CHAPTER TEN
It was six-thirty in the morning, the sun was just beginning to set and you could hear roosters crowing as they stared unblinkingly at their new home. It was as if it was another shock in a series of shocks to their systems. This was their new home? This ?
They looked around at their new neighborhood. At the small wooden shacks around them. At the dirt road and dirt yards that were their yard too. At the big, two-story wooden monstrosity that appeared to be the eyesore of an eyesore of a neighborhood.
“Every single house on this street is a shack, Ma,” said Carmine.
“Don’t you call those people houses shacks,” Trina admonished her youngest child. “It’s a certain style, that’s all.”
“A style?”
“Yes, Carmine, a style.”
“Then it’s a shack style,” Carmine said. “These houses are shacks. Including ours,” he added, looking up at their new home.
Trina didn’t have the energy to argue the point. Because it was a shack. Even the wood looked so old it could just fall apart if you blew on it too hard. It had a big front porch with broken-down looking chairs and rockers, just as the other houses on the street had as well. The dirt yard. The mangy-looking dog Dom had to run off of the front porch. “And it has the nerve to be a two-story,” Trina said, shaking her head. Then she looked at Reno like it was all his fault as she made her way toward the entrance.
Everybody followed Trina as they all gave Reno the side eye too. “What are yous looking at me like that for?” Reno said in his still heavy-Italian accent. But he knew why, that was why he didn’t pursue it. He went up to the front door too.
“Who has roosters in a neighborhood?” asked a confused Dom. “These are regular little houses and I’m hearing all these roosters crowing. Who does that? I don’t see a farm in sight.”
“You don’t have to have a farm to own a male chicken, Dominic,” said Carmine. “It’s not uncommon in the rural south. This, I might remind you, is the heart of the rural south.”
“With only two-hundred-and-fifty-one residents,” said Sophia, still shocked by that number. “Daddy’s blackjack table has more people around it than that on any given weekday.”
“Stop worrying about what you can’t change,” said Trina as Reno unlocked the front door. He took a deep breath and opened the door. Then he stepped aside and allowed his family to get the first look at their hell on earth.
But when he heard sighs of relief and claps and this what I’m talking about, he looked inside too. And just like under the hood of that old Ford Expedition SUV, inside of that hold rustic wooden house was the most beautiful place they could have hoped for. “This more like it,” said a smiling Trina. “Thank God!”
Reno closed the door behind him. He was so relieved to see that beautiful home that suddenly felt like home that he had to lean against the back of the closed door.
“Let’s go claim our rooms,” Dom said, and all of the young people ran upstairs. Only Reno, Trina, and Jimmy remained downstairs.
And they all headed straight for the kitchen. To Trina’s delight, it was gourmet. “Thank God,” she said again, her voice filled with gratitude. She checked the frig. It was filled to the brim too. “That’s why I love Sal. He’s rough on the outside and a teddy bear on the inside. Just like this house.”
“And that SUV,” added Jimmy.
But Reno wasn’t ready to join the Sal is a great guy bandwagon just yet. “He still got us in this backwater town,” he said as he sat at the center island.
“Where else was he supposed to send us, Reno?” Trina asked. “To New York City?”
“Oh look at you now. You got a nice kitchen and you’re suddenly all smiles about this place. It’s still in Mississippi. Don’t forget that.”
“I haven’t forgotten it. But at least we have a nice home to live in for these few weeks. At least that.”
Reno ran his hand through his hair. “Yeah, at least that,” he said.
“So what’s your cover, Pop?” asked Jimmy.
“Sal owns this diner in town. I’m supposed to be the new owner. I supposedly lost my shirt in real estate and decided to bring my family down south to start over. The diner will give us a place to hang out and be a part of the community at the same time. Less reason for the townspeople to get suspicious.”
“You better make sure you tell that to Soph and Dommi,” said Jimmy. “Because they will surely make friends quick and may start blabbing their mouths.”
“That’s why they aren’t making friends,” Trina said bluntly. “This family are their friends.”
“Right,” agreed Reno. “We stick together until they catch that bastard. Then we’re out of here. We do everything as a family.”
Jimmy understood that. “Let me see if there’s a room upstairs left for me,” he said and made his way upstairs with the others.
Reno with Trina, who was standing behind the center island, looked at each other.
“How long you think it’s going to take before they catch him?” Trina asked.
“A few weeks tops. Maybe sooner. I just wish . ..” He ran his hands through his hair again.
“You just wish what?” Trina asked although she had a good idea what.
“I wish we didn’t have to run and hide like this. I don’t like this shit. I should be out there trying to find that bastard too.”
“That’s a lie,” said Trina. “You should be exactly where you are: making sure that asshole don’t come for our children. Protecting us, Reno, is your full-time job right now. They’ve got more security looking out for Maddie and my parents and our grandbaby and Mariah than they have people on that cruise. And Tommy’s looking after your hotel and casino.”
“Which he’s never run either a hotel or a casino before in his life.”
“But Alex Drakos owns both and he’s agreed to advise Tommy if something drastic comes up. Stop worrying about that. And Mick and Sal will find Bernardi. They’re the two most powerful bosses in the entire world with more reach than anybody alive. They got you. Just be glad we’re together as a family, Reno.”
Reno looked at Trina. “Your ass wasn’t singing all that Pollyanna shit earlier,” he said. “But now you’re a regular Mary Poppins? Okay. If you say so.”
Trina had to smile at that herself. For some reason Reno always looked so sexy to her whenever he was sarcastic. She didn’t know why that was, but it was true. And it was making her hot.
She removed her chinchilla coat, tossed it over her shoulder, and began heading out of the kitchen.
“Where are you going?” he asked her.
“Just bring your ass on,” she said to him as she gave him that look he knew so well as she walked by him.
And Reno didn’t hesitate. He had tons of women every single day trying to get in bed with him. Not because he was the sexiest man alive, Tommy held that title in the eyes of every woman still breathing, but because he was rich and voted year after year the most powerful man in Vegas. And because, if he had to say so himself, he had a reputation as great in bed. He’d been with Trina a long time, and he knew that reputation was built on women lying about his massive infidelities to his wife, but it was still his reputation. But Trina was his choice. Every time he looked into her hazel eyes or watched her sashay those hips and ass, he knew he had won the prize.
He hurried behind her to the one bedroom, the master bedroom, downstairs.
And as soon as they entered that bedroom, Reno closed the door and locked it behind him. He began kissing Trina with a sense of urgency as they both walked until they bumped into and then fell onto the bed. And then Reno removed all of her clothing and then his own clothing and began making a desperate kind of love to his wife.
He was kissing her hard and long, moving from her mouth to her breasts and then down below. Trina was running her hands through his already messy hair and then holding his head as he bobbed it up and down as if she was his treat. But when it looked as if she was going to cum from his mouth alone, he stopped, moved his body on top of her, and entered her with a thrust that caused them both to let out sighs of exhilaration. They needed this. They both knew it too.
They made love for nearly fifteen minutes. It was quick for them, but it was necessarily quick. Because as soon as they finished; as soon as they both had cum with an electric cum and were calming back down from the high they had experienced, their children could be heard bringing in the luggage, talking about how beautiful the kitchen was, and turning on the television and playing loud music from that contraption Carmine had built. Not the Bee Gees this time. But Michael Bublé. And plenty of arguing back and forth about why Carmine had such a bad taste in music.
Reno and Trina, with Reno still inside of Trina and Trina now on top of Reno, smiled. It was beginning to feel a lot like home.
And within seconds, as they continued to smile at each other, Reno was stroking again, Trina was feeling it again, and they were at it. Again.