Men: What does it mean when you use the word "love" ?

Anonymous
A man I am seeing started, about a week ago, to use the word "love" when referring to me. ie: "hey love", "ok love", "how are you love" ...and other such phrases. Now I know he is super selective about his vocabulary and the words he uses so I also am well aware that this was not random. The first time he said it he even was very observant to my response. (clearly I passed some man-test, if he is still using those words).

For the few months that we have hung out/ "dated", never has he said those, So now I am freaking out. (you know how us women folk are). What should I take of it? What do these words mean for men? It he trying to step up intimacy or are these words verbal slips of that he is falling in love? what is going one...Help me out please. I don't want to be caught of guard.

To add: we are not actually in an exclusive relationship per se, but we are in an a very passionate might-as-well-be-exclusive "relationship" (for lack of a better word) for a few months.
Men: What does it mean when you use the word "love" ?
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