CHAPTER TEN
Roz was still a little sore from that double dose of lovemaking Mick put on her, but she nevertheless managed to enter the restaurant walking fairly normally. That didn’t stop Mick from poking fun at her, however. That didn’t stop Mick from smiling every time she would feel a sting, causing her to lurch her leg forward like some constipated cowboy.
When he leaned toward her and whispered in her ear, “looking good, Marshall Dillon,” she hit him with her elbow. Purposely hard.
“Ouch!” he said, his smile gone, and then it was Roz’s time to smile.
But Mick was happy to see her smile. He knew he overdid it in that motel room. He fucked her too long and too hard and lost control too many times. But he needed to get that stress off of both of them in the worse way. Their first day back was anything but triumphant. And they both still had a mountain ahead of them. He still had a war to wage, and it wasn’t going to be pretty on its best day, and Rosalind still had a business to rebuild and her good name to reclaim. But at least for now, thanks to his magnificent wife and her beautiful body, he thought as he placed his hand on the small of her back, they both could exhale. They both had a temporary reprieve.
As they stood among the crowd of people in the vestibule waiting to be seated, Mick and Roz realized how they suddenly became the center of attention. For some of those gawkers, it was mainly because they made such a striking couple. Some others, they knew, weren’t all too pleased to see their good looking white man with a black woman, or their good looking black woman with a white man. Whatever the reason, Mick didn’t give a fuck. He pulled Roz closer against him, and moved his hand from the small of her back to completely engulf her waist. Gawk on that, his gesture seemed to say.
Roz leaned against him too, when he pulled her closer, and she reveled in how strange and beautiful it was to her. There was a time when this kind of public display of affection would have been strictly verboten by Mick. He would have viewed it as a disgusting sign of weakness whenever he saw other men doing it, and a revolting sign of vulnerability if he were to do it himself.
But Roz could see how profoundly Mick was changing. Whenever they were in public places he seemed determined to let the world know that she was his. Not with big, in-your-face gestures. That wasn’t Mick. He was not going to be giving her those kind of passionate kisses in public that he gave to her in private, nor was he going to be holding her hand and swinging it in carefree unison as they skipped down the lane.
But he was always touching her, or pulling her closer, or placing his hand on the small of her back in a she’s mine gesture he seemed to want the world to know. Especially when great looking guys were around. Small potatoes, Roz knew, but it was still a far cry from the man he was when they first met in New York City.
As they continued to wait and ignore the gawkers, Mick began looking beyond them at the restaurant in full. He had an ironclad habit of surveying every room he entered with surgeon-like precision. He had bodyguards around, especially those on Roz’s detail who had been given a beforehand notice of their movements, and it was their job to blend in so effectively that they appeared to be nothing more than faces in the crowd. But Mick handpicked each one of them. He knew every face. But after the ambush, he had decided to take on the role of Roz’s chief bodyguard. It was his job to spot any problems.
Within a few minutes of his look around, he spotted one. He saw his son Joey, the youngest of his grown children, sitting with Cathleen. They were in the far back of the restaurant, huddling together, and it didn’t take a genius to know that Cat was up to something. As Cat usually was.
“What are you looking at?” Roz asked as she followed his eyes. And then she saw Joey and Cathleen too. “Oh, her,” she said with some bite in her voice.
“Yes, her,” Mick said with equal bite, and pulled Roz closer still.
After lunch, and long after Joey and Cathleen had left the restaurant without ever realizing Mick and Roz were even in the room, Mick drove Roz slowly and leisurely back to her office, as if he did not have a million things at his own office that he needed to attend to. But Roz loved that they were taking it slow. She had a ton of problems to get back to also. After that mass walkout, the very survival of her business was at stake. But their relationship trumped all of that. Because Mick was determined to make certain that the main thing remained the main thing, and that all else was a distant second.
But instead of going back to his office after dropping her off at hers, he made a detour and drove in the opposite direction. To a house he once purchased for the mother of his son, and a lover he still liked at the time. A house he once took back after that same woman besmirched Rosalind. But he gave the house to Joey. Joey gave it back to Cat.
Mick parked in the driveway and made his way to the front door. He rang the bell and, within seconds, Cathleen answered. When she realized it was Mick, she felt a twinge of fear. But she knew she had to play it off.
“Well, well,” she said with a smile. “If it ain’t Old Green Eyes himself.” Then she looked beyond him. “A Cadillac? You? And an Escalade at that. Since when, Mick? Where’s your Porsche, or whatever it is you drive? Where’s your sports car?”
Mick, ignoring her, walked on into the house.
Cathleen couldn’t believe his insolence. “What an asshole,” she said beneath her breath, although Mick heard her. But she wasn’t so foolish as to order him out of her home. She closed the door and stepped inside too.
Mick was in his form-fitting Armani suit, and he wore it well if Cathleen had to say so herself. He walked around her living room as if he owned the place. He bought it, she knew, but he didn’t own it. “What can I help you with?” she asked. “Would you like a cup of tea?”
Mick folded his arms. “Do I look like I want a cup of tea?”
“How should I know what you look like you want? I’m just trying to be civil. I know you never much cared for civility. Not even in bed. But I still think it has its place.”
“What are you up to?” Mick asked her.
“I was about to make myself an afternoon cup of tea. That’s the only thing I’m up to. You’re welcome to join me--”
“What are you up to with my son?”
“Oh, Mick, give it a rest! Why are you always assuming I want to corrupt my own son? He’s my son too! And nobody, I mean nobody loves him more!”
Mick nodded his head, and began looking around in his usual perusal. “Yeah,” he said. “Alright.” He unfolded his arms, and began walking toward her.
At first Cathleen remained defiant. But the closer he came, the more nervous she felt. And then he stopped, right beside her, and looked her in the eyes. “I don’t fuck around,” he said. “You know me.”
Their eyes locked. Cathleen thought she saw a little regret in Mick’s eyes, a little softness for her. But then suddenly, as soon as she thought she saw it, his look changed. And all she saw was something so cold she felt its chill.
“You are the mother of one of my sons,” Mick continued. “That’s the only reason I gave you another chance last month. But fuck with me again, Cathleen, even a little bit, and there will be no second chance.”
Cathleen attempted to smile it off. “What are you trying to say, Micky? That if I do anything you don’t like concerning my own son, what’s supposed to happen? Hun? That you’ll what? Kill me?” She laughed after she asked that question, as if she wanted to highlight the ridiculousness of his threat.
But Mick wasn’t laughing. He wasn’t even smiling. “Yes,” he said. And his eyes made clear he was not kidding.
Cathleen’s smile left too as Mick continued to stare at her. Was this man serious? But when he finally walked out of her home, she determined that he was not. He couldn’t be!
But when she closed her front door behind him, and locked every lock, she nearly collapsed against it. She was playing with fire. Either he was going to get burned, which was her life’s ambition, or she was. But either way, it was going to be fiery.
The backroom in a Drycleaners, in the heart of Koreatown, was the meeting place. On the surface, it was a standard issue Korean-owned Drycleaners. An old-style, tried and true Drycleaners. But behind the scene it was a shell company owned by Mick himself. The Koreans worked the legitimate clients out front, and kept all of the money from that side of the equation. Mick and his men did all of their business around back. It was in the ever-expanding network of ma and pop businesses Mick’s organization owned across the country to keep the Feds off track. As soon as they thought they had discovered one shell company, fifteen others sprang up. It was elaborate, and costly. But necessary.
The men were already assembled, along with Teddy and Joey, by the time Mick arrived. They were at a conference table, looking like the businessmen they were required to appear to be. All except Joey, Mick noticed, who looked like a thug. But it revealed more to Mick than Joey would ever know. In Mick’s eyes, Joey was the weakest man in the room trying to look as if he was the toughest. And because he was trying, it made him look even weaker.
Mick sat at the head of the table. Teddy, wisely, did not round up the foot soldiers in Mick’s army, but only those who were in the chain of command. Twenty-seven men strong. Those who worked behind the underbosses hit today numbered around twenty-one. They were the front line supervisors. The rest of the men there, including Pauly Pantangelo and Luddie Rizzo, were underbosses who had nothing to do with the security debacle surrounding Mick’s assassination attempt. They, therefore, weren’t summoned to the previous meeting and sat closest to Mick. But that didn’t mean they weren’t gravely concerned.
“Am I correct to believe you have heard the news?” Mick asked them.
“We heard there’s been a house cleaning,” Pauly said, “when we didn’t know the house was dirty. We heard nobody got out of there alive.”
“But what we didn’t hear,” Rizzo said, “is why. Our men are in shock today, Boss. They know shit went down surrounding that ambush that wasn’t supposed to go down, they know that. But they didn’t see where any of it was a killing offense.”
“That’s why Dad’s the boss and they aren’t,” Joey responded. “What does those shitheads know?”
“They were the ones who tried to take us out,” Teddy said. “We went there to talk. They were the ones locked and loaded. They were the ones who made it a kill offense.”
“Okay, we understand that part,” Pauly said to Teddy, leaning forward. “They panicked, overreacted, and so they paid. We got that.” Then he looked at Mick. “But word is getting around about this, Boss. They’re saying you’ve declared war on your own men. They’re saying you’re unhinged. There’s a lot of anxiety out there, a lot of fear. Our men want to know if you’re coming after them next. What are we supposed to tell them?”
“Tell them to be afraid,” Joey said. “Be very afraid.”
Wrong answer, Mick thought.
“Tell them if they didn’t do shit,” Teddy said, “then shit’s not going to happen to them.”
Right answer, Mick thought. “Tell them to shut the fuck up and do their jobs,” he said. “My war isn’t with my own men. But there will be war.”
Everybody at the table looked at each other. Rizzo looked at Mick. “War on who? On the Parrushi family?” Rizzo asked.
“The Parrushi family, the Renault family, and the Viettis,” Mick responded. “Every asshole associated with that ambush, and every asshole who thought about being associated with that ambush, will be dealt with.”
This was shocking news to Mick’s underlings. War was the ultimate in their line of work. It was the last resort. And to go to war, not with one family, which was tough enough, but three? It was the nuclear option as far as they were concerned.
Mick saw that concern. His men were supposed to be the best of the best. That was why they worked for him. But lately, like now, he wondered if they were even good. “Anybody has a problem with that?” he asked.
“I don’t have a problem with it,” Pauly said. “But what’s the plan? How are we going to pull a thing like that off?”
“Those are major organizations you’re talking about, Boss,” Rizzo added. “It’ll be a bloodbath if we mix it up with all of them all at once. I don’t see how we can survive it.”
“What the fuck are you talking about, Rizz?” Teddy asked. “You’re talking about the boss. We can survive anything with Dad in charge!”
“I just want to know the game plan, Teddy, that’s all,” Rizzo said. “Like Pauly said, our men are in a state right now. Seven underbosses went down today. Seven! No shit like that has ever happened in their lifetimes. And now we’re talking a war on three fronts? They don’t know what to think.”
“Nobody’s asking them to think,” Joey said. “Dad’s got that covered.”
Mick looked at Pauly, who heard everything. “What’s the word in the backrooms?” he asked him.
Pauly wasn’t going to sugarcoat it. “They’re saying you lost a step,” he said. “They’re saying you’re the one who invited the men to come into your house who was behind the plot to take you out. They say that fact alone has spooked you, and lessened you.”
“Yeah,” Mick said, with bitterness in his voice. “That’s what I heard too.” Then he looked at his men around the table. “Who at this table believe that shit?”
Not one man raised his hand.
But Teddy took it a step further. “Who at this table would tell him if they believed that shit?”
Not one man raised his hand.
And that took Mick by surprise. He had a problem. Something, somewhere had gotten away from him. His men didn’t feel they could be candid with him. That was the kiss of death for any boss. “Who at this table believe I will keep my word?” he asked them.
Every hand went up.
“Tell me the truth,” Mick said. “No harm will come to you.”
It was Pauly, as he suspected, who spoke up first. “The truth is, what happened this morning with Danny and Ang and the rest of them, may help the other families understand how misguided they are about your resolve. But it won’t help our people. All they see is that you took out their leaders. All they see is that their leaders apparently said what you didn’t want to hear and they paid with their lives. So nobody’s talking. There’s respect, Boss, and there’s fear. They will always respect you. But right now they may fear you more.”
“Good,” Teddy said. “He’d rather be feared.”
But Mick, Pauly, and the rest of the seasoned pros around that table knew better. That was not a good thing. He had to be both feared and respected, and both had to be on equally high levels.
“What’s worrying me the most,” Rizzo said, “isn’t about what our people think. It won’t be easy, but we can keep them in line. What’s worrying me is this talk of war. You’re talking about going to war with three of the toughest families in the business. That’s total war, Boss. And I say no. I say hell no. We will make the biggest mistake ever if we try to take on that many enemies all at once.”
The other men in the room were surprised that Rizzo would be so direct with Mick. But Rizzo didn’t back down. “I know what happened to you was tough,” he said to Mick. “Hell, it felt like the end of the world for all of us when you went down. We couldn’t believe they did it the way they did it. But that’s over and done. The men responsible are dead. Why bother with their families? My advice? I say you need to step back, reassess, and get over it.”
Before Mick could control himself, he exploded. He jumped from his chair, knocking it over, and knocked the shit out of Rizzo. He knocked him so hard across his jaw that three teeth flew out of the man’s mouth. Then Mick, the thug deep inside of him coming out, jumped on top of Rizzo and beat his ass.
It took Teddy, Pauly, and several other men to finally separate the two men, but by then Rizzo was bleeding profusely. And Mick was still red hot. “Get over that, motherfucker!” he yelled angrily at Rizzo as his men and Teddy held him back. His suit and tie
were askew, and his always neat hair was flapped down across his forehead. Joey stood back. he had never seen his father so unhinged.
But Mick didn’t give a shit. He was angry as hell. “That was my wife and my children in that truck, you fucking asshole!” he yelled. “That was my wife they could have killed! And my babies! And you’re telling me to get over it like it was some fucking joke? You get over that beat down I just put on your ass, motherfucker. You get over that!”
Mick was hot. He was so hot that even he was stunned by his emotional outburst. He snatched away from his men, causing many of them to stumble back. But he made no attempt to calm himself back down. “Get the word out,” he said to everybody assembled, “that I am declaring war on every family I named. Spread the word. I want them to know. I want them to be afraid. I want them to understand that that step they think I lost, will be found in their asses.”
“And then what, Boss?” one of his men had the nerve to ask.
“And then shut the fuck up until I give you further orders,” Mick responded.
“Yes, sir,” the men responded, careful not to incur the wrath of Mick that Rizzo had just incurred.
And then Mick left. He walked right out.
His sons walked out behind him, but they were just as shaken as the men around that table. Because none of them had fully realized just how deeply that ambush had affected Mick. Until now.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Two days later and six middle-aged Italian men were in the park playing chess, with two to a table. They were making a move and then pressing the chess clock to ensure equal time distribution, smoking their cigars, and relaxing in the morning breeze. This was their daily ritual. A few games before lunch every morning. Then back to the store to sell cigarettes and beer. A store that most of them knew was a shell for their nephew’s illegal trade. But nobody was the wiser. Those men were as unknown to the underworld as their nephew, Scar Parrushi, was known.
Mick Sinatra: Now Will You Weep Page 7
