Blackwing Defender (Kane's Mountains Book 1) by T. S. Joyce Page B

injury. I will say that scars like that will not be tolerated in my crew.”
    “Well…” Rowan said, slurping purple syrup off the popsicle stick. “I am not so bothered by that as long as it’s not malicious.”
    “What?” Kane said, looking appalled.
    Rowan shrugged. “The Gray Backs fought all the time. These idiots remind me of home in a big way. At least they were laughing afterward.”
    “I’m not laughing,” Beast said.
    “At least most of them were laughing,” Rowan conceded. “Sometimes crews can be like that.”
    “Violent little heathens?” Kane asked too loud.
    “Well, yeah. It worked for the crew I grew up in. Not saying this should be an all-the-time thing, but a little brawl here and there is okay.”
    Kane groaned and rubbed his hands down his face for too long to be polite. Maybe he had a headache.
    “Biggest fear,” Rowan called across the room. “Don’t think too hard, just answer the questions as they come. Emma, you start.”
    “Biggest fear?” Emma glanced at Winter, but hell if she knew what the dragons were looking for. Emma hesitated only a second before she said, “Failing.”
    “Getting too attached,” Beast gritted out.
    “STDs,” Dustin said easily, like shifters could even get those.
    Logan pressed his back against the wall and slid down until he sat on the floor, his elbows resting on his bent knees. “My biggest fear is that no one will ever really know me.” He looked over at Winter, and there was a charged moment between them.
    “Same,” she murmured.
    “Ugh, just fuck already,” Dustin complained. “Or wait, did you already do that?” When his eyes widened, a lightbulb practically went off over his head. “Is that where you got the claw marks? Kinky.”
    Heat blasted up Winter’s neck and warmed her cheeks.
    “Next question,” Rowan rushed out, but she was looking at Winter with a spark of curiosity in her blue eyes. “Why did you leave your last crews?”
    Emma shrugged and said, “Boredom.”
    “Don’t pretend you had a crew,” Dustin scoffed.
    Emma smiled brightly and zipped her lips.
    “Right?” Dustin asked, uncertainty tainting his voice as he looked around at the rest of them. He ran his fingers though his hair, smoothing it back from his face. “Because humans don’t have crews. You mean your family…right?”
    Kane and Rowan were smiling now as if they were in on the secret, and little Ms. Human Emma just got a whole lot more interesting.
    “Maybe that’s where she learned to drop a shifter,” Logan said.
    “Oh yeah, kicking a man in the dick is such a skill.”
    “It looked pretty skillful to me,” Winter said. “I thought you werewolves were supposed to be fast.”
    Looking grumpy as hell, Dustin flipped her off and crossed his arms over his chest.
    “No crew,” Beast said.
    “Boy problems,” Winter admitted.
    “Alpha was a lying asshole,” Logan murmured.
    “Why do you want to be part of the Blackwing Crew?” Rowan asked as Kane relaxed back into the chair and linked his hands behind his head, eyes on them and seeming to miss nothing.
    “I like dragons,” Emma answered.
    “I also like dragons,” Dustin said, but there was a false note in his voice.
    There was something strange about the way Kane looked at Dustin. Every time his glance slid the werewolf’s way, it hardened and filled with some deep, dark emotion that gave Winter chills. This look he gave Dustin was no different. “Try that one again.”
    Dustin growled, but he wasn’t meeting Kane’s eyes anymore. “I got sick of being bottom of my pack.”
    “So you’ll be bottom of the crew here?” Winter asked. “Good decision.”
    “Screw you. Oh wait, Logan already did.”
    “Do you want to die?” Logan asked him blandly. His face was all twisted and full of murder though, so Dustin exposed his neck like a wise dog.
    “I need an alpha more dominant than me,” Beast said, ignoring the interruptions.
    “Same,” Logan said.
    Winter pulled her