Hurriedly, Dinah flipped to V.
Patrick Varian—Punahou ’94 –’98—Raiford Reid.
Rented by wk., Bayside Apts., Hilo. Clothing, books, papers, PC. Computer forensics report pending.
The door bumped open and Dinah dropped the notepad.
Langford was talking over his shoulder as he shoved inside. “Take your gripe to Larson and see where it gets you, Kimosabe.” He gathered up the items he’d taken out of Dinah’s purse and piled them back in. “You’re free to go for now. We’ll be touch.” He glanced down at Fujita’s notepad and his beady eyes went beadier. He snatched it off the table and pitched it to Fujita. “Looks like you forgot something, Kimosabe.”
Fujita caught it and glared.
Dinah said, “It’s nearly midnight. Will someone please give me a ride back to Volcano?”
“There’s a pay phone downstairs,” growled Langford. “Call one of your friends to pick you up.”
“This way,” said Fujita. “I’ll show you.”
She followed him to the phone, thanked him tersely and, when he’d gone, she dialed Jon’s cottage.
“Leave me a message,” said his voice on the answering machine. “I la maika’i nou. Have a nice day.”
Chapter Thirty-five
Claude Ann threw her arms around Dinah and hugged her tight. “I thought you’d never call.”
“I wasn’t sure you’d come.”
“Then your brain’s sprung a leak. You should’ve known we wouldn’t cut and run. We had a lawyer and a bail bondsman lined up and ready to go into action, didn’t we, Xan? Oh, honey, you look beat. You must be ready to keel over.”
Coming from the fetid smell and chill of the indoors into the warm, fragrant night air had a tonic effect on Dinah. “I’m okay. Just take me away from this place.”
Xander hooked arms with both women. “The car’s across the street. This way.”
Claude Ann pushed Dinah into the back seat and crawled in next to her. “It’s closer to drive down to the big house. You need a hard drink and a soft bed fast. I’m gonna stay with you tonight. Xander’s goin’ back to Volcano with the others.”
“Where’s Marywave?”
“With Phoebe. Phoebe’s a godsend. She’s always gotten on with Marywave, but lately she’s just knockin’ herself out bein’ sweet.”
Xander took his place alone in the front seat and played chauffeur.
Dinah looked out the window as they cruised along the deserted streets. The blackness of the bay and the ocean beyond drove home to her the blackness of her situation. Of Claude Ann’s situation. Of their situation. She had a sense of impending doom, or impending incarceration which seemed tantamount to doom, and she hadn’t the faintest glimmer what to do next. The prospect of Hank and Phoebe raising Marywave while Claude Ann wasted away in prison accentuated the blackness. “Your prints are on the gun, Claudy, and the killer planted Raif’s phone in my purse. He may have thought he was planting it in yours, but either way, he’s trying to make one of us the patsy.”
“But who? I can think of people who might’ve wished Raif dead, or at least out of their hair, and I’m one of ’em. Xan is, too, and maybe even Jon. Xan and I have talked about it. We know how bad things look. But who would want to frame you or me?”
Xander stopped at a traffic light and Dinah felt rather than saw him looking at her in the rear view mirror. She leaned her head back against the seat and feigned sleep. She wished that she could eliminate Xander from the list of people who might want to frame Claude Ann. Legally, they were only business partners at this point. Did he stand to benefit if she weren’t free to claim her share of the profits from the Uwahi deal? There was no way to ask with him listening, probably no way even without him listening. Claude Ann would brook no doubts about the man she loved.
The miles slid past. Dinah didn’t open her eyes and Claude Ann and Xander didn’t speak to each other until they reached Kapoho Beach and the guard had to lift the gate for them. Xander drove on to the house. Claude Ann jumped out of the car, gave Xander a quick kiss, and went ahead to unlock the house. Dinah yawned and opened the door.
“Dinah?”
She looked back.
Under the grainy overhead car light, Xander frowned in a way that reminded her of one of those morally conflicted, shady characters in film noir. “I said it before, I’ll say it again. I didn’t kill him. But you need to know that if Claude Ann or you or either of my children should be charged, I’ll confess to the crime. Do you believe me?”
“I want to, Xander. I’m trying.” She started to get out, but turned. “Did Jon attend Punahou school?”
“No. He had the grades, but he didn’t want to leave the Big Island. Do the police think someone from Punahou had something to do with Raif’s death?”
“It’s not clear. It’s a link to the other murder. The archaeologist.”
“Ask Steve. He graduated from Punahou.”
That morsel was hard to swallow. Steve and Varian and Raif were all in their early thirties. If they all went to Punahou Prep, wouldn’t they have been aware of each other? Why had Steve not mentioned this coincidence when he was riffing on the subject of coincidences? Still harder to swallow was Xander’s promise to confess to Raif’s murder if the police came after his nearest and dearest. Was he an innocent man prepared to forfeit his freedom and possibly his life to save the people he loved, or was he a guilty man beguiling them with a promise he didn’t intend to keep? She didn’t take overmuch comfort from hearing her name on the list of those he’d go to prison to protect. Taking the fall for one’s beloved might be romantic. Taking the fall for the beloved’s maid of honor was crackbrained. As he drove away, she imagined him congratulating himself with something noble like, it is a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done.
She trailed Claude Ann down the driveway, across the deck, and into the house, ablaze with lights. Claude Ann was already pottering among the bottles and glasses at the bar.
“Make mine light,” said Dinah. “I woke up about forty thousand years ago with a hangover and nothing’s gone right since.”
Claude Ann thrust a tumbler of amber liquid into her hand. “When do you think that phone was sneaked into your bag?”
“I’ve been going over and over that question. The only time I remember it being out of my sight was at the Kilauea Lodge when we both left our bags on that banquette next to Paul Jarvis and Xander.”
“There were a lot of people millin’ around that night, Dinah.” Her defensive tone made it clear that Xander was off-limits as a suspect.
And then there was Marywave, presumably also off-limits. Dinah called to mind the triumphant look on the kid’s face as she dialed Raif’s number. Could her father have given her Raif’s phone and inveigled her to smuggle it into the purse? She wouldn’t conspire with him against her mother, would she? No. And even if Hank had killed Raif, he would have no reason to take his phone and no reason to call Lyssa at the spa. He wouldn’t even know she was there.
Dinah took a sip of her drink. “Jerusalem, Claudy. What’s in this?”
“Mostly bourbon.” She turned back to the bar, strained the juice from a jar of maraschino cherries into her drink, and plopped down in one of the club chairs.
Dinah set her glass on the coffee table and lay down on the black leather sofa. “Had Paul Jarvis ever met Raif? Could there be any reason on earth for him to want Raif out of the way?”
“They met socially once or twice. Lord knows what rude thing Raif might’ve said to him, but it wouldn’t have been enough to stir Paul to murder.”
“Was Jarvis ever in your hotel suite in Honolulu?”
“No. If the phone was put into your bag at Kilauea Lodge that night, turned on so it would ring, how long would it hold a charge?”
“I don’t know. Maybe it had
one of those automatic power save features.”
“One thing bugs me,” said Claude Ann. “The murderer takes the phone to confuse the time of death or give himself a better alibi, whatever. But why keep it? Why didn’t he toss it after he made that call to the spa? Was his plan all along to land us in the soup?”
“Maybe he wanted to make sure Raif hadn’t stored any incriminating data on the phone. And when he saw that he hadn’t, he decided he could send the police off in the wrong direction by planting it on one of us.”
“Yeah, but wouldn’t he need Raif’s password to find out what was on the phone?”
“Maybe he knew the password.” Dinah sat up. “I just remembered one other time when my purse was out of my sight. I left it in one of those locker baskets at Lyssa’s spa, which by the way is a front for illegal gambling.”
“Places like that always have extra keys,” said Claude Ann. “Do you think that George Knack guy is the murderer?”
Dinah was still trying to connect Varian’s murder to Raif’s murder and, apparently, so were Langford and Fujita. Varian and Raif had gone to the same school, along with Steve. Did all three of the former schoolmates like to gamble? Did that connect them? Knack had teased her with the information that a lawyer in Pahoa organized poker games. Suppose it were Steve. Suppose Varian had joined in one of Steve’s games after he arrived on the Big Island. Suppose he’d won more than he should off Steve and Steve killed him. Maybe Raif put two and two together and threatened to go to the police. Maybe he’d been blackmailing Steve, too. Steve would have needed to assure himself that Raif hadn’t recorded anything incriminating on his BlackBerry. He’d taken it away from the scene, checked it over, and later that night at the Kilauea Lodge, he could easily have dropped it in Dinah’s purse. She said, “I’m going to go to Pahoa in the morning and pay Mr. Knack another visit. If he confirms my suspicion, then I may have figured out who done it.”
Claude Ann’s eyes welled. “I’m afraid I know who done it.”
Dinah’s eyes widened. “Who?”
“Lyssa. She acted all lovey-dovey, but she knew Raif was cheatin’ on her. He made a big fat fool of her and she killed him and if she’s caught, her father’s gonna take the blame. Did he tell you?”
“Xander said he’d confess if you or either of his children were in danger of being charged.”
“I won’t let him do it, Dinah. He shouldn’t have to spend the rest his life stampin’ out license plates to make up for the sad fact that Lyssa lost her mama. When you go to that spa tomorrow, you find out if she was where she said she was, doin’ what she said she was doin’. Phoebe can’t vouch for her. If nobody else on the staff can, I’m gonna make her confess. I don’t know how, but I will if I have to beat it out of her.”
Dinah took a last sip of bourbon, closed her eyes, and laid back down. Claude Ann’s guess was as good as hers, maybe better. If Lyssa could buy Knack’s help to take care of the Tess problem, she could buy his help to provide her with an alibi. And here was the kicker: Lyssa could have picked her husband’s pocket and boosted his BlackBerry before he got off the plane in Hilo. In a place like Pahoa, how many cell towers were there? Could the cops pinpoint whether that call to the spa came from inside the city limits or ten miles south? Lyssa could have timed the phone call to give herself an alibi.
So many possibilities. So many secrets. Kini went by an eon ago. She felt a puff of air as Claude Ann spread a blanket over her. Her last thought was of Langford. She hoped the son-of-a-bitch didn’t sleep a wink.
Chapter Thirty-six
The sun didn’t loiter about playing peek-a-boo through the trees. Here at Kapoho Beach, it came up like a fireball and flashed through the windows with the intensity of an incendiary rocket. Dinah sat up blinking. Propped on the coffee table was a note from Claude Ann.
Gone to breakfast with Xander. Coffee, donuts and paper on kitchen counter. Extra toothbrush in bathroom cabinet, extra clothes in my bedroom. Help yourself. Back by ten. If you need anything before then, there’s a mini-mart two miles from the entrance gate. Keys to my car on the dresser in bedroom. CA
Dinah went to the kitchen and poured herself a cup of coffee. In all of the excitement last night, she’d forgotten to ask Claude Ann about her head-on with Eleanor. It couldn’t have been too scary or Claude Ann would have filled her in. Maybe Eleanor had only wanted to offer a show of sympathy to her niece.
The headline of the Hilo Tribune-Herald caught Dinah’s eye.
Billion Dollar Budget Deficits May Bring Slots To Hawaii.
Honolulu—Las Vegas has long been known as Hawaii’s ninth island, but soon Hawaiian residents may not have to fly six hours to place a wager. Lawmakers looking for ways to increase revenues and jump-start the state’s troubled, tourism-dependent economy will consider allowing gambling in Waikiki and on Native Hawaiian lands. A casino on Waikiki would need only state approval. A casino on Hawaiian Crown lands would need federal approval. The Akaka Bill, currently pending in Congress, would confer sovereign control of Hawaiian lands to Native Hawaiians, many of whom support legalization of gambling. At present, the bill does not contain an explicit ban.
The early Hawaiians resented the missionary’s ban on gambling and the general populace today loves to gamble. Hundreds of thousands of Hawaiians flock to Las Vegas each year to gamble and illegal gambling thrives on the islands, primarily in the form of sports books, cock fighting, and card houses. Proponents of legalization cite the prospect of job gains and increased tourist dollars from high-rolling Asian gamblers who won’t have to travel so far to get to the roulette tables. Opponents fear that our cultivated ambience of family-friendly tourism and natural beauty would be tarnished with the advent of gambling. They fear an increase in drugs, prostitution, and gambling addiction.
Notwithstanding Eleanor’s objections, gambling seemed inevitable. Uwahi wasn’t Hawaiian crown land and if there were enough Native Hawaiians who supported the plan to build a casino on the Big Island, a few awkwardly located bones wouldn’t stop the gambling juggernaut. Paul Jarvis might have no problem at all. But if gambling became legal, George Knack’s operation would shrivel and die. He was smart enough to read the writing on the wall. Dinah wouldn’t be surprised if he had opened a back channel to the squeaky clean Mr. Jarvis and proposed an accommodation of some kind.
She eyed the selection of doughnuts, most of which were coated with sprinkles. All that sugar made her teeth ache. She found eggs in the refrigerator, put a pot of water on to boil, and went to shower and dress. It was convenient that she and Claude Ann could still wear the same clothes. She chose a black peasant skirt and gauzy white blouse. If she was going to Pahoa, it seemed fitting to dress like a hippie.
The water was boiling when she returned to the kitchen. She boiled a couple of eggs, scraped the sprinkles off a doughnut, and sat down to eat. Claude Ann was due back in less than a half-hour. Was it a bad idea for Claude Ann to accompany her on this foray into Pahoa? She’d sounded a hair too fired-up when she talked about Lyssa last night. But the more Dinah thought about Xander’s vow to confess if one of his children was charged with Raif’s murder, the less sense it made for Claude Ann to impugn Lyssa’s alibi. After Claude Ann talked with Xander this morning, the two of them would probably team up and ask Dinah not to stick her nose in and make waves. The best plan, Dinah decided, was to scoot into Pahoa and put her questions to Knack before Claude Ann got back.
***
It was Golden Soul Day at Peacequest and tents representing each of the energy fields—earth, water, wind, and fire—had been set up on the front lawn. The air was spiced with incense and potential customers clustered around the individual tables, reading the literature and considering whether to invest in a $25 Vibrational Assessment. A silver-voiced man in priestly raiment held a group of German tourists mesmerized as he described the varying types of live and intelligent frequencies that co
mprised the energy field surrounding the body and the drastic deterioration in health and well-being that resulted when these frequencies became blocked or damaged.
The Germans talked amongst each other. “Gesundheitsproblem?”
“Aber ja! Gesundheitsgefahr.”
Jessica oversaw the wind energy table. Dinah waited in line until she could speak with her. “I’d like to see Mr. Knack. Is he in?”
“After the way you wasted Emily’s time, I don’t think Mr. Knack will want to see you.” She delivered this rebuke with a perfectly pleasant smile.
“I’m sorry about that, but I’m quite sure he’ll want to see me. I have some extremely troubling vibrations he’ll want to assess.”
Looking uncertain, as who didn’t these last few days, Jessica summoned a stand-in and led Dinah down the walkway to the front door. Once again, bells clamored and the smells of eucalyptus and lavender assailed her nose. The ladies in their terry robes glanced up from their magazines.
Jessica stopped at the front desk and rang Knack’s extension. “The lady who was here before, Ms…?”
“Dinah Pelerin.”
“Ms. Pelerin is here to see you. She says it’s…”
“A matter of life and death.”
Jessica frowned. “Important.” The girl turned her back on Dinah and listened. After a few seconds, she turned back, still frowning. “Mr. Knack says to go on back.”
Dinah walked back to his office, thinking belatedly that she should have left Claude Ann a note about where she was going. She should have left word to call the cops if Dinah hadn’t phoned in by noon. She rapped twice on the door and pushed it open. Knack lounged in his leather chair with his feet up on the beautiful desk. The pompadour, the pose, the apathetic black eyes—he was the perfect stereotype of a mafia don.
Bet Your Bones Page 25