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"Please Sean. There's something wrong, can't you look into it?" She asked.

"Look into what? Lucas acting weird?"

LAPD Detective Sean Brady sighed. When his stepson's wife, Lauren, had called him at work and asked to meet for lunch, it was a surprise to say the least. He wasn't especially close with his stepson, Lucas, or his daughter-in-law. So, when she said she wanted to speak to him about plans for Brady's upcoming forty-third birthday, he knew it was really about something else.

"He's not just acting weird, there's more to it than that. He's cold, distant, sometimes he locks himself in his study. And at least once a month, he's out all night, always with some pathetic excuse." She glanced round at the surrounding tables, checking that no-one was listening. "And we haven't ... you know ... not for months."

The detective winced; it was far more information than he had asked for. "So, you think he's having an affair?" Only after hearing the question out loud, did it occur to Brady just how hurtful it could be.

"Lucas isn't like that. He wouldn't cheat, he's not a player."

Brady managed to keep his face implacable. He thought back to what it had been like, nine years ago, when he first married Lucas' mother. His stepson was eighteen and he wasn't happy about suddenly having a thirty-three-year-old stepfather. For the first couple of years, they seemed to fight all the time, and the number one argument was the constant stream of girls that Lucas kept bringing to the house.

He was a good-looking boy; a talented athlete and he had some money in his pocket. All the girls liked him, and he liked them. It was understandable that he wanted to have a little fun. All his new stepfather had asked was, that he take it to a hotel, or her place, in fact anywhere, just keep it out of his house.

But the little punk just ignored him, sometimes bringing two girls back at the same time. It didn't help that no matter how hard Brady tried to discipline him, his wife Beverley, would always take her son's side. Things were strained there for a while, but thankfully, Lucas decided to go to college and become an accountant. Once they weren't living together, the two men were able to come to an uneasy truce.

Hearing Lauren now extolling Lucas' virtue was severely testing the detective's poker face.

"I'm sorry, but I had to ask." His voice apologetic. "What do you want me to do?"

Deep down, Brady just didn't want to get involved.

"You're a cop, isn't there a number you can call or something?"

He rolled his eyes. "No, there isn't a number I can call, or a database somewhere that will tell me all his secrets. If you really want me to find out what's going on, then I'll have to start prying into your private business. That's how real policework is done."

Her eyes dropped down, staring at her coffee on the table. Brady could see from the look on her face that she hadn't even considered the reality of what she was asking him to do.

"Are you ready for me to go digging through your bank records, credit card statements, you name it." He said, confident this was going to put her off.

With a sudden burst of decision, she answered. "Yes, yes I am. I need to know."

"Are you absolutely sure? Because once you know something, there's no going back.

"I'm sure."

"You better be." Brady said resignedly. "Okay I'll help you. But on one condition. Regardless of what I find, whether it's everything or nothing, you don't tell my wife or Lucas that I was the one who found it."

"Thank you." She said hurriedly, worrying that he might change his mind.

***

Brady arranged a time to visit the house when his stepson wouldn't be home. If Lucas was locking himself in his study, then that seemed an obvious place to start. After reassuring Lauren that he would tell her if he found something that she needed to know, she finally agreed to let him search on his own. Everybody in a marriage has secrets, and Brady figured that even a pain in the ass like Lucas was entitled to keep some of his.

It was a typical guy's study. In the corner there was a small green filing cabinet. Along the back wall were bookshelves with office-related textbooks, trashy action and thriller novels and some DVDs. In the centre of the room, was a large wooden desk with framed photographs and ornaments (that were obviously gifts), and dominating the desktop was Lucas' computer, an iMac.

He sat down at the desk and started rummaging through the drawers. There was plenty of pieces of paper, old batteries, pens, and assorted clutter - but nothing of note. Brady turned on the computer and was surprised to see it didn't need a password. He placed his own laptop on the desk and plugged it into Lucas' machine. He clicked an icon and started the LAPD's own cyber-crime search program, and then began his own manual search of the computer's files and folders. To his suspicious amazement, his stepson's computer turned up completely clean. Not even a questionable browser history.

The detective turned his attention to the small green filing cabinet. He tried the drawers, they were locked. He scanned his eyes around the room, wondering where Lucas might have hidden the key. After a few moments, he returned to the desk and ran his hand along the smooth underside. Brady grinned when he felt the cold metal against his fingertips. The taped-on key peeled away without difficulty, and he returned to the filing cabinet, smiling when the key turned easily in the lock.

There was the usual stuff, marriage paperwork, birth certificates, medical insurance, all neatly filed. Sean flicked through the folders until he found the bank statements and then he lifted the entire folder out of the drawer. He sat down at the desk and started leafing through the statements. One thing jumped out at the detective straightaway, around a year ago, the month-on-month final balance had begun dropping fast.

Flicking from one statement to the next he noticed that there was a substantial transfer each month directly to a numbered bank account. For nine months, his stepson had made a transfer of $2500 to the account and in the last four months the monthly transfer had increased to $5000.

At this rate there was probably six months of cash in the account. Brady sat back and sighed, was Lucas squirreling his money away into a secret account, getting ready to divorce his wife? He noted the bank details, snapped a photo of the most recent statement, and returned the folder back to the cabinet.

As he did, he noticed a small black rectangle at the bottom of the cabinet drawer. Lifting it out, he realised it was a smartphone in a leather sleeve. When he tried to access it, the password pin-screen lit up, he could see the phone was almost at full charge.

He looked at the numbered keypad and then tried Lucas' date of birth, without success. Then he tried Lauren's birthday, his wife's, his own, none of them worked. The detective was eager to get into the phone, it was kept fully charged and locked up in a filing cabinet, it was obviously important. But if he couldn't crack the pin number, he would never know why. Then, Brady had an idea, he tried Lucas' biological father's birthday, and the lock screen melted away.

The detective had a quick scroll through the message apps, there was only one stored contact on the phone, but no messages. He checked for pictures, there were none, but there were nine randomly named video files. The curious detective clicked on the oldest video which was about a year old.

The first few minutes had nothing on them at all; just a high-definition static shot of a rather fancy looking apartment with a burned in date and time in the bottom-right hand corner, 4th April, 8:24 PM. Brady dragged his finger along the screen until the video showed two men walking into the room.

He viewed the video with a policemen's eye; one man was black, powerfully built, a little over six foot tall. He was wearing white sneakers, red running shorts and nothing else. The other man was white, roughly the same height as his friend, and rather incongruously wearing an expensive business suit. The quality of the recording meant that even on the palm sized screen of the phone it was easy to see the suited man was his stepson, Lucas. The two men were laughing, exchanging barely audible small talk. While the detective brought the phone closer, straining to hear what was being said, the two men started kissing.

Brady stopped breathing for a moment. He knew to expect the unexpected when you went digging into people's private affairs, but he wasn't expecting this.

He sat in the desk chair staring wide-eyed at the phone as he watched his stepson being led to a white leather couch in the middle of the room. The black man in running shorts broke their kiss by playfully pushing Lucas back onto the seat. Then slowly he sank to his knees in front of Lucas and lowered his head into his lap.

"Is Lucas secretly gay? If he is then it might explain his strange behaviour."

He asked himself.

The camera was capturing the action side-on, and it was plain that Lucas wasn't being coerced. Brady could clearly hear his stepson muttering with approval as the kneeling man eagerly went to work on his cock. The man in red running shorts undoubtedly knew what he was doing, because it wasn't long until Lucas was groaning with pleasure. His head was tipped back, resting against the back of the couch, his mouth open, moaning in appreciation.

"Even if he's gay, why the bank payments? Is he planning to divorce Lauren?"

Sean's thoughts were interrupted, by another loud throaty groan from the phone. His eyes darted to the study door, worried that someone might walk in wondering what the noise was.

Suddenly, the detective was struck with the uncomfortable realisation that he was watching his stepson, having his cock sucked by another man. Like every other man in the world, the detective watched online porn from time to time. But he had never watched two men together before, he'd never even been curious to watch it. But this wasn't just two random guys, one of them was his stepson. His finger hung over the screen ready to stop it, but for some reason he didn't.

"Strange payments, hidden phones, pornographic videos. What is all this about?"

If he was going to help Lucas, then he needed answers, not more questions.

The detective kept watching as the man in running shorts started to pull down Lucas' suit trousers. Brady's stepson helpfully raised his hips, feeding the kneeling black man more of his stiff prick at the same time. It looked intense, Lucas was throbbing hard and loving every second of it. The man in shorts was obviously incredibly good at sucking cock. As he considered this, Sean suddenly became aware of his cock swelling in his pants. Almost instantly, he blushed and embarrassedly stopped the video, unsettled by his body's reaction.

"Blackmail. That has to be the reason. Someone has gotten hold of these videos and is threatening to expose Lucas if he doesn't pay."

It explained everything, he thought, happy to distract himself from the stirring in his crotch.

Satisfied with his new theory, Sean started to tidy things up, making sure to put everything back in its proper place. He was about to put the phone back when it occurred to him to copy the videos. He nodded to himself, it made sense to collect as much evidence as he could. Without another thought he plugged the phone into his laptop and copied the files onto a USB stick.

When he stepped out of the study, Lauren was waiting for him, her arms crossed.

"That didn't take long. Is that a good, or a bad sign?" She asked.

"So far, so good." He said, having no idea what to tell her.

With some rambling words and dismissive gestures, he made his excuses and left.

* * *

The detective went home that evening as usual. Over dinner, his wife Beverley, talked to him about something, but he wasn't listening. All the time she spoke, his mind drifted to the laptop bag and the USB stick within.

"What were those videos? And why when I was watching them did my cock start to get hard?"

After watching something boring and brainless on the television, they went to bed. It was the same old nightly routine, brush teeth, wash face, peck on the cheek, lights out.

After an hour in bed staring at the ceiling, unable to settle, he admitted to himself that it was useless. Unlike his wife, who was cheerfully snoring away in a frilly eye mask, he wasn't going to get any sleep tonight. Being careful not to wake her, he slipped out of the bed and made his way downstairs. Collected his laptop, sat down in the lounge, opened the computer, and put in some earbuds.

After furtively glancing at the stairs one last time, he opened the first video and dragged the pointer to where he had left it earlier. Watching on the laptop, was more immersive. The image was so much bigger, he could see Lucas' expression, the rapture on his face as the kneeling man skilfully worked his cock. The sound was right in his ear, every moan and slurp. Sean felt his own manhood stiffening almost immediately. The slow patient blowjob looked unbelievably good.

It was clear the kneeling man's skills were making Sean's stepson very hot. Lucas was hurriedly loosening his tie, panting for breath. Constantly groaning with pleasure, he began peeling off the rest of his clothes, until he was completely naked.

After fifteen more minutes of skilful sucking, Lucas finally blew his load, right into the kneeling man's mouth. He roared loudly into Sean's earbuds as he came. The man in running shorts kept sucking, obviously swallowing his sauce, prolonging the intense orgasm until finally Lucas nodded that it was over. After a few more moments of patient licking, the man in running shorts calmy stood up and with a wink, walked away confidently, disappearing through a doorway.

The player turned black as the video ended, for a moment he considered closing the laptop, but even as he thought this he was staring at the next file in the folder.

Sean could see on the computer that the next video was ninety-four minutes long. He clicked on it and instantly saw from the timestamp, that it followed directly on from the first video on the same day. The man in red running shorts walked into the bedroom and Lucas wasn't far behind.

For the next hour and a half Sean watched unblinking as his stepson was licked, sucked, and fucked in every conceivable way that he could imagine and in quite a few that he couldn't. The detective was amazed by Lucas' black companion, Lucas wasn't a small guy, but this man threw him round the bed like he was a toy. He never seemed to tire or need to rest after coming, he just kept going, like some inhumanly potent sexual athlete. The man fucked Lucas to a standstill and left his stepson sprawled motionless on the bed. Then he walked calmly out of shot, presumably for a drink or maybe a shower.

It was hard to tell if Lucas was exhausted, euphoric or both. But there was no ambiguity about the watching detective's own physical response; his cock was throbbing so hard it ached. He had thought about relieving himself several times during the video, but the thought of jacking off while watching two men fuck, let alone his own stepson, made him uncomfortable.

Brady decided to hunt down some girl-on-girl online porn to get off to. After just a few clicks he found a video, and a few seconds later, he got his release. It was a quick but very intense orgasm. His cock's hunger sated he made his way back up to bed. Half an hour later, his cock was raging hard again and before he had a chance to think about it, he slipped back downstairs to see what was on the third video.

* * *

When the alarm in the bedroom woke his wife, Sean had only been back in bed an hour. He had watched all nine videos and not got a wink of sleep.

Breakfast was quick, a coffee and some toast, another peck on the cheek and off to work. When he got there, he called his friend in the Commercial Crimes Division and ran the bank details. The information came back within five minutes, the account belonged to someone called Michael Terrell, and was registered to a very exclusive address down in Gallery Row. The guy had no priors, no aliases, nothing. Sean had spent last night hoping the account would be in his stepson's name - it would have made everything so much simpler. With each turn, he became more certain that Lucas was being blackmailed.

Sean tried desperately not to think about last night. If he tried hard enough, he could almost convince himself that it had been a strange dream. The sooner this matter was settled the sooner things could get back to normal and he could delete those files and delete some unsettling feelings along with them. He decided that he would go and see the mysterious Mr. Michael Terrell tonight, flash his badge, and scare off the bastard who was blackmailing his stepson.

* * *

Detective Sean Brady looked at the address again to make sure. He knew it was an exclusive address, but he hadn't anticipated a private penthouse elevator. It was a little after nine o'clock and he had told his wife he was going out for a drink with a few of the guys. It was Friday night after all, it was a reasonable excuse. That should give him enough time to scare off this blackmailer and then get his head together before heading home.

He buzzed the intercom, waiting impatiently as it trilled repeatedly at him. Finally, a calm voice came through the speaker.

"Can I help you?"

"I hope so, are you Michael Terrell?"

"Who wants to know?"

"Detective Sean Brady, LAPD."

"Well in that case I guess you better come up."

The doors of the private elevator opened, and he stepped inside. It might be exclusive, but it wasn't fast, the elevator took nearly a minute to go up eleven floors to the top.

As the door opened a sweaty middle-aged man, with sparse hair was coming down the hallway of the apartment. He was dressed in what looked like an expensively tailored grey suit, but even then, it still didn't fit him very well.

"Michael Terrell?" Asked Brady.

"Eh, no." The man replied, his voice annoyingly nasal.

He pushed past in a hurry and pressed the button to close the doors.

The hallway of the apartment was surprisingly old fashioned, with white mock-cornicing and cream painted walls. Ornate mirrors were hung on either side, all the way down the corridor. As he walked down, the detective looked left and right and was greeted by the infinite repetition of his reflection vanishing into the depths of the mirrors.

"Hello?" He called out. A little nervous that there seemed to be no-one there to meet him.

Somewhere in the background. non-descript saxophone music played quietly. There was a feint scent of musk or cologne in the air. Upon reaching the main room at the end of the corridor, Brady stopped dead in his tracks. He instantly recognised the room with its white leather sofa from Lucas' videos.

Sitting in an armchair, the other side of a table from the sofa, was the sexual athlete of last night's viewing. He was looking right at Brady, smiling confidently. It was unmistakably the man in red running shorts. But now, he was wearing baggy silk lounge trousers. The sheer white fabric contrasted with the dark skin of his exposed muscled torso. He was sitting with his legs crossed confidently, holding a heavy glass tumbler of scotch in his hand.

Now that the detective could see him in person, Brady thought he was a little taller than he seemed on the video, maybe 3 inches over six foot tall. He looked roughly 210 pounds, all of it toned, lean muscle, there was scarcely a scrap of fat on him. Mr Terrell was even more physically impressive in person than he had been on the video.