Man's got to have a code

Here are the four big ones.

1. Omertà. Conspiracy of silence. Shhhh.

2. Menudo. Kids who hit the double digits have to bow out of the racket and button their lips forever.

3. Spare the lambs. Mafiosini do not involve innocents or babes in arms.

4. The kiss. If you ask for the kiss, and you get the kiss, you are in the game. Period.

The commandments

Here are some mafiosini rules to live by.

1. Never, ever, touch an associate’s parents. Don’t even look at the parents. You don’t even see the parents.

2. No diaper jokes. You do not fuck with another kid’s toilet habits—if you’re working a job with someone who’s loaded, you suck it up.

3. You are always available for duty.

4. No cop friends. You don’t even dress up as a cop for Halloween. If your parents force you into a Halloween cop costume, you throw up on it pronto.

5. No juicing. Juice makes you crazy—you know that. You may drink water, cow’s milk, goat’s milk, sheep’s milk, raw milk, soy milk, rice milk, or almond milk. Formula is all right, but make sure it’s not from China, or you might die.

The rackets

The mafiosini run four tight ships.

1. The West Indian nannies. Any parent who wants to hire a nanny has to go through one of the five families. Dogs (parents) better go through the proper channels and pay the foxes (the mafiosini) the fee, or enter a world of hurt. It’s mainly the mothers’ girls and god’s mercy that own this racket.

2. The pediatricians. It’s your basic loan-sharking operation. Squeezed by the health insurance rackets and the bleating economy, downwardly-mobile pedes need cash bad. The foxes come to their fiduciary rescue, and as long as the doctors get them the vig on time with no shots, everybody’s happy. Mainly the Zambians and Starry Brot run this one. The pequeños hermanos are making inroads.

3. The party clowns. Your basic human trafficking kind of thing. It seems as if the foxes own the clowns and rent them out for birthday parties. The petits anges and Nyet Moloko have this one.

4. The au pairs. My agents are still working on the particulars of this racket. All I know is that there are a lot of Kazakh 6-year-olds collecting salaries and benefits from the major au pair networks. I think the IRS is getting wise, but is too afraid to indict.

Rising thugs

There’s always someone who’s not in the game and wants in. At the bureau we’re on it. My team has identified three families determined to edge their way in. Fear this.

Casa de Pequeños Hermanos, Guatemala City: Coming out of Zone 1 in G.C., these hermanos are on your shit.

St. Catherine Mikunda Orphanage, Lusaka: These Zambians will change the way you look at teething rings.

Hope Orphanage of Backwards Kids #1, Almaty City: In Kazakhstan they may call orphans “backwards kids,” but I think that’s because of what they do to your head with their onesies.

The five families

Gambino. Genovese. Lucchese. You know these families. Now let me introduce you to the really scary families in America today.

The petits anges. They come from the Little Angels of Hope Orphanage in Port-Au-Prince, and they whine right into the base of your spine.

The mothers' girls. These young ladies from Mothers’ Girls Orphanage in Taipei can throw tantrums that stink.

The mercy girls. You think the mothers’ girls are cold because of what they did with Tickle Me Elmo and that one guy's belly button? These sweethearts from God’s Mercy Orphanage in Guangxi Autonomous Region can mess you up.

The Nyet Moloko. Hotheaded and unorthodox, the kids from Volgograd Regional Baby Orphanage #9 (aka “Nyet Moloko”) do things with diaper cream that you really don't want to imagine.

The Starry Brot. These Ukranians from City of Odessa Orphanage #2 (aka “Starry Brot”) make the Moloko kids look like knuckleheads.

Who's in the game?

Don't misunderstand. At the bureau, we know that 99.9 percent of adopted children are not in the game. They come from ass-hard orphanages all over the world, and they settle into American life as honest, lawful citizen-children. We call these children lambs.

But the kids who are in the game? They carry beanie babies and bobos, but their shit is cold-blooded. They’re foxes.

Then there are the adults. On the street, they're known as dogs.

A brief history of the mafiosini

The uncomfortable truth: most mafiosini are American-born child-thugs, but the most powerful lieutenants and captains tend to be adopted children. Having come up in hard-core orphanages, they nutted up at an early age and, stateside, organized into ruthless rackets. They brook no resistance, nor do they suffer fools. They call each other “the chosen.” Of course, there are those who want to break into the rackets. At the bureau, the American-born wannabes are known as “the natives.” On the street, they’re called “the hopeful.” You know that saying, The converts are the worst? It's so true. The natives are twice as heartless as the chosen. Ask any grown-up who’s been force-fed silken-soy-and-flax-seed smoothies and dares to talk about it.

The Mafiosini

Nobody likes to talk about it, but there is an organized crime world run by children. I'm the sap in the windowless office who has to track them down and root them out. They have rock-solid rackets, and they leave a trail of tears and throw-up. They own the West Indian nannies. They own the pediatricians. They own the au pairs and the party clowns, and that's only the tip of the iceberg. Yes, they're cute. They wear funny costumes and they waddle and they say adorable things such as, "I wuv you," and "Him's my fwend." But how many times have I had to listen over the wire, as one of my agents gets cornered: I make you laugh? I'm here to fuckin' amuse you?