Pretty Dead by Anne Frasier

passenger side. “I was at the press conference a few days ago.”
    “Not a good time.” Elise slid behind the wheel. Beside her, the mayor stared numbly through the windshield. Jay Thomas was unaware of the identity of the woman on the beach, but in another ten minutes the whole city would know—if word hadn’t gotten out already.
    Jay Thomas dropped the hand he’d extended toward the mayor. Picking up on the tension, he shot Elise a questioning look, and she gave him an almost imperceptible shake of the head. He didn’t press it.
    The mayor was silent on the way to the river. Upon arrival, before the car rolled to a complete stop, he bailed out and loped across the open sand in the direction of the yellow tape.
    The scene had changed since Elise last saw it: now there was a crowd of about a hundred bystanders hoping to get a glimpse of something horrendous—as if their observation would protect them from ever experiencing anything similar themselves.
    As the mayor moved awkwardly through the loose sand, people parted to let him pass. He was someone who’d always been accessible, a people’s mayor. He rode his bike around Forsyth Park. He went to cafés and ordered his own coffee. He talked to people as he waited in line at the grocery store or while pumping gas. So when citizens saw him, they smiled. They waved and spoke to him.
    Today he didn’t see anyone. Smiles vanished, and people dropped out of his way. A few produced cameras and snapped photos of the odd expression on his face. The images would be hashtagged, and his grief would make fodder for mass consumption long before the next press conference. By the time reports of the murder hit the local stations, the crime would be old news.
    Elise ran to catch up, scanning and assessing the scene as she moved. “Where’s Detective Gould?” she asked a male officer.
    “He’s talking to the Scouts in the picnic area. They wanted to get the girls away from here.”
    The mayor ducked under the crime-scene tape.
    A woman collecting evidence protested when Chesterfield charged forward. Then the evidence collector saw who it was, looked at Elise, looked at the mayor, got to her feet, and stepped aside.
    “Don’t touch the body!” Elise said.
    The mayor ignored her. Or didn’t hear. He scooped his daughter into his arms and hugged her to him, and it was all the more awful because the rigor hadn’t yet left her body completely and her arms remained stiff and unbending. The grieving man let out the same sobbing roar he’d released in his office, rocking the girl’s body against him as the people processing the scene tried to pull him away.
    Finally, after what seemed like minutes, he let his daughter go, laying her back on the ground. He removed his coat and spread it gently over her. “You should have covered her up,” he said. “She shouldn’t be left like this.”
    “We’re processing the scene.” The words came from a young female wearing latex gloves.
    The mayor zeroed in, directing his anger at her. “I don’t care! Do you hear me? I don’t care! My daughter is dead! Dead!”
    The officer recoiled, opened and closed her mouth, and backed up.
    John Casper stepped forward. “Sir?”
    No response. John tried to get the mayor’s attention once again. This time the mayor heard. His head turned slowly.
    “I’m the coroner,” John told him. “We’re almost ready to take her to the morgue. You can see her again there.”
    John’s white coat and the mention of the morgue seemed to send the mayor’s emotions in a new direction. He showed a sudden comprehension of his surroundings. He spun around, arms limp at his sides. He spotted Elise.
    “You.”
    She swallowed.
    “Head of homicide.” He spit out the words. “A third murder in less than two weeks. This should not have happened. My daughter wouldn’t have died if you’d been doing your job.”
    “I understand,” she said, attempting to placate him. Elise could imagine his tangle of