“Mama!” Marcus cried, terrified.
But Denise ran to her son, and attempted to pull him away from the police. “Leave my child alone!” she cried. “What are you doing? Leave my child alone!”
Marcus, too, started resisting, but one officer held Denise back, while the other officer placed Marcus in handcuffs. And they began to leave.
But Denise would not give up. She ran to the door to block their exit. “You aren’t going anywhere with my child,” she cried. “That’s Brent Sinatra’s son! That’s Big Daddy Sinatra’s grandson! You people are in so much trouble! You’re going to have hell to pay if you don’t leave my child alone!”
But Ira didn’t care. The law was on his side. They hurried Marcus out of the room, down the steep stairs, across the lobby, and out into the waiting patrol car. Ira was right. The press was out in force as cameras flashed and questions were hurled and the officers perp-walked young Marcus to a waiting patrol car.
Charles drove up in his Jaguar, with Jenay on the passenger seat. They hurried over as soon as they heard the press report, just in case something like this could happen. “Call Brent,” he ordered Jenay as he jumped out of the car and ran just as an officer was sitting Marcus in the backseat of the patrol car, while holding back Denise.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Charles yelled at the officer as he hurried toward the patrol car.
“They arrested my son, Big Daddy,” Denise cried. “They have my child!”
But the policeman closed the door and hurriedly got into the front passenger seat. “Open the door,” Charles yelled as he pulled onto the now-locked patrol car door. “Open this damn door!”
Ira, coming out of the hotel, hurried to his own car. “Stay out of this, Big Daddy,” he advised as he made his way.
“I’m not staying out of shit!” Big Daddy yelled back. “Open this door!” He pulled and pulled and the cameras clicked and clicked. “Open this gotdamn door!”
But the second officer was already behind the wheel of the car, the first officer had already gotten in too, and the patrol car, just as Charles and Denise were banging on the window, sped off with sirens blaring.
Charles turned to Ira, to kick his ass, but he was already in his car and driving off too.
Reporters were yelling questions and flashing cameras, but Charles, with Denise following them, got into the Jaguar, and sped off too.
“Call Brent,” Charles ordered again.
“I already did,” Jenay responded.
Brent and Makayla arrived at the station just after Charles, Jenay, and Denise arrived. Brent’s usual parking spot was next to the flag pole, but he parked illegally across the lines this time, and he and Makayla jumped out and ran inside.
Charles, Jenay, and Denise were waiting at the reception desk as soon as Brent and Makayla walked in.
Denise was the first to jump up. “They arrested him,” she cried as she ran to Brent. “Your own men arrested him and won’t let us see him!”
Brent looked at the desk sergeant. “He’s being processed in, sir,” the sergeant said.
“Get an officer on that door,” he ordered the sergeant. “No press in this building.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Everybody wait here,” Brent said to his family, and hurried up the stairs. Although the actual jail was located on the ground floor, the much smaller Juvenile Detention Division was located on the top floor, and Brent headed in that direction.
After he left, Denise looked sneeringly at Makayla. She looked her up and down. “Why are you here?” she asked her.
“Because she belongs with us,” Charles said. “Which is more than I will ever say for your sorry ass!”
Denise, embarrassed, looked at Jenay, her former friend, as if she would ask Makayla to leave. “Worry about your son,” Jenay suggested. “Not Brent’s woman.”
“Something you’ll never be again,” Charles made clear. “I’ll disown him if he even thinks about having anything more to do with you.” Charles was fuming now, and Jenay didn’t stop him. She felt the same way.
“Kept that child away from him all these years,” Charles continued. “That boy would have never been in a predicament like this if you would have told us about him. This would have never happened!”
Denise had tears in her eyes, but she would not back down. “It’s not my fault,” she said. “None of this is my fault.”
But even she seemed doubtful about that.
Upstairs, Brent was just about to pull open the door that led to the top floor when Ira Stockton opened the door and walked into the stairwell.
“Go home, Brent,” he said as the door closed shut behind him. “That boy confessed and he has been arrested, something that should have been done before I had to get involved. Your girlfriend failed her very first test miserably. She lied to me because you asked her to. She will be fired, thanks to you.”
Brent stared at him as if he was looking at a contaminant.
“But it doesn’t matter,” Ira continued with a smile. “We got the boy exactly where his murdering ass belongs, and I’m a hero on every newscast from here to Van Buren for doing the right thing. This arrest is going to be the icing on the cake of my reelection. You just ensured that I can’t be defeated.”
Brent’s anger became a raging fire, not just because of Ira’s words, but because of the stunt he just pulled with Marcus, and he took his fist and punched Ira so hard that Ira stumbled back and then fell down the stairs. Ira’s eyeglasses flew off his face as he fell, and he landed on his ass.
Brent opened the door, walked out of the stairwell, and made his way into the Juvenile Detention Division. Eddie Rivers was waiting in the wing.
“Ira went behind my back too, Brent,” he said. “I didn’t know anything about it either.”
“Where is he?”
“He was already processed and jailed by the time I got here. There was nothing I could do at that point.”
Brent headed down the aisle that led to the jail cells. When he saw his son sitting there, all alone, and a jailer standing outside of the cell, his heart clenched. But he didn’t delay. “Open it,” he ordered.
But the jailer was concerned. “On whose authority, sir?”
Brent couldn’t believe he was asked that question. “Mine, you asshole! On my authority! Open it!”
The jailer quickly unlocked the cell and Marcus ran to Brent and jumped into his arms.
But Brent walked him back to the small twin bed and sat down. He sat Marcus on his lap. “I need answers, son,” he said. “No more bullshit. You talk to me and you tell me the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. You hear me?”
Marcus nodded.
“Do you hear me?” Brent asked again.
“Yes, sir,” Marcus said.
Brent exhaled. Here goes, he thought. “Did you kill Mark Stravinsky?” he asked.
Marcus had tears in his eyes, but he shook his head. “No, sir,” he said.
Brent’s heart squeezed with relief. He knew it all along. “Why did you confess to killing him?”
“Because they made me.”
“Who made you?”
“They said you would look out for me and I’ll never have to be arrested.”
“Who said that?”
Marcus hesitated.
“Tell me, son,” Brent said. “No more bullshit. Remember?”
Marcus nodded, and then wiped away his tears. “Mom and some man,” he said.
Brent’s heart dropped. “Your mother, and a man, told you to confess to the crime?”
“Yes, sir. They said you would protect me. They said you were my real father and you would protect me. But when I saw what they did, I couldn’t . . . I didn’t handle it right.”
“You handled it better than most boys your age ever could,” Brent said. “But what did you see, Marcus? What did they do? Did they kill Stravinsky at that motel?”
He shook his head. “No, sir.”
“Where
did it happen?”
“In the car. In a limousine. The man said he was going to give all this money to Dad’s campaign, and we were in the car with the man. That’s when the man and Mom tied him up.”
“They tied up Stravinsky?”
“Yes, sir. They tied him up and they put a handkerchief in his mouth. Then the man asked Mom if she wanted to do the honors. Mom said yeah. And that’s when I saw the knife. And Mom started stabbing him. She already had on gloves. But it was still real messy.”
Brent’s heart fell through his shoe. “You saw it, son? You saw your mother do that?”
“They made me sit up front, with the driver. So I didn’t see that part. But I heard it.”
“My Lord. What happened after that?”
“Then they put him in this big suitcase and we got in this car with Walter.”
“Who’s Walter?”
“This man. I don’t know him.”
“So you and your mother got in this car with Walter and the body was in a suitcase in the trunk of the car?”
Marcus nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Then what?”
Marcus scrunched up his face remembering it. “And then Mom and I went inside the motel room while Walter carried the suitcase in. They took Dad out of the suitcase and put him on the motel room floor.”
Brent wanted to strangle Denise. “Then what happened?”
“They sat me down, gave me the knife Mom did the honors with, and Mom told me what I was supposed to do. They put your name in my pocket, and then she and Walter left. They called the manager later, and the manager called the police. They told me to confess to the killing, but only after Mom came to get me. Not before. Then tonight, after you put us in that hotel room, she called a reporter named Jock and told him I confessed. She told him she had recorded it.”
Then Marcus scrunched up his face again. “I hated that man for the way he was always hurting my mom,” he said. “But I didn’t want him to die.”
“I know you didn’t, son,” Brent said with anguish in his eyes, and pulled him into his arms. “I know you didn’t.”
But then he knew there was more work to do. He stood his son up, got up himself, and walked out of the unlocked cell holding his son’s hand. The jailer, who had heard the entire story, did not bother to stop them.
When they made it downstairs, Denise ran to Marcus, and Marcus broke free and ran to Denise. Charles, Jenay, and Makayla stood to their feet. Makayla moved over by Brent. Brent placed an arm around her waist.
“What’s next?” Makayla asked him.
“What’s next? A murder charge.”
“Oh no. For Marcus?”
“Not for Marcus. For Denise.” Everybody looked at Brent. “Denise will be charged with the murder of Mark Stravinsky.”
“What?” Charles and Jenay spoke in unison.
Denise stopped hugging her son and looked at Brent. “What?”
“You killed that man. And what’s worse, you killed him and framed your own son.”
She looked at Marcus, with terror in her eyes. “What is he talking about? What did you tell him? What did you tell him, Markie?”
“I told him the truth,” Marcus said. “I told him the truth!”
Denise was horrified. She glanced at Brent, as if she was hoping he didn’t hear Marcus, and then she looked back at her son. She had to salvage this. She had to get out of this. “What truth?” she asked him. “That you killed Daddy?”
Marcus looked at his mother. “The real truth,” he said. “You killed Daddy.”
“But I had to do it, Markie, you know I had to! Daddy was mean to me. You saw the things he did to me! How could you betray me?”
But just as Denise asked her son what had to be a rhetorical question, a still-wobbly Ira Stockton arrived downstairs, with aid from Eddie Rivers.
“I’m pressing charges!” Ira yelled at Brent. “I want that man arrested for nearly killing me. I want that man arrested for attempted murder!”
Eddie looked at Brent. “He claims you pushed him down the stairs, boss. What say you?”
But as soon as Eddie asked that question, Makayla saw something out of the corner of her eye. When she turned and looked outside of the police station’s wall-to-wall picture window, and realized that what she was seeing was a rapid-fire rifle protruding out of a car, with the scope pointed directly at Brent’s head, she screamed Nooo and pushed Brent down, causing herself to fall too.
But just as she was pushing Brent down, the gunman moved his aim to his real target, and started firing in rapid succession.
As glass shattered and bullets sailed, everybody was pushing everybody else and getting out of the way themselves. Charles pushed Jenay down, and got down himself. Brent reached up and grabbed Marcus just as Denise was pushing Marcus to the ground. But Marcus was the main target and bullets were flying in his direction. But because of Brent and Denise, none of them hit Marcus.
And then the car sped off.
“Everybody okay?” Brent asked as he stood up and looked from Makayla to Marcus to his parents. They all looked fine. Then he pulled out his gun and, along with Eddie Rivers and some of their men, ran outside.
But inside was horrific too. Because, although the Sinatras were fine, Ira Stockton had been hit and was down, and Denise had been hit too, and was bleeding to death.
“Call an ambulance!” Jenay cried as she ran to assist Denise.
Charles ran to Marcus, and pulled him out of harm’s way, while Makayla ran to Ira. But Ira was already dead, and Denise, her eyes already glazing over, was barely hanging on.
“You’re going to be just fine, Denise,” Jenay said as she removed her jacket and placed it under Denise’s head. “You hear me? You’re going to make it.”
But Denise wanted her son. She was barely audible, but she was asking for Marcus.
Jenay looked at Charles. Marcus looked up at his grandfather. He allowed Marcus to go to his mother.
Tears were now in her eyes. “I’m sorry,” Denise said to Marcus. “I wanted him to stop, but I did it wrong, son. I did it wrong. But you’re going to be okay. Brent will take care of you. He’s your father and you’ll stay with Brent. Brent will take care of you. He’ll look out for us.”
It wasn’t lost on Jenay nor Makayla that Denise said us. But it didn’t matter any way. Shortly after she said it, she died.
But outside of the station, the chase was on. Brent and Eddie jumped into Brent’s truck and instead of following the gunman’s car, they went in the opposite direction. Because Brent knew Jericho too well. He knew that the gunman could turn as many corners as he wanted to turn, but eventually he would have to turn onto Devonshire Boulevard to get out of town.
They headed for Devonshire. Brent drove speeds in excess of eighty miles per hour, without the benefit of his dashboard siren because he didn’t want to announce his position, as they made their way to cut the gunman off at the pass.
And it worked, with mere seconds to spare. Because as soon as Brent’s truck flew through the alleyway and onto Devonshire, the gunman’s car was just about to fly past. But Brent’s truck collided with the car’s rear end, spinning the car so out of control that it flipped several times and landed broadside up.
But that didn’t stop the gunman.
He crawled out of the car and began to make a run for it. But he was no match for Brent. Brent jumped from his truck, ran after the gunman, and caught him within fifty yards of the accident. He jumped onto the gunman’s back and tackled him to the ground.
By the time Eddie made it up to them, Brent had his knee in the small of the man’s back and was pulling out his handcuffs. But the gunman was a mystery to both he and Brent. Neither one of them had ever seen him before.
Brent cuffed him. As Eddie frisked him, Brent asked the obvious question. “Who are you?” he asked.
The man looked at Brent with pure hated in his eyes. “Shane,” he said. “Shane Joffee.”
Eddie was shocked. That wasn’t a com
mon name, at least not in their neck of the woods. “What the fuck?” he asked. Then he looked at Brent.
“Are you related to Chief Joffee?” Brent asked him.
Shane shook his head. “Chief Joffee, you call him. As if you respected him as chief. When it was you who lied on him, set him up, and then took his job!”
But Eddie would have none of that. “Your father was fired by the mayor and Brent was hired by the mayor. What are you talking about?”
“They lied on my father and then forced him out. And my father never was the same again. He became a drunk.”
“He was already a drunk,” Eddie said.
“He became a drunk,” Shane said again, “and lost everything. He moved to Silicon Valley, where I worked and lived, and I tried to give him a good life, but it wasn’t good enough. He felt like a failure. He felt as if his world was taken from him when they removed him as chief. Two months ago he committed suicide. He died. All because of you,” he said to Brent.
Brent knew he was guilty of a lot of things, but Chief Joffee’s suicide was not one of them.
But Shane kept talking. “I had to make that right,” he said. “But not easy for you. I had to make it hard. But they all failed. Every single one of them. Neal Grassley was paid to kill your girlfriend. But he was wallowing in his sorrows and tried to kill himself instead. Then Clem Michaels was hired to take your baby sister out. But you beat his stupid ass to the punch and killed him before he could do anything. Then pretty boy Bobby Sinatra was on the list. And Walter Pierce had him in his crosshairs. It was all arranged. I knew his death would set you back. But his foolish girlfriend had the nerve to run over that innocent hooker and force my guy to back off. So Walter backed off.”
Brent remembered how Marcus had mentioned that name. “Who’s Walter?” he asked.
“He’s my private investigator, that’s who. At least, he was my investigator. But only after he finally did something right. He owed me that much. After he assisted Denise with the moving of the body from my limo to that motel, his services were no longer needed. Besides, he had failed in everything else anyway. Killing him was the easiest thing I ever did.”
Police sirens could be heard and police cars began to arrive.
Brent Sinatra: All of Me Page 19