly-haired one slips him a room key.
Looks like someone’s getting a menage tonight.
A light bulb suddenly goes off.
It finally occurs to me that the girls are probably in control, that most of them don’t actually believ
e what they say—it’s just flattery. They’re just hoping to sweeten the pot and improve the chances that Pete will forget all the other, better-looking options for a moment and take them for a spin.
Either way, both parties win.
I smile, grateful for the momentary distraction.
Then I turn to Scott, hoping to extend it.
“So. You have no plans of settling down ever, I take it.”
He shakes his head firmly.
“I have no idea why I would do that. My life’s perfect as it is—no nagging girlfriend, no frowns, no disapproval of my actions. I’m free to fuck and drink and play as I please.”
“So you’ve never met a girl you wanted to lock down?” I ask, suddenly curious.
I’m pretty much a confirmed bachelor myself, but there was a time the thought of settling down held some appeal.
I know Nate’s still open to the whole idea; he’s just cruising along until he can find someone worthy. He always wanted what his parents have, while I was keen on avoiding what my parents had, even though there was a time I’d hoped to fare better and tried serious relationships.
No more.
Scott shrugs, and I catch what almost seems like a shadow crossing his face.
Holy fuck. I hit a nerve.
“I mean, there was this one girl, but it didn’t work out. Haven’t been interested since. She was interesting, that one—kept me on my toes.”
He takes a sip of his Scotch, and I get the impression it’s to help fortify him; he needs that liquid courage.
That girl, whoever she is or was, must’ve done a number on him.
“So you loved her. You wanted to marry her.”
His face tightens and he looks away, and it almost seems as if he’s about to drift into memories.
“I did,” he admits.
I’m a bit surprised—Scott’s usually all about bravado. Then again, I haven’t exactly known him that long. We’ve hung out about three times since meeting at that party over a year ago.