“You’ve done a very good job here today, son, it’s time for you to go home. Please take the leftover rice pottage home and put it in the fridge,” Guillermo said.
“Sure Pops, see you when you get home,” replied Edwardo.
Edwardo went home, and shortly after there was a knock at the back door of the restaurant. The door led to the alleyway where deliveries for drinks and food supplies would be received. Guillermo asked who it was, and the voice on the other side of the door responded, “It’s daydreamer.” The courier had shown up earlier than expected. He loaded a few boxes onto his trolley and rolled the trolley through the kitchen.
Guillermo set up a table and a couple of chairs in the kitchen where the two started to count and weigh the individual bricks of cocaine and heroin. There were twenty-two bricks in total. Once all the drugs were accounted for, the dealers would collect their consignment at various intervals over the coming week. The courier informed Guillermo there was someone new representing the Pelican district, a guy they called Zorro Loco. He was going to be collecting his consignment the following evening.
Just as they were about to wrap up their meeting, a loud knock sounded from the front entrance. Guillermo headed down the hall. He hadn’t lowered the shutters yet, so he had a clear view of who was knocking. It was Edwardo.
Looking frustrated, he opened the door. “Why have you come back, Edwardo? It’s too late to be out of the house.”
Edwardo noticed that his dad seemed irritated, and he apologized as he walked in. “Sorry Pops, but I forgot to take my school bag earlier.”
Guillermo told him that he was talking with an old friend, and that he needed to collect his bag and head back home. As Edwardo picked up his school bag that he had left near the kitchen entrance, he could see the courier sat at the table in the kitchen. Since the courier didn’t know who was at the door, he had quickly hidden the bricks in a nearby cupboard. The boxes that had contained the drugs were now empty and scattered on the floor.
“Thanks Pops, so I’ll see you soon?” Edwardo asked. His father walked with him towards the front entrance, patted Edwardo on the back and told him he’d be home soon.
The restaurant had two hidden miniature cellars underneath the storeroom. The cellars had trapdoors disguised as floorboards. Guillermo had refashioned the floorboards himself. The previous owner had used the cellars to store alcohol. They were both six by eight feet, just enough room for an average-sized adult to maneouver around. There were eight steep steps leading down to each cellar. Guillermo always placed two wheeled, metallic racks over the retractable floorboards. The racks would shelve some kitchen utensils, spices and boxes of vegetables. To the untrained eye, the floorboards matched all the other floorboards in the storeroom perfectly. The wheeled racks also formed an extra layer of disguise.
Guillermo kept a safe containing some cash and documents in one of the cellars. He would always split the drug delivery in two, stashing them in each cellar. Once the drugs had been secured, he let the courier out the back door and locked it.
Around 8:30 pm the following evening, Guillermo was sitting at the far end of the restaurant. He was working on the restaurant’s sales figures when a man walked in. He couldn’t see the man’s face clearly, so he stopped what he was doing, got up, and walked towards the stranger. There was something familiar about the man. As Guillermo got closer, the man said, “I can’t believe it! When they told me about this place, I never imagined that the owner would be you.”
Guillermo got close enough to see who it was. “Wait a minute, you are Zorro Loco? This is unbelievable, it’s been what, fourteen, fifteen years? Come in, have a seat.” It was Guillermo’s officer friend from Puerto Plata, he had managed to find his way to America. Zorro Loco explained how he didn’t have a choice but to get involved in Miami’s drug industry, and how he was doing it all for his family—his new family. The so-called dream of moving his original family to the United States never came to fruition. He didn’t go into too much detail, but the short of it was that he abandoned his family in Puerto Plata and started a new one when he got to Miami. He said if given the choice, he wouldn’t be involved in the drug business. Guillermo didn’t believe anything he was saying.
The men sat down and had a couple of beers as they reminisced about old times. As usual, Guillermo didn’t have much to say to him. He mostly listened with the occasional nod and a fake smile. It was getting late, so Guillermo told Zorro he had to close for the day. He asked Zorro to give him a couple of minutes to get the bricks he had come for. When he entered the storeroom, he made sure Zorro hadn’t followed him.
A couple of minutes later he re-emerged with three bricks. He handed the drugs to Zorro, who stuck a pocketknife in each package and then to his tongue to test the quality. As Zorro tested the drugs, Guillermo objected. “Come on, you should trust me. I have never given you a reason not to.”
Zorro replied, “My
