Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Lucifer. They belong to J.K. Rowling and Fox and now Netflix.
Lucifer strolled up the street towards the yellow tape, unis, and bystanders. He flashed a smile at an officer standing guard at the tape who let him pass with no arguments. Scanning the alleyway for Chloe, he moved to join her. "Who do we have here?"
"This is 22 year old Yvonne Michaels," Chloe said. "Estimated time of death was around 5:00 am."
Lucifer winced. "I'm all for disrupting Dad's plans, but for once I agree with him. Hair was not meant to be blue."
"I don't know about that. I think her hair looks nice," Chloe said.
"Who found her?" Draco asked. He and Harry had arrived just a little before Lucifer.
Chloe crouched down beside the body. "One of her three roommates, Georgia Lom. Apparently she got a text from Yvonne's phone, asking her for help."
"So she knew she was about to be attacked." Harry took a step closer to the body.
Chloe shook her head. "That's the thing, based on the wounds and patrols, the body was dumped here between 4:45 and 5:15, but the text was sent at 6:20 this morning. I've requested her phone records and we're trying to locate the phone, but there's nothing on it yet."
"Where's the roommate now?" Harry's gaze swept the surrounding area.
"Dan's getting her statement." Chloe waved at her ex husband and he sent Georgia over to her. "Georgia, I'm Detective Decker, and this is Detective Malfoy and Agent Potter."
"What about me?" Lucifer asked. He turned to Georgia, resolved to take care of things himself. "I'm Lucifer Morningstar."
Chloe ignored him. "Georgia, do you know anything about what Yvonne was doing last night?"
"I was working all last night, so we didn't hang out."
"Right but did she tell where she was going to be or who she was going to be with?" Chloe pressed.
"We weren't that kind of friends. Both of us don't believe in clinginess or informing each other about everything. That stuff forms friendships toxic."
Not one to be discouraged, Chloe pulled out two pictures, putting Mark Mullins on top of the stack, and showing it to the girl in front of her. "Georgia, do you recognize this man?" Georgia shook her head. Chloe sighed and switched the pictures.
Georgia leaned forward to look at the new picture. "Oh my God!" She covered her mouth with her hand. "Please tell me that's not Jordan."
"Well I can, but that's not really going to change that he's dead. Dad's a little more stubborn than that I'm afraid," Lucifer said.
"He's dead too?" Tears pricked at the corners of Georgia's eyes. "I guess the only silver lining is that neither one had to lose the other. They went out at the same time."
"Jordan and Yvonne were pretty close then," Harry said.
"Uh huh. They were practically inseparable. Even that bitch Molly couldn't split them up."
Draco was rather taken aback by Georgia's sudden anger. "You mean Molly Nielson, Jordan's fiance?"
Georgia's eyes widened. "Wait, seriously? I had no idea they got engaged." She lowered her voice. "Honestly, I'm surprised he stayed with that psycho long enough to get that far. You know she called Yvonne trash a couple months ago? I mean seriously!"
"Was there any more to the altercation beyond that?" Chloe pressed. "What led to it?"
Georgia shrugged. "She's just a just a jealous judgemental bitch. Yvonne was drunk one night, and Molly insisted that she was bad for Jordan's sobriety even though the two of them met through AA before Molly and Jordan were even dating."
"Did Yvonne keep going to AA up until now?" Harry asked.
"As far as I know."
Chloe scribbled something in her notebook. "Thank you for your time, Georgia. Detective Espinoza will need to finish taking your statement before you can leave. And this should go without saying, but don't leave town."
In an unusual display of self restraint, Lucifer waited for Georgia to be out of earshot before declaring, "I knew there was something suspicious about the fiance! She was crying far too much to be believable."
"Lucifer!" Chloe exclaimed. "The woman lost her fiance. How much crying are you suggesting would be appropriate in that situation?"
"Well certainly not as much as she was doing. It was downright unseemly."
Sensing the impending argument and hurt feelings, Draco jumped in. "Okay, okay, while I agree that Ms. Nielsen was––for lack of a better word––a little saccharine, that hardly implicates her in this case."
"You heard the girl. Molly had an altercation with one victim over another victim." Lucifer pointed out. "And quite possibly could have targeted other people her so called lover knew through AA."
Chloe frowned, considering Lucifer's argument. "Maybe, but that only loosely explains the connection to Mark Mullins. I personally believe that the next step in this case is to investigate the AA connection between the three of them. If we can find out which group Yvonne and Jordan were part of, we may be able to connect the two of them to Mark."
—-
Chloe groaned and banged her head against her desk. She shouldn't have gotten her hopes up about the CCTV footage after it hadn't been at all helpful for the past two victims, but she couldn't stop herself.
She rubbed her eyes and looked around at the station. It was slightly quieter than usual because a lot of people were on their lunch breaks. Lucifer had gone off to meet some interior designer or something for Lux hours ago, and Harry and Draco had gone off to grab lunch.
Draco had been hesitant about leaving her to go through the footage alone, but after hours of searching for the AA group that Jordan and Yvonne had been part of, the two of them deserved a little break. Besides, she actually didn't mind watching the footage. It was an oddly meditative experience or it was until it proved completely useless.
The only thing that was at all helpful was that she could now definitively say that the body had been placed at 4:57 am. Did she know how long Yvonne had been dead before that? No. Did she know how she died? No. Did she even know how her body even got there? Once again no she did not. One would think that the footage would help answer at least some of these questions, but nothing in this case made sense.
A small finger poked her elbow. "Hi, Mom!" Trixie peered at the screen. "Who's that?"
Chloe rushed to click out of the footage. 'Trixie, baby, you're not supposed to see that."
"Why? Maze showed me something that looked just like it yesterday." Trixie pushed a pencil away from the edge of Chloe's desk. "Actually, there was a lot more blood on the one she showed me."
"What!" Chloe took a deep breath, trying to talk herself out of killing Maze. "Baby, Maze really shouldn't be showing you that kind of thing."
"Why not?" Trixie asked. "Her bounties always look so cool!"
Chloe shook her head. "Wait, honey, what are you even doing here? Wasn't Daddy supposed to pick you up "
Dan walked over. "I did, but I got called in at the last minute." He put his hand on Trixie's shoulder. "Monkey, didn't I say to wait by my desk?" Trixie just smiled at him, and Dan crouched down in front of her. "I need to talk to your mom about something serious. Can you go back to my desk please and then I'll take you to go get lunch like we talked about."
Trixie looked back and forth between her parents. "Why can't I stay here? I can handle police stuff." She cocked her hip and crossed her arms.
"Because if you stay here, we won't get any desert after lunch," Dan said, standing back up again.
Trixie's eyes narrowed. "You wouldn't."
"Oh I would." Dan jokingly crossed his heart. "I promise."
"Okay fine, I'm going," Trixie hugged Chloe. "Bye, Mom!" She ran off through the quiet station to her Dad's desk.
"Bye, munchkin!" Chloe called after her daughter. She turned back to Dan. "What did you want to talk about?"
"You know how Georgia Lom found your latest vic's body because of text from her phone?" Dan grabbed one of the crime scene photos from that morning off of Chloe's desk and held it up to his face. He grimaced at the markings on the body.
"Yeah, we're still waiting on that phone information you requested." Chloe could only hope that information would be more helpful than the footage she had just spent a whole hour of her life scouring. If they could find or track the phone itself, it could provide a big break in this case.
Dan put the photo back on Chloe's desk. "I have some good news and some bad news. Do you want the good news first or the bad news first?" he asked, already knowing which one she would choose.
Chloe wasn't sure if she could take another dead end in this case. "The bad news I guess." She figured she could let the good news cheer her up after.
"Well, the bad news is that the cell records show the text coming from the general area around where Yvonne's body was found." The picture of the brand that had been on Yvonne's body caught Dan's eye. He picked up the photo to inspect it, having never seen the brands that had been on the three victims.
Chloe nodded, disappointed. "Yeah, I didn't think we would get much from that. Was there anything about tracking the phone?" At least that lead might pan out.
"That's part two of the bad news." He lowered the photo, so he could look at Chloe as he spoke. "The tech guys are pretty sure that the phone's been destroyed by whoever had it. They're still looking for it, but I'm not hopeful."
"I guess that's to be expected. You said something about good news?"
Dan smiled. "Yeah, I did." Dan pulled a folded piece of paper out of the inside pocket of his sports coat. "They weren't able to find the phone, but they were able to get its last known location." He handed the paper to Chloe. "The location was at this address at 9:13 pm."
Chloe beamed at him. "Thanks so much, Dan. This is the closest thing we have to a timeline for Yvonne last night."
Dan examined her for a moment and cocked his head. "Something else is bothering you. What is it?"
"It's nothing, really." She fiddled absentmindedly with her watch. "I just don't know how to feel about this case. Nothing about it makes any sense."
"Yeah tell me about it." Dan sat down on the edge of her desk. "But you'll figure it out. You always do."
"Yeah, I guess. But it would be easier if I only had to deal with Lucifer's usual weirdness."
Dan raised an eyebrow. "Is Lucifer acting off again?"
"No, he's fine. It's Draco who concerns me."
"Chloe, I think you're just too used to weird. All this time working with someone as crazy as Lucifer has made a regular guy like Draco seem strange to you."
Chloe shook her head. "At least Lucifer is upfront about his insanity. I can't help but feel like Draco is hiding something, something important. And I'm just not sure I can trust him if he's so closed off."
Dan put a gentle hand on her shoulder. "Chloe, you don't have to trust the guy with your life savings. You just need to trust him to have your back when things get scary."
"I guess you're right. I still don't like the idea of having to trust someone who doesn't trust me enough to be honest with me."
"Chloe, the kid just got here. It's not exactly strange that he isn't itching to tell you his every secret and regret." Dan smirked. "Besides, if you found a way to trust the irreverent, inconsistent wonder that is Lucifer, I'm pretty sure you're capable of building trust with anybody."
Chloe pushed her mouse around aimlessly. "If I didn't know any better, I'd say Lucifer was growing on you."
Dan was about to respond when a voice rang out through the station. "Dad!" Trixie called.
He chuckled and shook his head. "I should get her some lunch before she goes on a hangry rampage."
"That's probably a good idea. Maze has been training her a bit too well." Dan walked back to Trixie, and Chloe unfolded the paper he had given her. The address wasn't familiar to her, but she knew the street was downtown.
She searched up the address. To her surprise, her search produced a small church. She went to its website but she didn't see any sort of service scheduled for the night before, especially not when Yvonne was supposed to have been there. It was possible that she had just gone to the church for personal reasons, but something in Chloe's gut said that she had been there to meet someone.
She clicked on an events tab up at the top of the webpage. Most of the page was dominated by a form for scheduling a new event, but a small box on the side listed organizations that used the church for events. Chloe scrolled through it halfheartedly, her eyes starting to glaze over after so many hours at her computer. Suddenly she sat bolt upright in her chair. There at the bottom of the list was the exact thing she needed, an AA group.
She looked at their schedule of meetings, but there was no meeting scheduled for the previous night. Figuring she may as well do due diligence, she still resolved to call the church to find out more about the group.
—-
"Are you sure this is her favorite?" Harry asked Draco as the two of them walked back into the station.
"For the last time, Potter, this," Draco held up a white paper bag, "is what she gets everytime we go to Phillip's truck." He spotted Chloe at her desk with her back to them and quickly put the bag behind his back.
"What are you doing?" Draco quickly shushed him, and Harry couldn't help but smile. Ever since Draco had accosted him from a tree in their fourth year, Harry had known that Draco enjoyed surprises and theatrics in general, but he'd never seen him do it without malice.
Without meaning to, Draco had been surprising Harry all day. He was honestly the last person Harry would have imagined as fitting in the muggle world, but he was more comfortable than Harry had ever seen him at Hogwarts. Even when he and Ron sneaked into the Slytherin common room, Draco had been on edge, constantly performing as a Malfoy.
As Draco and Harry got closer to Chloe, they could hear her talking to someone. Harry gave Draco a confused look. "Phone" Draco mouthed in response.
"What do you mean they meet every night? Their schedule says they meet Wednesday and Friday nights." Chloe asked whoever she was on the phone with. She nodded as she listened to their response. "Right would it be possible for us to access it?" She listened again. "Thank you so much for your assistance." She hung up the phone and closed out of the website she had been looking at.
"What was that about?" Draco asked as he and Harry walked up to her. He produced the paper bag with a flourish and handed it over to her.
Chloe seized the bag with gusto. "You didn't have to do this for me, Draco."
"Well you did take one for the team and go through all that footage that was obviously going to prove disappointing." He smiled at her as he spoke and Harry couldn't help but notice that there was not even a hint of a sneer in it.
Harry leaned against the edge of Chloe's desk. "Wait so who was on the phone?"
Chloe smiled. "That was the church that Yvonne's still missing phone places her at around 9 last night, and you'll never guess what was happening at the church when she was there."
"What?" Harry and Draco asked at the same time.
"An alcoholics anonymous meeting."
How do y'all feel about this chapter length? Is this about right or would it be better if they were shorter or longer (more like the previous chapter). I'm asking because I have some longer ones coming up and I'm wondering if I should break them up a little.
I hope that everyone is safe and healthy, both physically and mentally. Thank you for all the feedback and support, and thank you so much to everyone who favorited, followed, and gave Kudos.