Texas Proud and Circle of Gold

by Diana Palmer

  She glanced at her watch. “Oops, I’ll be late getting back. I dropped by to see what Billie wanted for lunch. I’m bringing it to her.” She smiled at him. “I’ve got two uncles who worked for a local crime boss in New York,” she said. She shrugged. “I don’t have a problem with it. But some people, you know, they don’t quite understand the life. See you.”

  “Yeah. See you.”

  She walked toward Billie’s office, feeling proud. She’d just put the first stick in the spokes of his relationship with Bernie. She had him off balance. Now it was just a matter of keeping him that way for some people she and Billie knew.

  The next step was to talk to Bernie and make a similar confession to her about Mikey. Funny how easy it was to make them believe things about each other. But she knew people like Mikey. He’d never ask Bernie directly if she’d said such things because he wouldn’t really want to know. He’d be afraid to hurt her feelings by accusing her of it, and of course she’d deny it—because it wasn’t true. But he’d have doubts. Big doubts. Jessie was going to make them even bigger.

  Chapter Twelve

  Mikey went back to San Antonio with Paulie to talk to the feds, and he was morose. Could Bernie feel that way about his lifestyle and not be willing to tell him? She’d certainly been shocked when he’d told her about the man who’d killed Paulie’s family. Well, he hadn’t confessed that he’d ordered the hit—although he had. What he’d told her was enough to shock her, even without that. Had he been too truthful? Maybe he should have waited until they knew each other much better before he confessed just how full of violence and turmoil his life had been.

  “Sari ever have a problem with your past?” he asked his cousin, who was driving them in a Bucar, the designation of a bureau vehicle used by the FBI.

  Paul frowned. “Well, she wasn’t overjoyed, if that’s what you mean. She’s an assistant district attorney, you know. A real straight arrow. I guess it bothered her some, but she loved me enough not to let it matter. Why? Is Bernie having second thoughts? She told Sari the two of you just got engaged.”

  “We did. But I told her a lot of it,” Mikey said quietly. “She’s got violence in her own past, something tragic. But hers was the result of an unbalanced relative. I’m not unbalanced. I’ve been a bad boy, Paulie. I’m not sure she can make a life with me, the way she is.”

  “You should talk to her.”

  “And say what? That I’ll change? That I’ll go straight and sell out my family? Fat chance, and you know why. You get in this racket for life. Nobody gets out except feet first.”

  “Marcus Carrera did,” he was reminded.

  “Yeah, Carrera. Well, he was a big fish and people were scared to death of him. Sure he got out. He always made his own rules. I’m not Carrera. I’m a small fry, compared to him.”

  “You own a casino in Vegas,” Paul reminded him drily. “You drive a Rolls back home. You’ve got millions in overseas banks. And people are scared of you, too, kiddo.”

  “No kidding?”

  “No kidding.”

  One corner of his mouth pulled down. “Well, that won’t matter much if I turn my back on the outfit.”

  “Sadly, no, it won’t. Hey, there’s always the witness protection program,” Paul teased.

  “I noticed how well that worked out for the guy who squealed on the big bosses. He got hit right in protective custody, now, didn’t he?” Mikey chuckled.

  “He did.”

  “You don’t get out. Hell, I don’t want to get out,” Mikey muttered. “It’s the only life I’ve ever known, from the time we were kids. I like being part of a big family. I like the style and the cachet.”

  “Will Bernie like it? She’s more of a butterflies and wildflowers girl than she is a showgirl.”

  “Yeah. I know that. But she’s so sweet, Paulie,” he replied heavily. “She’s the sweetest human being I’ve ever known. And I don’t think I can give her up, unless she wants me to. Even then, I don’t know how I’d go on without her. It’s only been a few weeks and I’m lonely when I’m not with her.”

  “It was that way with me when I was mooning over Sari and thinking how hopeless it all was. She was worth two hundred million, and I worked for wages.”

  “You’re still working for wages,” Mikey pointed out.

  “I’m not a sit-at-home type of guy. I love my job.” He glanced at Mikey. “So what are you going to do?”

  “Rock along until I’m sure she can cope. Then I’m getting her to the nearest justice of the peace before she changes her mind,” he chuckled.

  * * *

  Bernie, meanwhile, was still basking in the glory of her first proposal and looking forward to years of happiness with Mikey.

  The others were getting ready to go to lunch. Bernie got to her feet a little unsteadily and picked up her cane.

  “Rough day, huh?” Jessie asked in a gentle tone.

  “Just a little,” Bernie confessed. “I had a bad fall on my way home the other day. A car went out of control and almost hit me.”

  “Gosh, here in Jacobsville? People need to learn to drive!” Jessie muttered.

  “Just what I was thinking.”

  “Bernie, we’ll wait for you outside,” Glory called as they went out the door.

  “Be right there,” she said, reaching for her purse.

  “Mikey was in the courthouse when I went to take Billie her lunch,” Jessie said. She made a face. “I really shouldn’t tell you what I overheard him say to his cousin.”

  Bernie’s heart dropped in her chest. “What?” she asked, and sounded a little breathless with worry.

  Jessie sighed. “He told his cousin that he was worried about what you’d be like in a few years, because his grandmother had what you’ve got, and she was twisted like tree roots and almost helpless. He said that it was going to be hard to live with somebody who was sick so much. But that he’d made a promise and he was going to keep it. He said he was going to marry you because he gave his word. But that it was going to be like pulling teeth. He was used to women who could keep up with the pace. He went all over the world on trips for his family, vacationed in foreign countries. He didn’t know how you’d manage the travel. It was hard for a healthy woman, but you’d never keep up. He said,” she added with sad eyes, “that he’d rushed in because he was infatuated with you, and then it was too late to turn back after he’d thought about the difficulties.”

  “I see.” Bernie’s heart was beating like a drum. She felt sick inside.

  “I knew I shouldn’t have told you,” Jessie groaned. “I’m sorry. But I thought you should know. I mean, he’d never tell you himself.”

  “Of course, he wouldn’t.”

  “Please don’t tell him I told you,” Jessie pleaded. “I don’t want to make an enemy of him. He gets even with people. You don’t know how dangerous he is,” she added. “I come from up north. I’ve heard things about him. He scares people. Even bad people.” She laughed hollowly. “I don’t want to end up floating down a river...”

  Bernie felt sick inside. Even Mikey had hinted at something of the sort, that he had power in his organization. She remembered what he’d said about taking care of the man who’d killed Paul’s first wife and his child. It chilled her. “No, of course I won’t tell.”

  “Thanks. I’m truly sorry. I know you’re crazy about him.”

  Bernie managed a smile. She didn’t answer. She went out onto the street with her coworkers and pretended that nothing at all had happened. But she was devastated.

  * * *

  Jessie smiled to herself. She was going to reap rich rewards for her little acts of “kindness.” Throwing Mikey off balance had been the first step. Now she had Bernie doubting. The next thing was going to happen just as they’d planned it. And soon.

  * * *

  They spent all too much time in the Jacobs County c
ourthouse, Mikey was thinking as he waited for Paulie to come out of an office where he was comparing notes with a contact in the probate judge’s office.

  He was staring at a plaque on the wall, denoting the building of the courthouse almost sixty years ago, and the names of the men on the county commission who’d authorized the construction. Farther down the wall were portraits of judges, many long gone. He was bored out of his mind.

  “Fancy seeing you here again,” Jessie said with a smile. She was carrying a box with food and a cup of coffee in it. “I came to bring lunch to poor Billie. She hurt her foot and she can’t walk far.”

  “How’re you doing?” he asked, and smiled, because she really did seem to have changed in the past week or so.

  She shrugged. “Can’t complain. It’s just hard to get used to these Texans,” she laughed. “They aren’t like people up north.”

  “Nobody’s like people up north. Where you from?”

  She hesitated. “Upstate New York originally. You?”

  “Jersey,” he said. He grinned. “Doesn’t the accent give it away?”

  “It does, sort of.” She cocked her head and studied him. “I’ve heard of your family. You were an underboss to Tony Garza, weren’t you? Shame about him. He was a decent guy.”

  “He still is,” Mikey said.

  “I’m truly sorry that Bernie has such a hard time with your lifestyle...” She stopped and gritted her teeth. “Didn’t mean to say that,” she added quickly.

  He scowled. “What did you mean?”

  “Well, it’s just,” she hesitated. “Bernie doesn’t understand the world you come from and she’s afraid of it.”

  He felt his heart sinking. “She told you that?” he asked suspiciously.

  “Of course not. She’d never talk to me about you,” she said. “I told you about it before, remember? I heard her talking to Olivia, the other paralegal in our office. She said she was crazy about you, but that she wasn’t sure she could cope with the way you made your living. She said she’d never fit in with a bunch of, well, criminals.”

  He could barely get words out. The pain went all the way through him. He’d wondered about the way Bernie accepted what he was, that she said it wouldn’t matter. But she was a girl who’d never cheated in anything. She had a tragic past that predisposed her to loving the police. After all, they’d saved her and her father from a potential killer after the tragedy her grandfather had caused.

  Apparently he hadn’t been thinking straight at all. Rather, he’d been thinking with his heart instead of his brain. Bernie wasn’t like him. They had different backgrounds, and she didn’t understand the forces that honed his family into a criminal element over the years. The scandals of the Kennedy era, the unmasking of the five families, the scattering of bosses had been a wholesale offensive against organized crime. And it had largely succeeded. There were still bosses like Tony, who commanded power, but there was no more real commission that met and decided on who got hit, who had which territory, which politicians to support. Now the bosses were largely autonomous until they crossed the line. Nobody liked drawing attention to the outfit that was left, and people who did it got punished. Mostly, the days of wiping out a man’s relatives to make a point were over. But there were still renegades who paid insults back with blood. Cotillo was one of those. That would never really end so long as there were power-mad people in the loop.

  “I’m sorry,” Jessie was saying. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

  “It isn’t anything I wasn’t already thinking,” he confessed.

  “You live in the fast lane. Fast cars, fast women, easy money,” she said. “Bernie likes band concerts in the park and watching television in her room.” Her mouth twisted. “Not a good mix.”

  “No.” He wished he could forget what she’d told him about Bernie, the other day and now. But he knew it was true. He’d seen the way Bernie had reacted when he described his life to her. She’d said she could cope, that it wouldn’t matter. It would matter.

  “Please don’t tell Bernie I said anything to you,” she said softly. “I’d hate to have her mad at me now that we’re getting along so well.”

  “I won’t mention it to her,” he said absently, and he was thinking that there was no way he could discuss it with Bernie without putting her on the defensive, making her ashamed of her feelings. He couldn’t blame her. His lifestyle would be hard for any woman unless she came from a similar background. He’d been living in a dream. It was a sweet dream. But it wasn’t real.

  “I’d better get Billie’s lunch to her. Nice seeing you.” She walked away with a smile. It wouldn’t do to lay it on with a trowel.

  Paul came out of the probate judge’s office with a worried look. He fell in beside Mikey and they walked outside. “Harvey,” he said, referring to his contact inside, “told me that Billie and Jessie at Sari’s office came down here at the same time. It’s a little too cozy for coincidence.”

  “You think they’re Cotillo’s?” Mikey asked.

  “They could be. We’re going to do a thorough background search on all of them. What about that car that barely missed Bernie? Did she tell you anything about it?”

  He shook his head and stuck his hands in his slacks pockets. “Only that it was a dark sedan. It happened too fast.” He glanced at Paul. “Do you know about Bernie’s grandfather and what he did?”

  Paul nodded. “Tragic thing to happen to a child. There was a serious attempt on her father’s life not long after it happened, by a member of a victim’s family. He’s doing time.”

  “She said it might have been somebody like that, trying to scare her.” Mikey frowned. “It’s not Cotillo’s style, you know? He has people hit if he has a problem with them, like he tried to hit Tony and me. He doesn’t make threats.”

  “Neither do you,” Paul mused.

  “Hey, I am what I am.” He strolled along beside Paul. “I’ve been having second thoughts about this engagement,” he confessed.

  “What?” Paul stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. “But you’re crazy about Bernie. She’s crazy about you!”

  Mikey took a breath and smiled cynically. “She likes small towns and band concerts, Paulie. She’s never been in trouble with the law in her life. How’s she going to like jetsetting, mixing with celebrities and crooks, wearing designer clothes, traveling around the world with me when I’ve got people to meet? How’s she going to feel if I ever get arrested for something?”

  Paul took a deep breath of his own. “I don’t know. I don’t live in that world. I never did.”

  “Well, I do. I have to.” He grimaced. “And there’s her health to consider. I remember our grandmother. She got twisted like a tree in a hurricane. She was in bed most of the time at the end. She got upset and she had flares, remember that? Bernie would be stressed-out all the time. It would affect her health.”

  “You’ve done a lot of thinking,” Paul said. He wasn’t saying anything, but his tone was full of curiosity and suspicion.

  “Yeah. She’s the sweetest woman I’ve ever known. I’d like her to stay that way. Involved with me for life? It would...kill something in her.”

  Paul didn’t speak. He knew that Mikey’s lifestyle involved stress. But he’d never seen Mikey involved with any woman to the extent he was involved with Bernie. He thought that love would resolve all those issues. Mikey clearly didn’t.

  “What are you going to do?” Paul asked.

  “Ease off. Just a little at a time, so it doesn’t look like I’m shooting her out of my life.” He smiled sadly. “I want her to be happy. I can’t give her the sort of life she deserves.”

  “You, being unselfish. Call the journalists,” Paul drawled.

  Mikey chuckled. “Out of character, isn’t it?” he agreed.

  Paul threw an arm around him. “Not anymore, it isn’t, cuz,” he said quietly. “B
ut I’m sorry for both of you.”

  “Me, too,” Mikey said. His eyes were solemn. “Me, too.”

  * * *

  Mikey and Bernie were subdued at supper at Mrs. Brown’s. Neither spoke much although they went through the motions of participating in the conversation.

  But afterward, when Bernie started toward her room, Mikey stopped her.

  “Listen,” he began quietly, “I’ve been thinking—”

  “Me, too,” she interrupted.

  She looked as uncomfortable as he did.

  He shoved his hands into his pockets and felt his heart breaking inside him. He wanted to say something, but what could he say? His life wasn’t butterflies and roses. And, realistically, she wasn’t the sort of woman who could adjust to partying and casinos and jet travel and organized crime. It was impossible, but he hadn’t realized it until Jessie told him what Bernie had said.

  He looked down at her tenderly. She was so unworldly. It would be like her not to want to hurt his feelings or make him feel bad about what his world was like.

  She was thinking the same thing about him, that he didn’t want to hurt her feelings by admitting that he couldn’t live with a woman who might be an invalid one day, a woman who could barely keep up with him on a slow walk in the woods. He needed somebody vibrant and healthy, who could thrive in his company, not a woman who would limit his activities.

  “It might be an idea to cool it, just for a little while,” Mikey said finally. “I’ve got people working on that car that almost hit you. We’ll find out who it was.”

  “Probably somebody drunk who misjudged the curb,” she replied with a faint smile. “It’s a small town. Odd things happen here.”

  His dark eyes seemed even darker as they searched her light ones. “I’ve never enjoyed anything more than this time with you.”

  “Me, either,” she confessed, and tried not to show that she was dying inside.