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.

Just a continuation of the last chapter that was too long...Reading your reviews while I was supposed to be working today made me grin. I am officially on vacation and so tired, but hopefully after this weekend I will get rest and enjoy my holiday.

Chapter Eighteen

None of the men went home. While everyone was there, Brett brought out his jerry-rigged suction pump to be tried out. It didn't work.

"I've got some parts at home that will make it work," Sam said, looking at the invention. "I'll be right back."

He returned in about forty-five minutes with the required bits and pieces, and the dog, which jumped out of the truck to the sounds of "Oh! A dog!" from Bree, who sat down on the concrete curb around the pumps and entertained the energetic animal with lots of petting and ear scratches. Canine therapy at its best.

"Where'd you get him?" Brett asked Sam. In some dim recess of memory, Cedes recalled that Brett used hunting dogs.

"He wandered up several weeks ago, hungry and lost. I thought I'd give him to the Carlisles, so they won't be scared about staying by themselves after what happened yesterday."

Yesterday? Had it just been yesterday that Jim had shot the man from Nashville who had entered his and Mary Jo's home? She looked at the dog and fought against a surprising welling of tears. Sam had stubbornly not named the dog, but she'd seen him with it and knew he'd become reluctantly attached to it. For him to give it to the Carlisles said something about him, because instinct told her he was a man who had already lost too much to easily give up now what was his. Giving away the dog would cost him, emotionally, though she thought he'd rather eat glass than let people know.

He gave her a quick glance, as if keeping track of her location, then he and Brett began working on the suction pump. She knew nothing about mechanics and probably the best thing for her to do was stay out of their way. If she was less tired she'd have gotten the broom and started sweeping all the broken glass out of the store, but when the flood of adrenaline had drained away it left her feeling almost surreal. Bree had to be feeling the same way. Cedes sat down beside her and played with the dog for a while, then worked up the energy to offer, "Do you want me to take you home?"

"Not yet," Bree replied, after giving it some thought. "I'd rather wait until you can go inside with me to face Grandma and Carmen."

Cedes softly laughed. "Coward. I understand though"

After what seemed like a couple of hours of tinkering and jerry rigging, Sam asked her to move her Honda away from the tank access ports. The request made her realize she hadn't once checked to see if the Honda was damaged, but then she'd been sitting beside Bree in something of a daze. She stiffly got up and went over to her vehicle.

Amazingly, it seemed to be okay. She started the engine and pulled forward without closing the door, stopping when Sam barked, "Right there," though she'd got no more than ten feet.

"What's wrong?" she asked, leaning out to look at him.

"It's your gas. You should get the first five gallons."

She'd had pretty much the same thought, but she was so tired she'd forgotten about it. Then she looked at her gas gauge and shook her head. "I filled up right before the CME, so I still have a full tank." She had started the SUV a few times to keep the battery charged and the fluids moving, but until she'd driven it up Cove Mountain the day before to see Sam, it hadn't been moved at all in about two months.

"All right." He waved her on, and she pulled forward out of the way. As it happened, almost everyone there had also filled up beforehand, but had brought five-gallon cans to get extra. Sam and Brett opened the access to the largest tank and in short order had gasoline flowing. Mike wrote down who got how much, for Cedes's records.

Generators would be running tonight, she thought, glad for everyone in the valley. Those who had their own wells would have running water, and be taking hot showers—and likely letting their neighbors who were on a water system and thus had no water, because there was no power to pump it from the reservoir tanks, use their showers, in exchange for whatever they had to barter. She thought about making sure portable generators were taken around to warm the houses of those who didn't have fireplaces, which reminded her of the possibility of making braziers. There was so much to remember, and she was so tired . . .

"Someone's coming," Bree said, rousing to look down the road. Her voice sounded half-drugged. She had been half-asleep, too, leaning against Cedes's shoulder.

"A whole bunch of people are coming," Cedes noticed. The headlights Bree had seen were closest, but others had had the same idea and a steady stream of headlights was snaking toward them. Others were arriving on foot, plastic gas cans in hand. So much for waiting until about nine. On the other hand, with everything that had been going on, no one was getting any sleep so they might as well start pumping gas.

Herb Duncan and a couple of other members of the community patrol were the first few drivers to arrive. Herb got out of his car and stood looking around, his mouth open in astonishment. To save fuel everyone had turned off their vehicles, but there were plenty of spotlights and flashlights at hand and the scene was lit well enough to see that something had happened. Herb had his own flashlight, and he shined it at the large open spaces of the store, where the windows had been.

"What the hell has happened here?"

"Someone came last night and tried to steal the gas," Mike told him. "Cedes and Bree were standing guard and kept it from happening, but the store was damaged."

Herb turned to look at Cedes and Bree, sitting huddled by the gas pumps. "When did this happen?"

"Probably, four, maybe five hours ago. What time is it now?"

Herb didn't reply. He shook his head, looked around, looked back at Cedes and Bree. He opened and closed his mouth a couple of times, obviously thought better of what he was going to say and finally turned to Mike. "Why are all of you here? How did you find out it happened?"

"I came because I heard shots fired," Mike said.

"I did the same," Brett added.

"What woke me up was someone driving by my house," Carl Howell said. "That's a sound you don't hear very often now. I got up and went outside to listen, and was about to go back to bed until I heard the shots. I threw on some clothes and hightailed it in this direction."

Cedes looked at Herb and saw him clench his jaw. She imagined he was turning red, though that was impossible to tell in the beams of flashlights.

"Do you people never think to come and get me to tell me something dangerous going on that needs the patrol?" he bellowed. "This is the second time that no one has come to notify me when something important is going on!"

"You kinda live out of the way," Mike pointed out, though obviously he was struggling to be reasonable. "And I didn't know what was going on until I got here. We don't have phones, remember, and everyone who is here is someone who heard the gunfire and came to check. No one notified anyone, we didn't single you out. Sam Evans lives further than you on the same mountain road and even he heard the gunshots. Besides, by the time we got here, it was all over and whoever was trying to steal the gas had already left."

"But you all are still here, keeping watch. Someone could have come to my house."

"That's true, though we aren't exactly keeping watch." Mike replied, and glanced at Cedes in an obvious plea for reinforcements.

She sighed, and got to her feet. She was the acting community leader, so she had to act. She went over to them. "While it may appear that everyone was here—"

"Everyone wasn't here, and that is my point!" Herb argued.

"You didn't let me finish," She paused and reached for patience, which wasn't as accessible as it usually was. "While we were here, Brett decided to see if the suction pump would work. It didn't. So, Sam went back to his house to get some parts, came back, and they got it working." Hoping he could be redirected, she said, "Why don't you pull your car up to the tank and get some gas now, there's no point in waiting."

He paused, and for a few seconds she hoped that she had distracted him enough. Then, he looked around and said, "What about everyone else? Why am I the first in line?"

"Because almost everyone here already had a full tank, me included."

"Almost?"

"A few have topped off their tanks, and most filled some fuel cans."

She might as well have said they'd handed out gold and were leaving him copper. "Thanks so much for waiting for me," he said sarcastically.

"Herb. We've only pumped out a small fraction of what's in the tanks. The community patrol gets it first. You're in the community patrol. Some members were ahead of you, some in the patrol will get gasoline after you." She could hear her voice getting tight and after all she had been through in 48 hours she didn't feel up to stroking his ego.

"I am only ahead of them because I set my alarm," he said, still seething at the perceived slight. "Otherwise I'm sure you'd be glad to see me sitting at the end of the line and hoping you run out of gas before it was my turn."

"Fortunately for you, I am not that type of person, so it would behoove you to not judge everyone by yourself."

"Who the hell are you to tell me how to think? I know how I've been treated by the people here, all of you have made it plain I'm an outsider and not really one of you."

"That isn't true. Your help is appreciated."

"Oh sure it is." The sarcasm was back, heavier than before. "That's why you insist on trying to do this job even though you're clearly in over your head, even when it's obvious anyone else here could do a better job than you. A smart person would have set up a way to contact people, a smart person would have asked for my advice and listened—"

Over Herb's shoulder, Cedes saw Sam's head turn at the raised voices, and saw his eyes narrow. In almost the same instant he had assessed the situation and was coming toward them, his gaze focused on Herb, his chin lowered and every line of his body saying that he was about to kick his ass.

Her own chin lifted. She might have needed help when a bunch of people were shooting at her, but she didn't need help handling Herb Duncan. Once again, her last nerve was trodden upon. A faint red mist was forming in her vision, and she found herself visualizing punching Herb in the mouth, and liking the idea. Try Jesus don't try me because I use hands... Instead, in a voice that seemed to come from outside herself, she said, "You know what, Herb? You're welcome to the gas, but as for the rest of the bullshit that you are spewing from your mouth—" She stopped, and shot her middle finger at him, so close to his eyes they crossed a little as he focused on it.

The expression on his face was priceless. He looked like an open mouth bass as he opened it and shut it and opened it again. He sucked in an outraged breath. Then, evidently realizing he couldn't do anything he wanted to do or say because everyone else there would turn on him, he angrily walked away.

She'd never flipped any one off to their face before, not even when they deserved it.

She turned around and saw Bree staring at her with an opened mouth. Then the girl closed her mouth and began grinning, and gave Cedes an enthusiastic thumbs-up. Singing Beyonce's "Run the World (Girls)" again. It was something Roz would have done. The apple truly didn't fall far from the tree.

Strange how finger positions on one hand could have such completely different meanings. Shocked, she pressed her hands over her face. Twice now in twenty-four hours she'd lost her temper and been ready to whip ass and take names.

When Sam reached her, he stopped less than a foot away from Herb. "Just say the word, and I'll kick his ass for you." As always, his nearness seemed to create a force field around them that made everyone else fade in the background. It felt as if the two of them were insulated in a bubble like they had entered Flash-time like the characters on the television show The Flash. Perhaps he didn't feel it, perhaps this was an effect of the strength of her attraction to him, but having him close by made everything feel . . . better.

"Thank you, but that won't be necessary." She sighed. "I kind of feel sorry for him, because he's such a butthole and doesn't know the reason why people don't like him. His wife is really nice, though."

He looked down at her, that fierce gaze scanning her face, touching briefly on the small bandages covering the cuts. "You look like you're almost too tired to move. Why don't you go home and get some rest? We've got things taken care of here. After the gasoline is all given away, I'll go over security organization with the patrol, then come tell you about it." He glanced around and located the dog, curled up by Bree. "After I take the dog to the Carlisles."

She started to reject his suggestion, because she kind of felt as if it was her duty to stay, but then she saw how exhausted Bree looked and knew she probably looked just as bad, if not worse. She put her hand on his arm, loving the steeliness of him under her fingers even through the layers of his shirt and thick coat. "Are you certain about the dog? We can find another one for the Carlisles."

Sam looked at the dog again, and a brief flicker of regret might—might—have passed over his expression before quickly vanishing away. "Yeah, I'm positive. All of the attention they will give him will be good for him, and he'll be good for them. It isn't as if I won't be seeing him, because I'll have to do some extra hunting and take food down for them. They sure can't feed a growing dog without help."

And he was accustomed to being alone; that went without being uttered.

Correction: he'd been accustomed to being alone, but that had changed. Even though he was taking the dog to Jim and Mary Jo, he'd still be checking on the Carlisles and on the dog. However unwillingly, he'd also forged a connection with her, and she'd discovered she could fight for what was important to her. And she would fight for Sam because he was important to her, in more ways than she'd ever imagined.

Not only that, without effort the men had already opened ranks and accepted him into their company, and the only way he could extricate himself now would be to move completely out of the county. Given the circumstances and how difficult travel was, that wasn't going to happen. He was a natural at thinking strategically, in seeing what was an urgent source of danger and what wasn't.

She looked down the road at the long line of headlights, duty making her waffle about going home. Sam saw the indecision on her face. "I assure you we've got this, and I promise if we need you, I will personally come and get you," he said, drawing her close to him in a hug, then letting her go and leaving his hand on the side of her waist. Even as tired as she was, she was aware that he'd made a very public announcement of their relationship by touching her that way in front of everyone. No one seeing their closeness would think, "Oh, they're just friends."

It was true that she wanted to be his friend, she also wanted Sam to want to be her friend, as well as her lover. Friendship was more difficult, more emotionally intimate, and they hadn't achieved either step yet. She looked up at him with a small smile and nodded. "I know you will. I just feel guilty about leaving. But I do need to get Bree home, and I think I'll fire up the generator, so we can all have a nice hot bath." Though she'd had a shower at his place, now she felt grimy with gun smoke, and her hair and clothes smelled like burnt gunpowder. After the stress of the night, she wanted the comfort of modern conveniences. They had carefully hoarded their cans of gas for colder times and emergencies, but she thought this qualified as an emergency.

She gave his arm a gentle squeeze, then dragged herself into the store to get their rifles before going to retrieve Bree. She was beyond exhausted and each step she took made her feel as if she had weights tied to her body, and her eyes were gritty. "It's time to go home," she said. "And fire up the generator, so we can have hot water for showers. We'll have to start the pump for the well, too." Before they'd switched over to the county water system, all of the houses had had wells, and water pumps. Without electricity they'd been pulling buckets of water from the wells or hauling it from the creeks.

Bree's eyes lit up. "A hot shower! Praise the Lord, that's almost worth being shot at!"

Cedes couldn't help but laugh at her cousin. She wouldn't go that far, but Bree's enthusiasm meant she'd make herself keep going long enough to get everything done so they could.

Thank God, she didn't have far to drive, because she kept blinking to keep her eyes open. In the passenger seat, Bree huddled down into her coat. "I'm so cold." Even with the heater on them in the CRV, they were freezing. The heater was on to the highest temperature, but the car had not been on long enough to get it warm.

"I am freezing, too." She pulled into the driveway and saw a lamplight shining in the window, which meant someone was already awake. It was nearing dawn, she thought, seeing the sky lightening in the east.

Before she and Bree made it up the steps the door opened and Carmen and Emma both came out. "We've been so worried! Are you two all right? I can't believe you did such a foolish thing!" Carmen cried, tears in her voice, then she held her palm up to Bree for a high five. "I'm so proud of you both, and don't ever do anything like that again without me!" After Bree, Carmen high-fived Cedes, too.

"We didn't plan on doing it to begin with," Cedes murmured as they entered the warm house.

Emma, always observant, asked, "What happened to your pretty face?"

"Broken glass. It's nothing, just a few little cuts."

She and Bree took off of their coats, hats, and gloves and then both went to stand in front of the fireplace. Cedes had just had the thought that she was glad Roz had slept through everything, when she heard her aunt call out from the other room, "Cedes! Bree! You two get your asses in here right now!"

Carmen rolled her eyes. "She's been beyond difficult, since we found out what happened."

"How did you find out?"

"Tina Cohen Chang said Mike tore out of the house when he heard shooting, and she followed on foot because he forgot his gloves. She tracked the noise and lights to the store. After she gave Mike his gloves she stopped by back here and let us know what was going on."

She hadn't even seen Tina at the store, but then she'd been a little distracted.

"Cedes!" Roz yelled again.

"I heard you, the first time!" Cedes yelled back, because it had been that kind of night.

A shocked silence came from the bedroom, and Bree rolled her eyes. "You've done it now," she said in a stage whisper as she headed toward Roz's bedroom. Cedes followed after her, knowing Roz had to be soothed before they could do the necessary chores to get the water heater working, but she was almost at the end of her rope.

"We didn't know anything like that was going to happen," she uttered as soon as she entered her aunt's bedroom.

Roz's eyes widened at Cedes's appearance, and perhaps also at her uncharacteristic boldness. "You're hurt," she whispered, her hand going to her mouth.

"It's just a couple of little cuts, I promise. The store doesn't have any windows left, though."

"And Grandma, Cedes gave Mr. Duncan the finger," Bree proudly announced.

Cedes felt her face get hot, although she was grateful to Bree for deflecting Roz's attention away from the danger they'd been in; she just wished it wasn't her own badassery that had been brought to the forefront. "I was at the end of my rope," she muttered.

Bree curled up beside Roz on the bed and placed her head on Roz's shoulder. "I'm not sorry I sneaked out, Grandma. If I hadn't, Cedes might be dead. She needed me, and you all wouldn't have let me go if I'd asked."

For the first time Roz was silent. She opened her mouth, then shut it. Perhaps she was trying to think what she could do beyond scolding them both, but she also had to admit that, faced with a difficult decision, they'd done the best they could and had succeeded in keeping the gas safe.

"You'd have been there with us if you'd been able," Cedes pointed out.

"That's true," Carmen said, coming into the room with Emma, who was putting on her coat. "Don't even try to say you wouldn't."

"I have to go home," Emma said, "but I want to put in my two cents' worth before I leave. I'm proud of you, Cedes, and you, too, Bree. The two of you saved the gasoline for us. I'm grateful neither of you were hurt—or at least not hurt very much—and anytime you need anything, please let me know."

Emma left, and Carmen said, "I don't know about all of you, but I could use a cup of coffee and more breakfast than usual. Worrying burns up calories."

Cedes remembered everything she had to do before she could crash. "I'm going to start the generator and the well pump, if I can figure out how, and get the water heater going. I think we all deserve a hot shower."

"Fine thing for you to say, at least you can get in the shower," Roz grumbled, looking at her splinted and elevated leg.

"If you want one, we can put a chair in the shower and get you in and out," Carmen said stoutly. "As for turning on the well pump, I can help with that, too. We old people used to have to do stuff like that all the time. We were constantly having trouble with our pump. Likely we'll have to have a couple of buckets of water to prime it and get it going."

Cedes almost cried in gratitude that someone knew what to do. She'd been expecting to go the trial-and-error route, which would take so much time. And she so desperately needed that time for rest.

However long Roz had intended to scold them, those plans went by the wayside when faced with Cedes's cut face, Bree's statement of why she'd sneaked out, and the prospect of a hot shower. There was also the matter of flipping Herb Duncan the bird, which Cedes suspected would be brought up later, amid a lot of teasing.

Carmen insisted they would all feel better after they'd had something to eat, and she was right; the food and a cup of coffee didn't exactly energize her, but with Carmen's help Cedes was able to do what needed to be done to get the water running. Then she turned on the water heater, and listened to the satisfying snaps and pops as the heating unit began heating water. Bree stood next to a lamp and turned it on, staring in pleasure at the glow of the electric light. "Can we do this at least once a month?" she asked wistfully.

"Maybe. I can't make any promises, though." Once a month would be nice, but who knew what the future held? "I'll return in a couple of hours. I have to go home and get some sleep or fall on my face."

"I understand," Bree said, yawning.

Cedes stumbled as she finally made inside of her home a few minutes later. Her house was cold; the fire had died down, though some hot embers remained. She carefully added a few sticks of kindling and closed her eyes while she waited for the fire to catch. She dozed, sitting there, and came awake to see the kindling had almost burned up. She added more, and this time stayed awake to add wood. When the fire was blazing, she went to the couch, wrapped up in a blanket, and was asleep almost before her head hit the cushion.

To Sam, the day just wouldn't end.

There was the gasoline to give out, plans to be made with the community patrol—and Herb Duncan was still there, looking like a big ass spoiled brat, but there. Showing up counted for something, though he kept an eye on the man. Resentment could fester in unexpected ways, and have very ugly consequences in the best of times and this was unprecedented times.

It felt like it took forever to lay out the plans to systematically search every county residence for vehicles with bullet holes in them, as well as someone who was wounded. But he got the patrol to understand their mission, and he watched as they loaded up and headed out. Duncan was approached by a lean, youngish man with a feral expression, and the two stood and talked for a few minutes. Sam studied the young man, committing his face, build, and movements to memory.

"Who's that man Duncan is over there talking to?" he asked Carl Howell, who turned to squint in Duncan's direction.

"Hmm. Not sure. I think it might be Lawrence Nelson, but I wouldn't swear to it."

"I don't like the looks of him." Sam didn't mind making snap judgments, because doing so had kept him alive several times. The man gave the impression of meanness, with the hollow cheeks and eye sockets that he associated with drug use. Not only that, his body language said that he considered himself in charge of whatever he was talking to Herb about.

"If it is Nelson, I'd say you're right to feel that way." Mike frowned. "I don't like Herb talking to him. The Nelsons are heavy into drugs, from what I hear."

"Then that moves him to the top of the list of who might have tried to steal the gasoline."

At Sam's flat statement, Mike gave Herb and Nelson a wary look. "If I were a betting man, I would wager you were right."

"That also moves his property to the first one that gets checked. Now might be a good time."

Mike nodded, understanding completely, and moved away to talk quietly to Dave and Brett, both of whom carefully didn't look toward Herb but split up and moved to their own vehicles.

People were still coming and going, getting gasoline and leaving, making it easy for their covert activity not to attract any attention.

Sam watched until Herb moved on; the Nelson man got back into his car and stayed in line to get gasoline, which, if he had been one of the bunch who had attacked the store, was ballsy of him—but then, people on drugs would do literally anything to get more drugs. Sam looked down the road; the line of vehicles was non-ending; people would get their allotted five gallons, go to the back of the line, and get in line again for more. At five gallons a time, pumping out thousands of gallons took time, but this was the fairest way to spread it out fairly to everyone.

When Nelson was almost at the head of the line, Sam moved away to let someone else handle things, so he could concentrate on watching. Briefly he considered simply overpowering Nelson and taking him somewhere private to persuade him to talk, but hell, if he was going to live with these people he had to act as if he was halfway civilized, which he was no longer certain he was. If he knew this man had been among those who shot at Cedes, it would be game over—but he didn't know, he only suspected.

Sometimes meth-heads put on an act of friendliness, as if they needed to convince others they weren't truly meth-heads, but they usually went overboard in their act, talking too loudly, laughing too much. Nelson—and it was Lawrence Nelson, because Sam heard the name he gave whoever was now keeping track of who got the gasoline—was smarter than that. He kept his voice down and didn't say much, other than "Thank you," when he'd gotten his five gallons. Sam saw the quick, furtive look he cast around the store and parking lot, perhaps double-checking that nothing identifiable had been dropped and was lying around unnoticed, or maybe making plans to come back.

Sam walked over to the woman who had taken over and was keeping tally and casually asked how many gallons had been pumped.

"I haven't added it up," she replied, but flipped back over several pages of entries. "It looks like a lot, though; I'm already seeing people who have already been through the line more than once."

"Good. We'll keep going until the tanks are empty," Sam said, noting that Nelson was listening. That was their intention, and he wanted to make damn sure Nelson knew it, knew there was nothing to come back for. As a precaution, after Cedes had gone home, Sam had pulled his truck over the access to the small tank of pure gasoline, and also blocked sight of the pump he'd assumed was for kerosene before Cedes had told him any different. Maybe they needed to remove the pump, so no one got suspicious and started poking around.

Nelson left, probably to go to the back of the line again, and Sam took one more look down the highway. Oh yeah, this was going to be one of the longest days of his life.