Sal Gabrini 4: I'll Take You There (The Gabrini Men Series Book 7) (18 page)

“He’s
on the run,” Sal said.
 
“He always answers
my calls.”

“We’ll
find him, don’t worry,” Tommy said.

“And
Rip,” Reno said.

“Him
and Rip,” Tommy agreed.
 
“Between my men
and your men, and Sal’s men, we’ll find them.”

“Keep
my men out of it,” Sal said.
 
“Not until
I get more answers.
 
As far as I’m concerned
right now, until I know more than I know now, all of those fuckers are the
enemy.”

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Curtis
Kane had his legs on his desk and was leaned back in his chair enjoying the
phone conversation he was having with one of his friends.
 
Until he saw the Bentley drive up.
 

“Uh-oh,
girl,” he said, “let me call you back.
 
My boss’s boyfriend has just arrived and he doesn’t like it when I’m
less than professional.
 
Yeah.
 
You know it. Later.”
 

He
ended the call just as Sal was stepping out of the car and heading for the
entrance.
 
Barbara, Gemma’s paralegal,
was coming out of the file room.
 

“Chop
chop,” Curtis said to her.
 
“Her
boyfriend’s back.”
 
He motioned for the
front door.
 
When Barbara saw Sal Gabrini
walking across the sidewalk, she immediately opened the file.
 
Why he made them so nervous was their
issue.
 
But it was a fact.

“Good
morning,” Curtis said cheerfully, as Sal walked in.

“Good
morning,” Sal responded, unable to get up the cheer.
 
It was still early, he was still sleepy, it
would take a few more hours before he could be that bubbly.
 
And then again, he inwardly thought as he
looked at Curtis, he could never be that bubbly!

“How
are you this morning?” Barbara asked.

“I’m
fine.”

Yes, you are
, Barbara thought as she looked at
those powerful biceps outlined beneath his coal-gray Brook’s Brothers
suit.
 
“You’re here to see Miss Jones?”
she asked.

“She
in?”

“Yes,
sir.
 
But she’s with somebody right at
the moment.
 
If you’ll have a seat, I’ll
see if she can see you now.”

Sal
took a seat against the window, while Barbara headed for the closed office door
in the back of the building.
 
He folded
his legs and looked around.
 
He purchased
this building for Gemma after he found out she was renting the space.
 
And with that purchase she gained the title
to the three other offices on the property, of which now she was collecting
rents.
 
But this was nothing to Sal.
 
He’d buy her the world if he could.

“Looks
nice outside today,” Curtis said in an attempt at small-talk.

Sal
didn’t respond.
 
He wasn’t the small-talk
type.
 
He, instead, remembered the things
he did to Gemma on Curtis’s desk a couple nights ago, and got up and looked out
of the window.
 
Barbara returned.

“She
can see you now, sir,” she said, and Sal headed for the office.

When
the door closed, Curtis shook his head.
 
“He is such a racist,” he said.
 
“I don’t know what Miss Jones sees in him.”

“If
you don’t know that, honey,” Barbara said, heading toward her own desk, “then
something is wrong with you.
 
You’re not
as gay as you think you are.”

Curtis
leaned back and laughed.
 
“I call that a
read!” he said.

Inside
Gemma’s office, she rose to her feet as Sal walked in.
 
A short, slender black woman was seated in
front of her desk, with a thick notebook opened on her lap.
 

“Come
on in!” Gemma said happily.
 
“I didn’t
expect to see you before noon.”

“You
said the wedding planner was coming at ten.
 
I knew I needed to be here for the meeting.”

“Oh,
Sal!
 
You didn’t have to.
 
I could have handled it.”

He leaned
over and kissed her on the lips.
 
“You
won’t be handling anything alone,” he said.

Gemma
liked that idea.
 
“This is Bonita Cleary,
Sal,” she said.
 
“She’s our wedding
planner.”

Bonita
held out her hand as if she expected him to kiss it rather than shake it.
 
He shook it.
 
“Nice to know you,” he said, and sat down in the chair beside hers.

“So,
Sal, Bonita here was just going over the ceremony itself with me.
 
She was recommended because they say she
thinks outside of the box, and I told her that’s exactly what we want.
 
No cookie-cutter ceremony for us, right?”

“Right,”
Sal agreed.

“We
were just getting started,” Gemma said.
 
“Nita, why don’t you begin.”

“Why
thank-you, Gemma.
 
And I’ll be brief I
promise.”
 
She said this with a smile
that Sal didn’t return.
 
She cleared her
throat.
 
“Anyway, my suggestions aren’t
necessarily out of the box, per se, they are what I would call off the
charts.
 
For I, too, hate anything cookie
cutter.
 
I think a bride and groom should
have the best day of their lives and I do everything in my power to make it
uniquely so.
 
Call me the Denise Rodman
of the wedding scene.
 
Call me the
Michael Jackson of the ceremony.
 
Call me
the Prince of the special day.
 
Call me
the---”

“Great
day in the morning!” Sal yelled.
 
“Why
can’t we call you the wedding planner and you go on and plan the wedding?
 
Our
wedding!”

Gemma
wanted to laugh, but she wasn’t going to make the woman feel bad.
 
“The point he’s making,” she said instead,
“is that we get your point.
 
You’re
different.”

“Right,”
Bonita said.
 
She was seriously perturbed
with Sal’s gruff personality, but because the money was good, she was willing
to overlook it.
 
“I’m different.
 
I’m somebody who beats to the dance of a
different drummer. I mean, who dances to the beat of a different drummer.
 
I’m somebody who live and let live, and die
and let die.
 
I’m somebody who---”

“Why
don’t you just tell us,” Gemma said when she saw Sal turning in his chair,
“exactly what you suggest for us.
 
For
our wedding?”

“Yes.
 
Absolutely,” Bonita said.
 
“First off, when it comes to walking down the
aisle, I suggest we flip the script.”
 
She said this with a smile, and looked at Sal.

“Flip
the script?” he asked.

“Right.”

“And
what script are we flipping?”

“Instead
of Gemma walking down the aisle, I suggest you should walk down the aisle.”

Gemma
wanted to fall out laughing.
 
But she
held her peace.
 
Bonita was dead serious.

“I
walk down the aisle?” Sal asked.

“Yes!”
Bonita responded, as if she had given the best suggestion ever.
 
“Won’t that be exciting?
 
It’ll be you, with your flower boys.
   
The little lads will throw rose petals at
your feet as you walk.
 
And instead of
just a regular old tuxedo, you’ll strut down that aisle in a tux with a tail as
long as a woman’s wedding gown train!
 
It’ll be beautiful, I tell you.
 
And instead of Gemma’s parents giving her away, your parents will give
you away!”

Gemma
was fighting back laughter so hard that she didn’t hear that last
suggestion.
 
But Sal heard it.

“Instead
of her parents giving her away--”

“Yours
will give you away, yes!”
 
Bonita said.

“Oh,
yeah?” Sal asked.
 
“And how do you
suggest we accomplish that feat?
 
Given
that both of my parents are fucking dead?”

Gemma
stood up.
 
“Ah, Bonita, maybe we should
wait before we decide---”

“I
walk down the aisle,” Sal said, still fuming. “Can you believe this?
 
She wants me to walk down the aisle!
 
And with a train no less!
 
What, you want me to hire some guys to carry
it for me?
 
Maybe Reno can carry it for
me.
 
Or maybe I can ask some of those
boys in the hood.
 
Now that’ll be
different!”

Gemma
hurried around her desk as Bonita stood to her feet, her thick notebook still
wide open.

“I
don’t understand,” Bonita said.
 
“I
wasn’t mocking you.”

 
“Of course
 
you weren’t,” Gemma said as she helped Bonita walk to the office
door.
 
“It’s just that we may not be
ready for such drastic changes after all.
 
But I’ll phone you and let you know if we should change our minds.”

“But
as of right now?”

“It’s
a no,” Gemma said bluntly.

“A
no?”

“A
no.”

 
Bonita exhaled.
 
“I thought you wanted somebody who had ideas
outside of the box.”

“We
do!
 
But the box has to be located on
this planet,” Gemma said.
 
“That’s the
thing.
 
But thank-you for your trouble.”

Gemma
had to all but pushed Bonita on out of the door to get her out of the door, and
then she closed it.
 
She walked back
behind her desk, sat down, looked at Sal.
 
And that look on his face did it.
 
She burst into laughter.
 
She
couldn’t hold it a moment longer.
 
Sal
smiled too.
 
And then started laughing
himself.

“When
she said you would have a tux with a train,” Gemma said, “I died inside I was
laughing so hard!”

“That
woman’s crazy!” Sal said.
 
“Where do you
find these people?”

“I
didn’t find her.
 
She’s a friend of
Trina’s.
 
Trina recommended her.”

“Tree?
 
Did she use her to plan her wedding?”

“She
didn’t have a wedding, remember?
 
She and
Reno, for reasons she still will not tell me, had to get married in a hurry.”

“Oh,
yeah, that’s right,” Sal said, remembering how Reno had ordered a hit on Frank
Partanna, and needed an alibi.
 
“But wait
until I get my hands on Tree.
 
That’ll be
the last wedding planner she suggests to anybody.
 
Me walking down the aisle like some fucking
girl!
 
Yeah, I’ve got her aisle right
here!”

Two
days later, they closed on the big house.
 
Gemma was so happy she could hardly contain her joy.
 
Sal was so happy he actually bought a box of
cigars for the occasion, and managed to get Gemma to smoke one.
 

“Not
bad,” Sal said as he sat behind the wheel of Gemma’s BMW and took another puff.
  
They were outside of the title company that
conducted the closing, and had the keys to the property in their hands.

“It’s
awful,” Gemma said, coughing after her first puff.
 
“But wonderful too.
 
Because of what it means.
 
We own a house.”

“And
not just any house either,” Sal said.
 
“The big house.
 
Gemma’s
Palace.
 
That’s it.
 
That’s the name for it.
 
In England they name their houses you know.”

Gemma
smiled.
 
“So what’s next?” she asked him.

“We
furnish the joint!
 
And after the
wedding, with every room furnished already, we move in.”

“But
not before the wedding?”

“No.”

“May
I ask why?”

“We
won’t be married.
 
What are you
talking?
 
I won’t have you living in
sin.”

Gemma
smiled.
 
He slept with her every chance
he could, but he would never dream of living with her outside of marriage.
 
Sal was filled with contradictions like that.

“I
don’t want to hire a decorator,” Gemma said.
 
“At least not initially.”

“No?”

“No.
 
I think we should put our own stamp on the
place first.
 
If I need a decorator’s
touch to pull it all together, then yes, I’ll call one in.
 
But not unless we need that help.”