mbination of the three. The victims of this crime wave 
range in age from 15-year-old honor student Amanda Reed, to 67-year-old retired postman 
Omar Jenks. The linked deaths include a nearly even 18 women and 21 men. The victims are 
racially diverse: Caucasians, African Americans, Hispanics and Asians. 

The selection appears random. The motive seems to be killing for no other reason than to 
kill. 

So why even consider the idea of a serial killer? 

There are enough similarities in the modus operandi to rule out unrelated crimes. Every 
victim discovered has been burned to the extent that dental records were necessary for 
identification. The use of some kind of accelerant, like gasoline or alcohol, seems to be 
indicated in the conflagrations; however, no traces of any accelerant have yet been found. All 
of the bodies have been carelessly dumped with no attempt at concealment. 

More gruesome yet, most of the remains show evidence of brutal violence - bones crushed 
and snapped by some kind of tremendous pressure - which medical examiners believe 
occurred before the time of death, though these conclusions are difficult to be sure of, 
considering the state of the evidence. 

Another similarity that points to the possibility of a serial: every crime is perfectly clean of 

 

evidence, aside from the remains themselves. Not a fingerprint, not a tire tread mark nor a 
foreign hair is left behind. There have been no sightings of any suspect in the disappearances. 

Then there are the disappearances themselves - hardly low profile by any means. None of the 
victims are what could be viewed as easy targets. None are runaways or the homeless, who 
vanish so easily and are seldom reported missing. Victims have vanished from their homes, 
from a fourth-story apartment, from a health club, from a wedding reception. Perhaps the 
most astounding: 30-year-old amateur boxer Robert Walsh entered a movie theater with a 
date; a few minutes into the movie, the woman realized that he was not in his seat. His body 
was found only three hours later when fire fighters were called to the scene of a burning trash 
Dumpster, twenty miles away. 

Another pattern is present in the slayings: all of the victims disappeared at night. 

And the most alarming pattern? Acceleration. Six of the homicides were committed in the 
first month, 11 in the second. Twenty-two have occurred in the last 10 days alone. And the 
police are no closer to finding the responsible party than they were after the first charred 
body was discovered. 

The evidence is conflicting, the pieces horrifying. A vicious new gang or a wildly active serial 
killer? Or something else the police haven't yet conceived of? 

Only one conclusion is indisputable: something hideous is stalking Seattle. 

It took me three tries to read the last sentence, and I realized the problem was my shaking 
hands. 

"Bella?" 

Focused as I was, Edward's voice, though quiet and not totally unexpected, made me gasp 
and whirl. 

He was leaning in the doorway, his eyebrows pulled together. Then he was suddenly at my 
side, taking my hand. 

"Did I startle you? I'm sorry. I did knock. . . ." 

"No, no," I said quickly. "Have you seen this?" I pointed to the paper. 

A frown creased his forehead. 

"I hadn't seen today's news yet. But I knew it was getting worse. We're going to have to do 
something . . . quickly." 

I didn't like that. I hated any of them taking chances, and whatever or whoever was in 
Seattle was truly beginning to frighten me. But the idea of the Volturi coming was just as 
scary. 

 

"What does Alice say?" 

"That's the problem." His frown hardened. "She can't see anything . . . though we've made up 
our minds half a dozen times to check it out. She's starting to lose confidence. She feels like 
she's missing too much these days, that something's wrong. That maybe her vision is slipping 
away." 

My eyes were wide. "Can that happen?" 

"Who knows? No one's ever done a study . . . but I really doubt it. These things tend to 
intensify over time. Look at Aro and Jane." 

"Then what's wrong?" 

"Self-fulfilling prophecy, I think. We keep waiting for Alice to see something so we can go . . 
. and she doesn't see anything because we won't really go until she does. So she can't see us 
there. Maybe we'll have to do it blind." 

I shuddered. "No." 

"Did you have a strong desire to attend class today? We're only a couple of days from finals; 
they won't be giving us anything new." 

"I think I can live without school for a day. What are we doing?" 

"I want to talk to Jasper." 

Jasper, again. It was strange. In the Cullen family, Jasper was always a little on the fringe, 
part of things but never the center of them. It was my unspoken assumption that he was only 
there for Alice. I had the sense that he would follow Alice anywhere, but that this lifestyle 
was not his first choice. The fact that he was less committed to it than the others was 
probably why he had more difficulty keeping it up. 

At any rate, I'd never seen Edward feel dependent on Jasper. I wondered again what he'd 
meant about Jasper's expertise. I really didn't know much about Jasper's history, just that he 
had come from somewhere in the south before Alice found him. For some reason, Edward 
had always shied away from any questions about his newest brother. And I'd always been too 
intimidated by the tall, blond vampire who looked like a brooding movie star to ask him 
outright. 

When we got to the house, we found Carlisle, Esme, and Jasper watching the news intently, 
though the sound was so low that it was unintelligible to me. Alice was perched on the 
bottom step of the grand staircase, her face in her hands and her expression discouraged. As 
we walked in, Emmett ambled through the kitchen door, seeming perfectly at ease. Nothing 
ever bothered Emmett. 

"Hey, Edward. Ditching, Bella?" He grinned at me. 

 

"We both are," Edward reminded him. 

Emmett laughed. "Yes, but it'sher first time through high school. She might miss 
something." 

Edward rolled his eyes, but otherwise ignored his favorite brother. He tossed the paper to 
Carlisle. 

"Did you see that they're considering a serial killer now?" he asked. 

Carlisle sighed. "They've had two specialists debating that possibility on CNN all morning." 

"We can't let this go on." 

"Let's go now," Emmett said with sudden enthusiasm. "I'm dead bored." 

A hiss echoed down the stairway from upstairs. 

"She's such a pessimist," Emmett muttered to himself. 

Edward agreed with Emmett. "We'll have to go sometime." 

Rosalie appeared at the top of the stairs and descended slowly. Her face was smooth, 
expressionless. 

Carlisle was shaking his head. "I'm concerned. We've never involved ourselves in this kind of 
thing before. It's not our business. We aren't the Volturi." 

"I don't want the Volturi to have to come here," Edward said. "It gives us so much less 
reaction time." 

"And all those innocent humans in Seattle," Esme murmured. "It's not right to let them die 
this way." 

"I know," Carlisle sighed. 

"Oh," Edward said sharply, turning his head slightly to look at Jasper. "I didn't think of that. I 
see. You're right, that has to be it. Well, that changes everything." 

I wasn't the only one who stared at him in confusion, but I might have been the only one 
who didn't look slightly annoyed. 

"I think you'd better explain to the others," Edward said to Jasper. "What could be the 
purpose of this?" Edward started to pace, staring at the floor, lost in thought. 

I hadn't seen her get up, but Alice was there beside me. "What is he rambling about?" she 
asked Jasper. "What are you thinking?" 

 

Jasper didn't seem to enjoy the spotlight. He hesitated, reading every face in the circle - for 
everyone had moved in to hear what he would say - and then his eyes paused on my face. 

"You're confused," he said to me, his deep voice very quiet. 

There was no question in his assumption. Jasper knew what I was feeling, what everyone 
was feeling. 

"We're all confused," Emmett grumbled. 

"You can afford the time to be patient," Jasper told him. "Bella should understand this, too. 
She's one of us now." 

His words took me by surprise. As little as I'd had to do with Jasper, especially since my last 
birthday when he'd tried to kill me, I hadn't realize that he thought of me that way. 

"How much do you know about me, Bella?" Jasper asked. 

Emmett sighed theatrically, and plopped down on the couch to wait with exaggerated 
impatience. 

"Not much," I admitted. 

Jasper stared at Edward, who looked up to meet his gaze. 

"No," Edward answered his thought. "I'm sure you can understand why I haven't told her 
that story. But I suppose she needs to hear it now." 

Jasper nodded thoughtfully, and then started to roll up the arm of his ivory sweater. 

I watched, curious and confused, trying to figure out what he was doing. He held his wrist 
under the edge of the lampshade beside him, close to the light of the naked bulb, and traced 
his finger across a raised crescent mark on the pale skin. 

It took me a minute to understand why the shape looked strangely familiar. 

"Oh," I breathed as realization hit. "Jasper, you have a scar exactly like mine." 

I held out my hand, the silvery crescent more prominent against my cream skin than against 
his alabaster. 

Jasper smiled faintly. "I have a lot of scars like yours, Bella." 

Jasper's face was unreadable as he pushed the sleeve of his thin sweater higher up his arm. At 
first my eyes could not make sense of the texture that was layered thickly across the skin. 
Curved half-moons crisscrossed in a feathery pattern that was only visible, white on white as 
it was, because the bright glow 