His voice rose in alarm. “What are you doing, Jack? You have a mild concussion and a gunshot wound. You need to go back to the hospital!”
“I can’t do that,” I said. “I need to help find Reno. It’s been five hours since they took him, and every minute counts.”
“The police are already looking for him. I filed a report when Mom and I were at the hospital with you. Did you speak to them?”
“No, but I don’t have any information to give them anyway. You came to the hospital?”
“Yeah, don’t you remember? We rode in the ambulance with you,” Romy said. “I guess you were pretty out of it, though. After you came to, you kept trying to get up and go look for Reno, so they ended up giving you a sedative.”
“I don’t remember any of that.”
“We stayed with you for a couple of hours, but Mom was freaking out about Reno, so I ended up taking her home so she could lie down. I planned to come back after I got her settled, but she’s still pretty agitated.”
“It’s okay, I…made some new friends, so I’m not alone. They’re helping me find Adriano.”
Romy sounded confused. “Just, like, some random strangers?”
I hesitated before admitting, “They, um, they’re actually Reno’s relatives on his dad’s side. I called them and asked for help. I’m not sure how Mandy will feel about this, but I figured they’d have a lot of ideas and resources.”
“I think she’ll just be glad they’re helping find him.” After a moment, he said, “Reno looked into them a while back. Aren’t they involved in organized crime?”
“Maybe. But isn’t that exactly what we need to find a man like Greco, and to get your brother back? Reno always felt outmanned and outgunned, but now we’re evening the odds.”
“That actually makes sense.”
“I need your help, too,” I said. “The Dombrusos have people out there gathering information. But this is your hometown, and with your job as an EMT, I bet you know this city better than anyone. Where would a thug take a hostage if they didn’t want to be discovered?”
“I can think of several options, including a few abandoned buildings at the edge of town. But if someone really wanted to remain undetected, there are some houses scattered out in the desert that are literally in the middle of nowhere.”
“That would make sense.”
He paused before saying, “I’m trying so hard to think positive here. If all Greco wanted to do was kill my brother, he could have just shot him at the bar. But instead, he took him hostage. That probably means he plans to keep Reno alive, right? At least for a while…”
“That was Adriano’s assumption. He said Greco would most likely want to drag it out and torture him. But I don’t think we have days to rescue him. We probably have hours.”
Romy swore under his breath. Then he asked, “How can I help?”
“You can come meet us and go over some maps to help narrow the search—as long as your mom’s okay with you leaving her.”
“Her boyfriend’s here so I can leave, especially since it’s to help Reno. Where are you headed?”
“I’m not sure, but I’ll text you the address when we hang up,” I said. “One other thing, do you have any friends at the Las Vegas Police Department?”
“Yeah, I do. One of my good friends is a police officer.”
“Could he look up Greco and tell you if they have an address for him? There’s a good chance a man like that has been arrested in the past.”
“I actually already reached out to my friend, back when Reno first started having trouble with this guy,” Romy told me. “We found out there’s no record of a Mario Greco—no criminal record, DMV, nothing. That means it’s probably an alias. They could identify him if they had some prints to run through the system, but they’d need to find him first.”
I muttered, “That would have been too easy.” Then I pressed my eyes shut and said, “I’m going to go, because I’m feeling pretty nauseous. But I’ll see you soon.”
After we ended the call, Dante gave me the address of his vacation rental and I forwarded it to Romy. Then I sent a quick text to Wyatt, because I’d told him I’d check in when we chatted that morning. I didn’t want to worry him, so I didn’t mention getting shot or Reno’s abduction. Maybe I’d fill him in later on, once we got Reno back and everything was okay. For now, I just wrote:I went back and talked to Adriano, like you said. You’re right, that was exactly what I needed to do. Then I curled up in a ball again and tried not to throw up.
17
Jack
Under normal circumstances, I would have been delighted with the house the Dombrusos had rented. It was big, kitschy, and midcentury-modern, with multiple levels and a lot of period details from the 1960s.