His words stopped me cold. I could hear my own heart beat like drums inside me. The pounding of my heart was so loud it drowned out any other sound.

What was Ayden saying?

I observed the scene unfold before me almost as if I was out of my own body. I saw myself standing there just as if I were watching a scene from a movie. I saw Ayden sitting in the chair leaning forward on his hands with an evil smirk on his face. Blood trickled from his nose and mouth. Amber was shouting something to me as she held my hand.

But I didn’t hear a word she said.

My heart continued to thunder in my ears.

The look on Amber’s face said it all as she paled dramatically at the words Ayden was speaking.

But again, I didn’t hear him either. I watched with strange detachment as they argued back and forth. Amber tugged on my hand.

Looking down at myself, I noticed my hand was still clutched at my shoulder with Amber’s dress covering my wound. Blood had soaked the garment and was beginning to drip down my arm. Surely, the pain from that wound must be overwhelming.

But I didn’t feel a thing.

“ASH!” Amber’s sharp fingernails dug into my hand.

Suddenly, I was slammed back into my body. The pain from my shoulder exploded inside me.

And I could hear everything.

“So, Ash, did I shock you? Or couldn’t you see the resemblance between us all along?” Ayden slowly stood up next to the chair.

“What?” I shook my head to clear it.

“He’s your brother.” Amber muttered still in shock.

“My brother? How can that be?” Snapping to my senses, I pushed the pain aside.

Ayden chuckled.

“My name is Ayden Donovan, but it should’ve been Ayden Blackthorne.”

“So, my father is…yours?” I thought of Rita and all the other girlfriends my father had had.

Ayden began to pace the concrete floor as Amber kept a tight grip on the gun in her other hand.

“Yes, he is.”

“Then, who was your mother? Was it Rita? Terri?” I tried to think of all the women I’d known my father to be with. Perhaps it was some woman I never knew about.

Ayden shook his head.

“No, but you know her, Ash. You know her quite well.”

Again, I felt my heart began to thunder.

I swallowed hard trying to wrap my mind around it all.

“Enough with the cat and mouse bullshit, Ayden. Tell me!” My voice echoed throughout the room.

“My mother….let’s see, well, she wasn’t the best mom that was for sure. No, she let drugs rule her life much like your mother did, Ash.”

I closed my eyes. I couldn’t remain standing any longer. I collapsed against the wall slowly allowing myself to sink down.

“Ash, are you okay?” Amber knelt down beside me.

I nodded.

“He’s bleeding heavily, Ayden. I’ve got to get him to a hospital. Please, can’t you help us?” Amber pleaded with him. Blood began to pool on the floor next to me. I felt so faint. The lights in the room began to dim and Amber’s face floated before me.

Ayden stood up walking towards us. He rubbed his own bleeding face.

“What makes you think I would?”

“Because he’s your brother.”

I heard them argue back and forth over me until I thought I would pass out. I managed to choke out the one question burning in my mind.

“Tell me, Ayden, why didn’t my father tell me about you?”

Ayden’s voice took on a sinister tone. He crept closer to us.

“Because he wanted to protect his precious son. But he was my father, too.”

I nodded, feeling darkness begin to close over my mind.

I gazed up to meet his hazel eyes. Now I understood why they were so much like my own.

My brother.

“Ayden---“I whispered as I felt myself falling through the darkness.

“ASH!” Amber’s scream was the last thing I heard.

So, I guess you think I’m an asshole. And you’re right about that. But I didn’t mean for it to go down the way it did.

Amber was collateral damage. I loved her very deeply. But when I found out that my father didn’t want a relationship with me, I was devastated. I handled it the only way I knew how.

Stalking her, terrorizing her.

Okay, so now you think I’m blaming my poor coping skills on my traumatic childhood.

Damn right I am.

Growing up with a drug addicted mother in a rundown area of Chicago moving from house to house with a parade of live in lovers was awful to say the least. I never knew who my father was as a child.

It was only when I needed my birth certificate that I realized my mother had been lying to me my entire life.

The man she’d told me was my father wasn’t.

Instead of James Donovan being listed on my birth certificate, I saw the name Ashler Blackthorne.

My heart stopped as I recalled hearing the name Ashler Blackthorne in the media. He was a multi-millionaire real estate guy from New York. His face was plastered throughout tabloid TV shows.

As was his son’s, Ashton Blackthorne.

Ashton Blackthorne, young, handsome, wealthy, and a Harvard grad. He’d recently been made partner at a huge New York investment bank. Ashton Blackthorne, the man all the ladies swooned over, and the tabloids adored. He was always photographed with a bevy of gorgeous women at his side.

And that fucking prick was my brother…..

Here I was, a recent college graduate myself from the University of Chicago. Before I could confront my mother about what I’d uncovered, I got another call from one of her boyfriends claiming she’d overdosed again on heroin.

The year was 2007. I’d had enough of my mother’s constant drama. I was ready for a change. I decided to relocate to New York to find my father.

You know, cash in on the wealthy bloodline.

But when I confronted my father, the great Ashler Blackthorne he didn’t exactly welcome me with open arms.

No, he claimed he didn’t know a thing about me.

Nor did his precious only son, Ashton.

So for the next three years, I bummed around New York City working at various financial jobs just hoping and waiting good old Dad would come around….

* * *

As I watched Amber help my brother up the stairs, I couldn’t help but wonder what my life would’ve been like had Ash known about me.

Shaking my head, I looked around the carnage surrounding me. The concrete floor was covered in blood.

His blood.

My blood.

Blood brothers.

That’s what we were.

And that’s what we’d be.