Page 2 of Forbidden Hearts

Gustavo’s car’s headlights point at the bush with the ammo box and illuminate our immediate surroundings. Around us, everything else is in complete darkness.

“Jesus, man, please! You can have millions! Please, don’t do this!” Hugo rocks back and forth. His body is probably releasing adrenaline now that he knows there is no way out. His desperate eyes bore holes into mine.

“Do it,” I tell Santiago. He pulls out a knife, leans behind Hugo, and cuts him loose.

Hugo falls forward. His hands land on either side of the gun, and his face hovers inches above the revolver.

“I don’t want to do it,” Hugo says. “Please, have mercy.”

Mercy?

My brothers and I are known for a lot of things, but mercy isn’t one of them.

“I’m going to count to five,” I say, pulling out my gun. “Then I’m going to start shooting, so you better grab that gun and start running.”

Hugo looks at me again. The stress bulges his eyes. He looks pathetic.

“One,” I start.

He grabs the gun and runs straight for the bush with the ammo box.

“He’s faster than he looks,” Santiago chuckles. “Should we take him out now?”

“No,” I say. “Let him get to the bullets. Let him think he has a chance.”

???

About an hour later, I toss the last patch of dirt over Hugo’s grave. We are hours away from the nearest town. His body will never be found, just like his brother’s graves will never be found, either.

We load our shovels into the back of Gustavo’s car and drive home.

“What now?” Santiago asks after about fifteen minutes of driving in silence through the desert. He’s been shuffling in the backseat since we got in the car, no doubt working to get something off his chest. “You took out the last of the Romeros. Are you ready to get back to work forNuestra Casa?”

Gustavo glances at me before quickly returning his eyes to the road.

I took a year’s break from my job as an enforcer to hunt down the Romero brothers. In my absence, Gustavo had taken over my duties as an enforcer. While the job keeps him busy, I think Gustavo enjoys it more than being head of security and being shut in an office all day.

No.

I’m not ready to return to work forNuestra Casa, the most powerful crime family in Texas. After all, working for them angered the Romeros in the first place and drove them to do what they did.

What they did…

I can’t even bring myself to think about it. For the past year, I’ve been in a dark mental place, even by my own standards. Revenge was the only thing I looked forward to when I went to bed each night. But now that my quest to rid the Earth of Romeros is complete…what now?

Looking out the car window, an idea crept into my head. Maybe it’s the stillness of the dark desert that finally allows me to hear the thoughts rattling behind my brain more clearly. They are dangerous thoughts, thoughts that threaten my entire identity.

“I’m not going back,” I say in a moment of clarity. “I think I’m ready to retire.”

Santiago chuckles. When he sees I’m not laughing, he says, “But you’re only thirty. You have a whole career ahead of you! Are you serious?”

“I am.”

“Is this because of…”

“Don’t say her name!” I growl.

Taking a deep breath, I remind myself that what the Romeros did was entirely my fault. My fault. Nobody else’s.

---