by Toby Neal
Momi pointed her crochet hook at the bags of flour, coffee beans, taro roots and rice piled up against the wall next to a stack of folded empty fabric sacks. “Sometimes when I come in, the bags look like they’ve been moved. And there were crumbs on the floor.”
“What?” Rosario’s voice rose. “Was anything missing?” Both of their gazes flew to the sturdy, wall-mounted safe behind the desk, hidden under a photo of the restaurant.
“No. Nothing’s missing. The safe is untouched. I figured someone must have been coming in here on their break and eating. I’ve been keeping the door locked all the time I’m not in here, but it’s still happening.”
The women exchanged a long glance. “I think I better ask Lei what to do,” Rosario said. “We have a mystery on our hands.”
Momi laughed her rich, comfortable chuckle. “A burglar who eats our poi rolls. The crumbs I saw were purple.”
“I threw out a batch that got burned,” Rosario said. “Put them in the pig bin. But come to think of it, they weren’t there when I took the bin to the farm earlier this week.”
“Someone’s definitely helping themselves to the bin, then. But do we really care about that?” Momi quirked one of her elegant brows.
Rosario put a hand on a hip. “Sure, we do! I need those scraps for the farm, to make sure we get a good ration of fresh pork at slaughtering time.”
Momi shuddered. “I prefer to think our meat floats down from heaven wrapped in plastic.”
“You’re just lucky I don’t ask for a whole pig and make an imu out back to cook it all myself,” Rosario said.
“Good thing we only have a cement parking lot back there with no room for an underground oven, because I wouldn’t put it past you.”
Jenny, a pretty twentysomething cousin of Momi’s from the Big Island, stuck her head in. “Got my paycheck, Aunty?” Everyone on staff called both women “aunty” as a title of respect, tradition in Hawaii with senior female relatives.
“Got your check right here.” Momi dug an envelope out of the green cashbox on her desk and handed it over to Jenny.
Rosario swiveled her office chair to face the girl. “You been taking our scraps home to that pet pig of yours?”
Jenny straightened in surprise. “No, Aunty. I wouldn’t do that without asking.”
Momi and Rosario glanced at each other, frowning, and Jenny took that opportunity to disappear.
“Someone is stealing from our walk-in,” Rosario said.
“The mystery of the missing pig slops. Stay tuned, film at eleven,” Momi deadpanned, and Rosario finally smiled—but it bugged her that someone in their ohana of trusted staff was taking without asking.
Chapter Three
Consuelo
Consuelo hid her hands in the loose pockets of her orange coverall as she walked into the visiting area. She kept her face still, so as not to reveal the dread and excitement that filled her that her mentor, Special Agent Lei Texeira, was here to visit, bringing Consuelo’s dog, Angel.
The two came every week, but due to Lei’s busy FBI work schedule, it was never a predictable day or time. Consuelo hated to admit how much she looked forward to the sight of the curly-haired brunette agent with the warm, tilted brown eyes and smatter of freckles on her nose—but she didn’t have to hide how happy she was to see Angel.
The little Chihuahua, wearing a tiny therapy dog vest, bounced toward Consuelo, yipping with excitement. Consuelo scooped the dog up, ducking her head to hide her emotion.
“Hey, baby,” she whispered into Angel’s sleek neck. The little animal wagged her curly tail, her whole body vibrating. She licked Consuelo’s neck, and Consuelo tossed her head back and laughed.
“Consuelo.” Lei’s voice was brusque. “Come here.”
“Yes?” Consuelo turned to Lei, her heart pounding.
They weren’t alone in the room. Knots of girls visited with their families around the bolted-down tables. In a far corner, Fai and Jadene were twined together on one of the couches. Consuelo felt the older girls’ eyes burning a hole in her coverall as she advanced to sit on one of the metal stools beside Lei.
Usually Lei let Consuelo play with Angel alone for a few minutes, or let the other girls who still hadn’t really warmed up to Consuelo pet the little dog. Today, the agent’s gaze was intent and probing. “I need to speak to you privately.”
“Okay.” Consuelo moved to a stool right next to Lei, holding the dog in her arms. She still hadn’t decided if she was going to go along with Fai’s planned breakout, or if she was going to try to tell someone and get it stopped. Either choice was fraught with risk. She felt herself teetering on the brink of the hard choice as she gazed into Lei’s concerned brown eyes.
“There’s a bruise on your neck.” Lei pushed a hank of Consuelo’s glossy black hair away. “On both sides of your neck.”
Consuelo shrugged. “It’s no big deal.”
“Hey. Who’s your friend?” Fai’s voice came from over Consuelo’s shoulder, and she felt the Tongan’s bulk behind her.
Consuelo kept her face neutral and her voice flat. “This is Special Agent Lei Texeira. With the FBI.”
“You get visits from cops?” Fai’s meaty hand came down to rest on Consuelo’s shoulder and squeezed.
“Back up off of Consuelo.” Lei’s voice cracked with authority, though the agent hadn’t moved from her stool.
Fai’s hand loosened and slid away. Her tone was sulky. “Introduce me, roomie.”
“Agent Texeira, this is Fai Afa. My roommate.” And this time, when Consuelo raised her eyes to Lei, she knew her expression was pleading. Much as she was tempted by the opportunity to escape, she wanted more than anything to have this awful dilemma taken from her.
“Is this girl threatening you?” Lei’s gaze seemed to bore into Consuelo’s. She switched her frown to Fai.
Consuelo riffled through her choices mentally as she stroked the Chihuahua snuggled up to her shoulder. “No. We’re friends,” Consuelo said. “Fai’s helped me a lot in here. Kept the bullies away.” This was perfectly true.
Fai patted Consuelo’s back in an approximation of friendly approval. “That’s right. No one messes with my friends.”
Jadene approached. “I’ve noticed you every week when you come,” the skinny blonde said to Lei. Consuelo’s stomach turned at the girl’s shy act, so falsely sincere. “It’s great how someone important like you takes care of Consuelo’s dog.”
The two girls hovered nearby for the duration of Lei’s visit, taking turns petting Angel and making it impossible to get a moment alone with the agent. Lei seemed to be buying the girls’ friendly act, and Consuelo’s stomach tightened at the thought of how her mentor would feel when she heard of the trio’s escape. Lei would feel betrayed.
Consuelo knew how betrayal felt.
She didn’t want to ruin what she had with Lei. The situation squeezed her like the tightening coils of a boa constrictor.
Lei smiled at the other girls. “Can I get a moment alone with Consuelo? News of her family.”
Consuelo had no family, but Fai and Jadene didn’t know that. Fai gave Consuelo a last glance over her shoulder, and the two moved off.
Lei leaned forward, petting Angel, who’d fallen asleep with all the attention and now snoozed in the crook of Consuelo’s arm.
“Is there something you need to tell me?” Lei’s voice was soft. A fall of her curly dark-brown hair hid her lips from the prying eyes that Consuelo could feel at her back.
“I’d like a different roommate,” Consuelo whispered. “As soon as possible.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Lei whispered back.
Consuelo felt a weight lift. She wasn’t going to have to deal with this situation if she could just get moved out of Fai’s room.
It was an emotional wrench when she said goodbye to Lei and Angel, but there was a little more spring in her walk as she left the visiting area. Maybe Lei could get her away from Fai before the breakout.
Fai
caught her in the hall on their way to their room, hooking an arm around Consuelo’s bruised neck in a parody of friendship that the nearby correctional officer, a big mixed Hawaiian woman they called Aunty Marcie, didn’t react to.
“How’s your family?” Fai asked, giving Consuelo a little push into their room.
“Fine.” Consuelo tried to get some distance. The door was kept open except at night, and even then, the COs checked on the girls periodically through the wire-covered viewing window.
Fai followed Consuelo in, crowding her. “You were pretty cozy with that agent.”
Consuelo had had enough. She whirled toward the bigger girl. “Leave me alone,” she hissed. “I said I’d go. I didn’t say anything to Lei, even though she asked me if I was okay. I kept your secret, and I’m going along with your plan. Leave me the hell alone. You keep hassling me, and someone’s going to realize something’s up.”
“What’s the problem here?” Aunty Marcie boomed from the doorway.
Consuelo, hands on her hips, glared up at the big Tongan and didn’t look away. “Everything’s fine, Aunty Marcie,” she said.
Fai took a step back, turned to face Aunty Marcie with a smile that showed her straight, white teeth. “This girl. She keeps trying to borrow my panties.”
Aunty Marcie gave a snort of laughter at that unlikely scenario. She watched a minute longer, but Consuelo just climbed into her bunk and reached for her notebook as Fai sat down at the little desk with one of her community college textbooks.
Turned toward the wall, Consuelo opened her notebook and uncapped her pen.
She finally had an idea of what she could do to help herself.
Chapter Four
Lei
Lei held up her cred wallet at the exit sally port so that the guard could see it. “I need to speak to the warden.” She’d thought over her visit with Consuelo. There was no doubt something was wrong, and Lei hadn’t needed Consuelo’s whispered request for a new roommate to tell her that it had something to do with the big Tongan girl and her blonde sidekick.
The security agent nodded and picked up the phone. A few minutes later, a correctional officer opened the door. “Right this way, ma`am.”
Lei grimaced as she followed the stocky CO down the hall. At what point had she crossed that invisible age line into ‘ma’am?’
Efforts had been made, in this area at least, to soften the look of the youth facility. Artwork by the girls decorated the walls. An incomplete hand-painted mural gave a sense of something abandoned, as so many of the kids were.
Lei had taken a moment to put Angel back in the car with the windows down before returning to speak to the warden.
The warden was an older Caucasian man wearing Hawaii business casual: a muted aloha shirt and chinos. A ring of keys and an ID badge bounced above his belt buckle as he strode toward Lei.
“I’m Grover Smith. How can I help the FBI today?” The man’s weathered skin crinkled around blue eyes faded by years of squinting. Sailor or golfer, Lei guessed as she shook his hand.
“I’m here on behalf of Consuelo Aguilar,” Lei said.
“Ah, our famous guest,” Smith said. “What’s she done now?”
Lei smiled politely. “As you may know from the media, I was the one to capture and bring Consuelo in. I’ve been—mentoring her, shall we say, and it appears that there’s a problem with her roommate.”
“So. You’re not here in an official capacity.” The smiley crinkles disappeared from Smith’s face. “The internal affairs of the youth facility are none of the FBI’s business.”
“I realize that, of course.” Lei’s heart rate spiked with irritation, but she made an open gesture with her hands. Hard lessons in the past had taught her not to show emotions to these bureaucrat types. “I believe Consuelo’s being intimidated by her roommate. There could be trouble. I just thought I’d give you a heads-up that Wendy Watanabe, of KHIN-2, also has an interest in Consuelo and could pop by at any time. She’s told me she’s thinking of doing an in-depth piece on the facility.”
Smith glared, hands on his hips. “You can’t blackmail me with media pressure. Aguilar gets no preferential treatment. It sets a bad precedent.”
“There has never been, nor likely ever will be, another case like Consuelo Aguilar,” Lei said tightly. “Consuelo’s not one to complain, but she asked me to help her get another roommate. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t think it meant that something serious was going on.”
“I’ll take it under advisement. Now, if there’s nothing else . . .” Smith wasn’t going to budge.
“No. You’ve been very unhelpful, and it’s duly noted.” Lei spun on her heel and headed outside. No point in any further social niceties.
At her truck, Lei petted Angel as she thumbed through the contacts on her phone to find Wendy Watanabe’s personal cell. She and the petite anchorwoman would never be friends, but they’d come to a mutual respect for each other over several cases—and a shared interest in the brave teen who’d captured both of their hearts.
“Texeira. To what do I owe the pleasure?” Watanabe’s voice was crisp.
“I’m at Oahu Youth Correctional Facility. Consuelo’s got a problem with her roommate. Big Tongan girl named Fai Afa. I’m going to look into Afa’s criminal background, but I thought you might be interested in the fact that Warden Smith blew off my warning of a problem and Consuelo’s request for another roommate.”
“Jerk.” Lei could almost see the narrowing of Watanabe’s almond-shaped, sharp brown eyes. “I wasn’t kidding. I want to do a story on that place. I’ve heard some nasty rumors.”
“This might not be a bad time to poke around. I have a feeling our girl’s in trouble. She wouldn’t tell me more, but for her to ask me for help . . .”
“Yeah. I’m on it.” Watanabe hung up with a brisk click.
Satisfied for the moment, Lei started her vehicle. “Gotta run background on Afa and her friend,” she told Angel. “But it’s late. Let’s get home and relax first.”
Lei unslung her backpack that doubled as a purse and hung it on the hook inside of her door, as Angel and Keiki greeted each other ecstatically.
Lei’s boyfriend Stevens had brought Lei’s big Rottweiler over to Oahu when they’d reconciled a few months prior. Lei enjoyed the contrast of the tiny, aggressive teacup Chihuahua with Keiki’s massive but peaceful presence. The two dogs usually slept curled up together in Keiki’s bed, and combined, were better than a doorbell and an armed alarm system. Lei fed them side by side, smiling at the sight of their similarly marked but completely different shapes as the two greedily crunched through their kibble.
Lei headed for her bedroom and shed her wrinkled FBI “uniform” of linen jacket, shoulder holster, plain white button-down shirt, gray slacks, socks, shoes, belt, badge, and small, six shot revolver ankle rig. She hung her weapons in their usual place on the spindle at the corner of the bed, then took a shower.
The dogs were waiting at her bathroom door when she got out, eager for their evening romp in her postage-stamp of fenced yard. “You two aren’t too subtle, are you?” she teased, squashing some product into her curly hair in hopes that it would be manageable tomorrow.
Keiki whined, and Angel hopped up on her hind legs and danced in a circle, making Lei laugh.
The sound almost startled her, and she realized it was the first time she’d laughed in days. That was sad. She addressed the dogs. “That’s what you girls are good for. Comic relief from life’s piles of nasty crap.”
Consuelo’s worried face rose in her mind’s eye: the girl’s full mouth tight with secrets, her eyes shadowed with fear.
“We’ve got to get something better for Consuelo,” Lei muttered as she unlocked the front door and let the dogs out into the yard. She was glad the girl had Bennie Fernandez and Wendy Watanabe to defend her, too. Maybe between the three of them, they could get Consuelo moved to a better, safer facility . . . Lei poured herself a glass of chardonnay, filled a bowl with tortill
a chips and carrot sticks, and went outside onto the porch.
The dogs were doing their usual sniff-and-pee around the small yard with its high wooden fence lined with night blooming jasmine and honeysuckle. The flowers’ sweetness filled the cooling air of a late fall Honolulu evening, along with a chorus of squawking from a nearby mango tree in the neighbors’ yard, where a flock of mynah birds gathered in the evenings to gossip.
Lei grabbed a crocheted shawl Aunty Rosario had made, and took out her old relic of a flip phone. She opened it and pressed down a Favorites button whose digit was worn off with use, as she settled herself into one of a pair of old rattan chairs on her little lanai.
“Sweets! Long time since you called your aunty!” Rosario had a warm, rich voice to go along with a face creased by smiles and time as she called Lei by her family nickname. Her aunt’s dimpled cheeks, long silver-streaked hair and bright brown eyes were vivid in Lei’s mind’s eye.
“How you doing, Aunty?” Lei slipped easily into pidgin. “I been missing you, too. And that yummy pineapple upside-down cake you make.”
“Good, good, Momi and I, we both good. And I’m making that pineapple cake this weekend, along with some of that beef stew you like and those purple poi rolls I always run out of.”
“Oh, Aunty, you know how to make me homesick!” Lei exclaimed. “Those are my favorites!”
“Well, you going make it for Christmas? I’ll make all of your favorites!” Aunty wheedled.
Lei smiled, tucking the ends of the old shawl around her. “I’m coming. I put in for leave already.”
She had to hold her phone away from her ear at the loud whoop of joy from her aunt. “Momi, my girl’s coming home for Christmas!” Rosario hollered.
Momi got on the phone for greetings, and finally Lei had her aunt back on the line. “I can’t wait to see you,” Rosario said. “But honey, I get one small problem. Maybe you can help.”
“Anything, Aunty.” Rosario had never married or had children. She’d rescued Lei from the jaws of the foster care system when Lei’s mother had died, after locking Lei in their garage. Lei would never have grown into the woman she was now without her aunt’s steady, unconditional love—and she knew it to her bones.