Page 14 of Moon Tamed

I needed to thank my mother later for providing an easy route of escape. “Please excuse me, else she might send me home without supper.”

“Of course. Thank you for rescuing me from the doves. They’re obviously dangerous fiends.”

Snickering, I nodded and bolted for upstairs. The feathered fiends would settle in for the night, as the flock had learned we would provide for them. The partridges would join the doves along with the stray songbirds smart enough to nest inside the sunroom.

The last time I’d checked, the doves had adopted a pair of tiny speckled owls with a love of worms.

Rather than shower, I rinsed off and opted to take a bath. A soak would do me a world of good. After, I’d wear my kitten print panties with pride while pulling a prank my mother might forgive me for.

I’d change into my tiger pajamas, which was a fluffy onesie, and bring my favorite wolf plushy along for the ride. At the very least, I would confuse my temporary employers. As a bonus, I’d teach them what happened when I became bored. My choice to switch temporary work often helped me to preserve my professionalism.

Not even Sila knew the truth about the vast canyon dividing my work life from my home life.

Then again, work had never followed me home before—or to my parents’ home.

In a way, I appreciated that I wouldn’t need to hide my wilder side, the side that viewed the same-old, same-old as a fate worse than any prison.

Once the bath water cooled, I drained the tub, stole my mother’s robe, and emerged to discover a party in the upstairs hallway. My brother and Calden’s father waged a vicious war of knuckle slap against each other while my father handled being the caller.

“Doves,” Dad announced.

Neither landed a hit in the allowed five seconds, which my mother counted.

Calden held a ruler, and as neither player had landed a hit, he slapped their knuckles. “That was awful. Children play better.”

“He’s slippery,” Calden’s father complained.

I viewed the entire situation as my fault. Had I been a better daughter, I would have checked in on my parents more often. Caring for my parents seemed to require more than a single visit once a week.

How had my parents survived without proper supervision?

I bypassed the insanity, retrieved my pajamas, and brought my wolf to my mother. “Sir Wolfston requires his grandmother’s love.”

She took the stuffed animal. Enlightenment struck me.

They battled for some prize, which explained why everyone had lost their minds. While no one in my family was a Hunter, we defined what it meant to be competitive. As I’d surely find out what they battled over eventually, I returned to the bathroom to change.

Dressed appropriately and armed with the bra I refused to wear in my pajamas, I rejoined the party in the hallway. Judging from the reddened state of their knuckles, the opponents would resent the Stephans family before my father declared a winner. “Hummingbirds,” my father announced.

Calden’s father whipped his hand over and whacked my brother’s knuckles. Peter wailed his dismay, fell to his knees, and bowed his head.

When faced with absurdity, adding to it seemed reasonable. I draped my bra over my brother’s head. “Please wash that along with my work clothes.”

“I battled for your honor.” Peter flung himself at me and hugged my legs. “Mom said they could take you.”

“I’m working for them on a contract, Peter. They get me for eight hours a day, five days a week. This will be my normal for a while.”

“Do you know what they’ll do to you, my sweet and innocent sister?”

“I can be sweet, but there is an entire sunroom full of doves proving my lack of innocence. As for the lack of boyfriends in my life, if they did a better job of being my friend, they’d have panty privileges. I don’t kiss on the first date, so there’s no way I’m offering panty privileges to someone I’m not willing to introduce to our mama.”

“We may have done too good of a job raising the older one,” my dad said, and he stared at me with sad eyes before heaving a sigh.

“Who brought their baby to work today?” Nothing got my dad going like someone bringing a young child to work.

“My boss’s daughter had her newborn in,” he confessed.

Good grief. “Sorry, Dad. I keep finding the impatient losers who can’t wait a day for a kiss let alone the entire buffet. Want me to bring over a new bird for your flock?”

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