Black Jasmine (2012)

by Toby Neal

  “I gotta tell you something. Charlie Kwon is out of jail.” She said it fast, spitting the words out.

  He turned, leaning back against the counter. “So?”

  “So I’m just telling you.”

  “Why?”

  “You know why.”

  “Don’t. Let nature take its course. Scum like that always meet a bad end.”

  She turned away, took too big a sip of coffee, burned her tongue. “You know I have to deal with him.”

  “I understand you want to confront him. . .”

  “I need to confront him. I need to show him he can’t fuck with me anymore.”

  “Sad to say you’re too old for him now. Last thing on his mind is fucking with you.”

  Lei shot him a glare, pushed through the security door at the front to sit on the weathered top step, looking out into the java plum forest across the street. She could just see a sliver of ocean over the tops of the trees, lighting with the first of the day. A fresh, damp breeze blew down `Iao Valley to cool her hot cheeks and the coffee, but she blew on it anyway.

  He followed her out, sat on the step beside her. “I’m sorry. That was a shitty thing to say. What I meant was, you aren’t that child anymore.”

  “You got that right. And I need to look him in the eye and put the hurt on him for what he did.”

  “You’ve got a career that’s going well. Why endanger it for someone like him? What do you have to prove? You’re you. Beautiful. Strong. Mine.” He’d put down his mug, and his big hands reached out and took her face between them, turning her toward him, tilting her lips up to his.

  “Mine,” he said again, breathing it into her mouth as he kissed her.

  She melted into him, setting the mug down without even noticing. Charlie Kwon was temporarily forgotten, his touch erased by something better, more powerful—more present.

  “Let’s go out to Pauwela Lighthouse together later, after we work out,” he said eventually. “Don’t go without me.”

  “Think I can’t handle myself?” As always, the brittle defense leapt to her lips.

  “No. I think it’s Saturday, and we deserve to spend some time together. We can take a picnic.”

  She smiled and reached out to mock punch his hard stomach. “Ever the romantic.”

  “Someone’s gotta be.”

  Lei got on the road in her running shoes, turning in the opposite direction from Stevens’s Bronco with its big beginner surfboard lashed to the roof rack. Keiki was in fine form, prancing, waggling, and lunging at mynah birds.

  “Guess I need to tire you out, girl.” She cranked up the speed, and they pelted down the street, still damp from nightly rainfall.

  Her favorite route, a raised two-lane road that ran alongside a creek to the state park at the end, was empty of traffic. The trees, a mixture of tall, dark-leaved java plum and bright green palmate kukui, were topped with fingers of gold. Sun braised the leaves and dropped coins of light on the road ahead. Wild cocks crowed and mynahs squabbled, a background timpani to the rush of the stream. Early-morning air hinted at the rainfall the night before, the kind of sprinkle that kept `Iao Valley lush all year.

  She heard a car behind them and slowed, moving onto the shoulder and pulling Keiki in tight. The car had plenty of room to pass them on the narrow road with its steep shoulder plunging down to the boulder-strewn creek. But instead of passing them, she heard the engine roar. She didn’t have time to do anything but react as the realization hit—it was gunning for them.

  Lei dove off the shoulder of the road, Keiki’s leash tight in her fist. She rolled down the stony embankment that ended at the stream, the dog yanked off her feet and tumbling behind her. The car continued on, engine a shriek of power.

  She fetched up against a clump of strawberry guava, mere feet away from a boulder. She struggled to suck air back in, the breath knocked out of her. Keiki jumped up, shook off, and planted a warm, wet tongue on her face. She pushed the dog away and sat up slowly, checking for injuries.

  The wrist broken a few years ago had been wrenched by Keiki’s leash and gave back some jangles. Bumps and bruises chimed complaints from compass points on her body, but she’d been lucky.

  She needed to stop that car. It had to turn around; the road was a dead end at the park. Lei crawled and hauled her way back up the road, wishing she’d brought her cell phone—or the Glock. Preferably both. She and Keiki climbed up onto the road. She looked in the direction the car had taken.

  It had to pass her to leave the valley. She could flag it down and make an arrest, or at least get the plates and hunt it down later. She could go home and get her phone, badge, gun, and the truck—but he could get past her and escape if she did, and the asshole had almost killed her dog!

  Lei and Keiki walked forward on the light-shadowed road in the direction the car had taken. Lei shook out her arms and legs—she was going to have some mean bruises, but nothing appeared broken or sprained. She looked down the incline to the rocky creek bed and gave a little shudder. Yes, she’d been lucky and her dog, equally so. Keiki glanced up at her, intelligent brown eyes worried. She reached down to pat the dog’s broad head.

  “We’re okay, girl.”

  She picked up speed to a slow jog, heading up into the valley.

  Lei looked into the few driveways off the road, but she hadn’t been able to get even a glimpse of the car, so short of going up and feeling hoods, there was no way to tell if one of the residents had been their reckless driver. She entered lower `Iao Park, and as always, there were some cars parked in the lot, early visitors or broken-down vehicles that had been left for pickup later. A huge spreading banyan tree marked the beginning of the park, and she and Keiki passed under its canopy into shadow.

  That’s when she heard the roar of the engine, coming from the left. It had been waiting for them in the lee of the banyan where she couldn’t see it.

  She recoiled, yanking Keiki back, and turned to run. The road narrowed as they passed over a culvert twelve feet above the creek. There was nowhere to go.

  She ran. Ran like she never had before, adrenaline giving her a superhuman burst of speed to clear the culvert before she felt the smack of the bumper hitting her left hip and propelling her out into space. She flew, arms and legs windmilling, and like a bad dream she couldn’t wake from, landed with a gut-wrenching thud that shocked through her body. The world went mercifully black.

  Chapter 12

  Stevens pushed the wheelchair to the Bronco. The surfboards were still optimistically tied there; apparently he’d been sitting and studying the waves when the EMTs called his cell.

  Lei tapped her head, swathed in a bandage.

  “That answers what to do about my hair.” They’d had to shave the section on the side of her head where the rock had cut her scalp. “I guess I’m meant to have really short hair.”

  “That’s the least of it.” Stevens helped her out and into the front seat, settling the seat belt around her.

  “I’m really okay,” she protested, but it was feeble. Just moving caused her to hurt in a dozen places. Being run off the road and hit by a car was a good way to get find out all the places that could get bruised.

  He shook his head. She could sense something powerfully suppressed in the hard, jerky movements he made as he took the wheelchair back to the attendant and strode back to the Bronco. They’d been at the hospital for several hours as she underwent tests and observation. It had eventually been decided that she had a concussion and a lot of bruises but was okay to go home.

  Stevens got in beside her and turned on the SUV.

  “So much for our picnic.” Lei looked down at her blood-stiffened running shirt. The head wound had bled a lot before they stitched it.

  “So tell me what happened.”

  “I already told you. It hasn’t changed since the last time, ten minutes ago.”

  “I want to hear it again.”

  “Police harassment,” she said, with an attempt at a smile. Perhaps t
hat wasn’t reassuring, because he looked away abruptly.

  The hospital wasn’t far from their house, so it wasn’t long before they had to go through the ordeal of getting her inside. She didn’t want to go to bed, so after helping her with a brief shower and then wrapping her in her favorite kimono, Stevens set her up on the nice leather couch they’d sprung for when they moved in. He propped her up with pillows and covered her with the crocheted afghan Aunty Rosario had made so long ago.

  Keiki sat beside Lei. The big dog wouldn’t leave her side, and Lei found it comforting to breathe her doggy smell. She trailed her fingers through the dog’s ruff and down to scratch her chest. Keiki set her big square head on Lei’s tummy and gazed at her with soulful brown eyes. Heroine of the hour, the dog had run back and forth on the road, barking nonstop, until she attracted a passerby.

  Stevens poured Lei a glass of water. “They said to stay hydrated.”

  She groaned but took the glass and sipped. “Wish those pain meds would work.”

  “Tell me again.”

  “Oh God.” She handed him the glass. “The guy was gunning for me, no question about it. Ran me off the road; I knew the park was a dead end and he’d have to come back. So I followed him, wanted to wave him down and do a citizen’s arrest, at least get a look at the plates.”

  Stevens shot up with the coiled grace that was a part of everything he did.

  “That’s where I’m having a problem with this. It never occurred to you someone wanted to kill your ass? I mean, you’re well known. Who knows who might have tracked us since the Cult Killer case? You should have gotten yourself straight home! You were close to the house at that point—you should have gotten your weapon and called me!”

  “I know that now. I thought it was just a reckless driver that needed to be stopped. I mean, he almost hit Keiki.”

  The blow to the head had knocked the sass out of her, and her voice was small. This felt like the repeat of old arguments.

  Stevens sat back down. “Yeah, and he actually did hit you, in case you didn’t notice. I know I shouldn’t be yelling. But you could have been killed, and I don’t. . .” He got up and paced again. “I don’t know what I would do if I lost you like that.”

  He went to the kitchen, leaned against the sink, and looked out at the mountain behind the house, rising green and bright with full day. He turned back.

  “So you didn’t ever see the car?”

  “No. Nothing. It came from behind the first time, and I jumped out of the way. Second time, he ambushed me from the side and hit me here. I barely had room to go anywhere.” She touched the hip where the bumper had made contact, a purple-black bruise under the robe. “I’m actually lucky.”

  “Don’t you think I know it?” Stevens banged some pots around. “Let me fix you something to eat.”

  “I don’t know. Kinda nauseous.” She rested her bandaged head against the couch cushions. “Just gonna rest a minute.”

  Approaching night was turning the air blue when she woke up. Stevens watched a ball game from the armchair, and a plate of omelet congealed beside her on the coffee table. He must have been watching for signs of life, because he rose at once and came to sit beside her. Keiki lifted her head off her paws and licked Lei’s dangling hand.

  “How’re you feeling?”

  “Better, actually. Think I need the bathroom.” She was able to totter in and do her business on her own. He’d given the omelet to Keiki and was back in the kitchen.

  “Hungry?”

  “Yeah.” Lei had been dreaming—and in the dream a beautiful red-haired girl pointed into the tent village. The image haunted her—her gut was telling her there was more to find out at the Lighthouse. “Can we still go out to Pauwela Lighthouse?”

  “No. Absolutely not. They said a minimum of twenty-four hours of bed rest. You could have a clot or something.”

  “Tomorrow, then?”

  He shook his head, getting out a box of pasta. “Maybe. If you’re good.”

  “Okay.” She snuggled into the couch and decided to enjoy being waited on, since she didn’t have much of a choice and her head really did hurt.

  Chapter 13

  Stevens helped her out of the Bronco onto the wind-scored grass on the bluff at Pauwela Lighthouse the next morning. She slapped at his hands irritably.

  “I’m fine. I can do it myself.”

  “God, you’re stubborn.” He walked away, heading for the deep marks the fire trucks had left at the top of the bluff. She followed, already feeling bad for being so cranky and wishing she could take back her words.

  They stood looking the down the rugged bluff at the black rocks where the wreck had been. A crew had winched it up the bluff the day before, but glass still added an extra sparkle to the clear tide pools below, and rainbows of oil marked the water.

  A blanket of clouds on the horizon threatened rain, and the ocean had gone slate blue snagged by whitecaps. Lei found her eyes scanning for whales and was rewarded by a featherlike spout bigger than any wind-driven wavelet.

  A gust caught the big square Band-Aid on her head and pulled her hair. She held it down gently. Stevens had run a clipper on the number five setting over her whole head, and her curls were now evenly shorn, an inch or so long all over her head. She still remembered the intimacy of the clipper running up the back of her neck, the feel of his gentle fingers treating the wound. She pressed against his side, and he put an arm around her.

  “Sorry I’m such a bitch.”

  “Yes, you are.” He kissed the top of her head. “Sure you want to do this?”

  “We have a photo now. Maybe there was a reason she came here or was brought here.”

  Stevens turned with her to face the dense underbrush where the tent village hid. “Let’s get this over with so we can go home.”

  They pushed forward through knee-high grass until they found a path and followed it straight to the first tent, the one where the young mother lived.

  “Anyone home? Maui Police,” Stevens called.

  A long moment passed before the door of the tent unzipped and the young woman came out. She was holding the baby this time, its dark eyes wide and serious.

  “You called Child Welfare on me, bitch.” She gave Lei a hard stare.

  “You deserved it, bitch.” Lei gave some attitude back, though her head and bruises hurt too much for any heat. “Thought if I called them you might get some more services, maybe a place at the shelter.” The homeless shelter was already overcrowded, with a waiting list.

  “Yeah, well, it didn’t help.” The woman sat in the folding beach chair and gestured to a second one. Lei sat gingerly. Her hip hit the arm of the chair, and she winced. Stevens reached down to pat her shoulder and hit another bruise. She flinched again.

  “What happened?”

  “Hit by a car.”

  “Shit.”

  “Yeah.”

  “So what do you want now?”

  “We have a picture of the girl who died in the car.” Lei handed the color-enhanced photocopy they were circulating to the woman. “We’re still trying to find out who she is, what she might have been doing out here.”

  The young mother looked at the lovely dead face for a long moment. “I’d remember her if I’d seen her, but I haven’t.”

  “Okay.”

  Lei took back the photo, stood slowly from the chair. She handed the girl her card. “You have my number, if you see or hear anything.”

  “Well. There’s a girl here who might know something. I mean, she’s around the same age as this one, is all, and she’s new here.”

  “Where?”

  “She’s camping with Ramona.” The young woman pointed.

  “We know who Ramona is. Thanks. And we’ll try to get you some services; I’ll make some calls.”

  The woman laid her cheek along the baby’s downy head. “Okay.”

  Lei and Stevens approached the bluff-side tent of the imposing Hawaiian woman. She was still out in front, this time
working a basket. It was an elaborate construction with patterns of dark hala leaves worked into geometric shapes among light golden ones. Seated at the rickety table beside her was a dark-haired young woman. She looked up at their approach and hurried into the tent, zipping it up behind her.

  “Don’t tell me, the other guy looks worse.” Ramona looked Lei over.

  Lei snorted a laugh. “I wish. I was hit by a car. Run off the road.”

  “Someone have it in for you?”

  “I don’t know.” Ramona had a way of bringing out the truth. “Maybe.”

  “Well, then you know a little about what brings a lot of us out here.” Ramona waved a hand. “This camp’s for those with nowhere else to go.”

  Lei gestured to the tent. “Does she have anywhere else to go?”

  “I don’t know. Probably. She hasn’t talked much.”

  “Can we ask her a few questions? We just want to see if she might know this girl.” Lei brought out the photo. Ramona peered at it and shook her head.

  “Don’t know her.” She turned to the tent. “Anchara, come out. Nothing to worry about from these folks.”

  The door unzipped and a face peered out. The girl knelt in the opening. She was striking, with dark almond eyes set above scimitar cheekbones. Jet-black hair hung in snarls and tangles past her hips. Lei’s hand crept up to touch her own shorn head at the sight.

  “Hi, Anchara,” Lei said. “We just want to see if you know someone.” She proffered the photo.

  The girl came out a little more, held out her hand. Lei put the photo in it and witnessed the moment Anchara recognized Jane Doe. She dropped the picture and it fluttered to the ground as she withdrew inside and zipped up the tent.

  Stevens had a way of reining in his presence so he became like a tree or a stone, there but not threatening—a calm stillness that he could don at will. Lei called it his “cloak of invisibility,” and she wished she knew how he did it. He hunkered down by the closed flap, finally speaking.

  “You know her? We just want to find out who she was.”

  No answer.