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Mick and Reno sat in the Escalade and watched as Sal walked out of his home with Gemma at his side.

Both were casually dressed in jeans and sweat shirts, but whereas Gemma wore a waist-high leather jacket, which was appropriate for the weather, Sal wore an overcoat down to his ankles.

That, even more than seeing Gemma tagging along, got Reno going.

“Just look at him,” he said. “He looks like a stone-cold mob boss even when he’s not trying to look like one this time of night.”

Mick stared at Sal. He agreed with Reno.

“A coat that long in this kind of weather,” Reno said. “It’s not even that cold.”

But then he looked over at Mick and realized his uncle was suited up in his black trousers and black turtleneck and an ankle-length coat himself.

“I look like a stone-cold mob boss too?” he asked him.

“Not at all. You look like a meek and mild business tycoon.”

Mick smiled and then laughed. “Stick to casinos, Reno. You don’t know shit about nothing else.”

“What are you talking? I was a big-time mob boss before your ass knew what big-time was. Before Sal knew it too. You was just a piss-ass thug and Sal was just a crooked cop giving Tommy nightmares trying to get him out of the pile of shit he kept getting himself into. I got cred,” he said as Sal and Gemma got in and sat on the middle row.

Reno turned around. “Where’s Tommy?”

“He’s staying with the family.”

“Big Daddy’s still in town. He’s staying with the family. Not to mention this Fort Knox caliber security you have around this place.” The grounds were swarming with Sal’s capos, with big rifles, on shift duty. “What you need Tommy for?”

“Why is any of that your business, Reno?” Sal asked him. “Your ass can be so nosey sometimes!”

“ Sometimes ?” Mick and Gemma said at the same time. And then they all laughed. Even Mick smiled as he drove off.

But Reno wasn’t done. “And what you look like bringing your wife with you?” he asked Sal.

“We’re going to Curtis house. Curtis is her office manager. She wants to make sure her office manager is okay. If that’s okay with you.”

“That’s bullshit,” Reno said.

“Then stop asking stupid questions,” said Sal, “and you wouldn’t get stupid answers.”

Reno, realizing there was no changing Sal’s mind when it was made up, turned back around and minded his own business.

But not his own mouth. “Your ass trying to clear your name,” said Reno. “That’s what that’s about. As if this chick is gonna do that for you.”

“Let’s just get this over with,” said Mick as he drove even faster than he usually did. “I got a life to get back to.”

Sal and Gemma both wanted to know what was stopping him from getting back to his life, but when he said those words everything was placed back in perspective.

Big Dan claimed Robby set up that ambush.

Now Bianca was supposedly at Robby’s house when Robby declared he hadn’t seen her since he picked her up from prison.

They realized the enormity of this trip to Robby’s house and stopped the conversations. Everybody lapsed into silence.

But when Mick drove up and stopped in front of Robby’s house, and they saw the car that was parked on his driveway, a car Reno’s men said was the car Sal had purchased for Bianca, Gemma, Reno, and even Mick were shocked.

Sal didn’t just buy that dame a car, they all thought, he bought her ass a Maserati?

“You bought her ass a Maserati?” Reno verbalized for all of them.

But Sal didn’t respond. Because he still didn’t want it to be true. He didn’t want Bianca involved, and he damn sure didn’t want his underboss involved. He got out of the SUV and helped Gemma out.

Gemma wanted to say more about that car, and so did Reno, but they both held their tongues. Sal looked depressed enough.

But as they all got out of the SUV and after Reno acknowledged his men that were parked on the street two houses down from Robby’s, they all made their way toward the front entrance.

But as soon as they stepped halfway up the driveway, a sudden shift occurred as if they were experiencing an earthquake, and then BOOM !

It was an event so seismic in power that it threw all of them backwards, split through Robby’s house like a chainsaw, and the house exploded into a mushroom cloud of smoke and fire.

Sal crawled quickly to Gemma, and Reno and Mick got up and hurried over to Gemma too. But she was okay. She was getting back on her feet too.

And they all stood there amazed, watching the remains of Curtis and Robby’s “pretty” house engulfed in flames.

But then it occurred to Sal. “Robby’s in that house!”

“And Curtis!” Gemma said.

But when Sal began running toward the side of the house, Gemma cried out for him to stop, and she tried to grab him.

“I’ll get him, Gem,” Reno assured her as he ran behind Sal as Reno’s men hopped out of their cars and ran toward the house too.

“Put her in my SUV,” Mick yelled as he ran after Sal and Reno, and some of Reno’s men followed them while the other men assisted terrified Gemma back into Mick’s SUV.

But Sal was too fast for all of them. He was kicking in the backdoor, where the fire had not yet made its way, and saw Robby and Curtis on the kitchen floor. Curtis was trying to drag Robby to the door, but they both were overcome with smoke inhalation.

Sal grabbed them both and began dragging them toward the back exit when Reno and Mick ran in. They grabbed Curtis and Robby, too, and they all got them out of that house.

By the time they hurried with them around the front, knowing that the fire was on its way toward the back, there was another explosion when the stove was ignited in that kitchen area, that rocked the very foundation again.

By the time the ambulances arrived, Robby was unconscious and Curtis was nearly unconscious too. Neither man could tell them, at that point, who did it. Or where was Bianca.

They all assumed she had perished in the fire.

But wasn’t she the one involved in the ambush that left Lucky for dead?

They had no answers, and the questions were beginning to pile up. They hopped into Mick’s SUV and hurried behind the two ambulances.