Page 73 of The Premonition at Withers Farm

Molly jabbed at the laptop screen with more force than needed. She blinked a few times to clear her senses. “When I looked up the Cornfield Ripper—and there’s not much online about him—I also found that after the Withers sisters were murdered, there was another attack. But it wasn’t tied to the Cornfield Ripper. He didn’t claim it.”

“Doesn’t mean he didn’t do it.”

Molly smirked. “Well, maybe it does.”

Trent yawned lazily, although Molly could tell he was listening. “Hey. I’m glad something’s got your interest, but—why this? It’s not exactly calming bedtime reading.”

Molly shut her laptop and set it on the bedside table. “We live in the Withers house.” Dare she curl into his side like old times? She hesitated.

“I know.” His voice dropped. He was expecting an argument. Molly could sense him bracing for it.

“January was murdered.”

“Yeah.”

“Do the police know why?”

“They’re not saying anything, but that’s typical in an investigation.”

“What if she stumbled onto something—about the Cornfield Ripper?”

“Molly, the Cornfield Ripper didn’t come back from the dead to kill January.” Trent looked pained as he said it. Molly could tell he was recalling finding his cousin—in the ditch—by a cornfield—stabbed...

“There’s no correlation.” Trent reached over and flicked off the light. He nestled into his pillow. “Something else happened to my cousin.”

“I’m sorry,” Molly whispered.

“What?” His voice was equally as soft.

The darkness enveloped them in a warm, intoxicating embrace.

Molly dared to roll onto her side. She reached out and laidher hand on his abdomen. Trent’s muscles twitched beneath her touch. “I’m sorry.” She whispered the words again. For exactly what, she wasn’t even sure. Empathy for January’s death? Apologies for her standoffish behavior? Mutual grief for the babies they would never know.

Trent’s chest rose and fell in a deep silence. “Yeah. Me too.”

Those words. So incomplete and yet so full.

It was a start, wasn’t it?

Death required resolution in all aspects of life. The only problem was, often that resolution never came, or its answers and reasons why fell far short of satisfactory.

Maybe that was why death fascinated people. It was the not knowing why. Why did someone kill? Why did someone die? Why did God allow evil to exist? Why...

Why. The unanswerable question of the ages.

Molly started as Trent rolled onto his side. In the darkness, he reached for her. Maybe there was hope after all? At least a possibility?

23

The chickens were perturbed about something.

Molly tugged on her rain boots and trudged across the yard toward the coop. Sue and Alex were squawking like they wanted to raise the dead—and Molly didn’t need more of that!—and the others were flustered, a flurry of feathers dotting the yard.

“Oh no.” Molly increased her pace. If a fox or a raccoon had gotten into the coop... She had locked the chickens and her “boy”—the rooster—in last night, but she knew Trent would have let them out before he left for his job at Clapton Bros. Farms.

Fox and coon didn’t hunt during the morning hours, did they?

She hoped not.