Page 79 of Secret Heir For The Billionaire Twin

Julian rests one hand against the edge of the table.

“No.”

The answer comes quickly enough to surprise me.

“What did you think you’d do?”

“Engineering.”

“Just engineering?”

“Yes.”

“No boardrooms?”

“Not by choice.”

I turn toward him.

“So if the Blackwell name wasn’t attached to you, you would’ve built things and let someone else run the company.”

“That was the idea.”

There is no bitterness in his tone, but there is something more complicated beneath it.

“What changed?” I ask.

“My father needed me.”

The answer is simple, and I understand immediately that there is more behind it than he intends to explain.

I look back at the photograph.

“That sounds like inheritance without anyone actually saying the word.”

Julian’s gaze settles on me.

“Most inheritance works that way.”

The conversation shifts before I can stop it.

“What about you?” he asks.

“If no one expected anything from you?”

I smile faintly. “That’s harder.”

“You ask harder questions than that every day.”

“That’s different.”

“How?”

“Because they’re about other people.”

Julian waits.

I look down at the folders in front of me, then run my fingers along the edge of one.