XXI
Lucky returned to his penthouse just in time to clock back in for work.
He’d knocked out a huge amount of files in the quiet sanctuary of his office until his body hit its breaking point.
The coffee he’d gotten at around three in the morning hadn’t helped.
He hadn’t slept in several days, but the thought of going home sounded miserable with Charlie in his bed, so he worked until he’d thrown up and called it quits.
Thankfully, the tired human was still sound asleep, so Lucky went to his sofa, turned on the fireplace and curled up under a quilt.
The cold feeling that everyone had been mentioning had started to register, he was shivering and his leg ached from the self-inflicted wound that he had yet to tend to.
Tired and bleary, his eyes moved to the balcony and he watched a heavy storm roll in.
Another influx of souls must have arrived to cause such a thick wall of blood droplets to come in.
The sound of the rain hitting the balcony and windows lulled him to sleep.
Before he drifted off, though, he grabbed his phone and searched through his messages. He found Lucius’ name and sent a text.
After a few seconds, a response arrived.
Another beat of silence followed before Lucius continued.
Lucky blinked a few times and turned his phone on silent before he set it on the coffee table.
He’d been ignoring Gabe and Bub all night, he couldn’t handle it right now.
The throbbing in his head had only increased and he’d needed to shut it all down and focus on his work.
He pulled the blanket over his face and let his eyes finally close.
A rainy morning nap sounded so nice. At least until Charlie woke up and asked to go to the office.
Of course he’d say yes, because Charlie would ask so sweetly, and it was impossible to say no to him.
The prince’s sticky eyes opened. The scent of meat and spices filled his pierced nostrils. He groggily pushed himself up on weak arms, scanning the large, open floor plan with bleary vision. He saw Charlie in the kitchen, humming a hymn as grease popped on the skillet in his hand.
“Charlie?” Lucky mumbled.
“Mr. Lucky! I was worried, it’s so late and you’re usually such an early riser,” Charlie said with a smile. “I have coffee brewing.”
“Are you cooking?”
“Yes, I was a little hungry, and I’d feel awful making someone deliver food in this terrifying weather,” Charlie mused. “You need groceries.”
Lucky smiled. He rubbed his eyes and rose from the sofa, walking over with sluggish motions.
He saw that Charlie was, once again, in one of his expensive shirts.
It was a t-shirt, oversized and blood red in color that made the pinkish hue of the priest’s lips and cheeks and eyelids stand out.
His curly golden hair was damp and smelled like Lucky’s shampoo.
His legs were bare, knees all knobby and ankles so sexy.
Those freckled shoulders poked out as the collar of the shirt slipped.
Charlie looked at him with a soft grin as the prince approached. It faded when he seemingly saw the wound on Lucky’s leg. Lucky had fallen asleep in his burnt slacks and whiskey-stained shirt.
“What happened?” Charlie gasped.
Lucky looked down. He twisted his leg to look at the damage in the light. “I think I had a panic attack. Sometimes my tail has a mind of its own.”
“It looks painful.”
“Yeah, I need to go treat it and change into clothes that aren’t burnt to a crisp. I’ve ruined so many outfits this week…” Lucky sighed. “Thank you for making breakfast.”
“It’s actually dinnertime but I felt a tad naughty.”
Lucky smiled a soft, gentle smile. He didn’t even have a quippy response to offer, he was simply so endeared by the human that he wanted to savor it while he could.
Before he left to shower, he pushed Charlie’s slipped glasses up and tucked that stupid loose curl away from his eyes again before he excused himself to bathe.
He stepped onto the elevated back side of the penthouse where his bed sat, then walked into the bathroom and turned the shower on as hot as it would go to try and compensate for the dip in his internal temperature.
It seemed the only time that he felt warm was in Charlie’s presence.
Any time he so much as left the room he started to feel like he was shriveling up inside, and he had no clue how to fix it.
He didn’t want to think about what would happen to him when Charlie left.
Charlie had to leave, though.
He unbuttoned his shirt and dropped it into the laundry basket, then whipped his belt out of the loops as the steam started to fill the bathroom. He popped the button on his ruined slacks but stopped when he heard Charlie’s footsteps approaching.
“Sorry,” Charlie said as he peered inside. He saw Lucky standing there shirtless and turned beet red before he slapped his hands over his eyes.
Lucky chuckled. “What’s up?”
“I was, um—” Charlie split his fingers for a second to look before he clamped them shut again— “I forgot to ask if you wanted anything in your coffee.”
“Yes, there’s a bottle of cinnamon creamer I use. Th-thank you.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You don’t have to call me sir.”
Charlie smiled, it was the only part of his face that was visible with his hands covering his eyes and nose. “It’s only right. You’re my boss, Mr. Lucky.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, Chuck, we’re not in the office,” Lucky teased. He walked forward, approaching with a slow pace. “No misters or sirs to be found.”
“Speaking so informally feels odd. I’m not sure if it’s right for me to be this friendly with the devil.”
That sentence hurt. Lucky didn’t like it, and his ego took over.
He set his finger under Charlie’s chin and nudged his head up with a gentle force, urging the human to turn his way.
The steam had grown heavy, and warmth bloomed in his chest as Charlie’s skull tilted so freely under his will.
The priest’s plush pink lips parted, and there was a somewhat playful, possibly desperate, angle to it.
The wiggle of his body left Lucky yearning for more.
He knew he needed to stop, but he didn’t want to.
“That hurts my feelings,” Lucky teased.
“I didn’t know you had those,” Charlie replied.
“Oh, that snark is something else. What am I going to do with you?”
Charlie split his fingers again. He blinked slowly, icy blue eyes eclipsed behind dilated pupils as he studied, stared, gawked, and ogled.
Lucky loved it. He watched as Charlie’s gaze drifted from his pecs to his chiseled abs, stopping briefly at his well-groomed happy trail of pitch black hair that disappeared under that unbuttoned waistband, before flicking back up without restraint.
“You have so many abs,” Charlie mumbled. He bit his lip.
“I worked hard for them,” Lucky said coolly, even though he was eating it up.
“I… uh, oh! The bacon!”
Charlie scrambled away. The scent of burning meat hit Lucky’s nostrils and he snapped himself back to reality.
He watched Charlie walk back to the kitchen with a soft smile before he shut the door to go handle his raging boner before settling in for a nice meal with the man he was falling in love with.
For once, he didn’t think he minded a quick solo session, and he let himself believe he could let his ego go and think of Charlie’s smiling face while he did it.
For a second or two. He was a devil, after all.
Being a little bad couldn’t hurt anyone… right?