He applied himself harder to the oars, and immediately the other sculls seemed to drop behind, until the other rowers, too, picked up their pace, and one of them began gaining on him.
Robb could feel himself sweating now, and he began working harder. Once again he pulled ahead, but then, while two of the other boats continued to drop back, the third once more began catching up with him. Cursing silently to himself, Robb renewed his efforts.
At the computer terminal, Marty Ames studied the graphic readouts of the changes in Robb's blood chemistry as the boy punished himself even harder. The blood-sugar level began dropping, and then he watched as Robb's adrenal gland kicked in and a short burst of adrenaline shot into the boy's system.
Then, as the adrenaline faded from Robb's circulatory system, Ames's fingers flew over the keyboard.
Once more the graphics on the screen changed.
Robb's eyes narrowed angrily as he saw his computer-generated competitor gaining on him. He leaned into the oars harder, but he was getting tired now and didn't seem to be gaining any speed. He looked up from his labors to see the other boat catch up with him and move off to the right to pass him.
"No!" Robb shouted out loud, then bit his lips in angry determination as he realized how much energy he'd wasted on the useless outburst. The tendons of his neck standing out, he forced himself to row harder. Once more he caught up with the other scull.
Abruptly, the screen went blank. It was over.
He was back in the rowing room at the sports clinic and Marty Ames was smiling at him, his expression reflecting his pride in Robb.
"Not bad," he said, which, coming from Marty Ames, was considered high praise. "How'd it feel?"
Robb rested against the oars for a moment, panting, then shook his head. "I don't know," he said. "This setup really gets to me sometimes.Iknow nothing's real, but when I'm doing it, I get so into it I could swear I was in a real race. And that guy in the number-three boat almost beat me."
"How come he didn't?" Ames asked with deceptive mildness as he began removing the needle from Robb's thigh.
Now it was Robb who grinned. " 'Cause I got pissed at him," he confessed. "I just got pissed off at losing."
"And that," Ames said, "is exactly the point. Your anger released a shot of adrenaline, and the adrenaline was just enough to put you across the line. In case you're interested," he added, glancing once more at the computer screen, "you beat him by exactly thirteen hundredths of a second."
"Not much," Robb commented, standing up and stretching his tired muscles.
"It was enough to win," Ames told him. "And it'll get better. If you just keep at it, it'll keep getting better."
As Robb headed for the shower a few minutes later, he knew he'd keep at it, because he knew how much he liked winning.
He liked it a lot.
A whole lot.
Chapter Five
CharlotteLaConner knew that Chuck wouldn't approve of what she was about to do, and she was equally certain that he would find out about it. In Silverdale, after all, everyone always knew what everyone else was doing. Not that she particularly objected to the close scrutiny of a small town, she reflected as she put the final touches to the quarterly expense report she was compiling for the R amp;D Division. It was just that every now and then-times like today-she would have preferred a little more privacy.
She pressed the enter key on her computer, waited until the machine announced that the expense report had been successfully transmitted back into the main tank of theTarrenTech computer, then logged off for the day.
Charlotte had been working for only a few months, part of an experiment the company was conducting that, if successful, would allow women in Silverdale to work part-time at home. For now, the experiment was limited to the wives of men working for the company; only one man was participating-BillTangen, whose wife Irene, was a pharmaceutical expert, working full-time while Bill took care of their baby daughter. For Charlotte, the program was working out perfectly. She discovered she liked working alone and got far more done in the space of a few hours than she'd ever accomplished while working full-time in the division offices. This morning, however, she'd found it hard to concentrate, and after finishing the expense report, she decided to call it a day.
It was Rick Ramirez who had been preying on her mind all morning. Indeed, the injured boy had never really been out of her mind. Not that his name had even been mentioned yesterday. Silence had fallen over theLaConner household since the angry scene when Jeff had stormed from the house.
Neither Chuck nor Jeff would discuss it with her.
And that, Charlotte now realized, was what bothered her the most. Her husband and her son had clearly put the terrible incident out of their minds as though nothing at all had happened. But she herself had been unable to escape the image of the Fairfield player lying hurt on the field, and had awakened this morning determined to go to the hospital to see how he was doing.
But why did she feel so guilty about it? What on earth could possibly be wrong with visiting an injured boy?
She could almost see Chuck gazing at her with that look of his, the look that told her he couldn't fathom her thought processes, and that, therefore, there must be something wrong with them. And she could hear him, too, his voice taking on what she thought of as his "logical tone."
"But don't you see? If you go to the hospital, it's as much as admitting that Jeff was somehow responsible for what happened. And even if he were responsible-which he's not-it would still be a mistake. The lawyers could make hay with something like that."
Or was it Chuck's voice she was hearing? Was that really what he'd say, or was it how she herself felt, deep inside?
It didn't matter. Right or wrong, she was going.
Thirty minutes later, forcing herself not to glance around to see who might be watching, she pushed through the doors into the lobby of the small county hospital and stepped up to the counter. From behind the glass Anne Carson smiled at her, then rolled her eyes and pointed meaningfully at the phone she was cradling against her ear. Several times, as Charlotte watched, Anne opened her mouth to say something then closed it again as the person at the other end apparently went right on talking. Finally, though, Anne wearily put the phone back on the hook and slid open the glass panel that separated the waiting room from the office.
"Charlotte! What brings you down here?" Concern spread over her face. "You're not sick, are you?"
Charlotte shook her head. "I… well, I wanted to find out how the Ramirez boy is. From Fairfield?"
"Not good, I'm afraid," she said, then forced a small smile. "He's in room three, down the hall." She hesitated, then understanding Charlotte's distress, said, "It's against the rules, but you can look in on him if you want to."
Charlotte's step slowed as she moved down the corridor, and she came to a complete stop in front of the half-open door to the boy's room. At last, steeling herself, she pushed the door open and stepped inside. There were two beds in the room, but only one of them was occupied. Covered only with a light blanket, his head held rigid in a metal brace, his eyes closed, Rick Ramirez had a strange stillness about him that told Charlotte instantly that he was not merely asleep. She stepped forward and stood beside the boy, gazing down into his face. A lock of curly black hair lay over one eye, and Charlotte instinctively reached out to brush it back.
"Don't touch him," a soft but urgent voice said behind her. Gasping with surprise, Charlotte turned to see a pretty young woman, no more than thirty, coming out of the bathroom that connected this room and the next. "Please," the woman went on. "I can do it." She moved to the bed, and Charlotte stepped aside. Gently, her hand barely caressing the boy's cheek, the woman carefully moved the lock of hair. Then she looked up, her dark eyes meeting Charlotte's. "Who are you?" she asked.