Collection (5 page)

Cicero and Lucien were the heads of an international art forgery organization. They had established several houses in various countries that held their vaults and housed their employees. Every one of their employees were related to them, and they were exclusively female. Their business financed their search for a cure to a horrific
hereditary condition that affected everyone in the bloodline. For every piece of art they forged, they kept the original and placed it in one of the vaults. Often, drawing on the real examples, they would produce new work in the style of a particular artist. Collectors would pay well for original and previously unknown works.

Cicero, Lucien, and their people were the most successful art forgers in the world, and nobody outside of the family knew about it. The key to their success was the fact that they had been in business a long time. They stockpiled art materials through the years, knew how to fake the necessary documents for provenance, and had their artists in the best training program in the world; their own in-house apprenticeships. They were doing good business, and recent developments in genetic technologies had given them hope for the first time in centuries that a cure was possible.

As the only male survivors of their family, Lucien and Cicero were key to finding a cure. A genetic anomaly ensured Cicero and Lucien never aged, and never died. Given time and nourishment, they were able to heal themselves of even a serious injury. The same tangle of miraculous chromosomes functioned differently in the other male children of their family. Something happened at the three-year point and acted quickly to kill the boys. All of them were gone too soon. All except Cicero and Lucien, and nobody could explain why.

The brothers were the champions of their family, but they were separate from them as well. Getting too close to people, even family members, was painful because they would inevitably die and Cicero and Lucien never would. Every time a child in the family died, they knew that emotions ran high. Why did these boys die when Lucien and Cicero lived well past their rightful allotment of years? Yet no two people had worked harder to find a cure for their family, or sacrificed more of their own happiness.

Lucien and Cicero had sworn to put the business, and the ultimate goal of a cure, first. They did not expect the same of the female members of the family, but many chose to forego their own families in favor of work. Dani was one of these people. She never married, and never chose to risk having a child. She had dedicated herself to her duties and had become an accomplished archivist. Lucien had selected her as his personal assistant due to her competency and unwavering
loyalty. These assets had served her well so far, but Cicero couldn't help but believe that she would burn herself out if she cared too much. Cicero and Lucien weren't normal people and they couldn't live normal lives. From their point of view, everyone else was just passing through, but they were here to stay through it all; good or bad. Those around them sometimes had trouble understanding how to support them without getting hurt.

“So, he said he would be back by now.” Dani put her hand on the door. She was fighting the need to enter the library and talk to Cicero directly. She fussed with the knob and finally decided to stand just inside the doorway with her hands clasped behind her back.

Cicero sighed.

“Dani, he's a big boy. He can find his way home just fine, and he keeps the house key on a piece of string around his neck.” He lost the teasing tone, but lowered his voice to let her know he was annoyed by her intrusion. “Maybe he stopped somewhere, went to a movie or something.”

Dani seemed to hesitate, but then her anxiety overruled her hesitancy and she entered the library, taking a seat opposite the desk in one of the leather club chairs. “No. He always keeps to a schedule. He knows we need to know for the archive. He wouldn't deviate without telling us.”

Cicero snorted, “I don't keep to a schedule and the archivists manage just fine. He's not required to keep to a schedule. He's a human being, not a robot. I'm sure he'll tell you all about it when he gets here.”

“Maybe he's in trouble again.” Dani's voice wavered with the possibility that Lucien had been captured again.

“Maybe he is. What are you going to do about it? He's been through much worse and he'll get busted up again, it's inevitable.”

Dani was growing frustrated by his lack of affect.

“Aren't you concerned? He was tortured for days in China. He was beaten so badly that it took weeks for him to heal. He couldn't even talk for days. When he finally started speaking, I could barely listen to what happened to record it for the archive. I have nightmares about his memories.”

Cicero was getting angry.

“You're not telling me anything I don't already know, Dani. I was the one who got him out of China, so I saw first hand what his condition was. He bled all over my favorite leather coat.”

Dani leaned forward.

“Damn it, Cicero, I know you care about him. Why aren't you helping me watch out for him? He's too important to lose to carelessness or…
deliberate
stupidity. We need him. God knows we can't depend on you to take over for him.” She caught herself after that last comment. She thought she had gone too far, but Cicero knew that they all believed he was too casual about their work. Truthfully, he was as committed as his brother, but that didn't mean he had to act like a monk.

“Dani, I do care about him, which is why you need to let him go. The more you try to save him, the more he's convinced that he's not worth saving. Stop pitying him, stop soothing him, and stop treating him like he's some broken-legged, orphaned puppy you found on the street. He's been around a while, he'll be around a while, and the only person he can depend on is himself. Let him do that, or he'll lose whatever battle he's fighting - in his own mind or out in the outside world.”

She sat in the club chair for several moments while Cicero continued to work at Lucien's laptop. Finally she spoke.

“I can't hope to understand what it's like to live like you do, but as an archivist, I have to know everything you do, everything you feel. If we record something that helps with a cure, I'll call my life well lived. In the meantime, it's all I have. I hear about all the details with none of the usual censorship that normal people have with each other. It's hard for me not to feel involved personally.”

Cicero closed the laptop and directed his full attention to Dani, who suddenly looked like a child in the overstuffed chair.

“You are involved personally. Everyone in this house and all the other houses is personally involved, but don't let that become a problem. You'll only end up hurting yourself. Lucien would sacrifice himself a hundred times over to accomplish our goal, and he has. But, it's not enough. Neither my life or his or all the money in the world is enough to cure our sickness. Not yet anyway. So, we'll keep going. Until we find a way to win, we have to live our lives without
losing our minds. Lucien and I realized this necessity a long time ago. Whatever we do, we need to keep going. It's different for you, Dani. You could have your own life if you wanted it. Lucien doesn't have that choice and he honestly doesn't want it.” He'd tried to be as gentle as he could and still let her know that there were things Dani had no control over, things she shouldn't have any control over.

Dani realized that she was fighting a losing battle. She also realized that Cicero was probably right not to jump to conclusions, at least for a little while longer.

“Okay then. Sorry I bothered you. I'll leave you alone.” She stood and gestured to the laptop, “If you want to go into the vault later, I'll take you. Laurel can't stand you, so I figure I'll be doing both of you a favor.”

Cicero smiled.

“That's a generous offer, but I can't ignore her seniority. If I went behind her back, she'd go crying to Lucien, and he'd give me hell. I still intend to treat my visit here as a quasi-vacation, so I don't need the aggravation.”

“Thanks, Cicero.” Dani was still worried, but Cicero was reasonably certain that she wouldn't go out trolling the streets of Atlanta with a loudspeaker asking if anyone had seen a tall fellow with brown hair and a supernatural ability to heal himself wandering around.

“You're welcome, Dani.”

She closed the door as she left and Cicero rubbed his eyes. Lucien had not maintained the distance he ought to with Dani. She was too close to him. It was either time to get a new archivist, or drastically redefine their working relationship. It wasn't that he didn't like Dani, but she would begin to resent Lucien if there were too much honesty between them. Living without the fear of death sounded like fun, but it wreaked havoc on your intimate relationships. Out of self-interest alone, Cicero wanted Lucien healthy and not bogged down with personal drama. More than that, Cicero felt the weight of their responsibility to the rest of the family on his shoulders. If he lost Lucien, he would lose the one person who truly understood what it was like.

Every person in this house and all the others were related to Lucien and Cicero by blood. Granted, the connection was several centuries in the past, but they lived together through necessity. Nobody
understands like family. The genetic connection that bonded them, also cursed them. Whenever a male baby was born, it was not a time of celebration, but of tense anticipation. Without fail, for the past several hundred years, male children from Lucien and Cicero's bloodline would die before their third birthday. He would live like any other child until the unfortunate day when his genetic code betrayed him. Just as he learned to speak and understand his world, he would talk as only a child could about the pain and the fear he felt as he died. Every living daughter feared the day that she might bear a male child.

It was an unavoidable burden, this lottery of birth and death. The horror was not something they could isolate to one person; when it happened to one of them, it happened to them all. Each time they lost a child, they all felt the mother's agony. Until a solution was found, Lucien and Cicero would continue to do what was required of them. Likewise, the women of their family would live with them and work with them. They learned the skills necessary to finance their mission. If they couldn't find the cure in their generation, then maybe the next would be saved. The family came first, as it had for hundreds of years. As a result, the lives they led were secret. The occasional husband was vetted, and sometimes he was told about the rest of them, but often he was not. Many of the women wouldn't tell their boyfriend if they got accidentally pregnant. It seemed too cruel to subject another person to the possibility of a child's death. Outside relationships were secondary, or nonexistent. It was dangerous to know people in the outside world, and Lucien and Cicero were no exception.

Leading such an insular life protected them, but also denied them the possibility of leading normal lives. Sometimes, women would leave the family with the intent to reinvent themselves. This choice was a difficult one, but never frowned upon by the rest of the family. As long as they agreed to keep the secret of their family, they could do as they pleased. Nobody had ever broken this trust.

6

THE DARK VAN RUMBLED
out of the museum parking garage without drawing attention to the passengers inside. Lucien was fairly certain that they were still in Atlanta, though he couldn't be sure. Whatever chemical they had put on the rag to knock him out was strong, but he didn't know for how long he was meant to be unconscious. He decided that if the girl started to come around, then he would too. In the meantime, the large man was driving like a maniac on the interstate. He switched lanes suddenly in traffic, and the van pitched to the left forcefully. Lucien ended up lying snugly against the girl as he pretended to be a rag doll. Since his head was turned away from the men, Lucien decided to risk opening his eyes to see if she was okay.

Steven had carefully smoothed down her dress when he deposited her in the van, but her breasts were practically spilling out over the top. Lucien tried his best to avert his eyes. Just because she was unconscious didn't mean he couldn't be a gentleman. She was young, but he revised his opinion of her as a “girl”. He focused on assessing her health. Her face was calm and her eyes closed. She looked like she was sleeping. He hazarded another look at her chest, purely to calculate her respiration, and it was normal.

Steven started to speak quietly to the large man, and Lucien was glad for the distraction since he had calculated her respiration a couple of times already. He closed his eyes so that he could concentrate on what they were saying.

“What do you want to do with the girl?”

The large man answered gruffly. “I want to throw her off the nearest overpass. But, it's up to Mr. Harris what we do with her. I
imagine she'll be useful leverage with Lucky. He knows her. He's not fooling me.”

Steven spoke again, and Lucien had to strain to hear him.

“I like her very much. I wonder if Mr. Harris would give her to me? I would clean up after I was done. Nobody would ever find any piece of her.”

His companion sighed.

“I'm sure he would give her to you. He doesn't care for pretty girls as much as he likes pretty paintings. But, as I said, it's up to him. We weren't anticipating her, so he'll be angry. Let me do the talking when we get there.”

Hearing the names “Mr. Harris” confirmed Lucien's memory of the large man. He had seen him before when dealing with Raleigh Harris. As illicit art dealer “Lucky”, Lucien acquired and sold paintings to wealthy and unscrupulous clients. He had sold Harris three black market paintings a little over a year ago. At the time, Harris had called them the jewels of his collection, so Lucien was a little confused about being abducted by Harris's bodyguards. Buyer's remorse did happen in his line of work, but Harris had pursued these paintings for several years with Lucien's help. He had been ecstatic when Lucien made delivery of the paintings, and even given him a bonus. Lucien had to deal with many collectors in many guises, and Harris had been a very difficult customer to please. He had wanted a premium product with unquestionable provenance, but had the money to make such demands. If that product was in the hands of an unwilling seller, then Lucky worked his magic to get it for him.