Red Rain

by Toby Neal

  Red Rain

  Lei Crime Series Book 11

  Toby Neal

  Copyright Notice

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

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  Copyright © Toby Neal 2015

  http://tobyneal.net

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  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author/publisher.

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  Photo credit: Mike Neal © Nealstudios.net

  Cover Design: © JULIE METZ LTD.

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  ISBN ebook: 978-0-9967066-5-0

  ISBN print: 978-0-9967066-6-7

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

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  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Acknowledgments

  Excerpt Bitter Feast

  About the Author

  More Titles From Toby Neal

  Connect With Toby!

  Get Two Free Books!

  Get Two Toby Neal Books Free!

  * * *

  Toby Neal’s Website

  Red rain, in Hawaiian culture, is an omen associated with royalty. An incident of “blood” or red rain, such as a primarily red rainbow, a shower at sea colored red by sunset, or an unusual red mist of cloud—all of these things—heralded the birth, death, or transition of a chief.

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  –Summarized from The Fornander Collection of Hawaiian Antiquities and Folklore

  This book is dedicated to Nalu, the biggest little dog I’ve ever known, and the inspiration for Keiki. Thank you for joining our family for sixteen years of wonderful, heroic dog love. You will never be forgotten.

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  June 1999 - to November 28, 2015

  RIP

  Chapter One

  The child’s skull, stained red by iron-rich Hawaiian soil, rested on Captain Omura’s desk, its empty eye sockets gazing at Lei through the Ziploc bag it was encased in.

  “Shut the door, Sergeant Texeira.” Captain Omura looked away from her monitor, the bell of her immaculate bob swinging. “You said you wanted a private meeting.”

  “Yes, sir.” Lei clicked the office door shut and sat down in one of the hard plastic supplicant chairs in front of the captain’s desk, trying not to look at the skull. “While I was on Oahu this weekend, I had a visit from an army liaison with the company Stevens went to work for overseas, Security Solutions.” Lei pushed her hair behind her ears, groping for words, forcing them past the lump in her throat. “He informed me that Michael was captured.”

  “Captured? What does that mean?” Omura’s carefully groomed brows snapped together, and she leaned forward. “What kind of operation was this?”

  “A training camp for military police somewhere in Central America. They wouldn’t tell me where. His role was to work with armed forces personnel on investigation techniques, and he and several others were kidnapped. The army officer who informed me said that they expected a ransom demand anytime now, and that they’d handle it. The men were insured.”

  “So they expect that kind of thing?” Omura’s dark eyes widened. “That’s our tax dollars at work?”

  “I don’t know about that. I don’t know much of anything.” Lei threw up her hands, stood, and paced back and forth in front of the captain’s desk. “I’d like permission to take some personal leave.”

  “Denied,” Omura said immediately. “I can’t spare you.”

  “Come on, Captain! He’s your man, too!” Lei’s husband, Lieutenant Michael Stevens, was one of Omura’s steadiest officers, in charge of training new detectives, always working a full roster of lieutenant duties. “Don’t you want to know what happened to him?”

  “So this leave is for you to hop on a plane to God-knows-where, trying to find your husband ‘somewhere in Central America’?’” Omura made air quotes. “First of all, I don’t like hearing this news any more than you do. But seriously, Lei—I can’t spare you! I’m shorthanded, as you know, and Stevens taking that military leave really put me in a jam, as I wasn’t shy to tell him. So any personal feelings aside, I couldn’t let you go even if I wanted to—which I don’t. You’re a mother. Or have you forgotten you have a son who needs you, more than ever now that his father’s missing?”

  Lei’s stepson, Kiet, aged five, wasn’t handling his dad’s absence well. Lei rubbed her hands up and down on her black jeans, wicking away nervous sweat. “I haven’t forgotten. But I have family who’ve been helping with Kiet already…”

  “No. Just no. And if this officer told you to wait, you need to do that.” Omura stood, came around her desk, and did an unprecedented thing—held open her arms. “Hug.”

  “Captain?” Lei cocked her head in surprise, but she smiled as she leaned carefully into the other woman’s space and shut her eyes for just a moment. The Steel Butterfly was hugging her. It was an awkward and stilted embrace, like two triangles leaning against each other—but the emotion clouding the captain’s eyes was genuine as she pulled away.

  “I’ll do all I can to support you during this time. Flex time for your pickups with the kid, short days, swapping shifts, whatever. But I can’t grant any leave, especially if I think it might end up like that other trip.”

  That other trip.

  Lei’s belly tightened at the memory. She’d taken off for the Big Island to deal with an enemy in her own way, a move that had worked in some ways and cost too much in others.

  “Shit.” Lei’s shoulders sagged. “Okay.”

  “Good.” Omura tip-tapped on pointy-toed sling backs around her desk and sat down. “I have a new case for you. Something a little different, in addition to your regular cases with Pono. I’d like you to handle it as a side project.”

  She held up the Ziploc bag containing the skull. A fracture mark on the bone where the forehead would have been testified to possible cause of death.

  “Where’d this come from?” Lei accepted the bag and turned the skull in her hands.

  “I logged it into evidence already. It was brought in this morning. Apparently it washed up on the beach near one of the Hana streams. A woman named Iris Yamaguchi found it in some driftwood. She bagged it and brought it in. Didn’t realize she should have left it there and called us.”

  “Have you had anyone look at it? To date it, or anything?”

  “No. That’s for you to figure out, and if there’s anything more that can be found out about this poor kid—who it was, when it happened, if there was foul play involved.” Omura pi
nned Lei with her dark gaze. “I plan to keep you so busy you don’t have time to worry about getting that man back. Now go find me a cold-case child killer.”

  I woke with that jerk that happens in a falling dream, my whole body a-jangle with alarm and a sense of impending disaster.

  But the disaster had already happened, when we were captured.

  I blinked my eyes in a darkness as thick as if a velvet bag had been dropped over my head. The plane had crashed in my latest dream, and I’d been on fire at the end. Crawling. Dragging my dog, burning and desperate.

  Like the most recent time the house was on fire.

  But the plane hadn’t crashed, really. Must have been another dream. Or a memory. Maybe it had crashed. Who the hell knew?

  I wasn’t sure about anything right now. Dreams and memories ebbed and swirled through my mind, and I couldn’t tell which was which half the time. I shut my eyes, since I couldn’t see anything anyway, and tried to remember the real plane ride here to Honduras—because that’s the particular ring of hell where we’d landed. I was sure of that much.

  The military transport C-130, open and echoing, had roared along on its journey to whatever the godforsaken mission destination was—I hadn’t known at the time. I was strapped into the over-hard upright seat against one wall, alongside a couple of other civilian contractors. Military police troops I’d be training when we arrived occupied the rest of the seats.

  At least I’d finally slept on the flight. I rolled my sore neck, using the occasion to gaze around the interior of the aircraft. Several heavy-duty Jeeps were strapped down the length of the plane, along with a huge pile of supplies held down with a webbed net. I unstrapped from the five-point harness and stood, stretching my muscles. I took a walk up and down the length of the plane, getting circulation back into my legs.

  I felt shitty. Throbbing headache, dry mouth, a twitchy sense of frayed nerves. Perhaps left over from the dream I’d been having, but more likely that other thing. I dug in my olive-drab backpack, stuffed with all the personal possessions I’d have for the next six months. I took out my shave kit and went to the head.

  It was a bare-bones closet with a metal toilet and sink with a steel mirror above it. I did my business and opened the shave kit.

  I had a flask inside filled with booze, disguised as a shaving cream can. It had been a simple enough thing to buy online. This ration was all I going to get, and it was strictly for medicinal purposes, so I could stave off the DTs as I dried out.

  Because that’s what this stint overseas was all about. Kicking the booze, and the other mental shit, too. I swigged a gulp of the cheap scotch, gazing at my hollow-eyed reflection in the steel mirror with contempt.

  The foul stuff seared my throat and made my eyes water, burned my esophagus, and went off like a bomb in my empty belly. It tasted horrible. I wanted to retch. Instead I felt immediately better as flu-like symptoms of withdrawal receded.

  Just one more hit.

  The scotch still tasted horrible, but it felt good, and that second drink activated a fierce longing to finish the rest. But I was in trouble if I did. This had to last, and then I was done. I screwed the top back on. Feeling steadier, I shaved with a sliver of soap.

  Working the razor around that stubborn square edge of my jaw, I caught sight of the hook pendant Lei had given me. The white bone seemed to glow in the dim silver of the mirror, filling the shadow at the base of my throat, almost hidden in the olive of my uniform shirt.

  I still remembered her small hands pressed together over the pendant, her curly brown head bent before me as she murmured a prayer of blessing over it. She’d risen up on her knees in the bed before me and fastened the slightly scratchy coconut-husk closure behind my neck.

  My face had been close to her breasts: small, round, and perfect. I’d looked my fill at them and breathed in the smell of her. I’d shut my eyes and felt the love in the gift wash over me. I’d soaked it in, reveled in it—as I had in her body.

  I didn’t deserve any of it. I’d almost destroyed us. But I’d make up for it now, by dealing with my shit and making some money. The company I was working for, Security Solutions, paid very well. This six-month stint would be a good start for our son Kiet’s college fund, if nothing else.

  I finished shaving. Splashed my face. Buttoned up that last button so that the bone hook I told her I’d wear until I returned was hidden. Zipped up my kit. Returned to my seat.

  When I shut my eyes, for a moment I could still smell her.

  I slept again. I didn’t want to. Bad things came when I slept.

  Chapter Two

  “Dad! I see a wave coming!” The ocean off of Maui was always warm, but the currents and waves were strong. I was on my longboard with Kiet in front of me, out at the cove at Ho`okipa, our favorite break. Kiet wore a flotation device just in case he got into trouble. Sunlight sparkled on the water. The clouds, piled against the West Maui Mountains off to our left, looked like mounds of shaving cream. Out to sea, I saw the rise in the horizon that meant a wave was coming. I spun the board, Kiet sliding down against me.

  “Paddle hard!” I yelled. My boy’s little brown arms churned as hard as they could as we headed toward the yellow-gold of shore. I arched my back, lifting my chest above his little body as he thrashed and splashed in front of me. For five, Kiet had good focus and physical effort. I stroked hard, too, and in a moment we both felt the lift and surge beneath the board that meant we’d caught the wave.

  Kiet popped up to his feet. He looked good, braced strong, black hair gleaming with water and sun. As soon as I was sure he was up and stable, his arms outstretched, I jumped up behind him, angling the board to catch the wave’s peeling break off to the right.

  “Hang five, buddy!” I yelled. Kiet sidled up toward the front, and I whooped as he inched to the nose of the board, extending one foot to hang his toes over the end.

  He looked back to smile at me, so like his murdered mother, Anchara, that I lost my balance. We wiped out, the board flipping into the churning curl of the wave and sucking us under.

  All was churning dark water, roiling and deep. I fought for the surface, certain that my son was drowning. My eyes were open and burning under the water, filled with nothing but black. I was unable to find him, reach him, help him.

  I woke abruptly.

  I was shaking with the bone-jarring, full-body shudders of hypothermia. My jaw ached with tension from trying to keep my teeth from clattering together. I shivered so hard the water around me made tiny waves.

  Tiny waves that splashed against the mud walls of the deep pit I was in.

  Oh, yeah. The pit. I must be remembering this. I wasn’t in the pit anymore. I was lying flat on my back somewhere dry, musty-smelling, and darker than a coal mine. Probably a storage shed. I remembered what happened next, in the pit, but not how I got where I was now.

  “Lieutenant. Move back here.” A man hauled me under the armpits out of the puddle I’d fallen over into, propping me against the slimy mud wall. Rain continued to pelt down on us through a bamboo frame covered with palm fronds. I couldn’t stop shivering; my teeth chattered and my body quaked. I couldn’t even form words I was so racked with shudders.

  “I think he’s sick,” the man who’d helped me said to someone else. I tried to remember his name. I knew this man, this fellow prisoner, filthy in his mud-crusted clothing. His eyes were dark and shiny as he looked into my face, briefly touching my head. “He’s got a fever.”

  He was talking to someone on the other side of me.

  “You think they give a shit?” The other guy’s voice was scratchy and hard.

  “But we should tell them. He’s no good to them if he dies,” my helper said. He sat down in the mud beside me and threw an arm over me. “Relax, LT. We got you. Carrigan, get over here. Lean against him on that side. Let’s warm him up.”

  I felt the reluctance in Carrigan, but he shuffled over and pressed against me. Sandwiched between the two men, I eventually began to
thaw a little as our shared warmth loosened my locked muscles. “Thanks,” I whispered through cracked lips.

  I rested my forehead on my knees.

  A dim memory came to me. Carrigan was another of the civilian contractors. We’d all gotten to camp together—and the plane hadn’t crashed. Definitely hadn’t. I remembered his cold blue eyes. We hadn’t hit it off—I thought he was an entitled asshole. He wouldn’t change out of his polo shirt and Bermudas into the uniforms they’d issued us.

  “I’m in charge of tech. I don’t need to wear this hot, shitty uniform,” he’d said. Yeah, Carrigan was a jerk.

  “Hey, man, relax.” It was my friend whose name began with a “K.” He was pounding my back, because I was choking. Somehow I’d sucked water, and though I coughed and coughed, my lungs didn’t clear.

  “Hey!” K-Man stood, bracing his legs to pull me up. I felt hot but cold, too, and the shivering wouldn’t stop. “Hey! This man is sick!” He yelled up at the entrance of the pit, and this time Carrigan yelled, too, and then two more voices joined in, shouting up into the mouth of the pit. “Help! Ayuda aquí!”

  Things looked very close to me: the grains of soil in the walls were big as boulders, the puddle I knelt in, deep as a lake rising to swallow me. But then everything was far away, as if I were seeing through the wrong end of a telescope. The slurry of the mud walls formed distant, fascinating patterns.