A/N- I'm almost out of titles I can use that have devil in them :O Also I hate looking back and seeing that one chapter that has a non-devil title, but I can't think of anything appropriate to change it to xD

Will groaned as he was woken up by the sound of his phone ringing, and it would've given him a feeling of deja vous if it weren't for the fact that he had his face pressed up against Hannibal's warm, solid chest. He rolled over in the direction of the bedside table so that he could grab his phone, but Hannibal's grip on Will tightened and pulled him back. "Stay," he murmured.

"Gotta answer the phone. What if it's something important?"

Hannibal gasped, as if he were shocked by Will's answer. "Is there anything more important than you becoming my consort?"

Will rolled his eyes. "I still haven't agreed to that," he reminded Hannibal in a light voice. It had been two very long and very… convincing weeks, but Will hadn't actually agreed yet, and he figured that now it was time to get back to the real world. He wasn't even sure when they'd ended up back at Hannibal's house, but he did know that it meant Hannibal had already gotten his way plenty of times recently, and Will needed a chance to decompress. He managed to wriggle away- though he was well aware that Hannibal was more than strong enough to keep him trapped if he wanted to- and grabbed his phone, answering blearily without checking the caller ID. "'Lo?"
"Will, I need to talk to you. It's urgent."

Will blinked a few times, and then reached up with his free hand to rub at his eyes. "Jack?" He wanted to make a comment about it being so early in the morning, but with the curtains drawn, Will couldn't actually tell what time it was at a quick glance. "What's going on?"

"Where are you right now, Will? I'm at your house, but you're clearly not here."

Will sighed, and then stepped out into the hallway, ignoring Hannibal's curious look. "I stayed over a friend's house." He cringed at how much of a lie that sounded like, especially since he had let his phone die and hadn't bothered answering calls or texts since everything with Sam had gone down. The only person he'd contacted before going radio silent was Alana, to ask her if she would watch over his dogs for him. "Just tell me what this is all about."

Jack's frown could practically be heard in his voice. "Not over the phone. I need to be able to see you face to face, Will. Where are you? I'll meet you halfway."

Will winced. "I'm in Baltimore. Guess you should have called before heading all the way out to Wolf Trap."

Jack just barked out a place for them to meet, made Will swear not to talk to anyone else first, and then hung up abruptly. Will had absolutely no idea what was going on, and the confusion must have been evident on his face as he wandered back into the bedroom. Hannibal was still stretched out on the bed, looking so very tempting, but Will couldn't just abandon work, even if it felt like he'd practically already done that, considering how he'd been choosing out victims for Hannibal to murder. "Who was it?"

Will scrounged around for his discarded clothes, wrinkling his nose up at the fact he hadn't gotten the chance to clean them since Sam's place, and they were covered in blood and sweat. "Work stuff. And I can't exactly show up dressed in these."

Hannibal got out of bed, completely unashamed at his nakedness. "Why not? You look so beautiful in red." Will gave Hannibal a look, and Hannibal grinned. "I have some clean clothes you could borrow, if it would not offend what you call fashion."

"You just want to see me wearing your clothes," Will accused, though there was no heat to his tone. Hannibal didn't refute that claim, just pulled out a white undershirt and a pair of dark pants. "Thank god you're not sending me out in paisley," Will joked as he grabbed the clothes and put them on.

Hannibal snorted. "I should think god is the last person you would be thanking in this situation."

"Thank the devil then." Will leaned over to give Hannibal a kiss. "Alright, I'll see you later. Maybe tomorrow or Wednesday. I really need to go home and spend some time with my pack. And figure out the best way to dispose of my clothes."

Hannibal arched one eyebrow. "I would be more than happy to help you burn your wardrobe, and dress you in much finer things. Oh, you only meant the clothes you were wearing when you tortured Sam? I shall take care of those now that I am being forced to draw myself away from you for longer than a few minutes."

Will had to search his discarded pants to find his car keys, until he realized that he had no idea where his car was. It had been left behind at the coffee shop once Sam forced him to go with him back to his house, but surely someone would have towed it away for being left there for so long. He looked over at Hannibal. "I don't suppose you could loan me your car?" Jack said not to talk to anyone, though he wasn't sure what he wasn't supposed to talk about, and he assumed that that would extend to getting a ride to the meeting place.

Hannibal casually stretched his arms up over his head. "I am rather attached to my car, Will. I would feel much safer about it if I could chauffeur you to your destination."

"Nice try, but I need to be able to do work stuff with the amount of discretion it deserves, and that means no bringing sex partners with me. And I may not exactly be an expert on relationships, but I do know that it isn't healthy to be with each other 24/7. So you can let me borrow your car, or I can take a cab."

There was no way Will would ever classify the pout on Hannibal's face as 'cute'. Grown men pouting was not cute, and was certainly not the type of behavior that should be encouraged. "Are we really just 'sex partners', Will?" Calling them 'partners' seemed too straightforward. 'Boyfriends' would just be juvenile and cheesy. And it's not like they'd provided each other with much emotional support, or gone on any real dates. All they'd actually done was have sex. "You could call me your husband, Will. If you are my consort, then I am your husband."

Will shook his head. "I'm not your consort. And you know what? I think it's probably best if I take a cab anyways. Otherwise I'll have to come back here to return your car."

Before he left the room, Hannibal grabbed him by the elbow and swung him around to pull him into another kiss, this one much longer and more passionate than the previous one. When he finally pulled away, Will was left breathless, and then Hannibal tucked a small wad of cash into Will's hand. "To pay for the cab," he explained with a wry smile.

"Where you were even keeping that?" Will didn't refuse the money, though, just shoved it down into his pocket. "I'll talk to you later." Then he hurried away before he could get tempted back into bed, calling for a cab as he made his way out of the house.

It didn't take very long for Will to reach the place Jack wanted to meet, which was just a little park that didn't seem to have much foot traffic these days. He still had some time until Jack would get there, so he decided to call Alana in the meanwhile. She answered immediately, and Will already felt guilty for worrying her. "Will? Where are you? Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm okay, Alana. I'm sorry to ghost you like that, it wasn't my intention, I promise. I just needed some time to get away from everything, you know?"

Alana spoke passionately, and she was angry, though it wasn't at Will. "I told Jack not to let you get too close to things. I warned him you wouldn't be able to handle it."

Will wanted to assure Alana that he was more than capable of handling things, thanks to the fact that he'd been clear-headed ever since the first time he'd died. But it was as good an excuse as any for why he'd seemingly dropped off the map for a couple of weeks, and he was fairly certain that Alana wouldn't appreciate finding out she'd been made dog sitter so that Will could have a few years worth of sex crammed into a couple of weeks. "I'm really sorry to have worried you. I'm actually meeting with Jack now, so I'm guessing something urgent came up."

Alana went silent for a moment. "Will… no one could get ahold of you lately, so Jack didn't have a chance to let you in on his theory yet, but…" She trailed off. "I'll let him explain it himself. He sounds so damn determined that he's nearly got me convinced. Just don't let him make you think anything that you really don't believe."

Will wasn't really sure what to make of that odd and vague advice, so he just thanked Alana for taking care of his dogs, and then hung up. He didn't have much problem passing the rest of the time until Jack's arrival, mostly thinking back over everything that had happened with Hannibal. He let it all play out in his mind like he was watching some kind of movie, though that meant it took a concentrated effort to not let his body react to any of those memories.

And then Jack arrived, which worked about as well as a bucket of ice water to cool him down. He jammed his hands deep into his pockets, realizing for the first time how cold they were. "Jack, what's going on?"

Jack looked around to make sure no one else was close enough to listen in on them, and then sat down on the only bench in the park. It was an ugly, splintering old thing, but Jack motioned for Will to sit next to him, so Will did. "Alana Bloom thinks I'm crazy, but I'm thinking that I might know just who the Chesapeake Ripper is." Since Will already knew it was Hannibal, he prepared himself to put on a shocked face in reaction to whatever name Jack might conjure up. "How well do you know Dr. Lecter, Will?"

The shocked look on his face was completely real. Not at the identity of the Ripper, obviously, but at the fact that Jack had somehow arrived at that insane conclusion on his own. Maybe Will hadn't been paying enough attention lately to everything going on around him. But he didn't think Hannibal would ever be sloppy enough to leave behind evidence, so it was beyond him how Jack had put it all together. Then again, he was the head of the BSU, which meant that he had to have been competent enough on his own even before bringing Will aboard.

He gulped, and opened and closed his mouth a few times before managing to get out any actual words. "What makes you suspect him?"

Jack waved his hands around, clearly too excited about his theory to sit still. "Well to start with, he matched your profile. Single white male, older, wealthy, medical background, always acting pretentious and artsy and above everyone else. And, well, I'm sure this isn't going to be easy to hear, but I don't think those organs are being kept as trophies, Will. I think they're being eaten. And Lecter has always had one of his fancy dinner parties around the times that the Ripper has struck."

Will quickly tried to figure out what the hell he could say. If he denied Jack's theory too hard, it would just look suspicious. But if he helped Hannibal get caught, he'd probably never see the man again. He kept his face neutral, not wanting to give anything away. "That sounds circumstantial at best."

"I know. I need hard evidence to prove it. If Lecter is eating them, then I just need a sample of his cooking to bring to the lab and have it tested. I need you in this with me, Will. I've always supported you, even when you'd make connections that nobody else could see. Now I need you on my side, Will. You can see the things that I won't be able to see. I can get Lecter with your help. I need to know that you're my guy, Will."

It took a lot of effort to not gulp, but he was pretty sure that that would be a blatant sign of nervousness to a guy like Jack. "Of course, Jack. I've got your back. Just don't ride all of your hopes on Lecter, okay? If he does turn out to be innocent, you can't let that ruin your search for the Ripper."

Jack nodded. "I know, Will. But I also know that he's it. I can feel it. Isn't that what you always do? Know things because you can feel that they're the truth?"

"You make it sound like it's some kind of magic trick, Jack. It's about finding the clues and putting the evidence together. And right now, you don't actually have any evidence to hold against Lecter."

Jack nodded again. "We'll get it, though. Working together. We can find the evidence and put it together. If Lecter's the Ripper, then we're going to get the son of a bitch."

Jack was a good guy. He definitely didn't meet the qualifications Will used when picking out Hannibal's next victims. He just wanted to do his job, and even if he was getting a little obsessed with the Ripper in particular, it was still for the sake of making the world a safer place, and Will couldn't begrudge Jack for wanting to do that. So few other people these days had any interest in looking out for other people.

But trying to catch Hannibal was certainly going to be a dangerous game. And Will wasn't entirely sure he'd be able to protect Jack from getting burned once he got too close to the fire. If Jack attacked Hannibal, would Hannibal break his word and kill the man? He doubted Jack would be able to kill Hannibal, considering how much effort it had taken to down Sam, who was just a minion.

And with Jack's suspicious eyes all over Hannibal, it would be harder to spend time with the man. While he did want them to have some space between them sometimes, it didn't mean he never wanted to see Hannibal again. "Jack… what do you know about fishing?"

,,,

Hannibal had given Will enough money to take a cab all the way back to Wolf Trap, so he went, wanting to see his dogs and spend time with them. They were always a comfort to him in the way that no person was capable of being. They understood him better than anyone else did. Except for maybe Hannibal, but that didn't count because Hannibal wasn't human.

His pack rushed at him as soon as he stepped through the front door, and he let himself be knocked down onto his butt as they swarmed him, barking and licking and demanding to be pet, while also doing their best to make Will smell like home again, since he'd been away from them for too long.

It was good to be home, and Will hated himself for already missing Hannibal. But he refused to call the other man. He didn't need Hannibal to survive. He wasn't that dysfunctionally dependent on the man.

But there was more at stake here than just a relationship- if that's what Will was even in right now. Not that there had been much time for discussing labels in the past two weeks. Will grabbed the nearest dog to haul up onto his lap, and Winston was more than happy to get the honor of nearly breaking Will's legs with how big he'd been getting lately.

Will fished his phone out of his pocket, and waited impatiently for Hannibal to answer his call. "Beloved," he purred. "Miss me already."

Will gulped, and was glad Hannibal wouldn't be able to see the slight blush building up on his cheeks. "We have something of a problem on our hands. Jack is a better detective than I gave him credit for. He suspects that you are the Ripper. I didn't tell him anything, but now he wants my help making sure you get caught. I told him that I would play you in order to catch you."

"Oh, but if you are the one doing the chasing, I am sure that I would not mind being caught," Hannibal said softly.

Will rolled his eyes. "This is serious! Jack thinks I'm his guy-"

"Of course he is wrong about that," Hannibal interrupted. "You are mine. I am not concerned about Jack Crawford. As long as you continue to hold up your end of the bargain and reveal nothing of who I am, all will be well."

Will narrowed his eyes. "And of course you will hold up your end of the bargain and not kill any innocent people- including Jack Crawford."

Hannibal laughed. "But of course. I would truly hate to deprive the world of such an interesting man."

It didn't really ease Will's worries entirely, but it was better than nothing. "Good. So now how exactly are we going to defeat Jack?" He winced as soon as the word 'we' slipped out of his mouth, but it was too late to take it back now. There was no way it would have escaped Hannibal's notice. "We need a plan to get you out of this mess legally. I happen to be rather fond of my life here."

"I would be quite happy to show you around Paris someday, Will. Or perhaps Florence. Or any of the other great European cities. I think you would enjoy time there."

"Maybe for a vacation, but not because I'm on the run with a known serial killer. If you get caught, Hannibal, I'm not going down with you."

Stupid Hannibal couldn't keep the smug tone out of his voice. "We'll just see about that, won't we?"

Will hung up abruptly, not in the mood to try and navigate his way through a conversation with Hannibal. He'd gotten across all of the relevant information about Jack's new theory, and that was all that mattered for now.

Even as Will sat there, absent-mindedly petting Winton's soft fur, he couldn't stop thinking about his most recent time with Hannibal. It had been the best sex he'd had in a very long time, and he couldn't deny that there was something about the way Hannibal looked at him during it that was just so pleasant. Something adoring, like Will was the most amazing person Hannibal had ever seen before. That kind of attention was overwhelming, though. To be wanted so much by anyone was such a foreign feeling to Will.

And it wasn't just about the sex. Whenever he was with Hannibal, everything just felt more interesting, more intense. Like anything could happen at any moment. Nobody in the world understood Will as much as Hannibal did. Nobody else even bothered trying to understand him to that level. Even Jack didn't care about how Will's mind worked, only that it continued to do so.

And then there was Sam's final day. Will had felt good killing Garrett Jacob Hobbs for sure, but that was nothing compared to what it had felt like to torture Sam. He had felt so powerful, invincible, strong. Like he could do anything because he was the predator. And Hannibal was the one who had gotten Will there, and then told him how beautiful he looked covered in the blood he had spilled. Though thinking about Sam made Will feel guilty, too. He shouldn't feel so good about having hurt someone else so badly, no matter what they may have done to him first. He was a terrible human being for having gotten so much enjoyment out of someone else's suffering like that.

Will sighed, and slumped back against the couch. Winston seemed to be able to tell Will's mood had suddenly gone down, because he let out a little worried growl, and then licked wetly across Will's chin. Will shifted so that he could press his face into Winton's fur. "I have no idea what the hell I'm doing, buddy. I know that I should be doing everything I can to help Jack catch Hannibal, but first of all, I'm not even sure that imprisoning him would do much, considering he's the devil and all. And secondly, I can't help thinking that maybe Hannibal really does care about me. As more than just a friend, or some kind of weird pet project. I think there's something terribly wrong with me, Winston. Because I'm afraid that I care about the bastard too."