He’d heard more of Brianna’s conversation with Bentz than he’d admitted and now was on the track of the missing twins she’d mentioned. It didn’t take long. After logging in through the Observer’s Web site, he located information on the Reeves twins who’d gone missing from Phoenix, and Beau and Belle January from Dallas. They, too, had vanished, one after the other.

Victims of the 21 Killer?

Or just a coincidence?

Identical twins in the first case, but male.

Fraternal twins in the second, a man and a woman.

Not 21’s MO.

After printing out the information on each of the missing sets of twins, Jase added his own notes, including what he’d overheard about Zoe and Chloe Denning. The Denning girls fit the profile of 21’s victims much more closely than the other two sets. Was it possible that the killer had expanded from only female victims? The fact that they were killed as they turned twenty-one, of legal age, had to be significant. The killer was obviously making a statement about reaching adulthood, coming of age. Or was that just psychological crap and the guy was just a freak who had a fascination with twenty-first birthdays?

If they are victims of 21. Remember, the police and the criminal justice system think they got their man. There’s a chance this is all just Brianna Hayward’s half-baked theory.

He chewed on that; he didn’t think Brianna was the type to go off half-cocked, even if she was motivated by the desire to get her cousin Caldwell out of jail.

Then again, what did he really know about her? She’d been just a kid when he’d last seen her.

Still searching, Jase pulled up everything he could find about Donovan Caldwell, including the abduction and murders of his sisters, Delta and Diana. The abduction and ritualistic murders of Caldwell’s siblings mirrored those of Lucy and Laney Springer, two more of the 21 Killer’s victims.

Either the identical double homicides were committed by the same nut job, his apprentice, or a copycat who had inside information. From what source? The killer himself? An accomplice? A leak in the LAPD who would have information not given to the press or public?

Again, he made notes to himself. He had a buddy who’d worked at the LA Times for years, had some connections with the LAPD. Jase phoned, but his friend didn’t pick up, so he left a voice mail, then a quick text. As he read on, one of the most glaring facts that came out of his research was that there had been a gap of twelve years, a long span between the killings of the Caldwell twins and the Springer girls.

Had Donovan Caldwell suppressed his urges for a dozen years?

Unlikely.