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Chloe forced herself to look at him. His skin was red and raw, like drying meat that had been left out too long and had started to crack. His eyes had sunken into his face, falling into the depths with an orange glow. But what truly scared her about what she was seeing, was that she could see him in there. She could see her Lucifer in the eyes of this monster standing before her. Chloe could not pretend that this was foreign. She could not pretend this was somebody else, a nightmare that she didn’t recognize.
Lucifer smiled just slightly, looking at her as though nothing had changed. “Detective?” He’d asked, but it was lost in the void of her thoughts. She knew the horror before her was Lucifer. She could tell by the immaculate black suit, with the top button of his white shirt undone just to show the flare of his chest. She could tell by his hands, soft skin draped beside his thighs as he stood. She could tell by his long legs, which shook ever so slightly along with him. She made herself look up again, look at a face that she didn’t know but somehow still recognized. She’d kissed those lips, felt that nose nuzzling against hers, palmed those cheeks and jawline in her open hand. It was all the little things that made Lucifer recognizable like this, and she couldn’t deny it.
It was all true.
Chloe Decker awoke with a start, tears running down her cheeks, her hands grasping the sheets in sweaty fists. Her partner was the Devil, and her subconscious mind would play it over and over again until she could rationalize it in her own head.
A sudden rousing besides her caused the detective to jump, and despite a pounding headache, she looked around the room for the first time. This wasn’t her bedroom. Looking down, this bed was not hers either. She was shaking, sobs erupting from her throat, broken whines like the ghost of a voice.
“Chloe?”
Her eyes came into focus and landed on his face. Not the devilish monstrocity, but it was still Lucifer. It was the one she’d known since the beginning, but he looked exhausted in a way she’d never seen in him before. He didn’t look as put together as he normally did. His jaw was covered in unkempt stubble and he looked pale and almost sickly, like he hadn’t slept in weeks. Bits of his hair were stuck down to his forehead with sweat, while others were untamed and reached for the skies. He was wearing one of his robes, a red one that hang loosely around his shoulders, the fabric wrinkled and stretched. Yet he stared at her, unmoving, terrified to move too fast lest he scare her away.
She continued to sob, looking back at him, her lips curled in agony alongside her cries. Chloe tried to remember the night before, but it was mostly a blur. She remembered walking in on the scene of Lucifer standing above the lieutenant’s body. She remembered the Devil’s face that she’d seen again in her nightmare. She remembered Lucifer taking her hand, leading her outside into the dark, and sitting her in his car. She remembered driving in silence, until she’d passed out from exhaustion. Another wrecked sob broke its way from her throat as she realized all he’d done was taken her to his apartment, and tucked her into his bed so she could sleep, so he could keep an eye on her. And it looked like that’s all he’d done all night, just stayed awake to watch over her.
“Chloe…” He said softly, his own voice sounding on the verge of breaking.
She didn’t know if any of it was real, and she reached out with a shaking hand to grasp his arm, and she squeezed tightly. She watched his eyes flit down to look at the contact they shared, before dragging back up to meet her own eyes. He looked scared, and Chloe had never seen Lucifer look so scared before. It made her stomach twist up, clenching at empty nothingness. Yet her hand made contact with his skin, and although it was colder than he’d ever felt before, she knew he was really here. The Devil was here with her. Chloe gasped and withdrew her hand like she’d been shocked.
“Detective?” Lucifer spoke again, but this time his voice sounded pained, stretched thin, uneasy. His eyes had widened instantly as soon as he heard her gasp, and his mouth dropped open slightly when she’d pulled away. “Are you… okay?” He sounded like a boy. He sounded lost and confused and so awfully scared. And part of Chloe wanted to envelope him with her arms and hold him close, but she didn’t. He was the Devil.
She gulped and simply shook her head at him, shifting a few inches backwards, shifting away from him. “Lucifer… What am I doing here?” She asked, but her voice was shaky, and didn’t sound anything like how she wanted it to sound either. Her throat had almost closed around his name and saying it now was different than all the other times she’d said it before. Chloe was still crying.
“I didn’t want anything to happen to you,” he replied, and she almost believed him. “But you didn’t answer my question.” Lucifer’s eyes were soft, and he blinked at her a few times, just trying his hardest to keep her gaze.
“No,” she cried, squeezing her eyes shut and collapsing onto the bed, curled on her side with her arms hugging her own body, as if she had nothing else to do with them.
Chloe didn’t see it, but Lucifer flinched, wanting nothing more than to grab her hand and gently hold it in his own, letting her use his touch like an anchor in the storm. He’d never shown someone his face and then stayed to comfort them through the night– not like he had with Chloe, his dear detective, his love. She didn’t deserve to be poisoned by his presence. The detective was good, and Lucifer knew he was so not. It didn’t help that he could tell from her body language alone that she was terrified, and it was for good reason. He was the devil. He was a torturer and punisher, and nothing he could say or do would give her any reason to think he would never lay a finger on her. Nothing he could say could convince his Chloe how much he loved her.
Lucifer hadn’t slept all night. He’d taken Chloe straight to LUX, not trusting himself to leave her anywhere he couldn’t keep a constant watch. He needed to keep her safe. He needed to insure it. She fell asleep in the passenger seat of his corvette on the drive over, and his heart blossomed seeing her suddenly look so calm. He’d taken her upstairs as soon as he’d parked, and set her in his bed, pulling the covers over her shivering body, pressing a kiss to her head. Then he’d lay awake all night, staring at her, looking into the dark shadows around him just to make sure nothing lay beyond them. He knew she’d eventually wake up, but he didn’t know what he was going to say.
Lucifer had thought about it all night in anguish, knowing his beautiful Chloe would feel so many different things, and so many bad things at his hand. He tried to come to terms with what would become her terror, but he couldn’t grasp it in a way that felt right. Linda had been right all along; he didn’t show her because he was terrified of how she’d react. This was one big mistake that she wasn’t supposed to see. He’d lost control with Cain, and the hellfire in his soul had come out to play. Chloe wasn’t supposed to walk in. She wasn’t supposed to see him standing over a man he’d murdered, no matter if Cain had wanted it or not. She wasn’t supposed to see the sickness inside of him. Lucifer had millenia to come to terms with his face, and part of him took her to LUX because he was afraid of what she might do if she was left alone. Perhaps if he was there to guide her through the grief, he could make her see that she’d always known the real him all along, and that he wasn’t how he appeared. He wasn’t a monster.
“Chloe, my dear Chloe…” He began, reaching out a hand to stroke her skin, but pausing mid air, as if he was afraid her skin would sizzle and burn under his touch. “I’m so sorry…”
“No, no, no,” she sobbed, her eyes still closed, her face still buried in the blankets. “None of this is okay…”
Her words ripped into his heart, and the Devil felt it pumping weakly in his chest as the cold settled in. She was petrified. The love of his life had buried her head and sobbed at just the thought of him. In that moment he wanted to run. He wanted to get as far away from her as possible, so that he didn’t hurt her anymore. Lucifer sat up, his lower half still covered in fussed blankets. He was sweating, but his body still felt so cold. He didn’t want to touch her. He didn’t know what he could say that might matter to her.
“You’re… You’re right.” He avoided looking at her when he spoke. He couldn’t anymore. It was too painful to know that his mere existence was scaring and hurting her this badly. His body felt cold, but hot tears began to drip down his cheeks. The Devil was crying.
“You’re the Devil,” Chloe whimpered. It was impossibly hard to admit. She felt that saying it out loud was finally confirming it as reality. She hugged herself tighter, as her eyes finally opened on their own. She wanted to see him, needed to see him, to know that she was still awake. She needed to know that this was still real, but seeing him now caused a shudder to cascade down her body. Lucifer was sitting up, staring straight ahead at nothing at all, avoiding her gaze, streaks of tears dripping down his face. Her stomach twisted in on itself again; a hot and heavy ache settled there. He didn’t look like the Devil, not right now. He looked like her partner. He looked like a shell of a man. Lucifer looked like Lucifer, but he no longer felt familiar. She was throwing away everything she thought she knew.
“I am,” he whispered, losing the fight against his own thoughts as he succumbed to the madness. Chloe would never love him– could never love him. Not like this. And he didn’t expect her to care. He was evil incarnate, the lord of Hell, Satan himself. He was a tormenter, a persecutor, an oppressor and a mutilator. Lucifer was Hell’s king of torture. He’d done absolutely unspeakable things. He was a monster that didn’t deserve to be loved. He didn’t deserve Chloe. The detective was all pure and goodness to a fault, and he was a gruesome and harrowing beast. “I am the Devil,” he repeated, finally looking back at his love.
Chloe looked back, shocked to see the many emotions of his expressions. Was he a facade? Was this handsome face just a mask he wore around her? How could she ever trust him again? “Why?” she finally said, her sobs only calming because she lacked the energy to continue breathing as hard as she had been. Chloe didn’t have much fight left in her. “Why me?”
This must have taken Lucifer by surprise, because he looked at her, really looked at her, and his expressions softened to something else. “Because,” he stammered. “Because I fell in love with you, Chloe. I-I didn’t mean for any of it to happen. I didn’t mean for you to get caught up in this…” He trailed off, bringing his hands to his face, curling them into each other in front of his mouth. Lucifer’s eyes wandered over the surfaces of the blankets, noticing the ripples in the fabric, following them with his eyes. He looked back, seeing she’d finally slowed her sobs. “I love everything about you Chloe Jane Decker. But I understand. I’m not worth any of this, and I don’t think I should stay.” The Devil finally made a move to stand, swiveling his legs over to the side of the bed, but he stopped when he’d turned away, his toes inches from the ground. “I am sorry. I’m sorry that you had to see what you did. I hate myself for allowing you to see my monstrous side.” His voice shook with emotion, and still more tears snaked their way down his face.
“But why?” She cried, “Why am I so important? What makes me so special? I’m a nobody, Lucifer! You’re right, I shouldn’t be caught up in this…” The detective took in a long and shaky breath, fighting against the urge to sob with all the lasting energy she still held onto.
Something about what she’d said caused Lucifer to turn around, and she’d flinched again, which caused his eyes to go dark with pain. “No. No, you shouldn’t be, but I won’t let you speak ill of yourself, detective. I won’t allow it.”
Chloe sat up, scooching against the headrest, pulling her knees up to her chest. “Then how come you can? Because you’re the Devil, right? Because you’re evil and you like to hurt people?” She wrapped her arms around her legs, pulling in order to make herself small. Perhaps if she was smaller, he couldn’t touch her, couldn’t hurt her. The tears hadn’t stopped falling. Her eyes were blurry, but she could have sworn he was crying even harder than she was. Chloe only wanted him to listen to her.
“Maybe I am evil!” He yelled. It startled her, but he didn’t care this time. He had to show her. “I’m the bloody Devil, Chloe! Humanity has used me for the image of evil ever since my Father decided to cast me to Hell!” His voice was dripping with seething irritation and self hatred. “Didn’t you know the Devil was once an angel!? Didn’t you know why he became the King of Rotten!?” Despite crying out, Lucifer’s voice was shaky and uneven, and he wasn’t able to keep the emotion out of it. He was hurting. He was reliving his trauma, and also at the cost of hurting Chloe. He couldn’t bare it. Lucifer breathed deeply until he calmed. “I’m poisoning you,” he whispered, “I hurt everyone I touch, and I can’t handle hurting you, Darling. I simply care too much. The Devil does have feelings, you know. He does. And he can’t live with himself if he hurts his love, don’t you understand that?”
She was truly taken aback by this string of words. Lucifer had gone from white-hot, fiery anger, to a painful confession in a matter of sentences. He had internally morphed from the Devil inside to the Lucifer she’d known. He had stepped down from a monster to a man. Lucifer had turned all the way back around to face her again, sitting cross legged on the edge of the bed, just looking at her. “And I’m your love…” she whispered back, as if coming to her own realizations about his character.
“Yes,” he admitted, his voice soft, but there wasn’t a beat of hesitation. “You’re the only one, Chloe– the only one I’ve ever truly loved.” The Devil wiped at his face with both hands, clearing the tears from his eyes as he sniffled. “I love you. I love you so much and I feel horrible for that.”
She felt a bit silly asking the Devil so many questions, but he sat in front of her like a man in pain, and not like an evil soul. She breathed a sigh of relief. Maybe evil wasn’t the right word. Perhaps he’d simply been vilified. “Does love feel horrible to you, Lucifer?” She sniffled back at him.
“What hurts is knowing I’ll never have you like I want you. I would do anything for you, and I mean that.” He gulped around the sudden rock in his throat. Lucifer didn’t much like being so openly honest, but he hated lying more. He had never lied to Chloe, and he never would– so he told her. “I’ve always been honest with you, Detective. I am the Devil and I never lied. You are free to ask me anything you wish, and I will answer with that same honesty.” This step scared him, but it also made him feel a little more in his element. Lucifer didn’t want to feel like a monster, yet he did, especially because she still seemed so afraid. But Chloe always surprised him.
“You were really an angel?” She asked innocently, her grip on her knees was breaking as she let herself relax a little more.
“I was. A very long time ago, but I’m not sure I still am.” Lucifer’s relationship with his wings had been rocky from the second he’d landed in Hell. Divinity cast him out and he did the same. “But Amenadiel still is. Although I have many more brothers and sisters still in the Silver City.”
Chloe could tell by his posture that this subject saddened him, especially when he mentioned Heaven. But Amenadiel was an angel too. She supposed Maze really was a demon as well. Everything just became so real for her, and she had nobody to go to, but Lucifer. Nobody to talk to about just how much her worldview had shifted, but the Devil himself. If Heaven was off limits, maybe… “Why aren’t you in Hell?”
He was just a bit taken aback by this question, but he could have seen it coming from a mile away if he’d really been paying attention to much else besides the fact that Chloe had stopped crying, and was even leaning in when he spoke. It was the little things, after all. “Because,” he muttered, shyly looking up to meet her eyes. “Because Hell is horrible. It’s awful, and I’d much rather be here with you.”
Chloe’s idea of who the Devil was, had been changing. It had been changing since he began to talk so openly about himself. She could see why he was so insecure. Lucifer truly wasn’t who they all said he was. Tentatively, she reached a hand out, a burst of trust running through her veins. It settled slowly on his knee, and she looked back up to his eyes, fear hiding there.
Lucifer’s heart skipped a beat in his chest, but love bloomed there once again. He smiled at her, for the first time that morning. “Chloe,” his voice was honest and didn’t shake. “You know that I would never hurt you? Right? Please tell me you know that.” Lucifer slowly dropped a hand to rest over her own, and his thumb began to absentmindedly stroke hers.
The detective couldn’t do much else but nod. Her breathing increased, and her heart sang its praise from her chest. “You are not what they say you are,” she settled with when she finally pulled together the energy to say something to him.
“I’m not?” He asked innocently. “You would know better than anyone else. You know me Detective. I am not myself when you’re not here.” Lucifer spoke from the heart on this one. He really didn’t feel like much of anything when he wasn’t with Chloe. She had given him purpose as her partner, and the murders they’d solved together had given him more to look forward to besides the partying and the sex and the drugs. None of that mattered when the detective was around. She made him vulnerable. She kept him on his toes. She engaged his brain, she made him feel things, and she was never boring. Chloe Decker was the life he wished he had.
The dam broke in her at that moment, and Chloe leaned in all at once, her arms wrapping tightly around the Devil, her face pressed to his chest. And she felt her body explode from the inside with pure happiness and his arms wrapped around her thin frame, holding her close. This surprisingly felt familiar. She scooted up until she was all but sitting in his lap, and they pulled back just enough to look at each other. The detective remembered all of the good times they’d shared, and that’s what she chose to hold on to as she leaned up to kiss him.
Chloe kissed the Devil, and the Devil kissed back. And for the first time in her life, she knew she was right– she wasn’t herself without him either.