MICK SINATRA 3
HIS LADY, HIS CHILDREN, AND SAL
By
MALLORY MONROE
Copyright©2015 Mallory Monroe
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This novel is a work of fiction. All characters are fictitious. Any similarities to anyone living or dead are completely accidental. The specific mention of known places or venues are not meant to be exact replicas of those places, but are purposely embellished or imagined for the story’s sake.
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INTERRACIAL ROMANCE SERIES
BY BESTSELLING AUTHOR
MALLORY MONROE:
THE SINATRAS OF JERICHO COUNTY
SERIES IN ORDER:
BIG DADDY SINATRA
THERE WAS A RUTHLESS MAN
BOOK ONE
BIG DADDY SINATRA 2
IF I CAN’T HAVE YOU
BOOK TWO
BIG DADDY SINATRA 3
THE BEST OF MY LOVE
BRENT SINATRA
ALL OF ME
BOOK ONE
MICK SINATRA
FOR ONCE IN MY LIFE
BOOK ONE
MICK SINATRA
LOVE, LIES, AND JERICHO
BOOK TWO
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND
SERIES IN ORDER:
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND 2:
HIS WOMEN AND HIS WIFE
DUTCH AND GINA:
A SCANDAL IS BORN
DUTCH AND GINA:
AFTER THE FALL
DUTCH AND GINA:
THE POWER OF LOVE
DUTCH AND GINA:
THE SINS OF THE FATHERS
DUTCH AND GINA:
WHAT HE DID FOR LOVE
FOR THE LOVE OF GINA
BOOK EIGHT
THE MOB BOSS SERIES
IN ORDER:
ROMANCING THE MOB BOSS
MOB BOSS 2:
THE HEART OF THE MATTER
MOB BOSS 3:
LOVE AND RETRIBUTION
MOB BOSS 4:
ROMANCING TRINA GABRINI
A MOB BOSS CHRISTMAS:
THE PREGNANCY
(Mob Boss 5)
MOB BOSS 6:
THE HEART OF RENO GABRINI
RENO’S GIFT
BOOK 7
RENO GABRINI:
A MAN IN FULL
BOOK 8
RENO AND TRINA:
GETTING BACK TO LOVE
BOOK 9
RENO AND SON:
DON’T MESS WITH JIM
BOOK 10
MOB BOSS ELEVEN
THE WRONG ONE
BOOK 11
RENO AND TRINA
IN THE SHADOWS OF LOVE
BOOK 12
THE GABRINI MEN SERIES
IN ORDER:
ROMANCING TOMMY GABRINI
ROMANCING SAL GABRINI
TOMMY GABRINI 2:
A PLACE IN HIS HEART
SAL GABRINI 2:
A WOMAN’S TOUCH
TOMMY GABRINI 3:
GRACE UNDER FIRE
SAL GABRINI 3:
HARD LOVE
SAL GABRINI 4:
I’LL TAKE YOU THERE
TOMMY GABRINI 4:
DAPPER TOM BEGIN AGAIN
SAL GABRINI 5:
UNTIL YOU COME BACK TO ME
SAL GABRINI 6:
HIS HOUSE OF CARDS
ADDITIONAL BESTSELLING
INTERRACIAL ROMANCE
FROM MALLORY MONROE:
DANIEL’S GIRL (ROMANCING AN OLDER MAN)
ROMANCING MO RYAN
ROMANCING HER PROTECTOR
ROMANCING THE BULLDOG
INTERRACIAL ROMANCE
FROM
BESTSELLING AUTHOR
KATHERINE CACHITORIE:
LOVERS AND TAKERS
LOVING HER SOUL MATE
LOVING THE HEAD MAN
SOME CAME DESPERATE:
A LOVE SAGA
ADDITIONAL BESTSELLING
INTERRACIAL ROMANCE:
A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP
YVONNE THOMAS
AND
BACK TO HONOR:
A REGGIE REYNOLDS
ROMANTIC MYSTERY
JT WATSON
ROMANTIC FICTION
FROM
AWARD-WINNING
AND
BESTSELLING AUTHOR
TERESA MCCLAIN-WATSON:
DINO AND NIKKI:
AFTER REDEMPTION
AND
AFTER WHAT YOU DID
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
EPILOGUE
PROLOGUE
For once in his life, Mick Sinatra was afraid.
He sat in the chair in the big, dingy room, with his legs crossed and his arms folded on his lap, and watched Lorenzo Zatti stand before him and beg for his life. It was a cold night. Mick’s clothing, from his long white overcoat to his black turtleneck sweater, emphasized just how chilly a night it was. But it was freezing in that room. Because Zo knew he had done it this time. Zo knew he was a man condemned.
Mick couldn’t count the times he’d seen this scene play out. Hundreds, thousands of times. The man was different, but the desperation was always the same. Because the pleas never changed. They didn’t mean to double cross him. They didn’t mean to bring shame on his name. Their asses got caught, and they were sorry now. He could quote chapter and verse, he knew the lines so well.
But he’d never been more aware of himself as he listened to those pleas. He’d never felt the beads of sweat on his own forehead as he watched his so-called friend beg for mercy. He’d never heard his heartbeat pound louder than even the condemned man’s sobs. This shit wasn’t new to him. He was no fucking novice. But all he could think about wasn’t the snitch in front of him. It wasn’t the sight of this strong man begging like the wimp they all became in times like these. Mick couldn’t stop thinking about Rosalind. His brand new wife. Because in the end, if he made one false move; if he missed something that he had never missed before and somebody finally called his number, she would be all alone in this world.
Not that he
cared about dying. He didn’t give a fuck about dying. Everybody had to go sometime and he wasn’t the kind of man to live in a box as if he couldn’t drop dead in that same box. But he gave a fuck about dying and leaving Rosalind alone to mourn his sorry ass, and to regret their beautiful union forever because he didn’t bother to clean up his act and be there for her.
“Think about the years, Michello,” Lorenzo begged. He was a big man who thought highly of himself, but never amounted to anything more than a dope dealing street corner hood. He and Mick used to run those streets together. Now Mick ran corporations.
“We have known each other for twenty years,” Lorenzo kept begging. “How can you turn your back on a man who has been with you, through thick and thin, for twenty years?”
Who would take care of her? Who would be there for her late at night when she needed somebody to hold her? Who would protect her and stand up for her when the world tried to shut her down? Some new man? Some clown who wanted the fortune he would leave her, rather than her? She was Mick’s responsibility, not some other man’s! She was his.
“I never meant to double cross you, Micky,” Lorenzo continued. “Not for one second would I do that to you. You know me! I would never do anything like that to you. I would never bring shame on you with the crimes I’m being accused of this night. I love you, man.”
Mick stood up quickly when those words came out of Zo’s mouth. The one thing he hated more than bullshit was bullshit with feeling. He opened his long white coat, and put his hands in the pockets of his black pants. “Tell me who’s behind it,” he said as he stared at this piece of shit that just purported to love him.
Lorenzo knew it was serious now. Mick the Tick was on his feet. Mick wasn’t buying what he was selling and he knew he had to change course. He had to deny everything or risk losing Mick’s trust forever. “I can’t tell you what I don’t know,” he said. “That’s what I’ve been trying to say to you all night. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t know what any of you are talking about. Who’s behind what?”
Mick’s right hand man, Danny Padrone, got in Lorenzo’s face. He was one of three of Mick’s men in the safe house with the boss. “Who pulled the intercept, Zo?” Danny asked. “Who snatched the Cleveland cargo? You know what he’s talking about so stop fucking with us!”
“I would never do that to Mick,” Lorenzo pleaded. “And Mick, you know it. I didn’t snatch any cargo, what is he talking? I’m not guilty of what I am being accused!”
Mick walked up beside Lorenzo. He could smell the man’s sweat. “Who’s behind it?” he asked again
“I don’t know, I swear to you I . . .,” Lorenzo started to say, but Mick had had enough. He grabbed his former running partner by the hair, jerked his big head back, and with a knife Lorenzo had not even realized Mick held, sliced off Lorenzo’s ear.
Lorenzo screamed in pain and tried to jerk away from Mick. But Mick was too strong. “Who’s behind it, motherfucker?” Mick angrily asked him again. “Stop playing these games!”
The blood poured from the side of Lorenzo’s face, as his now dislodged ear rested in the puddle of blood forming at his feet. “I’m not behind it,” Zo said with a hard, pain-filled cry in his voice. “You’ve got to believe me,” he added, as he grabbed his handkerchief and tried to stanch the blood flow. “It’s not me, Mick. I swear it’s not me.”
“Just tell the truth and you’ll live, Zo,” Danny urged. “Just tell the fucking truth!”
“I am telling the truth!” Lorenzo yelled back.
“Who’s behind these intercepts?” Danny asked. “Just tell us who’s the boss!”
“You have the wrong guy!” Then he looked at Mick again. “I had nothing to do with it. Mick, please,” he pleaded. “Don’t do this, Mick. Mick, please!”
He was begging for mercy. He would have dropped to his knees if he knew it would save his life. But when he looked into Mick’s eyes, he saw no sympathy there. He saw no reminiscing about the good old days or empathy for his fallen comrade. All he saw in Mick’s hard green eyes was a coldness that chilled his blood. He knew he would get no mercy here.
That was why, as Mick was about to slice off his left ear too, and undoubtedly slice off other parts too, one part at a time, Lorenzo did the unthinkable in his line of work. He told. “Sal Gabrini,” he cried. “Sal Luca Gabrini!”
And everybody stood still. Danny couldn’t believe it. None of Mick’s men could believe it. They looked at their boss. But their boss was staring at Zo with an intensity that bordered on rage. “Talk,” he ordered.
“It’s not what I know,” Lorenzo clarified. “It’s what I heard.”
“Talk,” Mick said again.
Lorenzo swallowed hard. He knew he had to get it right. “I heard Sal was torn, because he didn’t want a war with you. He’s no fool. He knows he can’t win a war against you. And Rudy Balotti knew it too. But that didn’t stop him.”
Danny frowned. “Rudy Balotti? What the fuck does Rudy Balotti have to do with this?”
“Rudy is Sal’s son. Everybody thought he was Rudy Red’s son, but he’s not.”
“Tell us what we don’t know, prick,” Danny insisted. “We found out same as everybody else that Rudy is Sal’s kid. What does that have to do with this?”
Lorenzo was in so much pain that his face was a mask of agony. But he knew he had to give them the villain they wanted, or Mick wouldn’t stop butchering him until there was nothing left to butcher. “Rudy was the one who intercepted all of those shipments,” he said to Mick. “Including your Cleveland cargo. He found out it was going down and his men pulled an intercept while it still sailed in international waters. Like fucking pirates! But that’s Rudy. He outsmarted everybody. He knew it was going down and outsmarted everybody.” Zo grimaced as the pain continued to rip through his head.
Danny looked at Mick. “But he works for us, boss. Rudy’s our bitch. He’s our snitch.”
“He was playing you,” Lorenzo said to Mick. “Rudy was pretending to need you to be his strongman against everybody else, while he was plotting all along to weaken your influence. Some say he did it for Sal. For his old man. He knew you had a thing against Sal for what Sal did to Sprig. But I say he did it for himself, or he would have never dragged Sal into a war with you. Because once that cargo was lifted, he ran to his old man for protection. Sal doesn’t want a war is what I’m hearing, but I’m also hearing he’ll have one if you try to harm his son.”
Mick knew Rudy Balotti was up to something when he came to him with that bullshit story about needing his protection. He didn’t buy his request for his protection one iota. But he never dreamed he’d be this stupid.
“Explain to me,” Mick said to Lorenzo, “how it is that you, my so-called friend, the man who supposedly loves me, got involved with the double cross? Your organization got a piece of the pie. A piece of my pie! Why didn’t you refuse to touch what wasn’t yours and come to me, friend?”
Lorenzo shook his head. Dread filled his heart. “I wasn’t double crossing you, Mick, I swear. And I do love you!”
Mick’s heart swelled with rage. “How did Rudy find out about those shipments?” he asked.
Lorenzo stared at his old friend. He couldn’t answer that question, because both of them already knew the answer.
“Yeah, friend,” Mick said. “I thought so too.” Then Mick, without warning to any of his men, or, in Lorenzo’s case, with too much warning, slit his old friend’s throat.
Lorenzo gagged for air, with both of his hands held toward his neck without touching his neck. He looked at Mick in horror, as if he was waiting for him to stop the pain, to stop the blood! And then he fell, eyes wide open, at Mick’s feet.
Mick thought about Rosalind, and how she would have felt if he had been on the opposite side of that knife. But then he thought again. He would rather be dead than be a snitch. He would never be on that side.
He dropped the knife beside Zo’s body. “And now it begin again,” he
said.
Danny looked at him. “Are we really going to war with Sal Gabrini, boss? Are you really going to war with your own nephew?”
Mick stared at Lorenzo. He stared at the man who he had actually considered a friend. “They’re double crossing me left and right,” he said. “I’ve been out of sight, handling my business. Letting the Dons run the show. They take my absence for weakness.”
“Fucking fools,” Danny said. “Mick the Tick weak? They must be nuts!”
“Who would have thought Zo would two-time you like that though?” another one of Mick’s men chimed in. “He was close to you for real. You told us he was hands off.”
“But it’s out there, boss,” his third man said. “These idiots are getting bolder. They think you’ve been on top too long. They think it’s high time somebody knocked you off.”
“What they think,” Danny said, “is that you’re losing your grip. But you’re about to show all of their asses just how firm a grip you truly have. Aren’t you, boss? If any grip is going to be lost, it’s going to be theirs.”
Mick exhaled. He needed a war like he needed a hole in the head. Rosalind didn’t need this! But he never backed down before, and wasn’t about to start now. “Clean this shit up,” he ordered his men.
Mick stared at the body now staring up at him. It was a shame it had to come to this. But what choice did Mick have? He didn’t see where he had a choice. He wouldn’t last an hour in this world if he allowed anybody to two-time him and get away with it. Especially his so-called friends. And now Gabrini had to be dealt with too. Now Gabrini had to be roped in. Mick let out a harsh exhale. It was a dog’s life. But it was his life.
Mick Sinatra 3: His Lady, His Children, and Sal Page 1