Duke steeled himself.
“I wanted to personally thank you for saving your mother’s life,” Mick said, “and mine, too, while you were at it. You were excellent, son.”
Big Daddy was pleased that Mick would finally give Duke his props, and Duke was so pleasantly surprised that he smiled the smile of a man in the catbird seat. “Excellent? For real?”
“For real,” said Mick. “I would not be here today had it not been for you. I could not have handled that situation any better.”
“Oh Daddy!” Duke said happily as he hurried to his father. “Coming from you that’s everything!” He threw his arms around Mick so hard that Mick staggered backwards. He wasn’t a man given to shows of affection and Big Daddy could see the awkwardness. Mick was coming along, but he had a long way to go in Big Daddy’s view.
“But that being said,” Big Daddy said and looked at Mick when father and son stopped embracing, “that entire situation proved why the gangster life is not the life for you, Duke. Right?”
Duke looked at his father. Everybody kept telling him what kind of life they didn’t want him to live and he was tired of it. They knew what kind of dude he was, and how well-suited he was for that life, but they lied anyway. Would his father lie to his face, too, even after the way he handled himself in that crazy town?
Mick was looking Duke dead in his eyes. He was looking dead at himself. Big Daddy might not like it, and Roz would surely hate it, but Duke wasn’t going to be anything else but who he was. “Be who you are,” he said to him. “That’s all you can do.”
Duke smiled another huge, bright white smile. “Thanks, Daddy,” he said.
Big Daddy was disappointed, but he didn’t let Duke see it. “Now get lost,” he said to his nephew.
Duke smiled again and then began to run back into the kitchen to tell Jackie and Marco that his old man said he did excellently.
But Mick stopped him. “And Duke?”
Duke turned around. Did he want him to go with him on another case? “Sir?” he asked anxiously.
“If you ever again discuss what goes on in my bedroom, on my wing of my house, I’m going to slam you against a wall and break your neck.Capeesh?”
Duke’s heart fell to this shoe. He suddenly remembered he was scared of this man. “Capeesh,” he said, and then he walked soberly out of that living room. Reality set back. He realized that his father was still Mick the Tick, no matter what praise he may dish out, and he’d be wise to never forget that.
But that reality only made him even more determined to be just like his daddy.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Three Cadillac Escalades in Mick’s fleet of tricked-out Escalades lined the driveway at the Sinatra family home when Nikki, seated behind the steering wheel of the middle SUV, saw the front door open and Mick stepped out. But her jaw dropped. “What in the world?” she said out loud.
Because her voice sounded so shocked, Teddy quickly looked toward the front door, too, and saw his father step out. He was suited up in his long, white coat and black trousers and turtleneck, which was nothing unusual. He was in fight-back mode and was wearing his fight-back suit. But then he saw that Roz was also coming out of the house decked down in a pair of straight leg, button-front jeans and her usual pristinely tucked-in blouse and accompanying blazer and heels.
“I didn’t know he was bringing Roz along too,” Nikki said.
Teddy, who sat on the front passenger seat beside his wife and second-in-command, was confused too. “Neither did I,” he said as he continued to watch his father and stepmother as one of their capos from the third SUV hurried over and opened the back passenger door. Roz and then Mick got inside.
Teddy turned around to face his parents as the door closed. “Ma’s coming too?”
He could tell his father didn’t like being questioned about a decision he’d made, but he answered him. “That’s correct.”
Teddy wanted to ask why and if it was a smart move and a host of other questions, but he saw thathow dare you question melook on his father’s face. Since he didn’t want to mix itup with him on his first day back on the scene, he turned back around.
But Roz decided to take it further. Teddy knew the woman before Mick did. She was certain he had some insight on her. “I’m coming along so I can meet the infamous Cleopatra.”
Nikki looked at Mick through the rearview mirror as she, along with the drivers of the Escalades in front and behind them, began driving off. He was actually going to introduce them???
Teddy almost turned back around, he was so shocked. But what was that his business? He didn’t say a word. Which, for Roz, only elevated her concern. Who was this woman, really, to Mick?
But as Nikki drove out of the gate along with the two additional Escalades, both housing some of the highest-ranking capos in the entire Sinatra crime syndicate, Mick,being Mick, was focused only on the matter at hand. “Any news on Spanky?”
“We still haven’t found him if that could be classified as news,” Teddy said. “But the thing I can’t get past, Pop is the fact that Spank’s involved at all. Because if Spank is the middle man, the person he’s working for has to be a heavy-hitter. He has to be. Spank don’t roll no other way. But who could that be?” he asked as he turned around to look at his father. He was shocked when he saw that Mick was holding Roz’s hand.
Roz was shocked as well when he took her hand and held it. Mick was never demonstrative of his affection for her. He rarely ever believed in public displays. But he was trying to turn over a new leaf, once again, and she was going to wait and see if this time was going to stick.
