The Slayer (Untamed Hearts #2)(72)

She opened her mouth and then closed it in horror. “Why’d you get it, then?”

“It was the only way to get my cousin out,” he explained, thinking for one insane moment that she might understand. “I committed myself to them so they would get him out. I didn’t have a choice.”

“Why does he get out and you don’t?” She sat up, making it clear she didn’t understand at all. “Why would you do that? You traded our happiness for his. Why would you do something that jeopardized our lives?”

“Because he deserves it more than I do,” he said, realizing right then how much he believed it. “And he’s a better person than me. Marcos is trying to save every teenage gangbanger in Miami. What the f*ck am I doing? Fighting? Lying to you?”

“That’s not fair!” she shouted as tears streamed down her face. “There’s nothing that’s fair about that! Why does it have to be one or the other?”

“Do you believe, in this perfect gringa world of yours”—he gestured around the apartment—“that everyone gets a happy ending? That everyone gets out?”

“Yes!” She wiped at her cheek. “That’s what I believe. Everyone deserves to be happy. Anyone can change, and everyone deserves a second chance.”

“Then you need to stay here,” he said as he stood up. “Stay here, mami. Live the lie in Garnet. Grow old and die here without knowing some people never get out. One of us should.”

Chuito walked around the bed and picked up his jeans. He stepped into them, suddenly not able to look at Alaine sitting there in the middle of his bed, with the marks of sex all over her body.

He turned to walk out the door, and Alaine let him.



Chuito walked all the way to Jules and Romeo’s house, barefoot and shirtless, freezing his f*cking ass off as the sun kept trying to rise and expose him.

If the sex hadn’t cleared his head, the cold certainly did.

With every step he realized one thing—he was in a whole world of shit.

In a moment of weakness, in some crazy bid to save Alaine from the insanity of the connection they shared, he had f*cked himself.

Now he stood outside the door to Tino’s apartment above the garage, looking at the screen door, trying to decide if he should knock on it. With Marcos he wouldn’t have hesitated, but he was frozen there when it came to relying on Tino.

They didn’t have a lifetime of watching each other’s backs.

It’d only been two and half years.

That was a big f*cking difference.

Trusting someone wasn’t easy for any gangster. It took years to work up to. He wasn’t certain if he and Tino were quite there yet, and making the wrong decision wouldn’t just mean putting himself in danger.

It would mean putting Alaine in danger.

In the end, Tino made the decision for him by jerking the door open and looking at him through the screen door. His hair stood up at odd angles, and he had that heavy-lidded look of someone who had just woken up.

“What the f*ck?” Tino stared at him pointedly, taking in that Chuito stood there in nothing but a pair of jeans. “You’ve been out here for five minutes.”

“How’d you know I was here?”

“I heard you come up the stairs.”

“But I don’t even have shoes on.”

“Motherf*cker.” Tino raised his eyebrows. “When someone comes up my stairs at five in the morning, I hear it.”

Chuito took a deep breath and finally admitted, “I think I f*cked up.”

“Fucked up how?” Tino opened the screen and shivered. “Madonn’, it’s cold.”

“I told Alaine.”

“Told her what?” He looked past Chuito to the driveway. “Did you walk here?”

“I told her everything.”

Tino’s head snapped back, and he glared at Chuito. “What do you mean, everything?”

“I mean, everything.” Chuito winced as he said it. “She wanted to know what the ink meant.”

Tino gaped at him for one long moment and then asked, “She doesn’t know about the Omertá ink? You didn’t—”

“I f*cked her first. She saw the Omertá ink. That’s what started it.”

“Chicks see my Omertá ink all the time. I don’t tell them what it means.” Tino’s voice was hushed with frantic disbelief. “Motherf*ckers die for shit like that. No one can arrest you for a tattoo, but they can sure as f*ck arrest you for admitting shit. Why didn’t you tell her about your Los Corredores ink instead? Expose your own f*cking family if you felt like confessing shit.”

“I did tell her about my Los Corredores ink,” Chuito said slowly. “I explained all of it.”

Tino looked truly stunned. “You told her what you did to get it?”

“I did,” Chuito admitted.

“Are you insane? She’s gonna tell Wyatt.” Tino’s voice was still low in horror as he leaned in and said, “We’re not talking ten years, motherf*cker. We are talking life without parole.”

“Maybe,” Chuito agreed and then turned to go back down the stairs. “Look, I’m gonna leave. I was loco to come. You don’t need my shit dragging you down.”