Chapter Text
“You’re the Devil,” Eve says.
There’s a slight waver in her voice, but there’s no uncertainty in her eyes. She believes what she’s saying. And why shouldn’t she? She’s seen it. Seen him. She knows what he can do, what he did down in Hell, and she doesn’t hate him for it. She doesn’t blame him for it. She just accepts him, with all his darkness and destruction, and if she accepts what he is, then why can’t he?
Lucifer gets to his feet. “Yes,” he says with a nod. “Yes, I am.”
Eve smiles. “And what does the Devil do?”
“I punish,” he says dutifully.
“Exactly,” she agrees. She’s beaming now. “So let’s go find this guy and you can flex those punishment muscles.”
“I already know where he is. Or, rather, I know where he’s most likely hiding. Mazikeen tracked him down.”
“Even better. Let’s go.”
Eve turns away from him, tugging on his arm so he’ll follow.
He doesn’t. He keeps his feet firmly planted, forcing her to turn back around, because it’s just occurred to him that he’s not the only one interested in finding Julian.
“What’s wrong?” Eve says, her smile fading into a frown.
He shakes his head. “It’s not that simple.”
“Of course it is. You’re the Devil, he’s a bad guy, and the Devil punishes bad guys.”
“Yes, but this bad guy killed a cop. The LAPD takes that very seriously. As we speak, there are likely dozens of officers searching for him.”
Eve’s lips press into a thin, disapproving line. “Including Chloe?” she asks, folding her arms over her chest.
Hearing the name of his partner makes Lucifer feel as though he’s been punched in the gut. He’s been trying not to think of her, trying not to imagine what she must think of him after what happened, but that’s easier said than done. She’s never far from his mind, even when he wishes she were.
“I imagine so,” he says as neutrally as he can. “It is her case, after all. And her father…”
He trails off as the realization sinks in. The Detective’s father was shot in the line of duty. And tonight, because her partner failed to do his job, another police officer suffered the same fate.
She must despise him.
“Lucifer,” Eve calls.
He pushes his morose thoughts aside and glances up at her. She steps closer.
“I know you like work,” she says, tipping her head back to look him in the eye. “And I get why you like working with Chloe. She’s nice. But I think she’s a bad influence on you.”
Lucifer gapes at her. “I beg your pardon?”
“She makes you second guess yourself,” Eve says defensively.
He scoffs.
“You’re the Devil,” she says, and she’s angry now. Her hands are curled into fists. “You punish bad guys. That’s what you do. Except you’re not doing it, are you? You know where this guy is, you know he deserves to be punished, but instead of going to punish him, you’re stalling.”
“I’m not stalling.”
“Yes you are. And it’s because of her. I know it is.”
He shakes his head. “She’s nothing to do with this.”
“She’s holding you back,” Eve insists. “She wants to keep you in a cage. But I don’t. I want you to be free. I want you to be the best version of yourself. And you want that too, don’t you? Don’t you want to be the best version of yourself?”
“I don’t even know what the best version of myself is.”
“Well I do. It’s the Devil I met in the garden. It’s the King of Hell who strikes fear into the hearts of the damned. Are you really going to let her stop you from being who you are?”
The soft ping of the elevator echoes through the penthouse before he can answer. Lucifer turns his head, frowning, because he isn’t expecting anyone.
His jaw goes slack when he sees who steps off the elevator.
“Hi,” the Detective says quietly.
“Detective,” he breathes in return.
They stare at each other until Eve clears her throat.
The Detective is the one to break eye contact. She gives Eve a polite smile. “Hi, Eve.”
“Hello, Detective Decker,” Eve says coolly. “What are you doing here?”
The Detective glances toward Lucifer. She licks her lips the way she does sometimes when she’s trying to find the right words, and for some inexplicable reason, he feels angry at Eve for asking a question that’s clearly put his partner on the spot. The Detective doesn’t need a reason to be here. She doesn’t have to explain herself. She can do whatever she pleases.
But then he remembers what happened earlier tonight, and how much she must hate him, and his anger redirects inward.
“I know why she’s here.”
Both women look at him. He has no idea what Eve is thinking because he doesn’t look at her. But the furrow in the Detective’s brow tells him that she’s confused.
“Go on, then,” he says. “I know you want to shout at me for my stupidity, so you might as well—”
“That’s not why I’m here.”
He blinks at her in surprise. “It’s not?”
“No.”
She glances toward Eve.
“Eve, would you mind if I talked to your boyfriend alone for a few minutes? I won’t be long and then I’ll be out of your hair.”
Eve frowns. She glances at Lucifer as if she wants him to insist that she should stay. But he’s not going to do that.
She looks disappointed by his silence, but she pastes on a smile. “Sure.”
She slides a hand up to the back of Lucifer’s head and pulls him down for a kiss. “I’ll be waiting downstairs,” she says when she leans back. “When you’re finished, we can go do what you do best.”
He nods. She kisses him once more and then heads for the elevator.
The Detective smiles politely as Eve passes. By the time the elevator doors glide closed and the car begins its descent, her smile has faded.
The penthouse is eerily silent. The noise of the city floats in from the balcony, but it seems muted tonight. The Detective is still wearing what she had on earlier, badge gleaming at her hip. He wonders if she came straight here from the scene where he caused the death of one of her colleagues.
“Can I get you a drink?” he asks.
She shakes her head. “No, thank you.”
He pours what’s left in the decanter he’s clutching into his glass, downs it, and then walks over to the bar for a fresh bottle. Once he has one, he turns to face her. She’s pressing her lips together, eyebrows furrowed and fingers twisting absently in front of her. He knows her well enough to know that she’s unsure of herself. Whatever she’s here to say, she’s nervous about it.
The realization flicks like a light switch.
“You’re here to tell me we can’t work together anymore, aren’t you?”
She snaps her gaze up to his. “What?”
“Understandable,” he muses, looking down into his whiskey glass. “Who would want to work with me after tonight?”
“I do.”
It’s his turn to look up in surprise.
She takes a step toward him. “Lucifer, I’m here to apologize.”
He stares at her.
“I’m sorry for letting you leave the scene without checking in,” she continues. “It was my scene. It’s my case. That means I’m responsible for everything that happens. I had to make some phone calls, talk to the brass, oversee some stuff. It’s a lot of boxes to check and things to juggle. But I should’ve—”
“Don’t be absurd,” he cuts her off. “You’ve no reason to apologize. Certainly not to me. You had far more important things—”
“But they weren’t more important. That’s what I’m saying. You’re my partner. I should’ve checked in with you, even if it was just to say that I couldn’t talk then, but I wanted to later. You’re important to me, Lucifer. And my actions tonight didn’t reflect that. I’m sorry.”
He’s speechless.
“I’m also sorry about Dan.” She’s twisting her fingers together again. “He told me what he said to you before you left. I saw him talking to you, but I didn’t…I had no idea that’s what he was saying or I would’ve stepped in. He was out of line, and I told him that. He’s going to apologize the next time he sees you.”
“I’d rather he not,” Lucifer says, glancing down at his whiskey. “I don’t deserve it.”
She doesn’t say anything. He keeps his eyes fixed on his whiskey. He can’t bear the contrition on her face. She has nothing to be sorry for. He’s the one who should be apologizing. But he can’t seem to find his voice.
She should be disgusted by his silence. She should turn and leave. But she doesn’t. She walks toward him instead, and when she stops before him, standing close enough to touch, his breath catches. They’re not any closer than normal. A few hours ago, they were crammed into her car, which was a much more intimate setting. But he feels like a bruise right now, like even the slightest pressure will be excruciating, and no one has the power to hurt him like she does.
“Hey,” she says, reaching out to touch his arm.
It’s so gentle—her voice, her touch, her very presence—that it infuriates him. Why is she treating him this way? What right does he have to her gentleness after what he did?
But he’s never been able to resist her. So many times, he tried to let her go. So many times, he failed.
He lifts his gaze to look at her. She searches his eyes, her expression so full of compassion and concern that it makes a lump form in his throat.
She squeezes his arm gently. “What happened tonight wasn’t your fault.”
“Yes it was.”
“No. It wasn’t.”
He pulls out of her grasp. He pretends he doesn’t see the brief flash of hurt in her eyes.
“You needn’t coddle me, Detective. What happened was absolutely my fault. If I hadn’t been there, if I hadn’t made such a foolish error, one of your colleagues would still be alive.”
“Lucifer, that’s not—” she starts, but then she stops talking abruptly.
He frowns, confused, until he realizes she’s noticed his bloody hands because he lifted one to sip his whiskey.
Shame washes over him. His hands are covered in the blood of an innocent, a human who died because he foolishly thought he could be the kind of man who’s worthy of the woman standing before him. He hasn’t bothered to wash it off because he doesn’t deserve to be clean. He doesn’t deserve forgiveness.
“Oh, Lucifer,” the Detective whispers.
There’s no judgment in her voice. No disgust. He frowns, confused, but then she reaches out and curls her fingers around his forearm, and his confusion slides into surprise.
“Come on,” she says, pushing past him.
She tugs gently on his arm. He stumbles after her, too baffled to voice a question or complaint. He follows her across the penthouse, up the stairs to his bedroom, and then into his bathroom.
She stops in front of his sink and turns to face him. He lets her take the whiskey glass out of his hand and set it on the marble counter with a dull clink, and then she lifts her hands to the lapels of his jacket.
“Do you mind if I…?” she asks.
He’s confused—surely she doesn’t want him to pleasure her now?—but he nods. She pushes his jacket off his shoulders and then sets it on the counter. She reaches for his arm next. He watches as she deftly removes his cufflink, sets it down next to the whiskey glass, and then carefully rolls his sleeve up toward his elbow.
He glances up at her face. She doesn’t meet his gaze, so he lets himself stare. He’s always thought he’d grow accustomed to how lovely she is. When you see something every day, you’re bound to take it for granted at some point, right? But every time he looks at her, it registers like a new revelation.
His partner is beautiful.
She finishes with his sleeve and reaches for his other arm.
“My dad always used to say that the most important part of being a cop wasn’t catching bad guys,” she says as she removes his cufflink. “He said it was serving the community. Building relationships and helping people who need help.”
He watches as a soft smile tugs on her lips.
“I wanted to be just like him, so that’s what I tried to do. After I graduated from the academy, I got assigned to a beat on the south side. There was this café that was like the center of the neighborhood. The heart and soul of the community, you know? So I started hanging out there. Getting my coffee in the morning, getting lunch or dinner when I could. Just getting to know people and making sure they knew who I was and that I was there to help if they needed anything.”
He feels an ache deep in his chest. Nothing she’s saying is surprising. Of course she wanted to be part of the community she served. Of course she went out of her way to get to know people and help them. That’s who she is.
But he’s immortal. He’s seen it all. He knows humanity, and he doesn’t think she understands just how rare she is. How extraordinary.
She’s finished with his sleeves. He still doesn’t understand why she rolled them. She turns the faucet on and puts her fingers beneath the stream of water as if she’s testing the temperature. When she pushes her own sleeves up, it finally clicks.
She’s going to wash the blood off his hands.
The ache in his chest grows sharper. “Detective,” he says.
But she doesn’t stop. She just clutches one of his elbows, gently pulls him closer to her and the sink, and then puts one of his bloodied hands beneath the faucet.
The water isn’t cold. But it’s her fingers brushing over his skin, gently wiping away the blood as if she doesn’t mind that she’s dirtying herself in the process, that makes him feel warm. She squeezes a few pumps of soap into her hand and then lathers his skin, gently scrubbing away the more stubborn grime as the scent of lemons fills the bathroom.
“One day, I met this girl. Regina,” she continues, her voice soft. “She was nineteen and studying to get her GED. She’d dropped out of high school after getting in some trouble, but she was trying to get back on track. She wanted to be a mechanic, open her own shop, and she studied at the café a lot. My car had engine trouble one day and she fixed it. That’s how we met. After that, I started meeting her at the café to help her study.”
He expects her to continue, but she goes silent. He glances from their hands up to her face. Her expression is blank, her eyes fixed on her work as she pumps out more soap and starts on his other hand, but he knows her. He knows she’s trying to steady herself before she speaks, because whatever she’s about to say is upsetting.
“One night, we were walking out of the café, and there was this commotion at the pawn shop across the street. Someone said there was a robbery in progress. I was off duty, but I was still in uniform, and I had my service weapon. I couldn't just stand there and let it happen while I waited for backup. So I told Regina to call 911 and then I ran over there.”
Her eyebrows furrow as she rubs her thumb over a bloodstain on his second knuckle.
“It was dark, and the lights weren't on, so it was hard to see. I found the owner unconscious but still breathing by the register. I could hear rustling in the back. I didn't know how many of them there were, or if they were armed, but I followed protocol. I identified myself, told them to come out with their hands up. Next thing I know, someone comes streaking out from the back, making a break for it. He plowed right into me.”
She turns his hand over to check his palm for spots she might have missed. He can’t take his eyes off her. He thinks he’s holding his breath, and he doesn’t know why, except that whatever she’s about to reveal feels important.
“We struggled,” she says. “I got the upper hand. He was on the floor and I had my gun pointed right at him. He was…” She shakes her head. “He was just a kid. Younger than Regina.”
She pauses, eyebrows furrowed, and he finds himself wanting to tilt closer to her, to comfort her somehow, even though he has no idea what she’s about to say.
“I hesitated just long enough that he fired his gun at me and then bolted. I yelled at him to stop, but he didn't. I had a clear shot as he ran away, and I could've taken it, but he was so young. I couldn’t…”
Her voice cracks. She clears her throat and then shuts the faucet off and reaches for a towel. The fabric is soft against his hands as she dries them. She hasn’t looked at him since she started her story.
“He fired at me again. I took cover and then gave chase. When I got outside, it was just in time to watch Regina try to stop him.”
Lucifer’s heart sinks.
“He shot her,” the Detective says, voice wavering. “Then he carjacked a van and tried to escape, but he ran a red at the intersection. The crash killed him and two other people. And Regina bled out in my arms.”
His hands are dry, but she doesn’t lower the towel. She just stands with her head bowed before him, his hands clasped in hers. He squeezes her hands gently, wishing he had something better to offer.
She finally looks up at him. Her eyes are shining with tears.
“I know how it feels to try to do the right thing and have it blow up in your face,” she whispers. “I know how it feels to have someone’s blood on your hands. I know it makes you question everything. It makes you think, what’s the point? If trying to help, trying to be good, causes just as much pain as not trying, then why try at all?”
He stares at her, frozen, because it feels like she’s looking straight through him, down into the marrow of his soul, and even though he’s dark and twisted, full of doubt and rage and guilt and grief, she isn’t flinching. She isn’t looking away.
“But you keep trying,” he rasps. “Even after everything.”
She nods. “Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because that’s who I want to be. I want to be someone who tries. Even when it’s hard. Even when it hurts. Even if I can’t bail the water out of the boat fast enough to keep it from sinking, I want to know when the ship goes down that I did everything I could to keep it afloat. Because the alternative is giving up. And I refuse to give up.”
Lucifer swallows around the lump in his throat and looks down at their hands.
“I’m not like you, Detective. I don’t have your goodness.”
“Bullshit.”
He looks up at her in surprise. She doesn’t look apologetic at all.
“I’m the Devil,” he reminds her.
“Yeah,” she agrees. “You led a rebellion against God. You command an army of demons. You’re the King of Hell. And tonight, you tried. Despite your past, despite what humans have said about you for centuries, despite what you say about yourself, you tried. You had every reason not to, and you did it anyway. And not just tonight. I’ve watched you try so many times, Lucifer.”
“I failed.”
“So did I. Does that mean I’m not good?”
She’s got him there. He can tell by the way she’s looking at him that she knows it. She squeezes his hands.
“You’re responsible for your choices, Lucifer. For what you decide to do. Tonight, you tried to do the right thing. Regardless of how it turned out, that’s what you chose. Julian is the one who chose wrong. You didn’t pull that trigger. He did. She’s not here anymore because of him, not you. And I know it hurts. Believe me, I know. But I hope it doesn’t make you stop trying.”
“Would you hate me if it did?” he whispers.
She shakes her head. “I could never hate you.”
“I’m the Devil,” he reminds her for the second time.
For the second time, she doesn’t blink.
“I could never hate you, Lucifer.”
He feels short of breath all of a sudden, like he can't inhale enough air into his lungs even though he’s desperately trying.
Hope sparks. He hasn't felt its warmth in weeks—not since she stood in his living room and told him she was terrified of him—but it burns now, warming him from the inside out as he stands in his bathroom with her hands clutching his through a towel.
“I owe you one more apology before I go,” she says quietly.
He frowns because he has no idea what she’s talking about. She shouldn’t even be sorry for the first two things she apologized for. What else could there be?
“The day Pierce died,” she murmurs.
Oh.
“The day I saw your face,” she adds, as if he doesn’t remember exactly how she looked at him.
His rekindled hope sputters. He pulls his hands away from hers. If she’s going to reject him, he doesn’t want her to do it while he’s clinging to her like she’s a life raft in the open sea.
She glances down at her hands, which are empty now except the towel. She twists the fabric the way she usually twists her fingers.
“I think about it all the time,” she says quietly. “About what I did and didn’t do. What I said and didn’t say.”
She looks up at him. He’s not surprised to see tears in her eyes. She feels things deeply, and he’s seen her eyes shine with emotion plenty of times. But he doesn’t know what these tears are for. Herself? Him? Their partnership that was doomed from the start, because regardless of what she says, she’s far too good for him?
“I didn’t believe in any of it,” she tells him earnestly. “I didn’t believe in God, or Heaven, or Hell. I told you that, remember? Right after we started working together, the night I shot you. We were in my car, and I told you.”
“I remember,” he confirms.
“I didn’t believe it,” she repeats as if she isn’t sure he heard her. “And then suddenly it was real, I had proof right in front of me, and I couldn’t…I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I couldn’t cope. I mean the enormity of it, of finding out that it’s all real, was hard enough. But then it was you. My partner. The guy who leaves cool ranch dust all over my car, and lets my kid paint his face, and refused to leave me while I disarmed a bomb. And it was Marcus, who…”
She exhales a shaky breath. He hates the faint prick of jealousy he feels when she says that name, even if the stupid git is dead and gone and suffering.
“He wasn’t a good man,” she says. “I know that now. But I almost married him, Lucifer. I introduced him to my kid. I planned a life with him. I was going to be his wife. And there he was, dead at your feet, and I didn’t recognize you. It was like…”
She frowns, shaking her head like she isn’t sure how to explain it, and then her frown softens.
“It was like that day I grabbed your coffee instead of mine.”
He can’t help but smile faintly at the memory. “You spit it all over me. Ruined my suit.”
“Because it was more whiskey than coffee,” she says with a faint smile of her own.
“That’s the best way to drink it.”
“For you, maybe. You expected it to taste that way. It was normal for you. But it wasn’t normal for me. I wasn’t expecting it. And then suddenly I had no choice, I was tasting it, and…”
“It burned,” he finishes when she doesn’t.
She nods. “Yeah. But I should’ve…”
She searches his eyes like they hold the words she’s looking for.
“It’s like what happened tonight,” she finally says. “There was a lot going on, but I should’ve remembered that you’re important to me. I should’ve answered your calls or texts, even if it was just to say that I needed some time. Because I did. That day you asked me if I could accept you, I…I just needed some time, Lucifer. You kept this huge thing from me—”
“I told you the truth.”
“Did you, though? If you knew I didn’t believe in any of it, if you knew I needed physical proof because of who I am, then was it really the truth?”
He doesn’t know the answer to that question. Or maybe he does, and he just doesn’t want to say it, because it means admitting that despite saying he doesn’t lie, he lied by omission to the person he cherishes most.
She glances down at the towel she’s still twisting in her fingers.
“I’ve thought about that day a lot. And I don’t think I can be mad at myself for needing time. I’m not ashamed that I was upset, and hurt, and scared, and confused, because I’m human. Feeling all those things is normal when your whole life gets turned upside down.”
She looks up to meet his eyes.
“But I do hold myself responsible for losing sight of you. For losing sight of us, and our partnership, and how many times you showed me exactly who you are, even if I didn’t know the Devil part was real. I lost sight of you, Lucifer. That’s why I listened to Kinley when I shouldn’t have. And for that, I am mad at myself. I’m furious. I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life, because I—”
She stops abruptly. Her eyes widen as if she’s afraid, and there’s no reason to be. He’s still in his human form, and he hasn’t made any sudden movements. She can’t be afraid of him, at least not any more than normal.
“You what?” he prompts.
She presses her lips together and shakes her head. Her eyes are gleaming again. A kinder man would let it go and wouldn’t push. But he’s not a kind man. He’s the Devil.
“You what, Chloe?”
She flinches at her first name, but it isn’t the way she flinched at his Devil form. It’s something different, pain instead of fear, and he doesn’t understand. Why won’t she just say it?
“I love you,” she whispers.
His heart staggers to a stop.
“I have for a while now. I don’t know when, exactly, but at some point I—” Her voice hitches. She licks her lips and shakes her head and then tries again. “I fell in love with you.”
He shakes his head. That can’t be true. It’s not possible. She’s her, and he’s him, and she can’t…she can’t possibly.
“No,” he rasps.
“Yes.” She swipes her hand over the tears that are spilling down her cheeks. “I’m in love with the Devil.”
He gapes at her, stunned.
She ducks her head and swipes at her tears again. His fingers twitch with the urge to do it himself. She takes a step backward, away from him, and the urge fades.
“I know you’re with someone else, and I’m not trying to change that,” she says, looking up. “I don’t expect anything from you. I just want you to know that I do accept you. All of you. And whatever you're willing to give me, I want it. And if that’s nothing at all, if you don’t want to work with me anymore, or if us being friends makes you or Eve uncomfortable, then I accept that, too. I just want you to know that I am so, so sorry. I wish I hadn’t lost sight of you. I hate that I hurt you. And I'm sorry.”
He stares at her, still too shocked to be anything but speechless.
She wipes her cheeks again, and then takes another step back. She sets the towel she used to dry his hands on the counter next to the sink, and then tugs her sleeves down and pulls her hands inside them. For some reason, seeing her fingers disappear inside her sleeves makes his chest ache.
“I should go,” she says quietly. “Good night, Lucifer.”
She brushes past him and heads for the door. He turns to watch her go, still stunned, but then he realizes that once she’s gone, he’ll be left with Eve. And Eve doesn’t want him to keep trying the way the Detective does. Eve wants him to punish.
“Maze found Julian,” he blurts out.
The Detective freezes at the threshold of the door.
“She called me with his location just before you arrived,” he clarifies. “It’s not a sure thing, of course. But I’m willing to bet that’s where he’s hiding.”
A tense beat passes where she still has her back to him. The silence between them is loud and oppressive, and he knows why. She’s wondering why he didn’t tell her that before now. She’s wondering why he didn’t tell her the moment she arrived, so they could go arrest Julian before he hurts someone else.
She finally turns to face him. He can see it written all over her face—she’s put the pieces together and realized that he had no intention of telling her.
“You didn’t tell me you asked Maze to find him,” she says after another beat of silence.
He’s a little surprised that her tone isn’t angry or disappointed. It’s just…mild. Neutral. And it shouldn’t be, because he knows she hates being left out of the loop. He knows she doesn’t like it when he goes behind her back.
But she went behind his back, didn’t she? What she did with Kinley, she—
Apologized. She apologized with tears in her eyes, and she told him she loves him, and he hasn’t forgotten what she said about how telling her the truth isn’t really telling her the truth when he holds things back.
“I didn’t tell you because I know what you’re going to say.”
She lifts her eyebrows.
“You want to arrest him.”
“That’s what we do.”
“It’s not what we do. It’s what you do. You’re a homicide detective and I’m—”
“My partner.”
He blinks in surprise.
“We’re partners, Lucifer. We’ve been arresting killers together for years. There are dozens of murderers behind bars right now because you helped me arrest them. How is this any different?”
“I’m the Devil, Detective.”
“You were the Devil all those other times too. You’ve been the Devil the whole time I’ve known you. Nothing has changed, Lucifer. I’ve changed. I know who you are now. But you haven’t changed.”
He says nothing.
“Right?” she says softly, searching his eyes. “You’re still…?”
“What’s the point of arresting him?” he says instead of answering. “His father will bail him out like he always does. He’ll hire expensive lawyers who twist the facts for the jury, and even if he gets convicted, he’ll spend a few years in a cushy prison before he gets parole and lives out his life in luxury. That’s not enough for me.”
“I know it can be—”
“You know nothing, Detective. You’ve no idea how it feels to—”
“My dad’s killer walked, Lucifer. I know exactly how it feels.”
Guilt washes over him. He’d forgotten about that.
“I know the system isn’t perfect,” she says, her tone still quiet and even. She hasn’t raised her voice at him once even though he knows she must be angry. “I know it can feel like bailing water from a sinking ship. But if we start acting like we’re above the law—”
“I am above the law,” he cuts her off as his temper snaps. “I’m the King of Hell.”
She shakes her head. “We’re not in Hell, Lucifer. This isn’t Hell.”
“But they all come to me eventually, don’t they? Why should I wait? Why can’t I get started now?”
“Because people can change.”
He laughs, sharp and cruel. Hurt flashes in her eyes, and then anger.
“I’m not saying Julian will,” she says. “I’m just saying that people can. Charlotte did, didn’t she? What if you’d punished her before she got the chance to change? She wouldn’t be in Heaven right now.”
“Charlotte is different. She isn’t Julian. He murdered someone in cold blood—”
“He made a choice. And he has to answer for that, both here on earth, and down in Hell. But you have to answer for your choices too, Lucifer. And if you go down this road, if you start taking away people’s right to choose to be better, you’re going to regret it.”
“You know all about regret, don’t you, Detective?”
She recoils as if he’s hit her, and it’s the surprise that flashes across her face that ignites his guilt. It’s not the hurt that follows, or the way she drops her gaze to the floor like she can’t bear to look at him. It’s that even now, even knowing what he is, she’s still somehow surprised when he lashes out and hurts her.
“I’m sorry,” he murmurs. “I didn’t…that wasn’t fair.”
She doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t look at him. He knows she’s trying not to cry and he’s never hated himself quite as much as he does right now. She apologized with the kind of sincerity only she can manage, and he threw it back in her face like a monster.
“What are you going to do about Julian?” she asks quietly.
“Eve thinks I should punish him.”
She snaps her head up. “You talked about this with Eve?”
She doesn’t say instead of me? He hears it, though.
“She says I’m the Devil, and that the Devil punishes bad people. And she’s right. That’s who I am.”
The Detective shakes her head. “That’s not the only thing you are.”
“It’s the most important part of me.”
“No, it’s not.”
“I have a responsibility whether you like it or not, Detective. When I abdicate that responsibility, bad things happen. Look at what happened at the docks.”
“Lucifer—”
“Eve thinks you’re a bad influence on me.”
The Detective gapes at him. “Me?” she says incredulously. “She thinks I’m a bad influence?”
“She said she wants me to be the best version of myself—”
“And she thinks that’s the best version of you? Punishing people however you see fit?”
“What is it, exactly, that you think I do down in Hell? Because it’s not playing bloody fucking Monopoly, I can tell you that much. Bad people are sent to me, and I punish them.”
“You told me it was a job. Something you were forced to do.”
“It was. It is.”
“Then it’s not who you are, is it? It can’t be if you were forced to do it.”
He blinks at her. He hadn’t thought of it like that.
“Look, Lucifer, I know Eve has known you for…”
She trails off with a frown like she’s trying to do the math.
“However long it’s been,” she finally says, fluttering her hand in a way that might make him smile if he didn’t feel so twisted up inside. “But she hasn't been here the last few years. Maybe she doesn't know you anymore.”
“And you think you do?”
“I don’t know. But what I do know is that you can’t define yourself based on something you were forced to do. Punishing people in Hell is something you did, but that doesn’t mean it’s who you are. And it sure as hell doesn’t mean it’s the best version of you. It might be the version of you that she wants—”
“As if you’re any different,” he scoffs. “Or have you forgotten your little volunteering field trip?”
“I haven’t forgotten. I told you, I lost sight of you. I thought…”
She frowns and shakes her head.
“There’s more than one way to do the right thing,” she finally says. “There’s more than one way to be good. I tried to fit you into this stupid little box because I lost sight of that, and I’m sorry. But this isn’t about that, Lucifer. It’s not about me and it’s not about Eve. It doesn’t matter who we think you are. It matters who you decide to be.”
“I don’t know who I am!” he snaps. “I don’t fucking know, all right?”
She doesn’t recoil from his anger the way he expects her to. She just nods.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” he echoes incredulously.
“Okay.” She takes a step backward. “Let me know when you do.”
“Are you joking?” he demands. “That’s all you have to say?”
“I’m not going to tell you who to be, Lucifer. I’m not going to tell you what to do. I just told you that letting people make their own choices matters. I’m not going to turn around and be a hypocrite by trying to force your hand.”
“What about Julian? What if I don’t want to follow your silly little human rules? You’re not going to try to stop me?”
“No.”
“I could torture him,“ he says darkly. “I could make him suffer. And it would be your fault for not stopping me.”
She doesn’t cower. She doesn’t flinch or back away. She just looks him straight in the eye and says, “I have faith you’ll do the right thing.”
“Only a fool would put their faith in the Devil,” he sneers.
She lifts one of her shoulders. “Then I guess I’m a fool.”
He stares at her, stunned.
“Good night, Lucifer,” she murmurs.
And then she’s gone.