But Trina looked at Jazz. “You think I’m that crazy? You think I just walked up in here without backup?”
Jazz, surprised to hear her say that, looked toward the entrance. And that was when Trina pulled out her own gun. “No, Jazz. I’m not that stupid,” Trina said, pointing her gun at Jazz.
And Reno and Tommy entered from around the foyer wall. And their guns were already drawn too.
Jazz shook her head. “I should have known your puppet master wouldn’t be far behind.”
“Fuck you, bitch,” Reno said.
“Drop the gun,” said Tommy. “And drop it now.”
Jazz didn’t hesitate. She knew about Dapper Tom too. Backdoor Tommy, they also called him. She dropped her gun.
“Where’s Bartholomew Garbo?” Tommy asked.
“I don’t know.”
“Where was he the last time you or Pump had contact with him?”
“Right here in Vegas. Getting everybody ready for the big grab.”
“The big grab?” Tommy asked, although he already knew what she meant. They needed to make sure nothing else was in the works and they were talking about the same thing. “What’s the big grab?”
“He wanted Sal’s wife and kid. That’s the big grab! But you found those two guards so you already know that. Where Bartholomew is now? He didn’t let me in on his plans after that.”
“Tell us everything you know about him,” said Reno. “Everything.”
“He hates the Gabrinis,” Jazz said. “Like the rest of us. What else is there to know?” Then she flung her wheelchair toward a side door, as if she had been startled, and Tommy and Reno quickly turned in that direction. But it was all a ruse. Jazz needed that split moment to pull her second gun from beneath her blanket, point it at Trina, and fire.
But Trina didn’t fall for the head fake. She knew Jazz too well. Trina fired before Jazz could, and shot her in the throat.
Jazz looked stunned as the bullet ripped through her. She wanted revenge and then she could die in peace. Trina took that away from her too?
The gun fell from her hand, and her head slumped to the side. She was dead.
And Trina was upset. She wished she would not have had to do that. “Damn,” she said. “Damn, damn, damn!”
“I’ll make sure we’re alone,” Tommy said, as he made his way throughout the house.
Reno went to Trina, and put his arm around her shoulder. “She’s not worth the tears, Tree,” he said. “Not that bitch.”
Trina knew it too, but she and Jazz went way back. Back when they both waited tables at Boyzie’s. Back when Trina first met Reno, and Jazz encouraged the union.
She leaned against Reno. Reno stared at Jazz Hannity. They still didn’t know a damn thing more than they already knew. But at least she got hers.
Four hours after the phone call with Bartholomew Garbo, Sal and Reno, and Mick and Tommy, were on Sal’s plane on their way to Slovakia. Trina wanted to go, in case they needed a woman’s intervention, but Reno nixed that idea outright before Mick and Tommy could. Because they most certainly would.
Sal, for his part, was too busy on the phone with his men, plotting strategy, to give a shit. He wanted his family back. That was all he could think about.
Fifteen hours later, Mick and Tommy were at their assigned posts and Reno and Sal, with half of the diamonds in briefcases, were told by Bartholomew to take a train to Levoca, where they would be picked up and escorted in.
Once at the compound, and in that guard house, Bartholomew refused to tell them where Gemma and Lucky were holed up, and, to prove to them that their agony over not knowing where their loved ones was would be his final act of revenge, he put a bullet through his brains.
He knew Sal and Reno were in the midst of a well-fortified compound that was surrounded by Bartholomew’s men.
He knew his men would blame them for his death.
He knew they wouldn’t get out of there alive.
He knew, even if they did make it out, they would never find Gemma and Lucky in time. Because they were on a timer. Twenty hours to Gem and Lucky’s destruction.
After Bartholomew killed himself, Reno and Sal grabbed those briefcases, and Bartholomew’s one gun, and ran for their lives.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The men broke through the door of the guard station, and began firing at Reno and Sal as soon as they saw their boss’s dead body. Bartholomew had killed himself, but all they knew was that a shot had been fired, he was dead, and his two enemies were escaping through the only window in the room.
They fired shot after shot and ran after them. Not that they were worried. The place was swarming with Bartholomew’s men. Those Gabrinis didn’t stand a chance!
And Reno and Sal would have agreed with them. They had the one gun and briefcases filled with diamonds. What the fuck defense did they have?
But they did have defense. Only it wasn’t coming fast enough. Because as soon as they jumped from that window and hit the ground running, more bullets were sailing their way from too many directions.
But they kept running. There was a barn behind the guard shed, and their first instinct was to seek cover inside that barn. They ran as fast as they could run.
But Bartholomew’s men were closing in. Reno turned to fire back, with the gun he had nipped from Bartholomew, but when he fired he realized there were no bullets in the chamber. Bartholomew’s ass had placed one bullet and one bullet only in that chamber: his suicide shot. Reno tossed the gun to the ground. They had no protection now. They ran even harder.
“Stop now or you’re dead!”
They heard the forceful voice and stopped in their tracks. Because they knew they didn’t stand a chance. Reno held up his hands. Sal held up his hands. And the mob of men began to descend on them.
And that was when they heard the helicopter.
Everybody looked up, because it was so unexpected, but for Reno and Sal it was right on time.
Because they knew who it was. It was a part of their own prep work before their jet even landed in Slovakia.
Tommy was on one side of the helicopter with a loaded machine gun, and Mick was on the other side of the copter with a loaded machine gun. And they didn’t hesitate. They began mowing down men.
The men, knowing their lives were in danger, not by weaponless Reno and Sal, but by those men in that copter, began running and firing in that direction.
But Mick and Tommy had too much firepower. They were shooting round after round after ever-loving round as if they would die if they stopped firing bullets. They kept firing. They didn’t stop.
And the men, realizing the danger they were now in, abandoned the fight and began to run for cover. They ran for the barn. A few of them grabbed Reno and Sal as protection, but Reno and Sal fought back. They used their briefcases to knock men away from them, and used their brute force to avoid being anybody’s shield.
It worked. The men abandoned that idea, too, and just ran. It was their time to run for their lives.
But Mick had more up his sleeve. He motioned for Reno and Sal to get away. Reno and Sal did just that. Instead of running into the barn with most of Bartholomew’s men, they ran back toward the guard house.
And that was when Mick pulled out a second big gun: a rocket that propelled enough grenades to easily blow up a barn.
But Sal panicked. What if Gemma was inside? What if Lucky?
He began waving his arms for Mick not to do it. But he was too late. Mick had already began doing it. And once began, there was no turning back.
The barn, and those men who had run inside of it, went up in a fireball.
The few men still remaining, were gunned down by Tommy.
Reno and Sal hit their backs against the wall of the guard station when they realized their side had won.
But Reno was confused. “What was your problem?” he asked Sal.
“What if Gemma and Lucky’s in that barn?” he asked. “What if Uncle Mick just killed them?”
But Reno knew that wasn’t possible. “No, Sal,” he said. “Garbo said we’d never find them. He wasn’t going to make it that easy.”
“But what if there’s a secret compartment? What if he hid them in that barn?”
Reno’s heart dropped through his shoe. Sal could be right. Sal could be right!
They couldn’t get in the barn. They had to wait until the fire faded before they could get anywhere near it. All they could do was watch and pray.
The helicopter landed as they watched. A second and third helicopter landed too, with their own men. Mick walked out suited up in his black trousers, black pants, and long, white coat. Had two shotguns still in hand. Tommy was with him, and he hurried to his brother.
“What happened?” Tommy asked them. “And why the fuck were you warning us off, Sal?”
“He killed himself,” Sal said.
Mick frowned. “Garbo?”
Sal nodded. “He said we’ll never find Gem and Luck. He said even if we get out of this alive, we’d never find them. What if they were right under our noses? What if he had them in that barn?”
Mick’s heart dropped. So did Tommy’s. They had never even considered the possibility!
But they could do nothing now but wait.
Until Mick ordered every man to search the compound inside and out. The barn was the only building burning. There were many other buildings onsite.
“Search!” he ordered, his white coat flapping in the wind.
And Reno, Sal, and Tommy, tired of watching, searched too.
But two hours later, they still had found nothing. Not a hair. Not a clue. Not a body. Nothing.
And three hours after that, when the barn was at least accessible, they found many dead bodies inside. But none of them belonged to a woman and a child. No secret compartments either.
Reno was right: that would have been too easy.
Sal looked at his Rolex. Those twenty hours Bartholomew said they had, was now cut down to fifteen. Time was not on their side!
But as they made their way to the helicopters, to fly around the area and see if there were any other buildings they could search, Sal stopped in his tracks. “Mother fuck,” he said.
They all looked at him and stopped too. “What, Sal?” Reno asked.
“This would be too obvious.”
“What would be too obvious?”
“And how was he going to get a black woman and a black child at that airport without anybody noticing anything? And we checked. Nobody saw shit.”
“What would be too obvious, Sal?” Reno asked again.
“This fucking country would be too obvious! Remember what Bartholomew said? He said he knows this territory like I know mine. Then he said maybe he doesn’t know it like that. But what if he really meant that I don’t know mine like that?”
“What are you getting at, Sal?” Tommy asked.
“He never brought them to this country. His ass never brought them to this country! What if Gemma and Lucky never left?”
“You’re saying they’re still in America?” Reno asked.
“I’m saying they never left. I’m saying they’re still in America. I’m saying never they left my house.”
Everybody was astounded. “What the fuck?” Reno asked.
It would be amazing if it was true. They all looked at Mick. Did he think Sal was nuts?
“It’s possible,” Mick said. “More than possible. But a crew will need to stay here to check every building in this area and anywhere else in this country. I’ll stay and oversee that effort. You, Reno, and Tommy get back to the states.”
And every one of them took off. Every one of them got on their cellphones as they did. Sal, Reno, Tommy, and even Mick ordered every one of their men to get to Sal’s estate. Sal notified his father, who was still there.
“Make them overturn that entire motherfucker if they have to,” Sal said to Neeco as the helicopter rushed him, Reno and Tommy to the airstrip. “And while they’re doing that, have other crews tear Vegas upside down. Gemma and Lucky didn’t leave that town. I feel it in my bones.”
“Don’t worry,” Neeco said. “We’ll find them if it’s the last thing we do.”
Sal looked at his watch again. It just might be.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
When they arrived back in the states, the clock felt like a gun to their heads. But they didn’t delay. A convoy of SUVs were waiting at the airport, with Trina waiting inside.
Instead of hugging Reno, Trina pulled Sal into her arms. He needed the comfort. She could see it all over his distressed face.
“What’s the progress, Tree?” Sal asked her as they sat in the SUV and it sped toward Sal’s estate.
“They’re at it full blown. But I don’t know if they’re finding anything. And the outside crews have been tearing up all of Vegas looking for Gem and Lucky, but they haven’t turned up anything either.”
Sal nodded his head. “I know. Dammit.”
“Where’s Mick?” Trina asked them.
“Still in Slovakia,” Reno responded. “He’s going to make sure we aren’t making a mistake. He wants to make sure they aren’t still there.”
Trina nodded. That sounded like Mick!
But when they arrived onsite, they were hoping for good news.
Neeco had taken Sal’s orders to heart because it looked as if the entire estate was being heavily renovated. Bulldozers and tractors were there. Track hoes and backhoes were there. And every other heavy machinery was hard at work.
Even a bomb squad was onsite, ready to disassemble the explosive should there be one. Sal had left no stone unturned.
Neeco, along with Bruce, were on the property with bullhorns, supervising every aspect when the convoy of SUVs arrived. They all got out swiftly and made their way across the property to the two men.
“Nothing,” Neeco said as they hurried toward him. “We’ve found nothing.”
Sal let out a harsh exhale and looked at his watch. They had ten minutes. Just ten fucking minutes! “What if I’m wrong?” he was saying anxiously. “What if she’s back in that country, and isn’t here at all? What if I’m wrong?”
“Then Uncle Mick will find her, Sal,” Tommy said.
“But it’s ten minutes to blast off and he hasn’t found a fucking thing either!” Sal was screaming from the top of his lungs. “What if I got it all wrong? What if my stupid ass got it wrong? Where are they? Where are they!”
Reno and Trina looked at each other. Trina had tears in her eyes. They didn’t know what to do either. And Tommy? He was as lost as Sal.
Sal was pacing, moving back and forward, asking all kinds of questions. “What about inside the house? Has anybody torn the house upside down?”
“And sideways, too, Sal,” said Neeco. “We found nothing inside either.”
Sal began walking around. “This can’t be happening. This can’t be happening!”
Neeco was distressed too. He looked at Reno. “Who’s behind it all? Did y’all find out anything?”
“We know Pump Futarda paid the kidnappers. We found out he was working for this crazy fuck named Bartholomew Garbo. It’s all about some shit that went down in a shootout in some mob war that claimed the life of Garbo’s son. It was all about revenge. Isn’t it always?”
But Neeco was confused. “Garbo?” he asked.
Everybody looked at him. “Yeah, why?” Sal asked anxiously.
“But that’s . . .” He looked at Bruce. “But that’s your cousin.” Neeco looked at Sal. “Bartholomew Garbo is his cousin!”
Everybody looked at Bruce.
“He said he’d kill me if I didn’t do it,” Bruce said.
Sal nearly jumped out of his skin. He couldn’t believe it! “Where are they?” was all he wanted to know.
“He made me do it,” Bruce was saying.
Sal ran to Bruce. “Where are they?” He shook him violently. “Where’s my family?!”
“In the house,” said Bruce.
“My
house?” Sal asked.
“My house,” said Bruce.
Sal looked at Neeco. Did they check them already?
“We didn’t check the guest houses,” Neeco said. “At least not the two me and Bruce live in. Why would we?” he added, but Sal, Reno, Tommy, and even Trina had already taken off. The bomb squad, along with Robby Yale, saw them running toward the guest houses, and took off after them too.
Bruce tried to back away, to make a run for it himself, but Neeco grabbed him. Nothing but hurt was in Neeco’s face. Everybody he’d ever tried to be close to in their village in Rome had turned on him. Now Bruce too? “How could you,” he said to him. “How could you?”
But Sal was running so fast, and so ahead of everybody else that his heart was pounding too loud to hear anything. He could have turned the knob to the guest house where Bruce had taken up residence. He could have easily tried the knob. But he bore into that door and knocked it down with his own shoulder.
But all he saw was the little studio that guest house was. “Where are they?” he cried. “Gemma? Gemma? Gemma!”
“Get that motherfucker!” Reno yelled, and Trina ran back outside.
“Neeco!” she yelled to Sal’s father. “Bring Bruce!”
Neeco grabbed Bruce by the catch of his collar and ran with him, his small feet off the ground, all the way to the guest cottage.
When they got inside, Sal ran to Bruce. “Where the fuck are they?” he yelled. “If they die, motherfucker, you’re dead! Where are they?”
Bruce ran to the closet door and opened it quickly.
But there was nothing but a closet there. But it was only half the size the closet should have been. Tommy looked at his watch. They only had two minutes now. They were already in the two-minute warning!
Sal ran to the back of that closet wall and, just as he suspected, it gave way. It was a front wall. A small room was behind it.
Sal and the gang ran in.
Neeco was blown away. “When in the world did that get here?” he asked.
“I started building it when I moved in,” said Bruce. “My cousin heard about you coming to America. He’s the one who told me to go with you. And prepare his way. I’m in construction. That’s what I do sometimes.”
Reno and Sal Gabrini: Fire with Fire Page 16