And there was Nikki Tarver, in a chair, her hands and feet tied and her mouth gagged, but otherwise looking just fine.
Teddy quickly removed the cloth and tape from her mouth. “Are you alright?” he asked her anxiously. “Did they hurt you?”
“No,” Nikki said, shaking her head. “I’m fine.”
“Thank God,” Mick said, as he slumped against the wall, relieved too. Nikki was like a daughter to him. He didn’t know why he took to her the way he did, but he did. He cared for her. He was pleased that Teddy had enough sense to get her. Teddy just needed to marry her ass and stake his claim.
But as Mick went to help Teddy remove the rope from Nikki’s arms and legs, they all heard a scary sound: a gun shot. Mick and Teddy stopped and looked at each other. Mick pulled out his Magnum. “You stay with Nikki,” he said, and hurried out of the room.
When he ran down the long, winding hall of the massive home, and onto the landing, he realized there was no need for concern. Joey was standing downstairs, his gun still smoking, as Irene‘s lifeless body laid at his feet. Mick exhaled. He could feel his son’s pain.
And when Joey looked up at his father, as if he couldn’t believe it had come to that moment, Mick’s heart dropped. And he walked downstairs.
When he got to Joey’s side, he looked at Irene, and then he pulled Joey into his arms.
Joey sobbed like he used to do when he was a little kid, and Mick would be leaving his mother’s home. “Stay, Daddy, stay,” he used to cry. But Mick had his own life to live, a syndicate to run even back then, and no child was going to interfere with that life. He never stayed. He wrapped both arms around his son, and held him as tightly as he could.
It was too late. He knew it. But it was all he had.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Gloria was asleep on the loveseat. The twins were asleep on the sofa. And Roz was pacing the twins’ playroom with a gun at her side like a lion guarding her cubs. She looked at Gloria and wondered how in the world could she go to sleep at a time like this, but she knew how. Mick could do no wrong in Glo’s eyes, and she trusted him to make it all right no matter how tough the situation became. She could sleep because Mick was on the case. Roz couldn’t sleep because Mick was on the case!
She worried about him more than she worried about any human being alive. Somebody had to, was how she felt about it. She was his tower of strength when his was running on empty, and she aimed to keep it that way.
And that was why she couldn’t keep still. She kept walking around that family room and turning and walking some more. She wasn’t going to rest until she saw Mick, with Teddy and Joey and Nikki, too, all in one piece, walk through that door.
The door to the playroom opened, causing her to quickly aim her gun, but it was no one to fear. It was Deuce McCurry, the driver/bodyguard Mick trusted most in the world. He had arrived in town less than a half hour ago and obeyed Mick’s order to go to the family home and guard his family.
“Mick called?” Roz asked anxiously as soon as she saw who it was.
“He’s here,” Deuce said and Roz, her heart leaping with joy, ran toward the door and then out of the playroom.
“Stay with them,” she ordered Deuce, and then ran as fast as she could across their sprawling home until she was running across the foyer and then out of the front door.
Mick, who had been driving Joey’s Charger, was just getting out of the car. And when she saw that he was in one piece, and that so were Joey and Nikki and, praise God, Teddy, too, she ran as fast as she could to them! And although Teddy should have been the man of the hour because he was the one who had gone missing, Mick was always the man of the hour for Roz. She ran into his arms first. She had to feel his flesh and bones first, even though she knew Mick was so muscular there were no bones to feel.
“Thank God,” she whispered into his ear as she held him. “Thank God you’re okay!”
Mick still had a hard time believing that somebody could love him so completely the way Roz did. He still struggled with how in the world could a stone cold man like him deserve such love. But he loved that he had it, and he wrapped his arms around Roz too. And they even kissed on the lips in front of all of his grounds security, and Nikki and his sons. But Mick didn’t give a damn. He missed her too.
When they stopped embracing, Roz then turned to the man of the hour and hugged him and Nikki at the same time. She was happy to have them back too. But Teddy did wince.
Roz pulled back from him. “What happened?” she asked. “What did they do to you?”
“I’m okay,” Teddy said. “It’s just my arm.”
“What about your arm? Did you go to the doctor? Mick, why didn’t you take this boy to the hospital?”
Mick looked at Roz like she was crazy. “The hospital? Please! He’ll live.”
Teddy gave his father a harsh look, but then he smiled at Roz. Good ol’ Roz. “I’m okay, Ma,” he said, reassuring her. Then he thought of something. “Did you call my mother?” he asked. “I didn’t want her worrying.”
Roz shook her head. “No. I wanted to give Mick a chance to find you first before she came running over with accusations.”
Teddy smiled. He knew what Roz meant. “Thanks, Ma,” he said.
But Joey wasn’t so thankful. When Roz turned her attention to him, she was stunned at how devastated he looked. She looked at Mick.
Mick exhaled. “Irene was involved,” he said.
“Involved?” Roz asked, frowning. “What do you mean?”
“He means she was using me,” Joey said bitterly. “He means she was fucking with me to get to Pop. She was working with Uri.”
Roz frowned. “Uri?” She looked at Mick again. “The actor? What about Uri?”
“His infatuation with you was all about luring me to New York so I would be out of town when they snatched Teddy.”
“But he’s an actor! What would Uri want with Teddy?”
“He thought kidnapping me would be the bargaining chip he needed to partner with Pop,” Teddy said. “That acting is his cover. He’s as thuggish as the rest of us. At least he was,” Teddy added.
Roz could hardly believe it. But then she frowned again. “But what did that have to do with Irene?” she asked Joey.
“They worked together all along,” Joey said. “She was using me,” he said again. “But I showed her ass.” He started moving around in his hip-hop style, with the chains around his neck clanging against his chest and the fist of one of his hands was hitting the palm of his other hand. “Didn’t I, Pop? Didn’t I show her? I showed her ass!”
Although Joey’s words and mannerisms were defiant, Roz could see the pain in his eyes. He wasn’t fooling her.
He couldn’t even fool himself, because the tears appeared in his sad eyes even as he kept moving from side to side, and soon they were trailing down his face.
And just like his father before, Roz went to Joey, too, and pulled him into her arms.
And it was a startling truth that Mick was just beginning to realize, and that Roz knew all along: of all of their children, including the twins, it was Joey who always ended up being the one who needed them the most.
He sobbed in her arms as she continued to hold him and walk with him into the house.
Teddy placed his arm around Nikki’s waist, and they walked in too. They walked as if it was all over, and Uri’s ill-fated scheme was a one-off.
But Mick walked behind them, and he walked alone. And he already had his cell phone out, and was making phone calls, ordering an even fuller and more complete investigation of Uri and Irene and Hector Morales while they were at it. They all had been investigated before, he was reminded, but he didn’t give a fuck. “Do it again,” he ordered, and they heeded his order.
The investigations would eventually turn up nothing, just as the previous ones had, but Mick kept sensing they were missing something. But as the days turned into weeks, and the weeks turned into months, he began to ease up. Nothing new had happened. Nothing unus
ual had gone down. There was no chatter in the underworld. He assumed he had been overthinking it.
But to his family’s detriment, and his own, he would quickly discover that he had assumed wrong. And the enemy he didn’t realize he had, that invisible rain, was about to take his world by storm.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
It started with Roz and what seemed to be a blip on their radar screen of life. Her new play on Broadway was a rousing success and for the past two months it had been receiving rave reviews and word-of-mouth excitement. One night, after the show, while Roz was in her dressing room removing makeup and talking with one of her costars, she was surprised when Teddy, Joey, and Gloria walked in. She smiled.
“Oh my goodness,” she said as she continued to wipe makeup from her face. “You guys were in the audience? Why didn’t you tell me you were coming tonight?”
Joey and Gloria looked to Teddy to answer her. But he was hesitant too.
Roz found that odd. Teddy hesitant? “What is it?” she asked.
“Could you excuse us, please?” Teddy asked Roz’s costar.
“Oh, sure,” the woman said as she got up and squeezed Roz’s shoulder. “Talk to you later, Roz,” she added, and then left the room, closing the door behind her.
“Okay, what is it?” she asked. Then a horrified thought occurred to her. “Is it the twins?” she asked anxiously.
“No, ma’am,” said Gloria. “Nikki’s with them. They’re fine.”
“Then what is it?” Then another horrifying thought occurred to her. “Is it Daddy?” She knew he was in Baltimore on business, or he would have been to tonight’s performance too. He was her biggest supporter.
But when she asked that question, she didn’t get an immediate answer the way she had when she asked about the twins, which scared her. Gloria looked at Teddy. Teddy exhaled. “Yes, ma’am,” he admitted. “It’s about Pop.”
Roz’s heart squeezed with fear and she stopped removing makeup. “What about him?” she asked. “What’s happened?”
Teddy exhaled, pulled up a chair, and sat down, his body leaned forward, beside Roz. “This woman has come forward, Ma,” he said.
Roz stared at him as if she couldn’t believe it. “A woman? Seriously? All the long faces because of some woman?”
“You haven’t heard what she’s saying,” Gloria said.
“The same thing the rest of those bitches always saying,” said Roz. “He’s cheating on me. He’s in love with them. That’s what they all say. You think I’m new to this game? From the day Mick asked me to be with him I’ve had to deal with some woman coming forward. Every time I turned around a woman was coming forward. The thirst is real, children. The thirst is real!”
“What thirst? What’s that supposed to mean?” Gloria asked her.
“It means I have a good man and those hoes out there will stop at nothing to get their paws on that good man too.”
Good man, Joey thought. He’d never heard his father described as a good man ever!
“So you don’t think Daddy’s ever been unfaithful to you?” Gloria asked Roz.
It was instructive to all of them that Roz didn’t answer her question directly. “Whatever the bitch is saying,” Roz said, instead, “she’s lying.”
“But this is different though, Ma,” said Joey just as Roz was about to continue removing her makeup.
But Roz exhaled. They were going to force the bullshit down her throat anyway, she thought. “Okay, what’s she saying that’s so different?” she asked, and sat back down her makeup wipe. She turned sideways, crossed her legs and folded her arms, and looked Teddy squarely in the eyes. “What’s the big news now?”
She noticed how Teddy’s muscular body seemed so tense. He usually didn’t get involved with his father’s female dramas like that. Apparently Joey was right and it was indeed different. “What’s she saying, Teddy?” she asked him specifically.
“She said she had an affair with Pop,” Teddy said.
Roz knew there had to be more to it than that. “And?”
“She has a child, Ma. A two-year old. He was married to you when the child was born.”
Roz stared at Teddy. They could see her well-put-together confidence began to fracture. But they also knew she was Mick’s biggest champion. They saw the unbelief in her eyes too. “That child isn’t his,” she said, although her gusto had lessened.
“If it’s not his child,” Teddy said, “then why did he take a DNA test?”
“A DNA test?” Roz had not expected to hear that. “He took a DNA test?”
“Yes,” said Teddy. “And I saw the results, Ma. I’m the one she came to. According to those results, that child is Pop’s.”
Roz stared at Teddy with a look so startled that it broke all of their hearts. That good woman didn’t deserve that, Teddy felt, and he was angry with his father. Roz didn’t deserve that shit!
Roz batted her eyes and looked away from Teddy. Then she turned back toward the dressing table, uncrossed her arms and legs, and continued to wipe off her makeup.
But she did ask a question. “Do you know where she lives?” she asked Teddy as she wiped.
Teddy nodded. “Yes. I had my guys look into her.”
“She’s in Philly?”
“No. She’s here in New York.”
“Call your father,” Roz said, this time looking at Teddy through her dressing table mirror. “He’s in Baltimore on business. Tell him I said to get his ass to New York now. Tell him to meet me at her place.”
Teddy nodded. That was how you did that shit, he thought. “Yes, ma’am,” he said, rose up, and immediately got on his cell phone.
Gloria and Joey looked at each other. They never would have thought Roz would confront the woman, and with Dad present too? But they knew it was the only way.
But then sadness came over both of them. Like Teddy, they were angry with their father too. They had just gotten over Irene‘s betrayal. Roz was having success on Broadway. Things were looking up for the Sinatras again.
And now this.
Another baby mama.
As if their father didn’t already have too many.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Deuce stopped the Escalade at the curb in front of the woman’s apartment building. Roz, Teddy, Gloria, and Joey all sat inside of the limo. And they waited. For nearly an hour they had to wait. But Mick finally showed up. An SUV drove up, and Mick got out buttoning his expensive suit.
“Wait here,” Roz said to the children, and got out of the Escalade. She looked gorgeous, they thought, in her fur coat, flare-legged pants, and heels. A gorgeous, strong, independent black woman with a heart of gold. What more did their father want, they all silently asked.
When Mick and Roz met up on the sidewalk, Roz waited to see if he would ask what it was about. He didn’t on the phone, according to Teddy. When he told his father the name of the woman, and that Roz wanted him to meet her at the woman’s apartment that night, he didn’t ask a single question, Teddy said. He just said okay.
And now, in Roz’s face, he wasn’t asking questions either. They met on the sidewalk, face to face, like two giants sizing each other up. But Mick didn’t say a word. A twinge of hurt crossed Roz’s face when he didn’t need to know what it was about, as if he already knew, but she didn’t let it consume her. He was pissed that she had called him to the woman’s apartment: she could see that in his eyes. But that was his problem. He was the one who had taken a DNA test. He was the one who didn’t ask her what the fuck was her problem. He just came along. What did he think she was going to do?
Because she was pissed too. It couldn’t have been more evident than after they met on the sidewalk and Mick moved toward her as if he was going to kiss her. But Roz moved away from him and headed toward the building’s entrance.
Teddy, Glo, and Joey stared at their father when Roz dissed him the way she had. It was refreshing to see. Nobody handled their father that way!
But it unsettling, too, because they kn
ew he was a man who would take that anger over being dissed out on somebody. And it was usually one of them.
But they also knew Roz had every right to be upset. She wouldn’t be his wife if she wasn’t strong as steel. A weaker woman could not have tolerated a man like him, and they all knew that too.
And despite her turnoff, Mick still opened the entrance door for her and they both walked inside. And he still placed his hand possessively on her lower back, making it clear who she belonged to despite her diss, as they made their way onto the elevator and up to the tenth floor.
Even in a fur coat, Roz could feel his big hand against her small back and she wanted to turn into his arms. She loved him just that much! But she first had to hear this woman out. She had to hear for herself that it couldn’t be true, and Mick had not fathered a child while he was married to her.
The door was opened by a fairly plain-looking blonde woman. Why were they always blonde, Roz wondered? Except for Roz herself and Bella Caine, Gloria’s biological mother who, like Roz, was also African-American, Mick seemed to prefer blondes. Some of those blondes were gorgeous, and some were ugly as hell. But almost all of his ex-lovers were blondes.
Her name, according to Teddy, was Giona. But as soon as she opened that door, and saw that it wasn’t just Roz standing there, but Mick too, Giona’s entire demeanor changed.
“Mick?” she asked. She was shocked.
Mick, reeking with completely controlled rage, opened the door wider so that Roz could walk inside. Once they were inside, he closed the door behind them.
“I understand you wanted to see me,” Roz said to Giona.
But Giona was looking frightfully at Mick. “What are you doing here?” she asked him. “I asked to see her, not you. Why would you be here?”
Roz frowned. “Why the fuck you think?” she asked. “You claim he has this out-of-wedlock kid with you, a kid born while he was married to me, and you don’t think he would want in on this discussion?”
Mick Sinatra: Ice Cold Love Page 9
