Sal Gabrini 4: I'll Take You There (The Gabrini Men Series Book 7) Read online

  SAL GABRINI 4

  I’LL TAKE YOU THERE

  By

  MALLORY MONROE

  Copyright©2014 Mallory Monroe

  All rights reserved. Any use of the materials contained in this book without the expressed written consent of the author and/or her affiliates, including scanning, uploading and downloading at file sharing and other sites, and distribution of this book by way of the Internet or any other means, is illegal and strictly prohibited.

  AUSTIN BROOK PUBLISHING

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  WITHOUT THE WRITTEN CONSENT OF THE AUTHOR AND HER AFFILIATES.

  This novel is a work of fiction. All characters are fictitious. Any similarities to anyone living or dead are completely accidental. The specific mention of known places or venues are not meant to be exact replicas of those places, but are purposely embellished or imagined for the story’s sake.

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  MORE INTERRACIAL ROMANCE

  FROM BESTSELLING AUTHOR

  MALLORY MONROE:

  THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND

  SERIES IN ORDER:

  THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND

  THE PRESIDENT’S GIRLFRIEND 2:

  HIS WOMEN AND HIS WIFE

  DUTCH AND GINA:

  A SCANDAL IS BORN

  DUTCH AND GINA:

  AFTER THE FALL

  DUTCH AND GINA:

  THE POWER OF LOVE

  DUTCH AND GINA:

  THE SINS OF THE FATHERS

  DUTCH AND GINA:

  WHAT HE DID FOR LOVE

  FOR THE LOVE OF GINA

  BOOK EIGHT

  THE MOB BOSS SERIES

  IN ORDER:

  ROMANCING THE MOB BOSS

  MOB BOSS 2:

  THE HEART OF THE MATTER

  MOB BOSS 3:

  LOVE AND RETRIBUTION

  MOB BOSS 4:

  ROMANCING TRINA GABRINI

  A MOB BOSS CHRISTMAS:

  THE PREGNANCY

  (Mob Boss 5)

  MOB BOSS 6:

  THE HEART OF RENO GABRINI

  RENO’S GIFT

  BOOK 7

  RENO GABRINI:

  A MAN IN FULL

  BOOK 8

  RENO AND TRINA:

  GETTING BACK TO LOVE

  BOOK 9

  RENO AND SON:

  DON’T MESS WITH JIM

  BOOK 10

  THE GABRINI MEN SERIES

  IN ORDER:

  ROMANCING TOMMY GABRINI

  ROMANCING SAL GABRINI

  TOMMY GABRINI 2:

  A PLACE IN HIS HEART

  SAL GABRINI 2:

  A WOMAN’S TOUCH

  TOMMY GABRINI 3:

  GRACE UNDER FIRE

  SAL GABRINI 3:

  HARD LOVE

  ADDITIONAL BESTSELLING

  INTERRACIAL ROMANCE

  FROM MALLORY MONROE:

  DANIEL’S GIRL:

  ROMANCING AN OLDER MAN

  ROMANCING MO RYAN

  ROMANCING HER PROTECTOR

  ROMANCING THE BULLDOG

  IF YOU WANTED THE MOON

  INTERRACIAL ROMANCE

  FROM

  BESTSELLING AUTHOR

  KATHERINE CACHITORIE:

  LOVERS AND TAKERS

  LOVING HER SOUL MATE

  LOVING THE HEAD MAN

  SOME CAME DESPERATE:

  A LOVE SAGA

  ADDITIONAL BESTSELLING

  INTERRACIAL ROMANCE:

  A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP

  YVONNE THOMAS

  AND

  BACK TO HONOR:

  A REGGIE REYNOLDS

  ROMANTIC MYSTERY

  JT WATSON

  ROMANTIC FICTION

  FROM

  AWARD-WINNING

  AND

  BESTSELLING AUTHOR

  TERESA MCCLAIN-WATSON:

  DINO AND NIKKI:

  AFTER REDEMPTION

  AND

  AFTER WHAT YOU DID

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  CHAPTER ONE

  Sal Gabrini walked from one end of the elongated room to the other end. Hands in his pockets. Double-breasted suit showing no signs of wear despite the dust and grime around him. Black, shiny shoes creating a rhythm to his walk, as if it were a march. But a death march.

  They were on the tenth floor of a vacant office building, and all eyes were on Sal. Especially Philly, who knew he’d fucked up. He followed Sal’s every movement. He learned the rhythm of his walk: twelve steps, and then a turn. Twelve more steps, and then another turn. Rattling change inside his pockets. Blue eyes ablaze with the look of a man trying to contain his rage. With the look of a man trying to decide, and not interested in getting it wrong, if Philly was going to live or die.

  Sal was an odd one. Philly heard about Sal. Everybody else were one-trick ponies: you knew what you were going to get with them. But you could never tell with Sal. Everything depended on something else with him. Whether he showed mercy, or was merciless, always depended on shit Philly couldn’t begin to figure out. But as Sal walked and turned, and turned and walked, and continued to rattle that change, Philly wasn’t waiting. He begged.

  “You know me, Sal,” he said for what Sal’s men figured were the hundredth time. “I couldn’t snatch a kid! Why would I want to take a kid?”

  “For revenge, motherfucker!” Neeco blared. “You know why.”

  Neeco was the man who tracked down Philly and brought him to Sal in the first place, and Neeco was no joke either. Philly knew it. Of all the men on Sal’s payroll, including the five-man crew in the room now, Neeco was the toughest.

  But nobody in that room, or anywhere else as far as Philly was concerned, was tougher than Sal. That was why Philly responded to Neeco, but was still looking at Sal. “What would I want revenge for? What is Neeco talking about? You know me, Sal Luca. Me and you, we used to run around Jersey together. We were little kids together! I didn’t do it. I knew he was under your protection. I would have never snatched somebody under your protection!”

  “The Ripper knew he was under Sal’s protection,” Neeco said. “Rip didn’t give a damn.”

  “Rip’s a fool,” Philly responded. “Don’t put me in there with Rip.”

  This angered Neeco. “Don’t put you in there? You work for the motherfucker!”

  “What are you talking? I don’t work for that prick! I keep telling you I don’t!”

  “You were there,” Sal said. Compared to Neeco, Sal’s voice was calm.

  But Philly saw his calmness, not as a reassuring sign, but a chilling one. “Yeah, I was there,” he admitted. “But I didn’t have nothing to do with it! I didn’t know that shit was going down, Sal, you’ve got to believe me! I was there to collect. Rip owed me big time and I was there to get what I was owed. That’s all. That’s it! Then Neeco and his men busted in like some gotdamn SWAT, and everybody scattered.”

  Sal stopped walking and looked at him. “Where did they hide him?”

  “I don’t know, Sal. I swear to you I don’t know. I didn’t even know they snatched the kid!”

  “Why wasn’t he there at the scene?”

  “I had nothing to do with
it, Sal, why you keep asking me these questions? You’ve got the wrong guy! Rip and his men got away, but they’re the ones you want!”

  “He’s full of shit, Sal,” Neeco said. “He’s one of Rip’s men and he knows it. He was right there with him. He wasn’t collecting a dime. He was plotting and scheming right along with the rest of those cocksuckers! He knows where that kid is. He’s full of it and he knows it!”

  But Sal wasn’t ready to get on Neeco’s ship of rage. He kept walking and turning. Turning and walking. This shit wasn’t checkers to Sal. It was chess. He had to look at the big picture. He owed his friend to find the kid, not to go halfcocked on some half-baked theory of Neeco’s. The kidnapped boy’s father had been one of Sal’s crew members too, and he died under Sal’s watch. He owed him. That was why his old lady came to Sal begging for help. Rip snatched the kid, she told him, and the cops weren’t doing a damn thing about it. Sal was angry that she went to the cops before coming to him, since their involvement would limit his. But for the sake of his deceased crew member, he was doing what he could do.

  But he had to do it right. A kid was involved and cops were on the case. He didn’t know if Philly was a part of it or not. He probably was. Neeco was probably right. But Sal didn’t deal in probabilities anymore. A man’s life was at stake. He had to have more.

  But before he could decide either way, and before he could take yet another twelfth step, Philly reached for the gun in Neeco’s hand, and they began to fight for it. A shot was fired, barely missing one of Sal’s men. Another shot fired: barely missing Sal.

  Even though other men were closer, it was Sal who moved with maniac’s speed and got to Philly first. “Motherfucker!” Sal yelled as he kicked the gun out of Philly’s hand, knocking it safely across the room, and then grabbed Philly by the catch of his shirt and dragged him to the open window.

  “Sal, please,” Philly was begging. “I didn’t mean for it to go off! I was trying to get you to understand. That’s all I was trying to do! Sal! Sal! Sal!”

  But his pleas went on death ears. Those bullets almost hit one of Sal’s men, and could have easily hit Sal. That was not allowed. Philly knew that was not allowed.

  Sal hoisted him up as if he were light as a feather, and hung him upside down out of the tenth floor window, with Sal holding him only by the catch of his big shoes.

  “Kill that motherfucker!” Neeco yelled. He ran to the window and stood beside Sal. He was out for blood after getting bested by the likes of Phil Meretti, and Sal knew it.

  Philly was still wiggling and screaming, and reaching up, and pleading with Sal to pull him back in. He was crying. He was begging for his life.

  There was a time when Sal would have dropped his ass and went home to dinner. He would have deserved it. He couldn’t fire on Sal Gabrini and expect no retribution! But things were changing in Sal’s life. He was soon to be a husband to the woman he loved, and would one day be a father. And even this thug here, Sal thought as he stared down at the terror in the begging man’s eyes, was somebody’s son. And somebody’s husband. And somebody’s father for crying out loud! They would be told that he was dead. They would have to spend the rest of their lives without his protection, his love, his whatever they needed from him, all because of Sal’s decision. And that was worth thinking about to Sal. Because he kept thinking about his own woman. What if that was Gemma getting the news? What if that was his children living fatherless for the rest of their lives?

  And Sal, just thinking about Gemma, and the children he didn’t even have yet, froze.

  For the first time in his entire life, he froze.

  But Neeco was there. The baddest motherfucker Sal had working for him. And he didn’t hesitate. Because as soon as Sal began to lean over and reach for Philly’s shaking hand, deciding that a punishment short of death was more warranted, Neeco released Sal’s left hand from Philly’s shoe, before Sal could make contact with Philly’s hand, and Philly went sailing down.

  Sal, stunned shitless, leaned over the window sill just as Philly, his terrified eyes still staring at Sal, and his trembling mouth still begging for Sal’s mercy, and his flailing arms still trying to latch onto the air, fell to the ground like some expendable crash-test dummy, and splattered.

  Sal looked at his second-in-command. He couldn’t believe any man, especially one of his own men, would defy him like that.

  He grabbed Neeco by the catch of his collar, drug him across the room, and rammed him against the wall so hard it shook the room. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” he yelled. His face was a mask of anger and disappointment. “Why did you do that to him, Neeco? What’s wrong with you?”

  Neeco’s face was a mask too. Of confusion! “What are you talking, Sal Luca? What are you talking about?”

  “I didn’t tell you to take that action.” He rammed Neeco against the wall. “That’s what I’m talking about! Why did you do that?”

  “Because that’s what we do!” Neeco yelled. “That’s what we do, Sal,” he said in a softer tone.

  And those words alone stopped Sal in his tracks.

  “That’s what we do,” Neeco said again. “He shot at you. He can’t shoot at Sal Gabrini and live! If word got around that he shot at Sal Luca and Sal Luca let him live, it’ll be open season on you, on your men, on anybody associated with you. On Tommy. On Gemma. On anybody near and dear to you. And you’re asking what the fuck is wrong with me? What the fuck is wrong with you, man?”

  Sal stared at his lieutenant. That was why Sal hired him. That was why he hired every man that ever worked for him. They were all as badass as he was. They didn’t take shit, but gave it. And as he looked around that room, at all of his men who were now staring at him, he knew Neeco was right. What the fuck was wrong with him? He would soon have a wife to protect, and children. Now was not the time for his ass to go soft, was he kidding? Now was the time for him to go hard!

  He nodded. And released Neeco. “Get downstairs,” he ordered. “Clean up the mess. We still don’t know where the kid is,” he added, “but Rip will get the word.”

  Neeco smiled. And nodded too. “That’s right. He’ll know not to fuck with Sal Luca Gabrini. He’ll know what will happen to his ass when he fucks with you.”

  Sal looked into Neeco’s eyes. Was he mocking him? But he wasn’t. He meant it. These men looked up to Sal Luca. And Sal knew it.

  But after they left to not only clean up the mess, but to remove all evidence that any mess had ever occurred, Sal still felt uneasy. When Gemma became a Gabrini, this was going to become her baggage too. Everything he did would affect her. Every right decision, and every wrong decision. Gemma would own it too. And that shit, the thought of the woman he loved enthralled in his long and deep-ass drama, scared him far more than any mobster ever could.

  But it was early still. He had asked her to marry him only a week ago. They hadn’t notified her folks yet. There was still time, he thought sadly as he left the room, for her to change her mind. There was still time, he continued to think as he headed down the stairs, for her to break his heart, and save her own.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Gemma Jones stood at the window inside her law office and stared at the rock on her finger. It must have been the thousandth time she’d put it on and stared at it. She was still amazed. A week ago Sal asked her to marry him, and she said yes. She was soon to be Mrs. Salvatore Luciano Gabrini. Mrs. Gemma Jones-Gabrini. It had a nice ring to it, she thought with a smile, as she stared, once again, at that ring.

  Then she stopped all of the smiling and started thinking about Sal. He was a man who came with some serious baggage. There was no way around that reality. But even with his issues, there was no turning back for her. No cold feet; no hesitation whatsoever. She couldn’t wait to be Sal’s wife! Just thinking about that man not only made her feel happy, it made her feel sensual. And desirable. Like the most beautiful girl in the world. Thinking about Sal made a no-nonsense woman like Gemma Jones feel giddy and romantic. Sometimes, late
at night, when he wasn’t with her, she’d still smell his wonderful scent. Or sense his presence. Or she’d still feel his dick wedged inside of her. Just sitting there, the way he did it sometimes. And then she’d see his blue eyes smiling at her, and feel his big arms around her, and she’d miss that man in ways she’d never thought possible.

  She was no emotional female. She wasn’t the type to ride or die, or let some man dictate her life purpose. But when it came to Sal, she was becoming a different woman. She was becoming that girl. He made her feel like a kid again. He made her feel that it wasn’t a sign of weakness when you choose to put your total trust in somebody else, but a sign of unconditional love. And she loved and trusted Sal. She trusted him with her life.

  It was Sal who was taking it slow. It was Sal who forbad her to tell anybody about their engagement until they had a chance to sit down and tell her parents first. It was Sal who left nearly a week ago on a business trip, and hadn’t bothered to give her a call.

  Not that he ever called her on any daily basis before. He didn’t. Many times she wouldn’t hear from him for days on end. It was just his way. It was as if he didn’t want her to suddenly become needy and clingy like most of his girlfriends of the past. He loved her strength and independence and even told her, after he proposed to her, that she’d better not change.