23 The Bond They Buried
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23 The Bond They Buried
Nyra’s POV
One of the only “perks” of being wolfless, if you could call it that, was this:
Most wolves didn’t clock my scent immediately.
Not unless they were looking for it.
Not unless they were close enough to care.
My smell didn’t announce me the way theirs did. It didn’t bloom into the air with dominance or rank or heat. It didn’t cling to the world like a flag.
I was easy to overlook.
Easy to miss.
Easy to pretend wasn’t there.
And for once, that invisibility became a shield.
I froze at the edge of the trees, just outside the porch, my breath held so tightly in my chest it hurt. Alpha Ethan stood at my mother’s door, broad shoulders squared, jaw hard, two of his men waiting a few paces behind him like guard dogs straining on a leash.
My mother stood in the doorway, spine straight, hands clenched at her sides.
They didn’t see me.
They were too busy tearing at each other with words.
I lingered where I was, behind the shadow of the pines, close enough to hear but far enough to vanish. My heart thudded against my ribs, a hard, frantic beat.
This argument was about me.
I could feel it in the air, heavy, ugly, inevitable.
Alpha Ethan’s voice cut through the morning hush.
“She disrespected me by walking away from the pack assembly like that,” he said, cold as iron. “She has to be punished.”
My stomach twisted.
Punished.
As if drafting me to serve wolves who hated me wasn’t punishment enough.
My mother’s laugh came out sharp and broken, the kind of laugh that wasn’t laughter at all.
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23 The Bond They Buned
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“Punished?” Elaine snapped. “What more punishment is there, Ethan? You’ve relegated her to a bloody omega. To cook and clean for people who spit when she walks past. What more can you do to break a spirit?”
There was rage in her voice, rage and something else.
Fear.
A fear she was trying to drown in anger.
Alpha Ethan’s answer was immediate, like he’d been waiting for the question.
“What else can she do?” he shot back. “She has no wolf. No abilities. Nothing.” His tone turned cruelly
matter-of-fact. “What more, Elaine?”
My throat tightened.
Nothing.
That word again.
The pack had always used it like a label they could slap on my forehead.
Nothing. Nobody. Unclaimed.
My mother stepped forward, not backing down, her voice trembling now with the force of everything she’d carried for years.
“She was fine being in the cabin with me,” Elaine said. “Fine with never stepping foot in your pack areas again. We were fine with that.” Her eyes flashed. “But you had to humiliate her.”
Alpha Ethan didn’t flinch.
“Yes,” he said. “Because she needed to know her place.”
My nails dug into my palms.
My place.
As if the world came with assigned seats and I was arrogant for wanting a sliver of dignity.
Alpha Ethan’s gaze sharpened, his voice lowering in a way that made the air feel colder.
“I’ve heard reports about her and Kieran sneaking around,” he said. “And I won’t let her ruin him and drag him down. A lot weighs on his shoulders, and he has to marry well.”
My heart stopped.
For a second, I genuinely stopped breathing.
Because that meant,
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23 The Bond They Buned
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My mother didn’t flinch, but her face went pale around the edges, like the insult had found an old wound
and sunk claws into it.
“I see you will never forgive me for rejecting you, Ethan,” she said quietly.
The sentence landed like thunder.
My world tilted.
Rejecting him?
My hands went numb.
My breath came out in a thin, trembling line.
What…?
My mother continued, and there was something painfully calm about her now, like she’d reached the
centre of the storm.
“I see it now,” Elaine said. “And now you’re taking it out on my daughter.”
I felt as if someone had reached into my chest and squeezed my heart until it hurt to exist.
My mother… and Alpha Ethan…
No.
That couldn’t be,
But the way Alpha Ethan’s face tightened… the way his eyes flashed… it wasn’t the reaction of a man hearing nonsense.
It was the reaction of a man hearing the truth spoken aloud when it should have stayed buried.
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