A Wave of Murder

by Kay Hadashi

  “As soon as I have a few hours, I promise.”

  Finding two cups of yogurt in the fridge, she sat down at the table with Thérèse. No sooner was she settled, her phone rang.

  “Now what?”

  “No be cross, Momma. Jus’ a phone call.”

  “You’re right, little one.” The call was from Trinh. “How’s work?”

  “Kinda boring without you here.”

  “My life is that good for gossip?”

  “The entire OR is talking about tomorrow. There’s even a wagering pool on the time of birth. Hey, how’s Thérèse?”

  “Eating a sandwich, followed by a popsicle, and then another nap.”

  “I gotta take ‘nother nap?” the girl asked.

  Melanie nodded at her.

  “And you?”

  “Good for another hour, and then Dottie gets here.”

  Trinh began laughing. “Tomorrow evening, there’s going to be six of you over on your side of the house!”

  “One big happy family. But I have the idea once the baby starts to fuss in the middle of the night, some of the older ones will vacate in a hurry for quiet, air-conditioned resort rooms.”

  “Dottie hung in there for the duration when Thérèse was a baby.”

  “First grandkid. She’s had another since then. The excitement has worn off. Anyway, she enjoyed being a part of the show back then.”

  “What about Addie?” Trinh asked.

  “People keep asking that. She’s a big question mark. On the one hand, I don’t mind being generous to someone in her circumstance. But there’s a limit, you know?”

  “You’re way more generous than I would be, Mel. But maybe you’re right. As soon as the baby starts to wail, she’ll make a beeline for the airport.”

  “What’re you doing for dinner?” Melanie asked.

  “Oh, no you don’t. You’re not bringing me into the fray on the same day Dottie gets here. Once she sees Addie shacked up in your house, there’s gonna be some jealousy stuff going on, which will only lead to a turf war. Leave me out of your soap opera, thank you very much. Anyway, Harmon is taking me out.”

  “Well, at least you’re getting something, if nobody else in the house is.”

  “I wish. I’ve put the brakes on all that until he decides what he really wants. This engagement ring being swapped back and forth is getting tiresome.”

  “The current status must be off?” Melanie asked.

  “Right. And each time he asks me to wear it again, I make him offer bigger promises.”

  “Yes, well, we both have our little soap operas. You’ll be there tomorrow, right?”

  “At work? Of course.”

  “No, in the delivery room.”

  “I’m planning on not working in a room doing cases tomorrow, just so I can sneak out to be with you. Josh knows to give me a call when the time comes.”

  After apprising Trinh of the latest developments with the police investigations, very much like a morning report on rounds at the hospital, she turned over official mayoral duties to her.

  “I’ll try not to screw up Maui too much, Mel.”

  Melanie laughed. “Any more than I already have.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Just as she was getting the dishes washed and the kitchen tidied, Melanie got another call.

  “Tomorrow, right?” Detective Nakatani asked.

  “I keep saying unless I can have it sooner, but I’ve run out of time. What’s up, Detective?”

  “There’s a new vic.”

  Melanie stopped what she was doing. “Another surfer?”

  “This one washed ashore at the Maui to Lanai ferry dock in Lahaina. Passengers were boarding, watching as it slowly floated closer. Imagine the looks on their faces when it finally got close enough to recognize what it was.”

  “Which ferry?” she asked.

  “Nine o’clock this morning.”

  “Which of course is the busiest one.” Melanie didn’t know what to do. Some public relations was necessary, to let not just the public know but tourists that everything was fine on Maui, nothing to worry about. But it wasn’t fine and there was plenty to worry about. In one week’s time, three young men, recent arrivals from the mainland, had died, quite possibly murdered, and near one of Maui’s most popular tourist areas. It was something the mayor would need to give a reassuring pep talk about. She was in need of her own pep talk right then, though. “Look, I can’t deal with that right now. I’ve already handed over the reins of the island to Trinh. I’m in no condition to go to the morgue, view a body, and then put everyone’s mind at ease with an inspiring speech. And I know Trinh will still be at work for a few more hours, after which, she’ll be busy for the rest of the evening.”

  It was something of a lie, that Trinh would be busy. It was only a date with Harm.

  “I’ll take care of it. At this point, there isn’t much to say.”

  “Nothing new on the first two?”

  “No, but we’re getting a lot of action on the auction sites.”

  “Speaking of auctions, whatever happened to Detective Kalemakani?” she asked. “I thought he was investigating those crimes, while you investigate the deaths?”

  “Who?”

  “I thought he said his name was Kalemakani when he called me the one time.”

  “I don’t know everyone at the precinct station yet,” Nakatani said. “Otherwise, I seem to be stuck with both investigations.”

  “Maybe now that you have a third death, you’ll find something that links them all together,” Melanie offered.

  “Well, even though they’re from the same state, the first two never seemed to cross paths until they got here. Neither had jobs at the same place or went to school at the same place. In fact, neither went to college at all. Just sort of drifted in and out of jobs.”

  “Wait. You said Kenny Winston didn’t go to college?” Melanie asked.

  “That’s right. Why?”

  “I distinctly remember his mother saying something about him going to college for a couple of years but not doing well. She was even hoping he’d get back in, either here or back in Arizona.”

  “I’ll dig a little more, but nothing came up on our searches these last few days.”

  “I got the impression he was going to a community college in Phoenix right before he came here.” From the corner of her eye, Melanie saw the head of someone go by outside the kitchen window, quickly followed by another. “Hold on just a sec.”

  She went out to the back porch and caught sight of two men just as they were trotting down the driveway.

  “Hey! This is private property! You need to ask permission if you want access to the trails!”

  One of the men waved his hand apologetically as they picked up speed in hurrying away.

  “Melanie, what’s going on?” he asked.

  “Oh, just a couple of trespassers. Somehow, the trails up into the mountains behind my house have gotten into a tourist brochure. In the last few weeks, we’ve seen someone at least once a week, and those are just the ones we see.”

  “Want me to come take a look?”

  “They’ll be long gone by the time you get here.”

  “Is there anything up there?” he asked.

  “Just old trails that wind around in circles. One supposedly goes all the way over the pali into the Iao Valley. Otherwise, it’s mostly open areas with old sugar cane here and there in the lower areas, and native forest in the higher elevations. Josh and I had our first date on one of those trails.”

  “You don’t have anything worth stealing on your property?”

  “Vegetables in the pea patch, and just old tools in the shed. I doubt they’re car prowlers. They’re always wet, as though they’ve just come down out of the forest.”

  “Have you recognized them as being the same ones as earlier times?” he asked.

  “None of us have ever seen them a second time. Josh has seen them, Trinh, her kids, and now me. These guys looked like
tourists with knapsacks on their backs. If it was later in the school year, I’d guess they were students out collecting vegetation samples for a science class, but kids from the college always ask permission first. No, I’m sure they were just tourists following a trail that has been included in some island activity website.”

  “Have Josh take a look around out there to see if anything is missing from your property. And it might be a good idea to put up a few No Trespassing signs.”

  Seeing Josh driving up the driveway from the road below, she grabbed the broom from the corner and swept the porch, knocking several of the old slippers to one side.

  “Speak of the devil, he’s home, and he’s brought his mother with him.”

  Nakatani chuckled. “Good luck with that. And I hope everything goes smoothly tomorrow.”

  Melanie slipped her phone into a pocket and put the broom away, and greeted Dottie with a smile when she emerged from the car. She called for Thérèse to join her on the back porch to welcome them.

  “Melanie! You’re so big!”

  That stung.

  “Thanks, Dorothy. Welcome back to Maui.”

  “And look at this little munchkin! You’ve grown so much!” Dottie said when she got to the porch. She began tickling Thérèse, which made the girl shriek.

  “Mom! She just had her tonsils out yesterday, remember? Let’s not make her scream too much, okay?” Josh followed along behind with the woman’s luggage. By the time he got to the porch, Dottie was already in the house with Thérèse, getting a tour. He leaned in close to Melanie to whisper, “Already calling her Dorothy?”

  “She called me fat.”

  “You are kind of big.”

  “It’s called pregnant,” she hissed. “What’s her excuse?”

  “Mom’s not heavy,” he said, going into the house.

  Melanie waited until he was out of earshot, before muttering, “I meant inside her head.”

  She found the others at the guest rooms, one of which Addie was still using. Several years before when Melanie finished her surgical training and returned to Maui, Trinh came with her. They had an addition of two bedrooms and a bathroom built onto one side of the house where Trinh and her kids lived for a while before building their own addition onto another side of the house. Since then, it had become the nanny’s room and guest room, with Melanie planning to turn both rooms into the ‘nanny suite’, where the next nanny would live while caring for the toddler. By some accident, Addie was shown to that room by Thérèse when she first showed up.

  “Who’s in the room I normally use?” Dottie asked, looking inside the door.

  “We have another houseguest,” Josh said. “Just take the other room. It’s the same.”

  “That’s the nursery,” Melanie said. “She can use my grandparents’ old room.”

  It was a room rarely used except for overflow storage of clothing, and more recently, the box of stuff Dottie had sent.

  Josh carried her bags in after Dottie and Melanie went in.

  “Well, I can get it painted,” Dottie said.

  Melanie didn’t say a word, only walked out. Halfway down the hall, the dam burst. “Josh!”

  He came into their bedroom a moment later.

  “The door.”

  He closed it.

  She put up her finger to keep him quiet. “She is not painting. Nor will she buy us new clothes, dress my daughter in frilly dresses, plant roses in the pea patch, raise goats in the back yard, or have a fireplace installed. She is here as a guest, not as a decorator, farmer, esthetician, rancher, or social worker. Is that clear?”

  Once she heard Josh end his lecture to his mother on what wouldn’t happen on her visit, Melanie went back to see her mother-in-law. She sat in the corner of the room while Dottie put her things away in drawers and the closet, still making it look like she was moving in permanently. She talked almost nonstop about Wyoming, and Josh’s family there. “But look at you! Tomorrow’s the big day, right?”

  “Tomorrow at noon.”

  “What’s my role? What am I doing?”

  There it was. She was already trying to take over. Dottie had been instrumental in assisting with Thérèse’s birth when Melanie delivered in a spa during a hurricane, unable to make it to the hospital. Now, Melanie needed to relegate the woman’s role to sitting in the waiting room with everyone else, and without hurting the woman’s feelings. “Mostly, keeping Thérèse under control out in the waiting room while Josh is in the delivery room with me.”

  “But…”

  “Josh is my coach and I need only one of them. Not that I need one. A bigger job is staying with Thérèse and keeping her out of trouble. Anyway, it might take a while. My OB is something of a control freak, and I’m leaving everything to her to manage.”

  “If there’s anything else I can help with, let me know.”

  Melanie tried to get out of her chair but couldn’t. “There isn’t. Unless you want to get dinner started. We’re getting tired of Josh’s cooking.”

  “How long has he been cooking?”

  “For most of the summer.”

  “And you’re as big as you are? That’s a surprise,” Dottie said. She began remaking the bed.

  “Why?”

  “Oh, if he went camping, he could cook pancakes in a basket over a campfire. In a real kitchen, he’s inept.”

  “Well, hopefully we’re not having pancakes for dinner.”

  Dottie left the room, leaving Melanie behind to try and get out of the chair on her own. She heard Josh ask his mother where she was, but didn’t hear an answer. A moment later, he came into the room.

  “I’m stuck,” she said.

  “Mom said something about you craving pancakes for dinner?”

  “Have you ever seen me eat a pancake?”

  He got hold of her hands and pulled. “Just that time when we went camping on the beach this summer.”

  “Did I finish it?”

  “I seem to recall you making an announcement you’d never eat one again.”

  She waddled out of the room behind him, one hand on her back. “And I’m sticking with that.”

  “Hey, I thought I saw a couple of guys running down the driveway. Who were they?” he asked.

  “Who knows? Probably a couple of tourists that went wandering through the hills for a while. I saw a couple of them earlier.”

  “They seemed in a bigger hurry than just going back to the hotel.”

  “Go out and check the carport and shed, make sure they didn’t make off with anything. And I think there are a couple of my grandfather’s old No Trespassing signs in the shed you can put up.”

  She looked in on Thérèse and found a game of some sort had started between her and her grandmother, dealing with dinosaurs charging each other. Figuring the naps were done for the day, she went to her room to change clothes. Grabbing a bottle of lotion, she set that back and took another, an expensive brand she normally reserved for passionate nights with Josh. Today, she just wanted it for the pleasant scent. She was spreading that over her belly when he came in.

  He stopped and looked. “Isn’t that…”

  “Nope. Today, it’s anti-bitch lotion.”

  “Your skin itches?” he asked.

  “No, you heard me right.” She gave him the bottle. “Feet and legs, please. And save some for your mother.”

  “Now what did she do?”

  “She called me fat again. Whatever happened to calling pregnant women glowing, or beautiful, or stunning?”

  “Do I have to talk to her again?” he asked. “Please don’t make me talk to her again. Not so soon.”

  Melanie watched as he applied lotion to her legs. “Do I act that way when we visit her home? I’m polite to her and the rest of the family when we go there every Christmas, right?”

  “Mostly.”

  “Why mostly?” she asked.

  “You have a peculiar expression on your face at the dinner table.”

  “Yes, watching as dead
animals are consumed has that effect on a vegetarian.”

  “Finished.” He gave back the lotion. “There’s good news. The tropical storm that was headed here has veered off again and weakened.”

  “As they usually do. Lightning doesn’t strike in the same place twice.”

  He stood. “Time to find the signs.”

  Half an hour later, Melanie went outside to find Josh, still working in the shed.

  “What in the world are you doing? I said look for a couple of signs, not take everything out.”

  “I got carried away. I found a spider’s nest and a few other creepy-crawly things.”

  “Well, have fun with your project. I’m going for a walk.”

  “Want me to go with you?” he asked.

  “The next several years of my life are going to be consumed with childcare, PTA meetings, swim meets, flute recitals, surgery, and mayoral duties, not to mention visiting relatives. I’d like one last moment of peace, quiet, and solitude before it starts.”

  She started waddling down the gravel driveway toward the large resort across the road.

  “Can you get across the road okay?”

  “I’ve been crossing that road all my life. I think I can manage it one more time.”

  After waiting for a long gap between cars, she crossed as quickly as she could. She had one place in mind, and took a circular route to get to it, following the footpath through the grounds to get there. The thing about the tropics is there were always flowers in bloom, catching Melanie’s attention as she strolled. She took note of which would grow well at home, thinking up a new landscaping theme for around the house. Once she was settled on the bench that faced out at the ocean, she took off her hat and waved air at her face.

  “Hi Honey. Been a while since you’ve been here at the bench.”

  “Hi Mom. Thérèse keeps me busy, and work is more hectic than ever.”

  “How are she and Josh?”

  “They’re great. He’s absentminded this time, a nervous wreck for some reason. Tay’s taking it all in stride.”

  “You’re a lot bigger than last time.”

  “Eight pounds bigger, which is all fat. It would be nice if people quit bringing it up.”

  “Get back to swimming as soon as you can, or go for runs with Trinh,” her mother said.