A Mob Boss Christmas: The Pregnancy (10 page)

“Like what?”

“Oh, it runs the full gamut, Mr. Gabrini.”

“Then tell me the gamut, whatever the fuck that is.”

“Pop!”

“I’m sorry, Doc,” Reno said.
 
“I didn’t mean to. . . Just tell me.”

“Well, there are numerous ways a pregnancy can
go.
 
From nothing at all, to minor to
severe complications, all the way to death,” the doctor said.

Reno stared at the doctor.
 
“Death of the child?”

“Or mother, or both, yes.”

Reno’s heart dropped.
 
He knew there could be complications.
 
But death?
 
For some reason that had never occurred to him.
 
Not once.
 
And the
idea that his horny behind caused these
possibilities for Trina were
too much.

“That’s rare,
Pop
,” Jimmy
sought to reassure his father.
 
“Death,
that kind of thing is rare.”

“You say it’s rare,” Reno said, “but the doctor here
is saying it’s possible.”

“But percentage wise, doc,
it’s
low, right?”
 
Jimmy asked.
 
He was concerned that this doctor was just
spouting off the top of his head.
 
He
didn’t realize what he was doing to a man like Reno, who felt everything so
deeply.

“Oh, yes,” the doctor replied, to Jimmy’s
relief.
 
“I’m sorry, let me make myself
clearer.
 
The
chances
of a deadly outcome is
very low.
 
Almost non-existent, really.
 
I didn’t mean to alarm you, Mr. Gabrini.
 
In fact, you stand a better chance of getting hit by a car this
afternoon than your wife actually dying from this pregnancy.”

Reno began to feel some relief himself.
 
“Yeah?” he asked.

“Oh, yes.
 
I
didn’t mean to alarm you.”

“Well, you alarmed me.
 
You alarmed me pretty good.
 
You had me damn near ready to tell her to
abort immediately, that’s how much you alarmed me.”

Bob smiled.
 
“I
didn’t mean to do that.
 
And you won’t
have to tell her to abort anything.
 
Besides, abortions carry risks for the woman, too, Mr. Gabrini.”

Reno wanted to flatten this guy.
 
What was it with him and all of this
worse-case-scenario
talk
?
 
Didn’t he realize Reno felt like he was dying
here?
 
Everything was a risk.
 
Everything could produce complications.
  
This pregnancy could have Trina dead in a
ditch let this joker tell it.
 
Some
bedside manners he had.
 
Some things,
Reno felt, were better left unsaid.
 
Especially if you were saying them about Tree to him.

And Trina had such confidence in this guy.
 
But Reno didn’t see it.
 
The only reason this big shot doctor probably
agreed to take her to the clinic in the first place was because she was pretty
and he might have thought he could get some after the abortion.
 
It was a crude thing to think, Reno knew, but
he was never going to be mistaken for a diplomat.
 
It was just that this guy was rubbing him
wrong.
 
This guy left a lot to be desired
to Reno.

“So what am I supposed to do for her?” Reno
asked.
 
“What am I supposed to do to make
sure we don’t have any of these complications?”

“Just love her,” Bob said as if he wished it was
him.
 
“The rest will take care of
itself.”

Reno nodded.
 
It was the first sensible thing the guy had said all meeting.

Reno lay wide awake in the middle of the night
staring at a sleeping Trina.
 
She was
lying on her side, facing him, with both of her arms around his neck.
 
Reno had his arms around her, too, with one
hand on her bare back and the other hand on her bare ass.
 
He was massaging her as she slept, and he
couldn’t stop thinking about all that that doctor had said to him earlier.
 
All of that talk of complications.
 
Yeah, they were possible.
 
Reno knew they were very possible, but this
was what Trina wanted.
 
And, now that it
was a fact, he wanted it very much, too.

Trina stirred and pushed closer against him, causing
her bare stomach to butt against his.
 
This was going to be the mother of his child.
 
Katrina Gabrini.
 
The only woman he would have ever chosen to
be the mother of his child.
 
Because he
loved her, yes, but also because of the kind of caring person she was.
 
She’d take perfect care of their child.
 
She’d nurture him or her,
love
the child, and make sure any child of hers treated people right.
 
Trina would stand for nothing less.
 
She lived by the golden rule.

Reno smiled as Trina snored and made those occasional
horse sounds she sometimes made in the middle of the night.
 
He kissed her forehead and pulled her closer
still.
 
The idea that something could go
wrong should still be terrifying him.
 
But it wasn’t.
 
He was just going
to stay prayerful and love his wife.
 
Because Bob Paxon was right.
 
The rest would take care of itself.

Over the next six weeks Reno felt like a man in a
candy store because his wife was pregnant with his child.
 
But because of those so-called risks involved
he also felt like a big bad bear was in the corner of that candy store
constantly watching him.
  
He walked
around the PaLargio as if life couldn’t be any more agreeable, and he walked
around the PaLargio as if life couldn’t have him more stressed.
 
He worried constantly about Trina.
 
She knew it, Jimmy knew it, and all of the
employees knew it, too.
 
But unlike one employee,
Cheri Dallas, the others had the good sense to keep their knowledge to
themselves.

Cheri was in Trina’s office attempting to get her to
reconsider a one-week-only contract for a comedic friend of Cheri’s.
 
Trina found the man’s sense of humor too
raunchy for the PaLargio (his entire routine was all about female genitalia)
and she didn’t think he was worth the controversy that often followed his
appearances.
 
Cheri disagreed and the two
women defended their positions.
 
Lee
Jones, who was also in the office, sided with Cheri.

“He’ll be at the Barclay Lounge, Tree,” Lee pointed
out, “and it’ll be a midnight show only.
 
I don’t see how any sensibilities can be trampled on with that kind of
limited reach.”

“Thank you, Lee,” Cheri said.
 
Trina looked at Cheri Dallas.
 
It was no secret that they had their issues
with one another.
 
For Trina, she simply
didn’t like Cheri’s management style.
 
She was too in your face for Trina’s taste and Trina often told her
so.
 
Reno said Cheri’s style was
necessary, given all of the different businesses that make up the PaLargio
corporation
, but Trina still felt Cheri went too far.

Trina also knew, however, that there were still
rumors rolling around about Cheri’s relationship to Reno.
 
It started even before she first came on
board.
 
Even Trina’s old friend Jazz had
heard the rumors.
 
People were saying
that Reno only hired Cheri because she was pretty and blonde and he liked the
contrast of fucking a gorgeous black woman one day, and then a gorgeous white
one the next.
 
He could have his cake and
eat it too, were how the gossipers would put it.
 

And Trina endured those accusations.
 
She endured them daily sometimes.
 
But she never even addressed them with
Reno.
 
She didn’t feel such scurrilous
attacks deserved addressing.
 
Yes, she
kept her eyes open, and yes, she paid close attention to Reno’s interactions
with Cheri.
 
She, after all, was no blind
bitch so helplessly in love that she wouldn’t see a cheater if her life
depended on it.
 
But she knew her
man.
 
She felt highly comfortable that
Reno Gabrini wasn’t fucking anybody but her.

But that didn’t mean those rumors didn’t hurt.
 
Because she knew the deal.
 
She knew that other women had felt just as
confident about their men as she felt about Reno, and some of those women had
been burned big time.
 
Trina had seen it
happen countless times herself.
 
She was
no fool.
 
She knew that everything was
possible.
 
But she also knew that in the
land of love there had to be trust.
 
And
she trusted Reno.

“I hear what both of you guys are saying,” Trina said
to Cheri and Lee, “and I agree that he’ll be in the Barclay and it’ll be a
midnight show.
 
But I’m not going to
allow either one of you to overlook the politics of this decision.
 
We’ve already had women’s groups citing the
PaLargio twice this year for what they called insensitive booking.
 
I just want us to pay attention to that.
 
Every time I turn around I don’t want some
comedian on one of our stages dissing females all the time.
 
So my answer remains no.
 
Lee, you’re the Chief Operating Officer.
 
You can overrule me.
 
But that’s my answer.”

Cheri looked at Lee.
 
She knew Lee didn’t have the backbone to overrule Queen Katrina when all
the queen had to do was run to Reno.
 
But, to her surprise, Lee did overrule her.

“Book him,” he said to Cheri.

Cheri didn’t even crack a smile.
 
“Yes, sir,” she replied totally businesslike
and looked at Trina.
 
Inwardly she was
gloating like a big dog.
 
Inwardly she
wanted to shout,
I won bitch
, right
in Trina’s black face.
 
But she held it
together.
 
Trina was nobody’s fool.
 
If she expected to remain GM, and keep her
beloved Reno close by, Cheri knew she had to, at all times, keep her true
feelings to herself.
 

She hadn’t gotten to first base with Reno yet, but
she was determined to keep trying right up under Trina’s nose.
 
She intended to steal Trina’s husband when
Trina didn’t even know the robbery was taking place.
 
Just the thought of it made Cheri warm
inside.
 
She had the upper hand, and that
black witch didn’t even know it.
 
Nobody
did.
 
Not even Reno.
 
That was how good and cool and diabolical
Cheri Dallas knew how to be.
 
That was
how she got ahead.
 
She played it cool
and kept being the most beautiful woman in the room.
 
And then, over time, the dynamic would change
and it would be the big boss begging her for a fuck.
 
In all of her years in the business world,
that fact had yet to fail.
 
They always,
in the end, asked for some.

The door to Trina’s office opened and the man himself
walked in.
 
Reno
Gabrini.
 
The
man that Cheri often spent many of her nights dreaming about.
  
Her heart, in fact, leaped with that sensual
delight as it always did whenever Reno came into a room.
 
His beautiful hair, his baby blue eyes, his
body and swag and incredible sensuality made her almost crave the man.
 

But, as always, Cheri showed no outward emotion
whatsoever.

When Reno walked in, Trina smiled.
 
There was no hiding of any emotion with
her.
 
And it was no surprise to her that
Reno would drop by her office.
 
Ever
since it was announced that Mrs. Gabrini was pregnant, Mr. Gabrini came by her
office every single day to make sure she was okay.
 
Before the pregnancy, Trina was sometimes
lucky to see Reno anywhere near her office once a week tops.
 
Now it was every single day.

“Hello, everybody,” Reno said as he walked toward the
threesome.
 
“What’s up?”

“Booking issues,” Cheri gladly took over and
said.
 
As general manager, she was the
lowest rank staffer in the room.
 
But
that never stopped Cheri.

“What kind of booking issues?” Reno asked.

“Lee and I want to book Jeff Fingar again, but Trina
doesn’t.”

Lee almost rolled his eyes.
 
Cheri didn’t realize it, but her need to get
Reno’s attention would probably cause her comedic friend his gig.