FIFTY-SEVEN

Frankie Maruichi called his favorite whipping boy close to him. “Get my son, Eddie, over here right now,” he told him with a voice that was used to having men follow his orders to the letter. A few seconds later, Eddie, decked out in a Sean John velour warm-up suit, made his way quickly to Maruichi’s side. There he stood glued, only nodding periodically in confirmation that he understood his duties. Eddie was a foot soldier on the rise and all who were close to Maruichi knew that whenever Eddie walked quickly, there was something urgent to be done. Maruichi’s oldest son was fat and normally did not move very fast.

Eddie ran to three other guys dressed in similar warm-up suits. Two of them got into an SUV while the others jumped into black sedan and peeled out. Inside the SUV, Eddie was busy barking out orders.

“I specifically want to say, do not, I repeat, do not under any circumstances kill this mug, alright? Scare him. The key word is scare cause dad wants it that way. Now, everyone knows what it is they’ve got to do, right?” Eddie asked.

“Right,” was the unanimous response.

“Alright. As much as I think dad is getting soft, I believe that there’s nothing to stop him from kicking my ass all over this great city,” Eddie said as both cars with liscense plates hidden joined the traffic in hot pursuit of Eric’s black Range Rover. The mission was a simple one, the plan to bring Eric into the folds of the mob might be complicated. How this would turn out depended on how much fear was instilled in Eric. Maruichi figured the police would not be involved. He did not second-guess himself.