Page 81 of Shameless in Vegas

“You’re not evil, baby doll.” I sit up straight as well, my shoulders drooping in exhaustion at the entire situation. “Everything I’ve learned about you tells me that everything you’ve done and everything you are is a result of what they did to you. You told me so yourself in that note. And I’m trying to tell you that the reason there was no way I was going to just to sit back and let you disappear like that is that Iknow. Okay? I know these people fucked you up six friggin’ ways to Sunday. It’sso obvious, Natalia. I don’t have to know the specifics of what all they did to you to see that. I can see that you’re not evil. You’re not like them. In fact…”

The point I’m trying to make dies on my tongue as I find myself locked in a stare with her. It catapults me back in time to the morning when I woke up and realized I’d taken her as my wife without even knowing it. When I stared at her eyes, spilling with tears then just like they are now, and thought about the fact that the only time I’d ever seen a woman cry like that was my sister on the day I murderedmafiososto protect her. I had never planned on or wanted to take anyone’s life. But when I found myself in that position, there was no question.

If you fuck with my sisters, I will fucking kill you. Literally.

I didn’t want to be in that position, but I don’t have a shred of regret over it. It was a righteous killing. And staring at those tear-filled eyes of my wife right now, it feels like a two-by-four to my face that she and I are really not that different—at least in this area.

It’s true that I’ll probably never know the true horrors of what the cartel has subjected Natalia to. But,again, based on everything she’s told me in both words and behavior, I know it’s bad enough for her to need that same kind of righteous retribution.

If anyone understands this it’s me.

After all, Iamthe cartel.

El sangre de mafiososruns hot through my veins, and it always has.

Natalia was not born with that same blood, and yet they forced the nature of it onto her so severely that it fused with her body and soul.

And now, for better or for worse, we are the same.

I can’t save her from what they did to her, and I refuse to rob her of her God-given right to make those assholes pay.

“In fact,” I pick back up, “you’re a lot like me.”

She arches one eyebrow. “I amnothinglike you.”

“You are.” I lean forward to rest my elbows on my thighs again, my chin sitting in one palm while I allow myself to drink in the sight of her eyes. “You’re so much like me that I would be a real hypocritical piece of shit to try to stop you from doing this. But you gotta understand that we’re on the same side Natalia, and it’s a bad idea to try to do this yourself. You can be the one to pull the trigger, but I’m going to at least hold the mother fuckers down for you.”

Her eyes are once again unreadable. “I don’t understand.”

“I’m saying, whatever you were planning to do to go after them, just bring me with you.” I gesture at the pistol where it lays carelessly on the tacky, polyester motel room blanket. “Let me back you up. Let me help you.”

Her jaw pulses rhythmically as she stares back at me, looking at me like I’m something foreign and untrustworthy. “I don’t know, Joaquin. I think you might end up just being a variable I can’t control.”

I cock my head. “Avariableyou can’t control? Are you fuckin’ serious?” I scoff, sitting up again and raking my hand through my hair. “I’m not a fuckin’ kid, Natalia.” I gesture flippantly at my chest. “Have you forgotten that we’re only in this situation at all because I fuckin’ ambushed these douchebags? I can control myself just fine. I’ll back you up. After all, two guns are better than one,querida. Surely, you know that.”

Natalia chews her bottom lip while the gears appear to be turning in her head. “Okay,” she says eventually. “But you’re going to have to trust me and do what I fucking say.” She presses her palms against the edge of the bed and leans close to me, spearing me with her steely eyes. “I know exactly what the fuck I’m doing, and if you don’t follow my directionsexplicitly, you’re going to throw a wrench in all of it. And then we’ll both end up dead.”

“I can follow fuckin’ directions. Jesus fuckin’ Christ, baby.” I jerk my chin at her. “So, when are we doing this?”

Her gaze lingers on my face for a moment before she looks away and reaches for the pistol. “Tomorrow. I’m going to their territory on the outskirts of Las Vegas. I have a bus ticket.”

I curl up one side of my lip at the idea of taking abusall the way to friggin’ Vegas. “Why not fly?”

She turns the pistol over in her hand. “I did not have money for a plane ticket.”

“Ihave money for a plane ticket, which meansyouhave money for a plane ticket,” I correct her.

“That is not my money, Joaquin.”

I grit my teeth as I recall the information I got from Vinnie. “Well, that’s what you think, and I guess that’s why you felt like you had to start fucking people for cash. Right, honey?”

At that, she cuts her eyes up to my face. “Spare me your puritanical judgement. I did what I had to do, which is what I’ve always had to do, which is survive. I needed money. I knew how to get it.”

I pitch forward and shove my finger against my chest. “I’m yourhusband. I have money. I would’ve given youall of it. But youleft.”

“You’re not really myhusband,” she snaps. “This isn’t a real marriage. This is just—”

“What makes itnotreal, Natalia?”

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