Hudson (Anderson Billionaires #4) - Melody Anne Page 0,31

we searched, we didn’t hear from her again.”

Damien tried to speak, and Joseph held up his hand, silently asking him to wait.

“From what we’ve found, that baby was you. Neilson had come back to Sandra when you were approximately three months old and took you away while she was sleeping. He took you to Maria to replace the infant she’d lost. Your mother, your real mother, Sandra, was already pregnant with Finn at that point, and he figured he’d make both of the women in his life happy. The sad thing was that they were only living about a hundred miles apart for nearly a year, and of course, neither wife knew of the other. Neilson decided he wanted to be with Sandra, your biological mother, and also the mother of Finn, Noah, Brandon, Hudson, and Crew,” Joseph told him as he pointed to each man in turn.

“We’ve never heard anything of another baby,” Crew said, looking suspicious of this story.

“When Nielson disappeared with Damien, he didn’t come back for six weeks according to the reports. Sandra was panicked, but she was in a remote village in a foreign land and didn’t speak the language, and though she tried getting help, there was no one to help her. She’d wanted to give up, not knowing what she’d do. She might’ve given up had it not been for the fact that she was carrying another child.”

“How did you find this out?” Finn asked.

“They finally tracked down the village where you were all born. There were four people able to collaborate this story. After six weeks, Neilson returned. He told Sandra the baby had been taken, and he’d gone after the kidnappers. He said he hadn’t planned to come back to her until he’d found him, but he discovered the baby had been killed. He said there was nothing they could do and the best thing for the sake of their unborn child was to grieve the loss and get rid of all traces of him ever having been there,” Joseph said.

He reached into a briefcase and pulled out a picture. He handed it to Damien, who stared down at the image. It was of a woman holding a baby, a bright smile on her lips, her eyes sparkling with joy.

“A neighbor had this picture. It was taken a few days before you disappeared.” He pulled out another picture. It was of the same woman, her belly round, her lips turned down, and her eyes dull. “This was several months later. She was about seven months along with Finn at that point, and still in pain over her loss of you.”

“So Neilson faked his death after leaving me with his castoff wife, and then went back to Sandra?” Damien asked.

“Yes, that’s exactly what he did. He was trying to decide if he was going to stay with Maria or Sandra. He chose Sandra,” Joseph said.

“Lucky her,” Noah said, bitterness and sarcasm in his voice.

“No, it’s lucky for our family that we got all of you. But the only lucky day your mother had was when Neilson actually disappeared from her life,” Joseph said. “And I’m sorry you didn’t get to know Sandra, Damien; even though she’d been put through hell, she truly was a wonderful woman and mother.”

“I don’t know how to process this,” Damien said.

“This isn’t something anyone processes in a minute, or even a week. This is something that will haunt all of us for a very long time to come,” Finn said. “I’d like to see all of the paperwork from the investigators”— he turned to Damien —“if that’s okay with you.”

Damien seemed shocked that Finn was asking. “Apparently it has to do with you as much as it has to do with me,” Damien told him. “I don’t know what to think about any of it. I can’t make it compute in my brain. I’ve been so angry with so many people for a very long time. My wife helped me heal, helped me forgive. And now I have to go through the entire process all over again.” He seemed defeated in that moment.

“This time you have brothers to help you figure it out. It won’t be easy, but maybe we can all have some sort of understanding if we do this together,” Brandon said.

“It’ll take time to get used to the word brother,” Damien said.

“That part won’t take us any time at all,” Brandon said with a grin. “I mean what’s the dif between four or five