Page 32 of Wicked Believer (Original Sinner #2)

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Charlotte

By the time we fall asleep again, naked in each other’s arms, I’m thoroughly spent, but a nightmare still wakes me—Mark hurting me, until that cold, never-ending embrace from my dreams saves me, Death cradling me protectively—leaving me lying there awake beside Lucifer a few hours later, uncertain what all this means.

It isn’t until I hear the sudden snick of our bedroom door closing and the overhead light flicks on that Lucifer’s warning of war fully settles into me.

War isn’t coming. It’s already here.

And there’s a man in our bedroom I’ve never seen before.

A man with wings.

“Lucifer,” I gasp, unable to scream, but the fear in my voice must wake him.

He sits upright swiftly, effortlessly shoving me behind his back to protect me. “For fuck’s sake, what is it with you and Mother? Really, Michael?”

Michael shrugs. “Lest you forget, brother, you were the one who summoned me .”

The words pique both my nerves and my interest, but I don’t dare move from behind where Lucifer has shielded me.

“ Now is not a good time,” Lucifer growls through clenched teeth.

“Really? I think now is an excellent time,” Michael says, leaning to the side to peer around Lucifer and grin at me.

“Considering we both know who’s at stake.

” He snaps his fingers, conjuring a chair from out of thin air as Lucifer’s shoulders stiffen beneath my palms. Michael twists the chair around, his chest leaning forward against the chairback, to make room for his wings.

“After all, it’s your soon-to-be father-in-law you killed in order to kick off this whole apocalypse charade. ”

“Apocalypse,” I echo, unable to stop myself.

Lucifer shoots me a warning look over his shoulder, like he’s ordering me to remain silent. I don’t think I’ve ever seen him this on edge since, well ...

Since Mark tried to kill me.

Or did, rather.

My breath stops short, my eyes darting to Michael.

Michael seems to read the question on my face easily.

“Keep quiet and out of my way, and I have no plans to hurt you, Charlotte. Even if I do have possession of our Father’s blade.

Besides, Lucifer was the one to kill ‘Daddy.’ But naturally, Lucy here only did it to get our Father’s attention, of course.

To kick the hornets’ nest and make a martyr to stir Father’s followers.

That’s the only reason he does anything. ”

I shake my head.

No. No, that isn’t true. I may have had my doubts, but Lucifer killed my father to protect me, the same way he killed all those people at Mark’s church for trying to hurt me.

Didn’t he?

I lean forward, glancing at his side profile from over his shoulder, but Lucifer doesn’t look at me.

“Tell him he’s wrong. Tell him he’s wrong, Lucifer.” I desperately search his face for some reassurance. But I ... don’t find any.

“Not now , Charlotte.”

But the way he says it is enough for me to know.

It’s true.

It is true.

I sputter, unable to form words as something inside me breaks.

“Same reason why he killed all those churchgoers.” Michael smirks at me. “To rabble-rouse the human masses. Piss off all the holy rollers, because it might irk Dad.”

“That’s where you’re wrong, brother.” Lucifer sneers. “It was your attention I was trying to get, actually.”

I stiffen. He didn’t kill them to protect me. Didn’t do it out of some warped and twisted expression of love for me.

At the news, Michael has the audacity to look smitten. Like a cat whose just dropped a dead canary at his master’s feet. “Really, Luce? You shouldn’t have.”

“I know what you’re up to. You and your little angelic army. Retrieving the lance. You truly thought you could do it without me?”

Michael makes a get-outta-here expression and shrugs. “Who says I’m planning anything?”

Hellfire sparks in Lucifer’s gaze, bright and terrible. “Don’t be coy. Opening the seals, freeing the Horsemen, starting the apocalypse. Really, Michael? Are you that desperate for Dad to return?”

“Father will return,” Michael hisses, his expression suddenly vicious. “My army and I will make sure of it, even if that means we must rid the earth of humanity.”

Bile burns at the back of my throat.

What did that asshole just say?

“And you knew about this?” I ask, glancing between Michael and Lucifer, until my gaze finally settles upon Lucifer’s face. “You knew and yet you did nothing? You told me you were handling this.”

Lucifer doesn’t answer.

“What did you expect, Charlotte?” Michael scoffs at me. “For my brother to defend humanity all because he fell in love with a human? Now that would be a twist no one would see coming.”

I look toward Lucifer, my eyes pleading. “Tell me it isn’t true. Tell me you weren’t going to sit by and do nothing to stop him, or worse, actually help him while—”

“Quiet, Charlotte,” Lucifer snaps, reminding me of my place.

My heart stops. My muscles tighten and my jaw sets.

Well, fuck that.

Fuck all his goddamned secrecy.

Either he’ll treat me like an equal moving forward, or he won’t have me by his side at all.

I throw off the sheets, coming to stand beside where he remains on the bed with only a blanket to cover myself, but he catches my wrist, a silent reminder, as if he means to say, Choose your battles wisely.

I can practically hear the words spoken inside my head. Like I imagined them.

And here in front of Michael isn’t the time nor the place, so I swallow down my rage. Save it for later. For my own safety.

Lucifer has at least helped improve my self-preservation skills that much.

“Well, you called this little meeting, Luce.” Michael makes a show of stretching and shaking out his wings. “So, what do you have to offer me?”

“I want in,” Lucifer says. “Call off the Righteous. No more attempts on Charlotte’s life.”

No . . . this . . . he . . .

“And?”

“And in exchange I’ll open the seals for you.”

“What? No!”

I don’t know exactly what that means, but considering we’re talking about an impending apocalypse, I know enough from all my years of Bible study to gather that it can’t be anything good. Lucifer and Michael both ignore me.

“Father may have given you the scrolls, but He gave me the power,” Lucifer says coolly, holding Michael’s gaze. “You need me.”

Michael hesitates, glaring at Lucifer like it physically pains him to consider it, but then abruptly he stands, kicking aside his chair so that it scrapes across the floor. “Done.”

For a moment, I’m too stunned to say anything. Then my brain comes back online, my thoughts reeling.

“Lucifer, you can’t,” I try to plead with him, but for the first time in a long time, his eyes are cold. Nearly as empty as when he first met me.

“It’s too late for them, darling,” he says softly.

Them .

Them meaning . . .

Humanity.

The panicked feeling inside my chest starts to tighten, becoming a very real, very urgent thing, until I can’t help but repeat the same word over and over. “No. No, no, no, no, no.”

Neither of them pays any attention to me.

“Father would likely agree.” Michael shrugs. “Mother, too, of course.” He smirks. “Well, in that case, I look forward to having you back on the team, brother. I’ll be in touch.”

With that, his wings give an almighty flap, and he’s gone in a blink.

Nothing but a blown-about pile of Lucifer’s stray sheet music and a few large white feathers remain, scattered across the floor. The chair Michael conjured lies on its side, the only other indication he was ever here in the first place.

Michael. The fucking archangel Michael.

The newfound leader of the apocalypse.

The false prophet.

“What the hell was that?” I round on Lucifer.

He tears from our bed like a man on a mission, refusing to look at me as he heads toward our closet. “None of it concerns you, Charlotte. Let me—”

“None of it concerns me?” I shout, my heart racing as I follow him into the walk-in, where he’s now haphazardly buttoning his dress shirt. “At what point are you going to stop treating me like I’m a child?”

He rounds on me. “Perhaps when you stop behaving that way!”

We both freeze.

It’s the first time he’s ever raised his voice at me outside the playroom.

My hands start to tremble.

“You sounded just like him then.”

Lucifer lifts a brow. “My Father?”

I shake my head slightly. “No, mine.”

Lucifer swears under his breath, muttering to himself before he rakes a rough hand through his hair, then runs it down over his face, exhaling. “There are many things in this universe you know nothing about. Things of which—”

“So, tell me, then. Tell me, goddammit!”

Lucifer’s eyes darken with a quiet fury, his fists clenching and unclenching as he draws nearly nose to nose with me. “You barely survived the news of our being fated, and yet this is how you want me to treat you? Like an equal? Like my queen?”

“Yes,” I snap. “Yes, I do,” I say, meeting him toe-to-toe.

Amber hellfire burns in his gaze, harsh and punishing. “I’m asking for you to trust me,” he says through gritted teeth, “for you to have faith in me, in us.” He reaches for me.

But I shake my head, stepping out of his reach.

“How could I?” I whisper. “How could you ask me that after all the ways you’ve lied to me?”

Lucifer swallows visibly, lowering his head so that it hangs from his shoulders as he places his hands on his hips. Finally, he looks skyward like he’s trying to find patience. Or praying.

If he were anyone else, I’d think that he was.

But I know better.

He presses his lips together, his nostrils flaring as he squares his shoulders, like he’s shoring up for the battle ahead.

“All right, Charlotte. You win. You want to make me your villain? So be it.” His expression hardens, his entire body language shifting as the shadow of where his wings used to be is suddenly cast onto the wall behind him.

The change I see in him then is so immediate it ... terrifies me.

My blood runs cold.

This is not the Lucifer I know.

This is a Lucifer I’ve never met before.

The vicious king of Hell.

Exactly the monster everyone believes him to be.

I take a step back.

Slowly, Lucifer prowls toward me, until I’m forced to retreat so far I’m backed up against the wall, cornered between his lithe body and the doorframe. He stares down the bridge of his nose at me like I mean nothing to him, that cold, deadened stare tearing me in two.

“You want to be my queen? Fine.” The amber hellfire in his eyes flames as he snarls, “Then start acting like it.”

He stalks past me, exiting our bedroom, leaving me standing there, alone and breathless, the marble floor where he stood only moments ago blackened and singed.

I stay frozen there, breathing hard, unable to make sense of what all this means, as if the whole world isn’t crumbling around me and my future husband isn’t one of the few leading the charge to scorch the earth beneath me.