Previously in Leather & Lace...

The pain was enough to bring him back around a little longer. He looked up to the cruiser's radio. If it was the last thing he did, Chloe and Lucifer needed to know they were in danger. Crying out in pain he forced himself to close the distance in one excruciating movement. Still reeling from the agony, he managed to unhook the radio.

"Unit 2310. Officer down. I say again, officer down. In need of EMS. Location: Roselawn Cemetery. Regent Lane... row..." Dan took in a precarious breath. He coughed and blood spattered the interior of the cruiser. A lot of it. "Row 26. Tell them..." He was having trouble taking in enough breath to form words. "...tell them... it was Michael."

Dan watched as the hand holding the radio dropped limply to the floor of the cruiser. There was nothing he could do to stop it. His breathing became shallower, fewer and further between with every passing moment...


Teaser: Chloe is captive in his cruel brother's hands and Lucifer is left with no choice but to think the unthinkable...


Daniel «

Unable to locate Detective Espinoza, out of leads and at a loss for ideas, Lucifer headed for the lab. There was a brain there he needed to pick. Michael wasn't just good at needling people with their own fears, he enjoyed it. The thought of him free to use Chloe as a pin-cushion for his sick entertainments... he had never hated his twin brother, but he was beginning to. Forcefully shoving the thought out of his mind, he composed himself and walked in on Ella hanging up a phone call. Her back was toward him and her hand was shaking.

Frowning, he asked, "Something wrong, Miss Lopez?" She turned toward him, eyes watering. She put down the phone and crossed the lab floor. Colliding with him, she wrapped her arms around him. Shaking, she started to cry.

Viscerally fearing Chloe had been found, wide-eyed and trembling slightly, Lucifer forced himself to ask the question, "What's happened?"

#

Two police guards stood stationed outside Dan's ICU room. Lucifer nearly skidded to a halt in the hall outside, his breathing heavy. His palms went to his temples as his expression twisted in both sadness and anger. On the other side of the window, Dan was laid out attached to suspension harnesses. There were pins and metal braces everywhere. His neck was braced. What little of his skin that wasn't bruised and misshapen, was deathly pale. He stood a better chance of dying than ever speaking again. Every muscle taut from head to toe, Lucifer stood rooted in place, quivering, enraged as he'd never been before. These injuries were Michael's doing. Wrenching himself away from the sight of Dan's horrific condition, Lucifer found a deserted hallway.

Taking hold of the waist height metal grab bar mounted on the wall with a shaking hand, he squeezed, putting his other fist inches deep into the concrete wall. His blinding fury had him wound so tightly he hardly uttered a sound, even though he tried to scream. Letting his forehead rest against the wall, he forced himself to breathe. His expression relaxed in pieces. Closing his eyes for a moment, he stepped back, holding his shaking hands up before him. They trembled as much from rage as from fear.

He was at his wits end. Even with all of his God-given gifts and supernatural strengths exactly where and as they should be, he was powerless to help or protect those he loved. Calling Daniel Espinoza someone he 'loved' was going a bit far, but... he felt obligated to him nonetheless. His hands gradually became steady again. As he took in a breath, a potent sickness took hold of his gut. With one hand on his hip and two fingers pressed to the centre of his forehead, Lucifer slowly walked back toward the main hall. He composed himself just shy of coming into the view field of the sentries outside Dan's room.

Lucifer approached and one of the guards put their forearm in front of him when he tried to enter the room. "I'm sorry, sir. No one is allowed inside. Lieutenant's orders. His condition is too... delicate."

"You don't say? I assumed the six-inch pins sticking out of him were some kind of sleepwear fashion trend." Regretting the sarcasm, Lucifer looked forward, away from the guard's critical glare, taking in a steadying breath. With an unmistakeable genuineness in his voice, he entreated the guard, "I am trying to find and punish the person who did this to him. And I may be the only familiar voice he hears before the end. A few minutes, Officer. That's all I ask." Glancing at the other guard, the officer withdrew his arm, nodding. "Thank you."

Stepping quietly inside, Lucifer helped the door close gently behind him. He approached Dan's bedside reaching out to rest a hand on his arm, withdrawing it when only inches away. Until now, Lucifer had kept the thought of what Michael might be saying to poison his relationship with Chloe out of his mind. He recalled Chloe saying once that Michael had seemed taken with her at first. It now occurred to him what he might be doing to her. Leaning on and taking hold of the bedrail with both hands, Lucifer thought the unthinkable. The sickness in his gut was roiling. He had a firm idea of where he'd find Dan's soul if he died. Somewhere he'd have plenty of time to talk. Lucifer turned and closed the window blinds. He reached for the life support's power plug, a wearing a resigned expression, eyes watering, hand trembling.

"Lucifer Morningstar" the earthly owner/operator of Lux would go down for murder. He would be persona non-grata at the LAPD. If he ever found Chloe, she would resent if not outright despise him for doing what he was about to do, but she would be alive and safe. Trixie...

Lucifer froze. Trixie would lose her father. A sob welled up from his heart but his throat was too closed for it to escape. He couldn't do it. Even with Chloe's life at stake, he couldn't pull the plug. Daniel didn't deserve this fate and it wasn't his place to choose when or how he met his end. Bringing his wayward hand back to the bedrail, Lucifer bent forward and began to cry unreservedly, his tears falling onto Daniel's hand, wrist and the sheets below. Noticing his grip was cracking the bedrail, he forced himself to open his fingers holding them out pin-straight, shaking and taking in short ragged breaths. He and Dan may have had their differences, but he wasn't a bad person. He was just lost. In that way, Lucifer realized, they weren't so different.

Slowly, he began to feel, alongside the hopelessness he felt at being unable to find Chloe, gratitude for the fact that he wasn't capable of doing what he had just considered doing.

Ella's jubilant voice suddenly intruded on his thoughts. He could see her in his mind's eye flitting excitedly around the lab as she spoke. The dead might not be able to talk, but, man, they're still awesome storytellers!

Lucifer's eyes went wide as the pieces of the logical puzzle in front of him started falling into place. If the dead could be so talkative, surely the not-yet-departed could be equally informative. Dan might not be able to tell him where he'd been, but trace evidence on his clothing and footwear very possibly could. Lucifer smiled and began to rejoicing laugh with tears still in his eyes, looking heavenward. He took in a few steadying breaths. So far, all Dan had heard from him at his beside was him crying and laughing like a mad person. He addressed him, and to his surprise, the right thing to say came out.

"Daniel... Chloe's missing, very probably kidnapped by my brother - Michael. We're going to find her. When I get back with her, you need to be here. And that little scamp of yours needs her father. So, please, don't go anywhere just yet." Lucifer's smile was subdued, but obviously there. He opened the blinds again and rushed out of the room. He was on his phone before he'd taken two steps.

"Miss Lopez, has the evidence from Daniel's crime scene arrived?" The optimistic tone in his voice shook Ella out of the funk she was in, with so much around them going to Hell all at once.

"It's coming in now. Why...?"

"Something on his clothing, or maybe his shoes might tell us where he's recently been," Lucifer said, the glint in his eye signalling the hunt was on.

"Oh my God. Oh my God! I'm on it, Lucifer. All over it."

Lucifer smiled. "That's my girl."

"I'll need comparison samples from places we know he'd normally go," Ella said, back in fight mode.

"Do you have sample containers there?"

"Yeah. Why? For what?"

Laughing, Lucifer responded, "A crash course on how to collect what you need."

Astonished, Ella stammered, "I, uh, I... okay. Okay!"

Finding a corner outside the building free from prying eyes, Lucifer flew off.


Author's Footnote

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