The Box in the Woods

The fourth installment in the Truly Devious series follows Stevie Bell, a teenage detective who previously solved a famous kidnapping case at Ellingham Academy. Home for the summer and working at a grocery store deli counter, Stevie receives an invitation that draws her into a decades-old cold case.

The novel opens on July 6, 1978, in Barlow Corners, Massachusetts. Four Camp Wonder Falls counselors sneak out after curfew to retrieve a marijuana delivery hidden in an old hunting blind, a small shelter used for concealment while hunting, deep in the woods: Sabrina Abbott, the town valedictorian; Todd Cooper, the mayor's son; Todd's girlfriend, Diane McClure; and Eric Wilde, Sabrina's new romantic interest. They settle into a clearing with a campfire. When the others drift away and fail to return, Sabrina finds Todd and Diane motionless on the ground and turns to see a figure she knows is not Eric.

The next morning, Eric's body is found on a path near camp. Sheriff Elliott Reynolds follows drag marks into the woods and discovers the hunting blind containing the bound bodies of Todd, Diane, and Sabrina, tied with red nylon cord. The word SURPRISE is painted in white on the inside of the lid.

In the present, Stevie lives in suburban Pittsburgh, her internet fame faded. Carson Buchwald, founder of subscription box company Box Box, has purchased the former camp and wants Stevie to investigate the murders for a true-crime podcast. Stevie recruits Ellingham friends Nate Fisher, a reluctant novelist, and Janelle Franklin, an engineer. Her boyfriend, David Eastman, the son of Senator Edward King, promises to visit later. Carson presents three theories: a drug deal gone wrong, the work of a regional serial killer called the Woodsman, or revenge for the hit-and-run death of eleven-year-old Michael Penhale, whom Todd was believed to have struck seven months earlier. Carson notes the crime scene mimicked the Woodsman but used different materials, suggesting a copycat.

Carson introduces the group to Patty Horne, who runs a local bakery and would have been with the victims had she not been on house arrest for breaking camp rules, and Allison Abbott, Sabrina's younger sister. At a picnic to dedicate a children's reading room Carson funded, he announces the podcast, and Allison erupts in fury. Later, Patty shares her backstory: Her father, Arnold Horne, a taciturn war hero, raised her after her mother's death. Her boyfriend, Greg Dempsey, kissed Sabrina, and when Sabrina confessed to Patty, the resulting fallout landed Patty and Greg on house arrest, which is why she was not in the woods. She reveals that Greg, distraught after a memorial gathering, crashed his motorcycle at a sharp curve near the high school and died.

When SURPRISE appears painted above Stevie's bed and Carson claims to have received a box of dolls arranged to mimic the murders, Stevie deduces that Carson staged both incidents to generate drama. She demands full control of the investigation.

Allison apologizes and invites Stevie home, where a room preserves Sabrina's belongings, including diaries through 1977 and a large ceramic turtle figurine. Sabrina's 1978 diary was never found. During a morning run, Allison shows Stevie Arrowhead Point, a narrow rock ledge seventy feet above the lake where Allison stops every day. Meanwhile, Janelle discovers a supply order form Sabrina typed, listing ceramics: "cookie jars; trash cann, turtle, teddy bear, roller skate." Stevie brings the form to Allison, who takes her to Paul Penhale, Michael's older brother and the town veterinarian. Paul recounts Michael's death and says the murders felt personal and local. Former camp director Susan Marks separately confirms that the diary was not among Sabrina's packed belongings.

Allison then dies after falling from Arrowhead Point during her morning run. Swimmers below insist no one else was there. Stevie refuses to accept it as an accident. David, now camped across the lake, adds to her distress by revealing a family friend has offered to fund his university education in England. They argue on Arrowhead Point before Stevie storms off. A storm knocks out power that night, and David's campsite appears empty by morning, though he has merely relocated after flooding.

At a diner, watching Nate type triggers a breakthrough. Stevie realizes the semicolon on the supply list was a missed colon: The items that follow are types of cookie jars. Sabrina, who loved turtles, made a turtle-shaped jar to hide her diary. The ceramic turtle in Allison's room is that jar, and Allison likely discovered this after receiving the supply list, a realization that may have led to her death.

Stevie and Nate break into Allison's house, find the turtle moved to the kitchen counter, and smash it open to recover a small red diary marked 1978. Someone enters the house. They escape but find their bikes stolen. A pursuer fires shots, driving them to Point 23, a cliff above the lake. They leap seventy feet into the water. Stevie screams that the diary is gone, ensuring the pursuer hears, though she has actually hidden it in a camouflaged bag in the undergrowth. David rescues them by kayak, and Stevie is hospitalized with a broken arm.

A flashing hospital light triggers a final insight. Stevie retrieves the diary and arranges a public reveal at Carson's Bounce House. Before a crowd including Patty, Paul, Susan, Sabrina's ex-boyfriend Shawn Greenvale, and cold case detective Sergeant Graves, she reads Sabrina's entries. The diary describes an afternoon when Sabrina, hiding in a cabana at Patty's house, overheard Arnold Horne speaking German with a visitor named Wendel Rolf, who referenced Berlin, prison, and a missing Nazi officer named von Hessen. Arnold later warned Sabrina he would "have to watch out for" her, and Rolf never checked out of his motel.

Stevie's classmate Germaine Batt presents research via video: Rolf and Arnold were Harvard classmates who served in military intelligence in Berlin during World War II. Photos reveal Arnold's resemblance to Otto von Hessen, a Nazi officer who vanished in 1945. Stevie argues the real Arnold died in Germany, and von Hessen assumed his identity, living undetected until a photograph in Life magazine during the 1976 Bicentennial led Rolf to recognize him.

Stevie turns to Patty. When Sabrina confessed about kissing Greg in the cabana, Arnold realized witnesses had overheard his conversation with Rolf. He told Patty the truth about his identity, and together they planned the murders. Patty identified the drug-pickup location and engineered her own house arrest as an alibi. Using a scale model Janelle built, Stevie shows how Patty signaled Arnold with a flashlight at the end of the school driveway on the night of the memorial, and Arnold blinded Greg with a high-powered light at the sharp curve, causing the fatal crash. Allison's death, Stevie argues, was also Patty's work: After finding the diary inside the turtle, Allison likely called Patty, her trusted friend, who placed sheets of ice tinted with food dye on Arrowhead Point before dawn. Allison slipped and fell, and the evidence melted in the sun, though dye traces remained on Stevie's shirt from when she was on the rock during her argument with David, before the storm washed the rest away.

Patty breaks down, calling her father "a good man" and denouncing the victims. Sergeant Graves informs Patty she has obtained a warrant for Patty's firearm and a DNA swab for familial matching against a profile from Eric's shirt. Officers escort Patty away. David tells Stevie he has declined the England offer, unwilling to let his life be shaped by others' feuds with his father. He tells her he loves her for the first time. On the dock, Nate announces he will write again, and Janelle leaves to call her girlfriend, Vi. Stevie and her friends conclude that while much of the evidence is circumstantial, documentary footage, potential ballistic matches, familial DNA, and dye analysis provide a strong foundation.