by T. S. Joyce
Weston pulled away abruptly at a knock on the door. Ryder shoved open the cracked door. “We have to go now.” He looked panicked, but still took a moment to look at Avery. “I like your dress.”
Avery looked down at her thin hospital gown. It was nearly see-through, hung crooked, and fit like a burlap sack. “Um…thanks?”
“You’re welcome.” Ryder yanked Weston’s arm, and they bolted out the door. And just before it swung closed behind them, Weston shot her one last look that said so many things without the use of a single word. Be careful. I’ll wait for you. You can do this. I love you.
She ran to the door as it clicked shut and watched him and Ryder bolt down the empty hallway. The panic was flaring in her chest at being in a white room with the door closed, but this was just the warm-up. Soon, things would be so much worse.
Patty was coming down the hall from the opposite end, checking doors, so Avery ran to the bed, sat down, and pulled up the hem of her dress. There was a thick stitching at the bottom, but she ripped the thread viciously for an inch until there was a little pocket right near her left ankle. She secured the camera inside and settled the fabric over her lap as the door lock turned.
“Are you okay?” Patty asked.
Avery nodded her head Jerkily. “I’ve had time to think.”
“Okay.” Patty looked flushed and distracted and glanced down the hallway in the direction Weston and Ryder had disappeared. “What did you think about?”
Avery blew out a steadying breath. This was the point of no return. This was her making the decision officially to volunteer for The Box. Be brave, little phoenix.
“I want to see my parents. I’m ready to go home.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
“This wasn’t how it was supposed to be for you,” Dad said.
Mom had been angry, crying intermittently, but she hadn’t said a word since Avery had been released from the hospital. It was shocking that Dad was the one who broke the silence.
“You mean I wasn’t born to bring the Novak Raven here?” Avery asked sarcastically.
“You’ve lost your damn mind if you think you’re going to talk to me like that, Avery Marie Foley. You’ve spent too much time out there with those animals—”
“I’m an animal—”
“You’re a civilized shifter—”
“I’m just like them!” Avery barked out. How had she said “Yes, sir” to all the bullshit he’d spewed over the years? Everything was different now. Everything. The way she felt about herself, the way she felt about other shifters and humans. The way she saw the world.
The ravens of The Hollow were jaded. The men were so domineering, the women so demure, and no one had challenged them enough. So here they were, a community cut off from the world, treating women like shit. Fucking barbarians.
“You will have to change your clothes before we enter the gates,” Dad said.
“Hard pass, these are comfortable.”
“Shorts up your ass and your chest hanging out for everyone to see. That’s not how the mate of a future council member should dress.”
“Stan,” Mom warned in a soft voice.
“Oh don’t you fuckin’ argue with me, too—”
“Don’t talk to her like that,” Avery said, resting her forehead against the back window.
Mom was crying again in the passenger seat, her shoulders shaking with silent sobbing. Avery had forgotten what it was like for a little while, but now seeing Dad put Mom in her place made her sick. Weston would never, ever treat her like that.
Mom had lied and betrayed Aviana, betrayed Avery, but she didn’t have any control over her life, and there was something incredibly tragic about that.
“You will change your clothes, or you’ll go in The Box.”
Avery closed her eyes against the fear in those two words. She blew a breath onto the window and drew a little raven in the condensation just to feel closer to Weston.
Voice trembling, Avery told him, “I’m coming home, but I won’t be cowering anymore. You will just have to get used to me.”
“The hell I will!”
“You will!” she yelled. “You should’ve a long time ago. You should’ve loved my raven, not trained her to be nothing. To be invisible. Mom, stop crying. Stop it. Dad’s a shit. He always has been. Leave his ass. Leave him. Why did you marry him in the first place? And don’t tell me for love because I’ve never seen him say a single supportive thing to you.”
Dad gripped the steering wheel so hard it creaked, and his profile turned beat red.
“I married him for the same reasons you have to marry Benjamin.”
“I’m not marrying that douchebag. I would literally rather sit my bare vagina on a cactus than walk down any isle to that prick.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Dad bellowed. “He can provide for you.”
“He’ll hurt me.”
“So what? So what? If you weren’t such a mouthy woman, he wouldn’t want to. You have no one to blame but yourself. No one.”
She opened her mouth to tell him to go fuck himself, but ahead, the gates to Raven’s Hollow lumbered, heavy and made of wrought iron. Two giant decorative ravens faced each other in the center, like great warriors guarding something precious. But raven shifters had never been warriors. None of them had but Aviana Novak, and her son, the Novak Raven. Everyone else had gotten so messed up and just dug deeper and deeper until they didn’t remember how to be okay anymore.
The gates opened, and Avery’s gaze followed the two men who stood somberly beside it, ready to close the iron barrier back against the outside world.
“Why am I here?” she asked softly, tears burning her eyes. “Why did you work so hard, lie so much, and put my friends in danger to bring me back to this place?”
“Because,” Dad said hoarsely. “The Novak Raven can’t lift our rank anymore. Only Benjamin can. He is in line to take Caden’s place. He has no heir. Any revenge he wanted on his mate will pass down to Benjamin.”
“Caden had a mate?” Avery asked, confused. First she’d found out Caden had been engaged to Aviana, but now he’d bonded to a mate? He’d always seemed to hate the fairer sex.
“Aviana was his mate,” Dad gritted out. “She’s the fucking queen of our people, but she’s been sitting on the throne of the Gray Back Crew this whole goddamn time, completely unreachable. Protected from Caden’s wrath by Damon, by Beaston, by the shifters of those mountains. She had a duty to Caden. She should’ve bore a son for him, not for some fucking grizzly. Weston should’ve been Caden’s heir, but because of the actions of his mother, his bloodline is tainted. She failed as a mother and a mate.”
“She was a great mother, and she was never Caden’s mate,” Avery ground out. Romance-less marriage contracts didn’t a mate make. That was like calling Mom Dad’s mate. If she was, he wouldn’t be able to treat her like he did.
And oh, she could see it now. She could imagine how Caden had obsessed over Aviana Novak over the years, waiting on a chance to exact revenge on the woman he felt like he owned. Benjamin saw Avery the same way. That they had to have the women who didn’t want them back was a sure sign of their monstrous egos. Something was seriously wrong with the men in this community.
Dad drove up the winding mountain road, past the houses that were dimly lit. It all looked so eerie in the dark. This wasn’t home anymore.
“Caw!”
Avery lifted her gaze to the tree branches above the road.
“Caw! Caw! Caw!” The branches were heavy with ravens welcoming her back to Hell.
Chills rose all over Avery’s body. The whole town seemed to be Changed. What if Weston got too close to the gates? What if he was seen? His raven was massive, much bigger than any raven here. He would be recognizable.
Weston knew how to take care of himself. She’d never seen him falter, never seen him hesitate. Even last night, he’d broken into the hospital within six hours of her being there and gotten away with it. She’d heard the n
urses talking about how the redheaded man had gotten away. They hadn’t even mentioned Weston.
He could be a ghost when he wanted to.
Dad didn’t even bother to take her home to change her clothes. Instead, he stopped directly in front of the council house and got out.
Avery clenched her shaking hands. Her palms were sweating just thinking about what waited for her inside.
Dad opened her door and murmured, “I’m sorry, Avery, but you will have to be reconditioned to accept life here.” The apologies of an asshole.
She stood slowly, her legs and arms heavy as lead. Mom was staring at Dad like he was a monster, and she had the right of it. He was so deep in his belief The Box was okay because it wasn’t physically hurting her that he’d lost his sense of right and wrong. Or maybe he’d never had it in the first place.
Avery hugged her mom. She wished she could hang onto her anger, but Mom had tried to save her in her own way. She’d encouraged her to go out in the real world and grow roots near the Novak Raven. Maybe that was all part of some fucked-up revenge plan on Aviana, but Avery was clinging to the thought that Mom also wanted to protect her from the life she hated. She clung to the idea that Mom wanted better for her.
Mom hugged her shoulders tight and didn’t let go until Dad pried them apart. “People are watching,” he muttered, tugging her hand hard.
“Where is Caden?” she asked. Usually he was the one to do the honors.
“He’ll be here any minute. He and Benjamin gave an extra statement at the station before they began their drive.”
Avery was panicking. With every step through the sprawling entryway, down the hall, down the basement stairs, her heart felt like it was going to beat out of her chest.
Dad stopped in front of the door of The Box. Inside, the single hanging lightbulb was already turned on, swinging gently in the frigid air from the vent above.
The tendrils of frosty air stretched into the hallway and surrounded her, beckoning her inside as if the room had missed her warmth. “How long do I have to stay down here?” Avery whispered meekly. She wished her voice was stronger.
Dad looked like the grim reaper in the swaying, harsh light. “As long as it takes.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“Me and Ryder bought a whole box of spy stuff and put the cameras all around Willa’s Wormshack. She’s a Gray Back like me, and really funny. You would like her. If she caught us, she would just laugh, so that’s why we picked her to spy on first, but all we got is three straight hours of video footage of her working with her worms. She sells them to bait shops and for people who make fancy gardens. She makes a stupid amount of money at it, but that’s not why she does it. She loves worms. Like…she LOVES worms. We did catch funny audio of her talking to them, though. She called them her babies, and named one of them Dingleberry. And I swear she thought of kissing one when he wiggled extra cute in her hand. Ryder and me were laughing so hard.” Avery’s voice hitched with emotion, and another tear streamed down her face. It was so cold in here, chilling her blood, freezing her bones. She wanted to be out of here, but she was supposed to stick to the plan. Only she couldn’t do this without Weston here. She needed his letters. “The spy cameras are so small we’ll never get caught. Never get caught. Never. Never. So small, we’ll never get caught.”
She’d drawn her knees up to conserve warmth and was clutching the spy camera like a life-line. When the time came, she needed to be ready. Ready to let the letter go, ready to accept that she was in The Box again, ready to move. Come on, Avery. You can do this.
She dropped her chin to her chest and sobbed because the letters weren’t keeping the walls from closing in. Not like they used to. She’d had the real Weston, and now the letters had lost their potency.
“So small, we’ll never get caught,” she whimpered.
“Darlin’.”
Avery’s sob froze in her throat. That had sounded like Weston. It was just the whisp of a word, but it was his voice. She smiled as another tear dripped off her chin and onto her Big Flight tank top. Weston was here, and even if it was just in her imagination, it counted. He’d come when the letters stopped working. “I knew you would come.”
“What?” The breathy voice was so faint, so soft, but she would know it anywhere. Her mate. Her Weston. Her Novak Raven had kept his promise.
And when she looked up, she sighed in relief. He was there, barely, on his knees right in front of her. His body flickered and wavered, and the air around him seemed to move, but his eyes held hers. Black like his raven’s and full of emotion. He was so handsome, even in the harsh light, but he looked confused. Strange. His confusion made no sense because this was all part of the plan.
“You said you would be here with me, and you are.” She opened her hand and showed him the spy camera so he would remember, and recognition flickered through his troubled gaze. “I’m stronger now,” she reassured him. And she was. She hadn’t lost her mind or clawed at the walls. She hadn’t gotten so lost in the letters that she’d forgotten her job here—to protect the ones she loved. She was scared and shaking, but she could do this.
He reached out, and she gasped as his fingertips warmed her skin. He seemed so real. So solid. Weston grabbed her wrist and pulled. “Avery, I can save you. I can get you out of here. Look, I can touch you. Come on.”
But that wouldn’t work. She’d already gotten video of the room, the claw marks, and the bucket in the corner, and the lightbulb swaying in the frigid draft, but she needed concrete evidence against Caden. Against his abuse of power and control over an entire race of shifters. As tempting as it was to try and let Weston save her, Avery’s job wasn’t done. Not yet.
“Weston,” she whispered. “This is the way it’s supposed to be. I can do this.” The two tears dislodged and streamed down her cheeks, but those were the last two she would allow since he’d come just as he’d promised. He was here with her. “You make me stronger.” She smiled because she knew that somehow, someway, she was going to see him soon. “Wait for me.”
Weston flickered out of existence, but his rushed words remained, filling her head and her heart. “I love you, Ave.”
“I love you, too. Wait for me.”
Footsteps sounded on the basement stairs, and Avery rushed to hit the button on the camera, hiding it in the shadows right between her drawn up legs, like she was huddled up and scared.
She wasn’t scared, though. Not of Caden or Benjamin or anyone else. Not anymore.
Now, she was angry. Such raw fury roiled inside of her, she felt as if she could breathe fire like the Bloodrunner Dragon herself. Inside of her, Avery’s raven was ready to blast out of her skin and make an escape. She was ready for battle. Ready to get hurt, ready to fly, ready to succeed, ready to leave this place and never look back.
The door swung open and Benjamin entered. He left it open a crack. So tempting to flee now, but she had to wait. Not yet, raven. Not yet.
She was shaking still from nerves, from anger, from seeing Weston. Benjamin smirked. “Scared Avery. You aren’t so cocky now that you’re back where you belong, are you?”
Where she belonged? The Box? No, this puckered asshole was mistaken. She belonged with the Bloodrunners.
“I don’t want to marry you.”
Benjamin leaned against the opposite wall and crossed his arms over his chest. He was tall and lanky. If Weston stood like that, his muscles would bulge out. He could squish Benjamin like a blood-filled tick.
“You will want to marry me eventually, Avery. I’m a patient man. If it takes six fucking months down here, you’ll come around.”
“Why do you want me?” she asked, trying to hold the tiny camera steady between her shaking fingers.
“You know why.”
“Because I beat you up when we were kids?”
“You humiliated me.” Benjamin’s blue eyes flashed with disdain as he twitched his head to shake his jet-black hair out of his face. He would’ve been a handsome man if hatred h
adn’t made his eyes so cold. “Caden was my mentor from birth, Avery. I was born to lead our people someday, and you made me look weak. I was in the hospital for three days because of you. I hated you. Every taunt from the males in our class, every Get Well Soon card from the females who saw me as pathetic—that was your fault. But as we grew up, I began to see you differently. I wanted to punish you for what you’d done, sure, but there was something more. You’re the prettiest trinket here, Avery. The most dominant female raven, and you’ll be the most fun to break.” Benjamin’s lips curved up wickedly. “Do you know who you remind Caden of, Avery?”
She shook her head, then murmured, “No,” so the camera could catch the audio.
“Aviana King.”
“You mean Aviana Novak?”
“I mean Aviana King!” he screamed, his face turning red. “Caden told me everything. She was too independent for her own good, too. She fancied herself above the flock, like she didn’t need us. Like she didn’t need Caden. She left him for a filthy bear shifter. A filthy Gray Back. She left Caden with no heirs, no nest, no mate. And then you came along. A late Changer, and when your animal finally got her shit together and showed herself, she came out dominant. The first and only fucked-up female since her. Since Aviana. Every time Caden put you in here—he was punishing her. Every time he heard you scream to let you out—it was her screaming. Every tear, every pathetic sob, every heartbroken sound—that was his revenge until he could get to her offspring. Her pride and joy. Her only son. Her only raven child. You were his revenge until he could reach the Novak Raven.”
Avery swallowed the bile that crept up the back of her throat. “But he didn’t,” she whispered.
Benjamin cupped his hand around his ear. “What’s that?”