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Trixie smothered her gasp as she heard her mother hang up the phone. She’d known that her mother was hiding something and being really weird about Lucifer but she hadn’t expected this. She couldn’t let this happen. She just couldn’t. She slipped out her window and got an Uber to Lux, bouncing in her seat with nerves the whole way. Once she got there she rushed up to the door, skipping the entire line, but the man in the front wouldn’t let her in. This was the first time she’d been here when they were open. “Please, I need to talk to Lucifer. It’s really important. Tell him it’s Trixie and it’s an emergency.”

The guy pulled her to the side and called someone else over as he talked into his wrist. “Sorry kid, but Lucifer isn’t downstairs. He’s probably still up in the penthouse,” he said after a minute.

“Okay, then let me up there,” she said in a panic.

“Okay, c’mere kid,” the bouncer said pulling her around the corner into the alley, but just as she started to get really scared, he hit a button and the elevator door opened. She hadn’t realized she could get up there from out here too and when the door closed behind her she let out a sigh of relief and nearly slumped over. She should have known that Lucifer would never hire someone that would hurt a kid though and as the devil he would know.

When she came out of the elevator, Lucifer was just putting on his suit jacket and paused, looking at her curiously. “What are you doing here? I didn’t even realize you were back in town? Is something wrong with your mother?” he asked worriedly. He hadn’t seen either of them since Chloe had skipped town a month ago after she accidentally saw his face. If only he hadn’t had to draw on so much of his power to light that sword to send his mother home. If only Amenadiel’s power had lasted another thirty seconds, but no. The stars aligned just the right way and he had scared her. He just shook it out of his head for now. If the child was here, then something could be very wrong.

“We just got back and then I heard Mommy on the phone and she was talking to this old guy we met in Rome and they kept talking about poisoning you and sending you back to hell and how Mommy had to be the one to do it and how you were evil because you’re the devil but you’re not but Mommy’s gonna kill you anyway and you have to…”

Lucifer put a hand over Trixie’s mouth to stop her babbling long enough for him to wrap his mind around what he’d already heard. Chloe was planning to kill him. With poison. An old guy from Rome must be a priest. Chloe thought he was evil and needed to die. He felt his heart tearing in two, but had to keep it together for the moment. The child was already falling apart. He couldn’t afford to. When he felt her lips stop moving, he removed his hand. “I’m assuming your mother doesn’t know you’re here?” One problem at a time. Get the child taken care of and then he could deal with the rest.

Trixie shook her head and when Lucifer took his phone out of his pocket she started to panic again. “No, you can’t call her. I came here and warned you so she’s gonna think I’m evil too and she might try to kill me too,” she babbled, tears running down her cheeks.

Lucifer stopped before completing the call and jut put a hand on her shoulder. “I don’t believe there is anything that you could do to cause your mother to think you’re evil and want to hurt you,” he told her steadily. Then again, an hour ago he wouldn’t have thought she could think he was evil and be plotting to kill him either. He knew that she was afraid of his devil face, but she had worked with him long enough, knew him well enough, to know that he wasn’t evil. How many times had he told her that he punished evil? He knew that airing those thoughts wouldn’t make the child feel any better though, so he kept them to himself. “Besides which, she is your mother. If I attempt to keep you away from her that is kidnapping. Do you understand?”

“Okay, but please don’t call her. Call my dad instead. Then you won’t be kidnapping me and Daddy can come get me. Please,” she begged.

Lucifer sighed and handed her his phone. “Very well, child. I don’t have his number, but if you know it, you may call him.”

Trixie took the phone and dialed her dad’s number. “Daddy, I’m at Lucifer’s. I need you to come get me and please please please don’t tell Mommy,” she said when he answered.

“What? Why are you at Lucifer’s? Why doesn’t your mother know where you are?”

“I promise I’ll tell you everything when you get here, just please don’t let Mommy take me. Please,” she begged.

“Is Lucifer there? Let me talk to him,” Dan said sternly.

“Okay, here,” Trixie said, handing the phone to Lucifer.

“What is going on?” Dan asked Lucifer in complete confusion.

“I don’t have a lot of details myself. The child showed up and started going on about her mother plotting to kill someone and is afraid of being next for some reason. I told her that the detective would never hurt her, but she still begged me not to call her. When I told her that I couldn’t just keep her here away from her mother and that it would be kidnapping, she asked to call you instead,” Lucifer gave him the story without the part about him being the one she was trying to kill. “She’s been here less than five minutes, so that’s pretty much all I have.”

“Okay, I’m on my way over. She’s not in the club is she?” Dan asked. He couldn’t hear any music in the background, but needed to be sure.

“No. I was still upstairs getting ready to head down when she got here. The bouncers would never have let her into the club while it was open,” he explained. “The outside access is in the alley next to the building if you don’t want to go through the club when you get here.” He knew that the only times Dan had been there he’d come through the club first.

“Okay. Thanks man. I owe you one,” Dan told him before hanging up. Lucifer was somewhat glad that he and Dan were on good terms right now. It would definitely help this situation.

Once that was done, he sat the child in front of the television and put on some insipid cartoon channel that had apparently come with his cable package and went to the bar and poured himself a drink. It didn’t seem that the child was watching much of the show through her tears, but he didn’t know what else to do to help her. Hopefully her father would be here soon to fix it. When he heard the elevator about ten minutes later, he was surprised that Dan had gotten here so quickly. Traffic must have been better than he thought. He froze when he heard Chloe’s voice call, “Where is she? What did you do to her?” in fear before the elevator doors even opened all the way. He wasn’t ready to deal with her yet, damnit.

He didn’t move from his place at the bar, simply pointing to the couch as she stepped out. He should have expected what happened next though as the child jumped up from the couch, a fresh wave of fearful sobs pulling from her as she ran to his bedroom. He sighed and started to go after her, but Chloe shoved him out of the way and ran after her herself.

Lucifer huffed as his hip hit the bar and his drink sloshed. When he heard her trying to coax Trixie out from somewhere he looked over and realized that the child was apparently under the bed. He winced at the thought of what else was under there, but hopefully the fact that they were all in a duffel bag would give him some points if her parents found out. Chloe apparently gave up on talking her out for the moment and came storming back into the living area and shoved his back against the bar this time. “What the hell did you do to her, you bastard?” she cried.

Lucifer held up his hands in surrender as he drawled, “I did nothing to the child. She showed up with a crazy story and begged me not to call you, so I called her father instead. He should be here any minute.” He forced himself to keep his voice steady despite the way his heart was breaking. It seemed that there was truth to the child’s story after all. He wanted to yell at her for ever thinking that he could be so…evil, but he had heard enough stories about angry mother’s to not poke that particular bear. If he could just hold her off until Daniel arrived, maybe something could be settled. He hoped.

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“And I’m supposed to believe that?” Chloe snapped, keeping Lucifer backed right up to the bar.

“Ah. Saved by the ding,” he said as he heard the elevator again, using her distraction to slide out of the trap she had him in. “Daniel. You’re just in time.”

“Chloe?” Dan asked confused. “Why are you here?” He had hoped to get some time to figure out what was going on first.

“Why am I here? My daughter uses my Uber account to get a ride to Lux and I’m not supposed to be here? Why the hell didn’t you call me if you knew where she was?” she snapped. At least Lucifer had been telling the truth about one part.

“Because when I talked to Trixie she was terrified of you for some reason. I wanted a chance to figure out what was going on and calm her down first,” Dan tried to placate her. “Why didn’t you call me when you got back to town? Or when you realized she was missing?”

“I just hadn’t gotten around to it yet, and I knew where she went so I had no need to call you. I was just coming to get her.”

Dan looked around. “Where is she?” he asked more to Lucifer than to Chloe.

“When the detective got here, she ran screaming to my room and is hiding under the bed refusing to come out,” Lucifer said wearily.

“Trix!” he called out. “I’m here now. Everything will be okay.”

There was a scuffle coming from Lucifer’s room before the child came running out, still crying, and dodged her mother’s arms to hide behind her father. Seeing the look of terror on her daughter’s face when she looked at her, caused most of Chloe’s anger to be replaced by concern. “What’s wrong, Monkey?” she asked, reaching out to her.

“Lucifer isn’t evil. You can’t kill him,” she snapped, apparently gaining a little courage from hiding behind her father.

“Your mother doesn’t want to kill Lucifer, baby,” Dan assured her. “You must have misunderstood.”

“No, I didn’t. She was talking to this old guy from Rome about poisoning Lucifer and how he was evil and killed people and needed to go back to hell, but he’s not evil. He doesn’t hurt people,” she said, openly crying and all but begging her father to believe her.

“I know he doesn’t baby, and your mom does too,” Dan tried again.

“Show him,” Chloe ordered Lucifer. She knew that if this went much farther Dan would start thinking she was crazy and she wasn’t about to get sent to a mental hospital and lose her daughter. “Show him so he’ll understand. I’m not crazy.”

Lucifer looked at her coldly. “If I truly were as evil as you believe, then why would I risk my own secrets to help someone who was trying to kill me? Would I not enjoy the idea of you being committed as insane and losing everything?” He gave that a moment to sink in before he did the only thing he could do under the circumstances. Letting her be destroyed like that was never an option. He sighed heavily as he pulled his other face forward.

“Whoa!” Dan gasped, instinctively taking a step back and pushing Trixie further behind him.

“Give me the poison, detective. I know you have it with you,” he told her, holding his hand out. There was nothing for him here now. He saved her from being thought crazy, and now it was time for him to go. The only way any of them would have any peace of mind was if they saw it with their own eyes. He was sure Amenadiel wouldn’t mind dropping Maze off once he learned what happened.

Chloe was too terrified to even argue as she reached into her purse and handed it over with shaking hands. Lucifer let his face bleed back into his normal one as he opened the vial and started to put it to his lips, ignoring the child’s sobs, assuming they were from fear of him now that she’d seen the truth. That would be fixed soon enough. He was stopped by a hand on his arm though. “Hey, what do you think you’re doing?” Dan said incredulously.

“Doing what I should have done years ago. Returning to hell so that I don’t hurt anyone else I care about,” he said firmly.

“No, don’t go,” Trixie cried, and he was nearly bowled over, both literally and figuratively by the hug she wrapped around his waist. “You can’t die, Lucifer. You don’t hurt people. You help them. Please.”

“Look, this is a lot to take in at once here, but let’s not be so hasty. I mean, as much as you irritate me sometimes, Trixie is right. You’re not evil,” Dan told him before looking at Chloe. “After everything he’s done for you, for the department, for everyone, how can you think he’s evil?”

“He’s the devil, Dan. You saw it! The devil lies. Every story of good and evil in the history of forever says that he is the root of all evil,” she tried to explain.

Lucifer looked away sadly, pulling the child from her grip on him and started to head back to the bar. The poison vial was pulled out of his hand by Dan. “I’ll just hold onto this for the moment.” He didn’t want to be worried about a cosmic suicide while they figured this out.

Lucifer poured himself a larger drink than usual, just trying to stay out of the way. Once Daniel got his bearings, he would give the vial back and they could be done with this mess. This waiting was harder than anything else he would have to do.

Dan turned back to Chloe once he knew that Lucifer wasn’t going to kill himself right this second, and said, “Okay, I don’t have any idea what happened all those millennia ago between heaven and hell and neither do you and I’m betting neither does anyone who wrote all those stories. There is no evidence whatsoever that the devil is evil or that he is a liar and we have years worth of evidence of the opposite. He’s a bad influence yes, selfish, hedonistic, childish, okay. But since when are any of those things a death sentence? And since when are you judge, jury, and executioner? You wouldn’t even arrest a suspect based on that kind of flimsy hearsay and you’re going to kill him for it?” he asked incredulously.

“The catholic church gave me this task, Dan. Father Kinley said it had to be me,” Chloe tried to reason. “They have all the evidence and they’re the only ones qualified to judge the devil.”

“Bullshit,” Dan said. “Since when do you fall in with all this religious garbage anyway?”

“Since I found out the devil is real!” Chloe cried desperately. “Since I found out everything is real!”

“Just because the devil is real doesn’t mean all the stories are true. What kind of evidence do they have?” he asked, hoping that there was some rhyme or reason behind this other than hysteria.

“Pictures,” she told him.

“Pictures of him killing people? Ripping the heads off babies? Drowning puppies? What?” he asked skeptically. He knew better than most how pictures could be doctored.

“Pictures of him talking to people. Horrible people. Hitler. Nazis. Pictures of him going back over a hundred years.”

Dan gaped at Chloe for a moment. “Pictures of him talking to people. And that’s enough to sentence him to death?” He had to admit that the idea of him buddying up to Hitler was unsettling though so he turned to Lucifer. “Do you have anything to say to that?”

Lucifer sighed. It seemed like there was more theatrics for him to participate in before he could go. “Yes, I have been to the earth many times before seven years ago. I’ve never stayed long though. A few days here, a week there. Yes, I met Adolf. He was the main reason I came up that time. I was getting such an influx of souls all at once and I was curious as to who was causing it. I found him a thoroughly disgusting individual…”

“You were smiling in the picture,” Chloe accused.

“I’m sure I was. It was a party after all, and one in his honor. Telling him what I really thought would have caused a riot and probably hurt many innocent people who were there. What I actually said was that I congratulated him on being one of the worst examples of evil I’d ever encountered and that I couldn’t wait to see him again. Obviously, I meant him turning up in hell. As I’ve told you before detective, I am not evil. I punish evil. And I certainly never lie.”

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Dan had a few questions of his own. “When you got the cure when Chloe was poisoned how did you do it?” he asked. He had a suspicion now that he knew what he did, and he needed to know if he was right. If he was, hopefully hearing it would get through to Chloe.

“There was only one way to get the cure, Daniel. The only place it existed was in the head of the man who created it.”

“So what? You went to hell to get it from him?” he asked, completely hearing how crazy that sounded, but after what he’d seen tonight, crazy was apparently the new normal.

“Obviously,” Lucifer drawled.

“How did you get there?” he asked. “I mean, if you were about to drink poison to get there now…”

“The only way for me to get back to hell since I cut my wings off is to die,” Lucifer explained.

“So you killed yourself to get that cure. For Chloe,” he said incredulously. “How did you know you would be able to come back?”

“I didn’t. Not for sure,” Lucifer said with a shrug. “There was no reason the defibrillator wouldn’t work to bring me back…well once I got out of my own trap down there anyway…but it wasn’t like I had much choice in the matter. The detective would have died without that cure.”

“Your own trap?” Dan asked.

Lucifer sighed. It seemed that they were going to hash everything out. Maybe hearing the rest would get them to let him get on with it. Surely killing his own brother would be enough to turn the rest of them against him. “Hell traps you within a loop of your greatest guilt. As long as I was stuck in that loop I could never have come back. When I killed my brother to protect the detective that was enough for me to get ensnared as hell forced me to keep killing him over and over.”

“When did you kill your brother? And how was it protecting Chloe?” Dan asked feeling almost sick at the very thought of it.

“After she was in her car accident. The accident was caused by my brother as a warning. He gave me twenty-four hours to allow my mother’s soul to be completely destroyed or he would kill the detective. I killed him before he could kill the detective for my defiance,” Lucifer admitted.

“That’s why you were such a mess after that,” Dan said as though it all made sense now. “How many people have you killed?” he asked curiously, wondering if it was just the fact that it was his brother that affected him so badly or if there was more to it.

“One, Daniel. But that one was my own flesh and blood. Isn’t that bad enough?” Lucifer snapped irritated.

“But you killed him to protect people. There’s nothing wrong with that. I’ve killed people in the line of duty to protect others. So has Chloe. It’s part of the job. I can’t imagine being forced to kill my own brother like that, and I hate that you had to do it,” Dan told him seriously. It was obvious that, even now, Lucifer felt horribly guilty for it, and knowing how it happened, he meant every word he said.

“You can’t be serious, Dan. He just admitted to killing his own brother. An angel!” Chloe snapped.

“To protect YOU,” Dan snapped back, starting to lose his patience. “And if that brother is an angel, what about Amenadiel. Wouldn’t he be an angel too?” Lucifer nodded. “But you guys are close?” he asked more for Chloe’s benefit than his own.

“Sometimes. It goes back and forth with us really,” Lucifer said with a shrug.

“It always does with brothers,” Dan said with a chuckle before turning to Chloe. “So, if angels are so important to you why does that one not matter? Why would Amenadiel be around him if he was so evil?”

“But the church…” Chloe protested.

“Fine, let’s get back to the church part. You said this one priest gave you this mission. Did any others know about it?” Dan asked.

“I’m sure they did…”

“But you don’t /know/,” Dan guessed.

“Not for sure, no, but they…”

“How about a little test then. Call the main office there, and ask for the next available priest. Tell them that this one gave you a mission to kill the devil and you need to talk to him about it, but you lost his number. See what they say,” he said, crossing his arms. If more of the church was involved then he would have to resort to other methods of argument, but he couldn’t see the church as a whole ordering a hit on someone, devil or not, and then sending some simple detective to carry it out.

“Fine. Then will you agree with me?” Chloe asked pointedly.

“Then we will talk,” Dan agreed. He wasn’t allowing anyone to be executed just on the sayso of some religious nuts, no matter how many of them agreed.

Chloe pulled out her phone and called the number for the vatican that she hadn’t called since she’d met Father Kinley and gotten his personal number. She did as Dan said and asked for the next available priest who picked up soon after. “Hi, my name is Chloe Decker. I was there a few days ago and was talking to Father Kinley. He sent me back here to send the devil back to hell, but I need to talk to him about part of the mission and I lost his number so I wondered if you could…Oh okay…yes I’ll hold.”

Dan raised his eyebrows at her. “What’s going on?”

“They’re sending me to the bishop. They probably can’t give out another priest’s personal number,” she told him smugly.

“Right,” Dan said skeptically.

“Daddy, you’re not gonna let her kill him are you?” Trixie whispered worriedly.

“Don’t worry, baby,” Dan said softly. “We’ll work all this out. Why don’t you go watch some more TV while we do, okay?” He had almost forgotten she was hiding behind him, but given how completely his world had just been rocked on it’s axis, he could be forgiven for that. He hoped.

“Don’t let Mommy take me?” she asked in a small voice.

“We’ll figure that out too, baby. I promise she won’t take you anywhere if she intends to hurt anyone, okay?” Trixie nodded and finally came out from behind him, skirting way around her mother and headed back to the couch where the cartoons were still playing on the TV. “Thanks for finding her something appropriate to watch,” Dan told Lucifer who just nodded curtly at him.

“Yes, hello Bishop Carrington. My name is Chloe Decker…Yes, Father Kinley…Lucifer Morningstar here in LA…I’m supposed to slip him a vial and the Father Kinley will do some kind of ritual, I know my part of the plan, but since I lost his number I can’t call him to…what?...excommunicated? Why?” she started to look nervous. “But he really is the devil…well no, but…I can’t do that unless…yes, Bishop. I understand,” she said downtrodden as she hung up the phone.

“Well?” Dan asked, having a pretty good idea of what they said. “They didn’t know anything about it did they?”

“That doesn’t mean he was wrong. They don’t even believe that Lucifer is the devil. The bishop just said that if he’s hurting people I should have him arrested. Like any prison could ever hold the devil,” Chloe protested.

“You’re right about that part,” Lucifer chimed in. “So let’s just make everyone a little safer and give me the vial back and I’ll be out of your hair,” he said holding his hand out to Dan. He was tired of waiting and playing out this ridiculous drama. They knew what he was now and he didn’t know why Daniel was stalling, but he’d had enough.

“No,” Dan said firmly, tightening his grip on the vial. “In fact…” he walked over to the sink and poured it down the drain.

“Well that was ridiculously stupid,” Lucifer said worriedly, as he yanked open the cabinet underneath the sink and crushed the pipe in his bare hands, hoping he was quick enough.

“What? Stopping you from drinking it?” Dan scoffed.

“No. Pouring a poison that is apparently strong enough to work on the devil down the drain. For all we know it could poison the entire city,” Lucifer snapped.

“Shit!” Dan said, going wide-eyed and looking down at the work Lucifer had done, forcing himself not to shudder at the fact that he had apparently crushed a metal pipe flat with almost no effort. “Did you get it?”

“I don’t know,” Lucifer said annoyed. “I hope so, because if I didn’t, I wouldn’t have any clue how to stop it.”

Dan pushed his own stupidity from his mind. He didn’t have any idea either. He’d just have to keep an eye on the news for the next few days to be sure. With nothing to do about that situation, he turned his attention back to the situation at hand and looked at Chloe. “You still think he’s evil when he’s that worried about other people who could be hurt?”

“The devil is a good actor. There has to be a reason they call him the Prince of Lies,” Chloe reasoned.

“There is,” Lucifer cut in. “Because when people don’t want to hear inconvenient truths they call them lies instead.” He could live with being thought of as evil. It hurt more than he could say, but he would put up with it just like he always had. He couldn’t stand being called a liar though.

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“Please see reason, Chloe,” Dan begged. “There is absolutely zero reliable evidence that he is evil and plenty of evidence, from our own eyes that say he’s not. You’re asking me to let you kill someone who’s done nothing wrong…well okay, he’s done a lot wrong, but nothing that deserves death.” Snorting evidence, doing drugs at crime scenes, hell doing drugs at all, none of that could be considered good, but none of that was deserving of death, even if they were qualified to make that judgement.

“He’s the devil, Dan,” she said stubbornly. “How can you just let that go?”

“Because I don’t believe fairy stories over what I see with my own eyes,” he said. “Let me put this another way. I will NOT let you murder an innocent man…shut up Lucifer,” he said when he heard the devil snort at his comment. “Given the fact that our daughter is terrified of you now, I can’t let you take her either. That means that we are at an impasse and if we can’t get this resolved, the only choice will be to involve the authorities, and you know how that will go.”

“No,” Lucifer said standing up. “I will not have her put away as a lunatic for knowing the truth. I will not have her entire life be destroyed because of me. There is another option here.”

“No there isn’t,” Dan snapped, looking at Lucifer. “We need you, Lucifer. Is that what you want to hear? How many criminals have been put away thanks to you? How many anonymous donations have helped the victims and the department? You can do a hell of a lot more good up here than you can down there.”

“The police have been putting away criminals without my help for a long time, Daniel, and they can continue to do so. As far as the money, I’ll have no use for it where I’m going, so you can have it all. Put it to the best use you see fit.”

Dan huffed in frustration. “What about that little girl over there, huh?” he tried a different tact. “What do you think it will do to her if you die here?”

“She’s young. She’ll probably forget all about it,” Lucifer said dismissively.

“You think so? She snuck out of the house in hysterics and rushed here to warn you. To SAVE you. If you die then she will feel like she failed, no matter how much anyone tells her otherwise. She won’t forget that.” He gave that a moment to sink in before he continued. “You said hell traps you by your guilt. What do you think she would feel if you die? Would you really want that for her?”

Lucifer winced and looked back and forth between Chloe and Trixie, feeling like he was being asked to make yet another impossible choice. Dan’s words affected more than just Lucifer. Chloe looked like she’d been struck dumb. Part of that was from Lucifer’s insistence on dying rather than letting her be hurt, and she didn’t miss the look on his face at the position that Dan had backed him into either. “I…I have to go…” she said rushing past them both and heading to the elevator, repeatedly mashing the down button until the doors closed.

Dan started to go after her, but Lucifer grabbed his arm to stop him. “Let her go,” he said.

“How do we know that she won’t come back and try to kill you later?” he asked.

“Because she can’t,” Lucifer told him, pulling out the penknife he’d slipped into his pocket from the bar. “Not anymore.”

“What do you…” Dan asked confused.

“For the longest time, the most curious phenomena has been happening whenever she was nearby. I became mortal. Whatever it was is apparently broken now,” he said pulling the blade over his skin and nothing happened. “Before if she was anywhere near the building I would be bleeding now, but she can’t possibly be that far away yet.”

“How does that work?” Dan asked as he passed confused into completely baffled.

“I don’t know. I never did figure it out. Perhaps it had something to do with her affection towards me making me vulnerable and now that she hates me the spell is broken? Or maybe it was the act of trying to kill me that did it. Maybe my father doesn’t want me to die so he fixed what he broke…never mind. Long story,” Lucifer said dismissively. “But suffice it to say, I am now, once again, immortal. She can’t come back and kill me. Unless she gets her hands on some more of that poison and it really is strong enough to kill the devil which isn’t very likely. Otherwise, there was no reason that she had to be the one to slip it to me.”

“When did you realize that you were immortal again?” Dan asked suspiciously, suddenly worried that he’d been played as he put the pieces together.

“After you dumped the poison, the knife was my plan B, but it didn’t work,” Lucifer told him.

Dan nodded and relaxed. So, he really had thought that the poison would kill him when he tried to drink it. None of it had been an act. He was interrupted by Trixie before he could say anything else though. “Is everything okay now, Daddy?”

“Yes, baby. Everything is fine. You’re gonna come stay with me for now, okay?” he said, scooping her up when she came running over to him.

She nodded against his shoulder. “Okay. Thank you Daddy,” she said happily.

Dan looked at Lucifer. “I should get her home, but I have a lot more questions…”

“Since I will obviously be sticking around for a while, I will be at your disposal to answer them,” Lucifer told him.

“Just one more for now…Charlotte…she really doesn’t know me does she?”

“No,” Lucifer shook his head. “The Charlotte that woke up at the pier is a different person than the one you’ve known for the last year. It’s a…”

“Long story. Yeah. I’ll get it later. Thank you again for taking care of Trix and I’m sorry about Chloe,” he said as he headed for the elevator. Lucifer just nodded and raised his glass in a silent salute.

Once the doors closed behind them, Lucifer finally let his tears fall as he threw his glass at the wall and watched it shatter. It seemed his father’s plan was really to break him after all, and it had succeeded. He would stay here if only because he had nowhere else to go. He couldn’t get back to hell without his wings now that his coin was gone, so unless Amenadiel got his wings back with that whole time stunt, he was trapped here. In this place where everything reminded him of what he lost. What he’d almost had.

He was definitely regretting throwing that blade in after his mother. Non-existence sounded pretty damn good right about now and it was the only thing that could kill him now that he was immortal again. Well that or one of Maze’s blades, but he knew how closely she guarded those. She wouldn’t let him kill himself when there was no way for her to follow, and he couldn’t leave her trapped up here alone either. Not when she’d been the one wanting to go back for so long anyway. Hell wasn’t likely to be much better than here regardless. That was where Chloe wanted to send him. No, non-existence would have been so much better.

He grabbed another glass and refilled it, taking it and the bottle over to the piano, and lighting a cigarette as he started to play. He looked around the empty penthouse and realized that this was all he would ever have. Two years ago, he would have thought that would be enough. Before he’d met her, he would have been perfectly happy with what he had. Now though it was achingly empty and he had no idea how to fix it. He was broken and he didn’t even know if it was possible to be put back together. He didn’t recognize the haunting tune that flowed from the ivory keys, but he still kept playing anyway. The music thinned for a moment every few minutes as one hand reached up to flick his ashes or take a drink, but that was the only change for the next few hours.

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Dan got home and spent a long time getting Trixie calmed down enough to go to sleep. He could tell how completely exhausted she was, which wasn’t surprising if they had just gotten home from Rome a few hours ago. Once she was in bed he was free to start processing. Almost. The thoughts of Lucifer kept rolling around in his head and he didn’t like leaving anyone in the kind of shape Lucifer was in, but his daughter came first. Lucifer had basically been suicidal. Just because he was apparently immortal again, however that worked, didn’t change that. He was sure that there must be something that would work, and giving Lucifer time with nothing but his own thoughts for company, to figure that out couldn’t be a good thing.

The only thing that kept Dan from worrying even more was the fact that Lucifer had said he’d be sticking around for a while. He had promised to answer more of Dan’s questions. He knew the common belief that Lucifer didn’t lie, and hadn’t quite put that much stock in it before. Seeing how Lucifer had reacted to being called a liar though, he had to believe it. The man didn’t even flinch when being called evil, but jumped to his own defense at being called a liar. He’d said he’d be here so he would, and that was that. That didn’t mean he needed to be alone right now though.

Dan pulled out his phone to call Amenadiel, but didn’t get an answer and he huffed. Maybe Amenadiel was already with Lucifer but he doubted it. He didn’t think Lucifer would have called him so he would have no way to know that his brother needed him. He tried to think of who else might be able to help him. He’d heard that Lucifer had a shrink, and wasn’t that just a whole new helping of surrealism, but he didn’t know her. He thought her name was Linda or something of the like, but that wasn’t a lot to go on. Ella! Ella knew his shrink. Maybe she could help.

Dan briefly considered calling Maze, but remembered someone mentioning that she was a demon, which made a whole lot of sense. Between that and what he knew of her personally, he didn’t think she would be much help. She wasn’t exactly the touchy feely type, so he called Ella. Thankfully, she answered. “Hey Ella, it’s Dan. I need your help with something.”

“Sure. What’s up?” she replied perkily, as usual.

“Do you have the phone number for Lucifer’s shrink?” he asked.

“Yeah…why?” she asked suspiciously. She’d thought Dan was a lot more friendly with Lucifer since the whole thing with him saving Chloe’s life…somehow, but if he was trying to cause trouble for him she wouldn’t be a part of it.

“Because they guy is really going through some stuff right now and I think he could use some help, is all,” Dan told her.

“What’s wrong? What happened?” Ella asked worriedly.

Dan hesitated for a second, not sure what to tell her as he thought it over. Lucifer was never exactly closed off about the fact that he was the devil, but that could just be because he didn’t expect people to believe him. Ella could be exactly what he needed right now though. Assuming she didn’t freak out like Chloe did. He didn’t think she would though. Whether she would be willing to help him or not, he couldn’t say, but he didn’t think that she would make things worse. He wasn’t sure if his shrink knew the truth either, and Lucifer would need someone that knew. It wouldn’t hurt that he would have someone to talk to about all this crap too. He decided to take a chance. “Look, did you mean everything you’ve said before about thinking the devil got a bad rap?”

“What does that have to do with…”

“Just answer the question please, Ella?”

“Okay…yeah, of course I believe it. I mean, dude was an angel first and you don’t go from all good to all bad just like that. And biblically speaking I don’t see how anything he did was really so bad. Everything else about him just seems more like scary stories trying to scapegoat someone, so yeah. I don’t think he’s as bad as people think,” she told him.

“Okay, good. Just please don’t freak out. Or if you do, don’t go after Lucifer…”

“What are you trying to say, Dan?” she asked confused. He couldn’t be implying what she thought he was implying.

“I found out that Lucifer really is the actual devil, and you know that I wouldn’t believe that without some serious proof…”

“Holy crap,” Ella said breathlessly. She knew that if the proof was good enough to convince Dan of all people then it had to be real, and he wouldn’t lie to her about something like this.

“Yeah. Tell me about it. The thing is though…Chloe found out too. That’s why she took off like she did last month. Apparently she confided in some priest that sent her back here to kill him with some kind of super poison. Trixie found out, went to warn him, called me since she was afraid of her mother now, and we all had this big standoff in his penthouse when she came after Trixie. Lucifer tried to take the easy way out and drink the poison himself, but I dumped it. Chloe just wouldn’t see reason though. She just kept piling it on him and then took off when I refused to let her murder the guy. He was in bad shape when I left, but I had to take care of Trixie…”

“I’m on my way over there,” Ella told him and Dan could even hear her keys jingling as they talked.

Dan smiled, glad that he seemed to have done the right thing, and hoped Lucifer saw it that way. He still had to be sure though. “You’re not going to…”

“Oh please, Dan. Give me a little credit. I know Lucifer’s a good guy. I’ve seen it myself. And no one deserves to go through something like this alone,” Ella told him as she started her car.

“Thanks Ella,” Dan said relieved. He thought about reminding her that she could call his shrink if she needed to but knew that she would know that.

“Of course,” she said as she hung up, pulling out into traffic. She got to the club about twenty minutes later and wasn’t surprised to see it hopping. She wasn’t sure if he would be downstairs trying to drown himself in the atmosphere or upstairs brooding, but she would need to go through to go up anyway, so she waited in line to get in. After a quick perusal of the place, she was pretty sure he wasn’t there, so she headed for the elevator. She heard the music before the elevator even stopped and her heart nearly broke at the sorrow she could hear in it.

She knew he was out of it when he didn’t even seem to hear her come up. When she saw him take a drink from the bottle instead of refilling the empty glass next to it, she knew that she had been right to come here. And Dan had been right to call. Lucifer was never so undignified as to drink from the bottle. She waited until he put the bottle down before she went over and took the bottle, refilling the glass. He stopped playing abruptly when he noticed her, but she ignored it and went to the bar to get a glass for herself.

“Ms. Lopez? What are you doing here?” he asked confused, trying to hide his feelings as usual.

“Being a friend,” she told him as she sat on the bench next to him after pouring her own glass and taking a long drink. “But you can’t expect me to process this whole devil thing without booze,” she joked. She wanted to let him know that she knew, and that while it was a big thing, it wasn’t a big deal. She knew that pretending she just accepted it without any trouble at all would just make him skeptical and wonder what kind of freakout she was hiding, so she decided to play it real.

“So you know. I assume Daniel told you? Or did you hear from the detective?”

“I talked to Dan,” she told him. “He was worried about you and wanted to know if I had the number for your shrink. I kinda bullied the story out of him.” She didn’t want him to be mad at Dan for spilling the beans if he was going to be. Especially since they were finally getting along and Dan had just been trying to help.

“I assure you, Ms. Lopez. I will be fine. This is hardly the first time I’ve been cast as irredeemably evil.”

She could see right through him. “Maybe not. But I bet it’s the first time that someone who should have known better tried to kill you for it.”

“Not really,” Lucifer drawled. His whole family should have known better after all.

Chapter Text

Ella winced at his statement. Yeah, she should have thought that comment through. The guy’s own family had been the ones to cast him in that role in the first place and she wouldn’t be surprised if at least some of them had tried to kill him. “Right. Yeah,” she said awkwardly. “But you know they’re wrong don’t you?”

Lucifer scoffed. “Are they?” He got up off the piano bench stiffly and took his drink out to the balcony, leaning over it and looking out over the city.

Ella got up and went after him, hoping she wasn’t about to have to stop him from jumping. If such a thing could even hurt the devil. “Yes, Lucifer. They are.”

“You barely know me, Ms. Lopez. Everyone who knows me best says I’m evil. That I’m to blame for every wrong thing that ever happens. That I deserve to spend the rest of eternity trapped in Hell.”

Ella sighed. This was going to be harder than she thought and with that kind of baggage it wasn’t surprising that he was a mess. She couldn’t even argue with anything she said, except for the fact that she knew, deep down, all the way in her heart, that this man…angel…devil…whatever…was not evil. That wasn’t likely to convince him though. “Okay, how about this then. How about you tell me what it was that was so bad. Treat me like an impartial party. Since I barely know you as you say, I’m not emotionally involved and can be unbiased here.”

Lucifer laughed harshly. “You intend to stand here listening to the litany of horrible things I’ve done over the millennia that I’ve existed. That would take longer than your lifetime.”

“I’m not talking about anything you did in hell. No one who hasn’t spent that much time there can even be qualified to judge that. I’m talking about what you’ve done here. What you did to get sent there in the first place.”

“I rebelled against my father is what got me sent there in the first place,” he said coldly.

“Okay,” she said matter-of-factly. She already knew that much. “Why? What exactly did you do to rebel?”

“Because I wanted to be free. Free of his strict rules and tight leash. Free to be who I wanted, go where I wanted, do what I wanted. I tried to leave, but he kept dragging me back so I got some of my other brothers and sisters together who thought like me and we all tried to convince him and then tried to escape, but it never worked. Then I had the bright idea to screw up his little experiment called humanity. Then he would have to let me go. Oh how right I was,” he explained despondently.

“And how did you ‘screw up’ humanity?” she asked.

“I gave them free will. I gave them knowledge and desire and the ability to think for themselves. He was livid. Apparently he wanted to destroy me outright, but my mother talked him into sending me to hell instead. So you see, Ms. Lopez. I truly am to blame for every scrap of evil in the world. Every murder, every bit of violence, cruelty, hatred…”

She cut him off. “Love, kindness, compassion, empathy, acceptance…” she added. “You gave people the ability to make their own choices, Lucifer. That doesn’t mean you’re responsible for the choices they make.”

“And yet, without me humanity would still be in paradise with no concept of evil.”

“And no concept of anything else either. A gilded cage is still a cage,” she told him. “Free will can suck sometimes, yeah. People can suck sometimes. But it’s still better than not having it at all, and I’d be willing to bet you anything that nearly every person in this world would agree with me on that.” She smiled and bumped his side playfully. “On that charge I find you innocent of evil,” she teased. “Next charges?”

He looked at her like she’d grown two heads for a long time before he sighed and turned away, lighting another cigarette. “I killed my brother,” he said almost inaudibly.

Ella bit her lip to keep from gasping at that admission. She didn’t want him to think that she was passing judgement yet by her reaction. “Okay…why? What happened?”

“He was going to kill the detective and completely eradicate my mother’s soul. I tried to talk him down. To get him to stop, but he wouldn’t. We fought. He won. Then Maze came and fought him and he won again. He was about to pull the string of destiny that would set everything in motion. I just…reacted. I couldn’t let him do it. I grabbed the only thing I could…Azrael’s blade. I didn’t mean to stab him with it. I don’t think I did anyway. Maybe I did. It’s all a blur, but the he was dying in my arms and there was nothing I could do. I…I did worse than kill him. That blade…it destroyed his soul too…he’s completely gone and I’m the one who did it. I eradicated my own brother’s soul and I didn’t even hesitate,” he had tears streaming down his cheeks by this point, losing his battle at stoicism. Ella’s easy acceptance of his pre-hell sins had dug behind those walls just enough to open the floodgates.

Ella lost her battle with stoicism too and crashed into him so hard that they both stumbled as she hugged him tightly, tears shining in her own eyes. “You did hesitate, Lucifer. You tried to talk him down. You tried to fight him off without killing him. You only went there when he gave you no other choice. You did everything you could, Lucifer. Please know that.”

“I could have just given him the detective,” Lucifer said hauntedly, not returning her hug, despite the fact that she wasn’t letting go. “She would have been dead, yes, but there was no threat to her soul. She would be happy and at peace in heaven now. My mother would have been fine, and he would be back home. Instead, my brother is destroyed, my mother is gone forever, and Chloe has anything but peace.”

“And none of that is your fault. Not really. You did the best you could with the information you had,” Ella assured him. “Chloe’s reaction is definitely not your fault. She’s being stupid and letting her fear run away with her. Your brother forced your hand. How hard would it have been for him to just go somewhere else to ‘pull that thread of destiny’ whatever that means, while you were injured.”

“N-not hard. It…it would have been smarter even for him to do that,” Lucifer said, a look of confusion flitting across his face.

“Then he was doing it right there because he wanted you to see. He was trying to make you feel like a failure. He was taunting you and daring you to stop him. /His/ cruelty killed him. Not yours,” she told him and gave it a moment for that to sink in. “I don’t know what happened with your mother, but…” she stopped herself. She was about to say that it couldn’t have been his fault either, but that wouldn’t help and would probably set them back. She was supposed to be the impartial party here. If she started absolving him for things that she knew nothing about it, he would just clam up again. “But I’d like to hear about it, if you’ll tell me,” she finished, as she finally released him from her hug and leaned back on the railing again.

Lucifer sighed. “She’d been manipulating me ever since she got here. Trying to force me into starting a war on heaven. I was the only one who could light the flaming sword, see. The lightbringer and all. I got the sword and got it lit, but a war…Killing one brother nearly killed me and she wanted me to start a war that see would so many more of them fall…I just couldn’t do it. She wanted heaven for herself. She wanted to kill my father, a plan I didn’t really mind of course, but the collateral damage would have been too much. Instead I used the sword to cut a whole in space and time and sent her to a whole new universe of her own to create. Then I broke the sword and threw half of it in after her so she could never come back to this one. I sent my own mother away forever. Trapped her in a completely empty universe, completely alone. Away from all of her children, her family, friends, everyone and everything she ever cared about…”

“To save everyone else, Lucifer,” Ella pointed out. “Do you think she ever would have stopped trying to start that war if she had stayed?”

“No. She couldn’t have. She was losing her hold on her human vessel. It couldn’t contain her divinity. She was about to explode. The only other option would have been to send her back to hell.”

“So you did the best thing for everyone. Yes, she’s alone, but she doesn’t have to be forever. If she can create her own universe than she can create people too. She can have more children. It doesn’t make up for what she lost, but do you really think that killing half her children, forcing you to kill more of your family, would have been better? And what would she have done if she did take over from your father? Would anything have been better?” She doubted it. The way he had talked about her manipulations and how willing she was to start a war that would have her own kids in the line of fire, she didn’t sound like the kind of goddess she wanted in charge.

“N-no. Probably not. She got kicked out for trying repeatedly to destroy humanity in the first place,” Lucifer said, starting to understand what Ella was saying.

“So there you go. You saved the entire world, along with the rest of your family, and all of heaven. I’d bet sending her back to hell would have been far worse for her than having a whole universe of her own to play with, so everyone got the best of that deal. Thanks to you. /Your/ solution saved it all. But you think you’re evil?”

Chapter Text

Ella’s reactions helped Lucifer to take a mental step back and really think about her question. Did he think he was evil? Everyone else did. Everyone who knew him the best thought that he was. But what did he think of himself? He’d always protested that he wasn’t evil, and he’d believed it at the time, but how could everyone else be so wrong? He knew more than most that no one ever sees themselves clearly. Didn’t that mean that they would see him more clearly. But Ella had mentioned being impartial and unbiased. Maybe that was the key. Maybe they were letting some perceived betrayals color their opinions and he was just letting them get in his head.

He’d just wanted to be free. Was that really so bad? Then he’d given the humans the freedom that he wanted so badly. It wasn’t his fault that they were idiots about it. Unless his father knew and that’s why he didn’t give it to them in the first place. But if that’s what they wanted, then they should have the chance to throw off their shackles too. He hated what happened to Uriel, but Ella was right. He could have done his thing from anywhere. He didn’t have to stay there and taunt him with it. He’d tried everything he could. It was the same with his mother. He’d done his best to save as many people as possible.

Chloe was a different story though, but it had been an accident. He hadn’t meant for her to see his face like that. He hadn’t wanted to scare her. He’d had to use so much of his power to open that portal though that he lost his grip on his human side. He couldn’t have stopped it. She was the one who ran away rather than talking to him about it. She was the one who listened to the crazy priest. The way she turned on him was tearing him apart and breaking his heart. He’d loved her. He’d never loved anyone before. It wasn’t his fault though. He hadn’t done anything wrong.

Ella kept silent as she leaned against the balcony watching him. She could see him turning over everything in his mind, and she hoped that she had helped him find some peace. He deserved it. The more she learned, the more certain she was of that. She’d always thought that the devil got a bad rap, but it had been so much worse than she ever imagined. She took the silence as an opportunity to try to wrap her head around all the revelations too. At no point was she even considering turning on him the way that Chloe did, but it was still a lot to take in.

She tried not to think of Chloe. She prided herself on being non-judgemental, and without hearing from Chloe herself about what in the world she was thinking, she wasn’t going to judge her. She was scared. That was understandable. Chloe hadn’t believed that the devil existed at all. She hadn’t believed in anything. It must have been scary for her to learn the truth. Ella didn’t even know /how/ she’d learned the truth, so that could have an effect on her reaction too. No, it wasn’t her place to judge Chloe and if she came back she would hear her out. She owed her friend that much. She wouldn’t let her hurt Lucifer any more than she already had though. That wasn’t going to happen. Not on her watch.

They had both stood there in silence for nearly an hour before Lucifer broke it with a quiet, “No.”

“No?” Ella asked, trying to remember what was last said and what he could be responding to.

“No, I don’t think I’m evil,” he said softly.

Ella grinned and leaned against his side, shoulders only touching because of how he was hunched over the railing. “Then you’re smarter than most people,” she joked.

Lucifer couldn’t help but chuckle. “It does seem that way doesn’t it,” he said with a sad smile of his own.

“It doesn’t make it much easier to deal with other people thinking of you that way though does it,” she said sympathetically.

“Rather the opposite in fact,” Lucifer admitted. If he really was evil then they were just seeing the truth, but if he wasn’t then they were just betraying him.

“I wish I knew how to help with that,” she sighed.

“You are,” Lucifer said almost inaudibly as he took another drink of his scotch, finishing the glass that had almost been forgotten as he was lost in his own thoughts.

Ella smiled brightly at his words and reached for his glass. “I’ll get us some refills.”

Lucifer shook his head and grabbed the empty glass from her hand instead. “I’ve got it Ms. Lopez.”

“Ella,” she called to his back as he headed inside. “It’s Ella, not ‘Ms. Lopez’” she said in a parody of his accent.

He returned with the bottle and set the glasses on the table to pour as he laughed. “Ella it is. I suppose since you know all my secrets and sins now, I can’t really keep you at a distance anymore now can I?” he joked.

She snorted amusedly, but couldn’t help but ask, “You’ve been trying to keep me at a distance?”

“Naturally. The reasons should be obvious,” he said as he returned to his position on the railing.

“Because I didn’t believe who you really were, you couldn’t totally be yourself around me so you kept that wall up to keep that part of yourself hidden,” she guessed, and figured she was right when he didn’t correct her. “And maybe because you thought you were protecting me by hiding all the bad stuff away and protecting yourself from the rejection if I found out,” she probed a little deeper. Only the tightening of his hand around his glass and the increased tension in his shoulders told her that she had hit a nerve. “Well I know now, and I’m still here, so no more hiding.”

“You don’t know it all,” he said worriedly.

“Okay. What don’t I know?” she asked curiously, wondering what he would have left out.

“You don’t know what it was that scared the detective so badly. You’ve heard about it, but you haven’t /seen/ that side of me.”

“Then show me,” she said matter-of-factly.

“I don’t want to scare you too,” he admitted.

Ella punched him in the arm. “Don’t start that. I’m not that easily scared, so come on. Show me what you’ve got.” She wasn’t the slightest bit worried about him doing something to hurt her. He never would have hurt Chloe and he would never hurt her, so whatever it was he meant by ‘seeing’ that side of him didn’t involve that.

Lucifer sighed and let his human face fall away as he turned to her watching for the moment of panic, and wincing when he saw it in her eyes and quickly looked away again. “Don’t be like that,” she chided him, knowing what he’d seen and why he turned away. “It was a little startling, yeah, but I’m still here. I’m not scared of you, you big dummy.”

“You’re not?” Lucifer asked skeptically as he turned back to look at her, relying on her eyes to tell him the truth.

“No. I’m not,” she met his eyes easily. “It looks pretty gnarly actually,” she instinctively reached a hand up to feel, before freezing. “Does it hurt?”

Lucifer snorted. “Not anymore, no.” He was more than a little startled when she touched him. No one had ever touched him like this before. He could tell there was nothing romantic in the gesture. It was more curiosity as she traced over the scars and long healed burns.

“This is from when you fell wasn’t it? The fires of hell and all?” she asked sympathetically as her hand moved over the top of the scarred head.

“Yes,” he said simply as his human face returned. He didn’t fault her for her curiosity and it was certainly preferable to the way most people reacted, but it was making him feel far more exposed than he was comfortable with.

Ella pulled her hand back sheepishly when she felt hair again, gave him an embarrassed shrug. “Sorry.”

“It’s quite alright Ella,” he gave her an accepting nod as he turned back to face the city.

“So that’s what she saw and why she freaked?” she asked. When he nodded, she asked, “Is that the proof that Dan saw too?” He nodded again. “And did Trixie see it too?” Another nod. “So out of the three people who saw it before, only one of them freaked out. Why would you think that I would?”

“Two actually. Dr. Linda freaked out too, but she managed to get over it once Maze intervened,” Lucifer told her.

Ella nodded. That made a little more sense. If it was fifty/fifty she could understand why he would be so nervous. “I’m sure Chloe will get over it too.”

Lucifer shook his head. “It doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Why not?”

“Because she tried to kill me, Ms…Ella. She never even attempted to talk to me and even when she was given all the evidence that I wasn’t what she feared I was, she still held firm to that belief. It took her ex threatening to have her arrested and committed for her to leave. There is no coming back from that. I do hope she finds her peace, but there is nothing left for me with her.”

Chapter Text

Ella felt her heart break for him. Anyone with eyes could see how much he’d loved Chloe. She found herself wondering if he’d ever allowed anyone to get that close to him before. She doubted it. If there was one thing she was good at it was reading people and he seemed almost like he had been seeing the world for the first time. Maybe he had been actually. “Have you spent much time on earth since the whole apple debacle?” she asked, not realizing how abruptly she was changing the subject, but she wouldn’t have known what to say to his statement anyway.

“I’ve popped up from time to time, but I’ve never gotten to stay long before Amenadiel showed up to shove me right back in hell. The longest I’d managed to stay was about eight days before.”

“What changed this time?” she asked curiously. When had Amenadiel gone from throwing him back in hell to almost a brother again?

Lucifer laughed harshly. “In a fit of desperation, he wrote me a blank check for a favor. I cashed in to stay here.”

Ella winced. She couldn’t imagine having to blackmail your own family just to be able to have a life. “What was he so desperate about?”

Lucifer’s laugh at that was a little less harsh. “He got caught up in a mugging when he came to take me back. During his brief moment of unconsciousness while his body mended after he was shot, the mugger stole his necklace. The necklace was a piece of divinity gifted to him by our father, so naturally he had to stop at nothing to get it back. Since I was so ‘deviously evil’, his words, he thought I could help him get it back, and I did. The look on his face when I cashed in my favor afterwards was priceless,” he smirked.

Ella laughed at the story despite how bad she felt for him. She hadn’t missed the pain in his voice when he mentioned Amenadiel’s opinion of him and she found her own opinion of Amenadiel dropping by the minute. “Well for what it’s worth, I’m glad you stuck around this time. And I hope you stay,” she told him, remembering what Dan said about him wanting to go back after everything.

“We’ll see,” Lucifer said noncommittally. He wasn’t willing to make any long-term plans right now.

“At least promise me you won’t go without saying goodbye first?” she asked hopefully. If she could at least get that much of a promise then she would have a chance to talk him out of it. “In person, not over text or voicemail or something,” she quickly closed the loophole. Just because he didn’t lie didn’t mean he wasn’t very skilled at finding loopholes and skirting around the truth.

Lucifer sighed. “If it is at all possible, I will say goodbye,” he promised. “It’s not always up to me though,” he pointed out.

Ella nodded. She knew that if someone else came and threw him back there against his will, then he couldn’t do anything about that and neither could she. She would have a chance to talk him out of it if he /chose/ to leave though, and that was the important thing. “I can live with that. You’ve got a deal.”

Lucifer chuckled but was interrupted from saying anything else by the ringing of his phone. He pulled it out curiously, noting the time and wondering who would be calling him at three AM. “Yes?”

“Hey Lucifer. I’m sorry to call so late, but it’s Trix…”

“Is she alright?” Lucifer immediately asked worriedly.

“She’s fine. Physically at least. She had a bad nightmare and insisted on talking to you, and I can’t get her to calm down so…”

“Put the little urchin on the phone,” Lucifer said, his voice a mix of touched, concerned, confused, and a little bit of annoyance.

“Hi Lucifer, are you okay?”

“I’m fine, child. Why wouldn’t I be? I believe I’m supposed to be asking you that though,” he drawled.

“I was afraid that Mommy was gonna go back to hurt you and that you would let her and no one would know you were hurt or dead and you would leave us and…”

Lucifer wished she were here so that he could put his hand over her mouth again to stop the stream of words, but he just settled for talking over her. “Everything is fine, miscreant. I’m fine. Your mother hasn’t been back, and even if she were she can’t hurt me anymore. As far as letting her or leaving, I have just promised another friend that I won’t do that and that if I need to leave I will say goodbye if I can. If it will calm you down, I will promise you the same.”

“Yes please, Lucifer,” Trixie sniffled.

“Very well. I promise you that I will not intentionally leave or allow anyone to make me leave without saying goodbye to you first if I have any choice in the matter at all,” he said solemnly.

“Thanks Lucifer. Please be safe,” she said sadly before handing the phone back to Dan.

“Thanks man. I wasn’t sure what else to do. I didn’t wake you up did I?”

“No. Sleeping is not something that has been on my mind this evening,” Lucifer said bluntly.

“Well you should get some sleep. It helps. Trust me,” Dan said sympathetically as he hung up.

“Easier said than done,” Lucifer muttered as he put his phone away.

Ella grinned at him as she tried to decide what to actually say in response to that. She finally settled on, “So I’m your friend huh?” She didn’t think she’d ever heard him actually use that word before and she liked it.

“That is what you said when you got here was it not?” Lucifer drawled amusedly.

“Yep. I’m glad we’re agreed,” she quipped. “And Trixie is your friend too?”

“She’s a child. Do they even do ‘friends’?” he asked perplexed.

Ella laughed. That just reinforced her belief that he was very new to the whole feelings thing, and made her even more sad that his kept getting crushed so badly. She put that out of her mind for now though. “Yes. They do. More so than adults sometimes,” she explained patiently.

“I still don’t understand why she cares so much about me of all people.”

“Probably because she can see the same thing I do. That you are a kind, honest, generous person who deserves far better than he gets.”

Lucifer froze in shock for a good long moment and Ella didn’t know whether to laugh or cry at his complete and utter bafflement. That didn’t change as he finally found words. “If you’re trying to talk your way into my bed, you needn’t try so hard, dear Ella,” he said turning to face her with a charming smile.

Ella snorted and rolled her eyes, deciding to save the contemplation over the fact that he automatically assumed any compliment he got was for an ulterior motive. “You wish buddy,” she teased. “But I think Dan had the right idea about you getting some sleep, so come on.” She grabbed his arm to pull him back inside and he followed obediently.

“You shouldn’t drive home this late.”

“You’re not going to get me in bed that easily,” she teased. “I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“Not hardly,” he scoffed. “/I/ will sleep on the couch. You can take the bed.” When she opened her mouth to argue he cut her off. “You have my word that you will remain unmolested and alone in that bed.”

“That’s not what I was gonna say, Lucifer,” she told him clearly. She knew that he would never touch her or anyone else without consent. There was no question in her mind of that. “I was going to say it’s not fair for me kick you out of your own bed just because I decided to stick around so late.”

“Nor is it fair for me to let you sleep on the couch when you were only here to help me with my emotional crisis. You have helped me immensely this evening Ella. Let me do what little I can to repay you.”

Ella couldn’t help but smile at him for that. “Only if it’s understood that I didn’t do it to get anything in return. It isn’t payment for any debt because no such debt exists. I did it because I care and that’s what friends do for each other.” She remembered their conversation about exchanging favors for favors and how friendship isn’t about paying each other back for kindnesses. She had let him owe her a favor that time only because he insisted, but she wasn’t doing it again.

Lucifer agreed and it wasn’t until Ella was wrapped up in the most comfortable bed she could have ever dreamed of that she realized that she had made him repay her favor by taking him to church. She’d taken the devil himself to church. She put the pillow over her face to smother her almost hysterical laugh. It was definitely too late to start thinking /that/ one through.

Chapter Text

Ella woke up the next morning to the smell of bacon and coffee and she stretched, not really wanting to get out of this bed yet, but the food smelled so good. She looked at the clock to see that it was eight am and she groaned. She was going to have to hurry if she was going to make it to church on time. She could have lived with a few more hours of sleep after being up so ungodly late. She couldn’t help but giggle at that thought. Leave it to the devil to keep her up ungodly hours.

She dragged herself out of bed and into the kitchen to see Lucifer standing at the stove and it wasn’t until he turned that she saw that it said ‘kiss the cook’ and she laughed and shook her head. “Morning.”

“Good morning,” Lucifer said cheerfully as he set a plate on the table with pancakes, bacon, and an omelet. She saw the butter and syrup already on the table. “Dig in,” he told her as he filled his own plate and joined her a moment later.

“This is really good,” Ella said around a mouthful of pancake. “How are you such a good cook?”

Lucifer laughed. “When you’ve been kept away from things since the beginning of time, there’s a lot of motivation to learn everything and do everything as fast as possible. Especially when you don’t know how long it’s going to last.”

Ella nodded, trying not to show how sad that was. She knew that Lucifer was putting on an act of being okay and she wanted to let him get away with it. She could see the underlying tension in his easygoing façade, but sometimes the best way to deal with things was to ‘fake it til you make it’. He had opened up and talked about it last night, so she would let him hide today if he needed to. “Yeah, that makes sense. What else can you do? I mean besides play piano, sing, cook, solve crimes, etc.”

“Quite a bit,” he chuckled. “You didn’t even mention my greatest talent,” he waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Ella rolled her eyes amusedly. She couldn’t really say anything to tease him about that after all the interviews with his previous partners. She hadn’t seen much of them, but when she got a break waiting for results, curiosity had her going down for some of them. “Yeah yeah. We know all about that talent.” She took a sip of her coffee and groaned. “Okay, while I’m not at all surprised that you have a cappuccino maker, how do you know how I like it?”

Lucifer grinned. “Because I do have eyes dear Ella. And a rather excellent sense of smell. You’re always considerably more cheerful when you have a caramel macchiato than when you are drinking the dreadful station coffee, no matter how much cream and sugar you put in it.”

“So you made me a caramel macchiato,” Ella said almost incredulously.

“Yes,” Lucifer said simply, not seeing any need to elaborate.

Ella just shook her head with a grin. “Thank you, Lucifer,” she said earnestly and just nodded in return. She finished her food quickly and looked at the time. “I hate to eat and run, but I still have to go home and change before church.”

“Yes, yes,” Lucifer said with a tight smile. “Wouldn’t want to be late for your weekly suck-up session to dear old dad,” he teased.

Ella froze midstep. She hadn’t even considered that. She was going to worship the guy who had thrown Lucifer out of his home just for wanting to be his own person and giving humanity their most precious gift. “I…”

“I was teasing, Ella,” he told her when he realized how she had taken his comment. “I assure you that I don’t hold your faith against you.”

“Yeah, but still. I mean, I don’t want you to think that I’m not on your side because I am. I mean, I know my faith isn’t very good to you and your dad was a real jerk and I might decide to stop going, but I’m still trying to wrap my head around this and it’s all so new still and I don’t know where I stand or what I’m gonna do, but I don’t want to hurt you and…”

“Ella, stop,” Lucifer said, trying his best to keep an unaffected smile on his face. “My father has done nothing wrong to you…”

“Except for hurt my friend,” she interjected.

“Let me speak, darling,” he drawled. “To my understanding, the entire point of faith and religion is to find peace and if my father helps you to find that then I have no intention of interfering in that. Personally I find it rather boring, but if it makes you happy then go be happy. Just please don’t make me go again,” he ended with a playful whine.

Ella laughed loudly. “I promise. I will never make you go to church with me again. I’m surprised I didn’t get struck by lightning the first time. No need to tempt fate twice right?” she joked as she headed out. She wasn’t fooled. She could see the hurt in his eyes at the idea of her going to worship his father after spending most of the night consoling him over how he was treated. The fact that he was trying so hard meant a lot though, and she could see the truth in what he’d said about finding her peace.

She’d meant what she’d said too though about not being sure of anything right now. She wasn’t sure if her peace could still be found at church. She had too much to figure out, but until she did, she didn’t feel right turning her back on God. She had a brief thought that it would have been easier if God and the devil had stayed mysterious figures and she’d never learned of the whole truth and the family drama, but she pushed that thought away. It was the way it was and there was no use wishing for different. She wouldn’t change anything anyway. Lucifer had needed her last night. Her friend was hurting and needed a shoulder, and devil or not, she could never have turned her back on him.

This wasn’t exactly her first crisis of faith, though this might just be the one that broke her faith for good. She wasn’t going to make any hasty decisions about it though. She would have words with the big guy and see how she felt from there. That was the way she always handled these things and she saw no reason to change that. No reason other than how much it hurt Lucifer that was. She knew that throwing away her faith just for his sake would hurt him just as badly though. He’d proved that with his insistence that she go anyway.

She knew that her going to church was only a small part of what was bothering him though so she tried not to make it a bigger thing than it was. She knew that the biggest issue for him was the fact that it was a catholic priest that turned Chloe into an attempted murderer. The only way to prove to him that she wasn’t like that though was to continue on as normal. She did reach for her phone and call Linda on the way though and advise her to check in on Lucifer. She didn’t give details, not wanting to break Lucifer’s confidence, but told her sooner would be better than later.

Once she got home she showered and changed quickly before heading right back out the door. Despite her previous resolve, she did hesitate outside the church doors and took a few deep breaths. That was normal right after just leaving the devil’s penthouse and eating breakfast with him? She shook her head at her ridiculousness and headed inside. Today’s homily was on forgiveness and she stayed after for some time to pray on her own. She got her chance to have her words with the big guy as she berated him on never forgiving his own son and treating him so horribly and asked how they were supposed to learn forgiveness if he didn’t practice it himself.

When Father Tom sat next to her afterwards as she was just staring into space looking for answers, he asked her if everything was okay. Part of her wanted nothing more than to unload on him, but she didn’t dare. She didn’t think that Father Tom would ever do what Chloe’s priest friend did, but that didn’t mean that he would have a good reaction either though. She didn’t want to cause him any more trouble with the church than he already had, so she kept her own council and assured the priest that she was fine. Just searching for answers. He didn’t pry and left her to it.

Chapter Text

Lucifer had just finished getting breakfast cleaned up and sat down with a good stiff drink when he heard the elevator again and sighed. He turned to see who it was and wasn’t completely surprised to see Linda. “I don’t know what dear Ella told you Doctor, but I assure you, I’m quite talked out, thank you.”

Linda chuckled and just sat down across from him. She knew better than to take offense at his tone. It was simply a defensive mechanism. He wanted to push her away before she could get too close to what was bothering him. “Okay. She didn’t tell me anything really though. Just thought I should come and check on you.”

“So what? She just left so now you’ve been tagged in? I don’t need a babysitter,” he snapped.

“She just left?” Linda asked curiously. Ella hadn’t mentioned that. “She stayed last night?”

“Not like that, Doctor,” he assured her curtly. “She came to keep me company and simply stayed to late to drive home.”

“Okay. Why did she think you needed the company?” She knew better than to ask why he needed it. Then he would just get defensive and claim that he didn’t and it would take that much longer to get around to this question which would be required anyway.

Lucifer huffed. “Oh perhaps because the detective finally returned from her wanderings with a priest and some devil poison in tow.”

“Wait, what now?” Linda asked in shock.

“Yes. Speaking of, I need to get a plumber in here for the bar sink,” Lucifer said thoughtfully.

“How is that a speaking of?” Linda asked, confused.

“I broke the pipes when Daniel decided that it was a smart thing to do to dump a superpoison down the drain,” Lucifer said matter-of-factly.

“Okay, I think you should start from the beginning,” Linda said, hoping that she wasn’t going to have to resort to clawing every detail out of him and having to put the puzzle together on her own.

“I’ll make a deal with you, Doctor,” Lucifer said, looking at her for the first time since she’d arrived. “I will tell you what happened if you don’t attempt to try to get me to talk about how it makes me feel. Deal?”

She didn’t like it, but she knew how stubborn she could be and if she didn’t take the deal she would get nothing from him. She knew that Ella wouldn’t have called her unless it was big, and Chloe trying to kill him certainly qualified, so she would just have to find another way to help him. “I won’t try to make you talk about your feelings /today/,” she still felt the need to qualify.

“Good enough,” he said before launching into the entire story from the moment Trixie got there until Chloe ran out.

“Wow. That’s just…wow. I can’t believe she would do that,” Linda said in shock. “How could she ever think that?”

“I don’t know, Doctor. How could she? A bit of theme though huh? Two of the people that I bare my soul to completely freak out.”

Linda winced, but felt the need to defend herself. “Okay, I get that I freaked out a bit, and you know I’m sorry for that. But never did I even consider the idea of trying to kill you and I would never have stood for anyone else suggesting it to me either. My freakout wasn’t even as much fear of you as it was my own existential crisis. Trying to figure out where I fit in this world once it was so much more than I ever thought. I never seriously thought that you would hurt me or anyone else and I never thought that you were actually evil.”

“Could have fooled me,” Lucifer said, taking a long drink of his scotch. “You wouldn’t even open the door for me.”

“That should have been your first clue that I wasn’t afraid of you. You were the devil for crying out loud. A locked door wouldn’t have stopped you if you wanted to hurt me. You could have just broken it down and all it would have done was pissed you off. If I really was afraid of you, I would have tried to placate you by letting you in and begging you not to hurt me. I didn’t open the door for anyone. Do you think I was afraid of Dan the dentist or Mandy the teacher too?”

Lucifer looked at her searchingly like he was trying to figure her out. Could she really be telling the truth? “You still shut me out when I needed you most,” he pointed out.

“I know, Lucifer. And I can’t tell you enough how sorry I am for that.” She knew that the only reason he had come clean was because he was tearing himself apart with guilt and she’d left him to deal with it on his own. “You were my patient and I owed you more than that. More importantly though, you were my friend and I should have been there for you. I should have at least explained that I needed time to come to terms with things. I never meant to hurt you, but I know that I did.”

This all should have been said a long time ago, but he had just brushed things off once she was back on level ground, and she had let him. She shouldn’t have though because now they were dealing with it in the wake of something so much worse. To think that he had entertained the thought that what Chloe had done was borne from the same place as what she had done hurt her deeply, but she knew that it hurt him that much more. “I know that I promised not to ask you to talk about your feelings, but I do have something I need to say about this. I know how understanding you were about my freakout, and I thank you for that, but this is something completely different. She tried to kill you, Lucifer. You can’t be expected to be understanding. In fact, you shouldn’t be. That’s not something you can just brush off.” She hated being so blunt about this but she needed him to understand. She needed him to not do what he always did and let people get away with anything because he didn’t think he was worth more. “What she did was more than wrong. It was more than just hurting and betraying you. It was criminal, and you can’t just pretend it never happened.”

Lucifer snapped at that and threw his glass across the room for the second time in as many days. “Then what am I supposed to do, Doctor? Tell me? Spend every day dwelling on the fact that the only person I’ve ever loved thought that the world was better off if I was dead?” he yelled as he jumped to his feet.

Linda jumped startled at his outburst the way she always did when someone had one, but then relaxed and just waited for it to be over. It was progress, and she knew that this was why Ella had called her. Lucifer may have been open to talking to Ella, which she found surprising enough, but he never would have let himself go like this in front of her. “No, Lucifer. You accept it. Learn to deal with the pain, and put it behind you. You have to go through it instead of bury it.”

“There is no /dealing/ with it, Doctor,” he snapped. “Just thinking about it tears me apart! You have no idea how close I am to…”

She waited a second before she realized that he wasn’t going to finish that sentence. “How close you are to what, Lucifer?” she coaxed gently.

“To…to breaking,” he slumped back in his chair. “To snapping and becoming everything the world thinks I am. I just…I want to tear it all down with my bare hands and…” he choked on a sob as he doubled over in pain.

Linda went over and sat next to him, pulling him over so that his head was laying in her lap. She wasn’t here as his therapist. She was here as his friend. This wasn’t a session and this wasn’t her office. She was free to offer him whatever comfort she wished. “Even Trixie,” she asked softly. “Who risked everything to save you. To warn you. Even Dan who fought for you despite everything you’ve been through. Even Ella who cared enough to come right over as soon as she knew you were hurting and stayed all night so you wouldn’t be alone. Even me,” she continued. “Would you want to tear us apart too?” She knew the answer to that, but she needed him to realize it.

“N-no,” he shook his head, trying to get control of himself. Her compassion and the comforting hand running through his hair was working against him though. He hated how undignified he was being right now, but he couldn’t stop it.

“Because you care for us, and you know that we care for you, devil or not. And that’s how you get through this. By leaning on the people who care and allowing us to help you. You don’t have to deal with this alone. You don’t have to be strong all the time. Trust us just like we trust you.”

Chapter Text

Lucifer just laid with Linda’s lap and sobbed for a good long while until he ended up falling asleep. She smiled sadly at that. She knew that he’d needed it. Needed to get it out so the healing could begin. She checked the time and decided to let him sleep for a few hours before waking him up for lunch. Shedding that kind of emotional baggage was draining. She kept running her hand through his hair as he slept and murmured softly, “You’ll be okay, Lucifer. You’re so much stronger than you realize.”

She reached for the remote on the table next to her to watch TV. She didn’t really want to think too hard on what had happened right now. That would just upset her which would upset him again. She knew that he was far more perceptive than he liked to let on. No matter how hard she tried to hide it, he would know there was something wrong, though he would probably misinterpret it in the worst possible way.

She was surprised to find the television on Cartoon Network when she turned it on and it took her a minute to realize that it was probably from Trixie last night. She amusedly wondered if Lucifer even realized that cartoon channels existed before that moment. She flipped through until she found a movie that would be interesting enough to keep her distracted from her own thoughts but not so much that she would be loathe to leave it if he woke up, and she settled in to watch. Not long after the movie finished, she heard her phone buzz and she grabbed her purse from the table to look at it and saw that it was a text from Ella. ‘How is he?’

‘Getting there. He’ll be okay,’ she sent back.

‘Good. Thanks.’

Apparently the sound had woken Lucifer up, because as she was putting down her phone, he was sitting up, wiping his face with one hand while the other tried to fix his hair. “I don’t suppose we can just forget about my unseemly display there?” he asked hopefully with a look of distaste on his face.

“Only if you promise not to hold back if you need to do it again. We can forget about it as many times as you need. Okay?”

Lucifer huffed and nodded. He had no intention of needing to do that again anyway. “I’m just going to go wash up.”

“I’ll order us some lunch while you do. Anything in particular you’re in the mood for?” Linda asked.

“Italian,” he said after a moment’s thought. “Call Angelini’s and tell them it’s for Lucifer. They’ll know what to send,” he said before disappearing around the corner.

Linda grabbed her phone to look up the number and did as he’d said. They promised it would be there in forty five minutes. When Lucifer came back she said, “I didn’t realize they delivered.” They were the fanciest Italian restaurant in the city and reservations there generally took months to get.

“They do for me,” he said with a smirk and Linda laughed. Of course they did. She didn’t know why she was surprised. “Now I have a bone to pick with you, Doctor. You said that you wouldn’t make me talk.”

“I didn’t,” she said with a smirk of her own. She enjoyed being able to give him a taste of his own medicine. “I didn’t make you do anything. I didn’t even ask you to talk. I just gave you a little piece of advice and you took it from there.”

Lucifer narrowed his eyes at her as he thought back over the conversation and then let out a barking laugh. “Touche Doctor. Don’t think I’ll forget that though,” he warned amusedly.

“I never thought you would,” she told him with a smile. She could see that he was still struggling, but he was doing a lot better after unloading like that. “Ella texted. She wanted to make sure you were okay.”

“What did you tell her?” he asked worriedly.

“Just that you were getting there and that you would be,” she said. “I may not be acting as your therapist today, but I don’t betray my friends’ confidences either.” She knew what he was worried about and more than anything she wanted him to know that he could trust her. His trust had taken a massive hit last night and it was affecting him deeper than even he realized. If not now, then it would soon. She had no problem with reassuring him that she could be trusted as often as he needed her to.

“So lies and platitudes. Is that all it takes?” he asked wryly.

“It wasn’t either of those things, Lucifer,” she told him.

“I broke down like an infant, Doctor,” he said pointedly.

“Yes. You did. And you were long overdue for that. You needed to get it out. To get it off your chest. We all break down like that sometimes. Occasionally we’re even lucky enough to have someone to hold us through it. As I’ve told you before, you have to let yourself feel it before you can move past it and that’s what that was,” she explained patiently. “You /are/ getting there. And you /will/ be okay. It just takes time.”

“Right,” he scoffed, going to get a new glass and filling it up. If things didn’t turn around soon he was going to have to pilfer some more glasses from downstairs, which would, of course, lead to ordering new glasses for downstairs.

Linda knew that she wasn’t going to convince him right now, and that wasn’t at all surprising. The remainder of the time waiting for the food was spent in light easy conversation. Linda huffed a laugh as Lucifer conversed with the delivery guy in fluent Italian and they had a nice relaxed lunch. She stuck around for a few more hours before she told him she was heading out. “And who will you be tagging in next?” he asked sarcastically.

“No one,” she said with a laugh. “Like you said, you don’t need a babysitter.” She put a hand on his shoulder and looked at him seriously for a moment. “But if you need anything, someone to talk to, a shoulder to cry on, even someone to rant and rave to, you have my number. Use it.”

Lucifer chuckled and nodded. “Understood, Doctor.” Whether he would or not remained to be seen, but he got what she meant. After she left he went to the piano. It wasn’t until about an hour later that he realized maybe she was right. He was alone and didn’t feel like he was being ripped in two this time. It still hurt. It hurt a lot, but maybe it really was getting better. Maybe he really could get through this in one piece.

He spent the rest of the afternoon playing piano, pouring his feelings out through the music. He lost track of the time and it was long dark by the time he pulled himself out from it. He finished the rest of the Italian food and went to bed. It had been a long and emotionally exhausting day. He was asleep nearly as soon as his head hit the pillow. Unfortunately his sleep was more restless than usual as he was plagued by nightmares. Not of death or of Hell, but of Chloe betraying him in so many different ways. He woke far earlier than usual with a sheen of sweat on his forehead, and started his day with more than a little irritation.

He had just finished breakfast when his phone rang and he answered it a little more harshly than he’d intended due to his mood. “Hey, Lucifer, we got a case we could really use your help on.”

“Not in the mood,” he said shortly.

“Lucifer, this guy…he’s killing kids. A seven year old and a ten year old so far,” Dan told him seriously.

Lucifer sighed. “Text me the address.” He wasn’t just going to let kids get murdered. That was when he realized that he was stuck. He would be with the police department for the remainder of his time on Earth, however long or short that was. He couldn’t just stand by and allow people to be hurt and killers to go unpunished if there was something he could do to stop it. He’d always thought it was his fascination for the detective that kept him doing the job, but he knew better now. He just hoped, for the first time, that she didn’t come back, because he knew that if she did, he would have to leave. He would never be able to look at her every day after this.

As he left he let the cleaning crew downstairs know to let the plumber up when he got there. He’d taken the time this morning to pull the pipe out and drain it into a cup, which was sealed tightly and marked biohazard. He would figure out where to take it from there later.

Chapter Text

Lucifer got to the crime scene, a nature park, to find things in full swing. Ella was just starting to give Dan the rundown, and stopped when she saw Lucifer and waited for him to get there too, and started over. Lucifer listened to everything she said with half an ear as he looked around, getting a feel for the area and already trying to get into the head of the killer like he always did. Once Ella had given them all the details she had Lucifer went over to the bodies that were just inside the woodline and knelt beside them to look them over. It was only a moment before he had to reach out and close their eyes. “Their eyes could have been important,” Dan protested.

“You have pictures already I’m sure,” Lucifer snapped. “At least give them their dignity.” It wasn’t like he could ever forget that look anyway. It was just added to the many many horrors that were burned into his mind for all eternity.

Ella put a hand on Dan’s arm to stop him, seeing how much this one was affecting Lucifer before putting a hand on Lucifer’s shoulder to help steady his nerves. “Yeah, we do. It’s fine.”

“There aren’t any kids in hell are there?” he asked sympathetically.

“No. Not this young, anyway. There are many that most would consider children though. It’s not until they hit puberty that their souls begin to become more malleable in that way. That they start to take damage,” Lucifer told him.

Dan nodded. That explained a lot. Like how hard cases involving kids always hit him. To Lucifer kids were precious and pure and should know nothing of pain and abuse and fear. Not that he disagreed of course, but he didn’t have the past that Lucifer did, nor god only knows how long he’d been alive to reinforce it. It also explained how uncomfortable the devil was around Trixie. He’d never been around kids at all. Probably had never even seen a kid until he got to Earth. “Then you know that these two are safe in heaven then,” he said the only thing he could think of that might help.

Lucifer took a deep breath and nodded. “Small favors,” he said as he got up. “Who found the bodies?” he asked, trying to get back to the case.

“Their mother. She’s over there,” Dan pointed to the grieving woman that was sitting on a bench next to one of the uniformed officers with a toddler in her lap.

Lucifer followed him over, not noticing Ella come with until she spoke to the woman. “Here I can take him over there for a little while so you can talk freely,” she offered the woman, reaching out to the toddler.

The woman looked reluctant to give him up but eventually agreed and handed him over. Once they were out of earshot, Dan asked her, “Can you tell me what happened?”

“Yes and why you weren’t watching your children and let this happen?” Lucifer asked irritated, only feeling a little remorse when she burst into tears again.

“Excuse us for a minute,” Dan said, grabbing Lucifer’s arm and pulling him away. “What the hell, man?”

“What? Is it not the job of parents to protect their offspring from things like this?”

“Well, yes. Of course, but there’s only so much a person can do. It’s impossible to protect from everything, especially when you have more than one kid to watch.”

“Then parents should not have more children than they can adequately protect,” he said matter-of-factly.

Dan sighed, realizing now why Chloe tended to look so weary when dealing with Lucifer sometimes. “In a perfect world, you’d be right. But then, in a perfect world, things like this wouldn’t happen at all. She’s doing the best she can and just lost two of her children. Don’t you think she’s suffered enough?”

Lucifer sighed. “I suppose.” It wasn’t like she was guilty of anything more than negligence anyway. Before Dan could head back over to talk to her, Lucifer grabbed his arm and cut his eyes towards the parking lot.

“What?” Dan asked confused.

Lucifer resisted the urge to hit him. He had noticed the satellite microphone so didn’t dare say it out loud, he just cut his eyes again, glaring as he did. This time Dan looked where he was gesturing and saw what Lucifer had. Dan nodded and looked at Lucifer jerking his head towards the treeline and Lucifer nodded. “I’m going to check and see if there is any evidence in the woods. Perhaps our killer used that escape route,” Lucifer said for the benefit of their spy.

“Good idea. I’ll check the playground,” Dan told him as they split up and went different directions.

When Lucifer had circled around behind the car and crept up, he noticed the man inside looking around nervously, so he just stepped up to the open window and said, “Hello murderer.”

Just as the guy looked like he was about to run, Dan stepped up on the other side, pointing his gun at the man. “Out of the car and put your hands on your head.”

The man did as asked, but protested, “It’s not what you think. I didn’t hurt those kids.” He seemed much more willing to talk to Dan than Lucifer.

As soon as he was free of the car, Lucifer grabbed the front of his shirt and slammed him against the car, “Then why would you be here spying on the investigation. Isn’t it true, Daniel, that criminals often revisit the scene of the crime? Spy on the investigations?”

“Yes, it is, but let him go so I can cuff him. You’re hurting him,” Dan pointed out. It wasn’t bad enough for him to be bent out of shape about it, even if this guy wasn’t the killer, but he knew that it would get worse if something wasn’t resolved quickly.

“Good,” Lucifer snarled at the idea of hurting this scum.

“I have nothing to do with this case,” the man protested. “My name is Father Kinley…”

Lucifer sucked in a sharp breath and let him go, taking a step back in shock. Dan took the opening to jump in and cuff him. “I don’t care who you are, surveilling a crime scene is still illegal. And if I can manage it I will find a way to get you for conspiracy to murder Lucifer too,” Dan snapped, dragging him over to one of the uniforms and having him put in the back of a car.

“You do realize that was a waste of time,” Lucifer pointed out as they headed back towards the grieving mother.

“I know the chances of getting him for conspiracy are slim to none unless we just get really lucky, but he should at least get a hefty fine for the surveillance,” Dan told him. “It’s the best we can do.”

“There is little point,” Lucifer said with a shrug, only for Dan to grab his arm and stop him in his tracks.

“Yes. There is. Even if it’s flawed and not nearly enough, it’s still justice. For what he did to Chloe and what he tried to do to you,” Dan said seriously. Lucifer just nodded curtly and continued walking, leaving Dan to keep up.

The interview with the grieving mother went slightly better this time. She was closer to hysterical than she would have been the first time, but Lucifer refrained from making it worse again. Few of the bystanders saw anything at all and the few who had seen anything had been less than useful, so they had very little to go on. That didn’t stop Lucifer from turning over every bush, legal or not, to find the killer.

Dan hated the illegal shortcuts that Lucifer always took, but as long as he kept himself separate from them, they would be okay. Lucifer had a lot more freedom as a consultant than he did as a detective and if there was one thing the devil was good at it was talking himself out of trouble. It had irritated Dan to no end before, but he could admit now that it had been mostly out of jealousy. It did nothing but help their cases, most of the time. Knowing that he wasn’t human was a big help in getting rid of that jealousy.

Thanks to Lucifer, they had the killer in custody around lunchtime the next day, and also thanks to Lucifer, had a full confession not long after. Not that Dan hadn’t done his part, of course, even beyond keeping it all as legal as possible. Lucifer wasn’t the best at putting the clues together and figuring out motives. All they needed now was Ella’s test results to tie everything up in a neat little bow and make sure the guy went away for life.

Once that was over with, Dan was free to deal with Kinley. “I think I will skip this part if you don’t mind,” Lucifer drawled.

“No way. You might be the only chance we have of getting him on something,” Dan told him, blocking him from leaving yet.

“What do you mean?” Lucifer asked with an uncaring tone.

“He knows you’re the actual devil. He’s a priest. He despises you. Having you in there getting him riled up might just get him to admit to something we can take him down for,” Dan pointed out.

Lucifer sighed. He hardly cared what the priest thought of him, but knowing what he had helped do to Chloe was enough to get him to agree. “Very well. If you insist.”

Chapter Text

Before they went into the interrogation room with Father Kinley, Dan turned to Lucifer and said, “I know this probably sounds strange coming from me since I usually tell you the opposite, but feel free to be as condescending and annoying as you want in there. Just remember if we want to be able to use the confession, you can’t go full devil.”

“Understood,” Lucifer said with a nod before they went in. Lucifer put on his heavy swagger as he strolled in. “Well, well, well. If it isn’t the wayward priest,” he drawled as he plopped his butt down on the table. “You know, the dear detective had a rather interesting conversation with your bishop a couple days ago. The word excommunication was even mentioned,” he taunted. Dan bit his lip to keep from laughing. Give Lucifer an audience and he could certainly put on a show. He was positive now that if this priest was ever going to talk that Lucifer would be the one to push him to it.

“Only because you have everyone fooled,” the priest spat distastefully. “That was a good act there at the crime scene, but I see right through you. The only thing that actually bothered you was that you didn’t get to hurt those kids yourself.”

Dan was on his feet almost before Lucifer had him out of the chair, as he tried to pull Lucifer away. There was no question how he would react to that, and Dan was now wondering if he’d been wrong to bring Lucifer in here. Unfortunately, Lucifer was far to strong for Dan to move him one inch if he didn’t want to go and now that Lucifer’s hand was around the priest’s throat, he had to do something. He was thankful that the cameras were currently looking at Lucifer’s back and couldn’t see his flashing red eyes. “Lucifer, buddy, come on. He’s just trying to get a rise out of you. He’s trying to get you to lose it and prove his point. Don’t let him win.”

Lucifer visibly struggled to rein himself in before he shoved away from the priest, eyes fading back to brown as he turned. “You just proved my point,” the priest said smugly. “You are pure evil and just putting on an act to make everyone think differently.”

“And that’s why you were conspiring to have him killed?” Dan asked leadingly.

The priest just sat down and crossed his arms smugly. “I admit to nothing.”

“Because you know you’re wrong,” Dan tried to push the matter.

“Come on, ‘Father’,” Lucifer sneered. “Admit it. You want me dead because I’m the devil, but you don’t have the guts to do it yourself, so you farm out your dirty work to unsuspecting innocents.”

“It has nothing to do with courage,” the priest spat. “But with who could get close enough to you to do the deed.”

“You expect us to believe that you giving someone else to poison to slip to me had nothing to do with cowardice?” he smirked.

“I am no coward,” the priest said jumping to his feet. “I will do the duty of God no matter what he calls on me to do. Whether that is giving you the poison myself or giving it to someone else to do the deed.”

“So you admit to giving someone the poison and telling them to kill Lucifer,” Dan asked, grateful to the devil for not mentioning Chloe’s name. The priest just slammed his mouth closed and sat back down, refusing to say another word, no matter how much Lucifer or Dan taunted him, so they gave up.

Once they headed out, Dan told Lucifer, “That might have been enough to at least get a psych eval. He won’t go to prison, but then that never really would have been on the table once he started spouting about you being the real devil. I’ll see what I can do.”

“I’m glad I was able to help. Perhaps getting him out of the picture will help the detective find some peace,” Lucifer said as he headed out before anyone else could stop him.

Dan sighed heavily as Lucifer walked away and Ella came around the corner with an irritated look on her face. “Did I just hear what I thought I heard?”

“What do you think you heard?” Dan asked.

“Lucifer not giving one crap about the fact that they tried to kill him and being more worried about Chloe ‘finding peace’ despite what she did,” Ella said annoyed.

Dan nodded slowly. “Yep. I’m pretty sure that’s what you heard.” Dan too was being hit pretty hard with the fact that he’d been so wrong about Lucifer for so long. Granted he had been grateful to him after he saved Chloe’s life, and they had started getting a little closer, but even then he’d thought that he was just a narcissistic, hedonistic, childish playboy. In his defense though, Lucifer was a very good actor. He hid his insecurities very well.

They both went through the rest of the day with a nervous energy, and as soon as Ella put the last report of the evidence on Dan’s desk, she immediately headed for Lux, not knowing that Dan would be headed for the same place soon after. Ella was still standing near the entrance looking around for Lucifer when Dan almost bumped into her. “Guess we both had the same idea huh?” he said with a smirk.

“Yeah. I checked upstairs, but he wasn’t there, so I’m guessing he’s down here somewhere,” she told him.

“Or he’s out somewhere else,” Dan pointed out. “Come on. Let’s get a drink. If he’s here he’ll be hitting the bar soon enough.” Ella nodded and followed him to the bar as they drank and chatted for a while before Ella noticed Lucifer come out of the back room and wade into the crowd. He grabbed a drink from one of the servers and had a woman in his arms before Ella could even get up from her seat. Dan pulled her back to sitting. “Let him have some fun. We’ll catch him at some point if he’s alone,” he told her. Loosening up like this might just be exactly what Lucifer needed. Sometimes being a friend meant taking a step back.

They both kept half an eye on him for the next hour as he teased his way through half the women in the club, had more than a few drinks brought to him, and Dan forced himself not to notice any of the drugs Lucifer took. Then he disappeared to the back again and when he didn’t come out for a little while, Ella got up to go talk to him, and this time Dan went with her. Only because he had gone back there alone. The security at the door looked at them funny, but let them pass, recognizing them as friends of Lucifer.

They rounded the corner to see a stack of paperwork on the desk and Lucifer sipping a drink and smoking a cigarette as he flipped through, clearly working very hard and focusing intently. “So this is why you never help with paperwork at the station,” Dan joked.

Lucifer startled and looked up before chuckling and motioning to the chairs in front of the desk. “Quite. I have enough of my own paperwork to do. A place like this doesn’t run itself.”

“Just how much do you work?” Ella asked incredulously. “I mean, this must be a full time job. You work at least three quarters of the time at the precinct, and you still find time to party like crazy and sleep with half the women in the city?”

Lucifer shrugged. “I need less sleep than the average human. I can easily get by on three hours a night and even skip a night here and there without any adverse effects.”

“Okay but that’s still a lot of work,” Ella said concerned.

“It’s still far less than I’m used to,” Lucifer explained, letting her know that her concern was unwarranted. “You have no idea the administration nightmare involved in running hell. This is still my vacation,” he joked.

“So what happens to all that work down there…all those souls…while you’re up here?” Dan asked curiously.

“The souls are fine. I’ve managed to streamline that process over the millennia so they are sorted and sent where they need to be automatically. Sure a few might slip through the cracks here and there without my personal attention, but that is no matter. The demons have their standing orders and know the penalty of disobedience, so beyond that I don’t really care what they do. The administration work however…That will probably fill half the dimension by the time I return, but I’ll worry about that then.”

“You don’t have any demons who can do administrative work?” Ella teased.

Lucifer laughed loudly. “I highly doubt any of them can even read and I shudder to think of what state hell would be in upon my return if I gave them that much power.”

Chapter Text

“What about Maze? She’s a demon right?” Dan asked, suddenly realizing that if Lucifer really was the devil then Maze was probably an actual demon and that made a lot of sense.

“She is, but Mazikeen is special,” Lucifer said with a fond smile. “She is a first generation Lilim, one of the original daughters of Lilith. She is one of the only ones left which means she is smarter than the average demon, and the average human, though that’s mostly since she’s lived so long. I taught her to read when we first came to Earth and decided to stay for a while. It only took a couple weeks.”

“How does that work?” Ella asked curiously. They hadn’t really gotten around to the q and a before, and she was more than a little curious. There were some things that she didn’t want to ask him until they were alone, but this should be safe enough. “Her being a first generation and the rest not being very smart, I mean.”

“That is rather a long story if you wish to hear it,” he told them, when they both nodded, he got up and refilled his drink. “Come on. If I’m not going to be working, we might as well join the party while I talk.”

“You’re not worried about other people overhearing?” Dan asked.

Lucifer scoffed. “Please. They’ll just think I’m talking about some fantasy story I’m writing or something. Humans can be rather oblivious that way.”

Ella laughed and shook her head. “Or think you’re a method actor or something,” she poked fun at herself.

“Precisely, my dear Ella,” he teased, heading out the door not waiting for them to follow him.

They both did follow him though, in time to see him grab some drugs from behind the bar and even spike his own drink. “How is it that you drink so much and do so many drugs, but I’ve never seen you more than moderately buzzed?” Dan derailed the conversation to ask.

“I’m the devil, Daniel. Human vices can only affect me so far unfortunately. Do you know how much I would love to get completely drunk and/or high? Even just once? An amount that would kill a human barely has an effect on me.”

“Right. That makes sense,” Dan nodded, stopping to refill his own drink. That had been about what he’d guessed anyway, but the confirmation helped. It also helped him to be less irritated about Lucifer sampling evidence. Less, not completely gone. It was still evidence after all.

“How come we never have to pay for our drinks here?” Ella asked as he got another herself. She hadn’t been here very often, but when she had, they’d never taken her money other than as a tip, even when she offered, and she hadn’t seen Dan pay either tonight.

“Because you’re both on the VIP list of course,” Lucifer said as though it should be obvious. “Along with a few other select people, you drink free here.”

“Wow. Thanks Lucifer,” Ella said wide-eyed. While they had been friendly before of course, until the other night they’d never been particularly close.

“Yeah. Thanks,” Dan told him uncomfortably. He wanted to know who else was on the list, but that was simple curiosity. It was none of his business so he refrained from asking.

“Yes. Well. You were asking about the demonic power structure,” he changed the subject as he usually did when someone thanked him for something nice that he’d actually done. He had no problem hamming it up for undeserved thanks, but found deserved thanks to be rather uncomfortable.

He walked over to his usual center booth and made a hand motion that immediately cleared it and sat in the center spot, leaving Dan and Ella to sit before he began to explain. “Lilith was the first demon and already had a dozen children before I arrived in Hell. She was not happy about being displaced by me, and I ended up having to lock her up in one of the deepest cells when she kept causing trouble and trying to assassinate me. Many of her other children followed in her footsteps over the millennia, but two of them, Mazikeen and Dromos, decided to take the opposite route and serve me. Due to the fact that inbreeding was something of a necessity for the demons if they wished to reproduce at all, and the fact that my father wasn’t mitigating the effects like he did in the beginning with humanity, the successive generations were not exactly the cream of the crop. Intelligence was decreased, cruelty and tendencies towards violence were increased, and they became little more than vicious animals. Thankfully, they are trainable to some degree.”

By the end of the explanation, Lucifer had a woman hanging off either arm and was paying as much attention to them as he was his guests. Dan and Ella didn’t care much though. The story was interesting enough and they were well used to Lucifer’s antics, that they paid little attention. “So the demons torture the human souls?” Ella asked. She didn’t think that Lucifer could be cruel enough to torture them himself. At least not unless they /really/ deserved it, which couldn’t be everyone in hell.

“Some of them. Most of the humans torture themselves plenty. Hell is designed to trap them in the moments of greatest guilt or their greatest fears and they just live them in a loop. Of course, if I didn’t give the demons some outlet for their natures, they would turn on me, much like an animal that is controlled too tightly. In turning on me, they would also disobey my orders against possession and wreak havoc on the earth as well. To that end, they have free rein in the worst section of hell where the most heinous of souls reside with the understanding that the other levels are off limits.”

“And if they go there anyway?” Dan asked, ignoring how Lucifer was playing with the hair of his ‘companions’ and nuzzling against them as they talked.

“Then their punishment would depend on why and what they did. Anything from being banned from any torture for a period of time to being tortured themselves to execution,” he said with a shrug.

“So this…Dromos…is in charge of all that while you’re up here?” Ella asked curiously.

“More or less. He can’t execute them without my say-so, but torture is probably a more common punishment nowadays. I can’t say that I care much though. I’ve never liked demons. Despicable things they are. With obvious exceptions.”

Dan couldn’t help but snort a laugh at that, and when Lucifer looked at him curiously, he shook his head. “Just remembering something Trixie mentioned once about Maze had been ‘kinda like a zookeeper’.”

Lucifer laughed hilariously at that while Ella had her drink come out her nose. “An apt description for sure,” Lucifer said.

“Can I ask what the whole thing was about with Charlotte now?” Dan asked. He’d been sitting on that question for days and desperately wanted an answer.

“Charlotte, since you knew her, wasn’t exactly Charlotte Richards. Charlotte Richards was killed in the original case where we found her and her body was commandeered by my mother when she escaped from Hell.”

It was Dan’s turn to shoot drink out of his nose. “Your mother?! As in…”

“The goddess of all creation, yes. She and my father had a falling out over the continued existence of humanity…he was for she was against…and so he threw her into Hell to get her out of the way,” Lucifer explained. “Not to worry though. I sent her to her own little humanity free universe so she could make anything she wanted, so there is no threat. I was as surprised as anyone when Charlotte returned to her own body afterwards.”

“I…I slept with…with…” Dan stammered and Ella was quietly snickering into her drink. She thought this was hilarious.

“With my mother. Yes,” Lucifer said irritated. “I’m sure you have a better understanding of my reaction to learning that little tidbit now.”

Dan just nodded with wide eyes, surprised that he was still alive, and still reeling over the fact that he’d been with the goddess of all creation. “O-on that note…I should probably go…the babysitter’s time is almost up.”

“Have fun, Daniel. Say hello to the urchin for me,” Lucifer mocked as he waved. Once Dan was gone, he turned to Ella. “Are you attempting to inhale your drink, darling?” he teased.

Ella couldn’t hold her laughter in anymore. “Sorry. That’s just…I mean, I know it’s your mother and you probably hate the idea…but his reaction…”

“Yes, it was rather amusing wasn’t it,” Lucifer said with a mischievous glint in his eye. “It brings up so many opportunities for future interactions.”

“I can’t wait,” Ella said cheerfully, looking forward to seeing how Lucifer was planning to torture Dan with this one. She was glad to see that he seemed to be doing a little better and wasn’t letting the stuff with the priest get to him. “I should probably head out too and let you get on with your night,” she said looking at Lucifer’s eye candy that were still fawning all over him.

“Of course, darling. You’re welcome anytime,” he told her, fully intending the double meaning behind those words.

Chapter Text

Lucifer spent the rest of the evening going back and forth between trying to catch up on the work he’d gotten behind on at the club the last few days, and taking long breaks to enjoy the perks that reminded him of why he was bothering. When he finally did make it up to his penthouse, he had a few guests in tow and the sun was coming up before the party stopped. He just needed to cut loose and forget about everything for a while. He wasn’t sure what Doctor Linda would say about that particular step of the healing process, but it got results.

He groaned when his phone went off a few hours later. Just because he could manage on a few hours of sleep didn’t mean that he liked to. He groped around the bodies for a bit until he found his phone and answered with a sleepy, “What?”

“Sorry, man. Got a crime scene,” Dan said apologetically. He was hoping that Lucifer was really back to work now and he hadn’t just woke him up for nothing. Given that he could hear multiple sleepy protests in the background, he could only imagine how Lucifer’s night had gone after he left.

“Text me the address. Might be a bit though,” he muttered.

“Yeah, sure. Just don’t take /too/ long,” Dan told him with a chuckle as he hung up.

The fact that the crime scene wasn’t far from Lux worked in his favor this time though, since he arrived only minutes after Dan despite having taken twice as long to get ready. He’d been in dire need of a shower after his nightly activities after all. “That was quick,” Dan joked when he walked up.

“Well the starting canvas is so close to perfection anyway, it doesn’t take long,” Lucifer said theatrically motioning to his body.

Dan snorted skeptically. “Right. Anyway…Whatcha got Ella?” he asked the chuckling forensic scientist who gave them the quick rundown with the usual jokes, mostly tactless, from Lucifer which Ella, as she always did, joined in on. Dan just rolled his eyes at the antics. Everyone dealt with things differently, and Ella and Lucifer were really two peas in a pod in that respect. As long as none of the victim’s families were around, he could deal, despite not wanting to admit that it was actually pretty funny.

When they got back to the precinct, Lucifer was startled by the little missile that attacked his legs. “Lucifer!” Trixie squealed happily as she hugged him.

He stumbled slightly as his hands raised at the assault before he reached down and patted her on the head. “Hello, child,” he said awkwardly before Trixie let go. “What are you doing here?”

“The babysitter had a family emergency,” Dan explained, which had also been why he had been so late to the crime scene himself. “I’m still trying to find someone else to watch her.”

“I would suggest Maze, but I’m not sure when she’ll be back from hunting her latest bounty,” Lucifer said with a shrug. He hadn’t heard from her in a few days.

“Are you sure Maze is safe?” Dan asked worriedly.

Lucifer tilted his head at Dan as worry creeped into his eyes. If he was judging Maze just because she was a demon than he was probably judging Lucifer for being the devil. “She’s watched the urchin before,” he pointed out.

“Yeah, and I’ve never been particularly comfortable with it. It’s not because she’s a demon, though now that I know that it does come into play a bit, but mostly because all the oddities are explained now. I’ve always worried about what she might expose Trixie to.”

“Auntie Maze is awesome,” Trixie jumped in.

“I don’t know that I would use those words, but I can’t disagree with the child’s assessment. Maze may not be the best influence in the world, but let’s face it, so few people are. She would never hurt the miscreant, and no one could hope to keep her safer.”

Dan nodded. He couldn’t argue with that. He would just have to be sure to set clear ground rules. “Except for the fact that Maze isn’t here,” he pointed out.

“Yes. That does put a crimp in that idea doesn’t it,” Lucifer chuckled. “One moment. I’ll be right back.” He stepped away and made a quick phone call. “It will be resolved momentarily,” he promised as he returned.

“What did you do?” Dan asked worriedly. Lucifer’s impulsive decisions were rarely good ideas. Only the fact that he trusted Lucifer for the most part with his daughter’s well-being had him taking it as well as he did.

“Called in a favor,” he said with a shrug.

“What kind of favor?” Dan asked a little more firmly.

“You’ll see in about ten minutes,” Lucifer said with a smirk and Dan sighed and resigned himself to arguing then if needed. “Until then…” he looked around for a moment before grabbing a file from Dan’s desk. “Amuse yourself, child.” Dan grabbed the folder back from her hand before she could open it and replaced it with an empty one for her to doodle in.

Dan and Lucifer kept their conversations about the case as quiet as they could manage to keep little ears from listening in until they were interrupted by a ruckus out front. “Ah. My solution must be here.” He got up and headed to the front. “Right this way folks, follow me.”

Dan watched in surprise as the big screen television was rolled in followed by boxes of movies and games, a dvd player, and the newest X-box. Lucifer led them to the conference room and showed them where to set up. “I don’t know that the lieutenant will like this,” Dan warned him.

“Nonsense. She loves me,” Lucifer pointed out smugly. “Besides, it’s not like the child will be the only one to benefit. Well maybe from the games, but the television could be used to watch surveillance or show crime scene photos to a larger group, or many other things.”

“Yeah, I know, but this isn’t a day care center, as she keeps reminding me,” Dan pointed out.

“I understand that, but on the rare occasions when situations like this arise, with your child or other people’s children, this will keep them out of the way and occupied.”

Dan just shrugged. If Lucifer wanted to stick his neck out like this, then that was on him. It didn’t mean that he was going to take advantage of it any more than he had to. Today was unfortunately one of those days. By the time they finished their argument, everything was hooked up and ready to go, and Trixie bounded over excitedly to decide what she wanted to do first. Dan took a moment to look over the movies and games and make sure they were appropriate before nodding and letting her have at them. There were quite a few that were borderline appropriate, but nothing bad enough for him to pull.

Dan just huffed when the lieutenant came around a little later and thanked Lucifer for the setup. Unfortunately, the lieutenant heard him, but thankfully didn’t get angry. “If having to deal with the /occasional/ child being entertained here is the price for Lucifer to donate such a useful system, I’ll take it.” Dan nodded. He got the hint with her stress on the word occasional.

“And that’s how it’s done, Daniel,” Lucifer told him once she was gone. “Offer something useful to the other person in return and you’ll be surprised how many doors are open to you.”

Dan shook his head. “We don’t all have that kind of money to burn,” he pointed out.

“This cost me nothing,” Lucifer chuckled. “The owner of the electronics store owed me a favor. His debt is now clear.”

“Okay but how much did his original favor cost you?” Dan asked pointedly.

“Nothing. It just involved a few introductions to the right people that could promote his business to other right people,” Lucifer explained.

Dan blinked at him for a moment as he turned that over in his head, realizing just how intricate Lucifer’s network must be. He could imagine it like a spider web with so many strings from so many people to other people and he was getting a headache just thinking of it. He couldn’t even wrap his head around how Lucifer must be able to manage it. Maybe he could learn a lot from the devil, but he doubted he’d ever get the basic class to work up to that level.

Dan and Lucifer were in and out a few times for the rest of the afternoon following up leads and talking to suspects, but they hadn’t really gotten anywhere by the time it was getting late. They had just decided to pick it back up the next day, when Maze came in with her latest bounty. Before anyone else could greet her, Trixie rushed past them. “Auntie Maze! I missed you so much!”

Chapter Text

“Trixie!” Maze grinned, hugging her tightly. “When did you get back? Where did you go? Where’s your mom?”

“On that note, I should head home,” Lucifer said quickly before slipping out the door and taking off before anyone could think to stop him. He knew that prolonging the tongue-lashing from Maze would only make it worse, but at least it wouldn’t be in front of the entire precinct.

Ella had seen him leave though and since she already knew the story, and wasn’t needed to tell it, she went after him. He was already pulling out by the time she got out there though and she stomped her foot in irritation. She should have run, no matter the attention it would have gotten. Now she would have to go to Lux again. When she got there she headed up to the penthouse first, and sure enough, there he was, leaning on the railing of the balcony with his telltale drink in his hand. “You okay?” she asked as she walked up next to him.

He turned to look at her worriedly. “Much as I would normally appreciate your company, darling, this isn’t a good time.”

“Why not?” she asked challengingly. She wasn’t going to let him push her away when he was hurting.

“Because, Ella dear, when Maze gets here, you will want to be far away,” he said wryly.

“Why?” she asked again, this time confused.

“Because Maze in a temper is difficult for anyone to deal with. A mere human wouldn’t stand a chance.” He heard a crash from the penthouse and sighed. “Too late,” he whispered. “Just try to stay out of the line of fire, would you?”

“LUCIFER!” Maze screeched in anger.

“I’m right here, Mazey darling. No need to yell,” he drawled as he stepped inside.

“UGH!” Maze threw a blade at him and he caught it just before it reached his shoulder with a raise of his eyebrow. “Damnit Lucifer! If someone tries to kill you, you call me!”

“Why, so you can come and do the same thing?” Ella asked incredulously.

Maze did a double take at her presence before snapping. “Oh please. Lucifer doesn’t miss, and even if he did it would have just hit his shoulder which he fully deserves for NOT CALLING ME!” she turned to address Lucifer again for the last part. “Just because I’m not officially your guard anymore doesn’t mean you can just leave me out of the loop!”

“Actually, it rather does. You quit protecting me. You said so yourself,” he pointed out.

“UGH!” she screamed again, throwing another knife, this one he caught in front of his chest. He knew her well enough to know that it wouldn’t have hit anything vital even if it had gotten through though. “And you know full well that I didn’t mean that you stubborn ASS!”

“What purpose would calling you have served? What could you have done?” Lucifer asked pointedly.

“The same thing I’ve always done when someone threatened you,” she snarled. “Make her regret it.”

“This time was different. It was the detective,” he said with a note of warning in his voice.

“The hell it was, Lucifer! She tried to KILL you!” Maze yelled.

“And she failed,” he told her. “See?” he held out his arms and twirled around, despite being fully dressed. “Not a scratch. It’s no different than the time I was burned at the stake that you thought was so hilarious. Or when those farmers went after me with the pitchforks, or when…”

“It IS different, Lucifer! She COULD have hurt you! And she KNEW it!” Maze snapped. “I WILL track her down and…”

Lucifer’s devil face sprang into being and his eyes flashed a dangerous red. “You will do no such thing, Mazikeen,” he growled with a demonic undertone as he backed her against the wall. “You will NOT harm her. Stay AWAY from her.”

Maze instinctively bowed her head submissively and said, “Yes, my lord.”

Lucifer sighed and let his features fade back to normal, glancing back at Ella to make sure she was okay and breathed a sigh of relief when she gave him a nervous smile and nodded in acceptance. He turned back to Maze and backed away from her. “I’m sorry, Maze. You know I hate that as much as you do,” he said apologetically as he sat on the couch.

“Then why would you do it? For HER?!” she growled with much less heat as she sat down next to him, now that she was calm enough to sit.

“Because she was just afraid. It’s a normal reaction to what she saw. No harm was done.”

“I wouldn’t say no harm was done,” Ella muttered, feeling safe enough to speak again.

“What do you mean?” Maze asked coldly, giving Lucifer a look that dared him to interrupt.

“Just because she didn’t hurt him physically didn’t mean that she didn’t hurt him at all,” Ella said pointedly.

“Maze doesn’t care about feelings, Ella dear,” Lucifer scoffed.

“You don’t know what I care about anymore Lucifer,” Maze snapped in irritation. She thought she’d proved that after their last fight when Linda had to intervene.

“Regardless, the matter is closed, and you have nothing to worry about anymore Maze. She no longer has the power to hurt me.”

“You mean your little mortality issue is resolved now?” she asked skeptically.

“Yes, it is. Tested and proven,” Lucifer assured her.

“That doesn’t mean she can just get away with it,” Maze still argued. “After everything you did for her…I watched you DIE, Lucifer,” she pointed out. “I sat there and watched you kill yourself, just to get that antidote for HER! We almost didn’t get you back! Do you have any idea what that was like?!” she asked, eyes welling up with tears. “And you want to just let her walk away after throwing that back in your face!?”

“What what? You did what?” Ella asked in shock.

Lucifer sighed and gave her the cliffs notes version of that story before turning back to Maze. “I didn’t do it for thanks, Maze. I didn’t do it so that she would owe me. She owed me nothing for that so there was nothing to throw back in my face. I did it because it was necessary. That’s all.”

“And everything else you’ve done for her?” Maze asked incredulously. “Everything else you’ve sacrificed? You killed your own brother to save her for crying out loud!”

“Yes. I did. And all that falls into the same category. I did was was necessary. No more, no less, and she owed me nothing. She is gone and whether she comes back to LA or not, she is out of my life permanently. It’s in the past and that’s where it will stay.”

“So if she does come back I’m just supposed to walk around and pretend nothing ever happened?”

“I’m sure not going to,” Ella muttered, and Lucifer looked at her in shock. “What? I’m not gonna hurt her, but we are SO gonna have words.”

Lucifer huffed. “Words are fine, I suppose.”

“Well I’m glad you think so, but I’m not a demon. I don’t take orders from you anyway,” she told him as she stuck out her tongue at him.

“Wait…she knows?” Maze asked surprised, just now realizing that he had gone full devil right in front of Ella.

“She does. As do Daniel and the child,” Lucifer told her.

“Well I knew they did. It was kinda necessary to get the whole story, but how did she find out?”

“Daniel told her,” Lucifer explained.

“He was worried about Lucifer, but he had to deal with Trixie, and I kinda made him tell me why Lucifer needed some company before I came over,” Ella explained, once again trying to keep Dan off any supernatural shit lists.

“Okay, fine. Anyone else that’s in the know now that I should be aware of?” she asked pointedly. Lucifer shook his head. “So if words are fine for her, does that mean I can have words with Chloe too?”

Lucifer sighed. “Only if she comes back. You can’t hunt her down all over creation to do so,” he told her.

“Fine,” Maze huffed. “I still think you’re being stupid letting her get away with this.”

“I agree with you,” Ella couldn’t help but say. “I mean, she was my friend and all, but trying to kill someone? Very not cool. She’s a cop. She should know better. Not to mention that Lucifer doesn’t deserve that.”

“Try telling him that,” Maze scoffed.

“I know. I have. He’s just too stubborn to listen,” Ella replied with a smirk.

“HE is right here, you know,” Lucifer said in irritation. “And HE can hear you.”

“We know,” they both said at the same time. Ella burst out laughing and even Maze cracked a smile. Lucifer gave them both a mock-glare and got up to refill his drink. And make some for his guests while he was at it since they didn’t seem inclined to leave anytime soon.

Chapter Text

After he handed the drinks over, he said, “Might I suggest ladies, that the party is a bit livelier downstairs?” He could think of far better pastimes than sitting up here and discussing his deficiencies and/or endured betrayals, after all.

Ella shrugged, realizing that he didn’t want to hash this out anymore, so she got up and took her drink and dumped it in his glass. “Then I’m gonna get something better to drink downstairs,” she teased him.

“Better?” he laughed, taking a sip to get it low enough not to slosh as he walked. “This is top shelf scotch darling. There is no better.”

Maze rolled her eyes and downed her drink in one shot before following them to the elevator. They hadn’t been down there long before one of the bouncers leaned down and whispered something in Lucifer’s ear. He got up, telling them, “It seems I have been requested. I’ll be back.”

“Requested for what?” Ella asked too late as he was already gone. She looked curious when the music stopped and turned to look at the piano when she heard it start and the spotlight hit it. She smiled brightly. She’d only heard Lucifer play once before, but she’d heard he was a good singer too.

Ella recognized the music, but couldn’t quite place it until the lyrics started. “Well you can tell everyone I'm a down disgrace; Drag my name all over the place; I don't care anymore; You can tell everybody 'bout the state I'm in; You won't catch me crying 'cause I just can't win; I don't care anymore, I don't care anymore…” Lucifer sang.

“Good for him,” Maze said, raising her glass in a salute that he couldn’t see.

“Hear hear,” Ella said with a grin doing the same. She knew that he didn’t mean it. Not really. Not yet. But he was getting there. She knew without a doubt now that he would be okay. It would just take time. Singing it out was probably the healthiest coping mechanism that Lucifer had in his repertoire. She also couldn’t deny that he had an amazing voice. She could listen to him all day long. Unfortunately, he just did the one song. “That’s it?” she asked disappointed when he got back to the table.

“First rule of show business, my dear Ella. Always leave them wanting more,” he joked.

“Well it worked,” she laughed and gave him a playful shove as the music came back through the speakers. The three of them, with often rotating guests, spent the rest of the night having fun. There was a lot of dancing involved, a lot more drinking, and some drugs for Lucifer and Maze, that Ella passed on. Before they knew it, it was last call.

“Oh wow,” Ella slurred drunkenly. “I didn’t realize it was so late. I should go,” she got up and then fell back down. Or would have if Lucifer hadn’t caught her around the waist with a laugh.

“I don’t think so, darling. You’re in no state to drive,” he said amusedly. “Come on.”

“I’ll just stay down here and finish shutting the place down. You know I’m still good to drive,” she joked, not at all worried about Ella in Lucifer’s hands.

“Kay,” she muttered leaning against him only partially willingly. “You smell nice,” she told him as he half carried her up the stairs to the elevator.

Lucifer laughed again as he hit the button for the elevator. “So I’ve been told.” He got her inside and to the bed before he sat her down and took off her jacket and shoes. Once he laid her down he was surprised when her arms went around his neck and she pulled him into a kiss. He kissed her back instinctively for a moment before he realized what he was doing and pulled away. “Far be it for me to say no, darling, but since you have said just that every time you were in a state of mind to do so, I feel I must.” Also because this was far too reminiscent of another memory, he didn’t say.

“Oh come on,” she groaned, barely understandable, all of her inhibitions gone in the fact of the massive amounts of alcohol she’d drank. Her desire to not be another notch on bedpost was pushed to the back of her mind by the knowledge of how damn sexy he was.

“Goodnight, Ella,” he said pressing a kiss to her forehead before making a quick escape in fear that she might wear him down and get him to do something they would both regret. Once again, he slept on the couch, glad that this one was so large if this was going to become a habit. He set the alarm on his phone for seven in the morning so they could both be up in time to be at work.

“Ella,” he said as he shook her shoulder. “Time to wake up.”

“Mmmph,” she swatted at him and he ducked it with a laugh.

“I have asprin here for you, but you have to get up to take it,” he coaxed in a sing-song voice.

“I’m gonna shove that asprin up your ass,” she muttered turning her face into the pillow.”

Lucifer laughed louder at that, making her wince. “That would be a new one for me, darling, but I’ll try anything once,” he joked. When she put the pillow over her head, he tried one more time. “You’re going to be late for work if you don’t get up now.”

“Oh crap!” That did the trick because she sat up like a shot before groaning and putting her head in her hands.

“I assume you want the asprin someplace other than up my ass now, yes?” he teased.

She just grabbed the pills and the glass of water from his hand and downed them. Once she did she managed to open her eyes and look at the clock. “Oh man. I’m gonna be really late. I gotta go home first.”

“No need,” he told her. “I’ve taken care of everything.”

“I can’t wear the same clothes two days in a row, and I doubt you have anything that will fit me,” she pointed out.

“I know. But I went to the store across the street and got you something. I assumed that after the late night it would be better to let you sleep an extra hour than wake you up and make you drive home with a hangover,” Lucifer told her.

“The store across the street…you mean Neiman Marcus? You bought me clothes from Neiman Marcus?” Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined owning something from there. One shirt would have taken her entire paycheck.

“Of course,” he said with a shrug. “It was the only store nearby. But if you don’t hurry and get in the shower you’ll be late anyway.”

She grabbed him in a quick hug of thanks before heading for the bathroom. While she was showering, Lucifer was cooking a quick breakfast, having already showered and gotten ready himself. By the time she got out he was putting the plates on the table and figured they had about fifteen minutes to eat before they needed to leave. “Dude, you got me Gucci?” Ella said in awe as she came out, fully dressed with her hair in a ponytail. “And I don’t want to know how you got my underwear and bra sizes.”

“I have a very discerning eye for such things,” he winked at her and motioned to the table. “Eat.”

She sat down and picked up her fork as the turn of the conversation brought back her memories from the night before. She was almost finished eating before she found words. “About last night…”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about it,” Lucifer waved her off.

She ignored him. “I just want to say…thank you. And I wouldn’t have blamed you if you had gone for it. It would have been my own fault.”

He looked at her with a serious frown. “No one will ever share my bed unless they truly wish to, Ella.” Even when he used his allure, it only worked if they wanted him anyway. He did, after all, ask what /they/ desired.

Ella smiled, a little embarrassed, and leaned over to kiss his cheek. “And that’s why you’re such a good man, Lucifer. Devil or not,” she said as she grabbed her jacket and headed out.

Lucifer sat there blinking in surprise for a moment before he got up and gave the dishes a quick wash before heading out too. He could drive much faster than Ella and keep control, so they ended up arriving at around the same time.

Chapter Text

They didn’t catch their killer until just before lunch on Friday, and Lucifer was about to head out for his therapy appointment when Dan stopped him. “Hey, Lucifer, hold up.” When he stopped and turned around, Dan looked a little uncomfortable as he said, “Look, Trixie made me promise to ask you…I told her you probably wouldn’t want to…but she talked me into a game night tomorrow, and…”

“Far be it for me to disappoint the child. Tell her though, that unless she’s expanded her repertoire she’s not painting my face again. I’ve had more than enough rainbows and unicorns on my cheeks for a lifetime,” Lucifer drawled. “And I will pick my own karaoke songs this time. As much as I appreciate the challenge of singing Whitney Houston, it won’t be repeated.”

Dan just gaped at him like he’d turned the entire world on its head. There were so many things in that statement that threw him for a total loop that he couldn’t even pick one of them to focus on. Once he found words again, he said, “Okay. I’ll tell her. Two o’clock?”

“Sounds good. Shall I bring the standard game night menu?” he asked and Dan nodded. “Very well…oh wait…I have an idea…Ella!” he called up to the lab. When she opened the door and looked down he said, “Game night with the child tomorrow at Daniel’s. Two o’clock.”

“I’m in. Tell Trix I can’t wait,” she said with a grin before ducking back into the lab.

“Perhaps with an extra face to paint, I’ll have more luck at avoiding it,” Lucifer reasoned.

“Yeah. Good luck with that one buddy,” Dan just clapped him on the shoulder before walking off, intending to attempt to find some solid ground in his new world, and not even caring that Lucifer had invited someone else to his house without asking. It wasn’t like he’d invited one of his stripper friends. Ella would have gotten an invitation anyway if he’d thought of it first. Trixie would love it.

Lucifer’s session with Linda that afternoon went much as expected. She praised him for getting back out there but when he told her about the game night the next day, she warned him to expect it to bring out some memories. He, of course, thought she was telling him not to go, but she quickly corrected that. “It’s good to go. To hold onto something of your old life even as you move on. To see that just because one thing changed you don’t have to lose everything. I just want you to be prepared for the fact that it might be hard at first so it doesn’t catch you off guard.” She knew how he tended to react to those things and hoped that the warning would keep him from running away.

Lucifer promised to keep that in mind and found himself wishing that he hadn’t agreed to go now. A deal was a deal though, and he would never break a promise. Especially to the child. At least Ella would be there. She had proven very good at keeping his spirits up. As long as he could hold off his mood until after he left, it would be alright.

The next day, Lucifer loaded up with popcorn, candies, and finger foods like French fries and chicken nuggets before heading to Dan’s house. Ella got there not long after he did and all the adults were getting the popcorn popped and putting the rest of the food in platters or bowls while Trixie set up the monopoly game. It went as normal for a while, with each of the four of them laying on their stomachs facing a different side of the board, but Dan made the rookie mistake of allowing Lucifer to be the banker.

Trixie was the first to land on an unowned property after she got low on money and she pouted when she didn’t have enough to buy it, so Lucifer just handed over a stack of cash and her face brightened. “Hey, you can’t do that!” Ella protested, popping her sucker out of her mouth to do so.

“Banks give loans do they not?” Lucifer asked smugly.

“Not in the game, they don’t,” Dan told him.

“Who’s the banker here?” Lucifer asked.

“The rules say no loans, so there’s no loans,” Dan said firmly taking the money from Trixie and handing it back to Lucifer and the property went up for auction. Lucifer just waited until Dan and Ella got into a bidding war and weren’t paying attention before he slipped the money to Trixie anyway. She beamed at him and slid it under the board so no one would notice. She was smart enough to wait a few turns to pull it back out and use it.

The next dust-up happened about an hour later when Dan spotted Lucifer paying for things out of the bank instead of his own money. When he called him out on it, Ella reached over for the bank. “Okay that’s it. I’m the banker now,” she said with a laugh.

“I don’t think so,” Lucifer held onto it. “You can’t change bankers mid-game.” That started a struggle for the bank that ended up with money flying through the air. Trixie cheered and giggled as she started grabbing everything she could and adding it to her stack.

Dan shook his head exasperatedly. “Is this how game nights usually go?” he asked Trixie in a stage whisper.

“Mommy’s not silly enough to let Lucifer be the banker,” she whispered back loudly, causing Ella to burst into laughter and Lucifer to pout.

“Okay, how about everyone put all their money back and we’ll start over with the initial amount from here,” Dan made a decision. “And /I/ will be the banker from now on.”

“Spoilsport,” Lucifer muttered. That at least prolonged that face painting portion of the day. Once Trixie had won the game, the face paints came out, and Lucifer reiterated his earlier stance. “I do hope you can do something other than rainbows and unicorns now.”

“I can do stars,” she offered helpfully.

“Stars are acceptable,” he nodded and let her get to work, unfortunately not paying any attention to the colors she used. “Did you know that I made the stars?” he asked conversationally as she painted his face and Dan and Ella tried not to laugh at how oblivious Lucifer was to the pink glittery stars that were appearing on his face.

“Really? That is sooo cool!” she exclaimed.

“Yes really. That’s why they called me the lightbringer,” he told her.

“Which one was your favorite?” she asked.

Lucifer blinked in surprise a moment. No one had ever asked him that before. “I’ve never thought about it, but I suppose if I had to choose one, it would be this one.”

“Which one?” she asked confused.

“The one you call the sun,” he chuckled, trying to stay as still as possible so that he didn’t mess up her artwork.

“Awesome!” Trixie said excitedly. “Did it take a really long time to make them all?”

“It was really boring in heaven. I had to have something to keep me busy,” he told her.

“So did you make the Earth too then?” she asked.

“No. That was my father. He decided that the stars weren’t enough. There needed to be more in the universe so he highjacked my stars and started making planets around them,” Lucifer said disgruntled and Ella couldn’t help but snicker at his tone. “How many stars are /you/ making child?” Lucifer asked impatiently when he realized how long she was taking.

“As many as you did,” she said cheekily.

“I don’t think so, urchin. You may finish the one you’re working on and that’s it.”

“Okay,” she huffed. She had gotten five on each cheek and was finishing the third on his forehead by now anyway so she could live with that. “All done.”

Lucifer grabbed the mirror to look and scowled. “Since when are stars pink miscreant?”

“You make your stars your way and I’ll make my stars my way,” she said stubbornly before grabbing the paints and running over to the other side of the room. “Daddy’s next!” she exclaimed before Lucifer could protest her statement. Dan tried to argue for stars too of a different color, but Trixie wasn’t having it. “Lucifer had unicorns and rainbows lots of times, so he’s allowed to ask for something else.”

Lucifer chuckled as did Ella who was sliding over to sit next to Lucifer now so they could watch Dan’s turn. “That was a pretty cool story you told Trixie.”

“It was all true,” he told her.

“I know. But it’s still cool,” Ella told him. She’d heard of Lucifer as the lightbringer many times and there were theories out there that said he made the stars, but knowing about it and hearing it were two very different things. It made him seem almost larger than life the way he talked so matter-of-factly about something so incredible. “So are there any pictures of you with the unicorns and rainbows?” Ella asked mischievously.

“Of course not, dear Ella. No pictures is a standing part of that particular deal,” Lucifer told her.

“I hope you reminded Dan of that,” she told him.

“I did. And I also have a little insurance policy of my own,” he whispered, sliding his phone out of his breast pocket enough to see that it was recording.

“You’re breaking a deal?” she asked with a raised eyebrow.

“The deal was no pictures. It said nothing about video,” he smirked. “That said, the video will stay private as long as pictures of me with pink stars on my face don’t surface anywhere.”

Chapter Text

Once everyone had their face painted; Ella didn’t protest the unicorns and rainbows and proceeded to paint a flower and a turtle on Trixie’s face in return; it was time for the karaoke portion of the evening. As they were all going through the catalogue picking songs, Ella suggested Eternal Flame for Lucifer and he visibly winced and shot it down immediately before saying he needed to stretch his legs for a minute and walking outside.

Once he was outside, he leaned against the tree in the yard, lit a cigarette, and pulled out his trusty flask. Here was the pain that Linda had warned him about. He had been beginning to think that she was worried over nothing. There had been a twinge when the child mentioned how her mother had never let him be the banker, but that was it before now. Now it was washing over him in waves.

When Lucifer was gone, Ella looked confused at what she’d said that got that reaction when Dan explained, “It was one of Chloe’s favorite songs. I’m not sure what kind of history they have with it though.”

“Oh,” Ella said sadly looking towards the door and wondering if she should go after him or not before deciding that she needed to. The last thing he needed was to brood alone. She was somewhat surprised and glad to see that he hadn’t gone far. At least he wasn’t running. Just getting some space. That was a good thing. “I’m sorry,” she said as she leaned against the tree. “I didn’t know.”

“There was no reason that you should have known,” Lucifer told her.

“Do you want to talk about it?” she asked. “Dan said that it was one of her favorite songs, but didn’t know more than that.” She intentionally avoided mentioning Chloe’s name.

“I sang it to her once not so long ago,” Lucifer admitted with a sad sigh. “We were on a case. There was this bar doing an open mic night…” he trailed off, lost in the memory.

“I’m sorry,” she said again, leaning against his side and resting her head against his shoulder. “She’s an idiot who has no idea what she threw away.”

Lucifer scoffed. “She threw the devil away, Ella. It’s not exactly a loss for her.”

She smacked him in the chest. “Yes. It is. I would give just about anything for a guy who would sing me a song like that. Even if he was the devil.”

“So you would take any evil horrific man in the world as long as he would sing to you?” Lucifer asked skeptically.

“Hey how. We’ve already established that you’re not evil and you’re definitely not horrific in any way,” she argued.

“I thought we were talking about your choice in men, not me in particular,” he joked.

Ella laughed and bumped her side against his playfully. “Dork,” she teased. “Okay so no. I wouldn’t take just anyone just because they sang to me, but that’s still a pretty big gesture that can make up for a lot of other deficiencies.”

“If he was stupid?” Lucifer asked mischievously.

“Depends on /how/ stupid,” she told him, grinning at the game.

“If he was ugly?”

“Who cares about looks?”

“If he had severe halitosis?”

“Okay that one might be a deal breaker,” she laughed.

He laughed with her and put out his cigarette. “Come on. We should get back in before we get assigned songs.”

“Sure thing,” she looped her arm in his as they headed towards the house.

“Lucifer!” Trixie cried as she attached herself to his waist again. “You came back!”

“Of course I did. I promised karaoke didn’t I? And you should know by now that I never break a promise.”

Twenty minutes later they all had a list of songs picked out and they started with Dan singing I Love Rock and Roll which left everyone wincing at his voice. Trixie went next with Part of Your World from The Little Mermaid. Then was Ella with I Believe in a Thing Called Love. Lucifer finished off the first round with Born to Run. From there all semblance of order fell apart. Ella grabbed Lucifer to back her up more than once which prompted Trixie to do the same and Dan to jokingly protest that no one wanted him as backup. Lucifer’s quip of “We want you to back up from the microphone does that count?” saw a handful of popcorn to fly at him which started the food fight that ended the karaoke and only broke up when Trixie skinned her knee diving over a table.

As they were leaving, Trixie gave Lucifer another hug and said, “I’m glad you came. I wasn’t sure you would.”

“As long as it remains every two months, I will continue attending as long as you wish,” he promised.

“I thought you said that game night was every month?” Dan asked Trixie suspiciously.

“It is. Next month is Auntie Maze’s turn,” she told him.

“Ah. I understand completely,” Dan said amusedly as he tried not to laugh. He wasn’t the least bit surprised that they had to alternate months. He couldn’t believe that Lucifer let him and Ella see him like that. There was no way he would let his demonic enforcer see it. The more time he spent around Lucifer the more amazed he was that Chloe could ever think he was evil. He had apparently done this with her regularly for a while. How could she possibly see the devil with unicorns and rainbows painted on his cheek by an eight-year-old and still think he was evil? It boggled the mind. He was starting to wonder if having her committed might have been doing her a favor.

Lucifer headed home feeling better than he had in a long while, and resolving to listen to Dr. Linda more often. She’d said that this could be healing and that he didn’t have to lose everything just because one piece was gone, and she’d been right. Just as she had been about the tough parts, though there were fewer than he’d expected, and it never ceased to amaze him just how easily Ella always managed to pull him out of a funk. He waited a few hours after he got home to wash the paint off his face. He would never admit how much he liked the urchin’s style when she’d told him that her stars would be her way.

The next few months settled into an easy routine. He spent most days at the precinct, working at Lux in the evenings, early mornings, or occasionally during the day when there was nothing to do at the precinct. Ella visited once or twice a week, and at least one of those times was spent partying in Lux, usually with Maze, sometimes with Dan, Linda, or both. Linda also stopped by once a week or so, sometimes for the party night, and sometimes just to chat. He and Dan were becoming better friends, but other than the occasional party at Lux and the game night every other month, he didn’t see much of him outside the precinct, which was understandable since he was a single father now. When he didn’t see Amenadiel, he assumed that he’d gotten his wings back with the whole slowing time thing at the pier and flitted away back home. Just like his brother to leave without even saying goodbye.

The pain in Lucifer’s heart was hurting less and less when he thought of Chloe, who also hadn’t been seen since that fateful night. He was also thinking of her less often which helped too. Dr. Linda had told him that he was well on the path to healing and he actually believed her this time. That didn’t mean that it didn’t still overwhelm him from time to time, but those times were coming less frequently. One big change was that, since losing Chloe, he found himself feeling something that Dr. Linda called loneliness. He tried to put it out of his mind though. The devil didn’t do lonely. He still had friends for the first time in his long life. There was no reason for him to be lonely. Despite his best efforts though there was still a hole there that not just anyone could fill.

Lucifer swore to himself that the hole would forever remain unfilled. He’d given the whole love thing a shot and it blew up in his face and nearly destroyed him. He wasn’t about to open himself up for that again. Not now that he was finally functioning normally again. His bed was seldom empty, even if he occasionally wasn’t in it when Ella was sleeping one off. He had his friends, his work, and all the fun he wanted. That was enough. It would have to be.

Chapter Text

It was about six months since the incident and things were completely back to normal. Well, as normal as could be when Lucifer was partners with Dan of course. They’d had their rocky moments, but now their partnership was as solid as could be. Which wasn’t saying much considering the fact that Lucifer was currently hiding from his partner in Ella’s lab. Just because he ate the last pudding cup in the fridge was no reason to threaten a guy’s manhood for crying out loud.

Ella was half working and half watching Lucifer in amusement. She knew it annoyed some people, but she found his compulsion to touch everything in sight adorable. She’d seen him catch himself at it often enough to know that he didn’t do it on purpose and she wondered if it had something to do with all those years in hell. If maybe the absence of something there caused him to develop this complex. Thankfully he had learned not to contaminate unprocessed evidence, though that could have something to do with the fact that she kept the bags sealed right up until she was ready to process it.

She was waiting for some test results when her phone rang. She glanced at it with the intention of just sending it to voicemail and dealing with it later, but when she saw that it was the manager of her apartment building, she was curious enough to answer. “Hello?...Yes…WHAT?!...No, I…okay that’s good, but…o-okay…t-thank you…”

When Lucifer heard her first stutter, he snapped his head around to look at her and when he saw the tears welling up in her eyes, the empty coffee cup he’d been sniffing clattered to the table and he was by her side in under a second. It was a good thing, too, because no sooner than she hung up the phone, she crumbled and burst into tears and Lucifer just reacted. He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her into a firm hug that kept her on her feet as she broke down and sobbed. He was fairly sure that this was the first hug he had ever initiated, and was also reasonably certain that it was the first one he had actually participated in since the incident.

Lucifer wracked his brain, trying to think of something he could do to fix this…whatever this was. The only thing he could think of was the one and only time that he had been in this state and Linda had started running her hands through his hair. He wasn’t sure if it helped or not, but it was worth a try. He kept one arm wrapped around Ella’s back while the other arm went to her head and started running through her hair. Suddenly the door to the lab opened and Dan stuck his head in. Lucifer could tell that he was about to say something, but stopped when he got a look at what was going on and then asked, “What happened?” Lucifer shrugged helplessly, so Dan came over and put a hand on Ella’s back. “Ella, sweetie, what’s wrong?”

Ella just shook her head that was buried in Lucifer’s chest and didn’t speak. Probably couldn’t speak. The part of Lucifer that had no idea what he was doing and was completely floundering wanted nothing more than to hand her off for Dan to deal with and make his escape, but a larger part of him couldn’t bear to let her go. Not when she was like this. Dan sighed and said, “I gotta get going, but call me if she needs anything?” Lucifer looked between the woman in his arms and his partner, torn on what he should be doing now, but Dan just shook his head. “You stay. I’ve got this.” Lucifer nodded and returned to feeling lost and uncomfortable as his only chance for salvation left.

Thankfully it wasn’t much longer before Ella managed to get control of herself and muttered, “Sorry.” She couldn’t bring herself to step out of his arms though. They were the only thing keeping her together right now.

Part of Lucifer wanted to tell her that she should be sorry. What was she thinking falling apart on him like that? Didn’t she know that he had no idea what to do? What he said was, “Whatever are you sorry for, darling?”

“For breaking down…and for messing up your suit,” she sniffled.

“That’s truly the least of my worries at the moment,” he said as he let go and steered her to the only chair in the lab. He sat her down and then knelt in front of her so they were nearly eye level. “What happened?”

“Th-that was my apartment manager on the phone. H-he said that there was a…a gas leak, and…and the building exploded,” she said trying very hard not to break down again.

“Was anyone hurt?” he asked, wondering if she’d lost a friend or family member and that’s why she was like this.

“N-no,” she shook her head. “They managed to get everyone evacuated in time before…”

“Then anything else can be fixed,” Lucifer assured her.

“Fixed?” she asked incredulously. “I’ve lost everything. The only things I currently own are the clothes I’m wearing.”

“Then it’s a good thing you have a rich friend who is more than willing to help you out,” Lucifer said encouragingly.

“I-I can’t ask you to…”

“You’re not asking, darling,” Lucifer told her. “I may not have much experience with friendship, but to my understanding it is times like these when friends come together and help each other, yes?”

“But it’s too much,” she protested. She knew full well what Lucifer was offering because that’s just the way he was.

“Nonsense. What’s the point in having money if you can’t use it to help a friend who’s just lost everything, hmm?”

“I-I-I…th-thank you, Lucifer,” she lost her grip on her tears again as she threw her arms around his neck. He hugged her back until she got control of herself and let go.

He got up and helped her to her feet. “Come on. Let’s go get the rest of the day off and then we can get you sorted, alright?”

She just nodded and let him lead, too numb to do anything but follow at the moment. After a brief stop by the lieutenant’s office to let her know what happened and that they would be taking the rest of the day off, he led her to his car. “We’ll come back and get your car later,” he promised. The first stop was Neiman Marcus where he ushered her over to the saleslady. “My friend here just lost everything she owned in an explosion. She needs an entire wardrobe, including shoes,” he told her.

“Lucifer, no. I can get by with just a few things for now,” she found the strength to protest.

“An entire wardrobe,” he said firmly. He knew that she didn’t make much money and was often cutting corners to make ends meet. He wasn’t going to have her going into debt for this. Not when it wasn’t even her fault. The saleslady smiled and nodded at him, taking Ella by the arm and leading her into the store.

While Ella was occupied, he took the opportunity to make some calls. He’d spent the drive considering how else he could help her when he lit on the perfect idea. Maze’s old apartment downstairs at Lux. He’d offered it back to her when she’d moved out of the apartment she had shared with Chloe, but she didn’t want it, so Ella could have it. At least for now. Until she could find somewhere she liked better. It needed some work though. First of all it needed locks installed, and preferably a security system. Maze had been a security system of her own, but if Ella would be staying there it needed to be safe. He would also need to have an outer access door installed. She probably wouldn’t like to have to go through the club every time she went in and out. Soundproofing was also a must since it was attached to the club. It hadn’t been a problem for Maze since she tended the bar whenever the club was open while she lived there, but it would be a problem for Ella.

By the time she was back and the clothes and shoes were stacked on the counter, all the arrangements had been made and scheduled and he’d paid extra for a rush job. It would be finished in three days. Until then, she could stay with him, or Maze, or Linda, or Dan. He was sure any of them would offer. He had also texted Dan while she was busy and let him know what happened and he’d said to let him know if there was anything he could do to help. Once Lucifer had paid, he loaded everything in the car and headed for Bed Bath and Beyond. That was a much quicker trip and she was soon kitted out with everything she needed urgently. At least until she got into her own place and then she would need things like dishes, pots and pans, and so on.

Chapter Text

Once they were back in the car, she started crying again, and Lucifer fought the urge to sigh. “What is it?” he asked.

“I…thank you for all this. I can’t tell you how much it means to me. I just…keep thinking about the things that can’t be replaced. I know it’s stupid, and I should feel blessed to have what I do thanks to you, but…”

“What is it that can’t be replaced?” Lucifer asked.

“A-all my pictures and photo albums. My keepsakes. M-my turtle. Bob.”

Lucifer was quickly making a plan in his head as he turned towards Lux. As a result, he didn’t exactly get around to responding to her statement as he refined it out loud. “Maze had an apartment downstairs at Lux. I’m having some work done on it so you can move in there. It’ll be a few days before it will be ready though. I’ll be out of town for a bit though, so you can stay at the penthouse while I’m gone and by the time I get back the apartment should be ready.”

“I can’t just let you give me an entire apartment, Lucifer,” she said wearily. “I can find someplace to stay.”

“I know you can,” Lucifer told her. “Look, I will never understand you humans and your preoccupation with little bits of paper or numbers on a bank’s computer screen. If you don’t want to keep the apartment long term, then okay. But you can at least stay there until you find another one.”

“Fine. But I’m paying rent,” she told him.

“If you wish, but no more than you were paying at your old place and not until next month,” he bargained. “You already paid this month there, I presume.” She nodded both at his statement and in acceptance of the deal.

Once they got back to the penthouse, Lucifer helped take all her bags up before packing one of his own. “If you’ll give me your keys, I’ll take someone to get your car for you on my way to the airport,” he offered.

“Yeah. Okay,” she said, handing them over. “Where are you going?”

“Out of town,” he said cryptically, and she rolled her eyes but didn’t push. It was none of her business. He grabbed one of the bouncers from downstairs since there was still an hour before the club opened and took him to get Ella’s car before calling the airline and getting a plane ticket to Detroit leaving in two hours. While he was on the plane, he did some research for the next leg of his mission. He had to get creative since he had so few names to go by, but by the time he landed he had an address that he was reasonably sure was the right one and ordered a car to pick him up.

After he dropped his stuff off at the hotel, he headed to the ramshackle house and resisted the urge to brush off the non-existent dust. He couldn’t imagine growing up in a place like this and his respect for Ella just grew. A stern looking old woman answered the door and Lucifer switched to fluent Spanish, partially to charm his way inside. “Hello, are you Ella Lopez’ grandmother?”

“What’s happened to my Ella? Is she alright?” The woman suddenly asked in an almost panic.

“She’s perfectly fine. I promise. I’m a friend of hers from LA and I just need a favor for her,” he told her.

“Who are you?” she asked narrowing her eyes.

“I do apologize. I should have introduced myself first off. My name is Lucifer Morningstar and I work with Ella at the LAPD,” he said charmingly.

“Paloma Lopez,” she introduced herself as she narrowed her eyes at him. “Very well. Come in,” she said after a moment of scrutiny. “What favor does my Ella need?”

“There was an incident this morning at her apartment building. There was a gas leak and the building exploded. She’s fine, as I already mentioned,” he added quickly, but not in time to stop her prayer which made him wince as she made the cross sign. Contrary to popular belief, such things weren’t poison to him but that didn’t meant that he was comfortable with what they represented. He just continued. “I’ve helped her get clothes and everything else she needs for the moment and I’m refitting an old apartment I own so she’ll have a place to stay until she gets back on her feet. She is most upset over the loss of her family photos though, and I hoped you could help me there.”

She looked torn for a moment before she said, “I only have one copy of my photos…”

“If you would be willing to loan them to me, I can have copies made and have the originals returned to you by tomorrow. Possibly the day after, depending on how quickly the copies can be done,” he suggested. “You have my word that they would be returned in the same condition I got them in.”

She narrowed her eyes at him and studied him for a long moment and he resisted the urge to fidget under her gaze. Just when he thought that he was about to be thrown out, she said, “I will accept your offer on one condition.”

“What’s that?” he asked

“My Ella’s soul remains her own. If you must have a soul in payment for your kindness to her, you will take mine. This is not negotiable.”

Lucifer blinked in shock for a good minute before he found words. “I don’t need or want anyone’s soul,” he said incredulously. “I am helping Ella because she is my friend. That’s all.”

“You are the devil,” she said clearly.

“Did Ella tell you…”

“She didn’t need to. You did. You are Lucifer. You are here to make a deal to help my granddaughter.”

Lucifer sighed heavily. “I know this is probably going to fall on deaf ears, but I’m not what you humans make me out to be. I’m not evil. I /punish/ evil. I don’t hurt innocents and I certainly don’t take anyone’s soul, as payment for help or otherwise.”

“You are Lucifer the angel and not Lucifer the devil,” she said, continuing to scrutinize him.

“I’m still the devil. I’m still the king of hell. Someone has to keep the demons in control and away from the Earth.” He looked away as he felt his emotions start to overcome him. He’d come here to help her, but now he’d probably destroyed her relationship with her family just by being her friend. “Look, I know I’m not going to convince you that I’m not evil, but can you please at least help me help Ella?”

He could still feel her eyes on him for a few minutes before she got up and left the room. He wondered whether he should be waiting or leaving, but before he could come to a conclusion she returned with a stack of albums. “Your word that they will be returned?”

“Will you accept the word of the devil?” he asked wearily.

“I will accept the word of the angel you once were,” she said firmly.

He nodded. If that was as good as he was going to get. “You have my word that they will be returned in exactly the same condition they are currently in.”

“Very well,” she said. “And when you return them, we will talk about your relationship with my Ella.”

Lucifer resisted the urge to respond to that in any way but a nod as he turned and walked out. He let out a heavy breath when he got back to the car. Ella had said that her grandmother was formidable but what the hell? He was the devil for crying out loud. And how had she seen right through him so completely. If he didn’t know that he would be able to sense if one of his family was nearby he would have suspected that she was his father with the power she seemed to hold over him.

He shuddered as he told the driver to head to the nearest all night printing place. He paid the employee a large bonus to get it all done in a rush and allowing him to be present. He had promised that they would be returned in the same condition and he wasn’t going to let some idiot clerk make him break a deal for the first time in his life. Especially not to that particular woman. He watched the kid like a hawk as he copied all the pictures and even made sure that each picture went back in the same slot it had come from.

It took all night and most of the next day before he had copies of all of the pictures. It was already dark before they were finished though so he headed back to the hotel and told himself that it was most certainly NOT to avoid a certain old woman for as long as he could. He did stop on the way and grab a stack of new photo albums and spent most of the night putting the pictures in them for Ella. It was more of a way to keep busy than anything else. He knew she would probably rearrange them anyway.

Chapter Text

The next morning, Lucifer waited until around ten am before heading out. He doubted that Mrs. Lopez slept in, but didn’t want to chance waking her up if she did. By leaving at ten he should be able to be there and gone before a lunch invitation could be issued…if one was going to be issued at all, and he could be back in LA by this evening. He knocked on the door, trying to hide his apprehension, and it was answered almost immediately. “Come in,” she told him, stepping aside for him.

He resisted the urge to sigh. So much for an easy handoff. Once he was in, she motioned him to sit as she took the albums from him and started flipping through them. He started to get up and leave at some point but she just barked, “Stay,” and he immediately sat back down. For the first time he was starting to understand how his power affected people and he didn’t like it. Only when she had flipped through every page of every book did she set them aside and nod. “You kept your word. Good.”

“I always keep my word,” he assured her.

“You care for my Ella, yes?” she asked.

“Yes. I do. She is a very dear friend,” Lucifer admitted freely.

“Only a friend?” she asked skeptically.

“Yes,” Lucifer told her honestly.

“But perhaps not always,” she guessed.

“I…I don’t…um…”

“If you care for her, you will stay away from her,” she told him.

“I…I can’t do that,” he said, closing his eyes and looking away so that she wouldn’t be able to see the emotion in them.

“Why?” she asked.

“Well, we…we work together…and…and she wouldn’t let me if I tried,” Lucifer tried to explain.

“And you don’t want to.”

Lucifer sighed. “No. I don’t,” he couldn’t stop from saying.

She looked at him for a long while before nodding. “Good.”

“P-pardon?” he asked confused.

“She needs someone strong enough to fight for her. Even against this,” she told him, letting an amulet fall from her fingers.

Lucifer’s eyes widened when he saw it. “Wh-where did you get that?” he asked in shock.

“It doesn’t matter,” she told him. “You would not have been able to enter this house if you were evil and you cannot lie to me at all while I have it. I have always known my Ella was destined for greatness. I don’t know what role you will have in that destiny, but I know you are meant to be a part of it somehow.”

“But I’m the devil,” he said, completely baffled now. How could he be a part of some grand destiny? How could a devout catholic woman believe in him at all, much less apparently trust her granddaughter to him?

“And you were an angel first. Your story isn’t finished yet.”

“How do you know that?” he asked.

“Because you are here,” she told him. “As long as you live, your story is not finished.”

“I…” Lucifer struggled for words, but had none in response to that, so he changed the subject. “Do you have another of those amulets?” he asked hopefully.

“Why?” she asked.

“I want to give one to Ella,” he admitted, not that he had a lot of choice but to answer her questions as long as she was holding it.

“Why?” she asked again. “You wish her to have this power over you?”

“Not particularly,” he told her. “But if that’s the price for her to be a little bit safer then yes. There are very few of those that exist. My father is very strict about divinity falling into human hands.”

“As he should be. I do not have another, and even if I did, I would not give it to her. Not as long as she is close to you.”

“Why?” he asked incredulously. “Don’t you want her to be safer?”

“You of all beings should know that power corrupts, Lucifer. She may be safer from any demonic evil that may come into contact with her due to her association with you, but the power she will hold over you would corrupt her in time. I can feel it starting to affect me already with the little contact I’ve had with you. I will have to trust in you to protect her from your world, and if she should die, I would rather her die with a pure soul than a corrupted one.”

Lucifer couldn’t argue with that. He would rather her go to heaven than end up corrupted and in hell. If that meant that she had to die sooner if he failed to protect her then so be it. If the little contact that Mrs. Lopez had was already starting to corrupt her, then he wouldn’t risk Ella’s soul. “I will do everything in my power to protect her. You have my word.”

“Good. Now you should go, Lucifer Morningstar. Do not seek me out again, or look for this amulet. You will not find it. It’s path through our family will end with me,” she told him, as she left him to see himself out.

He had already checked out of the hotel and had his bag in the car waiting for him so they headed straight for the airport and he was on the 12:00 flight back home. Due to the time difference he would land at LAX at two pm. He didn’t breathe easily until the plane was in the air. He’d never thought he would see one of those amulets. One of the few pieces of divinity that humanity was permitted. Supposedly it was so that something of humanity would survive if he were to raise the demons for the apocalypse. To him it was just another sign of the lack of faith that his family had in him. He wondered if the contact with it had changed Ella’s family somehow. Maybe that was why she was so…insightful. Or maybe that was just her.

During the flight, he found himself worrying that this was another issue like Chloe. His father meddling in his life. If Ella was just another manipulation. What were the odds that of the dozen amulets like that in the world, one of them was passed down through her family? He shook that thought off though. No, that was ridiculous. Even his father couldn’t have traced the path of the amulet that far, and the amulet would never fall into Ella’s hands anyway. If he had something to do with it, then she would have it. He was sure of it. He only hoped that he was right.

He knew that he should be freaking out right now. Between that amulet and the fact that Ella apparently had some grand destiny…it had his father’s fingerprints all over it, but he couldn’t quite manage to care and that confused him. He almost wondered if something was messing with his head, but that wasn’t possible. Not even his father could do that. If he could have then he never would have rebelled in the first place.

Once he got back to LA and got his car from the airport, he had one more stop to make on the way to Lux. He dropped his newest purchase and the photo albums off in the finished apartment and headed upstairs to look for Ella while the workmen cleaned up. He found her sitting on the couch watching television and she looked up and grinned at him when he came in. “You’re back. How was your trip?”

Lucifer opened his mouth to answer three times before he managed to find an almost adequate word. “Interesting.” He dropped his bag on his bed and told her, “The apartment is ready if you want to go take a look at it and then we can go and get the rest of what you need.”

“You’ve done so much for me through this, Lucifer. I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”

“Wasn’t it you who said that favors weren’t done for repayment?” he said amusedly as he led her to the elevator.

“Well yeah, but that was for little things,” she told him.

“It shouldn’t matter if they are big or small. No debts can exist between friends,” he told her.

Once they were in the apartment, Ella’s eyes immediately lit on the large aquarium on the table and she ran over. “You…you got me…a…a new turtle?” she looked at him with tears in her eyes.

“I told you that I would replace what I could,” he said with a shrug, his gaze falling to the photo albums next to it.

“What is…” she flipped the first one open and her jaw dropped as she kept flipping pages faster and faster before grabbing the next album and checking just the first page and all the rest. “How did you…”

“Your grandmother was kind enough to let me copy her pictures. I know it’s probably not all of what you had, but…oof,” he was cut off by the tightest hug he’d ever received in his life and he couldn’t help but hug her back.

“You…you…I can’t believe you…that’s where you went…” she cried into his shirt.

“These are happy tears, I hope?”

“Of course, you dummy,” she sniffled, just squeezing him tighter.

Chapter Text

“You met my abuelita huh?” she asked amusedly once she had herself back under control again.

“I did,” he shifted uncomfortably.

“Oh come on,” she laughed. “You can’t tell me she scared even the devil.”

He shrugged helplessly. “In my defense, that amulet she had did most of the work.”

“The amulet?” she asked confused. “You don’t mean that it’s real do you?”

Lucifer couldn’t help but chuckle. “You know the devil personally and you doubt the veracity of an amulet?”

“Amulets are a dime a dozen anywhere you go,” she pointed out. “They always make grand claims.”

“Well this one was the real deal,” Lucifer told her. “It was…unsettling.”

“What did it actually do to you?” she asked worriedly, sitting next to him on the couch and putting her hand on his knee comfortingly.

“It forced me to answer every question she had with the complete truth for one thing,” he said disgruntled.

“But you always tell the truth anyway,” she pointed out.

“Yes, but not the entire truth, and I do avoid a lot of questions when I feel the need to,” he pointed out.

“Good point. What kinds of questions did she ask you?”

“It’s not important,” Lucifer told her.

“Case in point for avoiding questions,” she teased. “Did it do anything else?

“It forced me to obey her,” he said with a shudder. He left out the one thing that he didn’t obey her on. He hadn’t figured out how he had gotten around that one yet. Could it really have just been that he was strong enough?

“What did she make you do?” Ella asked, forcing the bile back down her throat at the idea of Lucifer being stripped of his free will.

“Nothing bad, darling,” he assured her. “Just made me sit back down when I tried to leave at one point, and tried to make me take her soul instead of yours, as if I would ever do such a thing.”

“So she knows…” Ella said hauntedly. She had no idea how this was going to affect her family dynamic.

“I didn’t mean to tell her,” he said. “I never wanted to make things more difficult for you.”

“I know, Lucifer. It’s not your fault,” she told him. “How did she…take it?”

“Well apparently the amulet was good for one other thing. She knows I’m not evil at least. It wouldn’t have let me in the house if I was. She seemed to take it well enough after that surprisingly.”

“Good. That’s good,” she sighed with relief.

“Oh come on. You can’t tell me she scares the woman who faced down the devil in his own home,” he teased her.

She stuck her tongue out at him in response and he laughed. “I should probably call her soon.”

“Tomorrow,” he told her. “We still have a lot to do today to get this place ready to move in.”

“Does that mean you’re kicking me out of the penthouse?” she joked.

“Not at all, darling. You’re welcome to stay as long as you like. I just thought you might like your own space back sooner rather than later.”

“Good point,” she chuckled. “Let me just make a list of what else I need for Trevor here.”

“He should be good,” Lucifer told her, assuming she was referring to the turtle. “I got everything the man at the pet store recommended. The rest of the supplies are in the cabinet under the table.”

She opened to door and looked through everything before she grinned. This was going to be one pampered turtle. “Perfect. Thanks Lucifer,” she said kissing his cheek as she got up. When she got to the door, she realized that he wasn’t following. “Weren’t we going to go shopping?”

“Right. Yeah,” he said shaking his head as he got up. They managed to get everything except groceries before they had to get back so she could get what she had moved and the linens on the beds before she passed out.

“You can just shop in the penthouse for groceries for tonight and tomorrow morning,” he told her. She chuckled and nodded. She would go grocery shopping after church in the morning. She wasn’t telling Lucifer that though. First of all, she didn’t want to mention church to him again, not that she intended to hide that she was going of course. Secondly, she knew that he would try to pay for it if he knew, but this was one thing she had enough money left in her account for. She just hoped her plan didn’t backfire and she didn’t come home to full cabinets. She doubted it though. Other than Trevor, he had taken her to pick out everything, and she didn’t see why food would be any different.

He helped her get the essentials set up before he went back upstairs, but not without another grateful hug from her and she collapsed on the couch in exhaustion for a few minutes. Once she caught her breath, she fed Trevor, guessing that Lucifer hadn’t done so, and got up to go to bed. Not before running her hands over the front of the top photo album with a happy smile. She still couldn’t believe that Lucifer had done that. Just hopped on a plane within an hour of her saying that she missed her pictures, flew halfway across the country, braved her grandmother and her magic amulet, and brought some pictures home. It boggled the mind.

The next morning when Lucifer woke up, he headed to Linda’s. When she opened the door, she immediately let him in and asked, “What’s wrong?”

“What makes you think something is wrong?” Lucifer asked confused.

“Because in the two and a half years that I’ve known you, you’ve never once come to my house,” she pointed out.

“I haven’t?” he asked, tilting his head in thought. “Huh. I hadn’t realized that. How remiss of me.”

Linda shook her head with a chuckle. Now she knew that nothing was wrong wrong. He was just spinning his wheels over something. That was the only thing that got him this scatterbrained. “Come on,” she led the way to the living room. “Can I get you anything? And no I don’t have any alcohol in the house.”

“Just water then, thanks,” he told her, scrunching up his nose at the thought. “Should have just called you to come over.”

Linda laughed as she came back with a glass of water for him. “So what brings you here?” she asked as she sat down across from him.

He started from the beginning and gave her the whole story, from the phone call Ella got about her apartment until he went to bed last night. “Okay, so if I’m understanding you correctly, what’s got you worried is the fact that you couldn’t answer her grandmother’s question about a future relationship, the fact that you’re not worried about your father’s hand in things, and why you were able to fight the amulet’s effects when she told you to stay away from Ella. Am I right?”

“Essentially,” Lucifer nodded.

“Okay so the fact that you dropped everything and spent a fortune when Ella needed help, flew halfway across the country on a moment’s notice to replace her pictures, had an entire apartment retrofitted, and didn’t even think twice means nothing to you?”

“Why should it? She’s my friend and she needed help. I’d do the same for you,” he told her confused.

Linda couldn’t help the warm smile that spread on her face at that, but still said, “I doubt that.” When he looked almost hurt she explained. “I don’t doubt that you would drop everything to help me, and lend me as much money as I needed. Maybe even take me shopping. But refitting an entire apartment and flying halfway across the country to replace pictures that could just be mailed out instead…that’s above and beyond even for you.”

“What are you saying?” Lucifer asked, narrowing his eyes at her.

“I’m not saying anything. I’m asking you to look at your own actions objectively and draw your own conclusions.”

“You think there’s something to her grandmother’s idea of a future with us, don’t you?”

“The important thing is what /you/ think,” Linda told him. “You were worried about why you couldn’t answer that question. What would that amulet do if you didn’t know the answer? Or if you were denying the answer?”

“It would force me to tell the truth as I know it, and I doubt it would be affected by something so trivial as denial,” Lucifer said irritated.

“Okay, leaving off the question of whether there is anything there or not, why are you so against even the suggestion of it?”

“What makes you think I’m against it?” he asked.

“You keep asserting that she’s just a friend like me. You started getting agitated when I disagreed, and you’ve been defensive ever since the subject was brought up. So why are you so against it?”

“Because I’ve tried the whole love thing before, doctor, and it nearly destroyed me. I won’t do it again.”

Chapter Text

Linda sighed sadly. “There is something I’ve been meaning to bring up, but I didn’t want to dredge up old hurts. I see now that I should have done it anyway.”

“What is it?” Lucifer asked defensively.

“I owe you an apology,” she told him.

“For what?”

“Before everything happened, I kept encouraging you to open up to Chloe. I assumed your reticence was due to an inability to trust, but I realized after everything happened that some part of you instinctually knew that she couldn’t handle it. That she couldn’t be trusted. I shouldn’t have just disregarded that.”

“What happened is hardly your fault, Doctor,” Lucifer scoffed. “I didn’t take your advice and tell her anything. She saw me in a complete accident.”

“I know. But it doesn’t change the fact that I steered you wrong and didn’t pay attention to your own instincts.”

“What does this have to do with now?” Lucifer asked irritated. He didn’t want to dredge all this up again.

“Because now I am asking you…what do those instincts tell you about Ella?”

“What do you mean?”

“I know that she knows the truth about you and who you are, but how much does she know?” Linda asked him gently.

“Everything,” he said. “Well maybe not /everything/. I’ve lived a long time. But all the big stuff.”

“As an example, does she know more than me?” she asked curiously.

“It depends on how you define more, I suppose,” Lucifer told her. “She knows more of the overall information, but you know more little details since that’s usually what you ask about.”

“How so?”

“For example, she asked how the power structure of hell works and how things get done when I’m up here. You asked if your Uncle Edgar was there and what Hitler’s hell was like,” Lucifer explained.

“Okay, that makes sense. So essentially she does know more than me about the big picture. What about how you got there in the first place?”

“She knows the whole story,” Lucifer said with a shrug.

Linda resisted the urge to smirk. She had asked that many times and just got evasive answers in return. “Is there anything about yourself you feel like you can’t tell her or that you have to hide from her?”

“No, not really. I mean, she got most of the story from me when I was at my lowest point.”

“So she’s seen you at your lowest point, she knows your history, I’d wager that she knows you better than anyone, am I right?”

Lucifer shrugged. “Maybe. I guess.”

“You’re being evasive again,” she pointed out.

“Okay. Yes. She probably does. It doesn’t change anything,” Lucifer snapped.

“No? You trust her, Lucifer, whether you admit it or not. You trust her in a way you never trusted Chloe, because your instincts are spot on. You trusted them then and you were right. Trust them now.”

“So what? You think that I should just go and confess my undying love and give her the chance to break me too?”

“Is that what you feel for her?”

“No…I-I don’t think so?...Maybe?”

“You don’t have to know right now, Lucifer and that’s okay. You can figure that out in your own time. All I’m saying is don’t let your previous bad experience keep you from trying again when and if the time comes. Trust your instincts, and I think it’s pretty clear that your instincts say that Ella can be trusted.”

“Being friends with the devil and loving him are two very different things, as I’m sure you know. You nearly had a coronary when you realized that you slept with the devil, after all.”

“You’re right. Well not so much about me. I was just shocked is all. But you’re right about them being different things. It could be that you fall in love with her only to realize that she doesn’t feel the same way. That’s always a risk, and one you have to be prepared to face if the time comes. Yes it will hurt, but it won’t be a betrayal. Those are also very different things.”

“That still doesn’t help me figure this out,” Lucifer said in frustration.

“I know. It’s never easy. But you’re trying to figure everything out all at once on a timetable that’s not your own. This isn’t something that you can rush. The answers will come when they come. You just have to be open to them when they do.”

Lucifer huffed. He’d never been good with patience. “What about the specific issues I’m dealing with?”

“Well we’ve already addressed the question that you couldn’t answer, so let’s talk about the fact that you’re not so worried about your father’s involvement. Do you think that maybe your worry over that was some part of you picking up on the fact that something wasn’t right with Chloe? Maybe you were looking for a reason for it to be wrong and latched onto your father as an excuse?”

Lucifer thought about that for a minute. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

“And maybe since you don’t have that feeling with Ella, you’re not as worried about it. It feels more natural. Easier maybe?”

“Maybe,” he said again.

“This is good. This is what you need. To think about it. To consider the possibilities and figure out where they go. As far as the question of why you were able to resist the amulet when she told you to stay away from Ella, I think that’s a far more simple answer and not necessarily as deep as you might think.”

“What do you mean?”

“You care about her. Whether it’s friendship or more than that doesn’t matter. You care deeply for her either way. So much so that you were able to overcome a divine imperative. Now that I’m thinking about it, that may have something to do with why you don’t fear your father’s involvement too. After managing to overcome that, you feel more confident that you can overcome other obstacles he puts in your way.”

Lucifer nodded, deep in thought. “I think I could have overcome that if she’d told me to stay away from you too,” he decided.

“Possibly. Like I said, that doesn’t necessarily have to signal romantic feelings,” Linda explained. “None of what you’re dealing with means that you have those feelings for her.”

“But what if I do?” Lucifer asked desperately. “I don’t know if I can do it again.”

Linda moved over to sit next to him and put her hand on his knee comfortingly. “Even if you do have feelings for her, you don’t have to do anything about it until you’re ready, and you don’t have to be ready right now. No one will fault you for needing more time.”

“But what if I’m never ready?”

Linda chuckled. “You’re just borrowing trouble now. Just take it one step at a time. Don’t let what ifs and somedays derail you. I know you’re used to seeing the big picture, but sometimes you need to forget the big picture and just put the pieces together as they come.”

“Like solving a case,” Lucifer said with a nod.

“Exactly. You don’t have all the answers when you start. You have to find them and take things one step at a time to the conclusion.”

“Instead of getting into the head of the murderer, I have to get in my own head,” Lucifer thought out loud. “But how do I do that?”

Linda laughed. “If anyone knew how to do that, I would be out of a job.”

“But you know…don’t you?”

“Nope. I’m fumbling along blindly just like the rest of you. I just have better tools,” she joked.

“Wish you’d share,” Lucifer mumbled.

“What do you think all this is about?” she shook her head amusedly. “My job is to share those tools to help you find your way.”

“Thank you, Doctor. You’ve been a big help,” Lucifer said as he got up to leave.

“You’re welcome,” she said with a smile and almost squeaked in surprise when he reached out and hugged her. It was quick and nervous, but it was a hug. Initiated by him. She barely managed to return the hug before he was gone.

She went to put his glass in the sink as she turned things over in her head. He was making so much progress. Things were so much easier with him the last few months. There were fewer misunderstandings and he seemed more introspective. He seemed almost…comfortable in his own skin was the best way to put it. It was amazing what changing one element of a dynamic could do sometimes. Before, Chloe was the center of his support system. She was his rock and she wasn’t up to the task which affected him more than any of them had realized. Once she had crumbled though, Ella seemed to slot right into that place.

Linda didn’t know if there was a romantic future for Ella and Lucifer, but she found herself hoping there was. They were good for each other in so many ways. Ella had accepted him so easily in a way that no one else had really. Dan had accepted him immediately too, but he’d had no choice. It was a high-pressure situation and to prevent a murder, something he abhorred, he’d had to take Lucifer’s side. It was different from the way that Ella had accepted him. No pressure. No judgement. No demands. He was her friend and that was all that mattered to her. Devil or not. It was taking time, but it was bringing him out of his shell, and Linda was glad for that.

Chapter Text

After Ella left church and the grocery store, she called her abuelita on the way home. After a bit of small talk, they got to the reason for the call. “I expected to hear from you soon. Assuming Lucifer told you of his visit, that is.”

“He kinda had to tell me Abuelita. How else would he have explained the photo albums,” Ella pointed out.

“He told me what happened to your building. How are you?” she asked.

“I’m okay. Thanks to Lucifer. I feel kinda bad for him actually,” Ella chuckled.

“Why is that?”

“He’s not exactly the best with feelings,” she admitted, loving the fact that she could be open with her grandmother for the first time in months. “Especially when a woman bursts into sobs in the middle of her lab. I didn’t really notice at the time, but it was obvious he had no idea what to do.”

“What did he do?” her grandmother asked curiously.

“He just hugged me until I calmed down enough to talk and then sat me down asked me what was wrong and then promised to fix it,” she laughed.

“So no different than any other man then. And better than some.”

“Pretty much,” Ella grinned. “That’s Lucifer though. Take away the superpowers and he’s just like anyone else. A little more clueless about some things and a lot more knowledgeable about others. I’m really not happy that you used that amulet on him though,” she added dangerously.

“Did you expect me not to be sure when the devil turns up on my doorstep claiming to be a friend of yours?”

“You could have just asked me,” Ella said. “Unless you don’t trust my judgement.”

“Of course I trust your judgement nieta. But the devil is said to have a silver tongue woven with lies. He has a power over people and the only way to be sure was to negate that power,” she tried to placate her granddaughter.

“Okay, to correct some misconceptions, yes he does have a power over people. He can make people confess their secrets. He uses it to make murderers confess at work, but it only brings out truth. HE is all about truth. Lucifer never lies. Even if the truth makes him look bad. He might avoid a question or tell a partial truth, but he never tells a lie. He doesn’t steal souls either,” she said pointedly. “And did you really try to offer him your soul for mine?”

“I did and I would do it again,” her grandmother said firmly. “Perhaps one day when you have children or grandchildren you will understand.

“I don’t think you realize how much that hurt him for you to even imply it. I know that you couldn’t help it though. You didn’t know any better. And so does he, which is why he tried to hide how much it hurt him. Which is also why he tried to make the amulet seem like no big deal, but do you have any idea what you did to him?”

“I made myself safe and made sure you were safe. That was all that mattered.”

“You took away his free will. The very reason he left heaven is because he wanted free will. His great sin that got him thrown into hell was giving free will to humanity because that’s how much it mattered to him and you stripped it away from him like it was nothing,” Ella said, trying to blink the tears from her eyes as she pulled into the alleyway next to her new apartment.

“And yet, he still asked me to give the amulet to you,” her grandmother said.

“He WHAT?!” she yelled. “He didn’t tell me that part. Why would he…how could he…”

“Because he wanted you to be that much safer,” she told her granddaughter. That had been the point where she had completely turned her opinion around on him.

“I don’t want it. If you send it to me I’m going to throw it in the deepest part of the ocean I can find. Or maybe a volcano if I can get to one,” Ella told her firmly.

“I already told him that I will never give it to you as long as he is in your life, but I am very proud of you for realizing the danger nieta. No one needs that kind of power over another being.”

“But you used it on him. You used that power and stripped away everything that he values,” she pointed out.

“Yes. I did. And I will pay the price for that. And I will pay it gladly for all the reasons I already told you. What’s done is done and there is no use in dwelling on it any longer.”

“As long as it’s understood that you are never to use it on him again if you get a chance,” Ella practically ordered.

“I already told him not to come see me again,” she promised. “That way the temptation is removed.”

“Okay, good. Now what did you mean about the price?” she asked worriedly, now that was settled.

“I simply meant the price we all must pay when our time comes. It is nothing to worry about.”

“Okay then. Listen Abuelita, I have to go. I just got home and I need to get my groceries inside and put away, but I’ll call again soon, okay?”

“Yes, we have much more to discuss,” she said cryptically.

Ella barely managed to control her anger long enough to get everything inside and put away before she stormed up to Lucifer’s penthouse. “Lucifer!” she snapped irritably as she looked around for him.

“Ella?” he asked worriedly as he came out of the bedroom. “What’s wrong?”

“How could you even think…for a minute…that I would accept that…that…disgusting amulet?”

“Because it would keep you safer,” Lucifer explained.

“Safe from what? From you? I’m already safe from you.”

“And safe from any demons that make their way up looking for me,” he pointed out.

“And what about the cost to you? You would really give up your free will every time I’m around just to make me a little bit safer from a threat that might never even come? And you really thought I would accept that?”

Lucifer shrugged sheepishly. “It was just a thought.”

“Well you get that thought out of your head right now. I’ll tell you the same thing I told Abuelita. If I get that amulet it will be thrown in the ocean or a volcano, preferably the latter. I will never EVER use it. Not anywhere near you. Got it?”

Lucifer’s lips twitched in a smile as he nodded. The conversation he’d just had with Linda brought to mind the fact that Chloe would have taken it. Even if she had come to realize that he wasn’t evil. Even if they had gotten together, she would have taken it. Maybe not used it, but she would have wanted the safety net. “Since that’s settled, are you ready to go grocery shopping?”

“I already did. I had enough in my account for that and I can’t let you pay for /everything/,” she told him.

“Oh. Okay. So you just came up to yell at me for trying to keep you safe then?” he joked.

She punched him in the arm. “No. To yell at you for trying to sacrifice your own well being to do it. That’s not cool. Ever.”

“Well since you’re here, you want a drink?” he asked with a grin.

“Ugh, you’re such a pain sometimes,” she said just as much amused as annoyed.

“Is that a yes?” he teased.

“Yes that’s a yes.” A moment later she had a drink in her hand and was sitting next to him on the couch and they fell into the same easy conversation as always. This time it was more about Ella’s childhood. Now that he’d met her grandmother, he was curious. She didn’t like talking about her childhood much but since she knew pretty much all his worst moments, it was only fair.

It was a couple hours later before they were interrupted by the ding of the elevator and Lucifer turned to see who it was. When he saw an old man that’d never met he stood up and looked him over curiously. “Can I help you?”

“My king!” the man cried and rushed over, falling to his knees in front of Lucifer. “I’m so glad I found you. This city is very confusing.”

“Dromos?!” Lucifer asked incredulously.

Chapter Text

“What are you doing here, Dromos?” Lucifer snapped, glancing over at Ella as if to be sure she was still okay.

“I’m sorry, my lord. I know that possession has been banned, but there is a situation and we need you.”

“What kind of situation?”

“We had a redirect, my lord. One that has been long awaited. We don’t know what to do with him,” Dromos told him.

“Well spit it out. Who is it?” Lucifer asked impatiently.

“Cain, my lord.”

“Cain? As in the worlds first murderer? How did he break my father’s curse?” Dromos looked at him confused. “Never mind. Forget it. I’m sure his file is pretty thick.”

“He has many files. The one marked murder is as high as my knee and the others are nearly as high,” Dromos informed him.

“Well well. Someone has been busy. I am unable to return right now, so I will trust you to take care of this in my stead. He is to be guarded at all times by at least two demons in addition to any that are playing with him. He is to be kept in the most secure cell that is unoccupied. Perhaps my mother’s old cell. And if he escapes, Dromos, it will be your head.”

“But…my lord…you’ve been on vacation for so long. We miss you. We need our king,” Dromos whined.

“Do you think I don’t know what I’m doing Dromos? Do you think I do anything without reason? Do you not trust your king?”

“I do trust you, my lord. But…”

“But nothing!” Lucifer snapped, eyes flashing red. “I have my reasons and they are not for you to know. I will return when I have completed my tasks here and not before.”

“Yes, my lord. I’m sorry my lord,” Dromos groveled.

“Good. Now if there is nothing else, you will take that body to the nearest alley and return to hell immediately,” Lucifer told him.

“Can’t I stay for just a little while? I’ve never tortured a live one before.”

This time Lucifer’s face went full devil and his voice took on the demonic undertones. “You will NOT lay a hand on anyone. You’re lucky I haven’t incinerated you already for questioning me. It’s time for you to go home. NOW!”

“Yes, my lord. Right away, my lord,” he bowed before rushing out.

Lucifer didn’t relax until he was gone and he turned to Ella. “Are you alright? I’m sorry you had to see that…”

“It’s fine, Lucifer,” she waved it off. “It’s your job right? To keep the demons in line?”

“Yes but…”

“No buts. It’s who you are. Why would it bother me?” Lucifer breathed a sigh of relief, so Ella felt safe to ask. “I am curious about a few things though.”

“You know I am always at your disposal for questions, my dear Ella,” he waved his arms wide in invitation and sat back down next to her.

“What did you mean by your tasks here?” she asked curiously.

“Nothing at all,” Lucifer said with a chuckle. “Well, nothing specific anyway. If I told the demons I was never coming back they would rebel. If I told them I just wanted to play some more, they would rebel. If they think I’m up here doing important kingly duties that they aren’t privy to, the status quo remains.”

“Isn’t that a lie?” Ella asked confused.

“Not at all. I am doing tasks up here. I’m catching murderers. Running my club. Having fun. I never said what my tasks were now did I?” he smirked.

She thought about it for a minute before she laughed. “Definitely gotta be careful with you.”

“Always, darling. Haven’t you realized how dangerous I am yet?” he joked.

She shook her head amusedly before turning to her next question. “What was that about a redirect?”

“I mentioned before that Hell pulls people in by their guilt, yes?” She nodded. “Well sometimes the most heinous of people commit terrible crimes, but have no guilt whatsoever. They are automatically sent to heaven. However, heaven gets a file the same as I do and they have a lot more available angels to look through them. When those people get to heaven they are redirected to hell.”

“Okay that makes sense. But I thought you said the process was all automatic?”

“It is for most souls. Redirects are different. Because their guilt didn’t pull them down, there is nothing to feed on. It falls to me to design a hell loop that will torture them appropriately.”

“But since you’re here…”

“I can’t design a hell loop, hence the guards. Most redirects I wouldn’t worry about. They are always the worst of the worst so the demons get free rein, and no matter how bad or smart they are, no one has the strength to escape once the demons get ahold of them. Cain is different though. He’s lived almost as long as I have and if his files are as big as they say, then he’s been a very successful murderer and criminal mastermind for all that time. Even Hitler’s murder file was only about four inches thick and he was charged with every murder in every concentration camp. Anyone who can get away with so much for so long should not be underestimated.”

“Wow. Yeah. That makes sense. I would definitely want to be careful with that one,” she said wide-eyed. If more than ten million murders was a four inch thick file how many would be in a two foot high file? And with that being only one of many files…she wasn’t really one to condone torture, but she could make exceptions.

Ella didn’t stick around much longer. She still had a lot of unpacking to do. She did stick around long enough to prove to him that she wasn’t leaving because of his display back there though. It was a few days before she got around to calling her grandmother again, and the conversation went much as expected until the end. “I’ve been trying to decide whether to tell you this or not, but I think you would be better forewarned.”

“Forewarned of what Abuelita?” Ella asked worriedly.

“Lucifer loves you Nieta. He doesn’t realize it yet, but he does.”

Ella laughed. “No he doesn’t. You have to be wrong.”

“Why is that so hard to believe, Ella?”

“Because…he just got out of a really bad situation…he can’t…”

“How bad?” Abuelita asked worriedly.

“Worse than mine even,” she said seriously before explaining. She told her Abuelita everything. Well everything except Lucifer being Lucifer, but now that she knew that, they were back to no more secrets. She knew that she could trust her to keep it to herself and she knew that Lucifer would understand. “There was this detective that we worked with…Chloe…she and Lucifer were partners for years and everyone could see that they were head over heels for each other. He kept telling her that he was the actual real devil, but she never believed him until she saw for herself one day. She took off, found one of those crazy extremist priests that you always warned us about, and they came back and tried to kill him. No matter how much evidence she got that he wasn’t evil like she thought, she just wouldn’t believe and kept going on about how he had to be killed or he would destroy the world and all kinds of stupid stuff,” she sniffled, tears forming at the thought of it.

“The worst part though, was that he had never loved anyone before her. In all the millennia he’s been alive, she was the first person he ever loved and she turned on him like that. He actually tried to let her do it even. He was going to just drink the poison anyway. Thankfully another of our friends was there and stopped him. Oh Abuelita…when I found him later that night…he was so broken. He was questioning everything, especially himself.”

“How long ago was this?” her grandmother asked her.

“About six months since she came back. Longer since she ran off when she learned who he was.”

“And you have been there for him since then? You put him back together?”

“I have and I helped. There were a few of us who had a hand in getting him through it,” she explained.

“Then that explains it,” she said with certainty. “You have been his anchor for so long that he has grown attached. He hasn’t realized it yet because he is still colored by that pain. Our first loves always flare the brightest, but they tend to die the fastest as well. He will realize how he feels. The question is how do you feel?”

“I…I don’t know…I mean…”

“Just think about Nieta. You have time.”

“H-how would you feel if I did? I mean…he’s the devil…”

“Yes. He is. But as I have always reminded you…he was an angel first. He is capable of love. He was willing to sacrifice everything he held dear to keep you safe. There is proof now that he is not evil. If you love him, then I will support you.”

“I’ve never needed proof to know that he wasn’t evil,” she pointed out. “And I knew the rest of that too.”

“Then all you need to know now is your own heart,” her grandmother said before they ended the call. She just hoped her granddaughter thought long and hard before making a decision. She didn’t want to put the pressure on her, but the very fate of the world could hang on her decision. After what she had learned about Lucifer’s last love, she had no doubt that his love for Ella would either be the key to his redemption or his greatest fall yet and she feared for the state of the world if he fell.

Chapter Text

It took Lucifer a few months before he came to the realization that he did love Ella, and then he was even more of a bundle of nervous energy than usual as he tried to figure out what to do about it. He wanted to be with her, but he was afraid. He spent a lot of time with Dr. Linda trying to come to terms with that and move past his fear and it was almost a year since the worst day of his life when he finally felt like he was ready. Now he just needed the opportunity. He skipped the first one since she was drunk. He didn’t want it like that, and not only because it could lose him any chance in the future. It was a few days before the next one came around.

They were lounging around in the penthouse as they tended to do at least one night a week when the discussion came back around to his arrival on Earth this time around and he was telling the whole long story. “So there he is thanking me for my help and he just casually mentions how evil I am. Like he’s just discussing a shopping list. Like it’s nothing. Like he just expects me to agree because how could I not.”

Ella reached out a hand to his cheek to turn his face to look at her. “Lucifer, anyone who knows you knows that you’re not evil. You couldn’t be. You’re too good,” she told him earnestly.

When he looked into her eyes and saw all the compassion there, he was lost. He knew that this was his chance. His heart felt like it was beating out of his chest as his eyes darted down to her lips for a moment before returning to her eyes. It felt like forever that he sat there with his pulse roaring in his head as he tried to get up the nerve, but it had only been a second. He leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers and it stole every breath from his body. He lifted his hand to her cheek as he kissed her softly and slowly and when she kissed him back, he felt like he was floating. When it ended, he leaned his forehead against hers, breathing heavily and their breaths mingled between them for a moment before she leaned back. “Th-That wasn’t a…an ‘I want to sleep with you’ kiss was it?” She stammered.

“No,” he whispered, as he opened his eyes to look at her, feeling the fear start to well up in him again as her eyes looked almost panicked.

“It was…was more that…wasn’t it?” she asked essentially the same question again.

“Yes,” he told her, begging her with his eyes not to go. Not to hurt him. Not to break his heart. Not again.

Every fiber in Ella’s being was screaming at her to run, but she forced herself not to. Not yet. She knew she wouldn’t be able to stop it for long, but if she ran now, without any explanation, then she could lose this forever and she wasn’t willing to give up just yet. She might still lose him forever anyway, but at least if she could say something…anything…she might have a chance. “I-I don’t know if I can…can do this…I’m…I’m scared.”

Lucifer sighed sadly and looked away so she wouldn’t see the tears in his eyes. “Because I’m the devil.”

“No!” she said almost hysterically. She couldn’t let him believe that. Not even for a minute. “It has nothing to do with who you are. It’s…it’s me…I just…I need to go…” she started to get up to run, but he grabbed her hand to stop her, which just made her panic worse.

“Just answer me one question first?” he practically begged. “Do you have any feelings at all for me?” She couldn’t force any words from her throat right now, but she managed to nod so he let her go. Once she was in the elevator, he slumped back onto the couch and finally let the tears fall. He’d been so close. So close to having it all.

He wiped the traitorous tears away even as more took their place and he turned every moment over in his head looking for his mistake. Trying to figure out where he went wrong. Only her answer to his last question gave him a sliver of hope that maybe all wasn’t lost. Maybe if he was patient. Or should he fight for her. He just didn’t know. If he chose wrong…he needed help.

He rushed downstairs and to his car, driving as fast as he safely could towards Linda’s house. When he got there he knocked on the door and kept knocking until it opened. “Lucifer? What’s wrong?” Linda asked worriedly.

“I messed up. At least I think I did. I don’t know,” he said as he came in and plopped down on her couch.

“Okay. Just tell me everything from the beginning,” she said as she sat down next to him, taking his shaking hand in hers.

He started from the beginning as she’d said. From the conversation straight through until the elevator closed behind her. “I don’t know what I should do. Should I give her space? Should I talk to her? Tell her I’ll wait? Should I fight for her?”

“There’s no easy answer here, Lucifer,” Linda told him sympathetically. “I’m not her, and I don’t know what made her react that way so I can’t tell you what she needs. All I can do is ask you what /you/ want to do.”

“Anything. Whatever it takes,” Lucifer said unreservedly. He’d known that moment their lips met that he would do absolutely anything for her. If she wanted him to fight he would fight to his last breath. If she needed time, he would give her eternity. He’d thought he loved Chloe before, but comparing that to how he felt for Ella was like comparing a drop to the ocean.

“That’s not particularly helpful in this case,” she said gently.

“Just tell me what to do, Linda,” he said plaintively.

“I told you…”

“I’m not asking my therapist here. I’m asking my /friend/. If you were me, in this situation, what would you do?”

This was one of many dilemmas in Linda’s life since she took the devil on as a patient. That line between patient and friend kept blurring more and more and she never knew which way to go. Normally in this situation she would refer him to another therapist and just be his friend, but it wasn’t so simple. She was the only therapist who knew about the angels and demons stuff, so she was the only one who could help him. So which would it be this time. Therapist or friend.

It didn’t take her long to decide on friend. They were in her home, not her office and he was specifically asking for his friend. “Okay. But I would like to preface my advice with the reiteration that I don’t know what she’s dealing with so I don’t know what would be best.”

“I get it. I won’t blame you if I crash and burn,” Lucifer said impatiently.

“Okay, so you said she kissed you back happily first.” He nodded. “Then she looked panicked.” He nodded again. “She said it wasn’t about you being the devil.” Another nod. “And she said that did have feelings for you.” One more nod. “Then the best advice I can give you as a friend is to wait a few days. See if she comes to you. If she doesn’t then maybe think about a grand gesture, but not something that will put her on the spot. Something to show her how much you care without going too far.”

Lucifer felt the knot in his chest loosening now that he had a plan of action. “Okay. Wait a few days and then grand gesture. Got it.”

“But Lucifer…this gesture…it needs to have meaning. Buying her a big gift won’t cut it. One thing you need to make sure you remember is that it might not work. Don’t take a bigger step than you can handle if it doesn’t.”

Lucifer nodded thoughtfully, trying to make a plan. He knew what he wanted to do, but the question was whether he could go that far without any guarantees. If he could put himself out there that far. He knew that he didn’t have a choice though. If he wanted this to work, he would have to go all in. If he didn’t, he would always wonder if it would have made a difference. “Thank you, Linda,” he said sincerely, pulling her into a tight lingering hug before he left.

Linda smiled after his back. “I just hope you’re still thanking me afterwards,” she muttered. She really hoped that wasn’t the last hug she would ever get from him. She didn’t know if he could take another heartbreak.

Chapter Text

Lucifer texted Dan and told him that he was taking a few days off. If he was going to give her space, he was going to do it right. She wouldn’t see him unless she chose to. Dan, predictably, asked if everything was okay, and Lucifer said that it would be. He just had some things to handle. If this didn’t work, he would probably be far from okay, but he was trying not to think like that. He had to keep his hope alive if he was going to have any chance at all of getting through this at all. He was already a nervous wreck and he still had days to go.

He hoped that she would come to him before he had to do this, but he knew that was probably a fool’s hope. He remembered how panicked she’d looked. That wasn’t something you could get over in a few days. Over the next few days, he didn’t leave the penthouse at all. He spent most of his time pacing and didn’t sleep for more than an hour at a time. He had spent so much time running his hands through his hair that it was standing up all over the place. He couldn’t even bring himself to play the piano.

It was just his luck that his few days were up on Saturday night of all nights. He tried to force his jitters down as he took a shower, styled his hair, replaced his rumpled suit with a freshly pressed one, and took a few deep breaths before he headed down in the elevator. He didn’t go down the stairs yet though. He pulled out his phone and sent a text, having made a last minute change to the plan this morning. ‘If you need time or space, just say the word and I’ll wait for you, but if you want to know how I really feel, come out to the club.’ He hit send before he could chicken out and walked down the stairs to wait.

Ella was sitting on her couch trying not to cry, as she had been the last few nights, when she got the text. She read it three times, trying to puzzle out what he meant. Then she sat there for a while trying to decide what she wanted to do before realizing that there was only one thing she could do. She had to know what he was talking about. She couldn’t just spend the rest of her life wondering what could have been possible if she’d just walked out that door. She took a brief moment to wash away the worst signs of her crying and brush her hair. She threw on the first casual outfit she could find. Anything was better than going out there in her pajamas.

Lucifer had been watching her door for fifteen minutes and she hadn’t come out. Nor had she texted him back. He tried not to panic. Maybe she wasn’t home. Maybe she was busy. Maybe she wasn’t coming at all. He sighed and put his head in his hands. When he looked up again, he saw her standing there outside her door, looking around. He was both ecstatic and even more terrified, and both of them for the same reason. He was going to get his chance. Now he just had to not blow it. He signaled the deejay, who cut the music as he headed to the piano.

Lucifer remembered what Linda said about not putting her on the spot so he didn’t call her out as he sat down and just started to play. He looked at his hands like he hadn’t done since he had first started to play, and he played the opening three times before he managed to center himself enough to look up and sing. The words came easier than he’d thought they would the second he met her eyes. “I see the questions in your eyes; I know what's weighing on your mind; You can be sure I know my heart.” He sang with as much feeling as he’d ever sang anything in his life.

“'Cause I'll stand beside you through the years; You'll only cry those happy tears; And though I make mistakes; I'll never break your heart,” he continued and Ella’s eyes filled again with the tears that she had just cleaned the evidence of away. This time they were happy tears though. He was singing to her. Publicly.

“And I swear by the moon and the stars in the sky; I'll be there; I swear like a shadow that's by your side; I'll be there,” He couldn’t have looked away from her if he tried, especially as the next part came. He knew the significance. He’d been on Earth long enough. He wanted her to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt that he meant every word. “For better or worse, till death do us part; I'll love you with every beat of my heart; I swear”

Ella’s hands were over her mouth now as she tried to hold in her feelings, but at the same time she still felt the fear coursing through her. Was singing a song with someone else’s words a loophole in the lie thing? “I'll give you every thing I can; I'll build your dreams with these two hands; We'll hang some memories on the walls; And when just the two of us are there; You won't have to ask if I still care; 'Cause as the time turns the page, my love won't age at all,” he continued singing.

“And I swear by the moon and the stars in the sky; I swear like the shadow that's by your side; I'll be there,” he sang as he all but begged her with his eyes to see everything he was saying. To see that he was completely baring himself to her. He could see no indication of what her response would be as she just stood there with her hands over her mouth and tears streaming down her cheeks. He didn’t even know if they were happy tears or sad tears.

By the time he had started the last stanza, she knew what she had to do. If he was willing to go this far, she had to give him a chance. She didn’t have a choice. She would never forgive herself if she didn’t. “For better or worse, till death do us part; I'll love you with every beat of my heart; I swear.” It took until the last notes faded for her to get up the courage to move and she started to walk towards the piano.

Lucifer saw her coming and felt his heart in his throat. With every step she took his hope rose higher. Surely she wouldn’t come all the way over here to reject him in the middle of the club. She would just turn and go back to her room right? When she sat down on the bench next to him, he reached up and turned the mic off. He knew that the people closest to them would hear every word anyway, but there was no need to make it any more public than it already was. She seemed like she was struggling to speak, so he decided, in for a penny, in for a pound. Maybe she needed some reassurance in his own words. He took both of her hands in his and whispered, “If you’ll take a chance on me, Ella, I’ll give you everything I have to give. I swear.”

Ella still couldn’t find words, but she found a better way to communicate her feelings. She grabbed both sides of his face and kissed him desperately, pouring every ounce of feeling she had into the action. His heartfelt words of his own after the song had been the last straw to break through her fear. She blushed brightly at the applause that broke out when she kissed him, but wasn’t letting go until she had to. She was glad when she heard the deejay start back up. At least that meant some of the attention would be off. Hopefully.

Lucifer choked up when she kissed him and immediately pulled her into his lap sideways, deepening the kiss. He couldn’t care less about who was watching now. She was kissing him. That was all that mattered. This time when the kiss broke and he rested his forehead against hers, she didn’t pull away and they just sat there for a long moment. “I love you, Ella,” he took the chance to tell her. Really, after everything else he’d done tonight, it was such a small thing.

Ella didn’t think it was such a small thing though because she tilted her head forward and kissed him again, this time soft and slow, much like when he’d kissed her the other night. When she returned to their previous position, she said, “I love you too, Lucifer.”

Chapter Text

“Can we go somewhere and talk?” she asked him after a few minutes.

“Absolutely,” Lucifer said, waiting for her to get up so that he could and they headed upstairs to the penthouse. As out of character as it was for him, he actually did hope that she really meant to talk. He’d just poured his heart out after all, and only got a few words in response. Not to mention, he wouldn’t go so far as to demand it, but he did think he deserved some sort of explanation about the last few days.

Once they were upstairs, Lucifer sat on the couch and pulled her down next to him and she turned to face him. As much as she wanted to climb in his lap or curl up to his side and be as close to him as she possibly could, she knew that she needed to explain first. Give him a chance to decide that she wasn’t worth the hassle. She couldn’t bring herself to let go of his hand though. “I’m sorry,” she started earnestly.

“I don’t need apologies, Ella,” Lucifer said gently. “I just want to understand why.”

“I was almost married once,” she blurted out before taking a few deep breaths to steel herself to tell this story. “I was young, just out of high school, and we were madly in love. At least I thought we were. When I found out I was pregnant, he asked me to marry him. We were getting married in a small church a month later. We wanted it done before I started to show. I hadn’t seen him since the previous day when we went for our bachelor and bachelorette parties. I was there, in the receiving room at the church, full white gown, veil, shoes that were killing my feet, just waiting for the bridal march to start and he never showed. I found out a few hours later that he had run off with one of the strippers from his bachelor party. I fell apart after that. I could barely function. I…I lost the baby two weeks later…” she had tears streaming down her face by the end.

Lucifer had sat patiently through her story, and he was starting to understand where she was coming from now. He reached his hands to her cheeks and used his thumbs to wipe away her tears before pulling her forward to kiss her forehead lovingly. “I meant every word down there, my love. I will be by your side for as long as you’ll have me. No matter what?”

“Even if things in hell go crazy and they really need you back?” she asked worriedly.

“Then my father can send someone else or do it himself,” he said seriously.

“Even if the demons threaten me and use me to get you back?”

“Then I will be here fighting for you at your side. They would have to go through my dead body to get to you and that would rather defeat the purpose,” he assured her.

“Even if…” she trailed off biting her lip.

“Even if what, darling,” he coaxed.

“Even if you get scared and are tempted to run off and marry a stripper again?” she said with a wince, both for throwing his past in his face and the reminders of her own past.

“It will never /ever/ happen,” Lucifer assured her. He started to continue but stopped himself. From the little he knew of relationships, talking about stuff like this wasn’t a good thing.

“What?” she asked worriedly. “Please don’t do that. It makes me worried about what you were going to say.”

Lucifer sighed and ran his hands down her arms to take her hands in his again. “In talking with Linda, I’ve learned a lot about why I acted the way I did with Chloe. I just wasn’t sure that you wanted to hear it. That’s why I stopped myself.”

“I do want to hear it,” she told him. “I…I think I need to hear it.”

“I never showed Chloe what I was because instinctually I knew that she couldn’t be trusted. I ran away every time we started to get close because I knew that we weren’t right together. I didn’t realize that I knew, but something in me did know. But I’ve never run from you, Ella, and I never will. I showed you my true face right away and you didn’t even flinch. I trust you completely. I could never have gone out there and bared my soul like that for anyone else, but you are worth it. That and so much more.”

“You said you’d done that for her too…” she asked, not upset, but confused.

“No. I said I sang her a song. It was a fun, upbeat song, and the true purpose of it was to call out the suspect in the crowd and get the people to bring her to the stage. Yes, there was some feeling to it, but it was mostly just fun. It was nothing like what I just did down there. Not even close.”

“I was such an idiot,” Ella said sadly, hanging her head.

Lucifer let go of one of her hands and put a finger under her chin to lift her head. “No, darling. You weren’t an idiot. You acted on the information you knew and were justifiably afraid. I’ve spent most of the last two months in rather intense sessions with Dr. Linda trying to overcome my own fears enough to love you, so I do understand.”

“But you still went out there and…in front of all those people…”

“Yes. I did. Because like I said, you’re worth it. Believe me, I was as terrified as I’ve ever been, but I knew that if I didn’t take that leap then I would always wonder if it would have made a difference. If my cowardice lost me my last best chance at real happiness.”

“Mine almost did,” she said sadly.

Lucifer smiled wryly at her and leaned forward to press a short kiss to her lips. “No, my love, it didn’t. I wasn’t going to give up. Even if all I could do was wait for you, I would have done it.”

Ella smiled brightly at the love she could see in his eyes. “So…we’re okay?” she asked hopefully.

“Almost. After your story there are a few things I need you to know up front so that you can make an informed decision about this,” he said nervously. When she looked at him curiously, he said. “I can never give you children, and I doubt I will ever be able to give you a wedding either.”

She reached up and cupped his cheek. “It’s okay about the children. After what happened, I could never have any more anyway. But why on the wedding?”

“Because we would be standing up in the presence of my father and telling him that you were the most important thing in the universe to me. That if he wanted to hurt me, here’s the way. We would be intentionally invoking his presence to bind our lives together and I don’t know what he would do with that, but I doubt it would be good.”

She frowned and nodded. “I hadn’t thought of that. I-if the time comes when we’re…you know…ready for that…would you be open to options if I can find one safe enough?”

Lucifer huffed a laugh. “Darling, if you could find one safe enough, I would marry you in an instant.”

Ella laughed and slid over to lean against his side. “Not moving too fast are you, dear?”

“You know me. When I jump, I go all in,” he joked, wrapping his arm around her and kissing her head.

“Then we’ll try to find a way,” Ella said softly, tilting her head up for a kiss and he didn’t disappoint.

Once it was over Ella bit her lip, not sure if she wanted to ask what was on the tip of her tongue or not. “What is it, my love?” Lucifer asked, having noticed that she was thinking about something.

“I just…if we can find a way soon…like in the next couple weeks soon…do you think we could wait until our wedding night to…” she trailed off.

“Darling, when I said I would wait forever for you, I meant in every way. Whether it’s two weeks from now or two years from now. You will come to my bed when /you/ want to and not before.”

“And can you…you know…go without for that long?” she asked.

Lucifer laughed. “I’ve gone without, as you say, for much longer. Some things are worth it.”

“Oh so I’m a thing now am I?” she teased.

“Oh yes, darling. The most beautiful thing I own,” he teased right back.

She laughed and smacked him in the chest. “Only if I own you too.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way, dearest,” he said smugly. He knew that he got the better end of that particular bargain.

Chapter Text

As they were cuddling on the couch, Lucifer suddenly started shifting uncomfortably. “What’s wrong?” Ella asked curiously.

“I don’t know…okay…ouch…crap…” He jumped to his feet just as two gleaming white wings sprung from his back, knocking over their glasses from the table. “What the…”

Ella’s eyes went wide. “Um…wow? Did you…um…know you had those?” she asked, not quite sure what to say.

“I used to, but I got rid of the buggers when I came to Earth this time around,” Lucifer said irritated. “They weren’t supposed to come back.”

Ella couldn’t decide whether to laugh or be sympathetic. “How did they come back?” she settled on asking.

“I don’t know. Probably my father having a right good laugh at my expense,” Lucifer said irritated as he folded them away.

“No, wait,” she said disappointed as they disappeared. “Can I see them again?”

Lucifer sighed. “Okay, but let’s go over here, away from the breakable things.” He walked over to the open area near the bookshelves and rolled his shoulders to bring them back out.

“Okay, wow,” she said walking a circle around him to look at them. She reached out a hand before snatching it back. “Can I…touch them?” she asked hopefully.

“I don’t see why not,” Lucifer said with a shrug.

Ella reached out and ran her hand over the feathers. “They’re so soft,” she said in awe, moving up to trace her hand along the top and then back to the wing joint in his back.

Lucifer hummed in contentment as she ran her fingers over the joint. “Mmm. That feels good, darling.”

“Good how?” she asked curiously.

“Rather like a massage of an aching muscle kind of good,” he told her.

She chuckled and wondered if that had anything to do with them just suddenly growing back or if that was a sensitive point all the time. She grinned when she realized that she would get a chance to find out. She rubbed the area a little more firmly and his wings twitched. After a few minutes he shifted away from her touch uncomfortably and his wings disappeared.

Lucifer turned to look at her and saw her pout and he chuckled and pulled her in for a kiss. “Sorry, dearest, but if you want to wait for certain things, best not to have too much more of that,” he joked.

She blushed and grinned. “Yeah. Probably best.” At least now she had some idea of how to get him going when the time came. Though knowing him, breathing would probably work too. Now that she was over her moment of awe, she was able to think a little more clearly on what it meant. “Are you…okay with this?” she asked as she led him back to the couch.

“I’m not likely to be able to change it, am I? If they grew back once, what’s to say they can’t again?” he said disgruntled.

“Well why did you cut them off in the first place?” she asked curiously.

“Because with my wings and can get back and forth to hell. No wings, no passage, and no one trying to convince me to go back.”

“So you think they’ll try to make you go back now?” she asked worriedly.

“They can try, darling,” he said with a challenging smirk. “They would have to drag me kicking and screaming and if they could do that I’d have been back there a long time ago.”

“Then why were you worried enough to actually cut off your wings? Didn’t that hurt?”

“It hurt immensely, but it gave me something to point to and say, ‘nope. Sorry. Can’t.’ That left them with the option of carrying me there, with me fighting the whole way or just leaving me be. With my wings they’d just keep bugging me about it.”

“So they’re gonna start bugging you again?” she guessed.

“I doubt it will take them long to realize that with you in my life now they have even less chance than they did before.”

“They won’t try to…remove me…will they?” she asked worriedly.

“They can’t harm a human. I wouldn’t put them past trying to split us up somehow, but forewarned is forearmed and all that, right?” he asked hopefully.

“Don’t worry. I’m not going anywhere,” she assured him, cuddling up to his side. “They can try all they want.”

“If I need to, I’ll make a deal,” Lucifer told her. “Once your life is over…without their interference…and you’re safely in heaven, I’ll go back.”

She furrowed her brow. She hadn’t even considered that. He would live forever and she only had a short time. When she was gone, she would either go to heaven where they would be separated forever or she could go to hell with him into eternal damnation. “How do you know I’ll go to heaven?” she couldn’t help but ask. She’d done some pretty bad stuff in her life after all.

“Because you’re too good and kind to go anywhere else. Besides, you’ve got that whole worship of my dad thing going and he’s pretty big on that. It makes up for most anything else in your past, so you’ll be good,” Lucifer assured her.

“Would I get a choice?” she asked. She wasn’t going to jump right into a choice of hell, but things were different now and it deserved some consideration.

“Not likely,” he said. “What’s there to choose though? Paradise or torment? Somewhat of a no-brainer there dearest,” he chuckled tightly.

“More like you or no you,” she muttered. “U-unless you just don’t want me forever. That’s okay too. I mean…my lifetime is plenty…”

He cut her off with a searing kiss before saying. “Ella dearest, please understand that my not wanting you in hell has absolutely nothing to do with me not wanting you forever. But I want you to be happy and safe more than I want you with me.”

“I’m not saying that I would choose hell if I get a choice. I honestly couldn’t say one way or the other what I would choose yet.”

“Ella…” he said wearily.

“No, Lucifer. You don’t get to do that. When I do eventually make a choice, it’s my choice to make. Not yours. Got it?” She told him, poking her finger into his chest in emphasis.

He sighed heavily, but nodded. “But you’re still going to church tomorrow right?” he asked. For all his trepidation about it before, he suddenly wanted nothing more than for her to keep going.

“Yes. I am. Until a decision is made, I won’t change anything,” she promised before trying to lighten the mood. “Why? Trying to get rid of me for a few hours?” she teased.

He chuckled, appreciating her attempt greatly. “Naturally. How else am I going to sneak all the hookers out of here?” he joked.

She laughed and shook her head. Even if she didn’t know that he was kidding the reference to hookers made it obvious. The idea of Lucifer ever paying for sex was absurd. “You’re coming back to work Monday right?”

“I was planning on it,” he told her.

“I was worried when you weren’t there the last few days,” she admitted. “I was afraid I had hurt you too much and you…” she trailed off.

He squeezed her tightly. “I was pretty spun out for a while, but I also knew that I couldn’t just let you go. My biggest issue was trying to figure out if you needed time and space or if I should fight for you. Now if you had answered differently when I asked if you felt anything for me it might have been a different story,” he chuckled wryly.

She smiled and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Then I’m glad I answered. And I’m glad you decided to fight. When you were gone I thought you were just giving up.”

He shook his head. “Linda advised me to give you a few days to recover before I did anything. I decided that if I was going to give you space I needed to go all the way and not force you to deal with me at work too.”

“Okay, from now on, even if we’re fighting, you don’t get to not come to work. Avoiding each other isn’t the answer and yes I know that sounds rich coming from me since I was right downstairs the last three days and could have come see you just as easily. We both need to work on that.”

“Okay. No more avoidance,” Lucifer said happily. Not seeing her for the last three days had been torture and he was glad that he wouldn’t have to do that again.

“So do we tell people about us?” she asked, biting her lip worriedly.

“Well disregarding the fact that half the city will probably know by this time tomorrow after what happened downstairs,” he chuckled, “I have no intention of trying to hide my feelings for you anymore.”

She breathed a sigh of relief. “Okay. Good. Because I don’t want to hide either.”

Chapter Text

When Ella started yawning, Lucifer smiled and hugged her to him. “You should go get some sleep, love.”

“Can I stay? Maybe you can just…hold me tonight?” she asked hopefully.

Lucifer grinned and kissed her softly. “I would love to, dearest.”

“I’ll run down and get my pajamas then,” she said with a grin. The next morning, waking in Lucifer’s arms she felt like she was on top of the world. When she opened her eyes she saw that he was already awake. “Good morning.”

“And a very good morning it is,” he said with a grin, kissing her firmly, but quickly. He didn’t want to get carried away in their current position. “And we have just enough time for a nice breakfast before you need to get to church.”

“Sounds perfect.”

On her way home from church she called her grandmother to tell her the news and she had seemed happy for her, but mostly happy she was still going to church. Ella explained that Lucifer was very supportive of her faith, to her grandmother’s surprise. She declined to mention that she might decide to stop going to church anyway. There was no use opening that can of worms until or unless it was necessary.

Once she got home, she headed out through the club, intending to go see Lucifer, but she saw him sitting at his usual booth working on the books. “Do you usually work out here when the club is closed?” she asked as she leaned over his back and snaked her arms around his neck.

He smiled and reached a hand up to her arms and rubbed his thumb over the skin. “It’s far less claustrophobic than that office, that’s for sure,” he chuckled before turning for a kiss.

“Have you had lunch yet?” she asked since it was a little after noon.

“Not yet. I was waiting for you to get back,” he told her.

“Well lets take a lunch break, and then I’ll leave you to your work,” she suggested.

Lucifer grinned. “I’ve already made reservations darling, whenever you’re ready to leave.” She chuckled and rushed off to change. If he made reservations then it was at somewhere fancy and nice church clothes were not the same thing as fancy restaurant clothes. Not to her mind anyway. It only took her about twenty minutes to be ready and Lucifer grinned as he looked her over before offering her his arm.

After a nice lunch, the rest of the day was spent doing their own things. Lucifer finished up the books and went over the inventory, and Ella curled up with a novel on her couch.

The next morning, Lucifer suggested driving to the precinct together, but Ella unfortunately had to shoot him down. “We’re both out doing our own things for at least part of the day. It’s better if we both have our own cars available.”

Lucifer did make a statement when they got to the station though, by meeting her at her car and opening the door for her. He waited until they were inside and he had handed out a good portion of the pastries that he had brought so that plenty of attention was on them and then he swept her up in a lingering toe-curling kiss before shooing her off to her lab.

Most of the place broke out in applause, but some, like Dan just shook their heads and laughed. “Marking your territory?” he teased as Lucifer walked over.

“Nothing nearly so crass,” Lucifer said with a roll of his eyes. “Simply spreading the good news the easy way.”

“Well it definitely worked,” he said with his own eye roll. “Seriously though, I’m happy for you guys. It’s about time.”

“Oh?” Lucifer asked with a chuckle. He hadn’t realized it was so obvious.

“Even Trixie asked after the game night when you two were finally going to get together,” he said pointedly.

Lucifer shook his head with a laugh and changed the subject. “Do we have a case?” he asked.

“Not yet, but I’m sure we will soon. The lieutenant just got here,” Dan told him.

“In that case, you know where I’ll be when we’re up,” he said with a nod, heading up to the lab. He slid up behind Ella and wrapped his arms around her stomach as she was starting one of her machines running. She grinned and leaned back against him for a moment before he let go and moved to the other side of the table to chat.

“What was that about downstairs?” she asked amusedly, making it clear that she wasn’t actually upset about it.

“Well we made a big production at my place of business the other night. I decided turnabout was fair play,” he joked.

“Just keep in mind that, while you work for yourself, I don’t.”

“Don’t worry, darling. I promise to keep all displays on the job on the right side of the line I can charm us out of,” he said with a chuckle.

“See that you do,” she said mock sternly as she grabbed her field kit and stole a kiss. “Got a crime scene. See you there if you guys pull the case.”

Since she was gone, Lucifer headed back downstairs and mingled around for about twenty minutes before Dan grabbed him to go to the crime scene. Ella and Lucifer’s banter at the scene wasn’t any different than usual, though their body language showed the change in their relationship.

It was near quitting time, and since they didn’t have any suspects yet, the plan was to pick it up in the morning. Ella was just setting up some tests that would run overnight when Maze came in with her latest bounty. She apparently heard the news pretty quickly because she came up to the lab almost immediately. Lucifer had been playing with something on the shelves in the corner as they chatted and when he noticed Maze come in, he watched curiously, to see what she would do.

Maze walked straight up to Ella, who turned to greet her, but her greeting was stuck in her throat at the way Maze was looking at her. The demon was standing toe to toe with her and staring her down. She figured it was some kind of test, especially when she heard Lucifer’s warning growl of, “Mazikeen…” She couldn’t deny being nervous, but despite the fact that she was currently /very/ aware that Maze was a demon and could kill her before she even noticed movement, she wasn’t afraid. She knew that if she was in any danger, Lucifer would have intervened, and this was one test that she was determined to pass.

Maze was the one reaction she was most concerned about. Everyone at the station was pretty much mutual friends from the start, but Maze and Linda were Lucifer’s. Linda she knew would be good, Maze was a different story. Not only was she primarily Lucifer’s friend, but she had been by his side for longer than she could even comprehend of time. She had been his everything pretty much since time began. If there was one person whose approval she was desperate for it was this one.

After a long stare-down, Maze gave a dramatic sniff to the air, before she turned and quick as lightning pulled a knife from her belt and sent it careening towards Lucifer. Ella instinctively grabbed her arm to stop her, but far too late. No human could ever be fast enough to stop her. Lucifer just grabbed the knife out of the air a few inches from his shoulder. “Come now, Mazey darling. There is a better way to test that which doesn’t involve giving dear Ella a coronary.” He expertly flipped the knife in his grip before slashing it across his opposite palm. “See? No blood.”

Lucifer had tested that himself under the table at lunch the day before. He wasn’t sure what it meant that he wasn’t vulnerable around Ella, and part of him wondered if it meant that it wasn’t real. He had quickly put that out of his mind though. Knowing what he now knew about his feelings for Chloe, it was hardly an accurate test and nothing had ever felt more real to him than what he had with Ella.

Maze nodded at him and her lips twitched in a slight smile. “She doesn’t make you weak. Good.” She turned back to Ella and looked her up and down one more time before nodding again. “I approve.”

Ella squealed and almost tackled Maze in a hug, which the demon accepted with something resembling grace, having gotten almost used to it over the years they’d been hanging out together. It didn’t mean she was going to return the hug though. Once she let go, Ella took another two minutes to finish setting up the tests for overnight before they left, inviting Maze to hang out with them for the evening at Lux.

Chapter Text

A couple weeks later, they were no closer to figuring out a way to safely get married and Ella was getting very tired of waiting, so that evening while they were lounging around the penthouse, she kissed him passionately and moved over to straddle his lap. Lucifer was surprised and caught off guard, but was definitely not complaining as his arms wrapped tightly around her and a moan pulled from his throat. When her hands started undoing the buttons on his shirt though, he found the strength to stop her. At least for a minute.

He took both of her hands in his and held them still, pushing her away just enough to free his lips to speak. “Are you sure, Ella?” he asked gently.

“Hell, yes,” she said breathlessly. She had gotten very good about omitting references to god from her everyday speech, at least when Lucifer was around, but random hells did pop out from time to time. They didn’t seem to bother him as much though.

Lucifer let go of her hands and pulled her back into the abandoned kiss as he stood up. She wrapped her legs tighter around his waist as he carried her to the bedroom. Two hours later, he plopped to the bed next to her as they both tried to catch their breath. “Oh yeah. That was definitely worth waiting for,” she panted.

“I do aim to please,” Lucifer joked, getting his breath back at a much faster rate.

“And you do an excellent job of it too,” she said happily as she found the strength to roll over and cuddle up to his side. Her hand traced nonsensical patterns over his chest and stomach as he did the same over her back and they just laid there enjoying the silence. It wasn’t long before Ella found herself dozing off. “I don’t wanna go back downstairs anymore,” she slurred sleepily, not really realizing what she was saying.

Lucifer smiled and moved his hand up to run through her hair. “You’re welcome to move up here anytime you wish,” he said softly, not sure if she was more awake or asleep at the moment.

“Mmm. Tomorrow,” she mumbled as she fell asleep.

Lucifer’s lips twitched as he shifted to get more comfortable and follow her into sleep. He couldn’t help but hope that she would still mean that in the morning. Lucifer woke up the next morning alone in bed and felt a pang of both sadness and fear. Had he come on too strong? Was she running again? Before he could get himself too worked up he hear the soft ding of the elevator, and pulled himself out of bed, not bothering to get any clothes on.

When he left the bedroom, he couldn’t help but laugh at the sight. Half of Ella’s clothes were strewn all over the furniture and there were a few boxes of books in random places as well. Ella was just coming in with the aquarium and she set it on the bar before she looked up and noticed him looking around the room. “I’m gonna clean it up,” she promised quickly. “I just didn’t want to wake you up so I was doing all my sorting and stuff out here and it is still okay for me to move up here right? I mean, I know I was half asleep when I said it, but you weren’t so I figured you meant it and…”

He cut her off with a kiss, pulling her tightly against him with a chuckle. It really was the best way to stop her when she was rambling. She hummed happily into the kiss winding her arms around his neck and playing with his hair. When he pulled away, he beamed down at her and said, “I would love nothing more than for you to move up here, my love.”

She grinned. “Good. Then while I’m finishing my sorting, you can go start making some room for my clothes in that big closet of yours.”

He laughed at the idea of her ordering him around, but didn’t hesitate to do as she asked. “Did you sleep at all?” he joked as he grabbed a large box and started throwing clothes into it that had been left by previous overnight guests. He hadn’t cleaned out his closet in a while.

“Enough,” she laughed. “Once I woke up I was just too excited to get back to sleep.”

Once Lucifer was done with the closet, he did the same with the almost empty dresser. The only thing he used it for was underwear, socks, and his two pairs of silk sleep pants which easily fit in one drawer. “You could have woken me,” he pointed out. You know I don’t need as much sleep as humans.”

“I know. You just looked so peaceful, I didn’t want to disturb you,” she said as she brought the first load of her clothes, the ones that needed to be hung up, into the room and started putting them away.

By the time Lucifer was finished with his spring cleaning, she had plenty of room since she was rather the opposite of him. Most of her clothes would go in the dresser while she only had a few things to hang up. His job done, he went to help her get her clothes moved in. “Feel free to go through that box and grab anything you want to keep,” he told her. He wasn’t entirely sure of the etiquette regarding such things, but it would be a waste to throw it all away and he had no clue who any of it belonged to. If they hadn’t come to retrieve it in the two months since he last had company then they weren’t going to.

Ella’s lips twitched at the thought. It was pretty tacky, but this was Lucifer. She knew that while he had the big stuff down, he was pretty clueless about a lot of the iffier things. Besides, it was free clothes, and it wasn’t like he would think any less of her for accepting, so she went through the box. Most of it was a little on the tacky side, not that it was surprising given most of Lucifer’s guests, but there were a few things that she really liked and decided to keep. “I can take the rest of this to the church for donations tomorrow if you don’t mind?” she suggested.

“Doesn’t matter to me, darling. Whatever you want to do with it is fine.” She didn’t realize that he heard her mutter about wishing the silver strap heels were her size and he smirked. Putting the rest of her stuff away was easy. She hadn’t reaccumulated too many books since she lost everything, so there was easily room on his bookshelves for them. Finding a place for Trevor was a little more difficult, but they settled on moving one of the smaller tabled to the opposite side of the room under the television. She’d suggested the bar, but his response was, “Darling, do you have any idea how many angelic and demonic battles take out that bar?”

She blinked at him for a minute, not sure if he was joking or not, but still couldn’t help but laugh. “Okay. Let’s keep little Trevor safe and out of the way.”

“My thoughts exactly,” he nodded. He didn’t particularly care one way or the other about the little animal, but he knew that Ella cared a great deal for it. They had taken a lunch break after the sorting of the clothes, and by the time they stopped for dinner, she was completely moved in. Thankfully they had thought to make any further trips to her apartment immediately after lunch because getting boxes through the club while it was open would have been a nightmare.

“What are you going to do with the apartment downstairs now?” Ella asked curiously. He had gone to all the trouble to fix it up less than a year ago after all.

Lucifer shrugged. “Probably leave it empty for now. I don’t really want to trust some random stranger with 24/7 access to the club by renting it out.”

“That makes sense,” she nodded. “But maybe consider walling off the club entrance?” she suggested.

“Then if someone does need to live there with access to the club, it’s no longer an option. I had the apartment created for Maze to live there while she was helping me run the place, after all.”

“Good point. And it’s not like you need the money,” she chuckled. He hadn’t even let her pay the rent this month. He said it wouldn’t have felt right taking money from his girlfriend, especially since it was something that he would have been more than happy to provide for free all along. While she most certainly wasn’t with him for his money, she couldn’t deny that not having to worry about it would be nice. She had no intention of letting him go overboard, but she wouldn’t deny him a reasonable amount of pampering if he wanted to, and knowing him he would definitely want to.

Chapter Text

The night, Ella and Lucifer spent much as they did the previous one, but this time Lucifer took more time. After having gone without for so long before their first time, his stamina hadn’t been the best. Sunday when she got home from church was spent the same way, only breaking for lunch and dinner, which was eaten in bed.

Monday morning, once they got to the precinct, Dan chuckled and shook his head at Lucifer, watching Ella walking up to her lab. “Fun weekend?”

“What makes you say that?” Lucifer asked cheerfully.

“The way Ella’s walking,” Dan pointed out amusedly.

“Ah. That. Yes, it had been a while and I might have gone a bit overboard,” Lucifer said with a shrug. “Not that I heard any complaints, because I certainly didn’t. In fact, she did this thing…”

“Okay, let me stop you there,” Dan said holding up a hand. Bringing up that subject with the king of oversharing wasn’t exactly the smartest move he’d ever made. “I’m happy for you, but I don’t need details.”

“Oh very well. I would like to point out that it only took once before she was asking to move in, though,” Lucifer said smugly.

Dan snorted. “What did you say?” he asked curiously. He honestly couldn’t say which way it would have gone. On one hand, Lucifer was a notorious playboy who didn’t seem the type to settle down, but Dan knew that a lot of that was just an act he put on. He just wasn’t sure how much. He also knew that Lucifer was very intense and never did anything halfway, so if he was with Ella he meant it for good. Even if his eyes hadn’t already told him that.

“I said yes, of course. Why would I say anything else?” he asked incredulously.

“So when’s the big move?” Dan asked the man who was certainly NOT his best friend. Maybe someday he would come out of denial over that fact.

“Two days ago,” Lucifer laughed.

Dan shook his head and laughed with him. Of course it was. “You definitely don’t waste any time do you.”

“Oh that one’s not on me,” Lucifer said amusedly. “I woke up in bed alone Saturday morning and found most of her stuff strewn around my living room as she was sorting through it.”

Dan barked a laugh. “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

“Because you’ve known Ella as long as I have,” Lucifer joked.

Later that day, Lucifer was glad the timing worked out as it did, because he was heading into interrogation just in time to see the delivery person be directed Ella’s lab, and he stopped to watch. He was also glad that she had her blinds open today because he got to see her face light up at the bouquet of flowers in the blown glass vase that she was presented. He saw her gush for a moment before she looked out the window, her eyes searching for him and when they found him he winked and grinned at her. Dan was right behind him and clapped him on the back and said, “Nice one.”

“I do try,” Lucifer drawled. He’d remembered something that Dr. Linda had told him about making sure the romance doesn’t die just because sex was introduced to a relationship, and he was determined not to be found wanting on that score. Thankfully his knowledge of languages extended to flower language and he wasn’t sure if Ella knew it or not, but even if she didn’t, it was still pretty flowers.

Ella was over the moon at the flowers and since they weren’t the traditional roses, and it looked like a custom bouquet she knew that he had chosen the flowers for a reason. She started looking them up and their meanings. Inspiration, blessedness, longing, thinking of you, unequaled love, hope, devotion, fidelity, beauty, and eternal love. She blinked back the tears from her eyes with each new meaning she found, and she was surer than ever now that it had been completely on purpose. This was basically a love letter in flower form.

She kept half an eye on the door to the interrogation room while she tried to focus on her work. Thankfully she wasn’t doing anything crucial when he came out, because she was out the door like a shot and headed downstairs. She jumped in his arms and kissed they daylights out of him. Unlike the first time they kissed like this in the building, there were more chuckles than applause, though that could be because of the way Lucifer looked shocked for a moment at the sudden attack. That and the fact that everyone had seen the flowers and knew why.

Lucifer spun her around to shed some of her momentum as he recovered from his surprise and he smiled into the kiss. “I take it you like them?” he said amusedly.

“Are you kidding?” she asked incredulously. “I didn’t know you knew flower language.” She wanted to confirm her suspicion.

“The devil knows all languages, darling,” he told her with a smirk. He wasn’t going to mention that he’d actually had to learn that one instead of being gifted with the knowledge.

“Well they’re perfect,” she said happily, stealing one more kiss before heading back to her lab. She grinned every time they caught her eye where she had carefully placed them in the center of the main table. At the end of the day she was torn on whether to take them home or leave them here before she decided to leave them. She spent most of her time during the week here anyway, and she liked how they brightened up her lab. They had just started to wilt by Friday and she considered throwing them out, but decided to wait until Monday. They would probably be completely wilted by then, even with the extra water she added before she left, but she just couldn’t bring herself to get rid of them yet.

Saturday morning, Ella was in the shower and Lucifer was heading to start breakfast when he sensed someone else in the penthouse with him. One of his siblings. He spun around, grabbing for the hell-forged blade he kept under the bar before positioning himself between where he could sense it from and the opening to the bedroom. “I know you’re here. Show yourself,” he said irritated.

“Geez, Lu. Is that any way to greet your favorite sister?” Azrael asked as she shimmered into view.

“Well, hello Azrael,” he drawled, hoping that he wasn’t going to have to fight her.

“What? Too cool to call me Rae-Rae anymore?”

“Well endearing nicknames are for people who didn’t abandon me for millennia so…”

“I didn’t abandon you, Lu,” she protested. “You don’t know. You weren’t there. I was so messed up…”

“Oh and why’s that?” he asked skeptically.

“Because I lost my favorite big brother, you dope,” she told him. “You have no idea how much I missed you. I missed having someone listen to me drone on and on about whatever was on my mind. I know it probably didn’t mean much to you but it meant a lot to me.”

“So much so that you left me to rot in hell for millennia without as much as a single visit?” he scoffed.

“That wasn’t my choice,” she said desperately. “Father issued a Command right after he kicked you out. Amenadiel was the only exception. If we went looking for you it was a death sentence. I thought about it anyway. Just so you would know that you weren’t forgotten, but I knew you would blame yourself if I was killed for it so I thought it better to just…you know…try to move on.”

“Then why and how are you here now? He rescind the command so he could send you to do his dirty work? Or are you here for…” he glanced back where he just heard the shower water turn off. “You can’t have her.”

“No, no, no. Nothing like that. I mean, yes, I’m /technically/ here for her, but just to get around the Command. It’s not her time or anything. I gotta say, when I sent her to you, I definitely didn’t expect this to happen,” she finished with a grin.

Lucifer dropped the blade with a clatter as his face went white as a sheet. “You sent her…to me…” he almost whispered in anguish. “None of it was real? It was all just another manipulation?” his voice gradually got louder. “Why can’t you all just leave me alone? Was she in on it?”

“Rae-Rae?” Ella asked in shock as she stood in the doorway in her bathrobe with her hair wrapped in a towel.

“You know her,” Lucifer said heartbrokenly as he jumped to the only conclusion he could. “You…” Lucifer couldn’t take anymore and just spread his wings and disappeared.

Ella knew the broken look on Lucifer’s face all too well, but had no idea what put it there. “What just happened?”

Chapter Text

Lucifer appeared on the roof of the building, not sure where else to go. He’d just had to get away. He considered going back to hell. This was just the last straw, but he needed to get himself together first. He couldn’t go down there like this. The demons would smell blood in the water and it would be all over. He paced as he tried to remember how to breathe while his entire world came crashing down around him.

“I might have stuck my foot in it,” Azrael said with an apologetic shrug. “Sorry.”

“Okay, I have like a million questions for you right now, but first, do you know where he is?” Ella asked hopefully. She had to find him and fix this. She wasn’t sure what was going on, but from the little she heard of what he had said and the look on his face, she wasn’t sure how long she would have that chance.

“I can take you to him if you want,” Azrael offered, holding out a hand.

Ella nodded and took it, yelping when she was yanked off her feet and she barely noticed the wings unfurling and the whoosh of air before she was stumbling as he was put down. “Lucifer!” she cried out, rushing towards him, but he held out a hand to stop her as he backed away, eyes shining with tears.

“Listen, Lu. It’s not what you think. Please just hear me out,” Azrael pleaded.

“Why? To give you another chance to manipulate me? So you can finish the job father started and completely break me?” he asked hysterically.

“No. I would never do that, Lu. I promise. You know I would never lie to you. I sent her here because she needed help. She was in a bad way where she was and I hoped that she would run into you and that you might help her the way you always helped me. That’s all. No manipulation. I just wanted my two favorite people to be together. I didn’t expect just how together you got.”

“That doesn’t explain why you never told me that you knew my sister?” he turned to Ella, not buying this story. “I would think that would be a rather important point to mention,” he snapped.

“I didn’t know, Lucifer,” she said desperately, begging him to believe her. “I swear I didn’t. She told me she was a ghost and I thought I was just seeing things. That I was crazy. I haven’t even seen her in five years. Since before I left Detroit. I didn’t even realize she had anything to do with me coming here. Please believe that. If I had known I would have told you.”

Lucifer looked back and forth between her and Azrael. “It’s true, Lu. I started hanging around with her after she was in an accident when she was a kid. She was a false alarm and I just got kinda…attached. I was lonely, so I made friends. I couldn’t tell her I was the angel of death though, so I just told her I was a ghost. When she was almost committed we decided that I would take off, but I still kept an eye on her from time to time.”

Lucifer could feel the tightening in his chest start to ease a little bit as their words sank in, and this time he didn’t stop Ella from approaching him. She ran both her hands up his bare chest to his shoulders. “Please Lucifer. You have to know that I would /never/ hurt you. I love you with all my heart and soul. I would die before I would risk hurting you. Please believe that.”

“Then…this is really real?” he asked hopefully, tears still shining in his eyes as he reached a hand up to brush down her cheek.

“Yes, Lucifer. Nothing in my life has ever been this real,” Ella whispered only to be pulled in for a kiss as she felt his tears mingling with hers.

Azrael watched with a smile, glad that she’d managed to fix her mistake. Before anything else could be said though, she winced. “Crap. I gotta go. I’ll come back when I have a little more time,” she said flapping away.

Lucifer pulled himself away from Ella to say something to his sister but she was already gone so he just sighed. Ella put her hand on his cheek and said, “Now that we are at least somewhat okay, can we go back home so I can get some clothes on?”

Lucifer let out a hoarse chuckle and picked her up bridal style before flaring his wings and flying them back inside. “I can’t believe you came out like that,” he said as they landed back in the living room.

“I had no idea what had happened, but I could tell how much you were hurting. Getting to you was far more important than my own modesty,” Ella explained.

“I am so blessed to have you, Ella Lopez,” he whispered, pulling her close and resting his forehead against hers.

“Not nearly as blessed as I am,” she said softly giving him a slow kiss before turning and heading for the bedroom to find some clothes.

She only got a few steps before Lucifer yelled and grabbed her, snatching her back. Unfortunately, the move over-balanced him and he slipped. He managed to right them both before they hit the floor, but he cursed in pain before bending to pick up something that she couldn’t see and limped towards the couch. “I don’t suppose you would consider grabbing me a rag and some bandages?” he asked Ella, dripping blood from his foot.

Ella nodded with wide eyes and went to do just that, waiting until she got back and was cleaning the wound before she asked, “I thought you were immortal and couldn’t be hurt. Is this because of me?” She remembered the whole thing about Chloe making him mortal, and desperately hoped that she wasn’t doing the same thing now.

“No, darling. It’s not your fault. This is a hell-forged blade. It’s one of the only things in existence that can hurt even me.”

“Why was it even there?” she asked incredulously.

“I usually keep it under the bar but when I sensed one of my siblings present, I grabbed it just in case. I must have dropped it when…you know,” he shrugged.

“That’s why you pulled me back? Would it have hurt me more than you or something?” she asked.

“No. It wouldn’t have been any different for you,” he assured her. “Otherwise I wouldn’t keep it anywhere humans have access to. It’s just very /very/ sharp.”

“So instead of me stepping on it, you nearly slice your foot off?” she asked incredulously.

“Is it that bad?” he asked, trying to bend to take a look, but she was in the way.

“Yes, it’s that bad. I really hope you don’t have to heal normally from this because you won’t be able to walk for at least a few weeks. Just at first glance I can count four tendons, a big hunk of muscle, and who only knows what else that have been sliced all to hell.”

Lucifer sighed heavily. “Move for a moment, please,” he told her.

“I need to keep pressure on…”

“Please, Ella,” he said more firmly.

She gave him a warning look, but moved back. When she saw him starting to stand up, she said, “You can’t…” she cut herself off at the sight of his wings springing from his back. He was standing on one foot as he reached around and grabbed hold of some feathers and yanked, wincing in pain. “What are you…” she couldn’t even finish the sentence as he sat back down.

“Here. Put this on the center of the cut,” he told her handing her one of the feathers. She looked at him skeptically but did as he asked, gasping when it sank into the wound which healed before her eyes. She was still blinking in shock as he handed her the other feather he had pulled. “This one is for you. Put it somewhere safe that you will always have with you. If you’re ever hurt too badly, use it the same way.”

She took the feather from him like it was made of gold and cradled it in her hand for a long moment before getting up and putting it in her purse. “Why didn’t you just do that in the first place?” she asked once she found words again.

He grimaced in annoyance. “Because now that’s going to itch for weeks.”

She couldn’t help the giggle that escaped and clamped her hand over her mouth. “Sorry. I just…” she giggled again.

“Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up,” he said amusedly.

“Will it really be that bad?” she asked, trying to resist the urge to giggle again.

“I can deal with it. I just would rather have not had to. Though I am glad it happened. I’d been meaning to give you a feather for emergencies for a while, I just kept forgetting.”

Chapter Text

Over the course of the next month, they didn’t see Azrael again, and part of Lucifer was annoyed at that. Did she really just come to rip his heart out, fix it, and then leave again? But no, she seemed to have something else to say but was interrupted before she got to say it. He hoped she wasn’t in trouble. That she hadn’t triggered the death sentence she’d mentioned. He hoped that she was just busy. There were a lot of people dying in the world at any given time after all.

He still hadn’t heard from her again before he was woken up by the sound of the elevator. He kissed Ella’s shoulder where she was still sleeping and grabbed his silk pants from the chair, sliding them on as he headed out. He made it two steps out of the doorway before he stopped dead in his tracks and stared in shock for a moment. His guest had just opened her mouth to speak and he held up a hand to stop her, which galvanized him into movement. He rushed over and pulled out of the line of sight of the doorway to the bedroom, suddenly wishing he had an actual door. “What are you doing here?” he hissed.

“I just…I needed to say that I…I’m sorry,” she said shakily.

“Okay. Fine. Apology accepted. Goodbye,” he tried rushing her back out. He didn’t want her to see Ella in bed, not sure how she would take it, or how Ella would react to her.

“Wait, Lucifer. Please,” she said, pulling away from his grip. “I need to say…did you get a pet?” she asked confused, noticing the aquarium and starting to go over there.

Lucifer stepped in her way, blocking her from going any farther and unfortunately ending up closer to her than he wanted to be. “Just say what you need to say and leave,” he said impatiently.

“Okay. I’m sorry,” she started.

“You already said that. Move on,” he snapped.

“I know. I just…I could say it a hundred times and not even come close to expressing just how much I mean it. You’re not evil, Lucifer. I know that now. I should have known that then. I was just so scared and messed up. I miss you. So much. I…I love you Lucifer. Please forgive me.”

Lucifer froze and blinked at her in shock for a moment before he let out a harsh laugh. “You know. There was a time that I thought I loved you more than I could ever love anyone. I would have given you anything. Done anything for you. But then you ripped my heart out and stomped on it. You broke me, detective, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.”

Chloe had tears running down her cheeks by this point. “I’m so…”

“Sorry. Yes. I know, but you know what?” he said wryly. “I’m not. I mean, I’m not exactly going to /thank/ you for what you did, but if you hadn’t done it, then I wouldn’t have found everything I never realized I needed. I wouldn’t have found the /true/ love of my life. No…of my existence. She put me back together when I needed her most. She taught me how to truly love. That it was okay to just be myself. That I was just fine the way I was. What I felt for you was nothing. I’m glad you realized that you were wrong about me, but I’m afraid it’s too late, and I’m glad it is. I wish you nothing but the best in your life, but you have no place in mine. Goodbye, detective,” he tried again to get her to leave.

“Look, Lucifer,” she kept trying. “I know that whatever bimbo you have this time…”

“Okay that’s enough,” they were interrupted by Ella coming into the room. She looked at Lucifer. “I’m sorry, love. I heard voices and I was going to let you handle it, but if she can’t take no for answer…”

“Ella?!” Chloe gasped.

“Yes. Me. After you tried to murder him, Dan called and told me everything. I knew he would need a friend, so I came right over, and things just went from there.

“You couldn’t wait to jump in his bed, could you,” Chloe snapped irritatedly.

Lucifer opened his mouth to defend Ella, but found himself quickly sidelined when Ella pushed past him. “It was more than a year after you left before he even managed to open up to the idea of love again, and then, partially because of everything that happened between you, it took him a little longer to convince me that he really cared. There was no jumping into anything by either of us.”

“I’m sorry, Ella. I didn’t mean that. I just…I’m shocked. You can’t possibly know what he is…”

“You mean that he’s the devil? The king of hell? Ruler of demons? Fallen angel? Yeah. I know. I’ve known since the night you left. So what? He’s still the same person I knew before that. You’re the one who couldn’t deal and took off. I stayed and helped pick up the pieces. You had the chance for everything and you threw it away. You don’t get to come back here now and try to take away my happiness.”

Lucifer smiled and stepped up behind Ella, wrapping his arms around her stomach lovingly. And partially to hold her back if it came to it. “She could never take me away from you, darling. No one could. You have to know that,” he assured her.

Ella relaxed in his arms and turned to give him a quick kiss. “I know, Lu,” she told him and he smiled at the nickname she had started using after she heard Azrael use it. “But that doesn’t change the fact that she’s trying to.”

“Look, detective. I get that you’re sorry now. I do. I hold no hard feelings towards you and wish you the best. But there is nothing left between us, and it’s time for you to go. Now,” Lucifer said firmly. There was nothing else to say by any of them and he wasn’t going to let her keep upsetting Ella.

Chloe hung her head and turned to go back to the elevator. As the doors closed behind her, she heard Lucifer say, “Come, dearest. Looks like we’re having an early breakfast this morning,” and as the elevator descended she cried for what she’d lost.

As soon as she was gone, he pulled out his phone and texted Dan to let him know Chloe was back in town. He guessed when he didn’t have a warning text from Dan that her first stop had been here. Probably because it was so early in the morning. She would have wanted to wait until the child was awake. No sooner than he had sent the text his phone rang and as soon as he picked up, he heard, “WHAT?!”

Lucifer put him on speakerphone so that he could continue to cook while he talked and he gave Dan the cliff notes version of what had happened. “She just left a moment ago and I wouldn’t be surprised if you were her next stop. I assumed you would wish to warn the child before she arrived.”

“Yeah. That would be good. I should do that…I just can’t believe…after all this time…she had the nerve to show up and expect you to just take her back. What the hell?”

“That was pretty much my reaction too,” Ella chimed in.

“Oh, hi Ella. Good morning. Sorry.”

“That’s okay. We all kinda had our world rocked this morning,” she said with a tight chuckle.

“Yeah, no kidding. Well I should go break the news to Trix. I’ll see you guys in a couple hours,” he told them.

About halfway through their breakfast, Lucifer had a thought. “I think I’m just going to stick around here and get some work done this morning. Daniel can text me if we get a crime scene.”

“You think she’ll be there, don’t you?” Ella asked, realizing what he was thinking.

“I don’t doubt that, assuming she plans on sticking around, she will attempt to get her job back,” Lucifer told her.

“You think she will stick around?” Ella asked.

“Since her child is here and she seems to be trying to make amends, it’s likely,” Lucifer told her.

Ella nodded. That made sense. “What if they try to get you to partner with her again?” she asked worriedly. Not worried that she would break them up, but worried about Lucifer’s state of mind at being put in that situation.

“Then I will refuse. If they don’t let me do that then I’ll quit. I won’t be so petty as to refuse to work in the same building as her or even balk at some overlap on cases, but I will not partner with her again.”

“Is it petty of me to say, good?” Ella asked worriedly.

“Not at all, darling,” he assured her.

Chapter Text

After Ella left for work, Lucifer headed downstairs to start on the payroll a little early. Wouldn’t hurt to get ahead, and he needed something to do to keep his mind off things. It happened to be one of the rare moments when he was completely caught up on his work for Lux. He got a text with an address from Dan around ten that morning and grabbed his jacket and headed out. It turned out to be one of the rare times he beat his partner there and used the time he was waiting to flirt with Ella, who didn’t bother giving any of the details before Dan arrived.

When Dan got there about ten minutes later, he took a minute to talk to Lucifer before getting the details of the case. “Hey, man. I get why you didn’t want to come in this morning. It was a good call.”

“She was there then?” Lucifer asked.

“Yeah,” Dan said with a wince. “And she will be from now on. Will you be okay with that?”

“As long as I don’t have to partner with her, yes. Ella and I discussed that possibility this morning. She got her job back, did she?”

“Sort of. She’s on probation for a year and been demoted the same way I was after the Malcom thing, but yeah. She’ll be back, and probably helping out on cases on and off.”

“That’s fine. I can deal with that. How are you dealing with it?” Lucifer asked in a rare moment of empathy.

“With the work thing, fine. But she wants back in with Trix and that’s a tough one. Partially since Trix doesn’t want to see her. I shot her down flat concerning getting custody back. The papers went through a long time ago and she’s down as abandoning her so there’s no worry there. The babysitter knows that Chloe is not allowed to see her, but I’m tempted to call Maze and ask her to take off bounty hunting for a while as a babysitter/bodyguard. Do you think she would?” Dan asked hopefully.

“I don’t see any reason why she wouldn’t, especially with the det-Chl-Decker back,” he struggled with what to call her. She wasn’t a detective anymore and that had been more of a pet name than anything. Calling her Chloe was just not comfortable at all. Neither was Decker really, but it was the best of the options.

Dan nodded and took out his phone to call Maze immediately, holding up his hand for Ella to wait and he would be there in a minute. He had mostly just been waiting to get Lucifer’s opinion on that one. Maze had babysat Trixie more than once over the last year and change since Chloe left and he’d found out that she was a demon, but with her other job it hadn’t been a regular thing. True to Lucifer’s prediction, she dropped everything and headed straight for Trixie. She promised Dan that if Chloe tried to take her, she’d rip her arms off.

That settled, Lucifer and Dan headed over to get the details from Ella and get to work. When they got back to the station a little over an hour later after talking to everyone they had to talk to there, Lucifer could feel Chloe’s eyes on him the second he walked in the door. For his part, he nodded courteously in her direction and otherwise ignored her. When she was helping on the case, he was polite, but distant, and did everything he could to keep her at arm’s length, much to her annoyance. It was two days before she cornered him and said, “Look, I know that I’ve lost my chance at being with you, but can’t we at least go back to being friends? Or even just friendly?”

Lucifer sighed and shook his head. “I’m sorry, but no.”

“Because of Ella?” she guessed.

“No, not because of Ella. Believe it or not, she trusts me completely and would never try to run my life or tell me who to be friends with. It’s because you tried to kill me in case you’ve forgotten. You refused to listen to any evidence contrary to your ridiculous beliefs and insisted that I deserved to die. That I was the root of all evil. Then you disappeared for over a year doing dad only knows what before you finally realized you were wrong and came crawling back. No. We can’t be friends. I will work with you cordially, and you’re lucky I’m willing to go that far,” he snapped with a note of finality and walked away.

Chloe stood there in shock for a long moment. This was a different Lucifer than the one she had left. He was more confident. More comfortable with himself. The old one would have taken her back in an instant, if only as friends. She had done a lot of thinking over the time she’d been gone and realized that underneath all the masks he wore, he had very little self-confidence, but that had changed now. Even his masks were mostly gone. She blinked back the tears that were forming in her eyes, refusing to cry at work, and just turned to get on with her day. She was glad it was Friday.

When Monday rolled around, things were as back to normal as they were going to get. Lucifer came to work with Ella in the morning and started passing out pastries as he did every Monday morning before perching on the edge of Dan’s desk to chat for a while. Like usual, Ella headed out not long after they got there, stopping to steal a kiss from Lucifer on the way out. “That’s not really appropriate at work,” Chloe couldn’t help but say when she saw it.

Lucifer snorted derisively. “You see that door over there?” he asked condescendingly. “That’s where the boss works. She has no problem with it, and that’s all Ella or I care about.” That said he turned back to his conversation with Dan.

Chloe wasn’t ready to be dismissed so easily though as she asked Dan, “I’m still coming over tonight to see Trix right?”

“As long as we don’t have to work late on this case, yes,” he told her. “Not that Trixie is too happy about it.” When he turned back to Lucifer, Chloe sighed and walked away, already in a horrible mood.

Her mood didn’t get any better either as just after lunch, a flower delivery arrived and headed straight up to the lab, not even stopping to get directions. She noticed that Lucifer was standing on the other side of the room, leaning against the wall and watching Ella while Dan was working on some paperwork, so she went over to Dan to offer to help. He nodded and passed her a stack, but her attention was more on the Lucifer and Ella drama.

“Does he do that often? Have flowers sent to her while she’s supposed to be working?” she asked in a tone that left no doubt that she disapproved.

“Every Monday,” Dan said, not looking up from his paperwork. “Always different flowers with a different message. Something about flower language that I don’t get,” he shrugged.

Chloe watched Ella brighten up happily and her glance went to Lucifer who seemed to brighten up just as much. She scoffed when he winked and grinned at her, before he moved off to find someone else to annoy. How could he still flirt with people like that when he was supposedly so happy with Ella. And how did Ella put up with it. “So Lucifer is still useless with paperwork huh?” she tried to make conversation with Dan.

“Can’t really blame him,” Dan said with a shrug. “He has more than enough paperwork of his own to do for Lux. This is basically his second job, after all.”

“There can’t be that much to do there,” Chloe scoffed. He sure never seemed to work hard.

Dan just shook his head. “You have no idea what it takes to run a business like that do you? Between inventory, accounting, payroll, and probably a dozen other things I’m not even thinking of right now, the guy barely gets three hours of sleep most nights. So what if he likes to have a little fun too.”

“Since when are you and him best friends?” Chloe asked skeptically.

“Since I ended up having to fight for his life and then partnering with him. Once I started understanding him, it was easy from there,” Dan said with a shrug. “Now are you going to quit being a harpy and get some work done or am I still doing all the paperwork on my own?”

Chloe shut her mouth and got to work. She was on thin enough ice at work as it was. If Dan complained about her then she might just find herself out of a job. As it was, she was back living in her mother’s house. She didn’t want things to get any worse.

Chapter Text

It was mid-afternoon before the next dust-up. Chloe was bringing some evidence up to Ella’s lab and Lucifer was up there, playing with everything in sight, including evidence. He was currently juggling three cups, one of them in an evidence bag, when Ella laughed and plucked the one in the bag out of the air, messing up his rhythm and making the other two fall to the floor. “Sorry, Lu,” she said with a grin.

“No you’re not,” he pouted.

“Maybe she’d be able to get more work done if you could act like an adult,” Chloe couldn’t help but say.

A hurt look flitted across Lucifer’s face before he wiped it away and narrowed his eyes at Chloe. He turned to Ella and asked, “Am I bothering you, love?”

“Of course not. You know I would tell you if you were. /I/ don’t see any need to keep you on a leash like a dog,” she said pointedly with a glare at Chloe. She had seen the brief moment of hurt in Lucifer’s eyes and hated it.

“Except sometimes when…” Lucifer started with a smirk and a glint in his eye.

“I don’t need to know that,” Chloe said loudly before he could get started. Once she noticed that he’d stopped, she still couldn’t help but say, “If you paid a little more attention to the case it might go faster.”

Ella scoffed. “He pays plenty of attention. He just does it in different ways,” she snapped before turning to Lucifer. “Lu, sweetheart, before she came in here what was running through your mind?”

He shrugged. “Trying to figure out why pruning shears were the weapon of choice when there were so many better options right next to them. Considering the people we’ve talked to so far in relation to pruning shears. Trying to decide what to cook for dinner. Wondering if you’re planning on checking the dinging thing over there,” he smirked amusedly at the last one, and let out a laugh when she got it and spun around to do just that. Chloe realized that she had lost that argument and just dropped off the evidence and left.

The next day she was in a much better mood, and everyone in the building gave a sigh of relief. She had managed to spend a few hours with her daughter last night and getting taken to task for her treatment of Lucifer before made her realize that she was still doing the same thing in a way, just for a very different reason. Seeing him so happy without her hurt and she was taking it out on him. She made a new resolution as she went in that morning that she wasn’t going to be such a bitch anymore. She would just keep her head down and do her work and stop sniping at Lucifer or anyone else.

The rest of the week went well with that new resolution, though she couldn’t help but wince at the hurt that went through her every time Lucifer and Ella were so sickeningly sweet. As Lucifer was leaving early on Friday since the case had wrapped up, Dan called to him, “Don’t forget about tomorrow!”

“Like I would ever disappoint that little urchin,” Lucifer called back with a laugh as he headed out.

“What’s tomorrow?” Chloe went over to ask. And what did it have to do with Trixie.

Dan winced and sighed, hoping this wasn’t going to go where he was afraid it was gonna go. “Game night,” he told her.

“I’ll come too,” she offered.

“I don’t think that’s the best idea,” Dan told her. “Lucifer and Ella will be there so…”

“And she’s my daughter. Not theirs,” she said pointedly.

“Still…” Dan waffled.

“Listen, Dan. I’ve been nice letting you set the pace here with Trixie, but you can’t keep shutting me out. If I have to get a lawyer and take it to court I will,” she told him.

“Fine. You can come. But don’t expect a warm welcome. Especially if Lucifer and Ella cancel because of it,” Dan snapped and stormed back to his desk. He still had a lot of paperwork to do before he left. First though, he needed to make a phone call. When Lucifer answered, he explained what happened and that Chloe would be at game night. “Look man. I completely understand if you want to cancel and I’m sure Trix will too.”

“She and her mother are still not getting along correct?” Lucifer asked.

“No, they’re not,” Dan admitted. Of course, they had only seen each other twice and both times with him in the room. He definitely wasn’t willing to let Chloe be alone with her.

“So if we cancel, we are taking away two people that she likes for one that she doesn’t. That’s hardly fair to her. No, Ella and I will be there and we will remain cordial in front of the child, even if she does not,” Lucifer told him.

“Okay. Thanks man. Trixie will really appreciate it,” Dan said before hanging up. He considered going to talk to Ella about it too, but decided to let Lucifer handle that. She wouldn’t be happy and Lucifer was better at cheering her up than he was.

That night, Chloe ended up working late finishing up everyone’s grunt work. By the time she left it was almost dark outside. There was one thing she needed to do before she could go home though. She headed to Lucifer’s and went upstairs. This time she only took one step out of the elevator before knocking on the wall. “Anyone here?” she asked as she looked around, not able to see much around the corner.

“I’m in the office and Ella’s in the shower. If you want to talk to her you’re going to have to wait,” Lucifer called.

Chloe rounded the corner and was surprised to see him working on paperwork. She remembered what Dan had mentioned about how hard Lucifer worked, and wondered just how true it was. “Actually I was hoping to talk to both of you.”

“Then have a seat. She shouldn’t be long,” he told her, not looking up from the book he was working on. Chloe took enough of a glance to see that it was an accounting workbook, but didn’t want to pry by looking any further.

“Can I ask…why don’t you use a computer for the accounting?

“I put it all in the computer later, but it’s easier for me to do it by hand first. That way I can catch any mistakes better,” he told her.

They sat in silence for the rest of the time until Ella came out ten minutes later, dressed to the nines and still putting on her earrings. Lucifer finally looked up when he heard her footsteps and smiled brightly. “You look ravishing, darling.”

“Thank you, sweetheart,” she said with a grin. “So do you as always.” That done she turned to their guest and raised an eyebrow.

“She said she wanted to talk to both of us,” Lucifer told her before looking at Chloe with a look that said ‘get on with it’.

“Right. Yeah. I won’t keep you long since you look like you’re going out somewhere. I just want to say that I’m sorry.”

“We went over that already, I thought,” Lucifer said narrowing his eyes and hoping they weren’t about to have a repeat of that distasteful scene.

“No I mean about earlier this week. I was being petty and jealous and taking it out on the two of you and I shouldn’t have. I’ve been trying to do better.”

“We’ve noticed and we appreciate it,” Lucifer answered for both of them, reaching his hand up to Ella’s which was resting on his shoulder and she nodded in agreement.

“Yeah, and I just want to say thank you for still coming to game night tomorrow and I promise I will be on my best behavior. I know that I will never get back much of what I lost in my stupidity, but I’d like to get back what little I can and maybe we can find a new normal.”

“Thanks,” Ella said. “I hope we can too. I don’t expect that we will ever be friends again, but we can be friendly at least in front of Trixie.” It was her turn to answer for them both this time.

Chloe nodded and gave them a tentative smile. “Well that’s all I wanted to say. I’ll let you two get on with your night.” She got up and headed out.

Lucifer and Ella gave her a few minutes to clear the area before they headed down to Lux, hoping that she wasn’t planning to stay and drink for a while. They got lucky in that area though. There was no sign of her so they could relax and enjoy their evening. They still had plenty of company wherever they sat if they stayed still for too long, but at least none of them were hanging all over Lucifer. Since the big production they made when they got together, everyone knew that he was off the market now. They still hung on his every word, but as long as they didn’t touch, Ella didn’t care. By the time they went back upstairs after last call, she was exhausted and relaxed and they fell into bed together happily.

Chapter Text

Saturday morning, Chloe got up and headed downstairs only to stop short and muffle a scream. “Oh my god, Maze! You scared the crap out of me!”

“Good,” Maze snarled. “You know, I’ve been waiting for you to show up for the kid while I’m watching her. I wanted an excuse to tear you apart and even Lucifer couldn’t fault me for protecting Trix.”

“What do you…” Chloe asked with wide fearful eyes.

“You know what I am now, yes?” she asked cruelly, twirling her blades in her hands and Chloe nodded in terror. “Then I want you to know, Decker, that the only reason you’re still alive after what you did, is because Lucifer forbade me from going after you. I’m still forbidden from hurting you. At least physically. Verbally is a different story.”

“And you listen to him because…he’s your king?” she asked, trying to think around her fear since it seemed like Maze didn’t intend to hurt her.

“Usually yes. In this instance, he had to force the issue,” Maze told her. “That’s how badly I wanted to destroy you.”

“Force the issue how?” Chloe asked nervously.

“You see, as the king of hell, he can take on his full hell form and make Commands that any demon is forced to obey whether they want to or not,” Maze told her, trying to get across just how badly she wanted to hurt her that Lucifer had to go that far.

“So he took your will away?” she asked horrified.

“To save YOU, you stupid bitch!” Maze asked enraged that even now she was looking for things to use against him. “I can count on one hand the number of times he’s done that to me in the millennia I’ve been working with him. He despises doing it. Funny how every ‘bad’ thing he’s done has been to protect you isn’t it?”

Chloe deflated. “Well it’s not like he cares anymore now does it,” she muttered.

“Oh, he does. Just not as much as you might want. He hasn’t rescinded my orders. He doesn’t want you dead, or horrifically deformed and in pain for the rest of your life, which would be my personal choice. And I want to make sure you know how lucky you are that he’s as forgiving as he is because if you had done that to me, nothing could have saved you. And remember what I said about Trix. Lucifer would do anything for her and if you were ever a threat to her…well he would fault me for nothing. Don’t forget that,” she said before disappearing faster than Chloe could see.

Chloe took a few deep breaths, trying to steady herself after that encounter and turning over everything in her head. Even after she’d tried to kill him, he’d gone to great lengths to protect her. How could she have been so stupid.

Ella woke up around noon to the wonderful smell of breakfast and she smiled, pulling herself out of bed. She checked on the progress and saw that she had time to take a quick shower before she sat down to eat. This was a smaller breakfast though since they were going to be munching on junk food all day and he knew that she couldn’t eat a big breakfast before that.

After they ate, they left to hit the store on the way to game night as they always did, though tensions were much higher than usual this time. They would get through it though. It got a lot easier when they got there and were set on by Trixie before they could even ring the doorbell. “Uncle Lucifer! Aunt Ella!” she cried, wrapping them both in hugs. Lucifer had stopped flinching at the title months ago and had gotten far more used to showing and accepting affection since he and Ella had gotten together, so he reached down and gave her a hug.

Trixie stepped back. “I’m soo glad you came even though Mommy’s here. I didn’t want her to come, but Daddy said she had to.”

“It’s quite alright, urchin,” Lucifer said fondly. “She is still your mother.”

Trixie huffed at that, but grabbed both their hands and dragged them inside. “Daddy! They’re here!”

Dan came out shaking his head at Trixie’s exhuberance and Lucifer and Ella quickly realized that Chloe was already there and they nodded cordially in greeting before taking the bags to the kitchen and starting to get everything set up. When Chloe tried to come help, Dan quickly sent her back out. “There isn’t room in here for four people moving around. We bump into each other enough with just the three of us,” he told her to try and kill the sting just a bit.

By the time everything was ready and they were bringing out the bowls and platters, Trixie had the game all set up and was explaining the way of things to her mother. “Uncle Lucifer is the racecar, I’m the hat, Aunt Ella is the puppy, and Daddy is the battleship. You can pick one of the other pieces.”

“Okay, I’ll be the cat,” she decided, grabbing the piece and putting it on the board.

Ella had to bite back the comment that threatened to spill out at her choice, but managed. She and Lucifer, by silent agreement, decided to share a side of the board since they were up to five people now. Lucifer was the first to manage to shake off the awkwardness and decided to try and lighten everyone else up too. “I’ll be the banker!” he said happily.

“No!” Dan and Ella both exclaimed at the same time before breaking into laughter.

Trixie’s giggles quickly joined them. “We’re not that silly, Uncle Lucifer.”

“Yeah, we learned that lesson the first time,” Dan laughed.

“Nice try though, honey,” Ella patted his back in mock sympathy.

Lucifer stuck his nose in the air as best he could when laying on his stomach on the floor. “Just because I like to liven up the game…”

“Which would never end if you keep handing money over whenever someone runs out,” Dan joked as he grabbed the bank. “Sorry Ella, but you’re too close to Rockefeller over there this time.”

Chloe knew that she was on thin ice and she was still a bit shaken over the incident this morning, so she mostly just kept her mouth shut. The fact that she was here was enough of a win and maybe if she could prove to Trixie how hard she was trying there might be a bit of a thaw there. She spent the game taking in the different relationships and trying to figure out where she could fit in this new dynamic. She was taken aback anew at the way Lucifer and Ella meshed together, and she could see even more how suited they were for each other. Lucifer and Dan seemed almost like best friends despite how much they needled each other, and Trixie seemed completely attached to both Lucifer and Ella, and they seemed the same to her.

She remembered what Maze had said this morning about how Lucifer would do anything for Trixie and she wondered if that had something to do with her defense of him. Then she remembered how he’d bought Trixie an expensive doll not long after they’d met just because she wanted it, and how he was always trying to get her out of trouble and indulging her every wish and she wondered if it had always been that way and why. She managed to banter a bit with them all over the course of the game and it was strained but acceptable. That just made it worse for her in a way though because it was like she had just a bare taste of everything she wanted.

Dan won the game a few hours later, and Trixie got up to get her face paints for the next portion of the evening. This time she decided that Ella should be first. It tended to rotate around after the first few times once she learned that Lucifer wasn’t going to run away if she gave him the chance. She had expanded her abilities over the last year, so there were more options now and Ella got a puppy on one cheek and a kitten on the other with a rainbow over her forehead just because Trixie liked doing rainbows.

Lucifer was next and the negotiation started. “Can you do a big angry dog?” Trixie shook her head. “Still haven’t learned Bruce Lee mid flying kick?” She shook her head again with a giggle. “How about a tiger?” Another head shake. “Then what do you suggest, urchin?”

“I know! I can do angel wings and stars!” Trixie said excitedly.

“Very well. I suppose that is acceptable,” Lucifer said with a sigh that didn’t fool anyone. “But not pink?”

She patted his arm consolingly. “Like I said before. You do your stars your way and I’ll do my stars my way.” Lucifer snorted amusedly and decided not to fight her. “Can you tell me about your stars again?” she asked as she started painting.

“Again? I have told you the story three times,” he whined.

“I know, but I like the story,” she said cheerfully.

He rolled his eyes and started. “Well back when I was young and heaven was all that existed in the universe, the night was pitch black and wrapped around us. I was laying in my bed trying to sleep one night, but was quite bored, so I decided the dark needed some decoration…” He started explaining, catching Ella’s eye every so often as she watched him lovingly. She loved hearing the story as much as Trixie did. Or maybe she just loved hearing him tell it to the child.

Chapter Text

When it was Chloe’s turn for the face painting, Trixie considered what to do, especially after her mother said she could do whatever she wanted. She knew that what she wanted to do would probably get her grounded though, so she went with a generic unicorn. When Chloe offered to do her face next, Trixie shook her head and went to Ella. “Aunt Ella, will you paint my face now?”

Ella chuckled uncomfortably, but said, “Sure kiddo. What do you want?”

“I want an angel on one side and the devil on the other,” she said with a grin, pulling a laugh from Lucifer that was quickly followed by everyone else. Even Chloe cracked a smile.

Ella was a very good artist and decided to go all out on the devil and really do Lucifer’s devil face. She knew it was what Trixie would want and the fact that it would be a poke in the eye to Chloe was just a bonus. The angel bore a striking resemblance to Lucifer too with the pure white wings, but since it had to be from farther away to get the wings in, she wasn’t able to get detail in the face. Trixie pronounced it, ‘the most perfect thing ever!’ when she looked in the mirror.

Then it was time for the karaoke to be brought out and there was quite a bit of dithering over songs and arguing over who Lucifer was going to back up on which songs. Lucifer laughed and said, “You do realize that since we will be doing only one song at a time, I can as many as you wish.” When Chloe asked if he would back her up on a song too, he hesitated a long moment before saying, “It depends on the song.” When her first choice was a slow love song, he glared at her for trying it, so she went back to looking.

Lucifer and Ella did a few different duets, but given the presence of the child and the family atmosphere, didn’t make them sappy, though they were love songs. Just more fun upbeat ones. Don’t Go Breaking My Heart and You’re the One that I Want, were the love songs they did and then the two of them and Trixie did We Go Together, also from Grease. Lucifer did manage a few songs on his own as well. Welcome to the Jungle, and Ring of Fire. Chloe never did manage to find a song that he would sing with her, having given up after her plan to get even just a taste of what she lost failed.

Once the songs were picked, the night went much better as they were all able to loosen up, forget about the tension, and just have fun. Lucifer, as usual, hammed up everything he did, especially the duets with Ella as they danced around as they sang and Trixie spent most of the time giggling at them. There was a bit of tension returned when Chloe sang Purple Rain, but they decided to take it in the spirit it was probably not offered, but should have been.

When they got to the end of the night food fight with everything that was left over and mostly stale by now, Chloe’s disapproval was clear, but she kept her mouth shut and let them have fun. As usual it was brought on by a funny and well timed quip by Lucifer against Dan. Chloe only participating enough to not be called a killjoy. She just considered it a win that she wasn’t exclusively targeted. Everyone else was more worried about having fun that settling grudges, so tended to avoid her so as not to change that.

Afterwards, Trixie bestowed big hugs on Lucifer and Ella as they left, and Chloe stuck around for a while. Once it was just the three of them, Trixie said, “I’m gonna go take a shower now.” It worked since she was the most covered in food, but really she just wanted to get away from her mother.

Once she was gone, Chloe asked, trying to keep the judgement out of her voice and mostly succeeding. “So you get left to do all the cleaning up?”

Dan shrugged. “It’s only fair since Lucifer foots the bill.” Chloe couldn’t argue with that so just decided to help him clean up.

“How do you keep him from giving her money and stuff all the time?” Chloe asked. That had been something she always struggled with.

Dan chuckled. “I don’t. I just told her that if she saves up enough to build a stable and a fence and buy a pony and everything she needs to take care of it then she can get one. And she can’t tell Lucifer what she’s saving up for. He doesn’t give her nearly enough for that and by the time she gets that much money she’ll be grown anyway.”

Chloe just blinked at him for a moment before bursting into laugher. “Okay, that’s a good one.”

“She does still spend a little bit from time to time, but that goal keeps her from going overboard.”

“Very sneaky. I wish I had thought of that.”

On the way home, Lucifer said, “That wasn’t as bad as I was afraid it would be.”

Ella agreed. “Yeah, she wasn’t kidding about being on her best behavior,” she chuckled. “Though the stunt she tried to pull with the karaoke was a low blow.”

“I know. And I saw it coming a mile away,” Lucifer told her amusedly.

“You did manage to avoid that rather expertly,” Ella praised him.

“I’m not as much of an idiot as she apparently thinks I am,” he pointed out. He knew that the whole stunt was designed to back him into a corner and get him to sing a love song with her that would put a wedge between him and Ella. Even if he had gotten caught in her trap it would never have worked the way she wanted it to. They were both glad that it would be another two months before they were put in that position again though.

Monday back at work did show quite a bit more thawing, even when the weekly flower delivery arrived, which is why Ella actually bothered to answer Chloe when she asked about the flowers. “Dan said something about flower language. What did he mean?” she asked curiously when she ended up in Ella’s lab dropping off some things.

Ella smiled brightly. She loved talking about it and had already done her research on this newest bouquet, so had no problem answering and only part of the reason was to test and see if her jealousy really was under control. She went over to the vase and explained. “The Yarrow means everlasting love, the Violets loyalty, faithfulness, and devotion, the little sunflowers mean adoration, Marjoram is for joy, Calla Lily is for beauty, and the angelica is saying that I’m his inspiration, and probably also means something quippy about angels,” she finished with a laugh.

“Wow. That’s…really sweet. I would never have imagined him doing something like that,” she said with a sad smile.

Ella laughed and decided now was a good time to enlighten her. “Really? The guy who notices /everything/? The guy who, at least once a week, brings the entire station pastries and coffee? Who knows exactly how everyone takes their coffee and their favorite pastries? The guy who spends half the day flirting around and listening to everyone’s stories about their families and friends and whatever else? You’re surprised that he’s so thoughtful?”

“I…I never thought of it like that,” Chloe said struck dumb as she turned over every one of their previous interactions in her mind.

“I’m sure you probably thought something about him just trying to butter people up and buy affection and just flirting to get people in bed. You probably didn’t even notice that he always got their coffee and pastries just right.” Ella could tell by the look on her face that she was right. “You know, the first morning after you left, I had ended up consoling him until around three or four in the morning so he let me crash in his bed and he took the couch. When I woke up, he had cooked me a nice breakfast and even made me a homemade caramel macchiato just because he’d noticed that I was ‘always happier when I had one of those in the morning’. His words. And this was back when we barely knew each other.”

Chloe couldn’t help but smile at the thought and how it reminded her of all the times he would break into her house to make breakfast, but she had never appreciated it. It had annoyed her even and right now she couldn’t even think of why. “I’m glad he has someone who appreciates him, then,” she managed to say before making her escape.

Once she was gone, Ella couldn’t help but smirk. She had managed to keep a friendly tone through all of that and the fact that Chloe hadn’t reacted defensively was a good sign for the future. That didn’t mean that it didn’t feel good to point out how wrong she’d been.

Chapter Text

Chloe continued getting better about seeing Lucifer and Ella together and the couple in question kept getting closer. A few weeks later they were at a crime scene when all hell broke loose. Ella was still processing the scene, the uniforms were canvassing the area, Chloe was helping Ella and Dan and Lucifer were interviewing the last witness who seemed more than a little sketchy.

The witness realized that he had messed up even before he saw the glint in Lucifer’s eye and the look from Dan. Unfortunately they had both still been trying to consider how to bring him down when he made a completely desperate move and grabbed the nearest person he could to use as a hostage. It was just his bad luck that person happened to be Ella. “Oh fuck,” Dan muttered and looked to Lucifer fully expecting what came next.

Lucifer’s eyes flashed to red, the second the murderer touched Ella and he lost all control over his human persona as soon as the knife went to her throat. “/That/ was a mistake,” he growled demonically as he considered the best way to extricate Ella from his grip without risking her life.

Chloe gasped and covered her mouth as she took a few steps back, still afraid of him looking like that and even more so with his voice change. Thankfully, the murderer was just as terrified and started shaking as soon as he saw the change in Lucifer. This gave Ella the opening she needed as she threw her elbow back into his side and stomped on the insole of his foot at the same time as she twisted sideways away from the knife. It still nicked her though.

As soon as Ella was free, and especially since he saw the blood, Lucifer had the man hanging in the air by his throat and slammed against the wall of the alley as he started to blubber. Ella pushed Dan away as he was trying to check the cut on her neck. She could tell it wasn’t bad and she needed to stop Lucifer before he did something he would regret. She stepped up beside him and placed a hand gently on his arm. “Lucifer, love. Don’t do anything rash. You know you can’t kill a human.”

“Maybe not, but I can make him wish he was dead,” Lucifer growled, tightening his grip on the man’s throat.

“I understand how you feel and don’t necessarily disagree with you,” Ella said gently. “But if you hurt him then he walks on a technicality and then is in a position to hurt other people too, and I know you don’t want that. He’ll be in hell soon enough and then he’ll get what he deserves.”

Lucifer visibly struggled with his temper before letting go and the man crumpled to the ground. Lucifer wasn’t quite done with him yet though as he leaned over and growled in his face. “You will confess to everything you’ve done wrong or I will visit you again and then no one will hold me back.”

The man blubbered hysterically as he nodded and as Lucifer stepped back, Dan rushed forward and slapped some cuffs on him. Before Lucifer could call his human face back up, Ella jumped in his arms and kissed him desperately. He was so emotionally raw at the moment that he didn’t even realize which face she was kissing until it was over and he felt her hands tracing over his scars. He hastily pulled his normal face back up and looked around to see who had seen it before breathing a sigh of relief. The murder had happened in a blind alley which meant the crime scene tape and guards were around the corner and the only people present other than the killer were already in the know. That brought his mind back to the fact that Ella had kissed him like that, and he looked at her with confusion.

Ella knew what had him so off kilter and she just smiled lovingly at him and said, “You’re you no matter what face you’re wearing.” He was worlds better about his discomfort with that side of him, but it was still prone to crop up from time to time. Especially when he was already off-balance what with the hostage attempt.

Before he could say anything in response to that, he remembered and noticed that she was hurt. “You’re bleeding,” he said, tilting her head back so he could see.

She chuckled and allowed it. “It’s just a scratch,” she told him and he visibly relaxed when he saw that she was mostly right. It was a little more than a scratch, but it hadn’t hit anything but skin, so she would be fine.

He nodded and kissed her again, this time soft and slow. “You were wonderful,” he told her, knowing that she would know that he meant how she got away.

“Growing up with four brothers comes in handy sometimes,” she joked just as Chloe had gained control of herself and rushed over.

“Are you okay, Ella?” she asked worriedly.

“I’m fine,” she told her, taking the bandage Chloe was offering, and Lucifer used his pocket square to clean the area before putting it on. “Thanks,” she told them both.

About that time, Dan came back after handing off the suspect to the uniforms to bring him back to the station. “He seemed perfectly ready to confess, so we should head back and get him finished up. You good?” he directed the last to Ella.

“I’m good,” she assured him. “Wouldn’t say no to a drink though,” she laughed.

“I think you can handle this suspect from here, and Ella and I will take off a little early today,” Lucifer said with a note of finality.

“Yeah. That’s fine. Just be prepared to give a statement when you get in tomorrow,” Dan told them. It was almost the end of the day anyway.

“I’ll take the evidence and your stuff back to the lab for you,” Chloe offered and Ella nodded gratefully.

Lucifer gave her a grateful look as well, leading Ella out of the alley and straight home, pouring her a stiff drink as she plopped down on the couch. The drink was hastily abandoned on the bar as he grabbed the blade from under the bar, unfurled his wings, and flew immediately between Ella and the balcony door. “Who’s there?”

“It’s just me, Lu,” Azrael said as she shimmered into view.

Lucifer immediately relaxed. “Quit doing that,” he snapped.

Azrael shrugged. “Habit,” she told him just before she got swept up in a hug. She chuckled and hugged him back. “What was that for?” she asked happily, clearly not complaining.

Ella took that chance to jump into the conversation and bestow her own hug on the angel. “We were worried about you after you didn’t come back for so long.”

“Yeah, I kinda almost got caught before so had to lay low for a while. Sorry, I didn’t get a chance to warn you about what was coming, but it worked out anyway,” Azrael told them.

“What do you mean what was coming?” Lucifer asked worriedly.

“Kind of a long story, but here’s what you need to know first. I made Ella invisible to Dad and if you’ll let me I can do the same to you. That way he thinks she died and went to hell where he can’t see and you went after her.”

“You can do that?” Ella asked in shock.

“Why would you…” Lucifer knew that if it was found out it would paint a huge target on her back. Death may be able to hide from anyone, but that didn’t mean that life on the run would be easy with just one slipup meaning her own death. Whatever had brought this on must be big.

“It’s part of the long story. Trust me. It’s better this way. Will you let me?” she asked impatiently. The sooner they were both protected the sooner they all were.

“Will you tell me the long story after?” Lucifer asked pointedly. He didn’t want to let one of his siblings mess around with him without understanding why. Not even one he somewhat trusted.

“Yes. I promise,” she said quickly so Lucifer nodded. She reached up and put a hand on his head and there was a brief glow before Lucifer shuddered and stepped away.

“Ugh. I forgot how uncomfortable that was,” he scrunched up his nose. “Now what happened and why would Dad assume that Ella was in hell?”

“Because she’s been banned from heaven,” Azrael said bluntly.

“WHAT?!” Lucifer exploded.

“Maybe now would be a good time for those drinks, sweetheart,” Ella coaxed with a hand on his arm.

Lucifer nodded tensely and shot Azrael a glare as he turned. “And then you WILL be explaining.”

“Was already planning on it, Lu,” she told him.

Chapter Text

Lucifer came back with two drinks and the bottle after Azrael declined one and he sat down tensely, knowing that Ella wouldn’t want to sit if everyone else was standing. Once Ella and Azrael had followed his lead, he took a long drink and said, “Talk.”

“Well I’ve been doing some digging for a while now, and learned quite a bit about Father’s plans. Do you want me to start from the beginning or start from now and work back?”

“Beginning,” Ella said at the same time Lucifer said, “Now.” Lucifer looked torn for a moment, desperately wanting to know how Ella had gotten banned from heaven sooner rather than later, but decided, as usual, to give Ella what she wanted. “Okay, beginning.”

“Okay then. What you may not realize, and what none of us knew until much much later is that when you gave humanity free will, that wasn’t all you did.”

“What do you mean?” he asked worriedly.

“You didn’t just give them the ability to make their own decisions. You took /all/ control of them away from Dad. And the more they started to overrun the world the less control he had over anything here. Didn’t you ever wonder why Amenadiel always just ordered you back to hell and talked you into obeying rather than just chuck you back himself?”

“I figured he just wasn’t sure who would win the fight,” Lucifer said with a shrug.

“Oh please,” Azrael rolled her eyes. At Lucifer’s affronted look she explained. “I’m not saying that you couldn’t beat him. I’m saying that he wouldn’t doubt that he would win. You know the size of his ego as well as anyone.”

“Basically, you’re saying that as long as I’m on Earth, dear old dad can’t control me at all?”

“He can give suggestions. Nudges. But no. He can’t force anyone to do anything,” Azrael told him. “That’s why he always works through human intermediaries like Chloe Decker and Malcom Graham.”

“Then I was right that Chloe was a tool for him to manipulate me with,” Lucifer said knowingly as Ella took his hand comfortingly.

“Exactly. When he is directly involved in the creation of a human life, he can shape their overall personality from that first spark. Her specific actions were all her, but the personality that drove them was created by him. She was designed to be immune to your powers which would intrigue you enough to get you hooked and then her attitude would continue to tear you down over time, but you would mistake that intrigue for love and get all twisted up in knots.”

“Tear me down?” he asked confused. “I know that what she did in the end was bad, but…”

“No, she had been tearing you down all along,” Ella interjected. “I always wondered how you put up with it. The way she was always telling you off for everything you did. Just for being yourself. She was always assuming the worst possible motives for everything you did no matter how nice it was. She treated you like an unruly child.”

“I…hadn’t realized…did she really?” Lucifer asked, trying to think back.

“Haven’t you noticed how much better you’ve felt about yourself since she’s been out of your life?” Ella asked.

“I thought that was just you, darling,” Lucifer told her.

“It wasn’t,” Azrael chimed back in. “She was to slowly erode your confidence and at the same time get you to fall for her. Then she found out who you really were, not like you hadn’t told her a hundred times already,” she rolled her eyes. “Dad ended that that time slow early on purpose so she would see and she took off, just like he planned. A few nudges and she ended up in Rome with the priest and a plan to kill you. What was supposed to happen was that she would come back, apologize, pretend to be okay and most importantly, pretend to love you. You would be so happy you would do anything and then she would slip the poison in your drink on a date. It was just slow acting enough that you would realize what she’d done and break your spirit completely before you woke up in hell with no desire to ever leave again.”

“But that didn’t happen,” Ella said relieved, as much to reassure herself as anything else.

“No. Dad didn’t account for the fact that her child would get so attached to you or be eavesdropping at just the right time to come and warn you, and let me tell you he was not happy. The child is banned from heaven too.”

“WHAT?!” Lucifer jumped to his feet, even more enraged if at all possible. “He can’t ban a CHILD from heaven!”

“Believe me, Lu. You’re not saying anything most of us haven’t. We even tried to talk him out of it, but…” she trailed off, choking up a bit.

“But what?” he asked worriedly, sitting back down. If it could affect Azrael like that it had to be bad.

“He went off on us for questioning him. He…He smote Michael. Warned us that the rest of us were next if we didn’t drop it.”

Lucifer sucked in a sharp breath at the thought of his twin as his own eyes filled with tears. “How could he…”

“It’s bad up there, Lu. Really bad. It’s been getting worse ever since you got thrown out, but lately it’s been…” she shuddered.

Ella took a few deep breaths to center herself. She had more questions about the players involved, but she could ask Lucifer later. Right now they needed the rest of the story and when it seemed like no one else was going to speak again, she did. “Does he have anything to do with Chloe being back?”

“Right. Sorry. Got a little sidetracked,” Azrael said wiping the tears from her eyes. “Dad also wasn’t counting on you and the rest of your friends to support him so much after everything came to light, which is how all of you came to be banned. He figured if everyone Lu cared about was in hell then he would go back anyway.”

Lucifer was shaking with anger now and only Ella’s presence leaning against his side and rubbing his hands was keeping him steady. “So the entire goal is to get me back to hell?” he asked incredulously.

“And break you badly enough that you never think of leaving again,” she added. “Which brings us to the next part of the plan. Cain had been looking for Chloe ever since he’d gotten wind of a report due to a nudge from Dad about her making you bleed. He wanted to use her to end his curse, but when his big plan got derailed, he changed things up a bit. He nudged Cain towards where Chloe ran to and since he was posing as a police lieutenant, he got a transfer there. When her presence alone wasn’t enough to end it, he realized that she had cared about you so he set out to replicate that, but he ended up falling in love. That wasn’t part of Dad’s plan, so he took the curse away and Cain was killed. He hoped that Cain’s arrival in hell would cause enough of a stir for the demons to come get you to come back and help them.”

“It almost worked,” Lucifer told her. “If it hadn’t been for the fact that I was already falling for Ella, I might have actually gone back then.”

“Which is when Dad realized that she was too much of a problem so he set out to neutralize her. Since Chloe and Cain had eloped not long before his death, she got everything he had, including all of his stash houses and Dad nudged her to take a look which led to her realization of what true evil was and that you weren’t it. When she realized that she’d fallen in love with the monster and threw away the angel, she came back here to try to get you back.”

Lucifer scoffed. “Like that would ever happen.”

“Only because you’d learned the true meaning of love in the time she’d been gone,” Azrael pointed out and Ella smiled and leaned heavier against him. “He had been counting on the fact that you’re always so forgiving to those you care about. He knew that hadn’t changed because of how easily you accepted Amenadiel back into your life after everything he’d done to you. He didn’t realize just how much things had changed when you fell for Ella.”

“Looks like you’ve saved me again, my love,” he told her with a sad smile.

“And I always will,” she replied, reaching up to brush her hand down his cheek.

“Which brings us to today,” Azrael said, wanting to get the last of this out as quickly as possible.

“What about today?” Lucifer asked dangerously.

“Father decided that he needed to get Ella out of the way. What happened today was essentially a hit,” Azrael said and was cut off before she could say any more by a glass flying from Lucifer’s hand and shattering on the wall as he doubled over and started shaking even worse than before.

Ella pulled him into her arms and started running a hand through his hair, kissing the top of his head. “I’m okay, sweetheart,” she murmured. “I’m right here. I’m fine.”

Azrael tried to get through to him too. “When I saw her name pop up on my list I headed straight to her. I was ready to intervene if you hadn’t. I would have refused the pickup Lu. I wouldn’t have taken her away from you.”

“See? Everything is okay,” Ella coaxed as she could feel Lucifer getting control of himself. She knew he had a lot more to get out, but there would be time for that later.

Once he was as calm as he was going to get, Ella asked Azrael. “Just a few more questions for now. Does Chloe have any idea how she’s being used?”

“Not a clue,” Azrael said.

“Okay and what does he have planned next?” Ella asked. That was the last thing she was sure they needed to know before they took some time to come to terms with all this.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “Which is why I wanted him to think that this plan succeeded. You’re both off his radar now so he’ll think you’re back in hell.”

“And he can’t see us through Chloe or anything like that?” she asked just to be sure. If she needed to take Lucifer and run she would absolutely do it. If it kept them both out of hell for as long as possible, she would drop everything in her life and get as far away as possible.

Azrael shook her head. “Nope. It doesn’t work that way.”

Ella breathed a sigh of relief. “Okay. Good then. We can figure out the rest later. I think we need some time to come to terms with this right now.”

“Yeah. Absolutely,” Azrael said as she got up to leave.

“Rae-rae?” Lucifer called hoarsely before she left. “Keep us updated?”

“I will. Now that you’re off the radar, it’s not as dangerous for me to come,” she assured him before she left.

Chapter Text

Once they were alone, Ella moved to straddle Lucifer’s lap, but sitting back farther than usual. This wasn’t a sexual thing. She sat back on his knees and put her hands to either side of his face and tilted him up to look at her as her thumbs brushed away the tears on his cheeks. She could feel the hurt radiating off him and the haunted look in his eyes was haunting her just as much. She leaned her forehead against his and just offered her support in the only way she could.

She had no idea what she could possibly say right now to make anything the slightest bit better. From the fact that his father was intentionally trying to break his spirit, blocking anyone he cared for, even children, from heaven, putting out a hit on her. It was so much. The only thing keeping her together at the moment was the need to be here for him. She could have her own crisis later.

He sat there for a long moment just soaking up everything she offered before he seemed to almost crumble and pull her tightly against him, burying his face in her neck as he sobbed. Of her hands ran through his hair and the other one over his back and shoulders as she pressed soft kisses to his shoulder and neck and anywhere else she could reach without dislodging him.

It was quite a while before he managed to rein in his emotions and start to move back, but his movement was stopped when his shirt caught on her necklace. Her crucifix necklace. He freed it with shaking hands before wrapping his fist around the crucifix so tightly his knuckles were white and she could tell how hard he was trying to force himself to keep control. She didn’t care anymore though. “Go ahead, Lu,” she encouraged him. If he didn’t then she would.

He just took a deep shaky breath and managed to release his fist, gently laying the necklace back against her skin just right. “No,” he said hoarsely. “Your faith is not mine to take away.”

She smiled sadly and pressed a kiss to his forehead. “You’re right. It’s mine,” she told him, reaching to her neck to unclasp the necklace. She got up off his lap just long enough to open the balcony door and chuck it before she returned to her position. “And it’s gone. For good.”

“As long as you didn’t do that for me,” he said, looking into her eyes desperately.

“No. I did it for me. Because I will have no part of a god like that. I would have done it a long time ago if it was only for you,” she assured him. When they lapsed into another heavy silence, she asked, “Do you want to talk about it?”

He shook his head, leaning forward to rest his forehead on her shoulder. “No. Not right now. I know I need to and I will. Just…not yet.”

“Okay,” she said softly, still using her hands to caress him comfortingly. “Whenever you’re ready, I’m here.”

“I know. I-I- Thank you,” he managed to say, hugging her again and burying his head back in her neck. “Just…thank you.”

She gave a watery smile and leaned her head against his. “Always, my love,” she whispered. “Anything you want or need. Always.” They just sat like that for hours. Until long after the sun went down. Both of them lost in thought and taking any comfort they could from each other. She could feel him starting to get tired. He would randomly lean more of his weight on her for a moment before catching himself. “Come on, sweetheart. Let’s head to bed,” she coaxed, getting up off his lap. “I’m gonna text Dan and ask him to come here and get our statements in the morning. Tomorrow’s Friday and I think we need an early weekend don’t you?” He just nodded and followed her meekly which worried her as much as anything else. She stripped him down to his boxer briefs and helped him into bed before stripping herself down and joining him and he still hadn’t said a word, but as soon as she was laying down, he hugged her tightly to his side.

The next thing either of them knew, Dan was shaking them awake. Lucifer creaked his eyes open and mumbled something as Ella whimpered. “Sorry guys,” Dan said apologetically. “But I kinda need to get your statements sooner rather than later.”

Lucifer sighed and opened his eyes all the way before smacking Ella on the butt and sitting up, knocking her off his chest as he did. “I’ll go first and give you some time to get presentable, darling,” he told her, grabbing his silk pants from the chair and sliding them on before heading to the living room. He grabbed his robe on the way and shrugged it on as he was sitting down. By the time he had finished his statement, Ella was dressed and out and gave hers. All in all it had taken about 15 minutes.

“So you guys are still pretty shaken up, I guess? Is that why you’re taking the day off?” he asked.

Lucifer snorted. “You could say that, but what happened in the alley was the least of it.”

“His sister dropped by after we got home and had some…bad news,” Ella explained as vaguely as she could, letting Lucifer be the one to decide how much to share.

Lucifer got up, pressing a kiss to the top of Ella’s head. “Feel free to tell him all about it while I go start breakfast,” he told her.

Ella looked after him sadly, not wanting to protest. He knew that Dan needed to know how precarious all of their positions were, especially Trixie, but he clearly wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. At least not in front of Dan. She waited until Lucifer was out of the room before she got up and waved Dan to follow her out to the balcony so there was less chance that he would overhear. Once they were out there, she explained everything that Azrael had told them, including the decree about Trixie and herself and probably Dan and Linda too being banned from heaven. Dan was appropriately horrified.

“So you mean to tell me that my ten year old daughter is slated for hell. No matter what she does in her life from this day on.”

“Unfortunately, yes. If I know Lucifer he’s trying to think of a way to fix it, but until or unless he does, that’s how things stand.”

“And this is a god that people worship? That you worship?” he asked incredulously.

“People don’t know the truth about him apparently and now that I do…” she lifted her head to show her bare neck. Lucifer interrupted them about that time to say that breakfast was ready.

“Yeah. I should get going…”

“On the contrary, Daniel. I made you a plate too. There is something I need to give you before you leave anyway, and I would rather have a fortifying breakfast first,” Lucifer told him before turning and heading back to the kitchen without giving anyone a chance to argue.

Dan seemed to know better than to bring up the big subject over breakfast and kept the conversation light. Once they finished eating, they moved back to the living room, and Dan asked what it was Lucifer needed to give him. “Whoa!” Dan exclaimed, taking a step back as brilliant white wings sprung from Lucifer’s back.

“Darling would you mind?” Lucifer asked. “You can get a better angle to get more in one yank than I can.”

“Lu, are you sure?” she asked worriedly.

“I will not have any of them going to hell just for being kind to me. Yes I’m sure,” he said firmly. When he saw her agreement he told her, “Ten of them if you please.”

“What are you…” Dan asked completely confused before wincing in sympathy as Lucifer did when Ella yanked a handful of feathers out of his wing.

Lucifer counted out four and handed them to Dan. “Two for you and two for your offspring. If either of you are ever fatally wounded, just place the feather over the wound and it will heal. It will also work for internal injuries.”

“Can we…use them on other people if needed?” Dan asked.

“Use your judgement, but remember the necessity of explanations to them if you do. And make sure you let me know when and if you use one so that I can get you another,” he told them.

“Are you…you know…okay?” Dan asked as Lucifer folded his wings back up.

“Not the most pleasant thing in the world, the initial pain or the constant itch while they grow back, but I’ve had worse,” he told him. “Make sure the urchin understands that she always has to have at least one on her at all times.”

“I will. I’ll try to find a way to make her understand how to recognize fatal injuries too so she doesn’t waste them,” Dan promised.

“If she does, she does. I would rather them be wasted than her hesitate to use them when they are needed. I have plenty more,” he joked.

Dan nodded. “Thanks man. You don’t know how much this means to me.”

Lucifer nodded back at him. “I do what I can,” he told him as Dan left.

Chapter Text

Ella turned to Lucifer and asked, “Who are the rest of the feathers for?” She had a few guesses, of course, but wondered how right she was.

“Two for Dr. Linda, another for you, and some spares for any necessary replacements,” he told her, handing her a second feather. “You I want to keep /both/ on you at all times. You do have an active hit out on you by my father himself.”

Ella nodded and put the second one in her purse next to the first. “Actually, I have a better idea,” she said grabbing it back out. He looked at her curiously as she went and found a string that she tied around it and hung it from her neck. She made sure to hang it low enough that she could move it around as needed instead of having to worry about getting it off over her head if she was hurt, so it was hanging around the center of her stomach.

Lucifer smiled and nodded. It was a good idea. “Might want to put it under your shirt though so it doesn’t draw too many questions.”

“Smart thinking,” she said, sliding it under her shirt. Wearing a feather wouldn’t be that odd if it looked like a normal feather, but it practically glowed. No sooner than the thought hit her it was glowing brightly and she pulled the makeshift necklace back out of her shirt to see what was going on only to find that the feather was gone. “What the…”

Lucifer shook his head amusedly. “Apparently not the best idea. Here,” he handed her another one. “Just keep it in your purse for now. I have another idea to keep it closer, but it might take a few days.”

“What happened?” she asked confused.

He reached out and pulled the bandage off her neck. “It did it’s job,” he told her.

“I thought it had to be on top of the wound?”

“Not technically. Only if the wound is bad enough, which is usually the only reason to use them.”

“Okay, but then why wouldn’t that have happened when I picked it up with my hands?”

“It’s a complicated thing involving intent and the thickness of the skin, and a few other factors,” he told her with a shrug. “Does it really matter?”

“Not really. I was just curious is all,” she told him.

“Now lets go see Dr. Linda and make sure she’s kept safe,” he told her.

“I can wait here,” she offered. “I know you have your session in a couple hours anyway, so you might as well stick around.”

“I know that I can’t keep it up forever, but I would really rather not have you out of my sight today,” he told her.

“You want me to join you in your therapy session?” she asked pointedly.

“Sure. Why not?” he asked. He would have invited her to do so before if she wasn’t working when he had his sessions. “It’s not like I have any secrets from you, dearest.”

Ella smiled brightly and took his hand. “Then okay. We should probably wait until closer to your session before we go though. She’s probably busy.”

Lucifer shook his head. “No. I don’t want to take the, admittedly small, risk of her needing it before I get there.”

Ella resisted the urge to shake her head. She couldn’t exactly blame him for being overly paranoid at the moment. “Okay, lets go then. You might want to get some clothes on first though,” she said amusedly, pointing out that he was still in his robe.

He chuckled and went to do just that, while Ella took the opportunity to brush her hair and pull it back. Ten minutes later they were in the car headed to Linda’s office. When he got there, Ella pointed out that the red light was on so he couldn’t go in, but Lucifer paid no attention and just went in anyway.

Linda sighed at the interruption and said, “We’ve talked about this, Lucifer…”

“Sorry Doctor, but this is a matter of life and death. I just need five minutes,” he said, grabbing her arm and pulling her into the empty waiting area so that her patient didn’t have to leave.

Ella rolled her eyes, but declined to comment. Lucifer handed her two feathers and said, “Keep these with you at all times and if you get fatally hurt just put one over the wound.”

“What is…am I in danger?” she asked worriedly.

“Yes and no…short version, I just found out that Dad put you on the ban list for heaven for helping me, which means we have to make sure you don’t die until I can find a way to undo that. I’ll give you the long version in…” he looked at the clock. “An hour and a half.”

Linda wanted to ask why this couldn’t have waited that long in the first place, but decided that it wasn’t important so she just nodded and headed back into her office.

“So what do we do until then?” Ella asked.

“Work on my idea for you to keep the feather closer,” Lucifer told her, leading her back out of the building and across the street to a jewelry store. It didn’t take long for her to figure out what he had in mind when they were looking at lockets.

Finding a locket that was big enough to hold the feather but not completely gaudy looking was a challenge, but they soon found one that had a large enough cavity inside for the feather to be rolled to fit. Lucifer was tempted to have some things added to it to make it more special, but just settled on an inscription that could be done in a few minutes so they could take it out today. At least it still had a ruby centerstone, though he would have preferred something less common.

He sent Ella to browse the bracelets section while he told the jeweler what to have engraved on it. While they waited, Lucifer went to join Ella in her browsing, and by the time the locket was ready, they were buying a diamond bracelet as well. Ella immediately turned it over to see the inscription and felt the tears of happiness welling up in her eyes as she read ‘For the love of all my eternities’ and she stood on her toes to kiss him softly. “It’s perfect,” she told him happily and let him put it on her there in the store. He put the bracelet on her as well before they headed out. There was still twenty minutes before his appointment, but that would give them time and privacy to put the feather in the locket.

No sooner than they were inside Linda’s office for his appointment, she took a moment to greet Ella before saying, “Okay long story now.”

Lucifer chuckled harshly and steeled himself to tell the most difficult story of his life. If not for Ella by his side, he never would have gotten through it. There were a few questions about the substance of the matter, but otherwise, Linda did her job and talked him through his feelings with Ella’s help. She was glad that her next appointment had cancelled and that her lunch hour was after that, because this was far too big to handle in one session.

Once they had no choice but to leave, Lucifer and Ella both took a few minutes to get themselves together, Lucifer more than Ella since he was more concerned with appearances. Linda offered to come by when she was done for the day if he still needed to talk, but she was looking more at Ella with the offer. She knew that Lucifer would pretend he was okay until he snapped. Ella nodded and promised to text her later and let her know.

Lucifer wasn’t doing so badly after getting it all out there though. He told Ella later on when she questioned him about it, “It’s not like my father being a jerk is anything new. I hadn’t seen my twin brother in millennia anyway so while his death hits hard, it’s not an everyday kind of pain. I have everyone as protected as possible now until I can find a way to get them back on heaven’s list. It hurts yeah, but I’ll be okay,” he assured her. “And you’re a big part of that,” he said pulling her close and resting his forehead against hers. “I would have been lost without you.”

“And you know that I’m more than happy to be here for you, Lu. No matter what,” Ella responded with a smile.

“Even if it lost you your place in heaven?” he asked worriedly.

“One day with you is worth an eternity of paradise, my love,” she whispered before being pulled into a slow loving kiss.

Chapter Text

Once he was over the emotional crisis, Lucifer was able to consider the freedom that being out from under his father’s gaze offered and he spent most of his down time for the next week on a secret mission. He would need to catch up on the work for the club that Ella thought he was doing in that time, but this was worth it. On Friday he spread the words that anyone with an LAPD ID and/or badge would drink free the next night from seven pm on. He encouraged everyone to be there at or near seven and with some people made it as close to a demand as he could get away with. He even went so far as to offer to find a babysitter for Trixie himself if Dan couldn’t find one. That was when Dan knew that this was more than just a night out and started forming a suspicion. If he was right, then he wouldn’t miss that particular spectacle for the world.

The next night, all Ella knew was that all their friends from work, plus Maze and Linda, were going to be hanging with them at Lux. Lucifer suggested that she wear her red off the shoulder dress and she just shrugged. It hardly mattered to her after all. They met everyone at the bar and had drinks and hung out for a while and it was about seven thirty when he signaled the deejay who cut the music and turned the spotlight on the piano in the center. Ella chuckled and gave him her hand. This was a pretty regular thing. He loved singing to her and she loved being sang to.

None of them had noticed Chloe slip in at the back a while ago as she sat there nursing her own drink but they wouldn’t have cared anyway. Lucifer, as he always did, lifted Ella up on top of the piano before he sat down and started to play Everything I Do by Bryan Adams. “Look into my eyes; You will see; What you mean to me; Search your heart; Search your soul; And when you find me there; You'll search no more,” he sang.

“It is so sweet when they do this,” the lady next to Chloe that she didn’t know said with a note of longing in her voice.

“They do this often then?” she asked.

“At least once a week. At least that I see. Maybe more often,” she answered, not taking her eyes off the couple.

“Look into your heart; You will find; There's nothing there to hide; Take me as I am; Take my life; I would give it all; I would sacrifice,” Lucifer sang and Ella watched him lovingly with tears already welling up in her eyes like they always did. He always just put so much love and emotion into every word when he sang, and this one was hitting especially true.

“Don't tell me it's not worth fightin' for; I can't help it, there's nothin' I want more; You know it's true; Everything I do; I do it for you,” he sang the chorus as Ella mouthed the words along with him, meaning it just as much as he did. “There's no love; Like your love; And no other; Could give more love; There's nowhere; Unless you're there; All the time; All the way, yeah,” he continued, his eyes never leaving Ella.

When the song finished, he ignored the way his heart was threatening to beat out of his chest as he got up and motioned her to stay. He ignored the confusion in her eyes as he stepped away from the bench, the spotlight following him. He pulled a small box out of his pocket and got down on one knee in front of her as she gasped and her tears finally started to fall. The entire crowd seemed to be holding it’s breath, not that either of them noticed. Lucifer spoke loud enough to be sure that the microphone picked him up as he said, “I love you with everything I am, Ella Lopez, for the rest of eternity. If you’ll take a chance on me, I’ll give you everything I have to give,” he echoed his words from the night they first got together. He opened the ring box revealing the three carat princess cut red diamond ring that was surrounded by quarter carat white diamonds set in a solid platinum band. “Will you marry me?”

Ella couldn’t even speak. She just nodded so hard she wondered if her head was going to fly off. Lucifer grinned and slid the ring on her finger before getting up. As soon as he was standing, Ella slid off the piano right into his arms and kissed him passionately. He wrapped his arms around her waist and spun her around as he kissed her back just as eagerly and the entire room broke out in applause. All but one person at the back who discretely slipped out.

Chloe walked back to her car, tears streaming down her cheeks. She shouldn’t have come. She had been curious, and the lure of free drinks had been tempting. That display just made it even more clear that she’d never had a chance. That could have been her up there having all her dreams come true. If only she hadn’t been so stupid. So uptight. So stubborn. If she had just opened her eyes and seen how perfect he was just the way he was.

Deep down she knew that it would never have worked though. Even now, she freaked out at the sight of his other face, but Ella hadn’t even flinched. She’d even kissed him like that. Chloe knew that she couldn’t have managed being the center of attention like that. She wasn’t a spotlight type person and that was just who Lucifer was. Ella was good for him. Chloe couldn’t deny that. She just wished that she could have been good for him instead. She sat in her car for a good hour before she was able to stop crying enough to drive home. Unfortunately, she never made it there.

Back in the bar, there seemed to be a queue forming to congratulate the couple, their closest friends at the front. They had to wait until Lucifer stopped spinning his fiancée and their lips separated long enough. At the front was Dan and Maze. Dan grabbed Ella in a hug, while Maze told Lucifer, “That was the most sickeningly sweet, sappy thing I’ve ever seen in my life and I hate you for making me watch it. But I’m happy for you.” Before she could make her escape though, she was pulled into a squealing hug by Ella as Lucifer laughed, getting pulled into his own hug by Dan which he actually returned for once as the music came back on.

Next up was Linda and the lieutenant, who both hugged them both and it seemed like it was a never-ending stream of hugs and well wishes from there. They were sure that some of the people that came up and hugged them just wanted the chance to be in Lucifer’s arms even for a minute, but neither of them minded that. As long as they didn’t cross the line. Once the parade of well-wishers ended, they both headed for the booth that Linda, Dan, and Maze were holding for them.

When Lucifer sat down, Ella sat across his lap, wrapping her arms around his neck and he just grinned and held her around the waist. “Is there anyone in this city I haven’t hugged in the last half hour?” Ella asked with a grin. She definitely wasn’t complaining though. Not only was she on cloud nine anyway, but she would never turn down hugs from anyone. She was the very definition of a hugger. It was just her luck that her soon to be husband gave amazing hugs.

Before anyone could say anything else someone else grabbed both Ella and Lucifer from behind and lifted them out of their seats for a moment with a hug and an almost ear-piercing squeal. “Sorry. I know I shouldn’t be here in front of all these people, but I just had to say how happy I am for you both, and we’ll talk later. Gotta go now. Bye.”

“You can…stay,” Lucifer finished shaking his head at the now empty space behind him as Ella burst into laughter.

“Who was that?” Dan asked blinking in shock, not sure how to react.

“That was my sister,” Lucifer chuckled. “Azrael.”

“/That/ was the angel of death?” Linda asked surprised. “I didn’t expect her to be so…”

“Bubbly?” Maze said distastefully.

“What I want to know is how she knew,” Ella said laying her head on Lucifer’s shoulder. “I thought you could sense any of your siblings when they were nearby.”

“I can and I’m almost positive she wasn’t here,” Lucifer told her. “My attention was elsewhere so I may have missed it, but I doubt it.”

“Maybe she saw that rock on your finger all the way from heaven,” Linda teased. “I mean, holy crap!”

Ella laughed and held up her hand to look at it. “I know! It’s so perfect! And huge!”

Lucifer laughed along with them and nuzzled her neck. “I did try, darling. I had briefly considered going with a purple diamond, but decided the red diamonds go better with your coloring.”

“That’s a red diamond?!” Linda asked in shock. With the bad lighting in the club she had assumed that it was a ruby or something. “Those are ridiculously rare.”

“Naturally,” Lucifer drawled. “Diamonds are the symbol for engagement are they not? And they are no more rare than my dearest fiancée.”

“Okay, I think I’m gonna go find someone and get laid before you two make me puke,” Maze said, tossing back the last of her drink, and getting up, wading into the crowd. The rest of them spent a few more hours having fun before Lucifer took his new fiancée upstairs to have his way with her.

Chapter Text

During breakfast the next morning, and Ella kept looking at her ring and breaking out in the happiest grin of her life. So much so that her face was starting to hurt, but she didn’t care in the slightest. Lucifer kept breaking out in his own grins at seeing her so happy. They were just cleaning up from breakfast when Azrael popped up again, and this time Lucifer was halfway expecting it, so while he had a hand on the blade just in case, he didn’t pull it before she appeared. “Oh good. You’re decent now. I popped back in last night and let’s just say I got a show I definitely didn’t want.”

Ella blushed brightly but Lucifer just laughed. “Well that’s what happens when you don’t announce yourself before entering someone’s bedroom,” he drawled.

“Yes. Well. Lesson learned,” Azrael said with a shudder. “So, come on. Let me see the ring…” Azrael bounded over to Ella who was more than happy to show it off again.

“How did you know last night?” Ella asked curiously, now that she could.

“It’s complicated,” Azrael put her off. She didn’t want to bring down the mood with the fact that she had a nearby pickup and saw the whole proposal in her mind since it was one of the last things she saw.

“But we’re not found out or anything are we?” Lucifer asked worriedly.

“Nah. You’re good. I would have said right away if you weren’t. Give me a little credit, Lu,” she told him with a roll of her eyes. “So when’s the big day? Where are you doing it? You do know a church wedding is out, right? That’d be a big old beacon to Dad.”

Lucifer chuckled at the reminder of how much Rae-Rae and Ella were alike. They both tended to babble when they were excited. “We haven’t really talked about anything yet,” Ella admitted sheepishly, remembering what they were doing instead.

“Though I did have some ideas,” Lucifer chimed in. “I have an idea that I’m sure you’ll love for the location and a tentative reservation for two months from now, pending the bride’s approval, of course.”

“Oh?” Ella asked curiously. She didn’t mind him taking the lead like that, and had no intention of being a bridezilla. She knew that he had incredible taste and knew her well. If he thought she would like it, she probably would.

“Yes, have you ever been to the LA County Arboretum and Botanical Gardens?” Lucifer asked, and Ella shook her head.

“Well I can take you today to see it. There’s this one spot that’s a clearing in the middle of a tropical forest with a waterfall feeding a clear pond,” he described it.

“Oh, Lucifer, that sounds amazing!” Ella squealed and he grinned happily. “What date did you have it tentatively reserved for?”

“May fourteenth,” he told her. “But we can change that around if we need to. That was the soonest date they had open.”

“May fourteenth sounds perfect,” Ella said with a grin. “What about the reception?”

“Here at Lux of course,” Lucifer said as though it should be obvious.

“Will there be enough room?” Ella asked.

“How many people were we planning to invite? I assumed it would just be our core group of friends, some others from the station and your family,” Lucifer asked.

“What about your family, you dope?” Azrael asked pointedly.

“Well I assumed you knew that you were invited, Azrael,” Lucifer rolled his eyes. “Assuming you can get away without drawing suspicion of course.”

“Oh sure. That won’t be a problem. There are others that will want to come too though,” she told him.

“Others? When I’m all but on the run from heaven and you want to bring other siblings?” he asked incredulously.

“Just ones that are on your side,” Azrael told him. “Though not all of them. That many disappearing off his radar at the same time would definitely be suspicious, but maybe a few of them. The ones that you were closest to before.”

“There are others on my side?” Lucifer asked skeptically.

“Of course, doofus,” Azrael told him. “You weren’t the only person involved in that rebellion, you know. And the worse father gets the more people are flocking to our side. You should know that Michael was one of the first to come over after everything.”

Lucifer scoffed. “He was one of the first to stand against me, too.”

“Mostly because he was scared,” Azrael pointed out. “You two were always so close and he was worried about what would happen to you if you went through with it. I mean, yeah, he thought you were wrong, but he was never as much against you as you apparently thought. It didn’t take him long before he realized that you were right though. He told me once that you were the best of all of us and he hoped he got a chance to tell you some day,” she said sadly, looking down, knowing that chance was gone forever.

Lucifer blinked a few times to clear the tears from his eyes and swallowed around the lump in his throat before changing the subject. “Who were you thinking of bringing?” he asked.

“Well me of course, and Gabriel, Jophiel, and probably Camael. More than that would risk exposure and those three have been missing you big time.”

Lucifer thought about it for a few minutes before nodding. “Okay. They can come too. But you better be sure about this Rae-Rae. I don’t want to risk Ella if something goes wrong.”

“Neither do I, and while there are some in our group that I can’t be a hundred percent on, I’m as sure of those three as I am myself,” she said seriously.

“Since that’s settled, I think we need to sit down and write up a guest list before we can decide on the reception location,” Ella chimed in, full of excitement for her wedding. “Oh and I have to call Abuelita and let her know…”

“How about you do that after we take a look at the location and get it and the date set in stone,” Lucifer suggested. “The reception we can figure out later, of course.”

“Right. Yeah. That’s probably a good idea,” Ella said with a nod.

Azrael laughed. “I’ll let you get to it then and let the others know.” She almost tackled them both in hugs before she disappeared.

Ella immediately fell in love with the location and almost tackled Lucifer for finding it. The woman showing them around just laughed at them and was happy to set the date in stone and take Lucifer’s check to pay for it. Ella called her grandmother on the way home and told her the good news and when it was going to be. Before anyone could say anything about how they would get there, Lucifer took the phone out of Ella’s hand. “I’ll give you back to Ella in a moment, but I just wanted to let you know that I’ll be paying to bring any of Ella’s family and friends out here and places to stay while you’re all here. I’ll just need a number, preferably sooner rather than later but no rush,” he said before handing the phone back before she could even respond.

Ella took a few minutes to assure her grandmother that yes, Lucifer was serious. No, there was no repayment required in any way. Yes, he could really afford it and was in fact, quite rich. Finally she agreed to accept the offer and get back to them with a number within a few days. Then the conversation turned to venue. Abuelita wasn’t particularly happy that her granddaughter wouldn’t be married in a church, but given the choice of groom wasn’t particularly surprised. Since it couldn’t be in a church, she thought the arboretum was the next best choice. Close to God’s creation. Ella hadn’t told her about the whole falling out with God and being in hiding from him and all. She didn’t exactly know how to even begin that conversation. When she kept having to say that she didn’t know for the rest of the string of questions, she was told to keep in touch with more information before they hung up just as Lucifer was pulling into his normal spot.

Once they got home they started working up the guest list. None of Ella’s friends from Detroit made the cut so it was just her family coming out from there, which meant her grandmother, three brothers, and if any of them were bringing dates. Then there were Lucifer’s four siblings, Dan, Trixie, Linda, Maze, and a few other people from the precinct. By the end they realized that Lux would definitely have enough room, so Lucifer made a mental note to start calling decorators and caterers on Monday. Lucifer shot down the idea of a live band though. “No one plays in my club but me,” he told her. He would have caved if she had her heart set on it though, but she didn’t.

“You will be singing me a song at the reception right?” she asked hopefully.

“Darling I was planning on doing two. At a minimum,” he told her. “Our first dance, I’ll have a mic and then at least one at the piano.”

She grinned. “Perfect. And I’m guessing you want to stay with the normal deejay here?”

“As long as you have no objections?” She shook her head that she didn’t. She liked Jim and he did a good job.

“I think I’ll let you handle the flowers too since you’re so good at it,” she told him. “As long as you don’t mind, of course.”

“Not at all, dearest,” he told her. “Anything else we need to decide on?”

“A lot,” she laughed. “The wedding party, dress, rings, vows, I know we’re going with a non-religious ceremony, but there are a lot of those to choose from, the officiant, probably more I’m not thinking of right now.”

Lucifer was steady writing as she was talking. “Okay you can handle the dress along with whoever you want to stand with you. I can take care of the rings. I’ll start looking into some non-religious ceremonies and narrow them down for you to choose. We can write our own vows. An officiant should be easy once we know what kind of ceremony we want, and we can think about the wedding party for a few days and decide then.”

“You are so good at this,” Ella said with a grin.

“Organizational skills are rather a must for any good king,” he joked.

Chapter Text

The rest of the weekend was spent in heavy planning, but then they had to go back to work on Monday. They got a round of applause when they entered and Lucifer took a theatrical bow as Ella blushed and grinned. She did a lot of showing off of her ring over the course of the day and when her flowers arrived a little before lunch, she was even happier. She didn’t think she’d ever smiled so much. Even the grisly murder they were called to didn’t get her down. None of them even noticed that Chloe hadn’t shown up for work.

It wasn’t until Tuesday that Dan got a phone call in the middle of the afternoon, and only the fact that Lucifer had been paying attention kept him from hitting the floor as his partner grabbed his arm to steady him and help him to the chair, looking at him concernedly. “How did it happen?...Yeah, I’ll let her know…No you can take care of it…Yeah, of course I’ll be there and so will Trix…Okay thanks Penny.”

“What happened?” Lucifer asked concerned.

“Chloe…she was in a car accident Saturday night…she didn’t make it. Penny was out of town and just got the call today.”

“Saturday night…where was the accident?” Lucifer asked worriedly.

“I’m not sure. Penny didn’t say,” Dan told him. “Why?”

“I’m sure it’s nothing,” he waved him off.

“You think she was there don’t you and that’s why…”

“It was just a thought,” Lucifer shrugged.

“Hey, man. You know even if that is what happened, it wasn’t your fault,” Dan told him.

“If I had made my intentions that night more clear then maybe she wouldn’t have gone.”

“Or maybe that would have made her more determined to go. You know how Chloe is…was. She always had to see things with her own eyes,” Dan pointed out. “It was an accident and no one is to blame, especially not you.”

Lucifer sighed and nodded. He didn’t completely believe that, but he would pretend to. If nothing else, then for Ella’s sake. She didn’t deserve for this to bring down her happiness any more than it had to. At least it explained how Azrael had known. If Chloe had been there and Azrael picked her up…It also explained why Azrael didn’t want to say how she knew. “I should go tell Ella,” he said sadly.

Dan nodded. “Yeah. I’ll let the lieutenant know and spread the word down here.”

Lucifer headed upstairs and into the lab where Ella was humming as she was working and he winced. She was in such a good mood, he hated to bring it down. He stood there for a long time watching her with a sad smile until she turned around and jumped. “Geez Lu. Make some noise whydoncha?”

“Sorry, love,” he said with a twitch of his lips.

“What’s wrong?” she asked suddenly worried.

“I have some bad news…”

“Oh my god, the wedding is off isn’t it? I knew it was too good to be true. I shouldn’t have gotten my hopes up…” She was even more sure of her assumptions when she was stopped not by Lucifer’s lips but by a finger to her own lips.

“No, Ella. The wedding isn’t off and won’t be if I have anything to say about it. It’s…Chloe…there was an accident. She’s gone.”

Ella’s eyes widened and she deflated. Luckily Lucifer had expected that reaction and had been steering her towards the chair as he’d been speaking so Ella landed in it. “Oh wow…that’s…does Trixie know?”

“Not yet. Dan just found out. I’m sure he’s going to be leaving shortly to go tell her,” Lucifer told her.

“What happened? When?” Ella asked and Lucifer gave her the details. He could see in her eyes that she made the same connection that he had, but she didn’t say anything about it.

“Do you think we should go to the funeral?” she asked softly. She was torn on the subject herself.

“I think we should only go if Dan or Beatrice specifically ask,” Lucifer suggested. “We weren’t on good terms with her, but we are with her family so if they ask for our support, we should give it.”

Ella nodded. “Yeah. That makes sense. I don’t think that Dan would, given our past, but Trixie might.”

The funeral ended up being set for Friday afternoon, and neither of them were much in the mood for wedding planning that week. Thankfully they were ahead on everything and had plenty of time, and it gave Lucifer a chance to catch up on his work for Lux. Especially since Dan had the rest of the week off, which meant so did Lucifer. No one asked either of them to go to the funeral thankfully, and by the time the weekend rolled around everything was mostly back to normal. It was like once the funeral was over they could put it all behind them and they got back to planning the wedding.

“I was thinking of asking Gabriel to stand with me,” Lucifer said more than a little jittery about it.

“Okay. That makes sense. You don’t seem so sure though,” Ella coaxed.

“It’s just…I haven’t seen him in millennia. I spent all that time thinking he had abandoned me just like everyone else,” he explained.

“Maybe we could ask Rae-Rae if he could make it down for a visit first somehow? Give you two a chance to talk it out before the decision is set in stone?”

Lucifer nodded. “That’s a good idea, but I don’t know if it will be possible,” he told her. “Cloaking everyone for the wedding and reception will be dangerous enough for her.”

“Maybe it won’t, but it can’t hurt to ask,” she pointed out and Lucifer nodded.

“I’m trying to decide between Linda and Rae-Rae myself,” Ella told him.

“I would go with Linda personally, but let Rae-Rae know she was in the running. She’ll have a lot to do coordinating my siblings that have never been to earth and keeping the whole thing cloaked from Dad.”

Ella nodded and checked that off her list. “I was thinking Trixie for the flower girl, but I don’t have any ideas for the ring bearer.”

Lucifer thought about it for a long moment before saying, “Do we have to have a ring bearer?”

Ella considered it before shrugging. “No, I guess not. The best man usually holds the rings anyway so the kid doesn’t lose them.”

“Well there you go then. All we have left for the wedding party is my final decision on Gabriel or Daniel.”

“Dan is your second choice?” she asked curiously.

“Well he is basically my only male friend,” he pointed out. “I could go nontraditional and have Maze as my best woman, but she wouldn’t thank me for putting her in the ceremony,” he chuckled. “She’s disgruntled enough about having to be there.”

Deciding on everything else was easy now that Lucifer had the research done on the ceremonies and officiants, so Lucifer asked Ella to pray to Azrael. He knew that with Dad’s Command she couldn’t come for him. Once she arrived, before she could say anything, Lucifer asked, “Would it be possible for Gabriel to come down for a little while?”

Azrael considered it for a minute before nodding. “Yeah. We should be able to swing it. He’s always out and about anyway, so Dad doesn’t pay him much attention. Why?”

“Can you make it happen? Sooner rather than later?” Lucifer asked, declining to answer her question. She huffed but nodded and left. Lucifer knew it would be a little while at least before he got there so he turned his attention to going through flower arrangements while Ella was flipping through dress magazines.

Lucifer looked up about half an hour later as he felt another presence just as Gabriel materialized on the other side of the room. “Hey, Lu,” he said nervously, looking mostly at the floor but glancing up every few seconds.

“Gabriel,” Lucifer nodded as he got up. “Azrael told me about the Command.”

“Yeah. I really did want to come see you. Help you, even, but Dad…” he shrugged.

“Rae-Rae informs me that you want to come to my wedding,” Lucifer tried again to make conversation when nothing more was forthcoming on that subject and Gabriel just nodded. Ella was biting her lip at how cute they were and how shy Gabriel seemed to be. Lucifer huffed. “Well you have a funny way of showing it when you won’t even look at me,” he snapped.

Ella got up and walked over to Lucifer, putting a hand on his arm in both support and to help calm him. She didn’t understand the situation, but she could tell that Gabriel was nervous and worried and didn’t want him to make it any worse and prevent them from reconciling. The fact that he was even considering Gabriel for his best man after so long meant that Gabriel was very important to him.

Chapter Text

Gabriel finally looked up, chewing on his lip nervously. “Sorry. I just…”

“You just what?” Lucifer asked, only a little impatiently this time. Ella’s presence was very settling for him.

Lucifer was almost bowled over as Gabriel practically tackled him in a hug. “I’m so sorry, Lu. I wanted to be there for you for so long, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t brave enough to stand up to Dad and you were left down there all alone to rot and…and I’m sorry.”

Lucifer blinked in surprise for a moment before wrapping his arms around his brother and hugging him tightly. “I understand, Gabe. Truly, I do. You weren’t facing potential banishment. You were facing potential death and if you think that I would have wanted you to die out of loyalty to me, then you’re crazy.”

“Then you’re not mad at me? Rae-Rae said you had to be talked into letting me come…”

“Only because I was worried about Dad finding out. Not because I didn’t want you there,” Lucifer told him as they let go and Lucifer motioned him to sit down. Ella hesitated to join them while they were working things out, but when Lucifer held out his arm to her, she smiled and went to sit at his side. “This is my Ella,” he introduced her.

“It’s great to meet you,” Gabriel said happily. “Rae-Rae’s told me everything about you.”

Ella smiled warmly at him. “It’s great to meet you too.”

The next little while was spent with small talk and just the brothers reconnecting and Lucifer was feeling much better about his idea. It was about an hour before Gabriel looked up nervously and said, “I really wish I could stay longer, but keeping off his radar for too long…”

“I know,” Lucifer said with a sigh. “Then I guess I’d better get to the reason I asked you to come.” He took a deep breath as Gabriel looked at him curiously. “I was wondering if you would be interested in standing with me at the wedding.”

Gabriel grinned happily. “Are you kidding? That would be amazing!” He seemed to consider it for a minute before looking crestfallen. “I don’t know that I’d be able to though. I mean, getting away for the wedding itself will be hard enough, but I know there’s a lot of other stuff to do…”

“Nothing that I can’t handle,” Lucifer told him. “I know it’s not exactly traditional, but it’s worth it to have my brother back by my side even if it is only for a few hours.”

Gabriel brightened back up at that. “Then yes. Absolutely. I would love to,” he said, diving on top of Lucifer on the couch for another hug.

Lucifer and Ella both laughed as Ella moved out of the way, giving Lucifer room to push Gabriel away. “Off me, you oaf,” he said amusedly through his laughter.

Once they got untangled and Gabriel was back on his feet, Lucifer stood up and pulled him into a proper hug which was then repeated by Ella before Gabriel flew off. “He was…interesting,” Ella said with a chuckle.

“That’s Gabe for you,” Lucifer shook his head. “He’s one of the few of my siblings that was younger than me, though not by much. He looked up to me quite a bit and was one of the first on my side in the whole rebellion thing.”

“I can tell he loves you a lot,” Ella said with a smile, sitting back down with him and curling up to his side. “You don’t talk about him much. About any of your siblings.”

Lucifer shrugged and pulled her closer. “It’s…hard. To talk about them, I mean. To remember them and…and how things used to be before everything went wrong.”

“I understand,” she said sympathetically. “But maybe you could just tell me a little bit about the ones who will be at the wedding?”

Lucifer nodded. “You know Rae-Rae, and now Gabriel. Then there’s Jophiel. She was also with me in the whole rebellion thing. She was one of my eldest siblings though. She was the second born after Amenadiel. She’s not much for fun or frivolity, but she’s very fair-minded, so she completely understood the desire and need for free will. Then there’s Camael. He’s about as different from me as can be. He’s pure joy and sunshine. A little like you in that way actually. He’s always happy and confident and instills those things in others. It’s like you can’t possibly be sad when he’s around. He’s another that was younger than me. He’s actually the youngest of us all.”

“They sound nice. I can’t wait to meet them,” Ella told him.

“There’s something else I was thinking about,” Lucifer told her, not quite sure how to bring it up.

“What is it?” she asked. “You know you can talk to me about anything.”

“It’s just…with my siblings coming…maybe it would be easier to let everyone who doesn’t know about me in on the secret. I mean there are only a handful of people from work and then your brothers…”

“My brothers would completely freak,” she told him.

“Your grandmother knows though, and it seems like she runs the family. Do you think she would help?”

“Why are you worried about it?” Ella asked, hoping to understand a little more about why he was asking.

“It’s just that, while Rae-Rae is good around humans, and even Gabriel is to some degree having been here once or twice, the other two aren’t. I can just foresee a hundred different things that can go wrong and end up spilling everything in the middle of the festivities and then we’d have to deal with the freakouts then which would completely ruin our day.”

Ella nodded as she thought about it. His concerns made sense and, as much as he did have a tendency to be paranoid, in this instance she didn’t think he was. “I don’t think we’ll have any problems with the people we’re inviting from work but let me talk to Abuelita about my brothers before we make any decisions.”

He nodded, kissed her before getting up. “I’ll let you get to that and calling Linda, and I’ll get back to work on the flower arrangements and maybe even start writing my vows,” he said with a smile.

She nodded and grabbed her phone, taking it into the bedroom to make her calls. By the time she came back out half an hour later, she had an answer for him. “If you can fly them all out two weeks early, that will give them time to get over it before the wedding. Abuelita says that we have to be the ones to tell them together, but she will be there to rein in their reactions.”

Lucifer nodded with relief. “Okay good. Then just a few people at the station to tell.”

“We should have Dan and Trixie there when we do to help soften the blow. Linda probably wouldn’t be much help since no one there knows her, but she couldn’t hurt if you want the extra support.”

“Yeah. That’ll be good. Maybe we’ll invite them all by next weekend. They should have their invitations by then.”

“Linda and I are going dress shopping on Saturday morning, but maybe Saturday night we can do dinner up here with everyone?” she suggested.

“That sounds like a good plan,” Lucifer told her.

Monday morning, Lucifer decided to talk to Dan about the best man thing. “I want you to know, Daniel, that you were my primary choice for best man, but then I found out that all of my brothers didn’t abandon me after all and were actually forced to stay away from me against their will so…”

“Hey it’s fine man. I don’t blame you for wanting a brother up there with you. It’s cool,” Dan told him. “Thanks for thinking of me though.”

When they noticed the invitations making the rounds on Thursday, Lucifer and Ella split up to start inviting people for dinner. Dan was shocked when they told him that they were telling everyone who was invited to the wedding who Lucifer really was. “Most of my siblings have never been around humans. We would rather get the reactions out beforehand in a controlled environment than risk one of them causing a scene and having it all come out in the middle of the wedding.”

“Yeah I get that. This is big though. I mean, expanding the circle…are you sure they can handle it?”

Lucifer shrugged. “I don’t know, but outside of the immediate circle, they are our closest friends, so I hope so. If not, then oh well. There aren’t enough of them for anyone to take seriously if they try to make trouble so it will just make things awkward around here for a while at worst.”

“What if someone else reacts the way…the way Chloe did?” Dan asked worriedly.

“Then we deal with it,” Lucifer shrugged. “I doubt it will happen though. With everything I’ve learned about her and my father’s involvement, it’s likely that her reaction won’t be repeated.” At least he hoped not. Either way, while he did consider these people friends, they weren’t close enough to truly hurt him the way Chloe had.

Chapter Text

Spilling the secret to the rest of their friends from the precinct went well for the most part. Dan and Trixie helped quite a bit. Especially Trixie who climbed in his lap and gave him a hug when he revealed his devil face. Her badgering of him for the next little while and him catering to her every whim was just the icing on the cake. There was no way he could be evil if he was so good to a child, even if he was still more than a little uncomfortable with her. When Dan pointed out that there are no children in hell and he’d never even seen one before he came to Earth, that part was completely understood as well.

In fact, the most exciting part of the evening was when their lieutenant asked why they were telling them now. When Lucifer explained that some of his siblings were going to be at the wedding and that most angels don’t have any idea how to interact with humans, many of their guests got more than a little excited. They didn’t flinch at the devil but the idea of meeting angels had them all enraptured. Of course, that could be because they’d already known the devil for years, even if they hadn’t realized that fact. They’d never met an angel.

Ella was quick to point out that Lucifer was an angel too, which prompted a request from Trixie for him to take her flying. Lucifer rolled his eyes, but took her for a short flight. He usually flew her for longer, but it would have been rude to leave their guests for very long. Needless to say, the sight of his wings was enough to calm those who had still been on the fence. Lucifer was more than surprised that everyone took it so well, but Ella wasn’t. “They’ve known you for years, sweetheart. I’m sure all of them suspected anyway. You’re not exactly subtle, and some of the abilities you flaunt can’t be human.”

“You’re still worried about your brothers, aren’t you?” he asked, noticing the tightness in her voice. It was understandable. These people at least had plenty of exposure to him before finding out the truth. Her brothers wouldn’t have that luxury.

Ella nodded. “I would be a lot more worried if Abuelita wasn’t going to help,” she told him.

“As long as she leaves that amulet at home,” Lucifer muttered.

“I talked to her about that and she is bringing it, but it will stay at the hotel when she’ll be around you,” Ella told him. “She can’t bring herself to travel without that protection and especially if she’s going around the city alone, but she will trust you to protect her instead when you’re around.”

Lucifer nodded. “That’s acceptable. Imagine…an elderly catholic lady trusting the devil to protect her,” he chuckled and got smacked in the arm by a laughing Ella.

Most of the next month was spent finalizing plans and getting everything ordered and arranged. Ella had found what she claimed to be the perfect dress, but she was keeping it at Linda’s so Lucifer didn’t go snooping. She knew him far too well. Finally, it was time for Ella’s family to arrive. Ella had to talk Lucifer out of having them picked up at the airport in a Limo. She told him to save that for the wedding and that he didn’t want to seem like he was trying to buy their goodwill. Since there were four of them, he did hire a van to pick them up and bring them to Lux. Since they were arriving around lunchtime, the club wouldn’t be open yet and would actually be opening late today. Lucifer had even cleared out all the employees other than the bouncer outside the front door.

Both of them were more than a little jittery while they waited and Ella kept fussing over the lunch they had prepared that was spread out over the bar. Lucifer, on the outside, was the picture of calm sophistication though, even as they were walking in. Ella almost laughed at the way her grandmother was eyeing the bouncer warily as she walked by and as she hugged her, she whispered, “Don’t worry. He’s human.”

As Ella was being manhandled by her brothers, the fourth of which would be here shortly and was driving himself, Lucifer greeted her grandmother with a kiss to the back of her knuckles like the perfect gentleman. He didn’t miss the snort of amusement from one of Ella’s brothers, but he wasn’t sure which one. “So this is the guy huh?” one of them said skeptically looking him up and down.

“Lucifer. Morningstar,” he introduced himself holding out a hand and fully expecting the crushing grip. He smirked and just increased his own pressure. Enough to hurt a bit, but not enough to cause any damage to the fragile human’s hand.

Ella just shook her head. “You don’t want to get into a test of strength with him, Jay.”

“We should eat before we get too deep into sharing,” Lucifer said, wanting to put off the big reveal until they had some food in their stomachs, and knowing where Ella was going with that lead-in.

Lunch was spent with mostly small talk and her brothers sizing Lucifer up. There was a lot of talk about the club and how he made his money. Abuelita shared the story of how they had met when he came to get pictures from her to replace Ella’s. That seemed to cool her brothers down quite a bit. Anyone who would go to such lengths for their sister couldn’t be all bad. Lucifer just hoped, for Ella’s sake, that opinion held.

They had been finished eating for a while before Abuelita said, “I think we’ve delayed long enough, don’t you, Lucifer?”

Lucifer huffed a nervous laugh. “Yes. I suppose we have.” He looked at Ella’s brothers and told them. “There is something about me that you should know before the wedding. We thought it best that you have some time to process the information which is why we flew you all out early. I want to assure you that I am not what you will think I am when you learn this and that I truly love your sister and only want what’s best for her.”

“Oookay,” Jay was the one to say confusedly.

“Right. Well. No time like the present,” Lucifer muttered, trying to psych himself up before he said. “I am THE Lucifer. The actual devil.” He was met with disbelieving looks as most of them at least glanced at their grandmother worriedly just at his words, and got more confused when she didn’t react. When he showed his devil face though, that got a major reaction.

All four of Ella’s brothers scrambled away from the table in fear and even Abuelita gasped and crossed herself, having never seen that particular sight before. When Jay grabbed Ella and pulled her away from him, Lucifer forced himself not to react, knowing that would just make things worse, as he faded back to his normal face. Before he could say anything, Ella did. “He was burnt up when he was thrown into hell. That’s why his face looks like that.”

Ricardo was the one who noticed that Abuelita didn’t seem afraid. “Abuelita?” he asked confused.

“Let your sister go,” she said sternly to Jay who instinctively did as he was asked and Ella went straight back to Lucifer’s side.

“How can you let her be with the devil?!” Jay asked incredulously.

“Remember everything I’ve taught you about forgiveness and redemption?” she asked them, motioning them to sit back down. Lucifer put a hand on Ella’s arm and she bit back her comment about Lucifer not needing redemption.

“But he’s the devil!” Marco said.

“Yes. He is. But also remember that the bible was written by humans. Whose to say they understood everything? And whose to say that what was true then is true now? Perhaps this is how things are supposed to be.”

“He’s got you under his spell or something,” Jay said worriedly.

“He does not. When we met I was as skeptical as you which is why I used the amulet…”

“That hunk of junk,” Ricardo scoffed.

“Actually, that hunk of junk, as you call it, is the real deal,” Lucifer interjected.

“And we’re supposed to believe you?” Carlos said disbelievingly.

“You are supposed to believe me,” Abuelita snapped irritated. “I assure you if he had been evil, the amulet would have repelled him completely. As it was, I had complete control over him.”

“Not the most pleasant sensation, to be sure,” Lucifer muttered.

“Then let us see,” Jay said in challenge.

“No! Absolutely not!” Ella snapped.

“Darling…” Lucifer tried to placate her.

“No!” Ella said again before turning to Jay. “How would you feel to have your entire sense of free will stripped away and be completely at the mercy of someone else? Subject to any of their whims? Once was bad enough. I won’t have him subjected to that again.”

Chapter Text

“Your sister is right,” Abuelita ended the argument sternly. “The experience of stripping someone’s will away has left a stain on my soul that I will never be rid of. I will never do it again unless it is a life or death situation and I will not allow any of you to do so either.”

Lucifer jumped in there. “I assure, Mrs. Lopez. Your soul is unstained. Your remorse has taken care of that. You /have/ to forgive yourself.”

“You will call me Paloma or Abuelita,” she told him.

“What even is that amulet anyway?” Marco asked. Now that he knew it was real, he was more than curious.

“Do you mind if I answer that question?” Lucifer asked her.

“Not at all. You probably know more about it than I do,” she waved a hand at him to continue.

“That is one of around fifty amulets that my father created and gifted to the humans in case of a demonic uprising. They were to be used for their protection and are one of the few pieces of divinity that humans were permitted. Once he realized that they allowed humans complete control over angels as well, he stopped making them and retrieved as many as he could from the humans. There are probably no more than ten left in the world today.”

“So, you see,” Abuelita told them. “It was his angelic side that the amulet called to. I will not give you all the details of our conversation, but I will tell you with certainty that he is not evil and that he does have your sister’s best interests at heart. More than that…I trust him.”

“You trust the devil,” Jay said in shock. “/You/.”

“Yes. I do,” She said with a nod before turning back to Lucifer. “Now, you will show me the location that the ceremony is to be held while Ella catches up with her brothers.”

Lucifer’s lips twitched in a smile at the fact that she was still ordering him around even without the protection of the amulet. In this instance he had no intention of refusing, despite his concern at leaving Ella alone with her brothers. He didn’t leave without a parting comment to them though. “If one hair on her head is harmed, you will get first-hand knowledge of why I strike terror into the hearts of demons. Understood?”

Only the fact that the threat was on behalf of their sister kept any of them from getting angry, though a couple of them seemed like they were about to wet themselves. Ella smacked his arm with a laugh. “We’ll be fine. I’ll take them up to the penthouse so the crew can get to work down here and get ready to open.”

“You’ll make the calls?” Lucifer asked, sure that he wasn’t going to get a chance to with Abuelita with him. When she nodded, he offered her grandmother his arm to escort her out.

The drive was spent in silence, mostly because of the air rushing by in the convertible and as they walked the grounds where the wedding was going to be held, she started to talk about why she wanted him alone. “Did you know that I’ve had that amulet constantly since my mother died when I was seven years old?” she asked him.

“No. But that explains a lot,” he told her with a nod.

“Does it? Because I’m not sure I understand,” she told him, clearly looking for answers.

“Constant contact for so long with even such a minor aspect of divinity can change a human,” he explained. “It can affect different people in different ways, but usually it gives a form of wisdom. Even a minor ability to sense the fabric of the universe. Humans might call it ‘being psychic’, but it’s not a parlor trick.”

She nodded. “That does explain things then,” she told him.

“Why? What’s wrong?” he asked, sensing that there was more to this than he knew.

“I can see the winds of change surrounding you and Ella,” she told him. “I don’t know what kind of change. I know that neither of you are the center of it, but you are the catalyst for it. Does that mean anything to you?”

Lucifer thought for a long moment as they walked around. “I don’t know. I know that things are getting difficult for my brothers and sisters and that they want a change, but I don’t see how I could be involved in that and definitely not Ella.”

“How do you mean?” she asked curiously.

“Are you sure you want to know?” he stopped and turned to her seriously. “It may adversely affect your faith.”

She smiled at him, touched that he would worry about that and more sure than ever that she had made the right choice. “It will not. My faith is not nearly so shaky as some. It is not the details that I worship, but the system. The ideas. Besides, it is better to know the truth than dwell in lies.”

Lucifer sighed and nodded as they continued walking and he explained the basics of what Azrael had told him. Not the personal stuff, but the overall about how his father was making rash and cruel decisions and becoming more obsessed with control and how his siblings were taking it. She listened patiently before asking, “And there is nothing you can do to help them?”

“No,” he shook his head. “I’ve tried the rebellion thing and it didn’t work. I can’t even get into the gates of heaven, nor can Ella anymore.”

“Perhaps it simply wasn’t the right time then. I’m sure your path will become more clear eventually. Just do me a favor Lucifer?” she stopped and turned to him.

“What’s that?”

“When the time comes, don’t shy away from your destiny. Or let Ella shy away from hers.”

Lucifer scoffed. “I don’t think destiny has any say in this. My father certainly wouldn’t ordain his own downfall.

“You don’t believe there is a destiny beyond him? That encompasses us all that even he can’t control?” she asked pointedly.

Lucifer considered that. “I don’t know,” he admitted after a few minutes. “We were always taught that his will was all and that nothing happened without his say-so. Then again, that is clearly not true, so perhaps there is a grander plan at work.”

“So let it work,” she told him, patting his arm as she continued walking.

“I will try,” he said, that being the best he could promise. If this plan involved something happening to Ella, then he definitely wasn’t going to stand by and let it happen on faith. That was something that he’d lost a long time ago.

“Ella informs me that some of your siblings will be attending?” she asked, changing the subject now as they started making their way back to the car.

“Yes. Gabriel, Azrael, Jophiel, and Camael,” he told her. “Apparently more want to come but if too many do then it will draw suspicion from my father.”

“The messenger, the angel of death, the guardian, and the angel of joy,” she considered them with a nod. “Good choices.”

“They are the siblings that I was closest too in heaven and that have been the most supportive of my cause since I was banished. Until recently I hadn’t seen any of them in millennia, and I’ve only seen Gabriel once and Azriel a handful of times.”

“I look forward to meeting them,” she told him as they reached the car and the drive back was also spent in silence. Lucifer cooked a nice dinner for everyone before the hired car took them to their nearby hotel. He gave them the number for the car service that would take care of them as long as they were in town on his tab and told them they were welcome anytime.

Once they were alone, Lucifer asked Ella, “How were things with your brothers after I left?”

“Not bad. It took a while and about a hundred questions, but they’re cool with us now. At least mostly. They do need some time to process and all. They’ll probably end up with another hundred questions between now and the wedding too,” she chuckled.

“Understandable, and you know I have no problem with answering any questions they may have,” Lucifer told her.

“How were things with Abuelita?” she asked.

“Interesting,” Lucifer told her and gave her an overview of what they’d talked about.

“Change huh? I wonder what that could mean.”

“I don’t have any idea. She seems to think that we’ll know when the time comes though. It makes me more than a little nervous I have to admit.”

“Me too. Change is never easy and usually messy,” Ella said worriedly.

“My thoughts exactly,” he said thoughtfully before shaking it off. “No matter. Whatever it is, it isn’t here yet. Right now, all we need to worry about is our wedding and making everything perfect for the day.”

Chapter Text

It wasn’t until the next night that Lux was overrun by Ella’s brothers. And then every night after that. True to Ella’s prediction, they ended up with a lot more question which Lucifer spent a great deal of time answering. They teased him mercilessly at one point when he sang to Ella at the piano, but he just smirked at them in response. He hardly cared what they thought of it. It made Ella happy and he enjoyed doing it. That was all that mattered.

Abuelita never came to the club while it was open, but did spend quite a bit of time in the penthouse chatting with both Ella and Lucifer after work. She even chided Lucifer for working too hard when she realized how much he was doing with the precinct, Lux, and wedding planning. He had to explain that he was trying to get as far ahead as he could with Lux before the honeymoon. Maze would be taking over while he was gone and she knew what she was doing, but he still preferred as much of the personal touch as possible.

Maze had been a revelation to the old woman, though all of Ella’s brothers just drooled over her. Only the fact that she trusted Lucifer kept her from having a heart attack when she found out that Maze was a demon and she was never particularly friendly with her. Not that she was what you would consider friendly with anyone, but Maze got at best polite cordiality.

Both Ella and Lucifer took off at lunchtime on the Wednesday before the wedding so they could spend the last few days with last minute things. Lucifer had intended to skip out on the bachelor party tradition since most of his time on Earth had essentially been one big bachelor party and he couldn’t actually do anything that would make it more than a boring diversion. Ella’s brothers didn’t allow that though, and neither did Dan, so he relented for their sakes and the night before the wedding Lux was lined with jello and pudding pits and filled with strippers.

Ella’s bachelorette party was similar, without the pudding and jello of course. There were definitely strippers though and Ella had a blast. Linda had outdone herself and even Maze had fun. Ella stayed the night with Linda, despite having been offered the second bed in Abuelita’s room. Linda’s was closer to the arboretum though. They would be picked up by limo at seven am and taken to the venue where they would meet the beauticians and get ready in their staging area for these sorts of things.

Ella didn’t start getting nervous until she was sitting in the chair having her hair and makeup done and then she was a bundle of nerves and felt like she was going to be sick. “What if he changes his mind? What if he doesn’t show up? What if he ran off with one of the strippers? What if…”

Abuelita chuckled and shook her head as Linda tried to calm her down. “He would never do any of that, Ella. He loves you and would do anything for you. You have to know that.” When that didn’t seem to help her any, Linda made an offer. “He should be here by now overseeing the setup. Will it make you feel better if I go check on him?”

“Would you? I know I’m being silly. I just…”

Linda nodded and headed out to do just that. She’d gotten the story of Ella’s previous aborted wedding so she understood her fears completely. She found Lucifer in the clearing, dressed only in his pants and dress shirt that was half buttoned, as he directed the placement of the archway. “Linda?” he asked worriedly when he saw her. “What’s wrong? Is it Ella? Is she okay?”

Linda laughed at the pair of them. “Yes, she’s fine. She’s just freaking out a little bit and wanted me to make sure that you were here and not getting cold feet.”

Lucifer chuckled and shook his head. “Tell her my feet are plenty toasty and I’ll be waiting for her to walk down the aisle.” He followed it up with a mutter of, “If we ever get a working aisle,” before rushing over to have the crooked chairs redone.

Linda grinned and headed back to Ella with the news and she visibly relaxed. She felt a lot better after that, right up until she had the dress on and was standing in front of the mirror. Then the nerves came back with a vengeance. At least this time it wasn’t worry about it not happening. It was more worry about things going wrong.

Lucifer didn’t doubt for a second that Ella would be there, nor did he doubt what he was doing here. That didn’t stop him from being jittery as he took his place and Gabriel clapped him on the back and told him to relax. Lucifer tried and gave Linda a shaky smile and a nod as she came down the aisle. He didn’t completely relax until Ella came around the corner and took his breath away. Her dress fell to her ankles in deference to the outdoor setting and the bodice was strapless and weaved with small pearls. Her hair was done in an elaborate updo, and she had gone with a tiara instead of the traditional veil. Lucifer couldn’t take his eyes off of her.

As soon as Ella saw Lucifer standing under the archway, all of her nerves fled and she couldn’t take her eyes off him either in his classic tux as he beamed at her. It took all of her self-control not to just dash down the aisle to his side. Her oldest brother Jay was giving her away and nodded to Lucifer at the handoff. Neither of them heard much the officiant said, until Gabriel poked Lucifer in the back when it was time for the vows.

“I’ve heard love be described as a flame, but I don’t agree. Flames can be extinguished and even stars die. My love for you never will. It will live in my heart for eternity. I am yours, my dear Ella, heart and soul, until the end of existence. I will give you all I have to give, share with you everything I am, and spend the rest of your life doing everything possible to give you all the happiness you deserve,” he said unwaveringly.

It was Ella’s turn now…if she could manage to speak through her tears. His vows may have been short but they were heartfelt and said everything she could have ever hoped for. “I could never have imagined loving anyone the way I love you. The fact that it’s you is even more surprising, but that just goes to show that the most surprising things are usually the best. You make me happy in ways I never thought possible and the idea of not spending my life with you is crippling. I love you more with every breath, Lucifer and there is nothing that would make me happier than being your wife. Not even eternity would be long enough with you so I will take every second I can get until then.”

There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. Except for Maze, of course who was sitting in the front row on Lucifer’s side. On the very opposite end from the angels naturally. Even Maze was smiling though. As much as the scene sickened her, she liked seeing them so happy. Abuelita was the worst of the bunch though as she had tears streaming down her face at the beauty of it, and Linda wasn’t far behind. The applause when they kissed was almost deafening and caused their first mistake of the night. Surprisingly it wasn’t one of the new angels that caused it either as Lucifer’s pure white wings sprung from his back and wrapped around them without him even noticing.

The officiant looked like he was about to faint, but Linda was quick on the ball and caught him, helping him to a chair as everyone else in attendance laughed. His job was done anyway and Linda was quick with the cosplay excuse for the one person who wasn’t in on the secret. Gabriel grinned and leaned forward, tapping Lucifer on the shoulder. “Hey bro. Your wings.”

Lucifer pulled out of the kiss and looked around before shrugging sheepishly and folding them back away. “Oops?” That just increased the laughter.

Gabriel shook his head. “And you were worried about us.”

Birdseed was thrown as they walked back down the aisle, followed by Linda and Gabriel arm in arm. Most of the guests were being transported by Limo, but Lucifer and Ella were sitting on the back of his Corvette as Maze drove, leading the procession to Lux for the reception. They had decided on buffet food rather than full catering just so that Lucifer could allow his siblings to relax without worrying about caterers not in the know and everything was set up by the time they arrived.

Chapter Text

After accepting all the hugs and well wishes in the receiving line, Lucifer and Ella took their place at the center booth with Gabriel and Linda while everyone else took other seats. They had set it up so that the speeches would be done first. Then food. Then dancing. Once everyone was seated, Gabriel stood up with the microphone that Lucifer handed him. It took him a minute to figure out how to work it before he started his speech. “Just so we’re clear, everyone here knows what we are right?” he asked first, not actually intending it to be in the mic, but it hardly mattered. When Lucifer nodded, Gabriel sighed and said, “good,” as his wings sprung from his back. “I don’t know how you can stand keeping your wings locked up all the time.” Lucifer just shook his head at the action and even more when the other three angels in the room did the same.

Lucifer wondered how many people would actually hear Gabriel’s speech with all the gawking, but then that could be why his brother had done it. Gabriel was crafty that way. “When we were kids, I used to follow Lucifer and Michael around all the time. They were my favorite big brothers, but especially Lucifer. He had a sense of fun that was unparalleled and no one could keep him down for long. I guess that’s not true anymore since he’s well and truly tied down now,” he laughed. “But then again, he is older than time itself so it’s about time he settled down. I don’t know Ella very well yet, but anyone can see how good she is for him and how much they love each other, so I think I speak for everyone when I wish them all the happiness they can take.” He sat back down and handed the mic to Linda.

“I’ve known Lucifer longer than I have Ella, but I am blessed to consider them both my friends,” Linda started. She had run her speech by Lucifer for approval given the whole doctor patient confidentiality issues that always arose when talking about him to anyone. “When I met Lucifer he was still relatively new to this world and trying to find his place in it and there were quite a few rocky starts. Then he met Ella and everything just fell into place. She brings a ray of sunshine into everyone’s life, especially his. I watched along as they taught each other how to love again. How to believe in themselves. How to make the most of what life has to offer. At the risk of echoing Gabriel, they are good for each other, and I know they will be happy. To Lucifer and Ella,” she finished as she raised her glass.

The next hour was spent with everyone eating and mingling. Gabriel and Linda got more than a few comments on their speeches, but the best comment ever that made Lucifer’s night was from Abuelita who told Gabriel. “I rather expected more eloquence from the messenger of God.”

Lucifer almost fell over laughing, as Gabriel shrugged sheepishly and replied, “He usually tells me what to say.”

Once everyone was finished eating Lucifer got up and headed out to the center stage. He clipped the small microphone onto his jacket and hit a button on his remote. The deejay had set everything up so that all Lucifer had to do was click the buttons. When the music started and Lucifer pulled her into the dance, Ella didn’t recognize the song and that didn’t change as he started to sing. “Lady, I'm your knight in shining armor and I love you; You have made me what I am and I am yours; My love, there's so many ways I want to say ‘I love you’; Let me hold you in my arms forever more…” As she listened to the words in his deep honeyed voice, she couldn’t deny how perfect it was. He’d chosen well.

By the time the song ended, she was in tears again, glad that she’d listened when she was advised not to wear mascara. Waterproof could only do so much. Her tears turned to laughter as the next song started and Lucifer spun her into Jay’s arms before going and offering his hand to her grandmother. Linda and Gabriel also took the dance floor together for the song We Are Family. About halfway through the song, everyone else joined in, Trixie being the most exuberant, bouncing all over the dance floor. They had planned most of the wedding together, but Lucifer had asked to surprise her with the special songs as well as the honeymoon location, so she allowed it.

Once the two scheduled dances were done, Lucifer switched it to the normal playlist tracks, and just let everyone go. He and Ella spent some more time on the dance floor, but also spent some time mingling with their guests. At one point Lucifer and Gabriel were flying around the high ceilings practically playing catch with a laughing Trixie. “Drop my daughter and I’ll kill you, Lucifer,” Dan yelled amusedly as he watched them. Only the fact that he trusted Lucifer completely with Trixie’s safety had him allowing it at all.

Ella was sitting with her grandmother laughing at the spectacle and Abuelita smiled at the sight as well, noticing how much care Lucifer was taking with her. “He would make a good father one day,” she told Ella.

Ella blushed brightly and looked a little sad as she said, “You know I can’t have children, Abuelita. And even if I could, Lucifer’s father would never let us raise a Nephilim.”

“I know that, Nieta, but adoption is an option,” she pointed out.

Ella considered it, but wasn’t convinced. She didn’t think Lucifer would go for it. For all that he had warmed up to Trixie, he still wasn’t a fan of kids. She knew that it would probably be different with his own kid, but to adopt one…she wasn’t sure he would go for that. And she wasn’t sure she wanted to either. “We’ll see.”

“Just think about it,” her grandmother said with a note of finality and Ella nodded. She could do that much.

About an hour later, Lucifer stopped the music again and led Ella to the piano in the center, lifting her up to sit on it and she grinned and blushed, eager to see what song he was going to sing to her this time. When she heard the opening of All Of Me she started tearing up again. He really was going all out to make this day perfect.

Abuelita left around nine pm stating the need to get some rest before their flight in the morning, but she hugged both Ella and Lucifer tightly before she left. Everyone else stayed until close to midnight when Lucifer and Ella decided not to delay their wedding night any longer and headed upstairs. Their flight wasn’t leaving until the morning either, though it would be around six am rather than ten when the flight to Detroit was leaving. Neither of them got any sleep in the intervening hours though, too busy consummating their marriage…many times. Thankfully they got time to sleep on the plane.

Lucifer hadn’t told Ella where he was taking her on their honeymoon so when she got her first look at the Hurawalhi Island Resort she spent a good ten minutes gaping before he chuckled and led her inside. They had just enough time to drop off their luggage in the honeymoon suite before their reservations at the undersea restaurant which just had her gaping again. Lucifer kept having to prompt her to eat when she kept looking out through the dome. Once they got back to their room, Ella wasted no time in showing her appreciation for the amazing location.

Contrary to expectations, they didn’t spend their entire month-long honeymoon in the suite. There were more than enough activities to keep them busy during the day and they partook in many of them. While most evenings and nights were spent wrapped up in each other, they did enjoy the nightlife at least a couple times a week. Ella did miss having him sing to her though since none of the clubs they went to had that option. When she mentioned that, he made a point to sing to her in the suite at random times, sometimes sweet loving songs, sometimes fun upbeat ones that had them dancing around the room. Ella couldn’t imagine being happier.

By the time they got home a month later, they were happy, relaxed, and tanned. The had a few more days before they had to be back at work and quickly called their friends to let them know they were home and set up a dinner for the next night. That night was going to be spent overcoming the jetlag.

Chapter Text

They got back to work and Ella got her new IDs that said Ella Morningstar and spent most of their first day staring at it off and on just like she had when she’d gotten her new driver’s license. Things quickly settled back to normal, though Lucifer was still sending her flowers every Monday. The use of flower language and the different messages in each of them kept it special rather than just becoming routine. It was only a month later when they had to take some more time off work though. This time unscheduled.

It was about mid-day and Lucifer was headed into interrogation with a suspect when Ella ran down and stopped him. “It’s Abuelita. She’s in the hospital and they say she’s dying. She’s asking for us.”

Lucifer nodded and pulled out his phone while Dan went ahead into interrogation. It only took him a few minutes before he had the next flight out booked for Detroit. “The flight isn’t for about four hours. Why don’t you head home and pack us a bag while I go get a confession from this guy. By the time you get back, I’ll be done and ready.”

Ella nodded and took the keys he offered her for the Corvette, kissed him quickly and headed out. Sure enough, he had the confession in about ten minutes and was waiting for Ella when she got back. Ella was more than a little jittery on the plane, and it was all Lucifer could do to keep her calm. When they got to the hospital, Jay was still there and hugged them both. Ella knew that he hadn’t left all day if not longer so she told him to go get some rest and something to eat and they would stay with her.

They both sat on either side of the bed and Abuelita reached out and took both their hands. “I’m glad the two of you could make it.”

“Of course we came Abuelita,” Ella said, tears in her eyes.

When Ella looked at him hopefully, Lucifer just shook his head. “If there was something wrong with her, I could help, but not even my feathers can heal old age,’ he said sadly.

Ella nodded. She had figured that. “Lucifer. Hand me my purse,” Abuelita told him, and Lucifer didn’t even hesitate to do so. When she reached in and pulled out the amulet, Ella gasped. Before she could decide what to say, her grandmother took the amulet and placed it in Lucifer’s hand. “You understand now why you can never give this to Ella, yes?”

Lucifer nodded and looked at her confusedly. “Why are you giving it to me?”

“Because in your hands it’s powerless so you’re safe to keep it until or unless you find someone worthy to give it to. Or destroy it. It’s your choice. It’s too powerful to risk it falling into the wrong hands now that I understand what it really does,” she told him.

Lucifer closed his fist around it and nodded. “I’ll be careful with it,” he promised.

“Thank you,” she told him. “Lucifer, if I go to hell…”

“Why would you think you’re going there?” he asked in shock.

“I don’t know how right or wrong my faith has been in the eyes of your father,” she told him.

“That doesn’t matter,” Lucifer assured her. “Your place is chosen by the amount of guilt you carry.”

She chuckled weakly. “I am a catholic Lucifer. Guilt comes with the territory.”

Lucifer cracked a smile. “Don’t I know it. Half of hell is filled with catholic souls who don’t belong there. But I won’t let you be one of them.” He looked at Ella. “Will you call Azrael?”

Ella nodded and immediately did just that. It only took a few seconds for her to appear. “It’s almost her time. I have to take her,” she said before anyone could say anything.

“No, I know,” Lucifer said. “I just wanted to ask you…make sure she makes it to heaven?”

“You know that’s not for me to say…”

“Please Rae-Rae. For me. Make an exception if it’s needed,” Lucifer said earnestly.

“For me, too,” Ella chimed in, tears streaming down her cheeks.

“I won’t know if it’s needed until the time comes, but yes. For the two of you I will take her to heaven either way. You’re lucky the gatekeeper is part of the cause,” she told him. “I’ll be back when it’s time.”

“Thank you,” Abuela said weakly to all three of them, even though Azrael was already gone. “The other undeserving souls though…”

“I can’t do anything about them,” Lucifer told her. “I wish I could. That was part of the cause Azrael mentioned. The cause I championed in my rebellion. All the undeserving souls would be taken from hell and sent back to heaven.”

“Like in revelations,” she said. “It will just be you who brings it about rather than your father.”

Lucifer shook his head. “No, not me. I can’t…”

“Don’t shy away from your destiny Lucifer. Remember. Just because you don’t see how right now, doesn’t mean it won’t happen,” she interrupted him.

“I’ll do what I can if I find a way,” he promised wearily. He didn’t think it would ever happen so it was an easy promise to make anyway.

“Good,” she said pulling both his and Ella’s hands so that they were together across her stomach. “You take care of each other,” she told them as she drifted off to sleep.

Ella broke down in sobs now that she wasn’t trying to be strong and Lucifer went around the side of the bed and lifted her up before sitting down with her in his lap as he held her. He wasn’t sad. He knew that she would be missed, but she would live on in heaven where she belonged. Death from old age was never sad to him. It was just the way of things. He knew that when Ella went it would be different though. Especially if he found a way to get her off the banned list so she could go somewhere he could never get to again.

Ella’s brothers were back before she passed a few hours later, and since she knew them all, Azrael appeared visibly. “Don’t worry. I’m taking her to heaven,” she told the brothers as she lifted the currently unconscious soul from her body. “No exception needed,” she said before she disappeared.

After a few moments of silence, Jay found the strength to ask, “What did she mean, ‘no exception needed’?”

“Abuelita was worried about the possibility of going to hell. Lu asked Rae-Rae to make an exception and take her to heaven anyway if that wasn’t where she was already going,” Ella told them and they all looked at him gratefully.

“It wasn’t needed anyway. I didn’t think it would be,” Lucifer said with a shrug.

“Still. If nothing else, it gave her peace of mind, so thank you,” Marco told him and the others nodded in agreement.

They went back to Abuelita’s house once her body was taken away and it wasn’t until they were discussing arrangements that Ella burst into tears again. “We can’t go to the funeral,” she told Lucifer brokenly.

Lucifer sighed sadly and pulled her into his lap again. “I’m so sorry, my love, but you know she would want a church service.”

“I get why you can’t go to church,” Carlos said, “but why can’t she?”

Lucifer explained how God thought they were both in hell since they were hidden from him after he tried to have Ella killed, so they both had to avoid churches.

Jay frowned. “Then maybe we could…”

“No,” Ella cut him off. “Lucifer is right. This is about what she wants. As long as you guys know that we’re not there because we don’t care, that’s all that matters,” she looked at them almost like she was begging them to believe that.

Jay put a hand on her shoulder. “Even if we were tempted to doubt that, the fact that you both jumped on a plane here within hours of my calling you and the fact that you bargained with the angel of death to get her soul to heaven proves it. And we’ll make sure everyone else knows that too.”

“Well not the angel of death part of course, but that you care,” Marco added.

“Abuelita wanted me to let you know also, that while she may have taken you out of the will money-wise, it wasn’t because she didn’t love you. It was just because Lucifer has more than enough to take care of you. I’m not getting any money either,” Jay told her. “You still get all her jewelry though and any of her clothes that you want to take.”

“I don’t care about stuff,” Ella said through her tears.

“We all know that, darling,” Lucifer consoled her. “But it will be something to remember her by.” Ella nodded as she buried her face in his neck.

“Well it’s getting late. We should head out and talk more tomorrow when we’re hopefully a little more together,” Carlos suggested.

Jay nodded. “You two are welcome to stay here.”

When he felt Ella shaking her head against his neck, Lucifer said, “We appreciate that, but we should get a hotel. I don’t think Ella is up to staying in this house right now.”

They stayed in Detroit for a few more days. Until after the funeral. The wake was in Abuelita’s house though so Ella and Lucifer were able to be there for that much and no one who was present doubted their caring when they didn’t show up for the service the next day. When they headed back to LA, Ella had the little bit of jewelry that she’d inherited, along with some of the books that had caught her eye. Jay got the family bible as the eldest, not that Ella was particularly partial to that anyway. The will hadn’t closed yet, of course, but since no one was fighting over it there was no issue with Ella taking her stuff now.

They got home on Saturday night, and Ella felt completely wrung out and Lucifer got her stripped down and into bed before he started unpacking. When he put the amulet in his safe, the divinity contained in it was so small that he never noticed it connecting to his own, nor did he notice it pass to Ella a few days later.

Chapter Text

It was more than a month before they noticed any changes and it was Lucifer who pointed out how Ella had been sleeping and eating more than usual. They didn’t think much of it though until a week later when Ella suddenly passed out while she was working in the lab. It was pure luck that Lucifer had been there to catch her and he quickly rushed her to the hospital. He couldn’t heal her if he didn’t know what was wrong after all. Not if it was serious. Ella woke up halfway to the hospital and chided Lucifer for being a worrywart, but he just pointed out that suddenly fainting for no reason could very well be serious. Two hours later, the hospital informed them that it was in fact very serious. They were having a baby. Then it was Lucifer’s turn to faint.

The nurse laughed, but Ella was in too much shock to laugh with her, though she would later. A lot. Once they got Lucifer woken up, off the floor, and into a chair, the nurse left them alone, promising to be back soon with the discharge paperwork and advising her to make an appointment with an OB as soon as possible. As soon as they were alone, Ella turned to Lucifer. “How is this possible? I can’t…and you can’t…or can you…”

“I don’t know,” he told her honestly. “I didn’t think it was possible for me to…impregnate a human. Not without doing it intentionally. I mean…” he got up and ran a hand through his hair. “If this was possible than how did it not happen before? It’s not like I ever bothered with any preventative measures…”

Ella grabbed his hand as he paced by, just needing his comfort right now. “How much danger will this put us in?” she asked, placing a hand protectively over her stomach.

“I don’t know,” Lucifer said again. “I would have to talk to Azrael and see if hiding you will hide him too or if she can even hide him at all...He might be too powerful.”

“More powerful than you?” she asked confused.

Lucifer nodded. “A lot more. The addition of a human soul with divinity…well there’s a reason my father forbade Nephilim. They are as powerful as he is.”

Ella’s eyes widened fearfully. “How can we raise a child that powerful?” she asked almost hysterically.

“He won’t come into his full powers until he’s an adult,” Lucifer assured her. “They won’t even start forming until he hits puberty.”

“So it will be safe for me to have normal prenatal care and give birth in a hospital and everything?” Ella asked hopefully.

“It should be, yes. He should be no different than a normal human baby on the outside until his wings start growing in when he’s around a year old.”

“You keep saying ‘he’. Can you tell…”

Lucifer shook his head. “No. It’s just better than saying ‘it’.”

Before anything else could be said, the nurse returned with the discharge paperwork and they left. The ride home was spent in silence, both of them still in shock and neither of them knowing what to say. Once they got back to the penthouse, Ella plopped down on the couch and pulled Lucifer down next to her. “Say something, Lu,” she said plaintively.

“I…I don’t know what to say,” he admitted.

“Are you…okay with this?” she asked biting her lip worriedly.

“With having a family with you, yes,” he told her. “Overall, I don’t know. I can’t know until I know how much danger we’re in.”

Ella closed her eyes and called for Azrael who appeared a few minutes later. “I’m pregnant,” she said before Azrael could say anything.

What neither of them expected, and actually made them both feel a little better, was Azrael squealing in happiness and bouncing over to hug them both. “Wow. This is amazing! So awesome! A baby!”

“A /nephilim/, Azrael,” Lucifer said pointedly.

“I know that much, Lu. I do have a brain,” Azrael rolled her eyes. “Let me see,” she motioned Ella to lift her shirt. When she did, Azrael placed a hand on her stomach and there was a brief glow. “There. All hidden. The baby would have been covered by your invisibility for a few more months but better safe than sorry. I’ll need to do that again when they start growing into their powers though.”

“They?!” Lucifer asked looking a little faint again.

Azrael laughed. “No, no. There’s only one as far as I can tell. But since we don’t know yet if it’s a he or she…”

“Then please just pick one so you don’t give me a coronary again,” Lucifer said willing his heartbeat to return to normal. This time Ella was far enough out of her state of shock to laugh. And then she just kept laughing. “I’m glad you think it’s funny,” Lucifer grumbled.

“Sorry, love. Just remembering you fainting when the nurse told us about the baby,” Ella said through her laughter.

“He fainted?” Azrael said with undisguised glee. “Oh I can’t wait to tell Gabe.”

“Yeah, yeah. Laugh it up,” Lucifer muttered. “I’d like to see Gabe take that news any better.”

“Well since the crucial stuff is taken care of and you guys know you’re safe now, I need to be getting back to work. Was on my way to a pickup when you called. Smell you later,” Azrael said before disappearing.

Ella reached out and took Lucifer’s hand again. “I really am sorry for laughing. And for telling Rae-Rae.”

He saw the worried look on her face and pulled her into his lap, resting his forehead against hers. “It’s okay, dearest. I’m not mad. It is rather amusing, after all.”

Ella smiled and leaned forward for a kiss. “So now that we know we’re safe…can you tell me if you’re okay with this now?” She desperately hoped that he was. She understood his trepidation before and even shared it, but now…she was over the moon. She never thought she would get to have a child after what had happened to her last one.

“I’m very much okay with this, darling. I know I’ve never really understood the human desire to procreate, nor have I had much use for children at all. This is different though. This is /our/ child. He is a part of both of us that will live on forever. Even after…” He trailed off, not even able to say the words.

Ella knew what he meant. After she was gone. After her human life ended, Lucifer would still have some part of her to hold onto in their child. “He’ll be immortal then?” she guessed.

Lucifer nodded. “Yes. More so than me even. The only thing that will ever be able to hurt him will be Azrael’s blade.” He knew that she had called it back to her after he threw it in the rift. He’d seen her with it. At least the other piece was gone forever so it could never be put together again.

“And she would never hurt him,” Ella said with a nod. “Do you think this is what Abuelita meant about the change and destiny and all?” she couldn’t help but ask.

“I doubt it…unless…” he trailed off, fear lighting his face as it dawned on him.

“Unless what?” Ella asked, more than a little worried at the look on his face. When he didn’t respond right away, she asked, “Come on, Lu. You’re scaring me. Unless what?”

“Unless he is the instrument for the change,” Lucifer said hauntedly. “She said that we weren’t the center of it but we were the catalyst. It fits.”

“What do you mean?” Ella asked. “I need a little more than that.”

“The reason my rebellion never worked before…never /could/ have worked…is because no one can stand against Dad. Even if every angel in heaven had been on my side, he could have just wiped us all out. Even if we had been able to kill him, like with the blade, it would have meant the end of existence because with no creator controlling the throne everything would have ceased to be.”

“Okay but how would the baby…” Ella trailed off as her eyes widened.

“He will be as powerful as Dad. He could stand against him and he could take the throne,” Lucifer told her. “I get now why she kept telling us not to run from this.”

“But he’s just a baby,” Ella said, tears in her eyes.

“He won’t always be,” Lucifer pointed out, still turning things over in his mind.

“You want to raise our child with the sole purpose of overthrowing heaven?!” she asked incredulously and not a little angrily.

“What?!” Lucifer did a double take at her. “No! Of course not! But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t prepare for the possibility.”

“And how do you intend to do that?” she asked with narrowed eyes, almost daring him to say something she didn’t like.

Chapter Text

Lucifer took both her hands, hoping to placate her, and hoping she wouldn’t kill him for what he was about to say. “Since I’ve been here on Earth I’ve realized something. More so since I met you. The biggest problem in heaven right now, starting with my father, is that none of us were raised with love. That’s the best thing we can do for this child.”

Ella breathed a sigh of relief at that, but still had to be sure. “Just so we’re clear, you’re not proposing that we raise him as a warrior and fill his head with ideas of becoming the new god?” she asked.

“No. Not a chance. That would end up unleashing something worse than we have now. No, he won’t even know about the possibility until he’s an adult if I have anything to say about it. I am thinking we should train him to fight, but not exclusively. More as a part of a well-rounded life, like many children take martial arts. He’ll be stronger and faster than other kids so I’d like Maze to train him rather than putting him with other kids, but only once or twice a week for an hour or two at a time.”

“Only if he wants to,” Ella said firmly.

“Of course. You know how much I value free will. I would never take that away from my own child any more than necessary,” Lucifer told her. “No more than I would force him to overthrow heaven if he didn’t want to. It will be his choice. All we can do is make sure he has the tools to succeed no matter what choice he makes.”

“Which means raising him with love and giving him a well-rounded life?” Ella asked. When Lucifer nodded she smiled and kissed him lovingly. “I can get behind that plan.” After another kiss she said, “But we tell no one about this.”

“You realize that Azrael, as well as anyone else she shares the news with, will quickly figure out the same thing,” Lucifer pointed out.

“I know, but they can’t exactly be a part of his life. Well Rae-Rae could, but I don’t think she’d interfere that way. I meant no one here on Earth,” Ella told him.

“I’d like to get Linda’s advice,” Lucifer said hopefully.

“Okay. I can understand that. But that’s it,” Ella said firmly and Lucifer nodded. The lapsed into another long silence, as Ella leaned her side against his chest and laid her head on his shoulder, both just taking in the enormity of what was going on. “Lu?” Ella said after a while.

“Hmm?”

“I’m scared,” she admitted.

Lucifer huffed a laugh. “Me too, darling.”

“You don’t seem it,” she told him.

“Are you forgetting that I fainted?” he asked wryly.

She giggled. “I promise I will never ever forget that. But you don’t seem so scared since then.”

“I assure you, love, if you were in my head right now you wouldn’t say that,” Lucifer chuckled.

“Talk to me then. Let’s help each other through this,” Ella said hopefully.

“I don’t know if your fears are the same as my fears and I don’t want to add more to yours if they’re not,” Lucifer pointed out.

“It doesn’t matter, Lu. We’re in this together,” she said softly, taking his hand and placing it on her still flat stomach. “This is /our/ child, and we should be on the same page.”

Lucifer ran his thumb back and forth over the soft skin with a smile as he nodded. “I just keep thinking that the demons will be after him the same as the angels if they find out about him. After he’s born I’ll have to quit work at the precinct. We can’t exactly leave him with a babysitter. Even without the protection aspect, once he starts sprouting wings and flying around that would be a lot to explain, not to mention expect a human to put up with…”

“And what if he flies off the balcony or out the window. Will we have to board up the windows and wall off the balcony,” Ella added her own fears to that.

“Oh, no. That’ll be fine. As long as I’m here anyway. He wouldn’t be able to get up high enough without flying and if he’s already flying then he won’t have to worry about falling. I’ll just have to go after him,” he told her.

“Okay, but I can take off work instead until then. I know how much the work means to you,” Ella suggested.

Lucifer shook his head. “No, darling. Your work means just as much to you and I still have the club I can take care of from here. I wouldn’t have time to do both anymore anyway,” he pointed out.

“So you’re gonna be a stay at home dad? /You/?” she asked with a laugh.

Lucifer blinked in shock at the D word for a moment before he shook his head to clear it. “You sound skeptical.”

She shook her head as she leaned it back on his shoulder. “Might have something to do with the fact that you just had an internal panic attack at the word dad.”

“I’ll get used to it,” he said mock-defensively. “I have nine months after all.”

“Probably closer to eight,” Ella told him. “Maybe even less. There’s no way to know for sure until I get to a doctor. But you’re right. We have plenty of time. We don’t need to figure all this out tonight.”

“There is one more thing I want to figure out now though,” Lucifer said, getting up and heading over to the bar, grabbing a normal penknife and coming back over. “Do you trust me?” he asked holding a hand out to her.

“With my life,” she said putting her hand in his, not sure what he was getting at. He flipped her hand over to her palm and ran the knife over firmly enough to create a shallow cut, but nothing happened. He breathed a sigh of relief and tried again a little harder. “What…”

Lucifer smiled and pulled her into a hug. “I was hoping that the baby would be making you more invulnerable. I mean, obviously you’re vulnerable to things like low blood sugar, but you can’t be injured. Just one more thing I want to try.” He ran off and grabbed the hell-forged blade and came back. “Your arm this time. I’m just gonna try a little tap.” When the blood started welling up he winced. “Sorry. Guess you’re not as invulnerable as he’ll be, but you’re as invulnerable as I am at least.

“No, it’s okay. It was good to test it. It’s barely more than a scratch. At least we know my limits,” she assured him seeing that he felt guilty for it. She was just glad that this lessened the chances of him being /too/ hoveringly overprotective.

Before either of them could say anything else, Lucifer’s phone rang and he answered. “Hey man. I just left work. How’s Ella? Is everything okay?”

“You could say that. She’s pregnant,” Lucifer told Dan and there was a long silence on the other end of the line.

When Ella mimed putting it on speakerphone, Lucifer did just in time for Dan to recover enough to say, “Oh wow. Congratulations man. That’s…wow.”

“Thanks Dan,” Ella said happily.

“Is that…are you telling people yet? Other than me, I mean. Can I tell Trix?” he asked.

Lucifer looked at Ella who shrugged. “Sure. Feel free to tell the urchin if you like,” Lucifer told him.

“That’s…wow,” Dan said again.

“We’ll see you tomorrow, Dan,” Ella said with a laugh. Maybe by then he would have found more words.

“Right. Yeah…wow,” he said as he hung up the phone and Lucifer burst into laughter as well.

“I suppose I’d better call Maze and Linda and let them know too. Maze in particular. If she hears the news from anyone else I’ll probably be testing my knife catching reflexes again,” he joked.

Ella chuckled. “Yeah you’re probably right. You call Maze and I’ll call Linda. Then we should be able to get them both before word spreads. You know once Trix knows the whole world will.”

Both of their calls went well. They both offered congratulations, and Maze was already going on about teaching the baby knives and combat. Lucifer decided to save the argument about what and how to teach him for later, and just let her gush.

About two hours later they heard the elevator and turned to look just as Trixie came bounding out and jumped up next to them on the couch. Since she was looking and talking mostly at Lucifer, Ella grabbed her phone and called Dan, putting it on speakerphone so he could hear and would know what was going on. They had long ago worked out a system for this. “Uncle Lucifer! Aunt Ella! Daddy said you’re having a baby. That is so cool! Will it be my cousin? I don’t have any cousins but I really want one. Is it a boy or a girl? What are you going to name it?...” Lucifer quieted her with a hand over her mouth as he usually did when she started babbling and there was a muffled, “sorry,” from behind his hand so he let go.

“Yes we’re having a baby. He won’t technically be any relation to you, but since neither am I it hardly matters, so yes it can be your cousin. We don’t know yet whether we’re having a boy or a girl and haven’t picked out any names since we just found out a few hours ago. Did I get all your questions?”

“I think so,” Trixie said with a giggle and they talked babies, mostly with Ella, for the next twenty minutes before Dan showed up.

“How many times have we talked about this Trix?” he asked wearily.

She hung her head. “Lots,” she admitted. “I just got so excited.”

“You know what this means?”

“I’m grounded,” she sighed.

“Two weeks. Say goodbye and lets go,” Dan said almost as amused as he was angry. Trixie bounded over and hugged Lucifer then Ella before following her father out.