Mick Sinatra: The Harder They Fall Read online

  MICK SINATRA 5:

  THE HARDER THEY FALL

  BY

  MALLORY MONROE

  Copyright©2016 Mallory Monroe

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  AUSTIN BROOK PUBLISHING

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  This novel is a work of fiction. All characters are fictitious. Any similarities to anyone living or dead are completely accidental. The specific mention of known places or venues are not meant to be exact replicas of those places, but are purposely embellished or imagined for the story’s sake.

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  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  EPILOGUE

  PROLOGUE

  Mick Sinatra leaned one elbow on the armrest as he slowly drove his pearl-white Escalade along the streets of his town: Philly. Rosalind Sinatra, his wife, and their twins in the back, were along for the ride too. Only Roz couldn’t stop looking at him, and couldn’t stop shaking her head.

  “What?” he asked, glancing over at her.

  “You, that’s what. You look different driving a tank.”

  Mick chuckled. “What tank? This is a Cadillac, woman. This is a luxurious vehicle. Tank my ass.”

  “Oh, it’s nice,” Roz agreed, looking around. “Red leather seats. Fully loaded. Beautifully appointed. But I’m just still a little shocked that you bought it, to be honest. You’re a sports car kind of guy. I might be wrong, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen you driving an SUV before.”

  Mick looked out at the road ahead of them. He was not a man who gave in to sentimentality, not even for her. But he couldn’t hide the truth. “I’ve never been the father of twins before,” he said. “I’ve never been the husband of a woman like you before. The way these fuckers drive out here, it’s protection for my family. Strong, big protection. It’s plenty of car seat room for the twins and, as they get older, plenty of leg kicking room. There’s also,” he added, darting his big, green eyes at Roz, “plenty of bitching and moaning room for the wife.”

  Roz hit him playfully on his massive bicep. “Watch it, buster,” she said. “I know where you live.”

  Mick laughed and turned a corner.

  “But it’s a trip, isn’t it?” Roz folded her arms. “The two of us married, and parents of twin babies? You and me? When we first met in New York, I didn’t see this coming in any way, shape, or form. When we first met, I didn’t think you were about anything good. Just another good looking man looking for a quick hit and run.”

  She was partially right. Mick wasn’t looking for love when they first met, he wasn’t even looking for sex. He was visiting a director friend of his who was auditioning dancers. And then came Roz on stage with a group of dancers. She was a beautiful black woman on stage with other beautiful women. And she was the worse dancer of the group. There was no reason whatsoever for him to be looking her way. But he found that he was not only looking, but couldn’t look away. He saw something in her eyes. He saw something beyond that smoking hot body of hers that made him keep watching. He saw something so striking and so different about her that she haunted his dreams. But that wasn’t something he could just talk about.

  “Yeah, I didn’t think we’d end up at this place either,” was all he managed to say. “That’s for damn sure.”

  Roz smiled. “But here we are. The parents of two beautiful babies. I’m still getting over the shock. You already had kids, but these are my first two.”

  “I already had kids I didn’t raise,” Mick pointed out. “These are the only two I’ve ever raised from infancy. That’s why I bought this vehicle.” He frowned. “I’ve got to get this shit right for a change.”

  Roz looked at him as he drove into the parking lot at the doctor’s office. It was the twins’ check-up day and Mick had them arriving on time. She knew how important it was for him to get it right this time. Mick had a total of six biological children by five different women. Adrian, his oldest, was dead. His remaining three grown children still harbored some resentment because of his absence in their lives. They were coming around, thanks to his renewed efforts to bring them around, but he’d had degrees of difficulty with all of them.

  “Don’t worry,” Roz said as the SUV stopped and she unbuckled her seatbelt. “You managed to get us to Doctor McKay’s on time. Something I’ve never managed to do. You’re on your way, kid.”

  Mick chuckled at the kid reference, since he was much older than Roz, and unbuckled his seatbelt too. He and Roz stepped out of the SUV, both ready to move to the back of the SUV and get the twins out of their car seats. But first, Mick looked around. It was an instinct born out of years as the head of the Sinatra crime family. And then he closed his door.

  But he looked again, because he thought he saw something. At first he still couldn’t recognize what it was he thought he saw. But then it was made clear. Across the parking lot, in a car parallel to where Roz now stood, a rifle began to lift out of a car’s window. His instincts, his love, that pure adrenalin that kept him alive all these years, took over.

  “Get down!” he yelled to Roz as he leapt onto the high hood of the big SUV, slid over to the passenger side, and knocked Roz to the ground as he jumped on top of her. They both fell down just as a bullet sailed above their heads and shattered the front passenger side window. Then the gunfire was rapid.

  Mick was hit once in the back, and the pain pierced through his entire body. But he still ordered his wife to go. “Get back in the truck,” he said to Roz, “and drive our babies away from here!”

  “Mick!” Roz cried. She knew he’d been shot.

  Then he was shot again, this time in the side, causing him to recoil.

  “Go, Rosalind!” He pulled out his own gun. “They’ll kill us all. Get away from here! I’ll give you cover,” he added, and then was shot a third time.

  Roz screamed. “Help us!” she cried. “Somebody help us!”

  Mick was in pain and was losing it fast. But he couldn’t die yet. Not until he knew his babies were safe. Not until he knew his wife was safe. Not until he stopped the bastard trying to take his last breath from taking hers.

  He looked at Roz. His eyes were filled with fear for her and sadness that he probably would never see her beautiful face again. That he would never see the love of his life again. But then his same soft, caring eyes turned menacingly hard. They even scared Roz. “Go now!” he angrily ordered as he rolled off of her onto his back, and beg
an firing back at those motherfuckers.

  Roz jumped inside the open passenger side door as he gave her cover. She knew her only mission was to get their babies out of harm’s way. And she began scurrying over to the driver side to do just that. Her purse was still in the truck. Her keys were in the purse. All she had to do was press the Start button and go.

  But it would mean leaving Mick behind to die, and she didn’t think she could do that. They needed a break. This was stormy weather unlike they’d ever experienced, and they needed a break in the weather. A sudden, miraculous break in this stormy, merciless weather that wanted to drown them all.

  But the gunfire didn’t stop for the weather to break. It was relentless. All Roz could hear were her babies crying and even more gunfire. Unceasing gunfire. In an urban city. In the heart of the city of brotherly love. It felt like a movie to Roz. Like one of those old-fashioned westerns where gun battles were as commonplace as water.

  But Roz knew this was worst. Because she knew Mick had fallen. Because she knew Mick was still in mortal danger and he had ordered her to leave him in danger. Because she knew the Wild West, that city called Dodge, or even that gunfight at the O.K. Corral had nothing, not anything at all, on Philly that day.

  CHAPTER ONE

  One Month Earlier

  “Did you see her?” Hillary asked.

  “See who?” Cathleen responded.

  “That wife of Mick’s. Roz. She’s in here too.”

  They were walking to their table inside Akon’s restaurant, and Cathleen Thomas nearly broke her neck as she cranked it from side to side in search of Rosalind Sinatra. When she saw her sitting at a back table alone, with her plate of food pushed to one side, she stared at her. Roz was reviewing a small stack of papers spread out in front of her, and typed messages on her cell phone as if she was the queen of multitasking. Cathleen’s look turned hard. “I still can’t believe she got the ring,” she said, “of all of us. It makes no sense.”

  “None whatsoever,” Hillary Riverton agreed.

  “And I bet she was the one who pushed Mick up to do what he did to Joey,” Cathleen added.

  But Hillary wasn’t buying that one. “Oh, please,” she said. “Nobody pushes Mick Sinatra up to do anything. Least of all her.”

  The waiter sat them at a table in the middle of the crowded restaurant, took their drink orders, and left. Cathleen sat her Louie Vuitton purse on the table and removed her coat and gloves. “My son has recovered physically from that chain gang style beating his father put on him. But emotionally?” Cathleen shook her head. “He may never recover. Poor baby. And I still say it’s her fault too. Joey wouldn’t have done what he did if she wasn’t monopolizing Mick’s time. Joey would have never put that child in harm’s way if his father was more involved in his life. But that bitch over there hates Joey because his father loves him. It’s her fault too.”

  Hillary looked at Cathleen as she removed her own coat and gloves. They were card carrying members of the Mick Sinatra baby mama club, and there were three additional women with cards too. One of those women, the one sitting at that table on the other side of the restaurant, had a leg up on them all. She not only managed to get Mick to put a ring on it, his first time ever doing that with one of his ladies, but she also was the only one to bear him twins. There was plenty of scorn to go around for Rosalind Sinatra. But Cathleen, Hillary knew, had an even deeper reason.

  “Joey will recover emotionally too,” Hillary said. “Just you wait and see. And I agree with you. Roz could do more to facilitate Mick spending more time with his children. But don’t let that heifer win. Mick is the one who put that beating on Joey. Mick is to blame.”

  “I know that,” Cathleen said. “But that bitch had a hand in it. I know that too. I put as much blame on her for what happened to Joey, as I put on Mick.”

  But across the room, Rosalind had no idea she was being blamed for anything. She didn’t know that Mick’s former lovers had even entered the restaurant. She was too busy texting her assistants with issues she was discovering with each of the various contracts she reviewed. She ran a talent agency with many clients, and that job alone commanded all of her attention.

  But she did manage to notice her client Kinna Franks entering the restaurant. Mainly because she entered so frantically. Mainly because she looked around the room as if she would die if she didn’t see who she needed to see, spotted Roz, and then hurried to her table. “I didn’t get the part, Roz,” she said anxiously, her eyes red from too many tears. “I didn’t get the part!”

  Roz frowned. “What do you mean you didn’t get it? You did get it. Jerry called me and offered it to you. What are you talking about?”

  “He chose somebody else,” Kinna said with a whine in her voice. “The casting list was emailed and my name wasn’t on it. He chose somebody I never even heard of before!”

  Roz didn’t need this headache. Not today! But she abruptly stopped texting, looked up the telephone number of Broadway director Jerry Copeland, and gave him a call. She motioned for the distraught Kinna Franks to sit down.

  Kinna plopped down. “How could he do this to me? I don’t know what happened. I was the best one at the auditions, Miss Roz, I swear I was! Even the stage manager said I had it in the bag. Even he said I was the best. I just knew I had it.”

  But Jerry Copeland’s voice mail picked up. Roz leaned back in her chair, and left a message. “Jerl, this is Roz Graham. I don’t know what’s going on, but my client Kinna Franks is telling me she received the casting list and it didn’t include her. I know that can’t be right because you assured me she had the part. Please give me a call back. We need to get this resolved today. Thanks, Jerl. Bye.”

  Roz ended the call.

  “So what do we do now?” Kinna asked.

  “We wait,” Roz said. “He’ll call when he calls. But he’ll call.”

  “So you think it could be a mistake?” Kinna asked hopefully.

  “I don’t know,” Roz said, looking over at the entrance as a customer walked in. “But we’ll find out.”

  When she realized who that customer was, and why he caught her eye to begin with, something changed. Even Kinna saw it. Roz’s confident face suddenly looked mortified.

  “Miss Roz?” Kinna asked. “Are you okay?”

  Roz’s heart was pounding. She was a long way from okay. She began grabbing her papers.

  “Roz, what’s wrong?” Kinna even turned around, to see what the disturbance was. But all she saw was a tall black man waiting to be seated. She turned back around. “Are you okay?”

  “I’ve got to run,” Roz said as she stood up. She grabbed her coat, stuffed the papers into her shoulder bag, and grabbed her phone. “I’ll let you know what he says when I get a call back,” she added, and then hurried out of the restaurant from the side exit door.

  It was so sudden, and so unexpected, that Kinna took note. The man at the entrance took notice too.

  But across the room, Cathleen and Hillary more than noticed Roz’s sudden departure. But unlike Kinna, they saw when the change occurred. And they saw who caused the change.

  “Waiter,” Cathleen said excitedly as a waiter was walking pass their table.

  The waiter hurried to her table. “Yes, madam?”

  “See if that gentleman waiting to be seated would like to join us.”

  The waiter bowed. “Right away, madam,” he said, and went to do her bidding.

  Cathleen looked at Hillary. “Who knows? It may be nothing. It may be something.”

  “From the way she ran out of this restaurant,” Hillary said, “I say it’s something.”

  “So do I,” Cathleen said happily. “Now, with our visitor coming over, it’s our job to find out what that something is. And to figure out how in the world we can use it to our advantage.”

  Hillary smiled and shook her head. “You never quit, do you?”

  “The way that man did my son?” Cathleen asked. “Never!” she said.

  The lim
ousine and the SUV drove off-road beneath the viaduct and splashed over water puddles from day old rain. Four men, led by Barry Criggs, were waiting in the isolated place, all rubbing their hands together against the cold, all blowing visible breath in the wind as they waited to see if Mick the Tick would understand. There had been a royal fuck up. But it wasn’t their doing.

  When the vehicles came to a stop, the back door of the limo was opened, and the four men got inside. All four sat across from Mick, who was sitting next to his son Teddy Sinatra. Teddy did as he always did in these situations: he sat quietly, listened to his father, and learned.

  The four men tried to small talk his father at first. They tried to talk about everything but the main thing. It was a fool’s errand, and Teddy knew it. What surprised him was that Criggs and the guys, all of whom were much older than Teddy, didn’t.

  “Wasn’t it something?” one of them asked. “The way our Eagles came back from a twenty-eight-point deficit to win? That was some sweet shit there, boss. Some sweet shit.”

  “What happened?” Mick asked in his quiet, no-nonsense way.

  “The quarterback threw this incredible pass to Jarrett,” another one said and Mick, without a moment’s hesitation, lifted the gun they didn’t even realize he had by his side and shot the talkative guy through the forehead. The other three men slammed their bodies away from their suddenly fallen comrade. Even Teddy flinched, but quickly composed himself. His father, he knew, was doing what he had to do.

  “I want another motherfucker to fuck with me,” Mick said angrily. “Now tell me what happened out there, and I don’t mean what happened at some fucking football game! What happened? I heard it was like taking candy from a fucking baby the way they took my shit!”

  “We were outmanned, boss,” Criggs said. He was the leader of the pack, and he knew he had to be the one to convince Mick to keep them alive. “We were outnumbered something like five to one. Our men didn’t stand a chance.”

  “And how did that happen?” Mick asked. “How could it be that a shipment worth fifty million dollars is unloaded into trucks that all some fucker had to do was drive up with more men and take it? Where the fuck was the backup crew? Where the fuck was the crew backing up the backup crew? I told you never cut corners when it comes to my money, Criggs! How many times do I have to tell you that?”