After a surprisingly good night’s sleep Chelsea felt better. The first person she sought upon entering the courtroom that morning was the young man she’d seen talking to Milt Waking. He wasn’t there. Was that good or bad?
Chelsea reminded herself that she did not need to know the answer. She just needed to keep praying. As she watched the attorneys prepare for the day’s proceedings, silently she talked to God.
Stan Breckshire was wearing a shocking orange tie with his brown suit. He scrabbled through pages of notes at the prosecution table, rubbing his right shoulder and stretching his neck from side to side. Darren Welk whispered with Terrance Clyde, Erica Salvador leaning over to listen.
The courtroom door opened. Sidney Portensic wheeled in a television set on a tall stand, a VCR on a shelf beneath it. Stan Breck-shire scurried over to help him set it up.
The courtroom filled quickly. Reporters took their seats, Milt Waking’s eyes gliding across the jury and landing on her. Chelsea did not immediately look away.What was he up to? For once she wished she could talk to him.
The TV set was ready. Stan eyed it with satisfaction, rubbing the side of his head until his hair stuck out. Chelsea suppressed a smile. Then he returned to his seat, perching like a hawk.
Court was called to order.
“Your Honor,” Stan announced, “the prosecution calls Detective Les Kelly. And as part of his testimony, I will be showing the videotape of the defendant’s interview on the morning of Monday, February 18, with Detectives Kelly and Draker.”
“All right, Mr. Breckshire.”
Detective Kelly took the oath in a reedy voice, his wiry frame held perfectly straight. Stan Breckshire asked him a few questions regarding the detectives’ interview with the defendant, then quickly moved to the video. The judge fiddled with the chain of her glasses as the prosecutor started the VCR. Sidney turned down the courthouse lights. The television flipped on and Darren Welk’s face filled the screen.
His expression leaped from the television like some feral animal caught in headlights. Chelsea’s stomach immediately constricted. The onlookers sucked in a collective breath. Fear and defensiveness hardened Welk’s eyes. The deep lines around his mouth and forehead pulled taut, then slackened, pulled taut, slackened, as if his conscience and his survival instinct wrestled for control. His hands spread stiffly on the table, then slid together, clasping with a desperately feigned casualness that made his fingertips tremble.
This, thought Chelsea, was a man with something to hide.
Detective Draker read him his rights.“I watch those crime shows, too,”Welk joked. The words seemed to splatter the air around him. His thick chest rose as he dragged in a breath and pressed back against his chair.
He didn’t deny hitting his wife.He didn’t deny that the blood on the blouse came from a cut in her head.He remembered details such as Shawna Welk taking off the blouse and Tracey Wilagher kicking him awake later. Yet he claimed to remember nothing in between. According to Darren Welk, his wife had probably run off with a boyfriend, somehow managing her complete disappearance from an out-of-the-way beach in the middle of the night.
Chelsea’s eyes slid to Darren Welk, who sat stiff-backed at the defense table, fingers tightly laced. One thumb pressed into the other hand,wrinkling his sun-leathered skin.He eyed himself on the television screen as if he were his own worst enemy.
Yes, Chelsea thought, you are.
She glanced at Brett.He too sat stiffly. So like his father.His face was pale.
“Are you aware, Mr.Welk,” the detective onscreen said, leaning forward, “that both you and I have referred to Mrs.Welk in the past tense?”
Darren Welk’s reaction pulsed from the television through the courtroom.His face hardened like frozen soil. “When did I do that? I’d have no reason.”
“Your wife washed her blouse because she didn’t like messes?”
On camera Darren Welk’s expression slackened, then worked to reassemble itself. Chelsea shot another glance at the defendant. He pulled his eyes away from the television and locked a firm-mouthed gaze onto the courtroom floor.
“Where’s my dad?” a muffled voice from the video demanded off camera.“I want to see him right now! I want to talk to the detectives!”
The onscreen Darren Welk pressed back in his chair, eyes wide. “No!” He shot out a hand and grabbed the surprised detective’s wrist. “You’re not talking to my son. You’ve got your man.” He stabbed his chest with a finger. “Leave Brett out of this.”
The detective eyed him coldly.He picked the man’s hand off his wrist as if it were a giant spider. “We’ve got our man?” He lowered his chin, staring at Welk. “Is that a confession, Mr.Welk?”
Darren Welk’s mouth opened, then snapped shut. His gaze narrowed, darkened, his shoulders straightening. Suddenly he slammed a fist into the table. “I want to see a lawyer!”
His face froze on the screen, mouth in a snarl and teeth bared, eyebrows jammed together. Next to Chelsea, Gloria sucked in an audible breath. No one in the courtroom moved, all staring at the anger, the hatred, in that face. Chelsea’s eyes moved back and forth between Darren Welk and his son. Brett sat in utter stillness, as if one move would make him explode.What was it? Chelsea’s mind scurried for an answer. Everything about Darren Welk reeked of guilt. But Brett. Something about Brett …
With a funereal air Stan Breckshire approached the television. He studied the frozen face onscreen, then trailed his eyes to Darren Welk, pulling the stares of everyone in the courtroom with him. Welk flushed, averted his eyes to his grasped fingers. Suspicion, cloying and rancid, steeped the jury box.
“Your Honor,” Stan Breckshire pronounced, the words dripping with meaning, “I have no more questions.”
Terrance Clyde cross-examined.When defense was through, Stan pushed out of his chair with an air of finality and leaned across the table on spread fingers. “The prosecution rests,” he announced.