The suspect, the man at the docks Teddy had shot in both legs to keep him from running away, was not only still nursing those wounds but new ones too: he had been badly beaten.  Repeatedly.  But as soon as Teddy saw him, he smelled a rat.

The men guarding him, two members of Joey’s crew, nervously and quickly stood to their feet when the door opened and they realized not only had Joey, their immediate boss, walked in, but the big boss, Teddy Sinatra, and Mick Sinatra, the boss of all the bosses, walked in too.

They had been playing cards at the table when the bosses walked in, and their guns were at the ready.  But Mick, like Teddy, was staring at the suspect.

The suspect was on the floor, rope tied by the neck and feet, and he was in bad shape.  His legs were turning black.  His eyes were bulging out.  He’d been tortured.

“Get him up,” Teddy ordered, and the men quickly grabbed the suspect, without regard to the suspect, and dropped him down in a chair.  The suspect screamed out in pain.

“Who is he?” Mick asked Joey.

“Roger Caulfield,” Joey proudly said.  “He’s a pyrotechnic expert who also knows how to set it off in the explosives field too.  He’s usually hired by mob types when they need a quick fire or two.”

“And you found him how?” Teddy asked.

“I found his ass,” Joey said.  “What difference does it make how?”

But Teddy remained suspicious.  He was told this guy got away, and he was told by members of Joey’s team.  He had men of higher caliber than any on Joey’s crew looking for him.  But Joey found him?  Joey?  Teddy was suspicious as hell.

Mick moved closer to the suspect.  “My name is Mick Sinatra,” he said.

The suspect looked up at him through the little slit in his eyes that had not yet closed.  “I know who you are,” he said.

“You also know that two of my ships were destroyed,” Mick said.  “I understand you destroyed them.”

The suspect didn’t respond, which Mick also expected.  “Why?” he asked.

The suspect hesitated, but it was obvious to Mick and Teddy that he was going to spill the beans.  “It’s what I do,” he said.

“Who paid you to do what you do?” Teddy asked.

Another hesitation.  Then the suspect said the word: “Bovenconti,” he said.

Although Joey and the twins were smiling at their triumph, Teddy was staring at the suspect.  And he wasn’t buying it.  The only thing the suspect apparently responded to was torture.  He was tortured into saying that name.  But was he saying the truth?  And Teddy was no-nonsense.  What good was a confession, he thought, when it wasn’t the truth?

To everybody’s surprise, Teddy pulled out his loaded gun, grabbed the suspect by the throat, flipped him back until his chair was on the floor and Caulfield was on that floor still in that chair.  Teddy placed his gun in the suspect’s mouth.

Joey moved to stop Teddy, but Mick pulled Joey back.  There was always a method to Teddy’s madness, and Mick knew it.  He stared at his son.

“You said you knew my father,” Teddy said to the terrified suspect.  “But you know me too, don’t you?  I’m the fucker that shot you in both legs.  Remember me?”

The suspect was nodding, and sweating bullets, and staring down at that gun in his mouth.

“You know I’ll be more than happy to finish what I started,” Teddy continued.

Caulfield nodded nervously.

“When I pull this gun out of your mouth,” Teddy said, “you’d better tell me the truth or I’ll put it right back in, and I’ll unleash a load in that mug.  You understand what I’m saying to you?”

The suspect nodded nervously again.

“Bovenconti didn’t hire you to do shit,” Teddy said.

“Dad!” Joey complained.

But Mick gave him a look that shut him up.

“You know Bovenconti didn’t hire you,” Teddy continued.  “And I know Bovenconti didn’t hire you.  Who hired you?” Teddy asked.  “And you’d better tell me the truth.”

Then Teddy pulled his gun out of the suspect’s mouth.  “Who hired you?” he asked again.

The suspect hesitated yet again, but then he spoke up.  He knew what Teddy was capable of.  “They did,” he said.

Teddy frowned.  “Who the fuck are they?”

“Them,” the suspect said and nodded his head.  Teddy and Mick both looked to where the suspect was nodding.  He was nodding toward Joey and the Bevin twins.

Teddy was floored.

Joey was angry.  “That’s a lie!” he yelled.  “That’s a bald-faced lie!  I didn’t hire him!  He knows I didn’t hire him.  That’s a lie!”

But as soon as Joey turned toward his father, to plead his case, another explosion occurred.  But this one wasn’t with explosives.  It was with a truck, a big Ford F-250, that plowed through the front of the safe house and landed, like a sudden missile attack, inside the house.  The men inside of the truck jumped out with automatic rifles and fired away!

Mick, Teddy, and Joey all were diving for cover as soon as the truck broke through, and they pulled out their weapons firing back.

The guards inside the safe house were diving and firing at the intruders as well, and the Bevin twins were firing too.

But the Bevin twins weren’t firing at the intruders.  They were firing at the Sinatras!  They were running to take their position behind the truck and were firing at the men they just moments before worked for.

Teddy was so angry that he made it his mission to stop those twins.  And he managed to shoot one.  Big-Eye Bevin fell before he could make it behind that truck.

And the shootout was on.  Teddy, Mick, and Joey, along with the guards, were on one side of the gun battle, in position behind the couch and chairs and whatever they could get behind, while Ron Bevin and the men in the truck were on the opposite side of the battle.

Joey was shooting and shooting, and so were the guards.  But one guard, and then the second guard, were quickly taken out.  They were no match for the firepower coming at them.

On the other side, Ron Bevin and his men were shooting for their lives.  They were going to fight to the death.  But Mick and Teddy were pacing their shots.  Mick wanted to tell Joey to ease the hell up, too, but it would give the game away.  At least Teddy understood, Mick thought.  At least Teddy understood!

And their strategy of taking cover and pretending to fight without putting up much of a fight, paid off.  It paid off in spades when Ron Bevin and the men behind the truck, along with Joey, all ran out of ammo.

Mick and Teddy Sinatra weren’t about to give anybody a chance to reload.

It was their time to fight to the death.

And they did.  Mick and Teddy came out from behind their sheltered place firing.  They killed the men in the truck before they could run out of the house, and Teddy was just about to take Ron Bevin out too.

But Ron dropped his weapon, and he threw up his hand.  “I surrender!” he yelled.  “Don’t shoot me, Teddy.  I surrender.  Please don’t shoot me!”

Teddy and Mick stopped firing.  They needed to hear the story.  They needed to hear just how this shit could have happened.

In the melee, Caulfield, the arsonist and their original suspect, had been killed.  Both of the safe house guards had been killed.  But once Joey saw that his father and brother had secured the room, and they were back in control again, he came out of hiding.  And he came out angry.  He came out and ran to Ron.  He was about to knock him out, but Teddy grabbed Joey and stopped him.

“We need to know why,” he said to his little brother.  “Forget the pride and emotion, Joey.  Forget that shit.  We need to know why!”

And Joey understood, at that moment, just what his father meant.  He understood why Teddy was in charge.

But Teddy had little patience for a turncoat like Ron Bevin.  He went up to him, his gun still pointing at him, and asked one simple question.  “Tell me who before I blow your fucking brains out,” he said.  “Who hired you?”

Ron was defeated, but he knew he had to tell the truth.  “Malidec,” he said.

If there was a name that Teddy, Mick, and Joey would have never expected to hear, it was that name.  “Malidec?” Teddy asked.  “Detective Malidec of the Philly PD?”

“He’s mob masquerading as a cop,” Ron said.  “He wants to take over.  He wants your territory.  He wants it all.”

“Why would he hire you?”

“Because I was on the inside,” Ron said.  “I had Joey’s complete confidence.”

“Fucking asshole!” Joey yelled, unable to tamp down his emotions.  “I trusted you!”

Mick pulled Joey back before he did something stupid.  Mick placed his arm around Joey’s waist and kept it there.  Teddy was steering this ship exactly the way Mick wanted it steered.

And, true to form, Teddy suspected that there was more.  “Malidec is the mastermind?”

“Not just him.  It’s the whole East Coast Mafia.  Guys nobody’s never heard of.  They’ve all band together to take you down.  You and your old man.  They were supposed to take out both of you today.”

“How would they know if this ambush worked?” Teddy asked.

“Me and my brother were supposed to call and tell them when it was over.”

“Call now,” Teddy said.  “Tell them we were hit, but you don’t know if we survived.  You got out.”

“And if you try something funny,” Joey said, “I’ll kill you personally.”

“Call him,” Teddy said.  “And Joey’s right:  no bullshit.”

Ron Bevin made a phone call.  “Put it on Speaker,” Mick ordered.

Ron placed the call on Speaker.  “Malidec,” the voice said over the phone.

“It’s Ron.  It’s over.”

“And the outcome?” Malidec asked.

“We hit them both.  But I took off.  I don’t know if they’re dead.”  Then he added, heartfelt: “They took out my brother.”

“Good job,” Malidec said.  “And don’t worry.  You’ll be greatly compensated for your loss.  Come tonight.  Eight pm.  At the warehouse.  We’re supposed to meet there to discuss where we go from here.  I’ll have your money at that time.”

And the call ended.

“What warehouse?” Teddy asked, grabbing the phone.

“On Roladeck,” Ron said.

Mick exhaled.  “Let’s go,” he said.  “We’ll set up early.  And take him with us,” he added. “He’s our ticket in.”

Joey grabbed Ron angrily by the arm and escorted him out of the safe house.  Mick and Teddy headed out too.

“You believe Bevin?” Teddy asked his father.

“Do you?” Mick asked Teddy.

“We heard that phone conversation.  We have to go see.”

“I agree,” said Mick.  “But I hate like hell these kinds of journeys.”

“What kind?  Where there’s uncertainty?”

“Where there are too many risks,” Mick said.

And as soon as he said it, gunfire erupted again.  Another ambush.

But this time, with the very first shot, Mick Sinatra went down.