Scorched Ice (Fire and Ice #3)(34)

Julian lowered his hands from beside her head. He pointed to Devon, then himself, and then made some gestures to indicate he would go into the room. Devon nodded.

Julian bent down before stepping cautiously into the doorway. He crept into the room until he vanished from view. Quinn’s heart leapt into her throat as every horrible image of what could be lurking within raced through her mind. What if he was shot with a crossbow, or someone dove on him with a stake? She’d watched him die once already; she couldn’t do it a second time. A cold sweat broke out on her skin, and her mouth went dry as the seconds ticked by in her head.

Quinn took an abrupt step toward where Julian had been. Devon held his hand out and gave her a fierce look. She glared back at him before focusing on the doorway again. She had no doubt Devon would tackle her to the ground before he ever allowed her to follow Julian, but if she heard one off sound, she’d fight him to the death to get in there.

A light turned on within, and Julian appeared in the doorway. Devon lowered his arm when Julian reclaimed her hand. “Causing trouble?” he inquired of her.

“Nowhere near as much as you,” she replied.

“So very true.”

Quinn followed him into the room with Lou and Luther on her heels. Her gaze ran over the typical landscape paintings hanging on the beige walls. To her right, the fluorescent light in the bathroom illuminated the cream-colored sink. Beside the sink, a toothbrush, shaving kit, and hairbrush were still neatly laid out.

The carpet beneath her overlarge sneakers was the standard, gray industrial carpet found throughout the hotel. Her nose wrinkled as the potent aroma of cologne flooded her nostrils. It smelled like someone had dumped an entire bottle of it somewhere.

Devon closed the broken door after Dani stepped into the room. They walked by a coffee table, fridge, and sofa in a small alcove room before stepping around a corner and into the main part of the room. The red comforter on the bed was tossed back, the sheets a tangled mess in the center of the mattress. A book on the stand beside the bed was opened and placed facedown to mark the reader’s last spot.

Herb’s last spot.

On the nightstand on the other side of the bed, a broken bottle of cologne was tipped onto its side. A small puddle sat beneath it, but the rest of the liquid had run down the side to absorb into the carpet.

Herb had come back here after Julian had chased him, she realized, probably before he’d arrived in the arcade room. In his rush to get whatever it was he’d needed from here, he’d knocked the cologne over and left the broken bottle—just as he’d left everything else, including his open suitcase in the corner.

“What did he take from here?” she wondered as Julian released her hand to walk over to the suitcase.

He didn’t hesitate before pulling the clothes from inside. He held them briefly before tossing them onto the floor. No emotion played over his face, but his eyes held a hint of red within their ice-blue depths. The angel tattoo on his arm flexed with his movements. He tossed the last piece of clothing onto the floor and stood staring at the empty suitcase like he was contemplating smashing it.

“Whatever he took from here was important enough for him to chance returning to the room for it,” Luther said from behind her.

Julian grabbed the lid of the suitcase and threw it off the stand before turning to face them. “We have his address. We’ll go there.”

“We’re supposed to be meeting the vamps in Maine in a week,” Quinn reminded him.

“What’s his address, Lou?” Julian demanded.

Lou pulled his phone from his pocket and scrolled through it. “The address he gave is in Burkes, Pennsylvania. He would have shown his license when he checked in, and since he used his real name, it’s probably his actual address.”

They had all handed over fake IDs when they checked in, but Lou was right. If Herb had used his real name, there was a good chance he’d used his real license and address too.

“I can get on the computer and find out more when we leave here,” Lou said.

“Good. We’ll pay Herb a visit in Pennsylvania on our way to Maine,” Julian said.

“Do you think this Burkes, Pennsylvania is like Cedarville was?” Dani asked.

“What is Cedarville?” Quinn inquired.

Red flashed around Julian’s eyes again. “Cedarville was the name of the town in New York where Cassie and I were imprisoned. The Commission used the residents of the town to further their experiments until it became a town full of nothing but Halflings. Those Halflings were monsters trapped somewhere between human and vampire and nothing but mindless killing machines.”

Quinn hugged herself when goose bumps broke out on her flesh. The Commission really was a bunch of monsters. “Do you think Burkes could be like Cedarville?”

What would it do to Julian if the town was another place for vampires and humans to be experimented on?

“No,” Julian said.

“What makes you so certain?” she asked.

“Because there aren’t enough members of The Commission left to pull off something on the level of Cedarville again.”

“How do we know there aren’t many Commission members left?” Dani inquired. “I mean, we know how many of them we took out, and Luther and I had an idea of how many of them were in existence, but do we really believe they told us everything, or even half of their secrets?”