The written rules were simple.
Uno. Go to the P.O box the 1st of every month.
Due. Do not open it until I return home.
Tre. Spend the cash however I want.
The unwritten rules were anything but.
When I first received the letter with instructions, I w...
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There are rules when you become a made-man. There are consequences of your choices; punishment for the negative and superlatives for the positive. When you become a mafioso, these rules become your life, your code, your everything. That's how we keep everyone in line.
Gossip of brutal and painful punishments keep the soldiers on our side. Fear is a powerful motivator.
If you're born into the lifestyle, you're motivated not by fear, but by the family legacy...the power.
There are several families in my world. These families are spread throughout the world, led by their capos. Most capos are the child of one of the big five.
The big five - the most formidable and largest families within the Italian mafia; Ambrosio, Calabrese, Venturi, Ruscello, and Basile. Sometimes we were allies, other times we were the worst of enemies. It was a complex and ever-evolving dynamic.
People know my name. They know my family. They know who my father is. My name is revered within our world. My father is the boss of the Sicilian mafia.
Our family is large. My father remains in Sicily with my mother and several soldiers of our family business. I am one of his many capos.
I have dominion over the family in the eastern United States. My responsibilities vary from providing financial covers to taking care of snitches. The most important aspect, and the only thing my father cares about, is making money.
Making money is easy. People fear my family, my name, myself. Getting them to listen isn't a difficult task.
But within all businesses, sometimes you have to step in and remove an inadequate part of the system.
#
The town car comes to a slow stop on the other side of the busy street. It's Saturday - we love doing business on the weekends. People are too distracted by alcohol and entertainment to give a fuck about anything that happens around them. The best cover for our operations were those that came naturally, the ones we didn't have to create.
I take a final drag of my cigar before putting it out on the ashtray beside me. My driver looks at me from the rearview mirror.
"I'll pick you up in twenty."
I nod my head slowly in agreement. Everyone in my family speaks Sicilian during business transactions. Few people spoke it in the United States, and even if many did, everyone knew that when you heard someone speak the language, you leave them the fuck alone.
No good came from Sicilian.
A grin arises on my face at that thought. I flex my fingers within my leather gloves. On the other side of the street, the strobe lights from the club are vigorously pulsating to the beat of the music. Drunkards stumble out, puking in the alley, or walking to another club to party. The people who are sober wait between the velvet ropes in front of the bouncer.
