The Cadillac Escalade SUV, owned by Mick, pulled into the parking lot of the busy Philadelphia mall in the late evening dusk, and parked alongside a Ford Explorer. Natalie Vichy got out of the Ford and got into the backseat of the Escalade. Mick Sinatra, a man she’d known for a very long time, was seated on that backseat as if he owned the world. There was a lot of respect she had for him and what he’d accomplished since his days of terrorizing the streets of Philly with Santo. But there was a lot of envy there, too. Mick made it out of the minor league. She and Santo never did.
But she wasn’t there to reminisce, or even air her grievances she had with the man she now needed. As soon as she closed the door of the SUV, she got to the point. “They killed Santo,” she said.
Mick looked at her. She and Santo had been missing. That was why he had Gio and a few of his other senior men on the case. But to hear that his one-time lieutenant, a man he used to trust with his life, was dead, was unnerving. “You know this for sure?”
Natalie nodded. “I know this for sure.”
“Who killed him?” Mick asked.
“His own men, Micky.”
Mick was surprised. “His own men?”
“His own men! His own men killed my husband!” Tears appeared in her eyes. “They backstabbed him and killed him as if he was beneath them. Santo loved those men. He loved every one of them. And they killed him, Micky. You have to avenge his death.”
“I don’t have to do a motherfucking thing,” Mick said with irritation in his voice. He hated with a passion when somebody told him what he had to do.
But then he calmed back down. Natalie was a bitch, but she loved Santo. “What is your evidence that it was his own men?” he asked her.
Natalie shook her head. “You question my motives?” she asked bitterly. “You, a man who left Santo all alone in this world and never reached back to offer him an ounce of compassion and help, would question my motives? I stood by him! When nobody else would, when he served all those years in prison for you, I stood by him!”
Mick had nothing to do with Santo’s incarceration all those years ago, and he knew Natalie knew that. But blaming others was what she did. Mick ignored her. Santo was once his ride-or-die friend before their big falling out. If what she said was true, and his own men turned on him, she got it right: Mick would be the only man who can avenge his death. “How do you know it was his own crew?” he asked a different way.
“Because I know. Because that’s what the Don wants.”
Mick stared at her. “He worked under somebody? Santo had a Don? I thought Santo worked alone?”
“He used to. When he could. But it’s hard out here. He needed cover. You wouldn’t give him any, but he needed it.”
“Who?” Mick asked. “Who’s his Don?”
Natalie paused.
“Who gotdammit?” For some reason Mick’s hackles were going up. “Who?” he asked again.
When Natalie said, “Teddy Stefani,” Mick understood why he was so unsettled.
He stared at her. In shock. “What the fuck are you talking about?” he asked. “What the fuck are you saying?”
But before Natalie could answer, the sound of a gunshot could be heard. Mick wasn’t sure where the shot came from, but he pushed Natalie down as he ducked himself, and pulled out his piece. When the back window of the Escalade suddenly shattered, as more gunshots could be heard, he knew exactly where the bullets were flying now. “Get the fuck out of here!” he yelled to his driver. His driver hit the gas, reversed the powerful SUV, and took off.
But the bullets kept coming as Mick glanced up, between shots, and saw an Infiniti following them. When he saw that there were two men in the car, and one of them was shooting at the SUV, he began lifting up, shooting back, and then ducking back down. When Natalie tried to lift up, to see who was doing the shooting, Mick shoved her back down. “Keep your ass down, Nat, what’s your fucking problem?” She stayed down after that.
But the shootout continued as the SUV swerved around corner after corner as fast as it could, getting away from the mall and making it out into the city streets. And as their firepower seemed to increase, Mick changed his focus from the men in the car, to the car itself. Instead of shooting from the back shattered glass as he had been doing, he rolled down the side window, reached out, and aimed for the tires. He hit one with his first shot, and then the second one with his second shot. And his theory worked. The Infiniti suddenly lost traction, went on two wheels and then went airborne, and smashed down in the middle of the road.
“Keep going,” Mick ordered his driver, as the Infiniti burst into flames.
Mick then sat back down in the SUV, and leaned his head back. Talk about a close call. That was a fucking close call!
Natalie got back on the seat, too, and looked at him. But she was perplexed. “What are you doing?” she asked him. “We need to know who they were. We need to know who was trying to kill us.”
But Mick was well ahead of her. “I already know,” he said.