Chasing Amanda Read Online Free PDF

twirled her spaghetti and stared intently into the little chunks of tomato in the sauce. Anytime she appeared worried or showed the littlest bit of apprehension in her confidence, Cole drew a connection to Amanda. She hated hearing the accusation in his words but knew she could not divulge the truth. The guilt ate at her so deeply it burned. “I just had a feeling, that’s all.” She couldn’t tell him about the pressure as she had entered the woods or the visions that had engulfed her while she was running. Cole had never fully believed that she experienced visions, and she worried about how he’d immediately categorize her, as he had with her visions of Amanda, like a patient. As a physician, he believed in facts, tangible data—not paranormal episodes.
    “Is that all? Nothing else?” he asked.
    “No,” she said, swallowing the desire to tell him everything. The need to keep her thoughts to herself saddened her. “I need to call Erik.” She abruptly got up from the table, set her full plate onto the counter, and left the kitchen before the truth could escape.
    “Of course you do.”
    Molly heard the rustle of the newspaper and the clank of fork to plate behind her.
     
    Upstairs, Molly paced, her desire to call Erik forgotten, replaced with frustration. She knew Cole was right, her emotions were at risk. Her mind retraced the steps of the search, circling back to Hannah’s actions, whose quick retreat nagged at her. She pushed the curtains to the side and looked out the window into the evening at the sunset. Staring into the vast woods beyond her yard, she realized that Stealth and Trigger’s disappearance provided the perfect excuse for her to get out and investigate.
    Her heartbeat picked up momentum as she grabbed her flashlight and notepad and stuffed them into her printed fabric backpack. I’ll do this for Amanda, she thought. She threw the duffle over her shoulder and crept downstairs. Hearing the television in the family room, she circled around and grabbed her car keys off of the entrance table. “Honey,” she called out, “I’m going to look for Stealth and Trigger.” As an afterthought, she grabbed their leashes from the hook and hurried out the door.
     
    Cole heard the door shut and worried about what his wife wasn’t telling him. He remembered the morning of October 12, nine years earlier.
    Molly had been sleeping fitfully toward the morning hours. When she’d finally awakened, she’d been scared and shaking. She’d anxiously relayed a dream she’d had of the little girl she’d seen in a parking lot days before. In the dream, the child screamed and cried, frenzied with terror. He had told her that it was her subconscious working overtime, and he’d gone on with his day. The next morning, she had again been tossing and turning. When she’d awakened, she’d stared straight ahead, tears streamed from her eyes. As if in a trance, she’d described her nightmare, the searing pain that ripped through the little girl’s body, the stale smell of alcohol and sweat pouring off of the man’s body as he climbed off of the damaged child, the knife being drawn from its sheath, glistening as it plunged through the air and into the child’s chest. Again, he’d rationalized. It was just her subconscious fears—she’d seen a stressful scene between father and daughter, and her mind had run with it.
    He had gone about his morning routine, and Molly had been furious, accusing him of not caring, not believing in her. It wasn’t until two hours later, when he’d picked up the newspaper and seen the headline, “Body of Amanda Curtis Found,” that finally, after all of those years of his wife professing that she had some strange type of sixth sense, he pondered, truly considered, the possibility that she was empowered, or hindered, with some sort of ESP that he could not comprehend.
    Cole stuffed the memory into his subconscious, not wanting to revisit the tumultuous years that almost tore their