Reno and Son: Don't Mess with Jim (The Mob Boss Series) (11 page)

“Right now.
 
This afternoon.
 
And you will not
text Jimmy or prepare him or his father for my visit.”

“But. . . What if he’s not even there
today?”

“I’ll take that chance.
 
It’s my responsibility, my duty, to make sure
you aren’t making the mistake of your life here.
 
Your mother is no longer with us.
 
It’s all on me now.
 
Jimmy, from all I’ve heard, is very close to
his father.
 
Like father, like son.
 
So yeah, let’s go now.
 
Right now,” he added.
 
“I want to meet this man today.
 
I’ve tried to stay out of your love affairs,
and I think I’ve done a great job of it.
 
But this is different.”

Val didn’t disagree.
 
Because it was true.
 
This was different.
 

SEVEN

“You know who you look like?”
 
Jimmy was walking the floor of the casino,
trying to stay awake, when he happened upon one of the big spenders at a
blackjack table.
 
Every employee at the
PaLargio had a duty to treat the top gamblers with extra courtesy, and Jimmy,
after watching his father do it, now had it down to a science too.

The woman, a tall, busty, middle-aged black
woman, looked at him.
 
She didn’t
respond, but she smiled.

“You look like Wendy Williams,” he
said.
 
“At least your own sophisticated
version of her.”

After a moment, the woman responded.
 
“I get that all the time,” she said.

“No shit?”
 
Then Jimmy flapped his hands out in front of him and pointed them
downwards in an imitation of Wendy Williams.
 
“How you doin’?”

The woman laughed.

Jimmy smiled too.
 
“So I know what I’m talking about then?
 
I wasn’t completely off the reservation?”

“You know what you’re talking about,” she
said, and her eyes gave him a quick perusal.

Jimmy pretended to be pleased by her
perusal and vindicated for approaching her at all.
 
But then when he did his usual look around
the room, and saw Val and her father enter the casino, he frowned.
 
What in
the world
, he wondered, as he moved away from the big spender and headed
for the entrance.

Buddy Wellstone saw Jimmy approaching them
before Val did. “Here comes your young man now,” he said.
 

Val looked too.
 
Jimmy was now fully dressed, in a black suit,
and Val felt a tingle of excitement just seeing him again.
 
Last night was a special night for them.
 
It started terribly, with Jimmy’s arrest, and
ended remarkably.
 
He even said how much
he loved her and needed her.
 
She’d never
felt closer to him in their entire courtship.

“Hey,” he said when he walked up to
them.
 
His eyes couldn’t help but wander
to Val, whom he was thrilled to see again.
 
And he leaned over and kissed her.
 
But it was too weird seeing her father in the casino.
 
“What are you guys doing here?”
 
He was looking more at Mr. Wellstone when he
asked it.

“Dad wants to meet your father,” Val
responded.
 
“And before you ask me why
didn’t I phone, it’s because Dad wants to meet your father and he wants it to
be a completely unannounced visit.”

Jimmy was astounded.
 
“Unannounced?
 
But . . .”

Buddy looked at Jimmy.
 
“But what?”

“But, and I don’t mean to sound rude or
anything like that, but you can’t just walk into my father’s office without
some kind of appointment.
 
I mean . . .”

“I know what you mean,” Buddy said.
 
“You mean this is The PaLargio, not some Ma
and Pop operation like Wellstone Realty.
 
And I understand that.
 
But I
still want to meet him.
 
I want you,
without giving him any beforehand notice, to take us to his office so that I
can speak with him.”

Jimmy shook his head.
 
“I’m going to tell you up front, Mr.
Wellstone, he’s not gonna like it.”

“That’s fine.
 
He doesn’t have to like it.
 
I simply want him to be himself.
 
That’s exactly why I’m here.”

Jimmy glanced at Val.
 
It was out of character for Mr. Wellstone to
inject himself into their relationship, and they both knew it.
 
Now, all of a sudden, he was not only in
their relationship, but demanding to meet his father?
 
“I don’t understand,” Jimmy said.

“You don’t understand what?” Buddy asked.

“What changed?
 
Why the need to suddenly have to meet my
father?”

“You were arrested last night.”

Jimmy swallowed hard.
 
“Look, sir, that was a big mistake.”

“Perhaps it was, but it happened.”

“Jimmy was protecting my honor,” Val
said.
 
“He didn’t get into trouble for no
reason.”

“Understood.
 
But it happened.
 
I have to make sure this is a good idea.”

Jimmy frowned.
 
“You have to make sure what’s a good idea?”

Buddy didn’t back down.
 
“You with my daughter,” he said.

“And you expect my father to be able to
tell you that?”

“Or show me,” Buddy said.
 
“That’s right.”

Jimmy knew this would be a net zero in the
end, but Val always said her father was a very stubborn man.
 
He made up his mind and that was that.
 
“But what do you expect to accomplish,
sir?
 
Whether Val decides to be with me
is up to me and Val, not anybody else.”

“I understand that too.
 
But I’m her father, and I want to meet
yours.”

That stubbornness, Jimmy thought, on full
display.
 
But if he thought he was
stubborn, wait until he got a load of Reno.

“Right this way,” Jimmy said, and he
escorted them across the casino, toward the elevators.

They rode the elevator to the thirtieth
floor in complete silence.
 
Jimmy still
felt embarrassed about his arrest, and the fact that Mr. Wellstone had to learn
about it didn’t help either.
 
And
Val.
 
Jimmy looked at her as the elevator
buckled along in starts and fits and continued to lift higher.
 
She looked even more worried than he
did.
 
She’d already said Reno was rude to
her last night, what would she think if he was disrespectful to her
father?
 
Last night, Jimmy realized anew
just how much he loved Val, and wanted to be with her.
 
He could only hope that this meeting, this ambush
of a meeting if you asked him, didn’t derail all of that.

They stepped off of the elevator and headed
for his father’s suite of offices.
 
As
soon as they walked in, the secretary smiled at Jimmy.

“Is he in?” Jimmy asked her.

“He’s in.”
 
She looked at the others with Jimmy.
 
Jimmy, keeping his promise, decided not to let her notify Reno that he
had guests.
 
He decided to go on in.

They walked up to the office door, opened
it, and entered the circus of people that filled Reno’s office.

Reno was standing behind his desk, his suit
coat off, his sleeves rolled up, talking angrily to two of his managers.
 
“I don’t give a rat’s ass if she won fifty
Grammys,” he was blaring.
 
“I don’t give
a fuck if she won Emmys and Oscars too!
 
She will not pull that bullshit in my hotel!”

Val’s heart sank as soon as they
entered.
 
She looked at her father, but
he was staring at the animated Reno.
 
Then she looked at Jimmy.

“Pop!” Jimmy yelled quickly, to interrupt
the tirade.

Reno frowned as he and his managers looked
toward the door.
 
And Reno wasn’t pleased
by the interruption at all.
 
“What?
 
What is it?”

Jimmy looked at the Wellstones.
 
“Here goes,” he said to them and began
walking toward Reno’s desk.
 
Buddy and
Val followed him.

“Somebody’s here to meet you,” Jimmy said.

Reno glanced at Val and the gentleman with
her, but he mainly kept his eyes on Jimmy.
 
“Meet me?
 
What are you
talking?
 
Don’t you see I’m busy here,
James?”

“It’s Val’s father,” Jimmy said, praying
that such a statement would ease Reno’s aggressiveness.
 

And it did.
 
At least for the time being.

“All right, guys,” Reno said to his
managers.
 
“We’ll talk later.
 
But you tell that woman to don’t even try
that shit with me.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I’m not the one.”

“Don’t worry, boss, we’ll clear it up.”

“You’d better,” Reno said as he waved them
off.
 
They spoke to the Wellstones as
they left the office.

Jimmy had hoped Reno would clear out the
rest of his busy staff, all of whom were at the conference table talking on the
phones or typing vigorously or discussing strategies one with the other.
 
But he didn’t.
 

“Mr. Wellstone,” Reno said, walking from
behind the desk.
 
He extended his hand as
he walked.
 
“It’s good to meet you, sir.”

“And you,” Buddy said as they shook hands.

“I would say I’ve heard a lot about you,”
Reno went on, “but that wouldn’t be true.
 
I don’t think I’ve heard anything about you.”

“I told you about him, Pop,” Jimmy quickly
pointed out.
 
“I told you how he worked
in real estate.
 
I told you how he owned
Wellstone Realty.”

“Well yeah, that was kind of obvious.
 
Val did say she worked for her father’s
company.
 
I’m not talking that.”

“I understand what you mean, Mr. Gabrini,”
Buddy said, “because I haven’t heard much about you, either.
 
But I’ve read a lot about you.”

Ah, Reno thought.
 
“Don’t believe everything you read.”
 
Reno said this with a smile that Buddy didn’t
return.

“Why don’t we have a seat over here, Dad,”
Jimmy suggested, pointing to the empty sitting area in the noisy office near
the backside of the room.
 
Reno agreed
and motioned for them to move in that direction.

When they all sat down in the arch-top
chairs, Reno leaned back and crossed his legs.
 
“I hate to move this right along, but I do have a hectic schedule
today.
 
So I’m going to have to ask what
exactly is this about?”

Val and Jimmy both looked at Buddy
Wellstone.
 
Buddy leaned forward.
 
“I thought it was high time I met you.
 
Your son and my daughter are very close, and
although I pride myself in staying out of her affairs, I felt this was too
important.”

Reno studied Buddy Wellstone.
 
“And what suddenly made it so important?”

“I’ll be blunt with you, Mr. Gabrini.
 
Your son’s arrest concerns me greatly.”

But Reno was shaking his head.
 
“Your concern is misplaced.
 
It was just a barroom brawl, nothing
more.
 
It’s been cleared up, no charges
were even filed.
 
You have nothing to
worry about there.”

“Nothing to worry about?” Buddy was
astounded that he could be so cavalier about it.
 
“Excuse me, sir, but Jimmy could have killed
that man.”

“It was a fight.
 
No charges were ever filed.”

“But that’s only thanks to your connections,
if you believe the media.”

“Don’t believe the media,” Reno said
bluntly.
 
“You have nothing to worry
about when it comes to my boy.
 
He’s a
good young man who is nothing but respectful toward your daughter.”

“He’s very respectful of my daughter, yes,”
Buddy said.
 
“I agree.”

Jimmy and Val were at least warmed by such
an agreement.

“But I’ll be lying if I say his arrest
doesn’t worry me.
 
It does.
 
I don’t think any man should become so angry
that they lose that level of control.
 
But that being as it may, it’s your connections that worry me more.”

Reno just sat there.
 
Jimmy stared at him.
 
He knew his father well.
 
He knew Reno didn’t like where this was going
at all.
 
“And what connections are you
referring to?”

“Your mob connections.”

Jimmy’s heart pounded.
 
“There’s no mob connections, Mr. Wellstone,”
he said.
 
“Those reporters, they’ll write
anything to get that big story.
 
My pop is
no mob boss and he doesn’t have any mob connections.”