Some stories don't want to be told. Some truths refuse to stay buried. Investigative reporter Kate Chisholm travels to the quiet town of Ruppert Hills, Missouri to cover a grisly discovery at an abandoned grain mill. What starts as a routine assignment quickly becomes something more unsettling. The townspeople are polite but guarded. Questions are deflected. History is rewritten. And beneath the surface of everyday life, Kate senses a tension she can't quite explain. It's as if the entire town is waiting for something.Her investigation leads her toward buried stories tied to the Trail of Tears, a reclusive shopkeeper and medicine woman who insists some wounds never stopped bleeding. At the same time, Kate struggles to understand her husband's disturbing return from captivity overseas and the impossible pregnancy that follows. As strange shadows move where nothing should exist, and something stirs in the black muck of the grain mill, Kate realizes Ruppert Hills is not just hiding secrets. It's preserving them.And when the truth finally reveals itself, escape may no longer be possible-for her or her unborn child. A published author with a knack for twisted tales, Stephanie Ayers is a full-time world-building ninja and part time freelancer living in Ohio while crafting her own story and resists growing up at all costs. She mothers her children, loves her husband, attends church, and avoids all things housework and zombies. When she isn't doing any of these things, she can be found in Creative Cloud designing book covers, promotional graphics, logos and more.Stephanie has been a regular contributor and leader for Bloggy Moms and Just Be Enough, and currently writes content for Blogmutt and IAPWE.Her debut novella, Til Death Do Us Part, was published by Bannerwing Books in 2013, and her work appears in several anthologies and collections, notably Precipice 2, Flash Fiction: 1x50x100, and Endless Darkness. Her poetry has been featured in Ambrosia: A Poetry Anthology, and her first solo collection of horror stories released in October 2017.
