Midnight Sun (The Twilight Saga #5) - Stephenie Meyer Page 0,158

long grass. Her expression wasn’t frightened, but it was desperate. I didn’t understand what she was doing.

I couldn’t let her crash into me, whatever she was intending. I needed her to keep her distance. I raised my hand again, palm forward.

She faltered, then wobbled in place for a moment, exuding anxiety.

As I stared into her eyes, saw my reflection there, I thought perhaps I understood. Mirrored in her eyes, what I resembled most was a man on fire. Though I’d debunked her myths, she must have held on to them subconsciously.

Because she was worried. Frightened for the monster rather than of it.

She took a step toward me, and then hesitated when I moved a half step back.

“Does that hurt you?” she whispered.

Yes, I’d been right. She wasn’t afraid for herself, not even now.

“No,” I whispered back.

She stepped another foot closer, careful now. I let my hand fall.

She still wanted to be closer to me.

Her expression shifted as she approached. Her head cocked to the side, and her eyes first narrowed, then grew huge. Even with this much space between us, I could see the effects of the light refracting off my skin shining prism-like against her own. She moved another step and then another, keeping the same distance away as she slowly circled around me. I stayed completely motionless, feeling her eyes touch my skin as she moved out of my sight. Her breath came more quickly than usual, her heart pumped faster.

She reappeared on my right, and now there was a tiny smile beginning to form around the edges of her lips as she completed her circle and faced me again.

How could she smile?

She walked closer, stopping when she was only ten inches away. Her hand was raised, curled close to her chest, as if she wanted to reach out and touch me but was afraid to. The sunlight shattered off my arm and whirled against her face.

“Edward,” she breathed. There was wonder in her voice.

“Are you frightened now?” I asked quietly.

It was as if my question was totally unexpected, as if it shocked her. “No.”

I stared into her eyes, unable to stop myself from fruitlessly trying—again—to hear her.

She reached toward me, very slowly, watching my face. I thought perhaps she was waiting for me to tell her to stop. I didn’t. Her warm fingers grazed the back of my wrist. She stared intently at the light that danced from my skin to hers.

“What are you thinking?” I whispered. In this moment, the constant mystery was once again acutely painful.

She shook her head slightly, and seemed to struggle for the words. “I am…” She stared up into my eyes. “I didn’t know.…” She took a deep breath. “I’ve never seen anything more beautiful—never imagined something so beautiful could exist.”

I stared back at her in shock.

My skin was blazing with the most flagrant symptom of my disease. In the sun, I was less human than at any other time. And she thought I was… beautiful.

My hand lifted automatically, turning to take hers, but I forced myself to make it drop, not to touch her.

“It’s very strange, though,” I said. Surely she could understand that this was part of the horror.

“Amazing,” she corrected.

“You aren’t repulsed by my flagrant lack of humanity?”

Though I was fairly sure now what her answer would be, it was still astonishing to me.

She half smiled. “Not repulsed.”

“You should be.”

Her smile widened. “I’m feeling like humanity is pretty overrated.”

Carefully, I pulled my arm out from underneath her warm fingertips, hiding it behind my back. She valued humanity so lightly. She didn’t realize the depths of what its loss would mean.

Bella took another half step forward, her body so close that its warmth became more pronounced, more present than the sun’s. She lifted her face toward mine, and the light gilded her throat, the play of shadows emphasizing the coursing of her blood through the artery just behind the corner of her jaw.

My body reacted instinctively—venom welling, muscles coiling, thoughts scattering.

How quickly it surfaced! We’d been in this arena of visions mere seconds.

I stopped breathing and took a long step away from her, raising my hand again in warning.

She didn’t try to follow. “I’m… sorry,” she whispered, the sound of the words lilting up, turning them into a question. She didn’t know what she was apologizing for.

I carefully loosed my lungs, and took a controlled breath. Her scent was no more painful than usual—not overwhelming, the way I was half-afraid I would suddenly find it.

“I need some time,” I