Fire and Vengeance

by Robert McCaw

  Koa left with a new assignment for Piki—a forensic biopsy on the Gommes-Witherspoon relationship. Gommes had probably stiffed Witherspoon on his fees, provoking a disagreement, but there might be more, and Koa wanted to understand it.

  He called Piki and explained what he wanted, and then asked about the search for bulldozer records. He’d hoped that Piki had found paperwork linking the dozer to Gommes. It would be sweet to confront the smug developer with evidence he couldn’t refute, but Piki had yet to score. “Get on it,” Koa said, and then softened his rebuke, “as quickly as you can.”

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  AS KOA AND Basa drove north on the Belt Road toward Cheryl Makela’s farm, Basa handed Koa his cell phone. “Take a look at this Tony Pwalú video. I had one of the techs download it from my body cam.”

  Koa watched the video twice. On the third pass, he turned the volume up and put the phone close to his ear. Then he turned to Basa. “When we interviewed Pwalú, how’d he describe the woman from Honolulu?”

  “He didn’t.”

  Koa rewound the recording, turned the volume to max, and pressed the phone to Basa’s ear.

  “I’ll be damned,” Basa said. “I never heard him say ‘haole lady.’”

  “Neither did I, but you can hear it on the tape. Your souped-up GoPro’s got good ears.”

  “Thought you’d be impressed.”

  Koa had been thinking about body cams. “You don’t tell people they’re being recorded, do you?”

  “Nope. The public can see the camera on my uniform, so people are on notice. Some police departments have put out public notices or press releases about body cams. If anyone asks, I tell ’em it’s on.”

  Makela lived in a plantation house, raising horses on a thousand-acre farm outside the tiny town of Pepe‘ekeo on the northern coast of the Big Island. In Hawai‘i, land and political power were intimately interwoven, and Cheryl made her bones weaving that fine fabric. Piki’s research revealed that, while in law school, Makela had hitched her star to the Democratic Party then flexing its muscle throughout the islands. While the party’s rhetoric called for the breakup of the huge, mostly Republican landholdings, the political reality was different. Democratic politicians at all levels of Hawaiian government became partners in huis—syndicates and partnerships. The huis developed Hawai‘i’s resorts, malls, and office complexes during the great postwar building boom.

  Nowhere was this symbiotic relationship more finely honed than in the state’s land planning offices. Investigative journalists wrote volumes about land deals where the directors and commissioners of the various planning agencies reaped untold profits. And Cheryl Makela represented the huis and the developers, all the while spinning the “revolving door” in and out of county government positions—always cutting a piece of the cake for herself. A piece heaped with frosting. The woman who attended UH law school on a full scholarship had become rich enough to retire on her thousand-acre horse farm.

  Over the years, she greased the way with large campaign contributions and strong political connections with Mayor Tanaka. He’d first named her to the planning commission, then she’d become deputy director, and finally director of the Hawai‘i County planning department. Bribery and conflict of interest allegations swirled like a typhoon around her, but nothing stuck to the Teflon woman.

  Makela came out of the stables when Basa pulled up alongside her restored plantation house. Now in her seventies, still with a shapely athletic figure, she wore sleek black riding boots, jodhpurs, and a collared show shirt. A mane of thick white hair tumbled from beneath her traditional black riding hat. She turned to say something to a stable boy before addressing her guests.

  “Good afternoon, Detectives. Welcome to Makela Stables.”

  Although he’d met her before, Koa introduced himself and Sergeant Basa. “Thank you for agreeing to see us,” he added, taking in the stables, the dressage arena set up for eventing, and the thoroughbred horses in the pastures beyond. It cost a fortune just to maintain the place. County planners, at least those in land development deals, plainly lived better than police detectives.

  “Let’s talk in the garden,” she suggested, leading them through a gate in a white picket fence into a flower garden with orchids, ginger, and heliconia plants in full bloom. Miniature iron horses dotted the pathways. They each took one of the heavy wrought-iron lawn chairs set around a small table beside a bubbling water fountain. With a touch of bravado, she removed her riding helmet and placed it on the table before shaking out her white hair. She was an attractive woman, but with her bright blue-green eyes and angelic face, she must, Koa thought, have been a knockout in her younger years.

  “You’re here about the awful accident at KonaWili.”

  “Yes,” Koa responded.

  “I never imagined anything like it could happen. Those poor children,” she said.

  “And their parents,” Basa interjected, obviously thinking of his own kids.

  “Yes, I suppose it’s the worst thing ever to happen to a parent,” she responded.

  Her sympathy seemed stilted to Koa, but he’d learned a long time ago people displayed highly individualized reactions to tragedy. And with no children, this woman would be less likely to look at the disaster from a parent’s point of view. “Tell us about the approval process.”

  “The developers planned a big community with several hundred homes. As part of the approval process for any large development, the county negotiates land for public facilities like a police subdivision, a firehouse, and an elementary school.”

  “The government purchases those sites?”

  She ran her fingers through her hair, straightening strands displaced by the riding helmet. “Yes, of course. We don’t use the zoning process to extort developers.”

  Why not? Koa thought. The developers stand to make a fortune. Why shouldn’t they pay for the required public services? But he hadn’t come to argue that point, so he moved on. “Who selected the KonaWili parcel for the school?”

  “Well, the developer proposed the site, and the county approved it.”

  “Was it inspected?”

  She gave a disinterested shrug. “I suppose so. I mean, some of my junior staff worked with the developers on the subdivision layout. They might’ve visited the site.”

  Koa knew from Zeke that few, if any, county personnel had land planning skills, but the notion that the county would approve a school building without a formal site review surprised Koa.

  “Aren’t site visits a normal part of the approval process?”

  “Not necessarily. Mostly the staff examines the plans for conformity with the zoning codes.”

  “Did you ever visit the site?”

  She hesitated, and he saw a tiny quiver in her lips, the first crack in her façade. “I went up at the top of the property once, but just for an overview.”

  “When you bought into the Hualālai Hui?”

  Her eyes went wide for just a fraction of a second. She hadn’t expected him to know about her interest in the land. “Yes, about then.”

  He wanted to pin down where she had gone and what she had seen. “Exactly where did you go?”

  “Just to the top. There’s an overlook off the road near the top where you can get a good view of the whole property. We just spent a couple of minutes getting the big picture.”

  “Who’s we?” he asked.

  “Just me and the broker for Paradise Land Company, the former owners.”

  “Did you see the fence?”

  She fidgeted with her hands. “There were lots of fences. It was a ranch for a long time.”

  “I meant the one around the volcanic vent. From your viewing point, it wouldn’t have been too far.”

  Her face lost its color and her eyes narrowed. “What are you suggesting? I never knew about a volcanic vent on the property. I never would have invested—”

  “I simply asked if you saw the fence.”

  “No.”

  Koa knew h
e’d gotten to her. Her reaction was too sharp, and he thought maybe she, like Gommes, had known about the vent. “You invested quite a lot of money in the Hualālai Hui, didn’t you?”

  “It’s a large property, and I’ve owned lots of real estate over the years.”

  “According to public records, you and your partner—Gommes’s real estate development outfit—bought the property for forty million dollars. Do I have that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you put up 40 percent?”

  “I own 40 percent.”

  Zeke Brown had described how real estate sharks played the development game. Many public officials, especially those in a position to grant the necessary zoning and building approvals, “bought” into land development deals at big discounts. So Makela’s glib answer didn’t deceive Koa. “You know that’s not what I asked. Did you put up 40 percent of the money or did your partner buy you a carried interest?”

  She shifted in her chair and ran her fingers through her hair again. “That’s none of your business.”

  Her body language provided all the response he needed. The developer had given her a disproportionate share to ensure he got his land use and building permits. Koa wondered how much of a discount, but he also wanted to know who else the developers had bribed. “Were there sub-huis in that deal?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “Oh, it’s definitely my business. Ranchers fenced off that volcanic vent years ago, and the developers subsequently covered it up twice—first before the surveyors arrived and again while the school was under construction. I’m here to find out who knew about the volcanic vent when you bought the property and when you approved it as an elementary school site.”

  As he spoke, the blood drained from her face, turning her skin as white as one of her fence posts. “Well, you won’t learn any more from me.” She stood and turned back toward the stables leaving her riding helmet on the table. “I’m sure you can find your own way out.”

  “Wow,” Basa exclaimed as they walked back to Koa’s Explorer. “She’s sure got a poker up her ass.”

  “She’s been the queen of dirty real estate deals since the late 1970s, and she’s suddenly confronting a multimillion-dollar deal gone sour, not just financially, but politically and criminally. She’s never before been in a position where she might have to name names.”

  “You really think she has silent partners in a sub-hui?”

  “I’d bet my next year’s salary on it.”

  “Then it’s gonna start raining horseshit.”

  “That’s what I’m hoping, that we’ve started a fire in the stables.”

  Koa’s cell rang, and he stared at the screen. It was his sister calling from Honolulu. She had promised to get back to him as soon as his brother came out of the operating room, and he’d expected to hear from her hours ago. He answered, fearing the delay wasn’t good news.

  Alana sounded greatly relieved. “The surgery took fourteen hours, but it’s done, and the doctors say they got all of the tumors.”

  Koa, who had been holding his breath, felt himself relax. “That’s great news. How is Ikaika?”

  “He’s unconscious in the ICU, but the nurses say he should be awake sometime during the next few hours.”

  “How are you and Māmā holding up?”

  “I was scared, Koa, really scared for him, but Māmā’s doing fine. I’ve never seen her so calm around doctors. She’s been in all the meetings and never once challenged the haole doctors. It’s like she’s always known something was wrong with Ikaika and suddenly discovered the secret. It’s strange. Not at all like her.”

  “She’s always believed in him even when the rest of us gave up.”

  “You’re right. She felt something the rest of us never did.”

  After Koa thanked his sister and hung up, he turned back to Basa. “You ever follow up with your brother up at West Hawai‘i Concrete?”

  “Yeah. He’ll talk to us. Says we’ll be interested. Real interested.”

  When Koa arrived home that evening, Nālani failed to greet him at the door as was her custom. His heartbeat quickened and he felt a ripple of fear. As a police officer, he and those close to him lived with a level of danger beyond that of most people. Having recently come from two murder scenes, he was already tense, and with no sign of Nālani, his unease became palpable. “Nālani,” he called out.

  “Here,” she answered before emerging from the kitchen with a handful of ginger root from their garden. “I was out back. Didn’t hear you drive in.” Coming forward, she kissed him, her arms outstretched to avoid touching him with her dirty hands. Relief surged through him.

  “We saw you on TV. The super circulated the news clip,” she said, referring to her boss at the national park. “Everybody was talking about the way you faced the crowd down.”

  “We were lucky no one got seriously hurt,” he responded.

  “You mean that crowd was lucky you were there,” she replied.

  Later, over dinner, he told her about Pueo. “He’s a strange old codger with a beard longer than Santa Claus, living like a hermit on that mountain, lost in the past. Going on about the Grateful Dead, and I’ll bet he’s never even heard of Madonna. Hawai‘i has some of the strangest dudes.”

  “‘I will get by … I will survive.’” Nālani, something of a rock and roll buff, rattled off a few bars of the Grateful Dead’s hit single.

  Koa shook his head in awe. “You’re amazing.”

  “My wasted tween years … listening to Jerry Garcia’s brand of rock while my friends were into Madonna and George Michael. The other girls thought I was nuts … and maybe I was.”

  “That’s my Nālani, always independent-minded,” he said taking her in his arms with a smile. “It’s one of the things I love about you.”

  “I hope there are other things,” she said with the mischievous smile that had first attracted him.

  “Oh, there are,” he said, pressing his lips to hers.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  KOA AND BASA turned off the Māmalahoa Highway a few miles south of Kamuela. Giant cinder cones dotted the landscape with Mauna Kea rising 14,000 feet to the east. Sunshine had returned to the Big Island, and brisk trade winds sent puffy white clouds skittering across a blue sky. Closer to the road, the silos and conveyor belts of West Hawai‘i Concrete stood out against a mountain backdrop. Trucks kicked up dust trails as they hauled crushed stone from a nearby quarry. At least a dozen concrete mixers dotted the yard around the concrete company’s headquarters building.

  “How long has your brother been doing concrete?” Koa asked.

  “Since the ’80s,” Basa responded. “He tried to get me into the business, but I turned him down. Big mistake. He makes a hell of a lot more than I do.”

  “There’s money in concrete?” Koa asked.

  “Not for the slobs who lay the stuff, but the drivers do okay, and the managers make good money, especially with all the construction activity on this side of the island. And West Hawai‘i Concrete dominates the business on the west side. My brother does alright.”

  When they drove through the gate, the ground turned from the rusty red of oxidized lava to the white of concrete dust, and the glare from the reflected sun intensified tenfold. They parked and got out. The trade winds caught them in a swirl of concrete dust, blinding them and coating them with fine white powder. They’d be cleaning shit out of their hair for a week. At least, Koa thought, it didn’t have the taste or smell of rotten eggs like the KonaWili site.

  Koa stopped just inside the admin building, letting his eyes adjust from the blinding glare outside to the fluorescent office lighting. He looked to Basa. White dust coated the sergeant’s face, and Koa guessed he too must look like a ghost.

  “Arsenio!” The deep voice boomed across the confined space. A taller and heavier carbon copy of the barrel-chested police sergeant came around the counter to bear-hug his brother. Dressed in jeans and a company logo shirt, the o
lder Basa topped six-three and weighed over two hundred pounds, but it was all muscle. Although Basa’s brother was a good ten percent taller and bigger than his little brother, the resemblance was uncanny.

  Basa hated his given name. Cops used it at their peril, but family, Koa guessed, got a pass. Slapping his brother hard on the back, Sergeant Basa turned to Koa. “This hairy caveman is my older brother, Osvaldo.” Koa barely suppressed a laugh; Arsenio had wrought his brotherly revenge on Osvaldo.

  “Just call me Ozzy,” the older Basa said, leading them around the customer counter into a small room with a conference table. “You’re here about that horrific disaster down at KonaWili.” It was a statement, not a question. “Let me get the paperwork.”

  “Osvaldo?” Koa asked with a raised eyebrow after Ozzy left the room. Basa just spread his arms and shrugged. “What can I say? Parents!”

  “You got your body cam running?”

  “No. I turn it off for family.”

  Ozzy returned with a sheaf of papers. “You want to know about the concrete orders for the school?”

  “Orders … plural?” Koa asked.

  “Yeah,” Ozzy responded. “Unusual for a government contract, but that job had two separate orders.” Ozzy pulled papers from his stack. “This first one is pretty straightforward. On big government contracts, we typically get about three months’ notice, ’cause the contractor wants the materials ready. Delays on these government jobs cost big bucks.”

  Koa pulled the order across the table and studied it. Boyle Construction had ordered hundreds of cubic yards of concrete to be delivered in stages—foundation, foundation walls, main floor, main building walls, sidewalks, and miscellaneous finishing. The order appeared to cover the entire job and bore the number of the DOE-approved construction contract. Dozens of delivery tickets, some dirty or crumpled from having been countersigned on the job, were clipped to the order, showing the deliveries as the job progressed. Finally, the file contained a series of invoices requesting payment and vouchers reflecting the dates and amounts of payment.