What Hammer Wants Page 4

  Seb saw the sudden change in her. “What?” he asked her.

  But Amelia was still thinking it through. “It’s worth a shot,” she said.

  “What’s worth a shot?” Seb asked.

  But Amelia didn’t say. She grabbed her coffee and hurried for the exit. Seb hurried right behind her.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “I know better than this, Millie,” Seb said when Amelia’s Bentley stopped in front of the Parade diner.

  “I’ve gotta do what I need to do,” Amelia said.

  “But him? And here?” They were in the show-nuff hood. “We aren’t in this bad a shape,” Seb said. Then he looked away from the diner and looked at Amelia. “Are we?”

  Amelia hated it too. “Last month I had to cover that lost shipment when we were just really getting our sea legs. Now I can barely cover the rent and pay staff and another shipment goes missing? Now I’ve got to pull investigators from cases that can actually make us some money to track that shipment down. And these are the same guys who didn’t find the last shipment and may not find this one. And you need to ask me if we’re in bad shape?”

  “Why can’t you just go to Mick. That’s your brother! His mean ass will get to the bottom of it.”

  “Before or after he kills me for having anything to do with it?” Amelia grabbed her purse. “You don’t know him. You think he’s vicious, I know he is!” She started shaking her head and opening her car door. “No way. My family stays out of this.”

  “What about Hammer? He’s not your family. Not yet anyways.”

  But Amelia would not be persuaded. “Same difference,” she said and got out of the Bentley.

  Seb leaned his head back and rubbed his forehead. If he wasn’t afraid that Amelia would kick his ass if she found out, he’d call her brothers personally. But Amelia, like her brothers, didn’t play either. He wasn’t calling anybody.

  Eddie Spaletti was at his favorite table eating breakfast when his bodyguard came up to him. “She wants to see you, Boss,” he said.

  “Who?” Eddie asked.

  “Mink,” the bodyguard said.

  Eddie smiled and looked beyond his guard. When he saw Amelia standing near the entrance, in her customary mink coat and heels, he smiled. “Mink ain’t the nickname for her,” he said. “That’s Foxy Brown right there. That’s Cleopatra Jones.” Then he grinned. And ate another big forkful of food. Then he nodded his head.

  The bodyguard looked at Amelia and then motioned for her to come on back.

  Parade was a popular diner owned by Eddie’s brother, and it didn’t open until noontime, but Eddie could always be found having his breakfast while the staff prepared to open. That was why Amelia came there first. She knew Eddie’s routine too.

  “Hello, Eddie,” she said as she stood in front of his table. The bodyguard sat at the next table over.

  When Eddie kept eating and didn’t respond, Amelia said it again. “Hello, Eddie.”

  Eddie finally looked up. “Well well well. If it ain’t Cleopatra Jones,” he said. “Or are you too young to know who I’m talking about?”

  “I need a favor, Eddie.”

  “Who doesn’t?”

  “I need a favor, Eddie.”

  Eddie stared at her, determined she was serious, and then motioned for her to sit down. Amelia sat down.

  “Nice coat,” Eddie said, checking her out. “But you’re always stylish. That’s what I like about you. You know how to keep your man.”

  Amelia rolled her eyes. “Here we go,” she said.

  “Most women don’t have a clue,” Eddie continued. “They don’t seem to understand that men like a woman who jump through hoops for them. Who dolls up for them. You’ve got it, Millie. You’ve got style. You know how to keep your man.”

  “My style,” Amelia said, “or lack thereof, has nothing to do with any man. Don’t get it twisted.”

  Eddie laughed. “I won’t get it twisted when you get real. Everybody knows Hammer has certain standards in his women. The only reason he’s kept you in his stable as long as he has is because you live up to those standards day in and day out. Or your ass will be on the streets, too.”

  “Fuck you, Eddie,” Amelia said, causing Eddie’s bodyguard to look at her. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about,” she added.

  But that only made Eddie laugh harder. “Got that Sinatra temper. Oh, yeah. You’re a Sinatra alright. Used to hear the boys say no way. That black broad ain’t no Sinatra. But they haven’t seen that temper of yours. They see that temper, they’ll know it too.”

  “Eddie, I need a favor,” Amelia said impatiently. “Can we talk business? And I’m not talking personal business either.”

  “Alright already! Can’t a man have a little fun?” Then he stopped eating and leaned back. “Okay, talk. What favor a Sinatra needs from a little fish like me?”

  Amelia leaned forward. “I need a loan.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I need a loan, Eddie.”

  Eddie frowned. “What you coming to me for? Ain’t no fucker alive got more money stashed that Mick the Tick. And Big Daddy Sinatra is no slouch either. But you coming to me?” Then he smiled. “Unless,” he said, “there’s a very clear reason you’re not going to them.”

  “Are you going to help me or not?”

  “For how long?”

  “I’ll need at least four or five months.”

  “That’s a long-ass time for me to wait on my payback. What amount?”

  Amelia exhaled. “Five.”

  “Five thousand?”

  Amelia just stared at him.

  “Five hundred thousand?”

  Amelia still didn’t respond.

  Then Eddie began eating again. “You’ve got me confused with one of your brothers.”

  “I know you sling that amount, so don’t even try it. And you know I’m good for it.”

  “Why would you need that kind of dough?” Eddie asked her.

  “That’s none of your business,” Amelia said. “Just know I need it.”

  “Arrogant just like’em too.”

  “Are you gonna lend it to me or not, Eddie? I don’t have all day.”

  Eddie stared at her. Almost lost his cool. But then he thought about whose she was, and cooled back down. “At what rate are we talking?”

  “Two percent if I have to pay it back in four months. Two-and-a-half if you give me five months.”

  Eddie was shaking his head. “No dice.”

  “Come on, Eddie, why not?”

  “Because I’m no fucking bank, that’s why not. You want cute interest rates, you go to big banks. You want ridiculous rates because no fucking bank is going to lend you squat given your activities involved, then you come to Eddie Spaletti. Your friendly loan shark. You know how this shit works.”

  “We’re talking a ninety thousand dollar return on your investment,” Amelia said. “And you know I’m good for it.”

  “I don’t know shit when we’re talking that kind of cash.”

  “Then what’s the rate?” Amelia asked.

  “Twenty-five percent.”

  Amelia frowned. “Fuck you!” she said. “Do I look like I was born yesterday? Fuck you!”

  “Then fuck me. You’re the one need the dough. Not me.”

  Amelia hesitated. “I’ll go to five,” she said.

  “I’m still at twenty-five,” he said.

  “You know I’m not giving your ass twenty-five percent on that kind of cash.”

  “Then go back where you came from and get it however you have to. Because that’s my bottom line. And that’s a cut rate for me. It’s usually fifty percent, and I don’t care how much cash it is.”

  Amelia was disappointed, but she wasn’t about to let him see that. She stood up to leave.

  “I’ll bet Big Daddy and especially Mick the Tick would just love to know what their baby sister is up to.”

  Amelia looked at him.

  “I’ll bet a little phone call from me will knock their socks off,” Eddie said, and as soon as he said it, Amelia reached over the table and grabbed him by the catch of his shirt. But as soon as she grabbed Eddie, his bodyguard’s gun was at her temple.

  Amelia felt the heat of that gun, but she didn’t let go of Eddie’s shirt. “First of all,” she said to him, “neither one of my brothers will take a call from the likes of you. Second of all, Hammer will lock your ass up for admitting to being in the same room with me. But if, on the off chance you do get to communicate with one of them, you’d better not so much as mention you saw my face.” Then she stared hard at him. She had a reputation for being as hard-edged as her siblings when she needed to be. “See if I’m bullshitting,” she added, and then released his shirt.

  She looked at the guard. He removed his weapon from her face. But as soon as he did, Eddie angrily lurched over the table, yelling you bitch, and grabbed Amelia by her mink coat. Then he threw her onto her back on the table as if he was about to get the last word on his own turf.

  But as he said himself, Amelia was a Sinatra. And nobody was getting a last word on her. She took one of her boots and kicked Eddie in the groin when he attempted to straddle her, causing him to back up in excruciating pain, and then she flipped him onto the floor and had her gun out and to his head.

  But not only did Eddie’s immediate bodyguard have a gun to her head, she realized three other bodyguards were in that establishment, all three she thought had been workers getting the place ready for opening, had guns to her head as well. But Amelia still didn’t remove her gun. “Better get your boys, Eddie,” she said to the loan shark.

  Eddie hated doing it, but he knew he had to. “Nobody shoot,” Eddie said when it appeared it was going to be a standoff. “She’s Mick Sinatra’s s
ister. Don’t forget that. We shoot her, we’re dead.”

  The bodyguards took their boss’s words to heart because each one of them, including his immediate guard, withdrew their weapons and backed off.

  Amelia stared at Eddie a moment longer, and then withdrew her weapon too. She looked at the bodyguards, in case she ever ran into any of them again, and then left the not-yet-opened diner.

  When she got outside, she exhaled.

  But she still had a problem. A major problem. And she had to have that cash flow. When she got back in her car, she’d already decided.

  “Well?” Seb asked her.

  Amelia began buckling her seatbelt. “He said no.”

  Seb exhaled. “What are we going to do now? Lenny is a killer, Millie. That man don’t play. And four-point-five million dollars? That’s how many bullets he’ll want to put into you. And unlike the rest of the world, that man don’t give a fuck who Mick the Tick is. He’s reckless enough to actually think he can play on the same field with him, and win! And he’d love to knock Hammer off his perch. That’s the mindset we’re dealing with. What are we going to do?”

  She exhaled. She knew her family would help her if she’d only ask them. But she also knew what they would do to her if she told them what she was doing. As if that shit wasn’t in their bones too. As if she could anymore play it straight and narrow than they could. Especially Mick. He’d kick her ass if he found out the truth, when she was following right in his footsteps.

  But she knew she had to choose. And she knew it would be like choosing between a firing squad, a hanging, or suicide. “Looks like I’m going back to Canada,” she said, and then scrunched up her face because she knew how badly Hammer was going to take the news of her actual business interests. But it was either getting help from Hammer (the suicide), or from her brothers (the firing squad, the hanging, or worse).

  It wasn’t going to be her brothers.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  “Another fuck up, Hammer.”

  “I got him out of there alive,” Hammer pleaded. “We saved his life!”

  “But he shouldn’t have been placed in that situation to begin with!” Gus Bellamy, the Defense Secretary, decried. “You should have never let him get placed in that fucking situation!”

  “You talk as if I called that meeting. His people phoned me. They set up that place and time.”

  “He’s the leader of a gotdamn banana republic! You’re fucking Hammer Reese. The former head of the CIA. The head of Special Ops. Why would you let him dictate to you?”

  “If he’s such a lightweight,” Hammer asked, “what are we backing him for?”

  The secretary exhaled. They were in DC, standing in a sciff (a sensitive compartmented information facility) at the Pentagon, and the secretary was as angry as Hammer had ever seen him. “Where is he now?”

  “I’ve got him in deep cover.”

  “On our soil?”

  Hammer exhaled. His non-answer answered the question for the secretary.

  “Gotdammit, Hammer! What are you trying to do to me? Why would you bring him here?”

  “Because that’s the only way I could ensure his safety. Or has the mission changed? Because that’s the assignment I was given. That’s the assignment I gave to my men. To keep him alive.”

  “What are his demands?”

  “Weapons.”

  “Forget it.”

  “And men.”

  “Forget it!” Bellamy yelled again. “He must be insane! I’m not putting any more Americans at risk than we’ve already done. And I shouldn’t have you anywhere near this catastrophe.”

  “Come on, Gus.”

  “Can you imagine what would have happened around this town if the legendary Hammer Reese would have died in those jungles of Peru? And it was discovered why he died? That we, the United States of America, is not only backing a coup d’état, but we’re instigating one! If the president’s political opponents find out anything about this operation--”

  “Nobody’s finding out shit,” Hammer said, “if we give Cordoba what he wants so that he and his men can carry out the mission without their hands tied behind their backs.”

  “He’ll lose reelection if this gets out.”

  “It won’t get out.”

  “Not that you care,” the secretary said.

  “Has the mission changed?” Hammer asked. “Are we still going through with this or not, that’s what I need to know?”

  The secretary closed his eyes and then opened them back up again. “Give him what he wants. But I want you, not one of your men, supervising the delivery.”

  “It’ll take us a few days to get it set up, but I’m on it,” Hammer said, and turned to leave the sciff.

  “And Hammer?”

  Hammer turned back.

  “If the president’s political opponents find out about what we’re doing, it’s your ass. I won’t back you up, and neither with the president. It’ll be Hammer gone rogue.”

  “I would not expect anything less from you or the president,” Hammer said in a voice that was meant to show just how low he thought of his superiors. And then he walked on out. One day, he knew, he was going to fuck duty and never return.

  But to make matters worse, as soon as he walked out, he saw Reggie Dell. It would not have been so shocking had she not seen him. He would have been able to make a clean getaway.

  But she saw him, and appeared shocked that he was even in the building. “Hammer,” she said in a voice that didn’t pretend to be displeased.

  Gus Bellamy came out of the sciff just as Reggie spoke. “Oh, good,” he said. “I see you two have reacquainted yourselves. Reggie’s in your sector again, Hammer,” Gus added.

  Hammer looked at him. “Not a good idea.”

  “It wasn’t my call. Nor is it yours. She’s back in.” Gus began leaving. “Oh, and Hammer,” he said, turning back again. “Give her a lift, will you? She’s on assignment in Ottawa.”

  Hammer didn’t respond. Gus knew the animosity ran deep. But duty was duty. “It’s an order, Hammer,” Gus said finally, and left.

  Hammer exhaled too. Reggie smiled. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I don’t bite. Not you, anyway,” she added, and then laughed.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The taxi drove up the mountain and was allowed entry onto Charlemagne when the gate chief saw who was inside. Amelia and JoJo both sat in that backseat and stared out at the foreboding place as the cab lumbered its way up the steep incline, along the winding driveway, to Hammer’s mansion. For some strange reason, Amelia always became nervous when she approached his lair. As if she wanted so much for her and JoJo to not just be visitors on that mountain, but to live there in peace and harmony with the man both of them loved maybe too much, considering what they both got in return for their love.

  She remembered when one reporter said something about Hammer that she never forgot. He was such a beloved, respected, iconic figure in the U.S. government, the reporter had said, that no one person, place, or thing could ever claim him. “Hammer belongs to the world,” that reporter once said. And that might be true. But where, Amelia wondered as the cab came to a stop, did that leave her and JoJo?

  James, Hammer’s valet, met the cab and opened the back door for Amelia and her son. “Welcome back, Miss Sinatra!”

  “Thank you, James. How’s the family?”

  “Everybody’s doing well. Mom is visiting her brother in ---, so she’s doing much better.”

  “Good. That’s good to hear.”

  “I’ll get your luggage, ma’am,” James said as JoJo and his nanny/bodyguard Rowena got out, too, and they all made their way up the steps to the front entrance.

  Watson, Hammer’s butler, opened the door as they approached. “Welcome back, ma’am,” he said happily. He adored Amelia and JoJo. “Hello, Master Reese,” he said to the young man. JoJo smiled and waved.

  “He’s home, right?” Amelia asked as JoJo and Rowena began entering the house.

  “I’m afraid, no,” Watson said.

  Amelia was surprised. “He’s not back from D.C.?”

  “No ma’am. He stayed overnight. Was he expecting you?”

  “No. No, he wasn’t. I didn’t plan to be back this soon myself, but it couldn’t be helped. When will he be back? Today, I hope.”