Page 73

Then, his voice—rough and low, like gravel catching on the edge of something soft.
“You really love me?”
The question landed with more weight than I expected.
I didn’t blink. Didn’t flinch.
I just nodded. “Yes.”
His chest rose, sharp and shallow, like he hadn’t let himself hope I’d say it. Not after everything.
“I love you, too,” he said, and it wasn’t soft. It wasn’t poetic.
It was raw. Blunt. Fierce.
Like a vow. Like he’d carved it into himself long before he ever said it aloud.
Then his mouth twitched—just a little. Like he wasn’t sure if he should laugh or confess a sin.
“I think I knew the second I saw you,” he murmured,dragging his fingers gently through my hair. “Back at Grace House. You didn’t even see me.”
I searched his face.
“I was watching through the scope,” he said.
My breath caught.
“You didn’t know I was there,” he whispered. “Couldn’t have. But your eyes—Hallie Mae, they punched the breath out of me.”
His words hit like a tremor low in my belly.
“I tried to ignore it,” he continued, voice quiet now, like he was almost afraid of the truth. “But I couldn’t. You got under my skin so fast it was like you were already there.”
I stared at him, heart thudding.
“You loved me before I even knew you,” I said.
“I did,” he replied. “And I’ll keep loving you—even if you walk away from the blood and fire and ghosts I can’t shake. Even if you decide I’m too much wreckage to carry. I’ll still love you. Because I already do.”
Tears stung the backs of my eyes.
He kissed me then—slow, reverent, like a benediction.
Like he meant it.
We sat in that quiet, the weight of the world pressed out by the sound of our breath.
I held onto that moment—his lips on mine, his breath steady, the words he’d just said still blooming between us like wildflowers growing through a battlefield.
And then I pulled back, just enough to meet his eyes.
“Tell me everything,” I said quietly. “About Department 77. About what you think happened to my dad. I’m ready now. I want to hear it all.”
His gaze darkened a little, not with secrets but withthe weight of them. He nodded once, slow and solemn, like he knew there’d be no going back from here.
“I will,” he said, brushing his fingers along the curve of my cheek. “No lies. No half-truths. Just the whole ugly, dangerous, bloody story. Because you deserve that.”
I nodded, heart pounding.