By the time they found a bench in front of a lake, Sal sat down but Gemma removed her sandals and walked to the water’s edge. Sal was immediately concerned.
“Be careful,” he said as he folded his legs. He watched her closely. “Don’t get too close.”
“It’s so peaceful out here,” Gemma said. “All these years I’ve lived in Las Vegas and I’ve never once been to this park.”
“You’ve never been to that jazz club either,” Sal said.
“That’s true,” Gemma said with a smile as she moved closer to the water’s edge.
“Get back some, Gemma,” Sal said. “I don’t feel like dragging the river looking for you tonight.”
Gemma laughed. “What river?” she asked.
“You’re too close to the water,” he said. “Get back.”
“Yes, Daddy,” Gemma said with a smile.
Sal grinned. “I like the sound of that. Call me that all the time.”
“You wish,” Gemma responded, and then walked back toward the bench. Sal looked so splendid to her in his tailored suit, that she couldn’t help it. She made it up to the bench and kissed him. Then sat down beside him.
He snuggled her against him. It was a breezy night. “Warm enough?” he asked her.
“I’m good, thanks. It’s such a beautiful night, Sal.”
“Yes, it is. A fantastic night.”
“We never do anything like this.”
“You’re enjoying yourself?” Sal asked.
“Very much. It beats skating.”
“Don’t remind me,” Sal said with a chuckle. “We’ll do more things like this I’ve been neglecting to do with you, Gemma. I’ve been so busy running around the country giving my best to everybody else, I neglected to give my best to you. That’s going to change.”
Then there was a long pause. “I have something I need to tell you, Gem,” Sal said. “Something I’ve never told anybody in my life. Not even Tommy. But it’s weighing heavily on me. I feel you have a right to know.”
Gemma’s heart began to squeeze. Was it another woman? She looked up at him. “What is it, Sal?”
“When I talk about my men, and when I go out of town?”
Gemma hesitated. “Yes?” she asked.
“It’s an organization,” Sal said. He looked at her. “I’m the boss of that organization.”
Gemma stared at him. She could feel the fear rise up within her, the same fear she felt when she left Sal that night. “Tell me what you mean, Sal.”
Sal exhaled. “I run a syndicate of men, Gemma. Mob guys. And I’m their boss.”
Gemma’s heart began hammering. “What are you saying, Sal? Are you telling me that you’re a mob boss?”
Sal hated to admit it, but he knew he had to. “It’s not the term I’d use,” he said, “but it’s the correct term. I’m a mob boss, Gemma,” he admitted out loud for the first time in his life. And then he looked at Gemma. Her expression was so unreadable that it worried him. Especially when she began to cry.
“Oh, Gem,” Sal said, holding her. “Don’t be upset, darling. I don’t do anything I don’t have to do. I’m not into any illegal trade. And I’ll always keep that world separate from our world. I promise you that.” He handed her his handkerchief. “Don’t be upset.”
Gemma was sniffling. “I’m not upset,” she said as she wiped her eyes. “I’m not crying because I’m upset. I’m crying because I’m happy.”
“Please don’t,” Sal started to say, but then he stopped and realized what she had just said. “Say what now?” he asked. “You’re happy?”
Gemma nodded her head. “Yes, Sal. I’m happy.”
“Because I’m a mob boss?”
“No, silly! I already knew that.”
Sal was shocked. “You knew it?”
“Of course I knew it! I’m no idiot. You practically live out of town! And all of those unsavory looking characters always coming around and asking to speak privately with you. I would have been a fool not to know that you weren’t running something.”
“Then what are you happy about?” He took his handkerchief and handed it to her.
“I’m happy,” she said, wiping her tears, “because you finally told me. You said no more secrets and lies, and you kept your word.” She threw her arms around him. “I love you for that!”
Sal never dreamed it would go this way. He held her tightly. But then he thought about the obvious. He pulled back and looked at her.
“But aren’t you worried, Gem, about being married to a man with my baggage?”
Gemma stared at him. “If it was any other man, yes. I would be deeply concerned. But it’s you. And I know your heart, Sal. I know you will never harm anybody who didn’t harm you or yours. So no, I’m not worried. You protect me. You take fantastic care of me. I’m good.”
Sal swelled up with love and pride. She was a special lady. He sensed it the moment he laid eyes on her, although he didn’t act like it. And he pulled her, once again, into his arms.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Early that next morning, Sal’s cell phone began to ring. Gemma was in his arms, and sound asleep, when he reached onto the nightstand and answered. It was Angelo Romano, one of his men.
“We’ve got him,” Angelo said.
“Where?” Sal asked.
“The Big House.”
Sal glanced at Gemma. She continued to sleep soundly. “I’m on my way,” he said, and ended the call.
He gingerly got his naked body out of bed, dressed in a pair of jeans and a pullover sweat shirt, grabbed his keys, and headed toward the door. When he looked back, Gemma, to his relief, was still asleep. His hope was that he could handle this messy business and get back to her before she even realized he had gone.
The Porsche sped onto the driveway of the two-story safe house, stopped in front of the garage, and Sal stepped out. The front door was opened by Angelo.
“He’s in the basement,” Angelo said as Sal entered, and they began heading in that direction. “You should see him, boss,” Angelo said. “He’s scared shitless.”
“He’d better be,” Sal said as he and Ang hurried down the far stairs into the basement. Three other men were down there with a traumatized Victor, and one tossed a steel rod to Sal.
Sal caught the rod and walked up to Victor.
“Sal,” Victor said with a plea in his voice.
“We meet again,” Sal said as he made his way toward him.
“I don’t know nothing, Sal,” Victor began explaining but Sal wasn’t interested in conversation. He immediately lifted the rod and began whaling on Victor.
“Sal, please!” Victor screamed, as he fell out of the chair.
“Who put her up to it?” Sal asked, as he continued to beat him down with that rod. “I’m tired of this shit, Victor, tell me who!”
“I don’t know! I swear I don’t!”
Sal continued to beat him down as blood began to gush.
“I’m dead if I tell,” Victor finally admitted.
Sal stopped hitting and stood erect. “No, Victor,” he said. “You’re dead if you don’t.”
Victor shook his head in agony. “Sal, please.”
Sal began to whale on Victor again. “It was Rudy!” Victor quickly said. “It was Rudy.”
Angelo looked at Sal. “Rudy?” he asked.
“Rudy who?” Sal asked Victor.
“Rudy Balotti. It was Rudy, Sal!”
Sal was floored. “Rudy Red?”
“He’s the one behind the whole thing.”
“What whole thing? What the fuck does Rudy Red have to do with me?”
“He paid your employees to file that racial discrimination lawsuit. He made Blanche lie. He had his guys try to kill you that day you ran me down, and they tried to take out your wife in that courthouse parking lot. He wants to destroy you.”
“But why?” Sal asked.
“Because of the kid.”
Sal frowned. “What kid?”
“He does
n’t want you to take the kid.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? Take what kid?”
“Your kid,” Victor said.
“He’s fucking with you, boss!” Ang yelled. “He’s fucking with you!”
But Sal couldn’t dismiss it that easily. “Talk,” he said to Victor.
“Blanche told him the kid was his,” Victor said, “but it wasn’t. It was yours. But she knew he would kill her if he found out that she was having sex with you while she was still his girlfriend.”
Sal frowned. “What are you talking? That was twenty years ago!”
“The kid is nineteen. Rudy had a DNA test after I told him the truth.”
“You told him?” Angelo asked. “Why you cock sucking snitch!”
“Go on,” Sal said. He didn’t give a fart who told Rudy. The fact that there was a kid bearing his blood, and Rudy knew about it, was the point.
“The test proved he wasn’t the father,” Victor continued as he fought through unbearable pain. “Blanche told me she wasn’t messing with anybody else at that time. Only you and Rudy.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Sal asked with distress in his voice. “Blanche was never pregnant. I remember those days!”
“But she was! She went to Arizona to stay with Rudy’s parents, because she didn’t want you to know. But she was pregnant, Sal. She was pregnant with your son. After she and Rudy broke up, he wouldn’t let her have anything more to do with the boy. And she knew she was dead if she told him the truth. Because he was devoted to that child. It nearly killed him when he found out the truth.”
Sal nearly dropped where he stood. “Where’s the child now?” he asked.
“He’s with Rudy. He works for Rudy. He’s sometimes in Chicago. He’s sometimes here in Vegas. He’s sometimes in L.A. The plan is for him to take over one day. He’s a bad motherfucker, Sal. Getting next to him is as impossible as getting next to Rudy.”
“And Rudy did a DNA test?” Sal asked.
“The test came back negative. He found out that the kid’s not his and went crazy. He wanted to kill Blanche. I made him give her another chance. So he decided to think it through and use her. He was the one who wanted her to tell your wife. He’s trying to destroy everything you love.”
“Where’s Blanche?” Sal asked.
Victor shook his head. “I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know! She took off and I don’t know where she went.”
Ang and the other men looked at their boss. Sal tossed the rod aside.
“What do we do, boss?” Ang asked.
“Keep him here,” Sal said. “Until I find out what’s going on, keep his ass right here.”
“Will do, boss,” Ang said, and Sal walked out.
But he couldn’t stop thinking about that conversation. Blanche was pregnant all those years ago, pregnant with his child, and he had no idea? The child was with that gangster Rudy Balotti all this time? Raised by Rudy? Sal knew he had to find Blanche first, and then Rudy. He had to get answers fast. And then, he thought with pain in his heart, he had to see his son. A son who probably was going to hate him. And Gemma, he thought with even more distress. This might be too much for Gemma to take.
But when he drove onto his street, ready to tell Gemma what he had just been told himself, two cars that had been parked around the corner cranked up and drove up behind him. Sal knew an ambush when he saw one. He floored it, speeding past his own home as if he didn’t even recognize it. But he barely made it to the end of the street before other cars came from around the corner and cornered him. He knew when he was outnumbered. He stopped. He was about to reach for his gun when the men in the front car jumped out in FBI jackets with their guns drawn, and hurried up to his Porsche.
“Exit the car, Mr. Gabrini!” the special agent in charge yelled. “Now!”
Sal immediately complied, getting out of his automobile with his hands raised.
“What’s going on?” Sal asked. “What’s this about?”
But the agents immediately put him in handcuffs and began frisking him, as the men in the back car ran up to him too.
“What’s this about, agent?” Sal asked again.
“You are under arrest,” the agent in charge said, “for the kidnapping, rape, and murder of Blanche Delilah.”
Sal was stunned. Blanche was dead? Rudy had iced Blanche? Victor said she took off. What else was Victor lying about? What the fuck?
“Let’s go, Mr. Gabrini,” the agent said as they pulled Sal toward one of their automobiles. “The road ends right here for you. This is it. It is my pleasure to say that this will be the last time your slick gangster ass will ever breathe free air again!
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Gemma was fast asleep when Sal was arrest two hundred yards from their home. She woke up an hour later, showered, brushed and dressed, and made her way downstairs. She wasn’t in the kitchen but a few minutes, preparing a cup of coffee, when her cell phone began to ring. She looked at her Caller ID. She was still sleepy and could barely read the writing. But it was Reno.
“Hey, Ree, what’s up?” she asked as she yawned.
“Have you heard from Sal?” Reno asked.
Gemma didn’t like the nervous sound in his voice. She had just run a spoon under the water tap. She held it still. “No,” she said. “He already left for work. Or, at least he was gone when I woke up. Why?”
“I’m hearing he’s been arrested.”
Gemma frowned. “Arrested?”
“I’m hearing the Feds have him, Gem.”
Gemma’s heart dropped. “On what charge?” she asked.
“Nobody’s telling. I went to the FBI office, but they claim they didn’t know shit. Then one of my men call and tell me he’s being booked at County. I’m on my way there now.”
“I’ll meet you there,” Gemma said, and ended the call. She hastily grabbed her briefcase and keys, unplugged the coffeemaker, and hurried out of the door.
Three hours later and they still would not allow anyone, not even Gemma, to see Sal. She told them she was there as his attorney, not his wife, but that didn’t matter to them. They claimed he was still being processed in, and she would have to wait, but she knew that was their bullshit reason to question him without an attorney present. Not that she worried about Sal telling too much. She knew her husband. Sal was nobody’s fool. He would stand mute no matter what they threatened to do to him.
But in those three hours, everybody had arrived at the police station. Reno and Gemma had arrived first. Then Trina and Jimmy showed up. Then Tommy flew in from Seattle and was there too. Then a group of criminal defense attorneys, a dream team of powerhouse attorneys that Reno and Tommy had on their payrolls, showed up too. But even they couldn’t get in to see Sal either.
Then finally, after several more minutes, the agent in charge came out of the backroom. The powerhouse attorneys were ready to go and see their client, but he stopped them. “Mr. Gabrini wants to see his wife and his other family members. No lawyers,” he said.
That was fine by the family members. They just needed to eyeball Sal and find out what was going on. They left the lawyers in the waiting room and made their way into a large interrogation room where Sal was being held.
“Assume we’re being recorded,” Gemma alerted them all as they walked in.
Sal was seated at a long, metal table with his hands clasped on top of the table and his jeans and sweatshirt appearing wrinkled and worn. Gemma expected him to be concerned, but when she saw just how concerned he appeared, her heart dropped. She sat beside him. Reno, Trina, Tommy and Jimmy, sat in front of him.
Gemma didn’t ask if he was okay. Of course he wasn’t. She just gave him a hug.
But Sal looked at her and wanted to know if she was okay. When she told him that she was, he nodded and looked at Reno and Tommy. Although Gemma was an attorney herself, she always deferred to Reno and Tommy. They knew the inner workings of law enforcement better than she did. They knew exactly what
needed to be asked.
“What’s the charge?” Reno asked Sal.
“They claim I kidnapped, raped, and murdered Blanche Delilah.”
Gemma was stunned.
“Blanche Delilah?” Reno asked. “That woman with that bullshit story about having your baby?”
Sal nodded, although it wasn’t so bullshit. But that was for another place. “Yeah. Her.”
“Give me a break!” Reno said.
“What evidence do they have?” Tommy asked.
“I don’t know.” Then Sal furrowed his brow.
“What difference does it make,” Reno said. He knew the jeopardy Sal was in. He also knew they were being watched and recorded. “You didn’t do anything to that woman. Who cares what they claim happened to her. That’s their problem.”
“We have the attorneys outside,” Tommy said. “They’ll going to work hard to get you out on bail.”
“No way,” Sal said, shaking his head. “Gemma’s my lawyer.”
Even Gemma was surprised to hear that. Tommy and Reno and even Trina were floored. “What are you talking about?” Reno asked. “You need the best of the best, Sal. You need junkyard dogs who’ll mix it up with the best of them.”
“Gemma’s my lawyer,” Sal repeated.
“But Gemma’s. . .”
“But Gemma’s what, Reno?” Sal asked.
“Gemma’s a good attorney,” Tommy said. “But. . .”
“But what? Spit it out, Tommy?”
“But she’s not the best of the best,” Tommy said. “Even Gem would admit that.”
They all looked at Gemma. They loved her, but Sal was being accused of a capital offense. They didn’t need good. They needed the absolute best.
“I’m not the best,” Gemma admitted. “Not if you’re looking at wins and losses. But I love Sal the most. Who should be his attorney? A man who can defend Sal vigorously, and then go home to his family and live his life? Or a woman whose life, whose family, is Sal?”
Sal Gabrini: His House of Cards Page 13
