The Lies I Tell(84)
I know only three things about her: her name, what she looks like, and that her flight departs this morning. My advantage—she doesn’t know anything about me. I fight down panic that I might have missed her somehow.
That she might already be gone, and with her, the opportunity for me to slip out of this life and into a new one.
People disappear every day. The man standing in line at Starbucks, buying his last cup of coffee before he gets into his car and drives into a new life, leaving behind a family who will always wonder what happened. Or the woman sitting in the last row of a Greyhound bus, staring out the window as the wind blows strands of hair across her face, wiping away a history too heavy to carry. You might be shoulder to shoulder with someone living their last moments as themselves and never know it.
But very few people actually stop to consider how difficult it is to truly vanish. The level of detail needed to eliminate even the tiniest trace. Because there’s always something. A small thread, a seed of truth, a mistake. It only takes a tiny pinprick of circumstance to unravel it all. A phone call at the moment of departure. A fender bender three blocks before the freeway on-ramp. A canceled flight.
A last-minute change of itinerary.
Through the plate glass window, fogged with condensation, I see a black town car glide to the curb and I know it’s her, even before the door opens and she steps out. When she does, she doesn’t say goodbye to whoever is in the back seat with her. Instead, she scurries across the pavement and through the sliding doors, so close her pink cashmere sweater brushes against my arm, soft and inviting. Her shoulders are hunched, as if waiting for the next blow, the next attack. This is a woman who knows how easily a $50,000 rug can shred the skin from her cheek. I let her pass and take a deep breath, exhaling my tension. She’s here. I can begin.
I lift the strap of my bag over my shoulder and follow, slipping into the security line directly in front of her, knowing that people on the run only look behind them, never ahead. I listen, and wait for my opening.
She doesn’t know it yet, but soon, she will become one of the vanished. And I will fade, like a wisp of smoke into the sky, and disappear.
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Reading Group Guide
1. One of the most powerful tools in Meg’s arsenal is a familiarity with social media. What do you think she could learn about you from your online presence?
2. Since they both know the other woman is lying about her identity, Meg and Kat also know they shouldn’t trust each other. How does their friendship grow despite this?
3. Discuss the role of ego in Meg’s cons. How do her targets create openings for her with their own bad behavior?
4. At first, Kat blames Meg for what happened with Nate. When do you think she stopped feeling that way?
5. The greatest downside of Meg’s career is the loneliness. Do you think she could have kept in touch with her friends when she started scamming Cory? How would you feel in her position, moving cross-country every few years and not making any permanent connections?
6. Meg believes that scamming Phillip to return Celia’s cottage was a turning point in her career. How was that job different from the others she had run?
7. Why does it take Kat so long to recognize that Scott has relapsed? Where would you draw the line between supporting a partner who is trying to overcome an addiction and protecting yourself?
8. Kat doesn’t trust that Scott will be investigated by his colleagues. Is there incentive for police departments to investigate their officers and detectives? What motivations do they have to sweep corruption and violence under the rug?
9. Meg posits, “The difference between justice and revenge comes down to who’s telling the story.” What does she mean, and do you agree with her?
10. What’s next for Kat and Meg? Do you think Kat will succeed in her new quest? Will Meg really retire from cons?
A Conversation with the Author
What inspired you to write The Lies I Tell?
I’m obsessed with true crime podcasts, and a few years ago, I came across one about a con artist who went to elaborate lengths to lure in his victims, gain their trust, and then steal everything they owned. That particular con artist was a man, but I remember thinking, What about female con artists? Would people be more inclined to trust them? From there, my imagination took over.
Like with The Last Flight, I didn’t want to write a female character who was a true sociopath, so I spent a lot of time trying to figure out a way to write a female con artist with a conscience. A woman who used her intellect and wits to do some good in a world where women often get the short end of the stick.
Meg and Kat don’t trust each other, even as they get closer and closer. What was the most challenging part of writing their relationship?
The most challenging part was making sure the relationship evolved naturally, while also keeping the timeline relatively short. Kat has the heavy load of her own trauma that keeps her from seeing Meg clearly at first, and I needed her to slowly begin to embrace Meg, despite who she believed Meg to be. The other challenging part was making sure Meg was simmering with her own pent-up rage, while at the same time keeping her sympathetic to the reader. A lot of plates to keep balanced!
Kat’s relationship with Scott is heavily influenced by his gambling addiction. What did you want readers to take from this conflict?