by T. S. Joyce
Sammy’s was all sticky wood floors, mismatched tables, and a stuffed deer butt over the bathrooms down the hallway. Aviana smiled at the memory of the first time she’d met Beaston here. She’d been so scared to talk to him. He hadn’t known she was his raven after all those years, but as an adult, she’d sought him out. He was so different from what she’d remembered of the sweet silver bear cub. Beaston as an adult was feral, but she’d still seen a spark of the boy she’d known. Thank goodness she’d approached him here. It had been a huge turning point in her life. The emptiness that had swallowed her whole was banished when she met Beaston.
“You look mushy,” Willa said through a grin as she handed Aviana a shot glass of orange liquid.
“She’s not drinking,” Beaston growled.
“Pipe down, scary-beary. It’s just orange juice so she can toast with us. Clara has the same boring, non-alcoholic juice shot. Don’t worry. I’m not trying to piss off the dragon and the beast by getting their preggo mates schnockered.”
Aviana took the shot of OJ and lifted it in a silent toast to Clara, who stood beside Damon as he greeted Kong with a big grin on his face. That old dragon used to never smile.
Sammy’s was covered in shiny red, and oversize plastic ornaments hung from the exposed ceiling beams like disco balls. A Douglas fir tree stood in the corner, stretching from floor to ceiling and covered in tinsel and bows. A smile consumed Aviana’s face.
Beaston leaned forward, wrapping his big hands around her waist, and murmured against her ear, “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“I never thought I would have this feeling again.” Her heart pounded just being close to him. He smelled of pine sap, shaving cream, and the spicy, masculine body wash he used in the shower. Unable to help herself, she kissed his cleanly shaven cheek just to feel the smoothness of his skin against her lips.
“What feeling?” he asked, sliding his hand up her arm and around the back of her neck, pulling her closer.
“I used to get this giddy feeling when I would bring you presents on Christmas night. But when my dad moved us away, I thought the holiday would never feel like that again.”
“And you have it now? That feeling?”
She nodded, and Beaston opened his mouth to say something, but Denison’s voice rang out loud and clear over the speakers on stage. He and his brother Brighton picked pretty notes from their old, beat-up guitars as he said, “A rumor went flying through the Ashe Crew late last night that had us all buzzing. I’d like to address it here so we can celebrate it right. If it’s true, of course.”
“What is it?” Kong called over the crowd. But the behemoth gorilla shifter’s dark eyes twinkled when he dragged his gaze to Aviana and gave her a wink.
“I heard that Beaston Novak, the wild man himself, is going to be a daddy soon. Tell me I’m wrong,” Denison dared him through a deep grin.
Beaston looked around the room coyly, his green eyes blazing before he arched his attention to Aviana. He looked so proud she was melting right here and now. “You aren’t wrong,” he called out, holding her gaze.
The cheering and ear-splitting whistles that erupted were downright deafening, but Denison managed a toast over the noise. “Lift those glasses high! To Beaston and Aviana and their new bundle of joy on the way. You’re one lucky sonofabitch, you crazy animal.”
Beaston’s shoulders shook with congratulatory claps on the back, but he managed to down his shot of whiskey in between laughing without spilling a drop.
Aviana drank her orange juice down a few seconds later after Willa reminded her. She was having trouble keeping her eyes from the dimples that bracketed Beaston’s smile. He was mesmerizing and more relaxed in a crowd than she’d ever seen him, and her stomach flitted this way and that, like little bird wings in her middle.
Two of the Ashe Crew women, Skyler and Everly, joined Denison and Brighton up on stage and dedicated the next song to her and Beaston. Their voices rang out in perfect harmony as they belted out an upbeat holiday song.
“I want to dance,” Beaston said in a velvet stroke against her ear.
With a nod, she followed him out to the dance floor and giggled and laughed as they shook their hips in the middle of the crowd. Her man could dance. He admittedly didn’t remember much from the time of his life he often called the before, but he did remember his mother teaching him to dance in the living room of their tiny cabin when he was seven. And as Beaston spun her and dipped her, his grin grew bigger, and the blazing inhuman color dimmed from his eyes, revealing the soft forest green she so rarely saw in her mate.
And when the song changed and slowed, he slipped a hand to her waist and held her palm in his other. He brushed the pad of his thumb over her stomach in soothing circles that told her their baby was on his mind, and he looked down at her with such deep adoration.
“I traded you.”
She shook her head, confused. “Traded me for what?”
“You gave me shiny trinkets, Ana.” Resting his cheek against her temple, Beaston pulled her in close and slid her hand between them. He pressed her palm to his pounding heart. “I gave you this.”
Chapter Seven
Beaston looked over at Ana and Mason and gave a private smile. His mate was asleep against his shoulder, and Mason was asleep against her. Outside, snow had just begun to fall, but it wasn’t the tumultuous storms that had been striking randomly over the last couple of weeks. This snowfall was the soft, stable kind, with fat flakes that the windshield wipers easily brushed off the front window. The woods surrounding him were a wonderland of white. Evergreen branches were dusted with snow, and animal prints dotted the piney woods beside the road.
The Christmas station was still playing low, and when Ana cuddled closer against his side, he turned up the heat and pointed the vent toward her.
This was going to be one of those moments he would remember forever. Ana had picked up a shiny penny, heads-up, in the parking lot on the way out of Sammy’s and smiled so sweetly when she had handed it to him. Beaston hadn’t told her at the time, but that penny was as important a gift as any of her others. He would keep it for always and remember the night he finally felt normal. Tonight had been easy and fun. He’d stayed lost in his mate’s smile, touching the swell of her stomach as though they had this secret between them that no one else could understand, feeling lucky that she’d picked him. It was celebrating a holiday with all of these people who had taken him in and had accepted him no matter how bad he got.
He’d never been so happy.
He would keep that penny with all of her other trinkets in his tackle box beneath the bed and always remember this first Christmas Eve that meant something.
Beaston pulled under the Grayland Mobile Park sign. Tires crunching against the snow, he stopped in front of 1010 and smiled at the other Gray Backs who were stumbling sleepily from Matt and Creed’s trucks and into their homes.
It was late, and tomorrow was Christmas, but Beaston wouldn’t be going to sleep with the rest of them.
He had work to do.
Mason inhaled deeply and frowned at the multi-colored holiday lights that were turning on around the trailer park. “We home?”
Beaston nodded. “Home. Yeah.”
Nodding, Mason smiled at the dash clock. 3:15. “Hey, Beaston?”
“Yeah?”
“Merry Christmas, man.”
“You, too.”
Mason pushed the door open and stretched outside before shutting the door behind him and tromping off to his trailer.
Beaston pulled Ana from the seat until she was curled in his arms, still fast asleep. With a soft sigh, his mate draped her arms around his neck as he kicked his door closed and made his way around 1010 to the woods that separated home from the rest of the trailer park.
He’d left the heater on while they were gone because he couldn’t stomach Ana coming home to a cold house. Her body was already working hard enough growing the precious child in her stomach. In the bedroom, he didn�
�t bother with the lights or removing her clothes. He just sat on the bed with her, cradling her body against his chest and watching the falling snow outside the window. Resting his cheek against her forehead, he cupped the curve of her belly and enjoyed the moment, holding his little family.
It was Christmas—the first one he would remember. The first one where he could repay Ana’s kindness from when they were children. From when she thought about him enough to visit him on each Christmas night for all those years before she moved away.
“Hey you,” Ana said in a sleepy voice.
He hugged her closer and rocked gently. “Hey you.”
“Tell me what you’re thinking,” she whispered.
“I’m lucky.”
Her face crumpled, and her eyes rimmed with shining moisture in the blue moonlight that streamed through the window. Gripping his hand, she pressed it more firmly against her stomach. “I’m the lucky one.”
When she said stuff like that, he couldn’t believe she was here. Couldn’t believe she wasn’t some figment his destroyed mind had come up with. But she was here, warm and solid against him, and his little baby was under his palm, and this moment was real.
Ana stroked her fingertips up under his eye and cupped his cheek, just before she leaned up and kissed him. Easton closed his eyes and inhaled deeply. Ana smelled different when she was sleepy. Even better somehow. Slowly, she slid out of his lap and stood, then pulled her sweater over her head. She kicked out of her snow boots and shimmied her jeans down past her ankles. And when she stood naked before him, she straightened her spine, tall and proud, asking him to drink her in—to enjoy the soft skin she offered. The moonlight adorned his mate, highlighting her curves. The swell of her stomach was his new favorite part about her. God, she was beautiful. Beautiful.
“Come here,” he said low, needing to touch her.
He cupped the fullness of her breasts gently. He’d read all the childbirth books when he’d been worried about Gia having a baby, and he knew Ana would be tender under his touch. He would have to be more careful with her.
Inhaling deeply, she arched back and rolled her eyes closed as Beaston dragged his fingertips down her ribs to her waist and then to her hips. Soft skin. Soft. He loved everything about her.
Slowly, he leaned forward and drew her nipple into his mouth and sucked it until it had drawn up into a hard nub for him. She moaned and swayed with his touch. So trusting, his Ana. She didn’t see any monster inside of him. Not like he did. She looked past his broken animal and saw the good. Lingering good. The parts he’d hidden from his bear all those years in an attempt to save a tiny piece of his humanity. Ana had found it, dug it out, pushed the darkness away until that little sliver of good was the brightest part of him.
Ana was good. Good to her bones.
She pulled his sweater over his head, and he could see it there in her eyes. She loved him. Needed him. Him.
Pulling his hands, she urged him up and wrapped her arms around his neck. She slow danced with him there in the rays of moonlight that lit the room. Beaston lifted her long hair over her shoulders and kissed her cheek, then her jaw. He kissed the lobe of her ear and then her neck. He brushed the back of his hand down her bare arm and smiled when she shuddered under his touch. So easily pleased. His perfect mate.
He kissed up her throat, sucking gently, grazing teeth, and giving soft touches. Her little sighs said he was doing something right. Her skin was chilled now, goosebumps rising wherever his fingertips met her. Cold. That wouldn’t do. Bending down, he pulled her into his arms and carried her to the bed. He could warm her. He ran hot. A product from his suffering, but he’d do it again. Do it again to be Ana’s blanket.
He settled her onto the bed and pulled the comforter over them. She leaned up with a needy sound in her throat. Pleading sound, begging him to connect with her. He needed the same. She gasped in pleasure as he pushed his erection into her. So tight and wet. Perfect fit. Perfect. He eased out as she hooked her leg over his back. Needy mate. Stomach flexing, he pushed into her again, and she made his favorite noise—the one where she’d let go, where she’d given herself to him, trusting him to please her.
“Oh,” she murmured again, arching her back until her beautiful breasts pressed against him.
Beaston pushed into her again, faster to meet her rocking hips. His body curled around her, over and over as the heat between them built. She felt so good. So good. Perfect.
He squeezed his eyes closed and intertwined his fingers with hers, held her hands over her head as he tried to slow the pace. He would go too fast like this.
“Please,” she said on a sigh.
Helpless. Helpless to tell her no. Helpless to slow down. His Ana deserved everything.
Needy sounds. Louder, and he was gone as the first pulse of her orgasm gripped him. He froze against her as he came, and a feral growl rattled his throat as he emptied himself completely into her.
Ana pulled him down against her and stroked his back, his arm, his face, his hip. Adoring his body as their aftershocks eased and eventually faded to nothing. He laid kisses over her eyebrows and cheeks. Along her graceful neck, and his sweet Ana was crying again. He huffed a soft laugh and wiped a tear from the corner of her eye. “Soft and full of tears.”
“You break me apart.” Ana pulled his palm to her lips and let her kiss linger there.
“Sleep,” he whispered. “I’ll keep you safe.” Always.
And she did. His mate curled against him and drifted off while he stroked her hair and watched the snow falling out the window.
When she smelled like sleep again and her breathing had slowed, he slid out from under her arm and tucked her in tight. He wouldn’t give her enough time to get cold without him here to warm her.
He would only be gone a little while.
Back in his sweater and jeans with his boots unlaced but on, he made his way quietly from the house and made fresh tracks in the snow toward his workshop. He turned on the single hanging lightbulb and looked over his home-away-from-home. Cluttered chaos. He was a knife maker and a wood worker, and Ana deserved something he made, just as she had made all of his Christmas presents.
He’d already started making her gift, but there was still work to do.
And as his gaze landed on the rough wood of his gift, he smiled.
It was still a work in progress.
Just like him.
Chapter Eight
“Ana,” Beaston murmured. His hand brushed her bare hip, then traced a line up her ribcage. “Ana.”
“Hmm?” she asked, stretching and opening her bleary eyes to the dark. “Beaston?” She sat up, alarmed. He never woke her this early. “What’s wrong?”
“Put these on.” His eyes were glowing green in the dark, but his lips were curved up in a soft smile as he settled a set of warm clothes in front of her on the bed.
Aviana stared at the jeans and the green sweater, then rubbed her eyes and frowned out the window. This morning was Christmas, and Beaston was waking her before dawn.
“Okay,” she said, unable to keep the smile from her voice as it hit her what he was doing.
She dressed quickly, washed her face and brushed her teeth, then made her way to the kitchen where Beaston was packing cinnamon rolls into a backpack. He turned and caught her hug, as if he’d known she was coming. With a giggle, she pressed little kisses all over his chest. He’d pulled on a burgundy thermal sweater. It was one of her favorites—the one with a few buttons at the neck. He’d left the top two undone, and she could see the indentation between his pecs beneath it. Jeans that hit his waist just right and those heavy work boots. He hadn’t shaved this morning, and she rubbed her cheek over his scruff just to feel her rough man.
Without a word, Beaston pulled her jacket off the counter where he’d stacked it with his own and helped her into it, then zipped her up and pulled her pink winter hat over her hair lopsided—a tease if his laugh was anything to go by.
“Beast,” she joked
with a swat and moved the hat out of her eyes.
He shrugged into his own jacket and shouldered the backpack, then took her hand in his and tugged her toward the door.
Aviana took one last look around the living room with its oversize, decorated birch tree and the ten socks hung from the fireplace mantel. The packages they’d wrapped together for the Gray Backs sat shining under the tree in reds and greens with sparkly white bows. Beaston had encouraged her to pick the wrapping paper she wanted, and her inner raven had crowed at all of the shiny choices. Their den, with the tree bark walls and muted light, had never looked homier.
“I’m bringing your present with us,” Beaston murmured, hugging her from behind. The fabric of their jackets made a zipping sound as he leaned down and kissed her neck.
Leaning back into him, she intertwined her fingers with his and pulled his hands over her rounded belly. “You already gave me the best present.”
Beaston chuckled a warm, happy sound. “No, Ana. You gave me that. It’s the greatest gift.” Resting his chin on her shoulder, he whispered, “You’ll bear me a healthy son who is fierce and loyal. A strong little Gray Back with black feathers.”
Chills blasted up her arms despite the warm jacket. If Beaston said she carried a little raven boy, then she did. He had the sight, as did his mother before him. Eyes gone round, Aviana looked down at her stomach, cradled by their hands, and smiled. He didn’t know it, but he’d just given her another gift. He’d told her in his own way they would be okay. That she didn’t need to be scared because everything would work out.
“Come on,” he said, draping a thick blanket over his arm and pulling her out the front door.
Bending down, she grabbed the small green package with Beaston’s present and followed him out into the cold, still morning. Their breath chugged in front of them like freight train steam as they made their way through the dark, piney woods. It had stopped snowing, and the clouds had thinned, and when Aviana looked up, she could see the stars dotting the dark sky like sparkling diamonds. Beautiful. But when she looked over at her mate, leading her toward his truck in the blue moonlight, eyes focused on the trail in front of them, an absent smile on his lips, his hand wrapped so strongly around hers as he carried a blanket to keep her warm and a packed breakfast to keep her fed, she knew the stars couldn’t compare. She’d never seen anything more beautiful than her Beaston.
