Jackson sits across from me, places the folder down, and starts eating as if he has all the time in the world, not that he is sitting on a ticking bomb.
“I can’t take it any longer, please, Jackson, what have you found?”
Jackson puts his silverware down and grins. “I’ve gone through everything.”
The room goes silent.
I try to breathe.
“They’re real,” Jackson continues. “Rowan and Callum Sinclair. Confirmed identities. Confirmed birth records. Confirmed parentage.”
My stomach drops. They’re real. Fuck.
He keeps going. “They grew up in Scotland since they were babies. Looks like her parents had moved to Australia for a bit, but when she got pregnant at seventeen and then again at eighteen, they hightailed it back to Scotland.”
She was so young. What the hell was my father doing with someone so young? Oh shit. No. The worst-case scenario runs through my mind.
“D?” Charlie asks, noticing my inner torture.
“We don’t have anything to confirm what her relationship was with your father, D, but he is the father of her children. A DNA test was done by her family.”
I swallow hard, but it doesn’t seem to clear the knot in my throat. “She was so young.”
Jackson nods. “All I can find is that they were in the country for two years and then moved back. Their mother is a Lady, too, her own parents having titles. Not sure how they got tangled up in a religious cult in Australia, but it’s not the first time I’ve seen something like this.”
“Sounds like they left after she got pregnant a second time,” Sienna adds.
“Probably because my father was messing around with a fucking minor.” I sneer. Charlie reaches out and rubs my back.
“As horrible as it sounds, I think you’re right, and judging from what the letter says, she was scared for her life and kept it a secret from everyone,” Jackson explains. “What I do know is a couple of years later, she married another aristocrat and he adopted the boys. That’s why they have the surname Sinclair.”
“Derrick, your brothers are literally royalty,” Vanessa teases, trying to lighten the mood.
“Does that mean Olivia knows them?” Christian asks.
Jackson nods. “She does. Callum, the younger brother, is in London. Her sister Penny is friends with him as they used to party together. Olivia said, other than being a playboy, he seems like a good guy.” Wow. What a small world. “They’re good men, Derrick. Clean records. Stable careers. No red flags. They’ve been genuinely trying to find you for the past year, and I honestly think they want a relationship.”
My throat tightens. “You do?”
Jackson smiles. “Yeah, buddy, I do.”
This is a lot to take in. Charlie slides his hand into mine under the table. He always knows when I need him.
“Rowan, the older one, lives in New York. He works in investments. He is a year younger than you. Not married,” Jackson explains. Oh. A year younger. Shit. “And Callum is a year younger than him, and he works in finance too.”
“That’s awesome. You guys are all similar in age,” Evan adds. Sienna elbows him. “What?”
Evan’s right, it is kind of nice that we are all around the same age.
“Why did they reach out through a PI and not directly?” Charlie asks.
“I’m assuming because of Derrick’s name change, they couldn’t find him, it would have been hard to track down a needle in a haystack,” Jackson states.
“What do I do?” I whisper.
The whole table waits.
Jackson answers first.
