Success, Opulence and Power by Hebru Young (the unexpected everything .txt) 📕

our meeting after lunch. Brandon called Sergio’s and placed our orders. Sergio was a good friend, and his restaurant was one of the most popular in downtown Milwaukee. Like me, his parents migrated to America many years ago, and they went into the restaurant business. Sergio Russo Jr. inherited the restaurant after learning how to run the business working with his parents. The restaurant had been successful when his parents were still in charge. Now, after opening the second restaurant downtown, it had become a staple in the area.

The plan was to go over the kidnapping charge after lunch; it would be interesting to see what the guys had been able to come up with. Kidnapping was a very serious offense and could get me life in prison. There was no question about it, the kidnapping charge and the conspiracy charge was where most of the money was going to be spent.

Chapter 23

The Road to Fynnwood

Where: Guillermo’s Cabana, North Walnut Grove, Miami

When: 0200 hours, Saturday, February 18, 2012

Currency: US dollar

It had been over a week since Eddie’s Assembly had their meeting with Raphael. Eddie needed to get the product ready, so he woke up around two o’clock Saturday morning to repackage the drugs. He knew his mother and sister would be fast asleep at this time. He retrieved the drugs from the secret compartment in the wall of his bedroom closet. This was also where he stashed his cash. He re-bagged the heroin and cocaine then put them into the individual travel cases he had bought. He put a brick of cocaine in one suitcase and a brick of heroin in another. The plan was to take two bricks per trip. Travelling with all fourteen bricks would have been too risky. He then filled the suitcases with his own clothes and some of the merchandise he sold at school.

He had informed the boys of his plan for transporting the drugs to Raphael’s. He told them to prepare for this and emphasised that they needed to all be on the same page. They would be dressed in their school uniforms and have their backpacks and books with them. They needed to look like they were attending a school event. Eddie told the boys that if they were pulled over by the police and the plan fell apart, they would blame the driver. The story would be that the driver coerced them into posing as passengers and threatened to hurt their families if they didn’t cooperate. It was genius.

Eddie told his mom the lie about the school event. He told her he had joined the debate team and that Saturdays was when practice took place. With this, he had a cover story for the next six weeks. After the six weeks, he would tell his mom that he was no longer a member of the debate club. Raphael got the call from Eddie the previous day to give him the green light. So, Raphael made all necessary arrangements from his end. Eddie set his alarm for 6:30 a.m., giving him an hour to get ready before the taxi arrived.

Eddie’s mom would already be at the restaurant by the time he woke up. Saturday was the restaurant’s busiest day, so Anna liked to get in early to prepare the food. Some Fridays, Isabel worked nights and would get home at 5 a.m. the following morning, so she would be fast asleep. On the Saturdays that she had off, she would sometimes wake up early to help Anna at the restaurant. Either way, no one would be around to see Eddie and his friend getting into a taxi with three suitcases.

Eddie was done packing the suitcases, so he put them back in his closet and went back to bed. As he was laid in bed, he thought about the amount of money he and his friends were about to make. It was almost fourteen kilograms of cocaine and heroin with a street value around $1,500,000. This worked out at around $375,000 split between his uncle and his friends. None of them had ever received that amount of money in their lives, and in six weeks or so it was going to become a reality. He kept rehearsing the trip to Fynnwood in his head, going over every detail and mulling over the problems that could occur on their way to Raphael’s.

Eddie was awoken a few hours later by his alarm clock. As he was about to get out of bed, there was a knock on his bedroom door.

“Come in,” Eddie said.

It was Isabel.

“Hi, Edwardo,” said Isabel.

“Oh, how’s it going, sis?” Eddie replied, surprised to see Isabel and hoping she would be going to bed soon.

“Hey bro, just checking on you. I heard your alarm go off. How are you doing? We’ve not really had the chance to talk,” Isabel said.

“Umm yeah, I’m okay I guess,” Eddie replied.

“Are you sure, Edwardo? You’ve got to be still hurting about Dad, I know I am,” Isabel said.

“I mean, of course I’m still hurting, but I know I have to be strong—Dad would have wanted that. Right?” Eddie said.

“I guess you’re right. I just miss him so much, you know? He was always there for us; I feel like there is so much we’ve missed out on,” Isabel said.

“I know, I feel the same way. This doesn’t do much for our pain, but I hear that the cartel got to the person that did it. I hear that the guy is dead,” Eddie said.

“You are right, that doesn’t get rid of the pain. Edwardo, I don’t like the idea of your involvement with these people, it doesn’t sit well with me at all,” Isabel said.

“I hear you, sis, but what do you expect me to do? This wasn’t my burden to carry, I inherited it. I didn’t see that we had too