They could hear another grin. “You love that little black wench that much? That you’ll give up the PaLargio for her?”
Reno exhaled. “Yes,” he said.
“I don’t believe it,” said Koba.
Reno frowned. “What the fuck you mean you don’t believe it?”
Trina quickly touched Reno. Easy, her face was saying to him. Don’t antagonize him. He may hang up!
Reno did calm back down. “Believe it, Sorzi,” he said. “I accept your offer.”
“No strings attached?”
“Other than the safe return of my granddaughter, no. But it will have to be a simultaneous exchange.”
“Simultaneous my ass!” Koba objected. “You’ll sign the paperwork. My officials handling the signing will have to be able to leave the country with the paperwork intact. And then, after that, you’ll get your grandbaby back. That’s how this is going to work.”
Reno knew that would be fool’s game. Signing over his business, and then waiting for him to honor their agreement? He wanted Maddie back, but that, to Reno, would seal her fate. “No way,” he said, and Trina looked at him. She knew he was the shrewdest businessman she’d ever known. But money wasn’t at stake this time. Maddie was. He had to tread carefully!
Koba knew it too. And he was none too pleased with Reno’s rejection. “What do you mean no way?” he asked him.
“Just what I said,” Reno said. “It has to be a simultaneous exchange.” Reno mouthed to Trina: go get Big Daddy.
Trina got out of bed, put on one of Reno’s big dress shirts, and hurried out of the room. Reno covered himself with the sheet.
By the time Trina returned upstairs, not only was Big Daddy with her, but Tommy, Sal, Jimmy, and Mick too. Even Gemma and Grace had come up as well.
And Reno was still on the phone with Koba.
“I’m going to say this one last time,” Koba said. “My people have to be out of U.S. airspace before I will release Maddie.”
Trina had told the family, as they were all running upstairs, about Koba’s offer. All of them knew that Reno would part with the PaLargio to get Maddie back in a heartbeat. But what they didn’t know was how in the world would it work?
And when they got upstairs, they saw that that very concern was concerning Reno too.
“If your people are gone,” Reno said, “what assurances would I have that Maddie would be released, and released unharmed? That’s all I’m trying to get you to tell me.”
Big Daddy was first up the stairs, and was therefore closest to Reno. Reno looked at him. Big Daddy Charles Sinatra was the best negotiator Reno had ever seen in action. And Charles was nodding his head, agreeing with Reno’s concern.
But Koba was playing hardball. “There is no other way,” he said. “My people have to be allowed to leave. Once they clear U.S. airspace, I will tell you where you can pick up your granddaughter. Think about it, Reno. Think! If I kill your grandbaby, do you think any court in any land will honor our agreement? Of course they won’t!”
Reno exhaled. He knew the flip side of that, too: that he could be recording Koba at that very moment. After he received his grandchild back, he would challenge that agreement in court too. Challenge it on the grounds of coercion and fraud. But he knew, like everybody in that room knew, he had no choice but to agree. And later, after the fact, kill that fucker and take his business back.
“Okay,” he said. “Just tell me when and where.”
“The when is now. The Queen is waiting for you in her suite. She’s handling the paperwork for me.”
Reno frowned. Trina did too. “The Queen?” Reno asked. “The Queen of Morovia?”
“Yes,” Koba said. “That’s why she’s in Vegas. To handle the paperwork. The contract will be between you and the country of Morovia. She, too, is indebted to me forever. I stopped a coup on her behalf. I’m the only reason she’s still in power in that tiny-ass country. She’ll handle the paperwork. Once she leaves the PaLargio, get on her plane, and is out of U.S. airspace, then you will go and pick up your grandchild. It will be quick and easy. The way I always do business. And then, after you have the baby, you and your family will vacate my premises. If you resist, I’ll fight back.”
It was a Hopson’s choice. It was a take it or leave it choice in the end.
Reno took it.
With nods from everybody in that room, Reno knew he had no choice, no choice at all, but to buy what Koba was selling. Lock, stock, and barrel.
CHAPTER THIRTY
The signing was surreal. Reno and Queen Ava of Morovia were in her suite as if this was a normal transaction. All of the papers were signed, sealed, and they stood to their feet. Ava even offered to shake his hand. Reno looked at her as if she was nuts.
“I took you for a woman with more pride in herself than to do the bidding of a man like Sorzi,” he said to her.
“What do you talk of pride?” Ava responded. “I would not be alive, and would have been kicked off the throne, had it not been for Koba. I do his bidding, yes, I do. Because one time, one crucial time, he did mine.”
“And a child is in the balance,” Reno said.
Ava hated that part of the job. “I know nothing of that,” she said. “I am simply overseeing the paperwork transfer. Nothing more. Have a nice day, Reno.”
And she and her team, with the signed documents in their possession, left out of the suite, and headed downstairs.
But as Reno got on the elevator with them, and watched them become suddenly very nervous and agitated for no reasons he could see, his antennas began to go haywire. Why should they be so nervous? The hard work was done. All they had to do was hit the road. But they were looking as if they were going to be put in front of a firing squad if they didn’t get out of there. Something more was going on here. Reno knew it, he just didn’t know what. He looked around, at Ava’s crew, and picked his target: the weakest link.
And when the elevator doors opened, he eased in front of that weak link, as if he was going to get off ahead of the man, just after Ava and her men got off. But Reno, instead, pushed the man back onto the elevator and allowed the door to close them in. Then he pressed the pause button. Ava and her team didn’t even seem to notice they were short one guy, as they were getting out of the PaLargio so fast.
But that only proved Reno’s point. And he jacked Ava’s man up inside the closed elevator, pulled out his gun, and pressed it against the man’s head.
But the man, again proving Reno’s concern, was more worried about the fact that he was stuck in an elevator, rather than that he was stuck in an elevator with a gun to his head. “Let me out of here!” he yelled, trying to break free of Reno.
“Why?” Reno asked. “What’s the big fucking rush?”
“Let me out of here!” He didn’t even seem to notice the gun!
“Why’s your team in such a big hurry? What’s happening?”
“The bomb,” he finally said.
Reno frowned. “The bomb? What bomb?”
“The bomb they plan to detonate as soon as we get away from here!”
Reno’s heart fell through his shoes. And he quickly unreleased the elevator pause button. “Where is the bomb?” he asked the man.
“I don’t know! They didn’t tell me anything like that. Just let me out of here!” He was banging on the elevator door.
When the door opened, the man took off running. Reno took off running too, to Stef Siranno, his hotel security chief. He was waiting downstairs.
“What is it, sir?” Stef asked.
“There’s a bomb,” Reno said urgently, as he began running toward the private elevator that led to the penthouse, where the family was waiting for his return. “Initiate Plan E!” He was also on his cellphone, calling upstairs to alert them.
“For which rooms, sir?” Stef asked, with his walkie talkie in hand, as he ran with Reno.
“All of them,” said Reno. “Get everybody, and I mean everybody, out of here! Hotel and casino! There’s a bomb, Stef
. Get these people out of here now!”
Stef was stunned. But he did as he was told. “Plan E in effect now,” he was running and yelling into his walkie talkie. “Every employee to his station. Plan E in effect now! For all sectors. I said Plan E for all sectors. Every employee to his station!”
It was a madhouse. Thousands of hotel guests and casino players were running out of the PaLargio as if their lives depended on it. Some were trampling others. Some were knocking down others. They assumed it was a terrorist attack, or a gunman, or both. They didn’t know. They didn’t care. All they knew was that the employees were ordering them to evacuate now, and they were obeying that order.
But it was each man for himself, which allowed chaos and panic to take root. And then to take over. It was a mad dash for every exit!
Reno was able to warn his family, too, and they were all being escorted, by Mick and the rest of the family, through a back exit that only they were allowed to use. They were out of the building quickly.
But Reno knew he had to be the last man out, and he ran back in. Trina grabbed him by the arm, and so did Dommi, but Reno looked at them. And that look, of a captain who they knew had to go down with the ship, caused them to release him. “I love you, Tree. Take care of the family, Dommi!” Reno ordered, as he ran away from them.
And Dommi, determined, grabbed his mother and ushered her out with the rest of the family too.
But Reno was still in. He made it back into the lobby, grabbed a walkie talkie too, and checked to make sure every employee had evacuated their section of the hotel and casino. They had.
“Then get your asses out of here!” Reno yelled, and waited until every one of his diligent employees had exited the PaLargio.
Then Reno, his heart so heavy it seemed as if it would explode, left too.
But it was as if timing was his second skin because, he had only just made it out of the door and onto the grounds, when the entire hotel and casino caved in, and exploded.
And it was a mighty explosion for a mighty operation.
It looked as if a demolition crew had planted that bomb.
The Gabrini and Sinatra family members made it around the front of the building, and saw that Reno had make it out, too. They all ran to him. But just as Reno was backing up, staring at the destruction, his family surrounding him, his cell phone rang. Was it about Maddie? But how could it be, Reno thought, after something like this was plotted and planned? First, he targeted his family. Then he destroyed his home. Now he was destroying his business. Koba had been toying with him all along! Why the fuck would he be calling? To toy with him some more?
But he placed the call on Speaker, and answered quickly. “This is Reno,” he said.
It was Koba. “I’m a man of my word,” he said. “So you can put your walkie talkie away now. It’s time for the exchange.”
Everybody gathered around Reno. Reno’s heart was hammering. “Where is she?” he asked.
“You can find your granddaughter inside the PaLargio,” Koba said, “room 952.” Then he laughed a big, loud, booming laugh.
Reno’s dropped the phone, as his heart sank. Everybody’s did too. “Maddie?” Jimmy asked, in shock. “Maddie’s inside the PaLargio?” He couldn’t believe it!
Then he and Reno, at the exact same time, broke away from the family and started running toward the entrance.
“Reno!” Trina cried. “Jimmy! Stop them!” she yelled as her husband and stepson took off like track stars.
But the other members of the family took off right behind them. And it took a herculean effort. It took Big Daddy, Mick, Tommy, and Sal, and all of their muscle combined, to hold father and son back. There was no way they were going to let Reno and Jimmy go anywhere near that burning building. It was too late. It was painful for them all, but it was too late!
Reno knew it, too, and he came to his senses first. But Jimmy was still fighting to get inside, to save his daughter. Then it became Reno helping all of them stop Jimmy. Jimmy was beyond distraught. “He’s toying with us, Jim,” Reno said to his son, fighting like hell to hold him back. “He’s fucking with us!”
But then Jimmy stopped fighting against his father and uncles, and realized something profound. He looked at Reno.
“What?” Reno asked.
“He knew you had a walkie talkie in your hand.”
Reno frowned. “So?” he asked.
But Jimmy was already looking around. And around again. And that was when he saw it. A car at the end of the round, trying to leave but blocked in by the mass of human beings on the property. He picked out that particular car because it was the only one, of all the cars trying to drive off, that seemed willing to run over his fellow man to get away from there.
Jimmy ran.
“What the fuck?” Reno asked. “Jimmy!”
But Jimmy kept running to that car. Reno, the Gabrinis, and Mick Sinatra didn’t understand it, but they ran after Jimmy too. Big Daddy stayed with the wives and children, protecting them.
Reno realized, as they ran, why Jimmy was running. Jimmy believed he was onsite. Jimmy believed the man responsible for all this hellishness was right within their grasp!
But it was Reno, not Jimmy, who would know Kobayatti Sorzi on sight. And as they approached the car Jimmy had targeted, and Reno saw that Koba was behind the wheel of that car, he overtook his son. He ran to that car and attempted to open the door. All of them were grabbing the door handle, trying to open it, even as Koba was trying to speed away.
But it was Mick the Tick who pulled out his gun and shot the driver side window, missing Koba’s head by inches, but shattering the window glass.
And while Jimmy angrily pulled Koba out of the car to beat his ass, Reno reached into the car and placed it in Park.
And that was when he looked in the backseat.
And saw her.
Madison Gabrini, also known as Maddie, best known by Reno as his only grandchild, was sitting in that back seat. Unharmed. And crying and reaching for her grandpa.
“Maddie!” Reno cried, and flew over that seat. When he got to her, he pulled her into his arms, with tears of joy in his eyes, and nearly crushed her. “Oh, Maddie! Maddie! Maddie!”
Mick and Sal looked in, too, and Tommy as well, when they heard Reno say that name. They smiled for the first time in a long time. They smiled a genuine, wonderful smile.
But they couldn’t tell Jimmy anything. He was too busy kicking Koba’s ass.
Until Sal grabbed him. “We have Maddie, Jim,” he kept saying. “We have your daughter!”
Jimmy suddenly stopped kicking Koba, and it finally registered. He looked at his uncle. “What? Where?”
Sal pointed where, and Jimmy quickly looked inside the car. When he saw Maddie, he jumped in too.
Mick and gang wanted to finish Koba off, but they knew there were too many witnesses. But Mick tried to pick him up to put him in one of their cars, to get him in a “private” place, like a torture chamber. But the cops were on the scene in force, and some were running toward them, too.
The cops were suspicious of the family in normal circumstances. They were hyper-suspicious in a circumstance like the one on scene. Because the burning PaLargio was one thing. Why the Gabrini men and Mick Sinatra had suddenly run to that car, and why were their wives and children running that way too, were something else. Something was happening beyond the horror of the burning PaLargio. They ran over to find out what.
But when the wives and children saw Maddie in the backseat of that car, and saw that she was unharmed, they leaped for joy and hugged each other. They would have hugged Maddie, too, but Reno would not let her go. Not even for her own father.
Destruction was all around them. Their home. The PaLargio. Everything was up in smoke. Koba took it all from them.
Except their love.
Trina looked at Reno, as he held his grandbaby with his eyes closed so tightly. She didn’t know if love conquered all, but she knew that their love did.
She go
t into that car, too, and held Reno as he held their grandbaby.
EPILOGUE
The Mercedes stopped against the curb on the dark, isolated, dead-end street. Reno, sitting behind the wheel, looked at the watch-styled clock on the dashboard.
“Fucking cops,” he said. “Wouldn’t you know it? They’re late.”
“We better be glad we’re getting this at all,” said Trina, who sat on the passenger seat. “Who set it up, anyway?”
“Mick. Who else?”
“That man has more connections than the New York subway system,” Trina said, and Reno smiled.
Then Trina looked at him. “We have a lot of rebuilding to do,” she said. “But at least that queen tore up that bogus contract. At least Koba no one can claim any rights to the PaLargio. Such as it is.”
Reno looked out of his side window. Now that Maddie was back home, he was able to digest what had happened to them. They lost their home in the ‘burbs, and the PaLargio. They were technically, at that moment, homeless.
“I know what happened to the PaLargio is heartbreaking for you,” Trina said. “It’s heartbreaking for all of us. Most people don’t think it will ever be able to come back as top dog again.”
“Most people don’t know what they’re talking about,” Reno said. “It’ll be back. Not to its’ former glory, but even better. No two-bit asshole like Koba Sorzi is going to knock me down and I don’t get back up bigger and better.”
Trina smiled. Nothing like talk of defeat to get Reno riled up. And that was what she wanted. Her man fighting, not complaining.
“What are we going to do in the meantime?” Trina asked him. “I love Sal and Gemma to death, but living with them for an extended period of time, I don’t know. Even they aren’t going to be crazy about that.”
“I’ll figure something out. My old man has property all over the place. We may move into one of those spaces.”
Then an unmarked police car drove onto the street, and parked in front of the Mercedes. “About time,” Reno said, and he and Trina got out of their car, and walked up to the unmarked car. The detective driving the vehicle pressed down the window. The detective on the passenger side, nodded.
Reno Gabrini: Turn Back Time Page 14
