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

Chapter 47

I didn’t think much as I ran from the house and down the hill. My dad and Tyler were facing off in the dusty street in front of the Saloon. Everyone else—all the men Tyler had and all my dad’s MC brothers—were in the hills surrounding the town, guns trained on one another. It felt like that moment right before a single spark causes an explosion. This explosion would’ve taken out my whole world.

I had to stop it.

Time moved at a snail’s pace even as I sprinted down the hill and then as I stood between my dad and Tyler, begging them and everyone else to please stop this insane war. The sun was in my eyes, pebbles of dust were scratching my throat and I thought I was just speaking into the slight cool wind that had started rising.

My family, they never back down from a fight. And Tyler… I was sure he wouldn’t back down from this fight either.

So the last thing I expected was for him to call for peace. And the second to last was the no objection that followed.

When Cross said they should all talk, that’s when I knew.

The war is over. Finally.

I’ve never seen my dad cry, and he’s not actually crying now, but he’s as close as he’s ever gonna be, I think.

He’s holding me so tight I can’t breathe, but I don’t really need to.

“I thought I lost you, Eden,” he mutters into my hair and holds me even tighter. “I couldn’t live with that.”

I’m holding him very tightly too. “And I couldn’t live without you either. It’s why I ran down here, whatever happened, I had to try and stop it.”

He moves back, but keeps hold of my arms. “That was pretty stupid, Eden. You could’ve been killed.”

“You too,” I say in that same tone he’s using. “I couldn’t let you die for me. Not when I was perfectly fine.”

He cocks at eyebrow and glances over at Tyler, who’s looking at us very intently.

“I wouldn’t be the one dying,” he mutters.

I think he’s probably right, so I don’t say anything.

All around us, things are happening… wounded getting carried into houses, men arguing, others drinking and laughing. Some cursing and looking like this is the worst day of their lives. Others mounting their bikes and riding off leaving behind clouds of ashy dust.

But Tyler’s got eyes just for me. I smile at him, just as Dad asks: “What the hell happened to you? Do you have that, what’s it called, Stockholm Syndrome where you think your kidnapper is your friend?”

I chuckle, “You know, maybe… “

“No, no, that’s not it,” I hasten to correct myself as Ice’s face turns murderously dark. I should’ve known he’d have absolutely no sense of humor about this. The last time he saw Tyler and me together was over a video call with Joker’s knife at my throat threatening to cut me open. It’s not something he’d easily forget.

I take his hands and force him to look at me. “I’m in love with him and he’s in love with me. It was like that before he brought me here, but he needed some extra time to figure it out.”

Dad is looking at me like he thinks I might be suffering from Stockholm Syndrome after all.

“Point is, he’s been through a lot,” I say. “But he’s willing to look beyond it. For me. I think.”

Tyler is still sneaking glances at us. And I have no idea what he’s thinking. Except that I’m pretty certain he wants to hold me as much as I want to hold him.

“That kinda peace, that’s what worries me,” Dad says. “How long is it going to last?”

“Forever,” I say, looking at Tyler’s dawn blue eyes and meaning it completely.

He’s too far away to have heard, but I think he did anyway.

“I hope,” Dad says, not sounding convinced. “Now let’s call your mom and sister.”

We’re still standing in the middle of the street with everyone mulling around us. A lot of my family and friends come up to us as we start moving to the shade of one of the houses to make the call. Including Cross and my cousin Hunter, Edge, Ruin, and Chance.

“So I see you handled yourself well,” Hunter says, giving me a big hug.

“Never underestimate a bookworm, right?” I say jokingly.

“Never again, anyway,” Hunter says. “You might’ve just ended this war for us single-handedly.”

He sounds like he’s really happy it’s over too. For us, the war started when he almost got killed. The fact that they all rode to avenge him, many dying and getting hurt in the process, has been a huge weight on his shoulders.

“Yeah, let’s not celebrate this peace just yet,” Cross says. “A lot can still happen. You look well, Eden. Are you?”

I nod, but I’m sure his piercing black eyes already saw that.

“I think they’re ready to talk,” Hunter says, eying the Saloon where Tyler is now standing flanked by Scorpio, Sarge, and some of the others whose names I don’t know.

“Let’s go,” Cross says, signaling something to the other Devils gathered on Main Street.

“What did he tell them?” I asked my Dad, once it’s just the two of us again. I know that the Devils communicate with hand gestures, and I even know some of them, but not these.

“To be ready in case Joker has something more planned,” Dad says then takes his phone from his pocket and dials Mom’s number, putting her on speaker.

“Is it over?” she asks breathlessly. “Are you alive?”

“Yeah,” Dad says.

“And me too,” I say.

The silence that follows seems to suck all the air from the world. All of which then feeds my mom’s scream of joy. Joined by my sister’s.

“I told you,” Summer says. “I told you she couldn’t be dead. I would’ve known it.”

“I’m fine,” I tell them. “Actually, I’m great. Go figure that it would take getting abducted to find my the one, right?”

“It’s just like one of those old school books you love so much,” Mom says. “So, yeah, maybe we should’ve seen it coming.”

We all laugh at that, even Dad cracks a grin.

Then we talk some more, and end on the happy note that we will see each other very soon.

“I should go see what’s happening in the meeting,” Dad says. “You OK out here.”

“I’m absolutely fine,” I say.

He signals something to his brothers standing around us and I’m sure it’s instructions to watch over me. Then he crosses the street and enters the Saloon, where a lot of loud talking is going on.

And as soon as the door swings shut behind him, Tyler comes out, his eyes only for me.

“Shouldn’t you be at the meeting?” I ask as he reaches me.

His eyes are full of soft devotion and hard coldness. No idea how that mixture is even possible, but here it is.

He hugs me tight and lifts me off the ground. “That was an incredibly stupid thing you did, running out here.”

“But also genius, right?” I tease, resting my arms around his neck and smiling at him. “You’re all alive because of it, whereas if I hadn’t, you’d all be dead. So I’ll ask again, shouldn’t you be in there, making peace?”

“Not before I do this…” he says, sets me down and kisses me so deeply and passionately and well that I’m glad he’s holding me tightly, because I need that support.

He tastes like dust, but also sunlight, and freedom, and above all, the kind of love I’ve only read about until now.

The town, all those people, the war, peace, it all just swirls around us as we kiss. A whirlwind with our love the anchor to it all, the shield that saved not just us, but everyone we love too.

I break away from the kiss, which is actually one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do.

“Now go make peace so we can have more of exactly this for the rest of our lives,” I say.

“The rest of our lives?” he asks, cocking an eyebrow. “You think?”

“You don’t?” I ask.

“Oh, I do,” he says. “This life and all the next ones. I was just checking your thoughts on it.”

“My thoughts are with you,” I say and kiss him lightly again, because I can’t stop myself. “Along with everything else. Thank you for making peace. Now hurry back.”

He doesn’t go right away. Just stands there, lightly holding my waist, looking at me like he’s seeing me for the first time.

“I could never do anything to hurt you,” he finally says, softly yet firmly. “Ever.”

He seems surprised to feel that way. Yet not sorry.

“I feel the same way,” I say, stand on my toes and kiss him again.

Deeply, lastingly, in a way that makes whole lifetimes of loving each other seem like mere seconds. Good. Because we have so many more of these seconds, these lifetimes, in front of us now. And I can’t wait to get lost with him in every single one of them. From right now, until forever.