“I’ll be damn. But they only got her?”
“Just her.”
“Who pulled off that hit? Those same two thugs?”
“No, they were in jail. But they did give us enough intel for us to find the guy.”
“Who was he?”
“Local loser named Jesse Colbert. One of my renters who had a major issue with me because I had gotten into it with him. We confronted him about it, he tried to make a run for it, and I had the privilege of taking him out.”
“Good. But what are you saying? You think that’s related to what happened to Makayla?”
“You wouldn’t think so,” Charles said. “I mean, why in the world would a diplomatic attaché from Botswana be affiliated with people like those two thugs and Jesse Colbert?”
“The same way a blue-blood like Lou Fontaine was,” Mick said.
“True. But to answer your question: I don’t know if there’s a connection or not. The cops say no way, and the investigation I did on Diallo would say no. He’s shady, but not that kind of shady. But you never know.”
Mick exhaled again. Charles could feel his anger. “So where are you?” Charles asked him. “Were you thinking about coming to Jericho any time soon?”
“I can’t right now,” Mick said. “I’m out of the country right now.”
“Oh. Okay. I didn’t know. But call me when you get back.”
“I will. And you keep me updated.”
“I will, Mick. Thanks for calling me back.”
And they ended the call.
Mick held the phone in his hand a moment longer, and then turned. Only to be surprised to see that his wife, Rosalind Sinatra, was leaned against the doorjamb, listening.
“Who was that?” she asked.
“My brother,” he said.
“Why did you tell him you were out of the country when you’re right here, at home, in Philadelphia?” she asked.
But Mick didn’t respond. He was still in deep contemplation.
When Charles ended his call, and was about to head back into the waiting room, Jenay came out into the hall, closing the door behind her.
“What’s wrong?” Charles asked her.
“What did Mick say?”
“He just said to keep him in the loop. He’s out of the country right now.”
“Who did it, Charles?” Jenay asked him. “You were hesitant when I asked before. Why?”
“Because I didn’t want to worry you.”
“After everything that’s going on lately? Worry me, Charles. I want to know. I had Junior to take care of, or I would have checked myself. Tell me who did this to Makayla. Was it somebody we knew?”
“We? No,” Charles said. “But you knew him.”
Jenay was puzzled. Who in the world could she know who would do such a thing? “Who?” she asked.
“It was Percy, Jenay. Your ex.”
Jenay couldn’t believe it. “Percy? You’re telling me Percy was the man in that car who tried to kill Makayla?”
Charles nodded. “Yes.”
“But that doesn’t make any sense, Charles. Why would Percy want to kill Makayla?”
“The cops think he was trying to kill Junior, but Makayla got in the way.”
“Good Lord!” Jenay said. “Junior?” That made it even worse! “But why?” she asked. “Why would he do such a thing?”
Charles didn’t want to go there.
“What, Charles? Tell me.”
“Nobody really knows at this point,” Charles said.
“But what is your guess?” Jenay asked.
“The guess is that he tried to kill somebody he figured would be near and dear to you, like your grandson. To punish you.”
“But why would he want to punish me? Because I told him I love my husband and won’t be leaving you?”
Charles believed that was exactly the reason, if that was the reason at all. “Yes,” he said.
But Jenay was shaking her head. “That’s not Percy. No way. He wouldn’t do something like that.”
For some reason, her faith in that fucker angered Charles. “Well I’ve got news for you, Jenay. He did do it. That’s not at issue. He could do it, and he did it. What’s at issue is why.”
Jenay looked at him. “You don’t believe it’s because I rebuffed him. Do you?”
“It seems a little flimsy to me as a reason, yes.”
“Then what else could it be?”
Charles shook his head. “I don’t know. I just don’t see what he thought that would prove.”
“You mean punishing me?” Jenay asked.
“Yeah. What would he get out of that?”
“Satisfaction?” Jenay asked.
“Maybe.”
“He was a member of the diplomatic corp. If he did it to punish me, maybe he figured he would be able to invoke diplomatic immunity and get away with it.”
Charles nodded. “Yeah, I thought about that too.”
“But you aren’t buying that either. Are you?”
“Oh, I think he did believe he could get away with it by invoking diplomatic immunity. But I’m not certain he did it to punish you.”
“He doesn’t seem like the type to you either?” Jenay asked.
“I wouldn’t put it pass him as quickly as you might. But he didn’t come across that way to me.”
“How did he come across to you?”
“Like a man who would need to get something tangible out of it if he put himself out there like that. And satisfaction ain’t it.”
“Then what could it be?” Jenay asked. “Money?”
“I don’t know. I hope that’s what it is, and we can put this episode behind us. But I don’t know.”
Then Charles placed his arm around Jenay. “Let’s get back inside,” he said.
But before they could, the surgeon walked up, and both of them froze.
“Is Chief Sinatra still here?” the doctor asked.
“He’s right in here,” Jenay said, and Charles opened the door. And the surgeon, along with Charles and Jenay, went inside.
Brent rose to his feet. Everybody in the room rose to their feet. And Charles closed the door.
“Hello, Chief,” the surgeon said.
“Is she out of surgery?” Brent asked. “How is she? How’s my wife?”
“Although she was shot at several times,” the surgeon said, “she was hit only once. And even that bullet wasn’t lodged. It went straight through, and bypassed all of her major organs.”
“Praise God!” Jenay said.
“That’s a good one to praise,” the surgeon said to Jenay, with a smile. Brent was smiling too. Everybody in the room were smiling.
Then the surgeon looked back at Brent. “She’s going to be just fine, Chief. There’s no swelling at the entry point. There’s no shrapnel or other fragments internally. And beyond the general concern about infection, of course, I believe she will make a full and speedy recovery.”
It was exactly what Brent wanted to hear. It was exactly what everybody wanted to hear. And they all let out a great sigh of relief.
And then two days later, as the family once again were assembled at the hospital, but this time at Makayla’s bedside as she rested peacefully in a private room, Mick and Rosalind Sinatra walked in.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
On the morning before Mick and Roz arrived in town, Jenay woke up early, to find Charles stretched out at the foot of the bed, between her legs, eating her.
She began squirming and sighing at the feel of his tongue licking and sucking her, and she rubbed his hair and lifted her legs onto his back to give him deeper access.
Charles loved when she opened wider, and he took advantage right away, as he moved his head closer in, and parted her lips with his fingers, and slid his tongue beyond her clitoris, and into her folds. Her stomach began pushing in and out, and he could hear her panting, when he ate her deep down.
But he was getting heated himself. He was humping the fucking bed he was getting so
hot. But before he spilled out on that bed, he stopped his oral and moved up, and began sucking her breasts. And then he pushed his self-guided, rock-hard penis deep inside of her. She was so slick, and so wet, that he was able to push right in despite her tightness. And Jenay was always tight and right. She was always so tight that every time he entered her it felt as if he had to break through a thicket to get to that grand prize: her solid gold pussy.
He broke through that thicket and began fucking her with strokes that made him so excited, and so fierce, that it caused him to suck her harder. Jenay placed her hands over her head when he sucked and fucked her. It made her feel as if she was getting it on both ends, and both ends were on the verge. She loved how Charles romanced that feeling with his masterful strokes and sucks.
It felt so good, and made her so excited, that she began pushing her feet against the sheet as if she was trying to push up further in the bed. But all she was trying to do was to maintain her control, and contain the orgasm that threatened to explode.
But she couldn’t contain it for very long. Charles’s dick caused her to go over. His dick caused her to explode inside with an orgasm that caused her back to arch so high that Charles lost access to her breasts.
But it didn’t matter, because he was cumming too. And it strained out like gold on her gold. And when he poured into her, he lost it. His sweat-filled naked body fell down on her naked body and flattened her against the bed. He wrapped his arms around her, and was breathing heavily in her ear, calling her name over and over, as he came.
They came for a long time. Charles was able to fuck her even harder, and she was able to pulsate and accept his pounding even longer, as if they needed this release and needed it worse than they could have thought.
It shocked them how intense it was.
And they kept cumming.
Until Charles was so exhausted, and had poured into his wife so completely, that he couldn’t move his dick another centimeter, even if his life depended on it.
And then, after recovering for what seemed like an hour, and showering together and dressing, they drove to the hospital. Bonita had spent the night at Ashley’s, so they didn’t have to figure out what they were going to do about her. Donald, deciding he would play big-brother protector just in case, spent the night at Ashley’s too. And they both agreed to get her to school.
And once at the hospital, as Charles and Jenay, and Tony and Robert were visiting with Makayla and Brent, Mick and Roz walked in.
It seemed as if Mick Sinatra overwhelmed the room when he entered it, and Charles’s children could only stand back and watch. They’d heard so many tales about Mick the Tick, and had read so many horrifying stories about his viciousness and position as the head of America’s crime syndicate food chain, that they still couldn’t believe he was related to them.
And it wasn’t as if they weren’t used to strong men. Their uncles Sal, Tommy, and Reno Gabrini were legendary strong men in that outsized way too. And it wasn’t as if their father wasn’t a force in the room, either. He was. But their father was a force for good and positive in their eyes. Their Uncle Mick felt more like a force to be reckoned with.
After all of the greetings and everybody had settled into chairs, Roz was amazed how good Makayla looked.
“I expected you to look near-death, girl,” Roz said to laughter. “The way Mick described it to me, I thought you were on your last legs.”
“I thought so too,” Makayla admitted, “when I heard all of the gunfire. But thank God only one bullet actually hit. Thank God the man who did it wasn’t a very good shot.”
“Where’s Junior?” Mick asked.
“Across the hall with Miss Sharon.”
“Oh, Tony’s lady,” Roz said. “Or is she still just a friend?”
Everybody looked at Tony. Tony smiled. “No, she’s my lady,” he admitted.
“About time,” Charles said.
“She’s the principal over at Saint Cat’s,” Brent said to Roz. “But yet she took time off work to come and be with us, and to help out with Junior. They don’t make’em any better than Sharon. Except when they made Makayla.”
Makayla smiled. But Charles cleared his throat.
“Oh, and except when they made Jenay,” Brent added.
Then Mick, to everybody’s surprise, cleared his throat.
“And except when they made you, too, Aunt Roz,” Brent added again, and they all laughed.
But Charles was still surprised. “When did you get back in town?” he asked his younger brother.
Mick had sat in one of the seats against the wall. His wife sat beside him. But unlike Charles and Jenay, who were holding hands, Mick had his arms folded. And he didn’t immediately respond to Charles.
“I don’t know why I assumed you were going to be out of the country for some time,” Charles continued. “Where were you anyway?”
Roz looked at her husband. Time to come clean, her eyes seemed to say. “I was not out of the country,” Mick said.
Charles frowned. “What do you mean you weren’t out of the country? But I thought you said you were.”
“I said it, yes. But it was not true. I had to look into some things, and I needed to do so autonomously.”
“So you lied to me?”
Mick knew how angry Charles could get when somebody wasn’t straight with him. He hesitated again, but answered. “Yes.”
“I don’t like that, Micky. You know I don’t like that. You could have told me the truth.”
“Yes, I could have. But that’s the way I chose to handle it and if you don’t like it, then that’s tough.”
Charles looked at his brother. “What did you say to me?” he angrily asked him. “Talk that way to me again and I’ll show your ass tough!”
Charles’s children all tensed up and looked at Mick. They expected him to fire back, and fire back hard. But he didn’t. He did something that shocked the shit out of them. “You’re right,” he said. “I was out of line.”
But their father, being their father, was still pissed. “Yes, you were,” he said. “Way out of line.”
Then Mick became defensive too. “What are you Miss Sensitive all of a sudden? Can’t you see I was trying to apologize here?”
“You should have never gone that way with me,” Charles fired back, “then there wouldn’t have been a need to apologize.”
Mick stared at him. It was as if they were kids again, and Charles ruled the roost.
“Don’t you ever come at me that way, you hear me, Mick?” Charles continued. “When you talk to me you talk to me with respect. You talk to me like somebody with some sense. And you’d better not lie to me again either.”
It was the same kind of tongue-lashing Charles often gave to his grown children. But they were his children, not Mick the Tick, a nickname he acquired because of his ticking time-bomb bad temper. Had their father pushed a man like Mick in the corner? Was he about to go off?
He didn’t go off, and, in fact, apologized again. This time Charles accepted it, but Brent could tell he was still pissed.
But they put the focus back where it belonged: on Makayla. And they laughed and joked until Tony excused himself, to go and see if Sharon was okay, and they laughed at that, too. Tony, they decided, was falling in love.
Mick and Roz said their goodbyes, after having dinner with Charles and Jenay, and left Jericho later that evening. But they weren’t out of Jericho a half hour before Mick’s private plane was landing in Dover, New Hampshire, surprising Roz.
She looked at Mick, who sat on the seat beside her. There was always method to Mick’s madness, she knew that, but this was a little too mad.
“Why are we stopping here for?” she asked him.
“You’re going to fly on to Philly after I get off,” he said.
“After you get off? Why are you getting off in New Hampshire?”
“I’m going back to Jericho,” he said. “For a few days.”
“Why?”
“I n
eed to make sure there’s no outside forces at work in that town.”
“Because of what happened to Makayla? I thought you looked into that already.”
“I did. And I didn’t turn up anything. But I can’t ignore my gut. Something’s wrong. I need to find out what before it’s too late.”
Roz understood that. “But why didn’t you just stay in Jericho and let me fly back?”
“I need to be there, in case shit happens, but I don’t need anybody to know I’m there.”
“Not even Charles?”
“Especially not Charles. I don’t want him changing his routine. The word is that Percy Diallo was a lone wolf who just wanted to punish Jenay. It’s vital that whoever might be behind whatever’s going on be convinced that Charles and his family believe the official version. If routines are changed in any way, the enemy will know they don’t believe it and the enemy might get desperate and try to take desperate measures before I can sniff out who these fuckers are.”
He had convinced Roz. “Who’s going to stay with you?” she asked. “I see the SUV waiting.”
“I’m taking one of my capos. One of my lieutenants. Guido’s staying with me. I’m flying in a full crew to hang out on the outskirts of Jericho, just in case shit goes down, but they’ll stay out of sight until needed.”
“But only one guy will be in town with you?” Roz asked.
“An invisible footprint has to stay invisible, Rosalind. The more people, the more likely my cover will be blown.”
Roz would have preferred to have him with her, but she knew he knew what was best. Then she looked at him. “Big Daddy lashed out at you because he was hurt that you lied to him about being out of the country. He felt it was unnecessary. Maybe he’ll feel all of this is unnecessary.”
“Perhaps it is. And, yes, I could have told him that I’ll be hanging around, seeing what I can see without anybody seeing me. But I know my brother, and I know that town. I grew up in that town. If there are bigger forces at work here, I need to find them before any shit happens. My brother is a tough-ass. He’s as tough as it gets. But he’s no gangster. He tries to play fair. I need to sniff this shit out and fuck fair. If anything’s going on.”
Big Daddy Sinatra: Charles In Charge (Big Daddy Sinatra Series Book 6) Page 13