Chapter One: See Riley’s troubles unfold

“Thank you, goodbye.” Ben said. The then hung up the phone and turned to Riley.
“Don’t worry Riley, you’re pizza will be here soon.” he reassured him. Riley sighed in relief; he had been waiting for Ben to call for pizza for the last hour and now he could finally stop worrying if it was going to happen or not.
“Riley!” came the frustrated call of an annoyed blond who was inhabiting the doorway of the kitchen with a look of great annoyance on her face. Riley ducked behind Ben for protection from the blonds’ wrath.
“What is it this time?” Ben asked in an amused tone.
“I found another one of his boxes of junk lying on the front porch.” Abigail was very frustrated with Riley and his never ending boxes of supposed junk. And she had had to deal with them for the last week while Riley had been moving in.
“They are not junk.” Riley said as he came out from his spot of cowering and faced Abby with an attitude that would have made anyone roll their eyes; and that’s just what Abigail did. She muttered a ‘whatever’ as Riley passed her on his way to go and pick up the box.
Just before he was about to open the door the doorbell rang. He then did what he was going to do anyways and opened the door to reveal a woman dressed in business like clothes holding a brief case.
“Is this the home of Abigail Chase?” she asked in a formal manner. Riley nodded his head.
“I’m here to help with the planning of the wedding ceremony.” this time she said it as if Riley was a little kid and wouldn’t understand what she was saying unless she spoke in a high pitched voice. Just then Ben came up from behind Riley.
“Abby’s on the phone right now but she will be with up in a minute. Would you mind waiting in the parlor?” the woman didn’t object and was led by Ben into the house. Riley then picked up his box and opened the lid. Inside were at least a dozen pictures of his ex-girl friend, Rachel. She had worshipped him when she had found out that he was the author of a book; but then after about a month of dating she got tired of him and moved on to the next boy standing in line. Yeah, Abby was right, this box was junk. But Riley didn’t have the heart to throw the pictures away in public and so he closed the front door and made his way up the stairs. When he got to his room he set the box down on the bed and sat next to it. He then reopened it and started unloading the contents. When he was done throwing the pictures away he noticed Ben standing in his doorway.
“Abigail wanted me to inform you that he sister will be arriving tomorrow to stay here until the wedding so that Abby has some more help with it.” he told him.
“Isn’t the wedding in two months?” Riley asked. He obviously didn’t realize how much time girls spent to just pick out one color of ribbon.
“Yeah, but she is the maid of honor and so she also needs to know about everything that is going to be happening. If you ask me I just think that you are driving Abby crazy and she needs to have someone around who can drive you off.” Ben said. Riley started to laugh but then realized that Ben was serious.
“Is her sister… you know… like…” Riley was having trouble finding the right word that would describe the mood and tone that he often received from Abigail.
“Riley I think you might like her.” Riley grimaced. He knew exactly what she was going to be like; and he defiantly knew he wouldn’t like her.
“Riley just give her a chance.” Ben insisted.
“Ben. I know what she’s going to be like. She’s going to be one: blond, two: very bossy, and three: an annoying know-it-all.” Riley told him. Ben just rolled his eyes at his friends’ judgment and left Riley to his own thoughts once more.


“Okay, I’ll make sure to be nice; yeah I’ll bring the fabric samples. Gosh Abby! You must think that I’m a baby. Fine, I’ll be there tomorrow. Bye.” Stephanie Chase hung up the phone with an exasperated sigh. Her sister was only three years older than her and yet she treated her as if she was a kid.
Stephanie’s life was such a rollercoaster; and it would become even worse now that she had her new job in Washington D.C. Her work life had always been rather interesting. When she had been in college she had been an intern at the FBI but after graduation she had then gotten the travel bug and wanted to go and see another part of the world. To do this she went on many archeological digs in many different countries. Then she settled down in England and worked at the British Library in London. After she had gotten word from Abby that she had yet again uncovered one of history’s greatest myths she had the urge to want to do something exciting. She had then applied for a job at the CIA in Washington D.C. and had been accepted to come and work as an Intelligence Collection Analyst and work on the occasional case. Now she was going to be moving in with Abby and her husband-to-be Ben, until she could find somewhere closer to her job.
“We will be landing soon miss, you might want to buckle up.” a flight attendant told her. Stephanie took her suggestion to heart and did up her seat belt. She then smiled to herself; flying was wonderful and she loved the feeling that she got in her stomach when they took off and landed.

“Abby! Wow, you look great!” Stephanie said as she hugged her sister whom she had just found waiting for her in the airport parking lot.
“Thanks Steph. You know, even though I love the new look but Mom and Dad aren’t going to like what you did to your beautiful brown hair.” Abigail said. Stephanie just rolled her eyes and lifted one of her eight suitcases into her sisters’ car.
“I have some boxes that came over on the mail plane that will be sent tonight.” she told Abby as she tried to change the subject. Abby didn’t drop the subject of her hair until she realized that Stephanie was not interested in what she would look like if she were a blond.
Soon the black minivan that belonged to Abigail was driving up to the front porch of a magnificent house. It had extensive grounds and the structure of the building was breath taking. Stephanie got out of the car once Abby had parked it and pulled down her white ruffled blouse. She felt self conscious all of the sudden to be walking into a house that was as magnificent as this one was.
“Stephanie, are you coming?” Abigail asked impatiently to the 22 year old that was standing aimlessly in the middle of the driveway. Stephanie walked towards the open doorway and past Abigail. This ended her up in the hallway facing a guy who looked about her age and was wearing sweats and a t-shirt that accompanied his messy hair and glasses.

Riley couldn’t believe that the girl standing in front of him was Abigail’s sister. She was not blond, but had red hair with blond highlights, dark brown eyes, and was not trying to tell him to go and get cleaned up like Abby was currently doing. Then just before he was about to go upstairs to follow Abigail’s strict orders she changed her mind and told him to go and help Stephanie-apparently that was her sisters’ name- take her bags up to her room. He then followed Stephanie out to the car and saw that there were eight suitcases.
“You pack light.” he said sarcastically. The red head just rolled her eyes and picked up two of her suit cases before heading back to the house.
Getting all of the suitcases upstairs and to her room was tiring work and soon Stephanie was sitting with her feet up on the counter of the kitchen while she ate some cookie dough ice cream. She had met Ben earlier and thought that he was nice and funny but he was not cute at all. Then there was Riley who was very cute but he obviously didn’t like her. And maybe it was just her imagination but she thought that she saw him glaring at her while she ate her ice cream. She then looked over at the man sitting at the dining room table. Nope it wasn’t her imagination, he was glaring at her. She had no idea why so she just came out and asked him.
“Why are you glaring at me?” she was a very extrovert person and had no fear of just coming out and asking something.
“Because… you are eating the last of the ice cream.” Riley knew it was a lame excuse but he didn’t want to tell her that he was glaring at her because she was a walking contradiction of his prediction of what she would be like.
Stephanie rolled her eyes. He was such a bad liar. She could tell because of the tone of voice he was using and the way that his eyes had kind of bugged out what he had paused between the words because and you. While she had been training for the FBI she had studied on how to tell if someone was lying or not for a brief time.
After she had finished with her ice cream she took a cookie and then made her way back up to her room to start unpacking. Half way up the stairs her cell phone started to ring and so she sat down and answered it.
“Hello?”
“Is this Stephanie Chase?” she recognized the person on the other end of the conversation as her new boss.
“Yes it is, how can I help you?” she asked.
“This is Percy Teaks, the head of the Intelligence Collection part of the CIA and we need your help right away.” his voice sounded urgent.
“Okay, I’ll be there in half n’ hour.” she told him. They both hung up and she hurried to find Abigail to see if she could take her car. She found her in the living room looking at pictures of reception halls.
“Hey Abby, my job needs me to be there right now, can I take your car?” she asked hurriedly.
“No, Ben has it. But I’m sure that Riley can take you, right Riley.” Abby said in a threatening voice. Riley who was entering the room carrying a plate of cookies and some milk let his shoulders slump and agreed half-heartedly.
The drive in Riley’s’ Ferrari would have been absolutely fantastic if he hadn’t spent the whole ride complaining that he shouldn’t have to play chauffeur to Stephanie and that it was just wasting gas and polluting the environment. Stephanie just wanted the ride to end and thankfully it did after they had gone through centuries of traffic and whining. Riley was surprised though when she directed him towards the CIA Intelligence building. And before they went inside she made him swear not to tell anyone that she worked for the CIA. Once inside they were directed to Mr. Teaks’s office.
“Thank you for getting here so quickly Stephanie. Now if your friend could just wait outside while we talk I would appreciate it.” he said indicating to Riley. Riley then went out and shut the door.
“Now, I know that you aren’t supposed to start working quite yet but we need someone with experience to take on this job.” Stephanie nodded her head to indicate that she understood.
“We have gotten word that someone was mining illegally in Montreal, Canada. Apparently there is a suggested mine there and someone took advantage of it being only suggested and was mining uranium, an element commonly used in nuclear weapons. We were going to go in and stop them when they suddenly disappeared. They left lots of evidence but no one has been able to make anything out of It.” he explained.
“So you want me to find out what it means.” Stephanie thought out loud.
“Yes, now you will be given the evidence in a box and be allowed to work on it at your home or at the office.” he said. She took this as her dismissal and left the room. She ignored Riley’s pestering and went and picked up the box at the front desk before leaving to go back to the house.
“So are you going to tell me what is in the box yet?” Riley asked, glancing at her briefly before putting his eyes back on the road.
“Nope.” She told him. He pouted and debated on just pulling over and dumping her on the side of the road while he drove home to see what was in the box. And while it was very tempting, he resisted the urge because he knew that he didn’t want to face the wrath of Abby and her red-head sister until he was ready to pass onto the next life.