Hunter and Blake's apartment actually did have an outside entrance, at the top of a set of exterior stairs that doubled as a fire escape. It opened into their kitchen, though, and they tended to use the one in the living room as their front door instead. That one was in a tiny hallway on the second floor, and Cam preferred it because it meant that fewer people would see him standing awkwardly outside their door in the middle of the day.

He didn't know whether Hunter was there or not. He was pretty sure the Crimson Ranger hadn't gone into work today, since even Rangers didn't heal that fast. The track was out for the same reason, and Cam had come from Ninja Ops so he knew Hunter wasn't there. That left the apartment.

He knocked sharply, still not totally sure what he would say when he found Hunter, but since he doubted it could go worse than yesterday he was willing to improvise. Between getting Hunter sent home from work, bringing down the kelzaks at the beach, and then the mess with that reporter--not to mention the scene at Ninja Ops afterward--he had some ground to make up. He thought he might at least be able to get Hunter to go to lunch with him.

The door opened, and the idea froze before it could even make it to his mouth. Hunter looked... strange. It wasn't his clothes, even if Kelly had forbidden him to wear that benzene t-shirt to work once she found out it was a beer molecule, and it wasn't the wrap on his arm. It wasn't his disheveled hair, or the stare he gave Cam when he saw him standing there.

But it was something about how long the stare lasted. It was about how dark Hunter's eyes were, and how long it took him to focus. It was something about the way he smelled--the faint scent of motor oil and dirt and sweat that clung to his clothes even when he himself was clean had been overpowered by the antiseptic smell from his injuries, but now there was something else. Something that warred with the sharp sterile sting of medicated bandages.

Something that smelled disturbingly like flowers. Perfume. Like a woman had been very close to Hunter, very recently.

Hunter as good as confirmed his suspicion by stepping out into the hall and closing the door behind him. "Hey, Cam," he said, and his voice sounded strangely detached. Almost as though he wasn't really there, as though this wasn't happening. "What's going on?"

Cam stared at him. What was going on? Shouldn't he be the one asking that question? Hunter was his. Maybe there were still some details to work out, like when and where and how and how long, but he was very clear on the first point. Hunter wanted him.

"Who's inside?" he blurted out.

Hunter blinked, clearly startled. "What?"

"Who," Cam growled, "is in. the apartment. It's a simple question."

"Yeah, and it's none of your business," Hunter shot back. "What, are you staking out the building now? Watching the door? What do you care, anyway?"

"I care that I can smell her on you!" Cam shouted. In the back of his mind, he was aware that he wasn't at his most reasonable right now. But Hunter was standing there, right in front of him, smelling of perfume. "You don't even like girls!"

He saw Hunter's expression darken, and he knew he'd crossed the line. "You don't know anything about me," Hunter snarled. "Get the hell out of here."

It wasn't worth considering. Fury had taken hold of him, and nothing Hunter could say would defuse it now. He grabbed the door handle and shoved it open, striding in before the other Ranger could stop him. There was someone in here who knew less about Hunter than he did, and she was the one that needed to go.

She was standing in front of the TV, her back to the door, perfectly styled blonde curls tumbling over the red plaid shirt she had wrapped around her. Hunter's shirt. Actually seeing her was such a shock that he stopped and stared.

She turned at the sound of the door. She smiled at him, shirt held loosely closed with one hand while the other reached up to brush a curl out of her face. "Hi," she said, just on the charming side of awkward. "Cam, right?"

He realized distantly that she was, in fact, wearing clothes under that shirt. Barely decent nylon shorts and a pink spandex crop top, like a Maxim model dressed up in a jogging costume, and that was definitely her perfume he'd gotten from Hunter. It was annoyingly strong. He shook his head in a futile effort to clear it, narrowing his eyes as her gaze shifted to Hunter.

"You have very handsome friends, Hunter," she remarked, her voice sweet and pretty and just the right pitch to be somehow soothing and suggestive at the same time. "I never realized."

"Leave him alone," Hunter muttered. He'd closed the door but he made no effort to approach her, instead leaning back against the door like he wanted to be anywhere but here. "He's new to this thing."

"Of course," she said agreeably, throwing Cam another smile as she sidled toward the door. He knew her from somewhere. He had just seen her; she was irritatingly familiar, but right now he couldn't see past Hunter's shirt around her shoulders and that awful perfume that had permeated the apartment.

"Not like you," she continued, close enough to touch Hunter now and he wasn't even doing anything about it. She let go of the shirt and lifted her hand, letting her fingers trail across his skin. "You know exactly what you're doing," she purred. "Don't you."

Later, he wouldn't be able to remember what it was that did it: her touching Hunter, her talking to him like that, or the way Hunter closed his eyes and trembled when she got close. A growl tore from his throat, uncontrollable. The wolf launched himself across the room and the blonde half-naked bitch was the only thing he could see.

He slammed into her and his senses overloaded. He felt like he was being suffocated by flowers and they squealed so hard his head threatened to explode. For a moment he might have been able to see but he couldn't tell because everything was a whirl of sound and smell and pain as he hit the floor. He didn't even know where the girl had gone and he folded in on himself in a futile effort to make it stop.

Then the sound was gone and he heard a scream that made all the fur on his back stand on end. He rolled over and skidded to his feet, finding Hunter first and deeming him safe before he realized the woman he had just attacked was leaping off the floor and sparkling. Shrinking. A broad-winged bird of prey backwinged into the air where she had just been, opening its beak to scream again.

Hunter was going after her--it--blindly, like he had no idea how close he was to getting his eyes clawed out, and Cam was human again in the second it took to reach Hunter and knock him out of the way. Hunter struggled as they banged up against the door, and Cam wrapped his arms around him and held on as best he could while the bird screeched angrily. It flapped dangerously in the small space, but it kept its distance even as Hunter thrashed against his restraint.

"Hunter!" he shouted, trying to keep an eye on the bird and mostly failing. The other Ranger was snarling, irrational, utterly uncommunicative. "Hunter, stop it! Hunter!"

When Hunter paid no attention, he yelled at the bird instead. "What did you do to him!"

He couldn't focus much past Hunter's hysterical fit, but he did see the woman reappear about the time the giant winged predator vanished. "Open the door," she snapped, and all the sweetness was gone from her voice now. She spun away from him, the red plaid shirt fluttering behind her as she stalked across the apartment.

Hunter lunged after her, and the distraction was enough that Cam lost his balance. He couldn't let go of Hunter and Hunter wouldn't stop fighting and they both crashed to the ground in a tangle of arms and legs. Cam's efforts to hobble his apparently crazed partner meant that he hit the floor first and Hunter couldn't recover fast enough to keep from slamming down on top of him.

There was a second, maybe two, when it was just the two of them trying to figure out how to get up. Then Hunter's gaze met his, and he knew those eyes were blue, he knew that, but right now they were so dark Hunter might as well have been drugged. And Cam cried out in surprise, in relief, as hips ground down against his and Hunter attacked his mouth with a savageness he hadn't realized he wanted.

Everything in him surged up to meet this new assault. Everything he had known was in him and had tried to deny. Everything he had suppressed, everything Hunter had suppressed for him when he couldn't do it anymore. Everything that was between them exploded the second Hunter lost control, and Cam latched onto it with a ferociousness that turned the entire world hot and close and demanding.

He was kissing, biting, being kissed, being burned, hands everywhere, scrabbling desperately at a body that pinned him and eluded him all at once and all he wanted was more because nothing about it was enough. Why couldn't he--he had to--he whimpered in frustration, in agony, in pure bliss, because he had needed this for so long and it had always been Hunter--

One word, gasped into the heat, a word that would haunt him for days and nights to come: "Mine."

The world shattered into piercing pain. He howled, convulsing, unable to make sense of the conflicting signals--pain, pleasure, pain--and Hunter was gone. The shrill pain in his ears vanished the second Hunter did but his body was already reacting and he swung toward the source with a snarl on his face and every muscle ready to lunge.

Almost every muscle. He dipped his head, a wolf gesture in human form, knowing he was vulnerable even as he did it but trying, trying to somehow shake the lust that rippled through him. The girl--

She had thrown off Hunter's shirt, he saw, as he forced himself to his feet. Another shudder wracked his body. And it was Hunter he wanted, but without the shirt he recognized those curves immediately. As she straightened up he blurted out, "You're the waitress."

She turned away from the window, and he was absolutely certain of it. She'd been wearing more, and her hair had been straight, but this was the same woman who had brought their food at the community center the other night. His eyes went to the grey plastic strip around her wrist: a bracelet with a circular design on it--or a button.

Hunter had been right, he thought with sudden clarity. The noise was painful.

He looked around quickly, found Hunter backed up against the wall beside the door, and he started toward him without thinking. He was stiff, head bowed, fists clenched against the floor on either side. Controlled. Self-contained.

"Don't touch him," the girl said sharply. Cam stopped where he was, turning on her with a growl.

"Yes, I know." She obviously wasn't intimidated as she stepped between them and pushed open the front door. "Gay ninja wolves. That explains some things."

"He's not--" Cam broke off when she turned away from the door. Her eyes were glowing green. It faded even as he stared, but he recognized the same thing his own eyes did under the right circumstances. Albeit a different color.

"Don't try to protect him," she said sternly. "We're the normal ones here."

His fingers clenched and he took a single step toward her. "Get away from him."

She didn't move. "If you touch him now, he'll react exactly the same way he did before. Let the air clear a little first."

That was what was different. She didn't smell like perfume anymore. The scent lingered in the air, but it wasn't coming from her. The open door was letting the slightly stale air from the hallway mingle with heavily perfumed air from the apartment--and now that he took the time to notice, he saw that she had opened as many windows as they had. A slight crossbreeze was springing up, further diluting the scent.

Not perfume, he realized. "Pheromones," he said aloud.

She just shrugged. "It's a fine line between passion and aggression."

Her casual dismissal of the situation infuriated him, and the wolf wanted to take action so badly that he was paralyzed. Torn between tearing into her and jumping the man huddled on the floor at her feet, he found that he couldn't do either. He could only stand there, angry, embattled, gritting out the one thing he could think of that might protect her.

"Get out of this building," he said, teeth clenching on the words.

Whether she would have done it or not, he didn't know. It was Hunter who gasped, "No." Staring straight ahead, he barely seemed aware of them. "Wait. What--what are you doing here?"

Cam couldn't stand still, so he backed away until he ran into the arm of the couch. "Are you all right?" he demanded, staring at Hunter. He looked awful. And in all fairness, Cam didn't feel much better.

"He's fine," the woman said brusquely. "He'd feel a lot better if he got laid, but it'll make my job easier if you wait until I leave."

"Still in the room, here," Hunter growled without moving. "Answer the question."

"What am I doing here?" She sounded vaguely amused. "Practically speaking, or the ultimate goal?"

"Whatever," Hunter muttered, turning his head toward the door. For fresh air, Cam wondered?

"I was sent here to seduce you," the woman informed him. "Iza thought you were the alpha, not the SO.

"Too bad," she added, apparently as an afterthought. "All the pretty ones are gay."

Cam was frozen in place. Her brazen words slammed into him, affecting him all over again, driving him closer and closer to rage. He could see it, feel it happening. He knew it wasn't human. It wasn't him. He struggled with the urge to put her in her place, fighting it, fighting it down, one tiny piece at a time, and it just came roaring back. The desire to dominate, to possess, to show her where her territory ended and his began.

Hunter wouldn't want me to shred her, he thought, a little desperately. Hunter was questioning her. He had to stay out of it until Hunter was done with her.

The rational part of him was irritated that this was the argument that worked on the wolf, but it did work, and he really needed not to kill her. No matter what Hunter was to him, there wasn't a jury in the world that would side with him if he murdered someone. Plus he had the sinking suspicion that she had "friends" who would respond poorly to their werebird being mauled by a werewolf.

"Right the first time." Hunter was hauling himself to his feet, and he gave her a glare when she offered a hand to help him. "Stay away from me."

She shrugged again. "If you say so."

"I do," Hunter snapped, his voice a little stronger now. "And I am the alpha. You got a problem with that?"

Cam bristled at the skeptical look she threw his way. "He's your alpha?" she repeated.

"You got a problem with me," Hunter snarled, "you take it up with me. Not him."

She didn't even look at him. "You don't have to listen to a human just because you're fucking him," she told Cam. "The pack won't make you give up your toys. Don't even have to share if you don't want to."

That was it. He went for her throat. He forgot every shred of rational argument as he leapt across the intervening space, intent only on defending Hunter. It was Hunter's voice that shouted "No!" and it was only his instinctive response that saved her life. Or his. She wasn't defenseless, after all. He stood there, glaring hatred at her, watching in mute, restless satisfaction as Hunter shoved her into the doorframe.

It was Hunter's arm on her throat instead of his teeth. It was Hunter's knee that slammed into her stomach when she made an abortive move for her bracelet--automatic self-defense, maybe, since it wouldn't have any effect on Hunter--and it was Hunter's voice that hissed in her ear. "I'm not a toy, and no one around here shares anything. You can tell Iza that the next siren she sends gets my friend in her face."

Siren. He turned that over in his mind, deciding that the name fit disturbingly well. But if Hunter knew what they were, why had he let the woman into his apartment in the first place?

Cam would have heard her if she said anything, but she must have tried to nod, because Hunter let her go. She twisted her neck a little but she didn't reach for her throat, eyeing Hunter warily as he stepped back. "Iza's not going to like you," she said, matter-of-factly.

"We don't have a problem with Iza." Hunter turned enough that he could see both of them--checking on Cam without taking his eye off of the girl. "As long as you know who you're dealing with, we're all good."

"No we're not," Cam snapped. She was too beautiful, too naturally appealing, too damn good at what she did, to be let off that easily. "Whatever you are, I don't want to see you around here again."

She looked at him, then back at Hunter. "Just a welcome present," she told him. "Iza sends us out to any new alpha in the area. It's not like you're special."

Hunter snorted. "Yeah, great. I'll pass on the freaky initiation ceremony, thanks just the same."

"Who's Iza?" Cam demanded, angry with the entire situation. She could leave any time now. And not just to spare him the trouble of killing her, either.

Again, the girl looked at Hunter. "You could tell him something, you know." She sounded disgusted, though it was hard to tell with who.

"What do I know?" he shot back. "I didn't even know you guys were for real until Cam showed up and broke your stupid spell!"

"It's biochemistry," Cam muttered. "Not magic." At least, he didn't think it was. On the other hand, the woman could turn into a giant bird, so what good was thinking going to do?

Finally, she was looking at him. "Iza's the pack leader," she informed him.

Then her gaze was back on Hunter. "If she'd known you were gay," she added, "she would've sent a satyr."

Cam's fists clenched. He was a breath away from his lupine form when Hunter glanced at him, and his eyes hadn't changed. Still dark, still full of heat--he might be standing and talking but he was still high on pheromones and it made his voice harsher than usual. "I have what I want," he rasped. "I don't need your kind of gift."

"It isn't just for you." She was actually pouting, and Cam understood that this was not a woman who was used to being turned away. Lucky her if she got to leave at all, with what he would have liked to do to her.

"Yeah?" Hunter said dangerously. "What do you get out of it?" His tone made it clear that if she so much as mentioned sex again, he wouldn't be responsible for the consequences.

"Information." She gave him a sultry, knowing smile that made Cam want to claw her eyes out. "You'd be amazed how much a man will say if you know what you're doing."

Tossing Cam an assessing look, she added carelessly, "Or maybe you wouldn't."

His nerves were raw from the fury roiling inside, the angry jealous possessiveness that clamored for her submission, the constant ache of wanting and fighting and being denied. He really was going to hurt her. Not because he wanted to, which he did, but because he couldn't help it. The energy had to go somewhere.

"Cam." Hunter's voice was quiet and tired and not at all commanding. If it had been, something inside him probably would have snapped, so tired of being held back and pushed around and kept away. As it was, he stopped even before Hunter added, "Don't," and the part of him that might have snapped just ached for everything he heard in that one word.

It was everything he felt. A weary mirror of his own frustration and anger and need. This was hurting Hunter too. It almost made him consider backing off.

He couldn't, of course. But he wished he could at least consider it.

"If we tell you what you want to know," Hunter grumbled, "will you go away?"

She considered him for a long moment. "No one's ever seen him before," she said abruptly, tilting her head toward Cam. "How long?"

"Get the logs from Mike and find out for yourself," Hunter snapped.

"Already have," she replied without hesitation. "Just wanted to see if you'd tell me the same thing you told him."

"Who are you?" Cam demanded irritably. "Because as the neighborhood welcoming committee, you leave a lot to be desired." The wolf might hold when Hunter told him to, but--hard as it was to remember lately--he was more than just the wolf.

"My name is Akeelah." She turned that pouty smile on him, suddenly finding him worth paying attention to. "And I offered more, if you remember. Hunter didn't want it."

She paused just long enough to catch him completely off guard when she asked, "Do you?"

"That's it," Hunter growled. He didn't even wait for her to look at him. "Get out. Right now."

She didn't move. "Nothing personal," she told Hunter. "I just hate to ruin my record."

"Get out!" he shouted, and even Cam flinched in surprise. "Get out of here!"

She shrugged, but she might have looked a little more nervous than before. "If you say so," she murmured. The tone did nothing to endear her to Hunter, who actually pushed her out into the hallway and slammed the door behind her. Cam stared at him, shocked to see Hunter smash his fist into the solid door and curse without inhibition.

That had to hurt, Cam thought distantly. But he was frozen in place. He could do nothing but watch as Hunter pressed his other fist against the door, not hitting it so much as just pushing as hard as he could. His arms trembled with the force he was exerting. Carefully, deliberately, he leaned his head forward and rested it against the door too.

Cam was torn. It wouldn't be hard to find the girl. For all he knew she was still in the hallway, standing on the other side of that door. There was only one thing he wanted more than to tear it open and find out--and it was literally standing between him and the possibility of doing just that.

"You should go," Hunter told the door. His voice was strained and his knuckles were white where they pressed against the wood.

"I can't," Cam heard himself say. Like he was someone else entirely. Like he was maybe even the wolf, and it was the human talking now. "You're blocking the door."

Without a word, Hunter lifted his head, pushed away from the door, and took a single step back. He paused there. Then he turned and walked jerkily to the chair on the near wall, throwing himself down into it without looking at Cam. "Go," he told the floor.

"I can't," Cam repeated, still stuck halfway between the couch and the door.

At least it made Hunter look at him. His expression was almost as dazed and drunk as it had been when Cam arrived, but he was in control of himself now and he sounded close to normal when he asked, "Why not?"

"Because you're here," Cam said quietly.

Hunter seemed to consider that, staring hard at him before tipping his head back to rest against the chair. "I really, seriously hope you don't mean that literally," he told the ceiling. "Because that has to be the only way this day could get worse."

It would be so easy to just go over there. Hunter had sprawled across the chair, spread-eagled with his legs open in front of him and his arms draped over the sides. He was making no effort to disguise the state of his body. So easy to straddle him in that old, well-cushioned armchair, to press mouth and hands and hips into feverish service in the name of relief. What could be wrong with that?

Cam knew even if the wolf didn't. So he backed up until he felt the couch behind him again, and he slid down to the floor and leaned up against the arm of the couch. It would have been safer if he'd sat on the other side of the couch entirely, out of sight of Hunter, but if he'd had that much restraint he would have just left.

"This is a really bad idea," Hunter muttered, not moving from his place in the chair. They were maybe five, six feet apart at the most. And Cam thought that if he concentrated any harder, he could hear Hunter's heartbeat from where he was.

"I don't remember any ideas being thrown out," Cam muttered.

"Here's one." Hunter's suddenly harsh tone was at odds with his boneless sprawl. "You get the hell out of here while I try to forget someone ever mentioned you and fucking in the same sentence."

"Here's another one," Cam retorted, almost cutting him off in his urgency. "We do it and get it over with because I don't know how much longer I can be around you like this!"

"Like what, doped up on some crazy woman's sex cologne?" Hunter snapped. He was still staring at the ceiling. "Well good news, they only try to 'welcome' you once! After that you don't get any more free aphrodisiacs and you're stuck with what you've got!"

"Are you completely clueless or is it just a clever act!" He was shouting and he knew it and all the windows were open but at least the door was closed now. "The wolf isn't an independent personality! It feels everything I feel; it just doesn't hide it as well!"

"Great, hide behind the wild animal excuse again!" Hunter shouted back. "Some of us have to deal with the consequences of our actions!"

"I can't hide!" Cam yelled. "Don't you get that! My privacy is gone thanks to my demented uncle and an immature wolf! I don't have any more secrets!"

Hunter glared up at the ceiling in silence for a moment before lifting his head to fix his gaze on Cam. For a moment Cam thought he wasn't going to say anything. Then, though, in a more subdued voice he remarked, "You're not as obvious as you think you are."

"You're not as observant as you think you are," Cam snarled in return. "Try being around people you know in a form that gives you zero control over which feelings you express and which ones you keep to yourself and see how long it takes you to get tired of them pretending they don't notice."

"Try being on a siren high around a guy who didn't look at you twice before that form," Hunter retorted.

"I am," Cam shot back.

Hunter let his head fall back against the chair. "This might be the stupidest argument we've ever had," he muttered. "I can't believe we're actually fighting over which of us is making the other more crazy."

"I win," Cam declared automatically.

"You do not fucking win!" Hunter exclaimed, sitting up in his chair. "I'm this close to saying 'screw it' and letting you do whatever the hell you want, and you think I'm making you crazy?"

Cam swallowed hard, wondering how close was close and what he could do to make that distance smaller. Hunter was right there. He was almost in reach, as if Cam could just extend himself a little farther and make the choice for him. Please, if he could just have this one thing--

He didn't realize he'd said it aloud until he heard the words. "Please, Hunter," he whispered, the sound strange in the silence that had followed Hunter's outburst.

He let his head drop, already feeling his face tingle in the wake of that unintentional plea. He wished it were only the wolf that told the world everything that was on his mind. It seemed to carry over into his human consciousness as well, and this might not be the most embarrassing thing he'd said but it had to be right up there.

"Okay," Hunter said quietly.

His head snapped up. "What?"

"Okay," Hunter repeated, elbows braced on his knees as he stared across the distance between them. "Screw it; what do I care? If it's you or the people you're gonna hurt if you don't respect me in the morning, I pick you."

Cam barely heard him. He was already on his feet and two steps away from Hunter when the door swung open and Blake walked in. Cam almost didn't stop. His momentum carried him to the chair, his knee just brushing Hunter's as he wrenched himself away. Blake's greeting drowned out the soft, strangled sound Hunter made, and Cam stumbled to the window and braced himself against it.

"Oh, hey Cam," Blake added, the clink of keys trailing his movement through the apartment until he tossed them on the counter in the kitchen. Cam heard him open the refrigerator, calling as he did so, "What's going on?"

For a moment, Cam thought the question might go unanswered. Then Hunter muttered, "Nothing." His tone--bitter, amused, disgusted?--was impossible to interpret. "Nothing's going on."

The refrigerator door closed, a can popped, and Blake sounded a lot more aware all of a sudden. "You all right, bro?"

Cam gritted his teeth, steeling himself to glance over his shoulder. Hunter was sitting just as he had been in the chair, except that now his head was in his hands and his face was hidden. Cam was struck by the sudden uncomfortable desire to comfort him somehow. When combined with the urge to tear his clothes off it was a truly disturbing feeling.

"No," Hunter told the floor. "You know those crazy siren things your friend warned us about? At the community center?"

Cam could only stare at him. Peripherally, he could see Blake nodding.

"Yeah, right, the--" Blake's pause was barely noticeable, but Cam felt other Ranger's gaze flick toward him. "Bird women. What about them?"

"They're the waitresses," Hunter said, not lifting his head. "The girls who staff the place, they're sirens. And Iza owns them."

"No way." Blake stopped with the soda can halfway to his mouth. "Seriously?" He paused just long enough to shake his head. "That almost makes sense."

Hunter lifted his forehead from his hands and rested his chin on them instead, so that he could eye Blake without having to actually move. Cam watched him, waiting for a look, a glance that would tell him he hadn't ceased to exist just because Blake walked into the room. It didn't come.

"No, come on," Blake was saying. "They're practically the hottest women on the planet, and they're waiting tables at a wolf hangout? Should have known there was something weird about them."

Hunter snorted, dropping his hands and bracing them against his knees as if he was about to get up. Except that he didn't. "They're freakin' weird all right," he grumbled. "One of 'em was just here. And she had her charm turned all the way up."

"Oh." Blake looked from one of them to the other, and he obviously got it. "Oh," he repeated, folding one arm over his chest and holding his soda can a little closer. "So... she's gone now? What'd she want?"

"Who knows," Hunter muttered. Then, seeming to realize that wasn't enough, he added, "She said she wanted to... know more about us. That Iza saw us at the community center, me and Cam, and she's trying to figure out if we're a threat or not."

"What, 'cause you're..." Blake trailed off, frowning. "Why would you be a threat to Iza?"

"Standard procedure," Hunter said with a grimace. "According to her. Iza must not have cared when we went because neither of us are wolves."

"Well--" Blake was still frowning. "That makes this more of a problem."

Cam glared at him, but Hunter just raised an eyebrow. "This what?" he wanted to know.

And he was right; it wasn't about Cam at all. Nothing seemed to be, when Blake was around. Instead, he wanted to talk about Tori--and okay, Cam liked her, but was this really the time for a brother-to-brother chat?

"She wants to see the community center," Blake was explaining.

Hunter shrugged, and for once he seemed to agree with Cam instead of Blake. "So take her."

"You know what it's like there," Blake protested. "She doesn't. She's hot and she's a ninja and they're gonna be all over her."

"So don't take her," Hunter said impatiently.

"Bro, this is Tori we're talking about," Blake emphasized. "She's not gonna take no for an answer."

Hunter rolled his eyes. "What do you want me to do? Mind control?"

"Come with us," Blake urged. "Tonight. We'll go, she can see the place, and if there's trouble I'm pretty sure the two of us can keep her out of it.

"It doesn't have to be for long," he added. "It's not like she's gonna want to stay once she sees what it's like."

Hunter considered it for longer than Cam thought the question deserved. Finally he nodded once. "Yeah, okay, fine. As long as you don't tell her I'm the extra bodyguard. I don't want to be on her bad side any more than you do."

Cam opened his mouth to protest, and he had actually gotten as far as "Wait a minute," before Hunter's still-dark gaze pinned him where he stood. "You want to come?" Hunter asked roughly.

Cam broke off mid-sentence. "Yeah." That was it, just yes, because the wolves and the sirens and the people who knew things about them that Blake and Tori didn't just didn't matter as much as the fact that Hunter would be there and Hunter had just asked him to be there too. With him.

"Great," Blake said, and he didn't sound quite as happy about it as he had a minute ago, but he hadn't really expected Cam not to go, had he? Straightening up, he carried his soda back into the kitchen with the words, "I gotta get back to work; break's almost up."

That was the best news Cam had heard all day.

Then Blake called, "Oh, Hunter, Kelly wants you to come in and sign some paperwork. Something about the sick days."

"What, now?" Hunter demanded. He sounded significantly more irritated than usual and still not nearly irritated enough, as far as Cam was concerned. "Does it have to be today?"

"Uh, considering that today's Friday?" There was a clanking sound as Blake tossed the empty can into their recycling bin, and he added, "Yeah, it's gotta be today. Unless you don't want to get paid next week. Your choice."

Hunter was staring at him and Cam was staring back and it wasn't momentous or climactic or anything except force of habit and the fact that neither of them was willing to say this thing between them was more important. Maybe Hunter wouldn't, because it was his brother, standing there by the door and waiting impatiently. And Cam couldn't, because who was he to tell Hunter that he needed this more than Hunter needed a paycheck, needed food, needed his own life?

"I'm gonna go," Hunter muttered. "Probably won't take long." His tone was indifferent. His expression was anything but when he added, "You can hang here if you want."

Cam's gaze went to Blake in time to catch the look he gave Hunter for that offer. But he didn't say anything, and Hunter didn't look at him. He kept his eyes on Cam until Cam nodded.

Blake glanced at Cam as Hunter moved past him into the hallway. Hunter didn't look back, and for once, Blake's face was hard to read. All he said was, "Later, Cam," and then they were gone.

Staring at the closed door, Cam wondered what Blake knew. Hunter kept secrets from Blake--of that, Cam was sure. But which secrets, and how carefully were they guarded? Blake certainly seemed to think he knew everything about his older brother...

In the sudden quiet, Cam's eyes were drawn to the shirt that hung over the arm of the chair on the opposite wall. One sleeve was hooked over the cushion while the bottom of the shirt trailed on the floor, and it was hard to tell if the girl had actually cared where it landed or not. It looked as though it might have come in contact with a piece of furniture purely by accident.

He went over and picked it up before he thought about what he was doing. As soon as he moved the shirt a wave of fresh perfume wafted into the air and his fists clenched involuntarily. What had been mildly annoying when he first arrived was now threatening to make him insane, and the reason for the strength of Hunter's reaction was clear in retrospect. Length of exposure was obviously a key factor.

There was no safe place to put the shirt. Finally he dropped it where it was and retreated to the kitchen, hunting through the drawers until he found something sealable. He stuffed the shirt inside and looked around for something to label it with. If Hunter and Blake owned markers, they weren't immediately visible, but he did manage to find duct tape and a pen.

Do not open, he wrote. Wash alone.

He considered leaving it out on the table, but the temptation to poke around Hunter's room was stronger than the desire to embarrass him. So he carried it over to the room on the left and pushed the door open. Yes, maybe it was Hunter's privacy he was invading. But as he'd said, he didn't have any privacy anymore, and that made him less respectful of other people's.

It hit him like heat rolling out of the room, the scent of Hunter stronger here than anywhere else in the apartment and undiluted by the outside air coming in through open windows. He actually closed his eyes, shocked by the force of his reaction. Hunter smelled like hurt lately, like bandages and antibiotic and injury, but this... this was just him. Just like standing next to him and breathing him in and not needing to pretend he wasn't.

That was when he knew that this particular privacy mattered. He wasn't just looking at a room. He was sensing the person who lived in it. He was communicating with Hunter in a way that was every bit as one-sided as the conversations Hunter had with him when he was a wolf. He should put the shirt down and leave, right now.

He set the shirt down carefully, beside what he thought might be the laundry pile. There were so many clothes strewn around the room that it was hard to tell. It was funny, he thought, studying the scene. It was disorganized and haphazard and chaotic... but it wasn't messy. There was nothing he could identify as trash anywhere. There was nothing that looked forgotten, nothing open that should be closed, nothing spilled or broken or--

Leaving, he reminded himself firmly. He was leaving now.

He sank down on the bed, not sure why he wasn't moving toward the door. He could imagine Hunter in this room, and maybe that was the strangest thing of all. He never saw Hunter when he wasn't working or training or hanging out with the others. He never saw Hunter alone--or he hadn't, until this past week. Yet he could picture him here, staring out the window or yelling to Blake or digging through his endless piles of clothes for something he'd lost.

Lying on the only partially made bed and gazing up at the ceiling. Falling into it late at night, exhausted and bruised and secure in the knowledge that Rangers got more from a night of sleep than most people did from a week of healing. Sleeping here, dreaming here, fantasizing here in this bed...

What did Hunter fantasize about, he wondered? It was an impossible question, not to mention an inconvenient one. The last thing he needed was to be sitting on Hunter's bed, thinking about Hunter's fantasies, when all he really wanted was to--

Wasn't that exactly what he wanted? He needed something, anything to relieve the tension inside. And here he had it: a few moments alone, privacy, the scent of the person he wanted.

It wasn't the same. But it wasn't anywhere near as embarrassing, either.

He couldn't do it. He was paralyzed by sudden comprehension as his mental schema went from "invasion of privacy" to "romantic longing." He wasn't here to jerk off. He wasn't even here for sex. He was here for Hunter.

The thought was terrifying.