Read Online Dread Champion by Brandilyn Collins - Free Book Online Page B

face never seemed to move.He looked like a spindly spider next to B. B., the overweight, brown-haired bartender, a woman who practically oohed and aahed with every statement. And that English teacher, Hesta Naples. Lynn rolled her eyes. Hesta sat straight-backed, her lips in a prim line, dark hair slicked into a severe bun. Stan told Lynn how he pictured Hesta’s house, a game he played in reading jurors. It would be immaculate, with silverware and underwear perfectly stacked. The latter was probably chain mail.
    Lynn had emitted a dark laugh till she choked.
    Stan neared the courtroom door, jerking his neck. His pinched nerve throbbed. In just a minute court would resume.
    â€œStan Breckshire?” a voice sounded on his left. “Milt Waking, Channel Seven news.” The man held out his hand and Stan shook it. The guy was Mr. Television, all right, down to the thick dark hair and chiseled jaw.
    â€œYou know I can’t comment about the case,” he said.
    Waking acted as if he hadn’t heard. His gray eyes pierced. “How nervous are you, knowing Chelsea Adams is in the courtroom?”
    Stan blinked.
    â€œSurely you know her background.”
    Stan tilted his head in a “So what?”
    â€œI hear you tried pretty hard to get her off yesterday.”
    â€œReally. I don’t recall your being present.”
    Waking shrugged. “I have my sources.”
    â€œThen go ask your ‘sources’ how I feel.” Stan darted into the courtroom.
    He banged down his briefcase on the table.What a jerk. Not a word about his opening statement. Just, “How do you feel about Chelsea Adams?”
    Stan’s hands stilled. Before lunch he’d noticed Waking yakking into the camera. Had he mentioned Chelsea Adams? Stan cringed. What would all his colleagues back home think?
    So? He tossed files out of his briefcase. He’d known this. Keeping reporters’ mouths shut was like telling a skunk not to spray. It didn’t matter. In the end winning was all that mattered.
    K ERRA SLID INTO HER SEAT and glanced around.Reporters, clustered up front, were settling, pulling out their notepads. Spectators sat mostly in groups of twos or threes. One sat alone—the young man she’d noticed when court broke for recess.He was solidly built,with brown hair cut very short.He caught her eye. She smiled briefly, then looked away, wondering.He looked like a young version of the defendant.
    She sighed, wishing they’d had a longer break. And she wished that chatty old woman juror, Irene Bracken, hadn’t horned in on her lunch with Aunt Chelsea. All the same, given the circumstances, Kerra was glad she’d come today. At least she had something to do. And she had to admit, the case was interesting in a morbid way.
    â€œAll rise,” the bailiff intoned. The judge swept in.
    The prosecution’s first witness was a black-haired woman named Lonnie Broward, a close friend of Shawna Welk.Kerra could see that she was nervous. Lonnie and her husband, Todd, had gone out to dinner with the Welks on February fifteenth, the night Shawna disappeared.
    â€œWe met at Croft’s Restaurant in Moss Landing,” Lonnie Broward informed the court. She spoke stiffly, her eyes fixed on the prosecutor.
    â€œWas this dinner something you had planned in advance?” Stan Breckshire asked.
    â€œYes. The four of us usually got together about once a month.”
    â€œHow well did you know the Welks?”
    â€œWe were their closest friends. In fact, Todd and I were with Darren the night he met Shawna at the restaurant where she used to work—the Villager in Monterey. She was our waitress.”
    â€œI see.” Breckshire jerked his right shoulder. “So you were actually friends with Darren Welk first.”
    â€œYes.”
    He nodded as if the answer held great import. “I’d like you to recreate for us that Friday evening of February fifteenth. Let’s start