Chapter 10: The Reminder
The beeper’s shrill alarm cut through the kitchen, a mechanical scream over the quiet wreckage of their conversation. Lucifer reached over and silenced it with a sharp press of his thumb. The silence that followed was thick, porous with everything left unsaid.
Robert’s face was a mask of weary defiance. Is this the part where you save me?
Lucifer looked at him, at the beautiful, broken angles of him leaning against the cabinet, come and spit still glistening on his chin. He didn’t see a man to be saved. He saw a canyon, vast and deep, and a figure dancing along its crumbling edge. You couldn’t pull someone back from a edge they loved the feel of. You could only stand there, a solid thing to crash against if they fell, or to leap from if they chose to fly.
He closed the distance between them. He didn’t grab, didn’t shake. He simply pulled Robert into him, one large hand cradling the back of his head, the other spreading across the small of his back. Robert was rigid for a heartbeat, then melted, his forehead thumping softly against Lucifer’s chest.
“That folded paper is an option,” Lucifer murmured into his hair, his voice a low vibration. “It is not a contract. It is not fate. You don’t have to take what’s offered just because it’s there.” He leaned back, tilting Robert’s chin up so their eyes met. The gold in his own was fierce, not with anger, but with a conviction that felt like a physical heat. “And I’ll be here. Every time you need a reminder of what you’re actually worth.”
He kissed him then. Not with the frantic passion of before, but slow, deep, a deliberate mapping. He tasted the bitterness of the day—the stale coffee, the adrenaline, the metallic fear. He sought beneath it for the familiar taste of Robert, the one that was all wicked wit and dazzling light. Robert’s mouth opened under his, a sigh bleeding into a groan, his hands fisting in Lucifer’s shirt as if to steady himself on a tilting world.
They broke apart, breathing the same air.
The lasagna was a lost cause, its top a blackened crust, the edges cemented to the dish. They scraped the salvageable middles onto plates and ate at the counter, standing up. No words. The click of forks, the chew of food, the distant wail of a siren climbing Sunset Boulevard. The burnt parts were acrid on the tongue, a necessary punctuation to the meal.
Robert moved first, taking the plates to the sink. He turned the faucet on hard, a jet of water exploding against porcelain and splashing back, soaking the front of his thin, white shirt instantly. It clung to his skin, transparent, outlining the planes of his chest, his nipples pebbling against the cold, wet fabric.
He stared at the pooling water, not moving.
Lucifer came up behind him, his body a furnace at Robert’s back. His hands were steady, methodical. He reached around, his fingers finding the first button of the soaked shirt. He popped it open. Then the next. And the next. The wet cotton fell away, peeled open like a skin. He pushed the shirt off Robert’s shoulders, let it fall to the floor with a sodden slap.
Robert shuddered, his head dropping forward.
Lucifer turned him around, his gaze travelling over the exposed flesh. He didn’t speak. He led him by the hand, away from the sink, to the clearer space of the living room floor. The yoga mats were a patchwork of faded colors. A throw pillow lay discarded. Lucifer guided him down onto the mismatched terrain, the linoleum unforgiving beneath the thin mats.
He followed him down, a mountain gentling itself over a quaking hill. He braced himself on his arms, caging Robert in, and just looked. The flicker of the fluorescent tube in the kitchen buzzed overhead, casting their moving shadows against the far wall.
He started at his throat, where Robert’s pulse hammered a frantic rhythm. He pressed his lips there, not a kiss, but a steady pressure, as if to calm the wild thing trapped beneath the skin. He licked a long, slow stripe up the column of his neck, to the hinge of his jaw. Robert whimpered.
“Luc…”
“Shhh.”
He moved lower, his mouth finding a nipple. He drew it in, sucking deeply, his tongue rubbing the tight nub until Robert arched off the floor with a choked cry. He gave the same devoted attention to the other, biting down just enough to walk the line between pleasure and pain. Robert’s hands flew to his hair, tangling, tugging, directionless.
Lucifer kissed downward, across the trembling expanse of his stomach, tracing the defined lines of his hips. He hooked his fingers in the waistband of Robert’s jeans, undid the button and fly, and dragged them and his briefs down in one firm pull. Robert kicked them away, his skin pebbling in the cool air.
He was fully hard, his cock curving up against his stomach, flushed and leaking. Lucifer didn’t take him in his mouth immediately. He nosed through the coarse, dark hair at the base, inhaled his musky, essential scent. He pressed a kiss to the inside of each thigh, feeling the powerful muscles jump under his lips. Robert’s breath was coming in short, sharp pants, his hips making tiny, involuntary circles.
“Please,” Robert whispered, a raw scrape of sound.
Lucifer looked up the length of his body, meeting his desperate gaze. Then he leaned in and took him whole.
Robert cried out, a shattered, beautiful sound. Lucifer’s mouth was hot, wet, unrelenting. He sucked him deep, his throat working, his tongue pressing hard along the sensitive vein underneath. He set a rhythm that was less about tenderness and more about consumption, a claiming. He wanted to erase the memory of Robert’s own desperate, hollow act in this kitchen. He wanted to replace it with this: worship that felt like a brand.
He pulled off with a wet pop, his own saliva slicking Robert’s shaft. “You are not a commodity,” he growled, his voice ragged. He licked a broad stripe from root to tip. “You are not a party favor.” He swirled his tongue around the head, tasting the bitter salt of pre-come. “Your talent is yours. It doesn’t come with a fucking powder chaser.”
He took him deep again, his nose buried in Robert’s pubic hair. Robert was babbling, a stream of fractured curses and pleas. “Oh god, right there, fuck, your mouth, fuck, I’m gonna…”
Lucifer reached up and pinched a nipple, hard. Robert yelped, the sensation short-circuiting his climax, pushing him back from the edge. A sob caught in his throat.
“Not yet,” Lucifer murmured, his breath hot on Robert’s wet flesh. He shifted lower, his hands spreading Robert’s thighs wider. He bypassed his cock completely and pressed his mouth lower, to the tight, clenching pucker of his ass.
Robert jolted as if electrocuted. “What are you—oh, fuck, Lucifer!”
Lucifer didn’t answer. He licked him there, a broad, flat stroke that made Robert scream into his own arm. He drilled his tongue inside, fucking him with it, wet and relentless. The obscene, slick sounds filled the room, mingling with Robert’s broken moans. He was shaking violently, his heels digging into the yoga mat, his back arched like a bow.
“I can’t… I can’t take it…” Robert sobbed, but he was pushing back against Lucifer’s mouth, demanding more.
Lucifer added a finger, slick with spit, pushing it in alongside his tongue, stretching him. Robert clutched at Lucifer’s shoulders, his head thrashing. “Need you,” he gasped. “Need you inside me. Now. Please, now.”
With a final, sucking kiss, Lucifer pulled back. He fumbled with his own jeans, freeing his aching cock. He spat into his palm, slicked himself roughly. He didn’t ask if Robert was ready. The raw, open need on Robert’s face was answer enough.
He positioned himself, the head of his cock pressing against that wet, loosened entrance. He locked eyes with Robert, whose gaze was dark, wild, utterly unguarded.
“This is what you’re worth,” Lucifer said, his voice guttural. And he thrust in, one deep, merciless slide that buried him to the hilt.
Robert’s scream was pure sensation, ripped from his core. It was too much, no preparation, just burning stretch and overwhelming fullness. Lucifer held still, letting him adjust, sweat dripping from his brow onto Robert’s chest.
“Move,” Robert begged, his nails scoring Lucifer’s back. “Fucking ruin me.”
Lucifer obeyed. He pulled out almost all the way and slammed back in. The pace he set was brutal, each stroke a piston driving the air from Robert’s lungs. The slap of skin on skin, the creak of the old floorboards beneath them, Robert’s choked cries—it was a symphony of wreckage. Lucifer drove into him, over and over, aiming for that spot that would unmake him.
He found it.
Robert’s eyes flew open, seeing nothing. A howl, jagged and raw, tore from his throat as his body seized. His cock, trapped between their pounding bodies, spilled untouched, stripes of white painting his stomach and Lucifer’s. The convulsive clenching of his ass around Lucifer’s driving cock was the final trigger. Lucifer shouted, a raw, ragged sound, and poured himself deep inside, his own hips stuttering, emptying in great, pulsing waves.
He collapsed forward, careful to keep his weight on his arms, his forehead resting against Robert’s heaving chest. The only sounds were their gasping breaths and the endless, indifferent drip of the kitchen faucet.
Minutes bled into one another. The sweat cooled on their skin.
Robert’s hand, trembling, came up to rest in Lucifer’s damp hair. His voice, when it came, was scratched raw, whisper-soft. “So that’s my worth, huh? Being fucked senseless on a shitty linoleum floor.”
Lucifer lifted his head. He looked into Robert’s eyes, saw the chaos settling, the sharp intelligence returning through the haze of spent pleasure. He saw a man, not a myth. Flawed, scared, beautiful.
“No,” Lucifer said, just as quiet. He pulled out gently, the aftermath sticky between them. “Your worth is being known. And still being wanted.” He shifted to lie beside him, pulling Robert into the curve of his body on the cramped, uncomfortable floor. “The rest was just punctuation.”
Robert let out a shaky breath that was almost a laugh. He curled into Lucifer, his back against that solid chest. Outside, the neon glow of the city stained the night sky, a constant reminder of the world waiting with its folded papers and its easy exits. In here, for now, there was only the rhythm of their hearts slowing into sync, and the dread-tinged peace before the morning would come, demanding answers.