“You’re going to make me come,” he warned, opening his eyes.

“You want to come like this?” Pierce asked. “Or when I’m fucking you?”

Griff almost lost it, but managed somehow to hang on, to plead thickly, “Fuck me, Pierce. Please fuck me.” More, right there, than he had ever managed with Levi.

The room smelled sharp with sex and spicy orange. Pierce’s face was grave and beautiful as he smiled down at Griff.

They shifted position on the mattress, Pierce lifting and parting Griff’s legs so that he was reclining with his exposed and vulnerable ass in Pierce’s naked lap. It was embarrassing and erotic and exciting all at the same time. He shivered as he felt the blunt head of Pierce’s cock rub over his asshole, nudge resistant muscle. Griff bit his lip and pushed down on the familiar scrape and burn—and at the same instant, Pierce groaned and shoved forward, sheathing himself.

There was a moment of overwhelming fullness, of having to accept, coalesce, or be rent in half. Griff forced open his eyes. Pierce stared back at him. There was no closing himself off from it. They were joined in the here and now. They were together in this moment. And this moment felt like forever.

Griff’s mouth curved, and Pierce smiled faintly in reply, no longer talking. He began to move, hips rocking in strong, deliberately timed thrusts, and every stroke seemed to brush across Griff’s prostate, sending hot little jolts of electricity shooting from the base of his spine to the back of his skull.

No hiding like this. No concealing what he was feeling, everything showed on his face. But everything showed on Pierce’s face too.

Griff wriggled, locked his legs around Pierce’s lean waist, and Pierce lost his rhythm for an instant, and then found it, thrusting harder, deeper, pounding to an urgent finish in short strokes. The slap of Griff’s buttocks against Pierce’s muscular thighs, the pinch and press of his balls against the moist heat of Pierce’s groin, Pierce’s soft grunts were doing it for Griff. He threw his head back and yelled, hands knotting in the bedclothes, coming in jets of creamy white, spattering Pierce’s chest and shoulders.

Pierce gave a breathless, ragged laugh, and a moment later he was coming too.

* * *

Some time later Pierce raised himself off Griff and flopped back on the stack of pillows, pulling Griff over so that his head rested on Pierce’s chest. Griff could hear the steady, reassuring beat of Pierce’s heart. Pierce’s fingertips absently traced the bones and damp hollows of Griff’s spine. “Muriel’s under sedation until further notice.”

“I’m not surprised.” His last sight of Muriel that evening had been of her staring into space, her mouth opening and closing like a stranded fish.

“I have to say, I didn’t see that one coming. I’ve never known Muriel to care much about anyone other than herself.”

Griff said slowly, “This is different though. Alvin was her son.”

“What?” Pierce sat up, staring at him. “That’s a new theory.”

“I’m pretty sure of it. I don’t have any proof.”

“Of that I’m sure.”

“Everyone in the family insisted that Alvin was an Arlington, that they could feel it, that the family resemblance was too great to be coincidence. So if you start with the assumption that the family is correct and Alvin was an Arlington, you have to consider how he came into being.”

Pierce snorted. “Came into being? You mean who fathered the bastard?”

“Or mothered him. That’s where we overlooked the obvious.”

“It’s still not obvious to me.”

“Alvin has—had—five potential lines of parentage. Jarrett, Marcus, Matthew, Mike and Muriel. I’m going by Gemma’s journal because she provides a pretty good chronicle of what was happening in the family around the time that Brian would have to have been conceived.”

Pierce shook his head. “This isn’t even circumstantial.”

“Everyone seems to agree that Matthew adored Gemma, and that they stayed devoted to each other even after Brian disappeared. So I don’t think Matthew is viable. According to Gemma, Marcus was still in love with her. She and everyone else kept hoping he would move on, but he didn’t, so I think Marcus is probably a no go. Not for sure. But he’s not my first choice.”

“First choice.” Pierce groaned. “This is pure supposition. Conjecture.”

“It doesn’t mean I’m not right. Mike was getting pregnant, pregnant, and recovering from her pregnancy during the crucial time period. Plus, she wouldn’t have bothered to hide another baby. Why should she? I think she’d have even enjoyed sticking it to her family with another illegitimate pregnancy.”

“Now there I agree.”

“I considered Jarrett—”

Pierce made a choked sound.

“But Jarrett is too meticulous, too much of a control freak not to be aware of any possible illegitimate offspring he might have had.”

“You think Jarrett would...” Pierce was too flabbergasted to continue.

“So that leaves Muriel. According to Gemma, Muriel left home to ‘find herself’ for about a year right around the time period we’re looking at. This is a woman who doesn’t drive.”

“Not driving doesn’t mean anything.” But Pierce sounded thoughtful. “She was gone for quite a while, that’s true. In fact, it was more like eighteen months.”

“No one seems to have known where she was or what she was doing during that time.”

“You think she was dealing with an unwanted pregnancy?”

“I do, yeah. I think she had the baby and adopted it out and then flew home to the nest. And I think that’s one reason Alvin didn’t reject the idea of a paternity test outright. I think he knew the results would be confusing in a way that might work for him. I also think that’s why Muriel was so thrilled and so happy about ‘Brian’s’ return, because from what I’ve seen of her so far, that’s not the reaction I’d have expected.”

Pierce made a noncommittal noise.

“And finally, I think that’s how Alvin came to have Tiny Teddy. I don’t think Tiny Teddy disappeared with Brian that night. I think the toy remained at Winden Hall. I think somewhere along the line Muriel came across it and hung on to it. Either because she didn’t want to upset Gemma or because in the back of her mind she thought it might come in useful at some point.”

“You think she planned this from the beginning?”

“No. But I think maybe the idea took root along the way. Maybe she looked Alvin up for other reasons or maybe she ran into him by coincidence, but I think she did come up with the idea to pass him off as Brian and thereby get her son back and inherit the entire estate—which she always believed she was entitled to as the eldest child. And I think Alvin would have been more than happy to go along with it.”

“That’s a lot of hunch and some guesswork but not much else.”

“But possible, right?”

“It’s not impossible.” Pierce considered. “Then where is Brian?”

Griff closed his eyes. “Where he’s always been. That’s what I mean about Brian’s kidnapping not being connected to Alvin’s appearance—or murder.”

“But whoever killed Alvin—”

“No.” Griff opened his eyes. “Whoever killed Alvin is not necessarily the same person who took Brian. In fact, I’m sure it’s not the same person. I think what you said is true, unfortunately. Somebody was counting on their share of the estate.”

“Not Muriel obviously.”

“Not Muriel. She had every reason to want Alvin alive and inheriting.”

Pierce was watching him closely. He said slowly, “You seem to think you know who took Brian.”

Griff looked away. “I’m not sure. I don’t have any proof and you’d think I was nuts if I told you.”

“You think you can get proof?”

There was something in Pierce’s voice. Griff threw him an uncertain look. “If it’s there, now that I know what I’m looking for. I’m not positive though. And if I can’t prove it, it’s better to stay quiet.”