Peace, tremulous, unexpected, sent a taproot out of nowhere into Morgan's heart.

Only yesterday a young woman came to me wanting a trap set for a man with a sweet smile and lithe arms. She was a fool, not for wanting him, but for wanting more of him than that.

Words, he decided, were inadequate at best, impossible at worst. They meant too many things. Or they meant nothing at all.

I do not want to choose which one of you I must love or hate. Here, I am free to do neither. I want no part of your bitterness.

She is our moon. Our tidal pull. She is the rich deep beneath the sea, the buried treasure, the expression in the owl's eye, the perfume in the wild rose. She is what the water says when it moves.

Shall I add a man to my collection?

Research the imagination. It was as obsolete as the appendix in most adults, except for those in whom, like the appendix, it became inflamed for no reason.