His eyebrows pull together.
"I've spent my whole life knowing one thing." I gesture between us. "Griffiths are loyal. We show up. We fight for each other. We don't betray each other." I let out a shaky breath. "The second I realized I was in love with Eva, all I could think was ...What if this is the thing that finally breaks us?" The words leave me in a rush. "I could survive losing almost anything in this world." I meet his eyes. "I couldn't survive losing my brother."
Silence.
Then Ace snorts.
"That's the dumbest damn thing you've ever said."
I blink.
"Aston, you can't lose me." His voice is so matter-of-fact it almost pisses me off. "I might want to punch you in the face sometimes." He points at me. "Hell, give me five minutes and I still might."
A laugh escapes me despite everything.
"But you're my fucking twin," he says, and his expression turns serious again. "That doesn't change because we screw things up.” He steps closer. "And you know something else?"
"What?"
"I know you.” He jabs a finger into my chest. "You're not the kind of man who steals another guy's girl." He shakes his head once. "If you went after Eva ... it wasn't because you wanted to beat me."
A grin ghosts across his face.
"It was because you have loved her for all these years."
I stare at him.
He shrugs. "I would've been pissed if you hid it forever."
Another beat.
"But I never would've hated you for loving the right woman."
“How do I make this right, Ace?” I ask, my voice steady and absolute. “I’ll do anything but give her up. But I swear, I’ll never keep a single thing from you again. You get the truth every time.”
Ace stares at me for a long minute, reading my face. “I’ll think of something.” The humidity between us is thick enough to choke on.
He finally lets out a long breath that eases some of the tension from his shoulders. He walks over to the outdoor kitchen and grabs two bottles of water from the fridge and tosses one straight at my chest.
I catch it against my ribs.
“You look hot,” he mutters, still carrying an edge, but his jaw has softened. He walks back over, his shoulder lightly clipping mine as he sits back down on the lounger. “Sit. Tell me how serious this is with Eva.”
I let out a breath that feels like the first time since I landed, a knot loosening in my chest as I sit back down next to my twin. The connection might be bruised and a bit fragile, but we’re back on the same team.
“I love her, man,” I say softly, cracking the cap on the water bottle. “And I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to deserve her.”
For the next two hours, the heavy weight that’s been between us for half a year hadn't just broken—it had completely dissolved into the quiet, grounding reality of the truth.
I lean back into the chair, letting my frame settle as the tension finally drains out of my shoulders, and I give him the raw, unedited story of the last six months of my life with Eva.
Ace just sits there in the silence, his arms crossed over his chest, his blue eyes tracking my face without interruption. When I finally run out of words, a slow, genuine smile breaks across my brother's face—the first real, easy expression I’ve seen on him since I got here.
"She’s a good one," Ace murmurs, his voice rough but laced with a deep, unmistakable warmth. He reaches over, his palm grasping my shoulder in a firm, lingering grip that tells me everything I need to know. "And I'm glad you finally got your shit together and took your shot."
We finish the night with good food and are just simply happy to be in each other’s company. It’s been too long since we’ve spent time together like this, and we both needed it.
By the next afternoon, the Florida sun is blazing down on the tarmac at the private airfield, heat waves shimmering off the concrete. Ace’s truck idles near the nose of my charter plane, the low rumble of the engine a familiar, steady backdrop to my departure.
