Reno and Son: Don't Mess with Jim (The Mob Boss Series) by Mallory Monroe Page B

Jimmy and Val both looked at him,
stunned that he would go there.
    Jimmy was especially distressed.   “Pop, what are you saying?”
    “I’m saying I have connections.   So what?”
    “So what?” Buddy asked.   “Are you serious?   How can you think that’s okay?”
    “Because it’s my business, that’s how it’s
okay.   It has nothing to do with you or
your daughter, or Jimmy either.”
    “But you’re his father.”
    “That’s right.   I’m definitely his father.”
    “And you admittedly have mob connections.”
    “That’s right.”
    “Well, Mr. Gabrini, I’m sorry, but I
absolutely do not want my daughter to marry somebody with that kind of
background.”
    “Good. I wouldn’t want her to marry somebody
like that either.   But since I’m not
marrying her, what difference does it make?”
    “What my Dad is trying to say,” Jimmy felt
a need to explain, “is that I’m not involved with whatever he may have going
on.   Which isn’t anything, really, because
he’s not a mob boss or anything like that.”
    “But his father, your grandfather, was a
mob boss,” Buddy said.
    Enough of this, Reno decided.   He uncrossed his legs and leaned
forward.   “Look, Mr. Wellstone, either
your daughter wants to be with my son, or she doesn’t.   But if you think for a second that I’m going
to sit here and pretend she’s hooked up with the Brady Bunch, you can forget
that.   The Gabrinis are not the Bradys.   Never was and never will be.   But if she wants an honest young man with a great
future ahead of him, then Jimmy’s her man.   If she wants an everyday Joe with everyday parents, then he’s not the
one for her.   It’s as simple as that.”
    Buddy stared at Reno.   What amazed him was how blunt the man
was.   There wasn’t a slick bone in this
man’s body.   He was even upfront about
his connections.   Buddy could appreciate
a man who didn’t bow just to con somebody.   He didn’t appreciate the connections, and he was still wary of his
daughter getting mixed up in a family like this one, but at least he heard it
straight.
    He stood up, prompting Reno, Jimmy and Val
to stand too.   “I know you’re a busy
man,” he said, extending his hand.   “I’ll
get out of your way.”
    Reno shook his hand.   “They’ll be fine, Mr. Wellstone.   Young people always are.”
    Buddy nodded and said his goodbyes, but
Reno could still see that doubt.   He
could also see the dread all over Jimmy’s face.
    And sure enough, within minutes of their
departure, Jimmy returned to Reno’s office overwhelmed with dread.   Reno was seated behind his desk, talking
quietly with one of his female staffers, when Jimmy walked in.
    Reno looked beyond the young lady, who was
around the desk standing next to him.   “I
thought I’d see you again,” he said as Jimmy walked up to the desk.   Reno then looked at the young lady.   “Give me a few minutes,” he said.
    “Yes, sir,” she said, she spoke to Jimmy,
and then she left.   There were still
about ten people in the office, working the phones regarding some big project,
but at least he had his father’s attention.
    “I don’t get it,” he said.
    “You don’t get what?”
    “How could you say that to Mr.
Wellstone?   You know how people feel
about the Mafia and all of that mob stuff.”
    Reno smiled.   “Mob stuff?   Get a load of you!”
    “But Dad!”
    “Don’t but,
Dad me!   I’m not lying to that man!   Her daughter needs to understand what
marrying you will mean, Jimmy, if that’s where it’s headed.   You’ve done a lousy-ass job telling her
apparently, given all of her sensibilities, but you need to lay it on the line
just like I did.   They can take it or
leave it, but at least it won’t come as any shock to anybody after the
fact.   We are who we are.   And we ain’t the Huxtables.   I told them so.   I told them the truth.   So what is it that I did wrong?   Tell me that?”
    Jimmy felt as if he