“You going to see Shimazu?” Kawika asked.
“Yes, of course. That’s the point of my trip.”
“Tell him we want to interview him right away—here, if he’ll come. And give me his contact information, will you?”
Cushing found Shimazu’s phone and fax numbers, and Kawika called Tanaka to pass them on. “I’m guessing our Makoto may not be all that cooperative,” Kawika said. “He’ll probably try speaking to us in Japanese, if he can get away with it. So you’ll handle him better than I can.”
“Iiko, iiko,” Tanaka responded sarcastically.
Kawika wondered why Tommy hadn’t showed up at the station. That was the greatest surprise of the day. So Kawika and another detective, one of Tommy’s friends, drove to his house. Tommy sat on his lanai, facing the sun, his bronze face reddened by some other force. He’s been crying, Kawika realized. A woman stood behind Tommy, one hand on his shoulder, the other arm cradling a small girl dressed in a police costume plus a Supergirl cape. The little girl looked distressed.
Kawika wanted to comfort Tommy—Dad was right; someone does need my forgiveness—but he couldn’t tactfully say, “I blame myself, not you; I was the one who had you make the call.” Kawika knelt, with a hand on Tommy’s arm. “Tommy,” he said, “it’s not our fault. You were right: Kai would have found out anyway. She would have told him no matter what. She knew we’d interview him, and we’d have to ask if he’d killed Fortunato as a jealous husband, check his alibi. You were right, Tommy. I was wrong, you were right.”
Tommy began to cry again. He put both hands on Kawika’s shoulder and clung to him, sobbing in anguish. The little girl began to sob in sympathy with her father. “Come on, Grace,” her mother said, comforting her and turning away. “Let’s leave Daddy with his friends, the nice policemen. Let’s go back inside.” Kawika felt himself tearing up along with Grace.
No one spoke for a long time.
“Let’s do something good,” Kawika finally said, “Let’s pull ourselves together, go see Joan’s mom, Joan’s keikis. C’mon, Tommy. I need to go, and I want you with me. I really do. You’re my Waimea guy, Tommy. You’re my partner.”
The grief counselors the police had sent to the Malos the day before were still there when Kawika and Tommy arrived. So were a half dozen other visitors, all busy cooking, cleaning, doing laundry. Here’s aloha, Kawika thought. Or would the scene be just the same on the mainland? Not with the smell of Spam frying on the stove, he guessed.
Joan’s children looked smaller than he’d expected, and bewildered.
14The Mauna Lani
Hours later, Kawika sat with Patience, facing the sunset at the Canoe House, the elegant outdoor restaurant she’d picked at the Mauna Lani. It struck him as an incongruous choice for a mainland haole dining with a Hawaiian detective, but he didn’t care—not this night. He felt his exhaustion yet felt, too, some foundation of himself, something holding him up. He’d smelled death the day before but had begun—perhaps on Tommy’s lanai—to smell life as well. The languid Hawai‘i evening began to take effect. A warm wind stirred the palms, and ukulele music drifted in from the hotel nearby.
“How long are you staying, this trip?” he asked.
“Ask me later,” she said, grinning, adjusting a plumeria blossom tucked above her ear.
After dinner and a long conversation about Hawai‘i, their families, their two backgrounds, and with the torchlight playing across her face and blonde hair, he asked again.
“Later,” she laughed.
When the check came and she waved him off it—“I invited you, and I get a discount”—he asked her a third time. This time she didn’t laugh.
“Kawika.” To his surprise, she took his hands in hers. “Your father is the biggest man I’ve ever seen—I told you that. But Kawika, you’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.”
He started to say something.
“Shh! Let me finish,” she said, laughing again. “It was hard enough to start!” She lifted her empty wineglass, tried to sip from it, put it down. “I know you can’t stop thinking about your case,” she went on. “I don’t want you to. I’d even like to help you. But tonight, despite all that, I want to be with you.”
Kawika didn’t know what to say. He just looked at her.
“Be with you,” she repeated. “Make love with you.”
Again he started to speak, and again she shushed him, very seriously this time.
“I haven’t been with anyone since my husband,” she said. “In fact, I wasn’t with him much the last few years.” If she blushed, the available light—from torches, stars, the moon—didn’t reveal it. “I want to be with you, Kawika. Tonight.”
He stammered, not quite ready for this, though he recognized his lapse, his complicity, the swell of guilt contending halfheartedly with his desire. “Are you sure?” he asked, temporizing. “So soon?” He didn’t say, I can’t—you’re a potential witness or I shouldn’t; there’s Carolyn.
“I’m not asking you to marry me,” Patience replied. “I’m in Hawaii, I’m unattached, and I’m with a man who’s really beautiful. I feel like we’re good friends—family friends. That’s enough. Enough for tonight.”
Once again he tried to speak. Again she wouldn’t let him—not yet.
“I’m not looking for love on the rebound,” she assured him. “I’m not looking for love at all yet. I just want to be close to someone. Physically close. Someone safe—especially the first time. Can you understand?”
Kawika nodded. He wanted to be close to her too. But he didn’t consider it safe. To him it felt like being close to molten lava. In an instant, his image of himself as honorable and decent might be crisped into
