Author's notes:

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Here's the second chapter (just a few hours after I've updated in French, you lucky folks!)

Music

'The Unforgiven' | Blackwall


MORE SAINT THAN DEVIL

2


She has been rubbing her fingers ever since.

From the precinct to her car, from her steering wheel to her gear shift, from the shifter to the ignition key.

Chloe is still rubbing them as she walks towards her new victim, in this alleyway where the stenches of sewers and decomposing body tickle her nostrils. Her fingers find no respite except with the smooth contact of the blue gloves she must wear for any detailed observation of dead bodies. Pulling the latex to her wrists, she quickly scans the place before coming even closer to the corpse, along with her partner who hasn't hidden his joy at being exempt from further paperwork for the time being.

East Los Angeles isn't known for its tranquility, so it's not surprising to frequently find crimes and murders according to gangs' susceptibility. What is surprising, however, is to find in the middle of these dangerous streets a stone dead person in her seventies - coming from a well-off background, given her clothes. It's surprising enough to bring half the people around the crime scene, anyway. Chloe passed the police cordon while yet another altercation between two men - inspired in their violent feelings by the death nearby - echoes. Lucifer stares at them while they push each other's buttons and push forward the other curious gathered behind the police cordon, weary officers trying to hold them back out of the restricted area.

"Not regretting Hell, are you?" she asks him, slightly punching him in the ribs with her elbow.

She has spoken lightly, yet her heart feels so heavy inside. Hell has this power over her, over him.

He shakes his head. "It doesn't look like I left the place behind, give or take one of two walking nightmares. Although I doubt your officers would tolerate beheading to teach good manners to these bullies, would they?"

She blinks at him. Does she really want to know?

"Right."

"Speaking of bullies," Lucifer says after he notices Dan's presence further on.

"Speaking of good manners," she replies, holding him by the sleeve.

Forced to stop, Lucifer turns to her with an arched eyebrow.

"I'd appreciate it if you'd... try them a bit more with Dan."

"And why should I, Detective? It's his that are below par lately, if you ask me. Is it something you did actually like about him? Would you appreciate more bullying from me, perhaps?"

Chloe opens her mouth, however stopped by surprisingly mixed thoughts about it. This isn't relevant right now, though. So she wipes these 'brutal' ideas from her mind.

"That's not the point. From his point of view, you just... left."

"I did."

"You know what I mean, Lucifer. He doesn't know why you left."

"And because of that, I should disregard his lack of good manners and optimize mine, really?" he summarizes, annoyance echoing in his voice.

"I'd just…" Chloe sighs while looking at Lucifer and her ex-husband in turn. "I'd just like to solve this case peacefully, all right?"

He sighs too, glaring at Dan over his shoulder. "It's not that simple, Detective."

"Didn't we agree to try to make things difficult for yourself, hm?" she tricks him with a smirk.

He pouts and she stops herself kissing him straight away. Not in public.

Not. In. Public.

Her thoughts get lost once more in intimate moments, dreamed ones, that take some time to become reality for both of them. It's evident that the world, the universe and time keep getting in the way. It's evident that she's holding back again.

He's here.

"Emphasizing facts isn't a deal, but as you wish," he accepts reluctantly. "I'll be more saint than Devil, for you."

She smiles, squeezing his fingers briefly. She regrets wearing her gloves, she regrets she hasn't waited to put them on. "As long as the Devil isn't far."

"Always by your side, Detective," he assures her with a devilish tempting grin.

After which, he takes a deep breath and walks towards the forensic agitation with Chloe at his side.

Always.

For a moment, she smells nothing but him, bourbon and cigarettes. Not common ones, the Devil can't breathe out less noble smoke than Merveilles'. As for her, she breathes in, as deeply as she can without him to notice. Many people can't tell the difference between one bourbon or another, even less from its ephemeral fragrance perfuming its drinker. Chloe has been one of those people, ignorant, not caring much about it. Then something happened, somebody's absence that has been haunting for her.

Now, she knows the difference.

And she has never drunk that much bourbon to recall a presence, a voice, just a scent. His scent.

Blanton's Single Barrel Bourbon and Merveilles.

He's here. Right here….

Each empty bottle has increased her obsession, has given her a pretext to go back there, to delude herself one last time. That's what she has thought then, one last time.

She rubs her fingers one last time before looking at anything else but her partner. Dan is carefully studying the victim's posture, writing details and possible clues in his notebook. Upon noticing her partner, he gazes at the Devil with frank animosity, to say the least, his gloved fingers tightening around the pen.

"Hey, Dan," she says with a last worried look towards Lucifer whose posture has become incredibly still under Dan's gaze.

Lucifer puts his hands in his pockets with a smile - saint as requested. Still, his proud posture remains devilish.

As long as the Devil isn't far, right?

"Daniel," he says in turn.

"So no 'Douche' today, uh?" Dan answers to him curtly, straightening up.

"I can't deny that the temptation is fierce, but I wouldn't be the Devil if I couldn't resist every now and then."

Dan looks at Chloe and Lucifer, her hopes shattered by a smirk from the most tempted one. "Not your best try to have her in your bed, buddy."

"Dan!" Chloe exclaims.

It's Lucifer, however, who prevents her from expressing her anger further with his hand on her forearm, not losing his amiable smile. The strength vibrating under his gentle hold instantly takes her desire to retort off her lips.

"Detective, Detective… Daniel is only highlighting his frustration for no longer having your delightful presence in his life," he calmly replies. "Besides, it's only natural from him to project the despicable sides of his boring lonely existence on others, isn't it?"

Well… so much for good manners.

Dan's expression surrenders to anger, growling at Lucifer the next second; "Screw y—!"

Ella chooses this moment to shut the ambiguous manners of the two men of her life down, past and present life.

"Dios mio! Couldn't He solve the traffic problems once and for all before everything else?" she exclaims, putting heavy bags and equipment near Daniel.

If Lucifer's stillness hasn't already been a sign of worrying hostility, his lack of eloquence regarding God's questionable acts is the most obvious one. As for Chloe, she hardly holds back a frustrated grunt. She has never really paid much attention to these frequent praises of the divine, although more so after she has found out the truth, but it has stayed on a strictly polite level of curiosity.

Now, she keeps wavering between bitterness and frustration towards the Father of All Things. The Father of all her torments, of the angel of whose He keeps controlling his every movement. Like Father, like Son. At least the Son learns from his mistakes.

Ella quickly notices the mood. her brow furrowed, she asks; "Did I miss something?"

"Only 'good manners', Miss Lopez," Lucifer finally relaxes, his jaw still clenched, though.

"Dan, could you interview the first people who arrived at the crime scene? You know how it works," Chloe tells him in a tense tone.

Dan glares at Lucifer one last time, slowly walking around the body. "Yeah... I know how it works."

Chloe breathes more freely once he has reached the police cordon. Lucifer finally releases his strong and yet gentle hold on her forearm. This isn't the first time he's shown himself that demonstrative in his concern for her well-being - both physically and during some manly verbal fights. However, this time it's particular. Probably because of this feeling of belonging coming from him, a clamour about her being 'his'.

"What have we here?" she asks after clearing her throat.

"Apart from good manners, you mean?" Lucifer replies.

"Lucifer..."

"Detective?"

"Guys, I missed this so much!" The forensic rejoins them, a radiant smile on her face. "We needed a bit more of 'Deckerstar' in this world; God did hear our prayers!"

"Luckily, He took action for this before traffic problems, didn't He?" Lucifer adds as he moves away from Chloe, stopping two or three steps away, near the recently deceased seventy-year-old woman's head.

Luck.

They can see it this way. This way is not hers, even if she knows Lucifer's way closer to God's than anyone might think. But, once again, Chloe needs time to deal with some particular notions, to accept them.

Luck and time.

This is her way.

"What about us taking actions for solving this murder?" she calls them both to order.

"Yes, Deckers—!" Ella exclaims joyfully, noticing Chloe's expression at the last second. "Deckersister."

She crouches down beside the victim, looking for something into her bags. Chloe, for her part, watches the victim's profile, whose marbled skin clearly announces the full possession of Death over her body and soul. Facing the ground, in this street of awful scents, the old well-dressed woman has no visible defensive marks, no abundant blood loss…. Although internal bleeding can't be excluded at this stage. Chloe has been doing this job long enough to stop taking appearances as facts.

Nothing is what it seems to be.

A breath of air can just be that; a breath, and can be much more than that.

"Don't go..."

The air brushing the back of her neck is different, just by its unpleasant smell. She shivers anyway.

"Please don't go, I… I—"

"Any idea who she is?" she asks, coughing a bit.

"Not yet," Ella tells her as she takes her camera out of her biggest bag. "No personal effects have been found on the body."

"Maybe the murderer took them before he left? It wouldn't be that surprising, considering where we are."

"If this is indeed a real murder, Detective," Lucifer intervenes after walking around the victim.

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I don't see any signs of violence on this decrepit lady. Except for the gaudy pink she seemed to use as a blusher, but—"

"Non-relevant for our case, Lucifer."

"But relevant for the longevity of the sense of fashion, Detective."

Before Chloe can even roll her eyes, Ella speaks again, "Lucifer's right, the first guys here didn't immediately think about murder. Given her age and the absence of any visible deadly wounds, her end could have been natural, not criminal."

Chloe frowns. "Why did they change their minds, then?"

"For this."

Her friend points to a specific spot on the ground, two or three inches from the victim's head. As she leans forwards, the detective finally notices the semicircle pattern of water starting at the level of the left ear and ending near the right one.

"Is it water?"

With these words alone, Lucifer expresses aloud Chloe's scepticism about it. She crouches down while Ella takes some pictures of the wet tracks on the ground.

Dry, for the rest of it.

"It hasn't rained for days and the pattern is too clearly defined to be a coincidence," she thinks aloud, quickly scanning the rest of the area around the body. "Did they find anything else? An empty bottle or...?"

"Not that I know of," says Ella - this time busy collecting some samples from the liquid.

"The killer might have cleaned carefully to cover his tracks, as with the victim's missing personal effects."

"Or these officers' sight is clearly below par, Detective. As much as some people's good manners are," Lucifer points out, leaning slightly behind her.

Chloe stares at him.

Pointing his finger at the victim's head, he explains; "There's something here, right before your eyes. As before hers, it seems."

Without delay, Ella leans forwards, her black hair almost touching the ground as she tries to see this detail pointed out by the Devil. Always in the details, as it also appears. Chloe also notices many of them. This short distance between his cheek and hers, the haunting smell of bourbon, his nostrils slightly dilated by the unpleasant scents of the place, by the body lying at their feet.

"Decker, gimme a hand?" Ella asks her, her gloved hands resting on the right temple of the corpse.

She averts her gaze before he can offer his.

Blessed are Ella's interruptions.

With the latter's approval, she lifts the decrepit dead face off the ground with careful precaution. The forensic slowly pulls a thin silver chain towards her, the cross attached to it also peeled away from the dehydrated retina.

Watching the iron object swing back and forth, Ella congratulates Lucifer; "Good eye, man!"

"Of course, my eyes are a hundred times more performant than yours."

"A cross?" Chloe wonders.

It can't have fallen out of the victim's pocket like that, nor could it have been dropped on this particular spot on the ground after she has been murdered; which they still must prove, although they're headed in the right direction. But they need to define the cause of death. Without that, it won't give a good start to the investigation - as if it wasn't enough that difficult already, with the lack of good manners….

Chloe carefully watches the victim's neck, moving up the stiff collar to her skin, already hard to the touch.

No signs of strangulation.

"A penny for your thoughts, Detective?" Lucifer says behind her.

"I'd like to know how this old woman - obviously a loaded one - ended up in a place like this. No ID, no car, nothing to clearly define the cause of death..."

"Count me in for the last one, Decker!" Ella exclaims confidently, thumbs up. "Ella Lopez will take up this challenge and find real answers to your questions! Give me twenty-four hours to rule out a few possibilities and do some analysis on our dear Jane Doe, okay?"

"As long as we don't have to classify more paperwork in the meantime," Lucifer mutters.

Chloe smiles, removing one glove.

"Fine. Let me know as soon as you find something useful. In the meantime, Lucifer and I will go around the area and interview some witnesses. Dan may have found some useful information as well..."

"Would you mind if I wait here, Detective?" Lucifer asks her. "Just the time for me to talk to Miss Lopez."

She stares at him, intrigued by his request. Ella has difficulty avoiding her gaze, but manages to do so through forensic manipulation of the victim's surroundings. What is this all about?

Her suspicion might be visible on her face and gaze because Lucifer immediately tops with a charming smile; "Besides, I doubt you'd appreciate another episode of Douchy Douche good manners, am I right?"

She sighs, finally nodding. He has a point.

"Okay, fine. I'll be right back; don't touch anything without gloves," she warns him before walking away.

"How buzz killing of you, Detective!" he complains in her back.

A smile rises her lips without him knowing anything about it.

Chloe can only agree with Ella, she missed this so much. She can say the same about the Devil's teasing and Dan's comment, although these have been more and more brutal than before, given the latest events in their lives. These recent additions mark the vast void he has left with his absence in her life.

He's here.

A new part of her life within she breathes again.

A new chance.

A little more time.

Some journalists heel her, held back behind the police cordon ongoing with criminal investigations. As always, they are eager for horrible details to spread around, most of which would be exaggerated. She ignores them and joins Dan, busy interviewing a fifteen year old young man away from the crowd of curious people. Unlike the others, this boy seems more eager to get out of here. She takes note of his neglected appearance; his jeans too torn to support any fashionable genre but financial precariousness, his pale skin covered scratches, bruises yellowed by time disappearing under his black sweats, which falls halfway to his knees.

He often runs his hand through his long brown hair, which often falls before his green eyes, wide-opened with nervousness.

Dan quickly notices her presence, his features still wearing the signs of his previous annoyance.

"Chloe, let me introduce you Francis," he says. "Francis, this is Detective Decker. Francis lives in the youth centre two blocks from here. He knew the victim."

"Did you?" she asks, looking at the young Francis, who nods swiftly, his gaze restlessly looking all over the place.

"Y-yeah. She... Mrs. Sanchez used to come often at the centre."

"Sanchez, you say?" she repeats.

"More precisely; Penelope Sanchez," Dan informs her after checking his notes. "A rich widow from the uptown, it seems."

Another nod from Francis.

"She was giving a lot of cash so we could have food, clothes and... you know who did this to her?"

"Not yet, but we'll do everything we can to find out, Francis, I promise. Do you know if she had a car?"

He nods.

"Do you know the model?"

Her car might still be here, as well as other essential evidence.

But Francis shakes his head this time.

"We'll go to the centre, Lucifer and I - they might know more about the victim's habits there," she thinks aloud.

"Right… Lucifer," Dan grumbles near her.

His comment makes Chloe cringe, but she nevertheless prevents herself from answering him. She thanks Francis for his precious testimony, then encourages him to follow one of the officers present on the crime scene to complete the paperwork so hated by her partner, hated in turn by her former one.

Once Francis leaves, she turns to Dan. "Will you tell me what the hell's wrong with you?"

"What's wrong with me?"

"Don't play dumb with me, Dan," she continues, annoyed, crossing her arms on her chest. "You've been trying to make Lucifer lose his temper ever since he came back. Can't you just act like an adult for once?!"

He stares at her in disbelief, fists on his hips.

"You' kidding, right?" he blurts out.

She keeps quiet, just glaring at him in turn.

"This guy clears off, leaves a trail of dead bodies behind him that I help you make up as mass suicide for hissake - also for yours since your fingerprints are everywhere on the crime scene - and all this without questioning you, not once! I support you every single day, every night, every time you get a panic attack, every time you can't think of anything but him - not even Trixie - and I should act like an adult?! So yeah, I hope you're kidding, Chloe!"

"Dan..."

"No 'Dan' with me, Chloe!" he cuts her off vehemently. "It's been two weeks. Two weeks since he came back from who knows where and you're already letting him regain his place by your side?! Just like that, really?"

Dan doesn't know, but she does; that's the difference, it's that simple. She leans on the car parked nearby, her skin hurt by the heat gathered in so little time into the metal, but less hurt than with her ex-husband's words.

"He's my partner."

"No, he wasyour partner," he retorts. "He has no rights to be here!"

She straightens up, ready to fight tooth and nail for Lucifer. "It's not your decision to make, Dan."

"You think that the Lieutenant would be glad to know that one of his civilian consultants might be involved in some mass murderer, uh?"

"That wasn't Lucifer. You don't know a thing about what happened that night," she says eagerly, looking around with growing apprehension.

"Because you don't want to tell me a thing about it, dammit! What am I supposed to think about all this, huh?"

"Nothing at all. The case is closed."

"Not for me, Chloe. I deserve to know. I need to understand."

"Like you let me understand with Palmetto?"

It's a low blow, but Chloe only realizes it once the words come out of her tense mouth. She can blame her anger, her fears to see Lucifer accused of murders because of Dan's masculine jealousy; but her reaction has nothing to do with what she's actually feeling. It's... visceral. A burning instinct, gushing out of the depths of her being by just hearing Lucifer's name.

By just the possibility of him being in danger, threatened.

It's... surprising, powerful and uncontrollable.

She sees Dan's understandable impatience turn into a defeated, hurt, and finally resigned expression.

"Dan—"

He nods, avoiding her gaze.

"Dan, I-I... I'm—"

"No, I was wrong," he says.

He takes a step back, a fake smile on his lips. "My bad, really. You're already in his bed, I see. He found his rightful queen, didn't he?"

As Dan heads back to the crime scene, Chloe stays near the car, taking his speech for what it is; a worry, a jealousy for which she can hardly blame him. It's a fair return, nevertheless true.

The King has found his Queen.

Quite literally.


I did give hints here, I did! :D

Anyway, more will come in the next chapters.

Thanks for reading, as always.