A Walk Through the Fire

by Marcia Muller

  Under the trees by the heiau I crouched, listening again.

  A sudden rustling behind me.

  I spun around, went into a shooter’s stance, bringing the flashlight up.

  Matthew staggered to a stop perhaps a dozen feet away, panting, hair hanging over his forehead, glasses askew. A ray of moonlight rippled through the wind-tossed branches and shone off the needle in his right hand.

  “Don’t come any closer,” I said. “Drop the syringe on the ground and kick it over here.”

  He held on to it, lowering his hand to his side. With his other he pushed back his hair, straightened his glasses. One lens was webbed with cracks; maybe that would prevent him from seeing this wasn’t a gun.

  I said, “I know about your father and Abigail Carew. I found Glenna, and she’s safe now. And I’ve called 911; the police are on their way. You’re going to drop the syringe. Then we’ll go back to the mill and wait for them.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Yes, you can. I’m offering you a way out of a six-year nightmare. All you and Jillian did was improperly dispose of two dead bodies.”

  Surprise showed in the lines around his mouth.

  I added, “I know Celia killed them and asked you to cover up for her.”

  Long silence. Then: “If that was true, it would make us accessories after the fact.”

  “She was your mother, Matthew. D’you really think your local prosecutor will press charges? Especially after the way you and Jillian have suffered?”

  No reply. He was thinking it over, trying to figure if there was any evidence that would link him to Tommy Kaohi’s death. “What about the Stanleigh woman? She’ll claim I kidnapped her at the airport.”

  “Did you?”

  “No. I brought her here so we could talk in private. She got hysterical, attacked me.”

  “Well, there you go. And I’ll tell you, she’s plenty scared. Probably scared enough to accept your offer.”

  Sirens in the distance now. Matthew ran his tongue over his lips, looking at what he still thought was a gun. Gauging his chance of overpowering me.

  “I’m a good shot,” I said. “I couldn’t miss at close range.”

  He shifted from foot to foot, glanced at a helicopter that was rapidly approaching offshore. “How’d you find out about Mother?”

  “Russ told me about her history of violence. And I saw the film footage of her right before she went off the cliff. She hadn’t visited any of the earlier shoots, so she didn’t know how much a made-up Eli Hathaway looked like Elson. Something snapped when she saw him. Her face was enraged, her arms were out to push him. She meant for him to go over.”

  Matthew nodded, his body sagging. He looked down at the syringe as if he was thinking of using it on himself. Then he hurled it away, and it bounced off the top slab of the heiau. His mouth twisted in an effort not to cry.

  He said, “The day she died, when I told Jill… Jill said, ‘Celia was trying to kill your father all over again.’”

  Now the helicopter was homing in on the cliffs, searchlight sweeping the ground. Matthew raised his head, stared blindly. Looked back at me, eyes panicked. I sensed what he was thinking: no way to back out of this mess, no way to go forward. He was smart enough to know he’d be charged with kidnapping and probably connected with Tommy Kaohi’s death.

  Suddenly he moved. At first I thought he was going to attack me, tensed and set myself. But he veered away from me, past the heiau, his footsteps slapping on the hard-packed ground.

  Heading for the sea.

  The police chopper’s light found and followed him, and by the time I reached the edge of the rise, he was standing on the cliff. I shouted, “Matthew, come back!” but my words were lost in the engine’s roar.

  He looked sidelong at the breadfruit tree, then up at the helicopter.

  “Don’t!” I started after him.

  Too late. He went up on his toes, arms spread, and launched himself in a graceless dive into the sea.

  Another desolate ghost, looking for a way home.

  APRIL 9

  Kauai

  6:53 A.M.

  Tanner was waiting for me when I came out of the brightly lit police substation at Waimea into the predawn murk. He’d left the chopper amid a gaggle of its official cousins near the parking lot.

  “Hey, you okay?”

  I nodded wearily, preferring to ignore how horrible I felt.

  “Caught the news on the radio, talked to a guy on the force. Pretty radical stuff. Too bad about Matt.”

  “He took the easy way out of a no-win situation.”

  “Well, anyway, I thought I should fly down, give you a lift back. Where’s Sweet Pea?”

  “Inside, with Peter dancing attendance. And I don’t think you want to be calling her that anymore. Sweet, she ain’t.”

  “You sound pissed.”

  “I am.” I started toward the chopper.

  “Don’t you want to wait for them?”

  “No. Peter, Ben, and Stephanie drove down together. The cops aren’t finished with them. Won’t be for a while. I am, though—with Glenna, anyway.”

  “You want to tell me about it?”

  I leaned against the big red bird, rubbing my forehead, where a headache throbbed. “Yeah, I do. Ms. Sweet Pea has been lying to me the whole time I’ve been here. Well, maybe not technically, but she sure hasn’t been telling me everything. If she had, it might’ve saved three lives: Tommy Kaohi’s, Celia’s, and Matthew’s.”

  “My brah filled me in on most of it.”

  “So you know Glenna’s mother was—”

  “Yes. And I know what happened to her and Elson.”

  “Good. I don’t think I could go into that one more time. Glenna found her mother’s briefcase in the attic at her father’s house outside of Melbourne when she returned to Australia to settle his affairs. It was in a mailing carton, addressed to Abigail Carew and postmarked Waimea in November of 1992—two months after she left her husband, and around the time Jillian would’ve felt strong enough to drive there and send it. Inside were Abigail’s airline ticket and passport, Elson’s manuscript and journal, and a note of apology that Jillian wrote. The carton had never been opened.”

  “So Glenna started checking up, found out who Elson was.”

  “Ironically, with materials on investigative techniques that I’d provided, because she expressed an interest in doing a documentary on my business. Eventually she connected with Peter and manipulated him into backing the film, so she could use it as a cover to come over here, get close to the family, and find out what happened to Abigail. Her presence stirred things up: Matthew figured out who she was, and he and Celia panicked. Jillian’s guilt became more than she could handle.”

  “Abigail was her mother, Sharon. She had a right to know.”

  “Sure she did, but I also had a right to know what was going on with my own client. When she realized she was into more than she could handle, did she tell me the whole story? No! Not then, not when we discovered that somebody—Matthew, with Ben’s help, it turns out—was monitoring her every move at Malihini House. Not even when one of the lowlifes Matthew hired to scare her off took a shot at her. Not even when Celia died!”

  “She explain why not?”

  “Oh, sure. Hy was right on about her wanting to grab a piece of the Wellbright fortune by marrying Peter. And she’s not even ashamed to admit it. D’you know what she said to me? ‘You’re so good at your work that I thought you’d figure it out on your own. Then Peter wouldn’t know I manipulated him into backing the film, and he and I could be together.’ The woman caused three people to die and let several others be endangered because she wanted the good life! Well, the hell with her!”

  Tanner was watching me with an expression that was half amusement, half admiration.

  “What?” I demanded.

  He shook his head, smiling.

  “Don’t you go holding out on me too, Russell!”

  “I was ju
st thinking that when you get mad, you’ve got more fire in you than Kilauea.”

  “Damned right I do! Your Pele goddess has got nothing on me!”

  He came over, put an arm around my shoulders, pressed my head into the curve of his neck. “You know,” he said, “I’m gonna tell Casey who her real father was and what happened to him. She’s old enough now for a lesson in how folks who have everything can screw up and waste their lives, even in paradise.”

  “And a lesson in how not to waste hers. By the way, did you hear anything about a major drug bust on Oahu?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, there was supposed to be one last night, and the distributor they’re nailing is Drew Wellbright.”

  “No!”

  “Yes.”

  “You have a hand in that?”

  “Uh-huh. I’ll tell you about it later.” I reached into my purse, located the wad of bills Drew had given me for Buzzy, and pressed them into Russ’s hand. “You know Donna Malakaua? Crystal Blue Inspiration?”

  “Sure.”

  “Give her this money. Tell her it’s for her brother’s legal defense fund.”

  “Don’t tell me that moron Buzzy was involved with Drew.”

  “He and I will be the prosecution’s star witnesses.”

  “That I’d like to see. Might even fly over for the trial.”

  “You do that.” I closed my eyes as I leaned against him.

  After a bit he said in too hearty a voice, “So where to now? Malihini House to pick up your gear, then Hotel-november-lima?” The phonetic alphabet designation for Honolulu International.

  “Not yet.”

  “Oh?”

  “You know that ledge in Waimea Canyon where you left me off the first time we flew together? I want to go there and watch the sun rise with you.”

  It was the only place I could think of to say good-bye.

  Russ and I sat on the ledge, our feet dangling above the canyon floor, holding hands. Across from us the rugged peaks were backlit by streaks of pink and gold.

  We didn’t speak, and as the colors grew more intense, I felt my anger with Glenna ebb and flow. Then all of a sudden it was gone, as if the sky had leached the fire from me and claimed it for its own.

  Finally he said, “You know, the ancients believed there’s a language of the heart that we can understand if we only take the time to listen. That’s what you’re listening to now.”

  “Am I? I’ve been hearing mixed messages the whole time I’ve been on this island.”

  “Yeah, but even in the most complex mixes there’s one sound that stands out. The message you’re getting from Hy is stronger than any I could ever send you. I know it, and so do you.”

  I squeezed his hand, stared at the now fiery peaks. We were both feeling the same sadness and regret, but mine would fade as I crossed the Pacific toward home and the future. He would remain here among reminders of what might have been.

  He said, “I like Hy. Dammit, I admire him. And it’s not easy to feel that way about the man who’s got the woman I want. But he’s an exceptional guy—takes one, to let go and walk away peaceably like he did, when his guts were screaming for him to hang on and act unpeaceable as hell.”

  “You’re an exceptional guy, too, Russ. You prove it every day in the things you do for the people you care about.”

  “Mahalo.” He ran his finger across my cheek, kissed my forehead. “Sun’s risen, pretty lady. Our time here’s done. There’s a midday flight from Honolulu to San Francisco. I’ll take you over there.”

  I smiled at him. “Mahalo, Russ.”

  APRIL 10

  Touchstone

  3:47 P.M.

  Hy had heard my approach and was waiting beside our dirt strip when I brought the rented Cessna 150 to a stop on the concrete pad next to the 172 that he apparently still had on loan. While I shut it down and gathered my things, he wedged chocks under the wheels, then came around to help me out.

  “About time, McCone,” he said.

  His matter-of-fact words were the same he’d spoken years before, when I’d also appeared unannounced at the door of his Mono County ranchhouse, some five months after we’d met. Today he didn’t even act surprised that I’d guessed he was here.

  He shut the plane’s door, thumped the wing. “Where’d you find this puddle jumper?”

  “You don’t recognize it? Old Two-five-whiskey?”

  “Christ, it gets more scabrous by the hour! Cheapest thing the FBO had available, right?”

  “You got it.”

  We started across the ice plant–covered ground toward our stone cottage. The flowers underfoot were in full bloom—magenta, red, orange. Suddenly something caught my eye and I stopped, pivoting. An earthmover.

  “Ripinsky! It’s started!”

  He grinned. “This morning. New contractor bulldozed the old foundation.”

  “New contractor?”

  “I fired Virgil. Like I’ve been saying since we hired him—”

  “‘What kind of a name is that for a contractor, anyway?’”

  He took my hand and led me over to where one day our house would stand. There was no sign of the old fire-blackened foundation.

  I asked, “So what’s this new guy’s name?”

  “Florian.”

  “You went from a Virgil to a Florian?”

  “Don’t worry. He’s smart, honest, and his crew shows up on time and sober. At least they did this morning.”

  “Miracle of miracles.” I stared at the bulldozer, my eyes misting. Hy had walked out on me on Kauai with no reassurances that we could put our relationship back together, but still he’d had enough faith in us to hire the new contractor and press forward with our building plans.

  “Glad you’re home,” he said, shyness edging into his voice.

  “Me too.” Now I was sounding shy!

  “Heavy-duty stuff, what happened with the Wellbrights.”

  “It was in the news here?”

  “Some of it. The rest I got from Tanner. He tracked me down through our Honolulu office yesterday, said he’d brief me, since you probably wouldn’t want to talk about it yet.”

  “… He say anything else?”

  “You mean personal? No.”

  I glanced at him, saw his neutral expression. Went over to the bulldozer and kicked its tire to see if maybe I wasn’t dreaming the whole situation.

  “By the way,” Hy added, “he asked me to tell you that Drew’s been arrested and Stephanie’s moved Jillian to a good private hospital where she’ll get the treatment she needs. He also said that it looks like Glenna’s going to grab that brass ring she’s been reaching for.”

  “Meaning Peter will marry her. Oh, well, maybe a conniving woman like her is what he needs to help him kick that island into the twenty-first century.” I paused. “Aren’t you going to ask what went on between Russ and me?”

  “No. What matters is you’re here.”

  “Just like that—don’t ask, don’t tell?”

  “It’s a policy I’ve always subscribed to.”

  Now I frowned. “What does that mean?”

  He grinned and shrugged.

  “Ripinsky, you never—”

  His eyes shone devilishly. “You’ll just have to guess at that, now won’t you?”

  I pursed my lips, considering this new possibility.

  “Ah, McCone,” he said, “I purely love keeping you off balance!”

  All right, he’d had his revenge. I glared at him for a moment before I relented. “Well, as far as I’m concerned, you can keep me off balance for the rest of my life.”

  Then, when I saw his smug grin, I added, “Maybe.”

  Settled into their new home, Sharon McCone and her husband, Hy, are beginning to at last feel comfortable. But the seeming calm is shattered when Hy gets a visit from a troublemaking former colleague, while Sharon takes on a new client desperate to save his home from thugs and drug dealers.

  Look for Someone Always Knows, availa
ble in July 2016.

  A preview follows.

  11:12 a.m.

  “It’s awfully different from the artist’s rendering,” I whispered to my nephew, Mick Savage.

  He and I and several of my staff were standing at the spacious entrance to the recently remodeled McCone & Ripinsky building on New Montgomery Street in San Francisco’s financial district. Workmen had just removed the tarps from a sculpture we’d commissioned—at great cost—from the world-renowned artist Flavio St. John.

  “What do you suppose Flavio’s intention was?” Julia Rafael had recently been dating a prominent Latino painter and was into all things artistic.

  “He needed a cure for a hangover,” Patrick Neilan offered, scratching at his thatch of red hair.

  “Don’t be facetious,” I said. “What is it supposed to be?”

  “Looks like clam shells.” This from our office manager, Ted Smalley. “A cheap concrete clamshell fused to a larger fake gold one. Flavio must’ve been hungry for seafood the day he came up with the design.”

  The workmen with the tarps seemed anxious to pack up and go. A small crowd had gathered, blocking their trucks.

  “Where is Flavio?” I asked.

  “Rome,” Patrick said. “He had urgent business there, so I drove him to the airport the other night.”

  “Urgent business? Without letting me know he was leaving? More likely he was escaping the scene of the crime—with our check in his wallet. I’m putting a stop on it.”

  “Ma’am,” a gentleman in the growing crowd said, “can you explain why you people elected to put such an eyesore on your beautifully restored granite building?”

  “Well,” I began, “we thought… The concept is as—”

  “As ugly as my Aunt Stella Sue’s butt.”

  That came from my husband, standing on the edge of the crowd: tall, lean in his tight jeans, with the brim of his cowboy hat pulled down over his roughly-hewn face. People erupted into laughter at his remark.