Those blue eyes meet mine, and I could swear I see turmoil playing out in their depths. “I love you?” Her voice tips up on the end like a question, and her eyes fall to the ground. “See? It’s not right,” she mutters to herself as she shakes her head.

I take two steps and fall to my knees in front of her. She opens her legs to accommodate me as I push my torso between them and reach up to cup her beautiful face in my hands. “You love me?”

“I more than love you,” she whispers shakily, as if she might cry. “I don’t know how to say it.”

“Love isn’t a strong enough word,” I whisper back. A tear trails along her cheek, and I swipe at it with the pad of my thumb. “Not for how I feel about you, either. I don’t think the English language has a word that can describe it.”

She barks out a wet laugh. Her trembling hands circle my wrists as she presses her eyes closed, tears leaking from them. “English sucks.” She sniffles. “You’d think the Wizard of Words would be able to come up with something.”

“Syntax Sorcerer,” I correct her softly.

“I was referring to myself,” she fires back. Those eyes open and land right on mine, and they almost glow in the soft light of the room.

Chuckling, I wipe her lingering tears away. I want to scream from the rooftops or do a dance. Maybe burst at the seams. I don’t think I’ve ever been happier than I am in this moment. But instead of doing any of those things, I say as calmly as I can, “I suppose love will have to do.”

And then, I decide that my mouth is better used to kiss her than to unsuccessfully try to find words to adequately tell her how I feel. Gently, I pull her closer, and she obliges. Her mouth opens immediately, and she lets my tongue dance with hers. When she scoots forward on the chair to press her chest into mine, I can feel her racing heart. My own is still soaring, beating in time with hers.

Scarlett loves me. She more than loves me. And I feel the same way about her.

She pulls back to look at me, studying my face like she’s committing it to memory.

“Love,” she whispers, as if trying on a new word to see how it feels.

“Love,” I reply, turning the word this way and that.