Comes a Horseman by Robert Liparulo

assessment of the responding patrolman who had set everything in motion.
    Fleiser cleared his throat. “I heard the name, but why Pelletier?”
    Alicia suspected the man would have asked anything that would, however insignificantly, move his thoughts away from the grotesque sight before him.
    â€œNicolas-Jacques Pelletier,” she answered. “In 1792, he was the first victim of the guillotine.” This nugget of trivia had popped from the mind of one of the investigators at the first known killing by the assumed perp in Utah. The name had stuck.
    The head’s strawberry blond hair was matted and sticking up in a pointed swirl. Alicia realized with sick vividness that the killer had carried it by the hair. But there hadn’t been a trail of blood. She lowered her view to check again, bringing the lights with her.
    â€œWhat are you doing? Go back to the head! The head!” demanded Lindsey, sounding panicked over the possibility of Cynthia Loeb’s head taking flight in the dark and whispering in his ear.
    â€œHold on.”
    The floor was clean, except for a few thin swirls of brown—obviously dried blood. Almost as if the spilled blood had been wiped up. But why? Then her lights caught a mark on the floor, and she stepped closer. Three-quarters of a dog’s paw print, made of blood. And it came to her: the animals had licked the floor clean.
    â€œCome on, lady.” The detective was really pouring on the charm now.
    Slowly she turned back to the head.
    Cynthia’s irises—green, Alicia noticed—had rolled up slightly, as if just becoming aware of how atrocious her hair looked. One eyelid was drooping. Blood filled both nostrils and caked the left temple and cheek. A purple-yellow bruise had blossomed on the other cheek. Dry lips were twisted in a sour grimace . . . a bloated tongue . . . blood . . . pooling, dripping onto the floor.
    A ridiculous saying came to Alicia’s mind— I wouldn’t be caught dead— and she realized this was what that meant. All the times you primped and groomed and applied your makeup just so, thought Alicia, assuming this woman had shared the cares of her gender. And you end up like this. No one else to impress. Not even yourself.
    She moved her eyes away, keeping the halogens trained on the gruesome orb for the benefit of the two men. The circle of light was wide enough to catch a mustard-streaked knife, bread crumbs, and a thin strip of clear plastic, the kind you tear off a pouch of cold cuts to get at the meat. An empty bread bag, crumpled and flat like a deflated balloon. She shifted the lights just a little and saw the rest of the meat package, empty. Behind it was the mustard bottle. Her eyes roamed the countertop, stopping at the pool of blood.
    â€œThe perp made a sandwich,” she announced.
    â€œHuh?” It was Fleiser.
    â€œHow do you know the woman didn’t make it herself, before she died?” asked Lindsey.
    Fleiser snorted. “Thanks for clarifying ‘before she died,’ Dave.”
    â€œYou know what I mean.”
    â€œThere are crumbs on top of the blood.” She centered the lights on them.
    Fleiser took a step. “Yep. Some of them are still white, unsaturated.”
    â€œJudas priest.”
    Silence, for a time, as each of them imagined the macabre scene. Alicia sensed that even hard-nosed Lindsey was a bit dumbfounded.
    Then Fleiser said, “What’s that on her forehead?” He edged closer, mindful of the bloody floor.
    â€œIt was in the notice I sent out.” Alicia instructed the video camera to zoom in on the small mark above the right eyebrow.
    â€œIt looks like a burn . . . a brand.” The tech was close enough to kiss the unfortunate Ms. Loeb. “It’s a sun.”
    â€œA sun?” Lindsey repeated.
    â€œAbout the size of a dime. Little flames radiating out from it.”
    â€œThe others were branded the same way,” Alicia said