Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Don’t. Please.

Chloe’s heels bump into the steps behind her, and the ringing in her ears stemming from gunshots in too-close quarters gives way to the ghost of remembered words. Lucifer has two gnarled crescents on his back; she’s seen them. Where he made Maze cut off his apparently very literal wings before cauterizing the wounds.

What she sees now is so much worse. As though she were meeting him fresh from the torture chamber, where he’d ordered Maze to burn feathers off of every inch of his body. His skin is bright red from the damage done to his tissue. But he doesn’t seem to realize it’s happened, unconscious of any problems with his physical form. Just like that time in his penthouse, proudly showing off for her, spinning so she could admire his well-defined back, chattering easily about his scars until she’d reached out to offer him comfort.

Don’t. Please.

She draws in a sharp breath, and the pain in her chest from where she was shot only minutes prior brings everything back into focus. There is so much to do. The scene is a mess. Pierce is…yeah, he’s dead. Her former fiance-slash-boss killed, it seems, by her almost lover-slash-partner, a known jealous party. And there are feathers? All over the ground. So much extra blood, unexplained by any of the other bodies. The bullet in her vest means they have a shot at selling this as self-defense—the truth!—but not if Lucifer is—

Scarred. Let’s not be overly dramatic, she tells herself. He is covered in scars. Burning, red, puckered, painful. Every inch of him a caricature of healing flesh.

Because he is the Devil.

“It’s all true.”

Her gaze flits away from him again, back to the chaos of the scene. Just so much to do. No matter the neighborhood, a shoot-out like this will have police arriving soon, and it’ll be so much worse for them if they don’t call it in. Hell, Dan’s probably already sent help their way, following her hasty phone call. Best case scenario, a short suspension interspersed with several mountains of paperwork. Paperwork she won’t be doing alone this time, so help her G—Lucifer.

“Detective,” she hears from somewhere far away.

She looks at him again. Decides to act.

“Put that away.”

He’s confused, utterly unrecognizable in form but completely the same in expression, his demeanor making him seem more familiar to her now than he had been months earlier, when he’d sat her down with great concern and tried to show her something. To show her this, presumably.

“That,” she waves her hand, encompassing his visage. “Put it away. We have to—to figure this out. It’s…” Terrifying? Impossibly sad? Rage inducing? Self-hatred inspiring? Chloe Decker is a woman who works hard at being satisfied with herself following a rocky start in the self-esteem ravaging world of teen movie stardom, but when her eyes flit over this new face, sins she hasn’t thought of in years slink towards the foreground of her mind.

Lucifer reaches a hand up, touches his cheek, and recoils. “No! Detective, look away. Please, you shouldn’t—”

He turns, and she knows what’s about to happen. This motherfucker is going to run. Again.

“Stay right there.” She says it calm, cold. “Stay there. Put that—face—away. If what you’ve been saying this whole time has been true, well, all of that Godly stuff can keep another few hours. Look at the scene. We’ll need to explain it.”

“I—” He stops on command, appears to struggle with himself. His hands return to normal, but he seems to be having difficulty with his face. “I killed him,” he confesses, looking at Pierce.

“I figured. Those feathers—they’re yours.” Her mind churns through old, confusing pieces of conversation. “Your wings are back. You flew me out?” Clever Detective, he’s called her so many times, but she’s been sloppy this year, both too reliant on his uncanny abilities and intentionally blind to any number of giant red flags that would have forced her to examine her own life more closely. She can feel her brain clocking into overdrive right now to make up for it. She doesn’t think she’s ever needed to be more clever. Satan is looking at her.

“If the forensic techs see those feathers, the blood—is that going to cause problems? Do we need to do something about them?”

“Uh, I suppose.” He looks at the mess on the floor as though genuinely surprised it’s there. He starts to bend down towards some of the feathers, only to stop short with a hiss, curling his torso inward.

Right, blood on the feathers. “You’re injured. Anywhere we need to take care of right now?”

He doesn’t look at her. “No, Detective. I’ll manage.”

This is one of those things he is technically not lying about, but hey, maybe she’s not as good at reading his honesty as she’d thought. He’d been telling the truth about being the Devil, after all.

But no. Even when she hadn’t believed him, it had been clear he’d believed himself. She can’t have been wrong about everything. “Don’t move if it hurts. I’ll figure something out. The feathers, your blood—are they dangerous to humans?”

She’s never seen him look more confused. “You shouldn’t have to see me—”

“Later,” she snaps, well and truly out of patience. “I am telling you what I need from you right now. Multiple casualties, an LAPD lieutenant dead, Devil blood and feath—angel feathers, right, on the ground, one bullet in my vest, a bunch of holes with no corresponding wounds in your shirt. This scene is a mess, and we need to be able to explain it. Will your blood and feathers hurt the crime scene techs? Think of Ella walking in here, she goes to take some samples, is she gonna be all right?”

“The blood isn’t a problem. Your lab had some of it before. The feathers…they’re ruined, broken.” His voice is so distant. The ringing in her ears is back. “The divinity should have drained out, if it was ever there. I don’t think these new wings carry it quite like the originals did.” He’s holding himself very still, head canted away from her. A patch of human looking skin has returned to the cheek she can see, but he’s still mostly red.

“Then we leave it. Someone asks where the feathers came from, we say ‘I don’t know.’ You got that?”

“I don’t lie, Detective.” Some of his personality comes back as he utters that familiar phrase. Even covered with magical, burning flesh, his word matters to him. He manipulates, role plays, will elide the truth for the sake of a joke, but no bald-faced deception. Chloe Decker catalogs the first natural law of the new world she finds herself in. Number one: the devil does not lie.

How someone can be so self-effacing and so difficult at the same time… ”Then you tell anyone who asks that they must have come from my guardian angel.”

“Detective.” Agony dwells in the twist of his lips. “I am not an a—I will always protect—”

“Later,” she says again, tone even harsher than before. Caring Chloe Decker is not available at the moment. Tactical Chloe is doing the thinking right now. “Okay, we put me back where I was when I got shot. We…we rip up your shirt so the bullet wounds aren’t so obvious.” She evaluates him again and finally notices that the bullet holes aren’t the only damage his outfit has taken. She reaches a hand towards his arm automatically before reeling herself back. “You—is that a knife wound?”

He clasps his hand over the cut on his bicep. “Just a scratch; pay it no mind.”

“So sometimes you bleed and sometimes you don’t.”

“Yes, it has to do with—”

“Later, Lucifer. Explanations later. Right now, could we make you bleed more on purpose?”

He stumbles backward. “You want to—but of course you do. I swear to you, Detective, I would never hurt—”

“Shut up and listen to me for one God damned—one you damned second, Lucifer. Devil shit, later. Huge pool of your blood. We need a source for it that isn’t your wings.”

He huffs, a bit of himself seeming to seep back into his carriage. “You’re just feeling nostalgic for the time you shot me, aren’t you?”

“Well, I’m hoping to get a bracelet to match the necklace you gave me.”

A genuine laugh. Good. Amused Lucifer is much easier to herd than self-loathing Lucifer.

“I suppose I could, er, aggravate my knife wound a bit.” Naturally, the rest of his skin regains its human-like coloring and texture as he talks about maiming himself.

“Right.” No time for sympathy. “And we make the holes in your shirt pass for cuts. You—you actually have supernatural charm. Literally. Right? So you use that to brainwash the techs into not looking too closely at your outfit.”

“I don’t brainwash—”

“Doesn’t matter. You’ll control the evidence of your clothing, yes?”

His shoulders drop. His fingers futz with the mess of his shirt. “Yes, Detective. I can be quite persuasive.”

Bizarre to hear him utter those familiar words without a hint of innuendo to them. “Good. And a little more blood from your arm—it won’t explain all of it, not really, but Ella knows about the whole Sinnerman thing. She’ll help us cover, believe we have a reason for it. Which we do. This is self-defense. We just need to make sure everyone else understands that.”

Self-defense, she repeats to herself. Two years before, she had ripped apart her entire life because Palmetto Street had looked wrong to her, and she’d needed to do something to make a dent in the mountain of corruption propping up the LAPD. Now she was doing a half-assed job at staging a crime scene in order to protect Satan, who has for some time now been one of the most important people—divine beings?—in her life. Luckily, for the definition of luck that includes her having ended up in this situation at all, there are plenty of obviously criminal men lying about the floor of the loft, holding guns and looking generally like bad news. Her mind reframes them—these are not casualties; they are suspects.

“We say that there was a power struggle. When we found Pierce, he was already arguing with his men. It was clear he was in trouble, in danger of being caught. Potential power vacuum leading to internal strife. Lots of bullets flying in lots of directions. You got hit with a dagger, I shot Pierce, trying to protect you,” not a lie, not a lie, she wasn’t a dirty cop, “and took a bullet for my trouble. You managed to drag me out of the way, and we sheltered in place. We were able to, um, out-survive the rest of them.”

“And you are quite uninjured?” Lucifer asks, ignoring the rest of it.

She rubs her chest—getting shot hurts, even with a vest on, and she knows tomorrow is going to be agony, but no reason not to make use of the adrenaline coursing through her while she has access to it.

“I’ll manage,” she says, parroting him, and he flinches. “Come on, I’ll—here, I was standing here when that guy shot me, right? Then, I fell, like this.” She allows herself to collapse to the ground. “Okay, at this point, I’m unconscious, knocked out by the force of the blow and the fall. So, in our re-imagining of the scene, you pull me away. Come on, drag me behind that pillar, so the blood smear shows.”

He raises his hands, but makes no move to touch her, leaving her staring up at him, uncomfortably aware that her clothes are soaking up his spilled blood. “Lucifer, if we don’t have a plausible story, they’re going to think you murdered an LAPD lieutenant in a fit of rage. They’ll think I’m an accomplice. With Charlotte’s evidence, we have a shot of convincing everyone of the truth, but not if we also have to convince them of actual freaking Cain from the bible running around battling actual Satan. Unless you want to show the entire precinct your Devil face?”

“No, you’re right, of course,” he says at last, leaning down. “I…I promise this will only take a moment, then.”

He touches her so gently, more gently than at any time in the entirety of their friendship, his palms a whisper of weight against her arms. He focuses on where his fingers are brushing against her jacket, then closes his eyes, exhales once, and abruptly a bear-trap grip wrenches her across the floor to mock-safety behind one of the room’s pillars. He lets go of her instantly, stumbling backwards to get away from her faster.

“Are you all right?” he asks, nonsensically, and she rolls her eyes as she pushes herself upright to survey the results of their bit of theater.

“No,” she says honestly, “but it’d be pretty strange if I were at this point. Okay, so you dragged me behind the pillar. We shelter, there’s more shooting between the bad guys. Then—what? How did the fight with Pierce end?”

Lucifer is staring at her pant legs, now dark with his blood. There are even a couple of feathers stuck onto her. “He had the knife on him, cut my arm, managed to get the knife to my throat, but I caught his hand, twisted his wrist around so that the blade went into him rather than me.”

“Good. Excellent. No edits needed. Self-defense, clear-cut. I need to call this in now. Are you okay to deal with other people?”

“It’d be pretty strange if I were at this point,” he returns. “But yes, make your call. I just need to grab the dagger—”

“Lucifer, that’s evidence!”

Finally, he looks her directly in the eyes, brows arched, and she feels like an idiot, because of course she’s already tampered with all sorts of evidence.

“Right, I know,” she blurts, moving forward, forward, can’t dwell on any of that right now, “but we need the murder weap—the self-defense weapon. The blade.”

“Detective, I’m willing to put on this little play with you if you think it necessary, but I cannot allow a hell-forged blade to fall into the hands of the LAPD.”

She admits that sounds bad. “All right. Slight edit. So you kill Pierce, but one of his henchmen is still around. He grabs the knife, tries to continue the fight against you, but when it becomes clear he’ll lose, he makes a getaway. Tall, white guy. We didn’t see his face.”

“And who is it we’re framing for my misdeeds?” So bitter, his tone and his eyes both. His shoulders are hunched, his fingers flexing. He’s miserable.

Enough of that. “You, we’re framing you, because you don’t lie, so tall, white guy, and you couldn’t exactly see your own face at the time, could you? And not misdeeds, necessary actions. You acted the way you had to.” Self-defense, the mantra drones on in her head.

There’s a flash of amusement in his eyes as she explains the trick behind her description of their fake perp, but he shuts down again when she offers him an excuse for killing Pierce. This entire year, things between them have been a push-pull of sweetness and pain; looks like upsetting her entire worldview has done nothing to restore their equilibrium.

“But you can’t have the blade on you when backup gets here. Can you disappear it? Make it go wherever your wings go?”

“No.” Apparently that was a stupid question, but how is she supposed to know what can and cannot be disappeared into thin air? “I will take it elsewhere,” he says.

“You aren’t leaving.” She practically screams it, and he turns fully away from her again. His back and shoulders are twitching; he is in pain, multiple levels of it, she would guess, and he clearly no longer wants to be here.

“I…you won’t notice I’m gone. If you truly wish me here—”

“You don’t get to abandon me with all of this.”

He doesn’t understand her, that’s clear. But he nods. “Very well. Close your eyes a moment. Please, Detective. I won’t come any closer to you.”

She chuckles nervously, because what the fuck did he mean by that, and closes her eyes. A burst of air brushes her left cheek, then another crosses her right, followed by the sound of him grunting in pain. She opens her eyes again to see him stumbling to his knees in front of her, ravaged wings raised behind him. The blade is gone.

He catches her looking. “I said—”

“Sorry, I’m sorry.” She closes her eyes tight again, giving him privacy. “I’m sorry, Lucifer,” she whispers, hearing him hiss as another puff of air wafts her way.

“That’s—they’re gone. You can look again. If you want.”

She opens her eyes instantly. He’s so pale, looking as though he really has been through a gun fight followed by a knife fight and barely come out ahead. The wound on his arm has worsened, and a spreading stain mars the sleeve of his jacket.

Behind him, somewhere she can’t see, dozens of bullet wounds have left weeping red trails on the splendor of his wings.

Time to call backup.

Roughly an hour later, Chloe’s given her initial statement and been cleared by the paramedics. She hasn’t talked to Lucifer since the first of the uniformed officers arrived, has barely looked at him, careful to avoid the impression that she’s concerned about what he might be saying. Removed from the immediacy of the scene, she’s starting to feel a bit foolish. The actual devil. Satan himself. What would it matter if the LAPD did think he murdered Pierce? Was that something that could even become a problem for him? Just how potent is his mojo trick, anyway? Clearly it really does work on other people; she doesn’t know whether to be grateful or afraid that she’s immune.

Off to her left, she hears the sound of yet another car door slamming, announcing more new arrivals. Her hearing is practically back to normal. Small blessings, she thinks as she turns her head, then has a brief white-out moment when she remembers that ‘blessings’ is yet another piece of her vocabulary that has become distressingly literal. She shivers at the thought of God judging her, deciding at this very instant whether she deserves the blessing of unruptured eardrums. Later, tactical Chloe commands. When you’re not busy covering up some very suspicious self-defense.

The new arrivals are dressed in identically ill-fitting black suits, though the woman of the pair has clearly upgraded her standard-issue sunglasses for something a bit more stylish. Feds. Of course; an LAPD lieutenant had led an international crime syndicate and then died in dramatic fashion. She imagines a lot of different agencies are going to become involved in the Sinnerman’s aftermath. She steels herself, ready for another round of questions, but the two agents don’t even look her way. They stop for a moment to speak to a uniform, then turn towards where the responding ambulances are parked. Chloe can see the bandaged head of one of Pierce’s surviving henchmen, conscious but concussed. She knows that at least one of Pierce’s men did die from friendly fire—strengthening her cover-up—but it had been foolish of her to forget that there were living witnesses to the incident whose statements she could not control. She really will be relying on her fellow law enforcement professionals deciding her word, no matter how false, is still worth more than that of an obvious criminal.

So much for not being a dirty cop, she thinks.

She still has one of Lucifer’s feathers, rescued from the waistband of her now confiscated jeans, where it had become lodged after she made him drag her through his blood. It’s small, no more than an inch and a half long, and ends in a jagged break at the top of the rachis. The barbs look like they should be soft, but instead they’ve the budding sharpness of young cactus’s needles. He’s prickly all over, she thinks.

“Detective Decker.”

She flinches, stuffing the feather into the pocket of her borrowed sweat pants with one hand while the other automatically reaches for a weapon that has already been confiscated as evidence.

“Whoa,” the newcomer says, hands raised. “Easy, shooter.”

Chloe flinches again, taking in the woman’s easy smile, round cheeks, short, sensible hair, and shoes that are just on the correct side of the dress code from being sneakers.

“Detective Bauda,” the woman says, reaching out to shake hands. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have approached from your blind spot like that. I know you’ve had a long day.”

“No, I’m just…” Chloe waves a hand in front of her face, then reaches out to take the other woman’s hand. “How can I help you, Detective Bauda?”

“I’ve got a few questions.” The woman smiles apologetically and leans into Chloe’s personal space. “Internal Affairs.”

“Oh!” Chloe had known this interview was coming, had been thinking about it before the feds distracted her. “Of course. Um, I already gave my initial statement. I should probably get a union rep before I say anything else.”

“Do you need a rep?” Bauda asks, eyebrows raised in a very convincing mockery of surprise. “It looks like a pretty clear cut situation. You did take a bullet.”

“I did. And my lieutenant ordered the shot. I’m sure Internal Affairs understands that I’m a bit wary of my fellow officers right now.”

“Internal Affairs is always wary of your fellow officers. But I understand. I was able to speak with your partner, though; he wasn’t as reticent as you are.”

Chloe snorts. “Lucifer? Yeah, I imagine he answered every question you asked and several that you didn’t.”

“Oh, good. I didn’t want to cause any tension between the two of you. You know, if you’d been hoping he’d wait so you both spoke only through representation. I understand your partnership is a remarkably close one.”

Chloe ‘hmms’ in response, non-committal.

“In fact, the rumor mill has me wondering why the two of you haven’t filled out one of those HR disclosure of relationship forms.”

“Contrary to rumor, I don’t actually sleep with every man I work with.”

“Only some of them, then.” Bauda nods as if this information is very illuminating. “Well, as you like, Detective Decker. We’ll set up a formal interview when you’re released from the scene and get back to the station.”

Shame burns at the back of Chloe’s throat as she watches Bauda walk away. It doesn’t abate when her gaze runs into Lucifer, lounging against a wall several yards away, cigarette dangling from his right hand. His jacket and shirt are now evidence, and he has of course chosen to remain topless, bare but for the bandage placed on his arm by the paramedics. He never allows himself to be tended to when injured on a case, but here he’s aggravated the wound and played up his blood loss, all at her command. He isn’t looking at her, but the clench of his jaw makes her think he is aware of her attention.

Anger, targetless, settles into her limbs, and she has to shake her hands to keep from forming fists. He’s hurt, she’s hurt, and there are still hours of questions and responsibilities left in the day.

So she contacts her union rep, returns to the station, meets with the feds, with detectives from a different LAPD precinct, with Bauda and her IA partner, one Detective Field. She writes up her own initial report, crosses the ‘T’s and dots the ‘I’s on some of her other outstanding paperwork—she has a feeling she’s not going to be allowed access to her files for at least a few days, and hates the idea of anything unfinished hanging over her. At some point, first Ella, then Dan find her. Ella’s hug is brief but expected.

“I’m doing what I can,” Ella reassures her when Chloe asks how things are going, “but that scene is crazy. What’s with all the feathers?”

“They surprised me, too,” Chloe says, taking a page from Lucifer’s book of misleading via the truth, and Ella has time for little more than a ‘buck up’ pat to the shoulder before she is sucked back into the world of evidence decoding.

Dan, she outright lies to. “I’m fine,” she reassures him, but “I’m not,” he admits, and it breaks her heart to think of all he’s had to go through to get to a point where he can admit that. Tactical Chloe is still in charge, though, so she plays up her sympathy for Dan’s feelings and successfully manipulates him into agreeing to 1) take some of his leave time, 2) with Trixie, 3) at his parents’, so he can be around family to help him deal with Charlotte and everything else, and, more importantly, so Trixie will be safely out of the way while whatever is going to happen to Chloe over the next few days unfolds. She knows she should be there for both of them—Trixie had cared about Charlotte, too, and might even have felt something for Pierce—but Chloe’s own brain is too overrun with thoughts like, “Who the fuck had Charlotte been?” to be of any comfort to anyone else right now.

Throughout all of it, Chloe catches glimpses of Lucifer. They are kept apart during questioning, obviously, but she can already tell that things are not going to go for him the way they’re going to go for her. Their colleagues cosset Lucifer, bringing him coffee and vending machine snacks, patting his back and smiling at him sympathetically. Her, well, she’s already heard three people refer to Palmetto Street. She’s never been well-liked, between being a woman and a former half-nude actress and a stick-in-the-mud when it comes to procedure. Pierce hadn’t been loved, but he’d been a cop through and through. Sure, there is evidence against him, but people discount evidence all the time. She certainly had.

She watches as Lucifer smiles charmingly at Officer Arroz, insisting on sharing some of his cool ranch puffs with her, then watches as his face goes blank again when the officer leaves, his personality switching to dormant, tucked into storage until the next bit of socialization required of him. Again and again, she sees him boot himself up and shut himself back down. He doesn’t look at her once, and she gives him space until Captain Monroe clears her to go home.

Chloe approaches Lucifer diagonally, letting him see her but not forcing him to look at her head-on. “Looks like we’re done for the day.”

“I heard. No immediate charges against us, at any rate.”

“Just suspension. With pay, though.”

“Yes, of course. You humans and your money.” He says it as a challenge.

“Trixie eats too much chocolate cake; I’ve gotta be able to pay her dentist. Are you okay to go home? Do you…will you need help with your injuries? The ones the paramedics couldn’t help with?”

“Everything will heal. You needn’t concern yourself, Detective. No lasting damage done, I’m sure.”

“Well. Good.” She twists her fingers together. “I guess that’s everything.”

“Indeed.”

She sighs. Abruptly, her ponytail is too tight; her head hurts. “Good night, Lucifer.”

He nods, acceptance settling across his features. “Goodbye, Detective.”

She turns towards her desk to grab her purse, and when she turns back he’s gone.

It’s after eleven when she shuts her apartment door behind Dan, Trixie latched sleepily to his side. Dishes wait in the sink. Mail sits unsorted on the table. Some of Trixie’s art supplies sit out on the coffee table, and one of her roller skates lies haphazardly just outside her bedroom door. Nothing’s a mess, really, it’s just the normal detritus scattered about a home where a child lives and cleanup has to wait until after her bed time. It still feels like a mountain of work to get through. Tactical Chloe has reached her limit; she tries to hand the ball to nightly chores Chloe, but fumbles the pass. Fuck-this-shit Chloe takes command.

Lucifer has, over time, secreted bottles of alcohol throughout her home, including some whiskey that sits cheekily in her pantry between the flour and the sugar, looking perfectly at home amongst her kitchen essentials. She grabs it and takes a swig as she walks up the stairs, another as she shucks off her clothing at the side of her bed, and another as she turns on the shower in the master bath. The bottle joins her under the spray; she’s not drinking for the taste, so it doesn’t matter if the liquor gets a bit watered down. She and her whiskey huddle down on the floor of the tub, her shoulders pressed firmly into one corner, knees drawn up to her chest, as she makes herself as small as possible.

Can God see her? Is she being watched, always being watched? Can her dad see her? How ashamed of her is he right now?

She’d almost let the Sinnerman become Trixie’s step-dad. Lucifer may have ultimately killed Pierce, but Chloe had sure tried.

She needs to spend more time at the range. Pathetic to graze someone from that distance—and Pierce had so much center mass to aim for!

Could God hear her lamenting that she hadn’t killed a man who only last week she’d been convinced she loved? Does prayer work?

“Fuck off if anyone’s listening,” she says, just for good measure. At least she knows Maze isn’t around to break out the popcorn while Chloe falls apart. Her sometimes roommate is a demon—guess that explains why her so called fellow tribe member hadn’t warned her about the whole Cain deal.

Chloe is never leaving Trixie with a babysitter again.

Just with Dan, the corrupt cop who gaslit his wife into believing she was incompetent and delusional.

Well, Chloe is a corrupt cop now, too, and she’d behaved both delusionally and incompetently in allowing the Sinnerman into her bed, so. Point Dan.

Eventually the water grows too cold to bear, so she drags herself and her bottle to bed. She sleeps in fits, waking again and again to glare up at the ceiling, at anyone who might be looking down upon her. When she wakes for the final time, still an hour before dawn, it is to a memory, the image sharp and merciless in her head. Lucifer’s face, the red, scarred, scary one, captured in a metallic reflection, minutes before she shoots him. It really is all true.

And she’s been lying to herself about it for years.

Chapter Text

The whiskey does nothing but leave her dehydrated and tired, so Chloe ditches the liquor the next morning in favor of some ibuprofen. Her chest hurts, with tendrils of soreness reaching out from where she’d been shot to contaminate her shoulders, her arms, her back. Pain makes her body a stranger; memory makes the world so.

Is cleanliness really next to Godliness, she wonders, staring down at the dishes in her sink. She’d intended to make some coffee, but the leftover mess from yesterday’s breakfast had distracted her. It doesn’t seem important to wash up. It doesn’t seem important to do much of anything. Her whole life is just a…just a blip. Lucifer’s been alive since before the earth, she thinks. Probably. She doesn’t really know, she realizes. Her brief interaction with tabloid fame taught her that second hand accounts are often wrong, especially when those accounts are intended to generate money, which. Isn’t the Catholic Church ridiculously wealthy? She recalls a news story about one of the popes wearing Prada shoes. Maybe organized religion and Lucifer get along better than she knows?

She refocuses on coffee, but again gets distracted when she opens the bag of grounds. Lucifer had bought her this blend, because he hated her mega-sized supermarket tin and because he’d gradually come to accept that she wasn’t going to take the extra time to grind her own beans in the morning, so this had been a compromise. For the definition of compromise where she’d told him not to buy her groceries and he insisted that he needed to have something to drink when he visited and bought it anyway. Natural law of Chloe’s new world number two: Satan is finicky. A snob, she thinks at first, but no, his stupid cool ranch puffs wouldn’t appeal to a true snob. He’s just particular. Specific about his coffee and his whiskey, about the cut of his suits and the organization of his home.

Maze is none of these things. So, not a Hell-based trait, just something that’s part of him.

She leaves the bag of coffee grounds open and wanders over to her couch, wasting an hour in meandering thought. Eventually she manages enough energy to check her phone. There are numerous missed texts and calls, mostly from Linda, who seems to be worried that Pierce might be dangerous, something to do with Maze. Chloe laughs, the sound swallowed by her quiet apartment. She doesn’t read the rest of her messages, just texts Linda to see if she wants to meet and goes upstairs, knowing it will take her a while to get dressed.

Linda suggests Chloe come to her, but Maze is there, so Chloe insists on a neutral location. They meet at a cafe, Chloe finding she’s still able to appreciate a caffeine fix she doesn’t have to prepare herself. It takes a moment to reassure Linda that no one other than Pierce has been permanently injured, and for Chloe to get up the nerve to ask the question she came here to ask.

“So, how do hallucinations work?”

Linda blinks in surprise. “Hallucinations?”

“Yeah, like visual, auditory hallucinations? If you were having them, would they seem…I mean, would they just slide into your life? Would you be able to tell something was happening?”

“Do you think you’re having hallucinations?”

Chloe laughs. “Maybe I hope I am? I don’t know, Linda. Have you ever wondered if maybe Lucifer’s telling the truth?”

“Ah.” Linda grows quiet, spends some time rearranging the sugar packet holder sitting on the table between them. “Did you see something that makes you think Lucifer is telling the truth?”

Chloe takes another drink of coffee, fiddles with the hem of her sleeve. “He has another face,” she says at last, committing. If one of her friends is going to think she’s crazy, it might as well be the licensed therapist. “I think I saw another face. And there were feathers, Linda. Like from wings.”

Linda blinks. “Oh. I haven’t seen the wings.”

Chloe’s gaze snaps up to meet Linda’s. “But you’ve seen the face. Red. Scarred.”

“With flaming eyes, yes.”

Chloe hadn’t noticed the eyes. “So if it’s a hallucination, your words here are part of it now.”

Linda smiles wryly. “At a certain point, to get by in this world, you have to start believing some of the things you see and hear. I can’t guarantee we’re not both suffering from some sort of shared celestial delusion, but I don’t think that’s the assumption you should be operating under.”

Chloe nods, turns her cup in her hands. “How long have you known.”

“Roughly a year and a half.”

“Oh.”

They sit in silence, not exactly companionable.

“I was bound by doctor patient confidentiality,” Linda offers at last. “I couldn’t say anything about it to you. Also, I didn’t know if you’d believe me.”

“So you know about Maze, then, too?”

“I do. She’s…Maze is very upfront about who she is. If you’ve been comfortable around her until now, then her demon nature won’t change things.”

“She’s been lying to me.”

“About being a demon?”

“About Pierce.”

Another silence, this one even more awkward.

“Did you know about Pierce? About Cain?”

Linda tilts her head to the side, studying Chloe. “I knew some things. I knew he was Cain. I did not know what he planned to do.”

“But you knew I planned to marry him. God, Linda, I—”

She remembers her awful bachelorette party, Linda drunkenly flirting with shirtless young men while Maze pushed Chloe towards marriage and Charlotte of all people seemed to be counseling caution. “Who was Charlotte, exactly?” she asks. She thinks she sounds very calm.

“Well, she was Lucifer’s mother for a while. Then she was just a regular person again. I’m not entirely certain how it all worked.”

His mother. Did that mean an aspect of God, or was she a separate Goddess? Theology had never been an interest of Chloe’s; she resents its current relevance to her life. “But regular person Charlotte knew about…everything.”

“Yes. She remembered being in Hell.”

“Oh!” Chloe hadn’t expected that, feels a full body spasm of sympathy for the woman. “Oh. So she really did know everything. Does Ella?”

“Not that I’m aware.”

“Okay. So, you. Maze. Charlotte. But not Ella. I have a handful of female friends in this world. One is dead, two encouraged me to marry a murderer, and I’m lying to the last one. Wonderful.” Chloe stands abruptly. “I have to go.”

“Chloe, wait. It’s all, um, complicated—”

“Yes, very, I’m sure. I have to go.”

She stumbles awkwardly out of the coffee shop, returns to her car, but doesn’t know what to do after that. She starts driving, so there’s no risk of Linda following her out to continue their conversation, but once she gets going she finds herself just aimlessly turning down the same streets over and over. The precinct hasn’t contacted her. She could call Trixie, but doesn’t trust her Mom-mode to engage properly just now. She spots a drugstore coming up on her right and pulls into the parking lot, not sure what she’s planning until she finds herself inside at the cash register, purchasing bundles of bandages, anti-septic, and anything else that looks like it belongs in a first aid kit.

He said he’d be fine, that he’d heal without aide. Probably what she’s doing now won’t matter any more than washing the dishes languishing in her sink. But it feels more important. So she goes to Lux.

It’s barely 10am, but the doors are open. Of course. Because Lucifer doesn’t believe in home security. The main floor is empty, not even the cleaners standing between her and the elevator to the penthouse. She keeps her eyes closed on the ride up. It hadn’t occurred to her until she’d arrived that Lucifer might not be here, that he might have retreated to Vegas again, or somewhere even further away, and it is difficult to convince herself to look when the elevator doors open.

She breathes out in relief—no white sheets cover his furniture. Not that the penthouse is exactly in it’s usual state. Lucifer’s shoes, socks, and pants—the sum remaining total of his outfit last she’d seen him—had clearly been kicked off the moment he returned home and remain in a little pile against the side of the bar. On top of the bar, five neat lines of coke lay out, an untouched offering. A scattering of unsmoked joints have been left beside a full tumbler of whiskey. A second undrunk tumbler is on the coffee table, and she can see a third out on the balcony. A still sealed bottle of Macallan lazes on the couch. A well used ashtray sits on top of the piano, but the cigarettes filling it could not rightly be called smoked—all appear to have been lit and then stubbed out immediately. Broken, abandoned feathers mark a path between each of Lucifer’s unused coping mechanisms.

All of it is splattered with blood. It’s as though a pack of dogs had been sent swimming in a sanguine lake and then let loose to shake themselves dry all over Lucifer’s home. Maybe he’d been overstating his healing abilities.

Chloe hefts her shopping bags and walks further into the apartment. He’s not in the bedroom, but she can see through his closet to where the bathroom door is closed. She passes beneath the watchful presence of his Armanis and Burberries and Pradas, conscious of the polyester nature of her own outfit, the only sound the crinkling of the plastic bags from the drugstore. She hesitates to knock on the bathroom door; it feels almost like she’s back on set, waiting between takes, existing in a space where everything that happened in the previous scene happened to a character, someone she doesn’t have to be again until the director calls action. There’s no director, though, just the rap of her own knuckles against wood calling both Lucifer and herself back into the moment.

A bitter laugh emerges from behind the door. “Mazikeen. I was wondering whether you’d have the courage to drag yourself back here.”

“Uh, no. It’s me. Chloe.”

There’s a soft thump, followed by a crash and then the door shakes as though he’s stumbled into it from the other side. Silence settles over the morning, which he appears unwilling to break.

“I, um, I didn’t know if you had a first aide kit? I brought some stuff.”

Another moment of quiet, then forced laughter. “I told you I would be all right, Detective. You needn’t trouble yourself.”

“Lucifer there’s…you’ve lost a lot of blood.” She can feel some of it, dry and flaking, on the door beneath where she’s rested her palm.

Something slides against the other side of the door, but it remains closed. “I’ll make more.”

She gulps, a sad little choked sound. “Lucifer, please. Open the door. I don’t—I’m not okay with any of it, yet. I’m not. But I need to do something. I guess I have to believe you when you say you’re the devil, now, but for over two years you’ve just been my friend. People’s feelings—well, maybe some people can change their feelings that quickly, but I can’t. I can’t just leave you hurt and alone.”

“No, I suppose we wouldn’t be in this mess if you were that sort of person, now, would we?”

The weight of his body leaves the door, and she hears shuffling sounds like he’s straightening things up a bit. A faucet runs, water splashes. It doesn’t help; he looks shattered when he opens the door.

He has his human skin on, normal brown eyes fixed on a point somewhere above her head. Droplets of water gather on his chin and at his hairline from where he’d scrubbed his face. The droplets on his hands have a decidedly pinkish hue, but she doesn’t see any bleeding. He’s wearing nothing other than a pair of red silk lounge pants, allowing her to see that the cut on his arm has completely healed. His wings have been put away wherever it is they go. His right arm, propped against the door frame, trembles slightly, and his naked torso cues her in to the rapid state of his breathing.

Chloe shifts her weight from foot to foot, nervous. She doesn’t know if she’s in danger, but he certainly seems more afraid than she is. Motherhood has taught her that sometimes the best way to calm down a panicky kid is by acting as though she knows exactly what to do, so she puts on her best cop-like ‘situation handled’ expression and nudges him out of the doorway with her shoulder, brushing past him to deposit her bags on the vanity.

“I don’t know how well traditional bandages will work on your wings, but I think—Lucifer, your back!”

She can see it in the mirror, one long, weeping gash below his left shoulder blade, where one of his scars used to be. Scars that are gone now, not faded but repaired as though they never existed. “Did you cut yourself?”

She reaches for him, but he dances back out of reach. “Superficial injury, detective. A foolish urge on my part—I didn’t want to keep what I don’t deserve, but then I remembered how vital my wings were during the action yesterday and thought better of it. It will heal on its own.”

“You keep saying that.” She presses the balls of her thumbs against her eyes, then shakes out her hands. “Is that what happened with your scars? Did they just need to heal, or were they like your de—” she stumbles over the word, “devil face? Can you make them appear whenever you want? Did you want me to see them that time?”

“My scars? No, those went away when my wings came back. A bit confusing for a human, I’m sure, but standard for a celestial body, I assure you.” He’s trying to match his usual insouciance, but he still won’t meet her gaze and his back is now carefully angled out of view.

“Right. Wings,” she says to herself. No more extraneous questions; she’s here for a reason. “I didn’t think to bring any towels—do you have cloths you don’t mind getting bloody?”

“As you can see, Detective, I’m functioning well under my own power. You don’t—”

“Cloths, Lucifer. Washcloths, towels, clean rags. What can I use?”

He rolls his head back and forth for a moment, jaw tight, but he obediently opens a cabinet and pulls out a stack of black washcloths for her.

“Good. These are good. Could you…here, sit on the toilet facing the wall, so I can reach your back.” She points him to where she wants him and returns to the sink as though she expects him to comply without further objections. Surprisingly, he does, getting himself settled while she stoppers the sink and fills the bowl with warm water. The washcloths are downy soft, luxurious in the same way each piece of his home is, everything selected to subtly improve the occupant’s quality of life. Yes, finicky, she thinks, wetting the cloth. Which is just another way of saying he knows what he wants. At some point, Lucifer had possessed a very specific idea of what his life should look like and he’d gone about making the world bend to his vision. That was the sort of quality that could be terrifying in any person, let alone the devil, but it also meant he wouldn’t have spent so much of his time hanging out at the police station, watching her do paperwork, or sitting next to her on stakeouts, flagrantly bored but unwilling to leave, if she weren’t something he wanted in his life. He’d selected her, just as he had his silk sheets and hundred year old whiskey and Italian marble floors. To what purpose, she doesn’t know. She remembers that aborted dinner a few weeks ago, his penthouse staged like the set of some hack romantic movie, all the cliches present. He hadn’t been able to tell her what he wanted from her, but he had absolutely wanted. She can’t trust him not to manipulate her, but she believes that he doesn’t consciously mean her harm.

When she turns back to him, her eyes catch on something left on the floor in his shower. “I really hope you cleaned Marcus’s blood off of that before you used it on yourself.”

Lucifer leans back briefly to study the discarded dagger, then returns to staring at the wall, not responding. An answer in and of itself.

“Ew, gross, Lucifer,” she says reflexively, and then blushes at his huff of laughter.

“I shall try to remember your tender sensibilities the next time I attempt a wing-ectomy.”

“Hey, no more trying to cut off any of your limbs. I don’t think you know what you’re doing.” The cut looks ghastly, a ragged flap of skin partially peeled back to expose his gory insides.

“Believe it or not I actually have quite a bit of practice. They kept growing back, you see, and Maze wouldn’t help, no matter how much she otherwise appears to wish me harm.”

Chloe wants to scold him, order him not to hurt himself again, but understands that there’s a great deal going on in his life that she has no concept of. So she returns to the task at hand. After snapping on a pair of nitrile gloves, she holds the damp washcloth a hair’s breadth away from the skin of his lower back, granting him a moment to get used to its heat before she begins stroking it over his skin. It’s a bit mesmerizing, really, the shush of the cloth moving over planes of muscle and the delicate bumps of his spine. He looks so human, skin clammy and trembling and real. Clearly flesh and blood. She’s familiar with the sweep of his back—he is not modest about his body—but she has never mapped it. Their relationship has been so fitful, so full of stops and starts that the moments of tenderness between them have all felt short-lived. There’s a sort of honor in being allowed to tend to him. To boss him into submitting to her washcloth. He would not have allowed this two years ago. Wouldn’t have allowed it from anyone else. It feels good to be able to do this for someone so reluctant to let his walls down, to be able to provide space for his vulnerability. She feels trusted.

Which is exactly the sort of sentimentality that led to her becoming engaged to Marcus Pierce. She schools her thoughts, forces herself to think about Lucifer’s other face, about all the things unsaid between them.

When the uninjured stretch of back between his blood-stained waistband and the bottom curve of his wound has been wiped clean,she carefully repositions the cut flap of skin so that the inflamed edges lie where they should. His breaths are short but even under her hands as she first blots away the bulk of the blood and then applies antiseptic to the wound before she secures the skin with butterfly bandages. Usually, it’s the sort of cut that would take stitches, but if it’s going to heal the same way his arm did, sewing him up would would traumatize the both of them to no good purpose.

He turns his head to look at her as she tapes a large sterile pad in place over the whole of the cut. She can feel his eyes lingering on her chest which is…actually pretty unusual for Lucifer. Despite his general lasciviousness, he doesn’t ogle without encouragement. She glances down at herself to see that the neckline of her t-shirt has slipped low enough to reveal the dark purple bruise from where the bullet struck her vest. Patting the last piece of tape firmly in place, she steps back and straightens her neckline.

“Does it—I’m sorry, of course it hurts,” he says, turning his face back to the wall. “I apologize, Detective. I should never have allowed it to happen.”

“Why did you?” she asks. “Not,” she holds up a hand quickly, “there in the loft. I stepped in front of you, and I’d make the same choice again. But why did you let him get away with so much for so long? You knew he was a criminal?”

“He’s hardly alone in that.” Lucifer sighs and finally allows her gaze to meet his own. “I didn’t recognize him at first, and when he revealed himself to me, his greatest wish didn’t involve hurting anyone other than himself. Father cursed him to live forever, and he wanted an end. As you can imagine, my father and I have differing opinions on how to treat people who transgress his laws, so I agreed to help Cain die. It was more difficult than I imagined, and appeared to come with some risks I hadn’t considered.” His eyes dart away from hers for a moment, and she allows his obvious avoidance to pass without comment. “The whole thing meant we spent a good amount of time together.”

“You became friends?”

“Of a sort. We understood each other, or so I thought. I don’t find that often.”

“No, I suppose you wouldn’t.” She’s never heard any stories about Satan hanging out with his good buddies. There aren’t any religious fables about the devil joining a softball league and going for drinks after the game. If his entire existence is just torturing damned souls, she imagines there is little time for camaraderie.

“Anyway, by the time I realized he was dangerous to you, it seemed too late. I did try to warn you—”

“Lucifer.” She wields his name like a judge’s gavel, and he flinches back.

“I did. I know I was rather more interested in my father’s manipulations than your relationship at the time, and that I didn’t exactly repeat the attempt when I was in a more rational state of mind. But I couldn’t trust my own judgment about him, not with the two of you becoming close. I should have tried harder, done more. But I thought…well, you made me a better man. I believed he might receive the same benefit.”

Chloe leans over the sink, gripping the edge of the counter until her fingers turn white. “I am not a person-shaped rehabilitation center, Lucifer. I’m not here to heal whatever wounded soul wanders by.”

Lucifer looks pointedly at the piles of first aide supplies adorning his bathroom.

“That’s different. This is different. I know what’s happening and I want to help. I didn’t sign up to teach a murderer not to be a murderer.”

He ‘hmms’ noncommittally. “Did you mean it? When you said you’d make the same choice, step between me and that gun, even knowing what I am? Knowing that I’ve killed?”

Self defense, her inner monologue returns. “I did mean it. It still seems like the only way either one of us could have walked out of that situation alive. Or…can you die?”

“I can. I would have in that instance. One ticket straight back to Hell.”

Chloe shivers, tries to hide the reaction by straightening up to pace. “You said in that instance—bullets won’t always kill you?”

“No.” He tilts his head at her. “You told me ‘later,’ when I tried to explain before. Is this later?”

She considers it. Their conversation up to this point has been personal, not too different from one they might have had a few days ago, before she knew. Getting into the nitty-gritty of his immortality or lack thereof would bring the whole God, Heaven and Hell aspect of things right into center focus. “No. No, I can’t do that yet,” she admits. “Just get your wings out, would you?”

He jerks to his feet, flustered though he had to have known that this was what she came here to do. “You’ve already done enough. Seriously, Detective. They aren’t necessarily safe for you to look at. Divinity tends to have a strong effect on mortals.”

“I’ve seen them—caught a glimpse, at any rate. And I saw your face, and your mojo doesn’t work on me. Take out your wings, Lucifer. I’ve seen your apartment; I know they’re still bleeding. I saw the number of spent casings at the scene. You probably still have bullets in you.”

“Clever deduction, Detective. Yes, I am still quite holey following the shootout, if you’ll forgive the pun. But as you can see from my arm, I do heal quickly.”

“So show me and I can stop worrying.” She’s not budging on this, and not just because she wants to patch him up. It would be so much easier to go back to not believing in him, to write herself off as delusional, to frame Linda as having fallen too far under the sway of his mojo to be considered a reliable witness. It terrifies her, knowing how prone she is to that level of self-delusion. She needs to see proof of him when her body isn’t coursing with adrenaline from a life-or-death showdown, needs to make sure the truth about him sticks this time.

He paces in a tight circle, as though psyching himself up. “I can’t imagine the sight of angel wings could really calm you, but please do remember I’m not an angel anymore. Fallen one, right?”

“Don’t worry, Lucifer, I promise not to think better of you than you deserve.”

He laughs, sounding more exhausted than amused. “Very well. If you’ll just back up to the door; it’s a bit tight in here.”

She does as directed. He jerks his shoulders a few times, but the only result is a deepening of the furrows in his forehead. His whole body radiates discomfort.

“Perhaps if you turn the other way.”

She turns and tries not to fidget as she hears him shift behind her. A minute passes, then two, but right before she turns to check on him a soft thwump of air sounds behind her and something heavy smacks into the shower door. She feels liquid spatter against the back of her arms, and twists them to see little specs of blood dotting her skin, just like she’s seen all throughout the penthouse.

“All right, Detective. You can look. Carefully, please. Do turn away if you feel any desire to fall into reverential worship.”

She scoffs, but takes her time turning around, pausing when she sees the first hint of white. She remembers the replica wings from the auction so long ago, the way they’d appeared to glow. That’s not what she sees here. It’s more like the feathers on a seagull—they might be white, but they project an aura of filth. Definitely no desire to worship, so she turns a little more, and sees the first of the bullet wounds, still wet. Caution forgotten, she whips the rest of the way around to take him in fully. His wings are massive and wretched and weeping with blood.

“Oh, Lucifer,” she says, putting a hand to her mouth. “Oh, you goddamned idiot.”

“Thanks for the reminder,” he bites back, scowling. His wings flex and tuck back behind him, hiding from her even though the movement makes him hiss with pain.

Stupid. “Sorry, sorry, I’m sorry,” she repeats, holding up her hands and stepping towards him. She reaches out, fingertips stopping roughly an inch away from his feathers. She traces them through the air. “You must be in so much pain.”

“You know the feeling, Detective.” He mimics her action, his hand hovering in the air just above the bruise on her chest before moving sideways, his index finger ending up directly over the spot on her shoulder where she’d been shot on their first case together.

She meets his gaze, nodding. He seems to understand her, or maybe they understand each other. He sits for her again, spreading his wings out as far as the bathroom walls allow.

“I’m all yours, Detective.”

Chapter Text

She knows this knife, has dug it out of her walls and yelled at Maze for leaving it laying out on the counter where Trixie could find it. This, now, is a different sort of knowing, feeling out each of its grooves, catching her gloved fingers against the very, very sharp edge. It needs to be scrubbed spotless before she can use it to dig the bullets out of Lucifer’s flesh.

He waits for her, less than two feet separating them. He’s folded his arms along the back of the toilet and his head hangs down low over them. His wings are splayed behind him, quivering as though in a breeze, but she knows it’s a combination of discomfort and nerves. She’s nervous as well, but her hands are not allowed to shake with it, so she’s controlling her breathing and mentally picturing each of the steps in this task she’s assigned herself. First, dig out the bullets. Second, clean the wounds. Thrd, stop the bleeding.

The blade is clean; no hint of Marcus’s blood remains.

There’s DNA on your shirt, Lucifer had said after Chloe had agreed to have sex with the Sinnerman in the station’s evidence closet.

She continues to scrub.

Lucifer twitches. Impatient, uncomfortable. “I think it’s as sterile as it’s going to get, Detective.”

“No reason not to make sure.”

“In that case, I might as well get a drink before we begin.” He heaves himself back up, wings and shoulders both pressed high, his whole body tight.

“Wait, Lucifer. Alcohol is a blood thinner; you shouldn’t…” She grabs one of the clean washcloths to dry the dagger with as she trails Lucifer back out towards the living room.

They both stop when he reaches the steps down from his bedroom and she can see his gaze fasten on the discarded, unconsumed booze and drugs scattered about the penthouse. Holding his head high, decidedly not looking back at her, Lucifer descends into the living room and picks up the full tumbler from his coffee table, the bottle from the couch, and then heads for the bar. “I’m being an abysmal host, Detective. Would you like something? As you can see, my supplies are well stocked.” He leans against the bar in such a way as to hide the lines of coke from her view.

“I had a shitty night, too,” she offers. “Mine actually did involve drinking your whiskey, though.”

If she’d hoped to comfort him with shared misery, it doesn’t work. He is avoiding her gaze again, avoiding looking at anything in particular, in fact. She realizes that for some reason he does not want her to see this evidence that he’d spent an evening not dulling his senses. He downs his drink, grabs the other full glass waiting on the bar, and raises it towards her. “To drinking my whiskey.”

After finishing the second glass, he starts to tidy up, whisking the ashtray off the piano and wiping the bar down without even a comment about the waste of cocaine. She watches him, feeling like she’s overstepping some boundary but unable to stop, like she’s sizing up a stray dog to see if it’s exhibiting signs of being rabid. This is not her typical Lucifer, but he is unpredictable when embarrassed, capable of responding with lavish displays of his more ‘devilish’ self or with a sort of rigid formality. This qualifies as the later, and she observes him growing stiffer and stiffer in his movements as his tidying only serves to spread more droplets of blood from his wounded wings.

They aren’t healing at all.

“Would you be more comfortable doing this on the balcony?” she asks at last. “You’d have more room to stretch out there.”

He jerks his head in something not quite like agreement and wanders out to pick up the last remaining full tumbler. He sips this one, gazing up at the bright new morning with a hint of disgust. “Another gorgeous day in the city of angels.”

She doesn’t take the bait. “I’ll get my supplies. Just find a comfortable position.”

Comfort doesn’t appear to have been a consideration, at least not when compared to the importance of staging. He’s kneeling upright on the balcony paving when she returns, head bowed, wings spread fully behind him. She guesses they’re fifteen, maybe twenty feet long in all, but the broken, bedraggled feathers diminish them. He looks like an offering. Penitent. A supplicant awaiting God’s judgment. Pinpricks of sensation trail up the back of her neck and she shivers. Not sure what to say, she pulls over a small table and spreads a clean cloth on top before laying out the dagger, a pair of tweezers, more cloths, and a bowl.

“This will hurt. You can tell me if you need a break.”

“I can endure, Detective.”

“That’s not what this is about.”

His wings twitch; a shrug.

Abruptly, the anger she’d felt at the scene the day before returns. He’s in pain, yes, but he’s also putting her in a position where she feels like she’s punishing him. Mom-Chloe knows this trick, but Lucifer is not a nine-year-old kid. She shakes out her hands, paces a bit to give the emotion time to pass.

“Detective?” His voice is tentative now, his neck craned so he can watch her over his shoulder. “I don’t expect—if this is too much—”

“I get it, Lucifer,” she snaps. “You did me a favor, just like I asked, and you didn’t run. Congratulations, you made it one night. Now stop trying to make me run instead. I’m here. I’m going to patch up your wings. I don’t want you in pain. If that changes, I’ll let you know.”

And she picks up the dagger.

The problem is, his wings are unavoidably living tissue.

Chloe has performed various surgeries on Trixie’s more well loved stuffed animals over the years, and somehow she had convinced herself that that skill set would transfer. But his wings are warm, the flesh trembling and inflamed, the feathers sunk into real shafts rather than simply glued in place. With Lucifer kneeling like this, she is also unable to forget that they are very much a part of his body. The familiar scent of him keeps sneaking up on her—his hair products, his cologne, his whiskey, all wafting up from him whenever she starts to think she’s gotten the hang of things. Her fingers trail against the skin where wings meet back as she searches out the embedded bullets. He doesn’t feel divine, or like a myth, or like damnation. He feels breakable, and it adds a sense of the mundane to his extraordinary appendages. She’d worried that she would freeze up when presented with direct proof that her world had been upended, but instead they make it easier to believe nothing has changed.

Touch. What quotidian magic.

Unlike the feather she’d taken from the scene, these feathers are soft, like stroking really overgrown peach fuzz, like burying her fingers in his hair the way she’s dreamt it, dreams in which his locks are unstiffened by product and he is languid and relaxed in her hands. She tries to keep her explorations light, superficial, as she brushes his feathers out of the way, searching for any irregularities of texture that might indicate another souvenir left under his skin. He’s been remarkably good at not reacting to her fumbling, at not flinching away from her knife or making any noise as she sinks the tweezers into him in search of fragments. She appreciates now why doctors are not meant to operate on family; keeping herself calm is more tiring than the task itself. It takes nearly two hours, and she spends the entire time holding back vomit.

Finally, she extracts what she believes is the last of the bullets and drops it in the waiting bowl. Chloe sets the knife down and steps back, reaching up a hand to pinch the pressure points on the bridge of her nose only to flinch away from the blood covering her glove. Lucifer sighs and shudders, wings flexing tentatively.

“I think you’ve found the lot of them. I feel…well, awful, actually, but it’s more throbbing pain that sharp pain, so maybe that’s an improvement.”

“You’re not really used to discomfort, are you? If you’re sometimes invulnerable? Or, no, I guess Hell is probably uncomfortable even for you.”

“Not typically painful, though. At least physically, not recently.” He uses his hands to help press himself back onto his feet and takes a few steps to stretch his legs.

“We can find you a chair,” she says, massaging her right wrist. Her hands are cramping, unused to so much close work.

“That would likely be easier,” he admits, and goes off in search of something suitable.

Chloe lets out a deep breath and looks down into the bowl of bullets. Despite the dozens of gunshot wounds, only nine bullets had remained lodged in his wings, but she’d found an additional twenty-three pieces of shrapnel that must have resulted from the bullets that struck the floor and walls around him. Even that wounded, he’d still been able to win a hand-to-hand fight against Pierce. No wonder he never wears a bulletproof vest, if this is what vulnerable looks like on him. She switches to massaging her other wrist and rolls her head to stretch her neck. Between the bullet yesterday and standing bent over his wings today, her chest muscles feel like they want to seize up, and her back and shoulders are attempting to compensate, leaving them sore in the bargain. She’ll take a bath when she gets home. A nice mid-day bath with her whiskey bottle; what else is forced leave from work for?

He returns hauling a straight-backed, armless chair under one arm, his other hand holding a bottle of water. He positions the chair where he wants it and hands her the bottle.

“Thought you might need a bit of refreshment, and,” he pulls a pill bottle out of his pocket, “a little oxy to take all our aches and pains away.”

“No, Lucifer.”

“Ah, well. More for me.” He pops the top off the pills and tips the remainder of them into his mouth, swallowing them down dry.

“Don’t—here, drink something with them at least.”

She tries to return the water bottle, but he waves her away. “That is for you. Don’t tell me you aren’t uncomfortable, and if you insist on fussing over me and you won’t take any party favors, at the very least we can keep you hydrated.”

“Thanks.”

She shifts her weight from foot to foot, then cracks open the bottle if only to give herself an excuse for not saying anything else. She’s thirstier than she realized, and drains half the water before she stops. When she looks back at him he’s watching her studiously, a little crease forming between his eyes. It vanishes when he notices her looking, however, and he turns away, sitting backwards on the chair so his wings are once again exposed to her, drooping now to rest against the ground. She lets him sit and goes to fetch some warm water to wash his wounds with. She finally understands how he can consume so many substances without harming himself, and she doesn’t know if the oxy has any real effect on him at all, but he does look more relaxed when she returns. His face, turned towards the sun, is overly pale, the bags under his eyes heavy in the bright light, but its still so dear in its familiarity she doubts she’ll ever think that this face is anything less than beautiful. His other face…she doesn’t know that face, what it means, who that man is.

He stretches first his left wing, then his right, allowing her to bathe him. It’s slow work, slower even than removing the bullets. The dried blood is the biggest problem, caked into the barbs—she doesn’t exactly want to scrub, so she’s left gently blotting him clean, inch by inch. Some of his feathers appear twisted, and she straightens these as she goes. Some of the broken ones fall out at her touch, including one of the massive primaries on the outer edge of his left wing. She cries out, startled and sad, when it falls, but he reassures her this is normal.

“That’s what they’re meant to do. Just leave the ones that don’t fall, but I would appreciate if you try to avoid the broken ends.”

She tries to, tries not to make anything worse. He’s less stoic than he was for the bullet removal, obviously crashing. He’s been up all night, she thinks, hurting himself. His wings twitch away when she brings out the hydrogene peroxide, making her hands shake each time she has to pull him back into place so she can get on with disinfecting the wounds. His wings are so sturdy, great bones framing them out, strips of muscle flexing under her fingers. Awful, to see them cower away from her touch.

He’s lost enough feathers that bandaging him up isn’t as impossible as it would otherwise be, but it’s still tricky. She feels a bit like she’s gluing cotton balls onto one of Trixie’s art projects, but in a deadly serious way. Lucifer hasn’t spoken in a long time, his forehead pressed down firmly on his forearms. Tremors regularly run down his back, and she has to stop herself from stroking the line from his neck to his waist, from trying to comfort him. Clearly, her touch is not soothing right now.

She doesn’t know when she starts talking, or chanting really. She’s sorry, she’s almost done, just a bit more, he’s being so good, so brave. Like soothing a frightened animal. It’s the sort of thing she’d expect him to mock and pull away from, but he doesn’t comment. His head is tilted towards her voice, and while he’s still trembling his breathing has evened out.

She lays the last bandage in place and steps back. It’s definitely an amateur job, but he looks less like a horror movie prop, so that’s something.

She wonders if she’ll ever see his wings again, ever see them when they’re whole.

Unable to resist any longer, she strokes his back between his wings, closing her eyes as the soft down tickles her wrists. “All done. Just rest a bit. I’ll clean up.”

She makes one trip inside, clearing away the bowl of dirty water first, and when she returns to him he’s raised his head towards where the sun is now well past its zenith in the sky. She stares, trying to rearrange his features so that they match the devil face she remembers, but he just looks so worn down. After a few hours spent touching him, his wings aren’t even foreign to her anymore. It all seems too ridiculous, that he’s Satan. People don’t just turn out to be Satan. Her inner defenses falter, and she thinks about that thing she isn’t supposed to think about. Just a few nights before, standing on a different balcony. He’d been so earnest and so sweet, his kiss had been so soft and caring. He couldn’t be monstrous. It wasn’t possible.

Pierce had never seemed like a hardened criminal. Monsters could still love.

“You were trying to show me your other face, weren’t you?” she asks. “That time, after you were dropped in the desert?”

“Ah, yes. Unfortunately I’d lost it for a bit. Came back in the end, of course. It’s who I really am.” Abruptly, his wings are gone, and he’s standing up to move his chair back to its original position.

Chloe gathers up the rest of her supplies and takes them inside, setting everything on top of the bar. “Why didn’t you show me your wings instead?” she asks when he rejoins her.

None of the bottles lining the back of the bar are up to snuff for him today; he stoops down and starts poking through the cabinets below the bar, eventually pulling out something that looks like it’s actually in her price range. He opens it up and chugs directly from the bottle. “They aren’t me. Not the real me. I didn’t want to give you the wrong idea; the point was honesty. No more going backwards.” He says the last with a sour twist to his lips.

Chloe nods, snaps her gloves off and moves around the bar to wash her hands in the sink. “So, what makes them not really you?”

“They’re angel wings, given to Dad’s beloved children. But I, as you seem to have somehow forgotten, am the devil.”

“But what does that mean?”

The bottle in his hands thunks heavily onto the bar top as he turns to goggle at her. “What does that mean? I know you’re not especially religious, but even you have to have heard—”

She shakes her head, cutting him off. “I know the Halloween style devil stuff—pitchfork and a tail, so obviously not an accurate portrayal. And I know some basic bible stuff, snake in the garden and that whole myth. But apparently you have a mom?” He nods. “So Christianity doesn’t exactly seem to have a good handle on everything. So what does being the devil mean? Is that a job, or a…a societal position? A personality type amongst celestials?”

“Oh, it’s later now, is it?” He’s already drunk half of his bottle. “The devil is who I am, Detective. I torture the damned and make my home amongst their screams.”

That succeeds in making her step back. Something flickers across his face, some putrefactive mix of hurt and satisfaction. “So that part is true?” she says to buy time. “Okay, big thing to digest. Okay.” His hands are trembling around the bottle as he drinks; she looks away from him, eyes fastening instead on the bowl of projectiles she’d pulled from his body, the ones that had injured him when he chose to protect her. “Okay. So is that where you were born, then? Hell? Or did you make it later? Decide humans needed to be punished, and—”

“I didn’t decide. I was cast out of the Silver City into Hell, as I’ve told you before.”

“So all of that is true—”

“I don’t lie!”

“And then you agreed to torture human souls because…because you were jealous of your father’s love for humans?”

“How dare you?” He finishes his bottle and sweeps away from her, seething. “I am not jealous of my father’s anything. I was given a task to do. It’s not like Hell offers a lot of alternative choices for the reluctant devil. And anytime I took a break, there was Amenadiel, ready to drag me right back. But I’m here now, and I haven’t tortured a human soul in the better part of a decade, uncomfortable for you as it may be to believe.”

“Why would that make me uncomfortable?”

“Not exactly the behavior you’d expect from me, is it?”

“It is, actually. Lucifer you, the you I know. Devil you—that word seems important to you, but I don’t know what it means.”

He laughs bitterly. “You saw—”

“I saw red skin, horrible burns. Just because some aspect of your appearance doesn’t perfectly represent the ideal of masculine beauty doesn’t mean you’re evil.”

She knows he’s angry when he doesn’t even take a moment to gloat that she thinks he’s pretty.

“I don’t think I ever realized just how self-deluding you are, Detective. I mean, it’s one thing not to believe me when I’m just a fabulous club owner telling you I’m the devil, but quite another when you have actually seen my true face and you’re still unwilling to accept the truth.”

Tears sting at the back of her eyes, but she’s able to blink them away. “Don’t—you don’t say things like that to me.”

“Maybe I should, maybe that’s what it’ll take for you to finally embrace some self-preservation.” He strides towards her, looms close. “You’re in Satan’s home, Detective. Come now, do you really want to trust yourself to the devil?”

“What does that mean!” It comes out as a shriek, surprising them both. Lucifer jerks back out of her space, and she takes a deep breath. “What is the devil, Lucifer? In what ways is he different from the you I’ve known for two years? Are you evil, or am I just supposed to tell you you’re evil? Maybe you’re not evil but still a really bad guy? I have no reference point for any of this.”

He deflates, slinks across the room and slumps down into one of his leather chairs, hands clasped over his knees and head bowed over his hands. “I should have known better than to think we could understand each other. You’re too good.” He smiles sadly, fiddles with his ring. “We don’t belong in the same world.”

“You say these things about me.” Chloe’s hands are shaking, her arms, her voice. “You say that I’m smart with notable instincts, that I’m nauseatingly selfless, that I’m wholly good. But when I ask you questions about yourself, about who you are, you tell me I’m self-deluding and that I’ll never understand. When I try to come to you with compassion, you insist I couldn’t possibly want to offer that to you. Was it a trick? To tell me I’m a great detective while keeping this massive secret about the state of the universe under my nose?”

“Never, Detective. You know I respect your skills a great deal.”

“But you don’t trust me. This isn’t trust, Lucifer. This isn’t even honesty. You, only wanting to show me your devil face and not your wings. You, insisting that I can’t know you if I won’t immediately believe you’re nothing more than a monster fit to terrorize children with. It’s defensiveness; you say the worst things you can about yourself so that you can tell yourself you always knew I’d give up and push you away. I get it. But I don’t want to be the person you’re pushing me to be. I don’t want to be told I’m not trustworthy, and that I’m going to hate you because you’re not perfect. I don’t want to be the person who can’t ever see the good in people just because they’re flawed. I’m not that woman, and you’ve never been that two-dimensional to me. You were my friend. But I guess maybe that version of you never really existed, huh? I guess I’m naive, and maybe you’re not really a person, and maybe none of my relationships with anyone have been based on anything but wishful thinking.” Her tears won’t be held back this time, so she turns away from him and walks urgently towards the elevator.

“Understood, Detective. I won’t trouble you with my expectations again.”

A groan of frustration rips its way through her chest and out her mouth. “Fine, if you want to leave—and to be clear, this is your decision, I haven’t asked you to go anywhere—but if you really want to run away, that’s your choice. But could you do me a favor and at least stick around through the end of the investigation? Because I would really like to keep my job and the odds are a lot better if my partner doesn’t suddenly skip town.”

“I’ll stay,” he agrees. “But not as a favor. That’s the second time today you’ve used that word, and I wish to be clear. There are no favors between us, Detective.”

“Right. Ledgers clear, no binding ties between us at all. That’s that then.”

If he’d had the courtesy to have a front door, she’d have slammed it behind her, but as things are she has to settle for jabbing repeatedly at the elevator button. When the carriage opens, she steps in and turns, seeing him for what could be the final time. He’s still seated, shirtless and sweaty, head bowed over clenched hands, almost as if he’s praying. Then the doors gently slide closed and she’s alone again.

Chapter Text

Chloe’s back in her car before she realizes that she’s covered in Lucifer’s blood. Her shirt is ruined, soaked through with large blotches of red. Blood is smeared on her arms, and there are faint marks from where she apparently wiped her hands on her jeans at some point. A look in the rear-view mirror shows there’s a streak of it above her right eyebrow and a tacky spot in her hair. There are feathers as well, three broken pieces stuck to the right side of her shirt where she must have brushed against him without noticing. So much for her being careful. So much for trying to help—he’d said it felt better once the bullets were out, but maybe none of it had been worth it. Maybe he would have healed on his own once he actually got some sleep.

She strokes the feathers, wishing there was some angel magic in them that could help her out, but they offer nothing but a pleasant piece of sensory distraction. Tucking them carefully into her purse, she turns on the car. Time to figure out what to do with herself for a few days.

It’s late afternoon by the time she gets home, and she’s exhausted. Her hands hurt, her arms hurt, her neck, her back, her chest. Action Chloe, the one who storms into the devil’s home with purpose, is gone, leaving her hollowed out and listless. Instead of doing the dishes in the sink, she dumps them out onto the counter before taking off her bloody clothes right there in the kitchen and leaving them to soak. Remembering her plan from earlier, she heads upstairs to fill the bathtub. She manages to get the water temperature right, even adds some lavender oil, but then she goes downstairs to get a glass of wine and spaces out completely, standing in the doorway to Trixie’s room, staring at her daughter’s empty bed. When she finally remembers why she came downstairs, it’s too late. The bath is cold, and she doesn’t have the energy to try again.

Messages are piling up on her phone, including one from Maze that simply reads, “Decker,” as though that’s a complete thought. She types out “Demon,” in response, but doesn’t hit send. She doesn’t trust herself to interact with Maze yet. Between the things she’d said about Trixie and the way she’d pushed Chloe at Pierce, on top of the whole her being an actual supernatural being thing, it should be Maze she’s angriest at, but, honestly, thinking about her just makes Chloe sad. He won’t take me home, Maze had said of Lucifer, and then she’d blown up the entirety of the life she’d made for herself on Earth. Right now, Chloe has a lot of sympathy for anyone who is that upset about having to experience human emotions.

Ultimately, she texts Ella, agreeing to meet for lunch the next day. Chloe is about to try for a video chat with Trixie when she remembers she has angel blood in her hair. It makes her irrationally irritated at Lucifer, as though she doesn’t have plenty of rational complaints against him right now, but muttering to herself about his inconsiderate inability to keep literally any of his fluids inside his own body keeps her motivated long enough to move her soaking clothes into the washer with a load of laundry and head back upstairs to shower.

Skin red from scrubbing, bundled in her comfiest pajamas, Chloe huddles on her bed with her phone. She catches Trixie just before dinner. Dan’s mom is in the background, yelling at Dan not to touch something on the stove, and Trixie answers Chloe’s call mid-eye roll.

Their chat is awkward—Trixie veers between talking about some yarn craft project her abuelita is doing with her and asking cautious questions about what she can do to make her dad feel better. Chloe tells her to just be there for him, tries to do the same for her daughter, but she knows she and Dan need to decide how to explain everything to Trixie. Trixie has abruptly gone from having almost four parents to having two again, plus two dead people to mourn. Chloe doesn’t know how to say, “Hey, monkey. You remember that guy I was going to marry? Well, he murdered Charlotte, and then he tried to kill me and Lucifer, so Lucifer had to shove a knife into his gut.”

Trixie’s post-Malcolm nightmares had been bad enough; Chloe doesn’t want to think about what will happen as a result of all the violence she’s dragged into their home.

She heads downstairs after the call, planning to put the laundry in the dryer and then turn in for a very early night. But as she’s pulling clothes from the washer, she finds one of Pierce’s shirts, a simple gray tee with the arms slightly stretched out from dealing with his oversized muscles. He must have left it in her hamper and they’d both forgotten about it when she collected his things to return to him.

One desperate, bewildered crying jag later, Chloe is scouring the rest of the house for anything else he might have left. After a two hour search, she stuffs the shirt, a pen from Pierce’s gym, and one of those little squeezy stress balls into the garbage can outside. Back inside, she opens up her laptop and spends some time ordering new sheets and new pillows online. She’d get a new mattress, too, if that didn’t seem like an extravagant splurge for a woman on the cusp of being fired and investigated for evidence tampering and possible accessory to murder.

She dreams about Pierce.

They are lying next to each other in her bed, in the aftermath of a bout of athletic sex, both sweaty and breathing heavily. For some reason, however, they are both fully dressed, every inch of skin below the neck covered as though they’re on their way to a wedding held at a rather repressive religious institution. They don’t speak, don’t look at each other, just stare up at the ceiling. Chloe knows she orgasmed, but she feels frustrated rather than satisfied, the same sensation as biting into a chocolate bar and finding out it’s made of carob. Down the hall from her room, she can hear a door open. A gunshot rings out, followed by a door closing. The sounds repeat, growing steadily nearer.

“Whose turn is it to shoot this time?” Pierce asks, and Chloe realizes there’s a gun lying between them on the bed.

“Tell you what,” Pierce says, finally looking at her. “I’ll race you for the bullet.”

And he reaches his right hand over to dig within the bloody wound on his left arm. Where she shot him.

Using perfect dream logic, she scrambles out of bed and lunges towards her dresser, where her small jewelry box sits. She knows the bullet necklace Lucifer gave her is in there, knows if she can just find it, she’ll be able to reshape it, make it whole and usable. But instead of her necklace, all she can find are spent bullet casings covered in blood and bits of feathers. Hundreds of them, more, spilling out over her hands, bouncing on the floor as she shoves them out of her way. She digs through them frantically, the doors slamming and the gunshots coming closer.

“Too bad, Chloe,” Pierce says, and she whirls around to see him extract a bullet, clean and shiny and new, from the now gaping hole in his arm. “You should have pulled the trigger more than once. It’s like you didn’t really want to penetrate either of us.”

He picks up the gun, loads it, raises his arm—

She wakes with a burning sensation traveling up the skin of her arms. There are irritated patches on her abdomen, on her face. She lifts her hands, and there’s enough dawn light coming through her blinds for her to see a clear demarcation line on her wrists between healthy skin and a red itchy rash that disappears up her shirt sleeves. She rolls out of bed, rips off her top, and examines herself in the bathroom mirror. The rash continues in blotches across her torso and on the right side of her forehead, angry and increasingly itchy.

Well, Lucifer had said divinity and humans didn’t mix well. She wishes he’d given her a more specific warning re: Satan’s blood being as bad as poison oak, but at least she’d been wearing gloves.

Thankfully, there’s a bottle of calamine lotion left in the downstairs medicine cabinet, a remainder from the last camping trip she, Trixie and Dan went on. She coats herself liberally and does her best to ignore the problem while she fixes herself breakfast. She’d skipped food entirely the day before, and something about being absolutely starving helps distract her from the possibility of an all-seeing God watching her every moment for long enough that she’s able to just get on with the basic necessities of living. Fed, she finally does the dishes and, feeling accomplished for the first time since she woke up on that roof with a bullet in her vest, she sets to cleaning up after last night’s Pierce-themed scavenger hunt. By the time she has to leave for lunch with Ella, her house is once again as clean and orderly as the home of a woman who isn’t currently wearing long sleeves and pancake makeup to hide the after affects of a day spent with a bullet-ridden devil.

They meet at a taco truck and eat on a park bench. Ella is looking her Ella-est, her ponytail high and bouncy, her shirt bearing the picture of a sloth that proclaims itself to be neither fast nor furious. They talk about how Trixie’s holding up, about Charlotte’s funeral, which her ex-husband has planned for that Saturday. Finally, mopping at her fingers with a handful of tiny napkins, Ella brings up the case.

“None of Pierce’s guys are talking. It’s actually a bit scary—like, they aren’t saying anything at all. Just dead-eyed stares. They didn’t even ask for lawyers, but a whole team of them showed up. Skalden and Huitz, so big money. I’m thinking whoever is trying to take over for Pierce wants to make sure no additional information about the organization gets out.”

“I suppose it’s too much to hope that the whole Sinnerman network will just go away without him.”

“Yeah. God-willing we won’t end up in a turf war situation with people fighting over who gets to take over.”

“God-willing,” Chloe repeats, musing. “Hey Ella, do you—what if I told you something kinda crazy? Like, I know you’re out on a limb with me already, dealing with the past few days and still coming here and talking with me about the investigation. I don’t want to overload you, or—”

“Is this about the crime scene? Because we cannot figure it out. There are so many bullets, just everywhere, like ricochet patterns that make no sense. And something huge came in through one of those upper windows? And the feathers—are you sure you can’t explain the feathers?”

Chloe s awkwardly and looks away. “I don’t…What if I told you I’m starting to believe in Lucifer’s whole thing? His whole ‘I’m the devil, God’s real and he’s my dad,’ thing?”

Ella looks like Christmas just came several months early. “Um, have you seen the script for whatever play or movie he’s been working on? Because if so, you totes have to share!”

“I wish. No. I mean, I think I’m starting to believe he’s literally telling the truth.”

“Huh.” Ella cocks her head and sticks her now clean hands under her thighs while she ponders for a moment. “I get it. Dude is committed to his story. I took him with me to church once, and he spilled so much character back story. Just an entire mythology. And with everything that’s happened, yeah. I get it. I personally am having some problems with the Big Guy,” she shoots a glance up at the sky, “right now, but having loved ones die, going through a near death experience yourself. Lots of people find religion after that.”

“So you won’t…you’re not going to like, tell IA I’ve lost my mind if I start treating the things Lucifer says like they’re literal.”

“As long as he’s not telling you to do things because he’s the devil—wait, you’re not, like, his first cult member are you?”

“What? No.” Chloe snorts.

“Good. Because with his charisma, we’re all really lucky he never decided to start his own church. Half of L.A. would line up to take orders from him.”

“Knowing him, he’d just make everyone blow off their paperwork and listen to him play the piano.”

“Ha, yeah. Lucifer’s church of ‘bring me more pudding cups and never ask me to do anything boring.’”

Chloe laughs, a glorious release, and she’s so glad that one of her friendships is still intact that she grabs Ella in a tight hug. “Thank you for not judging me.”

“Hey, Decker, no worries. I’ve got my own weird shit. Secret for a secret?”

Chloe nods.

Ella, despite having made the offer to share without prompting, still looks a bit nervous. “I see ghosts.”

Chloe pulls back, surprised. “Ghosts? Like, of victims at crime scenes?”

“Thankfully no. How awful would that be, right? Though I wouldn’t mind being the inspiration for the next supernatural procedural to get screwed over by network TV just as it’s hitting it’s stride. No, it’s just one ghost, actually. Yeah, I was in a car accident as a kid, and ever since, Rae Rae has been coming by to check on me. Now, you don’t think I’m crazy, do you?”

A few days ago, Chloe would have classified this as ‘quirky’ Ella behavior. Now? “No. No, I think a ghost seems perfectly plausible right now.”

“Whew!” Ella wipes the back of her hand against her forehead in an exaggerated motion. “There you go. Lucifer’s the devil, ghosts are real, you and me are both still completely kick-ass, capable women who aren’t imagining things.”

“That’s a nice thought.”

“So what did he do, how did he convince you?”

Chloe thinks of him, asking her to turn around because his wings wouldn’t come out while she was watching. “I don’t think I can…I know Lucifer is pretty open about every aspect of his life, but I think there are still a few things that are personal to him, you know?”

“I get it. I am going to ask him about those feathers, though, when you guys are back at work.”

“We’ll see if that happens. Even if we’re cleared—”

“You will be, no problem. We’re getting tons of new evidence against Pierce. The things he did—you guys are gonna be heroes when this is over.”

“Yeah.” Chloe brushes her hair back behind her ears, wondering if she’ll ever be brave enough to look at all of the evidence collected against Pierce when this is over. “Even if that happens, I don’t think Lucifer’s going to be around much anymore.”

“Are you guys fighting? He can’t be mad that you’ve started to take his alter-ego seriously?”

“I’m not entirely clear on what he’s angry about. Everything is difficult, and he’s got a lot of family stuff, and the whole thing with me almost marrying an actual living monster. Somethings are just too big for people to get through together.”

“Chlo, I don’t understand half of what’s going on with you guys right now. But I do know that that man looks at you like you’re his actual morning star.” She grins at her own pun, but then her face drops. “Sorry—maybe I shouldn’t be giving you relationship advice anymore. I was all in on Pierce, and look how that turned out.”

Chloe squeezes Ella’s forearm. “No—you’re a cheerleader by nature, and I really appreciate the extra cheer in my life.”

Ella tips her head to the side, quirking her mouth, before her lips slowly slide back into a smile. “In that case, as your official cheer squad, I say don’t give up on Lucifer yet. I mean, just because you believe he’s the devil, that doesn’t make him a bad guy.”

“No, I know.” Probably.

“Good. The devil is just a guy who asks questions, and I know you don’t object to that. Questions are like Chloe catnip.”

“So does that make Lucifer my drug or my plaything?”

Ella waggles her eyebrows. “Why not both? No, but seriously, Chlo. A lot is going on; don’t expect everything to be perfect right now. Give yourselves some space; maybe by the time you’ve figured out what’s going on in your head, he’ll have figured out what’s going on in his.”

“I would really like to think that this is one of those things that time will help with, but I don’t know, Ella. I just. I feel really gross right now, just absolutely awful, like I can’t trust my instincts, and like I put Trixie in danger, and like the people I know aren’t who they appear to be.”

It’s Ella’s turn to initiate the hug. They stay huddled together in the park until Ella has to head back to work. Chloe wipes her face as they stand, glad that she managed to keep herself on the less publicly humiliating side of almost crying.

“How about we plan movie night for Sunday, huh?” Ella asks, rubbing Chloe’s shoulder. “Just a low-key tribe hang with popcorn and a cheesy ‘80s classic? Maybe something in the Patrick Swayze oeuvre?”

“That sounds good. Maybe not the whole tribe, but you and me? Yes. I would like to ogle an uncomplicatedly handsome man who knows how to dance.”

“Done. Hang in there until then.”

With nothing to do, Chloe just goes home to wash her face and apply more calamine lotion. It doesn’t seem like the wrath of God, the wrath of Satan, or the wrath of IA is going to immediately fall on her, so that night she drives out to Dan’s parents’ place so they can sit down together with Trixie and explain what’s going on. They keep it simple—Pierce wasn’t who he pretended to be. He was a very clever man who fooled a lot of people, but Charlotte was smart and she figured him out. He hurt her, but she gave Chloe, Dan, Lucifer and Ella the information they needed to stop him, and now he can’t hurt anyone anymore.

“I don’t understand why you were going to marry him, Mommy,” Trixie says. “Lucifer knew he was a bad guy.”

“He told you?” she asks, voice sharper than she intends.

“It was obvious. And Marcus didn’t even ask me before he proposed to you. Everyone knows you ask the kid for permission first. It’s in every TV show.”

“You’re right, monkey. That was a very bad sign, and it was wrong of me to say yes to him. Sometimes…sometimes grownup relationships get complicated, and it’s difficult to see what the right thing to do is. I really thought he was a good guy. He seemed reliable, and he talked to me, and…I don’t know. I’ll never do it again, okay? I’m not going to bring anyone home again.”

Dan gives her a look, but doesn’t say anything until after Trixie’s tucked in and they’re back in his parent’s kitchen. “You know I don’t blame you, right?”

“I don’t know why not. I did a really stupid thing, Dan.”

“There was no way for you to know. I mean, he was a police lieutenant. How did he even have enough spare time to do all of that? To build a network that big? It’s just…”

Chloe shrugs, throwing up her hands. It really is ‘just.’

“Lucifer, on the other hand. Did he tell you yet what he knew, when he knew?”

“Not exactly. He’s not doing great right now, either.”

“Good.”

“Dan.”

He paces, massaging the back of his neck. “He’s a weird dude, Chloe. He does these things, like that time he tricked you so he could abduct a murder suspect? For which he received no fallout, by the way. And he knows more than he says. What is someone with infinite money even doing in our lives? Who is he?”

Chloe rubs her temples. “He’s the devil, I guess.”

“Yeah, right. Like that’s a great thing for Trixie to be hearing all the time. How did we get to a point where our kid is hanging out with someone who is openly delusional in the first place? God, Chloe, I know you like to see the good in people, but maybe it’s time you stop being so naive. I mean, how do you think—” he bites off the sentence with a frustrated grimace.

“So you do blame me for letting Pierce into our lives.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“You did. And you’re right. I need to be more careful. I see the good in Lucifer and I see the good in you and I thought I saw good in Marcus Pierce and I was horribly, horribly wrong. And you? You saw good in Charlotte Richards. And you were right. She became a completely different person from one year to the next. She became someone who cared, and she made a whole lot of people safer in the process.”

“I’m sorry, Chlo. I’m…”

“I know, Dan.” She reaches out and squeezes his arm, letting the argument slip away until a later date. “I’m sad, too.”

On Friday, Chloe is called back to the station to answer more questions.

Camped out in an interview room with her lawyer, Chloe talks to Bauda and Field from IA, to detectives from the organized crime unit, to representatives from the ATF. There are state police, too, not to mention a tired looking representative of the Chicago PD. Chloe keeps her story simple, offering as few extra details as possible. She hadn’t known anything until after Charlotte was murdered. She is absolutely not going to be anyone’s star witness.

When she and her lawyer leave the interview room after answering the last round of questions for day, Captain Monroe is waiting for her. “Decker, a few minutes? Hobson is taking over the Jawarti case while you’re out, and there are a few things in the paperwork that need to be cleared up.”

Her lawyer raises his eyebrows at her, but Chloe shakes her head. “It’s fine. Thanks, Elliot.”

“I’ll be in touch,” he says, before making his way out of the precinct.

Turning away, Chloe briefly catches the eye of Detective Bauda, who is still hanging around for some reason. The other woman gives her a smile and a jaunty wave, which Chloe meets stone-faced. Usually, she’s all for female detectives supporting each other, and she deeply believes in the important work IA does. But she does not like that woman.

Hobson’s questions only take about half an hour, but as soon as Chloe returns to the bullpen, Bauda catches her eye again. “Detective Decker! Glad I caught you. Would you mind hanging around for just a few more minutes? No new questions, so no need to call your lawyer. Just clearing something up.”

That sounds like bullshit, but Captain Monroe is still watching Chloe through the door of what had been Pierce’s office, and Chloe’s best bet of making it through this whole thing employed is to be, above all things, cooperative, so she nods and reenters the dreary interview room that’s been the setting for most of her day. Bauda doesn’t join her immediately, leaving Chloe to stew. She’s familiar with this technique, though, and does her best to keep her face neutral and relaxed, giving nothing away to anyone who might be watching from the observation room.

Roughly fifteen minutes later, she hears sounds of a commotion from the bullpen, and then the door to the interview room bursts open. It’s Lucifer, looking as though he’s done nothing for the past two days other than abuse alcohol and pain killers. He’s dressed in the equivalent of a no effort outfit for him—black suit, white shirt, white pocket square—and is more than a little rumpled, his shirt improperly buttoned and his pocket square hanging limp from its pocket.

“Detective!” he bellows as he sends the door crashing back into the wall.

Chloe stands, startled, reaching a hand out to an unstable looking devil. “What—”

He rounds on Bauda, who follows him into the room. Anger, bordering on rage, transform his face. “How dare you! Me, yes, drag me in here and pin me with your little frame jobs. But the detective has done nothing wrong!”

Chloe frowns. He doesn’t lie, which means he has some interesting ideas as far as what constitutes ‘wrong.’

Bauda’s face remains impassive. “If you could take a seat, Mr. Morningstar?”

“Detective, are you all right?” He stumbles towards her, tripping over his own feet. Chloe lunges forward to brace him, but he catches himself on the room’s table, turning the almost fall into a sort of purposeful lounge on his forearms as he leans towards her.

“You look…bumpy.” He reaches out and pokes her forehead where her devil’s blood rash is mostly healed but apparently not totally invisible under her foundation.

She swats his hand away. “And you look like you decided to take your magician’s act back on the road.”

He giggles, mercurial as ever. “Your mind is unique.”

“All minds are unique,” Bauda says, laying a folder on the table and taking a seat across from Chloe. “I’d heard he drinks a lot, but I didn’t know he was showing up to work this intoxicated.”

“He doesn’t. Usually.” She’s careful to keep the extent of her concern off of her face; Lucifer is always drinking, but rarely drunk, and they hadn’t left things well between them—the difficulty of trying to have incredibly important conversations when they were both exhausted and in pain. “I thought you just wanted to go over my statement. Why is Lucifer here?”

“Your statement—they’ve been interrogating you?” Lucifer’s anger is rearing back to the surface. Chloe reaches out a hand and squeezes his wrist. He locks his gaze on her fingers, quieting instantly.

“Calm down, Lucifer. It’s all part of a normal investigation. No one’s been charged. Yet?” She raises a brow at Bauda.

“An excellent word choice, Detective Decker. And I’m not going to ask you any new questions about the incident with Marcus Pierce, as promised.”

“If you’re not going to ask me questions, then it doesn’t sound like you need me here at all.”

“Well, I’m hoping you’ll be interested in a proposition I have for you, but I’ll admit you’re mainly here as millionaire bait.” She raises her eyebrow at Lucifer, who scoffs at the word ‘millionaire.’

Chloe looks between the two of them for a moment, then retakes her seat. “All right. Sit down, Lucifer. We should hear what this is about.”

“That is, of course, why I’m here, Detective. To obey your commands.” Rage dissipated, he’s now in a snit. He collapses into the chair next to her and immediately pulls out his flask. Chloe stops herself from taking it away from him; for all she knows devils need alcohol the way regular people need water.

“Thank you, Detective Decker.” Despite indicating that Lucifer is her target today, Bauda is keeping her attention entirely on Chloe. “Congratulations are in order. You are officially being investigated by Internal Affairs.” Bauda’s smile is genuinely congratulatory, like most members of the LAPD would consider pissing off IA as a feather in their cap.

“How dare you—” Lucifer starts to rise again, and Chloe clamps a hand on his shoulder, pushing him back down. He glares at her, then turns to Bauda and drops his anger, putting on a sort of manic smile instead, a scary version of his mojo stare. “I assure you, the Detective has only behaved honorably.” He says it like he’s inserting the thought into Bauda’s head.

Bauda turns her smile towards him, losing just a bit of her edge in the face of his charms. A complicated one, she recalls hearing him say from time to time. “Mr. Morningstar, I know you have gone out of your way to help the police over the past few years, and I understand that you have been cleared of all wrongdoing related to the Marcus Pierce investigation.”

Chloe whips her head around to look at him. Of course he’s been cleared. Of course. All that worry over staging the crime scene, keeping him out of danger, and for what? Dan’s words echo in the back of her mind. Who holds the devil accountable?

Bauda continues speaking. “And of course, as a civilian not formally employed by the LAPD, IA cannot open an official investigation into you. We can, however, prevent you from working with the detective in the future, and we are officially considering our options in that direction.” She beams at both of them. “Officially.”

Chloe finally picks up what’s being said. “Unofficially?”

“Good, Detective Decker. Smart. Ever since Palmetto, I’ve been telling my superiors that we should recruit you, but my lieutenant, he doesn’t like your movie.” She shrugs—what are you gonna do?—and nods at Lucifer. “Plus, we’ve all agreed that this one shouldn’t get anywhere near our department. I don’t think my colleagues are prepared to find out just how many vices they’re willing to indulge in. But, we were speaking unofficially.”

“Yes, woman, get on with it.” Lucifer sounds—hurt? Insulted? Chloe can’t read him well right now.

“Unofficially, IA has also cleared Detective Decker of all wrongdoing in the death of Lieutenant Marcus Pierce. He was killed as a result of his extensive criminal actions and any steps the two of you took on scene were clearly self-defense.”

“That’s what happened, so why is this just unofficial?” Chloe asks, canting forward in her seat.

“Because IA has a job for the two of you, and it’ll be easier if you are known to be on the outs with us. Tinged with corruption.”

“And if we don’t want to do this job?”

“Unofficially cleared, Detective Decker. This is the time for you to make friends with IA, not enemies.”

“So what are you asking? Or rather, what strings do you want Lucifer to pull for you?” Chloe leans back and folds her arms.

“Yes, what dirty little favor do our friends in IA need.” Lucifer takes another swig from his flask, appearing bored now that it looks like Bauda just wants to bargain.

“Nothing dirty about it. If everything goes well, you will be doing the citizens of Los Angeles a great service. Sure, Detective Decker may feel a bit reluctant—my lieutenant thinks you’re perfect for the gig, but like I said, he’s got a few hot tub hang ups.”

Chloe is furious because she’s embarrassed. Bauda is clearly goading her, clearly has a few hang ups herself, but just like at the crime scene, Bauda is also extremely effective at causing shame to rise in Chloe’s gut. “What is it?” she bites out.

“We’d like Lucifer to get on a member list, and then we’d like the two of you to do a little undercover surveillance for us.” She flips open her folder and slides it across the table to them. “Are you familiar with Captain Andrew Thorston?

The folder contains a photograph clipped to a brief bio. Career history, commendations, charitable causes.

Chloe nods. “I’m familiar with the name.”

Bauda looks at Lucifer and he rolls his eyes. “You can’t expect me to keep track of every nefariously minded member of this publicly funded criminal organization you work for. I would think foiling one kingpin-cum-commanding officer would be enough for a civilian consultant to achieve in a week.”

“Perhaps you’ve heard of a social club he recently joined,” Bauda says, pulling the folder back. “The Marquises des Douleur?”

Lucifer shudders in theatrical disgust. “Those louts? They called a few weeks ago about renting out Lux for an event. A proposed night of ‘true sensual depravity in an environment where men are given the respect they deserve.’ Dad awful poseurs who like to parade about pretending to be masters of kink while wallowing in every bit of patriarchal sexism encouraged by the most uptight preacher. Loathing is too gentle a word for the feeling they inspire.”

“That’s too bad. We were hoping you’d agree to join them.”

“No. Is that all?” He tucks his flask away and prepares to rise.

“Mr. Morningstar. Consider. There have been a lot of off-the-books complaints about the club over the years, but nothing sticks. Women who admit to being uncomfortable with what they’ve been asked to do, but who won’t say anything further.”

“So I visit the captain and forcefully explain that I don’t care for his behavior. No reason for me to waste an entire evening on the matter.”

Bauda’s voice becomes clipped. “I’m sure you’re referring to nothing illegal, but this isn’t the sort of situation that gets cleared up by smacking someone around. Captain Thorston and his friends have a great deal of power. Worse, we’ve received an anonymous tip that a women has gone missing from their gatherings, never to be seen again. Given what just happened with Marcus Pierce, we’re wary of turning a blind eye to any allegations of abduction involving someone with Thorston’s level of authority. When the Sinnerman is allowed to become an LAPD lieutenant, that’s a sign that the organization has become too corrupt to live on as it is. It’s time for us to start cutting off heads.”

Chloe moves to intercept Bauda’s eyeline. “What exactly are you asking Lucifer to do? Join this club and let you know if he sees Thorston hurting anyone? It sounds like this might be the sort of environment where ‘hurting’ is pretty common.” This is far from Chloe’s area of expertise, but everyone’s at least heard of Fifty Shades of Gray. Dan had been horrified to find a copy at his parents’ place during a visit, and he and Chloe had spent a night giggling together over some of the more ludicrous passages.

“We want him to do some basic surveillance, gather proof that Captain Thorston is actually a member, note if anyone else in the LAPD command structure appears to be heavily involved in the club, and find out if there’s any credibility to the rumors of missing women. Ideally, you’ll agree to help him with this task. Bring some actual investigative expertise to the problem.”

“Help him?”

“Pose as his sub.”

Lucifer explodes out of his chair. “Absolutely not!”

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Chloe just rolls her eyes. “Are you really asking us to go play Eyes Wide Shut with a bunch of top brass in order to avoid being railroaded into a murder charge just because your department can’t do its job?”

“Just offering you an opportunity to prove you’re one of the good ones, Detective Decker. You know, the rare cop who actually does want to help people. But no need to answer right away. I’ll let you two think about it. You know how to reach me.”

Chloe stands and gestures for Lucifer to follow her out immediately behind Bauda. She’s not dumb enough to discuss anything in a room with a two way mirror. “Come on, spending these past few days separated from the vending machines has to have been hard for you.”

“’Hard’ is my perennial watchword,” he says, plastic leer in place.

“Gross,” she says without feeling.

She ignores his offer of a crisp one hundred dollar bill and splurges on not only a packet of cool ranch puffs for him but also a packet of the flamin’ hot variety for herself. They snack on a bench outside the precinct, the sounds of the city muffling the crinkling of the foil packets.

“How are your wings?”

He looks at her, looks away. “Still incontrovertible proof of the divine.”

Chloe bites her lips together. Work talk it is. “If Captain Thorston is really a bad guy, if women have gone missing, we should do something.”

“Don’t allow that woman to guilt you into this, Detective. Trust me, these parties are nothing but tepid displays of heterosexuality marred by occasional forays into dubious consent. Nothing the world will take your captain to task for. You’d be better off siccing an accountant on him. That type always thinks they’ve come up with some smart way to avoid the taxman.”

“Don’t you worry about whether we could help those women?”

“Oh I see.” He’s finished his puffs and crushes the empty packet into a ball in his hand. “This is a test. Does the devil have a heart? Well, no, Detective. He doesn’t. Not when it would mean leading you into a room full of predators with a leash around your neck.”

“No one said anything about a leash.”

“Metaphorical and literal in this case, Detective. You would be uncomfortable at best, and that’s without factoring in my presence as your supposed master. I won’t have it.”

“Lucifer,” she tries, but he’s already gone, stalking down the street, hurling his flask out into traffic for the sin of being empty.

Chapter Text

Chloe arrives at Charlotte’s funeral early, hoping to spare Dan the awkwardness of being left alone with Charlotte’s ex-husband. She’d almost forgotten Charlotte had kids of her own, and is momentarily surprised to see their lost faces hanging around their father’s legs, bringing up memories from Chloe’s own past. Charlotte had only ever really referred to Lucifer and Amenadiel as her children, though that had probably been when she was actually a goddess.

Chloe has to ask Lucifer about that. Is there a goddess watching her as well as a god?

God—Hell, she hopes she and Lucifer see each other again.

The funeral itself is a church service—Dan says that her faith had been very important to Charlotte in the past few months, and he’d gone out of his way to convince her ex-husband to not just have it at a funeral home. Dan is a buffet style Catholic himself—he disagrees with a lot of church doctrine and rarely goes to church on Sundays, but at his core he believes, and Chloe knows the priest’s blessing means more to him than he’ll admit.

Unlike Charlotte, Chloe cannot find any comfort in the religious trappings she’s currently surrounded by. Just looking at the crucifix on the wall—how is she supposed to look Christ’s chiseled abs, agonized face, and bleeding extremities and not imagine Lucifer in his place, wings splayed and bleeding beneath her hands? How damned is she for that thought? Everything just raises more questions—she is now in the rare position to find out if Jesus had actually been the son of God—and she feels resentment growing in her chest at everyone who might be able to view faith as a means of simplifying their lives. Thankfully, she still has enough acting muscles left to avoid showing that on her face. She spends the ceremony with her best solemn look firmly in place, one hand kept cradled around Trixie, who is pressed tight to her waist, the other reaching out from time to time to stroke Dan’s back in an offering of comfort.

Ella and Linda are both there. Maze is not; understandable—Maze barely tolerates happy human emotions, let alone grief. Lucifer… Outside, at the grave-site, Chloe thinks she sees him watching from a ways off, but from that distance she can’t confirm that it isn’t some other tall, dark-haired man in a three-piece suit who has his own reasons for visiting the cemetery that day.

Chloe’s gaze keeps straying towards Charlotte’s kids, dressed in pristine, clearly brand new black outfits. They are huddled together, faces perking up a bit when Dan goes to talk to them. That’s…hard. Last week, he was Waffle Dan. Now, well. He and Charlotte had not been back together long, and he hadn’t spent time with her kids their first go around. She knows he’ll offer to be there for them; she also knows that their dad probably won’t encourage the connection, that soon the kids’ll barely remember Dan. Charlotte’s ex seems like a caring enough dad—she hasn’t seen him since the investigation into the dead body in his wife’s hotel room, but he’d certainly gone out of his way to remove the dangerous, Lucifer’s Mom version of Charlotte from his kids’ lives. His eyes barely leave them at all, now. He seems a lot more present than Penelope had been at Chloe’s dad’s funeral. She hopes they’ll be all right.

By the time everyone gets to the reception at the ex’s house, Trixie is simultaneously emotionally exhausted and under-stimulated, and Chloe is glad to be able to send her off to play video games with the other children in attendance. Time spent with some people her own age who understand what she’s going through could only do Trixie good. Chloe certainly feels relieved when she’s finally able to take a plate, heavily laden with casserole, and plop herself down next to Ella on one of the home’s deep window ledges.

“How you holding up, chica?” Ella asks, her own eyes suspiciously red.

Chloe gestures with her fork. “You know. You?”

“Just refueling between crying jags,” Ella indicates her own plate.

“Carbs really are a blessing,” Linda says, walking up to stand in front of them. “I can’t imagine trying to handle a funeral on a keto diet.” Chloe smiles tightly, not wanting to make things weird for Ella, but also not wanting to engage with Linda right now. Linda, a therapist and someone who definitely should be able to read the signals Chloe is sending out, disobliges by settling in for a chat. “How’s Dan?”

“He’s Dan,” Chloe says, eyes automatically scanning the crowd for the man in question. “A bit lost, but trying his best.”

Linda nods. “I’m happy to help him if I can.”

“I’ll let him know.”

“How about you? She was your patient, right?” Ella asks.

“It’s…complicated,” Linda says, and Chloe looks over at the word. Linda meets her gaze and tilts her head, indicating…something? More celestial drama, probably. “Have either of you seen Lucifer? I was hoping he would be here. Or Amenadiel? I haven’t seen him since it happened.”

“No. I’m surprised—Amenadiel seemed really close with his step-mom, at least for a while there,” Ella says.

“Some people have a more difficult time with funerals than others.” It sounds like Linda is offering an excuse, and Chloe takes it.

“Hey, could you guys excuse me for a minute? I need some air.”

“Of course.” Ella, with the sympathetic look. “And we’re here, if you need to talk about it.”

“Thanks.”

In the backyard, a few younger kids are playing on the swing set. Chloe watches with a somewhat wistful smile until Linda joins her.

“I need to apologize,” Linda says. “I know this is not the best setting, but I also know how difficult it was for me when I first found out Lucifer was telling the truth, and I would hate for my own inadequacies to get in the way of you having the support you need.”

“Did you know Pierce was the Sinnerman?”

“No.” The answer is clear and direct. “I did know he might be dangerous, but I also assumed Cain would be a more human, and therefore more dependable, version of Lucifer. In my experience, limited as it is, immortals tend to be fairly straightforward, even when they’re lying to you. Lucifer’s mom was always terrifying, even at her most maternal. Maze, who should be terrifying, has always had a certain warmth, passion, really, that she directs at those who matter to her. I suppose Amenadiel did start out by lying to me, but from what I understand he’s been paying a steep price for that, and, well, obviously we grew to appreciate each other…”

Chloe puts a hand to her forehead. “How did you do it? How did you survive finding out about all of this stuff on your own?”

“Honestly? Maze. She made sure I understood she wanted friendship, and that she was offering friendship. Lucifer is a lot less comforting—he’s got his own issues that tend to get in the way. Have the two of you spoken?”

“Yeah. I went over after I saw you, actually. He’d been hurt, by Cain. I wanted to make sure he was all right.”

“Do you do still see him as your partner?”

“I guess? I don’t know. The world keeps sliding sideways on me. He’s just…he’s been a part of my life for a while now. And he’s so loud. He takes up a lot of room—there are no small doses of Lucifer. I don’t know how I’d adjust if he just wasn’t there anymore.”

Linda nods, tilts her head. “So you are open to resuming your friendship? To trusting him again?”

Chloe snorts. “Unfair, right? To be angry at you but not at him? Well, I am angry at him. We ended up screaming at each other. But he did try to tell me. The Cain stuff—I understand why I dismissed that. But Lucifer told me I didn’t know Pierce as well as I thought and that I couldn’t trust him. And we’d only been dating a couple weeks. It wasn’t… There was no reason for me to assume that Lucifer’s concerns were baseless. Sure, jealousy, but…” Chloe shakes her head. “I don’t know. Lucifer has a tendency to just act unilaterally when he thinks there’s a problem. The fact that he was looping me in on Pierce should have made an impression on me. I guess I was just too hung up on the other things Lucifer was refusing to tell me, or…Or.”

“Or you were in love.”

Horrifying, and probably true. She can still feel that flutter of her heart, the thrill of certainty that had come to rest in her chest the moment she’d decided to share her feelings with Marcus. Chloe pulls in a wet, gasping breath. “Don’t. I can’t.” He’d murdered Charlotte, but if all had gone to plan, Chloe would have been marrying him a week from today. Planning his funeral would have been her responsibility. Now, she doesn’t even know if anyone has claimed his body, if he has any next of kin.

“I’m sorry, Chloe,” Linda says again after a minute. “Being Lucifer’s therapist and being friends with all of you, it’s ethically…Well, it isn’t ethical at all. Too often I let myself pick and chose between obligations, favoring whichever are more comfortable for me to meet. I’ve really fallen down on the friendship front this past year.”

Chloe nods, allows herself to slump in Linda’s direction. “It’s not like I’ve been great, either. I mean, you clearly went through some stuff and didn’t feel comfortable telling me.”

Linda nods vigorously. “I am so glad to have another human in the celestial club, my God, Chloe. You know Lucifer made the stars? Like just, poof! Stars.”

“Huh.” Chloe says, then, “Huh!” in a slightly higher voice.

“Exactly.”

They stand together, watching the kids for a few more minutes. “Well, I’ll give you your space,” Linda says at last. “But I am here for you if you want to talk.”

Chloe nods, not really promising anything, and Linda goes back inside.

Alone again, Chloe rubs her arms and looks around at the black clad guests. So many people, all appearing genuinely sad. Charlotte had really pulled her life together. Chloe can’t imagine being friends with the old Charlotte Richards, but this one? This one had confronted this terrifying thing that happened to her and, instead of staying locked in fear, had taken action. She couldn’t have known she only had a few months left to live, but she’d made the most of them anyway.

Chloe, on the other hand, has practically spent the past week hiding. She sighs, thinking of Trixie, about how she’d want her to behave in a similar situation. She pulls out her phone, opens up the text chain with Maze. Looks at the blinking cursor next to the word ‘Demon’ that she’d typed but not sent. Hits send.

A little over an hour later, Chloe’s just finished saying goodbye to Dan and Trixie when she feels the responding text come in.

We good?

That depends on Trixie. I get that you were mad at Lucifer, but whatever you were doing pushing me at Pierce, that put Trixie in danger, too.

I’m allowed to see her? To apologize?

I need to know you understand the concept of collateral damage, first.

Nothing for a minute, then, I’ll ask Linda about it. Later, Decker.

Well, Maze promising to learn something hadn’t been high on her list of expectations, so maybe things are going to turn out better than Chloe’d hoped. She takes hold of that positive feeling and pulls up a different text chain.

Can we meet for lunch tomorrow? Just talk about stuff?

This response is nearly immediate. Yes. Come by around noon—I’ll even make you grilled cheese.

Actually, could we meet somewhere else? Somewhere neutral? I think it would be easier.

The response is a bit slower this time, dots popping up and disappearing from her screen like he’s cycling through responses.

Of course, Detective. I’ll arrange a reservation.

They meet at a bistro just upscale enough to make her feel uncomfortable walking inside. Lucifer read her request perfectly; no way she’s going to cause a scene here.

He’s waiting when she arrives, dressed in a dark maroon suit paired with a charcoal shirt and pocket square. For all that he’s usually dressed to impress, he looks a bit more formal today, his eyeliner nothing more than a fine accent along his upper lash line and his hair ruthlessly straightened rather than just blow dried and product-ed into submission. He’s fiddling with a menu, but looks up with a cautious smile when she drops into the chair across from him.

“Detective, I must apol—”

“Is prayer real?” she asks, cutting him off before he can distract her. “And that all-seeing God thing? True? Because I feel like I’m constantly being watched and it’s driving me a little crazy.”

“Ah. Yes to both, sort of.” He at least looks apologetic while he says it. “My father can see all, but he’s the quintessential absentee parent—good luck getting him to take an interest. My siblings,” he waves a hand, “take their cue from Him. They tend to avoid humans unless specifically given a task to perform. As for prayer, it works, but mainly not for humans. My siblings and I can always hear each other, but human voices are fainter. If you pray with direction and intent, your prayer might be received, if the angel in question is open to receiving prayers at that time. But as I said, most of my siblings do not care to interact with humans.”

“And your mom…?”

“In another universe. Not a worry.”

He’s so blase about it. What could Chloe possibly worry about, now that there are multiple universes and celestials can apparently move back and forth between them? Are there celestials from other universes, too? But she came here with a specific set of questions; no getting bogged down in alternate dimensions. “What about you?” Lucifer? she thinks with intent. Can you hear me?

He winces. “I am rather more attuned to you than most, Detective, and was expecting you to make the attempt. You can imagine, however, the things most people pray to Satan for. I rarely listen. I’m no mind reader, remember? Your thoughts are your own.” He sits back and straightens his cuffs. “I wish I could be more reassuring. Have you slept at all?”

“Is that your way of saying I’m not looking my best?” Chloe is well aware of the bags under her eyes and the extra stress lines running across her forehead.

“You are always beautiful, Detective.”

“Hmph. I’ve slept some. More than when Trixie was a baby.”

“How is the little urchin doing?”

“She’s processing. Dan’s got her at his parents for a little concentrated family time.” She spots a waiter approaching, and the conversation stops as they place their orders. “So I was thinking,” she says once they’re resettled. “I can’t just ask you all of the questions I might have—I mean, we’re talking about everything since the beginning of time. Right?”

“Absent the first nine months or so, yes.”

“Wow. Okay, that’s too much. We can’t cover all of that. So, big things first.” She looks down, steeling herself. “Any genocides in your past? Dictatorships? Mass cruelty events? Any serial murder sprees?”

He looks wounded and small. “Come up with your own definition for the devil, then?”

“No. But I’d hate to assume and be wrong. Though it sounds like, in terms of harming humans, you really only get involved in that after they’re dead?”

“You lot do plenty to each other here on Earth; you hardly need my help.”

“And you don’t decide who goes to Hell?”

“We’ve discussed this—”

“When I thought it wasn’t real. Please, Lucifer, a little patience?”

“I do not decide, no. Humans work it out for themselves based upon their feelings of guilt.” His words are clipped, his tone decidedly impatient, but his eyes are clear and beseeching.

“And your dad is the one who set up the whole Heaven and Hell system.”

“Yes. I’m sure Mum offered notes, but humans weren’t her project.”

Chloe nods tightly. “That’s good. I mean, it’s terrible, but good that you’re not, you know, big, spooky, destroyer of worlds Devil Man.” She brings her arms up over her head, forming little finger claws as though she were a devouring beast, catches the eye of one of the other diners, and quickly drops her hands back into her lap. Lucifer snorts, and she rushes on. “Right. That’s the big stuff. Any other history of the universe bits, we’ll take as they come up. But what I want—what I need right now is to know what’s happened that involves my life. All the little supernatural pieces of weirdness that have come up since we met. Our partnership, celestial stuff edition.”

He fixes his cuffs again, rearranges his silverware. “I suppose it’s a fair request. You’ll tell me if you need a break? It’s—there’s a lot, Detective. Some of it you won’t like.”

“I’m sure I won’t like most of it, but being in the dark about what’s been happening at work, or in my home, or to the people I care about?” She shakes her head. “I need to know.”

So he tells her, starting with their first case. She thinks she’s taking it well; she is compiling a list of things she apparently refused to see when they were happening, but she doesn’t feel like the world is so vast she’s going to disappear. And some of the things she’d been most worried about turn out to be less bad in the telling. Lucifer had shown his face to Jimmy Barnes, driving him mad, but Barnes had of course been trying to kill them at them at the time. More importantly, Lucifer had not forced a man to jump off a roof when they were searching for his wings, and still sounds genuinely disturbed by the incident.

“You kept your wings after you cut them off, because…you could just pop them back into place if you wanted to?” She pictures him as a divine Mr. Potato Head, complete with wing attachments. Across the table from her, he doesn’t even blink; definitely not a mind reader.

“Celestial biology. All my pieces are, in fact, mine, whether presently attached or not.”

“You know that’s not how it works for humans, right? No cutting off my hand and sticking it back into place.”

“Yes, I have become very familiar with human anatomy over the years, Detective.”

“Surface level only, I hope.” She can’t picture him doing any dissections, but then he’s never been squeamish.

His smile turns challenging. “Even if only by reputation, you should know by now that I can go very deep.”

She rolls her eyes. Moving on. “But then you just burned your wings? After all of the effort it took to track them down?”

“They were a crutch. Unnecessary. I’m an independent devil, and there was no chance I was going back to Hell,” his eyes flicker away for a moment, but then he smooths his expression and continues, “so I decided to free myself of them. Better than them falling into the wrong hands again.”

“That’s when you got Monroe to make you my official partner, right? So to commemorate your commitment to staying on Earth, you decided to get a job?” She starts to laugh, but, well, why not? She certainly prefers to have some structure and purpose to her days, though there is that saying about the devil and idle hands.

“And lucky for you I did, Detective. I’m quite the natural investigator, and my resume for doling out punishment is unmatched.”

“You know it’s not about punishment, right? It’s—it’s about accountability, and preventing future harm. That’s what I do. Justice.”

“Of course. One look at the way prisons are run in this country proves it’s all about harm reduction, hmm?”

“That’s… Yeah, okay, fair. But that’s what it’s supposed to be.”

“’Supposed to’ is not a phrase I put much stock in.”

“But you do—isn’t that what sparks the punishment? People commit wrongs, they don’t behave how they’re supposed to, and so you punish. Which is what, it sounds like, you were supposed to do in Hell.”

He sits back, arms crossed. “Very tidy. Have you solved me, then? Is that what you’re here to do?”

She turns to the window, avoiding his gaze. “Ella did say that the devil is all about questions, which makes you ‘Chloe catnip.’”

“And now that you’ve figured out the answer to me, am I to be batted under a sofa and forgotten?”

Chloe laughs a little manically. “You are far from solved.”

He looks discomfited, like she confirmed something for him that he wanted proven false. “Of course—we’re only a few weeks into the partnership in my ‘celestial stuff edition’ retelling. By the by, does Miss Lopez know now? About me?”

“No. No, I told her I believe you, but she still thinks you’re the world’s most committed method actor.

“I do appreciate that she chooses to see me as an artist rather than a liar or a lunatic. Very well, where was I? Just burned my wings, and as you said made a deal with then Lieutenant Monroe to become your proper partner.”

“Why me?” It is, if she’s honest with herself, the question she’s most curious about. “Is it just that your desire mojo didn’t work, so you were curious, or…?”

“You cared.” He shrugs. “About Delilah. About, well, name a person. You had your own fully fleshed out moral code and you weren’t even a hypocrite about it.”

She hears it again. Don’t. Please. He’s been naked in front of pretty much the entire city, but he’d been so unprepared for anyone to respond to those horrific scars with concern. Her eyebrows draw together and her mouth becomes pinched. She feels a sudden loathing for every lover he’s had since arriving in L.A., everyone who’s looked at him and seen only themselves. His body cants away from her, his hands rising to straighten his jacket as though he’s about to stand, and she realizes he’s watching her expressions far too closely for her to be unguarded now. She can be angry with the beautiful and careless denizens of Hollywood later.

“That was the sneaker case, right?” she prompts, switching her expression to curious, and he falls back into his narrative. Amenadiel quickly takes the top spot on her list of people to be furious with, but, “It was two year ago, Detective, and he did lose his powers in consequence. He’s learned quite a bit about humans since,” Lucifer says.

Still, Chloe is pretty sure he deserves to be punched on sight. “Has he learned anything about how he’s supposed to treat his family?”

“Well, he’s stopped scheming to put me back in Hell, so it’s a decent start.”

Speaking of.

She has to close her eyes when he tells her about dying from Malcolm Graham’s bullet, because she remembers what it had felt like in the moment, being so certain that she’d lost him. Now, knowing that she had? It can’t be allowed to happen again. “You left something out,” she says, voice husky. “It’s later now—tell me why you’re vulnerable sometimes but not others.” So I can make sure that vulnerable setting remains off.

He goes through the whole fidgeting routine—cuffs, silverware, pocket square, ring. Tugging on his collar, patting down his hair. “Now, I don’t know why this is the case. There doesn’t seem to be any reason for it—it’s certainly not anyone’s fault.”

She gives him a flat stare, and he throws up his hands.

“Fine. As you wish. You, Detective. Do you recall when I told you that you make me vulnerable? I was not speaking metaphorically. When you are nearby, I am as mortal as any human.”

She’s stunned, sits there blinking while picturing him wandering, desperate, through the corridors of Hell, bargaining with his father because he wouldn’t leave her and Trixie in danger unprotected. She curls her hands into fists, not realizing just how tightly she’s clenched until one of her fingernails breaks the skin of her palm. She hisses, bringing her hands up to shake them out.

“Detective,” Lucifer says, alarmed, and reaches out to catch her bleeding hand. One of his fingers brushes against the cut, and it stings. She jerks her hand back. He immediately retreats, scoots his chair back from the table, farther from her.

“Apologies, Detective. I forgot myself. I’ll—”

“Why do you stay?”

“You’re right, of course.” He stands, and she pushes to her feet to block his path.

“No. Why do you still work with me, still spend free time with me? You could die, Lucifer. You did die. You set your wings on fire to avoid going back to Hell, and then I practically sent you there anyway.”

“You almost died. Yet you don’t hide yourself away.”

“That’s different. I’m always mortal. You’re an ang—you’re the devil. You’re as old as time, a constant. You created the stars. It doesn’t matter if I die, but you—”

“It very much matters, Detective. It matters more than anything.”

He just says these things, and she’s supposed to…what? How can she respond to that? She bites her tongue. In public. Fancy bistro. She gestures for him to retake his seat and does the same herself. “I don’t want you putting yourself in danger like that, Lucifer.”

“I don’t want you putting yourself in danger, either, Detective, but you did just that less than one week ago. You’re doing it now. Whatever problems you’re having admitting to yourself who I am, you saw my devil face. Your body knows I’m a threat, that you’re seated across from a monster. Your heart rate is elevated. You admitted you aren’t sleeping. You’re injuring yourself, and despite forcing me to endure your ministrations for hours you won’t even let me take a look at your hand.”

“Forcing you?”

His face shuts down at the hurt in her voice, and his eyes lock on the door. “Please, Detective. This is enough for today. Please?”

She casts about for something to say to make this right, to make him understand. “I’m not afraid of you, Lucifer.”

“What did you say about trust, about honesty the other day? That you didn’t want to constantly be told that you were a different person from the one you know yourself to be? Well, it doesn’t feel good on my side either, Detective. I told you. I told you who I am again and again, and you didn’t believe me. And now you’re sitting here, listening to me tell you about who I am and what I’ve done and you still don’t believe me. You want it all to be excusable, to pretend that Amenadiel would have taken those actions against me without any justification.”

“There is no justification for what he did.”

“Of course. Silly me to think I might understand this better than you do.”

Her hand, curled tightly against her chest, hurts completely out of proportion to the minor cut she sustained. It throbs with each word he speaks, and she can feel her energy draining out through the break in her skin. “You’re right. Fine. Enough for today. Go.”

He pulls out his wad of cash, drops far too much money on the table, and bolts for the door.

That night, curled up on her couch next to Ella, watching Patrick Swayze chastise Jennifer Grey for her spaghetti arms, Chloe is still holding her hand tight to her chest. The skin around her cut is red and inflamed. She can only imagine there was some irritant trapped under her fingernail when it drew blood. She’s disinfected the area to high heaven, but still it throbs.

“See, why do none of the bad boys I bring home ever know how to dance like that? They all pretend, but the only move they ever know is how to grind against my ass on the dance floor.” Ella is pouting over the popcorn bowl, eyes glued to the screen.

“You should institute a test. Make them at least prove they can step back and forth on the beat before you let them take you home. No, make them lift you!”

“Ooh, yeah. Brute force with rhythm.” Ella sighs contentedly. “Um, not to spoil the mood, but just as a heads up. I heard the feds are expanding their investigation. Sounds like you might be out of the office a little while longer.”

“That’s not too surprising. I suppose the rumor mill is thrilled.”

Ella scrunches up her nose. “Yeah. It’s pretty nasty. I didn’t realize how bad it was for you before I showed up. People seem to be carrying an old grudge, kinda blame you for Pierce even. Like you had to have known what he was, being engaged to him and all.”

“I get it. Me dumping him makes it even more suspicious, right? Like I found out but didn’t tell anyone.”

“That’s one of the possibilities being discussed, yeah. I’ve been letting everyone know how wrong they are, but I don’t know that it’s having much affect.”

Chloe shakes her head. “Thanks for trying, Ella, but the chances of me being popular at work died a long time ago. What about the stuff from the scene? Any issues with that? Like, anything weird going on with the feathers, or anything else?” Were any of the crime scene techs experiencing weird angel blood related rashes?

“Only that we can’t identify them. I mean, some of them are capital L large, so not your average bird, and they’re stiff. Sharp even, but they don’t seem to be synthetic, so. Lucifer’s guardian angel theory is the best one we’ve got.”

Chloe grimaces, hearing the line she’d fed Lucifer coming back to her through Ella’s mouth. Was she being unfair to him? Trying to force him to be something he wasn’t?

“And I should probably let you know, they found some files that Pierce had been keeping. Like, ultra creepy files. He’d completely bought into Lucifer’s whole devil thing, but there were all sorts of things about angels and demons and, like, black magic.” Ella cringes, twisting her fingers together. “And about you. Um. I haven’t seen it, but I hear it’s pretty detailed. Like, personal stuff.”

Chloe’s pretty sure her vision blanks out for a second. Wonderful—now in addition to her coworkers all having seen her boobs, they’ve all probably read an account of her sex life. She’s never touching a man again.

“He didn’t think I was an angel, did he?” she asks, willfully not thinking about it.

“More proof he was evil—what kind of man believes in the divine on Earth and doesn’t think his fiancée walks on water?”

“Yeah.”

“Hey, sorry, Chlo. No more shop talk. Just Baby having the time of her life.” Ella gives an exaggeratedly salacious wiggle of her eyebrows, and Chloe allows herself to laugh and let go for a minute. She’d made her choices; nothing to do about them now.

Chapter Text

After another night of fitful sleep, her hand is still sore but not as inflamed as it had been. Hoping that this won’t turn out to be one of those freak infections that lead to amputation, Chloe gets up to laboriously go through her morning routine.

Today is mandatory counseling day.

Chloe has been through the counseling process for officer involved shootings before, so she feels confident she’ll be able to control the conversation well enough that a psych eval won’t be one of the things standing in the way of her continued employment. She’d made the appointment with Dr. Zeflman as soon as possible post-shooting, to make it clear she wasn’t carrying any guilt about the event. When she arrives at Zeflman’s office, she makes eye contact and gives answers that are brief but not too brief. She is competent, not perfect. So, no, she hasn’t been having any trouble sleeping (she’s made certain her makeup game is on point today), but yes, she is feeling more stress than usual. She misses being at work, and will feel better when the investigation clears her. No, she hasn’t been drinking more, but yes she has been spending time with friends. She has a support system; she won’t fall apart. The citizens of the great city of Los Angeles can trust her with their safety.

Dr. Zeflman nods throughout it all, saying very little until the end of their hour.

“It sounds like you’re dealing with everything very well. I see no reason why you shouldn’t resume work normally following the outcome of the department’s investigation.”

Chloe is careful to show only a small portion of her relief. “Thanks, Doc.”

“But, Detective Decker.” The doctor sets aside her notebook and leans forward across her desk. “I am a little worried that you aren’t taking the time to process everything.” She holds up her hands reassuringly. “Don’t worry, I’m not putting this part in my report. I know that many officers can’t really be honest in this room, because they see me as a barrier. There’s no real space for doctor patient confidentiality when I’m writing up a recommendation to your superiors, is there?”

Chloe cocks her head, smile careful and pleasant. “What do you mean, Dr. Zeflman?”

“I mean Lieutenant Pierce was a significant part of your life, both in and out of work. It’s normal for you to want to put your life back together exactly the way it was before your relationship with him deteriorated. But I want you to recognize that you don’t need to do that. Your life has changed significantly in the past week, which means this is an opportune time for you to make changes for yourself. You can reshape your life so that it fits the new you better. You don’t have to go back to old habits just because it seemed like they were right for you before, just because they’re comfortable and familiar. Allow grief to move you forward, not hold you back.”

“I’m not grieving, Dr. Zeflman. Lieutenant Pierce was not who I thought he was. I don’t regret his passing.”

“It’s okay to grieve for the person you thought he was, too. Just. Make sure that whatever you’re doing for yourself now, you do because you want to and not because you’re afraid.”

Chloe keeps her mask on tight, doesn’t let Zeflman’s words visibly shake her, but inside she’s rattled. It does feel like she’s been making amends with all of the people in her life, repairing old bonds, but that’s normal, too, right? Telling herself it’s not fear making her do it, she pulls out her phone as soon as she’s back in her car.

Can we try again?

He doesn’t reply until she’s back home, and the wait only heightens her anxiety. What if she is just reaching out to Lucifer from fear of change? She’d told Linda the truth: there are no small doses of Lucifer. He would be in her life or he wouldn’t. And she wants him there, doesn’t she? She’s not just convincing herself that his face, his wings, his world-altering truth doesn’t scare her because she’s more afraid of having to fill the hole he’d leave in her life?

Where would you like to meet? he responds at last, leaving her flooded with a relief that provides her with none of the answers she needs.

“How are your wings?” Chloe asks, hoping to ease into the heavier stuff.

They’re sitting in a rotary sushi bar not far from her house, sharing a plate of edamame. The conversations around them function as white nose, allowing her to tune out her own thoughts for a moment and focus on how pale he looks. This is why she keeps asking for in person meetings rather than speaking to him on the phone; in theory, he’s a scary immortal, possibly immoral, being with unknown powers. In practice, he is as worn down as she is, just another person muddling through a difficult situation. Still her Lucifer, just with new bonus features added on.

“They haven’t fallen off,” he says, eyes intent on the conveyor belt. Apparently that’s all he has to say on the subject. He snags a spicy tuna roll and some seaweed salad for her and a rainbow roll for himself.

She smiles down at her plates. Over the past two and a half years, she’s seen him be the most self-centered, inconsiderate asshole, but he’s always attentive, in his own way. Anything she enjoys gets engraved on some stone tablet in Lucifer’s head, never to be forgotten.

“I want to apologize. You were right.”

“What about this time?” He keeps his chopsticks poised above his plate, not eating, and she realizes he’s waiting for her to tell him that she is afraid of him. That he is a monster. Somehow she has to find a way to be honest with him without feeding into his insecurities.

“About me not believing you, before I saw your face. Some of the things you said, I had no way to believe. But I still should have taken you more seriously. This past year—” She breaks off, shakes her head.

“It’s all right, Detective.” He looks so soft and understanding, her gentle nightmare of a man. “I wasn’t trying to convince you most of the time. I was rather worried about how you’d react—I certainly never expected it to result in so many lunch dates. You do tend to surprise.”

She laughs, but quickly sobers. It occurs to her that he’s never had a proper break up, and doesn’t know that more often than not relationships die slowly rather than in an instant. She hopes that’s not what this is. “In some ways it’s more difficult, knowing you now,” she says. “Because whenever I think beyond the immediate, beyond the two of us sitting here, eating sushi on Earth, I can’t figure out why I’m a part of the story. I’m…a blink of the eye. I’m so easy for someone like—no, not like you, but of your abilities—someone like that to control or dismiss. But you’re here, looking at me like I matter.”

“You do,” he says. His eyes are vast and unblinking.

A derisive huff of breath escapes her, and she holds up a hand to stave off his response. “I believe I matter to you, I just can’t…It’s difficult to process, when I think outside of the immediate. But in other ways,” she says quickly, moving forward before they get stuck in a conversation that will make him miserable, “it’s easier to know you now. I was usually fine, just accepting that my partner and best friend had this ongoing delusion that he dealt with. But it was also a strain. I didn’t always know how to respond to you in a way that would be best for your mental health, or sometimes I would get frustrated that you couldn’t just let go of something that obviously wasn’t true, or I would feel like you were lying to me because I just couldn’t make myself generous enough to think from your point of view. That was more work than I realized—work that was absolutely worth it. Every relationship takes effort, and ours was absolutely worth it—but it’s a relief to know that I don’t have to interpret the things you say. Now I guess I need to put some effort into not just knowing that you’re speaking the truth, but into accepting that truth?”

His lips quirk up, but then he clears his throat and looks away. “I’ll do my best to help.”

“Lucifer Morningstar, the devil, who has done some very bad things.” He nods. “And a lot of good things, too.” He frowns, opens his mouth— “When we left of yesterday, you’d died to save my life and you went to Hell for a minute?”

“Ah. That.”

And they begin again. He tells her about the deal he made with his dad, and then talks about his mother. He talks about cheesy noodles and car bombs (a fun new item added to Chloe’s day-to-day list of concerns). He talks about the warden’s trial, only obliquely touching on Chloe’s testimony, as though that moment is too dangerous to discuss in full. He goes on long enough that she realizes he’s avoiding something.

“How come your siblings were okay with your dad throwing your mom into Hell? I mean, I get that your whole family seems pretty dense when it comes to how they should be treating each other, but if both of your parents raised you guys to worship them, then why does it seem like everyone puts your dad first?”

“Well, you met her,” he says, and Chloe huffs in acknowledgment. “Exactly. She was difficult, to put it mildly. Mercurial. She could be absolutely lovely. She’d go through these periods where she’d be a devoted mum. Lots of affectionate words, gentle touches. Then her mood would change and she’d follow up that affection with some violent rage or a plot to make you prove that you loved her more than you loved Dad or your brother or whoever. Dad was more stable. He had a plan—to follow him was to have a purpose. He was always distant, of course, and a completely egotistical bastard. But predictable when it came to knowing what would please him. He seemed safer. That’s certainly what Uriel thought.”

He freezes, and Chloe knows she’s found the sore spot.

“Is that one of your siblings?” she asks, carefully keeping her eyes on her nearly empty plate.

Lucifer notices and fishes a spider roll off of the conveyor for them to share.

“He was my brother,” he says, making liberal use of the soy sauce. “I killed him. He doesn’t exist anymore.”

He’s told her about Azrael’s blade, about his mom’s attempts to make him angry enough to wield it, so Chloe has enough information to put two and two together. She drops her chopsticks and reaches out for his hand.

“Don’t.” He’s very still, dressed all black today, like a seductive tragedy. Lucifer is a man built from neutral colors—hair, skin, eyes—yet somehow his is the shiniest hair, his the most sparkling eyes, his the warmest countenance. Usually. Now, he is cold and flat.

Chloe pulls her hand back and crosses her arms across her chest. This is it, she realizes. His trump card, the thing he’s done that proves he’s so inherently rotten that Amenadiel could be justified in attempting to have him killed. Goose pimples rise across her skin as she shivers.

“You recall your car accident?” he asks in a monotone. He explains it to her without inflection, Uriel and his patterns. Uriel and the chip on his shoulder. Uriel and his plan to make Dad proud. Uriel, who would have killed his mother to save what he thought was his father’s vision for Heaven, and who would have killed Chloe and Maze to spite his fallen brother. Lucifer doesn’t use these words, but Chloe can read between the lines. She’s been witness to the aftermaths of a lot of violent scenes.

“So there you have it, Detective, something you can fit into that devil definition you’re working on—Satan is a killer. You asked about my wings earlier? They won’t heal. All your hard work, and they’re still just streaming with blood.” He offers her a plastic smile, his eyes desolate. “And why not? There had to be some consequences eventually. Dad was willing to let it slide when I killed one of his sons, but he’s pretty strict when it comes to murdering his favored creations. Uriel he could lose, but not Cain, not a human.”

No good reassurances exist for this situation. She tries to break it down into component parts, isolate the things she knows how to address. “I’ve killed, too,” she says. “You’ve seen me do it.”

“To protect your spawn. Perhaps you can sympathize with Dad, then?”

“No. Cut that out.”

Chloe’s not used to being this angry this often. She’s afraid if she opens her mouth, she’ll start yelling, even though it’s not him but his family that she’s furious with, so she’s stuck silently seething at her spider roll. Another rule of Chloe Decker’s new universe slides into place: Satan doubts. His father, his mom, Uriel, Amenadiel, even Cain if one wanted to lump him in with the rest of the immortals—they were all so certain that they were doing the right thing, feeling justified sometimes even after they were proven wrong. But Lucifer knows he is flawed. She wonders if that is, ultimately, why he fell, or why he was cast out, rather. Because he reminded all the denizens of the heavens that not even the power to create whole worlds could make a being flawless, and they all hated him for showing them that truth.

“Sometimes there are only bad choices,” she says at last. “Putting you in a position where you have to jail your mom, kill her even? That’s not right. Uriel made his decisions, and you had to react. Same with Pierce. Same with Malcolm Graham. Is it just those two, Uriel and Cain?”

“Disappointed?” His voice is so caustic it strips her eardrums raw.

Questions down, Decker. “Just getting to know you.”

“Any verdict yet? Enough of a reference point for you to cast your judgment?”

She would try again to take his hand, but he’s still got himself pulled back away from the table, contained and untouchable. “The Devil and Detective Decker: they’ll kill to protect the ones they love.” She says it like it’s the tag line to one of the cheesy B-movies he loves, the sort she would still be making in another life. “You didn’t seek them out, Lucifer; they came to you.”

“I should have…I should have, Detective.”

She knows what he’s trying to say even if his words aren’t there. She wishes, keenly, that she’d killed Pierce before he’d had to. A bubble forms in her chest, something fragile and dear, an echo of something she’d felt before, when she’d seen his scars, when they’d shared a piano bench, when he’d disparaged her middle name. She blinks her eyes, sniffs discreetly, and picks up her chopsticks again. If she’s going to force him to relive his trauma in public settings for her own comfort, she can at least do her best to reestablish normalcy for him. “Stop hogging the soy sauce and tell me what you did with your sister’s sword. Have I met her?”

He blinks, clearly not expecting the change in topic. But he settles into it quickly enough, scooting a little closer to the table as he passes her the requested condiment. “Ah, no. She’s rather busy being the Angel of Death and all. Not much for visits.” His armor slides back into place, and he continues his story.

Ultimately, she wishes they’d stopped at his brother’s death. “What does that mean, I’m a miracle. Like, Amenadiel is my dad?” She’s going to cry again.

Lucifer rears back, lips twisted in disgust. “Dad forbid, Detective, no. He just,” he waves his hands in he air, “made you possible. Your parents are still your parents.”

“So this was like, celestial hormone treatments? Supernatural IVF?”

“If you like.”

That doesn’t sound too bad, but… “Why? What does it mean, that I wasn’t supposed to exist?”

“It means Dad saw an opportunity to manipulate me.” The way Lucifer explains it, she is a celestial torture device, bound to him by some creepy divine love spell.

“That’s why you were so angry when you came to see me? When I was poisoned? You keep thinking I’m in cahoots with your dad?” She recalls a time early in their acquaintance when he’d insisted on seeing her back, checking for wings. She remembers hunching over, turned away from him with her shirt rucked up, feeling his desperation and knowing that this man was dangerous to her, specifically, because she would not have accepted such handling from anyone who she hadn’t already tucked down deep within herself. If him being the devil meant he’d been playing some elaborate game with her over the years, he’d certainly taken the time to include a lot of details that didn’t carry any meaning to someone who didn’t know who he really is.

“An error in judgment that’s become increasingly clear over time, Detective. You are a victim in this.” His gaze traces over her face. “That’s why I knew that as soon as I procured the antidote, I had to let you go.”

“Lucifer, you—wait, the antidote. Was that more celestial stuff? Do you have, like, super healing powers?”

He holds his hand out and tips it from side to side. She goggles.

“I don’t,” he clarifies. “My wings do, or the originals did, anyway. I suspect that when Dad stuck this set on my back, he decided to remove some of the premium features first. Did I mention the woman who thought I was a cosplayer?” He says the word like the direst of insults. “Hardly proper respect for the divine. I mean, horribly embarrassing to unfurl in the first place, though she was lovely, Detective, you should have seen—”

She scrunches up her nose. “Lucifer. Less sex talk, more how am I still alive?”

“Jealous, Detective?”

She sucks in a breath because, well, yes, how dare he show his wings to one of his randoms and not to her, but she also can’t help but smile because he finally sounds like himself. Daring, teasing, just brimming with possibilities. “Focus,” she tells him, but it sounds like an endearment.

He puffs out his chest. “Not even the dead can hide from the devil. I just popped down to Professor Carlisle’s Hell loop—”

She presses her palms flat on the table, suddenly dizzy. “How many times have you died and gone to Hell for me?”

“Just the two.” He sounds bashful, like a teenage boy offering a corsage. “I don’t think I can manage a third time,” he admits, and then he’s stripping himself bare for her again, like it’s nothing. Like he owes her his skin. He tells her about his Hell loop, about how glad he was to see Uriel again even if he had to keep stabbing him, about his mother’s one shining maternal moment. Chloe’s already overloaded, her brain crashing, and then he explains how he knew he needed to leave her behind when he returned with the antidote. Needed to set her free.

Chloe is not designed to feel so many different things. Her very blood is trembling. “I thought you just got scared. The relationship was too serious for you to handle, or you were too afraid of what it meant to get involved with someone who has a dangerous job. But you went to Hell for me, endured all of that, even though I’m not enough of a person to have my own feelings? Miracles don’t get to have that?”

He turns to study the food passing by their table. “I thought so. I don’t really know anymore. My father cannot be trusted. There’s no doubt you were designed to mess with me—why else would you be immune to my powers? And your free will is too precious to take any chances with.”

“So you made sure I understood that my feelings were meaningless by disappearing without a word and coming back married to the first bimbo you could find?”

He frowns, genuinely affronted. “There’s no call for attacking Candy, Detective. Whatever you think of my behavior, she is blameless, and an absolute sweetheart.” Chloe thinks she might literally have a stroke. Had she really been mentally praising this man’s thoughtfulness earlier because he remembers what type of sushi she likes? And he just. Keeps. Talking. “The best wife I could have asked for. She was in a nasty situation, so I helped her out, and in exchange she married me. I was able to reset our relationship so you and I could be friends and Candy helped me gain some valuable intel on Mum’s plans.”

“Friends.” Chloe starts nodding compulsively. “So miracles are allowed to have friends?”

His brain finally catches up to the conversation. “Were we not friends?”

“You knew. You knew what Dan had done, how he’d made me question my own perception of reality. And then you disappeared, like nothing had happened between us. Like I’d imagined it.”

“I couldn’t trust—”

“Me?”

“My father—”

“I do not. Want to hear it. I am done. With your father. I am done. With my life. Being rewritten. By celestials.”

He bows his head, bites his lower lip. He’s lost the conversation again, or turned it into the one he keeps insisting they will eventually have. “I understand, you needn’t say anything further. I…what you’ve given me is far more than I ever expected, and I am forever grateful for your generosity and companionship. For sharing your goodness with someone so undeserving. I will not trouble you further.”

He’s got that look on his face, like a dog that has sentenced itself to a time out in the corner because it knows it’s been bad. She grits her teeth, rolls her eyes in frustration. Not this again.

“Let’s be more specific this time, Lucifer. If we’re going to keep going back over this same ground again and again, we should really dig down into it. In what ways am I better than you? Well, let’s see. When you got quickie married to a woman you hardly knew, you were knee-deep in grief and trying to thwart your terrifying parents’ machinations. When I got engaged to a man I hardly knew, it was because I was sad the boy I liked wouldn’t ask me out. But that makes sense, right? I’m not a real person. I’m just programmed. So of course I can’t be trusted to make responsible decisions.”

“Don’t speak about yourself that way, Detective. You take care of the people in your life. People can rely on you.”

“Just not you. Because when it comes to you, I’m a manipulation. Well, let’s take a look at how I’ve used that supposed free will you protected for me? Because show me a man I can carpool to work with, and I’ll sign right up for a lifetime commitment. I mean, I love Dan, and I am forever grateful for Trixie, but he was a bad husband. Remember—convinced me I was crazy? That I was bad at my job? And then I got back together with him. He had to be the one to break it off. And then there’s Pierce. He shoots a blind man and I shrug it off, like that wasn’t a clear show of unnecessary force. But he claimed he was being responsible and he shared a little anecdote about his brother—who it turns out he’d murdered—”

“Something he and I have in common.”

“Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare. Who did he save when he did that, Lucifer, huh? Or any of the times he killed after that? Or when he was building an entire crime syndicate? You were protecting the people in your life. It’s awful, I know, and unfair, and painful. You gave Maze a chance at a life. You gave your mom her freedom. You gave Trixie her mother.” She looks away, head tipping back. “I can’t believe you were dealing with this on your own.”

“Being your partner, someone you counted on. It helped.” He runs a hand through his hair and drops it, idle, on the table.

Chloe seizes her chance, capturing his left hand between both of her own. She strokes her thumbs over his knuckles, massages into the delicate stretch between his fingers and thumb. He remains rigid under her touch and, uncertain, she drops his hand. He sighs and tucks it back under the table.

“At least you should be able to understand now why it was so important you be able to choose. I had thought your decision to be with Cain proved you did have the ability, but the fact you so quickly forgive me now that you know about Uriel, when you saw me with my true face standing over Cain’s body, surely that’s an indication that you are not completely free.”

Chloe puts a hand to her forehead, tries to compose herself. She’s not angry anymore, but he still needs to hear this. “You didn’t let me choose. You rejected me.”

“Detec—”

“You did. As for Marcus—he let me think I could see him. He told me a distorted version of his brother’s death and made me feel special, as though he were opening up. He took a bullet for me, when I didn’t know how meaningless a gesture that was for him. And he ignored me. He ignored me, so of course I fell for him the moment he showed an interest, because I felt like I’d won him over, like he’d grown to know me and liked me more with knowing. I took every fantasy I’d spun out in my head over the past two years about—well, I took those fantasies and I tried them out with him because he said he wanted me. I made a fool out of myself at work. Again. And then he broke up with me, but instead of taking that time to evaluate our lopsided relationship dynamic, I agreed to marry him. I didn’t even discuss it with Trixie first. Every moment he spent with me was a manipulation. But you think it must have been your dad messing with my feelings when I thought you and I could be a thing? Lucifer, the guy who went to Hell for me twice and didn’t even take credit for it, that’s not the guy I was manipulated into caring about.”

His eyes are so dark and so soft. “You deserve someone who will stay. Someone who isn’t a monster.”

She feels a wave of dizziness, realizing anew that not only is there an all powerful God, He chose to raise His son like this, to cast him into Hell and brand him as evil. What could He possibly want to do with Chloe? She hadn’t been able to figure out what Marcus—a human—had wanted with her. How can she hope to guard herself, guard Lucifer, guard her daughter against a God? Dark possibilities lurk at the corners of her mind, possibilities she does not want to explore. The room seems to get smaller for a moment, forcing her to take a deep breath to make sure the air is still there. She lays her hands flat on the table, grounding herself, and looks back up at Lucifer. He’s frowning in concentration, trying to read her.

“You’re not a monster. You’re not. But I need to a take break.” No more celestial stuff for today.

“Of course.” He’s immediately pushing his chair back, again dropping a bundle of cash on the table that proves he has no idea what money is actually worth.

Always so quick to leave her, she thinks, knowing she’s being unfair. This sucks, but they are getting better. No one is storming off, no one is crying. No yelling, just a few patches of forceful talking. Progress.

She stops at her car and looks at him, this over-sized, distressing, darling and discombobulating man. “Think you’ve got another lunch in you for tomorrow?”

“Are you certain you want to?” he asks, and it hurts, how little he seems to want to fight for their friendship. She’d been angry about the word before, and she probably will be again, but for now, ‘friends’ is the minimum of what they are. That is, if either Satan or a Miracle of God can have friends.

“We didn’t talk, not really, not so we understood each other, for a long time,” she says, “and it led to a complete mess. I want to talk it the entire way through. Unless it’s too much for you?”

“As long as you want me, I’ll be here, Detective.”

He just says these things. “Same time tomorrow then? That bakery with the good chocolate croissants near the station?”

“Until tomorrow. Farewell, Detective.”

But before she gets back into her car, Chloe pulls out her phone and looks up the nearest gun range. Too often, Lucifer’s been placed in a position where he doesn’t have any good options. Whatever happens with the rest of their relationship, if the two of them ever do end up in an impossible situation again, Chloe will make the decision that needs to be made, and she’ll have the aim to back it up.

Chapter Text

She dreams about Marcus again.

This time, they’re at the penthouse, in Lucifer’s bed. Still fully dressed, but less formally this time—it looks like it’s beach day; there’s even a cooler sitting on the floor. Lucifer lounges in the corner of the room, dressed in only a black silk robe, watching them over the rim of a mug of no doubt doctored coffee.

Again, Chloe knows that she and Pierce have just had sex, that she came, but there’s not even a twinge in her muscles to commemorate the occasion. She looks over at Lucifer, and he raises an eyebrow.

“Not what I’d call a bang, Detective. I was expecting something more—why else would such an experienced and worldly man put so much effort into convincing you that you love him?”

“She has other gifts,” Pierce says, rolling up onto his side and reaching across Chloe to the bedside table where she’s left her bullet necklace. It reshapes easily in his hands, the bullet becoming whole, the chain reforging itself into a golden gun.

“Really?” Lucifer sounds delighted. He rises from his chair and comes over to crouch next to her side of the bed. “Are you a black widow, then, Detective? I bet you taste like the sweetest poison.” He glances down between her legs and licks his lips.

Pierce, who had never shown much interest in that particular dish, laughs. “It’d be nice if she’d be that obliging, but no, she makes you do most of the work for her. Here you are, Chloe.” He tosses the gun onto her stomach much as he might have thrown a case file onto her desk. “You’ll have to come over to this side, Lucifer. She never plans ahead; one bullet will have to do for both of us.”

“Oh, no, that will never do. With her aim? Here, I think I have some extras lying around.” Lucifer stands and with a crack of air manifests his wings, majestic and perfect. “Hold out your hands, Detective,” he says as his wings begin to flap.

A hail of bullets fall with each beat of his wings, showering down upon her, bouncing off her forehead and collecting in the hollow of her belly button, building up along her sides, surrounding her, covering her.

“Think you can actually manage to do something with these?”

Pierce scoops bullets into his hands, tossing them into the air like snow. “It’s a miracle, Chloe. You’ll never be without again. Come on, now—double tap, two to the head this time.” He guides her hand around the gun, places her finger on the trigger, and then turns her hand so the barrel rests against her own forehead. “Don’t worry, we’ll keep practicing until you get it right.”

As soon as it’s a respectable hour, Chloe calls Dan. She needs Trixie back home. She needs to be back at work, too, but that’s out of her hands, and in the meantime she can do this. She doesn’t know who Chloe Jane Decker, Miracle of God, is, but Trixie is real and that makes all the rest of Chloe’s doubts irrelevant. If she could create such an amazing new person out of her own body, that means she has to be a person, too.

Right?

Dan agrees to bring Trixie back that night, as long as he can take her again over the weekend—”I get it, Chlo. She’s been an absolute Godsend for me this past week,” are his exact, deeply unnerving words—and Chloe settles into her last solo morning. At least her hand is no longer swollen, the cut now healing normally. Her rash is gone and her bullet bruise, while still a sore muddle of yellows and purples, is improving, so her body hasn’t completely betrayed her, sleep issues aside.

She thinks of Lucifer and his wretched, weeping wings.

She goes for a jog. Stretches. Showers. Tries to meditate, a new practice she’d begun the morning after digging nine bullets out of Lucifer’s incontrovertible proofs of divinity. Tries not to think about God, about whatever it is He wants her to do. Mostly He’s not interested, Lucifer had said, but God probably pays more attention to His miracles than to the average human. She could, what, try to defy Him? Difficult without knowing what exactly He wants from her, but that’s never stopped Lucifer from trying. She could start by de-celestialing her life. The pieces of how it would work come together in her mind--trading Trixie back and forth with Dan, going to work. Taco Tuesdays. All of that would stay the same. Her late nights at the precinct would just be spent alone. No witty commentary, no ridiculousness, no softness to even out the harsh world of her casework. She’d get a new partner, probably someone who didn’t much care for her and didn’t take up any of her time outside of the office. Or she could quit, see if acting still held any appeal for her, or maybe go into private security consulting. It’s not like she hadn’t been busy before Lucifer showed up at her crime scene, sole survivor of a hail of bullets. Dr. Zeflman’s advice runs through her head like a mantra. Make sure her new life works for her, and her life does feel brand new right now: stiff and chafing.

She’s concentrating so hard on the vision of herself as a woman free of celestial entanglements that when she spots Lucifer through the bakery window, a smile breaks out on her face. Like she’d forgotten he’d be there, like she’s missed him. Dr. Zeflman can stuff it; Chloe Jane Decker, Miracle of God or otherwise, does not give up on people, even if those people aren’t human.

They sit by the window, enjoying the sun and the pan au chocolate, both hesitant to get started. Lucifer is dressed in dark blue today, his pocket square a poorly matched green paisley somewhat sloppily stuffed into place. She wants to reach across the table and fix it for him, to brush his hair back and smooth out the lines on his forehead.

“I’ve been thinking about it,” he says at last, staring out at the passersby. “It’s not a question I get asked. Ever. All of the books have already been written, and even the sympathetic ones are pretty damning. Who is the devil?” He smiles softly. “The devil is who I became when I started questioning my father. All of the bad things I’ve ever done, and I have done plenty, all of my misdeeds, it’s the devil who did them. I’m not lying when I say I’m a monster, but the devil is also the only version of me who’s been free. Which means he’s the version of me who was able to choose to do any of the things I’m proud of, too. The angel—Samael. He was my parents’ vessel. I am the devil.”

Chloe feels her whole body cant forward. This is trust. “Okay. That makes sense. Thank you, Lucifer.”

Her fingers twitch across the table towards him, but the moment is too fleeting. He tugs his jacket into place, visibly pulling himself together. “Now, if I recall where we left off yesterday, I had just returned from Vegas?”

He talks more about his mother, an incomprehensibly frightening woman—poor Linda, no wonder she’d referred to her relationship with Charlotte as “complicated”—who Lucifer still clearly loves. For all his talk of punishment, he has no concept of how to hold a grudge for his own sake. For a man who can be so petty, it’s terrifying, the things he’ll allow people to do to him without consequence, his forgiveness never more than the slightest gesture towards apology away.

He talks about the return of his wings, the disappearance of his devil face. She understands a bit now why the loss of something that clearly causes him so much shame was still so disturbing for him.

“I assumed it was my father meddling, of course, forcing me to be the son he wanted. I’m still not certain that isn’t what happened, but Amenadiel has a theory—”

Chloe scowls. She’s still mad at Amenadiel.

“—that we’re self-actualizing. I felt good about myself, so wings and no devil face. He felt guilty about trying to have me murdered, so he lost his wings and his powers. They’re back now, or at least the wings are. He flew Charlotte up to Heaven, you know?”

“I’m glad.”

“Yes. Fitting first class flight.” His smile is sad.

“And now, your face came back because of Pierce, or Cain, I should probably start saying.”

“I killed a human, Detective.”

“I promise you, Lucifer, I am making time for target practice every week from now on. The next time we’re in an us or them situation, I will take care of it.” She feels fierce, like she could surround him and keep him whole, no matter who comes at them. He looks at her with the whole of his concentration, eyes dilating, before his face shuts down again and he shakes his head.

“Better me than you, Detective. I am already bound to Hell; I’d rather spare you the guilt.”

She considers him. “So, humans are kind of self-actualizing, too. With their Hell loops? I guess it’s a decent theory, that angels—and devils—would be able to do that more in real time, given you aren’t supposed to die.”

“Amenadiel does have a good idea now and then. Not that I’d let him know that.” He raises his eyebrows, and she laughs.

“I won’t tell him.”

The conversation becomes increasingly less comfortable after that. He talks about his devil-napping, about the feeling of his life being stolen from him, about Cain, about male bonding through violence and the hundred deaths that didn’t take, about his fear that his father would punish him through her if he actually did kill a human. About the moment he found out Cain had become mortal.

“Wait, so just because I was ready to say ‘I love you,’ his curse was broken?”

At some point, he’d stopped being able to look at her. His cufflinks have grown loose from all the fiddling, yet still he stays, still he talks, putting in the effort to make all of this okay for her. The devil may have done terrible things, but that certainly isn’t his default. “I think it’s actually the other way around,” he says. “Cain cared about you, and for the first time in the entirety of human history from the second generation onward, he prioritized someone other than himself for a moment. Of course, he quickly reverted to caring only about himself, but Dad didn’t want to re-curse him, I suppose.”

“So, that was me. He was able to die because of his relationship with me.”

“Through no fault of your own.” Lucifer sounds indignant, but also a little worried. “You mustn’t feel guilty.”

She shakes her head. “No. I’m just thinking—you assumed that your father miracle-d me into existence to mess with you. What if that wasn’t it at all? You just said—from the second generation of humankind onward, Pierce—Cain was running around, doing terrible things and spreading misery. Sounds more like a punishment for everyone around him rather than a fitting response to his crime. What if you father made me so that the curse would be broken?”

He looks utterly pole-axed. “That doesn’t—why would my mojo not work on you if you were just put here for Cain?”

“Because it might have gotten in the way. When Pierce started showing an interest in me, you could have just mojoed me out of the relationship. It also meant you found me interesting, started spending time with me, which is what drew Cain’s attention towards me in the first place. He never would have taken the time to get to know or care for a normal woman. And then you cared enough about me that once Cain’s mark was gone, you actually went through with killing him, stopping him from causing further harm.” She nods to herself, the pieces coming together in her head. “I was made for Pierce. I was born to love him, so he would fall for me in turn and break his curse.”

Lucifer is on his feet abruptly, striding towards the door, every line of his body absolutely furious. About halfway across the room he stops and whirls around. “You cannot still love him!”

And suddenly Chloe is angry as well, which is deeply unfair, since she cares more about making a scene in public than Lucifer does. “No, of course not,” she whispers, beckoning him back to her. Everyone in the shop who hadn’t looked around at Lucifer’s outburst turns their heads towards her and leans in. “I broke up with him before the whole final reveal, remember?”

“Oh, right. After weeks of playing happy family and telling me what a good man he was and choosing him, yes, congratulations on finally seeing the dullard for what he was.”

She can feel the blood rushing to her cheeks. “We’re done with this conversation. We aren’t doing this here.” She gathers her things and stalks past him.

“Oh, now that you’re the one with something to answer for, we’re done, are we?” He’s after her, practically pressed to her back as she hits the parking lot and approaches her car.

“Why are you angry?” she asks, digging in her purse for her keys. “I thought you didn’t want your father meddling—”

“And here you are saying all He did was make you fall in love with the world’s first murderer and then use me to kill him. Yes, no reason for me to be upset about any of that.”

“It would mean it was real.” The words leave her mouth without her permission. “It was. Before you ran off to Vegas and Candy, it was just as real as we said.”

Annoyingly, her body starts pumping out tears again. She doesn’t want to be crying, she just wants to yell at Lucifer and feel some catharsis for once, but apparently she’s going to be breaking down again. Because if she’s right, then he could have stayed, they could have been together, and she never would have looked at Pierce, never would have invited him into her home. None of this would have happened.

She turns away, fumbles with her keys, drops the stupid things.

“Here, Detective—” His voice is soft as he bends down to help her, which only makes things worse.

She stomps her foot on the keys so he can’t pick them up for her. “Go home, Lucifer. Just—It’s too much. Go home.”

He hangs around her back like a ghost, and she can hear the break in his breathing as he tries to say something, the right thing. “You only knew half of me then,” is what he settles on in the end. “Even if my father wasn’t manipulating your feelings, I would have been.”

“Well, that doesn’t matter anymore, does it? That’s over with now.”

“As you say, Detective.”

She just stays there, leaning forward against her car, until she hears the Corvette driving away.

That gross feeling is back, like something’s rotting inside her, some whithered fruit stuck tight to her insides, decomposing, spilling out worms to wriggle amongst her organs. The thought won’t leave her. She was made for Pierce. She hadn’t loved Marcus; she’d been his path to salvation. Nothing more than that recovery center she’d accused Lucifer of mistaking her for. Chloe Jane Decker doesn’t give up on people, because if she did she wouldn’t have been of use to God.

Worse, Chloe will never know for certain if she’s right.

When Dan arrives with Trixie, she’s tempted to turn them away, say something came up and Trixie has to stay with him longer. She’d promised Trixie she’d never again make the same mistakes she had with Pierce, but how could she know? If she isn’t a normal person, if she doesn’t have free will, she can’t trust her own actions. That’s the theme of the month, really, just a pile of evidence that Chloe cannot trust herself.

Of course, she also can’t turn Trixie away. Part of it is selfishness—she’s missed her baby girl—but much more than that she knows the sting of an absentee parent, and she cannot pass that wound down to her daughter. So when Trixie pushes her way in through the front door, Chloe greets her with full enthusiasm and thanks Dan profusely, despite Trixie’s shirt bearing signs that Dan is offloading a freshly chocolate cake-fed and therefore sugar-loaded kid.

That night, Trixie does everything she can to remind Chloe of how nice it had been, actually, to not have a child in the apartment at all times. She doesn’t want to do her homework. She doesn’t want to eat her dinner. After the week she’s had, Chloe just wants to coddle her daughter, but Trixie is resistant, shooting down all Netflix suggestions, bringing out boxes of Legos she then immediately sets aside in favor of drawing paper that she scribbles at listlessly before putting it aside in turn. She turns to Chloe with that classic childhood complaint: “I’m bored.”

Throughout it all, she keeps looking at the door, like she’s waiting for someone to arrive. Or afraid they will. Regret clenches in Chloe’s abdomen.

She’s in the middle of trying to convince Trixie that it’s too late to build a blanket fort and she needs to go brush her teeth when her phone chimes.

Lucifer.

Do you wish another lunch tomorrow?

She answers without thinking. I’m pretty much up to date on everything now, right?

As you say, Detective.

He’s sulking. Great. Honestly, she could stand to go twenty-four hours without him assuming everything she says is a dismissal. She could also probably stand to be more careful about what she says to him, but Trixie is having a minor meltdown over having left her preferred pair of pajamas at Dan’s, so Chloe sets her phone aside, forgotten.

Chloe indulges Trixie in an extended-length storytime, but ultimately does manage to get her settled in bed, nightlight on, stuffed pony cuddled close. Miss Alien and her lurid bloodstains have been conspicuously removed from bedtime snuggling duty since Maze’s outburst, but Chloe notes that the stuffed toy has made it back to the nightstand from her original exile in the closet, so perhaps Trixie is ready to forgive.

Upstairs, brushing her own teeth in the master bath, Chloe rinses out her mouth and sighs. Maze has been silent since Saturday; Chloe hopes the demon doesn’t make Trixie wait much longer.

She settles into bed, stares at the ceiling, and listens to the wind rattling against the windows. Just another long night, maybe a couple hours of sleep if she’s lucky.

“Mommy!”

Chloe is out of bed and tripping over the blankets before she can engage conscious thought. She rattles down the stairs, slamming a knee against the wall and barely catching herself from falling when she reaches the ground floor. Trixie is sitting up in bed, sobbing.

Nightmare. No immediate threat.

Chloe’s adrenal gland refuses to believe this, and she barrels into Trixie’s room still on high alert.

“Shh, monkey, it’s okay. We’re okay.” She tries to pull Trixie into a hug, but her daughter fights her off, still shrieking.

“No! No, it’s not okay!”

It’s been months, maybe over a year, since Trixie’s had a proper temper tantrum, but she is making up for it now. Her chest is heaving, her eyes and nose are running, and she does not want comfort of any sort.

“He’s dead! I know he’s dead! Why won’t you just tell me?”

“Shh, monkey. It was just a dream.” Chloe unsuccessfully tries again for a hug. She’d hoped that, given how little time Trixie had spent with Pierce, she wouldn’t take his death so hard, but—

“Then why hasn’t he come to see me?” Trixie keens. “I know he’s dead. I know Marcus killed him, like he killed Charlotte! Just tell me, Mommy. Lucifer’s dead!”

Chloe’s body seizes in panic before she remembers, no, Trixie’s wrong. She and Dan have just screwed up.

“No, monkey, no. He’s fine, I saw him today. He’s okay, he’s just—” he’s just Satan, and I don’t know if I can allow him into our house right now because I am afraid to draw God’s attention towards you.

“Where is he, then?” Trixie’s shrieks have lost some of their power, becoming more plaintive. “Can I talk to him?”

“Trixie, it’s late. I don’t know—”

“He’s awake, he’s always awake. If he’s not dead—”

“He’s not. Shh.” Shit. “Let me, I’ll just try to call him. But remember he works nights, too, at his club, so he might not answer.”

She works her way past Trixie’s defenses to press a kiss onto her forehead and dashes upstairs to find her phone.

When he picks up after five rings, Chloe can’t hear him over the sounds of Lux.

“Lucifer? Lucifer, are you there?” She bounces a bit on the balls of her feet, impatient. Downstairs, Trixie is still crying.

On the other end of the line, the sounds of the club fade away, only the thrum of heavy bass permeating whatever hideaway Lucifer has tucked himself into. “Detective? Realize you have more questions for me after all?” He sounds drunk and bitter.

“I’m sorry to bother you, Lucifer, but do you have a few minutes? Trixie is…” displaying all of the behaviors you find most unappealing in human spawn “…really upset. She had a nightmare, and she hasn’t seen you since the whole thing with Pierce killing Charlotte. She’s worried he hurt you, too. It would be a huge help if you could talk to her.”

Nothing from the other end, just a brief rise in volume as people cheer on a dance floor far away.

“Lucifer? It’s all right if now’s not a good time. Maybe she could call you tomorrow?”

“Now is fine.” He clears his throat. “Yes, now is good. Is there…what have you told her?” His voice creeps upward as he speaks. He’s nervous.

“Just that Pierce was a bad guy.” He snorts. “I didn’t tell her you were hurt, or about, you know. The red face.”

“My terrible, soul-damning countenance? You do have the most wonderful gift for euphemisms, Detective. Very well, put the little urchin on. I promise I won’t talk of damnation.”

“Lucifer…”

“I promise, Detective. Reassurances only.”

Chloe takes the phone downstairs. “Hey, monkey. Lucifer wants to talk to you.” She passes over the phone and hovers next to the bed, wishing she could hear Lucifer’s end of the conversation over Trixie’s loud, huffing, post-hysterics breaths.

“Are you sure you’re all right? Can I see you?”

Chloe shuts her eyes, breathes through her nose. Lucifer is a master at not making promises; this will be fine.

He says something that makes Trixie hiccup with wet laughter, and then she’s crying again, softer now, cathartic rather than panicked. “I’m glad you’re not dead.” He makes her laugh again. “Can you read me a story?”

“Ah, no.” Chloe steps in, reaching out for the phone. “You’ve had your stories and you’ve spoken to Lucifer. It’s time for sleep. You still have school in the morning.”

Trixie ignores her, settling down on her side in the bed and wiping her face on her sleeve. “He’s singing, Mommy,” she whispers, cradling the phone to her ear.

Chloe presses a hand to her forehead, but doesn’t argue. She watches as Trixie’s eyes slide closed and her breathing calms. Gently, she pulls the phone from her daughter’s hand and tucks the blanket up a little more around her shoulders.

“Thank you, Lucifer,” she says, flicking off Trixie’s lights and shutting the door behind her. “I mean it. Thank you.”

“Far be it from me to refuse a damsel in distress.”

“What did you say? When she asked to see you?”

“I made no promises. You needn’t worry; I’m sure that now she knows I’ve not been gruesomely murdered, you’ll be able to distract her from the thought of me.”

Chloe shakes her head, making her way back upstairs to her room. “No, Lucifer. Trixie loves you.” His silence gains texture. She supposes it makes sense—Lucifer enjoys interacting with people, but children aren’t good at boundaries. Their sincerity slips through; his defense mechanisms aren’t designed to help him deal with those whose desires are still under development. “Maybe this weekend, if you’re not busy, the three of us could meet at the pier or something? I’ll buy you ice cream.”

“I suppose I could make room in my schedule, as long as you’re promising a treat.”

“Yes, Lucifer. As many scoops as you’d like.” She sighs, collapsing backwards onto her mattress. “Any chance you’d sing me to sleep, too?”

“Nightmares, Detective?”

“Yeah,” she admits, toying with the edge of her sheet. “I think I just have too much free time to think about it all—no distractions. Nothing else to tire out my brain. I miss work. I am not the relax at home type.”

“Solving murders did always add a piquant touch to the day. Difficult to sleep the sleep of the just if you’re not pursuing justice all day, I suppose.”

“Something like that. Look, I’m sorry if I was short with you earlier.”

“Not at all, Detective. You no doubt need some space to, ah, take in all the implications.”

“There’s a lot. A lot of implications.”

“Don’t I know it. Well. I should get back—both a bachelor and a bachelorette party tonight, so my charming self is in high demand.”

“Of course. Thank you again.”

“Always, Detective.”

He texts her at 5am, at the exact moment when ‘staying up late’ meets ‘getting up early.’

Happened to run into Captain Thorston last night. Odious chap. Perhaps he is deserving of our attentions after all.

Chloe clutches her phone to her chest with a smile. He’s sending her a case to work. Like it’s a valentine.

Chapter Text

There’s no chance of getting Trixie up in time to meet the bus the next morning, so Chloe drives her to school and, as she’s already in the car anyway, stops to pick up more first aide supplies before heading to Lux. She and Lucifer can discuss how they want to proceed with their covert investigation, and since he’s finished explaining all the celestial stuff that had been going on while she was oblivious, there should be no more major revelations for her to contend with. They might even get through an entire conversation without yelling at each other. They might start figuring out what the shape of their new relationship would be, now that they can be honest with each other.

Since her last visit, everything in the penthouse has been cleaned, with the rug and some of the other soft furnishings replaced. She drops her first aide supplies on the bar and steps further into the room, opening her mouth to call for him when her gaze lands on the opening into his bedroom. Ropes have been affixed to his headboard, a blindfold lies discarded on the floor, and a flogger rests on the nightstand, the tails of which cannot possibly feel as velvety soft as they look because the half naked woman getting dressed next to his bed has a very precise pattern of raised red marks on her back.

“Oh!” Chloe spins to look the other way. She has this bizarre urge to freeze, as though the awkwardness can only see her if she moves. This is not the first time she has surprised Lucifer with a guest, but it is the most unexpected.

“Sorry,” the woman says, coming down the stairs into the living room, still carrying her shoes. “Lucifer let me oversleep. You must be the Detective?”

“Uh, yeah. Yep.” Yes, she is the Detective, famed non-sex partner of Lucifer Morningstar. So he’s sleeping with randoms again. Or still. And making pillow talk about her. Huh.

“Detective!” Lucifer emerges from the direction of his closet and approaches her with the enthusiasm of a puppy encountering a small child. “I didn’t expect you here! Have you met Stacia?” He gestures towards the woman bracing herself against the bar while she straps her heels back on. “She was a marvelous help last night in tracking down the captain and convincing him I’m the sort of man he’d want to associate with. We had to do a little bit of role-play, didn’t we, darling, but mission accomplished.”

Stacia smiles easily at him. “It was my very real pleasure.” She steps toward Lucifer, reaching up for a quick kiss. “The best night of my life,” she says with feeling. “I have to run, but call me if you ever want to do this again.”

“Ooh, greedy for it, aren’t you?” Stacia laughs, and he watches her leave, wearing one of those self-satisfied smirks that trigger Chloe’s eye rolls as a Pavlovian response.

“So you’re bringing in your own civilian consultants now, I see.”

“I’d call her a fan of the punitive system,” he says, waggling his eyebrows at her. “Drink? Or perhaps I could make you some breakfast?”

Chloe honestly cannot decipher what it is she’s feeling. Jealousy doesn’t work. She’s really not prepared to say, ‘Hey, I want to enter into an exclusive, monogamous, romantic relationship with you, the devil,’ a fact she had rather unkindly shared with him less than twenty-four hours prior, so jealousy is right out. Post-Pierce, any form of dating seems wildly irresponsible, especially given that she can’t trust that any of her emotions are genuine. No, she must just be hyper-aware of how heavily he’s leaning on all of his coping mechanisms right now. Ever since his one night of miraculous sobriety, it has been clear that Lucifer’s been indulging deeply, and sex is as much a part of that as the whiskey and drugs. Perhaps it’s worry she’s feeling? That seems like a safe feeling to be having; she’ll go with that. “Don’t you need to shower? Or clean up a bit?”

Ah, yes, the words of a clearly worried friend.

His face drops and his shoulders go back. “Making your morning rounds to check on my hygiene? I suppose those bags are full of toiletries? You’ve wasted your money; I’d never sink so low as to use the type of two-in-one products you buy at the same place people go to seek remedies for their infectious rashes.” He’s trying for arch, but wearing nothing but pants and an untucked shirt, shoeless with his hair not yet styled for the day, he just looks rumpled and soft.

Irritation slots into place within her, straightforward and familiar. “No, of course not. I’m going to take another look at your wings.”

“You keep asking about my wings. How they’re doing, can you see them, can you touch them—or, actually, you haven’t so much been asking that as telling me you’re going to do it. We’ll have to work on your understanding of active consent if we’re going to go down this ridiculous undercover path with Thorston.”

“Would you rather I just let them become infected or something?”

“But you never ask about my face,” he continues, nudging her bags of supplies out of her reach. “What’s the matter, Detective? Don’t you want to see it again? Not quite as pretty as the feathery bits?”

She’s such an idiot. Had she really thought they wouldn’t immediately start snapping at each other? That they were back at a place in their relationship where a pop-in visit wouldn’t immediately turn into a disaster? “Is your devil face thingy injured? Fine. Whip it out. I’ll apply a cold compress, maybe spread on some burn ointment. Would you like that? Do you have any here, or should I go back out and get some?”

He steps into her space, forcing her to tilt her head back to look at him properly. “What if I call your bluff? What if I say, yes, Detective, please heal my damned visage?”

“That’s it.” She leans in towards him, refusing to be intimidated. “Show me. Come on, this is clearly going to be a thing for you, so show me. Devil face, out, now.”

He spins away, huffing derisively. “Don’t tempt me.”

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m probably getting that ‘active consent’ thing wrong again. Well, here’s your chance to teach me. I have to ask, right? Please, Lucifer, show me your damned visage. I’m begging you. You like begging, right? That’s why Stacia was here?”

“Here we go. Big bad devil, must love to subjugate the little humans, yes? I’ll have you know that that woman approached me of her own free will. She heard I was looking for Captain Thorston, offered to introduce me to him and pretend that I’m just as sexist as he is, and all she wanted in return was a little domination, a little pain, and a soupcon of humiliation. You heard her—’best night of her life.’”

“Oh, I’ve heard it, Lucifer. From ninety-three people and counting, now.”

“Ninety-three—there have been a lot more than that, Detective.”

And the thing is, he probably remembers all of them. Chloe has thought more than once about the parade of witnesses she’d interviewed when investigating Jana’s and Raj’s murders, has lingered over a few of the statements, trying to visualize what exactly he’d been doing with the various implements mentioned. He’d had sex with ninety-two people in a two month period and been able to instantly provide not only their names but their contact information. She can still see him in her mind’s eye, chatting comfortably with the waiting line of interviewees, effortlessly recalling the details of their lives. Lucifer’s relationships with these people never went beyond sex, but sex clearly matters to him in a way it doesn’t to the stereotypical playboy. Another new rule of her upended world: the devil likes to make people happy. His father couldn’t have chosen a better punishment than casting him down into a hole where Lucifer only ever saw people at their most miserable. No wonder he’s averaging more than one sex partner a day; it’s the only way he knows how to please people while still protecting his boundaries. He’d even referred to his time with Stacia as though it had been part of a bargain. Chloe knows he trades his body away as a favor—Hell, that’s how they met Linda—but it’s never seemed so sad before.

The fight abruptly drains out of her, and she brushes a hand back over her hair, sighing. “Are you going to show me your other face, or can we get on with changing the bandages on your wings?”

“It’s a pity that you think those are your only options.”

He’s back to his whiskey, back to not meeting her gaze. She throws up her hands and goes off in search of the chair he’d brought out the first time they’d done this. She places it on the balcony, sets up her table with bandages and cloths and antiseptic and hot water. He lounges on the piano bench while she preps, cycling through the openings of half a dozen classical pieces she can’t name.

“Come on, Liberace, I’m ready for you,” she says when everything’s in place.

He doesn’t move. “How is the urchin this morning? Fully recovered from last night?”

Chloe crosses her arms and leans against the balcony door frame. “Yes. Whatever you said to her really helped.”

“I’m glad. When we… If you choose to allow me to see her again, do you want… Shall I say goodbye?”

“Only if you’re planning on leaving.”

He ducks his head, hides his face while he returns his glass to the bar, and by the time he turns back to her he’s himself again, wearing his own singular expression—balanced precisely on the edge between mischief and boredom. She nods her head towards the chair and turns to put some gloves on.

“Can you take off your—oh!” she says, startled, as his wings manifest directly through the fabric of his button-down. She reaches out, hand hovering over the spot where feather and cotton merge. “They just, right through your shirt.”

“They aren’t of this realm; physical boundaries, well, how deep into the metaphysics would you like to delve?”

Physics, in any sense, is not Chloe’s strongest subject. “That’s all right,” she says hastily, “it’s just, you’ve got blood on your shirt again.”

He grimaces, examining his outfit. “I keep forgetting.”

She’d forgotten as well. Tiny dots of red stipple her arms; there’s likely some on her face as well. She wonders if she should ask him about the rash she’d gotten last time, but figures that he won’t let her take care of him if he thinks it might harm her. “Did the cut on your back heal, at least?” she asks, wetting a cloth and quickly wiping herself off.

“Yes. Not a trace of it left.”

“Good. That’s good.”

About half of the bandages she placed last week have come off, and another quarter are barely hanging on. Blood has soaked through the ones that do remain, and his feathers are once again mussed and disarrayed. Had she wondered who holds the devil accountable? Clearly he handles that himself. Chloe bites her lips together, considering him, before removing the rest of the used bandages and once again beginning the process of bathing his wings.

She works more carefully this time, keeping his blood off of her skin. The spot where the wings disappear into his shirt disturbs her, but otherwise these appendages are old friends, almost comforting. She takes pride in wiping the feathers spotless and arranging them in neat rank and file, deriving the same type of satisfaction from the task as she does when pinning evidence neatly into place on a case board.

“Is that why you were so set against going undercover in Thorston’s Marquis club thing? Is that whole whips and chains thing what you…do?”

He snorts. “I do it all, Detective. Whips and chains are just a variation on the theme. I fulfill desires; that is what I enjoy. Any sexual interaction—or even a non-sexual scene, in the case of BDSM—it’s an exchange wherein all parties involved are able to indulge their truest selves. What the captain’s little club does, there’s no space for that there—or rather, it only exists for the powerful men happily indulging while they prop up each others’ careers. The women they bring in, they aren’t there to have their own desires filled, but to fulfill what they have been conditioned to believe is their place in life. Exploitation rather than freedom.”

She ponders what he’s said, fingers moving steadily over his wings. He talks about desire, but what he craves is trust—both receiving it and offering it. She wonders if he ever actually gets it. What she knows of his family situation is…not good. And if the only experience he has with human relationships is no strings sex with people whose desires he knows effortlessly due to his mojo, then his familiarity with that exchange has to be pretty limited. A loose feather comes out in Chloe’s hand, and she sets it aside before continuing with her ministrations. She sees a few new pin feathers growing in, and brushes over them carefully. “These look like they’d itch.”

“They do.” He sounds so disgruntled.

“Molting must be a pain.” She imagines him with nothing but stubbly new feathers and smiles.

“Molting?” He jerks around to look at her. “I am not a bird!”

“Of course not.” She places a hand on his shoulder and firmly steers him back into position. “They’re still so soft, even when they’ve just come in,” she says, ruffling the new growth. “The ones at the crime scene were prickly.”

“Angel wings aren’t decorative; they’re weapons when they need to be.”

“So you can just transform them into danger mode?”

He huffs out a little laugh. “When appropriate.”

“But not now? Even though I’m ‘forcing’ you to endure my ministrations?”

He shifts away from her slightly. “I apologize. I was being…”

“Difficult?”

“I suppose so, yes. I’m rather good at that.”

“You’re the master of difficult.” She continues to run her hands through his baby feathers, scratching lightly, before realizing she’s stroking him like a pet and quickly moving on. “Right. Let’s get these patched back up.”

It’s trickier this time with all the new feathers coming in, but she manages to get the bandages taped down. She goes back over his wings a final time, wiping away any remaining blood and resettling any feathers disturbed during her work. “There. This should help protect your furniture at least, until you figure out why they aren’t healing.”

“I told you. It’s my punishment for killing a human.”

“Or it’s like Amenadiel said, another self-actualization thing. Have you talked to Linda about it?”

“I’ve been taking some time off from therapy.” His shoulders, which had sunk down and forward as she worked, are back up around his ears again.

“She might be able to help.”

“Worried you’ve gotten stuck with long term wing care?”

“Worried about you, Lucifer.” She strokes her hands out along the great bone scaffolding at the top of his wings, avoiding the part where they disappear into his shirt, then strips off her disposable gloves and deposits them on the table with her used cloths. Walking around to his front, she crouches down to face him. “Hey. Do you want to show me your devil face again?”

He jerks away from her. “Why on earth would either of us want that?”

“It seemed important, earlier.”

“I was just being irritable.”

“You were being an ass, and so was I. Come on, exchange of trust, right? I show you I’m not only interested in the angelic half of this new you I’m meeting, and you show me that, no matter what you look like, you’re still, well, you.”

The chair legs scrape against the paving as he jolts to his feet and disappears his wings. He grabs the bowl and bloodied towels and takes them inside, then comes back to grab the chair and the rest of her supplies. Chloe allows herself to fall backward and sits on the ground with her back pressed against the balcony railing, watching as he tidies. He goes all out, even tying a little frilled apron on over his clothes and using a spray bottle and cloth to scrub at the drops of blood that spattered the windows when he manifested his wings. It’s pleasant, being out in the open air so high above the city. She wonders if it reminded him of flying, back when he couldn’t anymore.

Eventually he runs out of things to clean and just stands in the doorway to the penthouse, twisting the ring on his finger. “Do you truly desire to see my devil face, or are you only trying to make me more comfortable?”

“Both,” she says honestly. “Linda says you have flaming eyes; I didn’t notice those the first time. I’m curious.”

He shakes his head. “That’s hellfire, for the damned. It’s not pleasant.”

“You know, Dan did that whole thing where he filmed Trixie’s birth?”

Lucifer blinks. “Ah. Indeed?”

“I’m just saying, you can watch the recording if you really want. My body is also capable of extremely disturbing things. I’ve been asking a lot of you the past few days, haven’t I? You probably feel a bit like a zoo exhibit.”

“It’s not that bad.”

“You can ask me questions, too. About being human. What it’s like to start out as a senseless baby, how it feels to know paper can cut you, things like that.”

He shakes his head, but he also finally leaves the doorway, coming close and lowering down to arrange himself on the ground next to her, about a foot of empty space between them.

“Here, just for a minute, here. I’ll show you. If you want.”

She nods, tilting her head to catch his lowered gaze. “Please.”

He lets out a long breath and closes his eyes. It happens like a blink, only her eyes remain wide open. One moment, beautiful smooth skin, the next, raw and ravaged flesh. It’s uncomfortable to look at, like a piece of the world has been peeled away at the corner of her vision, some parallel universe peeking through. A universe where God is real, and where Chloe is small and mortal and maybe not even a real person. Lucifer is still here, though, solid and knowable. His skin shimmers a bit, the blister that is his face shifting minutely under close scrutiny. It looks painful; she wishes she had gotten that burn cream. Strangely, she thinks the first appearance of his wings had been more alarming than his devil face—those, at least, are otherworldly and in open defiance of all natural laws. This face is just so…superficial, compared to the shift in worldview that accompanies it. The most disturbing thing about it is that, in the world she used to know, anyone who looked like this would be well and truly dead, and no one as vivacious as Lucifer should look that way. “May I see your eyes?” she asks.

He turns his head obligingly, taking a moment for himself before he lifts his eyelids. She sees them this time, embers where his irises should be. It comes over her again, that strange mood that has her remembering old sins, just like she had in the loft. She can liken it to his desire mojo, she realizes. When he’d first asked her what she desired, she’d felt a wash of thoughts—how much she wanted to be a good mom, for her work to have meaning, for her marriage to go back to being a source of comfort rather than a source of pain. But she hadn’t felt compelled to share any of those things with Lucifer, and she doesn’t feel compelled to grovel for forgiveness of her past sins now, either. She can feel her heartbeat increase, can feel small tremors threatening the integrity of her smile, but she forces herself to maintain eye contact. “That’s handy—instant in-home fire, perfect for staring into contemplatively on long evenings.”

He barks out a startled laugh. “Not the typical response I receive.”

She shrugs. “We already knew your mojo doesn’t work on me. Can I touch your hand? It won’t hurt you?”

“No, it’s, it’s fine.” His gaze flicks down, watching with single-minded focus as she reaches out towards him.

This red flesh is hot and oddly textured, desert dry and papery. A force radiates from it; just as two magnets might repel each other, his skin fights against her touch. Her fingers rise from him when she drops her concentration. Deliberately, she takes his hand, rubs her thumb along the back of it, slides her hold down so she can massage his fingers. Ridges mark the keratin forming his claws, like tiny rumble strips under her fingertips. He is clearly built to discomfit in this form, but he is still just a man, made up of small, discoverable details only those closest to him could ever learn.

He’s the same. Still her same Lucifer; one person with two faces. More dangerous, more difficult than she’d known, but not fundamentally different. She wonders if he knows that. “No horns, then?” she asks.

“No. I am not a goat, or any other animal you might care to ask about.”

“Of course, sorry, stupid question.” She drops his hand and pulls away, embarrassed. “It’s—” I had a very good dream once. If the rest of this has to be real, why couldn’t that be, too? Flustered and guilty, she casts about for something else to say. “Can I take a picture? So I can get used to it and won’t be startled—”

He’s human again and striding off towards the bar. “Want some proof, Detective? A trophy to show off, how you tamed the devil? Or maybe something you can use to gather up a posse of villagers with pitchforks?”

“What? No, Lucifer—”Stupid, stupid, stupid, Chloe chastises herself as she picks herself up to go after him.

He’s rummaging in the lower cupboards, searching for what she will forevermore think of as his chugging whiskey, and she can feel it all falling apart again.

“I’m sorry. I can’t adjust fast enough. I’m trying.”

“What’s to adjust to? I’ve told you a hundred times that I’m the devil.” He stands straight and spreads his arms wide, so tall and wide and not even a little intimidating, still wearing his flouncy apron. “Same as I ever was. Just the handy bit of hellfire you send in whenever it’s convenient for me to mojo out a desire or terrify someone into confessing. Those eggs you needed so badly.”

She wonders if she did die, if this is her Hell loop. They are going to start yelling at each other again. She’s going to end up crying. Again.

She’s really sick of crying.

So she kisses him.

It should be fierce and passionate—the way she grabs his shoulder certainly is, with a bit of desperation trying to horn in on the action. But somehow, the distance she has to cross, the one that has her rising up on her toes and pulling him down to her mouth, that distance is enough to soften everything. Because their kiss is as sweet as it always has been. She might not be his miracle, but they are one together. Tender, the lips she presses to his. Cherishing, the hands he brings up to cradle her face. Together, they carve out a pocket for themselves, casting aside any piece of the universe that isn’t warm and comforting and golden.

It’s close-mouthed, little more than a graze—she feels the shape of his Cupid’s bow against the seam of her lips, turns her head just slightly so the friction can light up their nerve endings. What glory, to experience the heat of him against her mouth, to feel him pressing back against her, drawn to her own warmth. The sensation rattles through her, so intense it makes her abdomen clench and her neck shiver. Then she’s sinking back on her heels and he lets her go, his fingers trailing down her neck as she draws away. He’s so careful with her—how could he be anything but good? The kiss settles in her heart like a touchstone. Frustratingly, tears still gather in her eyes, but not from anger. She’s just overwhelmed, and from the way he’s shaking when she drops her head down against his shoulder and he slides his arms around her, she thinks she’s not the only one.

“I just want this,” she says. “Am I allowed to just want this?”

“I want this,” he says, and there’s the ferocity that she’d expected in their kiss. “Just this.”

She strokes his arm, soothing. “So we keep going. This is the goal. We’ll work the rest of it out and end up here.”

“There’s hardly a guarantee, Detective.”

“I’m tenacious, and you tend to get your way.”

“I just. I hate hurting you. I feel as though I’m always hurting you these days.”

“Yeah, back at you. Being honest sucks.”

He laughs, nuzzles her hair. She stays pressed against him until she feels back in control of herself, plus a little longer just for the joy of it.

He wants her, too. He said it.

“All right,” she says eventually, pulling away and wiping her eyes. “I’m going to go wash my face, and then we’ll go over what you learned about Thorston and what we’re willing to do for Bauda.”

She takes her time in the bathroom, and when she exits, the remaining traces of Stacia have been removed from his bedroom. She wonders if it’s time for that conversation, where she asks about his many sex partners and whether he’d be willing to set them aside. Chloe had spent so much of the past year waiting for him to either admit the obvious truth about his feelings or let her go, unwilling to make her own feelings clear after the whole Candy debacle. Now that she knows all of his reasons for pushing her away, though, doesn’t that make things even between them again? On the other hand, she’s certainly not ready to take up the hypothetically empty spot in his bed. It’s clear at this point that she and Lucifer don’t always understand each other, and he might mistake her questions for demands, or even for a promise on her own part. For all that it had happened less than two weeks ago, their moment on the balcony might as well have happened in another lifetime, before she’d learned that she couldn’t trust her instincts. Not to me, she’d said when he’d told her he was the devil, and that’s still kinda how she feels. But maybe it shouldn’t be? Both because he’s been around for millions—billions?—of years and has certainly done some things she’ll need to come to terms with—her thoughts skip quickly over the millennia he’d spent torturing the damned—but also because that moniker means something to him other than the strictly negative. No, trying to formalize anything with Lucifer at the moment would just lead to more confusion. Best to leave it for now.

Her lips are still tingling from their kiss.

She brings her fingers to her mouth, watching from the top of his bedroom steps as he fusses with something on the coffee table, his back turned towards her. He’s taken the opportunity to finish dressing, and is now nattily attired in a blue check suit paired with a soft slate colored shirt. With her hogging the bathroom, he wasn’t able to access his hair products, though, and his curls are still in evidence, making him look boyish and free.

Her lips really are still tingling, burning, even. She goes to dig some lip balm out of her purse, and Lucifer finally notices her return.

“Detective, perfect! I’ve just whipped together a few sandwiches. Nothing extravagant, but I’m sure we can find you something else if they aren’t to your liking.”

“That’s great, thank you.” Her words come out slurred—are her lips going numb now? She rubs at them—yeah, that’s numbness, all right.

“Detective?” Lucifer frowns at her. “Are you all right? You’re looking a bit swollen?” He cocks his head and peers at her face.

She smacks her lips together, trying to figure out what’s going on. “Did you have something on you mouth earlier?” It’s got to be an allergic reaction. Maybe he uses some sort of fancy lip mask she’s having a bad reaction to, or—

No!

She remembers, rather after the fact, that her time spent doctoring his wings isn’t the first time she’s encountered Lucifer’s blood over the years. If angel-devil blood were inherently toxic, they would already have discovered that side effect. Add in what had happened when his fingers had grazed that tiny cut on her palm, and now this?

“Did you hit yourself?” he’s asking. “Shall I get some ice?”

“Lucifer,” she says, only it comes out more like ‘Lusheefa,’ “I think we have a problem.”

His eyes widen, and he starts patting at his pockets. “You’ve been poisoned again, haven’t you? Don’t worry, I’ll call an ambulance—”

“No—”

“You’re right. I drive much faster. We’ll get you to the hospital immediately.” He grabs her arm and drags her towards the elevator.

“Lucifer, stop!” Chloe digs in her heels and bats his hands away. “Calm down. I’m not dying. It’s just a little allergic reaction.”

“To what?” There’s still the touch of the frantic to his eyes, and it’s only going to get worse.

Chloe sighs, working hard to make her words as understandable as possible with her swollen and numbed mouth. “To you. I think you’re self-actualizing again. Because of Cain. I think you’ve made yourself literally toxic to humans.”

“Preposterous!” Even so, he springs backwards, pulling his hands behind his back to get them away from her.

“I had a rash from your blood last week. And this didn’t happen the last time we kissed.” She supposes she has reason to be thankful she hadn’t succeeded at the passionate lip lock she’d intended; this is bad enough without a numb tongue in the bargain. She heads back to his bathroom to examine herself in the mirror—her lips looks like she’s just returned from a visit with an unlicensed plastic surgeon who never even passed high school bio.

Lucifer stands in the bathroom doorway, looking helpless. “I assure you, Detective, I have never passed this kind of problem on to any of my partners.”

“You should probably call Stacia.”

He blanches. “Poor woman. And here I’d thought making the awkward STD call to a lover was one of those human experiences I’d never get to enjoy.” He pulls out his phone, then stops. “Although. Given how quickly this reaction has occurred with you, and how much time I spent with Stacia last night...”

No, no, no, no, no!

He meets her gaze. “Excuse me for a moment.”

She presses her face into her hands, listening to him retreat into the further reaches of the penthouse. The sound of his voice is faint; she can’t make out the words, just the apologetic tone. It’s only the one call; a notably slow week, for him.

When he rejoins her, his curls have transformed from boyish to disturbed. “I’m happy to report that Stacia does not appear to be suffering any consequences from her time with me.” He’s shut down, remote, just like he was immediately following Pierce’s death. His hands are carefully tucked into his pockets, his entire body held still. “You are, as ever, wholly special and unique, Detective. It seems I’m only poisonous to you.”

Chapter Text

Seminar topic Chloe Decker plans to propose for the next law enforcement conference she attends: how to discuss the initial stages of an undercover operation with a devil who has self-actualized himself into becoming a designer allergen specifically targeted at you.

“It’s fine,” she’s said multiple times. “They’re just a little numb; it’ll wear off.”

It is not fine. She’d thought figuring out how to be there for a partner with devil delusions was difficult; Chloe has no concept of how to address this.

He’s not listening to her, digging through his closet for some gloves that match his suit.

“It’s just from fluid exchange, not touch based,” she tries to tell him, reaching out to grab his hand. She’s been touching him—his wings, his devil hand, his normal hand—but this time is different. Her nerve endings scream out—danger!—and she snatches her fingers back, stung. Where her middle and ring finger brushed against the back of his hand, her skin is red and shiny, like she touched a hot pan. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck? She tries to stay calm, not startle him. “Okay, wow. That’s new.”

His nostrils flare, and his mouth screws up into something small and ugly. She’s never seen him angrier, and for it to be directed at himself…

“That’s the power of God’s poison.” He balls up a glove that even she can tell is too brown to match his outfit and hurls it across the closet. “Can’t say He didn’t warn me, can I? I’ve known what I am from the beginning, and yet still I thought for a moment that I could have—Well, why wouldn’t I become more toxic the moment I learn it’s possible? What a fun piece of theater for Him to look down on. You may wish to stand further away, Detective, lest we learn it is unsafe for us to breathe the same air.”

She doesn’t want to feed into his self-hatred, but she doesn’t want a lung infection, either, so she takes a step back. “Has Amenadiel returned from Heaven yet?”

“No.” Lucifer decides on a pair of gloves and then starts sorting through a selection of what she eventually realizes are cravats. Her outrageous, fancy-British-man-devil of a partner.

“Are you going to dig out a face mask next?”

“If necessary. I trust you will keep your hands to yourself from now on.” He shoots her a stern look, utterly serious.

“I’ll try,” she says, but he doesn’t appear to catch her sardonic edge, just nodding primly.

“See that you do. This is. Unacceptable. Obviously we can’t work together.”

“Whoa, Lucifer. That’s not necessary.”

“It is. How exactly do you propose to work as my partner and infiltrate a group of men who enjoy subjugating women if even casual touch between us causes you harm?”

“That’s…okay, good point. But we can make it work. We’ve gone months without exchanging blood or saliva before, so no problem there.” Yes problem there. She would very much prefer that his blood stay inside of him, but that kiss? That kiss deserved a follow-up. “And leather is a fetish thing, right? We can just make sure my skin is covered.”

He snorts.

“And we’ll do some tests to see what the limits of this are. And you’ll talk to Linda. She can help—therapy with her got you your wings back.”

He slams a drawer closed and diligently covers up his exposed neck with the chosen cravat. “After over a year and a half of sessions, yes.”

It’s absurd, but watching him wrap up the length of his throat makes her feel lonely. Ever since they started meeting for lunch, she’s felt like they were in this together, stumbling forward in the dark but with each other to lean on as they figured things out. Now, he’s closed to her. His subconscious is clearly hostile, and his conscious is busy walling off his body. She’s on her own again in this newly divine universe.

“Needless to say I cannot see your offspring this weekend,” he says, “on the off-chance your genetic similarities leave her susceptible to whatever this is. She would inevitably attach herself to me, and she is quite small, Detective. Her internal defenses are likely not as strong as yours.”

Chloe sighs and turns away. “You’re probably right.” He’s always so conscientious when it allows him to better believe in his own monstrousness. She wishes she could contradict him, but she can’t, not when it comes to Trixie’s safety. “Maybe we can set up a video chat between the two of you, so she can see that you’re all right?”

“I don’t know why we’d bother. It’s clearly best that she forget me. Best for you as well. If there’s one thing that remains true from the time before Pierce’s death until now, it’s that you don’t need me. I’ll take care of whatever it is Bauda wants without you. You’ll be reinstated in no time.”

“And then what?”

He makes his way into the bathroom and starts picking through his grand selection of hair products. “Then you’ll go back to being the Detective and I’ll go back to being a nightclub owner. It worked for years; it’ll work again.” He glares at his gloves, then at his hair products, before shooting her a stern ‘stay put’ look and stripping his hands bare again so he can arrange his hair into something as untouchable as the rest of him.

“I don’t want that,” she says simply, but he doesn’t respond.

Sighing, she returns to the living room, giving the sandwiches a wistful glance—probably best not to ingest anything he’s touched. His liquor should be fine, though. She pours herself something expensive looking, forgetting that her mouth isn’t up to handling liquids right now. A line of whiskey dribbles down onto her shirt when she takes a sip. Great. She wipes her hand across her mouth and tries to scowl.

Foiled again.

When he returns, hair perfect, Lucifer seems surprised she’s still there.

“Is there something else you require, Detective?”

“I meant what I said. We’re going to go over this thing with Thorston, and we’re going to figure out the limits of your present condition so we can interact safely.”

“I am a literal danger to you—”

“And I am a literal danger to you, and apparently have been for years, so, yeah, turnabout and all that.” If there’s one thing more irritating than fighting with him again, it’s having to fight while sounding like a cartoon duck.

“It’s not quite the same thing, is it?”

She sees him fidgeting towards and away from the bar and rolls her eyes, retreating to the library area so he can get himself a drink. They are getting nowhere. “Stop moping and tell me about Thorston.”

“Moping! I do not mope.”

“Prove it.”

He huffs. “Very well. Captain Andrew Thorston, middle-aged bore. Likes to tie up pretty young ladies and give them a spanking. Nothing wrong with that, as far as it goes, but he doesn’t exactly respect them for their efforts, which is very bad form, to say the least. Has an eminently appropriate wife who apparently knows about and approves of his hobbies, according to what he said last night, though I don’t think he has a great read on the inner lives of women.”

“But your, um, Stacia knows him?”

“Apparently he was in attendance one night while she and a friend were scouting Lux as a potential bachelorette party location. Stacia had the good sense to turn down his advances, but the friend has an unfortunate affinity for authority figures. The poor women subjected herself to multiple dates with him—gossip is he has a weak striking arm, a good thing for someone who completely neglects aftercare. Can you imagine, giving someone ten lashes and then directing them to the kitchen to run themselves a glass of tap water?”

Chloe wrinkles her nose. Right. This is the sort of discussion she’s signing up for. “Wait, he was at Lux? Police captain, married, and from the profile Bauda showed us the other day, he has some heavy charitable commitments. Add in his social club, and I wouldn’t have thought he’d have the time to stand in line outside of your club on a typical night. Could indicate he has a sideline, something that requires a permissive atmosphere where deals can be made.”

Lucifer waves a hand dismissively. “Many of L.A.’s finest visit Lux—as we’re colleagues, of a sort, I’ve lowered entrance standards for those with badges. Or I used to. Rest assured, the moment they suspended you, I spoke to my door staff. Yours is the only badge allowed inside without a warrant.”

So this is what unconditional support feels like. Chloe sways a bit on her feet, looking at him. He says it like it’s nothing, like arranging his business around her is simply how the world is meant to work. Dan hadn’t even taken her side in private during the Palmetto fiasco. Why had she ever given Marcus a second thought? Why had she stopped kissing Lucifer earlier? She bites her lower lip and receives an instant reminder. Right—non-human devil-man, constantly making himself unavailable, either emotionally or physically. Currently poisonous to her, specifically. She sighs and runs a hand over her hair.

“Still. Could you check with your staff, see if Thorston was here often? Might give us an easy insight into his schedule, whether there’s anyone he meets with regularly we should be looking at.”

“Of course, Detective.”

“Good. Anything else you learned last night?”

“Well, he deeply desires to become mayor one day, though I think he’ll have some difficulty dredging up the support. A bit crass and too open about his proclivities.”

“Not that the LAPD would care.” There’s enough bitterness in Chloe’s voice to catch Lucifer’s attention.

“Yes, not exactly the most egalitarian institution, is it?”

“All the more reason to remove Thorston from power, if he’s as sexist as you’re suggesting. Did he invite you to join his club?”

“Not quite, but he was eager to show off his little group. I’ve been invited to an informal gathering on Friday night, very exclusive, he assured me. Only the best perverts.”

“Okay, so we have an in. We can take that back to Bauda, see what else she’ll give us in terms of what exactly IA is looking for, any details they have about that allegedly missing woman. Anything that will help us plan before we go to this gathering.”

“We—”

“I said we and I meant we.”

His face is still closed to her, his shoulders still held high, but his body is tilted towards hers. I want this, he’d said, finally. But he would focus on the negatives. “Detective Bauda was right; you would have to pose as my submissive. They won’t allow a woman in for any other reason. It would place you in a very vulnerable position—I don’t get the impression that these men care much about womens’ boundaries.”

“But they’ll care about yours—tell them I’m not to be touched and they’ll listen. You’ve clearly got money and clout; they’ll respect your claim.”

“You’re very trusting.”

“No, I’ve just been around long enough. When I first started as a uniform, I dealt with six straight months of half naked photos being taped to my locker, but as soon as Dan let everyone know I was his girlfriend, most of the guys backed off.”

“Perhaps I’ve misjudged you, Detective. I never took you for a masochist, and yet look at what you’re willing to put up with.”

“I’m just goal oriented. I don’t scare easily.”

“I’ve noticed.” He raises his glass in acknowledgment before taking a deep drink.

“Okay. So that’s a plan. I’ll talk to Bauda, get all the paperwork. You reach out to Thorston and accept his offer, get any additional details you can. I’ll meet you back here tomorrow morning so I can change your bandages while we exchange information.”

He drops his glass, not even glancing down when it shatters on the floor. “No.”

“Yes.”

“No. No. Why would you? No.”

“It needs to be done, unless you want to keep dripping blood all over the place. I’ll wear gloves; it’ll be fine.”

“Have you forgotten that I’ve become increasingly toxic to you?”

This is not going to become another conversation they have on repeat. Chloe stalks across the room towards him.

“What? Detective, stop!”

He backs away until she has him cornered behind the bar. She reaches out, plucks the pocket square from his jacket, and, after wrapping it around her hand, reaches up to cup his cheek.

“There. See? No problem.” He’s holding his breath, his eyes focused on her own. She fully intends to step back, and is distantly surprised to watch her hand as it drags the ridiculously soft silk up to his temple, along his brow, and back down to his jaw. He’s trembling, but…pliant, is the word. “No problem at all,” she murmurs, even as muted spasms of pain travel down her fingers to her arm.

He swallows heavily, and her eyes go wide. She cackles a bit as she steps back. “Yeah. So, gloves will work.”

“We shall see,” is as far as he’ll go.

Any further attempt at planning forgotten, Chloe practically flees to the parking garage. This time, when she gets to her car, she realizes she still has his pocket square clutched in her hand. Instead of taking it back inside, she tucks it into the inner pocket of her purse alongside his feathers. Where she’d touched his face through the cloth, the skin on Chloe’s fingers feels warm and tight, like they’ve received a little too much sun.

What is she doing?

What is she doing?

Having a mini panic attack in the parking garage at Lux, apparently.

Her best friend is not only literal Satan, but he’s literally making himself toxic to her. The problem got worse when she pointed it out. That’s not something she can turn into the mundane. There can be no long hours spent stroking his self-actualizing subconscious in order to familiarize herself with this aspect of him. And she is, what? Forcing him to let her touch him? To let her hurt herself with his presence? This has to be it, the answer to the question of whether she is in control of her own actions or just programed by his dad, because why else would she be behaving like this? Sure, Lucifer needs help with his wings—but does he actually? Nothing looked infected. He isn’t worried about them, so why should she?

I want this, he’d said while the sex toys he’d used with another woman were still lying out on his bed. He can’t even know what a relationship is, not from a human perspective.

She certainly never showed him what it’s like to be cared for in that way. I can’t sleep, he’d said, and she’d responded by telling him what a good man Marcus was.

Chloe had agreed to wed Pierce this coming Saturday.

She cannot trust herself.

The precinct hosts little wellness classes sometimes—how to de-stress, how to keep calm in high pressure situations. The advice is always the same: breathe and visualize something calming. She tries it. Deep breaths, four counts in, eight out. Thinks about Trixie, laughing and happy. Thinks about the outing she’d proposed with Lucifer, ice cream. Thinks of Trixie enthusiastically throwing herself at Lucifer, about her hugging him and laughing while her skin breaks out in a rash, in boils, in burns as red and scarring as Lucifer’s own.

She grabs her purse and breathes into it. Just breathes. No thinking allowed.

The whole episode lasts maybe five minutes according to the dashboard clock, but Chloe feels absolutely wiped. She just wants to sleep, but that hasn’t been in the cards lately, so she needs to do something else. In the rear-view mirror, her lips are still swollen, but more bee-stung than duck-like. She texts Bauda, asking for a meet, and starts her car.

Bauda directs her to a dog park that looks nearby but with traffic actually takes an hour to reach, which means by the time she arrives, Chloe at least sounds normal again. She spots the other detective on one of the benches along the edge of the park, casually watching a trio of Labradors play nearby.

“Which one’s yours?” Chloe asks, sitting down.

“Oh, I don’t have a dog,” Bauda says. “I just like to watch.” She arches an eyebrow at Chloe, like they’re friends who share risque jokes. “What about you? Are you here to agree to a bit of voyeurism?”

“I’m here for information. Lucifer has an in with Thorston, but that’s as far as anything goes unless you’re ready to get specific with what he or his group have been accused of, what you want us to investigate, and what the time line is for wrapping up your official investigation into me.”

Bauda turns away and starts digging in her bag. “And here I thought you’d be eager for the work.”

The truth is, Chloe is eager, and not just because being a detective is so central to how she views herself. She does care about police corruption; if the captain is involved in a woman’s disappearance, or hell, even if he’s just an overt sexist in a position of extreme power over a lot of female law enforcement officers, then she wants to help put an end to his career. She doesn’t like Bauda, though, and trust is something she’s short on right now. It hasn’t escaped her notice that Bauda’s partner has been absent for both of their unofficial talks. The other woman had implied that at least her lieutenant in IA is aware of this operation, but there’s a disturbing lack of paperwork offering Chloe any cover if this unofficial operation goes south.

Bauda extracts a thick manila envelope from her bag and hands it over. “Here’s a copy of the complaint we received, a little more background on the captain and what we’ve learned about his club. When is Lucifer’s next meeting with Thorston?”

“Why?”

“How can I tell you the time line of our official investigation if you keep me in the dark about your unofficial investigation?”

“He has an opportunity on Friday night.”

“Good, that’s good. Go in and get as many names as you can. You’ll need to talk to the other women there—find out their backgrounds, see if there are any red flags. Take pictures if you can.”

“Pictures? Is this an investigation or blackmail?”

“Sometimes one is better than the other.”

Chloe frowns. “What’s the outcome of all of this? If Lucifer and I get some proof of illegal activity? Does IA actually do anything?”

“Something, sure, but you’ve been around long enough to know not to get your hopes too high. If you can prove abduction, or worse, then we have a case. But short of that? Most likely, he’ll remain a captain, but he’ll be shuffled to the back bench with no chance of further promotion and some loss of responsibility until he retires in a few years.”

“And it’s easier to strong-arm him into doing what you want if you don’t open up a formal investigation and force him to get publicly defensive. Wow. Real great work your department does.”

Bauda smiles, sharp and pointy. “Homicide is the glamor squad, the one everyone guns for because you get to feel like rock stars. You’re catching bad guys and saving lives and finding justice. IA is different. We are incremental change over long periods of time. Corruption isn’t something you solve with a single case.”

“Do you really think the LAPD has gotten even a little less corrupt since you joined?”

“Do you?” Bauda cocked her head. “But you’re still here. Still working with that civilian consultant of yours. Still just friends with that one, by the way? Sure you can hold to that, what with all this undercover work, playing his sub?”

Actually, we just kissed, but I’m pretty sure that won’t be a problem, because now he’s toxic to me, literally, and any further physical relationship is completely off the table. Out loud, Chloe shares a different truth. “The idea of playing submissive to Lucifer does absolutely nothing for me.” Bauda’s being awful, but Chloe is actually glad for the reminder that there are reasons other than the celestial that make exploring anything beyond friendship with Lucifer a bad idea. She does not want to encourage her reputation as ready and willing to hook up with everyone in the department.

“You know yourself best. Think of it this way, the more information you bring me about the captain, the more I can do to put an end to the harm he’s doing. If everything goes well on Friday, we should be able to get you back in the office on desk duty next week. You won’t be completely cleared yet, of course. The feds,” she says with a shrug. “Right now, they’d prefer to clean out the entire department, and you were closer to Lieutenant Pierce than most.”

“They won’t find anything. I had no idea.”

“We wouldn’t be meeting if I thought otherwise. Take a look at the details, call me if you have further questions, and let me know how Friday goes.”

Bauda gets up, walks over to the dogs, and gives all three a very friendly round of pets before making her way out of the park.

Chloe grimaces at the manila envelope; this is all very irregular. If she hadn’t been hiding something while also attempting to deal with the complete upending of her worldview, she might not even have agreed to go through with it. She could definitely do without Bauda’s constant digs at her personal life.

But she is hiding several things, and her worldview has been upended. So.

Maze texts thirty minutes later while Chloe is waiting in the pickup line at Trixie’s school.

Talked to Linda about “collateral damage.” Learning to play chess so I can win without sacrificing the little pawn dudes, because they have limitations like Trixie.

Then a moment later:

Trixie is way more badass, but Linda says it’s a thought experiment or whatever.

Maze doing homework. Hell appears to be home to a lot of prickly softies.

“Whatcha smiling about?” Trixie asks, clambering into the car’s passenger seat.

“Uh, just a text,” Chloe says, pulling away from the school. “From Maze actually.”

“Oh.” Trixie’s gaze goes to the window, but her head stays angled towards Chloe, listening.

“There’s something she’d like to say to you. Would you be okay with me inviting her to dinner? Maybe tomorrow night?”

“I guess that’s fine.” Trixie’s face remains stoic, but her hands grip her backpack a little more tightly.

Chloe takes a hand off the steering wheel just long enough to stroke her daughter’s hair. Yeah, whatever else they’d done, she and Dan really had made one badass little kid.

Apparently her phone call with Lucifer had been the cure Trixie needed; she’s back to her normal self that night, silly and upbeat, if still reluctant to engage with her homework. With her snuggled against Chloe’s side on the couch for a little pre-bed movie time, the apartment is finally starting to feel like home again. Chloe does have moments when she is overwhelmingly aware that God could be watching like some omniscient stalker, but it’s easier to take when she’s got a steady reminder that, celestial bullshit aside, Chloe has done something worthwhile with her life, something her dad will be proud of if he is able to look down on her from Heaven. That’s a nice thought, actually. Being non-religious, she’d always believed that her dad would never know about his granddaughter, but now she believes that not only does her dad know about Trixie, they might get to meet someday in the far, far, far future.

After putting Trixie to bed, she texts Maze about dinner the next night and starts going through the material Bauda provided. It’s not much—a couple of official photographs of Thorston, public and less public versions of his bios, and a few witness statements. She wishes she had access to her work computer and old case files so that she could cross-check a few things, but trying to do any of that while on suspension would be like waving a red flag in front of the feds’ faces. A girl named Maddy, last name unknown, general description of ‘black hair, twenty-something, sturdy build, tall,’ had possibly last been seen at one of the captain’s club gatherings. There’s no official missing person’s report, just an anonymous tip from someone claiming to have worked an event, though in what capacity isn’t specified. This isn’t a huge red flag—off-the-books tips are pretty common when the informant is a sex worker. Chloe assumes a large proportion of the women at these club gatherings are likely professionals. There are a couple of additional anonymous complaints in the file: the captain had tried to coerce someone into attending an event, had made inappropriate remarks at work, had told his club buddies that he was disciplining a female officer for not being subservient enough. Certainly credible, but not anything that’s likely to harm his career, not with the way the world typically works. She wonders if Lucifer has learned anything else.

Linda says I have to ask if I should bring anything, Maze texts while Chloe is typing up a time line of the information, such as it is.

You can bring desert, Chloe responds, figuring if she’s going to facilitate this reunion between her daughter and a literal demon, she might as well go all out. This, at least, is something God probably doesn’t have a hand in. Chloe can easily imagine Him using a human to manipulate His son, but using a demon to manipulate a human? That seems far-fetched. He’d probably want Chloe to help encourage Maze back to Hell where she belongs, which, childishly, makes her want to help Maze figure out how to make a home here even more.

She does some internet searching, stumbling across a Reddit thread on the Marquises des Douleur that paints the group as a sort of MRA hero cult, but there’s no official web presence for the club that she can find. The captain himself pops up sporadically, mostly in association with the Police Benevolent Fund and the Children Forward Initiative, an organization for underprivileged youths that he appears to be very closely connected to. His association with the organization pre-dates his time with the LAPD—he’d spent several years with the Evanston PD in Illinois, and had helped promote the Initiative’s benefits there before starting up a local chapter when he’d moved to L.A. four years ago. His promotion to captain looks PR related—he’d been at the heart of a bust that had taken a disturbingly large cache of military-style weapons off the streets and effectively shut down the local arm of a smuggling ring. The papers had trumpeted his leadership, and he’d gotten a new rank within four months. As a captain, it doesn’t seem as though he’s achieved anything spectacular, however. The press had quickly fallen out of love with him—the crassness Lucifer had noted—and his name appears less and less frequently in official statements. Strange, then, that Bauda is asking for material to curtail his influence.

Chloe taps her fingers idly, then does a search on Bauda’s name. Typical for an IA detective, there’s almost nothing. No glorious busts, no official statements. She doesn’t appear to have any social media presence. Chloe tries narrowing her search to anything from at least four years ago, related to Evanston, and turns up one reference from nearly a decade back. A young beat cop had been stabbed on duty one night and severely injured, her chances of survival unknown as of the date of the article. Accompanying the write up was an official EPD photo of a very fresh faced Bauda, looking oh so earnest in her dress uniform.

Chloe checks her time line. Thorston had been a sergeant in the same precinct as Bauda at that point. Could this all be some personal vendetta?

There’s no one for Chloe to take her concerns to, however. Her official resources are limited to Dan, who is grieving and doesn’t need to be swept up in any more shady business, and Ella, who is an amazing friend and scientist but who has no political clout and would get batted aside by IA as though she were nothing. Chloe grimaces, feeling trapped, until she remembers that Lucifer has confirmed Thorston’s unsavory side. Bauda’s reasons for wanting to hurt Thorston’s career might be very well founded. For all Chloe knows, Bauda is one of those anonymous complaints against him, and she’s run out of official ways to protest his abusive treatment.

Unease slightly abated, Chloe returns her focus to Thorston. Maybe she can earn herself some of that ‘sleep of the just’ Lucifer mentioned.

Chapter Text

This time when she dreams about Marcus, they’re all in the evidence closet at the precinct. Chloe is leaning against a shelving unit, naked and used. Her post-orgasm body aches, like she was forced off an edge rather than encouraged into pleasure, and now she’s been discarded like a spent shell.

Lucifer and Pierce stand together, blocking the door out into the rest of the precinct, dressed as they were when they went undercover playing husbands. Lucifer has his devil face on, and behind his back his wings are out, white, unblemished and awe-inspiring. Pierce has an arm slung around Lucifer’s shoulders, and one of Lucifer’s is draped around Pierce’s waist. Lucifer dangles the bullet necklace he gave her from his other hand and holds it out when she reaches for it.

“You’re giving that to her?” Pierce asks, sneering. “Look at her. That is not a woman who does the penetrating in a relationship. Trust me, I’d know.” He smirks as he fondles Lucifer’s chest through his sweater.

Gunshots sound on the other side of the door, followed by yells and the sounds of furniture being rearranged. The entire precinct, settling in for a siege.

“Well, someone needs to take care of that,” Lucifer says. “I suppose you want me to do it?”

He’s looking at Chloe, question in his eyes, and she shakes her head, tries to move towards him, but the floor is slippery, and she ends up stuck in place, clutching the shelving unit to keep herself upright.

Lucifer rolls his eyes. “Right. I suppose we’ll have to be heroes. You have your own gun?”

Pierce grins. “Always.”

They share a passionate kiss, licking into each other’s mouths while Chloe cringes away from the sound of gunfire.

“Thank your dad she brought us together, hmm?” Pierce says, gently stroking Lucifer’s hair. “Well, come on then. Let’s go kill them all. Time for your game face.”

The red disappears from Lucifer’s countenance as his wings jolt out of existence, leaving him looking wholly human. He rubs his hands together. “Wonder how many bullets I can catch this time. Bet it’s a record.”

Chloe lies in bed, staring at the ceiling. If she gets up now, there’s time to get Trixie to the bus stop. Chloe can get out the door, go meet Lucifer, get to work on this case.

She’s afraid to see him again.

She wonders if he’ll let her take care of his wings.

Chloe feels no urge to worship them, but there’s no denying that the only time the two of them have been able to remain calm in each other’s presence is when she’s had her fingers in his feathers. She wants that peace, that closeness, and it frightens her, because it means she hasn’t learned to be careful, despite everything else she’s learned since Pierce’s death. She should be encouraging Lucifer to keep his distance, should be taking the time to observe how he behaves now that she knows the truth about him, should be dissecting her own behavior to figure out what parts of her life are real and wanted and which parts are fake and imposed upon her by…other forces. Instead, she’s been pushing herself further into his life, ignoring his attempts to put up boundaries. Her behavior is dangerous, and she’s not even being fair to him. He’s clearly dealing with a lot as well; he deserves his space.

Waking up early does give her plenty of time to work on meditating, so she goes through her practice. Centered, grounded, she decides: she’ll tell him that they’re friends, but that she needs to keep things professional for a while. She decides: she’ll return his pocket square and his broken feathers. She decides: she’ll offer to continue helping with his wings, but they will touch the minimum amount possible.

She decides: wanting him is not the same as needing him. She decides: she needs to be alone. She decides: this is how she will keep Trixie safe, Miracle of God or no.

She texts him before she arrives this time, but he’s still not alone when the elevator deposits Chloe in the penthouse. Maze lounges in one of his leather chairs, twirling the knife that killed Pierce.

“Hey Decker,” she says. “I hear I have you to thank for cleaning this up. Appreciate it.” She raises her chin in Chloe’s direction, that little nod of respect that means, as far as Maze is concerned, everything between them is fixed.

Chloe, who hadn’t been prepared for the brief panic she’d felt when she’d seen an armed Maze in Lucifer’s home, gives a tight smile. “Uh, yeah. I hope, uh, Pierce didn’t hurt you? Taking it from you?”

“All good.” If Maze picks up on the unspoken questions Chloe’s asking, she doesn’t respond to them.

“And you and Lucifer? You’ve made up?”

Maze shrugs. “Why hold a grudge? I was stupid to want to go back to Hell when all you humans can’t go five minutes without needing me to defend you, and he was stupid not to take me when I asked.”

Chloe relaxes. Maze: terrifying and heartfelt. Her being an actual demon really doesn’t change anything at all. “That’s good. I’m glad. That you’re here to help.”

Apparently that sentiment is too emotional for the demon to bear, as Maze immediately stands and struts towards the elevator. As she passes Chloe, she tips her head out towards the balcony where Lucifer is nursing a drink. “I don’t know what kinda torture you’ve been putting him through, but he called last night begging me to come over and take care of his wings, so. Respect. We still on for dinner tonight?”

Chloe can no longer dismiss Maze’s constant references to torture as mere figures of speech, and she is glad she already decided she needs to impose a distance between herself and Lucifer, or she’d be really hurt right now. “Yeah.”

“Cool. Later, Decker.”

Chloe sets her purse down and looks out through the balcony doors. Lucifer is fully armored today: black suit, white shirt, red pocket square and cravat, black gloves. Very much the devil who doesn’t care about petty human concerns. His shoulders are held high to his neck, though, and his brow is deeply furrowed as he stares out over the city. Before she can forget, Chloe fishes out the broken feathers and pocket square from her bag and leaves them on top of the bar. She runs through her checklist: friends and colleagues, no touching, firmer boundaries. She does not need anything else, and will not pursue it. He wants space, and she will respect his limits.

She knocks on the glass doors to the balcony, careful not to surprise him, but he doesn’t turn around when she steps out. A handful of broken feathers are scattered about, dots of blood marring the barbs, but the windows are free of spatter today.

“As you can see, Maze has already tended to my wings, so there’s no need for you to risk yourself.”

“She said. You’ve made up?”

He shrugs. “Maze is Maze. Devious, but in some ways refreshingly straightforward. She betrayed me to assist Pierce, Pierce double-crossed her, so now she’s willing to forgive me for my so-called selfish behavior.”

“And you trust her?”

“She’s not angry with me anymore; as long as that’s true, I’ve nothing to worry about. The moment I displease her?” He shrugs again. “It’s difficult for her. Demons are born for Hell, and Maze in particular took her oath of fealty to me seriously. Then I released her from it. She’s had a difficult time figuring out what to do with all that undirected intensity.” He looks away and adds in a softer voice, “I imagine she felt rather trapped and alone. But I’m sure Dr. Linda will figure out how to fix her.”

“Did you talk to Linda about it? About other things?”

“You mean about my suddenly poisonous self? We spoke briefly. She thinks I have self-esteem issues. Ridiculous!” He turns at last, offering up a pale imitation of his usual peacocking. “Wouldn’t you say I’m perfect, Detective?”

“I wouldn’t go that far. Come on, Bauda gave me some information on what she wants us looking into.”

She heads back inside and starts to set everything out on the coffee table. He goes immediately to the bar, pausing when he spots the little pile of feathers and silk. The thumb of his left hand rubs against his gloved fingers as he stares at her returned mementos before, drink apparently forgotten, he crosses back to the center of the room and collapses into a chair where he continues to fidget, as though he’s been cut free of any purpose and doesn’t know what to do.

“Before we get started, I want to apologize for yesterday,” Chloe says.

He looks up, alarmed. “You aren’t the one—”

“I am. I’m the one who ignored your boundaries and tried to push you into doing things you didn’t want. I’ve kinda been treating this whole situation as something that happened just to me. But you were there, too. And Dan, and Trixie, they both have to deal with any fallout as well. It’s not fair for me to keep demanding things from you and then responding with what could only be called mixed signals. So. I need to tell you that I’ve valued our partnership and our friendship, and that seeing your other face hasn’t changed that. I am grateful to you for taking the time to explain everything to me. But you were right yesterday. We clearly need some distance from each other right now. So, while I don’t want to lose you from my life, I agree that for the moment we should limit our relationship to our professional partnership. I know I need some space to handle all of these changes, and it seems like that’s probably true for you, too.”

The toe of his right shoe listlessly scuffs across the rug, its back and forth almost hypnotic. “I’m glad to hear you’ve reclaimed some measure of self-preservation, Detective. It will be for the best.”

His voice never sounds empty; if she weren’t seated in the room with him, she would have thought someone else was saying the words. A void grows in her stomach, but she ignores it. She’s already made her decisions; now she just needs to be strong. She will be in control of her own life. God can just butt right out.

She walks him through the scant information provided by Bauda, along with everything she’d found online.

“Strange that they’re both transplants,” Lucifer remarks. “And Thorston’s work with youths—there’s a potentially unsavory element to that, given his sexual proclivities.”

Chloe grimaces, not wanting to think about it. “Yeah. As much as I don’t like Bauda, I still think it’s worth looking into Thorston. If it’s nothing, no harm done, but if it’s something, then it’s something really bad. Did you check with the staff downstairs? Did anyone recognize Thorston?”

“Yes, turns out he was a regular in recent weeks. Kept pestering the bartenders for help meeting me, of all things.”

“He wanted to meet you?”

“Apparently. I’ve been less sociable of late due to, well, reasons.” Exhaustion, jealousy, the stress of trying to protect everyone from a rogue demon and a criminal mastermind all while solving regular murders, Chloe fills in for him. “So our paths never crossed. Odd he didn’t mention wanting a favor when we spoke the other night, but no doubt there’s something.”

“Bauda puts us onto his trail, but he was already trying to meet you?”

“If she knew, all the more reason for her to use us as bait. Perhaps Pierce’s unmasking merely gave her the opportunity to launch an investigation long in the works.”

“Maybe. Did you get any more details on this gathering tomorrow?”

“I have an address.” He texts her the detail, which she quickly look up.

“It’s an Airbnb, so not one of their own members’ homes, or at least we can’t assume it is. Be nice if we could run a title search.”

“The good captain also informed me there is a dress code.” Lucifer is looking at her now, the ghost of a smile lingering on his lips. “Just last month I would have had so much fun with this.”

“That bad, huh? All right, what am I going as?”

“Unfortunately, we’re rather limited as to options, but needs must in these times.” He disappears in the direction of his closet, returning with a large, flat box along with a normal sized shoe box. He sets both before her on the coffee table and steps back. “I estimated the sizing based on the last time you had to costume yourself out of my closet, so it should fit.”

With great trepidation, Chloe lifts the lid on the larger box. The garment inside is shiny and black and… “Rubber?” She touches it, feeling the not unpleasant smooth slip of it under her fingertips.

“Latex. The theme of the night for the ladies, apparently. Skin that is not skin. Given our touch issues, I’ve selected a full catsuit for you. There’s a hood in there as well, which would provide the added benefit that no one will be able to see your face. I wasn’t certain how willing you were to be recognized?”

“Yeah, no, thank you,” Chloe says, a random collection of syllables to take up space while she considers the contraption in front of her.

“Would you like to try it on now?” He steps back, gesturing her towards his bedroom and, presumably, the bathroom beyond, the only room in the penthouse with a door to it. His level of politeness is unnatural, at least for him, and makes the prospect of putting on this full body condom even less enticing.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, thanks.”

“Right.”

“Oh, we should test it, though. To make sure the touch thing won’t be an issue?” She slides an arm into what must be the neck hole and holds it out towards him.

Lucifer makes a little tsking sound. “I’ll admit this is not at all what I imagined our first foray into fetish gear would be like.”

Chloe’s mind starts to speculate and—No, she chastises herself. “I don’t wear fetish gear,” she says instead, which is true and a good thing to remember. Even if she hadn’t already decided the things she’s decided, she and Lucifer likely wouldn’t even be compatible, down the road.

“A shame. You’ll have to let me model some for you when you have a free moment; I’d hate for you to get the impression that this can’t be good fun, with the right partner.” His voice isn’t quite right, and his expression misses the intended mark, but Chloe knows he’s trying to reestablish their typical banter, so she rewards him with an eye roll.

“There she is,” she thinks she hears him murmur before he finally reaches out to touch her arm through the latex.

It’s strange—touch without touch, the sensation of his fingers dulled but still detailed. He starts by just resting his fingertips tentatively on her forearm, then when she doesn’t respond he skates his hand down towards her wrist, which he grasps loosely through the material. He’s warm, more so than usual, but there’s no sting as there had been when she touched his face through the fabric of his pocket square the day before. When he removes his hand and steps back, there’s no lingering sensation on her skin. She pulls her arm free of the garment and shows it to him.

“Looks like we’re good.”

“An excellent start.”

“Start?”

“Yes. We’ll have to walk through where you’re comfortable being touched, what kinks you’re willing to pretend to indulge in, how I’m allowed to talk to you, safe words. The lot.”

Chloe frowns down at the molded oil slick in the box in front of her. She does not want to be having these conversations with him, not when ‘boundaries’ is the watchword of the moment. “I think we’ll be okay. I—I trust you.”

He locks his gaze with hers and takes a step forward, and only then does she remember the extra meaning that phrase must have for him now. Still…

“Devil and all,” she confirms, not looking away.

“You shouldn’t,” he says immediately, “and not just because of the ‘me’ of it. You’ve never done any kink before, have you?”

“Ah, I am not about to discuss the particulars of my sex life with you, Lucifer.”

He nods and swings away from her to walk the border of his living room. “I thought as much. It can be quite intense for humans, often in ways that surprise them. Touch, for example. You might think it obvious where I can and cannot touch you for the sake of this ruse. Certainly you would object to me cupping your lovely breasts?” He pauses, eyebrow raised, for all the world like it’s a serious question.

“Yeah, I’d object.”

“But what about your neck?”

“That’s fine.”

“Is it? If I set my hand on the back of your neck when you’re kneeling, making it a weight that drags your head forward and down, is that all right? What if I grasp your throat, fingers pressing against your trachea—still fine? Remember, you’re surrounded by strange men whom you absolutely cannot trust. What about your shoulder, where the scar marking our first case resides? You might feel nothing about that mark; on the other hand, you may feel more protective of that area due to the trauma. There are thousands of details about your body that I know nothing of, Detective. Perhaps you have erotically charged elbows and don’t wish them stroked outside of your bedroom. What of your stomach? It’s an area most humans shy from touching on one another without invitation, but it’s not considered strictly intimate. May I, role playing as a man who controls you, touch you there?”

Every word out of his mouth makes Chloe more and more unhappy, even though it underlines for her the fact that she is right to trust him. He cares; he would never hurt her in this way.

“I get it, you’re right.”

“As always.”

“Don’t be smug.” She sighs and runs her hands over her hair, smoothing back her already perfect bun. She does not want to be thinking about this. Are there still any neutral touch locations between them? Any place that won’t mean more the moment his hand reaches out to her? “Um, shoulders are fine. Arms. I guess back of the neck—or back in general. Knee down on the legs?”

“Are you asking me?”

“Is that enough, do you think? To sell this.”

“I can sell anything, Detective. What about wrists?”

“Yeah. Or—” she actually thinks it through— “maybe just one at a time on those?”

He nods. “You want to feel like you still have some freedom of movement, just in case.”

His words make sense of her half-formed feelings, and she relaxes. “Yes. Thank you.”

“For what?” As excruciating as this conversation is on her end, it appears to have knocked him out of his earlier funk to the point where he is once again at the bar, indulging in his usual top shelf whiskey. Glenfiddich for plotting how to guide her through a sex party unscathed.

She shakes her head, looks away. “I’m probably more out of my depth here than I realize.”

“Which is why I’d rather do this myself. You will not enjoy being there tomorrow, and even in the best circumstances I would never take a sub to play in public at a location I’m not already familiar with. It will be…stressful, for both of us.”

“I won’t actually be your sub. I’m a cop, Lucifer. I can handle undercover work; I’ve done it before. Not exactly like this, but it is part of the job sometimes. And I want to investigate this, both because Thorston sounds like a skeeze and because I don’t trust Bauda.”

“You want your normal back.” He’s giving her that soft face again, which isn’t helpful in the moment—boundaries, Decker—so she gets up and walks towards the balcony, enjoying the warmth of the sun streaming through the wall of glass.

“So what was the rest of it? Safe words?”

“Yes. If you don’t have one you’re partial to, I’d recommend the stoplight system—green for go, yellow for caution, red for stop. It’s easy for most people to remember.”

She nods. “That’s fine. I just say a color if there’s a problem?”

“Yes, and I’ll check in with you regularly throughout the evening.”

“Oh, that might not work. I mean, given the venue. Is this a safe word crowd?”

Lucifer snorts. “If they aren’t we should be locking them all up. But you’re right, it might attract attention we don’t want, make it more difficult to achieve our goal. Ah, but you know now. So you can pray to me.” He grins, like that settles everything.

“Pray?”

“Yes, just like you did at lunch the other day. Think at me with intent.”

“Are you sure you’ll hear? You said it only works when—”

“I will most certainly be paying attention to you, Detective. Trust me, I will hear you if you call to me.”

Lucifer, she thinks. Green?

He sticks his tongue into the corner of his mouth and gives her a once over. “Glad to hear it, Detective. Good, that’s all sorted. Now, how would you like me to talk to you?”

“What do you mean?” she asks, still a little thrown by the prayer thing. It reminds her too much of the paranoia she’d felt upon first realizing God could be watching her all the time. But it’s Lucifer—half the time he barely pays attention to what she’s saying, let alone what she might be thinking. This is fine, she tells herself.

He’s clearly not listening to her thoughts now, barreling forward with what he’s singled out as the important part of their preparations for tomorrow. “What should I call you, for starters? I assume ‘Detective’ is off the table. Do you want to be Ch—”

“No.” She cuts him off before he can say it. She can count on her fingers the number of times he’s used her first name. This will not be one of them. “Something else. Some other nickname.”

“Right. Darling?”

“Something you don’t use in normal conversation.”

“Pet? Doll? Kitten?”

She sticks her tongue out. “Ew.”

“Kitten it is,” he says with a laugh.

“You’re the worst,” she says, but she still turns back towards him so she can see his smile. “What about you? I’m not calling you master.”

“’Sir’ is fairly common.”

She tilts her head back and forth. “I can work with that. Sir Lucifer.” She puts on her ‘fancy British man’ accent, startling a groan out of him.

“Simply appalling.”

“Whatever do you mean?”

He buries his face in his hand, but not before she catches sight of his grin. “None of that now. We’re working, Detective.”

“As you say, Sir Lucifer.”

“Kitten,” he tries in a warning tone, but she just laughs.

“God, that sounds ridiculous.”

“No need—”

“To bring your father into this? I’m sorry, but it is all his fault. Or his and your mom’s, I guess.” She sighs, irritated at herself for breaking the moment. “Fine. What was the rest of it? How you can talk to me?”

“Uh, yes.” He clears his throat, finishes his tumbler, and pours himself another drink. “What made Stacia such an asset the other evening was her taste for humiliation. I was able to speak to her in a less than respectful manner and she enjoyed it.

“Do you? Enjoy that?”

He frowns. “Not as a matter of course. It was situation specific. With the right partner, I enjoy everything. You do seem preoccupied with whether I enjoyed my time with Stacia.”

“No.” No. “It’s just, you keep saying you’re fine with everything, but you’re concerned about how to talk to me. It’s only a role, Lucifer. You’re not trying to tap into my desires here, so if you’re comfortable with that sort of thing, we should be fine.”

“As I said, people are often surprised by how things affect them in the moment.”

“So we’ll try something out now. A dry run.”

“There’s no such thing when I’m involved,” he says, fully himself for one relieving moment.

“Gross. Seriously, let’s try it. We arrive at this house. I’m in my little catsuit thingy, calling you sir. We get inside, and you, what?”

He’s clear on one point, at least. “I introduce you as my particular favorite, whom I do not share.”

“Good. Then?”

“This is the trouble with not knowing the layout beforehand. Presumably there will be drinks. If I send you to fetch me one, it might give you a moment to speak with some of the other ladies in attendance.”

“Perfect. Okay, so you make small talk while I get drinks—”

“Just one drink, for me. You would be allowed to consume only what I specifically direct you to eat or drink.”

“Okay, I guess that makes sense,” she says, but he’s peering at her sideways, as though trying to suss out her response.

“How does that make you feel?”

She shrugs. “A bit silly maybe? But it’ll make it easier to hide the fact that I won’t be drinking alcohol.”

“Hmm.” He starts wandering around the room again, leaving about an eight foot radius between them at the closest before he turns and walks in another direction. “I suppose the easiest thing to do would be to position you. Have you kneel, or stand a certain way. I could leave you posed at various places around the venue, a sort of living listening device. Send you on errands as appropriate.”

“That sounds easy enough. Let’s give it a try.”

“Ah. Yes.” He looks her up and down. “Um. Come and kneel at my feet?”

It’s phrased as a question, which surprises her. He has definitely made cruder requests with confidence, though not since she saw his other face. “Are you asking me?”

He tries again, this time pointing at the ground before him. “Kneel.”

Better, but it comes out cheeky rather than commanding. Rolling her eyes at him, she walks forward and uses a hand on the back of a nearby chair to help lower herself to the ground.

“That won’t do at all,” he says, fussiness engaged. “No prized sub of mine would ever hang onto the furnishings like that. Here, like this.”

Chloe expects him to give directions, say something. Instead, he sways his way down towards the floor in one sinuous shift of his body. Her brain stutters, and for a moment her world shrinks down. Nothing exists other than the flex of his abdominal and thigh muscles, graceful, deliberate and strong. Meant to be seen and appreciated. To please his audience. Even fully besuited, she can see the way his hips lead his movements, the ripple of his torso that leaves his shoulders perfectly still as he settles down onto his knees. He clasps his arms behind his back and bows his head just low enough that he couldn’t accidentally meet anyone’s eyeline. He should be looking up at me, she thinks, an automatic correction to his form that she absolutely should not voice right now. She bites her tongue instead, staring while he holds his position so that she can observe the particulars. Before she can get her brain fully back online, a second sway of his muscles brings him back onto his feet. “Now, you try.”

Chloe blinks, searching for her cool facade. She raises one eyebrow, trying not to think of the amount of practice that he’s put into that move. “You really do like everything, don’t you?” she asks as she clambers back to her feet.

He shrugs. “Pleasure takes infinite forms. Why deny myself?”

A few reasons come to mind, but really, it’s none of her business. So she keeps her mouth shut and tries out a smoother descent to her knees, adopting the pose he’d shown her. “Better?”

“I suppose.” He still looks displeased, like something is out of place. He cocks his head one way, then the other, toying with his ring as he looks at her.

“Any other orders, sir?”

His hands drop to his sides as his nose wrinkles. “Well, you don’t have to say it like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like I’m some stranger you’ve just apprehended for gross public indecency.”

“Sorry, Sir.” This time she trots out her best ‘hot girl in the movie’ voice, the sultry one she still breaks out from time to time in undercover situations. “How else may I serve you, Sir?”

Lucifer laughs, a little breathily. “Yes, that does work. Um.” He starts playing with his ring again, his body angling away from her.

She relaxes back onto her heels, dropping the persona. “Are you okay?”

“Of course. Why wouldn’t I be?”

“It’s just…that safe word thing, the person in charge gets to use the colors, too, right? If they don’t like what’s happening?”

“Yes, both Dom and sub are encouraged to safe word when appropriate. That’s part of the trust.”

“So, if I asked you for a color right now, yours would be…?”

“Green, of course. Honestly, Detective, there’s nothing you could do that would be unwelcome.”

“But maybe there’s something you could do,” she realizes. “You don’t want to be doing this—or you don’t want to be doing this with me?” Her mind goes to Stacia, to the easy rapport Lucifer had had with her. He’d done more than give orders, there.

“I bloody well do. You at my feet, asking how you can please me? You are a dream come true, Kitten.” He’s trying to keep it light, like he isn’t admitting things he probably shouldn’t be, but he’s also taken a few steps back from her now, well out of touch range.

“But maybe not like this.” She cocks her head to the side, and his gaze slides away from her.

“In my dreams, you’re here because you want to be.” He smiles somewhat sadly. “In real life, I’m having a terrible time gauging what it is you do want. I’d hate to presume incorrectly. You’ve enough to fear about me without adding anything else.”

“I’m not afraid of you, Lucifer. And this is just pretend; it’s not real.”

“It’s not real, but it’s still us. Still you.”

She bites her lip, bowing her head. “Undercover is both easiest and most difficult when it’s close to the truth.”

“Too bloody right.” She hears the soft rustling of his suit as he shifts his weight back and forth, and she brings her head back up.

“What if you let me navigate? Hmm? We’ve established that I can talk to you without anyone else knowing. So, you’ll be in the driver’s seat, giving the commands out loud. But I’ll give you feedback. Suggestions. I’ll let you know anytime I’m uncomfortable or need an adjustment, or if there’s something I want to try. That way you’ll know. It’s always my choice.”

“Yes, Detective. Or, that sounds like an excellent plan. You’ll be all right? Praying at me? Only it didn’t seem like you enjoyed that.”

“I trust you, remember? I’m creeped out by the idea of anyone being able to just poke around in my head, but you’ll only hear what I want, won’t you, Lucifer.” She’d intended it to come out as a question, but for some reason as she’s speaking, she feels steadily more sure of herself. Lucifer’s gaze hasn’t left hers, and he’s looking increasingly relaxed, as though she’s the one winning his trust, no matter that she’s on her knees and he’s the one with mind-reader-adjacent powers.

“Only what you want, Detective.”

“But everything I do want, you’ll hear it. You’re attention will be on me.”

His lips part slightly as she talks. “I swear it, Detective. You needn’t worry.”

“I know.”

She allows the moment to linger, allows herself to enjoy the warm depth of his irises, to listen to the soft ease of his breath. He’s the one who breaks, chuckling awkwardly and spinning back towards the bar and another drink.

“Right, well. That’s that. All set then?”

Chloe remains resting on her heels a moment longer before rising. Accepting that he needs to put aside this part of their preparations, at least for the moment, she returns to the coffee table where everything is still spread out. “Actually, I have some time before Trixie gets out of school. I’d like to keep going over what information we do have, maybe brainstorm other things we can look into before tomorrow?”

He smiles. “The detective at work.”

“If I’m going to work a case—”

“—you’re going to be thorough, yes, I’ve learned. You get your papers settled, I’ll get you some coffee. It’ll be just like at the precinct.”

And he’s right; it is just like being back at work, though with fewer resources at hand. She directs their efforts, and he throws out off the wall comments that are a lot less frustrating and a lot more insightful now that she knows the perspective he’s coming from. It’s easy. Had she been worried about coming here? Why? They’re partners; they knew how to do this.

Chapter Text

Chloe decides on chicken parmesan for dinner, mainly because Trixie enjoys helping with the prep work, which will give her something to concentrate on if she feels overwhelmed when Maze shows up.

The demon is early, which is only slightly less surprising than if she’d shown up on time. Through the kitchen window, Chloe watches Maze walk up and sends Trixie to open the door while she finishes chopping garlic.

“Small human,” Maze say when the door opens. “I brought dessert.”

Trixie responds with a listless, “Thanks,” even though Chloe can see Maze attempting to hand over a cake box. Maze cuts a look at Chloe, who redirects her own gaze to the cutting board. Faintly, she hears the creak of leather as Maze squats down to Trixie’s height.

“I apologize for the way I spoke about you. I was angry at other people and didn’t, um, take ownership of my emotions.”

“What?” Trixie does not sound impressed.

“Something Linda said, I don’t know. The point is I didn’t mean any of it. Other people were being stupid and I let them get to me. I’m,” and here Maze stops to roll her eyes grandly at herself, “homesick and lonely.” Her lips curl, as though accurately identifying her feelings is literally revolting. “I swear to you the loyalty of my blades.”

Trixie responds immediately, without judgment. “The points of my daggers aim ever at your enemies.”

That sounds like a well-worn response. Her daughter has been exchanging violent oaths with a demon. Lovely.

“Cool.” Maze caps off the moment with a little fist bump before standing to dump the cake box onto the kitchen counter. “Decker. When’s food?”

“You’ve got about half an hour.”

Maze jerks her chin at Trixie. “Come on out back; I want to see whether you kept up your training.”

“No throwing knives in the backyard,” Chloe calls after them, wondering if she’s a bad mother for not following them out to make sure Trixie isn’t playing with deadly weapons. Only a few minutes pass before she hears Trixie’s laughter sounding through the open windows, and when she peeks into the yard, she sees her daughter and Maze engaged in what must be some sort of hand-to-hand training, no matter that it looks suspiciously like a tickle fight. Chloe’s lips twist into a not-quite smile. She misses the resilience of youth, friendships mended with a word. Adulthood takes so much effort, the constant decision to forgive and move forward.

Sighing, she pulls out her phone and opens up the text chain that’s been sitting unused for weeks.

Tribe night Saturday?, she types before returning to the stove.

God—no, not Him, but damn, er, fuck if she isn’t going to need a distraction come Saturday.

Dinner is a lot easier than Chloe had anticipated. Trixie’s forgiveness is whole and all encompassing, and by the time they’re using garlic bread to mop up the last of the sauce on their plates, she’s already campaigning for Maze to move back in. Maze keeps her eyes locked down on her plate when Trixie makes the suggestion, so Chloe tries to take the pressure off.

“We’ll see, monkey. It’s a lot of effort for someone to move back and forth, and Maze has other people in her life. She and I will have to talk it over later.”

While Chloe does the dishes, Maze tries teaching Trixie how to play chess—”It looks hella boring, but it’s all about battle strategy, and you get to kill the other person’s guys with your horses.” They spend about 20 minutes on the traditional game before breaking out the paper and crayons to design a more bloodthirsty version while Chloe finishes cleaning up. Maze takes story time duties that night, but Chloe is able to see through the open bedroom door to where Miss Alien has fully reclaimed her prized in-bed sleeping privileges. When Maze rejoins her in the living room, shutting Trixie’s door behind her, Chloe greets her with a smile and a beer.

“Thanks for being so honest with her. She’s had a tough couple weeks; tonight was good.”

Maze shrugs. “Cain was an ass. Glad he’s in Hell now.”

“Oh!” For some reason, Chloe had not put two and two together on that one. If Hell is literal, then she knows people who end up there. She guesses she’s glad Pierce isn’t in Heaven, and there’s some momentary pleasure in knowing he’s receiving some punishment for all he’s put her and others through, but forever? Forever-forever?

Maze is peering at her cannily. “Not so much with the Hell talk yet, huh? Don’t worry; took Linda a while, too. You’ll get there.”

“It just seems like a terrible system. And you wanted to go back there?”

“It’s home. Familiar. Harsh, demanding. I know who I am and what I’m doing. There’s no wrong in Hell, as long as you’re making people scream. And I’m good at that.”

Chloe nods, nods, nods while trying to think of a topic shift. The thing is, she knows what she needs to ask Maze, but it still takes a full bottle of beer before she works up the courage.

“I need to ask you for advice, but I want to stress that this is all work related, so no, you know, commentary.”

Maze makes no promises, face waiting to be bored and ready to mock. Chloe sighs and goes to fetch the box Lucifer had given her. She sets it on the kitchen island and lifts off the lid.

“Could you tell me how the Hell I’m supposed to get into this thing?”

Maze laughs. She guffaws when she lifts out the latex catsuit, and howls as she examines the included hood, complete with a zipper over the mouth opening. The suit also has a zipper—over the crotch. There’s nothing running down the front or back to indicate how it’s supposed to go onto a person. Lucifer also sent her home with a selection of talcs and lubes, but Chloe isn’t certain what to apply where or if they’re used together, and if anyone would know, it’s her erstwhile roommate, if Maze ever gets over her enjoyment of Chloe’s discomfort.

“I can’t believe Lucifer convinced you into fetish wear ‘for work.’ That’s amazing. I bet he’s at home jerking off right now thinking of you in this thing.”

“Maze, inappropriate,” Chloe snaps, trying to sound in control and not mortified. “This is strictly for work. And he’s not...thinking of me that way.” She explains about IA and Bauda and Thorston’s whole sex club deal.

Still chuckling, Maze grabs the box and leads Chloe into the bathroom, going over the basics of dressing aids and neck entry cat suits. “Come on, strip off and I’ll help you out,” she says when she’s gone over the technique, but Chloe shakes her head and pushes Maze back onto the other side of the doorway.

“I can get it, I think. Just… Wait here? In case I get stuck?”

Maze is still smiling, but she doesn’t laugh again. “Sure thing, Decker. I’ve got you.”

It takes a while.

To distract herself from the ordeal and the fact that Maze is waiting to gawk at her in this contraption, she tells Maze more about the case, about her concerns about Bauda, about how little they have to go on.

“So this detective chick is from Evanston,” Maze says when Chloe’s completed her rundown. “And this dude she’s having you look into is, too?” There’s an expectant silence. “Damn, Decker, maybe your head is divinity scrambled. Evanston? Chicago suburb? That doesn’t ring any bells for you?”

“Oh. Oh, no.” All her moments with Marcus have been playing on a loop in her head, and it takes Maze to point this out? Chloe is off her game; yet another reason tomorrow night is a bad idea. “You think they’re connected to Cain, or to his whole Sinnerman operation? You think he sent them here, while he was still working in Chicago.”

“That would be the first thing I’d check into.” Maze pauses, and when she speaks again, it’s in a her ‘everything’s casual, I definitely don’t care, don’t look at me’ voice. “I could take a look, or whatever. I know you get busy with the kid, and Lucifer is a full time job in and of himself.”

Chloe finally settles the neck of the cat suit in place where it’s supposed to be. “That would be great, Maze. I don’t have access to my usual resources right now; I’d feel a lot more comfortable knowing someone is digging into Bauda.”

“You can count on me,” Maze says from beyond the door, using the same tone of voice she’d used when she’d promised Trixie the loyalty of her blades. “And vice versa?”

It’s definitely a question. Chloe frowns, tries to remember if she somehow betrayed Maze during that whole ‘engaged to the first murderer’ debacle. “Yeah, Maze. We’re friends, right?”

“How are you coming on that suit? Hurry up, or I’ll have to break the door down to help.”

“It’s, uh, on.” Chloe turns around to regard herself in the mirror. It fits, which is about the only opinion she wants to venture at this time. She feels like a plastic toy. The material isn’t exactly uncomfortable, just extremely present, covering every inch of skin, fingers and toes included, below her jawline. She won’t be able to stop thinking about it the entire time she’s wearing it. And it hides nothing. Nakedness might have felt more modest, honestly. At least her skin isn’t so shiny.

“So let’s see it. Come on, Decker. I bet you look hot.”

If she can’t show Maze, there’s no way she’ll get through an evening with strangers tomorrow. Wishing she had cuffs to tug on or a shirt to pull down—something to fiddle with—she opens the bathroom door and steps out.

Maze wolf-whistles. “All right, Decker! You should ditch the granny panties more often. Turn around for me.”

Practice, Chloe reminds herself, giving a spin. “It’s on right? I haven’t missed anything.”

“Oh, it’s on right.” Maze’s gaze isn’t coming anywhere near above Chloe’s neck. “If Lucifer isn’t jerking off thinking about you in that thing, he certainly will after he sees you in it.”

“Gross, Maze. No.” Chloe grabs her bathrobe off the hook on the bathroom door and disguises herself in terrycloth.

“You know, if the two of you had just been honest about your whole deal with each other, a lot of the shit that went down would never have happened. You never would have looked at Cain, and Lucifer wouldn’t have been too busy lying to himself to give me a second thought. He has the hots for you. You have the hots for him. Accept it, bone, and get on with your lives.”

“I’m not taking Lucifer away from you, or whatever it is you’re thinking.”

Maze shakes her head, but it’s clear she doesn’t fully believe that. “He’ll always put you first, but he needs me. Eventually you’ll die; I’m the only one who understands what it’s like to know you’ll all die, and we won’t.”

Chloe had been ready to launch into an argument about how Maze is still refusing to take responsibility for her own actions, blaming Lucifer and Chloe instead, but that remark effectively stops her tongue. “It really is a terrible system.”

“Yeah. His dad sucks.”

“His mom, too, from what I’ve heard.”

“She has her good points,” Maze says, unable as ever to resist a terrifying woman.

“You know that I need you, too, right?” Chloe remembers that she isn’t allergic to this former denizen of Hell and reaches out to put a hand on Maze’s arm. “For a long time, I really didn’t have friends. A lot of attention gets put on romance or family and all of that, but friendship is it’s own thing, and it’s just as important.”

“Friendship is magic,” Maze says, because of course Trixie has passed along that indoctrination. “But it’s never anyone’s priority. You don’t choose the friend first.”

“Sometimes you do. Linda chose you, right? She messed up first, but she chose you. And it doesn’t always have to be about ranking.”

“Not always. But sometimes.”

Maze leaves shortly after, making an excuse about needing to track down and hopefully knock around some felon in the process of bringing him to justice. Chloe wishes she had a similar coping mechanism. Feelings: why?

She practices wearing the suit. She adds the hood and the shoes, which, while higher and spikier than what she’s used to, aren’t beyond her skill level. She walks the house, wearing her robe in case Trixie wakes up and sees her. Thankfully she wears gloves often enough at work that having her hands covered all the time isn’t a huge challenge, but it takes a while before she’s confident she can move in the suit without embarrassing herself—or Lucifer, her faux master. Thinking of that, she tries out that kneeling move he’d shown her. It’s not natural for her, probably never will be, but she thinks she can fake it for a night.

When Hot Tub High School came out, one reviewer wrote that she had “all the acting talent of a fence post trying to win a dog show.” That quote definitely doesn’t spend all night making itself at home in her brain.

She dreams of Hell, of Marcus there, where she helped imprison him, and when she wakes far too early, she thinks about Lucifer’s eternities in that place, and about how he chose to go back—twice—for her sake. It doesn’t make sense; why should anyone be going to Hell, be enduring that type of suffering, for her? Why is she involved in any of this?

Why would Lucifer be willing to do that for her when he couldn’t even make it to what was supposed to have been their first date?

The feds call her in at noon.

She’s managed to forget about them, mostly. Throughout her suspension, she’s had more than one call with her lawyer to go over what each law enforcement agency wants from her, but since that initial interview the day of, the FBI has essentially ignored her.

Had she ever wanted to be the center of attention? Nineteen year old Chloe really had been an idiot. Her lawyer is there, but he barely makes an impact. It’s six straight hours of questioning.

Aside from their opening salvo (”Settle a bet—do you recall a large albatross flying in through the upper window? What about a trumpeter swan?”) all of their questions relate to her and Marcus’s relationship. What had they done together? Where had they gone? Who had they met? Did she know any of Pierce’s friends? Did it seem like Lucifer and Pierce had known each other prior to Pierce’s arrival at the precinct? Did Pierce talk about his past? Why had they broken up the first time? Why had she taken him back? Why had they broken up the second time? Had she loved him? Had he exhibited signs of religious fanaticism? What were her religious beliefs? Had any aspect of their sex life been ritualized? What had he said about the mark on his arm? Did she often date her superiors? Had he ever spoken about getting another tattoo? Did he believe in predestination? Did she believe in predestination? Did she often have sex at work? Had she viewed Pierce as controlling? What had the power dynamics of their relationship looked like? Had she trusted him around her daughter? Had she helped him gather information for his files? Had she helped him illegally obtain the piece of petrified wood they’d found in his home? Had she been aware of him illegally obtaining any other mementos of his travels?

She dearly wishes she could just explain the God thing to them. “Hey, I don’t know the answers to any of these questions for certain, but there’s a good chance that the answer to my involvement with Marcus Pierce boils down to ‘God said so.’ But no on the wood thing.”

Just as she thinks things are wrapping up, they show her a handwritten time line encased in a clear plastic evidence bag. It shows dates and times of ‘milestones’ in her relationship with Marcus—their first date, when they’d first held hands, first kissed. When she’d first initiated those actions. First time having sex, what she’d said yes to, when he’d been able to convince her to try more. How she’d introduced him to Trixie. Brief descriptors of personal anecdotes she shared with him, such as when she’d talked about her dad’s murder or her relationship with her mom. There’s a little sub-note under each milestone charting how close she was to being in love with him.

The feds ask her to confirm dates, times, actions. They ask whether Pierce’s love measurements had been accurate. If she knows why he would be tracking this.

It’s mortifying, seeing everything laid out in concrete form. She doesn’t want to remember what she actually felt, can feel herself rewriting her memories so that she can tell herself she never really cared for Marcus. But it had gutted her when he’d dumped her. There might have been divine shenanigans to blame for that love, but she can’t pretend she’d been indifferent.

Chloe had felt prepared for the party that night, but after going over every case she’d worked under Pierce, every off duty moment they’d shared, after dwelling ad nauseam on the faux-Sinnerman case, when Lucifer had manipulated her and Marcus had convinced her he was the good guy for killing a man, she’s more than a little shaky.

Thankfully, Dan had already been scheduled to take Trixie after school. Lucifer being Lucifer, there are twenty-three texts waiting for her when the FBI is finally done with her for the day. She can feel the anxiety pouring through her phone as she skims through the “Are they done with you yet?”s and the “Shall I come rescue you?”s and the “Why do you subject yourself to the tyranny of fools in bad suits who are apparently obsessed with extraterrestrial life?”s he’s sent her. She’d texted him that morning about Maze’s belief that Bauda and Thorston are connected to Pierce’s Sinnerman network, and he’d immediately suggested that they call off the entire undercover operation, which only makes her feel more cornered into going through with it. She wants to be the Chloe Decker who gets things done, who handles stressful situations and who doesn’t let a messy personal life interfere with her work life.

She isn’t even supposed to have a messy personal life. She’s tried so hard to be boring, and she is good at it, too.

Chloe drives directly to Lux from the precinct. It wouldn’t make sense for Lucifer and his ‘kitten’ to arrive separately at the party, so she carries a small duffel containing her costume and dressing aids. Lux is already packed, and she hears a string of loud protests as she breezes past the line out front, nodding at the doorman. She smiles greetings at the staff members inside as well, none of whom have any clue that their boss is the literal devil rather than just an eccentric man who’s rich enough to get away with his quirks.

She pauses a few steps to the elevator and backtracks to the bar.

“Hey, Patrick?” she asks, waving at the main bartender. “Do you have a second?”

Patrick pauses his garnish stocking and hurries over, wiping his hands. “Detective Decker? Anything you need?”

That’s another thing about Lucifer. The entire staff, whether she knows them or not, refers to her exclusively as Detective Decker in the same tone of voice she might use to greet the deputy chief of police. “I was just…Look, you don’t have to say, but…How is Lucifer as a boss? Does he, uh, pay well? Offer enough time off, and all of that?”

Patrick chuckles, looking surprised. “A good boss? Most places like this expect you to be no older than 25, but with ten years experience and willing to give up your entire life for minimum wage plus tips and no benefits. Mr. Morningstar doesn’t care if you have experience as long as you learn quickly and seem willing to have fun. Everyone here makes five times what they would anywhere else, plus we get full medical, dental and vision, with as much time off as we need, which we can actually take, because while most places are looking to minimize staff, he’s hired more than enough people to cover any missed shifts.”

“So you like working for him?”

Patrick hesitates a moment. “Look, this is the best job I’m probably ever going to have. He can be, uh, surprising? And mercurial, definitely. But it makes the place interesting. I don’t have to worry about being bored at work. What’s up, Detective Decker? You’re not considering a career change?”

“Ah, no, just, uh, making sure that, you know, all his consulting work isn’t getting in the way of his real job.”

“No worries, Detective Decker. He’s always been a great boss, but everything with him has been better since you came along.” Patrick winks and turns back to his lime wedges.

Right.

When she reaches the penthouse, the elevator opens to the sound of the piano. It’s something soft, classical and contemplative and slow. When the doors open, Lucifer turns his head towards her but keeps playing. “Detective. Glad you finally made it free of governmental clutches. Everything went well?”

“Fine. Just long.” He nods absently and turns back to his keys, as though she doesn’t have hours worth of worried texts from him on her phone. She stays for a minute, watching him play. His fingers are so long and sure on the keys. Strong, she things. It takes a lot of strength to maintain that perfect control over timing and volume. Flexibility to hit the right notes. The patience to learn, dedication to build up his skill level and his repertoire. Beautiful, useful hands. Manicured nails kept short.

His hands stop moving, and she glances up to see that he’s turned to look at her, eyebrow raised.

“Right. Sorry. I’ll just,” she points towards her duffel bag and then back towards the bathroom.

Somehow it takes even longer to put the thing on this time. There’s a false start where she pulls it on backwards, then the torso gets twisted around, then she has trouble getting her hands through the sleeves. When she finally gets it on, she’s covered in streaks of talc, and she spends fifteen minutes polishing herself with the shine wipes Maze had dug out of the tissue paper included in the garment box before she’s ready to look at her reflection.

Out in the living room, Lucifer has switched to playing something in a minor key.

Chloe examines herself in the mirror, which, given that this is Lucifer’s bathroom, is outsized and ridiculous, and the view is…

She remembers Maze’s crude comments about what Lucifer’s reaction to her would be and takes a moment to practice her posing.

She doesn’t look like herself. When she thinks about it, Chloe likes her body now more than she did when she was nineteen and Hollywood approved. She has confidence she lacked then, a familiarity with herself she can rely on. She knows she can pull this off. Hot Tub High School Chloe could have posed as arm candy, but adult Chloe is sophisticated arm candy. The sort of woman who can convey that her partner is not just rich, but has a good personality, too. That’s not how she thinks of herself, normally—that’s not how she lives her life—but she still knows it’s true. Yet she cannot look in the mirror right now and see herself. Maze, she knows, would look terrifying in this thing. Chloe would try to mimic her, but she isn’t supposed to look terrifying. She’s supposed to look controlled. Owned. Pretty and fun to play with. It’s not a good fit for her.

She normally carries a gun, for fuck’s sake.

Picking up her heels and hood, she returns to the living room.

There’s a moment as she pauses at the threshold of Lucifer’s bedroom, where his fingers pound upon a powerful bass chord and he looks up, and then the penthouse is filled with the ugly shriek of the piano bench being shoved out of the way as he abruptly stands. Chloe doesn’t know what reaction she was hoping for, but somehow he gets it right for a split second, his expression struck and awed, before he’s turning away towards the bar and his whiskey.

“It fits?” he says to his decanter.

“I got it on,” she says, descending the steps. She goes to the couch and makes it halfway to sitting before the squeak of latex on leather convinces her she’d rather stand.

“And you’re, um. Comfortable?”

She just laughs.

His hands slide from glass down onto the bar top as he leans forward, head bowed.

She knows it’s a bad idea as her mouth opens, but she just spent the entire day with the FBI and she’s about to put her trust in him completely, so, “Why did you manipulate me like that? On that fake Sinnerman case?” she asks, like raking over the past could change anything now.

“Why didn’t you look for me when I was devil-napped?” he shoots back, still not turning around.

Chloe sighs and rubs her temples. “Now I ask why you didn’t respond to any of my calls when you went to Vegas, and you ask why I didn’t just let you explain when that flight attendant showed up, and backwards and backwards until I’m asking why you insisted on following me on that first case and you’re asking why it took me so long to shoot you if I didn’t like having you along.”

He laughs humorlessly. “You did like having me there. Didn’t you?”

“I—you grew on me. I don’t know, a guy says he won’t let you die one time, and suddenly you’re willing to put up with him.”

Lucifer straightens and finishes pouring his drink. “I thought our purported Sinnerman was in league with my father. That he’d arranged my kidnapping, forced my wings to grow back, and had then started trying to take over my life here on Earth. Granting favors and what not. You were…We’d never felt further apart. You thought I’d lied to you about who I am.”

“I thought you were running.”

“I had hoped you had a better opinion of me than that. When you didn’t?” He shrugs. “I don’t have many people I can turn to. It appeared I was under attack, you weren’t there, and Maze was.”

“And Maze likes schemes and torture.”

“To be fair, the scheme was mine that time.”

“Yeah.” She rubs her face with one hand. “It was self-preservation on my end, or that’s what I thought. You said yes to dinner, you didn’t come. You said we were real, then you married Candy. You said you wanted to tell me everything, and you never showed up. After a lifetime of living with Penelope, and my dad being murdered, and Hollywood sleaziness, and Dan’s gaslighting…You deserved more faith than I had left to give. Cynicism was supposed to save me a lot of heartache. What was it Maze said when you two made up? I was being stupid?”

“She changed her mind, you know? Tried to stop Cain before he killed Charlotte. She didn’t mean to do any permanent harm. She’s used to dealing with immortals and dead people; the stakes are different.”

“Maze is like a teenager,” Chloe agrees. “She knows just enough about being around humans to cause a lot of damage without having enough experience to deal with her own emotions or clean up the aftermath. I,” she shakes her head, “feel a lot of sympathy for Maze.”

His head tips forward again. “You are, as ever, the most generous person I’ve been privileged to know.”

That’s just depressing. “Maze is still taking care of your wings?”

“Yes.”

“Show me?”

She watches the line of his back tense, then—whoosh—his wings are there, speckled in blood and awkwardly bandaged. They’re gone again in a second, and Chloe closes her eyes, bites her tongue to keep from criticizing the job Maze is doing with them. It’s effective—he hasn’t gotten worse—but Chloe knows he’d be better off under her care.

He throws back his drink and fixes the hang of his jacket, still not looking at her. “Shall we?”

“Yeah. Just let me get my shoes on.”

She leans against the bar, lifting a foot and attempting to get the straps of her heel properly situated, but it’s difficult to work the clasp with latex clad fingers and the shoe slips from her grasp to the floor.

“May I?”

Lucifer has turned back towards her, but his gaze is directed down at the fallen shoe rather than at her. He doesn’t even see her nod, which almost makes her change her mind. It feels oddly daring to agree out loud, but if she says no, he’ll likely misinterpret that as her rejecting him, and he’s clearly already in a mood. “Yes.”

He approaches and sinks to one knee at her feet. “You’ll let me know when it hurts?”

“I will.”

His fingers wrap around her left ankle with the delicacy with which someone in her income bracket might handle fine crystal. It doesn’t hurt; she only feels the extra heat of him lighting up her leg. While she grips the edge of the bar tightly, he lifts her foot and rests it upon his raised knee. Grabbing the dropped shoe, he carefully guides her toes into place, then smooths his fingers up her foot to her ankle. She tries to liken the experience to being assisted by a shoe salesman, but it’s nothing like that. Knees down on the leg—she’d designated this area as a safe place for him to touch, yet the stroke of his thumb up the bridge of her foot marks her, indelible, something she’ll remember for years. He guides the ankle strap through it’s tiny, golden buckle, his head bent over his work. She’s acutely aware that he’s close enough that normally she would have been able to feel his breath against the skin of her calf, but the latex steals that detail from her, leaving only the trails of increasing and decreasing pressure and temperature as his fingers move over her.

He secures the strap in place, rotating her foot back and forth to ensure he hasn’t fastened it too loosely or too tightly, then sets her foot back on the ground, waiting until she’s gotten her balance before he picks up the other foot. She hands down the second shoe, once again actively choosing this, and he repeats his actions. He’s Satan, she reminds herself, but what does that mean, except that he had a shitty family back when his family were the only beings in existence. He’s impossibly old, brimming with powers she’ll never fully comprehend, but it’s difficult to recall how small she’d felt in the face of incontrovertible divinity when he’s kneeling like this. He’s making her a mountain to his valley.

“How vulnerable is vulnerable?” she asks as he slides the second buckle into place, her gaze locked on the bared skin at the back of his neck. “I know you can get shot and stabbed, but what about a fist fight, or something like that?” It’s the first time they’ll be going into the field since he took a few dozen bullets for her, since she found out she makes him mortal.

Maybe they should have figured out a way for her to do this alone.

“I’m still not human,” he says, his heat and pressure melting the inside of her ankle. “When I’m close to you, I’m more susceptible to pain, and a punch has more effect, but I’m still stronger than any human you’ll meet. Hand to hand, I’m essentially guaranteed to come out on top.”

Essentially guaranteed is not a guarantee at all. “But not unscathed.” He doesn’t respond, and she frowns. Chloe flexes her foot so that the spike of her heel comes to rest below his knee cap. “Let me know when it hurts.” Slowly, watching his reaction, she applies more pressure, up to the point where it would start to become uncomfortable on her own leg. “Still all right?”

His fingers spasm around her ankle, but he nods his head. “Yes, Detective.” There’s a ragged edge to his voice, something that makes her want to press harder.

Instead, she relaxes her foot, letting her heel rise away from him. “You aren’t weakened, but you are…permeable.” She wants him to look at her, reaches down to make him. He sucks in a sharp breath as her hand slips along his jaw, pulling his gaze up to her own. “I don’t want you putting yourself at extra risk tonight. No rash or self-sacrificing moves. Talking and listening only, and mostly listening.”

He scoffs, but doesn’t move, allowing her to hold his face where she wants it.

“I’m serious, Lucifer. I know I’m putting you in an uncomfortable position. I need you to be careful and to let me know if you need to leave.”

“I won’t be the one at risk.”

She drops her hand. Of course he won’t make that promise. He will be Lucifer and she will adjust to whatever he decides to do on the fly. At least they’ve made sure she doesn’t feel even slightly in character. What an auspicious start. She draws away from his grip and stands on her own two feet again. “This is my job, Lucifer. It’s what I do.”

“In that case.” He stands and walks away to summon the elevator. “Ready for a party, Kitten?”

Chapter Text

There’s a moment where it all makes sense.

Lucifer waves her into the elevator ahead of him, then, perhaps sensing her insecurity, finally takes a moment to give her a lingering up and down look before he joins her inside.

“You look incomparable, Detective,” he says, taking his place behind her left shoulder.

“Well, this is a one time thing.” But despite the dismissiveness of her words, she stands taller, the sense of him at her back a buttress supporting her against all comers. She is a cop, even when she’s on suspension. A complete lack of resources and an unusual outfit can’t stop her.

She has to put the hood on when they get to his car, however, and it all goes downhill from there. Both her ears and nose are covered, muffling sounds and requiring her to leave her lips parted in order to breathe. And while the holes left for her eyes are large enough to allow her to see, she can still catch glimpses of the black latex edges at the corners of her vision. Her world feels circumscribed. She’s never been claustrophobic, but she now knows she could learn to be.

It’s too late for costume adjustments, so “I’m fine,” she says when Lucifer asks, paused at a stop sign one street away from their destination. “Let’s go do some surveillance.”

“You could at least try to make it sound fun. Infiltration, Detective.”

He has no difficulty slipping into his character when they arrive, which makes sense given he’s done things like this before. Chloe falters almost immediately. Their hosts didn’t bother to hire valet services for the night, so they end up parking down the street in front of what is no doubt a pissed off neighbor’s house. Lucifer exits the car, but doesn’t come around to pause at her door, doesn’t offer to let her walk ahead of him, just heads straight towards the house. They’d gone over this—she’s the one following him tonight—but it puts her wrong-footed. Normally, she only follows him when he’s gone off half-cocked on some impulsive bit of recklessness. Even knowing this is part of their cover, hurrying to walk two steps behind him leaves her body primed for disaster, like they aren’t on the same page and she’s going to have to diffuse a situation.

A bottle blonde in a latex French maid’s uniform opens the door for them, ushering them into a period perfect mid-century modern home. Someone has a Mad Men fetish, Chloe thinks, running her eyes over the decor. The latex maid quickly runs down the rules for the evening—the women dressed like she is are staff and strictly for looking at, those wearing pink Playboy bunny outfits are available for over-the-clothing touching and can be hired for more, and the rest can only be touched with the permission of the men who brought them.

“No one is to touch my Kitten,” Lucifer says with steel under his voice, and the woman drops a little curtsy.

“Of course, Sir. The hall to the left leads to bedrooms if you’d like some privacy—there are door tags to indicate if they’re occupied. Toy chests are in each bedroom, as well as in the living room, and we have a St. Andrews Cross, a spanking bench, and some other treats in the den.” She finishes with a practiced wink, a simulacrum of salaciousness.

Chloe looks away as soon as she hears the word ‘toys.’ She tries not to be prudish, but… From here, she can see into the living room where about fifteen men and nearly twice as many women are circulating. As far as the women go, she’s the only one fully covered. In addition to the hired women, there are latex nurses, latex school girls, latex bikini models, even what looks to be some sort of latex Star Trek person. Ella would be thrilled.

The men are more uniform, wearing suits and ties in blues or grays, none of which are of Lucifer’s caliber. He’s in black tonight, paired with a wine red shirt and a pocket square in a surprising light cream color that gives the impression of a lily bursting forth from his chest. It’s like turning the God of puckish good taste loose amongst a throng of corporate executives.

“Kitten.” Lucifer’s voice, tone edging on warning, breaks through her observations, and she remembers herself. Right. No gawking. Eyes down. Time to pretend Submissive Chloe is a real thing.

Lucifer leads her into the party. Across the room is a wall of sliding glass doors that have been left open onto a patio where a bar has been set up. Even though some of the latex maids are circulating trays of drinks, Lucifer points her towards the bar. “See if they have my brands.”

She gives him a little bow, feeling the latex hood press against her throat as her neck bends. He’s already turned away, started talking to another guest. As she walks away, she hears the faint sound of his voice asking someone what they desire. A surprised shiver runs down her back. She hasn’t seen him work his mojo trick since learning that it’s actually supernatural compulsion. She’s been thinking of him as the vulnerable party—and he is—but he’s also the devil, a celestial force she’s brought into a group of very breakable humans whom he would absolutely like to punish, if given an excuse. It’s fine, you’ve planned this out. You’ve got him under control, she tells herself, as though that’s not worse. Those eggs you needed so badly, he’d called himself, angry and hurt, certain she couldn’t care about him as anything other than a tool.

Forcing her feet to keep moving, she goes through her breathing exercises. Everything is going according to plan. Later, she’ll make sure he understands she sees him as more than a work shortcut. In the meantime, she’ll stick to the strategy they agreed to—he’s to introduce himself to everyone he can, collecting names and business cards. Thorston, they’d decided, should be forced to seek him out. Hopefully, in order to secure Lucifer’s attention, he’ll share the details of why he’d been hanging out at Lux, why he’d joined this club in the first place.

It’s Chloe’s job to talk to the other women.

Keeping her head down, ignoring the nearby sounds of what is definitely a grown man spanking a grown woman, she steps into the open air. None of the men are currently on the patio, but one of the latex maids is manning the bar. Chloe smiles diffidently at her.

“My—” her mind stutters. ‘Sir’ won’t work in that sentence. “My master,” she forces herself to say, “requested I check what whiskey is available.”

“Sure, take a look.” The woman looks bored, unimpressed with the whole crowd.

Chloe slips behind the bar to look at the available bottles. She doesn’t see anything that matches what Lucifer keeps stocked in his penthouse. There is a bottle of Macallan, but it’s a baby, only 12 years old. He’ll deal, she decides, snagging a tumbler and pouring two fingers.

“Have you worked many of these parties?” she asks.

The bartender’s gaze goes flat. “They don’t pay me to talk.”

There’s an element of contempt in the words; she’s judging Chloe for being one of the women who shows up at these parties without it being a job. Chloe doesn’t understand why anyone would come here in their free time, either, but it’s too early in the evening to risk blowing her cover to see if she can get any of the working women to open up. Instead, she turns towards a nurse and a corseted Ren Faire-style wench who have also come outside to fetch drinks.

“I’m new,” she tells them, trying to project a shy air. “Any tips for a first timer?”

The nurse just curls her lip and walks away. Corset takes the time to look Chloe up and down, huffing derisively. “Shut up and keep your attention on your master or I’ll steal him,” she promises before she too reenters the house.

The bartender is shooting her some champion level side-eye. “The women here are not for conversation. Keep your head down, stick to your guy, and find somewhere else to make friends.”

Far too late, Chloe realizes the extent of the mistake she’d made in allowing Bauda to decide her approach towards tonight. Coming in as Lucifer’s submissive practically guarantees none of the women will talk to her. Maybe if they’d gotten her hired as one of the latex maids, the other workers would have been willing to gossip, give her some tips. But showing up as the property of the richest man here? No one is going to trust her. Stymied, Chloe goes back inside, looking for Lucifer. Of course she’d chosen the wrong approach; how is she supposed to know how to question these women if she cannot understand them? She’s pretty good at connecting with witnesses, but she’s also used to having a badge backing up her right to receive answers.

She finds Lucifer surrounded by a group of guys in their twenties. A lot of the men are younger than she’d expected, she realizes, quickly turning her eyes to the floor as one frat boy looking asshole casually reaches out to grope the breast of a passing pink bunny. She remembers to bow when she presents Lucifer his drink, then slinks behind him, standing with her hands clasped behind her back.

“I like a bit more skin, but I’ll admit that hood it sick,” one of his companions says. Oh good. They have opinions about her.

“I need to get my bitch one without the eye holes—turn her whole head into a hole to fuck.”

“She tends to spill my whiskey when she can’t see,” Lucifer drawls, voice bored in a way she recognizes as threatening but which these men mistake for dry humor. One of his hands lands on her arm and he does a quick triple tap of his fingers—their prearranged signal for him asking how she’s doing.

Green, she prays, because she’s heard worse. Never mind that her heartbeat had picked up at the word bitch, at the idea of someone taking away her sight in this crowd. It’s fine. She’s fine. Color? she asks him in turn, and he rubs his thumb back and forth three times—green as well. She doesn’t believe him, knows he would rather be threatening these assholes with a hand around their necks, but as long as he stays in character she has to trust him.

No luck with the women, she tells him. Plan B while I figure out another approach.

Plan B is using her as a listening post. “Kitten,” he says, pointing at the floor nearby, right next to where a pair of middle-aged men are relaxing in matching club chairs.

As agreed, she sinks to the floor and settles onto her hands and knees. “Hold my drink,” he says, setting his tumbler down on the flat of her back.

He’d been proud of that line when he’d thought it up. They’d laughed together, conspiring as a team in his penthouse. The memory curdles as his frat boy admirers guffaw. They trail after him as he walks away, and Chloe tries to focus on the conversation the two men are having. When they’d made this plan, she hadn’t factored in just how much the hood hampers her hearing. The braying of the frat boys had been easy to pick up, but a normal conversation is more difficult, especially when she hears the first crack of a whip from a nearby room.

Focus, Decker. You knew what type of party this was.

But it’s so much more uncomfortable than she had imagined.

Despite what Lucifer had said, in the back of her mind she’d believed it would just be like one of his parties. All booze and drugs and music and naked people—definitely not Chloe’s speed, but still clearly an enjoyable time for those involved.

No one here is having a good time.

Even the men seem more like they want to be enjoying themselves rather than like they actually are. There’s a core of boredom in every one of them, bringing streaks of cruelty to the fore. Stupid things—the men she’s eavesdropping on keep sticking out their legs to trip the latex maids as they walk past carrying food or drinks. There’s a lot of casual slapping and pinching, large stretches of bruised and reddened skin showing up on all of the more scantily clad women as the night wears on. There are no contented smiles as she’d seen on Stacia’s face. These women are putting up with it, some of them resigned, some of them viscously pleased whenever one of the others receives a particularly hard slap, and some of them just looking desperate for the attention. She remembers Lucifer saying that these women aren’t here because they enjoy the treatment, but because they think this is the way they are supposed to be treated, and she can see he’s right. She wants all of these men in jail. Unfortunately, none of the victims will be willing to file a complaint, even if Chloe did currently have the authority to start slapping on handcuffs.

Her arms start to shake. She wonders where Lucifer is, how he’s doing. She doesn’t want to interrupt him if he’s managed to discover something, so she doesn’t pray. Her heartbeat is still abnormally fast; the neck of her catsuit constricting momentarily with each beat of her pulse. She’s certain her hearing is getting worse, and even if it isn’t, the men are only exchanging dirty jokes and bragging about their cars, restaurants they’ve been able to get tables at, how many women they’ve had sex with. She’s getting nothing. It’s all useless. Pointless. She’s forced them here for nothing.

Suddenly there’s a new weight on her back. Another glass has been placed next to Lucifer’s.

“Let’s load her up, see how much she can hold,” someone says.

It’s fine, it’s fine, it’s—Lucifer! she can’t help but pray when the third glass is added. I’m fine, she knows she has to add—she’s the one who brought the devil among humans, it’s her job not to panic him, but, Be calm. Plan B’s not—

But he’s already there, shoving a man out of his way and quickly knocking two of the glasses off of her back and onto the floor. Three fingers tap quickly on her back as he reclaims his own drink.

Green, she prays, because it’s fine, she can handle this long enough for them to actually find something to take back to Bauda, and, “I don’t share,” he says coldly to those who are protesting his treatment of their drinks.

Good, that’s enough, she prays, because she knows he is a breath from deviling out.

“Kitten,” he says, trying for imperious, but there’s uncertainty dwelling in his vowels. She rises to her feet, hoping he can’t see how shaky she is. It’s difficult to find her balance on the heels, especially when he reaches out and pulls her to his side.

It’s fine. I just need to think of something else. Maybe I could catch some of the women talking if you left me by the bar—

One rub of his thumb. Red.

Okay, you could leave me—

Another rub of his thumb. Red.

You want me to stay with you?

Three rubs. Green. Okay, she understands. If he needs her close by, she can stay close by, keep him calm and focused. Her suit absolutely does not suddenly feel tighter as her chances of digging up any useful information on her own disappear.

He’s just standing there, holding onto her arm, and she’s at a loss for ideas. He hasn’t talked to Thorston yet—they have a ‘mission accomplished’ signal for that—so he should go back to mingling. Or maybe they should take a time-out, visit one of the private rooms, discuss what, if anything, he has learned? But if she has to speak with him, actually talk instead of pray, there’s a good chance he’ll key into just how uncomfortable she is, and he’ll insist they leave. Her brain keeps on running into that wall—being here is a terrible idea, but she doesn’t get to go back to work until they bring Bauda something, and she cannot go back to that netherworld of suspension where she is just some Miracle of God hanging around an empty apartment by herself. She’s the Detective, she should be doing something, solving crimes. She liked her old life; she needs it back.

Right on cue, Thorston approaches.

Lucifer lets go of her arm to shake hands, and Chloe sinks down to her knees. It’s not the graceful move he showed her, but it’s an excuse to get off of her feet. She’s not lightheaded, she tells herself, she just needs a moment. Still, she misses the entire first part of Lucifer’s conversation with Thorston just trying to get her breathing sorted out.

Three quick taps on her head. Green, she tells Lucifer, because finally they’re some progress. Another half hour of this is doable.

Thorston fits right in with the rest of the men, even if he’s one of the oldest here. He’s mid-fifties, graying, the sort of man who looks experienced and authoritative at a press conference and kinda pathetic whenever he’s out of dress uniform. Even here in a suit and tie, he looks shrunken and diminished—a man whose power comes from the system rather than within himself.

Lucifer does not fit in. Chloe knows just enough about watches and shoes to be able to tell that a handful of the men here have significant amounts of disposable income, so it’s not simply wealth that sets him aside. Still, Thorston bends towards him, currying his favor. Lucifer is a wolf among dogs tonight.

It would be an interesting observation, if Chloe could shake the steadily encroaching thought that something is about to go horribly wrong. It’s not rational, she knows it isn’t, to think that she and Lucifer are edging closer and closer to catastrophe, not when Thorston’s appearance is the first thing to go right all night, but her fear grows.

Her costume feels tight. She can feel the seam where her hood meets the neck of the body suit, and she tilts her head back and forth, trying to shift it into a more comfortable spot.

Tap-tap-tap, go Lucifer’s fingers, and Green she replies, because there’s nothing he can do to assist.

“I’m glad you decided to join us,” Thorston says. “I think you can see there’s a lot of potential here, just waiting to be exploited.”

Lucifer’s gaze slides over the pink latex bunnies, and he hums noncommittally.

“I know, it’s a lot of surface flash, but believe me, this is the market. This is where we build.”

“Are we building something together?”

Thorston takes a long drink, sets his glass aside, and leans in. This is it, the reason they’re here. Just a little while longer, and she gets to go home.

In this perfectly retro house, there’s a perfectly retro mantelpiece complete with one of those gold clocks they give out at retirement parties. With perfect timing, that hefty golden monument to the past strikes midnight. Twelve little chimes, and it’s Saturday morning.

Congratulations, Decker. Today’s your special day. In another universe, she would be getting married.

All at once, Marcus is everywhere. He’s every man in a boring suit, he’s the box of floggers lying open against one wall, he’s the grimace on the face of a latex maid who just got tripped yet again. It doesn’t make sense—Chloe had never seen Pierce indulge in behavior anything like this. Certainly he’d never done anything sexual to her that she hadn’t agreed to. But none of the women here are prisoners, not exactly. The ties binding them to this scene aren’t physical, just as she’d, technically, been free not to date Marcus, not to have sex with him, not to give him all of her time and attention.

There’s a book of not-too-scary stories she used to read to Trixie that includes a tale about a woman who always wore a green ribbon around her neck, until one day her husband took it off of her and her head fell off. The line around Chloe’s neck where her hood meets her catsuit is positioned exactly where that woman’s green ribbon would have been.

Her hearing goes—there’s just pressure, as though from a quick change in altitude. Lucifer is tapping again. Again and again—he’s so uncomfortable, and she’s trapped him here, where they aren’t even doing any good.

The picture comes to her mind unbidden, Marcus dead on the floor of that loft, Lucifer standing over him. Billions of years, many of those in Hell, and yet Lucifer had never killed anyone. Then, in the past two years, he’s had to kill twice, including one of his brothers.

Because of her.

The neckline of the catsuit presses against her trachea. Her heart races. She can’t breathe.

She knows that’s not true, tries her breathing exercises to calm herself down, but—tap, tap, tap—it doesn’t work.

Green, she snaps, because they’re stuck and she’s caused Lucifer enough trouble. She just needs a moment. Send me out of the room. Out of the room, Lucifer!

He leans down as if to whisper in her ear and gestures towards a hallway, but his eyes betray him. He is worried; she isn’t doing her job here. She promises herself she’ll fix it, just as soon as she calms down. She rises from her knees, nothing even a little seductive about it, and makes her way unsteadily to the hallway. She finds a bathroom and locks herself inside, immediately ripping off her hood, but it doesn’t help. Her breathing exercises are useless—the latex follows the dip and swell of her chest as she breathes, it’s constriction inescapable. Her fingers won’t work properly. She scrabbles at the neck to the suit, but she can’t work her latex clad fingers between the suit and her skin, and even when she manages it, her arms feel weak. She can’t get it off. She’s stuck. It won’t come off!

She’s so preoccupied with her costume she barely notices the sound at the door, but then Lucifer is in the bathroom with her, eyes wide with concern. He says something, but she can’t make sense of the words. A dull, sourceless whine sounds in her ears.

“Get it off, please, just get it off. I can’t breathe. I can’t.”

He looks at his hands—bare, because it would have been suspicious if he’d worn gloves indoors all night, and she had been fully covered—but, “Please,” she begs, clawing at her throat, and he steps forward.

Her neck burns as he slips his fingers under the latex, and it’s almost a relief. The pain is clean, sharp and clear, chasing the cotton out of her ears and allowing her to focus. She hears the latex squeak, then there’s a great snap and suddenly her torso is bare, the torn suit gaping off of her. It still clings to her arms, and she collapses onto her knees, struggling to free her hands. Lucifer is there again, his toxic fingers painting red trails down her arms as he works her clear of the latex. She looks up to thank him, but his face is turned away, eyes fixed on the wastebasket.

He won’t look at her.

Finally all ten of her fingers are out, and she bends over her knees to press her hands and forehead against the cool tile flooring, taking great, heaving breaths. She startles when she feels something closing around her again, but it’s just Lucifer laying his jacket over her shoulders. It smells better than it should, that hint of vanilla from his cologne beating back the scents of cigars and brandy and sweaty men that the two of them have been stewing in all night. She clutches the jacket’s lapels, snuggling deeper into its warmth, still hunched over on the floor, letting Lucifer stand guard while she gets herself under control.

“Detective?”

She realizes he’s called to her more than once, and she makes a wordless sound of acknowledgment.

“If you won’t be too frightened, I think I should fly you out of here. We should not go back out into that room.”

“Mmhhmm,” she agrees, reaching one of her hands out to grab one of his.

He hisses, jerking his hand away. “Careful!” he snaps, and it’s true, her palm stings, but having him pull away is worse.

She’s really fucked this whole thing up. They haven’t even learned anything. There’s nothing to take back to Bauda. She put him through tonight for nothing.

She starts to shiver, breath coming in shorter, faster gasps again.

He leans over her, arms held mere inches from her sides. “It’s all right. You’re all right. It will only take a moment, and you’ll be home.”

“No,” she says, voice shaking. If he takes her home, he’ll leave, and it’ll just be her alone again in the space where she’d planned a life with a man who’d tried to kill both Chloe and Lucifer and who had killed Charlotte and countless unknown others. “I can’t. I can’t.”

“Apologies. I shouldn’t have suggested it. Ah…” he trails off. “A hotel? Dr. Linda’s, perhaps?”

She shivers harder. She can’t be seen right now. “Yours?”

There’s a notable pause, like he doesn’t want to take her back to his home, and why would he? But then she feels the stinging heat of his arms wrapping around her, and there’s a sensation—

Space. Weightlessness. A rush of freedom the likes of which she hasn’t felt since childhood. She can breathe easily again.

Then they’re in the penthouse bathroom—safe, familiar, private—and she’s grasping onto the vanity to keep herself upright while he scrambles away, out of reach. She hears him leave the room, and her knees start shaking again. She’s very, very tired, and she just wants somewhere to collapse.

Lucifer returns quickly, wearing gloves and carrying a glass of water and a neatly folded set of sky blue silk pajamas. He sets both next to the sink and reaches past her to open the medicine cabinet, setting out an array of bottles next to the water glass before backing away to the doorway.

She pets the ridiculously soft silk of the pajamas. They’re far too small for him. She musters the strength to turn and look at Lucifer.

He ducks his head. “After the last two times you spent the night here, I thought you might like your own set of sleepwear. As fetching as you looked in my shirt, I think these may be more comfortable.”

“Thank you.”

“Is there anything else you need at the moment? Anything at all I can do?”

She almost asks him to help her change, to get rid of the rest of this latex suit so she doesn’t have to deal with it, but knows she’s being ridiculous. He’s not her servant, not her security blanket. He’s done enough, so she shakes her head, looking down.

“I’ll let you get dressed, then. I’ll be right outside, if you change your mind.”

Chloe picks up the pajamas that he’d bought just in case she got drunk and commandeered his bed for a third time. He can fly, and yet he’d taken the time to make sure she could inconvenience him in luxurious comfort.

She regretfully slips off his jacket and hangs it neatly on a hook on the back of the bathroom door. After almost falling over twice, she ends up sitting on the floor to pull the legs of the catsuit off. It’s not until she’s buttoning on the pajama top that she realizes she’d spent several minutes half-naked in front of Lucifer, but at this point she’s too tired to be embarrassed. She glances at the pill bottles—a smorgasbord of pain killers and sleep aids, both over the counter and prescription—and takes some ibuprofen, because as much as she hates to admit it, the marks denoting where Lucifer’s hands had touched her skin have started to ache.

Energy crashing fast, she leaves the bathroom and shuffles through his closet towards the bedroom. She’s already put him out enough, but the pajamas had practically been an invitation, right? And sure enough, there he is, turning down the covers on his massive mattress.

“Feeling better?” he asks, skirting the bed to give her space.

“Hmm,” she mumbles, collapsing down on the bed and drawing the sheets up over her. Safe, familiar, warm. Finally, she can rest.

“Just sleep. I’ll keep watch.”

I liked flying with you, she thinks drowsily, but it’s just a passing thought, directionless, and he doesn’t hear her.

Chapter Text

Chloe doesn’t open her eyes immediately upon waking. She knows where she is instantly—the bed is too comfortable to be anything but Lucifer’s. The pajamas throw her for a minute—she’s used to cotton tees and shorts that have put in a decade of sleep duty. Even first thing in the morning, she’s aware enough to realize that the silk set Lucifer provided probably cost more than any outfit she’s ever owned, including her wedding dress.

She can picture him. She knows that, when she finally opens her eyes, he’ll be there, sitting in the chair in the corner, red robe doing nothing to cover his chest, sipping his spiked coffee. Finally decided to rejoin the living, Detective? he’ll say, or something equally snarky, and then he’ll ask if she fancies some Irish in her coffee. They’ll eat breakfast burritos, and she’ll tell him what flying had felt like, ask about what it feels like from his perspective. She’ll convince him to take her again, sometime when she can actually enjoy the full experience.

Chloe buries her head in the pillow. The skin on her neck, torso, back, and arms, each place he’d touched her, all of it hurts. He’s not going to do anything that requires touching her again, and when she opens her eyes, they aren’t going to talk about flying. He probably won’t want to talk at all; he’ll just want her to go.

The chair in the corner of the room is empty when she works up the courage to look. Lucifer isn’t in the bedroom at all, or visible in the sliver of living room she can see from this angle. The penthouse is utterly silent.

Well, that makes things easier. Kinda.

Still, Lucifer’s absence, despite saving her some embarrassment, leaves her cold. She slinks out of bed and into the bathroom. All traces of latex have been removed, but the clothes she wore here the previous day are stacked neatly on the vanity, clearly freshly washed. There’s also a selection of hydrocortisone creams for her welts, and an even broader array of painkillers than had been on display last night. When she works up the courage to look in the mirror, she blinks, then laughs softly at what she sees. Not only did he purchase her pajamas, but they’re personalized, with “the Detective” embroidered in stark white stitching on the left side of the shirt. She runs a finger over the lettering, then notices that the hems of her sleep shorts have been decorated with little handcuffs.

He just does these things. Borrowing his dress shirt—that’s for someone who stays the night. Personalized pajamas are for someone who stays. He hadn’t just been thinking about sex when he bought these; he’d been thinking of her comfortable and at home in his space. Two days ago, she’d told him they needed to keep their relationship professional while he was hiding these in his closet. And now he doesn’t even feel comfortable in his own home while she’s here.

Her neck looks like someone took a strap to it.

After making liberal use of the hydrocortisone cream, she gets dressed. The silence of the penthouse feels like an accusation, so she rushes, not bothering to brush her hair, just folding the pajamas neatly so Lucifer will know she appreciated them. She hustles back through the bedroom and out to the living room only to stop short.

On the couch, scrolling through her phone, is Linda.

“Um, hi?”

Linda startles, dropping her phone to the side and whipping her hands down to her knees, snapping into her therapist pose. “Hi, Chloe. Sorry. Wow, he was not lying about those welts.”

Chloe hunches her shoulders self-consciously. “What are you doing here?” Where’s Lucifer?

“Lucifer asked me to come over. He says you had some problems last night. It sounds like you may have had a panic attack.”

“Something like that.”

“Would you like to talk about it?”

“What? Like you’re my therapist?” Chloe steps farther into the room. Empty glasses litter every available surface, and what she’s pretty sure is a bag of pot gummy bears sits half-empty on the piano. She’d left him so stressed he hadn’t even bothered to clean up the signs.

“Like I’m your friend,” Linda says, her posture becoming slightly less rigid. “Lucifer was worried, and I promised him I’d help.”

“Oh, well, that makes sense, then. As long as Lucifer okayed it.”

“You’re still angry at me.”

Chloe covers her face with her hands, rubs her eyes. She’s being a brat. “I’m not—” She waves a hand. “You know, I had to see this therapist for work, and she told me that now was a great time to take stock, make sure everything in my life works for me. It scared me, because I liked my life, for the most part. I liked my family and my friends and my job. So I thought, hey, I’m Chloe Decker. I’ve survived Hollywood and divorce and having my daughter kidnapped by a coworker. I can handle anything. But last night proved me wrong. I made some bad decisions, and apparently chased Lucifer out of his own home. I guess Pierce won. Old Chloe Decker doesn’t get to exist anymore.”

Chloe is trying to keep her voice steady, but it’s difficult when Linda looks so calm. It’s unfair, that Linda can present that professional face as though anything about this situation could possibly be neutral.

“You had a rough night—” Dr. Martin says, and Chloe can’t take it.

“Don’t. I don’t need you trotting out that matter of fact doctor voice, like, oh, Chloe, its natural to be upset. Oh, Chloe, it’s okay to grieve. It’s not okay, Linda. I let people down, and I hurt them, and you’re human! You’re human. You were supposed to side with me over a bunch of angels.”

“There are no sides—”

“Of course there are sides, Linda! Heaven and Hell, those are sides. It’s set up in the DNA of the universe.” Suddenly, she’s laughing, anger battling with embarrassment and guilt. She drops into a chair across from Linda. “Sorry. I’m not myself this morning.”

“Um.” Linda lowers her head, then looks back up. “I know you’ve indicated you don’t want to hear it, but what you’re going through is a normal response. Last night was very intense, and sometimes that sort of experience kicks up a lot of emotions in the aftermath. It doesn’t mean you can’t handle things, just that you need to take a moment to heal.”

“With you, here to hold my hand at Lucifer’s orders.”

“He was…distressed, when he called me. He said that you would need someone to provide aftercare, but that seeing him might just make things worse.”

Chloe rolls her eyes. “Aftercare?”

“Yes. He felt it important that you not wake alone. When he told me about last night, I recognized the symptoms of a panic attack and I decided to offer to help. Guess I missed the mark with that.”

“No, you’re being very kind. I don’t know what—I just don’t know, Linda.”

“You wanted him to be here?”

“I just want everything to be easier. I’ve been waking up every day knowing I have to have these awkward conversations and be mature, and…” And I was supposed to be getting married. I was supposed to have help with all this life stuff.

“Tell you what,” Linda says, rising to her feet. “How about no conversation, just coffee. I’ve been dying to use Lucifer’s fancy espresso machine, but those things are noisy and I didn’t want to risk waking you. Want a cup?”

Chloe hmms listlessly, watching as Linda starts fiddling with the machine behind the bar. A soft thump echoes from the balcony, followed by the sound of the outside door opening. She spins in place.

“Luci—”

But it’s not him. This man is large and bald and smiling beatifically as though he’s been touched by inner peace and wants to share the good news with everyone around him.

“Linda! Chloe!” Amenadiel says, stepping into the room.

Chloe jumps to her feet, hauls off, and punches him right in the face.

“Oh, no!” She hears the sound of espresso mugs shattering, but doesn’t turn to check, because—

“Auaugh!” Chloe screams, cradling her hand to her chest. Is he made of steel?

“Oh, God, is it broken?” Linda fusses around her, trying to take hold of her hand as Chloe blinks back tears.

“Chloe!” Amenadiel exclaims, unhurt. “Of course, I startled you. There’s a normal human explanation for how I came to be on the balcony without you seeing me come in—”

“You almost got Trixie killed!” she yells at him. “And you took a hit out on your brother, then had the gall to just stand there and lie to my face. ‘Uh, my brother’s crazy, he wears blood packs all day every day just in case.’”

“She knows?” Amenadiel asks Linda, talking over Chloe’s head.

“Yes, she knows. Come on, let me see.” Linda finally gets a good hold on Chloe’s hand and quickly runs her fingers over everything. “I don’t think it’s broken.”

“It’s not fair. He deserves to get punched in the face.”

“Absolutely.” Linda nods supportively, and Amenadiel throws her an affronted look.

“I grant that I did make mistakes, and now that you’re aware of who I am I would like to offer an apology—”

“Just one?”

“A very large apology,” he amends. “I had some…unworthy ideas about mortals.”

“It’s just, it’s ridiculous. You run around taking out hits, and lying, and—and—and having a messy love life, but you are your dad’s favorite?”

Amenadiel finally starts to look embarrassed.

“That’s right—I know what you did to Linda and Maze. What, you going to try to hook up with Ella next?” This is nowhere near what she is angriest about, but Chloe can tell a weak spot when she hits one.

“I have been reckless.”

“Profligate!” she exclaims, because it sounds bible-y.

“All right.” Linda steps in, soothing her hands down Chloe’s arms. “No need to use, um, insults?” She cocks her head. “Amenadiel, welcome back. You got Charlotte settled safely?”

Chloe remembers why Amenadiel hasn’t been around and feels terrible, which sucks, because she had finally settled on an outlet for her emotions that didn’t also make her feel guilty.

“I did. She’s happy. Home, you could say.”

“I guess you did one right thing,” Chloe says bitterly, pulling away and starting towards the elevator, shaking out her sore hand.

“Chloe, wait! Are you sure you’re all right? You don’t need to talk?”

“No, Linda, I’m fine.”

“But I’ll see you tonight?”

Right. Tribe night. Her idea. “Sure. Fine.”

The elevator doors finally open and she enters, jabbing repeatedly at the buttons until she doesn’t have to see either Amenadiel’s or Linda’s worried faces anymore.

Chloe kills time.

She gets her car washed. She window shops. She picks at a late lunch. She does not get dressed in a too expensive, single use dress, stand up in front of her gathered friends and family, and see her mom crying happy tears while Chloe weds a solid, upright citizen who pays his taxes and doesn’t keep a pharmacy’s worth of illegal drugs in his breast pocket at all times.

She avoids looking at her phone.

She spends $150 on the nicest mens t-shirt and sweatpants she can stomach buying, because what if Lucifer ever does come to visit her again and finds out she’s never bought him sleepwear?

The memory comes unbidden, him falling asleep on her couch with Trixie curled into his side, Lilo & Stitch still playing on the TV in front of them, empty dinner plates littering the coffee table. He’d been ruthless about the inauthentic nature of her thirty minute homemade enchiladas recipe, but he’d still eaten seconds. He’d come over to discuss some case, but they hadn’t talked about work at all that night. A few weeks later, she and Marcus had gone on their first date.

The idea of going home makes her anxious.

Still, she can’t avoid it forever. Eventually, she returns to her apartment to shower and change. She’s considered backing out of tribe night a hundred times, but hasn’t been able to work out what to text. If nothing else, she doesn’t want to disappoint Ella. So, she throws on some skinny jeans and a turtleneck that will hide the red marks and heads out to meet her friends at a bar known for its cheap drinks and bad music.

She knows it’s a mistake the moment she walks through the door. A headache has already taken up residence behind her left eye, and she abruptly cannot recall what people talk about other than devils and gods and free will. The rest of the tribe is already there, seated at the bar with their drinks (Linda, a glass of wine; Ella, a tequila sunrise; Maze, eight shots of whiskey). Linda spots her first, offers a tentative smile. Chloe’s face does…something, and Linda promptly steals two of Maze’s shots and downs them, one after the other.

“Nice!” Maze exclaims. “Let’s get drunk!”

“Hey, everyone,” Chloe says, then, not wanting to fall behind, grabs two shots for herself.

It’s not good whiskey—unlike Lucifer, Maze isn’t fussy—and it doesn’t even work quickly. Ella does her best. While Linda laughs nervously and Maze shoots Chloe these weird looks that mean she’s definitely received a run-down on last night from someone (of course, Lucifer’s wings—he’d probably needed some help with them today, after Chloe forced him to use them last night), Ella makes conversation. She’s had some bad dates, she’s trying out new hobbies—apparently she got a chicken?—but overall she can’t hide the fact that she’s struggling. Chloe notices for the first time that her own neck is not the only one conspicuously necklace free—Ella’s trademark cross is gone. Disappointing Ella isn’t the worst thing God has done recently, but it still ranks. Chloe wants to say something that will help, but she’s too busy fighting the sensation that she needs to crawl out of her own skin. She hates that everyone seems to know about her failure the night before, hates that even though she’s not lying to Ella, she still can’t be open with her, and hates that these girls’ nights, which used to be a refuge, have become just another thing that leave her questioning her very self.

But then, a minor miracle happens. Over the din of the evening crowd, the juke box plays a handful of guitar chords, and, “You say…”

“I only hear what I want to,” Linda sings, almost too quiet to hear, but Ella jumps on it. “And you say…” and Chloe has never been one to resist a 90s jam, so she has, “I talk so all the time,” on lock, and even Maze is there when the back beat comes in, because her knowledge of pop music is possibly more extensive than Lucifer’s, and then the four of them are shouting lyrics at each other like it’s their high school reunion. Scream-singing “I can leave, I can leave,” is the best Chloe’s felt in weeks.

The four of them whoop as the song closes, loud enough that some asshole at the back of the bar yells, “Shut up!” but it doesn’t matter, because girls night is finally on.

“Lisa Loeb was my fashion inspiration,” Linda says. “I had those, those glasses. I thought I was the shit.”

“You’re still the shit,” Ella says. “I was a Lisa Left Eye girl. She was a Lopes, I was a Lopez, we matched.”

“Shirley Manson,” Chloe admits. “But like, the Hot Topic version of her. I had to use wash-out hair dye because my mom would have murdered me if I showed up at an audition as a non-blonde.”

Maze squints. “When was this? Human years, how long ago?”

“Twenty, um, ish?” Linda says, fudging her numbers.

“I think that was the period when wearing severed hands became a big thing in Hell. Which pop star would wear severed hands?”

“Definitely Courtney Love,” Linda deadpans.

Ella nods. “To Courtney Love!” She raises a shot glass, and the rest of them follow suit. “Courtney Love!”

The shots kick in, and time slips.

They’re standing at a high top in the corner of the room, Maze and Ella nodding intently while Chloe grips Linda’s hands fiercely in her own.

“But you’ve got your boundaries all reversed with us, Linda,” she’s saying. “Like this morning? You aren’t my doctor, you’re my friend! But you think you’ve got to be professional all the time, so you just listen, but you get to talk, too. I mean, it’s not just all of that whole world,” Chloe waves at Maze, “that you dealt with on your own. You were assaulted, and everything that happened with your ex, I mean we barely talked about it. You need to come to us, Linda. No therapy; you’re our lady.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Ella affirms. “We love you!”

“And Maze! Mazikeen. Maz-a-queen. Listen.” Chloe leans across the table to grab Maze’s cheeks. “I know you get homesick. Normal! But I should have made sure you know that this is home. We are home,” she points at the others. “So while you’re stuck here, or whatever, I’ve got you, and Linda, and Ella, and Trixie. One of us falls down on the job, the rest are still here. You move back in if you want. Like I said, home!”

“Shut up!” Maze says, but she drops her head to hide her face.

“And Ella, babe.” Chloe grabs her next target and lands a quick double-kiss to Ella’s temple. “I don’t get the God thing. He seems like an asshole.”

“Complete dick!” Maze interjects.

“But He was important to you, and I know you’re going through it with Charlotte’s death, but we’ll help you out. I think it’s great you’re raising chickens now. I wanna get your chicken a present. What do chickens do for fun?”

Time slips again, and Chloe is miming pummeling someone into the table while Maze cackles. “I’d hit him again and again, if his skin weren’t made of granite. Who does he think he is? Smug!”

“So smug!” Linda agrees. “I bet it felt great to punch him. God, he was good in bed.”

“No, Linda, boo! I will hook you up. You need some better dick,” Maze protests.

“You gotta hold your fist like this next time,” Ella says, wrapping her arms around Chloe to fix her fighting stance. “Next time, Amenadiel’s gonna feel it.”

Another slip. They’re on the dance floor. Maze carries more drinks towards them while Linda hops in a circle, hands above her head, Ella grinds on some tattooed guy, and Chloe hangs off Ella’s neck, yelling, “Make him lift you!” in her ear.

The booze goes fast. It’s barely past ten when the bartender cuts them off, and by ten thirty they’re back in the parking lot. Linda is triple checking that Ella wants to leave with tattoo guy while Chloe takes a picture of his drivers license and Maze shows him one of her knives. Good thing Ella likes bad boys, or there’s a strong possibility her friends would ensure she never gets laid again.

Then it’s Ubers (and Maze’s motorcycle) and shouted goodbyes. It is only ten after eleven when Chloe stumbles through her front door and up the stairs to her bedroom. She beelines for her jewelry box, for the squashed bullet hidden inside. It doesn’t look like nightmare fuel; it looks like a hug. A little bit of, “We’re both fuck-ups, but at least we’ve got each other,” affection. A piece of metal that went from her, through Lucifer, then from him and around her neck.

Then off her neck and hidden away, because, why? Marcus? Because Chloe “Miracle” Decker isn’t allowed to wear her friendships openly?

No.

Since when has she been that woman?

She picks up the necklace and tries to put it on, but she’s too drunk, too clumsy and too impatient to work the clasp properly. She slips it into her pocket instead and calls another car. Within half an hour, she’s at the beach.

His beach. Their beach.

Los Angeles isn’t the best place for star gazing, but stars are always closest at the water’s edge, and she wants to see them. Sand is not designed for drunk legs, but she still manages to get her shoes off and make it halfway down to the water before she notices she’s not alone. The moonlight glints off of carefully coiffed hair, picks out square shoulders and a long throat, not covered in her presence for the first time in days. Delighted surprise stretches Chloe’s mouth wide—no matter that she identifies this beach with him, it never occurred to her that Lucifer might be here, dressed like a funeral with skin as pale as a corpse, his eyes lifted up to the very stars she’d come seeking.

“Lucifer!” She jogs towards him even as he jerks back in surprise.

“Tracking my phone again, Detective?” he asks, voice a little sharp, but she barely notices it, pushing right up into his space.

She doesn’t touch him, just closes her eyes and breathes, soaking in his presence. He smells right. Is the right shape—she knows how far he stretches above her head, how his shoulders bracket her own.

Eventually, she becomes aware of how rigidly he is holding himself, barely breathing, and she sighs and steps away, turning again to the shoreline. She wanders into the shallows, the gentle waves tickling her ankles.

“What are you doing here, Detective?”

She hums in response and reaches into her pocket for her phone to check the time. “It’s my wedding day,” she says, “and I still have to wait…” the math takes her longer than it should, “thirteen minutes to make sure I don’t end up married to Marcus. He’s still all over my apartment, you know, so I had to come wait somewhere safe.”

“Well,” Lucifer says after a while, sounding supremely uncomfortable. “I believe I ensured you don’t need to fear making that particular error.”

Chloe just shakes her head. “There are no rules anymore, Lucifer. I can’t assume anything. He was in my bed and my head and he knew the first woman who ever lived. And so did you!” She rounds on him, eyes wide with realization. “You have known all of humanity!”

“Not quite, but Eve, yes. Perhaps we should get you out of the water, hmm?”

She waves him off and does a shuffling little run to kick up some splash. “I like the water. I had a terrible nightmare about beach day—or maybe just beach wear? And you had so many bullets!”

He grimaces; she doesn’t want him to grimace. “You have the prettiest smile,” she tells him as encouragement.

He snorts and looks away. “Be that as it may, I assure you that Cain will not be coming back. You are safe to go home.”

But she’s got Lucifer and moonlight—why would she want to settle for going home? “I can’t go home because I need help.” She tries a different gambit, digging in her pocket. “I need help to put this on. I couldn’t do it, you need to help.” She finally manages to dig out her necklace and holds it out to him hopefully. His gaze locks on it immediately, but he doesn’t approach.

“Unless you don’t want me to wear it anymore?” Her mood breaks. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I let you down. You trusted me and I screwed up.”

“With Cain?”

“Last night.” She hangs her head and looks away.

“What?” The word cracks through the air between them, indignant and horrified. “Detective, why on Earth—”

“You trusted me to make sure it was okay, that we were okay, but I couldn’t. Not when they all could’ve been working for Marcus. Still. Like he’s still interfering with my life. From beyond the grave!” She uses her best spooky B-movie marathon host voice, hoping to get a laugh out of him, but he just looks lost. And awkward. Why does a man who lives in suits and Louboutins spend so much time at the beach?

“You are never dressed for the situation, but I wouldn’t change it,” she says, and staggering backwards out into the surf. “I’m sorry. I kept saying green because you weren’t doing anything wrong. It was the other people. It felt like they were in control, and it’s not like you could have changed that—I had to do the job—so I kept saying green. I wasn’t lying. I didn’t lie to you,” it’s important that he knows, “I thought I could keep it together, but I couldn’t. I know I’m supposed to. No punching photographers, no naked movies, no freak outs.”

“I disagree. You get to freak out as much as you like.”

“Yeah?” She looks over at him where he stands well back from the water’s edge, his face serious.

“As often as you need. I’ll keep you safe every time. And I am always firmly in favor of any nakedness you choose to partake in.”

She smiles at him. He looks cold, like he could use a hug, so she holds the necklace out again. “Come put this on me.” She clumsily swipes the hair away from her neck one-handed and trips towards him, but he backs away from her. “Lucifer?”

“No—red, Detective.”

She pulls up short.

“As glad as I am that you still wish to wear my gift, there are welts on you from where I touched you last night,” he says. “I cannot allow that.”

She wants to argue, but, “Red,” she agrees, because that is what’s important. She loops the necklace chain around her neck and double-knots it at the back, giggling as he winces in pain.

“That is not recommended jewelry handling.”

“Come look at the stars with me.” Chloe stumbles the rest of the way out of the water and flops down into the sand, falling to her back. “I wanted to see them. Linda says you made them.”

There’s a moment where she’s just lying there, spinning with the earth, but then she hears sand and clothing shift a few feet away and she knows the two of them are spinning together now.

“I did. You’re really not bothered by my being the devil, are you?”

She shrugs against the sand, absent-mindedly counting the pinpricks of light in the dark sky above. “I do mind. I don’t like it, that the celestial woo-woo stuff is real. Do not care for that. But you? You have magic powers and super villain money but all you do is steal Dan’s pudding cups and ruin my filing system. If you were the ‘devil’ devil—” she reaches her hands up and wiggles her fingers for emphasis—”you’d be trying to get us all to do stuff. ‘Bend to my will!’ and all of that, but you don’t, and you bend to me all the time. All the time. You get me home safe, even when I’m the responsible one.”

She can hear his breath mingling with the sound of the waves. “If that’s how you feel, why are you having nightmares about me?”

“They aren’t about you. Not everything is about you.” Why does he have to be so self-centered all the time? “You are in some of them, but they are about Marcus—Pierce—Cain!” She waves a hand, trying to encompass the whole of her ex-fiance’s millennia of existence. “And about me and what I do or don’t do or did or didn’t do. I am a very scary person, Lucifer Morningstar.”

“Terrifying,” he agrees in that warm blanket voice, and she turns her head so she can see him lying not far from her, sand in his hair. “I’m sorry I allowed things to go so far between you and Cain. I should have shown you my wings. I just…it is important to me that you not have the wrong impression about who or what I am.” He’s looking at her like she’s delicate, like she’s a curl of foam on a cappuccino, gone with a sip. He doesn’t realize that she’s the one who could consume him.

“I can see you, Lucifer,” she tells him. His eyes are luxurious pools in the moonlight; she stretches out under his gaze, basking.

He clears his throat and looks away. “I think we’re safely past midnight.”

She pulls out her phone to check. 12:02am. “Congratulate me—I am officially not Mrs. World’s First Murderer.”

“Felicitations.”

“Thank you.”

“Why…”

He trails off, so she fills in, “Why did I agree to marry him?”

“Why did you call it off?” he asks instead. “Before you knew who he really was. Why?”

She wriggles in the sand. “I thought it would come back. That night, when he broke up with me, I wanted to be in love with someone, not just,” she gestures widely at him, “so I was going to tell Pierce I loved him, and I was going to mean it.” She frowns apologetically. “I had a lot of emotions that night, just everywhere. And then they went away. I thought, if I took him back, the emotions would come back, too, because they never went away with you.” He makes a soft sound, but she is still drunk enough to keep going. “No matter what, they were always just there, constant, so I thought it would be that way with Marcus, and since I couldn’t have you?” She shrugs. “But they didn’t come back. And suddenly I was with this paper perfect guy who told me I wasn’t worth it. And it felt like he was still telling me I wasn’t worth it? Because the moment I said yes, there was no celebration, just this checklist—how to get Chloe Decker married in 15 steps. And I started to think, marriage is long. Would all of that be more checklist? Or would the to-dos stop with the I-dos, and then I’d be married to a piece of paper. I kept imagining Trixie’s quinceañera, you know? We’d have a big party, and she and Dan would dance, and you’d buy her a car she still wouldn’t be old enough to drive, and you’d stock the glove compartment with a flask full of top-shelf whiskey that she’d still be too young to drink, and Marcus would…be there? Sitting off to the side? He’d give her a store bought card, maybe, if I reminded him? And I would have to watch you being lovely to my daughter and then pretend he was the one who was her other dad. I’m not…I lie to myself, but not about family.”

She dares to look at him, but his eyes are closed tight, his hands clenched into fists at his sides, and he’s breathing very carefully. She worries she’s made him sad. “Show me,” she demands, hoping to take his mind off of things.

He opens his eyes and looks at her, confused. “Show you?”

“Yeah. Show me the dirty pictures you drew with your stars. Don’t pretend they aren’t there! I know you stuck some filthy constellations up there.”

He laughs, and a place inside of her quiets, content. “I didn’t, actually.”

“Impossible. I know you, devil.”

“I swear! You have to remember, there was no Earth at the time, so I wouldn’t have known to arrange things into pictures from this point of view, regardless. But I was also—it was before I fell. I didn’t even know sex was a possibility back then.”

“That can’t be true. You are sex.”

He nods in agreement. “Nevertheless. Also, everyone I knew was my parent or my sibling, so…”

“Ah, ew.” Chloe has a thought, and starts giggling into her hand. “Lucifer Morningstar, the 40 million year old virgin.”

He laughs along with her, the sound clear and brilliant. “Now Detective, sexuality is fluid. Just because I enjoyed a long asexual youth doesn’t mean I’m not also the first and best lover the universe has ever seen.”

“You would bang the universe, slut.” He looks stunned for a moment, and she can’t contain her guffaws.

“Detective! Language!” As he chuckles, his hand drifts towards her across the sand, still well out of reach.

She wants to turn on her side, curl towards him, tell him sweet things, but instead she takes refuge in the stars. Her particular devil, flitting about, setting each one just so, dimming and brightening them to fit his mood. “Okay, no pictures, but I bet you do still have a favorite.”

“I suppose, well. Sol,” he says somewhat sheepishly. “It meant more than it should that Dad made one of my stars integral to the lives of his favorite creations. I wish I could say his approval didn’t mean anything, but, well. And of course, it’s come to mean more since than.”

“It’s a good star,” Chloe says with authority, as though she knows anything about the matter. “Warm. Bright. Good for seeing things with.” He huffs. “I always liked the dippers. Mainly because they’re the only constellations I could pick out on my own. My family would go camping in the summer, and the three of us would lay out looking up at the stars and my dad would ‘race’ me to see who could find the dippers first. He’d let me win every time.”

“Foolish sentimentality,” Lucifer says, faux disapproval in his voice. “Maybe if he’d made you work harder, you’d have grown up knowing more than one constellation.”

“Shush. But I also just like that people looked up at the sky and were like, look, those stars up there are either a pair of bears or a pair of kitchen implements, but either way one’s the mom and one’s the baby.”

She listens to him laugh, listens to the sound of his fingers trailing back and forth in the sand as though he’s petting it. The drinks from earlier have well and truly bested her, and she feels her eyes start to drift shut.

“I’ll call you a car,” she hears him murmur, and she wants to protest, but “red” he’d said. He’s worried about them being too close, like they would be if he drove her home himself. She can practically feel it, the intimacy of sharing that tiny Corvette interior, their hands tangling together across the center console. She’s half convinced her imagining is real, but all too soon he’s calling her back to awareness, urging her up out of the sand and into the backseat of some stranger’s vehicle, where she sits silent and alone all the way home.

Chapter Text

It turns out not every universal law has been upended by the insertion of the celestial into her life. Chloe is still too middle-aged to be hungover. Her body is furious with her, and frankly she can’t blame it. She knows she tried to match Linda shot for shot, and if that isn’t hubristic behavior she doesn’t know what is. The rest of the night lurches through her memory in fragmented pieces. Obviously she went to the beach—there’s still sand stuck to her left arm and she can feel more scattered about her in her bed. She’s pretty sure she saw Lucifer—she has a vision of him, soft and laughing in the moonlight, lying next to her—but as to the specifics of their conversation? No data found. And when she works up the energy to snag her phone off the bedside table, it is no help. There’s an email confirming the chicken swing she apparently ordered, but there’s no text trail with Lucifer to indicate why they met, or how foolish she’d been.

She hopes she had the courage to apologize, at minimum.

Had they talked about the stars? Yes. She’s friends with the guy who made the sun.

Maybe she’ll vomit.

She slides off her mattress to the floor, then slowly picks herself up enough to make it into the bathroom. There’s something strangling her—she runs her fingers over the delicate chain wrapped close around her neck. Is it knotted? Thank Lucifer’s dad she hadn’t lost it at the beach, but her fingers are no better at working the knot hung-over than they had been at working the clasp drunk. She rubs the squashed bullet as she looks herself over in the mirror. Bad idea. No one needs to see her like this, least of all herself. She makes it to the shower, turns it on, and fights her way out of the clothes she’d worn to tribe night. Chloe lies down on the floor of the tub, letting the pelting water slowly bring her back to life.

She should have waited until she and Lucifer were fixed to go drinking; he’d have brought her coffee. Now she has to take care of that herself.

Downstairs, wrapped in towels and waiting on her coffee maker, she picks up her phone.

Everyone else still alive? she sends to the group. Outside, a very inconsiderate bird is having a marvelous morning. Chloe wonders if there’s a hunting season for robins.

Here, Ella texts. Alive might be pushing it.

Phone too noise, is Linda’s contribution.

Wimps. Maze, naturally. Ellen, you at least bone that hot dude?

We went for burgers and he tried to pay for our meal by offering the waiter a free tattoo, which my date was ready to apply right then and there with a busted pen. Waiter was into it, and they hooked up while I watched and ate french fries.

Nice. I didn’t know you were kinky—I know some guys you should meet.

Ella, I strongly recommend you do not allow Maze to set you up with anyone she considers kinky.

Don’t be so uptight, Linda.

Chloe smiles and slides her phone away. Her entire world had been disordered, but it turns out she does still have friends. Flawed, messy, wonderful friends.

It’s a rough day—she does nothing except drink water, sort out her necklace situation, and watch HGTV through half-closed eyes—but her hangover has subsided enough by the time Dan comes by with Trixie that she can feign normalcy. Since all of their family time recently has been focused on sad and serious conversations, they’ve decided to do a Taco Sunday. Chloe sidles up next to Dan while he browns the meat, keeping half an eye on Trixie shredding cheese.

“Good weekend?” she asks.

He nods. “Yeah. Better. I’m going to be back at work tomorrow. I needed the time off, but when I don’t have Trixie…”

“It’s a lot of free time,” Chloe agrees. “It’s pretty shocking to look back at myself and realize I’ve become one of those people who lives to work, but…” She shrugs.

“Yeah. Teenage Dan would have thought I’m an idiot. Like, what did I used to do that took all day?”

“Well, you used to have friends,” she teases, bumping his shoulder with her own.

“Ha. But speaking of, I heard you punched one of my friends?”

“Ah, right.” Somehow Amenadiel had become Dan’s improv buddy. Were there celestial shenanigans going on at improv, too? “Did your buddy tell you he deserved it?”

“He did.” Dan eyes her cautiously. “You wanna tell me?”

She shakes her head. “Something that happened a couple years ago that I just found out about. He’s changed—I think—and I shouldn’t dredge it all up. I am still pissed, though.”

Dan nods. “I, uh, told him off. For missing Charlotte’s funeral. Shitty of me, given he was her step-son, maybe, and probably has his own feelings about it. He was…weird. Like he’s a religious dude, and I knew he’d tell me she was in a better place. But he really believed it, and I guess I believed it, too, when he said it. I don’t know what he did, Chloe, but he’s a good guy. It helps me, having him around.”

“I know.” Chloe squeezes his arm and turns to stop Trixie from burying herself in a cheese avalanche of her own making.

Nearly an hour later, their plates are almost empty when the front door opens abruptly, revealing a baggage laden Maze.

“Decker. Trix. You.” She nods at them each in turn. “Just moving my stuff back.”

“Wait, she’s moving back in?” Dan asks, cutting Chloe an alarmed look.

Maze freezes. “Yeah. Last night you said… Or maybe I got it wrong?”

Chloe blinks. What is it about getting drunk with Maze that has her asking the demon to move in? Well, moment of truth, she supposes. Chloe “Miracle” Decker might not have had any choice about her interactions with Marcus, and she might not get to choose what her feelings are for Lucifer, but Maze? That’s probably a choice. So, is she the sort of person who gives second chances? She looks at Trixie, who is practically vibrating in her seat. Trixie, for whom Maze is studying chess and to whom the demon had offered an honest apology that included an accurate description of her feelings, an unheard of feat from Maze.

“Of course,” Chloe says. “Your room’s just as you left it. Well, you know, cleaner.”

Maze nods sharply. “Thanks. Just here for a moment. Got a bounty. In Chicago.” She raises a brow pointedly.

“Well, good to have you, for however long.”

Trixie bounces out of her chair and bounds towards the stairs. “I’ll help you unpack.”

Chloe watches her daughter and the demon go, avoiding Dan’s gaze.

“Chloe.”

“What? So I don’t like one of your friends, and you don’t like one of mine.”

“This is two of your friends I don’t like, and Amenadiel doesn’t walk around with knives strapped everywhere. What if she, like, makes pot brownies again, or something?”

“Then I’ll make sure to save you some. What do you really have against her? You two were close there for a minute.”

Now he’s avoiding her gaze. “It’s in the past.”

“Dan. I know how hard you’ve worked to not be the dirty cop who gaslit his wife.” Dan winces, rubbing the back of his neck. “Maybe you backslid a bit? And maybe Maze was there? But trust me, however hard you’re working, given her background, she’s working more than twice as hard, and she’s put herself on the line for all three of us more than once.”

“Yeah. Just. Just watch her with Trixie, all right?”

“Of course.”

“Right.”

And it’s settled: Chloe Jane Decker, miracle or not, believes in the good in both people and demons.

Chloe had texted Bauda on Saturday about the disastrous undercover op, but Monday arrives with no response. She goes through her new no-work routine: gets Trixie off to school, goes for a run, meditates, forces herself to do housework because it does still matter that she and her daughter have a clean place to live. Around ten o’clock, her phone vibrates. Lucifer, being the one brave enough to break their awkward silence.

Detective, if you’re feeling up to it, would you be willing to join me for one of our lunches?

Lunch. What a word to strike terror into the heart.

They meet, once again, by the ocean. There’s a food truck selling Cuban sandwiches by the boardwalk, and they eat leaning against the railing, looking out over the water. It’s the first time they’ve met at his behest since she saw his other face, she realizes. He’s been allowing her to set the boundaries of their interactions—something she would have thought impossible from him a few years ago. Marcus had promised that. Chloe had wanted to take things slow, and he’d promised to follow her lead. But then within weeks she’d been dumped and engaged. Lucifer considers himself a devil of his word, but it’s not words he’s offering her. He’s actually doing.

Chloe has a difficult time looking at him.

It’s not embarrassment, though she’d expected to feel that. It’s the sudden omnipresence of him. The salt air is imbued with his essence; she can no longer disconnect the ocean from him. Strange, as sea salt isn’t amongst his preferred perfumes—he is richness and decadence and heat, nothing as light as the breeze off the water. Still, it is the scent of him thrusting himself into her life while she struggled to find her footing at her mother’s beach house. It’s their first kiss. It’s the imagined image of him arriving in L.A., smiling a greeting up at his stars, cutting off his wings and setting them on fire. It’s him lying beside her the other night, hazy in detail but clear in feeling, laughing with sand in his hair. But it’s also the divide between them. How can she look at him, allow light refracted through her corneas to condense him into one human sized body when the vastness of his existence is even more fathomless than the deepest ocean trench? The Pacific is a mere pond, easily contained within the confines of one planet, whereas Lucifer roams from Heaven to Hell to Earth to the stars. Inescapable. Elemental—perhaps literally. He was created with the universe, after all. Perhaps he can be distilled down to one atom, one particle that is Light. Or maybe he’s a compound—one part Goddess, one part God, absent their purity but boiling over with complexities that spin out into new combinations, new possibilities.

Beside her, this incomprehensible creature of legend fastidiously wipes his fingers clean with a handful of napkins and reaches into his breast pocket for his customary after-meal drink. Her partner, who abhors stickiness and whose vices and foibles are well known.

“Which whiskey do you put in your flask?” Chloe asks, surprised at how husky her voice sounds.

“Mhm.” He holds up a finger, then dashes back across the boardwalk towards the sandwich truck, returning shortly with a little condiment cup he uses as a makeshift shot glass. “There you are, Detective. It’s a bourbon today, actually. A little Pappy Van Winkle for you. Cheers.”

Well, it’s not like it’s a work day. The bourbon is vanilla and spice, just like him. “Bourbon for daytime sipping.” Mid-shelf whiskey for chugging, Macallan for brooding on his couch.

“A good bourbon can’t tell one hour of the day from another.” He takes another drink, closing his eyes briefly, and slips the flask back into his jacket. “I spoke to Detective Bauda. She’s formulated a new plan.”

Chloe’s known this would be coming, but it still hurts. “It’s finally time, huh? You don’t want to be my partner anymore.”

“I am trying to be your partner.” He grips the wood railing hard enough that it creaks. “After Friday, it is clear a different approach is needed.”

She bites her lips together, taking a deep breath through her nose. “I understand. I dragged you there, and we didn’t even learn anything.” She blinks rapidly, keeping herself together.

“Don’t be absurd. It was an Hellish evening—and I should know—but we hardly learned nothing. Take your purported missing girl, for instance. If she did disappear, it wasn’t from one of the club’s parties.”

“Maddy? Did someone mention her? One of the men?”

He scoffed. “Of course not, Detective, but I do have functioning eyes. You made me read that witness report half a dozen times—black hair, sturdily built, and tall. Does that description match any of the women from Friday night?”

“Well, no, but how—”

He raises his eyebrows, and she pulls her head back as the realization hits. Chloe has spent her entire life in Los Angeles, and roughly half of that life had been spent responding to casting calls. She’s used to being in rooms full of slim blondes; it never occurred to her to find it strange in the moment, but all of the latex-clad women she’d seen Friday night had definitely been of a type.

“Exactly,” Lucifer confirms. “One of those posturing pustules your police captain insists on spending his evenings with actually bragged to me about their boring taste in female party attendees.” He scoffs.

She remembers seeing something about this when she was researching Thorston’s club ahead of time and ran across all its online fanboys—the additional status that disgusting subculture attributed to men who bagged blondes. Plus, “None of the women can be tall, because what if one of the men ended up feeling short. And sturdily built is too close to muscular; the men risk feeling weak.”

“Fools. I tell you, Detective, there’s nothing quite like having a proper Amazon of a woman bend you over—”

“Focus.” He pouts, soothing himself with a drink from his flask. “So Maddy, if she exists, never would have been invited to one of those parties. The men are all too insecure.” Which actually is something she had noticed while they were there. “The men you met there, we’re talking, what, junior executives?”

“The younger ones, mostly. A couple faltering business owners. The ones closer to Thorston’s age have some modest success.”

“Anything as impressive as a police captain?”

Lucifer tilts his head side to side. “Franchise owners, for the most part. Men with a handful of car dealerships or a string of dry cleaners. Enough money to afford some excess, but they’re far from the Fortune 500.”

“And politicians?”

He shakes his head. “Golf buddies of some councilmen.”

Chloe remembers the other little details—the lack of valet service, the 12 year old Macallan. The Marquises des Douleur are men who have enough money to prey upon the vast majority of L.A.’s population, but who are still so far from the actual heavy hitters they don’t even know how to ape true excess. “You said Thorston wants to be mayor—the franchise owners would be able to throw some money behind him, but in a city like Los Angeles? I don’t see any real political gain to him joining this club. It’s not what Bauda painted it to be. Those men can do damage, yes, but they aren’t anywhere near your level of power—theoretical human you, I mean. Bauda didn’t need to rope in a millionaire; this could have been run like a normal undercover op.”

Millionaire bait, that’s what Bauda had called Chloe. And then Thorston had invited Lucifer to join him in a room full of her doppelgangers.

“Bauda told us that Thorston is a recent member of his club, right? And you said they’d requested Lux as a party location just a few weeks ago, and then Thorston started hanging around the bar looking for you. This isn’t about Thorston; they’re both targeting you. In I.A., Bauda would know about your work with me on the Palmetto case, have a better sense of how close we are, so she approaches you through me. Thorston still sees you as the devilish club owner who maybe has a thing for his work partner, so he sets you up with a bunch of Chloe Clones—”

“Clones? Those women are nothing like you!”

“You said it yourself—”

“You are wise, and determined, and, and, regal. None of those women hold a candle.”

She has to hold back a laugh—he’s all puffed up like an angry cat. She wonders if his feathers literally get ruffled in moments like this. It hangs in her mind, the possibility of stroking her hands through those feathers, soothing him, in some alternate universe where his wings are whole and she can touch him without pain. But she can’t touch his wings, especially not in public, and she doesn’t want to dwell on the possibility that alternate realities are, well, real, so she brings the conversation back to business. “With women who he thinks might be your type, then. Like the one you married—Candy has roughly the same look.” And isn’t that a realization she’s glad she didn’t have last year. What would pre-devil-reveal Chloe have done with the knowledge that Lucifer had run from her hospital room and gotten hitched to the Vegas sleeze version of herself? “The club is just a red herring. This is about you.”

“That is often the case, but why this time? I suppose Captain Thorston might be trying to rope me in as a donor for some ill-fated run for office, but Detective Bauda?” He tilts his head consideringly. “I suppose some people are dreadful at asking for sex—”

“Or,” Chloe cuts in quickly, “Maze is right. What if they both did know Pierce, either because they’re part of his network or because they owed him favors. Ella says Pierce kept files on celestials.” And on me, she doesn’t say. “Someone had to be helping him with that research. It’s possible other people know about you, about devil-faced you.”

She expects him to be worried—she certainly is—but instead his expression becomes fond. “There. All worked up about not having learned anything Friday night, yet here you are piecing together a whole host of clues.”

“Only because you noticed what we were actually seeing.”

“Yes, I’ve become quite good at teamwork, don’t you agree?”

She does laugh this time. It’s—he’s— Minutes ago she’d been braced for rejection, for him to shut her out, for them to start arguing again. Instead, he’s brought their conversation here. “You’re all right,” she says, her tongue finding its way to the corner of her mouth as she looks up at him. “Most improved.”

He grins, his own tongue pressing into his cheek, before his expression abruptly blanks and he looks away.

Her world dims. They still aren’t back to where they had been with each other, not yet. “What did Bauda say? When you told her Maddy couldn’t have disappeared from one of those parties?”

“I didn’t tell her. When I spoke to her, I learned you’d already sent her a message saying we’d failed, and I didn’t want to contradict you. It occurred to me—” He breaks off, shifts uncomfortably. “Before we left the penthouse that night, you asked for certain reassurances I refused to give. It occurred to me that if you had more reason to believe you could rely upon me, you might not have found the evening so…stressful.”

Chloe shakes her head. “It wasn’t about you. I—I do things. I take care of people, and I hold the bad guys accountable. That’s the life I built. And I failed at it—failed for months, inviting the worst of the worst into my home, and that all just really hit me at a very inconvenient moment. There’s nothing you could have done.”

“If I’m your partner, if we are a team, then that’s not actually true, is it?”

“Lucifer, you’re not listening—”

“That makes two of us. I am hardly helpless, Detective. We have been working together for years now; if you feel you cannot lean on me in a difficult situation, it is because that is something I’ve taught you.”

“Great. Let’s play who’s the bigger screw up. This is so helpful.” She turns away to watch the passersbye, listening to Lucifer sigh and shift six feet to her right. The thing is, she appreciates what he’s saying, and she doesn’t want to fight. She’s just so jagged internally. All of her favorite things can’t help but bump against her sore spots.

“You’ve allowed Maze to move back in,” he says after a while, retreating to a neutral topic.

Chloe nods, watching a small child try to eat something he picked up off the boardwalk while his mother struggles to keep his hands away from his mouth. Lucifer tracks her gaze and rears back, revolted.

“Ugh. Though it does remind me. Maze said the urchin has been asking about me?”

“Yeah. Pretty much every day. I told her you had an infection that was harmless to adults but could be deadly in children.”

“Hardly harmless, Detective.”

“I’m healed, Lucifer. No permanent damage.” She shows off her neck and arms, the marks left by his fingers now so faint they’re easy to miss.

“You can be alarmingly reckless regarding your own well being. But regardless,” he holds up a hand to ward off her protest. “As much as I do not wish you to suffer, I don’t wish your child do so, either. If she needs to see me, we can do one of those video chat things.”

Chloe’s grin is wide and instant. “Really?”

“Yes. Whenever her schedule next permits.”

“She gets out of school at two-thirty.”

“That’s…fine. Yes, of course. Tell her she has a date with the devil.”

“How would you survive it?”

“Talking to your spawn?”

“Not being an international celebrity whose name pops up in countless cliche phrases.”

He laughs, collapsing back against the railing, sticking his hands in his pockets. At ease. Pleased with her for a moment. He tilts his head, running his gaze again over her neck and arms. “I regret leaving you alone on Saturday morning. Sending Linda in my place.”

“That’s—you don’t have to—”

He shakes his head. “I was uncertain how you would feel about seeing me that morning. I had hurt you, and—the flying.”

She wants to tell him about that lovely moment of freedom he gave her when they flew, despite the pain from his touch, but as she opens her mouth, a passing rollerblader gets into a screaming match with a kid on a skateboard, and it just doesn’t seem like the right place to go into raptures about his more angelic abilities. It would probably make him uncomfortable, anyway. “I didn’t mind,” she says instead. “And thank you for the pajamas. I’m sorry I kicked you out of your own home.”

“You didn’t.”

“I did. Linda said you’d wanted to be there. Something about aftercare?”

He smiles a little sadly. “I know we weren’t really doing a scene, but normally in that situation, if a woman in fetish gear spent the night at my feet, I would take care of her afterward.”

She thinks again of Stacia, looking relaxed and pain free as she said her goodbyes. “That’s part of it for you?”

“Of course it bloody well is. Aftercare can be as simple as making sure your partner is comfortable and hydrated. Make sure they’re warm enough. Sooth any marks or bruises. It’s the denouement, like when you and I have a drink after solving a case; the evening isn’t complete without it.”

He’d left her that tube of cream for her marks, she remembers, and it hits her again, just how overwhelmed she’d been, how incapable. “Thank you,” she says fiercely, facing him. “That could have gone so poorly if you hadn’t taken care of everything. I never should have allowed Bauda to goad me into investigating this for her. I knew better, it’s just…Something needs to not have changed. Something needs to be the way it’s supposed to be.”

“That’s why I went to Detective Bauda myself,” he says in a rush, “to make a new plan. One that keeps things human. If I had my way, well. No more Mr. Nice Devil.” His mouth slants cruelly, and she’s pretty sure it’s just her imagination that makes his eyes flicker with flame.

It startles her just the same, reminds her that however safe she is around him, he’s still a supernatural being of unknown, ineffable power, and she’s pointing him at people who’d have no ability to defend themselves. Terrible people, sure, but she thinks again about Marcus, in Hell now forever, and a chill sneaks down her spine. You were supposed to side with the human, she’d told Linda.

Even though she’s definitely not praying, Lucifer still picks up on her train of thought. “Don’t worry, Detective, I’ll behave. You’ve made your distaste for ‘celestial woo-woo’ quite clear.”

She frowns, not understanding the reference, and his expression drops.

“How much of Saturday night do you remember?”

Chloe scrunches her nose apologetically. “Some. Sol.”

“Sol,” he agrees.

She gets that flash of him again, moonlit and beautiful, gazing back at her. “I got the necklace unknotted.” His gaze tracks her fingers as she touches the chain around her neck.

“I’m glad.” His hands twitch, but then he clears his throat, examining his shoes. “Well, the point is, during our evening confab, you also made a few things clearer to me, vis-a-vis your thoughts about certain aspects of me. I spoke with Bauda, but I haven’t committed to anything with her yet. Consider me your leashed devil, Detective. I won’t go after anyone without your approval.”

“Oh.” She blinks. “That is new. But like, good new.” For what feels like the hundredth time, she starts to reach out to run her hand down his arm only to pull back, frustrated. She’d never noticed just how much of their communication had been touch-based.

“Moving forward, right?” He watches her hand’s aborted movement with a hint of longing.

No more going backwards, he’d said once, right before she lost faith in him. They’ve been waiting on a precipice for a long time. “What does Bauda want you to do?”

“I’m to hold a little get together for Thorston’s group. At my penthouse, so I can control the playing field. You…I do not want you there, but we’d install cameras and everything. You wouldn’t be left in the dark if you don’t want.”

Chloe frowns, considering. “So a repeat of Friday night, just with a different venue and no me?”

“I suppose.”

“And Bauda asked for the cameras?”

“Yes.”

“There’s no way.” Chloe runs through the scenario quickly. Yesterday’s hangover had been entirely worth it; one night of actual relaxation seems to have restored her ability to think. “It’s always been suspicious, but there’s no way this is a legitimate undercover operation. No warrants, no support, just one civilian hosting a secretly recorded gathering in his home? Not a chance—the legal headache alone if any of the guests realizes what’s going on, not to mention if something happened to you. Uh uh. This is all Bauda. She took advantage of the fallout from Pierce to manipulate us into running this for her own reasons.”

“Seems like a lot of work for her to go to just to get some footage of Thorston.”

“It does, doesn’t it? This doesn’t make any sense. What, um, did Thorston actually tell you anything? I remember him talking to you the other night, but I kinda lost focus on what was happening around then.” He’s already proven she’s not going to face any recrimination from him on this front, which allows her the bravery to be honest.

Indeed, his face gentles, but she doesn’t find any pity in his gaze, just support. “Something about the two of us building something together, but that’s as far as the conversation went.”

“How did you leave things with him? I imagine our exit looked odd.”

Lucifer waves away her concerns. “I let him believe I went off to enjoy some of the entertainments on offer that night and had someone from Lux fetch my car before its presence could arouse suspicion. As far as anyone there knows, we left the party quietly in the ordinary course of the evening. I’ve heard from Thorston already, actually. He left a message trying to set up another meeting.”

“So we don’t even need his club anymore—you could go directly to him. He’s ready to talk. I don’t understand what Bauda is pushing for—the only thing that makes sense is if she’s trying to gather blackmail material, but to what end?”

“I could set up dinner with him tonight, if you’d like. Do a bit of information pumping.” He bounces his eyebrows to highlight the potential double-entendre in his words, and she scrunches her nose in disgust.

“No. No, I think we can do better.”

“Oh?” He leans in, welcoming her notes. He really isn’t shutting her out this time.

“If you go to dinner with him, and we only get what he’s willing to tell you he wants, and you lose some leverage. He’ll start to think you’re equals.”

“Dad forbid.”

“Exactly. He needs to think you’re willing to be on good terms, but only distantly interested. Whatever he wants to build with you, make him go out of his way to sell you on it. He’s more likely to give extra details that way. More than that, we need to put him in a position where you can learn more about him than he realizes he’s giving away. Preferably without letting Bauda know we’re suspicious of her, at least until we have an idea of what she’s hoping to accomplish.”

“And how exactly do we do that?”

“You do throw a party, but it’s not for Thorston and his buddies.” She smiles. “It’s for Amenadiel.”

Lucifer huffs. “I do appreciate that you’re not fond of my brother at the moment, Detective, but I can’t imagine throwing a Thorston-approved party for Amenadiel will maintain anyone’s cover.”

“It won’t be like Friday. It’ll be a slightly more upscale version of your typical evenings. Rich guy fancy night with the possibility of an orgy breaking out.”

He grins. “I must say, this sounds like a much better plan.”

“Your brother just got back into town—true, so you don’t need to lie. You’re throwing a little get together to welcome him. That way, if they are targeting you, if Pierce left behind something that might be dangerous for celestials,” Lucifer openly scoffs at the idea, but Chloe persists, “Amenadiel will be there as your backup. Reply to Thorston’s message, and ask if he can get you the contact information for the women who worked the event on Friday—you’re looking to hire some additional help, the sort of women who can liven up an evening. Let him finagle his own invitation from you. That allows us to interview some of the women who have interacted with him and his club—I’ll pose as your social secretary or something like that, interview them first, then introduce them to you. That way we can confirm Maddy was never at those parties, and it lets you honestly report back to Bauda that you’re moving ahead with her request to host an event with Thorston.”

“Even if it’s a more conventional party, you’ll still have to stay out of sight. Thorston could recognize you.”

“You said Bauda wanted to have cameras, right? I can monitor the event, be your one woman surveillance team. We won’t record everything—I’d like to minimize our chances of getting sued—but I can take some still captures if anything interesting happens. And…” she trails off, considering. “If we plan the guest list carefully, we might get additional information. Other members of LAPD leadership, maybe some judges or prosecutors—find out who Thorston is close to. Until Maze confirms one way or the other, I think we should operate under the assumption that he was part of Pierce’s network. There have to be a few people who traded favors with the Sinnerman who haven’t been targeted yet by the investigation into Pierce. I’ll talk to Ella and Dan, you reach out to your contacts. Maybe we’ll find someone with links to both Pierce and Thorston, and we see how Thorston reacts to being reintroduced to any likely suspects.”

Lucifer raps his knuckles against the railing, his smile, well, devilish. “There’s that detective brain in action. I can see the little wheels turning, figuring out how you’re going to put an end to every hint of corruption in your fair city.”

Chloe snorts. “Maybe not every hint, but I do what I can.”

“You do, don’t you. You’re still the Detective, whatever your official job status.”

Right. Because Chloe’s still suspended, and if Bauda’s investigation isn’t backed by I.A… “I mean, if that’s okay. With you. Obviously, since there’s no official case here. Bauda isn’t actually holding my reinstatement hostage. We could just drop this, if you don’t want to investigate—”

His brow furrows. “What just happened? You were excitedly filling my week with subterfuge; what’s changed?”

“I don’t want you to think you have to do this, that’s all. You’re not eggs, not to me.”

“A no doubt charming turn of phrase that I’m unfamiliar with.”

“You said,” she stretches her hand out behind her and waves it, calling up their past. “You referred to yourself as those eggs I needed so badly. And I said it, too, back when I couldn’t explain what happened in that warehouse with Malcolm. I just want to make sure you know, even if we aren’t working together, I still want you to be part of my life. You aren’t just useful—I mean, you’re a great partner, but—”

He gets so soft sometimes, like she’s unlocked a bonus personality he keeps hidden from everyone else. “It’s all right, Detective. I understand. And thank you, but I do believe we should track this mystery down to its end.”

“Oh. Good.” She smiles at her feet. He’s facing her, just radiating Luciferness at her. It’s a little overwhelming, but nice.

“Does this mean, once you’ve been properly reinstated, you’d still like us to be partners?”

She looks up quickly. His expression is easy, but he’s so good at masking himself. Once again, she wants to reach out, take his hands or hug him, something to offer reassurance, but she’s limited to using her words. And if he really is going to start listening to her, including her in his plans, even when he’s emotionally involved in a case? “Are you actually asking permission this time? Then yes, Lucifer. This is me, officially asking you, the literal devil, to be my partner.”

“I accept.” A tension so constant she’d become inured to it dissolves from her shoulders and spine. He’s going to stay; she won’t lose him for the simple sin of knowing him better than she used to. He straightens, fluffs his pocket square. “But only if you’ll tell me everything about punching my brother. Was he surprised? Did he cry?”

Chloe adopts a mock serious face. “Well, first of all, it hurt. A lot.”

He looks at her through lowered lashes, eyes twinkling. “So you didn’t enjoy it at all?”

She bites her lip. “I didn’t say that…”

He sighs wistfully. “Next time, please let me watch?”

“Next time.”

Chapter Text

When Lucifer Morningstar desires to throw a party, the world bends to accommodate. Chloe had envisioned days of prep work, but Lucifer has her set up with a string of interviews by three that afternoon. She has just enough time to grab Trixie after school and deliver her to her first chunk of parent-free babysitter time in weeks (something Trixie seems far too excited about) before she’s faced with the group of now de-latexed maids from Friday night.

Since there’s a good chance the women will remember Lucifer from that night (everyone always remembers Lucifer), they’ve decided to have Chloe interview everyone alone first, in case any of the women are reluctant to talk around a man from that set. Chloe sets up shop in one of the business offices on Lux’s first floor, putting a sheen of professionalism on the whole hastily organized endeavor. Now that she’s paying attention, it is eerie how similar all of the women look. She’s struck again by how different Thorston’s group of horrible men is from Lucifer, whose taste has always run to anyone and everyone willing to put a little effort into the flirtation. The nine women she interviews are all roughly the same height, weight, and shape, their shade of bottle blonde the only differentiating feature.

The women share a particular bluntness as well. “No way is any rich guy paying that much for me to hand out drinks. If I’m expected to get naked with the guests, I need to know that up front. I have ground rules.”

Chloe is talking to Shauna-no-last-name, who she recognizes as the bartender from Friday night. The other eight women Chloe’s interviewed have shared similar sentiments, and Chloe responds to Shauna with a bland, non-threatening smile. “Mr. Morningstar likes to pay well. He wants everyone to have a good time, including staff. You’ll see when you meet him. This isn’t a trick; he doesn’t expect you to have sex with anyone.”

“I’ve met him,” Shauna says. “Or at least seen him. I worked a party he was at a couple nights ago; that crowd, they don’t give away money they don’t have to.”

Chloe pretends to consult some notes. “Ah, that must have been the Marquises des Douleur event?”

“Yeah. I saw him there with the rest of the perverts. He had a woman pretty much chained to his heels all night and disappeared with her God knows where half-way through.”

“His Kitten,” Chloe says with a nod, face bland, bland, bland. “Yes, Mr. Morningstar is very fond of her; I believe he became uncomfortable about some of the advances the other club members made towards her and decided it was best to leave.”

Shauna snorts. “Possessive doesn’t mean fond. Seriously, how long have you worked for this guy?”

“We’ve worked together almost three years now.” Lucifer’s not-technically-lying policy really does work. “I can assure you, Mr. Morningstar keeps his contracts to the letter. You won’t be expected to do anything other than serve drinks with a smile. In fact, if any of the guests do behave inappropriately, we’d like you to let us know.”

“Yeah?” Shauna still looks skeptical. “I mean, I’ll take the gig. The money is crazy for one night. It’s just I like to be aware of what I’m walking into. Stuff can go bad when it’s a surprise.”

The bland smile cracks, and Chloe can’t stop herself from leaning forward across the desk, holding Shauna’s gaze. “I know. This party will be nothing like that one; you’ll be in charge of yourself.”

Shauna screws up her lips, pensive, and nods. “All right. I’m in.”

“Excellent. You will have to meet with Mr. Morningstar first—he likes to interview everyone personally before officially hiring them, but it’s pretty much a formality. If you have time now?”

“Sure.”

They stand and Chloe gathers up her notepad and phone, pretending to just notice a sticky note suck to the desk. “Oh. This is a long-shot, but I understand you may have worked with the same people as a ‘Maddy’? I’m sorry, I don’t have a last name, but she met Mr. Morningstar at,” Chloe waves her hand, “one of these things. He took a liking for her and was hoping to hire her, but I haven’t been able to track her down.”

Shauna is back to regarding Chloe skeptically. “Maybe. A lot of us don’t use the same name event-to-event.”

“Of course. I understand she’s tall, dark hair, sturdily built.”

Shauna’s eyebrows rise in surprise. “The circuit I’m on, you don’t run into ‘sturdy’ very often.”

“Are you sure?” Chloe pretends to check her notes again. “She may have been wearing a wig. I believe Mr. Morningstar met her through a Captain Thorston of the LAPD?”

Shauna snorts, then quickly smooths her expression. Remembering the other woman’s disdain for the ‘pets’ at the party on Friday, Chloe shifts tactics slightly. “Don’t worry; I know what it’s like to have to work with these people. Mr. Morningstar’s all right—he pays well, and he understands the word ‘no’—but most of the men he hangs out with? I don’t know Captain Thorston, but if he’s anything like some of the others…”

“It’s not even that—Thorston’s surprisingly all right. He actually sat and listened to me bitch about an audition I went on where the casting director took one look at me, said, ‘Too ditzy,’ and rejected me without even letting me read. I’d been waiting two hours at that point. Fucking Hollywood.”

Chloe barely hides her surprise at how quick Shauna is to defend Thorston, but she knows how to commiserate over a bad audition. “Ass. I don’t think you come off as ditzy at all.”

“That’s what Thorston said. Most of the guys I meet would’ve just made a blonde joke, but Thorston’s enough of a sad sack himself he could sympathize.”

“That’s surprising.”

“Yeah. Don’t get me wrong—dude’s gross and has no charisma. A total skeeze. And as for your Maddy, no. He’s completely predictable—all the women he plays with are these tiny little things who could be his daughter. It’s just, his wife is a different story. Sturdy—I mean, my grandma used to call herself a battle-axe, and that’s Mrs. Thorston.”

If Chloe were drinking anything, she’d have done a spit take. “His wife? You’ve met his wife?” Eminently respectable, she recalls Lucifer saying.

“Weird, right? That marquis club, all the new members have to host one of their get togethers, and Thorston actually used his own house. Wifey handled the party planning.”

Chloe bites off the start of a few sentences. “I guess some couples, uh, share?”

“Swingers I can get with. This lady? She’s telling me what to stock the toy chests with one minute and talking to me about angels the next.”

Well, shit. “Angels?”

“Yeah. Apparently all I have to do is be open to it and some angel’s going to fly down and show me how to live my best life.”

“I don’t think I’ve run into that particular version of a religious marriage before.”

“Religious nothing. Woman was looking to start a cult. Captain Thorston had to keep chasing her away from us. He apologized later, said his wife just hates to see people stuck in careers they don’t love.”

“Career? I’ve known you two minutes and I can tell catering isn’t your career.” Catering seems like the safest way to describe Shauna’s job.

“Right? I mean, this is a gig. I’m an actress, but I need to work. I’m not one of those women who’s gonna give their lives over to these men. Wifey’s just jealous she let herself get caught.”

Chloe nods exaggeratedly. “I know exactly the type, so unhappy with her own choices she’s trying to convince everyone else to—what’s her cult’s mission? Go live in a barn somewhere worshiping this angel?”

“Oh my God, it’s always a barn, right?”

“And the ‘angel’ is always some unwashed dude with bad hair.”

“Always. Show a little originality, right? But no, Mrs. Thorston had some holy relic, said all I had to do was renounce the devil and she’d show it to me.”

Chloe freezes, and Shauna laughs.

“Don’t worry. As long as Lucifer Morningstar pays the way you’ve said, I’m not renouncing nothing.”

Chloe joins her in an awkward laugh. This whole thing really is about Lucifer. She doesn’t know if this counts as him embroiling her in more celestial drama, or as her endangering him with human shenanigans.

She leads Shauna back out to the bar, where Lucifer is still ‘interviewing’ the last woman Chloe had led out to him. Of course, the interview appears to consist of the woman teaching him some dance moves up on top of one of the tables. Chloe looks upwards, closes her eyes, and clears her throat loudly.

“Oh, Det—Ms. Decker, perfect. Lydia, you must teach Ms. Decker that move. Absolutely smashing.”

Chloe pinches the bridge of her nose. “Are you ready for the next interview, or should we wait elsewhere?”

“Oh, I suppose, all right. Here you are, darling.” He courteously helps the dancing woman down off of the table top. “You are absolutely hired. It’s going to be quite the exciting evening.”

Chloe keeps her gaze fixed on the ceiling while Lucifer says goodbye to one woman and hello to Shauna. What had she expected when she brought him a group of women who wear skimpy outfits for a living? They’re his favorite kind of people.

As he’s leading Shauna to one of the booths, Lucifer flags Chloe’s attention and points almost discreetly at his eyes, but she shakes her head, just as she has done for the previous eight women. She doesn’t know why the thought of him using his mojo on these people makes her uncomfortable, but it does, and it’s unlikely any of these women are behind whatever it is that’s going on. Chloe turns away, planning on leaving him alone to gather information based on the strength of his charisma alone, but finds herself lingering at the edge of the bar, watching him.

He’s happy. Sure, he likes pretty ladies, but it’s not just that. Something has settled in him; he and Chloe have agreed to be partners, agreed he would stay, and he’s happy.

It’s lovely.

She pulls herself away, goes up to the penthouse to await the results of his final round of questioning. Lucifer joins her within the half hour, heading towards his home bar as soon as the elevator doors open.

“Well, unless you managed something on your end, I’m afraid that was a bit of a bust,” he complains, pouring a drink and settling in on the piano bench. He starts playing what Chloe realizes after a moment is a very pretty instrumental version of Garbage’s I’m Only Happy When It Rains.

“I did learn something,” she says, swaying towards the bench. Normally, she’d sit beside him; sometimes, he’d try to teach her the chords to pop songs. But he doesn’t want to risk them touching, so she wanders away towards the library while giving him a quick rundown on what Shauna had told her.

“Could be Cain,” he says of the ‘renouncing the devil’ cult. “But it could also be any member of my family, or just some random religious nuttery. Did Shauna say anything else about Lady Thorston’s beliefs?”

“Uh, yeah. Angels. The angels would show her how to live.”

“Dad, just what we need, more of my siblings running around. I’ll have a chat with Amenadiel, see if he knows who’s been stopping by earth recently.” He finishes his song and takes his glass back to the bar. “Well, party tomorrow then?”

“Don’t we need to give people time to make room in their schedules? A little advance warning?”

“It’s never been a problem before.”

Of course not. No wonder he’s always so impatient—everyone is too eager to run on his schedule. Well, she’s the exception. “Be that as it may, I’ll need at least a day to get that information about possible Pierce associates from Dan and Ella and cross-reference it with what we know about Thorston. And you’ll need to talk to your contacts.”

“Wednesday, then,” he agrees, pausing his playing to pull out his phone and send a quick text to some hireling who is about to have a very busy 48 hours. “That should take care of it.”

“And I think we should try to arrange a meeting between me and Thorston’s wife.”

“Just you?”

“I’m not sure introducing Ms. “Renounce the Devil” to Satan himself will get us very far.”

“Ah.” He rests his hands in his lap and stares at her pensively. “If her husband is aware of who I am, she might be as well.”

“Maybe.”

“And if she’s a fanatic, she may have been keeping tabs on my work.”

“It’s certainly possible.” Chloe doesn’t pay much attention to the press, but she knows there’s been a puff piece or two on the crime solving devil.

“Which means she may recognize you.”

“Yeah, but your name will trigger a reaction, whether she’s seen you before or not. What are you driving at?”

“Religious fanatics are not always the most predictable people. She may respond strongly to meeting Satan’s handmaiden.”

Chloe raises her eyebrows. “Try again.”

He tilts his head, considering. “Perhaps you’re right. Satan’s mistress?”

“Satan’s co-worker. But as for Mrs. Thorston…” Chloe steels her shoulders. “I know I wasn’t my best on Friday, but I can handle meeting one religious fanatic without a celestial bodyguard. This is a middle-aged woman with no known history of violent behavior.”

He waves her off. “It’s not that. It’s—” He turns away, something suddenly fascinating about the wall behind his bar. “One of the things about not being human, about not having to worry about human things, is I forget sometimes about all the things you do to protect yourselves from the world. I forget, quite regularly, that the boxy view obstruction you often wear under your clothes is a vest meant to protect you from bullets rather than merely one of the more alarming facets of your fashion sense. When you were shot—” He stands abruptly and strides over to his liquor shelves. His hands start to play with the bottles, making sure they are evenly spaced on the shelves. Busy work. “When you were shot, there was a moment, for me, where you hadn’t almost died.”

Don’t hug him, don’t hug him, red, don’t hug him— “I know, I know what that’s like. When Malcolm shot you, I know. Lucifer.” Chloe wraps her arms tightly around herself. There’s no good answer to this. After what happened to her own dad, she can’t say his worries are unfounded. “What we do is dangerous. Justice, uncovering corruption, it’s dangerous work. But I’m trained, and even if you don’t come with me to meet her, you move fast, right? I’ll meet her somewhere public, somewhere it would be difficult to bring a gun. I’d pray to you the moment I was in trouble. I promise you. I take safety seriously—I’ve got to for Trixie’s sake, right?”

He finishes his fussing and nods shortly. “As you say.”

Don’t hug him, don’t hug him— “Hey. The Devil and Detective Decker: they put their lives on the line, but only in a very responsible manner.”

He huffs and finally turns back towards her. “You’d never fit that tagline on a poster.”

“The Devil and Detective Decker: all Kevlar all the time.”

“The Devil and the Detective: protection isn’t just for the bedroom.” She’s too surprised to completely choke off her laughter, and he grins, advancing. “Vest your chest to save splendid breasts.”

“Okay, that one’s not even a tagline.”

“So demanding.” He’s back at his piano now, his body canted towards her. Normally, he wouldn’t have stopped his approach, would have continued on until he stood directly in front of her, looking down. He doesn’t loom, despite his height. It’s more that he flows around her space, allowing her body to dictate his own form.

Chloe clears her throat. “Anyway, we should figure out a way to talk to her. Oh, and I guess we’ll have to get you some surveillance cameras from somewhere.”

“No worries there; I’m already well supplied.” He cuts his eyes towards her, his smile saucy and smug. “I have made a home movie or two before, Detective.”

Chloe pauses, then blinks. An imaginary Lucifer blooms in her mind, that same smile on his face as he strips for all ninety-plus of the lovers she interviewed while they film him with their phones. That little kneeling move he’d done—she knows how supple he can be. How bold. He’d beckon his lover towards him, his eyes intense— “Oh. Oh, of course. Um.” She trips on nothing, grabbing onto his reading chair to stay upright. “Then you’ll do that,” she says, trying to cover as she regains her balance. “You’ll get the cameras installed. And I’ll talk to Ella and Dan. And we’ll chat tomorrow. We will chat tomorrow.”

“Aren’t I still scheduled for a call with the urchin this evening?”

“Right, yes.” Yep, video chatting with her daughter is exactly the sort of camera-related activity she’s picturing him taking part in right now. Absolutely that.

It’s late enough when she leaves Lux that Dan has already picked Trixie up from the babysitter. Chloe joins them at his place for half a plate of spaghetti, waiting for Trixie to go to her room to collect her schoolwork before reopening the subject of the Sinnerman with Dan.

“I thought the fifty-seven different investigative agencies working on the case pretty much had it covered.” Dan takes their plates to the sink, as though she didn’t used to live with him and doesn’t know he never does dishes unless he’s avoiding doing something worse.

“It’s I.A.,” she says, sticking with the mostly-true-and-safe-for-humans version of events. “This detective—Bauda—has me jumping through hoops trying to get her to clear me.”

“I.A.,” Dan scoffs because, though he deserved his demotion, he still resents the people who handed it to him. “They the reason you were late tonight?”

“And the reason I need you to take her on Wednesday.”

“And it’s related to Pierce?”

“Bauda wants to use our connections—well, Lucifer’s connections—to look into someone who might be involved with Pierce’s network. It’s sensitive, internal stuff—I’m half convinced she just has a personal vendetta against this guy. But I thought, well. Charlotte had all those files on Pierce, and I know you spent a lot of time going through them. I didn’t know if you might be aware of someone connected to Pierce who hasn’t been targeted by the official investigation yet.”

When she started talking, Chloe had felt awkward asking for Dan’s help, but the more she speaks, the more normal this feels. She’s been so hung up on the idea of herself as the Detective who Solves Things that she’d forgotten that Solving Things has always involved leaning on her friends. She doesn’t have to be the only human dealing with this; it’s a little mind blowing.

Dan’s clearly having a more difficult time; he’s scrubbing a fork like it personally offended him. Finally he just throws the utensil back down in the sink and braces his hands against the counter.

“Yeah. I might have some ideas. Look.” He turns to her, and the image of Dan, hurt but healing, slips away to reveal Dan, deeply grieving. “Just don’t say anything, okay? I know. I already know.”

Frowning, she follows when he leads her into his bedroom, where the meaning behind his words is immediately apparent.

He’s turned one wall of his room into a case board. There are photos and notes all connected by pieces of yarn. He’s got what have to be copies of all of Charlotte’s files spread out on one side of his bed, clearly his regular nightly reading material. He won’t meet her gaze.

“I know. I’m obsessed. I thought it would be better, once we got the guy who shot her. But it turned out there was still this whole organization behind him, Chlo, and no one will let me work on the case, now that it’s official. They won’t share anything with me. I’ve had a dozen guys pat me on the back and swear they’ll make the bastards pay and then shut me out because I’m toxic with the brass and no one wants to get in trouble. So I figured, you know, I already had copies of the files from when we had to be covert about investigating Pierce. Taking down his network, it matters. Charlotte believed that.”

Chloe just nods, gathering him to her, tucking his face down against her neck and stroking the back of his head. “I know.”

He doesn’t cry, just breathes wetly for a beat before pulling away, clearing his throat and wiping his eyes. “So. You can have everything I have. I’ve made a bunch of notes, timelines and things. There’s some photos of Pierce—he barely pops up online, but you can’t be a Lieutenant without doing a few photo ops. I’ve identified a some people who were maybe close to him.”

“Thanks, Dan. Look, Bauda seems like she’s full of shit—” he laughs, “—but if it turns out she is actually onto something, I’ll tell you.”

“You better.”

“You know, Linda would talk to you, if you need it.”

“You talk to her?”

Chloe grimaces.

“Yeah, thought not. I don’t know, maybe? If it doesn’t get better, if we don’t catch any of these guys, and…”

“Okay.” She strokes his arm and goes to collect Trixie.

She texts Lucifer a warning when they get back to the apartment and waits until he confirms before letting Trixie know about the video call. Trixie is thrilled and immediately starts assembling materials—she has pictures she wants to show him, a joke she heard at school (What do you call an old snowman? Water.) that she wants to share, a new single from one of her favorite bands she wants to play for him. Chloe leaves her to her preparations and grabs Trixie’s tablet to set up the call.

When he answers, Lucifer is lounging on his couch. He’s wearing that amused but detached look on his face that he uses whenever he’s pretending he doesn’t feel connected to the humans around him. She knows exactly what it would be like if she were there beside him, cologne and whiskey scenting the air, the cool breeze from his patio, the stillness broken by the clink of ice cubes in a tumbler. An easy night. Languid.

“Detective! Is the urchin prepared for our chat?”

Chloe blinks herself back to reality. “Oh, just wait. You’re in for a whole multimedia presentation. She’s really excited, Lucifer. Thank you.”

“Well, I would be falling down on my devil duties if I allowed Daniel to be the only masculine influence in her life.”

“Mmhmm.” Chloe shakes her head and walks back into Trixie’s room, handing the tablet off to her daughter who greats Lucifer with her typical shout of his name.

Leaving the two of them to catch up, Chloe returns to the living room. She texts Ella to see if she’ll be able to add any information to the pile before starting to sift through Dan’s work. It’s a lot, some of it difficult to read, in that it shows him in what had to have been the first flush of grief. There are random asides and accusations that don’t make much sense—he appears to have spent a couple of days looking into a barista just because Pierce always got his coffee from the same shop at the same time and seemed friendly with the staff. It’ll be a job just paring everything down to the relevant information.

She keeps half her attention on Trixie throughout her work, listening to her daughter giggle and hearing some very not-to-Chloe’s-taste music. When she hears Trixie’s sing-song, “Bye, Lucifer!” she sets aside the case files and goes back into Trixie’s room.

“Good chat?” she asks, taking the tablet from Trixie and setting it on her nightstand.

“Yeah. He says he’s trying his best to get better so he can see me in person. I told him people aren’t in charge of diseases like that, but he didn’t believe me.”

“Lucifer sometimes has trouble admitting he isn’t in charge of everything.”

Trixie just sends her a pointed look.

“All right, bed.” Chloe shamelessly pulls the Mom card to end the conversation there, tucking Trixie in and kissing her forehead.

Ella doesn’t get back to her that night, and eventually Chloe’s forced to admit she’s not going to get anywhere with Dan’s notes until she gets some sleep. The case slips away from her thoughts until she finds herself, once again, lying awake in bed, staring at her ceiling.

She can’t stop thinking about Lucifer.

She thinks about him deciding to go off on his own, making his own plan with Bauda, and then reeling himself in, coming back to her. Treating her as his partner. She thinks of him backing off when their argument was about to turn heated, bringing them around to a point where they could understand each other. She thinks of him, taking time to make Trixie laugh, of him trying so hard to fit himself into her life. She wonders why he would possibly want to.

But mostly, again and again and again, she thinks of his little smirk, the exact slant of his eyebrows, the little glimpse of his tongue she got as he said, “I have made a home movie or two before, Detective.”

The thoughts are still there when she wakes up in the morning. She can’t even make breakfast for her kid without remembering him breaking into her home because he wanted to feed her—before they were even really friends! He just does these things for her, except now he isn’t breaking in. He’s asking her to join him.

Chloe is certain that the bullet necklace did not use to be so distracting.

An email from Ella had been waiting for her when she got back from dropping Trixie at school, and between the information in that and Dan’s notes, Chloe has more than enough to keep her busy if she could just concentrate. The necklace is a menace. It slips out of her neckline, dangling down as she leans over Dan’s files. It thumps against her chest whenever she leans back to think. It hangs almost exactly over the spot where Kevlar had saved her from Pierce’s henchman’s gunfire. Her bruise is all but healed, but her flesh still feels tender under the cool metal of Lucifer’s gift.

She makes him vulnerable.

Of course, when Lucifer originally gave her the necklace, she didn’t know the literal nature of that sentiment. Didn’t know that standing beside her was the equivalent of risking his life. Didn’t know that, for some reason, he considers that vulnerability precious, something he’s literally giving her, wants her to have and hold and display proudly around her neck. He hadn’t been able to tell her, hadn’t known how, maybe, but he’d still gone out of his way to find the bullet, keep it close for nearly two years, and then surrender it to her even as their relationship started to break down.

She misses him.

Ridiculous. They spoke yesterday, will speak later today, when they have a call scheduled to test the cameras he’s setting up. They’ve been texting back and forth as she works, her letting him know of any names he should add to his guest list based on Dan and Ella’s information, and him sharing details of a few additional names that might link Thorston and Pierce gathered through his contacts. He still trusts her and her abilities, even though she let him down. She wonders how therapy with Linda is going, how his wings are holding up with Maze out of town, whether he’s starting to come to terms with the fact that Chloe still trusts him and his abilities, even knowing who he is.

Focus, she tells herself yet again. The children’s charity Thorston had been involved with is looking more and more like the primary link between him and Pierce. Pierce hadn’t been an official part of the organization, but he was at every event, lurking at the edges of photographs showing picnics and casino nights and career fairs. Chloe starts making a list of any dark haired girls of the right type that she finds in the charity photographs, but without much hope it’ll lead to anything.

There is one name buried in Charlotte’s files that Chloe keeps returning to, a man one of Pierce’s lieutenants occasionally spoke with. Eddie Gauchino. She recognizes that name and the face that goes with it, but she can’t pinpoint from where. Too many years working too many cases. A Google search shows that whoever he used to be, he’s now an associate at some rich dude’s boutique consulting firm. Not much help, but it gives her a new avenue to start down. Slowly, Chloe begins to assemble a case board of her own.

Her fingers only stray to the chain around her neck every five minutes or so.

Chapter Text

I have made a home movie or two before.

Lucifer has so many cameras. Chloe had pictured maybe a nanny cam or two, but he’s got the entire penthouse wired as though the next big reality TV show is going to be filmed there—The Real World: Orgy House. And the quality! These cameras have a much higher resolution than anything the department would have been able to offer, the colors sharp and details clear. She’d been surprised at how comfortable he seemed setting them up; he isn’t the most tech savvy person she knows, which is understandable for someone older than the use of tools.

I have made a home movie or two before, Detective.

Cameras fully installed, Lucifer leads her on a nonchalant remote tour of his home while she watches from her apartment via the software installed on her laptop. He appears utterly at ease, unconcerned about being watched. Of course. He likes attention, often gets cranky when he’s background rather than center stage. It’s far too easy to imagine him starring in more than one intimate video—impossible, in fact, to think that he hasn’t been making porn for as long as the technology has been available. Scattered throughout the city there have to be dozens of people, at a minimum, who have the ability to turn on their cell phones and pull up his image any time the fancy strikes. Dozens of unknown people who can watch him smile and moan and come with a simple press of their fingers. Dozens of people who aren’t her. Thousands more who’ve seen it in the flesh.

She shouldn’t be thinking like this. She’d made her decisions, established her boundaries. None of those other people get to see him when he’s hurting, when he’s serious, when he’s at rest, when he’s soft and knowable. None of them are his partner. She made that trade off long ago. It’s fine.

On her laptop screen, Lucifer darts up the steps to his bedroom and she changes the camera feed to follow him. He walks the room in a grid pattern, allowing her to ensure there are no blind spots. He’s chattering away at her, of course, because that is what he does, the Bluetooth he’s wearing in his left ear barely visible on screen. His current topic of choice is the new tailor he’s auditioning, his usual man having given notice of his imminent retirement plans. Chloe is trying to pay attention while she checks the camera angles, making sure they’ll be covered during whatever happens the following night, but the thought remains. Dozens, possibly hundreds, possibly thousands, of videos of him. Of his mouth, his face, his elastic expressions, silly or stern as the mood strikes.

Lucifer, she prays at him impulsively, but he’s too caught up in his wardrobe to hear her.

“Absolute rubbish, Detective. You wouldn’t believe it if I showed you.”

She’ll believe anything of him, now that she knows just how huge a mistake not believing him had been, but he is of course talking about the fit of a jacket that had been delivered that morning. He moves into his closet, and she changes the camera display again to follow.

“I’m sure I won’t be able to tell the difference,” she says into her laptop’s microphone. “Looks like that’s the whole apartment—no blind spots.”

“We’re still one room short of finished, Detective,” he says, looking in the direction of the camera and nodding his head to the side. He leads her into the bathroom, where, unsurprisingly, the image remains fully colored and high def, the camera focused on the shower and vanity. Obviously she will be leaving this camera off tomorrow. He’s such an exhibitionist. Shameless. She can imagine him purring for the camera, inviting his lovers to film a little memento of their time with him. She could probably find videos of him online, if she took the time to search. Maybe some website has their videos listed side by side: Devil Does Dallas next to Hot Tub Hottie High-Quality Clip. She remembers the rush she’d felt, stepping out of the water twenty years ago, all of the cameras, all of the attention, on her, before she’d come to understand the consequences that come from that sort of display. Lucifer refuses to care about such consequences, so of course he never has to face them.

“Why do you even have all of these cameras, anyway?”

“I met the most charming exhibitionist couple who asked for a delightful favor. I arranged a gathering in the penthouse for like-minded individuals and closed down Lux for a private party of voyeurs who enjoyed watching the action via the screens at the bar. Ended up having two orgies that night.” He smiles wistfully.

“And which one did you take part in?” she asks wryly, already knowing the answer.

“I’m too good a host to ignore any of my guests, Detective. But ultimately I knew the voyeurs would prefer a performance, and I hate to disappoint an eager audience. Which is why I cannot abide a tailor creating abominations on the level of the jacket this chap sent me. The public demands I look my best.” Lucifer’s attention quickly returns to more pressing matters. “Even you’d be able to tell—the shoulders are completely askew. Do I look like I have cockeyed shoulders?” He pivots, arms wide, towards the camera. Of course she already knows his shoulders are powerful and square. Perfect for gripping.

“So show me.” She doesn’t know where the words come from. She just says them, watching him preen on the screen before her.

“You can’t expect me to wear it out in public!” He throws a scandalized look at the camera. He knows where they all are, knows the angles, how to display himself on them. How to display himself to her, she thinks.

“Show me now. Go put on the jacket.” For some reason, her hands are trembling.

“Fancy a bit of a fashion shoot, do you?” he asks with a wink, but he obligingly turns back towards his closet, clearly eager for an excuse to complain in more detail.

He slips off the black jacket he’s wearing, straightens his shirtsleeves, and pulls a navy blue jacket off of its hanger. He holds it up to the camera, as though its deficiencies are self-evident.

“Just look at these cuffs. You won’t believe it when it’s on. Imagine, a suit that I can’t make look good.”

“I can’t imagine that,” she says too honestly, immediately pressing a hand over her mouth and leaning back from the screen. Thankfully he can’t see her, but she can still feel the blush spreading over her cheeks. It’s this case. Thorston’s stupid group, and the conversations it’s forced them to have. Of course her mind can’t stop drifting in that direction.

But on her laptop screen, he is looking directly into the camera, a shy smile on his lips, and even though it quickly morphs into one of his more typical leers, the sweetness of it stays with her.

“I do hate to disabuse you of that confidence in me, Detective, but look!” He slips the jacket on. Predictably, she has no idea what he was talking about with regards to the shoulders, but she can tell that overall it hangs a bit looser than his typical jackets. Still, he looks good.

“I don’t see the problem,” she says as he turns in place, modeling himself—modeling the jacket for her. “What about the pants?”

“Trousers, Detective, unless you want to have a very different conversation. What about them?”

“Are they just as bad? Will I be shocked by them as well?”

The look he gives the camera is uncertain, as though he’s trying to puzzle out a riddle she’s telling. “Their tailoring is equally horrid. I’m happy to model them for you, if you’ve taken an interest.”

“Show me.”

“At once!” He lifts his eyebrows and grins, but then he pulls the navy blue pants off of their hanger before remembering to remove the black pair he’s already wearing. He awkwardly hangs the navy pair on a wall hook before lifting his feet one at a time to pull off his shoes.

It’s not that the size of his feet is a surprise, it’s that his shoes look so much larger when they aren’t balanced out by the rest of him. Chloe’s gaze lingers on them as Lucifer sets the pair neatly against the wall, and then she follows his hands as they return to his belt. As he undoes the buckle, she becomes aware that he’s stopped chattering.

“Is it just the suit, or have you had to deal with subpar accessories as well?” she prompts.

He chuckles. “Fortunately no. My belt supply remains of the highest quality.” He slips the strip of leather from it’s loops with a proper flourish. His shirttails are long enough that, with the angle of the camera and despite his characteristic lack of underwear, he’s not really revealing much when he pushes his pants down, but he still steps free of them with unexpected quickness to slide into the waiting navy blue pair.

“Oh, that is a shame,” she says without thinking, noting the way this pair of pants does nothing to show off the curve of his ass.

“Thank you!” he exclaims, his strange moment of reserve gone. “I told him, why try to hide perfection?” He bends over, cheekily directing the posterior in question her way.

“They are rather baggy, aren’t they? No, you’ll have to send them back.”

“I intend to! I have standards for my closet, Detective. These do not rate the space it would take to keep them.”

“Do you have a favorite?”

He cocks his head, tugging at his lapels. “Favorite?”

“Suit. One that you think fits you best. As a comparison.”

“Shall I be your doll, Detective?” Her breath hitches when his voice dips low. This is the way their game is played. He pushes buttons, he flirts, he tempts. He never follows through. She is supposed to shut him down now, redirect them towards the case. The cameras are placed and checked; there’s no need for her to still be watching him. Her fingers drift, yet again, to the bullet hanging around her neck.

“Which one would you pick?” She can feel the blood thrumming through her veins.

He bites his bottom lip, turns away from the camera and towards the rows of hanging suits. The selection process is very serious business. He fingers fabrics, evaluates lapel styles, considers linings. He pulls out a black suit, holds it up in front of him, head cocked to the side. After a brief glance at the camera, however, he returns it to its place and continues on.

His final selection is a three-piece in a vibrant indigo. Chloe wishes she knew more about mens fashion, because she is certain there are a lot of additional details that would tell her why this one is better than the black, but she only knows that she appreciates seeing him in bolder colors. Black definitely works on him—paired with a white shirt and red pocket square, it’s practically his signature look—but it also reminds her of the slick playboy she’d initially dismissed him as, not the bright, impish partner she knows. His devilish self versus her devil. On screen, he starts to slide off the navy jacket, putting a bit more shimmy into the move this time, but she stops him.

“What about the shirt? Is that the one you’d wear with it?”

He pauses, looks down at his socked feet, and Chloe clenches her fingers together hard in front of her. This isn’t their game. She’s blown it, pushed a step too far. He’s uncomfortable.

But then he looks up at the camera, and his face is utterly open and willing, and she has to bite one of her knuckles to muffle her response. Her gaze darts around her empty living room. Trixie is working on a group project with a friend, and won’t be home for anther two hours. No one else has access to this camera stream. It’s not recording.

The word comes out as a prayer. Color?

“Green.” But it sounds like, Please.

She takes five deep breaths, four count in, eight count out, trying to calm herself enough to speak without her voice shaking.

“Suit. Shirt. Socks. Belt. Shoes. Cufflinks. Pocket square.” She forms each word like it’s a sentence on its own. A simple list of nouns, but they both know she’s just given him instructions. She can see his breath shudder through him, sees it get caught in his chest before coming out in a rush that drops his shoulders and ends with his head hanging loose on his neck.

“As you wish, Detective.”

This time, his search is more focused. There’s clearly a specific subset of shirts he wears with this suit, because he stands still in front of one section of his wardrobe for several minutes, considering, before he pulls out one in an electric violet. He hangs this with the suit and approaches some of the built-in drawers. Without any hesitation he pulls out a pair of argyle socks patterned with a variety blue and purple diamonds. For the belt and shoes both he selects a rich cognac color. The cufflinks take him longer, and in the end she can only tell that they are silverish. The pocket square selection takes the longest; he pulls out several, holding them against the shirt and the suit to judge their suitability, before deciding on one in a rich cream patterned with twisting vines of verdant green and royal purple. Items assembled, he looks back up at the camera.

Waiting. For directions.

“Well, get dressed.” Her hands grip her thighs.

He grants her a smile, the devilish, teasing one. “As you wish, Detective.” Once again, he starts to shimmy out of his jacket.

He doesn’t make it camp, doesn’t turn this into an act. His movements are flirtatious, but also casual, as though they have undressed for each other before, as though he has come home after work and is stripping off the day. The jacket falls from his shoulders to his hands, and, despite it’s lackluster tailoring, he still hangs it carefully, smoothing and straightening its lines, allowing her to see his arms flex and move under the perfect fit of his white dress shirt. He removes his cufflinks, takes them over to his jewelry case, and even spends a moment polishing them with a small cloth before he places them inside. Care, precision, an unwillingness to rush the task.

Her breath catches when he unbuttons his pants, but all he does is pull his shirttails out before beginning to work on the buttons running down his torso. He’s angled himself, giving her a three-quarters view of his front. It highlights the narrowness of his waist, allows for a bit of an additional reveal when he twists towards the camera as he pulls the shirt open and off of his shoulders, bringing his defined chest fully into view. She can tell that his breathing is heavier than usual, and the space between her legs begins to ache. He pulls the shirt from his arms and turns further towards the camera, abdominal muscles tightening appealingly as he reaches across himself to grab a hanger for the shirt. He hangs it in a separate section of his closet, then pauses a moment, stretching his arms above his head and loosening his shoulders. It gives her an excellent view of the size of him, his height and breadth, of the swell of his pecs and the line of muscles narrowing down to the v of his hips. Then he swings his arms back down and picks up each foot in turn to neglegently pull his socks off. He tosses them casually into a hamper, hands moving immediately to his waist. He’s returned to that three-quarter position in front of the camera, and she bites her bottom lip as his fingers dip below his waistband, but he turns away as he pushes his pants down his legs, presenting her with a view of his rather lovely behind as he steps free of his last piece of clothing.

A small sound of satisfaction escapes her as she considers the the definition in his calves, the flexing of his thighs, the power in his back. He looks at the camera over his shoulder, obviously pleased with himself. “Every suit starts with the wearer, Detective. I do like to give my tailors the best material to work with. But you wanted to see me clothed. Or did you?”

His expression invites her to ignore the suit, to let him direct a different type of show for her. But his hands are raised just a fraction towards the waiting outfit, as though he doesn’t really want her to hand the reigns back to him just yet.

“I want to see you wearing the clothes you picked out to impress me.”

His eyes close briefly, a tremor passing down his arms before he does as directed. Shirt first, then socks. Pants, vest, cufflinks, jacket, shoes, pocket square. He’s visibly aroused—not hard, but interested—yet apparently unconcerned with that fact. His actions continue on as before, careful, unhurried, aware of the small details. When his jacket is settled correctly on his shoulders and his pocket square is flared to perfection, he paces in a small circle, giving her the full three-sixty view. The peacock with his feathers on full display.

“See, Detective. Clearly a superior garment.”

She hums noncommittally. “What else would you do? When getting ready?”

“You’re right, of course. The me is in the details.” He leads her back to the bathroom with a jaunty step. There, he reapplies his eyeliner, takes a file to one disobedient nail, refreshes his cologne and spends an inordinate amount of time arranging his hair. When he finally finishes, he claps his hands together, spins once in place, and then locks eyes on the camera through the reflection in the mirror. “There you are, Detective. Perfection!”

Chloe nods, alone in her own home. “This is how you prefer to look, at your absolute best?”

“Well, I can’t see any room for improvement, can you?”

She cannot. He is beautiful and proud, but most importantly everything about his appearance right now was chosen knowing she would be his only audience. “Model it for me.”

She gets a brief glimpse of his tongue flicking out from between his teeth. “With pleasure.”

He strides back to the closet and uses it as his personal catwalk. He struts, he smooths his hands down the front of his vest, he flairs out the jacket to show the silk lining, then spins and flips up the back of it to show off the fit of his trousers. He poses, shoots his cuffs, and gazes up at the camera through lowered lashes with a come-hither grin on his mouth.

Chloe’s finger hovers over the line of his jaw as it appears on her screen.

“You look lovely, Lucifer,” she says. Her voice is soft, quiet, but full of conviction, and it’s back on his face, that shy look from before. He’s slower to hide it this time.

“Make yourself a drink.”

He rubs his palms together. “Sounds marvelous. Will you join me? I believe I placed a bottle of cabernet sauvignon you’ll like in the leftmost lower cabinet in your kitchen.”

She snorts. “How much alcohol do you have hidden in my apartment?” She grabs the laptop and takes it with her in search of his gift. The wine is right where he promised, and she pours a glass while listening to the sound of a tumbler being filled on his end of their connection.

“I’m not sure, these days. I’ve been lax about restocking—I shall have to take an inventory, the next time you invite me over.” On screen, he’s holding a glass of whiskey and leaning against his bar, the picture of a wealthy bachelor at leisure.

She can’t remember the last time she deliberately invited him over. More than a month, certainly, possibly two. He didn’t use to wait for an invitation. Chloe takes a sip of wine to distract herself. It’s tart without being overly dry, and she swallows with pleasure.

“I do like the wine, Lucifer. Thank you.”

He tips his own glass towards the camera and turns his face towards the windows walling his home.

“It’s a nice day; take your drink out to the balcony.”

He straightens without complaint and ambles outdoors. She has two camera angles on him as he stands on the balcony, one giving her the stretch of his back, the other showing him in profile. He leans down so his forearms rest upon the railing, whiskey tumbler clasped loosely in his right hand. The sun is low in the sky now, gentle rays playing over his contented face. A breeze pulls at his hair, and he leans into it, because as vain as he is, he’d never let worry about the state of his hair intrude on his enjoyment of everything the world has to offer. She takes her laptop and her wine back to the couch, relaxing backwards, enjoying him while he enjoys the skyline. The rising tension she’d felt while he undressed for her has faded to the background. They could end this…experiment…here. It’s been a bit of a weird moment between them, but they haven’t really done anything yet. He modeled a suit; they shared a drink. Nothing has changed.

She misses him. This him, vain and flirty and comfortable. The him he keeps swallowing down whenever they’re with each other because he’s afraid of how she’ll react to him, both physically and emotionally. She knows that the whole poisonous thing he’s doing now is mostly due to self-loathing, a physical manifestation of how he views his presence in her life. But that’s not all it is. Toxicity is a defense mechanism; she can hurt him. She doesn’t want to, though. She wants him smiling and loose limbed and safe.

“Play me something.”

Lucifer turns his face up for one more moment of sun, then tips his drink back to finish the dregs.

“Any requests?”

“Something you enjoy, that you’d like me to enjoy with you.”

He hums, ruminating, and she imagines she can see the sound vibrating down his throat even as a shiver climbs her back.

“Take your jacket off.”

He comp1ies, setting his tumbler down on the bar inside before tossing the jacket to lie neatly beside it. Once enthroned on the piano bench in his shirtsleeves, he begins playing meanderingly, testing out notes here and there without settling into a specific song. Two of the five cameras placed in his living room give her a view of his fingers, long and deliberate on the keys. Her breathing starts to pick up again.

“Roll up your sleeves. Let me see your forearms.”

“Yes, they do rather resemble those of a Disney prince, don’t they?” he says, lifting his fingers from the keyboard and removing his cufflinks, stowing them away in his vest pocket. “Not as beefy as some,” he mutters, pausing for a moment as he rolls up his left sleeve before continuing, “but quite the popular attraction none-the-less.”

Chloe recalls Ella raving about Pierce’s arms, recalls not exactly disagreeing on the point. Pierce’s body had been all blunt strength, seemingly straightforward in form and intent. Lucifer is just as strong, stronger, really, but built on more delicate lines, a hint of vulnerability in the stretch of forearm that he reveals with each turn of his cuff. She recalls how gently he’d touched her shoulders in the loft after Pierce’s death. Chloe would touch his forearms with that same gentleness, let him know that she wouldn’t hurt him. She’d caress him, kiss the inside of his elbows, discover if the soft, pale undersides of his arms are ticklish.

Tension rebuilds in her chest, moves down her body to pool in her lower abdomen.

Arms exposed as requested, Lucifer returns his hands to the keyboard. He’s decided on a song, low and bluesy, on the edge of sad but all the more beautiful for it. Chloe doesn’t know much about music outside of 90s pop, Dan’s classic rock and Trixie’s K-pop, but she likes this. It makes her think of Father Frank, of how caring Lucifer can be with anyone willing to surprise him. She imagines herself across town, sitting next to him on the bench, his arm brushing hers. His gaze would alternate between her and the keys, his face swaying towards her with a smile whenever the bass line took the fore.

“If I were there with you, I’d be leaning against your side, head resting on your shoulder.” She watches the shoulders in question straighten on her screen, but otherwise he doesn’t respond.

“I’d reach over, place my hand on you thigh just above the knee. Take your left hand off the keys and put it there, right where my hand would be. Keep playing with the right.”

His gaze finds one of the cameras, his eyes wide. Looking straight at her, he slips his left hand from the keys to rest on his leg. His right hand continues on, adjusting to carrying the whole song without pause. His fingers, so deft, are a little shakier now.

“Good. Slide your hand down onto your inner thigh. Brush your thumb back and forth. Take in the texture of your, uh, trousers,” she remembers the Britishism just in time, before she can break the mood by saying ‘pants’ again. “That’s my thumb on you, soft and warm through the wool.”

“Yes, Detective.” His gaze remains steady, but his mouth has grown a little slack, his face opening up with arousal. Her breath catches in her throat at the sight. This is for me, she marvels. Just for me.

“Slowly, slowly, I would drag my hand up your inner thigh. Slowly. Show me what I’d do? Good, feel the warmth of my skin through your trouser leg, gliding up until…Stop.”

He freezes, the room falling silent. His mouth hangs open, his breathing heavy. His eyelids have drooped, eyelashes splayed low.

“Good, Lucifer. Stoke back down, then up again. Keep it slow. Don’t go any higher than before. I’m there with you, enjoying a nice evening. A drink, some music. You.”

Chloe strokes her own thigh, imagining his hand, the weight of it, his long fingers wrapping almost fully around her leg. She watches his movements on the screen, watches his breath become short each time he reaches the uppermost limit she’s imposed. His right hand picks the melody line back up, but it’s urgent now, a top line unfulfilled, searching for it’s bass.

She waits until his hand is sliding up his thigh again; right before he reaches the zenith she cuts him off. “Unbutton your vest.”

The carefulness he displayed while dressing is gone. He pulls impatiently at his buttons, and she tsks at him from her couch, where the calm of her voice is belied by the way she is leaning forward, straining towards the image before her, one hand high on her own left thigh, the other gripping the edge of the laptop screen. “Careful, Lucifer. That is my suit now; I wouldn’t want you to damage it.”

“No, Detective,” he agrees, voice pained.

“Place your hand on your abdomen, feel yourself breathing, your muscles expanding and contracting through your shirt.” She mirrors his movement, disappointed to feel her own bargain-bin flannel rather than his expensive cotton. “That’s my hand on you, centering you. I’m behind you now, my arm around you, pulling you towards me. My breasts are pressed against your back—” he moans, and the music cuts off again as the fingers of his right hand spasm into a fist, “—and my cheek is pressed against yours. You’re asking me something. What are you asking for?”

His eyes are closed, his chin tilted towards her imaginary form as his breathing speeds. “Please, will you touch me?”

Chloe clenches her thighs together. “I am touching you, Lucifer. You’ll have to be more specific.”

“I want—please, Detective?”

“You can ask. I want you to ask.”

“Skin. I want your skin on my skin, please.”

She wants it, too, his words highlighting the thirst she’s been ignoring ever since his current self-actualization problem reared it’s head. There’s a warmth, an electricity, a comfort that comes from touching him that she can get nowhere else. That’s not a part of this, though. For this moment, she can set her own yearning aside, focus on him. “I don’t know,” she says, “do you deserve that? This is the second time you’ve stopped playing without permission.”

Permission. She hadn’t known she was going to use that word, feels a little lost, but her whole body tingles when the fingers of his right hand jerk open, finding their spot on the keys. He plucks out a simple, repetitive pattern, but the sound of the piano isn’t what she’s hearing. She just hears him saying I want this, over and over with each note.

Her body is liquefying, but sharp certainty takes up residency in her brain. “Thank you, Lucifer,” she says, voice so polite he might have just passed her the salt. Let him know you’ve got him, her certainty tells her. “I’ve always loved seeing you play. Can’t you hear me say so? My breath, hot against your ear as I let you know just how much I’ve enjoyed watching you? You sound wonderful, of course. You are an excellent pianist. But looking at you—you are alive in a way no one else I’ve ever met has been. You’ve experienced so much, but every emotion appears brand new on your face, and you share each and every thing you feel when you play.”

He sighs, and his right hand plucks out a stronger melody. It makes her smile, knowing he’s trying to show off for her.

“Your fingers…they are quite distracting, aren’t they? I’d have to pause for a bit, still leaning against your back, bent over you, surrounding you, I’d have to pause and watch them. Think for a moment about what else those fingers can do.”

“Everything you want, Detective.” He sounds so earnest. It hits her like a wave, a roll of sensation against her skin—his imagined touch. Her body shivers, her breasts ache, her toes curl. She muffles a gasp with the back of her hand, goes through her breathing exercises again.

“Take my hand off your stomach, use it to unbutton your shirt. Remember, gently.”

He nods, eyes closed tight in concentration as his fingers move purely by feel from button to button.

“Spread the fabric a bit. Good. Now explore. I want to feel the grooves in your abdomen, feel the puckering of your nipples. I’ve never gotten the chance to touch you like this. I’d be thorough, getting to know you.”

He groans, deep and loud, as he pets himself. “Do I please you, Detective?”

Chloe makes quick work of the buttons on her own shirt and casts it aside, suddenly far too hot. She cups a breast, tweaks her nipple through the fabric of her bra, pretending simultaneously that it’s her fingers on him and his fingers on her.

“Very much, Lucifer. Unbuckle your belt.”

“Detective.” His voice sounds a bit slurred now. He struggles to obey her one-handed, and his playing definitely suffers, but she doesn’t much care. She laughs softly in relief when the belt is finally out of their way.

“Perfect, Lucifer. I bet you’ve got an idea of what I’d do next, if I were there with you now. But I’m not. I’m all the way across town, at home on my own. While you’ve been prettying yourself up for me, I’ve been relaxing on the couch, hair in a messy bun. No makeup. Boring beige bra, a pair of jeans you’ve seen me wear a hundred times.”

“You’re gorgeous,” he moans, heartfelt, and she smiles.

“Think of those jeans, think of how my legs look, think of where they meet. I’m cupping myself there now,” she says, matching actions to words. “Do you like that, knowing I’m so turned on watching you that I’m touching myself through my jeans?”

His Adam’s apple bobs as he swallows. “Yes, Detective.”

“Join me. Touch yourself.”

He moans again, left hand immediately dropping to rub himself through his pants, but her gaze remains locked, transfixed by his face. If an artist could paint him right now, they’d title the painting ‘The Agony of Hope.’

“Unbutton your trousers. Slide your left hand inside. Stroke yourself.”

He shudders when he takes himself in hand. She unfastens her jeans and scoots them off her hips, slipping one hand into her underwear to skim lazily over the seam of her outer lips. There’s no hurry; he will last as long as she wants, and she wants him to last. Who could care about orgasms when she has Lucifer, sitting exactly where she put him, all of his attention on her, telling her yes, again and again and again?

“Is it good?” she asks, sinking her fingers down between her folds. She’s slick, her insides throbbing in time with his movements. “Tell me how it feels.”

“Fucking amazing,” he gasps. “Detective, please, tell me what you’re doing. Let me see it.”

She deliberately lets slip the slightest hint of a moan, watching his hand squeeze tighter, stroke faster in response. “I’m sliding a finger inside myself and cursing the fact that it isn’t yours.”

“I want it to be. It’s all I want, to make you feel good. Will you come? Will you let me make you come?”

“Not yet.” He arches slightly at her easy refusal. “We go at my speed, don’t we?”

“Yes, Detective.”

“Maybe you need a cool down. Take your hand off your cock.” Thrillingly daring to be the one spouting dirty words at him while his own language remains relatively chaste. He obeys her with a slight whine. “Play with your nipples. Show me what you’d do if I ever allowed you to touch my breasts.”

He does his best, rolling a nipple between thumb and forefinger, pressing lightly with the edge of his fingernail while she teases herself with her own hand. Teases herself with the sight of him. Bringing her other hand down to apply pressure to her clit, she ruthlessly winds him up like a toy. She allows him to take hold of his cock again, but makes him keep his grip loose and his strokes slow. When he’s panting in frustration, she orders him to let go once more, find some other spot to play with. She breaks him down until he is sweating and ragged, his tendons straining as he tries to follow her lead, to not move faster than she’s allowed. It hurts, how gorgeous he is like this. So generous, her devil. She wants to climb on top of him, bite his earlobe. She wants to know everything anyone has ever known about his body and all the things they’d never bothered to learn.

“Stroke you neck,” she says. “Show me where my mouth should be, where it feels best.”

Hips shifting, he presses his fingers to a spot just below the hinge of his jaw on the left side of his throat. She copies the movement on herself, using eyes and touch to cement the location in her memory. “That’s mine, now. No one else touches you there.”

“Yes, Detective.”

“Feel my mouth on you, my lips, my teeth. I’m marking the spot. Mine.”

“Yes.” He’s pleading, and she can’t help but moan in response. He’s pressing so hard into his own flesh. She wonders if he’ll bruise, if her phantom mouth can use his fingers to raise a hickey on his skin.

“Put your hand back on your cock. Fast and tight.” He does so, his torso curling in slightly as he resumes stroking. His right hand is still plunking out a string of amelodic notes as he attempts to behave for her, and seeing him make that effort is somehow just as erotic as the sight of his hand moving against his own flesh. “I’m there with you, Lucifer,” she says as she feels the heat within her coil tighter and tighter. “You can hear me moaning in your ear now. You can smell my desire for you. You can feel my hand, can’t you? Stroking you?”

“Yes,” he grunts.

“My good devil,” she drawls, voice so husky she sounds like a stranger. “So pretty for me. So willing. You’ll come when I tell you to, won’t you?”

“Yes, Detective.” His assent is fervent. They are making a holy covenant between them, a promise of pleasure encouraged and exchanged. She bucks against her own hand, lets loose a cry that he echos, sounding like he would die to hear her again.

“Not yet. Not yet,” she warns, her finish just out of reach. “Open your eyes. I want to see them—look at me. Do you want me to come?”

“Please,” he begs.

“More than you want your own orgasm?”

“Yes. Always. Please, Detective.”

“What if I want to see you spurt all over your own hand, all over that suit you wore just for me? What if I want to take your perfect, pressed and primped self and absolutely wreck you?”

“I want it. Yes, that, anything.”

“Come.”

A switch flips in him, his whole body contracts, and he obeys, calling her name. Not detective, but “Chloe,” in a ruined, strained voice that pushes her over the edge into her own orgasm.

Aftershocks are still twitching through her when her brain catches up to what she’s just done. Whatever self-assurance had taken her over is gone now, and she’s at a loss as to how she allowed this to happen. No, not allowed. Commanded. She closes her eyes and sees again in her mind those imagined clips from the home movies he’s made with those dozens or hundreds or thousands of other people. Countless people who’ve clearly driven her crazy with jealousy, because there are a lot of reasons she should not have done, well, that. They’re still working on communicating honestly with each other, they don’t know for certain whether she has free will, she’s still having random bouts of panic over everything that’s happened since she found out about Pierce, he’s self-actualized himself into a hazard, and to say that she hasn’t just had sex with a third coworker would be splitting too fine a hair for her conscience to allow. She can still hear Lucifer’s ragged post-orgasm breathing through her laptop speakers. Worse, she can still hear his right hand plunking out random notes on the piano. Apparently they’re not done yet.

Fuck, she thinks, eyes snapping open as she pushes herself to sit upright after having slipped nearly off of the couch during the final moments of their exchange. Various conversations from the past week flit through her mind. She was in charge. He was playing her sub. That isn’t their game, this isn’t what they do. He is the loud, brash, brazen one. He is the one with eons of experience, who knows words like ‘aftercare’ and who can handle these situations.

Her hands are shaking again, for a very different reason.

“That’s good, Lucfer,” she says, no longer able to keep her voice steady. “You were wonderful, perfect. You can stop playing now.”

His hand drifts from the keyboard to his lap. He looks mussed and a little dopey, smile lazy and soft. “Your pleasure is the most beautiful sound to ever grace this earth, Detective.”

She chuckles, a bit uncomfortably. “Thank you. Um, just, just rest there a moment. Let me know when you feel yourself again, yeah?”

“Yes, Detective.” He’s swaying a bit, side to side, grinning. It calms her to see him so relaxed. He’d looked so hungry, desperate really, while she talked him off, and it had been glorious. Painfully pretty, the clench of his jaw when he came. But she wants this, too. His silliness and his unexpected bouts of naivete, both attributes she finds all the more wonderful now that she knows who he really is. He laughs suddenly, holding up a sticky hand. “I suppose I should wash up.”

“Yes. Drink some water, too.”

“You’re remembering your training.” He smirks at the camera and rises, holding his pants up as he sways towards the bathroom. He stops at the top of the steps to his bedroom, seeking out one of the cameras again. “Detective. I—this—you are incredible. Truly, the pleasure of my life.”

“Oh.” This is why she shouldn’t make huge decisions on the fly. Advance planning Chloe would know how to respond to that without being struck silent by insecurity. Lucifer doesn’t lie, but his life has been so very long, and they hadn’t even touched. “Well, with over two years of anticipation, it’s got to have been a new experience for you, right?”

His lips droop for a second—is he disappointed in her response? did she misunderstand him?—but then he laughs again. “Indeed. A round of applause, Detective. You led quite the merry chase.”

That doesn’t sound right. But if he wants to keep this light…? “You did offer to make Hell freeze over for me. I guess you finally made it that far on your to-do list.”

“Yes.” His smile is tight now, eyes flat. “Well,” he says, looking about, and she is aware for the first time of how awkward this conversation must be for him, exposed but alone in an empty room, unable to even see her via video. “I know before we got distracted you did have one or two things you wanted to finish up before tomorrow. I won’t keep you.”

That’s a very polite way to tell her he’s done with her for the day. Her hands hover above her keyboard, like there’s some keystroke she can make that would allow her to reach out to him across the distance, to make things less awkward. But he has the right to some privacy, and it’s not like he can retreat from her without her assistance right now.

“Yeah, you’re right. Thanks, Lucifer,”—she curses internally, smacks herself in the forehead—”I mean. This was lovely.”

He ducks his head. “It was.”

“I’ll, uh, get out of your hair, though. I’m turning off all of the cameras now. All of them. You’ll be on your own again.” The views on her laptop go black one by one, only the audio connection remaining, allowing her to hear him softly saying, “Yes, I suppose I will be.”

Even more impossible to sooth him now, when she can’t see his reactions. Still, she tries. “Do you want, I mean, can I do anything? Aftercare-y? Are you okay?”

“Certainly, Detective,” he says in his brightest voice. “You can’t imagine a little video wank would be too much for me? Great fun, and something I would eagerly repeat. But right now, I really just need a shower.”

If she could only be there, fuss over him a bit, maybe she could fix things, but now more than ever she needs to respect any boundaries he puts up. “Okay. I’ll talk to you tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow. Good evening, Detective.”

“Bye, Lucifer.”

She disconnects and shoves her laptop away. Her jeans are still pushed halfway down her legs, her breasts pulled out of the cups of her bra. Her body still feels languid from pleasure, from hearing him beg for her pleasure, but her mind is an anxious mess, already listing out the many, many mistakes she’s made today. Slumping to the side, she buries her face in her hands. What now?

That night, when the loneliness that’s been dipping in and out of her awareness for weeks washes over her, it does so with a keenness that leaves her breathless. She reaches for her phone, pulls her hand back. She wants to talk to Lucifer, but she doesn’t know what to say, doesn’t want to crowd him if he wants space. It was just a little video wank. Nothing. He’s probably on the floor at Lux, wrapped up in some impossibly beautiful and carefree party-goer. Chloe’s probably the farthest thing from his mind.

What could she even say to him?

Lucifer, she thinks purposefully, with intent. Sleep well.

She closes her eyes, pretends that she doesn’t expect anything, but her fingers clench against her sheets when she hears the text notification on her phone chime.

You as well, Detective.

Miraculously, she does.

Chapter Text

Captain Monroe calls her at seven the next morning. For the first time in weeks, Chloe isn’t already awake. She’s still shaking lurid, half-forgotten dreams out of her head when she answers the phone, her professional self deserting her. It doesn’t matter. Surprise; Chloe is to report to the precinct that morning for desk duty.

Well, that’s certainly another point in the ‘Bauda isn’t running an official investigation’ column—Chloe and Lucifer haven’t exactly delivered on their end of the bargain. But it also means Chloe has to scramble to get herself and Trixie ready and out the door. She hadn’t imagined that her first post-yesterday communication with Lucifer would be a text about her work schedule, but at least it breaks the ice. Now they can pretend things are normal.

Oh God, what if things just go back to normal? She longs for and fears the possibility all at once.

He’d been so happy, before she’d said the wrong thing.

Congratulations on being back where you belong, Detective. I’ll handle everything here and be ready for you when you’re done at the precinct.

Lucifer’s text doesn’t even include a devil emoji—normal is officially out the window.

Desk duty sucks, but it’s not as bad as she’d feared. Her weeks out of the office appear to have tamped down some of the animosity she’d sensed immediately following Pierce’s death, though a couple of her fellow detectives seem a little too pleased they get to send her on errands. News about Pierce’s files has clearly gotten around—she’s sent to the evidence closet no less than six times. A minute in there and the walls start to close in.

Fortunately, there are some benefits to being stuck at her desk. She finally has a chance to look through some of her old cases. The name she recognized from Charlotte’s files—Eddie Gauchino—appears years back in her history. Chloe’s first year as a detective had been spent working vice, and Gauchino had popped up at the outskirts of two of her cases, a low level pimp who ran girls for the Scaluci family. Chloe frowns as she reads back through her notes. The Scalucis had been small time back then—a little loan sharking, some illegal gambling, but not a player amongst the bigger L.A. crime families. Now, though… On a hunch, she does a news search on the family. Sure enough, their rise to power came immediately on the heels of the weapons bust that had made Thorston’s career. Could be a coincidence, but could also mean that the Sinnerman had done them a favor by taking out a rival while installing one of his people as a captain in the LAPD at the same time.

A bakery bag thumps onto Chloe’s desk, causing her head to jerk up. “Detective Decker! Glad to see you back at work.” Detective Bauda smiles down at her, sickly sweet. “You like lemon bars, right?”

“Thanks.” Chloe casually closes her search window and makes no move towards the bag. “I was surprised to hear from the captain.”

Bauda shrugs. “Well, I really only wanted you for Lucifer’s contacts, and since he’s agreed to work with me directly now—he did tell you he’s working with me now, right?”

“I heard something about that.”

“Well, with his full cooperation, it didn’t make sense to hold up your reinstatement anymore. You know, I think I owe you an apology. All those comments I made about the two of you having an unprofessional relationship, and you aren’t even partners anymore. Shame. But don’t worry, the new lieutenant should be transferred in soon. Here’s hoping he’s cute.” Bauda holds up two sets of crossed fingers, winking suggestively, before walking off.

“Whoa. Bitch.” Ella strolls up and knocks the bakery bag off Chloe’s desk into her trash can. “Come on, let’s go get you some lunch that hasn’t been poisoned.”

After stopping to invite Dan along, they head to a sandwich shop down the block. The biggest perk of desk duty is not having to eat on the run, but Chloe still spares a wistful thought for her vending machine lunches with Lucifer as she tucks into her Reuben and Ella fills Dan in on the I.A. agent who is now Ella’s sworn enemy.

Dan furrows his brow. “Uh, is this some mean girl stuff I’m not going to understand? Like, lemon bars mean you’re…sour?”

“Dan, she basically called Chloe the office slut. The lemon bar was a dominance display, like, she’s so in charge she knows everything about Chloe, from her pastry choice to her sex life. It’s also a way to make Chloe look crazy if she fights back—Bauda was just being nice, handing out treats. Crazy Decker, can’t get along with any cops, even the ones everyone else hates.”

“Right.” Dan busies himself adding more mustard to his pastrami. “Uh, what about that secret case I’m assuming you’ve also roped Ella into helping out with, Chlo?”

Chloe takes pity on him and lays out the bare bones of that night’s operation.

“Wait, you’re going to a party tonight with members of the Scaluci crime family?”

“Maybe. I still have to see if Lucifer has a way to get them an invitation, but…”

“But he’s Lucifer, so he absolutely knows someone in that family. Hell, he probably does business with them.”

“He’s not a mobster, Dan.”

“That you know of. There’s a lot we don’t know about him, Chlo.”

I know how pretty he is when he begs. Which is not a thought she’s going to share with the class. “Anyway. You don’t need to worry about any of tonight’s guests—we aren’t doing anything to spook anyone. Basically, this is a chance to see who talks to who, maybe get a hint that points us in the right direction. Doing research without using police resources sucks.”

“One thing that might help,” Ella says, reaching for some napkins to mop up a minor meatball sub disaster. “I’ve been making buddies with one of the FBI techs. Turns out, a handful of Pierce’s guys all had the same tattoo—a phrase in Latin. ‘And God did lay a path.’”

“That sounds like Lucifer,” Dan says, jaw hardening.

“That sounds like someone who hates Lucifer,” Chloe corrects. It sounds like Thorston’s wife, is what it sounds like.

Ella tilts her head back and forth. “Believing in literal decrees from God does seem very Lucifarian, but it also ties in with Pierce’s whole ‘Angels are real and I’ve got a file on every one of them,’ thing.”

“Did Pierce have that tattoo?” Dan asks, looking at Chloe like it’s nothing.

“No.” Chloe tries not to sound harsh, but doesn’t quite succeed. “Just the circle on his arm.”

“Fake,” Ella says, moving the conversation on quickly. “Fake tattoo—used stage makeup to put it on. Weird, right? Why would anyone fake that tattoo?”

Because he didn’t want a demon to know he was mortal.

“Because he was a freak,” Dan mutters.

“You said some of his men had the tattoo. Not all?”

Ella shakes her head. “Nope. Feds think it’s maybe a sign of infighting in Pierce’s network even before his death.”

“Where would it be located? The tattoo?”

“Right over their hearts. That mean something to you?”

“Maybe.” She tells them what Shauna had said about Mrs. Thorston. “Is there a new God cult running around I’m unaware of?”

“That is a spooky coincidence,” Ella agrees. “So Thorston and Bauda were all up in Peirce’s Sinnerman business?”

“I don’t like it.” Dan is looking at Chloe, a hint of that manic grief in his eyes.

“I’ll be careful,” she assures him, taking out her phone to send a quick series of update texts to Lucifer. She wonders if Thorston would have a tattoo, or maybe Bauda. Well, Thorston would be at Lucifer’s party tonight, and people did tend to get naked at Lucifer’s. Maybe she’ll find out.

Chloe knows it would be a waste of time to go home to freshen up before heading to Lux. So she uses the bathroom at work instead, fixing her makeup so she can go sit in a room alone and watch Lucifer enjoy himself via a remote feed. Her outfit—a perfectly serviceable blazer, blouse, and skinny jeans combo—feels inexcusably dull. Lucifer hadn’t minded that yesterday. Gorgeous, he’d called her.

Well, he hadn’t been able to see her then.

She takes down her hair, fluffs it, scowls at how flat it hangs, at the kink left by her hair tie, and slaps it back up into a ponytail.

It’s not like she’s going to see him for social reasons. They’re working. They probably won’t even talk about yesterday. She looks fine.

She applies, removes, and reapplies some lipstick before forcing herself to leave.

Lux’s doors have barely opened for the evening, but there’s already a crowd. The bouncer lets Chloe in with a cheerful greeting, then sends word through his earpiece so that by the time she hits the stairs inside, the security guard in charge of crowd control for the penthouse that evening already has the elevator doors open and the carriage waiting for her. Because Lucifer, precise about his wants, has made it clear that she is always to be welcome. Chloe fidgets throughout the ride up to the penthouse, straightening her shirt, pulling down her cuffs, slicking back her hair. The elevator comes to a halt and she closes her eyes, letting out a deep breath. If he’s disappeared to Vegas again, she will literally kill him. Her eyes slide open along with the doors.

He’s barely an arm’s length away.

Security must have let him know she’d arrived. He’s standing just inside the penthouse, holding a small drink tray, looking handsome as ever, dressed in contrasting shades of blue. His hair is immaculate, his eyeliner precise, the edges of his beard sharper than she’s ever seen them. She’s distantly aware that they aren’t alone—bartenders and caterers and general gophers are busy with preparations, but they all fade into the background as she runs her eyes over the trim fit of his suit. Her gaze snags on a silver chain leading to his vest pocket.

Suit. Shirt. Socks. Belt. Shoes. Cufflinks. Pocket square. Pocket watch. The list floats through her mind, a new addition for next time. If there is a next time. If either of them want to do that again. She leaves his cravat and gloves off her list. She’s getting used to seeing him wear them, but she doesn’t like them—he doesn’t like them. They are an imposition. A barrier rather than a display.

“Good evening, Detective. Drink?” he asks, proffering his tray. “I’ve had a mocktail prepared for you, since you’re working.”

He’s on his absolute best behavior, then, not even trying to tempt her to indulge. She’s grateful even as her nervousness increases. She’d been hoping she could follow his lead on how to deal with yesterday, but he’s clearly waiting for her to decide, judging by the way he’s peering at her, smile not quite reaching his eyes.

“Thanks.” She picks up a glass from the tray. It’s bubbly and smells of citrus and because he’s being so considerate, gulping it down will do nothing to help calm her. She wishes she could steal some of his whiskey.

There’s a pause as they both try to work out the next conversational step. Lucifer sets the tray aside on the bar and raises his own glass of clearly non-mock liquor. “A pity we can’t break out the champagne yet, but a toast all the same. Congratulations on your return to duty, Detective.”

“Thanks,” she says again, like it’s the full extent of her vocabulary. They clink glasses and she takes a sip—the drink is delicious and refreshing. Exactly right. If nothing else, he’s a fantastic host. He’s so focused on her she can feel it, an invisible caress. His gaze sinks, lingers on her legs—pair of jeans you’ve seen me wear a hundred times she’d told him. This isn’t the pair from yesterday, but close enough. There’s a glimmer of something in his eyes, a hint of worship quickly tamped down, so, yeah, “Thanks,” is going to be the whole of her vocabulary for a moment because she cannot feel anything other than gratitude that she gets to be welcomed into his home, that things haven’t fallen apart yet.

“And how was your first day back?” he asks, still trying to carry the conversation for both of them. He gestures her forward, inviting her to take a seat.

“Fine. Desk duty. Paperwork.”

“A crime to waste your brain on that nonsense.”

He still just says these things to her. At least yesterday hasn’t changed that. She’d known a shared orgasm wouldn’t make him think less of her, but it is nice to hear the confirmation.

“And you? Your day? How was it?” Relieved to have finally spit out a complete thought, Chloe takes a seat on the edge of a chair, drink clutched tightly. A woman is cleaning the windows nearby, the squeak of her squeegee making Chloe twitch.

Lucifer perches on the arm of his couch, unsuccessfully faking relaxation. “Productive, though I admit I was rather distracted.”

He’s trying to catch her eyes, once again asking without asking for her to let him know how to behave, whether he’s allowed to flirt, allowed to reference the previous day. Her gaze slides to the piano, just sitting there, gleaming.

“I could play for you while we talk.” The offer is made in a low voice, with just a hint of a rumble to it, and Chloe closes her eyes, throat suddenly dry.

“Lucifer, I—”

“Chloe!”

Chloe springs to her feet as Amenadiel’s greeting echos through the room. She whips around to see him descending the steps from Lucifer’s bedroom, besuited and self-satisfied.

“It’s good to see you. I’m glad you’re doing well after our last meeting.”

Lucifer moves instantly, interposing himself between Chloe and his brother. “No—back!” he commands, pointing an imperious finger towards the bedroom.

“What’s wrong?” Chloe asks, setting down her drink and reaching instinctively for her gun, absent from its customary spot at her waist. The staff continue their bustlings, unbothered, indicating the brothers have likely been arguing all afternoon, but she still keeps a wary eye on Amenadiel, edging up to Lucifer’s side, ready to support him if needed.

“My apologies, Detective. He was meant to keep himself in storage until after you were ensconced in your observation post. I’m aware you do not wish to see him, but you did include him as part of the plans for this evening.” He looks extremely put out by this fact.

“Lucifer, no, it’s fine.” She reaches out to lay a reassuring hand on his arm, corrects herself before the touch can land, and steps forward to greet Amenadiel. “I’m glad you’re here,” she tells him, still unwilling to apologize for punching him. “It’s possible some of the guests tonight will be part of Cain’s network. I don’t actually expect any violence, but I wanted Lucifer to have some support just in case. That is, if the two of you are still getting along?” She casts a questioning glance back at Lucifer, who looks both confused and frustrated.

“I will not allow any harm to come to my brother,” Amenadiel promises just as Lucifer says, “I can handle myself—you needn’t worry.”

“Right.” It likely says nothing good about her that the introduction of interpersonal conflict has her feeling more in control of the situation. “Amenadiel—Lucifer has shown you who to keep track of tonight?”

“I’ve been given a list, yes. I’m to check everyone for tattoos if at all possible, and keep an eye on the ladies to ensure none of them are inconvenienced.”

“Inconvenienced is a word for it. And Lucifer didn’t know the last time we talked about it—you have time stopping powers, right? Are those back?”

Lucifer throws up his hands and stalks off, in a snit over something. She knows he gets ideas in his head sometimes, understands why he thinks she wouldn’t want to see his brother, but this behavior is over the top.

“No.” Amenadiel looks away. “My wings are healed, but the rest of my angelic powers remain elusive.”

“That’s fine, just taking stock of our arsenal. You understand you’ll have to pretend to get along with the guests, right? Even if they’re awful? I know you don’t have Lucifer’s issues with lying, so I need you to take up the heavy lifting there.”

Finally, Amenadiel looks insulted. “I am not dishonest.”

“Lying about lying? That’s no way to get your powers back.” Lucifer returns from the bar, having refreshed his whiskey more than once. “You see, Detective, I could have spared you from this unpleasant conversation, if you’d let me.”

“That’s enough. Amenadiel, you know how to pretend, so tonight, you pretend. Get us all the information you can. And,” she closes her eyes, reminds herself of the person she’s trying to be, “thanks for talking to Dan. He says it helped.”

She gets that beatific smile aimed at her again. “I’m glad. And I’ll do my best to be useful tonight.”

“You,” she points at Lucifer, “show me where I’m setting up for the evening.”

He regards her pointed finger with a peculiarly arrested expression before stepping back and gesturing for her to proceed him. “I’ve had a door installed on the guest suite for you.”

Chloe has spent a lot of time in this penthouse over the years and never once has she seen a guest suite. He directs her down towards his kitchen, and she sees a set of double doors has been added across the alcove that typically opens into what she thinks of as his drug den—a hookah lounge-slash-home spa. Sure enough, once opened, the doors give way to the usual array of floor cushions and pipes. The pinball machine Lucifer had been briefly obsessed with after Ella dragged him to an arcade stands in one corner, near a display case of novelty bongs, beyond which stands the in-home sauna she realizes he must have had installed in place of the guest bath. A desk has been added against the wall opposite the door, complete with a far-fancier than required computer and a spread of nine monitors, stretched three high and three across, a different camera view already displayed on each.

“Wow. I thought you’d stick me in one of the units on a lower floor or something. You didn’t have to, you know, bring in contractors for one night.”

“If you’d prefer a different apartment, that can be arranged, but I thought you might want me on hand, in case you see anything, or—or if you run into any trouble.”

In case I have another panic attack, Chloe fills in. “It’s a good thought,” she says. “Your guests won’t mind losing access to all of this?” She gestures towards the nearest of the pipes.

“They’ll make do with other entertainments.” He takes a step back, tucking his hands behind himself. “I understand that you’re the sort of commander who likes direct contact with her lieutenants, but I wanted to say, you don’t have to take on that task in this instance. If Amenadiel, or, or, anything else makes you uncomfortable, I’ll deal with it. I can keep all of that separate from you. For you.”

He’s being earnest again, but she doesn’t understand the offer. “Amenadiel is Dan’s best friend and your brother. Linda’s maybe-something. I’ll have to learn to get along with him.”

“You don’t,” he stresses. “He doesn’t even have to be around. I can—you’ll only have to deal with the things you want to.”

“No one can make that promise,” Chloe says, thinking about paperwork and menstrual cramps and Trixie’s annoying classmate Mykayla who always complains that Chloe doesn’t provide homemade organic snacks.

“Detective, what I mean is, anything about having me in your life that makes you uncomfortable. You won’t have to deal with any of that. It can be just what you wanted it to be, before. I can do that.”

She still doesn’t quite understand him, but her lip curls in reflexive revulsion. “Lucifer, no. I don’t want to force you to be anything.” She remembers chastising him yesterday, when he’d stopped playing the piano without permission, and her whole face and chest flush. It had felt right in the moment, he hadn’t seemed to mind, but does he think she wants him to, what? Give his actions over to her completely? Your leashed devil, he’d called himself. She’d thought it had been hyperbole, him letting her know that he would consult with her before acting, but given his family history, maybe she hadn’t taken him seriously enough. “That’s not—yesterday was an aberration. I don’t need that.”

He looks struck—despondent—she’s said the wrong thing again.

“Not what I meant,” she says quickly. “I just don’t want—”

“No need to explain.” He cuts her off, no longer willing to meet her gaze. “If you excuse me, it looks like my first guests are rudely punctual.”

And he’s gone, leaving Chloe alone with nine monitors full of freshly arrived party-goers. It’s not fair. Weeks of painful, honest conversation, and the moment it seems like their relationship is moving forward again, their communication completely breaks down.

Feeling stuck, Chloe settles into surveillance mode, trying to take some satisfaction from the fact that she’s finally stumbled across a way to keep Lucifer both productive and entertained while leaving herself free to get on with real police work. Real, tedious, meticulous police work. She’d told Amenadiel the truth—she doesn’t expect any violence tonight, or any big revelations. What she expects is to be able to compile a long list of potential Sinnerman connections that she can then pass on to Ella to backdoor to her FBI buddies. And if Thorston shows up and explains exactly what’s going on with his wife and her relic and Bauda’s off-the-books investigation? All the better.

At one point, a server stops in with a fresh drink and a plate of food, but otherwise she’s left undisturbed. The number of partiers steadily swells, an improbable number of people showing up well before the typical L.A. dinner hour. All of them want time with Lucifer. She shouldn’t be surprised; there’s a reason he can pull off regularly turning his dance club into a piano bar without losing customers. If he’s having a good time, the people around him will, too. Maybe it’s an extension of his mojo, the natural effect of setting a literal angel loose amongst humans, but she notices Amenadiel does not have the same affect. Different angels, different mojo, she supposes. But if they’re self-actualizing… Maybe it’s the same mojo, just different desired outcomes.

Thorston, unfortunately, is not among the early arrivals, but there’s plenty for Chloe to keep track of. She takes notes while a private prison operator suspected of trading multiple favors with the Sinnerman exchanges a more than friendly kiss with a prosecutor known for her aggressive pursuit of low-level offenders. A sheriff’s deputy shows up dressed to impress wearing a $20,000 watch. A real-estate mogul offers a friendly line of cocaine to an alderman from a neighborhood resisting gentrification.

Carlo Scaluci is here, she prays to Lucifer when a dark haired man familiar from half a dozen precinct appearances strolls off the elevator. He’s got a woman with him—young, petite, very much in line with the pets from last Friday. The woman hangs off his arm, wearing the smallest socially acceptable cocktail dress Chloe’s ever seen, and she keeps looking at Scaluci as though checking his mood. Is that what Lucifer thinks Chloe wants? Someone to hang on her, who sublimates themselves for her?

Chloe’s not religious, but when she thinks of Lucifer tucking away his personality at the whim of anyone else, the only word that comes to mind is ‘blasphemy.’

On screen, Lucifer flinches. He spares a quick, worried glance at a camera before going to meet the new arrivals. Is she not supposed to pray at him anymore? If not, why is he listening for her? He’s back in character by the time he joins Carlo and his date at the bar, clapping the other man on the back, all smiles. Maybe she just startled him? They’d agreed to a set of red-yellow-green hand signals during his initial camera set-up, and he’s not using them, so maybe this is just some new bit of Lucifer inscrutability she’ll have to laboriously drag an explanation out of him for later.

Eddie Gauchino shows up shortly after Carlo Scaluci, and Amenadiel does his job, striking up a visibly stilted conversation with Gauchino almost immediately. Lucifer has moved on from the bar, in constant motion as always. She doesn’t have sound tonight, but just watching him on screen Chloe knows when he’s joking, when he’s flattering, when he’s flirting. She sees him induce some guests into enjoying his hot tub, sees him lean down to light a woman’s cigarette, sees him making an obscene hand gesture that indicates he’s telling a story that would have Chloe rolling her eyes. She knows his smiles well enough to know that this one is more manic than happy, but he’s still playing his role perfectly. She’d wondered, earlier in the day when she’d been struggling to focus on another detective’s grunt work, how she’d feel, watching him flirt with other people now that they’d, uh, shared additional intimacies. Turns out, it doesn’t bother her. Flirting is to Lucifer as breathing is to everyone else. He likes to have his ego stroked, likes to stroke the egos of others, and flirting allows him to do that without actually making anything personal.

Still, there are odd moments when she sees him interacting with someone on screen and a feeling of unease slips over her. She can’t pinpoint why; it’s just flashes here and there, but it could become a distraction if she lets it.

Chloe refocuses on Gauchino and sees that he’s now out on the balcony next to the hot tub, Amenadiel still awkwardly stuck to his side. A woman dressed in the same plain white shirt, black pants combo as the catering staff approaches them, her focus on Gauchino. She tries to draw him aside, her gestures large and angry. Amenadiel tries to interrupt, but the look the woman turns on him is so full of contempt it successfully chases him back a few steps.

Odd.

Chloe tries a different camera view, hoping to get a better look at the woman’s face. She’s not one of the women Chloe interviewed, nor had she been working the party earlier this evening. She’s unfamiliar, but she’s also dark haired and tall, built like a young Lucy Lawless. Huh. Lucifer and Chloe had designed this event hoping to attract all the major players surrounding Bauda and Thorston; apparently they’ve been more successful than expected.

She’s about to flag Lucifer’s attention when the elevator doors open again and Captain Thorston finally walks—or stumbles, really—into the penthouse. He’s clearly at least half a dozen drinks into his night already. Something’s gone wrong—this is not the same man from Friday night, trying hard to impress Lucifer. Lucifer darts over, grabs Thorston before the captain can take a header into the floor. For maybe the first time in his life, Lucifer Morningstar steers someone away from a glass of booze. Trusting that Lucifer will handle whatever’s going on there, Chloe turns her attention back to Gauchino and the dark haired woman. Something’s flipped in their interaction. Gauchino now has a hand on the woman’s arm, holding her in place while he signals to someone else in the crowd with his other hand. Amenadiel reaches out to help the woman break free, but she uses her free hand to slap him away. Chloe tracks Gauchino’s gesture and sees Carlo Scaluci snaking through the other guests towards the hot tub.

That seems bad.

Chloe feels weird praying at anyone other than Lucifer, but no one’s wearing ear pieces tonight. Amenadiel, she tries.

Maybe she should have warned him. On screen, Amenadiel startles, whirling around. He catches a heel on the edge of the hot tub, overbalances, grabs onto Gauchino’s shoulder in an attempt to stay upright, and both man topple into the hot tub with a splash.

Chloe lets out a very immature bark of laughter. It’s almost as good as punching him, and far more effective—Gauchino had let go of the dark haired woman when he fell, and she’s now leaving the balcony, headed away from Scaluci and back towards the kitchen.

No time to enjoy the sight of floundering, waterlogged angel. Lucifer still has his hands full with Thorston, so Chloe gets up and starts towards the door, ready to step out and intercept the woman herself. She pauses with her hand on the doorknob. Lucifer had been worried about her, about her safety. He’d actually said it, opened up to her, and she knows that’s not easy for him. She’d promised him to be careful. Turning back so she can see him on screen, she prays.

Lucifer. I think I’ve spotted Maddy. She’s dressed like the catering staff; I’m going to try to catch her in the kitchen. Okay?

Lucifer doesn’t respond immediately, instead frowning up at one of the cameras. It’s difficult to wait, but they’d agreed. They’re partners, and she shouldn’t run off without consulting him anymore than he should run off on her.

I’ve got my vest on, and it’s clear she’s not carrying a gun. I’ll check in with you regularly.

He tosses his head and clicks his fingers three times—a reluctant green, but green all the same. Chloe moves.

She’s just in time. Maybe-Maddy has apparently finished up whatever she was here to do—she doesn’t stop in the kitchen, just barrels on through past the actual workers towards the door leading to the fire stairs. Chloe sends Lucifer an update, but doesn’t slow down, following the other woman into the harshly lit concrete stairwell.

“Maddy,” she calls, running now. The woman looks back, but doesn’t stop. “Maddy, do you really want to run down a couple dozen flights of stairs when security is already waiting for you at the bottom.

“I’ve done nothing they can hold me for,” Maddy yells back, not breaking her stride.

“Trespassing.”

“At Lucifer Morningstar’s? Who’s gonna buy that?”

Fair point. “Detective Bauda will think of something.”

Bauda’s name doesn’t stop the other woman, but she does miss a step, falling forward to brace herself against the wall on the next landing. Chloe takes advantage, grabbing onto the handrails on either side of the stairwell and swinging herself down the last half dozen steps to join Maddy on the landing. She quickly sprints down the next flight of stairs, placing herself between Maddy and an exit while still giving the other woman some room. Cornered people tend to fight, and starting a wrestling match in a stairwell is the opposite of safe.

Realizing she’s caught, Maddy smacks a walls. “Great. Fucking wonderful. I was worried I was done dealing with dirty cops.”

Chloe keeps her voice calm, holds her hands up reassuringly. “Maddy, I’m a detective, too. If you have reason to believe Detective Bauda has done something illegal—”

Maddy laughs. “Then I’d better keep it to myself before she pulls out proof of what I’ve done, right? I get it; I know how this system works. Look, tell her I don’t have her stupid box anymore, all right? Yeah, I stole it. Yeah, I brought it to Thorston, but then his wife went freaking looney, so I decided to find an actual buyer. If Bauda wants that thing back, she’ll have to take it up with the new owner.”

“Is that why you’re here? Did you sell something to Eddie Gauchino?”

“I’m here because he ripped me off. Counterfeit money—I should have guessed, right? He’s been dodging me ever since, but then I spot him coming into Lux.” She shrugs. “I’ve worked catering, knew I could probably sneak up here as a member of the staff, so I took my shot. And missed.”

“Eddie still won’t pay?”

“Said I’d have to take it up with his boss. That’s a phrase you don’t want to hear from a man like him.” Maddy looks sullenly down the stairs.

Chloe feels sorry for her, even if she is a self-admitted thief. “What was in the box you took, Maddy?”

A miscalculation. Maddy’s head snaps back up, and she gives Chloe a careful once over. “You aren’t one of hers, are you? Bauda’s crew? What, you think you’re just doing a favor for a buddy on the force? Take my advice, forget this whole thing. It’s crazier than you want to deal with.”

“I can handle crazy. What was in the box, Maddy?”

“Ask Bauda. Look, are we done here? Call off security, let me take the elevator down, huh?”

“What was in the box, Maddy?”

Maddy’s a few years into her twenties, but her expression is pure bratty teen when she says, “Proof of the divine. Why don’t you head back upstairs—couple of those guys think they’re holy, don’t they?”

A relic, Shauna had said. “What—”

Maddy cracks, looking tired and a little desperate. “I don’t know, all right? Bauda and her group only showed it to their special favorites, said it was too much for normal minds to handle. I was going to take a look, but then Mrs. Thorston went crazy from it, and I don’t need that. I don’t care if angels are real—they aren’t going to do shit for me. I’m just trying to get some money, set myself up somewhere far from all of this.”

“Okay.” Chloe nods. “Okay. I’ll contact security, make sure they let you through downstairs. Just… Did you know Marcus Pierce?”

The other woman’s guard goes back up. “Yeah.”

“Who was he to you?”

“Someone who died.”

“But before that?”

“Someone who said he wouldn’t die. You can’t trust anyone.”

Chloe holds her position for another moment, debating, then steps aside. Maddy flounces past her down the stairs and pushes through the next fire door onto one of the lower floors. Chloe’s thrown by the unpleasant reminder that Marcus had successfully hid an entire second life from her. But she’s relieved, too. Tonight she successfully pursued a suspect and conducted an interview while the specter of her ex-fiance hung over her head, but she hadn’t panicked. Her breathing is normal, her pulse steady. She’s not broken. Chloe Decker, cop, isn’t going to be yet another one of Cain’s casualties.

She sends Lucifer an update and returns to her surveillance post. As she settles back into her chair, one of those flickers of unease from earlier washes over her. Her eyes search out Lucifer on screen. He’s abandoned a now passed out Thorston on the sofa and is leaning against the stairs to the upper level of his library, chatting with a young man Chloe doesn’t recognize. The man is handsome, polished, dressed with a precision that almost equals Lucifer’s. They look like a matched set, and the other man is clearly hoping to have sex with his host. That’s not the problem—Chloe has seen this scenario multiple times tonight—but there’s something…

The stranger’s hand rests on Lucifer’s shoulder. Chloe frowns, eyes narrowing as that hand slides up to Lucifer’s collar, his fingers playing with Lucifer’s cravat, creeping up towards where fabric gives way to skin, and Chloe can’t look away. She clenches her hands, gaze laser focused on the stranger’s fingers, and tries to figure out why she’s so agitated. It’s not as though the man represents an actual threat—Lucifer can easily defend himself against one person. She remembers the sense of dread she’d felt on Friday, the certainty that something awful would happen to Lucifer, and worries she’s about to have another panic attack after all. Her heart stops as the man’s fingers brush against the edge of the cravat, almost touching Lucifer’s neck.

Lucifer!

The prayer rips out of her, urgent and demanding. On screen, Lucifer disentangles himself from the man and cuts through the crowd, heading her way.

She doesn’t know what she’s doing. Chloe, trembling, meets Lucifer at the door. He bursts into the room, wild-eyed, quickly scanning for threats.

“What’s wrong?” he asks, reaching out an arm to guide her behind his back, where she’ll be protected.

She ducks his arm, steps into his space. Her right hand moves on its own, coming up to his neck. She doesn’t touch him—Red, Detective—but it’s a close thing. Her index and middle finger stop a scant inch away from the spot just below the hinge of his jaw on his left side, and his pupils blow wide. Finally she remembers, and it’s embarrassing, and stupid, because it was just a bit of in-the-moment sex talk, a piece of spoken lust that doesn’t mean anything. There is no real agreement between them, and there’s no way she can lay claim to a piece of his neck, but he’s trembling beneath her fingers.

“Yes, Detective,” he says, so quietly that if her every sense weren’t tuned into him she never would have heard.

She can’t look at him, drops her gaze to the floor, takes her hand away from him, tucks it behind her back. Yesterday’s desire sweeps through her—she remembers wanting him bruised, wanting her mark stark on the delicate skin of his throat. He hangs in front of her, like he’s waiting for her command, like this all makes sense and means something and he’ll do whatever she says. She closes her eyes, sways towards him, takes in the scent of his cologne. He keeps an entire perfumery’s worth of scents in his bathroom, and yet everything he wears carries a note of vanilla. Such an un-devilish scent, a sweet and easy complement to so many other fragrances. She senses him stiffen and opens her eyes. He seems to have remembered where they are, what they’re doing. Who they are to each other. He straightens, backs away. Bows, bizarrely formal, unlike himself. Except then he leans over and whispers directly into her ear. The devil, sealing a deal.

“You have my word on this, Detective. No one else touches me there.”

Abruptly she’s flushed, gasping, wet. He’s perfect and he’s hers for one shining moment, but then he walks away, returns to the rest of the party. His back is straight, his head held high, his steps buoyant. His smile is wide and genuine; he’s thrilled with himself. Chloe doesn’t understand who she is anymore.

Chapter Text

The party’s tenor changes after that. It’s subtle, but notable. A judge who once chastised Chloe for not being dispassionate enough in her testimony now dirty dances with a half-naked city counselor. A high-powered defense attorney tosses weed gummies into the mouth of an assistant district attorney. A UCLA professor puts together an impromptu game of bowling with Lucifer’s priceless antiques as the pins. The air of carefree delight is nearly infectious enough to affect Chloe, who is not the audience for this type of party. Lucifer sees himself as a punisher, but she thinks he might actually be a revealer. Someone who can open people up, introduce them to themselves in a way that doesn’t come paired with instant judgment. Sure, several of these people deserve judgment—and justice—but after the past few weeks, Chloe is starting to believe even the wicked deserve a few hours of respite. Constant stress, guilt, and anxiety only make a person foolish and desperate, not a better version of themselves.

Lucifer glows.

He flirts with her via the cameras. Teasing, he toys with the edge of his cravat—she is never living that down. He shimmies out of his jacket to join in the bowling, winking at the camera while he does so. He tips his glass back to drink the last of his whiskey and allows a drop to fall from his lips, down his chin, and he pouts at the camera while using a finger to chase that drop down the line of his throat.

Stop being so obvious, she prays, trying for annoyed rather than…frustrated.

His mood breaks—that same worried frown from when she’d prayed earlier in the evening—but it’s only for a moment, and he’s back to himself, even if he does thankfully tone down the looks to the cameras.

It’s after 4am by the time the last of the guests leave. Chloe’s spent the last half hour dozing on and off, and jerks upright when Lucifer once again opens the door to her surveillance room.

“All set, Detective?”

“Mmph.” She rubs a hand over her face. The monitors are empty and Lucifer’s form is relaxed against the door frame.

“How long until you take the doors out again?” she asks, knitting her fingers together and stretching her arms above her head. Exhaustion cuts through the embarrassment from earlier, making it possible for her to look at his face. A good choice; he really does have the prettiest smile.

“Contractors arrive in five hours.”

“What’s with you and doors, anyway?” She pushes herself to her feet but doesn’t approach him, leaning back against the desk.

“I’ve no need for them.”

“You don’t like them,” Chloe corrects.

His contentment dims. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve already debriefed Amenadiel and sent him home. Would you like to swap information now, or should we wait until tomorrow? You’ll be getting precious little sleep as it is.”

She lets him change the subject; now is not the time for an argument. “Maybe just the highlights.” He holds the door for her, courtly, and follows her back out to the living room. In exchange, she pours him a drink. His decanters are long emptied at this point, so she makes her way behind the bar and looks up at his shelves before making her selection.

“Dalmore for mid-case musings,” she says, sliding him a tumbler before pouring some for herself. As exhausted as she is, she should be taking a cab home anyway.

He shakes his head at her, but there’s a hint of red on his cheekbones. “You’re learning your whiskey.”

I’m learning you, she wants to say, but chickens out. “Did you discover anything interesting tonight?”

“Ah. Well, the good captain’s lost his wife. She’s divorcing him over his unsavory associations.”

“I wondered what that was about. I suppose it makes sense. If Maddy’s relic causes some sort of religious fanaticism, and Mrs. Thorston learned her husband was trying to build something with the devil…”

“Indeed. Apparently it’ll make things more difficult for us, but he’s certain I can still take the reigns.”

“The reigns of what?”

“He passed out before he could say. You are a much more charming drunk.”

“Gee, thanks. Any sign of that tattoo Ella mentioned?”

“Afraid not. If we’re dealing with rival factions in the Sinnerman’s organization, it appears we’ve only met people from the non-relic obsessed branch.”

Chloe sighs. “Okay. So with Pierce no longer around, the Sinnerman’s network is fracturing, people are scrambling to gain control. I’m guessing that’s where the Scalucis come in? If we can prove a link between them and Thorston, we might be able to get him caught up in a real I.A. investigation.”

“Carlo did make a rather cutting remark about how the captain once tried to impress him by offering him a Cuban cigar—that he’d purchased from Carlo himself.”

Chloe snorts into her tumbler. “That sounds about right. So, smuggling.” It’s not a smoking gun, but maybe it would be enough to move Thorston out of a position of power, which is something that needs to happen, whatever Bauda’s personal reasons for disliking the man. “I’ll see if I can get a feel for where Organized Crime is with their ongoing investigation into the Scalucis. There might be a way to set up a sting against Thorston. What about Amenadiel? Did he find out anything?”

“Let’s just say that spycraft is not my brother’s forte. He did overhear one comment—it appears your Mr. Gauchino and Carlo shared a laugh over Thorston’s ruptured marriage, and Carlo said something about the captain bowing and scraping to me the way the ‘winged monkeys do to their dead warlock.’”

“That’s interesting. If he were just making a movie reference, he would have said witch. He’s referring to someone specific—would the dead man be Cain?”

“I can only imagine.”

“The wing comment, though—did you ask Amenadiel whether any of your other siblings, uh, visited recently?”

“No one he’s aware of—he says everyone seemed to be home when he visited the Silver City, but there are rather a lot of us.” Lucifer shrugs apologetically, and Chloe finds herself getting caught up again in the breadth of his shoulders. He’s mussed, jacketless, shirtsleeves rolled up. Cravat askew.

She quickly downs the last of her whiskey, and when she looks back up Lucifer’s gaze is fastened on her mouth. “I’d better call it a night.”

He stirs, rousing himself into action. “Of course. I’ve already arranged for a car—it should be waiting on the street outside. But we’ll talk more? Tomorrow? I can call?”

“Yes, if you’d like.”

“If you’d like, Detective.”

She’s too tired to make whatever connection he’s driving at, so she just waves him off. “Yes, tomorrow.”

He plants his tongue in one cheek, eying her up and down with the sort of energy only the devil could bring to a 4:30am goodbye. “Excellent.”

Chloe gets about two hours of sleep that night, but that’s still enough time for her to dream about Marcus.

They are at Pierce’s home this time, all three of them in his bed. Chloe, fully dressed as though on her way to work, lies on her side. For the first time, there’s no indication she’s recently orgasmed; instead, she feels neglected, cast to the side. Lucifer is beside her, facing her, with Pierce spooned behind him. Both of them are naked, and Pierce is thrusting into Lucifer with the steadiness of a metronome. Pierce looks so calm, utterly unaffected by his movements, but Lucifer is wrecked. His hair is tousled, his eyeliner is smeared, his face is flushed. Sweat slicks his body, and his muscles are trembling from exertion. He flinches with each snap of Pierce’s hips.

“You have to help me, Detective,” he says. “I can’t seem to finish him off.”

One of Pierce’s hands is locked on Lucifer’s hip. The other curls around his throat, his fingers resting on that spot just below Lucifer’s jaw. Her spot.

“Mine,” she says, but no sound comes out.

Pierce shakes his head. “Come on, Chloe. You remember the wedding vows. What’s yours is mine.” He squeezes his hand, and Lucifer groans. “I think he likes it. I think he’s glad that he’s mine now, too. Bet he sees my face every time he looks at you. What do you say, Lucifer? When she kills you, which of us is keeping you company in that Hell loop?”

Lucifer’s hands are fisted in his pillow. His whole body is shaking. “I can’t last much longer, Detective. Please.”

The bullet necklace is around her throat this time, right where it belongs. She pulls out her service pistol from it’s proper place in her holster, loads it.

“Better hurry, Chloe,” Pierce warns. “He’s going to shoot soon.”

Chloe places the gun muzzle against Lucifer’s heart.

“I’ll take care of you,” she mouths.

She’s never been more grateful to wake up.

It risks making her late for work, but Chloe still pulls the ingredients for one of her dad’s Hawaiian bread sandwiches out of the fridge. She needs that comfort this morning. Her phone chimes while she’s laying the bread in the frying pan, and she wipes her hands on her jeans before reaching over to open the text. She’s expecting work, or maybe Dan double-checking Trixie exchange plans with her. Instead, it’s from Lucifer, and strangely, it’s not a string of nigh-incomprehensible emoji.

It’s a picture.

Of a suit.

Hanging in his closet.

Chloe frowns and checks the status of her sandwich—the bread’s still not quite as browned as she’d like—and her phone chimes again.

He’s texted, “?”

Just that.

Chloe’s skin tingles as comprehension dawns. He’s asking her approval. She—she—she—

She does three quick laps of the kitchen island, grabs her phone, throws it in the freezer, and escapes out onto her back patio where she stands with the heels of her palms pressed against her eyes until her smoke detector goes off and she has to run back inside to deal with her burnt sandwich. Fitting for the devil to cause a fire in her kitchen from all the way across town. She dumps the still smoking pan in her sink, too frazzled to try again. She’ll just skip breakfast.

Or.

She could invite him over. He’d make her breakfast. If she told him to.

The suit in the picture had been a hunter green. She’s seen it on him before; the color brings out the richness of his eyes. Not that she spends a lot of time noticing his wardrobe, but, well. He’s very pretty.

Just for me. The thought slinks into her head unbidden.

When she takes her phone out of the freezer, she has four new messages—three photos of alternate suits and then, a few minutes after the photos were sent, there’s a single line of actual text. Apologies, Detective.

She throws her phone down on the counter, feeling terrible.

She can see him standing in his closet, going through his clothing, the way he had two days before. His long fingers are stroking down the sleeve of a jacket, the tip of his tongue just barely peeking past his lips as he tilts his head in consideration. Baring the side of his neck.

She can’t think about it. This isn’t her; she’s never done this before. Never wanted this. It has to be some sort of compulsion, something God arranged—why else would Lucifer of all people have promised to be only what she wants him to be? Either Chloe doesn’t have free will, or Lucifer doesn’t.

Blasphemy.

Whatever this control thing is he’s offering her, that needs to end now.

She just can’t bring herself to text him back.

She wants to say, you make me happy (but maybe thats just your dad). She wants to say, I love knowing that I can make you happy (but I’m terrified you’re being manipulated into staying with me). She wants to say, I’m not afraid of your devilish side (but I’m so small, and the universe is so vast). She’s late for work; she can’t compose something perfect enough that he won’t misunderstand.

Work is a slog. Dan and Ella are both out on active cases, so there’s no chance to discuss the Thorston matter with them. A stack of files from the 1960s is dumped on her desk with instructions to digitize everything. Her phone is terribly silent. There’s nothing from Maze, who is an inconsistent communicator at best when there isn’t something she actively wants. And Lucifer is off somewhere, hurt. Because she hasn’t texted him back. Because she can’t look at a picture of one of his suits without blasphemous thoughts.

She needs advice. And it strikes her—what does Lucifer do when he has a problem like this? She knows she’s been rejecting Linda’s offers of help, but this wouldn’t be about Chloe, not really, and Lucifer trusts Linda.

Do you think it would help to have a couples session with Linda? she texts him. Such a cold conversation opener after his series of photos. For your—she deletes that, starts again, our touch issues, and maybe some other stuff?

There. Ice broken. She should be able to concentrate on her work now, dull as it is. The details of a cold case from 1967 snag her full attention, and she’s startled when her phone vibrates with Lucifer’s response.

You’ve made it clear you don’t wish Dr. Linda to behave as your therapist.

I don’t want her to default to it, but she’s good for you, and she knows everything about us. Please?

She second guesses the ‘please’ the moment she hits send. Is that a manipulation? But it’s too late. He’s already replied.

As you desire, Detective.

Great. Maybe. She loops Linda into the text exchange, asking about her availability that evening, and starts searching for someone to watch Trixie, because lately there’s no solution that doesn’t come with extra tasks attached to it.

About three hours later, Chloe is pretty certain she’s built an actionable case against the responding officer in the 1967 murder she was just supposed to scan in and forget about, when she’s distracted from the report she’s typing up by the sound of a body dropping into the chair next to her desk. Her heart lifts—

But it’s Maze, looking sly and pleased with herself.

“Hey Decker. Wanna see some dirty pictures?”

Chloe makes Maze wait until they’re away from the station to say anything else. She takes a late lunch and texts Lucifer to meet them at Maze’s preferred venue, a dive bar with little in the way of afternoon clientele and a bartender who gives Maze a wary nod when she enters and doesn’t approach when Chloe and Maze take a table in the back.

Lucifer arrives a few minutes after they do. Chloe has been feeling nervous—guilty, really—about what mood he’ll be in following that morning’s failed interaction and her request that he attend additional therapy, but aside from the moue of distaste he gives upon observing their surroundings, he seems himself—happy, even, approaching their table with a jaunty step. He’s not wearing the green, she notes with disappointment, just a plain gray two piece with white shirt and pocket square. It’s an elegant suit, but does nothing for his eyes.

“Detective! Mazikeen.” He slides into the chair next to Maze, diagonal from Chloe, his eyes warm.

“What’s with you?” Maze asks, looking him up and down.

“Nothing’s ‘with’ me. Just looking forward to a—” he shoots his cuffs, a brag, “—couple’s session later today.”

Maze’s mind has two primary tracks, and as such she understands what he means immediately. “You two finally boned!” Maze looks to Chloe for confirmation.

Chloe does her best fish impression, mouth opening and closing unproductively, her mind not even processing Maze’s question because she’s stalled out on Lucifer’s words. That’s why he’s so happy. She’d invited him to a couple’s session with Linda, not thinking. She should have said ‘group’ or ‘joint’ session. He thinks they’re together, like, together together. She had just promised Trixie she wouldn’t be bringing any more men into their lives, and now she’s done this. Stupid. She’d known this was a concern, had warned herself about it the last time they kissed, before they knew he was toxic to her. A vocabulary slip up on her end, and he thinks she’s made promises she doesn’t know that she’s ready to make. She never should have indulged, should have kept things platonic between them, should have—

“Mmhm!” Lucifer hums with a snappy tilt of his head. “I mean, not in person, naturally. But satisfaction was had all around.”

“You found something in Chicago?” Chloe asks too loudly, face on fire.

“Details first. Was it hot?” Maze licks her lips eagerly.

“Chicago.” Chloe slaps her hands flat on the table.

“Work first, Mazikeen,” Lucifer chides. “Salacious details later.”

“Lucifer.”

“Respectful salacious details later.” He’s smiling at Chloe, and she feels awful, and still all she wants is to gather him close, trace that smile with her fingertips, press her lips to his to seal in his happiness.

Maybe ‘couple’ wasn’t the wrong word. Maybe they can still have this. They aren’t on the same page, but maybe they’re close enough—

“Fine. So, Cain definitely knew both Thorston and Bauda.”

Cold water everywhere.

Maze pulls out an envelope and slides it across the table to Chloe. Inside are a number of photos, the top one clearly years old, both stained and wrinkled.

“I got that from the photographer regularly hired to work those charity functions Thorston’s into, with the kids. He had a bunch of old negatives for photos the charity rejected. Check out the guy on the far left in this one.”

Lucifer’s already grabbed the photo, peering at it closely before tossing it back down with a disgusted huff. “He would turn back up, wouldn’t he?”

Chloe doesn’t need long to understand the source of his ire. Barely in frame, looking much younger (and less eyeless) than he had the last time she saw him, is the faux-Sinnerman.

“The guy’s camera shy—too high up in Pierce’s org to spend a lot of time being visible. But I guess all of them spent at least some time with the kids.” Maze pulls out additional photos—years’ worth of charity functions featuring younger versions of Thorston and a Pierce who always looks the same age. None of these photos ever made the papers.

“This must have been going on long prior to the captain’s involvement,” Lucifer says, leaning forward for another look. “Pierce pretty much raised Mr. Fake Sinnerman here.”

“He did?” Chloe’s head snaps up.

“Indeed. From what our dearly departed inventor of fratricide told me, this pretender was pretty much Pierce’s foster child.”

“Oh shit.” Chloe covers her mouth with her hand, closing her eyes. Thank God—thank something Pierce had never spent much time with Trixie. “The children’s charity—it is grooming, but not the sort I worried Thorston would be involved in. They were taking these kids—underprivileged, ignored—and they were raising them up to be loyal to Pierce, to the Sinnerman network. You can’t build a network that extensive, can’t keep it running for generations, based on fear alone. Pierce, and all his lieutenants, were training these kids to be loyal. Like—like an international mafia, built on found family, with Pierce as the perennial Godfather.”

“That would explain this,” Maze says, pulling out another photo, this one showing a group of kids, ranging from roughly six to sixteen, grouped together at a picnic while a grinning Thorston hands them an oversized check. “Look familiar?” One of Maze’s nails stabs at the face of one of the older girls.

“Bauda. She was raised in the organization.” Chloe snaps her fingers. “And that’s why Thorston’s branching out to groups like the Marquises. From my research, you can’t imagine how many angry young men view those guys as heroes. It’s just another recruitment source for him.” Another piece clicks into place in her head, and she looks over at Lucifer. “He’s trying to recruit you.”

Lucifer balks. “Me?”

“It makes sense, right? I mean, Thorston knows you’re a police consultant; he’s kinda your boss.”

Lucifer visibly bristles.

“Not that he has any real power over you,” she says hurriedly. “But still, he wouldn’t be so deferential to you if he didn’t see you as a potential power source.”

“If they’re into recruiting kids, why would they be going after Old Scratch? Gravity is younger than he is.” Maze sits back, arms crossed.

“Say Thorston was one of the kids Pierce raised, and he’s as loyal as our fake Sinnerman, who literally stabbed out his own eyes rather than give the Sinnerman’s secrets to the devil. If Thorston was that loyal, he knows who Lucifer really is. And now that Pierce is dead, there’s a power vacuum. Thorston had a key role in recruiting for Pierce, but he knows he doesn’t have the ability to hold the top spot in the organization himself, so…”

Lucifer straightens, looking simultaneously affronted and smug. “I’m not a recruit—I’m their new leader!”

Chloe remembers Ella’s comment about how lucky they are that Lucifer has never decided to form a cult. Yeah, from the outside, someone could easily mistake him for a Sinnerman in waiting. “That’s what Thorston wants to build with you. And if there’s a divide in the organization, say Thorston’s on one side, Bauda on the other, then that’s why she’s been trying to push you to spend so much time with Thorston in unsavory situations. She doesn’t want footage of Thorston misbehaving; she wants footage of you tempting Thorston into misbehaving. Of you being the devil everyone’s been taught to fear.”

She’s so busy thinking it through, putting the pieces together, that she almost misses the hurt in his eyes. “I have never tempted that man into anything.”

“Of course not; you’re too boring now.”

“Maze.” Chloe levels a warning glance at the demon and turns back to Lucifer. “Most people don’t know you. Think about it—Thorston’s wife must be aware of what he’s into, must be a part of the Sinnerman’s network herself. She helped him host a BDSM party in their own home that she didn’t even take part in—she wasn’t bothered by his behavior until he started spending time with you. If Bauda’s faction has—or had—a religious relic that makes people true believes in God, and Thorston starts taking orders from the actual devil, in a situation designed to make it look like you’re not a good guy? Bauda was setting you up, trying to gain material that would widen the chasm between her faction and Thorston’s, maybe sway some of his followers to her side. But they’ve lost their relic, which was why she wanted us to look for Maddy. The question now is has Thorston’s wife teamed up with Bauda now that she’s seen the relic.”

“How clever.” Lucifer is glaring at a random spot over Chloe’s head. “I do make an excellent bogeyman. Perfect for scaring any wayward recruits into line.”

“Cain wasn’t exactly a good guy,” Maze says, rolling her eyes. “We’re talking about an international criminal network.”

Chloe nods, keeping a worried eye on Lucifer. “Right. Bauda must know she can’t change everyone’s mind. But a lot of Pierce’s top guys have already been picked up by the various agencies investigating him. The lower level people, the ones Bauda would be trying to sway, they probably don’t think of themselves as bad guys.”

“Typical.” Lucifer’s voice is full of loathing, and Chloe’s afraid not all of it is directed outward. “Humans are too eager to cut corners and cause harm, all while casting themselves as heroes.”

“It does make sense,” Maze says after a moment. “If Bauda’s group is trying to re-brand as holey.”

“And it explains why Mr. Fake Sinnerman turned against Pierce—why play secondhand to a kingpin if you’ve got a higher purpose?”

Chloe cocks her head. “Did the fake-Sinnerman say anything useful when you abducted him, anything that might tell us what was going on in Pierce’s organization?”

Maze rolled her eyes. “Complete nothing. I put in some of my best work, and the guy still wouldn’t talk. And then when Lucifer got involved, it was all, ‘Oh, you have to kill me,’ like, good luck, dude. Threatening him,” she jerks a thumb towards Lucifer, “isn’t going to get you murdered.”

“He wanted you to kill him?” Chloe asks, concerned. That hadn’t been a part of Lucifer’s celestial version of events retelling.

Lucifer nods. “Yes, until Pierce showed up and shot him. It ‘had to be me.’ It was…unnerving.”

“But he knew who you are, right?”

“Indeed.”

“Maybe…what if he knew angels aren’t supposed to kill humans?”

“I suppose it’s possible. Cain likely met one or two of my siblings back in the early days; who knows what they told him?”

“What’s the punishment for killing a human supposed to be?”

Lucifer folds his arms across his chest and looks away. “Well, my wings won’t stop bleeding for one.”

Chloe’s heart hurts. She wants to ask if he’s doing all right, if he’s in pain, but she doubts he’d be receptive to that conversation, especially in front of Maze. “Okay. But beyond that. You literally cut your wings off once; I doubt allowing them to bleed is really the threatened punishment.”

“I don’t know, do I? Dad is pretty tight lipped—the occasional do this, do that, but—” He stops abruptly, suddenly looking at her worriedly. “Well, never mind that. Pierce killed him. Human on human violence, perfectly ordinary.”

Chloe sets that aside to talk about in couples therapy. “But he clearly thought something would happen. He kept setting traps for you, and was successful at catching you in them. Having you kill him was a plan. If he and Bauda are part of the same faction—”

“Oh, they’re definitely part of the same faction.” Maze grins. “I promised you dirty pictures, didn’t I?”

She flips through her pile of photos and pulls one to the top. Again, it’s several years old, only this time, it’s also apparent the people in the photo aren’t aware they’re on camera. It’s a creeper shot, taken through a window. The photo’s subjects are in bed, nude, only partially covered by a sheet. Bauda and the fake Sinnerman. Lovers.

“Ugh.” Chloe grabs the photo and flips it over to the blank side.

“Boo, Decker. I thought you’d loosened her up?” Maze looks at Lucifer.

“It turns out the Detective enjoys keeping things tight and controlled.”

Maze’s grin is wide and proud. “Nice, Decker!”

“Enough, Lucifer.” He doesn’t look at all abashed at the scolding. “No matter how much I dislike Bauda, we aren’t showing her non-consensual porn shots around a bar. Where did you even get that?”

“Pierce was running a centuries old criminal organization. People are going to notice something, even if they aren’t certain what it is. I checked around with my PI contacts, and it turns out one of them was mentored by a guy who got murdered while he was investigating some potential police corruption. Dead guy left my contact a few files. He was never able to make any sense out of them, but he let me take a look. No shots of Pierce, but a couple of Thorston meeting Mr. Fake, and then Mr. Fake and Bauda.”

“This is a problem,” Chloe says. “If Bauda and the fake were a team, she might be trying to hurt you, too.” She looks at Lucifer, who shows his typical lack of concern for his own safety.

“If you hadn’t notice, it’s you she seems to dislike. Makes sense—you came along and stole Daddy’s affection.”

“Gross.” Chloe shudders at the idea of Pierce in any sort of ‘daddy’ role.

“And then you lifted his curse, making him mortal, and you shot him.”

“And you killed him, plus you’re the devil and it seems probable that she already didn’t like you.”

“Guys. Bauda hates you both equally.” Maze lowers her chin, looking surly. “This couple shit is already annoying.”

Lucifer looks pleased; alarm klaxons start going off in Chloe’s head. Change topic, change topic, change topic—

“In any case, if we have photos linking Thorston to the fake Sinnerman, and we can use Charlotte’s files to link Pierce to the Scalucis, and show that Thorston is buying smuggled goods from the Scalucis as well, it should be enough for us to make a case against him.”

“The rest of the Marquises des Douleur as well, I imagine,” Lucifer says offhandedly. At Chloe’s raised brow, he adds, “For drugs, Detective. I imagine the Scalucis are their suppliers as well—Thorston certainly handed out numerous party favors last Friday night.”

Which she hadn’t even noticed. “Cocaine?”

“Maybe some, but I think you’re forgetting how pathetic that organization is. Insecure men in a situation where they may have to perform publicly? Little blue pills, Detective. Black market Viagra.”

“What? That’s a thing?”

“Did those strike you as the sort of men who want a paper trail linking them to broken boner pills?”

Maze cackles, and Chloe closes her eyes. All right. It’s still illegal trafficking of prescription drugs, and she would like to put an end to those parties if she can. “I’ll…we’ll see. If the link is there, once we get Thorston charged with something, maybe we can implicate his buddies.”

“Bauda’s cooked too, right?” Maze asks, peeling up the edge of the picture Chloe’d flipped over.

“No.” Chloe slaps her hand back down on the photo. “Bad romantic decisions aren’t illegal—she might get a dressing down for not informing the department of her connection to the guy, but there’s no proof she helped him with anything illegal. And I’d rather not revenge-porn anyone out of a job.”

“Spoil sport.” Maze pouts.

Chloe tries another tack. “I’d like to leave her in play for the moment, especially since we don’t know who all the players are and we need to track down that relic Maddy stole. Maze, could you keep an eye on Bauda? She’ll be looking for the relic herself; we need to know if she finds it.”

Maze shrugs. “I’ve got some time.”

“Thank you.” Chloe makes eye contact, trying to ensure Maze understands that Chloe does appreciate the work she’s doing.

“Whatever.”

Demons really are just like teenagers. “I need to get back to the station, but at least we know next steps. Maze keeps track of Bauda. Lucifer, you talk to your contacts, let me know if you hear of anyone moving a religious relic. And I’ll try to organize all our evidence related to Thorston into something actionable.”

Chloe pushes herself to her feet, and Lucifer rises along with her.

“Allow me to escort you.”

Maze just rolls her eyes and heads for the bar.

Lucifer starts doing that old timey gallantry thing he does sometimes—opening the door for her, herding her so that he takes the side of the sidewalk between her and the road. He’s also fluffed his pocket square twice by the time they walk to the end of the block, like he wants her approval. Chloe’s mind goes straight to his suit texts, and apparently his does as well, as he says, “Apologies for my blunder this morning.”

“Oh, no, Lucifer. You don’t, I mean—” Text me as many suit pictures as you like? Let me pick out your wardrobe every day? Please never refer to that time I made you dress for me ever again? What does she want to say?

“Now, Detective,” he barrels on. “You said I could call. I assumed texting would be just as welcome, but I overstepped. Demanding without—”

“Don’t.” The word snaps out, angry, but then she’s pressing the back of her hand to her mouth and blinking back tears. Blasphemy.

“Detective?” He’s at a loss, distressed, but she has no guidance to offer him.

Chloe shakes her head—there’s still hours left in her work day. There’s no time to do this properly now, but she can’t just leave him like this. “You never need permission to call or text or anything else.”

He does not look reassured, hands twitching at his sides. Normally, she would reach out, stroke his arm, impress upon him that she’s still there, that things are okay. Has anyone touched him since she stopped being able to? Maze has been taking care of his wings, but that’s hardly tender care.

“I promised you, this will be what you want,” he says.

I don’t know what I want. I just want you. “That’s not right, Lucifer,” she hears herself saying instead, awfully. “I don’t—I’m not one of those men, like Thorston or any of them. I don’t know why you would think that. You used to always do whatever, say whatever—”

“That was before!”

Before…? Oh. Right. “I don’t see what the other day has to do with whether you can text me, or whether I can speak to Amenadiel, or why you flinch when I pray to you now.” She’s suddenly very aware they’re on a public street.

“You had indicated, in a conversation that you apparently do not fully recall, that at one point you very much desired a relationship with me.”

“You knew that, from before, last year. ‘This is real’—you’re the one who said it.”

“And I thought I was wrong! But what if I wasn’t? What if you could choose.” He stumbles over the word, bites his lip. “I had thought not even you could be so forgiving as to overlook my becoming a literal poison to you. But two days ago—I know it was likely just an itch to scratch, easier to do when you don’t have to be in the same room with me, but if it wasn’t? I could be what you want, who you thought I was before. You wouldn’t have to interact with any of the celestial woo-woo; I’d take care of it. You’ll know who I am, so it won’t be a lie, but I’ll keep that part of my life separate from you.”

“Lucifer, no. That’s not healthy.”

“Screw healthy!” He paces away. “I made you happy, you can’t deny it. I can do it again; it’s what I’m good at.”

She feels sick. Chloe had interviewed 92 people who used him to fulfill their own desires, and now she’s become one of them. “Stop.” She throws up her hands, slipping into her breathing exercises even as her lungs grow tight. “I don’t want you to be someone else. No running, remember?”

“You do want it,” he insists. “You’re the Detective, but you’ve stopped asking questions. No, ‘What’s Hell like?’ or ‘Have you met this departed family member?’ or ‘How do you torture Hitler?’ No, ‘What did you do that made your family cast you out?’ You don’t want that part of me.”

Her heart rate picks up. He’s right; she hasn’t asked. She would ask now, but she’s about to go back to work where she’ll be surrounded by people who’ve seen a detailed account of what she did with Pierce in the evidence closet. She cannot feel small right now. “Have you talked to Linda about this? About us?” she asks instead. Safe; pointing him towards more reliable help.

“Of course—this was her idea. I explained to her that my touch issues had recently become urgently in need of a fix, and she pointed out that as soon as I know you aren’t afraid of me, I’ll get better. She said you needed time to realize I’m still the same person you knew, but how much easier would that be if you don’t have to get used to anything new?”

Oh, no. “That’s not what she meant, Lucifer.”

He shakes his head. “Why do you keep pointing me towards the doctor? You don’t want to talk to me yourself?”

“I do. We are.” But she’s leaning away, one hand against the building behind her. Her legs feel wobbly.

“Then why force yourself into a session with Dr. Linda, when you have made it clear you don’t want that? I can fix myself; you needn’t be uncomfortable.”

“We obviously still need help communicating when it comes to the important things.”

“Not at all.” He reaches up, undoes his cravat, bares his throat to her. “All yours, Detective, remember? Just the way you want it? I think we’ve both made ourselves clear.”

His voice slips into a purr and his gaze shifts to her own. It’s what he does when he asks people about their desires, and it isn’t without affect. Chloe wants him, impossible as he is, and he must see the truth on her face because he slinks closer.

She struggles to keep her focus. “Some things are clear,” she agrees. “I do want you.”

“Then no need to bother the good doctor. As soon as you realize the me you want is just a phone call away, everything will work itself out.”

“No, Lucifer. Like I said, the other day was an aberration. I don’t do that, um, in charge thing. I don’t want to pick out what pieces of you get to come out and which get hidden away.”

“What a marvelous idea, darling! I know just the game to play.” He’s buried himself completely within the seducer role now, the offer of sex rolling off of him, the rest of his personality tucked away somewhere where she cannot see it or reject it. Fifteen minutes ago, they sat in a bar and he protested the way the world casts him as a tempter, but that’s all he’s letting himself be right now. Because she messed up. Lucifer is supposed to be irrepressible, but she’s breaking him.

“Stop it. No, Lucifer.” She’s pressed back against the building, and he finally notices. She tries to mask her panic, but his look of horror tells her just how badly she’s failed.

“Detective,” he breathes, backing away. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I would never—I’ll go.”

“Lucifer!” She wants it to be a shout, but she doesn’t have the breath for that, and he doesn’t stop, just darts off down the street, turning out of view at the first opportunity.

Chapter Text

Chloe is pretty sure couples therapy is canceled, but she goes to Linda’s office after work anyway. Sure enough, when she pokes her head through the door, Linda is busy packing up her bag for the day.

“Oh, Chloe! I’m sorry, Lucifer called—”

“I’m sure he did.” Chloe slouches into the office and slumps down onto Linda’s couch, letting her head sink back so she’s looking up at the ceiling. “You know, it was one week ago today that I sat him down and told him we needed to keep things professional. Then we went to a sex party, I slept in his bed, and I initiated—well, I’m sure he told you.”

Linda’s silent pause speaks volumes. “You know, I do have the time blocked out on my calendar if you want to do a solo session. Or even just talk? Remember, Dr. Martin has a prescription pad, but only your friend Linda has wine.”

The thing is, Chloe does want to talk. She wants to complain about all of this to someone who already knows what’s going on and whose feelings she won’t accidentally hurt. Linda should be perfect. But while drunk Chloe had happily reconnected with Linda, sober Chloe still balks at opening up to the other woman.

Still, there is one other thing that has to happen today.

“Want to go mattress shopping with me?”

It’s not until they’re standing in a showroom, surrounded by mattresses priced in the upper hundreds on the low end, that Chloe starts to feel self-conscious. “I’m not usually so cavalier about big purchases like this, but…” She trails off, not sure she’s ready to dive into nightmare Marcus’s insatiably horrifying sexual appetite.

Linda stands with her hands on her hips as she surveys the overwhelming number of options. “I bought a new house.”

“You’re moving?”

She shakes her head. “After my divorce. Reese had a lot of opinions about energy efficiency—we had to live in a new construction so it would be built with long-term energy efficiency in mind. Like putting new windows in an old house is worse for the environment than building a whole new place. He liked clean lines, white everywhere, had a lot to say about how frivolous other design styles were. It was just easiest to let him get his way. First thing I did after signing the divorce papers was go house hunting. Bought my Spanish-style and have been pouring most of my money into fixing it up ever since.”

Chloe meets Linda’s gaze, finding nothing but sympathy. “Your house is beautiful.”

“Now it is. I’ve still got a few projects. Mostly I’ve hired contractors, but right now I’m trying to retile the master bath myself—it might be beyond my skill level, honestly.”

“I guess a mattress isn’t so bad. They don’t come with projects.”

“Or a mortgage.”

“Some of these might as well,” Chloe says, looking at a price tag.

“Think of it as an investment—future Chloe will thank you for the good night’s sleep. What are you looking for? Soft? Firm?”

Lucifer’s. The night spent in his bed had been, without question, the best night of sleep she’s had since learning the truth about Pierce. Though Chloe doubts Lucifer would sleep on anything that began its life in a strip mall.

“I don’t know. What I have now is pretty firm, I guess?” She leans over and presses her hands against one of the clearance options.

“I guess the two of you weren’t together long enough to fight about mattress styles.”

“We didn’t fight about anything, really. Pierce just…” Chloe waves her hand. “Proactively agreed with me? His mattress was extra firm, though. Guy liked rocks.”

Linda chuckles. “Come on, looks like their extra soft selection is this way.”

A few minutes later, they’re lying side by side on a queen sized mattress that feels like it’s going to suck Chloe down, quicksand style. “This won’t work. I guess I’ve never really thought about mattresses,” she admits, attempting to sit up. “When I moved in with Dan, we just kept his old one, and when I moved into my current place, my mom let me bring the one from her beach house, so I’d have one less expense. Is that ridiculous? I’m nearly forty, and I’ve never picked out my own mattress.”

“That’s one of the excruciating things about leaving a serious relationship—you’re forced to confront just how much you allowed yourself to depend on this other person who ultimately let you down.”

“After Dan you’d think I’d have learned how to do this.” Chloe struggles off the mattress and leans down to help pull Linda up.

“I thought I knew better,” Linda says, eyes down, straightening her skirt. “B.A. in psychology, followed by med school, followed by a residency, followed by decades of field experience—I thought I knew how people worked. It was mortifying to realize I’d spent all of that time in a relationship with a man who didn’t actually see me. That’s why I never really talked about the separation with you, even knowing what you went through with Dan. I just couldn’t believe I’d let myself spend my life with someone who viewed me more as a possession than a person. Those last few years, when he was refusing to sign the divorce papers and barging into my home or my office, acting jealous whenever I had a date—it made me hate myself a little bit, that I’d once given him permission to see me as his.”

Chloe wants to say there’s nothing small about the self-hatred she feels when she thinks about Pierce, but the most she can make herself say is, “I can relate to that.”

Linda nods, then bites her lip. “What I’m saying, Chloe, is you met me at a low point in my life. Add in the fact that I started allowing Lucifer to pay for therapy with sex?” She raises her eyebrows meaningfully. “Every day, I had to hold myself out as someone worth talking to, worth listening to, worth receiving advice from, all while knowing it was a lie. When we all began to be friends, I thought it best that I limit that friendship to fun-Linda. You know, quick with a dirty joke, a lightly scandalous personal anecdote, nothing that would let you know just what a mess I was. But then the Goddess of all creation attacked me, and Reese died—”

“And you didn’t think you could talk to me.”

“That’s not on you.”

“Part of it is. Maze said something to me the other day—no one picks the friend first. She was comparing friendship to romantic relationships, but it got me thinking. For a long time, I wasn’t choosing friendship at all. I lost most of my acting friends pretty quickly after I decided to switch careers, and I became someone who had work buddies. Friendly professional acquaintances. When you and Ella and Maze tried to get me to open up, I wasn’t exactly welcoming.”

Linda doesn’t contradict her. “That’s how things started with Amenadiel, you know? I was dealing with the logistics of Reese’s death, and Amenadiel was just there. I didn’t have to seek him out. He came to me, and he was kind. I’ve never had a man be that kind to me before.”

“It sounds like he’s grown a lot in the last few years,” Chloe says grudgingly, wandering away to sit on the edge of another mattress.

“He has,” Linda agrees, “but that’s not… I don’t know why I’m being so indirect about this. I’m trying to apologize about Pierce.”

Chloe feels her expression shut down. “You already did that.”

“A full apology. I want to let you know why I did what I did. Not an excuse, just an explanation. I know you’re hesitant about me still. I would like us to be better friends—I don’t want to lose you from my life. You matter to me, Chloe.”

“Then why?” Chloe stares up at Linda, surprised at how much this still hurts. “Why wouldn’t you warn me?”

“I was a coward.” Linda says it so simply, Chloe can’t help but accept it.

“You were afraid of how I’d react.” It makes sense; Chloe had been aggressively unwilling to accept a reality where bible characters doubled as her co-workers.

“No, never you. Like I said, Amenadiel was there for me. He supported me through Reese’s death, and also I had all of these new scars, after Goddess… But they didn’t matter to him. He made me feel beautiful. But being with him hurt Maze, who I love, who had been the one who kept me sane after I found out about the whole God, Goddess, Satan deal. It felt like I had to lose one of them. That’s when Lucifer told me about Cain.”

“He really does have a sense of timing, doesn’t he?”

“Uh, yes. And the first thing out of my mouth was, ‘Cain sounds dangerous, this is a bad thing.’ But the two of you weren’t dating at the time, and Lucifer was a patient speaking in confidence, so I decided that Lucifer and Amenadiel knowing would have to be enough to keep you safe.”

“But then I did start to date him.”

“Almost immediately after I broke up with Amenadiel, and Maze hated me anyway. I felt isolated. Vulnerable. I didn’t understand it at the time. It wasn’t until Maze showed up at my home to protect me, saying Cain had threatened my life, that I realized just how afraid I had been of him hurting me. Ever since Goddess attacked me, I’ve been terrified of another celestial doing the same thing. Cain was dangerous, and I’d just lost the two people who made me feel safest. Every time I thought of warning you, something inside me just ran away, refused to do anything that would direct his attention towards me. I am so, so sorry, Chloe.”

Knowing that Linda couldn’t handle celestial nonsense with any more grace than Chloe’s managed helps somehow. Chloe bounces to her feet and wraps Linda in a hug. She almost says, ‘It’s okay,’ but it’s not, so she says, “I forgive you,” instead. “And I’m sorry I wasn’t more there for you. From now on, okay? I’ll try to be more present, but even if I’m not, I want you to let me know when you’re in trouble, or when things are difficult, or when you’re hating yourself. You know I’ve got no room to judge.”

Linda snorts wetly and pulls away, taking off her glasses to wipe her eyes. “If I were here as your therapist and not your friend, I’d have to counsel you about your self-esteem after a statement like that.”

“Good thing you’re my friend, then. Wait, are you okay with Maze moving back in with me? I don’t want to leave you feeling unprotected, or—”

“No. No. I love Maze, she can stay with me if she needs, but Chloe. My poor walls. All those knife marks.”

“Yeah.” Chloe sighs. “I gave up on my security deposit long ago.”

“I bought her a target to practice with, but I guess demons need to be able to precision throw anywhere and everywhere. Maze doesn’t really ‘get’ interior decorating.”

Chloe tilts her head to the side. “Hey. How about I help you with that bathroom tile?”

“I didn’t say any of this to guilt you into manual labor.”

“No, I know. But I’ve never had a place I could decorate myself, and I watch so much HGTV, Linda, sometimes all I want to do is knock walls down. Let me help.”

“All right. Tiling buddies.” Linda holds up her hand for a high-five, and Chloe complies with a laugh.

Tiling buddies. Something relaxes in Chloe’s chest. She recalls again the advice she’d received from the department shrink about reshaping her life so that it fits her better, and realizes that doesn’t mean she has to change everything. It’s not a choice between keeping or discarding her old relationships; it can be about making them better, too.

Half an hour later, Chloe’s selected a new mattress (medium soft, but nowhere near as comfortable as Lucifer’s), and she and Linda have moved to a wine bar down the street.

“So I’m guessing Lucifer didn’t menace you into a panic attack?” Linda asks once they’re safely supplied with glasses of the house white.

“He didn’t menace me at all. He is the most frustrating man sometimes. I know he means well, but he gets his ideas, and then I don’t know how to say things properly, and it all just spins out of control.”

“Did you have another panic attack?” Linda presses, looking concerned.

“No, not really. It’s a lot sometimes, and I get a little short of breath thinking about the scope of him, of God. I don’t know, Linda, I haven’t had this many emotions since I showed my boobs to the world and my dad was immediately murdered.”

“No!” Linda laughs in a ‘I know it’s not funny, but I can’t help myself’ way. “Oh, teenage Chloe must have had some terrible sex after that.”

“Teenage Chloe had no sex after that, thank you very much. Took over a year for Death Tits Decker to get back on that horse.”

“Mmm!” Linda sits up straight in realization, but claps a hand over her mouth.

“What?”

“No, no. Dr. Martin isn’t having this conversation.”

“But Dr. Linda is, so spill.”

“It’s just…the camera thing. With Lucifer.”

Chloe’s mouth drops open as Linda’s words hit home. She had been instantly distracted by the idea of Lucifer on film. Her face heats and she tries to hide behind her hands. “Oh my God. Don’t tell me I was acting out some sort of psycho-sexual complex thing with Lucifer?”

“Nothing that dire,” Linda reassures her quickly. “But I do think that being in charge of what happened on camera in that way was probably very therapeutic.” She uses her primmest psychiatrist voice, and Chloe can’t help but giggle in response.

“He’s so pretty, Linda,” she says when she calms down. “It’s not fair. How am I supposed to make rational decisions when I get him to do that little smirk thing and feel like I just stuck the topper on a Christmas tree?”

Linda hums appreciatively. “But rational decisions?” She waves her hand dismissively. “How would you summarize this situation, like you just did with your dad? What’s the one sentence summary of what’s going on here?”

Chloe thinks for a minute. “Well, I decided to say yes to love, and the two guys in my life turn out to be Cain and Satan, because God maybe custom made me for one or both of them, and the one I agreed to marry ends up dead and the one I’m partners with ends up with his own body turning against him.”

“Yikes. You know, I’ve only ever heard of ‘miracle baby’ as a good thing, but you’re really weighing down the other side of the scale. That is interesting, though.” Linda sets her wine glass aside and turns more fully towards Chloe. “The last time you went through such a traumatic experience, you indicated you shut down. Celibate Chloe, back when you had to have had tons of offers.”

Chloe shrugs. She had been popular for a minute there.

“But this time, you aren’t shutting down. Hell, you tried, but it didn’t take. You keep seeking Lucifer out—even though you just identified a difficulty with putting yourself out there. What do you think that means?”

“Now that’s a Dr. Martin question,” Chloe says, retreating into her wine glass.

“She’s so difficult to turn off,” Linda admits, taking a huge drink from her own glass.

Detective Decker can relate. “I don’t know, couldn’t seeking Lucifer out just be a different trauma response?”

“It could be. That’s why ‘rational’ isn’t always a great indicator of whether you should do something. Years from now you’ll be able to go back over what’s happened here and figure out what the right thing to do was, but I doubt you want to wait that long to start making decisions.”

“No, that’s not going to work.”

“So, you set ‘rational’ aside, and you just think about what you want. Feelings aren’t bound by reason, but they’re still real. All else aside—ignoring all the celestial stuff and remembering that he makes his own choices for himself, just like you do for yourself—all else aside, what do you want from a relationship with Lucifer? Think about that. Just shrink it down to really practical terms—how does he fit into your life, your goals for yourself, the things that are most important to you, and then let him know, so he can make his own decisions.”

“He’ll make the wrong decision,” Chloe says. “He’ll cut himself in half for me, and end up miserable. We won’t work like that.”

Linda nods. “He is more than capable of breaking your heart. But Chloe? The will-they-won’t-they thing you had with Lucifer is over. You did. And it sounds like you would again, if given the chance. You can’t go back to relationship limbo. You go forward, or you end things. Please, learn from my recent mistakes. Avoiding difficult discussions only makes things worse.”

Chloe hates that Linda’s right about this, but if Chloe is going to make her relationships better, that has to include Lucifer. “It’s just, I really don’t want to screw this up. Lucifer is surprisingly delicate for someone who’s supposed to be invulnerable.”

“That’s why you have to be direct and honest. Make sure you know what you want before you talk to him, and don’t stop talking until he understands what you’ve said.”

Chloe plays with the stem of her wine glass. “I can’t put Trixie through another messy relationship.”

“Chloe, Pierce and Lucifer are extremely different men. Whatever happens with Lucifer, he’s not going to turn out to be someone else.”

“He’s trying to be. You know, he thinks you advised him to pretend to be a normal person rather than the actual devil.”

Linda blinks. “Does he think he knows how to pretend to be a normal person?”

“I am honestly really curious who he would have dressed up as to get into character.”

“Dan?”

“Dan and I got divorced. Given how much respect he has for you, I’m wondering if he’d try to pull off some of your heels.”

Linda purses her lips, considering. “He does have the legs for it.”

Chloe remembers those legs, long and muscled and on display for her while he stripped in his closet. How would those legs look in heels? No more developing new Lucifer-specific fetishes, she scolds herself and downs the last of her wine.

On her way home, Chloe makes a run to the grocery store for more Hawaiian bread, because she has double-earned a comfort sandwich. In fact, she plans to eat at least three of them—Trixie will love a breakfast for dinner night. But then Chloe gets to the check-out, and there it is, the little magazine rack encouraging impulse buys from people waiting in line. GQ. Some actor she doesn’t recognize is on the cover, being worn by a suit that would have looked so much better on Lucifer. She recalls wanting to understand the finer differences between the indigo suit he chose to wear for her and the black one he rejected, and suddenly the magazine is in her cart. Like it’s porn, she stuffs it under her pillow when she gets home. And, like it’s porn, once she’s made dinner and checked Trixie’s homework and tucked her little girl safely in bed, Chloe goes upstairs and pulls the magazine out before climbing under the covers. She reads 500 words on how to style a suit with a crew neck. There’s a spread on belts. She spends a good fifteen minutes trying to picture Lucifer wearing the various ties pictured throughout the magazine. She’s only ever seen him in bow ties at formal events. Once this poisoned touch issue is resolved, she decides he’s never wearing a cravat again, but something slimmer? She might like that on occasion. A tie is a bit like a leash and collar rolled into one.

Chloe doesn’t know why she can’t stop thinking like this. The most sexually adventurous thing she’s ever done was have sex with Pierce in the evidence closet, and the memory of that is literally infesting her nightmares. Post-hot tub, she’d made her decision—no more escapades that could lead to her being eternally slut-shamed, and treating Lucifer like a pet definitely falls into that category.

Shall I be your doll, Detective? he’d purred at her.

She stuffs the magazine firmly under her mattress and tries to get some sleep. A few hours of dreams about mensware that are definitely not nightmares later, she’s sitting at the kitchen island with a pen and pad of paper. On one side of the paper, she’s written ‘Repulsive Cons.’ On the other side, she’s written, ‘Relationship Pros.’

The repulsive list comes easily—Lucifer is arrogant and self-centered. Often thoughtless. Incapable of denying himself any pleasure. He leads a surprisingly violent lifestyle—though she hesitates over that one. Her life also includes violence, but his involves a shocking number of furniture-destroying brawls. He drinks all the time. He steals drugs from evidence. He makes every case about himself. He ran off and got married without letting her know where he’d gone, just disappeared from her life—not that she should care about that, if she is repulsed by him. He is the literal devil, and he brings the entire history of the universe with him wherever he goes.

She has a more difficult time starting on the relationship pros side, not because she can’t think of anything, but because she reflexively shoots down everything she thinks of as being possibly influenced by her Miracle of God status. Eventually, she tries Linda’s advice and starts with what matters most to her.

Trixie. Trixie loves him. He makes her feel safe. Even in the beginning, when he was flummoxed by the existence of a child in his orbit, he’d treated her well, always leaving her happy and laughing. He would humor Trixie to a ridiculous degree. Even when his grasp of parenting is flawed—she remembers that whole doll fiasco, not to mention the driving—it’s clear that Trixie’s well-being matters to him, and he will challenge even Chloe if he thinks she’s not acting in Trixie’s best interests.

The rest of her family. Lucifer legitimately has a better relationship with her mom than Chloe does. He and Dan…not exactly friends, but given the fact that Dan slept with Lucifer’s mom (note to self: never tell Dan about Goddess), they get along better than she would expect. Her friends. Ella loves him like he’s another one of her brothers, and Chloe has seen Lucifer hang on every word of Ella’s excited science-babbles long past the point where Chloe has to tap out. Linda is obviously pro-Lucifer, and she spends a lot of time probing the recesses of his mind, so if there were reason to loathe him, Linda would likely know. And Maze cares deeply for him, no matter that their relationship is more complex than Chloe will ever understand.

Work. He has complete faith in her intelligence and instincts—that comes through every time he calls her ‘Detective,’ but he’s also baldly praised her skills on numerous occasions. He never makes her feel less than, never tries to ‘protect’ her by impinging upon her ability to work. She can rely on him for support there—usually. He’s not perfect. He’s more of a hindrance than a help when it comes to paperwork, but he still shows up for stakeouts despite finding them boring. The job matters to him. That’s something they share, and she knows he will go above and beyond to track down murderers, even risking his life, because he cares about people and about what’s right.

Now that she’s focusing on tangible things outside of her own mind, it’s easier to add to the list. He remembers all of her favorite things—coffee orders, restaurant picks, ‘90s jams—and takes pleasure in providing them for her, even while complaining about how they offend his own particular tastes. He doesn’t make her feel bad about mistakes—he’s a big Hot Tub High School fan, but there was also the time she drunkenly threw herself at him and not only did he keep her safe from her own recklessness, he hasn’t even teased her about it since that morning. Hell, he’d turned the time she shot him into a sweet gift symbolizing their friendship. She doesn’t have to hide herself from him, doesn’t have to be perfect, doesn’t have to box herself up in some idea of what a responsible adult should be. He’ll let her be playful, which is something divorced-detective-moms don’t always get to be. For someone who’s entire existence is theoretically centered around punishment, he’s really very accepting.

He’d watched her fall apart, fall away from herself, become panicked and lost, and he’d stepped up without hesitation to help her put herself back together, to remind her who she is, not just what she does. That generosity and care—whatever superpowers he has, that part of him is wonderfully human.

They have history, concrete moments she can point to and say, here, this is when he showed me I could trust him. Here, this is where he proved himself as a partner. It’s nothing like it was with Pierce. She fell for Lucifer over the course of months, thousands of little interactions building up to greater feelings. And she’ll fall for him again, if he wants her to, if he’s still interested.

She scribbles out the repulsed side of her list. Turns out playing detective with her own feelings works. Huh.

If he’s still interested, though. That’s a big if—she’s been erratic lately, and he clearly has concerns about the status of his own free will and about her ability to truly accept him for who he is. She’ll have to ask him if he’s still concerned about his own ability to choose, ask him if he’s willing to be himself around her. She’ll have to tell him that she wants a relationship with all of him, to ask him if he’s brave enough to be patient with her. She’ll have to give him permission to reject her.

Chloe wakes Trixie up early so that they have plenty of time to sit down for breakfast. Once they’re both settled with cereal and juice, Chloe takes a deep breath and begins.

“Monkey, you remember when we talked about what Marcus had done, and I promised not to bring anyone home again?”

The handle of Trixie’s spoon clatters against her bowl when she drops it. “Already? Did they hire someone new at work?”

Okay, fair. “No. It’s no one new, and I haven’t talked to him about this yet, but. Lucifer and I—”

“Oh, Lucifer. That’s okay.” Trixie picks her spoon back up and resumes breakfast, apparently thinking the conversation settled.

“You wouldn’t mind me dating Lucifer? I know it’s fast.”

“Maze and I discussed this ages ago. We agreed you two should be a couple.”

Knowing Maze, Chloe doubts that was the exact phrase used. “I don’t want you to feel rushed. You are still the most important person in my life, and I won’t do anything to make you feel unsafe.”

“Mom, it’s Lucifer. He’s the best.”

“He is pretty great, isn’t he?” Chloe reaches over to squeeze Trixie’s arm, earning an eye roll. Trixie is focused on more important things than a mother-daughter bonding moment.

“Does this mean we’ll start having game night again?”

“I still have to talk to him, ask him out. He might not say yes.”

“Like he’d say no to you. Maze is right, you two are idiots.”

“Language!” Chloe pulls out her sternest Mom voice, but secretly, she hopes Trixie (and Maze) are right.

Can we talk? I have something I’d like to ask you.

It takes Chloe ten minutes to compose that text, and she spends the rest of the day regretting her wording. She drives Trixie to school, checks her phone, no response. She goes to work, no response. She finishes putting together her notes on Wednesday’s party to hand off to Ella and Ella’s FBI buddies, and yet there’s still no response from Lucifer. Her words sit there at the bottom of their text chain, unread. Maybe he lost his phone, or the battery is dead. Maybe he moved to Vegas permanently this time.

Chloe has been light on family time this week, so she and Dan agreed to have dinner with Trixie that night before Chloe leaves her with him for the weekend. While Trixie picks out a show for them to watch with dinner, Chloe pulls Dan aside. She knows Trixie isn’t going to keep her news secret, and she doesn’t want Dan to find out from someone else.

“I’m going to ask Lucifer out,” she tells him while they unpack Chinese takeout onto some plates.

Dan slams down an egg roll with a sad little plopping noise. “Dammit, Chlo.”

“I know, Dan. He knew about Pierce and he didn’t tell us. But he told Amenadiel, and he told Charlotte, and they didn’t say anything either. One month ago, if Lucifer had walked up to you and said, ‘Daniel, the lieutenant is the Sinnerman,’ would you honestly have believed him? He needed proof.”

“He could have tried to explain. Charlotte shouldn’t have been involved.”

“She was his family, Dan. Sort of. And she wanted to be involved. Her death is on Pierce, no one else.”

Dan grunts in frustration and picks up the egg roll, biting it in half. Chloe gives him a moment, watching him chew angrily in a move she remembers well from when they lived together. “He stops stealing my pudding.”

“That’s fair.”

“Don’t expect me to be okay with him right away.”

“I won’t.”

The other half of the egg roll disappears. Chloe predicts an extra hard gym session is in store for Dan tomorrow. “Be careful with him, okay?”

“You don’t have to worry about that,” she says honestly. “Thanks, Dan.”

Dan grunts and starts attacking the sweet and sour chicken.

And so, after dinner, Chloe once again makes her way to Lux. He still hasn’t read her message. Maybe he’s gone, maybe he doesn’t want to see her, but she has to try. The moment she walks into the club, she knows he’s in the building. Lux is famous for its atmosphere, for crowds of people uniformly enjoying themselves. Tonight, though, every couple Chloe sees is either in the midst of a vicious argument or half-way to a public indecency charge, sometimes both. She can feel the energy herself, lust and hurt licking up her back as she approaches the elevator. There’s a line tonight, dozens of people waiting for a ride to the penthouse. Chloe goes directly to the elevator doors, where one of the bouncers, Henri, has stationed himself.

“Detective Decker,” he greets. “You need to talk to the boss, get him to tone it down. We’re running into fire code violations, not to mention everything else.” He looks nervously at a couple of women at the front of the line who are disagreeing over the correct way to roast a chicken in the same tone of voice Chloe might use if she ever gets the chance to speak to Pierce again. “I don’t know, maybe he could come down, play one of his piano sets? People here need to chill the fuck out. Uh, pardon the language.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Chloe promises, and he holds back the crowd to make sure she gets a spot in the elevator the next time it opens up.

She ends up jammed into the back corner, pressed up against a couple making out while listening to a pair of friends each furiously insisting that the other one has the cuter pair of shoes on. She doesn’t know exactly what’s going on, but she’s certain Lucifer is at the heart of it. He’s hurt, and it’s spilling out to affect everyone in his general vicinity. He also appears to be ignoring her text in favor of throwing a party, so there’s that. Not ideal circumstances for a relationship talk. It would be so much easier to just admit she’s in over her head, that they’re just too different. Easier to take the elevator back down and go back to her mostly human life.

No more running from stewardesses, she thinks, and the elevator doors slide open onto the penthouse.

Chapter Text

When the elevator doors slide open, the first thing Chloe hears is an agitated British voice saying, “Not on the piano, you priapic philistines!”

It takes a minute for the people ahead of her to unload into the penthouse, and during that time she picks up other sensory details—primarily the reek of sex and the din of non-stop squabbling and moaning. Chloe realizes she is about to step into what could only be described as a very angry orgy.

None of the arguments appear to have turned violent, but they are inescapable. It’s a lot of shouting about who’s mother is the worst and who ruined who’s suede jacket. Simultaneously, a woman is having a very loud, prolonged orgasm on Lucifer’s sofa.

Not provided by Lucifer himself, she’s relieved to see.

He’s facing away from the elevator, using his pocket square to scrub vigorously at a spot on the top of his Steinway while two pantsless men stumble off in search of a less well guarded surface. The men are clearly in love, or lust, but in between sucking on each others’ necks, they are also sniping at each other over who forgets to buy milk on a regular basis and what that forgetfulness means about their commitment to their relationship.

As more people spill into the penthouse, Lucifer half turns, granting Chloe a view of his right profile. He’s irritated and surprisingly out of place, still fully dressed in the gray suit from yesterday. “Great, more bloody—” His voice cuts off when he spots her in the crowd, and his expression quickly cycles from annoyed to stunned to defiant.

“Come to join the devil at play, Detective?” he drawls. He drops his pocket square and turns to face her head on, and despite the fact that he’s got his emotional walls back up like it’s two weeks ago all over again, Chloe’s face splits into a victorious grin.

On the left side of his neck, just beneath the hinge of his jaw, Lucifer has adorned himself with a large red sticker. It’s octagonal, like a stop sign, and in white block letters it reads, “NO TOUCH!”

He’s being faithful.

Lucifer blinks at her reaction and takes a step back, nonplussed. “Did you come to join?” He peers at her as though expecting to see symptoms of a head injury. “Not really your type of event,” he warns. “Are you certain you’re yourself?”

Keeping her gaze high to avoid seeing too much of what makes this not her type of event, Chloe shrugs past a few encroaching party girls and approaches him, hands twisted together in front of her stomach. She’d practiced her opening line on the drive over here, but can’t remember a single word. “I tried texting. I guess you’ve been ignoring your phone?”

He pats absently at his breast pocket, then glances out towards the balcony. “Oh. I got rid of it.”

“You got rid of it?”

“An impulse. Detective, why are you here?”

“I wanted to talk to you about something. Us.”

His earlier defiance drains away entirely, walls dropping to reveal pure exhaustion. He sighs and runs a hand over his face. “I haven’t got the energy to argue right now. As you can see, I have guests to tend to.”

“We won’t argue—or I hope we won’t. I think it should be a good thing?”

It’s heartbreaking how quickly he smothers the flare of hope that blooms in his eyes. “You’ve decided to take me up on my offer?”

“No. Something better. I think it would be better.”

He’s wary now, ready to be disappointed. “I suppose I could spare a few moments.”

“Is there somewhere less…” Chloe waves her hand, “1970s playboy mansion-esque where we can talk?”

He casts an exasperated look about his very crowded home. “Maybe the kitchen?”

But the kitchen has been taken over by a couple throwing flour at each other and another busily licking jam off of each other’s naked skin. Chloe and Lucifer end up out on the balcony, huddled in the corner furthest from the hot tub. He’s standing, shoulders slumped, about three feet away from her, gaze fixed on his own feet, fingers of his left hand tapping against his thigh.

“What was it, then?”

Even his hair looks tired, too listless to maintain it’s styling, curling limply down onto his forehead. “Here, let’s sit,” she says, leaning back against the wall behind her and sliding to the ground.

He taps his foot impatiently, but joins her on the ground, sitting next to her, eyes directed forward at the balcony railing. The day-old clothes, unkempt hair, and unshaven jaw give Lucifer the patina of debauchery, but he’s sober, she realizes. There’s no scent of whiskey or cigarettes clinging to him. He’s eschewed his preferred vices, just as he had the night after Pierce’s death. It’s like he’s faced a setback so devastating he knows there’s no substance on Earth that could grant him escape, or perhaps as though he doesn’t believe he deserves that escape.

“You’re angry at me,” Chloe says, because apparently she can’t help herself.

He huffs humorlessly. “That’s why you’re here? Tell me, Detective, why would I be angry at you?”

She cranes her neck forward to look at a pair of women, both wearing wedding rings, engaged in a life-or-death discussion about how one of them always leaves half-empty mugs of cold coffee around the house, then looks back at Lucifer. “Your orgy is full of arguing couples. You’re angry at me.”

“I’ll vet the guest list more carefully next time.”

“It’s your mojo, isn’t it?”

He lets his head fall back on his neck. “Some people are more affected by me than others,” he says tonelessly. “Usually it’s just low grade desire, but sometimes?” He shrugs.

“Sometimes you broadcast more of your emotions.”

“It shouldn’t affect you.”

“No, because I’m immune.”

“Because you are the most strong minded person I’ve met.”

“You mean stubborn. Is that why you’re angry?”

“Why can’t you ever just let things be easy?” he snaps suddenly. “Always with the pushing, can’t just take a perfectly simple solution to our problems.”

“You spending the rest of your life pretending you’re human is hardly a simple solution.”

“It is! You wouldn’t have to do anything! Just continue on as you have been—”

“And watch you mojo an entire building into acting out a naked version of Fight Club?”

“I’m so glad you didn’t come here argue.”

Chloe looks down. “You’re right. I’m sorry.” She grips her own forearms, nervous. “I came here to ask you out.”

Silence. She can’t look at him.

“I did end up talking to Linda yesterday, and she helped me kinda filter out all the extra stuff and just focus on what, you know, matters. What I want from my life, what’s important to me.” She’s babbling, tries to refocus. “And that’s you. I want you. In my life. My—” the word boyfriend seems too small, “—partner. Outside of work, too.”

He inhales, a small gasp of sound almost inaudible over the party noise. “But I’m a poison to you.”

It’s enough to allow her to look up, biting her lip through a smile. “No. You’re just high-strung. Difficult, which is good, because I’m not great at easy.”

He laughs, just a small breath of hope. “I needn’t fear boring you, then. But, Chloe.” Her name on his lips always sounds like a prayer. “It made you panic—I made you panic. I cannot bear being the thing that makes your life worse.”

“That’s just it. You’re the thing that makes my life better. Look, I know now, Lucifer. Whether you pretend to be human or not, I know that God and Hell and angels and Goddess are all real. It’s easier for me to handle that if I have someone who helps me understand the things I’m having trouble with. And I cannot be left in the dark—remember the way I forced you to go back over everything I’d missed in our partnership? I hate not knowing. It makes me feel out of control.”

“And you do like control.” He smirks, and she rolls her eyes.

“But I wanted to make sure—I know you were upset when you found out about the whole miracle thing. Are you all right with it? Knowing your dad might have made me to take away your free will?”

“I’m not what matters—”

“Stop that, or we are going to argue. You do. You matter to me.”

He sighs, bites his tongue. “I’ve long since come to terms with the idea you may have been sent by my father to control me. Being with you? It’s a greater piece of grace than I’ve ever experienced. I do not have the strength to walk away from you just to spite my father.”

“Sounds like I’m a very effective trap, then.”

“No.” He shakes his head, sliding nearer. “You’ve made my life larger. New experiences, new feelings. You’ve introduced me to parts of myself I didn’t know existed. You’ve helped me become someone who has friends, who can maintain a relationship with one of my siblings. Without watching you with your spawn, I’d never have figured out a way to deal with Mum that didn’t result in one or both of us getting hurt. Before we met, most of what I did was desperate—endless attempts to spite my father or grab a moment of fun out of eons of boredom and pain. You’ve shown me how to lead a life I’m proud of, a life where I’m not only my worst self. You are my freedom, Chloe.”

She can feel herself glowing, soaking in his words like sunlight. “You’re just wonderful.”

“So glad you’ve finally realized,” he says reflexively, the brag automatic. “But what about your own free will? Can you be certain this is your own choice?”

Chloe shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter. So what if your dad designed me for you? You still make my daughter happy. You help me be a better detective. You taught me how to have a life outside of work. You are kind and good and caring. I am so very lucky, so very glad to have you in my life.”

His lips pinch at the corners. “If you truly wish to do this, you should let me be a man worthy of your time and attention. Let me give you the normal, human life you want.”

Chloe recognizes the pattern in his response—he’s wildly selfish and self-centered 95% of the time, until it comes to personal relationships, in which case he has a tendency to brush aside his own needs, as though he believes that prioritizing someone else’s desires is the only way he can show his affection.

His parents have a lot to answer for.

She shakes her head, the rejection gentle but firm. “No. This only works if you’re you. Just imagine it for a moment. Please? You being you and me being me, not hiding or pretending, just us together. Relaxed, honest, trusting. I think we can make it work. I think we could be really happy.” The last comes out nearly in a whisper. She tilts her head up, looking into his eyes, hoping he can see what this would mean to her.

“I don’t know if I can just be myself with someone. I haven’t done that in…” He trails off. “I’m Maze’s king, and Amenadiel’s task, and the doctor’s patient. No one else believes I am who I say I am. No one else who still speaks to me, at any rate.”

“That’s okay,” she says quickly, and immediately wants to smack herself, because it’s clearly not okay to him. “Or, what I mean is. If it’s difficult for you, I can be patient, as long as you’re trying. I’ll need you to be patient with me, too. You’re right that the celestial stuff overwhelms me, but you are too important to me for me to ignore what’s between us because the universe seems so vast all of a sudden. It’ll take me time, but I’ll get past that. If it takes you time to figure out how to be yourself, who you want to be, I’ll give you all the time I have.”

“I want us to be perfect.”

“I want us to be real. Perfection is for—I was about to say it’s for your dad, but he seems pretty far from perfect, so what hope do the rest of us have? You and me? We’ll be messy and sweet and satisfying and us.”

She’s winning—she can see it in the softness of his smile, the crinkling the corners of his eyes. “Have you been a closet romantic all this time, Detective? Do you go home at night, free your hair from it’s prim workplace bun, and compose sonnets to your sturdy brown shoes?”

“Ass.” She turns away, scrunching up her nose but smiling.

“Your ass, if you want it.”

She turns back, heart full. “I’ll take good care of it.”

“Are you certain? It likes a lot of attention?”

“I am not about to let you make a pegging joke right now, Lucifer. Not the time.”

“But there will be a time?” A leer flits across his face, replaced once more by uncertainty. “I really don’t know what I’m doing here, Detective. I’ve never had anything like this. Never known anyone like you.”

She really, really wants to touch him. “Here,” she says instead, scooting around until she’s sitting perpendicular to him, knees drawn up to her chest. “Turn towards me and sit like this.” He complies, so that the two of them are sitting face to face. “Now slide back a bit?”

“What on Earth are you up to?” he asks, bemused but willing.

She lifts her right leg, flexing her foot so he’s presented with the sole of her boot. “Look, my sturdy brown shoes have very thick soles. No chance of skin contact. Put your foot up against mine?”

He scoffs. “You know, I’m pretty sure I tried this position with a circus performer once.” Still, he lifts his foot until their feet are pressed sole-to-sole, the flashy red of his Louboutins outlining the dull simplicity of her knockoff boots.

She feels like a kid, silly, playing stupid games with a friend in some liminal piece of time carved out from other responsibilities. “This is how we’ll work,” she says, pressing her foot forward to make him draw his own knee further in towards his chest. “I push and you give, and then you push—I said you push—”

“Yes, very well.” He sounds grumpy, but he’s clearly holding back a laugh as he presses his foot more firmly into her own.

“And I give,” she continues, allowing his leg to push her own back. “Partners.” She leans to the side to get a better look at him. “All right?”

“All right.” They stay still for a moment, feet pressed together, before he clears his throat and draws away. He stands and dusts off his suit. “Still, I would be obliged if you could give me some pointers as we get started. I’m afraid I made an awful muck of it the last time I thought we might be together. Could you, I mean, what do you d—” he catches himself, flushes.

“What do I desire?” She clambers to her own feet, bursting with affection. “I desire the freedom to kiss you whenever I want, but unfortunately we’re still limited on that front.”

“At least we already know you’re creative enough to work around that barrier.” He walks over to the railing and leans back, putting the lines of his body on display, his neck tilted to show off the sticker he wore for her. It’s a mark of hope, she realizes. I want this, he’d said, and he meant it. Even after yesterday, he’d still hoped.

“Creative is good,” she says, blushing. “Though, I’m not sure about the uh, the whole power thing we did.”

“Don’t tell me you don’t enjoy it; I won’t believe you.” So cocky, so smug, so perfectly him, the smile on his face right now. His hips are canted forwards, his hands resting loosely in his pockets, his body open to her.

She could put him on his knees. Make him do that little snake maneuver to lower himself before her. He’d go willingly.

“No. I mean, I did,” she assures him, “but I don’t trust it. I’ve never—that’s not me. And I’m too worried about you trying to be someone you think I want rather than your actual self. So no. To that.”

He stands up straighter. “What, then?”

“I mean, we’ll still, you know,” she waves her hands in the space between them, “but, uh, normal style?”

He tsks at her. “That won’t do. There’s nothing abnormal about a little control kink, Detective.”

“Vanilla then. Boring.”

He takes half a step towards her. “Never boring. Never with you.”

Seeing the lust in his eyes as he looks her over while he’s wearing what amounts to a ‘Property of Chloe Decker’ sticker on his neck? It’s suddenly hot out on the balcony. Very, very hot.

“Right. We’ll have to, um, figure out what works for us in that area. But we’ll be a couple outside of that. We’ll…” She realizes she’s never had to explain this to anyone. “We’ll prioritize each other first—or, after Trixie.” She looks up to see if he has any qualms about taking on that responsibility, but he nods.

“I will always take care of your spawn.”

“I know. That’s part of how I know this is right. I told her about this, or asked her permission, rather.”

“No doubt she leapt to give her approval.” But his voice is unsure.

“She did. According to her, you’re the best, and the two of us are idiots for not doing this ages ago.”

“So insightful for such a young age, but with your genes she was bound to be smart.”

“I told Dan, too—you can’t steal his puddings, anymore, by the way.”

Lucifer pouts. “But Detective, I need to eat something to keep my strength up throughout the day. If I’m to make that trade off you’ll have to promise me an even better treat.” His tongue flits over his bottom lip, his meaning obvious, and she rolls her eyes out of habit.

“None of that at work. And I mean that, I’d rather keep this quiet.” His expression dims, and she quickly amends her statement. “For now, I mean. I don’t want to keep you a secret, and you can talk to Maze or Linda or your brother. But until we have this Bauda situation wrapped up, I don’t want to give her any fuel to use against me.”

He doesn’t look convinced. “I suppose I can be discrete for the time being.”

“Thank you, Lucifer.” She walks closer, knowing she needs to respect his concerns about the two of them touching but unable to keep so much distance between them.

“What else? How else do couples behave?” His voice sinks lower the closer she gets, just a hint of rasp to it, and she has to tuck her hands behind her back to keep from reaching out.

“Well, we’ll prioritize each other, support each other—emotional support, I mean, as well as other types. Arrange our lives so that they grow together, check in with each other on big decisions, be responsible to each other.”

He nods, something close to avarice growing in his eyes. “Yes. I can, or I will certainly try to do all of that. You’ll tell me if I mess up? Give me a chance to do better?”

“We’re not being graded, Lucifer. I’ll always give you another chance. And you’ll let me know if I’m doing something that bothers you, or not doing something you need?”

“I’ll try. For us.”

For us. She can’t even hold his hand.

It’s clear his thoughts have followed the same path as he abruptly straightens, tugging his jacket into slightly less disheveled order. “Right. That’s that. I suppose I should escort you out, for now, but,” he pauses, taking the time to finger-comb his hair back from his forehead as though overcome by a moment of vanity, but his voice is cautious when he asks, “will you call me tonight?”

She remembers it, his voice over her laptop speakers, begging her. But he’s right here now; they both are. “You got rid of your phone, remember?”

“Ah. Yes.” He looks again at the balcony railing.

“Lucifer. Did you throw your phone off of the balcony?”

He looks sheepish. “As I said, an impulse. I didn’t want to watch you not calling me. And then people began showing up.” He gestures at his still crowded apartment, though the level of anger radiating from his visitors has dropped sharply throughout their conversation.

“You didn’t just chose to host a sex party tonight, then?”

“I wasn’t exactly in the mood for company. I chased the first few out, but they kept coming, all so angry and horny that I figured I owed them a safe space to get it all out, no matter the cleaning bill in my future.”

Chloe grimaces. “Gross. So you are affecting their behavior?” He hesitates, so she adds, “This is me asking questions about the celestial woo-woo side of you. I might not ask all the questions you expect me to ask about Hell, but I do want to know you, which means understanding your whole mojo deal.”

He laughs. “My Detective, so eloquent. As I said, some people are more susceptible to me than others. I have…it’s difficult to describe. I learned to sort of dampen my divine allure when around humans—really cut down on the number of ‘be not afraid’ talks I had to go through every time I visited Earth. But sometimes it slips out anyway. I don’t make anyone feel anything,” he hastens to add.

“You just allow them to experience what they’re already feeling.” Chloe nods. “So the couples who came to Lux tonight, the ones more susceptible to your influence, found themselves going over any problems in their relationships while also expressing their love for each other. Instant Orgy Fight Club.”

“I did try to tone things down.”

“But you were emotionally exhausted. I know. So wait, your ‘what do you desire’ trick—is that just focusing your ambient divinity onto one person to amplify the effect?”

“I suppose it is.” He blinks. “You are the most startlingly brilliant person.” She can feel herself blushing, and he grins. “Yes, brilliant, clever, wise. My boundlessly intelligent Detective.”

He does know how to hone in on a point of pride, and he’s so generous about doing so with her. “Regardless,” she says, trying to regain a hold on herself before she gives in to the urge to kiss him. “Please don’t throw anything else off of your balcony—it’s dangerous. And please, I know this is difficult for you, but please start assuming that I want you in my life. I want that today, and I’ll want it tomorrow, and the day after that. We’re building something together now, yeah?”

“Yes, Detective. I apologize for running yet again.”

“And I’m sorry I kept you waiting. I needed time to figure myself out, but from now on I’ll tell you that up front, make sure you know I’m coming back.”

He looks rather stunned by the offer. “I didn’t know that was an option—marvelous, the advances in interpersonal communication you humans have discovered.”

Amenadiel really is the only family member he’s spoken with in eons, Chloe realizes, with the exception of his terrifying mother. He really does expect each argument to be the end. “I’m going to do better by you,” she promises. “But that means you need to keep your phone with you, so I can reach you.”

“I’ll have a replacement within the hour. And then you’ll call?”

“You don’t want me to stay?”

He blinks at her, non-plussed, before a lewd smile crosses his face. “Of course, Detective. I’m sure we’ll find something to your liking.”

Brow furrowed, Chloe allows him to lead her back into his living room. The party has evolved into a normal orgy now, or what she assumes from lack of experience must be something approaching normal. She’s trying not to take too much note of what’s going on around her, instead puzzling over what Lucifer’s last comment had meant. Clarification arrives when he starts introducing her to the handful of his guests who are not physically attached to another human being.

“Here’s Tej—lovely chap, terribly flexible. Ooh, and this is Andre. Or maybe Marla?” He tilts his head and waggles his eyebrows at her as she smiles awkwardly and shakes hands with some beautiful but less-clothed-than-optimal people.

“Uh, hi, everybody. Um. You know, Lucifer, I think I should probably get going after all. Could you, uh, maybe walk me out?” She points a thumb back towards the elevator.

He’s frowning now, but he excuses himself from his guests and follows her into the empty carriage, standing pressed against the wall farthest from her.

“Did I do something to displease you, Detective?”

“I just…were you introducing me to those people so I could have sex with them?”

“If you liked. You said you wanted to stay?”

There’s a sinking sensation in her core. Maybe they really don’t know how to communicate with each other. “After we…I thought we’d agreed. You and me…?”

The air is suddenly tense, and he’s staring at her like she’s about to renege on a promised prize. “Yes. Us. We agreed, all of two minutes ago. You haven’t changed your mind? I hadn’t thought you that fickle.”

“No, no changing my mind. It’s just, you wouldn’t care? If I had sex with other people?”

He’s still watching her like he’s expecting a trap, as though at any moment she’ll lead him into a pit full of snakes and spikes. “You chose me? Yes?”

“Yes? I mean, yes.”

“Not just…Detective. Is this just about sex for you?”

She recoils just as the elevator doors open on the ground floor. “Of course not!” she says, stepping out. Henri shoots her a grateful look as she leads Lucifer through the much calmer club towards the street outside. “Is that what it is for you?”

“Absolutely not. Sex—well, I desire it. With you, constantly. But ultimately it’s inconsequential—that part of our interaction will be whatever you want. But we will be a couple, yes? Together? Partners outside of work. Fa—” He cuts himself off. “A unit,” he says instead as the two of them step back out into the warm Los Angeles evening.

He sounds almost angry, and even as she wishes she could take his hand, soothe him, there’s a part of her gearing up to fight if she needs to. “I know how you live, Lucifer. Sex is not inconsequential to you.”

“Compared to you?” His voice rises; breaks. “To us? It’s nothing. Or it is if you meant what you said, if you care about me as I care about you. You said, I am your priority. Other than the child, I come first with you. You said it. That wasn’t just—I’m not just the best night of your life, an achievement. I am part of your life. That’s what I want.”

He’s so intense right now, so serious. It leaves her flushed; she wishes she could gather his face in her hands and sooth the creases from his forehead. “That’s what you are, yes. What I want, too. Sorry—I know you get jealous, sometimes, and I don’t think I really understood what you were jealous of.”

He draws back, indignant. “I don’t get—”

“Of course you do. It’s okay.” It’s just going to take her a while to get used to a relationship with someone with such a different background. She can’t assume anything, she realizes. “Human guys, in my experience, the jealousy is usually physical. Physically possessive. That’s not a concern for you?”

“I’m not cruel, Detective. I would never interfere with your desires, especially not if I get to watch.” He looks proud of himself when she rolls her eyes. “I know I’m a bit hampered right now what with not being able to touch you, so it makes perfect sense that you would want some alternate company. It’s not as though you’ll encounter anyone better than me.” He’s so self-assured in this one area, she can’t help but laugh.

“No, I never will, will I?”

He beams.

“So I’m allowed to have sex with other people. Okay. I don’t want to, but I’ll let you know if that changes.”

“Then you’re not upset? Everything is all right again?”

“I suppose it is. What about you? Are you going to go back up and, er, join the festivities?”

Somehow, he looks even cockier. “Is that what this has been about? Are you jealous? Detective, I’ll never encounter anyone better than you, either.” He doesn’t come closer to her, but he leans forward as though he wants to. “Say the word and I’ll cover my whole body in little red stickers.” He sweeps his hands down in a gesture that encompasses his entire form. “All of this is yours to command, as you like.”

There’s no hesitation in his voice. None. Chloe feels the blush spreading from her cheeks down her neck.

“You do like that, don’t you?” he drawls and she shivers.

No, she reminds herself sternly.

“Can you picture me, Detective, at your feet? Gazing up at you, awaiting your command? Naked and hard and wanting, absolutely unable to do anything about it without your permission?”

That’s not something he’d want, she reminds them both. “I can’t imagine you’d enjoy that? Just being left unfulfilled and ignored while I go about my day?”

“I want whatever you desire, Detective. Imagine it. Imagine the two of us at the precinct, you knee deep in paperwork, me decked out in whichever suit you’ve chosen for me that day, a pretty picture for you to rest your eyes on whenever the boredom gets too crushing. Imagine reaching out and brushing your fingers against me, just here,” he gestures at her spot on his neck, “and knowing that you were laying claim, declaring ownership over me in front of all of your coworkers. Imagine knowing no one else can hold the devil the way you do.”

She forces herself to imagine, instead, bored Lucifer fiddling with everything on her desk, twitting Dan until even that amusement has lost its luster for the day, and then making some loud, ribald comment whenever her eyes stray to his neck so that everyone she works with quickly knows way too much about her sex life. Chloe frowns, going back over their conversation to try to sort out what it is he actually needs from her. He’s right; they can’t touch right now, and if ever there were a man who requires physical affection…

She tests the possibility out in her mind and decides it’s one she can live with. “I meant what I said before, all of it, including that I don’t want to do anything that risks leaving you feeling like you don’t have free will.”

He scoffs but she holds up a hand.

“I mean it, Lucifer. I don’t know where our…game…comes from, and I don’t trust it. But putting that aside, for now, if you do want to have sex with other people, that’s fine, as long as I’m the only one you’re emotionally involved with. We’ll reassess once our touch issues are resolved, but for right now,” she steels herself, “I don’t want to be cruel.”

He looks worried more than anything else, reaching up to palm the left side of his neck. “Does that mean you no longer wish me to bear your mark?”

It should; she knows that. Ridiculous—hell, unhealthy, to think of any part of his body as her own. But she wants it, and maybe it feels good for him, too, like a piece of her is with him, even though they can’t touch. It’s just a limit, she reasons with herself. Like couples who swing but only kiss each other. Every relationship has it’s own shape. This can be theirs, at least for the moment.

“If it doesn’t bother you, I’d rather you do. I don’t mean the sticker, but, yeah. I’d rather you keep that spot just for me.”

He ducks his head and gazes at her through his lashes, looking relaxed and happy, and isn’t that a rare thing these days?

“It won’t bother me in the slightest. Well, I have some guests to encourage to leave. Because, Detective? I only want you, and that won’t change.”

Her quick grin proves the lie behind her earlier words. She very much does not want him having sex with anyone else. “Good. Good. And, yeah. I will call tonight. If you’re available.”

He runs his tongue along his lips. “I’ll be waiting.”

She turns away, but then a thought strikes her and she turns back. “Lucifer? How strict is your no sex on the piano rule?”

“Out the window the moment I’m able to have you there.”

“Glad to hear it.” Pleased with herself, Chloe puts a little extra sway into her hips as she walks away.

Chapter Text

By the time she reaches her car, Chloe’s nerves are back in full force.

No matter that she’s driving home, away from him, she did just make a sex date with Lucifer for tonight. She’s going to have to say things, things she doesn’t typically say. She’d managed the last time, but that ‘little video wank’ hadn’t been planned. She doesn’t know if she can say that sort of thing on demand, worries she’ll get shy, clam up, disappoint him. I don’t want anyone else, he’d said, a glowing beacon in her memory, but he’s literally surrounded by real sex in his home at this moment. How could Chloe possibly measure up?

She’s trying to remember everything Linda’s ever said about her time as a phone sex operator when she walks into her apartment. Maze is on the couch, sulkily eating a nutritious dinner of tequila and Lucky Charms, but she slams her bowl down on the coffee table when Chloe enters.

“Did you really go to an orgy at Lucifer’s without me?”

Apparently Lucifer got his new phone. “Hi, Maze, how was your day? Mine went well.” Chloe drops her bag on the kitchen counter and toes off her shoes, only to look up and realize that the demon appears genuinely hurt by her lack of invite. “I didn’t know there was an orgy, okay? He says it just happened, his mojo was on the fritz.” Maze appears unappeased, so Chloe tries again. “Neither of us had sex. With each other, or anyone else.”

“All the more reason you should have invited me. I could have told you how to be ‘event appropriate’—Linda does it for me all the time. You’re too clueless to party on your own, and you’ve obviously broken Lucifer.”

Chloe winces; Maze and Lucifer clearly just spoke, so… “Does he seem broken?”

“No. Just…different.” Maze scowls, resentful of that fact. She grabs her jacket from where it’s been slung over the back of the couch. “I’m gonna go find Bauda while you two have your monogamous phone sex.” She says ‘monogamous’ like it’s a curse.

He was just there, Linda had said of Amenadiel, and Chloe sighs. If Maze is going to be in her life, and apparently she is, then she and Chloe need to figure out a relationship that’s not built around Lucifer or work. One that isn’t so fragile or filled with demon temper-tantrums. “Have you ever fired a gun?”

Maze scoffs and pulls a knife out of her cleavage. “I can handle Bauda.”

“No, I mean. I’m going to the gun range tomorrow. Would you like to come with me?”

Maze’s chin dips, considering. “What do we use as targets?”

“It’s paper, but still. It’s a deadly device that unloads with explosive power when you touch it right—I figure that’s up your alley.”

“Yeah, I can give that a try. All right, I’m in.”

“Good. Any news on the Bauda front yet?”

“She’s a boring target. Went to that Thorston dude’s place last night, but he wasn’t there. Wife was—barely. Bauda caught her carrying a bunch of suitcases to the car. They talked for a minute—not amicable, on the wife’s side, anyway—and then Bauda drove off again. Went to a tattoo parlor—”

“Really? Which one?” That sounds like a genuine lead, a way to find out why some of Pierce’s men had marked themselves.

“I’ll text it to you. She wasn’t in there five minutes before they showed her the door, too. Then she just went home, sat by herself all night. Like I said, boring.”

Chloe nods. “Thanks, Maze. I don’t want you wasting your time—if Bauda isn’t up to anything tonight, either, maybe check out the tattoo parlor again? See if there’s anyone there you recognize from the Sinnerman case?”

“Maybe. I’ve got actual bounties to work, too, you know?”

Chloe bites back a groan of frustration and rolls her head back on her neck as Maze stalks by her towards the front door. “Maze. I promise. If I ever knowingly attend an orgy, I will invite you.”

“That’s all I’m asking, Decker.” But Chloe wins a quick grin from the demon before she slips out into the night.

Chloe pulls her phone from her bag and finds a text from Lucifer waiting—detective emoji, phone emoji, devil emoji, eggplant emoji, water emoji, prayer hands emoji. Even she can figure that one out.

Still, she doesn’t call immediately, taking the time to shut down the apartment for the night. She goes upstairs, changes into her pajamas, washes her face, all the while testing out possible lines to use during their call. If he wanted to fantasize about a blow job, what would she say? How would she make it sexy for him, exciting? What dirty phrases is she comfortable with? When she approaches her bed, her eyes linger on the drawer to her bedside table—should she use her vibrator? Last time had been unplanned, she’d made do with her fingers, and it had been more than fine. But this time, she has the option…though, he’ll hear it. He has bat ears, especially for anything involving sex. Somehow, the addition of a sex toy to their interactions feels more intimate, revealing, and she’s already a little tense. She decides against it for tonight.

Eventually, she has no more excuses for delay. She sits on the edge of her bed and calls him, putting her phone on speaker so she’ll have her hands free.

“Detective,” he greets warmly when he answers.

“Hi, Lucifer. Um. Hi.”

“Hello to you, too. I trust you made it home safely?”

“Yeah.”

“Splendid.” Then, getting straight to business, he prompts, “The cameras are still in place. Please feel free to turn them on. Now, or whenever you feel the urge, honestly. You have my blanket consent in this matter. But, perhaps, now, especially.”

“Maybe if you’re good,” she says, absently, hopping up to grab her laptop.

“I can be very good. Perhaps if I impress you enough, you’ll turn on a camera of your own?”

“Your desire is noted,” she says, like it’s inconsequential. His request unnerves her, though. With what dating is these days, she knows she comes off a bit prudish in this matter, but she’s never sent anyone naked photos, not even Dan, and has certainly never put herself in a position where anyone might end up with a risque recording of her. All that teen actress baggage she carries around won’t allow her to, but with Lucifer asking…she keeps thinking about the moment she agreed to do the topless scene twenty years ago, about how daring it had made her feel, like she’d caged a little piece of lightening under her skin.

She’s turned on, but too anxious to do anything about it. There’s a thrum in her ears, in her cheeks and temples—he’s there, listening, with her. There’s a part of her that just wants to bask, bathe in this new emotional synchronicity between them. She would if they were in the same room, but he’d hurried her out, asked for a phone call, and now she feels like she has to speak.

“What—” she starts, just as he says, “Shall I—” and they both trail off into awkward silence until Chloe has to laugh.

“Shall you what?” she asks. “You must have had something in mind when you asked me to call.”

“You didn’t want to?”

“I want to—I want to talk to you. Spend time with you. That’s what I was offering before when I talked about staying at your place. I didn’t want to join in the orgy.”

“It did seem out of character, but you’ve been full of surprises lately.”

“Good surprises?”

“Uniformly.” He pauses for a moment, then finally allows his personality out. “I cannot stop thinking of your voice in my ear, telling me to come. I’ve gotten off to the memory dozens of times already. All the scenarios I think up end like that now.”

“Tell me about these scenarios.” Chloe shifts, settling into her bed, her computer open at her side but the cameras not yet engaged.

“Everywhere. As soon as I got rid of the last orgiest, I took a shower and imagined you there, watching me, telling me what to wash, when to use the shampoo, making me wait to touch myself.”

That’s not what Chloe expected, and her brain shies away from the image. They aren’t doing that—he’ll tear himself in half. Blasphemy. She slams her laptop shut; they can’t recreate the dynamic from their previous time together. It’s too uneven, her watching when he cannot. She needs him to tell her something that he wants, that she didn’t put into his head. “You have to have thought of something other than me watching you shower. What about—remember when you showed me how to kneel?”

“Yes, Detective. Me, sinking down at your feet, hands behind my back, head bowed in supplication while you studied me. Would you like me there, in your bedroom? Kneeling at the foot of your bed, waiting for you to decide what you want? Ready to serve?”

No. Blasphemy. But her breath hitches—the way his hips had shifted when he knelt... “No, I meant when I was kneeling. You said me at your feet calling you Sir was a dream come true. Why don’t you tell me about that dream?”

Cloth rustles on the other end of the line, like he’s restless. “That’s… Before I knew you, when you were just a girl on a movie screen. I thought about you climbing out of that water and sinking down in front of me.”

“Oh.” Hot Tub stuff. Okay. Kinda the opposite of a turn-on for her at this point, but maybe there’s a spin on it that could work. Couples do this for each other—Dan had always loved the high school quarterback/head cheerleader scenario—though she thinks that was mainly about him wanting to fantasize about making all-state senior year if he hadn’t broken his collar bone—and she’d played along no matter how silly the pom poms made her feel.

“Do you want to picture me like that now?” Chloe asks. “In your hot tub, tiny red bikini barely covering my breasts. Flirting with you, waiting for you to crook your finger, beckon me to you?”

Her hands are idle at her sides—she’s still figuring out how to get into this scenario for her own sake—but it’s a complete shock when his response is similarly disinterested. “I can’t picture you coming to me—’Get in the tub, Lucifer,’ you’d say in that irritated tone. I’d have to make it up to you for keeping you waiting. You know I don’t typically need to breathe? Even with you around, I bet I could hold my breath a very long time.”

Okay, so he wants to go down on her—that tracks, given his years’ worth of comments. But that doesn’t need to mean she’s in charge. “What if no pool, then? Just straightforward, I’m in your bedroom right now, undressing.”

“Would you like me to do it for you?”

Yes. “Yeah. Talk to me. Tell me what you want.”

“I’d slip your ridiculous polyester blend blazer off first—” Well, she did want him to be himself. “—taking the chance to smell your hair—jasmine.”

Chloe imagines his nose tracing along the nape of her neck, a frisson of excitement skating down her spine.

“I’d slip my hands down your sides, pull your blouse free of your waistband, slip a few fingers under the hem, smooth my hand over your stomach.”

Yes. Chloe mimics the move.

“You’d snap at me, smack the back of my hand for taking liberties without permission.”

She can hear the smile in his voice, the fondness, but his words still freeze her. “No, Lucifer. We aren’t doing that, remember?”

He’s impatient now. “Why won’t you let me give you what you want?”

Well, she’s impatient, too. “Why won’t you tell me what you want?”

“I want to make you feel good. To give you your desires. What is the point of dating the slut of the universe if you won’t take advantage of my all-inclusive list of turn-ons? Anything. I’ll enjoy it as long as it’s what you want.”

Chloe tells herself that she’s worried about Lucifer’s free will, but what she’s really picturing are the notes from Pierce’s files that the FBI had shown her. A carefully mapped out strategy where a man pretended at what she wanted in order to control her, make her love him, and hurt those she cared about. Suddenly her limbs feel distant, her lungs heavy, the walls close. She needs to get Lucifer to tell her something he wants; that will keep them both safe.

Breathing carefully, she tries again. “Tell me something from early in our partnership, okay? What about—all right, that time I came to the penthouse and you were naked. You must have had something you were hoping for that night.”

He’s silent for a beat. “What about before that? When I surprised you with breakfast, and you apprehended me very temporarily clad in a towel?”

“What about then?” She lets him hear her smile; this one could work.

“What if I’d asked to cook for you in advance, and you’d said yes. You hear me come in while you’re in the shower, and you decide you really need to thank me for going out of my way to feed you.”

“And what exactly were you planning on feeding me?”

“Naughty, Detective. Though I do like the thought. No, let’s say pancakes are on the menu.”

All that time spent coming up with blow-job dialog, wasted. “So I slip out of the shower, tie a towel around myself, and come out to greet you. You’re in my kitchen, jacket off, shirtsleeves rolled up while you work.” It’s not the exact scene from her first unplanned foray into nudity with him, but it still feels familiar. Domestic. It warms her, thinking of him puttering around her kitchen, at home.

“You take one look at my gorgeous self and suddenly it’s not just the shower that’s made you wet.”

“It’s not,” she agrees, sliding a few fingers under the waistband of her sleep shorts, just beginning to tease herself.

“You wait until I look up, until I can see you, and then you pull your towel off, displaying your absolutely perfect breasts. Bloody fantastic. I still think about that moment, you know? Constantly. Endless stake-out? Amenadiel drops by for a chat? There they are—Detective boobs.”

“I’m so glad to have helped alleviate your boredom.”

“You are incredibly generous, though not generous enough I’ll note to show them to me on purpose yet.” The pout is clear in his voice.

She takes a moment to remember that morning, remembers alarm fading into frustration and anger, swiftly followed by irritated embarrassment and confusion. Why would a wealthy playboy roll out of his no-doubt shared bed at the crack of dawn in the hopes of cooking her breakfast? Why was that thought in his head? She allows herself to think about what it would have been like if he had asked. She’d still have been confused, would have almost certainly said no, but he’d overwhelmed her when he’d first burst into her life. She’d found him unbearably demanding, but it’s only upon reflection that she realizes, as demanding as he was, he never actually took anything more than her attention, inserting himself at her side so he could absorb any extra she had to spare.

Starved for it.

“I would, you know. Show them to you. Drop the towel, arch my back, maybe give them a little shake.”

“Ooh, lovely, Detective.”

“Trail one finger down from my throat, along the inner curve of my breast, circle the nipple as it hardens.”

“Drops of water from your hair following that finger down, hanging off of that nipple.”

“Sounds like I’d be chilly. Wouldn’t you want to come over and warm me up?”

“And let you go hungry? Never.”

She laughs, unexpected and full-bodied. He’d been so eager for her to call, she’d assumed it would immediately lead to some absolutely filthy mutual fantasizing. Instead, he’s as ridiculous as ever. “I’d come to you then, wrap myself around you from behind.”

“Mmm, yes. Your friendly little nipples poking into me through the fabric of my shirt. You’d toy with the tie on my apron, kiss my shoulder blade.”

Chloe’s smile fades and her hand slips back up out of her shorts, onto her stomach. He’s serious, she realizes. He wants to cook her breakfast, be her day-to-day, not just at work but always. Her chest feels tight with yearning. What with the whole ‘God, the Devil, and Hell are all real!’ revelation, she’d almost forgotten to worry about whether a man who chooses to live above his nightclub could be happy with her quieter lifestyle, but here he is, unknowingly reassuring her anyway. It’s so easy to picture, this lightly naughty twist on a lazy morning in.

“You’d take my hands from your waist, bring them up to kiss, then gently push me away. I’d sit at the breakfast bar, waiting for you to bring me a plate of pancakes.”

“What, idling about when you could be setting the table? Am I to be so quickly taken for granted? At the very least someone will need to set out the syrup.”

This dork of a man. “I’d be providing the inspiring scenery. Besides, you know your way around my pantry better than I do.”

“If you’d feed yourself properly I wouldn’t have to supplement your grocery list.”

“Because a woman can’t have enough frosted cereals and phallic shaped vegetables in her kitchen.”

“I’m shocked, Detective—without those cereals, Maze would starve!”

She’s giggling; she isn’t supposed to be giggling. She’s supposed to be using her best sultry voice and trotting out the sort of lines Linda used to charge $1.99 per minute to say. “Maze can keep her glorified sugar lumps as long as you’re willing to make me a decent breakfast.”

“But of course! I’d have your plate ready in a jiff, hand deliver it. And since you’re being so lazy, I suppose I’d have to feed you a bite, too.”

“Oh yes?”

“Yes. But, Detective?” He sighs in exaggerated disapproval. “Turns out you are a terribly messy eater. You get syrup all down your front.”

“I’m so sorry. Won’t you please help me clean up?”

“If needs must.” He sounds so aggrieved. “I suppose I could sup the syrup off your lips—your lower lip takes a bit of effort. I’d have to use my teeth.” Chloe sighs, biting the lip in question. “I’d kiss it off your chin. Slide my mouth down your neck—you’ve an exquisite neck, Detective. Proud as a ballerina’s. There’s a dollop of syrup in the hollow of your throat. I’d have to linger, make sure I’d sucked the skin completely clean—though I suppose this is where you tell me I’m not to leave visible marks?”

“No, but I have a few turtlenecks in my closet.”

He hums, voice a low thrum over the phone. “I’m going to enjoy that—knowing that beneath your clothes I’ve left myself a hidden treasure map, all your pleasure points marked with an X.”

Chloe’s eyes slide closed as she imagines pressing her fingers into her own clothed shoulder just to feel the ache left behind by Lucifer’s mouth. “I’ll enjoy that, too.”

“Of course, there’s no need to hide anything on me. My body is a canvas you may paint as you like.”

“Is that a hint? Are you tired of licking syrup off of me? Shall I return the favor?”

“Kind of you to offer, but we’ve just reached a very tricky point in the cleanup operation—you see, just south of your neck, the syrup trail has split into two.”

“What are the odds?” And because she’s smiling, because he’s making this so fun, keeping her so relaxed, Chloe changes her mind and reaches over into her bedside drawer, pulling out her vibrator.

“Luckily for you I am adept at using my mouth and my hands simultaneously,” he’s saying, still detailing his improbable condiment mishap. “I’d cradle your left breast with my fingers, staunching the flow of syrup, while I tended your right breast with my lips. They get sensitive, don’t they?” She hums in agreement, cupping her right breast with one hand. “Swollen. Pebbled areolas the color of a desert sunrise’s first blush. Nipples like gum drops.”

She snorts and hears him make a little chef’s kiss noise through the phone.

“Delicious—exactly the sort of sugary treat I need to energize my day. And despite how amusing you appear to find this mess you’ve created—” she laughs aloud again “—I bet you’d do your best to help me clean up, hmm? Your hand in my hair—”

“Cradling you close,” she finishes for him, wanting him to know he’s right.

“Moving my mouth over to your left breast when it starts to feel neglected. I’ll be able to hear your heart beating through your skin. The single loveliest sound in the world.” There’s alight shift in mood, and he whispers, “I listened for it while we waited for the paramedics to arrive when you were shot, while we rode in the ambulance. I’d never imagined…”

His voice trails off, lost, and pinpricks of sensation dart across Chloe’s shoulders, cover her breasts, her belly, stipple her legs and gather between her thighs. Even back then, he’d cared, and now? Now, she’s safe with him. She switches her vibrator on to its lowest setting.

“Well, hello there!” He perks up instantly. “What have we here? Have you invited a friend, Detective?”

“Shut up and keep talking.” Whatever—he knows what she means.

“No, no, you must introduce me. What model do you use? What color? Send me a picture?”

“It’s just a little bullet vibe. Um.” She closes her eyes. “Purple.”

“Indeed.” He sounds very pleased, like everyone doesn’t know red, not purple, is the devil’s color. He’s not Prince. And she’d just bought the cheapest one, and it just happened to be purple, so. “Clitoral stimulation, then?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“That’s your preference?”

“I don’t—I haven’t really thought about it. I guess I need something there to, you know—”

“Come?”

“Yes, Lucifer.” She’s starting to get impatient again. “I enjoy other stuff, but I don’t, I mean. Vibrators for me are kinda a quick fix, not a long evening.”

“You must treat yourself better, Detective. I will teach you decadence in self-pleasure. The fact that you cannot state whether your preference lies with clitoral or vaginal stimulation—” He stops short, and she can practically hear the little light bulb of realization going off over his head. “I’m going to know. I’m going to know what you like.” The mood changes again, the playfulness of earlier dropping away to reveal raw desire. “I am going to learn every millimeter of you until I know your body better than you know yourself. I will spend entire days buried between your thighs. I will wake up with the taste of you on my lips. I will know your pleasure as I know nothing else in this life.”

The way he growls through that vow—yeah, okay. Chloe is on board with this. She kicks her vibrator up a notch and starts putting it to use.

Lucifer picks up his cue. “I am going to get down on my knees in your kitchen and drown myself in your cunt. It won’t matter that my mojo doesn’t work on you—you’ll keep your hand in my hair, guiding me, letting me know exactly where I need to be. You’ll tell me your desires through the clench of your fingers and the quake of your thighs. Every sound you make—like that one, beautiful, Detective—I’ll read every sigh and moan. I’ll feast on every indicator, catalog them all.”

“How would you learn? Where would you start?”

“My mouth on your opening, my tongue dipping inside, tasting you from the source. Are you earthy? Sweet? My nose nudging against your clit, getting a feel for how you like to be touched. Direct contact? Indirect? Once I knew how to approach, I’d pull back, teeth just grazing your inner lips, hands pressed to the creases of your hips, holding you open. My beard lighting up your inner thighs—I wouldn’t have to put any effort into marking you there. You’d do the work, wrapping your legs around my head, forcing me close, looking for friction. I’d use my fingers—you like my fingers, I know that now. I’ll play you like my piano—that little spot just inside of you, do your moans get higher pitched or deeper when I touch it? What about when I stretch you open? What about when I set my mouth over your clit and suck?”

“Yeah, suction, and um, a little stretch,” Chloe directs, pressing down on her vibrator in firm rhythmic circles. She’s distantly amazed at how quickly things are suddenly moving, how they’ve gone from languid fantasy to imminent culmination, but she is not going to last long with him spilling his lust into her ears. Knowing that he wants her, knowing that he wants to hear her, to pleasure her? It’s heady, and sparks a bone-deep arousal she feels no need to contain. She can see him, kneeling between her thighs, that red sticker marking his neck as she holds his mouth to her sex. His eyes—she recalls how he’d looked on screen, the blown pupils and drooping lids. To have that blissed out expression staring up at her while he works on her?

“I’ll flick my tongue out. Thousands of nerve endings in the clitoris, and I am going to find the exact ones that make you happy. The exact sequence you like them pressed in. Everything I’ve ever wondered about, all the details I longed for while lying alone in my bed, I’ll know—you want me to know, yes?”

“Yes.”

His breathing grows harsh. “It’ll be better than anything you’ve ever had, anything you thought possible. It’ll be so good you’ll crush my head between your legs. All of my senses will be clogged with you—my whole world your desire.”

“Yes.” That is exactly where he should be right now. The need in his voice—it’s what she wants more than anything, to bring that need out in him and to dole out satisfaction until he is replete.

“You’re close,” he says. “I already know that much. Let me hear you, Detective. Please, let me have you. I can see you, glowing in that morning sunlight, head thrown back, unable to stop yourself from going over the edge. Please, Detective—will you come?”

She will, and she does. Chloe is not typically loud in these moments—she lives with a very observant child, after all—but this time she is. She wants him to know what she’s feeling, that he did well, that she’s pleased with him. As she rides out the aftershocks, she gives him his name, “Lucifer,” in a wrung out voice, and is rewarded with a groan from his end of their connection.

“It’s even better the second time,” he says, “hearing you. I’m going to hear you every day—multiple times a day. I’m going to stay right there at your feet and take you over again. How many can you give me, Detective? What’s your record?”

His intensity hasn’t dropped a whit. It’s obvious that not only did he not come, he has no intention of doing so anytime soon. She feels a flash of…something. Unease, maybe, that they’re sliding back into an uneven power dynamic, concern that he’s not looking after his own wants. Definitely not irritation that he’s trying to set the pace.

“No.”

He gives a grunt of confusion. “What?”

“No,” she says, reverting to their earlier fantasy. “You’ve had your meal; now it’s time to do the dishes.”

There is a moment of dead silence. “You must be joking, Detective.”

“No joking. It’s important to stay on top of these little chores. And since you cooked, that means I wash.”

“I will pay someone to do your bloody dishes, just get back over—”

“No, I’d rather do them myself. Can’t you see me, walking away from you, turning on the sink, bending over to get to work.”

His gasp of understanding is exactly what she’d hoped it would be.

“Exactly. My breasts hanging down, jiggling while I scrub. My back arched, my ass—have you seen my naked ass before?”

“When you were drunk, when you commandeered my bed.” He sounds laser focused.

“Good, then you can picture how I’d look, bent over the sink, legs spread just a little. I suppose you’d have quite the view, kneeling there on the floor, but I think it’s time you got up. Come and join me at the sink, Lucifer.”

“Yes, Detective.”

It feels so good to hear him say those words in that tone, but it also serves as a warning to her—she’s taking charge again, needs to correct course. Needs to just make it dirty and fun for him. So she says the first filthy thing that pops into her head. “You’re so big, but you’ve got me so wet and relaxed I bet you could just walk up behind me and slide inside. All the way in. Such a tight fit.”

He groans, broken and yearning. “I can’t even imagine—if just hearing you is this good. Would you want me inside you?”

“I do.” She tells him the honest truth. “I want to feel your cock reshaping me, stretching me out to my limits, making my body new in its image. I want you to—” she catches herself. I want you to wipe all traces of Pierce from within me. “—make it so I feel you with every step I take for the next week.”

His breath hitches, and she hears a faint squelching—the sound of a fist moving swiftly over a well-lubed cock. Good, that’s what she wants. She turns her vibrator back on—maybe she can give him a second orgasm after all.

“I heard that, Detective. You’re touching yourself thinking about me fucking you. You haven’t had sex until you’ve had it with me—the devil invented this particular dance. Long, slow strokes—you’ll feel every inch of me.”

“It’ll be brand new for you, too,” she promises. “I’m the only one who can give you all the sensations, pleasure and pain. When I clench around you it’ll be like nothing you’ve felt before.”

Air hisses through his teeth, a whine escaping his throat. I am going to ruin you, she thinks, then hopes she didn’t make it a prayer, because she certainly thought it with intent.

“Fast and hard, Detective,” he says. “You’re so wet and so strong; I don’t have to hold back.”

“Don’t,” she tells him. “Give me everything.” She closes her eyes, listens to him talk, encourages him to think of her. Encourages him to fuck his fist and imagine it’s her, wetter and hotter and tighter than anything he’s ever experienced. The sounds he makes, his moans and grunts, the gravel in his voice, it’s enough to bring her back to the edge of another orgasm where she waits, holding back, wanting to tumble over with him.

And if in the end, when she finally does come, she imagines reaching a hand back, grabbing his hip, halting his thrusts. If she imagines his great, muscled frame trembling around her, his arms shaking as he brackets her torso, his hands, white knuckled, gripping the edge of the sink with all his might as he strains to hold still for her while she grinds herself back onto his length, taking him at her own speed while he begs for permission to move? And if in real life his voice does rasp through her phone, pleading, “Say it, please, Detective,” until she gives in and tells him to come? If all of that is true, well, what harm could it do?

After, she curls onto her side and listens to him catch his breath, mentally flipping through conversational prompts. This was where she screwed up the last time; it’s important to get this right. But the best she can come up with is, “That was really good. Fun and good. I had a really good time.”

He’s laughing at her, which was not the intended response. “Good? Detective, when we finally do that in person, I might literally perish from pleasure. Don’t tell me you get that loud for ‘good.’”

“Shut up.” But she’s smiling now, too. She knows she should probably go clean herself up, but she snuggles around her pillow instead. “So, you lie in bed thinking about me?”

“Pardon?”

“Don’t play dumb. I know your secrets now. You said you lie in bed thinking about me.”

“Detective, I’ve wanted you for years. Of course I think of you.”

“You lie awake all night,” she says, teasing. “Imagining me, knowing no one else will do.”

“It’s true,” he says, surprisingly earnest. “I want you very much. You’ve never thought of me?”

She can’t lie to him when he’s being sweet. “I have. I dreamed about you.”

He’s quiet for a moment. “I bet I wasn’t the devil in those dreams.”

She picks up her phone and takes it off speaker, pressing him close to her ear. “You were, actually.”

“Oh? All red and scarred? Bit of a monster fetish, Detective? Growing up on your mother’s films, I suppose it’s not too surprising.”

“No.” Chloe bites her lip; never in a million years would she have thought she’d admit this, but despite the length of the city between them, the moment still feels intimate, soft and warm and close. “I thought you’d have horns.” He makes a sound of disgust, and she laughs. “No, they were good—really good for leverage. I liked them.”

“Very well.” His aggrieved sigh isn’t so mock this time. “I shall procure a set of prop horns for you, but only for use in sex games. Let us be very clear on this—you get a three-horned devil or no horns at all.”

“That’s going to backfire, you know. You’ll start getting turned on whenever you see one of those Halloween costumes.”

“The devil, undone by a plastic headband? You are my bane, Detective.”

She giggles, allowing the conversation to lapse. “Lucifer, do you cuddle?”

“Not traditionally. My encounters lean towards excitement, not…”

“Tenderness?” She draws idle circles on her sheets with a finger. “You’ll cuddle with me.”

“Is that an order?”

“A truth.”

“Perhaps. I suppose I’d need pointers here as well.”

“Cuddling pointers, hmm? You’ll be a natural. I’ll just hug you close.” She can hear his uncertain expression at the mention of the ‘h’ word. “Don’t be difficult—you like hugs.”

“I’m…growing to appreciate them.”

“Liar. That whole sentence should be past tense. You like them, and you give good ones, too.”

“I appreciate the pep talk.”

Chloe closes her eyes, imagining him there with her. He’d be the little spoon tonight, she decides. She’d wrap around him, kiss his back— “How are your wings?” It’s a non sequitor, and he gets touchy when she asks about them, but, “We’re dating, now. I get to ask how you’re doing.”

“Is that one of the rules?”

“Yes. Is Maze still cleaning them? How’s the pain?”

“I’m suddenly filled with ideas for slutty doctor role play. Yes, Maze is looking after them. The pain is negligible—”

“Is it really, or are you just good at pretending you’re fine?”

“Yes, Dr. Decker. The pain is in hand. Since you dug out the bullets, the throbbing’s been dull enough I can smother it with a handful of oxy even when you’re not present. The point of this punishment seems to be disfigurement and mess, not physical suffering.”

“If you need the pain relievers, you are still in pain. Is there anything I can do?”

“I’m finding the post-orgasm haze very effective at taking my mind off of them.”

She rolls her eyes out of habit, then realizes she doesn’t have to brush him off anymore. “Then we’ll have to make regular appointments for me to nurse you back to health.”

“Yes, please. My schedule is wide open, as are a few other things.”

“Maybe I can come over tomorrow night? I could tend to my patient in person?”

“Ah.” He leaves her hanging for thirty awful seconds, worrying she’s done something to ruin things again. “It’s just… You’ll laugh.”

“I won’t. What is it?” Does he only want her when he can’t see her? That can’t possibly be true. Unless he wants distance?

“I’m worried… Our touch problem, you said at first it was just fluid exchange. I’m afraid what might happen, in case of spatter…”

She breaks her promise immediately; a hand hastily clamped over her mouth does nothing to stifle her laughter.

“Teach me to trust your word.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He’s worried about getting over-excited and spattering her with devil spooge. It’s sweet. Really. She sniggers. “Sorry. That’s—that’s very thoughtful of you, Lucifer. Very conscientious.”

“Be quiet. If you get to worry about my wings, I get to worry about hurting you.”

“Honestly, it’s a relief. You rushed me out of your apartment so fast tonight, I thought maybe my poly-blend blazer had turned you off me for good.”

“I’m more at risk of embarrassing myself over a fetish for your prim off-the-rack separates than some plastic horns. Though, if you’re wiling to accept fashion advice, Detective—”

“I’m not wearing a tube top and mini skirt everywhere, Lucifer.”

“It doesn’t have to be a tube top. There are a number of delightfully revealing halter tops available—”

She laughs, and he hums in approval. She can practically see him doing that thing where he plants his tongue in his cheek and then swiftly runs it over his lips.

The conversation lags again, but it’s not uncomfortable. Chloe feels very relaxed and just a bit drowsy. Her eyelids are drifting shut when he asks, “Do you think the urchin would prefer a piece of chocolate gateau from Jenivee’s or the seven layer salted caramel chocolate cake from Papa Sugar’s?”

“Human children can’t just live on chocolate cake alone, you know. What deal have you made with her this time?”

“I thought—as a thank you. For welcoming me into your lives.”

Oh. Oh. Chloe’s heart clenches and for a moment she feels so much it hurts. She holds the phone away from her face until she’s certain her voice will be steady. “What if you got her a very small piece of both, and got some for yourself as well? That way the two of you could do a taste test on your next video call.”

He clicks his tongue, considering the idea. “Two isn’t a proper taste test. I’ll have to make a few more selections, but it would be the perfect opportunity to finish instructing her on the music scene in Seoul back in the 60s. She seems well versed in the current artists, but she’s frightfully ignorant of her history.”

“No sex, no drugs,” Chloe warns, not really worried.

“Of course. I was just going to tell her about the time Shin Joong-hyun and I—well, there may be a bit of drug use in this one, but it’s educational never the less. You see, I had just gotten a lead on this chap who kept a pet lynx in his menagerie outside of the city. A lynx is no tiger, but…”

He goes on to tell a story involving a daring rescue of all the animals in the private menagerie and using music to sooth the savage beasts, though not enough to stop them from savaging their former owner. It’s not a traditional bedtime story, but Chloe starts to drift off none-the-less. He sounds at ease, content; for once, all is right in Chloe’s world.

Chapter Text

At some point during the night, Lucifer must have hung up, because Chloe’s phone is dark and silent in her hand when her alarm goes off on Saturday morning. Still, she hugs it close to her chest, turning her head to bury her face in her pillow, grinning wide—last night had gone well—before tapping the screen to life and seeing that Lucifer’s already sent her a text this morning. It’s epic in scale even for him—a long string of emojis with the entire cast of little emoji professions represented along with a grocery store’s worth of produce, plus a few animals thrown in as spice. She doesn’t even attempt to decipher it all, but he ended his message with a kissy face, so she sends one of those back, hoping she hasn’t just agreed to anything too sexually outrageous. He replies almost immediately with a full rainbow of heart emojis, and the right corner of her mouth curls up in pleasure. This is so much better than before—they might really work out, this time.

More energized than she’s felt in weeks, Chloe swings her legs out of the bed and stretches her arms over her head. Lucifer texts again—a photo this time. Him in bed, sheet barely clinging to his hips, hair sleep tousled and starting to curl. She zooms in on his face, on his half-lidded eyes and self-satisfied smirk. The morning sun limns the apex of his right cheekbone, and for the first time, he actually does appear angelic.

You’re beautiful, she types—then deletes, before cycling through a few variations.

Perfect view to start my day
Wish I was there
I see you’re an early riser ;)
I want this every day

Eventually she just sends him a heart-eyes emoji and tosses her phone onto the bed, getting up and heading for the bathroom. How terribly unfair that dating Lucifer of all people means she suddenly needs to be good with words first thing in the morning. She probably should have just sent a picture back, but she doesn’t wake up looking model perfect, unlike some people.

She hears another text come in while she brushes her teeth, a few more while she flosses, and then an entire flurry arrives all at once while she’s finishing off with some mouthwash. Frowning, Chloe spits and hurries back into her bedroom. The first few texts are normal—lewd emojis—followed by a Detective?, and then a slew of increasingly not-safe-for-work selfies. The sheet is gone from these photos, but so is his face.

Shit.

She calls immediately.

“Detective,” he purrs, answering before the first ring is finished. “See something you like?”

“Yes, er. Sorry, to be slow replying. I was just in the bathroom, getting ready to go in to the station.”

“They’ve chained you to a desk and sill require you to go in on weekends? Are you certain you want this job back?”

“Yes, I want my job back, Lucifer. I’m short on hours this week, and going in today gives me a chance to check in with Ella. I gave her my notes from your party, and I want to see if she’s been able to talk to her FBI buddies. There are a few other leads it will be easier for me to follow up there, as well.”

“Oh.” He sounds contrite. “Very well, what time shall I meet you?”

“You don’t have to come in—it is still just paperwork.”

“I’m afraid I’ve rather fallen behind on my own contributions to our off-the-books investigation. I’ve yet to reach out to Detective Bauda or the captain after our get together on Wednesday.”

Right. “It’s been a busy couple of days.” Emotional mess Lucifer is not a productive Lucifer. “Not your fault.”

“Easy enough to mend,” he says brightly. “I’ll simply explain that an unexpected orgy came up. The devil cannot be expected to run on anyone else’s schedule, after all.”

You’d run on my schedule, she thinks smugly, before squashing that train of thought.

“Was there any particular tack you wished me to take with either of our suspicious Cainites?”

Chloe flops back on her bed. “Well, it looks like I’ve missed my chance to talk to Mrs. Thorston.” She quickly relays what Maze had told her last night.

“Perhaps the truth then, with Detective Bauda, at least as far as the captain’s performance Wednesday night goes? Prompt her to discuss the erstwhile missus?”

“Yeah, that makes sense. Maybe Bauda has an idea where she went. Or Thorston does. I should have asked Maze if she could track her, but she was already in a mood.”

“Ever since we got to Earth, Maze has been nothing but moods. You can hardly wait for it to clear.”

“I think she was genuinely upset we didn’t ask her to have group sex with us.”

“Can you blame her?”

Chloe snorts, then blushes, covering her face even though he can’t see her through the phone.

“You do make the most charming noises, Detective. Perhaps there are a few other sounds you’d allow me to coax out of you this morning?”

It’s tempting—very, very tempting. But she really shouldn’t spend all day in bed having long-distance sex with her new boyfriend. Probably. She has reasons she shouldn’t be doing that, right?

If she says no now, she gets to see him in person sooner.

“So you’ll talk to Bauda about Mrs. Thorston,” she says, shutting down his flirtation and keeping things on track.

He sighs deeply. “Very well, Detective. And shall I contact the captain as well?” He doesn’t sound eager.

Chloe finds herself wanting to say no and takes a moment to examine the instinct. If they’re right, Thorston thinks Lucifer would make a perfect Pierce substitute as the new Sinnerman, and she doesn’t want Lucifer to have to spend time with someone who views him that way. She doesn’t want to make him play that role. “We’ll hold off on Thorston for now,” she says, buying time. “It’s not like he’s likely to show up at the precinct today; we’ll see what Bauda has to say first.”

His breath huffs softly through her phone. “I should have expected that—you’re always so careful when laying your traps.”

“You make me sound like some sort of spider.”

“No, just a canny detective. With me as your dashingly handsome homme fatale.”

Chloe’s resolve slips. “And are you here to lead me astray?” she asks, her free hand toying with the hem of her sleep shorts. He doesn’t answer right away; he’s still learning that he’s safe with her, like this. “I mean, strolling into my office, dressed in that flashy suit, distracting me from work.”

“You’d try to keep it all business,” he says at last. “In a suit of your own—you’re devastating in a suit. That one you wore for all of those unworthy Top Meet chumps.”

She remembers that outfit, all black and— “I’ve been meaning to stop wearing shirts to work.”

“You see, one night as a couple and already I’m improving your fashion sense! You’d accessorize with a fedora, the brim shadowing your face, making it so I could only see a hint of your disarmingly sly eyes. I’d know you were trouble the moment I walked through the door.”

“Which one of us is playing the fatale here?”

“You’ve always been irresistibly intriguing to me. From the moment we met.”

Chloe wriggles her toes, overcome by a wave of happiness. He’s just so—so— “Now you’ve got all the time in the world to figure me out.”

“Decades.”

There’s a sadness in the way he says ‘decades’ that she doesn’t know how to tackle, so she retreats to the fantasy. “You’d take a seat on the corner of my desk, showing off those long legs, leaning down into my space, insisting I take your case. Promising whatever I want in return.”

“I should have known you’d enjoy this scenario. I’ll have to concoct a suitable mystery for when we role play this in earnest—sex and deduction. You can’t say I don’t know how to keep my Detective entertained.”

His Detective. She wants to jump up and down, hug him, something to make physical the feeling pulsing through her veins. “Don’t pretend I’m alone in that—you enjoy mysteries just as much. I bet when you were growing up, no one in your house—er, sky palace—was able to keep a secret from you.” She knows he was never precisely a child in the way Trixie is, but she can still imagine him, curls free of product, a fresh look to his face, eyes bright and curious. And, okay, her brain does provide a bunch of greeting card style cherubs (and one mini Amenadiel) for him to play detective amongst, but she still thinks there could be an element of truth to the vision.

“Sky palace, is it? But no, you’re thinking of your own youth.”

“I don’t think so—you clearly enjoy it, and you’re clever, and you have a knack for sizing people up.”

“Is that all it takes to be a proto-detective? But if you’ll recall, I was on the other side of the fence back then—the universe’s first criminal.”

“Your parents were the criminals,” she snaps harshly, no room for argument in her voice.

He sounds placating and a bit dismissive when he responds. “You are delightfully biased, Detective.”

“Lucifer—“

“I did enjoy puzzles,” he cuts her off before she can defend him further. “Not so much solving them, but setting them up. Pranks you might call them, but I think that’s an oversimplification. I made sure anyone who walked into one of my traps had all of the clues necessary to avoid it. Uriel was always the most satisfying to get—so good at seeing patterns, but sometimes you could throw him off.” His voice slows as he mentions his brother.

Uriel knew to be on his guard, then, she wants to tell him. He knew what he risked when he threatened to kill almost everyone you love. It’s not your fault. But as much as she wants to absolve him of his clearly still lingering guilt, she knows forcing the subject now will only start his day on a sour note.

“Well, I guess I should finish getting ready,” she says after the silence stretches too long.

"Detective?” He blurts the word, then stops speaking.

She waits, feeling oddly tense. “Something else?”

“I just. How are you? This morning?”

“Oh! I’m good. Good. Are you? Good?”

“That’s rather the eternal question, isn’t it?”

“No, I mean. I like it when your voice is the last thing I hear before I fall asleep.”

“This is the first time anyone’s accused me of being a soporific.”

She sighs and scrubs a hand over her face. Why did he even ask the question if he’s going to be so evasive with her? But then, why did he invite her to a romantic dinner and then not tell her how he was feeling? Why did he always ask her to walk out onto an emotional limb on her own? She knows she’s not being completely fair, but— “Never mind.” The silence stretches.

“Apologies, Detective. I—I find I’m a little overwhelmed at just how much I enjoyed last night. I wanted to make certain we are both still on the same page, as it were.”

“I am. Absolutely same page.”

“Splendid. That’s—I’m glad.”

He sounds so bashful, and her body is too small to contain the jolt of fondness that strikes her. “Good.”

“Poor Detective. You’ve not had your caffeine fix yet, have you? Never fear, I’ll see you shortly, bring you that blend of artificial sugars and milks you call coffee and pretend is an indulgence. We’ll get your full vocabulary back in no time.”

“You’re making me look forward to work on a Saturday morning.”

“That desperate to see me?”

“Yeah.” Chloe holds her breath, feeling very brave.

He clears his throat. “Right. Well. Then I shan’t keep you waiting.”

He does. Of course he does.

She doesn’t mind, really. It’s just after eight o’clock when she arrives at the precinct—well before Lucifer’s usual work hours. Chloe assumes it takes him a while to assemble himself in the morning. She makes use of the alone time, doing something she should have done days ago and heading upstairs to where the vice team is located. Sure enough, Detective Enora Jackson is already hard at work, squinting at her computer screen.

“Lose your glasses again?” Chloe asks, leaning against her desk.

Enora looks up and does an exaggerated double-take. “Well, if it isn’t Chloe Decker. I thought you’d gotten left behind when the precinct moved to the new building two years ago. You certainly haven’t come to see me in that time.”

“That’s not true. I’ve seen you—“

“You’ve seen me stealing creamer from the homicide break room.”

“And I never ratted you out once.”

“Mmhmm.” Enora leans back in her chair and runs a hand over her close-shaven hair. “What’s the favor, then?”

“No favor. I’ve just been stuck going through old cases lately—“

“Desk duty,” Enora says with a nod. “I heard.”

Chloe’s confidence falters, and she has to force her face to remain neutral. Everybody in the precinct knows way too much about her life right now, but she cannot be effective at her job if she can’t brave a conversation with a coworker. She takes refuge in Lucifer’s Detective Fatale from that morning, shirtless but behatted, sly and wry and able to shrug the whole dirty world off with one roll of her shoulders. “I’m sure you’ve heard plenty. In any case, I came across a name that immediately made me think of you.”

“Be careful about what you say next—it had better be flattering.”

“Eddie Gauchino.”

Enora makes a face, and Chloe laughs.

“I don’t know what you’re chuckling about—that is not an association that makes me happy. That little punk makes you think of me?” She wrinkles her nose. “I haven’t thought of him in forever.”

“Me either—not since I was a rookie detective assigned to your team and you had me running around street corners collaring him and a dozen other guys just like him.

“Lot of good it did us. I don’t think we ever got him locked up for longer than it took to make bail.”

“Seriously? You’ve still never found a charge that stuck?”

“’Still,’ she says, like he’s my white whale. No, Gauchino? After you left the team, the Scalucis went big-time. Eddie got a promotion—spent a while as every D-list star’s favorite go-to guy for party favors. Drugs, girls, boys. Even picked him up on suspicion of trafficking exotic animals once. Must have stepped on some family toes, though, because he dropped out of sight a few years back. One of the younger Scaluci boys picked up where he left off—keeping the higher profile contacts closer to the family.”

Which is probably how Lucifer met Carlo Scaluci, Chloe thinks, making a mental note to confirm that with him later. So, Eddie Gauchino started dealing drugs, etcetera, to the seedier side of Los Angeles’s almost wealthy, then became too successful at his job. His bosses decided to knock him back a few pegs and replace him with one of their own. Eddie, trying to regain favor, gets the relic from Maddy and delivers it to Carlo Scaluci, figuring his family can use it to take over the Sinnerman’s empire. Chloe can see the pieces fitting together—Thorston was one of Pierce’s recruiters, and foster kids wouldn’t have been the only vulnerable demographic he targeted. Lucifer had suggested Thorston supplied his fellow club members with black-market Viagra—drugs could make it easier for him to connect with any number of insecure, lonely people, who Thorston could then have roped into the Sinnerman’s fold. Thorston comes out to L.A. ahead of Pierce, assists in setting up the Scalucis with a power move against their rivals, and gets Gauchino as his very own drug connection as part of the payment. Then Pierce dies, and everything falls apart.

There’s still no way to tell where the relic Maddy stole is now, though. Carlo could have kept it, or handed it off to someone further up the organizational chain. Nothing they’d learned at Lucifer’s party indicates Carlo is a religious man himself, which means there’s a chance he sold it to a ready buyer—to the right person, holy relics are worth a fortune. It could be anywhere by now.

Chloe spends a while longer with Enora, taking the chance to genuinely catch up with her, before retreating back to homicide. She’s trying to think of ways to interrogate Carlo Scaluci without being fired for conducting an off-the-books investigation while on limited duty when she turns the bend on the central staircase and—

There he is. Lucifer. Standing at her desk, futzing with the lapels on his suit jacket. He went with dark colors today—a two piece suit just a shade shy of black, paired with a shirt and pocket square in an only slightly lighter gray. He’s sleek. Elegant. Really fucking sexy.

Discretion, she reminds herself—she’s the one who said they should keep their relationship under wraps at work. Still, it’s a struggle. She looks like a goof, she knows she does, but she trots the rest of the way down the stairs, all but skipping over to him.

“Hey! Good morning! Hi!” Three greetings—okay, a little much, but it’s his first time back at the precinct in a while. She would be excited to see him even if he hadn’t looked into her eyes less than twelve hours ago and called her his freedom.

“Detective!” He whips about to face her, grinning just as widely as she is. “Here,” he twists back around to pick something up from her desk, “as promised. One saccharin caffeine dose, just as you prefer it.”

“Thank you.” Is she batting her eyelashes? She should stop batting her eyelashes. She takes the cup instead, cradling it to her chest. It’s still warm, and if she wants to pretend some of that warmth is from the heat of his hands, no one else needs to know just how much of a sap she’s become.

He clears his throat. “Yes. Um.” He looks her up and down, gaze lingering on the bullet necklace on full display thanks to the low neckline of her blouse. Okay, maybe she put a little extra thought into getting ready this morning, but he likes her hair down, and he appreciates a bold lip, and he’s right here in front of her, throat bobbing as he swallows at the sight of her. “You look especially delectable today,” he says upon completing his visual inspection, his hands going back to fiddling with his lapels.

“You look—“ Discretion, Decker— “nice today, too. Sure to impress on your first day back.”

He straightens, hands falling to his sides. “Yes, I thought you’d feel inspired by me in this suit—it seemed to make quite the impression on you the first time you saw it.” She cocks her head in question, and he leans forward conspiratorially, “When you spanked my bum.”

Chloe freezes, flushing, remembering both the feel of him, ample and firm, under her hand, and the mortification that came when he had responded with shocked bewilderment.

“I only wish I’d had the sense to respond more appropriately,” he continues. “If I’d understood you were just tapping into your true desires, well, imagine what we could have been getting up to the past eighteen months.”

“No, uh, we’re not, um…” Chloe flounders. She hadn’t been trying to do their whole control game with him back then, had she? No, she’d just wanted to be direct and sexy. Maze-like.

Nothing says vanilla sex like Maze, right?

He leans closer, breathing her in. “You are intoxicating when flustered, Detective. Soon I’m going to know all of the ways to make you blush. How far down does it go, I wonder?”

“I—I don’t—“ This close, the rumble of his voice wakes the small hairs at the back of her neck. She thinks of him again, kissing down her throat, down her chest, all the way to her—

“Excuse me, buster, but how long were planning on being here before saying hello?” Suddenly there is an Ella launching herself between them, slugging Lucifer in the shoulder before wrapping him in a hug that pins his arms to his sides. “I missed you buddy—no more of these long vacations, okay? I can’t do without my regular devil dose.”

“Pleasure to see you again as well, Miss Lopez.” He wriggles, attempting to escape her hold.

“Nuh-uh,” she says, holding him tighter. “No getting away until you promise to tell me everything you’ve been up to in your time off.”

“Well, actually,” he begins, brightening, but then Chloe sees his brain catch up with his mouth as his expression shuts down again. “No news to report.”

He wants to tell Ella about them. Because Ella’s his buddy. But Chloe told him no one at the station could know, and he’s respecting her wishes.

You can tell Ella, she prays, and is instantly rewarded with a little peek of his tongue as his lips split wide with excitement.

“However, I’m certain you have something to show me in your lab, Miss Lopez,” he says, grasping Ella’s wrist and hauling her off across the precinct. In truly discreet fashion, he shuts and audibly locks the lab door, then rushes around closing all the blinds. Roughly ten seconds later, Ella’s high pitched squeal can be heard throughout the precinct.

Chloe puts a hand to her forehead and looks around the bullpen. On the one hand, no one is looking at her. On the other, judging by the giggles and knowing looks being shared, all of her co-workers now believe Lucifer and Ella are having sex. She’s probably going to have to get used to everyone always assuming that her boyfriend is having sex with other people. It’s amusing, she tells herself. Just one of those funny things that comes from dating the devil.

Really fucking funny.

“Ella do something to piss you off?”

“Huh?”

At some point during her musings, Dan must have arrived, because now he’s standing beside her, eyebrows raised. “You’re glaring at the lab,” he points out as he finishes stripping off his jacket and draping it on the back of his chair.

“No, just thinking. Trixie get to her junior scientists meeting okay?”

“Extraterrestrial Explorers of Tomorrow? Yeah, she’s all set until one o’clock, and I should be wrapped up here around noon.” Without looking, Dan pulls open the top drawer to his desk and tosses his keys inside. There’s a soft ‘gloop’ sound, and some sort of brown, viscous liquid spatters Dan’s outstretched arm.

“Is that…?” Chloe steps forward to look. “Pudding?”

“Are you kidding me!” Dan yanks open his second desk drawer, then the third. Three separate pools of chocolate pudding quiver underneath the precinct’s florescent lights. There’s really only the one possible culprit. “No fu—this is what you want to invite into your life?” he asks.

“You did say he couldn’t steal it from you anymore.”

“Oh, that’s just freaking great.” He reaches into the top drawer, attempting to extract his keys while creating as little mess as possible. He slams his drawers shut and stalks off towards the kitchenette, pudding drops trailing behind him.

Chloe follows, watching him wash off his keys and remembering Lucifer telling her about the ‘puzzles’ he’d set up for his siblings. “Believe it or not, I think he’s trying to be friendly.”

“By covering my stuff in pudding? That’s friendly?”

“I didn’t say he was good at it. And, hey, it looks like he did empty the drawers first.”

“That’s your excuse?” He vigorously dries his keys with a pile of old takeout napkins. “I guess this means he said yes last night.” There’s bitterness in Dan’s voice, but not as much as she’d feared. Chloe raises an eyebrow in question and he sighs. “Trixie was pretty excited about the idea of him being around more, so I asked her why she’s such a fan of Lucifer.”

“Oh?”

“All right, maybe I called him arrogant and careless and she told me off. She reminded me about,” he takes a moment to examine his keys for any remaining contamination, “about how it went down with Malcolm. How Lucifer was willing to put his body between our kid and a gun. Yeah, he was wearing a vest, but that doesn’t save you if you get shot in the head.”

There was no vest. He died, she wants to tell him, but Dan would never believe her. “Lucifer really does care about her. About us.”

“I know. I wound up calling Amenadiel after I put Trixie to bed. He confirmed what you said, that he and Charlotte both knew everything Lucifer knew about Pierce. I guess their dad got the family involved with the Sinnerman somehow? Amenadiel said that he and Lucifer didn’t recognize Pierce as the Sinnerman on sight, and once they figured out who he was, there was no proof. By that point, Pierce had already become fixated on you, and tipping him off about the investigation could have caused him to lash out, hurt you…or Trixie.”

Chloe takes a moment to be grateful that Amenadiel has no compunctions about misleading humans when it comes to celestial matters. “They were all in a really difficult situation.”

“Yeah. I’m still pissed, but…I won’t be forever. I won’t make problems for you two. Just keep him away from my stuff—no more friendly gestures.”

“Thank you, Dan.” Chloe pulls him into a quick hug. She draws away, and is surprised to see Lucifer striding towards them, eyes narrowed, Ella literally skipping at his heels.

Dan points a single finger at Lucifer. “You’re cleaning up my desk.”

“But it’s your pudding, Daniel. I wouldn’t dream of taking it away from you.” Lucifer slides awkwardly between Chloe and Dan, forcing Dan back a step.

“I’m gonna get you back for this.”

“I’m quaking in my Louboutins.”

“Whatever, man.” Dan walks away, shaking his head, and Lucifer turns back to Chloe, expression drawn.

“What is the matter, Detective.”

Chloe frowns. “Other than that childish display?”

“Childish! I’m several eons older than either you or Daniel—all of my actions come from a place of superior maturity.”

“Hey, Decker!” Ella is bouncing on her toes beside them. “Wanna come visit the lab? Discuss that work related stuff you have to tell me.” She winks.

“Yes, the company is so much more pleasant in there than out here.” Lucifer glares in Dan’s direction.

Chloe leans over to catch his eye. “He’s the wronged party here, you know.”

“Is he?” Lucifer tugs his jacket firmly into place. “Well as it happens, I do have an appointment with I.A. Perhaps I’ll go make a full report of my wrongful behavior!” He stalks away while she’s still trying to figure out what’s going on.

“What’s with that?” Chloe turns to Ella, pointing her thumb at Lucifer’s retreating back. He’d seemed happy enough earlier.

“I dunno. He was in a really good mood a moment ago. You know why.” Ella waggles her eyebrows.

Chloe rolls her eyes. “Fine, let’s talk.”

The moment the lab door closes behind them, Ella tackles Chloe with a hug.

“I knew it! I knew you two would get together. You’re both too hot—the universe meant for you to get it on.”

That is a distressingly literal possibility, but Ella is busy enjoying a little solo bump-and-grind dance, so Chloe doesn’t think she needs to be burdened with the whole ‘miracle’ discussion.

“Yeah. Anyway, I wanted to ask you about those notes I gave you—“

“Chloe. Come on. It’s been years, and you’re finally with Lucifer, and you want to talk about case notes?”

“It’s kinda important, Ella.”

Ella winces. “Sorry, you’re right. This is, like, the fate of your career and the downfall of a whole criminal empire, and I’m getting caught up in your love life again. I don’t know why I keep doing this.”

“Hey.” Chloe reaches out and squeezes Ella’s arm. “I told you, I love that you’re such a cheerleader at heart. And I am really happy.” She bounces in place once, emotions slipping free. “But,” she straightens her blouse, “work first.”

Ella copies her movements. “Right. Serious, professional ladies here. Okay. I gave your notes to my FBI tech buddies to pass on—they were a big hit. I guess Lucifer’s got some fanboys at the L.A. field office, because I was a little worried about explaining the whole ‘undocumented secret observation’ thing you guys set up, but nope! Everyone was just super disappointed not to have been invited to his shindig—they’re all convinced he’s MI6, like, real-world James Bond.”

“And they all wanted bit parts in his next piece of international espionage against some rocket ship building, nuke stealing, cat owning billionaire?”

“Big time. I had to promise to keep them informed of any gadgets I see him using.” She touches her nose conspiratorially. “Of course it also helped that you guys provided some of the missing links necessary to expand the whole Sinnerman investigation—city counselors, the sherrif’s department, you name it. Should be slow going still, mostly. But, and you didn’t hear this from me, maybe they’re now looking for the first excuse they can find to bring in Carlo Scaluci. You know, interrogate him, get a warrant for his place—and his financials. Apparently everyone has been stumped figuring out where most of Pierce’s money came from, but now that they know the Scalucis are involved? That family moves so many different products—they’ve got distribution networks internationally, you know?—so it’s possible they were moving product for Pierce.

“Putting the global in global criminal enterprise.”

“Exactly. So if Lucifer is going to trot out any more of his man-of-mystery escapades involving Carlo, maybe give me a tip off and I can tell my contact?”

Chloe purses her lips. Most of Pierce’s wealth would have come from the twinned magics of compound interest and immortality, but if it makes the FBI, and all of the other investigative entities, focus on the Scalucis, and Chloe can tie Thorston to the Scalucis… “We may be able to put something together soon.” Lucifer will have to talk to Thorston to accomplish that, though.

“Great. Now, spill. I already got the Lucifer version of events—‘The Detective’s so perfect, so clever, she shone with the beauty of a thousand stars when she strode into the penthouse and declared I belong with her’—which, did you really? Because,” Ella fans herself exaggeratedly with her hand. “Seriously swoon-worthy move there, girl.”

Chloe can’t help but laugh. “I don’t know about striding in, but yeah, I did go ask him out. Convinced him we’d be good together.”

“And?”

“We are.” She shrugs, like it’s not a big deal, but she can’t stop her smile. “We are. It’s so good, Ella. He’s just so—he’s like, bigger than life, but he’s so sweet, and he wants to make me and Trixie his priority.”

Ella clasps her hands to her chest and bends backward, making a sound as though mortally injured. “You’re both too cute. I am dead from the adorable. This is perfect—best news of the year. Now, lets get into it. Did he, like, take you right there on the balcony, or—“

“Ella!”

“Because it had to have been some romance novel level sex. Uncontrollable passion, tearing off clothes—“ Ella is halfway through mimicking ripping off her own shirt when there’s a sharp rap at the door and Acting-Lieutenant Mikelson pops her head into the room.

“Miss Lopez, we need you for the briefing on the Mulaney case.”

Ella jolts to a standstill, then starts scrambling at the pile of papers on the table in the center of the room. “Ah, right, yes, I’ve got those notes right, right here. Just going over some, you know, work stuff with the detective.” Chloe gives what she hopes is a super professional, not at all embarrassed wave to indicate that yes, she is a detective doing work stuff.

Mikelson doesn’t look impressed. “Detective Decker. I’m certain if you’re busy enough to justify coming in on a Saturday, there’s plenty for you to work on at your own desk. Miss Lopez? Now.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Chloe and Ella speak almost in unison. So much for being discreet and professional at work.

Chloe sticks to her actual job for the rest of the morning, pausing only when Dan starts to pack up for the day.

“Hey,” she calls, and he walks over with a raised eyebrow, shrugging on his jacket.

“What’s up?”

“You still go bowling with Vickers and Montaigne from Organized Crime?”

“Not in a few months, but we’re on good terms if that’s what you mean.”

She wrinkles her nose at herself. “I know, subtle, right? Could you find out where they stand with the case against the Scalucis? Specifically Carlo Scaluci?” She leans forward, lowering her voice. “There’s a chance we’ll be able to link Captain Thorston to the family via a drug connection, and in that case—“

“You gotta let me be there, Chlo. If you’re going to do anything that puts a dent in the Sinnerman’s empire—“

“I’ll let you know any details as soon as I have them. Nothing’s in place yet, but it could move quickly, and I’m not back in the field yet. If there’s a collar to be made, it’s yours.”

“I’ll text Vickers right away, see if there’s anything I can find out.”

“Thanks, Dan.”

He reaches out and squeezes her shoulder, just as Lucifer reappears, hurrying over from the direction of the stairs, his narrowed eyes focused on Dan’s hand.

Chloe’s own eyes narrow in turn.

“Detective.” The word is clipped. “I believe we have some private case matters to discuss.”

Dan shakes his head at her. “Not too late to change your mind.”

“Dan.”

“Just saying.” He walks away without another word, leaving Lucifer staring after him while Chloe stares at Lucifer.

“Thought he’d never leave.” Lucifer turns back to her, finally, but his smile is forced and doesn’t reach his eyes.

Chloe regards him silently for several seconds. “Give me a moment to wrap up and we’ll head out. I want to visit that tattoo parlor Maze mentioned.”

Apparently picking up on her mood, he fidgets silently beside her desk while she packs up for the day, then trails mutely behind her when she’s ready to leave.

“What was that?” she asks as soon as the elevator doors close behind them, granting them a bit of privacy.

“What indeed. I didn’t expect to find you locked in an intimate embrace with another man once today, let alone twice.”

“An intimate embrace? With Dan?”

“What else would you call it!”

“A hug. And then a friendly goodbye. Because Dan and I are friends. Yesterday, you tried to set me up with your naked sex buddies and today you’re jealous because Dan touched my shoulder?”

“Well, as far as I’m aware, you’re not emotionally involved with any of my naked sex buddies!”

“Emotionally involved?” She laughs ruefully. The elevator doors slide open onto the parking garage, and she’s grateful to be able to gain a bit of space from him. “I’m allowed to have friends, Lucifer. Let’s get that straight right away, because if that’s a problem for you, this will never work.”

He growls in frustration, jogging after her. “Don’t you think I know that? Of course I do! I explained as much to the doctor when I called her. I cannot be jealous of Detective Douche. It’s unseemly—impossible! I would never—“

“Then what was that?”

His mouth snaps shut and a muscle ticks in his jaw. “If you need to be cuddled in the middle of the precinct, I should be able to do that for you.”

“What?”

“The hug! That stupid, nothing hug. It is inexcusable that I am not able to offer you the comfort you need, that you must look elsewhere for that!”

Chloe stops short, reaching a hand out towards him. “Whoa. Hey, Lucifer. You offer—you are a comfort to me.”

“I know you’re holding back,” he says, walking ahead of her to stand alone at the back of her car. His ever moving fingers trace the inelegant lines of the cruiser, delicately outlining it’s workmanlike form. “If I could get this blasted self-actualization under control, you wouldn’t feel the need to keep yourself in check.”

“We haven’t tried in a while. Maybe, after last night…” she trails off, knowing it’s the wrong thing to say. He’s vibrating with stress; there is no chance that he’s touchable for her right now.

“I cannot risk it,” he confirms, his hand cradling the boxy corner of the cruiser’s trunk. “After last night? I could not bear to cause you pain.”

“That’s okay.” She joins him at the car, setting her hand near his on the metal. If he were calmer, she’d tell him about her realization that so much of their prior mode of communication had been touch based, that she understands where his frustration is coming from, but she doesn’t want to pile more guilt onto his psyche. “That’s okay. There’s no rush. You are a comfort to me. Talking to you, being with you? That’s what I need. You give me strength—just this morning, the thought of you helped me get through a tense moment. You are who I need. The self-actualization will sort itself out. We’re still so new—it’s a little nerve wracking, isn’t it? I must have tried on seven outfits this morning, wanting to find something you’d like, and you’ve already seen me in pretty much my whole wardrobe.”

“I was just getting warmed up at seven.”

“See? Even when we’re miles apart we’re sharing the same struggles.” He scoffs, but his jawline relaxes. “It’s just new—we’ll both calm down. But you can’t be shitty to Dan—he’s having a rough enough time as it is. He was the one in need of comfort in there, by the way.”

Lucifer grimaces. “Yes. He was…good for Charlotte. I imagine he must miss her a great deal.”

“He does. But he’s healing, little by little. And it turns out he’ll get to see her again some day.”

“I suppose he will.” The thought brings a melancholy twist to Lucifer’s lips.

“Come on,” she says, tilting her head towards the front of the car. “Get in, and you can debrief me about your meeting with Bauda.”

He groans theatrically, throwing himself into the front seat. “An utter waste of time, Detective. The Lady Thorston’s disappearance seems to have thrown whatever plan Detective Bauda had into chaos. She went on a whole little rant—I’m dragging my feet, it must be on purpose, I know what they have, I’m keeping her from her true purpose, blah, blah, blah.” He pulls down the sun visor and starts to fix his hair in the mirror.

Chloe stifles the urge to reach out and still his hands. “Did she say anything specific? Where Mrs. Thorston could have gone? What would have been in the box Maddy stole from her—did you discuss Maddy at all?”

“I tried bringing up the young miscreant, but Detective Bauda dismissed her as already lost. I tell you, she is not doing well, Detective.”

“Did you, uh.” Chloe points two fingers at her own eyes.

“Ply her with my devilish charm?” he finishes for her. “I wasn’t certain if you’d appreciate that.”

“Oh.” On the one hand, she doesn’t want him assigning her power over what he does. On the other, his mojo does make her uneasy—or at least it had, a few days ago. Somehow, having seen it spilling free, affecting a building full of people because he was overwhelmed with stress, leaves her more at ease with the idea. He’s not casting some sort of spell over people; desire, bringing out desire, it’s intrinsic to his nature. Forcing him to bottle it up all the time doesn’t seem fair. She leans back in her seat, fingers twisted together, thinking. He finishes with his hair and starts pawing through the glove compartment, probably looking for snacks. The last time she’d held those hands, they’d been red and clawed, and she hadn’t known it would be the last time for a long time.

Vanilla. With sandalwood and cardamom this time. His scent always grows around her whenever they spend time in the car together, stronger with each breath. Police cruisers are home to any number of ignoble human odors, but Lucifer’s presence gifts her with the hint of another, more delicious world. She’d forgotten what it’s like to feel wrapped up in him this way, how it means safety. Their phone calls have been enjoyable—more than—but being near him? Hearing the shush of his breath? Seeing the way the light picks out the individual hairs in his stubble? Watching his pianist fingers pawing through old takeout menus because his energy is boundless and uninhibitable? Chloe turns further towards him, one leg drawing up slightly onto the seat. A napkin from her favorite coffee place is tucked into the cup holder, a remainder from whenever they last rode together and he brought her a drink as an offering. He’s more fastidious about her order than she is. He finds her preference cheap and revolting, but he still regularly purchases it for her in public, damn his reputation for fine taste, because he craves her enjoyment. Her eyelids slip low as she studies him, her breaths slowing and deepening.

“Detective.” There’s a hint of a rasp to his voice, and she notes his hands have stilled, clenched tightly around his own thighs. She knows that tone of voice, now. It means he’s willing to plead—for her attention, her touch, her pleasure. “Is this what your face looked like when you watched me on screen? Wanting me?”

“We’re at work, Lucifer.” The words are right, but her tone is not professional. It’s sultry and promising and she needs to get herself together. “Now, put your seat belt on so we can go.”

They’ve had this argument, many times. The devil doesn’t wear a seat belt. The devil doesn’t fear car crashes. The devil doesn’t mess up the lines of his suit with nylon. His gaze meets her own, an unformulated question lurking there. Silently, his left hand leaves his thigh, reaches behind his right shoulder. His fingers grasp the belt, firmly wrap around it, draw the shoulder strap down and across his body. The buckle snaps shut with a pleasing click, and she examines the restraint, the way it cinches across his waist and pulls against his collar.

“You’re marvelous like this,” he breathes, the worship in his voice making her feel floaty.

Satisfaction cuts through her, marrow deep. Good devil, she thinks, opens her mouth to say it, but—No. How does she keep creating these situations? The cruiser’s seat belts are in no way erotic. They are a safety measure, not kinky sex accessories. She still has to say something, almost makes the moment into a joke—Don’t you mean miraculous? but that risks making him uncomfortable, so she says, “You are a marvel,” instead. The right choice—she gets to see his shy, pleased smile again. My good devil, she tells herself indulgently. She’ll keep him safe and happy, just like this.

Vow made, devil secured, she fastens her own seat belt and fixes both her GPS and her attention on the suspect tattoo parlor.

Chapter Text

The trouble arises when it’s time to get him out of the seat belt.

He’s calm on the drive over, detailing a scavenger hunt he’s planning to host in the prohibition tunnels under Lux, an event that sounds like it will be illegal, dangerous, and, yes, fun. Every so often, he brings a hand up to stroke along the shoulder strap, not adjusting it, just confirming its presence. When Chloe pulls into a parking spot in the strip mall housing Skin Crossing Tattoos, it’s the most natural thing in the world for her to reach over to unbuckle his belt as soon as she’s released her own. She realizes what she’s doing when her hands are halfway across the console and snatches them back, fingers fluttering in the air, an embarrassing flourish of, ‘Not touching, not controlling, just being your buddy.’ Except she’s not just his buddy anymore. She’s his lover, and he’s looking at her expectantly.

She tries to open her door while it’s still locked. After a brief struggle, Chloe stumbles out into the parking lot, swinging the door closed behind her with such an awkward motion that it doesn’t latch properly and she has to open it and slam it back into place, all without looking at him. She cannot look at him, because he is still sitting there, where she put him, restrained by her command.

She keeps messing things up.

Reaching a hand behind her, she beckons him towards her, but there’s no sound of him exiting the car so she finally turns, hands on her hips. Lucifer is peering at her through the windshield, looking rather more like an abandoned puppy than the literal King of Hell has any business looking. “Come on, Lucifer,” she snaps, hating herself for retreating behind impatience, as though he is the one in the wrong here.

With a very dramatic sigh, he flings his seat belt aside and finally joins her in the parking lot, putting on a show of straightening and buttoning his jacket. “We’re still doing this, I see?”

“Doing what?” If anything, her voice grows harsher.

He raises an eyebrow. A different man would let the truth remain merely implicit, but Lucifer is not that man. “Pretending you don’t want to dominate me.”

Neither of them have used that word until now. Chloe’s stomach twists sickly at the sound. That word does not belong anywhere near him. He’s so strong and powerful and proud. And he comes when you tell him to, says the little voice in her head, the one that has her insides clenching in want rather than horror. “I said we aren’t doing that. Stop pushing.”

He flinches as if slapped. “Chloe.”

Her gaze drops, shame a hot wash down the back of her neck. “I’m sorry. I know. It’s not you—you’re not the one who keeps starting things. I just—you won’t risk touching me in case it hurts. I can’t risk hurting you, either.”

“I’m not at risk from a little light bondage. You could never hurt me.”

Like he’d been perfectly fine in the aftermath of their ‘little video wank.’ “I can hurt you. I have. You’re offering so much, and—it would be too easy to take advantage of you.”

“I’m offering myself freely—there’s no advantage to be taken.”

“Now you really are pushing.” Her voice isn’t harsh this time, but it is firm. “No, Lucifer.”

His hands go to his own hips, head tilted to the side as he observes her. “One day you’ll decide to take what you want, and it will be the happiest day of my life.”

“What about it would make you so happy?”

“I want to give you your desires, of course.”

Which is hardly an answer at all. She looks away.

“Not today, then,” he says at last. “We’ll let it go for now, all right? Take a little break, interrogate some potential bad guys? There, that gets a smile—you do love intimidating evil-doers into good behavior, don’t you?”

She laughs, reluctant but unable to resist him. “I don’t intimidate witnesses.”

“No, that would be wrong according to your little police code of conduct that absolutely none of your compatriots adhere to.”

“You and I will adhere to it.”

“Yes, Detective.” He’s not being obedient this time, just an ass, and she rolls her eyes skyward.

“Let’s get this over with.”

Chloe isn’t sure what she expected from the official tattoo parlor of the Sinnerman’s acolytes, but it wasn’t a lavender scented, plant festooned hideaway with French new wave music being piped through speakers set in the ceiling.

“Now this is a disappointment,” Lucifer stage whispers to her. “Very uncinematic.”

“We prefer hygienic.” Chloe turns to see the three visible tattooing stations and the reception desk all being overseen by a single man—short, wiry, and covered in tattoos. Black lines only—no color.

“Well, hello,” Lucifer oozes, slinking over to the man. “Are you the chap that’s been inking my dad’s name all over every misguided idiot in this town?”

Chloe suppresses a sigh—her fault for not going over strategy with Lucifer before they walked inside—and plasters a bright smile on her own face before stepping in front of the advancing devil.

“Yeah, hi, we were told this was the place to go? Now that we’re on the right path?” She’s giving her best version of an L.A. blonde who’s just found a new exercise guru, her voice a mix of worship and self-superiority with a hint of an insecure undertone.

The tattoo artist’s expression takes on a long suffering cast. “Buy an established business, they said. Get a built in customer base. Look, I don’t know what cult the last guy was in, but you are literally the twenty-third person to come in asking for The Path tattoo this week. They are taking everyone—bikers, finance bros,” he looks Chloe over, “bored housewives.”

Lucifer rears back in affront. Naturally—he would never have a bored housewife.

“You know what that means, sweetheart?” the tattoo artist continues. “When they take all types? It’s a scam. You’re all being bilked for cash. And now? The prior owner of this place is missing. Straight up disappeared. So maybe you can tell all your little ‘path’ friends that we’re under new management, and we don’t do multi-level marketing or whatever you’re into. If you’re serious about getting some ink, we can sit down and do a consult on an original piece, or you can take a look at the flash,” he waves a hand at the wall across from the reception desk, which is lined with gleaming new glass cases full of small, pre-designed flash art for customers who wander in for some spontaneous ink, “but I’m not tattooing messiah bullshit on anyone.”

“Wow, okay.” Chloe blinks, regrouping. No wonder Maze hadn’t turned up anything more when staking out this place. “Hey, you sound like you have a lot of integrity. That’s cool.”

“I do appreciate a man who understands the nonsensical nature of messianic beliefs,” Lucifer says, “but do you think it’s the smartest business move, yelling at new customers?”

“I didn’t spend the past decade saving up for my own business just to pretend I’m not the boss.”

“Right. Totally understand,” Chloe cuts in. “I think we got off on the wrong foot. It’s my friend—she’s a sucker for those MLM schemes. I actually came here to check out her latest one, see if I could learn anything that would convince her to drop it. But you say the guy behind it is gone?”

“Yeah—probably to avoid charges for stealing everyone’s money.”

“Did he happen to leave anything behind? A brochure or anything? Something that would show what he’d been up to?”

“Was I not clear? Cults? Scams? Fraud? All things I’m not interested in being involved with. Do either of you actually want a tattoo?”

“Um—“

“Detective, it’s us!”

Chloe glances over at where Lucifer appears engrossed in a piece of flash art.

“What do you mean, us?”

“Look, burger and fries.”

Chloe steps over to join him. He’s pointing at a little cartoon-style rendering of a burger, fries and milkshake meal. A dopey smile takes up residence on her face.

“Our favorites. But what’s the milkshake doing there?”

“I’m surprised at you—surely you’ve heard Kelis’s seminal,” she groans, “treatise on the subject. I’m the irresistible, universally beloved fries. You’re the sensible, substantial burger. The two of us brought together by a thick. Tasty. Milkshake.” He punctuates his words with a quick flick of his tongue, and Chloe’s neurons light up, the whole of her focus coming to bear like she’s seconds from nailing a dangerous suspect. Code red—action stations. He’s doing sexy banter.

Okay, she can handle this. Time to prove she can be a fun girlfriend, his match. Chloe bites her lip and lets her eyes trace down his form. “I’m the burger? Shouldn’t you be the one with the meat?” Wow. Okay, no. That was bad. Hadn’t she learned her lesson the last time she’d tried using double entendres on him? Chloe is terrible at flirting. She should not be allowed to speak.

Lucifer, improbably, chuckles and leans closer. “Yes, but you will be the one with the meat inside of you, self-actualization willing.” Objectively, it’s a horrible line. Subjectively, it’s the cutest and funniest thing Chloe’s ever heard. She’s giggling, and he’s grinning that saucy grin, like the whole world is a game and he wants to play it exclusively with her. There’s a brief moment where she wonders: what if she hadn’t been so drunk the first time she came onto him? What if his mother had never told him about Chloe’s miracle status? What if one or both of them had been a little braver when they danced at his homemade prom? But it’s only a moment—she knows that what they have now could in no way stand diminished next to any prior might-have-been. They have a future, built on a solid base of trust and honesty, full of desire sparked and hunger sated.

The tattoo artist clears his throat. “I don’t get paid to listen to straight people make bad sex jokes.”

Awkward Chloe threatens to make a reappearance as she remembers they have an audience, but Lucifer steps forward, hackles raised. “How dare you—take that back! You’ve never met a more bent man in your life, and if I had not recently entered a state of blissful monogamy, I’d prove it to you right here and now!”

Blissful. He still just says these things. Thoughtlessly being the most demonstrative man she’s ever been with. The devil, relishing boyfriend-mode. Chloe can barely remember what they’re doing here, why they would ever waste time on this tattoo parlor when they could be elsewhere, whispering dirty nothings into each others’ ears.

“Sorry, man. But I still don’t get paid if it’s bi guys making bad sex jokes. You want the tattoo or what?”

Lucifer looks to Chloe, eyebrow raised. “What do you say, Detective? How’d you like to get a tribute to us tattooed on my arse?”

Chloe blinks, trying to catch up. “You want a tattoo? Now?”

“Why not? I don’t have any plans, do you?”

Crap. Chloe digs out her phone to check the time. “I do, yeah. I’m running late to meet Maze.”

“Cancel. She’ll understand.”

“I’m pretty sure recent events prove that she would not understand. I can’t blow her off. Hey,” she gives the shop owner a short wave. “Thanks for talking with us. Good luck with the business.”

“Perhaps we’ll be back another time.” Lucifer holds the door for Chloe, ushering her back outside.

Chloe stops at the edge of the parking lot, squinting against the midday sun. Frustration creeps up her back, tightening the line of her shoulders. Lucifer needs to get his subconscious under control if only so she can finally take advantage of one of those back rubs he’s always offering with his ‘multi-talented fingers.’ “Another dead end.”

“But not exactly a fruitless visit.”

“You really want that tattoo?”

“I’ve never been able to get one before, but with you present? Could be an interesting experience. My skin will likely expel the ink once we spend any time apart, of course, but we’d know it had been there. What do you think? Would you like it?”

“If it’s going to fade anyway, we could get you a temporary tattoo. No needles, less pain.”

“Not quite the same thing, is it?”

“Do you want pain?” Chloe asks hesitantly. Is that why he keeps pushing for her to be in control? She’s not sure if she could go very far down the S&M path, but maybe there’s some sensation stuff they could work out without her having to be in command.

“The novelty intrigues, but that’s not the point. It’s about…” He pauses, searching for the right words. “Sinking us into my flesh. A trial endured in order to forge a commitment. Not something your child could press on and then wash off later in the day.”

He wants so badly to belong somewhere. Her hands come up, and she fists them in the front of her own blouse to stop from reaching out to him. “You can’t wash me off, Lucifer. We’re already indelible.”

His expression remains pensive. “But would you like it? Me, face down, bare bum exposed in the tattoo chair, a tribute to you rising steadily on my skin.”

The artist’s hands caressing him while she is unable to. “I couldn’t do it now,” she admits. “I’d want to hold your hand, in case it did hurt.” He scoffs. “And, you know, maybe touch the tattoo. Before it disappeared.”

His lips compress into a tight line. “Everything I think of to please you keeps highlighting my limitations instead.”

“You don’t need to do anything special.”

“I want to. I want everyone to see how spectacular you are.”

“You’re pretty spectacular yourself.”

“Yes, that is my point. Instead of insensible clods like that man looking at you and seeing only your inherent shoe-like nature, they’ll look at me and see that you are fierce enough to win the attention of someone as exquisite as yours truly.”

And he also still just says stuff like that. Chloe grits her teeth and starts walking towards the car again. “You’re just cranky that he thought you were straight.”

“I am not cranky, I am justifiably insulted.”

“You’ll have to get used to that. Eventually, your reputation for being the most versatile lover in Los Angeles will fade.”

“Yes.” His step hitches, but then he’s back in his spot behind her right shoulder. “But I find I prefer the idea of being widely regarded as yours to being merely celebrated for my unmatched prowess.”

“Well, that’s good, because we are together.”

“But with no marks to show it.”

“Not yet.”

He opens the driver’s-side door for her and watches her settle into the car, his hand straying to her spot on his neck. “Yet. Are you certain you can’t postpone Maze? We could—“

“We will.” His face brightens. “Later.”

He scowls and slams her door. Chloe’s phone vibrates in her pocket and she pulls it out to see a new text from Dan. He’s spoken to organized crime, and while their attempts to make a case against the Scalucis have routinely stalled out—no doubt due to Pierce’s influence—there have been recent developments with the family.

“Dan says there are signs of a power shake-up in the Scaluci family,” she reports when Lucifer joins her in the car. “Shipments rerouted or going missing, lots of turnover among their lower-level thugs. Dominic Scaluci—he’s the purported head of the family—hasn’t been seen outside the house in days. Usually he’s pretty hands on.”

“Hardly a surprise there’s trouble, if they were an arm of the Sinnerman’s empire.”

“True, but it’s only in the past week that things have really changed.”

“The relic.”

“Exactly. Now if only we knew who had it…”

“I have a thought on that. The cases on the wall inside—cheap, mass produced junk, obviously, but they reminded me. When Carmen Grant stole my wings, he kept them on display in his home. They would have required a specially made mount. That’s what you do when you’re filthy rich and obtain something precious—you hire someone to show it off to best advantage while keeping it protected.”

“So you’re saying whoever obtained the relic might want to build a custom case for it—like with artifacts in museums.”

“Exactly. We’re no longer dealing with Cain, who would have viewed any such relic merely as a tool. This new purchaser would likely be more invested. We’re talking UV filtering glass, alarms, maybe temperature control. There are only so many people locally who do that sort of custom work for private collectors, especially if we assume a rush job.”

“And let me guess, you know all of them personally.”

“I do have a rather extensive art collection, Detective, and while I don’t have to worry much about theft, I would prefer not to damage a pure expression of human passion through neglect.” In the name of fun, sure, she thinks, but not neglect. “As soon as we learn what form this relic takes, it could be the matter of a few phone calls to learn exactly where it is.”

“That’s a really good idea, Lucifer.”

“Thank you!” He gives her a gracious nod, regally accepting this acknowledgment of his mental prowess.

“Unfortunately, with the guy who did those ‘path’ tattoos missing, we’re back to having no leads.” Ignoring Lucifer’s conspicuously unbuckled seat belt, Chloe starts the car and pulls out of their parking space.

Lucifer tilts his head in consideration. “I don’t know. Twenty-three tattoo seekers in the past week—whoever is attempting to take over this fanatical faction of Pierce’s empire is recruiting. Very actively. I could put together a questionnaire for the bouncers at Lux to administer. ‘Skip the line and drink free if you know someone with this ugly tattoo,’ that sort of thing. Someone must know someone.”

“It’s not the most discreet option. No guarantee of success. The tattooist skipping town—that could indicate people in the know are heading underground. Whether he had official power in the organization or not, he would have symbolic power. He’s the one inking the statement of truth into everyone’s chests. If he felt the need to leave so suddenly, he must have felt threatened.”

“Threatened by whom?”

“It has to be new leadership. That’s why Bauda was a mess when you talked to her today—she’s lost control over whatever it was she was trying to accomplish through us. But the people in charge…it can’t be the Scalucis. Or at least not Dominic Scaluci.”

“Who else?”

“I don’t know. Someone inexperienced. You heard the guy—they’re taking all comers. Their tattoo artist has disappeared, but people are still looking for him at the shop. It’s very amateurish. Dominic, he’d be recruiting muscle, and no one would be talking to outsiders.”

“Look at you.” Lucifer’s gaze slides over her in an approving up and down. “Planning how you’d run your own empire? Promise that I’ll get to be your first subject.”

Chloe’s stomach dips. She’d almost been an unknowing co-head of this whole criminal enterprise. Pierce’s queen, as it were. What had his plan been for her? Would he have given it all up, or tried to keep it a secret? Had he thought he could corrupt her, convince her to join him? She’d agreed to do a lot for him—distancing herself from Lucifer, having sex at work, getting engaged on a whim. There’s no version of Chloe that says yes to organized crime, but smaller things? What if he’d admitted to little foibles, gradually over time? Could he have convinced her to look the other way until suddenly she was complicit? Until Trixie was involved?

“Everything all right, Detective?”

Chloe glances at Lucifer sideways while keeping most of her focus on the road. He’s momentarily still, fingers paused on the AC vents, mid-attempt to get the air flow directed just so. He looks at home, no matter that he’s too long limbed, too nattily attired, too five o’clock shadowed for the cramped, working class and respectable 9 a.m. world of her car. He could have insisted they take his corvette, but instead he's willing to let her drive.

“I like you.”

He rounds on her, neck jutting out, eyes bulging, metaphorical (and possibly literal) feathers ruffling. “I should hope so.” His fingers leap into action, executing his little self-soothing routine, fixing cuffs and lapels and pocket square. Futzing with his hated cravat. “The feeling is quite mutual.”

Chloe bites back a smile. “Anyway. I don’t think a random Lux patron is going to solve everything for us. I suppose we could talk to Bauda again, use your mojo trick on her. See if she’ll tell us what the relic is.”

“You’d be okay with that?”

Chloe shrugs. “Maybe? I don’t know—does it ever make you uncomfortable, like you’re invading someone’s privacy?”

“I never ask a question I wouldn’t gladly answer myself. Do you see it as an invasion?”

Chloe’s lips twist to the side as she chooses her words. Consent matters to Lucifer. One ill-considered remark and he’s likely to believe she thinks the worst of him. “It’s different, probably, for angels. Or devils or demons. You all know that these sorts of powers exist. Humans, we don’t know to be worried about magic.”

“It’s not magic. Magic is wonder and delight. I merely ask a question, and then whoever I’m asking gets to choose what they say in return.”

“They choose?”

“Of course. You’ve heard me mention the complicated ones? Take that chap back at the shop—if I’d asked him what he wanted, he’d likely have told us that he wanted me to pay for two full sleeves of artwork. Undoubtedly true, but hardly his deepest, most hidden desire. The easier ones? If I ask someone what they desire and they immediately tell me that they want to murder their mother for her money, it’s because they don’t actually believe there’s anything wrong with that desire. They only fear the consequences.”

“So you think those people, the easy ones, they really want to have someone to share that desire with? Someone who will tell them it’s only natural?”

“Perhaps.”

“But Bauda is a complicated one.”

“Very. Growing up with the Sinnerman, exposed to whatever this relic is, plus everything else in Cain’s collection? I imagine she would have the wherewithal to be more careful about what she admitted to me than most.”

But she’d still have to admit something. It’s the crux of Chloe’s unease, the fact that one line from Lucifer compels action from every human except Chloe. She doesn’t think it’s wrong for Lucifer to use his mojo—it’s part of him, how he was designed. But it might be wrong for Chloe to ask it of him. In any case, “You don’t think there’s much use in talking to Bauda again?”

“It’s an option, but we do still have the captain to speak to. His wife did have the bloody relic, after all. And Captain Thorston’s head is a lot softer than Detective Bauda’s.”

Right. Thorston.

“Well,” he prompts when she’s silent for too long. “How would you like to proceed? I can call him up for a chat while you meet with Mazikeen. What are the two of you up to, anyway?”

“I’m taking her to shoot guns.”

“If Maze gets a gun, I get a gun.”

“No one is getting a gun. I just thought it could be an activity she would enjoy. I’m not into group sex, but weapons I can do.”

“Don’t let Maze hear you say that—she’ll think you mean something else entirely.”

“No, not do, not, like, do—you know what, never mind. I was going to the range anyway and thought we could bond. Next time she gets into a fight with a friend, she’ll know it doesn’t mean her entire life here is ending.”

“You really are a disgustingly kindhearted person, aren’t you?”

“I want to be. I’m trying to be.”

“You are. Positively nauseatingly caring. But Maze is still a demon. Don’t expect too much.”

“I can’t control how other people treat me, only how I treat other people. I want her to know she has a place here, so I’m showing her that sometimes friends come first.”

“Hang on, if anyone is coming—“

“No.”

He huffs, much put upon. “Very well, have your fun with Maze. I shall make do with far inferior company.”

“You don’t have to meet with Thorston if you don’t want to.” Chloe keeps her eyes forward, hands locked at ten and two on the steering wheel.

“I’ve no objection.” He sounds genuinely confused by her hesitation.

“It won’t make you uncomfortable? Spending time with him now that we know he thinks you’re like Pierce?”

“I would hope the devil ranks higher than Cain in a mortal’s estimation of evil.”

“Exactly. That. You shouldn’t have to be around people who can’t see how good you are.”

“What a wonderful realization. Surely this means you’ll stop spending your time with all of the sentient afterbirths wandering about the precinct convinced you aren’t the best thing to ever happen to the L.A.P.D.”

“That’s—“

“Different? How?”

“I’m a cop. That’s my choice, and in order to be a good cop I need to be okay being disliked by my colleagues. You don’t have to put up with that.”

“I do. You said it yourself, with regards to Amenadiel. Some things in life are unavoidable. You are stuck learning the intricacies of your child’s labyrinthine unicorn-based entertainment preferences. I am stuck being the devil, with the millennia of bad press that comes along with that. Just because you don’t only see me as those eggs you need anymore doesn’t mean I don’t have a ready dozen to whip at the nearest low life.”

“But in this case—“

“In this case there is a relic of unknown origin being used to mentally alter an alarmingly high number of humans. Detective, if you weren’t yet in the celestial insiders club, I’d still need to take care of things behind your back while also helping with your regular case work. It’s a relief to be able to share what’s going on with you.”

“Oh.” Her responsible devil. On occasion, at any rate. He’s made it so easy for her to recognize him as the man she’s known for the past three years; the realization that during several of the moments when she thought he was being careless, he’d been shouldering burdens far heavier than this one… She’d known he was a good man, but she hadn’t known the depth of him.

“Oh. Now, tell me whatever plan it is you’re so nervous to have me carry out, or I’ll be forced to come up with one of my own, and you do get cranky when I think for myself.”

“No, I get irritated when you act without thinking.”

“Semantics, Detective.”

“Fine.” Chloe makes him wait while she changes lanes, torturing him with responsible driving. Maybe she does need to reckon with what him being the devil means in practical, work-related terms. “I think it’s time we make the big push. All our leads are drying up before we can investigate them, both Bauda and Thorston seem to be falling apart, and Dan’s organized crime contacts indicate that the Scalucis are unstable now, but that might not be true tomorrow. If you’re comfortable—and I mean that. I don’t want you to feel like I’m pushing you to behave a certain way—“

“You’ve made your reluctance on that point painfully clear. Yes, Detective. Let me be bad for you.”

Chloe doesn’t choke on her own tongue. She doesn’t. “You’re just going to be talking.”

“A task I’m quite expert at, as I proved last night.”

“Focus, Lucifer.” Focus, Decker. “It’s very simple. Thorston thinks your the devil? Be the devil he thinks you are.”

“Not to be critical, but my devil face is not always the best option for getting information out of suspects. They tend to become rather gibbering at the sight.”

“I don’t mean—no devil face. Just be that guy. Cinematic crime boss Lucifer Morningstar. Have fun with it. Make him believe that if he doesn’t impress you—“

“He’ll sleep with the fishes?”

“Sure. And make sure he understands how difficult it would be for him impress you—we want him scrambling to show you every card he has. Think about it—Thorston’s main claim to usefulness was setting up that children’s charity as a feeder for the Sinnerman’s organization. Do you want to spend a decade building relationships with troubled kids?”

“Dad, no!”

“Exactly. Even if you were willing to admit you like kids—“

“How dare—“

“Unicorn? Painted right here?” Chloe taps her cheek. “You are a natural with Trixie.”

“Well, the spawn is one thing—“

“Even if you were willing to admit you like some kids, it would take way too long for the purposes of establishing you as Pierce’s successor. So, Thorston branched out with his sex club buddies. But even if you weren’t the kind of guy who cares about consent above all things, would any of those men impress you?”

Lucifer curls his lip in distaste.

“Exactly. You’ve,” she gestures widely, a little unsure on this point, “run a kingdom.” He nods, and she shuts off the part of her brain that starts shrieking about dating someone who rules an entire realm of being. “And to do that you needed demons like Maze.”

“Mazikeen is rather exemplary among her own people, but I see what you mean. If I were trying to be the new Sinnerman, I would not be impressed by Thorston’s offerings.”

“Right. You force his hand—if he wants to secure a spot on team Lucifer, he needs to prove he can bring you muscle. Can he give you cops? Can he give you the crime families? The established networks? A stockade of weapons? Any useful relics Pierce may have left behind?”

“The relic I’ll grant you, but I already know all the cops and criminals I need to.”

“You aren’t actually using him to expand your circle of friends, Lucifer. Remember Shauna, that nearly naked cater-waiter slash actress? She referred to Thorston as ‘enough of a sad sack’ to sympathize with someone down on their luck. His skill is recruiting the weak and vulnerable, not people who already have power of their own. My bet? He will go straight from you to Carlo Scaluci. Carlo’s his only option. I think Thorston did a deal with the Scalucis to help them grow their territory a few years back when he first arrived in town and they were still barely a presence in L.A.’s underworld. The Scalucis owe him, so he gets his own liaison to provide him with drugs, maybe a little muscle for intimidation. That’s Carlo. You lean on Thorston, Thorston will bring you Carlo Scaluci.”

“But I can meet with Carlo Scaluci any time I want.”

“This isn’t your typical meeting.” Chloe flexes her hands on the steering wheel. “Because Thorston? Is going to convince Carlo to try to kill you.”

Lucifer gasps, as excited as six-year-old Trixie being surprised with an unexpected pony ride. “Am I going to be in danger? How thrilling.”

“You are going to be invulnerable. Literately bullet and stab proof. Yes?”

He tucks his chin meekly. “Yes, Detective.”

“Damn right, ‘Yes, Detective,’” she mutters, pulling off the highway onto the exit for the precinct. “When Thorston offers to arrange the meeting, make sure he believes that you plan on taking over where Pierce left off and that you expect Carlo to come prepared with ways to help you cement your leadership.”

“Thus threatening an end to any pretension to power Carlo may have. And right when his family is undergoing a little shake up of it’s own, meaning that now is by far his best chance at making something of himself. He won’t risk an immeasurably wealthy, intelligent, well-connected and powerful rival stepping in.”

“It’s not like this would be the first time you antagonized someone into shooting you.”

“Cruel, to make me think of anyone else penetrating me at a time like this.”

“You’ll live. Literally. Literally, Lucifer.”

“No non-metaphoric vulnerability. Check.”

“Carlo’s lawyers might be able to get him out of any other charge we could pin on him, but attempted murder? With the victim alive and prepared to testify? That at the very least gives probable cause for a whole host of search warrants.”

He props an elbow against the window frame and leans his head against his fist. “You are a properly devious woman.”

“Don’t be too quick with the complements—there’s a lot of ifs in this plan still. Like, if you and Dan can work together civilly.”

“Must we?”

“You must. In addition to needing you to be invulnerable—and I mean absolutely untouchable—“

“Yes, yes.” He waves a hand impatiently.

“In addition to that, I am not back in the field yet, and the FBI is still questioning me with regards to Pierce’s activities. If we want any arrests to stick, I can’t be anywhere near this. Once you have things planned with Thorston, send me the information and I’ll feed it to Dan as an ‘anonymous’ tip. Wait for him to contact you, then you can work out the details together.”

“I’ll make an appointment for a chest waxing straight away.” Chloe shoots him a look, and he clarifies. “So I can wear a wire. Would ‘Monkey Bottoms’ work as a code word for when Daniel is supposed to leap in, guns blazing, protecting me from my dastardly assailant?”

“Let Dan decide if you go in wired, all right? He’ll work out operational details, minimize the chances of Carlo or Thorston realizing this is a set up. Remember, the more villainous these men think you are, the less likely they are to think you’re working for the good guys, so try to keep it believable.”

Chloe pulls into the precinct’s parking garage and slows to a stop by Lucifer’s corvette. As she shifts into park, she turns her head to study him. “Are you sure you don’t care if people think you’re part of a boring couple?”

He laughs in exasperation. “A boring couple rooting out police corruption and plotting the overthrow of a band of criminals? Detective, I made peace with the more staid aspects of your personality months ago.”

“But you like being flashy.” It’s endearing, how deeply showmanship runs in his psyche.

“I like being with you.” She smiles, a wellspring of contentment flowing under her skin. “Now, come on, give us a preview.”

“A preview?”

“Before you send me off into the cruel and dangerous world. It’ll be hours before we can have a proper moment together. Won’t you show me, Detective? What you have on underneath that fetching workday outfit?

“What?” Chloe peeks nervously out the car windows. There’s no one nearby, but she knows there are cameras in the parking garage and isn’t certain how much they can see.

“Just a taste. What color lingerie? Did you put on a matching lace set, or have you got on, I’m guessing, faded polka-dot cotton knickers and that same beige could-never-be-boring-as-long-as-it’s-cupping-your-perfect-breasts bra you wore while you watched me and touched yourself?”

He is eerily correct about the knickers, but her bra, while utilitarian, is at least a respectable black. She’s wary of another sit down with the FBI, now with a flashing incident added to their list of improprieties to ask her about. But. This is Lucifer, not Marcus. She feels both more confident in saying no to him without fear of losing his affection and less interested in turning him down. Does the parking garage really count as ‘at work’ anyway? Taking another quick look around, Chloe hooks a finger into the neckline of her blouse and gives a quick tug, flashing him a view of her left bra strap before yanking her shirt back into place.

“Have mercy, Detective. You can hardly call that—“

“Do you want to complain or do you want to see the other one?”

His jaw swings shut with a soft click of teeth. Smugly, she gives him a similarly fast look at her right strap, pulling her neckline low enough that the top of her bra cup is briefly visible as well.

He hums, deep and low. “Such an antagonistic take on burlesque, Detective. Very arousing.”

“Weirdo,” she says, but she’s laughing again, and when he finally lets himself out of her car, she’s not thinking about Thorston or the Scalucis or even about fraught forays into submission and control. She’s thinking how very, very lucky she is that once upon a time he decided to get up from behind his piano and become her crime solving devil.

Chapter Text

“This is freaking awesome.” Maze hefts the 480 Ruger she’s decided to start with, face split wide with glee as she unloads it on her defenseless target. “Freaking awesome!” she repeats, yelling in case Chloe can’t hear through her ear protection, which Maze, of course, has eschewed.

“Thought you might like it.” Chloe, who stuck with her police issue Glock, finishes unloading her clip and presses the button to bring in her target. Not terrible, but not good, either. Not where she wants to be, but that’s been true for each of her range visits since Pierce’s death.

“All I’ve gotta do is crook my finger and someone’s head pops off on the other side of the room.”

“We’re only doing target practice, remember?” Chloe reloads while Maze selects which gun she wants to try next. Chloe typically shoots at an L.A.P.D. range, but in an effort to avoid running into her coworkers she’s brought Maze to the range Chloe learned to shoot at when she was a kid. It’s been owned by the same family forever, and they keep an impressive variety of rental weapons available for people to try out.

“They have a baby!” Maze calls out, holding up a pocket Derringer, then does a double take as Chloe sets up for her next attempt. “That’s your problem.”

“I’m not having problems.”

Maze tucks her weapon into her waistband and without further warning grabs onto Chloe’s hips from behind.

“Whoa, not when I’m holding a gun—stop that!” She smacks Maze’s hand away from her ass.

“Had to do it—gonna drive Lucifer crazy telling him about this later.”

“Don’t torture him.”

“It’s practically my job. Job adjacent.” While she’s talking, Maze subtly repositions Chloe’s hips and shoulders, then places a firm hand on her abdomen. It’s like a magic trick—suddenly Chloe’s discovered what balance feels like, when she thought she’d been perfectly balanced this whole time. “Try it now.” Maze backs off, giving her space, and Chloe fires another round.

Dead to the heart.

“I’ve been shooting for over twenty years. How are you better at this already?” Chloe fires a few more shots, all landing within an inch of each other. “Unbelievable.”

“You’ve been doing this twenty years; I’ve been doing combat training for almost as long as there’s been a Hell. You’re not bad, considering.” Maze returns to her own stall, immediately starting to—and Chloe swears this is what’s happening—giggle. “Look what it can do!” She brandishes her little pistol and shoots the outline of a cock and balls into her target.

Chloe drops her head, sighs, and begins trying to find that magic balance point again on her own.

“We should bring Trix next time.”

“Dan and I’ve decided she doesn’t get to shoot a gun until she’s thirteen.”

“You just said your dad took you when you were a kid.”

“My mom, actually.”

“No shit? My mom taught me how to kill, too.” Chloe blinks. Well. Hell. “Actually,” Maze continues, conceding a point, “she gave me my first rocks, showed me how to sharpen them. Same thing.”

What was it with celestials and rocks? “My mom was not teaching me to kill anyone. I was supposed to be a big name actress, but she would have settled for me following in her B-movie footsteps. Chicks in action flicks need to be able to handle weapons, so guns were a part of her whole training regimen. Dance, music—did not take. I liked the gymnastics and horse riding all right, and of course,” Chloe practices a quick draw, her bullet landing several inches left of her intended spot, “the shooting’s come in handy. I used to be better at it.”

Maze, now playing with an old fashioned Smith & Wesson six-shooter, grunts. “You’re doubting yourself. It’s stupid. I’ve been fighting for longer than your human brain can handle thinking about. Cain had been lying and manipulating for all but a few decades of your species’ existence. When your enemy’s been prepping for thousands of years and you don’t even know there’s a battle going on, you’re going to lose.”

Chloe lowers her weapon and looks over to where Maze is now trying out trick shots, firing from behind her back.

“Lucifer should have brought me up here during the old west. I would have dominated that entire era.”

“How do I know if there’s a battle going on?”

Maze cocks an eyebrow. “There’s always a battle going on. Trouble with humans is you’re weak and have emotions. You need allies, and someone like Pierce can trick your emotions into thinking he’s trustworthy.”

“Demons don’t need allies?”

“Demons who need allies die young.”

“What about Lucifer? Weren’t the two of you…?”

“Lucifer’s different. He doesn’t lie. Doesn’t have a clue about emotions, either. And he was alone. I understand alone. Plus his feathers can be forged into daggers, so I had to sign up for that. Then it turned out I thrived on it. I mean, he’s king down there, but he’s not really a hands on ruler. I had a lot of say over how we did stuff, and staying ahead of the assassination plots stretched my creative muscles.”

It hits Chloe that Maze used to be someone with an extremely high-powered job and a lot of responsibility. Just as she’d done with Lucifer, Chloe had habitually dismissed Maze as careless, but turns out, she’s just lost in a strange world with no structure to guide her. “So it would have been your own siblings who plotted against you and Lucifer?”

“My siblings. His siblings. His mom. My mom. All the other rejects his dad threw down into His waste pit. Everyone wants to take on the king.”

“Seems like there’s been plenty of that since you guys came to L.A., too.”

“Past few years, after we met you.”

Score one for miracle Decker—God’s meddling mortal keeps Satan and his demon entertained. “But you’re bored here?”

Maze switches guns again, choosing one so large that Chloe would have trouble handling the recoil. She fires one-handed, unmoved by the kick-back. “Eh.”

Maze code for ‘I don’t want to answer.’ Chloe focuses on her own training, finding that balance point again and again, moving her gun from holster to hand. Maze brings in her target, her silhouette now missing it’s head.

“I thought I could handle Cain.” Maze isn’t looking at Chloe as she speaks, for once taking her gun safety seriously. “Cause of my whole Hell upbringing. Cain wanted to die, I wanted Cain to die. Seemed perfect. I should have had it covered, but you’ve all infected me with your feelings. I fucked up, let him get one past me.”

“And the part where even if everything had gone according to your plan, I end up grieving a man I thought I loved?”

Maze shrugs. “You got over Dan easily enough; you’d have gotten over meat-head, too. He sucked. You all bounce back from that sort of thing.”

“We don’t bounce back. All that stuff you felt with Linda and Amenadiel, with Lucifer? That betrayal? We all feel those things, too. It still hurts just as much for us.”

Maze takes her time considering this, shooting a straight line across the neck of her next target as easily as she’d slit someone’s throat with one of her knives. She lets the range fall silent, a beat between bullets. “I wanted you to hurt. I wanted to make Lucifer choose me and I wanted you to know what it felt like to be left behind. I didn’t think Pierce could really matter.”

“It’s not about Pierce, or even Lucifer. It’s about you. We were friends. It hurts because you matter to me.”

“I didn’t think I could really matter to you, either.”

Chloe struggles silently for a moment. There’s a reason Maze brings out her sympathetic rather than punitive side. “That’s something for you to remember going forward. You matter. The Pierces of this world will convince you that you’re all alone except for them. They’ll convince you your actions won’t matter to anyone else, and anyone who does get hurt deserves it.”

“Linda said the same thing. It’s stupid—I’ve done this same shit to torture people in Hell, but I don’t even have a soul. None of this should work on me.”

“Who says you don’t have a soul?”

“God.”

Chloe supposes He would be the authoritative source on that one. “You’ve talked to Him?”

Maze shakes her head. “My mom.”

“Would I know who your mom is?”

“Lilith. First woman.”

“I thought that was Eve?”

“Nah. Eve was the redo—Adam’s rib. Biddable, unlike Mom who decided she didn’t want to fuck a dude just because they were stuck in the same paradise.”

There’s a pretty horrifying implication there. Everyone’s told Chloe how terrifying Goddess is, but it seems like God can be pretty scary Himself. “Well, I guess I can’t argue about souls, but you clearly still have emotions.” She waits for Maze to protest, and is pleasantly surprised when she doesn’t. “Pierce used them against you, and you used them against me.”

“I shouldn’t have done it. I’m,” Maze’s lips twist, “sorry.”

“I know,” Chloe says, because she does, and because there’s nothing else to say. She’s already chosen to allow Maze back into her life. For now, Pierce exists as an ache between them, but that will dwindle as long as Maze keeps doing what she’s doing—being emotionally honest, learning to do better. Chloe can give them time.

Maze snarls and fires five shots in quick succession. “I don’t get it! How do you all do this? People die, and they break-up, and they do shitty things to each other, but you all keep moving forward. Going to work at your meaningless jobs. Eating sugar-free bullshit. How do you keep doing that when it hurts? The people in Hell loops don’t do that—they’re just stuck. They fucked up and they can never change that.”

“Maybe,” Chloe says as her bullet swings wide of target, “Hell isn’t for the guilty. It’s for those who are unwilling or unable to change. Being alive, living, means changing, making new choices.”

“Learn, adjust, adapt. I can understand that. Survival.”

Survival. Chloe’s shot barely hits the edge of her target this time.

“Enough, Decker.” Maze is suddenly at her side, hands immobilizing her right arm and gun. “Cut this shit out. I’ve watched you. Researched you. Noted you as a threat. Your instincts are good, and you’re cautious. Caution can keep you alive, but don’t mistake self-doubt for caution. Cain fucked with us both, and we took some hits, but he’s the one who’s dead. Sometimes you take a loss, but if 99% of the time your instincts are correct? You need to trust your instincts, trust your training, and take the shot.”

Chloe meets her stare. “How did you keep going for thousands of years when survival was your only goal?”

Maze shrugs. “I didn’t. That’s what Hell was supposed to be, what it is sometimes. But then Lucifer showed up. He organized us, gave us options other than killing each other forever. Gave us new goals. New fun.”

Torturing souls. Chloe’s mind can’t help but fill in the blank of how demons have fun, but Chloe supposes everyone makes the best of the options available to them. After all, Penelope, for all her faults, never sent Chloe out into the world with a couple of rocks and a ‘good luck staying alive.’ Hell: designed by God to punish His creations for being as imperfect as He made them. Chloe’s lip curls. She tries again—draw, set, fire. Her shot isn’t as perfect as the one Maze guided her through, but in any real world situation, it would get the job done.

“We’ll make a demon out of you yet, Granny Panties.”

Chloe does another quick draw, and this time she hits dead center. “No more granny panties cracks, okay? I do not wear granny panties. Cheek coverage does not equal granny.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll take you shopping for the good stuff. Lucifer doesn’t need to know what you usually wear.”

“Pretty sure it’s too late for that.” He has 100% gone through her underwear drawer at some point, she’s certain of it. “And he will be grateful for whatever he gets.”

Maze grins, her tongue coming out to run the edge of her teeth. “I love hot Domme Decker.”

“Not a Domme,” Chloe grumbles, but the descriptor doesn’t sound wrong coming from Maze.

Half an hour later, waiting in the parking lot while Maze finishes returning the last of her rented guns, Chloe texts her a link to the website that has been sitting open in a tab on Chloe’s phone for the past three months.

“New lead?” Maze asks, walking out the door with her phone raised questioningly.

Chloe shakes her head. “Trixie saw something about Olympic archery and asked if she could start taking lessons. Dan and I haven’t been able to commit to taking her, but I thought this might be your kind of thing.”

Maze clicks the link and scowls at the pictures on the archery center’s website. “None of this is effective training. Why are they all smiling? Where are the battle-scarred warriors? Why does everyone have two eyes?”

“Because it’s for kids, Maze, and they’re having fun. I know you could probably set her up a target at home, but this way, Trixie gets to meet some people her own age who are into the same things she is, plus she learns how to compete if she wants to make this her sport as she gets older.”

“So this place will allow her to earn valor and status among her kind?” Maze nods. “That will be useful when she needs to raise an army.” She turns back to her phone, going over the website more carefully this time.

Chloe contains a sigh. Demons. “It’s a place where she can make friends.”

“I’m her friend.”

Chloe pretends not to notice the wariness in Maze’s tone. “Yes, and that’s why I’m seeing if you want to be the one who takes her. You guys can hang out, and you can make sure she’s learning proper technique. But she also gets to have friends her own age who can help her get through all the human stuff you never went through. And maybe you’ll meet some cool adults to hang out with while the kids are practicing.”

“Cool adults? With kids?”

“It’s possible.”

Maze does not look convinced, but she still nods her head. “I’ll take Trix to check the place out, see if it’s up to her standards.”

“But remember, if you decide to do this with her, it’ll be a weekly commitment for as long as Trixie’s taking lessons. Every Wednesday would be a family day for you. Meet a hot guy? Have a bounty? Lucifer pisses you off? You still need to show up for Trixie.”

“She knows she can count on me.”

“Good. Then I’ll let you discuss it with her, make plans.”

“Cool. That it? ‘Cause the gun play has me kinda horny, so—“

Chloe’s palms shoot up. “Got it. Don’t need details. I’ll see you at home later?”

Maze grunts and heads for her motorcycle. Chloe hangs back, watching as she slings herself into the seat, looking comfortable, in control and unconcerned.

“It doesn’t happen again.”

Maze freezes, face impassive, hands gripping her helmet.

Chloe stares into Maze’s eyes, unblinking. “I’m mortal. Trixie is mortal. We do not have time to play fifty rounds of backstabbing like you do with Lucifer. It doesn’t happen again.”

Maze jerks her chin up and down once. “It doesn’t happen again.” Then she slides on her helmet and roars out of the parking lot, leaving Chloe feeling strangely lighter. Demons can and do lie, but that had sounded like the truth.

She arrives back home in time to make the delivery window for her new mattress, only to find a package already waiting for her: the chicken swing she’d ordered for Ella’s new roommate. Apparently Chloe’s still got some relationship homework to take care of today. Researching ‘how to help Ella deal with God’s suckiness’ distracts Chloe from worrying about Lucifer for a while, a good thing since he doesn’t call until after five.

“Terrible news,” is his chosen conversation opener, causing Chloe to drop the chicken breasts she’d been pulling out of the freezer onto her toes.

“Ow! What’s wrong?”

“Sounds like you’d know more than I would. Are you quite all right? Do you need me to kiss something better?”

“I’m fine. What’s the terrible news?”

“Carlo wants to meet up immediately.”

Chloe waits a beat. “And that’s terrible because…”

“Think, Detective! Between the sting and the inevitable hole of interviews and paperwork you’re going to disappear down afterwards, there’s no hope of us having phone sex tonight.”

Alone in her kitchen, Chloe throws a hand into the air, flexing and then casting her fingers wide. “Lucifer.”

“Awful, isn’t it? So I was thinking, I’m not typically one for a ‘quickie,’ but—“

“No quickie. Now, tell me what the plan is.”

After minimal further pouting, he runs through everything without further digressions. Thorston, suitably intimidated by a display of devilish impatience, has reached out to Carlo, who has in turn asked for a nighttime meeting at the docks, several blocks away from anywhere a sane person might want to hang out after the sun sets.

“I’ll talk to Dan,” she says when he’s finished. “He’ll approach you—it’s possible that not everyone at the precinct is trustworthy, so we’re going to let him to contact you when it’s safe to do so. We have to limit who’s in the know about tonight’s operation.”

“I suppose one of the benefits of Daniel’s unscrupulous past is that he’s skilled in skulduggery.”

Lucifer’s correct, which is oddly the opposite of comforting. Maze had said Chloe’s instincts are good, but Marcus hadn’t been the only crooked cop she’d agreed to marry. Panic once again tries to assert itself over her body. “Hey, do me a favor?”

“No favors, Detective. Ask and it’s yours.”

“Send me a video—“

“Oh yes?”

“Proving your invulnerability.” He sighs dramatically. “Before you go tonight, I wanna make sure everything’s in order immortality-wise.”

“I promise you, I’ll be quite safe, but I’ll send you your video if it’ll help you relax. I’ll send a fun one, too—the devil’s girlfriend should never go a full twenty-four hours without a devil-induced orgasm. You’ll need something to keep you busy while you’re waiting for me to entrap our evildoers.”

She doesn’t like the word ‘entrap,’ but it’s not too far off the mark. “You know there’s no twenty-four hour clock on us, right? I’m still going to be your girlfriend tomorrow.”

He dismisses the statement. “Whatever tomorrow might bring, you deserve the best right now—“

“And I’ve got the best.”

She can hear the catch of his breath as he starts and then rejects a response. “I’ll let you contact Daniel, shall I?”

It’s not the wrong thing to say, but it’s not what she wishes he’d said. “I will. Be safe tonight—call me as soon as it’s over.”

“You’ve my word.”

After they hang up, Chloe puts the chicken in a bowl of water to thaw, her mind drifting towards her dad. When she was fifteen, he’d toyed with the idea of taking the sergeant’s exam, and he used that as an excuse to hang out with her at the kitchen table, studying while she attempted to cram an entire week’s worth of homeschooling assignments into one night. Those evenings always ended with an ice cream break, huge heaping bowls containing much more than the half-a-serving size Penelope would occasionally allow her. They’d hide in the kitchen while they ate, leaning back against the counters, and he’d talk to her like she was an adult, almost the way Lucifer talks to Trixie now. ‘It’s a different job, Monkey’ he’d said, outlining his trepidation about actually going through with the exam. ‘Right now, I’m on the streets. I’m with the community. The moment they assign you your own desk, it’s all about learning to delegate. I don’t know if I’m ready to send someone else out to do what I still think of as my job.’

Chloe learned he was right when she made detective and had to start assigning legwork to uniformed officers, but tonight goes beyond that. She is not used to staying behind when it’s time to close a case, even though she knows in this instance it’s the right thing to do. Dan has run dozens of similar operations over the years; he’ll be fine. And Lucifer is invulnerable, as proven by the disturbing video he sends her of him happily jabbing a butcher’s knife harmlessly into his naked torso. She stops the video when he puts down the knife and starts to unbutton his pants. There will be time for that later.

After talking to Dan, she calls Ella, telling her what to pass on to the FBI, and when. It would be no good if a rival agency decided to come in and take control of the operation at this point, but if informed right when Lucifer and Carlo meet, the FBI can send a team to Carlo’s home before word of the arrest has time to leak to Carlo’s associates. She doesn’t want anyone to have a chance to destroy evidence before investigators can arrive on scene.

Evidence like she’s putting the finishing touches on right now. She’s not technically planting anything incriminating, she reasons, a knot in her gut. She’s providing information to a man who won’t get it in time to use it. Wearing a set of nitrile gloves, she prepares a manila envelope containing a selection of the pictures Maze brought back from Chicago, only including the shots that intimate a connection between Thorston and either Pierce or the fake Sinnerman. They provide a meager link between Thorston and illegal activity, but that’s not the point.

Dan drops Trixie off in time for dinner, but he’s back out the door before he has to listen to their daughter complain about a boring meal of chicken, veggies and rice. Apparently if Lucifer were here, he’d have been able to come up with something fun to eat, even last minute. Chloe won’t be able to put off Trixie’s requests for an in person meeting with Lucifer much longer, especially since Chloe has to keep pretending to forget the name of Lucifer’s fake illness because the moment Trixie has a name she’ll hit the internet and learn her mother is lying. It’s a relief when Maze finally strolls in looking, er, relaxed and diverts Trixie’s attention by quizzing her on how bloody Olympic style archery is allowed to get.

About forty-five minutes before Lucifer’s scheduled meet, Chloe pulls Maze aside and hands her the prepared envelope, now with “As requested,” scrawled across it’s front in impersonal block letters.

“Could you plant this in Carlo Scaluci’s home?”

The demon looks her over consideringly, as though sizing her up for a Hell loop. “Lucifer really has loosened you up. What’s in here? Drugs? Stolen cash?”

“It’s just a few of the pictures you brought back from Chicago.”

“The ones you said wouldn’t put anyone in jail?”

“They won’t. But when the FBI searches Carlo’s place, they’ll see that he has them, and when they interview Thorston, they’ll let him know that Carlo had them. Thorston’s going to think Carlo has been investigating him, maybe setting him up for blackmail or worse. If Thorston feels cut off from any hope of rescue from his associates, he’s more likely to throw himself on the mercy of his brothers in blue and cut a deal in exchange for providing information.”

“Strategy. I’m into it.”

Maze leaves shortly thereafter, and Chloe cobbles together a fun Saturday night for her daughter by offering Trixie the opportunity to jump on Mom’s brand new mattress (hey, it’s her first new adult mattress ever; Chloe wants to jump on it, too). After the bed has earned Trixie’s stamp of approval, they camp out in it with Chloe’s laptop and a bag of microwave popcorn. Maze even joins them mid-binge watch when she returns from her errand. Chloe almost feels content, until daughter and demon both fall asleep, using each other as pillows, and Chloe is left awake by herself, worried about two of the people most dear to her in this entire world.

Midnight passes without a call from Lucifer. So does one o’clock. If something had happened… She knows she’s still Dan’s emergency contact and strongly suspects she’s Lucifer’s as well. Someone would have let her know.

She eventually falls into a doze, fitful, her brain showing her replays of the kiss Lucifer shared with Pierce, only reframed now as a kiss of death bestowed by mafia don Pierce upon Lucifer’s head.

She jerks to awareness at 4:17 a.m., her phone buzzing on the pillow next to her. She fumbles for it, manages to answer it with clumsy fingers, and before she can even get it to her ear she hears Lucifer’s voice shouting through the speaker.

“Detective, you must get to the precinct at once—bloody Daniel’s arrested me!”

It’s not ‘at once,’ but she does her best. After making sure Maze is okay to stay with Trixie and stopping quickly at Lux, Chloe storms into the precinct on a mission. It’s never empty, but there’s more activity than normal for this time in the morning, including Dan, standing outside one of the interrogation rooms, speaking intensely with an unknown guy in an off-the-rack suit who Chloe assumes must be a fed.

“Really, Dan?” is all she allows herself as she breezes past him.

“I told him I’d get him back,” he replies, unrepentant.

She can hear Lucifer before she can see him, lecturing the mostly drunken population of the holding cell on what dire fate awaits anyone who even thinks about vomiting in his direction. The officer on duty outside the cells must have been waiting for her, since he stands and reaches for his keys the moment he spots Chloe coming down the hall.

“Officer Galdeng? I’m here for—“

“He’s all set.” Geldeng waves her off. “Espinoza paid me $50 to keep Lucifer back there until you showed up, but you really made me work for that cash. He hasn’t shut up the entire time.”

“And why should I?” the subject of their conversation calls. “I am the victim of an injustice here!”

“Let’s go.” Chloe leads the way around the corner to the cells. Lucifer stands at the bars, angry as a wet cat. His hair is mussed, his eyeliner is smeared, and Chloe can see bare skin through two holes in the chest of his formerly crisp white shirt.

“Detective! What are you going to do about this? I want Daniel and every one of his co-conspirators reprimanded. Fined. Demoted! They should be tried in the city center, their sins known to all. Do humans still throw rotten veg at criminals? I’ll bring that tradition back for this!”

“Go ahead and fill out a complaint form,” Geldeng says placidly, aware of Lucifer’s feelings towards paperwork.

Lucifer continues his harangue, castigating Galdeng for taking so long with his keys, and Chloe absorbs another truth about the universe: the devil is infinitely gentle.

Lucifer can open all locks; he could have walked out of the cell at any time. He could have overpowered anyone attempting to arrest him. He could have responded to this whole prank with something far more dangerous than a raised voice. But he didn’t. He let Dan have his victory, let Officer Geldeng maintain his belief in the safety of the cell lock. Some of Lucifer’s restraint could likely be attributed to his desire to please her by not starting a brawl with Dan, but it goes beyond that. Lucifer knows the advantages he has over humans, and he controls himself so as to not hurt others. The amount of consideration and care he exhibits by standing in this jail cell, it astounds her.

“I’ve got your things at the desk,” Geldeng is saying, leading the way back around the corner, but Chloe holds out a hand.

“Wait—I thought you might need these.” She digs into her purse and hands him a prescription pill bottle followed by a water bottle.

Lucifer stares down at the pills, brow crinkled, his theatrical anger dissipated. “You brought me drugs? The good stuff?”

“You said your, uh, back,” she waves her hands in a wing flapping gesture, “has been hurting when you don’t take pain meds, and I figure it’s several hours past time for your next dose.”

There’s a beat where he’s nonplussed, but then he cocks his head. “What do I need to say for you to bring me ecstasy?”

Checking to make sure Geldeng is out of earshot, she leans in close. “I think I’ve done that once or twice already.”

A charmed smile spreads across Lucifer’s face. “Detective, such a naughty mind you have. Tell me, all these years on the force, have you developed any jailhouse fantasies we could discuss?”

She takes a breath, mouth hanging open. “No. I also brought you a change of clothes and some of the products from your bathroom—there’s a suit bag in the trunk of my car. I didn’t know if you’d want to head straight home or if you want to stay here and see what happens?”

“We’ll stay, of course. You’ll want to see the interrogation.” He takes a handful of pills and washes them down with the water. “What did you choose for me to wear?”

“I grabbed one of the options you had laying out on your bed, I guess from yesterday morning.”

“Ah. Still, I appreciate you thinking of me. I’ll go clean up and meet you in the observation room.”

“I…yeah. Of course.”

I appreciate you thinking of me. It’s a normal thing to say, but it doesn’t sound right. “How did it go tonight? I mean, aside from you being arrested?”

“I’m looking forward to finding out.” He gives her a slight nod and walks off. Normal, she tells herself. He’s been stuck in the drunk tank for a few hours—he’s eager to get cleaned up. But he seems anxious about something.

Chloe returns to the bullpen, eyes peeled for Dan. She doesn’t see him, but Interview Room 1 is in use, so she slips into the observation room, which is already occupied by Vickers and Montaigne from Organized Crime as well as one of the FBI agents. On the other side of the observation window, Dan and a second FBI agent sit across the table from Captain Thorston.

The captain has faired worse than Lucifer. He’s sweaty, sloppy, and bears the querulous look of a toddler up hours past his bedtime. His eyes and mouth have contracted to bitter puckers, and he’s leveling the whole of his ire against Dan.

“I shouldn’t be surprised it’s you. He tell you about himself?” Thorston asks the FBI agent. “The corruption? The deaths? You ruined your own life and now you’re determined to ruin everyone else’s, too.”

Dan absorbs the blow smoothly. “Wasn’t me who decided to work with Carlo Scaluci. Wasn’t me bragging about how I could help supply weapons and men for a gang war. Wasn’t me tonight acting as an accessory to attempted murder, setting up a police consultant to be shot.”

Thorston sneers. “You’re so fucking stupid. You’re all so fucking stupid. You have the devil beside you every day telling you who he is, but you don’t believe him. He’s going to boil your faces off over this.”

“That so?” Dan leans back in his chair. “You think Lucifer Morningstar is going to come save you? Wasn’t that you a couple hours ago, shrieking at Scaluci to shoot him and not you?”

“No, no. Lucifer knows I know about him. He doesn’t care about getting shot. No. He’s going to get me out of this, and then you’re going to pay.”

“I don’t think you’re very good at telling your allies from your enemies.” The FBI agent flips open a folder and pushes it across the table towards Thorston. It’s the photographs Chloe had asked Maze to plant at Carlo’s place. “Seems like Carlo Scaluci has been keeping an eye on you.”

Thorston leans in for a better look, his mouth briefly flattening into a quivering line. “Carlo had these?”

The FBI agent hums in the affirmative. “Did you know your buddy Carlo had three attorneys already waiting to help him out by the time we got you to the precinct? But not one of those lawyers has asked about you. You’re the fall guy, Captain.”

The captain pushes back in his chair, folding his arms over his chest. “So I knew Lieutenant Pierce. So did everyone at this precinct.”

“Yeah?” Dan pulls one of the pictures of Thorston with the faux-Sinnerman out of the pile. “What about this guy, huh? What was his name?”

Thorston remains mulishly silent.

“Be a big help if you could tell us. ‘Cause that investigation’s still open. Tracing down everything this guy did, it’s been tough. Big, big case—everyone knows about it. But you never said anything. No, ‘hey, that’s Stu, we go way back.’ How come, Captain?”

“Think it’s because he was busy covering his boss’s tracks?” the FBI agent posits.

“Now that is a good theory. Yeah. I think that’s what happened. I think you’re just another one of Pierce’s lackeys, and you are going to spend the rest of your life rotting in jail for it.”

“You wait—“ Thorston starts, but Dan cuts him off.

“Wait for what? You still think the devil’s coming to save you?”

“I don’t typically deal in salvation. Don’t see why this should be the exception.”

Chloe tenses when Lucifer, freshly primped and besuited, strolls into the interrogation room without knocking and half sits with one hip on the table. “Please don’t melt his brain,” she whispers into her clenched hands, and in the other room Lucifer darts a glance at the two way mirror. His eyes are still brown, so that’s promising.

“I told them you’d be here,” Thorston crows, not reading this situation correctly at all. “Last time you pissed him off, Espinoza, you ended up demoted. What do you think’s going to happen this time?”

“I’m sure Lucifer is only here to confirm that he will not be doing anything to assist you in evading legal consequences.” Dan sounds certain of no such thing. He looks to the FBI agent for back-up, but the agent is staring mutely, flushed and slack-jawed, at Lucifer.

He does look good, Chloe thinks, admiring the way he’d taken command of the interview from the moment he entered the room. She’d brought him a subtly checked gray suit, and it gives him a vaguely professorial air. She wonders if he has any glasses he could wear with it, then wonders if he’s melted her brain because accessorizing isn’t typically where her mind wanders during an interrogation.

“And why should I?” Lucifer looks down his nose at the captain. “You promised me an entire crime syndicate and instead I end up with bullet holes in a my Burberry. You’re lucky I knew to expect violence and changed into something from last season’s collection.”

Thorston somehow manages to read that line as a reassurance. “I knew you’d understand. Now, get me out of here. We have to—“

“We have to correct the impression that you are in any position to make demands of me.” Lucifer’s face doesn’t change. His eyes, when he turns to quickly assess Dan, are still brown. His voice, however, rumbles with graveyard dirt. “Detective Douche here no doubt has many questions for you, Captain, but I only have one. What toy of my father’s did you keep in your house? What piece of my familial legacy have your erstwhile friends been using to drum up hatred against me? What scrambled your wife’s brain and left you a bitter, lonely, friendless husk with no hope for salvation other than to spill every secret you’ve ever held and beg that it’s enough to buy you mercy? What did you steal from Heaven, Captain?”

Thorston gapes up at Lucifer while Dan rubs the back of his neck nervously. Even the horny FBI agent has the sense to lean as far away from Lucifer as possible. The lights in the room don’t dim, but everything except Lucifer fades. He used to do this, Chloe remembers. Early in their partnership, he’d been much worse at passing for human. This is the devil she’d shot, the one who had convinced her to fear him, however briefly. She’s not afraid of him now, not even when he slams his hand down on the interview table and barks, “Answer,” into Thorston’s face. The devil is infinitely gentle. He gets angry. He lashes out. But time and again, Chloe has seen him pull himself back, seen him allow the humans around him to be clueless and frail and safe in his presence. Sometimes he needs help doing so, but anger is not where he chooses to live. Not who he chooses to be.

“A feather,” Thorston stammers at last.

Lucifer flinches, and Chloe remembers long, white feathers, bloodied and broken, scattered about Pierce’s dead body while Lucifer looked up at her with his scarred face. “Who’s feather? What did it look like?”

“I don’t—I don’t know. I,” and Thorston’s entire face crumples, hot tears of shame rising in his eyes. “I didn’t look. I was afraid. It does something to their minds. I couldn’t look.”

Lucifer straightens. He rolls his neck while straightening the lines of his suit, then waves a lazy hand that encompass the scene. “He’s all yours, Daniel. I’m done with him.”

He sweeps out of the room, and Thorston’s fear metamorphosizes into rage. He thumps his fists onto the table and swipes the pile of photographs onto the floor, yelling once, short and harsh.

“That bitch! That fucking blonde bitch! I should have known. What the fuck is up with her magic cunt? You married her, Espinoza, so let us all in on the secret.”

“That’s enough!” Dan’s chair legs shriek as he pushes to his feet, his quick glance at the FBI agent betraying the reason he isn’t risking getting booked on an assault charge right now.

Chloe’s hands curl into tight fists. She’s too busy worrying about Lucifer’s reaction to care about the looks she’s getting from the men standing around her, but thankfully, the next door that slams open is the one to the observation room. Lucifer stalks in and takes up a position at her back, a bulwark against anyone else’s opinions. The faint sound of grinding teeth drifts down to her ears. Chloe shifts slightly, putting herself between Lucifer and the door, and tries to pretend, at least externally, that ‘magic cunt’ is a compliment.

“My whole life, my whole fucking life I was there for Pierce. I helped him build something great enough to bend the world, and he gives it up after a few months with her? Some chick who ran around showing her tits but couldn’t even casting-couch her way into a film career? Who had to rely on Daddy’s legacy to get a job? Pierce jeopardized all of us, the whole family, the one we all built for him, because of her! And Satan himself, running after her like some simpering cuck, putting up with piss reeking murder scenes just to get a whiff of her? As soon as I get out of here I swear to God I’m going to hunt her down and find out first hand what makes that pussy—“

Dan’s concern for his own career loses, and he lunges across the table. Thankfully, the FBI trains its people well, and the agent is hauling Dan back before he can rearrange Thorston’s face. “Time for a break, Detective,” the agent says, forcing Dan out of the interrogation room.

Thorston pounds his fists against the table once more, then drops his head down into his hands. In the observation room, Vickers turns around, mouth open, ready to make some stupid comment, but Lucifer growls, and Vickers stumbles back. He slinks out of the room, followed by Montaigne and the other FBI agent. The door closes behind them, leaving Chloe and Lucifer alone, the only light in the room filtered in from the other side of the two-way mirror.

Chloe turns to look at Lucifer, at his locked jaw, at his head held high, gaze purposefully directed to the side, away from Thorston. “Thank you. I know that was difficult for you.”

He snarls and paces across the room three times before rounding on her. “I am not the one who has been injured here, Detective. Why? You are brilliant, and insightful, and— Why do you allow—“ His hand slices backwards towards the other room.

“Because I just won. He confessed.” Lucifer’s head jerks back at her words, and she nods. “Yep. On the record, not only to being part of the Sinnerman’s network, but to helping build that network. If you’d smote him like you wanted, there’d have been no confession.”

“I can still smite him now.”

“Now that he’s talking, there’s a lot more we can learn. This is the best lead the investigation’s had—everyone else we’ve arrested has been low-level muscle and completely lawyered up. Thorston helped with recruitment. He knows things. As of now, keeping him alive is a priority, and probably a challenge.”

“He doesn’t deserve protection. He— You deserve—”

Chloe suppresses a smile. “I have a boyfriend who’s faith in and support of me makes it easier to shrug off the stupid things assholes like that say.”

That stops him, makes him pull in on himself. “You shouldn’t have to shrug it off. It is an outrage that he is allowed to know you.”

“He doesn’t know me; he just needs a woman to blame because he’s not strong enough to accept what he’s done. Now, are you all right? I’m pretty sure you got shot tonight.”

He smooths down the front of his shirt. “Invulnerability fully intact, as promised.”

“Good.”

“You seem surprisingly calm about everything. My video must have been quite the hit—enjoy a handful of orgasms watching me, did you?”

She blushes, looking quickly at the door. “I haven’t watched it yet.”

He slumps backwards, perching on the ledge of the observation window. “Oh.”

“Something to look forward to, once we wrap this up.”

Enough of the fury has leeched out of him to allow Chloe to see the anxiety lurking beneath it, keeping his shoulders hunched and his gloved fingers tapping against the window sill. “You’re pleased, then? Tonight went as you hoped?”

“Yeah, I think so. How’d it go at the docks?”

“As you suspected it would. Carlo showed up, tried to shoot me, and Daniel popped out with his handcuffs to haul everyone off, your favorite devil included.” His gaze is directed at her feet, and he’s started bouncing his right heel. “It hit me when Carlo arrived at the meet that you truly weren’t there. You always want to be involved, but you left this to me.”

“I know I can trust you.” Lucifer releases a slow breath, allowing more of his weight to rest back on the window ledge. Chloe has interviewed thousands of people at this point in her career; she knows how to spot when a suspect is close to breaking. Lucifer isn’t a suspect and she doesn’t want to break him, but she can see that they’re circling something important.

“During the interview, Dan made it sound like you got Carlo and Thorston talking, like they incriminated themselves.”

“Yes, well, Daniel agreed to put my waxing appointment to good use and sent me in miked. I thought an extended confab about everyone’s misdeeds would spice up the evening. A little drug dealing, a little arms smuggling. Felony convictions all around.” His voice is bright, but his words are rushed. Chloe folds her arms across her chest and walks towards him, hips rolling.

“That’s good. Smart.” He swallows, and the air turns thick. “When we’re done here, you’ll have to tell me all about it. How you played them against each other. How you manipulated them into giving us the evidence we need. How you controlled the scene so that no one got hurt. I want to know everything so I can tell you in detail how clever you were, how no one could have done better.”

Hands gripping his own thighs, he lifts his head. “I did well?”

“Very, very well, Lucifer. You accomplished everything I wanted and more.” Coming up to him, she lays her hand on the window, inches above his shoulder, and he turns to press his cheek against the glass, eyes closing. His breath flows over her skin.

Time stretches. He keeps his eyes closed, taking a private moment for himself. Chloe feels alert, but not in a bad way. Just present. Focused. Noting every flicker of his lashes against his lightly reddened cheeks. When he finally opens his eyes, she’s ready.

“You’re the best partner I could ever hope for. You. Just you.”

Lucifer doesn’t break; it’s a release. Tension flows from his body, and she gets to see that shy smile she remembers seeing on her laptop screen, only he doesn’t hide it away this time, allowing her an unobstructed, up-close view of true beauty. She catalogs the striations in his irises, the gentle arch of his brows, the easy hang of his jaw.

My good devil, her brain insists, a confusing intrusion. There’s nothing kinky going on here. She’s not controlling him. This isn’t sexual, it’s normal partner stuff. He did well with a difficult work assignment, and she’s letting him know.

Giving him what he deserves.

Chapter Text

Time catches up to them when the door to the observation room opens. Lucifer straightens, clearing his throat, expression blanking. Unaccountably angry, Chloe whips around and glares at Dan, who takes a step back, hand still on the doorknob.

“Not interrupting am I?”

“It’s fine.” Her voice makes a liar out of her words, but Dan’s willing to let it pass.

“Just wanted to check on you. That was a lot.”

“It was a confession,” she repeats. She doesn’t want to talk about what Thorston said about her, not with anyone, and definitely not with Dan.

“It was.” Ex-husbandly duty of care out of the way, Dan lets loose a manic grin. “We’re doing it, Chlo. Cleaning up Pierce’s whole empire. It’s what she would have wanted.”

“Charlotte would be quite proud.” Lucifer steps out from behind Chloe, fixing his cufflinks. “Which is why I’ve allowed you this little respite from retribution. As soon we’ve completed her work, be assured I will be coming for you.”

“Phrasing! Boom!” Dan points his finger in a ‘gotcha’ maneuver, then smacks his hand against the top of the door frame on his way back out of the room.

“Well, he’s certainly full of vim and vigor all of a sudden.”

“He just led his first major bust since his demotion, and he did it for someone he loves.”

Lucifer doesn’t respond, just looks at the door, thoughtful but remote. Chloe regrets Dan’s intrusion. She lost something when Lucifer drew away from her, wants to put him back in that place where he looked up at her, trusting and open, but she knows the moment is gone, leaving nothing in its wake but frustration, inscrutable and unabatable.

That frustration remains, a frayed wire in her limbs, for the rest of the morning, aggravated by Lucifer’s continued withdrawal. As he follows her back and forth between observation rooms, he doesn’t joke, doesn’t provide inappropriate commentary, doesn’t even pester Dan, who’s own mood is on a steady decline. He’s been banned from the questioning after his outburst with Thorston, and Chloe can see the realization setting in that, while Dan will get credit for this collar, between the FBI, Organized Crime, and I.A., he’s going to get sidelined from the ongoing investigation.

The interrogations go nowhere. Thorston continues to brag about how much he got away with right under the department’s nose, but he’s finally called for a lawyer of his own to help him work on his plea deal. Carlo Scaluci, on the other hand, maintains complete silence, each question put to him shot down by his lawyers. Chloe recognizes Charlotte’s old partner from Richards & Wheeler, now renamed Wheeler & Rutledge, among his retinue. Cold, to continue working for the organization that killed her, but given what she knows of pre-Goddess Charlotte Richards, it’s not surprising that her former partner would be more interested in money than morals.

Eventually it becomes clear that Chloe isn’t going to learn anything more that day. Worse, she’s superfluous. It’s not her case, and the ongoing investigation around her relationship with Pierce means she can’t become further involved without risking tainting everything if this all goes to trial. She leads Lucifer back over to her desk and collapses in her chair. He loiters, but not in his typical fashion. Her Newton’s cradle remains unmolested.

“Can I get you anything? One of those horrid sandwiches you love? More coffee?”

She rolls her head back on her neck, staring up at the ceiling. “No. I’m just tired. And… There’s always a let down, you know? After a win. That after-case drink with you—your denouement—always helped settle me down, but only after I’d done all the paperwork, dotted the Is, crossed the Ts. Wrapped everything up neatly. I don’t get to do the paperwork on this one, and you and I still have work to do finding that feather Thorston mentioned. I assume it’s angelic, but you’ll have to fill me in on what the possible sources and effects could be.”

“Me.”

“What?”

“Me. The possible source.”

“Oh.” She remembers again the bloodied and broken feathers scattered about Pierce’s body, left over from when Lucifer saved her life. This seems like a conversation they shouldn’t be having in public.

Lucifer’s frown deepens as the silence stretches. “I will find it for you, I swear it.”

Chloe blinks. “I know we’ll find it. We already have a solid place to start looking, right? Now that we know it’s a feather, you can reach out to those custom display case, um, craftsmen, to see if anyone made a case for one recently. And if that doesn’t pan out, according to that tattoo artist, whoever has it hasn’t been shy about showing it around. There’ll be some sort of trail we can follow.”

“Of course. Forgive me, I’ve been wasting time.” He pulls out his phone. “I’ll start calling around.”

“Wait, Lucifer.” She holds out a hand towards him, her frustration from earlier spiking. “It wasn’t an order. You don’t have to do that right now.”

“I didn’t become the world’s greatest partner by lazing about.” He means it to be cheeky, she can tell, but the words come out sharp.

It doesn’t make sense—Dan’s interruption shouldn’t have ruined either of their moods half so much—but it’s clear that Chloe has missed a step somewhere, failed at something.

Some of her thoughts must show on her face, because his own falls into a grimace. “Perhaps we should get you home before I start calling around. You humans need more sleep than I do, and it was rather early when you rode to my rescue. You can nap, and hopefully by the time you wake, I’ll have something for us.”

“That’s…probably a good idea. I can drop you back at Lux. Or, is your car still stranded down by the docks somewhere?”

“It had better not be. I messaged Maze as soon as my phone was returned; she’ll have had someone retrieve it by now.”

“I don’t want to know how you’re going to repay Dan for this, do I?”

“I don’t know why you’re worried; my response will be proportionate and just, as it always is. Remind me, how many times can humans be bitten by a cobra before it becomes a problem?”

“No cobras.” She gives him a stern look and gets up from her desk, heading for the elevator.

He slips into step behind her. “Rattler, then?”

“No.”

“But those are clearly the superior snakes! Hoods, bone maracas. None of the others have as much style.”

“No snakes, Lucifer.”

Perversely, she feels better now that he’s deliberately being annoying. Inside the elevator to the parking garage, she leans back against the wall, looking him up and down, but he starts to fidget under her gaze, uncomfortable with her. Sighing, she turns her attention back to the doors and leads the way out of the elevator when they open. She’d parked on the top level today, and to her right, the open walls of the parking garage let the midday sun stream over the pavement, its blanket of light broken by a lone man’s shadow. Staring out at the street, Dan cautiously takes a drag on a cigarette and immediately starts coughing.

“Well, that pathetic display doesn’t speak highly of the man’s oral skills. How long were you married to that, Detective?”

“Wait for me in the car.” Chloe points her finger in command, and Lucifer slouches off to do as told with all the grace of a recalcitrant teen.

“Excuse me,” she says, walking up behind Dan, “but how do you expect to pass your fitness tests if you keep smoking those things, Officer Espinoza?” She nudges his shoulder, and he ducks his head with an embarrassed huff. When they’d first met, Chloe had still been shedding a few of the bad habits she’d picked up while running around the young Hollywood scene, and cigarettes had been the most difficult to quit. “They’ll ruin your lung capacity. I know you’re afraid you’ll put on weight if you quit, but remember. Food is fuel. Your gonna need it if you ever want to build any muscle.” She squeezes one of his biceps, and he brushes her off.

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Come on. Since when do you smoke?”

“I used to when I was younger.”

She raises an eyebrow, and he rolls his neck.

“Fine. I smoked twice when I was nineteen and threw up the second time. I just—Vickers offered me one to celebrate, and… I should be happy. I was happy, just a couple hours ago. I thought, maybe if I got some fresh air…”

Chloe disentangles the cigarette from his fingers and takes one satisfying pull. She closes her eyes as she exhales, enjoying both the hit of nicotine and the slight weight balanced familiarly between her fingers, before she drops the cigarette and grinds it out beneath her heel. “Those are the opposite of fresh air.” Another thing he’d used to say to her. “You felt stressed out, wanted an excuse to get away for a minute. I get it.”

“It felt so good bringing Thorston and Scaluci in. And getting that confession out of the captain? But I’m realizing there’s no end-point to this. There’s always going to be some other bad guy, and she’s still—“ He cuts himself off and looks back out into the sunlight. “The other thing about smoking I never appreciated is it’s a great way to not talk.”

“Charlotte smoked, didn’t she?”

He grunts in the affirmative. “She wouldn’t even let me get after her about it, the way you would. Didn’t want to quit. She smoked one cigarette every evening, whenever she decided to stop working for the day. She said it was the only way she knew how to put a period on the endless work that came with being a lawyer. It was her time, where she didn’t have to think about clients or anyone else. But she invited me to stand outside with her, while she smoked that cigarette. Didn’t talk about her day, just…let me enjoy breathing with her.” He meets Chloe’s eyes. “I brought Thorston in, but the work was all yours. Whatever else happens from here on out, I’ll always be grateful to you for that. I couldn’t have done it.”

Chloe takes his arm and leans against him, propping her head against her shoulder. “I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately. You know how doctors can’t operate on family? Technically we have the same rule as cops, but we break it regularly, thinking that because it matters more to us, we’re the only people who can solve the case. But that’s wrongheaded. Doctors shouldn’t operate on family and cops shouldn’t work on cases that involve their families because when you’re that close, you can’t see anything but your own pain. I’ve missed a lot of clues the past few weeks, probably more than I realize, because every piece of this job that I love is tainted by Pierce and just how stupid I was around him. I mean, look at what happened with my dad’s case. I botched that to hell and back. Today, last night? You kept your cool, ran the sting the way it needed to be run. You did her proud. You did enough.”

His breath catches, and he lets out a slow exhale, tilting his head so it rests on top of her own. “I have to step back,” he admits. “Take some actual time away. Stop obsessing.”

“That would probably be the healthy thing to do.”

“See, normally I like healthy. They need to figure out a way to make free weights for your brain.”

“A little flaxseed smoothie for your amygdala?”

Dan pulls back at the suggestion. “Ugh. I do the weightlifting so I can eat food with actual flavor to it.”

“Food is fuel,” she repeats, and he pushes her away in mock disgust.

“I like my fuel premium grade, thanks. Hey, can I take Trixie for the week?”

“We really need to get her back on a regular schedule.”

“I know, I know. Next week. But her last day of school for the year is Wednesday. I thought I could take a long weekend, and the two of us could go camping for a few days. Spend some quality time together, far away from death and everything else I can’t change.”

Chloe’s objections die on her tongue. “Trixie’d love that. Come over for dinner; you can take her home after.”

“Thanks, Chlo.”

Chloe leans into him for one last side-hug. “You did good today. But if you ever put Lucifer in jail for fun again, I will help him prank you back.”

“Bring it on.”

“Careful, Dan. I’m the only thing standing between you and a drawer full of cobras.”

“Cobras? You’re joking, right? That’s a joke. Chloe? He’s not going to put snakes in my desk is he?”

Chloe just shrugs, smiling as she walks backwards away from him. “Does that sound like something Lucifer would do?”

“Aw, man!”

Chloe laughs and turns, heading towards her car where the devil in question is hunched down to peer out the passenger side window at her.

“You never smoke with me,” he accuses as she lets herself into the driver’s seat.

“You’ve never helped me clean up baby vomit.”

He shudders. “It is perhaps best that you had someone to breed with long before we met.”

“Don’t say breed. I am not a farm animal.”

“I’ll cross that off your list of potential fetishes.”

“That’s a thing?”

“Very much so. Obviously I’ve never impregnated anyone, but I’ve been solicited for stud services many times in a role play capacity.”

“So it’s one of your fetishes?”

“Hardly, but I love me a nice cream pie.”

“Gross.” Her frustration from earlier comes back full-force, and she doubts, for a moment, that she could ever find this man attractive without divine intervention. But then Chloe turns her head and sees him looking at her with an expression that could only be described as hungry, and yes. Yes, she very much does find this man attractive, far beyond his father’s ability to meddle.

“Don’t knock it ‘til you try it. Or, more to the point, until you let me try you.”

“I’m not the—“ She stops herself, actually brings a hand up to cover her mouth. I’m not the one stopping you from trying. I’m not the one keeping us from touching.

“Not the—oh.” He’s far too intelligent, and far too eager to find fault with himself, not to put the rest of that sentence together.

“I didn’t—“

“Don’t give it a second thought. You’re out of sorts right now. Best get you home so you can have that nap.” He makes a gesture as though he were about to start the car, only of course she’s the one sitting behind the wheel.

So she starts the car, not mentioning his lack of seat belt this time. They make it out of the garage and onto the highway in silence. “I don’t blame you.” He lets her get the words out this time. “I’m not even upset with you. I don’t know why I’m feeling so irritable right now.”

He tilts his head sympathetically. “I’m afraid you’re suffering from a taste of top drop.” He says the phrase like it should mean something to her. She gestures impatiently, and it’s his turn to roll his eyes. “At the risk of getting my head bitten off again over pushing you into things you’re very much choosing to do on your own—“

“Lucifer.”

“You started a scene with me in that observation room.”

“I didn’t.”

“I think we’ve both learned by now that you’re not fully aware of when you’ve strapped on your Domme leathers. Aftercare isn’t just about hydration and wound care. It’s about shifting headspace, moving safely back into the world outside the scene. You were interrupted, and a part of you is still furious about it. I likely should have stopped you before we began, given the location, but it rather crept up on me as well. You are…irresistible in a way I’m not accustomed to. I…” He founders, apparently having drifted into a conversation he isn’t prepared for.

“It bothered you, too? Being interrupted?”

“I’m never exactly happy to see Daniel—“

“Fine, don’t answer.” She breaks too sharply at a light, fingers drumming in quick staccato on the steering wheel. Chloe can feel his insecurity, and as much as she doesn’t want to, tries to pack away her irritation. She knows emotional directness is difficult for him. She’d promised him patience, needs to follow through on that promise if she’s going to keep him convinced that this relationship isn’t too complicated to work. “I’m sorry. You were answering in your own way.”

“It did bother me, yes.” He doesn’t look at her when he says it, but at least he says it.

“I meant it. What I said in the observation room. It wasn’t a scene, wasn’t play.”

“They aren’t mutually exclusive.”

They aren’t? “Regardless. I meant it. And I want to say, your devil stuff—the mojo, and your other superpowers—“

“Superpowers? I do have some tights I could wear if you ever have the fancy.”

Maybe, Chloe is surprised to find herself thinking. The options with him really are endless. “I mean your eyes and strength and all that. I know you’ve been keeping all of that in check in order to give me time to adjust. I really, really appreciate that. But I don’t want you to do that anymore. You deserve to get to be yourself.”

“My mojo isn’t me.”

“But it’s a big part of you, your whole vibing with other people’s desires thing. I want you to feel free to use it, and the rest of your devil powers, without checking with me for permission first. I’ve been watching you interact with people for years—just because I know fully what you’re capable of now, that doesn’t change the fact that you’ve shown you’re more than capable of using your powers without stepping over the line.”

He’s quiet for a moment. “You’re certain? This isn’t more of you being concerned about your being too in control?”

“No.” She answers automatically, then does him the respect of fully considering his question. “No. You’re right in thinking there’s a link there—I’m worried about giving you the impression that only parts of you are acceptable, and I’m worried that me dom-dominating you,” she gets the word out, “would reinforce that impression. You’re not used to being accepted for who you are. I want to give you that acceptance. I want my devil partner back, whole, in one piece.”

He’s still so quiet.

“I like your devilness,” she presses. “I like you.”

“So you’ve said.” He fiddles with his gloves, straightening the fingers. “This seems rather out of character for you. If we’re paying attention to ways in which your miracle status might be affecting your view of me.”

“Out of character how?” Has she made him feel like he can’t be himself in the past?

“I figured you’d want to do your full due diligence before setting me free on the local populace again. Go on, Detective, I know you want to. Ask me what I did in Hell. What I did to deserve being sent to Hell.”

“Did you want to tell me?” She tries to give him her full attention while also paying attention to the asshole trying to merge into the too small space between her car and the car in front of her, and manages to avoid rear-ending anyone. Barely. “I’d love to hear anything you want to share with me about your past, but maybe not right this minute?”

“Hiding from the truth again?” She can see it out of the corner of her eye, that showy ‘I’m a big, bad wolf’ sneer he does.

She rolls her eyes. “Some of us don’t have supernatural reflexes and shouldn’t have serious conversations while operating heavy machinery. I trust you, Lucifer. You don’t have to tell me every bad thing you’ve done, every mistake or moment of unkindness. If I had, what, millions? Billions? Of years to live, I’d accumulate a lot of baggage, too. I know you helped torture souls in Hell, and I know that sometimes you still like to punish, here on Earth. I’m not unaware of your darker side—I think I’m more familiar with your faults than you are with mine, or you’d have realized by now that I can be cruel, can be punishing, just like you.”

“On the contrary, it’s one of your best qualities. And I assure you, the vague idea you have of me torturing souls is a far cry from understanding the reality of what I’ve done.”

They finally hit another red light and she’s able to turn to him, take a moment to study his glinting, pasted on, Teflon expression. He could tell her every detail of his life in this moment and not share anything of his actual self. It occurs to her that if ‘top drop’ is a thing, there must be some equally glib name to describe a submissive’s reaction to an aborted scene. “I want to hear about your past because I want to know you, all of you. Not to judge you, never to judge you. You’re—“ Too close to my heart for judgment. “My partner, and we’re past judgment. Which is why I only want you to tell me what you’re comfortable sharing. Your past is your own; you don’t owe it to anyone. You don’t need to show me your shame in order to become worthy of me.”

Tension leaks out of the car as Lucifer looks down at his lap, then leans forward, bracing his hands against the dashboard. “Please, Detective,” he says, and it sounds like he’s in pain. “Tell me something you want from me. Anything. Anything. Let me do something for you. Does us dating mean I can buy you that Mustang now? Perhaps you’re more of a Lamborghini woman?”

“No, no extravagant gifts. Just…be you.”

His laugh is rueful, and when he turns towards her his expression is exasperated, but fond.

“You are the most amazing and frustrating person I will ever know.”

Right back at you, Satan.

As tired as she is, Chloe doesn’t head straight home after dropping Lucifer at Lux. Instead, a little over an hour later she’s standing in a cramped bathroom with Ella, staring down at a tiny brown hen nesting in the straw-and-sawdust mixture that now lines the bottom of Ella’s bathtub.

“She’s so…fluffy?” How does one compliment a chicken?

“Isn’t she the cutest?” Ella gushes, trapping Chloe in a side-hug and shaking her back and forth. “I have to shower at the precinct now, but it’s totally worth it.” That explains Ella’s extra disheveled state. She’d answered her apartment door dressed in rumpled pajamas, hair in two frazzled buns, her face still streaked with last night’s glitter—a far cry from her typical Sunday church look. “She’s smart, too! Hey, Margaret? What’s three minus two?”

Margaret cocks her head at the sound of her name. A few moments pass. “Bwak.”

Chloe blinks. “Wow. That’s something.”

“Right? And now her Auntie Chloe’s brought her the funnest little swing! She loves jumping on stuff and swaying, so this is going to make her day. I was sure you’d never remember that conversation.”

“I didn’t, but drunk Chloe knows my credit card number. What do you say I help you put that swing together?”

“Yes! Oh, and Lucifer just sent me this crazy $2,000 bottle of bourbon to ‘celebrate the birth of Deckerstar—‘”

“The birth of what?”

“Your ship name—he loved it when I told him about it, hence the ridiculous gift. So, day drinking and assembly diagrams?”

Deckerstar? Ship? “Why not?”

Chloe follows Ella back out into the rest of her apartment, which somehow seems to have gotten even smaller since the last time Chloe saw it. The entire place consists of a living/sleeping area barely big enough for a full sized bed separated from a tiny kitchenette by a postage-stamp sized bistro table. Chloe’d been beating herself up on the drive over here about how Ella is always the one to come visit her, not vice versa, but maybe the demands of motherhood aren’t the only reason for their lopsided visit distribution. Still, she promises herself she’ll make more of an effort from now on. It’ll be good for Ella to feel actively cared for, especially right now.

Ella always projects energy, an unmistakable indication of her mood—usually, it’s Upbeat, or Focused if she’s in the lab. Today, as she pours double shots of bourbon into a pair of mugs, her mood is Anxious. That anxiety doesn’t seem to be directed at Chloe—Ella doesn’t shy away from handing over one of the mugs and joining Chloe on the bed, where they tear into the waiting package—and she’s clearly happy about livening up Margaret’s living situation, but she’s jittery in a way Chloe doesn’t recognize.

“How’s…” Chloe trails off. How’s your quietly self-destructive grief spiral going? A little tactless. Unfortunately, Ella is now looking at her expectantly, and she has to say something. Might as well jump right in. Mission: Cheer Up Ella is a go. “I watched a Star Trek last night.”

“What!” Swing pieces scatter as Ella bounces closer to Chloe on the mattress. “Which one? Did you start at the beginning, or pick a specific episode? What made you give it a try? Did I finally convince you how great it is? Did you love it? Do you want to learn Klingon?”

“No! No.” Chloe had decided on a few firm boundaries when she set out on this path. “I’ve just been thinking about that conversation we had a few weeks ago, where I told you I started believing Lucifer, and you said you were on the outs with God? And then the swing showed up, and I remembered how the night I ordered it, you weren’t wearing your cross.” Ella rubs her still bare throat. “It seemed like we’re maybe struggling with some similar things. So I did a search online, thinking I’d find a helpful spirituality book, or something. But I ran across this Reddit thread about a TV show that was all about these beings who were either Gods or aliens or both, and about the people who held deep religious beliefs about them, and the people who didn’t believe but who were still indelibly linked to them—“

“Deep Space Nine!” Ella throws her head back in a mini joy seizure. “Of course! Sisko is the perfect captain for you.”

“I do like that he’s willing to punch people.”

“You watched ‘Q-Less’?” Ella claps rapidly three times in a row. “I can’t believe I finally get to live in a world where I can talk to you about Q.”

Chloe ducks her head to the side. “That’s kinda why I brought it up. I mean, I don’t really have a lot of time to read, but I thought instead of a book club, you and I could have a TV show club? We could watch an episode and some weeks we’d talk about, you know, all those thorny faith issues. And then some weeks we’d just drink wine and make fun of the cheesy 90s special effects.”

“More importantly, we can debate whether Julian is in a relationship with O’Brien or with Garak, or if it’s more of an enlightened polycule situation.”

“Wait, they had that sort of thing on 90s network TV?”

“It’s heavily implied. You’ll see. You will see!” And suddenly she’s hugging Chloe, face buried in Chloe’s shoulder, her breath suspiciously ragged. “Thanks, Chlo. This’ll be really fun, and I could really use some fun that involves friends and thinking, as opposed to strangers and not thinking. Most of my non-work friends are from church, and it’s tough being around them right now. My D&D group always met in the church basement after services, but I stopped going, and I guess it messed up the campaign when I dropped out unexpectedly and now everyone’s mad at me in addition to everything else, and it’s all just a lot.” She sniffs and pulls away, wiping away a tear with her fingers. Looking down at her hand, Ella laughs and shows Chloe a now glitter-speckled palm. “Not that I mind having sparkley clothes, and sheets, and light switches, and everything else, but now that I’m shower-challenged, it might be a good idea to limit my nightclub visits to once or twice a week.”

“Trixie has glitter paint if you ever feel Star Trek time is cutting too far into sparkle time.”

“Did she watch with you? Finally, I get to raise your child right!”

Chloe grants Ella the expected eye-roll, then reaches out to squeeze her shoulder. “And if you ever want to talk about anything else, non-Trek related, we could do that, too. Just dedicated friend time, no work talk allowed.”

Ella picks up a packet of screws that came with the swing and starts trying to tear it open. “I might need that. I feel ridiculous. This is not the first time I’ve known someone who died. Hell—I told you about that time I almost died. The whole crisis of faith thing isn’t really me.”

“Grief isn’t one thing, Ella. It’s not the same every time.”

“Yeah. I think… She asked me to help her. Charlotte. Be her, like, good person mentor. She kept popping up with more and more ironclad excuses for us to spend time together—it was terrifying.”

Chloe laughs softly. “Even at her kindest, Charlotte was still pretty terrifying.”

“I have never met anyone so good at setting goals and then identifying the shortest path between herself and those goals. She lived her whole life as the crow flies.”

“That’s why she chose you as a mentor—you are truly good.”

“I don’t know.” Ella pauses to lean over the side of the mattress and pull a small bag of tools out from under the bed. As Ella starts pulling out half a dozen different specialized screw drivers, Chloe decides maybe her contribution to swing building can be moral support.

“I wasn’t exactly eager to hang with her at first,” Ella continues. “And then Charlotte chose to single-handedly attempt to bring down the largest criminal network in the world. You’re a cop. Dan’s a cop. I’m basically a cop. And she chose to do it herself. What if I made her believe that in order to be a good person, to be worthy, she had to do something so risky? Just because that was kind of my path, from stealing cars to solving crimes--”

“No. You having a past probably helped the two of you understand each other, but going after Pierce? That was pure Charlotte. Old Charlotte hung out with crime lords all the time—trust me. I went to one of their parties with her.” Actually, that had been Goddess, but the clients had been Charlotte’s. “She was an incurable adrenaline junkie. Except, where most people like that go bungee jumping, Charlotte liked to stare the worst of the worst right in the eye. Fearless.”

“Not fearless.” Ella has her tools sorted and is now laying out the swing parts by type. “She told me once. Her whole lifestyle change, it was all motivated by fear of Hell. Is that what I’ve been helping do to people my whole life, going to church every week? Scaring them into taking these outrageous risks to prove they don’t deserve eternal damnation? Sorry.” She drops her selected screwdriver and slides from the mattress, padding barefoot into the bathroom. Chloe hears a muffled sob and the sound of a nose being blown into a wad of toilet paper.

Anyone else, Chloe would have allowed them a moment alone, but Ella has never been a ‘personal space’ sort of person. Chloe follows her friend into the bathroom and does her best to replicate an Ella hug from the provider side of things. “Ella, a man walked up to you and introduced himself as the devil, and you told him that you didn’t think the devil was such a bad guy. You’re not threatening anyone with a week of damnation, let alone an eternity. Whether the church does that? Well, we have 176 episodes of discussing Bajoran religious beliefs to get through before we answer that question, right?”

“Right. You’re right.” Ella pulls away and looks at Chloe with fire in her eyes. “I would never be a Kai Winn.”

“I’m sure I’ll agree with you once I get that reference. Now, how about we finish that swing so you can start taking cute chicken pictures?”

“Oh man, Margaret does these little hops when she’s excited—I’ve got a video.”

After another 90 minutes of chicken videos, swing assembly, and failed attempts to convince Margaret that said swing isn’t actually a secret torture device to be avoided at all costs, Chloe is back in the parking lot, checking her phone. One message: devil emoji, magnifying glass emoji, feather emoji, and a big green check mark.

Chapter Text

Chloe presses pause on their unofficial investigation long enough to go home and complete the Trixie hand-off with Dan, but it’s still barely 6 o’clock by the time she’s leaning against the side of her car in the parking garage at Lux, waiting for Lucifer. Apparently things inside are ‘hammer emoji, bomb emoji, explosion emoji, frustrated face emoji,’ but ‘devil emoji, red down arrow emoji, soon sign emoji.’

True to his hieroglyphics, it’s only a minute before the elevator door opens, emitting a pair of men clad in hardhats and tool belts, followed by Lucifer, who has made the interesting choice of being arm in arm with a stunning brunette woman clad in an exquisitely tailored skirt suit and $1,100 Bottega Veneta heels. As they exit into the parking structure, the woman is laughing, deep and throaty, and she uses her free hand to bat playfully at her escort’s chest.

“Oh, Lucifer, you are wicked. I love it!” she exclaims in rich, cultured tones. Lucifer, bafflingly, chooses to lean closer to her, saying something too softly for Chloe to hear all while making an excessive amount of eye contact. Whatever his words, they make the woman laugh again before she peels herself away from his side. “Too terribly naughty. Ciao, darling!”

“Ciao!” Lucifer grins after her, shamelessly watching her walk away before turning, at long last, towards Chloe. “There you are, Detective.”

“Who was that?” Chloe aims for nonchalant, but instead lands on jealous shrew. Maybe she should have taken that nap; her frustration from that morning comes roaring back at the first sight of his face. She understands now why he’d been jealous of Dan. It is unfair that everyone else is able to touch him casually. It is unfair that he is only able to be touched by people who will do so casually.

Lucifer brushes her question aside. “A nuisance, but necessary if we’re ever to have any privacy here on days when your spawn is in residence. Shall we take my car this time? It will blend better where we’re going, and I’ve already raised the top to put it in stake-out mode.”

“Uh, fine. What do you mean, when Trixie’s in residence?” Chloe asks, effectively diverted.

“I assume you will insist on having her with you occasionally when you visit. I figured building her a habitat to keep her contained maximizes my chances of seeing you naked on those nights.”

“A habitat—“ Her lips thin. “She’s not a lizard. I take it you’re reconverting your guest room into an actual bedroom for Trixie?”

“Bed, en suite, and there’ll be a door and everything. All the conveniences you human’s love.”

“You’re taking the bong cabinet out of there too, right?”

“I don’t know—she will be a teenager soon. She might like them.”

“Lucifer.”

“Very well. Though she’s far more likely to grow bored in there without them.”

“You know she can open doors on her own, right? She won’t stay in her room the entire time she’s in the apartment.” Trust Lucifer to do something thoughtful in the most irritating fashion possible.

He opens the passenger door of the Corvette for her with a smug flourish. “Already taken care of—I installed a brand new, state of the art telescope on the balcony. When she leaves her room she’ll be diverted by surveying her future Martian homeland. Thus, urchin-free naked time for you and me.”

Chloe attempts to pack ‘that’s very sweet, but you’re still an idiot’ into her sigh. “She will love the telescope, and she’ll insist that you stargaze with her. As a two person activity.”

He’s frowning as he settles in behind the wheel. “It’s a fairly straightforward instrument, Detective. Look in one end, see the cosmos up close. Surely she can figure it out on her own?”

“Trixie knows how to use a telescope. But she will want to spend time with you. And even if she didn’t, your balcony wraps around your whole apartment, and there are floor to ceiling windows in your bedroom.”

“I may not have doors, but I do have curtains.”

“No naked time, and, specifically, no sex in your apartment while Trixie is there unless you also put a door on your bedroom.”

“What, and ruin the stonework?”

“And when we do break that rule,” Chloe continues, because she’s a realist at heart, “it’ll be quickly and quietly in the shower behind the door you do have that both closes and locks.”

“Are all children as high maintenance as yours? I’m certain I’ve seen families with a dozen of the little brats—hardly seems possible to procreate that prodigiously with all your restrictions.”

He’s being purposefully obtuse, but Chloe can’t even mind that much. He brought in contractors to make sure her daughter feels welcome in his home. As difficult as it is for him to verbalize his feelings for Chloe, it’s going to be many times more difficult for him to acknowledge that he cares deeply for Trixie, and not just for Chloe’s sake. “Is it a Hell thing? Your lack of doors? Do you…worry you’ll get stuck?”

He tries to distract her with some of his patented reckless driving, but knowing he really does have supernaturally quick reflexes, Chloe just hangs on to her seat and waits him out.

“I don’t get stuck,” he says at last when he finally runs into a red light he can’t beat. “All doors are open to me, both here and in Hell. I did have that little personal loop experience last year, but that was brief, and the exit looked like the elevator, so if I had any lingering trauma I’d be out of luck there.”

“But you still don’t like doors in your home.”

“Dr. Linda asked me about that, too, shortly after I escaped my loop. The doctor can be infuriatingly close-lipped about what she’s thinking while we’re in session, but in this case it was rather plain. She worried I’d be uncomfortable at home after such an experience. I’m not—I like my home. I designed it all myself, to suit my tastes. The problem wasn’t being stuck in the penthouse, it was being forced to kill Uriel again, over and over. He couldn’t escape either, you see. I tried so hard to convince him that no one had to die, but he couldn’t see beyond what Dad might want.”

“Oh.”

“Yes. Oh. I’ve seen a great many people trapped by my father, stuck behind doors they cannot open. While I’m on Earth, everyone who visits me will do so with the security of knowing that they can leave whenever they wish.”

Chloe reaches across the center counsel, hand hovering half a foot from his thigh. Touching him, especially through his suit, would not hurt that much. She could set her hand down, give him a brief squeeze, let him know she feels for him, cares, is here for him. But, “Red, Detective,” he’d said. Looking back, she understands now that she’d initially behaved cavalierly about his boundaries, and that can’t continue. She needs to be here for him in a way that helps him, even if it isn’t what she thinks she should be doing.

So she pulls her hand back to her lap, turning so that her head is nestled against the headrest as she watches him. “You get major boyfriend points for making the penthouse more Trixie friendly, but don’t think you can distract me from my original question. I asked who you were with when you came out of the elevator. Not the contractors. The woman. The one pressed up against you. ‘Oh, Lucifer, you’re so naughty!’” Her irritation from earlier has dissipated, but Chloe can still work up an unflattering whine of an impression.

“Now, Detective, no need for jealousy.” But he likes when she acts possessive, the infuriating man. He takes his eyes off the road for a moment, long enough to turn towards her, elongating his neck so that the spot she’d claimed is clearly visible over the top of his cravat. Chloe’s insides jolt with a quick flash of mine. He’s gotten her trained so quickly. “Lauretta is one of my lawyers.”

All amorous thoughts flee. “You’re not going to sue the department. I know Dan was out of line—“

“Indeed he was, and trust that my revenge for that indignity will be handled personally, not delegated. No, she was helping me deal with someone even worse than Daniel. As of an hour ago, I own every bit of debt Captain Thorston has managed to acquire in his fifty-odd years.”

“What?”

“Yes. His mortgage and car loan, of course. Some medical debt from when he tore his rotator cuff. But the captain is a greedy man, not content to live the life his bribes could purchase him. Seventy thousand in loans to renovate the home he could barely afford. More than his yearly salary in credit card debt. Then there’s the gambling—private games with people a public servant should never owe anything to. Now all of those markers are mine.”

“Why? Why would you do that? We have him, Lucifer. He’s locked up right now.”

“He’s arraigning a plea deal right now. If you choose to swallow your anger at the way he spoke of you, that’s your business. I am not as magnanimous as you are. You wanted me to use my devil powers? What’s more devilish than money? I own every piece of his life. He is never going to breathe an unencumbered breath ever again. No one will lend to him, no one will help him. If he ever steps foot out of jail, all of his energy will be spent scrounging for basic necessities. And if he even thinks about finishing that threat he began to utter against you?” Lucifer shakes his head, and there it is, that flash of red in his eyes she’d been afraid of seeing at the station. “Hell will be a welcome respite compared to what I’ll make of his life on Earth.”

“I didn’t need you to do that.”

“No. You needed me not to melt his brain, and I acquiesced. You say you are goal oriented, fine. But I’m goal oriented, too. You wish to be a police detective, and to that end are willing to put up with all manner of poor treatment. I wish to ensure that every undeservedly elevated ape who takes advantage of your unprecedented forbearance understands that they will never again know a moment’s peace in this life.”

Vengeance. The starved, monstrous piece of Chloe’s soul, the part of her that keeps a carved list of the wrongs committed against her by Cain and a dozen other men, pumps a fist in victory, only to be quickly smothered by the vast weight of consequences. It appeals to her, this idea of swift revenge, but she has spent her adult life working towards justice, and she knows about eternity, now. “If all of his time is spent struggling to stay alive, he won’t have any chance to become better. Like Charlotte did.” The line sounds hollow, forced. Chloe doesn’t believe ‘better’ is attainable for a man like Thorston, not as he is.

Lucifer agrees, and he has evidence to back himself up. “Captain Thorston knows about me, Detective. He knows about Hell. Out of all the billions of humans who have existed over the millenia, the captain is one of a very small few who actually knows his time here on Earth is but a prelude, that his decisions here have lasting consequences. If he had Charlotte’s strength of character, her willingness to atone, he would have done so years ago. Because you wish it, I won’t drive him mad with guilt before he reaches his Hell loop. But every strip of power he prized in this life will be gone. He will have no money, no friends, no position, no reputation to rely on. Think of it as giving him a fresh start. He’ll have nowhere to hide from himself, and much more importantly, no means of intruding upon your life ever again.”

As subtly as she can manage, Chloe goes through her breathing exercises. Lucifer, too perceptive when it’s least convenient, once again turns his attention from the road. “You think I’m doing the wrong thing. You regret taking the devil off your leash.”

“No. I don’t think you’re wrong.” She’s not lying. But she doesn’t say what she is thinking, which is that she and Lucifer and the handful of others who know the truth could never, even if they worked with perfect insight and flawless execution until the heat death of the universe, save all those billions of guilty people from eternity. There are a lot of Thorstons in the world, but there are also Charlottes, and so many more who were never even as bad as Charlotte but who still carry guilt. This is the problem Ella’s been facing all on her own, because Ella Believes. Ella couldn’t take away Charlotte’s guilt; Charlotte had to do it herself, and in doing so she’d died suddenly, violently, when she’d only begun to find happiness in her new life. Ella is stuck with the fallout of that brutal redemption, and so is Chloe. Chloe, who now has to walk around knowing that everyone she meets is possibly damned, and she can’t save any of them. Dan, maybe. She’ll have to work on Dan. But even that comparatively small task is so vast—Trixie’s dad’s eternal soul. Chloe remembers the laundry list of training Linda had gone through to become a psychiatrist, but even she only treats, what, a few dozen patients at a time? And therapy doesn’t help everyone.

“If I’m not in the wrong, then why are you upset?” Lucifer asks, and if ever there were a person over-burdened by guilt...

So Chloe shakes her head. “I don’t like Hell.”

“I’ve always said you have good instincts.” He makes a joke of it, but they drive the rest of the way in silence.

Dominic Scaluci, purported crime family kingpin, lives on a surprisingly cookie-cutter street a good ninety minutes away from the worst of the downtown smog. It’s an old neighborhood, one he would have bought into when he arrived in the city, then chosen to stay in once the family started making real money after Thorston helped them achieve prominence. These are still multi-million dollar homes—this is L.A.—but nothing about the neighborhood screams ‘mafioso.’ Lucifer, naturally, is crushed.

“Is that a swing set I can see through the back gate?”

“Yes, Lucifer. It’s a crime family. Even criminals like to play with their grandchildren.”

“The movies really are better than real life. Excepting in your case, of course.”

“Thank you.”

“Movie you didn’t even carry a gun, and your breasts in 3-D, I mean—“

“Thank you, Lucifer.” He sighs, directing a wistful look at her fully clothed chest. She ignores him, surveying the quiet street in the fading daylight. When Lucifer’s source had confirmed that their most obvious suspect had in fact been the one to recently commission a top of the line display case for one very fancy feather, Chloe’d had to stop herself from saying a prayer of gratitude that they’d booked Carlo that morning. With everyone scrambling to pull together as much evidence as possible against Carlo and his immediate contacts, the detail that Organized Crime usually had watching over the family patriarch had been temporarily reassigned, leaving the field open for Chloe and Lucifer to do some surveillance of their own.

“Do you see any guards? Dan said there’s always someone posted out front. Although, it does sound like the regular guy has been absent lately. If they’ve been using substitute muscle…” She trails off, frowning, and looks down at the notes Dan had passed on to her from his Organized Crime buddies. “This doesn’t sound like an operation that’s recruiting at the rate implied by the number of new people seeking tattoos. What did your display case guy say again?”

“Artur, my collection conservationist, indicated that Dominic’s people reached out to him right around the time Maddy would have sold her relic. They wanted a top of the line job for what they described as the world’s most valuable feather. Artur assumed they had something illegal—“

“Illegal feathers?”

“Yes—your government has outlawed the collection of feathers from wide swaths of species. Apparently there is a black market for the rarer breeds—the extinct ones go for thousands.”

“I think we can assume Dominic Scaluci isn’t collecting dead bird feathers.”

“Mortals do the strangest things with their money, but it would be quite the coincidence for him to take up that hobby right now. Artur was not allowed to see the feather himself; he had to work from from a reference drawing. He delivered the final product roughly four days ago.”

“Right around the time Organized Crime noticed a change in the posted guards. Huh.”

“Perhaps now that he’s got it properly displayed and protected, Dominic has begun showing his prize off to his men? The sight of divinity has a profound effect on most people.”

Chloe nods. “Their regular hired muscle sees proof of God, needs a few days off work to adjust to the change in world view.” She pauses, studying him carefully. “You asked Thorston about who the feather belonged to—would there be different effects based on the angel? Like, you have your desire mojo and Amenadiel can stop time. Is it similar for the feathers?”

“I haven’t run tests, have I?”

Chloe opens her mouth once, twice— “But if it is your feather?”

“If it is, people,” he waves a hand, faux-dismissive, jaw set square and high. “People do tend to react to them as if they’ve seen their greatest desire—pure divine love wrapped up in some barbs stuck to a shaft.”

“Okay. But I’m immune to that, so that’s in our favor.”

He huffs, gaze locked on the window.

“You said the ones at the crime scene were all broken…”

“Yes. Handy thing about divinity—humans can’t steal it. Only willingly shed feathers maintain their powers, as it were. Of course, I did willingly cut off two full wings covered in feathers.”

“But then you set them on fire.”

“Only after they were stolen—who knows how complete the set Carmen Grant acquired was? And then there were the others. I left multiple sets of wings lying where they fell when I cut them off. They ended up in dumpsters, mostly.”

“You were hurt, probably woozy with blood loss,” Chloe tries, knowing that’s not an excuse, not when they’d seen a man kill himself over that first stolen set of wings.

“I was selfish, reckless, irresponsible.” His words fall like stones, cut slabs of judgment. And he’s right.

But she still finds herself arguing on his behalf. “You won’t do it again.”

“Yes, only took me nearly a dozen false starts, but I believe I’ve learned that lesson.”

“So we make it right.” He finally looks over at her, and she has to work to keep her face perfectly even. She can’t let him see judgment, but he won’t respond well to sympathy, either. “Once this is done, we track down any other feathers that might be out there.”

“In between your job and tending to the urchin, you want to traipse the globe looking for my castoffs?”

“The globe? Because I thought we were talking more of a local—wait, look. That must be the guard.”

A man staggers around the house from the side yard. He could almost be from one of Lucifer’s movies—he’s muscley and square jawed and cauliflower-eared and obviously armed underneath the cut of his mid-range off-the-rack suit. Unfortunately for Lucifer’s action movie-based hopes, this man is also weeping. Streaming, unashamed tears that leave him stumbling, nearly sprawling, until he ends up hanging off the stone fence bordering the front yard.

Lucifer breathes the sigh of a man wounded to the depths of his artistic soul. “Once again, the movies have set me up for disappointment.” He unlatches his door and starts to unfold from the car.

“Lucifer, wait. What are you doing?”

“Do you not see the devastated meathead practically falling into the street?”

“Yes, and if you don’t get back in the car, he’s going to see you.”

“Detective, the way that man is weeping? Either he’s just discovered that too many steroid injections can have a shocking effect on your fun bits, or he’s overcome by my Father’s oh-so-subtle power. I don’t know what your plans for the evening were, but I didn’t come here to leave an angel feather in the hands of mobsters.”

Chloe’s plan had been to observe; she’s pretty sure she made that clear. Get the lay of things, figure out a sensible way to recover the feather. Not to stroll up to the nearest gun-toting man and say—

“Hello, crybaby. Seen anything of great and terrible beauty lately?”

The man looks up. Far from leaping into mobster security guy action mode, he reaches out towards Lucifer as though for support. “They’re gone!”

“Clearly! I assume you’re speaking of your lost marbles?”

“Vulnerable, remember?” Chloe says sotto-voice, hurrying up beside him. She’d spent an indecisive moment frozen in her seat, but given that she didn’t have the car keys and he would absolutely get himself shot before she could run far enough away to trigger his invulnerability, she’d decided that playing peacekeeper was her best option. She steps into the armed man’s sight line, hands spread open and empty before her. “Who’s gone? We’re here to help.”

“No one can help. It’s too late. It’s all too late.”

Chloe recognizes the note of despondence in the man’s voice, and despite her better sense, she moves forward, reaching out to lay a hand on his arm. The man wraps around her, burying his face in her shoulder, and she has to hold out her free hand to Lucifer to stop him from intervening.

“It’s not too late. We’re here.” She turns to lock eyes with Lucifer. She’s not an expert—yet—but this reads as divinely influenced behavior. She doesn’t have any Godly fix-it methods, so she falls back on what she knows. Establish a connection, calm him down, find out what’s going on. “Everything’s going to be all right. What’s your name?”

“Silvester,” he answers between sobs.

“Silvester. What’s happened? Why do you think it’s too late?”

“You’ll never understand. You can’t.”

“Oh, bloody—“

“I want to try.” Chloe glares Lucifer into silence.

Silvester draws back with a sniffle. “I’ll have to show you. Then you’ll be like the rest of us.” Taking firm hold of Chloe’s hand, he draws her towards the front door.

Never would Chloe have imagined that they’d be able to walk into this house, escorted, welcomed by security. Lucifer gets to do things like this, but Chloe’s luck never turns this way. Maybe the celestial insiders club does come with some perks. Dangerous, potentially deadly perks. She taps a nervous hand against her stomach as Silvester drops his hold on her in order to open the door. The comforting implacability of Kevlar meets her touch. Her gun still languishes locked up in her safe at home—again, she’d been planning a surveillance mission, and they are well outside her jurisdiction. Sometimes a gun can only make things worse, but she should have realized Lucifer would be quick to Lucifer his way into a confrontation. After nearly three years working together, she knows he does this. She’d gotten too used to him being afraid of scaring her the past few weeks. Tried-and-true rule of the universe: the devil prefers to fast-forward to the exciting bits of an investigation. Professional Chloe usually keeps him in check, which is why she needs to get off of desk duty and back into the field working real cases because moonlighting Chloe has really indulged him in his bad habits. Two steps into the house, however, Chloe starts to feel cautiously hopeful, because it’s already clear that Silvester isn’t the only person in the Scaluci household who can’t stop crying.

“Without a doubt the most appalling party I’ve ever been to.”

To one side of the foyer, a trio of people cry together in the formal living room, impervious to Lucifer’s disapproving sneer. A lone man sits, head buried in his arms, upon the stairs leading to the second floor. The glass doors on the far side of the family room open onto a pool area where five bathing-suit clad mobsters and molls kick their feet somberly in the water, speaking in broken voices. The Scaluci family retainers sprawl about the home like attendees at a funeral—except at every funeral, there are people going through the motions. People who didn’t care much about the deceased, or who aren’t able to accept their sadness and instead turn it into dark humor or even anger. The emotion here is unnaturally uniform, and Chloe feels a hint of trepidation. This couldn’t be Lucifer’s work, surely? She can’t imagine reactions to his feathers would be so regimented, though it would explain even more why he’d want to get rid of his wings, if they lead to such conformity.

Some of the mourners see them, but no one protests, too deep within their own feelings to care about interlopers. The guard leads them through the kitchen into a wood-paneled rumpus room. On the south wall, next to a rack of pool cues, is an incongruous metal door with a number pad set into the wall beside it. A safe room, or something similar. Again, under normal circumstances Chloe would never have been able to get inside, but their tour guide types in the door code without hesitation, not even bothering to block her view of the keypad. Chloe mentally notes the passcode—another gift for Organized Crime—and then the keypad beeps and the door swings open onto a spacious office.

A spacious office occupied by five men, four of whom are shirtless, positively ripped, and on their knees.

“This is more like it. It’s not The Weaponizer,” Lucifer says, leaning down to snark into her ear, “but I’ve seen films with very nearly this exact beginning that were quite action packed indeed.”

Chloe’s too busy taking in details to roll her eyes. The four men are supplicant, part of some proto-religious ceremony, heads bowed and hands clasped. They aren’t weeping, but the mood remains somber. The fifth man, whom she recognizes from case files and newspaper articles, is Dominic Scaluci himself. He’s a short man, thin, with a thick shock of gray hair. His face bears the marks of his six decades on Earth, but the deep grooves running perpendicular to his mouth aren’t from age. Sorrow carves trenches into his skin, the sort that make people imagine wisdom where there’s only pain. He, too, is shirtless, but unlike his men, he has a black heart inked over the left side of his chest. The edges are uneven and smeared, like it was drawn on by a Sharpie. Presumably, it’s taking longer to get a custom tattoo designed for his new position as Head Feather Holder than it did to get the display case in order. Speaking of, upon moving further into the room Chloe can see the corners of a pedestal bearing a glass case peeking out from behind Dominic’s shoulders as he carries on with his service.

“We shall be scoured hollow,” he’s saying as the door clicks shut behind them. “Clean and unattached, empty and pure. The loss of all must be embraced—“

“I’ve brought them to see.” Silvester strips off his own jacket, leaving his gun holster in clear view as he stumbles to his knees. “Everyone needs to see.”

Dominic’s head snaps towards the interruption, eyebrows slanting down like a cartoon villain’s. “Fool. I’m the one who decides! I am the one—“ But then he moves, revealing the contents of the display case behind him, and Chloe Sees.

If pressed to provide physical details about what she sees, she would be able to state definitively that it is a feather. Pressed further, she would venture ‘dim’ as a descriptor. The feather does not trap night within it, but it is dusk, a leeching of warmth and color. Silvester was correct: they are all gone, and it is too late, and her heart is broken.

Some of the griefs are small—Trixie is no longer a baby, Chloe is no longer twenty, past choices are set in stone and inalterable. Some of them are not small. Lucifer, leaving and leaving and leaving. Charlotte’s death, just as she stepped into a new life. Chloe’s grandparents, all four of them gone for over ten years now, but their deaths made fresh as though they just happened. Her dad—

And then there’s that other grief, too horrid to name. But all of it is present, a new wound punched into her chest.

She doesn’t feel her knees slamming to the ground; she only notices the change when her view of the feather alters, it’s sucking pull above instead of before her. Physical sensation grows distant, muffled and muted—she only knows she’s crying because she’s having trouble breathing. She can hear someone calling ‘Detective,’ the syllables slowed and distorted, recognizable due to extreme familiarity, but even recognizing the word, she cannot bring herself to respond. She understands the bleakness of the universe now, it’s vastness complete and terrible. Loss hollows out a Chloe-shaped cocoon from the rest of the world. She dwells in sorrow now.

Until someone sets that cocoon on fire.

Chloe cries out, physically pained. Divinity had held her and now she is both bereft and adrift. There’s a new place within her—her heart, her soul—that had been so close to achieving peace through deprivation, that had almost become divine in itself, but now she’s been left incomplete forever. Screaming in denial, she wrenches her focus upward—and sees Lucifer. Red eyes, human face, not-quite human hands, fire growing from the tips of his fingers, human voice calling for her—“Detective! Detective, are you all right? Speak to me, are you all right?”

“It’s gone,” she croaks.

“It’s all right. I’ll make sure you’re all right.” His eyes still lit with hellfire, he joins her on his knees. “I swear to you, you will be all right.”

Chloe blinks, eyes dry and gummy, tear ducts run dry. Her grief had been pure, perfect, whole. The ashes from the former angel feather sift down into the wreckage that remains from where Lucifer’s fist shattered the bullet-proof glass of the display case. “Bring it back. Bring it back.” She reaches towards him, beseeching, and he pulls back, horrified. She’ll remember that, later, but right now, she wants to see that feather again, awful as it was. She’s not herself without it, not anymore. She’s grateful Lucifer is here, but she loathes him for what he’s taken from her, even as she also l— The thought stalls, her brain faltering. With the feather gone, she feels as though she’s been cast even further from those she mourns. She and Lucifer can’t be a pair, partners, just the two of them, if a part of her is forever missing.

Except it’s not just the two of them. It’s her, and Lucifer, and half a dozen mobsters who just watched him burn up the most expensive feather in the world.

Chapter Text

Fortunately it is sexagenarian Dominic Scaluci who reacts first, not with a command to his men but with a rage filled scream and a belated tackle aimed at Lucifer’s back.

Even vulnerable, Lucifer shrugs the man off mid-vow, rising to his feet with a smoothness and power that sends Dominic crashing backwards into the display pedestal. Lucifer sighs, straightens his jacket, and nods his head sharply at Chloe. “If you’ll excuse me for one moment, it seems these men are about to make a series of poor decisions.”

And then Lucifer proceeds to allow these men to make those poor decisions.

Chloe watches, unmoored, as he sidesteps an incoming attack, then sets his foot out to trip his assailant, allowing his attacker’s own momentum to carry him to the floor. She’s noticed it before, the way he fights half the time as though he is a smaller man, relying on agility and physics tricks rather than his own considerable brute force. The devil, observing humanity’s sins. Enabling them. But not forcing, not interfering. Free will and free consequences.

The other men who had been kneeling before Dominic when she and Lucifer walked into the room are on their feet now, attempting to box Lucifer into one corner of the room, but he manages to duck out of the way of a fist such that one of the men levels another of his compatriots, then Lucifer sends the unbalanced first man stumbling into the third man. It’s all so easy for him, neat and tidy, it seems impossible that they could be in any danger here. Chloe sprawls back on her ass, barely sensible enough to keep her head up. She had lost everything, but the world had also made sense while she gazed at the angel feather, and she’s having a difficult time following the sudden eruption of kinetic activity. Dominic Scaluci attempts to dive at Lucifer’s ankles, but Lucifer pivots onto one foot, delivering a literal ass kicking to one of the other men and clearing the way for Dominic to land face first in the broken glass left by the shattered display case. One of the shirtless men takes note, thinks to grab one of the glass shards as a weapon, but broken glass doesn’t come with a hilt. The man cuts his hand immediately. He swears and attempts to hurl the shard at Lucifer. Lucifer flairs his jacket, a false target, like a cape presented to a bull and whipped aside at the last moment. The man’s throw goes wide, right into the face of another goon. Partially blinded by the blood flowing from the cut to his forehead, this man stumbles into and begins wrestling half-naked with the man with the cut hand, much to Lucifer’s approval. Chloe laughs, actually laughs. She’s never enjoyed the Three Stooges, but she’d faced a void borne of divine loss and now these fools are flailing around trying to cause more loss through violence, as though a sloppy uppercut could be the catalyst for apotheosis. Idiots, the lot of them. What else can she do but laugh?

Until she hears the sound of a gun cocking. Silvester, the man who led them into this room. The only one with a weapon, and much less friendly following the feather’s destruction. He’s smart, too, at least enough to know how to apply pressure like any good thug. He isn’t aiming at Lucifer; he points his barrel at Chloe.

“Get your hands behind your head and lie face down on the ground,” Silvester barks.

Chloe has time to wonder if Heaven would be like that pristine cocoon gifted by the feather. It’s not that she wants to die. She doesn’t. She just can’t find the wherewithal to do anything to stop it from happening.

But then Lucifer turns away from his downed attackers, sees what’s happening.

And changes.

Half the time, Lucifer fights like a much smaller man. The other half of the time, he fights like a mountain, like gravity, like the terrifying beast who lives in the dark of nightmares, strong beyond all possibility. Now, he fights like the devil. It’s not just his eyes this time, not just his hands. His face, his body, everything. He grows taller, broader, skin cracking, peeling, revealing. This is not the guilt drenched man standing over Cain’s corpse. This is not the trepidatious display from his balcony. Here, he is a pillar of ash, Hell personified, wrath coalescing into humanoid form within a mobster’s home.

Chloe looks up at him, mouth dropping open in awe. Her immunity to him remains, but she is not insensate. That edge of guilt comes to her, as it had the previous two times she saw his devil side, but having seen divinity unblinkered, she can now recognize it in him, too. Or maybe it’s not divinity, but infernality, something wholly his own created from the depth of his pain and fear. This is no mindless feather, ensorcelling humans through inertia. Lucifer is raw, fully alive, emotion pulsing from him, a blast of care that blots out any memory of emptiness.

Incredible.

Without looking, Lucifer flicks his hand to send his current attacker flying over a desk and crashing painfully into a bookcase. Then he moves, or must, the transitional frame missing from Chloe’s brain as Lucifer goes from one side of the room to directly in front of her in less than a blink.

“You Will Not Harm Her.” Not a human voice. If the Earth’s core could speak, it would speak in this tone. Lucifer Wills, and no other will matters, not even his father’s. Who would look to the sky when the sun has manifested ten feet south of your rumpus room?

Everything stops. Silvester’s hands go limp, the gun dropping harmlessly to the ground. Chloe only realizes that Dominic has been shouting a near constant refrain of unimaginative ‘get hims!’ and ‘rip him aparts!’ when his words fall away into a drawn out whine. The six non-devil men in the room dissolve from threats to penitents—some on their knees, others falling back against the wall, one yet weeping still, gibbers of fear rather than sobs of grief. Chloe watches the consciousness of sin rise from within their souls to surface in their eyes.

“Please,” goes their chorus. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. Please.”

Instead of sin, the memory of purpose rises in Chloe. She’d promised Lucifer, promised herself, that she would be the one to make the tough decisions in these situations. That barren, feather-shaped crevasse still exists in her soul, but looking at Satan realized incarnate comforts her, freeing her from her stupor. The feather had been a forgotten shard loosed by an indifferent God, callous in the face of his creations’ pleas, but Lucifer, born of that same power, walks sentient among humans with fond intent. She has not been abandoned. Lucifer will do his best to make things all right for her—he promised—and now it’s her job to make sure he doesn’t do anything he’ll regret.

“Lucifer.” Chloe’s voice is a bare croak, but he’s so good, he responds to her immediately. His weight shifts away from Silvester, and he darts a look down at his hands.

“No.” She doesn’t hear the word so much as see his lips move, and then he shrinks, reverts to pale skin and slouched shoulders, looking small in a suit that’s been stretched and displaced by his prior transformation. His skin is clammy, his eyes wide and shadowed.

“The tools of Heaven are not to be so misused,” he says after a beat, out of character, like he’s delivering the moral of a cautionary tale. “Next time the feather won’t be the only thing I burn.” Not looking at Chloe, he tugs on the cuff of his left jacket sleeve, a move that sadly proves too much for the loosened shoulder seams. The thread pops and fabric slouches down his arm, ignoring Lucifer’s impotent attempts to push it back into place.

The men around them stare, like they can’t quite accept that this man is the same devil they saw moments ago.

Lucifer paces a tight semi-circle between Chloe and the men. “Can you walk?”

It’s only when no one else responds that she realizes he’s talking to her. “Um?” Chloe looks around, then places her hands on the floor, willing to test whether she has enough coordination to stand, but—

“Wait, wait.” He stops her immediately, dropping back down to his knees and using his bare hands to clear the glass shards away from the floor around her. The harsh breathing of broken men almost drowns out his quiet murmurs of “Just a moment, one moment, I’ll take care of it, it’ll be all right.” Once he’s satisfied it’s safe for her to move, he rises and steps away, eyes on Dominic, whose mouth is working it’s way up to forming words again. “Detective, if you’re able, we should leave.”

She wants to beg him to bring back his devil face, too, the way she’d begged him to restore the feather. He’d been so vibrant, and if she cannot have perfect ascetisism then she will have chaotic fulfillment. But purpose, she reminds herself. They are supposed to be working towards justice and public safety, not running around melting brains. Still wobbly, Chloe pushes herself first onto hands and knees and then fully upright.

He holds up a hand, gloveless. He must have taken them off to activate his fire powers. Her partner has fire powers. Huh. She probably should have guessed that. “Let me go first. Just in case.”

Chloe hangs back, remembering that they’re still in a house full of muscle, and allows Lucifer to proceed her like a wall.

But no one notices them. Unable to witness the feather’s destruction, shielded from the sounds of a skirmish by the safe room’s soundproof walls, the rest of the house’s occupants are still content in their perfect grief, unaware of the metaphorical bomb that went off in their midst, taking out not only their holy relic, but also their leader and five other men as well. The specter of Jimmy Barnes looms over Chloe’s thoughts. Even if those men don’t end up institutionalized, they will never be who they once were again.

Chloe doesn’t care, and can’t tell if it’s the lingering emptiness within her or that vengeful part of her that Lucifer had awakened earlier coming to the fore. Drugs, guns, and girls—the holy trinity of organized crime in L.A., and Dominic Scaluci had become a master at running all three. That meant everyone in his inner circle had signed off on ruined lives, slaughter, and human trafficking. Is she meant to have infinite compassion, now that she knows about eternity? People make their choices—these men had made choices. Lucifer had shown them their sins, made them care about everyone they had hurt, and lo, it was good.

Definitely the divine high talking.

But even knowing that, she gazes at Lucifer’s back as he walks before her, a forbidding—if sloppily attired—honor guard, and she desires.

Unaware of her thoughts, Lucifer tosses his torn sleeve to the ground as soon as they emerge unmolested from the house. “We cannot linger long enough to secure you separate transport back.”

“No,” Chloe agrees, not paying attention to his meaning. She picks up the sleeve and presses it to her face, breathing in his scent, then follows him on legs as sturdy as a newborn fawn’s. She’s grateful to finally collapse down into the Corvette’s leather seats, to curl against the door, swaddled in the safe embrace of the seat belt, hands wrapped in the comfort of his discarded wool. Perhaps it hurts, transforming so completely and so quickly, because the graceful fighter from before is gone. Lucifer enters the driver’s side of the Corvette a new creature, one of angles. He’s a tall man and the Corvette is a small car, but never before have his elbows and knees made themselves so prominent as to make the space feel cramped.

Not cramped enough for Chloe’s liking, not now. In fact, as the car’s ignition sparks to life, she becomes uncomfortably aware—seriously, physically uncomfortably aware—that without his touch issues, they would be having car sex right now. Between the grief and his display of power and the lingering void within her, she needs. She needs to be pressed against him, hips grinding, him panting her name, her hand gripping his hair keeping him close, close, close. She needs him, just him, all of him. Bitter resentment spikes within her, that he can’t control his subconscious long enough to give her this. Purpose, she reminds herself. It’s difficult this time, to swallow down what she wants to say, but she manages, twisting his sleeve in her hands until the weave bites into her palms. Mission: get the devil somewhere safe (for him and everyone else) is in progress. Not that he isn’t the one doing all the work, his gaze locked on the road ahead of them. He should be looking at her. The thought surfaces, tantalizingly familiar and utterly inappropriate for a whole host of reasons, not the least of which is his clear discomfort. He’s withdrawn, his physical movements constrained within the tightly defined box of his own personal space.

And yet he is divine.

Chloe has known about Heaven and Hell and all the rest of it for almost three weeks now, but merely seeing Lucifer’s other face, tending his wings, that hadn’t been enough to really drive the point home. Shape shifting, flight, hypno-stare—all of those things are a mere step from human. Comic book fodder. Having a feather completely change who she is upon first sight? Feeling the press of God inside her mind, pushing out any thoughts that didn’t serve His purpose? Feeling that cleft in her brain still? She has the benefit of knowing what the feather is, knowing why it had that effect on her, and still she has the urge to redirect her life toward searching out one more hit of Grief in its ur form. Of course people are setting up churches or cults or whatever else. They don’t even have the devil to comfort them through the first pangs of withdrawal.

Chloe leans forward in her seat, trying to catch a look at his eyes—brown again. Rats. Not that the brown isn’t very nice as well…

She closes her own eyes, hoping to quiet her inconvenient lust through lack of visual aide. It’s only when she’s not looking that he speaks.

“Shall I drive you home?”

Home. What a difficult word. She’d lost that tonight, however temporarily. It’s a struggle to remember the practical concerns of daily life. “My car is at Lux.”

“I can have it delivered.”

She keeps her eyes closed, worried what she might see on his face. “Do you want to be alone?”

“That doesn’t matter—“

“Lucifer.” The word erupts sharp, angry, implacable, cracking into being and away again, leaving the rumble of wheels on pavement as a tense soundtrack to the moment. Chloe scrunches her eyelids down more tightly, trying to keep her mind an uncomplicated blank, despite her brain’s best attempts to show her either the feather or Satan or both.

“I’d rather keep you under observation long enough to ensure you aren’t suffering any ill effects from exposure.”

He hadn’t answered her question, but, “Fine.”

“A drink, then.”

It feels like he’s offering a fragile truce rather than something they’ve done scores of times in the past, but she can’t yet read the undercurrents of the conversation. An easy enough problem to solve: she remains silent for the remainder of the drive.

The quiet does nothing good for his nerves. At Lux, he escorts her out of the car, into the elevator and out again into the penthouse, all with one arm extended behind her, the other out to her side, as though herding her, a dog on a mission—get one feather-brained Detective safely into a chair. Once he’s successfully parked her, he trades her the torn sleeve she’s still clutching for three fingers of whiskey, neat—Glenfarclas to clear the Detective’s head.

“All right?” he asks, hand rising to hover alongside her cheek.

She tilts towards it, unthinking, and he snatches it back.

“Drink your whiskey. I’ll be right back.” He rips off his ruined jacket, hurls it in the general direction of his fireplace, and, with a quick look at her, stops to ensure the balcony door is firmly shut before retreating into his closet.

Chloe sets her glass on the coffee table and lets her attention wander around at the penthouse. Signs of minor construction work clutter the floor along the stone wall enclosing his bedroom—a ladder, drop cloths, paint cans. And there, visible through the window, is the new telescope, longer than Trixie is tall. Chloe mentally probes at the remains of grief in her head. Not so bad. Not unbearable, not when she can see the physical proof of the life Lucifer is trying to build for them. She can adjust, especially if she can get Lucifer to do his devil face thing again, from time to time. She frowns. But he’d have to mean it. He’d have to be that angry, that uninhibited again. Just showing it to her as he had on his balcony wouldn’t work. He’ll be reluctant. He’ll fight her.

“Still all right?” He breezes back into the room, wearing one of his more anonymous gray suits, hands covered once again in a pair of black gloves. “Let’s get you topped off.” He grabs the bottle from the bar and adds a fourth finger of whiskey to her untouched glass. “There. That’ll help. Are you warm enough?” He flits back into his bedroom to fetch a throw blanket, settling the soft alpaca wool around her shoulders without acknowledging that she has yet to speak.

“Just sit there and I will take care of everything.” He throws the balcony door wide open, then steps away into the open space between his bar and his library, shakes out his arms, and brings his palms together in prayer.

What…

A soft whump sounds from the balcony, and she turns to see Amenadiel striding into the room, forehead crinkled in a frown. He has wings, too, Chloe remembers. She feels a slight qualm, like she shouldn’t be thinking about other angels’ wings, but Lucifer would understand. Maybe, if she doesn’t punch him this time, Amenadiel will show her his feathers.

Unaware of her schemes, Amenadiel passes her by her with nothing but a nod of acknowledgment. “Luci? Has something happened?”

“Oh, something has happened, brother.” And then Lucifer punches Amenadiel in his face.

Amenadiel staggers back, but Lucifer follows up his right hook with a left, and that’s enough to send the other man to the floor.

Chloe is torn between the petty human urge to cheer and the responsible peace officer urge to stop violence, so she settles for watching with her mouth hanging open as Lucifer grabs Amenadiel by the collar and gets another good hit in before Amenadiel hooks his ankle behind Lucifer’s knee and pulls him off balance. Amenadiel headbutts Lucifer and slithers out of his grasp, coming up swinging, but Lucifer doesn’t stay on the defensive for long. Amenadiel hurls him backwards into the bar with bone-shaking force—seriously, how much must he spend annually on replacement glassware—but Lucifer uses this as a chance to grab a projectile, slinging the remaining several thousand dollars worth of Glenfarclas at his brother’s eyes. Non-miracle afflicted angels can’t be blinded by alcohol and glass, but they do flinch, and Lucifer takes advantage of the opening, grabbing Amenadiel by the arm and spinning him around so that he’s pinned against the bar top.

“You dare call me the irresponsible brother, when you are the one leaving your parts scattered about for every wanna-be Jim Jones to build a cult around?”

“What are you talking—“ Amenadiel bucks against Lucifer’s hold, but Lucifer twists his captured arm higher.

“I discovered proof for your self-actualization theory tonight. Remember all of those feathers you guilted yourself into losing, the ones you dropped all over this city? I found one—we found one, still brimming with divinity.”

“That’s impossible. I didn’t choose to give—“

“But you did. So sad you didn’t live up to Daddy’s standards that you shed all over His human terrarium. And now you’re going to fix it. You’re going to give the Detective another feather.”

“Luci!”

“You will. She saw, brother, and I will not have her jumping off any buildings in despair, so you are going to gift her one right now.”

Chloe feels unbearably stupid, multiple clues from their time in Scaluci’s house falling into place. Of course it hadn’t been Lucifer’s feather. Looking at him would never make her feel like that, but Amenadiel…

Lucifer jabs his elbow into Amenadiel’s kidneys, eliciting a grunt of pain, but Amenadiel finally manages enough leverage to shove himself, and Lucifer with him, back from the bar. He twists from Lucifer’s hold and bounds back a few paces, holding his hands up warily.

“Lucifer, we cannot allow the humans unchecked access to our feathers.”

Lucifer loosens his shoulders, readying for another round. “If only you’d come to that realization a few years ago. Still, I’ll compromise. Not our feathers, just yours, and not humans, just the Detective.”

What a wonderful boyfriend she has. Chloe admires how comfortable he looks in his fighting stance, how rakish the lock of hair hanging down over his forehead makes him. And he’s going to get her the feather. Her hero.

Wait.

“I’m not going to jump.”

Lucifer starts to circle, looking for an opening. “What’s that, Detective?”

“I’m not going to jump. I’m not, I don’t want to worship, or despair.”

Lucifer finally looks her way, briefly, before returning wary eyes to his brother. “You asked me to bring the feather back. You don’t want it anymore?”

Yes. Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.

And she’s not even strong enough to lie about it.

“Yes, I want it.”

“There you go. Come along, Amenadiel. Hand one over.”

“Chloe, I understand what you must be feeling right now—“

Chloe shakes her head. “You’d think, since it was your feather, but I don’t believe you’ve got a great handle on your emotions.” Lucifer is bleeding, only slightly, a split lip, but it’s enough to arrest her attention and bring part of her brain back into focus. She pushes herself upright and totters over to plant herself at his side. She hadn’t had her feet under her earlier when it mattered, but she can still make Amenadiel understand that this fight is two on one, odds not in his favor.

“Detective.” There’s a warning note in Lucifer’s voice. Despite his recent wardrobe refresh, his cravat is once again mussed, and she can see the tendons in his neck flexed from tension. One day, she will bite him there.

“I’m with you,” she says. “If you’re fighting, I’m fighting. I might not be able to hurt him, but I can ruin his relationship with his improv buddies.” She puts her own fists up. “That’s right, feather dropper, one wrong move and Dan will be playing ‘yes and’ with someone new.”

“Detective, sit down. Drink your whiskey.”

“No.” Adrenaline does a marvelous job at getting her mental gears turning at near-normal speeds again.

“Chloe, be reasonable. You must see how dangerous it would be to have another feather floating around. Now that the threat from my…my past carelessness has been removed, we should leave it at that and be grateful no further harm was done.”

“It would be dangerous,” she agrees. "That’s the problem—the feather from tonight? Not the one we’ve been looking for. You remember the relic we were searching for when Lucifer threw his party? We know now it’s a feather, but it couldn’t be the one we found tonight.”

“How can you be sure?” Lucifer drops his fists, unwilling to fight while she might get involved. After making sure Amenadiel is going to stand down, too, Chloe retreats behind the bar to dig up the first aide supplies she’d left there after her last wing cleaning visit.

“Lucifer, sit—you can have that whiskey if it won’t hurt your lip.”

“I’m fine.” Inexplicably, the lure of the untouched glass proves resistible to Lucifer, but he does flop down onto his sofa. She sits on the coffee table across from him, only for him to start objecting again. “As eager as I am for a visit from Doctor Decker, you cannot risk being near me right now. Fluids.” He wipes his mouth with disgust, blood smearing across the leather of his gloves.

“So clean yourself up.” She thrusts her handful of cotton swabs and anti-septic at him.

He accepts the swabs, but only for the purposes of glove clean-up.

“We need to focus. Why do you think there’s another feather out there?” Amenadiel is also bleeding, from both his nose and a cut on his forehead, but he can look after himself.

“From what Lucifer’s said, there could be multiple out there. But the one we found didn’t have the same effect on me described by the other witnesses. And some of the men tonight were shirtless.”

Lucifer grimaces. “Cultists love to take the fun out of nudity. No tattoos. Except that hideous scribble on the world’s saddest Godfather knock-off.”

“Exactly. The black heart Dominic drew on himself doesn’t match what Ella described to us.”

“’And God did lay a path.’” Amenadiel finds some tissues behind the bar and begins to clean himself up. “And my feather, the one you saw tonight, did it make you feel as though my father had provided guidance?” He looks hopeful.

“No.” His shoulders slump. “It felt like I’d lost everything that mattered, and everyone else in the house who’d seen it was in mourning. Dominic said something about being ‘scoured hollow.’”

“We must still be looking for one of Lucifer’s, then.”

“Of course you’d try to shift the blame back onto me.”

“Well, we know it can’t be one of my feathers, and no one else has been on Earth recently. Who else’s would it be?”

Lucifer mutely slumps to his side on the couch like a recalcitrant teen, the antithesis of the primordial beast Chloe wants him to be to distract her from the empty space behind Amenadiel where his wings could be if he would only let her see them. Conversation first, she tells herself; feather extraction later.

No. No feather extraction.

Probably.

“Who else’s would it be?” She repeats Amenadiel’s question, but with more investigative intent. “I don’t know if ‘path laying’ is something your feathers would inspire…” She frowns at Lucifer.

“Light bringer.” He sweeps a hand down his supine form. “I’ve illuminated a path or several thousand in my day.”

“But would it make people dislike you? We think the faux-Sinnerman wanted to send you back to Hell, and Thorston’s wife left because of his association with you, despite her lack of concern about the rest of his behavior.”

“That is odd.” But Amenadiel’s voice is hesitant.

“Indeed. I’m all about self-love.” Lucifer's double entendre falls flat.

“So maybe it’s yours,” Chloe allows. “But who else? After tonight, it would be stupid to assume you’re the only option. How else would humans get feathers? Do angels ever come down and just hand them out?”

Lucifer is not the eye rolling member of their partnership, but he still proves adept at the maneuver. “Luckily for your species, none of my siblings has taken an interest in humankind for the past two thousand years or so.”

Chloe’s relief dies in infancy. “Cain. You did say he was older than me.”

“She’s right, Luci. Who knows what he collected. He was walking the world when Dad still interacted directly with mortals.”

Lucifer covers his face with one hand. “This is my curse for killing a human—playing clean-up after Dad’s messiest mistakes.”

Chloe sets her hand by his head, depressing the cushion next to him so he can feel her presence. “Unfortunately, I think that’s what we have to assume. We know he tracked celestials and he liked to collect things. If Pierce—Cain—had a collection of at least two angel feathers, he could have more. Theoretically, how many could he have? Apart from the two of you, would any others be here on Earth?”

The brothers share a look. “Technically…” Amenadiel trails off.

“Technically.” Lucifer agrees. “At one point or another, all of my siblings have been to Earth, though most only fleetingly, and not since humans became too numerous to fit into one room. Not since rooms became a thing, really.”

“You mean, back when Adam and Eve—because they were a real thing. And Cain would have had access to anything they had, because he was their son.” Time, so much time, and still a fraction of Lucifer’s life. Chloe boxes up that thought and stores it away for sometime when she doesn’t have anything else to worry about. “But they’re feathers, right? Nothing that old would last.”

Amenadiel shrugs. “I wouldn’t say it’s likely. But technically…” That is quickly becoming Chloe’s least favorite word.

“Angel feathers don’t deteriorate. We aren’t mortal, and neither are our bits,” Lucifer explains. “They can be destroyed, and fairly easily once removed from the wing, but if neither destroyed nor used?”

“Used? So whoever is using this other feather to recruit followers, eventually the feather will stop working?”

“Sadly, no. Archangel feathers, such as my own, can be used to heal any wound, and that use consumes the feather.”

“But that’s a good thing,” Amenadiel insists. “Our sister Gabriel is also an archangel, and the most frequent visitor to humanity. She’s certainly the most likely to gift her feathers to anyone, but even she has rarely been called upon to deliver messages in the past thousand years or so, and in that time, any feathers she gave would surely have been put to use in healing.”

“Probably.”

“But not definitely. Okay.” Chloe pulls out her phone and opens her notes app, where she’s been keeping a high level overview of the most pertinent details in this investigation. Telling herself she’s not gathering details for her own future divine feather hunt, she asks, “What would Gabriel’s feathers look like? And if she gave them as a gift, what effect would they likely have?”

“Actually, that might make sense.” Lucifer sits up. “If she was running around spreading malicious lies about me, as I know she has more than once, that would explain why everyone is being infected with unjust devil-hatred. Gabriel is a messenger, and that could very well have been her message.”

“Father was very angry when you rebelled,” Amenadiel admits. “He did want to warn the humans not to be taken in by your—“

“Charm? Wit? Good manners? Stunning beauty?”

“By any, er, false impression you may have inadvertently spread about Heaven. Gabriel was tasked with warning certain humans to be wary of your treachery.”

“My treachery? Mine?”

“You know you behaved rashly.”

Chloe leans forward to place herself between the brothers. “Enough. There’s no behavior rash enough to justify what your father did, and I’m not interested in hearing arguments to the contrary, not from either of you. Now, Gabriel. She’s our most likely source—“

“Oh.” Amenadiel gives up his argument and looks again to Lucifer for confirmation. “But she isn’t. There is someone who has spent even more time with humanity than Luci has.”

“Who—oh.” Lucifer’s face falls. “But she’s not exactly visiting anyone at a time where she could be handing out gifts.”

“Sometimes…there are false alarms.”

“So what if there are? She’s not hanging about—busy, busy, busy, our Azrael.”

“Azrael? As in Azrael’s blade?” Maybe Chloe’s just responding to negative propaganda, but she would rather they not be dealing with anything coming from the Angel of Death.

“She is on Earth most minutes of the day, now that you lot have become so populous.” Lucifer finally hauls himself up to pour a drink. “But the point stands, she’s not here making friends.”

“It’s been a long time since you knew her, Luci. She has, in the past, chosen…pets, might be a good word for it.”

“If you’re referring to people, then no, ‘pets’ is not a good word.” Chloe stares Amenadiel down.

“Very well. Special interests, maybe? Every once in a while, she arrives to escort a soul to the afterlife only for that soul to be brought back to life through medical intervention. If the soul impresses her during their few moments of death, Azrael will come back and visit them when she has time.”

“And Cain died more than once.” Lucifer shakes his head and passes the glass of whiskey he’d prepared to Chloe, not noticing her incredulous expression or how she immediately places this glass next to the still full one waiting on the coffee table. “I told Father she didn’t have the temperament for that job. Who would? My sister,” he says to Chloe, “is not at all what Death is made out to be in human myth. A bit awkward, but sweet. She would make friends where she shouldn’t.”

“Okay. Is she an archangel, too, like you and Gabriel?”

Lucifer tips his hand back and forth. “Yes, but for the purpose of this conversation, also no. Death cannot heal; her feathers cannot be used in that way. Azrael herself is very non-judgmental, but her feathers? They test the weight of a mortal soul—light enough for heaven, heavy enough for hell.”

“The path they’ll take after death.”

“Exactly.”

“Or the path they need to take to change their future fate. So anyone who looked at one of her feathers and saw the horrors of Hell waiting—“

“Would likely be inspired to hold quite the grudge against me, yes.”

“Someone who saw her feathers, they might respond like Charlotte, and try to be better, right?”

“Charlotte really was a rare woman. Malcolm is the more likely behavioral model.”

And what were the chances that any of the men whose brains he’d scrambled tonight would be of Charlotte’s same rare quality? Over two hours post-exposure now, thoughts of those men aren’t as easy for Chloe to shake off.

“It’s good we have a starting point.” Amenadiel, at least, is staying on task. “I’ll call Azrael—“

“Brother.” Lucifer holds up his hand. “I believe the Detective has dealt with enough of our family shenanigans for one night, and I’d rather not risk her getting an eyeful of judgment wings.”

“I wouldn’t mind.” Chloe can hear the longing in her own voice.

Amenadiel stops, his hands held in front of him an inch away from prayer pose. “On second thought, I’m pretty tired. This seems like a daytime conversation. In fact, I should probably let the two of you say good night.” He walks towards the balcony, step hitching when Chloe stands to follow him. “Actually, I would like a drink. I’m going to go down to the bar. In the elevator. Like a human. Being on Earth again and all.”

Chloe pouts. She really isn’t going to get another dose of divinity tonight.

Improv hasn’t improved Amenadiel’s acting, as he performs the least convincing facsimile of a causal walk to the elevator, whistles in completely normal human fashion while waiting for the doors to open, and ostentatiously mimes searching for the correct button in the carriage before his face folds into an actual frown. “Luci, why won’t it move?”

Lucifer sighs and hustles over. “I’ve installed a lock—for you and the urchin, Detective. No more stewardess interruptus for us! Here.” He reaches into the carriage and taps away at something, then steps out of the way as the door finally starts to close. “Thought we’d never get rid of him. Another drink?”

Chloe looks at the two still full glasses on the coffee table. “No, I think I have plenty.”

He hums agreeably and returns to the couch, not getting a glass for himself. “Bloody long day. Don’t worry; I’ll make sure Amenadiel leaves you a feather.”

“You really will, won’t you?”

“Of course. I owe you, after all.”

“Owe me?”

“For allowing me me off your leash. I promised you anything you wanted in return, but all I’ve done is instantly make you regret your decision. Just this morning you asked me not to melt any brains, and here I’ve done it to six men at once and gotten your own precious head caught up in the crossfire.”

“My brain is fine,” she says with more conviction than she feels. “As for those men…”

“Yes. What do you think? Were they eviler than Captain Thorston? Dominic Scaluci certainly, but his henchmen? Can you absolve me for that? Because I don’t regret it. Anything to keep you safe. Anything.”

But he does regret it a little, she thinks, which makes it easier to shove her own misgivings aside. “I understand that. I’d do the same for you. I know that’s gotta be difficult to believe—this is twice now I’ve left it up to you to get us to safety.” She’d promised herself that she would be the one to handle guns from now on.

“I really am a monster, to put you in the position where you would feel guilt for me.”

“You’re not. I don’t… Have you kept track of Jimmy Barnes?” His head jerks up in surprise. “I haven’t. I should have, but after I shot you, I was pretty determined to not believe you were the devil, so I didn’t. Even after seeing your face, I never checked. He was institutionalized, but I don’t know if feeling his guilt, knowing about Hell, helped him in the long run.”

“You cannot ask me to feel compassion for that man.”

“I’m not. And I’m not asking you to feel it for those men tonight. You’re doing that all on your own.” She pictures him again in her minds eye, fire made flesh in Dominic Scaluci’s home, all charred skin and sharp bone and palpable command. He hadn’t done that with Jimmy. Hell unleashed, that is what he’d given her. She knows him now in a way she hadn’t a few hours prior, can taste the ashen aftertaste all those years of exile had left on him. In order to save her, he had allowed her to see a part of himself he’s ashamed of, the part that he was convinced would drive her away. This beautiful, beautiful man.

She smiles down at him. “You were amazing tonight.”

“Not the word I expected you to choose.”

“You were. All fire hands.” She wiggles her fingers wide, laughing, enchanted. “I didn’t know you could do that.”

“Oh, I’m quite the eldritch horror.” But then his bravado fades and he admits, “Sometimes. When I feel strongly enough.”

“You were radiant, staring all of those men down.”

“Detective, I am a weapon against mankind.” He should never think that—he should never think that, but he does, and he’s still talking. “We may as well embrace that. Can you really call the beast you saw tonight good? Amenadiel is the good brother, and look what his feather did to you?”

She shakes her head, resolute. “You’re a good man.”

“That’s the divinity talking.” He drops his head onto the back of the couch, sighing in resignation. “You are handling it better than most—that legendary Decker stubbornness—but you’ll feel better once you’ve gotten some sleep. You’re sure you aren’t feeling any despair?”

“No. No, you took care of that.”

His eyes narrow, suspicious. “Glad to be of service.”

“Just like you always are. Three years ago you wanted to help people so much that you forced your way into being my consultant, and you’ve still managed to grow so much since then. Lucifer, I—“

Her throat closes. She hadn’t known she was going to say it, hadn’t planned this out, but it’s true, it’s true. She loves him, and why shouldn’t he know it?

Except suddenly she’s back on her couch at home, crying herself sick, Marcus’s dismissive words ringing in her ears. They say what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, but sometimes it just makes you a coward. She can’t be the one to say it first, not this time. But maybe she can do something else.

She studies Lucifer, the regal splay of his relaxed thighs, the exhausted curl of his gloved fingers, the mess of his half-cleaned lip, the still calculating gleam in his eyes as he examines her. A little defeated tonight, but still striving, still powerful and sly and glowing. She takes in his image and then she closes her eyes, holding the picture clear in her head. With direction and intent, she shares it with him, a prayer so he can see himself the way she sees him, a font of safety and trouble and fun, infinitely dear.

Silence reigns.

Self-conscious, she opens her eyes. He looks at her, head cocked, chin tilted down, eyebrows together, mouth a melancholy slope.

“Did I—sorry, did I do it wrong? I just wanted to show you…” She starts picking at her cuticles.

“No, darling. You haven’t done anything wrong. Nothing wrong at all.”

Darling. Strange to have a new nickname, but not bad. The Devil and his Darling. She could get used to that.

“But Amenadiel is right: it is late, and because of me you got hardly any sleep last night. Shall I call you a car?”

“Oh. I guess I should…” She takes a half-hearted glance at her phone. “I could stay? I mean, Trixie is with Dan…”

“You’d regret it in the morning when you had to go into work in the same clothes you’ve had on all day. Not very discreet.”

“No, I suppose you’re right.” Darling, he’d called her. He’s being considerate, not rushing her out. “I can drive.”

“If you’re certain.” He stands and escorts her to the elevator.

She notices the new keypad she’d missed on the ride up. Still gazing at him, she pets the keys with her finger pads. “I really appreciate you doing all of this. You don’t have to remake your bachelor pad so quickly.”

“Past time for it—how much trouble could that lock have saved us, hmm?”

“What’s the code?”

His funk lifts long enough for him to flash a wicked smile. “Daniel’s birthday.”

A shock of laughter bursts out of her. “What?”

“Easy for the Urchin to remember, and the last code he’d ever guess, guaranteeing all of our evenings will be Douche free.”

She puts a hand to her mouth, smiling through her fingers. “Not fully domesticated yet, are you?”

“Never.”

“Promise?” She wants to kiss him. Open mouthed and dirty hot and then he could take her against the wall—

“Good night, darling. Let me know when you get home, and call if you’re having trouble, or if you need anything.” He reaches in to punch in the code for her and steps back. There’s barely enough time for her to wave good bye before the doors separate them.

God—not him, but damn, Chloe is going to watch the ‘fun’ part of that video Lucifer sent yesterday the moment she gets home. There’ll be no getting to sleep without it.

Amenadiel is waiting at the bar.

Lux is packed, because Sunday nights still count as the weekend at Lucifer’s. Amenadiel’s ‘just getting a casual drink’ act doesn’t really work when there’s a pack of eight nearly-naked women almost forcing him off his stool as they thrust towards the bar, demanding shots. Chloe should ignore him, leave, but it’s too obvious that he’s going to go right back up to see Lucifer. Maybe they’ll contact their sister, but maybe Amenadiel will fight with him again, say more of the things that cause Lucifer to view himself as a monster, and Chloe’s not willing to let that happen.

She shoulders through the pack of women, issuing a terse, “I’m a cop,” when they start to complain. Amenadiel turns towards the commotion, frowning at her as she presses close to the bar.

“Chloe? Is everything all right?” His expression turns more serious. “You know I cannot give you one of my feathers.”

“Why not?” He’s taller than her, in general and especially when seated on a barstool, but she does her best to look down her nose at him even while looking up.

“You are remarkably strong minded for a human, but even so, your brain is not designed to handle divinity.”

“Maybe it was. I’m a miracle, remember?”

“But you were affected by the feather. I have no reason to believe you won’t recover—“

“Does it get worse or better with multiple exposures?”

“I—“ He frowns. “I don’t know. We weren’t told to experiment on humans.”

“And that’s all humans are to you, right? Just your dad’s toys, there to play with or not, at his invitation.”

“That’s unfair.”

“Is it?” The patrons around them turn at the shrill note in her voice, and Amenadiel holds his hands out flat, pressing down in a ‘keep it down’ gesture. Like Hell that’s happening. “ Pets. That’s what you said. But you’re sorry, aren’t you, for those ‘unworthy’ ideas you had about mortals back when we first met?”

“I am.” He sounds sincere, but when does he not?

Chloe scoffs. “Prove it. You’ve had two years. What have you done to address your guilt? Hmm? What have you done to be better? Did you make amends with your brother? Or did you tell him he’s a task assigned to you by the dad who threw him away? Did you get a therapist to work through that superiority complex that led you to endangering my daughter’s life? Or did you just lie to and then fuck your brother’s therapist? Did you try to stop Uriel—“

“Yes.”

“What?”

“I did. I went to confront him. But without my wings…”

“Oh, so that’s it. Without your powers, without being able to beat up your little brother, well, I guess there was nothing else you could do. It’s not like you could explain that just because Uriel wasn’t planning on killing me personally, he’d still be responsible for a human’s death. Not like you had direct experience to draw on there. It’s not like you could explain to him that lives matter, even when those lives belong to women. Unless you also think your mom is nothing and no one compared to your dad.”

“Our family is complicated.”

“Complicated. Right. And it’s Lucifer’s fault, all on his own, and he has to fix everything by himself, too, right? Without his own wings, in fact.”

“That’s not fair.”

“None of this is fair!”

“I am sorry—“

“Here’s the thing, Amenadiel. You’re not sorry. I didn’t feel guilty when I looked into your feather. Grief. Grief, that all these years of silence from your dad aren’t proof that you’re so in sync with him that you know what he wants without him having to say a word. Grief over the gulf between you and your father. Grief that you might have lost his respect, or whatever scrap of attention he ever paid any of you. You know he takes his love away from anyone who isn’t perfect, and you felt so fucking sorry for yourself when you thought he’d taken it away from you. You fucked up and got my daughter kidnapped and Lucifer shot and your daddy issues were so strong you grieved yourself into impotence. And then you didn’t even have the courtesy to clean up after yourself, and now I have that grief inside me, too.”

“Guilt and grief aren’t so different.” Amenadiel locks eyes with someone over Chloe’s head, offering some onlooker an embarrassed smile. Beyond his shoulder, two women are laughing behind their hands at Chloe, clearly mistaking Amenadiel for a beleaguered boyfriend dealing with his too-drunk and too-crazy girlfriend at the bar. Let them think what they want; her actual boyfriend is upstairs feeling unworthy because his family sucks, and Amenadiel is the only member of that family Chloe has access to.

“Chloe, I know you want another feather, and I know that the aftereffects of divinity exposure have left you emotional—“

“’Emotional?’ No. I’m angry. Because why did Lucifer even have to call you here tonight? Where were you, while we were out tracking down your mistakes? What do you even do all day? Wait around for improv class? Yeah, Lucifer’s made some mistakes, but that’s because he tries. He goes out and he meets people and he tries to make their lives better. What have you ever tried to accomplish? Huh? Anything other than win your dad’s love through toadying, through tormenting your brother. You more than any of your siblings have infinite time. What do you do?”

“I am working in my own way.” He takes a deep breath, straightening his spine. “Ever since I returned from the Silver City, I have been leaving myself open to prayer.”

Chloe waits for the rest of it, but apparently that’s all he’s offering. “Is that supposed to mean something?”

“I thought Lucifer explained. In order to hear a mortal’s prayer—“

“You have to be willing, yeah, I know, but are you actually doing anything? Or do you just listen and then oh so piously go back to not interfering with your dad’s toys?”

He hesitates, tapping his fingers on the bar top. “Actually, it turns out not many people have heard about me. My name didn’t make it into the Bible alongside Lucifer’s. You’re, uh, you’re the only person who’s prayed to me.”

“What, ever?”

“As far as I’m aware.”

“Wow. Wow. Such a big help, being willing to listen to all those people who don’t even want you. You know what, I think that’s actually the perfect penance, very you. Lets you feel noble but doesn’t require anything from you. Typical.”

“I do what I can to help.” He speaks down towards his own chest. “I helped contain Mother. I saved Linda’s life.”

Chloe pauses. She’d forgotten about that part of his history with Linda. “Okay, you’re right. I’m glad you did that. But since it turns out you do actually know how to be helpful? Maybe spend some time thinking about why you don’t do more stuff like that instead of waiting around for prayers that aren’t coming.” Victory comes in his flinch, the way he reflexively hunches his shoulders to hide his face. Triumphant, Chloe pivots on her heel and pushes back through the crowd, finally one up on divinity for the night.

Chapter Text

As soon as she gets home, Chloe texts Lucifer. As she dashes up the stairs to her room, she starts imagining another phone call between them—

But he sends a simple ‘good night’ text, complete with period at the end of the sentence. Very non-flirty. She reasons that he might still be speaking with Amenadiel, or even Azrael, so as she curls up in bed, she scrolls back further in their text chain. Chloe doesn’t even bother getting undressed first, just pulls up the video Lucifer sent the day before and skips ahead to the part where he starts to strip.

To her surprise, she doesn’t end up reaching for her vibrator. The video is hot—it is naked Lucifer—but as she watches, the analytical part of her brain kicks into high gear. He chooses to keep his cock in frame throughout almost the entire runtime—not an unusual choice for a sex video, and it is impressive, long and thick. Uncut, of course, and Chloe’s inexperienced enough with that feature to appreciates the visual demonstration he provides on how he likes to be touched. She notes all of it, the tightness of his grip, the twist of his wrist, where he presses with his thumb. The speed…the speed is for the viewer’s benefit, she thinks, not Lucifer’s. There’s a lot of playing to the camera, all moans and hip rolls and head tossing. But every so often, he retreats into himself, closing his eyes and biting his lip, breath catching as his hand speeds. Then he gets himself back under control, giving the camera a flashy leer before the hand holding his phone shifts so that his face falls out of frame for a while.

He calls her Detective when he comes.

When the video ends, she sets her phone aside and stares up at the ceiling, turned on but faintly dissatisfied. It’s sexy, watching him touch himself, but not as hot as he’d looked earlier that night, wearing his devil form. Divinity high, she tells herself, not really caring. If she’s honest, though, seeing him all red and ascendant, like lightning corralled but ready to strike, had only been the second hottest thing she’d seen that day. His face that morning, in the observation room at the precinct, unlocked and honest, wholly focused on her—

That morning, when she’d told him he did well, he’d stripped down further than he had in his video, despite remaining clothed. And he’d called it a scene. What if that’s all their control game has to be, just her letting him know how good he is until he takes off all of his masks and finally relaxes? She could—she wants to do that.

She looks over at her phone, flexes her fingers. Reaches for it once, twice, then grabs it and opens a web search. ‘Power dynamics in sexual encounters’ is the primmest way she can think to put it, and the search algorithm rewards her cowardice with some very proper, very clinical results. JSTOR features prominently. She tries ‘control game sex’ and this time there’s a lot of porn, but also a lot of people being authentically enthusiastic and curious and helpful.

Thus begins the sloppiest, most disjointed bout of research Chloe’s ever conducted. She doesn’t even click on any of the links from that initial search, opting instead to get up and scrub out her bathtub. She spends five minutes reading about how a bound and gagged submissive can still safe word, and then she puts away some laundry. She skims a first hand account from a sub who loves being kept on public display, and then straightens up Trixie’s room. She discovers a pair of acronyms—SSC and RACK—but before she can start to understand the nuances between Safe, Sane and Consensual and Risk-Aware Consensual Kink, she starts seeing references to ‘the 4Cs’ and ‘PRICK’ and it all becomes too much again so she mops her kitchen floor.

Eventually, brain buzzing, still wired despite her body’s exhaustion, she watches Lucifer’s video for a second time and touches herself, thinking about what he will do in his next video once she’s told him what she wants from him, for him. After she comes, she has the urge to call him, but the plain text he’d sent earlier stops her. Chloe doesn’t know how much energy it takes to go full-devil. He probably needs his sleep tonight, and it has once again grown very late.

That doesn’t mean she can’t give Lucifer something pleasant to wake up to, though. A little video of her own. A reward for the next time he’s good for her.

Wardrobe takes forever. She almost decides on the cotton polka-dotted knickers he’d imagined her wearing before, but ultimately her vanity wins and she pulls out a lacey turquoise thong that she’d bought during an ‘I’m still sexy, dammit’ shopping spree after signing her divorce papers and then, of course, never worn. She doesn’t have a matching bra, so she goes without. Her planned shot is simple and brief, but she still does over a dozen takes, playing with her lamp shade in order to get the lighting just right.

And when she’s satisfied with the finished product and finally changes into her pajamas and climbs back into bed, this time to sleep, she lies awake remembering how at peace Lucifer had looked when she praised him, how connected to him she had felt. She thinks: tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow—

Mornings transform a person.

Nighttime Chloe had been horny and confident. Morning Chloe is tired and afraid. And the only difference between the two is the not quite three hours of rest her brain had gotten—how much worse would things get if she ever managed a full eight hours?

So, despite not being a snooze button person, Chloe spends fifteen extra minutes lying in bed, face pressed deeply into her pillow, hoping to somehow burrow far enough to escape the ache in her head. Apparently not even divine highs come without a hangover. As if she didn’t already have enough reasons to think Lucifer’s dad sucks. Why couldn’t real angel feathers be like the fake copies of Lucifer’s wings she’d seen at that auction years ago, really pretty with no negative side effects?

Chloe jolts upright, then has to bring her hands up just as quickly to make sure her head isn’t literally splitting open from the sudden movement. Battling off the temptation to pray to Lucifer for a prescription opioid delivery, she flounders her way out of bed and to her medicine cabinet for a responsible dose of aspirin. Feeling not in the slightest bit better, she makes her way back to her bedside table and grabs her phone.

There are no texts from Lucifer.

She hadn’t expected any, really. As opaque as he can be about some things (about some very significant things), she knows him. The only reason she’s retained any semblance of sanity over the past few weeks is because he’s proven that she knows him, no matter the many details he’d been keeping to himself. Last night, he’d acted out because he’d felt guilty, believing that one of his feathers was the cause of their problems, and then he’d felt even more guilty when his recklessness had put her in harm’s way. And she’d seen his devil face again, a part of himself he only ever uses against bad guys and himself. This morning, he’ll be dealing with self loathing and he’ll be worried his face or sight of the divine has made her afraid of him and what he brings into her life. And, of course, she is afraid, though not of him, per say. God and all his after-effects. Those she fears.

Strong minded. Lucifer had referred to her as such, and Chloe has seen evidence of ‘complex’ people who can resist Lucifer’s mojo. It’s probably the same with divinity. She’ll be fine.

But just how strong is she, really? Marcus… Like poking at a newly formed bruise, she pulls up the memory of the night she’d decided to tell him she loved him. How had she gone from disappointment over Lucifer avoiding her to bawling on her couch over another man? What had been real there? She knows now that she is not a wholly reliable narrator of her own life, if only because she’d been so deliberately obtuse about Lucifer’s not-so-secret identity. Miracle status aside, how mentally strong is someone who can lie to themselves for so long and to such an extent? How strong is someone who could let Marcus into her bed—Cain. Even in her own thoughts, she needs to think of him only as Cain. First murderer, master manipulator. She remembers Maze’s pep talk at the gun range, but it’s less helpful than it should be. After last night, she finally, finally understands what she’s actually dealing with in terms of celestial woo-woo, and she has no defense against that sort of power.

But as for Lucifer himself… She just wants him to act like a boyfriend and text her to make sure she’s back in her right mind after last night.

But he’s difficult and strangely delicate and she knew that going into this. If they’re going to work as a couple, she needs to leave room for him to be overwhelmed. Chloe can just talk to Linda or Ella or someone else until she and Lucifer feel more secure with each other.

Instead of texting Lucifer, she nestles back underneath her covers and searches the internet for updates on Carmen Grant, seller of fake wings but thief of the genuine article.

Not one, but four newly built community art centers in the greater Los Angeles area bear Grant’s name. There’s a recent profile in the L.A. Times—the man who turned himself in to the authorities two and a half years ago for antiquities smuggling, leveraged his intel on other smugglers to reduce his punishment down to time served plus a few hundred hours of community service, and who then gave all his wealth away to bring fine arts to underserved communities, all while spreading the word of God. The quotes from Carmen himself paint the picture of a man who is utterly repentant of his past sins and utterly dogmatic about his current interpretation of the bible, post religious conversion. Every interview with him adds another line to the laundry list of sins he appears to be building—-do not steal (this is heavily emphasized), do not deface a piece of art, do not ‘frolic with the devil.’ There’s also a lot about obeying spiritual leaders, such as himself.

Lucifer would be horrified. Whatever consequences he’d imagined for Carmen post-wing debacle, she doubts he’d intended to find his father a new convert.

Someone at the Grant Foundation must specialize in search engine optimization—the articles written at the time of his arrest are buried deep down in the search results. Shortly after Chloe last saw him, Carmen had turned himself in to federal authorities in the middle of the night, not bothering to contact his attorneys first. He’d been raving and disheveled—the mugshot is not flattering—and in statements given to a reporter who was lucky enough to be on scene covering a separate case, Carmen had spoken openly of his many crimes and his deep conviction that he was headed for Hell. From his initial statements, it’s a wonder he didn’t end up institutionalized like Jimmy Barnes.

Except Carmen had spent days, if not weeks, with Lucifer’s wings. Lucifer’s face must have driven him to confess his sins, but spending that much time around divinity…there must be some sort of tolerance build-up for him to bounce back so well. His firsthand experience with angel feathers certainly affected him, improved him even, but his old personality still shines through, allowing him to once again seek power and influence, even while eschewing his former quest for wealth.

It’s a comforting discovery—the aftereffects of Chloe’s own interaction with divinity are not necessarily permanent. Amenadiel’s feather hadn’t inserted foreign thoughts into her, after all, just brought out what was already there—her own, personal griefs, if at an overwhelming scale. But then she realizes that the aftereffects of divinity aren’t the only things she has to worry about. She’d left six discombobulated criminals at the Scaluci house last night. There’s no telling what happened after she and Lucifer left. She wonders if this is something the divine struggle with—remembering to take care of the fallout of their actions while constantly high on their own divine natures. It’s not just that Lucifer is dangerous. He’s wealthy enough to own a building in downtown L.A.; of course he’s dangerous. It’s that there are a lot of consequences to him, and Chloe now has to be aware of those consequences. It’s uncomfortable to think of power that vast and inhuman contained within someone who is so very vulnerable himself.

After five failed attempts at composing a text to Lucifer that asks him what they should do about the casualties they’d left behind last night without sounding accusatory, Chloe gives up and goes to take a shower. Maybe it’s one of those conversations that will work better in person. If she can manage to look him in the eye after that almost love confession. After—

She remembers abruptly how last night had ended and immediately checks her phone to make sure that no, she hadn’t sent Lucifer the video she’d made. The file remains safely isolated on her own device, and Chloe gratefully presses the little trashcan icon to remove all possibility of her embarrassing herself further. She pauses, though, when the pop-up appears on her screen asking her to confirm she wants to delete the video. Wincing in anticipation, she presses cancel and then play. It’s not as scandalous as she’d feared, and far less revealing than her movie career had been. All of seven seconds long, the video opens on a shot of her right hand resting high in the middle of her abdomen, even with the the lower curve of her breasts, nipples just out of frame. Her hand moves, fingers tracing a line down her stomach, around her navel, down to the waistband of her panties. The shot ends just as her fingers dip below the elastic. No identifying marks. Nothing explicit.

She doesn’t delete it.

Between her impromptu research and the time she wasted dithering over home-made porn, Chloe is ten minutes late for work, which triggers a fifteen minute dressing down from Acting-Lieutenant Mikelson, during which Mikelson makes a lot of steely eye contact and implies that Chloe’s unprofessional behavior is directly responsible for the difficult career path Mikelson was dealt as an ambitious policewoman. But even with this generous time buffer, Lucifer still hasn’t arrived by the time Chloe returns to her desk to finally settle in for a long day of paperwork. Chloe gets about thirty minutes of work done over the next hour, too distracted watching the stairs, waiting for him to arrive. When Mikelson finally leaves her office, dressed for court, Chloe takes advantage of the lack of surveillance to seek out a distraction.

Internal Affairs is located on the top floor of the precinct, sharing a half-demolished space with the one-man art theft detail. Theoretically, once the budget comes through, there will be proper offices up here, but currently, the entire division works in an open layout, five desks shared amongst eight people. Anti-corruption is not where the L.A.P.D. invests it's money. Unsurprisingly, Detective Bauda has secured one of the desks for her personal use. She sits curled over her keyboard, surrounded by overstuffed file folders and half empty coffee cups.

“Hey, just wanted to stop by and see how you’re doing,” Chloe says, sidling up to the desk. “Lucifer said you weren’t your best the other day.” It’s childish, but Bauda’s answering glare gives her a little thrill of pleasure.

“You know, our mutual friend and I used to debate whether you knew the truth about your partner. He was sure you were clueless, but I was never completely certain.”

And just like that, Chloe’s wrong-footed again. “Our mutual friend?”

“Did you want to discuss this here?” Bauda raises an eyebrow and looks around at her I.A. colleagues.

Chloe grits her teeth. “Lunch?”

“I’ll pick you up at noon.”

Not exactly the answer-filled, lengthy break from her angel obsessed thoughts that Chloe had been hoping for.

But it doesn’t matter, because by the time Chloe returns to homicide, Lucifer’s there, wandering the precinct with a mostly full drink tray. He must have already left one cup with whoever is on front desk duty today, and Chloe can spot a domed lid enclosing a mound of whipped cream—Ella’s preferred drink topper—along with cups for herself and Lucifer. He’s so human looking. A little pale, a little anxious, bringing in treats to share because that’s what he does. It’s not his fault that he comes with all those inhuman consequences. He didn’t kick himself out of the only place fit for a celestial to live, and he certainly doesn’t belong in Hell. Chloe can help him figure out how to make a home here on Earth without harming too many of the humans.

She’s almost certain of it.

His step hitches when he spots her (like he’s excited to see you, she tells herself) and he switches his drink tray to his left hand, straightening his jacket with his right. He’s dressed like Easter Sunday—all light gray with pastel purple accents—and his hair is ruthlessly straightened in a way she’s beginning to distrust.

He stops a good five feet away from her.

“One tall, non-fat almond milk latte with sugar-free caramel drizzle,” he intones, wresting her cup free of the tray and handing it out to her. His mouth is a cocky, slanting grin but his eyebrows purse with insecurity.

She intends to say, Thank you, but “You’re perfect,” comes out instead. Apparently this is too startling a revelation to hear before cocktail hour, because suddenly Chloe has sugar-free caramel-laced latte all over her shoes and Lucifer is fumbling to keep Ella’s whipped cream and sprinkles topped beverage from joining Chloe’s on the floor.

“I’m sorry!”

“No, I’m—bollucks.”

“No, I’ll just—“

“Right let me—“

And he’s crouched at her feet again, tossing napkins onto her shoes, a mostly salvaged but visibly sticky drink tray next to him on the floor.

Tomorrow, she’d thought last night, meaning, now, Today. She looks down at the top of his head, at the shiny sheen of his product-laden hair under the bullpen’s florescent lights. It’s just the right length for grip— “Lucifer, that’s, this is fine.” Chloe sighs and takes a step back away from the spreading puddle, checking her shirt to make sure the rest of her outfit escaped unscathed.

“I can have it dry cleaned—“

“No, look, you barely got me. It’s fine. I’m fine.”

“Are you?” He looks up at her, brown eyes deep and still and waiting on her answer. “Are you all right?”

Last night, he had been a towering figure, powerful and uncontainable, the full force of his devilish side engaged to protect her. When she’d woken this morning, she’d dismissed the intensity of her reaction to him as a residual effect of divinity, but now he is before her, worried and uncertain, and the effect is just as intense.

“Detective? You’re still recovering. That’s, I’ll fix this. I can fix—“ He starts to stand, and she takes another step back.

“No! No, I’m fine. Still myself, just—I just need to—“ She hooks a thumb towards the bathroom and beats a hasty retreat, the damp soles of her boots squeaking mercilessly with each step.

Only a few drops of coffee made it onto her shirt, and between some damp paper towels and the hand dryer’s best efforts, she’s more or less presentable again in fifteen minutes. It takes her another five to leave the bathroom again, because Lucifer’s nervous, which makes her nervous, and she’s worried that she’ll start feeling guilty and afraid about last night again, and she’s worried he’ll realize what she’s feeling and punish himself for it. Chloe pauses, looking out at the bullpen, where Lucifer has conned one of the uniforms into cleaning up his spill while he delivers the last cup of coffee to Ella. This is Chloe’s chance—to do what, she’s not sure. Sneak out without seeing him again? She likes seeing him, likes being near him. It’s just awkward right now.

She can handle awkward. It’s fine.

She manages to believe this for the length of four whole steps, at which point she spots Amenadiel posed upon the stair landing, his smile more self-satisfied than she’s ever seen it, Dominic Scaluci unconscious and cradled in his arms like a geriatric baby.

“I have apprehended a criminal,” he intones, voice solemn and booming.

The bullpen’s resulting stunned silence is broken only when Lucifer emerges from Ella’s lab, dashing towards his brother. “No, no, no, we discussed this. You aren’t rocking him to sleep. Throw him over your shoulder if you must, but arm twisting is really the proper hold—“

“Detective Decker?”

Chloe jerks around to see Officer Chepette who, along with pretty much everyone else who isn’t looking at the angels squabbling over how to best pose an insensate mob boss, is looking to her for guidance. Well, she is the reason Lucifer and his brother come and go from a police station like it’s a free public day care.

“Which, uh, which one of them should we arrest?” Officer Chepette asks.

On the stairs, the bickering angels grow perilously close to a slap fight. “Let’s find out.”

It takes time.

Amenadiel doesn’t understand that they have to ascertain whether there is a valid warrant for Dominic Scaluci’s arrest. He seems to be under the impression criminals can just be checked in at a counter like a returned library book.

“I’m redeeming myself,” he says, repeatedly, sounding like a child who just learned how to put his shoes on all by himself. It’s a little creepy, honestly, a sentiment shared by Detective Vickers when Organized Crime finally shows up to confirm that yes, there is an arrest warrant out for Dominic Scaluci, ever since three of his henchmen dragged two of their own kicking and screaming into the closest precinct to Scaluci’s house and ratted out the entire organization.

While Vickers corrals Amenadiel into an interrogation room to explain himself, Chloe directs Lucifer into a conference room to finally have the conversation with him she’s been putting off all morning.

“What was,” she points back out through the room’s windows towards where Amenadiel had staged his grand entrance, “that? Did you take him back to the scene? Did your sister send you there? Did you even get to talk to her? What happened last night after you sent me home? We agreed you’re going to tell me things now. I’m supposed to be in the loop!”

Lucifer commandeers one of the rooms many chairs and rolls himself away from her outburst. “I think you were full up on ‘in the loop’ last night. I’m still working on getting you one of his feathers, by the way.”

She pauses, fingers twitching. “That’s—that’s—“ Tell him that’s not necessary, Decker. Say it.

He nods to himself and spins in his chair so he’s no longer facing her. “Still feeling an overwhelming desire to see Amenadiel’s fluffy bits?”

“Yeah,” she admits. “But maybe not for long. You…being with you last night, that helped a lot.”

He frowns, jaw ticking to the side. “Well, I suppose that’s something. I had heard you may have developed a new obsession.”

“What?”

“You dressed down my brother last night. Compared him unfavorably to me. And didn’t even beg for a feather.”

Chloe suddenly realizes that he might not want her yelling at the only family member he actually gets along with.

“Was that okay?”

“It’s true, then?”

“I’m sorry, I thought—think he deserves it. Should I have checked with you first?”

“You’re deferring to me?”

“I know he’s family…”

“He—yes, my family.”

“Yes.”

“Yes.”

She waits for him to elaborate a single thought before huffing in frustration. “What is with you today?”

Her irritation makes him sigh in relief. “That’s normal at any rate.”

Chloe has no idea what is being said in this conversation in which she is theoretically an active participant. She wishes her coffee hadn’t ended up splattered over the floor where it’s caffeine is useless to her. “Anyway. I don’t like the way he treats you, but I don’t want to make your life more difficult.”

“Darling—“ there’s that pet name again, “—yesterday I acted recklessly, ignored your advice, placed you in danger, and nearly got your precious brain turned into mush. If ever I deserved one of Amenadiel’s condescending lectures, it was last night.”

She frowns. He’s not wrong, but she can’t agree with him. “I understand why you did what you did.”

“I had a feeling you’d say that.”

“What does that mean?”

“Nothing!”

Chloe knows most of the factors that have gone into his mood, but she can’t tease out what exactly is making him act so distant, and therefore doesn’t know how to solve the issue. The silence stretches a beat too long.

“But you wanted to know what I got up to after you left last night,” he says, spinning back to her with faux brightness. “Amenadiel and I did attempt to contact Azrael. She is ‘busy’ and will speak with us ‘soon’—ten minutes and ten years are roughly the same to an immortal with a mission, so don’t hold your breath there. But one of those knocks I gave Amenadiel must have finally jarred his brain back into place because he started going on about how he’d been failing to do his duty and he had to make sure there weren’t any more of his feathers floating around out there.”

“Glad to hear it.” Chloe can’t keep all of the smugness out of her voice.

“He wanted to see if the Scalucis had any more of them—an idiotic idea. Of course they did not. But it reminded me that I had failed in my duty to you and left behind rather a mess. It seemed bad manners to force you to clean up after me, so my brother and I returned to the scene of the crime, as it were. Typically humans respond to my face with guilt and fear—it’s anyone’s guess which emotion will be stronger. In this case, our devil-addled henchmen split roughly fifty-fifty, three wanting to confess their sins and reform, two wanting to flee into the night, with Dominic himself hard-nosed enough to want to build up his criminal organization even larger so that not even my formidable wrath could be a threat to him. Thankfully, the rest of the household was near catatonic in their grief over the destroyed feather, allowing Amenadiel and I to assist the three reformed types in subduing the others and locating the nearest police station, but we made the mistake of assuming a bruised and terrified old man would not be able to escape alone on foot. Took a moment to track Dominic down, and Amenadiel begged the privilege of delivering him to you personally. I wanted to go home and change into something that was not covered in eau de mobster, so let him have the honors.”

“Just like that,” Chloe says, more to herself than to him.

“Yes. I suppose so.” He eyes her warily, then resumes spinning in his rolling chair, reducing their chances of prolonged eye contact. “One bout of celestial nonsense contained, at any rate.”

“Carmen Grant confessed.” Lucifer glances over his shoulder at her mid-spin. “After you got your wings back, he confessed. Wound up with a slap on the wrist, because apparently not even fear of the devil stops the rich and powerful from behaving like the rich and powerful. Divinity really can’t make anyone into someone they’re not. It’s good to know.”

“But he never would have confessed without the influence of my devil faced. Divinity won’t change who someone is, but how they choose to behave? Don’t be so certain, Detective.”

“But it’s not forever. I checked into Grant this morning. He’s still out there, living a life.”

“I want something rather better than that for you.”

She waits until his spinning takes him back around to face her. “I have better.”

His eyebrows slip back down into brooding formation.

“Well, at any rate, I’m glad you were able to clean up after our visit last night. Will the Scalucis tell anyone about us? I mean, I wasn’t acting as a police officer, but…”

“Probably best if mention of you doesn’t appear in any police reports while you’re on desk duty, yes. I doubt you will be top of their mind when they discuss last night, Detective, impressive as you are.”

Right. The red dragon, or near enough, manifesting in front of them would have drawn the eye. “No, you’re probably right.” She checks her watch and sighs. “But they’re Organized Crime’s problem now. I don’t know if you want to stick around—they might want to speak with you. I’ve got paperwork to do, but then I’m meeting with Bauda. It’s time for us to come clean with her, I think, and get her to tell us what she’s really been after this whole time. I invited her to lunch.”

“Lunch?” Lucifer cocks an eyebrow. “I do so love it when you’re ruthless.”