Midnight Sun (The Twilight Saga #5) - Stephenie Meyer Page 0,237

him and was aware again of Emmett looming, massive and eager, beside Carlisle.

I was surprised at his frustration. James didn’t want to be careful. He was anxious for a fight. However—still poised to strike—he spared part of his focus to tune in for some movement from Victoria, but she was frozen with fear.

My own attention was compromised as Laurent finally reacted.

“You brought a snack?” he asked, disbelieving.

Like James, he moved a step closer to Bella, though his move was more instinctual than aggressive.

That didn’t matter to me. I twisted slightly, my eyes never leaving the greater threat, and snarled my rage in Laurent’s direction, baring my teeth at him. Unlike James, Laurent immediately retreated.

James shifted again, testing my concentration. I was in place to answer his maneuver before the motion was complete. His lips pulled back over his teeth.

“I said she’s with us,” Carlisle repeated, his voice closer to a growl than I’d ever heard it before.

“But she’s human,” Laurent pointed out. There was still no aggression in his mind. He was only baffled and frightened. He couldn’t make sense of this situation, but he realized that James’s ill-considered offensive might get them all killed. He glanced toward Victoria, checking her reaction much as James had. As if she were some kind of weathervane.

Emmett was the one to respond to Laurent. I didn’t know if it was Jasper who made it feel as though the ground shook as he took one step closer to the conflict, or if it was just Emmett being Emmett.

“Yes,” he rumbled, his tone absent of all emotion and inflection. The steel of his voice seemed to cut straight through the center of the confrontation, evoking a sudden chill in the air.

I was pretty sure that was Jasper’s work, but I didn’t split my concentration to be sure.

It was effective. The hunter straightened out of his crouch.

I read his reactions minutely, holding my defensive position against the possibility of a trick. I expected anger, frustration. I’d seen before that he was arrogant, not used to being obstructed. Having to concede to a larger force than his own would surely infuriate him.

But instead, a sudden excitement jolted through his thoughts. Though his eyes never entirely left Bella or me, he was cataloguing in his peripheral vision the threats facing him. Not with fear or annoyance, but with a strange, wild pleasure. His eyes still skipped over Jasper and Alice, seeing them only as numbers in a census. Emmett’s threatening mass seemed abruptly exhilarating to him.

“It appears we have a lot to learn about each other,” Laurent observed in a mollifying tone.

And then James’s inexplicable elation gave way to planning. To strategy. To memories of past victories. And for the first time, I realized—with dread and panic—that he was no mere hunter.

“Indeed,” Carlisle agreed, his voice hard.

I desperately wanted to know what Alice was seeing now, but I couldn’t afford to miss any detail in my adversary’s thoughts.

I listened as he remembered cornering target after target, as he relived the lengths of his more exhaustive pursuits, as he catalogued the opposition he’d overcome to get to his prey. None of the previous challenges were greater than what he was looking at now. Eight—no, seven, he corrected. A coven of seven—certainly with some talents among them—and one helpless human girl who smelled better than any meal he’d had in the last century.

Thrilling.

He couldn’t start here, with so many protecting her.

Wait until they separate. Use the time for reconnaissance.

“But we’d like to accept your invitation,” Laurent was saying to Carlisle. James was only superficially aware of the conversation; he was absorbed in his planning.

Until Laurent added, “And, of course, we will not harm the human girl. We won’t hunt in your range, as I said.”

This broke through both James’s new exhilaration and his vigilant focus. He turned away from me to stare at Laurent with amazement, but Laurent was facing Carlisle, and he didn’t see as the shock turned to loathing.

You dare speak for me?

The heat of his reaction made it clear that the coven would not stay intact. I heard James’s resolution to use Laurent as long as he was convenient, but he would rather kill him than leave him behind when that usefulness was over. It appeared that his desire to destroy Laurent was based entirely on this one comment; I couldn’t find another source of resentment. James was easily provoked, I decided, and unforgiving. Perhaps I could use that.

James had no thought of Victoria choosing Laurent. I