Mob Boss Eleven- The Wrong One (The Mob Boss Series Book 11) by Mallory Monroe

said.
    Reno
hesitated, then walked in slowly.   Maybe
she had a coat behind the door, he assumed.  
    But
when Val closed the door behind him, and continued to just stand there as if
she was dressed in Chanel head to toe, he held his hands, palm up,
confused.   “What are you doing?” he asked
her.
    “I
thought you were Jimmy,” she said with a smile.
    That
smile was gorgeous, Reno thought, but he wasn’t fooled by it.   “What do you think you’re doing?” he asked
again.
    “I
told you.   I thought you were Jimmy.”
    “But
as you can see I’m not Jimmy.”
    “Right,”
Val said with that smile.
    “So why
haven’t you marched your naked ass upstairs and put some clothes on?”
    Val
just stood there.   She didn’t expect that
response.   She had no plan B.   Given his reputation with the ladies, she
never expected rejection.
    “Go,”
Reno ordered her.   When she still
wouldn’t move, he grabbed her by the arm and slung her away, to give her the
momentum to move forward.   But she still
just stood there.  
    Reno
frowned.   “What the fuck is wrong with
you, Valerie?”
    Tears
came into Val’s eyes.   Sincere tears,
Reno could tell, not like that phony-ass smile she slapped on when he walked
into her house.   And he suddenly wasn’t
angry.   He felt her pain.   He felt it deep within his heart.  
    “What’s
the matter?” he asked her again.  
    But
Val shook her head.   “I don’t know,” she said,
unable to stop the flow of tears, unable to understand her own actions.   “I can’t snap out of it.   I’ve tried and I’ve tried.   They don’t think I’ve been trying, but I
have, Mr. Gabrini.   I swear to you I
have!   But I can’t get over it.   Jimmy says I’m going backwards, and I
am!   He’s right.   I’m sliding so far back that I’m reduced to
seducing my own father-in-law!   What’s
wrong with me?   I don’t know what’s wrong
with me!”
    Reno
immediately pulled her into his arms.   His heart went out to the sweet young woman.   But then he just as immediately pulled back
when he felt her.   He removed his suit
coat, placed it around her towel-clad body, and then he held her again.   She sobbed in his arms.  
    After
allowing her as much time as she needed, he walked her over to the sofa in the
living room and sat her down.   He sat
beside her, on the edge of the sofa, and continued to hold her hand.
    “I’m
sorry,” Val was saying.   She looked at
him. “I would never do. . .”   Then she
frowned.   “But I did it.   I’m sorry.”
    “Don’t
be,” Reno said, squeezing her hand. “You aren’t yourself right now,
sweetheart.”
    “But
it’s been three months,” Val said.   Then
she looked at him.   “You’ve lost a child
before.”
    Reno
nodded.   “I’ve lost two children,” he
said softly.
    “Oh.   Of course!   I didn’t mean---”
    “One
was killed, and my wife, as you know, also had a miscarriage.”
    “Trina
said it takes time to get through it.   She said it takes time to move on.   But it didn’t take her this much time.   Did it?”
    Reno
exhaled. “When my child was killed, it took, and is still taking forever.   It nearly cost us everything, including our
marriage.   We separated, was heading
straight for divorce.   But thank God,
Trina wouldn’t let me go.   Because I was
a mess.   And she knew it.”
    “A
mess like me?” Val asked, seeking that reassurance that there really was a
light at the end of her tunnel.
    “I
was worst,” Reno said, giving her that light.   “I was inconsolable.   Nobody was
going to tell me shit about how I felt and how I should snap out of it.”
    Val
stared at him.
    “The
second death, the miscarriage, brought us closer.”
    “But
how?” Val wanted to know.   “How could
such an awful thing make any couple closer?”
    “Because
I called Trina on her bullshit,” Reno said, and Val flinched.
    “You
what?” she asked.
    “I
called my wife on her bullshit.