The Heartless Alpha’s Beloved Luna (Avery and Gideon) novel Chapter 557

Before I could answer, she walked past me, almost mechanically, and left the room.

I stared after her, not sure what to think. She was acting odd lately, and that parting comment was strange. I thought about what Bjorn said last night and decided to find him.

Just as I suspected, he was upstairs in his room, sitting cross-legged on the floor with a half-finished model airplane in front of him and a fine brush between his fingers.

I leaned in the doorway. “How’s it coming?”

“Almost done with this one.” He kept his eyes on the wing. Then, without looking up: “Is she still here?”

“Your mother?” I asked. “Of course she’s still—”

“I told you already. That’s not my mother.”

I crossed the room and sat on the edge of his bed. “Why do you keep saying that?”

“Because it’s true.” He looked up at me then, his eyes level and completely serious far beyond his years. “That’s not her, Dad. That woman downstairs isn’t Mom.”

“Bjorn…” I sighed and rubbed the bridge of my nose.

“I know you don’t believe me.” He went back to his work. “She’s doing something to you so you don’t see it. But whatever it is, it doesn’t work on me.”

The hairs on the back of my neck prickled as he said it. He said the words with such calm certainty—not like the scattered thoughts of a ten-year-old with an imagination running rampant. Rather, he said it in the same way he painted his airplane. Calm, with precision, and utterly sure of himself.

But I knew Avery. I would recognize her anywhere.

I opened my mouth to say so. But he had already gone back to painting and didn’t seem interested in continuing the conversation, so I left him alone for now.

A little while later, I took the long way around the back of the house, past the kitchen gardens, and came up on the side of the greenhouse where the glass panels ran floor to ceiling. I didn’t go to the door. I stopped at the side panel first, just for a second, just to look in before I went in.

She was standing in the middle of the room, hunched over her worktable, her elbows lifted as she busied herself with something. I smiled faintly. Normal. She looked normal. Not an imposter like Bjorn had said, or whatever he thought she was.

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