“I assure you, there’s no joke.” Gerard leaned back, getting more comfortable. “This little boy is your father’s final son. There are four of you now.”
He picked up the will and began reading again. “It is my wish that the remaining two-thirds share of Andreas Holdings be divided equally among my four sons—Darius, Cade, Nick and Gino.”
Gino.
A baby.
His final half-sibling was a baby!
Darius sucked in a breath, forcing that to sink in, but it wouldn’t. His brain had frozen. He was stunned, speechless and working not to lose his temper over something he couldn’t change. Nick and Cade appeared to be equally shell shocked.
Finally, the business sense Darius had trusted his entire life came to his rescue. “I want a DNA test.”
The smooth leather sofa sighed when Gerard sat forward. He looked down at his entwined fingers, then caught Darius’s gaze. “Your father might not have married Missy Harrington, but he’s named on the birth certificate as Gino’s father. Had Missy not died with your father, you might be fighting her for the company right now.”
“I still want DNA.”
“I understand you’re surprised—”
“Surprised? How about shocked? First our father calls us to the hospital after the accident to tell us that he gave one-third interest in the company to someone else. So we’ll never fully own our own damned company. Then he tells us we have no sense of family and unless we pull together we’re going to lose everything he built. Then he dies. Just like that.” He snapped his fingers. “Now you’re telling us there’s a fourth brother?”
“Mr. Andreas, the very fact that you didn’t know your father had another child is proof that your sense of family leaves a bit to be desired.”
Darius nearly cursed. Who was his womanizing father to tell him that he had no sense of family? His father had abandoned his mother. Hell, Stephone had abandoned him until he was in his teens. And then he’d appeared in Darius’s life only because he had wanted to ensure that Darius went to a good university so he could be groomed to work for Andreas Holdings.
“For decades our father preached that we shouldn’t take family troubles to outsiders.” He rose. “Yet it looks like that’s exactly what he’s done.” He reached for the baby carrier. Now that the shock was receding, things were beginning to sink in and make sense. He didn’t really need DNA to tell him this was his brother. His father had been living with a thirty-year-old woman. It was no shock she’d gotten pregnant. Gino had all the physical markings of an Andreas. With his father’s name on the birth certificate and Gino’s name in the will, this little boy was family. And his father wanted him to care for him. So he would. Unlike his two brothers, Darius had always done what their father had asked.
“We’ll take our brother and go now.”
Whitney held back the carrier. “Dad?”
Gerard said, “There’s more.”
Darius just barely controlled his rising fury. “More? “
“You, Darius, get custody of Gino, but you share it with Whitney.”
He turned his heated gaze on her.
Her yellow hair was probably pretty, but she had it rolled in a tight, no-nonsense bun at the back of her head. Her gray suit hid any hint of the body beneath it. He caught the gaze of her blue-gray eyes. In spite of the fact that she dressed to downplay her appearance, Darius felt a click of attraction. And it was mutual. He saw the flicker in her pretty blue orbs.
“It’s up to you how you divide Gino’s time. If you want to have him three days a week and Whitney four, or if you want to have him for two weeks a month and Whitney two, whatever you choose is up to you two. But she will vote his share at your board of directors meetings.”
This time Darius did curse. But he quickly pulled in a breath, struggling to rein in his temper, and glanced again at Whitney. The click of attraction he’d felt when he’d first looked into her eyes turned into a current of electricity that zapped between them. They were definitely attracted.
If this were any other day, any other time, any other circumstance, he would have pursued her. Peel off a few layers of clothes, take down her hair—he was just about certain he’d find paradise.
But those eyes, those pretty Persian-cat eyes, told him to forget it. It didn’t matter if they were attracted to each other. They had a job to do. Raise Gino. Together.
Whitney stayed perfectly still under Darius Andreas’s scrutiny, though warm, sweet attraction hummed through her. She ignored it. He was a gorgeous man with his dark, brooding good looks, his tailored suit made to accentuate his broad shoulders and trim hips, and his commanding personality. Any woman would react to him. Simply from the way his other brothers hadn’t even spoken since introductions were made, it was clear that Darius was the brother in charge. And that was very sexy.
With his piercing onyx eyes boring into hers, she suppressed a shiver. But she wasn’t worried about falling victim to the attraction. Attractions frequently grew into relationships and relationships made people vulnerable. The pain that had followed the loss of her husband had been indescribable. She’d never put herself through that again. She’d never even let herself get close. She couldn’t be attracted to Darius Andreas. She refused.
Darius squeezed his eyes shut in disgust and popped them open again. “All right. Fine.” He motioned for Whitney to follow him. “Let’s go.”
“Go?”
“If this baby’s on the board, he’s working for a living.”
Whitney’s dad laughed. “Very funny, Darius.”
“I’m not laughing. My father left the company in a sad state. There’s work to do. And nobody’s excused. Since your daughter has his vote, she’ll pull his share of the duty.”
“That’s preposterous—”
“Dad.” Whitney interrupted her father. “It’s okay. I’ve never been one to shirk my responsibilities.” She straightened her shoulders and looked Darius in the eye, accepting his challenge. If he thought he’d intimidate her on day one, he was sadly mistaken. She could handle a little work. “If everybody’s working, then I will, too.”
“All right,” her dad agreed, “but before anybody leaves there’s one more thing.”
Darius turned. His dark eyes were ablaze now.
Whitney’s dad looked from Darius to Cade to Nick and back at Darius again. “With someone else in possession of a one-third share of Andreas Holdings, and four brothers sharing the other two-thirds, you don’t have to be a math scholar to know that individually none of you has controlling interest in the whole company.” He glanced from Darius to Cade to Nick again. “Your father has instructed me to allow the holder of the one-third interest to remain anonymous until she decides how to handle her position. She’s in her seventies, so she may simply want to sit back and enjoy the profits. But if she decides she wants to be active in the company, you had better be united or Andreas Holdings will end up being run by somebody other than an Andreas.”
“We’ll need a few minutes.” Past being shocked by the conditions and warnings coming out of his dad’s lawyer’s mouth, Darius spoke quietly, with the authority of command. “We’d appreciate the use of your office to discuss this.”
Gerard Ross rose. “Whitney and I will take Gino to her office. Have Cynthia call us when you’re ready.”
Gerard and Whitney left the room through a side door and Darius faced his brothers. “This wasn’t exactly how we expected the reading of the will