Page 94 of Moon Tamed

My mother regarded me for a long moment before turning to my brother and saying, “I probably shouldn’t have taught your sister that. I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry she doesn’t want to kill me?”

My mother’s rather perplexed expression made me laugh. “Don’t worry about it, Peter. She did teach me I love you too much to actually kill you. But she also taught me that if I want to have my own camping kit, I have to abuse you when you put yourself into an exploitable position. Which you have. Don’t play knuckle slap against Calden. You will lose.”

“Can we view this as my attempt to give you an extra week of camping?”

“That does earn you my favor, but it doesn’t get you out of taking me shopping for camping supplies tomorrow.”

“If he’s taking you camping all the time, you’ll never come home. We’ll be sitting here wondering if you were eaten by wolves out in the forest.”

Somehow, I kept from laughing or leering at my brother. “I’m sure I will be fine. Thank you for the extra week of camping time, Calden.”

“You’re welcome. You should defeat him harshly for his failure to provide books to go with your camping time.”

“Two new books, but that’s it, Coraline,” my brother announced.

“As I am a lazy creature and two books is better than no books, I agree to your terms.”

My father stared at my mother. “She gets this from you. I never would have come up with such a plan, even when desperate to get you to date me.”

“Well, she’s smarter than both of us combined, because honestly, I wouldn’t have come up with such a plan either. But it would have worked. She gets the book thing from both of us. We’re just far more restrained in our book indulging ways.”

“Only because she keeps attacking our wallets using birds,” my father muttered.

“And our general reluctance to go to the library, as we’re aware we are terrible at returning books. I have no idea where she got her prompt nature from, but it wasn’t from us.” My mother considered me through narrowed eyes. “Are you sure you’re not adopted?”

“Mom!” I stomped my foot and placed my hands on my hips. “You swore never again after the thirty-six hours of hell I put you through.” I pointed at Peter. “You are also a liar.”

“He’s the product of a bottle of wine and a lack of common sense,” she replied.

Peter faked a sniff. “I thought I was the product of a crying Coraline, who wanted a little brother to play with.”

“It took the bottle of wine to think it was a good idea.”

I laughed at my mother’s ruthlessness. “And how much of a fuss did Peter put up?”

“About twenty-two minutes, which almost tricked us into having a third. But then your father wisely reminded me that you were thirty-six hours of misery. Peter, I’d like to mention that was your first and last successful ambush, and you used it to escape my womb.”

The Stephans cracked up, as did I. “Quit while you’re ahead, Peter. But you should give me a third book because I was so needy they decided to have you to help keep me somewhat contained.”

Peter sighed, made a show of shaking out his hand, and muttered, “What happened?”

I giggled and shrugged. “That’s a good question. So, Mom. Dad. I have a question for you.”

“You have taught us to fear when you have questions,” my father replied. “I’m not sure I want to take this bait.”

“I am looking for dirt on Mr. Stephans. So far, all I have is a blatant misuse of petty cash funds to pull pranks on his son for morale boosting activities. Thoughts?”

“What’s your tally up to on petty cash misuse?” my mother asked in a curious tone.

“Not nearly as high as expected, although I’m concerned about the latest receipt, which is for a twenty pound drum of glitter, a restock of paintballs in all colors other than mine, and child-safe glue, which implies he’s going to be applying glitter and paintballs to his children. Meaning the Hunters.”

“You would be correct,” my boss informed me in a solemn tone.

“I need something more substantial than what I have for this report. I’m going to release the initial findings, and I’ll be laughed out of the city-state. I’ll flee from the shame of being unable to find evidence of corruption.”

“It’s simple, Coraline. I never wanted this job. I did it because someone needed to, and my predecessor had a corruption rap sheet ten miles long. A similar report went out during the election, and I was the only one with a clean record, so I got the job. But I’ll add a few more counts of petty cash abuse and give you the receipts. Perhaps I will treat my executive secretary to lunch for putting up with my wicked ways.”

---