Lydia, a stay-at-home mother; and a little blond kindergartner by the name of Melody Grace. It would be fair to say the McCartneys never really knew what hit them. Once these men were allowed into their house, they would not be leaving until they got exactly what they wanted. These men understood the power of fear, were masters at the art of manipulation.
Fifteen minutes later, a black Lincoln, brimming with Bovaros and made men—the capodecinas, or capos as they were called—slowed as it pulled in front of the same house in Montclair. A light mist rose from the hood of the car already parked in the driveway, a small puddle of moisture below the tailpipe. They were too late—mere minutes. They had no other option but to drive away.
By three o’clock, another vehicle was summoned to the Cape Cod, a dark Suburban with bulletproof windows. It remained in the street while two men guarded it from the outside. Thirty minutes later, Arthur and Lydia walked the forty paces from the front door of their home, adorned in bulletproof vests, flanked by two men commanded to preserve their lives. Behind them was little Melody Grace, crying as she was carried by the third man, weighed down by a Kevlar wrap draped over her tiny body, watching her home fade with every step.
The McCartneys never returned to Montclair.
To New Jersey.
To the Northeast.
TWO
There were two reasons to kill the McCartneys: to keep them from testifying or to punish them for having testified. Either way, bleak.
Meanwhile, the Justice Department started working its sloppy sleight of hand, a magician with only one trick in its repertoire: the disappearing act.
Federal Witness Protection.
This suburban family had witnessed less than fifteen seconds of criminal activity, and once the Department of Justice was done getting theirs, the McCartneys would be thrown out in the wild to fend for themselves, protected by the illusion of contrived existences. Five years earlier, Louie Salvone had tried giving my dad up in a plea bargain, gave the feds four crates of documentation, and they still couldn’t nail Pop for a single thing.
Things didn’t turn out very well for Louie. All I can say is this: shiv.
In Salvone’s case, he had it coming. He could have done his six months and come out a stronger man in the organization as a result. But by that time Louie’s desire to party had matured into a pretty serious coke habit, and the combined thought of going a half year without a fix—not to mention the nightmare of going through withdrawal in prison—had him looking for the fastest way out.
The McCartneys, on the other hand, were guilty of nothing more than wanting a plate of eggs, some orange juice, and a pair of cappuccinos. You can’t even say it was an error in judgment; they were simply customers, and frankly the kind any restaurateur would want in his establishment. Going down the alley might have been a bit much, but what father wouldn’t go knock on a few doors for his child?
A little over a year later, I started to hear more and more about taking care of the McCartneys. On our retainer were not one but two of New York’s most powerful law firms. The bigger of the two, the firm with the most connections and people on the take, crafted a gorgeous defense for my father. The Justice Department wasn’t foolish; they had the McCartneys deposed to what they’d witnessed mere minutes after they were thrown into Witness Protection, produced enough videotape to single-handedly turn a profit for TDK. But Pop’s legal team somehow managed to get anything this innocent family said in the videos thrown out on some technicality I never fully understood, which had little impact on how airtight the government’s case was; the witnesses would simply be able to retell it live in court—and Pop’s legal team knew it. What it gave the Bovaros, you see, was time.
Time to eliminate the witnesses.
I was getting older, had just turned twelve, and as my usefulness surged, so did the significance of conversations I might be privy to, or at a minimum overhear. Couple that with my oldest brother, Peter, basking in the glory of knowing and hearing more than the rest of us and desperate to prove it, and the image of the future started taking shape, its brightness and vibrancy hinging on finding the McCartneys. Without them, the Justice Department would have to return to Louie Salvone’s ineffective documentation of how the Bovaros