Chapter 24
I tucked all of the information I'd learned about Callen into the evidence box sitting atop my coffee table. After years of hiding, I felt like I was finally ready to face the demons of my past.
“That that's ironic as fuck huh?” I said aloud to Jesus who was perched on the couch, staring at me. “It's almost like I was always destined for hell.”
“Are you just now figuring that out?" I mocked in my best Jesus impression. He sounded like a real dick.
“Oh shut up, your holiness. We can't all be as omnipotent as you.” He answered with an annoyed growl, and it made me smile.
“Are you sure you don't want to join me for my stake out?
It's going to be fun,” I said in a singsong manner.
Jesus stood, stretched, and turned to face the wall where he promptly curled back into a ball of furry hatred. “Oh come on. I'm bringing snacks!”
“Fuck all the way off,” I answered for him. Is that really what he'd say? I've never actually known, but my educated guess was a solid one.
As I sat with Barb, scrolling through Callen's life for hours, it solidified my need to trust my instincts.
Any outsider looking in would consider him a standup citizen.
He was a wealthy businessman with a family.
He hosted company parties, donated to several charities, volunteered at homeless shelters…
The only thing the man didn't have was a goddamn key to the city.
I knew what the newspapers didn't though.
I knew what he was capable of. What lengths he was willing to go for entertainment. I've witnessed firsthand the obsidian film that blanketed his eyes when he held someone's life in his hands.
Callen got off on playing God.
He was about to learn that the one thing more powerful than the Almighty was Satan's scorned mistress.
After all stakeout essentials were packed, I said my goodbyes to Jesus and ran out the door. The blackout car I picked up from the rental company earlier today was parked on the curb and, just as I intended, was blending perfectly with the falling night.
I sank into the driver seat and pulled out my phone. Barb had been so kind as to help me locate Callen’s phone after we finished recon, hacked into his GPS, and gave me full access.
“Let's see what you're up to tonight asshole,” I mused while opening the app and searching for the blue indicator dot. “Bingo.”
He was in the city, and he was on the move. Adrenaline pricked at my ears.
I waited for about 15 minutes before pulling away from my apartment complex and heading in his general direction.
He hadn't stopped yet, but I had a pretty good idea where he was going: the shipping ports. No one drives that side of St. Louis in the middle of the night unless they’re up to no good, and import shipping containers was a bad sign.
The drive over was fast, my thoughts racing just as fast as the car.
Tonight could very well be the night I killed Callen.
I pulled over on a darkened street and shut off my headlights.
He parked his black SUV in the shadows by a row of containers.
He didn’t get out, though. Just sat in idle. The suspense made my palms sweat.
Good thing I packed wine.
I’d been sitting for approximately twenty minutes staring at Callen’s car when–
“You reek of rotten grapes.”
“Christ in a corset!” I jumped, choking on the half swallowed liquid and lashing out with the bottle. Lucifer swatted it away like a fruit fly. “What in the seven hells are you doing in my passenger seat?” The alcohol burned my throat and nose, making my voice a raspy whine.
“Contrary to your myths, I can assure you there is only one hell, levels or otherwise.”
“Gee,” I coughed, “thanks for the clarification.”
“You’re welcome.”
I glared at him, ready to assault his self-righteous ass for the sarcasm, but stopped when it became blatantly obvious he was sincere.
“Un-fucking-believable.”
“Why are you parked on the road in the middle of the night?” he asked.
I put the car into drive and pulled out onto the road, turning the direction Callen went and keeping a fair distance away.
“Jesus and I are taking a break. I let him keep the house in the separation.”
“You can keep your trashy apartment. The feline will come with me.”
Mouth gaping and completely stunned, I glanced over and said, “Are you seriously choosing the cat over me in the divorce?”
I'm not sure what I expected from him, but it definitely wasn't a smile.
One corner of Lucifer's lips turned up, those mismatched eyes staring out the windshield and I was in total fucking awe.
Goddamn, sin was truly captivating.
I cleared my throat and focused on the road ahead. We were getting close to the loading docks.
“Are you going to answer my question,” he asked.
“Uhhh…” I swallowed and scrambled for composure that was completely lost. “You’ll have to remind me what it was.”
“Why, Dany, were you parked on the road in the middle of the night?”
“Oh, well,” I fumbled over my words, but made for a quick recovery.
“This really annoying asshole that I know was concerned about my safety, and so he recommended that I get to know my date better. He also told me I have fourty-eight hours to get my shit together or he’d make me drink off brand Coke for eternity, which would be unimaginable torture. ”
“Since when do you listen to me?”
“Who said you were the annoying asshole?”
“Come now, dearest,” he said, lips thinning alongside his patience. Or, maybe it wasn’t impatience at all. Maybe… he was hiding another smile?
Rather than humoring his pompous ass, I threw my car into park and reached for my bag in the back. Like everything else in my life, it was more difficult than I expected. Apparently I drive like a maniac because the bag was nowhere to be found.
“Sweet sin of Sodom," I grumbled, pushing my feet against the floorboard to help me stretch further. The cold feel of leather prickled my skin where the hem of my crop-top was hanging on for dear life. “Where the f–”
Warmth trailed the underside of my breast and I stopped dead. My eyes closed of their own volition, breath frozen in my lungs.
“Luci,” I whispered. “What are you doing?”
He took his time, fingers moving in a slow and deliberate arc as if he were relishing every inch of skin. When his middle finger rested on my sternum, Lucifer cupped the bottom and traced a slow line over the side with his thumb.
“Luci,” I tried again.
“I’ve been wondering what this might feel like,” he mused, voice a soothing bass that whispered across my mind just as his fingers did my body. “Whether or not your skin would rise under my touch, or that your breath may catch.”
All cylinders were firing in my brain, but not a damn one would catch and burn.
What in the bible loving fuck was happening?
“What’s the matter, dearest Dany? Has Jesus stolen your tongue?”
“I…”
“That would be a shame,” he hummed. “I can think of many more useful places for your tongue. Would you like to know?” Lucifer’s thumb grazed the peak of my nipple.
“Fuck,” I groaned.
His hand began a painfully slow trek down the center of my stomach before stopping at the waistline of my pants.
The last time we were in this position, he’d fucked me raw and left my world turned upside down. My knees buckled onto the driver seat, forcing all of my weight forward to rest on the side of his seat. Every sense dimmed compared to the electricity of his touch and the cool command in his voice.
“It’s fascinating to see how quickly you fumble when the tables are turned. How eager you are to lose control when someone offers to take it.” He toyed with the waistband of my sweats, his fingers almost hesitant like he was asking to take the wheel.
“This isn’t me losing control,” I ground out, his words stoking the defiance that always lived under the surface. “Do you want to know what I think?”
“Please,” he purred. “Enlighten me.”
“I think,” I panted, mouth watering, biting my bottom lip to stifle the moan building with every radiating throb between my legs. “That this is you losing control, Luci.”
“Oh?” His tone was that of mock amusement, but it didn’t fool me. I caught the millisecond of hesitancy and used it against him.
I grabbed the hand lingering at my waist and pulled it between my legs, forcing Lucifer to cup me over the fabric.
His body went preternaturally still, eyes flaring to life in a picturesque vision of power.
“I think you’ve wanted me since the beginning,” I growled and leaned in until we were nose to nose. “Watching from the shadows like a man who longs for what he can’t have. And then he finally gets a taste…” I pushed his palm into my clit, threw my head back and moaned.
A fine, trembling power began pulsing between us. It started under my skin, both reaching for Lucifer and fighting to resist his call. God’s most beautiful angel was a fucking drug that would bring me to ruin if I wasn’t careful.
I wondered if he knew it.
“Dany,” Lucifer warned.
The smell of burning embers enveloped my senses.
“Are you losing control again, Luci?” I questioned.
“The last time I lost control, angels fell from the heavens. I can assure you," he growled, "this is not me losing control.” Lucifer slid his hand from my hold and sat squarely in his seat, looking out the windshield rather than at me.
“Oh, well then," I cleared my throat. “I'm glad we got that out of the way. Wouldn't have wanted this to be awkward. Because I was sure there for a moment that you totally wanted to fuck me.”
Because I definitely wanted to fuck him again.
As if he could read my thoughts, Lucifer huffed a small laugh and said, “When I decide to fuck you, Dany, there will be no sliver of doubt who’s making you come.” He turned that piercing stare toward me and pinned me to my seat with it. “Ever.”
He took that moment to throw my long forgotten snack bag on my lap.
Heat crawled up my neck and consumed the air surrounding us.
I hated how hard he made me stumble, and I was getting pretty fucking tired of it by this point. Time to grab this hell horse by the reins.
“Lucifer Hark-the-Harold Christ,” I gasped with an exaggerated clutch of pearls. “Since when on God’s green one do you speak such filth? A classy gentleman such as yourself should be ashamed.”
The tremble in my hands was beginning to fade, which made it easier to dig around in the bag for my snacks.
“Where was my bag?” I asked. “Were you holding it the whole time?”
“It was on the floor, Dany,” he said with a full on eye roll.
“Well this could have gone so much differently if I’d known it was between your legs.”
“You never asked.” I laid out all of my packed snackies buffet style on the dash. “What are you doing?”
“Here.” That was all the warning I gave before dumping my drink options out onto his lap.
He grumbled an obscure curse like I’d handed him roadkill with sloughing fur.
“Oh, calm down,” I scoffed, grabbing the small pair of binoculars from a side pocket and tossing the empty bag over his shoulder. “Don’t be so prissy.”
“What is all of this?”
“Ughhh,” I groaned with my standard flair of sarcasm.
“If I have to tell you one more time that this is a stakeout, you’re uninvited.
Snacks,” I gestured toward the plastic baggies lining the dash.
“Drinks, and binoculars. Essentials. I see that you didn’t come prepared.
Don’t worry. I’ve never been afraid of sharing,” I teased with a wink and regretted it immediately.
Hellfire glowed in his one green iris. It was an effort to keep my mind from drifting to that night on the hood of Joe’s car.
I could tell by his face that Lucifer was not a man who shared.
“That night,” I whispered, my tongue darting out to wet my bone-dry lips.
“Was it you?” The muscle jumping by his clenched jaw was answer enough.
But– “How? What did you do to him?” Joe had been there.
When we were finished, he stood panting behind me and I could feel a wetness that wasn’t mine slick my thighs.
“If there is one thing you can be certain of, dearest Dany, it’s that I do not share.”
I don’t know what prompted my next words. Fear? Genuine curiosity? Sick pleasure?
“Is this one of those ‘you’d rather see me dead than share with a filthy mortal’ moments?
“Of course not,” he answered in what sounded suspiciously like disappointment. “Do you think me a monster?”
“Aren’t you the devil-damn definition?”
“What more is a definition than an opinion assigned to a word?”
His words dragged a laugh deep from my belly, and I couldn’t keep from giving him a good ole southern slap on the shoulder as I rocked back and forth.
It could have been my mind playing tricks, but I could have sworn I felt a deep, rumbling vibration coming from beside me.
“Okay,” I wheezed, patting my chest in an attempt to calm down. “Fuck me. Jesus is really missing out.”
With a face straighter than a line, Lucifer asked, “My nephew or your cat?”
“I didn't know you could do that,” I teased, eyes stinging with stray tears.
“I don’t know to what you refer, Dany, but never forget that I am capable of anything.”
“Except having a father’s love, of course.”
It was out before I could stop it.
Time slowed alongside my heart, and the end of immortality felt like it was a bullet flying down the barrel.
“Luci, I–”
“I don’t know what hurts more,” he started. “Having my biggest failure thrown in my face…” his head cocked to the side, studying me as the words drifted. “Or being made fun of by a stripper for having daddy issues.”
My ugly cackle rang through the car cabin like Santa’s fucking bells through the night sky. It was delicious and bubbly, fueled by nothing except this moment living between us. I watched his smile spread until two rows of perfect teeth stood out against the night.
“You know for a second there I thought you were going to kill me.”
“I’ve considered doing many things to you, Dany, but death has yet to be one of them.”
“Lucifer David MorningStar, are you flirting with me?”
Before I could get an answer, a chorus of car doors sounded off in the distance. Three other vehicles had arrived. Callen and the new arrivals stood huddled in conversation, but it was too dark to make out faces.
My stomach felt sick all of a sudden.
There he was. The cause of every deplorable thing in my life was standing less than two hundred yards away.