Chapter Text
The first time Lucifer sees Chloe Jane Decker, he thinks she looks like starlight.
It’s hard to explain. He’d never try. It’s terribly sentimental, and the Devil is not sentimental, so he’d never say the words aloud.
But she looks like starlight.
It might be her dress. It’s black as night, but the fabric is shot through with silver thread and there are tiny, sparkling gems sewn all over that look like stars. It clings to her waist and flares out at her hips and ends well above her knee. The neckline plunges dangerously low, and the back is open enough that there’s a smooth expanse of bare skin just begging to be touched. He wonders if she has freckles on her skin that he could trace like constellations.
Or maybe it’s her hair. Like her dress, it’s black. It’s long enough to fall down past her shoulders, curled into a subtle wave and held back from her face by a silver clip that’s also studded with gems. The clip gleams beneath the flashing lights of his club. He wants to pull it free and let her hair loose and bury his hands in it as he kisses her.
Then again, it could be her makeup. Her eyeshadow is dark, and even though her eyeliner appears to be silver glitter, it makes her look dangerous somehow. Lethal. Her lipstick is a brilliant shade of red. It’s the same color as his coldest stars, a shade that human eyes can’t fathom, and he’s mesmerized.
She catches him staring.
She meets his gaze from across his club. She’s standing at the top of the stairs above the DJ booth like a queen surveying her kingdom. He’s leaning against the bar with a glass in his hand. When their eyes meet, all the breath leaves his lungs.
She’s stunning.
The moment passes as quickly as it appeared. She breaks eye contact and ducks her head and walks down the stairs. He watches her, but when she gets to the bottom of the steps she disappears into the crowd. He feels the loss like it’s physical, like one of his limbs has been severed, and that startles him. Unsettles him. He shouldn’t have such a strong reaction to a woman he barely made eye contact with.
He frowns and downs his whiskey and pushes her from his mind.
He sees her again.
It’s an hour or so later. He hasn’t been keeping track of the time or of her. In fact, he’s been trying not to think about her.
It hasn’t worked.
He’s flirted with a dozen women since he saw her, and danced with half a dozen more, but she’s lingered in the back of his brain like the after effects of a mind-altering drug. He can’t stop wondering about her. About what color her eyes are and what her voice sounds like and what her name is.
And then he sees her.
She’s sitting in a booth, cozied up next to a guy who’s far too sleazy for her. Her head is tilted forward and she’s looking at him from under long, dark eyelashes. She’s smiling coyly as she plays with the top button of his shirt, and Lucifer’s been seduced enough to know what she’s doing.
But why is she doing it? What’s a woman like that doing with a man who leaves a metaphorical grease trail everywhere he goes?
Lucifer frowns. There’s a gorgeous leggy blonde talking to him, but he’s not listening anymore. He’s watching his mystery girl flirt with a douche who looks like his name could be Chad or Brad. He looks like he can’t believe his luck that a woman like mystery girl is curled so close to him in a booth, and Lucifer can’t believe it either. What the hell is she thinking when she could have any man in this club? What the hell is she thinking when she could have him?
Leggy blonde is prattling on about her dreams of being an actress. Lucifer hums like he’s listening but he’s not. He lifts his whiskey glass to his lips and watches as mystery girl leans forward and whispers something in her companion’s ear. Her hand dips beneath the table, and Lucifer can tell by the way the man’s body goes suddenly rigid and his eyes widen what her hand is doing.
Lucifer curls his lip. Lucky bastard.
She leans back, gives him a look that could set any man ablaze, and then slides gracefully out of the booth. She glances over her shoulder and arches an eyebrow, and the man scrambles after her. He latches onto her hand, and she doesn’t pull free but she doesn’t stop either. Lucifer watches as she leads her sleazy companion through the crowds, toward the side of the club, down a hallway, and then through the first door on the left which is marked by a sign that says Authorized Personnel Only.
He blinks in surprise. That door leads to a storage room, and it should be locked. Clearly it’s not.
Are they going to fuck in his storage room?
For a moment, he just stands there and stares at the closed door. It’s not the first time patrons of his club have gotten busy in his storage room. It happens quite often, actually, and he’s had his fair share of romps in there too. He should just leave them be. That’s what he’d normally do.
But the longer he stands there, the stronger the urge to go after her becomes. It’s just so wrong. A woman like that deserves a good shag, one that leaves her panting and flushed and pleasantly achy, and there’s no way she’s going to get it. The douche she’s with is most certainly a two-pump chump, and the chances that he gives good head are slim to none. Mystery girl is about to be frustrated and disappointed, and what kind of club owner would he be if he let one of his patrons leave unsatisfied?
No, this just won’t do. If she’s going to fuck someone in his club, it’s going to be him.
“So I really think I’m ready for my big break,” the leggy blonde says. She runs her hand up Lucifer’s chest and gives him a look that he thinks is supposed to be seductive. “And I heard you know some people in the industry?”
Lucifer brushes her hand away. “You’ll have to excuse me, darling, there’s something I need to do. Or, rather, someone.”
She frowns. “What?”
He brushes past her and heads in the direction of the storage room.
“Lucifer,” she calls out, her voice tinged with anger.
Lucifer ignores her. He finishes the whiskey in his glass, sets it on the tray of a passing waitress, and then adjusts his cufflink. He probably shouldn’t be doing this. It’s odd for him to be so fixated on a random woman when there are dozens—hundreds—of others he could have. But he’s been restless lately. Bored, even. Nothing’s fun anymore because nothing is a challenge.
Maybe mystery girl will be.
He finally reaches the storage room. Anticipation is thrumming through his veins. He pauses just outside the door, runs his hands over his hair and straightens his jacket, and then reaches for the handle and swings the door open even though it’s locked.
He’s not sure what he expected to find on the other side. Maybe mystery girl on her knees. Or sleazy guy with his hand up her skirt. Or perhaps both of them in the middle of a partially-clothed, sloppy screw against one of his shelves.
But seeing the sleaze ball zip tied to a chair as mystery girl holds what appears to be a switchblade to his throat?
That definitely wasn’t what Lucifer expected.