26. Twenty-Six

Maze is drinking whiskey when her phone rings. 

She glances at the screen, reads the name on the Caller ID, and then lifts it to her ear. 

“You better have good news for me, Jack,” she snarls. “They weren’t in that stupid town in Illinois you sent me to, and they’re not in Bumfuck Pennsylvania either, and if you send me to one more damn farm town that they’ve already left, I’m going to kill you and make it hurt.”

“I found their license plate number.”

Maze frowns. “What?”

“You said they were in that Super 8 in Illinois, right? But they left before you got there. So I nailed down a potential time frame, and then I programmed my algorithm to check traffic cams within two hundred miles, and—”

“I don’t give a shit how you did it, Jack. Just get to the point.”

“I found them,” he says, excitement lifting his voice. “They’re in an Escalade. I’ve been waiting for the license plate to ping, and it just did. I know where they are right now. Like, right now.”

“Where?”

“They went through a toll booth in New Jersey two minutes ago.”

A memory surfaces in Maze’s mind.

Once upon a time, the Devil went to New York City. 

Chloe and Lucifer get to New York around four in the afternoon. 

Traffic isn’t terrible, which is nice. Battery Park is on the very tip of Manhattan, and since they’re meeting with Death at dawn, they agreed it was best to stay as close to the park as possible. Back in Vegas, Lucifer floated the idea of treating themselves to a penthouse suite in one of the expensive hotels nearby after a week of sitting in the car and staying in roadside motels. But Chloe hadn’t shared his enthusiasm—too many people, too many cameras, too many opportunities to get caught so close to the finish line—so they settled on booking an Airbnb under their fake identities. 

Chloe doesn’t actually know anything about the Airbnb—she let Lucifer choose it, since he was pouting about not getting to stay in a penthouse suite—so when she walks in the front door, she’s stunned. 

“Wow,” she breathes. 

It isn’t a huge apartment, but it doesn’t need to be. There’s a kitchen to her right, with gleaming countertops and a round table set for four. There’s a doorway up ahead to her left, and she can see the end of a bed covered in white linens. Up ahead, just beyond a sitting area with comfortable looking furniture arranged on a rug, is a wall of massive windows with stunning views of the city and the park and the water. 

The front door clicks shut behind her, and Lucifer appears at her side with a grin. “Do you like it?”

Chloe leaves her bags on the floor and crosses the apartment to stand in front of the windows. The trees in the park are changing colors with the fall weather, and the blue sky is a shade lighter than the water, and it’s just…

“It’s beautiful,” she breathes. She turns to face him. “How much does this cost a night?”

“Does it matter?” he asks as he adjusts his cufflink. “It’s just money.”

She snorts. “Only rich people say that.”

“I’m not rich, darling. I’m filthy rich.”

She laughs. He crosses the room and wraps his arms around her waist, pulling her flush against his chest. She drapes her arms around his neck and smiles. 

“Filthy’s a good word for you,” she muses. “Lots of ways to apply it.”

“You would know,” he murmurs, ducking forward to kiss her. 

She smiles against his lips and kisses him back. There’s a promise in it, but no immediacy. It’s just a kiss, and she likes that. It’s going to be hard, once they get back to L.A. and back to work, for her to remember that she can’t just kiss him anytime she wants.

She leans back eventually, and he reaches up to brush her hair behind her ear. She left it down today because he asked her to this morning after she got out of the shower. He said it shyly, like he wasn’t sure he was allowed to ask, and she’d kissed him so hard he stumbled backward into the wall.

Now, he can’t seem to keep his hands out of it. He curls a strand around his index finger. 

“I know you’re wary of spending the night in the city,” he says in a low voice. “Would you like to order food and stay in for the evening?”

She considers the question. It’s tempting. Even if she wasn’t wary and tired, she’s a homebody. She likes staying in. But then she glances out the windows at the trees of Battery Park in the distance, and she smiles. 

“I’ve got a better idea.”

And that’s how they end up sprawled on a blanket in the grass in Battery Park. 

Lucifer is sitting, his long legs stretched out before him, his eyes following people as they walk by. Chloe is lying on the blanket next to him, her head resting on his thigh, staring up at the stunning oranges and reds and yellows of trees she doesn’t get to see in Los Angeles. One of Lucifer’s hands is planted on the blanket behind him to hold himself upright, but the other is buried in her hair, his fingers stroking gently through the strands. It feels amazing. She’s so relaxed she thinks she might melt straight into the ground. 

She doesn’t know how long they’ve been here. A while, probably, since the sun is starting to set, but she has no desire to check the time. They’ve been asking each other questions and swapping answers and acting like any other normal couple who decided to enjoy a gorgeous fall Saturday in the park. They’re not normal, of course. But it feels like it, and she’s too busy basking to let logic—or their looming date with Death—get in the way. 

“Best concert you’ve ever been to,” she asks, drumming her fingers idly on her stomach. 

Lucifer hums. “I attended a particularly raucous Led Zeppelin concert once.” 

“But was it the best?”

He glances down at her with lifted eyebrows. “You doubt me?”

She smiles. “I’m just asking if it was the concert you enjoyed or if it was all the sex you probably had.”

He grins wolfishly. “There were several sexcapades that night.”

She rolls her eyes. 

“None so pleasurable as those I share with you, of course,” he murmurs, his fingers dancing along her hairline. 

She smiles at him. She’s not jealous of his previous lovers anymore. How could she be when he belongs to her? But she loves him for offering reassurance, and if she wasn’t so comfortable right now, she’d sit up and kiss him. 

“So was it the best?” she presses. 

He tilts his head. “I’m not sure. I suppose there were…” He trails off and furrows his eyebrows. “You know, you’re right. It wasn’t.”

“So what was?”

“Pavarotti.”

“The opera guy?”

He smiles down at her. “Yes, darling. The opera guy. I saw him perform E lucevan le stelle live and it was exquisite. I’ve never heard anything like it.”

He stares off into the distance, a wistful look on his face, and Chloe watches him with a smile. He’s such a nerd.

He notices her amusement when he glances down at her again, and he furrows his eyebrows at her. “What?”

“Nothing.”

He smirks. “Has my nerdiness turned you on again?”

“Pleading the fifth,” she says with a laugh.

He smiles. He always smiles when she laughs. She likes that. 

He combs his hand through her hair. “What about you?”

“*NSYNC, obviously.”

He casts his eyes heavenward. “Bloody hell, Detective.”

“Look, it takes a lot of talent to sing and dance like that simultaneously. Plus they were so hot. They had these Adidas tracksuits on, and it was so...” She sighs instead of finishing.

Lucifer shakes his head. “I will never, ever wear an Adidas tracksuit.”

“You would if I asked you to.”

He opens his mouth, and then closes it again.

She grins. “Sucks when you can’t lie, huh?”

He rolls his eyes at her, but he’s smiling. “So is that one of your happiest memories? Fawning over Adidas clad boybanders with your friends?”

“I don’t know about happiest,” she says, stretching a little and then resettling on the blanket. “But it was pretty great. My parents got me tickets for my birthday. My mom was supposed to take me and two of my friends, but a few days before the concert the studio called her about doing reshoots for a movie she’d just finished. So my dad went with us.”

“Was he miserable?”

Chloe shakes her head. “No. I mean, it wasn’t his style of music at all, and it couldn’t have been fun to be surrounded by thousands of screaming teenage girls, but he smiled the whole time. That’s just who he was.”

“What do you mean?”

Chloe chews her lip and studies the fall foliage as she tries to figure out a way to explain it. 

“My dad was different than a lot of my friends’ parents. I knew he loved me, but I also felt like he liked me, you know? He was always interested in whatever I was interested in. He never made me feel stupid for liking the things that I liked. It’s one of the things I’ve always been really insistent about with Dan. It shouldn’t matter if Trixie loves Mars and aliens, or Barbies and dresses, or football and race cars, or even all that stuff at once. Let her love what she wants, you know?”

When Lucifer doesn’t say anything, Chloe glances away from the trees and at him instead. She goes still when she sees the pensive, slightly sad expression on his face.

“Babe?” she says, reaching up to stroke her fingers over his shin. “What’s wrong?”

He shakes his head. “I was just thinking that if I’d had a father like yours, or a mother like you, I might have turned out differently.”

Chloe’s chest aches. “I love the way you turned out.”

His eyes flicker over her face, and then his expression changes. His eyebrows furrow, and his lips part as if he’s about to say something, but he doesn’t. 

Chloe feels like there’s tension in the air all of a sudden. Not bad tension. Just...tension. Like the way it feels to reach the top of the first giant hill on a rollercoaster, but the car hasn’t started the descent yet. 

“What?” she murmurs.

He shakes his head a little, and then smiles. “So if that wasn’t your happiest memory, then what is?”

Chloe hesitates for a second, wondering if she should press him on whatever he was just thinking, but decides against it. “You mean, like, ever? In my whole life?”

“Indeed.”

She blows out a breath. “I don’t know. I have to pick just one?”

“You can pick three.” He holds up his index finger. “But none of them can involve me.”

She shoots him a look. “Ego much?”

“Look at me,” he says, gesturing at himself. “I’m a walking, talking hit of happiness for you humans.”

Chloe laughs. 

He smiles and combs his fingers through her hair. “I know you, Detective. You’re disgustingly polite and painfully kind. You’ll feel obligated to include me in at least one of your three answers.”

She frowns. “You’re not an obligation, Lucifer.”

“Perhaps,” he acknowledges. “But I’d like to know what makes you happy other than the Devil.”

Chloe considers arguing with him but doesn’t. “All right,” she sighs. “Give me a minute to think.”

“I’ll give you two because I’m a generous lover. As you’re well aware.”

She rolls her eyes. He leers at her but refrains from additional innuendos. His hand continues to stroke through her hair, and she stares up at the trees and the sky that’s starting to color with the sunset and thinks. 

“The day Trixie was born,” she says. “Giving birth sucks, but then they put her in my arms and…” 

She trails off as she remembers it. She struggles briefly with the guilt and grief in her chest—it’s been a week since she saw her daughter, and she misses her more today than she has any other day—but the knowledge that she’s so close to ending this nightmare soothes her somewhat. 

“I didn’t know it was possible to love someone that much,” she finishes.

Lucifer smiles. “And number two?”

“We took Trixie to Disneyland once,” she replies. “It was hot, and there were a ton of people, and it was around the time when things started to get bad between me and Dan. That’s part of the reason we went, actually. We thought some family time would be good for us.”

“This doesn’t sound happy, Detective. In fact, it sounds rather terrible.”

She laughs. “It wasn’t great until we got there. Trixie was so over the moon excited, and joy like that is contagious, you know? We ate food and rode rides and took pictures with characters and it was like everything else just paused. For one day, there was nothing wrong. Trixie still says it was one of the best days of her life.”

“Well I’m glad Beatrice had a lovely time, but what about you? These are meant to be your happiest memories, darling, not hers.”

“Her happy memories are mine. It makes me happy when she’s happy.”

He sighs. “I suppose I’ll allow that.”

“Well thank you, your majesty.”

He laughs. “And number three?”

Chloe presses her lips together and hums. She rifles through her memories, trying to find one that stands out, and she does.

“The first commercial I ever booked,” she tells him. “My mom was so thrilled, but I was terrified. I had, like, one line and I couldn’t seem to get it right. So my mom called my dad, and he drove over to the set and gave me a pep talk, and boom. I nailed it in one take. We did a couple more, and then he took us for ice cream. It was the first time we ever went to Bennett’s, that ice cream stand I told you about.”

“I remember,” he says. “He got rum raisin, you got Fancy Nancy.”

Chloe smiles at him. “Yeah.” 

“I may have to try this Fancy Nancy when we return to Los Angeles.”

An image of Lucifer standing in front of the red and white stripes of the Bennett’s stand, struggling to lick his ice cream cone before it melts while Trixie laughs at him, sparks a deep sense of longing in Chloe’s chest. 

“What about you?” she wonders.

He frowns. “What about me?”

“What are three of your happiest memories? I mean, I know you’re immortal so you have way more to sort through than I do. But can you narrow it down to three?” 

He smiles. “I believe I can, yes. Are you ready?”

“Yep. Lay it on me.”

He holds up his index finger. “Our half date.” He holds up two fingers. “The night you took me stargazing.” He holds up three fingers. “Last night.”

For a moment, Chloe can do nothing except stare at him. He smiles at her and returns his hand to her hair, apparently unbothered by her shock. Somewhere nearby, a group of kids scream with laughter. A breeze ruffles the trees. A dog barks in the distance. 

“Those are all moments with me,” she finally manages to say.

Lucifer smiles. “Wonderful deduction, Detective. No wonder your solve rate is so high. Truly one of L.A.’s finest.”

He’s teasing her, but she’s too caught up in what he said to make a clever retort. 

“But you said I couldn’t pick moments with you,” she says, propping herself up on her elbows. “You shouldn’t have picked moments with me either. You broke your own rules.”

“I’m the Devil, darling,” he points out with a grin. “Breaking the rules is what I do.”

Chloe stares at him. He stares back, still grinning. She sits up and twists toward him so that they’re eye level and facing each other.

“Lucifer,” she starts. But she’s not sure how to finish. 

His grin fades. He lifts his hand to her face. “I searched for millennia for happiness,” he murmurs. “But I didn’t find it until I found you.”

Chloe’s eyes sting with tears. “Not romantic my ass,” she whispers. 

He laughs, and she kisses it from his lips. 

Lucifer nearly blurts out I love you at the park. 

Truth be told, he’s spent the whole day nearly blurting it out. He almost told her this morning, when she burrowed closer to him beneath the sheets and murmured You’re like my own personal space heater. He almost told her when she asked the barista at Starbucks to leave room for cream in his coffee so that he’d have room for his whiskey, and when she sang along to Edwin McCain’s I’ll Be on the radio, and then again when she cursed at a pickup truck that cut them off on the highway. He almost said it when she laughed at one of his puns when they went through a drive thru for lunch, and when she spent ten minutes explaining Beanie Babies to him, and then when she kissed him in their Airbnb. 

But the park. Bloody hell, the park. The fall breeze blowing through the strands of her hair and sending the scent of her shampoo floating past his nose. Her head resting on his thigh. The brilliant shade of her eyes in the sunlight, and the sound of her laugh, and the way she can’t stop staring at the fall-colored leaves. 

The words are right there, right on the tip of his tongue, and he longs to say them. He wants to shout them and sing them and hire a plane to write them across the sky. He wants to murmur them in her ear while they dance. He wants to breathe them against her lips when she kisses him. He wants to whisper them into her skin in the dark when they’re tangled in the sheets and each other.

He loves her. 

But he doesn’t tell her. He can’t. Nothing has changed. They’re thousands of miles from home and he hasn’t kept his word yet—she doesn’t have her life back yet—and he doesn’t want her to associate his long-awaited declaration with Dream’s nightmare. He wants it to be special. He wants it to be romantic and grand and perfect. 

So he waits. 

When the sun starts to dip beneath the horizon, the Detective tells him they should probably go. The park closes at dusk, and the last thing they need is to be approached by a cop. He reluctantly gets to his feet, and as she folds the blanket, he pulls his phone out and searches for a restaurant nearby since they’ve yet to eat dinner. He finds a tavern that reminds him of The Paddock and checks the menu, and when he sees that it’s mostly burgers and fries, he looks up at her. 

“Interested in grabbing a bite while we’re out?”

She tilts her head. “As long as it’s not too crowded or too fancy.”

“I can assure you it’s not the second,” he says, reaching for her hand. “As for the first, we’ll just have to check and see, won’t we?”

It only takes them ten minutes to get there on foot. He’s not typically the kind to enjoy walking to dinner, but the weather is beautiful and the Detective is holding his hand and it feels...normal. Like he’s not the Devil, and they’re not fugitives, and they’re not planning to meet Death soon. They’re just a couple in love, walking to dinner on a Saturday night, too caught up in each other to think of much else. 

The tavern isn’t particularly full, and while there is a camera mounted above the front door, the Detective doesn’t seem concerned. 

“It’s old,” she murmurs, eyeing the camera. “I’d be surprised if it works, but even if it does, it’s probably not hooked up to a central system.”

“I’ve no idea what that means,” Lucifer replies.

She smiles. “It means the only way someone can access their footage is if they come here and get a physical copy. I’ve had to do it during cases before.”

“Ah. So we needn’t worry about Maze’s hackers then, hm?”

She frowns. “Maze has hackers?” 

“Oh yes. Several. She’s quite skilled at bounty hunting, but even she needs some digital assistance every now and then.” He gestures toward the staircase in the back of the bar. “Shall we go upstairs and seek out a bit more privacy?”

She nods. He leads her by the hand through the bar, and then up the steps. There are even fewer people upstairs, and they snag a booth along the wall that’s tucked around a corner and thus hidden from view of the stairs. A waitress appears soon after, and then the Detective prompts him with another question, and they fall into the same pattern they’ve been in all day. 

It happens when they’re nearly finished with their burgers and fries. She’s explaining why she hates ketchup. She’s got a few bites of her burger left, but she flips the top bun off and eats just the bacon and then pushes her plate away. A few strands of hair fall into her eyes as she talks. She pushes them behind her ear and then folds her arms on the table. Her nose scrunches adorably in distaste when she mentions the purple ketchup fad of the early 2000s, and he thinks, I could listen to this woman talk about ketchup forever. 

And then it hits him. 

He loves her. 

And he wants her to know.

“Lucifer?” she says.

He snaps to attention. “Hm?”

She smirks at him. “What are you thinking about? Please tell me it’s not sex related, because I can’t do ketchup sex. I want to throw up just thinking about it.”

He doesn’t answer. She studies him, and her smirk slowly fades into a concerned frown. 

“Lucifer?” she says, uncertainty creeping into her voice. “What’s wrong?”

He knows he needs to answer her. But when he opens his mouth, nothing comes out. He can’t seem to remember how to string a sentence together. His entire vocabulary has deserted him save for three words. Those three words. 

So he says them.

“I love you.”

He’s met with silence. 

She looks completely, utterly stunned. Her mouth has fallen open, and her eyes are wide, and she’s sitting as still as a statue. 

The words seem to echo as they hang in the air between them. He wonders if he should regret blurting them out so unceremoniously, but he doesn’t. The only thing he regrets is that he didn’t say them sooner. He should have said them every day since this nightmare started. He should’ve said them to her in that evidence closet. He should’ve said them on his balcony before he left for Hell, and when they danced at her prom, and on that beach before she kissed him. He should have said them during their very first case, when he knew that she was different, and that he was different with her.

Her eyebrows furrow a little, and then she whispers, “What did you say?” 

He wonders if she thinks she misheard him, or if she’s trying to give him an out just in case his impulsiveness got the best of him. Either way, it makes him ache. 

He leans forward and holds her gaze intently. “I love you. I’m in love with you.”

She stares at him, speechless. 

“I was going to wait,” he says into the silence. “I didn’t want to say it until the nightmare was over. I wanted it to be special. But I realize now that’s ridiculous because, well, every moment with you is special.”

Tears are welling up in her eyes. She swallows, her throat constricting. “Lucifer,” she murmurs. “If you’re saying it because—”

“I’m saying it because it’s true,” he cuts her off gently. “It’s always been true. First love, last love, everything in between. It’s you, Chloe. Always you. I love you.”

Hope lights her eyes, and then a breathtaking smile starts to blossom across her face. “You mean it?” 

He smiles too. “Heart and soul.”

Zatanna is next in line to order at her favorite taco truck when goosebumps race across her skin and a quiet, otherworldly voice whispers in the back of her mind. 

Danger. 

She hesitates just long enough to glance at her surroundings—no one is looking at her, and the guy behind her in line is glued to his phone—then closes her eyes and mutters a word and wills herself to disappear. 

When she opens her eyes again, she’s standing in a bedroom at a safehouse in Santa Monica. Chloe Decker’s kid is sitting at a desk in the corner of the room. Her head is resting on her arms, which are folded on top of a math textbook. Judging by the pencil that’s close to falling out of one of her hands, she was doing her homework when she fell asleep. But it’s not Trixie or her homework that Zatanna is worried about. 

It’s the man standing over her. 

He has a newspaper in one hand, and a cell phone in the other, and he appears to be taking a picture. He’s wearing the uniform of a police officer, but Zatanna knows it’s fake. This man is not a cop. He’s a threat. 

She holds her hand out and mutters under her breath. The cell phone flies out of his hand, across the room, and into her palm. 

The man whirls around in surprise. When he sees her, his expression twists into something murderous. Zatanna gestures at him as she murmurs a few more words, and his body flies across the room just like his phone. Instead of ending up in her hand, though, he collapses onto his knees before her. He struggles, but he can’t move beneath the invisible force of her magic.

“Release me!” he growls, still trying and failing to stand.

Trixie startles at the sound of his voice and stirs. 

Zatanna lifts her other hand, and Trixie goes back to sleep. Zatanna turns her attention back to the man kneeling before her. 

“Shut up.”

He opens his mouth, but she flicks her hand. His lips seal themselves closed. His eyes widen, and she thinks she sees a hint of fear, but she doesn’t care. She glances at Trixie, and when she’s sure the kid is fast asleep, she looks down at the phone in her hand. 

There’s a text message conversation on the screen, but there’s only one text and it’s not even a text. It’s a photo. Trixie is in the background, asleep, and the newspaper is in the foreground. It reminds Zatanna of a photo a kidnapper would take. 

Her blood boils. She searches through the phone for a minute or two, trying to figure out who was on the receiving end of the text, but there’s nothing. She’s half tempted to call the number and see who picks up, but that’s not her call to make. It’s Chloe and Lucifer’s.

Zatanna looks up at the man who’s still kneeling before her. She dismisses the enchantment that has his lips sealed and then asks, “Who are you?”

He sneers at her. “I don’t answer to you.”

Zatanna flicks her fingers and murmurs, and the man’s eyes bulge. He gasps for breath as if someone is choking him. 

She bends forward to look him in the eye. “I’m not a girl you want to mess with,” she warns in a low, dangerous voice. “Tell me who you are, or I’m going to turn you inside out like a t-shirt.”

His face is slowly turning crimson. Zatanna lets him struggle for another second or two, and then she flicks her fingers. He gasps immediately, gulping in breath after breath as if he was just underwater. 

“I don’t have all day,” she says, folding her arms over her chest. “Answer the question.”

He looks up at her with a glare. “I am Malacoda of Hell.”

That brings her up short. “Hell?” she repeats. 

He bares his teeth and snarls. “That’s what I said.”

“Wohs flesruoy,” Zatanna mutters.  

The man’s face briefly morphs into its true form.

Zatanna frowns, confused. “You’re a demon.” 

“Yes,” he hisses, his black eyes glittering in the dimness of the room. “And you’re right to be afraid.”

She snorts. “Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not afraid of you. If anyone should be afraid, it’s you. Your king will be livid when he finds out you were here.”

“I am here under orders from my king,” the demon snarls. 

Zatanna frowns. “That’s not possible. This child is under Lucifer’s protection.”

“Lord Morningstar doesn’t protect human spawn,” the demon spits. “You speak of the Imposter.”

“Imposter?” Zatanna echoes. “What the hell are you talking about?”

“You’ll see,” the demon says with a wicked smile. “Soon, the whole world will see. War will come, and Hell will ascend, and we will crush you humans beneath our heels and laugh.”

Zatanna’s blood runs cold. 

“Dnib,” she murmurs. Thick ropes appear as if out of nowhere and bind the demon’s arms tightly to his sides. He snarls at her and gnashes his teeth, but she ignores him. 

She presses her fingers against a small tattoo on her wrist and whispers, “I need you.”

A split second later, John materializes next to her. He looks worried. “What’s wrong, love?” he says, reaching out to touch her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

Zatanna ignores the spark that shudders through her body at his touch and nods at the demon. “This demon says Lucifer sent him.” She holds up the phone. “He texted someone a picture of the kid.”

John glances at the phone and then at the demon. “That’s impossible,” he says, shaking his head. “I talked to Luci an hour ago. They’re in New York.”

“Imposter!” the demon says, spit flying from his mouth with his vehemence. “You speak of the Imposter!”

John frowns. “What the bloody hell are you talking about?”

“The plan is already in motion,” the demon says, his eyes wild. “Lord Morningstar will use the human to bring the Imposter to his knees and then war will come. Blood will run through the streets like water and the Prince of Darkness will take his rightful throne.”

“I don’t have time for demon riddles,” John growls. He lifts his hand threateningly, and sparks appear at the ends of his fingers. “Tell me who the Imposter is, or I’ll send you back to Hell.”

The demon laughs. “Do as you please, human. You may send me down, but Lord Morningstar will bring me back up.”

John narrows his eyes. “I seriously doubt that. He’ll flay you alive when he finds out you were here.”

The demon sneers. “He’s the one who sent me.”

John frowns, and then understanding hits Zatanna like a lightning bolt.

“John,” she says, darting her hand out to grab his arm. “Lucifer’s twin. His identical twin. The one who pretended to be him.”

John frowns at her. “Michael?”

“Imposter,” the demon howls, jerking against the ropes binding him. “He plays at being our king, but we know the truth!”

John’s confused frown dissolves into understanding. “They think Michael is Lucifer. And I bet he’s working with Dream.”

“Forget Dream,” Zatanna says. “He said they’d use a human to bring the Imposter to his knees. And there’s only one human Lucifer will bow for.” 

All the color drains from John’s face. “Chloe.”

“Go,” Zatanna says, pushing his shoulder. “You have to warn Lucifer. Now.”

“Stay with the kid,” John commands. 

And then he grabs the demon by the collar of his shirt and disappears.

“Say it again.”

“I love you.”

Lucifer’s voice rumbles through his chest, and Chloe can feel the vibration against her cheek where it’s resting over his heart. She smiles and presses her nose into his skin and breathes him in. He smells like sweat and sex and Lucifer, and she’s so happy she feels like she’s weightless. She’s lost count of how many times he’s said it since dinner, but it still doesn’t feel like enough. 

She lifts her head to look at him and rests her chin on the back of her hand. “No take-backsies.” 

He smiles. “Never.”

A flurry of emotion whirls and then knots in her chest. “I love you too.”

He winks. “That’s just the multiple orgasms talking.”

She laughs, and the knot dissolves. He traces his fingertips over her bare back, up the curve of her spine and then over her shoulder blades in a lazy pattern. He smiles at her, and she smiles at him. 

“You’re happy,” he murmurs. It’s an observation, not a question, but she answers it anyway.

“Very happy.” She lifts her free hand and brushes her fingers over the stubble on his cheek. “Are you?”

“Happiest I’ve ever been.” 

There’s awe in his voice, and it propels her forward. She pushes off his chest and puts her hands on the mattress on either side of his head and leans down to kiss him, soft and slow. He curls his hands around her hips, and then glides his palms upward over the length of her body and back down. His skin is warm. She wants to ask him to say it again. She feels like an addict. She gets a hit, and then immediately needs more. 

“I love you,” he whispers against her lips as if he can read her mind. 

Warmth unfurls in her chest. God, she is so in love with him. 

She shakes her head, and her nose brushes his. “I’m never going to get sick of that.”

“No?”

“No.”

“Feels like a challenge.”

She laughs and leans back to look at him. “Do it. Try to make me sick of it. I dare you.”

Her hair is falling like a curtain on either side of her face, and he brushes one side behind her ear and then cups her cheek. 

“Careful, Detective,” he murmurs, his voice low. “The last time you issued me a dare, you ended up bent over my desk.”

“That was not a dare,” she disputes with a laugh. “I made one innocent comment—”

“It was not innocent.”

“—and you ran with it.”

“What was I supposed to do? You can’t bend over for me—”

“I did not bend over for you. I dropped my phone—”

“Oh, yes, you dropped your phone. Likely story.”

“—and you take everything as an invitation because you’re incapable of behaving—”

“I can’t behave? You were the one who said you’d been thinking about it all day.”

“I meant you, Lucifer. I didn’t mean I spent all day thinking about you nailing me from behind against your desk.”

He grins. “Yes, well, you certainly didn’t complain when I did.”

She rolls her eyes but can’t disagree because he’s right. He brushes his thumb along her bottom lip with a smirk. She holds his gaze, and then uses her tongue to pull his thumb into her mouth and suck on it. 

His eyes darken. He rolls them over so she’s beneath him and leans forward to give her a kiss that makes her back arch and her toes curl. It’s not hard to interpret where his mind is and what he wants. She wants it too. But she’s only human, and they’ve been busy.

“Wait,” she says, pushing on his chest. 

He pulls back to look at her with a frown. 

“I’m still recovering from the last round,” she explains. “Not all of us have supernatural endurance.” 

He immediately rolls off of her body and onto his side to face her. “You’re right. Apologies, love.”

There’s no anger or disappointment in his voice, but she still feels bad. “Sorry,” she says, turning her head to look at him.

He shakes his head. “Don’t apologize.” He smiles mischievously. “We’ve got all night.”

“No sleep tonight, huh?” she says, ignoring the sudden ache between her legs. “We’re just going to stay up until dawn when it’s time to meet Death?”

“How can I sleep when your single-night orgasm record is right there, ready and waiting for me to break it?”

She laughs.

He rests his temple on the heel of his hand and reaches out to grab the ring that’s still around her neck. He studies it, and she studies his face. He looks younger somehow. Freer. Or maybe just happier.

He glances up at her. “Do you need to sleep?” he asks quietly.

She shakes her head. “No.”

“I know you’re tired.”

“Yeah,” she admits. “But I don’t want to sleep.”

She doesn’t say it’s because of the nightmares, but she doesn’t think she has to. 

He brushes his fingers along her cheek. “What do you want?”

“This,” she says, curling her fingers around his forearm. “Just you.” She turns her face to kiss his hand, and then she grins. “And maybe some ice cream.”

He grins too. “I think I can manage that.”

He kisses her briefly, and then starts to get out of bed. She frowns, confused, and then she realizes what he’s doing and darts her hand out to grab his arm and stop him. “Wait, no. I was joking. Don’t go.”

He pauses. “You need time to recuperate, do you not?”

“Yeah but I didn’t mean I wanted you to leave.”

“There’s a shop just down the block, love. I’ll pop out and grab a few pints while you rest, and I’ll be back before you can even miss me.” 

She blinks at him. “Seriously? You’re going to go out at—” she glances at the ornate decorative clock hanging on the wall and then back at him “—ten o’clock just to buy me ice cream?”

He lifts a shoulder. “I enjoy fulfilling desires. Especially when they’re the desires of my beloved.” He leans toward her, and brushes his lips gently over hers. “Besides, if you’re rested enough when I return, I can lick it off you.”

Heat flares immediately in her body. “What is it with you and eating things off me?” 

He leans back to give her an incredulous look. “Have you seen your body?” 

She laughs. His lips break into a wide smile. She lifts her hand to brush her fingertips along his stubbled jaw. “I think it’s my turn to eat something off you.”

“Oh, yes please,” he purrs, and ducks forward to kiss her again. 

She wraps her arms around him. “You really are like walking heroin,” she murmurs against his lips.

“Funny, I was just thinking the same thing about you.”

She smiles, and then his tongue slips into her mouth, and heat flares in her body again. She’s got about ten seconds of self control left before she caves, and she really does need some time to recuperate, so she turns her face away and pushes against his chest with a sigh.

“Go before I change my mind.” 

He grins, presses a kiss to her cheek, and then climbs out of bed. 

She rolls toward his side of the bed and grabs his pillow, hugging it to her chest and watching as he disappears from the room. He’s back a moment later, his clothes in one hand and socks and shoes in the other. 

“We left quite a trail of clothing from the front door to the bed,” he says with a wink. 

She snorts. “Which is weird since we didn’t even make it to the bed.”

He arches an eyebrow as he tugs his pants on. “Yes, you seemed quite disappointed about having your first orgasm of the evening against the front door.”

She throws the pillow at him. He laughs. He tosses it back at her, and she hugs it close and buries her nose in it. It smells like him. 

He pulls on his shirt, smiling at her as he does the buttons and then tucks it in. He doesn’t bother with cufflinks, and just rolls the sleeves to his elbows instead. When he’s finished he sits on the edge of the bed, his hip bumping against her knee. She watches him put his shoes on, admiring the breadth of his shoulders and the fluidity of his movements. His hair is a mess compared to it’s usual careful styling, but he’s made no attempt to fix it. She likes that.

“Right then,” he mutters once his shoes are tied. He turns toward her and puts his hands on either side of her body, leaning forward to hover over her. “What flavors of ice cream shall I bring you?”

“Surprise me,” she answers, reaching up to comb her fingers through his hair because she can’t resist. 

He smiles. “I love you.” 

She couldn’t keep a smile off her face if she tried. She thinks he likes saying it just as much as she likes hearing it. “I love you too.”

He leans down to kiss her, lingering for a second or two even after he pulls his mouth away from hers, and then he straightens and gets to his feet. He strides toward the door, pauses in the doorway just long enough to shoot her a wink over his shoulder, and then he disappears. 

Chloe hears the front door slam behind him a moment later. 

She stretches and then resettles on the bed. The muffled sounds of the city are just outside the window, but other than that, the apartment is silent. They didn’t bother to turn any lights on when they got back from dinner—they were a little too focused on each other for that—so the apartment is dim but not dark. There are too many windows and too many lights  in New York City for it to be dark. She stares up at the shadows on the ceiling, smiling like a lovesick teenager as she plays with the ring hanging around her neck. She can’t believe he finally said it. 

He loves her. 

She closes her eyes and replays that moment at the bar over and over again. Every time she relives it, it gets better. When he gets back, she’s going to make him say it a dozen more times, and then a dozen more after that. She’ll never get sick of it. She feels like her chest is going to crack open from the sheer force of her joy. Lucifer loves her, and they’re going to meet with Death in a few hours to fix this damn nightmare, and then everything is going to go back to normal. No, better than normal. She’ll have Trixie and her friends and her life back, but she’ll also have Lucifer. Her boyfriend the Devil, who’s in love with her.

He’s in love with her. 

She rolls over and buries her face in his pillow with a grin. She breathes in his scent, and then an idea strikes her. Back in Denver, when Valerie brought her a dozen sets of lingerie to choose from, she opted for the bustier set. But that’s not the only thing she chose. She picked out a second one too, a black lace set that made her think of the dress she’d worn on their last night in Los Angeles. She was going to save it for after they met with Death, to celebrate if things went according to plan and the nightmare was over. 

But why wait?

She bites her lip around another grin and climbs out of bed. She crosses the room to her suitcase and rifles through her stuff until she finds the lingerie, and then she grabs one of his shirts to put on over top and heads for the master bathroom. She freshens up a little, and then puts on the lingerie. She admires herself in the mirror for a second—he’s going to have a heart attack when he sees her in this—and then pulls his shirt on over top and buttons a few buttons. 

She’s trying to decide if she should touch up her makeup when she hears the front door open. She grins. She should’ve known he’d be quick. 

She pads out of the bathroom and through the bedroom in her bare feet. “Back already?” she calls out with a laugh. “What’d you do, sprint the whole—”

The rest of her sentence dies on her lips when she gets out into the apartment.

Standing just inside the door is a man who looks like Lucifer, but isn’t. There’s an ugly scar across his face, and one of his shoulders is hanging lower than the other. His eyes trail slowly over her bare legs and then up her body, and Chloe’s blood runs cold.

Michael smiles. 

“Hello, Detective.”