i found the devil (i found him in a lover), a lucifer fanfic

i found the devil [i found him in a lover]

It's dusk when they pull up to the airfield, the sunset tiger stripes of orange and black on the horizon and the plane idling at a dull roar ahead. It's probably best not to ask where Lucifer got his hands on a private jet on short notice, or what favors he had to call in to do so, as Chloe has long since lost any fond notion that she has any idea what is actually going on. If she has already agreed to this – going into hiding for a brief period, at least it's supposed to be brief, until there's no more chance of any murderous archangels descending from heaven to take her out – then clearly, the event horizon of rationality was passed a long time ago. Better to go with it. And she can't deny there's something very, very strange, and very, very wrong, happening here. An ordinary woman, a police detective in Los Angeles, does not expect to find herself caught at ground zero of a supernatural war. She's still wrapping her head around it. Barely.

Lucifer parks the convertible, and glances sidelong at her. "You ready? Let's go."

"Yeah," Chloe says, half to herself, as they get out, he pops the trunk, and hefts their suitcases. She has a moment of wondering who's going to come pick up the car, as clearly Lucifer isn't going to just leave it in the bushes for some local automotive enthusiast to stumble on, but decides that's another thing it's best not to mention. She glances down at her phone, resisting the urge, yet again, to call Trixie. Lucifer says that she's the target, so taking her daughter along would just likewise put her in danger, and she's been sent on a road trip north with Maze. No idea how that's going to work, though the idea of an ass-kicking ninja demon and an eight-year-old girl with a thing for listening to the Frozen soundtrack on repeat stuck in a car for seven hours is vaguely amusing. Chloe told Trixie it was just like the witness protection program she sometimes had to put people in, getting them away from bad guys who wanted to find them and hurt them. She's going to go on a big-girl trip to San Francisco with Maze, won't that be fun? She'll call as soon as they get to wherever they're going (Lucifer hasn't said, so nobody nefarious can overhear and follow them). They can share stories about their vacations. Take pictures. Be good and don't drive Maze too crazy. See you soon, monkey. I love you so much.

(She cried in the car the entire way over, but silently, and Lucifer pretended not to notice.)

They climb up through the weeds, vault over to the airstrip, and walk onto the runway, where a man in a blazer and jeans and bolo tie comes down the steps of the plane, greets Lucifer with a handshake and a "Mr. Morningstar," and does not ask for any ID or passports. They head up and duck inside, and Chloe, who admittedly does not have many private jets to compare it to, thinks it looks like the sort of thing a washed-up eighties coke dealer would buy, like a tacky casino in Vegas. She's surprised there isn't a damn leopard skin tacked up on the wall, and knowing Lucifer's friends, this is probably in fact a washed-up eighties coke dealer's old drug-smuggling Cessna. As an officer of the law, she should object, but later. Later.

She sits down in one of the maroon-velour seats as Lucifer shoves the bags into the overhead compartment and wedges it shut. Then he sits down across from her, with that hunted, haunted, inward look he's worn more and more often these days, such a sea change from the goofy, oblivious, inappropriate five-year-old who wanted to dance around forensics labs, take selfies with dead guys, ask murder suspects about the logistics of rooftop pot gardens, and otherwise act as if nothing could rain on his parade. That's gone now. His old self is completely lost. After he finally came out of his self-destructive tailspin, he's done his painful best to try to be normal (Dan has actually helped, offered him a Body Bags marathon to make him feel better) but it's clear that it's still mostly an act, and mostly for her sake. After everything he's already done because of her, and he can never forget it. Chloe struggles not to feel guilty about it – she never asked for it, she never knew, Lucifer made his own choices – but it does eat at her that she can't even really make it better. Just help him endure it, to try to somehow reach the other side.

Their unknown private-jet-owning friend pulls the stairs up, closes the cabin door, and they dutifully buckle up, even though there are no perky flight attendants with safety demonstrations. Lucifer remains lost in thought, staring out the window, as they start to taxi, then speed up into their takeoff roll, and roar up into the air. Chloe, used to the interminable waits and long lead time of commercial flights, is rather taken aback at how fast the whole thing is, even as she resists the urge to ask if they need to clear this with an air-traffic control tower somewhere. The light-bodied Cessna bounces a few times on its way above the smoky, glittering metropolis of Los Angeles quickly falling away below, and she sees Lucifer's knuckles go white on the armrest. Despite his cracks about punishing people who put their seats back on airplanes, it's clear that he hasn't done this much, and – god, right, he's an angel, flies-with-the-wings angel, probably can't possibly trust any rickety human contraption and doesn't want to be in it without those to back him up. Because the Devil doesn't fly. The Devil falls.

"Hey." Chloe leans over the aisle, putting a hand on his arm. "It's going to be okay, all right? We're not going to crash, but if we do, I'll strap on the parachute and save you. Promise."

"I don't doubt you would, Detective." He tries a smile, which doesn't reach his eyes. She hasn't really seen him smile in weeks. "To be sure, it would be a fitting way for me to die, plunging out of the sky. Done it once before, after all."

"Nobody's plunging anywhere." His arm is tense under her touch, but he hasn't pulled away, as he's had a habit of doing recently, so Chloe keeps it there. She has found it hard to control the urge to touch him somehow, whether just a brush of her shoulder against his chest, a hand on the shoulder, a reassuring brush. She has achingly noticed the loss of their usual physical proximity, the way they always stand tucked into each other, him covering her with his body, the way she always subconsciously thinks she might elbow him in the gut if she turns around too fast. He's back to being around her, but he's still holding himself at a careful distance, as if she's breakable, or as if he is. Testing and judging every moment, every action, every breath, to see if he can still bear to carry the impossible burden that's been loaded onto his shoulders. No wonder he looks so tense, so crunched, so tired. It's a miracle he can even stand up.

Lucifer smiles again, faintly and only with his mouth, as they bump a few more times, jostle in the jetstream, and finally level out at small-plane cruising altitude, the evening sky a stunning dark pink and orange, traceries and columns of clouds like whips of heavenly fire stretching away in the bottomless blue. Chloe wonders if this is how an angel could see the world whenever they wanted, if they do. How high one of them can fly, and not get his wings burned off like Icarus. She keeps her hand on Lucifer's wrist, thumb stroking lightly, until she says, surprising herself, "I want to give Trixie the doll you bought her."

He lifts his head slowly, confused and blinking. "What?"

"When we get back." She says that when determinedly, refuses to let it shift to if. "I know what I said, and it's true that parents don't give their kids everything they want, but. . . sometimes kids also have rich, eccentric friends who like to buy them presents behind their parents' back, even when they shouldn't." She smiles back, just as faintly and painfully. "That doesn't ruin them for life either. So. When we do. I want to give it to her, and I want to tell her it came from you."

"I. . ." Lucifer makes a motion as if reaching for the pack of cigarettes in his breast pocket, before remembering you're not allowed to smoke on an airplane. "I. . . that's not really necessary, Detective. She can think it's from you."

"But it's not, and I don't want to take your credit. She likes you, you know. She likes you a lot."

"Despite my best efforts?" A corner of his lip plucks up wryly.

"Yes, despite those," Chloe says firmly. "Which, you know, you can possibly think of letting go. I'm not saying you have to start doing her hair in the mornings and helping her with her homework, but she knows you're hurting. Kids can tell. She wants to help."

Lucifer closes his eyes. It clearly galls him that he doesn't have a smart remark to hand for this, but instead, he just sighs. "I suppose I can't really fall much farther, can I? Fine, Detective, whatever you say. As long as I don't have to play bloody Barbies."

"I'll take care of that part." Chloe pats his hand, unable to resist a slight smirk. "Lord of Hell, Prince of Darkness, Great Destroyer, whatever else, and you'd be totally undone by the sight of a pink Dream House and some glittery little high heels, huh?"

"I have no idea what those are, nor do I intend on finding out." Lucifer shudders. "But, well, if you insist, the child can have the doll. I suppose I didn't buy it just for you to keep it shut up in a closet and be a bad mother."

Chloe rolls her eyes slightly, but resists the urge to barb back at him. She knows the topic of mothers, and whether they're bad or not, has weighed heavily on his mind recently. She doesn't know what to make of his, now that she's finally had to accept that "Charlotte Richards" is just the name of the body that his celestial-being mother happens to be occupying. She seems nice enough, if rather intense, and has made no secret of the fact that she thinks Chloe is a distraction and a dangerous liability to her son – after all, if he catches a measly mortal bullet when she's around, his goose is cooked. Completely ignominious way to die, and it makes Chloe wonder why, if he could just be perfectly safe away from her, he doesn't do that.

(Not that he didn't try. Not that they weren't both completely, utterly miserable about it. As if some things, even the assurance of his own existence, aren't worth being apart.)

She tenses slightly herself at the thought, even as she can tell that Lucifer senses it; his eyes flick to hers, and then to where her hand still rests on his. Even in their damage and their distance, they have remained utterly in tune with each other, picking up those small hints and moments and glimpses of the inner war they're both fighting. But it's just them here, and will be for a while longer, and for once, neither of them can run away. "Lucifer," she says quietly. "Do you want to talk to me? About, I don't know, anything at all. Why you and Dan possibly love the Body Bags movies so much. I don't care."

Again, he tries that smile which can't make it to his eyes. "You sure you're all right yourself? After what we learned about your father?"

Chloe takes a slow, rattling breath. "I." She pauses, considers. "I'm dealing with it."

He lifts his free hand and flicks her hair off her shoulder, fingers lightly brushing her neck, the most he's ventured to touch her in weeks. It sends an odd frisson of shock through her, settling low and unexpectedly hot in her stomach, as her eyelashes flutter, she swallows, and has to briefly look away. She has felt unbalanced without him right at her side. Naked.

Neither of them say a word for some time thereafter, as the sky begins to grow darker and darker, and stars begin to spangle the heavens. Chloe wonders if it's safe to ask where they're going yet. He told her to pack for something warm, so she doubts it's the Arctic; the Devil surely can't deal well with cold temperatures, anyway. There's also a limit to how far a small plane can fly, so it's probably not the other side of the world. As long as it's not their coke-dealing aviator friend's stash hangout, as getting arrested for being an accessory to narcotics trafficking would not be much of an improvement over supernatural murder. Still, though. Hopefully he's thought of that.

Lucifer remains tense for any further jolt and bump, though the ride is mostly smooth, and finally they begin to dip and bank, circling down beneath a thin layer of cloud to some brilliant blue tropical night below. The Mexican Riviera, maybe? Cabo San Lucas, if she had to guess. Seems like his kind of place. Probably knows someone who owns one of those ludicrously expensive private resorts. Of course he's not going to hide out in some shack in the mountains somewhere; Lucifer Morningstar does not rough it. He'll probably be ordering her to kill any bugs they see, Chloe thinks wryly. Doesn't strike her as a big appreciator of the beauty of nature.

They whir down, hit the ground with a thump, and coast along a narrow runway, even as Lucifer involuntarily grabs for her, clearly thinking they are in fact crashing. He lets go with a cough when he realizes they're not, and they surf to a stop with a thunk. He unbuckles and stands up as she follows suit, hauls down the suitcases, and walks to the front of the plane, as their friend (still no names offered, not that she expects it) hands Lucifer a manila envelope. "Good luck," he says. "We'll be in touch."

"Yes. Thank you." Lucifer nods, brittle, as they unfold the steps and descend into a hot, sticky night that feels like a punch in the chest. He hauls the suitcases across the tarmac (still nobody asking them for any passports) reaches a gate, opens it, and steps through into a parking lot, glancing around as he fishes in the envelope, extracts a set of keys, and points them and presses the unlocking button until the correct car beeps. He looks disapproving, as it's a plain silver Nissan rather than his sleek black Jag, but beggars can't be choosers. They load in the bags, he opens the passenger door for Chloe and then gets behind the wheel, and pulls out.

They drive down from the airport and into a tony Baja California resort town – Cabo, definitely, or something a few miles down the coast. Lucifer seems to know where he's going, or is upholding his male duty not to ask for directions, and ten or fifteen minutes later, they start up a road that switchbacks back and forth up a hill, terminates at a locked gate which he scans a key fob at, and then drives through. On the far side, at the top of the hill and gazing down at the town and the beach and the glittering moonlit sea, there's some steel-and-glass villa, the kind of place that rents for a few thousand a night, surrounded by palm trees. Home sweet home for the foreseeable future, evidently.

They get out of the car and head up the front steps with bags in tow, as Lucifer unlocks the front door and lets them in. It's warm and dark inside, as he beckons down the front hall. "Choose any room you like, Detective. There should be enough for a few days, we'll do a proper shop tomorrow. I. . . I think I'm going to go to bed."

"It's been a long day." Chloe shuts the door behind them, and puts the bolt in as he watches; his anxiety level clearly isn't going down any time soon. Then as he starts off, she catches him by the hand, pulls him back, stands on her tiptoes, and kisses his cheek. "Thank you, Lucifer."

"I, ah. . ." Even the dimness isn't enough to disguise the flush that rises up his neck as he ducks his head. "Ah, you're, you're welcome, Detective. Good night."

He practically trips over his own feet on the way down the hall, as Chloe pauses, then follows him after a moment, opening the door into the first expansive bedroom she finds. It overlooks the sea, everything looks too modern to be touched, and the bed is a king-size, made with hotel-standard white sheets. A champagne bottle stands in a bucket of ice, apparently if she feels like a solitary tipple before bed, and there's an equally space-age bathroom that will probably wash her on command if she orders it to, maybe give her a pedicure. But it's still hot, she doesn't want to kibitz around looking for the thermostat, and she's not quite ready to sleep, despite everything.

She thumbs out a quick text to Trixie, doing her best to sound upbeat and jovial, letting her know they arrived safely, then puts her phone down, looks through the sliding glass doors at the glimmering infinity pool on the patio, and makes a decision.

Chloe steps outside, shuts the door behind her, and looks down at the dark world, the distant sea, the huge, fat pearl of the nearly-full moon. It's still warm enough to bring prickles of sweat to her forehead, and there's nobody here to see. She pauses, then starts to undress, stripping off her jacket, T-shirt, jeans, socks, and underwear, leaving them in a crumpled heap on the pool deck, and diving in.

The water is delightfully, bracingly cool, and she gasps involuntarily as she surfaces, spraying droplets. The pool is illuminated with eerie blue mood lights, and she can't deny that she enjoys pretending she's in some sort of artful photoshoot, striking a pose for an imaginary camera. Lets her hair tumble out of its tight ponytail as she dives again, stroking a few lengths, reaching the end of the pool, and looking out over the glittering belowness of things. It feels high up here, rarefied, as if she hasn't quite come down from the flight, is removed from the day-to-day filth and chaos and bustle of humanity. She hasn't even heard another car. Clearly, Lucifer chose this place for its solitude, for knowing he'd be able to spot anyone coming a mile off.

Chloe paddles back to the other end, drifting in the warm water, still holding the heat of the daylight sun. It's blessedly, unspeakably wonderful to let go for a moment, after everything. She's alone here, floating in the womb of the world, embryonic, unmade. Has a strange, poignant moment of missing her own mother, despite the chaos and complexity of their relationship. But right now when she's alone, when she –

Lucifer is standing at the head of the pool.

Chloe almost doesn't see him, until she does, whirls around, catches him there – her heart almost stopped, she thought it was someone else, some random perv with an axe bursting in to finish what the heavenly dogs of war have started – and she's about to chew him out for Peeping Tom-ing on her skinny-dipping when she sees that he looks utterly smote down. He wasn't intending to come out here and see her, didn't realize that she had the same idea, is attempting to back up as fast as he can, and trips over a Barcalounger. "Detective," he babbles. "Detective, please do not think I am so vastly unchivalrous as to – well, I did not intend at all, I'll just – "

Despite her racing heart, for more reasons than one, Chloe can barely believe that he just saw her full-monty naked and didn't make some dumb crack about Hot Tub High School and how this must be bringing back cherished old memories. Not even one comment about perky tits and keeping things up nicely. Not that she doesn't mind him accidentally not being a thirteen-year-old boy who is mesmerized by any mention of the mere possibility of boobs, but still. He is clearly changed in a deep and fundamental way. Very serious, indeed.

They both remain where they are for a moment longer, Lucifer studiously averting his eyes, lest he be struck down by this vision before him. Chloe can still feel her pulse thudding in her chest, the dryness of her mouth, the fact that it's good she's floating in water, as her legs are not entirely steady. It's not only the heat of the night coursing in her veins, and she's well aware. The only fact remains as to what she's going to do about it.

She considers a moment longer. She can tell him to go. He would. He's always followed her lead. Done what she said. Been content to let her yank him around and whisk his phone out of his devious paws and push him this way and that; she's half his size, but she's in charge, and they have always both known it. There is no way, however, to know what would come of this.

It's just the two of them here. Hiding from reality, in more ways than one. It's like a highly colored dream. Something they might both forget on waking, anyway.

It has been a long time by herself. Such a very, very long time.

He's gorgeous. He clearly adores her. He'd have slept with her the first time she asked, except the first time she did ask, she was drunk and in no fit state to be doing anyone with anything. And somehow, that time, he said no. She's grateful that he did, believe her. But still.

She deliberates a moment more, then says, "Lucifer, you can look."

His head snaps up before his higher faculties quite kick in, as he catches sight of her again and his eyes just glaze over, jaw rather slack, staring at her the way he did when she stepped out of the elevator on the night Father Frank died, and told him that she was there for him. As if he can't believe that she really would want to be there, to ask more of him than his unorthodox but useful skills at solving murders. The way he perks up, bright as a puppy, whenever she lets that side of her show. She's been so high-strung, so closed off, so self-defensive. Hard to be that when you're naked in front of him now, in the warm dark. Alone. Together.

He looks at her for a long moment, barely breathing. She expects the lewd crack, the tongue thing, the question about whether she's stretched. You know. Typical Lucifer. But this is a moment which defeats even the Devil's endless reservoir of glib innuendo and easy sarcasm, which he can't quite fathom or process, and is afraid to grasp at in case it dissolves like a snowflake on the tongue. He shakes his head, as if to reset his faulty visual input, but can't look away. She hopes he doesn't pass out from lack of air, or blood in the brain. If an immortal is susceptible to such things.

She waits, treading water, as all this collides in his head. She thinks the invitation, if he wants to take it, is clear enough. If he doesn't want to just run off again, veering out of her orbit, crashing into every other star on the way. It's gotten incredibly hard to tell.

Lucifer remains transfixed for a moment longer. Then, slowly, he raises his hands. Starts to unbutton his shirt, slowly at first, then faster. Shrugs it off, hesitates a split second as if about to change his mind, then undoes his trousers as well, sliding them off his lean hips, all broad shoulders and long legs, trim and slim as a flagpole, as he dips his toes, then slides in with barely a splash. It's too dark to see him as much more than a silhouette, despite the ghostly blue glow curling up around them like phosphorescence, as he wades slowly closer. The water that reaches over her waist laps somewhere around the middle of his thighs.

He reaches her, or at least close enough to extend a hand and touch her, but doesn't. There remains a final foot of space between them, the air almost buzzing with the silent force, as she tilts her chin back and looks straight into his eyes. She feels it like an electric shock down her spine, all the way to her toes, which perhaps might not be the thing you want to feel while standing in water, but which is even stronger than the first. She is the one to raise a dripping hand, then two, and rest them on his shoulders.

Lucifer lets out a slow, ragged breath. She can see him trembling with the need to keep control of himself, to not seize hold of her then and there, as she drifts closer to him, enough for their feet and calves to brush beneath the water, hinting at more intimate contact. His hand comes down and settles on her hip, fingers curling around it, almost brushing the small of her back. Both of them seem to be caught in slow motion, inch by inch, as one of her hands floats up to his dark head, rests in the thick ruff of hair at the nape of his neck. Slowly, still so slowly, for this is a dream and neither of them want to wake up, she pulls his head down to hers.

Lucifer moans, low in his throat, as their mouths touch. His is warm and wide and soft, almost tentative, shy. Her other hand comes up to cup his head, even as their bodies ebb together and she feels the nudge of him between her legs, brushing against the inside of her thigh. After so long on the periphery, of dancing around, of holding back, of everything they have been doing and that they have done, this literally fully bare confronting of each other is a shock in more ways than one. Every imaginable way, in fact, even as she tightens her grip on him, their heads turn, and the kiss turns from light and cautious to sudden and ferocious. The water splashes as he grabs hold of her with the other hand, lifting and pulling her against him, arms wrapping around her back. There is no sound but their gasping and gulping, her faint, frantic whine, their mouths and their bodies, moving and melding. God. She has been waiting too long.

They're both thoroughly roused and shaken and heaving for breath by the time they break apart, still circling in the water, her arms around his neck, her toes dangling above the pool bottom, turning and turning, set adrift with only the other to anchor by. Her fingers dig into the muscle of his shoulder, questing down his back, until she remembers the scars and how he doesn't want her to touch them. Her hands stop, but he doesn't seem to have noticed, and she moves them again. "Lucifer," she whispers. "Lucifer, is it all right if I – "

He keeps staring at her, a man in an opium dream, Kublai Khan and absinthe hallucinations. And all who heard should see them there, and all should cry, Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! She doesn't remember where it came from, or why she should think of it now, but that poem always gave her the delightful shivers. Even as she slides a finger lightly over the corrugated scar of his missing wing, she can feel him shudder from head to toe, and pulls herself up into another hungry, greedy kiss. Weave a circle round him thrice, and close your eyes with holy dread. Indeed, Coleridge, more than you ever guessed. He lifts her up, her forearms on his shoulders, as she leans down to pull him still closer.

For he on honey-dew hath fed, and drunk the milk of Paradise.

Chloe's back bumps lightly against the edge of the pool as they come down from that second kiss, both of them flushed and gasping, her bottom lip wet and bruised where he's bit at it, as he bends and begins to kiss her cheek and jaw and throat, working lower, as her legs float up around him and lock around his waist. She grinds herself against the smooth, flat plane of his stomach, as he growls and nearly swings them around to take her right then and there, but stops himself. He has been waiting just as long (if not longer, poor dear) and he intends to do this properly. His hot mouth muses and meanders across her collarbone, lifting her out of the water to have full exploration of her cleavage, closing around one nipple with a hard suck that makes her practically light-headed. He bites lightly, then lets go, exploring slowly across her chest, cupping a breast in his hand and brushing his thumb across the other nipple until it stiffens. Chloe doesn't remember the last time anyone touched her with such intent, devout attention, such utter attunement to every single inch and sinew and atom of her. It's unspeakable.

Her wet fingers curl and then clench around him again, as she strokes down to the other scar and touches it as lightly and gently as she can. She doesn't know if it hurts physically, the way amputees suffer pain in a phantom limb – does he sometimes wake feeling the ache of his mutilated, sliced-off, stolen, burned wings? It certainly hurts in other ways, she doesn't doubt, but does not appear to be doing so at the moment. Not as they keep kissing, as he pulls her lip between his teeth again, as they zig and zag through the water. Chlorinated pool water is not the most delightful substance to have up in your lady parts, Chloe thinks inanely, so if they're going further, they might have to get out at some point. But this, this is too delightful to want to stop. She catches the curve of his mouth beneath hers, the gleam in his eye. He's grinning. Actually grinning. And even in the dark of the night, it's like the sun coming out from behind a cloud.

At last, however, neither of them can hold back, as they fumble and stumble and splash to the edge of the pool, climb out almost tripping over each other, and step back through the door and into her room. They pick up right where they left off, barely missing a beat. Her hands slide up and down his torso, his coming down to smooth over her ass, as she is well aware that certain parts of him would be more than happy to get onto the main event. But even as she makes up her mind for it, he lifts her, walks her backwards to the bed, and sets her down, gently as a bauble of blown glass, among the pillows. Then slides his hands down her thighs, spreads them. With barely a heavy-lidded flicker of his eyes up at her, he kisses her very low on the stomach, then settles between her legs. Noses lightly into her wetness, flicks her clit with his tongue, and licks a light, slow, extremely thorough stripe.

Chloe almost passes out, uttering a barely human noise and clutching two fistfuls of sheet, back arching. He holds her legs firmly apart with both hands, continuing his explorations, kissing and teasing, until he sets his mind to proving that he is a really bloody spectacular cunning linguist. She almost can't take the pace, the pressure, the way he is driving the most exquisitely sensitive and secret bits of her into full-on delirium, as she whines and writhes against him and he whispers, "Hold still, darling," into her. She is aware that he is teaching her a lesson. Play with fire, especially hellfire, especially with the Devil, and you will damn well get burned.

At last, just as her entire belly is quivering and she is gulping and jerking uselessly for air, he lets up, breathing hard himself, eyes dark with smug satisfaction as he gives her another dainty, kittenish lick. "Enjoying yourself yet, Detective Decker?"

"You're such." She gulps again, still seeing stars. "Such an ass."

"Oh, is it my ass you're interested in?" He brightens. "Too bad we don't have any toys, or for that matter, lube, but I'm sure we could think of something."

"No, I did not mean that I wanted to peg you." She falls back against the pillows. She'll get her breath back one of these years. With someone like Lucifer, it's probably better not to ask if he's done something unless you want the answer, and besides, said answer is probably "yes" anyway. "I'm sure I also don't need to ask if you have certain ideas."

"Oh, indeed, my dear." There he is, there is flirtatious, salacious, outrageously inappropriate Lucifer, looking at her with the deepest and reddest of that certain deadly sin glittering in his eyes. "Plenty of time to come up with them, all those nights when my right hand was playing the part of you."

"I did not need to – " Oh shut up, Decker. You're damn well aware you like that thought. Slowly, she sits up. He leans toward her, hungry for another kiss, but she pushes him back. "Fine then. How about you show me?"

"A practical demonstration? You are a wicked one." His voice is so low, almost a purr, that it buzzes in her bones, his lips against her ear. "Very well."

He sprawls back in all his naked glory, letting her get a nice long look, before he closes his eyes, slowly strokes his right hand down his stomach, and takes hold of himself, thumb lightly circling, teasing and testing. Moves slowly at first, gripping the pillow with the other hand, uttering a breathy noise in the back of his throat as he shifts himself further into his grip. "Oh, yes, my dear," he whispers, rich and slow. "Oh yes. Just like that. Just there."

Chloe's own breath hitches slightly as she watches him, the play of light and shadow on his face, the concentrated, utter ecstasy that seems no less for the fact that it's his own fantasy and not actually her. He sighs and moans as he picks up the pace, rubbing harder and faster; she is pleased (should she be pleased?) to see that he apparently imagines her as very good at handjobs. Her tongue darts out to touch her dry lips, fingers drifting down her own stomach to retrace the path his mouth has just been mapping, teasing herself in time with him. Until he brings himself to verge, but won't let himself go over, stopping and letting go, opening his eyes with a triumphant grin. "There. All you were picturing, Chloe?"

The sound of her first name, which he so rarely uses, is almost as odd and delightful as the rest of their intimacy, a magic word whispered to cast a spell. She leans forward slowly, on all fours. "What makes you think I ever sat around and imagined you doing anything?"

"You've often told me, nearly in so many words, to go have relations with myself. Surely you can't have been entirely unable to resist what that would look like?"

"Actually." Chloe licks a finger, strokes and circles down his chest, not quite touching one of his nipples. "I can."

Lucifer sighs. "Is that why it's taken you this long to have sex with me?"

"Whoa now." She circles closer. "I don't think we've actually done that yet, have we?"

"To cop one of your bewildering sporting metaphors, no, I suppose not. Rounded third base, but not yet quite slid home." He does that tongue thing of his as he devours her with his eyes. "I realize you're a cruel woman, my dear, but it does seem rather painful to cut a man short."

"You cut yourself short, buddy." Chloe smiles at him, bending closer, biting ever so lightly at his nipple, pushing him backwards onto his elbows. "Does you good to have some delayed gratification in your life."

"I have been delayed, Detective. Believe – oh goodness gracious – in that."

"Oh goodness gracious?" She slides slowly up onto him, straddling him, not quite letting him into her. "And I don't think I've ever heard you use any adjective stronger than 'bloody.' Has anyone ever told you that you swear like a nice British granny?"

"Well." Beads of sweat stand out on his forehead. "I could say fuck, if that was what you were looking for. Though I believe in this context, it would have an unavoidable second meaning."

"Mm-hmm." Chloe smiles innocently at him, rolling her hips ever so slightly. It is unabashedly delightful to torment the Devil, to have him on his back beneath her, completely at her mercy. That is what she likes about Lucifer: he will flirt and make passes at and otherwise make his interest and attraction in her clear all the livelong day, but she controls any and all intimacy, decides when she wants to let him closer and when she wants him to back off, and he will go. And now, when she's been trying to get him close again for weeks and weeks and he'll barely dart into arm's length, she is likewise discovering that she enjoys every bit of closing that distance, even as there is still some distance that he would very much like to be closed ASAP. He whimpers, trying to shift his hips beneath her to align them, but she pushes him straight back. "No cheating."

"I'm the Devil, darling," Lucifer mutters faintly. "Cheating is in my nature."

"Strain yourself." She leans down and kisses his nose, then the corner of his mouth.

"I'm not sure how much more you think I can strain myself before something goes terribly wrong." He bats at her feebly. "Bloody hell, I think you're actually more diabolical than I am."

"Be careful what you wish for," Chloe says in a singsong, wedging herself harder against him and grinding. "Isn't that the point we're trying to make here?"

"Oh, I knew it. You're paying me back for earlier, aren't you." His hand claws at the air with its need to pull himself over and into her. "I would like to take this opportunity to notify you that I am very, very sorry."

"No, you're not."

"No," Lucifer agrees. "I'm not. Nor for this, either."

With that, he rises up underneath her too fast to see, flips them over, spreads her knees with his, and comes down between her – but again, still not quite in her. Close, so close that it makes her head spin with the need, but not quite. For all his melodrama and bellyaching about how long it's taken for her to sleep with him, or why won't she sleep with him, or how much he wants to sleep with her, he's still not going to go for it if she doesn't want him to.

Chloe grins, soft at first and then wider. Shifts herself, wriggling underneath him, and pulls a knee up. Leans up, catches his earlobe between her teeth, and pulls his head down against hers. Slides a hand between them, moves it down, and takes hold of him. Strokes him the way she saw him doing earlier, the way he imagined. Then without a word, guides him up to, then into, her.

Lucifer sucks in a dazzled, shattered gasp, barely nudging her apart, as he shifts his own weight, bracing himself on his elbows. He edges into her a bit at a time, restraint at odds with their furious frenzy, eyes never leaving hers, watching to see if he's doing this right. Of all the countless women he's slept with, he's made sure to note that he never leaves them unsatisfied, is a connoisseur of the female orgasm as much as his own. But it's never been (at least as far as she knows) like this. Not with someone he loves, whom he wants to do everything right for, who isn't just a beautiful and anonymous conquest whose name he has already forgotten in the morning. Chloe almost feels the urge to remind him that she isn't made of porcelain, that he doesn't have to worry about breaking her; he gets these oddly adorable fits of gallantry from time to time, trying to protect her, to shield her. After what she's pieced together about Uriel, about what he did to his own brother to save her life, she takes it much less of a semi-amusing joke than she used to. She saves him in their everyday work, usually, but what he saves her from is far more vast and dark and violent.

Still, however, there's nothing but them. No outside world, no threats, no distractions, nothing but him, and her, and the endless, expansive night beyond. He slips further into her, both of them so roused and raw and ready for each other that he glides with barely an effort, until he finally seats himself to the hilt. Chloe gulps, adjusting herself. You have some balls on you, pal, she said once, and him, Oh, thank you, but they're quite average. She isn't about to do a detailed comparison, but all she can think of is that he fits, he fits exactly, just at the edge of stretching her with that deep, sweet burn. She likes him just as he is, as if they have been designed to complete each other's missing halves. Oh holy hell.

"Ungh," she sighs, flailing out to get her arms around his neck, rolling their hips again to align the fit, hearing the soft wet sounds their bodies make. "Oh g. . ."

She bites her tongue. Pretty sure it would kill the mood to invoke, you know, his father. Instead, she finds herself whispering, of all the ridiculous things, "Oh goodness gracious."

Lucifer buzzes with restrained laughter, even as he settles more deeply into her. "What was that about how I swear, my darling?"

"Ungh." Chloe's not feeling dazzlingly eloquent right now. Sue her. Her toes clutch in the sheets, her grasp tightening on him. "Come on. You want it."

"Oh yes." He bends his sleek dark head, mouth ghosting over her breast, kissing lightly, as he tries a slow, shallow thrust. "Most unbelievably so."

"So what are you waiting for?" She claws at him again, almost keening. "Come on. After all this. You. Come on. Have, you know. S – "

Before she can get out what is not among the more scintillating examples of bedroom repartee, he drives into her so far and firmly that it ends on a squeak. Her head spills back into his arm as he rides her, the mattress shaking, as she clutches hold of him and can't get her breath. She pushes herself up against him, needing every scrap of the heat and the strength and the friction, the soft rasp of him in and out of her, the way she claws him home again and then again. Her other knee comes up, sprawling, as she digs in her heels and works back against him with the same thoroughness and care, sighing and gulping. Then builds up some momentum, flips them over, and straddles him.

Lucifer looks up at her admiringly, clearly liking the view from this angle, as she grips hold of his hips, resettles him into her, and starts to ride him back. She pulls him closer, nose in his neck, in the clean hollow of his collarbone. Slows their pace a bit, stretches out and lengthens each stroke of his inside her to its fullest potential. Doesn't want to waste any of it. Doesn't know if tonight is the only one they will ever have. You'd hope not. If she's being honest, she knows that if they live until the next one, if they don't die tomorrow, it is all too likely to happen again. But if nothing else – she still doesn't believe in fate, in unavoidable destiny, in something too great and terrible to change – she knows that that cannot be taken for granted.

They move faster, then faster, gripping hold of each other, foreheads and noses pressing, staring into each other's eyes, as he comes almost upright, switches them again, and bears her beneath him onto the bed. She can feel herself losing it, in bits and pieces and then all at once, as their combined heat and strength and need comes to its head and tips over into brilliant whiteness, as her release shudders and twists through her body to her very core, as Lucifer loses himself a few moments later and falls heavily onto her shoulder, tremors running through him from head to toe. As she's too dazzled to move, to breathe, to speak, to wake, cradling his head against her, finally turning to kiss his hair. Strokes his back, the clean line of his spine. Doesn't say a word.

The sheets are twisted and crumpled and knotted beneath them. He's still inside her, softening, until at last he pulls himself together and rolls off. Tugs the bed into some semblance of order, pulls the quilts up over her, and seems about to get up and go. That, after all, is what he's done so often before. Doesn't necessarily expect that the lady wants him to hang around after they've got done with the naughty bits. After all, they have separate rooms. The choice remains.

Chloe catches his hand. Their eyes meet, startled.

She whispers, "Stay."

Lucifer hesitates. She can see him, once and for, fighting his overpowering urge to run away. To return to his little kingdom. To be safe. To be alone. Free.

But he always does what she asks.

He pauses an instant more, then nods. Slides back underneath the covers alongside her, easing himself down, as she rolls toward him, tucks herself against his chest. She feels almost shaky, short of breath, and not from what they have just been doing. It's been so long since she has let that armor down, let anyone to see, to more than see. And with him. . . she trusts him, she trusts him completely, she wouldn't be here on this night in this house with him if she didn't, but however much she retains the ability to break him, he does the same for her.

He's right. It's not as if she hasn't thought about it. When there is a gorgeous man who's glued to your side and clearly adores you and would let you have some any time you wanted, of course it occurs to you. Maze has even bluntly asked why on earth she and Lucifer haven't slept together yet, and when Chloe stammered some answer about how she's still finalizing the divorce, not really jumping back into the dating pool, the demon gave her an incredulous look. I asked why you haven't slept with him yet, Decker. Not why you haven't married him.

Chloe wants to think, she always has, that if she ever did sleep with him, entirely in the hypothetical, it would only be once, and she could stop whenever she wanted. Not because she thinks Lucifer would object (although his ego would be wounded) if she decided only once was enough, but because it would be just too dangerous to do it twice. Once, after all, is excusable. Things happen. Heat of the moment. Even if nothing about tonight was hasty, even if they took their time every step of the way. She can still tell herself that story. If she wants.

She rolls against him. Pulls his arm over her. She doesn't want to sleep away from him tonight.

Doesn't want to be away from him tonight.

Doesn't want to be away from him.

Doesn't want to be away.

Doesn't want. Doesn't want.

She can't tell that story anymore.

How much, how very much, she wants.