become what I was destined to become. I would take the reins from Uncle Carlo and continue to build on the foundation he put in place. I will become the one who decides.
I will be, sad but true, everything my father would have hated.
I will be feared and respected.
I will have great wealth and power.
I will be a mob boss.
I will be a Don.
B Y L ORENZO C ARCATERRA
A Safe Place: The True Story of a Father, a Son, a Murder
Sleepers
Apaches
Gangster
Street Boys
Paradise City
Chasers
Midnight Angels
The Wolf
Short Story
“The Vulture’s Game” (eBook)
PHOTO CREDIT: KATE CARCATERRA
L ORENZO C ARCATERRA is the #1
New York Times
bestselling author of
Sleepers
,
A Safe Place
,
Apaches
,
Gangster
,
Street Boys
,
Paradise City
,
Chasers
, and
Midnight Angels
. He is a former writer/producer for
Law & Order
and has written for
National Geographic Traveler
,
The New York Times Magazine
,
Details
, and
Maxim
. He lives in New York City with Gus, his Olde English Bulldogge, and is at work on his next novel.
www.lorenzocarcaterra.com
Read on for an excerpt from
The Wolf
by Lorenzo Carcaterra
Published by Ballantine Books
Chapter 1
Los Angeles, California
Spring, 2013
My name is Vincent Marelli and I own your life.
I know you’ve never met me, and if you are lucky you never will. The chances are better than even you’ve never heard of me, but in more ways than you could think of, I own a piece of you. Of everything you do. I don’t care where you live or what you do, a percentage of your money finds its way into the pockets of the men I lead. We are everywhere, touch everything and everyone, and always turn a profit. And once we’ve squeezed every nickel we can out of you, we toss you aside and never bother giving you a second thought.
You lay down a bet at a local casino or with the bookie in the next cubicle, we get a cut. You take the family on that long-planned vacation, a large chunk of the cash you spend—highway tolls, hotel meals, the rides you put your kids on—finds its way into our pockets. You smoke, we earn. You drink, we earn more. Buy a house, fly to Europe, lease a car, mail your mother a birthday present, we make money on it. Hell, the day you’re born and the day you’re buried are both days we cash out on you.
And you’ll never know how we do it.
That’s
our
secret.
We’re never in the headlines. Oh, you’ll read about some busts and see a bunch of overweight guys in torn sweatshirts with tabloids folded over their heads do a perp walk for the nightly news, but that’s not us. Those rodeo clowns are the ones we want you to
think
we are. Those are the faces that get Page One attention, headline trials, and triple-decade prison sentences. We have thousands of guys like that and we toss them into the water any time federal or local badges need to make a splash, make the public thinkthey’re out there serving and protecting.
We remain untouched.
We are the most powerful organization in the world.
In the last twenty years nearly every top-tier branch of organized crime has joined our union: from the three Italian factions to the Yakuza in Japan, the Triads of China, the French working out of Marseilles, the Algerians, the Israelis, the Greeks, the Irish, and the British. We are now one. A powerful and ruling body so strong, we are beyond the reach of any government, let alone an ambitious local district attorney out to make a name. We have become what the old-timers like Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello, and Meyer Lansky dreamed about.
We are a United Nations of crime.
We took the business of crime off the streets and brought it into the dark, wood-paneled rooms where the real money and power live. It didn’t happen overnight and there were some bodies dropped along the way. In those early years not every crew greeted the plan with applause. That’s understandable. These were men and women used to doing business their own way. It wasn’t easy to make them look at the bigger
I will be, sad but true, everything my father would have hated.
I will be feared and respected.
I will have great wealth and power.
I will be a mob boss.
I will be a Don.
B Y L ORENZO C ARCATERRA
A Safe Place: The True Story of a Father, a Son, a Murder
Sleepers
Apaches
Gangster
Street Boys
Paradise City
Chasers
Midnight Angels
The Wolf
Short Story
“The Vulture’s Game” (eBook)
PHOTO CREDIT: KATE CARCATERRA
L ORENZO C ARCATERRA is the #1
New York Times
bestselling author of
Sleepers
,
A Safe Place
,
Apaches
,
Gangster
,
Street Boys
,
Paradise City
,
Chasers
, and
Midnight Angels
. He is a former writer/producer for
Law & Order
and has written for
National Geographic Traveler
,
The New York Times Magazine
,
Details
, and
Maxim
. He lives in New York City with Gus, his Olde English Bulldogge, and is at work on his next novel.
www.lorenzocarcaterra.com
Read on for an excerpt from
The Wolf
by Lorenzo Carcaterra
Published by Ballantine Books
Chapter 1
Los Angeles, California
Spring, 2013
My name is Vincent Marelli and I own your life.
I know you’ve never met me, and if you are lucky you never will. The chances are better than even you’ve never heard of me, but in more ways than you could think of, I own a piece of you. Of everything you do. I don’t care where you live or what you do, a percentage of your money finds its way into the pockets of the men I lead. We are everywhere, touch everything and everyone, and always turn a profit. And once we’ve squeezed every nickel we can out of you, we toss you aside and never bother giving you a second thought.
You lay down a bet at a local casino or with the bookie in the next cubicle, we get a cut. You take the family on that long-planned vacation, a large chunk of the cash you spend—highway tolls, hotel meals, the rides you put your kids on—finds its way into our pockets. You smoke, we earn. You drink, we earn more. Buy a house, fly to Europe, lease a car, mail your mother a birthday present, we make money on it. Hell, the day you’re born and the day you’re buried are both days we cash out on you.
And you’ll never know how we do it.
That’s
our
secret.
We’re never in the headlines. Oh, you’ll read about some busts and see a bunch of overweight guys in torn sweatshirts with tabloids folded over their heads do a perp walk for the nightly news, but that’s not us. Those rodeo clowns are the ones we want you to
think
we are. Those are the faces that get Page One attention, headline trials, and triple-decade prison sentences. We have thousands of guys like that and we toss them into the water any time federal or local badges need to make a splash, make the public thinkthey’re out there serving and protecting.
We remain untouched.
We are the most powerful organization in the world.
In the last twenty years nearly every top-tier branch of organized crime has joined our union: from the three Italian factions to the Yakuza in Japan, the Triads of China, the French working out of Marseilles, the Algerians, the Israelis, the Greeks, the Irish, and the British. We are now one. A powerful and ruling body so strong, we are beyond the reach of any government, let alone an ambitious local district attorney out to make a name. We have become what the old-timers like Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello, and Meyer Lansky dreamed about.
We are a United Nations of crime.
We took the business of crime off the streets and brought it into the dark, wood-paneled rooms where the real money and power live. It didn’t happen overnight and there were some bodies dropped along the way. In those early years not every crew greeted the plan with applause. That’s understandable. These were men and women used to doing business their own way. It wasn’t easy to make them look at the bigger
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