GODDESS OF THE MOON (A Diana Racine Psychic Suspense)

by Polly Iyer

  “Everyone in the group other than Crane grew up poor as dirt. Fernando Reyes’s parents were migrant workers who came over the Texas border from Mexico; Martin Easley was raised by his mother after his father was killed by the police in a botched arrest; and Jeremy Haynesworth’s father was a drunk―his mother cleaned houses to eke out an existence. All of them were brilliant and found a way to pay for college―their way out of hell.”

  Out of one hell and into another, Diana thought.

  “They all worked for someone else and made their bosses a lot of money with their ideas or patents,” Lucier continued, his brow furrowed in thought. “Not one reaped financial benefits personally until they hooked up with either Compton or Crane.”

  Diana listened. Coming from humble circumstances herself, she found the background stories of those climbing the ladder of success interesting.

  “Compton’s story is similar. Poor but hardworking parents. He had a head for business and driving ambition. He also married well―twice. His first wife’s father, Senator Gault Fannon, wasn’t rich, but he enjoyed a spotless reputation. What he had were connections.”

  “There’s a switch,” Diana said. “An honest politician. Or is that an oxymoron?”

  Lucier played with the remainder of a sweet potato on his plate, seemingly oblivious to her remark.

  “So Compton married well,” she said, trying to get him back on track. “What happened?”

  He looked up as if he suddenly remembered she was there and continued to explain the gossip about Fannon and the votes for the government contract that put Compton on the map. “Married well, but not as well as marrying into the Crane family.” Lucier related the phone conversation he had with Dione Compton. “She knows more than she’s willing to tell right now.”

  “Once she does, the whole thing will be out in the open. I can’t imagine she’d expose her family unless she fears for either her life or her sister’s.”

  “Compton sent Maia somewhere,” Lucier said. “Ralph Stallings is trying to unravel the properties owned by Compton’s conglomerate, but there’s so much corporate finagling it’ll take awhile. I’ll update my request to include Crane’s holdings.”

  “You know, Ernie, the property could be in the name of one of the others or their wives. Since they’re all related, it might be joint property.”

  “Dione said her father wasn’t the one in charge. That leaves Crane, the granddaddy of the group, and I bet his holdings are more convoluted than Compton’s. These guys know how to tangle business so you can’t find what they don’t want you to find. We’d be hard pressed to uncover the mystery location before the night of the crescent moon or before Dione Compton disappears if they find out she’s talked to me.”

  “Can’t you pick her up?”

  “She said no protective custody. Not yet. She’s not ready to turn herself over to us and expose her family’s shenanigans until she finds out more. There may be more children involved than just the kidnapped babies.”

  “You mean all the kids from the group’s second families who are working overseas?”

  “Exactly,” Lucier said. “Cal Easley and Seth Crane are the only ones missing from a first wife, and Cybele Crane is the only first wife still around.”

  “Maybe they’re in charge of wherever they are,” Diana said. “All these sons and daughters working out of the country doing humanitarian work is a little much.”

  “If they have kids, the numbers could be more than we first thought.”

  “Have you checked passports?”

  “Stallings did. Their passports confirmed they’re where they said. Destinations all over the place—Africa, Asia, in the most remote places. Crane’s and Compton’s foundations do valuable work overseas―no doubt about that―so the state department doesn’t find any of this strange. The question is, are these sons and daughters where they’re supposed to be. I don’t think so. These companies have private jets and enough money to bribe officials, especially in third world countries.”

  “What if those people really are out of the country doing good deeds?” Diana asked.

  “Then I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am, and neither do you. The fear in Dione Compton’s voice told me she knows enough to be in serious danger.” He pushed aside his plate. “I hope she cleared her cell phone like I told her to.”

  “Even if you’re right, Ernie, why the disappearing acts?”

  “I’m not sure, but Crane is behind it. He picked those men. Offered them more riches than they could ever attain and daughters who’d make any man come just by looking at them. In exchange, they had to embrace his philosophy.” Lucier pinched the bridge of his nose and shook his head. “Maybe he never mentioned the word Satan until later, calling it something else.”

  “Slater mentioned animism,” Diana said. “A spiritual philosophy nothing like Satanism, but it might have worked as a stepping-stone to gently release those men from their own beliefs.”

  “I don’t believe a man like Reyes, who must have been brought up Catholic, would chuck his religion and divorce his wife just like that. Not without a major case of guilt. Yet, that’s what he did. Reyes, Haynesworth, and Easley all divorced and remarried a few years after going to work for either Crane or Compton.”

  “There has to be more.” Something popped into Diana’s mind. “This might be crazy, so hear me out. Question: what did all the kidnapped babies have in common?”

  “Besides being taken by Deems or someone like him? They were all from super intelligent parents.”

  “Yes, and what else?”

  “I don’t want to play twenty questions. Just tell me. What?”

  “I’m not sure where I’m going with this, but don’t stop me until I finish.” She got up from the table and paced. “Crane recruits brilliant men, right? All good-looking men too. Harder to notice when you’re around their wives, but I noticed. He partners them with his beautiful, brilliant daughters.” She reversed her pacing, barely noticing the quizzical expression on Lucier’s face. “They create beautiful, brilliant children who scatter to different places, ostensibly to do good works.”

  The idea formed as she spoke, and the more she thought about it, the less crazy it sounded. She must have gone deep into thinking mode because the next thing she knew, Lucier was calling her name.

  “Ego. It’s all about ego.” She pounded her fist into her palm as her thoughts gelled. “Listen. Besides wealth and beautiful women, what if Crane promised the men that their superior genes, joined with those of their brilliant, gorgeous wives―his daughters―would be the basis of a new society, first through their progeny, then through subsequent generations.”

  “You mean he’s creating a master race? Didn’t someone already try that?”

  “Yes, but Hitler weeded out what he considered the less pure; Crane is creating the race from scratch. He chose those men for their intellectual and physical attributes. Compton was a no-brainer. He’d already proved he’d do anything to get ahead by marrying his first wife. Crane recognized that characteristic. He had his pick of the best and the brightest from both companies, mated them with his own offspring―daughters raised to please―ego again, then he mixed in the worship of money and uninhibited sex instead of God. When things didn’t develop fast enough, he tossed in a few extra genius babies for good measure, and voilà, his own master race―a new culture, created with Crane genes.”

  Lucier scoffed. “It’s too far-fetched. Those four women couldn’t produce that many babies, and wouldn’t they all be cousins or something?”

  “Cousins removed with carefully distant inbreeding. Then he employs surrogates, offers them money and a good life, and implants his daughters’ eggs. Why not? Tell me what’s wrong with the premise? Think what’s happened over the last week or two. Remember, money is no object. Crane has geneticists in one of his companies. Scientists can be bought just like anyone else, especially if they can work on special projects. I’m hypothesizing. Tie it all together and it’s dia
bolically plausible.”

  “A real stretch, Diana. Even if you’re right, why Satan?”

  She plopped down into her chair at the table. “I don’t know. Something to bind them, a powerful feeling of belonging. That’s what most religions offer. Maybe at first he explained it as their personal religion, without the demon aspect. In the end, the men rationalized to embrace guiltless hedonism and all the money they could ever want.”

  Lucier lifted his water glass and took a sip, his eyes focused on Diana. “He raised his daughters to seduce from birth, with Cybele as teacher. Even at sixty, she’s competition to her daughters. I never had Jason check her history, but I bet her roots are similar to Crane’s, and their small family affair turned global.”

  “Now they’ve taken a different path―a futuristic one,” Diana said. “Maia and Dione went along because they didn’t have a choice. Cults don’t give you choices, and that’s what this is. They’ve been brainwashed to become willing members, everything within the group, with no repercussions to outsiders. ” She stopped, and both said the next sentence together…

  “Until the kidnapped babies.”

  “Maia bucked the system,” Diana said, “now Dione Compton is scared because she’s contemplating following in Maia’s footsteps and going against everything she’s been conditioned to believe. Whatever rituals the group participated in, whatever practices they followed, until those babies, they never broke the law.”

  “The root of all evil,” Lucier said. “Then pleasure.”

  “Not so simple. To embrace Satanism, you first must deny God.”

  “Jesus,” Lucier said.

  “Him too.”

  Neither seemed interested in their food any longer. What if her hypothesis was correct? The thought frightened her, and for the first time since the Seaver baby disappeared, she understood why she’d interest Crane and Compton. Her genes. The unique gift for which she had been either blessed or cursed.

  “The captain would laugh me out of the office.”

  Diana nodded in silent agreement. Who would believe such a radical idea?

  “As far-fetched as I think your theory is, I can’t ignore it,” Lucier admitted. “Now to figure out what to do.”

  They cleared the table, took the dishes to the kitchen. Lucier’s attention wandered to the coffee table. “Pretty flowers,” he said. “Where did you get them?”

  Diana glanced across the room. How would Lucier interpret Slater’s visit? He was already suspicious where Slater was concerned. Besides, nothing happened but a mystical conversation. “One of the neighbors brought them from her garden. Wasn’t that nice?”

  Chapter Thirty- Six

  The Seed of a Plan

  Seth escorted Maia up the elevator to the fourth floor. Anat’s building was one of two multi-storied structures in the compound, and she was the only occupant in it. He unlocked the door, and they stepped inside Anat’s suite, outfitted with everything one needed for a comfortable imprisonment. Sofas covered in chintz, bookcases overflowing with reading matter, a complicated-looking sound system playing Mozart, and an in-house gym. Anat Crane lay stretched on a chaise on a large balcony, her arm curled around a beautiful toddler on her lap. She read to the child from a large picture book. Both acknowledged their guests with a smile.

  Maia’s half-sister was even more breathtakingly beautiful than she remembered. She saw her last a little more than a year ago. Anat favored Selene, only her features were softer, where Selene’s were angular and sharp. She inherited the knockout body, though. Long and lean, with curves in all the right places, skin gleaming like burnished bronze from the sun.

  Anat emerged from the womb with a streak of independence and defiance not acceptable to the group. She fought everything from the time she learned to speak. No one, not even Silas, could tame her mind. Gifted with an intelligence far exceeding those around her, she met every persuasion with a cogent and logical antithesis. Religion in general sapped the individual of reason, she said, and offering oneself to Satan to rationalize sexual pleasure was the height of perversion. No matter what indoctrination techniques they used, Anat resisted. She even drew some of the younger ones to her side, but she was quickly plucked from their presence. When she was no longer controllable, she was separated―a euphemism at the compound for luxuriously imprisoned, but only if you were a Compton, Crane, or from one of the main families. Other less important members in the group’s tentacle-expanding assemblage received a month at camp. Just the threat of ostracism and the tactics used to bring one back into the fold squelched any potential uprisings.

  Maia breathed a sigh of relief. Anat was too smart not to play along, as long as it served her purpose. She understood control because she’d been taught by the best.

  Wearing shorts and a tank top, Anat swung her long legs off the chaise and placed the child in a playpen. The little girl picked up a book and opened it, pointing at the pictures and cooing words that were almost intelligible, never once with a whine on her lips. Anat patted her daughter’s hair, then walked slowly toward Maia and threw her arms around her.

  Maia kissed her and whispered in her ear, “How are you?”

  Anat glanced at Seth and whispered back, “Bored, except for Chloe. Even though they forced the pregnancy, I can’t imagine life without her. She’s my beacon of light.”

  Maia stood back and studied her half-sister, ran her fingers through Anat’s long sable hair. “You’re beautiful,” she said, then walked out to the balcony and crouched in front of the toddler, who lifted big blue eyes and grinned wide enough to show the few teeth poking through her gums. “She’s a beauty, Anat.”

  “Smart, too.” Anat turned to Seth. “Can we have some time alone, please? I haven’t seen Maia in a while, and I’d like to speak to her without you looking over our shoulders and listening to everything we say.”

  Seth shook his head. “You know I can’t.”

  “Please, Seth,” Maia said. “Don’t be the obedient soldier for once.”

  “Maia, I―”

  She locked gazes with Seth. “Please.”

  He bit his bottom lip. “Okay. For a while.”

  He left. Maia heard the key turn in the lock.

  “Come onto the balcony,” Anat whispered in Maia’s ear and tugged her outside, closing the sliding glass door behind her. “There might be hidden microphones, but I haven’t found them. Still, you can’t be too careful. No camera, though. I’ve checked thoroughly. They hide cameras in the compound so they don’t intimidate the children. They’re afraid a Big Brother attitude might spawn another me.” Anat grinned and walked to the balcony railing. She pointed to the vast forest. “A long-range camera could be aimed at the balcony.” She waved, taunting the possibility. They settled into two chairs. “I play their game as best I can, Maia, and give them as much trouble as I can too.”

  “Even if there is a mike, there’s no one for you to talk to.”

  Anat shrugged. “People visit. They need an okay from the boss, and they can only stay an hour, but they visit. Sometimes we write notes, like when I want something I’m not supposed to have.”

  “Like what?”

  “Later. There are those here who help me when I ask. I don’t do it often, because I don’t want to get anyone in trouble. They let me keep Chloe because I swore I’d jump off the balcony if they didn’t. Silas would never allow that. Nor would Selene, even though she doesn’t understand how she produced such a genetic malfunction. Of course, I’d never jump because I’d be leaving my child to be raised like we were. That’s unacceptable.”

  The large balcony jutted out twelve feet over a steep canyon of jagged rocks and white water rapids. A panorama of lush verdant hills and trees surrounded the compound. If there was a way down, Anat would have found it.

  “What do you do all day?” Maia asked.

  “Read, study, exercise, listen to music. I paint and write short stories too. I keep busy, and sometimes I don’t know where the day goes. And most importan
tly, I play with Chloe.” Anat looked at Maia. “Why are you here? Did you come to―”

  “No,” Maia said, shaking her head. “No more children.” The reality of Anat’s words settled hard in Maia’s mind. Was this going to be her life too? Confined to living life in a vacuum? Anat had made the best of it. Could she?

  Anat got up and leaned over the railing. Her voice brought Maia back from a place she didn’t want to be. “Then? No, don’t tell me. You finally spoke up and they shipped you off. It’d have to be you. Everyone else is incapable of making decisions for themselves.” She looked off. “Except Cal. You know, Cal Easley. His suite is on the other side of the compound. Unlike me, he can roam freely. They don’t think he has the guts to cause an uprising.”

  “How is he?”

  “I see him at meetings they make us attend, and sometimes he visits. He works out and looks good. When I knew they were going to force me to have a child, I said I’d mate with Cal, but I guess they thought any offspring of ours would be worse than the two of us put together.” She gazed at Chloe. “Cal’s gay, you know.”

  Maia rose and joined Anat. “No, I didn’t.”

  “He’s the smartest person here, but they won’t harvest his sperm for fear the gay, as they call it, will be passed on. They must be pissed to pass on such rich genetic material.”

  Maia chuckled.

  “Cal gets a perverse pleasure knowing that,” Anat said.

  “How strange, because I’ve never known the group to care if people are gay.”

  “No, as long as they’re not part of our society.”

  Maia put her hand on Anat’s arm. “Whose Chloe’s father? Seth says you won’t say.”

  “I won’t. I don’t want anyone using this baby against the father. There are a few of us with a remnant or two of independence. Please don’t ask, Maia. Especially if you intend to tell Seth.”

  She’d never tell, but Anat didn’t know that. “I wouldn’t. I understand.”

  “Thank you.” Anat offered a loving glance at Chloe. “What did you do to wind up here? Must have been a beaut.”