Page 104 of A Smile Full of Lies
And as I watched the footage, one of the figures on the screen, the one in the Bill Clinton mask, tilted his head and barked out a muffled order in a voice I could have sworn I recognized from somewhere. I just couldn’t put my finger on where.
Then, the figure closest to the camera laughed, and every hair on my body stood on end.
My blood ran cold.
No fucking way.
He turned, revealing a height and build I knew far too well. Broad shoulders. Narrow waist. Lazy, cocky posture. I’d been underneath that body more times than I could count, back when I had terrible judgment and worse self-esteem.
Thayer. I knew it with every fiber of my being.
The demonic clown mask he wore made my skin crawl, but it fucking suited him.
I knew that silhouette. I knew that fucking ice cold laugh.
My stomach twisted violently. He’d been there.
Oh my God.
He’d been there when Knox’s family was murdered.
But… how had Knox not recognized him in the video? They’d been best friends, after all. But maybe that was the problem – they’d been so close that Knox hadn’t ever really looked at him, in detail. Not the way I had when I was obsessively, stupidly,convincing myself that I loved him. And Knox had never seen Thayer and his cousins at that party, in the HVAC ‘costume’. That was the clue I had, that he didn’t.
I stared at the screen, ran the video again, then just sat there and shivered.
Until I heard the footsteps on the front steps.
I barely had time to close the video player before the front door creaked open behind me.
My heart dropped.
“Shit.”
Knox stepped back inside. His keys jingled in his hand as he shut the door behind him.
“I forgot the contracts for the Mobile client,” he said, crossing the living room toward his office. “Printed them last night. Should’ve grabbed them earlier, but… It was just lucky I hadn’t gone too far before I realized…”
His voice trailed off when he spotted me at the laptop, sitting there at the island, my hands gripping the sides of it like I could crush the whole machine.
“You opened it?” he asked.
I nodded slowly.
“Yeah. Just… finished watching the clip.”
Knox paused at the hallway threshold. His expression softened, but only slightly.
“Wasn’t much to go on,” he said. “Couldn’t make out faces. No license plate on the van. Masks. Coveralls. Leather gloves. Plastered boots, all the same size. It’s all generic as hell. Pretty much a dead end.”
My vision swam. My heart beat so loud in my ears it almost drowned him out.
I forced myself to nod like I agreed. Like I wasn’t dying inside.
“Yeah,” I whispered. “Not much to go on.”
His eyes searched my face.
“You okay?”
