by B K Johnson
Jameson ignored her lame attempt to be a hardened criminal and gestured to Officer Miller. He knocked on the door and another officer brought in coffee already doctored up with cream and sugar, like Daniella had ordered. He carefully placed it in front of her, and exited the room. She shrugged off the con act, and demurely sipped her coffee.
Now she looked every bit the sophisticated young lady she had been trained to be. Daniella repeated all of the information she had previously given in her confession. She’d been quite aware of the videotapes, once Michaela had been deposed. She made sure they had been removed as promised after Samantha admitted the affairs and Daniella herself had been questioned before a court reporter. She’d held nothing back, wanting to injure Geoff as much as possible and assault his manhood.
“I also know that Geoff’s gun was being kept in the master bedroom closet, unlocked in its case,” confirmed Daniella. Step by step she told how she’d made sure Geoff’s fingerprints were still on it after its last cleaning when he put it away. Daniella copied his schedule from the calendar he’d kept in his home office, prior to the couple’s separation. So she knew when he’d be around and coming into the house by court order, and when he wouldn’t. The timing had to be such that Geoff would have access to the home, and therefore to Samantha. Surprisingly, she refrained from swearing for quite some time. However, when Detective Jameson got to the actual motive for the murder, Daniella exploded.
“That fucking bitch told me she was going back to Geoff. She’d already talked to him and told him he was the love of her life, not me. Sam said she wanted a baby, and I couldn’t give her one, and Geoff could. She admitted I was just a ‘wonderful but temporary dalliance’, she called it, and she just went along with my trashing him ‘cause she wanted to please me. Little fucker had no balls. Afraid to live the life of a gay, even in SF or Marin, and didn’t want to adopt a child who needed it. We could’ve had a family. We didn’t have to make one. Even though I didn’t want to raise a kid, knowing I’m no kind of mom, I sure would’ve let her have one she could mother. She probably would’ve done a better job than mine did.”
“Why are you so angry at your mother, Daniella?” Jameson gently led her away from her fury at Samantha Gage. He had her motive now, and knew enough to end that area of questioning. He had to find out if Samantha was pretending to despise Michaela just to keep them from looking at her as a suspect, or truly hated her, like Maria Luisa suggested. There had been some evidence pointing to Michaela, like the timing of the murder and the fact that Samantha continued having a sexual relationship with her. This was in spite of Daniella’s insistence that, other than Geoff, they were a monogamous couple. Tommy herself told them about the first time she saw Samantha visit the “purple house” and witnessed her wrapping her legs around Michaela’s body. “Was it because she and Samantha were still lovers?” he continued.
“That’s just the icing on the cake, honey,” harrumphed a much calmer Daniella. “Didn’t you know she gave me up to my Dad when I was just a kid? She had more ‘important’ things to do than take care of me, like politics and such. She liked doing fun things with me on a few weekends, but the day-to-day scene wasn’t for her. My Mom always told me it was ‘cause she wanted me to be raised in a stable household and not be exposed to her numerous affairs. She hired Maria Luisa to live with me and Dad, and just went on screwing everything that had a cunt. Or even making it with a dick and a cunt. Making a ‘statement’ by living ‘honestly’, she called it.”
“Officer, take the coffee away from her right now!” shouted the usually quiet Detective. “That is the ugliest word any woman could call another woman, young lady, and I won’t have it uttered in my presence.”
In the other room, Tommy stood and applauded Jameson’s rebuke of Daniella. No swear word offended her more than the one that reduced a woman to nothing but something to be plundered. And to hear a gay woman demean her former lover by cheapening her female body was quite a shock. She sat down again, when she turned to see the other officers and assistant DA in the room were not sharing her sentiment. Flipping them off, Tommy turned her attention once again to the continuing interrogation.
Somewhat chastened, but sulking while she spoke, Daniella admitted she pointed the cops toward her mother because she was mad at her. And at the time, she didn’t want to cop to the murder. As angry as she was at the woman who bore her, she negated any possibility that Michaela was at all complicit in killing Samantha. In fact, Daniella confirmed that she knew Michaela and Samantha still loved each other, but more as friends than lovers. Sam would turn to Michaela when she was upset with Geoff, or confused about her sexuality, and Michaela would comfort her.
Daniella was jealous of that relationship, and wished her mom had done the same for her. Ironically, she thought she would be killing three birds with one stone by shooting Samantha and pinning the murder on Geoff first, and her mother second. Now, she found that she missed Sam terribly, and realized that her obsession with Samantha had not lessened with her demise. She often found herself talking to Sam in her head, or seeing her face, or feeling her arms around her. Samantha’s ghost was Daniella’s constant companion these days, and Daniella thought that by confessing Samantha would rest easier and leave her the fuck alone.
Something still didn’t ring true to Detective Jameson about Daniella’s confession. There were subtle inconsistencies only the cops and the perpetrator knew. But, convinced there was something there, Detective Jameson finally led Daniella back in time to her father’s heart attack.
“Sure, I offed him,” she admitted. “He wouldn’t let me stay out late, or drink and party with my friends. And he not only objected to my lifestyle, he was furious when he found out I liked girls. After his last lecture, I couldn’t take it anymore. I loved him, but I had to be able to live my life on my terms, and he wouldn’t let me. I went on-line and found out all I could about digitalis. His doctor prescribed it and all I had to do was crush some of his pills and keep putting them in anything he drank. So what if it showed up on the autopsy?
Everybody knew he took it, and maybe he made a mistake and took too much. At least, that’s the way it worked. Nobody suspected me, but I noticed Maria Luisa looking at me differently some times. That’s all.”
With those last words, Tommy was called to the outer office. Nadine was there, and looked really upset. Rod had called her and told her to get Tommy out to Hawaii right now. Not only was Dave missing, but the Honolulu police suspected foul play. His parents called in his disappearance, and it had been several days now since anyone had contact with him. Rod’s PI found a cold trail and could not locate this Loke Tommy said Dave had been dating. It was presumed both of them had been kidnapped or worse. Rod already made Tommy’s reservations on Hawaiian Air, and paid for them as well. He would pick her up at the airport tonight.
Shaken, Tommy quickly left the station with Nadine and got a quick kiss on the cheek from her as she headed to her own car. Tommy got in the Jetta and started it up, lifting the car phone to see if Rod had left messages for her. Four urgent messages were from Rod, and the fifth message was the worst screaming Tommy had ever heard. She just knew it was Dave. Crying hysterically, she headed for home to pack up some clothes and get to the airport ASAP.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
Loke was beside herself. She whirled through her home, trying to make it look welcoming and comfortable. The few pictures she had of herself and Dave had been framed, and she hung them in the living room. They were really the first things she expected Tommy to look at. Having placed a call to Tommy’s office on Dave’s cell phone, and heard the taped message that Tommy was out of the office for at least the next week, she knew the time had come for Tommy to meet her. She left no message before the beep, so there would be no record of the call. Excitedly, she reflected that right this minute Tommy had to be on her way to Hawaii. Or, chuckled Loke, she had already arrived.
“How to play this?” she mused. Although she’d spent a large nu
mber of her waking hours anticipating Tommy’s arrival, and coming up with several different alternatives of enticing her to this home, she had not settled on one that really struck her fancy. Getting deliberate about it, she sat down at her desk and wrote them all out.
She was quite well aware of Tommy’s relationship to Rod. Loke had already obtained the phone number at his Black Point home. Since Tommy did not have a cell phone, she would have to call her there. Timing was so important. She would have to place the call when she knew Rod was not in the home and Tommy was there. She no longer needed to hide behind her watcher identity, so she could surveil the opulent Jefferson residence as herself. She would also have to use a cell phone, and it couldn’t be Dave’s. Otherwise, Rod’s detective would think Dave was in that area and could be easily located.
This line of reasoning led Loke to reject several of the scenarios she had envisioned. It also spurred her to leave her home and go out and buy a disposable cell phone that could not be traced to her. Dave would be no trouble in her absence, since she had drugged him with a few tablets of Ambien. He was, of course, again gagged right after he swallowed the glass of water with the pills.
She worried a little about him since the fight had gone out of him. That last session with the skewers under his nails had been more pain than he could bear. He would now just lay in one position, occasionally crying to himself. He did not communicate with her anymore at all, preferring silence to her frightening rants. Dave was such an important part of her ruse, and she could not afford to have him completely out of it now.
As hard as she had tried, and begged, and threatened, and tortured, she could not yet get Dave to say the magic words. She knew they would have to have one more torturous session. Even if she could just get him to say the words in panted efforts, one at a time, she could piece them together in one recording she could use for her purposes. He had ceased to be any person of interest to Loke, and was now just a piece of flesh that was a means to an end. She consciously chose not to even think of him as the professor she had first met and become aroused by. She did like to use him as a sounding board, however, and would have to get him to be awake enough to hear how magnificently she had avenged her son.
At times, when she lay in her bed thinking about herself and her spiral downward into vengeance, she often wondered if she had lost her conscience, if she’d ever had one. “Or,” she thought, “I might just be Pele’s tool.” No longer did she invoke God’s name or pray or expect deliverance from any entity. When she had choked the last breath of life from her sister’s lungs, and watched her die, Loke knew she had turned a corner.
She had not meant to kill her, but she could not listen to any one berate her son.
Maile had committed the cardinal sin, and relented that she had known Kekoa was a mahu for some time before his suicide. Loke had reacted immediately to the perverted use of mahu as applied to her son. And for her own sister to believe he had killed himself and not been the victim of an antiquated system that punished children for defending themselves was just too much on top of the use of the hated slur. So Maile was silenced forever.
There were times when she missed her older sister, who had raised her son. But there were no signs or fragrances or pictures of Maile anywhere in the home. None of Loke’s other sisters visited her, so she was a lonely and bent figure. They called her crazy. Although they considered Kekoa’s suicide and Maile’s murder the events that took her mind, they could no longer enjoy her company. She was always trying to get them to call Kekoa’s suicide a murder, and her behavior had become totally inappropriate after Maile died. They had to protect their own children from their auntie’s insanity.
And so Loke did not have any one in her life to bounce her ideas off of. The only person who even continued to be in touch with her was Leleo, her kumu hula. She knew he mourned Kekoa’s death almost as much as she, but he chose to just be sad at the loss of the talented young man’s life. He could not entertain any thought of vengeance, and when Loke would test him on the subject, he would use every effort to get her to change it. Leleo was becoming an old, haunted man, and only his former dancers were his occasional companions. No lovers lined up at his door any longer, and his once muscled body had succumbed to gravity. He continued to blame himself for Kekoa’s suicide, but could not voice that fault to Loke. He also could not admit his part in the long-held secret surrounding Kekoa’s death. Leleo knew she would not hear of it, or would protest it vehemently. Unbeknownst to him, that was the main reason he had escaped her wrath.
Once she left Best Buy with her purchase, Loke took a drive around Diamond Head. She was lost in her own thoughts of her past, and almost did not see the black BMW convertible coming toward her. She had taken the Eastern route around the island, and was therefore now heading toward Waikiki. This other vehicle with its two gorgeous occupants were on the other side of the road. Loke shook herself to full awareness and openly stared at the red hair blowing in the soft trade winds as the convertible sped away from her. She turned right at the next street and made a u-turn.
Loke followed quite a distance behind the BMW, for she knew its destination. There was no mistaking that hair and its owner. Tommy was indeed in town, and the black convertible was Rod’s choice of a ride while on Oahu. The smile on Loke’s face grew so great it almost seemed it would split her visage open. She didn’t notice, since she didn’t glance in her rear view mirror. Her total focus was on the couple in their ostentatious ride just six blocks ahead of her.
She made the same right Rod did, just a minute after his turn. The palatial residence took up most of the next block, and was right on the edge of the mountain next to the shore. It was protected by a huge stone wall, with a gated entrance. Loke pulled to the curb at the one other home on the street, and let her engine idle while she watched the BMW slide sleekly through the now open gate. How she wanted to follow it right now! It took her some minutes to calm herself down. She knew for certain that Tommy was in her territory, and just hours away from being in her grasp. Her excitement overcame her caution, and she shut the engine off.
Walking purposefully down the sidewalk, Loke found the old trail that existed between the two mansions. It had been declared a public access to the beach, since it was used hundreds of years before the haoles came to take possession of the land. Only a handful of Hawaiians knew of this trail and used it. The ancient stone steps led to a rock salt water pool fed by the Pacific. The public was allowed to use the pool, but its existence was pretty much a secret to anyone who was not a local, or a resident of Black Point.
Loke carefully negotiated the steps, as if she was just another bather on her way to the pool. She did not have a swimsuit on, and she carried no towel, so if the Black Point security officers noted her presence, she would have to make up some story quickly. She knew she could not risk being identified at this time by any officers of the law. Although she didn’t know it, Rod had given her description to the police who were trying to find Dave. He had pieced it together from interviews his detective had conducted with other members of Dave’s class. She had even changed her hair more, though, by having it cut much shorter, which greatly altered her appearance.
Some of the women had been better able to speak to Loke’s physical attributes, and one Caucasian woman in particular had paid attention. Dawn, as she was called, had been interested in Dave herself, and when he’d shown how struck he was by the beautiful Polynesian woman, she made herself look her over as competition. Once she realized the couple was dating, she ceased being interested in Dave and turned her attention to another professor in another of her classes. But the portrait she’d helped the police artist draw of Loke was damn near perfect. And this Loke did know, having kept track of Dawn and stolen a copy of the portrait from Dawn’s home.
Loke just couldn’t resist getting as close as she could to her intended victim. She had no intention of invading the Jefferson mansion, knowing it to be impregnable. Her goal was to entice Tommy away from it. Lok
e glanced up and saw Rod bringing Tommy a glass of juice onto his terrace overlooking the bay. “Oops,” she giggled to herself. “I’d better get out of Dodge and not be seen here.” She allowed herself one more look at Tommy, and quickly took the stone steps back up to the road. She got in the car and drove it a few streets away, placing the first call she would make to Tommy in Rod’s home.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
After having had a tall drink of fresh, rejuvenating guava juice on the lanai with Rod, Tommy felt immensely refreshed from her long flight and resultant jet lag. The three- hour time difference always interfered with her natural metabolism, and she really thought she’d be exhausted by now. But Rod did her the immense favor of picking her up in his convertible, and since it was another glorious day in Honolulu, they rode with the top down. Rod usually prowled Oahu’s roadways with the top down, but Tommy didn’t know that. She just knew the sun on her face and the brisk breeze in her hair made every nerve tingle and awake from the somniferous plane flight from SF to Honolulu. And for Rod to top off the wind-blown ride with a refreshing drink of guava nectar was exactly what Tommy had needed. Revived, she felt sure she could find and rescue Dave.