[Mister Saint]: 79.Contest Entries.Judge Me Not

For [Kaimee]'s I Want You To Write Forgiveness contest.

This entry contains some adult language, some inferred violence and minor inferred sexual content. ^^ 

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           Virgil slid the still-warm barrel of the Peacemaker into the holster at his side, steely blue eyes scanning the bedroom one last time. His gaze fell upon the sparsely-clad figure of Moira, taking in the torn silks and gashes along her chest with an expression of perfect neutrality. The dead men on either side of her bed Virgil ignored.
          “Moira,” he greeted her with a tip of the hat. The woman stared back at him, eyes still swollen from shameful tears and outlaw fists. If he could have, Virgil would have killed those two rustlers again for treating his wife that way.
          “Let’s get you home,” he suggested, holding out a gloved hand for her to take. Moira would have none of it, however; she would not budge from that bed. “C’mon, woman, what are you waiting for? Their buddies will be callin’ before too long, god dammit, let’s go.”
          “I’m sorry, Virgil,” the young woman spoke as if pleading to him, begging for their five years together to cool the fury he no doubt felt. “I didn’t think you’d know, I was just doing it to make some money while you were on the trail…”
          Virgil shook his head. “It’s fine. Come on.” Moira sobbed once, twice, gazing at her husband as if his response perplexed her. “We’ll talk about it at home. We gotta get out of this cathouse already before more of them show up.”
          “How can you forgive me for this? For taking other men into my body, Virgil, for nothing but a couple of dollars?” Moira stood at last, wrapping her shoulders in one of the establishment’s many baby-soft robes, her eyes burning with shame and misguided fury. “You dumb bastard! You’re supposed to hate me for whoring myself… you’re supposed to tell me that I deserved the way these two beat me! How can you just say it’s okay?” Virgil sighed, the tips of his busy mustache lifting a bit as he did.
          “Because it’s fine. Because you never hated me for leaving you at home for weeks at a time, running cattle from here to New Mexico. Because you never minded cooking for me, or cleaning my clothes even when the trail dust was so thick you could write in it, and you didn’t call me a sinner just because I’ve shot my share of outlaws. Because no matter how many times you called me a son of a bitch, you still loved me, and stayed with me.” He looked to the door, embarrassed in a dozen ways by his earnest admission. “I owe you more apologies than I’ve got time to put to words, Moira. That’s why I don’t.” Moira stared at him, lower lip trembling. A soft cry of tempered grief escaped her bloody lips, and she rushed into his waiting arms, burying her bruised face against his shirt.
          “But I never blamed you for any of those things, Virgil…” she started to say, but was quieted by the familiar tickle of mustache, followed by the softness of a brief kiss. She smiled up at him, into those Texas blues that had stolen her heart so long ago.
          “That just means that you forgave me faster than I could say I was sorry,” Virgil gently explained, his gloved fingertips trailing along the back of her hair. “I figured… maybe this time, I could return the favor to you.”