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The second Chloe steps out of the elevator, sweaty and exhausted after the longest day ever, she’s met with Lucifer’s big grin and a blindfold.
“No,” she says immediately.
“You don’t even know what I want to show you yet!” He walks towards her. “It’s a surprise.”
Chloe glances at the blindfold in his hand. It’s scarlet red. Silky. “I’ll take a good guess and say it’s a weird sex thing.”
He stops in front of her. “It’s not, actually. Unless…” He gives her a once over, his lips sliding up into a smirk. “Would you like it to be?”
Chloe raises an eyebrow at him.
“Right.” He clears his throat. “Believe it or not, it has nothing to do with sex or any other sordid activities. I just wanted to surprise you with… well, you’ll see.”
Chloe narrows her eyes at him.
“You’ll like it,” he promises. “Or at least I think so.” A small, almost nervous smile touches his lips, and suddenly Chloe knows it’s not something silly or weird, because Lucifer might be both, but he is never nervous. At least not in the few weeks she’s known him.
“Okay.” she says, shifting from one foot to the other, still a bit wary.
Lucifer grins. “Lovely.” He holds up the blindfold in front of her eyes.
Chloe quickly leans away. “I’m not wearing that.”
He frowns, confused. As if he doesn’t understand why she wouldn’t want to wear something that’s probably been used on several of his lovers.
“Very well.” He folds the silk together and puts it in his pocket. Stepping behind her, he holds up his hands a few inches from her eyes. “Allow me then?”
She could just close her eyes, but there’s something about the way he asks her and his nervous smile the moment before that makes her say, “Fine.”
He covers her eyes with his large, surprisingly warm hands.
“This way,” he says, a smile in his voice, and guides her towards the left of the living room until they’re by the—
“Stairs,” he warns.
Chloe takes a careful step down, realising they’re on their way down to the extra room in the penthouse—a room she actually hasn’t really been in yet. She doesn’t even know what’s in there. Lucifer doesn't seem to use it.
She almost trips on the way down and instinctively grabs Lucifer’s forearm to steady herself. It reminds her of the night they met, and he must be thinking the same thing because with a smirk she can almost hear, he says, “Please mind the cufflinks.”
Chloe presses her lips together to keep in a chuckle and continues, carefully, down the stairs. Despite herself, her heart beats a little faster with curiosity.
“And the last step,” Lucifer announces. They stop at the foot of the stairs. Slowly, Lucifer removes his hands from her eyes.
The first thing Chloe notices is a treadmill.
It faces the big panorama windows framing the city skyline, all shiny and new. Obviously expensive.
She’s about to look up at Lucifer and ask him about it, but then she notices something else. A closet—tall, sleek and classic where it stands against the wall. A narrow bookshelf that matches in style. A wooden nightstand with a small lamp and a scented candle on top of it.
A bed.
Chloe slowly takes her eyes off of it and looks up at Lucifer.
He smiles softly. “I thought you might like your own room.”
She takes in the room again. It’s been a week since he asked her if she’d like to stay. A week since she said yes. Nothing has really changed since then; she’s been sleeping on the couch like all the other nights since she first came here. When he’d offered her to move in officially and she’d accepted, she hadn’t even taken into account that she didn’t have a room—that all she had was the couch to sleep on—which, to be honest, scares her a little. She always thinks things through before she makes a decision. She rarely does something impulsive. It’s not in her nature.
Perhaps her roommate is already rubbing off on her. Or maybe he’s just a little more charming than she’d like to admit.
Either way, she could have ended up living in a penthouse with him without a room or a bed.
But… there is a room, and it has a bed.
She takes a few steps closer to it.
It’s a queen size, not ridiculously huge like his Alaskan king size (seriously, how many people does he need to fit in there?), and the sheets aren’t silky gold and decadent. They’re off-white and made of cotton, probably Egyptian cotton, because she can’t imagine him buying anything less, not even when it’s not for himself. They look nice and soft. Comfortable. She can’t wait to sleep underneath them tonight. And every night after that, because this is where she lives now.
For the first time, as she looks around the room—her room—it really dawns on her.
She lives here now.
“You don’t have to keep any of the furniture if you don’t want to,” Lucifer tells her from behind her, bringing her out of her thoughts. “You can furnish and decorate it however you like, of course. I just thought it was a bit rude to leave you with nothing but four walls.”
Chloe smiles. She likes what he’s picked out, actually. It’s not something she would have bought herself—mostly because she’d just have gotten nearly all of it from IKEA—but it fits her style nonetheless. Simple, classic, a bit rustic with the wooden nightstand. It’ll go nicely with the coffee table she’s inherited from her grandma and her light couch. Her monstera would look good in the corner. And she could put a desk next to the…
The bookcase isn’t empty. Curious, she wanders over to it.
“Shoplifting for Dummies?” She holds up the book and looks at Lucifer with a raised eyebrow.
He gives her a pleased smile. “Well, the best way to catch criminals is to get inside their minds, Detective.”
Chloe snorts and shakes her head, putting the book back on the shelf. The title next to it reads “Sex positions that will change your life”. She doesn’t even comment on that, she just rolls her eyes. The next one makes her quirk a brow.
“The Bible?” she asks.
Lucifer grins. “Yes, well, it’s comically inaccurate, but I thought you may like to brush up on how to save your soul now that you’re living with the Devil.”
Chloe can’t help but laugh. “Right, thank you,” she plays along. She lets her finger travel to the next spine. Crime and Punishment. Unlike the others, it looks old. A bit worn.
“It’s the first edition,” Lucifer tells her. “I thought you might find it interesting.”
Chloe smiles at him. She wonders if he’s read it, if it was his before he gave it to her. Where he got it from. If she didn’t know better, it could easily pass as an original copy from the late 19th century. But it can’t be. Why would he have that? Although… he does have quite the collection of antique books from the looks of his bookshelves.
It’s one of the many mysteries about him.
She goes over to the treadmill by the windows. For an exercise machine, it’s actually not ugly. In fact, it almost suits the room somehow, sleek and elegant.
“Consider it a housewarming gift,” Lucifer says before she can question it. “So you might be able to actually catch the bad guys and not sound like Darth Vader with asthma.”
Chloe snorts and bites her lip. “Well, thank you,” she says. “We do have treadmills in the gym at the academy, you know?” she can’t help but point out.
He walks closer to her, the hardwood floors barely making a sound under his shoes. “Yes, but you keep complaining about those—”
She mentioned one of them wasn’t that good once.
“—and besides, I doubt they have this view.”
He gestures towards the windows. The LA sunset has painted the city gold against the pastel-coloured sky, the clouds hanging like cotton candy over the skyscrapers.
“No, that’s true,” Chloe agrees. “The view doesn’t hurt.”
She doesn’t think of herself as a snob—Lucifer hasn’t rubbed that much off on her—but there is something special about the view from a penthouse. Especially this one. Something about being so high above, so close to the sky. It almost makes you feel weightless. Also, it just looks… breathtaking.
It’s one of the things she’d been sure she was gonna miss the most once she moved. The view.
Now she gets to wake up to it every day.
She checks out the rest of the room. It’s a big room, three hundred square feet at least, and yet Lucifer apologises for “only” being to offer her the smallest room. The closet is spacious—not as spacious as Lucifer’s, which is a walk-in bigger than the entire room, but Chloe doesn’t have a thousand suits she needs to fit in there. It reaches from floor to ceiling with round knobs and a matte, light grey finish. Her fingers itch to fill it with all her clothes, to move in. Properly. Not that she hasn’t been grateful for the bathroom drawer and the few shelves in Lucifer’s closet he’s let her borrow, it’s just… gonna be nice to finally feel some sense of having a… of actually living somewhere.
Chloe softly closes the doors to the closet with a smile and walks over to the bed. Like everything else, it’s simple and modern, with an oak frame and those expensive cotton sheets she’d noticed before. She sits down and runs a hand over them. They feel as soft as they look, like a cloud against her palm.
It makes something flutter inside her chest, the thought of him picking out bed sheets for her. Of him choosing furniture he thinks she’d like and need, from the treadmill and the closet to the small, elegant bedside lamp.
He’s clearly had fun, as well. Not just with the books; the candle on the nightstand says its scent is Sex on the beach (not even a bad scent, which almost makes it even more annoying) and when she, slightly suspicious, opens the drawer in the nightstand, she finds a bottle of lube and two packs of condoms.
“Lucifer,” she chides, heat rising in her cheeks.
He just grins. “Better safe than sorry, right?”
“There’s not even a door!” she suddenly realises.
“Well, you can’t have it all, Detective,” he teases. “Besides, your birthday is approaching.”
Chloe tilts her head a bit. She didn’t know he knew her birthday. It makes her wonder when his is. She’ll have to ask him later. Right now, there’s something else she needs to know—
“What is your aversion to doors, anyway?”
The atmosphere changes slightly. Lucifer’s lips twitch into something bitter, almost contemptful. “Well, I’ve learned quite well that you can never be sure what will be behind them.” He glowers at the empty door frame.
Chloe nods as if she understands. She doesn’t. She has no idea what he means—she rarely does when he talks in metaphors. But she wants to. She wants to understand, to get to know him. To find out what hides behind his proverbial doors. She probably will, now that she’s going to live with him.
The thought makes her weirdly… excited.
“Right,” she says, not knowing what else to say, and tries to lighten the mood. “But at least there’s a door for the bathroom.” She glares at him. “I mean, not that that has stopped you from walking in on me in the shower.”
Three weeks she’s stayed here, and three times she’s had to yell at him to get the hell out.
Lucifer smirks. “Apologies, Detective.” He doesn’t look the least bit sorry. “My usual house guests don’t have any qualms about me seeing them naked.”
Chloe snorts. “Yeah, well, I’m not your usual house guest.”
Lucifer smiles. A soft, genuine smile. “No. You’re not.”
Chloe’s chest clenches a bit. She can’t help but smile back at him.
“In fact, you’re no guest at all,” he says. “I think that’s officially stated now.” He gestures around her room and meets her gaze, his brown eyes warm and sweet. “Welcome home, Detective.”
Chloe bites her lip, her throat suddenly tight with emotion.
Then she hugs him.
Lucifer stiffens, either surprised or uncomfortable. Probably both. Chloe removes her arms from around him and takes a step back.
‘“Sorry, I know you don’t really do hugs… but- just…” She looks up at him and smiles. “Thank you.”
Lucifer tugs at his waistcoat and fixes his cufflinks. He gives her a smile that’s a little tight. “You’re quite welcome, Detective.”
Chloe wrings her hands. “I, uhm, we could- do you want to maybe… eat something together?”
His smile loosens, stretching wide and happy across his face. “Of course. Chao Krung?”
Chloe presses her lips together around a smile. “And you say you can’t read people’s minds.”
Lucifer chuckles. “I can’t. I just know you, Detective.”
You do, Chloe thinks as he goes to order and she looks around her room again. It’s actually a bit scary how well he already knows her. Scary and… nice.
She gets her clothes from her designated bathroom drawer and the shelves in Lucifer’s closet along with her police books from where they’ve been lying on Lucifer’s desk and takes them to her room. She puts the clothes in the closet and the books on the shelves, next to the Bible and Sex positions that will change your life, while Lucifer sets the table on the balcony. A 90s song plays softly from the speakers in the living room. She can hear him humming along to it as she puts her things in place. Chloe smiles. Maybe she’s rubbing off on him, too.
“Dinner’s ready, Detective!”
She goes to join him, casting a last glance at her room before she climbs the stairs. He’s already brought the food to the balcony, unpacked everything and arranged it nicely on their plates. He stands by one of the chairs, the setting sun bathing him in a golden light as he waits for her, ever the gentleman.
“Smells amazing,” she notes as she sits down opposite of him.
“You too,” Lucifer says with a smirk and sits down as well.
Chloe rolls her eyes, and yet her cheeks get a little warm.
They chat and joke as they eat. It’s surprisingly easy, considering it’s only the second time they’ve had dinner like this—together. Usually, they just order take-out separately and eat it by themselves. Sometimes Chloe doesn’t even have dinner, too exhausted from training to do anything but collapse on the couch, and Lucifer… well, he eats at the most odd times of the day because of his busy night life.
It’s a bit of a shame, actually, because it’s kinda nice, having dinner with him. Both tonight and last week, when he’d made her lasagna and asked her to move in with him. Her mouth almost waters at the memory. For someone who doesn’t have a stove in his home, he’s quite the cook.
“Have you ever thought about getting a kitchen?” she asks him.
He looks up at her, a glint in his eye. “One room at a time, Detective,” he teases. “And no, I haven’t actually. I don’t really need it. I have the one down on the-”
“The tenth floor, I know.” Chloe nods. “I mean, it's your home, but I was just thinking it’d be easier if there was one here, too, you know… now that you have to cook for me more often.” She sends him an innocent look as she lifts her glass to her mouth.
Lucifer raises a brow. His lips twitch into a smile. “Now that I have to what?”
Chloe just gives him a teasing smile as she takes a sip of her water.
“I’m your roommate, Detective. Not a housewife.” She can tell he tries to sound offended, but it’s not really working out for him; his twinkling eyes give him away.
“Still,” she says, putting down her glass, “when you made me dinner and asked me to live here, I thought your cooking was a part of the package. It’s one of the main reasons I said yes, you know?”
Lucifer lets out a sound between a scoff and a chuckle. “And here I thought it was your undeniable attraction to me.”
“Sorry,” she jokes, a smirk pulling at the corner of her lips.
“Don’t be.” He leers at her. “I’m still living off those noises you made.” Chloe pretends she doesn’t hear that. He looks contemplative for a second, before he says, “Maybe we should get a kitchen.”
It doesn’t matter his motives are dirty; the ‘we’ spreads like warmth in Chloe’s chest. She smiles at him. “Yeah?”
“Yes.” He looks inside at the bar as if picturing it. Then he looks back at her with a stupid grin on his face. “Makes kitchen sex easier, too, when you finally can’t resist me any longer.”
Chloe snorts. “Keep dreaming, Lucifer.”
His gaze glides over her. “I will.”
Chloe rolls her eyes. She looks at the bar through the windows like he did. It’s actually not that hard to imagine a kitchen there. With counters and cupboards against the wall and maybe an island in front of it. Maybe they’d have to move his piano a little, but there’d still be plenty of space. They could have the fridge to the right.
“And Detective?” he says.
Chloe turns her gaze back to him. He’s got an uncharacteristically soft look in his eyes.
“It’s your house too, now.”
Chloe’s lips stretch into a smile. It’s only been a week since she agreed to move in, but… she’s already slowly starting to feel like it is.
And it’s not just because she has her own room now.
It’s also the emerging familiarity. Of the place and of him. When she offers to clear out the table and do the dishes, she knows he won’t let her. She knows he’ll offer her a cup of tea, but she’ll say no, because she also knows he’ll most likely bring someone home tonight, and even though she has her own bedroom now, she still has to get through his to get to the bathroom. She knows he’ll start getting ready for the night once he’s done with the dishes, not that he needs it—he’s already wearing a tailored suit and his hair sits perfectly as always. She knows he’ll ask her to join him. She’ll say no, he’ll call her boring and then tell her to have a good night. She’ll go to sleep, he’ll go down to the club and come back in the early morning with a one-night stand, which Chloe will try to sleep through.
The only thing different about tonight is that she’s going to sleep in an actual bed.
“I hope it’s comfortable,” Lucifer says while he’s on his way out and she’s making her way to her room in her pyjamas. He sends her a smirk. “Otherwise you’re always welcome to sleep with me.”
Chloe gives him a sarcastic smile. “How kind of you.”
Lucifer grins.
“Sleep well,” he tells her.
“Have fun,” she tells him back.
She starts to go down the stairs, but then he calls her name.
She stops on the third step and turns towards him. “Yes?”
“Out of curiosity, what was the reason you said yes? To moving in.” A smirk pulls at his lips. “I mean, besides my skills in the kitchen and your undeniable attraction to me, of course.”
Chloe snorts, and then she thinks. It’s a good question.
“The same reason I said yes to going home with you that first night, I guess,” she ends up answering.
He tilts his head, intrigued. His eyes twinkle. “And what was that?”
Chloe smiles. “The company.”