Author's notes:
'Took me some time to come to this new chap! (life, new unplanned story and so on…) But we're back, aren't we? With a big chap, as well!
I'd say we passed the introduction of the plot with this one.
The fun has just begun! (that and many other things) X)
I saw we reached 13k views too! Thank you so much for that =3 I also thanks SPCLjmm for the last review on the former chap.
Back in business now!
Music
'My Style' | Beginners
THE DEVIL'S UNEXPECTED BLUE BALLS
12
Six.
Six hundred.
Six hundred years.
Or more... six hundred years or more.
So it could be more than six hundred and one, two, three or fifty years.
It could be six hundred and sixty-six.
Anyone would probably laugh at such supposition. But Chloe wouldn't. Of course she won't, she who… who's not anyone anymore. Who's not busy counting years for 'anyone'.
Six hundred and sixty-six, that would make sense.
Devilish sense. Persephone's sense, too.
Well yes... six seeds to eat, six hellish, earthly months which would soon become eight.
Six...
Six hundred and si—
"Detective?"
"Hm? Sorry, what?"
Chloe sits up as soon as these stammered words come out of her mouth, her chair legs scraping the floor for an inch while her partner clears his throat. Blinking several times, she follows his gaze, a purposive glare for their actual suspect who was staring at them, unable to decide which of the two partners he should be more scared of.
Judging by how he pushes his chair back to the wall as soon as Lucifer looks away, Lucifer is scarier.
Chloe won't contradict him.
He's always been.
"Isn't this the part where you imply the suspect's criminal implication and that I do the same, although more blatantly, the next second?"
Francis, who's kept pushing his chair back towards the wall, stops. His eyes widen, favoring Chloe rather than Lucifer.
"What? 'Criminal implication'?"he repeats. "What do you mean? I've done nothing wrong! You lunged at me like a freaking Amazon!"
Lucifer joins his hands on the table. "And you deserve far worse treatment for making me lose ten dollars. I've never lost a human bet before... never." His tone shows deeper irritation than his glares.
"Wha... but—"
"We didn't bring you here to imply anything 'criminal', Francis," Chloe says.
"So I'm free to go?"
Lucifer smiles, amused. "It depends on Maze outside."
Francis frowns. "Maze? What's this, your sex doll?"
Lucifer chuckles, his smile widening just as much as his threatening aura. "Oh, no no no. Nothing fake about Mazikeen - she's hot off Hell. Well, off the Mother of Demons; Lilith."
Francis is obviously confused. Chloe, for her part, keeps the name in a corner of her mind - one of the few sensical corners left that would soon go crazy like the others before.
Lilith.
This... person who was helping Michael in Hell.
The Mother of Demons.
"Mazikeen is the person who helped me bring you here, Francis," Chloe explains. "She's pretty good at catching people for the L.A.P.D., as you noticed."
The color drains out of Francis' face, under the Devil's mocking gaze and his queen's more critical one who continues; "Anyway, we still have some questions for you. If you could answer them...?"
"Questions about what?" he asks, still suspicious.
"Penelope Sanchez." Chloe also joins her hands over her file. "You said you knew her the other day. How did you meet?"
"At the center. I've already told you."
Chloe insists. "And that's it? You never spoke to each other? When she was coming to the center or... anywhere else outside?"
"Outside?" Francis repeats.
"The Detective is referring to an outside area, yes; a covered but undoubtedly discreet place," Lucifer says.
Francis blinks at him, puzzled. He opens, closes his mouth. "I- No. She came from time to time, that's all. Like any other dickhead who gives us money so that we owe them afterwards," he adds bitterly.
Lucifer approves his last words with a smile. "You're cleverer than I thought."
His tone tickles Chloe's curiosity as well. "That's what you think she was doing?" she asks him. "Looking for your favors?"
"How the hell would I know?! I just knew her by sight!"
"Really?"
Chloe looks at Lucifer who exclaims, "Clever but amnesic, are you? Hard drugs spare no one but me."
Francis stares at him. His eyes flicker with a long series of theories that might explain her partner's weird speech, Chloe can tell. She can because hers had flickered the same many times. They've probably flickered during the last hour, from the square to this chair.
Now they're flickering with theories about Francis.
She looks at a kid who's already prey to earthly demons before the real ones. Lies, drugs, precarity, mistrust...
He's too young. It's too soon.
"W-what, but—?"
"What my partner is blatantly implying is that your side of the story doesn't match with Mrs Harris'. But still… she might be wrong about what she saw between you two. Right?" she says, turning to Lucifer who nods.
"To err is human, Detective."
With these words, facing his amused expression, with their knowing glances; Chloe feels the same pressure inside her belly. Pressure from the time left to enjoy the sound of this voice, this face, this bond.
That's not enough time, too short.
The time passing after this 'Luciferian' speech, although mainly focused on mankind's imperfections, is shortened by Francis' answer - uncooperative and utterly distrustful towards them -, a short one as well. "I want my lawyer."
Sighing in response, Chloe voluntarily moves her chair back from another inch. "All right. We're gonna make the call. Lucifer?"
She beckons him to follow her, taking her file with a last look at their suspect who shudders once the Devil's glare answers his before they walk through the door together. The daunting Devil is nevertheless chivalrous as he holds the aforesaid door for her and the one of the next room with the same knowing smile.
Dan doesn't smile.
He doesn't waste time to criticize Lucifer either, "That's a great way to get a kid's declaration, man! You've done good, really!"
"Daniel, Daniel... just because premature moves are your trademark doesn't mean I should move the same. In fact, I'd rather see myself as an 'exhilarating languor' for the Detective."
Those two are definitely not ready to calm things down, are they?
Chloe, professional as ever, takes the lead. "He's hiding something," she says, looking at Francis through the two-way mirror.
With a last glare for each other, Lucifer joins her, hands in his pants pockets. Dan doesn't seem ready to stop commenting on their way of working, though - an addiction to any kind of aggression for the partnership he has before his very eyes. "Of course he is. We caught him buying hard drugs; he's facing heavy shit here. That and expulsion."
"It's a known risk for him, with what Penelope saw," Chloe says without turning around, frowning. "No, there's something else. Why else would he ask for his lawyer now? Why deny his connection to her? Everybody from the center knew they were talking to each other, often."
"He wants to avoid spending the rest of his life in prison, not expulsion," Lucifer reveals to them.
She turns towards him. "What makes you say that?"
Lucifer lifts his shoulder in a half shrug. "I've seen that kind of look before, Detective. Many, many times."
"Where?"
"In Hell."
"Right…" Dan mutters scornfully. "I'm gonna call his lawyer."
"Prematurely moving, aren't you Detective Douche?" Lucifer answers back while Dan walks out of the room with quick steps where hostility and resentment can be heard even more clearly.
As soon as the door slammed shut, Chloe elbows him. "What about 'good manners'?"
"Prematurely forgotten, I'm afraid," Lucifer replies, smirking at her.
She only succeeds in not returning his smile by focusing on Francis; still sitting, still rubbing the arm that Chloe had twisted in his back. "This kind of look is usual in Hell, really?"
"Really."
She studies Lucifer's expression with the same attention for details she does for Francis'. But the royal, divine aura that radiates from him isn't a detail; not for her, not anymore.
Now that she knows, that she's bound to a King, in such crazy mythological ways.
Definitely terrifying...
No wonder Francis has been so uncooperative. On top of whatever he's trying to hide from them.
The Devil, the King of Demons; that would sober anyone.
Better not share this teasing comparison with him, though.
"How so?"
"Hell is the worst prison of the universe and its cells are... well, just like the place where all those unfortunate people go after death, eaten away by guilt. I happened to go into a cell - every five decades, so as to make sure that everything was working properly, if the punishment was up to the fault or required the Devil's touch…." Their gazes meet, although he quickly averts his with a tense smile on his face. "I mean... I-I guess there's no need to go into the details."
"Guess not," Chloe whispers.
The unease she feels about his forthcoming departure has grown stronger, more painful with each of his words directly connected to that place. Directly connected to what would await him down there, far away from her.
Lucifer nods. "Anyway, there always came a time when the tortured soul had a glimpse of what - or who - was beyond the loop. They saw me, eventually. When it happened, each one of them had that same look. A look within which determination, distress to leave this endless nightmare, fiercely glowed."
He smiles again, lighter expression than the topic explained - 'barely' explained, as far as human perception can bear.
"They all try to convince me that they shouldn't be punished, even though they are because they feel like they should. Like I could do anything about it - me, the Devil!"
Maybe he could?
He said it himself, in the car. Hell, this dark place of nightmares strangely responding to his 'desires' of control over demons, she'd submitted - a 'she', really? - to his will for six hundred years or more. His power over this place has most likely changed.
How much? How so? Under which conditions?
To this, Chloe can't find answers on her own, not even a theory. She's still limited in her perception.
This is as frustrating as comforting... not being fully aware of these sorts of details about him, about Hell, and everything else.
This is as frustrating as comforting to know that she's still able to do her job, to trust most of her perceptions.
And Chloe's present perception is that Francis has been involved in Penelope's murder.
He has, somehow.
She points her chin at him. "Is there something you can do about him?"
Lucifer arches an eyebrow.
"Your mojo-thing," Chloe specifies. "Could help us learn further information before his lawyer gets here."
She'd seen the Center's lawyer leave the precinct at the same time as them this morning, but he was supposed to come back in the afternoon for a few more interviews. It's probably a matter of minutes before he uses his legislative eloquence to counter their efforts.
Lucifer shakes his head. "I'm afraid not. That would only half work."
"Half work?"
"Drug use tends to bias the subject's response to it," he explains. "See, drug addicts - people who are generally in withdrawal - only care about their present desires, whose deeper reasons are broken up by the more or less intense effects of the drugs they use. This is chemical."
"But he could still tell you something useful, right?" Chloe insists.
He shrugs. "That's risking rubbing him up the wrong way, Detective. I doubt he'll want to tell us anything afterwards, with or without his lawyer to hold his hand."
Here's this smile again, devilish mischief all over his face.
"A demon could hold his other hand, what do you say?"
"I say that gratuitous violence against a suspect is inappropriate."
"What's 'gratuitous' here? He cost me ten dollars; I want a run for my money!" he exclaims, still annoyed.
Chloe rolls her eyes while shaking her head. "Serves you right for betting on our suspect." Following this, Chloe smirks, shamelessly teasing her pouting partner; far, so far away from the royal aura that she and Francis have felt before. "I never thought of the Devil as a sore loser…."
"Because he's not. Even more so that he never loses!" he replies confidently.
"Sure."
"I'm just the victim of this boy's illogical behavior. Who would've thought that someone in his situation could afford such an expensive, illegal substance?"
He still sounds like any sore-loser, but it nevertheless draws Chloe's attention to another detail. It had seemed insignificant at first, annoying at best; to see Lucifer and Ella squabbling over it, that and listening to Lucifer's endless monologue.
He still hasn't stopped.
Rightly so.
How could Francis buy two grams of coke?
The kids from the street, drug addicts in general, know some tricks, they know where to look for good stuff, good and cheap. But money… that's something else. That's always been enough to act violently.
Agressions in streets, home invasions.
Murder, sometimes.
"You're right," she says, watching Francis rub his sleeve on the table - over and over again - as he looks around him.
A nervous tic.
"I know," Lucifer says.
She elbows him again, delighted to hear his overly dramatic moan before continuing; "You're right about what we saw on the security footage. It was speed."
"So there's still someone who has faith in a fallen angel like me? How refreshing!"
"The question is, where did he find enough money to buy hard drugs in the meantime?"
Lucifer shrugs once more. "Just ask him, Detective."
"Dan might be back with his lawyer any minute now," she sighs, pursing her lips afterwards.
"Right, such a premature finale!" he scoffs again. "I can make the pleasure last, though - with 'exhilarating languor', you know?"
The smile they share radiates with a similar intensity, enhancing their professional and more private harmony, deepening Chloe's unease further in the process. The few lights of the room brush Lucifer's shoulders, the grey fabric of his suit.
At the thought of ashes, her smile fades.
At the thought of time, her gaze shies away from his.
Her steps lead her outside, far away from the darkness of the room, yet not before agreeing with him on an all new strategy. It's with his word for giving her five more minutes alone with the suspect that she walks into the interrogation room again.
"Where's my lawyer?" Francis asks as soon as she closes the door.
"He'll be here soon. Does it bother you if I wait for him here with you?"
Francis's forehead creases with suspicion. A few seconds passed before he folds his arms on the table. "As long as you don't ask anymore questions…." he says.
Chloe smiles and pulls the chair towards her, file put on the table.
"No more questions," she reassures him.
Once seated, she turns the file towards her, her fingers on its upper right corner. "I've something else to do, anyway."
The file opened, she's not surprised to hear a strangled noise from Francis. She keeps her eyes on the file, looking at the first picture taken from the center's videotape showing Francis with Penelope. Whistling, Chloe puts it face down on the metal table, taking her time to pick the next one. All the time necessary for him to watch it.
"What's that?" he asks her.
Chloe holds back her smile before lifting her chin, feigning indifference. She lifts the picture slightly, Francis' buying drugs from this unknown dealer forever caught on paper; with Penelope's shape in the corner as a bonus. "This? Oh, it's from the security camera of the Center - from the garage, you know? This is part of the reason why my partner is so mad at you…" she adds with a sigh.
She watches Francis struggling with both fear of what she might know and that of her partner.
"M-mad?"
Clever. Not that it surprises her. He's trying to buy some time.
It probably isn't his first arrest.
She already thought so, since he asked for a lawyer so quickly.
She nods, putting the picture down. "Yeah. He's the sore-loser type, especially when he had every reason to believe he'd win. So did I."
"I don't get it..." Francis whispers, his eyes stopping at the closed door.
"Look, this picture - you're clearly buying speed. Lucifer bet you'd have it on you when we found you, while my colleague Ella - our forensic scientist - had bet on cocaine." Chloe spins the incriminating picture on the table, shaking her head as she pretends to be disappointed. "Lucifer has very, very good eyesight. I never thought he'd be wrong. But you know, like he said…" Turning the picture a third time before looking at Francis, she repeats; "to err is human."
She won't specify her partner's non-human nature, though. Francis stays quiet, even avoids her gaze until she shrugs. "I should tell Ella to give you your part of the bet. Although if you can afford cocaine that soon after Mrs Sanchez's murder, it won't do you any good. Am I right?"
Francis barely replies with shifty eyes.
Chloe smiles, lifts her hands, then apologizes to him; "Right; that was a question. Sorry. Just thinking out loud. Don't mind me."
She lets a whole minute go by, turning over other pages from the file, more pictures of Penelope's body and Ella's toxicology report. Francis inhales sharply, sniffs, rubs his eyes. Then Chloe sits up, sighing as loudly as she can with an annoyed look towards the closed door. "What's taking them so long?"
"Dunno..." Francis whispers, elbows on the table.
"You'd think that murder conviction would get them moving faster, but no!"
Francis freezes. "M-murder? But... you said you only had a few questions!"
"I did," Chloe says. "But... since you refuse to answer our questions, the prosecution will have to settle for circumstantial evidence. It's enough, these days."
She starts to hear voices approaching the interrogation room. Lucifer's exhilarating languor is coming to an end, it seems. Right on time. It's still short, anyway.
"Circumstantial evidence?" Francis repeats, his face going blank.
Chloe nods, pointing to the open file in front of her. "You know; the purchase of illegal substances, your altercation with the victim the day before her death, your presence at the crime scene, this sudden change in your drug habits that matches with Penelope's stolen check in Mrs Harris' office."
She pretends to feel sorry for him. And she is, she mostly is.
Scaring a kid to do her job, this isn't something she's proud of.
"It was a job, Detective. Something I was forced to do."
She fully understands Lucifer's feelings.
She's surprised she didn't figure this out sooner.
To err is human, Decker.
Francis is, too.
This is his chance to do better.
"I wish I could ask you questions, those that you'll need to prove your innocence in all this, I really do. But-" Chloe turns to the door behind which she hears several male voices more and more clearly - Lucifer's being the loudest, of course. No doubt he's still standing in Dan's and the lawyer's way. "But it's too late, I guess. Now that your lawyer's here..." she says with a slight, sad smile.
She starts to gather the documents put all over the table, as slowly as Lucifer allows her to, taking the picture of the victim's body last before closing the file.
The scraping of her chair as she gets up is noisily theatrical, as was this last smile - light, a shy expression of her compassion about his inevitable future in prison. Watching all these feelings in Francis' wide eyes, Chloe knows that those years playing into second-class movies, those years showing her boobs in a hot tub, aren't wasted time.
"-ough is enough, Mr Morningstar! I'm here to represent the interests of Mr Harri's center, at 'your' request indeed, but any other legal requests of yours will have to wait until the end of this interview, which you're persisting in delaying!" The lawyer shoo Lucifer away as he opens the door.
Right when Francis grasps Chloe's wrist.
The acting of a former actress, now working for the L.A.P.D., who's enhanced by her devilish partner's bluff has no other choice but bear fruit, right?
"Wait! I'll answer your questions."
-xXx-
An hour later, Chloe walks out of the interrogation room with Lucifer on her heels and the frustrated lawyer's glare following their triumphant exit.
She's exhausted, but satisfied.
It's lost time - lost in a much more dramatic way elsewhere - in questioning a suspect. Yet, it'll save them some for the rest of the investigation.
She feels lighter, her good mood can also be felt in the way she behaves with her partner. There's barely an inch between she and he, more smiles than she wants to count, more laughs than she can stop.
She doesn't even roll her eyes when he hails Ella while he closes the door, a dozen heads - including the forensic expert's - turning towards them soon after. Chloe knows she feels 'better' by not spontaneously taking a step back, less worried about the coming gossip about their proximity than its coming end.
"Miss Lopez! I declare our bet null and void!"
Dan joins them before she does, leaving the room next to the interrogation room with a disgruntled look on his face, the same as the lawyer. "Right... because you also put money on victims now," he says, slamming the door shut.
Lucifer arched an eyebrow. It's a safe bet to say that his next words would imply disdain and mockery.
"Isn't this another premature move from the Detective Douche?"
Dan shakes his head. "Dick."
"Douche," Lucifer repeats with a smirk. "It starts deceptively as the same but there's a difference, believe me."
Although happy to have a solid lead to follow, Chloe nevertheless listens to her special warning signal for 'diabolico-human testosterone challenge' and hands her file to her ex-husband, voluntarily placing herself between him and Lucifer. Not that it would prevent Lucifer to keep insulting Dan over her head.
She's not miraculous enough to stop the Devil's pranks.
"Here, I wrote down everything that Francis told us about our man. If it was indeed one of the many volunteers, he should be on the list. Look for anyone who's crazy enough to ask for a kid to pour poison in our victim's tea."
Dan takes the file, not without looking daggers at her partner. "Crazy or not, our guy might be clever enough and use a false name," he says, checking the file, then shaking his head for what it contains. "How can you ask a kid to do this?
"Oh you'd be surprised," Lucifer says in her back.
"Not if it's another of your silly metaphors," Dan retorts.
"They're not—"
"You heard him, Dan," Chloe takes part. "He knew how to use Francis' weak spots. For him, it was pouring the vial contents into her tea or getting kicked out of the center for theft and drug use."
Moreover since Penelope had noticed the boy's problems the day before. Another detail keeps bothering Chloe - all the more since she hadn't been able to clarify it with Francis who'd been cooperative enough for the bulk of the investigation but much less so about their relationship.
They were close, period.
It couldn't be explained, according to him.
Maybe not how strong a bond can be - how could she explain this bond between her and Lucifer? -but its origin….
She finds it hard to believe that they had become friends at the center just like that, thanks to the victim's regular visits, through unplanned encounters when she was leaving Mrs Harris office after giving her check.
These encounters shouldn't have been that fortuitous if he'd exactly known when walking into the office, right after she'd given her check that day, when she and Mrs Harris would walk out of it to show Mrs Sanchez how the center was evolving, when they'd come back for a cup of tea thirty minutes later.
It can't be just 'luck'. This volunteer hadn't surprised him stealing the aforesaid check, nor had proposed to him a 'deal' afterwards just like that, just because he was 'luckily' passing by. As happy as she is to have gotten answers, Chloe refrains a shiver of disgust when she recalls another detail she'd be glad to forget.
"This isn't the worst deal there, trust me. That's why I didn't argue."
It's with these kinds of moments that she finds it hard to appreciate her job.
Happy to do it right, sicked-off by what she heard.
"It was a job, Detective."
In the end, it's always more than that.
Lucifer's work had become so much more than that. Six hundred times more.
"I had no choice! It was either that or die in the street!" Francis had shouted.
"Something I was forced to do..."
Chloe's smile fades a bit, her good mood passing as time. It's also her, probably her, who turns good things into bad ones.
She'd have liked to be able to blame her changing emotions, shaped by this strengthened bond between her and the Devil.
She'd have liked to know what to do with this information that she had so cleverly avoided since his return.
She doesn't know what to do except act like they always do.
Can we only talk about 'habits' with the Devil as our partner?
"You think he lied about the vial?" Dan asks her. "What if he's our guy's accomplice from the start? Maybe he made it all up to get out of trouble, who knows?"
"Well, I do," Lucifer answers for her.
Dan rolls his eyes, raising the hand that holds the questionable file. "Right - 'I am the Devil, I know what liars are like!' " he scornfully recites.
Lucifer keeps silent for three seconds.
Three seconds of peace that Chloe sorely missed the next moment.
"You should stick to mimes, Detective Douche. That's friendly advice."
His jaw clenched, Dan is finger pointing the Devil, his two weeks old rage barely contained. "We are not friends! Never!"
It's only been two weeks...
There's so little time left to spend together.
Before Lucifer can politely answer to him, Mazikeen walks out of their superior's office with her check that she uses like a fan until she joins them, sneering at her ex's raging words. Her smile widens when she turns to Lucifer. "Isn't that another human who hates you?"
It still surprises Chloe not to see fangs under her lips.
It's nothing to do with Maze's demonic sde. It's just Maze being… Maze.
"The more the merrier, hm?" Lucifer replies with a tense smile.
Dan lowers his hand.
"Not anymore," he mutters before going back to his desk.
Chloe exhales deeply as she watches him walk away with his back deliberately turned to the three of them. Maybe even more turned to her than to Lucifer.
They both need to have a serious talk about Lucifer's return in their lives.
She has to find a way to make him accept it, for as long as it would last; that and his next 'long' departure.
Shit.
How is she gonna explain this to Dan? To Ella? To her boss?
What about Trixie?
Lucifer's gazing at Mazikeen's check when she turns back. "Well? Tacking a kid to the ground brings how much in exactly? More than the astronomical sum of money you spent for five thousand boxes of plonk and lube, I hope?"
The demon runs her fingernail over the paper to fold it in half before putting it back in her pocket jacket. The gesture is slow, a slow threat to Chloe's human perception.
"You know what humans say - 'time is money'. Although you didn't spend much by warning us all that you were leaving, did you?"
Lucifer gets upset in no time. "How about you take this sum of money off the bloody mess you left in my club, hm?!"
"Oh do I? And how about I kick your ass o—"
"Okay... that's enough now, stop. Stop!" Chloe shouts, raising her hands.
Once she's certain they would remain silent for more than a few seconds, she loudly sighs her irritation. "Never thought I'd say this, but you guys are worse than Trixie and Ella combined."
"I'm no—" Lucifer starts to exclaim, offended.
She asks for his silence with a glare, Mazikeen greeting her authority with a smirk. She then asks them to follow her by pointing her chin towards her desk; a more discreet place for sentimental - would she dare to say, family - issues of these two supernatural pains in the ass.
Half the precinct already knew about the massive amount of lube at Lux's, might as well keep the other half for themselves.
"Okay," she says once she gets to her workspace. "Now that it's just you and me, I'll make you both a deal."
Lucifer passes his tongue over the inside of his lips. "Oooh, Detective! Speaking the Devil's language so fast…."
"What's the deal?" Maze asks.
"Lucifer genuinely apologizes to you and you stop making him pay for his departure whenever it pleases you, 'kay?" Chloe offers. "I really can't handle your hard feelings and Dan's at the same time, I'm only human."
Lucifer's eyes widen as soon as he hears the word 'apologize' before staring at the demon, many reproaches glowing within his gaze. He starts to rebel the moment Chloe stops talking, "What?! Why should I?"
"Deal," Maze accepts, not hesitating a second.
"There's 'no' deal. Not by a long shot!" Lucifer exclaims.
Chloe sighs deeply. "Lucifer, you left without telling anyone but me. Maze deserved better than this and you know it. So... deal with it, literally! I'd like to go through the list of volunteers before I pick up Trixie from school."
"I can leave that to you."
" 'Course you can," the demon groans, crossing her arms on her chest.
His eyes burned with warning, his former right-hand woman - demon - glaring back at him.
"A deal is a deal, Lucifer," Chloe reminds him. "Especially with the Devil, right?"
"Speaking of deal rules, how about the part where I do 'accept' the deal?" he stubbornly retorts.
Chloe squints. "Well, let's just say that, as the new Queen of Hell, I get a voice for any deal involving you - which I decide to apply here."
Mazikeen sneers at the King's annoyed sigh, forced to obey to a simple human's will. "Well done, Decker."
Lucifer yields with another long sigh. "Very well. Mazikeen..."
She turns her head, arms still crossed over her chest.
"I apologize for my... hasty departure. I had no intention of hurting you by implying that you no longer had your place in Hell, nor by my side."
Her grouchy face softens on his last words, for the next ones as well.
"Actually, It's quite the opposite. You were- You're the only one I trust to protect everyone I care about here on Earth. Besides…" He smiles. "Didn't we agree on the fact that you no longer wanted to be under my command?"
The demon smiles in turn, just enough to hope for a lasting truce between them two. "As we agreed on my free will - you should have let me choose to follow you or not," she reminds him.
"You're right," he admits. "My apologies, really."
They are, Chloe can tell.
As for Maze, she quietly looks at him for a long time, her gaze - not even her expression - doesn't change for a glimpse of forgiveness for the Devil. Maybe because she's been raised in a place devoid of such a concept.
Her expression changes eventually, her mouth curving into a smile. "Okay."
With these words, the demon punches her king on the shoulder, her smile widening with his outraged yelp.
"Now we're even."
"Ow! If that's how you accept apologies, I'd better refrain from doing so!" He rubs his shoulder, then looks at it closely. What's wrong with this bloody shoulder today...?"
"So, how was it in Russia?" Chloe asks her as she sits behind her desk.
"Cold."
Chloe arches an eyebrow, waiting in vain for more.
Maze shrugs eventually. "Cold, Decker;" she repeats. "That's all."
Chloe notices how disappointed she sounds, how she averts her gaze.
She feels her pain.
"And where do you plan to go next?"
"Maze!" Ella cries as she runs to them before hugging the demon.
Lucifer smirks as Maze freezes into the unexpected hug, cocking her face to the side, away from Ella's strong grip around her shoulders.
"I missed you so much! A month is way too long. You realize that our last girls' night out was... can't even tell when! When, Chloe?" Ella asks, still hugging Maze.
Chloe opens her mouth, her friend cutting her off enthusiastically shortly after, "Let's plan this - ASAP! We have so much to talk about! I'm calling Linda!"
Ella disappears to her lab as quickly as she came, phone in hand and Lucifer shouting a monetary reminder in her back. "I'm still waiting for my ten dollars, Miss Lopez! Where is she running off to? Miss Lopez? Wait!" he hails her, hurriedly walking towards the lab.
Maze looks at Chloe who smiles, holding back this irrepressible urge to laugh at her shocked expression.
She taps her file on the desk. "Was Russia really that 'cold'?"
Maze comes closer, shrugging again before rummaging to her friend's things - she picks one of the many ballpoint pens from the jar, skillfully twisting it from one dangerous finger to the other, all this little display of supernatural skills without looking at Chloe once. "It's like I told you. Like you just said."
Chloe nods, pensive. She shrugs in turn. "That probably explains you being back in L.A. so quickly. I didn't expect to see you, neither did Francis."
The demon frowns. "Francis?"
Chloe smiles, amused by her friend's compulsive disinterest in details and people she thinks as insignificant. Somehow, Chloe should feel 'honored' not to be part of this group of people, she likes Trixie. Likes Linda.
As someone else, someone that Maze clearly doesn't want to name before her.
"Our suspect. You had your heel in his back."
"Oh, yeah."
The demon shrugs once more, throwing the ballpoint pen into another jar, on a desk five meters away. Freaking precision, if this isn't supernatural stuff at work...
"You said you missed me…."
Chloe grins.
"Are you talking about... 'feelings'?" she teases her, yet touched by this half spoken truth about her return.
Mazikeen squints, immediately striking back with a larger grin; "We can talk about something else. What about you and Lucifer?"
" 'Me and Lucifer'...what?"
"You were hopping mad at him less than 24 hours ago, Decker."
The latter opens her file to put on an act, do something, something to look at so as not to look at her friend, not to see her gloat for having nailed the main issue. "I 'was', yes. Isn't that all about feelings again?"
"It's not." With these words, Mazikeen places her hands on the desk, leaning forward - until her shadow covers the file, until she prevents her friend from dodging her questions. "It's all about 'acting out'."
Chloe lifts her chin, arching an eyebrow.
"You know, how turned on you were last night…" the demon says, her smile widening. "How hard Lucifer was in his pa—"
"I'm working."
Maze taps her fingernails on the desk. "Not an answer."
"No real question either," Chloe replies, not taking her eyes off the file.
"I can arrange that. Did you two make up with naked s—?"
"Maze!" she hisses with a panicked glance.
Mazikeen raises her palms, then puts them back on the desk, fingernails back on tapping the piece of furniture. "You wanted a 'real' question."
Chloe sighs, looking around her one last time. 'We talked. Talked a lot."
Maze waits no more than a few seconds to insist. "It's a codeword for giving him a...?"
With her slender and skillful fingers she starts to mime the devilish grip and inflates the inside of her right cheek with a suggestive lick.
Chloe rolls her eyes and closes the file before facing her friend's teasing, the friend she 'missed' a day ago. So much could change in 24 hours.
"What about you? 'Cold' is your new codeword for Eve or what?"
Mazikeen's smile fades. Out of the corner of her eye, Chloe sees Ella coming out of her lab, Lucifer on her heels - apparently satisfied with whatever they talked together. Her lips curving into a smile, she nods at the forensic expert as the demon looks in the same direction. "You better get out of here before she begs us to sing karaoke in her lab."
Mazikeen stares at her for a moment, almost enough time for Lucifer to join them.
"Nicely dodged, Decker." She turns to leave, pauses, then turns back to Chloe. "Do you mind if I pick up Trixie from school? I mean, Ella's gonna ask why I left so…" she adds awkwardly.
A corner of Chloe's mouth lifts. "I don't mind. She'll be happy to see you. She missed you."
Mazikeen squints, an amused smile appearing on her lips anyway. "Cool. See ya, then." Halfway up the stairs, the demon turns around one last time, shouting for everyone concerned or not, "That'll give you both time to have a good fuck!"
All people present in the precinct turn to the two partners, one barely offended in his private life - mostly because he never had one - and the other turning crimson for the treacherous reveal of hers.
Chloe meets Dan's gaze, more embarrassed by him obviously judging her than by the demon's words.
Lucifer shakes his head at her side, sighing, "It's little time for many lube, anyway…."
Chloe thinks back to what he said this morning in the street. She hesitates a split second before launching into the topic.
She's embarrassed enough to try, at least.
"Speaking of which..."
He arches an eyebrow. "I can arrange a delivery to your place in just a few clicks. How many boxes would you like, Detective?"
"No, no. I-I..." She takes a deep breath, repeatedly scratching the corner of the file in front of her. "I'm talking about... what you said during Francis' arrest, you know?"
"About the orifices? Aren't those the best places to use lube?"
Chloe shakes her head, turning more red by seconds.
"About the fact that you... that you haven't... since… got it?" she stammers, quickly pointing at his crotch.
She can't look him in the eye, she can't look at him at all.
She nevertheless does when she hears him chuckle. The smile he gives her his sweet compassion for her shy interrogation. "No shame talking with me, Detective. Speak freely."
She smiles in turn, slowly inhaling her discomfort to exhale it a second later. She's neither stupid nor a virgin.
She's not ashamed.
Not for this.
"Right. What I wanted to say... six hundred years spent in Hell, without any kind of sexual activity, it's... it doesn't sound like the Devil I know."
Lucifer shrugs at that.
"Maybe because this Devil no longer exists." He gives her further explanations when he sees her puzzled expression, "You're not the only one who's noticed this change about me. Linda has spent the last session to find valid explanations for it. Some of her theories were… interesting, to say the least."
"Which ones?"
He doesn't answer right away, doesn't answer at all. "These are just theories, nothing 'interesting' enough in that."
Then he smiles at her. Chloe can't help but smile all the same, yet convinced that he's hiding something from her. It probably has something to do with him having spent eons in Hell, since he didn't confirm not having sexual activities down there.
He didn't say anything.
He just clouded the real issue, again.
For how long would he keep doing that? This is important stuff. Isn't she important enough for him to tell her everything now, for those few months left?
The pressure is building in her belly.
Four months, no... three months and two weeks.
And those eight months in Hell.
In Hell, that would be more like... eight hundred - no, thousands of years witho—
"Detective?"
She jumps for the second time today. "Hm? What?"
"How about Tuesday?"
Chloe frowns. "Tuesday?" she repeats.
"For our date. I was thinking about next Tuesday, it'll give me time to get some important details worked out. This third date can't be anything but 'special', can it?"
"Third?"
"Well, yes. If we count the first two failed attempts at intimacy between us, of course," he says. "So, Tuesday suits you?"
Chloe opens her mouth, surprised, panicked, excited; a little bit of the three at once. Staying focused on the first feeling visible on her features, Lucifer hastens to explain his request, worried - as always - of not reacting as she hoped. "You said you wanted 'baby steps'."
Soon afterwards, a beguiling smile rises on his devilish, handsome face. "Besides, having an intimate dinner with me is the best way to solve the 'Devil's unexpected blue balls' case."
Blue balls?
Aware of her colleagues' insistent glances and her partner's slightly anxious - though mostly amused - one on her, Chloe doesn't waste time to weigh the pros and cons.
She's waited two weeks.
Wasted weeks, wasted years too.
She nods, a quiet agreement for their next 'intimate' case about the man who had claimed her as 'his', who she had claimed as 'hers'. The man who claims her so for the next months, for longer than that.
"Tuesday. Sure," she whispers. "Can't wait."
The pressure in her belly increases, is appeased by his genuine smile. "Wonderful!"
Her discomfort doesn't wait for him to walk away to affect her breathing. Chloe's face turns red, then goes white as she half-listens to him complaining about coffee and then disappearing in the kitchen.
Her fingernails scratch the file. Her breaths quicken increasingly, answering to the pressure within her, everywhere….
What she feels between her legs might be considered as much uncomfortable as masculine 'Blue Balls', although she can't tell if it's about him postponing this 'sex' case to solve until next week or rather about her reaction, stupid panic thoughts about giving back his reputation to the Devil.
She can't panic about this.
She's not.
Nope.
