Tough Customer

'Last man standing. Made even the Texas Rangers look like little girls.' He took another slurp of whiskey. 'He's worse for wear, but fine.'

'Where is he now?'

'Last I saw him, he was at the entry to the hospital emergency room, fielding questions from reporters. All the Houston stations. One from Tyler. Lafayette, too, I think. People still like hearing about a posse running the bad guy to ground. Especially in the Thicket. Adds to its mystique.'

Berry shook her head in wonderment. 'I can't imagine Oren venturing into a wilderness.'

'I can't imagine him doing a lot of the things he did.' He warily eyed the bottle of antiseptic that Caroline carried in along with a plastic sleeve of quilted cotton pads. 'Is that gonna burn?'

'It won't hurt as much as an infection would,' she said. 'You probably should get a tetanus shot.'

'Don't hold your breath.'

Frowning at him, she knelt down beside the rocking chair and doused a cotton pad with the liquid, then applied it to a nasty puncture wound on the back of his hand.

Between curses over the stinging antiseptic, he talked the women through the previous few hours.

When he finished, Berry asked, 'What are Oren's chances?'

'Of surviving? He won't. He'll die now or he'll face three counts of murder and die courtesy of this sovereign state. Either way, his goose is cooked.'

Berry got up and walked to a window that afforded a view of the lake. The sun was setting. A flock of birds was reflected on the surface of the water. Pines cast long, straight shadows on the pebbled shore. The setting was picturesque and tranquil, exactly as it had been last Friday evening when she and Ben finished their work and, innocently, decided to cook steaks on the grill and celebrate the completion of a yearlong project. The memory caused her to grimace.

She turned to face her parents. Funny that she automatically thought of Caroline and Dodge now as a unit. A pair. Her parents.

'I want to see Oren.'

With a decisive thud, Dodge set his glass on the cocktail table at his elbow. 'Goddammit.'

'What?'

'That's exactly what Ski said you would say. He bet me that's what you would say. I just lost five bucks.'

'Whose car is that?'

He retrieved the glass and slammed back the last of the whiskey. 'Belongs to the deputy who's guarding Starks's room at the hospital. Ski said I could borrow his car to come here, get cleaned up.'

'Well, now that you're clean, you can drive the loaned car back. We'll follow in Mother's.'

* * *

Berry was anxious to talk to Ski, or just to see him, if only from a distance.

She was also anxious to see Oren. She desperately wanted this episode of her life concluded, and it wouldn't be completely over and done with until she had acknowledged to Oren the part she'd played in all the egregious things he'd done.

He must have been mentally ill all along, but perhaps she had tipped a precarious balance that had plunged him into insanity. Perhaps if she'd been kinder and more tolerant, his innate impulses would have remained dormant until he died of natural causes at a very old age.

In any case, until she owned up to her culpability, she wouldn't have peace.

If his condition was as critical as Dodge had said, time was running out for her to meet that obligation. Unfortunately, as she was crossing the hospital lobby on her way to the ICU floor, she was intercepted by Ben and Amanda Lofland.

'So that's Ben,' Dodge said out the corner of his mouth, his tone indicating he wasn't impressed by what he saw.

'You two go on up,' Berry said. 'I'll be along.'

Reluctantly, Dodge ushered Caroline toward the bank of elevators, leaving Berry to confront the couple alone. Ben was in a wheelchair being pushed by a hospital orderly. He looked pale, drawn, and thin. Amanda was at his side. She was brimming with malice.

Berry said, 'Hello, Ben, Amanda.'

Speaking over his shoulder, Ben asked the orderly to give them a minute. As soon as he was out of earshot, Amanda launched her attack. 'Why did you sic that deputy on me?'

'Ski?'

'Ski?' she repeated in an unflattering imitation of Berry. 'You're on a first-name basis with him. No shocker there.'

'I don't know what you're talking about, Amanda.'

'He was here first thing this morning, questioning me about Sally Buckland.

Questioning me. He found some calls to her on my cell phone. Why would he be investigating my call log if you hadn't poisoned his mind about me?'

Had the subject of Sally's death not been so serious, Berry would have rolled her eyes over Amanda's melodramatic phrasing. 'All I ever said about you in connection with Sally was that I wasn't aware that you two knew each other.'

'We didn't. But we both knew you. We both knew the treachery you're capable of.'

'Let it go, Amanda.' Ben sounded weary. Berry figured he'd been listening to her ranting about this for hours. 'What does it matter now that Sally is dead and her killer is in custody?'

'So you've heard about Oren?' Berry asked.

'The TV in my room was on,' he said. 'Hell of a thing, this whole mess. And Sally.' He ran his hand over his pasty face. 'Jesus.'

'You have no idea. It was quite awful, finding her that way. They're thinking that Oren abused and tortured her for hours before he killed her.'

'I hope the creep dies,' Amanda said. 'He almost made me a widow.'

'Mrs. Mittmayer wasn't as lucky as you,' Berry said quietly.

'Like I said, I hope he dies.' She gave Berry a hard look. 'Are you here to see him?'

'I want to, yes.'

'What for?' Ben asked, looking genuinely flummoxed.

'You know what for, Ben. For the same reason I called him on Thursday afternoon.'

Under her meaningful stare, he squirmed in the seat of the wheelchair. 'What purpose would it serve to talk to him now?'

'Maybe none. But I still want to say what I feel I must.'

Amanda looked impatient and made an event out of checking the time on her wristwatch. The woman really was too self-centered and mean-spirited to deserve Berry's notice.

Addressing Ben, she said, 'Good luck with the campaign. It's all yours now.'