He dropped into his chair next to Max and snagged the last two burgers and fries. “So, game night tonight,” he said, elbowing Max’s arm. “You in?”
“Um, sure?” Max glanced from him to Lukas and back again, then to Caius. “All of us?”
“I don’t play,” Caius said.
“Don’t lie.” Quinn took a too large bite of burger, barely chewing before swallowing. “You got banished from the barracks for being too competitive.”
Max coughed in a terrible attempt to hide his laugh.
Quinn smirked in the face of Caius’ glare before focusing on his food. He might have asked Caius to join them anyway, if Lukas hadn’t been acting so weird. When he glanced across the table, he found Lukas intently focused on the last few fries on his plate. Beneath the scent of beef and grease, he swore Lukas smelled anxious. Which didn’t happen.
Lukas was a fucking sniper. He was the calmest shifter Quinn had ever met, to the point he was convinced Lukas’ wolf was far closer to the surface than most. Few humans could ever manage to sit still for hours on end, waiting for one specific target to be in one specific spot. Shifters tended to have a bit more patience than humans, even alphas, thanks to the wolf in them, but more than once Lukas had scouted a mission for twelve or more hours.
Quinn didn’t have that in him. He needed to move and burn off excess energy. The only exception was if he was on a computer or playing a game, but that was his human hyper-fixation at its finest.
He polished off his burgers and snagged a beer from the fridge, then went back for the leftover sushi he’d ordered too much of yesterday. More than once, Caius had asked if he had a sushi tooth instead of a sweet tooth over the years. He was always glad to report that yes, yes he did.
Max’s eyebrows went up when Quinn sat back down and popped the lids off three different rolls, but he’d been with them long enough by now to know how much a shifter could eat.
After spending all day running around the woods as a wolf, he was starving.
He went back for a small dish, poured a generous amount of soy sauce into it, then mixed an entire wasabi ball into it. “I was thinking we should get a tree,” he said, eyeing Caius as he popped a large bite of delicious roll into his mouth.
Forget finding a cook. He really could eat sushi every day for the rest of his life.
Caius glanced at him before, unsurprisingly, looking at Max. “Do you want to pick one out?”
Max blinked when he realized Caius was talking to him, tearing his eyes away from Quinn’s sushi. “Really?”
Quinn hid a smile by shoveling more food into his mouth. Max’s excitement was palpable, and he nearly vibrated with the effort to keep still. “We should all go. We need decorations and shit too. Can make it a new pack tradition.” If they were going to make this their home, they needed to start it off right. They couldn’t spend all their time worrying about the Order or the next mob hit.
He’d make some changes to his scrubbers so they weren’t taken by surprise again. Maybe even reach out to one of his friends who’d gotten into info brokering to help.
Lukas was oddly silent as he sipped the last of his soda. More silent than usual. He doubted most people would even notice since Lukas kept to himself most of the time. Sometimes Quinn was surprised he’d even joined the pack, but even a lone wolf knew better than to go packless.
Humans may have deceived themselves ages ago that they could exist as islands without unraveling, but shifters relied on pack more than humans ever relied on family.
Quinn stared and ate his sushi as Caius and Max worked out tree details, but Lukas never looked up. He knew the moment Lukas realized he was being watched when he went absolutely still, like when he settled in for a long wait with nothing but his gun and the other end of his viewfinder.
That was fine. He’d get some answers soon. Lukas wouldn’t have suggested game night for no reason.
He polished off the last bite of sushi and sat back with a groan, rubbing his food baby.
“Can’t believe you’re not sick,” Max muttered.
“You should try it sometime. You need some meat on those bones.”
Max scoffed. “I don’t see how you all eat enough for twenty people and aren’t fat.”
Quinn laughed. “Shifter metabolism.”
“Exercise doesn’t hurt either,” Lukas said, standing and dumping his trash.
“I exercise,” Quinn protested, crossing his arms when Lukas raised an eyebrow at him. “Fuck you.” He picked up the empty containers and bottle and tossed them in the trash before glancing at Max. “Games?” It was almost sickeningly cute when Max and Caius lingered a few more moments, their fingers locked together on top of the table.
Nothing like being attacked and nearly kidnapped to make one sentimental.
He headed downstairs and sprawled into the corner of his sofa, propping a foot on the edge of the table. “You two can pick,” he said, once Lukas and Max joined him.
