Chapter 40
Lionel
At least the bakery wasn’t too crowded, and there was no line at the counter behind us, so no one was watching the Devil buying a drink for me. It wasn’t my fault. I had money that I’d worked to earn. I could buy coffee.
“I must’ve dropped my wallet, okay?” I said to the smug Devil standing next to me, so pleased with himself that it radiated from him like searing heat off desert sand. The barista was noticing too. Either that, or she was wondering why I had no money on me.
“Trony checks the pockets before she does laundry. Your things are probably in the kitchen.”
“Ugh, fuck.”
“Soon,” he purr-whispered.
I turned my head and narrowed my eyes at him.
I opened my mouth to tell him where he could shove that, but then I realized he already had.
Shoved. And from a certain viewpoint, there had been some fucking already, or at least some penetration.
Even as I thought it, my muscles tightened involuntarily around the godsdamned butt plug again.
Lucifer’s eyes twinkled, and he smiled like the horny, horny ass he was. “Is everything all right, Nelly?”
I glanced around to make sure no one was going to overhear. “Fuck you, Lucy.”
There was that rolling, rumbling Devil noise again. “Babe. You’ll know better soon. The other way around, always.”
The barista saved me from dispensing another “fuck you” in his general direction by putting a nice large coffee in front of me.
“There you go.” She had nothing but a lukewarm nod for me, but a big old smile for the Devil at my side.
She could have him for all I cared. And his magic plug too.
“Yeah, thanks,” I said, sounding like the kind of grumpy customer who made nice people want to quit the service industry.
Lucy put an arm around me just as my hand closed around the paper cup. “Thank you so much. Nelly has it bad when it comes to coffee.”
She chuckled. “Oh, I know the type.”
The fuck? Were they flirting? With me right there? The nerve. Then again, who cared? I had coffee, and the coffee was so, so good. The first sip alone calmed me by miles.
“Oh, my Nelly is a type all his own.” Lucifer stroked my shoulder with his thumb. I tried to shrug his hand off.
The barista looked at me, clearly unimpressed. “The things we will endure for love.”
That did it. The coffee was not good enough to distract me from the dark turns this conversation was taking.
“Right. Gotta go. Bye.”
Getting out from under Lucifer’s muscly arm was a small feat, but fueled by strong arabica, I made it, leaving the bakery and the nosy, nosy barista behind. Sadly, a fluffy-haired shadow soon appeared at my side, and the clicking of claws on the pavement let me know Soul wasn’t too far away either.
“In a hurry, babe?”
“Five minutes. Can I just have five minutes to enjoy this coffee I will fully reimburse you for?”
“Hmmm. Reimburse. Fancy word, that.”
I shot him a look. I couldn’t wait for this to be over, for him to get fed up with me and move on to the next willing flower like the immortal butterfly he was.
“You’ll get your coffee money back, Lucy, so let me at least have this one in peace.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Whatever you say, Nelly.”
It was entirely possible he had an internal timer, but regardless, he was shutting up for the time being.
I walked around Chymical Street aimlessly, slowing to the pace of the tourists and the few locals around me as I finished my coffee.
At least this way, the friction in my ass was reduced, and I could almost imagine I was just out for a stroll by my lonesome.
Except whenever someone stared in my general direction, clearly looking at the person next to me, I was uncomfortably reminded that I wasn’t alone.
Lucifer stuck to my side like an unshakable hellish glob of person-shaped glue with pretty baby cat hair and dazzling blue eyes.
“You seem so pensive, Nelly,” he said after about five minutes. Soul barked in agreement from my other side. Yeah, the Devil and the cursed poodle had ganged up on me, because that was my life.
“Just…hungover.”
That was only half a lie. The aspirin was wearing off, and so was the coffee. I also had no idea where else I should go to find out more about Lily. And the other victims, possibly.
Joanne Frazer had been on the smith’s customer list, and I had to make sure Christine found that bit of information. Likely as not, the talisman we’d found was the one she’d ordered from there.
All that really told me was that she didn’t buy her talismans online though. That made sense seeing as when there was a good smith in the community, most magic users would stick with them. And so far, I’d not seen another smith’s shop, but I’d have to check to confirm that.
The flip side of that was that Lily hadn’t appeared on the smith’s list, so…she’d gotten her nice pen talisman online? Or maybe whoever had taken and murdered her hadn’t picked her out as a magic user through watching the smith.
The result of my efforts then was that I had some sort of a clue that Lily had been seeing someone, or at least going on a date, and Joanne Frazer had bought her coin from the smith Lucifer had so selflessly whammied with his magic.
What would help me would be figuring out who Lily had been going on a date with, but I simply didn’t know who she knew.
I couldn’t very well ask around randomly, and if I tried snooping around in her office or her place, there was always a chance I would really mess up the investigation, possibly a conviction, and I really didn’t want that.
I sighed, wishing I were half as good at all the detective work as Christine was, wishing I were still on the case.
“Babe, are you tired? I should take you home.” Lucifer ushered in the inevitable fate I had been trying to put off.
I took a deep breath, and of course, with him so close, there was no way to ignore that scent of his.
Resigning myself, I finished the last of my coffee and tossed the cup in the trash.
“Guess I should pay you back for that coffee after all.” I looked off to the side at the doors of offices and shops, not really seeing anything.
Lucifer pulled me to a stop by the arm and turned me to face him. He gripped my chin and forced me to look at him. His skin was hot against mine, and the damn touch made my heart skip a beat.
“Hot and bothered, aren’t you? Don’t think I didn’t notice how hard you got when I touched you earlier, my sweet little virgin-in-spirit.”
“I’m not—” Before I could finish, he’d pressed my lips shut with his finger.
I found myself staring up at him after all, which was a mistake.
He was just too beautiful, too good to be true, and that damn, knowing smile of his…
Oh, I wanted to wipe that off his face with my fist, but I’d probably only break my wrist.
“So contrary at every turn. I think you’ll enjoy it when I make you come over and over until I finish inside you.
” He ran his finger from my top lip to my bottom lip.
“And don’t worry, I’m bigger than what’s currently filling you, so it will be memorable.
You’ll feel me deep inside you, filling you to the brim, Nelly. ”
For a moment, I didn’t know what to say, and Lucifer used that opening to reach for my hand and drag me with him back to where he’d parked Metatron’s car.
The other pedestrians seemed to simply move out of our way, and I wondered whether that was because Lucifer was an immortal or because he was this gorgeous piece of man.
Either way, we were back at the car in no time, and the Devil once more held the door for me.
“I’m not contrary,” I told him as I gingerly got in.
“No? But you are getting hard again, and you cannot argue facts.” His eyes went to my pants.
Oh, screw him. Just once. And then, my life could finally, finally go back to normal.