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VICKY:
We Partenios are notorious for taking our sweet time, and my brother Vinnie has lived up to our family's infamy. Don't get me wrong though, we Partenios are far from lazy. Our tenacity more than makes up for any procrastination, but above all, we always get the job done. Now back to the story. It had been over an hour past the time I'd agreed with my brother to meet in our office. We had gotten some, for lack of a better sugarcoated term, business. It was some downright fishy business, but it was from one of our most reliable and longest known clients. I was considering marching down to out bar to get Joey to tell me where the hell Vinnie was, when he finally moseyed his way into the office. With his pal vodka nonetheless. I've seen Vinnie drunk on many more than a few occasions to learn what alcohol does to a person. I have also cleaned up enough vomit to declare alcohol a tricky seductress. She lures you into forgetting your problems and then BAM! You're puking up your innards wondering what happened and the problems settle ever so nicely back on your shoulders. Alcohol is a sadistic bitch to those who do not moderate her. Vinnie insisted on drinking the vodka like the hardheaded guy he is. The office is no place for a drunken fool, so I snatched it from him and explained the business. "The turtle has about fifteen grand in it, Vinnie. We get ten percent of the loot if we pull through plus we got a $1000 down payment." We always took a down payment for our jobs as a kind of collateral. Vinnie smirked. "Let's take a look at this down payment." I opened a briefcase we'd received on the desk. All in small bills as policy. "All we might have a problem is would be the police station being so close by," I said fiddling with my tie a bit. "We can always have the boys create a diversion," Vinnie proposed. "I nominate Tony," I said trying not to crack a smile. Tony was our scapegoat of sorts. "Fair enough," Vinnie said, "He owes you after that incident last week... Meet you out front in the car in two hours." Vinnie got up and turned to leave. "One more thing, Vinnie." "What?" "I'm driving." |