Mob Boss Eleven- The Wrong One (The Mob Boss Series Book 11) (3 page)

Trina
looked down the street at the young men on the corner.
 
Reno looked at her, at her gigantic hazel
eyes as they carefully considered that corner.
 
He loved the fact that she always had to see it for herself, and make up
her own mind.
 
Then she looked back at
him.
 
“I realize it,” she said.

“You
realize there could be a drive-by shooting at any moment and your ass could be
right in the middle of it?”

Trina
didn’t blink.
 
“I realize it,” she said.

Reno
stared at her.
 
She was so tough now, and
he was proud of his part in making her tougher.
 
But she was sometimes fearless too, and too willing to take chances.
 
He didn’t like that part about her one
bit.
 
He had to literally beat her ass a
time or two because of it.
 

He
looked past her, at the humungous building before them, and at the two people
standing there, all smiles, as if they were waiting for their lottery
winnings.
 
He began putting on his suit
coat.
 
“And you wanted me to meet you
here why?” he asked.
 

“I
have an idea,” she said.

Reno
wanted to roll his eyes. “Not again, Tree.”

“Just
come and hear us out,” Trina said.

“If it’s
about opening another store, I don’t have to hear you out.
 
The answer is no.”

“It’s
not about opening another store, Reno,” Trina said with a smile.
 
“Just hear us out.”

Reno
smiled. “Do I have a choice?”

Trina
intertwined her arm in his.
 
“None,” she
said, and escorted him toward her two potential partners.
 

Reno
was reasonably certain that this meeting was going to be all about yet another
how to overextend myself
bright idea by
Trina, and he was certain he was not going to like it.
 
He put back on his shades.
 

Gennifer
and Maurice braced themselves as the power couple headed their way.
 
It was now or never for their little venture,
and they both knew it.
 
They put on their
best smiles.
 
They outwardly displayed
their best looks of sincerity.
 
They
inwardly prepared the best sales pitch of their lives.
 
Because they knew this had to work.
 
They knew it had to be the kind of sales
pitch that would alleviate any of Reno Gabrini’s concerns, and tamp down any
good reason he had to reject their proposal.

But
what they didn’t realize, as Reno approached them, was that he was already
rejecting it.
 
When it came to his wife
overextending herself, they could try to sell him the moon, the stars, the lake
and the sea.
 
But he wasn’t buying any of
it.

“I
want you to meet Maurice Pender and Gennifer Goff,” Trina said to Reno when
they arrived at the building’s entrance.

“How
are you?” Reno asked the twosome.

“We’re
honored to meet you, Mr. Gabrini,” Maurice was the first to respond.
 
“We’ve heard so many wonderful things about
you.
 
So many magnificent things.”

Wrong approach
, Trina thought, and she was
right.
 
Reno didn’t waste time.
 
“You heard things,” he said to Maurice, “but
none of them were wonderful or magnificent.
 
None.”
 
Reno looked Maurice in the
eyes.
 
“Let’s cut the bullshit.
 
What’s this about?”

Maurice
and Gennifer exchanged a quick glance.
 
What in the world
, they wondered.
 

But
Trina didn’t wonder at all.
 
She had
already told them what in the world they were up against.
 
They just didn’t believe her.
 
“Gennifer and Maurice once ran Halperin
House,” she said to her husband.
 
“I’m
sure you’ve heard of it.”

“Yeah,
I’ve heard of it.
 
It was a . . . what’s
it?
 
A shelter, right?” Reno asked.

“For
battered women, yes,” Trina responded.
 
“It used to be housed in this building.
 
Before it closed, Maurice was the executive director and Gennifer was
the business manager.
 
But after it
closed, it left a major void in this city that they’ve been trying to fill ever
since.”

“A
void they want you to fill?” Reno asked.

“They
want me to help fill, yes,” Trina responded honestly.
 
“But it’s something I’ve wanted to do for a
long time.
 
You know what it’s like here,
Reno.
 
You own the PaLargio.
 
You see it every day.
 
This is Vegas, and so many women are
victimized here because of the atmosphere, and so many of these men think they
can get away with it for those same reasons.
 
A new, state-of-the-art battered women’s facility is exactly what’s
needed.
 
And the building is already in
place.
 
And with Mo and Gen, we have the
brain trust.
 
Liz knew I was interested
in moving in this direction, so she put me in touch with them.”

Reno
looked at his wife.
 
“A battered women’s
shelter, Tree?
 
So now you’re interested
in battered women?”

“I’ve
always been interested in women period, Reno.
  
I just didn’t know how I wanted to make something happen.
 
I didn’t know how to turn my interest into
action.”

“But
these two do?”

“Yes,
sir, we do,” Maurice chimed in, despite his previous slap down.
 
“As your wife just so eloquently stated, we
ran Halperin House.”

“And
apparently you ran it in the ground,” Reno pointed out, “because, as my wife
also eloquently stated, it’s closed now.”

Maurice
wanted to lash back at Reno, but Gennifer took over.
 
“Yes, you’re right, Mr. Gabrini,” she said.
 
“It is closed, that is a fact.
 
But we did everything in our power to keep
these doors open.
 
We worked for free for
months on end to keep the doors open.
 
For the sake of those poor women.
 
But the economy took a nosedive and the funding dried up.
 
The owner did all she could, but the money
just wasn’t there.”

At
least the good looking red-head got to the point, Reno thought.
 
He would rather deal with her.
 
“So what do you want from my wife?” he asked
Gennifer.

“We
want her to invest with us so we can reopen the shelter.
 
We want to make sure that women of all
backgrounds can feel secure in knowing that they have a special place to
come.
 
We want to provide love and
comfort and a safe place for the ladies.”

“And
this is the best news of all,” Maurice said with a confident smile.
 
“The name will be changed and we will be
calling it, not Halperin House, but Gabrini House!”

Maurice
said this as if that alone would seal the deal.
 
Trina and Gennifer both wanted to roll their eyes.
 
Didn’t Maurice get it yet, Gennifer
wondered?
 
This man did not like
flattery.
 
At all!

But
Reno was already over Maurice.
 
He
ignored him.
 
“Again,” he said to
Gennifer, “what do you want from my wife?”

“We
have the knowledge,” Gennifer said.
 
“We can
really help the ladies and make this work.
 
But we need funding.”

Reno
nodded as if he figured it all along.
 
“Money,” he said.

“Money,”
Gennifer agreed.

Reno
scratched his thick, unruly brown hair and then raked his fingers through it,
tossing it even more.
 
Gennifer loved the
messy look of his beautiful hair, but she also would love to take a comb
through it.
 
And through the rest of him
too, she thought, as she looked down at his sinewy form.

“It’s
about the money,” Trina said, “yes, it is.
 
But it’s also about the cause.”

“Let
me get this straight,” Reno said to her.
 
“You work at the PaLargio, and you’re my second-in-command there.
 
You run Champagne’s, and you’re the owner,
the manager, the stock clerk, and whatever else you need to be when you’re there.
 
You’re the mother of my three children, two
of which haven’t even started grade school yet.
 
And you’re my wife, no easy task for any human being alive I will freely
admit.
 
But yet, on top of all of that,
with all of that on your plate, you expect me to agree to let you bankroll and
run a battered women’s shelter?
 
Are you
fucking kidding me?”

 
“It’s not just me, Reno!
 
I’ll be one of the investors, but I won’t run
the day to day at all.”

“That’s
the same shit you told me when you wanted to open Champagne’s, Trina.
 
The exact same shit!
 
‘I won’t run it at all, Reno,’ you said to
me.
 
‘I’ll just put up the money.
 
It’ll be easy.
 
It’ll be a piece of cake!’”

“That’s
a
got
damn lie!” Trina shot back.
 
“I never said anything about it being easy or
any piece of cake.
 
Why do you keep
saying that?”

“Because
you implied it!” Reno responded.
 
“Now
you’re working at Champagne’s almost as much as you’re working at the
PaLargio.
 
Your children get glances at
their mother.
 
You’re so exhausted
sometimes you look like you need to be hospitalized to get your ass some
rest.
 
And you think I’m going to go
along with this?
 
No.
 
The answer is no.”

“But,
sir,” Maurice asked, “the building is already here.
 
At least come inside.
 
Don’t you want to look inside?”

Trina
and Gennifer couldn’t believe he asked that.
 
Reno frowned. “Why the fuck would I want to look inside some
got
damn building?
 
My wife has too much on her plate right
now.
 
That’s the issue.
 
She can’t be a part of this.
 
That’s the point.
 
She can give a donation, but that’s it.
 
She’s not partnering up with you.
 
So you need to find yourself another sugar
mama, oh, I’m sorry.
 
I mean
investor
.
 
This one is not available.”
   
He looked at Trina.
 
“Where’s your car?”

“Reno---”

“Where’s
your car?” His tone was even firmer.

Trina
exhaled, mainly to control her anger.
 
“It’s still at Champagne’s,” she said.
 
“I rode with them.”

“Let’s
go.”
 
He began leaving.

Trina
wanted to defy him.
 
She wanted to tell
him that this conversation wasn’t finished by a longshot.
 
But she knew what that would get her.
 
She looked at her would-be partners.
 
“I’ll call you,” she said, and followed her
husband out of the building.

When
they left, a bitter Maurice looked at Gennifer.
 
“Did you see that?
 
I hate him!”

“But
do you hate his money?” Gennifer asked.
 
“We need the cash.
 
Once we gain
Mrs. Gabrini’s trust, then we can do what we need to do.
  
His entire complaint was about how she’s
stretched too thin as it is.
 
That’s
great for us, Mo.”

Maurice
looked at her.
 
“Great for us?
 
How is that great for us?”

“Because
if she agrees to partner with us, she’ll have to let us run it the way we see
fit.
 
She’ll be too busy to know the
difference.
 
We can do whatever the hell
we want.
 
And our cash flow will crank
right back up, and right under her nose.
 
And the money, once again, will pour like rain, and our high class
living will return.”

“And
not a moment too soon,” Maurice said, and Gennifer laughed.