Page 45 of Silent Bones (High Peaks Murder, Mystery and Crime Thrillers #7)

F ire crackled and hissed as another log settled into the flames, sending sparks spiraling up into the night. The lake stretched out beyond their campsite like black glass, reflecting the stars and the orange glow of their firepit.

Noah sat in a folding chair beside Callie, watching his teenagers interact with Ed, who was demonstrating various Sasquatch calls with the enthusiasm of a man who'd spent decades perfecting his craft.

"Now, the key is the resonance," Ed was saying, cupping his hands around his mouth. "You want it to carry through the trees, echo off the water. Like this?—"

He let out a long, haunting call that seemed to roll across the lake and disappear into the forest. Mia and Ethan burst into laughter, trying to imitate the sound with varying degrees of success.

"That's horrible," Mia giggled, attempting her own call. "I sound like a dying moose."

"Hey, dying moose might attract something," Ethan said, producing an even worse approximation that sent them all into fresh laughter.

Noah felt some of the tension from the past few weeks begin to ease from his shoulders. This was what he'd needed… his kids’ laughter, the simple pleasures of a campfire, the vast wilderness around them indifferent to human corruption.

"I appreciate you inviting me," Callie said quietly, her voice barely audible over the teenagers' continued attempts at wildlife calls.

"Glad you could make it." Noah took a sip of his beer, enjoying the way the firelight played across her face. "You looked like you needed to get away from everything as much as I did."

"More than you know." She was quiet for a moment, watching the flames dance. "So… what's the deal between you and Natalie Ashford?"

Noah glanced at her, surprised by the directness of the question. "Nothing. Ancient history."

"Ancient history that involves her father suggesting you might become his son-in-law?"

"You were eavesdropping?"

"I stepped back in to use the washroom. Hard not to overhear when he was practically marking his territory in that coffee shop." Callie's smile took any accusation out of the words.

"Why are you interested?” he asked.

“Enquiring minds want to know."

Noah studied her face, seeing genuine curiosity rather than jealousy. "We had a thing a few months back. During the Catcher case. It ended when I realized she came with too much baggage, specifically, her father."

"Smart choice."

"Was it? Sometimes I wonder if I'm too careful, too suspicious of everyone's motives."

Callie was quiet for a long moment, her eyes on the fire. "After everything that has happened with Luther walking away clean... do you ever think about throwing in the towel? Just saying to hell with all of it?"

Noah considered the question seriously. The weight of incomplete justice, of corruption that went unpunished, of a system that protected the powerful while discarding the honest, it was enough to break anyone who thought about it too long.

"Every day," he said finally. "But then I think about Avery. About that family that died at Wallface getting some measure of recognition, even if it's too late. About Dale's victims getting justice, even if it came at a terrible cost."

"Partial victories."

"Better than no victories at all."

From across the firepit, Ed's voice carried over the crackling flames. "All right, you two, let me show you the real deal. This is the call that won me first place at the Whitehall Sasquatch Calling Contest."

He cupped hands around his mouth, and produced a call that was deeper, more resonant than anything he'd demonstrated before. It echoed across the water, and seemed to hang in the air for long seconds before fading into the forest.

In the sudden silence that followed, they all listened to the night sounds, the gentle lap of water against the shore, the soft rustle of wind through the trees, the distant cry of a loon somewhere across the lake.

Then, from deep in the forest beyond their campsite, something answered.

The sound was similar to Ed's call but different, wilder, more primal, with a quality that seemed to come from something that had never learned to imitate human sounds, only to respond to them.

Mia and Ethan stopped laughing.

Ed froze, his hands still cupped around his mouth. Noah felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up, not from fear but from the recognition that they were hearing something that didn't belong in any field guide.

"Was that...?" Ethan whispered.

Ed lowered his hands slowly. "I've been doing this for thirty years," he said quietly. "That wasn't an echo."

He raised his hands again and produced another call, this one shorter, more tentative. They all held their breath, waiting.

The response came faster this time, closer, with a timbre that suggested something large moving through the trees just beyond the reach of their firelight.

Callie reached over and took Noah's hand without taking her eyes off the forest. Mia and Ethan moved closer to the fire, their earlier laughter replaced by wonder and a healthy dose of nervousness.

"Should we—" Mia started to ask.

“What?" Noah replied softly. "Go investigate? Chase it through the woods with flashlights?"

After everything they'd been through, the human monsters, the institutional corruption, the violence that people could inflict on each other in the name of justice or revenge or simple greed, the idea that something unknown and possibly unknowable might exist in these woods felt almost comforting.

The forest had gone quiet again, but it was a different kind of silence now. The kind that suggested something was listening, watching, considering whether to reveal itself or fade back into legend.

They sat around the fire for another hour, talking in whispers, listening to the night sounds, waiting to see if their mysterious respondent would call again. But the forest kept its secrets, offering nothing more than the ordinary sounds of wind and water and the settling of old trees.

Eventually, the fire burned down to embers, and they began the process of banking it for the night. As Noah helped Ed secure the campsite, the older man paused and looked back toward the forest.

"You know what I think?" Ed said quietly.

"What's that?"

"I think there are things in these woods that don't want to be found. Things that are better left alone."

Noah recalled the note left on his windshield.

Noah followed Ed’s gaze into the darkness between the trees, thinking about all the secrets these mountains held, some exposed, some buried, some that would never be fully understood.

"Maybe that's for the best," he said.

As they settled into their tents for the night, the lake lapped gently against the shore, the stars wheeled overhead, and somewhere in the vast wilderness around them, mysteries endured.

Noah fell asleep to the sound of water and wind, holding onto the memory of that otherworldly response echoing through the trees.

In the morning, they would break camp and return to a world of incomplete justice and imperfect systems, but for now, in the heart of the wilderness, other possibilities lingered just beyond the firelight.

The mountains kept their secrets.

And perhaps that was as it should be.

THANK YOU FOR READING

If you enjoyed that, please take a second to leave a rating and review, both help, it’s really appreciated. Book eight will be out in the fall of 2025.

Thanks kindly, Jack.