The Baxter Motel is about what I might have expected from an out-of-the-way motel at a nearly nonexistent rest stop. It’s decrepit, with the sign peeling and almost rotting, abutted by an equally decrepit house and what looks like it used to be a restaurant—now abandoned. If Quinn wanted a place to sleep for the night, and didn’t want to sleep in her freezing car, this would be a perfect place to hide out.
The light is on in the motel’s lobby. I step inside, and the first thing I see is a bucket in the center of the room, with water leaking down into it from the ceiling. There’s a desk at the far end, and a man is sitting at a desk, looking down at his phone. But when he sees me walk in, he sits up rigidly.
I approach the desk tentatively. The guy sitting at the desk reminds me of the boys Quinn used to date in high school and college. He has those boy-next-door type of good looks, like Scotty Dwyer. That was her type—much more so than classically handsome Derek. I was always surprised she fell for Derek.
The man doesn’t return my smile. His brown eyes are wary as they rake over me. I wonder if he recognizes me— people say Quinn and I have a resemblance although less so since she started dyeing her hair. “Yes?” he says.
He looks suspicious of me and I haven’t even opened my mouth. Right off the bat, I sense I won’t get much out of this guy. I have to try something else.
“Do you have any rooms for the night?” I ask. He narrows his eyes at me. “A room?”
I blink at him. “This is a motel, isn’t it?”
He looks at me for a long time, and he nods. “Yes. It’s fifty dollars a night.”
“Cash okay?” “Yeah, fine.”
He stands there, waiting while I fish around in my purse for my wallet. I pull out a twenty, two tens, and a five. I’ve got another three dollar bills, and now I’m counting change out.
“Fine,” he says after I’ve counted out almost a dollar in change. “That’ll do.”
I let out a breath. I thought he was going to turn me away for being fifty cents short. “Thanks.”
“I have to go change the sheets on the bed.” He reaches under the table and pulls out a yellowing sheet of paper. “I need you to fill this out for me.”
It’s the standard information sheet. Name, contact information, address. I’ll have to make it all up.
The man ambles off, presumably to change the sheets on the bed, even though it’s unnecessary. I’m not going to spend the night here. I’m only going to stay long enough to get the information I need.
I make up a fake name, and scribble in some fake address in my most illegible handwriting. My name is Melissa Smith and I live in Jefferson, New Hampshire.
While I’m waiting for the man to return, I get out my cell phone. There’s another missed call from the police station. I don’t call Scott back. Not now, anyway. Maybe after I get back home.
Idly, I type into the search engine on my phone: Baxter Motel New Hampshire.
I didn’t expect to get any hits. Maybe a Facebook page with a link to a website “under construction.” But instead, my entire screen fills with stories about the Baxter Motel. And the one word present in every single result is “murder.” My heart jumps in my chest.
“All set, ma’am.”
I jerk my eyes up from my phone screen. That man is standing in front of me, even though I didn’t see him come back downstairs. I shove my phone back in my purse. Part of me wants to ask him if he knows that every single mention
of his hotel on the Internet has the word “murder” in it. I have a feeling he does.
I swallow. “Thanks.”
He grabs the sheet of paper that I just got done filling out. He scans my details and rolls his eyes.
“What?” I say. “Nothing.”
“You just rolled your eyes.”
He puts down the piece of paper on the desk. “You really want to have this conversation?”
“What conversation?”
“Your information is fake.” He shrugs. “It’s fine.”
I fold my arms across my chest. “What makes you so sure of that?”
“I used to live in Jefferson. You got the zip code wrong.
Way off.”
I open my mouth, not sure how to respond to that. “I…” “I said it’s fine.” He waves to indicate I should follow
him. “Come on upstairs, Melissa. I’m Nick, by the way.”
I follow Nick up the stairs to the second floor. This motel could definitely use a new paint job, and it’s almost frightening how much the stairs creak as I walk up them. This motel could use a new everything.
We pass rooms 201 and 202, and then we come to a stop in front of room 203. The door is still slightly open from when he must have changed the sheets. He drops the key into my hand. “Here you go.”
I glance over his shoulder, into the tiny furnished motel room. At the hard bed and the tiny TV, and the small window. “Do you have anything for dinner here?”
He shoots me an irritated look. “I can make you a sandwich.”
“Is it included with the price of the room?”
“I suppose it will have to be, since you didn’t even have enough money to pay for the room.”
I look down the hallway behind him, at the two closed doors. Rooms 201 and 202. Is it possible that my sister occupied one of those rooms? It’s time to find out. “Is anyone else staying here?”
He raises his eyebrows at me. “I respect your privacy. Maybe you could respect the privacy of the other people staying here.”
With those words, he turns and leaves me.
Wow, that guy really didn’t like me. I’m not sure why, because he seemed belligerent from the second I came into the hotel. Maybe it’s not me. Maybe he’s having a bad night. I enter the tiny motel room and shut the door behind me. I turn the lock, but then I notice a deadbolt as well. I
swing it into place.
The double bed is just as uncomfortable as it looks. I shrug off my coat and settle down onto it, and a spring jabs me in the butt. I adjust the pillows behind my back so I can sit up, but these pillows have seen better days. There are three of them, and they’re all flat as a pancake.
My phone rings. I reach into my purse to pull it out, and Rob’s name is flashing on the screen. Undoubtedly, he’s wondering where I am. If I tell him I went off looking for Quinn, he’s not going to be thrilled. But I have to tell him something.
I take the call, and immediately, I hear crackling on the other line. “Claudia?”
“Hi, Rob,” I say. “Listen, I’m sorry about taking off.
There’s just… There’s somewhere I had to go…”
“Claudia, I……..” There’s a good five seconds of nothing but crackling. “What……. can’t hear…….”
“I’m looking for Quinn,” I say. “I’ll be back late tonight. I promise.”
There’s more crackling, and then the line goes dead. I guess the reception is still bad after the storm. Oh well. I answered the phone, so at least he knows I’m not dead.
I settle down on the bed, and bring up the Internet browser on my phone. Now that I have some privacy, I can read about the Baxter Motel.
I click on the first link, which is an article from two years ago. The headline jumps out at me: Woman Found Murdered in New Hampshire Motel. The woman in question was twenty-five-year-old Christina Marsh. She was discovered dead in one of the motel rooms. Stabbed to death. There were no signs of forced entry.
The article notes that the owners of the hotel, Nicholas and Rosalie Baxter, were working with the police to find the perpetrator.
I read the articles one by one, and the story materializes. The woman, Christina Marsh, had been staying at the hotel for about a week. She hadn’t left her room in a day, so Nick Baxter went to check on her. He discovered her lying dead in a pool of her own blood.
Several of the articles mentioned a “relationship” between Nick Baxter and Christina Marsh. One went so far as to call her his girlfriend and implied the affair had been going on throughout her stay at the motel.
He was never charged with anything, at least not according to any of the articles. And I would assume if he had been convicted of murder two years ago, he wouldn’t still be working here. So I’m guessing he was cleared.
I look down at the bedspread underneath me. Did it happen here? Was she killed in this very room?
I shove my phone into my purse. I’m supposed to be focused on Quinn, but something about this place makes me feel very uneasy. I need to do what I came here to do and get out.
I crack open the door to the hotel room. The hallway is empty. Quiet. I slip into the hall and look at the other two rooms. 201 and 202. This motel isn’t much bigger than my house.
I try room 201 first. There’s a “DO NOT DISTURB” sign hanging from the doorknob, but I ignore it as I rap my fist gently against the door. No answer. Then I knock again. Harder.
Nothing.
Then I try the doorknob. Locked.
I feel this crawling sensation on the back of my neck. I whirl around, just in time to catch somebody staring at me from room 202. A watery blue eye. Some silver hair.
Having been caught, I panic and scurry back into room
203. I close the door behind me and throw the deadbolt into place.
My mind is racing. Room 201 is obviously empty. Room
202 has a guest in it, so Quinn could never have been staying there. That means I should get back on the road.
I’ll just wait a bit longer. To give myself more space between me and the police.
I figure I’ll watch some TV, but I don’t see the remote control anywhere. My eyes fall on the dresser next to the bed. Maybe the remote control is in the drawer. But I open it up and all I see in there is a copy of the Bible. Then as the drawer shifts, I see a spark of something shiny from underneath the Bible.
I push the Bible aside and that’s when I see it. A wedding band.
My hands are trembling as I pull a gold wedding band out from the drawer. It looks like the one that my sister wore for the last two years. But there’s only one way to be sure.
I tilt the band to the side and look on the inside. Wrapped around the inside of the band, I see the engraved letters: DEREK + QUINN.
Quinn was here. In this very room.
I lift my eyes, which make contact with the window. There’s a house overlooking the motel. A rickety old two- story house. And there’s a light on in one of the second-
story windows. I can make out a silhouette of a woman sitting in front of the window.
Watching.
I shiver and almost drop the wedding band. The sight of this woman staring out the window has unnerved me. I look down at the wedding band in my hand. I need to get the hell out of here.
No. Not yet.
And then I hear a single knock at the door.
