LITMIR.BIZ

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to comfort his own children.

      He had never felt so unutterably weary.

      “I ask you once more to stay away,” he said.

      “I never give up on something once I’ve started,” she said, “and I still haven’t cut your hair. Unless you’re afraid you’ll lose all your strength, like Samson in the old story?”

      He almost smiled. “I’m in no danger of such a fate, Miss Murphy.”

      “It’s about time you called me Gwen, don’t you think?” She held out her hand. When he didn’t take it, she grabbed his and squeezed it firmly. “Gwen.”

      The feel of her skin had an instant effect on his body. He grew hard, and it seemed as if all the blood in his veins rushed to his cock.

      She released him, taking a step back as she did so. A slight shiver ran through her.

      “Good,” she said, a little too sharply. “It’s a date, then.” She turned away, half tripping in her haste. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

      Dorian let her go. When she had left the warehouse and he could no longer hear the clack of her heels outside, he sat down heavily and dropped his head between his shoulders.

      Yesterday his mind had been full of the resolve to ignore his attraction to Gwen Murphy. Of course he’d made the mistake of allowing himself to hope she wouldn’t return and force him to take decisive action. But she had come, and he had failed miserably at keeping her at a safe distance. He admired—yes, liked her—more than ever before.

      Far worse, he’d only sunk more deeply into the maelstrom of his own hunger. And the irony of it was that he had never developed a resistance to such weakness, because he had never before suffered the particular illness that caused it.

      One of the first things any newly Converted strigoi learned was that most vampires were unrepentant sensualists, reborn to the lust for pleasure no matter what they had been in human life. Raoul had certainly been a prime example of the principle, with his love of luxury, his grandiose manner and his extensive harem of protégés, both male and female.

      Dorian had been different. When he’d first been Converted, he’d had no choice but to focus on duty, since he’d virtually become Raoul’s property. Yet even when he had proved his value and loyalty many times over, earning privileges generally granted only to trusted lieutenants and vassals, he had preferred work to pleasure. His needs were few, his desires nearly non-existent. That hadn’t been altered even when he’d recognized his genuine admiration for Allegra Chase and accepted the consequences.

      To say he was no longer the man he had been was a gross understatement. His new need for physical closeness, for the intimate touch of flesh on flesh, for a woman’s body, seemed the least significant change of all. But it was enough. Enough to ruin the very person who had changed that part of him irrevocably.

      Perhaps Gwen might have escaped the perils of his interest if she were the type of modern young woman who saw no shame in lying with a man simply because she desired it. The fact that she’d retreated so hastily after she’d taken his hand told him that she’d finally seen him as a man, not merely an object of charity or a lunatic deserving of her pity. And he had no doubt that she was fully capable of surrendering to the instincts that brought male and female together, regardless of species.

      If Gwen could simply acknowledge such instincts and give them full control, she might disarm his need with a single act of sex. But Gwen, for all her brash confidence, would never agree to a casual liaison with him or any other male. There was a hidden core of conventionality in her that he could sense as strongly as he sensed the rhythm of her pulse and the beat of her heart. She might be unstinting in her willingness to help those less fortunate, but there was a part of herself that she would always hold back. Especially in matters of romantic intimacy.

      Romance and love were concepts as alien to Dorian as the fear of death. And though Gwen might see him as a man, “liking” was a very long way from the ominous human emotion that could bring about her downfall. Even if she allowed herself to feel more for him than she did, more than what mortals called “friendship,” she would never be able to understand what he had been, how he had lived, what he’d done. She would never know what had shaped his life, what drove him so near madness, why he couldn’t be trusted.

      Even her courage wasn’t enough to face the truth.

      Dorian covered his face with his hands. Tomorrow came the madness, and he couldn’t be sure that he would recover. Today he was rational enough to separate his lust for Gwen’s body from his desire for her blood. But instinct, among strigoi as among men, could be more powerful than reason. Physical wanting, unchecked by clan law or the command of a liege, could become the drive to procreate. And there was only one way that vampires could produce more of their own.

      Disgusted by his weakness, Dorian coldly considered his options. If he survived tomorrow night’s ordeal, he would plan an escape. He knew of a few places in Hell’s Kitchen where he and Walter might find temporary shelter until he could think of something better. Places where Gwen wouldn’t find him.

      Soon enough, she would forget him. And he would remember her as just another human who had passed in and out of his life, as insubstantial as a ghost.

      Dorian picked up the basket and went to find Walter.

      LORD BYRON’S, it was said, had the best steaks in Manhattan. It had always been a fashionable watering hole for the elite, overpriced and overdecorated, with crystal chandeliers and ornate mirrored walls that echoed an earlier age. Women in Chanel gowns and ropes of pearls, ferried in black limousines, arrived on the arms of men in top hats and tuxedos. A small orchestra played discreet melodies as Wall Street brokers discussed their latest stock purchases and young couples danced cheek to cheek.

      To an outside observer, Lord Byron’s looked positively staid. But like any club or restaurant worth its salt, it had a private room in the back that catered to those who wanted a little alcohol and excitement with their meals. And like any good reporter, Mitch knew the right password to get in.

      He spoke briefly with the maître d’ and led Gwen to a table near the band. They were playing a recently popular tune, a little ditty about someone who done somebody wrong, and several couples were on the dance floor kicking up their heels.

      Gwen and Mitch had barely sat down when a waiter brought a cooler holding a bottle of wine. He displayed the label to Mitch, who nodded his approval.

      “I didn’t know you could afford Chateau D’Or,” Gwen said, shaking out her napkin with a snap.

      Mitch gave her an exasperated look. “Trust you to say something so damnably prosaic at a time like this,” he said.

      “A time like what?” She sipped at her ice water, casting Mitch a glance of childlike innocence. “Aren’t we here to celebrate your latest triumph?”

      The blare of trumpets briefly drowned out Mitch’s reply, but his handsome face was eloquent.

      “…should know me better than that,” he said. “I haven’t forgotten.”

      Gwen resisted the urge to put off the forthcoming conversation with more banter, but she could see that Mitch wouldn’t play along. He’d decided on formality tonight, which was a very bad sign.

      “Okay,” she said with a faint sigh. “I’m sorry, Mitch. I’ll try to be good.”

      He relaxed a little, allowing the waiter to decant the wine. He held the glass under his nose, breathed in, and then tasted the Merlot with appreciation. After a moment he gave the waiter an approving nod, and the man filled Gwen’s glass.

      The first thing Gwen thought as she drank was that the wine really didn’t taste any better than the cheap stuff she’d shared with Dorian a few hours earlier. She’d enjoyed that impromptu picnic more than she had her last few meals in Manhattan’s finest restaurants, enjoyed sparring with a man who was as unpredictable and volatile as a summer storm…

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