Morning rays snuck into the dark flat, joining the electric light of the city that never entirely turned off. Everything here was still and quiet, in sharp contrast to the night before. Passive silence was barely disturbed by the soft mingling breathing of several companions. It was a harmony of safe dreaming and secure slumber of warm bodies. The entire world could be asleep or awake, unaffected by anything inside his private domain.
Except maybe the housekeeper, who started to step out of the elevator, squeaked audibly and rapidly punched the 'door close' button.
He probably should have had Maze warn her not to come up. Except Maze was up here too, dozing but with a glimmer of wakefulness and a handspan and arm length out of reach. She was spooning Linda, pale and dark skin warming together. Maze wasn't the cuddling type. She didn't want to be the first to move. Impatience would win out before long though.
This was the time before humans started to get up, to check their phones to see what they missed out on the internet the night before. They lay in their bedding, coming to reality and embracing or avoiding it. Millions of alarms nearly simultaneously being slapped down for another five or ten minutes or longer. It was a time to delay fate. It was the moments before they remembered an outside world - the ones not on the night shift, anyway. They were all curled in their beds, others' beds, floors, other places. All doing the one thing every human on earth had to do, which was wake up and start the cycle over again.
A mere hundred or so years ago, there was only the sun. Now it was millions of individual lights coming on screens, brightening dark rooms instead of the family breakfast fire in the hearth. The world was so much bigger now than it was. Problems were more diverse, but also more solvable. Dreams were bigger too. The silent lights of a landing airliner crossed his windows against the clear lightening sky of deep navy blue. He could fly to it if he wanted. Lucifer Morningstar snuggled deeper into his void-black sheets instead, the humans around him shifting slightly, snoring and warm and still.
This was one of his favorite times of the day. Gently sleeping beings, satisfied with their visit up to his place-when they stayed overnight. And they were always well satisfied. No one departed the Devil's arms otherwise. They slept hard and deep after - he chuckled - well, you know. It was almost enough to make him wish he'd been born a mortal. Not quite though.
Some previous visitors turned over in their dreams they would or wouldn't remember. Some were sleep-talkers, mumbling under their breath quietly or shouting about grocery lists or other banal tasks (thankfully there were none of those last night, a point in all of their favors). Lucifer hadn't had a real sleepwalker yet, that he knew of. He once had a woman sit up in the middle of the night and talk to him for half an hour and not remember it the next morning.
A man once apparently tried to sleep-beat him to death with his pillow before Lucifer woke him up. He apologized in the best way possible and slept the rest of the night soundly.
The sun, unerring and relentless - he made it that way, after all - inched in a bit more, reaching for them with golden fingers. "Just a few more minutes…" never truly worked. Except maybe for Amenadiel. He chuckled to himself. Yawned.
Lucifer was awake now. It was too early. His muscles were heavy and unwilling to stretch, sore. Some physical sensations that otherwise wouldn't be present without his dear detective close by. It wasn't entirely unpleasant. More like a drug in some ways, making him drowsy. That first morning he woke up with complaining muscles after vigorous sex was a real first. He wouldn't trade it for the world.
He rolled his neck to the other side, and there was the top of one bare foot against the prickly stubble on his face. It twitched, then gently nuzzled the side of his head, toes lacing into his hair. Said owner of the foot wrapped an arm around his thigh and pressed her face close to his calf, her soft breasts cradling his leg. Her short trimmed curls pressed somewhere along his bare hip. She murmured a complaint about the time and nipped his skin lightly. She was under the mussed silken fabric and hiding from view, with only ankles and feet visible.
Lucifer moved slowly, reaching up to trace the arch of her foot and kissing the top softly. Her body jerked a little, and one hand slipped up his thigh, spread fingers dragging through his fine leg hair. The other woman and man on either side of him stirred.
He started to lean up but was stopped by an unforgiving tug against his shoulders. Oh, right.
His wings were trapped under everyone on the bed. He laid back. Chloe, still dreaming, huffed under her breath and burrowed into his opposite side, her head resting on his chest, unlike the other woman. Ella giggled next to his equally confined leg and tickled the feathers near her, sticking up between his legs. Grooming was going to be in order, nay, required once everyone was up.
None of them wanted to move yet. Ella lazily cuddled his leg, gripping him tight with both arms and rubbing her face against his knee like a house cat and began snoring again. After a moment, a tiny bit of saliva escaped and ran down behind his knee, making him shiver, but still not wanting to move. It's not like the sheets wouldn't have to be burned as it was.
Lucifer smiled to himself, extending an arm behind Chloe's loose gold waves and pulling her closer. Her arm snaked over his midsection. Her hand warmed sleepily across his belly, flicking through his happy trail and continuing to the other side. She encountered Ella's belly and snugged her hand down between Ella and Lucifer in an unconscious form of possessiveness. Not that she needed to. Chloe settled back down, not quite waking up in the first place. He was in a sea of warmth.
He glanced to the other side past Ella's feet and realized Dan must be using her butt as a pillow. He had an arm around her waist over the sheet. He slept hot and was half-spooning Ella on top of the covers naked. Dan's usually tense face was relaxed, spent. He was already a handsome fellow, in repose, the lines around his eyes softened. He hardly looked he worked for the police. Too, Lucifer mentally amended.
Next to Dan, Maze and Linda were entangled. Linda in a short white nightie that ended up hiked against her back. Maze cracked an eye open at him over Dan's head. Lucifer closed his eyes again in what he hoped was enough of a signal not to move yet. The sleeping humans needed the recovery time more than either he or the demon. And this was nice. Like waking in a pile of exhausted puppies.
Before too much longer, someone's stomach would growl. The pleasant evening before would be at an end and reality would start intruding its' head once more. After breakfast, Dan and Chloe would have to go collect their spawn from a sleepover party. Maze probably had some bookkeeping to do and didn't like hanging around in bed in any case. She was staying put for now for him, indulging him. Everyone had to get up and do something, reconnect with the things they had to do to keep living, keep being human.
Just a few more minutes...