Kamdar's men shove them out of the car, and Arman feels a sense of deja vu. He's been here before. He isn't sure why Kamdar is alive, but he and Thony are both uncuffed before they are led into the abandoned home. It occurs to him all at once where this is: the house he killed Maya in. This is a dream. This is a way for his conscience to remind him how low he can sink. How did it get this far? He's so far removed from who he used to be. His business might be dirty, but he never wanted to be the kind of person who saw an innocent as an acceptable loss. That was never his intention. It was why he saved Thony. It was his downfall, really. Maybe that was why he stopped caring when Kamdar started using him as a hitman because driving Thony away felt like the only way to undo what he did. But she kept coming back. The same thing will happen again. He will raise the gun and shoot Maya to keep him and Thony safe. It's not a choice he's proud of, but he stands by it. He manages to collect himself by the time they make it through the plastic tarps into the room. He's in control here. This isn't real. It doesn't mean anything.

All of that goes out the window when Kamdar gestures not to Maya but to Nadia.

Her eyes meet his, and she screams. Her makeup is smudged, and despite the duct tape on her mouth, she's begging him to help her with everything she has. There's an anger there that Maya didn't have. He instinctively goes to free her but is stopped by Kamdar. He doesn't need to say anything; the message is clear: he has to choose. Kamdar places the gun on the table and slides it over to him. At the same time, he commands one of his men to raise his gun to Thony's temple. He stands there with his hands on his hips impatiently. Kamdar walks to where Nadia is, gently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear as though he's not the monster that's making this happen.

"Who's it going to be, Arman?" He asks.

He can hear Thony quietly plead from beside him. He can't bring himself to look at her because he's too fixated on Nadia. The decision should be simple, but he can't move, he can't breathe, and every passing second makes him feel worse. Kamdar starts to count, and he can't do this, he won't do this. He knows what he should do, but nothing feels right.

When Kamdar gets to three, he grabs the gun and points it at himself. Everything fades to black. He wakes up panting and dripping with sweat. For a split second, he isn't sure if it's blood. His mouth is dry, and he clumsily reaches for the bedside lamp. He swings his legs over the side of the bed and makes it to the ensuite in time to empty the contents of his stomach. He lets out a sob, the images from his dream flashing in his mind. A part of him doesn't remember what is real and what isn't. He needs to hear her voice. He stands with a slight wobble and splashes cold water on his face, pausing to look at himself in the mirror. He's a mess. His eyes are puffy from crying. He's tired, God, he's so tired. After a moment, he makes his way back to the bed. He sits on the edge, grabbing his phone and calling.

The phone is about to ring out before, finally, she picks up. "Armando?" She mumbles.

"Yeah, it's me." He rasps.

Nadia groans in some combination of confusion, sleeplessness, and annoyance. "What do you want?"

"I… I just needed to hear your voice." He admits weakly.

There's a rustling of the sheets, as though she might not intend on hanging up on him just yet.

"I can't do this anymore." He says, his voice breaking. "Please. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I can't lose you, cariño. You're everything to me."

"What happened?" There's a flicker of pity in her voice, but it's hard to hear beneath her stony facade.

"I… " He gulps, hot tears streaming down his face. "I dreamt about what Kamdar made me do. When he forced me to choose between Maya and Thony, but…" He clears his throat. "Instead of Maya, it was you."

There's a pause. Somehow, he doesn't think it's because she feels bad for him.

"You did this for her, and now you've come whining to me?" She says coldly. "Who did you choose? Huh?"

He clenches his jaw. "Don't make me think about-"

"No, Armando, I want you to. I want you to tell me right now, who would you choose if it was between her and me?"

The mere thought makes his chest tighten, and tears spring to his eyes. He looks down and sees the gun again, and oh, God, he's back there again. He sees Nadia's eyes begging him not to do it, he hears Thony begging him not to do it, he feels every fibre of his being begging him not to do it.

"Armando?" She asks, with less distaste and more concern. "Armando, I asked you a question."

"I don't-" The words come out pathetically. "I don't know. I shot myself in the dream."

Nadia scoffs, and he can practically hear her roll her eyes.

"It's not because I can't choose. It's because I hate that I'm even put into these situations. What happened to us? We had everything we wanted, and now look at us."

"She. She happened to us. Why can't you understand that?" She yells. "Why can't you see that this is her fault? God, I wish you'd never met her."

"I was trying to do a good thing by helping her son, alright?"

"I understand and sympathise with what she's going through. I do. I'm not the heartless, jealous bitch you think I am. You think ever since I found out we couldn't have kids, I've dealt with it by being cold." She begins. "Yes, I've detached, so I can look at the photos of my niece and nephew or walk down the street and see a family without bursting into tears. But that does not mean I don't care." She explains calmly. "I just cannot let you go on risking our livelihood, everything we'd ever built, for her."

"You don't understand. I couldn't watch that little boy die-"

"You do not get to tell me I don't understand!"

One way or another, it was going to end up here. It always did. "Don't bring this up." He's not saying it because he's being selfish. On the contrary, he can't watch her break down over this again. He's comforted her time and time again when the topic comes up. He knows she's never healed from it. He can't do this again, and certainly not now.

"You started it. You know, at least Robert supported me when I talked about my feelings-"

There it is. If he has to hear his name one more fucking time-

"He was controlling."

"But he wasn't absent." She insists.

"Bullshit. I was there for you!" He points at his chest, no longer caring about trying to keep his voice down. "Every God-damned negative pregnancy test, every miscarriage, when our son was stillborn, I was there, not him."

"And whose fault was that?"

His jaw twitches. "Do not go there. You know that it's both of us."

"Yeah, but you're the one who said not to use a sperm donor, and I agreed so you wouldn't be embarrassed or resent that kid because it wasn't yours."

He knows this is a touchy subject for him. It fires up his emotions like nothing else does. It also, unfortunately, gives him a tendency to run his mouth and say very stupid things. "Is that what he offered you? To give you the child that I couldn't-"

"Oh, por el amor de Cristo, enough with your jealousy."

"I'm not jealous-"

"You're being possessive. You're treating me like your commodity, like an asset." Nadia states, and she's unfortunately correct. When he gets like this, it makes him protective and controlling, the type of man he doesn't like being, especially not around her. "For the last time, I never did anything with him. I know he's manipulative. I never once believed any of his promises. I'm over him. I've been over him for years, Armando." He can tell she's trying not to cry. "Why don't you trust me enough to believe that? I trust you. Despite everything you've done for her behind my back, I still trust you because I love you."

Arman sighs. What did he do to deserve her? Even when she's pointing out how much he's fucked up, she's doing it with love, she's not giving up on them. She had every right to kick him out of their home, and somehow she's both conveying that she stands by that, but also doesn't want it to be this way. Where did he go wrong? How did he let himself get so caught up in Thony's mess that he forgot the woman he vowed to spend the rest of his life with? All signs point to him loving Thony, loving her more than Nadia. The idea of that doesn't feel right, and it's not because he's in denial; it's because it's not true. He might not have made his choice in his dream, but that doesn't mean he can't. He believes that Thony and her family don't deserve to suffer, but now his family has suffered and for far too long. When he was in the depths of working for Hayak, despite loving the money and the power that came with it, he'd always wanted to do something more. He never liked hurting people. It was why he cared so damn much about protecting Thony. But maybe that was just it. This wasn't about Thony. This was about trying to be better. This was about trying to find a way out so that he and Nadia could live their lives in peace but not without luxury. Thony had been the key. The one to give him the chance to silence Hayak permanently. But she'd nearly fucked up and stopped them from doing the same thing to free themselves of Kamdar. He nearly lost Nadia because of it. He couldn't let that happen again.

He wouldn't let that happen again.

"You're right." He sighs. "I… I do trust you. You killed Kamdar. You cleaned up the mess I made. You fixed things for us."

Nadia seems almost shocked by his candour.

"I care about Thony and her family. But I care about you more, and I'm done being her lackey. I'm done dropping everything and running to help her."

"But why did you keep doing it in the first place?" She asks, making a very valid point. "If you knew what was most important, why did you keep doing it?"

He lifts a shoulder. "I… I don't know. I felt like I couldn't leave her when she was depending on me. But I should have stopped it before it got to that point. The only reason I didn't was because I thought we could free ourselves of Hayak. I thought we could use the fact that she cared about me to keep us safe from the Feds."

"You do care about her." She points out, seemingly accepting of it. "You don't have to lie to me about that part. And I'll admit she has been… useful. But not anymore. Now? She's a threat to us. We have everything back now. We have La Habana. We have our home. We have our freedom." The fact that she's saying 'we' and not 'I' isn't lost on him. He's unsure whether it was intentional, but she isn't correcting herself. "And we have each other. I don't want to lose you again."

"I don't want to lose you either," Arman says, slightly choked up. "I… I just want to fix this. I want to be us again. You make me so happy. I love you so much."

Nadia sniffles. "I love you too. But I mean it, Armando. Words aren't enough here. You need to show me." She says sternly before her voice softens. "Now, get some sleep."

He understands what she's asking, he does.

Which is why he's going to do everything he can to make this right.