Page 45 of Trina Gabrini: Bring Him Back Home to Me

“It ain’t me,” Moose said.

Reno and Trina stared at him as if he’d just told them the sky was purple. Tommy and Sal stared at him too. “What ain’t you?” Reno asked him.

“All the shit that’s been happening. It wasn’t me.”

Tommy and Sal glanced at each other. But Reno frowned. “What you mean it wasn’t you?”

“What are you talking what do I mean? I mean it wasn’t me. Word been getting around that you putting all this shit at my feet. But that ain’t true, Reno. Why would it be true? What I’m coming for you for? I haven’t had a beef with you in decades. Why all of a sudden I’m coming for you? Especially after you kicked my ass the last time. You know how long it took me to build back up after that war? What I look like starting another war?”

He was making sense to Tommy and Sal. But Reno had the Lydia factor that Moose wasn’t mentioning. “If it ain’t you,” he asked him, “then who the fuck is it?”

It was Moose’s time to frown. He was a hand-talker like Reno. “How should I know?” The palms of his small, stubby hands were outstretched. “I’m over here dying because I’m hearing the Gabrinis gunning for me. I’m hearing they blaming me for shit I had nothing to do with. Trying to burn down the PaLargio? Are you fucking kidding me? What I look like trying to pull off that kind of shit? Like I don’t know you got Sal Luca and Tommy’s muscle behind you. You got Mick the Tick’s muscle behind you. You got Monk Paletti’s muscle behind you. And my old ass gonna pick a fight with all that? What the fuck, Reno! What you take me for?”

It was the first time that Reno was beginning to have his doubts. But he still hadn’t mentioned her. “What about Lydia?” he asked him.

But saying her name didn’t seem to register so much as a blink from Moose. “What about her?”

“She said you knew.”

Moose stared at Reno. “I knew what?”

Tommy and Sal glanced at each other again. Trina glanced at them too. Then they all looked at Reno.

But Reno was beginning to go numb. Had he been had? Did Lydia lie to him? “She said you knew about what went down with your sons and their families that night.”

Now Moose was perplexed. “What you mean what went down? Billy Stallini took out my family, and I took out his. What are you talking, Reno?”

Reno was flabbergasted. “You don’t know?”

“Don’t know what?!” Now Moose was the one who was anxious.

“Lydia said you knew. She said you knew I was the one behind that hit.”

By the sheer look on Moose’s face, everybody in that limo knew what Reno had just said was news to him. “You?” He looked as if he still couldn’t believe it. “You’re telling me you was behind . . . That you took out my family like that? My grandbabies? You, Reno?”

They all could tell that Reno was fighting back every ounce of emotion he had within him. And when it came to the shame of what he’d done, he had plenty. “Yes,” he admitted.

Moose looked as if he still couldn’t believe it. “But you wouldn’t . . . You never went around hurting families like that. Me and my men hit you, you hit us back. You never went for anybody’s wives and kids. That ain’t you, Reno.”

Now Reno was frowning. “What the fuck you mean it’s not me? You don’t know me like that, and you didn’t know me then like that. You came for my life back then when you came for the PaLargio with that fake-ass will. And I heard about that scheme you was cooking up to take it by force next time. To go through me and mine and take it. You think I was gonna let that stand?”

“But I was at war with Billy Stallini at the time. I just knew he was behind it. I never once even considered you!”

“Were you planning to take over the PaLargio by force?” Tommy asked him.

Moose hesitated, but he manned up. “Yes,” he said. “But it was only in the planning phase when that hit went down.”

“That was the point,” said Trina. “Reno had to make sure it stayed in the planning phase.”

Tommy and Sal were both shocked that Trina would try to justify what Reno had done. But that was exactly what she was doing. But there was always one thing about that twosome: If they were going to be dysfunctional, they were going to be dysfunctional together.

“Lydia told me you knew,” Reno said. “She told me one of the made men from my father’s organization got out of prison recently and was selling that secret for a hefty price. She said you paid him.”

“But how could she tell you that I knew anything when she’s the one who told me that you was blaming me for that PaLargio explosion and for a lot of other accidents that tried to take out your children?”

Everybody was shocked. Especially Reno. “What you mean she told you about the PaLargio explosion? How could she tell you that when she’s dead?”

The look on Moose’s face said it all. “Dead?” Then he frowned. “What are you talking? When did this happen? I’ve been in L.A. for the past few weeks handling mob business and she’s been staying with me at my villa. I just saw her a couple hours ago when she told me what happened at the PaLargio and how you was blaming me for that explosion and some other shit. And then I came straight to you.”