Duke rocked slightly on his feet, his hands fisting and reopening at his sides. Even he couldn't say exactly why he was hesitating.

(Except that sitting in Lucifer's lap would make him feel small, protected. Except that the nest was where they'd wrapped themselves around him when he didn't have any defenses left. Except that he'd worked so hard in the last few days to put his walls back up that he was terrified of them coming down again.)

"Should probably clean all that up at some point," he said, looking away.

If he went to them now, those walls were going to come down hard and he wasn't sure he could put them back up again after.