Deckerstar | 52. “I think I’m in love with you and that scares me half to death.”
“Detective?” Lucifer’s voice carried in the still night air, reaching her with the rustle of his footsteps in the shadow of the building where she had fled, just beyond the reach of the lights of police cars and ambulances that had gathered at the scene. “Detective?” he called again, a rough tremble to the word. She saw his form silhouetted against the lights, looking around for her.
She took a deep breath and forced herself to unwind her trembling body from the ball she had tucked into, her back against the brick wall. “Here,” she called back, pushing to her feet. Her voice scraped in her throat, rusty. She raised an arm and stepped into the light where he could see her. “I’m over here.”
He looked around at the sound of her voice, his shoulders relaxing, and jogged over to her. He stopped a few paces away, ducking his head a little too see her face. “Chloe?”
She gave him a tremulous smile. “Sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to bolt like that. I . . .” She trailed off.
He frowned. “You’re sorry?” He took a step toward her and she closed the distance between them, reaching up to touch his face. He was back to normal now, his skin warm and smooth under his stubble, dark brown eyes black pools in the dark rather than glowing red jewels.
His hand covered hers. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” he said.
She laughed, a strangled, half-hysterical sound, and let her hand fall. “You didn’t.”
“I didn’t?” His brow furrowed, questioning, uncertain.
“No.”
She had seen his face before, his other face, the face he called a monster, but never so close, never for so long. When he’d thrown himself between her and the murderer they’d been tracking for nearly a month, he’d shown his full Devil form, eyes blazing red, a snarl on his lips, but that wasn’t what Chloe had run from. She reached up and touched him again.
She hadn’t run from him. She had run from what she realized when she saw the face he’d refused to show her, scarred and terrifying and so very, very sad. She’d run from the deluge of feelings she could no longer deny, the knowledge that what lay between them wouldn’t be pushed aside any longer, because now she had seen his face, the face he’d been too ashamed to let her see, and she had felt no fear.
Nothing about him frightened her. And that was terrifying.
Her fingers slid over his cheek to his lips. He held very still. After a moment she raised her eyes to his. “You don’t scare me,” she said.
The flare of hope and gratitude in his eyes stabbed her to the quick. “Really?”
“Really. I—I think I’m in love with you, and that scares me half to death.”
He laughed, his eyes bright in the flashing lights. He mirrored her gesture, his fingers caressing her cheek, tracing the line of her jaw to her lips. “It scares me, too,” he said. “I don’t know where this is going to take me. Us.”
She stretched up on tiptoe to kiss him, pulled back just far enough to speak. “I guess we’ll find out together.”