Amish Gone

By Erica Fanning

Rachel woke up one morning without her husband by her side. When she looked for him outside, she found him dead in his buggy...With her husband's business as their sole means of support, Rachel takes over and scrambles to keep things afloat. She's soon accused of his murder and realizes that she has been set up. But by whom? And will his real murderer be coming for her?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Trellis Publishing
• Release date: Jul 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201122782

Book preview

It was a bright, sunny day in the little community where Rachel Miller lived. The birds were chirping and squirrels scampered across the yard. Rachel busied herself in the garden, eagerly awaiting her husband’s return from the city. David’s furniture sold better there, so he and Rachel had agreed that he could sell in the city twice a month. Rachel always got a little queasy thinking about her husband in that big city with nothing but a horse and buggy. She was still trying to convince him to take extra safety measures, but he claimed he was a man of peace.

Guns won’t fix the hearts of men, sweetie. David had laughed at Rachel’s sour face.

Maybe not, but they sure are a good deterrent. Rachel’s family had been hunters growing up, so her views on weapons were different than most Plain people you might run into.

David had pulled Rachel in close. Honey, look... if it will make you feel better, when I come back from this trip, I will look into buying a gun for myself.

Rachel gave her husband a small smile. That’s all I ask.

All day however, Rachel had that feeling that something was wrong. She didn’t know what, but she was hoping it was nothing. After gathering the few tomatoes and green beans the garden had given her, she took them inside.

Then she heard it. The sound she’d been waiting to hear come down the long driveway all day. David had returned. She hurriedly finished what she was doing, not wanting to seem too eager to see her husband, but also trying to be as free to move about with him when he came dancing in the doorway as he was prone to do.

Something was wrong. David didn’t come in. In fact, she hadn’t even heard him leave the buggy. She went outside and she saw him leaning forward in his seat.

Maybe he’s praying, she thought. Hey you! He didn’t respond. It wasn’t until she saw that his eyes were glassy and that his skin was pale that she knew something was wrong. She quickly closed the distance and checked to see if he was breathing. Nothing.

Panic set in. What happened? Was it murder? Did he simply just die? She felt numb. What was she supposed to do? She could barely breathe.

She stumbled down the driveway and to the next house. The Stoltzfus’s were home thankfully. Rachel wasn’t sure what she would have done if she had to go much further. She pounded on the door frantically. The door flew open and that’s the last thing Rachel remembered.

Rachel woke with a start. She felt nauseous and had what some would call a killer headache. She was in the Stoltzfus’s house; Mary was caring for her while Luke was nowhere to be found.

There you are, Mary cooed. When you came to our door and suddenly passed out, we knew something must have been wrong. We had just seen David go by...

Mary stopped and suddenly the recent events came flooding into Rachel’s mind.

Someone killed him. Rachel sat up quickly and was hit with vertigo. Mary pushed her back down onto the couch.

You need to lie still. How do you know it was murder? Mary pulled some blankets over Rachel and despite not wanting to be there, she secretly enjoyed being doted on.

David was perfectly healthy. I knew from the time David left that he wasn’t going to come back to me alive. I just... didn’t expect to be the one to find him. The image of seeing his dead body filled her mind and without warning, her eyes were filled with tears. "They took