Parallax

Chapter 8

Kate had a mischievous glint in her gold eyes and Bella knew that face. She had that look every time she was planning something sneaky with her gift.

Bella looked around the others then stared at the outstretched hand. She noticed that Emmett beside her and Jasper behind Alice were paying close attention to her and Kate and realized what Kate was trying to do and that there was probably a bet going on about it.

She suddenly thought of an idea to play along and smiled innocently as she reached for Kate's hand.

"AAAHHH!" Bella shouted and her body buckled as if in pain.

"No!"

"Bella!"

"Kate!"

The vampires where panicking as Kate automatically withdrew her hand with a terrified look, afraid that she might have accidentally hurt her. Emmett had a triumphant look but suddenly felt guilty that Bella got hurt in the process while the others were all worried about the only human in the house.

Only Alice was unaffected, already seeing the outcome beforehand and knew Bella was going to be immune to Kate's gift. The others caught Alice's reaction right away and they all looked at Bella in disbelief.

Caught in the act, she gave them a Cheshire smile and stood up straight.

"Too much??" She asked and Alice smiled mischievously.

"Awww... I thought I'd already won" Emmett said in a dismayed tone.

"Did you just bet on me that I would get electrocuted?! "Bella exclaimed but there was a hint of amusement on her tone. Emmett raised his two hands up in defense.

"I didn't think Kate would give you a strong one! "

"Wait, how do you know about my gift?" Kate interrupted in disbelief.

"Edward might have mentioned it before" Bella lied and she caught Jasper eyeing her with a raised brow. She has never been good at lying as a human but she had years of practice with having a neutral expression when she became a vampire. Jasper though, who was an empath, could detect a lie right away but he wasn't calling her out so she let him be. She was sure that he was waiting for her to explain herself when the right time would come. Speaking of Jasper, since Emmett was the one that was disappointed that it had no effect on her, that means Jasper was the one who betted for her and she felt overwhelmed by the fact that even in this timeline, this Jasper trusted Bella's gifts as much as her own mate does.

"So you really are immune to my powers? I was only going to give you a small tingle of course, just enough to make your hair stand, but... "Kate was looking at her curiously now. She looked like she wanted to test her full powers on Bella and since Bella was in the mood for indulging her mentor and friend, she held her hand out again.

"Have a go at it with your full powers" Bella urged her and everyone looked at her like she had gone crazy, even the gifted vampire in front of her hesitated.

"Are you sure? If I go all out, I could kill you" she stated.

"You won't hurt me" Bella replied confidently and Tanya smirked at her.

"You sound so sure of your gift"

"Only because since I can't turn it off, I doubt it can affect me no matter the intensity of the attack, as long as it's only mentally affecting me" Bella explained since she couldn't really tell them that they already tested it before. Once when she was human and several times after she was a vampire and it wasn't just Kate's power that they tested it. She had already proven herself against all of the Volturi's guards that had mental abilities, including Aro, himself.