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She turned her head and spoke directly to Caroline. "No one is prouder of your extraordinary success than I am, Mother. But it's a lot to live up to. I'm equally ambitious, but when it comes to achieving goals, I don't have your patience, your style, or your grace. I'm wired differently, I guess," she said, glancing at Dodge.
"In any case, the pressure and guilt I was feeling over what I'd done intensified. That's why I launched into you that day, and then later had the scene with Oren on my porch. I came here to Merritt to get my head straight, my priorities readjusted. During that process, I realized I must acknowledge my underhandedness and rectify it. When I called Oren last Thursday night, I told him that his name would be on that campaign when it was presented." She paused, then added softly, "It wasn't enough."
The silence among them was heavy, then Dodge heaved a sigh. "You ask me, that's all bullshit. Okay, so maybe your ambition got a little out of hand. Sally Buckland had free will. You may have nudged her, but she made up her own mind to resign.
"As for Starks," he continued, making a face of distaste, "behind this guy's smarts was a weird little creep with violent tendencies just begging for a chance to get out." He pointed a stern finger at Berry and said, "Now, you've fessed up. Drop it."
She felt a rush of affection for him and would have expressed it out loud if the doctor treating Oren hadn't suddenly appeared in the open doorway. "Any of you named Berry?"
She stood up.
"He's saying your name over and over."
"Should I ...?"
He gave a pragmatic shrug. "Up to you." Then, as abruptly as he'd appeared, he vanished.
Caroline reached for Berry's hand. "Don't go in there. We shouldn't have even come."
Berry looked over at Dodge, sile
ntly asking for his opinion. "I wish he'd've died out in the Thicket, spared you this."
When she met Ski's eyes, he said, "If you go in, I'll go with you. I need to hear what he has to say."
She went to him. He placed his hand on her elbow, and together they left the waiting room and walked down the corridor.
Oren's ICU was a scene from a horror show. She approached the bed with trepidation. His eyelids were wildly fluttering. He was murmuring her name, like a chant. His hands were moving restlessly, his fingers plucking at the bedding while his wrists pulled against the restraints around them.
"Can he hear me?" she asked.
"You can try," one of the attending nurses replied.
Berry swallowed her misgivings. "Oren?" When he didn't respond, she cleared her throat and said more forcefully, "Oren? Can you hear me? It's Berry."
His eyelids blinked open, but his eyes were rolled back into the sockets, unfocused. He spoke her name in a thin, raspy voice.
"Yes. It's me." She groped for something to say that wouldn't sound entirely inane. "You're in the hospital. The doctors and nurses are trying to help you."
"Berry." Again her name passed through his lips as he blinked rapidly to bring her into focus. "Berry."
"I'm here."
"You're alive."
"Yes."
"You should be dead."
She sucked in a quick breath and recoiled. Ski put his hand on her shoulder. "Let's get out of here."
But before she could move, Oren managed to twist his hand, enabling him to grab her wrist. She looked down in horror at his cold, moist fingers clamped around her wrist. His eyes were now wide open and focused on her. The madness in them caused her to sob in fright.
"You will die," he said with malice. "You will die."
She wrenched her wrist free and stumbled backward, coming up against Ski but remaining transfixed by Oren's maniacal gaze. Then suddenly his eyelids fluttered again. His throat bowed hideously. His head slammed back into the pillow, knocking askew the gauze that had been covering the hole in the side of his skull and the brain matter bulging out of it. His body began to buck uncontrollably.
"He's seizing," one of the nurses said in an urgent voice.
