CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

MaKayla had thrown on a pair of shorts and one of Brent’s dress shirts, and Brent had on his jeans and a t-shirt as they made their way up to the big, black Cadillac Escalade that was parked on the driveway of their lakefront home. It was nightfall, just after eight and breezy, but they both felt a sense of forebodingness that rendered them chilly as they made their way to the SUV.

Mick Sinatra was the driver. No one was on the passenger seat. “It took you that long to walk outside?”

“We were . . .” Brent had to catch himself, to MaKayla’s relief. “We were indisposed,” he said which, to MaKayla, amounted to the exact same thing he had caught himself from saying.

But Mick always seemed to know everything to her anyway. By their hurried appearance, he’d probably already figured out what they had been up to.

“What’s up, Uncle Mick?” MaKayla asked him.

Mick looked her up and down in that unnerving way of his. “How are you?”

She was surprised that he would bother to ask. “I’m out of jail,” she said, “so I’m great right now.”

“Out of jail but not out of the woods.”

She nodded, that sobering look returning to her face. She folded her arms. “Right.”

“Brenton treating you well?”

Another surprise. “Yes sir. More than I could have ever hoped for.”

Mick looked at Brent. “Even though you arrested her ass,” he said. “And don’t hand me that I was doing my job bullshit. That’s your wife.”

“I know who she is,” Brent said. “You don’t have to tell me who she is. You worry about your house, and I’ll worry about mine.”

MaKayla’s heart began to pound. Brent was hard like that. He got it from his father. But coming at Mick the Tick with that hardness might be a serious error in judgement. She held her breath for the backlash.

But it didn’t come. Mick gave Brent the stare down, alright, and MaKayla saw that flash of anger in his eyes that chilled her to the bone. But she also saw respect for Brent in his eyes too. It was no secret in the family that Mick never liked the fact that Brent was a cop: he hated cops. But he always had respect and love for his nephew. MaKayla saw that every time he came around. Which wasn’t that often. Which made her wonder why he was around now. “What brings you to our neck of the woods, Uncle Mick?” she decided to ask him, not only to quell the sudden tension, but to find out the reason for his visit.

Mick and Brent continued to exchange a longer-than-usual stare down, but neither man blinked. And Mick looked away first. He looked at MaKayla. “That informant you went to that hotel to see.”

“Jake Dalenti, yes sir. What about him?”

“Get in the backseat.”

MaKayla looked at Brent. Did he find Jake and take him to one of his safe houses he kept in Jericho? Those safe houses were supposedly a secret, and they didn’t know where they were, but they both knew they existed. That was why Brent nodded and they both got onto the middle row of Mick’s big SUV. They wanted all the intel they could get. And nobody had more than Mick the Tick.

But when they got inside the SUV, they were astounded to see that not only had Mick located Jake Dalenti, but Jake was seated in the middle of the back row. And he was in bad shape. Both eyes nearly swollen shut. Blood on his shirt in his chest area. His hands tied behind his back.

“Jake?” MaKayla could hardly believe it. “What happened to you?” she blurted out before she knew it. Because she and Brent both knew what happened to him was their Uncle Mick.

But this was an opportunity to confirm MaKayla’s side of the story. And Brent got down to business. “Were you at the Hayton Hotel when my wife got there?” Brent asked him.

“I wasn’t nowhere near that.”

“You grabbed me from behind,” MaKayla said.

“I didn’t. I swear! I wasn’t there.”

“Then why did you have Deputy DA McGuire call me and tell me you were waiting at the Hayton to give me information?” MaKayla asked him.

“I didn’t tell him to call you. I never talked to him that day.”

But MaKayla wasn’t buying it. “You’re lying, Jake. I can tell when you’re lying.”

“Okay, I talked to him. But that was days ago when I told him to warn the chief about Noah Lamm.”

Brent frowned. “Noah Lamm? What about him?”

“He was running off the mouth about how you were gonna evict him, but that he was gonna blow your brains out if you tried.” He looked at MaKayla. “I called and told McGuire to tell you to warn your husband.”

Brent and MaKayla looked at each other because Noah Lamm did keep his promise and attempt to assassinate Brent. But he only managed to shoot a hole in a young rookie doing his job. The rookie was recovering well, and Lamm was in jail facing serious time, but it still left a bitter taste in Brent’s mouth.

Brent looked at MaKayla. “Did McGuire tell you about Noah Lamm?”

MaKayla shook her head. “No. Of course not. I would have told you if he had.”

“But that’s the only information I had to give him,” Jake said. “I had nothing to do with what happened at The Hayton.”

MaKayla believed him. She knew when he was telling the truth. She looked at Brent. “He’s telling the truth. He’s not involved.”

She was a little hasty for Brent’s taste, but MaKayla was good like that. It was her job to call out liars. Or believe them when they told the truth.

But Brent asked Jake several more questions he knew nothing about, and then they got out of the SUV. Brent went up to the driver’s side window and looked at his uncle. “Why would you beat the guy senseless like that without knowing the full story?”

“I told him I wanted to talk to him and his ass ran. He made me chase him. I don’t chase some punk-ass snitch just to hold a conversation with him. We’ll talk. But he’s getting his ass kicked too.” Then Mick looked at Brent hard, as if he couldn’t understand why Brent didn’t understand the family code. “You got a problem with that?”

Brent knew his status as a police officer kept him as the outside man in his larger family of gangsters, but he didn’t think his concern was unreasonable. “I do have a problem with it matter of fact. But thank you for bringing him. Will you at least take him to the hospital?” Brent would himself, but the questions surrounding that drop off would get MaKayla into even deeper trouble.

Mick knew it too. “I’m gonna drop his ass off where I found it. And don’t worry,” Mick added when he saw that look in their eyes. “He won’t say a word.” Mick looked into his rearview mirror at Jake Dalenti. “Will you?”

“I ain’t saying nothing to nobody!” Jake yelled out. “I just wanna go home.”

Brent nor MaKayla had any sympathy for Jake. Brent knew snitches like him were crooked as a curve and MaKayla knew what kind of unsavory character Jake truly was. But MaKayla was an officer of the court and Brent was an officer of the law. Mick’s ways were not their ways and never would be. At least not before MaKayla’s very freedom was put to the test.

And MaKayla knew Mick rounded him up to help her. “Thanks Uncle Mick,” she said and reached into the window and gave him a hug.

Brent braced himself. Mick had better not disrespect his wife. But when Mick reached out and hugged her back, Brent was floored.

But like Big Daddy, Mick had a soft spot for MaKayla too. “Take care of yourself,” he said to her when they quickly unembraced.

MaKayla smiled.“I will.Thanks.”

Then Mick pressed a button that closed off the third row of his tricked-out SUV with a soundproof partition, and then he looked at Brent. “A van will be here at nine tonight to pick you up.”

“What’s happening then?”

“You’ll find out,” Mick said, put his car in reverse, and sped away.

MaKayla looked at her phone. “It’s almost eight-fifteen now. We’d better get ready.”

She began to head back toward the house, but Brent pulled her back. “ We ? What do you mean we ?”

“I mean you and I. We work together, Brent. That’s the way it’s got to be. If anybody has any intel that could aid in my freedom, I want to hear it straight from them. I’ll know what questions to ask.”

What Brent always loved about MaKayla was her toughness. He knew she could take care of herself in any situation. And he usually allowed her to handle her own problems and situations. But he also knew her vulnerable side. And that was considerable too. But she was right: she’d know what questions to ask. He still didn’t want his wife in that position. But she was in it. They had no choice.

He removed his objection, and they hurried inside to get fully clothed.