Mick Sinatra 4: If You Don't Know Me by Now (11 page)

“You weren’t
going to stay anyway,” Mick said bluntly as he concluded cleaning her and then
himself.
 
“Teddy will meet your plane
when you arrive in Philly.
 
He’s been
ordered to stay with you until I’m back in town.
 
You stay at the house until I am certain the
threat has been neutralized.”
 
He looked
at her as he wiped his dick.
 
“You
understand?”

Roz
understood.
 
Sometimes she was amazed she
could ever question this man.
 
But she
couldn’t lose herself.
 
There was a fine
line between running their household and completely running her, and she had to
make sure he didn’t cross the line.
 
“Yes, sir,” she said to him.

Mick knew he
could be brutally heavy-handed most of the time.
 
It was needed with everybody else in his
universe.
 
But Rosalind wasn’t everybody
else.
 
She was his wife.
 
“Teddy is in charge while I am gone,” he said
to her as he put her bra back in place and pulled down her blouse.
 
“But Teddy is not in charge of you.
 
I fully expect, however, for you to obey me
and do what I just told you to do.
 
Stay
at home, under extra guard, until I return.
 
I’ve ordered Joey and Gloria to get to the house too until they hear
from me.”

Roz looked
at him.
 
She wasn’t about to question his
authority regarding her safety ever again.
 
“I won’t go off the reservation again, Mick,” she said.
 
“Don’t worry about me, or the children.”
 
She placed her hand on the side of his
face.
 
“You just take care of yourself,
and come home safely.”

“With you to
come home to,” Mick found himself saying, “I’ll be a fool not to take care.”

Roz smiled,
they kissed, and then Mick opened the door.

Mick’s men
glanced at each other with that inwardly smiling look.
 
They could tell they had been fucking.
 
Roz had that glow all of Mick’s previous
women used to display whenever they got out of that limousine with Mick.
 
But they dared not even joke about it the way
they used to.
 
Mick loved this one.
 
She was Mrs. Sinatra in more than name
only.
 
He made it clear to them from the
first day of their marriage:
 
“Mrs.
Sinatra and I are one,” he said to them.
 
“What you do to her, you do to me.
 
How you treat her, is how you treat me.
 
Try me,” he added with that cold stare that even they feared, “if you
don’t believe me.”

They weren’t
about to try him.
 
They treated Rosalind
Sinatra as if she was royalty in their midst.

Carmelo
Rodriquez could not expect such royal treatment.
 
Carney, one of Mick’s New York men, hurried
across the street in Yonkers as an SUV drove up and parked on the side of the
road.
 
Mick, sitting in the front
passenger seat, pressed the window down and looked at Carney.

“Is he in
there?” Mick asked him.

“Not over
there, he’s not.
 
But if you drive behind
it, there’s another motel.
 
He’s in room
9.
 
Playing cards at a table on the left
side of the door.
 
And boss, there’s a
backdoor.”

“Who gives a
shit?” Mick asked.
 
“The fucker who tried
to kidnap my wife will not be getting away from me.”

Mick rolled
the window back up, and ordered the driver to Carmelo’s location.
 
Carney smiled.
 
What he and Mick’s men loved about him was
that he wasn’t afraid to do his own dirty work.
 
He didn’t send anybody to do what he could do himself.
 
Carney looked around, and then left the
scene.

The SUV
drove through the alleyway, through water puddles, to a second dilapidated
motel.
 
The hideaway of murderers and
rapists, no doubt.
 
Mick was certain he
didn’t have to worry about snitches in a place like this.
 
Nobody, not even the owner of this rat hole,
wanted a cop anywhere near them.

The driver
parked directly in front of room number 9, putting Mick off in front of the
door.
 
Mick got out, with shotgun in
hand, and blasted the door open.
  

Carmelo and
his man, playing cards at the table, didn’t see it coming and quickly tried to
reach for their guns.

“Try it,”
Mick warned, “if you want to die today.
 
Try it.”

When they
realized it was Mick the Tick, they both gave up and placed their hands in the
air.

But Mick
didn’t stop because they did.
 
He went up
to Carmelo, forced-open his mouth, and put the barrel of his shotgun in his
mouth.
 
While Carmelo was fighting with
fear, his partner fell back in his chair, scared shitless too.
 
Mick looked at the sidekick.
 
“Make one move, and you’re dead.”

The man
quickly nodded his fat head, and stayed perfectly still.

Mick looked
at Carmelo.
 
“When I pull this gun out of
your mouth,” he said to him, “you are going to tell me why you hired Hamilton
Sturgess and those other fools to kidnap my wife.
 
If you lie to me, you will not be able to say
another word for as long as you live.
 
Which will be about another second.”

He removed
the barrel of the gun from out of Carmelo’s mouth.
 
Carmelo gagged and coughed.
 
“Tell me why,” Mick said.

“I don’t
know what you’re talking about.”

Mick fired a
shot to within an inch of Carmelo’s head.
 
Carmelo, and his sidekick, could not believe it.
 
“Tell me why,” Mick said again.

“I wasn’t
going to hurt her,” Carmelo suddenly said.
 
“I tell you I wasn’t!
 
I just
wanted to get some money.
 
That’s all.
 
Just a big payday.
 
I was going to send you a ransom note, you
were going to pay it, and I was going to pay everybody else involved.
 
But I wasn’t going to hurt her!”

Mick stared
at him.
 
He’d given him a second chance
before.
 
He didn’t kill him back then, he
just beat his ass.
 
But now he realized
that was a mistake.
 
Carmelo had mistaken
his ability to exact punishment that fit the crime, for weakness.
 
“You’re an honorable rogue, in other words,”
Mick said to him.

Carmelo
thought he was getting through to the crusty gangster.
 
He’d let him off easy before.
 
Maybe again?
 
“Yeah,” Carmelo said.
 
“I’m
honorable that way.”

“Well I’m
not,” Mick said without hesitation, and blew Carmelo’s brains out.

Carmelo’s
sidekick began moving backwards on his butt, stunned by the view.

But Mick was
not done.
 
As Carmelo sat slumped in the
chair, Mick pulled out the machete he had concealed under his coat, aimed it at
Carmelo’s neck, and again without hesitation, sliced his head completely off.

“
Nooo
!” the sidekick screamed.
 
He looked at Mick as if he was looking at a
monster.
 
“
Nooo
!

Mick felt
like a monster.
 
But he knew they were
fucking with him now, and endangering his wife in the process.
 
He was not going to let this stand.
 
“You tell everybody you know,” he said to the
sidekick.
 
“You tell everybody you don’t
know,” he added.
 
“You tell those
motherfuckers that if they don’t know me by now, they know me now.
 
You tell them that if they ever think about
touching my wife, or touching any member of my family, the same will befall
them.
 
You tell them,” he continued,
pointing the machete at the sidekick so sincerely that the sidekick fearfully
backed up on his butt until his back was against the wall, “that Mick Sinatra
will not tolerate any bullshit from anybody.
 
I don’t give a fuck who they are.
 
And if they still don’t believe me, if they still think I’m
bullshitting, you tell them to come and take a look at this headless
motherfucker right here.
 
You hear me?”

“Yes, sir,”
the sidekick said, tears in his eyes.
 
He
was a punk compared to a man like this and didn’t care.
 
“Yes, sir!”

“You get to
live to tell the news.
 
But if you don’t
tell it,” Mick said, pointing that bloody knife again, “I’ll track you down
like the dog that you are and use you as my example number two.
 
Do we understand each other?”

“Yes,
sir.
 
We understand, yes, sir, Mr.
Sinatra.
 
We understand.
 
I’ll tell every living soul I know.”
 
Then he realized what he was saying.
 
“Except the cops,” he added.
 
“I’ll never tell the cops, I promise you I
won’t!”

“You can
tell the cops.
 
You will die for telling
the cops.
 
But that’s your choice.”

The sidekick
was shaking his head, he was promising on his mother’s grave that he wouldn’t
dream of telling the cops.
 
“Only the bad
guys,” he said.
 
And then Mick, with
knife in hand, with shotgun in hand, left.

Carmelo’s
friend looked at Carmelo again, and the separation of his head from his body,
at all of the blood, and fainted.

He passed
right out.

One Month Later

Gloria
Sinatra parked her car in the parking lot next to Fonz’s car, and walked into
the restaurant.
 
It wasn’t up to her
usual standards, and was too far out for her taste too, but this was where he
wanted to meet.
 
She was falling in love
with him, so she obliged him.

Michael
“Fonz” Dorsett was a handsome young man with a low-cut fade, skin brighter than
Gloria’s although both of his parents were African-American, and a great
smile.
 
But he was also domineering and
controlling and many other things she didn’t like in a man.
 
But unlike the other men who wanted her, she
actually had feelings for Fonz, and he seemed to care deeply for her.
 
He was a young man on the rise, and she was
going to be supportive all the way to the top.

“Why this
place?” she asked when she arrived at his table.

He stood up
and helped her out of her coat.
 
“Why not
this place?” he asked her.
 
“It’s popular
with actors in town.
 
With artist types.”

“I should
have known,” Gloria said with a smile.
 
She sat down, and the waitress came and took her drink order.

Fonz leaned
forward, as if he couldn’t wait to tell the news.
 
“Guess who else seems to like this place
too?” he asked.

“Who?”
Gloria asked.

“Your
mother.”

Gloria
frowned.
 
“My mother? My mother isn’t in
Philly.
 
She doesn’t even like this
town.”

“I mean your
step
mother,” Fonz corrected
himself.
 
“Over there.”

Gloria looked
across the room where he was pointing.
 
And, to her shock, Roz was sitting in a booth with a man at her
side.
 
Another couple shared the booth
with them, but it was Roz and the man who appeared to be far more affectionate.

“What in the
world,” Gloria said when the man, with his arm already around Roz, squeezed her
shoulder.

“Who is he?”
Fonz asked.

Gloria,
still floored, shook her head.
 
“I’ve
never seen him before in my life.”

Fonz
smiled.
 
“You mean to tell me that woman
you claimed was so wonderful and virtuous is cheating on your Dad?”

Gloria still
couldn’t believe it.
 
Not Roz!

“They were
kissing,” Fonz said.

Gloria
looked at him.
 
“Quit lying!”

“I’m telling
you the truth!” Fonz insisted.
 
“I saw
them with my own two eyes.
 
They kissed!”

But Gloria
didn’t believe it.
  
She didn’t believe
it when the waitress brought her a drink.
 
She didn’t believe it when the waitress brought them their plates of
food.

Until they
were almost ready to go, and Gloria saw with her own two eyes when Roz leaned
against the man.
 
The man looked at Roz
with what even from across the room seemed like lust in his eyes, and kissed
her on the lips.
 
And not a peck either.
 
But with the kind of passion that could rival
the passion Gloria had seen her father show Roz.
 
Her mouth fell open.

“Didn’t I
tell you?” Fonz said cheerfully, as if he had just won some bet.

But Gloria’s
heart was aching, as if she had just lost far more than any bet.
   

Three days
later and Roz was sitting in the back of the limousine fielding call after
call.
 
Her African-American driver, Deuce
McCurry, took peeps at her through the rearview mirror and smiled.
 
When she finished the last call, he looked
through the rearview again.
 
“You work
even when you aren’t working.
 
Just like
that husband of yours.”

“And we both
need to slow our asses down.
 
We have
babies to raise!”

“You’re
raising them just fine,” Deuce reassured her.
 
“You’re a modern woman who enjoy working and motherhood.
 
Ain’t nothing wrong with
that.
”

Roz
smiled.
 
She and Deuce were close now.
 
A former cop and marksman, he used to be
Mick’s personal driver/bodyguard, the best and most loyal one he had.
 
But after Roz came into Mick’s life, Mick
assigned Deuce to her.
 
Deuce missed the
action with Mick, and there was always action with Mick, but he grew to love
Roz as if she were his own daughter.
 
It
was now his preference to be her protector.

But while
waiting at a red light, he continued to stare at Roz through the rearview.
 
“You aren’t looking forward to this.
 
Are you?”

Roz rarely
spoke about her innermost feelings with anyone but Mick, but Deuce had hit the
nail on the head.
 
“Not at all,” she
said.
 
“I have directors I still have to
call to smooth out some issues my clients are having.
 
I want to be home with my babies.
 
It’s just not the best time.”

“But going
to the mayor’s reelection celebration, at the mayor’s mansion no less, is a big
deal.
 
You get to rub elbows with the
elite of the city.
 
It can help your
business.”

Roz’s
business didn’t need that kind of help.
 
Keeping politicians happy had nothing to do with what she did.
 
But it had everything to do with what Mick
did.
 
And not at Sinatra Industries
either.
 
But Mick’s other activities that
were not legit, nor spoken of openly, but that had to be managed too if he
expected to remain one step ahead of his thousands of enemies.
 
Greasing the palms of politicians was as much
a part of his job as smoothing the feathers of directors and producers was
Roz’s.
 
She was going to this function
for Mick’s sake, and Mick’s sake alone.

Her cell
phone rang again.
 
She looked at the
Caller ID.
 
She smiled and answered.
 
“Well, hello there,” she said.

Deuce drove
through the intersection as the light turned green, but he also glanced at Roz
through the rearview.
 
Her voice had
changed.
 
She was always businesslike
when she spoke with her clients.
 
She was
always straight to the point and direct.
 
But her voice sounded sensual now.
 
Seductive.
 
Almost playful.
 
It must be Mick on the line, he
concluded.
 
Until she said, “we can’t
keep doing this, William,” and Deuce’s antennae went straight up.
 
He didn’t look through the rearview this
time.
 
He was too busy listening.

“Not my
office, no,” Roz continued.
 
“Too many
prying eyes.
 
Yeah, way too many.
 
Nope, that’s out too.
 
Too many people know me there.
 
Further out is better.
 
Somewhere like that place, yeah.
 
That could work.
 
But don’t expect me to keep doing this,” she
continued, but her voice lowered to where Deuce could not understand what she
was saying.
 
Then she spoke in her normal
volume again.
 
“Just let me know and I’ll
be there.
 
Okay, William.
 
Bye.”
 
She ended the call.

Deuce’s
heart plunged as he continued to drive her to Mick.
 
Women cheated all the time.
 
Hell, he hadn’t exactly been Mister Faithful
to his own wife either.
 
And he’d be
shocked if
a
gotta
have it
man like Mick hadn’t dipped his
feet in those waters a time or two since marrying Roz.
 
But somehow he thought Roz was better than
them.
 
Somehow he thought Roz wouldn’t
dare cheat on Mick.

“We’re here,”
he said, as he turned into the circular driveway of the mayor’s historic
mansion.
 
He couldn’t say for certain if
Roz was cheating.
 
He could very well be
misreading the conversation he’d just heard.
 
But he remembered her kissing that guy a month ago in the back of her
agency, and he knew the cheating lingo like he knew the back of his hand.
 
And Roz, to his great dismay, seemed to have
that lingo down pat.

Inside the
mansion, Mick was holding court with newly reelected Mayor Granville Wallace, with
Joe Strasberg, Gran’s campaign manager, at his side.
 
They were in the mayor’s study.
 
All three men were standing at the window,
looking out over the courtyard at the hundreds of guests that filled the
brick-lined court.

“This was my
last race,” Granville said to Mick.
 
“And
until you got Lubinski to drop out of the race, it looked like I wasn’t going
to win my last one.”
 
He looked at
Mick.
 
“I owe you, my friend.”

Mick did not
look at the mayor.
 
He continued to stare
at the pile of guests trampling around in the courtyard.
 
But he did set him straight.
 
“You are not my friend,” he said to him.

Strasberg
rolled his eyes.
 
He couldn’t stand Mick
Sinatra.
 
But the mayor smiled.
 
“It’s just a term of art,” he said.
 
“It doesn’t matter if we’re friends or not.”

“It
matters,” Mick said.
 
“Friends can take
liberties with other friends.”
 
He looked
at the mayor.
 
“You will not be taking
liberties with me.”
 
He handed Granville
a piece of paper.
 
“These are the two
names for police chief and police commissioner.”

Granville
reluctantly took the sheet.
 
“You know
the unions supported me too.
 
They’re
expecting their two names to get those two jobs.”

But Mick
wasn’t interested.
 
“I don’t care what
they are expecting.
 
They can expect the
moon.
 
What the fuck I care?
 
Those are the two names that will occupy
those two positions.”

Strasberg
looked at Mick.
 
“Or what?” he asked him.

Mick stared
at Strasberg.
 
He did not make idle
threats, and wasn’t about to make one now.
 
They knew what.

The door to
the mayor’s study opened, and his chief usher peered inside. “Excuse me,
gentlemen,” he said.
 
All three looked at
him.
 
He looked at Mick.
 
“Mrs. Sinatra has arrived, sir,” he said.

Mick, to the
shock of Granville and Strasberg, hurried out of the study.
 
When the door shut behind him, they looked at
each other.
 
The mayor smiled.

“What?”
Strasberg asked.

“I think we
just found that man’s Achilles heel.
 
I
think we just found that weakness we can exploit.”

But
Strasberg wasn’t buying it.
 
“You’re
playing with fire, Gran,” he warned.

“So
what?
 
I’ve always had a little arson in
my blood anyway.”
 
Then the mayor
laughed.
 
Strasberg knew what Sinatra was
capable of.
 
He failed to see the humor.

Mick walked
out of the study just as Roz had entered the mansion and was handing her coat
to one of the maids.
 
Mick stood there
for a moment and took in the sight of her.
 
Just seeing her sometimes took his breath away.
 
This was one of those times.

She wore an
elegantly soft, brown-and-cream colored gown with lace and pearls that accentuated
her flawless brown skin.
 
Her cleavage
showed the bountifulness of her breasts, and the slick down design of the dress
showed off her figure.
 
But it was her
face that Mick noticed most.
 
To everyone
there, she was just another strong, beautiful black woman in the crowd, there
to congratulate the mayor, and to network.
 
Mick saw her strength and beauty, but he saw her vulnerability too.
 
He saw the fragileness in her soft eyes.
 
Not that long ago she would not have been
invited to events like this.
 
She was
never in the elite of any city.
 
And she
was still getting used to the change.
 
She still felt contempt for people like these, who, in the
not-too-distant past, would not have given her the time of day.
 
Mick prayed she stayed that way.