MOB BOSS 3: LOVE AND RETRIBUTION (11 page)

Cecil and Earnestine stared at their daughter, 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 stil the same person, just the grown-up, mature, experienced version.

And Reno, in the bedroom, was wide awake in bed. Through the paper-thin wals he had heard every word. And it was stil 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 Nely Furtado on his stereo, and pressed the button on his car phone.

Reno, who had falen back asleep after the heated conversation between Trina and her parents had ebbed, answered his ringing cel 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 hel time is it anyway?”

“Ten am. Daytime.”

Reno yarned. His voice raspy. “How you doing?”

“I’l live. It’s you I’ve been worried about. How’s everything going? How’s Tree?”

There was a hesitation on Reno’s part. Could be because he was just waking up, although Tommy suspected more. “It’s tough,” Reno admitted. “What can I say? But it’s al right. I’l 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.”

“Al right, al 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 sipped his latte, blew through a yelow 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’l stay out of your business. You can dish it but you can’t take it.”

“You don’t tel me your sad stories,” Tommy said, “and I won’t tel you mine.”

“Ah, so it’s like that?”

“Exactly like that. But realy, 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 sitting around beating yourself up, Reno. What’s done is done. Tree understands that. You need to.”

“I wil. Especialy after this funeral. After I can get this whole thing sorted out. I’m puling 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 doing. “So you’re stil in Portland or what?”

“No, I got back last night.” Then Tommy hesitated, but Reno realy was the only human 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 hel that means.”

“You fucked her brains out, didn’t you?”

Tommy hesitated. Reno was about as diplomatic as some banana republic dictator. But it was weighing heavily on him. “Yes,” he admitted.

“No surprise there. Even though, let you two tel it, it’s over and it’s been over since forever. Please. What’s with you two anyway? 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 rols. That’s why I never went after her. She’s a gorgeous girl, but that’s about al 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 of a good, loyal, but strong as hel 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’l 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 vulnerable, perhaps the most fragile woman Tommy had ever known. But because she was great at concealing it, Reno and everybody else took her as this ice princess. When she was a long way from cold. Especialy 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 checking in. I’m on my way to the office.”

“I hurt your feelings, didn’t I?”

“Of course not, Reno.”

“Look, I love Shanks too, I realy do. I respect the hel out of her, that’s why I want her on my team. I just wouldn’t wanna marry her or anything, that’s al I’m saying. And I just don’t understand why you’re so head over heels with that particular girl, that’s al 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 tel me al the time that if al 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?”

Tommy smiled. “I don’t appreciate you caling my woman a wolf.”

Reno laughed. “Al in good humor, brother.”

“Would it stil be humorous to you if I caled 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. “Goodbye, Reno,” he said, and kiled the cal.

By the time he parked his Mercedes and entered the Gabrini, Incorporated office building in downtown Seattle, had walked across the busy lobby filed with associates too new to even realize who they were hustling past, and rode the elevator to the top floor, those words Reno had used to describe Shawna stil stuck in his mind. Lone wolf. She was a lone wolf. And, if Reno was to be believed, would always be alone.

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 restaurant 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.

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.

“Helo, 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 alow 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 monitoring 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 kitchen 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’l handle it, Irene, thanks.”

“And another thing, sir,” she said just as Tommy’s hand landed on the knob of his office door.

“Novela’s waiting to see you.”

“Novela?”

“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, al female, and none except Shanks, she believed, deserving of him.

“I’l 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 Novela 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.

It always started and ended the same way. She always agreed to an open, no-strings-attached relationship early on. Would be al-in, al amped about it. Would insist it’l work for her too because she needed her space just as fervently as he needed his. She understood unconditionaly that she wasn’t going to change him, and he wasn’t going to change her (or would be interested in changing 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 cals. 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 looked out at the cloudy Seattle skyline. Then he turned and looked at the woman who was actualy one of his

favorites. Although, 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, Vel,” 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 wil be over just like that. Because it’s not going to change, Vel. You knew that going in.”

Novela 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 Novela 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 Gabrini had to wield. And she was begging
him
? She closed her eyes because it was true. She was wiling to beg him. He was worth it.

She reopened her eyes. Saw compassion in his. She was depending on that compassion. “So what you’re saying to me,” she said, stil stunned, “is that I am now and wil always be just a booty cal 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 understand how resolute he realy 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.”

“Wel 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 expect me to think about you every day and every night, spend al of my free time with you, and not fal in love? How could you not fal 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 cal on line one, sir.”

He frowned. “Who is it?”

Irene hesitated. “Miss Shanks, sir,” she said.

Tommy almost glanced at Novela, to see if she understood the seriousness of that name in his life. But he didn’t even look her way. “Al right, I’l take it, Irene, thanks.”

Novela began walking toward the chair to grab her purse and coat. “I have a plane to catch anyway,” she said.

Tommy folowed her to the chair. Helped her into her coat. When she turned around, she fel into his arms.

He held her, and when she stopped embracing him, he held onto her coat lapel. They stared into each other’s eyes. “For the record,” he said, “I don’t want it to end.”

Novela stared at him. “I saw a car on your driveway last night,” she said. “A Lexus. When I rang the doorbel a woman answered. A beautiful woman. She said you were in Portland and she didn’t know if 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. Remember when I asked and you told me that? Yet this woman gets a key?”