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Roz’s plan was a simple one. She had to relieve some of that stress Mick had bottled up inside of him before his face to face with Teddy and Nikki or it could be world war three up in their house tonight.

That was why, when he got out of the shower and did as he usually did and laid across the bed to air dry, she got out of the tub. But instead of drying off and dressing, she went to him, got on top of him as he laid across their bed, and began kissing him with a passion she knew he couldn’t resist. And when he returned her passion and wrapped her in his arms, she knew she had him right where she needed him to be.

They kissed and groaned and Mick rubbed and massaged her for several minutes as if they were making love with their mouths and his hands alone, until they both needed more.

Mick turned Roz onto her back, passionately brutalized her breasts, and then went down on her hard. She moved around and allowed him to go down on her even harder. Until he needed even more than that.

And that was when he entered her.

For nearly half an hour they gave each other that release nobody else could give to them. Roz was all about Mick’s release, but he was all about her release, and the combination was electrifying.

And when they came, they came together like a mature married couple with no more points to prove. They came long, and they came hard. So hard that when he had poured out of himself all he had to give to her, and when she had felt the last of those pulsations that were ripping through her slender body, they just laid there for several more minutes still.

But then reality sat in, as it always did when the whole point was to eclipse it if for only a little while, and they both knew it was time to face the music.

They both knew there was no telling if it was going to be a well-thought-out song they all could get on the same page and sing, or a wild freestyle they all were going to mangle up and regret.

As Mick pulled out of Roz and finally got off of her, she was placing her bet, unfortunately, on the freestyle. Because she could tell, by Mick’s body language alone, that the stress her move had taken off of him was already coming back.

She looked at him. He was on his back, staring seemingly into a place he never invited anyone to visit. It was his refuge. It was where he made decisions. It was where he withdrew to whenever he knew he was at a crossroad.

Roz knew to let him take his time. He would speak when he was good and ready, and she never forced it.

Although it took much longer than she had anticipated it would, given the events of the day, he finally spoke. “Reno, Tommy, and Sal called,” Mick said, “and Alex Drakos and his brother. And Amelia and Hammer and Trevor Reese.”

“They offered their thoughts and prayers?”

“And help, yes. But I didn’t know what to tell them. I don’t know what the fuck is going on myself.”

Then he frowned, shut down again, and went back to his private contemplation. Just like that. And they went through another long period of silence.

Until he spoke again. “I tried to give it a chance,” he said.

Talk about out of left field. Roz didn’t know what he was talking about. “You decided to give what a chance?”

“A real vacation. I hadn’t had one in a so long, and neither did you and the twins, so I thought it was long overdue. That’s why I didn’t check in. I let my corporate guys run my corporation without my input, and they did a good job of it. They held it down for me like they usually did. I let Teddy and Nikki run my syndicate without my input, and look what happened. All hell broke loose. I’m on vacation playing around in a fucking pool while my entire organization was burning to the ground thanks to those two. And they didn’t bother to notify me until today ?”

He tried to calm himself back down, but couldn’t. “And you keep asking me when am I going to step aside and turn my syndicate completely over to Teddy. When am I going to turn an organization that took me a lifetime to build up over to his sorry ass. You expect me to just hand it over when I couldn’t be away one solid week without all this insanity going down under his watch. And I’m supposed to be okay with that? How am I ever going to be able to walk away from all this shit when I can’t even go on a vacation for one damn week?”

Then he shook his head. Got dammit!” he said angrily, loudly, and with clenched teeth, as if knowing he would be in the game forever was getting too real again. He got out of bed.

Roz closed her eyes and shook her head too. So much for relieving his stress. It lasted only as long as he was inside of her.

But she agreed with everything he was saying. She was as angry with Teddy as Mick was.

She got out of bed right behind him. She wanted answers too.