Page 82 of Moon Tamed

“I love them, but I don’t have as much time for them as I’d like, so I don’t have any right now. I expect I’ll end up with a few because of the Earth situation.”

“Can I be signed up to have a few horses?”

He laughed. “If you could get away with it, you’d spend your entire life just playing with animals.”

“That did not take you long to figure out.”

“Call it a lucky guess.”

I sat on one of the cut stumps Calden had gathered for the site and observed him cook the rabbits over the fire. “This isn’t something I’ve done before. I usually just tossed my rabbits in a cooler and hauled them back to the bus stop.”

“For you to be hunting near a bus stop, you were just on the outskirts of the city.”

I nodded. “I could have asked Dad to drive me out, but I have unacceptably independent tendencies.”

“Unless you’re being offered a camping trip,” he corrected.

I laughed. “If this is what camping is like, I am never saying no to a camping trip. It’s quiet, I have ready access to books, I can acquire a warm, fluffy wolf at my leisure, and while my parents will surely question why I’m not showing up for the family dinner, I’m sure your father will be questioning the same thing. Your father will eventually join forces with my father, and they will determine we have fled somewhere, probably for some nefarious purpose.”

“My father will figure it out quickly. He’ll just go to my favorite camping store and ask if anyone has seen me. The instant a store clerk confirms I had been there, he will understand I fled to go camping. If he’s smart enough to ask if I had anyone with me, he will know it’s a camping trip for two. My father can be cunning when he stops to think. Will he stop to think? That I can’t tell you. But once our parents join forces, they’ll figure it out quickly. Will you or I be accused of kidnapping? That’s the real question here.”

“I’ve never kidnapped anyone before, so I doubt I’ll get blamed. You’ll be accused of luring me off. Without doubt. I limit my escapes from the city to roughly six to eight hours, after which I show up with a small cooler filled with rabbit.” I eyed him. “What do I have to do to get my own unlimited license?”

“Ask my father nicely. I hear the power of tears might work to get him to abuse his powers and put in the request that you get an unlimited rabbit license. You could detail your experiment to corrupt him in your report. And if he doesn’t cave, well, he’s going to have a flawless record. He gets an unlimited license on the grounds of running the place, but he never goes anywhere near the base limit. And he reports his every kill, even when camping and hunting as a wolf.”

“There should be limits to his ethics,” I complained. “How can I get dirt on him if there’s no dirt to be found beyond horrible pranks paid for through the petty cash? And once I put he does petty pranks using petty cash, everyone will see the joke for what it is.”

Calden’s eyes widen. “I had not thought of that. He really is pulling pretty pranks using petty cash, isn’t he?”

“And he’s probably waiting for the moment someone notices and calls him out on it.”

“He would.”

We stared at each other, and Calden’s lopsided grin promised some form of trickery on the horizon. “You’re planning something,” I accused.

“I am planning on running away with you so we don’t have to deal with the hunt on Monday.”

I giggled, as the hunt preparations had driven most everyone to the end of their rope, myself included. “And you do this once a month?”

“It’s usually just two days of prep, but Dad wanted the finesse tests this go around. Usually, we try not to spend too much time preparing for the hunts, as we have a lot of work to do. Hunt weeks, most employees end up working three to four hours a day of overtime to make sure they can participate in the hunt and get the basic work done. Dad always approves that because it’s a good way to keep morale high and give bonuses to everybody without saying it’s a bonus.”

“There must be some deep, dark secret involving your father, Calden. Nobody is this ethical. Nobody.”

“I’ve been looking for years, and I haven’t found anything. Power? He’s not interested in it, and it annoys him that he has as much of it as he does. The worst thing he has done is abuse the petty cash on his petty pranks. And those petty pranks involve me!”

“Won’t running away put a damper on the hunt, though?”

“Oh, no. Dad will continue the planned activities as normal, postpone any of the hunts involving us, and then pay overtime for the entire faction to hunt us down and drag us back to work. If he clues in we’re running away to avoid the hunt, we’ll become the hunted.”

My eyes widened at the thought of the entire faction coming out to bring Calden back, probably kicking and screaming. “I’m not sure we brought enough clothes for that. Or potatoes.”

“There’s a grocery store nearby, and half the fun about camping is getting dirty. My SUV is due to be cleaned anyway.” He smirked. “You’re not afraid of a little dirt, are you, Coraline?”

“No, I’m afraid of your father, my parents, and my brother joining forces. Do you know what that lot might do if we run away?”

“What?”

“Plan a wedding, because obviously, that’s what should happen when two adults decide to go camping together without supervision.”

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