Hero Complex (17 page)

Raven’s gaze drifted back to the paper. Devon opened her mouth, then closed it. For now, it seemed better not to tell Raven about the stalker photos. Fearless or not, Raven didn’t deserve that added worry. Besides, they were safe here.

Saturday seemed the best day for their bunker mission. Most of the Keaton sports teams had games off campus—which meant fewer faculty members on patrol. Bodhi parked their Range Rover as close to the Palace as he could, a few large rocks wedged in front of the wheels for extra security. He carried a backpack full of tools, complete with thick suede construction gloves for each of them.

“What are these for?” Devon asked. She and Raven tried to stifle a giggle as they slipped the gloves on. They looked like oven mitts with fingers.

“This hill gets pretty steep. Figure we’d need something else to hang on to.” Bodhi was all business. He pulled at a coil of metal cable attached to the front of the Rover. “If we hang onto this as we go, we should be okay.” He carried the cable down to the edge
of the Palace. The three stood on the farthest cement ledge. Devon peered down at the brush-filled abyss below.

“I don’t see the lower ledge,” Raven said. “Shouldn’t it be there?”

“It’s in the plans, so it’s definitely here.” Bodhi pulled an extra loop of the cable around his hand. Devon lay flat on the ground and smoothed her hands along the cement ledge. She could see bushes and dirt below, but no other cement lookout like the plans had detailed.

“Do you think if we dropped over this, we’d land on the balcony?” She turned up to Bodhi, who’d begun making his way down the hill.

“Maybe. I just don’t like the idea of our feet leaving the ground when we don’t know what we’re landing on.”

“Better listen to Mr. Precaution over here,” Raven said.

She extended a hand to help Devon up. With Bodhi leading the way, they inched farther down the hillside, each of them sliding gloved hands down the taut cable. Soon Devon was perpendicular to the sloping hill. Anxiety pricked at her. What if the lower balcony had been completely covered by the shifting hillside? What if there was no way into Reed’s secret room?

“There’s something over here,” Bodhi grunted. He reached for a tangle of ivy wrapped around a tree and was suddenly standing upright. He stomped his foot on the ground and smiled. “This is it.”

“Whee!” Raven yelled as she leaned and pulled the cable—and Devon with it—toward Bodhi. Bodhi wrapped the cord around the tree stump and helped them to level ground.

Hidden in the shadow of a nearby redwood, Devon could now make out the back wall of the hidden second level. Dirt was piled in a mound against the bottom of the wall, and dusty cement arched above. She didn’t hesitate. Grabbing a nearby stick, she started digging the packed dirt away from the wall. Once it was gone, she tossed the stick aside and ran her hands along the wall’s flat surface.
She could feel the indentations of the handprints. Her heart leapt. This was it!

“Here, try this,” Raven said. She pulled a bottle from her backpack and poured water along the top of the wall.

Five pairs of handprints were instantly visible. Small initials were carved below each: HK and FK were next to a pair of prints to their left, ED below a chubby set of prints to their right, and in the middle, RH and AH. Reed and Athena Hutchins. Raven ran a hand over the handprints on the left side. “Francis Keaton, but who’s the H?”

“That’s his wife, Hana,” Devon murmured.

“What happened to her?” Raven asked. “Wouldn’t she have a building or something named after her at school?”

Devon shrugged. “Don’t know. Maybe she left before the school was built.”

Bodhi dug his fingers into a groove in the wall between Reed’s and Edward’s handprints. “There’s something else …” He pulled a crowbar from his backpack.

“Jeez, where you been hiding that?” Raven laughed.

“What? I came prepared,” Bodhi grunted as he jammed the crowbar into the crevice. It didn’t budge.

“Maybe that’s not the way in,” Devon said. She turned and took in the view. The trees below weren’t tall enough to obscure the Pacific Ocean. But now was not the time for sightseeing. She scoured the platform and caught a glimpse of rusted red metal: a hinge.

“Look.” She knelt down and wiped away the dirt. The metal continued toward the back wall.

Bodhi used the crowbar to scrape along the lines of the hinge, and soon a small square doorframe took shape. After a few tugs with the crowbar, Bodhi pried the small door open with a loud creak. A burst of cold, metallic-smelling air drifted up. Bodhi poked his head into the darkness. “There’s stairs.”

Raven stepped back. “I can’t. That’s way too small for me. I lied when I said I was fearless. I get claustrophobic.”

“You brought a flashlight, right?” Devon asked.

“What do you think? Come on, this is what we’re here for.” Bodhi lowered himself through the door, his backpack hitting the edges as he descended.

Raven nudged Devon. “I’ll keep an eye out. You got this.”

Bodhi was right. She nodded, steeling herself, took a gulp of air, and stepped down. Instantly she could feel the cold from the stone steps sneak up her legs. Bodhi turned on his flashlight. A stone tunnel appeared, arching overhead. Bodhi reached the bottom. His flashlight beam bounced and disappeared around a corner.

Devon landed on the flat ground and turned the corner to find Bodhi staring at a wall full of shelves. A few small wooden crates and one metal box were all that was left. “Let’s get this stuff outside,” Bodhi whispered, panting.

He set his flashlight on a shelf and handed Devon the metal box. She took it with her free hand. It was lighter than she expected.

Bodhi pulled out a crate filled with mason jars, each stuffed with what looked like dirt. He caught her puzzled stare. “Someone thought it was important enough to store and save, so I’m bringing it out with us,” he said.

“Good idea.” Clinging to her flashlight, Devon tucked the box against her body. She shivered. “I’m freezing. Raven? You out there?” She started to climb back out and held the box through the small door overhead, but Raven didn’t respond. Devon hoisted herself up and outside again. “Rave?” she yelled in the direction of the car.

“Up here!” Raven called back.

“We found something! Come down!” Devon used the crowbar to pry open the metal box. Inside was a single manila envelope sealed with a faded red string. Devon untied it and pulled out a sheet of paper.

Devon reread the document. Keaton, Hutchins, and Dover had all agreed on how the land was to be treated. This document probably had some historical significance as far as The Keaton School went … but it wasn’t exactly buried treasure. This couldn’t be what Reed wanted her to find, could it?

Bodhi emerged from the underground room, pushing the jarfilled crate out ahead of him. “What did you get?”

“I think it’s an early deed to the land or something.”

“Let’s bring it up to the house. Where’s Raven?”

“Up top,” Devon said. She was careful not to bend the dry paper as she put it back in the envelope.

“Rave?” Bodhi yelled. There was no response. The metal cable started to quiver next to them. Devon and Bodhi traded a confused look.

“Raven?” Devon yelled. The cable swayed more, followed by the sound of the car starting up. “What the—”

Raven screamed.

Bodhi pushed Devon against the cement wall, his hands tight around her arms. “Stay here!”

He turned to run to Raven, but the metal cable must have been cut from above, because it was suddenly hurling toward them. He ducked as the cable lashed at the ground, breaking a few branches along the way before hanging like a renegade question mark. But
he didn’t hesitate. He jumped up, grabbed the ledge, and pulled himself over it, vanishing overhead.

Devon could only hear her own fast breathing. She looked down and saw that her hands were pressed into the groove of Reed’s palms. It was the only comfort she had. Raven must have fallen; maybe she tried to move the car? The terror rising up the back of her throat told Devon that was wishful thinking. She immediately thought of the photos of her and Raven at the deli. Had their stalker come up to campus? Why hadn’t she told Raven? It had been a stupid move.

She quickly tucked Reed’s envelope into her jeans and under her jacket against her back.

Better to leave the metal box down here in case there was trouble.

“Dev! Come up!” Bodhi yelled.

His voice sounded urgent but not panicked. Whatever danger there was had now passed, Devon reasoned. She hoisted herself over the ledge as he’d done, crawling in the dirt at the steepest parts. Finally she broke into a run.

Bodhi was helping Raven into the backseat of the car. Devon caught a glimpse of blood on her leg, and her shoe was matted with dirt. Raven’s eyes were squeezed shut and her mouth twisted in pain.

“We gotta go. Get in,” Bodhi said.

Devon ran to the passenger side and started to get in when she glimpsed a shadow on the grassy slope above, in the direction of campus.

“Devon Mackintosh, is that you?”

The mysterious figure didn’t sound like a student, more like a concerned teacher. The glare of the sun made him impossible to identify.
Damn, now Keaton knows we’re down here
. Not that it mattered anymore. All that mattered was getting Raven help.

Raven’s foot and ankle were broken, but she wouldn’t need surgery. Bodhi didn’t want to leave her side at the hospital, though Raven insisted she was too high on painkillers to miss him if he took Devon back to school. And it was late. Devon didn’t want to appear antsy, but eight straight hours in the ER was beginning to take its toll. And she couldn’t be late for curfew, not with the campus buzzing with who-knows-what.

The hidden paper poked into her shoulder blades. She was too nervous about who might be watching to move them. Even worse, Raven couldn’t remember much about what happened, which only made Devon more paranoid.

According to Raven, she’d spotted a guy starting their car. Raven apparently opened the driver’s door and tried to pull him out, and the front tire ended up rolling over her foot. The guy ran toward
the Keaton campus, and Raven couldn’t remember what he looked like, other than that he was wearing a Keaton baseball hat. A new baseball hat—that much she remembered. Devon had to ask, but Raven said she didn’t notice any dimples in his cheeks. Then again, the guy probably wasn’t smiling.

Maybe it wasn’t Eli. Maybe it was Khaki.

“What do you think, Dev?” Bodhi said. “I should probably get you home.”

Raven was staring glassy-eyed at an infomercial for a “revolutionary” vegetable-cutting set. Machines hummed and beeped around her.

Devon nodded, resisting the urge to crawl into the hospital bed and hug Raven. “I’m going to check around the hillside. Maybe he dropped something when he ran away.” She fought the fear of being watched, the idea that Raven’s nurse was listening to their conversations, that cameras were snapping their every move. There would be clues left on the hillside, and she would find them. But today’s incident had planted a darker idea in her mind: they weren’t safe on campus, after all.

The Hutchins family had used Grant to get to her last semester; it couldn’t be that difficult to put a new student on the payroll. An image of Oz flashed in her head. He was new and conveniently very close to Cleo. And Cleo was conveniently close to Devon. Not to mention, he’d already tried to hide one thing. Maybe he was hiding lots more.

B
ODHI
’
S HAND WAS POISED
over the key in the ignition, but he couldn’t seem to start the car. Instead he just stared at the steering wheel, sitting in silence in the hospital parking lot. Devon reached over and rubbed the back of his neck. Bodhi bowed his head. Even though she couldn’t see the tears, she knew he was crying.

“It’s not always going to be like this,” Devon soothed. “I don’t know why all this is happening, but we’re going to solve it.”

He sniffed and shook his head, straightening up. “If something had happened to her, I don’t think I could have handled it.” His voice was thick. “I’m supposed to protect her. I’m supposed to make sure she
doesn’t
end up in the hospital.”

Devon leaned over the console and pulled Bodhi’s face to hers. She kissed his lips, wet with tears. He pulled her closer and kissed her back.

Her cell phone rang. She pulled away and fumbled for it.
Mom. Uh-oh
. Bodhi cleared his throat, rubbed his eyes, and started the car while Devon answered.

“Devon? Where are you?” Her mom sounded frantic.

“Headed back to school.” Devon and Bodhi exchanged a look. “Oh, no, they called you, didn’t they?”

“Someone saw you leave campus with that Elliot boy. They weren’t sure if you were hurt. They asked me if they should call the police. Devon, you’re okay, aren’t you?”

“I’m fine, Mom. I’ll be back at school in twenty minutes. Who called you—”

“I’m on my way, too.”

“What? No, you don’t have to do that.”

“Devon, they asked me to.” Her mom hung up.

“What’d she say?” Bodhi asked. His eyes stayed on the road.

“I’m screwed,” Devon said, feeling sick. “Really screwed.”

Disciplinary committees were rarely convened at Keaton, and only in true emergencies. There had been only one last year, when Kevin Cosmo had showed up to formal dinner blatantly drunk. Devon vividly remembered the silence that had fallen over the whole hillside during the hour-long proceeding, as if everyone was waiting to hear the results broadcast across campus.

Kevin Cosmo had gotten kicked out.