Chloe parked in front of the LUX, just near the usual queue of the elegant, beautiful people waiting to be let inside. She felt out of place in her boring car and causal clothes but didn't want to lose time parking at the back entrance. The valet knew her by sight and reaching for the keys smiled to her encouragingly:
"Just hurry."
The detective nodded with gratitude, appreciating words of support. Now, when she finally arrived at the club, she was so nervous that she barely could breathe. With her hand on the doorknob, she hesitated. Why exactly was she so worried? After all, she knew that Lucifer would be happy at her sight. He was waiting for her, to reconcile.
Wait. Why was she keeping the doorknob? The doors to the LUX had no handles, besides they were usually opened, with bouncers guarding the entrance.
Chloe looked around. There were no one around. No bouncers, no queue, no valet. No Los Angeles. Just her and this door and she had no idea what was behind them.
Slowly, she pushed the door, revealing the vast, rocky labyrinth, covered with greyish ash.
"Oh, no, not again," she whispered and tried to lock the door, but it disappeared in the meantime and she found herself standing in the middle of the unfriendly countryside. She had no choice but slowly walk down the narrow path, meandering between the rocky walls.
It was terribly quiet. When she was here with Maze, the place was filled with moans and cries of the victims and shouts of their torturers. Now there was nothing but silence, in which she heard only her own steps.
Somehow, this silence was even worse than the previous sounds of torments.
"Hello?..." she called, feeling like the last idiot, but no one replied. "Is anybody there?"
She wasn't scared. Her instincts didn't warn her against any danger, any unnamed enemy lurking behind the corner. All she felt was sadness and loss.
Having noticed the wooden door in the wall, she opened them with hope for something – anything, but there was nothing behind it, only darkness. She walked further, randomly choosing path bends, the ash falling on her blouse and jacket, the colours of her clothes fading into greys, like the stone walls around her.
She ran for a while and tried a few other doors, but there was only darkness behind them and all paths looked the same. She didn't encounter anyone.
Hell was empty.
"And what was that supposed to mean?" the detective said accusingly to her reflection in the mirror when she woke up. "Hell does not exist."
"Hell does not exist," she repeated again, louder.
"Hi. I heard that you caught the guy yesterday?" asked Dan. He stopped for a moment by her desk and cast a quick, unsure glance toward the empty chair near it.
"Lucifer didn't come today," Chloe replied at the unspoken question and for a moment her heart clenched when she saw how Dan visibly relaxed. He would never admit it, but a brush with Lucifer yesterday put him off balance. And it was no more than a short conversation, during which her partner was very moderate in using his abilities. "And yes, we caught the guy. I am pretty positive that this drug won't reappear."
"So, you closed the case. Congratulations," Dan smiled sincerely. "Mine's not going that well."
Chloe eyed him cautiously. She heard there was some problem with Benitez, but didn't know the details. "What's happening?" she asked, lowering her voice.
Dan looked around and whispered back: "Benitez disappeared. I couldn't have reached him for a few days."
"Perhaps he is simply keeping a low profile," consoled him Chloe, but they both knew that it was very likely that Benitez got caught, killed and the whole operation turned into the fiasco. "If you need my help… I have no open case now. Just a few reports, but they can wait."
"Maybe later I will show you the files… perhaps you would notice something I missed," nodded Dan. "Anyway, thank you."
The air between them evidently improved. Dan usually was nicer after getting a kick from life into his ego. Besides, Lucifer's absence also helped. Chloe thought she could address now the issue that concerned her yesterday and openly ask him about his plans concerning Trixie.
However, when she started to speak, she realized that there is another, entirely different question weighing on her mind.
"Dan… I have been thinking about something. We…" she started slowly, hesitated and blurt out: "We had a church wedding."
Dan stared at her, blinking. "Yeah?..."
"Does it… does it mean something?"
"I don't get it. What are you asking about?"
Chloe sighed. They were married in the church, due to the joint pressure of both her mother and Dan's parents who wished to see their children having a dream wedding. Chloe neither liked it, nor needed it, but in that time she still had too much of an actress in herself, an actress wanting to give a good show and satisfy everyone. So, she put on the white wedding dress and went down the aisle in the church full of flowers. The only concession to her worldview was keeping her oath secular.
"You know, the Catholic church is quite clear about the divorces. There are none. How… how are you dealing with this?"
"Since when do you care?" Dan chuckled unpleasantly, immediately ruffled. "I do not know, that's the last of my concerns at the moment. I do not plan on remarrying at the moment, thank you very much. Once was enough."
Chloe rolled her eyes. "I thought you would be more helpful. After all, you were visiting the church? Reading the Bible? At least as a kid, right?"
"My parents are religious," Dan shrugged his shoulders. "What's going on, Chloe, are you going through some… crisis of values? Are you having some second thoughts concerning the divorce?" Though he was speaking angrily, at the last world his voice broke for a moment.
"No," replied quickly Chloe, feeling guilty at the hurt expression on his face. "I just mean… well, at that time I thought this whole wedding was no more than a kind of show… but what if it is not? What if all this is real? I mean… God?... Heaven, Hell, so on? What if this wedding meant something? Like… you know, 'whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven'?"
Dan looked at her for a moment and started to laugh. "These are metaphors, they shouldn't be taken literally," he replied and, to mask uncertainty in his voice, added ironically: "What, are you scared that you would get stuck with me for the whole eternity? Now, that is not a very attractive prospect of Heaven, is it?"
Now, when he said it, it sounded so stupid. Chloe grimaced, slightly ashamed. "Yeah," she smirked, all lost in thoughts. Stupid and funny. What sort of Heaven would that be? The eternity with Dan sounded so… dull. Even in his best moments, Dan was dull, she had to admit it now, when she got to know… someone… who was so much… not dull. "Not very much. In such case, I would rather see how Hell looks like."
A moment of cold silence on Dan's side realized her how her words must have sounded for him.
"I am sorry, I didn't mean it like that!" she called quickly. "I was just… wondering, Dan. That perhaps this all exists. Afterlife. And that there are… consequences to what we do…"
"Well thank you," hissed Dan, not listening to her clumsy excuses. "You start the weirdest conversation, dwell on the matters you never concerned yourself about… and all this is just a new way of telling me how much you despise of me? That was a low blow, Chloe."
"Dan, that's what I meant," Chloe repeated, standing up. "I am sorry. You misunderstood."
"I don't think so. I need to go," Dan turned on the spot to leave, but after few steps looked back at him: "Find yourself some priest to talk about it. Oh, and keep your help for yourself and your new boyfriend. Somehow our marriage oath didn't stop you from jumping to bed with him even before we signed the papers."
"I didn't…" started Chloe but gave up, because Dan was already away, disappearing in the conference room. Besides, people were already staring at them. Now, that came out great.
For a moment, she regretted having coming to work so early today. After spending the two previous nights at the stakeout, she could have come later, or even take a day off, to order her distorted sleeping patters, just like Lucifer must have done. That was the most probable reason for his absence, he was simply sleeping it all off. Right?
And since she was already at work, she could use this time to make up her paperwork, prepare reports and yes, talk to Dan, to clear the air between them. Not antagonize him even more. Why did she even start this conversation?
The afterlife does not exist, she thought, opening her computer. There is nothing beyond this world, and if there are some… phenomenons that cannot be explained at the moment, they certainly would be in future.
She saw enough Discovery programmes with Trixie to know, that even if something was not explicable at the moment, it… it didn't prove anything. Sad as it sounded, death was the end of existence.
Death.
Chloe froze, with her hands over the keyboard.
She killed a man once, a few years ago. There was a shooting, she - yet not a detective – and other police officers against a gang. A few criminals got shot, one of them died in the hospital. Only from the reports did she learn that it was her bullet that hit the mortal shot. She felt very strange about it, but the whole situation was as impersonal, as it only could be. She didn't even see this man's face.
But how much it went against the fifth commandment? It certainly wasn't self-defence, but was she acting with the conscious intent? Would it matter?
She opened Google to search for some information but then hesitated. Google didn't seem to be an adequate source of that kind of knowledge. Perhaps she should indeed read a few books, maybe talk with someone wiser, like Dan suggested, reevaluate her worldview…
Oh, just pull yourself together, Decker.
That was enough. That was the last moment to stop before she would become some haunted lunatic, questioning everything and everyone. Existential crises simply weren't her forte.
She always stood firm, both feet on the ground, resilient to doubt and speculations. That's why she was good at her work. That was exactly what Palmetto was about. She was doing her job, not listening to… opinions.
Luckily, with all that was crumbling around her, she still had some job to do.
Chloe slammed her notebook on the desk, opened the folders and started to fill in the files. Pushing everything else aside, she concentrated on work, as the lives of half of the Los Angeles population depended on her finishing these – not so urgent – reports.
If Lucifer only came now, just like that, thought the detective during the short lunch break, chewing some sandwich from the vending machine.
After all, he was always unpredictable, switching between moods like between TV channels. Why couldn't he make her life a little easier? Just forget about yesterday and simply come to work, laugh and banter with everyone as usual?
And she could forget about yesterday as well.
He won't, she admitted gloomily. Not today, not tomorrow. If I won't speak to him, he may not come at all.
For a moment, she felt tempted to leave it like that. After all, it was obvious from the beginning, that one day Lucifer would disappear from her life. The only question was, how much ashes he would leave in the process. At this stage, she would probably be still rather unscattered by his departure. Perhaps this would be for the best.
And then she reminded this moment from the last evening when she stood holding onto him, listening to his heartbeat and everything in her screamed that she must talk with him as soon as possible – and, just like the valet in her dream told her, she should hurry.
After work she left Trixie in her friend's house – another occasion to spend an evening together lost – and as soon as possible drove to the LUX. It was still early and the club was closed, but still, after her dream, she was reluctant to park in front, choosing the back entrance instead, where she barely found a place between the delivery cars. The suppliers were unloading boxes, supervised by Maze who ordered them around, pointing the directions with something long and narrow in her hand.
Chloe left the car and intended to pass by the commotion heading for the entrance, but, to her surprise, when Maze immediately left the suppliers and approached her.
"Decker? Good," she called. The object in her had was, indeed, the riding crop. "It is about time. Lucifer is in the club."
"Thanks," replied the detective, thrown off balance by this unexpected openness. "Yes, I need to talk with Lucifer."
"Great. And tell him to finally move his ass from the piano. The club must be supplied and cleaned before the evening and no one can do anything while he is playing."
The detective narrowed suspiciously her eyes. "I guess there is a reason why you didn't do it yourself."
Maze snorted with laughter and for a moment looked almost friendly, before her face closed in her usual scowl. "You could be fun, Decker," she said. "But I hope you came to say goodbye."
Goodbye? The detective realized, that Maze's unexpected friendliness was a kind of politeness shown to the unwelcome guest who is finally leaving. A sting of irritation made her turn on the spot and headed for the entrance. However, she stopped after no more than two steps.
"There is something I would like to talk with you about, Maze," she said.
"Talk with Lucifer," the barmaid stated obliviously. "He is better at talking."
Chloe smirked. He certainly was. "Maze, I…" the detective hesitated and blurted out: "You said once that you showed me Hell. What did it mean?"
Maze shrugged her shoulders. "Dreams. I wanted to scare you."
"But… that's not possible. You cannot… make my dreams. And Hell does not exist."
The dark-haired woman looked at her for a moment with an impassive face. "And you want to inform me about it, because?..."
Chloe bit her lips and for a moment looked aside. Oh, well, she could speak with Maze. The barmaid didn't like her anyway. And she was already crazy. "I am seeing it again in my dreams. You know, this… stone walls, a labyrinth of paths…"
"Ash falling from the sky and the doors leading to the cells, right. That's Hell," nodded Maze, unmoved. "But I have nothing to do with your present dreams. It is all happening in your head." She looked at Chloe, smirked and leaned toward her. "You know it doesn't have to be your problem, right?..."
"What do you mean?" asked absently Chloe, trying to separate what he saw in her dreams from what Maze told her. The barmaid couldn't have seen her dreams. It was a pure coincidence. Or, perhaps, she was suggestive and Maze somehow manipulated her…
"You do not have to concern yourself with Hell," continued Maze. "You will never end there, you are full of light like a little Christmas angel," the barmaid snorted scornfully. "All this doesn't have to be your problem, Decker. You can leave us alone, right now." She stepped even closer into Chloe's personal space and looked her straight in the eye and concluded: "Forget us."
Chloe stood still for a moment. To her surprise, she felt neither offended nor threatened by Maze. On the contrary, she found something incredibly sad in this strive for isolation. "Don't you feel lonely?" she asked without thinking. "Just you two and this club?"
The barmaid laughed, tilting her head back. "Lonely? We are not some pitiful human wimps. And believe me," she winked suggestively, "none of us is lonely in the LUX."
Chloe could imagine what she meant, but it didn't mislead her. "Don't you need something more?"
Maze remained silent for a long while, playing with the hilt of the riding crop. Her challenging smile was gone and she looked at Chloe with utmost seriousness when she replied: "More would be dangerous."
And then she was gone, yelling at the suppliers as of nothing happened.
Chloe slowly entered the building, passing by the boxes of wares, with each step more anxious about the conversation she was going to have. What made Maze think that she came to say goodbye? After all, she and Lucifer didn't actually even quarrel. What happened yesterday, was no more than a misunderstanding to be cleared. Didn't Lucifer treat it in the same way? She said something harsh, but she was tired. She might have overreacted, but…
I was terrified, and he saw it, she thought with regret, walking toward the main room of the club. The corridors in the back of the LUX were as clean and shiny as the official rooms of the club. Chloe fleetingly wondered that
Lucifer didn't tolerate any blemish in his surroundings. On the other hand, he was perfectly able to see and reveal any imperfections in people's souls.
That two features put together made up for the very demanding partner.
No matter what Maze said, the detective would never interrupt Lucifer while he was playing the piano. She leant over the empty bar and for a moment just listened to him.
The man who plays like this couldn't hurt anyone, thought hazily Chloe, once again prone to believe, that yesterday's evening was no more than a streak of misunderstandings. She could remain like this for hours, floating with the soft melody, forgetting all the violence and ugliness of the world. However, all too soon the music faded, as if Lucifer felt her presence, even if he couldn't see her from his seat.
"Detective," he welcomed her, slowly turning toward her. Their eyes met and for a moment Chloe wondered, how long exactly hadn't he been sleeping.
Then, however, he stood up with his usual liveliness and a cocky smile. "I didn't expect you so soon, Detective. Did we get a new case? Did something happen in the current investigation that requires my presence? Or did you just came to discuss what exactly is not going to work in our cooperation?"
So, he didn't switch the mood since yesterday. He didn't forget. And he was not going to make it easy.
"We need to talk," sighed the detective.
"Ah. The third option," observed causally Lucifer, inviting her to the elevator.
Once they were in his apartment, Lucifer immediately headed for his bar, raising the bottle of whiskey and tumbler toward Chloe with a silent question. When she shook his head in refusal, he weighed for a moment a glass in one hand and the bottle in another, as if he was wondering whether drinking straight from the bottle wouldn't be a simpler option. Finally, he poured the generous dose to his tumbler and turned to the detective.
"Let's get over with this," he said shortly, draining the content of the glass in one draft.
The detective for a while couldn't find suitable words, distraught by the contrast between gentle music he played a few moments ago and the destructive vibes that surrounded him now put her.
"You are angry at me," she started slowly.
"I am not," came the immediate answer.
And the tumbler got refilled.
The detective walked through the room to the window and back, trying to gather her thoughts. Lucifer remained standing by his piano, keeping a drink in one hand and running the other down the lid of the instrument as if considering to open it and play again.
"Okey," sighed Chloe. "I am angry at you."
"Good!" exclaimed approvingly Lucifer. "You are recognizing your emotions. That's progress. At least that's what my therapist says, and she should know. I am not sure I reached this stage yet. So fat, I am still getting used to the fact, that emotions…"
"Stop it," snapped Chloe. "Please. Just… concentrate on me for a moment."
"Be careful what you wish for, Detective," muttered Lucifer ironically, but then silenced and looked at her expectantly.
Chloe stood in front of him, took a deep breath and started speaking. "Lucifer. I am sorry if I sounded… too emotional yesterday, but it was a heavy day and you… you weren't exactly easy to deal with." The tone of her voice was a bit too official, but she had to reign her emotions to keep the conversation reasonable. "I need to know that I can rely on you. I know that you… you may have a different approach to some issues, but if you want to work with me… I mean with the LAPD, you need to… adjust to some rules."
"Bloody Hell, Detective, can't you see how much I am trying?" called Lucifer with exasperation. He set the empty tumbler on the counter with a loud crash.
The glass cracked spectacularly, indicating that the reasonable part of the conversation was over.
"Well, yes, I might have had some problems with noticing it yesterday," the detective retorted accusingly. "Like when I was gathering Ben Mitchell from the floor."
"Yesterday?" Lucifer only shrugged his shoulders. "I relented to you, respecting your… sense of comfort."
"My what?..." gasped Chloe, losing the rest of her composure, because the last night she was as far from comfort as it is only possible. "And if I left the room, he would have been at the ER now, wouldn't he? Don't you really see anything… wrong in your behaviour?"
"Wrong?..." Lucifel almost hissed, crooking his head in this specific manner of his. "There is nothing wrong in punishing the evil, Detective, on the contrary, it is very, very right and worth the effort! And yet I let this wretched scoundrel go, just to please you!" Lucifer leant over Chloe, his eyed blazing with such emotions, that she couldn't help making a step back. Her reaction cooled him down and he also stepped back, rasing his hands in appeasing gesture. When he continued to speak, he evidently struggled to keep his voice calmer. "Detective, I have seen so many rules and laws created, broken and forgotten, and I know that there is only one that counts in the universal dimension: that wrongdoing should be punished. Everything else are just your humans' fleeting whims… However, I was ready to…"
Now that was too much. The detective realized that Lucifer saw the things from the different point of view, but the fact that he somehow perceived himself as the one with the monopoly of truth and righteous judgment and her – whimsical and irrational – crossed all limits.
"Whims?" she interrupted him with a snort. "You dare to speak about whims? You?... You are the most unpredictable, unreliable and chaotic man I have ever met!"
Lucifer rolled his eyes. "Yes, yes, yes and no," he mocked her count of insults. "I am not a man."
"Right, you are the devil," Chloe intended to retort ironically, but somehow the sarcasm got strangled in her throat. "And you are above all the rules and all the laws," she tried again, this time with a better result.
Still, Lucifer ignored her taunt, only shrugged slightly as if she said something obvious. "Don't you really notice how I am trying to adjust to your… requirements?" he said instead. "How I am waiting for your permission to use my more… unusual abilities? Did I ever not stop when you asked me? Bloody Hell, Detective, I even released these dealers who hurt you," he pointed toward the fading scar on Chloe's cheek.
"You didn't release them," reminded the detective. "They are in jail."
Lucifer laughed. "In jail. So scary. Do you want to know, what I would do with them?"
"No," replied quickly Chloe.
For a moment they stood in uncomfortable silence, all the told and untold words ringing in the air. Then Lucifer walked to his bar again and reached for a new tumbler, the glass clinking quietly when he poured himself a drink. Chloe suddenly felt the wave of weariness and sat on the sofa. She hid her face in the hands and rubbing her forehead.
That's not going to end well, she thought, not angry anymore, but resigned.
"I do not like how you phrase it, Lucifer," she said finally, once more trying to speak reasonably. "As if it was about all about me. And it is not," she stressed. "You started to help the LAPD because you like solving the cases. Without me, you would be working without someone else, right? And you would have to follow some rules as well."
Lucifer didn't reply at once. He raised the tumbler, swirling its content, then put it aside on the piano and run his fingers over its surface, as if sweeping some invisible dust.
"I am not sure," he admitted finally. His voice was devoided of the previous passion and the sting of concern forced Chloe to stood up and near to him.
"You should rest," she said, taking in the shadows around his eyes. "When did you last sleep?" Her hand raised involuntarily to his cheek, but before she managed to touch him, he raised his palm, stopping her.
"Detective," he asked quietly. "Why didn't you speak yesterday about the rules and laws?... Why about mercy?..." He looked her in the eye almost beggingly, for a moment looking so tired and tormented, that Chloe had to swallow back tears, that were threatening to spill.
"I don't know," she replied, feeling as lost, as he looked like. "Does it mean something?"
How strange, it was the same question she asked Dan a few hours ago… Did some forces, that she had no idea about, that she chose to ignore, had an influence on her life? Lucifer was still looking at her, with some silent despair in his sight, and his eyes were dark, so dark… If she let herself to be drawn into this darkness, what would become from her life? What kind of changes would she have to face?
And then Lucifer jerked, breaking their connection and shrugged his shoulders.
"I don't know," he replied harshly, his face again expressing nothing but the usual nonchalance.
Touching him didn't sound like a good idea anymore and Chloe slowly retreated to the sofa. After a while, Lucifer followed her and sat on the armchair, leaning himself on the backrest, with his legs crossed, his pose oozing confidence as if he wanted to mask and forget these few seconds of vulnerability that just passed between them.
"Well, Detective, once we are done with shouting as well as with the moment of weakness," he smirked sarcastically, "I guess it is time to near to the conclusion of our little discussion."
He raised his tumbler toward her, as if in a toast, and Chloe for a moment closed her eyes. No, it was not going to end well.
"We could end this conversation here, Detective. Return to our status quo. I would try to play by your rules, really. And you would try not to notice anything that would trouble you too much."
Ah, how biting it sounded. Chloe forced herself not to flinch and keep his sight. "But we are not going to do this?" she asked almost challengingly.
To her surprise, Lucifer avoided the direct answer. "I cannot help but notice, that my company is slowly becoming too uncomfortable for you. And, as you pointed out so wisely, there are consequences to everything. If we were to continue our… partnership, there certainly would be some consequences to face. We cannot ignore it. You need to make your choice… consciously," he sighed and concluded, looking at her with regret. "You cannot close your eyes."
Recollections of the last evening brought the wave of shame, fear and anger. Chloe decided She decided to act on the last one.
"You are making it all about me again and it is more about you," she said accusingly. "You thought you will get to have everything your way. Learn something new, get some thrill… Suddenly it turns out it does not leave you unaffected. You make things you did not intend, driven by feelings you did not expect. And it is something unacceptable, right? You simply got scared of… of the change in your life. Of the change in you."
To her surprise, Lucifer didn't get angry or offended with her speech. On the contrary, his eyes gleamed with satisfaction, as if the conversation took the direction he desired.
"Very well, Detective. Let's make a deal. I will risk the change if you risk the truth."
Oh. So that's how he cornered her. For a moment Chloe remained silent and motionless, with sinking feeling realizing she would need to give him a direct answer.
So, she could… keep him. He already supported her in a way no one did before, and he would remain by her side. Their relation would develop and Chloe couldn't deny that it was something she very much… desired. And he declared he was ready to change, so if she pointed out the most… unacceptable traits in his life and personality – strange, that she thought first about the crowds in his bedroom and only then about sending the suspects to the in the asylum - he was ready to work on it.
But, to have it all, she would have to learn, what exactly did she saw reflected in the glass in the closed factory, on that day when she shot him. And she would have to let fall apart this web of lies and illusions she built around her in the last weeks - because she was the one hiding behind the illusions, not he.
I cannot, she thought, feeling her heart broke.
"I see your decision on your face, Detective," observed Lucifer almost causally. "But I need you to say it."
He sounded so oblivious, but Chloe knew better. From the way he looked at her, from the way he sat, tensed and straightened, clenching his grasp on the armrests… He also wanted to keep her.
I cannot, she thought again, cursing herself for being such a coward, but… but it was not only about him. Accepting him meant that… well, that he would provide her with proofs, hard, undeniable evidence she couldn't ignore, that the world around her was much more than she believed it to be. It would inadvertently change her reality, open the whole new dimensions she had only a very vague idea about.
She wouldn't be able to cope with it.
"I cannot," she said aloud.
"Very well," Lucifer commented with a nod, not moving from his armchair, not looking at her.
There was nothing left to say and Chloe stood up, turning to leave. The sense of calamity overwhelmed her when she was walking toward the elevator, each step required extreme effort, as if she was struggling against herself. Hazy pictures form her dreams flashed in her mind, recollections of ash and rocks, light and darkness, and everything in her was screaming that she is doing something wrong, wrong, wrong…
Lucifer caught up with her moments before she reached the elevator.
"Chloe," he said fervently, his oblivious façade broken, " if you stayed I wouldn't anyone let hurt you."
The detective frowned. If he said 'I wouldn't hurt you', she might have found it somehow reassuring. However, his choice of words only confirmed, what she feared most - that his life was like the Pandora chest, filled with unknown menaces.
Perhaps if she was alone, she would risk it. She wanted to risk it. However, she had a daughter to think about. She couldn't drag her into it.
"But that's not enough, right?..." asked Lucifer, seeing her face.
"No, that's too much," replied quietly Chloe.
Lucifer slowly nodded, acknowledging her decision. "That's so right, Detective" he commented, his voice tinted with sarcasm. He stepped back, letting her go, and then turned abruptly, heading for her balcony, quickly putting distance between them.
"Leave already," he called only, with his back toward her, not with sarcasm anymore, but with the strangled wraith in his voice and he detective hectically pushed the button of the elevator, letting the breath out only when the door closed, separating her from his apartment.
All in all, that wasn't a good farewell.
Chloe was never the one to show emotions, even if her mother encouraged her to be more open. 'Show that you have feelings, that you care,' she used to say, preparing her to the endless auditions. 'Nothing will serve you better to have it your way than a tear or two on this pretty face,' advised Penelope, when some arrangements required settling.
But Chloe couldn't pretend to be a soft and emotional one. She never cried in front of people. If she was hurt, she only pressed her lips, closing her face for painful emotions. As a child, she was praised for being so brave, as a schoolgirl – she was called 'proud' already with slight reproach, that became more visible when she became her acting career. 'Arrogant. Stuck–up'. Finally, 'cold'. That what her fellow officers started to call her at the precinct, when she refused to get ashamed at the countless jokes concerning her movie, or when she never cried at the crime scenes, even if everyone expected from the former actress some kind of breakdown. 'Cold bitch', after Palmetto.
So, cold as she was, she didn't cry leaving the LUX.
She only pressed her lips, and raised her chin, and – somewhere inside feeling like a little girl, trying not to cry because of the skinned knee – walked through the club, whether the stuff was hastily bustling around, just like Maze wanted. Perhaps Maze was there too, but she didn't look in her direction. She couldn't bear her gloating.
Chloe didn't also cry on her way home, because she needed to keep attention while driving. And she didn't cry at home, because it would worry Trixie. She spent some time with her daughter. She checked her homework, made her supper, watched some cartoons with her and finally – tucked her in bad and read a few stories. Even if she felt numb, she could still play the role of a good mother.
Only later, when Trixie got asleep, Chloe went to the bathroom, opened the shower, and while the water was running, let the tears to run down.
She cried and cried, hoping that the water would wash away her regret and sense of loss. That she would cry once and then accept it, just another disappointment in her life. Indeed, once she finally was out of tears, she felt a bit calmer. Having washed her face with cold water, she went to bed, with a resolve to be strong and go on with her life, accepting what couldn't be changed.
And then she cried some more.
The next days were surprisingly calm, even at work. Chloe didn't get the new case, so she could concentrate on ordering the documentation from the last one. She spent some time in the prosecutor office and in the archives.
Lucifer must have settled things with Monroe, as she didn't comment on his absence. Once or twice she mentioned assigning the new partner for Chloe. Generally, the attention of the precinct focused around Dan and Benitez, who still didn't reappear. The situation was getting hectic, but Chloe remained outside of it, not being a member of Dan's team.
Dan didn't talk with her after their last argument, except for the matters directly concerning Trixie.
At some point, Chloe enjoyed her peace. Her reason told her, she made the right decision. He lost the excitement but regained the feeling of security. Of course, she felt a bit lonely, but she was going to get over with it. She got over splitting her husband after many years of marriage, she would get over the man she had known since a few weeks. It would only require time.
If she only could stop thinking about him.
Perhaps it didn't help that the gossip portal in Interned each day gushed about the new party in the LUX, which extravagance outshone all the previous scandals of Los Angeles. She didn't read them, but the headlines were descriptive enough.
She couldn't help noticing a few photos of Lucifer. He looked good. Very much in his element. Happy.
She wasn't happy, but she was fine. Well, she would be fine. In a few days.
In a few days, when she entered the precinct and was halfway toward her desk, she suddenly noticed that something was wrong. There was an unusual commotion, people running around with worried faces, making phone calls, checking maps… Monroe was in the conference room, in the company of a few unknown men, looking important and troubled. It indicated some major incident. A shootout? A terrorist attempt? No, she would herd about it.
The detective slowed down realizing, that there was some strange tension… around her. People were avoiding her. Keeping the distance. She felt a few glances directed at her, but no one neared to her. As if no one wanted to be the first one to speak with me, she realized.
Finally, she stopped standing in the middle of the opened space of the precinct and looked at Monroe, catching her sight through the glass panel. The lieutenant froze for a moment, the discomfort twisting her features. Then she turned to the men working with her and with one of them left the conference room, heading toward Chloe.
The detective stood motionlessly, as if her feet grew into the floor, her heartbeat escalating, blood rushing in her ears, her vision narrowed to Monroe and her companion nearing to her… She felt as of waiting for her own execution, some part of her back in this terrible moment when two officers came to their house informing about her father's death because Monroe had the same, troubled and apologizing expression…
She must have been wrong, it could not have been personal. She had no one else in the force to lose since she and Dan broke up. Of course, technically, Dan was still her husband, but it couldn't be about him. He couldn't have even got to work yet, this morning Trixie had a swimming competition and he went with her, to cheer for her, so he should have been with Trixie…
Oh, no.