LITMIR.BIZ

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the comfort of her own apartment, surrounded by the familiar, Francesca settled into the window seat with her laptop, taking a moment to peer down at the busy street below her. In the heart of the downtown core, the view afforded her the greatest science experiment of all—watching people in their natural habitat.

      After graduate school, and her training with the FBI in Quantico, Francesca was stationed within the Richmond field office to handle some of the toughest profiling cases ever to cross an agent’s desk.

      While that usually led her to work with murderers, and she had a knack within the specialty of fingerprinting serial and spree killers, her profiling skills extended to hunting down a variety of cases handed to her. Serial offenders, no matter what the charge, were some of the trickiest individuals out there when it came to the professional world of crime. But it was always the tough ones Francesca thrived on solving, loving that sense of accomplishment that would arrive when a case closed. Even though the success of one case was short-lived with the assignment of another case to crack, those minuscule moments were worth it all, reminders that her work was valued not only within the FBI, but as a productive role in society.

      No matter where an assignment took her or how difficult a case she was dealt, it was her modest home retreat where she worked best, enjoying the calm it could bring in between cases, and the quiet it could shed on an overactive mind.

      It was something coworkers had commented on far too many times. Francesca’s inability to leave work at work, and save the moments at home as some sort of spa-like sanctuary. Sure, it all sounded great in theory. Turning off the working mind entirely, however, was easier said than done.

      This, though, was nothing to complain about, as far as she was concerned. Her mind had a way of mysteriously working, even in her sleep, and putting together the puzzle pieces of profiling cases was something she lived for. It was her passion. Her obsession. Her purpose.

      And really, Chesca had so little of a social life outside of her colleagues and keeping in touch with connections made through Athena Academy, that her downtime away from work was…well, mostly focused on work. It was a stark contrast to the socialite home life she was reared in as a child, that’s for sure. But working the big cases had become her life’s carrot. It’s what made her feel whole.

      Smart enough to realize life couldn’t be all work and no play, Francesca did her best to make her home environment as comfortable as possible, so that she had the best of both worlds.

      It may have been considered a working playground by some, but to her it was a haven away from the office chaos. A place to concentrate. Formulate ideas. Connect the dots. And it was comfy as hell.

      Though the domestic environment of her childhood home was of museum quality—harsh lines, stuffy upholsteries, over-the-top everything—Chesca preferred comfort over style when it came to home fashions. Usually this applied to her personal wardrobe as well. What was the point in having a pricy settee that no one would dare touch? Not that she entertained guests often. Which further emphasized the point of making sure her abode was the most comfortable and casual it could be.

      The ultrasuede couch was her most beloved furnishing in the small but ample apartment, nearly seeming overstuffed and oversized for the one-bedroom, second-floor unit. But the collection of throws, mixed-and-matched textures of pillows, and a well-placed shag carpet all catered to the sense of feeling swept off her feet.

      Perhaps it was the deliberate contrast of her upbringing that led her to prefer comfort, practicality and function. Whether she was working on an all-night caseload, or drifting off to late-night infomercials, it didn’t matter so long as she could put her feet up, let her back slide into cushiony softness, and feel…at home.

      Despite her reputation for being career-focused, Francesca was often regarded as a “what you see is what you get” kind of person, her simple lifestyle contrasting with the often-complex cases she’d encounter in her work world.

      Alex Forsythe, fellow Athena grad and FBI forensics colleague to Francesca, had often said she admired this trait in her friend, knowing no matter how complicated the world around them could get sometimes, there was nothing better than counting on a good, solid friendship that was as clear as day, and hassle-free.

      Which is exactly how Chesca preferred to keep her living situation. Hassle-free. While a substantial section of her urban apartment was dedicated as a workstation, stacked with files, case histories, and tools of the trade, this never cluttered her comfortable environment, or took over the meaning of her home.

      Bringing work home, and letting it clutter her life were two very different things, and Chesca always made sure that no matter how tough a case she was working on, she knew when to file something away for the night, and how to file something as “out of sight, out of mind.”

      That’s why it was so important to her to feel completely at ease in her no-nonsense style, and let the warm earthy tones of her chosen décor act as a backdrop for her office away from work. Plush decorative pillows, simple but soft fabrics, and a carpet that hugged her bare toes as she paced back and forth mentally dissecting criminal evidence allowed her to relax, focus, and get the job done while casually clad in cotton boxers or her favorite jeans.

      The bare bones but earthy warmth of home was often all she needed to zone into whatever her mind needed to tackle.

      But there was little peace within her mind as she sat in the window seat today, watching people below, their faces just a glazed blur as her mind reeled around something much more pressing.

      The assignment from Oracle.

      Since returning from the case in Baton Rouge, Chesca had managed to have a full day to unpack, unwind and await further information from her extracurricular employment.

      Delphi had sent a message informing Chesca a courier would soon be delivering further information pertaining to the assignment, and the only additional hint of what was to come was the mention of something very important to Francesca. Something that would hit close to home with the many women associated with Athena Academy and all those who fought to see it succeed.

      She would be profiling the notorious blackmailer Arachne, determining whether she was one and the same as the Queen of Hearts assassin.

      The name Arachne was enough to raise the blood pressure of just about any of Francesca’s social circle. With her cover blown, it was now understood Arachne was behind the recent student kidnappings in an attempt to bring down the Academy.

      Putting a face to the name would be Francesca’s goal, not only as part of her assignment from Oracle, but to finalize the fight her fellow Athenians had been trying to win for far too long.

      Quite honestly, it was an honor to have been assigned this case by Oracle. The intel organization could have called on any of its recruits for such an assignment, but for some reason Delphi had made her selection, and Francesca was not only flattered, but personally determined to do whatever it would take to be of assistance.

      Francesca wasn’t the only Athena grad to be recruited by the network, though she had little indication of who the others were, what their roles were, or why they were selected. It was rare to hear of a fellow agent’s work, though it wasn’t entirely unheard of.

      For everyone’s safety, she presumed the details of the operation had to be kept secret. The one thing all participants knew, though, was the extreme importance of the intelligence gathering it conducted, as it did its part in fighting for justice even when standard institutions such as the FBI, NSA or CIA backed away.

      No one really understood how the information was distributed within Oracle. Only that when an agent had carried through with an assignment, a full report was to be given to Delphi, the enigmatic handler of the operation.

      Though Francesca had her suspicions from time to time, she didn’t admit to having a clue of who Delphi might be in reality. Of course it was a code name. But if she was meant to know, she would in time.

      For the most part, Francesca had let her analytical mind piece together what she imagined the inner workings of the organization to be, but there was little she knew as honest-to-goodness

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