She reached over and took my hand in hers, intertwining our fingers. “And…” She started tracing lines on the back of my hand with her other hand before looking up and meeting my gaze with a look in her eyes that made me breathless. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that I don’t want to be your dating coach anymore.” She sighed.
When she didn’t speak for a moment, I worried she might stop there and leave me even more confused than I’d been before. But then her lips quirked up into a hopeful smile and she said, “I don’t want to pretend like I want to help you find the perfect woman for you, or teach you how to get someone to fall head over heels in love with you because…” She sighed. “Because I want you, Cole.” She drew in a shaky breath, her delicate shoulders rising with the movement. “And I don’t want you going out and looking for some other girl because I want to be the girl you want to be with.”
She stared down at our hands, like she was afraid to look me in the eyes after exposing her heart so fully.
But I wanted to see her eyes, because I wanted her to be looking at me when I told her what I thought about what she’d just said.
So I took her chin in my hands and gently guided her face back up so our gazes met. And when she lifted her deep brown eyes up to meet mine, I said, “You have no idea how long I’ve been waiting to hear those words from you.” I swallowed, still not really believing any of this was real. “And the only reason why I haven’t been able to decide where I’m going to play next year is because I couldn’t imagine staying here and watching the woman I’d been in love with for three years date anyone who wasn’t me.”
“The woman you’re in love with?” Her eyes darted back and forth between mine, as if she wasn’t quite sure she’d heard me right.
“Yes.” I leaned my forehead against hers. “I’m so in love with you, Arianna.” I touched her shoulders and smoothed my hands down her arms, my throat thick. “And I would be the happiest guy in the world just knowing you felt for me even a tenth of what I feel for you.”
And the look she got in her eyes when I said that was everything to me. Because it told me everything I had wanted to know for years.
She cared for me, too.
I wasn’t alone in falling for my best friend.
“I love you too, Cole,” she whispered. Then lifting a hand to my face and caressing my cheek with her thumb, she said, “I think I’ve loved you for a long time. Until now, I just never thought I’d ever deserve someone as amazing as you.”
Warm shivers raced along my skin with her touch, and my heart felt like it might burst with how much I felt for her in that moment.
“I’m sure you deserve far better than me,” I said, not understanding how she could ever feel she deserved less than anyone else. “But I hope you’ll be okay settling for me, anyway.”
“I’d be lucky to have you.” She shook her head gently, just looking at me in a way that I could only describe as quiet awe. “But as long as you’re okay slumming it with me and all my flaws, I think we might just make each other very happy.”
“I think you’re right.”
I knew I should probably say something more—make some sort of grand romantic statement. But all I could think about was how I was sitting with the most beautiful girl in the world and she was telling me everything I’d ever wanted to hear from her. And that maybe, for the first time since we’d met, she might actually be waiting for me to kiss her.
So, after taking in the way she was currently biting her bottom lip and the way her gaze seemed to be flitting from my lips and to my eyes and then back to my lips again, I whispered, “I think it’s only right that I show you just how much I love you now.”
She leaned closer to my ear and whispered, “I think it’s actually time that I showed you.”
And just the way she gazed at me through hooded eyes was enough to send my heart