Page 43 of Jericho

"It's fine. Eat, and then I can show you to a room."

Chapter 23

Jericho

"It's not much," I tell her, opening the door to my assigned room. "But it's clean and safe."

Aspen stands in the open doorway to my room, her eyes darting around it, like she needs to memorize her surroundings. I know she was feeling guilty for not being able to provide any more information on places she has traveled with Damien and even her father when she was younger, and she might be trying to make a difference. Either that or she might not trust that she's safe here. I don't know that she has accepted that we aren't her enemies. I know that has more to do with how she was raised than anything else.

I've done my best not to take that thought to heart because we all have our own hangups over shit.

"I have a meeting," I tell her, not stepping further into the room.

"This is your room?" she guesses, despite the fact that there isn't a single distinguishing thing in here to make her think that.

"What makes you ask?"

"It smells like you," she whispers, a pinkish tint lighting up her cheeks.

Her eyes dip to my mouth, making my entire body threaten to come alive, and we aren't doing that shit right now.

"The other rooms are either taken or undergoing a remodel," I tell her. "Lock the door behind me if it makes you feel safer."

I turn and walk away, hating that she's able to cause any fucking reaction from me other than irritation at this point.

I quickly make my way down the stairs and right to the conference room. I need to be around other people before my body leads me right back to her.

The room is already occupied by Casper, Ace, and Jersey. Nyx is sitting in the corner, dark eyes assessing us like we pose a threat to him somehow. Jesus, the man gives Hemlock's resting bitch face a run for its money.

"This won't be a very long meeting," Hemlock says as he comes into the room, letting the heavy door swing closed behind him.

I'm surprised he was able to pull his ass away from Zara long enough to join us.

I tilt my head, annoyed with myself and the bitterness swimming inside my head. I'm not normally such a cynical bastard.

"Our team has made its way through numerous locations," Hemlock says, the huge television behind him powering on to show pictures of five different locations. "The Reese/Gaines organization has its dirty little fingers in so many fucking pies, it sort of feels like we're looking for a needle in a haystack."

I let my eyes roam over the images on the screen, but it's no surprise that I don't recognize any of them. When I worked with Ivan Reese, I was at the house because he was always at the house. I can't swear that these locations weren't connected to him before Damien took over.

"We're looking through literally decades of travel plans and information. Blackbridge is working through some locations up north," Hemlock continues. "Neither team has found anything that indicates Eli Gaines has been on the property. Wehave no further proof that Damien has taken other children. It's very possible that the driver, Samuel, was lying in order to save his own neck."

The crack of knuckles makes my eyes dart to Nyx who looks like he's readying himself to take the man out.

"Is he here?" I ask, growing pissed at the chance that a man who could compromise everything might be in the house. The urgency to go to Aspen to make sure she's safe has me literally on the edge of my seat, ready to stand.

"He's still in Massachusetts being monitored," Hemlock assures me. "After the tracker was found in Aspen, we located a similar one embedded in the back of Samuel's neck. Damien hasn't sent a team for him yet. We're prepared if he does."

"What happens if Gaines goes back to one of the places we've already searched?"

"I don't know that he'd do that," Hemlock says. "But we have people in place, monitoring all the other locations."

"That's spreading us a little thin, isn't it?" Ace asks.

"That's why we've called in some reinforcements," Hemlock says, and the conference room doors open as if we're watching some theatrical show.

I look back and see several men I recognize from the day I burned the case with Nathan Adair to get Brielle Adair out of his clutches.

Cerberus New Mexico, and from the looks of it, it's damn near everyone on that team.

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