CHAPTER EIGHT
“Boss? Boss?”
Teddy and Marco were seated at the kitchen table playing a game of Spades.
Cleo Burgess was in the living room of the open floor-planned house tied to a chair with two armed guards on either side of her.
Teddy’s capos were on guard duty in the back, in the front, and on both sides of the safe house too.
The way his old man stressed the urgency of her capture, they were taking nothing for granted.
Teddy didn’t bother to look at one of his capos that had just come inside. “Boss,” the capo said again.
“Don’t you see I’m working over here?” Teddy responded to him. “Damn. I can’t even play a game of spades anymore?”
“You can play, but you can’t win,” Marco said as he threw down an Ace. “Bam!” he said and won the deck.
Teddy tossed his cards in. And looked at his capo. “What is it?”
“Sal and Robby’s a few blocks away.”
Marco looked at the capo too. “Sal Gabrini’s in town?”
“And he’s on his way here.”
Teddy was confused. “How did he find out we were back here?”
“I don’t know, Boss. But he’s heading this way. And there’s no way we gonna tell Sal Gabrini he can’t pull up. Nobody’s got the nerve.”
Marco looked at his father. “I thought you wanted him out of the loop.”
“Pop wanted it.”
“Why?”
“How the hell should I know?” Teddy was irritated as he stood up and grabbed his suit coat. “You think that man tells me his business?” He began putting on his suitcoat and heading toward the exit. Marco hopped up and followed behind him.
But Cleo, who heard the conversation, was adamant. “Keep that man away from me,” she yelled, “or I won’t tell y’all shit! Keep Sal away from me!”
Teddy and Marco looked at her. Even after two more years of wear and tear, she still looked good. And still riled Teddy in ways he couldn’t understand. She still got under his skin.
He and Marco, with the capo behind them, walked outside.
Marco popped a gum in his mouth. “Wonder why Robby’s with him? A man that takes his underboss around with him means it’s major league business he’s on.”
“That’s why he’s with him.”
Marco shook his head. “I still can’t believe that shit.”
Teddy looked at him. “What shit?”
“I still can’t believe a man like Sal Gabrini would hire a gay underboss. I know I haven’t been in the family long and I don’t know him like that. But the great Sal Gabrini with a gay underboss? He just don’t seem like the type to me.”
“He’s not.”
“Then what gives?”
“Robby gives. He was Sal’s underboss before Sal found out about his sexual preferences.”
“And he kept him anyway?”
Teddy nodded. “Yes.”
Marco nodded. “That takes guts. I’m not gonna lie. That takes guts. I see the way they still treat Nikki sometimes just because she’s a black underboss. I can’t imagine how much flack Robby Yale gets. Because let’s face it. Sicilian mobsters aren’t exactly the model of open-mindedness.”
Teddy grinned. “Ya’ think?”
Marco grinned too.
But their smiles dissipated when an SUV drove up and that same Sal Gabrini, with his underboss Robby Yale, stepped out.
Marco shook his head. “Look at Uncle Sal in his patented double-breasted suit. Always sharp as a knife. And I hate to say it, but no matter how hard he tries to pull it off, he can’t shake that mob boss image the way you and Big Pops can. He can’t shake it.”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to,” Teddy said, as he and Marco began walking toward the SUV.
“If it ain’t Salvatore Luciano,” Teddy said when he got up to that man who was his cousin in actuality, but whom he called Uncle Sal as a sign of respect.
They did the customary half-handshake/half-hug bro greeting.
“How the hell are you doing, Uncle Sal?”
“I’m here,” Sal said as they stopped embracing. Then Sal looked at young Marco. They were moving him along a little too fast for his taste. “Hey.”
“How you doing, Uncle Sal?”
“I’m here,” Sal said again. “But what your ass doing here? Anything dealing with Cleo should be highest level only.” Then he looked at Teddy. “And Ted knows it.”
“Take it up with Pop,” Teddy said with his hands up. “If it was left up to me my son wouldn’t be involved in none of this shit. Especially not with that bitch. It was Pop’s call.” Then Teddy looked at Robby and smiled. They were close. “What up, Dog?” he said as they embraced.
“I’m good, I’m good,” Robby said. “Frankie Paletti tells me you put your money on the Dodgers over the Yankees and had to give him a small fortune for your error in judgement.”
“You listen to Monk if you want to,” Teddy said. “I didn’t give him shit.”
Robby laughed.
“Where’s Nikki?” Sal asked. “Looks like she would have been the one riding shotgun in this situation.”
“She’s on her way to Essence.”
Sal frowned. “What the fuck is Essence?”
Marco was astounded. “You’re married to a black woman and never heard of the Essence Festival, Uncle Sal?”
“Oh you mean that thing-a-ma-thing in New Orleans they have every year?”
“Yeah, that thing-a-ma-thing is the Essence Festival. Auntie Gemma’s not going?”
“She can’t,” said Robby. “She’s in the middle of a hotly contested court case, and she’s the lead attorney. That’s why Curtis, as her office manager, can’t go this year either.”
“I’ll bet he’s pissed.”
“He is,” Robby said and then glanced at his boss.
Sal took a lot of heat for keeping him on as his second-in-command after he came out of the closet.
But that didn’t mean Sal ever wanted him discussing his private life, or boyfriends, on the job.
Robby hated it, especially when he had to listen to all the other capos talk about their girlfriends, but he knew it was what it was in their world and he’d better be glad to still be standing.
“I’m gonna check it out one of these days when Pop and Big Pop aren’t working me like a Hebrew slave. ”
Robby laughed. But Teddy knew Sal Gabrini didn’t fly to Philly for the hell of it. “What brings you to town, Sal?”
“The same thing that brought you to Vegas. I don’t appreciate you coming to my city and not notifying me.”
Teddy had opted to work his own leads when he got to Vegas yesterday.
Since his father for some unknown reason preferred that he and Marco find Cleo, instead of Sal, he felt it would be less pressure to stay in the dark while in Sal’s town.
“It was supposed to be a simple grab and go,” Teddy said.
“I didn’t know you knew I was in Vegas.”
“He knows everything,” Robby said.
“How did you know we left Vegas and was back here?”
“When Robby told me he told you about the sighting, I put a crew at the airfield. I figured you’d land outside of Vegas, Henderson probably, and drive in.”
Marco was impressed. “That’s exactly what we did, Uncle Sal. They don’t pay you the big bucks for nothing!”
Robby was impressed too. “I told you Boss knows everything.”
But Sal was dead serious. “She’s inside?” he asked Teddy.
“She’s in there.”
“Then let’s go.” Sal began to head to the front door.
“She’s inside, Sal,” Teddy said. “But . . .”
Sal frowned. “But what?”
“She says she won’t tell us anything if you come anywhere near her.”
Everybody looked at Sal. Even Robby wanted to know the why. He knew they had a beef, but he didn’t know what the beef was about. All of their inquiring minds wanted to know.
But Sal wasn’t telling. And when Mick’s big Cadillac Escalade drove up that long, winding driveway like he was on the Daytona speedway, Sal didn’t bother to even respond.
But when Mick stepped out of that SUV in his long white coat, his black trousers, and his black turtleneck, they knew he didn’t come to chat, or to ponder, or to discuss next moves or strategies. He didn’t come to fuck around.
He walked fast and deliberate as he headed straight for the front door.
“Teddy, you and Marco wait out here with Robby,” he said without breaking his stride, and even Teddy knew not to object.
Although telling him, the third most powerful mob boss in the world, to hang outside with an underboss and a capo was absolutely objectionable.
But he saw that ice cold look on his father’s face. He held his peace.
And Mick and Sal went into the safe house, closing the door behind them.