ROMANCING THE MOB BOSS (18 page)

into the room, wasn’t saying much.

But the state of the room wasn’t an issue

for them. Because they were kissing, and

fal ing onto the bed, before they could even

inspect the place. It had been their first time

since Paris, since al those romantic Paris

nights when they made love so often that Trina

once joked that they were becoming freaks

about it. Reno had joked back, “becoming my

foot, we’re already there,” and banged her

mercilessly.

And now, in Dale, Mississippi, he

wanted her just as desperately. He removed

her blouse, thril ed to see she was wearing no

bra, and began kissing her chest and breasts.

As he did, Trina was undressing him, his shirt

and his pants, and then lifting herself up so that

her remaining clothes could be removed,

rendering them both completely naked.

But Reno couldn’t stop kissing her.

He’d move down, from her breasts to her

stomach, but kept moving back up to her lips.

He loved the way she tasted. So much so, that

he moved al the way down, to her thighs, to

between her legs, and tasted her so long, and

so expertly that Trina was having an orgasm by

the time he entered her.

He entered slow and easy, total y in

control, his rod throbbing for her before he got

halfway in. But when she began to throb back,

from her orgasm, his control broke, and he

pounded.

For what seemed like hours, but were

actual y good, long minutes, he pounded. The

bed began squeaking as if the springs were

going to pop, as the sound of the silence was

enveloped with the sound of flesh pounding on a

bed that might not be able to take it much

longer.

They were so explosive that they nearly

ended up off of the bed from the intensity, as

Trina’s smal body kept arching to take him in

ful y, kept moving as the feel of him so deep

ful y, kept moving as the feel of him so deep

within her caused her to want to scream. She

wasn’t giving this up, not for anybody else this

world had to offer, and she knew it now like she

knew her name.

When they final y stopped, when the bed

squeaking final y eased, he let out a long,

exhausted exhale, kissed her on the lips again,

and rol ed off of her. Now they were laying side

by side, both amazed at how right they were for

each other, although they appeared, to the

world, to be so wrong. Reno took Trina’s hand,

and held it against him.

After laying there longer, both

embracing the power of harmonious love, Trina

looked at him. “Are you plotting to kil Frank

Partanna?” She asked him this without blinking,

without stuttering, without any signs of outward

distress.

Reno sighed. His distress was more

readily seen. “I cannot al ow that asshole to

think that he can kil my father, that he can kil my

brother, that he can just take what my father took

a lifetime to build and claim it as his own, and

expect me to just turn my back and walk away.”

Trina looked away. “It’l be like a

betrayal,” she said and Reno, amazed, looked

at her.

“That’s right, Tree,” he said. “I’l be

betraying my father’s memory if I walk away.”

“But what about the moral point, Reno?

How can you say you love God, and take a life

he put on this earth?”

“I understand what you’re saying, I do.

And I know that a part of me, a moral part of me,

may be lost forever if I go down this particular

road. But they bought this fight to me, Tree. I

wasn’t bothering nobody. My old man wasn’t

botheri ng nobody. Goodness knows Joey

wasn’t bothering nobody. But they bothered

us.” He looked at Trina, his blue eyes stormy

and drained. “I can’t let that stand or it’l be

open season on the east coast, on men like my

father. And Carmine and Dirty wil be sitting

ducks. I can’t al ow that, Tree. The east coast

families, my father’s friends, can’t al ow it.

That’s why we were meeting. To plan this with

precision. I wish this wasn’t my fate, I wish I

wasn’t put in this position. But I’m in this

position. I hate it, but I’m in it.” Then he added,

to make certain she understood: “I’m no saint,

Tree. I’m tel ing you I’m not.”

Trina seemed to take it al in. Already

Reno was seeing a change in her. “When’s the

hit?” she asked him.

He stared at her longer, and then looked

at the Cartier watch on his wrist. “In exactly two

hours and eight minutes.”

“When it al goes down, you wil be

questioned, you know that?”

“I know.”

Another kind of
taking it all in
pause

from her. “Okay,” she final y said, getting out of

bed, “let’s give you an alibi they can’t refuse.”

Reno looked at her, was happy and

saddened that she now was completely

onboard, but took her lead and got out of bed,

too.

***

restaurant in south central LA, drinking with his

men and laughing at this cockeyed female he

once fel in love with. It’s eight in the evening,

the sun is just beginning to set, and Frank is at

peace with the world.

“I didn’t know if she was looking at the

wal or at me, but it didn’t matter,” he says.

“That dame was a wildcat in bed, she was even

growling when I fucked her.” The men laugh.

“Growl, growl,” he says, gesturing like a cat.

Back in Dale, Mississippi, just after ten

at night, and Trina and Dale are standing at the

altar in Cecil Hathaway’s smal church.

Earnestine is the witness, although it’s obvious

she’d rather not participate. Cecil is standing

before the couple, the Bible in his hands.

“Dearly beloved,” he says, “we are

gathered here today, in the sight of God, to join

this man and this woman in holy matrimony.”

Back in LA, while Frank is laughing his

head off, Gooch, one of his lieutenants, comes

running into the private room. “We got trouble,

time to boogie!”

There’s no hesitation. These men know

how to respond to trouble. Frank is immediately

grabbed and ushered down a long, narrow

grabbed and ushered down a long, narrow

hal way.

In Dale, Reno looks at Trina. Although

she’s in pants and blouse, and even he’s in a

wrinkled suit that had seen better days, she

couldn’t look more beautiful to him.

“Do you, Katrina Marie Hathaway, take

this man, Dominic Gabrini, to be your lawful y

wedded husband, to have and to hold, to love,

honor and obey, in sickness and in health, til

death do you part?”

Trina looks at Reno. She isn’t smiling,

she isn’t doubtful, she’s dead serious. “I do,”

she says.

LA: Frank’s smile is stil plastered on his

face, he knows danger is lurking or he wouldn’t

be running out through this back hal specifical y

built for getaways like this, but he also knows

it’s going to be al right. It always is. That’s why,

when the back door is busted open, and he and

al of his men come crashing out, certain they

had escaped any looming disaster, and saw the

guns drawn as soon as they saw the light of day,

he stil didn’t get the message.

Dale: Reno squeezes Trina’s hand

tighter, when she says I do.

“And do you,” Cecil says, turning now to

Reno, “take this woman, Katrina Hathaway, to

be your lawful y wedded wife, to have and to

hold, to love and to obey, in sickness and in

health, til death do you part?”

In LA: Not until the bul ets begin ripping

through his chest, not until his lieutenants don’t

even have a chance to point their weapons, not

until he sees his men dropping like flies, not until

he sees the blood gushing out of his own body

like a faucet leak, does he final y see the

danger. But he sees it too late.

Frank Partanna, the mighty man, fal s.

Not with a bang, but with a thump. With blood

spewing from his mouth as his face, his once

smiling face, hits the ground hard.

“I do,” Reno says in Dale, Mississippi,

and they, he and Trina, are pronounced

husband and wife.

“You may kiss the bride,” Cecil says

proudly, but they’re already doing that.

Once the kissing stops, they lean their

foreheads against each other, staring at each

other.

“You sure you wanna take on this

adventure,” he asks her.

She smiles. “I need this adventure like I

need a hole in the head,” she says, causing him

to laugh. “For real, though. But I need you like I

need air to breathe.”

This stops him short. He stares at her.

“Yes, Dominic Gabrini,” she says. “I’m

ready to take it on.” Then she adds, with a grin,

“Bring it on, baby,” and he laughs.

“I love this girl!” he proclaims to her

father and mother, and proudly walks her out of

the church and into the quiet darkness of a

breezy, but hopeful Mississippi night.