Dark of the Moon

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“But I did injure the men who attacked me.”

She went a little pale. “Did you kill them?”

“They are not likely to attempt to harm anyone again in the near future.”

“And that’s why you tried to commit suicide? Because you dared to defend yourself against a pack of wharf rats?”

Dorian looked away. “Losing oneself…is not a pleasant prospect. I had no desire to risk harming anyone else.”

“And that proves you’re not as lost as you think you are. Once you have a steady job, we can find a way to help you. There are plenty of other men who suffered from the War in the same way you have.”

The War. Once again she assumed that he’d fought in Europe, when he’d never set foot outside the state of New York.

“Are you certain you still wish me for the janitorial position?” he asked.

Gwen caught his gaze. “You can’t solve your problems by hiding for the rest of your life. Maybe a little regular work is exactly what you need.”

“And if I prove unsuitable?”

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. And if one of these moods comes over you, you’ll have a place to go. I’ve gotten you the room next to Walter’s at the boardinghouse.”

“That was unnecessary.”

“You can’t stay here, you know. And I won’t let you go back to that horrid warehouse.”

He inclined his head, conceding defeat. If Gwen was not discouraged by his partial confession, he could not refuse her offer. Though he couldn’t stay by her side every moment, he would have access to any research she conducted from the newspaper office. And he would have an excuse to continue their relationship, should she begin to lose her crusading determination to reform him.

An excuse, indeed. An excuse to continue taking her blood. An excuse to go on feeling the strange mingling of frustration and exhilaration he experienced whenever she was within his reach.

“Sit down, will you?” Gwen complained. “I get the heebiejeebies when you loom over me like that.”

Dorian retreated to the far wall. “You were generous to do this on my behalf,” he said.

“I told you I wasn’t going to give up on you. I meant it.” She stretched her arms over her head. “You can move to the boardinghouse tomorrow morning.”

“And I will begin to repay you when I receive my first compensation.”

“There’s no hurry. I know you’re good for it.” She stretched again and rose, padding toward the kitchen in her stockinged feet. “I’m starved. Do you want some soup?”

Dorian hesitated, dreading the thought of sharing even closer quarters with her.

Tonight, he told himself. Tonight, while she sleeps.

He followed her into the kitchen.

“WHO IS HE?”

Mitch stood over Gwen’s desk, his face flushed with anger. She’d hardly ever seen him so emotional; he’d always prided himself on being in complete control of his feelings. Only lately had he begun to reveal open frustration and annoyance with her. She didn’t like the results.

“I’ve told you all I know,” she said, drawing on the rags of her patience. “I found him on the streets. He reminded me of Barry, so I decided to help him.”

“You just ‘found him on the streets.’”

“That’s right. It was obvious that he was a doughboy who’d suffered since the War. Was helping him so wrong?”

“A doughboy? He can’t be much older than you are.”

“Some of them served at fifteen and sixteen.”

“But you don’t know anything about his past.”

She shrugged. “If he can’t do the job, we’ll find out soon enough.”

Mitch lowered his head like a bull about to charge. “What else is going on, Gwen?”

“Don’t tell me you’re jealous of some poor guy who doesn’t have a dime to his name?”

He stared at the far wall. “Of course I’m not jealous.”

“Then give him a chance. You’ll hardly have to see him, anyway.”

Fury boiling behind his eyes, Mitch stalked away. Gwen leaned on her elbows and rubbed at her forehead. Dorian had only been at the Sentinel for a few days, and Mitch had been brooding the whole time. The first night, when he’d been finishing up a story and Gwen had introduced him to Dorian, there had been a palpable hostility on his part. It was as if he’d guessed that Dorian had spent several nights at her apartment. As if he knew she’d behaved in a way that would have shocked him.

Whatever had been going through his mind, then and now, she had to admit that his instincts weren’t entirely wrong. There was something else going on. Something that had possessed her from the moment she’d held Dorian’s dying body in her arms. Something she had done her best to deny, entirely without success.

She’d felt some measure of relief when Dorian had moved out of her apartment and taken up residence with Walter, but she found herself thinking of him when she should have been concentrating on her assignments. Looking forward to the hour when he showed up for work, quiet and contained, less and less like the disturbed and antagonistic recluse she’d met at the waterfront or the man who’d so recently wanted to end his own life.

But Dorian was still dangerous, for all his willingness to carry out his humble duties. She often worked late; when he came into the office with mop and broom and dustpan, she couldn’t stop watching him, the working of muscle under his corduroy trousers, the flex of his arms and shoulders. Sometimes he looked up and met her gaze, and she almost let herself believe she saw hunger in his eyes before he turned away.