Standard Disclaimer: No copyrighted material used in this chapter belongs to me. This story belongs to Linda Howard/Jones with some RIB and the writers of Glee mixed in.

Trigger Warning: Justifiable Homicide. The beginning is very suspenseful almost scary if you care for Jim and Mary Jo. If this triggers you, you can find the break with the line and begin reading from there.

Chapter Eleven

Jim Carlisle had spent another restless night, sleeping in fits and starts. Not being able to sleep annoyed him but out of habit he rolled over hoping not to wake up Mary Jo. He'd had trouble sleeping since the sun storm had knocked out the power, but she hadn't missed even one night's sleep. She'd always been that way, sleeping through thunderstorms and worrisome times of their lives. The only time he'd known her to lose sleep was after their son Clint had died. That had led to sleepless nights, and a lot of heartbreak, for both of them. He'd gone off by himself to cry so he wouldn't upset Mary Jo, but she always seemed to know anyway, and would hug him extra hard when he returned.

That was what kids did: they took a piece of your heart when they were born, and you never got it back. Even now, thirty-odd years after Clint died, Jim still missed him and mourned him. From time to time he grieved that Clint had never married, never had kids of his own, but then he'd been just in his twenties when he died. Jim and Mary Jo were alone, almost all of their family members already gone, and the ones who weren't so distant that he didn't know their names and wouldn't recognize them if they came knocking.

He'd thought a time or two that Clint was the reason Mary Jo had been so drawn to Sam Evans. Clint had been in the army, too. Not that Clint and Evans were anything alike other than having green eyes, and though no one seemed to know anything for certain about Evans, it was obvious that he was a military man through and through. It was in his walk, those long ground-eating strides, the way he carried himself, and the "don't mess with me" look in his eyes. Both he and Clint had willingly joined the military, and were willing to sacrifice their safety and comfort for others. Clint had made the ultimate sacrifice. Evans had survived, but carried ghosts around with him.

But Mary Jo hadn't seen any of that, other than maybe sensing that he had a military past. She'd cottoned to him immediately, like the way she'd invited him to dinner, when they first met. Now, Mary Jo was friendly to a fault, but that was fast even for her. Look how she'd lit up when he'd stopped by. He suspected if she had her way, she'd have Evans moving in with them. Good thing Evans wasn't likely to want to move in with two old people.

Restlessly Jim changed positions again, his thoughts moving on to what Carole had told them about Roz Washington breaking her leg yesterday. That was bad, not just that Roz was injured, but she'd been elected community leader, and she had a way of organizing people and getting things done. Basically, she bulldozed them. He wondered who'd take her place. Her niece, Cedes, was a kind and smart young woman but never put herself forward; maybe the new leader would be someone else—

Creak.

Jim froze, his thoughts suddenly focused, every muscle tense. If he'd been asleep, he wouldn't have heard the unusual noise. If the power had been on—with the heat or air running, the refrigerator humming and occasionally making that noise that Mary Jo had told him for months needed to be fixed but he'd never gotten around to doing—he wouldn't have heard it. But the power wasn't on, no sound, no light, and he'd definitely heard something. His heart was suddenly pounding as he went on alert.

Moving cautiously, he eased from the bed and reached into the bedside drawer for his pistol and a small flashlight. He crept around the bed to the bedroom door, turned on the flashlight and pointed the beam down, blocking most of the light with his fingers. If the house hadn't been so dark he wouldn't have needed the light at all, but even so he had an advantage over any possible intruder, because he'd lived here for over forty years and knew this house like the back of his hand.

As dim as the light was, as quiet as he was being, Mary Jo still woke up and stirred. He immediately said, "Hush," hoping she heard the soft hissing sound and recognized him, hoping whoever was in the house hadn't heard it and realized they were awake.

He held up his hand toward her, signaling her to stay put, then put his finger to his lips.

She'd never listened all that well, but then, after all these years had he really expected her to do what he said? Hah. She was quiet, but she slipped out of the bed and positioned herself behind him. When they heard another sound, a creak from down the hall, she placed her hand gently against his back.

Their bedroom door was open; they lived alone, no reason to close it. In normal times, before the power went off, he'd have dialed 9-1-1, then closed and locked the door and taken Mary Jo into the bathroom and locked that door, too, to shelter until the cops arrived. He was eighty years old, and while he owned a pistol he hadn't shot it more than a handful of times. He was glad to have it for protection, but—shooting someone? He'd never seriously thought he might have to.

Another sound, a soft click as if a drawer had been eased shut. From the direction of the sound the intruder was in the kitchen. What food they had was there, of course. He didn't want to shoot someone who was driven by hunger, but—they didn't have much, and they needed what they had. If their food was stolen, they'd have to rely on friends and neighbors, none of whom had a whole lot themselves. Down the road, any loss could mean the difference between surviving or not.

He'd scare them off, that's all he'd do. When they realized the house wasn't empty and that he was armed, they'd run.

His bare feet soundless on the cold tile, he slipped down the short hall, Mary Jo close behind him. Another sound in the kitchen, like another drawer being opened and closed. Jim thought about calling out, trying to scare away the looter, but what if whoever that was already had a bag packed and took it with him? What if he came into the narrow hallway with a weapon of his own? They'd be sitting ducks. So Jim waited until they were in the kitchen doorway before he barked, "Stop right there!" as he raised the flashlight and shined the beam full into the face of the surprised intruder.

He got the fast, blurred impression of a middle-aged man, no one he knew. He expected a look of shock, expecting the guy to bolt for the back door. Instead the looter spun toward them, reaching down to jerk a pistol from his waistband. But Jim's pistol was already in his hand, and Mary Jo was standing right behind him. Knowing he had to protect her wasn't really a thought, it was something much faster and more basic than that, something that had him pulling the trigger almost before he saw the pistol in the intruder's hand.

The intruder fired, but he hadn't brought his hand all the way up and around, and the bullet hit the wall to the left. Mary Jo screamed, and Jim fired again.

The intruder fell, overturning one of the kitchen chairs, knocking over the trash can.

Mary Jo kept screaming, though she slapped both hands over her mouth. Jim turned and put his arms around her. To his surprise he was shaking like a leaf, worse even than she was, and carefully he reached out to place the pistol on the countertop before he dropped it. Then he held on to his wife, and they shook together.

Cedes spent the night at Roz's house, to help take care of her. Carmen didn't need to be going up and down the stairs at all hours of the night to check on Roz, and if Roz decided to do something stupid—like try to get up by herself—Bree wouldn't be able to stop her. That left Cedes to sleep on an air mattress on the floor in Roz's bedroom.

Not that Roz didn't protest; she did, loud and often. Cedes said, "If it were me lying there with a broken leg, where would you be?"

Roz only scowled at her. The expression was kind of funny, because Roz was loopy on pain medication and instead of a real scowl she looked more as if she had just bitten into a lemon. Cedes swallowed a laugh as she turned out the light and tried to make herself comfortable on the air mattress. She had her pillow. The door was open so the heat from the fireplace could come through. No, it wouldn't be a restful night, but she'd get some sleep.

She turned on her side and got comfortable; she was even beginning to doze off when Roz started up again. "I'm perfectly alright by myself. I know I can't get up and go to the bathroom. There's no way you'll be able to sleep on the floor—"

"I was almost asleep when you started talking again," Cedes said, and followed that with a firm "Hush."

There was a muted grumble from the bed. Cedes listened, and in a few minutes Roz's breathing had slowed and deepened. Tired from the stressful day, Cedes dozed off. She didn't get any deep sleep, of course, and three times during the night she got up to put wood on the fire. Once she had to help Roz to the portable chair toilet they'd placed by her bed. The patient's restlessness told her the pain medication was wearing off, so she gave her another pill.

Because she didn't sleep well, she was up well before dawn, and put the kettle on the fire to make coffee. She got dressed as quickly and quietly as possible, then sat at the table and made notes about getting classes organized for the kids. It occurred to her that, when Roz could get around better and wasn't in so much pain, in a few weeks, one of the classes could be held here. Having something to do would keep her aunt out of trouble, and the kids could help her. It was a win-win.

She had drunk half of her instant coffee when heavy footsteps pounded up the steps. Her heart leaped and she jumped for the door, before whoever was out there could pound on the door and wake Roz. "Who is it?" she demanded, leaning close to the door and cupping her hands around her mouth to contain the noise.

"Mike."

Quickly she unlocked the door and let him in. His face was stark, and his clothes were slightly askew as if he'd put them on in a hurry.

She held up a finger, went to Roz's bedroom door and closed it so the noise wouldn't disturb her. "What happened?" Something had, obviously, something bad.

"Someone broke into the Carlisles' house a couple of hours ago. Jim shot and killed him."

"Oh my Lord." Shock didn't hold her still. Roz obviously couldn't go, which meant she had to. Because Mike looked as if he needed it, she quickly made him a cup of the instant coffee—which he gratefully took—then she went up the stairs to wake Bree.

"There's been an emergency and I'm going with Mike," she quietly told the sleepy girl. "Get dressed and come downstairs so you can hear your grandma if she needs something. You can grab a nap on my air mattress if you want."

"Okay." Bree yawned and stumbled out of bed. Cedes hurried back downstairs. Mike was standing with his back to the fire, warming that side of him while he sipped the hot coffee.

"Were the Carlisles hurt?" she asked as she pulled on her shoes and a coat.

"No, but they're pretty shook up."

"Who was it?"

"Man named Bobby Surette, Shurette, something like that. From Nashville. He had a driver's license on him."

Nashville was over two hundred miles away; as alarming as the break-in was, just as alarming was that the intruder had traveled that far to their city, rather than moving straight south down the interstate. Why come here? What had been the lure? They'd never know now, but it was bothersome.

Bree came down the stairs, still yawning, with a jacket over her pajamas. Cedes said, "I don't know when I'll be back. I gave her a pain pill about three hours ago, so she'll sleep for a while."

"Okay." Bree was slipping through Roz's bedroom door as Cedes and Mike went out the front. She was glad that Bree was still too sleepy to ask questions, because she herself had more questions than answers and she didn't want to alarm the others when she couldn't tell them anything beyond what Mike had told her.

She and Mike walked fast, lighting their way with flashlights as they headed to Jones Cove Road. "Jim took Mary Jo next door and woke his neighbor, who went to get the community patrol," Mike said. "I guess one of us could make it to Sevierville and see if anyone is at the sheriff's department."

"If there was, I doubt they'd come out." It had been weeks since they'd seen a county patrol car, and before that only rarely.

"We should probably take the body in . . ." Mike's voice trailed off as he realized how futile that would be. There was nothing the sheriff's department could do that they themselves couldn't do right here. There was literally no working law enforcement, no way to investigate anything. They couldn't even notify his family, if he had any.

"We'll keep his ID, even take a picture, write down a statement about what happened, and bury him here," Cedes said. There was nothing else they could do, except say a prayer for the man's departed soul.

Mike nodded, as if he agreed with her. She was a little taken aback at his confidence in was something worth thinking about—later. Right now there was a serious situation that had to be dealt with.

There were a lot of flashlights bobbing around the Carlisle house and the neighbor's house, with some hunting lanterns providing additional illumination. A lot of people milled around in the yards, the street; probably almost everyone who lived anywhere in the neighborhood was out there, as well as several members of the community patrol.

"We might as well get this over with," Cedes murmured to Mike, gathered her nerve, and entered the Carlisle house. There were more people inside, some of them in the living room but most of them in the kitchen.

"In there," someone said, indicating the kitchen, so she and Mike joined the crowd grouped along the cabinets and around the small eat-in table. The dead man lay awkwardly on his side in the middle of the floor, facing away from her. A chair and trash can had been knocked over, and no one had picked them up. The air was ripe with the odors of death and Cedes gulped, then tried to breathe only through her mouth.

Dave Karofsky was propped against the sink; when he saw Cedes he straightened and said, "We haven't moved anything. The guy's pistol is lying right there, no one has touched it. He got off a shot, the bullet went through the wall."

They had all watched so many police procedural shows on television that, overall accuracy aside, none of them were about to touch a weapon that had been used in a crime. In other circumstances, Cedes would have smiled. Instead she tried not to look at the body, and focused on the people standing around who were all watching her, waiting for guidance.

"There isn't a lot we can do," she said. "Does anyone here have their cell phone with them? No? Then someone find one, and take the man's picture. Also get a picture of the bullet hole in the wall. Better yet, see if you can find a regular camera. I'll talk to Jim and Mary Jo, and write down their account of what happened." She paused, trying to think of what else might be done, wishing someone else would step up and take charge. No one did. "Is there any way we can take the guy's fingerprints? I don't know what good it will do, but it seems sensible."

A few people shrugged. A man who had been a park ranger before retiring several years back said, "Maybe an index card and some graphite scraped from a pencil. Or ink, if we can find some."

A woman said, "Mary Jo has one of those rolling things that she used to black out her address and info on papers she was throwing away. I'll go ask her where she keeps it." She slipped away through the crowd.

"Is there anything else, other than burying him?" Cedes asked, looking around.

"Not that I can think of," Mike said. "You have it covered."

Brett looked down at the body. "I hate to waste good wood building a coffin for someone who would rob old people and try to kill them, but it doesn't seem right to just dump him in a hole so I'll get it done. I can't waterproof it, so we'll need to bury him somewhere so he doesn't pollute the water supply."

Cedes blinked at the pragmatic outlook. But pragmatism was what they needed to get through this crisis, both the immediate one and the ongoing one of having no electricity.

"If y'all can handle the pictures and the fingerprinting, I'll go talk to Jim and Mary Jo." She looked at Mike and he nodded, indicating they'd get it done.

She went next door to find Jim and Mary Jo huddled in the neighbor's living room, a single quilt wrapped around both of them because they were both barefoot and in their nightclothes, Jim in pajamas and Mary Jo in a nightgown. The house didn't have a fireplace, and Cedes wondered how the people who lived here were keeping warm. She made a mental note to ask, once this crisis was taken care of.

Quietly she asked if anyone had a pen and paper, and when that was in hand she sat down beside the old couple.

"Am I going to jail?" Jim asked, his thin voice quivering.

"Heavens, no!" Cedes's response was automatic. "You did exactly what you had to do, to protect yourself and Mary Jo."

Mary Jo burst into tears and fiercely hugged Jim. "Thank God, thank God," she said over and over.

Something else occurred to Cedes, and she hoped this was the last "something else." Getting up, she went over to a group of women standing in the kitchen, where a coffee pot was heating over a camp stove. In a low voice she said, "Once the men get the body moved out of the house, is anyone willing to go over and clean up the kitchen? Mary Jo shouldn't have to deal with that."

"I will," a woman said. "I'm Carole Hummel, I live here. I'll do anything I can for them, they're such nice people."

Okay, while the opportunity had presented itself . . . "Nice to meet you, Carole. Tell me, how are you heating your house?"

Carole grimaced. "We aren't. We have friends down the street who told us we could go over there when winter really hits. They have a gas stove, and a fireplace, but they also have family staying with them already so it'll be a crush. So far we've made do with wearing lots of clothes and staying covered up, when we're inside. I don't want to put them out before we have to."

"That's a plan." It was also only one household. There were a lot of houses in their community that didn't have fireplaces. Maybe . . . braziers? She'd seen them mentioned in books. Grills were basically braziers, but they burned charcoal and that wasn't safe inside. But as long as there was a fireproof container and a rack, wood could be burned, too. That was something the whole community needed to work on.

In the meantime, she had an upset elderly couple and a dead man to deal with. She returned to Jim and Mary Jo, sitting beside them and writing down everything they said, asking a few questions but mostly just letting them talk.

"I never in my lifetime thought I'd shoot and kill someone," Jim said, staring into space. "Never. Our boy Clint was in the army—he's passed—and when he went in I worried about him maybe having to pull a trigger on someone. I talked to him once about it and he just said, Dad, you do what you have to do."

"And that is exactly what you did," Cedes said, putting her hand over his and feeling the frailty of it. Once that hand had been big and strong but now it was thin, each bone clearly felt. "You did what you had to do to protect Mary Jo."

Mary Jo laid her head against his shoulder. "He sure did."

When she thought she'd done all she could do there, Cedes crossed back over to the Carlisles' house. The sun had come up now, and frost glittered on the browning grass. Mike reported that Brett had handled the fingerprinting, though he didn't know how good of a job they'd done, and the dead man had been taken away. A small crew of women were at work in the kitchen, cleaning with bleach, setting things to rights. Neither of the Carlisles would feel easy about being there for a while, they could stay with friends or neighbors for as long as they needed to, but this was their home.

They didn't have a fireplace, either.

"We've done what we can," she said. "The neighbors will help them through today."

The crisis had brought something else to the top of her mental list of things that needed to be done, and that was dispensing the gasoline. Maybe there was a potter here in the community, and the gasoline could be used to fire a kiln to make clay braziers. If not, they'd make do somehow, but people needed to have heat. But first and foremost, the gas needed to be used before it went bad, in vehicles for stepped-up patrolling given that outsiders were now making their way to their county. They couldn't afford to assume the dead man was the only one, and that no one else would come looking to loot, maybe even kill.

Some of the community patrol members were there, because that was their shift, but others were just now starting their day and likely hadn't yet heard what had happened to the Carlisles; otherwise they'd have already arrived. "There's not a lot of time, I know, but spread the word that everyone who works patrol needs to be at the meeting today," she said. "We'll hold a security meeting after we finish with normal business. It's about something very important."

Mike nodded, then asked, "What's on your mind?"

"I don't want word to get out too soon, so I'll wait until we have everyone together."