Mahu Surfer m-2

by Neil S. Plakcy

  I agreed and hung up the phone, then repeated the gist of the conversation to Harry. “He didn’t tell you not to go surfing, did he?” Harry asked.

  I shook my head.

  “So you want to?”

  I thought about it for almost a minute. “I do. But not Pipeline. And I don’t want to go anywhere near Bishop Clark’s place and risk Rich Sarkissian taking pot shots at us there. How about Sunset?”

  Sunset was another great break, one I hadn’t patronized much because so much of the case seemed to revolve around Pipeline. Harry agreed that was a good compromise; it was unlikely that the killer would be driving up and down the North Shore with a pair of binoculars. Just to be on the safe side, we left my truck at Cane Landing and drove in Harry’s BMW, our two boards strapped to the roof. It was almost like being in high school again, only with a much better car.

  We surfed until mid-afternoon. We were sitting on our boards beyond the breakers, looking for waves, when Harry said, “This is my last wave, brah. Then I have to start packing up for the trip back to Honolulu. Arleen’s mom is babysitting Brandon so she and I can have dinner on our own.” He smiled. “That’s a big event in my life. I like Brandon a lot, he’s a great kid, but sometimes I want Arleen all to myself.”

  “Hey, I won’t stand in your way.” I saw a wave coming and grabbed it, leaving Harry behind. I got a couple of turns out of it, and then started dragging my board up the beach. Then I saw Al Kawamoto sitting in the blue Taurus up on Ke Nui Road. My first instinct was to turn around and get back in the water, even though I was exhausted and every muscle in my body ached. I was just tired of dealing with him; he was a homophobic asshole, and I just didn’t have the energy for his bullshit.

  “Gotta talk to you,” he said, rolling down his window as I approached.

  I didn’t want to tell him about someone shooting at me. Frankly, I didn’t think he’d believe me, even with the shell casings as evidence. “I’m exhausted, Al. Can’t it wait until tomorrow?” I kept moving past him.

  “It can’t.”

  There was something in his tone of voice, a note of resignation, even despair, that I had never heard from him. I turned around. “What’s up?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it here. Come on, get in.”

  “Al, I’m full of salt and sweat. You don’t want me in your car.” I looked at my watch. “Meet me at the Surfrider in half an hour. There are some tables beyond the tiki huts in the back. Nobody will see us there.”

  He rolled up his window and drove off. “Nice talking to you, too,” I said.

  Harry came out of the water then, and I waited at his car for him. “Who were you talking to?”

  “Homophobic asshole. I have to meet him for a drink in half an hour.”

  “Then we’d better hustle,” Harry said.

  My Dinner With Al

  Harry had to load up his car himself, because though I didn’t want to, I had to jump in the shower, then throw on an aloha shirt and khaki shorts. We told each other to take care, and I promised to call him the next day after my meeting with Sampson. “You think you’ll stay in town, or come back up here?”

  “I should see my parents. I’ll probably stay at my place tomorrow night.” We gave each other shakas and hit the road.

  It was probably forty-five minutes before I made it to the Surfrider, and Al Kawamoto was just starting his third beer.

  I sat down across from him. “So what’s so important?”

  “I didn’t know who else to go to,” he said.

  I’d been getting attitude from Kawamoto for days, and I was in the mood to give him some back. “Al. Don’t tell me you’re really gay and you’ve been in the closet all this time.”

  He gave me the dirtiest of dirty looks. “All right. I’m here. I’m listening. Talk.”

  “Me and Kevin, we’ve been partners for six years. He’s a stand-up guy. Jesus, I hate this.”

  My sensors started to go off. “Hate what, Al?”

  “Maybe I’m just crazy. But I don’t want to jam Kevin up if I’m wrong.”

  Al Kawamoto looked genuinely anguished. I had to figure he wasn’t happy about having to come to me-from day one, he hadn’t been my biggest fan. So what he had to say had to be that much more important, for him to overcome his dislike of me.

  “You’re a cop, Al. You know you can’t make accusations without evidence. So lay the evidence out for me.”

  He took a long sip of his beer-Dutch courage, my father called it. “We caught that first murder, the guy, Pratt. One of his buddies told me he thought Pratt had gotten mixed up in some kind of drug deal. I brought it to Kevin, he pooh-poohed it. ‘The guy’s a straight arrow,’ he said.” He looked up at me. “No offense.”

  “None taken,” I said. “Your partner was right. Pratt was a good guy. Everybody liked him. Didn’t fit the profile of a guy mixed up in drugs.”

  “Nope.”

  I took a sip of my beer and considered. “Except for the fact that surfing’s an expensive hobby. If you don’t win tournaments you don’t get sponsors and you’ve got to come up with all the cash yourself for equipment, entry fees, travel, all that stuff. Pratt taught surfing on the side, but you’ve got to give a lot of lessons to make any real money.”

  “That was what I thought, but Kevin, he wouldn’t listen. Finally I gave up.”

  “Okay. What else?”

  “Same thing with the girl. We started hearing rumors she was a dealer. Even connected her to that surf shop where she used to work, The Next Wave.”

  “I heard those same rumors, you know.”

  He nodded. “We couldn’t connect Pratt to the girl except through ballistics. Some reason, Kevin didn’t want to explore the drug angle. And I have to say I didn’t push as hard as I could have.”

  “Hey, I’ve had partners. It’s a give and take.”

  He finished his beer. “You ready for another round?”

  “I’m still working on this one. And why don’t you get a burger or something, Al? You don’t want to let the beer get too far ahead of you.”

  He called a waiter over and we both ordered burgers. He ordered another beer, too, but I noticed he started taking that one more slowly.

  “So far, Al, you haven’t got much to worry about. Kevin didn’t want to follow a couple of leads, well, maybe he thought they were a waste of time. Can’t argue with a judgment call.” I looked at him. “Do you think he’s using something himself?”

  He looked up at the thatched roof above us. We were in a glorified tiki hut, a couple of big poles holding up the sloping roof, only a few other high-topped tables around us. A pretty private area, even when the rest of the place was busy. That night, only about half the tables were filled.

  It was clear he didn’t want to answer that question, but I waited. Finally he said, “I think so.” That admission seemed to take something out of him, and his whole body sagged.

  “Why?” I asked gently.

  “His moods have been all over the place, and he’s always complaining about money. And lately he’s been cagey sometimes, about where he’s going or where he’s been.”

  Nothing was damning, but Al was a good detective. He’d been assembling small clues for a while. “Anything else?” I asked.

  “He wouldn’t let me talk to Vice. Got all angry. Said he’d handle it. Like he didn’t trust me. That’s not like the old Kevin. Jesus, I was best man at his wedding.”

  “You talk to Vice anyway?”

  He looked down at the table. “Nope. I didn’t want them to get suspicious. I was thinking maybe you could.”

  “Al, I’m undercover. Nobody’s supposed to know I’m working these cases. Not even you guys, until a couple days ago.”

  His head popped up suddenly. “You think Sampson suspected something?”

  I shrugged. “I know he was suspicious that you guys couldn’t come up with anything. Not surprising if it turns out Kevin was hiding stuff.”

  “What can we do?” Al ask
ed.

  The waitress appeared with our burgers. “We can eat,” I said.

  We ate in silence, and then finally I said, “I got called down to headquarters tomorrow for a meeting with Sampson.”

  Fear immediately jumped into Al’s eyes. “You think he knows something?”

  I shook my head. “I had the same suspicions about The Next Wave that you did, only I tried to ignore them because I know the guy who owns the place. We used to surf together years ago.” I figured that was all Al Kawamoto really needed to know about my relationship with Dario. “I finally emailed Sampson what I was thinking.” I took a drink of my beer. “Plus somebody shot at me yesterday at Pipeline.”

  “Jesus!” Al dropped his fork on the laminated table.

  “Probably wasn’t him shooting at me,” I said. “I’m sure he could use thunderbolts or a plague of frogs or something. I found a couple of shell casings on the beach; I’m taking them with me.”

  “Are you going to tell Sampson about Kevin?”

  “What do you want me to do? He’s your partner.”

  Al didn’t say anything for a while. I could only imagine how he was feeling; a partnership is like a marriage in many ways, and you cover for each other, you support each other… but that only goes so far, and I could see Al knew it.

  “You gotta tell him.” He reached down to the floor and picked up a briefcase he’d brought in with him. Opening it, he pulled out a file folder. “Copies of everything we found. You can read between the lines, you’ll see what Kevin didn’t want to follow up. You can point that out to Sampson.”

  That must have been hard for him, photocopying that file on Sunday afternoon, knowing exactly what he was going to have to do with it. I was starting to feel sorry for Al-and I hate it when somebody I don’t like starts to get me on his side.

  We finished dinner, and Al picked up the check. “No arguments,” he said.

  “All right.” I took the file back home with me to Cane Landing and read it over, and then read it through a second time, taking notes. I already knew almost everything in it; what I was interested in was what Ruiz knew when, and what he chose to ignore.

  It was almost eleven when I closed the folder and went to sleep.

  Road Trip

  By the time I got out of the shower the next morning, the sun was up, and the air was bright and fresh. Perfect surfing weather, and the North Shore beaches were still unusually empty. A siren song, but I had to ignore it.

  Traffic picked up when I connected to the H2 around Wheeler Army Field. At least it kept moving, and I made it to police headquarters on South Beretania Street in downtown Honolulu with a few minutes to spare.

  As I sat for a minute in my truck with the radio playing the Hapa version of the Hawaii Five-O theme, I couldn’t help remembering the last time I had been to headquarters, almost a month before. At the time I’d been nervous, reporting to a new boss for a new job. I’d had no idea that the job would be undercover, and that I’d be immediately plunged into such a difficult case.

  I fed the meter and walked up to the front door, past the memorial to officers killed in the line of duty. It was a place I never wanted to see a familiar name, but I stopped, like I often do, to scan it, letting all that sacrifice sink in. Another cop bumped into me as I turned to go in, and he started to excuse himself, but stopped when he saw who I was.

  I didn’t recognize him, but I smiled and said, “Sorry.” He bowed his head a bit and continued inside without saying a word. The aide at the metal detector was joking with everyone who came in, but didn’t say a word to me. Everywhere I went, it seemed like people stopped talking as I approached. I’m sure it was just my paranoia, though I worried what it would be like to deal with people like that every day, if I ever solved this case and got off the North Shore, and returned to work at headquarters.

  Sampson had somebody in his office with the door closed, so I had to hang around outside waiting for him to finish. I saw a couple of detectives I knew and said hello, and they were all pleasant enough. Still, I felt very conspicuous standing out there, and was glad when Sampson opened the door. I was quite surprised, though, to see my old boss from Waikiki, Lieutenant Yumuri, come out.

  He was just as surprised to see me. “Lieutenant,” I said, nodding.

  “Kanapa’aka.” He turned back to Sampson. “I’ll call you later,” he said, and walked past me.

  “Come on in, Kimo,” Sampson said. I wanted to ask him what Yumuri had been doing there, but I reminded myself the world didn’t revolve around me, and they probably had some other business. Still, the reception I’d gotten downstairs, and seeing Yumuri again, didn’t put me in the best mood.

  I sat down across from Sampson, noticing again the crowd of personal photographs on his desk, the miniature cannon on the shelf above. “Sounds like you’re getting close,” he said, leaning back in his chair. “But I want you to be careful. I don’t like the idea of anybody shooting at my detectives.”

  “I’m not that fond of it myself.” I pulled out the folder Al Kawamoto had given me, and explained how I’d gotten hold of it.

  A shadow passed over Sampson’s face. “I was afraid of something like this. Let me take look.”

  I handed him the folder and he skimmed through it. While I waited, I thought about what it would be like to work at headquarters, to report to Sampson on a daily basis. I liked him and thought I could work for him, but the rest of the force… I wasn’t so sure.

  Could I work in an environment where people didn’t like me, where they talked behind my back and went silent when I walked in the room? Maybe the force wasn’t the right place for me after all. I could move to the mainland, become a cop in a place like LA. Or I could stay in Honolulu and become a private eye.

  What would that be like, I wondered. How would I get clients? Would I be stuck on the sleazy underbelly of the law, chasing deadbeat dads, photographing illicit trysts?

  “What’s your take on all this?” Sampson asked, startling me out of my reverie.

  I’d been thinking all the way from Hale’iwa to Honolulu about how I’d answer that very question. “I like Kevin Ruiz,” I said, choosing my words carefully. “He seems like a stand-up guy. And after what I’ve been through myself, I hesitate to put the finger on anyone, to make them go through what I did. But I have to listen to my gut, and to his own partner. I think he merits some investigation. His case leads the same place mine does-to The Next Wave. He wouldn’t follow that lead, and when you couple that with Al Kawamoto’s suspicion that Kevin might be using himself, you’ve got a bad situation.”

  “I’ll have to read this over carefully,” he said, closing the folder.

  “Somebody has to talk to Vice. I told Al Kawamoto I thought that had to be him. We have to know what they have on The Next Wave. They may have their own investigation going, and we don’t want to step into it.”

  I handed him a plastic bag holding the shell casings I found at the beach. “Can you send these downstairs to the SIS lab and see if they can match the markings to the gun that shot Mike Pratt and Lucie Zamora?”

  He nodded. “And I’ll get hold of Al and make sure he knows I’m behind him.” He made a note on his Palm Pilot. “I want you to keep a low profile for the next couple of days.” He motioned to the folder on his desk. “Let me get this stuff squared away, and let’s try not to give this shooter the chance to take any more pot shots, for your sake and for the sake of the general population on the North Shore.” He looked up at me. “Anything you think you can do?”

  “Go surfing?”

  “Hold off a day or so,” he said. “Go back to your own apartment. Check with me tomorrow morning.”

  It was strange to pull up in my own parking lot, walk up the outside steps to my own little studio apartment. My whole place would have fit into the living room of the house Ari was lending to me, but it was home, and I was glad to see it. The place had a musty, closed-in smell, and I opened the windows and turned on the fan to air it out.<
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  I hadn’t been home for more than a few minutes when my cell phone rang. It was Harry, with a plan for the evening. He would pick me up around six, we’d get some take out Chinese and a six pack of beer, and head to Terri’s house in Wailupe. I’d get to see her son, Danny, who was still traumatized from his father’s death, and then the three of us could hang out and talk.

  I made one change in the plan. I had to swing past my parents’ house late in the afternoon, to see them, so I said I’d get the beer, and leave Harry in charge of take out, meeting him out at Terri’s house.

  Due to the way the buildings stack up between me and the beach, I’ve got a decent view of the ocean from the big picture window in my living room, and after I hung up on Harry I walked over and looked out toward the Pacific.

  A lot had happened to me during the past couple of months, and I hadn’t had much time to process it. Watching the surf dash itself against the shore gave me a minute to stop and think. The pace of my life seemed to have accelerated lately; I had moved much farther in the last few weeks, in many ways, than I had in several of the years before. It was enough to make a guy dizzy.

  I imagined running into a friend who’d been off island for a couple of months. “Hey, what’s new, Kimo,” he’d say.

  “Well, I caught a really tough case and nearly got killed solving it,” I’d say. “Came out of the closet, nearly lost my job, saw my life splashed all over the media, fought with my brothers and my parents, saw a friend die and killed a man myself, went undercover and had to be nice to a guy who basically raped me ten years ago. I’ve been pretty busy.”

  It was a wonder I hadn’t started knocking back shots, or popping pills or smoking Maui Wowie. I stared at the water for a while, trying to think of what else I had to do. I had my laptop with me, so I plugged it in, got online, and looked for information on The Next Wave. There had been a few police reports to the property, including the time Rich Sarkissian punched out that customer, but nothing in the police system about drug connections there.