underside of a shelf behind the bed. She scooted closer, the words seemed out of order, and then she realized: miles to go before I sleep written backward. Next to the words was a circle with what looked like three branches stemming from it. She ran her hands over Hutch’s carvings, brittle slivers of wood dropped away at the touch. Her breathing got shallow and quick and she felt her ears burning. Anger was creeping in and taking over. She had to get out of here.
ON A CLEAR DAY, with the sunset over the Pacific Ocean, the Palace had one of the best views on campus. Deep shades of orange and pink bled into purple as the sun vanished, and the ocean turned a dark blue as if pulling a comforter around itself to sleep for the night. But now the vista was ruined. The decaying concrete bunker was sectioned off by police tape—do not cross. Bright yellow and rippling in the wind, it threatened to snap off and drift down the mountain any second. The gravel and broken glass crunched under Devon’s shoes. Again, she wasn’t obsessing; she just wanted to see where it had happened. Returning to the scene of the crime—out of curiosity alone.
Devon sat on the bench wedged in the back of the bunker, with the graffiti-smothered walls all around her and nothing but the view below. Here was where he’d drawn his last breath. But for Hutch to be murdered, someone else had to have been here with him that night too. What were they doing? What brought Hutch out here? Matt said Hutch got a phone call that night. Could someone have called him to meet at the Palace? The police found a body and pills so they assumed suicide, which meant they probably hadn’t looked beyond this spot.
Devon walked behind the bunker. Only a single narrow trail through overgrown plants led to this spot. Anybody going to the Palace had to come through the Keaton campus and down the hillside. She walked up the trail, tucking her arms close to avoid getting scratched by the dried branches. The top of the trail opened to a gravel driveway where the school left outdated landscaping equipment. The driveway then eased into the lawn, where 100 yards up the hill, the gray rooftop of Spring House appeared. Devon stood in the gravel driveway. It must have been dark when Hutch had come here.
The sun was getting lower over the ocean, a half circle of golden orange light casting long shadows through the trees. If Hutch was angry about a phone call he got that night, did he come down here to blow off steam? But why here? Did he want to smoke a cigarette? Pot? Drink? It had to be something illicit to take him away from his dorm after hours. To Devon’s left she noticed an old tractor, rusted, tucked away by the hillside. Where Keaton farm tools go to die, Devon thought.
Something else caught her eye. Her feet crunched in the gravel as she walked toward the tractor. Three small green bottles were lined up next to the dirt-encrusted wheel. They looked oddly clean. Devon picked one up; it was small and round in her hand, not lean like a soda or beer bottle. She sniffed; the sharp smell of stale alcohol hit her. She studied the front of the bottle. The label was peeled off; only streaks of white paper remained. Was it possible Hutch drank from these bottles? Or better yet, his murderer? She tucked the bottle up her sleeve. Even getting caught with an empty was an offense punishable by suspension. She would have to hide it well back in her room.
Behind the tractor Devon saw a metal bottle cap: dark green with the ridges poking out and a white G printed on the top. It fit her bottle. Now she just had to figure out what the G stood for. It was possible other students had snuck to the Palace and had a beer or two in Hutch’s honor, but these were too far away.
Devon peered around the tractor to the hillside behind it. A wide patch of dirt cut a path down through the scrub brush—marked with fresh tire tracks. Is this how the tractor maintained the hillside? Devon glanced back at the wide, zigzag tires. The pattern didn’t match, and she doubted the tractor had actually moved from that spot in months. Could a car have driven up