Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Three weeks ago

Lucifer sat in a stiff chair next to Chloe’s bed, watching her sleep. She’d drifted off a little while ago, and he’d cajoled the nurses into letting him in, promising he wouldn’t disturb her.

He’d almost lost her. Her life had come so very close to being taken away from her, and even when he’d had the formula, he’d nearly cost her that life anyway by getting swept up in his guilt. He was beyond grateful for every breath she took now, each little unconscious movement she made in her sleep a gift.

His chest still burned a little, but it had nothing on how he felt inside. Physically stopping his heart was barely a footnote in all the pain he’d endured since he’d seen that photograph last night. All the pain he was still feeling.

The terror of thinking Chloe would die was fading now that they knew she’d be okay, leaving a mix of other emotions, most he couldn’t name and didn’t care to try. The only other one he knew was dread—dread for what would happen next, because things would change now. He had to draw a line between them that he’d never be able to cross again.

But for now he just looked at her, pale and wan, the color only just starting to return to her face. Sleeping peacefully. So beautiful it made his chest ache all the more.

It didn’t seem possible that she could have been made for him, that she only existed to hurt him, but it was the truth. Everything he’d thought he’d had was a lie.

And she could never know. It would only hurt her to find out she was a manipulation, and it would mean proving that he was the devil. She didn’t want to believe it, and he couldn’t bear to see her afraid of him now.

How was he supposed to go on like this? It hurt. So much, it hurt. He had half a mind to go steal whatever drugs he could find here so that he could numb the pain while he was still around Chloe, for even a short while.

But that would mean getting up, and he didn’t want to do that. He needed to see her open her eyes, to make sure for himself that she was okay.

And then…

And then.

The realization slowly dawned on him that there was only one thing he could do. He could never tell Chloe the truth, and without it, she’d never understand why they couldn’t be around each other anymore. She’d try to talk him into it, and he couldn’t allow that.

He refused to be a pawn in his parents’ machinations any longer. Staying here would only hurt them both.

So he had to leave.

Where, he didn’t know, but it didn’t matter. He’d go home and take some clothes and drive.

It was the right thing to do.

But he looked at Chloe and thought of how he might never see her again even after she’d escaped death today, and that hurt, too.

He could deal with it. He could take on that hurt if it meant doing the right thing. His heart was already torn to shreds. What was a little more pain on top of that?

Chloe shifted, just a little, her eyes moving behind her lids. He straightened, holding his breath, wondering if this was the time she’d awaken.

It was. She turned her head to see him there and smiled when he welcomed her back, and for a single moment, all Lucifer could think was how relieved he was to see that smile. When she touched his hand, he couldn’t stop himself from pushing her away.

Just this one last time, he would allow it.

It didn’t last long. She wanted to talk to him, wanted to be with him the way they never could now.

It was unbearable. He left, holding on to that smile even as it cut him deep.

He’d never see her smile at him like that again.

Present day

Three weeks. Longer.

It’d been just over three weeks ago that Lucifer had walked out of her life as suddenly as he’d walked into it, and she hadn’t had a clue that that was the last time she’d see him. The opposite, actually. She’d been so sure she’d be seeing him more than ever.

Over three weeks of silence, of wondering where he was and if he was okay, of thinking that she’d been the one to screw things up between them.

No more. Guilt had turned to hurt had turned to worry had turned to even worse hurt, and then a wave of anger had washed it all away until there was nothing else left. That was what she told herself, anyway.

Because Chloe hadn’t meant to push him too far, but Lucifer had absolutely meant to ghost her like that. A couple of days of panic she could understand, maybe, but after so long, it became a deliberate choice. And it would just be stupid of her to be hurt over it anymore. Over him. It wasn’t worth being hurt over someone who would do that to her.

But it wasn’t just some random person ghosting her, it was Lucifer. And that made it a hundred times worse.

So she’d shoved all her hurt feelings down deep and leaned into the anger instead. After everything they’d been through together, after she’d almost died and he’d managed to save her life against all odds, he’d just left without a word. She’d needed him and he was nowhere to be found. He’d let her think he was ready for something more between them and didn’t even have the balls to tell her no thanks, changed my mind. She’d called him a hundred times telling him she was worried about him after she’d been the one on death’s door, and he didn’t have the decency to tell her he was all right.

Who did that?

So much for being partners.

Chloe sat at her desk in the precinct, filling out an arrest report for her first case after coming back from leave. Jaw clenched, fingers hitting the keys more sharply than the situation called for. The keyboard hadn’t done anything to her. The case was nothing special, either. The killer had confessed almost immediately, a guilty conscious getting the better of him.

It was her absent partner—ex-partner—who was making her fume once again.

Lucifer wouldn’t have even been needed, but it didn’t matter. She wasn’t supposed to be solving cases alone anymore. And it wasn’t like this case was complex enough to hold her attention, so she kept thinking yet again about how much he’d screwed her over.

At what point, exactly, had he decided to leave? After a few days of sitting around Lux realizing a relationship wasn’t what he wanted? As he’d been walking out of the hospital, thinking that she was too demanding and he couldn’t deal with it? Before then, even?

She thought of him sitting by her hospital bed, waiting for her to wake up, already knowing that he wanted out. He’d dodged her request to talk, after all. Chloe had gone through that last conversation a thousand times in her mind, analyzing everything they’d said. After a while she’d realized he’d never actually told her they would talk later—he’d only told her to focus on herself, letting her think he was agreeing without ever saying the words.

Exactly the way he acted when he was trying to get around lying. And that made her think that he’d been deliberating avoiding making a promise to talk.

Her stomach twisted at the thought, that he’d already been done with her at that point. Not for the first time, she felt like such a fool. There she’d been, hopeful and relieved and overwhelmed by a lot of different emotions after finding out she’d survive after all. And there Lucifer had been, on an entirely different page, just waiting for her to wake up so he could…

She didn’t even know. Why bother waiting at all? Some sort of goodbye for himself?

Or maybe he had been going to tell her he didn’t want anything more, and then lost his nerve.

It only made her angrier.

Worse yet, though, was the idea that he’d been planning to leave even before then. That their moment after rescuing those kids had been what scared him off, and that whatever he’d been worked up about when he’d burst into her bedroom that night had something to do with it. That he’d only stayed to deal with her being poisoned first. An inconvenience, another chain dragging him down, something he had to take care of before he could ditch her.

Somehow it hurt so much more to think that was the case, so she tried her best not to think about it. It usually only surfaced in the darkest hours of the night, when she was too tired to keep her mind from drifting there.

Was the thought of being in a relationship with her really that bad? Not wanting one at all, she could understand. He’d never been the type and she knew that. So it only made sense that despite the way they kept dancing around each other, he didn’t want one with her either. She could have handled that.

But apparently those feelings were so repulsive to him that he’d fled rather than move on and go back to being partners like normal. He hadn’t just decided he didn’t want a relationship; he hadn’t just not texted her back. He’d wanted to get so far away from her that he’d cut off all ties, ended their partnership, left even Lux for God knew where. People didn’t put sheets on their furniture if they were only planning to travel for a couple weeks.

They did it when they were going to be away for a long time.

If even just wanting to talk about possible feelings between them was enough for him to jump ship on his entire life in LA, then fine. It was probably a good thing he’d left, even. He’d shown her why it truly was a mistake to want anything to happen. Chloe hadn’t learned her lesson the first time, so he’d made sure it stuck. Maybe she’d even be grateful after a while.

But she sure as hell wasn’t grateful now.

She submitted the arrest report and was about to go beg to help on another case—any case—when her phone rang. Snatching it up, she managed to mostly keep the bite out of her voice as she said, “This is Detective Decker.”

“Detective Decker, this is Detective Jay Wong from the LVMPD. Vegas.”

Why was she getting a call from the Vegas police? None of her cases were tied to anything there. “How can I help you?”

“Lucifer Morningstar was reported missing two days ago. I’m told he’s your partner?”

Her fingers tightened around the phone. Vegas. Lucifer. Missing.

Adrenaline shot through her. She was on her feet before she knew it. Angry with him or not, she didn’t want anything bad to happen to him. Maybe there was more to his continued silence than she thought.

He’d obviously gone to Vegas and gotten into some sort of trouble. She had no idea what was going on or why, but she knew it had to be serious, because Lucifer waltzed in and out of trouble the way some people took an evening stroll along the beach. He was entirely capable of handling himself when he needed to be. So to find out he was missing… “Yes,” she said, deciding not to mention their partnership was now in the past. “Who reported it?”

“His wife,” Jay said.

Chloe froze, rooted in place while the world turned upside down. His what?

And then everything started moving normally again as she came back to her senses. Obviously there was some sort of miscommunication going on. “I think I misheard you. It sounded like you said his wife reported it.”

“Yes, that’s correct. His spouse.”

Well, one of them had gotten it wrong, and apparently it wasn’t her. “I’m sorry, you must be mistaken. He’s not married.”

“It’s, ah… a new arrangement. He got married here less than a week ago.”

Chloe just stood there blankly for a moment. No. No way. He couldn’t seriously have ghosted her at the thought of being in a relationship only to go elope with someone in Vegas. “Are you sure? Like, absolutely, one hundred percent positive?”

“Yes,” Jay said, sounding resigned more than anything. “I pulled up the paperwork to confirm, since they don’t exactly have a history together.”

Better and better. Resolutely not asking, she said, “Okay, but just to be perfectly clear. We’re talking about the same Lucifer Morningstar, right? The one who was definitely my partner? Runs a nightclub in LA? Enjoys being the most infuriating person on the planet?”

“I, uh, I wouldn’t know about that last one, but yes. I’m sure. I take it you’re surprised to hear?”

“Yeah,” she said, any last delusion that there was a mistake going up in flames. “Yeah, you could say that.”

His wife.

What the fuck?

“And who is this lovely new wife of his?” she asked, clenching her jaw so tightly she was surprised she could get the words out.

“Her name is Candy Fletcher. I was calling to see if you know her or have any information that might help us find him?”

“No,” she said. “No, I don’t know her or anything else. I didn’t even know he went to Vegas. What happened?”

“We don’t know. According to Candy he went off on his own for a bit, and didn’t check in again that night. Or the next day. He’s not returning any calls—”

“Yeah, he’s good at that,” she muttered.

“—and we haven’t been able to find anyone who’s seen him at any of the places they’ve been frequenting.”

Chloe so didn’t want to think about what places they’d been frequenting, or anything else about what they’d been doing together. Any worry she’d had for Lucifer was gone again. Why did she keep putting herself through that?

“Don’t worry,” she told Jay. “You don’t know him, but I do. He likes to pull this disappearing act. And he loves nothing more than to indulge. It’s Vegas—he’s got it all at his fingertips. He’s probably just off on a bender somewhere with a dozen other women lined up for their turn.”

“That would be the best case scenario, but unfortunately I can’t assume anything,” Jay said wryly. “If he contacts you or if you learn anything, please let me know.”

“Sure thing,” she told him. Mentioning that there was no chance Lucifer would contact her anyway would only lead to more questions that she didn’t feel like answering.

She hung up the phone and planted her hands on the desk, taking a moment to close her eyes and process what’d just happened.

Lucifer was truly, truly unbelievable. He did all kinds of stupid, impulsive shit, but this? It would have been bad enough just leaving without a word. Refusing to answer even a single one of her texts was a dick move on top of that. But to go off and get married when they’d been…

Her fingers curled into fists as the hurt started to rise up again. She could feel it in her stomach, the tell-tale burn behind her eyes.

No. She wasn’t going to go through that right now. Taking a deep breath, she pushed it all back down again. This was just the last bit of confirmation she needed that she was better off without him.

She opened her eyes, staring at the floor beyond her desk. Cutting through the anger and hurt was a fresh round of worry, much as she wished it wouldn’t. What if something was wrong? What if he wasn’t just neck deep in some drug-fueled orgy somewhere?

Because Chloe had been right about what she’d said to Jay. She did know Lucifer, and something in her gut told her there was more to this latest disappearance than a lack of regard for anyone else. He sometimes stopped answering her, but never like this. Ignoring others wasn’t like him either.

He loved to be the center of attention, even if he didn’t want any from Chloe now. To be missing… he could still have gotten into trouble after pulling that stunt. Even if he hadn’t and it was just from him not caring about others or being too incapacitated to notice, that was a sign something was wrong right there. Acting out worse than usual, like when he’d been struggling so much a few months ago. A cry for help in the only way he knew how to make it.

She shouldn’t care. He’d made it perfectly clear what she was to him, and that he didn’t care about her enough to make sure she was doing okay.

But she couldn’t help it. They’d been partners, and unlike him, she couldn’t dismiss that so easily. She knew something was wrong now and couldn’t turn her back on it.

Fine. He’d saved her life, so she would return the favor and pull him out of whatever pit he’d sunk into. And then she would walk away on her own terms.

Gritting her teeth, she sat down again and started looking up whatever information she could find on Candy Fletcher.

“Hey, Chlo,” Dan said, coming up to her desk. “I wanted to see if—what are you looking at?”

Chloe tore her eyes away from the computer to glance over at him. Dan was looking at the screen, brows raised. Considering that there was a row of pictures featuring a lot of cleavage on it, that reaction only made sense. “Lucifer’s wife,” she said.

Dan’s eyes widened. “I’m sorry, what?”

“His wife,” she repeated. “Candy.”

It was kind of validating to see someone else be shocked at that news too. “Since when was Lucifer married?”

“Since last week, when he ran off to Vegas and put a ring on the first person to smile at him. I’m assuming.”

“Wow,” Dan said, gaping at the screen. “I just… wow. That is something else.”

“I’m going to choose to believe you’re talking about Lucifer and not the boobs.”

He shook his head, looking away again. “Of course I am. Well, I mean, they’re also—” He caught himself and quickly said, “Never mind. How did you find out? Is he back?”

“Nope,” she said. “The opposite. I got a call twenty minutes ago. Candy reported him missing and the police still haven’t found him.”

“Wow,” Dan said again, running a hand over his cheek. “He really knows how to make a mess of things, doesn’t he?”

“Yep.” She scrolled up to the most recent photos on Candy’s social media, where she’d posted all about her fabulous new hubby. Pictures of a huge diamond ring, some showing her wearing a tiny veil and a tight red mini dress, and a dozen shots of her and Lucifer together. Seeing them had made it feel real for the first time, the truth to everything Jay had told her sinking in at last.

He looked happy. Put-together the way he usually was, suit immaculate, hair done up with only a slight disarray from being touched by Candy. She knew, because one of the photos was of her doing just that. It made it harder to think that the reason Lucifer was missing was because he was just constantly high or drunk, that he was a mess and that she’d find him at a strip club somewhere.

Seeing it only made her feel worse.

This wasn’t some drunken decision he’d made on a whim that he regretted the next day. He was happy about it. Enjoying life, celebrating getting married, choosing to be with someone he barely knew over her. Like Chloe was already a distant part of his past, hardly ever crossing his mind.

Every new picture she’d seen of them was like a punch to the gut.

“As far as I can tell, Candy is exactly the type of person you’d expect Lucifer to be hanging out with,” she said. “Her family owns a bar, and she works there as a singer. Probably does other things too. No record, no major trouble her family’s gotten into—from what I could find without digging into them too much, anyway—and as you can see, her socials are as airy as could be.”

That wasn’t entirely true—going further back, there were hints of realness in her posts, where it seemed like Candy actually had more than a handful of brain cells. But Chloe wasn’t feeling generous enough to give her any credit.

“If Lucifer is in some sort of trouble, I don’t think she’s involved,” Chloe went on.

Dan said, “Mhmm. I’m sure you spent all this time analyzing the photos because you think she was.”

Chloe ignored that. Twisting to more properly face him, she said, “Look, Dan…”

He sighed, reading her expression too easily. “You want to go after him, don’t you.”

“Yeah. I do. I don’t know what’s going on, but I think he’s in some sort of trouble. And as much as this pisses me off, I can’t just wait around for him to turn up dead in a ditch somewhere.”

He nodded. “I know.”

She’d expected a lot more argument from him. “That’s it? Not going to tell me I should leave that asshole to deal with it himself?”

His lips turned up in a small smile. “I can definitely call him an asshole if you want, but no, I’m not going to tell you not to go. It would only make you mad at me, too, and besides… I actually don’t want to see him dead, either.”

“Since when do you care?” she asked, trying to figure out what to do with that. She’d expected Dan of all people to be annoyed with Lucifer too, but she also didn’t want to hear him say he didn’t care if Lucifer was dead or alive.

“Since he helped me save your life. Look, this is…” Dan gestured to the screen, seemingly at a loss for words. “He’s a real piece of work, don’t get me wrong. But he’s earned a certain amount of goodwill, too. Limited time offer.”

“Yeah,” she said quietly, looking away. “That’s pretty much where I’m at right now.”

“I’ll take Trixie while you go find him,” he said. “You just wrapped up your case, right?”

“Thanks,” she said. “And yes. Here’s hoping the lieutenant doesn’t mind me taking more time off after I just got back from leave.”

“Good luck,” Dan said. Their latest lieutenant didn’t like him, not after the trouble he’d caused over Malcolm. He wasn’t that thrilled with Chloe either, as far as she could tell. But he didn’t make her life difficult. Mostly he just kept his distance, and that arrangement was fine with her.

She looked at the photos of Lucifer one more time before exiting out of it. Dan walked off, and she headed for the lieutenant’s office, wondering just what she’d find when she got to Vegas.

No matter what happened, one thing was clear: this trip would not be pleasant, and when she came back, she’d still be on her own.

Six days ago

Lucifer wandered into some place called Fletcher’s, having been recommended here by someone at the resort he was staying at. He’d never been there before, so he figured he might as well, on the off chance that he’d actually find something interesting for once.

He’d chosen Sin City for its distractions; surely, he’d thought, there was enough here to keep him occupied, between the drinks and pills and plethora of entertainment found nowhere else. There’d be no shortage of people happy to join him for a time and then follow him back to his suite. Or even to whatever dim corner they could find instead. He’d thought he’d embrace all of it, that he wouldn’t be picky. It didn’t matter who it was with, as long as he didn’t have to think about anything besides the bodies pressed against his own.

Except he’d gotten here and found that actually, it did matter. He’d approached plenty of people that first night, and even more had approached him, but every single time he’d ended up walking away in short order.

He looked at them and saw Chloe instead. They smiled at him, and all he could picture was the way she’d done just that the last time he’d seen her. His fingers found bare skin, and all he could feel was her quiet, steady warmth as she reached for him. He hadn’t even made it to a single kiss; even his body seemed to know their lips would feel wrong on his.

There was only one person he wanted to be with, and yet she was the one person he never could be with.

So he’d given it up, preferring to be alone instead. Or as alone as he could be while constantly surrounded by people. If sex wasn’t going to happen, then he’d just let everything else Vegas had to offer sweep him away.

It hadn’t worked.

He couldn’t get properly drunk, and everything felt so empty. Hollow. Meaningless. No one cared for him here; he was just another wallet to the businesses and another body to everyone else. And maybe once, he wouldn’t have thought anything of it, but now… he’d gotten a taste for what it was like to be seen and cared for and wanted, and it was like it’d ruined everything else.

Every part of him wanted so badly to go home, where he could have that again.

It was just another cruel facet of this game. The home he wanted desperately to return to didn’t actually exist and never had. It was nothing but a pretty, painted facade he’d fallen for. He’d never actually had someone who could and would truly care for him the way he’d thought Chloe did.

But his stupid, foolish heart still couldn’t tell the difference.

So now here he was, craving his own designer poison, when he knew perfectly well that it only existed to hurt him. He couldn’t go back, but he had no idea what he was supposed to do instead, either.

All he could do was keep moving from one place to the next, doing his best not to think about anything at all. It was a fake sort of numbness, but it was better than nothing.

He sat at the bar and snatched up the drink he hadn’t even needed to ask for, watching the stage as a singer worked through a set.

“Who is she?” the bartender asked. “Not the one singing, the reason you’re drinking.”

Lucifer sighed to himself. No matter what he did, he could never get away from it.

He answered. Watched the gorgeous singer move towards him, gave his usual lines like he actually cared, hoping that maybe this time he would.

Only to realize that she’d robbed him.

Well. At least she’d managed to give him something to occupy his mind tonight, even if it definitely wouldn’t be with sex.

He got up to find out just what the night had in store.

The following evening had Lucifer doing something he never, ever thought he would, as a ruse or otherwise.

Getting married.

“Are you sure about this?” Candy asked, not for the first time. They were at the Marriage License Bureau, waiting for the officiant to come in. She was wearing a red mini dress and had bought a cheap little veil off a street vendor on their way over, so they could take pictures and sell the bit. The more practice they had, the better. But for the moment she’d dropped the act. “I mean really, one hundred percent sure?”

No. No, he wasn’t. It’d seemed like a perfectly good idea last night—what better way was there to get what he wanted? This one little ceremony would let him disarm his mother and sever any obligation Chloe felt she had toward him. They’d both be one step closer to being free of all the manipulation his parents were so fond of.

But now that he was here, it suddenly seemed so hard to actually cut that thread. When he said the words I do, that would be it. He’d go through with the plan, and any hopes he’d once had for them would be well and truly dead.

They’re already dead, he told himself. It was never real and never will be.

It didn’t help. He still couldn’t feel the truth of the words. He still longed, so much, for what he couldn’t have.

“Are you sure?” he asked Candy, trying to force his mind away from Chloe. “Having second thoughts about marrying the devil? It’s not too late to say no.”

She shook her head, a small smile on her face. “Out of all the people I’d call the devil in this city, you don’t even make the list. You helped me out, so I’ll help you out. But you’re the one getting the worse end of the deal, so if you want me to do something else instead…”

“Such romantic sentiments for your soon-to-be spouse,” he said. “No. This is the way it has to be.”

The person designated as their witness was giving them an odd look as the officiant stepped into the room. “Ready?” she asked.

Lucifer had found her a few minutes before and handed off enough money to get the short version. “Yes,” he said.

“We’re gathered here today to witness the vows of marriage between Lucifer Morningstar and Candy Fletcher. Do you, Candy, take Lucifer to be your husband?”

Candy glanced up at him, brows raised. After a second she said, “I do.”

“And do you, Lucifer, take Candy to be your wife?”

He held Candy’s gaze, and for a single heartbeat, he had the bizarre wish that Chloe would take her place.

But she wasn’t here. Candy was.

Just say it.

He’d never get what he truly wanted. And it was time he accepted that.

“I do.”

Chapter Text

Three weeks ago

Chloe hadn’t thought anything of the nosebleed at first.

She’d felt a buildup of warmth in her nose, but didn’t pay much attention to it. Sometimes she just got congested, sometimes it itched. It usually went away after a while. So when she felt a drop of that warmth slide out, she grabbed a piece of toilet paper—she kept forgetting to get out a box of tissues for her bedroom—and wiped it away, hand already moving towards the trash can. She never even saw the bloom of red.

Then she went to get her pajamas and felt it again.

She went back to the bathroom and this time, her eyes caught on the mirror. On the smears of red below her nose.

A drop slid down onto her lip, tasting of iron and salt.

Chloe froze, staring and staring at that red. A flash of heat swept through her.

No. No, she couldn’t have…

No, she really couldn’t have. Just because those victims had gotten nosebleeds didn’t mean she’d been poisoned. She’d been through a lot today, and everyone got them sometimes, right?

The fact that she hadn’t had one since she was a kid didn’t mean anything. She was getting older. Bodies changed.

She found the tissues shoved in the back of the cabinet below the sink and wiped at her skin, wadding one up to staunch the rest. It would stop in a minute.

The tissue soaked up the blood. More kept coming. She felt an almost unbearable urge to blow her nose and get it all out so she could put an end to it and prove she was fine.

Instead she pinched her nose and made herself breathe through her mouth, long and slow, trying to calm her racing heart. That was only making things worse, probably. She had to calm down.

She was fine. She was.

Her nose still felt odd, but after a few minutes, she moved her fingers away to check.

Both nostrils were bleeding now. She watched the blood slide down and felt like she was going to throw up from the panic burning through her.

The drops hit her shirt, staining the white.

No. She just hadn’t waited long enough. She was okay. She’d sit it out and then clean up and wake up tomorrow with this moment already half-forgotten.

Ten minutes this time. She counted out the seconds, slow and measured, swiping at the blood that leaked out between her fingers. She could feel every pounding beat of her heart, counting out the seconds at double time.

It’s fine. You’re okay.

But she had nothing to distract herself with. Every moment of those ten minutes was filled with images of Rick’s body in the dorm room, Ashley standing over the sink at the party. It just won’t stop.

She pressed an arm over her stomach, telling herself she was only feeling her own panic and not poison shutting down her organs. She had to get a grip.

But when she reached six hundred and moved her hand away, she had to immediately grab another tissue.

It was still coming out. She could still feel warmth trickling down before it hit the tissue.

Dimly, like she was hearing it at great distance, a bang reached her ears. “Detective, I need to talk to you!”

It took a second to realize Lucifer was downstairs, calling for her. “Detective!”

She couldn’t move. She couldn’t think.

“Detective.” He burst into her bedroom. “Did you know? This whole bloody time, did you know?”

She looked up and saw him in the mirror. “Lucifer… something is wrong.” She lowered her hand and turned around. The urgent, almost angry expression on his face quickly dropped away as he took her in.

“It won’t stop,” she said.

She would never forget the sheer terror that spread across his face. “Detective,” he breathed.

“Lucifer… I think…”

She couldn’t finish. She just looked at him, pleadingly, desperately hoping he’d tell her she was being dramatic and that this wasn’t a big deal. There was no reason for him to be here, but he was, at the exact moment she needed him. He’d realize she was being silly in a second and scoff and hand her another tissue, then laugh later at how worked up she’d gotten. They’d go downstairs and have a glass of wine and maybe finally talk, and… and everything would be okay.

The next few seconds stretched on for forever as he stared back at her. He didn’t scoff or hand her a tissue or tell her she was fine.

He just grasped her wrist and pulled her out of the bathroom.

“Lucifer—” She had to press the tissue back against her nose.

“Hospital,” he said. “I’m taking you to the hospital.”

She didn’t argue. Most of her mind was still a blank mass of panic.

She was in the passenger seat of her car before she knew it, Lucifer starting to drive as fast as he possibly could, the sirens on. “You’ll be fine,” he said, glancing at her. “You’ll be okay.”

As much as she’d wanted him to say those words, it didn’t sound reassuring in the slightest. Not with the way he said them, tight and forceful and still full of fear. Like the words were a threat to the universe.

He thought she’d been poisoned, too.

She held the tissue up again automatically. It took her another minute to realize that tickling feeling had stopped. When she took the tissue away and touched her nose, she was met with only the blood that had started to dry. “Lucifer, the bleeding’s stopped,” she said. The relief of it broke through the haze of panic clouding her mind. There was another explanation. There had to be, because she hadn’t gotten one of those flu shots. She told Lucifer as much, and when he pointed out that Carlisle could have done it during their chase…

She lifted her shirt.

Saw the bruising rippling out from the neat little hole punched into her skin, so stark even in the limited light.

The soreness that she’d thought was just regular muscle soreness from the scuffle was in fact a death sentence, and she’d had no idea.

Why hadn’t she looked earlier? Why had she waited so long to change? Hours had passed already, hours they could have spent finding the antidote.

The confirmation that she’d been poisoned should have made her panic even more, but instead, it was like the last of it was pushed aside. An awful clarity was taking its place.

That was it, then. They had to find the antidote or else she was going to die.

She really might be dead this time tomorrow.

“We can’t go to the hospital…”

Present day

Chloe put an extra pair of ankle boots into the bag and then piled in jeans, a few basic shirts, and a set of pajamas. Having to pack was doing an excellent job of driving the worry away, annoyance rising back in place. She couldn’t believe she was doing this. Even gone he still managed to be a pain in the ass.

She was really dropping everything to go chase after him because she couldn’t help caring about him even now, and all the while, he probably was passed out somewhere with a hundred empty bottles and lines of coke as far as the eye could see. She would find him and dump him in the arms of his new possibly-a-stripper wife and tell him not to bother coming back.

And then she would be done. Done.

The lieutenant hadn’t been keen on her requesting an unspecified amount of time off, but when she’d mentioned why, he’d immediately told her not to worry about it and to let him know if she needed any help. Chloe had gotten the distinct impression that Lucifer had done something to win him over—what or when, she had no idea—and while she’d been grateful, it’d mostly just added to her annoyance.

So now here she was, packing for what she hoped would only be a short trip. She figured she’d get there this evening, find him within a day or so, and head back tomorrow night.

She went to the closet, eyes skimming over the end where she kept her dresses and more classy outfits. If she was going to be chasing after Lucifer in Vegas, she might end up needing one.

Selecting a simple black dress, she slipped it off the hanger and shoved it unceremoniously into the bag, not caring if it got wrinkled. There was no way she was going to put that much effort into her appearance.

“Where are you going with that dress?” Maze asked. Chloe glanced over her shoulder to see her standing in the doorway, arms crossed. “I’m surprised you even own one.”

She went back to find shoes that she could wear with it. “Vegas. Lucifer was reported missing and now I have to go find him. Did you know he was there?” She paused to look Maze directly in the eye, because she’d asked her before if she knew where Lucifer was, and Maze had said she didn’t.

Maze raised her brows a little, not looking like she was lying when she said, “No. I told you I didn’t. He really didn’t tell me he was leaving, either.”

Chloe believed her.

“You said he’s missing?” Maze asked, sounding more surprised than anything. “How could he be missing? He lives here and we already know he chose to leave. It makes no sense.”

“Yeah, well, he got married while he was out there and now his wife can’t get ahold of him either.” She slammed the shoes into the bag while Maze gaped at her.

“He did what?”

“You heard me.” She went into the bathroom, grabbing up a handful of basic toiletries and her makeup bag. “So either he also ditched her out of nowhere, or he got himself into trouble, and now it’s my problem.” She shoved those into the duffel, too, and then zipped it shut harder than she meant to. For a second she just stayed there with her hands planted on the bag, stomach churning all over again with a mix of anger and worry. She hated it. She hated that she couldn’t stop feeling when it came to Lucifer.

Maze moved further into the room, coming to stand next to her by the bed. “Look, whatever he’s doing, it’s not because he doesn’t care about you,” she said, far more gently than she usually spoke.

Chloe just shook her head. Maze of all people giving her pity would drive her over the edge. “He can’t care about me all that much, or else he wouldn’t have done any of this.”

“There are things going on you don’t understand.”

“Oh, I know there are,” she said, slinging the bag over her shoulder. “That’s the problem. He won’t talk to me, so I can’t understand. But it doesn’t matter, because I understand perfectly well that he decided it would be better to walk away instead of dealing with his feelings. Turns out I’m the one who’s not worth it, and you know what? That’s fine. Better to make that clear now instead of later.”

She headed out, Maze trailing after her. “You feel that way, but you’re still going after him?”

“Yeah. Unlike him, I won’t just ignore people who need me.”

“He’s the devil. He can’t have gotten into any serious trouble, not enough to be worried for him. Especially not when—” She stopped abruptly, glancing at Chloe before adding, “Never mind.”

Chloe so, so could not deal with devil talk right now. That’d also been Maze’s response when she’d overheard her leaving Lucifer another voicemail saying she was worried and to please call her back. “I know you think you’re both invincible and yeah, sure, you’ve got terrifyingly good ninja skills and Lucifer has a knack for getting himself out of trouble as much as he does into it, but it’s very possible that at some point he won’t be able to.”

They reached the kitchen, and Maze caught her arm. “Okay, okay, wait.”

Chloe stopped, trying not to be annoyed with her too. “What?”

“Give me a minute to get my knives. I’m coming with you.”

She blinked. “What?” she said again, much differently this time. “I thought you just said there was nothing to worry about.”

“Well, probably there isn’t, but you made a point that there’s no guarantee. His mom is still here as far as I know, but another one of his siblings could have decided to visit.”

Great. More about Lucifer’s mysterious mother and references to his family that no one ever wanted to fill her in on. She just hoped that this wasn’t more double talk about devils or angels or whatever.

“And besides, Lucifer getting married? It’s not like that happens every day. There’s no way I’m going to miss this. And, you know.” She shrugged a little. “I won’t let you face trouble on your own.”

Chloe just sighed. That was definitely about Maze wanting in on the action and not actually about her. Maze wouldn’t exactly be a comforting friend on this road trip, but she’d already proven how good she was at bounty hunting, and if that meant they found Lucifer faster, she wasn’t about to turn her down. “All right. Fine.”

Twenty minutes later they were making their way out of the city. Maze really had not been kidding about grabbing her knives; her bag was ninety percent weapons and ten percent leather clothes. They’d argued for a full three minutes about who would drive before Chloe had won out, saying Maze could come with her or not, but she wasn’t handing over the keys.

So Maze sat in the passenger seat now, just as fidgety as Lucifer often was, playing around with one of her favored curved daggers. “What exactly happened?” she asked.

Chloe told her about her conversation with Jay and the pictures she’d found online, which only prompted Maze to put her knife away and search for Candy’s page on her phone. “Wow,” she said, while Chloe worked to keep from grinding her teeth. First Dan, now Maze. She understood why, but still. “You really weren’t kidding.”

“No. I wasn’t. I’m assuming you don’t know who she is either?”

“Nope. I mean, she’s definitely his type, but…” Maze let out a low whistle. “Just not his type for something like this. I didn’t think anyone was.”

“Yeah, well, I guess we were both wrong about that, weren’t we?”

“Anything else?” Maze asked. “I’ll go through these pictures, but I don’t think it’ll tell me much. I track down criminals, not glitzy Vegas showgirls.”

“She’s not a showgirl,” Chloe said, and told her what she’d found out about Candy.

When she was done, Maze just shook her head. “We’ll see when we get there.”

“Do you really think Lucifer’s family might be involved?”

She considered for a moment. “No, I don’t, but you never know.”

“I don’t suppose you’ll tell me the truth about them? Or how you actually got to know him?”

“No,” Maze said again. “He wouldn’t want you to know, and right now I wouldn’t want to tell you either. You’d just end up crashing the car and spending at least a week freaking out, and I’m really not in the mood to deal with that.”

Sure. Of course. Made perfect sense. “I wouldn’t crash the car.”

“Yes, you would. I tell you the truth, you say you don’t believe me, I give you proof, you lose your mind. That’s just how it works with humans.”

So they were right back to this whole devil thing. Chloe didn’t know why she’d expected anything less. “Fine. Don’t tell me. If it turns out they are involved, I’ll find out anyway.”

“Let’s hope they’re not,” she said, an edge to her voice.

Chloe had thought over Lucifer’s family again and again, wondering who they were and what they’d done to him. She knew they were terrible people who’d hurt him, badly enough for Lucifer to adopt the devil persona at all. Likely wealthy and powerful. And she knew he still considered them a threat, with how much he brought them up. But she had no idea what they would try to do with him. It would only make it harder for her to deal with this mess if they were involved.

Maze was never one to chat for long, and she ended up trying to take over the music before Chloe made her put her headphones in. It left her effectively alone with her own thoughts again. They hit the open desert after a while, and the clear blue sky and long stretch of dusty scrub in all directions only worked to rub the edge off her worry and lingering anger. Frustration rose up in its place—with Lucifer, but mostly with herself.

Getting married like that had to be about her. She didn’t know exactly what had been going through his mind, but there was simply no way it was pure coincidence that he’d done something like that right after they’d almost started something themselves. He hadn’t been able to handle one little conversation about feelings, so he’d gone off and dramatically married someone he couldn’t possibly care about to… to send a message or something, to one or both of them.

He might as well have planted a steel wall between them. If he’d been planning to come back, it would guarantee there was no chance they’d talk about their feelings again. And if he’d been planning to stay away, it would just be a reminder to himself that that nightmare was over and done with.

And Chloe couldn’t help feeling like this was ultimately all her fault.

None of this would be happening if she hadn’t kissed him. She’d thought Lucifer backing off was his way of saying that he wanted better for her, nothing more, but that wasn’t the truth of it. If he hadn’t literally meant those things about not being worthy, then it had to have been about not being ready for anything else between them. But she’d forced it anyway and then one thing had led to another and now here they were.

She shouldn’t have kissed him. She should have understood that there was a reason he hadn’t reciprocated any of her attempts at starting something the day after. And she shouldn’t have brought up talking about their feelings when he hadn’t had a chance to process anything that’d happened recently.

Mile after mile passed under the wheels without the scenery ever really changing. After another hour, Maze dozed off, turned slightly to the window, eyes closed. There was nothing to distract Chloe from thinking about it again and again. From remembering how it’d felt to go to his penthouse and realize just how much she’d fooled herself. How little she’d meant to him, after all.

He’d saved her life. They’d gone through countless moments of danger before. She’d trusted him to always have her back, to come through for her when she needed him. Again and again he’d lifted her up when others kept trying to shove her down. He’d become her friend, her confidante, the person she turned to for comfort.

And then he’d walked away like it hadn’t meant anything to him. He couldn’t even be bothered to tell her he was done.

It hurt. It just hurt, so much that sometimes she felt sick from it. Like now. That pit in her stomach was back, a gaping wound that sucked everything down, making her want to curl in on herself. Her head felt so heavy, heat pricking her eyes again despite her best efforts not to let it. Tears fell and she brushed them away impatiently, even though Maze wasn’t awake to see.

She didn’t want to cry over him again.

But the truth was that he’d worked his way past all her defenses and then cut her like a knife, and she couldn’t not feel that pain.

He was her partner. After separating from Dan, after Palmetto Street, throughout her investigation into Malcolm later, he’d been there for her. He’d shown her that she wasn’t alone. She’d really thought he was different, that despite all the missteps and acting like he didn’t care, he cared about her more than anyone else did.

She’d gotten used to the idea that others would end up hurting her, but not Lucifer. Not like this.

In the end, he’d discarded her like he did his other conquests and then gotten married to rub it in her face. And she was left the fool for allowing it to happen.

She should have known better; it wasn’t like all the signs weren’t there. She’d let herself be convinced that she knew who he truly was under the surface, that he’d be different with her. She’d taken that risk and now she had no one to blame but herself for how hurt she was.

It was her fault for opening up that much in the first place. Her fault for pushing him into something he didn’t want. Her fault for thinking she was special.

Maybe Maze was right and he did care about her—there was too much evidence to deny it—but there were limits, and she should have accepted that. But she hadn’t, and now she’d lost her best friend because of it.

If Lucifer was in trouble and he’d only run to Vegas because of her, it would just make her feel worse. Telling herself he’d made his own choices didn’t help.

So she truly did hope that her and Maze’s first impressions were right.

Maybe she should just tell him to go back to LA instead of telling him to stay gone. Make it clear that she wouldn’t bother him again, that he could go back to partying at Lux without worrying that she’d call or show up. It was a big city, and it wasn’t like there was a lot of overlap in the rest of their lives. She’d tell him she wouldn’t ask about him from Maze and that would be that. They never had to see each other again.

Chloe would be on her own no matter what, so he might as well go home, assuming Candy would follow and that he didn’t truly want to make Vegas his home now.

And then Chloe could finally work on piecing herself back together without wondering where he was or if he’d show up again.

It was better this way. Really.

Five days ago

There were dozens of businesses centered on Vegas weddings. It wasn’t hard to find a place for them to take a few pictures, surrounded by flowers and champagne flutes and tacky streamers. A photographer snapped some of them getting cozy and holding out their rings, while Candy acted like a ditzy bimbo once again.

And then they went out to a fountain nearby to take selfies, too. The whole thing had been Candy’s idea, and it was a sound one; even if no one he knew would see the pictures right away, odds were good at least one person would look her up when they found out. It would sell their story and distract people into not looking too hard at the kind of person Candy was.

Lucifer managed to laugh and charm the staff and down champagne with as much gusto as he ever did. Like everything else around them, though, it was all fake. Bright smiles and loud remarks to draw attention and make them believe what he wanted them to believe. Take away that flashy cover, and there was a very different story underneath.

He didn’t feel like himself at all. This should have been exactly his kind of scene, but he didn’t care for it now; he had to force himself to act the way he normally would, a vague sense of wrongness churning in his stomach the whole time.

Better get used to it, he supposed. He’d have to keep this up all all the time when he returned, whether Candy was around or not.

The knowledge just made it that much harder to keep a smile in place.

When they were done, they returned to Fletcher’s to celebrate with a round of drinks. Even beyond the ruse, Candy seemed happy enough as she introduced him to some of the staff, including the bartender who’d first told him about her, who gave him an odd look at the news. “I see you two hit it off,” he said.

“Of course, we did,” Lucifer said, circling his arm around her waist. “It’s very rare for anyone to resist my stunning good looks.”

Which, of course, only made him think of Chloe even more. How he’d thought she would never fall for him at all, how he’d started to get used to the idea that she actually saw him instead of what he could give her. And how it’d turned out that she was the one person who never could turn him away.

He was helping himself to another round of scotch when he felt his phone vibrate in his pocket. Undoubtedly the detective again, or someone else asking where he was. Maze had stopped bothering pretty quickly, but Amenadiel, Mum, and Linda were incessant. At least Linda actually asked if he was okay instead of just berating him.

He thought to ignore it, but the idea that Chloe was texting him again was too much to ignore. The need to know what she’d said consumed him bit by bit.

Every other text had hurt as though it were a physical blow—the way she obviously cared about him, how she kept wanting to see him, all without knowing she shouldn’t.

This one wouldn’t be any different, but he still had to know. Maybe now that he’d found a way to hopefully still be partners, it wouldn’t be so hard to see.

So he pulled out his phone and read the text.

He couldn’t have been more wrong.

Fine. Message received. I won’t bother you anymore.

Lucifer just stared at it, his stomach twisting like he’d drunk a whole bottle of scotch at once. People moved around him, but they suddenly felt too far away to be of any importance; the steady cadence of conversation and glassware being moved and the music overhead became muted, barely registering with him. He might as well have been entirely alone.

I won’t bother you anymore.

It might not even matter if he returned home now. She didn’t want anything to do with him. She’d given up on him, like everyone else.

It wasn’t fair of him to think that, he knew it—he’d been ignoring her for weeks, so it wasn’t like she hadn’t tried. But it hurt all the same.

This really was quite the ingenious punishment, a trap that he’d blindly walked into and now couldn’t escape. There was no direction he could turn that wouldn’t hurt. Whether he’d stayed or gone, whether he returned or not, whether Chloe treated him warmly or didn’t talk to him at all—it didn’t matter. There was no avoiding it. The only question was what form the pain would take.

A touch on his arm finally broke through to him. He looked up, the noise of the bar rushing back over him. “Lucifer?” Candy asked. “Are you okay?”

He put his phone away. He couldn’t lie, and he didn’t want to go over it with her, not now that she was already doing him such a big favor. Every time he looked at her tonight, he’d think of that text. “I need some air,” he said. “I’ll be back later.”

“Oh,” she said, letting her hand fall away. “Yeah, okay. I’ll be here.”

He nodded and left, feeling her eyes on him the entire way out the door.

Being outside helped, a little; the night air hit his face, making him feel a little less trapped. But it also made everything clear to him in a way he didn’t want.

He started walking in a random direction and picked a tacky little joint with a theme of the sea. Mermaid imagery was everywhere, hot women in skimpy bikini tops, and he suspected that the wait staff were meant to be sexy pirates. He barely noticed; he just went straight to the bar and ordered the strongest whiskey they had, then told them to leave the bottle.

Sometimes when he drank enough of it at once, he felt a little buzzed. At the very least, he could concentrate on the feel of it burning its way down his throat. So he tossed back one drink and then steadily worked his way through another, trying to focus on the whiskey, on the decor, on anything that wasn’t Chloe.

He failed miserably.

I won’t bother you anymore.

Did she even mean it? Could she mean it? Maybe she was angry now, but if he went back, would that all go away? Would she just forgive him like she’d forgiven every other thing he’d done wrong in their partnership, all because she had no choice?

He suspected the answer was yes, and that only made it worse.

Maybe he shouldn’t go back at all.

But that option hurt even more just thinking about it. All he could do was choose the path that had the least amount of pain, so…

If he went back, and made it clear that he wasn’t interested in being anything more than partners, then it could still work. Maybe she’d always have feelings for him, but she could move on and be happy with someone else. He could maintain that distance; he could. And there was no way he could ever tell her the truth of who he was now. Knowing that she was a pawn of his father’s would only hurt her even more.

It was too late for him, but he could spare her that. He would carry this alone.

His third glass gone, and he was beginning to think that maybe this whiskey was even stronger than he’d initially thought. He felt warm all over, and even though that pain was still there, it seemed manageable enough. He’d learned to live with other pain; what was one more?

A fourth, and he had the funny thought that maybe he was actually getting drunk.

It should have been ridiculous; it usually took a lot more than this for him to feel intoxicated. But the glass in front of him was starting to blur, and when he reached for the bottle again, he almost knocked it over. His thoughts were becoming fuzzy, too, like it was taking twice as long to actually work through any of them.

Huh. The only times alcohol had had this strong an effect on him, it’d been when he’d been drinking around Chloe. And even then, he’d never actually gotten drunk—he’d never felt the need to. But he’d long since wondered if he could, with her there—

It finally clicked that being drunk like this now meant she must be there.

“Detective?” he said, looking around. His heart was pounding with the anticipation of seeing her again. Where was she? Why was she here? How had she found him, out of all the places he could be?

It didn’t matter. It only mattered that she was there.

But he didn’t see her at the bar, or any of the surrounding tables. “Detective?” he said again, getting to his feet. He took off, searching for her. The whiskey was now having the downside of making that task slightly harder—it took more effort to concentrate, and he stumbled on occasion, as if the floor were trying to trip him up.

“Detective?” he called, pushing his way through a knot of people at the back. He couldn’t find her anywhere.

On and on he looked, until he had to accept that she wasn’t in the bar. He stepped outside, eyes landing on every single person passing by, but no luck; none of them were Chloe.

Maybe she’d just left. Maybe…

He started walking down the street, pushing by people as fast as he could. Until he really did trip over something on the sidewalk and careened into the wall of the building.

He thought to keep going, but what was the point? She hadn’t been in the bar, and she wasn’t on the street, either.

He didn’t know what was happening to him, but one thing was clear: Chloe simply wasn’t there.

Of course, she wasn’t.

I won’t bother you anymore.

“Are you okay, dude?” someone asked him. His face blurred in Lucifer’s line of sight.

“No,” he answered. No, he wasn’t. He was the furthest thing from okay.

Chapter Text

Three weeks ago

Lying in that hospital bed was the worst thing she’d ever gone through.

Getting through her dad’s death had had nothing on the fear that she was about to abandon her own daughter. Getting shot had been nothing but a blur; she’d woken up knowing she would be fine in what had felt like no time at all. Trixie getting kidnapped, facing Malcolm thinking she’d die by his hand—she’d had no time to dwell on it, and she would sacrifice herself for her daughter without hesitation.

This was different.

There was no one to save but her, the fight waged entirely within her own body, the crisis involving her and her alone. She couldn’t even do anything to help anymore. She had to just lie there and wait to see if her friends would be able to solve it for her while her body slowly and surely lost that fight, bit by bit. The doctors could only do so much.

Wait, and wait, and wait, the seconds both passing by at a trickle and roaring past her far too quickly.

When Dan came back from the one lead they had, Lucifer nowhere to be seen, she knew they were out of ideas. There was no hope left, but she managed to cling to a thin tendril of it anyway. It was almost cruel.

Because deep down, she knew that she wasn’t going to live to see another day.

She tried to be brave, to shove that fear and helplessness down so she could put up a strong front for everyone else. She couldn’t let them see how scared she was—even then, she wanted to help them with their own difficulties, and she didn’t want that to be the last memories they had of her. A crying, panicked mess, every bit of her true feelings on full display. She didn’t want them to know how much she’d be suffering before the end.

And she needed to do it for herself, too, for that same reason. If she gave in to those feelings, she would crumble, and she didn’t want that to be the last few hours of her life.

So she laid there and smiled and tried not to think that these really were the last hours she’d ever get. She held her daughter, who didn’t even know how bad it was, and tried not to say goodbye. Tried not to think that it might be the last time she ever got to hold Trixie in her arms. Trixie, who she’d held as a baby, who she’d watched grow up into this amazing little kid, who she might never see as an adult.

And she always, desperately, tried not to fall asleep. She didn’t want to miss out on a single second.

But she couldn’t help it. Weakness kept pulling at her, body and mind both. The poison hurt, despite the painkillers. It was the pain of her body breaking down, something so wrong twisting her insides. It steadily got worse, and trying not to let on how bad it was only made her more exhausted. Between that and everything she was feeling and trying not to feel, she was wiped out. Eventually she did lose her grip on consciousness.

She half-surfaced a few times, each one worse than the last. The pain was everywhere, her thoughts a fog of confusion, but the fear remained, impossible to control anymore. She was dying. The one thing she knew for certain.

Until she blinked up in a haze at the ceiling of her hospital room, the pain still there, but muted now. She felt so heavy. And a nurse told her, “It’s working. The antidote is working. Hang in there, dear. You’ll be okay.”

Chloe didn’t believe her. It had to be a figment of her imagination.

But then she saw someone standing at the doorway. Lucifer, her mind supplied, too slowly. He was out of focus, but she would know him anywhere. She blinked and realized he was looking back at her, and there was something about his expression that was all too real and raw and comforting, despite the roughness to it. He inclined his head, just as her eyes started closing again.

She hadn’t trusted it before, but she trusted him.

She really was going to be okay.

It was a while before Chloe woke up and knew that this time was different, that she would actually be awake for more than a few minutes. She was still tired, still achy, but she felt like she was surfacing from a long nap, everything quiet in a good way.

It was late afternoon, the setting sun slanting in through the windows. Lucifer was there. She’d been told at some point that he’d come up with the formula, somehow.

Every single time her back was to the wall, he came through for her. She’d thought it was over, but he’d found a way. She felt so much gratitude for this man who’d swept into her life and changed it for the better.

She was tired of pretending she didn’t have other feelings for him, too. She was tired of the games. They’d gotten a second chance to explore what they had between them, and she didn’t want to waste it. So she asked to talk to him later. When she was recovered enough to go home, she wanted to truly talk, the way they almost never did. With everything he’d done for her the past twenty-four hours, with the way he’d been looking at her that entire time… he had to feel the same way she did, at least a little. He didn’t do relationships, but maybe he’d be willing to try.

She was so happy to be alive, so full of hope for the future she might get, that she missed the fact that he never actually agreed to talk later. She missed the way his last smile didn’t meet his eyes. And she never for a second thought that it would be three weeks before she saw him again, bruised and bloody and full of pain that had nothing to do with his body.

Present day

Night fell when they were still an hour outside Vegas. They stopped briefly for food and drinks—coffee for Chloe and a cherry slushy for Maze. Chloe wasn’t all that hungry, her stomach still churning from grief and anticipation over how the rest of the night would go, but she made herself eat a sandwich anyway. She doubted they’d be lingering over food later.

The coffee, though, might have been a mistake. She’d thought she’d need the caffeine to stay up tonight, but she was too jittery as she wound through the streets leading to the Strip, heading right for the station Jay worked at. Being here now made it feel real in a way it hadn’t before. Lucifer was here somewhere, and she was sure she wouldn’t like anything she found while looking for him.

It’s just another case, she told herself. Do your job and go home.

If only.

They were nearly there when Maze said out of nowhere, “I think maybe you have a point.”

“What?” Chloe asked, thrown out of her own thoughts. They hadn’t spoken in a while; Maze had taken to watching through the windows with a sharp eye, as if she was already analyzing where to start their search. “I didn’t say anything.”

“Not now. Before. About us not telling you the truth.”

Oh. That. She’d gotten so used to being dismissed, she’d never thought Maze would bring it up again.

“I think it’s time you know,” Maze went on. “You’re in this mess whether he wants you to be or not. So when we get back… I’ll tell you everything.”

Chloe glanced at her. “Okay,” she said, still surprised. Maze wasn’t exactly the most considerate person ever, but she had to have been thinking about her at least a little during the drive over. And she’d actually decided to let her in on things, even if she wouldn’t do it now.

Maybe Chloe wouldn’t be entirely alone when she went home. She’d thought Maze was only here for the entertainment, but… she was still here, helping Chloe in the only way she knew how. Her roommate was the weirdest friend she’d ever had, but more and more Chloe did consider her a friend, and she didn’t want to be dismissive of her either.

Saying any of that would only result in being told not to get all touchy-feely on her, so she didn’t say anything. But she did feel a little better as they pulled into the parking lot.

“Finally,” Maze said, cracking her neck. “Do we really have to bother with this guy, though? You said he didn’t know anything.”

“Yeah. Five minutes, Maze. You can deal.”

“Fine,” she grumbled. “Five minutes, then you follow my lead.”

“No,” Chloe said firmly as they got out of the car. “We work this out together.”

“I’m the bounty hunter here. I know what I’m doing.”

She wasn’t about to argue with that, but that wasn’t the point. “I know, and I’ll listen, but you need to listen to me, too.”

Maze made a noncommittal noise that Chloe decided to take as grudging assent. They’d worked on cases together before; they knew what to expect from each other, even if Maze wasn’t happy about everything.

Chloe had called Jay earlier to tell him she was coming. It only took a moment for him to find them after they checked in. “Hey,” he said, holding out his hand. “Jay Wong. And…?” He looked at Maze.

“Mazikeen,” she said curtly, arms remaining crossed.

Chloe said, “She’s a bounty hunter. She’s good at finding people.”

“All right, then.” Jay led them over to his desk. “You said you didn’t know anything about this investigation, but you think you can help?”

“Yeah. I do.”

“Fine by me.” They got to his desk, and he went around to the other side. Flipping open a folder, he said, “I don’t know much, either. So any insight you have would be great.”

He went over what information he did have. According to Candy, they’d been at her family’s bar when Lucifer said he was going out on his own for a bit. He’d done that a few times before, so she didn’t think anything of it at first. But then he didn’t return that night, or the next morning. When a full day had gone by and he still hadn’t answered any of her calls or texts, she got worried and called the police.

“She thought it might have been an issue with a loan shark. Apparently Lucifer paid off a large debt to them recently, on her behalf. We managed to talk to the loan shark in question, but I don’t think he had anything to do with it—he seemed to like Lucifer, and there’s no reason to go after him. This isn’t how you squeeze money out of people, and there’s been no ransom request. Candy would’ve been the better target.”

Chloe nodded, sharing a surprised glance with Maze. A loan shark? Lucifer paying off a debt? That didn’t really fit her idea of him out here having the greatest time of his life, not a care in the world. Though maybe he’d been too drunk on whatever had possessed him to marry Candy to care, and had paid them off like he was tipping a waiter.

“We checked out the places Candy told us he might have gone, but no one’s seen him. His phone is most likely turned off—we tracked it to his last known location, another bar a few blocks away. Someone there remembered him, but said he left on his own after a few drinks. She didn’t see anything to indicate there was a problem. Security footage shows him leaving, and then he doesn’t appear on anything again from what I’ve been able to find.”

Chloe blew out a breath. Drinking alone at another bar instead of enjoying Candy’s company—or someone else’s—didn’t sound like him, either. And that one, she couldn’t fit into the narrative she’d been painting. Either the one with him partying away or the one with him getting into trouble.

Jay went on, “I also haven’t been able to find any use of credit cards or other bank activity, but then, with how wealthy he is, that might not mean much. It would take a long time to go through all his information, and there could be hidden accounts.”

“Don’t bother,” Maze said. “I mean, yes, that’s true, but he also pays in cash more than anything.”

Chloe realized just how accurate that was; she didn’t think she’d ever seen Lucifer pull out a credit card before, and he always seemed to walk around with hundreds of dollars in cash at any given time. She guessed Maze would know a lot about his finances, too, from when she used to run them.

Jay nodded. “That’s what the bartender said as well, and he paid cash to the loan shark. I have to ask—is he involved in any illegal activity that might have caught up with him here?” He seemed to have gotten Maze’s measure pretty quickly, because that question was addressed to her.

“Illegal activity, sure, that’s pretty much a given,” Maze said. “Just not the kind you’re thinking. The only trouble that would catch up with him isn’t the human kind.”

Jay raised his brows, probably reconsidering whether or not he should be trusting Maze with anything. “The human kind,” he repeated. “What kind of trouble would catch up with him, then?”

“Nothing,” Chloe said, before Maze could start going on about angel assassins or something. If she wouldn’t directly tell Chloe whatever secrets they were hiding yet, she certainly wasn’t about to tell Jay. “Nothing of his doing, anyway.” That, she was sure of. “He’s made a lot of enemies working with me, and he runs a network of favors that sometimes attracts people you’d consider… unsavory. He mostly just connects people, though.”

She’d already wondered if maybe that had something to do with it, but it didn’t make sense to her. Little though she knew of all his deals, from what she had seen, he managed to toe the line in doing anything that would make people want to target him. Like with everyone else, the people he broke the law with were taken in by him, too. And though he’d helped her arrest plenty of people by now, that didn’t make sense, either. Not with this happening in Vegas in a way that didn’t leave a trace.

“Anything you can think of in particular?” Jay asked.

“No.”

“Does he know anyone else who lives here?”

Chloe looked at Maze for that. She had no idea.

Maze shrugged. “A few. Two people own businesses on the Strip because of him, he’s friends with someone who runs a restaurant that has great cannolis—we should check it out while we’re here, Chloe, and you could use a good drink besides—and there’s a musician he usually meets up with. Evan or Ethan or something. There’s no way he’d hurt Lucifer, though. He’s way too soft.”

“And the others?” Jay asked. “What are their names?”

“I don’t know. I never cared enough to learn them. I’ll track them down if I have to, though, no worries.”

Jay didn’t look convinced. At Maze being able to track them or at her saying no worries, Chloe wasn’t sure.

She’d had no idea that Lucifer frequented Vegas that much. Was it part of his past he wouldn’t share? Or did he just drive up whenever he felt like it, during some of those times she didn’t see him for a while?

“Oh, and there’s Jamie, of course,” Maze said. “She runs the house for him. But she definitely wouldn’t hurt Lucifer.”

“The house?” Chloe asked, the implications hitting her all at once. “Lucifer’s house?”

Maze gave her a look that said well, duh. “Yeah. Obviously he doesn’t use it most of the time, so Jamie manages it for him.”

She didn’t know why it was so surprising, but it was. She knew he owned multiple properties in LA; she should have guessed there were others. Somehow, though, she hadn’t thought of it, and now it just made her wonder yet again how much she really knew him.

Was that where he’d been staying the last few weeks? Was that where she’d find Candy now, too?

Where else did he own properties? For Maze not to have assumed he’d come here, there must be other places he was just as familiar with.

Chloe had long since given up on Lucifer telling her anything about his past, had thought it didn’t matter, but standing here now, it suddenly did. Especially since this couldn’t have anything to do with the parts he painted over in metaphors. She felt like she’d been hit all over again, a dull blow that barely held up to the rest she’d been receiving lately. Disappointment anew at how little he cared to let her in.

Jay said, “We already checked it out. According to Jamie, he hasn’t been by in two years. He didn’t contact her either.”

Two years. Before she’d met him.

At least there was that, she guessed. Not that it mattered anymore. “Where was he staying, then?”

“According to Candy, he had a room at the Bellagio that he returned to at night. We talked to them as well. There’s no sign he went back after Candy last saw him.”

“Wait, he’d go back at night? Alone?”

“Yeah. I asked about that, too. Candy just said he wasn’t interested in moving in with her.”

Even more strange. She could see him balking at moving in, but there was a difference between that and not sleeping with his wife at night.

They headed out shortly after. “Keep in touch,” Jay told her. “Let me know if you find anything.”

“Sure,” she said. “Same with you.”

When they were back outside, Maze said, “Well, it seems that side trip wasn’t entirely useless. Candy might be a little interesting after all.”

“Maybe. More importantly, we have his last known location. There might be something Jay missed.”

“Sure, yeah. But we’re going to talk to Candy first, right?”

Chloe sighed. She still couldn’t decide if she wanted to meet her or not. But logically, it was their best next move. “Yes.”

Three days ago

Lucifer sat in some random bar a few blocks away from Fletcher’s, idly twisting the glass of scotch in front of him. He couldn’t recall the name of the bar; it wasn’t important where he was, so long as he was alone.

Candy’s company was welcome, but just like the day before, when the sun had slipped over the horizon, it seemed to drag his mood along with him. He ended up craving solitude. Here, there were no expectations of him. He didn’t have to pretend he was more okay than he was. He could just stare into the amber liquid and let his thoughts drown him. They were always so heavy these days, and holding them back wore on him.

At least this was the last night he’d be here. Tomorrow he would be heading back to Los Angeles along with Candy, to put the rest of their plans into motion and see what he might be able to salvage of his life there. It would be downright foolish to think he could have it all back—the whole point of his marriage was that he wouldn’t—but he hoped he might be able to keep a little more than he maybe should, despite Chloe telling him she was done.

She still needed a partner, and he could be useful to her. There wouldn’t be so much harm in that, would it? He would keep helping her find those needing to be punished, and that would be that. Nothing more.

She would be free to live the rest of her life without him, as it always should have been.

Lucifer drained the last of the scotch and asked for another. It wasn’t stellar, but it wasn’t awful, either. A line of warmth followed the liquid, pooling in his stomach, making the night seem a little brighter than before. He blinked at the bar and realized that his vision wasn’t quite as steady as it should have been. It skipped a little from point to point, while little halos of light surrounded reflections off the glasses.

It was vaguely interesting to him. A few shots and one glass of scotch in, and already he seemed to be on his way to getting drunk again. This was the third night in a row that he’d experienced the sensation, and he still wasn’t used to feeling it after so little alcohol.

He had no idea what’d changed, and he didn’t really care. All he could think about at the moment was how he’d be seeing Chloe again tomorrow. He craved and dreaded it at the same time; he missed her, he missed working with her, he missed talking to her, but he also knew that their partnership would never be the same. He didn’t think he’d ever be able to look at her and not be reminded of the fact that she only existed to punish him.

He should leave her alone entirely. But the thought of never seeing her again…

He just couldn’t do it. He’d always thought himself strong, but he wasn’t strong enough to walk away for good. He hadn’t even lasted a month before he was already formulating a way to get back to her where they would both be protected from his parents’ schemes.

Their partnership at work would have to be enough. It’d been enough before; if he waited long enough, surely it would be again. He’d stop wishing for anything more and be able to go back to his old habits. If this ability to get drunk continued, then it might not even take that long.

Halfway through the second glass, he pulled out his phone. It opened onto the same screen he’d been looking at last night, and the night before: his texts with Chloe. Or rather, her texts to him. There was a long string of them, starting from the day after he’d left her at the hospital.

Hey, are you coming over today?

Ugh, recovering is almost worse than the poison

Send help. My mom showed up today. If you were here I’d be stealing your flask right about now

I know hospitals are more boring than Lux, but I was hoping to see you soon…

Is something wrong?

Hope you’re okay…

I’m getting released tomorrow, can I stop by?

I’m home now, but it’ll be another week before I’m cleared for work. If that’s what you’re waiting for

But if you did want to drop by, I won’t try to corner you or something. Just so you know

Lucifer, I’m really getting worried. Please just let me know you’re okay?

I’m coming over

I saw the penthouse. I guess now I know why I haven’t seen you. But are you seriously not going to talk to me at all? Why wouldn’t you tell me you left?

Why did you leave?

Look, if something is wrong, if I did something wrong, could you please just tell me?

I’m still worried that I haven’t heard from you at all. I just want to know that you’re okay…

He stopped reading them before he got to the last one.

He’d had to resist reaching out to her every single night, especially when he’d realized she thought she’d done something to make him want to leave. As if any of this was her fault. She shouldn’t blame herself, but what could he possibly tell her in response to that? She’d never believe the truth, and without it, all that was left was her.

Better to just let his ring do the talking and hope they could skip any conversation about it. Go back to being partners like nothing had ever happened.

He hated it, so much.

“Hey there,” someone said next to him. He glanced over to see a middle-aged woman leaning against the bar, dressed up and giving him a look he knew all too well. “Need someone to drink with?”

“No, thank you,” he said bluntly. “Not in the mood.”

Her smile faltered. “Okay, well, if you change your mind, we’re just over there.” She gestured to the other side of the room. When he didn’t say anything else, she walked away.

It never ended. The annoyance over it was another thing he wasn’t used to; that fact of his life had never been an issue before. Well, mostly never. Except with Jana…

Remembering that moment on the balcony had him reaching for the glass again, only to find it already empty. He asked for another.

The bar around him seemed to smooth out along the edges as he consumed the third one. It was hard to see the texts anymore. Good. He turned the phone off entirely, so he wouldn’t be tempted to look again, and put it away. Instead he closed his eyes and listened to the music coming from the corner of the bar. If only there was a piano, he might have tried playing it for himself.

But there wasn’t one, and he was growing tired of this place. He wanted something different. What, he didn’t know; he just knew that he wouldn’t find it here.

“Can I get you anything else?” the bartender asked.

“No. Here.” He tossed down a bunch of cash without bothering to count it out. “Is that enough?”

“Um, yeah,” she said, flicking through the bills. “More than enough.” She began putting some back down. “It was only—”

He waved her off and stood, noting dimly that the room was dipping around him. “Keep it. I don’t care.”

“Sir—”

But he was already halfway to the door.

Perhaps he’d just head back to Fletcher’s and wait for Candy to be done for the night. As much as he’d wanted to be alone earlier, now it felt suddenly unbearable. At least there was one person he could talk to who viewed him as a friend, with nothing making things complicated.

He snorted to himself as he headed down the street. It just showed how screwed up his life was when getting married to someone he hardly knew didn’t count as a complicated relationship.

Someone knocked into him. Or maybe he’d knocked into them; it was hard to tell. He stumbled back a step as the guy said, “Sorry, man. You okay?”

Lucifer eyed him for a second, but it wasn’t worth getting into anything. “Fine,” he said, and made to keep walking.

But the man stepped into his path. “You seem a little intoxicated.”

“Yes. Odd, isn’t it? I’m quite unused to the feeling.”

He tried to go around, but the man blocked his way again. “I thought it took more than a few glasses of whiskey for the devil to get drunk.”

Lucifer frowned. Something was off about this encounter. Why did this stranger care? “Normally it would,” he said slowly, the words feeling weird on his tongue. “It’s ironic, how little tolerance I have, considering I drink gallons of the stuff every week. However, I don’t see how it’s any of your business.”

The man shook his head and pulled out a phone. “That guy really is crazy,” he said. “You’re just another man getting wasted in Vegas. This’ll be an easy job.”

“I’m not just another man,” Lucifer said, and then he finally realized what was wrong with this conversation. “How do you know I’m the devil? I don’t remember introducing myself.”

“Bring it around,” the guy said into the phone, and hung up. “Sorry. You probably don’t deserve what’s coming to you, but I’m not getting paid to care.”

Irritation was working its way through him. “What are you talking about?” he said, with as much authority as he could. He took a step forward, reaching for him.

The man swung his arm around. Lucifer shoved him into the nearest wall just as something pricked the base of his neck. “What the hell—”

He glanced to the side to see the guy pulling a syringe away. An empty one.

“What did you just do?” he growled, the alcohol seeming to burn away fast. “Who are you?”

The man just watched him. Lucifer shook him a little. “If you don’t want to find out just how stupid assaulting the devil is, you’ll—”

He blinked, a flash of light-headedness hitting him.

“You’ll…”

The man split in two. Lucifer suddenly wasn’t sure he was even standing anymore. He couldn’t feel his feet.

“What…”

“Yep. Way easier than expected.”

Apparently he had still been standing, because the next thing he knew, his knees were slamming into the sidewalk. He tried to get to his feet, to reach up and throttle the guy, but nothing happened; his body wasn’t responding to him the way it should. “You’re going to regret this,” he said, the words sounding even more slurred than they had a few minutes ago.

“I don’t think so.”

Rough hands gripped him from behind. There was more than one person in on this.

But Lucifer never got to see who was dragging him away. Blackness crowded his vision, and then he wasn’t aware of anything at all.

Chapter Text

Three weeks ago

Chloe fell asleep only an hour after Lucifer left, Trixie on the bed with her again, but the atmosphere couldn’t have been more different. She wasn’t afraid to let go this time.

The next morning, just before Dan brought Trixie back, Chloe texted Lucifer. She’d woken up just as relieved to still be alive, and thought of him almost immediately. Hey, are you coming over today?

She waited a few minutes, but he didn’t answer. Probably he was still asleep or busy getting dressed or something. He’d had a long day yesterday, too, and he needed the rest. So she put her phone away when Trixie rushed into the room.

She kept falling back asleep without meaning to, still worn out. Once when she was alone for a while, she dreamed of being far away in darkness, her friends frantically shouting for her. One voice stuck out to her, a voice she knew well. Detective. Please. Don’t go…

The voices started fading as other sounds from the hospital reached her instead. Her fingers stretched out on the mattress as she woke, seeking a hand that wasn’t there. A different sort of ache hit her as she opened her eyes and saw the empty chair.

It wasn’t until late that afternoon when Dan and Trixie left to get dinner, promising to be back again tomorrow, that Chloe checked her phone again. Of all the messages she had, none of them were from Lucifer. No texts. No missed calls. And he hadn’t come by at all.

She frowned, but figured he really must be exhausted. He’d probably show up tomorrow with a bottle of scotch and plenty of suggestions for how to improve the dreary hospital room, most of them questionable and all of them fun to hear, whether she admitted it or not.

She was moved to a different room now that she was out of the woods. It didn’t stop the endless poking and prodding and check-ins the next day as they monitored her improvement and ran tests to see if there would be any lasting damage. All signs were good. While the poison had done a number on her before they got the antidote, they were things that could be fixed. Her belly still hurt and she had no appetite, but she was able to handle a few bites of bland food. She was still falling asleep throughout the day, but scans of her head were clear, with no indications she’d continue to have seizures. It was just going to take time to heal.

The next morning after a doctor saw to her, she texted Lucifer again, hoping to give him a subtle nudge. Ugh, recovering is almost worse than the poison

Nothing. No response. She hadn’t heard a word from him yet.

His absence was even more noteworthy by the fact that Dan had told her mom she was in the hospital, prompting her to fly back to LA from where she’d been at some sort of event in Atlanta. Her mom fussed over her for a while and then settled in to talk, and while Chloe was glad to see her for once, by nightfall she had to pretend to fall asleep again so she could get a few moments of quiet.

Send help. My mom showed up today. If you were here I’d be stealing your flask right about now

She waited until she actually was falling asleep, but Lucifer still didn’t answer. She was starting to get worried.

The next day she felt even better, and she was getting antsy about being in the hospital. She wanted to go home and rest there, but her doctor insisted on one more day, just to make sure. Though it was never said to her so directly, it was made pretty clear that Chloe had been at death’s door. If Lucifer had taken even one more hour to show up with formula, if Dan and Ella hadn’t had the ingredients ready to go, it might have been too late. She still didn’t know how Lucifer had managed it. No one did, apparently. No one else had seen him again either.

She tried one more time that morning. I know hospitals are more boring than Lux, but I was hoping to see you soon…

When he still hadn’t replied by noon, she called him. It went to voicemail.

She called again mid-afternoon. Voicemail again. She said something about how she just wanted to check in and asked him to call her when he had a minute, nothing important, just to let him know what was going on.

He didn’t call her back. He didn’t answer any of her texts. When Maze came around later, she said he wasn’t answering her either. He wasn’t at Lux.

Chloe texted him, Is something wrong?

And then again a few minutes later, unable to help adding, Hope you’re okay…

By that evening, her stomach was twisting up again. Something was wrong, but she didn’t know what. Had something else happened to him? She remembered how he’d seemed angry when he’d shown up at her apartment that night and wondered if there was some new issue she didn’t know about that’d been put on hold because of the poisoning.

I’m getting released tomorrow, can I stop by?

When he still hadn’t said a single word to her, she started to think that maybe she was the problem. He’d been bursting into her house, and after running through their last interaction again and again, she’d finally realized that he’d evaded her request to talk as neat as you please. He’d barely stayed there for a minute before he’d wanted to leave, and she wasn’t sure anymore that it’d only been to let her rest. What if he’d wanted to get out of there because he didn’t want to talk to her?

She couldn’t quite mesh that with the way he’d been sitting at her bedside, plainly waiting for her to wake up, or how he’d gripped her hand as if to comfort them both. But obviously she was missing something.

Then she got to thinking that it had to do with that moment they’d found each other after confronting Carlisle, or with how she’d kissed him. Maybe she’d completely misread all the signs.

He’d told her outright that he was done pursuing something with her, and she’d kissed him anyway, thinking it was because he only wanted to do right by her and not because he truly didn’t want to be with her. Then after, he’d kept his distance, acting like he didn’t understand the concept of flirting and as if sex wasn’t even a thing, and yet she’d kept trying to force it.

She was so stupid. He’d been trying to tell her he wasn’t interested and she’d pushed him anyway.

There’d been that hug after saving the kids, but looking back, it could have easily just been from relief that they were both okay, or so they’d thought. It was obvious that Lucifer did care about her, but that didn’t mean he wanted anything more from her. He’d run off again after that moment.

And then the first thing she’d done after finding out she’d live was to ask to pick things back up where they’d left off.

That was it, then, wasn’t it? He cared about her, so of course he’d saved her life and waited to see her awake, but she’d made him uncomfortable by insisting on changing their partnership. No wonder he’d wanted to flee as soon as she’d brought it up. No wonder he was staying away when she was being so obviously clingy again.

Disappointment washed through her whenever she thought about it, but she tried to get over it. So he didn’t want a relationship, fine. It’d only been what, a handful of days since they’d stood on that beach? And they’d barely done anything. She could go back to just being friends, no problem. Lucifer hadn’t even truly wanted more than that; it’d only been her that was stupidly thinking there was more going on. There was nothing to be disappointed about.

It was easy to tell herself that, and hard to believe it, especially when he wouldn’t even just tell her he wasn’t interested. She was starting to get annoyed, even. All he’d had to do was say it wasn’t for him and she’d have understood, but instead, he was ignoring her like they were in grade school. She’d almost died and he’d saved her life against all odds and yet he couldn’t even be bothered to ask if she was okay now.

Present day

Fletcher’s wasn’t far from the station. Chloe found a parking garage nearby and then they made the rest of the way on foot, weaving around groups of people headed to the next spot of entertainment.

She’d never been to the Strip before—she’d never had any reason to, and it wasn’t like she cared for the sort of scene Vegas had to offer—so she couldn’t help being drawn in by the sights around her like any other tourist. She took in the extravagant buildings, the beaming lights in every color, the gaudy opulence flaunted at every turn. There was a heady, slightly reckless feel in the air. Something suggesting that here, it was okay to indulge, to release any inhibitions, to seek out more, more, more. Throw caution to the wind, live large, don’t worry about tomorrow. Enjoy the wonders. Lose yourself in the show.

Everything she wasn’t good at being, at doing.

Everything her ex-partner was good at.

Actually walking these streets only made her think again that nothing was truly wrong. What could possibly have happened to him here? He’d own every building he walked into.

But then she thought of him sitting alone at a bar, and wondered if maybe that was the most real thing about his entire trip out here.

They reached Fletcher’s and slipped inside, pausing a little near the entrance to look it over. It seemed like a fairly typical lounge, well-maintained with various tables and booths. A bar was laid out on one side of the room, a stage on the other. The platform was empty at the moment; soft music played from speakers instead. At nearly ten o’clock in the evening, there were plenty of people there, dressed up with drinks in hand.

It only took her a moment to spot Candy. She was talking to some of the patrons, giving them soft smiles and light touches, easygoing and alluring in a smoky gray dress. The people she was talking to were clearly enjoying themselves.

It was familiar in a way she didn’t care for. No wonder Lucifer had been taken in by her, too.

Maze was giving Candy a slow once-over. “Yep,” she said. “This is exactly what I expected.”

Chloe bit off her reply before it could take form.

Candy placed her hand on someone’s shoulder and laughed a little. She said something else to them and then left them to it, heading for the next area with deliberate, graceful movements. She glanced in their direction and did a double take. Something like relief flooded her expression, followed by a shadow of what Chloe thought might have been guilt or apprehension. She’d seen it often enough on suspects’ faces.

A moment later, Candy was making her way over to them. Her first words confirmed Chloe’s suspicions. “Detective Decker? Thank God you’re here.”

“You know me?”

“Of course I do. Lucifer wouldn’t stop talking about you. You’re the reason he was even here that night, not that I really understand why, but I mean, as bad as it is, I’m kind of grateful he was here…” She took a breath. “Look, I think maybe we should talk.”

“Yes, that’s why I’m here.” Chloe drew herself up, trying to cling to any semblance of professionalism she could, because this was somehow even worse than she’d been expecting. The way Candy was talking now, it reminded Chloe more of the pictures she’d dismissed than the ones she hadn’t been able to stop focusing on. Where it seemed like Candy might be more than just the next glamor shot. And that made it more real.

Lucifer wouldn’t stop talking about you.

She was such a mess and she’d only been there for thirty seconds. “I need you to tell me everything you know about what happened to Lucifer.” She was pretty proud of herself for not just demanding instead, Why? Why did he marry you?

Asking that question would only hurt her more. She had to stay on topic.

“Of course.” Candy turned and motioned to someone at the bar, who nodded back at her, and then she said, “Let’s talk over here.”

They followed her through the lounge, over to a set of doors tucked out of the way. Maze was still looking at her with open curiosity. “You don’t seem like much of an airhead.”

Candy glanced over her shoulder. “Um, thanks?”

“Sure,” Maze said, like it was a compliment. “The rest definitely checks out though.”

Chloe elbowed her a little, and Maze threw her a look as if to say, What?

A few moments later, they reached a smaller, more brightly lit room reserved for staff. It was nice, with comfortable-looking chairs and a table in the back. A counter and a small glass-front fridge held drinks, and most of them didn’t look alcoholic. “Can I get you anything?” Candy asked.

“No, thank you,” Chloe said.

Maze started going through the options without waiting for an invitation while Chloe took a seat at the table. Candy took the side next to her, which was maybe for the best, since it would make it feel less like an interrogation. Especially since Chloe had brought her notepad with her.

She took it out along with a pen and flipped to a new page. Professional. Just keep it professional. “When did you last see him?”

“Three nights ago. He said he was headed out and not to wait up for him.”

Maze came over and took the chair opposite Chloe, flipping it around so she could straddle the back. Chloe asked, “You were both here at the time?”

“Yes.”

“And how was he when he left?”

“What do you mean?” Candy asked, eyeing Maze. Chloe couldn’t exactly blame her, because Maze was giving her the same intense look she used to give Chloe a lot. The one that said she was very interested in you, in a way that suggested it might not be for the best.

“His… emotional state,” she clarified. “Was he upset? Worried? Happy?”

“Not happy,” Candy said, turning back to her. “But not overly upset, either. He was…” She thought it over for a moment. “Subdued. Kind of melancholy. He got quiet in the evenings and liked to spend them alone.”

“You sure about that?” Maze asked. “That’s not the Lucifer I know.”

Candy raised her brow, giving her a once-over like Maze had done to her before. Any intimidation was gone. “Yes, I’m sure. And you are…?”

Maze’s mouth dropped open in indignation. “So, what, he told you all about Chloe and not about me?”

“If he did, I don’t recognize you.”

Maze rolled her eyes, muttering something under her breath about how typical that was. “I come over here to save his ass again and he didn’t even mention me.”

“This is Maze,” Chloe said, since she was pretty sure Maze either wasn’t going to, or would introduce herself in a way she shouldn’t. “She’s a close friend.”

Candy nodded, confusion clearing. “Oh, right. He did mention you, just not as much. He said you were one of the only three people he could trust.”

Chloe didn’t want to know who the other two were. It seemed to mollify Maze, at least. She relaxed a little, satisfaction on her face as she said, “Good.”

Chloe asked, “What did he do during those evenings?”

“I don’t know, really.”

“So how do you know he was alone?” Maze asked.

“Because he told me he wanted to be alone, and he doesn’t lie. That’s also just what he told me, but honestly… I believe it. And if you’d seen him…” She shook her head.

Chloe didn’t ask about that, either. She just cleared her throat and wrote some random notes down, not that she’d need them. “Did you notice anything strange about his behavior? Did he mention anything out of the ordinary?”

“Sure,” Candy said. “But nothing I understand. Stuff about forces beyond his control.”

So it wasn’t just her, then. Moving on. “Do you know where he went?”

“No.”

“I don’t get it,” Maze said, still eyeing Candy, but this time it was more like she found her to be an oddly fascinating puzzle. “Did his mom finally drive him all the way crazy? You don’t seem like… well. Like someone he’d just be out for a good time with.”

Candy sighed. “Look, I—”

Chloe didn’t want to hear it. “We heard he paid off a loan shark. Can you tell us about that?”

Candy bit her lip. “Can I talk to you in private?”

That threw her for a second. “That won’t be necessary. Maze is essentially my partner in this, so—"

“The loan shark business is why I married your actual partner,” Candy said abruptly. She was looking Chloe straight in the eyes, as if it was a challenge.

Chloe just stared, mouth opening and closing again. Fine. Maybe it was better to just rip the bandage off. “Maze, can you go ask the staff and any regulars if they know anything?”

Maze gave her an incredulous look. “But—"

“Just do it. Please.”

“Fine,” she said grudgingly, getting to her feet. “But you better fill me in later.” She stalked off, leaving her and Candy alone with palpable tension between them.

Chloe asked, “What happened?”

Candy didn’t answer. She just said, “You don’t like me.” It wasn’t a question.

“I’m sorry you got that impression, but I’m just doing my job. So, what—”

“I mean, because I married Lucifer. From what he told me, and the fact that you came all the way out here… you really do have feelings for him, don’t you?”

Chloe looked at her for a long moment and then put the pen down, pushing the notepad aside. She clasped her hands together instead. She was fed up to the brim. “And what, exactly, did he tell you? That I fawned all over him like an idiot? That I’m too emotional and he just doesn’t want to deal with that?”

Candy looked surprised. “No, he—”

“I’m surprised he mentioned me at all, in fact,” Chloe went on, talking over her. All her professionalism had gone out the window, but she didn’t care anymore. If Candy wanted this conversation, she’d have it. “Considering how he decided he didn’t want anything to do with me anymore. Did he mention how he couldn’t be bothered to send me a single text to let me know he was alive? Or did he just decide to complain for a while before forgetting I exist again?”

She wasn’t being fair, but she couldn’t help it. She hadn’t been expecting Candy to know her, for Lucifer to have talked about her. She wished he hadn’t.

Candy let out a breath. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I feel bad for agreeing to it now, especially if Lucifer is in trouble because of it. I didn’t mean to hurt you, but I can see I did.”

Chloe looked away, pressing her lips together. “No,” she said at last, the anger gone from her voice. Candy really didn’t deserve it. “You didn’t hurt me, Lucifer did. I don’t hate you for it. Really. I’m just… dealing with a lot right now.”

Candy nodded. “I know. The thing is, um… Detective Decker—”

“Just call me Chloe,” she said wearily.

“Chloe. The thing is, it was always going to be a temporary arrangement. Us being married. We made a deal.”

Surprise after surprise. “What?” she repeated blankly.

“You probably thought I’m just some dumb blonde, and that we got drunk one night and decided to do what so many other drunken idiots do in Vegas.”

“Well, maybe at first,” she admitted.

“It’s okay. We wanted it to look that way.”

Chloe had the feeling everything she thought she knew about this case was about to be turned on its head. “You did?”

“Yeah. It was Lucifer’s idea, but not… not for the reasons you’re thinking. I told you I married him because of the loan shark, but he had his own reasons why.”

She told her then, about Candy robbing him and how he’d found her at her apartment later. How she’d told him why she’d done it, that her father had recently passed away and left her a club saddled with too much debt to pay off.

“I’m sorry,” Chloe said. Jay hadn’t mentioned Candy owned the bar herself now, and it hadn’t come up in her own brief search, either. “I didn’t realize you’d just lost your father…”

Candy gave her a small, quick smile. Chloe recognized it for what it was—an indication that things weren’t okay, but that she didn’t want to make a big deal of it. “It was a couple months ago now,” she said.

“Even so. I lost my father, too. All these years later and I still miss him. I don’t know what I would have done if I had to deal with a loan shark on top of that, not to mention…” She gestured vaguely. “All this.”

“Thanks,” Candy said. “Yeah. It hasn’t been easy. The club meant everything to him, and losing it… it felt like I was going to lose him all over again. Worse, that I was failing him. It’s my home.”

Chloe nodded, feeling something shift between them. A new understanding. “You wouldn’t have been failing him,” she said. “It sounds like you were doing everything you could to save it.”

“Probably more than I should have, but… I was desperate.”

“And then you picked exactly the right person to steal from.”

“Yep,” Candy said with another faint smile. “I thought I was screwed, but then the next thing I knew, we were talking in my living room with wine and ice cream. He told me, ah… a little about his own problems, too. And then he asked me to marry him as part of an exchange. He’d pay off my debts, and in return, I’d pose as his wife to help him with his mom. He thinks she’s planning something, I guess—he wasn’t really clear on the details—and said she wouldn’t tell him anything, but maybe she’d reveal her plans if he did something completely unexpected like that.”

His family again. Planning something? Seriously, what was the deal with them?

Maze had specifically said his mom was still in Los Angeles and that she didn’t think she was involved. Hearing this now, though, Chloe couldn’t dismiss it so easily.

But Candy obviously didn’t know anything more about her, so she put it off to the side for now to focus on the insane part of that statement. “He just decided to get married on a whim to a person who robbed him five minutes beforehand, so that he could get the scoop on his mom maybe, possibly planning something he wouldn’t like?” she said incredulously.

“Yeah. I thought it was crazy, too. But he was serious, and at the time it seemed harmless enough, and I just… I couldn’t say no to someone offering to pay off three hundred grand for me. Temporary marriage for my family’s bar? I’d have been crazy to say no.”

Chloe thought she was still a little crazy for agreeing to do it with someone she’d only just met, but she didn’t tell her that. “You know what?” she said. “Lucifer’s logic behind that is actually the least surprising thing I’ve heard all day. Impulsively doing something so ridiculous for the thinnest of reasons? Makes perfect sense.”

She laughed a little. “I’m sure you were very surprised when you heard what he did.”

“That’s an understatement.”

Candy clasped her hands together on the table, leaning forward. “The truth is, drunken Vegas weddings aren’t really a thing. Sure, there are chapels set up for the fun of it, but to actually get married you need to register it at the courthouse, and most people that drunk either don’t think of it or don’t want to deal with it. But it’s such a popular idea that it makes for a useful cover story. Who would think on it too much? Especially with Lucifer running a nightclub and apparently having a rep for sleeping around, and with me all dressed up as a stripper who can barely spell her name?”

Chloe thought of the pictures she’d seen again. “You were going to put on an act, to make everyone think you were some harmless bimbo.”

“Yes. It’s a role I’ve played plenty of times before.”

She took a moment to think that over. Honestly, it was a pretty solid idea—she’d bought it before she’d even met Candy in person. Maze hadn’t even needed to see those pictures to think something similar had happened. “So you were planning to go to LA?”

Candy nodded. “The day after he disappeared, actually. He was going to introduce me to everyone, let me do my thing, and then hope his mom would let her guard down.”

She let out a long, slow breath. At least this marriage stunt was just that—a stunt, and not one that was entirely about her, either. It didn’t make it hurt any less, but it might make it easier for her to forget about it later.

“So, that’s why I’m really worried about him,” Candy said. “He wouldn’t tell me what he thought his mom might be doing, but he did say his family was horrible and loved to hurt and manipulate him. Do you think they’re the reason he’s missing? I didn’t…” She braided her fingers together, biting her lip. “I didn’t know how to tell the cops any of this, especially when I don’t even know his family. But I thought maybe you would be able to help, since you’re so close to him. I was thinking of calling you myself.”

She shook her head. “We’re not that close,” she said, that hurt welling up again at the truth of the words leaving her lips. “I don’t know much about his family, either, but Maze does. I’ll talk it over with her.” She reached for her notepad again, as if it were armor that would protect her from her own feelings. “Thanks for telling me. Is there anything else you can think of that might help?”

“Not with finding him, but…” She hesitated, and then set her hand on Chloe’s arm. “Look, this thing with his mom, I don’t think it’s the only reason he wanted to get married. He was… he was really kind of a mess when we were talking that night, not that I realized just how bad it was until later. Because of whatever’s been going on with the two of you.”

Chloe stilled, jaw clenched. She both desperately wanted to hear it, and wanted to tell Candy to stop.

Wanting to know won out. So she listened.

“I don’t know how much I should even be telling you this, but… that night, he kept going on about how your feelings couldn’t be real, that you didn’t have a choice in falling for him. Somehow. From anyone else it would’ve sounded conceited as all hell, like he was just so irresistible that you couldn’t help yourself, but he didn’t mean it like that.”

“No, he didn’t,” she said quietly. He might say that about everyone else, but not with her, not anymore. She was the one person he knew wouldn’t just fall all over him.

“It’s like what I said before—he seemed to think it’s all some trick. That his dad was out to get him by making him think you’d really… I don’t know. I don’t want to say ‘love him,’ but—”

“Yeah, I got it,” Chloe said.

“Anyway. He seemed really hurt by it.”

The part of her brain that tried to work through Lucifer’s metaphors was already picking at what Candy had just said, trying to find the real meaning behind it. “So that’s what he’s going with this time.”

“What?”

She might as well explain. “He doesn’t do relationships. He likes to sleep with people and then be done with it. I might not know his family, but yeah, everything he’s said about them sounds awful, and I don’t think he’s really had much in the way of friends before, either. So I think getting close to someone”—to me—“freaked him out, and this is what he came up with to cope. He does that a lot—says things are happening outside his control, that God is messing with him or his mom is the killer on a case because of him. So I guess now it’s that my feelings aren’t real.”

Candy considered that for a moment. “I was wondering, about his name. Why he keeps calling himself the devil besides. That’s just… really kind of sad.”

Sure. It was. How many times had she thought the same? Whatever he’d been through, it’d been bad enough that he viewed himself as the devil now, and made him struggle with any kind of personal relationship. He lived under the assumption that people would see him as a bad person, despite all his outward self-confidence. He didn’t trust people easily. He didn’t let them in. He didn’t understand what it was to have a good family, or to be loved unconditionally.

So now it seemed that when she showed him he might be loved, he couldn’t understand it. It was so foreign to him that it was easier to think it wasn’t real. He believed that no one could possibly feel that way about him, so he’d become convinced it had to be a trick.

There was something so unfathomably sad about it.

But it wasn’t on her to fix it for him. If he wouldn’t even say a single word to her because of it, she couldn’t make that her problem. She’d been understanding before; she knew it was new to him, and she could have worked at his pace. Maybe she’d accidentally pushed him too far, too fast, but it was one thing to find it hard to deal with and another to do this to her. He had to be willing to try, to meet her halfway.

Looking at the person he’d legally married, she knew it was too late for that. She got now what Candy meant. She’d thought something similar before—that he’d done it to firmly remove any possibility of them.

Worse, even. Forget dates or sex; he’d given up on being her friend, too.

“I just wanted to let you know,” Candy said carefully. “I don’t fully understand what happened with you two, but it’s obvious he cares about you. A lot. As screwed up as it is, I think you were all he was thinking about when we were going through with it. And I think you were all he was thinking about when he’d go off alone in the evenings, too.”

“Yeah, well,” Chloe said, glad her voice came out steady. “It’s what he does with it that matters most.” She cleared her throat and flipped the notepad closed, ready to be done with this conversation. She didn’t want to think about Lucifer thinking of her while signing a marriage contract, or while he was drinking alone at a bar. It wasn’t helpful, and it was just making her angry again.

Candy held up her hands placatingly. “I get it. I’m not trying to say anything about how you should feel. But I also think you deserve the truth. In a way… I’m kind of glad we couldn’t go through with those plans.”

First Maze, now Candy. Great for people finally deciding she deserved the truth about things, but it was too little, too late. “Yeah. It’s always a good thing when people don’t lie to me like that.” She knew what Candy was implying—that Lucifer probably wouldn’t have told her he’d married Candy as a ploy, that he’d have let her believe it all in order to further push her away.

She’d thought at first that finding out it wasn’t as vapid as it looked made it easier to deal with, but framing it that way—that it would have been an intentional deception on top of callous hurt…

No, it didn’t matter how much he supposedly cared about her. He claimed his family was manipulating him, but he’d been about to turn around and do the same thing to her. Dan doing it had been bad enough. It was even worse with Lucifer. The one person who was supposed to always be honest with her, even if it was with his own version of the truth.

That burgeoning anger hardened. Cooled.

In her mind, the last thread between them severed.

She was truly done.

Two days ago

Lucifer was at the shore. Alone, everything around him eerily quiet, except for the waves crashing in front of him. They grew larger and larger, pounding the sand, eating up the distance to where he stood. He saw it coming, but stayed rooted in place until they washed right over him.

Then he was tumbling over and over in the sea, unable to sort up or down, buffeted this way and that. He couldn’t tell how to get to the surface. He wasn’t particularly trying to, either; though he wanted to, he couldn’t seem to actually do anything.

Gradually, the ocean changed. Muted voices broke through the water. The weightlessness ended, until he could feel the solidness of his body pressing down against a surface. Perhaps he’d been spit out onto the sand again, even the water no longer wanting anything to do with him.

A burst of heat hit his cheek. Bright light seared his eyes as he finally got them open.

Then he realized it wasn’t sunlight, and he wasn’t at the beach.

He was sitting on a rough concrete floor, arms twisted uncomfortably behind him. He could still hear the waves though—some sort of rushing sound he couldn’t place. People were in front of him, but as he was gazing at the floor, he could only see dark pants tucked into work boots.

He blinked, trying to get his brain to focus. Something was wrong, but he couldn’t immediately figure out what, and it seemed so hard to lift his head and find out.

A second later it was being whipped to the side, that same burst of heat hitting him again. Slapped. Someone had slapped him.

“Come on,” a voice said. “I’m sick of waiting around for you to wake up.”

Anger sparked in his chest. How dare anyone treat him this way?

His eyes opened a little wider as he swung his head around. A face came into focus, a man with short brown hair and scruff on his jaw. The movement made his head swim, the way it usually only did when he managed to get high, and he realized that the sound of the waves was in fact his own heartbeat, the blood rushing through his ears.

“Who the hell are you?” he growled, or tried to anyway. It didn’t come out quite right. “Where…”

“Ah, there we go,” the man said, smiling. Two others were there—one next to him, one further back by a door. “Lucifer Morningstar. Tell me, are you really the devil? Because I’m finding that hard to believe.”

He tried to move his arms up, but couldn’t. Plastic bit into his wrists, preventing him from moving them apart. From the odd strain in his muscles and the metal against his forearms, he could guess they were wrapped around whatever was pressing against his back. A pole, most likely.

“What is this?” he asked, feeling more and more awake by the second. What had happened to him? He had no idea who these people were, what they wanted, or why he was tied up in some room he didn’t recognize. The last thing he remembered was being at the bar, deciding he might as well find Candy for company—

Candy. Was she here? Had they hurt her, too?

“You really don’t know?”

“I paid off the debt. If you’re trying to get more out of me—”

The man laughed. “I have no idea what you’re talking about, so I guess you don’t know why you’re here. Huh.” He studied Lucifer for a second. “It’s a good thing we’re getting paid either way, because this is definitely the dumbest job I’ve ever taken. Asher, go tell the boss he’s awake so we can finish this.”

The person next to him shook his head. “That guy is off his rockers. There’s no way this is the devil. He’s just some sad drunk. A rich sad drunk, maybe, but—”

“How dare you,” Lucifer said, his voice dangerously low. Whatever they’d done to him, his head was clear enough now to show them what a huge mistake they were making. “I am not a sad drunk.” Even if he had been able to get drunk the last few days, that insult did not apply to him. “I am the devil, and if you don’t want to find out what that means firsthand, you’ll get these restraints off and tell me who you’re working for.”

All three of them just looked at each other skeptically. The one in the back said, “Sorry, dude. I appreciate the vibe you’ve got going on, I really do. But we were hired to hold you here, and that’s exactly what we’re gonna do.”

“One last chance,” Lucifer said. “Tell me who hired you and what they want, or you’ll be the one paying for it.”

The man directly in front of him crouched down, smirking. “You can threaten us all you want, but you’re not really in a position to do anything about it. We’ve got you zip tied in a locked room in a basement, with three more guys on the other side of the door. You’re not getting out of here, and there’s no way you’d be able to handle even one of us, let alone all six.”

He straightened, while behind him, the one who’d been instructed to tell their boss Lucifer was awake was talking into a phone. “You’ll find out in a minute who wants to have a chat with you. I’ll let him tell you why, since God knows it’s all a bunch of crazy talk. Ha. See what I did th—?”

He suddenly swept back, the smirk on his face gone in an instant, replaced with an expression of abject fear. The guy by the door let out a yell, stumbling back into the wall. The third went pale in an instant, jaw slack as he stared at Lucifer.

“Still don’t believe I’m the devil?” he said. He’d grown tired of the cockiness and swagger, mocking him for being the devil, enjoying the apparent display of power they had over Lucifer. They might have managed to get him here, but he was the devil, and they could never hold him for long. No one got to treat him like this. No one.

So he’d decided to let out his other form in full, making sure to channel every last ounce of ire coursing through him. They could enjoy the terror of hell now instead.

As he did so, he tensed and put his strength behind his wrists, snapping the zip ties. Lucifer pulled his arms around and slowly got to his feet, while the three men who’d been so convinced they were safe became engulfed in fear.

He felt sluggish, like the air really had been replaced with water, his balance not what it should be. But it was minor enough to ignore, and he doubted any of them would notice. “Now, then,” he started. “What were you saying about how I couldn’t get out of here, or handle even one of you? Who would like to go first so we can test that claim?”

The one farthest back scrambled for the door, getting it open and yelling to whoever was on the other side. The one who’d been on the phone had let it fall to the floor. He started pleading with Lucifer, as if that would do him any good. “No—please, I didn’t mean it, I—”

But Lucifer fixed his gaze on the one directly in front of him, the one who’d pissed him off the most. “If you’ve got so much bravado, I’ll volunteer you. Come on, tough guy. Let’s see how long you last.”

Lucifer took a step forward, still a little unsteady, but no matter. He didn’t need to be in full form. He blinked away the weight clouding his mind as much as he could and crossed the distance between them.

The man’s blank, terrified expression hardened a little. He stopped staggering backward, shifted into a semblance of a fighting stance, and raised a fist.

“I’ll give you credit for being brave enough to try,” Lucifer said. “But it won’t do you any good.”

The man threw the first punch, and Lucifer ducked under it. Easily enough, if not quite as easily as he’d usually be able to. He seized his arm in his left hand. The guy tried to twist out of his grasp, kicking out at him. Lucifer took the strike, a dull ache on his leg, and punched him in the head. A second later, he was dead weight in Lucifer’s grip. Pathetic.

He let go and moved on, looking for his next target. Asher, the man nearest him, was cowering on the floor to the side, having fallen to his knees. Up ahead, the one who’d yelled for backup was shakily lifting a gun. Him, then.

“Don’t look too confident, do you?” Lucifer said. “What do you think will happen if you shoot the devil?” He was no longer sure himself—though Chloe wasn’t here, everything else had been able to hurt him lately. Probably a bullet could take him out. But he was willing to bet this guy was too afraid to try.

Sure enough, he just swallowed hard, hand trembling enough that he’d have trouble hitting a target two feet away. Lucifer moved forward and then decided he might as well take a short detour to deal with Asher first. His pleading had changed to incoherent noises of distress; one quick strike later and those stopped, too.

Lucifer turned back to the one with the gun in time to see him spinning around. He glanced off the door in his haste to run before managing to regain his footing and disappeared through the exit.

Lucifer stalked forward, an odd pounding starting up in his head again. Bloody hell, why had his invulnerability completely disappeared now? These men should be a joke, but they’d actually gotten the best of him once, and now it was harder than it should have been to deal with them. An insult on top of an insult. Every time he thought his father couldn’t make his life any worse…

He strode out the door, moving as quickly as he could without looking like he was in a hurry. In the back of his mind, he noted the oddness of what lay on the other side of the door; compared to the starkness of the room he’d just left, he might as well be in a whole different building.

He’d walked right into a polished living area, complete with a leather couch and a TV, everything new and modern. A basement, he’d been told, and it seemed it wasn’t just a rough unfinished one under some commercial space. Why had they taken him to someone’s house? And why a house seemingly as nice as this?

It took only a few seconds for him to catch up to his target. He gripped the back of his shirt and yanked on it. The guy tripped over his own feet, staying upright only thanks to the hold Lucifer had on him. “You’re not getting out of here,” Lucifer said in a mimicking tone. He wrenched the gun away and tossed it to the side, then tossed idiot number three away, too. The man slammed into a bookcase along the righthand wall, and the whole thing teetered for a second. Books and a few figurines crashed down, raining on top of him as he fell to the ground, limp.

Lucifer spared him only a second to make sure he wouldn’t get up again before he turned, looking for the way out. He didn’t see any doors, just a solitary window high up on the far side, but the basement wrapped around the corner on his left.

Someone else was standing in the way, gaping at his fallen friend. Predictable as ever.

As soon as Lucifer took a step towards him, he snapped out of it. “He’s loose!” he shouted, voice loud and deep enough to carry clearly. He raised a gun as he did so, and Lucifer could see in his eyes that this one would let his fear drive him into using it instead of running. “He’s on the move!”

He sighted. Lucifer threw himself to the ground, behind the couch. Two shots went off, hitting the bookshelves behind him. Pain spiked through his head at the noise and the movement, the couch blurring in front of his eyes for a second. He gritted his teeth and pulled the world back into focus. A little too much; he lost control of his devil face and felt it slip away. No matter. It’d served its purpose.

“Come out!”

“Another brave one, hmm?” he called. “Too bad that won’t help you.”

Another shot rang out. Lucifer couldn’t just sit there; it would be seconds before the guy came close enough for the couch to stop shielding him, and waiting wouldn’t help him deal with this mess.

He looked to the side and saw one of the figurines from the bookshelf that’d rolled over this way. A little metal horse. Perfect.

He snatched it up and rose to his feet, aiming as he went. He had a split second to land eyes on the shooter before he hurled the horse at his head.

It struck true. The man released the gun with a startled cry, staggering back a step as he reached for his face. Lucifer closed the distance between them, wrapped his hand around his throat, and pushed him back until he slammed into the wall. A painting was knocked off its hook as Lucifer lifted him up a few inches. “Who hired you?” he demanded.

A few sputtering noises were all he got in return. Right. Lucifer started to lower him back down just enough to allow the imbecile to form words, but—

Movement, coming from his left, where the rest of the basement was open to him now. He looked over his shoulder. One door, slightly ajar with a toilet peeking through, and the bottom of a set of stairs. Most of it was enclosed by another wall. Someone was coming down.

He let go in order to deal with the newcomer, but he’d barely moved when they appeared, a gun already up.

“Bloody hell. This is getting old—”

They fired.

Pain exploded in his chest, and his body seized up. He felt like the fire of his devil face had turned real and engulfed every part of him. His legs gave out, and he toppled over, crashing onto his side.

What the hell? Getting shot before hadn’t felt like this—he couldn’t move, could barely think—

All of a sudden it ended. The fire vanished, the pain fell away, banking until he could feel his way around it. He pushed against the arm pinned underneath him, trying to move onto his back or sit up or—

Boots appeared in his line of vision, and the next second, the guy who’d shot him was bending over him, syringe in hand. It pierced his upper arm.

Lucifer managed to reach out just as the syringe was pulled away, hand closing over the guy’s wrist. He snapped it back, hearing the satisfying snick of breaking bones. A howl followed right after. “I’ll make sure to take you with me,” Lucifer got out, breathing more heavily than he should. He let go and pushed himself up, only then realizing what’d just happened. Thin wires protruded from his chest, which had very clearly not taken a bullet. Taser. He’d been tased, and then—fuck, the syringe—

A blow to his head almost sent him reeling again. He blindly lashed out as he surged to his feet, getting in a punch himself, and then he elbowed the guy in the side of the head. He went down.

Lucifer ripped away the wires, feeling more unsteady than ever, fighting to keep his balance as he looked around for more assailants. If they’d drugged him, he had to get out of here before it knocked him out—he had to—

A wave of dizziness washed over him. The man he’d been choking before was recovering, starting to get to his feet. Lucifer kicked him square in the head, almost falling again as he did so. Out… he had to get out…

He turned, stumbling on his way to the stairs. This was ridiculous. He was the devil—he could deal with a little lightheadedness. He wouldn’t be incapacitated after such a pathetic fight, drugs or no drugs, vulnerable or not. He would—he—

He reached the base of the stairs just as two others appeared at the top.

Fine. Two more. He could handle two more. There couldn’t be many others, could there? Six of them total—how many had he dealt with now?

One foot hit the first step as his vision became distorted again. Blackness was creeping in on the edges. He pulled it into focus once more, eyes landing on the man on the right. He frowned, recognizing those features.

He wasn’t built or dressed like the others. The last time Lucifer had seen his face, it’d been pleading with him, begging for mercy… begging him not to leave…

“You,” he ground out. He tried to shift his weight onto the step, but he just ended up falling forward instead. Despite his best efforts, the blackness won, and he passed out again.

Chapter Text

Three weeks ago

Going home had never felt so good.

She was still too weak to do much more than sit on the couch, but it was her couch, her pillows, her soft blanket curling over her pajamas. She’d come close to never being here again, but she was.

Trixie stayed for a while before Dan took her back with him so she could rest without having a child to take care of too. Surprisingly, Maze didn’t go anywhere. She had fried chicken delivered and didn’t feel bad in the slightest that Chloe was stuck eating plain food, which oddly enough made her feel a little better. They watched TV and then Maze actually helped her upstairs without making it seem like she was doing anything of the sort.

Chloe was starting to get used to Lucifer’s silence, but after stretching out on her bed and taking a moment to be grateful for it, her thoughts drifted to him again. She wouldn’t be here without him and yet he was nowhere to be found.

Maybe she just had to let him know that she’d realized her mistake and wouldn’t expect anything from him now. She was starting to feel guilty, if that was the reason he’d stayed away.

I’m home now, but it’ll be another week before I’m cleared for work. If that’s what you’re waiting for

But if you did want to drop by, I won’t try to corner you or something. Just so you know

She didn’t bother waiting for a reply that night, knowing one wasn’t coming. And she was right.

She had little else to do the next day but think about it. The silence felt so pointed, and it was making her go back to being hurt that he couldn’t be bothered to check in with her. She was the one who’d almost died, and yet she was the only one reaching out. Was he so disgusted with the idea of a relationship with her that he was shutting her out so completely?

It hurt. It was rejection on a scale she’d never thought she’d get from him. Lucifer was always direct about something like this, and yet he wouldn’t even give her the courtesy of telling her he wasn’t interested after she’d come that close to dying.

The day after, her thoughts circled back to wondering if something really was wrong that had nothing to do with her. If it wasn’t like him to ignore her so thoroughly after what they’d gone through, then maybe he wasn’t intentionally ignoring her. Maybe something had happened to him after all.

Lucifer, I’m really getting worried. Please just let me know you’re okay?

It’d been almost a week since she’d last seen him. She should have been resting, but anxiety was curling so thick through her that she ended up driving to Lux that evening. All her calls and voicemails from the day had been met with more silence. It wasn’t like him.

Before she left, she texted him one more time. I’m coming over

And then she called on the way there to explain a little, hoping that if nothing was wrong he’d hear from her voice that she was just worried.

Lux was busy as ever, but Lucifer wasn’t there. The penthouse was utterly dark when the elevator opened. It was only as she blinked at it that she realized she’d never seen it without a single light on somewhere. “Lucifer? You here?”

She was fairly certain there was a light switch next to the elevator, so she reached out, her fingers finding it with ease. She flipped it on.

Her breath caught, all the worry draining out of her at once, a rush of hurt taking its place. Her eyes pricked with heat, her heart falling and falling. Even as she called his name again, she knew he wasn’t there.

The furniture was covered in sheets. The air held a stillness she’d never felt at the penthouse before, one that told her just how abandoned the place was. Lucifer hadn’t just decided to ignore her.

He’d fled, stepped away from his life, left the city completely for all she knew. The silence very much was intentional. The sheets were all the evidence she needed that he’d taken his time, thought it out, and decided to leave for an extended absence, all without telling her.

A lump formed in her throat that she tried without much success to swallow back. She couldn’t entirely stop the tears either, her eyes burning too much not to release some of the hurt still flooding through her, but she swiped at them impatiently and made herself take a deep breath.

If she’d held it together while thinking she was about to die, she could do it again now. She wouldn’t break down because she’d been dumped so spectacularly by a man who’d only ever cared about sleeping with her anyway. She refused to cry over someone who didn’t even have the decency to tell her he was done.

She slammed the light switch back down, decided she was allowed to be petty enough to run up his electric bill and turned it on again, then left, arms crossed tight over her chest. Anger was starting to burn through her now, and she welcomed it, because it was ten times better than the hurt.

She threw herself back into her car, ignoring the complaints from her body, and pulled out her phone again.

I saw the penthouse. I guess now I know why I haven’t seen you. But are you seriously not going to talk to me at all? Why wouldn’t you tell me you left?

Why did you leave?

By the time she got home, the anger had abated just enough for her to add one last text. Look, if something is wrong, if I did something wrong, could you please just tell me?

She didn’t know why she couldn’t just leave it alone, but she needed to hear some sort of explanation from him. Wasn’t she owed that much?

But apparently Lucifer disagreed.

Maze told her she’d had no idea he was leaving, and Chloe believed her. No one else had heard from him either. It pushed her back into the worry category just long enough for her to try one last time.

I’m still worried that I haven’t heard from you at all. I just want to know that you’re okay…

When another day went by without a word, she settled back on anger. This was just ridiculous. She deserved better than this, and she was done caring if he wasn’t going to do the same. Message received, loud and clear. She was done waiting for him. Even if he showed up again now, she wasn’t sure she’d be able to just forget about it. It was a dick move to ignore her, he’d left her when she was weak and vulnerable and recovering from literal poison, and if he was going to ditch her the second things got hard, then maybe it was better to just end things now anyway. So much for being able to depend on him.

Lucifer might not have the decency to tell her he was done, but she wasn’t going to be like that. She went back to work and spent a few days on desk duty, everything about her situation making her seethe inside. And then that weekend when she still hadn’t heard from him, she texted him one last time and deleted their conversation history.

Fine. Message received. I won’t bother you anymore.

Present day

She and Candy went back out to the main room, where Maze was leaning against the wall with her arms crossed, managing to convey her impatience even while remaining still. She straightened when she saw them and said, “So, are you going to finally let me in on whatever that was about?”

Since Chloe had only just been ruminating on how little people ever let her in on things, that question did nothing to improve her mood. “In the car.” To Candy, she said, “It should go without saying, but if you hear from him or think of anything else that might help to find him, please let me know.”

“Of course,” Candy said. “And if there’s anything I can do…”

They exchanged numbers and said goodbye. Chloe was supremely glad for the cool night air as it hit her face, a soothing balm to every emotion piled up inside. She hadn’t realized just how suffocated she’d felt until she was outside.

“Come on, spill,” Maze said.

Chloe told her as they walked back to the car. About how they’d met, the deal they’d made, what Lucifer had been doing with the loan shark, and what he’d said about his mom. “Be honest, Maze,” she said. “Do you still really think his family isn’t involved?”

“Yes,” Maze said, without a trace of hesitation. “I don’t know what Lucifer thinks his mom is planning either, but that devious, backstabbing bitch is always planning something.”

“So then what makes you so sure she’s not behind it?” Chloe asked incredulously.

Maze shook her head. “She’s not harmless, don’t get me wrong. It’s just that she cares about him too much to hurt him.” She considered for a second, then added, “At least not physically.” She gave Chloe a sidelong look that she couldn’t decipher. “She hurts him in more underhanded ways.”

There was a lot of that going around.

Maze went on, “So there’s no way she’d kill him, and kidnapping him in Vegas… it makes no sense. She wants him to choose her, too. She wants his forgiveness and his love.” She spat the words out as if they tasted foul.

“Got it,” Chloe muttered. “So then what happened? I think we can count the loan shark out. Jay was right, they have no reason to go after him. Apparently Lucifer’s just been off marrying people and brooding alone, neither of which really lends itself to making enemies.”

Talking to Candy had been enlightening in a lot of ways she hadn’t expected, but it hadn’t moved her any closer to figuring out where Lucifer was now. She was still left with a whole lot of questions and no answers.

“No idea,” Maze said. “And there’s no point speculating. We need to check out Starling.”

The bar he was last seen at. “Yeah, that’s what I was thinking, too.”

“Even if he really was just there to brood or something, those morons that make up the Vegas police could’ve easily missed something outside the bar. Whether someone nabbed him or he found another den somewhere, that’s where to start.”

Chloe paused to pull up directions on her phone. It was just near enough that they could walk instead of trying to deal with parking all over again. “Let’s go on foot,” she said. “If Lucifer did the same…”

Maze nodded. “You lead. I’ll watch your back.”

The tightness that was coiled inside her eased a little more.

So she kept walking down the street, studying their surroundings with a more practiced eye this time, looking for anything that might stand out to her. She didn’t even know what it would be, but this process was familiar; she’d done the same for countless crime scenes and interviews, not knowing what to look for, but opening her mind to anything that might end up being important.

What would Lucifer have noted as he walked this street? Would anything have stood out to him?

By the time they reached Starling, she’d come up with absolutely nothing. It was just a busy city street full of people and a bunch of places she could see Lucifer entering on any random day.

Starling was one of them. It looked classy enough from the outside, and the interior matched. This was more of an upscale bar, with warm browns and soft golds and red highlights. There were plenty of tables and people to fill them, and there was a stage here, too, a platform off to the side where live music was being played.

It didn’t take long to find the bartender who remembered seeing Lucifer there. But they didn’t learn anything new.

“I really don’t know anything that would help you, I’m sorry,” the woman said. Her name was Kaylie, and she seemed regretful enough that she didn’t know more. “It’s hard to forget a face like that, and he tipped very well, so yeah, I remembered seeing him when that other detective showed me a picture. But nothing unusual happened.”

“What exactly did he do?” Chloe asked.

“He came in, ordered a few shots, and then just kind of sat there drinking for a while. Listening to the music, I think. He didn’t say anything, and he rejected about half a dozen woman and a couple men who came up to him. After he had three glasses of our most expensive scotch, he tipped me two hundred dollars and left. He was a little drunk, as you can imagine, but he just walked out of here like everything was fine.”

“Drunk?” Maze asked, like that was the odd part of her story, and not Lucifer turning down company. “There’s no way he was drunk.”

Kaylie raised her brows. “Yeah, I’m sure he was. I know it when I see it. He was spacing out a little, and his movements weren’t the smoothest when he left.”

“Was he sober when he got here?”

She thought a moment. “I think so, yes. Or at least not as tipsy.”

“And can you be sure that he only had the booze? Did any pills make an appearance?”

Kaylie looked disconcerted now. “I don’t know. I didn’t watch him all night. But this isn’t exactly the kind of place people come to get high, you know?”

Maze still seemed skeptical, but why that was so important to her, Chloe didn’t know. She asked, “Do you remember seeing him here before?”

Kaylie shook her head. “No, that was the first time. I asked, but no one else remembered seeing him before either.”

“Thanks. If he shows up again, could you please let me know?” She handed over a card.

Kaylie took it. “Sure thing.”

She and Maze went back outside and paused by the entrance. “Did you note anything special?” Chloe asked. “Besides the lack of doing drugs, I guess.”

Maze looked off to the side, gaze distant. “I don’t know. Lucifer getting drunk like that is weird. But I have no idea if that’s part of why he disappeared…”

“It’s not that weird,” Chloe said. “I get that he drinks a lot and has a really high tolerance, but that just means he’d probably gotten a few drinks in before he showed up here.”

“No, he truly doesn’t—” She sighed. “Forget it. Let’s just check out the area and see if anything comes up.”

“All right,” Chloe agreed. She pointed to the side. “You take that direction, I’ll take the other.”

“Fine.”

For the next three hours, Chloe walked down the main road and some of the surrounding side streets, going from one building to the next, asking if anyone had seen Lucifer or remembered something unusual from three nights ago. She always got the same responses.

“No, doesn’t ring a bell.”

“I wish I remembered seeing him—would have made my night better—but no, sorry.”

“This is Vegas. You’re going to have to be more specific than that.” Followed by another no when she explained.

And nothing stood out to her, either. Whether Lucifer had walked off on his own two feet or found someone to drive him away or had been driven off unwillingly, there was no sign of what’d happened to him.

She met back up with Maze around midnight. “Anything?”

“Nope,” Maze said. “You?”

“No.” She looked around, frustrated. “It’s useless to keep doing this tonight. Let’s go check out the hotel he was staying at.”

“Fine by me.”

The Bellagio wasn’t within walking distance, so they went back to the car and drove over. It wasn’t hard to find. Chloe pulled up to the entrance and showed her badge to the valet offering to park for them, letting him know they wouldn’t be there long. He stepped back, and she heard him talking quietly to a mouthpiece, undoubtedly letting the front desk know they were about to deal with the cops.

Sure enough, someone was moving around the desk to greet them when they walked in. “Can I help you?” he asked, giving them a polite but strained smile.

Before Chloe could lift her badge again, Maze said, “Get Savannah down here. Now.”

The attendant blinked. “This late at night? May I ask what this is about?”

“No,” Maze said curtly. “If you don’t wake her up, I’ll find her and do it myself.”

Chloe put a hand on her arm. “We’re working with the police on a missing persons case. Lucifer Morningstar. Do you know him?”

“Lucifer?” he said, surprised now. Like the name meant something to him. “The police were already here about that. We haven’t seen him.”

“Did you do anything with the room yet?”

“No, we haven’t touched it.”

“I need to look it over.”

He hesitated. “Let me try to get Savannah here.”

“Finally,” Maze muttered. “I told you. If you’re done wasting time…”

They moved over to the side of the lobby to wait. “Who’s Savannah?” Chloe asked.

“One of the assistant managers. That’s why Lucifer picked this place. He did her a favor to help her get this job, and so she makes sure he always has a room for free. There’s no way he didn’t talk to her at some point.”

Typical. At least she wouldn’t have to strong-arm her way through the staff.

Twenty minutes later, a woman walked through the front doors. Dark, curly hair framed her face, her makeup was perfectly done, her features alert despite the late hour. Chloe wouldn’t have had to guess who she was even if there were a lot of other people headed straight for her; she gave off a distinctive I’m in charge air.

“Detective Decker?” she asked as she approached, and held out her hand.

Chloe took it. “Yes. Sorry for bothering you so late, but—”

“No, no need to apologize. Anything I can do to help. You said you want to see the room?”

“Yes,” she said. “We’re double checking everything, to try to find something that might have been missed before.”

Savannah nodded. “I’ll take you up there.” She spoke to the attendant at the front desk for a moment, who handed over a key card. Then she motioned for them to follow her. “Lucifer mentioned you, when he got here a couple weeks ago,” she said.

That threw her. “He did?”

“Yeah. You’re his partner in Los Angeles, right?”

“Yes. I came here to find him.” Asking would be a bad idea, but her mouth decided not to listen to her, and the words came out anyway. “Did he say anything in particular?”

They got into the elevator. “I just asked him why he hadn’t been by in so long, and he said he was busy with his new job. That he worked with the finest detective there is, and… well. It didn’t quite make sense to me, but he said something about how lucky he’d thought he was to know you, until he was reminded there’s no such thing as luck.”

Chloe just pressed her lips together, trying not to let the words affect her. He ran off and the first thing he did was tell an old friend how much he liked being partners with her, while refusing to ever talk to her. What was she supposed to do with that?

Maze was clearly not interested in their current conversation. “How much did you talk to him while he was here? Did he say anything that’s actually important?”

Savannah shook her head. “If you’re asking if he said anything that would help with finding him, no. We just caught up for a few minutes when he arrived. He said he wanted to stay here for a while, we arranged a room, and then he headed out again. I haven’t seen him since.”

They got out onto one of the top floors and headed down the hall. “And no one else here knows of anything odd happening? Anything that can help?”

“No. I made sure everyone on the staff knows who he is, and they’re to report immediately if they encounter anything related to him.”

She hadn’t really been expecting to get any easy answers. “Can you let me know if they do?”

“Of course.” They stopped at one of the doors, and Savannah opened it for them. “Here. Detective Wong already looked through the room, too. I don’t think there’s much to find.”

Chloe went in. It took her all of three seconds to believe it.

From everything she’d heard about how he’d been acting and how long he’d been staying here, she’d expected… well, something. A bunch of clothes strewn around, a pile of half-empty bottles, an open suitcase, trinkets he’d acquired and discarded.

Instead, the room was about as spartan as it got. Room service had obviously been in; it was neat and tidy, the sheets perfectly tucked in, a couple of pressed suits hanging up in the closet. A single unopened bottle of whiskey was on a serving tray on the table, a few glasses ready and waiting alongside it, but there wasn’t anything to say he’d ever actually had a drink here. If she’d been in a room like this in any other context, she’d have said it was being occupied by some executive on a business trip. A very expensive one.

They walked through it anyway, but it only took a minute to confirm there was nothing that would help them. “Let’s go,” she said softly to Maze. Standing here in Lucifer’s space like this was making her feel strange. It was too personal, despite the lack of personal touches.

“Or not,” Maze said. She asked Savannah, “Can we have that keycard? We need a room, and he’s not using it.”

“No,” Chloe said automatically, realizing what she meant. “We can stay somewhere else.”

Savannah said, “I’ll get you another room.”

Chloe started to decline again—this place was too nice, and there was no way she was going to pay extra for a room tonight—but before she could, Savannah added, “No charge. You came all the way out here to help Lucifer, and from the way he was talking about you, I know you must be close. Consider it part of the favor.”

Chloe almost refused on principle. She didn’t want to accept anything that came from him. But it would just be stupid to say no to a free room in the same hotel Lucifer had been staying at, especially not when she was only here for him. “Thank you,” she said. “We’d appreciate it.”

“No problem.”

They went back down to arrange it at the front desk, and then Savannah showed them to their room. It was similar in setup to Lucifer’s—one of the nicest places she’d ever stayed. Two large beds, a sweeping view of Las Vegas through the windows, a couch and several chairs, a bathroom that looked like it belonged in a spa. And that was without all the amenities open to her downstairs.

Too bad there was no chance she’d be able to enjoy any of it.

She told Maze she’d go park the car and bring both their bags up, wanting to be alone for a few minutes. So far, she’d been right in thinking that the things she found in Vegas wouldn’t make her happy. Learning that Lucifer was having a hard time, that he’d run off instead of talking to her, that he’d been planning to manipulate her for his own benefit…

Walking out through a side entrance, she paused for a moment to lean against the building and look up. Lights shone from the hotel and nearby buildings, but they couldn’t entirely block out the dark, wide-open sky above her. It spooled on and on, the combined effects wrapping her in a vague sense of unreality.

None of this should be happening right now. She shouldn’t be here. Lucifer shouldn’t have been acting this way. Most of all, he shouldn’t be missing without a trace.

What could possibly have happened to him? So many things he’d survived before, but out here hundreds of miles from home and anybody who might have wanted to hurt him, his luck had finally run out? Was this a random incident, wrong place, wrong time? Or was it a targeted act by someone good enough to pull it off that well?

And if so, why?

It was too late for her to get any answers tonight. With a sigh, she pulled herself up and went to get their bags.

Two days ago

Whatever they’d given him was strong. It sucked him down deep and made surfacing hard. Lucifer faded in and out of some semi-conscious state for a while, almost waking up, but never quite managing it.

He had the sense that he’d been fully out for hours before he first started becoming vaguely aware of things going on around him. Voices, bangs, pressure on his arms. He tried to move, tried to open his eyes, tried to place any of the sounds he heard, but it was useless. As soon as he thought to wake up, he was pulled down again.

One dream after another played through his mind; sometimes he fought his way through his captors again, sometimes he was back in hell, sometimes he was with Chloe at the precinct or her apartment or some crime scene.

Eventually the dreams came to an end. There was no slap to wake him up this time; he just gradually came back to awareness. The strain of his arms being pulled behind him again. The metal at his back. The hard floor underneath him. His head, pounding worse than ever. A voice, where finally, he could make out the words: He’s coming to.

He opened his eyes. The light seared through them again, cementing reality once more. He was back in that same room, tied up same as before, with four men arrayed in a semi-circle around him. Every single one had a gun pointed square at his chest.

Lucifer laughed, the sound rough. His throat was dry, and he realized he was thirsty. He’d never really known what humans meant when they said that before. The rest of him didn’t feel that great, either.

Four sets of hands tightened on weapons. “A little afraid?” he said. “Finally learned your lesson?” He looked them over, satisfied to see marks of his passing on them. Bruises everywhere, a split lip here, a black eye there. Well, on all but one of them; the one on the middle right was unscathed.

Lucifer focused on him. “I don’t think we’ve had the pleasure,” he said. “It’s a shame you didn’t get your own personalized greeting from the devil.” The man just looked on, expression as hard as the others. “I don’t know if that makes you more or less a fool.”

“You might be the devil, but we still overpowered you,” the one on the left said. Lucifer turned to him next. The first one he’d taken down before, the one who’d been so cocky in the beginning. There was none of that now; he was just stating a fact. “It seems you can still get hurt, and I don’t think even you can dodge four bullets at once.”

The odds weren’t high, no. They locked eyes for a moment, tension between him and every single one of those four guns pointed at him. They had him, and they knew it. He didn’t think using his devil face would work again; if they were still intent on going through with this, it meant they weren’t entirely ruled by fear. Bringing it out again would just make it more likely he’d get shot.

He tested his wrists, wondering if they’d been stupid enough to try the zip ties again. As soon as he moved his arms, though, he realized they hadn’t. His jacket was gone, and his wrists and part of his forearms were wrapped in something a lot thicker. He couldn’t see it, but he could guess what it was.

“Rope this time,” the same person confirmed.

“Hmm. Do you think that’s enough? Or…” He studied their expressions, the intensity in their gazes as they watched him test the rope. “No. You’re not sure of that at all, are you? That’s what this welcome ceremony is really for.”

Maybe they weren’t complete idiots. He could appreciate the attempt, but this wouldn’t hold him for long, either. He was pretty sure. He’d never actually had to break out of rope before, but it could snap, too.

“Well, come on, then,” he said. “I’m quite sick of this, so let’s just get it over with. Where’s your boss now?” He gave them a smile he knew would have enough of an edge to make them nervous. It wouldn’t do to let them think he was totally submissive now. “Don’t worry. I’ll wait until after we have this chat to give you all round two.”

His new friend warily put his gun away and went to the door, holding it open. “He’s secure,” he said. A moment later, the man Lucifer knew as Carmen Grant walked through.

“Carmen,” he called. “Long time, no frighten. I don’t know if you’re the bravest, dumbest, or simply the most desperate man I’ve ever met.”

He was looking at Lucifer with something like terrified fascination, the same way he had when Lucifer had first strode into his house months ago. Afraid of the devil, but still drawn to him. Brave, dumb, desperate… Lucifer reckoned the answer was likely all three.

It explained why his captors had been fixated on whether or not he was the devil, and why he’d been kidnapped. Well, partially. He wasn’t sure exactly what Carmen wanted with him now, whether it was revenge or his wings or something else, but whatever it was, him being the devil was at the root.

“Lucifer,” Carmen said, licking his lips. He looked haggard, his face drawn and wan. Definitely desperate. Being exposed to divinity like that had done him no favors. Was it still affecting him that strongly, even now?

Lucifer hadn’t spared much thought for the man after dumping him in some industrial district all those months ago. He’d been irrelevant—a victim in a way, a pawn of his brother. Lucifer had figured being separated from the wings and knowing his eternal fate would be punishment enough in the long run. It wasn’t like he’d try to go after the devil.

Or so Lucifer had thought.

Carmen stepped around the three men with guns, the fourth of Lucifer’s guards following along. “Where are they?” he asked.

“Where are what?” Lucifer said, though he had a feeling he already knew.

“The wings,” Carmen said. “Where are the wings?”

Apparently the divinity had scrambled his brain for good. Damn his brother for causing this mess and making his life difficult, yet again.

“You hired people to kidnap the devil just so you could stare at my wings?” Lucifer asked. “You really need to move on. You should think about finding a hobby instead. Perhaps knitting. It’ll help take your mind off things.”

“Nick,” Carmen said, and the man next to him stepped up. Lucifer saw it coming, but could do nothing to block his hand as he struck him across the face.

“Answer the question,” Nick said.

His head had been hurting so much already, it hardly made a difference. “If you think you can bully me into doing anything, you’re sorely mistaken.”

Another strike, and he felt the skin of his cheek splitting open. “Maybe not,” Nick said, “but I can certainly have fun trying.”

“I’m not messing around,” Carmen said. “I want the wings, and you’re going to give them to me.”

Lucifer shook his head. “No, I’m not.”

The next blow was to his gut as Nick kicked him. He sucked in a breath and swept his leg out, catching the side of Nick’s knee. He swore, dancing back a step, and then stomped down on Lucifer’s calf in retaliation.

“So violent,” Lucifer said, ignoring the brief flare of pain. He didn’t care about these petty blows. Looking at Carmen, he said, “I didn’t take you for the type. What happened to worshiping the almighty dollar? Where’s the offer to buy them from me?” He clucked his tongue. “This is so uncivilized.”

Nick raised his fist again, but Carmen said, “Enough.” Nick stepped back, and Carmen moved forward. “I know enough about you. You don’t care about money. You won’t hand them over willingly. So I have to take them.” The constant wariness on his face lifted a little, and his expression turned pleading. “You don’t understand. I need them. I can’t live without them.”

“I understand just fine,” Lucifer said. “It consumes your every waking thought. Your life doesn’t feel complete without them anymore. And despite my assurances that you’re going to hell, you just can’t help yourself. You’re sure that if you have my wings, you’ll end up in heaven. Am I right?”

“Yes,” Carmen whispered. “Yes.”

There was a reason angels weren’t supposed to expose humans to the divine. Carmen wasn’t the first person to react badly to seeing an angel’s wings, though as far as Lucifer knew, it hadn’t happened in millennia. The effect was designed to put people at ease, to make them want to please the owner, to crave it so that one could feel blessed and at peace. But sometimes, it went too far.

Lucifer had always detested it; it was just another way for his siblings to feel superior, and it spoke to the sheer arrogance of his father. Humans shouldn’t be made to worship it against their will. There was nothing inherently good about it, and the fact that it was no longer allowed to happen was just about the only positive thing that’d ever come of it.

“And you all?” Lucifer asked, looking at the others. “Are you still just in it for the money? Or do you think you might get a free pass to heavenly bliss, too?”

“Maybe,” one of them said. A bruise marred his cheek, and there was tape on one hand. Lucifer recalled sending him flying into a bookcase. “It seems worth a shot, doesn’t it? Who wouldn’t take that chance?”

Lucifer let out a breath that was halfway to being a laugh. “You’re all fools. It doesn’t work like that. My father couldn’t give less of a rat’s arse about any of you. Having my wings might make you feel like you’re wrapped in safety and serenity, but it’s all an illusion. When the time comes, you’ll decide your own fate. And I think I can assume that you’ve all done things you shouldn’t have.”

Nick kicked him again, but Lucifer just let out another half-laugh. “Tell us where they are,” he said.

Lucifer looked Carmen in the eyes. “They’re gone.”

“Where?” he asked. “Tell me where.”

“No, I mean they’re gone. They don’t exist anymore. I burned them.”

Panic flashed in his eyes. “That—no. You’re lying. You wouldn’t have—they—”

Lucifer grinned. “I never lie,” he said, relishing every word. “I burned them that very same night, in fact. You helped me to realize something, you know—that I’d been holding on to them as a crutch, and that I well and truly wanted to sever any ties to my past life. So thank you for that.”

Carmen dropped to his knees and grabbed fistfuls of Lucifer’s shirt, beyond desperate now. “That can’t be true,” he said. “They can’t just be gone—”

“I assure you, they are. You really should have just asked me, Carmen. All of this was an utter waste.”

“No,” he said. “No…”

Behind him, the others exchanged glances, clearly not very pleased with this turn of events.

“I’m not an angel anymore,” Lucifer said, the humor dropping away. “Not any part of me. You only have the devil now. Hurt me all you like, but you’ll never be able to get what you want.”

Carmen released his shirt, and Nick pulled him back. At least one of them was learning. “You have to be able to get them back,” he said.

Lucifer rolled his eyes. “I’m growing tired of this,” he said. “It’s not magic. I can’t wave my hand and make them appear, and even if I could, I wouldn’t do it for you. If you want divinity, you’re shit out of luck going after me. You’d be better off spending the rest of your life praying to one of my siblings for some.”

“I tried,” he whispered. “I tried praying… but no one answered…”

Lucifer snorted. “Of course they bloody well didn’t. That was sarcasm, you idiot. If prayers actually work, it’s only with my father. My siblings can’t even hear you.”

“There has to be some way,” he said.

“There isn’t. You have my answer. And the longer you try to keep this up, the more I’ll make you regret it, so you might as well give up now.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. Lucifer sighed to himself. Carmen was too far gone to listen to logic. He’d keep trying until he couldn’t anymore, and now he’d convinced a handful of others that they might get a reward out of this endeavor, too. “No. I didn’t do all this for nothing. You’ll find a way, or I’ll never let you out of here.”

“I’m immortal,” Lucifer said. Probably that was still true. “I have nothing but time, so feel free to waste yours. Eventually you’ll slip up, and then I’ll rain hell down on each and every one of you.”

He thought briefly of Chloe, and a pang ran through him at the idea of being trapped here for an extended time while she… well, while she moved on without him. That was probably for the best, but still, his chest felt odd as he pictured it. He didn’t like it.

She doesn’t want anything to do with you anymore, he reminded himself. But he’d still been hoping that he could fix things, and now…

He wondered then if she would even care that he was in this situation. He’d left weeks ago, and no one knew where he’d gone, and she’d made it clear that she wasn’t worried anymore. If he didn’t show up again, would she think anything of it? Would she ever think to go looking for him?

Probably not. And that was his own fault.

It’s for the best. She shouldn’t be concerned for him. Maybe this was a good thing, even…

Just like that, he lost any interest in dealing with these fools. So what if he was trapped here? He had nothing to return to but his own illusion he’d built up around himself. All he had was the empty comfort of Lux and the habit of finding murderers. What did it matter?

Maybe Maze or his mother would get fed up with him and track him down eventually, but that was it, and he would only care to see one of them. Candy was the only person who might be worried right now, and she deserved better than that, too.

“What do you want us to do?” Nick asked.

“Leave him here,” Carmen said, looking pained. “Yes. Let him see we’re serious. There has to be a way…”

Lucifer just gazed dully at him. All of the focus he’d had was gone, his headache returning in full force. It might as well hurt. Everything else did.

Nick didn’t look entirely happy about it, but he still nodded. “Think it over,” he told Lucifer. “You sound like you don’t even want them, or anything else that we want. What would it cost you?”

He no longer had the energy to try to convince them that it didn’t matter if it wouldn’t cost him anything.

“Dalton,” Nick said, and the one who’d gotten a face full of books lowered his gun. “Low dose this time.”

Another damn syringe appeared. That might as well happen, too. Drugs sounded nice right about now; it might numb the pain, if nothing else. The one upside to this vulnerability mess.

“Bo and I will take first watch,” Nick said, as Dalton approached with a healthy amount of caution. “You and Leon head upstairs.”

Another prick in his arm. “Maybe if you gave me something better, I’d want to help you,” he said, but they ignored him.

A moment later, Dalton left with the one who must be Leon, ushering Carmen out in between them. The door swung shut, and the remaining person with a gun slowly lowered it. “We’ll be watching you,” Nick said. “And this time, we’re prepared. Try anything, and you’ll just end up tied there with a bullet hole or two. I imagine you still feel pain, so…” He smirked. “Choose wisely.”

“You have no idea,” Lucifer muttered.

They migrated over to the door. A table and two chairs were nearby, but they elected to stand instead, at the ready. Lucifer could have told them not to bother, but why let them be comfortable?

It was only a few moments more when drowsiness descended over him again, but not as fully as before. There would be no deep sleep this time; he’d just be trapped with nothing but his own useless thoughts.

For a while, he just sat there, mired in his own private misery. He’d been right about it numbing the pain, at least. It was still there, but not as sharp.

He wasn’t used to feeling this physically weak, and he had no idea what he was supposed to do about his guards, who would be all too ready to shoot him if he twitched the wrong way. So he didn’t bother to try to do anything about it. What was the point, anyway?

All this for wings he didn’t even want, but should have just kept. If he’d had them, these fools would never be able to hold him, guns or not. His defiance in getting rid of them the first time had been useless in the end, burning them even more so. His father’d probably had a right good laugh watching him cut them off.

He thought of Candy, glad that she, at least, wasn’t hurt because of him. He wondered if she’d noticed he was gone. He had no idea how long he’d been here, but from the light he’d glimpsed outside the window before, it was the next day at least. They were supposed to be heading for Los Angeles, so perhaps she thought it was strange, but…

It probably wouldn’t make a difference. Even if she decided to report him missing, it wasn’t like he was going to count on the cops to find him. There was only one he’d ever been able to count on for that, and she definitely wasn’t coming.

No, he’d have to just wait until he had a better opportunity to break out again.

But all that changed was that eventually, Nick and Bo decided to relax a little more and stare at him while sitting down instead. It didn’t bother Lucifer as much as it probably should have.

So he just sat there, and waited. Eventually he drifted off again, his thoughts twisting into dreams once more.

Chapter Text

The day before

When Lucifer next woke up, it was to the exact same room; the only difference was that the two guards at the table nearby had changed. It took him a minute to think back and recall the names that had been matched to them. Leon and Dalton. They glanced over at him every now and then, having noted him coming to, and tensed as he shifted in place. How did sitting down hurt this much? It wasn’t just from being used as a punching bag, either. His whole body ached.

When he settled again and didn’t try anything, they went back to focusing on some video they were watching, not paying much attention to him. For a while he just gazed vacantly at the door, not thinking of much in particular. His mind was empty.

But it didn’t last forever. He started to become more and more aware of how uncomfortable he was in that position, the pounding in his head that wouldn’t go away, the hunger curling his belly. Another thing he wasn’t used to, not to that extent. They hadn’t bothered to give him any food, and he highly doubted that was going to change. How long had he been there by now? A full day? Longer?

It got old fast. Just because he couldn’t get out of here just yet didn’t mean he had to be docile about it. If his guards were going to be preoccupied, he might as well see how hard it would be to get out of the rope.

As it turned out, very hard. He tensed his muscles and snapped his arms out—or tried to. The ropes dug into his wrists but didn’t give. He strained against the bindings, putting all his strength into it, which wasn’t as much as he should have had. Maybe if he kept at it long enough, found something to use as leverage—

“Hey!”

The guards were suddenly much more interested in him than the video. Their guns made a reappearance in short order as Dalton ordered, “Cut it out.”

Lucifer didn’t. He got his feet under him and slowly stood, using the pole to brace himself. That hurt, too.

The guards jumped up and rushed over, alarmed, but he kept ignoring them. He tried to use his weight and the pole itself to help snap the ropes, but—no good. They might slowly fray, but not nearly fast enough.

Leon said, “Stop or I’ll shoot. I mean it.”

Lucifer could see he did. He wouldn’t be able to go on much longer, anyway; he felt dizzy, the floor seeming to swoop a little under his feet. So he stopped.

This whole thing was ridiculous. He shouldn’t be nearly this weak, and worse, it was courtesy of a bunch of thugs who wouldn’t last ten minutes in hell. Barely able to stand, unable to break a simple rope. None of this would be happening if he were invulnerable, the one benefit he was supposed to have from being apart from the detective.

Why was he so vulnerable now? Did it have something to do with Chloe that he didn’t understand, a mechanism he’d tripped without realizing it? Or was it his father playing another game?

Of course it is, he thought. Whether it was an added bonus tossed in now or related to Chloe, it was all the same. His father was behind both.

“Can you really blame me?” Lucifer said, not wanting to think about that again. “Sitting around like that is incredibly dull. Would it kill you to offer me some entertainment? I should be the one choosing the videos.”

Dalton snorted. “You’re a prisoner. You don’t get home comforts. Find a way to give us what we want, and maybe we’ll give you something in return.”

“That’s not a very good negotiation tactic. I give you an essence of heavenly divinity, and maybe, possibly, if the stars align, you give me a cushion to sit on instead of this insufferable floor? You can see how I’m not getting a good deal here.”

Leon waved his gun. “We don’t have to give you anything, since you’re in our power. You’re the devil and you tried to kill us all—you’re lucky you just get to sit here instead of something worse.”

Lucifer glowered at them. “If I wanted to kill you, you’d be dead. Or did you miss the part where I had all of you in my power and yet every single one of you walked away still breathing? You should be lucky the devil isn’t actually as evil as all you humans think I am.”

They looked uneasy at that, but only for a moment before they remembered they were in control again. “Doesn’t matter,” Leon said. “You still just ended up right back here, and now what we say goes.”

“You seem awfully confident that you’ll get away unscathed, considering that I am, in fact, the devil. You’re stupid enough to try to keep me here instead of taking the good fortune I gave you. Eventually you’ll slip up, and I’ll make sure each of you get your due. You feel powerful now, but I’ve seen how you are when confronted with the reality of hell. We’ll see how long you last when you experience it for yourself.”

That only made their expressions harden. “Sit down,” Dalton told him.

“No.”

Leon put the gun away and instead pulled out a baton. He didn’t wait to use it, striking Lucifer in the gut.

Once it would have been laughable. With his new vulnerability, he felt it all the way through, having to resist the urge to double over. “Does that make you feel better?” Lucifer taunted them.

Another hit. His breath tore out in a rush, and he struggled to inhale again.

“Sit down,” Dalton said.

Lucifer just grinned. “No.”

Leon answered with the baton, obviously relishing each and every strike. One, two, three, four… He stayed just out of range of any way Lucifer might have had to lash out. Sharp pain bloomed through his ribs with the latest blow, and then Leon smashed it against his knee, too. His leg gave out underneath him, and he fell with a lot less grace than he liked.

Still he just laughed, despite the spikes of pain in his chest at the motion and the fact that it was harder to breathe than it should have been. It was weakness from them, whether they knew it or not. And he suspected that some part of them did, because they only seemed frustrated by it.

So Lucifer was utterly unsurprised when Dalton took out another syringe, and the fight went out of him again.

Sometime later, the drugs wore off once more, the sedative slowly losing its grip. It washed out, leaving him feeling weaker than ever. His body ached, and breathing too deeply sent a stab of pain through his ribs. Just thinking about trying to get up made him want to groan.

His guards had changed again—Asher and the one with a now-broken wrist. They jeered at him as his gaze flickered over, but he just ignored them. He suspected it would annoy them more not to give them a reason to work him over again.

This was starting to remind him of hell. Wake up, deal with these imbeciles, get drugged… they had the routine down, just like one of the loops.

And similar to how it was outside the loops was the dreary atmosphere, the lack of a good drink, and the boredom setting in in full force. “This is ridiculous,” he said, then swallowed around the dryness in his throat. “How long are you really planning to keep this up? Surely he can’t be paying you enough to make this your new full time job.”

The one with the broken wrist just smirked and said, “We’re getting paid enough for now. And getting God to grant us favor for putting a stop to the devil… yeah. It’s worth it.” Asher laughed softly.

Lucifer stared at them. “You think what?”

“The boss will be here soon,” Asher said. “Maybe that will get you to rethink helping us.”

Lucifer just kept staring at them for another moment. And then he laughed, and laughed, and laughed. His ribs were on fire, but he didn’t care; this was too much. “That is one of the most absurd things I’ve ever heard,” he said, still laughing.

They exchanged a glance, the smirks gone.

“You really… oh, this is priceless,” Lucifer said, just as the door swung open.

Carmen walked in, the other four guards surrounding him. “What do you think is so funny?” Carmen said, obviously nonplussed to find his prisoner laughing.

“You and your new plan. But wait, I want to hear it in full from you, too. This is exactly the kind of entertainment I’ve been looking for.” He stopped laughing, but a half smile, half grimace remained in place. “Go on, then.”

Nick glared at him, while the others raised their brows. Carmen looked miffed as he drew himself up a little. “Your wings might be gone, but there are others. Call down an angel.”

Well, that bit was new. Lucifer’s grin widened. “Call down an angel,” he said. “What exactly do you think would happen if one of my siblings showed up?”

“I’ll trade you to them for heavenly favor.”

He snorted. “There are so many flaws in that plan, I don’t even know where to begin.”

Leon got the baton out again. “I’m getting real sick of this,” he said. “I guess you need more motivation to fall in line.”

“Wait,” Carmen said, and he stopped, disgruntled about it.

“Yes, wait, my dear,” Lucifer added. “He needs to make his case first before you try to beat an agreement out of me.”

The trepidation left Carmen’s face, anger rippling across his features instead. Good. He would be much more interesting that way. “Can you do it?”

“No,” Lucifer said. “I could pray to them, sure. But it wouldn’t do any good.” He’d tried to call on Amenadiel before, figuring he’d already stooped so low that asking his brother for rescue wouldn’t make a difference. But as nothing had happened, Amenadiel either wasn’t interested, or more likely, he still hadn’t regained the ability to hear prayers.

“Why?” Carmen demanded.

“Since you obviously haven’t thought this through, let me clarify some things for you: my siblings hate me, and there is not a single one of them that would answer me. Not to rescue me, and not to trade me for whatever favor you think it’ll get you. They don’t have any favor to give.”

“They have wings, too,” Carmen said, desperation already breaking through again.

“Do you really think they’ll cut off their wings for this?” Lucifer asked incredulously. “Come on.”

“I don’t need the whole thing. Just a few feathers will do.”

“Some for each of us,” Dalton said. “And I think they would give us a blessing for turning you over.”

Lucifer rolled his eyes. “They can’t. Only my father can hand out blessings, and he doesn’t need you to get to me.”

“They’re angels,” Carmen said. “They have to be able to do something for us.”

“Even if they could, they won’t. They don’t need you to get to me, either.”

That wasn’t strictly true, but they didn’t need to know that. Any of his siblings could find him, but even vulnerable, they would have a hard time subduing him. He’d let Amenadiel drag him back to hell because he knew how pointless it was to resist, wanting to avoid his father intervening directly. Even Uriel, the one probably best equipped to win that fight, hadn’t managed it.

He shoved Uriel from his mind—he didn’t want to think about him right now. “Honestly, Carmen,” he said. “I’ve been on Earth a while now. If they gave a damn about me, they’d have come to collect me already.”

Carmen shook his head. “I don’t believe you.”

He sighed. “I don’t lie, remember? It’d just be a waste of time. On the off chance that any of them did show up just to bask in my humiliation, they wouldn’t deign to bargain with you. You’re human, and they all have a superiority complex second only to my father’s.”

“Try anyway,” he said, that desperation all over his face now.

“No.”

“Fine, then.” He nodded at Leon, who stepped forward and kicked him. His already injured chest screamed out in pain, and he couldn’t help sucking in air, which just made it worse. “Stay here and think about your options. I’ve got time.”

“I’ve got more,” Lucifer said.

“But I’m not the one who’ll be suffering in the meantime. I think I’ll win this little game.”

“Oh, I think you’ll be suffering, too,” Lucifer said, glaring up at him. “I know how to handle a little pain. But you… you can’t handle being separated from the divine. It’s eating you up inside. Having me in your hands only to be thwarted again, denied what you were so sure you’d get out of it…” He shook his head. “You’re being tortured far more than I am.”

His jaw set. “Well, if I don’t get what I want, I’ll only be taking it out on you.”

Lucifer didn’t care. Seeing him lose might even be worth it. Carmen would do anything, but he was pretty sure his hired goons would not. If they didn’t get a payout soon enough, they’d walk.

Carmen left after that, leaving a few of his men behind. They took turns taunting him, threatening him, hitting him. All to no avail.

Eventually they got bored of his lack of response, and left him alone. There were no drugs this time, but it didn’t matter. He was so worn down that he spaced out all on his own.

Present day

Unfortunately for her, Chloe woke the next morning feeling distinctly unrested. It’d taken a while to fall asleep, her mind constantly turning over the evening in her head, trying to seek out a solution to her main problem. Eventually, her thoughts turned to dreams, but not good ones; she dreamed of wandering the streets outside her window, buildings and lights blurring around her, searching for Lucifer everywhere but unable to find him.

She really hoped that that was just her brain being annoying and not a premonition.

Maze, of course, had slept like the dead. She was as energetic as ever as she got dressed, slipping an impossible number of knives into her outfit as she went. “I’m going to head out on my own,” she said. “Find the local gangs and see what they know. If Lucifer was kidnapped, someone in the underworld will know something.”

Chloe nodded, dressing in her usual jeans and a long-sleeve shirt, deciding to forgo the weaponry that Maze offered her too. “Don’t tell me the details. Just find out what you can.”

Maze gave her a smile of approval. From her, about this, that probably wasn’t a good thing. But Chloe didn’t care. “Now you’re talking, Decker.”

“I was thinking of going back to the station and reviewing the security footage Jay obtained, anyway. I doubt you’d want to join me.”

“Definitely not. But text me if something looks off. It might help.”

“Got it.”

They set off, Chloe taking the car, and Maze managing to pull off her disappearing act in the bright light of day. She drove to the precinct and got out of the car, mind set on the task ahead.

So she was caught off guard when someone strode right up to her car. Dressed in black jeans and a black long-sleeve shirt, he glanced at her with a no-nonsense expression that instantly made her wary. “To help your search,” he said, and set something on the trunk of the car without breaking stride.

“Wait! Stop—who are you, how do you—”

But two seconds later he reached a waiting car and got in. She hurried after them, but it was no use; they peeled away, and she had no way to stop them.

She went back to the car and saw what he’d left behind. A pale yellow post-it, with nothing more than an address on it.

What the hell? She looked back in the direction they’d gone, wishing he’d given her any more information than that, wondering who he was and how he knew who she was. Whoever they were, they must know something about what’d happened to Lucifer, and must have had a reason for doing this. For giving her the note at all, and for not being willing to talk to her beyond that.

A quick search on her phone showed that the address was some apartment building downtown. Could that really be where he was? Or was it just a connection? Maybe someone lived there who knew what’d happened to him…

She called Jay without bothering to go inside.

“Chloe, hi. Did you find anything?”

“Maybe,” she said. “I’m outside the precinct, actually. I was going to ask to review the security tapes, but then someone handed me a note with an address on it. Can you look it up and see who owns it?”

“Sure.” She gave him the address, and a couple minutes later, he said, “It’s in an apartment building. The whole thing is owned by a management company. I’d have to make some calls to find out who lives in that particular unit.”

“I’m going to go check it out,” she said. “Can you dig into it and see if you can find anything connecting it to Lucifer?”

“I’m on it. Let me know what you find.”

“I will. And are you also able to see if you can figure out who left me the note? Blond man, mid-thirties maybe, dressed all in black. Got into a gray sedan.” At least one camera would have captured them this close to the building.

“Will do.”

She ended the call and tried Maze next, but she didn’t answer. So she texted her the address and let her know she was going there instead of reviewing the tapes.

Any hope she’d had that Lucifer had simply vanished of his own accord were gone now. Her gut was screaming at her that someone had made him disappear. The lack of any evidence turning up, his odd behavior beforehand, the anonymity over the note…

Someone had targeted him. And still she had no idea who, or why.

Chloe got back in the car, started the directions to the apartment, and drove downtown. She parked on the street near the building and spent the next ten minutes sitting in the car, surveying the area. Nothing stood out to her; people walked by, a few came in and out of the main entrance, a delivery truck was parked on a side street. There were a few bars in sight, a cafe, a couple of stores for clothing and accessories. All of it exactly what she’d expect to find here.

So she went inside. A decently nice lobby with a couple of spaces to sit and a front desk, currently unoccupied. She looked around, but didn’t see anyone. She’d have to track them down on her way back out. Instead, she took the elevator to the fourth floor, halfway up the building.

It opened onto a hallway that stretched out in both directions. Apartment 405 was at the end of one side. Nobody else was around, so she knocked on the door.

No response.

“Police,” Chloe called, knocking again. “I need to ask you a few questions.”

Still there was nothing.

Not home? Refusing to answer? Something else?

Another door in the hall opened, and an older man walked out. He looked surprised to see Chloe there. “I think you have the wrong apartment. That one’s vacant.”

What? “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. The old tenant moved out a month ago. They’ve been doing renovations or something the last few days.”

A note of unease trickled down her spine. An empty apartment, supposed renovation… it would be easy for someone to occupy it for a short time, moving in and out under the guise of working there. And hard to track them down if you were looking for them.

“Thank you,” she said. He nodded and went to the elevator.

Chloe waited until he was gone, and then tried the door anyway.

It was unlocked.

She cautiously stepped foot inside, every sense on alert. The main room was empty of both people and furniture. A living room blended into the kitchen, with a short hallway opposite the entrance. She looked around as she headed straight for it; it seemed the man might be right that no one lived here, but it wasn’t completely devoid of belongings. A small pile of takeout boxes was on the kitchen counter, and a black duffel bag was on the floor.

The hallway led to two bedrooms and a bathroom. A check through each of them, and she finally let out a breath. There was no one else here at the moment, though the bathroom also showed signs of someone occupying the apartment.

She went back out to the kitchen and looked through the duffel. It was mostly empty, nothing but a shirt and a Swiss Army knife.

Who was staying here? There was no way it was Lucifer; it was too unlike him. He’d never need to sneak into an apartment, let alone stay in a place with nothing to sleep on but the floor. And an overnight bag like this one… yeah, right.

Something behind the takeout boxes caught her eye. She went over and picked up a stack of photographs, immediately going cold.

They were all of Lucifer. Walking into the Bellagio. Smiling with Candy outside Fletcher’s. Wedding pictures of the two of them, but obviously shot from a distance, with another photographer just in frame. Lucifer, sitting in a bar she didn’t recognize.

And then some from further back, of him in Los Angeles. Partying at Lux. In the garage, opening the door of his Corvette. Chloe was in one of them too. When they’d been talking outside the dorm room at Malibu State, and she’d made a complete fool of herself.

This was all the proof she needed to know she’d been right. Lucifer had been abducted, or worse.

Who had taken these pictures? What were they after? Why follow him to Vegas and then wait weeks to do anything about it?

She set them aside and was about to call Jay when she saw something else, too. A phone. The same kind Lucifer had.

She pressed the power button briefly, but nothing happened. Dead or turned off. Holding it down a moment longer, she got the startup message.

After a minute, the screen lit up with a picture of… her. Sitting at her desk, head bent over some report or other, a faint smile on her face.

Chloe blinked. That wasn’t what he’d used the last time she’d seen it, but who else would have that on their phone? She typed in his passcode. 6969.

It worked, and she opened his messages to see if there was anything that could help. A string of worried texts from Candy, labeled Con Artist Extraordinaire; some from Maze with far less concern and a whole lot more hostility; a couple from Amenadiel asking where he was; and ones from The Doctor, probably Linda, asking if he was okay. Then of course, there were her own texts that she didn’t bother to read again. It wasn’t like that would help, and she knew what they said word for word.

The only thing of note was a contact named Destroyer. Was he fighting with someone she didn’t know about? She clicked it to see.

But the last texts were just recent ones demanding to know where he was, which didn’t make sense if they’d been stalking him. There were apologies further up, too, for hurting him somehow. It didn’t specify.

He hadn’t answered any messages except ones from Candy, just before he’d disappeared. The only calls he’d made or accepted were with her too. At least Chloe wasn’t the only one getting the silent treatment.

Behind her came the click of the door opening.

She stilled for a single heartbeat, then set the phone down. She reached for her gun as she turned, but—

“Hands up.”

Too slow. She had no choice but to stop as she stared down someone who already had their own gun up and pointed at her. With dark hair, a scruffy jaw, and a split lip, he was wearing jeans and a shirt with some kind of cleaning logo on it. His expression was hard and focused, and he was holding the gun like he knew exactly how to use it. “I’m with the police,” she said. “Put the gun down, now.”

He wasn’t fazed in the slightest. “I don’t think so. Put yours on the ground, nice and slow, and then step away.”

Chloe hesitated, but her current situation was no good. She’d been caught off guard, she was alone, and she had no doubt that he really would shoot her if he had to. “Okay,” she said, and did as he said. “Let’s be reasonable about this. You—”

“No talking,” he said. When her gun was on the ground and she’d taken three steps to the left, he pulled out a flip phone and dialed without looking. “Bring the van around and come up here. We have someone else to transport.” He hung up.

Shit. Her heart was racing as she tried to find a way out of this, but he was still keeping his distance. Holding her at gunpoint with no room for her to move or fight back. “You don’t want to do that,” she tried. “Abducting a cop will only bring the entire police force down on your head.”

“Look at my face,” he said, as if she’d ever taken her eyes off him. “Do you think I’m worried?”

No. No, she didn’t. And that was extra bad for her.

For Lucifer, too. If he was still alive. “What did you do with Lucifer?”

He smirked. “So that is why you’re here. Good to know. Makes things easier.”

“Is he alive?”

In the space it took him to answer, she could barely breathe.

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

What did that mean? That he was planning to kill her, too? Or that she’d end up in the same place he was being held?

If she couldn’t get away now, that would be the next best option. Take her right to him, and then she could work out a way to get them both out.

But she desperately hoped it wouldn’t come to that.

“Get on your knees,” the guy said, and she had no choice but to listen.

“Why are you here? Why are you doing any of this? What do you want?”

He didn’t answer. A few moments later, someone else walked into the apartment. “Who’s this?” he asked, looking her up and down. He raised his brows in a way that told her he liked what he saw. “I thought we were just clearing the place out.”

“We are. So take care of her.”

The newcomer shrugged and headed straight for her. “Sorry about this,” he said. “I hate to hit the hot chicks, but that’s the way it goes.”

Chloe jumped to her feet as he neared, trying to duck around him and put him in between her and the one with the gun. Maybe she could cause enough confusion, get away before she got shot—

She only made it two feet before he grabbed at her. She tried to kick him in the crotch, but he blocked her as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. Before she could claw at his face, he shoved her down, so hard she toppled forward, barely managing to get her hands out before she slammed face-first into the floor.

She looked up, ready to run again. But the first guy was suddenly there. Gun out, but not aimed at her. Swinging for her head so fast she almost couldn’t see it.

It connected, and the pain of it swallowed her whole.

Chapter Text

Lucifer lost track of time again. For a while he just drifted, not entirely sure if he was actually conscious or not. Sometimes he thought his eyes were open, hazily taking in the basement and the two men playing cards by the door. But he was in too much of a stupor to do anything, and eventually, the scene would morph into something that he realized later couldn’t possibly be real. It made him wonder if he was ever actually awake.

Once, the door opened and sunlight flooded in, even though he’d been through the door before and knew sunlight could never reach this room. It stretched out to him and made everything ugly disappear, leaving him alone and awash in warmth, able to curl up and sleep peacefully.

Then there was the time when Carmen came back and said Ah, I see you’re ready to cooperate now.

No, Lucifer said. I told you. It’s impossible.

But Carmen’s face was lit up with wonder. He wasn’t looking directly at Lucifer.

Lucifer followed his gaze to the side. To the wing stretched out, feathers glowing faintly. Bloody hell.

So beautiful, Carmen whispered.

They’re not. Take them. I don’t want them.

A curved hell-forged blade was already in Carmen’s hands. Pain erupted from his back without Carmen taking a single step. The next instant, he was on a beach, his wings discarded on the sand and blood pouring down his back. Take them, he told Maze, voice ragged. Find a place to store them where I don’t have to see them.

He’d blacked out after that, the pain and shock of being fully cut off from divinity too much to handle. But the triumph he’d felt was worth it. His father didn’t get to win. He would live the life he wanted.

At some point after that, Chloe showed up. She knelt before him, shaking her head. Look at you, she said. This is what you get for calling yourself the devil. Now you’re in real trouble over fake wings, and I have to deal with it.

Sorry, he said. None of this would be happening if I hadn’t cut them off. And it was all for nothing, anyway.

She shook her head, smiling. Not for nothing. You make your own choices. And so do I.

You do? You’re sure?

Of course I’m sure. I’m a detective, remember? I always find the truth.

She was right; she would know best. And that meant she must be right about this, too. Okay, he said. I believe you.

She freed him from the rope and helped him up. Come on. Let’s go home.

When he next thought he might be awake, his face was wet. He chose to believe it was from the cuts.

Another time, the guards started talking in Enochian, the language he’d first spoken and now no longer fully remembered. He couldn’t understand the words, but he knew that they were talking about the Silver City. Then wings unfurled from their backs as their clothes transformed into attire resembling leather, tough but flexible, and they stood, jeering at him.

They came over and kicked him, again and again. Breaking his ribs. Crushing his own wings that were spread out on the floor next to him, dim and mangled and crusted in dried blood. Lucifer couldn’t fight back. He could only lie there and take it. The pain of his defeat was worse than the blows, anyway.

The dreams made it hard to tell what was real and what was not. So when a commotion started up outside the room and he opened his eyes to see the guards on alert, it took him a moment to be sure that this time he was actually awake. The details of the room were a little too real, the pain in his body a little too acute, despite the disorientation. He shifted to test the rope, and fire ignited in his ribs. More than before.

Maybe not everything about that last dream had been his imagination.

One of the guards opened the door and stuck his head out. “What’s going on?”

“New prisoner,” someone else grunted.

“Who?”

It was vaguely interesting to Lucifer. Nothing about his current situation had changed, so this might be a good thing, if they slipped up because of it. As it was, he was still tied up and too weak to do anything about it. He was having trouble focusing his thoughts; he saw the room, but like it was happening to him, instead of being something he could interact with.

Until two of the guards dragged Chloe through the doorway.

For a second he could only stare in surprise, thinking that this must be another dream, after all. But then he took in the blood on her face and suddenly everything felt very, very real.

He forgot about the rope. He forgot that he couldn’t even get himself free. He just lunged forward, twisting onto his knees, the only thought in his head to get to her. “Detective!”

His wrists jammed against the pole, but he ignored the pain and kept struggling. It sharpened his mind that much more, each second further crystalizing the scene before him.

Chloe appeared to be out of it; her eyes were closed, and she was limp in their grasp. Her head lolled to the side, flecks of dried blood surrounding a cut on her temple, part of her skin already darkening in a bruise. Her hands were bound with what very well might have been her own cuffs.

“Detective!” he called again. “Let her go—if you hurt her—”

Nick snorted as he followed them in. “I don’t think you’re in a position to be making threats.”

“You bastards, she has nothing to do with this—let her go, let her—”

A fist clipped his jaw. His head snapped to the side, vision reeling for a second. He sucked in a breath and looked back at Chloe. They carried her past him, mere inches away from the furthest point he could reach.

“Isn’t this interesting,” Nick said. “I take it you two know each other?”

Lucifer just kept struggling to get to her as she was dumped on the floor beside another pole. He shifted around his own to keep her in view, until his back was to the door. “I don’t think we need to bother with more restraints,” Bo said.

“Just leave her there.” Nick crouched down next to her. He gripped her face, turning it slightly as if to inspect it.

“Don’t touch her,” Lucifer snarled.

Nick smiled a little and looked up. “Who is she to you?”

He was suddenly afraid he’d made a huge mistake. He’d assumed they’d brought her here as leverage against him, but what if that wasn’t it? What if she was here for some other reason? If they didn’t know who she was, and he’d shown his hand through his reaction, then he’d just given them that leverage all on his own. They might hurt her in order to get him to do what they wanted.

“Suddenly not interested in talking?” Nick asked, smirking. “That’s fine. She should be coming around any minute. Maybe she’ll be a little more forthcoming. She certainly seems… weaker.” He patted Chloe’s cheek before leaning back on his heels.

Lucifer wanted nothing more than to break his wrist for it, but the threat couldn’t have been clearer. “She’s a detective with the LAPD,” he said, trying for a different tactic. “If she goes missing, you’ll have every cop in the city looking for you.”

“But if she’s from LA, it might take a while before anyone can confirm she is missing,” Nick countered. “Plenty of time for us to get what we want.”

Lucifer held his tongue, heart hammering. He couldn’t give them what they wanted, and though that hadn’t seemed like a problem before, it certainly was now. Maybe he had all the time in the world for them to make a mistake that would allow him to get free, but Chloe didn’t. There was an urgency to the situation now that hadn’t been there before. It didn’t matter what happened to him, but he had to get her out of there.

“I don’t know about this…” Dalton said uneasily. “I mean, kidnapping a cop, that’s just stupid. We—”

Nick straightened. “Feel free to walk away if you don’t like it,” he said. “We’ll split your share.”

Dalton clenched his jaw, but didn’t go anywhere.

“That’s what I thought.”

If Dalton was more motivated by the money, he might be able to use that, if it came to it. But in the meantime, he had to get their focus off of Chloe. “Let her go and I’ll negotiate,” he tried.

Nick let out a low laugh. “I don’t think so.”

“I—”

He broke off. Chloe’s eyes were fluttering beneath her lids, her head moving slightly. Detective, he thought, managing to keep it to himself this time.

“Wakey wakey,” Nick said, nudging her with his boot. Lucifer wasn’t as successful at stopping his body from reacting again. He jerked against the restraints, though of course, it did nothing.

Chloe opened her eyes with a groan, and then she froze, becoming aware of her current situation. The room flooded in fluorescent light. The two men standing over her. Lucifer, on his knees ten feet away.

Their gazes met.

“Lucifer,” she breathed. She twisted onto her side, moving her arms automatically, only to be drawn up short by the handcuffs holding them behind her back.

Nick reached down, grabbed her shoulder, and pulled until she was sitting upright, legs turned to the side. Chloe shied back, but he held her firm. “You seem like a smart person,” he said conversationally, “so I hope you won’t get the same bright ideas Lucifer did. You might notice we’re all armed, and there is only one way out of this room. Try anything, and I’ll tie you up the same as him. Down to every last mark.”

He let go of her. Chloe swallowed but didn’t move, her eyes darting around the room. Probably taking in the others, the truth in Nick’s words. “What is this?” she asked, eyes landing on Lucifer’s again.

He just shook his head ever so slightly. “I’m sorry,” he said.

Nick grinned at that. “I think I’ll ask the questions first. Tell me, why does the devil care so much about a cop?”

She frowned. Lucifer could all but hear her thinking fast, trying to work out what to tell them. He shook his head again, useless though it was. “You really think he’s the devil?”

“Oh, I know he is.”

A huff of air escaped her lips. She looked incredulous as always when it came to his true nature. “If he was the devil, I doubt you’d be able to kidnap him so easily.”

“It’s perplexing, to be sure, but we’ve gotten over it. All the better for us.” Nick leaned down a little, and she moved her head away. “Now answer the question.”

She bit her lip, eyes roving over the room again. “He doesn’t care about me that much. We just work together.”

Lucifer flinched; he couldn’t help it. It was exactly what he’d wanted her to think, but it still hurt to hear.

“The concern for your well-being he displayed when we brought you in here says otherwise.”

“I don’t know what to tell you,” she said. “That ‘I’m sorry’ was the first time he’s said a single word to me in weeks. You’re holding him hostage, or whatever this is, and you brought in someone he knows, too. He wouldn’t like either happening. That’s it.”

Did she really believe that? Just from his silence?

It should be a good thing, but it made him feel sick.

Maybe she’d realized that letting on how close they were would only be to their detriment, and was exaggerating so they couldn’t use them against each other.

He shouldn’t want that, either, but he ended up hoping that was the case anyway.

“And you?” Nick asked. “I know exactly who you are, Ms. Decker. I know you two work together—”

“Then why ask?” Lucifer said angrily. “Why the games?”

Nick ignored him. “If you haven’t talked recently, why are you here? How did you find out about the safe house?”

Safe house? And as to why she was here… Lucifer really wanted to know the answer to that himself.

Chloe didn’t say anything. Nick motioned to Bo, and he went over and kicked Lucifer in the stomach. He doubled over and sagged closer to the floor, the blow aggravating every other hit he’d taken recently too.

When he looked up again, he saw Chloe’s lips pressed together, worry in her eyes. But she didn’t speak.

The next strike was aimed at his head. He went down, blood rushing through his ears. It took him a moment to be able to focus his gaze enough to see Chloe again.

“Let me make something clear,” Nick said. “We have license to hurt him as much as we want. Maybe the devil doesn’t actually care about you in particular, but I already know you care about him enough to go looking for him, so this little act is pointless. You might as well just tell me how you found us.”

Chloe glared up at him. “He was reported missing, and they contacted me. I came out here to find him, yes. And I got a tip-off about the safe house. I don’t know who gave it to me.”

Nick’s brows drew together. “One of the people in this room?”

Chloe hesitated, but then looked at each of them in turn again. “No,” she said.

“If you’re lying—”

“I’m not. Distrust your friends all you want. It wasn’t someone here.”

“Describe them.”

“Tall, blond hair, a tattoo on his neck. Dressed to blend in with a crowd.”

None of the men he’d seen were blond.

“What else did they say?” Nick asked.

“Nothing. They just gave me the address and walked away. I had no idea what it was, and I still don’t even know where we are now or what you want with Lucifer.”

She looked at him as she said it, a clear question on her face, but he didn’t answer. He couldn’t bring himself to tell her the truth, not when she wouldn’t believe him. He just levered himself up again, trying to think of some way to get her out of here, but he was coming up blank.

“Who else knows about the safe house?”

“No one. I wanted to see what it was first.”

Nick just smirked a little. “Fine. I’ll believe you, for now. Just know that if you’re lying, I’ll make you both pay for it.”

Chloe didn’t quite roll her eyes, but he knew her well enough to see it was a near thing.

“And as for what we want with him, well. Who wouldn’t want the devil in their possession? Divine favor, money and power on Earth… it’s amazing no one’s done it before.”

“No one’s been stupid enough to do it before,” she said. “Especially not people who actually believe it’s real.”

This time, she was the one who took the strike. Nick hit her hard enough to knock her off balance, and with her arms bound behind her back, she couldn’t catch herself. She landed on her side before she was wrenched back up again, a fistful of her shirt in his hand. “Don’t think I won’t hurt you, either,” he said. “No one will find you here. If we decide you’re not useful, we’ll dump your body in the desert.”

“You’ll regret ever laying a finger on her,” Lucifer promised.

Nick let her go. She slumped forward, but remained upright. “The amount you both suffer is up to you,” he said. “Let me know when you decide to cooperate.”

Saying he couldn’t cooperate would only earn Chloe another hit, so he said nothing.

“I’ll give you some more time to think about it,” Nick said.

A moment later, another needle was pricking his neck. He was really getting sick of it.

“Hey—” Chloe started, but Lucifer just shook his head. He sighed and settled back against the pole, knowing he’d be useless in a moment.

“My captors are really quite generous with the drugs they offer,” he told her, drowsiness already pulling at him again. “If only they’d offer some better ones. Sedatives are so boring.”

Nick moved out of view. Lucifer heard the door opening and closing again, along with instructions to watch them. Chloe looked over his shoulder as they left, and then her gaze went back to him. “Hello, Detective.”

She just looked at him. An entire world was held in that gaze, one so vast and deep that it sucked him in more surely than the sedative. He didn’t like how it made him feel, so he added on, “Welcome to my humble abode. I’d offer you refreshments, but I’m afraid I haven’t had a chance to stock up in a while.”

“You’ve been here the whole time?” she asked.

Did she mean since he’d left Los Angeles? Or since he’d been taken?

He’d been trying so hard not to think of the last time he’d seen her. Or those texts…

Through the sedative pulling him down, he felt the tension that’d been hovering between them for days now, even over hundreds of miles of distance.

“I don’t know,” he said, his brain finally catching up enough to realize that of course, she meant since he’d been kidnapped. The other option made no sense. “Maybe. I don’t remember what happened. I was at a bar, and then I woke up here.”

She scanned him over. “How badly are you hurt?”

He shrugged, even that small motion causing his body to lodge a series of complaints. Not that he let any of them show. “I don’t know that, either. What about you? Did they hurt you, too?” His eyes closed on their own, and he forced them open again. They’d knocked her out, too, in far less kindly a way than they had him. But other than that…

“No. Not more than what you saw, anyway.”

He nodded. Or possibly his head was just slumping forward. It was getting hard to think again, to hold on to consciousness.

“Do you know where we are?” Chloe asked.

“No. ’m sorry, Detective.”

“For what?” she asked. The hardness in her voice jolted through him, and he realized he’d shut his eyes again. He opened them to see her gazing back at him, her mouth set in a line.

Everything. He was sorry for everything. “For always getting you involved in things you shouldn’t be part of. You’re only here because of me.”

She looked away. “If you’re talking about me being here right now, that’s the only thing you don’t have to apologize for. I chose to come and find you, and that’s not on you. Not unless you sent those guys after me. And I don’t think you did.”

His eyes closed again; he couldn’t help it. He couldn’t quite follow the conversation anymore. He felt like there were other things he should be saying, but all that came out was, “You didn’t have a choice. Shouldn’t have come here…”

He heard her voice in reply, but he couldn’t make out the words. They just washed over him, carrying him back to that land of unreality.

“The least you could do is not insult me when I was just trying to help you,” Chloe said quietly, but she wasn’t sure he could hear her anymore. He seemed to have passed out, his chin dipping down to his chest, all the tension in his body released. Great. The only person who might be able to give her any information she could use to get out of here, and he’d spend the next who-knew-how-many hours unconscious.

She’d wasted the last minute she had getting caught up in something that didn’t matter right now. But he’d taken her by surprise, and really, he probably wouldn’t have had anything helpful to give her anyway. Not when he’d been so out of it already.

This wasn’t at all how she’d imagined their reunion going. Granted, she somehow hadn’t really thought about what it would be like in this kind of situation; the only times she’d imagined seeing him again had involved her hauling his drunken ass back to Candy, where she had the upper hand and could give him a piece of her mind. After realizing he probably was in trouble, she simply hadn’t pictured the moment she found him. She’d been too focused on doing the actual finding.

Now she was stuck here right along with him, facing his drugged and unresponsive body while she herself was handcuffed and unable to move. Some rescuer she was.

She tested the cuffs again, not that she really expected it to do anything. Her shoulders were already starting to ache from the awkward positioning. She looked around for the tenth time, trying to figure out what her life would look like for the next few hours at least.

A rectangular room with boxes and crates lining the edges. Two bare supporting poles in the middle—one that Lucifer was tied to, one behind her. A guard for each of them by the door, standing there looking back at her warily. They hadn’t said anything when she was talking to Lucifer, either because they knew it wouldn’t help or because they wanted to know what she and Lucifer would say if they could talk freely. But they were very obviously alert and attentive.

One of them let his hand stray to a gun at his hip when she continued to study them. “Like Nick said. Don’t get any ideas.”

Nick. Chloe assumed that was the name of the person who’d interrogated her—the one who’d knocked her out. He seemed to be in charge here, but she had no idea who they were or what they really wanted.

Could they really have kidnapped Lucifer just because they believed he was the devil? And if so, why? If they believed that, then it seemed downright stupid to try to kidnap him. She knew some people did truly believe he was the devil, and more importantly, how afraid each and every one of them had been because of it. These people weren’t.

Nick had said they were after divine favor, whatever that was supposed to mean. As far as she knew, the kind of god they were imagining didn’t do favor anymore. You lived and you died and whatever happened to you after that was a result of your own actions. So what he possibly hoped to gain by capturing the devil, she didn’t know. It wasn’t like God had put up wanted posters for Lucifer with a reward listed.

As for money and power on Earth… well, that was obvious enough. He didn’t even need to be the devil for that. When God failed to grant all their wishes, they’d probably just get him to hand over all his wealth instead.

She might be able to work with that.

When nothing happened for a few minutes, she finally turned her attention to herself. Her head was pounding from being knocked out before, a sickening swoop running over her every time she moved too quickly. Lying down sounded like an awesome idea, but it wouldn’t help her get out of here, so she tried to ignore the feeling as best she could. She scooted back a little until she could lean one shoulder against the pole instead and stretched her legs out in front of her, knees a little off the ground.

“Do you guys really believe he’s the devil?” she asked the guards, who’d been watching her every movement. She tried to make her voice as believably friendly as she could, like she was confiding in them her own skepticism. She had to know exactly what they expected from him.

“Yes,” the guard on the left said. Short, slightly curly brown hair, a black eye, and a few other cuts and bruises all over; like the others, he looked like someone had recently gotten in a few good punches. She hoped Lucifer had managed to give them a hard time before they were able to subdue him, but also like the others, he wasn’t afraid right now. He had his arms folded, leaning back against the wall as if he was at ease. “We saw it.”

“Saw what?” she asked. “Look, I know you guys think I know everything, but I don’t. I don’t believe in any of this stuff.”

“You work with the devil and you don’t even know it?” he asked, brow raised.

“I know he thinks he’s the devil, but I mean, come on. There’s no way a guy like that is actually some powerful evil being. Even if you believe there is a devil, it wouldn’t be him.” She nodded at Lucifer, at the state he was in.

The guard just shook his head. “That’s what I thought at first, too, but it’s true. Whatever he’s doing on Earth, whatever weaknesses he has, he is the devil. I’ve seen his true form. I watched him break out like we were holding him with tissue paper. We all almost got killed that first night.”

Chloe turned that information over for a moment. She took it to mean that Lucifer had tried to escape at one point, and had come close to succeeding. Maybe that was when he’d hurt all the guards. He was good at getting out of confinements; she knew how practiced he was at those tricks. But they were just that, tricks. And his true form…

She thought again of that glimpse of something she’d seen the night she’d shot him. Some illusion of a visage from hell, a fiery nightmare designed to scare people. She’d seen the effect it had on others, how instantly people became terrified, how instantly they started treating him like the devil stalking them in the night when he did whatever it was he did. But that was just a trick, too. It had to be.

Because there was simply no way Lucifer wasn’t human. Whatever darkness was in his past, whatever Maze was so sure would frighten her too, it wasn’t actual hell. She knew him; she knew just how very human he was.

He apologized for getting her hurt when it wasn’t even his fault. He made mistakes and felt bad about them—except for this latest stint in running to Vegas, anyway, but even that said he was human. Because he wanted friendship and intimacy, but was terrified when it was given to him. He risked his life to save people he didn’t even know, and that had to be the greatest proof of all.

He could get hurt; he was slumped over right here, as hurt as she’d ever seen him, too weak to do anything to even help himself. He couldn’t be the devil.

But that’s not true, came a small voice in her mind. He was hurt even worse before.

All that blood pooled on the hangar floor. Lucifer lying motionless on the ground.

Appearing in front of her a minute later to deck Malcolm, like he hadn’t even gotten a scratch.

It’d never made sense to her, and she’d chosen not to force it to make sense.

What if he’d survived because…?

She mentally shook her head at herself. That still didn’t make sense, either. Not with Lucifer like this right in front of her now.

Maybe he does have weaknesses. Maybe he can get hurt, but truly is immortal. And he hasn’t been hurt enough yet this time to bounce back…

This was ridiculous. It had to be that she had a concussion and it was affecting her ability to reason. Lucifer wasn’t the devil, and she wasn’t going to end up making stupid decisions like these guys over any misgivings she might have had before.

“What exactly do you want from him?” she asked. “I don’t get it.”

They traded glances, but didn’t answer her.

So she tried, “If you want me to be useful, I need to know what the goal is. Maybe I can reason with him, or figure out how to get what you need…”

Both of the guards just looked at a point over her head, a clear sign they were dismissing her. Fine. She’d find out eventually when they started going at it again.

It worried her, what they might do when he couldn’t deliver on their demands. She’d lied to them earlier, of course; Maze did know the address of the apartment, and when Chloe didn’t turn up later or contact her, she’d know something was up. The most logical move would be for her to check it out. There had to be some link between the apartment and whoever these guys were, and Maze really was good at her job. She’d find them eventually.

The time until she did could really be a problem, though.

Lucifer was already in bad shape. She studied him carefully, the harsh fluorescent lighting casting his injuries into sharp relief. A myriad of shallow cuts crossed his face, with half the right side swollen and bruised. The skin under his eyes that wasn’t bruised was pale and wan. His lips were dried and cracked, like they hadn’t given him any water at all.

His clothes showed a similar story. His suit jacket was missing, and the blue dress shirt he wore was rumpled and covered in splotches of dried blood. From his face or other injuries she couldn’t see, she didn’t know. But with the way they’d kicked him earlier, the stiffness with which he’d held himself… she suspected they’d beaten him at least once.

Constantly getting drugged like that would only make things worse. They probably hadn’t fed him much, either.

He needed to get to a doctor as soon as he possibly could. And if those guys came back soon…

Chloe wished she could go over and help him in whatever way she could, but there was nothing she could offer him while he was tied up like that. She wouldn’t even be able to assess his injuries with her hands bound like they were, assuming the guards even let her get close to him. Somehow she doubted they’d be so laid-back if she made an attempt to get to him.

Right. First order of business: get her hands free, or at least have them cuff her hands in front of her instead. She might be able to maneuver her arms around her legs, but it would be better if they did it themselves.

“I need to go to the bathroom,” she said.

The guard who’d responded to her earlier just snorted. “You’ve only been here for twenty minutes.”

“So? That means nothing to my bladder.”

They looked at each other again. “You can wait.”

They didn’t give any indication they were considering otherwise. So she fidgeted and shifted constantly, hoping to make them uncomfortable by watching her be uncomfortable. They obviously didn’t care about comfort in general, considering the state Lucifer was in, but this was something so small that they’d have to cave on it eventually. And she was just a human woman, weak and restrained…

The minutes passed, and Chloe caught them exchanging looks a few more times, clearly annoyed with her. She just kept it up, pretending not to notice.

“Fine,” the one guard muttered, standing up straight. “Don’t think you’re tricking us into getting out of here, because it won’t work, and you’ll have wasted your one time.”

“This isn’t an action movie. I’m not planning to pull anything.”

He still seemed skeptical, but he opened the door and called someone else in to help. Apparently Lucifer needed two guards at all times.

“What’s your name?” she asked the guard. He gave her a suspicious look, but she just said, “Since you’re the only one talking to me here, I figured I might as well have something to call you.”

“Dalton,” he said. “Don’t think we’re friends, though.”

“No chance of that happening, don’t worry.”

He just smirked a little, and he and the other person who’d entered the room lifted her roughly to her feet. He gripped her arm as they marched her to the door, her legs a little unsteady and her pulse pounding through her head with every step. She really wasn’t planning to pull anything; there was no way she’d get very far like this. She just needed more information on where they were being held so that she could pull something later.

She hadn’t had a good view of the door before, so as they walked her through, she was startled at what lay on the other side. She’d assumed they were in an industrial building somewhere—a warehouse or an old office building or some abandoned storefront. But instead, she stepped out into a well-furnished room that looked liked it was part of some wealthy person’s house. Tasteful furniture, pristine hardwood floors, an expensive-looking TV on the wall. The only thing out of place was the pile of books dumped on the floor, only a few remaining on the bookshelves above.

A basement, judging from the single window set high into the wall.

That alone told her this likely was a high-end house. Why were they here? Did they work for someone rich?

Dalton led her across the room to a side bathroom. No windows, just a toilet and sink. “In here.”

She moved her arms up a little. “I need these off.”

He held up a key and gave her a warning look. “If you cause any trouble, we’ll give you a sedative too.”

She nodded, and a moment later, the cuffs fell off her wrists. She immediately brought her arms around, stretching her wrists and shoulders.

“Two minutes,” Dalton said, and she shut the door behind her.

She might as well actually use it, since she had no doubt they wouldn’t grant her another request for a long time. A quick search through the cabinet showed there was nothing in here but soap and toilet paper. There’d been no loose objects for her to pick up on the route to the bathroom, either.

This wasn’t something they’d done on a whim. This was planned out, and the people guarding them weren’t total amateurs. They knew how to manage captives and how to cover their tracks.

Dalton didn’t immediately put the cuffs back on when she opened the door again. On the way back, she noted the staircase along the nearby wall that led to the upper level, and more importantly, that there weren’t any other exits.

This would be difficult.

Chapter Text

Chloe was taken back to the room and the support pole across from Lucifer. It didn’t look like he’d moved. “Sit here,” Dalton said. He dangled the cuffs by one finger. “I’ll leave these off if you keep behaving. Go anywhere, do anything, and they come out again. If you make any sudden moves, I can’t promise my buddy Leon over there won’t choose a different tool.”

Over his shoulder, Leon grinned and put a hand on his gun.

“Yeah, I think you’ve made it perfectly clear by now that I’m not going to win any fights,” she muttered. “The smart thing to do is to stay right here and wait for the cops to find us. Because they will, sooner or later.”

“You’d better hope it’s later, because if we don’t get what we want before then, I guarantee you you’re going down first. Nothing personal. That’s just how Nick runs the show.”

Not for the first time, Chloe wondered if Nick was the one behind this whole endeavor, or if he was just the bad guy in charge. “You said you didn’t believe Lucifer was the devil at first, right?” she asked, lowering herself down until she was sitting against the pole again. Trying to make herself appear as nonthreatening as possible. “Why help Nick, then?”

“Why else? Money.” He motioned to her other escort, who left the room. But Dalton hung around instead of returning to the door, engaged in their conversation. Good. “I’m a mercenary, if you haven’t figured that out by now. We got offered good money to extort some more out of a guy who calls himself the devil, and now here we are. With the actual devil in our hands.”

She didn’t try to convince him otherwise. Dalton being in it for the money might be the first bit of good luck she had. “Well, even as just Lucifer, he’s rich as hell. And honestly, he doesn’t care about money in the slightest. I think he has so much of it that it’s meaningless to him. He even offered to buy me a house once, just because I said I was looking for a new place to live. The same way I’d offer someone a glass of water if they were thirsty. So if you want money… I guarantee he’d give you more than whoever’s paying you to let us go.”

Dalton just smiled a little, but Chloe could tell he wasn’t buying it. “I’m sure he would.”

“Nick isn’t here, and neither is the person who hired you,” she said. It was a guess, but from the way his expression didn’t waver, she knew she’d guessed right. Now she knew both that they weren’t at the house and that Nick definitely wasn’t the one calling all the shots. “So if you want to walk away with enough money to buy a house on a whim, too, then now’s the time to negotiate.”

Dalton took a measured step forward and leaned down. “Nice try, but it’s not going to work. Betraying your employer doesn’t get you very far in my line of work.”

“You wouldn’t need to work again if—”

“And,” he said, talking over her, “I don’t think for a second that if I just let you go, you won’t track me down later. I haven’t forgotten you’re a cop.”

She closed her mouth, feeling her luck evaporating into thin air.

Dalton straightened again and went back to the door. “I didn’t believe at first, but I do now. I think I’ll wait and see how this plays out, on the off chance I do get something money can’t buy out of it. And if not, well.” He shrugged. “I think Lucifer will still pay up then, and even split amongst us all, that’s still a pretty sweet payday.”

“We would still track you down,” she said, glaring at him now.

He looked a little discomfited for a second. But he said, “I’d still rather take my chances that way.”

Leon was grinning next to him. Chloe had the feeling that all of them would give her the same response. Why take money now, when they could have at least that and possibly more later?

So much for that tactic.

She looked away, trying to settle in as much as she could. But the floor was hard cement under her, the pole intensely uncomfortable no matter what she did. Nor could she get used to the eyes tracking her every move.

Eventually she just gave it up and lied down on her side, facing Lucifer, using one arm as a pillow. She’d meant what she’d said before; the smart thing to do was wait. Wait for Maze, or for Detective Wong, or for something here to change to their advantage. There was no way out right then; she’d just get herself and Lucifer hurt if she tried.

So she waited, and waited, and waited.

Time trickled by. After a while, the atmosphere shifted a little, the tension draining out of the room. Even Dalton and Leon could only keep it up so long with nothing happening. They sat at a nearby table, eyes flicking over to her every now and then, but mostly they seemed preoccupied with a card game they’d started up. Chloe listened to their muted voices and slowly got used to being under guard.

She dozed off a little, the headache getting the best of her. Not awake enough to be fully aware of what was going on all the time, but not fully asleep, either. If something happened, she’d be able to react. In the meantime… she needed all the rest she could get.

Sometime later, she opened her eyes again. Something had caught her attention, but she couldn’t immediately figure out what.

Then Lucifer shifted slightly, and her eyes went straight to him.

He didn’t seem to be completely awake yet. His head drifted to the side a little, his brows drawn together. His mouth opened, his lips shaping some word she couldn’t make out. But he didn’t make a sound.

After another minute he stilled again, whatever dream he’d been having losing its hold.

She lied there for a while longer, watching him. Thinking of how he’d ended up here.

Maybe she’d had good reason to think his latest disappearance was nothing more than him getting lost in an endless party, but she felt a little bad for it now. Angry as she was with him, he didn’t deserve this. Three and a half days in captivity, little to no food or water, beaten and drugged. All because he called himself the devil.

She wondered yet again at what had happened to him in the past. What his family had done to him. Why he’d learned those tricks, why he believed himself to be so awful at heart.

For just one single minute, she let herself think about what it would mean if he was the devil. If that past was one of actual hell. If his father, God, had really cast him out of heaven and condemned him to a life of pain and torture, and he reflected that back at people whenever he let them see who he really was.

She tried to picture him in hell. Surrounded by fire and demons and people screaming. Stalking amongst the worst of humanity, a grin of wicked hate in place, made even worse than all of them. The person evil feared.

She couldn’t do it. It just ended up looking like a bad cartoon drawing in her head. Lucifer, who always dressed in immaculate suits and viewed children as a terror? Who stuck around through boring cases and funded scholarships just because he could? That wasn’t him. He sought life and joy and fun every hour of the day.

And sure, he detested liars and murderers and those who harmed innocent people, he liked to make sure they were punished, but it was more complex than that. He didn’t just want to hurt them in turn. He cared about justice, and right and wrong. He did it for others as much as for himself.

She guessed maybe he could be the devil and that her idea of the devil was simply wrong. But still… she just couldn’t picture it. Something had to be different about the devil. And Lucifer…

She’d seen him feeling low, the way he poured his heart out into his piano. She’d seen his face light up when something made him unexpectedly happy. She’d seen the pure fear in his eyes when he’d found her with a bloody nose. She’d seen him mere hours ago, looking back at her after they’d given him the sedative, face full of some raw emotion that she couldn’t even begin to name.

He was a lot of things. And he was far from a saint.

But he wasn’t the devil, either.

His lips moved again. “’tective,” he breathed, the word cracked and broken and almost too quiet for her to hear. She stilled as his eyes fluttered open, looking at her, but there was a vacancy to them that made her think he was still caught up in his own mind. Not really seeing her. “Go… stay ’way…”

She loosed a long, slow breath. Even like this he wanted her gone.

Why? Why was it too much for him to just accept that she wanted to be part of his life? Why did he have to go and make this harder for her, to be in danger for his life and look at her the way he had and still push her away?

Something in her chest tightened at the thought that if he were more lucid now, he’d tell her that outright. Reject her all over again. Tell her to take care and get to safety and leave him behind, and not just now. Every other time from here on out, too.

“You’re the most infuriating person I’ve ever met,” she said, as quietly as she could. “I kind of hate you right now. And I hate you for that, too.”

Dalton and Leon paused and looked over at her. “Did you say something?” Dalton asked.

She sat up, watching Lucifer’s eyes fall shut again. “I changed my mind,” she said, more loudly now.

“On what?” he asked, slightly incredulous.

“On this whole deal you’ve got going on. I want in.”

Leon laughed. “You’re crazy.”

“No, I’m pragmatic.”

Dalton crossed his arms while Leon laughed again. “All right, I’ll hear this. Entertain us.”

She tried to keep from glaring at them. She couldn’t be too antagonistic, or this would never work. “I’m still not sold on him being the devil, but you were right. If he is and there’s something to gain from doing this, then I want to be part of it. And I know as it is, you’re not going to let me walk out of here. I’d like to try to change that.”

Dalton studied her for a moment. “You’d throw your partner under the bus like that?”

“I keep trying to tell you we’re not that close. Also, I’m pretty pissed off at him at the moment.”

“You’re a cop who was trying to find him.”

“Yeah. Did you expect any different?” She crossed her arms, too. “I’m not interested in joining the squad. I just want to walk away from this. I have better odds if I cooperate, no?”

He considered. “Possibly.”

“And if that means I get a chance to rescue his dumb ass later, I might as well take it. It’s not like I can do anything about it right now.”

“I guess you are a pragmatist.” He shook his head, though, still skeptical. “What do you even think you could do to cooperate? We brought you here to keep anyone else from finding us, and it turned out you might be useful to motivate him. Unless you’re offering yourself as a punching bag, I don’t see why we’d need you.”

“Yeah, I’ll pass on that offer, thanks,” she said. She was doing her best not to let her nerves show. If she played this wrong, it would make everything worse for both of them. “Maybe the past three days haven’t made this clear enough to you, but Lucifer is the most stubborn person on the planet when he wants to be. And trust me, right now, he wants to be. He’s not going to do anything you want him to. Even if you hurt me to change his mind, it’s going to take time. So let me talk to him. Alone. See if I can get information that will help.”

Dalton seemed to consider it, but Leon said, “We might not need him to do anything.”

Crap. If that was the case, then…

Dalton shrugged. “Sure. Why not? Let’s see what happens. If it helps, it helps.” Leon started to protest, but Dalton evidently had more authority here, because he was overruled.

That was easier than she’d thought it would be.

Dalton put a hand into his pocket and pulled out the handcuffs. “But if you want to be alone, then these go back on. Around the pole. And just know that we’ll have eyes and ears on you the whole time. You start plotting against us together, you’ll regret it.”

Or not. “Fine,” she said, because she didn’t have much of a choice. She’d been planning to do exactly that. Now… well. Maybe they’d still be able to work something out that she could pass off as her plotting against Lucifer instead.

“When he wakes up, we’ll leave.”

Might as well wait. He hadn’t moved again; there was no point being alone with him right this second, not if she’d be restrained too.

So she lied down again and kept waiting for something to change.

It was hard to judge how much time was passing here. There were no windows, no clocks, no sounds coming from outside. No one else came into the room.

How long had she been here by now? It was morning when she’d been taken, and she had to have been in this room for hours. Her stomach was tight with hunger, and she was thirsty, too. Late afternoon, she’d guess. How much longer would they keep this up?

It felt like another couple of hours had passed when Lucifer stirred again.

He lifted his head, eyes open and moving around as if he wasn’t sure where he was. They landed on her, and he swallowed. She had the feeling that this time he was a little more aware of what was going on.

“Lucifer,” she said, voice low. She pushed herself up again, glad that her headache had receded a bit, at least.

“Detective,” he mumbled, but didn’t do anything else. Seeing him so listless like that just felt wrong.

Their guards stood up. Leon waited by the door while Dalton grabbed the cuffs and made his way over to her. She put her back to the pole and let him pull her arms around, feeling the cool metal enclose her wrists once more. She hated it.

“Remember what I said,” he told her quietly, and walked away.

“What… doing…” Lucifer tried, head dipping down a little.

They left, the door closing behind them. Chloe didn’t know where the camera was, but she fully believed that there was at least one. “We’re alone,” she said. “I bought us some time.”

His eyes opened a little more at that. “Shouldn’t be here,” he said.

“Yeah, well. I am, and I can’t just waltz out of here, so let’s deal with it. Do you know who’s running the show?”

“Grant,” he said, as if on autopilot. “From the auction…”

She had no idea who that was. “What auction?” she asked.

“My wings. He had my wings…”

Wings… an auction. Right. The one the FBI had raided a while ago, when his wings had been stolen. And now someone had kidnapped Lucifer thinking he really was the devil. “I thought you said it was a replica.”

“He had them… the real ones…”

Chloe just sighed. Of all the things to be kidnapped for, it was over a set of costume wings? Ones that Lucifer had decided weren’t even actually important? And yet here he was now, still insisting that there had been real angel wings out there somewhere. “Is Grant the person who bought the real ones?” she asked, knowing she had to go along with this. “Or—”

“Auctioneer,” he said. His eyes met hers, but they weren’t entirely focused. “Kept them… divinity…”

Maybe Lucifer wasn’t actually awake enough for this conversation. What if he was just putting his own truth over things again, assuming it was about some set of wings when it was something else entirely? It didn’t even make any sense—why kidnap him if this guy had the wings already?

She tried to think over what she knew of the auctioneer, but really, she didn’t remember much. She’d chased after him and watched him disappear through what looked like solid wall. After that, she’d left it to the FBI, since it wasn’t her problem and she’d realized that something similar must have happened at Palmetto. She’d thought to go after him with Lucifer later, to get the wings he wanted back, but then he’d told her he wasn’t interested in them anymore, and so she’d dropped it.

She guessed it wasn’t entirely unreasonable for him to be involved, since that case had been so wrapped up in Lucifer’s identity as the devil. But this felt extreme. “What does he want from you now?” she asked.

“The wings,” he said. “He wants the wings. Can’t give them to him… they’re gone…”

Someone kidnapped Lucifer to get wings they’d already stolen from him? It didn’t add up. “Can you give them something else?” she asked, feeling like she was taking a shot in the dark. There was nowhere else to go with this, not when everyone was playing by a different set of rules.

He shook his head. “Nothing left. No one will come.”

She didn’t entirely know what that first part meant either. But the second part wasn’t true; she’d come for him, and there were others.

Had he spent the last three days locked up here thinking that no one cared enough to look for him?

It was kind of heartbreaking, but it was irritating, too. If he’d thought she wouldn’t want to look for him, it was because of him breaking those ties, when she’d tried to make it clear just how much she cared. And apparently he thought so little of her as to not care at all that her partner was missing, regardless.

Still, though, it felt too cruel of her not to let him know they weren’t completely screwed. “If only you had a bodyguard,” she said carefully. “Someone with a lot of skill who could track you down. I bet they’d find you.”

His brows drew together as he looked at her, his eyes seeming to become a little more focused. She really hoped the words got through to him. “That would be nice,” he said. “Do you think they’d raise hell?”

“I think we’d just have to sit back and let them have at it. Enjoy the show. You should really think about hiring one for next time…”

He leaned his head back against the pole, eyes almost falling shut again, but she could tell it was by choice. “No next time,” he said.

“Even better.”

They just looked at each other for a moment. “Why are you here?” he whispered. “You said… nothing to do with me anymore…”

She looked away at that. He was referring to her last text, probably. But that wasn’t fair. After what he’d just said a minute ago… “You were the one who left,” she said, the words coming out before she could think better of it. “You were the one who made it clear you don’t want anything to do with me.”

He laughed, low and bitter, so unexpected that she raised her head again. “If only that were true.”

Chloe could only stare at him, a wealth of frustration rising through her. This so wasn’t the time or place to have this conversation, but she couldn’t help it. Trying to shove it back down again would take more effort than she could give. Feeling so small, she said, “You really hurt me, you know.”

His eyes widened, lips parting. He looked like she’d struck him.

But right at that moment, she didn’t care.

“I guess maybe you thought it wouldn’t be a big deal to me. That I’d just shrug and go ‘oh, well.’ But it was, Lucifer. I really…” She swallowed, finding it suddenly hard to do so. “I really thought I was going to die. And then you saved my life and disappeared like it was nothing. Like I was nothing.”

“Detective,” he breathed. “That’s not… you’re not nothing, you’re e—”

He didn’t finish. But this time, she didn’t think it was because he was having trouble speaking.

“Don’t bother,” she said, looking away again. “I don’t want to hear it. Candy told me everything there is to know. I came here because it was the right thing to do, but I meant what I said. Once we get out of here, I’ll leave you alone. Just do me a favor and give me the same courtesy.”

He didn’t say anything to that right away. Chloe couldn’t bring herself to see his expression. She didn’t want to feel bad for the hurt she’d probably find there, or get caught up in the way he kept looking at her. He cared, but not enough; he was desperate for her to understand, but wouldn’t explain. She didn’t understand him, and she was tired of trying. It just hurt her, too.

“I was only trying to do right by you,” he said. His voice sounded so… defeated. Like he’d given up on everything and was just waiting for the next blow to land. “But there’s truly no way to avoid being harmed by the devil, it seems.”

Referring to himself as the devil again just stoked her anger. “It’s not some inevitable thing, Lucifer. You’re not inherently evil, or whatever. I tried to reach out, I tried to give you chance after chance, I tried to make it clear that I don’t see you that way and that I’d forgive any mistakes you made, as long as you tried to do better later. But you didn’t. You pushed me away. On purpose. You made your choices.”

He sucked in a breath. “I made the only choice I thought I could, so that you could make your own. Free of me. Free of any interference from my fa—”

“Stop,” she said, finally looking over at him again. She couldn’t take it anymore. “Just stop going on about how your father is controlling everything you do, Lucifer. It’s not true.”

“Not me,” he said, almost desperately now. “You.”

She shook her head. “No. He’s not. And nothing I say will change your mind if you’re determined to believe that I couldn’t possibly be making my own choices when it comes to you, so I’m done trying.”

“You don’t get it,” he said. A small sound slipped out with the words, one of pain. It cut her, too. “Please, Detective, I—”

The door opened. Dalton strode in, mouth set in a hard line. Leon and another person whose name she didn’t know followed behind him.

Chloe had been so wrapped up in their conversation that she’d almost forgotten where they were and that they were being watched. She’d stopped feeling the ache in her shoulders from having her arms twisted behind her, in her butt from the hard floor, in her head from the concussion. She’d dropped all pretense at working him over to their side. For those few minutes, nothing else had existed but the two of them.

It all came crashing back down now.

Lucifer just kept staring at her as Dalton stopped at the side, looking between the both of them. “That’s your idea of getting information out of him?”

It made Lucifer finally glance over at him, startled. “What?”

“Because it looked more like a lover’s spat to me,” Dalton went on. “So much for wanting in on our plans.”

“I changed my mind again,” Chloe said, while Lucifer looked at her with sheer betrayal. She wasn’t in the mood to try to correct whatever assumptions he was making. He could think whatever he liked.

“Not that close, huh?” Dalton said. Crap. “It seems to me like you know each other very well.”

“No,” she said. Maybe she could still salvage this. “I thought I knew him, but it turns out I don’t.”

“Sure. I’ll keep buying that.”

“Do you have ears?” she asked, beyond done with all of this shit. “Because I was very clearly telling him that I don’t like how he treated me and that I don’t want to be partners anymore.”

Lucifer visibly flinched across from her, and this time, Chloe did feel a little bad about how harshly she’d said it. She wasn’t even entirely sure she meant it. The last part, anyway.

No. She did mean it. It might hurt to think, but she had to draw that line so she wouldn’t keep getting hurt.

“Maybe you feel that way, but Lucifer here obviously feels differently. Isn’t that funny? The devil pleading with a human for forgiveness.” He shook his head in wry amusement. “I think that in fact, he’d do whatever we tell him to in order to spare you. Turns out this was helpful to us after all, so thank you, Detective.”

Fucking shit.

“You won’t touch her,” Lucifer said. She could see how angry he was, but it was much less of an impressive effect than it might normally have been. “If you give her so much as a paper cut, I swear, I will make sure you’re familiar with what hell is like before you ever set foot there.”

Chloe dearly wanted to tell him to shut up, but that would only confirm in their minds that she was full of it. Would it kill him to act indifferent right now? But no, he only did that when she didn’t want him to.

Dalton swept his arm out towards Lucifer, giving her a smug look. “You see? He would.”

“All I heard was a threat on your life, not surrender,” she said, but he wasn’t convinced.

“I guess maybe abducting a cop was worth it. I’ll leave you to rethink your strategy.” He walked off again, back to his post by the door.

“If you’re going to hurt me later, can you at least take these off again?” Chloe asked, lifting her hands as much as she could.

Leon laughed. “No way.”

Dalton didn’t correct him. She sighed, looking anywhere but at Lucifer. Which was hard, because she could feel his eyes burning her skin.

He didn’t say anything, though, and she didn’t either. Their captors held a quiet discussion by the doorway before Dalton left, leaving the other two to keep watch.

And slowly, the evening dragged on.

Chloe was guessing it was evening, anyway. She was feeling a little sick from the lack of food and rest, and her headache was making a comeback. She did her best to ignore it, trying to think of anything else she could do to help their situation, wishing Maze would pull a magic act and show up soon with backup in tow.

But nothing happened.

After a while, she stopped feeling Lucifer’s stare. A little while after that, she glanced over at him, and a fresh round of worry flooded through her. His head was drooping again, his eyes nearly closed and gazing vacantly at the floor. He looked like all the energy had been sucked out of him. Sick and dehydrated, wounded and weak.

How much longer could he last like this? What if he was already hurt too badly to fix?

“Hey,” she called out. His eyes flicked up at her, but he didn’t raise his head.

She hadn’t done it to get a response from him, though. Leon looked over at her. “What?”

“If you keep treating him like this, you won’t get anything out of holding him. He needs food, water, medical attention—”

Leon shook his head. “He’s the devil. He doesn’t need anything.”

“Just look at him. He clearly does—”

“No, he doesn’t,” Leon said, dismissing her. “He’s immortal. If he’s a little uncomfortable, well, that’s not my problem.”

A flash of sheer hatred swept over her, for Leon and everyone else involved in hurting him. They saw someone they thought they could use, told themselves he was the devil and therefore not human, and decided they could torture him all they liked. Nothing she said would convince them otherwise.

“Don’t bother,” Lucifer murmured. “They’re right. Won’t kill me… probably…”

“Shut up,” she told him. He had even less regard for his well-being on a good day than these assholes did now, so he didn’t get to judge. Even if he survived this, it mattered that he was suffering at all.

“Don’t worry about me,” he said. “Not worth picking a fight. Don’t make it worse for yourself.”

She was getting really sick of him telling her to take care of herself at his expense. “Right, because you’re so good at self-preservation when someone else is in trouble. If I was in your place, you would never take that advice.”

“You wouldn’t have hurt me first,” he said, voice fading out again. His eyes closed. “I don’t deserve it.”

“Do you really think so little of me?” she said, her anger spilling over to him yet again. “It doesn’t matter if you hurt me or that I’m mad at you. I came all the way out here to find you—I’m not going to just accept how they’re treating you.”

“There really isn’t a single damn thing you can do about it,” Leon said. His voice was cheerful on the surface, but there was an undercurrent of warning to it. “The both of you had better cut it out, because I don’t feel like listening to this ‘save yourself’ crap going on.”

“Yeah, well, neither do I,” Chloe said under her breath.

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the devil is in love with you,” Leon continued. Chloe looked over at him, startled to hear him put it so bluntly. There was no way any part of that statement was true. “What was it you said he did? Ran off on you, or something?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she repeated. She sure as hell wasn’t going to explain their relationship to any of these guys, and she’d already decided before leaving the precinct yesterday that she was going to help Lucifer regardless.

After a few more moments had passed, she realized she was waiting for Lucifer to open his eyes again, but he wasn’t moving. If that remark from Leon hadn’t made him stir…

The anger receded, worry taking its place once more. Come on, Maze…

If no one found them soon, they’d be in real trouble. She wracked her brains over and over, trying to figure out some way for her to help him, but came up with nothing. They knew full well now that they couldn’t trust her—the cuffs weren’t going to come off again. Sooner or later, they’d be swinging their fists at her to try to make Lucifer cooperate. And then she’d be worse than useless.

She just had to hope they could hold out long enough for a rescue.

I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve it.

The words repeated in his mind after he spoke them, echoing vaguely as Chloe responded. He could hear the words, but they were slow to make sense. Try as he might to focus on her, his hold on consciousness was slipping away again.

She was telling him how she’d come looking for him whether she was mad at him or not, and so she wasn’t going to sit around not caring that he was hurt now.

He really didn’t deserve her concern. He wasn’t worth defending, not if it meant Chloe would get beaten to a pulp too. But he couldn’t move his mouth to tell her that. It only seemed to make her angrier, but better she was angry than injured. Or worse.

Just take care of yourself, he wanted to tell her. It was good that she’d conspired against him. He had no right to ask otherwise, and though he’d been surprised before, he was glad for it now. If only it’d worked.

Once again, she was suffering because of him. It wasn’t enough that he’d crushed any hope she’d had; now she was being physically hurt, too. She never should’ve gone looking for him after he’d done that to her.

Not only had he led her to this basement, he couldn’t even do a damn thing to protect her. The one positive thing he’d ever been able to do for her was make sure she walked out of whatever danger they faced, and now he couldn’t even keep his eyes open. He was terrified that this was just the start—that they would end up torturing her to make him cooperate, or worse, kill her like they’d threatened. And he’d be helpless to do anything but watch.

All this because of those bloody wings.

Her life was at risk, she didn’t even fully understand why, and yet she was still trying to put him first.

He couldn’t bear it.

He had to get her out of there, no matter what it took. When Carmen returned, Lucifer would make vague promises in whatever form got them out of the basement, whether he could deliver on them or not. There was nothing else he could do. His word wasn’t worth her life. Eventually they would catch on, but it would buy her time to escape or for Maze to find them, if she was indeed on their tail.

It was the only thought in his head for some time.

I have to get her out.

Chapter Text

Lucifer was brought abruptly back to awareness with a kick to his side. It landed away from where he was pretty sure his ribs were broken, but it was enough of a jolt to make every ache scream for attention.

“Rise and shine,” Nick said. “You’ve slept enough. It’s time to give us what we want.”

He scanned the faces looking down at him. Five of Carmen’s six lackeys, plus the man himself, who was facing Lucifer directly. Two of them were flanking Chloe to his right. She was kneeling on the cement floor, hands still cuffed behind her, expression grim. Her eyes were latched onto his face.

He didn’t get more than a moment to take it in before Nick was snapping his fingers. “Focus,” he said. “Are you going to call down an angel, or do we get to hear a cop scream first? I do love a little music while I’m working. Makes it so much more pleasant.”

Chloe’s lips tightened, but she didn’t give any more indication that she’d heard the threat. It had to sound absurd to her.

Lucifer had no idea what his own face gave away, but the last of the haze clinging to him was gone. Panic was starting to set in instead. They were out of time. “Touch her and you get nothing,” he said. “She’s not part of this.”

“Oh yes, she is.” The one on her right, Bo, pressed the tip of his finger against her cheek. She tried to lean away in disgust, but he followed the movement. “Try us.”

“I think you’ll do whatever we want if it comes to that,” Carmen said. “How badly she gets hurt is up to you.”

Lucifer’s eyes darted to hers again. She said, “You can’t seriously expect him to summon an angel. Even if he tries, there’s no way it’ll work. You’re asking for the impossible.”

“You’re the only one in this room who doesn’t believe the truth,” Dalton said. “Say it’s impossible all you want. You’re just wasting your breath.”

“I thought you wanted his wings?” Chloe said to Carmen. “So, what, you finally realized they’re not actually angel wings and think a real one is just going to show up and give you some?”

Carmen looked at her. “They were real, and Lucifer took them back. If he can’t give them to me again, I’ll trade him to an angel for some of their divinity. Why wouldn’t they exchange a few paltry feathers in exchange for the devil? No matter what he says, I know they would.”

Chloe stared at him in disbelief. “You’re insane. All of you. Angels aren’t real. Lucifer isn’t the devil, and you’re going to end up in prison for nothing.”

Bo smacked her hard enough that her head whipped to the side. Asher, the other guard assigned to Chloe, had to push her back up. She glared at Carmen, blood breaking through from where her lip had split.

“All right,” Lucifer said, frantically trying to think. “All right.”

“Lucifer—”

Bo grabbed a fistful of her ponytail and yanked her head back. “Shut up.”

Lucifer swallowed and looked at Chloe in that position, held entirely at their mercy. He was picturing all the ways they could hurt her, every place they could bruise and cut and break her, each drop of blood that would paint her skin. Few were more familiar with torture than the devil, and so it was all too vivid in his mind.

He couldn’t let it happen. He just couldn’t. “I’ll pray to my siblings,” he said. “They can’t tune it out. If I go at it long enough, one of them is bound to show up.”

Even held like that, Chloe couldn’t help shaking her head a little. He dearly hoped it wouldn’t come to one of his siblings actually showing up, but the truth might end up forced onto her tonight.

“And when they do?” Carmen asked, licking his lips greedily. He was already hooked, far too desperate for more divinity. “You said they won’t agree to a trade.”

“Not to you,” Lucifer said. Bo let go of Chloe’s ponytail and reached for the baton at his hip. “Wait just one second, would you? They won’t agree if you’re the one asking, so I’ll make the deal.”

Bo paused. Carmen tilted his head a little. “And what deal would that be, exactly?”

“I’ll willingly go back to hell and stay there, in return for a feather for each of you.”

“No,” Chloe said, as if automatically. “No.”

She didn’t even believe it was really hell and still she reacted that way.

If he had to return to hell for good this time, he would. As long as she’d be safe.

“Just one?” Carmen said.

The greed from humans like him never failed to astonish Lucifer. “Just one? A single feather for all of you would be more than you have any right to ask for. Wings are utterly sacred to all of my my siblings—they won’t like giving them up, and humans aren’t supposed to get any divinity at all. Just one is a priceless treasure, and more than enough divinity for a single person.”

“Fine,” Carmen said, annoyed, but too impatient to insist. “What makes you so sure they’ll listen to you and not us? We’re the ones turning you over.”

“A human making that demand is too much. They’d never listen to you, but the humiliation of me begging to return to hell in that circumstance would be enough.”

He wasn’t at all sure of that, but he had to convince them. Bo’s hand hadn’t left the baton.

He’d just have to try for the ones who loved to see him brought low the most. Michael would sooner bring all of Carmen’s men to the brink of death and then take Lucifer to hell anyway while laughing himself sick at how weak he’d become, but there were others who would play more fair. Remiel, perhaps, or Raphael, to start with. He could work his way down the list from there.

Carmen considered the offer for a moment. “Very well,” he said at last. “You know what will happen if you don’t make that deal. Call an angel down.”

“Not here. It needs to be outside.” He had to give her a chance to get free, and that wasn’t going to happen while they were in this basement.

“I think an angel can find their way here. I’ll even leave the door unlocked.”

“Outside,” Lucifer repeated.

Carmen looked over at Bo. The next second the baton was out and slamming into Chloe’s upper arm. The barest cry of pain left her mouth in a startled burst as she lost her balance and teetered sideways, made worse when Bo kicked the side of her knee for good measure. She hit the floor, and Asher hauled her roughly back up again.

Lucifer strained against the rope tying him to the pole, but as before, it was useless. “Enough!” he snarled.

“So,” Nick said, and tapped his cheek in a mockery of affection. “Changed your mind yet? If not, I think we should redo her pretty little face some more. What do you think, Bo?”

Bo grinned. “Sounds good to me.”

“All right,” Lucifer said, dimly realizing he must look as desperate as Carmen did. “I’ll do it here, but only if you let her go.”

Nick laughed. “Save the bargaining for the angel.”

“Why should I go through with it if I don’t know that you’ll let her go later?”

Nick and Carmen exchanged glances. Dalton said, “You don’t really have a choice but to trust us, do you? If you refuse, it’s a sure bet we won’t.”

“That’s not good enough.” But he didn’t know if he could get them to agree, and it wouldn’t be long before she took another strike. If ever there was a time for Maze to pull off a rescue, it was now.

Carmen said, “If we let her go now, there’s no guarantee for us that you’ll go through with it.”

“I always keep my word.” They didn’t need to know he’d already decided to break it for Chloe if he had to.

Nick said, “I have an idea.”

“What?” Carmen asked.

Lucifer didn’t at all like the slow grin that unfurled across Nick’s face. “We’ll take her out to the desert and wait. If Lucifer follows through, she goes free. If not, I shoot her.”

Chloe’s expression tightened that much more. Lucifer met her gaze, suddenly wishing he’d thought of another tactic. He couldn’t guarantee one of his siblings would listen, and now if they didn’t, Chloe would end up dead for sure.

Carmen seemed to be hesitating. “Is that really the best way?”

“Do you want the feathers or don’t you?” Nick said. “Yes. This is the best way.”

“I can’t control my siblings,” Lucifer argued. “All I can do is try.”

“You’d better try hard, then,” Nick said, almost cheerfully.

Carmen was slowly nodding. “If that’s what it takes.”

No. No, this couldn’t be happening.

He’d never broken eye contact with Chloe. She was gazing back at him with an intensity he’d rarely seen before. Trying to convey something—what, he didn’t know. He couldn’t think. He could barely breathe.

From what he’d seen from Nick, he suspected Chloe would be taking a bullet tonight either way. They were too good at their job to risk letting her go, and if they didn’t take him with them… if he wasn’t going to be there to try to shield her…

“Take her out to the van,” Nick told Bo and Asher. To Carmen, he said, “You should come with us. It’ll be safer away from the devil if things go wrong. Lucifer can tell the angel where to deliver the feathers, and that’s how we’ll know.”

Chloe was forced to break her gaze as Asher pulled her to her feet. “You’ll regret ever touching either one of us,” she snarled. She was already struggling as Asher tried to get her to move forward, resisting every inch. Her eyes found his again. “It’ll be okay,” she told him.

It wouldn’t be. They were going to kill her. They’d take her out of this room and then he would never see her again.

In that one second she was very much alive, fighting with everything she had to stay right where she was, but in a minute or an hour she would be utterly still. Gazing up at the sky with unseeing eyes, blood oozing out of a hole in her head. That, too, he could picture with excruciating detail.

“No,” he said, the word barely audible. His breaths were coming in short bursts. “No.”

Every pain in his body was forgotten as he forced himself to his feet, the rope sliding up the pole before it was drawn taut as he lunged for her. “Let go of her!” he shouted. “Don’t you dare hurt her.”

His voice was rougher than it usually was. Darker.

He was pouring all the last of his strength into his arms, straining against the rope. He had to get to her. He would pummel each and every one of these vermin into the ground, tear them apart and guarantee they met his demons in hell.

Dimly he noted that the flurry of motion in front of him had come to a halt. He glanced at Chloe’s face again.

She was staring at him, jaw slack. Her face full of horror.

It was only then that he realized what his own face looked like. He’d been so careful, but now…

She was seeing the hell he’d brought straight to them. Seeing the devil.

Seeing who he truly was.

“Detective…”

It was the change in his voice that caught her attention first. It undercut the grunts coming from Asher as he made her move forward and her own ragged breathing as she fought against him, a voice that was full of rage in a way she hadn’t heard from him all day.

His movement drew her eye after that. He’d been frozen as they’d started to haul her away, looking at her with as much fear as he had when he’d found her with the nosebleed. And then, even though he should have been too weak to stand, he’d gotten to his feet in a heartbeat.

That was when everything ground to a halt. She became the one frozen in fear, and she wasn’t the only one. They were all looking at it.

At him. At his face.

Red and raw and utterly inhuman.

That—no. No, that couldn’t—it—

Not a trick, her mind whispered. Real. It’s real.

She was seeing it in full for the first time, and now, there was no denying it. Every last lie she’d wrapped around herself, every last delusion she’d clung to—it was all torn away in an instant as she stared at that face.

The face of hell. Of fire and pain. Of the devil himself, fighting now with everything he had to break free and get to her.

It burned, living flame condensed into the shape of a face that could only ever mimic being human. There was nothing of her partner in it. She looked, and it felt like she was seeing through it, like it was a glimpse into hell itself. She felt all the horror that came with it, too. Nothing good would come of following that face into hell. Every cell in her body was screaming at her to run, to get away, to escape before it was too late—

Lucifer glanced at her, and then did a double take. For a single second, their gaze met.

His eyes were even worse. Hell made sentient. It saw her—it seared right through her soul, locking onto her as its next target.

“Detective,” he whispered, and the word jolted through her. A small part of her became even more afraid that it knew her, but the rest of her was a mess of confusion. That wasn’t coming from the devil, that was coming from Lucifer. Her title, made reverent by the way he used it like a name, something only the two of them shared. Said with so much emotion that her brain was insisting it must have come from her human partner. She could even have sworn that she saw that horror on his face, too—not the horror of hell, but of someone confronted with a nightmare.

Lucifer and the devil were one and the same. And suddenly she didn’t know which one was looking back at her now.

The next second her focus came crashing back down to the rest of the situation she was dealing with as Asher shoved her, breaking her gaze with Lucifer. She stumbled, a flare of pain hitting her shoulder anew from where it’d been contorted by the baton, but Asher’s grip on her was so tight he just wrenched her back up again. “Shit—shit—”

He’s in a panic, too. The thought distantly crossed her mind as she concentrated on not falling, something made even more difficult than it should have been, because she felt like she didn’t know what was real anymore. The entire world was tilted. Asher kept trying to drag her along, but she resisted, because as afraid as she’d just been, she was even more afraid of making it through that door.

Right. She had to focus on the much more real and immediate problem at hand than finding out her partner wasn’t human after all. Lucifer being the devil wouldn’t matter in the slightest if the actual humans here took her away and shot her.

Unless she ended up in hell, and—and—

Oh god, hell was real, and God was real, and—

“Someone get him under again, now!” Dalton shouted, cutting through a fresh round of panic. Later. She could deal with that later. First she had to make sure she wasn’t killed, and then she could freak out about the rest.

Even though they’d already believed Lucifer was the devil, it seemed that face was enough to make them afraid again. Chloe caught a glimpse of Dalton’s face as she was forced back, eyes wide and alarmed. His hand was resting on his gun, as if prepared to use it if Lucifer did break free.

He was certainly doing his best. His gaze was locked on Bo’s now, the strain in his arms evident as he pulled against his bindings. His feet were underneath him as he crouched, putting everything he had into it, obviously trying to get something to break. The rope was starting to fray, threads snapping one by one—

Holy shit.

A groan managed to be heard even over the shouting from their other captors as they rushed to control the situation. And then the concrete around the base of the pole started to crack.

Like he was going to rip the pole right out of the floor if he had to.

Chloe stared, forgetting to fight back for a second. Asher used the chance to drag her back another few yards. “No—no—”

She started struggling again, twisting away, trying to get some kind of angle to use her arms, but he was holding them down too strongly. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Leon finally approaching Lucifer with a syringe in hand. He was brave enough to dart forward and try to nab him.

Lucifer lifted a knee and kicked out at Leon, sending him tripping backward. The syringe flew out of his hand and skittered off towards the shelves along the wall. “No more,” Lucifer snarled. “I don’t care what it takes—I’ll get free before you can overpower me.” He kept fighting against the ropes as Chloe lost ground step by step, more groans rippling out from the ceiling now.

She had to look away when they got to the door, needing to get free herself, but nothing she was doing was working. All it got her was more pain in her arms and a few more bruises against her side and head when the scuffle got her shoved up against the doorframe. Lucifer might be the devil and he might actually be able to tear that pole out of the ground, but she’d seen him taken down by those drugs before. She didn’t know who would win this fight.

She lost sight of him for good as Bo joined Asher, each of them gripping one of her arms and forcing her away from the room. Even if he did break free, she needed to buy herself every second she could. She tried stomping on their feet and then dropping her weight down, to no avail.

Somewhere up ahead of them she heard Nick telling Carmen, “…get you out of here and then we’ll deal with him—”

“Enough of this,” Bo said, his voice laced with anger and fear. They were halfway to the stairs. “Just knock her out again. I don’t want to be here if he gets loose—”

“It doesn’t matter where you are,” Chloe said. “He’ll find you and make good on all his promises. Your only chance is to let me go.”

“I don’t think so,” Bo said, and kicked at her knee again. She gritted her teeth, stumbling forward another step, a twinge of pain making her lose her balance. “Our only chance now is that angel’s protection. All we have to do is get you out of here and show him how serious we are. I think he’ll cave when he realizes he can’t save you in time any other way.”

Chloe had no idea if an angel would actually offer them protection, or whatever stupid feathers they kept insisting were important. It didn’t matter. In that moment, all she knew for sure was that an angel showing up wouldn’t stop the devil. It wouldn’t stop Lucifer from coming after them. “That won’t be enough—”

Bo let go of her and reached for his gun. “Fine. I’ll shut you up myself.”

A shout split the air on the level above them. Bo and Asher stopped for a second, looking up. Chloe couldn’t help doing the same. Lucifer was still in that room—there was no reason for someone to be screaming upstairs. Unless…

Chloe wouldn’t get a better chance. As best she could with her hands still cuffed, she lifted her arms and blindly threw an elbow out. She felt a satisfying crunch as it connected, followed by a bark of pain from Asher. A lucky strike; it’d hit his nose. His hold on her loosened and she bolted forward—

Only for Bo to immediately seize her around the waist and tackle her to the ground. Her already injured knee slammed into the wooden floor, making a much sharper pain flare up. It wasn’t much better with her shoulder; for a second she was worried she’d dislocated it, but she didn’t think so. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Bo lift his gun—

And then he grunted and pitched forward, crashing onto the ground next to her.

“Chloe!”

Maze. She was here.

Chloe squirmed back, trying to roll onto her knees. She managed it just as gunshots sounded nearby, nearly deafening her. For a moment everything slowed to a crawl except for her racing heart.

It took a second to be sure she hadn’t gotten shot—adrenaline was making her so shaky it was hard to sort through everything her body was telling her. She saw the knife sticking out of Bo’s back, his twitching fingers as he tried and failed to get up. And then there was Asher, aiming his gun at Maze, who was ducking back into the stairway.

She sucked in a breath, and time sped up again. Maze threw another knife, a whistling sound audible for half a second before Asher cried out. It’d hit his shoulder, and the gun tumbled from his hands.

Maze was already moving forward. She went past Asher, pausing only long enough to kick the gun away, and dropped next to Chloe. “You okay, Decker?”

No. But there were more pressing issues. “My hands—”

Maze saw the cuffs and drew the curved dagger she’d been playing with in the car on their way here. She moved out of sight, and a second later, a brief pressure played on Chloe’s wrists. The chain linking the cuffs snapped, giving her instant relief in her shoulders. “Where’s Lucifer?” Maze asked.

“Back there—he—they—” Words failed her, that image of Lucifer’s other face flashing in her mind. Maze would—

Wait. If Lucifer really was the devil, then that meant… Maze was…

“Just get out of here—I got this,” Maze said. She got up and stalked for Asher.

Chloe was frozen in place until her brain caught up, and she scrambled to her feet. Maze likely being an actual demon was another problem that needed to wait.

She went straight for Asher’s gun, feeling a thousand times better as her fingers wrapped around the handle, the familiar weight of a weapon she knew how to use anchoring her once more. Maze scissored her legs at Asher, and they rolled to the ground together in a way that Chloe knew was entirely controlled on Maze’s part. That was two of their captors she didn’t have to worry about anymore.

So she turned and ran for the other room, ignoring the jolt of pain from her knee with every step.

Another gunshot went off when she was still a few feet away. From inside the room.

Lucifer.

Heart pounding harder than ever, she rounded the doorway and took in the scene. Lucifer was standing—he’d gotten free, with broken strands of rope littering the base of the crooked pole. She couldn’t tell if he’d been hit or not. Leon was stirring on the ground across the room from her, but Lucifer wasn’t focused on him anymore. He was facing Dalton on her right, who had his gun up. Taking aim again.

Chloe got there first. Two shots that didn’t miss. Dalton collapsed, and Lucifer glanced over at her in surprise. That face was gone; it was just him again, just the person she knew. Looking in worse shape than she’d ever seen him, as if he was barely conscious but determined to keep going anyway.

Behind him, Leon had recovered enough to draw his own weapon. “Drop it,” Chloe ordered, but he didn’t. He just shifted his aim to her instead.

“No—” Lucifer shouted, and then he actually tried to put himself between them. His back to her, to shield her.

“Damn it, Lucifer—” She sidestepped as he went—he wasn’t exactly moving very quickly—and managed to sight Leon around him. They fired at the same time.

The gun slipped from his hand and he slumped onto his back. Once again it took a second to figure out she was okay—he hadn’t hit her.

Lucifer dropped to one knee, left hand flung out to brace against the ground.

No—no—

“Lucifer!”

Chapter Text

Chloe rushed forward, moving around to face Lucifer, terrified that she’d see a fresh stain of blood spreading across his shirt or worse.

His eyes were nearly fallen shut again, but they flicked up to her as she crouched next to him. “Lucifer—where is it, where—” She scanned him over, running her hands along his face, his chest. They reached his sides and he sucked in a breath.

“I’m fine,” he muttered, but she didn’t waste any time refuting it. She just kept frantically trying to find the place he’d been shot. Her hands didn’t find any fresh blood, so that gasp had probably been from his injured ribs. His torso wasn’t any worse off than before; maybe his leg, or—

Her eyes caught on the shine of his sleeve. Blood, soaking into the fabric on his upper arm. The one that wasn’t pressed to the ground.

She reached for it, letting out a breath of relief that he wasn’t in immediate danger of bleeding to death. “Graze,” he said, and tried to push himself up to his feet. “Get out of here…”

She had no choice but to hope that was true, since he obviously wasn’t going to let her help him here. “Yes. Come on, let’s go.”

He hadn’t actually succeeded in standing up this time, so she tried to put his arm around her shoulder to help him get up, but he wasn’t having it. He resisted, and Chloe was so stunned that he was rejecting her like this even now that she just froze, staring at him in disbelief. “Go…” he said, barely audible this time.

He hadn’t been saying they should get out of here. He’d been telling her to leave.

“You’ve got to be kidding me right now,” she said. “You can’t even stand. For once just let me help you.”

He didn’t respond. Maze appeared before she could do anything else, eyes sweeping the room, taking in the two bodies on the floor as she moved towards them. The blade she’d been carrying disappeared. “How bad is he hurt?”

“I don’t know,” Chloe said. “Bad. Well. For a human, I guess. But he…”

She suddenly realized she had her hands on the devil. That he was inches away from her. And Maze…

She looked at Maze, really looked at her. Demon. Maze was a demon. From hell.

In the sudden end to this fight, it was all hitting her at once. No one else was moving around them, and if Maze was here like this, that meant the action was over for now. Anyone else posing a threat would’ve been dealt with first; Chloe didn’t have any immediate worry that she’d be killed.

And that meant that now she really would have to deal with the fact that her entire world had changed.

Maze drew up short, studying her in turn, eyes narrowed. “For a human,” she repeated.

Chloe searched her face, looking for any trace that Maze wasn’t human. But like she’d done with Lucifer before Carmen had shown up, she couldn’t see it. Maze looked the same as she ever did. Terrifying, but in a way that Chloe could understand. Mostly.

“I saw,” Chloe told her, swallowing. “Lucifer. His other face…”

His body tensed where she still had her hands on his arm and back. She could feel his eyes on her, but didn’t meet them.

Maze pressed her lips together. “So now you know.”

“That’s the truth you said you were going to show me. That’s really what’s behind everything. Lucifer is the devil, and you’re a demon.”

“Yes.” Her expression was guarded as she said, “You knew, and ran back in here anyway. Are you going to be afraid of us now? Or can we have this discussion later? Because two of them drove off before I could stop them, and he needs help.”

“I’m fine,” Lucifer said, trying to push away from her again. “Just go…”

Chloe ignored him, caught up in what Maze had said. She hadn’t even thought about it before; she’d just gone back for Lucifer on instinct. Because learning the truth hadn’t made a difference? Because she’d known there were still two of their captors here that she had to deal with?

She didn’t know.

As for being afraid… probably she was supposed to be, or something. She certainly felt… off, a tension present that hadn’t been there before. But she didn’t think she felt scared of them. Maze had just saved her life, and Lucifer had been trying his utmost to do the same thing. He hadn’t erupted like that when he’d been their target—only when her life had been in imminent danger. She’d even just been telling him to stop being an idiot, wasn’t giving him any regard for the way he kept trying to get her to leave.

The idea that she’d be afraid of Lucifer… it felt absurd to her, even now.

The last part of what Maze had said got through to her. She didn’t have time to spiral about it right now; Lucifer was hurt, and she had to decide. Help him and deal with this mess later, or leave him to Maze and run off on her own.

It wasn’t a choice.

“Later,” she said. Lucifer let out a sigh, eyes closing. “Can you get him up? He won’t listen to me.”

Maze nodded, giving her one last look before she swapped places with Chloe. “I don’t know what kind of stupid you’re being now, but let’s go,” she told him, hauling him to his feet. “You already caused me a lot of grief. You better not make me carry you out of here.”

“So sorry,” he said, and even with how faint his voice was, Chloe could hear the sarcasm. “Next time I’ll get kidnapped in a way that’s more convenient for you.”

Maze just snorted. “No, you won’t.”

The exchange was bizarre, because of how normal it was. They sniped at each other like that all the time. Chloe didn’t know what she was supposed to do with it all anymore, so she just said, “Do you have your phone?”

“Yeah.” Maze pulled it out with one hand and tossed it to her. Chloe hadn’t been expecting it, and only just managed to catch it.

“Did you bring Jay with you?”

“Of course not. I didn’t need the cops screwing up my rescue. But I did tell them where you were before I came inside.”

“Good,” she said under her breath. They got through the doorway and into the main room, where she could see that the two men who’d been trying to take her out of the house were lying on the floor, unmoving. “Where are we, exactly?”

“You don’t know?” Maze asked.

“No. We were both unconscious when they brought us in…”

“It’s a house up in the foothills. About as remote as you can get around here and still be part of the city.”

“Okay,” she said. “I’ll call Jay and ask him to send an ambulance, too. He needs a hospital.”

“No,” Lucifer said. “Not going to a hospital…”

If he was going to keep being this bullheaded, she was going to keep ignoring him. She called Jay as Maze got him upstairs, clearing the upper floors of the house as she did so just to make sure there was no one else left. There was only one other body on the floor, someone dead or unconscious with a cast on their wrist. He hadn’t been downstairs with them. Since Nick and Carmen were the only ones she didn’t see, she assumed they were the two who’d gotten away, and told Jay who to look for.

“We’re on the way,” he said. “Five minutes out.”

“Got it.”

Her knee was starting to protest now, the adrenaline ebbing a little with the relative calm. She didn’t even know what other injuries she’d need to pay attention to first—her entire body hurt. As long as she was still moving, it could wait.

The front door was already open. Maze took Lucifer outside, and she followed a step behind them. The hills rose behind the house; Chloe immediately got a good a view of the city sprawling below. It was beautiful from here, with the lights shining up and the dark vastness of the desert all around. There were a few other houses that she could see, but with more than enough space between them to let Grant pull this off without notice.

She rubbed at her wrists. The cuffs were still tight around them, the chain dangling from both. “Do you, uh… are you able to get these off me?” she asked Maze. She had no idea how strong demons were, or how skilled Maze was at picking locks in general.

Maze glanced at them. “Sure. But Lucifer can do it more easily.”

His eyes flicked over to them, too. Then away. And then back again, like he didn’t want to interact with her but couldn’t help himself. “Forget it,” Chloe said. She’d be able to get them off when the police arrived, anyway.

“I don’t know what the deal is with you two, but you’re both being stupid. Lucifer, just do it.”

He swallowed, and held out his hand. He’d gone back to not looking at her.

She stretched her right hand out, not sure what to do anymore. What was he going to do, snap the metal without even looking? Make it incinerate with a touch?

His fingers brushed her skin as they found the cuff. She didn’t flinch, but she almost wanted to. Not because she couldn’t stand him touching her, unlike him, but because everything felt so charged and tense between them.

The handcuff opened with a click and fell to the ground. She blinked; whatever he’d just done, it’d unlocked without her feeling a thing.

The left handcuff followed in short order. She rubbed her wrists more fully now. “Thanks,” she said, but he still wouldn’t look at her. He tried to move away, even.

Irritation started to build through her. After everything they’d just gone through, after everything had just changed, he was distancing himself more than ever. And she was already sick of it. The fact that she was hurt and exhausted wasn’t helping things, either.

It was only another minute before she could hear the sirens. “Not going,” Lucifer insisted. “Take me back to the hotel…”

“No,” Chloe told him. She stood on the driveway with her arms crossed, waiting for the police to arrive. “You need a hospital.”

“Maze.”

Chloe glanced at her. Maze didn’t exactly feel the need to play by human rules, either, and now Chloe knew why. Would she listen to him?

She said, “Look, Chloe, he’ll be fine. You stay here and deal with the cops, I’ll take him to the hotel and he can heal.”

“Heal?” Chloe said. “He was drugged and beaten for four days, Maze, and now look at him. I don’t know what being the devil entails, but he clearly isn’t healing.”

She frowned. “That’s true. What happened to you?” she asked Lucifer. “How were they able to hurt you?”

“Don’t know,” he muttered. “Always vulnerable now…”

Always vulnerable now? What did that even mean?

Maze said, “Maybe you should go to the hospital, then—”

“No.”

Chloe moved to stand directly in front of him. Enough was enough. “Look at me.”

He did so, with obvious reluctance.

“You really don’t ever lie, I guess. So if you tell me right now that you’ll be perfectly fine in the morning—and I mean completely, miraculously fine like you’ve pulled off before—then I’ll drop it and take you to the hotel.”

She didn’t understand anything about him being the devil or how he could be hurt like this, and apparently they weren’t sure either. How was it that he’d just walked off being shot in that hangar like it was nothing, but other times, he stayed hurt? Was it just that he had to be mortally wounded before his body reset, or something?

However it worked, that clearly wasn’t kicking in right now, and she couldn’t be like those men in the house. She couldn’t just wave off his pain because he wasn’t human.

Lucifer looked away again, and that was answer enough for her.

“That’s what I thought.”

“Don’t want it,” he said anyway. “Not that serious…”

“Think back real hard to three weeks ago when I tried to tell you no hospitals and you took me there anyway, because it was the right thing to do.”

He met her gaze again, like he was compelled to do so. His eyes were full of pain, and she didn’t think it was entirely physical.

But that had to come first before they could even start to sort through the rest. She leaned forward and said firmly, “You’re going.”

The police cars arrived then. Jay got out of one and headed straight for them, while the others fanned out to secure the scene. “An ambulance is on the way,” he said, eyeing Lucifer. Then he asked Chloe, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah. Can I talk to you for a second?” She drew Jay to the side, going further than she needed to in order to make sure she wouldn’t be overheard. “Look, Lucifer is about to pass out any second now. Let me take him to a doctor and then I’ll go over everything with you. You might need the ambulance for the others in the house. I don’t know if any of them are still alive or not.”

The last thing she needed was Lucifer fighting them every step of the way, but he might. And regardless of her own screwed up feelings right now, part of her couldn’t help thinking that maybe it was a good thing they didn’t pack off the devil in an ambulance if he decided to resist them. She didn’t know what could happen.

Jay hesitated a second, then said, “All right. I’ll send one of the unis with you.”

“Do you know of anyone we can take him to for more private care?”

“Yeah,” he said slowly. “Yeah, I know someone. Is there something you’re not telling me?”

She almost let out a laugh, but caught it at the last second. Since it would probably have come out sounding hysterical, that was a good thing. “No,” she said, which was, of course, an outright lie. “He’s just been through a lot, and he’s trying to refuse all treatment. The quieter, the better.”

Jay looked over at him. “Okay,” he said. He gave her the name of a smaller hospital and the name of a friend who worked there. “I’ll call her and let her know you’re coming.”

“Thank you.”

He assigned someone to go with them, an officer named Ryan, and she went back over to Lucifer and Maze just as the ambulance arrived. “Detective—”

“Jay has a friend who will see you privately,” she said, speaking over him. “You’re going to listen to what she says and let her check you over. And if she decides you can rest at home, I’ll take you to the hotel.”

“Fine,” he said weakly.

“You do that. I’m going after those assholes,” Maze said.

Chloe nodded. “Let me know if you find them.”

“Not if, when. What do you know about them?”

“Not much. Just that they work for one of the people who got away, because they wanted Lucifer’s wings.”

“Carmen Grant,” Lucifer said.

The name obviously meant something to Maze. Understanding dawned on her face, along with a good amount of disgust. “That idiot again?” She shook her head. “All right. Shouldn’t be too hard.”

Chloe took over supporting Lucifer as Maze left, disappearing into the chaos without another word. He stiffened when she touched him again, and Chloe did her best to ignore that, too. She didn’t know why she was doing this, why she was caring so much. She didn’t know anything anymore.

She helped him down the driveway to where Ryan was waiting to take them to the hospital and got him into the passenger seat. And then they drove off, winding down the hill to the city below.

It was too quiet in the car, and especially now that Maze wasn’t there, all Chloe could focus on was the space between her and Lucifer. The very air felt like it was pulled taut, as if there was a physical tether connecting them. She was pretty sure he was just as aware of her as she was of him.

Where were they supposed to go from here? He’d become her partner, her friend, almost something more, and then he’d disappeared from her life as easily as Maze just had a crime scene. He’d gotten kidnapped and then cared more that she flee than for his own safety. He couldn’t even look at her half the time, but the rest, he couldn’t seem to look away.

He was the devil, who had a whole separate world she knew nothing about. She understood him less than ever. And he was adamant that she keep out of it all.

Maybe learning he was the devil wouldn’t change anything. Their partnership had already ended. Once this mess was cleaned up, she’d just go back home without him, anyway. She’d have a demon as her roommate to contend with, but that was it.

It didn’t feel right to her, though. Nothing about it felt right.

Dr. Orion met them outside with two assistants and a gurney. Chloe fully expected more protests, but none came; Lucifer was too out of it for that, if he even knew what was going on. She’d felt the tension dwindling as they got closer to the hospital, and now she knew why.

They got him inside and to a private section of the emergency room, while Chloe told the doctor what she knew of what’d happened to him. “Jay said you’re his partner?” she asked her, and Chloe hesitated only a moment before saying yes. Just so she could deal with this without them trying to kick her out.

Lucifer’s eyes opened as they reached the room. “My name is Kiera,” the doctor said. “I’m going to examine you, okay?”

His eyes drifted over to Chloe, still standing in the doorway. “The detective first,” he said.

“Oh, for the love of…” she muttered, unwilling to finish that statement.

Dr. Orion glanced over at her. “We’ll help her, too. Do you want your partner to stay with you?”

He didn’t reply for a moment. And then, without looking away from her, he said, “If she wants to.”

She let out a breath. It was a lot better than the no she’d thought he’d give, but…

Did he actually want her to stay? Was he so delirious he didn’t remember he didn’t want her around? He hadn’t even refuted her being called his partner.

She recalled, then, how Candy had told her he’d been planning to return to Los Angeles. Even now, he kept being hot and cold with her.

Did she want to stay?

As she held his gaze, she felt like there wasn’t a real choice in it. Maybe things were a thousand times more complicated between them than they should have been, but she thought that if she left now, they would only get worse. It would feel too much like abandoning him, rejecting him when he needed her. Whether or not he’d rejected her before, she couldn’t do it.

“I’ll be here,” she said.

He closed his eyes again. Maybe it was her imagination, but he seemed a little more at ease now.

Chloe stayed out of the way while they took off his shirt. She sucked in a breath as it slid away, revealing the mass of bruises all over his chest and abdomen, the swelling on his left side. She’d known it was bad already, but looking at that… how he’d even been able to move on his own, let alone break free like that, she had no idea. Devil or not, he had to have been in a lot of pain.

She’d never seen him so hurt and vulnerable, not like this. Maze had seemed confused that they’d been able to hurt him at all, and she was, too. Hadn’t that been one of the main reasons she’d been sure he couldn’t really be the devil? But here he was.

Wrong. Everything about this was wrong.

They gave him an IV, dressed the wound from where the bullet had grazed him—Lucifer hadn’t been downplaying that, at least—and then took him for a CT scan to assess his internal injuries. He didn’t stir again.

While they were busy with that, she filled out the hospital forms and gave her statement to Ryan, giving him as much information as she could on Carmen Grant and the people he’d hired to hold them. Telling him that they believed Lucifer was the devil, that Grant had believed he’d once possessed actual angel wings and now was trying to gain divine favor in some other way—it was one of the most surreal experiences of her life.

Seeing Lucifer’s devil face had felt immediately real to her, but this… this was now her having to look back on everything she’d thought she’d known and reframe it with the greater truth at hand, all while acting like it was ludicrous and they were all crazy for thinking so.

She hadn’t had time before to unpack it, but as she recounted the past day, she was able to start now. Those scars on Lucifer’s back… he really had cut off his wings, and had kept them in a shipping container. Grant had actually gotten his hands on a pair of real angel wings, and then decided he wanted more out of the devil.

She remembered seeing the replica of those wings. How she’d been impressed despite herself. Halfway through the conversation, she broke off, realizing that that must be what Lucifer’s real wings looked like, too. Because he actually had wings. Or used to. She still didn’t fully understand what had happened with them.

She tried to picture him with them. Standing in front of her with a little smile, white wings spread wide.

She’d seen him as he must be in hell, but… was that what he was like outside of it? Why had he cut them off?

Ryan had to get her attention again, and she made herself focus on the rest of her story. Another thing to talk to him about later, if he would talk to her at all.

No. Suddenly, the idea that he might not tell her anything even after all this—she wouldn’t accept it. She would make him talk to her if she had to. He owed her that.

Once she finished going over everything she could with Ryan, she left him in the waiting room and went back to where they’d be bringing Lucifer around again. Alone in the room with nothing to distract her, she found herself staring at an empty bed and the equipment around it. A prickle of unease was working its way through her.

As if she didn’t have enough to deal with already, a host of unpleasant memories from the last time she’d been in a hospital started presenting themselves. It was only three weeks ago that she’d been in a room like this, as weak as Lucifer was now. Worse. Because while Lucifer would heal with time, she’d been certain she would be dead by the end of the day.

She still had no idea how he’d come up with the formula for the antidote. All she knew was that it had been close—really close. An extra hour or two, and they wouldn’t have had time to prepare it before she was too far gone.

She’d certainly felt the effects, both as the poison wreaked havoc on her body and during the week it’d taken to recover. Being here now… she couldn’t help remembering how sick she’d been, how terrifying it was to know that she was going to die.

Having a gun turned in her direction tonight had nothing on poison. When someone was trying to kill her with a weapon, it came down to those few moments of action. Do it right and you lived; get it wrong, and that was it for you. There was no time to dwell on it, no time for fear to sink its way down to her bones. Assholes with guns, she could fight. But that day… she’d never felt more helpless or scared for herself than when she’d been lying in that hospital bed.

She tore her eyes away from the one in front of her and looked down instead. Her hands were still dirty from the events of the night, blood and dirt in the lines of her skin even after a quick wash in the bathroom. She traced a fingertip over a raw spot on her wrist, courtesy of the handcuffs, and reminded herself that her visit here tonight was very different than the last. Though she felt lightheaded sometimes, it was just from the concussion and lack of food. Her abdomen hurt, but it was from being roughed up, not from her organs shutting down. Her body ached, but it was only from a day of punishment—not from poison coursing through her veins.

They were at the hospital more for Lucifer than for her. She’d walk out of here in a matter of hours; there’d be no staying here for a week while she recovered and gradually realized how bad things were between her and Lucifer. She was in control of herself.

And she wouldn’t let him run again. Not until after they talked about everything.

Mind circling back to what she’d learned of him tonight, she thought of what Maze had said earlier. About whether or not Chloe was afraid of them.

She’d had enough time now that she wasn’t just reacting to things, caught up in the moment, adrenaline fueling her every move. She’d had time to start thinking. And even just a few minutes ago, she’d thought of forcing the devil to talk to her. Not as he was now—but as she knew him, healthy and strong and coherent. Able to hurt her if she pissed him off.

But she knew, deep down, that he never would. Not physically. Not like that.

No, she wasn’t afraid of him. Maze, either. If there were things to be scared about, that wasn’t one of them.

She sat in a chair and let her face fall into her hands, bracing her elbows against her thighs. This was all such a mess. Her thoughts were clear one second and tangled up in confusion the next. Every emotion under the sun was competing for attention. What was she supposed to think about this? How was she supposed to feel?

Sometimes she thought she was closer with Lucifer than she’d ever been with anyone else, even Dan. He saw her in a way no one else did, drawing out the best in her, believing in her more than she believed in herself. He was there for her when she truly needed him—up until the last few weeks, that was. She’d gotten used to the idea that he’d always have her back, had trusted him with her heart and her life and everything in between.

And though he had so many secrets, she’d thought she’d known who he was, too. That she’d seen through the persona he wore, and knew how good and kind and caring he was underneath. That he’d had a past she couldn’t imagine, but despite it all, he hadn’t lost that light. She’d seen him struggle and make mistakes and lose his temper, but always, he had lines he wouldn’t cross. He tried.

Even after being forced to accept that he was the devil, she still couldn’t mesh that fact with the person she thought she knew. She’d missed the biggest part of him, one that he loudly proclaimed every chance he had. How could she not have known? How could she not have seen?

How could she have ever thought they were that close, if she’d refused to believe him about that, and he’d refused to give her the proof he knew she needed?

Maybe this was all on her. Chloe could fault him for a lot of things, but not for keeping the truth from her. Not really. He’d told her from the very first time they’d met who he was. And even though of course, she hadn’t believed him at first, they’d been through so much together that now she had no one to blame but herself.

She’d seen the effects his true face had on others. She’d glimpsed it once herself before. She’d seen his strength, his mojo, the way he’d survived being shot in the hangar. She’d had his blood and refused to test it, despite his insistence that she do exactly that. Because she hadn’t wanted to see the truth.

Probably there were other things she’d been blind to as well. Family dealings he only alluded to. Times where his issues suddenly got resolved without any explanation. The odd things he’d said that she’d dismissed as metaphor, but that were completely true. Other things he’d kept from her that she didn’t even know to miss.

Would he explain it all now? Would she finally have the answers that filled in the gaps? Would she actually be able to understand him for once?

Would it even make a difference if she did?

She wasn’t so sure the answer was yes, or that she could actually understand everything. Knowing he was the devil didn’t change the way he’d abandoned her. It wasn’t a reason for not texting her back, or deciding to manipulate her when he did return. She couldn’t deny anymore that he still cared about her in his own way, but that wasn’t good enough.

The devil cared about her, but he still hurt her. He saved her life, and then pushed her away. He didn’t trust her enough to make her believe the truth or to let her in behind his walls.

Expecting him to be different might be pointless now that she knew who he really was, but she didn’t want to open herself up if this was what would happen. She couldn’t do it.

And then she laughed to herself when she realized that she’d actually been picturing the future where she knew him as the devil and still wanted all of that. The trust. The openness. The care and affection he’d been showing her more and more often.

Shit. She’d really been on her way to falling in love with the devil. She’d kissed him. She’d wanted—more. So much more, in all sorts of ways. And the idea that she could have had it wasn’t all that disconcerting.

Maybe because she still, even now, even remembering that face—she still couldn’t see him as actually being the devil. He was just her partner. Weird, and imperfect, and the person she’d most wanted by her side. Until he’d burned that bridge to ashes.

It was so messed up. And she couldn’t figure out how they might ever be able to sort through it.

Chapter Text

They brought Lucifer back into the room a little later. Seeing him wasn’t helping to work out her feelings, but Chloe was glad for the distraction.

“It’s not great,” Dr. Orion said. She went over the list while her assistant worked on cleaning up the rest of him. “He’s got three broken ribs and some internal bleeding, but I don’t think it’s serious enough to require surgery. I am worried about his head, but the scans didn’t show anything to be too concerned about. Multiple lacerations and abrasions, though only the bullet wound needs sutures. He’s severely dehydrated as well, and I suspect they weren’t feeding him much, if at all.”

Chloe looked over at him. She’d figured as much, too. At least it wasn’t worse…

“For now, we’ll just treat what we can and keep him under observation, check in later to make sure he’s progressing the way he should.”

Chloe nodded. “Thank you,” she said. “He, um. He would rather not be here if he doesn’t have to be. Is there any chance he can be set up at a hotel?”

“A hotel?” she asked, brows raised. “I’m not so sure…”

“It’s the Bellagio—it’s about as accommodating as it gets. Or he has a house I can take him to instead.”

She thought it over for a moment. “When he wakes up, if he wants to leave, I’ll set him up with a home nurse. The house, not the Bellagio. And I’d want to see him back here tomorrow for follow up.”

“Sure,” she said, even though he’d probably argue against it. That was a problem for later. “I’ll do that. Thank you. He’d appreciate it.”

“And you, I take it. Did anyone see to you yet? You need to be checked out, too.”

Chloe suddenly felt so tired. It had to be the middle of the night by now, and the adrenaline had completely worn off. Just the reminder that her body had taken punishment too was enough for her headache to reassert itself as an issue, and she still ached all over. “No,” she said. “Not yet.”

“Would you rather do it here, or another room?”

“Here is fine,” she said, glancing over at Lucifer again. They’d put him into scrubs; both his shirt and pants were trashed. It didn’t look right to her.

She stayed right there in the chair and let the doctor look her over. The broken skin on her lip and temple that needed cleaning. The concussion that took only a moment to diagnose. She took her shirt off, and Dr. Orion assessed her own bruises from where they’d hit her, all around her waist and her upper arm. They weren’t nearly as bad as Lucifer’s, though.

Both shoulders were stiff, her right one extra tender from being jammed up by the baton and shoved onto the floor. Her wrists were also cut and bruised. Her knee was the worst—stiff and swollen, it throbbed every time she moved it, and she had to bite her lip while Dr. Orion gently probed it with her fingers and stretched her leg this way and that. “How bad is it to walk on?” she asked. “I think I saw you limping?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said. By the time they’d gotten to the hospital, she hadn’t been able to help it. “I’d rather not stand up right now.”

“Does it feel like it’s going to give out on you?”

“Not really. Just hurts a lot.”

Dr. Orion nodded. “It’s a lower grade knee sprain. If you want, we can do imaging tests to see exactly how extensive the damage is, but ultimately treatment is going to be the same. Ice it, wear a wrap, and rest up for a few weeks.”

“That’s fine, then,” she said, leaning back in the chair. “No point in bothering.”

“When I see Lucifer tomorrow, come in and I’ll make sure it’s nothing more serious. For your knee and the concussion.”

“Okay.” She might as well.

“You’re a little dehydrated too, but some food and water should take care of that.”

Dr. Orion gave her some pills for the pain and swelling, an ice pack, and a brace for her knee, while a nurse brought in drinks and a dinner tray. She dutifully ate while waiting for Lucifer to wake up, thinking that she might have regretted not asking for her own room if it weren’t for the memories she was trying to avoid. She would have loved to lie down, and it could be hours more until he opened his eyes again. God knew he needed the rest. Literally.

Just like that, her mind started going again, despite her exhaustion.

God… heaven… angels… all things she’d been so sure didn’t exist, but they did. Honestly, the idea of there being a god frightened her more than Lucifer and Maze ever could. Was he really all-powerful? Was he watching her right at that moment? Did he know what she was thinking? Did he actually judge people for not worshiping him?

And when it came to Lucifer… ugh. There was a story behind it that she didn’t know. Some rebellion, some reason for him being kicked out of heaven in the first place. Maybe that should bother her, his past. Since he hadn’t just used the story of the devil to cope with his own trauma—he’d actually lived it all, and that meant he had done things in his past to worry about.

But right at that moment, it seemed too far away to matter.

No wonder Lucifer hated his father. No wonder he was always paranoid that his parents were screwing with him. God really could do all that stuff—

Wait. He’d said he had a mom, too. Maze had told her she was in Los Angeles. And also that she was generally a horrible person. Another god. Goddess?

Thinking about it wasn’t helping her headache. She’d never heard of the devil having a mother, but apparently he did, and she was not in some far-off place in the clouds.

Heaven…

There really was an afterlife, then. She wouldn’t just die someday and cease to exist. Souls were actually a thing. And that must mean her father was still around somewhere, too—that maybe Chloe would be able to see him again, eventually.

She thought about that for a long while. Wondering what it was like. Missing her dad all over again. Her thoughts turned to memories, ones she didn’t often let herself revisit, and then ones that might have been if he hadn’t gotten killed. Where he saw her get married and met his granddaughter and told her he was proud of her for making detective. There’d been so many little moments she’d taken for granted that she’d never get to have again, and she missed them just as much.

She thought of Trixie, too. How her daughter had become friends with the devil, and even better friends with a demon. It felt like things should change for her—like there was something Chloe had to do when it came to Trixie, now that she had this information—but she couldn’t think what. Maybe she was just too tired, but… what was supposed to change? Maze was already a challenge as a roommate, but they were working on it. Chloe couldn’t picture her bringing torture to the dinner table any more than she could picture Lucifer torturing people in hell.

Trixie would probably love it. She adored Maze…

“Detective.”

She jerked her head up, only realizing as she opened her eyes that she must have dozed off. She blinked, focusing on Lucifer, who was looking back at her more clearly than he had since they’d escaped. The bed was in an upright position, so it wasn’t hard to face each other, even though she wasn’t right next to him. “You’re awake.”

His eyes slowly traveled over her, and then back up. “You’re here.”

“I told you I would be,” she said, frowning.

“You saw my devil face.”

It wasn’t a question, and he knew perfectly well that she’d seen and believed him now, but he was clearly looking for some kind of affirmation anyway. “Yes,” she said. “I saw.”

“Yet you’re still here. Trying to take care of the devil.”

She didn’t know what he wanted from her. “I’m just trying to take care of you. Key word being trying, since you’re making it as difficult as possible. In more ways than one.”

She hadn’t meant to add that last bit. It’d just slipped out. This was probably not a good time for any kind of real conversation; she was too tired for it.

“Why?” he whispered. He’d asked her that same question before, and she’d gotten too swept up in hurt to answer properly. “Why did you come here? Why would you care so much?” He shook his head. “You shouldn’t care. You should be afraid of me. You should be running, so I don’t hurt you…”

Chloe couldn’t believe he was already coming back to this. She was definitely too tired to be mature about it right now, but since he wasn’t being mature about it either and he’d started it, that was his problem. “Well, I do care,” she snapped. “I’m so sick of you telling me I shouldn’t, but you know what? If you’re going to keep treating me like this, then you’re right. I shouldn’t care. And you know what else? It’s hard to be afraid of someone so pathetic. You hurt me, but not because you’re the devil. I don’t know why you care.”

Something shuttered in his expression. There was a deadness to his eyes that was wrong to see.

She hated this. All of it. “I’m not having this conversation right now,” she said. “Not again, especially if you’re just going to tell me to ditch you, like nothing I say matters.” She stood up to go find Dr. Orion, so that they could get out of there. Separately, now. “I made arrangements for you to be at your house instead. If you’d rather be there, then tell the doctor that. Otherwise, feel free to stay here. I’ll give you a day to recover, and then we will be talking about things. But just know that if you try to disappear again, I will find you, and any chance you have left of making amends will be gone for good.”

She headed for the door, but didn’t even make it two steps before he said, “Wait. Wait, Detective, please—”

No. Just—no.

She only stopped when she heard him moving behind her, and looked over her shoulder to see him trying to get up. “What the hell are you doing?”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’m sorry. For everything. Just, please. Don’t go like that.”

He kept trying to get out of the bed. Chloe would have pushed him back into it if her hands could land anywhere he wasn’t already hurt, but she didn’t think that was possible, so she stayed where she was. “Would you quit it?” she said.

He shook his head, finally managing to get to his feet. “I’m sorry,” he said again. He took a step towards her, and then ripped out the IV when it hindered his movement.

She stared up at the ceiling in pure exasperation. “What part about needing to recover do you not understand?”

“I don’t give a damn about that,” he said. When she looked back at him, he was only a few feet away from her. He stopped, not touching her, but he might as well have been. That tension was back in full force. “I’m sorry, Chloe. I don’t know what else to do.”

She realized then that his eyes were wet. Like he was about to start crying.

That wasn’t enough for her, either. She softened a little, but there was still a line between them that she wouldn’t be the one to cross. “Well, I don’t know everything that’s going on, so I don’t know that, either. But you could at least just stop saying you’re sorry, and stop telling me to leave.”

He took in a breath, wincing a little. She just waited him out. This was it. She didn’t want apologies; she wanted him to do better. If he tried to push her away one more time, she was done.

“Stay,” he said. “Please.”

Just like that, some of the tension deflated. She’d needed him to reach out to her even once, and now, he finally had.

“I don’t want this,” he continued. “Any of it.”

“Do you mean me, being close to you? Or—”

“Of course I don’t mean you,” he said, desperately now. “I mean this. You leaving like that, and me hurting you, and—and how it is between us right now. I hate it.”

Well, she guessed they were on the same page about that, at least.

“There are still things you don’t know,” he said. “I want you to care. But only if it’s real.”

They just held each other’s gaze for a long, long minute. A flood of emotions she’d been doing her best to bury rose up, threatening to smother her.

This is real, isn’t it?

It had been. But it had fallen apart that very same evening, not that she’d known it at the time. And now remembering that moment, and the hope she’d had after—it just hurt all over again.

Maybe he was right, and there were more things she needed to know to understand. If being the devil wasn’t a metaphor, there might very well be an actual reason he thought she wasn’t in control of her feelings when it came to him. But maybe she was right about him not being able to handle his feelings for her, too.

“Then tell me,” she said. “That’s all I ever want from you, Lucifer. To just tell me what’s going on. Help me understand.”

“I…” His mouth opened. Closed again. But she didn’t think it was because he wouldn’t say it; he looked like he simply don’t know how.

“Tomorrow,” she said, the rest of the anger draining out of her. She was so, so tired. “Tell me tomorrow. But you have to actually talk to me this time.”

“All right,” he whispered.

They looked at each other for another moment. “So, then,” she started. “Do you want to be here? Or do you want to go home? Well, not home, I guess, but—”

“Yes,” he said, cutting her off. “I want to go home.”

That statement felt so much more loaded than it should have been, but she couldn’t deal with it right now. “Then here,” she said, moving around him to where a simple, clean cotton shirt had been left for him. The remains of his suit were stuffed into a bag by the bed. “Put this on and we’ll get going.”

She had him sit on the edge of the bed and helped him into the shirt, ignoring his insistence that he could do it himself. She was about to move away to get the doctor when he lifted his hand, up towards her.

She paused, holding still as his fingers brushed over the bandage on her temple, feather-light. It lasted only a brief moment before he took his hand back again, letting it hover between them. Wanting to touch her but unwilling to do so. “How badly did they hurt you?” he asked quietly. “After they took you out of the room?”

“Not nearly as much as they hurt you,” she told him. “I’m fine. Just some sprains and bruises.”

He swallowed, eyes roving over her face and dipping down to her hands, as if noting every mark on her. “I was scared for you,” he said, meeting her eyes.

“I know. I was scared for you, too.”

It was true. She didn’t think anymore that she’d just run back for him on instinct. Or if she had, not the one that came from experience in situations like that.

He looked away, and she decided to leave to find Dr. Orion before they got into it again. She didn’t know why he couldn’t stand to hear he was important to her, but it just made her want to keep saying it. To make him acknowledge her like that.

Twenty minutes later, they were back in Ryan’s cruiser so he could drive them to the house Lucifer owned here. A nurse would follow them there.

Lucifer gave them directions, and it wasn’t long before they were in another area full of spacious, wealthy houses. Two stories tall with an empty pool in the back, Lucifer’s house was, unsurprisingly, made up of a lot of glass walls and outdoor spaces. She counted three different porches and balconies, and she was pretty sure the roof was open, too.

Ryan and the nurse helped get Lucifer inside and up the stairs, since despite his protests, he was still too weak to do it on his own. The interior was exactly what she’d expected out of a house like this: sparse, modern furniture, designs that screamed money but weren’t tacky. It didn’t feel lived-in in the slightest.

“How did you even know about this place?” Lucifer asked her.

“Maze told me. It was a stupid mistake that got me kidnapped too, but I’m not that incompetent at my job, you know. I did my best to find you.”

There was no bite in her words. The opposite; she was trying to keep things on the lighter side right now. She didn’t want to fight, she just wanted to go to sleep.

“Of course you’re not incompetent,” he said. And then he added, “I’m sorry. For making you come here.”

“I told you to stop apologizing,” she said, looking away from him.

“I—”

“Which room?” she asked. They were at the top of the stairs, and there were three bedrooms that she could see.

He sighed, and pointed at the one on the immediate left. “There.”

“Do you have any clothes?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.”

She hunted around and found a robe for him that would work, along with several other discarded garments that she’d rather not think about at length. Chloe checked out the other rooms while the nurse, Nathan, helped him change and got him into bed. She listened while he tried to give Lucifer another IV, which he vehemently refused. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “I don’t need it.”

Nathan tried, “It will help you feel better—”

“I don’t need it.”

Chloe marched right back in. “Just let him do it.”

“Detective—”

“No.” She sat on the bed next to him—there was more than enough room—and crossed her arms, glaring at him. “I didn’t come all the way out here and go through all that shit just to watch your body shut down because you’re refusing the treatment you need. I don’t care if you think it’s stupid. If you say no one more time, I’ll knock you out myself and let it happen anyway.”

He blew out a breath. “Fine.”

She waited until Nathan was done, and then went back to looking for a change of clothes for herself. There was nothing like pajamas or sweatpants, but she found a light, loose dress that would have to do. It was put away in a dresser drawer, and Lucifer had a housekeeper, so she decided to assume it was clean. She slipped it on and eased the brace back over her knee. As she finished in the bathroom, she tried not to look at her face in the mirror, knowing she must be a mess.

Then she went back into his room. Lucifer was sitting upright, propped up against a bunch of pillows to help with his ribs. He looked up at her in surprise, but she just went around to the other side of the bed. Without a word, she peeled back the covers and laid down on her side, facing away from him.

“Detective…”

“If you need something, let me know,” she said.

“That’s not necessary. You don’t have to—”

“I want a promise.”

“Isn’t that what the nurse is for?”

Yes. But she didn’t trust Lucifer to be honest about what he needed, and this way, she’d be right there if anything went seriously wrong. “A promise,” she repeated.

He didn’t say anything for a moment. And then, so quietly she almost didn’t hear it, he said, “Very well. I promise.”

“Don’t snore too loudly,” she said, closing her eyes. The sky was beginning to lighten, and the curtains were sheer, but she didn’t think it would be an issue. This bed, the middle of the desert—she would be able to pass out regardless. Lying down had never felt so good.

“I don’t snore,” he said, which was exactly what she’d been hoping for. She smiled, just a little.

She was almost asleep when he spoke again. Or maybe she actually was asleep, and was just imagining it.

“You, though… snore as loudly as you like, Detective.”

Lucifer was so exhausted that even trying to sleep seemed like it would take too much effort. He hardly knew what he was doing anymore. He obviously couldn’t think clearly, or else he wouldn’t be here like this.

He’d messed up again somehow. That had to be the case, because this wasn’t right. He knew that much—that this, with Chloe… it wasn’t allowed.

But he couldn’t do anything about it. He couldn’t turn her away again. It was beyond him.

She’d said to let her know if he needed anything, but the truth was, what he needed most was her.

He sat in bed, head resting against a pillow because he was too tired to hold it up anymore, and looked at her. Curled up only two feet away from him, hair fanned out on the pillow from her mess of a ponytail, not having had a chance to really clean up after what she’d been through. It wasn’t long before the tension left her body. Asleep now.

She knew the truth about him, and still, she’d chosen to fall asleep next to him. The devil. Someone she was supposed to be wary of.

His stomach churned, hot and tight, and not because of the injuries. He felt sick.

He hadn’t meant for it to happen, his devil face coming out again. He would never have wanted to do that in front of her. But when they’d taken her, moving her out of the room so they could kill her… he’d lost control. He’d only realized what’d happened when he’d caught sight of her expression, gazing at him the same way so many others had. Frozen in fear.

That was the way it should be. But then only a few minutes later she’d come back for him, afraid for him. Wanting to save him. Worried about him being hurt.

And that wasn’t right.

No one was supposed to be that unconcerned about him being the devil, not right after they’d looked into the fires of hell and seen exactly who he was and what he was capable of. But she’d just treated him the same way she always did.

Even after the immediate danger had passed, she’d kept caring. Determined to make sure he was all right. Staying with him in the hospital, considering what he wanted and trying to make it easier for him at every turn, sleeping here now…

No one should care that much. He didn’t deserve it.

His eyes felt hot and tight, too. Chloe blurred in front of him, and then the tears started sliding free. It was suddenly even harder to breathe than before, his lungs drawing in air in fits and bursts, causing his ribs to hurt again. But he made sure he didn’t make a sound.

It’s hard to be afraid of someone so pathetic.

He was. He could hardly fault her for saying that, when it was so utterly true. He’d spent weeks feeling sorry for himself, let himself get kidnapped by a human even more pathetic than he was, ended up too weak to walk on his own, and now he was sitting here crying for some reason he couldn’t even understand.

But he had no will left to make it stop.

This was just further proof that she couldn’t control her own feelings, it had to be. It wasn’t just about seeing his devil face. She’d been angry with him—hurt because of what he’d done to her. She hated him, and he couldn’t blame her for that, either. She was fed up and frustrated and kept wanting to walk away, telling him she was done.

Yet here she was, caring for him still.

He’d tried again and again to get her to leave, to focus on herself, to realize that she shouldn’t worry about him so much. And every time she’d just gotten even more angry at him for it. It had to be due to his father’s interference.

Because if that wasn’t the case, then that meant she just genuinely cared about him, more than anyone else ever had. More than he was worth to her. So much so that she would come for him even when she was angry, that she would put aside her own feelings until he was safe, that she would give him another chance to make up for it. That she wasn’t going to give up on him as easily as everyone else would have.

It meant that she might accept him as the devil and want him around anyway, no fear, no reservations. That he meant something to her, beyond what he could do for her or any physical desire she’d had. That she actually might choose to be with him, despite everything.

Thinking about what it would be like for that to be the truth just made him feel even worse. The tears came harder, his chest shaking with sobs he wouldn’t let loose.

Most pathetic of all was the way he still wanted her there, even knowing that of course, it wasn’t the truth. He did want her to care. This awful feeling inside or not, he wanted so badly for it to be real, for her to feel this way on her own. He so selfishly wanted her to keep caring, even though he truly didn’t deserve it.

He just needed her. So he’d given in, and asked her to stay.

Chloe would only be hurt because of it, but telling her not to bother was hurting her, too. He didn’t have the strength to keep doing it—both because he needed her, and because he couldn’t bear for that hurt to be his fault. He’d already hurt her enough as it was.

So maybe it was okay for him to accept it for now. Just until he told her the full truth, and then she would understand why he had to put an end to it.

Knowing it would come to an end only made his stomach twist again. It just kept going, on and on.

Maybe when he told her, she’d be able to see something he was missing. Maybe she’d have the answers, another explanation that would tell them it was real. Maybe…

He let out another shaky breath, struggling to inhale again. He could wish for that all he wanted, but there was no way around it. This was the last time he would get this. In a day or two, she’d be gone, and that would be that.

So he stayed slumped against the pillows, and looked at her, and let himself cry. Just this once.

Chapter Text

The buzz of a phone going off woke Chloe up sometime later. She must’ve been pretty deeply asleep, because for a long moment that seemed to last several minutes in her mind, she couldn’t figure out what the noise was or what she was doing. She just laid there, vaguely puzzled.

And then her brain connected the dots, and she opened her eyes. The bedroom was awash in light, but it wasn’t coming in directly through the windows. She’d rolled onto her back, and Lucifer was next to her, still upright and clearly asleep.

Lucifer—

Memories of the day before hit her all at once. The basement. Being used to get to him. Lucifer losing control, transforming into the devil.

He really was the devil. And she’d bullied him into going to the hospital and letting her help him here, on top of getting him to actually stop pushing her away completely. She’d fallen asleep right next to him.

It all felt so surreal. Surely he wasn’t actually the devil—surely things would go back to not making sense in a way that made sense once she returned to Los Angeles.

But one look at Lucifer’s face, bruised and open and so vulnerable in sleep, and she knew it was real. Their confrontation last night had been too raw not to be real.

She found the phone she’d left on the nightstand—Maze’s phone, since she had no idea where hers was—and finally answered it. “Hello?”

“It’s me.”

It was Maze’s voice on the line, but it sounded… weird. It took Chloe a second to realize why: she sounded hesitant, which was completely unlike her. “Did you find them?”

“Yeah,” she said. “They’re at a motel on the other side of the city. Ditched the car a few miles away—I don’t think they have a new ride yet. They don’t know I’m here, either. Do you, uh… do you want me to wait for you? Or do you want me to just drop them off at Jay’s doorstep?”

The last of the sleepiness left her. She had things to take care of. Rubbing at her eyes, she said, “I’m surprised you don’t already have them duct-taped and crying.”

Maze didn’t say anything for a few seconds. “I wasn’t sure if I should offer that as an option.”

That was definitely unlike her.

She glanced at Lucifer again, realizing that talking this way to Maze was different now that she knew Maze actually was a demon. She didn’t just get into fights with tough guys on Earth. She’d been torturing people in hell for Chloe didn’t even know how long. And here Chloe was joking about it like nothing had changed.

Why was Maze suddenly holding back?

Are you going to be afraid of us now? Or can we have this discussion later?

Right. They thought she’d be terrified of them—Lucifer had been surprised over and over by her actions, by how she wasn’t scared. Maybe Maze thought that later was now, that after Chloe had had a few hours to think and the adrenaline was gone, she’d fall into a panic.

There was still no fear of the two of them, though. Just of everything else, and that could sit in the background until she had time to deal with it.

The very fact that Maze didn’t want her to be afraid spoke volumes.

“Wait for me,” she said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. But if they try to leave, feel free to stop them however you like.”

Chloe could almost see the grin on Maze’s face as she said, “Sounds good to me.”

She hung up, and a moment later a text came through with the name of the motel. Chloe would have to figure out how to get there, since as far as she knew, her car was still at the apartment building. She’d prefer it if Ryan stayed here just in case anyone else came for Lucifer, but maybe she could convince him to let her take his car…

Then again, this wasn’t her city, and ultimately she had to let the Vegas police deal with it. Maybe she’d just ask Jay to pick her up.

She called him. “Hey,” Jay said, sounding exhausted. He probably hadn’t gotten much sleep either.

“Maze found the two that drove off. I want to be there when you take them in. Would you come get me?”

Jay sounded much more alert as he said, “Yeah. I think you’ve earned the right to be there. Give me twenty minutes.”

Chloe set the phone aside and looked at Lucifer for a long moment, unsure if she should wake him up to tell him what was going on. He hadn’t stirred while she’d been talking, and she was glad he was finally getting the rest he needed, but—

She studied his face more carefully, looking past the bruises. His eyes were puffy, and it almost looked like there were dried tear tracks on his cheeks.

Had he been crying?

He’d promised to wake her up if he needed something, and while he might not have considered pain relief a need, she’d never known him to cry from physical pain before.

If he had been crying, it was from pain of a different sort.

She didn’t know what to make of it, or of him in general. She didn’t know what was supposed to happen between them now.

They needed to talk about things, at the very least so she could find out what he thought was so awful. But that wasn’t going to happen yet, and Lucifer couldn’t come with them, so…

She decided not to wake him up. He needed the sleep, and she suspected he’d make a fuss if he found out she was leaving without him. Better to just not tell him until later.

She carefully got out of bed and went to the other bedroom she’d changed in yesterday, right across the hall from Lucifer’s room. There was no choice but to trade in the dress she’d worn to bed for the clothes she’d had on last night, because her only other options were even tighter dresses, tops that belonged in a club, and mini skirts. The one pair of skinny jeans she’d managed to find were too small.

In the bathroom, she splashed water on her face, mindful of the bandage on her temple and the bruises darkening on her jaw. It looked just as bad as she’d been afraid of last night. Her hair was a mass of tangles, but it could wait; she just smoothed it out with her fingers as best she could and put it in a fresh ponytail. The knee brace she put back on over her jeans, just so she didn’t make things worse. It wasn’t too bad to walk on, though her knee was still tender.

When she got downstairs, it was to find that another officer had relieved Ryan for the day, a young woman named Lexi. Chloe told her and the nurse what was going on and then scrounged up a notepad and pen in the kitchen. She wrote just a short note: Maze found them. Be back soon.

Underneath that she added, You’d better not try to follow.

Then she darted upstairs again to leave the note on her side of the bed. He still hadn’t moved.

Jay arrived not long after. She climbed into the passenger seat, and he drove off without waiting for her to put on the seatbelt. “Where are they?” he asked.

She told him. “Maze is there already. She’ll make sure they don’t get away this time.”

“So they kidnapped him because they think he’s really the devil?” Jay asked, speeding through the streets as much as he could. It would still likely take them half an hour to get there.

“Yeah. They were trying to get divine favor, from him or God.”

Jay shook his head. “I pulled information on the guy you called Carmen Grant. His real name is Colby Guzman, and he’s been on the run for the last year. The FBI never found him. I guess he actually believed that religious relic crap he was involved in.”

“Yeah,” Chloe said, instantly thinking about that auction in a new light. Was it all crap? Lucifer had been derisive about the other items at that auction, insisting only his wings were real, and it made sense that Grant—Guzman—whatever wouldn’t have been selling real relics. But that didn’t mean real relics didn’t exist somewhere. If the devil and God and hell and everything like that was real, did that mean Christianity was real? Or maybe just some of it? Didn’t other religions believe in the devil too?

Neither of her parents were religious, so she didn’t know much about any version of it. Dan had tried halfheartedly to raise Trixie as Christian, but it hadn’t really stuck—he’d stopped going to church a long time ago, saying he just preferred a personal relationship with God, and Trixie had only seemed interested in a kid’s Bible filled with illustrated stories. Chloe hadn’t seen it in years, and she didn’t remember any of those stories featuring the devil, except the one where he turned into a snake to get Eve to eat an apple. And she was highly skeptical of the accuracy there.

For the turning into a snake part, at least. The part about telling someone to indulge in their desires while defying God’s arbitrary rules, she had no problem believing.

There was so much she didn’t know about him. How was it that the man she knew had really lived for thousands of years, at the very least? How was it that she’d kissed someone who’d been immortalized in major world religions? How could Lucifer possibly be a fallen angel?

It was still too hard to wrap her mind around it.

Jay said, “Your partner might want to think about going by a different name now. With how… loud he is in a place like Los Angeles, this won’t be the only unwanted attention it attracts.”

Chloe snorted. If this was what she’d sounded like every time she’d been skeptical of his “metaphors,” it was no wonder Lucifer had found it so amusing. “Trust me, he won’t change his name. This isn’t the first time someone’s gone after him. He’s well aware that there are people who will hate him for it.”

That was an understatement, really. There were people like that preacher Malcolm had killed who’d been prejudiced against him, not to mention all the people Chloe was sure now that Lucifer had shown his other face to who’d become instantly terrified of him, and that had only been a handful of humans in the last few years. How many times had that happened in the past? How many times had people scorned his name without ever knowing the truth? What had he gone through with his family after falling from heaven?

He’d experienced more hate than anyone, and she was pretty sure it was entirely undeserved. There was no way the person she knew was awful enough to deserve that.

It was incredible that he hadn’t snapped from it all. That he was able to smile and laugh and bring joy to others. That he was still so good, whether he screwed up sometimes or not.

Jay parked at the motel a while later. “Almost forgot,” he said, and reached for something in the backseat. A small bag. “Here. You might want this.”

She took it gladly. Her gun, badge, phone, and car keys were in it—all the things they’d stripped from her at some point after knocking her out yesterday. Lucifer’s phone and keys were there, too. “We found them at that house last night, along with a bunch of photographs of Lucifer. Looks like they’ve been planning this for a while.”

“Yeah,” Chloe said. “I saw them too. It’s always fun to find out you’re being stalked.”

Jay shook his head. “We’re keeping them as evidence. The house appears to be under another false identity for Colby Guzman. Along with his other arrest warrants, we already have more than enough to keep him from bothering you again.”

“Good.” She left most of the items in the bag, lifting out just the gun for now. Like before, she instantly felt better to have a weapon in her hands again. Even better that it was her own. “What about the others helping him?”

“Four of them are dead. The other one we found is in the ICU, but he’ll probably live. I’m sure we’ll find plenty of evidence to put him away too. And this guy your friend found as well.” He handed over a pair of handcuffs. “Let’s go.”

They got out of the car. Maze peeled away from another car in the lot and sidled up to them, somehow managing to move unobtrusively even though she was dressed in black leather in the middle of a cloudless day. Her eyes met Chloe’s, a question in them for a brief moment, before her face adopted her fuck around and find out expression. “They’re up in room 213. I haven’t seen them leave, but I doubt they’ll hang around much longer. They’ll try to get out of the city.”

“That’s not happening,” Chloe said.

“Of course it’s not. I said try, not succeed.”

She couldn’t help thinking of how she was talking to an actual demon. How a demon from hell was standing in a motel parking lot on the outskirts of Vegas, more than ready and willing to use those knives she loved so much. How Maze had killed a guy right in front of her and wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.

But then, Chloe had killed people too last night. She’d already known Maze was willing to use those knives and that her fighting skills hadn’t been honed in a safe, controlled environment. She was waiting now for Chloe’s word, following her lead despite their bickering about it when they’d arrived two days ago. And that expression promising violence wasn’t directed at her.

It was oddly comforting, having a demon watching her back. Chloe still trusted her. She’d started to get used to walking into battles with Maze, and it didn’t really feel any different now.

“I guess you really are good at finding people,” Jay said, scanning the area.

Maze glanced at Chloe again. “Hunting down rotten humans? Yeah. Of course I am.”

“And rescuing friends,” Chloe said softly. Maze looked startled, but she didn’t reply to that.

Jay pointed out the two stairways leading up to the second floor hallway, one on either end. “We’ll split up, in case they make a run for it. You take the left, I’ll take the right.”

“Okay. You can focus on Grant,” Chloe told him. “I want Nick.” Grant might have been behind the whole thing, but of the two of them, Nick was the one who’d actually hurt her and Lucifer. She wanted the satisfaction of taking him down herself.

“Fine by me.” Jay nodded to her and headed off to the right, while Chloe went over to the other stairwell, gun lowered but at the ready. Maze decided to go with her.

“I can’t believe I’m letting the cops take them in,” Maze muttered. “They kidnapped the devil and almost killed you. The least they deserve is a little hell before you lock them up.”

Chloe agreed with her, but she couldn’t do it herself and she still wanted to be the one to put a stop to Nick, so she said nothing. Maybe she’d been a little too quick to tell Maze to leave them be this morning.

They reached the landing. Across the walkway, Jay was moving towards them. Chloe counted out the doors to 213 and watched for any sign of movement, but there was nothing to indicate the occupants of the room knew the cops were there, and the curtains were shut. They reached the door without incident.

Voices were audible from inside the room; it sounded like an argument was going on. Maze didn’t wait for permission before she kicked the door down.

“Police!” Jay called. “Get on your knees, hands on top of your head.”

Nick and Grant were both there. They spun around, obviously caught by surprise as Chloe followed Jay into the room. Nick’s hand reached for the gun at his waist for only a second before he decided against it, and slowly, they did as ordered.

Nick was giving Chloe a death glare, but Grant wasn’t nearly as composed. He was working himself into a nervous sweat, eyes jumping from face to face and then to the doorway. “You don’t understand,” he said.

“You’re under arrest for kidnapping, assault, fraud, smuggling, trading in contraband, tax evasion… what else was it? Oh, yes, attempted murder.” Jay stepped up next to Grant. “It’s a pretty impressive list you’ve built up.”

Grant pushed out at Jay, panic or desperation getting the better of him, and made a break for the doorway. Jay just said, “Now we can add resisting arrest.”

Nick took advantage of the noise as Chloe made to arrest him, too. His hand went for the gun again, but Chloe had been waiting for him to make a move and saw it coming a mile away. She darted forward the last few steps and pistol whipped him, just as he’d done to her. It felt good.

He grunted, faltering, and Chloe moved behind him. She glanced up to see Maze effortlessly putting a stop to Grant’s bid for freedom, sending him crashing to the floor with a groan. “Never hole up in a place with only one exit, no matter how secure you think you are,” Maze said. “And here you are calling yourselves professionals. Pathetic.”

Jay grimaced, tossed her a set of cuffs, and turned his attention to Nick to make sure that was the end of that. “Don’t move.”

Chloe wrenched Nick’s hands back, trading her gun for the cuffs. “I will shoot you if you so much as twitch the wrong way,” she said. “Please give me a reason.”

“Bitch,” he seethed. “I should have just killed you right then and there.”

“Too late. I told you how this would end.” She made sure the cuffs went on extra tight. “Frankly, you got off lucky. Your other friends are dead or in the hospital. Maze here wanted to have a crack at you, but that would look bad for us.”

“Don’t worry,” Maze said, grinning in a way that screamed Nick should be worried. “There’s always later.”

Chloe had no doubt Maze would find a way to make Nick pay for it one way or another, and she wasn’t inclined to try to prevent it. What happened next wasn’t on her.

She and Jay escorted them down to the car, where they were unceremoniously stuffed inside. Jay called in the arrest and asked a couple of officers to come out to deal with the motel and process Grant and Nick. “If you can wait, I’ll drive you to the precinct and show you what I found on the person who left you the note.”

Chloe had almost forgotten about it. One more loose end to tie up. “Sounds good.”

“So, am I getting paid for this?” Maze asked. “Since that’s twice now I’ve done your job for you.”

“There was no bounty or reward posted yet,” Jay said. “So no. You worked too fast.”

“Seriously?” Chloe said.

“I know, right? Ridiculous.”

“No, I mean you.”

“What?” Maze said, shrugging. “Obviously I didn’t do it for the money, but it was worth a shot.”

She rolled her eyes. “Ask Lucifer for a reward. You’d get more from him anyway.”

“No, I wouldn’t,” Maze said. “He’d react the same way you did. And for this, I wouldn’t ask him to… anyway. I only want it from the cops.”

Chloe was pretty sure she knew what Maze meant. It wasn’t about the money, not really, and even Maze had her limits. There was no way she’d stand by Lucifer’s bedside when he was that hurt and broken and ask him to be paid for saving him. It was only something she’d do if no real harm had been done, because it would never be a serious request.

Ever since Chloe had woken up, she’d been focused on going after Grant and Nick. Now that it was done with and she was just standing there waiting, her body was using the opportunity to remind her that she wasn’t at a hundred percent again yet. “I’m going to go sit down,” Chloe said, nodding to the closest stairs. “Let me know when you’re ready to leave.”

The stairs were predictably filthy, but her clothes were already trashed, so she didn’t care. She sighed as she stretched out her leg and rotated her shoulder a bit, wishing she’d brought water with her. Maybe she’d go request some from the front desk; she was feeling a little light-headed again. It wasn’t helping that she’d had too little sleep and food. But it was worth it to be here now.

Maze appeared and sat down next to her. “Here,” she said, holding out a bottle of water. “Jay thought you might need it.”

She took it gratefully. “You don’t have to wait around too,” Chloe told her. “You’ve been out here long enough.”

Maze lounged back like the stairs were a throne, making no move to leave. “There’s still one more person to find, isn’t there? Besides, you obviously need someone to watch your back. I don’t feel like tracking you down a second time. Unless… unless you don’t want me to come with you?”

Chloe shook her head. She was even more grateful in that moment to have Maze there, admitting in her own way that she cared. “Just wasn’t expecting you to.”

“Yeah, well. I’m coming anyway.”

They lapsed into silence for a moment. Chloe was more sure by the minute that Maze being a demon didn’t change a thing in whatever weird friendship they had; she’d always been so blunt and unwaveringly herself, even if Chloe hadn’t believed her history. It wasn’t like she’d caught her in a lie or deception.

While she still didn’t know what to make of Lucifer being the devil, it was almost easy in comparison to reconcile Maze being a demon. Things were far less complicated between them. She’d been going to tell Chloe the truth, and had stuck around when Lucifer had disappeared. Maybe he’d had a reason, but she still appreciated that friendship all the same.

It really said something about the current state of her life that being friends with Maze felt simple.

“So… are you okay?” Maze asked. She looked at the knee brace, and then studied Chloe’s face. “Those are some nice bruises you’ve got going on, and you kind of look like you did when you got home from the hospital a few weeks ago…”

Well, that was an oddly polite way of saying Chloe looked like crap. She’d been weak and a little unsteady then too, still recovering from the poison. Chloe hadn’t even thought Maze would’ve noticed on either occasion. “Yeah,” she said. “Thank you, Maze.”

Maze frowned. “Take it as a compliment if you want, but the bruises aren’t that impressive.”

She let out a little half-laugh. “No, I mean, thank you for saving my life. I’m not sure I’d be here right now if you hadn’t shown up when you did.”

“Oh.” Maze was looking uncomfortable again, like she always did when things got a little too sincere. “Anytime.” After another moment she said, “So, um… we’re still cool, then? You really don’t mind that I’m a demon?”

“No. I mean, don’t get me wrong, you are terrifying, but no more than usual. It’s more like things just make a lot more sense now with you being… you.”

She relaxed again, clearly deciding that that was a proper compliment. “Maybe I shouldn’t have been so worried about telling you the truth.”

“What would you have done?” Chloe asked, thinking about the way Maze had phrased it in the car on their way to Vegas. “As proof.”

“Well, you saw Lucifer’s devil face. I have another appearance in hell, too. But unlike him, I don’t show it off every five seconds.”

She blew out a breath. Maze kind of had a point; how many times had Chloe almost glimpsed his devil face, or seen someone react to it? And there were probably a bunch of other instances she didn’t know about. It was amazing that he’d managed to keep her from seeing it outright for so long. But she’d never have guessed Maze had another form, too. “Does it look the same as his?”

“No. I’ll show you sometime, just…” Maze glanced over to where Jay was talking on his phone, beside the car. “Not here.”

Yeah, that was for the best. “Okay, so, you have another face sometimes, and you being a master stealth ninja makes sense now. Does, uh… does being a demon come with special powers, or something?”

Maze snorted. “No. Apart from the whole ‘living forever’ thing, I guess, and I heal faster than humans. I can’t possess people, or whatever it is you’re thinking.”

Chloe nodded. That made things easier to process. “Is there anything else in particular I should know about? With you being from… from hell.” It was still weird to say.

“Nope.” Maze made a sweeping motion over her body. “What you see is what you get—a whole lot of awesomeness. Except now you know the torturing souls part is real.”

“Yeah, that’s still going to take some getting used to,” Chloe muttered.

Maze shrugged. “Don’t worry about it. I’m still the same demon you always knew. It’s not like we’re in hell now.”

“Right.” She tilted her head back, a million questions immediately running through her mind. Most of them having to do with what hell was like, and exactly what kind of torture was going on there, and what determined where someone ended up after they died. But it was too much to get into in a dank stairwell at a random Vegas motel. Instead she asked, “Why are you on Earth instead of in hell? Lucifer, too.”

“Because he wanted to be done with hell, and he took me with him. Not that I believed it was going to be permanent at first—I thought it would just be a longer break than usual, and then once he’d gotten it out of his system, we’d be back. But I don’t think he ever will, now.”

Simple as that. Lucifer wanted out of hell, so he left. Chloe didn’t think he’d ever want to go back either—for all that he’d occasionally reference hell like it wasn’t a big deal, it couldn’t have been clearer that he detested being associated with the people sentenced there. More than that, he truly enjoyed the life he had here. She couldn’t picture him wanting to give it up to go back to literal hell.

Really, she still had such a hard time picturing him in hell at all. It just wasn’t him.

But Maze was a different story. “Do you want to go back?”

Her gaze turned distant as she thought for a moment. “No,” she said. “Not right now, at least. I did at one point, but…” She let out a breath. “I had to get my own life here because Lucifer couldn’t take me back anymore, and because I didn’t want to be his servant anymore, and… I guess it turned out interesting enough. I’d choose to stick around a little longer.”

More questions crowded Chloe’s mind at that. Why couldn’t Lucifer take her back to hell? Because he didn’t have wings anymore?

She wondered, too, how much she had to do with Maze’s life being “interesting” now. She’d moved out of Lucifer’s place around the same time she’d started looking for a career, and as far as Chloe knew, she didn’t actually hate living together.

The image of her curled up on the couch with Trixie, both of them asleep after going out on Halloween, flashed in Chloe’s mind. It hadn’t been the last time they’d watched TV like that. She acted as babysitter sometimes, without complaining about it, and Trixie had taken to teaching her things like making cake out of a box or how to build a pillow fort. She even paid attention when Trixie talked about school or the shows she watched, taking her seriously in a way Chloe knew Trixie appreciated.

A demon from hell was friends with her nine-year-old daughter, and still, Chloe couldn’t make herself worry about it. Just like with Maze watching her back today, it was kind of the opposite; she was pretty sure Maze would do anything to protect Trixie.

She thought about girls’ night, and how Maze was friends with Linda, too. Were they her first real friends, outside of Lucifer? It seemed unlikely that she was close with other demons in hell, considering her attitude when Chloe had first met her.

Speaking of… “Are there other demons around, too?” she asked. “Why did Lucifer bring you with him?”

“Just me. And because I was his second-in-command in hell. It was convenient for him to have his favorite servant here, and I wanted to see if Earth was as fun as he said it was, on top of needing to protect him.”

“Second in command?” Chloe said, staring at Maze. It made sense, but something about her putting it like that was like being struck in the face. Not just a demon—hell’s best.

“Of course. Did you think he’d trust those other imbeciles to guard his back or run free here?” Maze scoffed. “Yeah, right.”

Chloe dropped her head into her hands. There really was so much she didn’t know about them and their past. Question after question after question…

Maze slapped a hand on her back in what was probably supposed to be a comforting pat. “It’ll be fine,” she said cheerfully. “All things considered, you’re handling this like a champ.”

“Great.” She dragged her hands down her face, instantly regretting it when she was reminded of how roughy it’d been treated lately. “At least there’s that.”

“Finally,” Maze said. “Can we get out of here now?”

Out in the parking lot, two cruisers were pulling up next to Jay. It was only noon, she’d been awake just a couple of hours, and already it felt like such a long day. “Yeah,” she said, getting to her feet. “Let’s go track down one last person.”

With it being the middle of the day, the precinct was noisy and full of movement as Jay lead them over to his desk along one wall. Chloe snagged an extra chair and pulled it up to the desk, thinking of how Lucifer had done that exact same thing at her desk countless times. It was weird to be the guest here in a case that was so personal.

Why even was the devil interested in hanging out at some grungy police precinct? It’d been weird enough that Lucifer, owner of Lux and a million three-piece suits, had wanted to put up with it. As the devil? It made even less sense to her. She’d understood that at first it’d only been about finding the killers—he’d always made it clear he wanted bad guys punished—but it’d become more than that. He hung around even when there were no cases now, and he had friends there besides Chloe. Lucifer could’ve chosen to spend his time doing literally anything more interesting than that, but he hadn’t. Until she’d gotten poisoned, anyway.

Maybe it should’ve also been weird to her that the devil liked apprehending the killers, but… it really wasn’t. It was only weird to her that someone who cared so much about right and wrong was the devil. She’d long since thought Lucifer was a consultant to work through whatever had happened to him in his past—a way to get justice for others if he hadn’t been able to get it for himself—and she suspected it was even more true now. She guessed it also made sense that if he’d overseen the bad guys being tortured in hell, he’d end up despising them on Earth, too.

As she glanced at Maze, who’d elected to stand with her usual I’m a badass stance, she wondered if it wasn’t the same for her. Somewhere deep down. Maze might not outwardly care about people in general, but she didn’t hurt them without a reason, and that reason was never just because I can. Skewed moral code or not, Maze directed that… passion towards people who deserved it, and she wouldn’t hesitate to protect her friends. First Lucifer, now Chloe and Linda and Trixie. Even Ella, probably, if it came to it. None of the people she’d go to the mat defending were ones who’d end up in hell.

Probably. She still didn’t quite know how that worked.

“I pulled up the security cameras,” Jay said, taking his own seat at the desk before turning to the computer. “It was easy to get a clear shot. He wasn’t trying to hide his face.”

“No, he wasn’t. He knew how not to draw attention to himself,” Chloe said.

Jay pulled up a picture on the screen. Not from the security footage—this was a standard profile picture. “His name is Enzo Beck. He’s lived in Vegas for the last ten years and was arrested once for assault and battery. Hasn’t been on our radar since, so we don’t know who he might be involved with. I have no idea how he’s connected to this mess.”

“Do you recognize him?” Chloe asked Maze, studying the picture herself now that she was able to get a better look at his face.

“No,” Maze said. “If I’ve seen him before, he didn’t stand out to me.”

“Can you send me a copy of that picture?” Chloe asked. She’d have to ask Lucifer the same question later.

“Yeah.” Jay started typing as he said, “According to this information, he works for a mechanic, and his address is five miles away from the apartment those guys were using.”

“Did you find out who was living in the apartment?”

He nodded. “It was being rented to someone who just moved to Orlando two weeks ago. I called, and he said he doesn’t know what was going on—he turned the key over to the apartment building and that was that. The office verified it’s empty until the new tenant moves in this week. I don’t think the tenants or the office are involved.”

Chloe didn’t either. It was bothering her, not knowing how this piece fit in. “Why tell me where to go?” she muttered. “Why help me find Lucifer? And how did he know who I was?”

“Maybe it was a trap?” Maze suggested. “I mean, he didn’t give you the location of the house. He got you to go to a place where they kidnapped you too.”

She shook her head. “Enzo wasn’t involved himself. The people who took me were surprised to see me there, and none of Lucifer’s other captors knew who tipped me off. They were spooked by it. The only thing I can think of is if he knows Lucifer somehow, but I can’t figure out how he would’ve known about the apartment when Lucifer had no idea what was going on until they already had him.”

“Well, then, let’s just go find this guy and ask,” Maze said, in a way that implied they weren’t going to have a polite conversation. “No point speculating.”

“Yeah,” Chloe said. “What’s the name of the mechanic?”

“Doug’s Auto Shop. But we need a statement from you first, Maze.”

“Later,” she said shortly.

“I have two bodies in the morgue courtesy of you. You already got to do it later, and later is now.”

“Oh, come on—”

“Just do it, Maze,” Chloe said. “It’ll take five minutes.”

She huffed. “The things I do for you…”

“Yes, this is much worse than fighting your way through a bunch of men with guns to rescue us,” Chloe said drily.

“I know, right? Apparently I get a punishment instead of a reward. Whatever. Just make it fast.”

Jay certainly wasn’t interested in dragging it out. As soon as they could, they took a taxi to the apartment building so Chloe could get her car back. On the way, she asked Maze, “How did you even find us? If there was no connection to the apartment.”

“I made a few friends while you were getting yourself kidnapped,” Maze said. “When you didn’t answer your phone, I went to that address and convinced the girl at the front desk to show me the security cameras. Then I had a chat with my new friends and found out one of the people using the apartment had been hired for a job by someone from LA. I tracked you down from there.”

“Well, maybe your friends can help us find Enzo if it comes to that,” Chloe said. The taxi driver was looking in the rearview nervously.

Maze grinned. “More fun for me.”

“I know you didn’t recognize him, but could he be someone, ah… from your world?” Chloe asked. Not a demon, if Maze was the only one here, and probably not an angel, but at this point Chloe wasn’t making any assumptions. There could be any number of things she didn’t know about for who was and wasn’t human.

“Doubt it,” Maze said. “Not if he’s been arrested and works for a mechanic. Also, Lucifer doesn’t exactly have any other celestial friends who’d help him. If he did, I’d definitely know about them.”

They got to the apartment building. “No charge,” the driver said hastily.

Maze was already getting out like she assumed she wouldn’t be paying one way or another. Chloe said, “I’m with the police. Don’t worry about it.” She paid anyway, glad that she was about to get her own car back.

They’d have to get Lucifer’s car at some point, too. It was still at Fletcher’s.

Right. She should tell Candy they’d found Lucifer. With everything else going on, she’d forgotten others were worried about Lucifer too. And she needed to check in with Dan, and talk to Trixie, even if just for a few minutes. Getting to hear her daughter’s voice after what she’d been through sounded amazing.

Pausing by her car, she pulled out her phone and looked through her notifications for the first time. There were the ten missed calls and several texts from Maze, ranging from short-tempered to borderline worried when Chloe never responded. Jay had called her a few times, too. Dan had called last night and texted, How’s it going? He’d sent another text this morning: Let me know what’s going on

Chloe texted him back first. Found Lucifer. We need a couple more days here. I’ll call you tonight.

To Candy, she said, We found Lucifer. He’s safe.

“If you’re going to stand around texting, can you at least give me the keys?” Maze said.

“You have even less patience than Trixie.” Chloe unlocked the car and got in, thinking about Candy and how she’d gotten married to the devil without realizing it. Probably best not to tell her that part.

Were they going to stay married, now that Chloe already knew everything?

But then, that little stunt hadn’t been just for her benefit. She had absolutely no idea how tricking Lucifer’s mother was supposed to work now that it wasn’t just Lucifer’s mother, but a goddess.

Candy texted back just before Chloe was about to put the car in drive. Thank God. Is he okay? Where are you guys?

Chloe couldn’t help staring at that first part. The irony of it. How was this really her life now?

Not just now, she reminded herself. It’s been this way for a while. You just didn’t believe it.

She texted Candy back. At his house. He’s resting. I’ll have him call you later.

His house? In LA?

No. Here in Vegas. What, had Lucifer never mentioned it to her? It wasn’t even surprising at this point.

I didn’t know he had a house here. Can I come over? Tonight?

She hesitated. Tomorrow, she told her. Maybe it was selfish, but she didn’t want Candy there yet. Not until she could have it out with Lucifer.

“How about I drive, you text?” Maze said. “We’re wasting time.”

“Absolutely not.” Chloe put the phone aside and finally pulled onto the street. “I’m still never handing over the keys.”

“Whatever,” Maze said. “Who were you even texting?”

“Candy. She wants to come over tomorrow.”

“That’ll be an interesting reunion. I’ll make sure to bring popcorn.”

Chloe rolled her eyes. “So, this thing Lucifer was planning to do with Candy,” she started. “To get information on what his mom is planning. How does that even... work? She’s a goddess?”

“Yeah,” Maze said. “Don’t go worshipping her, though. ‘Bitch’ is a better title.”

“I kind of got that from how you talk about her like she’s the devil. What’s her deal? Why is she even here and not in heaven?” If Lucifer and Maze were both wary of her, that couldn’t mean anything good.

Maze snorted. “She didn’t come from heaven, she came straight from hell. God locked her up for killing a bunch of humans a few thousand years ago. Then she managed to break out and took over a human body to avoid getting sucked back to hell again. You know her as Charlotte Richards.”

Chloe stared at her. “What?”

“Car,” Maze said cheerfully. Chloe looked back at the road and stomped on the brakes just in time. She hadn’t noticed traffic slowing down. “Told you you’d have crashed. Changed your mind about me driving yet?”

Chloe kept looking straight ahead, the sudden flash of adrenaline leaving her feeling shaky for a minute. “Charlotte?” she exclaimed. “Charlotte is Lucifer’s mother?”

“Yep.”

“So that whole deal when she first came into the picture… Charlotte was actually killed?”

“Yeah. You’ve never met the actual Charlotte Richards. Only Lucifer’s mom. From what I hear, though, she picked a pretty fitting body to take over.”

So many things about that case hadn’t quite made sense, but then, Lucifer had obviously been involved in some way, and things rarely made sense when that happened. She’d already made up her mind not to push too hard for answers, so she’d let it go.

All those moments when Lucifer had been thinking his mother was the killer… “She really killed a bunch of people?” Chloe asked.

“Yeah. The plagues weren’t actually the wrath of God for humans going against his will, they were the wrath of Goddess because she was pissed at her husband. Things like that.”

“Wow,” she said. So it definitely wasn’t the case that all religious stories were completely true. “And you think she’s planning on doing something like that now?”

“No. Not something like that, just… something. She really does want Lucifer to love her, and she doesn’t have her powers when she’s in a human body. She’s been resorting to more underhanded means of manipulating Lucifer. He keeps trying to tell her to back off, but it’s not like she’ll ever listen. She can’t understand why he wants to live among humans. To her, family comes first.”

“They’re not his family,” Chloe said. “Not like that.” She didn’t have to know the details to know that was true. No one who let him languish in hell could claim they were family.

“Call them whatever you want, but they are her children, and she wants to go back to heaven for the rest of them. She just can’t do that the way things are now.”

“And she doesn’t get along with God?” Chloe asked. “How many gods are there?”

“Just the two.”

Okay. Okay, at least there was that. Only two gods, and the one that was here was limited in her power. So not an immediate crisis. “Is there anyone else I should know about?”

“There’s Amenadiel, but you definitely shouldn’t worry about him. He lost his powers too, and he’s become less of a prick lately. He’s helping to keep that bitch in check.”

“Awesome,” Chloe said. “Great. Do I even want to know what you mean by less of a prick?” She didn’t know much about Amenadiel, really. Just that Lucifer didn’t exactly get along with him the way a lot of brothers got on each other’s nerves. Or so she’d thought.

“I think I’ll wait until you park.”

It was only a few minutes more before she did, pulling into a spot outside Doug’s Auto Shop. She turned to Maze, bracing herself. “Okay, tell me.”

Maze pressed her lips together for a second. “Until a few months ago, he was the one chasing Lucifer back to hell every time he came up for a visit. He got fed up with Lucifer not going back this time and tried a few ways to force the issue. First by telling Carmen Grant where to find Lucifer’s wings, and then by resurrecting Malcolm so Malcolm would outright kill him.”

Chloe’s hands clenched into fists, her ears starting to ring. Amenadiel was behind those things? They hadn’t just happened on their own? “Tell me you’re joking.” She already knew she wasn’t.

Maze shook her head.

“You’re telling me we’re only in this mess right now because of Amenadiel? Because he was that insistent on sending Lucifer back to hell? You’re telling me that my daughter was kidnapped because of him? Malcolm almost killed me!” Chloe was almost shaking with how furious she was.

“Look, I’m all for you tearing him a new one, but before you try to kill him yourself, you should know Amenadiel realized he’d screwed up and tried to stop it. Malcolm almost killed him too, and he helped save your life three weeks ago.”

“I don’t give a fuck. People are dead because of him. Trixie could have been one of them! And now this crap with Lucifer?” She shook her head. “You’re right, I’m not worried about him. I’m going wring his neck with my bare hands.” Angel or not, she didn’t care.

Maze looked amused at the threat, but not like she thought Chloe couldn’t do it. More like she was happy to hear it. “Just leave him breathing,” Maze said. “We kinda need him right now, much as I hate to say it.”

She closed her eyes, forcing herself to take a deep breath. One problem at a time. Amenadiel hadn’t killed those people himself, and if Maze was right, he hadn’t meant to put her daughter in danger. Carmen Grant was behind this mess now, no matter how he’d first found out about the wings. She could deal with Amenadiel once she got home.

“Let’s go,” she said, and got out of the car. She could let a little bit of that anger fuel her on now. It would help her with squeezing answers out of Enzo, and she badly wanted answers. To everything.

So of course, Enzo wasn’t there. “He hasn’t shown up for work since Wednesday,” the manager told her, after she showed him her badge and told him Enzo was a person of interest in an investigation. Wednesday—the day she and Maze had gotten to Vegas. “I don’t know where he is.”

“If he does show up here, please let us know.”

“Sure,” the manager said. Something told Chloe he wouldn’t. This place had a feel of people helping each other out; they wouldn’t share with the cops if they didn’t absolutely have to.

“Thanks,” Chloe said anyway, and left with Maze.

They stopped by the car. “You head back,” Maze told her. “I’ll go out on my own. I’ll get farther that way.”

Chloe nodded. “I’ll see if Lucifer recognizes him. Let me know if you find him.”

Chapter Text

They went their separate ways, with Maze turning the corner and disappearing somewhere on her own. Chloe drove to the Bellagio first to get her bag—she couldn’t wait to have her own clean clothes again—and to get a couple of suits from Lucifer’s room, too. There were some at the house, but she didn’t know if they were ones he’d want.

Then she made her way back. Evening was falling by the time she got to the base of the hills, the sky turning a dusky purple behind her. She was hungry; there hadn’t been time to eat this morning, and then she’d been too focused on other things to bother. After two days of hardly eating anything, she was starting to feel sick from it.

She let herself into the house with the suits draped over one arm, wondering what she’d find inside. Had he woken up yet? What was his mood going to be this time? She didn’t have the energy to deal with him trying to get her to go home right now.

But of the two people to greet her, neither was Lucifer. “Hi,” a woman said, getting up from a sitting area to come over to the entryway. “You must be Chloe. My name is Jamie, I work for Lucifer as a kind of property manager for this place.”

“Hi,” Chloe said back. “Maze told me about you. Nice to meet you.”

Jamie took the suits from her. “I’ll take these upstairs. Anything you need, just let me know. There’s food in the kitchen if you’re hungry—Lucifer figured you might be. Baked ziti and salad and fresh bread.”

So he had woken up at some point, and thought of her. Gotten her something he knew she liked to eat. It made her feel…

Well, she didn’t know. Something.

“I see you got clothes, but he had some brought for you too if you need them. They’re in the first room on the right.”

That feeling only increased. “Thanks,” she said. “I’ll change and then eat. Is he, um…”

“He’s upstairs. I think he fell asleep again.”

The nurse, Nathan, nodded from where he was still sitting nearby. “I was going to get him soon. Dr. Orion called to remind you both that she wants to see you for a follow-up.”

Right. One more thing to deal with. “Okay,” she said. “I can drive him there.”

“It doesn’t have to be now. After you eat.”

She nodded, and followed Jamie upstairs with her duffel bag. She set it in the room with the new clothes and took a moment to look through them. A few pairs of pants, shirts, basic underwear, a bra that wasn’t trying to make a statement… there was even a set of pajamas. She swallowed, running her fingers over the silky material. All of them things she’d have chosen for herself.

Maybe he really would stop running this time. Maybe…

She shook her head. She couldn’t let herself start thinking that way again. He just did things like that sometimes—he was still convinced she shouldn’t be around, and they hadn’t talked it out yet. It might end up meaning nothing.

She couldn’t help crossing the hallway to the room Lucifer was occupying. Jamie had been right; he was asleep, still propped against the pillows. Pausing in the doorway, she took a moment to study his injuries. They didn’t seem to have gotten much better, but despite the ugliness of the bruises, his face did look a little rested.

Then she noticed his hand was resting on his lap over the covers, a piece of paper held in his fingers. The note she’d left.

It was harder to convince herself that might mean nothing either.

She took a quick shower, immediately feeling better as the water washed away all the leftover dirt and dried blood worked into her skin and hair. Her own bruises were starkly visible in the mirror as she stepped out and reached for the towel, trailing from her shoulders down along her sides and then skipping along to various spots on her legs. And then there was her face…

She sighed. She’d have to explain it to Dan and Trixie, and she wasn’t looking forward to it. If she could go a full month this time without working her body over again, that would be great.

She changed into some of the clothes Lucifer had gotten her, determinedly not thinking about that choice, and then went downstairs to eat. The food had been left to keep warm in the oven, enough for several people to share, even though Jamie and Nathan told her they’d eaten before she got back. She put some on a plate and ate half of it in only a couple of minutes. It was delicious—not that she’d expected anything less—but she was too hungry to savor it.

When her stomach stopped complaining quite so much, she pulled out her phone to call Dan.

“Chloe. Finally. What’s going on? I was about to call the LVMPD myself this afternoon.”

“Long story,” she said. “Lucifer was kidnapped, and, uh. They took me yesterday too. I’m fine,” she said, when Dan started exclaiming about it. “I’m sitting in his house right now eating dinner.”

“Who kidnapped you?” Dan demanded. “What did they want with Lucifer?”

“It was someone who believes Lucifer really is the devil. They thought they’d be rewarded for it, by getting something from him directly or by turning him over to angels or something.”

“Are you kidding me?” Dan said. Chloe could picture him running a hand over his face in exasperation. “That’s nuts.”

“You’re telling me,” Chloe said. That statement applied whether she knew the truth or not. “Anyway, there’s something I need to wrap up here because of it, and Lucifer was hurt pretty badly. I won’t be back for another couple days at least.”

“Don’t worry about it. What about you? Are you hurt too?”

“A little. It looks worse than it is.”

“That does not sound reassuring.”

“I’ll be fine. Really. Is Trixie there?”

“Yeah. One second.” There were muffled noises for a moment, and then Trixie’s voice came on the line.

“Hi, Mom,” she said.

Chloe closed her eyes. Even just that was enough to make her feel better, a part of her she hadn’t even realized was coiled deep inside loosening a little. “Hey, monkey. How are you?”

“I’m okay. Did you find Lucifer?”

“Dad told you, huh?”

“He said Lucifer was having a hard time and you needed to go find him.”

Well, that was better than outright saying Lucifer was missing. “Yeah, he is having a hard time right now. But we’re working it out.”

“When are you coming home?”

“In a few days. Listen, Trixie… we had to deal with some bad guys here, too. I got a little banged up, but I’m okay. I just don’t want you to be scared when you see me.”

“What happened?” she asked, her voice suddenly so much smaller. Trixie had clung to her when she’d been in the hospital, and it had only just started to get better when she’d left for Vegas. “Are you really okay, or are you just saying that?”

“I’m really okay. Promise. It’s not like before. I’m fine, I just don’t look that way.”

“Okay,” Trixie said, but not like she fully believed it.

“Did you eat dinner yet? How was school today?”

They talked for a few minutes about the last few days she’d had at school, the conversation so normal when everything around her was anything but. Chloe ate another plate of pasta while Trixie talked, sounding more and more like her usual self as she went. By the time they hung up, she didn’t seem so worried anymore.

“Remember you have soccer practice tomorrow,” Chloe said. “Tell Dad in case he forgets. I love you, Trixie. I’ll see you soon.”

“Love you too, Mommy.”

The call ended. Chloe looked at her background picture for a moment, one of Trixie making a funny face with paint streaked across her cheeks, and let out a long breath. Things would be okay. They would.

“Lucifer.”

The voice floated through to him like it had so many times before. Calling to him through the darkness.

He knew by now that it wasn’t real, but it always made a pang of longing run through him, and that was very real. He wanted so desperately for her to come for him, even though she never would.

“Lucifer,” Chloe said again. A nudge on his arm had him opening his eyes. There she was, looking at him with a concern he craved but didn’t deserve. “Hey.”

“Here again,” he murmured. “I wish you were really here… wish we could really go home…”

“What?” she said, brows creasing together. “I am here, Lucifer. You’re at your house.”

As she spoke, the last of the haze of sleep faded away. This wasn’t a dream; Chloe was here, her face very real and marked from their ordeal, sitting on the bed next to him in a darkened room. She actually had come for him; they’d gotten out together. She’d seen his devil face, but she was still here touching him like she didn’t care. Her fingers were still on his arm from trying to wake him up.

“Detective,” he said. She let go of his arm, but not in disgust. Just from sitting back as he focused on her properly. “Are you okay?”

He’d fallen asleep holding the note she’d left him about going after Carmen. When he’d first woken up earlier, his eyes had immediately gone to the other side of the bed, his heart sinking as he saw she was gone. Of course she was gone. It was only right.

But then he’d seen the note, and worry had replaced the disappointment. He knew it would be different this time—Maze was already there, and he was sure the police would follow—but he didn’t like the thought of her getting into it with those men again. Apparently she’d anticipated how he’d immediately wanted to go after her, because she’d explicitly told him not to follow.

So he’d listened, no matter how much it ate at him. He would’ve been useless anyway. He hated how weak he was, how it was hard even to just go to the bathroom. He was the reason she was in this mess, and he couldn’t even watch her back as she finished cleaning it up.

It was only the fact that Lexi, his current police escort, had come up soon after to tell him they’d succeeded that had eased the tightness in his chest. Lexi had let him know Carmen and Nick were being processed and that Chloe was fine, and so Lucifer had told her she could go. There was no need for her to stick around anymore. He’d only tolerated it for Chloe’s sake.

He’d used Nathan’s phone to call Jamie to let her know they were at the house and to have food and clothes brought over, since Chloe had nothing here. The least he could do was make sure there was someone to take care of her, too.

And then he’d had to just sit there, and wait, and think about what she’d done for him. Wonder what would happen when she returned. Dread the moment when he told her why he’d left.

He hadn’t meant to fall asleep again. And now Chloe was here, wearing some of those new clothes, damp strands of her hair falling over her shoulders. He truly was useless if he hadn’t woken up when she’d left this morning, or when she’d come back tonight.

“I’m fine,” she said. “They didn’t have a chance to hurt us. Everyone involved in kidnapping you is either dead or in custody. There’s just one last loose thread—Maze is out tracking him down.”

“What thread?” he asked.

Chloe got out her phone and tapped at it for a moment. Then she held it up so he could see the picture on it. Some blond guy with a tattoo on his neck. “Do you know who this is?”

“No. Should I?”

“I don’t know,” Chloe said, putting the phone away. “His name is Enzo Beck. Does that sound familiar?”

Lucifer shook his head.

“He’s the reason we found you. He handed me a note outside the precinct with an address on it, for an apartment those guys must have been using as a base closer to you. I found pictures they’d taken of you in LA, and your phone was there too. Oh, that reminds me.” She reached behind her for something on the bed and handed over his own phone. “Here. I have your keys, too.”

“Thanks,” he said, setting aside the note so he could take it. The last time he’d looked at his phone, he’d been rereading her texts to him, and now… “They had pictures of me?”

“Yeah. One with me in it, too. They must’ve been watching you for a while.”

He swallowed back the urge to apologize again. “Makes sense. He couldn’t have done all this just since I got here, especially since I didn’t know I was coming here until…” He looked away, wishing he hadn’t said that.

Chloe didn’t give any sign it bothered her. “Yeah. But we can’t figure out how this person knew about it. He’s lived in Vegas for a while now, and when they brought me in, those other guys were surprised I’d found the apartment. They didn’t know who he was.”

Lucifer remembered them mentioning a safe house and interrogating Chloe about it. It hadn’t meant anything to him at the time, and neither the picture or the name were ringing any bells. “I have no idea,” he said. “If that person knows me, I don’t know him. It wasn’t like I was talking to anyone about people wanting to kidnap me. I don’t know anything about an apartment, either.”

She let out a little exhale in frustration. “I just want to know if there’s anything else we should worry about.”

There was something that didn’t add up; of course she was frustrated. She wanted answers like she always did.

It was something he’d always found endearing about her. Seeing it from her again now, like this was just any other case she was discussing with her partner… it sent another pang through him.

“So you’re okay with Maze,” he said.

She nodded.

He didn’t ask if she was okay with him. He knew the answer was no—there was still an underlying tension of so much left unsaid between them. But he couldn’t help asking, “It really doesn’t bother you that I’m the devil?”

She pressed her lips together, looking at him for a moment. As he had before, he suddenly felt laid bare, exposed. There was no hiding anything about himself now. She knew who he was; he could only wait for her judgment.

“I’m still not scared of you, if that’s what you’re getting at. It’s not like I found out you’re a whole different person. It’s just more like…” She trailed off, as if searching for the words. “Like I’m just finding out why you’re the person I know. What you’ve been through. But we still need to talk about things, because this… it’s not an excuse, either.”

He didn’t know what to make of that answer. It just left him even more confused. She didn’t have a problem with finding out he was the devil, but she wasn’t saying it didn’t matter. Just that it changed her understanding of him. Maybe it wasn’t just that she had no choice but to be okay with him, then, if she was still reserved about it, if not in the way he’d come to expect.

But he still couldn’t trust that she felt that way entirely on her own. It was too easy. Too simple, even though nothing about this was simple.

“It’ll have to be later, though, because we have to go back to the hospital,” Chloe said, as if drawing herself together. “This deal only happened because I agreed to a follow-up. Please don’t make me fight you on this. You might not care, but I do. And please don’t make me fight you on that, either.”

He had no desire to fight her on either count. Not anymore. He still didn’t understand why he was always vulnerable now, but he couldn’t deny that he wasn’t healing the way he should have, and he didn’t want to make it harder for her. Needing to go to the hospital yet again was ridiculous, but he was already at such a low point, he might as well add to it. “I won’t,” he said.

She nodded, relieved. “Did you eat?” she asked. “There’s still plenty of food left…”

“Yes,” he said. He’d picked through some of it, eating only as much as he had to, because he had no appetite. “Did you? I’ll have something else delivered if you didn’t like it…”

“Of course I liked it,” she said quietly. “I… thank you. For getting it.” Then she went to get Nathan to help, before he could figure out why she was acting that way about something so simple as dinner.

Nathan took that bloody IV out—he dearly hoped he was done with it—and stood nearby as Lucifer got out of bed and went to the closet. His ribs hurt with every little movement, but after nearly a full day of rest, he was able to walk on his own without feeling like he might fall. He could deal with the pain. It didn’t matter.

He had a few spare suits here, but he was surprised to see ones that he’d left at the Bellagio, too. He hadn’t told Jamie where to get them.

He thought of Chloe tracing his stay in Vegas to the hotel. Going back there today to get these for him. Something so minor it shouldn’t have ever crossed her mind, not with everything she was dealing with, but it had.

He didn’t like how it made him feel. He just took one and got dressed, wishing the pain would distract him, but it didn’t. All he could think about was Chloe helping him into that plain cotton shirt at the hospital.

He managed to get downstairs and out to Chloe’s car, with her hovering nearby but not touching him. Somehow he hadn’t really thought about actually getting to the hospital, but the next thing he knew, Chloe was driving them there. Just the two of them.

Suddenly it didn’t feel quite real. That she was driving them to the hospital, in Vegas, after getting kidnapped trying to rescue him when she’d been angry with him. She knew he was the devil, she was still upset with him, and yet.

Nothing about this was the way things were supposed to be. He knew it had to be because of the miracle, but it didn’t make a difference. That odd feeling wouldn’t go away.

“What?” Chloe said.

It startled him out of his thoughts. “What?”

“You keep looking over at me.”

He guessed he was. “Just hard to believe you’re here.”

“Because of the devil thing again? Or why I’m in Vegas at all?”

“The latter,” he said. “I know you were angry with me.”

She sighed. “Just because you’re mad at someone you—” She broke off, glancing at him, and then looked determinedly out the windshield again. “I couldn’t have not come when I found out you were missing. I was pissed off, yeah, and hearing about you getting married didn’t help. But that doesn’t mean I wanted you to get hurt. If you were in trouble, I had to do something about it. And maybe I wanted to tell you to your face that I was done, too.”

It didn’t explain why she was still here, but Lucifer didn’t want to ask. It would only get his hopes up when he knew she would be done with him again later. He’d fooled himself into thinking they could still be work partners, if nothing else, but that would end when she learned the full truth.

It would be for the best, even though it didn’t feel that way.

They didn’t talk again until they got to the hospital a little while later. Chloe parked, but just as she was about to get out, he said, “I’m sorry.”

She paused, turning to look at him. She didn’t say anything. Just waited.

“I’m sorry for disappearing without a word,” he said. “I should have at least told you I was leaving. I was a coward. And I’m sorry that you had to come here to look for me.”

Her mouth tightened for a second before she said, “I told you it’s not your fault.”

“I mean that it wouldn’t have needed to happen if I hadn’t run here like that. I should have talked to you instead.”

She searched his gaze for a moment. “Whatever it is you haven’t told me yet, it really hurt you, didn’t it?”

“Yes,” he said. “And after you almost died…” He didn’t know how to finish. It was still hard to think about now. She’d come so close to not being able to sit here next to him, her life nearly stolen before he or his family could ruin it. He’d had to stand by while that poison broke her down bit by bit, unable to do a single damn thing, trying and failing to find the answer. And then he’d almost screwed up the one chance he’d had to fix it.

Those trips to the hospital were very different from the ones here. It wasn’t even a question which he preferred.

Her eyes stayed on his, so clear and bright and alive, and then her expression closed off a little. She looked away, gazing out the windshield once more. “I thought it wasn’t that big a deal to you,” she said. “Since you just left right after.”

Something in him twisted at that. He’d wanted her to think they weren’t that close, but to think he didn’t care if she lived or died… “I don’t know what I would have done with myself if we hadn’t been able to get the antidote,” he said. “When I saw you with that nosebleed, it was like everything stopped. Like the entire world was ending. Nothing else mattered.”

Her jaw worked for a second. “I saw the pictures,” she said, her voice almost a whisper. “With Candy. Before I talked to her, I thought… I thought you were happy.”

He let out a kind of hollow laugh. Of course she’d seen those pictures. He never should have taken them. “I wasn’t happy. I was a wreck. The reason why I never answered you to even tell you I was okay was because I wasn’t okay. I couldn’t lie, and I couldn’t tell you the truth.”

She looked at him again, her eyes even brighter than before. “Why did you even stay until I woke up?” she asked. “Why let me think things between us were fine?”

“I wanted to see you awake for myself,” he said quietly. “So I’d know I could leave. And I couldn’t… I couldn’t bring myself to wipe that smile from your face. Not when you were only just starting to recover.”

She swallowed. “Were you planning to leave the entire time?” she asked. “Even before you found me that night?”

He shook his head. “No. I didn’t realize I needed to leave until I was sitting there waiting for you to wake up. Or I thought I needed to, anyway.”

Chloe let out a long breath, turning away from him again. “We should go in,” she said. “Get this over with.”

But she didn’t get out right away. He studied her for another long moment, feeling like something important had just happened, but not quite knowing what. Or whether or not he’d said the wrong things again. “Okay,” he said at last. “Let’s go.”

Chloe turned that conversation over in her mind as they walked into the hospital and let the front desk know they were there to see Dr. Orion. Before coming to Vegas, she’d managed to convince herself that her almost dying hadn’t affected him that much. Now she knew it had.

She had her answer on one of the questions she’d asked herself the most: when he’d decided to leave. And it hadn’t been right from the start. Getting poisoned hadn’t been an inconvenience to him. Thinking back over his reaction when he’d burst into her bedroom…

Maybe he’d just found out about whatever it was that’d made him so upset. He’d realized she was in trouble and had pushed it all aside to save her, staying longer than he had to in order to make sure she was okay. Wasn’t that more or less what’d happened with her on this trip?

Maybe she really did matter to the devil that much. He’d run because he cared too deeply.

Leon’s words came back to her. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the devil is in love with you.

Was he?

What was she supposed to do with that if he was?

It wasn’t like he’d ever tell her that. If it was true, he probably didn’t even realize it himself. She didn’t think he’d ever loved someone like that before, and she was even more sure he’d never been loved like that before.

That thought drew her up short. Did she love him?

She shook her head at herself as a nurse led them to a room similar to the one they’d had before. It didn’t matter, really. They were in too much of a mess for declarations of love to mean a thing. If they somehow managed to sort through it, then she could figure it out later.

And if her feelings really were being controlled somehow, like he kept saying… then that would only make things a thousand times more complicated.

“Dr. Orion will be in in a few minutes,” the nurse said. “She’s just wrapping something up now.”

They were left alone. Lucifer sat on the edge of the bed, trying to hide how much it hurt to move and not succeeding only because she knew him so well. “What does she even expect?” he muttered. “Vulnerable or not, I’ll be fine eventually.”

Chloe took a chair along the wall, more or less facing him. “Why are you so adamant about not needing treatment?” she asked. “You’ve been treated before. With the burn, and… you know. When I shot you.” She winced, still feeling bad about it even now. But she guessed she really had glimpsed that devil face back then, and he had goaded her into it.

Which just raised the question of why once again. Why had he thought he wouldn’t get hurt? Why was he so hurt now?

Lucifer grimaced. It took him a moment to answer. “That was different,” he said. “It’s not supposed to be like this. I’m not supposed to need all…” He waved his hand a little. “All this fuss. It’s not just a burn—I don’t just need to bandage a wound for a little while until it heals the next day. I’m not bleeding. I’m just—weak.”

He wasn’t used to feeling this way. He really did expect to just walk away from anything and be fine soon. Getting hurt those times had been a minor inconvenience to him, nothing more, and he was always the strongest person in the room. Had he always just taken punches and shrugged it off? Had he ever even been allowed to be weak? Told it was okay instead of needing to be fine? “I don’t get it,” she said. “If being the devil means you heal fast—at least I think that’s what you and Maze have been saying—then why is this time different?”

“I don’t know.” He let out a breath, gaze flicking between hers. “It’s not exactly that I heal fast, not the way you’re thinking. Humans aren’t supposed to be able to hurt me at all unless they get their hands on a special weapon.”

She frowned. That would make sense to her, except she’d seen humans hurt him plenty of times in the most ordinary of ways. “Then why…?”

“It’s different with me,” he said. “Or more accurately, it’s different with you. For some reason I’m vulnerable around you. I can get hurt when I’m near you, and then when you’re gone, I heal fairly quickly.”

Chloe just stared at him. “What?” she said blankly. “That… I…”

He gave her a faint smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes. “That night at your mother’s house… it was more true than you knew.”

When she’d told him she could be vulnerable around him, and he’d said she made him vulnerable, too. He’d acted so oddly after, and she’d thought it was just the first instance of him freaking out over getting close to her, but… “That’s why you kept putting as much distance between us as you could?”

“Yes. I’d just realized what had changed. I really didn’t think you’d hurt me when you shot me, and then I thought I was just always vulnerable. But I wasn’t. Not the way I am now, apparently.”

He’d realized he could only get hurt around her, and then he’d of course kept his distance, but not for long. When the fiasco with Malcolm had happened, he’d gone right back to being around her like nothing was wrong. “So why stay partners at all?” she asked faintly. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. How could she make it possible for people to hurt him? “Why…”

He shrugged. “I wanted to.”

Just like that. He wanted to.

“But how is that even possible? I’m not doing anything.”

“I don’t know that, either,” he said. “A week ago I’d have said I knew, but now… it doesn’t seem to fit. Not with how I’m always vulnerable anymore. It only started after I got married to Candy, when you were nowhere near me. So… I don’t know how it works.”

Chloe studied his bruises all over again. The stiff way he held himself, the result of those broken ribs. It really wasn’t supposed to be like this for him. No wonder he kept resisting treatment—he didn’t want to accept that he was as weak as any human.

Except he wasn’t, was he? Even injured, he’d kept going longer than anybody else would have, and he’d been on his way to ripping a pole out of the floor with his hands bound.

“Being physically weak doesn’t mean you’re weak,” she told him. “You were beaten and drugged for four days. It doesn’t matter if you’re the devil or not—it’s okay to need to rest. To be taken care of.”

His jaw tightened as he looked away. He didn’t reply.

Dr. Orion opened the door a minute later, which was good, because Chloe needed the distraction. She still couldn’t wrap her mind around the fact that he’d been getting hurt because of her—somehow—and that he’d ended up deciding it simply didn’t matter.

The fact that she’d been making him vulnerable just made her worried that Lucifer was right, and maybe her feelings weren’t entirely her own. There was still so much she didn’t know.

“Hi,” Dr. Orion said. “How are things going?”

“Okay,” Chloe told her, when Lucifer didn’t say anything. “As okay as they can be.”

“Good.” She glanced between them. “Do you still want to be seen together?”

Lucifer merely looked at her. Letting her decide once again.

“Yes,” Chloe said. “That’s fine.”

Chapter Text

Round two went better than the first. Lucifer was awake this time, and Chloe didn’t feel like she was about to pass out while everything about her world was shifting alignment. Things weren’t exactly okay between them, but they weren’t rife with tension, either. And something about Lucifer being there with her like this held any unpleasant reminders of when she’d been poisoned at bay, even though they’d just been talking about it in the car.

Dr. Orion evaluated her concussion first—it was improving, if not fully gone yet—then looked at her knee, and said she was good to go. Lucifer took longer. She had him take off his shirt, then checked the graze from the bullet wound and assessed the bruising and various cuts. He just sat there and let her do it, occasionally glancing over at Chloe before looking away again.

When she was satisfied that his own concussion was healing too, she said, “I want to do another CT scan. Just to make sure.”

“Is that really—” Lucifer started to say, then stopped with another glance at Chloe. He sighed. “Fine. And then that’s it?”

“Yes, as long as there’s nothing new to note.”

He went with her without further complaint. Chloe waited there, feeling like she was alone for the first time all day. The sudden lack of activity was helping to quiet her thoughts, and so she closed her eyes, sitting with that stillness for a while. There were a lot of things she needed to figure out, but for now she could rest, too.

They came back a little later. “All clear,” Dr. Orion said. “You need to take it easy for a few weeks, but you should be fine. If you develop any new, intense pain, let me or your primary doctor know.”

“Thank you,” Chloe said, knowing he didn’t have one and wouldn’t agree to it anyway. They would deal with that later, if it came to it.

Lucifer relaxed a little as soon as they stepped outside. When they were on the way back to the house, she asked, “Did they feed you at all?”

“No,” he said. “The only thing they gave me were those damn sedatives.”

She’d started to realize while they were there, that he was even thinner than usual. Not by much, but it still showed.

She parked in the driveway and said, “I don’t want to put it off until tomorrow.” She had to know.

He didn’t have to ask what she meant. Something in his eyes shuttered, his expression hardening just enough for her to notice. But all he said was, “Okay.”

They went inside. Lucifer sat on a chair in the sitting area—calling it a living room seemed a bit of a stretch, since nothing about this place felt homey—but she went into the kitchen first and got out some of the leftovers. Jamie and Nathan were gone; it was just them for the night.

Lucifer looked surprised when she put the plate on the side table next to him. “I—”

“You should eat even if you’re not hungry,” she said. He’d eaten before she had, around five, and it was just after nine in the evening now. She didn’t trust him to eat again before tomorrow, especially not if they were going to get into it tonight. Undoubtedly there was liquor stocked up here somewhere, and that was all he’d go for if things really did get ugly between them. She was just surprised he hadn’t already.

“Thank you,” he said carefully, and picked up the fork.

He kept doing things because she asked him to. Letting her lead, trying not to shut her out the way he obviously kept thinking of doing. Talking to her even though he kept bracing himself for the worst.

As much as she appreciated it, it didn’t feel right. It wasn’t him. It wasn’t them. They didn’t constantly dance around each other like this.

She just wanted to get this conversation over with. Put it all out there so they could figure out what to do. Because going on like this was going to drive her insane.

Chloe took a seat on the couch, looking around while he ate a little. The entire house was on the sparse side, but what was there looked tasteful and expensive. The walls were a warm tan that made the space feel light even when it was dark out, and just like in the penthouse, there were windows everywhere. The couch she was sitting on was a dark brown leather, matching the chairs and tables. A few pieces of artwork were the only real decorations. It wasn’t personalized. “How long have you had this place?” she asked.

“A year or so after I came to LA. Usually I just stayed at the resorts, but I figured I might as well have something else too.”

Right. Sure. Just buy a spacious house in Vegas for the hell of it. She had a hundred more questions about what he’d done in the past and what other properties he owned and if he’d gotten all that wealth from existing since the literal dawn of time, but that would have to wait until later. Instead she asked, “Why stay at the Bellagio this time, then?”

He pushed some of the pasta around, as if considering how to answer. “I wanted the distraction,” he said. “I didn’t want to think about what I was running from, and I would have done too much thinking here.”

He set the plate aside. It was only half empty, but she guessed that was on her for asking that question. “Okay,” she said. “Just tell me.”

He didn’t look at her as he slowly said, “That evening, with the nosebleed… I’d just found out that Amenadiel had been on Earth once to pass on a blessing. To your mother. Not long before you were born.”

A blessing. An actual, heavenly blessing. To her mother.

Before Chloe was born.

Lucifer met her stunned gaze as he finished. “You were born as a result of that miracle. It’s why my mojo doesn’t work on you. You were put in my path, and that—that’s how I know your feelings for me aren’t real. They can’t be real. It’s been a manipulation from the start.”

“What?” she said hoarsely. She suddenly felt light-headed, or like this conversation was happening all inside her mind. In all her wonderings over how her feelings might not be real, this had never occurred to her. That God wasn’t just giving her a nudge now, but that her entire existence was handpicked by him personally. That she existed to, what? Fall in love with Lucifer? “I can’t… that can’t be true. I can’t have been born just for you.”

Lucifer looked away again, his jaw clenching. That pain was back on his face, and it told Chloe that there was no catch. This was what had cut him so badly he’d fled. This was why he’d been going to end things with her before they could start. This was why he’d kept pushing her away again and again, why he couldn’t bear to hear her say she cared about him. “It is true. I’m sorry, Detective. I didn’t know—I had no clue, or I would have kept my distance from the start. I didn’t want this.”

“But I—” Her brain was scrambling to make sense of this, to find just one thing that would put a hole in that reasoning. “But how could I have been put in your path from even before I was born? I only just met you a year ago. You were in Los Angeles for years before that.”

“My father would have seen how things would play out, I suppose. I always wondered why he allowed me to resist Amenadiel taking me back to hell for so long, and, well. Here’s the answer. He knew that with you here, we’d meet at some point, and now…”

Her throat closed up. If God could see the future, see how she’d play into it… then… “Now what?” she asked. “Why have us meet? What’s the point?”

He glanced at her. “For things to turn out the way they did. You were designed to care about me, and that’s what happened. And I…” His jaw clenched again. “I fell for it. How could I not? Of course I would end up feeling that way about you, for real. Because I thought it was all real.”

He fell for it. Like her feelings were a trap. Like her wanting to be friends, kissing him on that beach… like it was all some kind of prank, and he’d been gullible enough to think it was real.

It hurt. A lot. Like he was throwing her feelings in her face, even though she knew that wasn’t what he meant.

“Okay, but… how could my feelings not be real? I’m real. A real person. Aren’t I?” She certainly felt real. She’d had a whole life before she’d met Lucifer, one that didn’t involve him in the slightest. She had plenty of other feelings outside of him. She’d been a kid like anyone else, she’d given birth to her own daughter, she was healing from almost getting killed for the second time in a month. How could she not be real?

“Yes,” Lucifer said. “Of course you’re real. Your life is your own, except when it comes to me.”

Chloe dropped her head in her hands, needing a minute. How was she supposed to trust anything about herself now?

It still didn’t even make sense to her. How everything else was her own doing, but not this. Not when it came to the one person she trusted above all others, the one person who saw her and thought the best of her in all the ways that mattered, who was always there when she needed him. Someone so important in her life, and now she was being told she had no choice but to think that way.

“I still don’t get it,” she said. “I still don’t get how that’s forced. How do you design a person to care about someone else?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m the last person who would understand what it takes to make someone care about me. But my father would know. How else do you explain it? All of it?”

As if it was so outlandish for anyone to genuinely care about him. “So you don’t know for sure my feelings are fake. You just know I exist for a reason, and think that that reason must be you.”

“Well, yes. What else would there be? That plan has already played out, and here we are.”

That had to be the flimsiest reasoning in all of history. No one had ever cared about him like that before, and she was born because of a miracle, and his mojo didn’t affect her. One plus one plus one equaled three. Maybe. Because there had to be a hundred other variables at play—they just didn’t know what.

The thing was, though, that those variables meant she couldn’t argue against it, either. How was she supposed to trust that they meant she existed for another reason? It wasn’t like there was anything else extraordinary going on in her life, not compared to everyone else’s. Her partner being the devil—no, possibly falling in love with the devil—that was as extraordinary as it got. Maze, Amenadiel… they wouldn’t have been in her life if not for Lucifer. “Why?” she asked, looking up at him, desperately now. “Why do that? Why make an entire person just to care about you?”

“I don’t know,” Lucifer said. That pain was carved so deeply on his face, it was like there’d never been anything else there. “Just to hurt me. As soon as I learned the truth, there was no way it wasn’t going to hurt me. No matter what I do now… there’s no way for it to be okay, Detective. I can’t stay away, and I can’t be with you, not like that. Even telling you the truth is hurting you, and that’s the last thing I ever want to do.”

“Sure, that’s your takeaway,” she snapped, unable to help herself. She felt like there were a dozen emotions roiling through her, and she couldn’t control a single one of them. “Do you really think the other options don’t hurt me too?”

He opened his mouth. Closed it again. “I didn’t think it would be the same as for me,” he said. “Not until last night.”

She squeezed her eyes shut, forcing herself to take a deep breath. This wasn’t helping anything. “Why do all that just to hurt you? Wasn’t being sent to hell supposed to be the ultimate punishment?”

He let out a low laugh. It was utterly devoid of humor. “You’d think. Perhaps my father knew I would leave hell for good this time and decided to play the long game in punishing me for that transgression.”

“So then what about me? I exist to punish you and who gives a fuck what that does to me, right? What did I do to be punished like that?”

He looked so helpless as he said, “I really don’t know. I’m sorry.”

“It sounds like there’s a lot you don’t know.”

Chloe hated everything about this. No wonder he hadn’t been keen on telling her the truth. This conversation was exactly as awful as he’d feared. He said, “I wish I had the answers, but I don’t. It doesn’t really matter, does it? It doesn’t change anything. Nothing between us could ever be real. That’s why I left. Why I should stay gone. Why you should stay away from me.”

As if telling her she shouldn’t feel this way changed the fact that she did. It hadn’t worked any of the dozen times he’d pushed her away before, and it wasn’t working now. Otherwise she wouldn’t feel so sick from it. “That’s why you married Candy. That’s why you were going to make me think that that was real. So you could end things in a way that made it clear you’d never be interested in me.”

“Yes.”

There were still too many emotions swirling through her. She decided to just go ahead and latch onto the anger, because it seemed easiest. “So you thought we were both being manipulated, and your solution was to manipulate me yourself. Do you know what it was like for Candy to tell me that? Did you think it through for even one second? Did you ever care what it would be like for me, both for you to show up married like that and for me to find out it was a lie? You were the one person, Lucifer—the one person I trusted never to do that kind of thing to me.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. He couldn’t have been conveying his apology any clearer through his body language, but it wasn’t enough. Not in that moment. Saying sorry didn’t change what he’d been about to do. “I thought it was for the best, since you weren’t supposed to know, and I just… I never wanted you to find out about this, Detective. I thought the one thing I could do was spare you the hurt of knowing you’re a pawn.”

She just stared at him in disbelief, until he finally got it.

“Oh,” he said. “I… I didn’t…” The realization that it spared her nothing—that it was just a different form of manipulation—was spread all over his face. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I was just trying to do the best I could.”

“That’s not good enough,” she said. “I had a right to know. You don’t get to decide what’s best for me, I do. You should have told me everything.”

“You didn’t even want to know I’m the devil,” he shot back. Neither one of them could help themselves. Everything was spiraling out of control. “Yes, I screwed up with Candy. But can you really blame me for not wanting to tell you the full truth? You made it clear you didn’t believe me and didn’t want to believe me. And after Linda… I couldn’t take having you look at me that way too. Maybe that makes me a coward. But you didn’t want to cross that line either.”

That anger held on for another moment before it lost its grip. She couldn’t deny he was right about that. She had refused to believe him. She’d refused to test his blood. She’d thought she was showing Lucifer she didn’t care about his past, that he could tell her on his own terms, but of course, she’d been so sure he was human. From his perspective, she’d been rejecting that part of him. “Linda?”

“I showed her my devil face a few months ago,” he said warily. “She was terrified for weeks before Maze got through to her. I thought I’d broken her for good.”

His therapist had been horrified. Someone else he’d trusted to know him and not balk.

Okay, so… maybe she could understand why he’d be so reluctant to show her, too. Especially with watching her nearly die from poison right when he’d learned her feelings weren’t real, just after she’d wanted their relationship to move in a new direction. It’d been one whirlwind after another, and seeing her run from him…

The tension between them deflated. “You still should have told me,” she said, but without any bite to it. She suddenly felt mored tired than anything. “Even before that night.”

Lucifer said simply, “I know.”

Chloe let out a long breath, raking her hands through her hair. “This is such a mess.”

He laughed again, but at least it wasn’t completely dead and bitter this time. Only a little. “That it is.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes while Chloe tried to sort through it all. The idea that God had personally put her on Earth to fall in love with—to care about Lucifer was even harder to accept than Lucifer being the devil. Did she really only exist for him? And for what? To play some petty, convoluted game with someone who’d already been punished enough? “How do you know about the… the miracle?” she asked. The word sounded ridiculous coming out of her mouth.

“Amenadiel met your mum after the trial, and he recognized her. Maze and my mother went to the bar where he was talking to her during that visit to Earth, and there was a picture of the two of them. They showed me.”

That was pretty solid evidence, if only for Amenadiel passing on a blessing to her mom, but… “Doesn’t Amenadiel know what it did? Why he did it?”

“No. He was just the means my father used. A courier, of sorts.”

So they really didn’t know anything about the why or how. “Trixie?” she asked.

“What about her?”

“How does she factor into this? Is she special, too?”

Lucifer shook his head. “I don’t know that, either.”

Chloe thought of Dan. Being married to someone else hardly seemed fitting if the goal was for her to end up with Lucifer, especially not when they’d had a child together. She’d almost gotten back together with Dan, too, after she’d met Lucifer. It’d been his own actions that ended that. So was Dan manipulated, too? How far was this supposed to go?

And the whole thing just seemed absurd. Sending Lucifer to hell was a very different kind of punishment than making him feel loved and letting him know it wasn’t real. Both cruel, but… one of them was far messier than the other. “You were going to come back, though,” she said. “You married Candy to end our relationship, but you could have just told me you were done if you didn’t want to see me anymore. How is being work partners, or whatever you were thinking, any different?”

He frowned. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“If I have no choice but to care about you, how is it okay to be partners? Why is it just… other things that are too much?”

“I just… I figured that way, it wouldn’t be going too far. Working together is one thing. Sleeping together is another. I’d never force someone into that, and this is too close to doing so. If we only saw each other through cases, at least you’d get a use out of it. It wouldn’t just be me taking from you.”

She thought that over. How he really thought that she wouldn’t get anything out of being in a relationship with him on its own. He thought the only way he could see her at all was to be useful.

If it was a given that she couldn’t help caring about him, it might make sense. But if they were just assuming that part, and he thought that no one would ever want to be with him for him…

“I should have cut ties completely, but I couldn’t,” he went on. “Turns out I’m not strong enough for that. So if you want me out of your life, you’re going to have to make that call. I’ll listen.”

Out of her life. For good.

She’d been so ready to tell him to do exactly that, but that was before everything had changed. The truth was, she didn’t want him out of her life. She’d only been telling herself that because of how hurt she’d been. And now she could understand exactly why he’d done the things he had, and it wasn’t from Lucifer just being callous in the slightest. She’d been at the center of all his thoughts.

She didn’t want to go back to how things were before they’d met. Those first cases together hadn’t been the smoothest, but they’d found their footing. He’d gone from being a pain in the ass to her only real friend, and… and…

“Wait,” she said. “Do you think you had no choice but to care about me too?”

“No. I’m not the one put in your path.”

Didn’t the things they’d gone through together count for something? She hadn’t just met some asshole club owner and decided she was fine with putting up with that kind of crap. He’d stopped acting like that on his own, and she’d had plenty of reasons to be able to trust him. He’d been a friend to her as much as she was to him.

She could give a hundred concrete reasons why she cared about him, and it was solidly because of who he was. The things he’d done. How was she supposed to believe God made her feel that way, when she never would have kissed him if he hadn’t done all the right things? She hadn’t even wanted to be friends with him at first. And she’d had clear reasons for that, too.

Was that supposed to be part of it? She made him want to be different? So that she, in turn, would feel differently about him?

That was just too complicated to make sense to her. She couldn’t accept it.

And even if that was the case, what about it made their relationship fake? If they affected each other, if they only grew to care for one another because of the things they’d gone through, how was it any less real than any other relationship? How was it any different from two people randomly bumping into each other on the street and realizing they fit well together?

All they knew for sure was that she’d been born for a reason, and that most likely, God had seen her meeting Lucifer. The rest was only speculation, and the more she thought about it, the less she was buying it. “So I’m supposed to be the only person on Earth who doesn’t completely have free will?” she said. “This is ridiculous. It just can’t be true.”

“You tell me how else you’re the only one who’s immune to my mojo,” he said. “Why do that, specifically? You’re the only one who sees me as being that good. No one else could possibly care about me so much they’d come chasing after me when they were furious at me. No one else would be this okay at finding out their partner is the devil.”

“You think I’m being manipulated even now.”

“Yes.”

Silence rang out as they stared each other down, tension building between them once again. He really thought she was only sitting here across from him because she’d had no choice but to care about him so much that she’d go crawling after him no matter what he did to her. Whether it was true or not, she’d been right in thinking he couldn’t believe anyone would possibly love him on their own. The devil had never known unconditional love; it was a foreign concept to him.

And she didn’t think it was true. She didn’t think she was only here because she had no choice. There was too much about it that didn’t make sense. “You just told me Linda came around,” she said quietly. “Maze is here, and she’s not exactly happy with you either. Even Dan wanted me to come find you.”

Lucifer looked startled at that, but she kept going. “That’s how people work, Lucifer. They care even when someone screws up. I came to Vegas, but I was absolutely going to walk away as soon as I found you. You saw me leaving that hospital room yesterday—I only stayed because you gave me a reason to.” She stood up. “You even just now told me that you leaving would have to be my choice. So obviously I do make my own choices when it comes to you. I don’t know what this means for me, but I refuse to accept that I only care about you because I have to. I’ve been making that choice over and over again for a while now. So it’s up to you if you can accept that or not.”

She went to the kitchen, needing a break. It was too much. She opened a window next to the table for the fresh air, taking a second to breathe in and let the breeze wash over her face. It cooled down some of the heat she hadn’t even realized was building in her cheeks, all that anger and frustration surfacing with nowhere to go.

Then she started sorting through the cabinets, looking for the booze she was sure he had somewhere. She wasn’t disappointed—there was an entire walk-in pantry full of it. She grabbed the first bottle of wine she saw, found a wine opener in a drawer, and sat at the table. As soon as she had it opened, she took a swig without bothering to get a glass.

For a minute she just drank while trying to focus on the view of the Nevada landscape she knew was on the other side of the window, but there was too much light in the kitchen and too little of it outside. Her eyes just caught on her own reflection instead. She looked nearly as much of a mess as she felt inside.

She couldn’t handle Lucifer’s theory being true. She just couldn’t. Even if she was born because of a miracle, she could exist for any number of reasons. Being here for Lucifer was only one possibility, and it didn’t even make that much sense. For all they knew, it could be for something that hadn’t happened yet.

She needed to believe she was her own person. Needed to believe Trixie wasn’t collateral damage, or whatever that would make her daughter. Too many things would’ve needed to be by design for this to be true, including her Dad’s death and Dan getting involved with Malcolm in order for them to break up, and she couldn’t take that being the case.

All the moments she’d shared with Lucifer that led to her wanting a relationship, they’d still happened, because of the two of them. Each one reaching for the other, over and over again. And it hadn’t been perfect—far from it. They’d had so many missteps, and yet there was always a reason they came back to each other. God possibly wanting her there didn’t make those moments any less real. It just meant that God was a raging dick, if the goal was to hurt Lucifer by making him think they weren’t real.

It still means you might have been born to care about him.

Did that make it wrong to want to be around him anyway?

She didn’t know. She just knew that she still did. Not the same way as what things had been headed towards—she was still too hurt by what he’d done—but she didn’t want to shove him away like he kept trying to do to her. She wanted to at least try to move past everything to do with Vegas and learn what being partners with the devil really meant.

If the goal had been to hurt Lucifer, then the plan ended here, with Lucifer good and hurt because of it. They got to choose what to make of it now. And since deciding to ignore this revelation seemed to go against any plan to hurt him, it sounded like a good idea to just go ahead and do that.

It was the only way she could move forward, really. Whether they did so or not was up to Lucifer.

When she’d finished cooling down and the thought of talking to him again didn’t seem overwhelming, she closed the window and took the bottle with her back to the living room. She hadn’t had enough to drink to really make a difference, but just having it in her hand made her feel a little better.

Lucifer was still sitting in the same spot, gazing at nothing, that same look of hurt suffusing every line of his face. He glanced over at her as she walked in, then looked her up and down, as if trying to gauge her mood. “I’m going to bed,” she said, hoping her voice sounded calm more than anything. She didn’t want to fight, and she didn’t want to make him think she couldn’t stand him. But she’d had enough for one night, and the lack of sleep with all the events of the last two days was starting to hit her again.

She paused by the chair he was occupying and held out the bottle. “Want some?” she asked lightly. “Or anything else in your liquor closet?”

Incredibly, the corner of his lips twitched up in a ghost of a smile. Just for a split second, but it was there. “If you’re sharing,” he said, and took the bottle. He stood, moving in that stiff way he always did now. “I’ll go up with you. If… if that’s okay.”

“I—”

Before she could tell him to stop saying things like that, her phone rang. She pulled it out from her pocket and looked at the screen, expecting it to be Maze, but it was an unknown number. Frowning, she answered it. “Decker.”

“Heard you’re looking for me.”

Her mind instantly conjured up the image of Enzo Beck. She’d barely heard him speak, but the voice seemed to match, and who else would be saying that to her? “Yeah,” she said carefully. “I have a few questions. I just want information.”

Lucifer had been taking a swig from the bottle, but something in her voice got his attention. He frowned, all that heaviness in his expression lifting a little as a familiar focus took its place.

“Then meet me at the Mirage tomorrow night. And call off your hound.”

The line went dead. “Wait!” Chloe said anyway, but of course, it was useless.

“What was that about?”

“The guy who tipped me off just called. He wants me to meet him at some placed called the Mirage?” She didn’t know where that was.

“It’s a high-end casino on the Strip,” Lucifer said. “Why there? I thought this guy was a lowlife.”

“No idea,” she said.

“It could be a trap…”

“Well, I guess we’ll find out tomorrow, then.” She didn’t think it likely, though. Enzo had helped her before, and he had to know she’d have people waiting if things went wrong. The location was also completely wrong for that kind of thing.

Lucifer started making his way up the stairs, while Chloe followed along and called Maze to tell her she could stop searching.

“Fine,” Maze said, annoyed. “At least one of us should be enjoying a night out. See you tomorrow.”

“Have fun.”

She headed into the room she was starting to think of as hers, even though she’d so far only used it to change. She ran her fingers over the silky blue pajamas Lucifer had gotten for her, eyeing her usual purple ones peeking out of the duffel. Why did everything have to be this complicated between them? The fact that he was the devil should’ve been the biggest hurdle in their way. And right now it felt like a footnote.

She sighed and put on the blue ones. Then she went to the bathroom in the hallway to brush her teeth.

Back in the hallway, she stopped by Lucifer’s room and leaned on the doorway. He was just getting into bed, the pillows still arranged so he could sleep upright. He glanced up, his eyes meeting hers.

For a moment they just looked at each other.

“You were really going to tell me we were done, weren’t you?” he asked quietly.

“Yeah,” she said. “Especially after I talked to Candy. I thought there was no way I could ever move past it.”

“So why did you stay?” he asked. “If it wasn’t because you didn’t have a choice? Why give me another chance?”

It came out sounding like a sort of plea. He’d asked similar questions before, but this time, it seemed different.

Why are you willing to forgive me for wanting to deceive you?

“Because I guess the whole you’re-the-devil part being real changed things,” she said. “I figured that if it wasn’t just an excuse to hide behind, then maybe Maze was right and there were other things going on. Things I’d refused to factor in. I wanted to know exactly what none of you would tell me before, and then… and then you asked me to stay.”

He swallowed. “What you said… I want that to be true.” That she didn’t care because she had to.

“Then just believe me. Just let yourself have it, Lucifer. I’m standing right here, knowing the truth, telling you that it’s still real.”

He held her gaze for a long, long moment. And then, voice barely above a whisper, he asked, “Will you stay again?”

She glanced at the rest of the bed next to him in surprise. “Here?”

He nodded.

That was a lot more than she’d been expecting from him, but she could see on his face how desperate he was to give in. And this was as close as they would get right now.

She guessed she wouldn’t be sleeping in that other room just yet. Without another word, she turned off the light in the hallway and got into the bed.

“That promise is still binding,” she said. “Wake me up if you need something.”

“Okay,” he said.

She laid on her back for a while, eyes closed, trying to sleep. But despite how tired she was, her mind wouldn’t stop turning over their conversation again and again. She was all too aware of Lucifer next to her in a way she hadn’t been when she’d passed out the night before.

She didn’t think he was having any more luck than she was. That tension told her he was very much awake.

Even with how sure he’d been that she was being manipulated, that she would want nothing to do with him after he’d told her everything, he’d still asked her to sleep here tonight. She almost couldn’t believe they’d ended up here after everything.

He wasn’t pushing her away anymore. Maybe he wasn’t offering her the world, but that was fine. After weeks of going through pain like that, of thinking he wasn’t actually loved when he felt that way about her… she didn’t expect him to just be okay with it after one conversation.

He really might have been in love with her, if it hurt him that much to be told what they had wasn’t real.

She realized her eyes had opened on their own accord, and that she was staring up at the ceiling without really seeing it. The room was dark, but there was enough light filtering in through the windows to make out basic details.

Without realizing she was going to do so, she said quietly, “Do you really think everything I’ve done, everything I am, is for you?”

She could feel his eyes drift to her, but it took him a moment to respond. “I don’t know,” he said, just as quietly.

“There has to be another reason. There just has to be. Even if there isn’t, it doesn’t mean that those feelings aren’t real. It just means that… that God knew what we’d choose and decided to set things in motion.”

Another long moment where he didn’t reply. “Does that still make it free will?” he asked. “Because that’s still my father deciding which version of the future he wants. I’m beyond grateful that you exist, Chloe, but how is it choosing to be with me if it was never going to be any different for you?”

It was her turn to be quiet for a while. Trying to figure out how to answer. “I was thinking, when I was in the kitchen,” she said, “that once we know what the deal is, the manipulation ends. If I do make my own choices, even when it comes to you, then we both get to choose what to do with this from here on out, whether I was born for that reason or not. So maybe that is why I was born. But it doesn’t mean we didn’t do the work to get here ourselves—both of us—and it doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be my choice to be with you.”

“Would you really be okay with that, though? Being with me when it might be by design?”

She didn’t know. That was the one question she still couldn’t figure out. She might want to stay partners, but even if she wanted a relationship with him, would she ever be able to stop thinking about it? Wondering if that was her literal purpose in life?

But she didn’t know if she’d be okay with permanently shutting that door because of it, either.

“I can’t do it, Detective,” he murmured. “I just can’t.”

It didn’t hurt as much as she might’ve thought, because she was so unsure herself. She needed more than an hour to think about it, and the simple fact was that no matter the answer, she didn’t want to start something with him now. “Then we’ll just have to figure it out later. Maybe we’ll learn the real reason why I was born, and that question becomes pointless.”

“I truly hope so. You have no idea how much I hope that’s the case.”

She let out a long breath. Her, too. “Do you regret it?” she asked. “Meeting me. You never would’ve gone through all this if you hadn’t.”

This time, he answered immediately. “No. I could never regret that.”

She was more relieved than she’d thought she’d be to hear it. No hesitation, no stepping around the answer.

“Do you regret it?” he asked.

Chloe turned on her side to face him. Everything about his expression was open and raw. He was looking down at her, his eyes large and dark, and even in the dim lighting, they shone. Always so bright. “No,” she said truthfully. “You changed my life. Saved it a few times, too. I could never regret it either.”

His throat bobbed. “I really am sorry for not telling you, and for leaving without a word, and for marrying Candy like that. All of it.”

“I know,” she said.

“And thank you. For coming to get me. I…” He swallowed again. “It means a lot to me.”

She reached over and touched his wrist. He looked at her hand, as if he was struggling with something. “I’ll always come for you,” she murmured.

He moved his arm back a bit, so that his hand could slip into hers, and squeezed her fingers. “I’m starting to get that.”

“Took you long enough,” she said, and was rewarded with that little flicker of an almost-smile again. And then the light caught on the tears that fell from his eyes.

She squeezed his hand in return, and then let go, turning onto her back to gaze up at the ceiling once more. She could hear him wiping his cheeks, but she didn’t say anything about it. She just said, “In case it wasn’t clear, I wasn’t plotting against you with those guys. When we had that time alone. I only wanted them to think I was, so I could talk to you.” It’d been bothering her, no matter how much she’d told herself it shouldn’t.

“I don’t think I really believed you would have. I wasn’t at my best.”

She was able to relax that much more to hear it.

There was something about speaking into the dark that made it easier to ask these questions, to confess to truths that were so painful otherwise. There was no anger getting the better of them, no frustration with each of them trying to get the other to see things their way. Just simple, honest answers. While there was weight to it, it wasn’t the kind that suffocated; there were plenty of difficult emotions, but it wasn’t cutting them up. Those feelings could just be. Released into the night.

She felt like she could tell him anything.

“But… did you mean it, when you said you hated me?” he asked. “I can’t tell anymore. And I know what you think now, but I just…”

It took her a moment to remember when she’d said that. She’d been sitting there, with nothing to do but think about their predicament and consider the man drugged into unconsciousness in front of her. There’d been a moment where he’d opened his eyes a fraction, mumbling in whatever haze he was in, telling her to stay away from him. And she hadn’t been able to keep her thoughts to herself.

You’re the most infuriating person I’ve ever met. I kind of hate you right now. And I hate you for that, too.

“You heard that?” she asked.

“Yes. I thought it was a dream at first, but then I realized it didn’t fit. You were always kind to me in those dreams.”

“You dreamed about me?”

He hesitated. “Yes,” he finally said. “You kept coming to get me out. To take me home.”

Now she was the one in danger of crying. Even thinking her feelings weren’t real and that she wouldn’t look for him, he’d kept dreaming she’d do exactly that. And then he’d have woken up alone, thinking all over again that it was never going to happen.

That was what he’d been mumbling when she’d woken him up this afternoon, wasn’t it? He’d thought she was a dream at first.

When she was sure her voice would be steady, she said, “I meant it. But not in the way that’s like… despising someone. It’s the kind of thing you only feel when it’s someone important to you. Because it was obvious you cared about me, but you wouldn’t let me do the same to you.”

“Oh,” he said softly.

They were quiet again for a while. Long enough that she thought he might be falling asleep. But when she turned her head to see him, he still had his eyes open. Gazing at the far wall.

He glanced over at the movement. She said, “I’m sorry for not believing you, when you kept trying to tell me you’re the devil. I didn’t mean to make it seem like I was rejecting you. I was trying to do the opposite.”

He let out a small sigh. “I know, Detective. You made it clear you see me in a better light than that. You just thought you were doing the right thing.”

Like how he’d thought he was doing the right thing in pushing her away. They couldn’t undo it, but they could do better going forward. Now that everything was out in the open.

She said, “I don’t even know if I can claim that title anymore. I knew something was off, but I refused to open that door. I kept ignoring the evidence.”

He shook his head. “It’s one thing to ignore evidence for a case, and another to have a hard time believing reality is different from what you know. I should have given you real proof.”

“But I still had some. I could have tested your blood. I could have insisted you prove it another way. But I stopped questioning.”

“Let’s just chalk that one up to both of us getting things wrong,” he said. “But I still think it was me more than you. You’re still very much the detective.” He said her title the way he always did, like it held more weight than just a usual ordinary word. “Even tonight, when I told you you’re a miracle, you just started trying to prove me wrong. Questioning things more than I did. Insisting that there isn’t enough evidence either way. If… if there is another reason, I’m sure you’ll find it. I wished once that you would. I just never thought you’d want to stick around to find out.”

She just gazed up at him for another moment. Hearing that from him helped, too.

She was suddenly determined to do just that. Figure out another answer. Somehow.

But it wouldn’t happen tonight.

She fully turned onto her side again, to curl up and settle into the pillow this time. Facing him, unlike the night before. “Okay,” she said. “I think I really am going to fall asleep now.”

It had to have been uncomfortable for him to move that way, but he reached over to make sure the covers sat well between them. His hand lingered just a moment too long as he smoothed them out over her. “Good night, Detective,” he murmured.

She closed her eyes, feeling better than she had all day. All week. “Good night, Lucifer.”

Chapter Text

Chloe had lost track of time. She had no idea how long they’d been locked in that basement. A few days? A week? A month? There was no way to tell. There were no windows, and the light never changed, those fluorescents always washing out the room in a sickly white. No one ever showed up anymore. No food, no water. They were forgotten and left to die slowly.

All Chloe could do was sit there, hands bound behind her back, and watch Lucifer fade away in front of her. He wasn’t conscious most of the time. He sat listlessly, the rope the only thing holding him up, his lips growing more and more cracked, his skin pale under the bruises and dried blood. He was going to die, and she was helpless to save him.

She knew she wasn’t doing much better herself. It was hard to focus on him sometimes, and she started having hallucinations. Ones where Lucifer snapped the ropes and stood with blazing white wings stretching from his back, a soft smile on his face. He’d offer a hand to her and help her up, too. Come on, Detective. I’ll fly you out of here.

They were never getting out. They were both going to die there. Maybe Lucifer really would grow wings and fly her to heaven…

“Detective.”

Another hallucination, where she could feel a hand gently stroking her hair back from her face. Her eyes were closed. She wanted to lean in to that touch, didn’t want him to ever stop…

“It’s all right, Detective.”

Her eyes fluttered open to see him crouched in front of her, those wings spread wide. He stroked her hair back again.

“Wake up. It’s just a nightmare.”

She reached for his hand. He must have released the cuffs for her already, because nothing stopped her movement. “Lucifer…”

He stilled. “I’m here.”

She blinked, eyes focusing on him as the dream faded away, reality catching up to her. They weren’t in the basement; Lucifer wasn’t crouching next to her, he was bent over her on the bed. His wings were nothing more than sunlight casting a haze over the room behind him.

But he really had been stroking her hair. She knew, because her hand was still clasping his, pressed against her neck just below her ear.

She let go. “Sorry,” she said, embarrassment flooding her cheeks. He had a look like a deer caught in headlights.

He cleared his throat and straightened. “It’s fine. You just kept making noises like something was wrong, so…”

She sat up, awkwardness suffusing the room. “Sorry,” she said again. “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”

He shook his head. “I was already awake. It’s almost ten.”

That explained the light. She usually didn’t sleep that long, but she’d needed it.

Without looking at her, he asked, “Was it about me?”

“What?” she said, confused now.

“The nightmare.”

She sighed. She knew exactly what he meant. “Yes,” she said. His pressed his lips together, a look of something like guilt crossing his face. “I was watching you slowly die in that basement. Neither of us was getting out.”

His eyes shot to hers, mouth parting.

“Even my subconscious knows what to be afraid of,” she said. “If you could stop assuming the worst from me, that would be great.”

“I just…”

“I know,” she said. “But still.” She got out of bed. “I can’t do this first thing in the morning. I’m starving. Is there anything to make for breakfast? I guess the leftovers would work if not…”

“I can have something delivered,” he said. “What do you want?”

“Bacon,” she said immediately. “Lots of bacon. And eggs. And toast. And potatoes sound great. Orange juice would be nice also.”

“So the works,” he said, grinning more to himself than to her. “No coffee?”

“I thought the coffee was a given.”

“Got it.” He picked up his phone. “Give me twenty minutes.”

She went to get dressed while he ordered food and took a shower. Downstairs, she wandered through the other side rooms for a few minutes to see what else there was to the house. Something that looked like it was probably supposed to be a study but was too sparse to function as one, a classy home bar on top of the booze pantry, a second sitting room.

She settled on the shaded veranda. It was light and airy, decorated with tied-back sheer curtains and potted plants, with various seating options and side tables scattered around.

She chose a cushioned loveseat overlooking the hills and took a moment to appreciate the view: the scrubby landscape dotted with houses all the way down to the city below, the wide open blue sky above. Then she got out her phone to catch up on a few things, checking for any urgent emails and sending one to the lieutenant to let him know what was going on. Her job in LA felt far away here, but she wanted to get back to it soon. She felt odd enough as it was. Looking through those emails reminded her that there were perfectly ordinary things waiting for her too, and it was nice to know not everything in her life had been upended.

Lucifer opened the door a little while later. “Food’s here,” he said.

She went back inside to eat with him at the kitchen table, her stomach rumbling as the scents reached her nose. He’d gotten everything she’d mentioned and then some. It was still warm. “This is delicious,” she said, going for another mouthful of potatoes. She started rotating between everything piled on her plate, unable to choose one thing for long.

“I’d love to take credit, but Jamie picked this place,” he said. “I’m not as familiar with breakfast options here.”

“Well, now you know. For next time.”

He gave her a funny sort of look that she couldn’t quite interpret. “Yes, I suppose so.”

Mostly they were quiet as they ate, both of them too busy with the food. When she couldn’t eat any more, she took a minute to sip the coffee, gazing out through the window at that gorgeous blue sky. That, getting enough sleep for once, a full stomach… she was feeling truly hopeful for the first time in a while. Like things really would work out okay.

Lucifer’s phone chimed, and he started texting someone while she cleared the table. “I, um… Candy wants to know the address for the house and if it’s still okay to come over,” he said carefully, with more than a little confusion. “Did you talk to her? Because I doubt Mazikeen did…”

“Yes,” Chloe said. “Yesterday. I let her know you were okay and she said she wanted to see you.”

“And you’re… okay with that?”

Chloe put the plates in the sink a little harder than she needed to. “She is your wife, isn’t she? I can hardly tell your new bride she can’t see you without even talking to you first. You should have let her know you were alive before now.”

“Detective,” he said, as if astonished.

She turned, hands clasping the edge of the sink behind her. “What? It’s the truth.”

He just gaped at her.

“I don’t hate her, Lucifer. I was pissed off at you. She… well, being okay with scamming me doesn’t make the biggest fan of hers, but she didn’t know anything about me and she only did it to save her bar. It was your idea. So I’m not going to shut her out just because I hate what you did. She seems like a good person—she really was worried about you. It wouldn’t be fair to her.”

He looked back down at his phone. “Why do I have a bad feeling about this?”

“Because you’re finally starting to come to your senses?” she suggested.

“Yep. I’m definitely going to be paying for it.”

“I really don’t know what you expected,” Chloe said, going back for her coffee mug. “You would be hearing ten times worse from me if you’d gotten to actually present her as your bimbo wife. Of all the bright ideas you’ve had…” She shook her head. “I’m going back to the veranda. It’s too nice outside.”

It was a way to let him know she wasn’t angry right at that moment. He went out with her, taking a chair opposite the loveseat she returned to. The day was warm but not overly so; it was near perfect in the shade, with the sun sneaking tendrils in along the side.

“So…” Lucifer started. “What does happen when we get back to LA, exactly? I don’t know where you want to go from here, Detective.”

She’d thought about it a lot last night and this morning. She didn’t want him out of her life, but she didn’t want a romantic relationship with him either, and of course Lucifer wouldn’t have accepted that answer regardless. The question he was really asking was do you still want to be partners?

They’d gone through too much together to just end things like that, no matter how complicated things were now. He couldn’t stay away from her, and she couldn’t stay away from him, either. Being partners was as good a way as any to start working things out. It would give them something else to latch on to instead of being left with only those painful feelings.

“I guess you heal and then come back to work when you’re ready,” she said, watching for his reaction. “If you want.”

He relaxed a little, the relief almost palpable. “Yes. I’d like that. No need to wait, I’ll be ready as soon as we get back.”

“No, there is definitely a reason to wait,” she said, exasperated now. “You still can barely walk. And do not immediately try to prove me wrong by getting up and doing something that will only end with your ribs on fire while you pretend like it doesn’t hurt to breathe.”

He froze with his hands already braced to push himself up, and then slumped back against the cushion. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “I shouldn’t need a week to rest before I can do basic tasks without thinking about it.”

“Probably longer than that,” Chloe said. “Broken ribs are a bitch.”

He huffed. “Better and better.”

“Welcome to being human. Feel free to lodge complaints with—well, with your dad, I guess.”

He gave her a thin smile. “Been there, done that. I think I’ll take the bruises.”

Right. Whatever his rebellion had been that’d led to him becoming the devil. She still had no idea what’d happened, but she didn’t want to ask just yet. It seemed like it would be another painful conversation; they’d had enough of those lately, and it was too nice out on the veranda to add another one. They were finally starting to get back to how they usually talked to each other, and for right now, she wanted it to stay that way.

“So this thing with your mom,” Chloe said, keeping her voice on the lighter side. “What are we going to do about it?” His eyes flicked to hers at the word we, but she kept going. “Maze told me what her deal is. Sort of. Are you still going to have Candy pose as your wife?”

“I’d really rather not,” he said, looking away from her. “Not anymore. I suppose it could still work, but… there are other ways. I’ll think of something.”

“What exactly did this plan entail?” she asked. “Were you just going to introduce them and hope Candy appeared to be such a ditzy bimbo that your mother would tell her stuff?”

“Basically, yes,” Lucifer said. “I’m sure Candy would get under her skin, and my mother is much less careful with what she says when she’s annoyed or frustrated. Even if Candy didn’t understand it, there might’ve been something useful that would come out of her mouth.”

“So then we just have to find something else that would annoy her into saying something, right?” It seemed pretty important to know what the goddess of the universe was planning, especially if Chloe was potentially going to be right in the middle of it.

“Yes, I suppose so.” He tilted his head then, studying her with a new light in his eyes. “You know… you’re rather good at that yourself.”

“Excuse me?”

“You’ve had the unique talent of annoying my mother from nearly day one, and you weren’t even trying.”

“Right, yes,” Chloe said, almost unable to believe this was a real conversation. “I just happened to not want her to commit crimes, so of course Goddess hates me.”

“It’s, ah. A bit more than that. She hates you in particular because I care about you more than her.”

He just dropped that statement like it was nothing, like it was such an obvious fact that it didn’t merit any fanfare. Chloe’s mouth parted as she tried to process that fact and what it meant for how Goddess viewed her.

As a threat.

“There was quite a lot of drama with her, but suffice to say, she hates that I don’t want to give up my life here, and you’re… well, you were more or less at the center of that life, even before I found out about the miracle. She can’t understand why I want to be a consultant and why you matter to me when I want nothing to do with my own family.”

“Not your family,” Chloe said automatically, and he blinked, looking surprised but pleased. “And I don’t think that’s ‘suffice to say.’ What drama?”

“Oh, you know. Spreading chaos with a celestial blade to get my father’s attention, trying to get you to call me a liar so I’d know I meant nothing to you and therefore shouldn’t care about you either, pushing us closer together after she learned about the miracle so that it would break me when I learned the truth.”

Chloe’s jaw dropped all the way open this time. “She did… what?”

“Yes. My mother has been rather busy since she escaped hell. I don’t know how much Maze told you…”

“I know that part,” she said, still trying to wrap her mind around all that. “What celestial blade? Trying to make me call you a liar?”

Wait, that one did sound familiar. Every time she’d talked to Charlotte, she’d really been talking to Goddess, and Charlotte had done exactly that—during the trial for her father’s killer. “At the courthouse—she took that case just to set us up?”

“I’m not sure if that was her goal at first, but she took the chance when she saw it.”

“Wow,” Chloe said. “She even outright told me that was what she wanted me to do. I couldn’t figure out why.”

Lucifer looked like he was about to say something before catching himself and changing his mind. He said, “Yes. I’m sorry for that, Detective.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong. That’s insane that your mom wanted to do that.”

“I told you it bothered her. She was sure you’d be selfish and throw me under the bus for it. Only you didn’t.” Instead of being upset over his own mother trying to hurt him, he just smiled like it made him happy. “See? You’ve been doing an excellent job of annoying her.”

She huffed. She’d never say it out loud, but apparently Lucifer took after his mother when it came to getting ideas for such outlandish plans.

“As for the celestial blade… you remember the case where the murder weapon went missing? A knife? And the multiple killers all acted crazy?”

Yes. She remembered that case all too well. “That was a celestial blade?”

He nodded. “In the hands of humans, it drives them to take out even the slightest bit of anger in extreme ways. Mum wanted people to go on a killing spree to get my father to show up.”

“Why would she want that?” Chloe said, more alarmed by the idea of two gods getting into it on Earth than the deaths, and that was already a huge reason to be alarmed. “I thought he sent her to hell.”

“He did. That would be part of the reason why.”

“So much for her not wanting to kill a bunch of people,” Chloe said under her breath. “Maze apparently forgot about that one.”

“I made it clear she’s not to do that again,” Lucifer told her. “And I was the one to retrieve the blade from the last murder scene. Mostly. Just so you can close that mystery out.”

She rolled her eyes. He wasn’t contrite in the slightest. “Gee, thanks.”

“Mum, ah… she also did try to kill you once. To take you out of the picture entirely.”

Chloe stared at him. “What? When did—she wants me dead? Why didn’t you start with that?” she exclaimed.

He shook his head. “Not anymore. I didn’t get the details—from what I understand, Amenadiel stopped her and Maze laid into him for not coming clean about it—but it wasn’t long before the trial. She changed tactics, and I made it clear that I would send her back to hell myself if she tried it again. More importantly, to her at least, it’s a guaranteed way to make me hate her forever, especially since now she knows exactly how far I’ll go to save you.”

Chloe didn’t know what he meant by that, but any curiosity was overshadowed by the rest of what he’d just said. She closed her eyes briefly before looking out at the hills, trying to come to terms with the fact that Goddess had almost killed her. “I guess I really do annoy her,” she said. “I… okay. Okay, I can deal with that. Now that I actually know.”

He half-grinned, half-winced. “She’s a delight, isn’t she?”

“I think I’d prefer the terms Maze used to describe her.”

He laughed a little at that. “I can imagine.”

“So is there anything else I should know about her?” Chloe asked. “Just lay it all on me at once.”

He thought it over for a moment. The fact that he had to think about it wasn’t reassuring. “I don’t believe so, no. But sooner or later she’ll come up with a new plan, and that leads us back to trying to get her to slip up and reveal what she’s thinking now.”

“Maze said she wants to go back to heaven? For… your other siblings, I guess?”

“Yes. I believe that to be her ultimate goal. It’s just a question of how she plans to achieve that, and what she wants from me right now.”

She nodded, mulling that over for a minute. “She really tried to break you with this miracle thing?”

He looked up at the sky. “Yes,” he said. “I would no longer want to be here for you, and I’d be furious with my father. A win-win for her.”

“Except the part where that means her son is in pain, and she wanted to make it hurt as much as possible.” She couldn’t understand it. How Goddess wanted Lucifer to embrace her, but was okay with doing that to him. If she cared about her son, how could she want that?

He shrugged, still not looking at her. “I don’t think she gets it, Detective. Not really. She wasn’t thinking of me being hurt, she was just thinking of what would come of it. Probably assumed I would forget about our partnership soon enough. She doesn’t really understand that the hurt comes more from finding out it’s not real than from my father manipulating me.”

“Is real,” Chloe said. “Manipulation or not.”

He turned back to her. “Right,” he said evenly. She couldn’t tell how much he truly believed it, but he seemed to be going along with it anyway, and that would have to be good enough for now. “Regardless, that was what it seemed at the time. For what it’s worth, I think she realized she went too far.”

“It’s not worth much at all.”

He gave her a little half-smile. “Yes, that was my view as well when I told her I was done with her.”

Right. He’d come here without a word to anyone, not just to Chloe, and he’d been trying to deal with his mother at the same time.

“So.” Lucifer clapped his hands together, apparently deciding not to dwell on that part. “About you trying to annoy her into revealing her schemes.”

“You’re serious about that?”

“Why not? She still doesn’t think much of you, no offense, and she doesn’t know yet that you found out about everything. You’d be acting naive, too, only instead of being ditzy, you’d just act like you did before you came to Vegas. Goad her on purpose this time and see how far you get.”

Chloe considered that. If she really got under Goddess’s skin that much, it might work. She liked the idea of having an advantage over her, where they could talk without Goddess knowing she knew everything. It would let her get a better feel for her while her guard was down. “And you’re actually okay with that?” she asked. “I would’ve thought you didn’t want me involved. You didn’t even want me around her that much before.”

“Yes, well, I have to be okay with it now, don’t I? If we’re still going to be partners. I don’t want to keep shutting you out, and being around me means dealing with my family. And honestly…” His lips twitched up again. “I’d kind of like to see you go head-to-head with her like that. It would be interesting to see how it plays out.”

It was like she finally had her old partner back, only her eyes were wide open to everything now. This was how he used to talk to her all the time.

She’d missed it.

“And you really think she’d reveal anything around me?” Chloe asked. “If she thinks I’m the source of half her problems?”

“Well, it’s always hard to say for sure, but she’s been fairly straightforward with you before, in some ways. Now you’ll see through the rest of it too. And you’re skilled at interrogating people whether they know that’s what you’re doing or not.”

He said it like he had full confidence in her. And it made her feel good to hear. “Okay. Then when we get back, I’ll—”

Her phone went off. An unsaved number. She answered it, thinking maybe it was Enzo again, or something to do with work. “This is Detective Decker.”

“Chloe. We need to talk.”

Chloe pulled the phone away from her ear and stared at it, then at Lucifer. He frowned, staring at the phone too.

That was Charlotte’s voice. Goddess.

Could she possibly have known they were talking about her…?

Lucifer quickly motioned to the phone. She put it on speaker. “And why is that?” she asked, hoping she sounded no different than usual.

“Lucifer. Do you know where he is?”

“Why are you asking me?” Chloe said, relaxing a fraction. Just coincidence, then.

“Surely you must know by now that he’s left Los Angeles. He won’t answer any of my attempts to reach him, and I…” She sounded like she was swallowing broken glass as she said, “I’m worried. He received unpleasant news before he left.”

Lucifer raised his brows.

Goddess went on, “I know you care what happens to him. So if you’ve heard from him…”

Lucifer shook his head.

“No,” Chloe said. “I haven’t. I don’t know where he is. He won’t answer my calls either.”

“Really?” Goddess asked, sounding skeptical now. “Because when I went to the precinct, I was told you’re in Las Vegas.”

The accusation was clear. “Yes. A person of interest in one of my cases fled here and now I have to haul his ass back myself. He’s been giving me grief the whole time, so I’d rather not add to it with this pointless phone call. Why, do you think Lucifer is here too?”

“You really don’t know where he is?” Goddess asked.

“Nope,” Chloe said, looking right at him. His eyes were filled with amusement, despite the pointed commentary. “Haven’t seen him. Was there anything else?”

“No,” Goddess said, voice turning sour. “I just thought you should know, in case you want to do something about it.”

“I’ll take that under advisement.” Chloe hung up.

“I’m touched,” Lucifer said drily. “I didn’t realize she knew how to be genuinely concerned for my well-being. And to hear such worried sentiments from you in turn.”

She rolled her eyes. “I guess this new and improved deception match is off to a great start. Maybe I will be able to get something out of her later. If we don’t tell her you’re back…”

“Let her stew a little longer in whatever passes for guilt in her heart,” Lucifer said. “Excellent idea, Detective. Though I’d appreciate it if you kept the thinly veiled insults to a minimum.”

“Outright insults it is, then.” She texted Dan while Lucifer huffed at that, to make sure he didn’t tell Goddess anything about the real reason she was in Vegas. And then she realized. “Wait,” she said. “Dan slept with Charlotte.”

“Ugh, don’t remind me,” Lucifer said.

She stared at him. “He slept with Goddess?”

“Sure, say it again,” he muttered. “Yes, the douche slept with my mother and now I have to quite literally live with that for eternity.”

“Oh, shit. He really…” Chloe was struggling with that now herself, in a way she hadn’t before. “Wow. Okay. And he has no idea who she really is?”

Lucifer shook his head. “She’s slept with plenty of people since she took over Charlotte’s body. It’s not like anything celestial would have been going on.” His face scrunched up in disgust. “Must you make me think about this?”

“Now you know what it’s like hearing you go on about all your bedroom activities.”

“This is most assuredly not the same. At least now you’ll stop saying that I’ve slept with her. Do you know how aggravating it was for you to not believe me when I said I didn’t and never would?”

“Oh, you so cannot blame me for that,” Chloe shot back. She started ticking off the reasons on her fingers as she listed them out. “I had no idea you were related, because you wouldn’t tell me the truth. You were being all secretive with her and gave me no other explanation for why. And you’ve slept with every other attractive woman in our lives, except Ella I guess, so excuse me for not thinking this was any different.”

“I told you the truth with Ella and I told you the truth with Charlotte,” he said. “Let’s just agree that for once I was not at fault here.”

“Are you kidding me?” she said incredulously.

“Look, I think the important thing is that now you know what’s been going on and we can just forget that bit, yes?” He was giving her that I’m-perfectly-innocent expression that drove her up the wall more often than not.

“Whatever,” she said. “So, when do you want to go back?”

“Whenever you like.”

He was recovered enough that they could make the drive, and if she got to talk to Enzo tonight… “Let’s just see what happens at the casino tonight. If there’s no one else we need to be worried about, I’d like to head back tomorrow.”

He nodded. “Works for me.”

“What works for you?”

Maze sauntered across the veranda and threw herself onto another chair, immediately sprawling back like she’d been lounging for hours. “Going back to LA tomorrow,” Chloe told her.

“Oh.” She straightened, just a little, and glanced at Lucifer before turning back to Chloe. “So, about living together…”

“What about it?”

“Well, do you still… you know… want me to live there?” Maze asked.

“Why wouldn’t—” Chloe stopped, realizing they were back to this again. “Yes, Maze. Seriously. I’m good with it.” It was directed at both of them.

Lucifer asked carefully, “Even with Trixie?”

She’d thought about that already. It hadn’t taken her long to come up with the answer. “It’s not conditional. Except I would still prefer you not be open about everything around her.” She wanted to be more familiar with their world first before having to explain it to her daughter. And if Maze and Lucifer stayed that close in their lives, she’d need to tell Trixie eventually.

Maze said, “Well… the thing is…”

Oh no. “What did you do?”

“She may or may not have seen my other form. The one I told you about yesterday.”

“She what?” Chloe exclaimed.

Maze looked sheepish as she said, “It was Halloween and she thought I should have a costume. I don’t know if she thought it was anything more than that. She’s always taken me calling myself a demon in stride.”

“And me being the devil, now I think about it,” Lucifer said. He didn’t seem concerned about Maze showing Trixie her hell face.

Chloe tipped her head back, taking a deep breath. Great. There was a chance Trixie already believed it and she’d had no idea. Though if Trixie hadn’t said anything about it…

Ugh. She’d have to find out later.

“Don’t worry,” Maze said, relaxing back into the chair. “The kid’s tough. She’s not some fragile flower who can’t handle it.”

“There are so many things I could say to that.” Chloe shook her head, trying not to take offense at the fact that Maze had been pretty sure she couldn’t handle it. “Just please don’t make it worse, not right now.”

“Sure,” Maze said. “House rule number 307. Got it.”

This was what she got for rooming with a demon. It can’t be any worse than what you’ve already dealt with, Chloe told herself.

“I still can’t believe you actually moved in together,” Lucifer said. “And that no one’s been skewered yet.”

“Really helpful, thanks, Lucifer,” she told him, looking at the both of them. They’d lived together in the past, too, and had a whole history in hell she knew nothing about. “How did you guys end up so close? Are there a lot of demons in hell?”

“Tons,” Maze said. “But most of them only have about five working brain cells. I was one of the few that realized supporting Lucifer was the smarter move.”

“As opposed to…?”

“Constantly pushing me,” Lucifer said. “At first, by trying to kill me in droves. They don’t care about whatever politics are going on in the Silver City—they just saw me as being an angel and nothing else, and that meant I had thousands of targets on my back the second I fell. Then later, when they finally realized they couldn’t pick me off so easily, by breaking the few rules I gave them and generally just being a pain in the ass.”

He said it all so casually, like having thousands of demons try to kill him wasn’t a big deal. He’d really ruled over not just doomed souls, but all of those demons. For a long, long time.

Maze said, “Helping to deal with those idiots means you move up the chain of command, and that always has its perks. He saw that I was the best of them and that I was willing to serve him, and that was that.”

It sounded so… cold. Maze had talked about being his servant before, but they seemed so familiar with each other now that it was hard to picture that kind of relationship between them in hell. The devil and his second-in-command. Perhaps they’d formed a special sort of bond over all that time in hell together, whether they’d seen it or not, but she wasn’t sure they’d actually been friends before.

Being on Earth might have changed that, just like it’d changed things for them in other ways. However it had started out, they were friends now, though it would probably never be a normal sort of friendship. Nothing Maze did was normal, and Lucifer wasn’t far behind.

“Well, I’m glad things are different now,” she told them. “I don’t think I could take Lucifer’s ego if he had someone bowing after him all the time.”

He scoffed. “As if she did that before anyway. There’s a difference between accepting my authority and groveling, and let me tell you, Maze does not grovel.”

Maze smirked. “Like I said. Perks. He needed me too much.”

“I never cared about that sort of thing,” Lucifer said. “I would have preferred everyone just do as I say and leave me alone, but that didn’t happen.”

Chloe tried to imagine it, a bunch of demons bowing to Lucifer in a field of flames, or whatever hell looked like. And as happened every time she tried to picture him there, she couldn’t do it. Hell was a far cry from this sunny late winter day, a sheer white curtain blowing behind him and the sky stretching on in the distance.

But of course, he had been in hell. That had been his reality most of the time, not a cushioned patio chair in an airy house in the desert.

She was so glad he was here now.

And no matter what happened between them, she hoped he’d never go back.

Chapter Text

Lucifer really should have known better, but the surprises from Chloe just kept coming. Learning everything about why she should stay away from him and deliberately deciding to do the exact opposite. Telling him even then that she was going to care whether he liked it or not, so it would be better to just get used to it. Agreeing to con his mother in Candy’s place and then being short with her two seconds later, even though the call had been unexpected and she knew full well that she was speaking to a goddess.

Well, that last one actually wasn’t so surprising. Not when she’d done the same to him after seeing his devil face while she’d already been fearing for her life, and with how she’d never been intimidated by Mum before…

Yes, he really was looking forward to seeing Chloe work her over later.

It was so freeing to talk to her about hell and his family knowing she believed it all and was on his side, without question. He’d only just started to get used to it from Linda, and it was slightly different with Chloe. He wasn’t sure why. He just felt like a huge weight was being lifted and now he could start to breathe, even with his bloody broken ribs. Maybe it had something to do with how Chloe met everything with that same steely determination, where Linda often needed more time to process celestial information. Or maybe it was just her conviction that she wasn’t being manipulated that made talking to her now feel even more real, somehow.

Whatever it was, he was grateful for it. He hadn’t felt more like himself in a long time.

It made Candy arriving that afternoon even weirder. He was actually married. With how he and Chloe were on speaking terms again…

That elephant never left the room, no matter how determined they all were to ignore it.

Well. Everyone except Maze.

“Hey, Lucifer,” she said, smirking as she looked through the windows at the front of the house. They were waiting in the sitting room; Chloe had just finished updating Dan on when she thought she’d be back. “Your wife is here.”

“Thanks, Maze. Do feel free to get lost.”

“No way. I’m not missing this.”

“What do you think is going to happen?” Chloe said, rolling her eyes. “I’m not going to start a catfight or something.”

“Yeah, you’re too boring for that. But it doesn’t matter. You’re all going to torture yourselves anyway.” She picked a chair facing the front door and lounged back, crossing one leg over the other and grinning like the fiend she was.

Candy knocked on the door a moment later. Chloe got up immediately, motioning to Lucifer to stay seated. He’d started to get up too, but he was still moving slower than he should have been. “I got it,” she told him, pointedly looking at Maze, whose grin just widened.

Lucifer stood anyway. He was filled with too much restless energy to sit around while Chloe welcomed Candy into his own house, one he hadn’t exactly told her about before.

He was still a few paces behind Chloe when she opened the door. Candy was dressed in casual clothes today, jeans and a simple short-sleeved shirt. “Hi, Chloe,” she said, and then her expression faltered as she took in Chloe’s face. “Oh my god. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.” She stepped back so Candy could come in. “It’s been a rough couple of days, but everything’s fine now.”

“What happened?” Candy asked, moving into the entryway. She saw Lucifer, and her look of dismay only grew. “I was so worried about you. I’m glad you’re okay, but…” She moved towards him and then stopped, as if at a loss for what to do.

He gave her a quick smile. “It was a thrilling tale of kidnapping and the detective coming to my rescue—”

“Of me coming to both your guys’ rescue,” Maze cut in.

“No one likes a credit hog, Maze,” he called over his shoulder. He just caught a glimpse of a very rude gesture before he turned back to Candy. “Anyway, I’m sorry for the trouble. It was not my intention to get kidnapped.”

“Like it ever is?” she said incredulously. “Who kidnapped you? Was it Louie Pagliani? Because—”

“No,” he said quickly. “No, it had nothing to do with you or our deal. It was someone who wanted my angel wings or, failing that, to turn me over to my siblings so they could get some divinity. Neither of which was ever going to happen, of course.”

Candy stared at him, then shook her head a little and turned to Chloe. “Is that true? I mean, not the part where it could happen, obviously. The reason why.”

“I wouldn’t lie about that,” he said, affronted, while Maze snorted behind him. “Or anything else.”

Chloe just sighed. “Yes, unfortunately. Sometimes people get a little too into believing he’s the devil. They won’t be trying it again, though. Maze and I made sure of it.” She glanced over at Maze as if to say, happy now?

“Wow,” Candy said, eyes darting to him again. “Thank you for finding him, Chloe.” She stepped forward, a little awkwardly, like she wanted to hug her. Chloe blinked, surprised, but moved forward too. They hugged for a moment, Chloe still looking surprised, but her expression softened.

“You’re welcome,” she said, eyes finding Lucifer’s.

“And I guess I should say thank you to you as well,” Candy said, addressing Maze.

“Finally someone does,” Maze said, a self-satisfied smirk flitting across her lips.

Candy and Chloe ended up sitting together on the couch, while Lucifer took up the last chair. It was so odd to see the two of them like that, where absolutely nothing about his plan had worked out the way he’d thought it would.

Candy was looking him up and down. “Did they hurt you?” she asked.

He waved his hand dismissively. “They tried. We hurt them worse.” Chloe gave him an incredulous look, which he ignored. “Don’t worry, my stunning good looks will be back soon enough. Not that they fully went away, of course.”

He grinned at Chloe rolling her eyes this time.

Candy seemed skeptical, but she let it go. She looked around the room. “I didn’t know you had a house here. You really are rich, aren’t you? Like rich rich.”

Maze clucked her tongue. “Seems like something you might want to tell your spouse, Lucifer. So much for sharing everything about your lives with each other. Make sure you get a good lawyer, Candy, so you can take half of everything he owns. Would you like this to be your new home?”

“Ever so helpful, thank you, Maze,” Lucifer said, while Candy bit her lip. “Remind me who was it who gave you your money? Ah, yes, that’s right. Me. Now do shut up.”

“I’m not going to ask for anything else,” Candy told him. “You already gave me more than enough.”

It was the least of his concerns. “Forget about it,” he said. “We can sort it out later. Just get the marriage annulled as planned.”

“Sure,” Candy said, glancing at Chloe. “So, um… about that plan. I guess part of it is already out the window, but I don’t know how much everyone else knows. Am I still conning your mom like you wanted?”

“No. I’m calling it off. As much as I’d have loved to see Mum’s reaction…” He shook his head. “The detective is going to be taking over that role instead. You don’t need to accompany us back to Los Angeles.”

“It’s such a shame you won’t get to meet your in-laws,” Maze said.

Chloe snorted. “That’s a funny way of saying blessing.” Then she gave an almost imperceptible wince.

Candy said, “Are you sure? I mean, not trying to insult you, Chloe—I’m sure you can help just as much—but I promised I would do it, and now I’m not fulfilling my end of the deal.”

“You married the devil, Candy. I’d say you’ve already done enough for me, too.”

She didn’t seem convinced. “But—”

“Trust me,” Chloe said, “that money is pocket change to him. He’s not going to ask for it back.”

“Still, though,” Candy insisted. “If there’s anything I can do instead…”

“I’ll be sure to let you know.” He gave her a brief smile. “At minimum I’ll expect free drinks whenever I’m here.”

“Obviously,” Candy said, near to rolling her eyes herself now. The two of them… “Well, I never expected a deal with the devil to turn out this way. It’s been a crazy time, but I guess you guys deal with this a lot.”

“Maybe not quite like this, but yes,” Chloe said. “Things are always interesting where he’s involved.”

It wasn’t exactly a compliment, but as she was the one who’d decided to wade through it with him, Lucifer couldn’t help taking it as a good thing. Much as he wished things were a tad less interesting himself sometimes.

Chloe stood and said to Maze, “Come with me to the kitchen.”

“Why?”

“Just do it.”

Maze slowly got to her feet, looking between the three of them. “Odd that you’d want to leave them alone together, but I guess we should let the married couple have a more private goodbye.”

Chloe grabbed her wrist and yanked her forward. “One more crack about it and I’ll run all your weapons through the dishwasher when we get home.”

Maze snickered, but allowed herself to be pulled out of the room. When they were out of sight, he could hear Chloe saying in a low voice, “Do it as much as you want later, just not in front of Candy.”

Great.

He and Candy looked at each other in the sudden awkward silence.

“Thanks again,” Candy said. “For everything.”

“And you.” They might not have been able to fully enact their plan, but she’d been a friend when he’d badly needed one.

Candy reached into her pocket and held something out to him. The engagement ring he’d gotten, one that was deliberately ostentatious in order to annoy his mother that much more. They hadn’t bothered with actual wedding bands. “Here.”

“Keep it,” he said. “Sell it, use it to remember me by, whatever you like.”

She raised her brows, a glint in her eye that he was familiar with by now. “What would Chloe think of you telling me to remember you by a wedding ring?”

He huffed. “Now you, too.”

She shook her head, lips tilting up in a grin. “This really was an insane idea, Lucifer. But I’m kind of glad I robbed you that night.”

“I never thought I’d say the same, but I’m glad too.”

She stood, and he followed suit. She held out her arms. “One last hug for your soon-to-be ex-wife?”

He stepped into it, despite the way his ribs complained at being squeezed. Candy didn’t need to know just how hurt he was, and he wasn’t about to let that stop him.

“Good luck with your mom,” Candy said, moving back. “And with everyone else, I guess. Hopefully no one else tries to kidnap you.”

“Yes, that’s always a plus,” he said. “Don’t worry. I won’t be caught twice by imbeciles like that.”

“Just don’t be stupid for too much longer when it comes to Chloe. She deserves better than that.”

“I know,” he said softly, looking over his shoulder at where she’d gone. “I’m trying.”

“She’s in love with you, you know.”

His head snapped back to Candy, his mouth dropping open. But no words came out.

“No matter what you think, it’s all too real. I can see it in the way she looks at you, and the way she was acting when we met…” She smiled a little. “Trust me on that. You know how good I am at reading people.”

He just kept gaping at her, unable to form a single coherent thought. “I… she…”

“I’ll work on getting this marriage annulled,” Candy said. “Talk to you later, Lucifer.”

With that, she left. Lucifer could only stand there staring after her.

It was only when Candy spoke again that he realized she’d gone towards the kitchen, not the front door. Her voice was much fainter, out of hearing range for a normal person. “Hey, Chloe, can I talk to you for a minute before I head out?”

Chloe said, “Sure. Um. Outside?”

“Okay.”

A moment later they were walking past him. Chloe shot a look his way that he couldn’t quite interpret. It wasn’t a look that said I love you, but that was all he could think about now. How had Candy possibly come to that conclusion? Chloe had been angry with him when she’d talked to Candy before, and today she’d just been sniping with Maze and reassuring Candy that there was nothing to worry about.

Chloe only wanted to be partners now, nothing more. Even if she did care about him outside of any influence from his father, there was no way she was in love with him. No way.

They went out through the front door and shut it behind them, but he could still make out their voices. Before he realized what he was doing, he inched a little closer to the door and listened.

“Look, I just wanted to say that I’m sorry for agreeing to this,” Candy said. “I didn’t really think about what it would do to you—I didn’t realize how serious things were between you two.”

“It’s not,” Chloe said. “Not like that, not anymore. But thank you.”

See? Candy might be good at reading everyone else, but obviously not the detective.

He shoved the twinge of disappointment that came with the words down deep. It was just an automatic response to hearing that, nothing more.

“Well, regardless,” Candy said. “I’m kind of relieved Lucifer called the rest off too. Even if you knew it was fake…”

“Yeah,” Chloe agreed. “It still would have been rubbing my face in it.”

He was so glad he’d decided against it. There was nothing he regretted more than thinking to use this sham of a marriage to put up a shield between them, whether or not Chloe knew the truth.

“I meant what I said before,” Chloe went on. “I don’t blame you for it, and I don’t hold it against you now.”

“Just maybe don’t hold it against Lucifer forever either?” Candy suggested lightly. “Make sure he earns it, of course, but if he does try to make up for it later… It’s just that if you have someone who means that much to you, it’s worth it to at least give them another chance. And whatever you say, I know you both mean a lot to each other.”

There was quiet for a moment. And then Chloe said, “I know. It turns out Lucifer wasn’t entirely wrong in saying that things are complicated, but I want to work things out between us. I really do.”

“Good,” Candy said, as if relieved. “Well, if you ever need anything, just let me know. If you’re ever in Vegas again…”

“Sure,” Chloe said. “I hope everything goes well with the family bar. Maybe sometime I’ll come see what you’ve done with it.”

“Absolutely.”

The handle turned on the door, and Lucifer quickly pretended to be studying the nearest painting on the wall, some abstract artwork of interweaving tan and blue lines. When he heard the door shut again, he chanced a glance Chloe’s way. “Ah, Detective, there you are.”

She was standing there with her arms crossed, looking at him with her brows raised. “Starting to build an appreciation for the fine arts, are you?”

“Starting? My dear detective, I’ve been the inspiration for countless artworks over the millennia.”

“Yeah, I’ll bet you have,” she said drily, and moved past him. “I’m going to eat something for dinner and then I’ll get ready for tonight.”

“I’ll have Jamie bring over something for you to wear,” he said. “It would be better not to stand out, and a place like the Mirage has a dress code.”

“No need. I brought something with me that will work.”

Any doubt he’d had that Chloe did, in fact, have something decent to wear immediately went out the window when he saw her coming out of the other bedroom that night. He stilled in the hallway, his thoughts grinding to a halt as well. They were replaced with just one: that dress.

He’d seen her in other elegant outfits, but this was already his new favorite. The dress was plain, a simple black material hugging her from the shoulders down to mid-thigh. A scoop neckline, long sleeves, bare legs…

He had to drag his eyes up from those legs. It was a good thing he was the devil, because it required a huge force of will.

“See?” Chloe said. “I came prepared. I was expecting to have to haul you out of a similar place.”

It was slightly rumpled, and she was still wearing the knee brace, but no one would care on either count. He certainly didn’t.

“What, did I get makeup on it or something?” she asked, looking down and tugging on the hem. It wasn’t helping things.

“No,” Lucifer said finally. “No, it looks perfect, Detective.”

She looked back up at him, frowning a little. It marred the effect of her makeup the same amount the rumples did the dress; she’d spent a while working on it, and it showed. She’d managed to diminish the bruising and draw attention away from the cuts on her temple and lip, with bold eyebrows and a smokey eyeshadow. Those damn lashes framing the blue of her eyes…

That gaze seemed to assess him for a moment before she turned and headed for the stairs. Once again, her actions were not helping him to keep a clear head. “I’ll see you later,” she said.

That did the trick. “What?” he said, moving after her. “I’m coming with you.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Don’t be ridiculous. Of course I am.” He’d been upstairs to freshen up himself, and though he still looked ragged from being held in that basement, he knew no one would care when it came to him either. He was still perfectly stunning as it was.

“He called me to talk, not you. I don’t want to scare him off.”

“You can’t be se—” He broke off, taking a breath. “Detective, there is no way I’m going to sit around here while you go off and talk to that lowlife. It was bad enough doing it yesterday.”

They reached the first floor. “Remember our conversation earlier about needing time to heal from broken ribs?” she said, turning to face him. “You don’t need to be there. I’m just going to talk to him.”

“It could be a trap. Not knowing what he wants is the whole reason you’re going. We’re going.” He held her gaze, not willing to back down this time. Not for something like this.

She pursed her lips. “I can handle myself, Lucifer.”

“I never said you couldn’t. It doesn’t mean I’m not going to watch your back anyway. You said you wanted to be partners, didn’t you?”

There was no hesitation in saying it now. He was stating a fact, not questioning if it was true.

Maze appeared nearby. “I’ll go with her,” she said.

Chloe shook her head. “You definitely can’t come. He knew you were tailing him.”

“Detective—”

“Fine,” she said. “You can both come, but you have to stay in the car.”

“No. I’m going inside with you.”

“Lucifer, nothing is going to happen that you can’t help me by waiting in the car,” she said, exasperated now. “People don’t get kidnapped in the middle of high-end casinos. If I get in trouble, then you can help me sort it out.”

“How will I know you’re in trouble?” Lucifer asked. “We’ll keep our distance.”

“I can text you every couple of minutes—”

“No good,” Maze said. “Someone else could text for you. You can’t actually stop me, Chloe. I’m going to have eyes on you one way or another.”

She threw her hands up. “Fine. Go be patrons across the room from me. But if he spooks, you’re staying here to track him down.” She pointed a finger at Maze.

“That’s what I call a win-win for me,” Maze said, unfazed. She headed for the door.

“You’re wearing that?” Chloe asked.

Maze was dressed in what passed for casual clothes for her. A thick crop top that hung somewhat loosely and cotton pants that still left nothing to the imagination.

“What, not revealing enough?” Maze asked.

“Never mind,” Chloe said quickly. “I’m sure you’ll make it work.”

“Well, duh. I make everything work.”

Chloe drove them to the Mirage. They left the keys with the valet, and then went in one by one. First Maze, slipping in when no one was looking. Then Chloe, striding inside with a confidence that she always had while working a case. A quiet confidence he loved to see from her.

After another minute, he followed. Chloe went to the bar, while Lucifer hovered at a table across the room that was hosting a game of blackjack. Maze joined him a moment later, and they pretended to watch the game going on while keeping tabs on Chloe. No one paid them any attention.

Chloe took a stool at the bar and ordered a martini, sipping it while she waited. A man approached her, and Lucifer tensed as they spoke. He looked nothing like the picture she’d shown him yesterday, and he was eyeing her with the same kind of interest Lucifer had had before.

“Quit glaring,” Maze said. “You couldn’t be acting more obvious if you tried.”

He cast that glare her way before forcing his expression to relax again. Chloe had evidently turned that unremarkable git down, because he walked off with an air of disappointment. Good.

“So what happened with you two?” Maze asked. “Did you tell her everything?”

“Yes,” he said. “Last night. It wasn’t pleasant, but she… she decided we were wrong and that she makes her own choices. All of them.”

“Well, maybe she does,” Maze said, with less of a bite than usual. “She’s different in a lot of ways, but your dad could have any kind of twisted reason for making her. She’s never been one to just fawn all over you and that hasn’t changed.”

“Yes, that was her reasoning, too,” he said quietly. “But it’s not enough.” He sighed. “Things will more or less go back to normal, I suppose. Except now she’ll know everything.”

“Good,” she said. “Try not to piss her off again. It’s no fun having her be snippy all the time. Not like that, anyway.”

“Yes, of course I’ll always make your home life a priority,” he said sarcastically. “My apologies for the lapse in thought.”

She lightly tapped his arm with a closed fist. “You should be apologizing for not telling me where you were, either. I didn’t do anything to you this time. If you’re mad because I was there when you found out, I tried to stop it when—”

“I’m not mad at you,” he said, surprised. “For that or anything else. It was my mother’s doing, not yours. I just didn’t tell you because…” He shrugged. “You live with the detective, and I needed to get away from it all. That’s it.”

“Yeah, well. I’m not your lapdog anymore, but I still give a damn.” She crossed her arms and looked away, as if pissed off. With herself for the admission, most likely.

Another minute passed in relative silence. Chloe was still waiting alone.

“Thank you for coming to look for me,” he said. “I’m not going to say thank you for dispatching those reprobates, because you love any excuse to fight, but for the rest… I appreciate it, Mazikeen.”

She huffed, still looking cross. He didn’t take it personally. “I just wanted to meet your wife, and I didn’t want to let Chloe have all the fun.”

She’d wanted to watch her back, just like she was doing now. He didn’t buy her flippancy about it, even if the words were true.

Her expression changed, becoming more predatory. “Ten o’clock,” she said, not looking directly. He glanced over.

Enzo was making his way to the bar.

Chloe spotted Enzo out of the corner of her eye, but she didn’t turn towards him yet. She wanted to see what he’d do first.

He slid onto the stool next to her and openly appraised her, giving a motion to the bartender that he was declining service. So she did the same back to him. “You clean up well, for a cop,” he said. “I’d almost be inclined to ask if you wanted to find a room.”

She scoffed. “As if I’d say yes anyway. Don’t waste the energy even thinking about it.”

“Only got eyes for the man across the room?” Enzo said. “Because he certainly has eyes for you.”

So much for the two of them being discrete. On paper, he might have been a low-level criminal, but he obviously had more skills than that. Or more resources. “How do you know Lucifer?” she asked.

“Many people know him. He calls himself the devil, makes deals people can’t resist, and doesn’t know the meaning of the word subtle.”

That wasn’t an answer. “Did he make a deal with you?”

“No,” Enzo said, grinning slightly, like he was enjoying this game. “I’ve never spoken to him.”

Finally a direct answer. Chloe believed him, since Lucifer didn’t know anything about him. It was just an opening to start getting real information out of Enzo. “Are you looking to make a deal with him, then? You don’t need to use me to get an introduction. Especially now, when he’s very interested in you too.”

Enzo laughed softly. “An intriguing day when I interest the devil, but no. I don’t want anything from him.”

“Something from me, then?”

His eyes roved over her, dipping lower than they needed to. “I’m still making up my mind. But as I’ve already been turned down, I think that’s irrelevant.”

She still had no idea what his motivation was. “Do you believe he’s actually the devil?” she said lightly. “Because if so, you’re much less interesting to me than I thought you were.”

He touched a hand to his heart, mockingly. “Hardly. There’s no way the devil would be kidnapped like that.”

Chloe studied him for a moment, trying to figure out if he was just pretending not to believe it. She didn’t think so, though. Most people didn’t without proof, and so far every single criminal who believed it feared him, even their captors. But Enzo wasn’t afraid in the slightest. “So if you weren’t involved, how did you know where he was?”

Enzo hummed a little. “Word gets around,” he said evasively. “Few people can pull off an operation like that without making some noise, and that idiot sure isn’t one of them. The people he hired were good. But he was still a weak link.”

“If you don’t want anything from us, why tell me about the apartment? Why meet me here tonight?” She had to work to keep the frustration out of her voice. He liked to talk a lot without giving her anything actually helpful.

He considered her, then reached over and took the martini she’d barely touched. He took a sip without breaking her gaze. “It’s not about me,” he finally said. “I was instructed to pass on the note, and no, I don’t know why. Neither of you mean anything to me. I asked to talk to you so you would leave me alone.”

“Who told you to do it?” she asked, mind instantly trying to think of potential suspects and coming up blank. That put them right back at square one with trying to figure out who wanted Lucifer found and why.

Enzo shook his head. “That’s all the information you’ll be getting, I’m afraid. If you’re going to arrest me, go ahead. You have nothing to hold me. I’ll be out by morning and I’ll make sure to file a complaint for harassment.”

“Sounds like you already know I’m not going to do that,” she said, taking the martini back. “I just hoped you might be friendlier than your record suggests.”

“I can be, under the right circumstances. Unfortunately that ends here.” He winked at her. “Have a good night, Detective Decker.”

He left, moving through the crowd until he’d disappeared from sight. Lucifer and Maze were at her side an instant later. “Do I need to go after him?” Maze demanded.

“No,” she said, pushing away from the bar. “That was all but useless. He had no involvement himself—he was just a messenger. And he wouldn’t tell me who for.”

Lucifer frowned, looking in the direction Enzo had gone. “A messenger,” he mused. “And we have no idea who wanted him to leave the note, no other requests to chat or leave a boatload of money somewhere as a reward.”

“Nope,” Chloe said, the frustration finally pouring into her voice. “It’s a total dead end.”

“I could stay anyway and find out,” Maze said. There was a familiar gleam in her eye. “If you let me chase after him, I’ll make him talk.”

“Forget it,” Lucifer told her. “It doesn’t really matter, does it? If they want something, they’ll show themselves later. I have real problems and some apparent Good Samaritan isn’t one of them.”

“Fine,” Chloe muttered, blowing out a breath. “I’ll let it go. Now that we’ve completely wasted the evening…”

“It doesn’t need to be a total waste,” Lucifer said. “We are at one of the nicer places Vegas has to offer. Care for a real drink, Detective?”

She hesitated. She wasn’t in a great mood, and she didn’t much feel like drinking, but maybe it would help her get over it. “Sure,” she said. “Just one.”

He beamed. “Excellent.”

They ended up in a booth in a more private lounge area. Chloe had two cocktails garnished a bright blue before she had to cut herself off in order to drive back home, but for a little while, she was able to relax and let the overhead music wash over her. Lucifer and Maze were telling her about their past visits to Vegas, including how he’d done a few favors for people who had a business on the Strip and how their dinner the night before had come from a chef Maze had mentioned was a friend earlier.

“You know a musician here too, right?” Chloe asked, vaguely remembering the other person Maze had named. “Does he also play piano?”

“Musician?” Lucifer said, frowning. “I know many musicians here.”

“That guy you always hit up,” Maze said. “You know. Emmett or Eric or whatever. The one who plays that crappy jazz.”

“Tyrese?”

“Yeah, him,” Maze said, slapping the table.

“Those names are nothing alike,” Chloe said. “I’m pretty sure you listed other names when we were talking to Jay, too.”

Maze shrugged. “Human names all sound the same to me.”

Lucifer clucked his tongue and turned to Chloe. “Yes, Tyrese. He plays excellent jazz, and yes, he does play the piano. Just not as well as me, of course.”

“Of course,” she echoed, grinning. She took another sip of the virgin cocktail she’d ordered while ignoring the criticism from the both of them.

“I’ve played at his private club a few times, though I hate to steal the spotlight from the owner,” he went on.

“Yeah, right. You love to steal the spotlight from everyone.”

His lips tugged up. Chloe was starting to think he was more intoxicated than she’d ever seen him, which was odd, because he hadn’t had that many drinks either. It wasn’t like he was drunk, just… not sober. It was something about the way he moved, the way he smiled, the way his eyes were just a little too bright. “Yes, well, wouldn’t you if every crowd adored you?”

She rolled her eyes. “I think that’s going a bit far.” Although the truth was that every time she’d seen him take the stage, he’d had a very captive audience. “How do I know for sure they preferred you over Tyrese? Maybe you just think they did.”

“Ooh,” Maze said. “Keep those insults coming, Decker.”

“Please,” Lucifer said dismissively. “You’ve heard me play, Detective.” He said it like that was all the evidence he needed.

“Sure, you’re good, but how could I be sure Tyrese isn’t better? I’ve never heard him play.”

He huffed. “When you’ve heard the best there is, you don’t need a sample for comparison. Perhaps I’ll need to refresh your memory.”

“You do that,” she said, but without the teasing tone this time. He blinked, as if caught by surprise for a second, and then smiled.

“Very well, then. I shall.”

“Yeah, yeah, everyone loves you,” Maze said. “Why do none of you want to hear about what I get up to in Vegas?”

“Because I can only take listening to so many stories of outright crimes before I feel compelled to quit my job,” Chloe said. “And I’m pretty sure my only other options are stories about wild orgies and kinky sex, which I’ll pass on, thanks.”

“I’m a demon. What do you expect?”

“Lucifer is the devil, which ranks higher, and yet only eighty percent of his stories are about crime, wild orgies, or kinky sex. So you need a new excuse.”

“He’s had thousands of years’ worth of visits to Earth to get it out of his system. I’m still working on that.” Maze downed the last of the shots she’d ordered. “And he only ranks higher because of a technicality. If he hadn’t been handed the title, I’d have been ruling hell by now instead.”

“What happened to wanting to support me?” Lucifer said.

Maze waved him off. “That was my best option.”

“I’m so touched,” he deadpanned.

They hit a lull in the conversation. Chloe finished her drink and said, “It’s late. If I’m driving back to LA tomorrow, I need to get some sleep.”

“All right,” Lucifer said, moving to get out of the booth. “I should just be glad I got that much out of you.”

Chloe was glad for it, too. She'd needed it. “What’s with you being tipsy?” she asked, following him out. He was still just a little off in a way she kept noticing, because he was never like this. “I see you drink all the time and nothing.”

“A side effect of me being vulnerable all the time, I suppose. I managed to get properly drunk a few times here before I ended up being drugged with sedatives. The only perk.”

Right. She was only just now remembering how the bartender at Starling, the last person to talk to him before he’d been kidnapped, had told them he’d gotten drunk and left. Maze had found it odd. “You really could drink all you wanted before and never get drunk?” she asked, as they headed out of the casino.

“Mostly. It took quite a lot, but sometimes I could feel it for a short time. Celestial metabolism.”

That reminded her of another time he’d said those words. When she’d thought he’d shown up to a crime scene drunk, but really, he’d just been an utter mess inside.

Why? What had gone on then? Something else with his mother?

She didn’t ask. It wasn’t the time for it.

“Is that how they were able to move you?” Chloe asked. “If you were drunk and vulnerable, then…”

“I guess I made it a little too easy for them,” he said, an edge to his voice now.

“Well, it’s not like you were expecting to be assaulted. It’s still solidly on them.”

“Oh, trust me, Detective. I know it is.”

They made their way out to the valet, and then Chloe drove them back to the house. She showered and changed into the pajamas again, thinking of how Lucifer had looked at her when he’d first seen her in the dress. She’d told herself before leaving Los Angeles that she wouldn’t be dressing up for him, and she hadn’t, but it turned out she still liked how it made her feel. Catching him off guard. The way he’d obviously thought she looked good.

It was so unfair how it had to come to nothing. Three weeks ago she would have happily worn this to Lux and let him peel it off her while his lips followed everywhere his hands touched, and now…

Now that would never be happening, for more reason than one.

She sighed and crumpled the dress back into the duffel bag. At least they’d still been able to enjoy the drinks. They could be friends; they could have something, if not everything she’d wanted.

She looked at the bed she’d never so much as sat on and then went across the hall to his room. Fuck it. For one more night, she would have this too.

Lucifer was just coming out of the bathroom. He paused, his expression softening as he saw her. Neither of them said anything, though, as she climbed onto her side of the bed. She closed her eyes as she felt him do the same.

“Wow,” Maze said.

Her eyes flew open to see Maze leaning against the doorway, arms crossed and a shit-eating grin on her face. Crap. She’d forgotten Maze was here tonight, and so she hadn’t thought to close the doors to either room. They’d never bothered before.

“This isn’t even the first time, is it? And the divorce papers aren’t even signed yet. You two really need to just get it over with and bone already. This is just sad, even for you, Chloe.”

“Dishwasher, Maze,” she warned. “Multiple times.”

“Close the door or I’ll quite literally close it on your face,” Lucifer added.

Her smirk just grew. “Sure thing. Be as loud as you like. I don’t mind.”

Before Chloe could throw a pillow at her, she shut the door, laughing to herself.

They just looked at each other. “She’s going to be truly insufferable now, isn’t she?” Chloe asked.

“Afraid so, Detective. It’s a good thing I’m not the one living with her now.”

“Thanks for the sympathy,” she muttered, closing her eyes again.

“You’re very welcome.”

The humor died down as they both got quiet. She couldn’t even bring herself to feel embarrassed about it. Maze could think whatever she liked.

This time, she didn’t pass out immediately or lie awake thinking. She just slowly drifted off, a quiet comfort all around her.

Chapter Text

Fortunately for Chloe, Maze only made one joke about them sharing a bed the next morning, asking Lucifer which was worse, the broken ribs or the permanent blue balls. She’d happened to ask it when Lucifer was in the kitchen, and the next second he’d hurled a knife at her head. She’d just danced back, laughing again, before turning her focus to dunking bacon into maple syrup.

When they’d all eaten and Chloe had gotten through a cup of coffee, she finally accepted that she’d be driving four hours back to LA. “So, obviously I’m driving my car, but what are we going to do with the Corvette? You’re not in any shape to drive.”

He plainly disagreed. “I can still—”

“Don’t even start,” she said. “The last thing I need right now is to double back because you got into a wreck and hurt yourself even worse.”

“As if you’d be ahead of me.” He sighed. “Fine. I won’t drive back myself.”

Maze said, “I think that leaves me. Feel free to ask any time. I’m in a generous mood.”

Lucifer eyed her, as if he was considering leaving the Corvette here instead. “You’d be more likely to wreck it than I would.”

“Don’t be so dramatic. I’m an excellent driver.” She looked like she couldn’t wait to get her hands on the wheel.

He said, “If you get a single scratch on it—if there is even one clump of dirt that shouldn’t be there—I will make you regret it.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Maze said, holding her hand palm side up. “Just hand them over.”

He heaved another definitely dramatic sigh and fished the keys from his pocket. “I mean it, Maze.”

She snatched the keys. Chloe said, “See, you finally get to drive. Have fun. Do whatever you like as long as you’re not endangering anyone else.”

Maze gave her a little mock salute. “Now that’s one request I’m happy to follow.”

“Seriously?” Lucifer said to Chloe, and she shrugged, unbothered.

“You still have a lot of making up to do. Get used to it.”

He grumbled to himself as Maze left with a “see you in LA.” Chloe started to get up to put her things together, but then stopped and lowered herself back to the table. She had something she needed to tell him, and she couldn’t put it off any longer. “Look, Lucifer… I want to talk about something before we go back.”

His brows furrowed, just a little. “All right… about what?”

“About you coming here in the first place, and how you kept trying to get me to leave instead of letting me help you.”

A deeper sort of wariness settled over his face. “I thought we did talk about that already,” he said. “I’m sorry for it, Detective. I really am. So—”

“I’m not bringing it up because I want another apology,” she said, keeping her voice even. “I just need to be clear on something. I know why you left, and I understand why you didn’t want me to stick around at first. But I can’t go through this again, Lucifer. I just can’t.”

“I…” He closed his mouth. Opened it again. “That’s the last thing I’d want, but I can’t promise nothing else awful will turn up.”

“No. I don’t mean that I can’t deal with more bad news. I mean that I can’t handle you deciding to deal with it on your own. If you really want to be partners, that means being partners for all of it—not just for drinks or to watch my back like with Enzo, but all the unpleasant things you think I’d be better off not going through. I don’t want you to try to protect me from whatever comes next. I want—I need you to talk to me, no matter what. I need to know that you’re not going to push me away again. And I need to know that you’ll let me help you when you need it.”

She held his gaze for a long moment before he looked away, mouth working. She just waited. If he couldn’t promise her that, then she was going to keep her distance anyway. There was every chance that he’d stop being willing to open up to her quite so much when they were back on familiar ground instead of being away in what felt like a place out of time, and so she needed to know if it was worth taking that risk. If he couldn’t agree to it now, he wouldn’t follow through with it later.

“All right,” he said finally, and looked back at her. “I’ll try. I’m not used to it, but—I will try.”

“Okay,” she said, feeling like a weight was being lifted away. For so long he’d been maintaining that distance, whether he had good reason for it or not, but now the lines had been drawn. There was no going back. “I know it feels like you have to always take those burdens on yourself, but you don’t. I meant what I said in the courthouse, you know. I want you to be able to rely on me, just like I’ve been relying on you.”

He looked away again. “Except you haven’t been able to lately, have you?”

“Well, I want to be able to again. So just don’t shut me out, and we both win.” She did get up from the table then; she’d said what she needed to say, and he’d given her that promise. Anything else from here would just be pressuring him unnecessarily.

Upstairs, she packed the rest of her duffel, with the new clothes Lucifer had gotten tucked into the shopping bags Jamie had left for her. She’d already offered to return the ones she hadn’t used—all but four of the six outfits, since she’d opted for one of them today too—but he’d said, “Don’t be ridiculous. They’re yours. Unless you don’t like them?”

“No, I do,” she’d said. “Thanks.”

His eyes had immediately brightened at that, even though he didn’t say anything else about it. So she’d keep them.

Ten minutes later, they were out at the car. Lucifer draped his suits over the bags as she put them all in the trunk. “Don’t you care about them getting wrinkled or something?” she asked.

“Well, they were stuffed into a suitcase before, so no. I’ll just have them cleaned up again. It’s not worth the bother.”

“I never thought I’d see the day,” she said. “Do we need to go back to the hospital? I think you might have a fever.”

“Ha, ha.” He shut the trunk. “Very funny, Detective.”

“Thanks, I thought so too.”

They got in the car. Before leaving Vegas, they had one last stop to make: the Bellagio, so Lucifer could get the rest of his things. She hadn’t taken all of his stuff out before, since she hadn’t known if he’d want to go back there or not.

And then they’d be going home.

Cain sat in a rental with the engine off. Under the name of one of his many superficial aliases, it was a silver sedan only a few years old. Not top-of-the-line, but far from a scuffed-up shoebox. Something that would blend in perfectly anywhere he had to go in Vegas. No one would look twice.

He’d been out here since sunrise, waiting. Watching. While he usually preferred to leave the grunt work to his underlings, this was a special case. He wanted his own eyes on the devil this time. The devil, and the woman who might very well be the person he’d been seeking for thousands of years.

The car was parked a few houses down the street from the one Lucifer owned. It was spacious and open and tasteful, as all the houses on this street were, screaming of the kind of wealth that Lucifer flaunted and Cain kept hidden. They’d been there for two full days, and now it seemed they were leaving. Chloe had walked out of the house with a duffel and several sleek shopping bags, Lucifer following with an armful of suits. No one locked the door.

Cain watched them load their belongings into the trunk, interacting with each other in a lighthearted way, much like he’d often seen from them in his surveillance over the past few months. It was nothing new. But it made him wonder all over again exactly what had driven Lucifer to come out here alone, attempt to drink himself to death, and marry a showgirl who was now nowhere to be seen.

His face was bruised all over, and he held himself stiffly, like he was hurt elsewhere too. Cain almost hadn’t believed the reports until he’d seen the pictures himself. Chloe had left the house for hours without him two days ago, and yet he was still that injured.

Why? How had Grant even been able to capture him in the first place? Cain couldn’t figure it out, but he badly wanted to know. If Chloe wasn’t responsible for making him vulnerable after all—if she wasn’t Gaudium, as he so desperately hoped she was—he would have to start over with a whole new theory, and he was too impatient for that.

Chloe still sported the marks from her own assault, too. He had no doubt she was human—he’d gone through every record she had, all the proof she’d been born to her very human mother—but there was obviously something special about her. She made the devil vulnerable, or at least Cain was fairly certain she did. And yet Chloe didn’t seem to believe in the celestial world. If Cain was right about that, she had no idea she was making the devil vulnerable at all.

Still she smiled at him like that. Still Lucifer circled her like she was the center of his world. They cared about each other; that was the most obvious part of all.

It only made Chloe more interesting to Cain. Who would ensnare the devil so completely? Who would make Lucifer risk his life for her, again and again?

They got into the car and drove off, all without ever glancing his way. Likely heading back to Los Angeles. Cain didn’t try to follow; he’d be seeing them there soon enough.

He’d first started tracking Lucifer a few years ago, when he’d come up on Cain’s radar after making a name for himself in LA. At first he’d been skeptical like he always was when hearing about something like that. But the more he’d tried to clear Lucifer as another playactor, the more proof he’d gotten that Lucifer was, in fact, the devil.

For the first time in eons, Cain had felt something like hope. What better person was there to help him than the devil? Surely Lucifer had some way of breaking his curse. Cain was willing to make any deal he had to, but he’d rather maintain the upper hand. If there was a way to coerce him into helping, he wanted to find it.

So Cain had started building up his information. He had quite literally all the time in the world, and so did Lucifer. By all appearances, the devil was planning to be there for a while.

A year or so ago, new reports had come in, and his files had grown. Lucifer, Chloe, Mazikeen, Amenadiel, Charlotte… there were plenty of people of interest to him in Los Angeles now. Cain just didn’t have all the pieces; there was only so much information he could gather from the ignorant spies he had in place.

So he didn’t know how Chloe made Lucifer vulnerable, only that she did. He didn’t know why Amenadiel seemed to be just as vulnerable as Lucifer was at the moment, but it only seemed to have started after the angel had spent more time around Chloe. And he had no idea how Charlotte was involved—she appeared to be just as human as Chloe—but she was up to her neck in it all. That much was obvious.

Cain had gotten all the information he could gather from a distance. It was time for him to get closer, to actually talk to them, though preferably without revealing who he truly was just yet. He’d waited so long to end his curse; he wouldn’t blow his best chance at finally succeeding because he was too impatient to handle it correctly. So he would take his time. And feeling them out before they learned who he was would give him an advantage.

Fortunately for him, he’d decided on the United States for the location of his current identity, and he’d long since become involved with the police. Being a cop with power was a great way to get things done and manage any bumps with his other… habits. Becoming Chloe’s superior was the perfect cover.

He’d nearly set the transfer in motion when he’d learned that Chloe was in the hospital after a close call, and then he’d been informed that Lucifer had left Los Angeles without her. So he’d waited. And when Lucifer didn’t return within a few days, he decided to go to Vegas himself and find out why.

It eluded him still, but Cain had more interesting questions to focus on. While it’d been easy enough to hear about that fool Grant kidnapping Lucifer, he couldn’t figure out how they’d managed it. Cain had almost intervened himself—it was a great opportunity to have Lucifer at his mercy instead—but had decided against it only because it would mean showing his hand too soon. He wanted to approach Lucifer on his own terms, and doing it by force when Lucifer was held captive and already pissed off wasn’t a smart move.

Still, though, it was to his advantage to end Grant’s schemes. Cain had been planning to send his men in when Chloe showed up in the city. Even better. He’d had Enzo give her a tip about where to find Lucifer and sat back to watch how it would play out, standing by at a distance to intervene if necessary. He couldn’t risk anyone else trying to kill Chloe.

Whatever had happened in that other house in the hills, Cain still wasn’t sure, but it only made things all the more interesting. Lucifer’s injuries. Chloe turning up to rescue him. No matter the exact nature of their relationship, they meant a lot to each other, and Cain could exploit that.

Soon, he promised himself, starting the engine after he’d given them a few minutes’ head start. Soon he would find a way to end this hell.

His next step: a chat with Carmen Grant.

“I’ll go in and get it,” Chloe said, pulling up to the drop-off zone at the Bellagio.

Lucifer looked like he was about to protest, but then decided against it. “Thank you,” he said carefully. “Please have them pass on my regards to Savannah.”

“Sure. She helped us, too.”

Savannah wasn’t there, but the staff was more than happy to help her get his stuff together and leave a message. “If there’s anything owed for either room, bill it to Lucifer,” she told them.

Once his suitcase was in the back with the rest of their clothes, she asked him, “Anything else before we go?”

He shook his head. “That’s everything.”

So they got on the highway and left Vegas behind them. Chloe wasn’t sorry to see it disappear in the rearview.

She did start to feel sorry for Lucifer, though. It was obviously uncomfortable for him to be in the car with his ribs. Even though he’d never said a word in complaint any of the times she’d driven him somewhere, his jaw was clenched, and he kept grimacing. For once she hadn’t made him wear a seat belt. “You should have just taken a limo with a feather bed,” she told him. “Or a private jet with a feather bed.”

Talking always seemed to help distract him, and that comment in particular worked well. He cast her a sidelong look. “Tell me, Detective, does something about me make you think I desire a feather bed in particular?”

She huffed. “Well, I don’t know what rich people do in these situations, but I doubt they slum it up in a regular passenger seat for four hours.”

He laughed. “Even so, you’d have had to drive yourself back regardless, since I doubt you’d have let me hire someone else to drive your car for you. And I would much prefer having your company over a feather bed, so I would have declined. You’re stuck with me.”

Chloe believed him. She was starting to get used to the idea that he actually felt that way. He really would have turned down luxury for this bumpy, uncomfortable drive back, just because she was the one behind the wheel. “Well, that’s where you’re wrong. Next time, hire however many drivers you like. A limo sounds much better to me.”

He smiled, surprised but delighted. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

It started raining then. The sky had been cloudy all day; it wasn’t pouring, but a thin misty drizzle was coming down, and Chloe had the feeling it wouldn’t be letting up anytime soon.

“Maze better be ahead of this,” Lucifer said.

“I think it’s moving west to east.”

“Fantastic. One last screw you from my father, no doubt.”

“I thought he wasn’t inclined to mess with the weather?” she said, only half joking.

“Usually he’s not, but I’m sure he’d make an exception for me.”

“Yes, because you’re really just that special.” That was only half a joke, too. Because she did think Lucifer was being ridiculous about this—it wasn’t that unusual for it to rain this time of year—but then, Lucifer had been singled out by God for eons. He sort of was special in that regard.

And she was, too, she guessed.

She shoved that thought away. Not now.

“Of course I’m special in every way,” Lucifer said airily. “I’m glad you’ve finally recognized that fact, Detective.”

“Oh, I can think of a few ways you’re definitely special, but I’m not sure you’d like to hear them.”

He was grinning when she glanced over at him. “That’s okay. They wouldn’t be accurate statements anyway.”

She rolled her eyes. “So, about that whole ‘asking for divine favor’ thing,” she started. She still had a million questions, and they had nothing else to do for the next several hours. “How likely was that to really happen? I mean… if God did a miracle to make me… does he do that for other people? Do prayers work? I know he has it out for you, but what about, like, humanity?”

Lucifer scoffed. “Please. He doesn’t give a damn about anyone individually. I’m fairly certain my father hasn’t doled out another miracle in a thousand years, and prayers from humans… I’ve never been able to figure out if they actually reach him or not, but if they do, he doesn’t act on them. And my siblings don’t have that power.”

“Right,” she said slowly. She thought about Ella, who fully believed in God with no proof at all. Ella might be right that he existed, but apparently, wrong in how much he cared. Because even if God technically cared about people, if he didn’t do anything, what difference did it make?

“As for my siblings… angels can pray to one another, but we don’t hear any from humans. The one thing my father did right—if I’d had to actually hear all those prayers to the devil…” He shook his head, looking disgusted. “No thank you.”

“Yeah, I can see how you’d be glad for that.” It was bad enough he was blamed for depraved acts, as he’d always said. To have to hear people actually asking him to help them hurt others or to curse his name when he’d had nothing to do with it? She couldn’t imagine what that would do to him. “So that whole cult thing with the children of the goat, or whatever it was…”

“Utter nonsense. I don’t know where they get it from. If anyone wants to worship me, there are much better ways to do it. In the bedroom, for instance. With offerings of molly and cocaine.”

“Yeah, I bet you’d love that,” she said drily. “Back to what’s actually important. That night, when they told you to summon an angel. You said you would pray to your siblings, that one of them would eventually get annoyed and show up? And… would they really have traded feathers for you? Would you really have gone back to hell?”

She didn’t like that thought. That he’d been willing to go back to hell for good just to try to save her life. Just thinking of him there, suffering in some terrible place far from any joy he’d found on Earth…

“I would have, if it’d come to that,” he said slowly, his voice more somber now. She glanced his way and saw a world of meaning in his eyes as he looked at her. “But I was really rather hoping something would give before we got to that point. Yes, I probably could have annoyed someone into showing up, and they probably would have been intrigued enough by my predicament to entertain a deal. Whether they’d have actually agreed to it, though, I have no idea. Some of them may have. Some would have left in disgust. And some would have just dropped me off in hell for free and imparted on Carmen and all his goons that trying to summon an angel is a very bad idea.”

“And the chance they’d have just helped us out because it’s the right thing to do?”

He let out a short, humorless laugh. “Negative zero, give or take a definitely not going to happen.”

“I’m starting to think all angels really do suck.” She believed him on that, especially after hearing about Amenadiel.

“What’s that expression about if you don’t have anything nice to say about someone? You should let out all your feelings and don’t hold back?”

“That is definitely not how the saying goes.”

“Well, it should, at least as far as my family is concerned. I suppose Amenadiel is starting to come around, but that would be about it. The rest of them…” He shook his head. “I used to get along with many of them, once. But they all abandoned me along with my father.”

“I’m sorry,” she murmured. For the fact that he’d been so utterly abandoned by everyone who was supposed to care about him, and for the fact that when he’d been at his lowest point, he’d been so sure none of them would have lifted a finger to save him. Or her. They’d have let Grant kill her, too.

“What’s there to be sorry for?” he said. She wasn’t entirely buying the nonchalance in his voice. “It’s not like I want them around anymore. They can stay in the Silver City where I don’t have to see their self-righteous faces.”

Maybe he genuinely didn’t want them to care now, but turning their back on him had still left a mark and always would. It had to. “Maze told me Amenadiel used to chase you back to hell.”

Lucifer made some kind of disgruntled noise in his throat. “Yes, that’s the summary of our relationship until last year. Fortunately he managed to unstick his head from where it was shoved up his ass—kind of impressive, really, since I didn’t think it could be done—and now I’m fairly certain he would leave the issue alone even if he still had his wings.”

That led her to other questions she had. “So he did really lose his powers? How did that happen?” She was pretty sure Lucifer had actually cut his own wings off, and was also fairly certain that Amenadiel hadn’t.

“Don’t know. He’s convinced Dad’s punishing him for—ah… for transgressions on Earth—”

“Yeah, I know,” Chloe said sharply, hands tightening on the steering wheel. “Maze filled me in on that, too. So don’t bother trying to sugarcoat it.”

“Well, at least I don’t have to break that bit of bad news to you,” he said. “Yes, he thinks he’s fallen just like me for getting people hurt and bringing too much of the celestial world to humanity. I do love the irony, considering that’s what he accused me of doing for millennia, and it was his justification for going so far to return me to hell this time. But who knows the real reason why?”

She wanted to strangle Amenadiel all over again. Losing his powers was nothing short of deserved.

Lucifer went on, “It’s a pathetic excuse for a ‘fall,’ if that’s what it actually is. More like tripping onto a soft bed of grass. All that happened was he lost the ability to stop time and has to walk instead of popping up uninvited all the time, big deal. No hell or damnation or becoming the world’s biggest scapegoat, not even a single scratch?” He scoffed. “When he has to deal with a few thousand demons trying to pluck out what’s left of his feathers and dip them in his own blood to use as trophies, instead of lounging around his cushy fake office feeling sorry for himself, then we can talk.”

Clearly he’d been waiting to get that off his chest. Chloe knew exactly two things about what being cast into hell had been like, including this apparent new fact, and it was more than enough to tell her Lucifer was probably putting it mildly. “That really happened to you?” she exclaimed, pressing on the gas harder without meaning to.

“Yes,” he muttered. “Among many other things. But anyway. Is this how you’re going to drive the rest of the way back? I approve. I’ll have to remember to bring up Amenadiel’s shortcomings the next time you drive slower than mountains erode.”

She eased up on the gas so that she was no longer going ninety miles an hour. That wasn’t why, but she wasn’t going to correct him. She thought he was changing the subject on purpose. “Forget Amenadiel,” she said.

“Gladly.”

“So if another angel had shown up and taken you to hell, could you have even come back if you’d wanted to? If you’d managed not to promise to stay there for good? Or even if you had, because honestly, that’s one promise worth breaking.”

He raised his brows, studying her a moment before he answered. She could feel his gaze even while she was watching the road. “No,” he said. “I couldn’t have come back unless someone brought me back.”

“Because you don’t have wings anymore, either?”

“Correct.”

“But you didn’t lose them because of your fall. You really did cut them off.”

“Maze did it for me, but yes.”

“Why?” Why would he do something like that? She couldn’t imagine having wings and then wanting to cut them off. It would be like cutting off her arms.

“Because I wanted to send a message to my father. I was serious about quitting hell, so I took away my main means of getting there.”

“The main one?” she asked.

“I had another way—a coin that grants passage to and from hell, one time only, and it’s since been used up.”

Chloe considered that for only a moment. She was curious, but she didn’t want to get sidetracked. “I can’t believe you’d do that just to send a message,” she said.

“I also simply didn’t want them because they belong to him. They’re something of heaven’s, and I was forged in hell and chose to live on Earth. They were useful while I was in hell, but after leaving?” He shook his head. “I didn’t want them.”

She pressed her lips together, feeling like there was so much that was wrong about that idea, but she didn’t know how to express why. Maybe she just didn’t get it yet. He wasn’t actually human; there was so much about being an angel, being the devil, that she didn’t understand. So she asked, “What exactly happened with Grant and your wings, then? Did you really keep them in that storage container?”

“Yes. Amenadiel leaked the location, Carmen got his hands on them, and then he couldn’t let them go. Divinity, it can do things to humans—twist their minds, drive them mad with wanting. He would have felt a whole lot of warmth and serenity and a false sense of love and acceptance, sort of like being on ecstasy, but cranked up to a thousand. Now he’s likely permanently addicted to it. He needs to feel close to heaven again.”

“Wow,” she said. “So everyone who sees angel wings feels that way? And you just left them on the docks?”

“They were hidden in a secret compartment in a container that was supposed to be locked, left away and secured,” he said defensively. “It’s not my fault. And it’s not quite that extreme for most. It varies.”

“Sorry,” she said. “I guess you’re really not at fault for that. So he wanted to keep those wings for himself and tried to sell a replica, and you found him later?”

“Yes. He had them mounted on the wall like some trophy.” His voice took on a dark edge. “I made sure he paid for it.”

Chloe eyed him, just for a second. “Do I want to know?”

“Oh, don’t worry. It was nothing illegal. Much.”

She sighed. “What did you do?”

“I described in great detail what was waiting for him in hell, making sure he felt it, too. A little counterbalance for all that celestial peace. You… well.” He shifted a little. “You’ve seen my face. You must have felt the… the fear, the promise of punishment for every transgression, the guilt multiplied until it’s crushing you.”

She frowned. She’d certainly felt something when she’d seen his face—fear, yes, and horror—but the rest? She didn’t know. “I guess,” she said, glancing at him. “Only for a moment, though. And then you said my name—or Detective, anyway—and… I just heard you.”

She felt his eyes on her again, for longer than a typical pause in conversation. But when he spoke next, it was as if it’d never happened. “Right, well. Anyway. I let him stew in it for more than just a moment, so that he’d get the message loud and clear. Then I trussed him up, put him in the Corvette, and dumped him in the middle of an industrial district. Took his clothes for an added bonus.”

“Of course you did,” she said. “Did the thought ever cross your mind to turn him in to the FBI? Since, you know. You were standing right there next to me when they explained why he was a person of interest, and again when they actually raided the place.”

He hummed a little. “Well, it wasn’t technically your case, and I was still used to doling out punishment myself. Plus, it wasn’t entirely his fault that he’d become so messed up. I had more important things to deal with.”

She could have pointed out that Grant had had an arrest warrant out for reasons that had nothing to do with keeping angel wings for his secret viewing pleasure, but it was pretty low on her list of concerns at the moment. “Important things like what?”

“Like burning my wings in front of Amenadiel to send him a message.”

Well, that explained a lot. “So that’s what happened to them,” she said under her breath.

“Yes. There’s nothing left of them to give to Carmen even if I’d wanted to.”

They were quiet for a few minutes while Chloe absorbed everything she’d just learned. There really had been so much going on just outside her awareness, so much she’d been involved in without knowing it.

“Okay, so… you had wings, and you have a devil face. What else? Do you have horns sometimes, too?”

“Excuse me?” he said indignantly. “What else. No, Detective, I don’t have horns, or a tail, or goat hooves.” He snorted. “Honestly.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said, putting as much sarcasm as she could into it. “Forgive me for not immediately knowing that a devil face is perfectly obvious, but horns are just ridiculous.”

“Forgiven,” he said airily. “Since you’ve recognized your lapse in judgment, and of course no one is as perfect as me. I’m not one to hold petty grievances against someone.”

She lifted one hand to give him the finger, and he laughed. “You absolutely hold petty grievances against people. Last month I ate a cookie Lorna got for you—which, by the way, you left on my desk, without any kind of note—and you didn’t shut up about it for two weeks.”

“Well, that’s different,” he said. “Cookie theft is a serious offense, Detective. You should know that.”

“Right, sure. I’ll make another note in my thesis that tries to explain your highly skewed and extremely subjective code of ethics. It’s been pretty difficult, but maybe in another thousand years I’ll crack it.”

He was grinning from ear to ear by that point. “Keep studying and you’ll become enlightened one day. I believe in you.”

She laughed; she couldn’t help it anymore. “Funny, that’s what I’ve been thinking about you for a year now. Except I have to force you into learning.”

They bickered for a while longer, and then Chloe started asking him other questions, too. Mostly about little oddities she’d picked up on, details she’d never fully understood before. How does your mojo work? Did you really pluck a bullet out of midair? So if Amenadiel can stop time, is that how you disappeared from Lux in a blink?

She had plenty of others running through her mind, but she didn’t want to ask anything too heavy. Things about his past, or what the deal had been with Malcolm and not bleeding to death, or why he’d really been so cut up on Halloween. She didn’t want to ruin the mood, not now. It could wait until later.

About an hour away from Lux, they stopped at a Japanese fusion place that Lucifer looked up on his phone. They hardly ever ate out together—Chloe hardly ate out at all anymore—but it didn’t feel awkward. It just felt… new, but in a good way. Like maybe it would become more of a regular thing.

The rain had let up by the time they were back on the road, but everything was still damp and gray and gloomy. She couldn’t wait to be back home.

But first she went to Lux, pulling into the parking garage and into the spot that was conveniently always open now, right next to where Maze was lounging against the Corvette. She had the suspicion that he’d had it reserved for her, but he’d never said.

She cut the engine, but didn’t get out. “Well,” he said, “I suppose we’re here.”

“Lucifer…”

He looked at her, tilting his head. Waiting.

There was one question she needed the answer to now. “Amenadiel might not want you back in hell anymore, but you said others would have gladly taken you there.”

He slowly nodded, as if not sure where she was going with this.

“So is anyone else going to take up that role? Is there any chance they’ll just show up one day and tell you it’s over?”

He studied her gaze for a moment, the confusion gone now. It was replaced with a softness that told her the question meant something to him. “I couldn’t say for sure, Detective, but I don’t think so. No one ever has in the last six years, and I haven’t—well. I’ve only seen one of my other siblings in several hundred years, and it wasn’t because of that. More and more, I think Amenadiel was tasking himself with it lately. The others seem content to ignore me.”

She let out a breath, relieved. She really didn’t want him to be forced back to hell. At least now she wouldn’t be wondering if he’d disappear again for that reason. “Okay,” she said. “Good.”

The barest hint of a smile played on his lips. “I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

It meant so much more than just that he wouldn’t be returning to hell. “Good,” she said again, and reached for the door handle.

“Took you long enough,” Maze said, straightening up. Her hair was frizzy, her clothes clearly damp. “Both for the drive and for getting out of the car. But don’t mind me. I’ll just sit around waiting until you feel like taking me home.”

“You could have gotten yourself home at any point,” Chloe said. “There are these things called taxis. Or Uber. The bus.”

“Yeah, right. Like I’d ever take the bus. Have you met me?”

“Forget I said anything,” she muttered. It was probably for the best that Maze hadn’t taken any kind of public transportation on her own. She didn’t even want to know how Maze had been getting around Vegas most of the time.

Lucifer was walking around to the other side of the Corvette, assessing every inch of his beloved convertible. “Hmm. Looks okay.” He brushed his fingers over the seat and grimaced. “As I thought. Still soaked through. At least it’ll dry…”

Maze crossed her arms. “It’s like you don’t trust me.”

He raised his brows at her. “For this? No, I don’t.”

“If you’d like to have a make-out session so you can reassure the car that it’s safe now, I’ll wait for that, too.”

“Such a delight, Maze.” He held out his hand, making a grabby motion. “Give it.”

She tossed over the keys, and he easily caught them. Chloe opened the trunk of her car and took out his suitcase and the handful of suits that they hadn’t bothered to repack. She walked them over to the elevator, Lucifer joining her, but when the doors opened, she handed them off to him and didn’t step inside.

“Not coming up?” he asked, and she shook her head. She didn’t want to see the sheets on his furniture again; it’d only bring up a memory she’d rather forget.

“Not unless you need help with this.”

“No, I can manage.” He went in, but left the suitcase between the doors, so they wouldn’t close. There was something in his expression like guilt or regret or disappointment. For the first time all day, awkwardness suffused the space between them. “So, I’ll… I’ll see you later, Detective.”

“Yeah,” she said, stepping back. “See you later.”

He moved the suitcase, and the doors closed. It felt weird to know she wouldn’t be seeing him again for quite a while, which in itself was weird, considering how this whole trip had started. But she’d gotten used to talking to him a lot the last couple days, especially since she was still learning about this other world.

It was Monday; Trixie would be getting out of school in just another half hour or so. “I’m making one more stop,” she told Maze, as they got in the car.

“Of course you are. What now?”

“I want to pick Trixie up from school.”

Her face brightened at that, though Maze was trying to pretend like she was scowling. “All right, fine. I guess we should make sure she doesn’t have to take the bus either. Those yellow monstrosities are pure torture. Literally—I’ve seen them in hell.”

“You’ve seen things for kids in hell?” she asked. “Like, seriously? Are there really kids in hell?”

“Not ones that young. I meant for the drivers.” Maze grinned, like she was reliving a fond memory. “All the screaming children, the fights and insults, the bad drivers on the road, the sticky seats, the smell, the monotony of doing the same thing over and over and over… it took that guy forever to even realize he was in an actual loop.” She breathed in. “Yeah. Torture.”

Chloe regretted asking.

The school day was almost over when she went in to let them know she was picking Trixie up. They didn’t have to wait long. She bounded out of the doors, locked eyes on Chloe, and ran right for her. “You’re back!” she exclaimed, throwing her arms up just as Chloe knelt down. She crashed into her, arms locking around her tight.

“Yeah, monkey. I’m back.” She didn’t care how uncomfortable it was as she squeezed her daughter, beyond happy to be hugging her again. Whenever she came close to dying, whenever her life was threatened at all, it was the one thing that made her fully able to breathe again. No ordeal was ever over until she and Trixie were safe together. And there had been far too many of them lately.

They eased up at the same time, with Trixie drawing back enough to study her face. Chloe grasped her hands, a reassurance for them both. “You are hurt,” Trixie said, worry replacing the exuberance from before. “It’s really not like before?”

“It’s really not.” She didn’t have to force a smile. “It just looks bad, remember?”

“Your mom’s fine, kid.” Maze stepped up next to them and put a hand on Trixie’s shoulder. “Bruises like that means she’s a badass. You should’ve seen the guys she took down. They’re way worse off.”

Chloe shot her a look, at both the language and the outright mention of violence, but it seemed to make Trixie feel better. “I know. She’s always a badass.”

Chloe was definitely going to have words with Maze later, since apparently her roommate was teaching Trixie quite a few. “Yeah? You think so?”

Trixie nodded, lightness coming back to her face. “Of course.”

She squeezed her hands once more and then let go, standing up as she did so. “Just don’t use that word at school, okay? Teachers don’t like it.”

Her expression shifted a little, like she just realized she’d gotten caught saying a word she wasn’t supposed to. “I won’t.” Then she turned and hugged Maze. “I missed you, too.”

“Well, duh,” Maze said, hugging her back without hesitation. “I’m sorry you had to be with your dad this whole time. Couldn’t have been much fun. Next time I’ll take you with us.”

Chloe didn’t bother to protest. Trixie said, “It wasn’t too bad. We got ice cream yesterday after soccer practice, and I didn’t have any homework, so I watched Pirate Princess.”

“Did Myra find the witch mermaids?”

“Yes! It was awesome…”

They chattered on about it as they got in the car and went home. Chloe only knew a little about that show, but Maze seemed to know all the characters and major plot points. She pretended all the time to not care about kid stuff, but the evidence said otherwise. Or at least that she cared about one kid in particular.

Rain started coming down again as they got home. Chloe quickly got her bags from the car and headed inside, deciding that she could unpack later. She wanted nothing more than to curl up on the couch with a blanket and a glass of wine.

So that was exactly what she did. She changed into an old t-shirt and pajama shorts, made fresh popcorn after Maze burned a bag by putting it in the microwave for an entire four minutes while she was upstairs, and then lit a bunch of scented candles to clear up the smell. With the fireplace on and the rain picking up enough to be heard drumming against the walls, it couldn’t have been cozier.

“Come here,” Chloe said, moving the blankets so that Trixie could climb up with her. Maze settled into the armchair. They watched one movie, then another, before she ordered pizza for them and helped Trixie with the assignment she had that day.

She was so glad to be home.

Chapter Text

“Five minutes,” Larson said. “That’s all I can give you.”

Cain didn’t believe him. The officer had already accepted his bribe for those five minutes; he would accept another for more time, if Cain insisted. It was just a show of power.

But five minutes would be plenty of time. “That’s fine.”

Larson opened the door to the interrogation room and held it open for Cain, who walked through alone.

Carmen Grant sat on the other side of the table. His eyes flicked up to Cain’s, then darted wildly around the rest of the room. He looked nervous. Jumpy. A thin slice was taped over on his face, running from his temple all the way down his cheek. One of his fingers was in a splint.

When the door shut again, he said, “You’re with her, aren’t you? Please. I’ll pay you—I have money stashed away—”

“Shut up,” Cain said, striding forward. He stood across the table and planted his hands down, leaning in. “You will answer my questions, or I’ll make those injuries feel pleasant in comparison. Understand?”

Grant nodded, eyes wide in terror.

“How did you manage to kidnap the devil?”

“I hired people. They found him drunk one night and took him. It was easy—one dose of a sedative and he went down.”

“What kind of sedative?”

“I don’t know.” At the look Cain gave him, he added, “I don’t! I let those guys handle it.”

“So there wasn’t anything special about it?”

“Special how?”

Cain considered him a moment. Grant was too panicked to keep up an act; he really didn’t know anything about it. Apparently Lucifer had been as susceptible to drugs as any human, and he really had been getting drunk every night.

“And while you were holding him?” he asked. “Did you need special restraints?”

Grant licked his lips, still nervous. “Yes. He broke out of handcuffs like they were nothing, but they weren’t damaged. Just unlocked. So we had to bind him all up in industrial rope. He couldn’t break it.”

“Industrial rope?” Cain repeated. “That’s it?”

“Yes. I swear.”

“And the girl you kidnapped with him?”

Grant looked at him blankly. “What about her?”

Cain went around the table, gripped Grant by the throat, and pushed back until he had him pinned against the wall. He kicked the chair out of the way. “Did anything happen to Lucifer when you brought her in? Did she do anything noteworthy? Did anything happen between them that wasn’t normal?”

Grant sputtered, and Cain relaxed his hold just enough to allow the imbecile to gasp out a few words. “Devil—his face—”

“Chloe Decker,” Cain ordered. “Tell me what happened with her.”

“Nothing! He just—wanted to protect her—”

Cain let go, and Grant slumped to the floor, clutching his throat. Useless. This fool was utterly useless; it’d been pure luck that he’d managed to hold Lucifer as long as he had, and he had no idea anything special was going on with the devil or the woman who had such a large influence over him.

Either something else was at play that he couldn’t work out yet, or Chloe didn’t always need to be around Lucifer to make him vulnerable. He needed to watch them up close to figure out what was really going on.

There was nothing else for him here. He had a plane to catch and a work transfer to arrange.

He rapped on the door once, and Larson opened it for him. Cain paused beside the man. “Did anyone else come by here to have a conversation with him?”

Larson hesitated. “No, but… he only got those injuries the other night. He swears up and down that some woman showed up to do it to him, and keeps going on about how she’ll come back to torture him for real. We didn’t find any evidence of it, though, and he’s crazy. He believes he kidnapped the devil. So who knows what he did to himself?”

One half of Cain’s lips tugged up in a little smirk to himself. It seemed Mazikeen had been busy. “Just ignore him,” he said, and walked off.

Chloe didn’t even make it to her desk the next morning when the lieutenant intercepted her. “Decker,” he called. She turned to see him walking towards her. “What are you doing here?”

She frowned. “Um. Working? I just got back yesterday.”

“Yes, I know. Lucifer told me you got hurt rescuing him.” His eyes roved over her face. “Sure looks it.”

Gee, thanks. “I’ll be fine.”

“He said you had a concussion, a sprained knee, and a banged up shoulder, on top of the usual.”

Since when did Lucifer report every minor injury to her boss? “Yeah,” she said slowly, though she was fairly certain her concussion was gone by now, and her shoulder was only a little stiff when she moved it the wrong way. Her knee still hurt sometimes, but she’d dealt with far worse.

“Sounds like you should go home and get some rest. I need my detectives in good shape. The last thing I’d want is for you to overdo it, especially after the last incident.”

An odd way of saying she’d been on death’s door recently. “Lucifer put you up to this, didn’t he?”

The lieutenant didn’t bother to deny it. He’d never been overly caring about her personal life. “Yes. I owed him a favor and so now you’re getting two weeks off, no vacation time needed. Do whatever you like with it.”

“What if I don’t want time off?” she said, trying to figure out if she should be annoyed or grateful to Lucifer for it. Why would he waste his favor like that?

“Think of it as mandatory medical leave. You should’ve been off for longer after you got poisoned, anyway, and you don’t have any active cases. Do you really want to turn down a vacation?”

“No,” she said. It was completely unexpected, since she’d thought the favor was already that she’d gotten time off to go to Vegas, but for once, a break sounded really nice. While she’d been anxious to get back to work after the poisoning, it’d been under different circumstances. She’d gone through so much else now that it would be good to have a few days where she could actually recoup.

“Then I’ll see you in two weeks. Don’t do anything else to get yourself hurt.”

He walked off. Chloe stared after him for another moment before Dan approached her. “Hey,” he said. Like everyone else, his eyes searched her face in a way she was getting sick of. “You okay?”

“Yeah. All good.”

“So some nutjob really kidnapped Lucifer because he calls himself the devil?” Dan shook his head. “Not the reason I thought someone would ever kidnap him, to be honest.”

“You thought someone would kidnap him?”

“Well, with the amount of trouble he manages to get himself into? I expected something to happen.”

Good point. “It’s taken care of, at least.”

He nodded. “And, um. What’s the situation with… you know. His new wife?”

“They’re getting an annulment. Turns out it was all a ploy to manipulate his mom, and—and me.” She took a breath, still not thrilled by it. “We had a long talk about things, and he finally told me what was going on with him.”

“Do I want to know?”

“Nope,” she said. “You really do not.”

“Then I’m staying out of it. So what’s the deal with him? Are you kicking him to the curb?”

Chloe couldn’t help thinking of him and Charlotte—Goddess—again, wondering if Dan would really be able to stay out of it now. He’d already been more… in it than he knew. “No. We’re working it out—he’ll be back to work once his ribs heal a little. I’m making him wait, and apparently, he decided that meant he should arrange for me to take a two week vacation.”

“Wait, really? You’re off for the next two weeks?”

She nodded. “I’ll take Trixie, since I won’t have anything else to do.”

“Okay. I can still take her out to dinner or something if she wants.”

“Sounds good. Oh, and by the way, please still don’t tell Charlotte anything about where I was or that Lucifer is back.”

He held up his hands. “Trust me, I don’t plan on talking to her about anything. Like I said, I’m staying out of it.”

Yeah, it was still weird. “See you later, then.”

There was nothing else to do but turn around and walk right back out of the building. Two whole weeks of no work and no pressing problems and no serious injuries to heal from. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had that.

She couldn’t totally relax, though, at least not yet. Dan might not want to talk to Charlotte, but Chloe had to. Goddess would find out Lucifer was back sooner or later, so they’d need to have this little chat before she worked it out. And now Chloe had plenty of time to make it happen on her own terms.

She drove to Charlotte’s law firm, thinking of how odd it was that a literal goddess was hanging around as a cutthroat attorney and actually doing a good job of it. It was supposed to be a punishment for her, but Chloe didn’t think she was suffering all that much. She might consider using human law to be beneath her, but screwing people over seemed right up her alley.

“I’m here to see Charlotte Richards,” she told the receptionist.

“Do you have an appointment?”

“No. Just give her my name. She’ll want to talk to me.”

It was only a moment later that she was told to head upstairs.

Goddess was in her office, waiting for her. Chloe had never been in this particular room, but it was exactly what she’d have expected to find in a law firm like this, all the furniture and paneling tastefully appointed and screaming corporate wealth. The pops of color were nice, but they could never warm the place up when its occupant was sitting there with such a cool, cunning look. “Detective,” she said, clasping her hands on the desk. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

For the third time that day, Chloe’s face was studied over. Goddess raised her brows, but didn’t say anything about it as Chloe took one of the chairs in front of the desk. She leaned back, crossing one leg over the other, making sure to appear relaxed and confident. Then she took a moment to study Goddess in turn, looking for any hint that she wasn’t human, that she’d once had the ability to level cities and it was only her borrowed body that kept that power in check. There was nothing. But she still knew.

She was sitting face to face with a goddess. Someone who’d already tried to kill her once. She wasn’t frightened, exactly, but she was all too aware that Goddess would hurt her if she really wanted to.

So different from talking to the devil. Or to hell’s top demon.

She lifted her chin a fraction. “You were right before. I think we’re overdue for a chat. A real one this time.” It wasn’t even entirely a lie. All their other dealings had been about a case, or the trial, or bizarrely, her relationship with Lucifer while she interviewed Goddess at the precinct. The phone call hardly counted either. Chloe might know who Charlotte really was now, and some of the things she’d done, but she needed to reconcile it all with her directly.

“All right, then.” Goddess leaned back, too, her eyes never leaving Chloe. A faint smile was playing around her lips. “How was your trip? I can see you really did have a rough time of it. At least now I know you weren’t lying, since Lucifer would never have done that to you.”

Chloe raised her brows. “You didn’t believe me?”

“He would tell you where he is before he tells me, and I don’t exactly have a reason to trust you.”

Yep. Goddess really did view her as a threat. “You seem to know why he left. Care to fill me in?”

“Not particularly. It concerns his family, his life in Los Angeles. Private business.”

That was rich, considering Chloe herself was at the very center of it all. Not to mention that he’d left partially because of the person saying that to her. “Well, then, I don’t know why you think I could help him. He obviously doesn’t want to be found, and he decided he didn’t want to talk to me either. He still won’t even tell me about his actual family.”

Goddess hummed a little. “Tell me, Ms. Decker—”

“Chloe.”

“Chloe.” The smile grew a fraction. “Why is it that you care so much for Lucifer, exactly? Just because he’s your partner? Because of the things he does for you? You may be… a decent person”—she said the words as if that was a flaw—“but I can’t imagine you’d overlook the fact that he’s the devil for no reason.”

She couldn’t know that Chloe believed everything now, but she did believe that Chloe didn’t have a choice but to care for Lucifer. She was prodding. Trying to see the cracks in the mirage. “What is it you think makes him the devil, exactly?” Chloe said, mimicking Goddess’ first question. “Because I haven’t seen anything from him to warrant that description. Not even with him pulling this disappearing stunt. Yes, he’s my partner, and yes, he’s helped me more than anyone. But I could give a hundred reasons on top of that. He’s my friend, and a very decent person worth knowing.”

Goddess considered her. “He is absolutely worth knowing, and he does deserve something good in his life. Do you think you’re what he deserves? Do you think you’re worth knowing, if it’s not the best thing for him?”

“Why wouldn’t it be the best thing for him?” Chloe uncrossed her legs, shifting forward just a little. “Whether I impressed you or not, I know you don’t like me. So let’s hear it.”

“I don’t like or dislike you personally. I only care what’s best for Lucifer. And I don’t think you’re it. You’re chaining him down to a life he wasn’t meant to lead—he was meant for so much more than to be some police consultant, squatting around in that filthy, squalid building of human pettiness, running around fixing all their little problems and upholding the meaningless laws they make for themselves. He risks his life for it—for you. You have no idea what he’d sacrifice for you. He puts you above anyone else, even himself. No matter what it costs him. And while you’ve proven you might be willing to sacrifice for him, I can’t stand by while he destroys himself for you.”

Chloe’s mouth parted a little before she remembered she was playing a role here. This went so far beyond Goddess being jealous of her that she didn’t know what to say to that.

Now she knows exactly how far I’ll go to save you…

Lucifer had mentioned something along those lines, but she still didn’t know what he’d meant. And apparently he’d been downplaying it, because there was something about the way Goddess was saying it now that told Chloe there was more to it than just putting himself in the line of fire or something.

Finally she said, “That’s what partners do. What real friends do. I wouldn’t ever try to tell him he can’t protect me, and I certainly don’t get to dictate what he chooses to do with his life. If he wants to be a consultant, that’s his choice.”

“What if it wasn’t?”

“No one is forcing him to do it. And trying to force him to quit would be just as bad.”

Goddess’ mouth tightened. Even if she did believe Lucifer was manipulated into being a consultant, that last comment had landed as intended. “I just want him to realize it’s not what’s best for him. Surely you can see how it isn’t.”

“I don’t get to decide what’s best for him. He does.” Chloe looked at the name plate on the desk, and Goddess followed her gaze. “You asked me why I care, but really, I should be asking you that question. You were fine with hurting him just to prove a point, and your career hasn’t exactly been based on compassion. To be perfectly honest, I get the impression that Lucifer can’t stand you. So who is he to you?”

Her expression soured that much more. Chloe was starting to enjoy herself. She’d expected the insults and didn’t put any store in them, but Lucifer had been right; it was easy to get under Goddess’ skin.

“I’m his family,” she said. “Even if you don’t know about his past, you must know that he had a fraught relationship with his father?”

Chloe had to work to keep her expression even. That was certainly one way of putting it. “Yes, I know that much.”

Goddess’ expression started to take on more than a little bit of condescension as she spoke. “Well, I had the great misfortune of being in a relationship with his father for a time. He hardly gave his children the time of day, but I cared for all of them, very much. So when he kicked Lucifer out of the house in as brutal a way as possible, I tried to step in and make him see reason. It got me thrown out too. With all the… hell that his father put him through before, Lucifer deserves better now. And I want to see that he gets it. So you can understand how I am, in fact, very important to him, despite our occasional… disagreement.”

Wow. Way to spin that in her favor. She was acting like she was a perfectly innocent victim who selflessly loved Lucifer, and that he was just headstrong about it, the way children sometimes didn’t understand how their parents loved them.

Goddess clasped her hands on the desk, clearly feeling like she had the upper hand again. “I’ll level with you, Chloe. Lucifer’s father is a manipulative bastard, and he’s never content to leave him alone, even after throwing him out like that. He’s interfering in Lucifer’s life even now, with power so far above your station that you could never hope to understand it. That’s why Lucifer is so upset right now. And that’s why, when he comes back, you should let him deal with it instead of drawing him back into your life.”

There it was. The first hint of whatever her goal was. “Ah,” Chloe said carefully. “So what, exactly, do you want him to do? Because if he has to deal with someone that powerful, it sounds to me like I should be helping him instead of leaving him to do it on his own.”

“That’s the problem, Chloe. He won’t do it at all if you’re there in his life. It can’t be both ways—he can’t be your partner and put a stop to his father’s interference at the same time. As I said.” Her lip curled, just a little. “It’s too far above you for you to understand.”

It was patronizing whether Chloe knew the truth or not. She was pretty sure Goddess would say the same thing even if she was aware of all the facts, too.

“As long as Lucifer thinks you might need him, he’ll choose you over his family. He’ll never be focused enough to use his own power the way he should. So if you care about him, then tell him to stop running. Tell him you don’t need him anymore.”

“Seriously?” Chloe said. “‘If you love someone, set them free?’ That’s what you’re going with right now?” She filed that tidbit about using his own power away to consider later. If she hadn’t known the full truth, it might have seemed like Goddess meant the power Lucifer had through his network of favors, but as it was, that didn’t seem to fit. Lucifer would probably know what it actually meant. The only thing Chloe was starting to be sure of was that Goddess wanted him to go after God, and that was a frightening thought.

“I’m not entirely sure what you mean, but that’s about it, yes. Stop dragging him down and let him take his life back.”

“Right. I can’t help him, but you’ll be there the whole time to support him.”

Goddess looked smug now as she said, “That’s exactly it. I’m his mother—for all intents and purposes—and I will see to it that he gets what he needs.”

Chloe scoffed. “You know what I think?”

“And what would that be?” The smug look never went away.

“I think you’re mad at his father for being manipulative, and yet you want to manipulate Lucifer yourself. Worse, actually—you want me to manipulate him too.” What was it with his family and manipulation? For the first time, Chloe thought that maybe it’d unintentionally helped lead Lucifer to planning on manipulating her in Vegas. He was so much better than his parents, but that didn’t mean they hadn’t affected him. And he’d been living with real and imagined manipulation all his life.

It made it just a little easier to forgive him for it. “I won’t do it,” she said.

The smile was finally wiped from Goddess’ face. “I want to help him see what’s right for him. His judgment is too clouded when you’re involved.”

“For someone who claims to care about him so much, and who claims to want him to reach his full potential, you don’t seem to think he’s all that smart or capable. I trust my nine-year-old more than that.”

Goddess studied her for a moment. Chloe could feel the tension between them rising, taking on a sharper edge. “Let me break something to you, then,” Goddess said, something like a cruel gleam in her eye. “The simple fact is that Lucifer might not even want to be partners with you anymore. There’s a reason he hasn’t been returning your calls. He doesn’t feel that he can trust you, and nothing you say will change that until he deals with his father once and for all. So you might as well just close the door the last inch for him. It’d save your dignity, if nothing else.”

A week ago, those statements would have hurt the way Goddess obviously intended them to hurt her. But now, Chloe knew perfectly well that none of it was true. The closest was Lucifer not trusting her, but she had been able to talk him out of thinking that way.

So Chloe just gave Goddess a little smile of her own and decided to dish it right back to her. “Actually, Lucifer called me yesterday. He said he’d needed a break from both his parents screwing him over, but that he missed being partners and wanted to pick up our relationship where we left off.”

Goddess’ mouth dropped open, all sense of superiority gone in an instant. “That can’t be true.”

Sure wasn’t, but she could think it was for a little while. “It is. He apologized and everything, and now I can understand why he left more than ever. Apparently he went to Mexico City to blow off steam and think over his options, and he decided that he’s tired of being played for a fool, so when he gets back tomorrow he’s just going to do what he wants and stop playing that game entirely.” Chloe tilted her head, eyes sweeping over Goddess. “I guess you’re part of what he doesn’t want.”

Goddess shot to her feet, outraged. “You do not,” she seethed, “want to start your own game with me.”

Chloe stood, too, much more calmly. “I’m not starting anything.” She totally was. “I just wanted to know what it is that Lucifer still won’t tell me, and to make it clear that I’m not a pushover. Neither is Lucifer. I won’t be used to manipulate him, and if he’d rather live his own life than confront his family, that’s his choice.”

She had no idea what would end up happening, whether Lucifer would actually want to go after his father if given the chance, but she was fairly certain Lucifer wouldn’t throw his life away to do it. He’d been making it clear that he didn’t want to go back to heaven despite all of Goddess’ attempts to turn his focus in that direction, and if he wanted revenge or something, he would have tried it by now instead of spending the last six years having fun in Los Angeles.

“Fine, then.” Goddess let out a long, slow exhale, but the ire hadn’t gone anywhere. “If Lucifer wants to ignore the injustices done to him, then I’ll handle things myself. It’s only a matter of time.”

Because that wasn’t ominous. However Goddess thought she was going to handle things couldn’t be good news for the rest of them. “I’ll be sure to tell him that,” Chloe said. “Since you have his best interests at heart.”

She wasn’t going to get anything more from her now, not when Goddess was angry and thought she couldn’t tell Chloe anything specific about her plans to get to heaven. She’d accomplished what she’d set out to do, so she left, keenly aware of Goddess’ eyes on her back the entire way out.

“Oh my god, what happened to you?” Linda asked with a start.

“Funny you should say that when my father is behind so much of what’s happened to me.” Lucifer shut the door to her office and lowered himself onto the couch. Four days after leaving that bloody basement and his ribs still hurt when he moved certain ways. At least pain meds worked on him all the time now too. They dulled the worst of it, and he was plenty used to moving around with injuries.

It was just plain annoying to still be injured at all when it was because of humans he’d usually be able to dispatch with one hand while drinking whiskey with the other, never spilling a drop. It would have made engaging in his usual activities more interesting, too, but admittedly he still didn’t care for the thought of them.

Linda gaped at him a moment longer and then rose from her desk to take her usual spot in the chair opposite him. “God did that to you?”

The bruises on his face had turned all sorts of lovely colors, dark blues and purples with lighter areas tinged yellow and green. At least he managed to be impressive even when it came to this. “If you’re referring to my new aesthetic of ‘devil who’s had his face done in,’ then no. He didn’t do this directly, but it wouldn’t have happened if not for his choice to have divinity warp human minds.”

Linda shook her head in a jerky movement, as if trying to clear it. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Well, let’s see. While I was… absent, an old acquaintance decided he wanted to possess my wings again, so he had me kidnapped. It turns out I’m always vulnerable to humans now, and they used me for punching practice when I refused. But that’s old news. Listen, Doctor.” He pressed his palms onto his thighs, just above his knees. It awakened the bruises he had there, too, but he ignored it. “I screwed up—I hurt the detective, and now… now I need you to tell me how to fix it.”

It’d been eating away at him all night. Longer. She might be giving him another chance, but she also flung out little quips about it at every opportunity, so it was obvious she wasn’t just going to forget about it. He kept thinking of the way she’d been looking at him at first, the things she’d said. He felt the burning need to keep apologizing, but she’d said she didn’t want that anymore. So he had to figure out what to do instead.

“What do you mean, you hurt her?” Linda asked. “Because you left and wouldn’t reach out?”

“That would be part of it, yes,” he said, wincing. He supposed he was going to have to explain all of it again. “Did she say something to you?”

Linda pursed her lips. She was already getting over her surprise, switching back to therapist mode. “She asked if I’d heard from you a few times. She didn’t say anything about how she felt except that she was worried, but I could kind of tell anyway. Especially since I know you two kissed before she got poisoned, and I’m pretty sure you didn’t get into a fight before you left.”

“No,” he said, letting out a breath. “No, we didn’t.” He told her then. About what he’d learned the night everything had changed. About leaving for Vegas so he could figure out what to do next. About marrying Candy, and getting kidnapped, and Chloe and Maze getting him out.

Linda just listened, open-mouthed, occasionally asking a question but otherwise letting him talk. “Wow,” she said. “I’m glad you’re both okay. So Chloe…”

“She knows everything now. Well. Not everything—I still haven’t told her about Uriel or my most recent jaunt to hell—but everything else important.” He was fine with delaying that conversation for a good long while. Maybe he’d never tell her. What difference did it make? It was over and didn’t affect her anymore.

“How is she doing with it? I didn’t know—I should reach out, help her if she needs it…”

He gave her a wry little smile. “Perhaps you should, but her freakout was rather short-lived. She just kept bullying me into getting medical care and then chewing me out for how I handled things.”

“Ah,” Linda said carefully. “I have to say, I commend her for it. I don’t think I would have been able to do the same. I’m glad she wasn’t afraid.”

“Yes, well.” He fiddled with a seam at the edge of the couch cushion. “I thought it was because of the miracle, but she kept insisting it wasn’t.”

“Yeah, that’s…. that’s a big thing to wrap my mind around. I mean, an actual, honest-to-god miracle? Literally, I guess.”

“Yes. She kept saying that miracle or not, her feelings are entirely her own, and that she doesn’t view me differently because of it. I want to believe that, but it doesn’t change the fact that… that we… we would never have happened without my father’s interference.”

“Well, maybe in a literal sense, but that doesn’t mean that’s why she’s here,” Linda said. “You really don’t know anything else about it?”

“No. Nothing. And of course Amenadiel is absolutely useless when it comes to this, too.” He reached for the water on the table, suddenly restless. He’d had enough of talking about the miracle again; Linda was likely to say the same things Chloe had and then use her therapist talk to somehow wrap it back around to his feelings, and he simply wasn’t in the mood for that right now.

“Anyway, that’s not why I’m here. The point is, I messed up by marrying Candy instead of telling Chloe the truth, and even though she’s told me not to, I feel bad for putting her life in danger and making her go to Vegas for me. So.” He put the pitcher back down and took a sip from the glass. “How do I fix it?”

“Uh-huh.” Linda regarded him for a moment. “Please don’t tell me you think you just have to do one thing for her and then Chloe will act like nothing happened?”

He sighed. “No. I don’t think that. But I still… I just…” He set the glass of water down and turned his palms up. “I need to do something. She’s already going back to being partners, but it… it doesn’t feel like enough.”

“You feel bad for putting her through that, and you want to make amends.”

“Yes.”

“There’s no simple answer to that, Lucifer. It’s not something you can fix with flowers or a magic set of words. Earning forgiveness, making up for a mistake… it takes time and sincerity. You need to show her you regret it, and that you understand why it was wrong and that you won’t do it again.”

“She already knows that, though. We talked about it. So that first thing—that’s what I don’t get. How do I show her I’m trying to make up for it?”

“If you already talked about it, then that’s a good first step. Ask her that, too. Find out what she needs from you.”

“Well, we already talked about that, too. She said she just wants me to let her in from here on out. But that can’t be enough.”

Linda hummed a little. “Think about what you did that upset her. You left without talking to her. Then you married someone else to end your relationship—which, by the way, is completely insane, and no, I don’t care if I’m not supposed to say that as your therapist—” Lucifer rolled his eyes. “—but anyway, the point is that she was hurt because you tried to push her away. It seems to me like that’s why she might just want you to never do that again. So if you want to make up for it, then do the opposite.”

“But how?”

She gave him a half-smile. “That’s up to you. Be attentive. Ask what she needs. Tell her when those secret crazy celestial planning sessions happen. Be her partner outside of work, and let her be yours.”

He scoffed. Those things were already a given, too, except the last one, and Chloe had already made it clear she wanted that from him. Linda was once again being as useless as Amenadiel.

“So, about why you left,” Linda started, and he groaned. Here they were again. “I think we should talk about it. About your feelings on your father possibly manipulating you.”

“Or we could not do that,” Lucifer said. “There’s nothing to talk about. My father is a conniving bastard, and my mother isn’t that far off, and now even if what the detective and I had was real, I can never have that with her. It’s over.”

“Lucifer—”

His phone went off. He pulled it out and saw who was calling.

“They really should change that saying to ‘speak of the goddess,’” he muttered, ignoring the call. He didn’t even want to reject it, because that would still be giving his mother a reaction. “Why does she keep calling when I start talking about her?”

“I take it you haven’t told her you’re back?”

“Of course not. She can deal with it a while longer. I’m sure she’ll find out soon enough.”

“She did go to hell for you,” Linda said. “She probably wants to know you’re okay, just like we did.”

“Yes, well, I don’t really care right now. What was it you said? There’s no one single action that will set things right with the detective? That would also apply to Mum. When she actually starts giving a damn about me outside of life-and-death situations, then maybe I’ll change my mind.”

The call ended. Two seconds later it went off again.

“Maybe you should think about what you want from her and apply that to how you handle things with Chloe,” Linda suggested.

“Finally a helpful answer.” Maybe he would use that. Mostly he wanted his mother to leave him alone, which would be the opposite of what Chloe wanted from him, but if he was ever going to forgive her the way she wanted him to, Mum would have to do a lot of things differently. So what would Chloe want him to do differently?

The phone went off for a third time. “Oh, for the love of…” He silenced the call and then put the whole phone on mute. Three texts followed shortly after.

Lucifer, pick up

I know you’re returning to Los Angeles

We need to talk

“I have a feeling the detective paid her a visit,” he said. He hadn’t known Chloe was planning to do that now. Even though he couldn’t have been there, he really wanted to know what’d happened, down to every last word and look between them.

He texted Chloe. Did you happen to speak with my mother?

Yes, she responded back. I’m on my way to Lux. I’ll tell you about it then.

“Got to go,” Lucifer said, standing up. “Nice chat.”

“Wait—I really do think we should talk about this more—”

“Bye,” he said in a sing-song voice, waving his fingers back and forth as he flashed Linda a smile at the door. He left before she could keep going on about it.

Back at the penthouse, he poured himself a drink and sat gingerly on the piano bench, thinking about what Linda had said. Maybe he didn’t have to do anything special for Chloe to forgive him—she already had, in the way that mattered most, just by letting him back into her life—but he knew that it still dogged them, and that she wasn’t going to be okay with it just like that. He felt like he had to do something to make up for it, something where they could focus on that and not what he’d done.

Be partners outside of work…

He still wasn’t really sure what that meant. They used to see each other outside of work sometimes; they’d been friends already, and now anything on top of that was right out. But if Chloe wanted him around more, then maybe…

He’d barely gotten halfway through his drink when the elevator opened again. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Chloe striding inside like she owned the place. And then she stopped dead. She wasn’t looking at him, though. Her eyes were darting around the room like she was assessing a threat.

Lucifer had a bad feeling about it. There was no reason for her to react like that unless she was reacting to him, and she clearly wasn’t. She’d been hesitant about coming up here yesterday too.

I saw the penthouse. She’d texted him that the night before her last message, when she’d told him she wouldn’t bother him anymore. That was it, wasn’t it? That had been the final straw for her. She’d found the penthouse arranged for a long stay away and now she didn’t want to be here anymore.

It didn’t look that way now, though. He’d had someone up here before they even got back to Los Angeles to tidy things up again. He’d never seen it the way she had, and now he didn’t know what to do about it. One more thing for him to make up for. He was already failing at it, it seemed.

Chloe shook her head while he sat there, guilt tugging at him once more. She seemed to settle back into that same sense of purpose she’d walked in with. “Your mother and I had an interesting conversation,” she said, stepping forward again.

He swallowed. Later. He would just add that to the list. “I assumed as much from the fact that she started blowing up my phone again.” He stood. “Care for a drink? I know I always need one before, during, and after a conversation with her.”

“Yeah, I can see why. I mean, I always thought she was a piece of work, but when she’s being that upfront about it?” She shook her head again. Lucifer had already lifted the decanter, about to pour out a generous amount of his favorite scotch for her, but she decided not to wait. She just lifted his own glass to her lips and took a drink, eyes narrowing a hair as she swallowed. “I always forget how smooth this stuff is. Why do I never take you up on offers for drinks, again?”

“Beats me, Detective. But then I don’t understand a lot of the things you enjoy or don’t enjoy.” He raised the decanter in offer, and she held out his—her—glass so he could add a little more. Even with the impending news about his mother, he rather liked her doing that. “Wasn’t it usually something about being responsible and not drinking before noon?”

“Well, it’s twelve thirty and you apparently decided to net me a vacation, so I don’t care today.” She eyed him. “Why did you waste your favor on me like that, anyway? I wasn’t that badly hurt. Not like before.”

A flicker of an idea formed in his mind. He made note of it and tucked it away for later. “I’d hardly call it a waste. We’ve been working together for a year now and there were a grand total of three days that you took off besides ones that followed a hospital stay or the ones for the trial. They weren’t even consecutive days, Detective. And they were all for your offspring.” Once when Trixie was sick, once when she had some sort of school event, and once when Chloe had taken her to a children’s concert. They hardly counted as time off.

“Okay, but so what? Why now?”

“Because…” He hesitated, not sure what to tell her. It was related to wanting to make up for Vegas, but he didn’t want to make it seem like it was that one single action that would mean he didn’t have to do anything else now. “I just figured it would be nice, since you were away from your needy spawn in order to come get me. Badly hurt or not, you still got injured because of me, right after you almost died. You should take the time to heal. And, you know.” He gave her a fleeting smile. “You’re making me do the same thing, and I can’t have you solving cases without me.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. Whatever you say, Lucifer.” She took another sip of the scotch and then went over to the couch.

He followed, choosing the armchair across from her. “Well, don’t keep me in suspense. Please tell me you got a few insults and cutting remarks in?”

“Sure did,” she said, something like satisfaction crossing her face. “I decided to take your advice and annoy the shit out of her. Only I think I just ended up making her really mad instead.”

“Both are excellent. What did you say to her?”

“First I told her why I care about you when she questioned that, then I listened to her tell me all the ways I was ruining your life, and then I asked why she cares about you, since from what I could see she’s the one making you miserable.”

“Fantastic,” he said, raising his glass in a toast. “I’m sure she just loved that.”

“Oh, yes. She got all high and mighty—which, I guess, makes sense since, you know… anyway.” She shook her head at herself and went on, “I feigned total ignorance over who she was to you, so she explained it to me in very small words and made it clear that only she knew what was best for you. I disagreed.”

He snorted. “Of course you did, since you’re not an idiot.”

One half of her mouth turned up. “I’m so glad you think so. Yeah, she tried to put herself in a good light, but unfortunately for her, I know what she doesn’t want me to know. Honestly, I don’t think I would have believed it anyway—I’ve seen through too much bullshit before not to recognize the heap of it she was trying to pile on me.”

“So what was it exactly that pissed her off so much?”

“Well, she tried to convince me that if I truly cared about you, I should get you to listen to her and cut all ties with you. I decided I wasn’t going to be doing that and gave her a piece of my mind on how manipulative she was being. Then to finish it off, I—uh.” She pressed her lips together, looking sheepish as she said, “Um, I sort of told her that you called me yesterday to say that you were sick of your parents’ crap and just wanted to be with me anyway.”

He almost choked, managing to swallow back his mouthful of scotch before he set the glass aside.

“Look, I only said it because I knew she’d hate it,” Chloe said quickly. “Obviously it’s not the truth. I’m not… you know, expecting anything—”

“I know.” He should have seen it coming, but his mind always tried to skirt any serious notion of them being together anymore, unless it was to lament the fact that it was never going to happen. “No, I don’t have a problem with that. No wonder she called me ten times in twenty minutes.”

“It was worth it. I really got to rub her nose in the fact that you want me in your life more than her, which isn’t even really a lie.”

“It is definitely not a lie.”

She smiled a little. “Although I think I might have officially become her enemy for that. Especially once she finds out the truth.”

He waved his hand dismissively. “You were already her enemy. No offense.”

“Full offense from her. Zero from you.”

He grinned. “I guess we’ll see what she does with that when I finally deign to answer her calls. I’d say she’s sufficiently annoyed enough to tell me what she’s thinking.”

“She already told me quite a bit. Nothing specific, obviously, since she doesn’t think I know who you guys really are, but it’s pretty clear to me that she wants you to get revenge on God.”

It was a good thing he’d already put the glass down, because his hand reflexively clenched into a fist. “Of course she does. What could possibly have made her think I would do that, I have no idea. I made it very clear that I want nothing to do with the Silver City.”

“She doesn’t think you want to do it at all. That’s why she was trying to get me to push you in that direction.” Chloe reached into her jacket and withdrew a notepad, the same kind she used at crime scenes. “What?” she said defensively, glancing up at him.

He might have been smirking a little in amusement. “You took notes?”

“When I got back to the car. I wanted to write down anything that stood out to me, just in case. Sue me.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it, my dear,” he said, and she threw him a distinctly unamused look. There was something odd going on in his chest. Those bloody ribs again.

She flipped over to the right page. “So yeah, there was the part about wanting you to rely exclusively on her in this little dance with heaven, so that she can put you on the ‘right’ path. The one that’s best for you, without me in it. She said something outright about dealing with your father once and for all.”

“Wonderful,” he grumbled, flicking his eyes towards the ceiling. “So she truly hasn’t given up on going back to heaven. Why she’s insisting on dragging me with her, I don’t understand. She’s welcome to plot all on her own.”

“Well, she might be doing just that,” Chloe said. “Before I left, she told me she would handle things herself if she had to. That it was only, and I quote, ‘a matter of time.’ She said it like she knows something I don’t.”

Lucifer thought that over for a moment, the humor rapidly disappearing. He wasn’t surprised that she was already thinking of ignoring all his orders and finding a way back to heaven on her own, but the issue was that she had no way of doing that in a human body. Had Mum been referencing some plot she’d figured out? Or had she just meant that eventually, she’d find a way?

Chloe was waiting for his assessment. “I’m not sure,” he said. “As far as I know, she can’t do anything. But then, that was the point of poking her. Maybe she’ll enlighten me sooner now. Anything else?”

“Yeah. She said that as long as we’re partners, you’ll never be focused enough to use your own power. She was talking about putting your foot down with God there too, and she was using broad descriptions of God being powerful to explain how he could interfere with your life. But I didn’t want to make any assumptions, so what do you think? Was she talking about an actual angelic power or something?”

“Devilish power, more like,” he said automatically, most of his mind turning that description over. “She used that exact word?”

“Yes.”

He looked through the windows to the balcony, thinking. He’d had plenty of power in hell, but it didn’t extend to Earth or heaven. The closest he had to power right now was through his mojo, which would be useless in a fight. His physical strength was better than that of humans, and slightly better than that of most of his siblings, but not enough for it to be what Mum meant. And other than that…

He’d only ever had one other power in his life. The one that had earned him the title Lightbringer. It was one that had eluded him in hell, and one he’d never bothered trying to use on Earth. He’d disavowed it as belonging to heaven, choosing instead to embrace a metaphorical light for himself. His name was a little screw you to his father for casting him into darkness, but that was all there was to it now.

Even if he could summon light here, that had to be useless in a fight, too. It wasn’t destructive on its own. It just… was.

“I don’t know about that, either,” he said, turning back to Chloe. “I don’t have any powers that would let me break through to heaven. Trust me, I’ve tried. My father put up a barrier keyed to me specifically.” He’d tried again and again after he’d healed some from his fall, throwing himself against that barrier over and over out of sheer rage. He could be banished from heaven; he’d had no desire to live there anymore. But he’d wanted them to feel what they’d done to him.

It was probably a good thing that he hadn’t been able to get through.

“What powers do you have, then?” Chloe asked curiously. “You make it sound like you have some. I thought there was nothing else to you being the devil.”

He sighed. “There’s nothing else physically besides my wings and my face, but you know about my mojo, and I had other powers in hell. I could control the realm to a certain extent.”

She raised her brows, processing that fact.

“And I could create light while I still called myself an angel. Mum called me Lightbringer because of it. That’s over with now, though, and it wouldn’t do anything in whatever war she apparently thinks I’ll be fighting.”

Chloe considered that, too. “At least you know what she’s angling for now. You… you wouldn’t actually want to confront your dad, right? Even if she cleared the way for you?”

“No,” he said, fingers curling over the arm of the chair. “No, I wouldn’t.”

“Not even now?” she pressed. “Because of… you know. Me.”

He looked at her. Saw the worry in her eyes. She knew perfectly well that it would only end in disaster. “No,” he said, more quietly this time, but in a way that emphasized how much he meant it. “If he’d like to explain to me why he did it, I’ll listen. But I’m not going back to the Silver City because of it. I don’t want anything to do with him. And I certainly don’t want to be drawn into a war between the two of them.”

She studied his face for another moment, and then nodded. “Good,” she said. “Because I really don’t want you to either. If you felt you needed to, I’d try to have your back. But I just want you here, and I…” She looked away. “I’d be afraid of what would happen. Not that I think you can’t hold your own, it’s just… it’s God. He already threw you to hell once before. And if two gods get into it…”

“That is precisely why I’ve been doing my best to discourage Mum from continuing down that road.” He drained the last of his scotch, relishing in the quiet burn, the way he felt it working its way through him. He’d learned the hard way that a war with his father would never end well, no matter who was doing the fighting. And he had no desire to risk Earth becoming a battleground.

Chloe nodded again. “Okay. Glad that’s settled. I guess we’ll just have to keep thwarting her plans until she gives up.”