Eden's Joker (Devil’s Nightmare MC Next Generation, Book 7)

Chapter 46

They came with that impenetrable darkness that’s always blackest right before dawn. Tore through my first line of outer defense with an ease I should’ve predicted but hadn’t. Screams, gunshots, and the hollow thumping of boots on arid desert ground was all I could hear for the longest time. Until I longed for the silence of sharing a bed with Eden, the town quiet below our house.

The Devils have experience, training and usually Lucifer himself on their side. They’ve also been hoarding their weapons, not selling to anyone since the war started. I didn’t have enough night vision goggles to go around to all my men, the Devils probably had spares on them. But the sun has risen, now wiping out at least that advantage of theirs.

A new scent rose with the dawn too. Metallic like copper, salty like the brine in the air by the sea. It rose from all the blood I know was spilled in the darkness.

I’m with my men in the second circle of defense. Sarge is by my side, Scorpio, and Razor too. Manic and Doom are aways to my left.

I still hear the thumping of boots, the odd gunshot, faint screams of the men dying for this vengeance. I’m not fooling myself into thinking that very many of those are from the Devils. But they will be.

The next two rings of defense are made up of my men. We’re well rested, since this is only our second battle in this war, and we’re all committed.

“This fucking wait is killing me,” Scorpio hisses beside me. Or maybe his voice just sounds like that because his teeth are chattering from lack of alcohol all night.

“Keep your eyes on the horizon,” I tell him. “They’ll be here any moment.”

The echoing gunshots and other sounds of battle have been growing progressively louder. And now that the sun has risen, I can also see some of the carnage this dawn brought.

Dead men lying on the hillsides, in ravines, their blood soaking into the greedy, parched, desert soil, coloring it black.

I see men running to safety, getting gunned down, getting stabbed, getting killed.

Everyone, not just the Devils, have their faces covered with bandanas and such, but I can still clearly tell who is who. The Devils move with a singularity of purpose, like a well-oiled machine, wasting no energy but what is required to make the kill.

I’ve seen some of them fall too. And that gives me hope.

“They’re so close,” Scorpio says. “Can we strike now?”

“I want them just a little closer…” I say, eyeing the invisible line I envisaged in my plans.

My heart rate’s picking up. If my plan for the rest of this battle doesn’t work, we’re totally screwed. I’ve kept my men as the last line of defense to tighten the final noose around the Devils, because my men are used to how close to the edge I like to play things. They won’t scatter and run when things get bad, because they trust that I know what I’m doing.

But if this goes wrong, if this part of the plan fails, then Justice is surrounded, and it’ll be every man for himself after that. I’m counting on the hate all my men and the ones joining us feel for the Devils to be the tipping point in our favor.

“Now!” I yell into the walkie-talkie.

One, two, three seconds later, the first explosion sends the dried desert ground in front of the Devils skyward. Six more such explosions follow, creating a wall of finely ground sand that hides the hills and the Devils from me momentarily.

When that clears, they’re not where they were, they’re retreating. Right into the ravine where I want them. Between my two rings around Justice, where they’ll be sitting ducks in a barrel.

“Move, get in position,” I instruct over the walkie. “Keep the cover fire going.”

Then I move with my men. The excitement of battle seems to have taken care of Scorpio’s shakes. Good.

We find the Devils right where we wanted them. In a narrow crevice between two flat-topped hills, ready for picking.

But there’s only about fifty of them in there, maybe less. And my men are all out in the open now, atop the hills, exposed.

The bullets start flying from everywhere the moment I realize that.

“Retreat, pull back, pull back to Point Zero,” I shout through the walkie, looking around to see if they all got the message before making a break for it too.

Point Zero is our last circle of defense. Justice is nestled between three hills. As long as we control those hills, no one can take the town from us. That must’ve been the founders’ thinking too, because it’s designed perfectly like that, I didn’t even have to make any changes or build any walls.

Sweat is mixing with the dirt on my forehead and running into my eyes, making them sting and water. On top of that, I’m panting as I finally reach the hill that overlooks Main Street and my house in the distance. Eden can see all of this from the bedroom window. She can see all our faces from there. Another reason why I didn’t want the main part of the battle to take place here. Not that it will make much difference in the end.

All my men made it, several of the others did too. But we’re surrounded now. And it looks like a hell of a lot of the Devils are still standing. Many more than I had hoped for. They’re walking towards us, tightening their own ring around my town.

The walkie in my hand crackles and then Manic’s breathless voice says, “They broke through on the main road. The bastards just rode right in, at least fifty strong. The fucking bullets just bounced off them.”

“Pull back to Point Zero,” I instruct. “Get behind them.”

“Can’t move… sniper got me in the leg,” Manic says. “They got snipers everywhere. Up high and far out. Everyone here’s down.”

That’s at least thirty of my men. And at least fifty fell in the hills at dawn. I’m down to three hundred. Maybe less.

Then the roar of bikes approaching the Saloon on Main Street drowns out even those dark thoughts. They’re shooting as they go, bullets ricochetting off roofs and other hard surfaces, smashing windows, getting stuck in the wooden walls of the houses, sounding like hail if it weren’t for the bangs of doom that brought them.

We made it to Point Zero, but we’re surrounded on all sides.

I see Karma’s hair flying free on a hill behind the town. I think I see Cross and his son on the one in front of me. And in the distance, I see my last ring of defense, closing in from behind. There don’t seem to be enough of them to squash the Devils from the back. But there’ll have to be.

Ice himself dismounts in front of the Saloon, aiming his gun at me. The bullet misses me by less than a hand span.

Three hundred of them, three hundred of us. We’re stacked all atop one another, surrounded on all sides. A glorious Mexican standoff if ever there was one. One for the books.

We wipe them out. They wipe us out. The end.

I never expected to make it beyond this act of vengeance. Just as I told Eden. But she wouldn’t hear it. Destroying the Devils was always the objective. It was always very likely that we’d all go down with them.

And I gotta admit, it’ll be a much sadder death since I didn’t get to see her beautiful face one last time, didn’t get to kiss her goodbye, didn’t get to enjoy her sweet softness one last time. I should’ve done all that last night. But it’s too late now for regrets.

“Come out, Joker,” Ice hollers in my direction. “You’re surrounded. You lost. But we’ll let the others live if you come out and face me now.”

No way is that a sanctioned move. But none of the Devils are contradicting him. Most likely they’re just giving him the chance to kill me before they kill everyone else. And giving me the chance to kill him at the same time.

“Fine,” I holler back. “Here I am.”

I toss the walkie to Scorpio, who’s looking at me like I’ve lost my mind.

“I’m coming down now,” I yell. “No one better not shoot me in the back and make Ice a liar now.”

“You’re not going down there,” Scorpio hisses. “He’s bluffing. They’re not gonna let anyone here live.”

“Yeah, I know that,” I tell him. “The plan is still on. But I’m gonna take this chance to kill the guy who brought us all here.”

Scorpio nods. “I got your back. Good luck.”

He offers me his hand and we grip forearms. A final goodbye to my oldest friend in the world? Could be. But at least we’re gonna get what we set out to get before that happens.

Everything is deathly quiet as I jog down the hill to meet Ice. The echoes of gunfire have long since died down, as have the screams and moans of drying men. The scuffing of my boots on the ground is practically the only sound for miles around.

Until another pierces the silence.

Desperate yet melodic, reminding me of birdsong at dawn, the wind in the trees, of rain pattering and fire crackling and all those other good things.

“No!” Eden yells. “Don’t do this!”

She’s running down the hill in the white dress I got for her to abduct her in, her long dark hair streaming wild behind her and her face glowing as though the sun is her own personal spotlight.

She stops between Ice and me, out of breath, her cheeks glowing a faint crimson.

“This doesn’t have to happen,” she says, giving us identical pleading looks.

I have my gun pointed at her father, his is pointed at me. Above us, more guns are pointed every which way, ready to start mowing down men like grass. I hate to be the one to disappoint her.

“It kinda does have to happen, Eden,” I say.

She turns to me, the pleading in her eyes so fierce, it hurts like a bullet to the heart.

“Just lay down your weapons,” she says. “You’re all surrounded, no one’s gonna make it out of here alive.”

I could make a bunch of wise cracks on the subject. I could tell her I told her so the other night. Instead, what I say is, “I’m sorry.”

And I really fucking am!

She turns to her father, who is staring at her like he’s watching a ghost.

“I’m fine, Daddy,” she says. “He didn’t hurt me. You don’t have to kill him. No one has to die. Not for me.”

She watched all this from afar, from the window of our house, and it must’ve looked like something she could stop. But now, as she looks around at all the men and women pointing guns at each other, even that bright light in her face starts to fade.

Ice has the same expression on his face that must be on mine. We’ve fallen off the edge here. The only reason everyone’s not firing their last bullets right now is because she’s standing between us. Dressed like a fucking peace dove. Looking at me like she’ll just wither and die if I do. Or her father does.

I’m seeing my dead parents on the side of that dusty road. I’m seeing Ice there. I’m seeing the bullet that killed my mother fly.

But it’s all hazy now. Washed out and faded like an old photograph.

Because most of all I see Eden and the heart-wrenching hope and devastating sadness in her eyes. I don’t want to die on this hot and dusty day. I want to live. With her. See what happens. See if the second half of my life can be better than the first. With her by my side, I’m sure it will be glorious.

I can’t fucking believe it, but I hear myself say. “We can all die here today. Or we can make peace. The first is a certainty. The second, not much more than a wish. One I’m not even sure I want to see come true. But life trumps death. Right?”

I fully expected my words to be followed by booming gunfire raining down from all sides, amid shouts of, No peace! and, No surrender!

Instead, the silence is so absolute I can hear Eden’s fast breathing and maybe even some birds singing somewhere. But this silence is thick and solid. And it could still shatter into a million flying bullets at the drop of a pin.

“Let’s talk!” Cross yells from somewhere to my left.

I’ve never met the man, but the way his voice carries, I’m sure it’s him.

I look over the faces of my men. Some are staring back at me in stark disbelief. But more have something a lot more like hope in their eyes. It’s not easy facing the day you die.

“The way I see it, we can either talk or die,” I say, speaking to my men. “But I can’t make that choice for you. I can only make it for myself.”

And with that I toss my weapon on the ground. Everything from the moment my gun hits the dirt, sending dust and pebbles flying, spins forward in slow motion. Or rather, everything is frozen in time including the smile of gratitude on Eden’s face. But no one else is moving.

Until Scorpio tosses his gun down too. “As much as I’d like to go down in a hail of bullets, I don’t think today’s the day. Doesn’t feel right.”

The others start doing the same. Most of them anyway.

Behind me, I hear Ice’s gun hit the ground too. I turn to see him give his daughter the tightest hug I’ve ever seen. I swear the guy is sobbing into her hair. But I wonder what’s gonna happen when she tells him she’s in love with me. He might not be so ready to lay down his weapon then.

But that’s a problem for the future. Because weapons are getting laid down all around me.

I was the one who came up with the idea for this war against the Devils. And now I’m the guy ending it. For Eden. For the only woman I ever loved. Never saw that one coming. But I’m not sorry it did.