Chapter Seventy Lucifer
Chapter Seventy
Lucifer
When Azrael returns from tracking down Charlotte, he prowls down the aisle like a primal beast, pausing only when he reaches one of the first pews. He heaves my brother to his feet by one arm, hauling Belphegor up to the front of the chapel with us and depositing him at the altar beside me.
“What the hell are you doing?” I hiss.
If I’m going to fucking die today, I’m not going to spend my last moments with my siblings.
Mother may have chosen to momentarily lend a hand to our cause, but there is a zero-sum chance a fight won’t break out at the reception.
This room is a lit celestial powder keg, and despite whatever delay of the inevitable Azrael may have buggered out of my Mother, I am still, unfortunately, mortal.
And I am done keeping my siblings in line for all of eternity.
Let them be someone else’s problem now.
“You’ll thank me later,” Azrael grumbles, brushing his hands over the front of my Versace tux as he straightens my jacket for me. He hasn’t stopped grinning since he had his way with me in the garden earlier, and the joy he clearly takes in this is a bit disturbing.
I never expected he’d be this eager to end me.
Though I suppose the lance should’ve been my first clue.
Bel blinks slowly, like he might have pregamed a whole fucking field of cannabis in order to get through this. He’s always hated family gatherings. “Why did you drag me up—”
“Just shut up and stand there,” Azrael growls.
“Did you find her?” I ask, my muscles tightening. A small part of me is furious at the thought that sending him might’ve meant that she enjoyed him without me.
“You may be her primary Dom, but she’s ours now, remember, Lightbringer?” Death claps my shoulder. “Don’t worry, she’s coming.”
Death looks a little too pleased with himself for my comfort, at the moment.
But I suppose I have no choice but to trust him now that he’s finally broken his covenant with my Father. Who else has been beside me since my Fall?
“What were the terms of the deal you made with Father, anyway?” I glance toward him.
Azrael grins. “You’ll find out soon enough.”
But then the music swells, the crowd stands, and I find my bride standing at the start of the aisle, and my heart stops beating.
She’s an absolute picture. Perfection embodied. More angelic than I could ever be.
She’s already my wife. Already mine in every way. But seeing her like this tightens something in my throat.
“It’s okay if you cry, Lightbringer,” Azrael mumbles.
“I don’t bloody cry,” I hiss.
Azrael snorts.
“Not in public, at least,” I grumble.
Charlotte makes her way down the aisle, all our guests watching and the cameras flashing. For a moment, I hope no part of this is tainted for her by the fact that, even if I hadn’t killed him, her father would never have been deserving of handing her away to me.
I am the only one she calls Daddy now.
Azrael will need a different honorific, honestly.
She belongs to me.
Has given me her heart.
Even when I didn’t deserve it.
Even when I manipulated her for my own means.
The trust she’s placed in me will be what humbles me for the rest of my days.
When Charlotte reaches my side, she passes her bouquet to my sister, who quickly exchanges it with Azmodeus, who’s sitting in the front row, in favor of a large rucksack I’ve just now noticed he’s holding. A bit of crimson pools at the bottom.
My brother just looks down at the bouquet, smirking, like he finds all of this an epic waste when we could skip the whole romance and go straight to the shagging.
I might have once agreed with him, but I’m still furious from how he fucked Charlotte and me over, and after I allowed him to touch her no less, so I glance down at the bouquet pointedly, my tone mocking.
“You think love has brought me low?” I chuckle darkly, the hellfire in my eyes blazing. “You’re next, brother,” I hiss.
Lust pales a little.
I turn toward my bride, taking her hands in mine as the priest begins to chant in Latin. Angelic wasn’t exactly an option, unfortunately.
“Lucifer,” Charlotte whispers, the words spilling out of her when I lift her veil, her eyes fierce with something she can’t hold back.
I don’t typically stand on ceremony, but she seems completely unaware of all the guests and cameras watching us.
“Yes, darling?” I mutter through my teeth.
“There’s something I need to tell you.” She grips my hands.
“Whatever it is, little dove, I think it can wait until—”
“I’m pregnant, sir.”
The words come out a little louder than she intended, and a hushed whisper tears through the crowd.
But I can’t possibly have heard her correctly.
I glance over my shoulder at Azrael, eyes narrowed, but Charlotte pulls my attention back to her.
“I’m pregnant,” she repeats, reading the confusion in my expression easily. “And it’s yours, not Azrael’s,” she adds. “I’m certain.”
I stand there, feeling frozen and lightheaded.
And then what she said connects, and without warning, I drop to my knees in front of her, pulling her to me and kissing her belly. Over and over again. Where my child is . . .
“You perfect, perfect girl,” I worship her. “Look what you’ve given me.”
My heart races, a tingling sensation starting at my chest and expanding outward so fast I can hardly wrap my head around it.
When I stagger to my feet a moment later, I pull her into my arms, kissing her for all she’s worth—which is everything—everything I own, my billions, my power, all of it.
She can take all of it for all I care.
Once we resurface, the chapel is so quiet I could hear a pin drop, and even the priest has stopped chanting.
I look out over our myriad of guests, scowling. “Oh, don’t look so bloody shocked. No bride of mine was ever going to be a virgin.”
“I don’t think that’s what they’re shocked about, Lucifer,” Charlotte mutters, her eyes darting to the crowd.
My brother and several of my angelic siblings now stand, their weapons drawn, their wings spread, and that’s when I realize that I’m going to be a . . .
A father.
I’m going to be a father.
Like Him.
And yet I have no idea how to be . . .
My gaze shoots to Azrael as I sway slightly, a bit of color draining from my face. “Azrael,” I mutter desperately.
Death grips me by the shoulder, steadying me.
As he always has.
“I’ve got you, Lightbringer.” He smiles, wide and knowing. “You had it all along. I was just waiting for you to see.”
All this time, he’s been . . .
I turn toward him and grab him by both sides of his face, kissing him in front of the crowd. A shocked gasp tears from all the humans and media present as the cameras begin flashing. But Charlotte’s adorable squeal of delight is all that matters to me.
This moment will be plastered all over the world within minutes, across every newsstand and digital screen, but I don’t fucking care.
Let humanity see what they both mean to me.
Charlotte grabs my hand, squeezing it in approval, and I pull back, my heart swelling over how she’s beaming from ear to ear. She saw this coming all along, didn’t she?
I don’t know how I never recognized it before.
But redemption, I realize, feels a lot like the moment she first told me she loved me.
The moment she set me free.
The sound of a blade drawn from its sheath echoes from the other side of the chapel as my brother draws the Holy Lance, stepping forth as the humans amongst the crowd begin to scream and flee.
My Mother watches from the back of the crowd, a slow grin spreading, like she intends for us to have a proper row, and I realize with a start what her true endgame must be.
But I have no intention of being a god.
I prefer being the villain He made me.
I throw back my head and laugh wickedly, casting out my arms wide. “Guess who’s back, Mikey?” I chuckle fiendishly, before I glance toward Azrael. “Right then. Shall we?”
Abruptly, I slam my fist into the ground, the few human guests left shrieking as I use the whole of my angelic strength to tear open a fissure all the way down to my realm beneath. Prophet be damned. I’ll fucking break the rules like I always have.
Azrael has hold of the nun’s soul in a second, promptly stuffing it into the body of a fresh corpse that one of his other versions has just procured. The nun sputters back to life, and the remaining crowd gasps.
“Welcome back, Ms. Santiago. Now if you don’t mind, once I’m through with you, you may want to make yourself scarce quickly.
” I crook two fingers in a slow, deliberate beckon, as if I were drawing a thread from her spine, a smirk playing at the corner of my mouth.
“I believe there’s something of mine you’ve been keeping. ”
She coughs, sputtering for air, and a cloud of black smoke-like shadows pour from inside her. Within seconds, my hellish power rushes to me like a force. The nun collapses to the floor, passing out, and then I am whole again.
I would never give up my sins because my Father forgives me.
He can fuck right off if He expects that.
I glance at Azrael, at Charlotte, pressing my hand protectively over her womb as I sweep her behind me—I don’t know how I didn’t recognize it before; she’s glowing—and then back to the lance in my brother’s hand.
I’ll be damned if I allow something as trivial as that blood-soaked blade to best me.
It’s time to play.
“I may be redeemed now, but make no mistake, brother.” Hellfire coils beneath my skin, erupting across the chapel floor, ready to strike. “I will always be the villain in your story.”