“Yeah, sheis. Because she’s a fuckingpsychologist.” He marches toward me and knocks the drink out of my hand, sending it shattering across the floor before fisting my collar. “If I find out that you’ve been abusing Isla, I’ll fucking kill you myself.”
“¡Escúchame, jovencito!” Ernesto barks, still seated on the couch. “No tienes entendimiento—”
“¡No, no entiende que él está abusando de ella!”Joaquin claps back, still gripping my collar, and I resist the urge to roll my eyes at his Latin macho that I know is mostly all bark and no bite—at least when it comes to me.
“Hijo,” Ernesto says calmly, but with an air of exasperation, “hay cosas que no sabes sobre esta situación.Let him go.”
Joaquin shifts his eyes as he hesitates, but then shoves me back as he releases my collar. “What kinda things?”
Ernesto groans yet again, rubbing his forehead. “Your sister is being threatened by the cartel,and Malachi and I are dealing with it. No, the marriage is not ideal, nor was it her choice, but it was the best thing we could think of to keep her safe from these threats.”
Joaquin narrows his eyes to slits as he cuts his gaze back and forth between Ernesto and me. “She’s in trouble?”
“Not at the moment,” I say evenly, adjusting my collar and smoothing my shirt. “By marrying her and keeping her here, I’m protecting her from people who want to do a lot worse to her than speak to her with a sharp tongue. She’s had to make a lot of adjustments by living here, but it’s for her own safety.”
“Huh.” Joaquin looks not entirely convinced, but he backs off. “Well… just keep your fucking hands off of her. We all know the real reason she had that giant fucking bruise on her face weeks ago.”
“That was an accident, I apologized, and it hasn’t happened since.” I fill another glass with scotch and salute him with it. “Sometimes mistakes are made. I have no intention of laying a hand on her again. If I do, you are free to come back and kick my ass.”
He cocks one eyebrow. “Iwill.”
I resist the urge to yawn in boredom at his idle threats. “Okay, then.”
Joaquin turns to Ernesto. “Sooo… Papá… do I get to hear more about what theprimoshave been—”
“No,” Ernesto clips as he pushes off the couch and crosses the room to grip the back of Joaquin’s neck and drag him toward the door. “You get to come with me and spend time with your sister before we leave.”
“I’ll be along to join you all momentarily,” I say as they step out of the room.
“Take your time,mijo.” Ernesto raises his glass in the air with his back to me. “Good work with all this.”
“Thank you.”
Once alone again, I meander to the couch where Ernesto was seated, pick up the folder of intel from Vinnie, and thumb through the photos again, suddenly wondering why I’m even bothering with any of this.
Why do I evencareif these cretins sink their claws into her and drag her all the way to her death?
But even I know the answer to my own silent questions.
After all, having Isla with me again and the realization of what her proximity to me has turned me into is slowly chipping away at my armor of hate and righteous vengeance. Again, I’mnota monster. I have my reasons for my treatment of her. Reasonsshethrust upon me.Sheturned me into this. And if I don’t continue to remind myself ofthat… especially now that we’re actually about to have the child we’d always wanted… the chink in my armor is going to ultimately unravel all of it.
Eleven years might as well be a millennium when it comes to technology, so I’ve replaced my phone a number of times since then. But I kept the one I had when she ended everything. Kept it charged. Kept it safe. Kept itclose, because I can’t even lie to myself about the fact that I have been tempted to abandon all of this, and forgive her, and simply put the past in the past.
I hate her… I hate her… I hate her…
But sometimes… even I know I’m just kidding myself.
You don’t love the way I did—do—and just let it go.
When you’ve been betrayed the way I was by the person who possessed your very soul, you have to fight against love for the sake of personal protection.
Fighting ultimately leads to weakness, and to fortify my strength and resolve, I stare at the last messages from her on the old phone.
Carrying the folder with me, I return to the vault that houses the jewelry and the gun, and then open the small lockbox stowed on a low shelf in the corner. I pull out the phone, power it on, and open the message thread.
Sunday, October 17, 2010
MALACHI
