Page 35 of Eden's Joker

I laugh, but it sounds metallic and fake. I hope Scorpio is drunk enough not to notice.

“Is that what they’ve been saying?” I ask and sit down next to him. “And who’s they?”

He doesn’t say anything. Just drinks some more. Odds are good that no one said anything of the sort and it’s just Scorpio who’s been thinking it. We’ve been through a lot. As much as I hate to admit it, he can read me pretty well.

“I want her to come with me because she wants it,” I say. “And that’s gonna take a couple of extra days. Ice and the Devils are down in Texas anyway.”

“All the more reason to get it done now, while they’re gone,” he says. “I should think.”

He’s eying me sideways, trying to gauge hisreaction. I keep my eyes fixed on a scorched condom wrapper blowing around in the breeze.

“They can’t stop us,” I say and stand up. “I need a shower.”

And I don’t need to listen to any more of his doubts. I have enough of my own. It’s not just one poisonous snake in my stomach. It’s many. They multiply when I get nervous and confused. I thought they’d be gone now that I’ve begun taking the revenge I’ve lived for since I can remember. None of this sits well with me and I can’t figure out why.

“Just don’t fucking fall in love with her,” he calls after me. “That’s all I’m saying.”

He finds that incredibly funny too. I don’t.

“I don’t do love, you know that.”

Or he should. I don’t even turn to see his reaction, just continue walking away.

One more date. Two tops. Then she’s mine. Forever.

I’ll have plenty of time to dwell on stuff I don’t understand then. But it’s very unlikely I’ll ever fall in love with her. Like I told him. I don’t do love. It’s an emotion I don’t know how to feel.

21

Eden

He’s already waiting for me in front of the theater, when I arrive, leaning against the flaky grey facade of the building, one leg bent and pressed against it, wearing his usual black all over and a huge grin. He looks good enough to be in a movie. He’d play the bad boy that breaks all the girls' hearts until he finds the one who steals his. I’m thinking I’m that one girl. And that is so childish I can’t even…

But it also makes it hard to be mad at him.

“You’re early,” I say as I walk up.

“And you look amazing.”

His eyes caress me from head to toe, the gaze hot and growing hotter as it slides across my curves which the simple, floor-length black dress I’m wearing doesn’t hide in theslightest.

So. Many. Questions.

Why won’t you even kiss me for more than a minute then?

Why did you just run out the two times we did manage to kiss?

I think he senses those questions because he peels off the wall and the grin disappears from his face.

But instead of answering them, he pulls the tickets from the inside of his shirt pocket and wraps his arm around my shoulders.

“I think we should go in,” he says. “We don’t wanna get bad seats.”

I actually chortle at that.

It’s us and maybe four other people waiting to go see this movie. I almost wasn’t one of those people. He’s the one who ran out on me. Rejected me. I almost didn’t come here today. And a part of me wants to leave. He won’t talk. He won’t acknowledge what happened. He wants to just skirt by like nothing happened? I don’t think so!

But his arm around my shoulders is making me feel things which are completely at odds with all those other frustrating thoughts. Makes me feel safe and protected and like I’m the only woman for him in the whole wide world.

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