Midnight Sun (The Twilight Saga #5) - Stephenie Meyer Page 0,283

passed her, continued to the TV to set the remote down. As he did so, he looked into the camera and winked at me. Then he turned to face her. The way he turned his body put his back to me, but I had a perfect view of Bella. The camera was angled so that I couldn’t see him in the mirrors. That must have been a mistake on his part. I imagined he wanted me to see his performance.

“Sorry about that, Bella, but isn’t it better that your mother didn’t really have to be involved in all this?”

Bella looked at him with a strange, almost relaxed expression. “Yes.”

“You don’t sound angry that I tricked you.”

“I’m not.” Truth radiated in her tone.

The tracker hesitated for one second. “How odd. You really mean it.” His head cocked to the side, but I could only guess at his expression. “I will give your strange coven this much, you humans can be quite interesting. I guess I can see the draw of observing you. It’s amazing—some of you seem to have no sense of your own self-interest at all.”

He leaned toward her as though he was expecting an answer, but she stayed silent. Her eyes were opaque, giving nothing away.

“I suppose you’re going to tell me that your boyfriend will avenge you?” he asked, his voice taunting. The taunt was not for her.

“No, I don’t think so,” Bella replied quietly. “At least, I asked him not to.”

“And what was his reply to that?”

“I don’t know. I left him a letter.”

Please, please don’t come after him, she’d written in that letter. I love you. Forgive me.

Her manner was almost casual. This seemed to bother the tracker, because his voice was sharper now, his tone twisting into something ominous.

“How romantic.” The sarcasm was palpable. “A last letter. And do you think he will honor it?”

Her eyes were still impossible to read, but her face was calm as she said, “I hope so.”

Please, this is the only thing I can ask you now, she’d written. For me.

“Hmmm. Well, our hopes differ, then.” His voice turned sour. Bella’s composure was disrupting the scene he had planned. “You see, this was all just a little too easy, too quick. To be quite honest, I’m disappointed. I expected a much greater challenge. And, after all, I only needed a little luck.”

Bella’s expression was patient now, like a parent who knows that her toddler’s story is going to be long and rambling but is determined to humor him anyway.

The tracker’s voice grew harder in response. “When Victoria couldn’t get to your father, I had her find out more about you. There was no sense in running all over the planet chasing you down when I could comfortably wait for you in a place of my choosing.…”

The tracker kept going, working to keep his words slow and smug, but I could feel the undercurrent of his frustration. He started talking faster. Bella didn’t react. She waited, patient and polite. It was obvious this rattled him.

I’d thought little about how the tracker had found Bella—there hadn’t been time for anything besides action—but this all made sense. None of it surprised me. I winced a little when I realized our flight to Phoenix had been the trigger for his last move. But it was only one of a thousand mistakes on my conscience.

He was wrapping up his monologue—I wondered whether he thought I would be impressed?—and I tried to brace myself for what would follow.

“Very easy, you know,” he concluded. “Not really up to my standards. So, you see, I’m hoping you’re wrong about your boyfriend. Edward, isn’t it?” It was a silly thing, to pretend he’d forgotten my name. He couldn’t forget it any more than I would ever forget his.

Bella didn’t answer him. She was looking a little confused now. As though she didn’t understand the point. She didn’t realize the show wasn’t for her.

“Would you mind, very much, if I left a little letter of my own for your Edward?”

The tracker walked backward until he was out of the frame. The picture suddenly zoomed tight on only Bella’s face.

Her expression was perfectly clear to me. She was starting to realize. She’d known he was going to kill her. She had never considered that he would torture her first. Panic touched her eyes for the first time since she’d discovered her mother was safe.

My own fear and horror grew with hers. How would I survive this? I didn’t know. But she