Free Wake of Darkness by Meg Winkler Page A

when are you gonna tell her? Jim
asked. He sounded happy, even in his thoughts.
     
    Now James, whatever do you mean? Alexander’s silent voice asked back. Sophie thought that—just maybe—Alexander
was taunting him.
     
    Jim, was the firm, correcting
reply.
     
    As you say.
     
    You know exactly what I mean. Our
new little addition. She likes you too, but she’s not gonna admit it.
     
    “What?” Sophie gasped to herself. She
suddenly wanted out of the eavesdropping hole she’d fallen into. She
frantically tried to stop listening, but she couldn’t pull her mind from his now that it was there, no matter how imperative the action seemed to be.
     
    I hardly believe what you are
saying. Besides, she seems terrified of me, Alexander answered casually
distracted, though Sophie thought that maybe he sounded a little sad.
     
    “I don’t want to hear this,” Sophie
sang to herself, as if she were able to block it out that way.
     
    Well, yeah! You sit there in the
corner and stare at her like you’re gonna eat her or something. I’d be pretty
damn terrified too, Al.
     
    Alexander.
     
    Jim laughed. Whatever. So, when?
     
    Do you not realize that
she could be listening?
     
    You think? Why don’t you go
surprise her?
     
    Sophie’s heart raced so quickly
that she thought it’d pound out of her chest. She wasn’t ready for that. What
would she say to him if he decided to follow Jim’s suggestion?
     
    No, no, no, she wanted to
argue back. She didn’t want anything to do with him in that way.
     
     “Hi Sophie!”  
     
    She froze. In her panic, Sophie’s usually
quick brain couldn’t keep up with the sound well enough to decipher the speaker’s
voice.
     
    She didn’t dare open her eyes. She
sat with her forehead still on her knees. Please, please don’t let that be
him, she prayed silently.
     
    Without raising her head, she
peeked with one eye at the person in her doorway. She breathed a sigh of
relief. Laney skipped over to her bed and planted a kiss on Sophie’s cheek as
she stared at her in wonder.
     
    Laney frowned. “You okay?” she
asked.
     
    “Yeah,” Sophie replied
absentmindedly. “Thanks.”
     
    “Who’d you think I was?” Laney
asked, cocking an eyebrow at her. “Wait. Never mind. Dante said dinner’s ready,
so I want to show you something really quick.”
     
    Sophie smiled at her and thought
she had to be the most adorable girl she’d ever met.
     
    “Thank you!” Laney replied with a
big grin. “Now listen: you’re gonna love this! We all have a special gift. Well,
more than one, but whatever! The vampires can run really, really fast…almost
fly, fly, fly, right? So…we can move from one place to another without
running !”
     
    Sophie watched her warily. Laney
laughed at the look on her face.
     
     “The only catch…” Laney began to
say, but her eyes glazed over. She was lost in a wayward thought, but was back
to normal just as quickly.
     
    “Are you okay?” Sophie asked.
     
     “Yeah, sorry!” She grinned
sheepishly at Sophie. “What was I saying? Oh, yeah. The only catch is that we
have to have seen where we want to go before we can get there, and sometimes
we’re too far from where we want to go, so it does limit us a little ,
but it’s really cool. We call it jumping ‘cause we don’t know what else to call
it, and it happens just like that”—she snapped—“Like a blink of an eye, quick
as a jump!” She giggled in the middle of her breathless chattering.
     
    “What are you talking about?”
     
    “Watch this. I’ll think about
standing in the hallway.”
     
    Sophie watched as Laney closed her
eyes, took a deep breath and then a split second later was standing in the
hallway. Sophie gasped in complete disbelief as Laney smiled at her, several
feet away from where she’d started.
     
    “Now you try. Come to me. Just
close your eyes and envision the hallway. Then all you have to do is want to be
there,” Laney instructed.
     
    Sophie