scientist Alexandra Forsythe, private investigator Darcy Allen Steele, CIA Agent Samantha St. John, Air Force Captain Josie Lockworth and Kayla Ryan, a police lieutenant.
They’d bonded while they worked hard at Athena. Tory had enjoyed the female camaraderie and the competition. At home Tory had always had to outsmart her older brother, Derrick, who liked to play tricks on her. For the most part she and Derrick had a good relationship, but he’d definitely kept her on her toes when she’d been younger.
She had gone into network news because she’d realized early on that getting answers and putting together the pieces of a puzzle were things she was good at. Her classes in archery, marksmanship and martial arts had been invigorating, but she’d really excelled in the subjects that focused on criminal procedure and investigation. She’d briefly debated going into law but in the end had decided to become a journalist. She liked writing and photography and she had a talent for getting people to open up and talk.
She opened her e-mail and found one waiting from Josie, summarizing the findings of the Cassandras’ investigation into Rainy’s death. Tory and Josie were very close friends. They seldom had time to get together in person, but they communicated via e-mail often.
The e-mail was written with a military efficiency.
To: Cassandras
RE: Rainy Miller Carrington
Facts (Recap):
In August, Rainy enacts the Cassandra promise, summoning all available Cassandras to Athens, AZ. Meeting set for the third Saturday in August at Principal Christine Evans’s bungalow at Athena Academy, 2000 hours sharp. Kayla Ryan, Darcy Steele, Alex Forsythe and Josie Lockworth are present.
Rainy dies in a car accident on her way to the meeting. Seat-belt failure contributed to the fatality. No evidence of tampering present.
Alex attends Rainy’s autopsy. She discovers that the appendectomy Rainy supposedly had in her first year at Athena never happened. Old ovarian scars show evidence of egg mining. Alex brings FBI agent Justin Cohen in on the investigation. Cohen’s sister died twenty years ago in childbirth after becoming a surrogate mother, about nine months after Rainy’s supposed appendectomy. Records show the baby died, as well. Cohen suspects Athena Academy of a conspiracy resulting in sister’s death. No proof found.
Kayla begins search of old medical records at Athena Academy for more information. Athena Academy continues to be under informal investigation. Nurse Betsy Stone potential suspect. Stone was a nurse the academy at the time of Rainy’s operation.
Darcy finds ads for surrogate mothers in Arizona papers from the months before Rainy’s operation. Hypothesis is that Rainy’s eggs were used to make a child/children. Darcy finds Cleo Patra, a woman who answered the surrogate ad and subsequently gave birth to a baby girl. The child was kidnapped. Whereabouts unknown. Attempts made on Cleo’s and Darcy’s lives. Cleo now in hiding.
Tory to investigate fertility clinic records for the time period surrounding Rainy’s operation for any possible links.
Messages left for Samantha St. John to apprise her of the situation. Sam in touch infrequently by e-mail. Whereabouts currently unknown. Everyone please keep in touch with any new information.
Josie
Tory rubbed the back of her neck. Just before Rainy had graduated, all the Cassandras had made a vow that they would all come, no questions asked, if one of the Cassandras called for help. They’d called it the Cassandra promise. Rainy had been the first to call on it, and all of the Cassandras knew that the situation must have been dire indeed for Rainy to make that call.
Tory had been in Britain in July covering a major development with Ireland when Rainy had placed the call to the Cassandras. Tory hadn’t gotten the message until it was too late. Before she had a chance to respond, Kayla had called with the news of Rainy’s death. Tory had returned to the States just in time to attend Rainy’s funeral.
Tory was still coming to terms with Rainy’s death. If only she’d known…
She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. She couldn’t go back in time and change things.
All the Cassandras were certain that Rainy’s car accident could not have been accidental. Much to their horror, the facts they’d put together indicated that Rainy’s death had something to do with Athena Academy.
Something that ex-Athena student and reporter for rival network ABS Shannon Conner had picked up on. Shannon had always been sneaky and a little under-handed when Tory and she had been at Athena.
In fact, Shannon had tried to frame Josie for theft, an event that had led Tory to the career she had today. The incident had become Tory’s first investigative case. She’d used the skills she’d acquired at Athena in criminal profiling and investigating to solve the crime, finding evidence to prove that Shannon had been the perpetrator.
Shannon had become the only student ever to be expelled from the school. And Tory knew Shannon hadn’t forgotten. She was always dogging Tory’s heels. It was funny that they’d both chosen media as a career, but on one hand it made sense. That incident with Josie had changed both women and had forced them to look hard at what they wanted.
For Tory, it was to always be a voice for those without one. To uncover the stories that had to be told.
She wasn’t sure what Shannon had taken away from the incident. But a few months ago, Shannon and her network had descended upon Rainy’s funeral and had aired an interview in which Shannon had raised questions about Rainy being used for scientific experiments while in school at Athena.
Shannon’s newscast had put the school in a bad light and had brought the school the unwanted publicity Athena had avoided since its founding more than twenty years ago. Tory had stepped in with a very up-beat piece about the school, which she hoped would counteract the negative publicity. But Shannon was still making noises about a follow-up on Athena, and Tory wasn’t going to let Shannon get away with ruining the school. Loyalty was one of the cornerstones of Tory’s life.
But even more important than neutralizing Shannon was finding out what had happened to Rainy, both now and in the past.
Darcy Steele had tracked down a surrogate mother who had carried a baby that might have been Rainy’s. All the Cassandras were committed to finding the child. Tory had promised to look into the ads and use her news sources to look for leads through fertility clinic records.
Kids scared her on so many levels. Another plus to dating Perry was that he had two grown kids from a previous relationship and he wasn’t looking to make her into a wife and mother. Tory freely admitted that settling down wasn’t in the cards for her. There were too many stories for her to cover to willingly give up her career for a husband and kids.
But she would do everything in her power to find Rainy’s baby. Tory frowned. That “baby” would be about twenty-one years old now. If he or she existed at all.
She’d researched a two-year window around the time the ads had run. And kept narrowing the search until she’d found something interesting—a break-in at a fertility clinic in Arizona about three months before Rainy’s surgery. She wasn’t sure it meant anything, so she’d sent the information to an old college friend, Lee Chou. Lee worked for the FBI crime lab in D.C. and was an expert at unraveling mysteries. Though Alex also worked for the FBI, she didn’t know Lee. And Tory knew that because
