But as Mick made his way up the five flights of stairs and entered the house, putting on leather gloves as he made his way around the kitchen to the living room area where their prisoner was housed, he had an ominous feeling. Something was at work. Something powerful. He felt it in his gut. But he couldn’t even fathom what.
Big Ridge Mahoney was lying on the sofa so badly beaten that Mick barely recognized him. Mick frowned. “What the fuck happened to him?” he asked.
Mick’s men in the room, some four men strong, all looked at Teddy. Teddy was standing against the wall, his clothes bloody and his handsome face filled with sweat and anger. He was still breathing heavily. “I guess I got carried away,” he said.
“Did he tell you who’s behind his change of heart?”
Teddy hated to say it. “No,” he finally said.
Mick stared at Teddy. He was nobody’s fool. This was no power play by a hardhead, but a risky move by a leader. A natural born leader. It wasn’t the risk Mick would have taken. The upside was good; but the downside, namely the death of the only man who could answer their questions if all didn’t go exactly according to plan, was too great. But Teddy had already made the decision.
“What’s the story?” Mick asked Teddy.
“There is none,” Teddy responded. “He’s not talking. Not even a little bit.”
Mick frowned. “What the fuck does that mean? Make his ass talk!”
“We tried, Pop. Look at him. Don’t you think we tried? That’s all we’ve been doing. But he won’t talk.”
Mick stared at Mahoney. That was why he never liked these either/or propositions. If they chose not to play ball, it could get dicey quickly.
But that was the game Teddy started. Mick had to finish it.
He walked over to the sofa and sat on its edge. He didn’t speak, however, until Mahoney looked at him.
“One chance,” Mick said. “You have one more chance to tell me what’s going on. I’m not going to beat it out of you. I’m not going to hold any kind of conversation with you. It will be done. You have one more chance.”
But Mahoney shook his head. His face had been practically disfigured by Teddy. But he still wouldn’t talk? Who, Mick wondered, was he afraid of? And why, as an equally curious question, wasn’t he afraid of Mick? This situation, Mick decided, had to be rectified.
“Who ordered you to defy our agreement?” Mick asked him. “Who ordered you to try to muscle in on my territory? Who ordered you to pull that stupid shit?”
Mahoney shook his head. “Fuck you,” he said in slurred words that made it sound like muck you.
But it was enough for Mick. He angrily grabbed Mahoney by the catch of his coat lapels, flung him up off of the sofa, and dragged his injured body across the room.
“Dad,” Teddy said, stunned by the suddenness of it all, as he hurried behind his father. “What are you doing? We need intel, Pop. You can’t take it too far. We need intel!”
Mick didn’t even dignify that comment with a response as he dragged Mahoney up to the only window in the room, lifted its dilapidated frame, and then backed Mahoney against the opening.
“What are you doing?” Mahoney was now asking, as he looked in horror from side to side at the air, the open space, behind him.
“I gave your ass a chance,” Mick said as he pushed Mahoney out of the window. Teddy and Mahoney both yelled nooo as Mick pushed. “Your chance is up!” Mick added.
“I’ll talk!” Mahoney suddenly said, as Mick knew he would. Mick grabbed Mahoney’s feet just as his feet were the last line of defense Mahoney had from completely hurling out of the window the same way Mick had hurled Will Flannigan out.
Teddy’s heart was pounding as he made it up to the window, too. His men were stunned witless as well. Mahoney, Teddy saw, was literally hanging by his bootstraps. And Teddy knew his father. He’d drop that motherfucker in a heartbeat. He only hoped Mahoney knew it, too.
“I’ll talk!” Mahoney cried again; his entire body hanging out of the fifth-floor window. “Just let me up, and I’ll talk!”
But Mick, holding onto those feet, was shaking his head. “Doesn’t work that way, partner,” Mick said. “Talk.”
“But let me up first,” Mahoney cried, but his desperation only caused Mick to release one feet, and almost release the second one.
“Talk, stupid!” Teddy yelled at Mahoney. “He’ll drop your ass if you don’t talk!” And we won’t know anything, Teddy inwardly added. “Talk!”
But Mahoney was already there. “It was Amelia,” he blurted out.
That name stopped Mick cold. Teddy stopped all movement too, and looked at his father.
Mick was staring at Teddy. “Amelia?” he asked.
“She’s behind it,” Mahoney said. “She’s the one.”
“That’s bullshit,” Teddy said, unable to begin to wrap his brain around what Mahoney was saying.
But Mick knew Mahoney from way back. He was a lot of evil, but he was no liar. “She came to you?” Mick asked him.
“Yes. Her people did. I had no choice, Micky. You know me! I wouldn’t do something like that for the hell of it.”
Mick had a thought. “Where’s your family, Mac?” he asked.
“She has them,” Mahoney replied. “She’s going to kill them the way she killed Richie Russo’s family if she finds out!”
Mick quickly began to lift Mahoney back into the room. Teddy and their men helped him. When Mahoney got back inside, Mick didn’t jack him up the way Teddy expected him, too. Mahoney, relieved, bent over hyperventilating as he moved away from the open window and leaned against the wall beside it. He was still in pain, but all he could think about was how close he came to certain death.
“She has your family?” Mick asked again.
“Yes,” Mahoney said with a nod. “They’ll kill them if I don’t do exactly what they told me to do.”
“Why?” Teddy asked. “Did she tell you why she was doing all of this?”
“I didn’t talk to her,” Mahoney said. “I didn’t see her. Her men, her goons, came to me. And they weren’t sharing their intel with me. They wanted me to refuse to honor the contract, and to get in your face by opening shop on your turf.”
“But why would she want to do that?” Teddy asked again. “This isn’t like Amelia! This shit makes no sense!”
“I had no choice,” Mahoney said. “He gave me no choice.”
“Who is he?” Mick asked.
“A guy with a bunch of goons for his backup. He said he was Amelia Valtone’s man. I don’t know who he is. He came after Teddy took out all of my men, all of my security. They came right after Teddy left. With a gun to my balls, he asked me what deal I struck. When I told him, he told me he was going to not only double my presence in the territory I had agreed to give up to you, but that he was going to put men in your territory in my name. On your turf. And he did it. He did it right away. I didn’t have shit to say about it. It was all on him, I swear!”
Mick didn’t like the sound of that. Teddy either. Any fucker who would be that in-your-face with his father’s turf, or after his father struck a deal, was a dangerous individual. He walked over and stood next to his father. Both men hovered over Mahoney.
“Describe him,” Mick said.
“Big black guy. Bald head. I don’t know. They all look alike to me.”
Mick studied Mahoney. “But?” he asked.
Mahoney hesitated.
“But?” Mick asked again.
“If I tell,” Mahoney asked, “you won’t kill me?”
“Depends on what you tell,” Mick said.
Mahoney felt confident with his intel. “It’s a deal,” he said.
Teddy was impatient with Mahoney’s caginess. “Just talk, motherfucker,” he said. “Mick the Tick is a man of his word, you know that. He keeps his word.”
Mahoney nodded. “I didn’t recognize the main man,” he said, “but I recognized every man who was with him.”
“Keep going,” M
ick said.
“I did some work with them before. Some drug running. And those guys worked for her.”
“For Amelia?” Teddy asked.
“For Amelia Valtone,” Mahoney said, and looked squarely at Mick. He understood the import of what he was saying.
Teddy, still shocked beyond belief, looked at Mick, too. Amelia Valtone wasn’t just any old hood. She was Mick’s sister. The half-sister he only recently discovered he had. He knew she was heavily into the drug industry. She’d even been Teddy’s supplier once upon a time. But Mick had somehow thought, after her husband died, that she’d given it up. He’d obviously thought wrong.
“Are you certain?” he asked the battered Mahoney.
Mahoney nodded his head. “I would recognize those guys anywhere. They belong to Amelia. And that black guy confirmed it, too. So yeah. I don’t know what game she’s playing at, but she’s playing for keeps. She ain’t fucking around.”
Mick exhaled. Mahoney had said a mouthful.
“Keep him here until we verify,” he said to Teddy, and began heading for the garage.
“What about my family?” Mahoney asked.
“Where are they?” Mick asked.
Tears appeared in Mahoney’s already battered eyes. “I don’t know.”
Mick stared at him. “We’ll do all we can to find them,” he promised. “But it’s not looking good. They iced Richie Russo’s family as soon as they knew I was on to him.”
Mahoney, who knew it was a loss cause, too, covered his face in agony. Mick hated that it had come to this, and he hated even more that Amelia was being implicated in this, but what could he do about it? He began to leave.
But Teddy hurried up behind him. “What does this mean, Pop?” he asked. “We’re going to war with your own sister?”
Mick looked at Teddy. How the fuck could he talk about going to war when they weren’t even sure if Mahoney was telling them the truth? “Find her,” he said. “Put as many men as possible on it.”
“But what does it mean?” Teddy asked again.
“Don’t worry about what it means,” Mick said angrily.
Teddy stopped walking, as Mick left the building.
When Mick got back inside of his Lamborghini, and before he drove away, he sat there and closed his eyes. He had a big-ass problem on his hands. Going to war with his own sister? What the fuck happened? How did it all go this sideways?
A man like him had few places to turn at times like this. Only two places: his wife and his brother. And he didn’t want to burden his wife.
He pressed the phone screen and called his big brother. When Big Daddy Charles Sinatra answered, he didn’t hesitate. “I need your advice,” he said.
And Charles Sinatra didn’t hesitate, either. He knew, if Mick was calling him, it wasn’t because he needed to chat over the phone. Mick didn’t chat over phones. He needed a face-to-face. “I’m on my way,” Charles said.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Gloria Sinatra, sitting behind her desk inside the Human Resources Department at S.I., was giving instructions to her assistant. “Let Pam handle the Oppenheim hire.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Fonda Cryer, her assistant, responded as she took vigorous notes.
“He’ll hire his own people,” Gloria continued, “but tell Pam we want the right of first refusal if any of them are not able to pass background.”
“Understood.” Fonda continued to write.
“Molly can handle the Lawton file. That should be pretty straightforward.”
“Ah, not today, however,” Fonda said.
Gloria looked at her. “Why not today? We’re already behind schedule.”
“She left early when she heard the news.”
Gloria frowned. “What news?”
“About Will Flannigan, ma’am. Everybody’s upset. They all liked him.”
Gloria had been trying to suppress the horror of last night. Although she had failed, she still managed to keep herself busy. “I understand everybody’s upset,” she said. “But going home when we have all of this work to do?”
“It’s just that it was different for Molly,” Fonda said. “I don’t know if you knew this, but she and Will were lovers.”
Gloria was floored. According to Roz, in addition to scheming to take over S.I., Will was embezzling money from her father’s company, too. And on top of all of that, he was seeing yet another girl? He was seeing a worker in her own department? What kind of fool had she been?
“I can order her back to work if you insist, Ma’am,” Fonda suggested.
“No,” Gloria said. “Let her grieve. Give her the Lawton file when she returns.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Fonda said, and took a note of that, too.
And then there was a knock on the door, just one knock, and the head of the company walked in.
Fonda, like almost every employee in the building, quickly stiffened when Mick walked in. Something about his presence always gave his lower-level employees palpitations. He was not an affable man. He was not given to quick smiles and off-hand comments. They didn’t know what to make of him. So they, as Fonda was ready to do now, quickly got out of his way. “Is there anything else, Ma’am?” she nervously asked Gloria.
Gloria could tell Fonda very much wanted to get away. It used to be ridiculous to her how they all reacted around her father. But after seeing Mick in action last night, it wasn’t ridiculous at all anymore. “That’ll be all, Fonda,” she said, and Fonda nodded toward Mick as she made a swift exit.
“Good morning,” Gloria said to her father as he slowly, in that arrogant gait of his, made his way toward her desk. Oddly enough, she, too, felt a bit overwhelmed as he approached her. She was forced to sit slightly sideways in her chair after last night; and the horror of seeing her father beat Will to a pulp, and then seeing Will’s horrific demise, haunted her still. But she knew she had to put on the brave front. Her father did not like weakness. “Good morning,” she said again, as if he didn’t hear her the first time, when he stopped in front of her desk.
“Good morning,” he finally responded, and then sat down and crossed his legs.
Gloria noticed he wore an Italian silk suit that hugged his muscular frame like a second skin. She noticed how his hair was combed perfectly and his big, green eyes were crystal clear. She noticed how the horrors of last night didn’t seem to be affecting him at all, when any other man would be as rattled as she was. She realized just how little she really knew her father’s business.
“You didn’t have to come in today,” he said.
“Yes, I did,” Gloria responded. She would have gone insane had she not had work to distract her.
“I’m glad you came to work,” Mick continued. “Soldier on. That’s what you have to do in this life. Don’t let anything slow you down.”
He made it sound as if she broke up with her boyfriend, or some other innocuous thing happened. She broke up with Will, alright, but it was hardly that simple.
“I’ll be okay,” Gloria said, if that was the reason he came. He was awful at showing his true feelings, and his words were lacking, too. But Roz kept reminding Gloria that he loved her. He may never say it, Roz also warned her, but he loved her.
But right now, she wasn’t sure how she felt about him. She would rather, for right now anyway, be left alone. “Is there something specific you came to talk to me about?” she asked him. She knew him well enough to know he didn’t just show up to offer her encouragement. He never did that.
And Mick, true to form, got down to the nitty gritty. “Effective immediately,” he said, “you will no longer run this department.”
Gloria couldn’t believe her ears. Say what now? She stared at her father. “You’re removing me from my position?” she asked.
Mick didn’t stutter. “Yes.”
“But why? I told you what Will was up to, Dad!”
“Fuck that!” Mick shot back. “You conspired with that man for months! You finally spoke up, yes, you did, but you shoul
d have spoken up when he first came to you with that bullshit. But you didn’t. Now you expect me to overlook that fact? You defied my order to stay away from him. You expect me to overlook that, too? You entertained the idea of doing just what he wanted you to do as if you were some lovesick clone without her own ability to reason!”
Then Mick had a forget this shit look on his face and rose to his feet. “You will return to your previous position on my executive staff, as an assistant working under Blair Conyers, until further notice.”
Gloria was still in shock. “You’re demoting me?”
“You’d better be glad I don’t fire your ass outright,” Mick responded. But when he saw that sad, dejected look in her pretty eyes, his heart went out to her. Any other employee would be out on her ass. Only for his children did he go this far. “Prove to me that you deserve a second chance,” he said, “and I’ll give you one. But do not underestimate how disappointed I am in you.”
Gloria felt that last statement to the depths of her soul. She disappointed him mightily. That was the second half of her nightmare.
“I flew you up the ranks in this company because I believed in your ability,” Mick continued. “You have a good head on your shoulders and the fortitude to do any job in this organization, and do it well. I still believe that. I am stunned how sidetracked you allowed yourself to get. Dick-whipped? My daughter? Don’t you ever allow yourself to be that weak again!”
But she was his daughter, and Mick loved her. And that was why he couldn’t end it there. “Get it back together,” he said to her, “and we’ll talk. But you’re out as HR Director. Clear out your desk and report to Blair. One of my senior managers will run this department in the interim.”
And Mick walked out of Gloria’s office.
Gloria felt as if she was being raked over the coals. She lost her man, her self-respect, and her job, too? All in the course of one day? All because of that stupid decision she made to listen to what Will had to say, and go along with it.
But she couldn’t blame anybody, not even Will. He sadly got what was coming to him, and then some, in her opinion. But her mistakes were her mistakes. She was not going to blame anybody else. It was all on her. Because her father was right. She was now everything she despised. She was now that weak female who allowed some man to dictate her path.
Mick Sinatra: Love and Shadows Page 8