But she wanted him and no one else. And Cleo always got what Cleo wanted.
She leaned over and kissed him on his lips before he could object. And then she tightened her grip on that blood money and got out of that car as quickly as she could. He would reject her if she didn’t kiss and run. He could be such an asshole like that.
Teddy was glad to see her go as he got back into his car. He didn’t give her a second glance. And then, in typical Teddy fashion she knew so well, he sped away from her with no regard for the fact that his spinning tires were kicking up mud against her shapely legs. Which had her fuming. But even that was worth seeing Mick again.
If she didn’t love Mick so much she’d hate him.
But oh how she loved him. He was her drug of choice. Nobody picked up what Mick laid down and didn’t want him to give it to them more and more and more until they had to have more and more and more of it. Until it was a magnificent obsession. Until nothing else mattered and the magnificence was long gone. Until getting rid of that obsession, for her own sanity, became the obsession.
As Mick drove away, he was looking through his rearview mirror at her too. And it seemed that he was looking back at her with a fondness that Teddy just couldn’t understand. She was messy as hell and stayed in trouble. Always had shit going on. Was the most chaotic person he’d ever known. But his old man just loved her. It was inexplicable to Ted how much Mick loved her.
But Mick wasn’t looking out of that side mirror out of fondness. He saw a car speed up toward Cleo before they turned the corner that would get them out of that back parking lot. Why would somebody be driving up back there? But when Cleo stood at her car door and turned and saw that car speeding toward her, she tried to hurriedly get inside of her car. That was when Mick knew it was trouble.
“It’s a hit!” Mick yelled out as he began pulling out his gun. “Turn around!”
Teddy didn’t know what his father was talking about, but he quickly hung a fast U-turn.
But as they were turning, the gunman in that automobile began firing shot after shot at Cleo. Mick’s heart dropped as Cleo went down after the second shot, but that gunman inside that car kept on firing at her. He was going for the kill shot.
Teddy was shocked, too, when he saw Cleo go down. He couldn’t stand her ass, but he didn’t want her dead!
Mick pressed down the window, leaned out, and began firing at the car to get that gunman away from Cleo.
But just as he started shooting, and just as Teddy was speeding toward the action, a group of four cars began speeding toward Teddy’s Hellcat, with many of the men inside those cars leaned out firing AK-47-style assault rifles at his car. The firepower was so excessive and intense that Mick had to get back inside the car and Teddy had to hook another U-turn and speed away. Those gunmen tried to keep up with his car, but it was fartoo fast. Teddy was gone like dust in the wind. Mick hated it, but he knew it was the right call. They were easily outmanned and outgunned.
But they weren’t three blocks away when Mick ordered Teddy to go back.
“Back?” Teddy was shocked. “For what, Pop? She’s dead. We can’t outshoot that much firepower..”
“Go back. I’m not leaving her like that. Not behind some abandoned building. Not alone. Go back.”
Teddy looked at his father. He truly loved that girl. Which blew Teddy’s mind. He had Roz. He had a good woman. Why was he always willing to mess that up over these dime-a-dozen whores?
But Pop was the boss. What he said always went during Teddy’s entire life. That was why against his better judgment, Teddy headed back to the scene of the crime. He could only hope that those gunmen were gone.
And they were. By the time they made it back behind that abandoned shoe factory, the only car left back there was Cleo’s. The gunman that shot her down was gone. Those four cars that came for Mick and Teddy were gone. But, incredibly, Cleo’s body was gone too.
“What the fuck?” Even Teddy was shocked.
He stopped the car and he and Mick got out, with Teddy more as his father’s bodyguard as he had his own gun out looking in every direction to make certain those punks weren’t lying in wait.
Mick looked inside Cleo’s car and found nothing. Then he just stood there, as if something was wrong, but Teddy had no idea what.
But when sirens could be heard in the distance, they knew they had to get out of there. They’d get their guys to try to findout what happened to Cleo and who was behind the ambush later. But right now, they had to leave.
Mick went back to Teddy’s car and got in on the passenger seat. Teddy looked around one more time, hopped in, and drove off once again.
He glanced at his father several times. He wondered what was it about that girl that he would give her the time of day.
But Teddy didn’t know the backstory. He didn’t know what Mick had her doing for him and his “clients” once upon a time. He had no clue the guilt Mick carried every time he saw that young lady. Every time he remembered, for the sake of his own illegal arms sales, what he did to her. The change in Cleo after she hooked up with Mick was immediate. Although Teddy couldn’t remember it.
But Mick couldn’t forget it.
CHAPTER ONE
TWO YEARS LATER
“That’s what I call a classy lady.”
