Page 118 of A Smile Full of Lies
“We were just going to rob the place and steal some tech from Knox’s dad’s safe, and sell it on the black market. They were supposed to be out of town, remember? But they canceled their trip out of town at the last-minute.”
“Why’d they cancel?”
He laughed — low, breathless, almost nostalgic.
“Fucking Knox and his goddamn family, always fucking up the plan. Knox begged off from the family trip to follow a… friend of mine to Gulf Shores. He thought I was cheating on you with her, which I was. Just not that weekend. I already had other plans. When Knox backed out of the trip, his dad used that excuse to cancel the whole thing so he could stay home and work. The old man always was a workaholic, to the point where it was unhealthy.”
I chewed on my bottom lip.
“Why didn’t you leave when you realized they were home, instead of on the trip like they were supposed to be?”
Thayer shrugged and waved his free hand in a dismissive motion.
“We were already in place. Already inside. What were we supposed to do? Leave? Risk being seen?” He shook his head slowly. “Nah. We improvised.”
“Improv? That’s what you’re calling it?”
“To be honest, things might not have gone quite so badly if Henry hadn’t come out of his office waving his gun at us like he thought he could intimidate us into backing down. He had that king of the world syndrome, just like Knox does. Didn’t do him any good, though. In the end, I was faster on the trigger than he was.”
My stomach twisted.
He looked at me like he was proud. Like he was still that golden boy from Stonewood Prep who always got away with everything.
I swallowed back the bile rising in my throat.
“Did you kill Victoria and Ava, too?”
Thayer shook his head, grinning.
“Nah. I’m not the only predator the Williams family created, if that’s what you’re asking. I ordered my cousins not to leave any witnesses, and they listened well. Eli ran Victoria down and shot her in the foyer. Chad went after Ava. He cornered her in her room and shot her three times. Caleb’s the only one who didn’tshoot anybody. He was our getaway driver. He had the van ready and waiting for us to pile in and haul ass.”
My stomach roiled.
“And you got away with it.”
“We were in and out in under ten minutes. Clean. Quiet. No witnesses. No evidence. Eli told us to police our brass. And I kept the shell casings.” He grinned, like it was a joke. “Little trophies, you know? They’re in my safe.”
I couldn’t fucking breathe.
I watched him turn away like it was nothing, open a drawer, and pull out a knife.
Casual. So fucking casual. Like he wasn’t holding a piece of razor-sharp steel in his hand.
He looked down at the blade with an almost nostalgic smile, then back up at me.
“You still have a thing for horror movies, Cooper?”
My mouth went dry.
“They always were my favorite.”
His grin sharpened.
“Let’s see if you scream like the final girls in your favorite movies do when the killer catches up to them.”
The knife caught the light. In that moment, I knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that I wasn’t going to walk out of here unless I made him bleed first.
I couldn’t blink. Couldn’t breathe.
