Feral Northern Shifters 2

this room, “I understand.”
“I’m glad to hear it.”
Doug left, and Ethan lay down and put an arm across his face.
“Turn it on again.” Doug shut the door behind him and Bram tapped the keyboard. Ethan came back on screen, lying on the bed with his face covered by his arm, as if protecting himself.
    Doug had expected Bram to obey and not watch him give Ethan the ultimatum, so Bram pretended he had not kept the surveillance on. Consequently, a question was in order. “What did you say to him, Doug?”
“I told him to leave you alone. He agreed to do as I asked.” Doug paused and frowned. “Why are you looking miserable? I took care of the problem.”
“Thanks.”
Doug paused, assessing Bram who wished he could dissimulate better than this. “You were pretty upset yesterday with the idea of Ethan kissing you. Ran against your ethics or something. Don’t tell me you’ve changed your mind today.”
Bram shook his head emphatically. “I haven’t changed my mind.”
“Good. I thought about it last night and decided you were right. It’s a bad idea to get physical with the cat. I want him to keep his head on straight.”
Head on straight. Right . But Bram just nodded.
“What’s he doing?”
“Lying down,” Bram said tonelessly and they both watched Ethan on the bed, chest rising and falling as if he was in distress.
Doug quirked his mouth into a smile. “Bit of a drama queen.”
Bram shrugged.
Clapping him on the back, Doug announced, “I’m out for a few hours. You can watch him from here if you’d prefer. If you find it too intense to be inside his room.”
“I might just do that.”
Doug strode out.
Bram waited a full half hour before he turned the camera off—Ethan hadn’t budged the entire time— and went into history. There he found video of himself watching Ethan from yesterday, forty-seven minutes worth, and spliced it out. Then he set it to play again and again. Yes, if Doug came back early and paid attention, he could figure out it was a false loop. Fortunately, Doug trusted Bram to do as he was instructed.
Bram ignored the pang of disobeying his alpha and walked back into Ethan’s room.

Chapter Seven
    Ethan didn’t react to Bram’s entry, even when he approached the bed. Bram stared down, wishing he knew what to do.
Let him go free .
It was the obvious answer and Bram didn’t trust it. If Bram opened the doors and let Ethan walk out of the building, he wouldn’t get far. There was a razor-wire fence that surrounded the pack’s headquarters. Yes, a legacy from Gabriel’s paranoid rule, but the thing was, Doug had never seen fit to tear it down. One day it might protect us from the government had been his last explanation.
Bram retreated and sank down into the corner, directly below the camera and out of its eye. Sure the camera was switched off, but under the circumstances, it didn’t hurt to be overcareful.
“What are you doing?” Ethan spoke to his arm still covering his face.
Bram tossed several answers around in his mind and couldn’t find anything he liked. He settled on, “I don’t know.”
Lifting his upper body so he rested on his elbows, Ethan looked across at Bram, then glanced up at the camera. He briefly closed his eyes before he rolled off the bed and came over to Bram on all fours.
Stalked over , Bram thought, and there was grace in it.
Day-old stubble adorned Ethan’s jaw and his badly cut hair stuck up haphazardly. The bones of his face were too sharp, even if he had put on a bit of weight since staying here. Bram thought he was so beautiful and could never tell him.
“Are we out of sight?” Ethan asked softly.
Bram nodded. He had hunkered down in the corner with his knees up, his legs blocking Ethan, who had stopped just out of reach.
“My cat wants out, out of this room, out of this body.” Ethan’s gaze burned, which made Bram feel hot. “But I think that might be a death sentence here.”
“No one is going to kill you.”
Ethan’s mouth twisted. “That’s what Gabriel once told me.”
“Doug is no Gabriel.”
“And yet, I am still his sacrifice, no?”
Bram wanted to shake his head, but he remembered that there were people out there who Doug said would take care of Ethan. Was that a sacrifice? “I don’t think so.”
“I suppose I should take some comfort from the fact that you don’t appear to want me to be a sacrifice.”
“I don’t,” Bram whispered.
“What do you want, Bram?”
The air seemed to thicken, a tension, and