A Very Beastly Christmas (Gray Back Bears Book 7) (3 page)

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 faster 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.”

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.”

“Silly bear,” she said on a breath. “You can’t watch over me every minute of the day.”

“Why not?”

“Because you can’t. I have things to do, and you have to work.”

“What things to do?”

“I’m going to make you a Christmas present, just like I used to. It won’t mean the same if you watch me make it.”

“A Christmas present. Woman, you’re giving me a cub.” He frowned. “Or a raven.” As realization dawned on him, he grinned and pulled her gently against his chest. “Are you going to give me a little raven, just like you, Ana?”

She giggled, and the noise settled something restless in him. “Would you mind?”

“No. Grizzly or raven, doesn’t matter. Either will be okay, and I’ll be happy.”

“You’re going to be a daddy.”

A shiver trembled up his spine and landed in his shoulders.

Ana laughed as she tickled his ribs. “You like that,” she accused.

He liked the idea more than he could ever put words to. Beaston wasn’t good with those—not like Ana. He wouldn’t have to wait for Creed and Gia to need him to watch Rowan anymore. He could care for his own baby, with Ana.
If she lived.

Stupid fucking thoughts. He gritted his teeth and made himself get up to shower. Creed would be giving the ten minute whistle soon, and Ana was right. As much as his instincts screamed to follow her everywhere, she wouldn’t be happy constantly watched. His mate was more independent than that. She deserved better than him stifling her. It would be hard, but he would force himself to leave her and hope that tomorrow would be easier, and the day after that even easier.

He showered quickly. Not because he was in a rush for work on the landing, but because he wanted to spend every second he could with Ana before he left her for the day. He hurried to pull on a red flannel shirt over his jeans, and work boots.

Ana’s humming perked up his ears and drew him to the doorway of the kitchen. She hadn’t hummed in months, and something about the change in her happiness tightened his throat. She stood over the small stove, one foot propped on her other knee like a flamingo. She always cooked like that, his Ana. Today, she’d put on colorful tights under calf-high snow boots lined with wool. A tight, black sweater clung to her new curves like a second skin, and he wanted to take her back to bed right then and there. He wouldn’t, though. Not when she was gifting him this moment. He would be still as a hunter and enjoy the happy notes drifting from her lips.

With a sigh, Beaston relaxed against the frame and listened as her humming morphed to the words of a song. It was one about silver bells, but she was replacing “bells” with “bears.” His bear was silver. This must be one of those holiday songs Willa had been belting out at the top of her lungs for the past month. Ana wrapped up an egg, bacon, and cheese biscuit into a strip of foil and shoved it into a paper bag with the rest of his lunch. She liked making his food in the mornings, though he was perfectly capable. He used to try to convince her to sleep in, but she always refused. And eventually he’d stopped urging her, because she always smiled so pretty when she finished packing his lunch. Damon was right. Ana was a nurturer.

Beaston strode across the wood floors, his boots clunking hollowly against the laminate. With a soft, satisfied growl, he slid his arms around her waist and cupped her belly from behind. “I think I won’t be able to stop touching you now.”

Ana relaxed back against him as he tasted her neck with kisses. “I think I won’t mind.”

“I really missed you,” he admitted low. He should explain, but couldn’t find the words. He’d missed how close they were. How in sync they always seemed to be. Ana read him better than anyone, and for the past couple of months, the distance between them had hurt more than he’d realized. Now, she’d closed the gaping wound in his heart overnight.

He should explain, but when he opened his mouth to try, she turned her head and laid a sweet kiss on his cheek. “I missed you, too.”

Creed’s ten minute warning whistle blasted through the woods. Beaston helped Ana into her heavy winter jacket, and then he shrugged into his own before opening the door for his mate. She liked to come with him in the mornings and wave him off. Sack lunch in hand, he closed the trailer door and watched Ana take off running with a teasing giggle. His breath steamed in front of him in a minty fog as he laughed and ran after her. She was easy to catch, his little raven, especially now that she seemed to run more carefully. Beaston spun her around and hitched her knees around his hips so he could carry her like he wanted, pressed against him.

His affectionate mate rubbed her cheeks against his, one and then the other and back again. Happy. She was happy, and it made him feel like a king that he could put that smile on her face and in her heart.

She was the best thing that ever happened to him. The best.

He stopped his trek through the woods and over the crunching snow to lean forward and kiss her like she deserved. Long and slow, so she would know he loved her. He didn’t say the words much, but she’d told him that was okay because he showed her all the time. It wasn’t that he didn’t feel like saying the words, but he didn’t talk much. Never had. Ana understood him.