Lahat ng Kabanata ng NEVERBOND: Kabanata 21 - Kabanata 26

* BETTY'S MEMORIES* The house always smelled like smoke, rotting wood, and cheap liquor. Not the kind that warmed you from the inside, but the kind that soured a man's blood and twisted his soul. Betty remembered that scent more vividly than she remembered her mother's lullabies. It was the scent of her childhood. Their house wasn’t a home. It was a broken thing — four damp walls stitched together by mould and silence. It stood on the far edge of the pack’s land, tucked away behind the chicken coops and drying lines where no Alpha ever bothered to look. In winter, the wind slipped through the cracks in the wood like a thief, stealing warmth, stealing hope. There were nights it felt colder inside than out, and Jasper would curl into her side, shivering, as if her ribs could offer what the world refused: comfort. Their father was always out — gambling, drinking, spilling stories in smoke-filled dens about the Luna he could’ve had, the warrior he would’ve been, if not for the curse

ALEX'S POV “She’s not your mother.” The words echo long after Kelvin retreats into silence, leaving Alex alone in the vast, candlelit office of his. His jaw tightens. He had scoffed at the comparison. Laughed it off. But now? He can’t stop thinking about it. The eyes. The silence. The broken fire behind them. It isn’t the same, he tells himself—but the more he tries to believe it, the more it claws at him. She isn’t like his mother. She’s worse. She’s defiant. She’s plotting. He turns sharply, footsteps ringing against the cold stone as he strides through the corridor, anger rising like a storm behind his eyes. He can’t breathe in this doubt. He needs control—over her, over himself. He rounds the corner and halts. Her scent. It’s stronger. Wrong. It smells of forest. And bloodroot. And distance. His eyes narrow. He throws open her door with a force that nearly rips it from its hinges. There she is—standing by the edge of her bed, startled, fr

BETTY'S POV Betty’s breath caught as the corridor curved, shadows swallowing her quick steps. Lisa’s voice faded behind her, distant and annoyed, but Betty didn’t stop. She needed space—just for a moment. A door loomed at the end of the passage, half hidden in the wall as though it had been forgotten by time. With a trembling hand, she pushed it open.The air changed instantly.She froze at the threshold, her pulse thundering. Rows upon rows of shelves stretched into the dim light, heavy with dust and silence. The scent of parchment and polished wood hung in the air, old yet strangely comforting. It wasn’t anything like the cold stone halls she’d grown used to. This… this was different.Her lips parted. A library.She hadn’t even known the pack owned one. Omegas like her weren’t told of such places, let alone allowed to enter them. She stepped inside slowly, afraid that the room might vanish if she moved too quickly, that it might have been only a trick of her imagination.The soft h