by Frankie Bow
“So where is everyone? Did Gloria come back with you?”
“We all got back just now,” Donnie said from inside the closet. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”
“No, no, it’s okay. I want to know what’s happening. Donnie, wait, I don’t understand. Medeiros said Gloria was under arrest for the murder of Iulani Malufau. How on earth do they think she did it?”
“Malufau’s blood alcohol was high. I don’t remember the exact number, but they said at that level you can barely walk. So it wouldn’t take a lot of strength for someone to throw him off balance.”
“They think Gloria got him drunk and pushed him out the window?”
“It seems to be their theory. More or less.”
“Donnie, wait. They think she went to see this guy in his room, alone? I can’t imagine going to confront someone like him by myself.” Of course, Skye had said Gloria was fearless.
“There was something else too. The bottom of the window in Malufau’s room was low, close to the floor. Even more evidence for their theory someone Gloria’s size could have pushed him out.”
“Donnie, do you think she did it?”
Donnie came to the closet door, and stood silhouetted against the light. “Doesn’t matter what I think.”
“When did this all happen? Do they know?”
“They calculated the time of death as the morning of the nineteenth.” Donnie came over and sat down on the bed. “Ka`imi says you’re the one who first ID’d Malufau. How did you figure it out?”
“When Skye told me Malufau had escaped, I remembered the guy who was following us, and I put two and two together. It was a lucky guess. So where was Gloria before she showed up here at the house?”
“I don’t know.” Donnie shook his head. “It’s something she’ll have to discuss with her lawyer. She didn’t tell me anything.”
CHAPTER FORTY
The next morning found me at my computer, revising the social-media marketing plan for Donnie’s Drive-Inn.
My first draft had been too detailed. It probably looked like a daunting amount of work to my overworked husband. Maybe I could simplify it a little, spell out the details of the campaign week by week, so that Donnie could follow it with little effort.
A small part of my brain, the sensible part, told me I was wasting my time. Donnie didn’t want me to rescue him. Still, I felt like I had to do something, and as Emma had pointed out, what was the point of his being married to a business professor if he wasn’t going to take advantage of my expertise?
“Molly?”
There were no other chairs around my workstation, so Skye perched in a rather familiar fashion on the edge of my desk.
“Oh, Skye. Good morning. Donnie told me everyone got back safe and sound last night. How are you holding up?”
“We had the dubious pleasure of experiencing the coercive power of the state apparatus. At least we managed to find a good lawyer.”
“Good. About the lawyer, I mean. Who is it?”
Skye frowned, trying to remember. “Some guy named Feinman. Have you heard of him?”
“Alika Feinman?”
“That sounds right.”
“Sure. He’s a local celebrity. My friend Emma Nakamura in the biology department says when she finally snaps and strangles her incompetent dean, Feinman is going to be the first person she—uh, it sounds like you’ve made a great choice.”
“Well, we have one little problem. Feinman’s in Costa Rica right now. Is it okay if he calls Gloria here?”
“We don’t have a land line. We just use our cell phones in the house.”
“I know. Gloria gave him your number. He’s going to call in about five minutes. Okay?”
“Alika Feinman is calling here?” I got up and retrieved my phone from my purse where it hung by the door.
“Sorry, Molly. Things have been so crazy. Thanks. We appreciate it.”
“No, no, I’m happy to help. Of course I am. You should know that the reception’s not great in this neighborhood. You might need to go outside if you want privacy. The reception in the room you’re in is almost nonexistent.”
I unlocked my phone and handed it to Skye. He took it back into the guest room, apparently not believing what I’d told him about the reception in that part of the house. Within a minute, Gloria was back out in the living room.
I tried to work on the Drive-Inn’s social media plan, while behind me, Gloria conducted a stage-whispered conversation I could hear perfectly well.
“We are cooperating,” she hissed. “We already postponed our flight, didn’t we? How come they’re so sure it wasn’t an accident anyway? Oh yeah? Who was the little snitch who told ’em I said that? What? Well they’re all lying, is alls I know. No I did not. Yeah, and it’s none of their business.”
Gloria’s side of the conversation went on in the same vein for a good half hour. Had I been the one racking up Alika Feinman’s fees, I’d have done a lot more listening than talking.
“Molly. Here’s your phone.”
Gloria dropped it on my desk and walked away. A thank you might have been nice.
While I just didn’t think it was fair for her to take it out on me, I could understand her being upset. The police could have written off Iulani Malufau’s death off as an accident. Why had they settled on Gloria as the murderer—just because someone overheard her making ill-considered comments about her ex? Who hasn’t done that? And you’d think having a friend like Andy De Silva in the department would have helped her.
I should get Pat Flanagan’s take on this. Pat was always interested in a good news story, although he probably couldn’t publish this one in Island Confidential. I picked up my phone and went out onto the front lanai. Pat’s number went straight to voicemail.
I stepped into the middle of the road, where the reception was strongest. I dialed again, and got transferred to voicemail again. I decided to leave a message.
“Pat, listen carefully, because I’m going to drop some bombshells on your voicemail right now.”
I checked up and down the quiet street for cars. There were none.
“Okay, here we go. A man named Iulani Malufau escaped from prison, turned up in Mahina, fell out of a window, and died. Who is he and why do you care? He’s Donnie’s sister’s ex, and he’s also Davison’s biological father. Now Donnie’s sister Gloria has been arrested for Malufau’s murder. Gloria’s husband is Skye Chaney, family is loaded, so they posted bail and hired Alika Feinman to defend her. Yes, the Alika Feinman. Now here’s the thing. They think Malufau died Tuesday, May nineteenth. Gloria appears to have arrived in Mahina on the seventeenth, but she didn’t show up at our house until the evening of the nineteenth, which is the same day Malufau died. It doesn’t look good for Gloria. Could you poke around and see what you can find out? Maybe the date on her itinerary is wrong, or somehow she has an alibi for the nineteenth, or something. Anything you can find out. Just in case.”
I heard a click, and then a woman’s mechanical voice. “The message length has been exceeded.”
A golf cart puttered up the road, and I stepped out of the way. The three teenage boys inside the cart waved as they went past. They were taking their skateboards to the cul-de-sac at the top of the tree-shaded street.
This would be a nice neighborhood to grow up in.
I put my phone away, smiled, waved back at the boys, and went into the house.
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Dinner was tense. Junior fussed incessantly as his relatives passed him around the table, trying to find the magic key to appeasing him. He didn’t calm down until Donnie took him. He kissed the baby’s fluffy round head and then held him, stroking his back. Junior dozed off immediately and spent the rest of dinner drooling contentedly on Donnie’s shoulder.
Through all this, Gloria made sure to appear very put-upon. Every so often, she would contribute a deep, heartfelt sigh or a despairing shake of the head to the conversation.
Skye enabled her, acting grav
e and solicitous.
I had to remind myself I wasn’t the one on the hook for murder. Had I been in Gloria’s place, I’d have been cranky too. I reminded myself of Emma’s advice: You always gotta suck up to the in-laws.
I hoped Pat could use his reporter skills to find something out about Gloria’s situation, preferably something exculpatory. Then Gloria and Skye could go home, and everyone could get on with their lives. Any such information would have to be handled with care, though. Gloria seemed like the type to resent people intervening on her behalf.
After dinner, Davison and Tiffany took Junior back from Donnie. Gloria went to lie down on her fainting couch while Skye fanned her with a palm frond and fed her peeled grapes. (Actually, I only saw them disappear into their room; I’m assuming the rest.)
Donnie and I cleaned up the kitchen and went to bed.
By the time I got out of the shower, Donnie was dead asleep. It was a warm night, so I turned the ceiling fan to the highest setting and pushed the comforter down to the bottom of the bed. I glanced over at Donnie to see if my jostling had accidentally woken him up, but no, it had not. I pulled the sheet over me and watched the ceiling fan spin in the dark. Donnie snored serenely beside me, and Junior’s wails reverberated throughout the house. At one point, someone stomped out into the kitchen to rummage noisily in the refrigerator. I heard something clatter onto the kitchen floor.
Apparently, the best way to prevent the arrival of a new baby was to have another baby already in your house. It must be some kind of Darwinian adaptation, like the way baby sand tiger sharks gobble up their brothers and sisters while still in the womb.
The next morning, Donnie drove us to Mahina Hospital. Doctor Ishimaru had called to tell me he’d signed us up for birthing classes, just in case our plans came to fruition sooner than expected.
“You’d normally wait till you’re pregnant,” he’d explained, “but at your age, you never know what’s going to happen. And there’s an open spot in the class. Might as well get the lay of the land now.”
We weren’t even out of the car, and I already felt like an impostor. To make things worse, Donnie was missing work for this.
“Are you feeling okay?” Donnie glanced at me and then turned his attention back to the road.
It was right after the morning rush, so traffic was pleasantly sparse. I’d been surprised at first to find that Mahina had a rush hour. Or a rush half-hour to be precise—short, nasty and brutish. It was usually over by eight-fifteen.
“Sure.” I sighed. “I guess Doctor Headmirror’s program is better than the hot tub with the dead gecko floating in it.”
“What?”
“Oh. Emma told me about this birthing place she knew about down in Kuewa. The same place your sister’s husband wanted to tour. Sky Light or something?”
“Are you thinking of LightSpirit? There’s a LightSpirit Organic Farm and Natural Birthing Center.”
“Right. That’s the one.”
We took the elevator to the third floor as we’d been instructed, and stepped out into an abandoned-looking hallway. The air conditioning was on overdrive. It was freezing.
“Are we in the right place?” Donnie asked. Why was he asking me? Was I suddenly the expert?
“I don’t know. I see an open door down there. Let’s check it out.”
I walked into a conference room with about a dozen metal folding chairs lined up on one wall. A few teenagers hung around, including some young and very pregnant girls. A counseling class for troubled adolescents, I assumed. I went up to a woman who looked like she was in charge, a sun-weathered blonde in a floppy orange-and-yellow rayon batik dress. She was fiddling with a boom box, trying different kinds of serene mood music.
“Excuse me. I’m sorry to bother you, but we’re here for the birthing class. Can you tell me where it is?”
“The birthing class? Are you here with your daughter?”
“My daughter? I don’t have a daughter. I’m here with my husband.”
“Oh. Well, welcome. We’ll get started in just a minute. I’m your instructor.”
I walked out to the hallway, where Donnie was waiting.
“We’re in the right place. If there’s an after party, I guess we’ll be buying the booze.”
Donnie followed me into the room, looking grim.
“Donnie it was supposed to be a joke.”
“That lady looks about our age.” Donnie indicated the one woman in the room, other than the instructor, who looked old enough to buy alcohol without getting carded.
Donnie and I sat down on two of the metal folding chairs against the wall, but our instructor was having none of that. She urged us to join our limber young classmates on the floor.
I was flexible enough to sit on the mat, thanks to my recent yoga lessons. Donnie, who was dressed for work, looked less comfortable.
Kara introduced herself to the class and launched into a speech about the weighty responsibility of bringing a new life into the world. She warned us against a number of pastimes I wouldn’t have dreamed of pursuing, pregnant or not. After the fire-and-brimstone intro, we went into some breathing exercises, which were supposed to calm us. These went on for what seemed like hours.
The instructor finally called for a break, and the round-bellied girls all leaped to their feet and stampeded out. It took Donnie and me a little longer to get up, but we managed. The “older” woman came over to us and struck up a conversation. She, as it turned out, was not expecting. She was there to give moral support to her pregnant fifteen-year-old daughter, who was out in the hallway with the rest of the mothers-to-be, in line for the ladies’ room.
“I had her when I was sixteen.” The woman shrugged. “I told her it was hard having a kid when you’re still in school, and she should wait. But here we are. Eh, you da kine, ah? Donnie from Donnie’s Drive-Inn.”
“That’s right.” Donnie flashed his charming smile. “Home of the Lolo Lunch Plate and the Sumo Saimin Bowl.”
“Yeah, baby girl and me used to go there all the time. Lately we been going Chang’s Pizza Pagoda though. You seen their two-for-one specials?”
“Yes.” Donnie’s smile faded. “I have.”
The second half of the class was devoted to diet and lifestyle. We were warned against eating junk food, forgetting to take our vitamins, petting cats, taking acne medicine, drinking lukewarm tea, or touching hair-loss pills. But it was the injunction against new tattoos and piercings that set off groans of disappointment throughout the room.
When the instructor had listed all of the ways we could accidentally cause lasting and irreparable harm to our unborn babies, she went on to explain how important it was to keep our stress levels low.
“Some of you are the kind of women who always have to be achieving something.” She looked directly at me as she said this. “And that’s great when it comes to your schoolwork or your career. But now is not the time to be a martyr. Now is the time to surround yourself with calm and serenity, and to remove yourself from anything that causes you stress. You have to be a little bit selfish. Starting right now.”
I raised my hand.
“How does one manage that, practically? For example, my husband and I have a house full of guests. I can’t exactly pack a bag and check into a hotel.”
I felt Donnie giving me a look. I ignored him.
“Can’t you?” She smiled at me. “What’s stopping you?”
Everyone in the class was staring at me now.
“Costs money, that’s why,” someone else said, and the spotlight was off me.
CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
“Did you think the session was useful?” Donnie asked as we were driving home.
“I don’t know. You don’t need to go anymore if you don’t want to.”
“Do you really want to leave our house and check into a hotel?”
Packing a bag and retreating to a private hotel room sounded delightful. Not only would I not have to scurry around picking up after my houseguest
s, someone would clean up after me.
“No, of course not, Donnie. I only asked her the question to show how unrealistic it is to try to create a perfectly serene environment. She should have given us concrete ideas we could actually use. Like how to get a good night’s sleep. I haven’t slept through the night since your sister—well, for a while now.”
“I didn’t know you were having trouble sleeping. Do you think you should see a doctor about it?”
“Donnie, we have four adult houseguests, a crying baby, and thin walls. It’s not a medical mystery. You seem to be able to sleep through all of it. But I sure can’t.”
“Maybe we can stop at Long’s and get you some over-the-counter sleeping pills.”
“Don’t you remember when she was talking about what you can and can’t take? She said there aren’t any sleep aids considered completely safe for pregnancy.”
“But you’re not pregnant yet. Are you?”
“No. You’re right. I’m not. Oh, Donnie, I almost forgot to tell you. Seeing the library reminded me. I ran into your Uncle Brian.”
Donnie glanced at me and then turned his attention back to the road.
“You told me. When you were downtown with Davison.”
“No, I saw him again. Later.”
“Hm.”
“I guess I don’t understand how your father’s brother can be right here on the island, and you don’t even want to talk to him.”
No answer.
“He told me what happened to your parents.”
Donnie didn’t seem any more eager to talk about Uncle Brian than the last time I’d brought him up, but I plowed ahead anyway.
“Didn’t you and Gloria live with him for a while?”
“Yes.”
“Davison seems to get along with him. I don’t understand why you and Gloria are both so distant. Didn’t he take you and your sister in after your parents passed away?”
“Is that what he told you?” Donnie’s voice was level, but he was gripping the steering wheel hard.
“Is it not true?” I asked.
“No. It’s true. He took us in. He treated us well. He was generous.”