MOB BOSS 6: THE HEART OF RENO GABRINI (Mob Boss Series) (17 page)

But
he waited patiently.
 

After
about twenty minutes of his father dribbling and taking jump shots, Reno
finally called it a day.
 
He walked over
to his son, tossed the ball into a bin, and grabbed his bottle of Gatorade that
sat nearby.
 
Then he drank half the
bottle, and sat down.

Reno
looked at his son.
 
He had that kind of
light-brown skin that always made him look freshly washed and clean cut to
Reno.
 
But his big eyes told a different
tale.

“Where’s
Ash and Coop?” Jimmy asked without pretending that he was there for any other
reason.

“We
aren’t going through that again,” Reno said.

Jimmy
moved closer to his father.
 
Reno was
sweating like it was nobody’s business, but you could still smell a freshness
about him.
 
But that was Reno, Jimmy
thought.
 
He could be in a shithole of a
sewer, and somehow manage to come out smelling like roses.

“Where’s
Ash and Coop?” Jimmy asked again.

Reno
grabbed a towel from the back of the bench and wiped his face.
 
“They’re okay.”

“But
where are they?”

“They’re
in one of my safe houses.
 
Nothing’s
changed.
 
They’re okay.”

“I
want to see them.”

“Not
now.”

“Why
can’t I see them, Dad?”

“Because
they have valuable information that I need to extract before they see
anybody.
 
You understand that?”

“But
they’re my friends.
 
They don’t know
anything.”

“That’s
where you’re wrong, young man.
 
They know
plenty.
 
And I intend to find out every
ounce of what that plenty is before I even think about letting them go anywhere
or see anybody.”
 
Reno drank more
Gatorade.
 
“But they’re okay,” he said
when he finished.

“But
how do I know they’re okay?” Jimmy asked him.

Reno
looked at his son.
 
“What do you mean how
do you know it?
 
I told you, that’s how
you know it!”
 

Reno
was amazed at how Jimmy was changing.
 
There used to be a time when his word was gospel to that young man’s
ears.
 
Now Jimmy questioned everything
Reno did or said.
 
It all started after
Trina’s arrest on some trumped-up charge.
 
Tommy Gabrini, Reno’s cousin and best friend, came to town, and he
brought his new lady Grace with him.
 
But
after they left Vegas and went back to Seattle, Jimmy’s relationship with Reno
shifted from blind trust to a kind of
trust
but verify
position that was no trust at all as far as Reno was
concerned.
 
And Reno still couldn’t
understand what caused it.

“I
still want to see them, Dad,” Jimmy said, reinforcing their changed
relationship.

“You
will see them in time, just not right now.”

Jimmy
hesitated, still staring at his father’s handsome face.
 
“Did you touch her?” he asked pointblank.

Reno
sipped more Gatorade.
 
“I kicked her ass
for fucking with me,” Reno admitted.

Jimmy
nearly jumped from the bench.
 
“You beat
her?
 
But why?
 
Why did you do that?”

“Because
she was fucking with me.
 
I didn’t have
time for her bullshit.”
 
Jimmy continued
to stare daggers at him.
 
“What?”
 
Reno asked.
 
“That bitch was trying to set you up, what did you think I was gonna
do?
 
Let her?
  
Tell her to behave next time and send her on
her way?”
   

Reno
hated showing this side of himself to his son, but he couldn’t help it.
 
He couldn’t stand a whore like Ashley Cooper
who didn’t give a damn that his son’s heart was in her hands.
 
He couldn’t stand that bitch and he wanted
Jimmy to understand that.

But
Jimmy was in love.
 
Reno could see it in
his big, pitiful eyes.

“But
what about their family?” Jimmy asked.
 
“What about her mom?
 
What is she
going to think?”

“She
talks to her mother, based on calls in and out on her cell phone, once a
week.
 
She spoke with her a couple days
ago.
 
We still have time.”
 
Then he looked at Jimmy.
 
“You ever met her boyfriend?” he asked.

Jimmy
stared at his father.
 
“I’m her
boyfriend.”
 

“There’s
where you’re wrong again.
 
She most
definitely has a boyfriend, and he ain’t you.
 
His name’s Eddie.
 
Eddie Dreeson.
 
You know him?”

Reno could
tell Jimmy was a little shaken by the news.
 
But he had to know.
 
“I never
heard her ever mention any Eddie,” he said.

Reno
took another drink of his Gatorade.
 

Jimmy,
as he expected, continued to stare at him.
 
“What about this Eddie?” he asked.

“He
helped a certain acquaintance of mine set you up.”

“And
that’s why you think he’s Ash’s boyfriend?”

“I
didn’t know he existed.
 
Ashley told me
about him.”

Jimmy’s
heart began to pound.
 
“Many guys want to
get next to her,” he said.
 
“So what?”

“Yeah,”
Reno said, rising.
 
“So what?”

Jimmy
stood up too.
 
“I still wanna see her,
Dad.”

“What,
is something wrong with your hearing now?
 
I said you can see her, just not right now.
 
Not before I get my information.
 
Not a second before that.
 
Now get your ass over to Lee’s office.
 
He’s going to go over the balance sheets with
you.
 
You need to get your head out of
the clouds and start focusing on the PaLargio more.
 
I’ve been easy on you since you graduated,
but I expect you to start getting down to business.”

“Get
down to business now?” Jimmy asked, astounded.
 
“At a time like this?”

“At a
time like what?” Reno asked.
 
“I’m
handling that situation with your so-called friends. You let me worry about
that.
 
That has nothing to do with you.
 
You do your job before you don’t have one to
do.”

Jimmy
always wondered how his father could carry on when such upheaval was circling
around him.
 
But he always did it.
 
“Yes, sir,” he said and began to leave.

“Oh,
and James,” Reno said.
 

Jimmy
turned and looked at him.

“You
ever walk in a room and see me doing what I do with my lady, you’d better run,
not walk, but run away from that scene.
 
You feel me?”

Jimmy’s
heart dropped.
 
How could he have seen
him on that balcony?
 
He seemed so taken
with Trina, so in love with fucking her, that there was no way he could have
seen him.
 

But
apparently he did.

“Yes,
sir,” Jimmy said embarrassingly, and then hurried away from there.

CHAPTER EIGHT

“Didn’t
I tell you I had business to take care of?” Sal Luca Gabrini said into his cell
phone.
 
“Didn’t I tell you I wouldn’t be
in Seattle for a few days?”

Sal
was in the backseat of his limo talking to one of his girlfriends.
 
His limo had just stopped at the entrance of
the PaLargio Hotel and Casino.
 
And he
was livid.

“I
don’t like that shit,” he said into his phone.
 
“Wanna know where I am every hour of the day, who do you think you’re
dealing with?”
 
Then he paused, listening
to her.
 
“What are you asking?
 
When will you see me?
 
Your ass will see me when you see me, that’s
when you’ll see me!”
 
Then he violently
slammed down his phone.
 
“Women!” he said
as if it were a curse word.

And
then he got out of his limousine.

“Welcome
to the PaLargio, Mr. Gabrini,” the Valet staff immediately greeted him as soon
as he got out.
 

Sal
buttoned his suit coat, nodded his head, and walked inside.

“Welcome
back, Mr. Gabrini,” the Concierge said as he hurried toward him when he
realized who had just entered the massive lobby.
 
Reno usually gave them the heads up whenever
Tommy or Sal were in town, so that the GM or higher could be there to greet
them.
 
But they had no idea.

“How
you doing, Max?” Sal asked as he shook hands with the Concierge.

“Mike,”
the Concierge corrected.

“Like
I give a fuck,” Sal corrected him.

Mike
swallowed hard.
 
He was well aware of
Sal’s lack of decorum, but that didn’t mean he liked it.
 
“I’ll escort you to the penthouse, sir,” he
said.

“Uncle
Sal!” Jimmy voice was heard, and Sal looked across the lobby.
 
When he saw his nephew hurrying his way he
smiled.
 
If you would have told him a few
years ago that he would be okay with the fact that a relative of his was this
strapping young half-black kid, he would have told you to go play with
yourself.
 
But now, as he watched Jimmy
come, he was not only okay with the fact that Jimmy was his kin, but he was
thrilled by it.
 
Other than his brother
Tommy, he loved Jimmy the most.

“My
nephew will escort me, Max, thanks,” Sal said to the concierge and the
concierge left.
 
Sal heartily embraced
his nephew when they met.
 
Jimmy, too,
felt closest to Sal above all his other relatives.
 
Not because Sal was such a good, kind
person.
 
But because Sal wasn’t, and
didn’t pretend to be.
  
Unlike his
father, Jimmy thought.

“You
look great, Uncle Sal,” Jimmy said as he looked at Sal’s Armani suit and felt
the muscles of his biceps.
 
“Spending
more time in the gym I see.”

“Ah,
fuck you,” Sal said and Jimmy laughed.
 
“Trying to say I was fat?
 
I
wasn’t fat, you fuck.
 
I was compact,
solid.
 
Built like a bulldog.”

“A
bulldog,” Jimmy said with a grin.
 
“Is that
what they call it nowadays?”

“Okay,
keep needling.
 
I could take your skinny
ass any day of the week.”

“Skinny?”
Jimmy asked.
 
“Who’s skinny?”

Sal
laughed.
 
“I can turn the tables with the
best of them, baby,” he said with a grab of his crotch.
 
“So don’t fuck with me.”

“I
hear you,” Jimmy said.

“So
where’s that knuckleheaded cousin of mine?”

“Who,
Reno?”

“No,
not Reno.
 
Jermaine and Tito
Jackson!
 
The Kardashians!
 
Of course Reno.
 
Who the fuck else is gonna be a cousin of
mine inside the PaLargio Hotel and Casino?”

Sal’s
rudeness took some getting used to, but Jimmy was getting there.
 
“I don’t know where he is. Ma said he had to
take care of some business.”

“So
he ain’t here?”

“Not
at the moment, no.”

“Take
me to Tree, then.
 
At least I can holler at
her.”

Jimmy
began escorting him to the private elevator in the back of the lobby.
  
Once they were alone inside the elevator and
the doors closed in front of them, Jimmy looked at Sal.
 
“Can we talk?” he asked him.

“Can
we talk?” Sal responded.
 
“Who are you,
Joan Rivers?
 
Can we talk.
 
Yeah, we can talk.
  
What is it?”