Page 107 of The Premonition at Withers Farm
Notes of observations of women that had to be speaking of the Withers sisters.
Perliett Van Hilton.
His victims.
“There’s no statute of limitations in Michigan,” Dan stated. He pushed his glasses up his nose. His hair was cropped short, his goatee trimmed. He reached across the distance between his chair and Sid’s. They linked hands. Molly realized they probably didn’t even recognize they’d done it. It was instinctual. Dan continued, “Murder can still be penalized.”
“I’m going out on a limb in saying that the Cornfield Ripper of 1910 is dead,” Sid said with a smirk.
Dan was a literalist. He nodded, missing the humor. “True. But there are generations of family who may still be seeking closure.”
Molly glanced at Trent. There was about a foot between them. He was freshly showered from farm work. He smelled good. He hadn’t said a word about her impulsive emoji text. Warmth crept up her neck. Now she felt as if she’d sent him something inappropriate. Guilty. Embarrassed rather. He could at least give her a wink. Just a wink.
“We owe it to Kilbourn to turn the diary in to the authorities.” Trent’s words held conclusion in them. “It’s not ours to keep.”
“But it was on your property.”
Molly could tell Sid wanted to keep it. Ew. “I don’t want it,” she said and shook her head. Not in her fragile state. She still needed to find the gumption to tell Trent ... well,everything. Until she told Trent, Molly knew she wasn’t going to completely rest. But it was a confession that, while most would say was embracing her mental struggles and agreeing it was okay to not be all right, Molly felt was opening the Pandora’s box they had danced around since their first miscarriage.
“Why is the killer’s diary on the Withers farm?” Trent’s question sliced through Molly’s straying thoughts.
She jerked back to attention.
Sid straightened. “I’ve been wondering the same thing. Doesn’t it mean the killerwason the Withers farm?”
“But what does any of this do in resolving your cousin’s death?” Dan prompted, drawing them all back from the past’s crime to the present. “You ladies were searching for clues about that missing woman January Rabine had been investigating. Instead, you once again stumble onto the murders of 1910.”
“They have to be linked somehow,” Sid concluded.
“How?” Molly bit her fingernail. She couldn’t peel her eyes from that awful book of nursery rhymes. From the killer’s pencil-sketched handwriting. That they were a few miles away and safely ensconced in a much more recently built farmhouse gave Molly relief from feeling like dead eyes were watching her from the corners, but still. A link?
“Linking murders from 1910 to a missing woman in 1982 to the murder of January today?” Trent blew out a huge breath, stretching his arms over his head, then draping his left arm over the back of the couch.
Molly could feel his hand on the cushion behind her neck even though his skin didn’t touch hers. She could feel the warmth. Feel Trent.
Dan adjusted in his chair, reaching for a cup of decaf coffee and slurping it before he spoke. “I did some research for Sid today.”
“My hero.” Sid offered him a corny smile.
He returned it. “Well, it was a relief to take a break from coding. Anyway, I dug into Tamera Nichols’s history—at least what I could find. She was a transient worker. Hailed from Madison. She had been waitressing at a diner in Kilbourn that’s closed now. Apparently, she worked there for about three months before she disappeared. After a brief investigation, authorities concluded she had purposefully disappeared.”
“But her family still reported her missing?” Trent squirmed. He was tired. Molly could sense it.
She stilled when his hand slid down the back cushion of the couch and his thumb touched the skin at the back of her neck. A light touch, but it sent electricity through her to her toes. A deep part of her ached. A longing. To be close again. To be his best friend again. To know Trent in the way she had when they had shared dreams instead of loss, happiness instead of bitterness...
“I contacted Brianna Nichols.” Dan was still explaining, unaware of the sparks that were flying from Molly’s entire being.
Good gosh! Trent’s thumb stroked the back of her neck. Lightly. A caress that was absentminded yet so purposeful. Molly didn’t move for fear the slightest twitch would somehow communicate a distaste for his touch. She’d shrugged him away so many times over the last few years.
Maybe that heart-eyed, smiley-faced emoji was the beginning of miracles.
“She wrote the blog post Gemma found?” Sid inserted.
Dan nodded. “Yes. Brianna Nichols is Tamera Nichols’s younger sister. She’s always believed that something happened to Tamera—not that Tamera disappeared on purpose. In her message to me, Brianna mentioned Tamera was a loner. She was independent, a drifter. But she was devoted to their grandmother. When Tamera stopped contacting her, Brianna knew something was wrong. The family knew it too. Only there was no evidence to go on. She simply vanished.”
Molly couldn’t breathe. Trent’s index finger had joined his thumb, and now it was a mesmerizing massage of gentle strokes.
“I feel like we’re missing something obvious,” Sid stated.
