Page 78 of Forever King

“No, and why do you always think the worst of me?” I ask, dreading when I’ll actually get the real reason I rushed down here out of my mouth.

He sits down behind his desk again and sighs. “I deserve that. I’m sorry, Kellen. You’ve been an asset here for years. I shouldn’t have asked that. You aren’t the same man you were when we had to hire Salem to get you out of that mess years ago. Now tell me what’s going on.”

His mention of Salem makes my heart sink. She trusted me to not be that man, as Matthias calls it, and I swear to God I haven’t been. I’ve never caused a second of trouble here at King Industries since then. I’ve been a good employee and a goodboyfriend. Hell, even my brothers would say I’m not the same asshole guy I used to be.

Still, she’s never going to be okay with this. Never.

“Kellen, you’re making me worried. What the hell is going on?” Matthias demands, his patience evaporating.

I don’t know how to answer him, so I just blurt out what I know. “Amelia Martin, a woman I had a relationship with right before Salem, died a couple months ago. Her sister is Emily Martin. She called me today to tell me that Amelia’s four-year-old son, Elias, is mine.”

The words fly out of my mouth like they can’t wait to escape from my head. When I finish talking, I look across the desk at my brother and see he’s stunned. His mouth hangs open, and he stares at me wide-eyed.

“Holy shit! I always expected this kind of thing to happen one day, but now that it has, I’m shocked.”

“What do you mean you expected it? Why from me? Why not from Marius?” I ask, wondering why my oldest brother feels the need to kick me when I’m down.

“Because you were a bigger dog than he was,” he says before switching into CEO mode. “Onto this child Emily Martin says is yours. Is there any chance she’s just looking for a payday? It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know you have money.”

God, I wish that could be the case, but my gut says no. “If that were the case, wouldn’t her sister have gotten in touch with me four years ago?”

“Maybe, maybe not. She and her sister are two different people. You said her sister died a couple months ago, so if she was looking to get money from you, it would be now.”

I nod since that makes some sense. “Maybe.”

Matthias springs into action, turning to his laptop to search for something. “I think we need a PI for this. We need someonewho can find out all there is to know about these Martin women and this little boy.”

While I fantasize about this PI he gets telling me it’s all a hoax or a money grab, Matthias calls the guy. “Greene, what’s new? You know how it is. Same old, same old. Yes, Ava loved the gift for the baby.”

As the man talks, my brother covers his phone and whispers, “I can’t remember what he sent. Damn! I think it might have been soup, but that doesn’t sound right.”

I can’t help Matthias with his problem. I’ve got my own, and they’re much bigger than forgetting some lame gift someone gave his family.

“Greene, I’ve got a project I need you to work on for me and my brother Kellen. Here, let me put you on speaker so we can all be part of this conversation.”

A second later, I hear a man’s voice come through Matthias’s phone. “Okay, what’s up?” he asks in a gruff voice almost as deep as my brother’s assistant’s voice.

Matthias points at me to talk, so I start explaining all I know. “A woman called me today. Emily Martin. She’s the sister of a woman named Amelia who I knew a few years ago and died two months ago in some train accident.”

The PI jumps in and says, “A train crash? That’s not something you hear every day.”

Ignoring his comment, I continue. “This Emily says Amelia had a baby four years ago that’s mine.”

Without missing a beat, Greene asks, “Any chance it could be?”

“No. Not at all,” I say initially, but my confidence quickly fades away. “Well, I guess anything’s possible, but I find it hard to believe I’ve never heard anything about this supposed son of mine until today.”

“Okay, what’s this Amelia’s last name? Was it Martin too?”

I wince as Matthias stares at me in what seems to be growing disgust. “I don’t know.” Feeling defensive, I say, “What? We weren’t planning for a goddamned future. We hooked up a few times. Last names were the last thing on our minds.”

My brother cringes, but Greene just says, “I’ll start with her name as Martin and see what I can do from there. Do you know the child’s name?”

“Elias,” I answer, slowly growing used to a name I’d never heard in my life before this morning.

“Okay. Any idea when he was born?”

I shake my head. “No. All I know is he’s four, his name is Elias, and he lives with his aunt Emily Martin. She’s his guardian now.”