CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Not half an hour later and Trina and Jimmy were back at the penthouse.
When they walked in, Sal and Dom, who were seated side by side on the sofa, stood up.
“Where’s Soph and Carmine?” Jimmy asked. “I know they didn’t get out trying to look for Pop too.”
“Uncle Sal made them go to bed,” said Dommi.
Jimmy exhaled. “Good,” he said.
But Trina was heading straight for Sal. And when she got up to him, she didn’t say a word. She angrily took her open hand and slapped him hard across the face.
It was a slap that shook the room. Jimmy and Dominic both let out audible gasps, it was so unbelievable to them.
Did their mother just slap Sal Gabrini, who was the second most powerful mob boss in the world, behind only their Uncle Mick?
They expected Sal to knock their mother through a wall.
Nobody came at him like that! But they both were ready to take him down if he so much as attempted to lay a hand on Trina.
But Sal didn’t raise a finger to Trina. Because he could only imagine what she was going through. He just stood there and took it.
And Trina stood there lashing it out. “What’s wrong with Reno?” she asked Sal angrily. Then she slapped him again. “You tell me what’s wrong with my husband and you tell me now, Salvatore Luciano Gabrini! You hear me, you motherfucker, do you hear me?!”
She went to slap Sal a third time, but Sal easily grabbed her by the wrist and stopped her. “Jimmy?”
Jimmy’s heart was pounding. “Sir?”
“Take your kid brother and get out of here. I need to talk to your mother.”
“Yeah,” said a still-angry Trina. “His ass gonna talk to me tonight!”
Jimmy and Dom both knew their mother was directing her venom at the wrong man, but they also knew their mother.
For her to slap Sal Gabrini, not once, but twice, was a definite clue.
She meant business. Sal had better speak up or expect her to continue to slap the shit out of him.
That was the woman they knew. When she was on a mission, there was no deterring her no matter what.
They headed to Sophia’s room to wait it out in there.
After they left, Sal knew he had to handle Trina with kid gloves. Because he was certain her anger was fueled by her hurt and pain. That was why he didn’t beat the shit out of her the way he normally would had some other broad not named Gemma blindsided him the way Trina did.
He knew he had to come clean.
“What do you wanna know?” he asked her.
“Do you know the woman?” Trina asked.
Sal hesitated. “Yes. But it’s not what you think.”
Trina frowned. “What do you mean it’s not what I think? Did you or did you not hear Reno tell me he wanted a divorce?”
“I heard him, yes.”
“Did you or did you not hear Reno say he was leaving me because of a woman? Now you tell me who this heifer is and you tell me now, Sal. Who is she?”
“It’s not what you think, Trina.”
“Then what the hell is it? Tell me, Sal! I’m dying here!”
Sal’s heart dropped for Trina. He went to pull her into his arms, but she pulled back.
“You tell me what’s going on with my husband, and you tell me now.
That’s all you can do for me. Because I’m certain your ass got something to do with it.
You and Reno fight like cats and dogs, but you’re always thick as thieves.
You know all his secrets, and he knows yours. Now talk!” she declared.
But before Sal could say a mumbling word, the door to the penthouse opened again and this time Sal’s African-American wife, Gemma Jones-Gabrini, hurried in.
When they saw her coming around the foyer looking flustered, Sal became worried.
He hurried to her. “Gemma, what’s wrong?
” he asked as he held her by the elbows.
“That’s what I wanna know,” Gemma said. “I got a call from Grace. She said Tommy’s rushing to Vegas and all he would tell her was that Reno left Trina. I said Reno left Trina, not the other way around? She said Tommy said Reno left Trina. I was in shock.”
“Ah Gem,” Sal said, relieved that it wasn’t something involving her, but annoyed that she gave him such a fright.
“You scared the shit out of me woman, rushing in here like this! Don’t you have opening arguments at that big trial later this morning?
You’re the lead attorney on one of the biggest cases of your career and you’re here behind some Reno bullshit? What are you doing?”
“What do you think I’m doing? Reno has the nerve to leave Katrina when it’s his butt that’s always messing up.”
“It’s still his butt messing up,” said Trina. “I haven’t done anything to him. We barely ever even fight!”
Sal and Gemma glanced at each other with shock in their eyes when Trina made such an outlandish declaration.
Talk about fighting like cats and dogs. Reno and Trina fought like lions and tigers and bears.
There wasn’t a week that went by when they weren’t at each other’s throats.
But Sal and Gemma learned long ago that Trina could be as delusional as Reno when it came to the true nature of their super-tumultuous marriage.
But Trina, failing to see the irony of her statement, kept on talking. “He left me for another woman, Gemma. I haven’t done shit to Reno and he left me for another woman. He said he wants a divorce.”
Gemma’s heart dropped as tears appeared in Trina’s big, hazel eyes. She hurried to her and they embraced vigorously.
It wasn’t lost on Sal that Trina wouldn’t let him comfort her, but she had no problem balling in Gemma’s arms. He shook his head. But that’s a woman for ya, he thought.
But when the two in-laws, who also happened to be best friends and business partners, stopped embracing, Trina was right back on her platform. She had to have answers. “What’s going on with Reno, Sal?” she asked him, but with less animation in her voice. As if she was dreading the answer.
But with Gemma present, Sal’s decision to come clean changed. He didn’t want his lady to know that he played a part in any of it. “That’s for Reno to tell you, Tree. I can’t.” His voice became emotional. “I can’t!”
Gemma could feel his pain. But she was confused too. “What does Reno need to tell her?”
“Why he left,” Sal said.
“Tree just said it’s because of another woman.”
“That’s not the whole story,” Sal said.
“Then what’s the whole story?” Gemma asked as if she was suddenly Trina’s attorney.
“Is Reno in trouble?” Trina asked Sal too.
Sal nodded his head. “Yes.”
“Because of his relationship with that woman?” Trina asked.
Sal nodded again. “Yes.” It was only half of the story, but an important half.
Gemma could tell Trina’s fight was leaving her and she was hesitant to hear the whole story. “Sit down, Tree,” she said to her and led her to the sofa. She sat down beside her. Sal took a seat in the closest wingback chair.
“Who is she?” Trina asked him in a far quieter voice.
Sal was on the edge of his seat with his elbows resting on his thick thighs and his hands clasped. “Her name is Lydia.”
“How do you know her?”
“I didn’t know her at all until after that night.”
Sal’s hesitancy gave Gemma some pause. She was beginning to wonder if her husband was involved in whatever this was too. “What night?” she asked him.
“The night of the party. It was before either one of us met you or Trina. Reno had just taken full control of the PaLargio and was throwing a bachelor party at the penthouse for one of our buddies.”
“This penthouse?” Gemma asked.
“It wasn’t as elaborate back in those days as it is now, but yeah, this penthouse. Reno hadn’t too long ago gotten full ownership and he loved to show off his power. You know how he is.”
“When you say bachelor party,” Gemma the lawyer asked for clarification, “are you talking about a party where strippers would be invited?”
“Strippers. Hoes. Whatever you wanna call’em, yeah,” said Sal. “Those types of broads.”
Gemma rolled her eyes at those Italian men in the family who still loved to refer to women as “broads” or “dames” even in this Me-Too day and age.
But what he called women was the last thing on Trina’s mind. Reno was on her mind. “What happened at the party?” Trina asked.
“Reno and Tommy were picking out women to quote-unquote ‘entertain’ us when Dirty came downstairs.”
“Don’t y’all sometimes call Dom by that name?”
“Yeah, but this is the original Dirty. A name well-deserved for his slick ass. He’s dead now, but he used to work for Reno’s old man.”
“I know who Dirty was,” said Trina. “Keep going.”
“So Dirty comes downstairs bragging about some woman he and Reno’s old man were banging upstairs.
We didn’t think nothing of it at first. Before the night was out, everybody was going to be banging somebody.
That’s why them dames were there. But when we found out that Dirty was talking about Moose Vatelli’s daughter, who couldn’t have been more than sixteen or seventeen, we raced upstairs. ”
A devastating look appeared in Sal’s large eyes as reliving that night still brought chills down his spine.
“Sal, are you okay?” Gemma asked her husband.
But Trina didn’t have time for sentimentality. She had to know the truth. “Go on, Sal,” she insisted.
“Reno’s old man was a sadistic sonofabitch. He had beaten that girl to beyond recognition and had raped her repeatedly. The girl was dead.”
Gemma was stunned. “Oh my.”
But Trina was just staring at Sal, her eyes bright with unshed tears. “Go on.”
Gemma looked at Trina and wondered when did she become so hard? But Sal kept going. “Reno went ballistic and tried to kill his old man’s ass for doing that to that girl. He beat him unconscious, although he was already so drunk that wasn’t hard to do.”
Somehow Gemma could sense that the rest of the story would involve her husband and her brother-in-law Tommy. “What happened next?” she asked Sal.
“Me and Tommy got Reno out of the room because his energy was too hot. We called in a clean up crew and they . . .”
Trina could feel her heart growing faint. “And they what?”
“They disposed of the body.”
“How, Sal?” Trina asked.