12.
Hot Tommy Casella started by shaking down drug dealers. He got his name by turning everything hot. Legit wise guys stayed clear.
A nut job. Casella hung around the goodfella joints, horny for an opening. An orphan looking for famiglia. Anybody to take him and his crew in. The guy could earn.
One night, vamping a haunt. I'm with crime, and crime don't pay. Set up another round. Casella went outside for a cigarette.
Holed up in the alley, Eddie Bones. Lead pipe special. The Bones cracked Tommy over the head. For being a big-mouth, loose canon, shit house punk. That's what you get for stirring trouble in my friend's joint.
The pipe job sent the mob a message. I'm not going anywhere. Socially, he never returned to the thing of ours. Biz was a whole new breeze. The defiant Casella skirted mafia turf, swimming in back wash. The mob run-offs were plenty. He pined for payback. Any shot at Bones, he'd be done.
He decided to escalate the drug dealer gig, posing as cops.
They blitzed local set-ups in the wind breaker detective look. He jacked dealers, pocketed cash, recycled dope. Who you gonna run to? They swept the city.
Business boomed. He expanded. Suits. The Hoover look.
Tommy and goons stepped up the targets and take. They went super bowl, hitting a gang of cocaine cowboys. The Colombians pushed back. The raid went haywire. The body count, a dead bandito.
Hombres stood up to the gringos. If you don't hand this guy over, we'll grab somebody. Anybody. Don't matter. And you guys know what kind of snatch and bag missions we run.
The real Hoovers dove in. So did NYPD. Eyewitness News beamed Casella's mug on it's six o'clock broadcast. Fugitive of justice. Wanted by everybody. Casella hit a precinct, turning himself in. He bunked eight years.
When Casella sprang from the Colombian shit storm, he went rampage. He hawked Joe. Joe retaliated with Rocky. Whack Hot Tommy. After the hit, Casella was smoked out. A fresh contract.
New and improved. Tommy and goons bounced west, landing in Las Vegas.
He started with shakedowns. Off the strip book. Ran coin, coke, and cooz for guys off-limits to the casino's. Casella took the action, building his trade. By then, big V was already big biz.
Off the Strip was anybody's game. Casella cranked it.
Worked the efficiencies and flop houses. Transients, locals, yahoos. Plugged into the dark, seedy streets. All info, all action, filtered through Casella's mob of outcasts. He grew. Was told only once to park it. Once. Step foot on the Strip, you're smoke.
Tommy and goons hung back, backstroking the backwash.