MOB BOSS 3
LOVE AND RETRIBUTION
MALLORY MONROE
c2012
All rights reserved. Any use of the materials
contained in this book without the expressed writ-
ten consent of the author and/or her affiliates, is
strictly prohibited.
AUSTIN BROOK PUBLISHING
This novel is a work of fiction. All characters
are fictitious. Any similarities to anyone living or
dead are completely accidental. The specific men-
tion of known places or venues are not meant to be
exact replicas of those places, but are purposely
embellished or imagined for the story’s sake.
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MORE INTERRACIAL ROMANCE
FROM BESTSELLING AUTHOR
MALLORY MONROE
:
DUTCH AND GINA:
AFTER THE FALL
DUTCH AND GINA:
A SCANDAL IS BORN
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND 2:
HIS WOMEN AND HIS WIFE
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND
MOB BOSS 2:
THE HEART OF THE MATTER
ROMANCING THE MOB BOSS
ROMANCING HER PROTECTOR
ROMANCING THE BULLDOG
IF YOU WANTED THE MOON
AND
FROM BESTSELLING AUTHOR
KATHERINE CACHITORIE
:
LOVING THE HEAD MAN
SOME CAME DESPERATE: A LOVE SAGA
WHEN WE GET MARRIED
ADDITIONAL
BESTSELLING
INTERRACIAL ROMANCE:
A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP
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YVONNE THOMAS
AND
BACK TO HONOR:
A REGGIE REYNOLDS
ROMANTIC MYSTERY
JT WATSON
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COMING SOON
MORE INTERRACIAL ROMANCE
FROM
MALLORY MONROE
DUTCH AND GINA
THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND SERIES
BOOK 5
ALSO ROMANTIC FICTION
FROM
AWARD-WINNING
AND
BESTSELLING AUTHOR
TERESA MCCLAIN-WATSON:
AFTER WHAT YOU DID
STAY IN MY CORNER
DINO AND NIKKI:
AFTER REDEMPTION
Visit
for more information
on all romance titles
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ONE
“An education in graciousness,” Reno
whispered as he leaned back and watched his
wife on the closed-circuit monitor inside his
office. She was in the ballroom at the PaLar-
gio Hotel and Casino, entertaining guests at
his mother’s seventieth birthday celebration,
while he was still stuck in the office.
“An education in what?” Lee Jones asked.
“What are you talking about, Reno? Did you
hear what I said?”
Reno looked at his general manager, em-
barrassed by his blunder. “Of course I heard
you. And the answer is still no. No-more
carnival acts, no more magic shows, no more
has-been lounge singers with their sorry-ass
Sinatra imitation. I want A-list only stars go-
ing forward, Lee. We’re the PaLargio, for
crying out loud, not some two-bit hooker
joint. Not some dumping ground for the acts
nobody else wanted.”
“I understand that, sir,” Lee said, his dark
brown hands clasped in front of him, his
temper, as always, perfectly in check. “But
we had no choice when you were in Seattle
and Trina was trying to run this place. We
couldn’t get the big names not even for a
one-night only. People didn’t think the
PaLargio was going to survive after all of that
craziness. So Trina signed who she could
sign and decided to give some new acts a
chance.”
“I know what Tree did. And I know she
did the best she could while I was away, I get
that. But now I’m back. And if I see another
clown on a tricycle with tops spinning on his
head I’m going to barf, you hear me, Lee?
This ain’t no Ringling Brothers circus we’re
running here, this is the PaLargio Hotel and
Casino! How many times I’ve got to tell you
that? We’re almost as big as Caesar’s Palace
here in Vegas, but we don’t act like it. I want
the big names too. I want the Celine Dions
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and the Tony Bennetts and Beyonce if we can
get her. Fuck I’ll take Lady Gaga over some
of these acts you’ve been booking lately. But
we got nobody, Lee.” He tossed the enter-
tainment list back to his general manager.
“Cancel all week-to-week contracts,” Reno
ordered, “and don’t show your face again un-
til you give me some big names signed,
sealed and ready to go.”
“Yes, sir,” Lee said reluctantly as he took
the list and stood to his feet. “But it’s not go-
ing to be easy.”
Reno looked at him, his bright blue eyes
blazing. “Easy? What the fuck is that?”
Lee smiled. Then laughed. That Reno.
“Talk to you later, boss,” he said, heading to-
ward the exit. “Welcome back, Reno.”
“Yeah, yeah, some welcome. Carnival acts
and clowns on tricycles. Some welcome,
Leonard!”
Lee laughed, knowing that Reno only used
his full first name when he was chiding him,
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and then he disappeared out of the massive
office.
Reno placed his hands behind his neck
and stretched his exhausted body, his mus-
cular chest and ribbed abs straining the fab-
ric of his powder-blue dress shirt. Behind
him, outside his floor-to-ceiling window, was
a sweeping view of Las Vegas at night: lights,
energy, nothing but activity up and down the
crowded Strip. And inside of the PaLargio,
in the ballroom, everybody were partying
and having fun. But instead of sitting back
and enjoying himself for a change, he was
here, still working, when he should have
called it a night hours ago. Trina, who felt he
was working himself to death since his re-
turn, had already phoned him twice and told
him to knock it off and come on down.
As he thought about Trina, he leaned back,
his hand massaging the back of his stiff neck,
and watched the monitor again. And there
she was again. His eyes were unable to even
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glance at anybody else in the ballroom. She
was walking out onto the dance floor, some
big, handsome, blonde-haired joker taking
her by the hand. Reno had many women in
his day, more women than he ever wanted to
claim, but never a woman like Katrina. That
was the thing. That lady had him so twisted
up in love that he didn’t know how to handle
it. She was one of a kind to him; a woman
who still made his heart beat faster every
time she entered a room. Still had it pound-
ing whenever he so much as looked her way.
And he was staring at her now.
She wasn’t particularly tall or thick, but
unlike many of the other females in the room
she wasn’t some flat-ass, slip of a girl either.
She was all woman, tight and curvy, with
that velvety-brown complexion that looked
sweet as syrup to Reno, and with the most
expressive, big bright hazel eyes he’d ever
seen.
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Her eyes told her story. She could claim
until she was blue in the face that she was
just fine, with no problems whatsoever, but
her eyes never lied. If Reno wanted to know
how she was really feeling, he looked into her
eyes. If she was as fine as she claimed, they
would say so. If she wasn’t, if she was telling
him she was fine so he wouldn’t worry about
her, the truth would be as simple as staring
into those two big, almond-shaped beauties
beneath those curved, flowing lashes, until
the real deal was revealed.
Her body told a story, too. It told Reno
how fortunate he was to have a woman so
fine. He was, in fact, thinking about that
body as he watched her. And when her
dance partner twirled her, and her short,
form-fitting satin dress revealed every sensu-
al curve, his penis came alive. That was
Tree. It didn’t take much. And when she
smiled that bright white smile of hers, tilting
her head back so that her big breasts heaved
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and her long hair draped down in silky
waves, he suddenly got a hard-on that he
knew wasn’t about to ease up. Not until he
had it sliding into her warm, wet, sweet
folds.
But he looked away. The last thing she
needed right now was some joker like him
pumping on her. Truth was they hadn’t
made love since his return to Vegas nearly
two weeks ago. And it wasn’t just because of
his anxiety, either. She also wanted them to
take it slow. When he left her, when his en-
emies forced him into a mob war that caused
him to lose his own son, for Trina’s own pro-
tection he left her for seven whole months.
Although she understood why he had to get
away, the fact that he had left at all still had
to hurt on a very deep level. He understood
that.
And now he was back. He still believed it
was a mistake; he still believed he was noth-
ing but bad news for her; but he loved her
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too much, and was far too selfish, to let her
go. And they were both still careful not to
derail this purposely slow-moving train.
The fact that the PaLargio was bleeding
money now and Reno, its owner and CEO,
needed to work eighteen hour days just to
right this ship also caused their relationship
to remain static. Trina was working with
him too, as the company’s president, and
they barely saw each other during most of
the day. They knew this couldn’t last, but
they also knew they had to tread carefully.
Reno almost lost it all in that mob war. He
even almost lost Trina, which, for him, would
have been the death of him too. He had to
tread carefully.
He got back to work. He still had tons of
paperwork to get through, and he still had to
figure out how to make the PaLargio the
profit prince it used to be. But he kept glan-
cing back at that monitor. He saw Trina’s
dance partner whisper some joke in her ear
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that caused her to laugh. But when he saw
that dance partner slyly move his hand down
to the top tip of her ass, with a few of his fin-
gers actually moving down further and then
lightly rubbing across that ass, Reno
frowned.
“What the fuck,” he said aloud, as if
amazed that anybody would dare disrespect
him like that. Trina was laughing at the joke
he had whispered to her, and was seemingly
completely unaware that she was being
mugged in plain sight by that smooth Joe
with the smooth hands. But when Mr.
Smooth did it again, and his finger escaped
once more and lightly rubbed across the ass
of Reno Gabrini’s wife yet again, that did it
for Reno. Forget the paperwork. Forget the
fact that the PaLargio had a long way to go
before it was back to where it needed to be.
He stood to his feet, grabbed his suit coat,
and headed out of the office. Within seconds
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he was on his private elevator heading down-
ward, to the festive ballroom.
Trina saw him coming just as her dance
partner was about to twirl her again.
“There’s my hubby,” she said happily. Reno
had made an appearance earlier, when his
mother first arrived, but he’d been upstairs,
in the office, ever since.
Her dance partner turned toward the ball-
room’s entrance when Trina mentioned the
arrival of her husband. He expected to see
some good looking black dude ready to re-
claim this gorgeous lady. But when he saw
that it was Dominic “Reno” Gabrini, the
owner of the very PaLargio Hotel and Casino
they were dancing in, a man reputed to have
ordered the hit on the notorious Frank
Partanna himself, he just knew there was
some mistake.
“But that’s Reno Gabrini,” he said. Then
he looked at her, shocked. “Reno Gabrini is
your husband?”
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Trina looked bemused. She didn’t know if
she should be flattered or offended by his
shock, but decided it didn’t matter. “That’s
right,” she said with pride, but her dance
partner, as soon as she said it, quickly re-
moved his hands from anywhere near her
body.
“What’s the matter?” she asked. She
thought they were in the middle of a dance.
But the young man’s eyes were already fo-
cused on Reno. He plastered a big, overly-
grand smile on his round face and extended
his hand even before Reno arrived.
“Mr. Gabrini, hi,” he said with such a
nervous grin that Reno knew he was right to
come and get his wife.
“Hello,” Reno said coolly, his stark blue
eyes staring into the man’s pale brown eyes.
“This is Mikey, Reno,” Trina said. “He’s a
friend of Dirty’s.”
Reno reluctantly shook the man’s hand,
but then pulled him toward him. “If you ever
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put your hand anywhere near my wife’s ass
again,” he whispered into the man’s ear, “I
will personally make certain that you never
have possession of that particular hand
again. Got me, pal?” Reno then leaned back
and stared into the young man’s eyes.
The young man shook his head vigor-
ously. “Oh, no, sir, I did. . . I mean, I didn’t
mean to . . . I mean. . .” Then he scrunched
up his face. “Excuse me, please,” he finally
said as he hurried, practically ran, off of the
dance floor.
Trina frowned. “What did you say to him,
Reno?” she asked. “That poor boy looked as
if he wanted to piss in his pants.”
But Reno, she quickly realized, looked as if
he wanted to piss in her pussy. That was
how lustful those soft blue eyes of his sud-
denly appeared to her. And just like that,
just by looking into those big blues of his, she
felt a tight knot of anticipation deep down
inside of her.
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Reno’s sex drive, which used to be incred-
ible, had been purposely dormant since his
return. In his noble mind, Trina knew, he
wanted to give her a chance to change hers.
He wanted to give her a chance to decide if
she could handle all of the mob baggage that
came along with his return. She knew the
deal. She knew he never wanted to have any-
thing to do with that mob life. She saw his
anguish and pain every time they pulled him
in. But somehow, some way, they always
managed to drag him in. And he wanted her
to be certain she could live with that. Sex, he
felt, would have only complicated the issue.
But as Reno looked down the length of his
wife and then back into her wondrously ex-
pressive hazel eyes, they both knew he was
now willing to allow that complication. It
was going to be risky. He still wasn’t at all
convinced that his return was a good thing
for her. But they both had needs that needed
to be met.
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Besides, Reno saw that dance partner cop-
ping a feel on his wife. He needed to step up
and accept the fact that he was back for good
or ill and they needed to get on with it. If he
didn’t, some other smooth Joe far cleverer
than dance partner was going to come along
and meet her needs for him.
And that, he knew, he could not have.
It had been two weeks, anyway, and she
was nowhere near changing her mind. How
much longer, he wondered, did he have to
torture himself?
Trina saw his anxiety deep in his troubled
blue eyes. “What’s it about, Reno?” she
asked him, her own eyes so sincere that he
wanted to grab her into his arms right now.
“It’s about you and me, Tree,” he finally
said, and then leaned toward her without
touching her. “It’s about a particular hard-
on I’ve been nursing ever since I got back in
town and saw your gorgeous mug again,” he
added.
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She smiled. And then laughed.
He reached out his hand to her.
Trina’s eyes stared into his. She was still
apprehensive, still unsure if they would ever
be anything like they used to be, but she
knew they couldn’t continue the way they
were going. They either had to be all-in, or
all-out.
She placed her small hand into his big one.
They walked deliberately slow off of the
dance floor, out of the lively ballroom, and
into the quiet corridor. The first hotel room,
just outside the ballroom, was occupied. But
the second one, reserved for ballroom guests
that only Reno or Trina could give authoriza-
tion to use, was empty.
Reno used his passkey to let them in, bolt-
ing the door behind them.
Trina smiled as he twirled her into his
arms and stared at her. When she realized
he was dead serious now, her smile left too.
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“So you think you can dance, hun?” he
asked her, drinking up the beauty of her, the
exotically sweet fragrance of her.
“I think I can,” she admitted. “But not as
good as you.”
“Yeah?” he asked, moving closer to her, his
hands rubbing softly over her tight ass, his
eyes never leaving hers. “What makes you
think that?”
“Because,” she said as she felt his hard-on
get harder against her, “you have a certain
body part, a certain rod-like body part that
always gets me going.”
Reno’s heart swelled. He really loved this
woman. He moved her even closer to him,
his eyes now staring at her lips. He rubbed
that particular body part against her, causing
those sexy, African lips of hers to quiver.
“You talking about this?” he asked, rub-
bing harder against her. “Or this?” he added
as his lips moved down and captured hers in
a long, circular, passionate kiss.
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Trina closed her eyes and moved with the
rhythm of Reno’s kiss. And the feel of his
rod against her, hard and stiff, caused her to
wrap her arms around his neck and to push
her small body even closer still against his
muscular, hard frame.
Reno lifted her into his arms, and she
wrapped her legs around him. He carried
her to the bed, their lips never parting.
He sat her down on the bed’s edge and re-
moved his suit coat and shoved his dress
shirt over his head. And there it was, that
tanned, muscular, sculptured body Trina
could never get tired of watching. And she
watched him as he unbuckled his belt and
unzipped his pants. He was making clear
that kissing her passionately, although
something he loved doing, wasn’t anywhere
near the only thing he planned to do to her.
That was as far as they’d gone over the last
two weeks. Just kissing. But now, he was
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making even clearer, he wanted it all. Every
inch of her.
That was why, before he even bothered to
drop his pants, he pulled out his penis. Trina
felt that same surge of anticipation she felt
the first time she saw the size of it, the
massiveness of it, and she wanted it all too.
Every inch of it.
He knelt down, his penis dangling in front
of him, as he kissed Trina on her neck,
nibbled along the edge of her ear, and then
kissed her on her lips. When her mouth par-
ted and his tongue slid in, linking with hers,
she drew in a sharp, sensual breath. And
then he unzipped and slipped down to her
waist that beautiful, sleeveless dress she
wore, exposing those firm bare breasts he
loved so well.
Reno’s heart raced when her juicy brown
melons bounced on exposure. And her body,
flat where it should be flat and curved where
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it should be curved, made him grab her
tightly in his arms.
He wrapped her in his arms as he kissed
and sucked her breasts, from one to the oth-
er to both at once. He couldn’t stop teasing
and licking and biting her nipples. He
moved up, to her lips again, and began kiss-
ing her with long, passionate kisses, while
his hands fondled, squeezed, caressed those
breasts. His penis was throbbing as he
kissed her, as it jutted out straighter and
stiffer against the seam of her bikini panties.
Trina, too, was enthralled with his lips, un-
able to stop returning his kisses. She
wrapped her arms around his muscular body
and became so caught up in the pressure of
his lips, the expert glide of his tongue, that
she did not realize he had lifted her slightly
and completely removed her dress and
panties, until he opened her legs and his fin-
gers slowly slid into her.
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Oh, Reno, she said lustfully as he fingered
her; as he continued to kiss her lips, to
fondle one of her breast, and moisten her
womanhood for what she knew would soon
be an incredible entry.
Reno could hardly contain his anticipation
as his fingers lapped around her folds and
softened every inch of her receptacle. She
was so small, still the tightest pussy he’d ever
felt, and he was so large and so stiff that he
knew this was going to be, as it used to al-
ways be whenever he entered her, a fuck he
would not soon forget.
And the mere thought of it, of the tight-
ness, of the moisture, of this sweet, gorgeous
woman right within his grasp, caused him to
leave her mouth and move down between
her legs. He had to taste it. He had to feel
and smell and experience it.
Trina leaned back on her elbows when he
took her feet, sat them on the edge of the
bed, her legs still wide open, as his mouth
28/302
made its way between those legs. She closed
her eyes in the sheer pleasure of his tongue
gliding along her clit, fondling it slowly and
rapidly and slowly again. And then he
slipped along her folds with the kind of slow,
precision swipes that caused her hips to arch
up and thrust herself into his face, as the
feeling intensified.
She wanted more of that intensity, and he
gave her more, and more, and more, until
she was sliding down. Her body was almost
uncontrollable as his tongue caused her en-
tire being to convulse and buckle in that rari-
fied moment of gratification she hadn’t felt
in such a very long time.
And even after he finally stopped, and
stood up, and she could see her husband at
his absolute barest, this specimen of a man
in full, she was still feeling the ripples of that
tongue-lashing he’d just given to her.
Reno couldn’t believe how wonderful it felt
to be this intimate with his wife again. He
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dreamed about her when he was away, every
single night he dreamed of this beautiful wo-
man. And now he had her back. A sadness
came over him as the past attempted to cap-
ture his imagination again and make him
feel selfish for wanting to be with her so
badly, but he dismissed it. They were in this
together, for better or worse, in sickness and
in health. To hell, he said to himself, with
that hellish past.
After jacking on his massive rod, stiffening
it even more, he stood in front of Trina, lift-
ing her legs onto the side of each of his mus-
cular thighs, spreading them as wide as she
could bear, and then slowly but firmly slip-
ping his rod inside of her moist folds.
There was a collective exhale for both of
them when he entered her. There was a kind
of everything they expected and more feeling
when his manhood met her womanhood and
her walls collapsed around him so tightly
that sliding further and further in was almost
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difficult. And that very tightness gave them
a wondrously sensual high.
They stayed in elevation as he made love
to her. His rod slid in, almost out, back in
again with such a rhythm, with such a long,
smooth sail that it lulled them into a kind of
tender relaxation that had every muscle in
their bodies feeling the heat.
Reno felt energized as he made love to
her. He could hardly believe how good it
felt. He looked down as his rod moved in
and out of the most important human being
on the face of this earth, the woman he loved
more than life itself, and he felt so unworthy,
and so fortunate, that he almost wanted to
cry.
He stared at her as he screwed her. Her
eyes were closed, her head was moving in
rhythm with his every stroke. Her gorgeous
African lips were parted, revealing a small,
pink tongue lapped over her bottom lip, and
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her breasts were bouncing in a continual
crescendo as his rhythm began to increase.
As the intensity increased he moved her
further onto the bed and got on top of her,
his thrusts now becoming faster and faster.
He grabbed her ass and lifted it even tighter
against him as he thrashed into her in even
faster thrusts that had them both panting
with soft breaths. Her hips were moving too,
in perfect circular motions that nearly undid
him. They were fucking unlike they had ever
fucked before; as if they still had points to
prove; as if they were determined to make
this coupling the best they’d ever had.
And when it finally happened, when he
had slid in and almost out, in and almost out,
in a pace so frenetic that his ass, thighs and
even arms shook, he felt the pressure point.
And then he thrashed into her as far as he
could go, until his swollen balls were
jammed against the outer ridge of her va-
gina, and he released in a hard gush. She
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climaxed in a wave of contractions. And the
combining of those singular acts caused both
bodies to strain in an arching that shattered
their separateness and made them, for this
moment in time, indistinguishably one.
When they came back down to earth, when
their arching bodies fell back down on the
bed, Reno looked at Trina, and Trina looked
at Reno, as if neither could believe what had
actually occurred.
For Trina it wasn’t just that it was great
sex. She hadn’t had any in so long that any
sex from Reno would have been good to her.
But it was the connection that floored her. It
was as if a part of her essence, a part of her
very core, leaped out of her and into him.
For Reno, it was the connection too. The
sex was wonderful. Trina was so tight and
sweet and fit him so perfectly that he’d never
had such a magnificent joining. But it was
beyond the sex. Well beyond it. It was as if
this woman, this beautiful woman he loved
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so much, had demonstrated in her lovemak-
ing that he was back and that she wanted
him back, no matter what. He had never felt
more love, more protectiveness, more pos-
sessiveness, for any other human being
alive. And it left him reeling.
He was so thrown, in fact, that he moved
off of her and laid on his back, his chest
heaving in and out, his eyes wide open and
staring in enchanted wonder.
“What just happened here, Tree?” he
asked her. And then looked at her with be-
wildered eyes.
Trina looked at him, her eyes as certain as
his was uncertain. “We just happened,
Reno,” she said without giving it a second
thought.
He smiled. It was as simple, as complic-
ated, as earth shattering as that. They just
happened. Reno and Trina. He nodded. He
understood. And pulled her into his arms.
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But even their euphoria, even the feeling
that they had finally crossed that Rubicon
and were all-in forevermore, could not stave
off Reno’s sheer exhaustion.
Within minutes, less than five, he was fast
asleep. And was snoring.
Trina smiled, got out of bed - somebody,
after all, had to entertain their guests. She
stared at him a moment longer, stared at his
beautiful physique, at his gorgeous face, at
his cascading brown hair as it flopped down
along his forehead and caused a man of his
unparalleled strength, a man pushing forty,
to become vulnerable and boyish-looking.
And then she covered up her precious cargo.
The limo came to a screeching halt and
Carmine Rossi hurried out. He ran past the
waterfalls and colonnade and into the
majestic entrance of the PaLargio, the valets
and doormen and bellhops all knew him, all
speaking to him as he made his way across
the lobby and down the long, marbled
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corridor that led into the elegant, spirited
ballroom.
He looked around for Reno. When he
didn’t see him he hurried over to Ritchie.
Ritchie, a muscular young man who every-
body called Dirty, was laughing and drinking
with his buddies over by the live band. Dirty
was married to Francine, Reno’s kid sister.
“Yo, Dirt,” Carmine said as he ap-
proached. “Where’s Reno?”
“Carmine, where you been?” Dirty asked
this in his thick Jersey accent. “Franny said
you and MarBeth was coming later, but the
party’s almost over.”
“Where’s Reno? You seen Reno?”
“No, I ain’t seen no Reno. I mean yeah, I
seen him for a minute, but he left.”
“Left where? Where did he go?”
“How should I know? Reno doesn’t tell
me his business. Where you been, that’s
what I wanna know?”
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Carmine looked passed Dirty, he was
getting no-where with that jerk-off. When he
saw Trina talking with Belle Gabrini, Reno’s
mother and Carmine’s mother-in-law, he
hurried for their table.
“Tree, where’s Reno?” he asked as soon as
he was upon her. She was seated to the right
of Belle, with Francine, Dirty’s wife and
Belle’s daughter, to her left. Trina saw the
look of terror in Carmine’s earnest face.
“What’s wrong?” she asked him.
“It’s---,” he started, shook his head, and
then looked at his mother-in-law, who was
now looking at him. He smiled, which was
always an effort for a tough guy like
Carmine. “Hey, Ma Belle,” he said. “How
you doing?”
“Which one are you?” Belle asked. With
her growing dementia, sometimes she recog-
nized him and the rest of her family, and
sometimes, like now, she didn’t.
37/302
“That’s
Carmine,
Ma,”
Trina
said.
“MarBeth’s husband. Your son-in-law.”
“Some son-in-law. Wait till Paulo hears
about this.” Paulo Gabrini, Belle’s husband,
was dead.
Trina patted Belle’s hand, stood up, and
walked away with Carmine away from her
earshot.
“What’s wrong?” she asked him again.
“Trouble,” Carmine said, his eyes register-
ing fear and anguished all rolled into one. “I
need Reno.”
“What kind of trouble? Mob trouble?”
“I need him, Tree.”
“No, Carmine, no. Reno’s not getting
caught up in anymore of that craziness.”
“This can’t be helped.”
“None of it can, that’s the problem. But it
has got to be helped this time, Carmine, are
you kidding me? That so-called trouble
nearly destroyed him last time, and you
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know it. And now you want to pull him back
into that?”
“It’s MarBeth, Tree.”
Trina’s heart pounded. MarBeth Rossi
was Reno’s sister and Carmine’s wife. She
was also the only one in Reno’s family, other
than Trina, willing to stand up to him.
“MarBeth?” she asked.
“And it’s bad, Tree,” Carmine said. “Or I
wouldn’t be here. It’s bad.”
Trina hated it. She knew Reno was ex-
hausted and needed his rest. She also knew
he needed more trouble like he needed a hole
in the head. But this was about his sister.
Carmine was right. It couldn’t be helped.
She escorted him out of the ballroom,
down the quiet corridor, and up to the hotel
room she had left less than an hour ago her-
self. She used her passkey and they entered
in.
39/302
Reno, as she expected, was still in bed and
fast asleep. She hesitated, he so needed his
rest, and looked at Carmine.
“It’s vital, Tree,” he said. “It can’t wait.”
Trina exhaled, walked over to her hus-
band, and shook him.
Reno jumped awake, his head and bare
shoulders lifting up suddenly, until he real-
ized it was Trina. He laid back down,
frowned, and closed his eyes. “Hey, babe,”
he said.
“Carmine’s here, Reno,” Trina said, but
Reno was snoring again as if he never woke
up in the first place. Trina shook him. His
eyes reopened.
“Yeah, I’m sorry, what was it?”
“I said Carmine’s here. He needs to talk to
you.”
Reno looked past Trina to Carmine, his
brother-in-law and many times his right
hand man. “What’s up?” he asked him.
“It’s MarBeth, Reno. She’s in trouble.”
40/302
Reno stared at him. Carmine was afraid
he had fallen back asleep, but Trina knew he
was wide awake now. The word trouble al-
ways got Reno’s attention.
“What kind of trouble?” he asked his in-
law.
Carmine swallowed hard. Didn’t know
how to say it, except to just say it. “She killed
Vito Giancarlo’s son,” Carmine said and
Reno threw the covers off and jumped out of
bed, his penis dangling, his nakedness com-
pletely forgotten. “She what?” he asked.
Trina, too, was stunned witless. They both
stared at Carmine.
“I just found out,” Carmine said, tears
staining his lids. “I just found out.”
“What the fuck happened, Carmine? What
are you telling me?”
“It’s that element she’s been hanging
around.”
Reno frowned. “What element? What are
you talking about?”
41/302
Trina walked over to the bathroom,
grabbed a white terry cloth robe, and came
back, listening intensely the entire time.
“It’s that guy,” Carmine was saying. “That
Joey Laster.”
“Who the hell’s Joey Laster?”
Carmine and Trina exchanged a glance.
“Well who is he?” Reno asked. Trina
helped him put on the robe.
“He’s the guy MarBeth been foolin’ around
with,” Carmine said.
Reno was tying the robe, but stopped mid-
tie. “Foolin’ around? What you mean ‘fool-
ing around?’ You’re trying to tell me that
MarBeth, that my sister, was cheating on
you? Is that what you’re telling me?”
Trina could tell that Carmine, a proud
man, hated to admit it. But he had to. “Yes,”
he said. “And Joey Laster isn’t the first time,
either. But that guy, Reno, is a major league
fuck-up and I told her that.”
42/302
“But you didn’t tell me a damn thing about
it,” Reno said angrily.
“You weren’t here, Reno. What was I sup-
posed to do? Call you up? You left us, re-
member? Didn’t want to have anything
more to do with us, remember?”
“That wasn’t the reason, Carmine, and you
know it,” Trina said, surprised that he would
go there. “Now I know you’re upset, we all
are, but you aren’t going to stand up here
and put that guilt trip on my husband.”
Carmine settled back down. “I’m sorry,”
he said. “I’m just so. . .”
“Tell me what happened,” Reno said, at-
tempting to maintain his cool although his
heart was hammering. He left his family for
seven months; left them dangling in the wind
when he knew they relied on him for practic-
ally everything. And he was now just begin-
ning to reap the whirlwind from that horrific
past of his that never seemed capable of let-
ting him go.
43/302
“Joey Laster is a small time hood who sold
drugs over in Newark,” Carmine said. “He
and MarBeth hooked up through some
friend of hers. By the time I found out, she
was already head over heels in love with this
guy. Said she’ll leave me if I try to break it
up or do any harm whatsoever to her new
Casanova.”
Carmine paused. The pain was still too
raw.
“So I did nothing,” he said. He saw that
look of disapproval in Reno’s eyes. “I didn’t
wanna lose my wife, all right? What would
you have done?”
Killed the motherfucker, Reno wanted to
say. “Just tell me what happened,” he said
instead. “What happened that caused my
sister to ice the son of Vito Giancarlo, my
father’s closest friend and her godfather for
crying out loud. I want you to explain that to
me.”
44/302
Carmine exhaled, felt as if he was near hy-
perventilation. “Can I sit down?” he asked,
and Trina hurried to assist him.
“Please,” she said, pulling the chair out
from under the small conference table in the
room.
As Carmine sat, Reno started moving
around, rubbing his forehead. Please, he
was praying, let this be some mistake.
Please.
“Want something to drink, Carmine?”
Trina asked him.
“No, Tree, thanks. I just been so blown
over since MarBeth called me. Cause it was
so out of the blue. We had plans. She was to
fly down for Ma Belle’s celebration, and I
thought she was on her way. I was waiting
for her at the compound in Spring Valley so
we could drive over and make our appear-
ance together. Then she calls and says she’s
still in Jersey, tells me what went down. So I
45/302
just jumped in the limo and got here as fast
as I could.”
“What happened?” Reno asked again, this
time his voice barely a whisper. “What went
down?”
“MarBeth said she was with Joey when he
was making a drop.”
“What kind of drop?”
Carmine hesitated. “Drugs, Reno,” he
said.
Reno and Trina exchanged glances. Trina
had suspected, for some time now, that both
Carmine and Dirty had turned to drugs to
keep the money flowing the way it used to
flow when Reno’s father was alive. Reno
didn’t believe it, but Trina always suspected
it.
“Go on,” Reno said.
“It was supposed to be a routine drop,”
Carmine continued. “In some office building
garage somewhere. It went fine she said,
Joey and the guy were talking, you know,
46/302
until the guy pulls out this gun. She says she
panicked, knew Joey kept a gun in the glove
compartment, so she pulled it out and got
out of the car. When the guy put the gun to
Joey’s head, she . . .”
Carmine looked at Reno as tears appeared
in Carmine’s bloodshot eyes. “She fired,
Reno. Three shots she think, but maybe
more, killed him dead on the spot. Joey star-
ted yelling, saying, ‘what have you done,’ and
then he jumped in the car, screamed for her
to get in, and they took off. There was an-
other guy there but he seemed too stunned to
react fast enough. She didn’t know it was
Vito’s son until Joey told her later.”
Reno’s heart grew faint. His sister killed
somebody. His sister? “Where is she now?”
he asked.
“They were driving around, that’s how
panicked they were. I told her to wait
wherever she was, I can’t even remember
right now, and I had our people bring her in.
47/302
They called just before I got here. She’s still
in Jersey, at the family compound in Somers
Point. Under heavy guard. She begged me
not to tell you, but how could I not, Reno?
She’s your sister.”
“Where’s this Joey character?” Reno
asked.
“With her. I had him brought in too. I
didn’t want the cops capturing him so he
could spill the beans on MarBeth.”
“Good,” Reno said with a nod, although his
face was still a mask of anguish. “Good
move, Carmine.”
“They’re both waiting for you.”
Trina’s heart dropped. Because she knew
this was just the beginning. She looked at
Reno. The anguish in her eyes broke his
heart.
“Go to the ballroom, Carmine,” he
ordered. “Get a hold of Dirty and also tell Lee
Jones I want to see him. Bring them both
here.”
48/302
Carmine glanced at Trina. He hated
pulling Reno in like this, he hated it, but
what did she expect him to do? He left.
Reno walked up to Trina, placed his hands
on her toned, bare arms. She was already
shaking her head.
“You can’t, Reno.”
“I have to, Tree,” he said, his heart filled
with as much despair as her eyes displayed.
“I don’t have a choice, sweetheart. She’s my
sister. She’s in trouble. What else am I
gonna do?”
“But she shot Vito Giancarlo’s son. He’s
not going to let somebody kill his child and
there be no retribution.”
Reno began rubbing her arms. “I know.
That’s why I’ve got to go to him--”
“No, Reno--”
“I have to, Tree. I’ve got to go to him and
beg that man’s forgiveness. I’ve got to do it
for my sister’s sake.”
“And if he wants blood for blood?”
49/302
Reno’s chest heaved in and out. He could
hardly believe he was being forced down this
road again. “I can’t let it be my sister’s
blood,” he said.
Trina’s heart fell through her shoe. Be-
cause she knew he’d do it. Reno Gabrini
would sacrifice his own life to save his sister.
He’d leave this earth today if it meant his
family would be spared. She desperately
hated and desperately loved that quality
about Reno.
Tears filled her eyes. “I’m going with you,”
she said.
But Reno was already shaking his head.
“You know better than that. I need you to
stay right here, Tree, with Ma and Franny. I
need you to be strong for me.” His eyes
glistened. He looked at her arms, and then
back into her eyes. “I’ll leave Dirty here, to
supervise and beef up security, and I’ll tell
Lee to keep his eyes wide open too. But I’m
50/302
counting on you, Tree. To be strong. Will
you do that for me?”
Tears dropped down her cheeks. She an-
grily wiped them away. “It’s so unfair,
Reno,” she cried. “It’s so not fair!”
Reno pulled her violently into his arms, his
eyes tightly shut as he held her. What did
they want from him! Just two weeks back
and shit like this goes down? He could
hardly contain his rage, his despair. But he
had to. For Trina.
He pulled back from her, his hands still
gripping her arms.
Trina rubbed her hand across the lapel of
his robe. “I’ll let you go this time,” she said,
tears falling anew, “but you’d better come
back to me, Dominic Gabrini. I’ll kill you if
you don’t.”
Reno smiled. Wiped away her tears with
his thumb. “I’ll be back,” he said in his best
Schwarzenegger imitation. And then his
look turned serious. He lifted her chin,
51/302
looked her dead in the eyes. “I’ll be back,
Katrina,” he promised.
And she smiled, as if his saying it made it
so.
She fell, once again, into his warm, strong,
powerful arms.
He would be back, she decided.
Because he had to.
52/302
TWO
The next morning, the limo carrying Reno
and Carmine drove through the electronic
gates of the family compound in Somers
Point, New Jersey. When the limo stopped
at the steps, however, Reno just sat there.
Carmine looked at him. “What is it?” he
asked. “She’s waiting inside.”
“Bring her here,” Reno ordered.
“Here? In the car?”
“Bring her here,” Reno said again. “Along
with the boyfriend.”
Carmine didn’t understand why. Did he
think the house was bugged or something?
But Reno was the boss. He got out, and went
inside to get the twosome.
Reno picked up the car phone, called Luigi
Drago, an east coast mob boss everybody
called the Drag. Because he was one of Vito
Giancarlo’s closest friends, Reno was using
him as a go-between.
“Tell me something good, Drag,” Reno said
into the phone.
“I talked to him Dominic. He’s upset obvi-
ously. Man just lost his son.”
Reno closed his eyes. He’d lost a child be-
fore too. But he couldn’t dwell on the
tragedy of it. He had his sister to think
about. “What did he say?” he asked him.
Drago sighed. “He’ll meet with you.”
Reno sighed relief. “Thank God.”
“He doesn’t blame you. Of course he’ll
meet with you.”
“And what about my sister?”
“What about the woman who murdered
his son?”
Reno’s jaw tightened. “Yes.”
“He wants to see her too. He’s her god-
father. He’ll forgive her, Reno.”
“I can’t take that chance, Drag. I can’t ex-
pose my sister like that. I’ll come see him on
her behalf. And if he feels a need to exact his
54/302
revenge on me, then so be it. But I don’t
want a hair on MarBeth’s head touched.”
“He’s her godfather, Reno, same as yours.
We’ll have to hope that connection will be
enough. He’s waiting for you, Reno. Take
care.”
“Yeah, thanks, Drag.” And Reno killed the
call.
When he looked toward the house, he saw
MarBeth and Joey Laster headed down the
steps, with Carmine following behind them.
How Carmine could put up with that shit was
a mystery to Reno. Some guy touch his wife
and be sleeping around with his wife was a
dead man. Plain and simple. But Carmine
allowed it and was now walking behind his
wife and her boyfriend as if he was the third
wheel.
Him.
Not boyfriend. Him.
It
sickened Reno just looking at it.
And that damn MarBeth, Reno thought as
she piled into the car and sat across from
him. She looked haggard to Reno, as if she’d
55/302
aged ten years in a day, and her good looks,
which were debatable to begin with, were
gone.
Joey Laster sat next to MarBeth, while
Carmine, amazingly to Reno, sat next to
Reno. If this was love, as Carmine had
claimed was his motivation, then Reno
wanted no parts of it.
But before Reno could say a word,
MarBeth, known for her big mouth, beat him
to the punch. “I know you hate me right
now, Reno, I know you do. But it’s not like
you think. It was self-defense, I declare it
was.”
“MarBeth?” Reno said calmly, doing all he
could to maintain his cool, but his sister kept
going.
“He was going to kill Joey, wasn’t he, Joe?
He had the gun and he had that gun locked
and loaded and ready to blow Joey’s head
off, I declare he did. Oh, you should have
seen it, Reno, it was like out of a movie.”
56/302
“MarBeth?” Reno tried again.
“I didn’t know it was Vito Giancarlo’s son.
I didn’t even know he had a son. I mean, I
knew he had one, but I never knew he was
out here selling drugs and doing all that
crazy stuff he was doing. I didn’t---”
“MarBeth,” Reno said angrily this time,
“I’m this close to slapping the shit out of you
so shut the fuck up!”
MarBeth jumped defensive. “You look
here, Reno Gabrini,” she shot back.
“Carmine and Dirty might let you talk to
them that way, but you won’t talk to me like
that. I told you it was self-defense. What
more you want me to say?”
“Tell it to Vito, all right? Walk your cheat-
ing motherfucking ass up to Vito Giancarlo
and tell him you’re sorry you murdered his
child but it was self-defense. See how far
that gets you.”
And just like that, MarBeth changed.
Tears came to her big, blue eyes. “What are
57/302
we going to do, Reno? Joey says they wanna
kill me. He says they wanna shoot me down
like a dog in the streets, Reno.”
Although she infuriated him no end,
Reno’s heart went out to his sister. “You
fucked up, Mar,” he admitted. “But I’ll see
what I can do.”
MarBeth was hopeful. “You’re going to go
see him, Reno? He’ll forgive you anything.
If you tell him it was self-defense, he’ll be-
lieve you. If you tell him I had no choice but
to defend myself---”
“Who is this?” Reno asked her, his eyes
riveted on Joey Laster.
“Who? What?” MarBeth asked. She was
so caught up in her own calamity that she
didn’t realize Reno had moved on. “Oh.
This Joey, Reno.”
“Your boyfriend?” Reno asked, unable to
hide his disgust.
“He’s a friend of mine,” MarBeth replied,
glancing at Carmine.
58/302
“What’s your problem,” Reno asked Joey,
“selling drugs to little kids?”
“I don’t,” Joey started, but Reno cut him
off.
“Beat it,” Reno said.
“Whatta ya’ mean ‘beat it,’ Reno? He’s
with me.”
“Not anymore, he’s not. Beat it,” Reno re-
peated. Carmine leaned over and opened the
door.
Joey was floored. “But I thought. . . I
thought you were going to provide the pro-
tection for us.”
“Who the hell is us?” Reno snapped. “I
protect my sister and my sister only. Your
ass is on your own. Now beat it.”
Terror gripped the young man. “But I can
tell,” he said. “I can go to the cops and tell
what happened.”
Reno looked at him. “Not if you like your
legs and arms and eyes and brain. If you
don’t care for those particular body parts
59/302
then fine, go to the authorities. If you care to
keep those particular body parts with your-
self, then you’d better zip it and keep it
zipped.”
Joey stared at Reno. He knew about Reno
Gabrini. He knew he wasn’t the man you
wanted to cross. He got out of the car.
“Joey, wait!” MarBeth screamed but Joey
wasn’t thinking about her. He was running
for the gate.
MarBeth looked at her brother. “Asshole,”
she said.
“Keep her in the car,” Reno said to
Carmine. “Take her straight to the airport,
get her on our private plane. If Vito is gonna
do a hit it’ll be here at this compound and
it’ll be during my meeting with him.”
Carmine looked at him. “So you think he’s
gonna retaliate?”
Reno exhaled. “If I know Vito, and I do,
I’d say yeah. You can depend on it.” He
glanced at MarBeth. Loved and hated her all
60/302
at once. But she was his sister, his respons-
ibility. “Keep her safe, Carmine,” he said,
and got out of the car.
As Reno got out of the car, a second limo
pulled up behind the first. The chauffeur,
who was also one of Reno’s bodyguards, got
out, opened the back passenger door, and
Reno got in. Carmine closed the door of the
first limousine and looked at MarBeth. Bit-
terness was in his eyes.
“I hope you’re happy now. Got your broth-
er involved. This shit can kill him, can des-
troy him all over again. But you don’t care.”
MarBeth looked out of the window, her
face as blank as her good judgment. “Got
that right,” she said.
Carmine frowned. “I don’t believe you,
MarBeth. You have the nerve to be upset
with Reno? Why? Why would you be upset
with a man who came all this way to help
your sorry ass? He didn’t have to come. He
could have said to hell with your foolishness
61/302
and let Vito take care of you. So why in the
world would you be angry at him? Because
he kicked your boy toy to the curb? Is that
it?”
MarBeth didn’t respond, but by that
cloudy look that suddenly came over her
already drained face, Carmine knew he had
hit a nerve. But he also knew MarBeth. She
was no sucker for love. She wasn’t going to
be all torn up because another one of her
boyfriends was shown the door. Something
else was going on here. He couldn’t say
what, but something on a far deeper level
was at work here. And it hurt him to his
core.
He stared at his wife, couldn’t take his eyes
off of her, as the limo pulled off and made
the fast trek to the airport.
Something was wrong. Reno felt it as soon
as he entered Vito Giancarlo’s study and saw
the big man sitting on the leather couch.
Reno walked over, sat beside him. He looked
62/302
awful to Reno, as a man in mourning should,
but he also looked enraged. Reno could see
it just beneath the surface of that bulldog,
jowly face of his.
“Hello, Reno.”
“Hello, Godfather.” Reno almost never
called him by that name. Mainly because he
didn’t really respect Vito Giancarlo. But also
because if he had had a say in the matter, he
would have never chosen a man like that to
be any godfather of his. But on a morning
like this, he was depending on that very
connection.
“I take it you came to offer your
condolences.”
“It’s an awful thing,” Reno said, refusing to
lie. Eddie Giancarlo was bad news from way
back, a street level drug dealer, and the
world, not to mention all of the kids’ lives he
ruined, was better off without him. But Reno
was no cold-blooded mobster. He believed
in God for crying out loud. Yet times like
63/302
these he felt cold. As cold, as heartless, as
ice.
Vito, however, was praising his son. “Ed-
die, he was a good kid, you know? Behind all
of that rough exterior, all of the drugs and
hookers, which I never condoned – you
know that, Reno. But he was a good kid.”
Vito looked up at Reno with a surprisingly
vulnerable look, as if he wanted Reno to con-
firm it too.
“Whether he was a good kid or a bad kid,
Vito,” Reno said, “he was your kid. And it’s
just awful what happened.”
Vito looked at Reno a few seconds longer,
with an odd look that could have been hate
or something worst, before he nodded.
“Yeah. Awful.”
Reno waited for Vito to bring up MarBeth.
When he didn’t, he decided to get to the
point himself. “MarBeth didn’t know it was
Eddie, Vito. She thought she was defending
64/302
her friend.” And then Reno added: “When
Eddie pulled the gun.”
“She says he pulled a gun,” Vito replied,
“but that’s not what I’m hearing.”
“Come on, Vito. MarBeth wouldn’t have
iced your son for no reason, now you know
that. She didn’t know it was him.”
“What you jumping all over me for? I
didn’t say she did know. I’m grieving here,
Reno, and excuse me if I don’t give a fuck
what MarBeth knew or didn’t know. My
boy’s gone. My child, Reno! That’s all I
know.”
Reno exhaled, nodded his head. “It’s aw-
ful, Vito.”
Vito settled back down. “What you want
from me, Reno?”
“I want hands off MarBeth. I want to beg
your forgiveness---”
“Ah, beg, what you mean beg? You’re my
godson. MarBeth is my goddaughter. No
godson of mine will beg any man!” He
65/302
settled down again. “Where’s MarBeth?
Why isn’t she here, Reno? She’s afraid of
me?”
“No,” Reno said. “But I am.” He looked at
Vito.
Vito frowned. Looked at Reno. “You are?
What are you talking, Reno? How can you
say something like that to me? I knew you
when you were first born, how can you fix
your mouth to say something like that to
me?”
“I need your assurance, Vito, that my sis-
ter, who is my responsibility now that Pop’s
gone, will not be touched for what
happened. It was awful, and I’m sorry, but I
can’t let you harm my sister.”
“MarBeth is a big mouth and a general
pain in the ass, you know that Reno. But
she’s my goddaughter. I don’t go around
putting hits on my godchildren. MarBeth is
safe.”
66/302
Although Reno closed his eyes in relief, al-
though he and Vito hugged in solidarity, as if
it was all settled now, Reno left the Giancarlo
compound feeling oddly unsettled.
So-
mething wasn’t right. He still felt it in his
bones. Vito was going to hit the family com-
pound, if he hadn’t hit it already.
He jumped in his limo and told his chauf-
feur/bodyguard to floor it. He wanted to get
to that plane and get himself and MarBeth as
far away from Jersey and Vito Giancarlo as
quickly as they could fly away.
“Want more eggs, Ma?” Trina asked Belle
Gabrini as they sat around the dining room
table in the PaLargio’s penthouse, and ate
breakfast. Francine was also at the table, but
she was too hung over to eat.
“I hate eggs,” Belle said as she ate the last
of the eggs on her plate. “But I love eggs,”
she added. Trina smiled, she was by now
well acquainted with Belle’s dementia.
67/302
Francine, however, who was drinking coffee
and smoking a cigarette, rolled her eyes.
“Want some more?” Trina asked her
mother-in-law.
“I want Dominic. Where’s Dominic?”
“He had to go to Jersey, Ma,” Trina said,
“but he’s on his way back. He called me from
the plane.”
“The plane? What plane? You’re the
hazel-eyed one, aren’t you?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Then Belle Gabrini frowned. “I want
Ritchie. Where’s Ritchie? They call him
Dirty, that’s not his name. Why they call him
Dirty?”
Trina looked at Francine. “Where’s Dirty,
Franny?”
Francine looked at Trina as if she smelled
something acrid. “How should I know?
Probably still in the casino gambling. That’s
all he’s good for anyway.”
“He’s not here, Ma,” Trina said.
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And then the front entrance into the pent-
house opened and men, all with guns, began
to rush in. And all three ladies reacted dif-
ferently: Francine dove under the table.
Trina hurried to grab her mother-in-law and
sling her under the table too, but a bullet
that could have been meant of Trina, hit
Belle Gabrini before Trina could reach her.
As soon as Trina saw Belle immediately
slumped over, she ran.
She ran into the kitchen, down the long,
back hall that led into the back entrance of
the master bedroom. She heard one man
yelling to “get her,” and she heard footsteps
running up the back hall. Her heart was
hammering, her mind was attempting to
shut down, but she knew she had to survive.
These men just put a bullet through the head
of Reno Gabrini’s own mother, so she knew
what they were capable of doing to her.
She reached into the nightstand drawer,
pulled out Reno’s Glock revolver, and took
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off through the bedroom’s front entrance,
down the front hall, and toward the livin-
groom/dining room area. All she could think
about was getting Francine from under that
table and getting the hell out of there. Just
the thought of Ma Belle had her in a state of
panic, and made her want to forget the
danger, but she knew she couldn’t forget it.
They killed Reno’s mother. They weren’t
about to spare her.
As soon as she ran into the livingroom,
pointing the gun down toward the floor with
both hands on the pistol, she saw two of the
men in the dining area. One was dragging an
hysterical Francine from under the table and
the other one was making sure Ma Belle was
dead. She heard that one say, “gotta get
her,” as he checked her pulse. And just like
that she understood what she faced. She
hadn’t fired a gun in years, not since she
managed a nightclub in her hometown of
Dale, Mississippi and was forced to carry
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heat, and only then she fired it at a shooting
range. But there was no longer any options.
It was kill or be killed.
What, she wondered agonizingly, would
Reno do?
She started shooting. She wasn’t inter-
ested in dying today. And she kept shooting,
killing first the man with Francine, and then
shooting at the man who suddenly turned
from Ma Belle and was about to shoot her.
She dived and then rolled, to avoid his shots,
but he was down, hit by her second bullet.
“Run, Franny!” she yelled, thinking about
Reno, thinking about how he would blame
himself when he found out his mother was
dead. They weren’t taking his sister too.
“Run!” she yelled again and Francine did
just as she said. But before she could even
make it out of the dining room, she was
gunned down too. Shot in the back by the
man who had followed Trina in the bedroom
and was now coming back up the back hall.
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He shot at Trina too, who dived behind the
chair, but not before a bullet whizzed past
her ear, just missing her, and she knew her
nightmare wasn’t anywhere near over yet.
She started firing again, hitting him this
time, his gun flying from his hand as he fell
like a sack of potatoes to the floor.
“Trina!” Francine cried and Trina crawled
to her, thanking God she wasn’t dead. She
held Francine in her arms as she pulled out
her cell phone to call 911. The part of Trina’s
brain still working knew that, given all of the
commotion, somebody already had to have
surely dialed 911, but she wasn’t taking any
chances.
Everything seemed so upside
down. Where was security, she wondered?
Where was Dirty? Where was Reno? She
wanted Reno! Tears began to pour from her
eyes.
But just as she thought this nightmare
could not possibly have any more twists, it
did. The barrel of a gun was placed against
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the side of her head. She thought there was
only one man running down the back hall
after her, but now she realized there had
been two. And he was locked and loaded and
ready to take her away from here.
“You’re the one we wanted, anyway,” he
said. “So drop it and drop it now, bitch.”
She dropped her gun. And suddenly
everything became real to her. Not surreal
the way it had been. Real. Belle Gabrini was
dead. Francine was shot.
She had killed
two people. And it was as real as the death
that clung to the air.
Time was real again. It at first felt like this
nightmare had been dragging on for two or
three hours, only to now realize it was more
like two or three minutes. And it was about
to end here and now, with her brains
splattered all over their beautiful marbled
floor.
And just as she looked down, just as she
was thinking about that floor, she heard the
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gunshot, and it was the loudest of all the
shots that had been fired that morning, in-
side the PaLargio.
And as blackness overtook her, all she
could think about was Reno. And it wasn’t
rational anymore. It wasn’t deliberate any-
more. It was unreal. It was raw and bare
and emotional. Just feelings. Just black-
ness. Just lifelessness.
And she found herself praying, as it all
shut down, that Reno, of all people, would
not be the one to find them.
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THREE
MarBeth wanted to confront Reno as soon
as he boarded the plane in Jersey, but
Carmine had already reminded her how
Reno was. He wouldn’t tell her anything if
she came on too strong. Give him a chance
to decompose, Carmine advised, and then go
talk to him.
It took all MarBeth had to heed her hus-
band’s advice, but she heeded it. Her broth-
er was an odd fish and always had been,
somebody who everybody turned to because
he was the strongest of them all. But that
strength came at a price, and often he had to
be alone, to come down from whatever
height he had just reached, and MarBeth
would give him that time.
Reno was settled in his seat in the back of
the private jet for nearly an hour, trying to
relax on the flight back home. He had
already phoned Trina. She had said that she,
Ma, and Francine were doing fine. They
were just getting up and would be sitting
down to breakfast soon. She was thrilled to
know that Reno was heading back, and he
was thrilled that soon he would be seeing her
face again.
“Take care of yourself,” he had said to his
wife. “And don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”
Trina had laughed. “So if you would do it,
then I can do it?”
“I didn’t say that,” Reno said with a smile.
“Let me rephrase what I said. Be a good girl,
a nun even, that’s what I mean.”
“Bye, boy,” Trina had said with a laugh
and Reno, laughing too, had killed the call.
That was an hour ago. MarBeth looked at
Carmine.
“I’m going to talk to him now,” she said.
“He should have been decomposed by now.”
“I don’t know, MarBeth. He looked pretty
pissed to me when he got on this plane. You
might wanna wait until we land in Vegas.”
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“Land in Vegas?” MarBeth said. “You
must be joking! This is my life we’re talking
about and I have a right to know what Reno
and Vito decided.”
Carmine’s cell phone began to ring. “If he
tells you off, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
MarBeth shook her head, she really had no
respect for Carmine, and made her way all
the way to the back of the plane.
Reno had expected her sooner than this, so
he wasn’t surprised by her visit. She sat on
the seat across from him.
“What happened, Reno?” she asked. “Did
he forgive me?”
Reno didn’t say anything. But MarBeth
wasn’t about to let that be the end of it
“Reno, did he forgive me?” she asked
again.
Reno hated that whine in her voice.
“Yeah,” he said
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“And you believed him?” Again, no re-
sponse from Reno. “You believed him,
Reno?”
Reno looked his sister dead in the eyes.
“No,” he admitted, and she slumped down in
her seat.
Carmine came running to the back of the
plane, his face as white as a sheet.
“What is it?” Reno asked and MarBeth
looked too.
“There’s been a hit,” Carmine said, breath-
ing heavily, his cell phone still in his hand.
“I knew it!” Reno yelled.
“Not at Somers Point, Ree,” Carmine said.
Reno’s heart began to pound, because he
knew, if he would allow himself to go there,
that there was only one other place.
“Where?” he asked.
“The PaLargio,” Carmine said and Reno
jumped from his seat and snatched the
phone from Carmine’s hand.
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“Who is this?” Reno asked anxiously into
the phone.
“It’s me, Ritchie.”
“What the hell’s happened, Dirty?” Reno
asked. “Where’s my wife?”
“They hit us, Ree,” Dirty said, breathing
heavily too. “They got Ma. They got your
mother---”
“My mother?” Reno asked, frowning.
“What about Ma?” MarBeth asked, stand-
ing too.
“What the hell are you talking about,
Dirt?” Reno asked.
“They got her,” Dirty was saying in a cry-
ing voice. “The paramedics pronounced her
dead on the scene. Ma’s dead, Reno!”
Reno couldn’t believe it. He started shak-
ing his head. His mother? Dead? Was this
fucker out of his mind?
“That ain’t possible,” Reno irrationally
proclaimed. “How can you say that?”
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“Say what, Reno?” MarBeth asked.
“What’s happened to Ma and Franny?”
“She’s dead, Reno,” Dirty said. “I’m telling
you she’s dead. She got it right between the
eyes.”
Reno again started shaking his head. “It
can’t be.”
“What can’t be?” MarBeth said anxiously.
“Ma,” Carmine said to his wife. “She’s
dead, MarBeth.”
MarBeth, too, started shaking her head.
“No,” she said. “Noooo!” she screamed.
Carmine ran to her, pulled her into his arms.
“This can’t be happening, Dirt, tell me this
isn’t happening.”
And then he thought about Trina. And his
heart suddenly stopped. He held the phone
with both hands. “What about my wife?” he
asked with a nervous quiver in his voice.
“Where’s Tree?”
“It was so bloody, Reno.”
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“My wife, where’s my wife?” Reno was
about to jump out of his own skin.
“She and Franny were rushed to the hos-
pital,” Dirty finally said.
“But they’re still alive, right?” Reno asked.
“Yes,” Dirty said, and that one word resus-
citated Reno.
“But it’s bad,” Dirty continued. “Real bad.
It was like a bloodbath in that penthouse,
Reno.”
A bloodbath? And his mother was in it?
His baby sister? His wife?
Trina was in that penthouse? Was in that
bloodbath?
Reno lost all control and dropped the
phone. He would have fainted, would have
died where he stood, had Carmine not re-
leased MarBeth, and grabbed him.
As soon as the doors to the hospital in Ve-
gas flew open and Reno, Carmine and
MarBeth hurried through, Dirty came run-
ning down the hall. The hospital was
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overrun with security, but they were men
Reno didn’t recognize. He had so many
questions about how this could have
happened at the PaLargio of all places and
how Dirty wasn’t hit when all three of the
women were, but those were the least of his
concerns right now.
“They killed Ma, Reno!” the always dra-
matic Dirty was yelling as he came. “They
killed Ma! And Franny’s fighting for her
life.”
“Where’s Tree?” Reno asked.
This stopped Dirty cold. “Tree?” he asked
as if he was offended. “I’m telling you that
Ma’s dead and that my wife, your own baby
sister, is fighting for her life, and all you can
ask about is some Tree? Some black bitch?”
Reno took his fist, slung it across Dirty’s
jaw, and knocked his brother-in-law to his
knees.
“Reno!” MarBeth yelled, getting down to
help Dirty. “His wife’s fighting for her life.”
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“That’s the only reason why I didn’t take
his,” Reno said. “Now where’s Katrina?” he
asked the downed Dirty again.
“This way, Reno,” Dr. Cabrew, one of
Reno’s private physicians, said as he ap-
proached the group.
“Dr. C,” Reno said, relieved to know that
he was taking care of Trina, and stepped over
Dirty heading toward the doctor.
“How is she?” Reno was asking as the doc-
tor escorted him down the hall.
“She’s traumatized, of course, it was quite
a scene, Reno. We’ll want to keep her for a
few days, run tests and observe her, because
she did, at one point, pass out. But she’ll be
fine.”
“Oh, thank God,” Reno said so heartfelt
that the doctor glanced at him, to make sure
he was going to be all right.
When they entered the room, and Reno
saw that Trina was not only all right but wide
83/302
awake in bed, looking completely all right,
his heart swelled, and he hurried to her.
“Reno,” she cried, sitting up and reaching
her arms out to him as if they would fall off if
he didn’t grab them. He hurried to her and
grabbed them, and her, into his own arms.
He pulled back, looking her all over. “Are
you really okay, Tree?” he asked.
“I’m okay, Reno, but Ma and Franny---”
“I know,” he said, pain all over his face.
“Franny’s still hanging in there, though.”
“She’ll pull through, I know she will.”
Then she frowned. “It was a nightmare,
Reno. Just terrible. But I thought about
you, and what would you do. And that’s how
I was able to do it.”
Reno was smoothing down her hair, still
looking her over as if his first perusal might
have missed something.
“To do what,
sweetheart?”
Trina looked at him, her bright hazel eyes
as big as those old Kennedy Fifty Cents. She
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had that look he always had when he had to
go there too. His heart dropped.
“What did you do, Tree?” he asked her
nervously.
“I had to do it, Reno. I had to shoot three
of them.”
Reno’s heart dropped through his shoe.
Trina’s death would have been the worst pos-
sible outcome, the absolute worst. This, the
fact that she, too, now had blood on her
hands, was the second worst.
Tears came into his eyes.
“I had no choice, Reno,” she said, tears ap-
pearing in hers too. “I know you hate it, I
hate it too. But I had no choice.”
He nodded, pulled her body against his,
her head now lying on his chest, his hand on
the side of her head. “I know, babe,” he
said.
“It was like it always is with you. They
brought the fight to me and I had to fight
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back. It was kill or be killed. They had
already shot Ma Belle.”
Reno closed his eyes. He grieved for his
mother on the plane, but that pain, that
ache, was still there.
Trina continued. “So I ran down the back
hall into our bedroom, grabbed your gun,
and ran up the front hall. I wanted to get
them before they hurt Franny. And I did. I
shot both of those guys. But then there was
this third guy, the one who had followed me
into the bedroom. He shot Franny before I
could shoot him. But I did shoot him, I did
get him.”
Then she paused, as if re-living that horror
scene all over again. She frowned. “I
thought that was it, Reno. I thought he was
the last one. But he wasn’t. There was this
other guy, came up from behind me. And he
put that gun to my head.”
Reno pulled her back. “To your head? He
got that close to you?”
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Trina nodded. “He was going to kill me. I
heard him cock the gun, his hand was on
that trigger, he was going to take me out like
they did Ma, Reno. He said I was the one
they wanted anyway.”
This stunned Reno. “You?” he asked. “He
said they were after you?”
“That’s what he said. He would have killed
me, I felt the barrel of that gun, I smelled
that barrel. He would have killed me if
Tommy wouldn’t have killed him first.”
Reno wasn’t sure if he heard her right.
“Tommy showed up,” she said. “And he
shot that man. They said I passed out after
that.”
Reno was stumped. What in the world
was Tommy Gabrini, his cousin and closest
friend, the man he turned to when he left all
behind seven months ago, doing at the
PaLargio?
And as soon as he thought about it, as
soon as he tried to make some sense out of it,
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Tommy Gabrini came walking into Trina’s
room.
“Hello, Reno,” he said, and Reno turned
around. And there was Tommy, looking his
usual dapper self in his always perfectly
tailored Italian silk suit and imported dress
shoes. His tall, lean, athletic body, and his
not-a-strand-out-of-place blondish brown
hair that framed his gorgeous face, often
made even Reno wonder how a guy could be
that freakishly good looking. And the relief
that washed over Reno was like a tension
breaker. As soon as he saw his cousin it felt
as if a load was lifted. It now felt as if he
wouldn’t have to bear this unbearable bur-
den alone.
“Tommy,” he said like an exhale and hur-
ried to him, hugging him. Tears were once
again in Reno’s eyes, as he looked at his
cousin; as he touched his face, touched his
arms.
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“It’s me, Reno,” Tommy said with that rak-
ish smile of his. “Not a ghost.”
“What are you doing here, man?”
“My firm does some security work for the
college, for UNLV, remember?”
“Yeah, I remember.”
“I had a series of meetings over there.
When they were done I thought I’d swing by
and surprise you and Tree. I had no idea you
had gone to Jersey.” Then he smiled again.
“I had no idea I would be the one surprised.”
“Oh, man,” Reno said, looking back at
Trina, who still looked stunned. “You just
don’t know how wonderful it is that you
dropped by.
Isn’t this guy something,
Tree?” He patted his expensive coat lapel.
“You’ve got the knack, boy, you hear me?
You’ve got the knack!”
And Tommy did. Always had a knack for
showing up right on time. It was that way
when they were younger, it was that way
today. But Reno was no idiot, either. He’d
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considered the possibility. If it had been
anybody else coming with that I just
happened to be in the neighborhood line,
Reno would have been suspicious. But not
with Tommy. He trusted Tommy above any
man alive.
Reno sat on the bed beside Trina, looking
at her and back at Tommy and they both
couldn’t stop smiling. They knew it was
forced gaiety. They knew it was their way of
suppressing the too-tragic-to-even-think-
about major matters, in favor of smiling at
the minor ones. But they grabbed that little
light in their darkness, in the form of Tommy
Gabrini, and grabbed it full throttle.
And although Tommy didn’t make it there
in time for Reno’s mother, and his sister was
in seriously bad shape, he had come in time
to help Trina.
And in Reno’s book, if he was honest, and
he was, there could not have been a more
critical time to come.
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Tommy gladly agreed to stay with Trina
while Reno made his way over to ICU to
check on Francine. She was hooked up to a
ventilator, her head wrapped in bandages,
and Reno just stood there, staring at his sis-
ter, silently praying for her recovery.
Dirty, her husband, was seated against the
wall, crying uncontrollably, with MarBeth
and Carmine holding vigil with him. When
Reno finished his prayers he sat beside Dirty
and held vigil too. But eventually he looked
at his brother-in-law and waited for him to
stop crying what Reno saw as nothing more
than tears of guilt.
Dirty eventually turned Reno’s way, but he
was still crying. “I don’t know what I’ll do if I
lose Franny,” he said.
“Where
were
you?”
Reno
asked
pointblank.
Dirty and MarBeth both looked at Reno.
“What?”
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“Where were you,” Reno repeated as if he
were sounding out each word. “When this all
went down, when your wife was taking a bul-
let in the head, when my mother was being
gunned down like a dog in the street, where
the hell were you?”
But MarBeth quickly objected. “How can
you worry about something like that at a
time like this, Reno?”
“Shut the fuck up, MarBeth!” Reno shot
back. “I’m talking to Dirty, not you.” Then
Reno looked at Dirty again. “Where were
you?”
Dirty swallowed hard, fear in his eyes. “I
was in the PaLargio, where you think?”
“Where in the PaLargio?”
“What you mean where? In the PaLargio!”
“The casino?”
Dirty wanted to hem and haw, he wanted
desperately to say no way, but Reno was
nobody’s fool. All he had to do was go to the
PaLargio and check out the video.
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“Yeah,” he admitted. “Around there.”
Reno let out a sharp exhale. “You had bet-
ter pray Franny lives. Because if she doesn’t,
if my baby sister doesn’t pull through and
fully recover, you will answer to me.”
Dirty was now horrified, and defensive.
“But what did I do? You told me to stay in
Vegas with the girls, and I stayed.”
“I didn’t tell you to get drunk and gamble,
you stupid fuck!” Reno was yelling now. “I
didn’t tell you to put my wife in a position
where she had to shoot and kill three
people! How is Trina gonna live with a thing
like that? Hell, I can hardly live with what
I’ve done and I’m a snake in the grass com-
pared to my wife! And you wanna know
what did you do? You wanna ask me
something that fucked up?”
“Excuse me, sir,” a man in a white coat
came in and said. “But you’ll have to tone it
down. This is a hospital.”
93/302
“Who the fuck are you?” Reno asked and
MarBeth rolled her eyes.
The doctor swallowed hard. He and his
staff weren’t fools. All of the private security,
all of the activity, all of the Italians, they had
automatically assumed this was some sort of
mob hit. And he knew he had to tread care-
fully. “I’m a doctor in the ICU,” he said.
“You’re my sister’s doctor?”
“The patient here? Yes, I’m. . . yes.”
“What’s the deal?”
The doctor explained the deal in great de-
tail. He admitted that it wasn’t optimistic
about her prognosis, saying that it was touch
and go at this point, and MarBeth started
crying uncontrollably when the doctor gave
the prognosis. Carmine was holding her,
consoling her, but she refused to be comfor-
ted. Dirty couldn’t be comforted either. It
was just a mess. There were no two-ways
about this. This was just a mess.
94/302
Reno left. Went into the quiet room of the
hospital’s chapel, sat in the back, and closed
his tired eyes. Somehow this felt weird to
Reno, as if this hit was all about him. But
that would be nonsensical since he had noth-
ing to do with what MarBeth did to Eddie Gi-
ancarlo, and any mobster worth their salt
would have known that.
But what about some newbie? Some mob-
ster who wasn’t worth shit, some friend of
Joey Laster’s? But that made no sense to
Reno, either. No friend of some nobody
hood could have penetrated his security at
the PaLargio without being some big-time
hood among the bigs. Like Vito Giancarlo,
for instance. Which meant, Reno knew, if he
retaliated, he would be dragged down into
yet another mob war. But for them to go
after the women, after his mother and sister
and wife, was telling. It was as if they
wanted to make certain he was dragged back
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in. They wanted to make certain he sought
his retribution.
But that was their game. They wanted
Reno to play their game.
He prayed for his mother’s eternity,
prayed for his sister’s recovery, and left the
chapel in search of Tommy. To talk this
thing through. Because Tommy was the only
man in whom he trusted enough to bear his
soul.
By the time he got back to Trina’s room,
and saw that she was asleep, he and Tommy
sat down in chairs beside each other. For the
longest time not a word was spoken, just the
soft hum of Trina’s snoring, as they both sat
in amazement at how peacefully she slept.
And they took their own counsel.
After a long, serene time had passed, Reno
looked at his cousin. “Where’s Sal Luca?” he
asked.
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“In Seattle. Getting on my last nerve. He’s
my baby brother, and I love him to death,
but he drives me crazy, Reno.”
Reno wanted to smile at that, but didn’t
have the energy. He then leaned forward,
rubbed his hands together, exhaled.
“Settle down, Ree,” Tommy said. “She’s
going to be all right.”
“Physically, yeah. She’ll be fine. But I
don’t know, Tommy. She had to kill three
people. I had to ice one in my entire lifetime,
one man, and I’m still reeling from that.
How in the world is she going to come back
from killing three?”
“Easier than you,” Tommy said.
Reno looked back at him. Tommy was
seated there, his legs crossed, looking his
usual elegant self. “What’s that supposed to
mean?”
Tommy hesitated, his bright green eyes
sparkling with revelations. But he chose his
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words carefully. “She knows how to see it for
what it is,” he said.
“And I don’t?”
“No, you don’t. But with Trina, I think she
understands she had no choice. She had to
kill those men. You had to do what you had
to do too, but you can’t see it that way. You
blame yourself. No matter how ludicrous,
you always blame yourself. Trina hates that
she was put in that horrible position, but
she’s a strong lady, Reno. She doesn’t dwell
on what she cannot change, she accepts it.
Yes, she was put in a horrible position, but
what can she do? She didn’t put herself
there. She didn’t tell those gunmen to come
to the penthouse and try to kill her. She un-
derstands that. You never have.”
Reno stared at his cousin. “I pray you’re
right, Tommy.”
“I’m right. I’m not saying this won’t
change her forever, it will. But she’ll still be
Tree. And if God can forgive her, she’ll
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probably figure she might as well forgive her-
self. But you, Reno, never get to that second
part.
You
figure
you
don’t
deserve
forgiving.”
“I don’t,” Reno said. Then he shook his
head, the emotions too raw. He changed the
subject. “What’s with security?” he asked. “I
assume you were the one who took care of
it?”
“I did.”
“But where are my people? I don’t recog-
nize any of these guys.”
“They all belong to me,” Tommy said.
Tommy, a former cop, owned two successful
restaurants in the Seattle area, but his main
source of revenue was his security firm, one
of the best in the country. “I checked the
videotape before I came to the hospital,” he
went on. “Those gunmen came in, with their
own passkey, through the basement, Reno.”
Reno was astounded. “Are you serious?”
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“They came in, all concealed in ski masks,
I mean it was out of a horror movie. And
they were able to triple-passcode through
your elaborately intricate security that I per-
sonally had installed, so I know it’s elabor-
ate, and made their way to that penthouse.”
“There’s a breach?”
“A major breach. Only a handful of your
security people have access to that basement
passkey, Reno, and even less know the triple
passcodes. So until we find out the source of
that breach, my people handle all security.”
Tommy looked at Reno. “Agreed?”
“Hell yeah,” Reno said as if that went
without saying.
Then he leaned back, ran his hand through
his already ruffled mop of brown hair. He
looked over at his sleeping wife. “This thing
had me worried from the beginning, Tom, to
be honest with you. When Carmine told me
what MarBeth had done, and now this. I
don’t understand it. Why would Vito hit the
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PaLargio? He knew I had nothing to do with
what happened to Eddie, he knew that. So-
mething ain’t right about it, man. I mean, I
knew he wanted revenge---”
Tommy looked at Reno. “He said that?”
“Didn’t have to. He gave me some song
and dance about how much he loves
MarBeth and how he’s our godfather and
would never do a thing to harm a hair on our
head.”
“You don’t believe him?”
“Hell na’ll. Vito’s not reliable. He’s the
one who gave me that bad intel on Frank
Partanna, don’t forget that. He’s the one
who claimed he didn’t even know Partanna
had a son and that lack of information
caused a gotdamn mob war.”
“So,” Tommy asked, “what are you going
to do?”
Reno looked at Trina again. “Keep her
safe,” he said. “No matter what.”
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“You think she can be safe at the
PaLargio?”
“With your people surrounding the joint,
I’m sure she would. But after Ma’s funeral
I’ve got to get her away from here, at least
until I can figure out what in the hell is going
on here.”
Tommy was nodding. “That was my re-
commendation, too. In fact, I think you and
Tree should come to Seattle. Until we can
figure this all out, like you said.”
Carmine came into the room, his cell
phone in his hand.
“What’s the matter?” Reno asked. “Franny
okay?”
“Yeah, yeah,” Carmine said, “there’s no
change with Franny.” He extended his cell
phone. “Phone call for you.”
“For me? Who is it?”
Carmine hesitated. “Vito Giancarlo.”
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Reno and Tommy looked at each other.
Then Reno took the phone, stood up, and
walked toward the back side of the room.
Tommy looked at Carmine as Reno spoke
on the phone. “What’s that about?” he asked
Carmine. “Why would Vito be calling Reno
after what’s happened?”
Carmine shook his head. “He wouldn’t tell
me nothing. Said he had to speak to Reno
and had to speak to him now. I didn’t like
his tone and I told him so. I said you wanna
speak to Reno so bad, why didn’t you call
Reno on his own gotdamn phone? I mean
the nerve of that guy. But he doesn’t have
Reno’s number, he says, except his number
at the PaLargio. And nobody’s answering at
the PaLargio.”
Tommy pinched the bridge of his nose.
“It’s getting crazy out there.”
“Tell me about it.”
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Reno killed the call, walked back over to
his chair, and handed the cell phone back to
Carmine.
“What did he want?” Carmine asked.
Reno sat back down. Shook his head as if
he was still amazed himself. “He said he had
nothing to do with the PaLargio hit.”
“What?” Tommy asked, astounded.
“He must take us for fools!” Carmine an-
grily declared. “Who else would have made
that kind of hit, on you of all people, on your
wife and your dear mother? Who else? And
he just happened to make the hit after his
own son gets capped and capped by your sis-
ter? The nerve of that guy!”
Reno exhaled, ran his hand through his
ruffled hair again. “Something’s wrong,” he
said again.
“Hell yeah something’s wrong,” Carmine
said. “Vito Giancarlo’s wrong! I say we hit
back tonight, Reno, and hit hard. Get him
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and his lieutenants and any other fucker
crazy enough to be associated with him!”
But Reno was shaking his head. “No,” he
said. “That’s their game. Somebody’s trying
to rope me into their game.”
“So you believe Vito didn’t do it?” Tommy
asked him.
“I don’t know,” Reno said, heartfelt. “But
the last time I went after a mob boss half-
cocked, with bad information, caused me my
own son. I’m not making that mistake
twice.”
“So you and Tree will come with me?”
“For a few days, yeah, after Tree gets out
and after I get Ma safely in the ground.”
Reno’s voice choked on those last words. All
three men, in fact, looked solemn at that
pronouncement.
Then Reno exhaled. “I need help,” he
admitted.
“You got help,” Carmine said. “You got
me.”
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“You and MarBeth are staying here with
Franny.”
Carmine frowned. “Ah, Reno, come on.
Dirty’s her husband. Why can’t he stay with
her?”
“Because you and me both know Dirty
ain’t worth a shit. I want you to stay here
too, guard her night and day, Carmine, until
she recovers. I should be back by then.”
Then Reno looked at Tommy. “But I’m go-
ing to need help. Serious help. Firepower I
can trust.”
At first Tommy didn’t understand. “I told
you my men will handle security.”
“That’s not what I mean. I’m talking a
personal bodyguard. A tactician, Tommy.”
Tommy frowned trying to comprehend
what Reno was saying and what that look on
Reno’s mug really meant. He needs help,
okay, he needs help, Tommy’s mind was say-
ing. But when it hit, it hit hard. “No, Reno,
not her.”
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“I need her, Tommy.”
“Need who?” Carmine asked, but they ig-
nored him. This was really a two-man con-
versation. And Tommy was shaking his
head.
“Not Shanks, please don’t tell me you’re
roping Shanks into this.”
“I need her, Tommy.”
Tommy hesitated. It had been nearly
three months since he’d seen or heard from
her. Three long months. Surely Reno under-
stood what he was asking of him.
But Reno was persistent. “I wouldn’t go
there if I didn’t have to, Tommy, you know
that. But something is telling me that this
boogey man is the biggest, baddest boogey
man we’ve ever faced. I need her.”
Tommy just sat there quietly, suddenly
looking drawn it seemed to Reno. And then
he seemed to resign himself to the fact that it
had to be so. “I don’t even know where she is
right now,” he said.
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Reno hesitated. He knew the pain just the
mention of her name caused Tommy.
But it couldn’t be helped.
“I know how to reach her,” Reno said.
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FOUR
The next night, when Tommy Gabrini
drove his sports Mercedes onto his circular
driveway and saw her car parked along the
slant, he literally stopped in his tracks before
he pulled on up and killed his engine. Reno
had said that he would get in touch with her,
but Tommy never dreamed it would be this
soon. Or that she would just show up at his
place as if nothing had happened.
He returned from Vegas yesterday, with
the hospital still running tests on Trina and
Franny still in intensive care. Reno spent al-
most all of his time at Trina’s bedside. When
he wasn’t at her side he was either checking
in on Franny, or planning his own mother’s
funeral. Sometimes Tommy wondered how
Reno held up at all. But he did, day in and
day out. Tommy, in fact, had yet to meet a
stronger man.
The only reason Tommy left Vegas before
the funeral was because he had to meet with
a corporate client in Portland whose CEO,
the very paranoid former head of Burton-
Bronston, was requesting a monumental
amount of surveillance work from Gabrini
Security. But after those drawn-out meet-
ings were over, however, Tommy wasn’t in-
terested in staying the night. He had driven
nearly three straight hours just to make it
back home. Now he wanted nothing more
than to go to bed and get some sleep. It was
nine at night, the Seattle sky was gray and
overcast, and he was so exhausted that he
didn’t even bother to invite one of his female
friends over to warm his bed.
But now he had to deal with her. And as
usual when she reappeared in his life, a part
of him was so elated he could hardly contain
his thrill. But another part of him, lately per-
haps the bigger part, was disconcerted.
He got out of his car and pressed his
keypad, the lights flashing three times as his
car locked then alarmed and then sputtered
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to sleep. From the flood light that illumin-
ated his big, quiet home, he noticed that her
car, a Lexus he had purchased for her last
year, had a dent the size of a tennis ball near
the back bumper. He rubbed the groove,
surprised that she hadn’t mentioned any ac-
cident. But then again, he thought, as he
headed across the driveway to his front door,
how could she? He hadn’t heard from her in
months.
When he entered the foyer of his colonial-
style home and rounded the corner to the liv-
ing area, he saw her. She was standing at the
back of the massive room in front of the
floor-to-ceiling window that overlooked the
Pacific Ocean.
He stopped all movement when he saw
her. She was just standing there, staring out
at the waves as they careened up and
splashed back down in a wild float across the
ocean, her tall, slim, exquisite body like a sil-
houette of magnificence even before she
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turned around.
And when she turned
around, and Tommy saw that face that still
dominated his dreams, his heart hammered
against his chest.
He continued walking toward her, his
movements not as steady now, but his eyes
refusing to leave hers. She was his gold
standard, the one woman he compared all
other women to, but he couldn’t keep letting
her do this to him.
As soon as ShoShawna Shanks turned and
saw him standing there, staring at her with
those piercing blue eyes of his, her face be-
came flushed. He was her gold standard too,
the man she compared all other men to, but
the only thing she always seemed able to give
to him was heartache and grief.
When Reno phoned and told her to get to
Seattle, that he needed her firepower, she
didn’t ask questions. She packed up her bags
and was ready to go. But then she just sat
there. On paper she was a firearms expert.
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But in truth she was nothing more than a
hired gun.
She, in fact, had just come off of a rescue
mission that went horribly bad, and where
she lost two of her people. She had been
holed up in a hotel trying to recover from
that very mission when she got the call from
Reno. At first she was gung-ho, ready to get
that adrenalin rush again. But then she was
paralyzed with fear, terrified of making an-
other mistake. She almost phoned Reno
back, especially since he said Tommy’s place
would be their meeting point.
Tommy, she had said as she sat in that
lonely hotel room. She wanted to see him so
desperately, to feel his strong, protective
arms around her, to be a part of his life
again. But after their last time together,
when he gave her his ultimatum, she was
worried that he wouldn’t want to have any-
thing more to do with her.
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She put on her best smile as he began
moving toward her. And her heart was
pounding too. He looked so elegant, she
thought, in his double-breasted Italian silk
suit and patent leather Ferragamo moccas-
ins. His wondrously thick hair was piled
around that thick-jawed, gorgeous face, and
his tall, lean body still looked as firm and
sexy as it had when he first caught her eye
four years ago.
Their eyes locked as he approached her,
and for a brief moment she wanted to run.
She wasn’t sure if she could deal with any
more emotion right now. But she didn’t run.
She attempted to smile instead.
“Hi,” she said when he arrived at her side,
her smile more unnerving than joyous.
Although her joy was usually contagious,
Tommy wasn’t trying to smile this time. Not
this time. Not when he was too inwardly
angry at his physical reaction to her. Already
his eyes couldn’t stop scanning her body.
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Already his penis was throbbing at the mere
thought of what hid between those long, lus-
cious legs of hers. He buttoned his Armani
suit coat, and slipped his hands into the
pockets of his pleated pants, in an effort to
hide his expanding reaction.
“I was beginning to wonder if you would
get back from Portland at all tonight,” she
said.
“You should have phoned,” he replied
dryly. It was that face. That gorgeous,
panther-like, dark-brown face that always
drew him in. Big, almond, African eyes, full
African lips, long hair in rolls of curls on one
side of her face, and a straight, silky drop-
down on the other side. She had that long
neck and those high cheek bones that gave
her a look so sophisticated, so aristocratic
that he always felt as if he was in the pres-
ence of royalty whenever he was near her.
She was once his queen. Once his woman.
A year ago he asked her to marry him.
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But she turned him down cold.
He leaned against the window pane, trying
his best to look at her eyes rather than her
body, trying his best to not want her so des-
perately. “How did you know I was in Port-
land?” he asked, deciding against small talk.
“I have my spies,” she said with that per-
fect smile of hers. Those beautiful white
teeth against her smooth black skin just
dazzled him.
Her look turned serious when he still
wouldn’t return her forced gaiety. “Irene
told me,” she admitted. Irene Burk was
Tommy’s secretary for nearly a decade, and
of all the women Tommy had had in that
time, and he’d had many, Shawna was still
her favorite.
“So Reno calls and you comes,” he said to
her, a slight edge of bitterness in his voice.
Shawna caught that edge. “He said he
needed me,” she explained. “Reno’s a good
guy. I look after the good guys.”
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“By being a button for the mob?”
“By getting rid of the bad guys.”
Tommy considered her. He hated the fact
that she hired herself out as some modern
day mercenary, working for the government,
the mob, foreign governments even: anybody
anywhere whom she deemed worthy of her
hire. He used to worry about her to no end.
He still worried about her. Some nights to
this day he’d wake up in cold sweats worry-
ing about her. The next night, however, he’d
have a woman, it didn’t really matter who, in
his bed.
But he also knew that her job was as much
a part of her as his job was a part of him.
And he’d never, not ever, try to take that
away from her.
“What did Reno tell you?” he asked her,
noticing how that tiny mole she used to have
just below the right tip of her bottom lip, a
mole he loved, was gone.
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“He told me about the hit on the PaLargio.
Told me about his mother and sister.” She
looked Tommy dead in the eyes. “And how
you saved his wife’s life.”
She always seemed so impressed with
him. She always made him want to be a bet-
ter man around her. “And what did you
say?” he asked her.
“Damn straight he saved her life,” she said
with that half-cocked smile of hers he loved
to see. “That’s Tommy. That’s what he does.”
Tommy smiled. She always, somehow,
managed to make him smile. But he couldn’t
keep letting her bounce in and out of his life,
especially after his ultimatum to her three
months ago. He told her then that they
couldn’t keep doing this. She’d already
turned down his marriage proposal nine
months prior to his ultimatum. But she kept
dropping by, popping in and out of his life,
anytime she needed reassurance or a man or
whatever, and like the sucker he sometimes
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felt he was for her, he kept letting her back
in. Three months ago he told her enough
was enough. His heart couldn’t take it any
longer. He told her they either committed
exclusively to each other, and eventually
started looking toward marriage, or it was
over.
He woke up the next morning, and she was
gone.
Now, three months later, she was back. To
help Reno, he knew that was her main reas-
on. But Reno wasn’t due in Vegas for another
couple days, and she knew it.
He was trying to get her out of his system.
He was trying to once and for all go on with
his life. But how in the world could he ever
do that, he wondered, if she kept coming
back?
He had to treat this return as business.
And nothing but. To protect his own heart.
But almost immediately he failed.
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“I’m glad Reno knew how to get in touch
with you,” he found himself saying, that bit-
ter bite still in his tone, “because I sure as
hell don’t.”
She turned back toward the window and
the high-arching waves of the Pacific Ocean.
“It was supposed to be over between us,” she
said, and then looked at him again.
“Remember?”
Tommy didn’t respond. He had never
been able to admit that he and Shawna were
no longer together. Not that they ever had
an exclusive relationship. They never did.
She was, in the beginning, the same as all of
his other ladies. And he gave her the same
spiel up front: no commitments ever, no de-
mands ever, no jealousy over any of his other
ladies ever. She saw whomever she pleased,
and he did the same. That was always the
way Tommy rolled and every one of his bed
partners knew it. And for the first three
years of their relationship, that was the way
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she rolled too. He, in fact, loved her daunt-
ing independence.
Until she slowly but surely started becom-
ing his favorite. First it was in bed. He star-
ted wanting her more and more until no one
else could come close to satisfying him the
way she did. And then he started thinking
about her, worrying about her, phoning her
constantly whenever she was out of his
sight. And he became more protective of
her, and more disconcerted when he thought
she was seeing some other guy. For over a
year he wasn’t seeing anybody but her and he
didn’t want anybody but her. He even did
something he declared he’d never do and
asked her to marry him. Her turndown al-
most crippled him. And he declared then to
never fall in love again.
Problem was, he had never fallen out of
love with her.
He pushed himself away from the win-
dowpane and headed toward his huge bar in
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his massive great room. “Want something to
drink?” he asked her.
She looked at him. She remembered the
night he gave her that ultimatum. They were
at this very house, in his bedroom. She
began putting back on her clothes. Tommy
got out of bed, put on his silk robe, and
walked over and sat on the edge of the bed.
She stepped into her dress and then came to
him. He zipped her up, the way he always
did, but this time he pulled her down onto
his lap, holding her.
For the longest time they sat that way,
their eyes closed. For Tommy it was her
wonderful scent, every curve of her body, her
smile and twinkling eyes and sincerity that
he knew he was going to miss. For Shawna,
any illusions about Tommy Gabrini were un-
thinkable. He was just a guy, she was still
trying to convince herself. Just a man.
She eventually stood up. He stood up too.
They stared into each other’s eyes. “Bye,
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Tommy,” she finally said, and then fell
against his chest. When he didn’t wrap his
arms around her again, she moved back and
looked at him.
“I’ll be back this way in a couple of
months,” she said. “I’ll see you then.”
But he was shaking his head. “I don’t
think so, Shawnie,” he said.
Shawna stared at him. “You don’t think
so?”
“I don’t think so.”
“I’m doing the best I can, Tommy.”
“Not good enough, kid.”
“Well what do you want me to do? Give up
my job, give up the biggest part of who I
am?”
Tommy shook his head. “And then blame
me for it? Not on your life. That’s why this
game we’re playing, this same time, next
month malarkey, has got to stop. For both
our sakes.”
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Shawna swallowed hard. “So you’re will-
ing to call it quits? To never see me again?
Is that what you’re telling me, Tommy?”
“What do you expect me to tell you?”
Tommy yelled. “I’m pushing forty, Shawna!
I’m getting too old for this shit! We’ve been
going around this mulberry bush for too
damn long! When you turned down my mar-
riage proposal, that should have been the
end of it then. But we didn’t even skip a
beat. The very next month you were back in
my bed. But I can’t keep doing this,
Shawna.”
She saw his hesitation, she felt his wrench-
ing pain. But she still didn’t believe it when
he said it. But he said it.
“It’s over,” he said. “That’s what I’m
telling you.”
At first her look was doubtful, of that yeah,
right, you know you still want me air of con-
fidence. But when his look didn’t change,
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and their usual teary-eyed goodbye didn’t
materialize, it was her look that changed.
And she didn’t want to engage him any
longer. Didn’t want him to say words that
she knew he would never take back.
Couldn’t bear to know that he would never
hold her again, never be there for her again.
When he was all she had.
So she left. She walked right out.
Now, three months later, she was follow-
ing him to the bar and sitting behind the
thick bar counter. Anxious, once again, to
change the subject.
“How did it go in Portland?” she asked
him.
Tommy prepared drinks. He knew what
she liked. “It went fine,” he said, not looking
at her.
“Sal Luca tells me you’re thinking about
opening a restaurant there. That true?”
His trip to Portland was completely related
to his security firm, but he never discussed
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that side of his business enterprise with any-
one. Not even with his baby brother.
Tommy sat her drink, a Gin Rickey, in
front of her. Tommy had the same.
He looked at her, looked at the way her
thin hand wrapped around the glass as if she
was protecting it. “Why are you here, Shaw-
nie?” he asked her, and then looked from the
glass into her eyes.
A deep sadness crept over her pretty face,
a sadness that caught Tommy short.
She sipped from her drink, avoided his
eyes. “Reno asked me to come,” she said.
“Reno asked you to come in a couple days,
after the funeral, when he would be in town.”
“So I came early. What’s the big deal?”
When Tommy didn’t say anything, but
continued to stare at her, the pain crept back
into her big, brown eyes. She tried to dis-
miss it, but she couldn’t. “I lost two of my
guys,” she said.
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Tommy didn’t say anything at first. He
should have known she wasn’t worried about
anything but that damn crazy-ass job of
hers. But he understood her anguish. “What
happened?”
“Rescue mission. We were a team. Eleven
strong. I was team leader. We were sup-
posed to get in, get out, it was all mapped out
like I always map it out. Clean, fast, success-
ful, that’s how I run any operation. And
everything went according to plan. Until it
didn’t.”
She swallowed hard, sipped from her
drink. “I forgot . . .” She looked down, at her
drink. Fought back tears. “I forgot to pull
the pin.” She said this and looked up at
Tommy, as if he somehow could undo her
memories. His heart ached for her.
“What happened?” he asked her, his voice
now soft, soothing.
“I tossed the grenade,” she said, “but I for-
got to pull the pin. Me, the team leader, the
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experienced hand, forgot to pull the
gotdamn pin! And they came at us, oh how
they came at us, with all guns blazing. It was
amazing, incredible that only two of us fell.”
She looked those big browns up at Tommy
again. Tommy’s heart pounded against his
chest. “But it was my fault,” she said, nod-
ding her head. “All mine. No way to spin it
as anything but my fault.”
Tommy stared at her. “Was this the first
time you took casualties?”
She nodded her head, sipped more wine.
“Where the fault was all mine,” she said,
“yep. Very first time. I’ve had moments
where we encountered the unexpected en-
emy and took a casualty here, a casualty
there. But never when I was the unexpected
enemy. I never took on unwinnable fights,
you see. If there wasn’t a clear path to vic-
tory, I turned them down. Always. I wasn’t
risking my life or the lives of my men if it
wasn’t clear cut and possible. All I had to do
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was follow the plan. My men followed it. To
the letter they followed it. But for me to be
the one to. . .” She shook her head, drained
down more gin.
Tommy knew her. She would hate him if
he coddled her, if he immediately pulled her
into his arms, although that was exactly what
he wanted to do. And that, he also knew,
was the last thing he needed to do. Because
tomorrow she’d be gone again, back to that
life he hated for her. And he’d be left broken,
depressed, and angrily fucking every lady in
his big black book, wishing it was her.
“Why are you here?” he decided to ask
her. She didn’t want him to coddle her, and
he wasn’t about to risk doing it.
She hesitated. She hated being vulnerable,
absolutely hated it, but every time she came
to Tommy that was exactly how she was. In
a state so vulnerable, in fact, that nobody but
Tommy could make her feel better.
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“I’m here,” she said, “because I wanted to
see you again.” Then she frowned. “No,
that’s not true.” Because it went further than
a mere want. “I needed to see you again,”
she clarified, her bright brown eyes lifting up
and looking him dead into his bright green
ones. “Spend the night with you again.”
Tommy’s heart rammed against his chest.
Those devastatingly gorgeous eyes of hers al-
ways did him in. Normally, through the
years, he didn’t mix words with her. Just
took her to his bed. Gladly took her. A
stolen night here and there with her, once a
month or so with her, was better than noth-
ing. But he was getting older now. He
wasn’t sure if he could continue to handle
some drive-by romance with a sweet young
thang like ShoShawna Shanks.
Especially with ShoShawna.
“Won’t that set us back?” he asked her, his
heart still hammering.
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She gave Tommy that honesty he loved.
“Yes,” she said. “Of course it will.”
“And when Reno’s done with your ser-
vices, you’ll answer the next call and be off to
the next dangerous hot spot again.”
A wariness came over her big eyes. She
looked out of the window. “I doubt if there’ll
be a next call,” she said.
Tommy stared at her. “Of course there
will,” he said. “You rescued the victims. Like
you always do.”
“I lost two of my men,” she said, “and all
three of the rescue subjects: a woman and
her two children. Her very young children.”
When she looked back at Tommy, and he
saw how actual tears were in her eyes, a wo-
man who never cried in his presence before,
he hurried from behind the counter.
She stood to her feet and hurried to meet
him halfway, her heart hammering too, as
she fell into his arms.
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For the longest time they held onto each
other. Until her tears had ceased from fall-
ing. It was only then that she allowed herself
to pull back from him and look him in the
eyes. “But you see,” she said, smiling and at-
tempting awkward levity, “I saved myself. I
panicked, cost the lives of five people, but I
saved myself. I’m not a total wipeout.” And
then her smile left and the tears fought hard
to return.
“Look at me,” Tommy said, tilting her
chin. She looked at him. “You’ll never know
how pleased and proud and happy I am that
you saved yourself. You understand?”
Shawna smiled through her tears. That
was why she really came. Because Tommy,
in truth, was the only human being to seem
to give a damn about her. Men loved her
body, thought she had that look they liked,
but Tommy loved her. Not her body, not her
looks. Her. Warts and all.
“Yes,” she said. “I understand.”
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They stood there for moments longer, star-
ing into each other eyes.
“Have you had your dinner?” he asked her.
She smiled, even chuckled. That was
Tommy. “No, daddy,” she said, “I haven’t
had my dinner yet.”
“Get out of those gotdamn formal clothes,”
he said, moving away from her and toward
the kitchen. “Put on something more com-
fortable. I’ll fix us something to eat.”
“Yes, sir,” Shawna said with a salute, as
she headed upstairs to his bedroom. Be-
cause she knew, like he knew, like their his-
tory together knew, that that dinner wasn’t
the only thing he would be eating before this
night was through.
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FIVE
Reno and Trina were no longer at the hos-
pital, but was temporarily holed up in one of
Reno’s safe houses just outside of Vegas. It
was small on purpose, to better control se-
curity, and was one of only two houses on a
tiny, dead-end street. Reno also owned the
other house, the first on the street, where the
security apparatus was set up. Only it wasn’t
Reno’s security now, but Tommy’s. And un-
til they could figure out just what happened
at the PaLargio, it would remain Tommy’s
people only.
Reno had thought to move Trina into a
suite on the south wing of the PaLargio, on
the exact opposite end, and some twenty
floors below, from where that penthouse
massacre, as the papers called it, had taken
place. But he nixed that idea. He had mis-
calculated already when he thought Vito
would hit the family compound in Jersey.
Taking her back to the PaLargio, a place he
had thought was rock hard secure, would be
too risky. This was Trina’s life they were
talking about. He wasn’t taking any chances.
Reno had been meeting with various mem-
bers of his team, including his board of dir-
ectors and his accountants. Now it was
pushing ten at night and he was still having
meeting. He was seated on the sofa in the
livingroom of the small house, blanketed by
security, and seated across from him this
time, in a line of chairs, was his team of pub-
lic relations lawyers: all with stacks of papers
seated atop their briefcases, all making
pitches on how best, in the eyes of the public,
for Reno to proceed. Seated beside Reno was
Lee Jones, his general manager.
“So the consensus,” Reno said, leaned back
in a slouched position, too tired at this point
to care how it looked, “is that we shut it
down?”
“Right,” his lead attorney said. “Keep it
down for about a month, two months on the
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outside, long enough for the public to have
moved on. And then we reopen.”
Lee was shaking his head, disagreeing with
the attorney’s assessment. “That makes no
sense, Reno,” he said. “You’ve answered
every question the Feds had to ask, Katrina
has answered every question, Ritchie and
Carmine and MarBeth have answered every
question. They’re going to clear you and
your family of any wrong-doing, I have that
conclusion on great authority straight from
the Sheriff himself. There’s no reason to
close now. Especially financially. And yeah,
the public may move on in a couple of
months, sure they may. But they may keep
moving on and forget to return to the PaLar-
gio. I’ve seen it happen.”
“I hardly think that we should be con-
cerned about that at this point, Reno,” the
lead attorney said with an obnoxious smile,
his voice always modulated, super-calm, a
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quality that drove Reno insane. Show some
life, some passion, something.
“Because the fact remains,” the lead attor-
ney continued, “that there was a horrible
shooting at that place that took the life of
your mother; that has your sister still fight-
ing for her life; that has your wife traumat-
ized. The idea that it would be business as
usual after something like that is a little
amazing to me, quite frankly.”
“Would be downright disrespectful,” said
his second-chair attorney. “I agree with Carl
that we should shut down for a time.”
The third attorney nodded. “Me too,” he
said.
“Not me,” Reno said, siding with Lee. “I
understand how you’re looking at it. You’re
looking at it from a public relations angle, I
get that. But I have to look at it from a long
term business angle. We were already bleed-
ing revenues, gentlemen. And I don’t mean
in drips. Although the casino is still thriving,
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the hotel is only at a third capacity and the
lounges are almost deserted-looking late at
night. People are gambling here, may get a
drink at the bar here in the early hours of the
night, but they aren’t staying here. They’re
going to our competitors to stay. If we close
now, that casino revenue will be gone, the
hotel and lounge revenues will be gone,
thousands of employees will be out of a job.
And it’ll be as if we’re confirming that this
place is tainted, and is closed because of the
taint. I’m with Lee on this one. Our custom-
ers may never come back.” Reno shook his
head. “No, gentlemen. That’s a risk too high
for me to take. I can’t take that risk.”
“But have you considered your wife?” his
lead attorney asked.
Reno’s jaw tightened. How dare that as-
shole mention his wife, as if Reno wasn’t
considering her every moment of every
second of every day? He had already de-
cided that Trina was going to Tommy’s place
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in Seattle to recover, and he was going to be
by her side there, until she was herself again
and until he could figure out the who, what
and why of that “penthouse massacre.” But
that was none of the business of some punk
lawyer who was going to get paid no matter
what decision Reno made. The fewer people
who knew his and Trina’s whereabouts, the
better.
“Don’t worry about my wife,” he warned.
The lawyer suddenly realized his blunder.
“I didn’t mean any disrespect, Mr. Gabrini,”
he clarified, but Reno had already moved on.
“What about advertisers?” Reno asked,
and as soon as he asked it, he heard his wife
scream.
Reno and Lee were up and running before
the team of lawyers knew what hit them.
Reno ran down the hall and slung open the
door of the bedroom, his heart about to go
into some kind of cardiac arrest, until he saw
her. She was still asleep, her head turning
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side to side, her mouth intermittently mum-
bling and screaming, still caught up in her
nightmare.
“Get rid of the suits,” Reno ordered Lee as
he moved toward the bed, “and you can go
too. I’ll get with you in the morning.”
“Right,” Lee said, glancing at Trina, won-
dering if she was ever going to be all right,
and then he left, closing the door behind
him.
Reno sat on the bed beside his wife.
“Tree,” he said, gently shaking her.
When she did open her eyes, and saw that
it was him and not her nightmare, she lifted
up and fell into his arms.
Reno closed his eyes tightly as he held
her. “It’s all right,” he said. “It won’t be like
this for much longer, babe, I promise you.”
He knew he could have let her go back to
Seattle with Tommy, while he stayed in
town, took care of business, attended his
mother’s funeral, and met up with her later.
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But Tommy had meetings and could only be
there for her just so much. And that would
have been unacceptable. He wasn’t about to
allow anyone other than himself or Tommy
to be his wife’s protector at this point. Espe-
cially when he knew so little about what kind
of war, just that it was a war, that was being
waged against him. He had no choice, none
at all, but to keep her here.
He then looked at her, placed his hands on
the sides of her face. “It was just a dream,
babe,” he said. “Just a nightmare. But we’ll
be out of here soon. You’ll get some fresh
air, have a change of pace, you’ll be okay.”
“Are we protected, Reno?” Trina asked her
husband.
“Oh, yeah, we are. Completely. Tommy’s
people are all over this joint.”
Trina smiled at his choice of words. “Not
your people?”
Reno nodded. “Not until I get a handle on
what happened here, no. I’m playing it
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super-cautious, babe. And that’s why,” he
said, lying her back down, “I need you to get
your rest. Tomorrow will be a new day and
after Ma’s funeral we’ll be out of here for a
spell. Just you and me.”
Trina smiled. “I’ll like that, Reno,” she
said, touching his wrinkled shirt. Then she
frowned.
“What is it, sweetheart?”
“You look rumpled,” Trina said, still fum-
bling with his shirt lapel. “I’m not taking
care of you right.”
“Oh, babe,” Reno said smilingly, leaning
down to her, his forehead pressing hers.
“Nobody, and I mean no human being on the
face of this earth, could take better care of
me. It’s an impossibility, Tree.”
“You’re just saying that.”
“Okay, keep talking, I’ll be showing you in
a minute.”
She smiled, understanding clearly what he
meant.
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He looked down, his lips a mere wisp from
hers. “Because as soon as you’re back on
your feet again, and have your strength
again, that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
Show you just how well you take care of
me.”
Trina stared at him. It was all so different
now. Because she knew how he felt now.
She, too, had blood on her hands and she
knew how it felt.
“Don’t worry, Reno,” she said, her hand
now tracing his gorgeous face. “I’ll look out
for you.”
Reno chuckled. “I know you will, sweet-
heart,” he said, and they continued to stare
at each other. Soon Reno’s stare once again
moved down, from her eyes to her mouth,
and Trina, too, began to feel the heat. And
when his mouth moved ever so gently down
to hers, and kissed her tenderly, and pas-
sionately, she wrapped herself into his arms,
and returned his passion.
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But she knew Reno wasn’t taking it to the
next level. Not yet. Not here. Not until
after they were safely away from Nevada, a
place she knew Reno now thought of as the
scene of the crime, and all of this craziness
that swirled around them.
And she was right. He removed his clothes
and got in bed with her. He pulled her into
his arms, and kissed her again. But then he
held her, comforted her, stayed right there
with her, for the remainder of the night.
At that same time, in Seattle, Tommy and
Shawna had their dinner, a steak and broc-
coli medley, and afterwards Tommy walked
around the table and pulled back her chair.
His eyes were hooded and lustful, as he
could not get over how sexy she looked in his
long-sleeved, oversized dress shirt she had
chosen, as she always did, to change into.
As usual, too, she had only the middle sec-
tion buttoned, teasing him with her shapely
thighs below and her half-exposed, big
144/302
breasts above. And when she stood up, he
took her hand and escorted her upstairs, no
questions asked, no second thoughts al-
though he knew they both should have had
plenty, to his bedroom.
He now sat on the edge of his bed, the last
of his clothing already removed, as he lifted
his shirt over her head, rendering her naked
too. When he opened his legs, with his erec-
ted manhood bidding her to come, she
came.
As soon as he touched her, as soon as he
pulled her against his ribbed stomach and
wrapped her into his powerful arms, she felt
that surge of excitement that only he could
make her feel.
She closed her eyes as he rubbed her
down, as his mouth found hers and began
kissing her with that slow intensity she
loved. It was always their first line of con-
tact, mouth to mouth, and it always felt so
good to them both that they lingered there.
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For the longest time they lingered there.
Until the feel of her big breasts flopped
against his chest, rubbing against him,
caused him to leave her mouth and find her
nipples.
Her body arched backwards as he ravaged
her breasts, nibbling on her with such an ap-
petite that she found her hands in his hair to
ease the intensity of the delight. All she
could feel were her nipples expanding under
his expert tongue, until they were swollen
with pleasure.
And then he lifted her higher, until her
legs were across his shoulder and her body
was leaned back in his arms, her buttocks in
his hands, her womanhood in his face. Ex-
actly where he wanted it.
He ate her greedily, the aroma of her so in-
toxicating that he couldn’t stop eating her.
And she didn’t want him to stop, as his
tongue burned her clit and scorched her so
deep inside that her abdomen constricted,
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causing her body to move up and down like a
cresting wave. She found herself panting
rather than breathing.
And when he was finished, when he had
pleasured her so long that her insides were
red with heat, she got down, on her
haunches, and began pleasuring him.
“Ah, Shawnie,” he said as soon as her
sweet lips touched his manhood and she took
him all in.
His lean, muscular body
stretched out backwards onto the bed as the
intensity now seared him. His manhood
began to swell to where the veins began to
strain, as she moved up and down his ridges
and curves like a woman who knew exactly
what she was doing.
Shawna did him unlike any other woman
ever could. She didn’t speed-suck him, as
women her age, those twenty-somethings, al-
ways did him. It was as if they wanted to
prove to him that they were good at head or
generally good in bed, when they, in
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Tommy’s opinion, weren’t very good at
either.
But Shawna took it slow, moving her
mouth over his rod with an almost rhythmic
lick and suck, lick and suck, a grab and
tease-bite, up and down, top to bottom, until
he could feel the feeling to the roots of his
hair. He placed his arms over his forehead
as she did him, as she kneeled down between
his legs and made him feel like that rod was
life food to her.
Tears wanted to come into his eyes as he
felt the tenderness, the love in her mouth.
He didn’t know what it was, couldn’t de-
scribe it to save his life, but she had it.
Whatever it was, ShoShawna Shanks, above
any woman he’d ever been with in his entire
life, had it in spades.
So much so that he had to stop her flow or
he would be coming right in that beautiful
mouth of hers. He therefore pulled her up to
him, laying her first on top of him face to
148/302
face, kissing her again with a long, purposely
slow and drawn out kiss. And then he turned
her to where her back was against his chest,
so that her legs could open and he could fin-
ger her. And he did. Long and slow, with
one and then two and then three fingers slip-
ping into her already wet folds. Sliding in
and sliding out. And then, when fingering
her was not enough, he slid his already mam-
moth rod into that juicy freshness he always
dreamed of feeling again.
There was always a pride of ownership
whenever he entered her, as if he just knew
no other man on the face of this earth could
give her what he was about to give to her.
And he gave it to her for the longest time,
sliding and gliding all over her pussy like a
man obsessed with the territory. And when
it got to be too comfortable, too relaxing, too
wonderful for him to bear, he slung her onto
her back and turned from easy gliding into
hard fucking that made the headboard
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bounce
in
rhythm
with
their
every
movement.
Shawna loved how Tommy could keep it
up for so long with her, pleasuring her to
levels she only got to experience when she
was in his bed. And she held onto him as he
rode her hard, as the sweat dripped from his
body by the sheer longevity, by the sheer
magnitude of his output. His body language
was all about pleasing her. It was all about
taking both of them to heights beyond their
previous highs. And his body worked hers to
near both of their breaking points. She
looked over his shoulder and could see his
ass tightening and slapping as he kept whip-
ping into her, dazzling her with his prowess,
making her so aware of what she could have
all the time, if only she would have accepted
his proposal.
But as soon as she even thought to con-
sider leaving her life and coming to his, a
thought that had been coming more and
150/302
more frequently of late, he released inside of
her with such a fierce release that his entire
body seemed to spasm. And then performed
a final push-in that pushed her over the top
too.
She screamed his name when she came,
her nails scratching his back when she came.
Her body felt fiery, her vagina so alive she
could feel the veins of his rod against her
walls. Her body tightened and tightened, as
he continued to gyrate, until it was im-
possible to constrict anymore.
And then they both crashed back down
and he eventually slid off of her altogether.
They, at first, laid side by side, so drained
they couldn’t speak even if they wanted to.
And then, like a sudden wind, reality hit.
This wasn’t going to last. This was only tem-
porary. They both had their own separate
lives to lead.
She turned, in tears, into his arms.
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Tommy closed his eyes, and pulled her
closer against him.
“I don’t want to leave,” she said regret-
tably, the way she always said after their
lovemaking.
Tommy used to always tell her to stay
then, since she didn’t want to go. But not
tonight.
“If you stay,” he said, “wouldn’t you be
missed by one of your boyfriends?”
He almost never mentioned her boy-
friends. But he asked anyway, because he
knew the pain that he would feel when she
eventually left, pain that he knew would be
unbearable. He wanted to keep it real.
Shawna, however, wondered what boy-
friends he was referring to, and wanted to
say so. “There’s nobody missing me,” she
said instead.
“I doubt that,” Tommy said with a smile
that didn’t reach his eyes.
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Shawna hesitated. She had to tread care-
fully. She even tried to smile too. “Is what
you’re really saying, Gabrini, is that you’ll
miss me when I’m gone?”
Tommy pulled her closer. “You know I
will, don’t play with me like that.”
Shawna’s heart plunged. She looked at
Tommy. “I didn’t mean---”
“Why did you come early, Shawnie, and
you tell me the truth?”
“I told you the truth,” she said, slightly of-
fended. The fact that he always became
angry after their wonderful lovemaking
wasn’t new to her, but she was hoping for a
pass this night. “I wanted to be with you,”
she went on. “I needed to be with you.”
When he didn’t respond, when he didn’t
pull her tighter into his arms or kiss her fore-
head or give her some indication that he was
pleased that she still needed him, she turned
defensive again.
153/302
She attempted to be lighthearted. “Some-
times I feel like a nut, okay, and sometimes I
don’t.” She said this with a forced smile. “I
felt like a nut. A big nut, that is.”
Tommy would usually smile too, to ease
the pain. But not tonight. “Doesn’t all of
your other boyfriends have nuts?” he asked
her.
She looked at him, realized he was not go-
ing to play along this time, and moved out of
his embrace. “It’s not the same thing, and
you know it. I don’t even. . .”
Tommy looked at her, her back now to
him.
“You don’t even what?
Have a
boyfriend?”
“That too.”
Tommy stared at her bare, brown back.
“What are you saying, Shawnie?”
Shawna thought about her answer, and
then turned onto her back. “I’m saying what
I just said. I don’t have any other man
154/302
fucking me. None. Nada.” She looked at
Tommy. He was staring at her. “Just you.”
Was she joking? Was she about to break
out with that killer smile the way she some-
times would do to him just when he thought
she was seriously discussing their plight?
“Since when?” he asked her. He was certain
this woman, this magnificent specimen of a
woman, had to beat them off of her.
Shawna stared at the ceiling. She knew
she was revealing far more than she had ever
planned to reveal. “Since I first met you,”
she admitted.
Tommy could hardly believe it. He stared
into those big, brown eyes. “Are you saying,
are you telling me that in all of these four
years that we’ve been on and off, and even
when you turned down my marriage propos-
al a year ago, you haven’t been with another
man?”
She stared into his eyes. Tommy thought
he knew her so well, but he really didn’t
155/302
know her at all. Because if he knew her, he
would not have asked such a question.
“That’s what I’m saying,” she finally said.
Tommy frowned. “Then why did you turn
me down, Shawnie?” His green eyes were
blazing now. “Is it your job? Do you have to
have thrills in your life? Is that it? Because
if it is you can work with me, in my security
firm.”
And she’d be right under his thumb, she
thought. Just as she was with Alex.
Which, Tommy sensed, was the real point.
“I’m not Alex, Shawnie.”
“I know that.”
“I don’t beat women.”
“He didn’t beat me, either.”
“He beat you down emotionally, which is
just as bad as taking his fists to you.”
Tommy exhaled. “I’m not like that.”
“I know you aren’t.”
“Then what’s the problem?”
156/302
Shawna exhaled. It was so complicated.
“He was good too.”
Tommy looked at her. “Who was good
too?”
“Alex. He was good too. Just like you. He
accepted me, warts and all, just like you.
And I fell for it. Lock, stock and barrel. Got
married, moved into the big house, became
Mrs. Alexander Grant. And it was good. It
was all good. Until my clothes were too re-
vealing. And my hair, so long and flowing,
was a tad too sexy. And I talked too loud at
parties and who was that guy that was un-
dressing me with his eyes and why did I let
that other guy whisper in my ear and who
are those girlfriends of yours and why do you
have to have a girls night out and why do
you have to be a cop anyway?” She exhaled.
Caught her breath. “Then it became as
simple as one question: what kind of a job is
that for a woman?”
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She closed her eyes. “And little by little I
submitted to this good man Alex. I loved
him and loved him unconditionally. He
loved me that way too, before we got mar-
ried. Before the ultimate commitment came
and I became his. He still loved me, but with
so many conditions that I forgot where he
ended and I began. And I realized he didn’t
love me at all because he spent our entire
marriage trying to destroy my image, and
mold me into his.”
She frowned, just remembering that life.
“So for the sake of my marriage I resigned
from the police force. Gave up a job I loved.
I had been on my own since I was a teenager,
had nobody, and the thought that I could be
loved by such a wonderful man made me
want to please him. I mean I was going to do
everything I could to hold onto my marriage.
But you know what changed my mind?
What made me get up and do something? It
was a very minor thing. We were dressing
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for his parents’ anniversary party. And I
knew I was dressed exactly the way he loved
me to dress. Hair, makeup, jewels, all had
his prior approval. And we were standing
outside, waiting for the car to come around.
He kept looking at me. Then he told me to
go back inside of the house and change
perfumes.”
She smiled a bitter, painful smile. “I
already had the perfume on. How in the
world was I going to change it? Scrub it out
of the skin it had already penetrated? But I
did. Like the good little foolish wife I went
back into the house, up the stairs, into the
master bathroom, and began to scrub off my
perfume. Until I looked at myself in the mir-
ror and asked myself, ‘what are you doing,
fool? You are scrubbing off perfume, idiot!’
And I realized how unhappy, how unfulfilled
I was. I gave up a job I loved; I gave up
friends I adored; I gave up my style, my flair,
159/302
everything
that made me ShoShawna
Shanks, to become Mrs. Alexander Grant.”
Her smile left. “I stopped scrubbing, just
like that. I walked out of that bathroom,
down those stairs, out of that front door, and
kept on walking. He was calling me, telling
me the car was here and what the F did I
think I was doing. But I kept walking. Even-
tually hailed a cab and kept going. Because I
realized what I was doing. I wasn’t scrub-
bing away perfume. I was scrubbing away
everything that made me who I was. Until,
when I looked at myself in that mirror, I was
unrecognizable.” She shook her head. “I can
never go back to being that person again.”
“And you think I would try to turn you into
that person?”
“No. But I never dreamed Alex would try
either. You’re not Alex, I know that. But you
didn’t see what I saw when he changed.”
She had to take a moment, as the memor-
ies began to flood her again.
160/302
“When you decided that we’d be exclus-
ive,” she continued, “and you suddenly
wanted to change the rules and commit,
something from the beginning we both said
was off the table, I began to see those same
tell-tale signs in you.” She shook her head.
“You’re an alpha-male, Tommy, which is
fine. The only kind of man I like. But after
Alex I became an alpha-woman. Which
means, the two of us together,” she shook
her head. “It won’t work. Not the way you
want it to work. Not the way I would want.”
Tommy’s heart was hammering. “How
would you want it to work?” he asked her.
She didn’t skip a beat.
“Just like it’s working now,” she said.
161/302
SIX
The next morning, Reno lifted Trina into
the warm water of the garden tub and sat
down behind her.
“You don’t have to do this, Reno,” she said
as he began to bathe her.
“I don’t have to do it? Of course I don’t
have to do it. I wanna do it. I love doing it,
are you kidding?”
Trina smiled.
“I get to rub your gorgeously toned arms,”
he said, bathing her arms.
“And your fine, flat tummy,” he said,
bathing her there.
“And your wonderful, fat, ham-sized
thighs--”
Trina laughed. “Quit playing, boy!” she
said as she pushed her body against his, ef-
fectively wedging his penis between her
crack. And Reno was laughing too.
But they both closed their eyes when they
realized the sensual position there were now
in. Especially when Reno’s lathered hand
moved down to her womanhood, and began
bathing her there.
He knew he had said that he would wait;
that his wife had been through such an or-
deal in Nevada that the least he could do was
wait until he had her out of Nevada before he
started banging on her again. And he knew
this bath wouldn’t make it any easier. But
after holding her all night, and after the way
she slept like a baby in his arms, he wanted
to keep pampering her, to let her know that
he would be by her side as long as the good
Lord gave him strength.
So he decided to bathe her.
“Reno, it feels so good,” Trina said, as her
bare back leaned against his muscular chest,
as her womanhood reacted to his expert
massage between her folds.
“Oh, babe,” Reno said as he took a finger
and plunged it into her vagina; as his penis
began to expand against her ass; as he could
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feel the moistness of her vagina began to sat-
urate his finger. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?” Trina asked, her
body now sliding along the tub’s bottom as
Reno’s finger penetrated deeper and deeper.
“I don’t know,” Reno said, his voice barely
discernible now, “if I can hold out.”
“You don’t know?” Trina asked, as Reno
slid a second finger inside of her while his
thumb massaged her clit.
“Oh, Tree,” he said, as his movements in-
creased, “I don’t think I can hold out.”
“Then don’t hold out, baby,” Trina said,
her body sliding so hard that Reno’s penis
was now sliding up and down her crack,
moving right along with her.
And when she said that, when she gave
him the permission he sought, he lifted her
toned body upward, slung his now rock-hard
penis between her legs, and entered her wo-
manhood with a slide-in that made them
both sigh in sex-starved lustfulness.
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She was effectively seated on his lap as he
drove deeper and deeper into her. The water
began slouching violently against their naked
bodies, and then cascading up and over their
bodies as his big hands continued to grip her
small hips and thrust her forward and back,
forward and back, faster and faster and
faster still, until some of the water began to
careen completely out of the tub.
“You know how to do me, Tree,” Reno said
with an ache in his voice as he fucked her; as
he looked down to see his thick penis enter
in and almost out of her, over and over, tak-
ing on the silky stream of her pussy wetness
even despite the wet water around them.
Trina leaned back against the ribbed abs of
his stomach, her head on his shoulder, her
hand on the side of his face, and let him fuck
her hard. This was what she needed. She
knew it the instant he entered her. And it
felt so good to her, so needful to her, that
now she was riding him: moving her hips
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herself, feeling that rod so far up inside of
her that it felt sweetly wedged there.
They rode and they rode: Reno and Trina.
Husband and wife. The two of them against
the world. And they were doing it on a day
when they should be in mourning. On a day
when they should be frightened and un-
hinged and so concerned about how in the
world were they ever going to get back to the
way they used to be, not just a few days ago,
but over half a year ago. Before all of the
craziness of this world decided to pay them a
visit.
They just rode.
To hell with it, they both thought, as they
rode.
Later that same morning, Reno had rode
her so hard that he dried off, laid across the
bed, and fell back asleep. Trina was up,
dressed and in the kitchen of the small safe
house. Her parents, Cecil and Earnestine
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Hathaway, had arrived in Vegas early that
morning, even after she had pleaded with
them not to come. She had told them she
was fine and in good hands with Reno.
But they came anyway. They wanted to
pay their last respects to Belle Gabrini by at-
tending her funeral, was their reason for
coming, but Trina knew them too well. They
also wanted to eyeball their daughter and see
for themselves that she was all right.
They were now seated at the small kitchen
table with her, sipping coffee, and the con-
versation quickly veered from gratitude that
she wasn’t seriously hurt to a hard plea for
her to return to Mississippi with them.
“We’ve been talking about this, thinking
about it long and hard, baby girl,” her father,
a kind, thoughtful man, said. “And we’ve de-
cided we just can’t keep allowing this. You
can’t keep allowing it.”
Trina really didn’t want to hear it, not any
of it, but they were her parents. She had to
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let them have their say. “I can’t keep allow-
ing what?” she asked her father.
Her mother, however, by far the more ag-
gressive of the two, answered. “You can’t
keep letting that man put you in mortal
danger,” she said. “That’s what!”
Trina stirred her coffee, doing all she could
to maintain her cool. “I’m not in any mortal
danger,” she said.
“Oh, yeah?” Earnestine asked. “Then why
are you here? Why aren’t you still at that
fancy PaLargio your husband owns? Why
are you in this little rinky-dink place where
bodyguards are all over the street, all around
this house, where a helicopter circling the
place like you some mafia boss in hiding or
something. Oh, but I forgot. It’s your hus-
band, the mob boss, who’s really the one in
hiding.”
“Nobody’s in hiding,” Trina said, and
looked up at her mother. “And Reno had
nothing to do with what happened to me.”
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“How could you fix your mouth to lie like
that?” Earnestine asked her daughter and
Cecil quickly placed his hand on his wife’s
hand, to calm her down.
He, instead, looked at Trina. “Then why
did it happen to you, baby girl?” he asked.
“That’s what we’re trying to understand.
Why did this happen to you?”
Trina exhaled. She looked at her father.
Relatively speaking, she had always been far
closer with him than she had ever been with
her mother. And he, she felt, deserved an ex-
planation. “Reno’s sister, MarBeth, was
hanging out with the wrong crowd. There
was some kind of drug shooting or
something, and she was caught up in it.”
“His sister?” Earnestine asked. “So it’s not
just him anymore. It’s his sister too. She’s a
mob boss too now?”
Trina was shaking her head. “It’s nothing
like that, Mama,” she said.
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“Then you need to tell me more than what
you’re telling. What does this sister’s con-
nections to some drug shooting have to do
with you? Why were they shooting at you?”
“They weren’t just shooting at me,” Trina
tried to point out, although she knew she
was, if that gunman was to be believed, the
intended target. “They shot at everybody in
the penthouse. I was the only one who
wasn’t shot.”
“Thanks to that cousin of Reno’s, that
Tommy person. If he wouldn’t have been
there you would have been dead. That in-
credible fact may make you feel warm and
cuddly at night, but it only makes me more
enraged.”
Trina was getting a little enraged herself.
“Enraged with who?” she frowningly asked
her mother. “Me?”
“Reno!” her mother yelled. “For putting
my baby girl in this position!” Tears were
now in her mother’s eyes. “He should have
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never married you, Katrina. I’m sorry but
it’s the truth. That man has put you in
harm’s way for life.”
“Reno loves me.”
“We know he loves you,” her father said.
“But love ain’t got nothing to do with this,
Tree. His lifestyle has put you in danger. He
has put you in danger, that’s just a fact. And
we, your mama and me, think you need to
consider leaving this marriage and coming
back home to Dale with us.”
But Trina was already shaking her head.
“It’s Reno they really want,” her father
continued, despite her protestation. “After
you leave the scene, and they realize the
marriage is over, then they’ll leave you
alone.”
“No,” Trina said.
“He put blood on your hands, Katrina!”
her father suddenly said with uncontrolled
explosiveness in his voice. “You killed two
people because of him, baby girl. Two of
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God’s children. How can you live with a
thing like that over your head? How can you
say no?”
Trina just sat there, clutching her coffee
cup. She knew she had killed two people.
And she knew they were God’s creation. But
they should not have come to her home, with
guns, trying to kill her. It was awful, and she
would have preferred it never happened. But
she didn’t go to their homes with guns, they
came to hers. She didn’t invite this fight, and
she wasn’t about to lie around crying over
something that wasn’t her fault to begin
with.
“How can you say no, baby girl?” her fath-
er asked her again, calmer now.
“Because Reno loves me---”
“You said that already,” her mother said
snidely.
“And I love him,” Trina continued, ignor-
ing her mother. Then she looked at both of
her parents.
“I don’t think you guys
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understand,” she said. “If I didn’t have
Reno, I wouldn’t wanna live. He left me sev-
en months ago by listening to the same kind
of advice you’re giving me this morning. He,
too, believed that he was too good for me and
was bringing me down and I was better off
without him. And when he left, I didn’t
think I was going to make it. It was a night-
mare for me. A seven month long night-
mare. It felt worse than death for me. And
you’re asking me to leave him?”
“Yes!” her mother said. “His chickens
have come home to roost. He’s bad news,
Katrina!”
“No, he’s not. I reject that out of hand!
Reno is not bad news. He’s a great man.
He’s the best thing that’s ever happened to
me. That’s what he is. The best thing.”
Trina exhaled, to calm herself back down.
“I know you mean well, Mama, and I know
y’all love me and all that. But you are so
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wasting your time. I’m not about to leave
Reno. No way. No how.”
Cecil and Earnestine stared at their daugh-
ter, wondering whatever happened to that
innocent, but always headstrong little girl
they used to know. And then realizing, Cecil
more than Earnestine, that she was still the
same person, just the grown-up, mature, ex-
perienced version.
And Reno, in the bedroom, was wide
awake in bed. Through the paper-thin walls
he had heard every word. And it was still
tearing him up a little more inside. Because
no matter how much he knew he couldn’t go
along with the Hathaways’ advice, he
couldn’t disagree with it, either.
He closed his eyes. Ashamed.
Tommy’s Bentley made its way up to the
drive-through window at Starbucks, paid for
a half-caff latte, and took a slow drive
through downtown Seattle. He sipped his
coffee, listened to Nelly Furtado on his
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stereo, and pressed the button on his car
phone.
Reno, who had fallen back asleep after the
heated conversation between Trina and her
parents had ebbed, answered his ringing cell
phone.
“This better be necessary,” Reno said on
the other end, and Tommy smiled. Reno was
a lot of great things, but an early bird wasn’t
one of them. Probably because he often
didn’t go to bed until the wee hours of the
morning.
“Rise and shine my man,” Tommy said.
“Up yours, Tommy,” Reno replied.
Tommy laughed.
“What the hell time is it anyway?”
“Ten am. Daytime.”
Reno yarned. His voice raspy. “How you
doing?”
“I’ll live. It’s you I’ve been worried about.
How’s everything going? How’s Tree?”
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There was a hesitation on Reno’s part.
Could be because he was just waking up, al-
though Tommy suspected more.
“It’s
tough,” Reno admitted. “What can I say?
But it’s all right. I’ll be glad to get her out of
Dodge.”
“I hear that.”
“So how you doing?” Reno asked again.
“I’m doing okay, why are you asking me
that again?”
“Because you don’t sound okay.”
“Can’t help how I sound to your sleepy
ears.”
“All right, all right, who is it?”
“Pardon?”
“Pardon? What’s pardon? You and your
manners, geez. Who is it this time? Which
one of your females got your ass in a twist
this morning?”
Shawna’s beautiful face, turned toward the
sunlight, flashed before Tommy’s eyes. He
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sipped his latte, blew through a yellow light.
“Who says it’s a female?”
“You need to settle down, Tommy.”
“Here we go.”
“You aren’t getting any younger. You
should be tired of playing the field.”
“Give Trina my love.”
Reno laughed. “Okay, I’ll stay out of your
business. You can dish it but you can’t take
it.”
“You don’t tell me your sad stories,”
Tommy said, “and I won’t tell you mine.”
“Ah, so it’s like that?”
“Exactly like that. But really, how’s Trina
getting along?”
“Better than me, I think. She’s a strong
lady.”
“I told you so. I just hope you aren’t sit-
ting around beating yourself up, Reno.
What’s done is done. Tree understands that.
You need to.”
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“I will. Especially after this funeral. After
I can get this whole thing sorted out. I’m
pulling out hairs trying to figure this shit out,
Tommy.”
“Stop trying. Just be there for Tree.”
“Yeah,” Reno said. “You’re right.” Then
he pivoted the conversation away from him
and his issues, as Reno was a master at do-
ing. “So you’re still in Portland or what?”
“No, I got back last night.” Then Tommy
hesitated, but Reno really was the only hu-
man being he could discuss it with. “When I
got back,” he said, “Shawna was here.”
“Already?” Reno said, surprised.
“Yup.”
“Whoop, there it is.”
“There what is?” Tommy asked.
“She’s the dame got you in this tizzy.”
Tommy smiled. “I’m not in a tizzy,
whatever the hell that means.”
“You fucked her brains out, didn’t you?”
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Tommy hesitated. Reno was about as dip-
lomatic as some banana republic dictator.
But it was weighing heavily on him. “Yes,”
he admitted.
“No surprise there. Even though, let you
two tell it, it’s over and it’s been over since
forever. Please. What’s with you two any-
way? It’s on again now? You guys ought to
just get married and give the rest of the
world a break.”
Tommy’s heart squeezed. “I wish.”
“But Shanks ain’t having it?”
Tommy sighed, looked left to right and
then proceeded through a stop sign. “Right.”
“What
you
expect,
Tommy?
That’s
Shanks. She’s always been a lone wolf, that’s
how she rolls. That’s why I never went after
her. She’s a gorgeous girl, but that’s about
all she is. She’s too tough to tame.”
“Oh, and Trina isn’t tough?”
“She ain’t that kind of tough,” Reno said.
“When I think of Trina, for example, I think
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of a good, loyal, but strong as hell mob wife
say. A woman like Ma was, who looks out for
her man and his interest. When I think of
Shanks, I don’t think mob wife. I think mob
boss.” Tommy laughed. “No, I’m serious
here now. That sister, that Shanks, is
something else. She’ll be too busy running
everything, bossing you around, before you
can even think about bossing her.”
Tommy said nothing. What Reno didn’t
know was that Shawna was incredibly vul-
nerable, perhaps the most fragile woman
Tommy had ever known. But because she
was great at concealing it, Reno and every-
body else took her as this ice princess. When
she was a long way from cold. Especially
when she was alone with Tommy, crying on
his shoulders, clinging to him as he wrapped
her in his arms.
“Anyway,” Tommy said, “I was just check-
ing in. I’m on my way to the office.”
“I hurt your feelings, didn’t I?”
180/302
“Of course not, Reno.”
“Look, I love Shanks too, I really do. I re-
spect the hell out of her, that’s why I want
her on my team. I just wouldn’t wanna
marry her or anything, that’s all I’m saying.
And I just don’t understand why you’re so
head over heels with that particular girl,
that’s all I’m saying.”
“Who says I’m head over heels?”
“You wanted to marry her, Tommy, come
on. A man like you wanted to marry a lone
wolf like Shanks.”
“She’s not a lone wolf,” Tommy said with a
snap in his voice.
“She is a lone wolf, Tommy,” Reno said,
not backing down. “I don’t know why you
don’t seem to understand that. I remember
when you loved that very fact about her. You
used to tell me all the time that if all of your
women were as completely independent as
Shanks, you’d be set. She is a lone wolf. But
a loveable wolf, how’s that?”
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Tommy smiled. “I don’t appreciate you
calling my woman a wolf.”
Reno laughed.
“All in good humor,
brother.”
“Would it still be humorous to you if I
called Trina a dove?”
“Trina ain’t no dove,” Reno shot back.
“She’s tough as nails. She just knows how to
finesse it, how to be ladylike about it.
Shanks is just tough as nails.”
Tommy smiled and then laughed. “Good-
bye, Reno,” he said, and killed the call.
By the time he parked his Mercedes and
entered the Gabrini, Incorporated office
building in downtown Seattle, had walked
across the busy lobby filled with associates
too new to even realize who they were hust-
ling past, and rode the elevator to the top
floor, those words Reno had used to describe
Shawna still stuck in his mind. Lone wolf.
She was a lone wolf. And, if Reno was to be
believed, would always be alone.
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When he stepped off of the elevator on the
top floor, and entered the suite of offices of
the chairman, his offices, it was the restaur-
ant side of his elaborate business that was
demanding his attention.
Tommy grabbed the stack of mail from his
secretary’s desk and began heading for his
office. Irene, his executive secretary, hurried
from her desk in the suite of offices and, with
pad and pen in hand, hurried behind him.
“Good morning, Mr. Gabrini,” she said,
glancing down. Even she was impressed
with the dark blue, double-breasted suit he
wore this morning.
“Hello, Irene. Any new news?”
“The chef at Diamante’s is threatening to
quit again, sir.” Diamante’s was Tommy’s
second restaurant, distinguished from Taste
of Southern by the fact that it was so elegant,
so upscale, so in demand that reservations
were booked solid months in advance. By
contrast, Taste of Southern did not even
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allow reservations. First come, first served,
and affordable for everyone, was the motto
of TOS.
“When did this happen?”
“He phoned this morning.
Said he
couldn’t take it anymore.”
“Sal?”
“Yes, sir. He says your brother is monitor-
ing the kitchen again and accusing him of
using down-market products. Chef denies
using any such thing, but Sal Luca won’t
listen. Chef wants the cameras out of his kit-
chen today or he won’t show up tonight, he
said.”
“Cameras?” Tommy asked with a frown, as
he glanced back at Irene. “What cameras?”
“Chef’s convinced that Sal Luca has hidden
cameras around the kitchen.”
Tommy shook his head. He loved his kid
brother, a brother who idolized him, but he
was a handful. “Okay, I’ll handle it, Irene,
thanks.”
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“And another thing, sir,” she said just as
Tommy’s hand landed on the knob of his of-
fice door.
“Novella’s waiting to see you.”
“Novella?”
“Yes, sir. We told her we didn’t know if
you were even coming into the office this
morning, but she insisted on waiting. And
waiting inside your office, sir. I tried to stop
her, but . . . she is your friend, sir.”
Irene said friend with a twinge of distaste
in her voice. Because she knew Tommy had
many friends, all female, and none except
Shanks, she believed, deserving of him.
“I’ll handle it,” he said to her again, and
watched as she left his side. Only thing was,
when Tommy entered the office, greeted the
gorgeous model Novella with a warm kiss
and embrace, and then sat down on the edge
of his desk to let her, as she put it, have her
say, he felt as if he had caught this show
before.
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It always started and ended the same way.
She always agreed to an open, no-strings-at-
tached relationship early on. Would be all-
in, all amped about it. Would insist it’ll work
for her too because she needed her space just
as fervently as he needed his. She under-
stood unconditionally that she wasn’t going
to change him, and he wasn’t going to
change her (or would be interested in chan-
ging her).
But as soon as it started getting good; as
soon as it became comfortable and exactly
the way both parties had envisioned it would
be, the demands always came.
First, she wanted more phone calls. Then,
she wanted to spend more time with him.
Then, more gifts. Until her demands became
a torch song. Why, she’d sing, couldn’t he
stop this pretense and dedicate his life to
her?
Only it was no pretense to Tommy. He
walked over to the window of his office and
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looked out at the cloudy Seattle skyline.
Then he turned and looked at the woman
who was actually one of his favorites. Al-
though, compared to Shanks, that wasn’t
saying much.
“We even look good together,” she went
on, her smoky, dark eyes firm. “Even you
have to admit that, Tommy. We enjoy each
other’s company. And even you said I knew
how to please you in bed. So I don’t know
why you’re acting like you didn’t see where
this was going.”
“I didn’t see it, Vell,” he said, “because
there’s nothing to see. You knew going in
that this was as good as it was going to get.
You knew that.”
“But you said you enjoy my company.
Now you’re talking like you can just end it
just like that?”
“If you’re insisting that our relationship
changes, yes, it will be over just like that.
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Because it’s not going to change, Vell. You
knew that going in.”
Novella had to take a moment, because
something was wrong with this picture. Who
did he think he was? She was no ordinary
woman. She was no piece on the side. She
was Novella Fleming, a supermodel known
the world over by her first name only. She
commanded the attention of men with more
money and more power than Tommy Gab-
rini had to wield. And she was begging him?
She closed her eyes because it was true. She
was willing to beg him. He was worth it.
She reopened her eyes. Saw compassion
in his. She was depending on that compas-
sion. “So what you’re saying to me,” she
said, still stunned, “is that I am now and will
always be just a booty call to you?”
“Those are your words,” Tommy replied,
refusing to play her game. If she only knew
how many women had come to him like this,
demanding more of him, then she’d
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understand how resolute he really was. “We
discussed our relationship before we had
one,” he went on. “You agreed to it, as did I.
Nothing’s changed as far as I’m concerned.”
“Well as far as I’m concerned quite a bit
has changed, Tommy.”
“Like what?”
“Like my love for you, that’s what!” She
had to calm back down. “How could you ex-
pect me to think about you every day and
every night, spend all of my free time with
you, and not fall in love? How could you not
fall in love with me, Tommy?”
Tommy exhaled. It wasn’t that simple.
She had to know that. “I told you going in--
-”
“I know what you told me going in!”
His desk intercom buzzed, then Irene’s
voice. “Excuse me, Mr. Gabrini.”
Tommy pinched his temple. “What is it?”
“You have an important call on line one,
sir.”
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He frowned. “Who is it?”
Irene hesitated. “Miss Shanks, sir,” she
said.
Tommy almost glanced at Novella, to see if
she understood the seriousness of that name
in his life. But he didn’t even look her way.
“All right, I’ll take it, Irene, thanks.”
Novella began walking toward the chair to
grab her purse and coat. “I have a plane to
catch anyway,” she said.
Tommy followed her to the chair. Helped
her into her coat. When she turned around,
she fell into his arms.
He held her, and when she stopped embra-
cing him, he held onto her coat lapel. They
stared into each other’s eyes. “For the re-
cord,” he said, “I don’t want it to end.”
Novella stared at him. “I saw a car on your
driveway last night,” she said. “A Lexus.
When I rang the doorbell a woman
answered. A beautiful woman. She said you
were in Portland and she didn’t know if
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you’d be back tonight. Did I care to come in
and wait.” She stared at Tommy. “You said
you didn’t give out keys to your home. Re-
member when I asked and you told me that?
Yet this woman gets a key?”
Tommy didn’t respond. He released her
coat lapel.
She nodded. “Yeah, I thought so. Good-
bye, Tommy,” she said this with sadness in
her eyes, and left his office.
Tommy was upset, because he understood
how she felt. Like with Shawna, he, too, un-
derstood the terms of their relationship go-
ing in and tried, when he asked her to marry
him, to rewrite those terms. It didn’t work
for him, it wasn’t about to work for her. And
then he felt an edge of distaste even compar-
ing his long-term, deep relationship with
Shawna, to his nothing-but-the-booty rela-
tionship with Novella.
He sat behind his desk and grabbed the
phone. “Good morning,” he said.
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“What’s your problem, Gabrini?” Shawna
asked. “Have a girl waiting this long on the
line.”
“Sorry about that. I had a . . . client. How
are you? Just waking up?”
“Yes, actually,” Shawna said. “Best sleep
I’ve had in a long time.”
Tommy smiled, pleased by that. He
leaned back in his swivel chair. “Glad to hear
it,” he said.
“What’s up for you today?”
“Meetings, mainly. And I need to get over
to Diamante’s before Sal runs away the chef.”
Shawna laughed. “If he hasn’t already.”
“Now that’s the truth. And then I’m taking
the company jet to Vegas to attend the funer-
al and retrieve Reno and his wife. Care to
tag along?”
“No,” she said as he knew she would.
“So,” he asked, “what are you up to?
Where are you?”
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“In your study checking my email on your
computer, my feet up in your chair, my body
clad in your dress shirt.”
Just the thought of her naked body under-
neath that shirt had him hardening. “Sounds
like a sexy sight to see,” he said.
“I doubt that seriously. My hair’s a mess, I
haven’t had my bath, I’m about as sexy as
this chair I’m sitting in. I look awful.”
You could never look awful to me, he
wanted to say, but knew it would be too syr-
upy and she would hate it. So he held his
tongue. “You don’t have any jobs lined up,
do you?”
“You mean after Reno’s gig?”
Funny, he never thought of her working
for Reno as a job. And just the thought of
the fact of that matter, that she would in fact
be working for Reno in a matter that was
grave and uncertain, gave him some pause.
Shawna was tough, and could handle herself,
but that didn’t mean he wanted her tossed in
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dangerous situations. “Yes,” he said. “After
Reno.”
“Nothing yet,” she said as if she’d just con-
firmed it in her email account. “Like I said I
dropped the ball on my last assignment.
Word gets around. I need the word to die
down before I’ll probably be on anybody’s
radar screen again.”
“And in the meantime?”
“In the meantime I help out Reno.”
“And then?” he asked and held the phone
with both hands.
“And then,” she said, “I’ll hang out with
my guy. See once and for all just what is go-
ing to become of us.”
Tommy closed his eyes in relief.
“That is,” she added, “if he still considers
me his girl.”
Truth was, there was no other woman but
Shawna that gave him that possessive, she’s
mine kind of feeling. No other woman came
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close. “He does,” Tommy said without
hesitation.
“Good,” Shawna said. “Now get back to
work.”
He was about to tell her something equally
cute, but Shawna, being Shawna, had already
killed the call.
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SEVEN
The gates opened to a luxurious estate and
the limo carrying Reno, Trina, and Tommy
began to lift up the slanted driveway and
made its way to the big house.
“Is this your home, Tommy?” Trina asked,
looking at the expansive view.
“Not my main home, no. I don’t live here.
But it’s mine.” This was a different house
along the Seattle countryside, on the out-
skirts of the city. Tommy rarely came here,
except when he seriously needed to get away.
“It’s lovely,” Trina said. “Is this where
we’ll be staying?”
“For now, yes,” Reno said, his arm around
his wife.
“So you knew about this place?”
“I knew,” he said. “I’ve never been here,
either, but I knew about it.”
“Who is that?” Trina asked and Reno and
Tommy looked where she was looking. And
walking from around the backside of the
house, tall and lean in her skin-tight trousers
and stiletto heels; in her sleeveless blouse
that barely covered the belly button of her
flat, ribbed stomach; with her long, stylish
hair blowing in the wind and framing a dev-
astatingly gorgeous face, was ShoShawna
Shanks. Looking so confident to Reno that
she almost looked arrogant. Looking so en-
dearing to Tommy that his heart began to
pound.
“That, my dear,” Reno said with a combin-
ation of pride and distaste, “is ShoShawna
Shanks.”
Trina frowned. “That’s Shanks? That’s
the woman you said was going to help us?”
“That’s the one.”
Trina stared at her. Except for the fact
that Shawna had a gun holstered on her hip,
she was absolutely nothing like Trina had
thought she would be. The way Reno talked
about the woman Trina was expecting her to
be some muscular, body-builder type who’d
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be standing akimbo at the gate with her
hands behind her back, her feet spread eagle,
all business all the time.
But this girl, Trina thought, looked almost
sad. She was pretty, there was no doubt
about that; Reno did get that part right. But
he didn’t mention the other, softer side.
But then again, Trina thought as the car
door opened and her husband helped her out
of the limo, Reno probably never bothered to
get to know the other side. She was fire-
power to him, the woman that was going to
help us, and that was all he needed to know.
“She’s gorgeous,” Trina couldn’t help but
say when they stepped out and she got an
even better look. When Tommy got out and
walked over to them, she repeated it.
“She’s gorgeous, Tommy,” she said again.
Tommy nodded, staring at Shawna. “That
she is,” he said in a tone so lowered that both
Reno and Trina looked at him.
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Shawna slowly made her way up the side
steps and across the walkway toward the
front steps, where the new arrivals were.
And she, too, was able to get a full view of the
threesome.
Tommy almost made her smile. He stood
there, looking amazing in his yellow cardigan
sweater, his olive green imported pants, his
expensive alligator loafers. What made her
want to smile was because she knew that this
was supposed to be his casual look, his little-
effort look. But even in his casual style he al-
ways looked so alluring, as if he had just left
a photo shoot, and still had that composed
look about him.
Reno, on the other hand, looked to
Shawna as if he had just left a murder scene,
and was still hyper-vigilant, still looking
around, still suspicious of everything and
everyone. Composure for Reno meant that
he only had one major calamity to worry
about, not several, which often endeared him
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to Shawna. Like Tommy, he dressed casually
too, in a brown polo shirt and a pair of kha-
kis, his thick head of brown hair a rumpled
mess because of his habit of always running
his hand through it. But unlike Tommy, he
looked casual. Then Shawna snorted. He
looked casual all right. Like a casually
dressed mob boss.
And that wife of his, a woman Shawna had
never seen before, wasn’t quite what she had
expected either. Reno’s women ran the gam-
bit from those wow factor females to those
say what? Reno’s dating that? air-headed,
trophy types. But this woman didn’t seem to
fit either bill. She was cute, nothing to write
home about but cute, yet Reno seemed
downright smitten with her.
Tommy had said that Reno had changed
and was truly in love with his wife, but
Shawna, who knew the playboy Reno as well
as anybody, wasn’t buying it. Reno wasn’t in
love with anything but the PaLargio as far as
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she could figure. But her initial impression
as she watched him now with this wife of his,
made her wonder if she would have to
reconfigure.
He seemed so protective of the woman, so
in tune with her that it took Shawna by sur-
prise. He had his hand in the small of his
wife’s back, was looking so lovingly into her
eyes, had her so close against him that
Shawna wondered where he ended and she
began. Which, for Reno and any of the fe-
males she’d ever seen him with before, was
something to see. In truth, the only time she
used to see Reno with a female was when he
was taking her to some bedroom.
As soon as Tommy saw Shawna in full he
walked up the steps, two at a time, and met
her at the top. Although both wanted to fall
into the other’s arms, neither did. Tommy,
instead, placed one hand on her arm, and
leaned over and kissed her on the lips.
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She closed her eyes when he kissed her,
she couldn’t help it, and she so wanted him
to pull her into his arms. But he, instead,
leaned back and began rubbing her arm.
“Any trouble while I was gone?”
She shook her head. “None,” she said.
“Good,” he said, still rubbing that arm, un-
able to stop looking into those bright brown
eyes of hers. Until Reno and Trina made
their way to the top of the steps and broke
the spell.
“What’s up, Shanks?” Reno said as only
Reno could say it. Tommy removed his hand
from her arm and turned toward his cousin.
“Broke anybody’s heart today?” Reno added
with a smile.
“Heart?” Shawna replied. “What’s that?”
Reno laughed. Trina glanced at Tommy.
She didn’t even know the backstory of those
two, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to tell
that he had dibs on this girl. And although it
was a joke that Reno had told, Trina could
202/302
see, for a brief moment, a flash of sadness in
Tommy’s eyes. Reno had said Shanks was
heartless, and she guessed that was why they
were joking about breaking hearts, but Trina
could tell that Tommy failed to see the
humor.
“Want you to meet my wife,” Reno said,
putting Trina in front of him. “Katrina
Gabrini.”
“Nice to meet you,” Shawna said, extend-
ing her hand.
“Nice to meet you, too,” Trina said, shak-
ing her offered hand. “Reno’s told me a lot
about you.”
“All bad I’m sure.”
“Damn straight,” Reno said and began
walking toward the front entrance, his hand
still in the small of Trina’s back. “You’re a
tactician, Shanks, you can’t afford to be some
softie. Besides, if you were soft, I wouldn’t
want you.”
203/302
They all laughed, although Tommy, whose
hand was in the small of Shawna’s back as
they made their way inside, the man who
knew how much those offhanded, steel
magnolia kind of comments really hurt her,
barely registered a smile.
After showing Reno and Trina their room
on the eastern end of the home, contrasted
with Tommy’s room which was on the far
western end to give the couple maximum
privacy, they all settled down in the
livingroom.
Reno and Trina were seated side by side
on the sofa, with Trina leaned back, her legs
under her butt, and Reno leaned forward,
anxious to hear what Tommy had to say.
Tommy was seated in the flanking chair,
leaned forward too, while Shawna sat alone
on the opposite sofa, her long legs crossed,
her gun still holstered on her hip, staring at
Tommy.
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“This is what we know so far,” Tommy
began. “There were four gunman. All four
stormed the penthouse with absolutely no
resistance from your security forces. Which
means of course, that they were ordered to
stand down when the hit took place.”
“But who ordered it?” Reno asked.
“We don’t know that yet. We can’t even
find the personnel who were guarding the
penthouse, let alone the ones who had the
passcode. None of them had all three levels
of codes, but each one had one level. Which
means they were all involved. And they all
took off just before the hit went down.”
“All of them?”
“Every one of those cocksuckers,” Tommy
said.
Reno shook his head. “It’s got to be Vito.
To turn every one of my main people against
me like that, it’s got to be a major boss,
somebody who can pay them the kind of
money he would have to pay them to get
205/302
lost. Somebody they would fear enough to
take the money and run. It’s got to be Vito.”
“That’s what I think,” Tommy agreed.
“Even though he’s claiming he had nothing
to do with it.”
“Yeah, right.”
Trina looked at Shawna. “What do you
think?” she asked her.
All eyes turned to Shawna. Whereas most
women who had her kind of physical attrib-
utes would relish being in the spotlight, she
never liked it.
“I don’t think it’s Vito Giancarlo,” she said.
Reno frowned.
“Why the hell not,
Shanks?”
“Because of the time factor, Reno. Think
about it. MarBeth kills Eddie Giancarlo one
night, and by the very next morning Vito Gi-
ancarlo has paid off all of your top security
people, every one of your top people, has
hired the right buttons for the hit, has flown
them to Vegas, they’ve got in without even a
206/302
snag of a hitch. All in a matter of hours?”
She shook her head. “That’s not possible.”
Trina nodded her head. Common sense
was always the minimum bar for her. It first
had to make sense above all else. “I agree,”
she said, already impressed, and looked at
Reno. “That’s a tall order even for Vito.”
Reno was thinking about it too. Thinking
long and hard about it. Then he nodded.
“Yeah,” he said, looking at Tommy. “It’s a
tall order, Tommy. This shit had to have
been planned months in advance.”
“If it’s not Vito,” Tommy said, “then it’s
some hellava coincidence, Reno. His son
dies one night, killed by your own sister,
then the very next morning there’s a hit on
the PaLargio. The nexus is what I can’t get
past.”
“Unless,” Reno said, his mind still in
thought as he spoke, “the nexus is the issue.
Maybe the bastard that planned this did plan
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it in advance, but decided to make their
move when the time was exactly right.”
“But it would still go back to Vito,” Tommy
replied. “He’s the only don with the juice
right now. At least any that would have
something against you. And we can’t dismiss
the fact that his son was killed. His camp
was the only people who knew about Eddie’s
death, and that includes the guy who was
with Eddie at the time. Who ran and told
Vito what had happened.”
“There might have been a breach in Vito’s
camp,” Shawna said and, once again, all eyes
were on her.
“But even if there was,” Tommy said, “who
would they have told that could pull off a hit
like this?”
There was a long pause. “Marcy comes to
mind,” Shawna said.
Reno, Tommy, and Trina stared at her.
“Marcy Davenport?” Tommy asked.
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“The mother of Reno’s deceased son, yes,”
Shawna replied. “Nearly eight months ago,
when her son was killed, she blamed you.”
“But how could she?” Trina asked. “Reno
did everything he could do.”
“We know that. But I’ve met Marcy D.
She doesn’t know that. All she knows is that
her son got drawn into a mob war that she
believes Reno started, and now her boy is
dead. That’s all she knows.”
Reno looked at Tommy.
“It’s possible,” Tommy said. “Marcy can be
a bitch on two legs when she wants to be.
And as a former hired gun herself, she’s the
master of precision hits.”
Reno leaned back. That was all he
needed. “But why would she have targeted
my wife?” he wanted to know.
“That’s if I was the target,” Trina said.
“We only have that hit man’s word to go by.”
“That gunman made that declaration while
he had a gun to your head,” Tommy said.
209/302
“He thought you were a dead woman. He
wouldn’t have lied.”
Reno looked at Shawna. “Why target my
wife?” he asked again.
“You took out her kid, far as she’s con-
cerned, she figure she’s entitled to take out
your wife,” Shawna replied in that cool, de-
tached way of hers that, for Reno, recon-
firmed her ice princess image.
Reno exhaled. “We’ve got to find her.”
“She’s found,” Shawna said and everybody
looked at her, including Tommy, who
frowned.
“What do you mean she’s found?” he
asked. “Where is she?”
“Louisville, Kentucky.”
“She’s in Louieville?” Reno asked with a
frown of his own. “What the hell she’s doing
in Kentucky?”
“Don’t know, but that’s where I tracked
her down. She’ll be here tomorrow. I set up
a meeting at Tommy’s Taste of Southern
210/302
restaurant. I told her Tommy wanted to talk
to her. She knows he’s a straight arrow and
has your ear, Reno, so she agreed.”
“And what if she comes with her own fire-
power?” Trina asked, now very concerned.
“She’s not that stupid. Besides, we’re tail-
ing her already. I had a tail on her before I
made the phone call to her. If she does bring
heat, it’ll be dissipated before she reaches
Taste of Southern. And Taste of Southern is
already being scoped, in case she called
ahead to some hired hand.”
“But with all of these security breaches,”
Trina asked, “can you trust your people?”
“Yes, and they aren’t my people. They’re
Tommy’s people.”
Trina looked at Tommy, as if surprised
that he would have authorized such a clever
move. But he hadn’t. What Trina didn’t
know and Reno only suspected was that
Shawna
had
carte
blanche
regarding
Tommy’s security personnel. They’d been
211/302
told long ago that they were to carry out her
orders as if Tommy himself had made them.
They were not to seek clarification, they were
not to second guess her. She was a pro,
Tommy had told them, and she, above any
human being alive, had his absolute trust.
Tommy had originally made this move as a
way to protect Shawna should she find her-
self working in the field and her people
turned on her, or she found herself in some
equally difficult spot that she needed getting
out of. He never dreamed she’d use that
power to protect his family. He looked at
her, with love, yes, but also with great re-
spect in his eyes.
Steaks were sizzling, the music, soft jazz,
was grooving, and Reno and Tommy were
manning the grill. There were on the back
patio of Tommy’s estate and Reno was just
getting off of the phone after a long conver-
sation with his people in Vegas. Trina and
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Shawna were further away, in lawn chairs,
talking too.
Tommy put the top back down on the grill
and sat down, beside Reno. His bright green
eyes, however, were on the women.
“Wonder what they’re talking about?” he
asked.
“Certainly ain’t no girl stuff,” Reno joked,
“with Shawna involved.”
“Knock it off, Ree,” Tommy said as he
drained down some of his bottled beer.
Reno looked at him. Confused. “Knock
what off?”
“All of the wisecracks about Shawna. She’s
a girl, too, Reno. She’s a woman. She’s all
woman.”
“I was just kidding around, whatta you
getting all bent out of shape about a thing
like that?”
“Because you go too far with it, that’s why.
She’s got feelings, Reno, okay? She’s no
213/302
block of ice the way you think she is, and I
just want it to stop.”
Reno stared at Tommy.
At Dapper
Tommy, the lover boy. “You’re that serious
about this girl?” he asked him.
Tommy exhaled, drained more beer. “Un-
fortunately, yes.”
“Why is it unfortunate?” Reno asked al-
though he already had a pretty good idea.
“What do you mean why? She turned me
down, remember? That turndown nearly
destroyed me.”
“But you go back for more destruction?”
Tommy exhaled. “It’s complicated, Reno.”
Reno was nodding before Tommy even
finished speaking. “I hear you, brother.
Love is always complicated.” Then he looked
at Tommy. “And I apologize for ribbing her
like that. She just comes across as so cold
and methodical to me. But, hey, I don’t
know the other side of her like you do. So I’ll
back off. Promise you that.”
214/302
“What’s going on in Vegas?
How’s
Franny?”
“Still in intensive care. She nearly died,
that’s the fact of the matter, and is still barely
hanging on. Carmine says Dirty’s stepping
up, though, being the man he needs to be.”
“I know we can trust Carmine,” Tommy
said, “but what about Dirty?”
“Dirty’s a shithead, but he’s all right. He’s
too terrified of me to turn on me so we don’t
have that to worry about with Dirty. He’s
trustworthy, he’s just not reliable.” Then
Reno leaned back, drained down beer also.
“But I hear what you’re saying. Nobody’s off
the table at this point. Carmine’s keeping his
eye on him. And just so you know I’ve got
Lee keeping his eye on Carmine.”
“Lee? Lee Jones, your general manager?”
“That’s the one.”
“Certain you can trust him?”
215/302
“As certain as I am about any of them. But
Lee I trust. I’ve got to trust somebody or I’m
screwed.”
Tommy nodded. Drained more beer.
Trina and Shawna watched the two men
talk and drink. And although Trina had a
bottled beer too, Shawna was keeping her
head clear until this business of who shot up
the PaLargio was cleared as well. She never
drank while on duty.
“So,” Trina asked, looking away from the
men and at the mysterious ShoShawna
Shanks, “what do you do exactly? Reno de-
scribes you as if you’re some modern day
mercenary.”
“I’m a cleaner,” Shawna said. “I get paid
to hire a team to go in and clean up a mess.
Usually it involves moving people from one
place to another place, but sometimes I have
to clean up after the people are gone.
Whatever’s required.”
216/302
“Including murder?” Trina asked, looking
at her.
“These are wars, Katrina,” Shawna said in
what she knew, as the years came and went,
was becoming more of an excuse than an ex-
planation. Then she sighed. “I do my job,”
she said.
Trina knew not to press, as she could tell
Shawna wasn’t entirely comfortable discuss-
ing it. She changed subjects. “I like Tommy,”
she said, looking at the men again. “He’s a
nice, thoughtful man.” Then Trina smiled.
“And not bad looking either.”
Shawna found herself smiling.
“He’ll
pass,” she said.
“He’ll pass?” Trina said in her best Reno
imitation. “Whatta ya mean he’ll pass?
School kids pass. Ugly ducklings with a per-
sonality pass. I got your pass right over
here.”
Shawna laughed out loud, prompting both
Tommy and Reno to look their way.
217/302
“She’s laughing?” Reno said, astounded.
“Alert the media, Tommy! She’s actually
laughing!” And then he remembered his
promise. “Sorry, man,” he said.
“No,” Tommy said, smiling too, his eyes
staring at Shawna. “It’s quite a feat.”
Later that night, in their large bedroom on
the eastern end of Tommy’s house, Reno slid
his penis into Trina from the back and they
both settled in, spoon-style, into a slow,
sweet, incredibly sensual fuck.
Reno’s arms were around her as he fucked
her, with her bare back leaned against his
bare chest, with his hands cupping her
breasts while his thumb rubbed lightly
across her hardened nipples. His dick was
expanding every time he pushed further into
her, and her vagina was moistening his rod
with her silky sweetness every time he pulled
out.
“Oh, Tree, what are you doing to me?”
Reno asked in an aching voice as he fucked
218/302
her, and Trina leaned her head back further,
over his shoulder, as her breasts felt the sting
of his fondle and her vagina felt the punch of
his glides.
“Oh, Reno,” she proclaimed, “what are you
trying to do to me?”
He smiled and kissed her neck as he
plunged in deeper and deeper, his move-
ments constant and barely increasing, the
sound of her saturation causing him to close
his eyes and just enjoy the feel, the sweet
smell, the slouching sound of her love. This
was his queen, his one and only, and he
could still hardly believe his good luck.
And then he plunged in as deep as he
could go, causing every inch of her walls to
begin to tighten around his expansive rod,
with his body slamming into her ass as the
feeling became unbearable, with her ass
slamming back against his body as the tight-
ening became incredible. He had her nearly
on her stomach, and he nearly on her back
219/302
by the time the intensity heightened beyond
their ability to control it any longer. And
then, as they exhaled, began to ebb on down.
They just lay there, exhausted, listening to
the sounds of their heavy breathing.
“I’m getting too old for this shit, Tree,”
Reno said to her.
“Be careful,” Trina said, “or I’ll have to go
out and find me a younger man. A boy toy.”
Reno moved off of her, but hit her pur-
posely hard and stingingly on her bare ass, as
he did.
“Ouch!” Trina yelled when she felt the
sting of his hit, and turned and looked at
him. “That hurt, Reno!”
“It hurt. It was supposed to hurt. Telling
me about some boy toy. What did you think
it was supposed to do? Soothe you?”
Trina smiled. “You’re jealous.”
“Damn right I’m jealous. I’m telling my
wife I can barely keep up with her, and she’s
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telling me she’ll just have to go out and find
some young stud who can.”
Trina stared at him, astounded that he
would have taken her seriously. “I was jok-
ing, Reno,” she said. Surely he understood
that?
Reno, lying flat on his back now, closed his
eyes, pinched his temple, and exhaled.
“Don’t joke like that, Tree. Not now. Not
with all this shit going on and I don’t know
what the fuck it’s all about.” He looked at
her. “I’m not a very secure man over here.”
“But why not?”
“What you mean why not? I miscalculated
so badly I nearly caused you to die, and to
die horribly. That would have killed me,
Tree, it would have took me away from here
just as surely as a bullet through my brain.
After something like that, after fucking up
beyond my wildest dreams of a fuck-up, I
can’t go around feeling like I’m some hun-
dred percent all-male stud over here, all
221/302
strutting his stuff and secure like. Don’t joke
like that.”
“You’ve got to stop this, Reno.”
Reno frowned. “Stop what?”
“Taking the blame for everything. Taking
it to heart the way you do. What happened
wasn’t your fault.”
“Like hell it wasn’t! I should have pre-
pared better. As soon as Carmine came and
told me what went down, I should have
called Tommy and got him and his people to
the PaLargio, before I even left town. I
should have told Dirty I didn’t want him to
leave the penthouse not even to piss on the
breezeway. I should have made Carmine
stay in Vegas.”
“Stop it, Reno,” Trina pleaded. “It’s not
your fault, I don’t care what you say. Your
mother died because it was her time to go.
Franny was hit because she didn’t know how
to duck and dodge. And I’m still alive be-
cause I did. Period. You aren’t the keeper of
222/302
me and Franny and not even your mother
when she was alive, Reno. We’re grown-ass
women. We’re our own keepers.”
Reno looked at her, surprised by her force-
fulness. And then he smiled. “Duck and
dodge,” he said. “I got your duck and
dodge.” And then he pulled her into his
arms.
She laid there, staring into his eyes.
“Promise me you’ll stop blaming yourself,
Reno,” she said, a plea in her voice.
Reno exhaled. “I promise you I’ll try,” he
said honestly. “But that ain’t an easy thing,
considering the evidence.”
“Yeah, evidence that you’ve got all twisted
around. You did nothing wrong, whether
you believe it or not. I believe it, and I’ll al-
ways believe it. Now take that, tough guy,”
she said with a smile.
Reno smiled too. Then his look turned
somber, serious. “Okay,” he said as if he was
making up his mind. “I’ll take it.”
223/302
And then he slung her on her back, got on
top of her, and slid his penis inside her
already wet folds once again.
If the eastern end of the house, where
Reno and Trina were making love, was
peaceful, the eastern end was on fire. The
bed alone was rocking so hard it sounded as
if the springs were so distressed that they
would break any moment. On that bed
Tommy was fucking Shawna up the ass, rid-
ing her so hard that she was holding onto the
bedpost, her ass jutted upwards, her mouth
screaming in elation.
Every muscle in Tommy’s body was strain-
ing as he fucked her, as the sweat poured
from his handsome face, as his penis kept
pushing so deeply into her that his balls were
slapping against her ass. And for the longest
time that was all that was heard: the rocking
of the bedsprings and the slapping of flesh,
as Tommy could hardly control his daunting
need.
224/302
And Shawna didn’t want him to control it.
She loved the feeling, as she rode with it, as
she encouraged him to put an ass whipping
on her she wouldn’t soon forget. Slow and
easy was good, they had done it slow and
easy the first time they coupled that night,
but now they wanted it rough.
And Tommy didn’t disappoint her. He
rode her hard. His penis was so expanded,
his erection near the painful point, that he
knew it was just a matter of seconds.
He pulled out just in time, just as he re-
leased all over her ass, his cum thick and
sticky, his breathing so heavy he could
hardly control it. He slumped against her,
and stayed there. And then he laid over, on
his back, the sweat pouring from him as his
body slammed down. And she collapsed too,
on her stomach, her body as emptied, as sati-
ated, as whiplashed as his.
She turned and looked at him. The veins
in his muscles were still showing. The sweat
225/302
still shone in glistening effect all over his
body. And his penis and balls were still red
hot, still on fire, from the pounding.
But it was his breathing that held her at-
tention the most. He was always winded
after their lovemaking; she often was too.
But Tommy was almost ten years older than
she was, and she was beginning to worry
about him. Sometimes, on assignments,
when she was in some dark van on her way
or in some dark room waiting, she would
think about Tommy. Was he eating prop-
erly? Was he getting enough rest? Was he
still trying to run two restaurants and his se-
curity firm on three hours sleep?
She placed her hand on his chest, as if her
touch alone could help regulate his breath-
ing, and he placed his hand over hers.
“I’m okay,” he said, patting her hand. “I
just need a minute.”
226/302
She smiled. She knew what he meant. She
turned back around, and just lay there, until,
within minutes, she was sound asleep.
Tommy, now recovered, turned on his side
and looked at her. She still carried his re-
lease all over her backside, not to mention
what he had poured into her vagina earlier,
and just the thought of it, just the sight of his
mark all over her, was turning him on again.
He was actually getting a hard on again.
Then he smiled.
“Not on your life,” he said aloud as he
willed himself to get up, to get a damp wash
cloth, and to purge her of him, inside and
out.
227/302
EIGHT
Shawna sat at a window booth inside the
Taste of Southern restaurant and sipped cof-
fee. She watched as one of the three wait-
resses hanging out at a table near hers poin-
ted toward the smudged-stained window.
“Check out that bad ride,” the one Shawna
had heard them call Peewee said to the one
they called Maria. Both gawked at the pearl-
colored Bentley as it pulled into the half-
empty parking lot. It was after two, which
meant the lunch crowd had gone and the
dinner crowd hadn’t started arriving yet, so
any car pulling up would have garnered at-
tention. Especially one as luxurious as the
one the two waitresses were eyeing.
“That’s Tommy Gabrini’s car,” a third
waitress, a good looking blonde, said to the
other two. She was seated at the table they
were hanging out at, going over receipts. Ap-
parently the manager or some such person,
Shawna figured.
“Who’s Tommy Gabrini?” PeeWee asked.
She was a small, yellow-toned black woman
with long braids and longer fingernails. She
and Maria, a taller but also slim Hispanic,
were apparently on break.
“Y’all new so y’all wouldn’t know,” the
blonde pointed out. “But that’s just Tommy
Gabrini. He owns this restaurant. Owns
Diamante’s too.”
“For real?” Maria said. “Dang. I can’t
even afford a drink in a place like
Diamante’s.”
“Yeah, it’s weird to me too,” the blonde
said. “He owns a five-star luxury restaurant
like Diamante’s, and a cheap, soul food joint
like this.”
“Say what you want,” PeeWee said, imper-
vious to her manager’s put-down of the very
soul food their livelihoods depended on, “but
I like this restaurant.”
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“And given the way so many people come
here every single solitary day,” Maria said,
“it’s as popular as Diamante’s.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” PeeWee said and
the manager laughed.
“Damn!” Maria said as Tommy, in shirt
sleeves, stepped out of his car. “Look at that
fine looking man there.”
PeeWee looked too, although the manager,
Shawna noticed, didn’t bother.
“That’s the owner?” Maria asked. “He
looks so beautiful, so strong and elegant.”
Then she laughed. “I’ll bet you be all over
that, Janet. Don’t you?”
Janet snorted, and Shawna could see the
bitterness in her eyes. “Not hardly,” she
said.
“Why not?” Maria asked her.
“Wrong color,” she said, and Peewee
looked at her.
230/302
“What you mean wrong color? You’re
white and he’s white, how is that the wrong
color?”
“It’s him. I’ve never seen him with a white
woman not one single time.” She looked out
of the window too. “I don’t think he can
handle a white woman,” she added.
PeeWee wanted to snort, Shawna could
tell it. But she also wanted her job. “Yeah,
that must be it,” Peewee said snidely and
Shawna smiled, sipped her coffee, and
looked out of the window too.
Tommy stood beside his Bentley, a car he
rarely drove, and put on his suit coat.
Shawna had driven her Lexus, which he had
parked beside, a car he had purchased for
her when hers was totaled during one of her
more colorful junkets. And although the
ladies were right to gawk over his great
looks, she loved him more for the person he
was inside. He didn’t constrain her; he
didn’t try to remake her in his own image the
231/302
way her ex-husband had tried. She knew he
could change, just as her ex had, but lately
she was beginning to wonder if it would be
worth the risk. The idea of belonging to one
man was an intolerable thought to her after
what she endured with Alex, but it was al-
most a false choice to her now. Because, in
truth, she had belonged to Tommy Gabrini
ever since the first day she laid eyes on him.
And just thinking about the way he made
love to her last night, as she watched him
walk across the parking lot and enter his
large restaurant, made her vagina squeeze in
anticipation of the next time that thick dick
of his would find its way deep inside of her.
Then she smiled. Every time she spent any
appreciable time around Tommy, she stayed
horny as hell.
“Hello, Mr. Gabrini,” Maria said as
Tommy began walking toward their table.
“Hello, dear, how are you?”
“I’m doing good, sir.”
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Tommy looked beyond her at his man-
ager. “Hello, Janet,” he said.
“Hello, Mr. Gabrini.”
“I take it these ladies are two of the new
hires you were telling me about.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You must be Maria,” he said, his light
blue eyes bearing into Maria’s dark brown
eyes.
“Yes, sir,” Maria replied, smiling.
“And you must be Patrice.”
“Yes, sir, but everybody calls me Peewee.”
“Well Peewee, I understand you used to
work at Mama Pearl’s.”
“For over five years, yes, sir, I sure did.
Until Mama Pearl passed on.”
“Very good restaurant. Mama Pearl gave
me a lot of pointers before I opened up this
place.”
“For real?” PeeWee said, and then caught
herself. “I mean, that’s good.”
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Tommy smiled. “For real is right,” he
said. “Welcome aboard.”
“Thank-you very much, sir.”
Tommy then looked at Janet. “Is my
brother here?”
“Yes, sir. He’s in the office.”
“Tell him I want to see him,” he said, and
then moved past their table and headed for
Shawna’s. All three women were watching as
he leaned over, kissed Shawna on the lips,
and then sat across from her.
“What did I tell y’all,” Janet whispered to
the other two, and then hurried to do what
her boss had ordered her to do.
“Any sight or sign of her yet?” Tommy
asked Shawna after he sat down.
“She’s at the corner of Blanchard. She
should be here within four and a half
minutes.”
Tommy smiled. “That precise, are we?”
“I leave nothing to chance,” she said.
“Especially when it involves family.”
234/302
Tommy was astounded when she said
that. Shawna, too, astounded herself. But
she didn’t take it back. Because, in truth,
Tommy was really the only family she had.
And his family, by extension, she felt, was
her family. It was ludicrous, she knew. But
that was how she felt.
“I still think we should have schooled Sal
Luca on what was going on before now.”
“I don’t. If I was to---”
A waitress came up to him. “Would you
like anything to drink, sir?”
“No, thank-you, Ann, I’m fine,” he said
with his most charming smile, Shawna
noticed.
The waitress left.
“If I told my brother beforehand,” Tommy
continued, “then he would try to change the
plan to fit what he believes is the best way.”
“This is the best way.”
235/302
“You know it and I know it and Reno sure
as hell knows it. That’s why I wanted to keep
it between the three of us.”
Shawna drank more coffee. “Katrina’s
nice,” she said.
Tommy looked at her. “Yes, she is.”
“Reno impressed me. I expected him to
marry a trophy, or at least a mockingbird.”
Tommy shook his head. “Reno’s got more
sense than that.” Then he looked at Shawna
again. “As do I.”
They exchanged a glance, and then Sal
Luca, Tommy’s baby brother, walked over.
“Shanks?” Sal said, surprised to see her.
“What wind blew you this way?” He sat be-
side Tommy, his short, round, bulldog frame
a stark contrast to Tommy’s tall leanness.
“Long time, no see, Sal,” Shawna said to
the bulldog of a man. He and Tommy, she
felt, were like night and day in every way.
“Yeah, long time,” Sal said, checking her
out too. “I thought you and Tommy were
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through. Tommy said he was done with
you.”
Shawna laughed. “You don’t beat around
the bush, do you?”
Sal looked at her sincerely. “What you
want me to lie to you? Is that what you
prefer?”
“No,” Shawna said, heartfelt. “I love your
honesty.”
Sal smiled. Of all of Tommy’s black fe-
males, and they all were black, she was the
only one he liked. He looked at his brother.
“So what you want? Janet said you
wanted to see me.”
“We’re getting a package delivered here in
a few minutes.”
“Male or female?”
“Female.”
“Gonna have to be moved?”
“Yes.”
“Who is it?”
Tommy hesitated. “Marcy.”
237/302
“Marcy? Marcy Davenport? You don’t
think she had anything to do with the PaLar-
gio hit. Do you?”
“We’ll go through the back,” Tommy said.
“Get it ready.”
Sal looked at his big brother. All of his life
he wanted to be just like Tommy. And even
now, at the age of thirty, he still wanted to be
just like Tommy.
He stood up. Looked at Shawna. “You
staying around or what?”
“I’ll be around,” she said.
“See you around then,” Sal said and left,
his thick thighs causing him to sashay more
than walk.
“You’d better go too,” Shawna said. “She
just drove up.”
Tommy looked and saw a rental car pull
into the driveway. When Marcy Davenport
stepped out, he stood and made his way to-
ward the back.
Shawna pressed her
Bluetooth. It was one of her team.
238/302
“The subject has arrived,” he said.
“I got her,” Shawna replied.
The cloth that covered her entire face
came off and the only person in the room
with her was Reno. She was relieved, Reno
would never harm a hair on her head, but
angry too.
“You’re an asshole, Reno!” she shouted.
“Yeah, I know,” he replied as calmly as she
was hysterical. “What else you got?”
“You’re an insufferable, pea-brain, muscle-
headed motherfucker!”
“I know that too. What else you got?”
Marcy looked at him with a smoldering
contempt that soon dissolved into sadness.
Reno’s heart dropped.
“Where am I?” she asked, looking around
at the small, windowless room. “And why
am I in handcuffs? I knew you were kinky,
Reno, but even you wouldn’t go through this
much trouble to get some.”
239/302
She was seated on a small, rollaway bed
and Reno was seated in front of her in a
chair, his legs crossed, his hands clasped and
to one side. He wore darkened shades to
avoid revealing his emotions. This woman
was the mother of his son, a son they both
lost less than a year ago. If she was the mas-
termind behind the PaLargio hit, he would
do what he had to do, but it would be a
shame. He didn’t want to hurt this woman.
She’d been hurt enough.
“Talk to me, Reno,” she continued.
“What’s this about?”
“Didn’t Shanks tell you?”
“Shanks didn’t tell me shit. She said
Tommy wanted to meet with me. I come all
this way, on my own dime mind you, think-
ing Tommy had something important to say
and that’s why he was going through
Shanks. I get to Taste of Southern, go in the
back, and I see Tommy. Then the next thing
I know my mouth is stuffed, my head is
240/302
covered, and I’m being transported. I don’t
deserve this treatment, Reno. You know I
don’t. You owe me.” She said this last line
with such bitterness that it made Reno
wince. “Now what is it you want from me?”
she wanted to know.
“Where were you the day the PaLargio was
hit?”
She frowned. “What? The PaLargio, hit,
Reno? Seriously? You’re trying to lay that
hit on me?”
“You have motive.”
“What motive?”
“You hate me.”
“I’ve always hated you, so what?” She
loved him once, she knew, when they were
an item, but that was a long time ago.
“You hated me more after Nicky’s . . .
death.”
The terror was still in her eyes, Reno could
see it. “So,” she said, determined to hide it.
“So that gives you a powerful motive.”
241/302
“Bullshit. What I look like hitting the
PaLargio, come on, Reno, think! Why would
I do something that stupid? And to take out
your mother, to almost take out Franny. I
didn’t hate them.”
“What about my wife?”
“What about that bitch?”
Reno’s jaw tightened. “If not you, Marce,
then who?”
“I need some money, Reno, that’s why I
came. I thought Tommy could set me up.”
“Talk to me, Marcy.”
“I will. But I need some money.”
Reno paused. “I gave you money.”
“And it’s gone, all right? I need some
more.”
Reno stared at her. He’d heard months
ago that she was on drugs. Reno was hurt by
the news but he couldn’t blame her. Not
after the horrific way she had to stand there
and watch her own child die.
242/302
“You’re on the junk, aren’t you, Marcy?” he
asked her.
“I need some money, Reno.”
“Alright already. I’ll give you money. Now
give me what I need. Tell me who ordered
the hit on the PaLargio.”
She looked at Reno. “You know who.”
“Who?”
“You know who.”
“Gotdammit, Marcy, does it look like I
know who? Who?”
“Vito, Reno, who else?”
But Reno was shaking his head. “Vito says
he had nothing to do with it.”
“And you believed him? What’s the mat-
ter, Reno, losing your touch?”
“But why Vito? Because of what happened
to Eddie?”
She smiled. “You’re kidding, right?”
“Kidding about what?”
“Reno, tell me you know.”
243/302
This girl talked in riddles, he thought.
“Know what?”
“About Eddie.”
“What the fuck about Eddie? Get to the
point, Marce!”
“You don’t know. I’ll be damned. You
don’t know.”
“You’re talking in circles, Marcy. I don’t
know what?”
“Vito pulled a Partanna on you.”
Reno was stumped. He stared at her. “A
Partanna? Frank Partanna? What does that
dead fucker have to do with this?”
“When Frank pretended that his son was
dead so his son could run his underground
operation. Remember that? It’s the same
with Vito and his son.”
“What? Get the fuck out of here!”
“It’s true! He knew they were going to
have that drug drop. The surprise was that
MarBeth would pull out a gun, and she was
the one who did the shooting. That small-
244/302
time hood Joey Laster was supposed to do
the shooting but with blanks in the gun. But
that idiot Joey left the gun in the car and
MarBeth did the shooting instead. But it was
blanks, Reno. MarBeth didn’t kill anybody.”
Reno didn’t know what to even think. He
stared.
Marcy laughed. “I figured that out as soon
as I heard about Eddie getting iced. I knew it
was a scam because of what happened with
Partanna. I thought you’d see right through
it too.”
“But Vito couldn’t plan a hit that fast after
Eddie’s shooting. Not that fast.”
“Why the hell not?”
“What you mean why not? Because he had
to breach my security, that’s why not! Be-
cause he had to pay off my top people.”
Marcy shook her head. “Reno, Vito Gian-
carlo breached your security months ago,
when that war started with Frank Partanna,
didn’t you know that? Your people been his
245/302
people for months. All he had to do was say
the word. And he had to say it. Word had
already gotten out that MarBeth killed Ed-
die. He couldn’t let her get away with that
without a hit back, or everybody would know
it was a Partanna.”
Reno could hardly believe it. Had he been
that off base? Had he been outsmarted that
badly?
Marcy laughed. “And your dumb ass actu-
ally thought I was the mastermind, that I
could have hit the PaLargio.” Her smile left.
“I hate your ass, you got that right. But I
wasn’t about to be your sacrificial lamb the
way our son was.”
Reno didn’t know if she was telling the
truth or telling a pack of lies, and the fact
that he didn’t know, didn’t have a clue, was a
problem.
He left the safe room, ordered his men to
give her some cash and take her back where
they got her from. And then he stood there,
246/302
both hands in his hair, wondering what in
the world was going on here.
247/302
NINE
They sat on the patio, Reno and Trina
sharing a lounger, and Tommy and Shawna
side by side in chairs. Everybody had a
drink, except Shawna, and everybody had an
opinion on what to make of Marcy’s claim.
“I’m not buying it,” Trina said. “Eddie Gi-
ancarlo not dead? It’s too incredible, Reno.”
“We thought Pags was dead, too,” Shawna
reminded her, “but Frank Partanna pulled it
off. He fooled everybody.”
“But that’s my point,” Trina said. “Every-
body saw it before. You can’t pull a stunt like
that twice.”
“What do you think, Tommy?” Reno asked
him.
Tommy just sat there, his legs crossed, his
glass of wine resting on the arm of his chair.
Then he exhaled. “We’ve got to talk to Vito.”
Reno nodded. “Agreed.”
“But the question is,” Tommy went on, “is
Marcy Davenport a trustworthy individual?
That’s the question.”
“Well is she, Reno?” Shawna asked.
“You’re the only one around here with any
intimate knowledge of her.”
Tommy glanced at Trina. Trina, however,
couldn’t care less about any of Reno’s past
romantic entanglements. She knew her
worth to him.
“About some things, yeah,” Reno said.
“What about this thing?” Tommy asked.
“What about Vito hitting the PaLargio and
Eddie not being dead? What about Vito
breaching your security months ago? You
believe all of that shit?”
“Yes. No. Hell, I don’t know, Tommy,”
Reno said, standing up and beginning to
move around. “I don’t know. That’s what’s
driving me insane. I have to know if what
Marcy said was true. I have to be absolutely
certain.”
249/302
“How can you be absolutely certain?”
Shawna asked. “There’s no absolute proof in
this game. Is it more likely than not that
Vito Giancarlo hit the PaLargio, regardless of
whether or not Eddie is alive or dead? I still
say it has to be Vito, since you’re so certain it
wasn’t Marcy.”
“It wasn’t Marcy. I looked into her eyes.”
“You looked into her. . .” Shawna shook
her head, her irritation showing. “Excuse
me, Reno, but what the heck does that
mean?”
“Shawnie,” Tommy said.
But Shawna would not back down. “No, I
need to know because let’s face it, Reno, your
judgment of late hasn’t been all that stellar,
I’m sorry but it’s true. And where I come
from looking into somebody’s eyes and de-
termining her soul is about as nuts as look-
ing into somebody’s ears and determining
her thoughts. Come on, Reno, you looked in-
to her eyes? Seriously?”
250/302
“Marcy didn’t hit the PaLargio, all right?
She’s been through enough. I’m not taking
her through any more wild goose chases be-
cause you had a bright idea. I have to be ab-
solutely certain this time, Shanks, and I
mean absolutely certain.”
“Then you can forget it,” Shawna said, “be-
cause there’s no absolutes here.”
Reno, however, stood firm. “I’m not
killing a man, or ordering a hit on a man,
based on a maybe.”
“Then you’re a dead man because they’ll
kill you on one. Or even less than a maybe.”
“Shawna’s right, Reno,” Trina said.
Reno looked at Trina, surprised. “So you
say we hit back? You’re telling me that I
should hit Vito?”
“I know you have reservations,” Shawna
said.
Reno looked at her. “Reservations? Is
that what you call it? Besides the fact that
Vito Giancarlo has the kind of manpower
251/302
and connections that can crush us, hell yeah
I have reservations! If we hit, and this is a
big if, I’m not doing this half-cocked like we
did with Frank Partanna and Pags. I’ve got
to know more. I’ve got to be sure.”
Shawna stood up too and walked over by
the rail. She leaned against it. Tommy
watched her. She was getting frustrated
fast. But not because she disagreed with
Reno. She understood he was making sense.
But it seemed to Tommy that she just wanted
to get this over with. That last job, where her
error caused her to take casualties, was
haunting her still.
“Why don’t we just let it die,” Tommy
said. “No more bloodshed. Let it be.”
Reno was shaking his head, but Trina
spoke up before he could. “He can’t do that,”
she said.
Both Reno and Tommy looked at her.
“Why not?” Tommy asked.
252/302
“Because they killed his family, his mother
no less. You expect him to just forget
something like that? Every mobster this
side of Jersey will be gunning for Reno if he
doesn’t get Vito.”
“But Vito is big, Tree,” Tommy said. “The
kind of hit we can execute isn’t going to
cripple an organization like that. He’ll hit
back. Then what?”
“We aren’t talking about crippling him.
We’re talking about taking him out, him and
his boy if that fucker is still alive.”
Reno stared at his wife. She had changed.
What he feared most after that attack was
coming to past. She was forced to shed
blood and now the strangeness of that shed-
ding was beginning to seem less strange to
her. His heart plunged.
Tommy, too, was alarmed. He looked at
Reno. Reno was still staring at Trina.
He walked over to her. “Come on, babe,”
he said, extending his hand. Trina was
253/302
surprised that he was ready to call it a night
this early, but she didn’t dispute him. She
stood and took his hand.
“Call Carmine,” Reno said to Tommy. “I
want him to get MarBeth here before we
make any moves. I think Dirty can handle se-
curity for his own wife.”
“But you’re going to make a move?”
Reno looked at his cousin. “They kill your
mother, nearly kill your sister, would have
killed your wife, your Shawna. What would
you do, Tommy?”
Tommy’s heart squeezed at the thought of
losing Shawna. “I’ll call Carmine,” he said.
Reno was taking a cell phone call from Lee
Jones by the time they made it into the bed-
room. He laid across the bed going over
business details regarding the PaLargio
while Trina showered and brushed and put
on a silk nightgown. Reno didn’t finish his
phone conversation, however, until after she
had gotten on top of him and straddled him.
254/302
She smiled, pretended to be riding a horse,
as he killed the call.
“Ride me, Reno,” she said jokingly.
“I’ll ride you all right,” Reno replied half-
heartedly. She had on no panties under-
neath her gown and she knew he was feeling
the pressure of her vagina against his stom-
ach, something that always used to get him
going. But he seemed unable this time to put
aside the fact that a lot of unknowns lay
ahead of them.
She stopped bucking. “What’s wrong?”
she asked him. “Everything okay at the
PaLargio?”
“Yeah, everything’s fine.” Then Reno
pinched his temple.
“Then what’s wrong?”
Reno stared at her, placed his hand on her
chin and then released it with a playful
snatch, although his eyes had no play in
them. “I’m a little concerned, Tree.”
“About Vito?”
255/302
“About Vito. Of course about Vito. But
about you too.”
This surprised Trina. “Me?”
“Yeah, you. Since when you sanction re-
taliation? You hate that shit.”
“I didn’t say I loved it. I said you couldn’t
let Vito or whoever it was get away with it.”
“I can’t allow it, Tree. I can’t allow you to
become me.”
A hardness came into Trina’s eyes. “It’s
too late for that now, isn’t it?” she said,
which surprised Reno. “They put us in this
position, Reno.”
“No, they didn’t. They didn’t put us any-
where. They put me in this position, not us.
And I’ll be the one to get us out of it.”
“We’re in this together.”
“No, we aren’t. I want you to understand
that, Tree. No, we aren’t. You’re still
innocent---”
“Innocent? How can I be innocent? I
killed two people, Reno!”
256/302
Reno grabbed her by her bare arms. He
shook her. “You’re innocent, you hear me?
You’re not what you was forced to do. You’re
not that and you will never be that, do you
understand me, Tree?” Tears were in Reno’s
eyes. “Tell me you understand that.”
Tears came in Trina’s eyes too, and she
nodded, laid her head down on his chest. He
wrapped her into his arms.
“I understand,” she said.
And she did.
It was after eleven by the time Tommy
made his way up the stairs to his bedroom.
He had been on the phone with Sal Luca
about his restaurants, and with his security
people about numerous other cases, includ-
ing final preparations for the transporting of
Carmine and MarBeth to Seattle. Francine
was still too ill to travel, still in ICU, and
therefore it was decided that Dirty, her hus-
band, would stay in Vegas with her. But
since MarBeth may still have a target on her
257/302
back, and Reno wanted her out of harm’s
way, Tommy ordered Carmine to get her
safely to Seattle.
Now all Tommy wanted to do was get
some sleep.
He changed his mind, however, when he
entered his bedroom and saw Shawna lying
on top of his bed. She was stark naked, on
her stomach, her lithe, toned, beautiful
brown body so gorgeous, so alluring to
Tommy that suddenly getting sleep was the
last thing he wanted to get.
He removed his tie as he walked toward
the bed. “Hey,” he said.
“What took you so long?” she asked.
Tommy was surprised. He sat on the edge
of the bed, stared at her, tried her. “Missed
me?” he asked her.
Shawna hesitated. He could see the fear in
her eyes. “Yes,” she said.
He smiled, placed his hand on her butt. “I
miss you every time you’re away from me.”
258/302
He began rubbing her in a slow, caressing
rub.
She felt a tingle deep within her vagina as
he caressed her. “Even after you dumped
me?” she asked him.
“I didn’t dump you,” Tommy said, unbut-
toning his shirt with his free hand. “I gave
you an ultimatum.”
“You gave me an ultimatum, and then you
dumped me.”
“I want to give you something else to-
night,” he said, his hand sliding between her
legs and rubbing against her womanhood.
She sighed.
“What do you want to give me?” she asked,
barely able to keep her eyes opened.
“My love,” he said and looked at her.
Normally this was the time when she shut
down. Any talk of affection turned her off.
But not tonight.
“Your love in the form of what? Your
dick?”
259/302
“That too,” Tommy said, his fingers mov-
ing between the lips of her vagina and
scratching her there.
She groaned.
“Do you want some dick, Shawnie?” he
asked as his fingers slipped deeper inside of
her, moistening her with every rub, making
her feel the anticipation of the heat as much
as the heat itself.
She nodded. “Yes,” she said, her voice a
whisper. “I want some dick.”
Tommy stood up, removed his shirt, un-
buckled and unzipped his pants, and then
stepped out of both his trousers and his
briefs.
Shawna looked down, at his long, stiffen-
ing rod, at his lean but muscular thighs, at
his tanned, athletic body that still turned her
on in ways that sent shivers down her spine.
She reached out, and took possession of his
penis, and began a slow, gentle massage.
260/302
Tommy stood there, as she fondled him.
And when she placed his penis into her
warm, sweet mouth, that mouth he loved, his
penis began to harden to such an extent that
he knew he wasn’t going to last much
longer.
He got in bed on top of her. She was still
on her stomach as he straddled her. Then he
took his engorged dick, rubbed it across her
buttocks, and then slipped it, big and hard,
into her vagina. His movements were slow
and steady as her tightness had him going in
but barely out. He squeezed her small,
brown ass as he gyrated her, as he continued
to move in and barely out, in and barely out,
and she squeezed the sheets of the bed as she
felt the intensity. This was Tommy, her gold
standard, the man she loved above any other
human being, and that fact along made her
want to cry.
He laid down on top of her, his stomach
against her ass, his in and almost out rhythm
261/302
steadily increasing. “You turn me on so
much, baby,” Tommy whispered in Shawna’s
ear as he fucked her. “I could fuck you all
night long.”
“Then do it,” Shawna said with sensual
delight.
But he knew that was impossible. The
feeling was just too intense. Because as soon
as she said it, Tommy’s control broke and his
gyrations became deeper, more penetrating
thrusts that caused Shawna to scream his
name.
“Tom-my!” she screamed as he rode her;
as she felt the stiffness of his rod thrash
against the walls of her vagina, over and
over. And his thrashings kept going deeper
and deeper until he was within the deepest
part of her womanhood. And that was when
he let it out. All of it. Into her.
She squeezed her vagina around his rod as
he released, and the tightness of her climax,
and the thrust of that release, met in a place
262/302
of such high intensity that they both lifted
up, and then crashed back down.
Later, as they lay arm in arm in bed,
Tommy kissed her forehead. He was holding
onto her as tightly as he could. And that ele-
phant in the room, that trip to New Jersey
tomorrow, could be ignored no longer.
“What’s going to happen, Shawnie?”
Tommy asked her.
Shawna hesitated. “About what?”
“Vito Giancarlo.”
“We’re going to meet with him.”
“And?”
Shawna smiled. “And there will be blood.”
Tommy pinched her bare butt. “Don’t play
with me.”
“I’m not playing. It’s the truth. You ask
me what’s going to happen and I told you:
bloodshed is going to happen, that’s what.”
Tommy hesitated. “And you’re okay with
that?”
263/302
Shawna didn’t respond. She knew exactly
where this was leading and she didn’t want
to go there.
“And you’re okay with blood being shed?”
Tommy asked again.
“No, I’m not okay with it,” Shawna finally
responded, “but what do you want me to say,
Tommy? It is what it is. I’ll just go and do
my job.”
“And your job is what? Helping Reno kill
Vito Giancarlo?”
“Vito is a bad guy--”
“Vito is a man, Shawnie. A human being.
And who gives you the right to end that
man’s life?”
“He killed Reno’s mother!”
“You don’t know that for certain.”
“I do know it, what are you talking about?
And what difference does it make anyway? If
he’s not guilty of this crime, he’s guilty of
some other crime. I just do my job.”
264/302
Tommy hesitated. “And what if I ask you
not to do this job?”
Shawna immediately moved out of his
arms and began moving out of his bed.
“Shawnie!” he yelled and grabbed for her,
but she was already on her way.
She grabbed his same dress shirt that he
had earlier tossed off, put it on her naked
body, and headed out on the balcony adja-
cent to the bedroom.
Tommy sat up, knowing he had bitten on
sensitive fruit, and wondered if making
amends was even worth the bite.
He quickly decided that it was, put on his
bath robe, and went out onto the balcony
too.
Shawna was standing at the rail, her long
hair blowing in the wind, as she looked out at
the birdbath in the middle of the big back-
yard. His shirt on her body was blowing too,
batting and wrapping around her slim body,
265/302
revealing far too much of her for such a
breezy night.
Tommy walked up behind her and opened
his robe, wrapping her into it with him, her
body now pressed against his. And they just
stood there. Then Tommy spoke.
“Forget I said that,” he said.
“But you meant it, didn’t you? You want
me to quit my job.”
“I didn’t say that, Shawnie. I don’t want
you to get caught up in any mob war, that’s
what I was talking about.”
“But that’s my job, Tommy. Reno hired
me because he could trust me to do what I
have to do. He doesn’t know who he can
trust now.”
“I understand that.”
“He trusts you, but you’re no killer. You
don’t have that in you, Tommy.”
“You’re no killer either.”
Shawna didn’t respond.
“I do what I have to do, too,” Tommy said.
266/302
“I know that,” she replied. “But that’s the
problem. Sometimes on these kinds of jobs
you don’t just do what you have to do, but
what you think you need to do. That’s the
difference. You don’t have that in you.”
Tommy exhaled. “I just want you safe,” he
said, a frown of anxiousness engulfing his
face. “I just want my lady safe.”
Shawna inwardly smiled. Because it was
true. Tommy Gabrini really loved and cared
about her, and was probably the only human
being on the face of this earth who did.
She leaned back, against his rock hard, na-
ked body.
“I’ll be safe,” she promised.
267/302
TEN
The private jet taxied at the airstrip in Ne-
wark, New Jersey and Reno stood to his feet.
With him on the plane were Trina, Tommy
and Shawna. Carmine and MarBeth, who ar-
rived earlier that morning, was also with
them. MarBeth might still be a target, re-
gardless of what Marcy had said, and Reno
therefore wasn’t about to take any unneces-
sary chances. The way he saw it he’d had
more than his share of unforced errors over
the past year. He wasn’t interested in having
any more.
As the plane taxied to a halt, Tommy,
Shawna, and Carmine stood up too.
“This is the deal,” Reno said, putting on
his suit coat. “I want the ladies to remain on
the plane.”
“On the plane?” MarBeth asked. “Why
can’t we wait at Somers Point, Reno?”
“Because I said you’re waiting on the
plane, MarBeth,” Reno shot back. “No hood
in their right mind is coming anywhere near
this airstrip to do any hit. This is the safest
place to be right now. That’s why everybody
came. So I don’t have to be worrying about
it. Me and Shanks will go and have a little
talk with Vito, you guys will stay here.”
“I’m going too, Reno,” Tommy said.
Reno looked at his cousin, at his expensive
tailored suit, at his perfectly groomed hair
and nails. Tommy used to be a cop, and a
damn good one, but now he was a business-
man first and last. He was no hood. “I need
you to stay here, Tom, with Trina,” Reno
said.
Tommy wanted to look at Shawna, be-
cause she was what his every decision was
about. But he, instead, stared at Reno. “I
can’t do that,” he said. “I’m going with you.”
“And I said I need you to stay here with
Tree.”
“No.”
“Whatta you mean no?”
269/302
“No, that’s what I mean. Hell no. I’m not
sending my woman into a dangerous situ-
ation while I stay here and babysit yours. I
love Tree, but I’m going with you and
Shawnie.”
Shawna wanted to tell Tommy that she
could take care of herself, and she knew she
could. But lately it felt kind of good to know
that he wanted to help.
Reno ran his hand through his already
ruffled hair. “Now, look---”
“If it was your lady going to meet Vito,”
Tommy asked, “what would you do?”
It was similar to the question Reno had
posed to Tommy the night before. Trina
smiled and looked at Shawna. Shawna
blushed to the roots of her hair.
Reno exhaled. “All right,” he said. “But
Carmine you stay here with Tree and
MarBeth.”
“Ah, Reno!” Carmine started but Reno
gave him a look so ice cold, he stopped his
270/302
whining. “Sure, Reno,” he said with a truck-
load of reluctance. He was tired of being left
with the females.
Reno leaned over to Trina, kissed her on
the lips. “I’ll be back,” he said.
“You’d better,” Trina said, holding onto his
coat lapel, fighting back tears.
Reno stared at her longer, and then looked
at Carmine. “Take care of them.”
Carmine nodded. “Don’t worry, Reno, I
will.”
When Reno and Tommy got off of the
plane, Carmine slung off his suit coat and
angrily, decisively, threw it to the floor.
***
The rotund Vito Giancarlo walked through
the reception area of his doctor’s swanky of-
fice with his snow white Persian cat in his
arms. It was a familiar scene, the mob boss
and his cat, although many of the staff as-
sumed him to be a wealthy, kindly old man
271/302
who, in their estimation, wouldn’t harm a
flea.
The limo that brought Vito to the doctor’s
office pulled up to the curb to pick him back
up as soon as Vito stepped outside. The
driver/bodyguard got out and opened the
back passenger door as was always the case.
Vito walked across the sidewalk, paying
more attention to his purring cat than to his
driver, and got in.
He didn’t realize he had company until he
looked up and saw, seated across from him,
Reno and Tommy Gabrini.
“What the hell,” Vito started and looked at
his driver/bodyguard as the driver got back
into the car behind the steering wheel.
When the driver turned around and removed
the chauffeur’s cap, and her long, black hair
cascaded down, Vito frowned. “Shanks?
What the hell are you doing here? Where’s
my driver?”
272/302
“Where you think?” Reno asked. Then he
smiled a chilly smile. “I’m not the only one
with a security breach, Vito.”
Vito stared at Reno as if he was disappoin-
ted in him. “I told you I had nothing to do
with that PaLargio hit,” he protested. “I had
nothing to do with it, Reno! You’re persecut-
ing the wrong man.”
“Where’s Eddie?”
Vito could hardly believe it. “What? You
trying to be funny here? You trying to take
the knife and twist it, Reno? Eddie’s dead
and you know it!”
“Then why didn’t you retaliate? You know
MarBeth was responsible, why didn’t you hit
back?”
Vito looked less sure now, as his double-
chin sagged even more. Tommy looked at
the much-feared Vito Giancarlo and saw
nothing but an old, fat man with too many
ghosts.
273/302
“I said I wasn’t going to retaliate, I said it
to your face. I keep my word.”
“Bullshit!” Reno yelled. “Why didn’t you
hit back, Vito, if Eddie was iced? If your son,
your flesh and blood, was shot down like a
dog in the street?”
“You’re
my
godchildren,
you
and
MarBeth.”
“Where’s Eddie, Vito?”
“I told you Eddie’s dead, Reno.”
“I was told you’re trying to pull a Partanna
on me.”
“A
Partanna?
What
the
hell’s
a
Partanna?” When Reno would not entertain
his ignorance, Vito sighed. “Eddie is dead,”
he said. “But his death was sanctioned.”
Tommy looked at Reno. Reno frowned.
“Like hell. Sanctioned by who?”
“By me, all right? Satisfied? Now I said
it. By me, his old man! I sanctioned it!”
Tommy stared at the old man. “Why,
Vito?” he asked him.
274/302
Vito stared past them. “He was a dis-
grace. He had become a disgrace. I put up
with everything. His lies, his cheating, his
stealing, I put up with it. He was my boy, my
child, so I put up with it. But he hated me,
blamed me for his mother dying when he
was a baby. I didn’t have nothing to do with
that, she died of a heart attack, but he was
convinced my lifestyle caused her to have the
heart attack. Eddie, he wasn’t a very bright
boy. He was what you call a dull bulb in the
drawer.”
“Why did you sanction his death?” Tommy
asked again.
“Because he was a disgrace, didn’t you
hear me the first time, Dapper Tom?” Vito
calmed back down. “It started when he star-
ted selling drugs like some two-bit hustler,
selling drugs to little kids. When I told him I
didn’t tolerate that bullshit, he left. Only he
didn’t leave the game. He offered himself to
Frank Partanna.”
275/302
“To Frank?” Reno asked. “Eddie worked
for Frank?”
“He needed him for that Vegas hit, when
he took out your father and brother, Reno.
Frank knew that if Eddie walked up to Paulo,
to your dad, there would be no alertness.
Then the others could take him on out.
That’s how it really went down.”
Reno was floored. “Geez,” he said.
Vito continued. “When I found out about
it, I kept his ass away from Partanna’s organ-
ization. I even sent him, under guard, to
Russia until the heat was off. One of his
guards was Joey Laster.”
Reno and Tommy exchanged a glance.
“Joey Laster used to work for you?” Tommy
asked.
“Yeah, he did. He was a loyal kid. He was
the one who told me about Eddie getting
hooked up with some Russia mafia types
while he was away and now was running
276/302
weapons for them and selling drugs for him-
self on the side.”
“Joey was a dealer too,” Tommy said.
“Yeah, he was. To keep an eye on Eddie.
And he was doing a good job at it, too. Eddie
had no idea he was relaying intel back to me.
But then when MarBeth found out---”
“About Joey the boyfriend selling drugs?”
Reno asked.
“MarBeth found out that Eddie was with
Partanna’s men when they iced your old man
and your baby brother. And she wanted
revenge.”
Reno stared at Vito. Tommy was staring
too. “MarBeth wanted revenge? How the
hell did MarBeth find out?”
“Through her fucking around with Joey,
how the hell should I know? But she found
out. And wanted to take Eddie out. She
blamed him for what happened to her fam-
ily. And she blamed you, too, Reno.”
277/302
Reno knew MarBeth harbored some anger
over what happened, but she had directed all
of that anger, he thought, at him.
“So I figured enough was enough,” Vito
went on. “Eddie had to go. He had dis-
graced my good name enough. He had de-
fied me on every turn. So I agreed to let her
do it.”
“Wait a minute here,” Reno said, con-
fused. “Are you telling me that you agreed to
let MarBeth ice Eddie?”
“He was a disgrace, Reno.”
“But . . . .” Reno couldn’t begin to wrap his
brain around what Vito was saying. Eddie
might have been a lowlife, but he was Vito’s
lowlife. How could he sanction the murder
of his own son?
“She was bloodthirsty,” Vito said, rubbing
his cat now, feeling more confident that
Reno wouldn’t do anything rash. “She
wanted Eddie’s blood.”
278/302
Tommy swallowed hard, his eyes riveted
on Vito. “Who else’s blood did she want,
Vito?” he asked him.
Vito didn’t skip a beat. “Why, Reno’s, of
course,” he said.
Reno snorted. “What else is new?”
“But she couldn’t kill her own brother,”
Vito said, “not even MarBeth was that cold-
hearted. I am, but not MarBeth. Because
she loves you as deeply as she hates you,
Reno. She’s a very confused girl. But she
had no problem whatsoever, however, taking
out her brother’s heart. Whom, she rightly
surmised, was your wife.”
Reno frowned. “My wife? What the fuck
are you talking about, Vito? You’re telling
me that my own sister orchestrated the hit
on the PaLargio? Are you telling me that
MarBeth had her own mother killed?”
Vito was shaking his head. “Everything
went wrong,” he said. “Because she did me a
favor and was willing to take the heat for it,
279/302
she asked me to get her people up to the
penthouse, to make your people stand down
so her people could take care of business.
She told me it was going to be a quick in and
out. They had one target they were supposed
to take out. But those fools she hired didn’t
try to just take out Katrina. They tried to
take out everybody in the house!”
But Reno was still lost. He was still frown-
ing. “What are you telling me, Vito? You’re
telling me that. . . that MarBeth wanted my
wife. . . That. . . .” Reno’s heart was barely
beating, and his voice began to sound faint.
“Are you saying to me that MarBeth wanted
Trina dead?”
“That’s exactly what I’m saying, Reno,”
Vito replied.
And as soon as it hit, it hit like a
sledgehammer.
“God, no!” Reno screamed as Shawna
turned back around and took off in that limo
so fast that all three men in the back bucked
280/302
forward. She slung the limo around corner
after corner and was speeding as if it wasn’t
her first time driving such a long machine.
She hung a U-turn so hard that all of the
men in the back slid against the doors.
“God, no!” Reno kept saying as he pulled
out his cell phone, too nervous to even dial
the numbers. It flipped out of his hand.
Tommy grabbed it and dialed for him.
“Don’t let this be happening again,” Reno
was saying.
“Please don’t let this be
happening.”
Tommy looked at Reno, as Trina’s phone
began to ring. And closed his eyes and
prayed as fervently in silent, as Reno was
praying aloud.
Trina and Carmine were seated side by
side in the front of the plane when her cell
phone began to ring. And then the world be-
came senseless.
MarBeth, who was seated just behind
them, immediately stood to her feet, pulled
281/302
out her revolver, and then walked in front of
the twosome and fired a bullet through the
head of her own husband.
Trina screamed and quickly tried to stand,
as Carmine’s blood splattered all over her,
but MarBeth just as quickly slammed her
back down. Trina tried to reach for her
phone.
“You answer it, you’re dead,” MarBeth
warned. And then she smiled. “Not that you
aren’t already, anyway.”
Trina stared at her sister-in-law. Beyond
stunned. “What are you doing, MarBeth?”
was all she could ask. Then she looked at
poor Carmine, who was now slumped over
beside her, blood everywhere. “What have
you done?”
“I’m the bitch who took out her own moth-
er,” MarBeth said, her bottom lip trembling
at the mere thought of how everything had
gone so awry. “It’ll take absolutely no
282/302
thought whatsoever for me to take you out
too.”
Tears wanted to shed in Trina’s stunned
eyes, but she knew that would be exactly
what MarBeth wanted.
And her phone stopped ringing.
“What did I ever do to you?” Trina asked
her sister-in-law.
MarBeth smiled. “You’re kidding right? I
know you are not asking me that question.”
Then MarBeth’s voice rose achingly loud.
“What do you think you did to me, you black
bitch? You hit the scene, distracted Reno,
and then half of my family was taken out!
My father and my brother. The good half.
And you have the nerve to ask me what you
ever did to me?”
MarBeth sat down, across from Trina, her
gun still pointed at her. She looked like
some wild woman to Trina, like a total
stranger.
283/302
“It won’t work, MarBeth,” Trina said, won-
dering what would Reno say. “Not here. The
pilot’s probably running back to the plane
right now. They probably already heard that
gunshot.”
“They didn’t hear shit!” MarBeth snapped,
not bothering to look away from her inten-
ded target. “Now shut the fuck up and wait.”
Trina wanted to ask what it was they were
waiting for, but she wasn’t about to risk it.
MarBeth had always had some chip on her
shoulder. She’d always been the one to give
Reno the hardest time. But never could
Trina have thought she’d stoop to this.
So she waited.
And prayed.
It took less than fifteen minutes for the
limo to arrive at the plane site. Reno,
Tommy, and Shawna jumped from the limo
and ran toward the plane, none of them an-
swering Vito’s relentless questions about
what was going on. But as soon as they did
284/302
jump out, Vito, nobody’s fool, got out as
quickly as his big bulk and age would allow,
got behind the wheel of the limo, and took
off.
The pilot, who was joking around with
some of the baggage handlers, saw his bosses
running toward the plane and began running
across the tarmac too.
“Where the hell were you?” Tommy was
yelling, his one hope, that the pilot would
have been able to help Carmine contain
MarBeth, gone.
“I was just over there talking, Tommy. I
was--”
But nobody cared what he was. Reno,
Shawna and Tommy all entered the plane in
swift succession. But as soon as they saw
first Carmine slumped over, and the blood,
and then MarBeth standing there, with Trina
standing in front of her, they stopped in their
tracks. Although Reno already had his gun
285/302
drawn, MarBeth had hers against the side of
Trina’s head.
“Shanks, Tommy, put those hands where I
can see them,” MarBeth ordered, although
her brother was the only one who had his
gun drawn. But somehow, it seemed to
Shawna, MarBeth was certain Reno would
not fire.
Shawna and Tommy, however, did as she
commanded. “Come further in,” MarBeth
said. “So I can see your pretty faces.”
All three did as she commanded, with
Reno in front, Shawna just beside him, and
Tommy beside her, his body slowly moving
in front of her.
“Close the door,” MarBeth ordered and the
pilot did as he was commanded.
Reno looked at Trina, whose face was such
a mask of anguish that he almost felt like
taking that gun and ending her pain right
here and right now. Because as surely as he
was standing there, if something was to
286/302
happen to Tree, it would amount to the same
thing. It would be as if he had taken that
gun, and killed her himself.
Reno’s heart was hammering, but he knew
if anybody was going to diffuse this situation,
it was going to be him. He looked at his sis-
ter, tears in his eyes.
“MarBeth,” he said, shaking his head,
looking down at bloody Carmine, a man he
loved, and back at her, “talk to me.” They
were far beyond the point of no return, and
Reno knew it. Which made it horrific.
Which made the terror of this moment feel
like thick shards of glass in his throat.
“Talk to me, Mar,” he said again.
He looked so pitiful and said it so heartfelt
that those tears Trina had fought so hard to
keep at bay, came anyway.
“I was waiting for you to get back,”
MarBeth said, fighting her own tears. “I
wanted you to see this for yourself.”
287/302
“See what, MarBeth? That you murdered
a good man like Carmine, your own hus-
band, in cold blood?”
“None of this would have happened, Reno,
if you would have listened to me. But you
never listened to me. You just ordered me
around, me and Franny, like our opinions
never counted to you. But you was so in
love, when you barely knew this woman, but
you was acting like you was so in love.”
“I love you too, MarBeth.”
“You never loved me! Never! Don’t tell
that lie! I loved you,” MarBeth said, tears
now in her eyes. “Everybody loves Reno.
But Reno only has eyes for Trina. His Tree.
Well I’m about to chop down this tree.”
“MarBeth, talk to me,” Reno said hur-
riedly, panicky. Keep her focused on him, he
said to himself. Keep her hate directed at
him. “I won’t know if you don’t tell me.”
“You should have helped Pop. When you
found out Frank Partanna was gunning for
288/302
Pop, you should have helped him. But you
didn’t. You left it up to Carmine and Dirty,
Reno. Carmine and Dirty! Two losers! Then
to put salt in our wounds by giving the
PaLargio to this bitch.”
Reno frowned. “I didn’t give the PaLargio
to anybody.”
“You made her president, it’s the same
thing, Reno! You didn’t make me and
Franny nothing. When you left, and I asked
you if me and Franny could work there,
could learn the business, you told me no.”
She paused. “You know why you said no?”
“I didn’t want my sisters to bear that
burden.”
“That’s a lie!” MarBeth shot back. “You
didn’t want anybody to get in the way of Kat-
rina’s ascension to the top. She was always
your first and last concern and you know it!
Her, above family, Reno. Her?”
289/302
MarBeth cocked her pistol.
Shawna
looked at Reno, stunned that he hadn’t made
a move.
“MarBeth, please don’t do it,” Reno said as
tears like blood dropped from his eyes.
“Please don’t make me do it. You take out
Tree, I’ll have to take you out.”
MarBeth laughed. “And that’s supposed to
scare me? You already took me out, Reno,
when you married this bitch!”
And as soon as she said it, she was ready to
pull that trigger. And there was no time to
think, no time to negotiate, no time to hesit-
ate. Time was out.
Shawna grabbed Reno’s gun right from his
hand and pulled the trigger, catching
MarBeth right between the eyes, missing
Trina by mere inches.
And MarBeth’s revolver was the first to
fall. And then MarBeth, with her suddenly
stunned look, dropped like a haggard Cab-
bage Patch doll, to the floor.
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And Trina let out a sharp, tight, overdue
exhale that she incorrectly thought was her
heart beating again.
Tommy took the smoking gun from
Shawna’s hand, and pulled her against his
body. She did what she had to do, he knew,
but the fact that she had to do it hurt him to
his core.
Reno just stood there, unable to move,
staring at his sister’s lifeless body. He
couldn’t have killed his sister any more than
he could have harmed his wife. But some-
how, he felt, he had managed to do both. It
wasn’t physical, he wasn’t the one to pull the
trigger because he could never have done it
that way. But his actions, his decision to in-
clude one in his life and exclude the other
one, was the real culprit here.
And then he looked at Trina, who was still
standing, who appeared just fine but for the
terror in her eyes. And he moved to her, and
pulled her into his arms.
291/302
Neither one of them felt celebratory.
Neither one of them felt lucky. They, in
truth, didn’t feel anything but the heartbeat,
the very lifeline, of each other.
And Reno knew like he knew his name
that he had to give it all up: the PaLargio, Ve-
gas, all of these mob hits and counter-hits.
He had to give it all up. If he ever expected
to hold on to Trina, it all had to go.
292/302
EPILOGUE
The chauffeur lifted the luggage into the
limo’s trunk as Reno and Tommy stood talk-
ing on the steps outside of Tommy’s house.
Trina and Shawna were talking too, at the
limo’s passenger door. They looked at the
two men. Both men wore their Italian silk
suits as if those suits were stitched onto their
athletic bodies. Both looked gorgeous, and
strong, and, to the ladies, something else not
as easily discernible.
To Trina, she believed it was relief. Reno
looked relieved, as if he was finally able to let
out a long exhale. They were moving on, to a
quieter life, and she could hardly wait to get
there.
To Shawna, she believed it was hope.
Tommy looked hopeful: because she was
still there, still in his arms, still in his bed,
still so deeply embedded in his heart that his
hope was making her hopeful, too. And as
she continued to take peeps at Tommy, as
her heart continued to flutter at just the
thought of how well he took care of her, she
felt for the first time in a long time that she
actually belonged somewhere.
Tommy felt circumspect too, as he and
Reno continued to talk. Only he was more
worried about Reno than anything else.
“Stop beating yourself up,” Tommy urged
his cousin. “MarBeth put herself in that
situation.”
“I know that,” Reno replied.
“It’s over now. It’s all over.”
Reno, with a pair of dark shades covering
his expressive blue eyes, looked past Tommy,
at Trina.
Trina was now laughing at
whatever it was she and Shawna were talking
about. But he could still see that terror, that
unspeakable fright, all over her. “I feel like
it’s just beginning, Tommy,” he replied.
“What are you talking about, Ree? Just
beginning? Franny’s doing fine, she’s on
track to make a full recovery, and Dirty
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hasn’t left her side. He’s stepped up big
time. There’re no mob hit lists that you’re
on, at least nothing we know about, which
means none exist. And Trina made it
through in one piece. It’s over. You can take
your beautiful wife back to the PaLargio and
live your life now on your own terms.”
“Until the next craziness strikes, right?”
Reno asked, now looking at his cousin.
“Then it’s on again.” He shook his head. “I
can’t take that risk.”
“So what are you saying?”
“I’m saying I can’t risk it,” Reno said. “I
love Tree too much. And I’m getting her out
of Dodge and keeping her out.”
“Ah, Reno, please don’t tell me you’re leav-
ing her again.”
“I’m not leaving her. I’ll never do that
again. But I’m taking her away from the
bright lights of my life. We talked about it.
We’re starting over somewhere, just she and
I, before it’s no longer possible.”
295/302
Tommy stared at his cousin. “Where?” he
asked him, although he already knew Reno
wasn’t telling. At least not yet.
And true to form, Reno extended his
hand. “Take care of yourself, Tommy,” he
said as he and his cousin shook hands. “And
don’t neglect the weightier matters.”
Tommy stared at him and then frowned.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” he asked
him, but Reno was already walking toward
the limo. “What’s that supposed to mean,
Reno?” he called after him.
When Reno made his way to the car, he
stood in front of Trina. Looked carefully at
her.
“You good?” he asked her.
Trina nodded. “Better than good,” she
said.
Reno smiled, kissed her on the lips.
Looked at her again carefully.
296/302
Then he looked at Shawna. “Something
I’ve been meaning to ask you,” he said.
“How did you know I wouldn’t do it?”
To Shawna it was a no-brainer. “She was
your sister, Reno. You could never harm
your family, even when they deserved harm-
ing. And MarBeth deserved harming. But
you wasn’t going to be the one to do it. And
one thing I’ve learned about you, Reno, is
that you’re always true to form. Even I know
that much.”
Reno smiled. “You’re still a smartass,
aren’t you?”
“Takes one to know one, baby.”
Reno laughed, and then his looked turned
somber. “Thanks,” he said to Shawna.
“That’s why I wanted you with me. I knew
you would act if I couldn’t.”
And to her shock he kissed her on the
cheek.
“Be good, Shanks,” Trina said as she and
Reno began to get into the limo. “Be good,
297/302
Tommy!” she also yelled to Tommy, who was
walking toward the car.
Tommy waved as he stood beside Shawna.
And he and Shawna stared at the departing
limo, rather than each other.
“Are they going to be alright?” Shawna
asked Tommy.
Tommy thought about it. “Trina will be
just fine,” he said. “And Reno will too. Espe-
cially with his new plan.”
“His new plan? And what plan is that?”
“To not neglect the weightier matters.”
Shawna looked at him. Confused. Until it
dawned. “The weightier matters, eh?”
Tommy didn’t think she would pursue it,
but was thrilled that she had. “That’s right,”
he said.
“And what are the weightier matters?”
“Love, family.” Tommy looked at her.
“Passion.”
Shawna felt the heat of that word as if it
was alive in front of her. And then she
298/302
looked once again at the limo as it drove out
of the electronic gates.
“I have a job offer,” she said.
Tommy’s heart dropped. He had been
dreading those very words. “Oh, yeah,” he
said, attempting to remain cool. “Where?”
“Here in Seattle as it happens.”
Tommy looked at her. “Seattle? What job
can you possibly have here in Seattle?”
Shawna hesitated, and then swallowed
hard. “I’m going to be a wedding planner.”
Tommy’s heart wanted to take flight. He
wanted to believe it. But could he? “Whose
wedding,” he asked carefully, cautiously, “are
you planning?”
This time Shawna smiled. “I thought
maybe ours,” she said and looked at him. “If
that’s okay with you.”
Tommy’s heart soared. Was it okay? Did
she just ask him if it was okay? He grabbed
her and lifted her into his arms.
299/302
“Yes,” he said into her hair, his eyes now
filled with tears. “Oh, yes!”
And when he sat her back on solid ground,
her eyes, too, were filled with the most joyful
tears she ever thought possible to shed.
She then hit him, playfully, on the arm.
“See what you made me do,” she said, unable
to wipe away the tears that wouldn’t stop
flowing.
300/302
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