Keith didn’t say anything for a moment. Then he nodded. “Possible. Let’s try this.” He grabbed the bill of his grimy baseball cap and slowly raised the hat.

My eyes went wide, but I could see the sense in what he was doing. If Drew was out there, waiting to pounce, he’d see the hat and take another shot. If he was gone, well, then we’d know that, too.

The hat went higher. Keith started to strain with the effort, but he kept going, sitting up and stretching . . . stretching . . .

“I think he’s gone,” Keith said. “There’s no way—”

BANG!

The hat spun out and away, skittering across the patio and landing upside down next to the fire pit, spinning in a slow circle.

“It’s a matter of geometry,” Keith said tightly. “To make that shot, he has to be somewhere between the back of Watson’s garage and a huge oak tree two doors down. But if there’s an infrared scope on that rifle, there are too many possibilities.”

His voice sounded different and I tore my gaze away from the spinning hat to see that Keith was gripping his wrist. “You’re hurt. Let me see.”

“Minnie . . .”

“Don’t worry, I’m trained in first aid.” Not that I’d used it much on living people other than bandaging a child’s skinned knee, but still. “Let me take a look . . . it’s not as bad as you might think. I’d say the bullet hit one of the stones up there and you got hit by some of the chips it knocked off. You have a bunch of small holes in your skin, is all.” They were deep, but now wasn’t the time to tell him that. “Clean it up and you’ll be fine.” Along with some antibiotics and maybe some stitches.

Keith groaned. “You have got to be kidding me. Replacing one stone to match the rest is going to be impossible.”

I quirked a smile, once again realizing why he and Rafe got along so well. “Looks like you already have next summer’s project all lined up. Here. It’s still bleeding, but I can wrap it.”

Every outside coat I owned had light gloves in the pockets, and I pulled them out now. I knotted the thumbs together, wrapped the former-gloves-now-bandage around Keith’s wrist, and knotted the pinky fingers together.

“That’ll slow the bleeding and keep it clean,” I said, patting my handiwork to make sure it would stay in place. “Soon as we get out of here, though, you should get to urgent care and have them take a look.”

The nursing ministrations and associated conversation had been conducted in whispers and had only taken a couple of minutes. And now that it was all done, silence fell.