Having received a mission from Don @Capazzo, Rumrunner jumps into the driver seat of a delivery truck on loan and makes her way winding through the streets of Chicago. This isn't the type of work he usually gives her; Rumunner is more of a desk jockey. But no one else was around, and he needed this done now. No big deal. She wasn't really busy anyway. In the passenger seat, the belt locked around a manila envelope folded over to keep it from opening and spilling its green guts all over the cab. It was a good deal of money, but it wasn't hers to keep. 

Pulling up to the address given, what looks to be some sort of garage, the door lifted to the ceiling and some cars up on jacks, Rumrunner puts the truck in park. She unbuckles the precious package, stuffs it in her jacket, and hops out, slamming the door behind her. Only one man is around, working on a car in the back, his hands covered in grease. He's a little larger than she is, so as far as guys go, not too big. His hair is slicked back, probably with the same grease that covers his hands and clothes. He looks up as she approaches, grabbing a red rag from his waist and wiping his hands as best he can with it. He doesn't do a good job... She clears her throat as he stands to greet her.

"Hello, sir. I'm here to pick up a delivery for Don Capazzo." Capazzo didn't tell her what the delivery was and it wasn't her place to ask. Pick it up and bring it back. She hopes the man knows which one she is talking about. His eyes move up and down her body and his lips curl into a smile while she addresses him. He looks over her shoulder to the truck parked outside.

"Yeah. This way. Pull it over to the second bay." He jerks his head in the direction he wants her to back the truck into while he starts heading the same way inside, towards a stack of wooden crates roughly two and a half feet high and six feet wide a piece. Rumrunner heads back to the truck, getting in the driver seat. She doesn't bother with the belt as she pulls it back into the second bay where the man is waiting for her. When she walks to the back, she finds the man by the crates, wrapping thick strips of material around and underneath them between the slits in the pallet they're sitting on. Apparently he knew which ones she meant. After securing the strips, he brings over a metal device on wheels, a lever on the back and a chain hanging from the top. The man attaches the strips to the chain on the cherry picker, moving back to the lever.

"Open up the back." She doesn't want to argue with him, it wouldn't do any good, so instead of telling him that he's not the boss of her she just rolls her eyes and opens the back of the truck as he works the lever, pulling the crate off the ground and guiding it towards the doors. She moves out of his way, letting him take care of the heavy lifting for her. He slides the crate in, detaches the straps, and moves on to the next one. Once he has all four of the crates placed in the back of her truck, he moves out of the way and lets her close the doors like a true gentleman.

As soon as the doors slam shut, her head follows, smashing into them. Two more times he slams her head into the back of the truck before she falls to the concrete floor. He takes this opportunity to pounce, straddling her as his hands go for her throat, but she squirms, turning her body side to side, doing whatever she can to keep him from strangling her.  To the side of his head she notices with a spark of hope a mechanic's work lamp, a caged light bulb hanging from an extension cord. Keeping one arm between them, hitting away his hands when they come for her, she reaches up and grabs the light by its base. With all the strength she has, she slams him across the side of his face, grabbing the cord itself as she does so. 

The second he rears back from the impact, she pulls her knees up, looping the cord around his neck and applying as much pressure to his chest as her body will allow. The cord tightens, his hands grasping for a hold, somewhere to dig his fingers into it, but she pushes harder, pulling it tighter while she watches his face turn a deep shade of red. If she were to let go now, he would kill her in a heartbeat. This time he wouldn't make it quick. If she let him live he was going to make her suffer. The blood rushing through her veins, her heart trying to break out of her rib cage, fuels her, drives her to do what she never thought she could. 

After what feels like an eternity, though it may have only been a few moments, his body stops struggling and falls limp on top of her. All alone, and with his weight crushing down on her, Rumrunner feels a panic setting in. Her breathing quickens, her hands shake while she tries to wiggle out from underneath him. She finally manages to escape, pulling herself to her feet, though somewhat unsteadily. She braces herself on the back of the truck, driving her foot into the side of his face, just for good measure. He doesn't react. He couldn't. With a sigh of exhaustion and relief, she leans against the truck, catching her breath. 

Once the panic dies down, she looks around. She can't just leave a dead body laying there. That would be stupid. She has to move him, somehow. Her eyes scan the garage, over the cars, the tire irons, the random parts lying about the place. Those wouldn't do much good here. Maybe one of the car jacks? She could back the truck up, put his body on the jack, and lift it up. But how was she going to get him over there? He might not have been much bigger than her, but she has little to no strength to speak of. She can't lift him on her own. Then her eyes move over the cherry picker.

Working quickly, if for no other reason than she doesn't want someone to walk in and find her, she wraps the strips around his body, grunting as she rolls him over to get them underneath his dead weight. One set around the chest, the other set around his knees. That should keep him balanced enough. She attaches the strips to the chain from the cherry picker and opens the back doors again, ignoring the blood that must have come from her head. Reaching a hand up, she touches her eyebrow, wincing a little as it stings. With a sigh, she opens the doors wider before climbing into the back of the truck, shoving a shoulder into the crates to move them further in. She needs room for the passenger. After seeing him work it, the cherry picker wasn't difficult to operate. She used the lever, lifted him up, and found it much easier than she thought it would have been to push it on the wheels, moving him into the back and setting him down before detaching the strips. With the doors now closed, she gets into the driver seat, her shaking hands gripping the wheel.

What to do now... She can't bring him back to HQ. That would raise too many questions. There's no way she's about to dig a hole to bury him. But the canal... She sets off down the road, wiping blood, sweat, and tears from her face as she tries to think of what she's going to tell the boss. Well, she can't very well lie to him. He has connections. Maybe he can make it all work out? It was self defense, so she won't get in trouble, right? He attacked her first. It was self defense...

She pulls up to the canal. Lucky for her it isn't a busy time of day. She doesn't see anyone around. Just to be safe though, she finds a spot hidden from public view and backs the truck up. After looking around one more time, she carefully moves behind the truck, careful not to slip off the edge and into the water herself as she opens the back doors, seeing his face looking back up at her. With disgust, she crawls over him, sitting down on the floor of the truck, and pushes her feet into his back, shoving him out into the canal, listening for the splash below. There it is! She scurries back to the driver seat and hightails it back to headquarters, where she'll have to face Don Capazzo. 

Taking a breath to calm her nerves, she puts the truck in park and gets out, pocketing the keys. She wipes her face one more time, smoothing her hair down, before walking up to her boss. He wasn't facing her, so she tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention. Once he turns around, she speaks, quietly but quicker than she normally does. 

"Hey, Bossman, I think we have a problem. I'm so sorry, it was an accident, but he... He..." She can't bring herself to finish what she was saying before her throat threatens to close up on her. Her hands are shaking as she pulls the manila envelope from her jacket and hands it to him. "I didn't mean to. I'm sorry..." She retrieves the keys from her pocket and hands them over as well, her head hanging. She can't even look him in the eyes. "The... The crates are in the back." She stands there, waiting for her punishment.

Don Capazzo is smoking his cigar when he feels a light tap on his shoulder. He turns around to see a frantic Rumrunner. Don Capazzo takes the keys from Rumrunner and puts it in his pocket. More importantly he holds her hand and guides her to sit down.

"Rum, please don't apologize. Word has already come back to me, I know our friend is...sleeping with the fishes. It's quite okay though."

Don Capazzo realized this business was a serious one at any moment anyone could be taken out and tonight was just another example. It was a dog eat dog world, remove or be removed and tonight Rumrunner chose to remove. There would be no punishment. She did nothing wrong, nothing he wouldn't have done himself. On the contrary he gave her a task and she did it...all aces in his book.

"Please just breathe, you've done a wonderful thing tonight, something with so much impact...it will not only help you and I but our entire family." 

Don Capazzo takes the manila envelope and looks through it. He nods as he flips through some papers. He continues to nod and takes a pull of his cigar. He flips through the final papers as he exhales some smoke. The boss then throws the manila envelope on the table and waves over to Rumrunner.

"Come with me Rum, lets go check out the packages...yeah?"

The Don walks and opens up a cabinet, he reaches down and pulls out a crowbar.

"We'll need this...Come on, follow me."

He then walks outside and opens up the truck, he hops on the bed and looks at the crates as he smiles and looks at Rumrunner.

"Oh their a beaut Rum! Abso-fuckin-lutely a beaut!!"

Don Capazzo laughs as he drives the crowbar into the corner and beings trying to pry the crate. He pulls with all his might and wrenches back the crowbar. He wiggles it back and forth a few times then pulls out the crowbar and repeats the process on the other side. After a few moments the crate is much looser. Capazzo finally removes the top portion of the crate leaving it now opened and exposed. He begins to pull out stuffers as he looks at Rumrunner.

"I bet you're wondering what the hell is in here, right? Am I right?"

Capazzo smiles and reaches in. His eyes light up and his smile went from ear to ear. THIS is the good stuff, a good freakin haul. He looks at RumRunner ecstatically. He wipes it off and then lifts it up in the air as he shouts to Rumrunner.

"Wooooo, here it is!"

Capazzo yells out as he lifts up a big sized bottle of gel.

Rumrunner stands there in shocked disbelief as her Don excitedly pulls out a bottle of hair gel from the wooden crate. Of course it would be hair gel! Why the man would need so much hair gel for a toupee she doesn't understand. Maybe it's to help build the facade that he actually has hair? Then it dawns on her. She just killed a man over hair gel. Wait, no. She killed him because he attacked her. That bastard attacked her over hair gel!

Then she remembers the envelope. The boss was looking through papers, not money. What was on those papers? She isn't about to ask him. It isn't her place. If he wants her to know, he'll tell her. She turns to him, unable to form a full sentence. She can only utter two words.

"Hair gel?!" She doesn't even use hair spray, let alone gel. Sure, that can keep his wigs looking fancy, which is probably why his hair is always so perfect. Real hair is never that perfect, not all the time. But crates of it? How much does this man go through? Was he insane? Looking at him now, at his glee and excitement, she is beginning to wonder.

Don Capazzo looks on as Rumrunner looks absolutely shocked. Did she just risk her life for some crates of...hair gel? Sure Don Capazzo took extra steps to ensure his hair was always perfect. So perfect people sometimes mistakenly thought it was a toupee, but it wasn't..it was just something he put way too much effort into. He looks at the hair gel and smiles. The boss takes the crowbar and opens up all the other crates. Rumrunner stands there stunned at the events unfolding. Don Capazzo goes from one crate to the other revealing more of the same. Hair gel. He grabs a few jars out and jumps off the bed of the truck.

"Wonderful Rum, it's all here."

Don Capazzo smirks. He begins to open up the jar.

"You okay?" He asks Rumrunner as she is clearly still surprised at the hair gel. He puts some extra strength into the extra strength gel and finally pops off the lid.

"There we go!"

He reaches in and twirls around the gel. Putting it on his head in copious amounts is one thing but this was a whole other thing. Don Capazzo's grin gets wider and wider as he reaches in the gel jar and continues to swirl and twirl, then his eyes light up. He pulls out an envelope. The Don then quickly makes his way over the the truck of the bed and takes out the contents of the envelope. He places the envelope down as a make shift place mat and holds up a small plastic bag. He begins to laugh. Finally he shakes out the contents of the plastic bag and reveals it to be DIAMONDS.

"These are the top of the line stuff from a connection in L.A...and we got a shit load of it."

He turns to Rumrunner.

"This was a huge haul for us today Rum, I know the struggles and sacrifices you made for it. I thank you and I won't forget this, you have my word."

Capazzo then takes another envelope and slips it into the pocket of Rumrunner as he smiles. This was her payment and she deserved every piece of diamond he gave her in that envelope.