Extinguish by J. M. Darhower

  "Pretend," he said, cocking an eyebrow at her. "Hit the gas or I will."

  Serah slammed her foot down on the gas pedal, knowing her brother would do as he warned. The car jolted, roaring loudly as it accelerated rapidly down the street. They approached stoplight after stoplight, each one peculiarly turning green right before they reached it. Serah peeked over, seeing her brother casually flicking his finger, changing the lights for her.

  They sped all over Chorizon and out of the city limits, weaving down winding back roads, passing not a single other car along the way. The Pontiac, despite being nearly fifty years old, ran smoothly, not a hiccup as it automatically shifted gears, roaring every time she pressed the gas harder. The speedometer inched upward farther and further—65, 75, 85, 95—as wind whipped Serah’s long hair, sending it swirling madly in the air around them. Samuel reclined back, grinning as he watched her drive for the first time.

  He reached over and clicked on the radio, twisting the dial and scanning through stations until he got one to come in. 30 Seconds to Mars blared from the speakers as Samuel turned it up as loud as the volume would go, singing along to the words of "Kings and Queens."

  Serah drove them back toward Chorizon, listening to her brother’s melodic voice as passion poured from his chest to the music. The song came to an end as soon as they reached the city limits again. They cruised through town going 35 miles per hour, and Serah pulled the car back in its spot along the curb in front of the coffee shop. She smiled, pushing her windblown hair from her face as she cut the engine.

  Samuel glanced over at her. "Am I the best brother ever, or what?"

  "You are," she agreed. "That was the greatest moment of my existence."

  "So far. You’ll have many more just like it, if not better, in the future." He smiled, reaching over and nudging her playfully under the chin. "We both will, sis. I just know it."

  Samuel apparated out of there, vanishing from the car as Serah once more shifted, invisible to anyone who walked by. She sat there gripping the wheel, not knowing, as she savored the moment, that it had been the last time she’d ever lay eyes on her brother’s immortal form.

  "Cinderella, dressed in yella'

  Went upstairs to kiss her fella'

  Made a mistake and kissed a snake,

  How many doctors did it take?"

  Nicki and her best friend Emily jumped rope as they sang harmoniously, beginning to count when they reached the end of the verse. Serah watched them in a daze.

  "Ugh, what a ghastly song," Hannah said, plopping down on the swing beside Serah. "Let me guess—it’s just another silly childish rhyme, right?"

  Serah slowly shook her head as the words ran through her mind. "It might be about Lucifer."

  Hannah scrunched up her nose. "Really? Satan?"

  "And me," she whispered as the little girls started over again, singing the rhyme from the beginning. Made a mistake and kissed a snake. . . "Was it?"

  "Are you okay?" Concern laced Hannah’s voice. "You’re worrying me, Serah."

  "I don’t know," she said quietly. "I don’t know about anything anymore."

  The girls started over for the third time, but Serah didn’t stick around to listen. She left Hannah without saying goodbye, teleporting to the field in Heaven. As soon as she appeared, an alarming sensation swam through her. With a deep breath, a succulent sweetness entered her lungs, the perfume of the countless wildflowers blanketing the land. She plucked a handful from the ground and brought them to her nose. Inhaling, she was taken aback by the fragrance, so strong a bitter tang tickled the back of her throat.

  That alone broke the doubt she’d had in her mind.

  She headed for Hellum Township, rushing through the gates and running straight into Hell, no hesitation in her footsteps as she burst through the force field, flowers still in hand. She sprinted for the tower, hurrying down the corridor, and burst through the wooden doors into the meeting room.

  Lucifer sat in his throne, appearing slightly worse for wear but still in one piece as he frivolously overturned cards with a flick of the finger. His expression was hard, his eyes clouded with a faraway look as he avoided her gaze. Across the room from him, in the chair Serah had occupied day after day, sat a skinny, trembling man. He looked over at Serah with terrified eyes. "Please help me," he whispered, imploring her. "Angel of the Lord, I beg for your mercy."

  Before Serah could even think of how to respond, Lucifer raised his arm, methodically closing his hand into a fist, stealing the voice right from the tortured soul. The man continued his pleading, his lips frantically moving, but no sound escaped. He grasped his throat, horror spiking in his expression as his eyes darted back to the King of Hell.

  "Play," Lucifer barked.

  The man quickly flipped over the next card on his meager stack.

  "As you can see, I’m busy, so speak your piece and leave."

  Serah held her hand out. "Here."

  Lucifer glanced at her and raised an eyebrow. "You brought me flowers?"

  "Take them."

  "No."

  "Smell them."

  "You smell them."

  "I did," she said. "Just a moment ago."

  His brow furrowed slightly as he gazed at her. Serah waited for him to react, for him to press her for an explanation, but he simply turned away after a moment, going right back to his game as if she weren’t even there. Slowly, she lowered her hand, still grasping the flowers, as anger surged through her at being disregarded.

  She spun around, facing the terrified man. "He cheats, you know. He’s such a spineless coward that he can’t even play fair."

  "Enough," Lucifer spat through clenched teeth.

  "He thinks I find him pathetic, but really, I’m the pathetic one," she continued. "Pathetic because I thought maybe there was more to him than this. Maybe he wasn’t hopeless. Stupid me, right? I actually thought for a second that Satan—"

  Lucifer stood up, a crack of unexpected thunder ripping across the ceiling and cutting her off mid-rant. All of the candles extinguished in a whoosh, leaving them in the dark. The floor near Serah suddenly opened up, fire raging from the crack as Lucifer threw the man into it, his screams cut off as the floor sealed once again. Lucifer stalked forward, heading straight for her, stopping when they were toe-to-toe, towering above her, his chest pressed against hers. Rage radiated off of him as he glared down at her, his eyes ablaze in the dark room, his nostrils flaring. "You have some fucking nerve."

  "Why?" she demanded, refusing to back down. She thrust the flowers at him, punching him in the chest with them clenched tightly in her fist. "What’s happening to me?"

  "What’s happening to you, angel, is that you’re finally starting to realize this perfect world you live in isn’t as perfect as it’s made it out to be," Lucifer said, snatching the flowers from her. "You’re starting to realize Daddy isn’t all He’s cracked up to be."

  "Blasphemy."

  "You can curse me all you want," he continued. "It doesn’t make it any less true. The signs are all there."

  "You’re wrong."

  "Am I?" He cocked an eyebrow at her. "Tell me you don’t feel the chill in the air, that you can’t feel my breath on your skin." He reached over, running the back of his hand along her pale cheek. She shivered at the sensation, tingles running down her body as his hand ran down her neck, trailing along her chest, between her breasts. "Tell me you feel nothing from that. I fucking dare you."

  She smacked his hand away. "You’re disgraceful."

  "But I’m right."

  "You’ve done this," she accused. "This is your fault."

  "Oh, I haven’t done anything to you, angel." He leaned forward, his lips near her ear as he whispered, "Yet."

  Lucifer stepped back as the candles once again ignited, his eyes trailing the length of her slowly, before he turned around and stalked back over to his throne. He sat down and kicked his legs out, waving for her to take a seat, but she didn’t move.

  "We’re a lot
alike, you and me," he said, "whether you want to believe it or not. I feel things. I taste things. I’ve always wanted more. Fuck, I can even cry, too."

  Her eyes widened. "You cry?"

  He scoffed. "I said I could, not that I do."

  "Then how do you know you can?"

  "I’ve shed a few tears a time or two," he admitted. "Hitting the gate hurts like a son of a bitch."

  "I saw," she said. "Yesterday."

  "I know."

  "You shouldn’t have come after me," she insisted. "You couldn’t have stopped me."

  He laughed dryly. "That’s where you’re wrong. I could’ve stopped you at any time. You left because I let you leave."

  Her brow furrowed. "Then why did you put yourself through that? Why didn’t you just stop me if you could?"

  "I told you—I’m not in the business of taking away free will. I wanted you to choose to turn around, to choose to come back. But you didn’t, even after the reapers attacked me. Message received, angel, loud and fucking clear."

  "How could you have stopped me?" she asked. "You can’t hurt me."

  Lucifer snapped his fingers, the room fading away to pure blackness. Serah felt like she was hovering in a void of space with no way to escape—no entrance, no exit, no nothing. Her Hell. "Okay, I get it. Enough."

  No response.

  She spun around in a circle, searching for Lucifer, but there was no sign of him anywhere. She tried to run, but she had no sense of direction. It was like gravity no longer existed. "Stop this!"

  Still no response.

  Time withered away, her panic escalating. She tried flying, her wings rapidly expanding, but she couldn’t tell if she was getting anywhere with no ground to soar off from. It could’ve been a minute or an hour, a day or a week—time meant nothing in a vast pit of nothingness.

  Terror ran through her, a cold sensation overtaking her body. "Lucifer!"

  At the sound of a snap, Serah was instantly back on her feet in the meeting room, eyes wild, hair windblown. Lucifer sat in his throne, not appearing to have moved an inch. Most of the flowers lay in a heap at his feet but he held one—a pale pink wildflower. "Terrifying, isn’t it? Being trapped? No wonder it's your Hell."

  "You’re horrible!"

  Lucifer ignored the jab and motioned to the table in front of him for the second time since she’d burst into the room. "Have a seat."

  Serah tentatively approached him. Instead of taking a seat in one of the black chairs, she hoisted herself up on the table, feet dangling off the side as she faced him. She was so close she could thrust her foot out and kick him if she so desired.

  With the mood she was in, it was certainly a possibility.

  "Why’d you do it?" she asked quietly. "That’s all I want to know. Why?"

  "I've done a lot, so you're going to have to be more specific," he said. "Why’d I rebel? Why’d I give everything up? Why’d I cheat at War? Why’d I crash into the gate like a fucking suicidal imbecile?"

  "No," she said. "Why'd you kiss me?"

  He twirled the flower between his fingers, bringing it to his nose and inhaling. "Why not?"

  "That's not a good answer."

  "It's the only one I've got."

  Serah shook her head exasperatedly and looked away, frustrated. Lucifer sat up and reached over, grasping her chin and pulling her face back so she'd look at him again.

  "Tell me something." His voice was low, a gritty whisper. "Have you ever done something simply because you wanted to? Not because you were ordered to, not because you thought you had to, but out of selfishness? Pure greed? You did it, because you couldn't imagine not doing it? Consequences be damned."

  She shook her head slowly. "No."

  "You're lying," he said. "You wouldn't be here with me otherwise."

  "I was sent to ask you—"

  "To stop the fighting," he said, cutting her off. "And you've asked me . . . more than once. And I've denied you . . . more than once. Yet here you still are. Why?"

  She shrugged a shoulder. "Why not?"

  Lucifer smirked. "Exactly."

  They stared at each other for a moment before he slowly, deliberately inched forward. Serah's breath again hitched as he pressed his lips to hers for the second time, kissing her softly. She trembled, kissing him back, for the first time tasting the mint in his mouth, tingling her tongue. She groaned at the sensation, the sound spurring Lucifer on. He tried to deepen the kiss, but Serah pushed away from him, both hands pressed flatly against his chest, keeping him at arm’s length.

  "We can't do this," she said. "It's wrong. It's all wrong!"

  "So?"

  She stared at him incredulously. "It's a sin!"

  "Ah, sin," Lucifer said. "Like the serpent that tricked Eve into eating the forbidden fruit. She devoured it, knowing she shouldn't."

  "And she was punished for it."

  "She was," Lucifer agreed. "But if you think for a moment she truly regretted it, you're wrong. That fruit was the most glorious thing she ever tasted—the sweetest, the ripest—and once you experience something so breathtaking, you never forget it. You never regret it."

  "How would you know?"

  "Because it's the same thing with feeling," he said. "Once you know what it's like to smell a flower, you can't go back to seeing it as just a plant. It's more than that—much, much more. And it's the same way with pleasure. Once you feel the shiver from a lover's touch, you can't go back to being numb again."

  "But Eve didn't just hurt herself by sinning."

  "You give her too much credit," Lucifer said. "She ate a fucking apple. That's it. She couldn't ignore her hunger. The temptation was too great. And if anything, instead of holding it against Eve, the world should really envy her."

  "Why?"

  "Because she experienced a pleasure none of them will ever get, gratification none of them will ever come close to. Even I don’t know what it’s like to bite into that apple, and I’ve never denied myself anything." Lucifer stroked his thumb along her cheek, a small seductive smirk twisting the corner of his lips. "Give in to it, angel."

  "Give in to what?"

  "The hunger," he said, his tongue slowly running across his bottom lip. "The need. Give in to the craving. Give in to me."

  "Never," she whispered, the word impulsively tumbling from her lips, no conviction in her feeble voice.

  "I know you feel it, deep inside of you, screaming out to be acknowledged, to be satiated," he continued as if she hadn’t spoken. "I can sense it, clawing underneath your skin, begging to be let loose, begging to be invited out to play."

  She shook her head, silently refuting his words.

  "Tell me you don’t feel it then, the fluttering in your chest; the hair on the nape of your neck rising as your nerve endings stir, your fingers tingling with the need to reach out and caress something." His eyes raked down her form. "Tell me your body doesn’t ache at the mere thought of me between your thighs, on top of you, inside of you, giving you what my brother never could—real feeling, the kind of feeling that makes you scream so loud your throat feels like it’s bleeding. Agonizing pleasure, the kind that torments your every thought, driving you to the brink of insanity only to pull you right back from the edge, over and over and over again. Unbearable pleasure, the kind that makes you beg for it to stop, but the moment it’s over, you feel like nothing but an empty, useless shell—a shell that needs more."

  Warmth flooded her body, starting from the top of her head and rushing down, engulfing that spot at the apex of her thighs that seemed to involuntarily respond to his tirade.

  "Tell me," he growled. "Tell me you don’t feel your body coming alive. Tell me you don’t want more of it, that you’d be content going back to your miserable, endless existence where a fucking tingle is enough to quench your thirst. Tell me, and I’ll never ask you again."

  Serah opened her mouth to tell him, to end the charade, but she couldn’t force the words from her lips. She couldn’t lie. She swallowed thickly, her b
reath quickening as she rubbed her hands against her dress, wiping away the sudden dampness of her palms.

  Lucifer jumped out of his seat, slamming his hands on both sides of Serah on the table. He towered over her, red raging in his eyes at her prolonged silence. "Tell me!"

  "No."

  The pathetic squeak of a word, barely audible, was enough of a spark to ignite a fire in the room. With no hesitation, no ounce of self-doubt, no second-guessing, Lucifer smashed his lips to Serah’s, kissing her with a fervor she’d never perceived before. He slammed her onto her back on the table, forcing her legs apart as he pressed himself against her, the layers of clothing between them not enough to contain the heat radiating from him. His erection throbbed in his pants, pulsating between her thighs as she ran her hands through his hair.

  Oh, Heavens. . .

  Lucifer’s hands slid up her outer thighs, shoving her dress around her waist as he hitched her legs up at his hips. There was no kindness in his movements, no gentleness in his touch, none of the sweetness she’d always associated with the act. This was lust, raw and authentic, an unfiltered yearning that brewed between them, unleashed for the first time.

  Lucifer broke from her lips long enough to tear her clothes off and throw them across the room. He pulled back as she lay on the table, not a shred of material shielding her from his eyes. He yanked his shirt off and dropped it to the floor near his feet, his dark stare fixated on her bare chest. His hands brushed across her nipples, the sensitive flesh puckering under his touch. A single fingertip slowly trailed down her stomach, circling her navel, before dipping into the bare flesh between them.

  Her eyes closed when his finger brushed against her clit, electricity jolting her. Through the darkness, she saw fireworks, her world exploding in vast colors she'd never seen before. A groan rumbled in her chest as she shifted her hips involuntarily, seeking more friction. He didn’t deny her, picking up her cues right away. He rubbed circles around the spot as he undid his pants with his free hand, kicking them off when they dropped to his ankles.

  Serah’s eyes opened again the second the connection was lost, but she didn’t have a moment to spare a curious glance at him. He plunged inside of her, filling her in one hard stroke. The breath caught in Serah's throat, escaping as a strangled moan as she threw her head back, arching her spine at the sensation. Lucifer’s mouth went straight for her neck, licking and sucking the exposed flesh as he plowed into her, his hips slamming into her thighs.