Page 97 of Blinding Light

Cyprian shrugged, wiping off non-existent dust from his shirt.

“You don’t know? He won’t be upset, you know, if you need time to develop your skills.”

When his lover still didn’t answer, Moargan just pressed him close, eyes fluttering when he felt his puffs of air against the exposed skin of his throat. “I wish I could teleport this Waltr to our place so that we don’t have to move.”

Cyprian smiled in the crook of his neck.

“Hmm. Now that would make my father upset, removing my old room. He’s sentimental like that.” He dropped a kiss onto Cyprian’s head. “Let’s go before we fall asleep. Go home and get warm.”

They climbed off the bed and Cyprian followed him out. He slipped his hand in his and gave him a little squeeze. “Thank you,” he murmured. “For showing me your room. It means a lot to me.”

And such honesty, coming from Cyprian, meant a lot to Moargan too.

When they got home, they found the kitchen filled with Luminary. Vandor and Yure sat at the bar, sipping from their beer, and Aviel stood behind the stove, cooking. More Luminary stood by the window, half in position, half casually hung back as they chatted with each other.

“What the fuck’s going on here?” Moargan called out when they entered. “Some house party you forgot to invite me to?”

Vandor barked an order and two uniforms vanished immediately. “Sorry, you came in when we were switching shifts,” he said sheepishly.

Moargan snorted and headed for the fridge. “Yeah, right. Well, you’re lucky, because we wanted to get the fuck out of here anyway. Want a beer, lover?”

Yure came up, a folder in his hand. “A word before you do?” He drew his gaze to Cyprian. “Hi, Cyprian.”

“Hi, Yure.” Cyprian leaned in and snatched the beer from Moargan’s hand, taking a provocative sip. He grinned. “I’ll see you in the bedroom.”

Fuck, when he said it like that…Moargan growled, unable to swallow his desire away. This guy was going to be the end of him.

Yure cleared his throat and Moargan whipped his head around realizing he’d been staring for way too long. Cyprian was gone, but his friends were still here. Smirking. Glowering at each one of them, he finally dragged his gaze to his best friend. “This better be good.”

“Stop thinking with your dick,” Aviel called from the stove. When Moargan stared at those golden eyes, they flashed in a silent challenge. Always a challenge. A gift from his upbringing in foster care. “He’s found something.”

“More contracts,” Yure confirmed. He placed the folder on the bar. “It took them a while to collect all the information, but here it is.”

“What else could there be? I even got a photo of baby Cyprian.” His chest fluttered at the memory of that tiny baby.

“The siblings.” Yure slid the folder over the bar and waited until Moargan flicked through the documents. “Check the bottom of the last page. We finally have the name and signature of Cyprian’s mother.”

“So she agreed to the adoption.”

“She did,” Yure confirmed. “Of all her children. You’re looking at all four adoption contracts. All four babies had the same parents, meaning that Celia Fandi is also Cyprian’s mother.”

“What about these other women Fandi mentioned?”

“Liar liar liar,” Aviel sang. He was cutting carrots.

Moargan let out a heavy sigh. He’d hoped Ludo Fandi had forced his wife, and the missing signature on Cyprian’s contract had been a good sign. Turned out she had signed the document regardless. Cyprian would be devastated. “So Cyprian has three full-blooded siblings? Why the fuck would that asshole lie about such a thing?” Something throbbed in his chest at the cruelty of it.

“Filthy liar’s going to get in trouble. Trouble. Trouble.” Aviel’s eyes were a golden flame, ready to shoot.

Moargan stared back at the documents. “Do we have any information on these siblings? Any current whereabouts?”

“No,” said Yure. “That’s impossible to know, Moargan. I’m sorry. They were shipped off-planet.”

“Can we at least see which planets they were sent to?”

“That’s not how this works,” Aviel said. Moargan stared at the way the knife slashed the rest of the carrots, glittering in its rapidity. “They’ll need to return by themselves. If they survived the injections, the Dariux in them would call them home. To Helion.”

“The Dariux will call them home?”

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