The Boss’s Daughters

by Douglass, Carl;

  Joseph McGee Private Investigator: Book Five

  THE BOSS’S DAUGHTERS

  McGee Works for a Mob Boss

  Carl Douglass

  Neurosurgeon Turned Author Writes With Gripping Realism

  PO Box 221974 Anchorage, Alaska 99522-1974

  books@publicationconsultants.com—www.publicationconsultants.com

  ISBN 978-1-59433-592-1

  eISBN 978-1-59433-593-8

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2015955403

  Copyright 2015 Carl Douglass

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in any form, or by any mechanical or electronic means including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system, in whole or in part in any form, and in any case not without the written permission of the author and publisher.

  Manufactured in the United States of America.

  Dedication

  To those who work to save children.

  Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter One

  Cinnamon Paxton, age eleven, and Paprika, age nine—her sister—are as nearly inseparable as sisters can be. Although they are in different grades at school—Harlem World Academy Lower School—they see each other at recess, lunch, assemblies, and all school activities. The two girls attend the same church—Universal Church—are in the same Girl Scout troop, play computer games together, and are part of the same small circle of BFFs with few friends or acquaintances outside that circle. By the sheerest of coincidences, they share the same birthday, two years apart. The sisters live with their mother in a very expensive five-story condominium on 142 West 129th Street under assumed names. The girls and their mother live separate from their father. That separation came about because the separation of the worlds of their mother and their father is—by mutual choice—necessary to protect the mother and children. The rich, privileged, and carefully protected, girls live in fear. That fear is mainly of their father and the people who surround him in his world.

  Very highly trained and capable men and women are on duty to provide security for the children and their mother twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, and have been in place since the children were born. The separation of the parents was occasioned when the girls were ages three and five by two acts of serious violence that took place near their former home in South Harlem. Angelina Paxton—the wife and mother—was completely ignorant and naïve about her new husband, Damien Markee, prior to their marriage. When the scales fell from her eyes and she came to realize what Damien’s livelihood and life entails, she grew up rapidly and issued an ultimatum—either he renounce his involvement with the BK [Black Knights] for a respectable life with her and their children; or the two spouses will have to live apart. Divorce is out of the question—they are Catholics, he is a controlling and an alpha male; and besides, as king of the BK, Damien is disinclined to abandon the enormously lucrative ongoing criminal enterprise he controls. For that matter, walking away from the gang is quite literally impossible to do and to survive. Damien and Angelina—real name, Desireé—agree to live separately despite all of the security issues and inconveniences that entails.

  She does not want to assume a new identity and to live apart from her husband, but he convinces her that it is altogether necessary. An accumulation of events after the separation further convinces Angelina of the wisdom of maintaining separate and secret lives, and she accepts the profound change in her life with conviction that it is the only acceptable alternative. Violence involving her husband makes the news with unnerving frequency, and—try as she might—Angelina is not able to shield her children from knowing about their father and what he does for a living. It is probably for the best that they receive frequent reminders because it keeps them wary and convinced that they must never make a mistake and reveal who their father is and what he does.

  After six years in the beautiful new school for Cinnamon and four years for Paprika, the student body and faculty have become accustomed to the presence of the bodyguard contingent. Security personnel are not at all uncommon in the exclusive and prestigious K-12 school. Cinnamon and Paprika—like their classmates—make a determined effort not to pay attention to the security men and women and their guns. On any given day, about a dozen men and women sit watching their young charges or take turns patrolling the hall. The important children of important people never quibble about the presence of so many armed officers. The general consensus is that it would be unforgivable to have their child go to school and be killed there by a loony. Nobody has any ‘icky-poo’ liberal nonsense about guns, metal detectors, x-ray machines when required, or pat-downs. They want their children to come home safe every day.

  This particular day is Cinnamon and Paprika’s birthday, and for lunch there is a birthday party for the entire school paid for by the girls’ father, Damien Markee. Only the head of the lower school—as it is commonly called—knows that Damien is the children’s father, and for this—as for many other occasions—he is an anonymous donor. Cinnamon is sitting with Paprika and two special friends who help them open cards from every faculty member, administrator, janitor, security officer, and student. No gifts are allowed to make it possible to honor every child on his or her birthday without going broke buying presents or crazy trying to keep up with anything more than a card made from colored card stock with a very short personal note.

  Pizza, chocolate cupcakes, and milk are the food groups chosen for the occasion as they are for almost every birthday at the school. Cinnamon especially loves parties, and she and Paprika have a great time laughing at the funny notes written by their favorite people. They have to wait an extra hour after school because their security unit is a man short, and they are reluctant to join the large crowd leaving the school grounds immediately after the last bell rings. Hank Duffy—former MMA fighter and Navy SEAL—developed a bleeding ulcer just before Cinnamon and Paprika were to be picked up for their ride to school that morning, and a certified substitute is not available on such short notice for the escorted ride home.

  Chapter Two

  Damien Markee holds court in two locations in New York City. This is his day to deal with the nitty-gritty in his East Harlem Men’s Club on 133rd Street two doors away from a derelict plant on Riverside Drive in Spanish Harlem. The men’s club is a long-term holdover from the days when East Harlem was accurately known as “Black Mecca.” Harlem’s black population peaked in the 1950s. In 2008, the Census found that for the first time Harlem’s population was no longer a majority black, with their share now reduced to 40 percent and is more accurately called “Spanish Harlem.”

  In the late 1940s, African-American veterans began returning from World War II expecting to find a changed America more in conformance with the partial acceptance of equality they had experienced in the military. They were sadly mistaken and understandably angry when they found the Jim Crow laws still in full flower, and the opportunities for gainful employment more often than not closed to them on the basis of their skin color. Some veterans accepted the status quo and a bitter assimilation into the “Whites Only” society. Many joined the exodus—the “Second Great Migration” from the rural South with all of its cruel discrimination and found their places in the teeming inner-city ghettoes. The motto of Harlem became “Making It,” and the draw to the neigh
borhood was overwhelming. Living there was better than in the South, but most of the people of color eked out a meager living doing the menial tasks that required minimal education that Whites were loath to do. A few combat-hardened men elected to follow suit with their Jewish counterparts in the Kosher Nostra and their Italian competitors in La Cosa Nostra building formidable criminal empires.

  In that era, Harlem—especially East Harlem—was their territory, and the Black Knights established their foothold. Jackson “Killer Knight” Jones was the first black man to achieve godfather status—to use the Mafia terminology—and he established a highly successful criminal syndicate that dominated Harlem. Although he ran a stern protection racket in the African-American community, he actually gave the citizens good protection and was wise enough to recognize that if his neighborhood flourished, so would he and his gang. Jones left the army as a first lieutenant, one of a handful of colored men to achieve officer rank. He was a genius in the controlling, rewarding, and disciplining men, and a very capable administrator who recognized his limitations. Taking a lesson from the mafia organizations that bore sway over the rest of the five boroughs, Jones hired able attorneys, accountants, and recruiters. He quickly acquired the finest police officers, judges, prosecutors, aldermen, state house representatives, and even two congressmen and a senator that money could buy. He was selective in gathering about him fanatically loyal and capable soldiers and security personnel, and paid them well and promoted them with fairness and evenness.

  Jackson Jones and his loyalists lived in a state of almost constant war—a condition for which five years of army combat had amply prepared them. They fought to preserve their territory, their people, and their criminal livelihoods from the incursions of the Italian, Polish, and Jewish criminal elements that—more often than not—required the shedding of blood and the loss of life. In so doing they materially contributed to the officially earned title for Harlem of “The Murder Capital of America.” Police statistics from 1940 on showed about 100 murders per year in Harlem. By 1950, essentially all of the whites had left Harlem. Police service in the two NYPD precincts serving East Harlem—the 23rd and 25th—was considered hazardous duty and a combat zone with areas that cops would not enter without a tank. For the industrious officer who was unhampered by a conscience, East Harlem was a great place to become quietly rich.

  The old saw that “Those who live by the sword will die by the sword” was altogether a truism in the neighborhood and among the Black Knights. “Killer Knight” Jones recognized that his was a profession that did not promise longevity. There were old Black Knights, bold Black Knights, but precious few old and bold Black Knights. Once he had the money, Jones made a residential move that emulated the rest of New Yorkers who were becoming affluent. He “moved up” to a beautiful brownstone on West 143rd Street between Amsterdam Avenue and Convent Avenue, in Hamilton Heights—the Hamilton Grange neighborhood.

  The neighborhood was part of what was known as “Sugar Hill.” Sugar Hill got its name because residents from areas of central Harlem and parts of the rest of the five boroughs aspired to move “up the hill” to the part of town where handsome brownstones, spacious and airy apartments, and buildings of sound architectural structure and enviable design abounded, and amenities enjoyed by the nouveau riche all around the United States were demanding were to be found if you had the cash. “Moving up the hill” was an undeniable prestige factor. It meant that you were rich, no matter what your color or religion was; you had made it to the land where living was sweet as sugar.

  Jackson “Killer Knight” Jones ensconced his family in Sugar Hill and established a double life of uptown legitimacy for his family while he pursued his real livelihood down in “the Mecca.” Jones was murdered by a mafia hit man in 1956. The Black Knights retaliated in such an overkill orgy of revenge that the Italians never again attempted a takeover or a threat to the territory ruled by the BK. Eleven “generals” of the BK—as they became known over the years—died violent deaths between 1956 and 2006 when Damien Markee rose meteorically from the ranks to assume the generalship. He was the first BK leader to have a college degree; in fact, he graduated from Columbia Business School with a BS in business management and the CUNY School of Law with honors. That alone—however useful—would not have brought him to the attention of the BK leaders. But his incomparable skills in the martial arts and use of most other equipment of death, total disregard for the lives of his enemies and competitors, and his brilliance in attaining and maintaining a clean police record while killing off his would-be opponents for the top position, earned him full respect—a status based on a bone-marrow level of fear by his allies and enemies alike.

  He even took over—by a peaceful purchase—the splendid brownstone in Hamilton Heights originally owned by the Jackson Jones estate. There—like any self-respecting Mafia don—Damien Markee entertained police commissioners, entertainers, politicians, churchmen, self-appointed black spokesmen, doctors, lawyers, and the glitterati of all stripes. There he lived the sweet “Sugar Hill” life, and—like the original owner of the mansion—also conducted his other life in the poverty-stricken ghetto of East Harlem just above the invisible but easily identifiable line between “the upper east side” and the ravages of Harlem above 98th Street.

  Among the guests in the Hamilton Heights mansion are Friday night poker game regulars—friends with no illusions about who Damien Markee is or how he makes his fortune. Those friends include the sitting mayor of New York, Franklin Delancy; Charles Daniels, the billionaire husband of the DCIA [Director of the Central Intelligence Agency]; Ivory White, a former senior officer in the BK, now a partner with P.A.M.J. McGee and Caitlin O’Brian—formerly an NYPD detective—in McGee & Associates Investigations; Gen. Mark Dantelle, USA Ret., a former associate of Damien during his brief military service; and Dominic Lanza, current don of the original Colombo Sicilian crime syndicate. By mutual agreement this group of friends accepts that business, politics, religion, and race are taboo subjects. It is absolutely forbidden for any business activity or connection to be entered into between any of the members of the Friday poker night group.

  This is Tuesday afternoon, so business is being conducted in the unofficial headquarters of the BK—the East Harlem Men’s Club on 133rd Street. Damien Markee asked for the meeting, and it is a sign of cautious mutual trust that all invitees are present. Damien—like all crime lords—has a nickname, “The Kiss,” a reference to a certain facial expression Damien has when he is delivering the kiss of death. The nickname is never used in Damien’s presence. Besides “The Kiss,” Don Dominic Lanza from the Colombo family; Leopoldo Rodriguez, the head of the New Conquistadores—the Puerto Rican syndicate that now controls Spanish Harlem; Bart Derekson from the Hells Angels; and, incongruously, Most Rev. Dany J. Khallouf, bishop of the Eparchy of Brooklyn Maronites—present as a buffer among the less savory attendees—are the other men seated in the back room of the Men’s Club.

  All of the men have a lunch imported from Spain of calçots grilling onions, tapas, cured Serrano and Ibérico hams, paella, and Don Rodriguez’s favorite sangria—a chilled combination of Rioja red wine, brandy, brown sugar, and ginger ale with the juice of fresh lemon and orange wedges. It is time for business.

  “Thank you, gentlemen,” Damien says. “We are all busy men; so, I will keep this short and simple.”

  “Simple so us peasants can understand, Damien?” Don Dominic asks with a smile.

  “Not for everyone—just for the Sicilians, Dominic.”

  They all laugh, and any remaining tension subsides. If they can share gentle ethnic jokes without rancor, they should be able to consider a mutually beneficial business arrangement.

  “Let me assure you that the place has been scrubbed clean of bugs. The police don’t come here unless they are invited—which is rare—and we have never had a listening device placed in the men’s club. To be safe, my security people swept it just an hour ago. We can speak frankly.

  “I
have been thinking lately how well we are getting along, as different as we are in background and approach. Police statistics show there were only nine murders in Spanish Harlem last year, and that is a trend that is holding. Rapes and burglaries are also way down. I am of the opinion that our restraint in dealing with each other is the main reason for that drop in crime where we live. I—for one—want things to stay that way. It is good for business. There was a time in the city when the heads of the five Sicilian families met and formed a council where they made rules and decided and enforced discipline. They made acceptable zones of interest and left each other alone for a time and prospered.

  “Times have changed. Back then, the dons had real control and received respect. Back then, this was Italian Harlem and the Cosa Nostra under the Genovese Family ruled, then it was Black Harlem and the Black Knights ruled. Now, in the twenty-first century, it is Spanish Harlem, and the Latin Kings rule under Don Leopoldo. That is the reality. There are lots of Puerto Ricans—almost 60 percent. Maybe something less than 40 percent African-Americans, and compared to the heyday of the Cosa Nostra here, only a few Italians left. There is a great deal of money to be made here. The rackets are still doing pretty well, but the state lottery has cut in on us in a big way. We still have the girls, the abandoned warehouse fights, and the union, city, and state contributions. The Italians have not made it a matter of war to lose their once complete control of the cops, the politicians, the unions, and the building trades and the trash collection cuts. In return, we have given up a share of the girls, the rackets, and the state money.

  “We need to form a council to make sure everybody is happy, rich, and safe. So, I am going to make you an offer. Without expecting anything in return except cooperation, I will help you get a hand into our enterprises in LA, Phoenix, Chicago, Philly, New Jersey, and Miami. Our suppliers for nose candy and some of the other pharmaceuticals is problematic, but our distribution system is great. Maybe we can work something out there. Maybe we can share our contacts with law enforcement and the courts. We all are doing pretty well in that regard; so, by sharing, we might make our businesses more secure and lucrative.”