Free Novak Raven (Harper's Mountains Book 4) by T. S. Joyce Page A

for him.
    Instead of telling him all of her mushy thoughts, she parted her lips and said, “Thank you.”
    “For what?” he asked, a slight frown furrowing his brows.
    For the kiss and for coming after me. For holding me when I found out my life was a lie. For telling me everything will be okay. For all the letters that saved me when I was a kid. For being you.
    He wouldn’t appreciate the sentiment, though, so instead she said the only other words that felt right. “Thank you for everything.”
    When one corner of his lip turned up, her breath stuttered in her chest. So damn stunning.
    Weston jerked his chin toward his truck parked at an angle on the side of the deserted road. “Get in and turn on the heat. I’ll grab your stuff.”
    “Okay,” she murmured, her legs and arms feeling numb with what had transpired in the woods. She’d thought her life was over, thought the darkness was swallowing her up, but Weston had come in and, like a beacon of light, absorbed the darkness and took the impossible weight off her heart.
    And now the rough, quiet, dangerous Novak Raven was being so tender with her. Avery made her way through the mud to the passenger’s side of his truck and climbed in. It had been lifted a few inches and sat on fat mud tires, so she had to use the rails and scramble a bit to reach the seat, but when she was finally in, she turned on the car to get the heat going, as much for her as for Weston, so he could be comfortable when he got inside.
    She canted her head and watched him pull her bedding and her suitcase from her car. He even slung her purse over his massive shoulder and made his way to her with long, confident strides. Something had changed in him. And when she looked down to turn the radio dial, the word Home was running across the screen with a phone number underneath, like he’d just ended the call. Home. His home? He must’ve called his father.
    She frowned. No. He must’ve called his mother, Aviana Novak, because she was the one who would know the most about Avery. Chills rippled up her skin. She’d grown up idolizing Aviana, and whatever her heroine had said to Weston had made a difference in his opinion of her.
    She’d never talked to Aviana except for the one meeting they had when she was young, and she remembered she wasn’t like the raven women she’d imagined. Aviana had sat straight and proud and had been angry, with her mother perhaps. Made sense now if Aviana had found out about the council’s treachery. Avery hated the idea that the council had read Weston’s letters. What must it have been like for Aviana to realize her own people were after her son? Avery felt sick just thinking about being a part of the council’s plan—whatever it was.
    Weston shoved her things in the back seat and jogged around the front of the truck. Raindrops fell in a constant downpour in the high beams, and his ripped torso was illuminated as he passed through. When he climbed into his truck and pulled the belt over his lap, she asked him before she lost her nerve. “Did your mother change your mind about me?”
    “No,” he said in that deep, rich voice of his. “ I changed my mind about you.” He cast her a quick glance and smiled sadly. “I think we both got played. I think we both got hurt, and that shit ends now. Fuck the council, fuck the ravens, and fuck your parents. You’ll show them.”
    Weston gunned it onto the asphalt, one hand draped easily over the steering wheel, one elbow resting on the console, the epitome of relaxed and confident male. Weston knew his place in this world. He was a raven shifter who had somehow clawed his way to the top of the food chain.
    The last thing he said bothered her, though. You’ll show them . She was a fraud. “Do you know about the woman’s role in raven culture? Did your mother explain?”
    Weston’s lips pursed into a thin line. “She told me a little.”
    “Females aren’t allowed to have jobs. Not after your mom left. They