Chapter 7

‘We’ decided on taking two cars (Like Gina told me and I agreed). She did not make all the choices for us, just ask her. (She tried though, just force of habit). I was perfectly comfortable with that and so was she until, Sandy, the new girl said ‘she’ would ‘take care of me’ when they left. I thought Gina’s reaction was a might overboard, her suggested course of action of Sandy being ‘drawn and quartered’ was even worse than the ‘Sicilian necktie’ option which was pretty hard to do on a girl.

It settled itself down when Paulie went with me instead and Sandy went with the girls. ‘Shopping must be quite treacherous’ I guessed. From the bags they brought home I realized why so many went. When Gina returned to ‘our’ hotel her explanation was a single word, “Vegas” was all she said.

Billy was as good as his word. There was a slight, no a significant difference; when it came time to leave for Vegas; the Cleveland ‘hit men, two women also’ were onboard, ostensibly for moral support to make certain that I showed up. Gina seemed to like that little touch.

For those of you that complain about the seating of most commercial airline flights, a private jet is not much better on a long trip, (When you compare first cabin to it). The trip to Vegas was a lengthy ride, let me tell you. On almost the entire trip Gina was giving instructions to ‘do this or don’t do that’ to the Cleveland troops.

In between giving orders and the head nods they gave it was like they were reporting to her. Well, she was the new ‘Capo’ so it was understandable. Finally she sat down next to me, gave me a big kiss and said, “Guess what?”

Now there could be many answers to that open-ended question. A response like ‘You are pregnant’ might not go over too well so I choose discretion and answered “What dear!”

It must have been an acceptable answer fore she said, “my poor, poor future husband. I am so sorry, I never meant to exclude you but I now realize I have. Let me tell you what I learned and why I was so excited.”

“Yes, tell me this.”

“Our spies have names of those responsible for the attack on Vito. One, the so-called ‘Mastermind’ is one of us.”

This news had me somewhat shaken.

“Who?” I asked.

“Jamie, my Bastard almost half-brother, the ‘Poof’ Papa sent to Vegas to be with more of his kind. Cleveland and Detroit will help clean up this mess. It will cost some but I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

“How much is ‘much’ my bride to be?”

Over five years almost a $ Billion. But we get to keep the plane. All in all, a cheap price to pay, we lose no territory or casinos but Vegas will now have Detroit and Cleveland plus us as it’s head, no longer LA.”