Betrayal - Fern Michaels [55]
“My car is just around the corner. Wait here, and I’ll be right back.”
James raced to his car, leaving Kate alone with Alex for the first time since they’d entered the courthouse.
“Kate, I don’t know what to say. I’m beyond shocked. I had no idea Sara had it in her to destroy me in such a deplorable manner. I wonder what Don was thinking as he listened to this bunch of malarkey.”
“I don’t care what he thinks, or his miserable wife. I care what those twelve men and women in that jury box think. Beyond that, I just can’t go there now. Alex, this is worse than I thought.”
He agreed. “I’d pay big bucks to find out how Sara learned all that sick stuff. Emily sure as hell wasn’t a party to it, I know that. Did she look like she was delighted or something to you? It was almost like this was a big game to her. The more she talked, the bigger the tale.”
James pulled next to the curb. “Let’s get out of here. We’ve got a couple of hours before we have to be back in court.”
They drove for fifteen minutes, then pulled off Highway 41 into the parking lot of what looked like an abandoned strip mall. “I hope the media hasn’t found this place. I discovered it last week. They have the best conch fritters in the state. Or so I’m told.”
Inside the mom-and-pop restaurant, James ordered boiled shrimp, the famous conch fritters, and bowls of she-crab soup. The waitress handed him a ticket with a number, telling him they’d call when their food was ready. They sat at a rickety table in the corner. The place wasn’t much in the way of decorations. Fish netting, with fake fish, sand dollars, and starfish, was plastered on the knotty pine walls. Pictures of men with humongous blue marlins and fish that were unidentifiable were placed haphazardly throughout the restaurant.
“Thirty-two,” the waitress called.
“Be right back.” Alex left the table to get their order.
Kate had her chance. “Quickly, James, how does it look for Alex?”
“Hard to say, Kate. We’ll know more after the jurors view the video in its entirety.”
“Talking about me behind my back, huh?” Alex teased.
“No, Alex. I was just asking . . . Never mind.
Let’s eat.” Food was the last thing on Kate’s mind. For Alex’s sake, she’d eat and like it. The forced cheerfulness between them was starting to frazzle her nerves. She and Alex had always been comfortable with one another. Now it seemed not only had they lost the life they shared, they’d lost the ability to be at ease with one another. Sara had taken more than she realized.
When James tried to drop Alex and Kate off behind the courthouse, the media spotted them. They ran alongside James’s vehicle as he slowly nosed his way through the throng of reporters.
“Mr. Rocket, how many other children have you molested?”
“Do you like boys, too?”
“Are you registered as a sex offender?”
The reporters kept shouting their questions at them. It was all Kate could do to keep from rolling down the window and telling them all to screw themselves. She mentioned this to James as they maneuvered their way through the crowds in search of a parking space.
“You wouldn’t want that splashed across the front page of the Naples Daily News, that’s for sure. Remember, this is a big news story for them, and that’s all it is. They don’t care about the people they’re reporting on, just the story. Don’t let their comments offend you.”
Like hell, Kate thought.
James found a place between a van and a scooter. Miracles never ceased. They needed one then, Kate theorized, as they crept through the hallway, back to the courtroom.
Ten minutes later, court was back in session. The lights dimmed, and Sara dominated the screen once again.
“Sara, tell me about the cigarette burn,”
Wykowski said.
“What’s to tell? He burned me. We were having a cookout. Mommy likes to cook.”
And that was the biggest piece of fantasy Kate had heard about Debbie since they’d met. The woman didn’t know the difference between motor oil and olive oil.
“Uncle Alex was at the grill cooking hamburgers. He had that