Copperfield was a massive warehouse owned by Mafia kingpin Mick Sinatra.  The youngest of his grown children, Joey Sinatra, was upstairs, in a room on the fifth floor, with three men that worked on Joey’s crew.  Two of the three, Ron and Big-Eye Bevin, the twins, were standing beside Joey.  The third, Khaki, was sitting in the hot seat.  And he was sweating bullets.

“I didn’t mean to do shit, Joey!” he cried.  “You know I don’t go around pulling that shit!”

“Then why did you pull it last night?” Joey was angry.  “Why you had to pull that shit last night?”

“It wasn’t like I went up to the guy and woo-woo started something.  I was in that club chilling.  He started in on me.  Didn’t he, Big?  Didn’t he Ronnie?  Ask the twins.  They saw it!”

“He started with a little bragging,” Big-Eye said.  “That’s all I saw him do.  But Khaki kept it going.  He wouldn’t leave it alone.  He wouldn’t let it go!  It was his ass that got up in that kid’s face.”

“We told him not to do it,” Ron said.  “We told him over and over, don’t do it, Khaki.  Don’t do it, Khake!  But he did it anyway.”

But Joey was still upset.  “What the fuck I care about what you told him?  You should have stopped him.  You knew who he was fucking with.  You knew what kind of heat that could bring on us.  You should have stopped him!”

“We tried,” Big-Eye said.  “I’m telling you we tried!  But you know how Khake is when he gets that liquor in him.”

The door to the room flung open, and Teddy Sinatra, their boss and Mick’s heir-apparent, walked in.  But he didn’t walk in casually the way his father would have.  He didn’t walk in with that cool Mick was known for.  He’d gotten the background on exactly what happened in that nightclub from a man who was also there, but he wasn’t on Joey’s crew.  Teddy knew exactly what went down.  He walked in mad as hell.

He was dressed in jeans, and a sleeveless sweatshirt that highlighted his muscular form.  Normally he was in suit and tie.  As the underboss of the Sinatra crime family, a suit was always required.  But it was too fucking early in the morning.  And after he heard what happened in that club, he didn’t give a shit.

He hurried up to Khaki.  Khaki, knowing what Teddy was capable of when his anger was unleashed, jumped to his feet ready to defend himself.

But as soon as he stood, Teddy was upon him.  And without any kind of discussion; without any kind of asking for any explanations, Teddy grabbed Khaki, lifted him all the way up above his head, and threw him out of the closed, upstairs window.

Joey and the twins, stunned, ran to the window as Khaki’s big body sailed down each and every one of those five stories, until he landed in the middle of the warehouse floor with a thump that kicked up dust.  And with every bone in his body undoubtedly broken.

The workers, all working in Mick Sinatra’s gunrunning business and tasked with checking the crates before shipping out, looked at the dead, broken body, and then up at the shattered, fifth floor glass.  They were stunned but not surprised.  None of them were choirboys either.  And when they saw Joey and the twins looking down, all three of whom were their superiors, they got back to work.

Joey and the twins then looked at Teddy.  They all were afraid of him, too, when he got like this.

Teddy was breathing heavily.  Unlike many underbosses in his position, he didn’t like when he had to get like this.  But that fucked-up crew of Joey’s kept putting him in that position!  “Another fuckup by another one of your men,” he warned his kid brother, “and you’re out.”

But Joey, being the young, hothead he was known to be, was offended.  “You can’t take me out of shit.  Dad runs this bitch!  Who the fuck are you to---”

Before Joey could even finish his sentence, Teddy rushed him, grabbed him by his oversized jersey, and ran with him until he slammed him against the wall.  Teddy’s teeth were clenched.  “Another screwup by another one of your men,” he said between his clenched teeth, as he knocked Joey’s back against that wall again, “and you’re out.  You want to see what I can and can’t do?  You try me, Joey.  Try me!”

Joey was sufficiently put in his place.  His lack of response proved that.  But Teddy was still angry with him.  “Who do you think has to go to Boss Bovenconti and admit we fucked up?  You?  Who do you think this shit is going to blow back on if Pop finds out?  You?!”

Teddy was breathing so hard he could hardly control his breaths.  He was beginning to hate this job.  And hate the wedge it was developing between he and his kid brother, a brother he loved with all his heart.  He released him.

“Bag him up,” Teddy said to Joey, “and get him ready for transport.”  Then he gave his brother another hard look.  “You’d better pray Pop doesn’t get wind of this,” he said.  And then he walked out.

One of the twins, Big-Eye, the instigator-in-chief, looked at Joey.  “What, Joey?  You’re going to let him talk to you like that?”

“Yeah, Joey,” Ron agreed.  “He’s no better than you or us.  He was on the line same as all of us.  But now, just because he got a little promotion, he gets to dictate everything like he’s your old man now?  You gonna stand for that shit?”

Joey and the twins knew Teddy didn’t get just a “little” promotion.  They knew Teddy was Mick’s second-in-command: a bigger position than any head of any family in any other syndicate in the country.  But Joey also knew his father didn’t play that insubordination shit, especially when it came to somebody disrespecting Teddy.  “Don’t worry about what I’m going to stand for.”

“But how we gonna ever get ahead if you get stuck, Joey?  This our futures too!”

“What you talking?”  Now Joey was talking with his hands, which was a sure sign of his frustration.  “I ain’t got shit to do with your futures.  This ain’t no volunteer work.  You’re getting paid to do what you do.  What are you talking?”

“You know what he means,” Big-Eye said.   “When you gonna make your move?”

Joey understood exactly what they meant.  If he was ever going to get ahead, he had to knock Teddy down to get there.  He’d been on the backburner too long.  It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see he was itching to get ahead, and the twins weren’t stupid people.  They saw the eye of the tiger in Joey’s eyes.  Joey was young and he was beyond restless.

But, to Joey, that wasn’t the twins’ business.  “Bag him up,” he ordered them.  “And remind those fuckers downstairs that they didn’t see shit, or they won’t have eyes to see any more shit.”

“Sure thing, Boss,” Ron said with his mouth, as he and Big-Eye looked at each other with disappointment in their eyes.  Where was his fight?  How were they ever going to get ahead in this organization if he didn’t make a move?  But they left to do what they were told.

And Joey, feeling the heat too, took the chair Khaki had been sitting in and angrily threw it against the wall.