Iced in Paradise Page 16

  “Thank you.”

  “Mahalo, Uncle.”

  I can’t wait to leave Ronaldo’s tiny house. As I head for the door, I remember that Ronaldo had been the one who’d been in Waimea Junction early Sunday morning to collect the surfboard. I ask whether he recalls anything out of the ordinary that day.

  Ronaldo tips his head back and strokes his chin whiskers. “The back door was wide open to your shave ice place. Figured you forgot to lock it, so I closed it, just to be safe. Who knew that a dead surfer would be inside?”

  Once we’re back in the van, we look at the information written on the Post-it. Just a first name, Chris, an email address, and a snail-mail address in Kekaha, a town west of Waimea.

  “Do you think that it could be him?”

  “Not sure. Either way, I’m curious why someone would spend so much money on a surfboard with a swastika on it.”

  I get chicken skin from thinking that I may have been waiting in a grocery store line behind someone who had been involved in something so horrible.

  “What are you going to do if you find him?”

  “Report him to the authorities. There’s no statute of limitations on war criminals.”

  Sean’s passion spurs me in my own mission to free my father. I think back to what Pono said. That a bruddah from Waimea has secret connections to the land around Bamboo Royal. Could he be talking about Kelly and Pekelo, the Ka-huakai brothers? I shudder, pulling at my seat belt. I may be uncovering some family secrets of people I’m closest to.

  Once we get closer to Waimea Junction, I ask Sean to drop me off at Santiago’s.

  “Mahalo fo’ everyting,” I tell him. “And good luck with your hunt.”

  He smiles. “Good luck to both of us.”

  Baachan is napping on her corner perch inside of Santiago’s. How she can sleep sitting up is beyond me.

  “Baachan!” I call out, and she finally blinks herself awake.

  “Yah?”

  “Where’s Dad and Mom?”

  “They went to meet with some lawyer in Līhu‘e. Recommended by Emily’s professor. Judge says Tommy can travel for dat.”

  I feel immediately relieved. Maybe this lawyer will be the answer to our problems. I glance at our trash can. It’s practically empty. Did we have any customers today?

  “Hardly anybody came,” Baachan confirms. “Dat girl wen do da Facebooky ting and tell people for stay away.”

  When I hear “girl” and “Facebooky,” I know immediately who Baachan is talking about. I look up Celia’s Facebook page and sure enough, she did a Facebook Live video around the time we left Bamboo Royal. “I would encourage everyone—tourists and the good people of Kaua‘i—to boycott Santiago’s, who is harboring a killer.”

  It has more than 200 likes and has been shared thirty-six, now thirty-seven, times.

  Shit.

  “Baachan, I’ll be next door at Killer Wave,” I tell her, but she’s already nodded back to sleep.

  The two brothers are working today, which makes it all the more convenient. “Is dea someting you two not tellin’ me?”

  Kelly is hanging up some wet suits, while Pekelo is at a desk.

  “Howzit, Leilani?” Kelly says. He doesn’t pick up the angry tone of my voice.

  I’m in no mood for “howzit” or “aloha.” None of this sweet-Kelly bullshit. “No ack Kelly. I’m sick of it!”

  Kelly nearly drops the merchandise that he’s handling. “What’s wrong?”

  “Your ‘ohana has ties to kuleana land where Mr. Hightower wants to build.”

  “You mento,” Kelly says. One thing about Kelly is that he cannot lie. At least not well. I can tell that he’s telling the truth now.

  We both look at Pekelo, who seems transfixed by something he’s reading on his laptop.

  “I wen meet wid da resistance bruddahs. They told me you went to one meeting.” I toss out a fishing line to see if Pekelo bites.

  He continues to sit there, typing away on his keyboard as if I hadn’t said a thing.

  “Pekelo, you wen hear me. And you met with Mr. Hightower da day before Luke arrived.”

  “Huh?” Kelly first seems confused, but he knows his brother. Something is up. “Pekelo?”

  Pekelo takes a deep breath. “Yah, it’s true.” He confirms that the Kahuakai family has kuleana land near Bamboo Royal Hills.

  “Why you nevah say notting?”

  “I try for make one deal with Wynn. Gonna sell him da land.”

  “So you on one first-name basis wid him?” The wet suits fall to the ground as Kelly approaches his brother. “I’m your only blood. How come you wen hide’um from me?”

  Pekelo’s jaw tightens.

  “You always tell me da ‘āina is everyting,” Kelly says.

  “Well, I was wrong. I went thousands of miles to fight for people’s land. And you know what, I not sure was worth it.”

  “You not tinking straight.”

  “Maybe not. But more than da ‘āina, I care for you, my lil bruddah. Our future. We have no future here, workin’ for Leilani’s father. You gonna be a married man. Don’t you need money for a new life?”

  “We not selling. Dat’s Kahuakai ‘ohana ‘āina.”

  “You pupule,” Pekelo insults Kelly. “You makin’ one big mistake. Mr. Hightower offering both of us one chance to get off dis island. And you are trowing it away.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  I WALK TEN STEPS BEHIND Baachan the whole way from Santiago’s back to the house.

  Finally Baachan stops and bears her fist down on her weak hip.

  “Wassamattayou? Slowpoke.”

  I try to quicken my steps, but it’s like all my energy has been pushed out of my body. I didn’t mean for the two Kahuakai brothers to war with each other, but that’s what happened. Kelly stormed out of Killer Wave, leaving me alone with Pekelo, who gave me big stink eye. “See whatchu did, Leilani.”

  “Pekelo says that I so niele, dat I put my nose into things I shouldn’t,” I confess to Baachan.

  “Eh, if he telling da truth, den no problem.” Maybe Baachan knows what’s going on more than I think. At least I didn’t straight out accuse Pekelo of being Luke’s killer. If I did that, our friendship would most likely be irreparably damaged.

  I drag myself up the hill to our house. The screen door is closed, but the front door is open. I half expect to see Mom and Dad sitting on our love seat in the living room, but instead it’s someone else with his bare feet up on our coffee table.

  “Uncle Rick?” Duke is also in the house and comes up from the floor to greet me.

  “Now a dog, too?” Baachan shakes her head at our growing menagerie of animals. She’s so upset that she barely acknowledges Rick and instead disappears into her bedroom.

  “Waitin’ for your dad. I going stay da night.” Rick sits up. His face is pasty-looking, with red splotches on his forehead and cheeks.

  “Eh.” I play with Duke a bit and rub his stomach. I sit on the floor, waiting to hear what’s going on.

  “I left Barbara,” he says. “It was too hard. I was staying sober and she was just bringing me down.”

  I feel both weird and honored to listen to his adult problems. Something has shifted in our relationship. He doesn’t see me as a little girl anymore.

  “Auntie Barbara has been drinkin’, too.” I say it to convince myself of it.

  Rick nods. “You notice?”

  “Sophie was actually da one to say.”

  Rick drops his head in shame. Sometimes it takes a twelve-year-old to see the plain truth. “Your dad’s been helping me through it. I didn’t want to leave Barbara, but he convinced me dat’s da only way she can get betta herself.”

  “Whatchu gonna do?”

  “Haven’t figured out my next step. May go Honolulu where my bruddah lives.”

  “We’ll miss you. Dad, especially.”

  That night Baachan and I make curry rice from a package. All of us, including Uncle Rick, eat until the botto
m of our pots are shiny clean. We say nothing of Rick and Barbara’s problems or my parents’ meeting with the lawyer and laugh when Duke stays under the table and licks our toes for any spilled leftovers. We are a house full of problems and brokenness, but we choose not to dwell on that for one night.

  “So how did the meeting with the lawyer go?” I ask Mom the next morning. The girls are at school, and Dad and Rick are in the backyard attempting to build a chicken coop, much to the consternation of Baachan. Duke is out there, too, chasing Jimin and the neighborhood cats that wander into our yard.

  “She seems to be pretty sharp. She actually worked in the Honolulu public defender’s office before coming out here to start her own practice. She says the DA has a weak case. No one saw Daddy do it, and no one even saw him in Waimea that night.”

  Could our luck be turning?

  “Only thing is,” she says and takes a sip of her green smoothie. “She’s expensive. But I’m trying not to think about that. Hope that everything moves fast so we don’t have to keep paying for the lawyer.”

  “How about the shave ice mold?”

  Mom shakes her head. “I don’t know if it got wet in the rain, but there were no fingerprints.”

  Damn. Here I thought that I’d made a groundbreaking discovery.

  Mom must have read the disappointment on my face because she pats my hand. “It was good for you to try. That’s da main thing: We can’t give up.”

  It looks like another slow day at Santiago’s. Baachan and I made a pact not to tell my parents about Celia’s “Facebooky,” but I’m worried. While Dad might be saved by the lawyer, we may be killed by her high prices.

  “Oh, my God, Leilani, one big mess.” Court, wearing her work apron, walks into Santiago’s. She has a Disney bandage around her index finger—one of the hazards of working with sharp implements. “They are not talking to each other. Kelly says that he’s no like Pekelo be his best man anymore.”

  “I’m so sorry,” I say. “My bad. I should have nevah brought it up.”

  “And let Pekelo sell the family land without getting Kelly’s permission? Dat’s da worst.”

  I’m relieved that Court doesn’t blame me.

  “Since we talkin’ about it, I wanna ask you—will you be my maid of honor?”

  “What do I have to do?”

  “Well, plan a bridal shower.”

  No problem.

  “And wear a dress. I know dat you no like fru-fru stuff. It may have lace.”

  I swallow. I think I’m emotionally allergic to lace. “For you, Court, I will do it for you.”

  “And maybe wear false eyelashes.”

  “Court!”

  “Actually, forget da false eyelashes. I no like you lookin’ betta than me.”

  “What?”

  “Leilani, if you only realized.…”

  I forget that Baachan has been sitting there, listening to our whole conversation. She lets out a honk that would rival any nēnē, Hawaiian goose, I’ve ever heard. “You wearin’ one lace dress. I betta live long enough to see dat.”

  Business is so slow that I tell Baachan to go home. I use this time to make Santiago’s spic and span. I start with our shave ice machine. We bought this one after my freshman year at UW. Our old one broke down so we had to get a loan to replace it. As this new one produced the finest, smoothest shave ice, business immediately went up and our Yelp reviews improved. Just think if we made more upgrades.

  I clean the main counter by our pop-up window and do inventory on our syrups. A shave ice truck in Old Kapa‘a Town uses fresh fruits like papaya and pineapple. What if we did the same, starting with fruit from our own mango tree? That’s something Mom could get into.

  Next I go into our pantry and check the canned goods. We are running low on the red beans—the beans that Baachan loves so much. They are expensive, so I don’t want to order too many of them. There’s plenty of sweetened condensed milk and li hing mui powder packages. Not so much matcha powder, but that’s pricey, too. And in our freezer, we have enough Dole Whip. Since we don’t have a self-serve machine, we just mix water with a package and put it into the freezer. Probably next on our “to buy” list should be a self-serve ice cream machine, but I know that I’m way ahead of myself. First order of business: Make sure Dad doesn’t go to jail, we don’t lose our house, and Mom stays healthy.

  Most customers just order at the window, but occasionally people besides my family come through our front door. Usually it’s confused customers—toddlers, old people, or folks from foreign countries—who don’t know better. I’m cleaning the metal tips of our syrup bottles when the door opens and closes.

  “This is your business?” Celia the witch has returned on her broom.

  “What are you doing here? Plenty of shave ice places in the North Shore.”

  She surveys our small dingy working place. Even with me doing a thorough cleaning, Santiago’s is unimpressive. “You live such a sad life,” she comments.

  “What do you want?” I don’t need any more trouble from Celia and her Facebook Live reports.

  “I need that photo back. The photo that you showed Wynn. If you give it back, I’ll call off the boycott.”

  Blackmail. Is that her regular MO?

  If I can’t get Celia easily out of Santiago’s, I can try to ignore her. The tip to our root beer syrup bottle is crusty, I notice. Not a popular flavor. I’ve told Sophie that we need to get rid of it, but she fights me on it, insisting that it is essential for her signature flavor, Blue Monster.

  “Wynn’s suffering, too. We’re all suffering.”

  Cue the violins.

  “We’re really in love.”

  I wonder if Mrs. Hightower has been informed of this.

  “Luke was too soft. Too romantic. We weren’t serious, at least I didn’t think he was. We were working on the sponsorship and one thing led to another. He told everyone that we were boyfriend and girlfriend.”

  I stop cleaning and think for a moment. “You were already seeing his father.”

  “It turned out to be convenient. If I was with Luke, I could be close to Wynn, too.”

  “I can’t see Mr. Hightower being happy about this arrangement.”

  “There wasn’t much that Wynn could say.”

  A lightbulb comes on in my mind. “Because of Mrs. Hightower.” For Celia, Luke was a bargaining chip. As long as Wynn stayed with his wife, Celia would be with Luke. Rich and beautiful people are so kitanai, Baachan’s Japanese word for dirty.

  “Wynn came early to Kaua‘i to be with me before Luke showed up.”

  “So when were you going to tell Luke about your relationship?”

  “I hadn’t thought that far.”

  Did Wynn Hightower fall into a jealous rage about his son being with his young mistress? Or was he sick enough that he didn’t care?

  Celia gets a sense of where my mind is going. “I can guarantee that Wynn didn’t kill Luke. After you came by Bamboo Royal that Saturday night, I went to his house in Hanalei. He was with me all night, and I mean all night.”

  “You’re Wynn Hightower’s alibi. And he’s yours. Why should anyone believe you? You both could have come here that night.”

  “There are security cameras all over his property that feed into a central system. Anyone can check to see exactly when we each arrived. And when we left.”

  I’m sure those could be doctored.

  “Neither one of us wanted to see Luke dead.” Celia steps into the exact place where I found Luke’s body. If she had killed him, would she even dare to return to the scene of the crime? Was she that much of a stone-cold killer?

  Tears run down her cheeks, and a part of me wants to laugh.

  “Here,” I finally say. “What’s your phone number?” She eagerly gives it to me and I text her the photo. “And look, see, I’m deleting it from my phone.” I even show her that I’m doing it. Nori and Taylor Ogura still have it, so I’m actually relieved to remove such filth from my device.

>   “Thank you,” she says. “I’ll call off the boycott. Do you want to be in a selfie?”

  I decline. “Do me one last favor.”

  “What?”

  “Don’t ever step into our business again.”

  After Celia leaves, it’s quiet again at Santiago’s. It doesn’t seem peaceful, however. I hate to admit it, but I think Celia is telling the truth. I’ve experienced that first rush of love—or maybe it’s more lust—when you are so blinded that you can’t see the person you are sleeping with honestly. I don’t know what it is about Wynn Hightower. He’s certainly not bad looking for his age, but money, power, and experience must have won Celia over. And Mrs. Hightower? Who knows what her deal is? How can she spend her life with a dirtbag like her husband? Or maybe she’s hanging in there for her children—now only her daughter?

  I’m full of thoughts when the door opens again. This time it’s Sean. I get a tingly feeling in my body and I immediately shake it off. We greet each other and I give him the latest on my father’s case. “My parents found a lawyer. A good one, I think. Someone my sister’s law professor recommended. But thanks for your referrals. I really appreciate it.”

  Sean nods. His cheeks are a bit ruddy from either the sun or excitement. “I wanted to tell you that I went there—to Kekaha.”

  “You mean to see the guy who bought the surfboard?”

  Sean nods. “It turned out to be a retired finance guy, a surfer. He’s a collector, like you predicted.”

  I don’t feel any joy in being right. “I’m sorry. I know that you really want to find John Fischer.”

  “Yeah.” Sean pauses and grins. “And get this—the guy’s Jewish.”

  “No way.”

  We both share a laugh.

  “You busy? I wanted to show you some things I’m doing in my space.”

  Since it’s so slow, I close up the window and put up the “We’ll be back” sign on our door.

  I hadn’t noticed that Sean has made renovations to his space. He’s created a sitting area in the front, with low bookshelves underneath the window. “That’s for the books. ‘Books and Suds.’”