Author's Note: Thank you for taking the time to read this story. I appreciate everyone who allows me to share my work with them, and would be overjoyed to hear what you think of it. Though this story takes place after my last three works ("Letters to the Darkness", "The Captain", and "Ruby Brown"), it should stand well enough on its own. Of course, if you'd like to read the others, I won't complain. (smiles)

Dedication: As always, to Astra, who wanted to see some more of the Florian/Solomon dynamic. I hope I've done your expectations, as well as the characters, justice.

Disclaimer: I own nothing related to Gorgeous Carat. In addition, "Less Than Love Is Nothing" is the title of a song by the very talented Jonatha Brooke-- I urge everyone to check out her music! She really is amazing.

Chapter 1: Desperate Measures

It started, as do most quarrels, with something very minor which neither party would recall the details of fifteen minutes after the finality of a slammed door had pronounced it dead.

Even in the heat of the moment, neither Noir nor Florian was really sure what had caused them to degenerate into a shouting match. Of course, there had been catalysts: Noir was annoyed because Florian had spilled coffee on some important documents, to which Florian's defence was that, if Noir wouldn't spend most of his waking moments working, he wouldn't have had to intrude on the sanctuary of his study just to spend some time with him.

"Why can't you be more careful?" Noir growled as he swiped angrily at a notarized loan agreement with an expensive handkerchief.

"I said I was sorry," Florian replied, more frustrated than contrite.

"You're always destroying things." Noir looked up to glare at Florian as though he were a dog who had just soiled an expensive carpet.

"I am not." Florian's voice was perfectly modulated.

"You are. Who broke the blue crystal ashtray in the drawing room?"

"One of the servants left it too close to the edge of the table. It could have fallen down just as easily if anyone else had walked by."

"Really?" Noir's eyes narrowed. "And I suppose the clasp on that bracelet I gave you two months ago snapped on its own?"

"I already explained that to you: I didn't notice I had left it on my nightstand before I put that book down." Florian glared. "Besides, it was almost repaired before you noticed it was missing."

"Whatever," Noir said with childish exasperation as he cast the hopelessly-soiled paper to the floor.

"You know, if you paid half as much attention to me as you are to that stupid piece of paper, I wouldn't even have been in here." Florian's glare intensified, and he felt his shoulders tense up in anticipation of an escalated argument.

Instead, though, Noir just sighed. "Here we go," he muttered as he flipped open his cigar box, withdrew one of the cigars within, and sliced its end with his pocket knife. "Do you mind, or will the smoke disturb your degeneration into melodramatic heroine?"

The patronization stung even more viciously than usual, but Florian forced himself not to respond to it. "I know you don't do it on purpose," he began, "but we've been spending more and more time apart these past few months. Either you're working, or you're planning another robbery, or you're in a bad mood, and I can't disturb you."

"I'm busy. If you need constant companionship, I'll buy you a lapdog."

"It's not that you're busy!" Florian inhaled sharply, and closed his eyes. "That, I could tolerate. That, I have tolerated. It's that..." He sighed. "I feel like you don't want to be with me anymore."

Noir frowned, but looked away. "That's ridiculous," he said darkly.

"It's not just that, even," Florian continued, as though Noir had not spoken. "Even when you're with me, you're always so... critical. Like now: it was an accident, and I apologized, and all you can do is recite my past failings." His voice dropped to a harsh whisper. "I wasn't aware we were cataloguing each other's mistakes."

Noir turned back to him, and the expression on his face, of the kind that he usually reserved for an annoying noble who caught him on a particularly bad day, brought Florian to the precipice of blind rage. The words that accompanied it pushed him clear over that edge. "I don't need to make any particular effort to catalogue your mistakes: after all, they're usually so unforgettably spectacular."

Bile rose in Florian's throat, and he took a step backward. "I can't stay here. Please excuse me." A moment before he finished speaking, he was already on his way to the door.

"If you can't handle an argument, keep your God-damn mouth shut!" Noir snarled after him.

Florian slammed the door behind him far too late to intercept his lover's parting words, and they followed him into the streets of Paris with all the tenacity of incubi.

---

It was nearly full dark when Solomon's reading was disturbed by a light tapping on his apartment door. In obedience to instincts honed by ceaseless training, Solomon moved slowly from his spot on the couch, closing the book silently and setting it aside even as he reached for the gun that he kept hidden between the split cushions. In all probability, the visitor meant him no harm, but Solomon had seen too many people killed by their own false sense of security to be anything but prepared for any conceivable circumstance.

As quietly as he could, he advanced toward the door with his gun held above his shoulder, though he hated to sneak around in his own home. "Who is it?" he called, not expecting an answer.

A short noise, the sound of the person on the other side of the too-thin portal clearing their throat, and then a familiar voice. "Florian du Rochefort."

Unconsciously, Solomon exhaled, and though he was still unwilling to relinquish the gun completely, he did jam it through his belt before unlocking the door and opening it just far enough to see whether Florian was alone. As far as he could tell by the dim light of the hallway, he was. "Florian. What brings you here at this hour?"

"I'm very sorry to disturb you, Solomon." Something in Florian's tone struck Solomon as different from his usual polite gregariousness, and he frowned. Despite their differences, most notably on the subject of Ray Balzac Courland, Solomon had always had a soft spot for the fallen aristocrat. "May I come in?" He glanced around, somewhat guiltily. "I have no wish to disturb your neighbours any further."

Solomon chuckled as he opened the door the rest of the way and stepped aside to allow Florian entry. "You wouldn't feel that way if you'd lived through some of their parties." He smiled, but sobered instantly when it became clear that Florian wasn't particularly responsive to humour. "Is everything alright?" He paused only long enough to close and lock the door, and then moved close enough to examine Florian's face. "What happened? You aren't hurt, are you?"

Florian shook his head, and Solomon noticed the shadows around his eyes. "No. No, I'm fine." He reached up to push his hair away from his face, and sighed. "I need to ask you a favour."

Solomon nodded. "What is it?"

A short silence unfolded between them before Florian managed to say, very quietly, "I wondered if I might stay here tonight."

Of all the potential requests that Solomon had imagined, not one was remotely close to the truth. "Why? Did something happen?" He glared. "Did Ray--"

"We had an argument," Florian explained. "I left the house... I had to get away. For a while, I just walked around, but then it started to get dark, and I still didn't feel like I could face him." A pause. "I left my wallet in my room, so it was impossible to check into a hotel, and even if I had had the appropriate documents with me, the banks were already closed before I thought to make a withdrawal. I could have asked someone else, I suppose... but Monsieur Tassel and Noel are out of town, and if I went to any of my acquaintances, I'm sure the story would be all over the district within the hour." Florian looked away then, almost as though he were ashamed. "I'm sorry. I feel very childish, intruding in your home because I don't want to go back to my own, but..." He trailed off, and the effort of will that it cost him to meet Solomon's gaze once again was painfully apparent. "I'm sorry. Please, forget I said anything. Forget I came here tonight." He began to circle around Solomon on his way to the door.

"Hang on a second." Solomon caught his arm as he passed, but loosened his grip as soon as he felt Florian flinch. "It's not childish at all," he said. "I understand where you're coming from, and..." He looked around his living room, took in the second- and third-hand furniture and the barely-contained mess, and half-smiled. "Well, it's no loan shark's mansion, but if you don't mind the reduced circumstances, I'm fine with you staying."

Almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth, he began to think twice about them: however, the relief in Florian's eyes banished his misgivings before he could so much as articulate them. "I'm sure everything will more than adequate," Florian said with a somewhat forced smile. "Thank you, Solomon. I appreciate this very much."

Solomon released Florian's arm, and waved his hand dismissively. "Don't mention it." He turned away before he began to blush in response to the unaccustomed gratitude, and went to the linen closet, where he began to pull out a set of spare sheets and a blanket. "You'll have to sleep on the couch: I haven't got a guest room. I'd also offer you a change of clothes, but I'm not sure they'll fit. although I might be able to find some that--"

Florian's light touch on his hand alerted Solomon to the fact that the other man was crouched beside him, and he fell silent in mid-sentence as Florian accepted the folded bedding. "Please, don't trouble yourself," he said softly. "I'm more than satisfied with this." He smiled again, this time a bit more sincerely, and Solomon found himself returning the gesture almost unconsciously.

How do I get into these things? he asked himself, not entirely in exasperation.