Fangtasia was open, Maze and Ginger having set everything up and turned on the neon sign before the vampires below had had time to rise. Lucifer had spent some time out on the floor, sitting in the throne and sipping on an endless supply of scotch. But eventually he'd grown bored—it was early yet and the place wasn't very packed.

Besides, Lucifer wanted to look around Eric's old office. He'd never had a chance to explore Fangtasia before and it seemed now was a good a time as any. So that's just what he did. He opened filing cabinets, shuffled through paperwork, looked into the tiny closet attached to Eric's office. Honestly, it wasn't particularly exciting stuff. The dungeon was far more entertaining. The office showcased the side of Eric that liked numbers, and paperwork, and putting everything in order. The dreadfully dull side of the Viking.

He kept moving down the hall when he'd finished exploring the business side of things. Surely there must be something interesting in this place besides the sex room below. And indeed there was.

At the end of the hall stood a door behind which a video rental store had gone to die. This, Lucifer knew, was where Eric had found that karaoke machine when the vampire had, of all things, serenaded him. A flutter of remembered love battered his ribcage as his eyes fixated on the old machine, the box of CDs sitting next to it dusty but with its flaps open. Lucifer smiled to himself as he crossed to the shelves to rifle through the CDs.

Goodness, but music certainly had changed since this place had been a dying rental store. Was that a good thing or a bad thing? Lucifer couldn't tell. So long as you could move your body to it, which resulted in sex later on, music was certainly serving its purpose, regardless of the decade. The song Eric had chosen to sing to Lucifer, for instance—it wasn't new, by any means, but it was a good one. Lucifer himself had sung it a time or two at the club.

He stepped away from the music and continued to touch everything within sight. The cardboard cutouts of Charlie's Angels and various other celebrities. Gaming consoles. Old DVDs, older still VHS. Various appliances that probably hailed from time as the bar, not the rental store. A massive popcorn machine. A delightful selection of porn that Lucifer lost himself in. He had sat himself on a box and was sorting through the porn, stacking them in piles—watch, don't watch, definitely watch—when the door creaked open.

Lucifer looked up and then smiled wide at the sight of Eric scrutinizing him. "Viking! I had no idea you kept such an ample collection!" Lucifer held up a DVD, the type that had not been in the main room when the vampire had rented movies to the public.

Eric came fully into the room, shutting the door behind him. "We didn't know what to do with them," he said honestly. "It seemed a waste to just throw them out."

"Indeed," Lucifer agreed, picking up a short stack of DVDs in cases with nothing but white paper wrapped around them. The names of these ones were pun heavy, but beyond that Lucifer didn't recognize anything about them. And they were all burned copies, rather than officially produced. "What, pray tell, would these be?" he asked, hoping for a colourful answer.

"That's exactly what you're hoping for," Eric told him, taking the top one and heading to the far wall where an older television took up too much space. He flicked the switch on it and a high-frequency whine blasted Lucifer's ears. The devil winced, deciding that technological advances had come a long way—he hadn't heard that sort of whine in years. Decades? At least one, he decided. Old tube TVs should never make a comeback.

He shifted on the box he was sitting on, eager to see precisely what kind of black market porn Eric Northman used to deliver to his clientele. The DVD player chugged as soon as the disc was put in it and a few moments later the video started playing.

There was no main menu on this DVD—nor was there anything remotely like a plot. There was no art to it. Simply a camera set up as a naked man padded across the floor toward a couch with three naked women on it. It took Lucifer a second to realize it was Eric that was reaching down to the centre woman, and then he was grinning from ear to ear, his attention moving back and forth between the television and his vampire lover. "Viking! Vampire porn? Your personal vampire porn?"

"Not all of it is me," Eric said, no shame or pride in his voice. "But we kept a selection of this for the vampire customers."

Lucifer eyed the screen, entertained by the fact that the camera had struggled with capturing how fast a vampire could, well . . . fuck. "Are the videos only of vampires?" Lucifer asked, enjoying the angle of the camera—it really showcased Eric's ass, the muscles of his back.

"There's always at least one vampire," Eric said, his eyes also on the screen. "But often there are humans involved. Not that the humans would remember the evening after we were done with them."

"Did they all go home at the end of the night?" Lucifer asked, already knowing the answer. It stood to reason, if vampires liked porn, they'd probably also love a good snuff film, too. They were predators after all.

"Not always," Eric confirmed, before stabbing at the off button on the DVD player. "Would you like to watch one?"

Lucifer almost said yes. He was curious—did Eric have a film of him killing a human? Would that be what he showed Lucifer? And how would Eric react to rewatching the event, now that he seemed to be trying to live by a moral code? But much as it all interested him, he knew they had other things to do this night.

"Perhaps another time," Lucifer said as he stood up. He shook a leg to straighten his pants. "We've a mystery to solve at the moment."

Eric straightened from putting the DVD back in its case. "About that," he said. "I think I might have figured something out."

Lucifer waited for Eric to continue, and when the DVD was tucked safely back in its case, he took it to put with the others.

"I had . . . interesting dreams last night," Eric finally said.

This perked Lucifer up. "Like the werepanther?" he asked.

Eric shook his head. "No, I wasn't dreaming of bayous full of monsters or anything. But my dreams were disjointed, full of half facts." Eric leaned up against the shelf that held all of the old electronics he used to rent out. "It was like our problem was a puzzle and I kept finding small pieces, but none want to fit together. Until one did."

Lucifer leaned toward the vampire, wondering what he'd say next.

"The smell of the algae," Eric continued. "I told you it was familiar, right?"

Lucifer nodded encouragingly. "Back at Florence Davis's place."

Eric nodded pensively. "Well, I smelled it again last night and for some reason it jogged a memory this time."

"What memory?" Lucifer asked, leaning so far toward his lover he was at risk of toppling over. But it seemed Eric Northman was an expert at delayed gratification, because he was certainly was doing a good job at stringing the devil along.

"My dreams were odd," Eric continued, as if not hearing Lucifer. "Discordant. Jagged. In one, I was in a tiny room with algae dripping down the walls. In the next, I was with Sookie, as an alligator studied us from the water. Another one was more memory than dream, though. The remembered anger and disgust as someone touched my shoulder. Someone trying to see if I was alright."

Lucifer raised his eyebrows in question. Would the damn Viking get to the bloody point already? "Who? What?" he asked, impatient.

A smiled bloomed over Eric's face and Lucifer realized the man had been torturing him on purpose. Oh, but the vampire knew him too well. He returned the smile, his heart racing just a tiny bit as he grabbed Eric by the belt loops and pulled until they were bumping into each other.

"Tell me, Viking. Don't play with me." But he followed that sentence with a burning kiss, more for his own need than to convince Eric of anything.

"I dreamt about that day you dragged me to one of your Detective's cases," Eric said when Lucifer broke the kiss.

Lucifer's eyebrows screwed together, and a worry flitted through him. "The Detective? What does she have to do with any of this?"

"Not your precious Detective," Eric replied, and Lucifer wondered if perhaps he heard a bit of jealousy in the other man's voice. "Rather, who your Detective is dating."

Lucifer frowned. "Pierce?" he asked. The frown deepened. "You said he smelled like . . ."

"A rancid fairy," Eric finished for him. "Like if Sookie had gone bad." He sneered, his fangs popping out, not in desire but in disgust. "The algae? It smells like the bad part of Pierce. Combined with it being in Sookie's house last night, I think that's what triggered the memory."

"It smells like him, for sure?" Lucifer asked, ice sliding down his back in foreboding. "Are you absolutely certain?"

"Definitely," Eric agreed. "And if Pierce fucking smells like this shit, I think it's safe to say he must know something about what's going on."

"We need to head back," Lucifer said, not noticing when Eric pulled him close, the vampire's blue eyes intent on his neck. "We've got to make sure the Detective's alright."

He was lost in thought—and worry—as Eric bent his head, and the pinch at his neck was almost unnoticeable. An unhappy growl came from the Viking a moment later, and he pulled back, not a single drop of blood having been taken. Lucifer, it seemed, was not feeling desperate enough for his lover. Worry for Chloe Decker's safety—talk about a mood killer.

"My apologies, Viking," Lucifer said, somehow feeling ashamed of his inability to feed him. This was the one thing that made their relationship so damn special, and usually the only reason he couldn't become vulnerable for Eric was when he himself had been sated beyond belief. Not because he was worrying about some damn woman who could barely tolerate him.

And here he'd been fretting over the idea that Eric would leave him for Sookie.

Dear Dad, talk about being a hypocrite.

"Just give me a few minutes to process," Lucifer said. He could hear the thump of music from the bar proper, although he knew hardly anyone was out there yet. Still . . . "Unless you'd rather find a meal on the dancefloor?"

Eric pushed away, leaning back against the door. "No, I'd rather not."

Lucifer cocked his head to one side. "But you must be hungry."

"Perhaps, but not for some fangbanger looking for a thrill."

Lucifer's heart seemed to plummet at that, and he found himself caught between two worries—about his love for Eric and about Chloe Decker and that scheming bastard Pierce. If he so much as laid a finger on her—

Eric folded his arms over his chest. "I think you suddenly know how I've been feeling these past few days."

Lucifer had the decency to lower his head, his eyes finding the floor in embarrassment. All his worrying about Eric and Sookie. The Viking was right. It hadn't been particularly fair. For even though he was suddenly worrying about Chloe, his love for Eric hadn't wavered. Not even a tiny bit. Even if he wasn't feeling particularly needy for him at the moment.

When he looked back up, there was nothing but amusement in Eric's eyes—well, behind his own worry, that was. "We need to head back to Los Angeles, Viking. If Pierce so much looks at her wrong, I'll have his head." He scowled. "Over and over, considering his immortal affliction."

"Not yet," Eric said, pushing away from the door and opening it. Lucifer followed him out into the hall, the two men heading toward Eric's office to the sound of the club music.

"Why not?" Lucifer questioned. "We're both fast enough to get there before morning. We'd even have a few hours to track the son of a bitch down for questioning."

Eric shook his head and disappeared into his office.

Anxiety spread through Lucifer's chest as he followed the other man. He didn't like Chloe being with Pierce in the first place. But if the world's first murderer was also tied to the missing halflings and the dead werepanthers? Chloe might be neither of those things, but she was special! He didn't want her getting hurt just because he was giving her space to make her own—stupid—decisions.

He followed Eric into the office, ready to argue about why they needed to get in the air now and fly to Los Angeles immediately. But Eric was shrugging into his leather jacket, looking the part of the dangerous bad boy, his blue eyes riveted to Lucifer's face.

"We can't go," Eric said calmly. "I did not come all this way to leave halfway through our work. And this is work, is it not, Lucifer?"

Lucifer sighed, hands reaching up to tug through his hair with worry. "But what if she's been kidnapped too?" he asked, knowing his argument was weak.

"Call her," Eric encouraged. "I'm not leaving Shreveport until I speak with the werewolves, but if you call and she doesn't answer, by all means—go back to Los Angeles."

Lucifer frowned. "I don't want to leave you here by yourself."

Eric shrugged. "I'll be fine. I'm not the one dating Cain from the fucking Bible, I'll give you that. And we've got no reports of vampires being attacked. But I'll be damned if I don't see Alcide and find out how the hell he let Sookie be kidnapped from his own fucking bed." He shoved his hands in his pockets and when he didn't find what he was looking for, reached a hand out toward Lucifer. "Can I have the keys to the Alfa Romeo, so I can at least go do my own thing?"

Lucifer's heart constricted. He didn't want to leave Eric here all by himself. The Viking was right—if Chloe wasn't in trouble right now, she probably wouldn't be if he didn't head home immediately. For all that Pierce was an insufferable twat, he did seem to genuinely care about the Detective, for some reason. And she was decidedly not a halfling or a Were-anything.

Instead of giving Eric the keys, he pulled his phone out. "I'll call her, like you suggest," Lucifer said. "If she answers; if everything is fine . . . I will accompany you to meet the werewolf. If not . . ." Lucifer trailed off as he went through his contacts to find Chloe's number. "Well, if things are not fine, perhaps we should part ways. Just for a short time, of course."

He glanced up at Eric. "But my going to her if she's in trouble does not mean I love her."

Eric gave him a dry smile. "That's what I've been trying to say all along, Luci."

"I hear you, Viking. I finally hear you," Lucifer admitted, pressing send and bringing the phone to his ear. "Loud and clear."