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Chapter 114.

I couldn't wait to tell Jess about the latest development with her father. I didn't trust him as far as I could throw him, and considering he was as tall as I was and outweighed me by about fifty pounds, that wasn't far at all. Cuddy didn't have to know that, but Jess would.

She answered right away. "What's up? Did you talk to Julio?"

That seemed so long ago, even though it was only an hour or so. "We're about to create a company to rival Molino's car shop empire, knowing he'll take the bait and fly over here to find out how he can stop it."

"Create for real or on paper?"

I smiled at her grasp of the situation. "That's to be determined. It'll depend on how cooperative your new friend Ricky is."

"What does he have to do with it?"

"He can provide the property and lend his name to the enterprise."

"I see you have this all planned out. Between Julio's experience at Molino's place, and Ricky's as a former racer, it wouldn't be much of a stretch."

"Exactly."

"You could have waited to tell me about this until tonight. There's something else going on, isn't there?"

I smiled again. "Your father's hand showed up in the most surprising place."

"Huh?"

"He's attempting a hostile takeover of the hospital."

She gasped. "PPTH? Wow, that is a surprise. Why would he do that?"

"To curry favor with his daughters for one. The other reason might be purely financial. Don't know, but I'm planning to find out."

"My father doesn't know anything about running a hospital."

"He's not the first businessman who thought his management abilities were all that was needed." I tried not to think about the disaster that caused in the past.

"He'll need to consult with someone who knows medicine. In all of his other businesses, he had advisers of one sort or another." She sighed. "And he had me to handle the financials, to keep the books and make sure we adhered to all the correct business practices and tax laws."

"So don't be surprised if he tries to hire you."

"Oh, no. I already told him I wouldn't work for him again. Besides, I have my own business to run now."

"He doesn't know that," I reminded her.

"Not yet." She laughed. "Wait until he finds out, although I kinda hoped it won't be until we were a roaring success."

"I guess we'll have to wait and see what he has planned." I would do all I could to be prepared, but I didn't want to assume too much. "You've worked with him in the past. I know he has a need to control things, but how much of a micromanager is he?"

"As I said, he relies on experts, but he does have his own ideas, and tends to impose them if there's any opportunity to do so. Good luck."

I scratched my neck. This was going to be tricky. "We can talk about this more later. Right now, I have to check in with Julio to find out how far he's gotten with the car shop venture."

She laughed. "I wonder if we could interest my father in starting a car customization business."

"Instead of Ricky and Julio?"

"Sure. Why not? It would keep him busy enough that he wouldn't mess with the hospital."

"Now there's an idea. I'm not sure it's a good one, though, since he doesn't know anything about detailing or souping up cars. I guess we can keep it on the back burner in case nothing else works out."

"He could back any business Ricky and Julio start."

"I'm sure Ricky has enough dough that he doesn't need it." We were getting into ridiculous territory. I looked up and saw my boss bearing down on my office. "It's been fun, but Cuddy's at my door and she's still on the warpath. I'd love to ignore her, but I don't think it's an option."

Jess laughed. "See you tonight."

I ended the call and met the glare of the woman in front of me with an enigmatic smile. "I talked to Jess. There's nothing she can or will do about her father, but she made a few suggestions for how I can handle him."

"What kind of suggestions?"

"Don't you want deniability? You know what sort of things I can get into." I smirked at her.

Her hands went to her hips. "Don't I ever." She sneered. "Alright. Do what you can." Turning on her four-inch heels, she left as quickly as she arrived.

I grabbed the ball on my desk and rolled it between my hands. I thought I finally had the answer to why Jess, Nina and Julio were kidnapped. Normally the answer to the puzzle would have been enough for me, but this time I wanted to prove I was right to everyone concerned. I didn't need the situation with Giordano and the hospital, and Cuddy, as well, to cloud the situation, but that had to be dealt with, too.

The plan Julio and I had come up with seemed like the way to go. I called him on his cell. It took a while for him to answer.

"Dr. House." He sounded excited. "I'm glad you called. An hour after you left, I got a message from Carlo asking me to come back to Palermo. What do I do now?"

"Did he give you a reason?" This could completely screw up our plans.

"No, all he said was he no longer needed me to carry out the orders he gave me when I left."

"That sounds ominous."

"Yeah, I thought the same thing. Maybe he found someone else to attack the Locarnos. Dr. House, I have to warn them, Ricky and Marcello, no?" I'd noticed before that when he was upset, his accent became more pronounced, although his English was still good.

"What did you tell Molino?" I didn't know how he could warn the Locarnos without explaining the situation, and that would be bad.

"That I was in the middle of some things here and had to finish them before I could leave. He got very angry and told me my place was there, with my family, but I finally convinced him I'd be able to leave in a couple of weeks."

"Stay calm. We'll think of something meanwhile. You mentioned earlier that there was someone Molino usually asked to do his dirty work?"

"Yeah, yeah. Giancarlo. I'm afraid that's who he'll send to finish what I never even started."

"And you'd recognize him if he showed up?" I asked.

"Well, yeah, but I can't hang around Ricky waiting for that to happen."

"Could you describe him?"

"You mean like the cops have people do? So an artist can draw them? Yeah, I guess so."

I was thinking as we talked. "There are all sorts of reasons for Jess and Nina to be around Ricky and maybe even Marcello. We might have to confide in Tina, too."

"Well, about that..." He sounded sheepish.

"Julio?"

"I kinda, that is, I may have, I mean, I mentioned something to her...Dr. House, I told Tina what we've been theorizing about Francesca's death and Carlo's part in it."

"And? What did she say?"

"Oh, she was ready to do whatever we want her to, but..."

"Spit it out."

"But then I told her Carlo sent me after her family. She was very upset about hat, and she doesn't want to involve them in any of this."

"So she'll still help you, but won't convince Ricky to go along with our plan."

"Yeah. But if I'm going back to Palermo, then we're not going through with it, right?" There was all sorts of hope in his voice.

"Sorry to burst your bubble. I still think we should lure Molino, himself, here. Perhaps if you warn Tina that he's sending this Giancarlo after her brother and uncle she'll be more cooperative."

"I wouldn't count on it."

"She'll at least want to warn them. We can give her a copy of the picture."

"Do you know an artist I can work with?" he asked.

I'd been thinking about that. I couldn't come up with one, but how hard would it be to find someone? "We'll come back to that. I guess we'll have to rely on Jess and Nina to get Ricky to agree to the auto shop."

"Can't we just use his name?"

"We also need him to provide an appropriate property. No, I think he'll have to be aware of what we're doing." I reviewed what I knew about the man. What motivated him? If we told him the entire story, would he want revenge on Molino, enough to help us with our ruse? As a race car driver he was used to taking chances, but had his accident driven that out of him? "I think Jess and I will have to pay a visit to Mr. Ricky Locarno, sound him out, maybe convince him the best defense is a strong offense."

"You're going to tell him the whole story?"

"It might be the best way to get his cooperation."

"Oh." His voice sounded strangled, as if I'd just given him the worst news possible.

"One more thing. If this doesn't work out, Jess and I have a back-up plan."

"You do?"

"Julio, you always have to have a back-up plan. I'd rather not use this one, but if we have to...how much do you know about Jess and Nina's father?"

"They've mentioned him, of course. I don't think I know much except that he tried to run their lives and now they don't have to depend on him anymore. What does this have to do with Mr. Giordano?"

"He's our back-up plan."