by Ann Simko
Michael Ricco made her sad and she hated him for that. Well she tried to hate him for that.
Thirty-two years old, with a PhD in criminal psychology and an MD, Maggie had worked for national security for the last seven of those years. She had guarded far more dangerous men than Michael Ricco, but none more fascinating. With her long dark hair framing a deceptively young face, most people would take her for ten years younger, a considerable help when she went undercover. She wasn't undercover now, though.
Her superiors thought a woman might make Ricco feel more comfortable in his new environment. Environment. Like he was a new zoo specimen, with people watching him day in and day out. She imagined that was exactly how he must feel.
Finished downloading the last twenty-four hours of data to the hard drive, Maggie reset the cameras and checked to be certain they were all up and functioning. When her desk phone rang, the readout showed it was the director of the research center.
"What is it Geoffrey?" He bugged the hell out of her, maybe because he thought of Ricco as a specimen, not a person.
She glanced at the monitor. Ricco was just sitting on his couch. No television, no music. He just sat and stared at the walls. She wondered, not for the first time, what was going on inside the guy's head. Psychologists and therapists who'd spoken to him, questioned him, had learned little. Michael Ricco wasn't big on talking.
"How's he doing?" Geoffrey said.
"Same."
"Yeah, well I have some news that might perk him up."
"You got approval?"
"Virginia here we come. A team is headed there now to brief his family. Apparently the Ricco clan has been quite prolific. There are about a million of them down in Corbin County. We had to narrow it down to about a dozen, direct descendants from his siblings. I was just coming down to tell him the news."
Maggie glanced at the monitor once more. Ricco had disappeared from the camera she had been viewing. She switched to another, and found him on the back patio, one his favorite places.
Hell, if I hadn't felt the sun on my face in over eighty years, I'd spend all my time outside too.
"Hey, Geoff, I was just going to go down and check a stuck camera," she lied. "Unless you have a burning desire to make the trip down from the main building, I could break the news to him."
"Yeah? Sure, go ahead, I have to make transportation arrangements. Thanks. Tell him we'll be going within the week. We have both stops arranged, everything he wants."
"Maybe that'll make him smile," she said, more to herself than to Geoff. She tried to remember if Ricco had smiled once since being brought here.
"I just want him cooperative, Maggs. This guy is costing us a fortune. We need to see some return on the investment, you know?"
"Yeah, I get that." She hung up, but continued watching Michael Ricco. She knew his story. Freaking one-hundred-and-sixteen years old, and he didn't look any older than her nephew in high school—unless you looked in his eyes.
She zoomed in and tightened the high quality, full-resolution image on Ricco's face. He was half turned away from her, so all she could see was his blond hair fluttering in the early morning breeze. Suddenly, he turned and looked directly into the camera, as if he knew she was watching him. Blue-green eyes accused her, but she didn't know of what. Maybe of being no better than the psycho who'd done the things to him that made him the way he was. That look, it made him seem ancient and hidden.
Maggie zoomed out quickly to a normal view. She felt ridiculous, like a high school girl caught peeking into the boy's locker room. She didn't like that he made her nervous. She didn't like a lot of the things he made her feel. In her line of work, feelings could become a liability.
Before walking down to his apartment to tell him about his long awaited family reunion, she paused the camera feed and inserted a loop from the last sixty minutes of video. Anyone looking at the monitors would believe they were watching a live feed, when in reality, the cameras in Ricco's apartment were no longer recording. They were simply replaying the same sixty minutes of tape over and over again.
* * * *
Maggie knocked lightly on the door. When she received no answer, she let herself into the apartment. There were no locks. Ricco couldn't go anywhere, even if he wanted to, and he certainly couldn't keep anyone out. Privacy didn't exist for him, except for now.
For the next few minutes, the only people who knew what Michael Ricco did or said, were Maggie and Michael Ricco.
She found him on the patio as expected, and called out so she wouldn't startle him—something she hadn't been able to do yet. He always seemed to know when she came within touching distance.
He looked at her through the glass doors and smiled.
God! He looks like such a little boy when he smiles. She paused with her hand on the door. Stop it girl! For God's sakes, just tell him and leave. She wanted to control her feelings, but she couldn't control the heart that beat just a little faster at that smile.
He motioned for her to join him outside. She took a deep breath and walked out to the small bricked patio.
"Hey." His voice was soft with just a hint of a drawl that identified him as a Southerner.
She returned his smile. "Hey, yourself. How you doing?" She felt stupid asking. She knew how he was doing, she'd watched every aspect of his life, either live or recorded, since he came to stay here.
He shrugged. "I'm good." He looked up at the camera. "Something wrong?"
Following his gaze she understood. The only times she had ever come to see him in person had been to introduce herself that first day, or to resolve equipment problems that arose occasionally.
"Oh, no, everything's cool." Cool? Jesus, I sound like a twelve-year-old. "Umm, I just got a call from Geoffrey. Everything is set for your visit to your family. Just thought you would want to know."
That got a reaction out of him, brought him to full alert. It was subtle, but she'd learned to read the slight nuances of his body language over the last few weeks. "He found my family?"
"We'll be going to Virginia as soon as we can make some arrangements."
"That soon?"
"Is that a problem, Michael? I mean, for the last week that's all you've asked anyone about. No visit, no tests, you said. Well, we got you your visit."
He licked his lips. The self-assurance she'd felt from him just moments ago had evaporated. Now she sensed only nervousness.
"What's the matter?" She sat across the small table from him.
"I'm not sure. I guess I never really believed you would find them."
"Well, we did. You don't have to go, you know. It'll piss Geoffrey off to the nth degree, but that's okay with me." She grinned, feeling very conspiratorial.
"No, no—I want to, I just... I don't know, this is just weird. Who did you find? Who am I going to see?"
"I'm not sure. Geoff said something about your siblings' descendants."
Ricco walked to the edge of the patio. Maggie followed, stopping just behind him. He was only an inch or two taller.
"Matty and Sarah," he said quietly.
"What? Who are they?"
"My younger brother and sister. It's strange to think of them having descendants." He wiped his hands on the front of his thighs, a nervous habit she recognized.
"I'm not sure this was a good idea," he said, with his back still to her. "I mean, how do I explain who I am? How I am?"
"Michael." She put a hand on his shoulder. "We'll take care of it. Geoff has already sent a team out there."
He turned around and suddenly Maggie found herself much too close to him. Instead of stepping back, she held her ground. She left it up to him, to move or not. He stayed where he was and looked down at her. "They won't understand."
"We did. It won't be any different for them."
He made a disgusted face, took a step back and looked out the window again. "I'm nothing but the next big performance bonus for Geoffrey. I'm still in a cage. I get that. I accept that." He shook his head. "My
family won't."
It surprised her that he would confide as much to her, and it upset her that he had no delusions as to his place in the scheme of things. "Is that how you feel about yourself, a specimen? Something to be studied?"
"Tell me I'm wrong."
She couldn't, so she said nothing.
"You know, I had a life once. There was a time when I was just Michael. But Michael doesn't exist anymore. There's only Ricco now."
Maggie was a little surprised she was the one he chose to open up to, surprised but grateful. "That's not true Michael."
"Yes it is. You don't know me, don't know who I am, don't know who I was. All you know is what is written in a file. Words don't always tell the whole story."
"You're right, but I can't know the whole story unless you tell me. Let me get to know Michael. Can you do that?"
Until now he had been looking out at the little yard, but at Maggie's question he turned and stared at her.
She met his gaze, never flinching at its intensity.
"Why? So you can add it to my file. Why do you care who I was?"
Maggie thought a moment before answering. "I've watched you since you came here. I mean, I know everything there is to know about the man in the files, maybe even more than you do. They have the Program's files going back almost sixty years, describing the things they did to you. Medically it's fascinating, but personally, I find it reprehensible. They took your life and compressed it to a culmination of facts.
"Why do I care? Maybe because I want to make it right, or as right as anyone can. Maybe because I want to give Michael a chance to exist again, will you tell me about him, about Michael?"
"No reports?"
Maggie smiled. "Just me. One person talking to another. For the record, anything you tell me is just between us." She motioned at the ever-present cameras. "For the moment we are alone, no watchers."
Michael narrowed his eyes. "Why?"
"I don't really know. Maybe I felt guilty about my part in making you nothing more than a specimen in a glass cage. I'd like to try to change that if I could."
Offering him her hand, she smiled. "Hello Michael, my name is Maggie and I would very much like to get to know you, if you let me."
He took her hand cautiously, his eyes never leaving hers. It was clear he wanted to trust her. It was also clear he had been burned in the past by trust.
She watched him struggle with the dilemma, and waited.
He released her hand and sat on the sofa. Staring at nothing, his eyes focused somewhere in the past, he started talking.
"My name is Michael John Ricco," he began in a low voice. "I was the first of three children born to Thomas and Katherine Ricco. My earliest memories are filled with smells. The smells of my mom's cooking and the smells of a barn filled with cows, the smells of picking potatoes and apples in the fall." He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, almost as if he could recall what his senses tried to remember .
Maggie sat next to him and listened. For almost two hours she listened as his world became real to her, as he became so much more than just words in a report. The enormity of what had been done to him began to take shape in his story.
She learned of his hopes, dreams and fears, so ruthlessly and carelessly taken from him on a rainy day in July. Those who took him had cared nothing about what he wanted or who he was. All they saw was the specimen.
"I had a girl, Emma," he said. "We were supposed to get married as soon as I got home from the War. She told me she would wait for me. As long as it took, she would wait for me."
He looked at Maggie for the first time since he'd begun talking. "I don't think she counted on waiting nearly a hundred years." A small smile played across his lips.
Maggie could help but return it. "I wouldn't think so. I bet she was beautiful, your Emma."
"I can't remember," he said, and the truth of that seemed to break his heart. "I know I thought she was. She had blonde hair and green eyes, but I can't see her face anymore. They took that too. They took my memories."
She saw her hand, as if it had a life of its own, reach over and lightly touch his. He looked up at her, a little surprised by the contact, but he didn't move away. Instead he turned his hand over and held hers.
He was right; no one could give him back what he had lost, but maybe she could give him something to replace the memories he no longer carried with him.
"Maybe," she said. "It's time to start making new memories."
Leaning closer, she touched his face with her other hand and placed a whisper of a kiss on his lips.
She'd expected rejection and shock at her forwardness. What she did not expect was for him to return the kiss.
He wove his fingers through her hair, and then pulled away to look at her. "It's soft. Your hair. From the first time I saw you I wanted to touch it and see if it was as soft as it looks." He smiled. "It is."
Maggie Riley, scientist, medical doctor and government agent, had no reply to that.
Those incredible eyes studied her and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth.
Now she felt like the specimen in a glass cage. "I'm sorry." She pulled away, flustered and embarrassed by her actions. "I don't know why I did that."
"I didn't mind." He smiled that little boy smile once more. "It's been a very long time since I was kissed by a beautiful woman." His brows creased. "Why are you sorry?"
She shook her head, "It's just not that easy, things could get complicated."
He softly touched her face with the back of his hand. "Life is complicated. That's what makes it all worthwhile."
Maggie felt something curl deliciously inside her belly and wasn't sure she wanted to walk away from it, from him. He was right. Life could get complicated all by itself. It didn't need her help.
Chapter 27
Dakota watched the Black Hawk helicopter land through the tinted windows of the government limousine. He did a double take as Michael Ricco exited its side door. The man he saw bore little resemblance to the Michael Ricco he remembered.
As difficult as the last two months had been for Dakota, they appeared to have been kind to Ricco. He had gained much-needed weight and his face no longer had that haunted, vacant look. His cheeks had the healthy glow of someone who had spent time in the sun. Blond hair tickled the tops of his ears and showed streaks of red. Dressed in jeans, a khaki t-shirt, and white Nikes, Michael Ricco looked like the farm-boy he had once been.
Dakota realized it was more than a physical transformation. The change went deeper. It took him a moment to figure it out, but then he saw it. Michael Ricco was smiling. In his hand he held a bouquet of wildflowers.
Ricco ducked the rotor wash, protecting the fragile flowers with his body. After waiting while several men in suits jumped out, he stepped forward as a woman appeared in the doorway. He held a hand out to help her down and put a protective arm around her as they ran to the waiting car.
Dakota felt a slow smile spread across his face. Good for you, Michael.
As soon as everyone was clear, the helicopter lifted off again, swirling dust and debris in its wake. The suits climbed into an unmarked car, while Ricco opened the back door of the limo and ushered the woman inside. They took seats opposite Montana and Dakota.
With a bright smile, the woman nodded in their direction. "Special agent, Margaret Riley... Maggie."
Her smile was contagious and Dakota couldn't help but return it with one of his own. "Dakota Thomas. This is my brother Montana."
Maggie shook first Dakota's and then Montana's hand. "I've heard a lot about you two. It's good to finally meet you." She turned and slid open the screen to the driver's compartment. "We good?"
The man, dressed in military fatigues, and obviously armed, spoke into his radio and then gave Maggie a nod.
"You ready?" she directed the question to Ricco who had not taken his eyes off her since they landed.
"Yeah." He turned to Dakota and Montana for the first time. "Thanks for doing this, for
coming. I wanted you here with me."
"Not a problem," Montana spoke from behind the veil of his Ray-Bans, but for once, he didn't try to hide his smile.
Ricco looked Dakota over carefully. "You okay?"
Dakota opened his mouth for his usual, "Yeah, I'm fine," response, and thought better of it. "Getting there." That was as close to the truth as he was willing to share at the moment. There would time for them to talk later.
Ricco nodded in understanding as the limo pulled out of the airport. "It gets better after a while."
Dakota had trouble believing that, but he attempted to return the smile anyway.
* * * *
The cemetery holding the Ricco family plot was a twenty-minute ride from the Corbin county airport, through rolling green hills and freshly mowed fields. Michael spent most of the ride trying to remember his family. Dakota seemed absorbed in his own thoughts, while Maggie and Montana chatted about their years in government service.
The cemetery itself was bordered all around by a black wrought iron fence. The driver threaded the limo through the maze of blacktop, until at last he parked near the center of the cemetery. He slid open the divider. "Three rows straight back, then four in...just to the left. Take all the time you need."
"Thanks."
The suits parked behind them. They split up and formed a loose perimeter around him. Ignoring their presence, Ricco got out and held the door for Maggie. Without waiting for Montana or Dakota they walked through the rows of headstones. Maggie took his hand, intertwining her fingers with his.
Ricco searched the names etched in cold granite, walking slowly in case he missed something. He stopped before one and stared at the name. His shoulders sagged, and he tightened his grip on Maggie's hand.
"Thomas Michael Ricco. Your father?" Dakota said, from just behind him.
"Yeah." With one finger he traced the individual letters etched deep into the granite. "My daddy. He was only forty the last time I saw him." He touched the death date. "He died at ninety-six." He had to smile. "I beat him by twenty years, so far. I wish..."