“I thought you said we couldn’t wear sunglasses inside the school house,” he said.
The principal frowned. “What are you talking about? Of course you cannot.”
“Nobody can?”
“You know the rules, Dominic.”
“Then why can my daddy wear sunglasses in the schoolhouse if nobody else can? The rules don’t apply to him?”
Reno wanted to smile but kept a straight face. Trina always warned him about encouraging that boy’s outrageous behavior.
But the judge looked at Dommi with alarm. “What is the meaning of this?” he asked Reno. “You allow your child to speak to his principal so rudely?”
Reno ignored the judge. “Why am I here?” he asked the principal.
The principal exhaled. “You are here,” he said, “because your son is running what they perhaps call in your world, the casino world, an extortion ring.”
Reno frowned. “A what? What the fu . . . what are you talking about?”
“Your son,” the judge said, “forces my son to pay him money for his protection.”
Dommi didn’t see the big deal. “What’s wrong with that?” he asked. “The bullies keep beating up the little people.”
The principal looked sidelong at Dommi. “What little people?” he asked.
“Like Roger,” Dommi said.
The principal was floored. “But he’s bigger than you are!”
“But I can fight,” Dommi responded. “Rog can’t.”
“Now see here,” the judge said. “My son can fight same as anybody else.”
“No, he can’t,” Dommi said. “He cries and let the bullies take his lunch money every day. So I told him, like I told the others, that I would protect him.”
“And that is admirable, Dominic,” the principal said. “But the problem is that you charge them money for this protection. Why, if you’re looking out for the little people as you call them, do you have to charge them money for your protection?”
Reno looked hard at his son. He wanted the answer to that question too.
Dommi didn’t skip a beat. “Because my daddy always told me anything free is not worth having. I’m worth having. They can’t have me for free.”
Reno smiled. He couldn’t help it. And then he laughed. The judge and the principal failed to see the humor, but Reno didn’t give a shit.
“This is outrageous!” the judge said with every ounce of umbrage he had.
“This is not funny, Mr. Gabrini!” the principal agreed.
“It’s funny to me,” Reno said, and his smile disappeared. “You’ve got a problem with that?”
And it was at that moment did both the principal and the judge remember who they were dealing with. Reno Gabrini. They both knew the rumors about his mob ties. About his own mob activity. About his shadiness up and down the line. They’d heard the rumors for years. Especially the judge, who worked in the criminal justice system.
Reno stood to his feet. “Go back to class, Dommi,” he ordered his son.
“Was I wrong, Daddy?” he asked as he stood up. The judge and principal looked at Gabrini. Would he rise to the occasion and set his son straight?
“No,” Reno said to Dommi. “You weren’t wrong at all. If those weaklings don’t want to pay for your services, then fuck’em. Look out for yourself.”
Dommi smiled. “Yes, sir,” he said, ran and hugged his father, and then left.
The principal stood up too. “You’re teaching your son an awful lesson,” he said.
Reno knew he was. And it cut him short. But Dommi wasn’t the son of a judge, or a principal. He was Reno Gabrini’s son. If he wasn’t tough, he wasn’t going to make it. Especially a kid like Dommi, who was a born gangster. Reno wished he wasn’t born that way. He wished he could mold him into a judge or a principal too. But he would only be kidding himself. Dommi could no more be some straight lace asshole than Reno himself could. “Don’t you worry about the lessons I teach my son,” he told the principal. And he left too.
The principal looked at the judge and shook his head. “A lost cause,” he said. “But don’t worry, Roger,” he added. “He won’t be taking any more money from you.”
Roger wasn’t in agreement with that solution at all. “But Dom looks out for us,” he said with some degree of anxiety in his voice. “The bullies are afraid of him. What am I supposed to do now?”
The judge looked at the principal too. Surely he had a better answer than the one he’d just given.
But the principal had no clever answer either. “We’ll cross that bridge,” he said as if he was saying something innovative, “when we get to it.”
Roger looked at his father. He would rather pay Dom Gabrini than rely on their unreliable principal. His father clasped his son’s hand. He was thinking the same thing too.
“What can brown do for me?” Oprah said with a smile as the UPS man entered Champagne’s carrying a small package. “I can think of a hundred things, and every one of them requires a bed.”
Trina smiled as she continued to stand at the computer behind the counter and review their latest acquisitions report. She co-owned Champagne’s with Gemma Jones-Gabrini, the wife of Reno’s cousin Sal, and Oprah was their new store manager.
“Hello, Mr. Postman,” Oprah said gaily. “Is it me you’re coming to see?”
The UPS man smiled as he approached the counter. “If your name is Katrina Gabrini, it is. But since I know Mrs. Gabrini, I’m pretty sure it’s not you I’m coming to see. But it’s nice to see you.”
Oprah laughed. “Same here,” she said, and extended her hand. She was a young, smart, attractive African-American woman with the kind of understated charm a store owner loved. “I’m Oprah Davenport,” she said as they shook. “I’m Mrs. Gabrini’s new store manager. Nice to meet you too.”
“How it’s going, Dave?” Trina said when she looked up from the computer.
“Perfect now that I’ve met perfection,” Dave said with a grin as he handed her his electronic signature interface to sign. But his eyes were on Oprah. “You’re the first Oprah I’ve met,” he added. “Other than the real one, I mean. Not that you aren’t real.”
“Right, yeah?” Oprah said with a smile. “My mom just loves her. I was born in Chicago twenty-one years ago and my mom didn’t hesitate to give me a name everybody would recognize as a name that belongs to somebody else.”
He laughed.
“The story of my life!” Oprah added.
While they continued to shoot the breeze, Trina opened the small package Dave handed to her. When she saw that it was a newspaper clipping, she was intrigued. She also saw a DVD inside. But as she read the clipping, and realized what it was about, her puzzlement turned into confusion that turned into pure horror. Her heart fell through her shoe. Her change was so pronounced that even Dave saw it.
“Are you okay, Mrs. G.?” he asked her.
But Trina was too floored to respond. She looked around as if she was lost.
“What is it, boss?” Oprah asked.
“I’ve got to,” Trina started saying, but didn’t finish. Then she grabbed the package, along with her keys and phone off of the countertop, and began leaving. She hurried back, and grabbed her purse. “I’ve got to go,” she said, and hurried out of the door.
Dave looked at Oprah. “She looks like she saw a ghost,” he said. “But that can’t be. I don’t deliver ghosts.”
He and Oprah laughed, but Oprah was concerned. The stability of her boss meant the stability of her coins. Oprah was highly concerned.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Sal Gabrini, and his African-American wife Gemma Jones-Gabrini, sat quietly in the restaurant and waited for Reno and Trina to arrive. Neither one of them were known for their punctuality, so Gemma didn’t gripe and complain about it. But Sal did.
“They act like we don’t have shit to do,” he complained. “We’re busy people same as they are.”
And they were busy. Sal, as CEO of the Gabrini Corporation,
and Gemma as an attorney in private practice, they both were extremely busy. But Gemma wasn’t worried. “They’ll be here, Sal,” she assured her husband.
“And I just want Reno to start that shit with me,” Sal said.
Gemma shook her head. “I should have never told you.”
“Yes, you should have. You don’t know Reno like I know him. He might bring a gun to this cat fight. He might want a pound of flesh for what amounts to a lot of noise about nothing.”
“Nothing?” Gemma asked incredulously. “Sal, because of your little driving lessons, Dommi stole a car and drove it! He could have killed himself or somebody else. What do you mean noise about nothing?”
“I taught Dommi well. He wasn’t killing anybody. He knew what he was doing. You have to let a man be a man.”
“But he’s not a man,” Gemma pointed out. “He’s a fifth grader, Sal!”
“That’s a lie,” Sal quickly stated. “He was born in the fifth grade. He’s ready to graduate now.”
Gemma couldn’t help but laugh. “You need to quit,” she said.
“But am I lying? You ever seen a fifth grader like Dom before? Hell if I have! That boy scares the shit out of me sometimes! Reno need to understand that he can’t baby him. Reno needs to understand what he has on his hands.”
“Speaking of Reno,” Gemma said, and then motioned toward the door.
Sal looked toward the entrance and saw Reno as he removed his shades, pushed his hair off of his forehead, and made his way to their table. Gemma smiled when he arrived. “Hey, Reno,” she said jovially. They were good friends.
Reno smiled too, leaned down, and kissed her on the lips. “How are you?” he asked as he gathered his suit coat and sat in the booth seat across from them. “Don’t answer that,” he added. “I know how you are. You’re with Sal. Poor thing.”
“Not funny, Reno,” Gemma said. And then she laughed.
“Very funny,” Sal said. Then he looked at Reno. “Where’s Tree?” he asked.
“I thought she would beat me here,” Reno said, and pulled out his cell phone.
When he called Trina, she didn’t answer. “She’s probably stuck in traffic,” he said. “She’ll be here.”
“Before she comes,” Sal said, “maybe we can clear the air about this Dommi situation. I don’t see where I owe you any apologies. I don’t see where I did anything wrong.”
“Oh, you don’t?” Reno asked. “Teaching my baby how to drive without my permission is no big deal to you?”
“No! I’m his uncle!”
“You’ll have to be my brother to be his uncle. You’re his cousin.”
“Whatever!” Sal said. “I have a right to be there for him.”
“There you go twisting it around again,” Reno said. “I didn’t say you didn’t have a right to be there for him. If something happens to me, I know you and Tommy will take care of my family. You have every right to be involved in all my children’s lives. But what you don’t have a right to do is teach him something that could get him killed! And driving, I think any rational adult will agree, can get him killed. He’s not ready to drive!”
“Oh, yeah? Then why did he drive so well, Reno? How many people did he kill when he was driving, Reno? How many accidents did he cause?”
“None. But that’s no thanks to you. I just so happened to catch up with his slick ass in time! My son is a handful, Sal.”
Sal and Gemma both caught the emotion in Reno’s voice when he said those last words. They looked at him. His eyes looked tired and his coloring looked drained.
Reno leaned back. “He’s a handful,” he said with resignation in his voice. “And I’m worried sick about him.”
Sal was at first surprised by Reno’s honesty, and then touched by it. “He’s a good kid, Reno.”
“But that’s the thing, isn’t it? He’s in a kid’s body, but he’s not a kid.”
Sal had to nod about that. “No. He’s not.”
“The world expects him to behave like one,” Reno said, “but he can’t. Like just this morning. You know where I was this morning?”
“Where?” Gemma asked.
“In his principal’s office,” Reno said. “Seems that man-child of mine was running a shakedown operation on the weaklings in his school.”
Sal laughed. “A shakedown operation?” Gemma asked.
“Oh, yeah,” Reno said. “He protects them from the bullies in exchange for cash.” Sal laughed again. “He’s running a racket right out of the fifth grade,” Reno added.
Gemma shook her head. “Does Trina know?”
“Not yet. I didn’t want her to run up to that school and beat his behind.”
“Why not?” Gemma asked. “He deserves it.”
“Not in front of his classmates, he doesn’t,” Reno said. “He has a reputation to uphold.”
Sal shook his head. “See, this is what I’m talking about. Reno and his infamous hypocrisy. You’re having a fit because I taught your son how to drive, while you’re busy teaching him how to run a numbers racket in school! But I’m the bad guy.”
“I’m the bad guy,” Reno said. “I’m his father.”
Another note of emotion in Reno’s voice. Sal and Gemma glanced at each other. They didn’t know how to take this side of Reno.
“So what do you propose to do about it, old man?” Sal asked him.
Reno ran his hand through his already messy hair. “Teach him,” he said.
“Teach him what?” Gemma asked.
“How to be himself,” Reno said. “How to deal with his fucked up nature,” he added.
By the time Reno made it home to their estate on the outskirts of Vegas, later that night, he had reached Trina by phone an hour earlier. She met up with a couple of girlfriends she hadn’t seen in years, she told Reno, and they were going out for drinks. Give her regards to Sal and Gemma. Reno was upset, because she could have phoned him hours earlier, but he held it in. It wasn’t Sal and Gemma’s problem. But now, later that night, as he was going up the stairs and coming into their bedroom, he felt no such restraint.
Trina was seated at the mirror in their bedroom, combing her hair. Reno walked up behind her.
“I put the children to bed about an hour ago,” she said. “You can wake them if you want to say goodnight to them.”
“Where were you, Tree?” Reno asked her.
Trina quickly looked at him through the mirror. Did he know? “I told you where.”
“What girlfriends you just happened to run into after all these years if you were leaving Champagne’s and coming straight to the restaurant? Where did you just happen to see these long lost friends?”
“At Champagne’s,” Trina said.
When Reno realized a female clothing store would be a logical place to see friends she hadn’t seen in a while, he looked flustered.
“It’s your own damn fault,” Trina said. “You walked right into that one.” But then her look lingered. She knew he was concerned, but she couldn’t go there. Not yet. “We were in phone contact, Reno. I don’t know why you’re tripping.”
“Maybe it has something to do with the fact that you were out at God knows where and I didn’t know where! Anything could have happened to you.”
Trina frowned. “What are you talking about? I had a few drinks with some old friends. How does that translate into putting my life in danger?”
“You’re my wife.”
“And practically everybody in Vegas knows that, Reno. That is not a secret.”
“We made a deal, Tree.”
Trina didn’t remember any deal. “A deal about what?”
“Security. That’s what!” Reno came in testy, but he only getting worse. “You begged me to pull my men off of you. It feels like a violation to be followed around like that, you said. You even questioned if I trusted you.”
“Damn right I did.”
“So I pulled them off, but only on the condition that you let me know where you were at all times, Tree.”
“I did let you know.”
“Bullshit! You told me you were out with some girlfriends you haven’t seen in ages and you’ll talk to me later. You couldn’t even give me the name of the place because you didn’t know the name, and before I could ask any more questions you had to go. Like calling me was cutting into your having fun time! Like I’m some gotdamn punk bothering you!”
“You’re making something out of nothing, Reno.”
“Nothing?” Reno asked. “Nothing my ass! We had a deal, Tree!”
“Okay.” Trina needed him to calm down. “I’m sorry I wasn’t more specific, alright? I apologize.” But that odd look of his wouldn’t let up. It was stressful enough. “What is it now?” she asked him. “I told you nothing’s going on.”
“That’s what you’re saying.”
“But you don’t agree?”
“I don’t.”
“And why not?”
“Because I smell a rat, Tree, and my nose is never wrong. Now who were these girlfriends? Were any of them boyfriends?”
Trina couldn’t believe what he’d just asked her. “What?”
“You heard me. Was any of those girls dudes?”
Trina dropped her comb and got up. “I’m not going to dignify that with a response,” she said, and began to head toward their bathroom. “You want to go there, you go there. But not with me,” she added, as she walked.
But Reno wasn’t about to let her just walk away like that. He grabbed her by the arm and pulled her toward him. The nearness of her, the sweet scent of her made him feel all the more concerned. He couldn’t lose her. Not to anybody. “Where were you that you couldn’t show up for a dinner you knew was important?”
“I told you where I was.”
“You said you were out with long lost girlfriends. You didn’t say where.”
“I told you I was at a club.”
“I thought it was a bar.”
“A bar, a club, what difference does it make, Reno? What are you going to do? Make the club owner turn over the video footage of my arrival and departure? Are you going to interview other patrons to make sure they saw me there?”
Reno Gabrini: A Family Affair Page 10
