Chapter forty-two : Everly

"Are you sure we need that?" Lucifer asked standing behind the cart.

"Of course! Even though I've never been camping, I know s'mores is an integral part of it." I said grabbing two packets of marshmallows.

Yes, camping, out of all the things he could've chosen from, it had to be something I'd never done. The weekend was finally here, my exams were good, and I finished with them this afternoon. When I reached home, Lucifer was there in about an hour and declared our weekend getaway would be camping. It wasn't like I didn't like the idea, camping was fine by me given it was something I had always wanted to experience. What scared me was spending four days and three days with Lucifer. Alone. In some godforsaken wilderness.

But I couldn't refuse him after seeing how he worked overtime just to take out time for me. I owed him that much. So now here I was doing shopping, the part I hated the most. He had to drag me here. Like literally drag me here because I was reluctant to go and made up stupid reasons to avoid it. But he'd promised it'd be fun and with being here I realized it was indeed an interesting task. I was assigned to gather all the snacks we required while Lucifer got the essentials. And it was already an hour and I still wasn't done with my part of shopping, but Lucifer was patient all the time, as I jumped from shelf to shelf and aisle to aisle to get back everything I liked into the cart.

"I understand that but don't you think it's a little too much for the two of us." It was more of a statement and he standing pushing the cart, not giving me a chance to take anything out.

"You done?" He asked with a smirk, and looking down at the stuffed shopping cart I nodded. "Yep."

"You surely are enjoying this a bit too much aren't you?" He smirked and headed down the camping section of the store. He grabbed some camping stuff about which I knew nothing while stood there guarding our cart. Now that I looked down at it again I realized I might've bought a lot of snacks. I saw Lucifer talking to a sale's assistant before I grabbed some of the extra stuff and went to put them back.

Unsurprisingly, just like I every time when I returned a beautiful woman was standing next to him. I couldn't believe it most of the times, no matter what this man tended to make heads turn. Even today in his khaki shorts and a simple light blue shirt he seemed to attract them like some crazy girl magnet. Nevertheless, the astonishing part was the way his demeanor completely changed. The warmth and softness was always replaced by coldness and sternness, it was as if he were a complete different person. And some twisted part inside of me seemed to like it.

The woman moved up close to him and whispered something before breaking into a fit giggles. Damn, what was wrong with that woman? Couldn't she see he was already here with someone and what she was doing was wrong. she was now practically hanging on him like a monkey. I needed to pull them apart, not that I was affected or something. I mean we were supposed to shop for our camping and Lucifer seemed to get off track, so like a good fellow camper I had to get him to focus.

I grabbed a tube from a nearby shelf, "Hey Lucifer is this rash cream you were looking for?" I called out making him and the woman turn in my direction. Lucifer arched his brow at me, I smirked and continued, "I know that rash of yours has been troubling you for so long, so I found the perfect cream for you."

"Do you know her Lucifer?" The woman next to her glared at me and then turned to Lucifer, but his eyes were trained on me. I felt a tingling sensation inside my body. I froze under his intense gaze, unable to move. He smirked and entangled himself out of the woman's grip then ever so slowly he started in my direction, our eyes never leaving each other's.

I stood there like a freaking statue looking at the woman's expression go from bewilderment to downright pissed as Lucifer came to stand behind me, wrapping an arm around my waist he pulled me into him, my back to his front. "As a matter of fact I do know her. Tiffany this is my girl, Everly." He said, "Sweetheart our company is working together with Tiffany's father's company on a project, the one I told you about." He smiled down at me. God, this was wrong he was the one supposed to be all flustered, not me.

Sparing me of any further embarrassment, Tiffany extended her hand in my direction, "Nice to meet you Everly. Lucifer forgot to mention that not only are our companies working together but we've been batch mates and known each other for over five years." She said smugly.

"It's nice meeting you too." Lucifer muttered something under his breath but I ignored it and took her hand and smiled but she scowled at me. Okay, so she might be gorgeous with her dark hair and toned body but there was something wrong with her attitude.

"Aren't you late for your dinner Tiffany?" Lucifer said.

"Oh, yes, I almost forgot." She laughed, "I'll get going now. Let's catch up some other day Lucifer and do bring Everly along." She smiled that perfect professional smile and swayed her way down the aisle.

"She's beautiful," I murmured.

"Don't let it fool you." Lucifer sighed.

"Say did you really go to college with her?" I tilted my head backwards to look up at him.

"Unfortunately yes, but that's in the past and now I have you and we have shopping to do."

"Yes we do but you'll have to let me go for that."

He looked down as if he hadn't realized he was holding me in a steel grip. "Nah, I like you against me. You're so soft and squishy, I don't feel like letting go." He smiled his full smile and poked my stomach

"Hey," I tried to wiggle out of his grip but it was useless. His poking turned into full tickling and I struggled to get away. Damn I hated being tickled because I was ticklish everywhere. When he finally let go, I was out of breath.

"Thank you for the rash cream." He smirked and casually went to a shelf to grab some stuff like he didn't just tickle me to death.

***

"We might have to take a rain check on camping." I said looking at the gray clouds that had appeared out of nowhere.

"Maybe," Lucifer said joining me at the doors to the roof. After doing the whole shopping spree we had lunch at a nearby restaurant and headed straight home. It was around six when I noticed the clouds which were growing darker. "But don't worry we have a little cabin where I'm taking you, even if it rains we can still spend the weekend there."

We stood there in silence for a long moment and I mused on the idea at how normal it felt. Me Lucifer under the same roof. Earlier I couldn't even entertain an idea of us being in a same room, and here we were. It seemed just yesterday when I bickered with him in the aisle of Fresh Point. From that point on he was just an eccentric, egoistic jerk who kept following me everywhere. But over the time my perception changed drastically. He did come across a little cold, okay too cold and intimidating but I got to see his other side, the warmer side. The silence was broken by the ring of Lucifer's phone, he excused himself and went into the study.

When he didn't return for quite long I headed to living room to look at the equipment we got. I was only able to make out the tent and sleeping bags while the others were alien to me. I picked up a bag and started opening and jumped hearing Lucifer's voice. God, this man was like a cat, a big freaking cat he moved around without making any noise. "What?" I snapped.

"I have to head down to an urgent meeting right now, I won't be long." He said looking down at his phone. My stomach turned, a meeting, didn't he say he was done with all of his work for the weekend. Tiffany. Perhaps she was the one he was supposed to be meeting. Wait, where did that come from? I shook my head, I had no reason to be upset about, he was just doing his job. And even if he was planning on meeting her I had no right to interfere. I sighed, something was seriously wrong with me. "Okay, be careful though, you know with the storm approaching and all." I smiled.

"Yes sure." He kissed on my head and headed out.

I stood there for a moment staring at the door, expecting god knew what. I needed to get my head straight and a long shower could help, grabbing my phone I rushed upstairs to my room. After the shower I could read one of my books and look into the internships I had, maybe that could help prevent my mind from acting strange again.