A Very Beastly Christmas (Gray Back Bears Book 7) by T. S. Joyce Page A

Bird?”
    Aviana forced a laugh at the raven joke and shook her head, careful to hide her eyes because she was absolute shite at lying. “Nothing. Just ready to see the boys home safely.”
    “Ah, they’re fine up there. Damon told me winter is the boys’ favorite part of logging season. They hit most of their lumber numbers when it’s cold and the ground is hard.”
    Even Aviana, with her weaker bird hearing, could hear the trucks now, and she zipped her jacket up to her chin as she joined Willa and Gia. Georgia was still out doing her park ranger duties, but this was a tradition for the rest of them—gathering around the high brick fire pit and greeting the boys on their return at the end of each day.
    Today was going to be the day. She would tell him now before it got too close to Christmas. Beaston hadn’t celebrated the holiday since he was a child and his parents were still alive, and it should be a special time for him. Not one where he was upset with her.
    God, let him not hate me.
    Creed’s jacked-up charcoal-colored truck led the way under the Grayland Mobile Park sign, and Beaston’s old, white Chevy followed closely, bumping and bouncing with every pothole.
    “There’s our A-team boys,” Willa called out, then let off a shrill whistle as she draped an arm over Aviana’s shoulders. Willa, with her bright-red dyed hair up in a high ponytail she’d straightened until it was spiky, was a woman Aviana admired deeply. She was brash and uncensored and funny as hell. She also had an inner strength about her that Aviana wished would somehow rub off on her. The tiny, dominant grizzly shifter wiggled her hips and sang a song about how the boys were too sexy for their shirts and how they were going to do their little turn on the bearwalk.
    Gia, Creed’s honey-haired mate, held her toddler Rowan tighter and bounced along to the beat with a big grin on her face.
    It was impossible not to feel better around her crew. Aviana’s insecurity only tightened its grip when she was alone during the day, but no more, because she was really going to tell him.
    Beaston’s window was down, and his bright green, wild eyes locked on her as he passed. His smile for her was heart-stopping, and she froze under his gaze as he pulled to a stop near 1010. Mason and Jason got out of the other side of his cab and Beaston cut the roaring engine. As he stepped out onto the snow, she was once again stunned by how handsome he was. Her half-feral mate wore a thick green jacket that clung to his strong shoulders, unzipped so a blue plaid flannel showed underneath and a dark gray thermal sweater peeked out from under that. His sweater clung to him, showing off the mounds of his eight-pack that flexed with every frozen breath he took. And as he crunched through the snow, his work boots making deep tracks as he made his way to her, she barely even noticed the limp in his gait anymore. When she’d first met him, he would go directly to his trailer after working on the landing in a rush to get away from the other bear shifters in his crew, but now, in no hurry at all, he approached her with ease and lifted her off the ground.
    With a long, relieved breath, she realized how good it was to be in his arms. He wouldn’t hate her. He would only be scared for her. Aviana buried her face against his neck and whispered, “I have to tell you something.”
    Beaston went rigid in her arms, every muscle tensed to stone beneath her touch. He looked around at the other Gray Backs, reuniting with their mates, then eased her to her feet in the snow. “Whatever I’ve done wrong, I’ll fix it.”
    “Beaston,” she whispered, tracing the two day scruff on his jaw with her pink mitten-clad finger. “You haven’t done anything wrong. I love you.”
    “As much as before, Ana?”
    She smiled. Everyone else called her Aviana, but to Beaston, she was just Ana. His Ana. “More than ever.”
    He searched her eyes with his blazing green gaze, and the smile that