Echoes Of Memory by Sara Driscoll (EXCERPT)

Hi, readers! This week, we have a terrific excerpt from a new standalone thriller, Echoes Of Memory by Sara Driscoll.

After surviving a terrible attack, Quinn Fleming has recovered in every way but one—her ability to retain new memories. Now, months later, it appears to the outside world as if the San Diego florist’s life is back to normal. But Quinn is barely holding on, relying on a notebook she carries with her at all times, a record of her entire existence since the assault. So when she witnesses a murder in the shadowy alley behind the florist shop, Quinn immediately writes down every terrifying detail of the incident before her amnesia wipes it away.

By the time the police arrive, there’s no body, no crime scene and no clues. The killing seems as erased from reality as it is from Quinn’s mind… until the flashbacks begin. Suddenly, fragments of memories are surfacing—mere glimpses of that horrible night, but enough to convince Quinn that somewhere, locked in her subconscious, is the key to solving the case… and she’s not the only one who knows. Somebody else has realized Quinn is a threat that needs to be eliminated. Now, with her life on the line and only her notes to guide her, Quinn sets out to find a killer she doesn’t remember but can’t forget.

Read on for an illuminating excerpt that perfectly depicts Quinn’s struggle!

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Officer Clark unsnapped the flap on a pouch on his utility belt and pulled out a notebook with a black leather cover. He flipped open the cover and extracted a pen. “I’d like you to walk me through what happened this evening.”

Quinn took him through her steps in taking out the trash, and then showed him where she’d hidden between the two dumpsters. When she would have slipped between them to demonstrate, he caught her arm. “We’ll stay out here. I’d like the crime scene techs to be able to access the site untouched.”

That’s part of the crime scene? Didn’t he understand the murder took place seventy-five feet away? “Of course. I’m sorry. I’ve never done this before.”

“Please show me exactly where the incident occurred. Let’s get closer, but not enter the area.”

Quinn led him down to the far end of the alley, taking care to stay far away from the site of the murder. “He came from the east, around the corner, and hid there, against the wall.” She pointed to a spot on the wall leading through the narrowest part of the alley, about fifteen feet inside the open gate. “He pressed himself against the wall, so from where I stood, I could only barely see him once he stopped moving.”

“And what did he look like? What was he wearing?”

“He was… he…” Panic rose into her throat as the picture she’d been trying to hold in her mind wavered. She pulled her notebook from her pocket. “I made notes.” She opened the book, the spine cracking ominously with her excessive force.

“We don’t need notes. I need you to tell me your impressions, not have a prepared statement. What did he look like? Tall, short, skinny, fat? Just talk to me.”

“Ummm… he…” Her breath was coming fast, and Quinn worried she’d start to hyperventilate. No help for it. She skimmed the page. “He was tall, lean. I think he may have been bald.”

“Not from your notes,” Clark said again, his voice taking on a harder edge. “Anyone can read from notes; I need to know what you saw. I don’t want a set story. You just lived it, so tell me.”

“I’m… I’m a little nervous. And I wrote everything down because I was worried I’d forget. I—” She stumbled to a halt as the approaching siren drowned out her words.

A second SDPD car pulled up to the mouth of the alley, lights flashing, as the siren cut off sharply. A man climbed out of the vehicle, spotted Clark and Quinn—and Clark’s signal of all clear—and jogged down the narrow driveway. He was young, slightly shorter and thicker than Clark, with short-cropped dark hair. “Clark.”

“Lugo. Ms. Fleming was walking me through the incident.”

Officer Lugo scanned the alley where they stood. “Where did the murder occur?”

Quinn felt two sets of eyes focus on her expectantly as Lugo impatiently cut to the chase. She pointed to the location where the alley opened up, but fell into shadows. “There.”

Lugo pulled his flashlight off his belt and flipped it on. Clenching it in a fist raised to his shoulder, he shone the light over grimy concrete, scattered garbage, and graffitied walls. He made a second pass more carefully over the wall—which was filthy but bore no obvious signs of violence—and then the concrete. “Got some piss here. But that could have come from any homeless guy passing through.” He turned back to Quinn. “Tell us what happened.”

“The victim entered the alley and pressed against the wall there.”

“A man?” Lugo asked.

“Yes.” A quick glance at her notes. “He was tall. Slender. Kind of a wiry build.” She looked up to find Clark frowning down at her notebook but pushed onward. “Short hair or bald. Seemed nervous.”

“Did he speak?”

“No. When I saw him come into the alley, I thought he was coming for me and I hid over there”—she indicated the dumpsters at the far end—“but then I realized he hadn’t seen me. He was watching for someone else.”

“What makes you say that?”

“His body language. He moved . . . furtively. And then pressed against the wall like he was trying to disappear.”

Clark paused his writing, his pen suspended over his notepad. “How long until the second person appeared?”

“Maybe a minute? Or only slightly longer?”

“A man?”

That one she was sure of. “Yes.”

“And what did he look like?”

Another furtive notebook check, this one taking longer as she lost her place and had to find that exact piece of information. “He was bigger. Dressed all in black. Moved very—”

“Look at me.”

Quinn froze and then forced herself to peer up at Clark.

“Keep your eyes on me. How did he move?”

“Aggressively.”

“What happened next? No. Don’t look at your notes. What happened next?”

“He attacked the man in the alley.”

“How?”

“He… uh…” She closed her eyes and concentrated. It was like the memory was trapped behind frosted glass, indistinct, and rapidly dissolving. It was terrifying to feel it sifting through her fingers like sand. She’d never tried to retain a single specific memory for any length of time. Usually, she moved through her day and then when she tried to think back, it was gone.

This was like watching someone die by inches as the last seconds of a man’s life disintegrated in real time.

But the more she pushed, the harder panic clawed along her spine, catching her breath and freezing her blood, the more the memory slipped out of reach.

There was no choice but to tell them. “Look, after I witnessed the murder, I went inside and wrote everything down. Sometimes my memory isn’t good, especially when I’m under stress, so I wanted to make sure I captured everything.”

“The incident just happened. I want you to tell me what you saw. Not what you have in your little script—”

“It’s not a script!”

“—you possibly wrote a couple of hours ago, or someone wrote for you—”

“That’s not it at all!”

“Prove it to us. Put the book away and tell us what happened. In your own words.”

“These are my words.” She looked from one man to the other, read suspicion in both expressions. “Let me walk you through it.” She barreled on, openly reading from her notes, describing the scene she’d witnessed in all the detail she could include. A knot tangled in her stomach at the growing unfamiliarity of the tale she told, and she stumbled several times in the telling as she looked up and caught the eye of one of the officers.

She was losing their attention. Losing their trust.

She trailed off at the end of her description and for a moment silence hung heavy between them, broken only by the ambient sounds around them of the city at play on a weekend evening. Finally, Clark slid his notebook into its pouch on his utility belt and grabbed his own flashlight. Standing well back from one end of the area Quinn had indicated, he carefully examined every inch of ground. Lugo started at the far end, and they slowly worked toward each other.

Quinn stood behind them, silent, her arms wrapped around herself, her notebook still clasped in her white-knuckled fist. She’d finished her tale, but wasn’t yet ready to let go of her single support system.

Finally, only feet apart, they stopped. Quinn caught the glance that passed between the two men and interpreted what it communicated—no blood, no bullet holes, no clear signs of a scuffle. Essentially no crime scene. Was there really a crime? When they turned to stare at her, she saw the rest of their conclusion. Not only was there no trace of a crime, but they had a single witness who couldn’t tell them what happened without referring to a “script.”

They didn’t believe her.

It was Clark who finally broke the silence. “We’d like you to go back into the flower shop. Make sure the doors are locked, and please wait there for us. We’re going to wait for crime scene techs to arrive to go over this alley with a fine-toothed comb. Then we’ll come find you. Can you do that for us?” His tone wasn’t cruel or derogatory, simply detached as he dealt with someone who was doing nothing more than wasting the department’s precious time.

“Yes.” Her voice sounded small and defeated, even to her own ears. Which in turn only fed the shame roiling inside her.

“Thanks.” Turning away from her, the men walked toward the SUV at the end of the alley, and into the wash of flashing red and blue lights illuminating the growing crowd on the far side of the car.

Quinn returned to the rear door of the shop and let herself into the quiet, fragrant space. Then simply hung her head and blinked back the tears burning her eyes and blurring her vision.

The man who died had one person who could have given law enforcement some clue as to what happened to him, one person who could have helped bring justice—to him, to his family, to those he’d loved, and who’d loved him in return.

One person. Her.

She’d failed.

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From Echoes Of Memory by Sara Driscoll. Copyright © 2024 by the author and reprinted by permission.

Echoes Of Memory by Sara Driscoll was published today July 23 2024 by Kensington Books and is available from all good booksellers, including