Chapter 1

Muriel Wilson was president of the local 'neighborhood watch' chapter. Though the little white haired widow was approaching 65 years of age, she took her responsibilities very seriously.

She distributed crime statistics, and police recommended countermeasures, in a monthly e-mail that her grandson had set up for her. She maintained a network of volunteers that touched base with the neighborhood's single senior citizens at least once a week, and more frequently if they were in failing health.

She also baked delicious chocolate chip cookies for the quarterly meetings of the watch chapter, held at the local grade school. A large box of cookies was always given to the police department representative at the meetings, to help ensure that her neighborhood got the attention it deserved from the cops.

To Muriel's great irritation, though her mind was sharp and her eyesight was still pretty good, the hearing in her left ear was only half as strong as it once was. Nothing pissed her off more than people assuming she must be weak-minded when they spoke into her bad ear and she had to ask them to repeat themselves.

It was because of that hearing deficiency that she was now hesitating to call 911. She peeked through the small gap in her living room curtains for the fifth time in the last five minutes, to look at the double wide mobile home across the street.

She had been outside working in her garden when the woman that lived there was picked up three days ago, leaving her daughter home alone for the three day weekend. One of the first rules of the neighborhood watch was to tell the group when you were going to be gone, so that neighbors could be alerted to watch for suspicious activity. Muriel suspected that the woman that lived in the double wide was a drunk, and didn't think of anything but herself. Muriel took it upon herself to keep a watch on her pretty daughter, who was left home alone.

Her vigilance was heightened earlier tonight, when a car parked in front of the trailer. It was an exceptionally dark night due to the approaching storm, and she couldn't make out the license number of the car, though she was able to see that it was an Acura or Honda of some kind.

Then a while after the car appeared, she thought she heard a loud bang sound. But she couldn't tell for sure where it came from. There was a storm coming on... perhaps it had been thunder? But she hadn't heard any additional bangs yet, as one would expect if it was from a storm. "Goddamned bad ear!" she thought.

She finally decided to call 911. Even though Muriel had worked with the police department for years, she was nervous - she'd never had cause to call 911 before.

Pete Riordan was several miles away, in the middle of mediating what had been a noisy and near violent fight between a husband and wife. When his shoulder mounted radio squawked he made the couple sit on either end of their couch while he answered the radio call.

Police dispatch wanted to know if he would be available to respond to a suspicious noise, possible gun shot report at the other end of his patrol territory. He told them he would likely be tied up on his current call for several more minutes, perhaps half an hour.

The dispatcher asked that he call in immediately when he became available, while she attempted to find another patrol car to respond. Unfortunately, it seemed many of the city's citizens were using the extra day off to do things that required police attention. Since Muriel had said honestly that she couldn't be sure it was a gunshot and not approaching thunder, her call was not given the highest priority.

Bobby was combing rice out of his hair and shaking it out of his clothing. He'd gotten too close to Raul and Barbara as they made their way to the limo waiting to spirit them away to the airport. He and Sammy had both been pelted with several direct hits while they were giving their parents their last hugs and kisses.

The flight to Hawaii was over sixteen hours in the air, so the newlyweds promised their kids that they would check messages and call as soon as they touched down.

The reception was still in full swing when he went to find Collette, to tell her he was going to go check on Julie. Collette was supposed to give him and Sammy a ride to Collette and Dave's house, where they would stay during their parents' honeymoon.