He backed away. “I think you better go shower. Don’t make me choose between sex and overcooking my pasta.”
“Why is this so good?” Adam asked while shoveling in more. “What did you lace this with?”
“Love,” Roscoe said, looking rather proud of himself. “And homemade tomato sauce.”
Austin didn’t say a word but didn’t stop eating either. I couldn’t blame him. This was the best thing Roscoe had made so far.
“This was your plan all along, wasn’t it?” I said, scooping more onto my plate, the cheese so gooey it fell on the table in strands. “You want to make me fat.”
The old werewolf said nothing while flashing his brows.
“What else can you cook?” Austin asked.
“It’s easier to list what I can’t.”
“I’ve been in the mood for venison.” Austin shoved another forkful into his maw, smacking loudly. I wasn’t looking forward to eating like that when I finally made the shift. “I’ll hunt it, you cook it. Deal?”
“I get to cook deer, and I don’t have to catch it? Shit. Sign me up.”
I looked over at Adam and we silently chuckled. Roscoe was hands-down the laziest bastard I’d ever met, but when it came to cooking, he didn’t cut corners. Austin offering to hunt was a bit of a curveball though.
“Oh!” Roscoe said, reaching behind him to grab an envelope off the counter. “Look. Our first piece of mail.”
I snatched the letter out of his hand. “Is that my check?”
“I dunno. It’s from the courthouse here in Norwich.”
“Oh yeah. The orientation.” I tore open the envelope and read the letter. “We need to go to city hall tomorrow.”
“All of us?” Adam asked.
“That’s what it says.”
Austin’s eyes went wide. “I’ll pass.”
“It’s mandatory, Austin,” I said, pointing to the bold lettering.
“I’m not going into a government building. They’ll have to come find me first.”
“Maybe the three of us can go up there without him,” Roscoe said.
“I don’t think that’s gonna fly.” I handed the paper to Austin. “But it’s your choice. I’d rather us not draw too much attention to ourselves though.”
“I don’t like this,” he whispered, reading over the document.
“It’s a small town in the middle of nowhere. There aren’t any black helicopters,” Adam said sarcastically.
Austin slammed the letter onto the table. “You think this is funny?”
“No, I think it’s stupid. No one’s after you. The military probably doesn’t even give a fuck where you are.”
“You just want them to take me. That’s what you’ve always wanted.” Austin stood and backed away from the table. “I bet you’ve been tipping them off this whole time, pretending to be on my side. Now they’re always watching me.”
“Austin,” Roscoe said calmly, “if Adam had done that, you’d already be gone.”
“Maybe all this is a lie. Maybe I’m still there hooked up to some machine, and this is all just a—a drug-induced hallucination!”
The far-away expression, the dilated pupils, the heavy breathing. The poor guy was having a full-blown panic attack. Roscoe stood and carefully approached the snarling werewolf.
