Tampa Star (Blackfox Chronicles Book 1) by T.S. O'Neil Read Free Book Online

out of Providence. He specialized in prostitutes—due to a loophole in the Rhode Island State statutes, sex between consenting adults in private places was legal and this extended to both hookers and Johns. Sally Boots ran strip clubs with convenient places in back where a patron could be entertained by a scantily clad dancer in a semi-private room—semi-private only in the sense that there was a curtain, rather than a door screening the clandestine amorous activity.
    Sally’s mouthpiece, a very high priced (and of course, Jewish) criminal attorney, advised him that  locked doors would definitely be a signal that something illicit was taking place, whereas an opaque curtain would at least provide a thin veneer of deniability—plausible or not.  Lawyers were worthless until you need them, like when the shit was in the wind, meaning immediately after it hit the fan.
      Still, the whoring business allowed him a pretty good living. He didn’t need to concern himself with hijacking trucks or boosting cargo from the port, although he missed the excitement.  In those days, he just sat back and counted the profit from the cover charge, water-down drinks, and trips to the Champagne Room that Sally taxed with gratuitous abandon.
    He demanded kickbacks from the hand-jobs, blow-jobs, and reverse cowgirl style fucks his flock of slutty dancers readily sold.  Most did it to fuel a cocaine habit (or worse) and he would help them out there too.  Sally didn’t handle the stuff himself, but he would arrange a visit from Doctor Sid, a dealer he trusted.  And of course, he also took a cut of Sid’s action. In short, there wasn’t an illicit activity that a dancer did that Sally didn’t get a cut of.  
    Sally technically belonged to a crew. His Capo was Eddie Valente, a guy who was over his head just staying out of jail and kicking upstairs to the big boss, Ray Patriarca, the boss of the New England Syndicate. Sally Boots and Ray went back a long time—they grew up together in Worcester and spent their formative years jacking trucks and cracking safes.
    Eventually, when the good luck ended, Sally got caught with a stolen truck full of Maine lobster packed in ice and bound for discriminating dinners on Park Avenue.  Sally went to jail and like the standup guy he was, kept his mouth shut.  Ray got big and when Sally got out in 8 years and change, Ray rewarded him by letting him run a Burlesques House in West Providence that had fallen into Ray’s lap after the owner could not keep up with his gambling habit.
    All was tits and ice cream for quite a while, but whoever said good luck was fleeting knew what he was talking about.  Sally was protected, but only up to a point.  His wife’s idiot son was always getting into hot water selling junk—which was highly frowned upon in the Patriarca family. 
    In October of 1969, Sally’s adopted son sold a bag of H to some hippie chick he knew from somewhere.  She overdosed in the company of her boyfriend, who did so as well.  The trouble was that the boyfriend was the son of Capo from his family.  They both died after being rushed to the hospital.
    In those days, hospitals weren’t equipped to deal with an overdose of heroin as the drug was still mostly confined to hip subculture of musicians, artists and an advance guard of connected junkies chasing the perfect high. 
    Somebody found out it was Sally’s stepson that sold the junk and he experienced a mysterious case of dead due to a collapsed larynx, not to mention a hypodermic needle that was found shoved up his ass.  Sally was told to move south if he wanted to continue breathing, as he was supposed to be responsible for the knucklehead. 
    So, welcome to Tampa. He bought a failing nightclub and nicely refurbished it as a high class strip joint. His  wife decided to stay in Providence granting Sally a geographic divorce and part of the dancer’s conditions of employment is Sally gets a piece of ass when he wanted it.  His