Mick Sinatra 2: Love, Lies, and Jericho (26 page)

He stroked
her as he pushed further into her tightness.
 
He stroked with slow, sensual strokes.
 
He planned to keep this pace for the duration.
 
But when he finally pushed in far enough, and
hit her special spot, he felt the coming change.
 
And when her vaginal muscles squeezed his
cock hard, virtually choking it, his mouth found hers in an exercise of
heightened passion, and they couldn’t go easy any longer.
 
The feelings wouldn’t let them.

They started
fucking.
 
She sat up and started riding
his cock and he arched his ass and started thrusting it inside of her.
 
He thrust and shoved it so far in that his
balls began slapping against her ass.
 
And then his pre-cum and her vaginal juices gave way to the main
event.
 
They came.
 
Together.
 
And forcefully.

 
Mick lifted his prone body up, lifting Roz
with him, as he throbbed and released, and kept fucking her with even more
force.
 
He thrashed her hard until her
orgasm was over and her vagina was no longer pulsating.
 
And until his cock had emptied out, and there
was no more push within him.

It was only
after that exhaustive session, a session that was supposed to be slow and easy,
he pulled her down into his arms, and held her there all night.

That next
day, after Mick had showered and left Roz relaxing in the bathtub, he made his
way to his office downstairs.
 
Archie
Bloom, his front gate chief, and Danny Padrone, his second-in-command, were
waiting for him in the office.
 
They had
been working through the night, searching for every ounce of intel they could
come across, to find out what happened, and who was responsible.

The heads of
two organized crime families, the two men who had been meeting with Mick when
the ambush at the airstrip went down, had been removed to a safe house.
 
But they were still under guard until Mick got
the answers he sought.
 
The third head,
Carp Bianchi’s son Nat and the new head of Carp’s organization, had been iced
by Mick after he demanded Mick take a smaller percentage from their
organizations, or face war.
 
It was a
serious threat that Mick did not tolerate from any of his underlings.
 
Nat’s body had long since been removed.

Mick entered
his office in a business suit, his usual Versace, Danny decided, and then
leaned against the front of his desk and folded his long legs at the
ankle.
 
He was always a serious man, but
they knew he was still furious too.
 
“I
want to know what fucker was crazy enough to ambush my woman, try to take out
my driver, and was powerful enough to pay off my men.
 
And I want to know now.”

“I know you
don’t wanna hear it, boss,” Danny said, “but we can’t tell you who.”

“Don’t you
tell me that.
 
Don’t you fucking tell me
that!”

“We looked
under every rock,” Archie chimed in.
 
“We
called in favors.
 
We checked out
everybody in the pipeline and every big wig in the know.
 
But nobody knows anything.
 
And those that do aren’t willing to talk.”

“What do you
mean they aren’t willing to talk?” Mick asked.
 
“They know something and won’t tell us?”

“They say
they
can’t
tell us,” Danny said.

Mick
frowned.
 
“Why the hell not?”
 
Then Mick thought about it.
 
“Somebody big?”

“He’s got to
be,” Danny agreed.
 
“He’s got to be
bigger than you.”

“Who the
fuck is that?” Mick asked.
 
“Name him.”

Danny shook
his head.
 
“I don’t know.
 
Here in Philly, there is no one.
 
And we can’t begin to know where else to
look.”

Mick ran the
back of his hands across his eyes.
 
“What
about the two mini-dons?
 
The head of
Teddy Stefani’s organization and Vito DeLuca’s?”

Archie shook
his head.
 
“They don’t know shit.
 
They aren’t involved.”

“Their
people are calling, and demanding their release,” Danny said.
 
“They say it’s not right for you to detain
them like this.
 
They had nothing to do
with that ambush.”

Then Danny
exhaled.
 
“Carp Bianchi called too.
 
He wants to know what happened to his
son.
 
When he finds out, there’s gonna be
trouble.
 
Trouble we can handle because
Carp answers to you, but trouble nonetheless.”

But Mick’s
singular focus was Roz, and who tried to pull a snatch and grab on her.
 
And they talked and talked it out.
 
Mick made his own phone calls, to men and
women in the higher echelons of city power who were under his protection, but
they didn’t know a damn thing either.
 
He
was sitting behind his deck, and hanging up from yet another dead end phone
call, when Roz walked in.

Mick looked
at her.
 
Because he knew she knew better
than that.
 
“I’m in a meeting,” he said.

“I know,”
Roz responded as she continued to walk toward the desk.
 
Danny and Archie glanced at each other.
 
What the fuck?

“Later, Rosalind,”
Mick said.
 
“I’m in a meeting.”

“But since
this meeting is about me and what happened to me last night,” Roz said, “I feel
I have the right to find out what’s going on.”
 
She looked at the two men standing on either side of the desk.
 
“Good morning,” she said to them.

“How are
you?” Danny asked.

“Good
morning, ma’am,” Archie said.

“We got
nothing,” Mick said as he leaned back in his chair.
 
“Nobody knows a
got
damn thing.”

Roz stood at
the front of the desk.
 
She, too, was
dressed for work, in a smart sky-blue Armani pantsuit, and her hand was on her
hip.
 
“What about those guys that were
here last night?
 
Those two heads of
families?”

Danny and
Archie glanced at each other again.
 
They
were amazed how much Mick allowed her to know about their set up.
 
Too much pillow talk, in their estimation.

“They don’t
know anything either,” Mick responded to Roz.
 
“They aren’t involved.”

“What about
that guy you had to deal with in Jericho?” Roz asked.
 
“Could he have something to do with this?”

Mick shook
his head.
 
“Even if his people had reach
like that, which they don’t, but even if they did, they couldn’t pull off an
ambush like that.
 
They couldn’t pay off
my men.
 
This was a power hit.
 
Major power was behind this hit.”

“Could there
be new heat percolating, boss?” Archie asked.
 
“Is there anybody out there you had dealings with lately, somebody with
some real reach that we don’t know about?”

Mick thought
about it.
 
“I told you the latest
characters I dealt with.
 
You checked out
Harper Curly.”

“His people are
too busy trying to take over the business after Harp’s death,” Danny said.
“They don’t give a fuck about revenge, and they don’t have that kind of power
either.”

“Neither
does Tony LeKirk,” Archie said, “the other guy you told us about.
 
He’s a zero too.
 
Everything we found out about the guy is that
he does dirty jobs for anybody with enough cash.
 
And he works alone.
 
His legacy ended the day he was iced.”

But Roz
looked at Mick.
 
“I know him,” she said.

Mick, Archie
and Danny looked at her.
 
“You know him?”
Mick frowned.
 
“You know who?”

“Tony
LeKirk.
 
I mean, I don’t know him
personally, but his wife was once in an off-Broadway play with me.
 
She’s an actress. Or at least she was.”

“But why
would you remember him?”

“Because of
the fight,” Roz said.
 
 
“His wife was having fits about her part, and
ultimately the producers fired her.
 
We
were all in the theater rehearsing one day when her husband and some big shot,
his father-in-law, came storming in.
 
They beat up the director pretty badly.
 
He was hospitalized.”

All three
men were dying to ask the question.
 
Mick
asked it.
 
“Do you remember his
father-in-law’s name?
 
The guy you said
was some big-shot?”

“I don’t
remember his first name, but I remember his last name because he was later
arrested on battery charges, and had the same last name of a famous former New
York Senator: Alfonse D’Amato,” Roz said.
 
“Yeah, that was his name.
 
Something D’Amato.”

Mick stood
to his feet.
 
He couldn’t believe
it.
 
Archie and Danny were floored
too.
 
They were beyond belief.

“Tex
D’Amato,” Danny said, his voice unable to shield his shock.
 
“Stone Cold D’Amato.
 
I’ll be damn, boss.”

“Who is he?”
Roz said.
 
“He’s Mafia or something?”

“He’s the
largest drug dealer on the East Coast,” Mick said.
 
“A stone cold killer, and every other stone
cold name in the book.”

“And he was
Tony LeKirk’s father-in-law?” Danny asked.
 
“How did we miss that?”

“It didn’t
come up,” Archie said.
 
“I didn’t know
that fucker was even married, let alone married to Stone Cold D’Amato’s
daughter.”

But Mick was
thinking.
 
He was missing something.
 
They were conflating too many events, and
something was wrong.
 
And then he
remembered one event in particular.
 
He
hurried from around his desk.

“What is
it?” Roz asked.

“What is
it?” Danny asked.

“What’s D’Amato
known for?” Mick asked.

“Drugs,”
Danny said.

“And
recruiting young dealers with connections,” Mick added.

“That’s
right,” Archie said.
 
“He liked his
runners to have connections so that he could have too much to lose if they try
something stupid.”

Danny was
floored.
 
“Joey,” Danny said.
 
“You think Joey worked for D’Amato?”

“That
bastard knows something he’s not telling me.
 
I’m going to see his ass right now.”

“I’m going
with you,” Roz said, as she moved to follow him.

“No, you’re
not either,” Danny insisted, as if it was up to him.

Mick stopped
in his tracks and looked at Danny as if he had lost his mind talking to Roz
that way.
 
Roz was already looking too.

“I was just
saying,” Danny said.
 
“It’s up to you,
boss.”

Mick took
Roz’s hand, looked at Danny one more time, and then he and Roz left.

Joey was
able to move around easily and was already antsy when he saw his father’s
Lamborghini drive onto the small, circular driveway of the isolated safe
house.
 
The house was in a deeply wooded
area, heavily guarded and fortified, and Joey didn’t hesitate to rush to the
door and make his way outside.
 
But as
soon as he opened the front door, a guard was stationed in front of it, and
Joey was not allowed passage out.

He went to
the window, instead, and watched his father help Roz out of the car and then
began walking toward the front door.
 
His
dad had on one of his expensive suits, and Roz had on a pantsuit, and they both
looked to Joey like some power couple on their way to lunch, not on their way
inside a safe house.
 
But that was the
strange thing about his father.
 
At SI,
and all around Philly, he was this highly respected businessman.
 
To the people Joey knew and hung out with, he
was a feared crime boss.
 
He used to
wonder how he pulled it off, until Teddy told him.
 
He was shrewd enough to pay off the big wigs,
Teddy had said, and keep dirt on them too.
 
Joey didn’t know how Teddy knew all of that, but it fascinated him.
 
It gave him even more reason why he wanted to
someday be as big, if not bigger, than his dad,

He hurried
up to the door as soon as it opened.
 
“Hey, dad,” he said, and then stood there like a kid at Christmas.
 
Roz could tell Joey wanted to hug Santa, but
wasn’t sure if Santa would like it.

“How are you
feeling?” Mick asked as he ushered Roz inside.
 
He was looking down at Joey’s small frame.

“I feel
great.
 
I don’t know why I have to still
stay here, Dad, for real, though. Doc Blaxton said he don’t see any reason why
I can’t resume my normal activities.
 
He
says I can go home now.”

“That’s not
a call for him to make,” Mick responded.
 
Then he ushered Roz toward the sofa.
 
“Let’s sit down.”

Joey
followed.
 
Mick and Roz sat on the
sofa.
 
Joey sat in the chair.

“It’s good
to see you again, Joey,” Roz said with a smile.

“What’s up?”
was all Joey would say.
 
He affect was so
flat that it almost sounded distorted.
 
But Joey couldn’t help it.
 
The
resentment he felt for her, because she waltzed into his father’s life only a
year ago but was already closer to him than he could ever hope to be, didn’t go
away with his injury.
 
It was still
there.

But for
Roz’s part, she understood.
 
She didn’t
try to force anything with any of Mick’s children.
 
She knew only time could change that level of
hurt.

“I didn’t
expect to see you,” Joey asked his father.
 
“Something’s up?”

Mick didn’t
hesitate.
 
“What’s your relationship with
Tex D’Amato?”

Joey was
stunned.
 
“How did you know . . . I
mean---”

“What is
your relationship with Tex D’Amato?” Mick asked again.
 
“And if you lie to me I’ll break every bone
in your body.”

Joey
swallowed hard.

“Tell me.”

“I used to
work for him.”

“Selling
drugs?”

Joey didn’t
respond.

“Selling
drugs?” Mick yelled.

“Yes!
 
He needed a kid who could access the private
school pipeline.
 
He picked me.”

Roz could
tell Mick hated that his suspicion was confirmed.

Joey saw his
father’s distress too.
 
“It was no big
deal,” he offered.

But Mick
would have none of it.
 
“Don’t fucking
tell me that!”
 
Mick pointed at
Joey.
 
“Don’t fucking tell me that!
 
It is a big deal and your ass knows it!”

“I didn’t
mention it because I knew you wouldn’t understand.
 
I was just learning the business so I could
do my own thing.
 
You wouldn’t teach me
anything,” Joey added, and Mick’s jaw tightened.
 
“So D’Amato came around and I said why
not.
 
I wanted to learn from one of the
best.”

“How long
did you work for him?” Mick asked.

“I started
when I was fifteen.”

“Good Lord,”
Roz blurted out before she could stop herself.
 
She looked at Mick.
 
The anguish
in his eyes told the story.

Then he
looked at his son.
 
“Fifteen,” he said.

“Yes, sir,”
Joey responded.
 
“I was real good at it
too.
 
I was the go-to guy for all the
rich kids in town.
 
But when I graduated,
I didn’t want to work for him anymore.
 
I
wanted to get my own supplier.
 
Make my
own connections.
 
So I told D’Amato I
wanted out.
 
But I was his golden boy.
 
He didn’t want me out.
 
I got out any way.
 
That’s when he got Tony LeKirk to try to take
me out.
 
He must have forgotten I
belonged to you.”

Mick knew it
was an easy reality to forget since he often behaved as if he had forgotten
himself.
 
He leaned forward, his hard
green eyes riveted on his son.
 
“Why
didn’t you tell me the truth at the hospital?” he asked him.
 
“Why did you give me that song and dance
about some woman being involved?”

Joey
hesitated.

“Tell me,”
Mick ordered.

“Because you
let me come and work for you.
 
I didn’t
want to blow it.”

“Telling me
the truth would not have blown anything.”

“And,” Joey
added, “I didn’t want you to think any less of me than you already do.”

Roz’s heart
dropped.
 
Mick felt as if he had been
kicked in the gut.
 
If his youngest was
this emotionally messed up, what was going on with the rest of his children?

But he
wasn’t going to find answers here.
 
He had
to protect his son right now.
 
He stood
up.
 
Roz and Joey stood up too.
 
“You’re going to stay with me until I can
take care of D’Amato,” Mick said.

“Dad,
don’t,” Joey begged.
 
“That guy’s a
killer.
 
He was willing to kill me just
because I wouldn’t sell drugs for him anymore.”

“It’s more
to it than that, son,” Mick said as they began walking toward the front
door.
 
“I’m on his kill list too.”

Joey was
confused.
 
“For what?
 
What did you do?”

“He looked
out for you,” Roz made it clear.

Joey looked
at Roz, and then looked at his father.
 
“You’re the one who. . . You killed Tony LeKirk?
 
That was you, Dad?”

Before Mick
could answer, the sound of gunfire erupted at such an unrelenting frequency
that even he was startled.
 
He could tell
it was a major gun battle between his men and well-armed intruders, no doubt
D’Amato’s men.
 
But before he could even
pull out his own weapon, and grab Roz and Joey, the front door burst open and
the guard who had been stationed at the door fell backwards into the foyer,
riddled with bullet holes.

“Downstairs!”
Mick yelled to Joey as he grabbed Roz, pulled out his gun, and they all ran
toward the stairs near the back of the living room that led to the basement.

Every window
in the house was shattered with hails and hails of bullets as they ducked and
dodged and hurried through the stairwell door and down the stairs.

“Where are
we going?” Joey wanted to know the plan as they jumped off the steps and ran
across the damp, unfinished basement with his father holding onto him too and
helping him along.
 
Mick had his arms
around Roz and his hands on Joey as his momentum spurred theirs along.

But Joey
wanted answers.
 
“There’s no way out
here, Dad.
 
We’ll be sitting ducks down
here.
 
Why are you bringing us down
here?”

They could
hear footsteps running upstairs; footsteps that were heading toward the
basement stairwell too, and Mick knew he had to go in front, to get them out of
here.
 
So he did.
 
He shoved past both of them and ran,
seemingly twice as fast as they were running, to a switch behind a clock.
 
He flipped the switch and the wall opened as
if it were a door.
 
A door to what
appeared to be a garage Joey didn’t know was even down there.
 
With a car in that garage.

The door to
the stairwell burst open, and footsteps could be heard running down those
stairs, running toward them.
 
Joey was in
near panic and so was Roz, and they both were looking to Mick.
 
Mick grabbed a gun out of the small of his
back and looked at his son.
 
He was
poised to hand it to him, but he had to make something perfectly clear.

He pulled
Roz in front of him.
 
“I’m depending on
you to get this precious lady safely back to my house,” Mick said to his
son.
 
“I need you to be the man I know
you can be, and handle your father’s business, you hear me, Joey? I love you,
son, and I need you to take care of her for me.”

“I will,
Dad,” Joey said with tears in his eyes.
 
“I promise you I will.”

Mick knew it
was like the blind leading the blind, but he had to depend on Joey.
 
“If you ever wanted to show me just how tough
you really are, this is the time.”
 
He
handed Joey the gun.
 
“There’s keys in
that car.
 
You crank up and the back wall
will open.
 
You drive her to safety.”

“Yes, sir,”
Joey said with all sincerity, as if he was on a mission.
 
They could hear the men advancing.
 
They knew it was a matter of seconds.
 
But it wasn’t seconds.
 
It was right now.
 
Because the gunfire erupted again, barely
missing Mick’s head.

“You come
with us, Mick,” Roz begged, pulling on him, with tears in her eyes too. “Please
come with us!”

“What did I
tell you?
 
You kill or you be
killed.
 
This bastard has to be stopped
before he harms my family.
 
Now go,” Mick
ordered, as he pushed her into Joey’s arms through the opening in the
wall.
 
Mick flipped the switch to close
the opening, and as soon as it did, he snatched the entire switch off of the
wall, rendering it useless, and decimated his only means of escape.
 
But he wanted those guns on him, not Roz, and
Joey.

He dived
beneath a table as bullets came closer, but he didn’t fire toward them.
 
He fired at targets in the opposite direction
of them, causing the gunmen to constantly look and shoot in that direction, as
if they had another shooter on their hands.
 
Mick was able to move further away from the escape route Roz and Joey
now occupied.
 
He had to give them time
to get away, before he revealed himself again.
 
He crawled on his belly along the floor, feeling all kinds of vermin
beneath him, and he suspected he might very well die in that filthy rat hole.

But he wasn’t
going to lay down and die.
 
He was going
to die trying to live.
 
And that was why,
when it felt like sufficient time had passed for his loved ones had gotten
away, and when it felt like his enemies had exhausted most of their supply of
bullets, he made himself known.

He had
already counted his attackers.
 
Four men
in all.
 
And he stood up firing.
 

He knocked
off one.

He knocked
off two.

He got in a
gun battle with the third, but knocked him off too.

But before
he could get the fourth one, another man showed up, and started firing
too.
 
He was outgunned again.
 
And he had to take cover again because this
man, unlike his predecessors, knew what he was doing.
 
He wasn’t firing in the dark.
 
He was hitting targets.