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everyone will need four-wheel drive to get here.” Joanna paused and then added, “Oh, and I’ll want the K-9 unit, too.”
    “You got it,” Larry said. “What about the M.E.? Are you going to call him or am I?”
    In the old days, when Dr. George Winfield had been the Cochise County Medical Examiner, the call-out could have come from any number of people inside Joanna’s department. Unfortunately, George had fallen in love with Joanna’s mother, Eleanor, and she had packed him off into a retirement that now included an annual snow-bird migration back and forth between Arizona and Minnesota.
    Both in public and in private, Joanna’s relationship with George Winfield had been businesslike and virtually trouble free even after he’d married Eleanor Lathrop. As sheriff and M.E., they had continued to work together with little difficulty. So it had come as something of a shock to Joanna and to other members of her department to discover that Doc Winfield’s replacement, Dr. Guy Machett, was anything but trouble free.
    For one thing, Dr. Machett—never Doc Machett—insisted that everyone follow a strict chain-of-command hierarchy. If his services were required, he expected the call to come from Joanna herself and not from someone who reported to her.
    “That’s my next call,” Joanna said.
    “Good,” Larry said.
    The relief in his voice spoke volumes. Larry had endured more than his share of Guy Machett temper tantrums. He didn’t need another one.
    The clock in Joanna’s cell phone said 8:01 A.M. as she scrolled through her contact list to find Guy Machett’s number. He was nothing if not punctual, so she dialed his office number.
    “Medical examiner’s office,” Madge Livingston drawled.
    Forty years of smoking unfiltered Camels had left Madge with a throaty voice that might have been sexy if it hadn’t been punctuated by periodic fits of coughing. A sixty-something peroxide blonde, Madge had worked for county government all her adult life, moving from one department to another because no one had balls enough to put her out to pasture. Madge’s last remotion, one that had moved her out of the county office complex, had landed her in the M.E.’s office. Like Joanna, Madge had gotten along just fine with Doc Winfield. Her relationship with Dr. Machett was something less than smooth sailing.
    Dr. Machett was a man with a very high opinion of himself, someone who felt he was doing the world a favor by sharing his vast knowledge and abilities with the lowly folks in Cochise County. Unfortunately, there weren’t many other people who agreed with that assessment.
    “Sheriff Brady,” Joanna said. “Is he in?”
    “I believe he’s on the other line,” Madge said. “Can you hold?”
    In the old days, Joanna would have passed the information along to Madge with no further muss or fuss because Madge would have informed George of the situation. These days it didn’t work that way, and both Joanna and Madge knew it.
    “Sure,” Joanna said. “I’ll hold.”
    While she waited, Joanna tried to imagine what had been going on when Debra Highsmith was gunned down. There was no way to tell where the victim had been standing in relation to her killer. As far as addresses were concerned, High Lonesome Road was a fine place to live—Joanna had lived there with Andy and she lived there now with Butch—but it struck Joanna as a hard place to die. It had been true for Andrew Roy Brady and it was equally true for Debra Highsmith.
    “Who’s calling?” Guy Machett asked when he came on the line.
    Madge Livingston knew very well who was on the phone. Not telling her boss who was calling was his secretary’s way of getting a little of her own back.
    “Sheriff Brady,” Joanna said. “We’ve located a body on High Lonesome Road.”
    “Where the hell is High Lonesome Road?” he demanded. “Sounds like it’s out in the sticks somewhere.”
    “It is. It’s just down the road from where I live,” Joanna told