Gemma's Daughter Page 12

  And they weren’t about to let up. Because Sal moved on top of her, and slid his dick so deep down inside of her that he wondered if he could hold on any longer. It felt that good. And he hung on. He fucked Gemma hard, and held on for dear life. He laid on top of Gemma, wrapping her into his arms, and stared at her beautiful face as he fucked her. He was determined, on that morning, to do her until she couldn’t take it anymore.

  And when she came, it felt that way to Gemma too. Sal was hitting it hard. He was riding her even harder. And she came with a thunderous cum.

  Then Sal felt the electricity and came right after her. It was as if all of the drain from yesterday was replaced by the kind of herculean energy he never would have thought he’d still have.

  Then Sal kissed her as he continued to pump on her. He wanted that feeling again. He wanted to make her cum all over again. But if he thought he was going to be able to get it up that easily, he was sadly mistaken. He was completely out of juice.

  He kissed Gemma again, slowly pulled out of her and loving every second of that pull-out feeling, too, and then he sat on the edge of the bed.

  Gemma sat up in bed, with her knees up and her hands around her legs. Her body was still reacting, as if Sal was still inside of her. And the conversation they started before Sal had entered her at all, began anew.

  “I have to do it, Sal,” she said. “You know I need to.”

  “And you know what I told you,” Sal responded as he put on his t-shirt. “I told you no already.”

  “But Sal!”

  “Don’t Sal me! I told you no.”

  “But I have employees in the hospital. I need to check on them.”

  “Do it by phone,” Sal said, putting on his underwear.

  “I can’t do it by phone,” Gemma said. “I need to see for myself that they’re going to be okay. And what about the family members of those that passed away yesterday? I need to make sure they’re okay too.”

  “Gemma,” Sal said in that voice that brook no debate, “I’m not going to tell you this again. Until I get this shit under control, you are not leaving this house. And I mean that. I understand you wanna be there for your people. I understand that. But this was no accident. This was an orchestrated attack. And I’m going to treat it for what it is. Which means all of this going here and going there is off the table.”

  He turned and looked at Gemma. “And I mean that, Gemma. My job is to protect you. And that’s what I intend to do.”

  He stood up and began putting on his pants. “Your ass is staying put until I say it’s safe out there. Talk to your people by phone. That’s your only option,” he said. “Now get up. We have guests,” he said, and headed to the bathroom.

  Gemma leaned back against the headboard. She knew, on every level, that Sal was right. She couldn’t just behave as if it was business as usual. But that didn’t make it any easier.

  “Gemma!” he yelled, and she rolled her eyes. Sometimes that man could be so domineering, and it infuriated her! But she knew where it was coming from.

  She got up out of that bed too.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  The Gabrinis were gathered together in Sal and Gemma’s living room with two different television sets turned on. The bombings, including the one at Gemma’s office, dominated the news. Tommy and Reno, who knew who was behind those bombings overnight, weren’t even looking at the television, but were talking amongst themselves. But Trina, Marie, and Tommy’s wife Grace, who Tommy had flown in from Seattle along with their children, were paying close attention. Because Trina and Grace knew it as soon as they heard the news. Those bombings had Gabrini written all over them. After what happened at Gemma’s law firm yesterday, they both knew somebody was going to pay.

  “Finally!” Reno said and everybody looked where he was looking. Sal and Gemma had walked into the room. “They finally make an appearance!”

  Grace smiled, got up and walked over to Sal and Gemma. “Hey guys,” she said cheerfully, and she and Gemma, and then she and Sal hugged.

  “When did you get here?” Gemma asked happily. “It’s so good to see you again.”

  “Tommy flew you and the kids in?” asked Sal.

  “We got in early, early this morning, yes. Tommy must have had ten guards waiting for us at the airport. And he was there on top of it. But the kids were glad to see him.”

  Sal smiled. “That’s Tommy,” he said. “Everybody loves Tommy.”

  “Where are the kids?” Gemma asked.

  “Reno made Dommi and Jim take them all downstairs in the game room. Dommi wasn’t with it, but Reno was. So that meant Dommi was,” Grace said, and they laughed. “But come on and have a seat,” Grace said. “You guys are probably exhausted.”

  Reno grinned. “I’ll bet they are,” he said.

  “I mean from the ordeal yesterday, Reno,” Grace said.

  Reno and Trina were seated together, too, with Marie seated beside Trina. They had all eaten breakfast before Sal and Gemma came down, and were now sitting around in the living room.

  “About time,” Reno said as Sal and Gemma walked over to sit down.

  “What’s about time? It’s not as if your ass was waiting on us,” said Sal to Reno, as they sat down.

  “Nobody’s got time to be waiting on your ass,” said Reno. “Who the fuck are you?”

  “Not you, thank goodness,” Sal said, and everybody laughed.

  But the laughter didn’t last. Because Gemma looked at the television and saw, not only her office bombed, but several other sites, and she exhaled. What on earth, she wondered, was going on?

  And then they got the call, and everything changed again.

  The intercom buzzed. “Mick Sinatra has arrived,” the guard at the gate said, and he didn’t ask for permission to let him in either. “He’s coming through,” the guard added.

  And everybody in that living room, including Marie, who hadn’t met him yet, but had read up on that man, sat up a little straighter.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  When Mick Sinatra walked around the wall of the foyer and entered the huge living area, everybody stood on their feet. For Marie, who stood up, too, he was nothing like she thought he’d be. But then again, he was everything like she thought he’d be. He wore a suit, for one thing, and on first glance looked more like a businessman than a mob guy. And he was tall and muscular and beyond belief sexy, too, which surprised her. But he definitely had that all-man body, and that sleek black hair, and that one, gorgeously sleepy eye.

  But there was an intensity about him, too, and an explosiveness that was so chilling and unnerving that it eclipsed all of his attractiveness although nothing about him had changed. Just that he was in the room. Just that his very presence seemed to overwhelm the room. And suddenly he wasn’t Mister Sexy at all to Marie, but was exactly who he was reputed to be: the boss of all mob bosses. The most feared mobster in the world.

  When he stood in full view of her in that living room, in all of his powerful presence and hardness, she understood without even knowing any of the backstory, exactly why they would call a man like him Mick the Tick.

  What also made her understand was in the way he entered that living room, walked straight up to another powerhouse of a man, her stepfather Sal Gabrini, and punched Sal with such a ferocious roundhouse right that it would have knocked out cold a lesser man. Sal, with that bulldog strength he possessed, didn’t fall, but the hit did cause him to stumble backwards.

  Marie screamed in shock and horror when Mick hit Sal. She was certain that man was going to kill Sal. Everybody else in that room: Tommy, Reno, Gemma, Trina, and even Grace, moved to protect Sal from Mick’s fury too.

  “Uncle Mick, don’t!” Tommy yelled.

  “Now come on, Uncle Mick, calm down!” Reno yelled.

  “Sal,” cried Gemma, pulling Sal back. “Sal!”

  Dommi left Jimmy with the kids downstairs and ran upstairs, to see what the commotion was about. What he saw was his Uncle Sal angrily break away fr
om the clutches of the rest of the family and rush right up to Uncle Mick’s face and knock the shit out of him.

  “Ah, shit!” Dommi yelled in disbelief. Somebody hit Uncle Mick? He’d never seen anything like it!

  But Sal had done just that. Sal had hit Uncle Mick. He hit him equally as hard as Mick had hit him, and Mick stumbled backwards too.

  But Dommi was worried for his beloved Uncle Sal too. Because even he knew hitting Mick the Tick wasn’t a good idea. It would have been better, everybody in that room knew, had Sal stood there and took it.

  Because as soon as Mick stumbled backwards, he was coming forward, and coming straight for Sal. Tommy and Reno tried to get in the way, but Mick pushed them aside. And in his rage he grabbed Sal, lifted him into a bear hug, and then slammed him down onto the coffee table so violently that the table split in two. And then Mick was down on his knees beating the shit out of Sal even as Tommy and Reno and Dommi and all of the ladies were trying to pull Mick away from Sal.

  But Mick was emotional too. And that combination of emotions and rage were not going to be denied. “Didn’t I tell your ass to wait?” he was yelling at his nephew even as he was beating him. “Didn’t I tell your ass to wait?!”

  But Sal was not the kind of man who was going to lay there and take it, even for an uncle he respected with total respect. He found the strength deep within himself and managed to flip Mick Sinatra onto his back as if he was an ordinary man. And then it was Sal, to everybody’s shock, who was beating the shit out of Mick.

  Tommy was about to try to intervene in the fight, but Reno pulled him back, and Reno held the ladies back too. Because it was a fair fight now. Sal, they all realized, was holding his own. Dommi couldn’t believe what he was seeing, but he was proud of his uncle.

  But Sal’s upper hand didn’t last for long.

  Because, like Sal, Mick was not the kind of man who was going to take anybody’s aggression lying down either. Sal had only managed to get a few good licks on Mick before Mick reached down deep, too, and found the strength to flip the script on Sal. He flipped Sal onto his back once again and then lifted himself and Sal back onto their feet. Mick then grabbed Sal and ran him backwards until Sal’s back violently slammed against the wall. And Mick was about to show him why he was the most feared motherfucker on the planet.

  But he didn’t get a chance. Sal was feared, too, and proved it. Before Mick realized it, Sal had grabbed him, turned him, and slammed his back against that same wall. And Sal was so angry he was shaking. And he was ready to take that shit to the next level.

  But he couldn’t do it.

  Because he knew, if he went there, there would be no coming back. Nobody was going to kick Mick the Tick’s ass and live. Mick was either going to take him out that day, or he was going to have to take Mick out.

  And the Gabrini everybody knew had the biggest heart of them all, couldn’t do it. He loved his uncle too much to even try it.

  He stared at Mick. And Mick stared at him. And both men were inhaling and exhaling so heavily that nothing else could be heard but the sounds of their ragged breaths. They were titans, both of them, and both of them understood the precipice they found themselves upon.

  A precipice neither man wanted to be on.

  Especially Sal, who was so emotional he was near tears. Because his rage was still there. Because his hand remained in a tight fist as if he was still on the verge of taking that one more lick that would surely take them over.

  But like the story of Sal’s life, it was up to him, as it always seemed to be, to talk them back down from the ledge.

  “What did you expect me to do, Unc?” he asked his beloved uncle. “They tried to attack my wife! What did you expect me to do?”

  “I expected you to do what I told your ass to do,” Mick fired back. “I told you to wait. When I tell you to wait,” he said and violently pushed Sal away from him, “you wait!”

  And somehow, because Sal used his heart instead of his fists and opened that line of communication with his uncle, they all sighed relief. The fact that Mick hadn’t already killed Sal meant he wasn’t going to kill him. Mick wanted down from that ledge too.

  But he was still angry as hell with Sal. “You don’t fuck around with Colombian cartels, Salvatore Luciano!” he yelled. “That’s what I was trying to tell your stupid ass. You don’t fuck around with those motherfuckers! I was trying to keep your ass alive!”

  “But they came for me!” Sal yelled back.

  “After you snatched his girl. What the fuck you thought they were going to do?!”

  Gemma looked at Marie. “She doesn’t need to hear this,” she said to Trina. Trina immediately motioned for her son Dommi to come over. Dommi, although still mesmerized by two men he admired beyond words, wasn’t so far entrenched in his admiration that he couldn’t understand his mother would kick his own ass if he didn’t obey her. He hurried to her.

  “Take Marie upstairs,” Trina whispered to him. Then Trina said to Marie: “Go with my son.”

  Marie looked at Gemma. She didn’t want to leave her newfound parents. But Gemma nodded for her to go. “We’ll be okay,” she reassured her.

  So Marie allowed Dommi, who was even younger than she was, to escort her upstairs.

  But both of them were staring at Mick and Sal as they went.

  Mick was, by now, pacing the floor, but not out of consternation, but out of frustration. He needed to walk off his unrequited rage. He realized more so than anybody else in that house just how close he and Sal had come to the edge of that ledge. And it scared him even more than it scared his nephew.

  He kept pacing for several more minutes as the tension in the room was able to ease. Gemma went to Sal, to make sure he was okay, but he was still staring at his uncle. He knew he had lulled himself into believing there would be no retaliation for snatching Marie, and when retaliation came nearly a month later, it caught him so off guard that it affected his reaction. He acted with his anger and not with his head. Three hits in one night? Now, he was realizing with alarm, that he had put his family even more at risk.

  But what, he still wanted to know, was he supposed to do?

  “You know something,” Sal said to Mick. “What do you know, Uncle Mick?” he asked him point blank.

  Mick stopped pacing, although he didn’t look at Sal.

  “Are they going to hit back today?” Sal asked Mick and Tommy and Reno were anxious to hear that answer too.

  But Mick didn’t respond. He just continued to pace again. Dommi had escorted Marie to her bedroom, telling her that it was just a family squabble and she should just rest and shouldn’t worry about, and then he hurried back downstairs just in case.

  He came back downstairs just as Tommy decided to ask Mick the same question his brother had asked him. “What do you know, Uncle Mick?” Tommy asked. Of all the family members, Tommy was closest to Mick. Although being the closest in the family to Mick didn’t exactly mean that he and Mick were close. It meant Tommy was as close to Mick as Mick would allow any family member (that was not his wife Roz) to get.

  But even when Tommy asked him to tell what he knew, Mick continued to pace. And they all continued to wait.

  And then, after a few minutes, he finally stopped again. “They have it wrong,” Mick said.

  Gemma looked at Sal. Who are they, she wanted to know, and what did they have wrong? But she, nor Sal, nor anybody else in that room, said anything.

  And Mick continued. “They think it’s because of my reputation. They think it’s because I’m supposed to be this badass.” He shook his head. “But it’s not.”

  He looked at Sal. “I’m still standing, and standing taller than all of those other motherfuckers combined, is because I know how to choose my battles. I know how to pick my fights. I know not to fuck around with a gotdamn Colombian cartel when I don’t have to fuck around with those motherfuckers!”

  He was getting hot again. Everybody braced themselves.

  But Sal didn’t blink.
“They’re coming for me today?” he asked him.

  “They were going to come for you today,” Mick responded. “Yes.”

  But Sal caught the nuance. “They were going to?” he asked Mick.

  “I know the head of the Valdez Cartel,” Mick said. “I went to him.”

  Tommy and Reno looked at each other. They were floored. But not as floored as Sal was, who was still staring at Mick. “You went to him?” he asked.

  “I went to make a deal with him. If he spared your life,” Mick said to Sal, “I would spare his.”

  Sal understood what that kind of deal meant. His uncle put it all on the line for him. For him! And he had to do it because of Sal’s hasty decision to snatch Marie, and then to retaliate on them after they retaliated on him before he had a chance to even notify Mick of his decision. He plunged them into a tit-for-tat war Mick had to use his considerable authority to snatch them out of. An authority Mick rarely used because every time he used it, he knew it diminished him. He knew he was putting another nail in his own coffin.

  Then Mick sat down, in one of the chairs. The rest of the family, including Dommi, who was allowed to stay in the room, sat down too.

  “Are you saying, Uncle Mick,” Reno asked, “that Marco Cardoza isn’t going to retaliate?”

  Although Mick respected Sal’s heart above all of the others in the family, he respected Reno above them all. He saw Reno as his equal. “I’m saying the Valdez cartel will not retaliate. I’m saying Marco Cardoza, and what remains of his men, is on his own. It wasn’t a tough decision. They view Cardoza as la estafa, anyway, who wasn’t worth starting a war over.”

  “As la what?” Reno asked.

  “As the fraud,” Mick said. “He’s a fraud. He’s not even Colombian.”

  Gemma was shocked. “Not Colombian?” she asked. “Then what is he?”

  “He’s a Canadian assassin who remade himself. He changed his name and his appearance and took on a Colombian drug lord personae so effectively that he was able to worm his way inside the cartel. When he came to the States to do his drug pushing, he pretended to be related to the head of the Valdez cartel, to give himself some extra leverage with the Americans, and it worked. They went along with it because he was good for business. He became one of their top drug dealers. But his name isn’t Cardoza. It’s Darcy. That’s why they call him la--”