"He needs something to wear," she murmured to Sherry.
"It's okay," he said over his shoulder.
Cate felt something rising in her, some great big bubble of tension that almost choked her. "No, Calvin Harris, it is not okay!" she said fiercely. "It is not okay for you to run around half naked and wounded on a cold night. We'll find something for you to wear, and that's that." Many things had happened that night that were far worse, but she couldn't do anything about those. She was damned, however, if Cal would take another step without a coat or at least a shirt.
He fell silent again, and she wondered if she'd lost her mind. Events were swimming out of focus again, so that small things seemed vitally important and large things were fading into the background. She looked at the strong length of his back, the deep furrow of his spine and the layers of muscle, and wanted to weep. Instead she took a deep breath and concentrated on cleaning the two deeper cuts. They were still oozing a little watery blood, but that was all. She put antibiotic on them, then held the edges together with one hand while with the other she painstakingly placed a row of butterfly bandages over each cut. When she was finished, the cuts no longer gaped open. Maybe they wouldn't have needed stitches, because neither of the gashes was truly severe, but she didn't want to take the chance.
"That's the best I can do," she finally said, restoring the first-aid kit to the way he'd had it and gathering the soiled wipes and torn paper she'd thrown on the ground. She hesitated, not knowing what to do with the trash now that she'd gathered it, and finally dropped it back on the ground. She would worry about neatness later.
Cal started to rise and she put her hand on his right shoulder to hold him still. "Cal needs something to wear," she called out to the people gathered on her lawn. "A shirt, a jacket, anything. Do any of you have something you can spare?" Then she added, "I'm going to get blankets from inside, so we can be warmer."
"Why don't we go inside?" Milly asked, her voice trembling with cold.
"Cate's house may be a little too close to the action," Cal replied. "There are other houses farther away, and out of the line of fire. I think it's safe here, but I'm not certain. A high-caliber bullet can go through several houses unless it hits something like a refrigerator to slow it down. I'll check distances after daylight. Until then, we need to pull even farther away, put more structure between us and the shooters. Thanks," he added as a flannel shirt was passed to him. Cate hadn't seen who made the donation. Cal quickly put on the shirt and buttoned it; he was shivering now.
"The coat closet is just inside the front door, on the right," she said to him. "I have several coats hanging in there, and the linen closet with extra blankets is just this side of the laundry. I'll run in, gather everything I can, and be back out here within one minute."
"I'll do it," he said instead, turning toward the porch.
Cate stopped him with her hand on his arm. "You can't do everything. Go find Creed and Neenah, and the others. Ill get the blankets and coats. Where should we go, so you'll know exactly where we are?"
For a moment she thought he would argue, but he said, "Pull back to the Richardsons' place," naming the house that was farthest from the bridge. "The shooting was coming from at least three separate locations, so they have different angles of fire. Stay low, try to keep some sort of structure between you and the mountain, from the bridge to the Notch. Got it?" He'd raised his voice so he was speaking to all of them, not just to Cate.
"Yes." Her breath was frosty as it hung in the air between them.
"If you do have to cross an open space, do it in a hurry. Don't stay in a line or the last ones are just asking to be picked off. Vary your routes, your timing, everything you can. Keep the flashlights off, if possible; you're just pinpointing your position if you have one on when you're in the open."
Heads nodded in the dark.
"How long will you be?" Cate asked, trying to keep her anxiety out of her tone. She didn't want him going out into the night by himself, though she understood they needed to know what was going on. And he was armed; he wasn't helpless.
"I don't know. I don't know what I'll find." He turned his head and looked at her in the darkness, a long, quiet gaze as potent as a touch. "But I will be back. Depend on it." Then he was gone, melting into the darkness with just a few steps.
Chapter 18
Neenah shrieked, terror clamping her arms convulsively around Creed as his heavy body crushed her to the rug. The percussion from the explosion shook the entire house, raining dust down on them in a choking cloud. Creed covered her head with his arms, trying to tuck her completely beneath him to shelter her from any falling debris.
Then it was quiet, a strange, ear-ringing silence.
"E-earthquake?" she gasped.
"No. Explosion." Creed lifted his head, and saw nothing but darkness. The lights were out - big surprise there. The explosion must have taken out the power lines that crossed the stream at the bridge.
Then there was a sharp, deep crack! that made his blood go cold, and simultaneously the front window imploded with a shower of glass slivers. He felt several stings but disregarded them as more booming shots rang out. He was already moving, twenty-three years of training kicking in at the sound of rifle fire even though he'd been out of the Corps for almost eight years, dragging Neenah along beneath him as he scrambled, half-crawling and half-slithering, out of the exposed living room and toward the short, more protected hallway he'd noticed when he came in. He couldn't see shit in the sudden darkness, but he had an excellent sense of direction.