Richest of the Spoils: In God We Trust, Presidents Just Come and Go!

By Neil Michael O'Mara

Political reporter Eddie Novak believes he is making a routine doorstep interview with a New York businessman, rumoured to sometimes deceive the law he has aspirations in the forthcoming elections to the Senate. To Eddie's horror, the candidate is the son-in-law of a Mafia crime boss. The meeting is memorable beyond belief and is the start of an association between the two, their families and the newspaper. The relationship between them starts as a cause and effect connection but as the mobster's career escalates so does the bad blood that becomes a war of nerves. The weapons employed to hurt each other are the ones each knows the better, the sword and the pen.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AUK Authors
• Release date: Mar 1, 2016
• ISBN: 9781785384189

Book preview

coincidental.

Prologue

Come in Mr. Chapman, come in. It’s Dennis isn’t it?

A much shaken Dennis Chapman, Political Editor of the Washington Chronicle entered a side room and sat holding the chair reassuringly as his known world had just been turned upside down. A glass of water was placed in front of him. He took the glass immediately and trembled as he took two sips one after the other. Dennis I’m sure FBI Agents will want to interview everyone here but in the meantime would you put me in the picture, the full story?

Sure but where do I start? At the beginning I guess but this is going to be difficult, said Dennis with a hesitant vulnerability in his voice. Believe it or not this all started twelve months ago when Eddie Novak knocked on my office door. He said a longtime school friend had phoned him to say one of their New York candidates for the Senate was a real crook and that there was a good story up there if he could get himself to the Hamptons.

Did you encourage him to go?

Sure at first why not, once a local guy puts up for a seat on Capitol Hill it becomes a D.C. story. We just didn’t bargain for Luca Bianchi. At that time we’d never heard of the guy. Although I did some homework just before Eddie went up there and what I found didn’t make good reading. I found out that a small time thug who ran a protection racket married the daughter of New York crime boss Salvatore ‘The Hammer’ Martelli. I guess Martelli is getting on in years these days and the business if you can call it that is run by his daughter Elena, her husband, Martelli’s son in law Bianchi and Elena’s younger brother Rocco.

What else did you learn Dennis?

"Well Eddie and I made some enquiries and it was rumored that Luca Bianchi had taken over the family and he was now the crime lord himself. It was alleged that he was into fraud, prostitution and money laundering. People have challenged him before and his defense has always been that he was a successful property tycoon. This guy reveled in the fact that he was untouchable. What we didn’t know at that time was that Bianchi’s reputation in the criminal underworld was that he crushed his enemies with extreme violence and was always surrounded with muscle-bound henchmen. His veil of respectability was his family and his passion for animals.

I told Eddie to leave the story alone, this was the mob and we didn’t need to get involved. I said there’s no way on this planet the guy would ever get a seat on the U.S. Senate. The next thing I learned was that Eddie Novak had booked himself on a flight to LaGuardia, New York. His friend collected him from the airport and they drove the hundred and twenty miles or so across Long Island to the Hamptons."

Is this relevant to what’s materialized Dennis?

Bear with me please, I believe what follows is very relevant. After asking for directions they eventually found the mansion of Elena and Luca Bianchi. To Eddie’s surprise there was no high wall or electrified fence, no locked gates. Whether out of respect or deference, they parked by the sidewalk and Eddie marched right up to the front door.

Passing a perfectly manicured lawn where Eddie said the weeds were afraid to show their faces to a highly glossed, polished front door he rang the doorbell. When the door opened the maid told him Mr. and Mrs. Bianchi weren’t at home and that he should go away for his own sake. Eddie said the maid was nervously looking over her shoulder all the time, he didn’t want her to get into any kind of trouble so he said he would come back later in the day.

So what occurred next Dennis?

Eddie said the villages that make up the Hamptons were so pretty, he and his friend drove off to find somewhere for a coffee and a doughnut. Then they decided to go for a walk and as he put it to kick few stones together. He said it was so easy to pass a couple of hours, catching up with his old college friend. I didn’t mind because Eddie works such long hours so if Eddie wants to take two hours for lunch, that’s no problem. You see this was an old girlfriend so I didn’t ask any questions, besides Eddie Novak is a free spirit, he’s been divorced a long time. Eddie did say he asked his friend what she had heard about Luca Bianchi. She said she’d heard some bad things, on the surface he was a respectable New York businessman and donor to several charities but the guy was also involved with the mob. Eddie was determined to return to the Bianchi family home to ask if there’s any substance to these rumors. They drove back to the mansion and again Eddie’s friend waited patiently in the car.

Dennis Chapman paused. He had reported and latterly managed political stories for over twenty-five years but nothing had prepared him for what happened next. Dennis looked at his inquisitor and realized he was cupping his glass of water with both hands. He took another drink to compose himself. As he looked into the glass he knows nothing will ever be the same again.

Can you carry on Dennis?

Sure, I think so. Eddie said he walked up to the house again now feeling totally relaxed. Having flown up from D.C. and driving the full length of Long Island, the catching-up with his old friend over coffee was a real tonic. He rang the bell and the same maid opened the door again. The maid reacted by waving him away but at that moment Mrs. Bianchi came to the door and directed him around the back of the house where he would find her husband. What Eddie found was a guy looking at ease dressed in a tee shirt playing on the lawn with a three-legged greyhound. Instantly a couple of heavies appeared from nowhere as Bianchi felt his private time had been disturbed. Eddie thought he would ask him a question about rumors of illegal activity before he was asked to leave. Without any warning Bianchi placed the point of a blade on Eddies chin. Eddie said he just froze and then without any provocation Bianchi whipped the blade across his face. Eddie said he felt a burning sensation and then blood began to pour from his face. Luca Bianchi had ripped Eddie’s flesh from his chin to his ear and caused him to have fifty stitches.

Chapter One

It was a glorious sunny morning and all seemed well at the White House. The leader of the western world was in his office and he was looking at his diary for the day. President Linus P. Makepeace with his thick wavy hair and bushy eyebrows was checking his entries that had been made for him by his secretary. He was smoking one of his large Cuban Punch cigars that were a favorite of Winston Churchill. When he exhales, his large frame bellows smoke that appears to fill the Oval Office. He’s the type of man that likes everything in its place and that includes his staff. He runs the nation’s affairs in about one maybe two hours a day and then spends the rest of his day on the golf course. Some say he spends more time playing golf than Eisenhower.

At eleven fifteen his entry simply reads ‘VP’. President Makepeace had summoned the Vice President as part of his whirlwind business morning before jetting off in Air Force One for a round of golf on the west coast with a couple of his Hollywood buddies. The President was now in his final year of his first term of office and was desperate for a second term. So far everything is going well, the country is at peace, the economy is doing well and he has just proposed extra funding for NASA, which has gone down well with the American people. Unlike many presidents before him, he has the time to take the initiative, be on the front foot, able to plan ahead. This is rather different from his predecessors who seemed to lurch from one disaster to another or had to deal with war or terrorism. So what could possibly be on the President’s mind this morning in the West Wing? Only one thing is standing in the way of his second term, his presidential library and his place in history and that is his Vice President, Josh Palmer.

It was eleven fourteen and the Vice President was announced, Josh come in, said the President.

Thank you Mr. President. Vice President Josh Palmer could feel it in his bones that this was no ordinary meeting. He is the complete opposite to that of the President. He’s small in stature, a professional accountant from mid west farming stock having a real eye for detail. It was said that these attributes gave the ‘Makepeace Palmer’ ticket real balance. Just to add to the tension the President offered Josh Palmer one of his coveted hand-rolled vintage cigars, something he had