Such Charming Liars by Karen M. McManus

Author:Karen M. McManus [McManus, Karen M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3
Publisher: Random House Children's Books
Published: 2024-07-30T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

Kat

It’s a cuckoo clock that brings me back.

A noisy clanging makes me shoot up from the strange bed where Jamie and I are lying, my heartbeat instantly going into overdrive. My bare feet hit a ropy rug as I stand up, and I smooth the skirt that’s ridden up on my thighs and Why am I still wearing this miserable dress?

Also: Where am I?

The continued clanging propels me into another room, one that’s sparsely decorated with a small love seat, two faded floral armchairs, and a few dark wood accent tables. There are two windows on one wall, both covered with thick plaid curtains that don’t let in much light. And between them, there’s the wall-mounted cuckoo clock. Its wooden front is carved like a chalet, with a little white fence and what looks like pine cones hanging from the bottom. As I stare, the doors of the chalet open and two tiny figures dressed in lederhosen emerge, spin in a circle, and retreat back into the interior of the clock.

“Good choice,” I tell the closed door as the clanging finally stops. “Hide.”

That’s what I’m doing; I’m hiding. Because I panicked at our apartment in the staff quarters after the attack on Jamie, retreated into the darkest corners of my brain, and forced Liam and Augustus to bring me…wherever this is.

It’s a modest little one-level cabin, nothing like the mansions I glimpsed on the Sutherland compound. Although it’s perfectly neat, with whitewashed walls and no clutter in sight, the floors look like they haven’t been swept in months. When I run a finger across the nearest table, I leave a shiny trail in the dust.

The first place Granddad ever bought in Bixby.

Augustus had said that, right before he and Liam hustled us inside.

After I told them…everything.

And now, the boys are nowhere in sight. I exhale noisily and wait for the panic to return, because, wow, I just royally screwed Jamie and Gem, didn’t I? I might’ve been able to convince Liam to keep quiet, but Augustus? Augustus Sutherland, whose aunt we were supposed to rob?

The odds aren’t good. And yet it’s hard to care when somebody almost killed my mother. Tried to suffocate her with a pillow, because…

Because why?

The answer makes my knees go weak. Because of me. Because I saw him kill Parker.

That has to be it. Otherwise, there’s no good reason why after I ran into a big lumbering murderer in the woods, a big lumbering murderer climbed into our apartment and tried to kill…not me, obviously, but the person he thought was me. He got a good enough look in the woods to recognize me from…where? The staff quarters? That disastrous lunch? The party?

And then, somehow, he knew where to find me. He must have realized I was part of the catering staff, which would explain why he made his way to the apartment building. But how did he know the exact room? Does that mean Parker’s killer was a caterer? Or someone on the planning

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