The Lies we Steal (The Hollow Boys Book 1)

Alistair

Pop-pop, pop-pop. 

The sharp sound propagates through the air and I don’t have to message anyone to know where they are. Heavy metal fireworks echo as I walk around the backside of Silas’s house to the backyard where there is a section of the space dedicated to one of his many extracurricular activities. 

The place we know he goes when the voices get too loud. When the things in his head start to seep out into the real world. The shooting range that his father designed for him is simple, targets at different yards, a booth that we are supposed to stand behind along with safety equipment that has never been touched. “Two hundred bucks says you won’t stand in front of the fifteen-yard target.” I hear Thatcher say as the gun stops going off. 

“Make it five and you’ve got a deal.” Rook bargains. 

There is a quick shake of hands and I know I should say something. Tell them it’s stupid and reckless, anyone else would. If I was a good friend, I would. We don’t need someone shot on top of the shit we have on our plate, but if they are making the bet, I know who is shooting. 

And he doesn’t miss. 

Ever. 

Leaves have begun to fall on the ground, crunching beneath my feet as I make my way to the booth. I lean my arms on the bench, watching them. Silas is surprisingly out of his black hoodie, a gray t-shirt straining against his massive shoulders. 

He always conceals himself. Never the kind of guy who struts around or shows off. Content being in the background, but when he’s in his element, when he’s doing what he enjoys, he loves to flaunt his talents. 

Rook is holding a bag of chips, walking down the path of open trees standing in front of a black, white, and red target in the shape of a human’s upper body. He turns to face us, smirking. 

There is no fear. No anxiety. Just excitement for the adrenaline that’s about to come. When you get over the obstacles your brain gives you when a fearful situation is present, when you face the panic head-on, fear can become the best aphrodisiac in the world. 

It’s called the flood. 

A boost of endorphins through your system. Making your skin tingle and heart race. It’s why there are adrenaline junkies in the world. Because they enjoy being scared. The rush of death. 

Something we all have a taste for in one form or another. 

Silas reloads his mag with a new clip, the clicking and clacking of the gun the only noise from him, even as he watches Rook grin like a cheeky bastard in front of him. 

While Silas had gathered quite the collection of weapons over the years I’ve known him. He had a favorite. The one he used most often, the one he’d been given at fifteen. 

The barrel of the Desert Eagle .50 catches the sunlight, the two sentences inscribed on each side reading, 

Timebo mala on the left. 

Vallis tua umbram on the right. 

It’s latin for, “Fear no evil. The shadow and valley are yours.” 

It had been given as a birthday present from Rosemary. The custom red skull grip, polished chrome barrel had cost nothing less than three grand. It had been the perfect gift for someone like it him, a testament to their relationship and the connection they had shared. 

A connection meant to last a lifetime but was ripped viciously from both of them. 

With ease he lifts the gun, the massive semi-automatic weapon was not something I was ever a fan of. I preferred to have full control over the destruction I implicated. Guns felt too impersonal. Not to mention, firing that thing felt like smacking a hammer against your hand. 

Yet, he made it look easy. Simple. Like it was nothing. 

Resting on my elbows, I waited, watching as he raised his right shoulder just below his cheek holding the gun out in front of him expertly. Rook lifted his arms out wide, leaving Silas room to shoot around his body. 

There is a pause for dramatic effect before the gun begins to go off. Barely jerking Silas’s hands back as he fires over and over again, adjusting and positioning his aim to whiz past Rook’s solid body. 

Once the gun is empty, he points it down at the ground. Cracking his neck as he looks back up at his handy work. 

We all watch Rook step away from the target, a perfect line of bullet holes marking his silhouette behind him. I’d thought it was empty, until Silas fires two more bullets plunging two holes into the chips. 

“Tried to take a little off the top, didn’t you shithead?” Rook teases, pouting that his snack is now ruined.   

A ghost of a smirk finds its way on Silas’s face and I smile a bit. The first real emotion besides rage or anguish evident that I’d seen since Rose died. 

Rook was good at that. Making Silas smile, making him forget the pain for solitary moments at a time. 

He needed this. Needed his friends. He needed to know that he would be okay and we would be there if he wasn’t. 

“Pay up, bitch.” Rook puts a hand out to Thatcher who glides his hands into his slacks, thumbing through crisp hundred dollar bills placing them in his palm. 

“Shame he missed. I was hoping for a bit of blood.” 

“Course you were, Dracula.” He says folding the money into his back pocket. 

I roll my tongue across the top of my teeth, “Not that I don’t love spending time with you three, but any reason I received a 911 text?” I speak for the first time since arriving. 

I’d planned on going to Spade One this evening, but I’d got an emergency meeting text from Silas, who rarely even messages in the group, so I knew it had to be important. 

Thatcher is the first to acknowledge me, “It’s about your little pet.” 

Briar Lowell. 

Not a pet. Just a target.

I wasn’t worried she’d opened her pretty mouth, I’d kept a close eye on both her and her friend. A testament to my abilities to stay out of sight because both of them couldn’t stop looking over their shoulders.

Especially Briar. 

She could feel me there and I think it was driving her insane she couldn’t find me when she felt my eyes on her body. Hiding in the shadows of the library, through the windows of her classes. I’d made it a point to make sure she didn’t mutter a single word. 

I wasn’t going to do anything severe, not until it was completely necessary. Until I’d noticed a vital piece of me was missing. I’d thought, maybe I’d lost it in the ruckus, but when the high settled, I realized I hadn’t lost it. 

It had been taken from me. 

Her sticky fingers from years of thievery, had stolen my ring. The girl who’d quickly shifted from a naive bystander with kaleidoscope eyes to the women who’d stolen from me. 

I rubbed my finger where my missing ring used to sit, feeling naked without it. In my anger, I’d decided to kill two birds with one stone. 

Sneaking into her room before I’d headed to the library to watch her. I’d planned on trashing the place to find what I had come for, but when it was nowhere to be found, I went with option B. 

Prove a point and make sure they both knew what was to come if they spoke a word of what they’d witnessed. 

I didn’t even know she had a pet. That was luck on my end and a severe inconvenience for her. 

Course, I let Thatcher handle the skinning of the animal, figured it’d be rude not to include him in something that bloody. 

I hadn’t seen her face when she found it. But I’d heard her, the wrathful scream, the crashing of throwing things around the room as I waited at the bottom of the steps of her hall. 

That anger was all mine. I’d done that to her. Set a fire under her ass. And I owned every inch of that emotion. All of her emotions. 

“What about it?” I ask, fist clenching at the need to get what belonged to me back. 

“Silas finally got into the school badge access database,” Rook says, “A joint and two bags of Doritos later, and we found out that Briar’s uncle, Thomas Reid, is a biology professor.” 

“And the study of organisms has to do with what exactly?” I say not following. 

“Look at you, Ali, paying attention in class. Mommy and Daddy would be so proud.” Thatcher teases, I grind my molars. 

Mommy and Daddy can go to Hell. 

“Will you just fucking tell me what you found?”

“Thomas Reid has swiped in and out of the chemistry lab more than any science teacher at the university.” Silas speaks, the click of metal ringing. Shocking me a bit that’s he’s actually talking.

“Over the past two years he’s been in there after-hours, one, two in the morning. Hundreds of times.” 

I lick my bottom lip, “So we think he is the teacher who texted Chris? Not to state the obvious, but what if Chris was just lying so we didn’t kill him? What if he’s actually the one who did it.”

I hated having to play this connect the dots shit. I felt like a corrupt detective and being a cop wasn’t something I’d ever aspired to be. 

“Why tell us about planting the body then? If he wanted to lie, wouldn’t he have just denied all of it? Also, what teacher do you know who’s headed into the chem lab at two in the morning? It would make sense for him to be, but we can’t go chopping his head off,” Rook smiles wickedly, “Yet.” 

“But it’s a lead. We can watch him, follow him, until we get the proof we need.” He continues. 

Rook’s zippo clicks, the flame lighting the end of his cigarette, “And we think his darling niece is involved or at least knows about it. I mean, think about it,” He inhales, 

“She’s broke as a fucking joke. You think a scholarship is what is paying for Hollow Heights? How’d she even get in to begin with, is an even better question. She’s not exceptionally smart or wildly gifted. Thomas must have had quite a few strings he could pull to get her here. The kind of money that buys your homely looking niece into a prestigious university. The kind of money that pays for peoples’ silence.” 

I cross my arms across my chest, chewing the inside of my cheek. 

This was it, a solid reason to go after her. Hard. 

To show her what it’s like when you get in over your head with people who don’t give two fucks if you live or if you die. 

Ideas crackled. Thoughts sparked. 

Images of her wide eyes soaked with unshed tears and panic. Her rosy bottom lip trembling as she contemplates every life decision she ever made up to that point. 

I was going to take everything from her. 

Her joy. Her friends. Her secrets. Her fear. 

It was all mine to take. All mine to steal. 

“Yeah. I’m with you, but she wasn’t even in Ponderosa Springs when Rose was killed. And I doubt her uncle is going around talking to her about murdering girls.” 

I did however need to proceed with caution. If we go after the wrong people, stepped on the wrong toes, harmed the wrong person, this entire operation would be over in twenty seconds flat. 

“You defending her?” 

I cut my eyes to Thatcher, his arms crossed over his chest, matching my stance. The wind pushing his slicked back icy hair out of order. The gray turtleneck and black jacket made him look older. More sophisticated. It was just another layer of his intimidation process. 

Look the part. Act the part. But inside, that’s where you can rot in peace. 

Inside you can be as evil and sinister as you desire. Thatcher believes in a mask. Hiding the world from what goes on beneath the surface. 

I don’t. 

I wear who I am. I have no reason to hide. 

He fits into the social food chain with appearance and communication. But we are the only three who have seen what is really beneath Thatch’s frozen skin. 

And because we know that, because we have him at a disadvantage, he despises the possibility of disloyalty. Of being betrayed. 

“Does it sound like I’m defending her, asshole? I’m just stating facts.” I furrow my eyebrows angrily, stepping from around the booth so we are on an equal playing field. 

If there was one thing I hated, it was being questioned about my loyalty. Especially to them. 

Rook places a hand on my chest, “Pipe down, boys. Nobody get their panties in a wad. I’m not saying she knows about the murder. Just saying, I have a good feeling that she knows something about the drugs. I mean,” He scoffs out a laugh, 

“Just look at her record. Not exactly a law-abiding citizen.” 

“Well, not all of us have daddies who clear our records.” Now Thatcher is just being a dick. He is fully aware the price Rook pays at the end of the day for that favor from his father. 

“How about we not get into daddy issues today, mm-kay American Psycho?”

I’d always admired that about Rook. His ability to laugh off pain, make a joke about something that would make anyone else angry. 

Joining in on the fun, I sniff the air sarcastically, “Ignore him, it’s shark week.” I bump Rook’s shoulder with a smirk and a chuckle. 

Always the one to dish it and never the one to like taking it, an annoyed look settles in his eye. Just as he raises both his fingers to each of us. 

We had a direction, had another plan, another person of interest. As annoying as it was, we were getting closer. Each mark on our soul, all the blood we had spilled, it would be worth it in the end. 

And now, I could have a little more fun with it. 

“We have to be patient now,” I say, making sure they are all listening to me, “We watch Thomas. See how he moves, what he does.” 

“And the girls?” Thatcher asks. 

“We freak them out. Do what we need to insure their silence. Get whatever information from Briar we can in the process. But we do not lay a hand on them, not yet.” I warn. 

We had to build up to that. Have them so paranoid they could barely blink in fear those seconds with their eyes closed would be the moment we would attack. Make them feel like every single moment we were watching, always there. Ready to pounce. 

I wanted them haunted. I wanted them petrified and horror ridden. 

Only then, when we had the proof we needed, we could finish what we’d started. 

The most exhilarated I have felt in a long time. My blood pumps, my mouth watering.

“Who doesn’t love a little foreplay before the main event?” Rook wiggles his eyebrows, working on his own accord to take the gun from Silas, who is glaring at him for even touching it. 

We have to get creative. We have to be sinister and stealthy. 

We are going to make them wish we’d end them, just to get a break from the terror that wracked their bodies. 

This was what I lived for.