Stephenie Meyer - The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner

I fought a smile. So the redhead was the mind reader, and he’d heard everything I’d wanted him to hear. Jane wasn’t getting away with anything.

Jane stared back at the mind reader with a blank expression. “Yes. Quite a pity how things turned out, isn’t it?”

The mind reader nodded, and I wondered what he was hearing in Jane’s head.

Jane turned her blank face to me now. There was nothing in her eyes, but I could feel that my time had run out. She’d gotten what she needed from me. She didn’t know that I’d also given the mind reader everything I could. And protected his coven’s secrets, too. I owed him that. He’d punished Riley and Victoria for me.

I glanced at him from the corner of my eye and thought, Thanks .

“Felix?” Jane said lazily.

“Wait,” the mind reader said loudly.

He turned to Carlisle and spoke quickly. “We could explain the rules to the young one. She doesn’t seem unwilling to learn. She didn’t know what she was doing.”

“Of course,” Carlisle said eagerly, looking at Jane. “We would certainly be prepared to take responsibility for Bree.”

Jane’s face looked like she wasn’t sure if they were joking, but if they were joking, they were funnier than she’d given them credit for.

Me, I was touched to the core. These vampires were strangers, but they’d gone out on this dangerous limb for me. I already knew it wasn’t going to work, but still.

“We don’t make exceptions,” Jane told them, amused. “And we don’t give second chances. It’s bad for our reputation.”

It was like she was discussing someone else. I didn’t care that she was talking about killing me. I knew the yellow-eyes couldn’t stop her. She was the vampire police. But even though the vampire cops were dirty—really dirty—at least the yellow-eyes knew it now.

“Which reminds me…,” Jane went on, her eyes locking on the human girl again and her smile widening. “Caius will be so interested to hear that you’re still human, Bella. Perhaps he’ll decide to visit.”

Still human. So they were going to change the girl. I wondered what they were waiting for.

“The date is set,” said the little vampire with the short black hair and the clear voice. “Perhaps we’ll come to visit you in a few months.”

Jane’s smile disappeared like someone had wiped it off. She shrugged without looking at the black-haired vampire, and I got the feeling that as much as she might have hated the human girl, she hated this small vampire ten times as much.

Jane turned back to Carlisle with the same vacant expression as before. “It was nice to meet you, Carlisle—I’d thought Aro was exaggerating. Well, until we meet again…”

This would be it, then. I still didn’t feel afraid. My only regret was that I couldn’t tell Fred more about all of this. He was going almost totally blind into this world full of dangerous politics and dirty cops and secret covens. But Fred was smart and careful and talented. What could they do to him if they couldn’t even see him? Maybe the yellow-eyes would meet Fred someday. Be nice to him, please , I thought at the mind reader.

“Take care of that, Felix,” Jane said indifferently, nodding at me. “I want to go home.”

“Don’t watch,” the redheaded mind reader whispered.

I closed my eyes.

As always, I am very grateful to all the people who made this book possible: my boys, Gabe, Seth, and Eli; my husband, Pancho; my parents, Stephen and Candy; my very supportive girlfriends Jen H., Jen L., Meghan, Nic, and Shelly; my ninja agent, Jodi Reamer; my “baffy,” Shannon Hale; all my friends and mentors at Little, Brown, most especially David Young, Asya Muchnick, Megan Tingley, Elizabeth Eulberg, Gail Doobinin, Andrew Smith, and Tina McIntyre; and, saving the best for last, my readers.

You’re the best audience anyone could have.

Thank you!