This was beginning to get exasperating. “Then what good is knowing all that math?” I asked, a bit testily. “You don’t have to be a hundred percent correct here. It’s not a court of law. Just give me a guess.”

“No guessing,” he said. “There are reasons you have to show your work on math problems. Guessing demonstrates a lack of base knowledge and a tendency to laziness.”

For crying out loud. “Hypothesize.”

“If we’re going to hypothesize, then yes, hitting another object could have created a slight deviation of the bullet’s trajectory. But, like I said, I’m not a—”

“So Drew could be a good shot. It was the happenstance of me moving the water bottle that angled it away to hit whatever it hit.”

Keith turned his head and looked at me. “Do you realize what you just said? You saved my life.”

Since we were still hiding, and there was still a guy out there with a high-powered rifle, the story wasn’t over yet. “I don’t suppose you happen to have a cell phone in your pocket.”

He shook his head. “And since you’re asking, I assume you don’t, either?”

“In my car.”

“That’s too bad,” Keith said. “Don’t suppose you told Rafe where you were going, gave him a timeline for coming home, and when you don’t show up he’s going to get worried, assume the worst, call the police, and they’ll come charging up here with sirens blaring?”

“No, he’s in a school board meeting.”

“A what?” Keith frowned. “Really? I thought they met . . . well, whatever. So that’s out as a possibility.”

“I’ve been hoping at least one of your neighbors heard the shot and called the police.”

“That would be nice, but it’s getting closer to hunting season and people are doing target shooting. You can’t shoot inside city limits, but you can in the township, and the township starts on the other side of our back lot line.”

I twisted around to look. The back fence was maybe a hundred feet away from us. “What you’re saying is hearing gunshots this time of year isn’t unusual, that anyone who heard it most likely didn’t think twice, and it’s highly unlikely that anyone called nine-one-one to send a friendly law enforcement officer our way.”

“That’s a good summary.”

“So we’re on our own,” I said, just to make sure I had it right.

“Agreed.”

We looked at each other, our faces about two feet apart, the fire casting a flickering light that was creepier than I would have liked.

“Maybe he left,” I suggested. “Maybe that was a one-time shot and when it didn’t work, he gave up. After all, he doesn’t know that we’ve figured out who he is.”