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door, but McCall stuck a booted foot in the doorway.
    “I’m sorry, but she’ll have to see me unless you want me to come back with a warrant to search the house,” McCall bluffed. “Tell her it’s Deputy Sheriff McCall Winchester.”
    A malicious light flickered on in Enid’s close-set gray eyes. “You’re making a mistake,” she said under her breath.
    McCall feared the old woman was right.
    A sound like the tinkling of a small bell came from deep in the lodge. Enid seemed to hesitate. “You will regret this.”
    McCall didn’t doubt it. The older woman stepped aside and the deputy sheriff entered her father’s family home for the first time in her life.

Chapter Three
    Enid led McCall into what could only be called a parlor. The decor was old-time Western, the rustic furnishings dated as if the house had been sealed for more than thirty years.
    McCall was too nervous to sit. She’d forced her way in here, and now she wasn’t sure what she would say to her grandmother when she finally saw her for the first time.
    At the sound of faint footfalls in the hallway, she turned, bracing herself, and yet she was still shocked. Nothing could have prepared her for the elderly woman who stepped into the room.
    Pepper Winchester was surprisingly spry for seventy-two. She stood, her back ramrod straight, her head angled as if she was irritated. Her face was lined but there was something youthful about her. She was tall and slim, elegant in her black silk caftan.
    Her hair, which had apparently once been dark like McCall’s, was now peppered with gray. It trailed down her slim back in a single loose braid. Her eyes were ebony, her cheekbones high, just like McCall’s.
    The resemblance was both striking and shocking. McCall had had no idea just how much she looked like her grandmother.
    If Pepper Winchester noticed the resemblance, her demeanor gave no notice of it. Nor was there any indication that she knew who McCall was.
    “Yes?” she demanded.
    McCall found her voice. “I’m Deputy Sheriff McCall Winchester.”
    Had the dark eyes widened just a little?
    “I need to ask you a few questions.”
    “I’m sure my housekeeper told you I don’t see visitors.”
    But you saw me. Why was that? Not because of the threat of a warrant. “I wouldn’t have bothered you if it wasn’t important. It’s about your son Trace’s disappearance.”
    “Have you found him?” The hope in her grandmother’s voice and posture was excruciating. So was the fear she heard there. And yet, Pepper Winchester had to know that if there was any news of Trace, the sheriff would have been here—not some lowly deputy.
    “I’m investigating his disappearance,” McCall said quickly, taking out her notebook and pen.
    “After twenty-seven years?” Pepper asked in disbelief. She seemed to shrink, all the starch coming out of her, all the spirit. “What’s the point?”
    “When was the last time you saw your son?”
    Pepper shook her head, her dark eyes dimming in the dull light. “I should think you would know that, since I gave that information to the sheriff at the time.”
    McCall saw that this had been a mistake. What had she hoped to accomplish? She had wanted to see hergrandmother. And now she had. The best thing she could do was to leave before Pepper Winchester got on the phone to the sheriff.
    But she’d come too far. She couldn’t leave things like this. Nor had she gotten what she’d come for. “Is there anyone who might have wanted to harm him?”
    Pepper raised her head slightly, her dark eyes locking with McCall’s. “Other than your mother?”
    “Did your son have any enemies?”
    “No.” Instantly, she corrected herself. “Buzz Crawford. He hated my family, Trace in particular.” Her voice broke as she said her son’s name.
    Again the former game warden’s name had come up in relation to Trace.
    “Was your son blackmailing Buzz Crawford?”
    “ What? Who would even say something like that? Your mother? ”