Chapter 9: Forbidden Evidence
The condominium development was a skeleton of steel and concrete, open to the night sky. Fluttering police tape marked a perimeter, and the strobing red and blue lights painted the unfinished walls in frantic, macabre strokes. The victim, a middle-aged man named Everett Finch, lay spread-eagled on the raw concrete floor of what would become the penthouse suite.
Chloe knelt beside the body, her gloved hand hovering over the wounds. Not stab wounds. Not gunshots. They were precise, seared lines, forming a faint, intricate pattern across his chest. The skin was blackened at the edges, the smell not of blood, but of burnt ozone and charred flesh.
“Definitely not a standard homicide,” she muttered.
Lucifer leaned against a support beam, surveying the scene with detached curiosity. “A brand,” he said. “An old one. Celtic, if I’m not mistaken. A symbol for a broken oath.”
Detective Martinez approached, his face grim. “No signs of forced entry. Security system was bypassed like it wasn’t even there. And get this—the developer says Finch was the one who approved the shift from affordable housing to luxury units. Made a fortune. Screwed over a lot of community promises.”
“A broken oath, indeed,” Lucifer mused, pushing off the beam to crouch opposite Chloe. He examined the brand without touching it. “The method is… theatrical. Painful, but not immediately fatal. He would have felt every second of it.”
“You think it’s a… a demon?” Chloe asked, her voice low.
“Possibly. Or a human with a flair for the dramatic and access to a very specific kind of cattle iron.” He stood, brushing non-existent dust from his trousers. “The motive is clear: vengeance for a betrayal. The tool, however, requires research.”
Back at the precinct, the air was thick with stale coffee and frustration. Chloe pored over financial records, community board meeting minutes, anything to find who Finch had crossed. Lucifer, meanwhile, had grown bored and vanished.
It was past midnight when she finally stood, her back aching. The evidence locker was her last stop, a place to clear her head and see if any similar MOs existed in cold case files.
The locker was a tomb of tragedies. The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, casting a sickly pallor on the metal shelves stacked with plastic-wagged items. Guns, knives, blood-stained clothing. Her eyes scanned, not for files, but absently, the lack of sleep making her focus drift.
Then she saw them.
On a shelf labeled “VICE – CONFISCATED,” amid a collection of illegal gambling machines and phony IDs, was a clear plastic bag containing a set of restraints. They were not standard police issue. They were made of thick, supple black leather, the cuffs padded and fitted with heavy-duty D-rings. They looked expensive, purpose-built.
She glanced around. The locker was empty, the only sound the distant drip… drip… drip of a leaky pipe. Her heart hammered against her ribs. A flush crept up her neck, warm and insistent.
Her mind conjured the image instantly, vivid and unwelcome: the sex pillow, with its sleek anchors specifically designed for such attachments. Lucifer’s hands, skilled and sure, buckling the cuffs. His voice, a dark whisper in her ear. The utter helplessness, the surrender.
It was reckless. It was against every protocol. It was insane.
Chloe’s fingers twitched. She looked at the bag’s tag. The case number corresponded to a closed, high-end brothel raid from two years prior. The evidence was slated for destruction next month. No one would miss it.
Her breath fogged the plastic as she leaned closer. The impulse was a physical pull, a throb between her legs that echoed the memory of him inside her, of the pillow holding her perfectly open. Before her rational mind could win the argument, her hand darted out, snatching the bag from the shelf and tucking it swiftly into the inner pocket of her blazer. It felt heavy, illicit.
The walk back to her desk was a blur. The leather felt like a brand against her side. She drove to his penthouse in a daze, the bag a secret burning a hole in her jacket.
He was at the piano when she entered, a glass of amber liquid beside him, his fingers coaxing a mournful blues progression from the keys. He didn’t stop playing when she walked in, just glanced up, his eyes immediately noting her tension.
“Detective. You look like you’ve just committed a felony,” he said, a smile playing on his lips.
“I need a drink.”
He nodded towards the bar. She poured two fingers of his Scotch, not bothering with ice, and downed half in one go. The liquid fire grounded her, or maybe it just fanned the flames already there.
“The brand,” she said, her voice rough. “It’s from a 15th-century grimoire on infernal contracts. I found it in the archives.”
“Splendid. So we’re dealing with a scholarly avenger.” He closed the piano lid and stood, walking towards her. “But that’s not why your pulse is racing like a rabbit’s, is it?”
She set her glass down with a decisive click. Reaching into her blazer, she pulled out the plastic evidence bag and tossed it onto the piano’s glossy surface. It landed with a soft thud.
Lucifer’s eyebrows rose. He picked up the bag, holding it to the light. His expression shifted from curiosity to pure, unadulterated hunger. A slow smile spread across his face.
“Well, well,” he breathed, turning the bag in his hands. “Chloe Decker. You little thief.”
“They were going to destroy them,” she said, defensively, her cheeks flaming.
“And you liberated them. For justice?” His tone was mocking, knowing.
“For science,” she retorted, echoing his words from the night before.
His laugh was low, rich, and full of dark promise. He tore the plastic open with a sharp rip, the sound loud in the quiet room. He let the leather restraints spill into his palm, running his thumb over the smooth grain. “Superior craftsmanship. Russian leather, by the feel. Taken from someone who appreciated the finer things.”
He stepped closer, the restraints dangling from his fingers. “Do you know what these mean?”
“Restraint,” she said, her mouth dry.
“No,” he whispered, his face inches from hers. “Trust.” He took her hand, his thumb stroking her wrist where the cuff would lie. “Absolute, irrevocable trust. The surrender of control. It’s the most intimate gift one can give. Or take.”
He led her to the bedroom. The sex pillow sat on the bed, an innocuous grey shape in the dim light. Lucifer didn’t rush. He undressed her with a reverence that felt like a ceremony, kissing each new inch of skin he exposed. When she was naked, shivering slightly, he guided her onto the pillow, positioning her on her knees just as before.
“Hands here,” he murmured, tapping the hidden anchors on the side of the pillow. She placed her wrists on the cool, smooth patches of fabric.
She heard the click of the buckle first, then felt the leather, warm from his hands, encircle her right wrist. It was snug, firm, but not painful. The second cuff followed, securing her left. He threaded a longer strap between the D-rings, pulling her arms slightly apart, anchoring them to the pillow. She tested the bindings. They held fast. A thrill of pure vulnerability shot through her, hot and sharp.
He knelt behind her, his clothed body a press of warmth against her bare skin. His lips found the nape of her neck, then traced down her spine. “You are so beautiful like this,” he whispered, his breath raising goosebumps. “My detective. All that strength, that relentless will… willingly bound for me.”
His hands caressed the swell of her ass, then drifted between her thighs. She was already wet, her arousal slick and undeniable. He stroked her, his fingers sliding through her folds, teasing her entrance, circling her clit until she was panting, pushing back against his hand.
“Please,” she begged, the word torn from her.
“Please, what?”
“Fuck me. Please.”
He stood. She heard the rustle of his clothes, the tear of foil. Then the blunt, hot pressure of him against her. He entered her slowly, achingly slowly, sheathing himself inch by inch in her tight, clutching heat. The restraint made the sensation overwhelming; she could only receive, could only feel him filling her up.
He leaned over her, his chest against her bound back, his mouth at her ear. “You’re under arrest, Detective,” he growled, the words a dark parody of her professional life. “For the theft of my sanity. The sentence is… until I say otherwise.”
He began to move. Deep, relentless thrusts that shook her entire body. The angle was perfect, the pillow holding her immobile so every drive of his hips hit a spot that sent sparks shooting behind her eyelids. The leather cuffs bit gently into her skin with each impact, a constant reminder of her submission.
“This cunt,” he snarled, pounding into her, “is mine. This tight, perfect fucking hole belongs to me. Say it.”
“It’s yours,” she gasped, the words breaking on a moan.
“Who do you belong to?”
“You! Lucifer, I—”
His hand came down on her ass, a sharp, stinging slap that jolted a scream from her throat, morphing it into a sob of pleasure. He did it again, on the other side, the pain a bright counterpoint to the deep, grinding pleasure of his cock.
“Again,” he commanded, his rhythm becoming savage, punishing.
“I belong to you!”
Her climax built like a tsunami, unstoppable, drawn from the very core of her surrender. It crashed over her, a convulsive, screaming release that locked her muscles and flooded her with wave after wave of intense pleasure. She screamed into the bedding, her body convulsing around him, milking him violently.
The feel of her clamping down triggered his own release. With a guttural roar that seemed to shake the room, he drove into her one last, deep time and held, pulsing, spilling into the condom as he collapsed his weight onto her back, his own body shuddering with the force of it.
For long minutes, the only sounds were their ragged breaths and the soft creak of the bed. He eventually shifted, pulling out of her, and carefully, tenderly, unbuckled the cuffs. He rubbed her wrists where the leather had left faint marks.
She rolled onto her back, feeling boneless, exposed, utterly spent. He lay beside her, propped on an elbow, tracing the red mark his hand had left on her thigh.
“The evidence,” she said, her voice hoarse. “I have to return it.”
“Nonsense. It’s been misplaced. Case closed.” He kissed her shoulder. “Besides, I’m rather attached to it now.”
She smiled in the darkness. The case, the brand, the mysterious killer—it all waited, a grim reality outside these walls. But here, tangled with the Devil in a web of trust and stolen leather, she felt a strange, powerful peace. She had crossed a line, both professionally and personally. And for the first time, she had no desire to look back.
The silence that followed was comfortable, a warm blanket woven from spent passion and understanding. Lucifer’s fingers continued their slow circuit on her thigh, over the faint, blooming imprint of his hand. “I do hope you’re not feeling any regret, Detective. About the illicit confiscation of city property, I mean.”
Chloe turned her head on the pillow to look at him. “Only that I didn’t do it sooner.” The honesty of it, even to her own ears, was staggering.
His smile was genuine, soft at the edges. “That’s my girl.”
Her body ached in the most exquisite way, a map of their collision. Yet, a low thrum of energy still pulsed beneath her skin, unsatisfied. She saw it reflected in the dark heat of his gaze. He was already hard again against her leg, an insistent pressure.
“You’re insatiable,” she murmured, but she was shifting, turning fully onto her back, her body an open invitation on the vast expanse of black silk.
“A celestial condition,” he admitted, sitting up. He looked at the sex pillow, then at her, a new idea sparking in his eyes. “The previous configuration was for my pleasure. Optimal access.” He dragged the pillow closer. “Let’s optimize for yours.”
He guided her with an architect’s precision. He positioned the wide, supportive end under the small of her back, lifting her hips at a gentle angle. Then he took her wrists, kissed each palm, and guided her arms up and back, over her head. The hidden anchors were there too, sewn into the pillow’s upper corners.
“Trust me,” he said again, the words a low vibration.
She let her arms go limp, offering her wrists. The cool leather cuffs, still warm from their earlier use, encircled her skin once more. He buckled them, the clicks firm and final. He attached a short, central strap between the D-rings, pulling her wrists together, anchoring them securely above and behind her head. The position arched her back, thrust her breasts upward, and exposed the length of her body completely.
She felt utterly displayed. Vulnerable in a way that made her breath catch. She was a feast laid out, and he was a starving man.
He knelt between her splayed legs, his eyes drinking her in. “Look at you,” he breathed, his voice thick. “Every secret part, offered. Your magnificent tits, this perfect stomach.” His hands glided over her, possessive and worshipful. “This delicious, swollen cunt.”
He didn’t enter her immediately. He leaned down, his mouth finding her breast. He sucked a nipple deep, worrying it with his tongue until she cried out, her back straining against the pillow. His other hand pinched and rolled the other, sending twin jolts of pleasure-pain straight to her core. He trailed wet, open-mouthed kisses down her abdomen, his stubble a delicious abrasion on her sensitive skin.
When his mouth reached her, she shuddered. He didn’t tease. He parted her with his thumbs and licked into her with a single, deep, claiming stroke. She gasped, her hips jerking, but the restraints held her firm. He owned her completely.
He ate her with a focused, relentless hunger. His tongue speared into her, then flattened against her clit, circling, sucking, devouring. He gripped her thighs, holding her open, as he drove her mercilessly toward the edge. The orgasm built, a terrifying pressure, heightened by her helplessness. She was a instrument, and he was playing a symphony of raw sensation on her.
“I’m… Lucifer, I’m gonna…” she choked out.
He pulled back, leaving her gasping and empty. “Not yet,” he commanded, his lips glistening with her. He rose over her, his cock a hard, veined weight in his hand. He rubbed the head through her drenched folds, coating himself in her wetness, teasing her entrance but not entering.
“Please,” she begged, straining against the cuffs. “Please, fuck me. I need it.”
“What do you need?”
“Your cock. I need your cock in my fucking pussy. Now.”
He rewarded her with a slow, inexorable push, burying himself to the hilt in one smooth, devastating stroke. The fullness was breathtaking. With her arms secured, every thrust rocked her entire body. He set a deep, rolling rhythm, each movement grinding the base of him against her clit.
He leaned down, bracing his hands on the pillow beside her head, his face hovering inches above hers. This was different from before. This was face-to-face, his eyes locked on hers, and the intensity was almost too much.
“See what you do to me?” he gritted out, his control fraying. “See how you make me lose my fucking mind?”
He pistoned into her, the pace quickening, becoming frenzied. The wet, slapping sounds of their joining filled the room. She could see the wild abandon in his face, the otherworldly need, and it shattered her last barrier.
“Come for me, Chloe,” he demanded, his voice a ragged scrape. “Let go. I’ve got you.”
The permission broke her. Her second climax tore through her, a blinding white convulsion that ripped a scream from her throat. Her channel clamped around him in rhythmic, vice-like pulses.
The sensation tipped him over. With a roar that held echoes of wings and fire, he drove deep and spasmed, pouring into her. He collapsed onto her, his full weight a comforting press, his face buried in her throat as they both trembled in the aftershocks.
Minutes bled by, marked only by their slowing breaths. He carefully unbuckled the cuffs, massaging her wrists. He rolled beside her, pulling her into the curve of his body. The city lights glittered beyond the windows, a silent, sprawling witness.
Her phone buzzed on the nightstand, a harsh, insistent vibration. The real world, with its dead men and cryptic brands, was calling them back.
Lucifer sighed, his lips brushing her shoulder. “Duty calls, I assume.”
Chloe didn’t move. The stolen restraints lay on the floor. The brand on the victim’s chest was a puzzle waiting to be solved. Her daughter would be home soon. She closed her eyes, savoring the last second of the dark sanctuary they’d built. “Yeah,” she said, finally reaching for the phone. “It always does.”