Page 36 of Nikki Sinatra: For Her Lover
Teddy was still trying to process what she just told him to even realize her distress. Children were killed? Young kids? Emilio’s siblings, plus other children, dead? He was stunned.
“I should have went back in that airport and delivered those drugs to him. I should have done it, Teddy. Had I done it those children would still be alive. But I was only thinking about myself.”
When she said those words, Teddy realized his blunder. He was so devastated about the loss of those young people that he didn’t realize how devastated his own wife was. “No, Nikki, no,” he said as he pulled her into his arms.
“It was all my fault, Teddy, and don’t say it wasn’t. It became my fault when I agreed to go to Thailand in the first place.”
She moved back and looked her teary-eyes into his eyes, as if she was daring him to tell her a lie. “It was my fault. Wasn’t it?”
Teddy wasn’t going to pretend she didn’t share some of the blame. She did. But now was not the time to tell her that. He held her tightly as she sobbed.
But she pulled back again. “Tell me, Teddy. Please. All those children dying. It was my fault. Wasn’t it?”
“You was a kid yourself, Nikki.”
“Bullshit. I was old enough to be in love with a drug dealer and be his drug mule. That wasn’t kid stuff.”
“I used to go that way, too,” Teddy said, “until Pop kicked my ass and made me get out. You were only eighteen when you got out. You did the right thing to leave town. You did right. How was it your fault that his other girl stole those drugs?”
“But had I done my job,” Nikki started saying.
But Teddy stopped her again. “You were eighteen, Nikki. He had no business sending a kid like you on an assignment like that. All the fault is on Emilio, not on you. And I’m not just saying that either. It’s the truth.”
Nikki appreciated his support, but she knew it couldn’t possibly be all on Emilio. She fell back into his arms.
He got on the bed beside her and held her for the longest time. But he knew there was more to the story. Why did Emilio come to town? Just to get revenge, or something else? Why now after all these years?
After several more minutes, he asked her. “Why did you meet up with Juda at that trailer?”
“I hired him to take out Emilio.”
“He’s the one that killed Emilio’s family?”
“No no. Those cartel boys did that. Mill was responsible for bringing in that product and he didn’t deliver. They had to make an example out of him. They took out his siblings and hissiblings’ friends. Juda worked for Emilio. He was a small-time dealer back then. But Emilio worked for Jackson.”
“Who’s Jackson?”
“Jackson Reeves. He’s locked up on a life without parole murder charge. He was incarcerated when it all went down. Emilio was running the show then. Those cartel boys put the blame on Emilio.”
“And Emilio put the blame on you, not his other girlfriend.”
“Right.”
“And now he’s in Philly?”
“He was. But Juda said he took him out.”
“You believed him?”
“Not now I don’t. Not after what you said happened at his trailer. And even before that I was skeptical. I mean I was happy he was saying he took care of it, but I told him before I left his trailer that I had to independently verify what he was saying before I was paying up.”
“So you haven’t confirmed it?”
“No. Juda said he was going to take me to the body tomorrow, but now you said he’s dead.”
Teddy pulled out his phone and immediately called the syndicate’s security chief Hoke Bianca. “Listen, I need you to confirm a death,” he said over the phone. Then he looked at Nikki: “Where did Juda say his man killed him?”
“Parking garage of some dentist office he claimed. But he said he moved him. He didn’t tell me where.”
