The Bride and the Bargain. Allison Leigh
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at him.
“—nor about having grandchildren to carry on the Hunt name,” the old man continued. “But the heart attack made me face some hard truths I’d ignored up until then. I could have died. I could die tomorrow.”
Gray still had a hard time imagining that. Harry seemed too vital. Too stubborn. Still, though Harry was a machine in many ways, he was an aging one.
His father rose, pressing his fists against the desktop. “I finally realized that left to your own devices, you four never will get married, which means I’ll never have grandchildren. I don’t intend to leave the future of this family to chance any longer. You have a year. One year. By the end of that year, each of you will not only be married, you will either already have a child or your wife will be expecting one.”
Gray stared, uncharacteristically nonplussed.
“Right.” J.T. finally broke the stunned silence.
Harry ignored their general lack of response. “If any one of you refuses to do so, you’ll all lose your positions in HuntCom and the perks you love so much.”
“You can’t be serious,” Gray finally said, focusing on the bottom line. Harry held controlling interest in HuntCom. Not even if everyone else on the board—Gray and his brothers, Harry’s oldest friend Cornelia and Corny’s four daughters—voted in accord against Harry could they outweigh his votes. He could do pretty much whatever he wanted, but that didn’t mean Gray believed the old man would actually follow through with unseating them.
They were all too good at what they did for HuntCom and the family interests, and Harry—affected by his heart attack or not—knew it.
“I’m deadly serious.” Harry’s eyes didn’t waver.
“With all due respect, Harry, how will you run the company if we refuse to do this?” J.T. asked. As often as Gray thought like Harry, J.T.’s thoughts were on the same wavelength as Gray’s. “I don’t know what Gray, Alex or Justin have going on right now, but I’m in the middle of expansions here in Seattle, in Jansen and at our New Delhi facility. If another architect has to take over my position, it’ll be months before he’s up to speed. Construction delays alone would cost HuntCom a fortune.”
“It wouldn’t matter because if the four of you refuse to agree, I’ll sell off HuntCom in pieces.”
Gray went still, ignoring his vibrating phone. Sell HuntCom? Where the hell did that idea come from?
“The New Delhi facility will be history and I’ll sell Hurricane Island,” Harry warned, his voice edged with steel. The isle was J.T.’s treasured escape and the idea of losing it probably hit J.T. harder than the idea of losing the company.
Then Harry turned his painfully serious gaze on Justin. “I’ll sell HuntCom’s interest in the Idaho ranch if you don’t marry and have a child.” Without waiting for a response, he looked at Alex. “I’ll shut down the foundation if you refuse to cooperate.”
The weight of the brothers’ fury filled the room.
Then Harry finally looked at Gray, delivering the only possible remaining blow. “HuntCom won’t need a president because there will no longer be a company for you to run.”
He was Harry’s second in command. Harry had started HuntCom, but Gray was HuntCom.
Selling the company itself—the very root of everything they had—was a fine threat. One that Gray wasn’t about to let himself believe. He had only to look at Harry’s behavior since the heart attack. He’d scaled back only some of his workload since then. To Gray, that looked like plenty of proof that even Harry couldn’t part ways all that easily with the company he’d built. He’d never sell.
“But that’s insane,” Alex said, clearly trying to sound reasonable and not quite making the mark. “What do you hope to accomplish by doing this, Harry?”
“I mean to see you all settled, with a family started before I die. With a decent woman who’ll make a good wife and mother.”
Gray swallowed an oath. That was rich. In the four marriages that had resulted in the four Hunt brothers, Harry had never managed to make one with a decent woman.
“The women you marry have to win Cornelia’s approval,” their father concluded.
“Does Aunt Cornelia know about this?” Justin demanded. Cornelia Fairchild was the widow of Harry’s best friend. Like Gray, Justin obviously found it hard to believe that she was a willing accomplice to Harry’s fit of madness.
“Not yet,” Harry allowed.
Justin looked relieved. Gray understood why, but he couldn’t say that he was as confident that their honorary aunt would have any sway in derailing Harry from his plan. She was more a mother figure to them than their own mothers had been, but that didn’t mean her allegiance wouldn’t stick with the old man. Cornelia and Harry went way back. She, along with her husband, George, and Harry had been friends since childhood.
Harry lifted his hand. “She’s a shrewd woman. She’ll know if any of the women aren’t good wife material.”
Too bad she hadn’t chosen Harry’s wives, Gray thought. Their lives would have been considerably different.
Unaware of Gray’s dark thoughts, Harry went on, making the situation even more surreal. “You can’t tell the women you’re rich, nor that you’re my sons. I don’t want any fortune hunters in the family. God knows I married enough of them myself. I don’t want any of my sons making the mistakes I made.”
Then none of them should be courting real disaster by walking down an aisle, Gray thought. Much less trying to procreate.
Justin was still trying to pin down Harry. “So Aunt Cornelia has to approve our prospective brides and they can’t know who we are. Is that all?”
Harry hesitated long enough to make every nerve at the back of Gray’s neck stand at suspicious attention. “That’s all. I’ll give you some time to think about this,” he added into the thick silence.
Not likely, Gray thought, reading his brothers’ faces.
“You have until 8:00 p.m., Pacific daylight time, three days from now,” Harry continued with an infuriating confidence. “If I don’t hear from you to the contrary before then, I’ll tell my lawyer to start looking for a buyer for HuntCom.”
And with that, he left the library.
J.T.’s lips twisted derisively. “I don’t see it happening. He’ll never sell HuntCom.”
“He can’t possibly be serious,” Justin concluded.
Gray shrugged into his jacket. Enough time had been wasted at the shack. He hadn’t known what to expect when Harry’d called him, but he damn sure hadn’t expected this. “We’re in the middle of a buyout. There’s no way he’d consider selling the company until it’s finished and that might be months away. He’s bluffing.”
“How can you be sure?” Alex asked. He freely eschewed the wealth and privilege that came with being a Hunt, but Gray knew that he tolerated the Hunt duty because it allowed him to satisfy his mile-deep humanitarian streak. He would be happy never to have a Hunt dime—only that would mean he couldn’t give it away to someone who did need it. “What if you’re wrong? Do you want to take that chance? Lose everything you’ve worked for over the past eighteen years? I know I sure as hell don’t want to see the foundation shut down…or run by someone else.”
“The only baby Harry’s ever cared about is HuntCom,” Gray said. “There’s no way he won’t do what’s ultimately best for the company. He always does.”
“I sure as hell hope you’re right,” Justin muttered. “Where did he get the idea it was time we all went hunting for brides?”
J.T. made a face, shaking his