Maui Widow Waltz (Islands of Aloha Mystery Series) (21 page)

CHAPTER 28

A
s
if being a low value chip in Todd Barker’s high stakes poker game wasn’t bad
enough, the Sunday edition of
The Maui News
upped the ante. When Brad disappeared,
the paper reported Lisa Marie’s plight with almost familial concern. Then Kevin
showed up dead. After that, the reporter assigned to the story seemed to take a
step back and re-evaluate. He no longer referred to Lisa Marie as ‘the widow
bride.’  Now it was the ‘
maka wai
bride,’ or ‘tearful bride.’
Although on its face the reference appeared sympathetic, I detected a touch of
snide.
Maka wai
is also used by locals when referring to fake grief—what
mainlanders call ‘crocodile tears.’

I was rummaging through the
cupboards looking for something to fix for lunch when the kitchen phone rang.
It was Marv. 

“I lost out on golfing Pebble Beach
yesterday,” he said, hardly giving me time to say
hello
. “And I can live
with that. But I’ve got to get back to work. I can’t sit around while these
local yokels screw around playing Hawaii Five-Oh.”

I wondered if he’d dialed the wrong
number.

“Anyway, Ms. Moon, I don’t have
time for chit-chat. I called to redefine our business relationship.”

Was he going to try and weasel out
on the reward money?

“Redefine it? How so, Marv?”

 “Since they’re calling Lisa
Marie a ‘person of interest,’ she needs to stay here, but we don’t. Tina wants
to get the hell off this island tomorrow morning and so do I. Personally, I’d
like to bring Lisa Marie back to the States with us and tell the cops to go to
hell, but her lawyer thinks that could make matters worse.”

“I hope you’re not considering
another proxy marriage.”

“No, no. Nothing that stupid. What
I’m proposing is for you to move in down here for a while. You know, to keep an
eye on things. You could ferry Lisa Marie around when she needs to go to the
lawyer’s office or shopping or whatever. That way, Tina and I can leave and I
won’t be constantly worrying about my daughter.”

“Well, I—”

“Look, I know Lisa Marie can be a
handful. And now that she’s doing this nut job routine, it’s gotten pretty
ugly. But I’m prepared to make you an offer you can’t refuse.” He chuckled at
that—I didn’t.

Before I could figure out how to
gracefully decline, he continued.

“How about four C’s a week to be
her companion?”

“Four hundred dollars?”

“That’s right. And if you manage to
get her cut loose from this circus, you’re still on for the ten grand. Think
about it, Ms. Moon, this could prove to be the most profitable non-wedding you
ever put on.”

“Well, thanks for thinking of me,
but I don’t see how I could manage tracking down information to get Lisa Marie
exonerated if I’m spending all my time down at Olu’olu.”

“Okay, I’ll make it seven C’s—a hundred
bucks a day.”

I hadn’t realized it was a price
negotiation.

“Marv, I just don’t see how I could
do both things at the same time.”

“Look, you put together weddings,
right? And you don’t think you can manage two tasks at the same time? Hell, you
led me to believe that on any given day you’re juggling twenty things or more.”

Ah, my Achilles’ heel—questioning
my work ethic.

“Well, I—”

 “I have faith in you, Ms.
Moon. Only thing is, I can’t have you bringing strangers down here to the
house. I want you to personally account for her whereabouts every minute from
seven at night until seven in the morning. But if during the day you need to
leave for an hour or so to do this other business, I can live with that.”

As much as I hated to admit it,
Marv’s offer
was
starting to look like an offer I couldn’t—or
shouldn’t—refuse. How hard could it be to make sure she stayed put while she
watched her soaps all day and then check in on her during the night? And the
money was certainly tempting.

“What does Lisa Marie think about
this arrangement?”

“Who gives a shit what she thinks?
She’s mental.”

Seems I’d bumped up against the
outer boundaries of Marv’s fatherly concern.

 “Oh, and just so we’re
clear,” he went on, “this is the full meal deal. We’ll keep the staff on until
this thing blows over, so you’re pretty much free to just paint your nails and
chit chat with Lisa Marie all day. No work involved. She’s been sleeping a lot,
so that should leave you plenty of time to chip away at the cops’ bogus case
against her.”

“Isn’t that what her lawyer’s
supposed to be doing?”

“I suppose. But he’s a grease ball.
I don’t think he’s all that smart.”

I probably should’ve stuck up for
James Kanekoa, but I didn’t want to debate James’ intellect, or lack thereof,
with a multimillionaire mob boss who probably hadn’t even finished high school.
And besides, I didn’t know how dedicated James was to proving Lisa Marie’s
innocence. He might assume, as did nearly everyone else on Maui, that she was
some kind of black widow killer. Maybe James’ strategy wasn’t focused on
proving her innocence, but rather on getting her declared mentally unstable.

But I wasn’t sold on her innocence
either. I felt she was hiding something, and the whole whacko act might be just
that—an act. If I found out she was involved in the killings, I’d be first in
line pointing a finger—screw Marv’s ten grand reward.

“It’s a generous offer, Marv, but
I’ll need one more thing before I say ‘yes’.”

“What’s that?”

“A check for the wedding
expenses—on your desk when I get there.”

“Oh, for crying out loud. How much
we talking about here?”

“I still owe my vendors almost four
thousand dollars.”

“Tell you what. I’ll give you half
that. You can use your Lisa Marie companion money to make up the rest.”

“Make it three thousand and you’ve
got a deal.”

“I wish I’d met you under different
circumstances, Ms. Moon. I’d have found a place for you in my organization.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment,
Marv.”

“You should. I need your ass down
here tomorrow by eight a.m. sharp. We’ve filed a flight plan and need to leave
by ten. Get here by eight so I won’t have to leave the nut case alone by
herself for too long.”

“I’ll be there—right on time.”

“Good. And I’ll have the check
waiting for you in the guest room. I’d like you to consider my office off
limits while you’re here.”

We said our good-byes and I went
upstairs to get my laundry basket. I needed to wash a few things before packing
for an extended stay at Olu’olu.

I came downstairs and found Steve
and Hatch in the living room watching a golf tournament. Since neither of them
had ever mentioned golf or, to my knowledge ever played a round of golf, I was
pretty sure they wouldn’t mind being interrupted.

“Guess what?” I did a ‘tah-dah’
thing with my hands to alert them I had something worthy of their attention.

“Tank Sherman’s been found hanging
by his ankles in Hana,” said Steve.

“No.”

“Your long lost father’s turned out
to be Donald Trump.”

“No, and not funny.”

“How about they’ve arrested Lisa
Marie for Kevin’s murder?”

“No, but you’re getting warmer.”

“How about you just spit it out
because I’m getting tired of guessing?”

“Okay. Marv Prescott just called
and hired me to move down to Olu’olu to keep an eye on Lisa Marie. He and the trophy
wife don’t want to stick around Maui and the police ordered Lisa Marie to not
leave the island. Marv’s paying me a hundred bucks a day to be her alibi.”

Hatch’s face darkened. “I don’t
like it. It could be dangerous.”

“What? Watching Lisa Marie? I could
be brain dead and do it. She’s a tree sloth.”

“No, I mean staying down there with
those sleaze-balls.” He looked over at Steve as if hoping to garner support.

Steve flicked his eyes back and
forth between the two of us, apparently not ready to weigh in on which way he
was leaning.

“Think about it,” Hatch went on,
“Lisa Marie’s unstable and she may even be a murderer. Not to mention that
‘Harry the Hacker’ and ‘Petey the Pervert’ are probably regular guests at
Prescott’s mafia Camp David. I don’t think it’s safe, and I don’t want you to
go.”

“I agree with Hatch,” said Steve.
“Tell him to hire some
schmuck
destined for the witness protection
program to watch his crazy daughter.”

“I’ve got three reasons I already
said ‘yes.’ One, he’s paying me a hundred a day, two, he’s agreed to finally
give me a check for his side of the wedding expenses, and three, I’ll have a
chance to really check out what’s going on with Lisa Marie.”

“What do you care?” said Steve.
“Seems to me now that the wedding’s a bust she’s no longer your problem.”

I hesitated. Steve didn’t know
about the reward money—or much else about my clandestine investigation. 
It was time to either come clean or dish up a pretty good fib.

Turns out, I wasn’t in a truthful
mood.

“Kevin was my client—I guess
technically both
Kevin and Brad were clients—and while I was working for
them they both died. Not only that, because they died, I lost my business to
the likes of Tank Sherman. In order to let it go and move on without regrets, I
need to know what happened. I’m not feeling very positive about the police
solving this case. It’s been more than forty-eight hours, you know.”

 “Noble cause, Pali,” Steve
said. “But what’ll you do if you stumble into something you can’t handle? I say
leave it to Wong and move on.”

“I appreciate you guys’ opinion,
but this isn’t up for a vote. I’ll call every day to check in, but, as of
tomorrow morning, my address will be Olu’olu.”

“Can we visit?” said Steve.

“Afraid not. Marv’s kind of
skittish about having strangers in the house.”

“Oh jeez, Pali. That’s just great,”
said Hatch. “You’re locked in and everybody else is locked out. Don’t you see
how insane this is?”

“Insane? Maybe you haven’t noticed,
but my whole life’s gone nutso in the past couple of weeks. I’m trying to put a
stop to it by earning enough money to pay my debts and hang on to my house and
business.”  

Steve shook his head. “Isn’t that
the same speech you gave me a couple of weeks ago when you first signed up Lisa
Marie?” He paused for a beat. “Oh yeah, and remind me again how that worked
out?”

CHAPTER 29

A
t
seven o’clock Monday morning I zipped up my suitcase and quietly tip-toed down
the stairs.  Hatch got up from the sofa and hobbled over to block my exit.

“I really don’t want you going down
there.”

“Did you sleep on the sofa?”

“Don’t try and change the subject.
I told you before, this could be dangerous.”

 “I know. But I’ll be okay.
You’ve never seen me fight, but trust me, they don’t award black belts for
congeniality. I can handle it.”

“Can you catch a bullet in your
teeth?”

I punched him lightly on his good
shoulder.

“I didn’t think so. Why are you
doing this—for the money? ‘Cuz if it’s just about money, I’ll loan you some, no
problem.”

“No, it’s more than that. Please
don’t worry. I promise I’ll call every day. What more can I say?”

“You could say you’ve wised up and
you’re not going to do it.”

“Wised up? Are you calling me
stupid?”

“You said it, not me.”

I picked up my suitcase and dodged
past him. When I left, I didn’t bother closing the door.

I fired up the Geo and took a
minute to savor one last look at my house and yard. There was no way I’d allow
this place to go to foreclosure. Then I remembered Tank had threatened to buy
it. I gunned the engine and headed out.

While driving to Olu’olu I did the
math on my financial situation. Even without the reward money I was close to
settling my debts. I had the two thousand dollars rent money from Hatch and I’d
be getting seven hundred from Marv in the coming week. That was almost enough
to catch up on my mortgage payments and pay at least the minimum on my past due
bills. And with Marv’s check for the wedding expenses I’d be able to reimburse
nearly everyone except me for their out-of-pocket costs. Whatever craziness I’d
be facing at Olu’olu was nothing compared to the relief of saving my home and
my reputation. 

Approaching Olu’olu I spotted a
break in traffic and made a wild left from Honoapi’ilani Highway. I skidded
toward the gate. Luckily it was open. Maybe Marv and Tina had just left for the
airport or maybe the security guy was expecting me. I parked in my favorite
spot, as close to the exit as possible. I popped the trunk and took out my
scruffy black roller suitcase with the gimpy wheel.

“I’ll take that.” It was the big
Fijian guy who’d harassed me when he’d caught me sneaking around the house.

“Thanks.” I didn’t know if Fijians
used the word
mahalo
, and I didn’t want to draw attention to our
differences. For all I knew, the guy could have been third generation
Hawaiian-born and raised, but from the looks of him, I doubted it.

Josie met me at the door with a big
smile and a glass of guava juice on ice.

“Lisa Marie is in the sunroom,” she
said, leading me to the now familiar room. “I think it’s nice of you to come
and keep her company.”

I didn’t know if it was the
language barrier or if my role had been misconstrued, but I decided against
setting her straight. After all, I was rather fond of guava juice.

“Miss Pali is here,” Josie
announced as we stepped through the French doors.

Lisa Marie—in a two-piece French
terry lounging outfit—was propped up on one of the brilliant yellow sofas. Her
face was buried in a Hollywood gossip magazine. She peeked over the top, then
raised it again and continued reading. I couldn’t miss the eerie resemblance to
Marv’s behavior with his Wall Street Journal.

“Bah wahp,” she said, her voice
muffled by the magazine. 

“Pardon me?” I said. It was more
reflex than any real curiosity about what she’d said.

“I said,
big whoop
.” She
lowered the glossy magazine and stared at me as if hoping to make me vanish
through sheer will. “Like I’m supposed to be glad Daddy’s hired a gopher to spy
on me.”

I told her I was there to make sure
she had an alibi witness since the police were still investigating.  

“Like I’m going to go and, like,
kill a bunch of
other
people?”

Her cold snarl made me want to
shake all over like a wet dog, but I kept it in check.

“I don’t think your dad thinks you’re
planning to do anything. He just wants to make sure you don’t get accused of
something.”

“Like anybody’s going to believe
you.” She stretched out on the sofa and draped the magazine over her face.

I took the hint.

Josie showed me to my room. It was
the one I’d seen earlier, the first bedroom on the left with the mahogany bed
swathed in mosquito netting and the enormous ceiling fan slowly churning the
humid air. The Fijian security guy—who Josie told me was named Kamisese, but
went by George—had placed my suitcase on a luggage stand at the end of the bed.
The zipper was open a couple of inches and I wondered if he’d taken the
opportunity to sneak a peek. Didn’t matter; I’d left the family jewels at home.

As promised, Marv’s check for the
wedding expenses was on the nightstand. He’d made it out to Polly Moone. Maybe
he was being ornery or maybe he didn’t know how to spell my name, but it didn’t
matter. I was on a first-name basis at the bank so I’d have no problem cashing
it.

I peered out the large shuttered
window. It opened onto a tiny courtyard tightly packed with dense tropical
foliage—a banana tree, birds of paradise, and philodendrons with dinner-plate
sized leaves. When I flipped the shutters aside and pulled the window open,
ocean-fresh air flooded the room.

I plopped down on the bed to see if
the obscenely rich had the same notion of comfort as the rest of us. I’m not
much for rock-hard mattresses. No matter what so-called back experts say, I
don’t sleep well on anything approaching ‘firm.’ The nights I’d spent on the
sofa bed squished next to Farrah and Sir Lipton had left me tired and achy. I
longed for Baby Bear plush, or at least Mama Bear middle-of-the-road.

My prayers were answered. The
mattress was a vast expanse of memory foam that brought to mind snuggling up to
Auntie Mana’s cushiony bosom. I considered taking a short nap while Lisa Marie
snoozed under her gossip mag, but figured I should first give Hatch and Steve a
call to let them know I’d survived the settling in.

“Hey, it’s me.”

“I was just going to call you,”
said Steve.  “The second you left the phone started ringing. You in a
place you can talk?”

“Yep, fire away.”

“Well, first of all, your buddy
Septic Tank called. He’s demanding you call him back. He wanted your cell
number, but I wouldn’t give it to him. He sounded pretty steamed about
something.” 

“I couldn’t care less. Now that I
got this babysitting gig I’m ripping up his check so whatever he’s bitching
about isn’t my problem.”

“From the way he was going off, you
still might want to give him a call.

“I’ll think about it, but I was
kind of looking forward to telling him to ‘pack sand’ in person.”

“He’s heading back to Honolulu this
morning, but he’ll be on his cell later on.”

“Did he leave a number? I don’t
exactly have him on speed dial.” I was hoping he’d say
‘no’
and I’d be
free to ignore Tank for the rest of the day.

“Hang on, the guy’s got more
numbers than a deck of cards.” He rattled off Tank’s cell, pager, answering
service, and home.

“Moving on,” he continued, “Doug at
your kung fu place called. He said to tell you—and this is right outta his
mouth—‘My brother James is
the man.’
He said to stop by and he’d
explain.”

“Huh. That sounds good.”

“And finally, I don’t want to burn
through your cell minutes, but I thought you’d want to know that Mitch—you
know, my bartender friend—told me he heard there’s something hinky with the
surveillance video from Ma’alaea Harbor. You know, the one with Lisa Marie and
Kevin arguing.”

“What’s hinky about it?”

“Not sure.”

“Where’d Mitch hear this?”

“Beats me. But you know what they
say—only three people you can trust:  your momma, your barber and your
bartender.”

I thanked him for the messages and
asked him to put Hatch on.

 “Sure, just a second.” There
was a rattling sound as he put down the phone. When it was picked up again it
was still Steve. “Sorry, Pali, but he’s in the john or something. Says he can’t
talk now. But before I sign off, I want you to promise me you’ll stay safe down
there. Call every day. If I don’t hear from you, I’m marshalling a posse from
the Ball and Chain and we’ll come looking. You know, my friends love a
party—even a search party.”

“Now there’s an image.” In my
mind’s eye I saw the rainbow coalition storming the gate at Olu’olu—all bare
chests, coifed do’s and well-oiled pecs.

“Anyhow, you watch your back,
sweetie, okay?”

I agreed and signed off. Then I
went searching for Josie. I found her vacuuming an immense round rug in the
foyer. It was a work of art—a pieced wool tapestry of palms, hibiscus flowers,
and red ginger. The roar of the vacuum drowned out the sound of my approach, so
I positioned myself in front of her and waved. She shut off the machine and the
motor wound down with a whine.

“Sorry for interrupting your work, but
I need to leave for a while. Would you mind keeping an eye on Lisa Marie?”

She puckered up her face as if not
pleased to be thrust in that role, but after a couple of seconds she gave me a
one-shoulder shrug signaling she’d do it.

“Is she still in the sunroom?” I
said. “Maybe I should tell her I’m leaving.”

“She taking a shower.”

“Okay. I’ll be back by…” I looked
over at the immense grandfather clock. “No later than ten o’clock.”

I zipped up to the Palace of Pain.
The back parking area was nearly full, which meant there was a class in
session. I quietly opened the back door trying to not interrupt. As I slowly
pulled the door shut behind me, the hinge shrieked, and Sifu Doug glanced up
and waved. He was leading a tots class for kids who looked about three or four
years old. A group of moms sat in a circle of folding chairs in one corner of
the room. They were chatting and laughing; each one clutching a coffee mug. It
appeared they were enjoying pre-school martial arts a heck of a lot more than
their offspring.

The kids wore black uniforms with
thick white sashes wound around their waists. Some of them were so skinny their
sashes were double-wrapped around their body yet they still hung down past
their knees.

“I’ll come back later.” I stage
whispered.

“No, no,” said Sifu Doug. “Hang on
a minute.” He instructed the students to practice the form they were working on
and told them he’d be back in a few minutes to check their progress. A couple
of the moms lifted their heads and nodded as if to assure Doug they’d keep an
eye out for shenanigans.

At his office door Sifu Doug kept
an ice-filled picnic cooler stocked with water bottles. He motioned for me to
help myself and I grabbed two waters, offering one to him before taking one for
myself. In all things martial arts there’s a protocol—a hierarchy of respect.
 

He pulled the top off his bottle
and took a long pull. Then he made his way into the cluttered space of his tiny
office. Pushing aside a tangle of padded headgear, an unopened cardboard box
embellished with FedEx stickers, and a broom with a broken handle, he sat down
in his creaky desk chair. He pointed to a white plastic chair behind the door.

“Pull that over and have a seat. I
told you I’d call if I heard anything more about your killer bride.”

I politely reminded him that
everyone’s presumed innocent until proven guilty.  The look on his face
told me I’d failed to make even a small dent in his opinion.

“
Da kine
, it don’t matter
whether she’s innocent or guilty, ‘cuz James is pretty sure she won’t even get
arrested.” He scooted his chair in and lowered his voice. “That video the cops
have is messed up. Time code’s all off.”

I bit my lip. This must be what
Steve’s bartender meant about the tape being ‘hinky.’

“What’s that mean—time code?” I
said.

“The time code on a surveillance
tape is a bunch of numbers in the lower corner that shows what time the tape
got recorded. On the video it shows a time code of 20:32, that’s eight-thirty
at night. But the sun sets before seven and on this tape it’s bright daylight,
so something’s messed up. And without that tape, they got nothing linking your
girl to either of the guys on the night they died. James says he’s thinks she
musta hired a pro to do in the guy.”

I considered correcting him once
again about the presumption of innocence but I let it slide. I still hadn’t
been successful in getting Farrah to call Lipton a
she
—and the dog had
the goods to prove it—so how could I expect to change anyone’s mind about Lisa
Marie’s guilt?

“The cops have only been working
the case a few days,” I said. “Something else might come up.”

“Might, but James is real stoked.
He says they got nothin’ and they’re not gonna get nothin’.”

We chugged from our water bottles.

I asked if he’d had much fallout
from the MRSA scare. He said two students dropped out, but they weren’t
hardcore, so he thought they probably just used it as an excuse to get their
money back.

A couple of minutes later, I got up
to leave. I thanked Doug for calling me about the tape and gave him a short
bow.

As I walked out to my car, I felt
something shift. Finding out who killed Brad and Kevin was no longer just about
collecting some reward money or even making good on my pact with Kevin. I
flashed back to my air marshal days—when I imagined myself grabbing a couple of
scumbag terrorists by the hair and pitching them out of a plane at thirty-five
thousand feet. In my world it’s crucial the good guys win. No, to be truthful,
it’s more arrogant than that:  in my world I need to make sure the bad
guys lose.