off the hook

Idioms

​having got free from a difficult situation or a punishment

I lied to get him off the hook.

No way will she let you off the hook this time.

I was finally off the hook.

​(becoming old-fashioned) if you leave or take a landline phone off the hook, you take the receiver (= the part that you pick up) off the place where it usually rests, so that nobody can call you

e.g.