Mick Sinatra: The Harder They Fall (4 page)

Roz looked
at him.
 
She knew that look on his
gorgeous face.
 
“Do you now?” she asked.

“I do,” he
said, staring deep into her eyes.
 
He now
stood between the desk and her chair.

“And what’s
that?” she asked.

Mick knelt
his big body down, lifted her skirt up to her waist, removed her panties
completely, and opened her up.
 
“This,”
was all he said, as he gave her pussy one long lick that caused Roz to shiver.

“Oh,” she
said in a voice that was suddenly breathless.
 
“But do you have time for this?”
 
She certainly hoped he did!

“I’m late
for a meeting,” he said, and then licked her again, “but fuck the meeting.
 
I’m fucking this first.”

Roz could
feel every inch of her smooth, brown skin flush as his mouth moved into her
vagina and began to eat her.
 
And that
former student and Jerry Copeland and Cathleen Thomas could all go do
themselves because Mick was doing her.
 
And he knew how to do her.
 
He
knew how to lick her in that perfect spot over and over, and eat her until her
vaginal juices flowed straight into his mouth.
 
And he ate it up.
 
He ate her so
masterfully that she wanted to slide out of that chair, get on that damn floor,
and let him fuck her senseless.

But Mick was
in control of her pleasure.
 
And he
wasn’t going to have his woman wallowing on some dirty office floor.
 
His dick was getting hard as a rock as he
mouth-fucked her.
 
But he knew he could
only go so far.
 
Because this wasn’t
about him getting his pleasure.
 
It was
about her getting hers.
  
And he was
going to do her until she came.
 
Until
those vaginal juices he was sucking up became so wet and so hot that there was
nothing for her to do but cum and cum and lift out of her skin with cum.

And Roz was
close to that point already.
 
Her hands
had gripped his silky black hair, and was moving his head up and down between
her legs as if his mouth was a dick riding her pussy.
 
She loved that he came to her.
 
She loved that he took time out of his crazy schedule
to come and see about her.
 
Cathleen
might have thought she was telling some bad secret.
 
She might have thought she was telling some
news about Roz and some man to drive a wedge between Roz and her real man.
 
But all she did was drive them closer.
 
Because every time Mick mouth-fucked her, she
felt as if yet another little part of her was his to keep.

She was wet,
and getting wetter as Mick did her, and she was on the brink of an orgasm with
every moment ticking by.
 
She was going
to enjoy her climax.
 
Because Mick was
right: she needed this!

But then a
knock was heard on her office door.
 
Mick
was down too low to be seen from the door, but Roz began to panic anyway
because she knew it was her secretary.
 
And she knew that after her secretary knocked, she was going to barge
right in.

“Tee’s going
to come in,” Roz said in a voice of panic.

“Fuck Tee,”
Mick said in a breathless voice as he continued to mouth-fuck Roz.

But Roz was
right.
 
Her secretary, Teegan Salley,
didn’t hesitate.
 
She threw open the door
and peeped inside.
 
She held a file and a
small plate in her hands.
 
“Sorry to
disturb you, boss,” she said, and was about to progress toward the desk.

“What is it,
Tee?” Roz asked urgently and Tee, thankfully for Roz, stopped in her tracks.

“I need your
signature on the Hogan addendum before we submit the final alterations,” Tee
said.
 
“And, on a lighter note, I have
this slice of cake you have got to try.
 
Min baked it and brought it to work today and wanted to make sure I
saved you a slice.
 
It’s red velvet, your
favorite.
 
And it is so good, boss!”

“Not now,”
Roz said, trying to keep her composure even as Mick continued to lick and suck
and mouth-fuck her.

Then Tee
frowned.
 
Something seemed off to
her.
 
Roz’s body seemed higher in her
chair, as if she was lifting up, and her face looked contorted.
 
“Are you okay, boss?” she asked.

“Un hun,”
Roz managed to say. “Fine.”

“And where’s
Mr. Gabrini?” Tee asked, suddenly looking around.
 
“I didn’t see him leave.”

Then she saw
Roz lift slightly as, unbeknownst to Tee, Mick bit her.
 
And it was only then, after Roz had lifted slightly
in her chair, that Tee saw that hooded, lustful look on her employer’s
face.
 
And she was now mortified that she
had interrupted something very, very important.

“I mean, it
can wait,” Tee suddenly said.
 
“The
addendum I mean.
 
And the cake too!
 
He can eat it later.
 
I mean,
you
can eat it later.
 
I mean . . .”
 
She didn’t know what she meant any more.
 
She scrunched up her face, and just left,
closing the door behind her.

Roz hit Mick
upside his head.
 
“Nice bite at the exact
wrong time,” she said.

But then he
bit her again, and again, and went down so hard on her that she forgot all
about Tee.
 
She began sliding down her
chair in lustful groans, with Mick’s hands holding her up by her bare ass.
 
She was now in the throes of her orgasm.
 
She was now in full clench.
 
And nothing else mattered, not anything,
except the way her man was making her feel.

When her
orgasm finally ceased, and her pussy finally stopped pulsating wildly, Mick got
off his knees, and then lifted her into his arms.
 
Roz felt so complete and satisfied that she
wrapped her legs around him again, and hugged him tighter than even he was
hugging her.

“Thank you,”
she said as she laid her head on his shoulder.
 
“I needed that.”

Mick
smiled.
 
He placed his hand on the back
of her soft hair and closed his eyes.
 
He
loved that he could read her.
 
He loved
that he had what she needed at this moment in her life.
 
He only hoped it was enough to keep that
stress from reappearing.

After a few
minutes, she leaned back and looked at him.
 
She knew him.
 
He was a very
sensual man.
 
“Don’t you want some too?”
she asked.
 
She knew she had no strength
to give him any, not after the kind of orgasm she had just experienced.
 
But right was right.
 
He deserved some too.

“You know I
want it,” Mick responded, staring in her lovely eyes.
 
“But I’m late already.”
 
He held her against him again.
 
“We have dinner with the children tonight,”
he reminded her.
 
“But after dinner, I’ll
get mine.
 
Don’t you worry.”
 
He looked at her.
 
“It’ll be payback time then.”

Roz
smiled.
 
They kissed.
 
And he left.

But Roz had
just grabbed her panties off of the floor, and was about to go into her
adjacent bathroom to clean herself up, when Tee came in again.

“I am so
sorry, boss,” she said heartfelt.
 
“I am
so sorry!
 
I had no idea he was doing . .
. I mean, he was . . .”
 
Then Tee
realized her new error.
 
“It’s probably
better left unsaid,” she said.
 
“Isn’t
it?”

Roz smiled
and nodded.
 
“Always,” she responded.

And Tee, in
total agreement with her boss, backed out of the office, and left.

Roz smiled
thinking about the look on her sweet secretary’s face.
 
Teegan was a joy to have on her team.
 
But as Roz continued walking toward her
bathroom, and began to think about those same thoughts she had been thinking
about before Mick showed up, she still couldn’t shake the feeling.
 
Seeing Chad Dawkins again was not something
easily forgotten.
 
It was still affecting
her.
 
Because his sudden appearance
seemed to portend something else.
 
Something dangerous.
 
Like a
warning red light in her mind that wouldn’t stop flashing.

“Ma, I gotta
go!”

“Did you
hear what I said?”

“Yeah, I
heard you!
 
I heard both of y’all.
 
But y’all are just saying words.
 
Dad will beat my ass again if I come at him
like that.”

Cathleen and
Hillary looked at each other.
 
They were
in the driveway at Joey’s house.
 
Joey
was hurrying to his Dodge Charger.
 
They
were hurrying behind him.

“If you
don’t put him in his place, he’ll never respect you, Joe,” Cathleen, his
mother, insisted.
 
“That’s why he
respects Teddy.
 
Teddy don’t take any
crap from him.”

Joey
couldn’t believe she was putting him in that category.
 
“And Teddy is way older than I am,” he
reminded her, “and was a gangster before Dad even knew he was a gangster.”

“And now
he’s his right hand man,” Hillary said.
 
“That should have been my boy standing beside him.
 
That should have been Adrian’s spot.
 
But he’s gone.
 
My baby’s dead at the hands of his own
father.
 
At the hands of
your
father.
 
The bastard.”

Joey stood
at his car and looked at the two beautiful but bitter women.
 
His mother was angry at his father because he
cut her off financially when she disrespected Roz.
 
Hillary was angry at his father because he
was forced to kill her only child, and Mick’s oldest son Adrian, when he tried
to kill Roz.
 
They were two bitter women
who hated Mick and despised Roz.
 
And
they wanted Joey to get their revenge.

But what
they didn’t understand was that Joey had changed.
 
He and his father had had an awful
confrontation not long ago.
 
So awful
that Joey still bore the scars Mick put on him.
 
But he realized that day what his half-brother Adrian must have realized
in his final moments: that if you crossed Mick Sinatra in any way, you were no
longer his son, but his enemy.
 
And he
showed no mercy to enemies.

“I don’t
know what y’all expect of me,” Joey said, his arms reached out and hands palm
up.
 
He wore oversized pants that hung
slightly below his waist, an oversize Philadelphia Flyers shirt tucked in, and
a big medallion gold chain around his neck.
 
He was hip hop to his core.
 
A
dark-haired Eminem.
  
But he was
questioning his gangster ways now.
 
They
hadn’t gotten him anything but trouble, and his father’s wrath.

But his
mother and Adrian’s mother didn’t see it that way.
 
“We expect you to stand up for yourself so
that Mick can respect you again,” Cathleen said.
 
“We need you in his inner circle, Joey.
 
We need you to hear things, and tell us
what’s going on.
 
Mick cut me off
financially.
 
What if he cuts you
off?
 
Where would we be then?”

“It’s just
dinner for crying out loud,” Joey said with exaggerated hand movements, his
frustration with the pair evident.
 
He
supported his mother now, but mainly on his old man’s dime.
 
He understood her fears.
 
But how was that his problem?
 
“All I’m going to do is have dinner with Dad
and Roz, and with Glo and Ted.
 
How am I
supposed to get in Dad’s inner circle at dinner?”
 

“You show
strength, that’s how,” Hillary said.
 
“Because your mother is right, boy.
 
And just like he cut her off, he can cut me off too.
 
I rely on those coins Mick gives me.
 
He took Adrian.
 
I don’t have anybody else to help me.”

“But what
does this have to do with me?” Joey asked, with the frustrated hand movements
again.

“Mick
doesn’t like weak people,” Hillary explained.
 
“If you continue to be his whipping boy, if you continue to be weak like
that, he’ll cut you off too.
 
I’m telling
you he will!”

Cathleen
placed her hands on either side of her son’s arms.
 
“Look son,” she said, “I know you’re
frustrated.
 
I know you don’t know what
to do.
 
But that’s why you need to trust
us.
 
We have your best interest at
heart.
 
Your father sure as hell don’t,
or he would have never beat on you the way he did.
 
We need you to hear us.
 
We need you to find out what’s going on for
us.
 
Because we have a plan.”

Joey looked
at his mother as if she had lost her mind.
 
“A plan against who?
 
Dad?”
 
Then his heart began to pound.
 
“Ma, he’ll kill you if you try to come
against him!”

“Not him,”
Cathleen said.

“Then who?”
Joey asked.

“When did
everything change between you and your father?” Cathleen asked him. “When did
he cut me off?
 
When did he kill Adrian?”

Then
Cathleen answered her own question.
 
“When Rosalind Graham hit the scene,” she said to her young son.
 
“That’s when everything changed!
 
That’s when your father kicked us to the
curb!”

Joey knew a
part of that wasn’t true.
 
He knew his
father had kicked him to the curb from the day he was born, and his mother
shortly after.
 
But a part of it was true
too.
 
Everything did change, and changed
for the worst, when Roz came along.

 
“Just toughen up, Joey,” Hillary said.
 
“Be strong enough that Mick will keep you in
the room.”

“And we
don’t mean that
mail
room he had you
working in at his corporation,” Cathleen reminded him.
 
“We mean the
main
room where Teddy and Gloria gets to be.
 
And you tell us what’s going on with that
bitch Roz.
 
You tell us what they’re
arguing about, because I hear they fight like cats and dogs.
 
I hear he beats her ass too.
 
Because I promise you, baby,” Cathleen added,
moving closer to her son, her hand massaging his spiky black hair, “we’re going
to get rid of that stain.
 
We’re going to
ease her black ass right out of the picture.
 
And when we do, you’ll be right there to ease right back in beside your
father.
 
Where you rightfully
belong.
 
And you’ll be his rightful
heir.
 
Not Teddy.
 
Not Glo.
 
You.
 
Because I’m depending on
you, baby.
 
And now that Adrian’s gone,
Hillary is depending on you too.
 
You
won’t let us down.
 
Will you?”

Joey knew
something had to happen.
 
He also knew
Roz was more the cause of their problems than not.
 
But he also knew his father.
 
His father could smell a rat a mile
away.
 
If he wasn’t careful, instead of
landing at his father’s side, he just might land at Adrian’s side: in a pine
box too.

“I won’t let
you down,” Joey said, got in his Charger, and sped away.

Hillary
looked at Cathleen as Cathleen watched Joey get away.
 
“Can we trust him to do it?” she asked.

“He’s my
son, isn’t he?” Cathleen asked.
 
“Of
course we can!”

Hillary wasn’t
as certain as Cat.
 
Joey was a weakling
in her eyes.
 
But he was all they had.

“I still
can’t believe they got away with that shit.
 
How did they get away with it, boss?”

Danny
Padrone was just one of several underbosses sitting in front of Mick.
 
He couldn’t believe it.
 
Angelo Jovanni couldn’t believe it.
 
Nobody assembled in that room could believe
it.

“The last
time somebody hit us like that,” Angelo said, “it was an inside job.
 
But none of our people would have pulled shit
like this.
 
We checked everybody and then
triple checked them.
 
Somebody’s toying
with our asses.”

“How did it
go with Barry Criggs?” Danny asked Mick.
 
“His crew was the one responsible for delivery.
 
His crew was the one that dropped the
ball.
 
What’s his excuse?”

“Who gives a
fuck?” Mick asked.
 
“There’s no
excuse.
 
His entire crew understands that
now.” Mick was at the head of the table.
 
They were inside the backroom of Angelo’s shell company: a healthy foods
store in the Italian Market district of South Philly.
 
It was one of the many command centers when
they needed to assemble.
 
They never
assembled at Sinatra Industries, unless it couldn’t be helped.

“Damn right
no excuses,” Danny echoed the boss.
 
“They allowed it to happen and now we have no merchandise.
 
This was supposed to be out biggest take of
the year.
 
Our foot soldiers were
depending on that shipment.
 
How could
Criggs fuck up our biggest shipment of the year?”

“You should
hear the complaints,” Angelo chimed in.
 
“It’s like we stole Christmas or something.
 
Nobody’s happy.
 
Everybody’s angry.
 
What are we gonna do, boss?
 
We have the best of the best.
 
They’ll walk if we can’t provide them
merchandise.”

“Another
shipment is coming,” Mick said.

Danny
frowned.
 
“You re-upped already?”

“When will
it get here?” Angelo asked.

“Tomorrow.”

“Night?”

“Morning,”
Mick said.

“I take it
you have a plan to avoid that shit from happening again,” Angelo said.

“What do you
think?” Mick asked.
 
“We’ll get together
with the logistics later.
 
I’ve got a
dinner date tonight.”

“But what do
we do?” Danny asked.
 
“Do we need to put
the word on the street that a shipment’s coming.
 
To entice a hit?”

“Hell no,”
Mick said.
 
“If it’s their aim to bring
my kingdom down, they’ll be spying the docks.
 
They’ll know.”

And then he
stood up.
 
Everybody in the room stood up
too.
 
“Tell the front line to calm their
asses down,” he said, putting on gloves.
 
“They’ll have merchandise tomorrow.
 
It won’t be our top grade, but it’ll be good enough for now.
 
It’ll tie them over for now.
 
Until I can get a bigger shipment in.”

“But . .
.”
 
Danny and all of the underbosses were
shocked.
 
“How in the world can another
shipment be coming in this quickly?”

“I always
have a backup supply nearby,” Mick said.
 
“Just in case.”

“But how?”
Danny asked.

“None of
your fucking business,” Mick snapped.
 
“Just be ready tomorrow.”

And then
Mick, sartorially dressed in a pinstripe suit, looking more like a businessman
than the ruthless killer they all knew him to be, left the backroom.

Danny was
offended.
 
He used to be Mick’s right
hand man.
 
He used to know the inner
workings himself.
 
Until Teddy’s sorry
ass took his role.

But then he,
along with all of the underbosses, smiled and high-fived.
 
They didn’t care how Mick got the merchandise
in.
 
They were just happy some was coming
in.