by T. S. Joyce
“Was this why you were crying last night?”
Aviana dipped her chin once. “I was so afraid you would be mad and disappointed in me. I shouldn’t have done this without you.”
Beaston shook his head, over and over in a slow denial. “Ana, if you wouldn’t have made the choice for us, I wouldn’t have been brave enough to try.” He pressed his hand gently against her belly and let off a long, shaky sigh. “How big is the baby?”
With a grin, she made a fist. “This big.”
Beaston’s dark eyebrows rose. “Really?”
“Really.”
Dropping to his knees in front of her, he whispered, “Baby bird,” as he stared at her stomach with deep emotion pooling in his eyes.
Heart too big for her chest, Aviana ran her fingertips through her mate’s hair as he rubbed his scratchy jaw over the swell of her belly, back and forth, back and forth. This was affection for him. This was him saying without words that he loved the little life they were creating.
“We made this,” he murmured. Easing back, he looked up at her with a stunned expression. “Ana, we made this.”
She couldn’t stop the smile that stretched her face now if she tried. “I know. Isn’t it amazing?”
“Amazing,” he repeated, quiet as a breath.
The air caught in her throat as Beaston stood smoothly. He ran his fingertips down between her breasts, his touch light as a feather, and when he lifted his gaze from her black lacy bra, there was hunger there that turned her stomach molten.
“I like you round and soft,” he murmured, voice deep and gravelly as he pressed his hand inside of her bra and cupped her.
She did have more curves now, and her breasts felt fuller under his hand, more sensitive to his affection. With a sigh of utter relief, she arched her neck back and closed her eyes just to enjoy the feel of him. Unbeknownst to her, Beaston had been a virgin when they’d slept together for the first time, but he’d always somehow known his way around her body, and now was no different. The snick of her bra was loud in the quiet of the room, and he gripped the back of her neck, massaging in small circles as he pulled the undergarment slowly off her arms. The brush of the fabric lifted chills on her body, but that was nothing compared to her body’s reaction to the sound of her jeans being unsnapped.
Beaston hunted her slowly. Steady hands, no hesitation, but her man wasn’t rushing his seduction. He was setting her on fire an ember at a time. Desperate to touch his skin, she pulled his gray sweater over his head and blinked slow, in a daze. It didn’t matter how many times she saw him like this, she never got over how sexy he was. His days on the landing doing manual labor as a logger had sculpted his body into lithe lines of muscle. She traced the perfect, shadowed indentation between his pecks and smiled when his shoulders shook with a shiver. His blazing eyes closed, robbing her of their color, but opened again when she traced the outer curves of his defined abs. She knew the map of his body by heart, yet she would never tire of exploring it.
Beaston pulled her searching hand to his lips and bit the heel of her palm gently. Just a little warning that tonight, this was his show. He clamped his teeth down harder for just a moment, drawing a gasp from her lips. Then he leaned forward and slid his hand down the front of her jeans, under her panties until he cupped her sex, and ran his finger through the slickness he’d conjured there.
“Ana,” he murmured as his eyes rolled closed. “So wet for me.”
Leaning forward, she pressed her forehead against his chest and pulled one of his drawn up nipples between her teeth. Stop teasing, mate.
Beaston inhaled sharply and swayed, as if she held as much magic over him as he did her. Gripping her hair at the base of her neck, he whispered in her ear, “Bitey little mate. Gonna get yourself punished.” When he slid his finger inside of her, she moaned.
Breath shallow, she unsnapped the button of his jeans and slipped her hand around his stony erection. It was long and thick against her palm, and she shuddered imagining it inside of her. She drew a slow stroke of him and reveled in the way he rocked his hips against her touch. It had been weeks since they’d been intimate with the lights on, and the relief she felt now at baring it all for him was almost tangible. She could feel it in the air around them.
“Mmm,” he moaned as she gripped him harder and pulled against his length.
Desperate to be closer, Aviana pushed down his pants and shucked her own, then grabbed his hand again and pressed it back where it was against the apex between her legs. Beaston leaned forward and pressed his lips against hers, sucking, biting, licking. God, she wanted him. After feeling distant, she needed this. Needed his touch. Needed his adoration so that she could remind herself they were okay. That he was okay.
She slid her arms around his neck and stood on her tiptoes to give him better access to her neck. Teeth, teeth, teeth, Beaston sure knew how to use those teeth, but when he came to the claiming mark just over her collar bone, his bites turned to soft kisses of reverence, just like he always did. Aviana gasped as he made his way lower and drew her nipple into his mouth. Pushing her backward until she lay on the bed, he laved his tongue over her sensitive skin, over and over as he pushed his finger inside of her. Instinctively, her body curled for him, and her knees drew up, inviting him…tempting him.
“I want you inside of me,” she begged.
A soft snarl rattled his chest, and he scraped his teeth over her breast. His version of punishment, but it was more pleasure than pain, and she arched her back against the soft comforter. “Beaston,” she whispered.
“Again,” he demanded.
“Beaston,” she said on a sigh.
He pushed the weight of his chest off her, and on one locked arm, he searched her face. “Not this one, Ana. This one is just for you. I want to watch your face when you come on my hand.”
Oooh, what this man did to her insides. She rocked her hips against his palm, setting the pace as the pressure built inside of her. Clenching the covers with one hand and raking her nails down his back with the other, she exploded around him and cried out.
“Good mate,” he rumbled in approval as he lowered himself down against her.
Stone hard chest against her soft breasts and, damn it all, she’d missed his skin like this. She rolled her hips as the aftershocks went on and on, and Beaston was back at her neck, nipping and kissing and building the fire in her middle again. With a growl, he rolled her on top of him and sat up, pulling her legs on either side of his hips until she straddled his lap.
Easing upward, she hovered over him for an instant, just to see that spark of desire and desperation in his eyes. Wild, dominant, apex predator shifter, and he liked when she took the reins in their bed. He made her feel like a goddess. Her. A timid raven shifter in the most dangerous crew of bear shifters there was, and her mate liked her in control.
His breath came ragged as she slid over his thick erection, taking all of him slowly. God, he felt good inside of her. This right here, this was where everything made sense. Where all her insecurities and worries disappeared, and all that was left was infinite adoration for the man who had stolen her heart when he thought she was nothing more than a raven and she’d thought he was nothing less than the entire world.
On the edge of the bed, Beaston tensed under her, feet planted on the floor as he gripped her hips and rocked to the rhythm she set. She was going to take him slowly, draw this out and make him come hard, because that’s what she needed right now. And she’d gamble that’s what Beaston needed, too. Arms around his neck, holding him tight, she kissed him as she rolled her hips with him again. The growl in his throat was constant now, but it didn’t scare her. It never had. Beaston was wild, but she understood him.
His fingers dug into her hips, his muscles flexed under her touch, and as that beautiful tingling pressure began to build in her middle again, Beaston slipped his tongue past her lips and tasted her again and again, deeper until Aviana whimpered and lost control. She bucked against him fas
ter now as he met her blow for blow. He was so big, she was filled with him. Stretched around him as she lifted off by inches and lowered herself back down. He felt bigger now, swollen, getting close just like her.
Grabbing her ass, Beaston lay back on the bed and watched her move over him. Hands on his stony chest, she dug her nails in as he arched back, his abs flexing with her as they moved. His grip on her thighs was tight as he silently urged her faster. So close. So. Close.
“Oh!” she cried out, chanting the word over and over as her body pulsed around him.
Beaston gritted his teeth and clenched his sexy, sharp-as-glass jaw as he froze under her and let off a lethal-sounding snarl. Jets of warmth filled her as his release matched hers, and then their rhythm slowed. Sighing in utter satiation, Aviana lay against his chest as his hands slid up and down her back in a soothing motion.
“I’ve missed you,” he whispered, as if he didn’t want to break the magic of the moment.
They’d been intimate lately, but she understood. It hadn’t been like this. It hadn’t been without abandon, adoring each other like this was.
Aviana smiled and snuggled her face against him. “I love you,” she murmured.
“I can tell,” he said, stroking her hair from her face.
“How?” she asked, teasing.
But the seriousness in his voice when he answered surprised her. “Because you let me put a baby in you.” Beaston ran his fingertips through her mussed hair and kissed the top of her head, allowing his lips to linger there. “You were scared of telling me, but nothing you could do would make me stop loving you. Nothing. You make sense.”
You make sense. Oh, she knew what he meant. Beaston hadn’t grown up around people, and their behavior confused him. He tumbled through life mostly animal and trying to figure out why people reacted in such human ways. For Beaston, “you make sense” was just as big as “I love you.” Perhaps bigger.
Aviana squeezed him tight and smiled against her mate’s warm skin. “You make sense to me, too.”
Chapter Five
In the light before dawn, Beaston lay awake in bed and turned the sprig of dried holly between his fingertips until the tiny red ornament bobbled side-to-side. Try as he might, he couldn’t for the life of him remember Christmases from the before. And suddenly, after the last eye-opening twenty-four hours, he wanted to give Ana more. He wanted to be better as she deserved. She’d always loved the holiday, but like with starting a family, he’d shut the conversation down and drawn into himself, far away from scratching at the memories of Mom and Dad and happier times. And now that he actually did want to remember, the memories weren’t there. They were just…gone.
His inner bear had protected him too well during the broken years and had killed off most of his humanity when he was living like a wild thing out in those woods. But now, it felt like he was missing something with Ana.
And even if Creed and Damon had spent the entire ride home yesterday spouting facts about modern-day childbirth and the low risks, there was still a part of him that feared losing his mate to something he had no control over. He could protect her body with his own from outside danger, but getting their child to light was something Ana would have to do on her own.
Beaston clenched his fist. This big? Well, perhaps a bit smaller since Ana’s hands were small and fine-boned, like her raven people. Still, he imagined the tiny baby all curled up in a ball sleeping warm and safe with Ana protecting it with her own body. He looked over at his mate and saw her in a new light. What a woman he’d found. What a mate. What an incredible person, and Damon had been right. Beaston, too, had noticed Ana’s attention on Rowan, especially when he held or played with her. How could he have not taken her desire for a baby seriously before?
So many regrets over the past several months, but he would make it right. He would make it up to her, and if, God forbid, something happened to her as it had happened to his mom, Beaston was going to make sure every second of Ana’s life was happy, and that included giving her a good Christmas—whatever that meant.
Ana sighed sleepily and stretched her toes against him as she always did right before she woke up. He smiled and waited for her to arch her back like some drowsy cat and give him that sleepy sound he found so fucking sexy.
She was pretty now. Maybe she was the prettiest in the mornings when he was the first to see her for the day, all mussed and vulnerable with those pouty lips and sleepy blue eyes. She was a morning person, like him. He got to see her before the make-up and the curling iron. Before the clothes. Sometime during the night, she’d thrown her leg over the comforter. Ana said he ran hot and she never got cold sleeping in this old trailer with him. His youth spent outdoors had made him that way, and for the chance to get to be her warmth, he’d go through it all again.
Ana’s raven-black hair fanned the pillow, and she scrunched up her tiny nose as she cracked her eyes open. Her eyes crinkled above her smile, but went round again as her gaze landed on the sprig of holly. “Are you okay?”
Beaston leaned over and brushed a strand of silky hair out of her face so he could see all of her. “I’m okay. Well…I have questions.”
Ana snuggled closer to him. He was sitting up, leaning against the headboard, but she wrapped her arms around his bare waist and nodded her head as she rested her soft cheek against his ribs.
“What was Christmas like? When you grew up, what did you do for it?”
Ana curled her leg over his and left a line of kisses against his side. Her voice was happy and full of nostalgia when she murmured, “My parents would wake me up early on Christmas morning, and they wouldn’t let me peek in the room with the presents. Instead, we would pack a quick breakfast, slip out the back door, and watch the sunrise together. It was the only morning we did that as a family. I asked them once why we only did it on Christmas, and my dad said it was because Christmas had the prettiest sunrise. I really think they did it to torture me because all those presents were sitting around our tree inside, just waiting to be opened.”
“The tree like we have?”
“It was an evergreen.”
Beaston frowned. Maybe he’d gotten it wrong, but when he looked down to ask Ana if he’d messed up, she had a dreamy smile on her lips and said, “I like birch trees best.”
Satisfied, he relaxed again under her arms and listened to her tell the story about how she would rip into the presents and be done with gift opening in a matter of minutes. “Then I would pack up two of my favorite new toys, and we would meet up with friends and family and have this huge lunch. Tables would be just covered in food. Every food and dessert you could imagine. It was like a dream.”
Beaston smiled imagining Ana as a child, tucking into a feast like that.
“And every Christmas night, after the day was done, I would sneak to my window and Change. I would pick up the gift I made for you and take it to your shed, then later, when you built it, your treehouse.”
“You made this?” he asked, lifting the trinket and looking at it in a new light.
“I made all your Christmas gifts. I know they weren’t much, but I was a young raven and couldn’t carry anything big. I thought about you all day on Christmas and wished you were with me. Sometimes I imagined it. You playing with me and eating beside me. One Christmas, I wouldn’t let anyone sit in the chair directly to my right because I’d reserved it for you, even if you couldn’t be there. Even if you didn’t even know I was a shifter and not just some friendly raven. I always imagined what it would be like to spend a whole Christmas day with you.”
Ana’s voice had begun to shake and soften, and something warm and moist made a tiny splat against his ribs. When he looked down, she was wiping her cheeks.
“I wished every year I could bring you that whole feast because I hated that you were hungry and alone. And when my dad took me away from you, after he found out I’d been spending time with a grizzly shifter, I didn’t like Christmas as much anymore because I didn’t get to bring you gifts at
night. I looked forward to those presents all year long. You always smiled and said I was a good friend.”
“Sweet Ana,” he crooned, stroking her damp cheek with the pad of his thumb. “Now we’re together. No more imagining.”
Ana laughed thickly and held him tightly, then jolted. “Oh!”
“What’s wrong?” he asked, panicked.
“The baby. It flutters sometimes.”
“It does?” he asked on a breath as he lowered himself beside her, eye level with her stomach. Carefully, he placed his hand over the slightly rounded mound, but he couldn’t feel anything. “What does it feel like?”
For a moment, she got a faraway look in her eyes. “My mom used to give me eyelash kisses on my cheek.” Ana leaned over and fluttered her lashes against his neck. It tickled a little. “It feels like that, but on the inside.”
A slow smile stretched his face as he looked from Ana’s stomach to her dancing eyes, then back to the swell of her belly. When he pressed his lips against her taut tummy, some strange emotion washed over him. Something he didn’t recognize and had never felt. It was heavy and weighed on his chest, making it hard to breathe. Closing his eyes, Beaston pressed his ear against her stomach and listened. There was a slow bum bum, bum bum that belonged to his mate, but there was something more. Something fainter and faster. A tiny drum that meant the little baby was okay.
Startled by the wash of feelings, he jerked his head up and said, “I don’t think I should go to work today. I should stay here.”
Ana gave a surprised laugh and cocked her head. “Beaston, the Gray Backs need you up on the landing. It’s Matt’s day off today.”
Beaston frowned at Ana’s perfect little innie belly button. He didn’t want to leave her. It made him feel sick to think about it. This wasn’t like before, when she might fly to a branch on the landing and watch him. There would be no seeing her until he came home from work. This was instinct. This was his bear snarling inside of him to protect her—at all times—while she was growing their child. “Ana,” he rushed out as he sat up on the bed. “I can’t do it.”