Keaton School 01: Escape Theory Read Free Page A

Not from a sponge pellet, either. She tugged at the plastic, but stopped short of opening it.
    “That brings me back to the original problem,” Devon started. “You can’t do Nutter Butters without milk. It’s a thing.”
    Hutch raised his eyebrows. “Oh, it’s a thing?”
    “It’s a thing. Like peanut butter and jelly.”
    “Like Simon and Garfunkel?”
    “Yeah. Like Rocky and Road.”
    “Or like orientation week and sucking.” Hutch smiled wide at his own joke.
    Devon laughed.
    “Let’s get some milk then,” Hutch said mischievously.
    “The machine is locked. Think we already established that,” Devon reminded him.
    “This machine is. But where do you think they store the milk for the machine?”
    Devon found herself smiling, again, too. What did he know that she didn’t?
    “Come on. If it’s a thing, then we gotta go on a mission to make the thing happen.” Hutch grabbed Devon’s hand and pulled her through the doors. “That’s just what was missing tonight. A secret mission.…”
    Devon’s thoughts were louder than Hutch’s words. His long fingers clasped her hand, scrunching her knuckles together. He pulled her along the gravel path outside the dining hall, leading her around back. The ocean wind whipped at her hair again, but, Hutch’s oversized grip felt warm and protective around hers. Safe. Which wasweird and definitely
not
safe, her over-analytical brain reminded her, because she’d just met him.
    One solitary light jutted out from the roof in the back, illuminating stacked wooden crates and metal dumpsters. Hutch pushed on the metal handle of a lone rusted blue door. “Presto,” he whispered.
    Sure enough, it opened right up into the school’s industrial kitchen. No locks here. Hutch led her inside, only letting go of her hand when she was past the threshold.
    The door shut silently behind them.
    “They don’t lock the kitchen?” Devon’s voice sounded ditzy in her own ears.
    She tried to make sense of her surroundings while her brain tried to catch up. How did a package of cookies get her here? Five minutes ago she was alone in her dorm room, and now here she was on a “secret mission” with Hutch, the knobby-kneed prized Keaton legacy. In the dark, her heart began to thump again. Ariel would be proud. This was undeniably stupid and exciting. “A place that bases everything on an honor system leaves a lot of room for stupidity,” Hutch said.
    Devon reached for the light switch, but he placed his hand over hers.
    “No lights. It’ll give away our position.”
    Hutch was just inches from her now. The outside light cast a dim glow through the small window above the door. Devon tilted her face up to him and felt his warm breath on her forehead. His light brown eyes were on Devon, flitting between her nose and lips. His eyelashes were dark but barely registered compared to his wide eyebrows. And his lips had that perfect dent in the middle. Devon found herself wondering what it would be like to kiss those lips. Hutch’s hand tightened over hers for an instant, but then he pushed away. The moment over. If it was a
moment
at all.
    “We’re not supposed to be in here,” Devon whispered.
    Hutch hopped on a sterile metal counter, his long legs dangling, as if he had all the time in the world. “Supposed to?Devon, Devon, Devon,” he said in a faux-mocking voice. (So he
did
know her name.) “ ‘Supposed to’ is such a loaded little phrase. Do you really want to live your life doing everything you’re
supposed
to do?”
    It wasn’t a rhetorical question. He stopped smiling. His eyes dug into Devon, forcing an answer out of her.
    “No, I guess not,” Devon stammered.
    “Good. Because I figure there’s two kinds of people in the world. The ones who do everything that’s laid out for them, the supposed-tos, and then there’s the people that look above it and do what they want to do. I prefer the latter, but maybe that’s just me. A not-supposed-to.” Hutch shrugged