by Kay Hadashi
“This is all of it?”
“Miniature kitchenette, bonsai bathroom, and bed inside the wall. Rusty water, flickering lights, and cockroaches galore. Yep, this is it.”
David looked ready to leave. “You have a way of getting back to the courthouse on time?”
“I have my bus pass.”
“You don’t have a car?”
“I have a car. It just doesn’t run. I’ve been trying to sell it, but nobody wants to buy a car that won’t start without being cursed at or slapped into submission. And it takes money to get it fixed, and it takes a job to earn money, and I need a license to work as a nurse, and I needed to be in that hearing this morning to get my license restored. Is any of that starting to make sense yet?”
He scanned the room one last time. “It sets a few things straighter.”
Maile softened up a little. “When you talk to the Katos, say hi to Thérèse for me. She sure is a sweetheart. Stubborn, but sweet.”
“Her mother was exactly the same at that age. You might be seeing a lot more of them in the coming months.”
“Any time she wants to hang out, and if I have the time, I’d be glad to have her for a few hours. Her mom doesn’t need to pay me for a tour.”
“It’s not that. Melanie has decided to run for governor in the next election.”
“I don’t pay enough attention to know one candidate from another. It seems like there needs to be a team approach to politics any more. Those positions are just too big and complicated for one person. I wonder if her friend, her Vice Mayor would run with her?” Maile asked, not really serious about getting an answer.
“Trinh Park? I’ve heard she’s not interested, but I know someone who is.”
“I feel sorry for anyone going into politics. Anyone I’ve heard of?”
David smiled back at her.
Maile wondered if she should apologize for her remark. “Well, good luck. If I have time on election day, I’ll vote for you.”
Watching David go off down the hall, she wondered what their true aspirations really were.
“Better them than me.”
***
The afternoon session in court lasted just as long as in the morning, and there still had been no need for Maile to be there. As soon as she heard that gavel slap its sounding board, she bolted for the door. All she wanted was fresh air and some exercise. Out in the corridor was Detective Ota. He looked to have been waiting impatiently.
“Detective, did you come by to see if I made it here?”
“No, but I did come by to see you, though. Do you have a few minutes?”
“I have the amount of time it takes for you to drive me home. After that I turn into an angry ex-wife.”
“Thank goodness you’re not my ex-wife.”
“I’m learning an ex-wife is an ex-wife, no matter what man happens to be in front of her at any given moment.”
As soon as he had his sedan’s engine started, Ota started on his reason why he was so willing to give Maile a ride home. “I need your help.”
“It’s getting toward the end of the month. You need one more arrest to meet your quota?”
He cast her a serious eye. “No. With the Swenberg case. Interested in lending a hand?”
“Not really. After meeting that Mrs. Abrams, I’ve lost my sense of civic duty when it comes to law and order.”
“I heard what happened, and I don’t blame you. This has nothing to do with her or that case. I have a lead in the Swenberg deal, and need some, let’s call it qualified help.”
“How in the world am I qualified in helping the police?” she asked.
“Similar to how you were last weekend. By attending an event with the Swenbergs.”
“I can’t dress up like a glamorous socialite and get away with it, not a second time.”
“It wouldn’t be to dress up this time. Word on the street is that you’re already in. You just need to show up.”
“Word on what street? Hawaii Kai Boulevard?”
“Look, the deal next weekend is a yacht cruise with only a small group of Honolulu A-listers.”
“Not much of a sailor, Detective, and I’m definitely not an A-lister. I might even get seasick. I doubt that’s on your agenda. What is your agenda?” she asked.
“I need someone crafty with being able to get people to open up, and that’s you. I’d also need that same person to do some snooping in the yacht, if at all possible.”
“Snooping for the missing box?”
“More like murder weapons.”
“You think he has the knife at his house?”
“We think it might be a part of an expensive cutlery set. We don’t need to necessarily find the exact knife. We only need to know if he has a set of those knives, and if one is missing.”
“I get it. If one is missing, that might be the murder weapon?” she asked.
“Right. That should be enough to get a search warrant from a judge to at least look in his kitchen and boat galley. But I’d need you to take photographs of everything in the boat galley. That would be the tricky part.”
“All of it sounds tricky to me,” she said. “Does that mean you finally believe me that I saw something in Carl Swenberg’s hand at the beach that time?” she asked.
“More with each passing day.”
“Why are you finally believing me?”
“Closed circuit video surveillance of the area near the snack bar at Hanauma Bay beach. I never bothered to ask, until the park staff happened to mention it when I went back today to talk with them one more time. They still had video of that day. It’s not complete, but a snapshot-style of every ten seconds. We did get several images of a man with the image of an anchor on one arm, carrying a dark-colored box into the water. Other images show what looks like the same man talking to you, and collecting bottles from you. That confirms what you’ve been telling us about what happened that day.”
“It also confirms I’m not a liar. But you seriously think that whatever Carl took into the ocean that day has somehow found its way into his half-brother’s yacht? And I’ll somehow find the time to snoop through cabinets without getting caught? Sounds like a set-up for trouble to me. How many people are supposed to be on the yacht at the time?”
“Anywhere from three to six.”
“Three? That means just Oscar, Honey, and me. Oh, now I get it. Not interested, Detective.”
“I’m not sure it would be like that. Anyway, a smart girl like you would be able to talk your way out of a compromising situation.”
“Maybe once, but not when two of them were working on me. If Oscar Swenberg is half as sinister as you make him out to be, and if Honey is half as weird as I think she is, I’m sure they’d find a way of cornering me. The only way out of that would be to jump overboard.” She bobbed her hands up and down as though she was comparing weights. “One shark or another.”
“I heard about what happened at the station cellblock last night.”
“Not one of my prouder moments.”
“From what I heard, you were doing quite well.”
“I don’t take much pride in picking fights with prostitutes, Detective. What’s her name, anyway?”
“Susan Suzuki of Makiki Heights, age twenty, high school dropout, both parents passed away, brother in the military, on her own since age sixteen. Also known as Suzie Suzuki when she made a half-hearted attempt at fashion modeling, also known as Kitty on the streets.”
“Where’s her little neighborhood, or workplace, whatever it’s called?”
“Why are you so concerned about her?” Ota asked.
“Just curious. She’s the only woman in Honolulu that spends more time in jail than I do.”
“Chinatown bars on weekdays, and she walks Kuhio in Waikiki on weekends. That’s where we pick her up. We wouldn’t mind so much if she didn’t wear loud clothes and fit in with everybody else.”
“Yes, City Hall’s quest to keep Waikiki pure and wholesome.”
Ota
parked at the curb in front of her building. “I need your help, Maile. I need someone with an intelligent pair of eyes and ears on that boat. You know what to look for.”
Maile sat quietly and wondered how much trouble she could get in if she helped out. All she had to do was tell Ota to go jump off a bridge and walk away. But she was also curious enough to know what was so special about the box that seemed to be behind so much trouble, not just for the Swenbergs, but for her.
“Where’d you get the information that they want me on their little weekend cruise?”
“Lenny.”
“I’d forgotten about Lenny the snitch. How much does he get paid for information like that?” she asked.
“Nothing, so far. It needs to pan out into something before he gets paid.”
“I don’t get it. Why does he get paid for just a few words of hearsay, but I’m supposed to help through the kindness of my heart?”
“If you came up with something useful, I think the department could find something in our budget for you.”
“I’d get paid for finding some evidence, but what’s the price tag on my sense of morals?”
“That’s for you to figure out,” he said. Ota banged his hand on the steering wheel with frustration. “This investigation, if it can be called that, is moving in slow motion. It’s driving me nuts that I have to wait until next weekend to get someone in their house. I just learned this afternoon that they’ve gone to Maui for a day or two, but I can’t assemble a team to get in the house in such short time.”
“You got that from Lenny, I suppose?” she asked.
“Right.”
“Handy guy to have in your pocket. Why can’t you just pick the lock on the front door and sneak in?”
“Well, legalities. I need a signed warrant from a judge showing just cause to enter and search private property. I can’t just go in and look around for something that might be incriminating. I must have a strong suspicion that a specific item is being harbored or hidden, something with a clear connection to a specific crime.” He took a breath to reload. “To do it right, I’d need to shut down the electrical feed to the house, even the entire neighborhood, just so the CCTV cameras wouldn’t pick us up. The only other way is to make it look like a home break-in, maybe steal a few little items which miraculously are recovered a few days later. That’s usually in conjunction with the feds, though. They have the clout to get away with that sort of thing, and I don’t.”
“You can actually do that?” Maile asked. “Turn off the electricity for an entire neighborhood?”
“That’s a part of the warrant the judge signs. We have to assure none of the neighbors would suffer unduly from having the lights off for an hour or so. Mostly, that means we have to make sure there aren’t any home patients that need medical equipment to keep them alive. But yes, when we enter a building being used for illegal purposes, we wait until night and shut off the lights. Two seconds after that, we break down doors and rush the place. This time around, I’m hoping to be a little more subtle than that by shutting down the CCTV and alarm systems, get in and out, and turn everything on again without anyone noticing.”
“I never knew it was so complicated.” Maile gave it a little more thought. There was a lot more going on with the Swenberg investigation than what she ever thought. Then she got an idea. “What’s the name of his yacht? I didn’t notice the other day.”
“The Mongoose. Why?”
Maile chuckled. “Seems like he could’ve come up with a more dignified name than that for a yacht.”
“You’ll help?”
“Can I think about it tonight and let you know tomorrow?”
“By when tomorrow? Because we need to set this thing in motion, and make sure it happens the way we want it to. A big part of that is knowing you’re on board.”
“What’re you planning to do? Plant hidden cameras and listening devices on the yacht?”
“You’re a fast learner, but I’m neither confirming nor not confirming that we may or may not do that. All I can say is that there are no devices of ours on the yacht at this time. That I know of.”
Maile laughed. “That’s not wishy-washy at all. But what exactly is your objective for me being on the yacht next weekend?”
“To get pictures of kitchen utensils. If you happen to find the box, that would be even better. If you could get a few incriminating words from Swenberg, that would be a bonus. We have a separate operation to search the house while Swenberg and his party are on the yacht out to sea.”
“He has CCTV cameras in his house. I saw those last weekend during that party. Inside and out,” Maile said. “Probably an alarm system.”
“We can deal with those. I just need your eyes and ears on the yacht while we deal with the house. Can you do it?”
Maile knew her answer, but was going to let him sweat. “I’ll let you know tomorrow.”
“What time would you know by?” he asked.
Maile considered her own rudimentary plan, which included city bus schedules and travel time. “One way or another, by noon.”
Chapter Fourteen
Maile went for a long run through Manoa Valley before stopping at her mother’s cottage. There were just enough leftovers in the pot and rice cooker that she got a meal. After a rest and watching reality TV with her mother for a while, she felt energized enough to run home. All the running gave her the opportunity to mentally hash out her simple plan for later that night. Detective Ota was still looking for the murder weapon, and thought there was something sinister about Swenberg’s box that had been lost in the waves at Hanauma Bay a few weeks before. An even bigger idea was that there was a connection between the two. Maile simply wanted to know what was inside the box to finally put the Swenbergs behind her.
She didn’t care about the remaining Swenberg brother, and even Honey was off her radar. As far as Maile was concerned, Swenberg was simply another wealthy man who didn’t know what to do with his money. Honey was a kept woman, much the same as how Prince Aziz treated women, making Swenberg just as morally guilty as Aziz in Maile’s mind. All of that was a puzzle for Ota and Abrams to figure out. Maile only wanted to know what was inside the box that made it so valuable. That was at the center of two deaths that were considered suspicious, and Maile had somehow been trapped in the investigation into all three brothers. Hopefully, by dawn, she’ll be free of it.
But she had a few things to do first.
Maile showered before dressing in an old black leotard and long-sleeved black T-shirt. On top of that she put on a flowery blouse and khakis, something that made her look like a Waikiki waitress. With a plastic bag folded into one pocket, and her trusty bus pass in the other, she left her little apartment behind. She had nothing in her apartment that was so valuable that wouldn’t be missed if stolen, except maybe her electric fan, so she left the door unlocked and her wallet and keys behind.
The buses ran from downtown to Hawaii Kai for most of the night, just not very often. The one she caught was the last of the hourly runs. Several other riders dressed like her were going home from work in Honolulu resorts, helping her to blend in with the crowd. Being a route she rarely took in her daily life, she figured none of the passengers or the driver recognized her. One by one, the others got off at stops along the way, until the bus arrived at the Hawaii Kai transit center. The driver shut down the engine while he went out for a smoke break.
“Gonna be a few minutes,” he said in a local sing-song accent. “Wherever you’re going, it might be faster to walk there.”
“Did I miss Kawaihae Street?” she asked.
“One stop back. Gotta walk it. No more buses goin’ that way till I turn around at the end of my run and come back.”
“Thanks.”
“You live around here?” he asked.
Maile positioned so she was upwind from his smoke. “Visiting someone.”
“Whew! You know some nice people! Wish I knew someone that live out here.”
“More o
f an acquaintance.”
“Whatchu doing goin’ there this time of evening? Because you no more dressed like the ladies in business I bring out here sometimes.”
She figured he meant hookers. She also needed a place to take off her outer layer of clothes without being seen, and find a place to stash them. “Prostitutes take the bus? I thought they got picked up.”
“Bring ‘em in time for a late dinner, if you know what I mean, and bring ‘em home again later. They know the route schedule better’n I do.”
“Well, that’s not why I’m here. You know if the transit center restrooms are open?”
“Janitors come by at the end of rush hour to clean, then lock’em up tight for the night. You could go to one of the restaurants if you gotta go bad.”
There was a small commercial area nearby that she walked to. A teriyaki place was still open but might not be by the time she was done with her errand. That’s how she was framing her project for that night, of sneaking into Swenberg’s yacht and snooping around for the secretive box. It was what Ota was trying to sign her up for on the next weekend after all, and if she were able to get on board the yacht alone and unsupervised tonight, she’d be able to rummage through drawers and cabinets without being seen. Best of all, she wouldn’t have to go on a yacht cruise with a slimeball and his Playmate girlfriend.
“It’s my morals on the line in this deal, not Ota’s.”
Going around to the back of the building, she hid behind a dumpster that had surely smelled better in years gone by, and shinnied out of her travel layer of clothes. Neatly folding them, she needed to find a place to hide them, and behind the row of dumpsters from various businesses wouldn’t work. After a quick search, she found a small ledge on the back wall of a building, and tucked her plastic bag of clothes in a shadow. She put her hair in a quick braid. All that showed of her that wasn’t covered in black were her hands and face, and with the black, sheer silk scarf she’d brought, even her face could be hidden when the time came. Knowing she had about two miles to cover before she got to the Swenberg home, Maile took off at a run.
She was just crossing the busy boulevard, now quiet, as the bus she’d been on was leaving the transit center. Maybe he didn’t see her dressed the way she was, but the driver paid her no mind as he drove past, continuing on with his route.