Dark Echoes: (Dark Falls, CO Romantic Thriller Book 7)

by Savannah Kade

  Dark Echoes

  (Dark Falls, CO Romantic Thriller Book 7)

  Savannah Kade

  Copyright © 2019 by Savannah Kade

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Dark Falls

  Also by SK and AJ

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Dark Memories

  Dark Falls

  The DARK FALLS Series

  * * *

  Dark Falls - Lori Ryan

  Dark Secrets - Savannah Kade

  Dark Legacy - Trish McCallan

  Dark Nightmares - Becca Jameson

  Dark Terror - Sandra Owens

  Dark Burning - Lori Ryan

  Dark Echoes - Savannah Kade

  Dark Memories - Sandra Owens

  Dark Tidings - Trish McCallan

  Dark Passion - Lori Ryan

  Novels by Savannah Kade:

  The WILDER Books:

  Our Song

  Heartstrings

  Love Notes

  Music & Lyrics

  The Wilder Complete Book Set

  The TOUCH OF MAGICK Series:

  WishCraft

  DreamWalker

  LoveSpelled

  SoulFire

  ShadowKiss

  The Touch of Magick Series: Complete Set

  * * *

  The LOVE FOUND US Series:

  Wildest Dreams

  Sunset Promises

  Shooting Star

  Hollywood Ending

  Love Found Us - Complete Set

  The BREATHLESS Series:

  Perfect

  Ruined

  Rebel

  Lucky

  Charmed

  Saved

  Dreamer

  Gifted

  * * *

  Savannah Kade also writes suspense as

  A.J. Scudiere.

  The NightShade Forensic Files

  Book 1 - Under Dark Skies

  Book 2 - Fracture Five

  Book 3 - The Atlas Defect

  Book 4 - Echo and Ember

  Book 5 - Salvage (A Shadow Files Novel)

  Book 6 - Garden of Bone

  Book 7 - The Camelot Gambit

  FORTUNE (red)

  FORTUNE (gray)

  The Vendetta Trifecta

  Vengeance

  Retribution

  Justice

  Resonance

  God's Eye

  Phoenix

  The Shadow Constant

  Chapter One

  Risa Caldwell found more adventure than she’d bargained for when she tripped over the body of a local missing girl. She’d decided to vary her usual running route that morning, thinking she’d like a little more adventure. Well, she got it.

  Her usual route was two miles through the woods, on an open path where she often passed other joggers. Today she tried a harder route, through a more isolated area. Still, she normally felt safe and comfortable jogging out here, even though she was mostly alone.

  For whatever reason, that morning she’d gotten a jones to try something new. So, when the path split to an unfamiliar trail, Risa gave in to a whim and took it.

  Portions of the national park were open to runners, hikers, and—in some places—even mountain bikers. The entrance to the path was clear, and she decided it was worth a shot even though she had no idea how long or difficult it was. She’d thought she was prepared for anything. That had been a mistake.

  Though she managed to run at a solid pace for about a half mile after the split, the path quickly narrowed to where that kind of speed wasn’t safe. Underbrush grew in close, free to spread where hikers had not been using the trail. Soon enough, the path also grew steep, and rocks and roots acted as makeshift stairs. Risa found she was hiking rather than running, but it didn’t matter. She loved a challenge, and she had nowhere she needed to be. So, she followed the mystery trail deeper and deeper into the forest.

  Today was one of her days off from the fire department, hence the long run. A tried and true morning person, she’d woken up with the sun and happily seen the day was already bright and warm.

  She’d taken the standard precautions—she’d let her best friend Leah Dev know where she was going and that she was running alone. Of course, Risa had her cell phone on her, tucked into a nice pocket stitched into the backside of her shirt. She didn’t have earbuds, though. As much as she felt safe out here running by herself, she liked hearing what was around her.

  When the path flattened out before her, even though it wasn’t very wide, she’d picked up her pace, again. But the reprieve hadn’t lasted long. It was only maybe twenty steps later that she was sent suddenly sprawling as a sharp pain shot up her left leg. She’d hit the ground hard, feeling the scrapes on her hands and knees.

  Twigs and rocks pierced her skin, pain now spiking her arms, as well. Cautiously, she rolled over onto her butt to check the damage.

  Crap, she thought. It felt like she’d twisted her ankle. Still, she wanted to be wrong. For a moment, she just sat there, hoping the throbbing pain would pass if she waited it out. It probably wasn’t going to work, but she gave it a try.

  While she waited, she picked tiny twigs from her palms and pulled leaves off her shirt. From her position on the forest floor, Risa looked around to see if anyone was nearby. Maybe they’d see her and come help pull her up. When no one appeared, she checked out the scene on the ground.

  She’d turned around when she rolled onto her butt and was now facing back the way she’d come. Narrowing her eyes, Risa spotted something sticking up in the path.

  It looked like maybe a root, but the leaves covering it obscured what it was. Still, Risa frowned. Something smelled, and that was a little odd, because she hadn’t noticed any scent of decay before. Maybe it was because she was sitting here in the rotting leaves. When the rains had come last week, everything had gotten soaked and had been sitting, damp and rotting, since then. She could feel a little bit of the wetness seeping up through her running shorts. She groaned. Wet-butt was the worst.

  Hobbling back along the hard path with a twisted ankle and wet clothing was not something she was looking forward to. Sighing, she pulled her phone out
and checked for signal. As expected, she was out of range. Crap.

  Risa tried texting Leah anyway. “Tripped, twisted my ankle. I’m okay, though. Hobbling my way out. Will be a while.”

  She hit the send button and hoped it would work. Then she put the phone back into the cute little pocket on her shirt. Clambering up onto one foot, Risa gingerly tried putting some weight on her left foot and felt the sharp pain again.

  Nope, she thought. Not gonna do that. Definitely twisted and—hopefully—not broken.

  The trail behind her was littered with bumps and wet leaves, but ahead of her, it was more clear. Hopping a bit farther that direction on just one foot, Risa tried to be as careful as she could and watch where she went. She tried to make sure she didn’t further injure herself in the process.

  It was only after she got back to the root she had tripped over that she realized what had gone wrong. Balancing as she leaned over, she brushed the leaves away a little bit and discovered it wasn’t a root under the leaves, but a knob of something covered in denim.

  Risa frowned as the smell got stronger. She brushed away more leaves and discovered yet another swath of denim. Looking to her left now, she saw another shot of color—this time sparkly blue. It was a sneaker.

  Risa sucked in a sharp breath.

  She hadn’t tripped over a root, but a body.

  Chapter Two

  Shaking from her discovery, Risa pulled out her phone again and held it up to the sky. She needed a signal, bad.

  What she’d tripped over was definitely a body. At least she knew better than to touch it any more than she already had.

  When her phone still refused to find a link, Risa swallowed hard and looked at the body again. Tipping her head and checking angles, she decided it looked like it had been here awhile.

  The sneakers—their color and size—made her heart clench. They weren’t very big. They were also a lovely shade of sparkly baby blue. Though she didn’t touch, Risa hopped a little, shifting her position, and checked out the right-hand side of the trail. If the legs were over on the left, a torso and head should be on the right. She gulped. Unless they weren’t.

  She wasn’t normally squeamish, but the thought did not sit well. It took a moment of deep breaths before she looked. Sure enough, under the fallen, wet leaves, the body was twisted, maybe face down. Through the gaps in the leaf cover, she could see flecks of pink fleece hoodie.

  Her stomach rolled. Not with disgust, but because she was afraid she’d found Kaylee Schulte.

  “Missing child” posters featuring Kaylee’s smiling face had appeared all over town along with news reports. Her face had been featured on the announcement corkboard at the fire station. The digital version had been stuffed into Risa’s email inbox with requests to share it. One shift at work, her truck had gone out and stapled print copies on phone poles, old-school style. And she’d seen other pictures around town, posted by other firefighters or officers or by Kaylee’s family and friends. Everyone was waiting for Kaylee to come home.

  Risa was no expert, but it wasn’t as if she’d never seen a dead body before. As a firefighter for the local F.D., most of what she’d seen was burned or at least singed, dead due to smoke inhalation. She rarely encountered random bodies left out in the woods like this. Then again, who would? Even so, she knew doing anything more here at the scene was wrong and that she was not to touch the body again.

  Sill unable to find any signal but happy that it appeared her text message had finally sent, Risa held the phone out in front of her again. This time she used the flash and took as many pictures as she could.

  While she tried to get every angle, that involved crouching down on one knee, then hopping over to the other side. Risa was trying desperately to do the right thing, but also to keep her weight off her newly twisted ankle. She was working on ignoring the fact that she had literally fallen over a dead body.

  If anything happened—because face it, no one was coming to get her—these pictures might become the only evidence she had of what she’d found. But what would really happen out here? This body was buried under leaves. It had likely stayed here, undisturbed for a while. But was this an unfortunate accident? Or had Kaylee been killed?

  If so, was the killer still paying attention?

  Startled by her thought, Risa stood to her full height—an impressive five feet, ten inches—and began frantically scanning the dense trees. She stopped and consciously lowered her breathing rate and let her ears perk up. She wasn’t sure what she was listening for, since she didn’t know what a killer might sound like, but she was grateful she couldn’t hear or see anyone nearby.

  Turning her attention back to the body, Risa glanced up the hillside. A disturbed trail in the mud and leaves made it seem as though the body had started farther up the bank and somehow managed to slide down here, perhaps with the rain and the mud that washed through last week.

  Last week, the rains had kept everyone away. This week though, the park had re-opened. She wondered now why she’d decided to take this trail today. Apparently, no one had come through here recently, though Risa could understand why, given the poor shape of the trail.

  She turned her attention back to taking pictures. When she’d gotten as many as she thought she could, she looked at her phone. Leah had not texted her back. Or, maybe she had, and it wasn’t getting through.

  Risa next tried to get the GPS to mark the spot before finally giving up. With a deep sigh of resignation, Risa realized she was going to have to get herself out of this mess.

  She thought about what her father always told her. Princesses save themselves. She was definitely going to have to do that now. “Black girl magic” wasn’t just Serena Williams or Beyonce, she thought. Sometimes it was hobbling your own way out of the woods with evidence of a dead body.

  Turning, she took one last set of pictures—this time of the trail itself. Risa was trying to get as much evidence as she could showing exactly where it was placed now. Then she got to the business of getting home.

  There was always the possibility that this body—Kaylee Schulte or not—was just someone lost in the woods who hadn’t survived. Risa was not going to be the next casualty. She consoled herself that Leah knew where she was, but that wasn’t going to save her any time soon, and the guys on shift would never let her live this down if she got stuck.

  Having dressed that morning for a run in the woods, she had only what she and her cute pockets could hold. Risa hopped a little farther until she found a sturdy stick with a nice T at the top. Testing her weight on it, she leaned against the rough, flat spot at the top for support. Though it was uncomfortable, it would hold her, she thought, and that would have to do.

  Forcing herself to go slow wasn’t easy. She was a runner and a doer by nature. Some of the little root staircases were much harder to navigate on a single foot, and she wound up on her butt. Scooting down them holding her walking stick over her head was faster and safer.

  With nothing but time and her thoughts for company, her heart grew heavy as she went. The Schulte family had fervently hoped Kaylee was still alive. She was old enough that some people believed it was possible the girl had simply run off.

  Her thoughts shifted. Not only was Risa going to need medical attention when she got in, she was going to have to lead the investigators back to the spot. What had taken about thirty minutes to run took over an hour and a half at this painful speed. But as she approached the trail head, she saw a shadow coming her way.

  Risa thought of the dead body behind her and the fact that she couldn’t run. So, she stood tall and took her only option. She waited, facing the man coming at her.

  Chapter Three

  Ethan Eames headed into the trails at the national park.

  Hiking behind him was local forensic scientist Grace Lee and Leah Dev, best friend of the woman they were looking for. In fact, it was Leah who had called in the body, though she hadn’t seen it. This was a new one to him—the first time he’d had a body repor
ted by text message.

  Ethan was torn. For one, he was not dressed for this shit. He’d shown up to work in his usual suit, button-down shirt, and tie. “Work” was a lonely office at the Dark Falls PD, because that’s where FBI agents got shuffled when they didn’t have a local branch office. At the precinct, the number of other officers who spoke to him was roughly zero.

  The FBI had planted him here about three months ago with no apparent rhyme or reason and told him to check up on whatever cases he’d thought were necessary. Whether his Agent in Charge was trying to get the local officers to riot against him or waiting for him to quit, he didn’t know.

  The sneakers he’d slipped on his feet when he exited his car at the parking lot had been virtually unused. He was pretty sure his assignment in Dark Falls was punishment for that mess in Florida.

  Luckily, the day was beautiful. It was his only consolation.