by Cathryn Cade
“Great,” Melia said brightly. “Let’s see if they want to snorkel.”
“Good idea.” David stood up. “Excuse us, please.”
“Well,” Suzy said, “I think it is time we all got back to the airport. Doesn’t our flight leave in a few hours?”
“Yes,” Benton agreed stiffly. “Lalei?”
She leaned away from him, digging her nails into the lounger. Jack grunted, and she started, realizing that her hand had been resting on his, not the chair. He flipped his hand palm up, capturing hers. “Gotta do something about this sadistic bent of yours,” he muttered just loud enough for her.
“Sorry.” Too upset to be embarrassed, Lalei stared at her mother, ignoring Benton, who stood waiting for her to rise as well. Rebellion burned as Suzy gave her a steely look.
Rescue arrived from an unlikely quarter.
“I’m sorry, Suzy. I should have told you,” Melia said, swinging her legs over the side of her lounger. We invited Lalei to stay a few days longer here at Nawea. Didn’t we, David?”
“We did,” her husband agreed, taking her hand to help her rise. “Sure glad you folks could make it over.”
“Great that you could come to the wedding,” Daniel agreed, shoving himself out of his chair and pulling Claire after him. “Suzy, thanks again for the great, ah…”
“Towels,” Claire finished. “So beautiful, and what quality. We’ll use them for years and years.”
Lalei wondered if she’d lost her mind or if they had. Claire, gushing over towels?
Her backrest moved again, nearly catapulting her off the lounger. Jack giving her another nudge, this one not so gentle. She shot to her feet. “Oh yes. Sorry, Mama. Forgot to tell you I’m staying on. I’ll be home…Thursday or so.”
She moved forward, ducking Benton, and gave her mother an air kiss near her perfumed cheek. “See you soon.”
“You are behaving like a—a loose island girl,” Suzy hissed near her ear. Aloud, she added plaintively, “Benton, I’m so sorry about the wasted money on the plane ticket.”
“I’ll reimburse him,” Lalei said through her teeth. “Better go. Don’t want to miss your flight.” She and her mother traded one last glare, and then Suzy turned away, her chin high, reaching for Benton’s arm. But he was staring at Lalei, his face so tight that white lines creased his cheeks.
“I’ll walk you up.” David offered his arm to Suzy. “You can take the Ford Escape. Just leave it in long-term parking, and someone will pick it up tomorrow.”
“Lalei.” Benton’s sharp voice made Lalei react as usual, freezing. Why couldn’t she just walk away? Even after her wild rebellion last night, all those years of ladylike pliancy were drilled into her very bones. “Please walk with me and your mother.”
She nodded tightly and walked beside him, around the palms and up the lawn. The sun was hot on her back, the grass cool and prickly under her bare feet.
“I am extremely displeased by your behavior,” he said coldly as soon as they were out of earshot of those on the lanai. “As is Suzy. You must put all this foolishness aside and come back to Honolulu with us.”
Lalei stared at him from behind her sunglasses, her heart sinking. He still wanted her after he knew—hell, after he’d heard her having sex with Jack?
He gazed straight ahead, his stance implacable. “I am prepared to overlook this episode, if you promise it will be the last of this…promiscuousness.”
Lalei flinched as if he’d slapped her, shocked and then furious. “I am not a whore, Benton. Jack is—”
He cut off her words with a sharp motion of his free hand. “It is clearly the influence of this branch of the Ho’omalus. They live the old-fashioned island lifestyle, free and easy. You do not belong here—you are your mother’s daughter.”
Lalei didn’t care any longer if anyone saw them. She pointed her finger at him, shaking with rage. “Don’t you insult my ohana. I am proud to be a Ho’omalu. My behavior is my choice.”
She realized her voice had risen only when the nearest door into the house opened, and Homu stepped out. He stood there in the deep shade of the lanai, watching.
Lalei shook her head at Benton. “You’re the one who should return to Honolulu. I’m staying here. And I may not come back.”
With that, she turned and ran across the lawn toward the house. Homu held the door open for her, his brows lowering as he looked past her at Benton.
The screen door slapped softly shut behind her as Lalei stopped in the middle of the cool, comfortable room. A ceiling fan stirred the air lazily, the day’s newspapers were strewn across a table, and a laptop sat open on the ottoman before a big, comfortable chair.
“You are very upset, keiki.” Homu touched her shoulder, his deep voice kind.
Lalei wrapped her arms around her bare midriff, hot tears flooding her eyes. “I’m sorry to make a fuss in your home. I should never have let Mother bring him here.”
Homu surprised her by chuckling. “Might have been difficult to stop her. Suzy is very good in her sweet way, at getting what she wants.”
Lalei lifted one hand and swiped at her wet cheeks, somehow not embarrassed to cry in front of him. “You know her well.”
“‘Ae, yes.”
This calm acknowledgement made her look up into his face. “Uncle…why did you invite her here, to Daniel’s wedding?” The two sides of her family had little in common other than their Hawaiian heritage.
Homu sighed. “Always before, Lalei, you have come to us by yourself. You pass back and forth between da Big Island and Honolulu, between the two sides of Hawaii. And each time you return to us, you seem…less comfortable here, less able to relax and be the girl we remember. I hope that you don’t think your old uncle and auntie meddle too much, but we wanted Suzy with you this time so that you can see the difference in the two parts of your life.”
Lalei sniffled. “Maybe Benton’s right and I don’t belong here either. I am my mother’s daughter.” As she repeated his words, they sank in her middle like a stone weight.
“You are your father’s daughter as well. You are Ho’omalu. You will always belong here,” her uncle corrected. He smiled at her, but his eyes remained serious. “If you want to. And you are indeed your mother’s daughter. But perhaps that means something other than what you think.”
Lalei shook her head. “Is that a riddle? Sorry, I’m too upset to figure it out. I need to go…get myself together.”
“It will come to you, my dear.” He waited until she’d reached the door to speak again. “Jack is a good man, yeah?”
Lalei froze, her hand on the door, her mind a perfect blank of shock. ”Yeah,” she mumbled. She fled out into the hot sunshine, her skin burning with embarrassment.
She ran down across the lawn and into the tangle of trees at the east end of the bay, not caring who watched. She had to get away.
Oh Pele, she’d meant for her mother and Benton to overhear her with Jack, but she’d forgotten about the Ho’omalus.
How could she have been so stupid? This was their house, their retreat, and she’d practically had public sex with another of their guests, right under their noses. Certainly in range of their ears. She’d wanted to shake things up, and she’d done it, but at what price?
Chapter Seven
Deep in the tangle of trees that clustered at the east end of the bay, Lalei sank onto a large lava boulder at the edge of the water, smoothed by eons of waves. She felt as if some reckless stranger had come to visit her, mind and body. But was this new Lalei a stranger, or was she simply the Hawaiian girl who had once eagerly emerged on her visits to the Kona Ho’omalus?
Slumping back against the upright rock behind her, she gazed unseeingly at the gentle surf lapping at her feet. She sat in shadow, but outside the trees, the sun sparkled on the sea. It was as if she sat in a tunnel…or a hallway.
Slowly the scene slipped away and became another place. Day became night.
She walked along the broad upper hallway of her
family’s Honolulu home. Moonlight shone through the tall windows, limning the familiar walk in soft shades. As she neared the end, instead of her own bedroom door she saw a huge doorway.
Her heart pounding, limbs shaking with fear, she reached out and took the old-fashioned door pull and opened the door.
Her father stood there. He was just as she remembered him from photos, slim and smiling, with ebony Ho’omalu eyes.
“Lalei,” he beckoned. “E hele mai, come.”
But the darkness behind him was beginning to glow with red-gold light, as if the very heart of the mountain burned beyond.
She stepped back, shaking her head frantically. “No, no, Papa. Don’t ask me. You come with me.”
“Lalei, come,” he repeated insistently. “You are your mother’s daughter.”
The fiery light grew, flames licking so close she felt their heat.
Lalei screamed.
She woke up with a start to find herself standing in the close tangle of trees, her feet in the surf, shaking, her skin at once cold and clammy with perspiration, her throat still raw from her cry.
Shoving back her hair, Lalei looked around her. She was safe at Nawea Bay, but what had just happened to her? Had she had some sort of blackout, or had she fallen asleep? If so, she’d never had any dream like this before.
Up on the mountain, thunder muttered portentously. The clouds gathered, dark and full.
“‘Ae,” voices echoed in the thunder. “Join us, little sister. Bring the rain.”
Hugging her arms around herself, Lalei gazed at the clouds massing over the mountain, as turbulent as her emotions. The dream, if that was what it had been, had frightened her, so real. But more than that, it seemed to have opened up something inside her, like turning the handle of a pressure release valve. Or maybe she’d opened it last night, quarreling with her mother or having sex with Jack.
She was so tired of battling to keep her emotions and her desires, her needs bundled deep inside. She wanted…to be herself. To set free her anger like the thunder, her tears like the rain.
Turning her head, she peered up through a gap in the trees at the driveway behind the house. Underneath the lowering clouds, her mother and Benton hurried along the driveway, Benton’s arms full of luggage.
Anger breached the dam of emotions jammed inside her. Oh, she’d like to send them on their way, all right. Her body unfurled, standing straight and tall. Head high, she looked up the mountain.
“Pele, laue mai ka ua loka, bring the pouring rains.” Lifting her hands, palms up, Lalei beckoned to the clouds. Then she froze, transfixed as power twined through her, her body shaking, as if she stood on the verge of some new knowing, some new facet of her being. Her hair floated around her, crackling as if static electricity shot through it.
Part of her was terrified. Was she about to be struck by lightning, here among the trees? Would they find her, another cinder blending with the ancient lava under her bare feet?
The new Lalei smiled fiercely, a woman on the verge of knowing her true nature. “Bring the rain,” she repeated, louder this time. “Come on, Pele, bring it!”
Thunder rolled. Somewhere in the clouds above, lightning flashed. A gust of wind blew through the trees, followed by a sheet of silver rain that swept down the driveway of the house like a curtain, enveloping the man and woman beside the vehicle.
Lalei clapped her hands over her mouth and watched, aghast and gleeful, as Benton and her mother scrambled inside the small SUV, soaking wet. Then, as the vehicle’s lights came on, and the motor raced, she threw back her head and laughed.
Euphoric, she lifted her arms to the warm rain as it reached her hideaway, and closed her eyes, letting it wash over her, sluicing over her hair and face, her bare skin. Not washing away her anger but baptizing her with the right to her own emotions, to her true nature.
She whirled in a dizzy circle, opening her mouth to drink the rain. It tasted sweet and wild and left her thirsty for more. For life and all that it contained, all that it promised for her.
She was her mother’s daughter. Pele, mother of all who dwelt on these islands.
Jack found her this way.
Watching her confrontation with Choy, he wondered what hold the bastard had over her and why her mother seemed to be throwing her at him. Maybe he should just go and punch his smug face. Not only did the dude treat Lalei like a possession, he supported the predacious TropicSun. None of what Jack had heard about Frank Decker was good.
Homu stepped out of the house, and Lalei ran to him. Jack relaxed a little, but part of him wished he could’ve solved it his way. Would’ve felt good to punch the guy. He boxed once in a while, sparring at his gym, and he had a hell of a right.
He stood watching as the others wandered toward the dock, along with Claire’s parents. Then Lalei ran from the house, still in her little bikini, her long hair flying behind her. She tore down the lawn and into the trees, disappearing. Ouch. He wondered uneasily if her uncle had lectured her about their tryst, wondered if he should go up and apologize to his host for his part in it.
Then the clouds began to lower, and he heard thunder.
“Oh no,” Claire complained from the dock, her voice carrying clearly in the hushed air. “We can’t go in the water if it’s going to storm.”
“Weather sure comes in fast here,” her father said, eyeing the clouds with astonishment.
Jack had to agree with that. But as the rain rolled down across the mountain to the shore, instead of joining the others under the awning on the dock, he turned the other way. The rain poured down in a silver sheet, sluicing down on his hot skin, while the thunder beat like a bass drum. Lightning flashed overhead from cloud to cloud.
Lalei was alone in the forest. She was a city girl; she’d probably be terrified. And was that a cry of fear he’d heard?
He jogged across the wet lawn, slipping once on the sloping grass and catching himself with an outstretched arm. Back upright, he ran on, down among the tangle of vegetation that lined the shore. The ancient path led into the trees, lined with rocks worn smooth by centuries of footsteps.
And there he saw her. Near the shore, under a huge fig tree that leaned out over the water, sat a high, flat rock, with another leaning back behind it. Great place to sit and enjoy a quiet moment in the forest…or something else.
Lalei stood before the rock, her head tipped back joyously to accept the rain pattering down on her upturned face. She was a beautiful pagan, her hair plastered to her head, rivulets of water running down her bare skin, catching on the tips of her silver-clad breasts and the tiny triangle of her bottoms, her eyes closed and that luscious mouth parted as if waiting to be filled.
She opened her eyes and saw him. Tipping her head down slowly, she stared at him, her black eyes pools of feminine mystery. Then she put out her tongue and licked a drop of water from her full lower lip, and he found himself moving across the damp earth until he stood directly before her. So close he could feel the warmth coming off her skin and smell her…that indefinable, seductive scent of a woman.
He remembered how it had felt to have her in his arms, her breasts and her sweet treasures bared just for him. To be deep inside her, surrounded by her sweet, wet heat.
Desire swept down through him in a lava-hot rush, from his brain to his cock and everything else in between. He wanted her, just like this, wet and wild and free, here in the forest. His earlier aggression morphed into hot, gut-clenching lust.
And judging by the way her nostrils flared and her breasts trembled as her breathing sped up, she wanted him too.
“Yeah?” he asked, his voice guttural, coming clear out of his chest.
“Yeah,” she answered and reached up for him at the same time he put his hands on her little waist and pulled her to him.
She was lithe and slender and soft, her skin cool on the surface but so warm underneath. As their skin met, he wanted to curl himself around her, envelop her, draw that warmth into him and hold on to it. Her mouth
was so soft, so warm under his, opening to let him inside that warm, honeyed lushness, share her sweetness with him.
He slipped one hand under her ass and lifted her up against him, turning blindly to set her on the ancient, smooth rock. Her legs parted, drawing him between them, and he leaned into her, holding her in his arms, cocking his head to deepen the kiss, deaf and dumb and blind to anything but her.
Her hands stroked his head, slender fingers furrowing through his wet hair. Then they stroked down his neck and over his shoulders, squeezing the breadth and heft of his muscles.
He shuddered, loving the feel of her hands on him. Her soft little breasts pillowed against his chest, the combination of skin and wet cloth making him crazy.
Breaking away from her kiss with difficulty, he leaned back enough to glimpse her breasts. “Take your top off.”
Breathing as hard as he was, she reached for the clasp between her breasts. Her hands shook as she unfastened it and then pulled it open. Jack groaned as she shrugged it away, leaving her breasts bared to him, bobbling with her movement like luscious fruit.
“Lie back, baby. I didn’t get to taste these last time. Today, they’re mine.”
She reached up and held on to him, pulling him with her as she lay back on the wet, black rock. Jack went willingly, his hands already reaching for those tempting mounds of sweet flesh, each topped with a sweet nipple, waiting for his tongue to lick them into his mouth. He captured one in his hand, squeezing it and rolling the nipple as he sucked the other, softly at first as he tested the feel and taste, and then harder as she bucked under him, her nails digging into the skin of his back.
“I guess I am good at that,” he muttered as he obeyed the tug of her hands, urging him to her other breast. God, he loved the taste and feel of her nipples on his tongue, the beaded areolas and firm little points. He could go on suckling her all day, intoxicated by the sweetness.
“You’re okay,” she retorted but spoiled her off-handedness by whimpering as he sucked her nipple into his mouth, hard, and rolled the wet one between his thumb and forefinger.