23. Game Over
23
GAME OVER
KRUZ
Ezra isn’t like anyone I’ve ever known, and I’m convinced there’s no one else in the world like him.
He’s the storm that tore across the island, dark and unrelenting, ripping through my life with no intention of leaving it the same.
And maybe I should be scared—terrified, even—but I’m not.
Not anymore, anyway.
He makes me feel alive in a way that terrifies me, sure, like standing at the edge of a cliff and knowing you’ll jump, not because you want to die, but because the thrill of the fall is worth it.
There’s something unhinged about the way I crave him, something raw and desperate.
It’s not just love—it’s obsession.
A need so sharp it cuts me, leaving me bleeding and still begging for more.
An obsession matching the one I know he has for me in return.
He sees me in ways no one else ever has, and he doesn’t flinch at the messy, broken pieces of me.
If anything, he finds them appealing.
I felt this way even when I thought I hated him, even though I didn’t want to admit it to myself.
But now that he’s bared his soul to me and laid all his secrets out on the table? Ripped his own life apart just to put it back together in a way that I can fit into it?
Game over.
And the wildest part? I don’t mind losing.
Not when it means this. Not when it means him.
Ezra watches me, his gaze dark and endless, like he already knows everything racing through my mind. Maybe he does. Maybe he always has.
“Say it,” he murmurs, his fingers brushing over my jaw, tilting my face up toward his. The firelight flickers in his eyes, dancing with something fierce, something consuming.
“I love you.”
The words fall from my lips without hesitation, raw and honest. A confession, a surrender—one I never thought I’d make. But with him, there’s no fear, no second-guessing. Just inevitability.
A slow exhale shudders through him, and Ezra looks unsteady in a way I’ve never seen before. Not in battle, not in chaos, but here. With me.
He swallows hard, his hand sliding down my throat, over my collarbone, until it presses against my chest, feeling the rapid beat of my heart. “Again.”
I smile, and it feels like the first real one in weeks. Maybe in years. “I love you.”
His mouth crashes against mine, the kiss deep and consuming. He tastes like salt and warmth, like home. His grip tightens, like he thinks I might disappear if he lets go, like he needs to prove that I’m here, that I’m his.
But I already am. I always have been.
His lips move against my skin, along my jaw, down my neck, as if he’s trying to map every inch of me, memorize me all over again. I thread my fingers through his hair, pulling him closer, needing him closer.
It lingers in the air—what we’ve been through, what we’ve lost, what we’ve gained. But none of it matters right now. Not when we’re here, tangled together in the remnants of the storm we barely survived.
“I meant it,” he says against my skin. “Every damn word. You’re it for me, Kruz. You always have been.”
I pull back just enough to meet his gaze, to see the truth written there. No more masks, no more defenses. Just Ezra. Just us.
I cup his face, my thumbs brushing over the angles of his jaw. “Then don’t let go.”
“Never.”
His lips crash against mine again, and this time, there’s nothing left between us. No more walls, no more running, no more fear.
Just the certainty that whatever comes next, we’ll face it together.