by Robert McCaw
He didn’t have long to wait. Chief Lannua called him to the chief’s top-floor office less than thirty minutes after he walked back into police headquarters. “Have you heard?” Lannua waived an official-looking document and a press release. “The governor has issued an executive order putting the state attorney general in charge of the KonaWili investigation.”
“And a press release?” Koa asked with a sinking feeling.
“Congratulating you on the capture of Leffler and terminating the KonaWili investigation. The Governor and the AG extend the profound thanks of the Hawaiian people for your extraordinary efforts. You’re a hero, Detective.”
Koa wanted to vomit. He wasn’t a hero, but a traitor. A dirty cop, abandoning his duty and his integrity for a family benefit. It felt awful.
The chief handed the documents to Koa, and he read slowly feeling the pain of every word:
After an in-depth investigation by the Hawai‘i County Police Department, the state attorney general announced the closure of the investigation into the KonaWili school disaster. After interviewing numerous witnesses and reviewing all the relevant documents, the Hawai‘i County police and attorney general have concluded that this terrible disaster was an unfortunate act of God. No one in the County or State governments was aware of the potential risk to schoolchildren at KonaWili, and all normal and proper steps and precautions were taken in the location and construction of the school.
There was more—words about cooperation and expressions of condolence. The press release extolled the outstanding work of Chief Detective Koa Kāne, but Koa stopped reading. His life had become a sick joke. The goddamn politicians had their whitewash, and he’d stupidly handcuffed himself into a position where he could do nothing about it.
“What about the mayor?” Koa asked. “He’s the one who appointed me.”
“Tanaka’s happy. For once, he’s not fighting the governor.”
Koa understood. Tanaka had kept control of the investigation to protect Makela, but she now had immunity. Maybe he’d also been protecting others, but now they too would be in the clear. Of course, Tanaka would be happy.
Koa thought about resigning, handing his badge and his gun to the chief, and walking out the door, but he couldn’t even take that step. If he made waves, Ikaika would stay in jail. He’d fallen into shit up to his neck. Finally, he stood. “Thanks for letting me know, Chief.”
He drove down to Lili‘uokalani Gardens and walked across the causeway to Coconut Island in Hilo Bay, known to locals as Mokuola, island of life and a place of healing. According to legend, swimming three times around the island would cure all ills. For an instant, Koa considered diving in, but instead, he sat down on the seawall and stared out into the ocean. A cruise ship made its way into the inner harbor, but he didn’t really see it. He’d violated his most sacred promise to himself—his promise never to sell his office. He removed his badge from his pocket and weighed it in his hand. He thought about throwing it into Hilo Bay but stopped himself. He had one last stop to make before he gave up his badge forever.
Koa entered Zeke’s office and sank heavily into one of the prosecutor’s chairs. Zeke must have known from the long look on Koa’s face something heavy troubled the detective. “What is it, Koa?”
“I’ve screwed up, Zeke. I screwed up bad.”
Zeke moved from behind his desk to sit across a small conference table from Koa. “It can’t be all that terrible.”
Koa slid a copy of the press release across the table.
Surprise registered on Zeke’s face as he read the paper. “The AG put this out?” he asked incredulously. “With your approval?”
“No, Zeke, I had nothing to do with it. Well, almost nothing.” Koa laid out the whole ugly story for Zeke, starting with his surveillance of Na‘auao at the Pacific National Cemetery, her disappearance in the capitol building, his conclusion she visited a state representative or senator, his conversations with Walker McKenzie, the meeting with the governor, and his realization that Na‘auao had, in fact, gone to warn the governor. He ended by telling Zeke he’d wait until Ikaika got out of jail—if the governor did, in fact, intervene—and would then resign. “I can’t be a dirty cop.”
When he finished, a crooked little smile crept across Zeke’s face. The expression annoyed Koa. “What’s the smirk for?”
“It’s fucking perfect,” Zeke said.
Koa shook his head as though to clear away mental cobwebs. “Don’t mess with me. This is the end for me.”
“Not by a long shot, my friend. Don’t you see what you’ve done? First, you’ve ID’d the last of the bastards in MJK’s room that night. But more importantly, they think they’re in the clear—that KonaWili is buried and it’s business as usual. Déjà vu all over again, as Yogi Berra would say. We just have to figure some way to set them up. Maybe we can use Makela again.”
“You have authority even though the AG has taken over?”
“Sure. The AG may control the police investigation, but I still have authority to prosecute crimes. Come on, Koa, put your mind to it. This is the endgame.”
“I can’t, Zeke. The mayor or the chief will have my head for bucking the governor, and … and I can’t let my brother down.”
“No problemo, my friend. Not on either count. The parole board meets tomorrow. The governor is either going to act or he’s not, but we’ll be over that hurdle by tomorrow night. And the mayor or the chief ? I’ll talk to the mayor and the chief when the time comes. In the meantime, remember, I appointed you an assistant prosecutor. That appointment still stands. You continue the investigation working for me.”
“You’re serious.” Koa still couldn’t quite believe what he heard.
“Damn straight, I’m serious. You need to get to work figuring out how to trap these bastards.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
THE PAROLE BOARD met the following morning at the Hilo courthouse. They had a full docket of hearings, and it was three thirty before the commissioners got to the administrative questions, like applications for reduction of minimum sentence. Normally, the commissioners decided such matters without public input, but Alexia Sheppard had persuaded the board to let her present the case for Ikaika before they decided whether to reduce Ikaika’s minimum sentence, allowing him the possibility of early parole.
When Koa arrived, only three of the five commissioners sat at the table, and they weren’t the ones most likely to give Ikaika a sympathetic hearing. Worse yet, Hardy Moyan sat in the front row. The thirty-year-old parole officer, a short wiry man with a long sour face, had diamond-hard eyes behind horn-rimmed glasses. His reputation as one of the toughest—most would say meanest—of the island’s parole staff preceded him.
Ikaika had scorned Moyan, stupidly calling him a stooge. Now, Moyan had a hard-on for Ikaika. Koa had tried to reason with Moyan but found him unyielding. Moyan regarded Ikaika as an incorrigible badass who needed to be locked up. Period. Full stop.
When Koa took a seat, Moyan noticed him and walked over to sit next to Koa. “I gotta give you credit, Mr. Chief Detective. You and your fancy lady lawyer cooked up a good one, but let me tell you, it ain’t gonna work. Your brother, he’s a real badass dude. That’s what I’m gonna tell the commissioners. Hell, I already told ’em in writing, and I’m gonna tell ’em again. In fact, I’m gonna tell ’em every time your brother comes up for parole. That son of a bitch is gonna serve the maximum, every last minute.”
Koa felt his muscles tighten and his jaw clench. He wanted to punch Moyan. The bastard didn’t have an ounce of compassion. With enormous effort, Koa restrained himself. He could only hope the governor had worked his magic. If so, it wouldn’t matter what Moyan said. And if the governor hadn’t intervened, then Ikaika didn’t stand a chance.
After finishing all the other matters, the chairman announced the commission would take up Ikaika Kāne’s case. Ikaika’s admin officer from the Arizona prison joined the proceedings by video conference. With everyone set, the chairman
told Alexia Sheppard she’d have five minutes to present her evidence and argument in support of a revision of his minimum sentence.
Alexia was brilliant. She started by presenting medical records concerning Ikaika’s collapse in jail, his diagnosis at Queen’s Medical, his surgery, and Dr. Kepler’s opinion that Ikaika’s tumors had impaired his ability to conform to societal norms. With the removal of the tumors, Kepler expected him to behave differently. Alexia presented Māpuana’s affidavit describing how Ikaika’s behavior had changed since the surgery and followed with Koa’s statement recounting the humor, the self-deprecation, and the new thoughtfulness in Ikaika’s postoperative behavior. Alexia then went through the Commission’s guidelines, arguing Ikaika met every condition for a reduction of his minimum sentence.
She took almost fifteen minutes, but the chairman let her finish before he called Hardy Moyan. Moyan described Ikaika as a violent recidivist with no moral code and no ability to distinguish between right and wrong. As Moyan spoke, Koa could see one of the commissioners nodding. Koa felt a sad, sinking feeling. It had been a long shot before Moyan poisoned the waters. Moyan had rendered it hopeless.
The telephone in the conference room rang before Moyan finished his tirade. Everyone paused while the parole board’s administrative officer answered the phone, listened for almost a minute, and then whispered something in the chairman’s ear. The chairman looked up with a surprised expression before announcing that the commissioners would take a ten-minute break.
During the break, Moyan approached Koa. “I told you I was going to nail the son of a bitch. You wasted your money on that fancy lady lawyer.”
“Fuck off,” Koa said softly before turning on his heels and walking across the room to chat with Alexia.
“You were brilliant,” he told her, “but Moyan’s queered the deal. There’s no way now.”
Alexia bore a forlorn expression. “I’m afraid I agree. Sorry.”
Almost a half hour passed before the board chairman returned. The other commissioners remained absent. “We,” the chairman announced, “have just received word from Governor Māhoe’s office. The governor has commuted Ikaika Kāne’s sentence. The papers are being faxed to the prison and the prison ward at Queen’s Medical. He will be released from custody in the morning. Since he is now a free man and beyond our jurisdiction, there is no need to continue this hearing. I thank you for your participation.”
A shocked expression distorted Hardy Moyan’s face. Koa only wished he’d captured it on film. Koa embraced Alexia and rushed out to call his mother.
The governor had come through for him like gangbusters. An order of commutation was final and irrevocable. It made Ikaika a free man, and it also freed Koa to help Zeke put the governor in jail without fear his brother would stay in prison. Perhaps, he thought, he should feel beholden to the governor, but he didn’t. The governor had helped cover up a murder, and he had almost certainly been on the take for years. He might even be a murderer. And he’d used Koa to shut down the investigation into the deaths of fourteen children and four teachers. Now he and Zeke were going to turn the tables.
Koa returned to his office with a light heart, like he himself had just been freed from prison. With his integrity in good stead, he felt like a whole person again and renewed his promise to himself never ever to sell out.
Refocusing on the investigation, Koa turned his mental spotlight on Gommes. According to Witherspoon’s confession, Gommes had orchestrated the cover-up of MJK’s murder. He’d dispatched Francine Na‘auao, aka Frannie Kapule, to sell the cops the phony suicidal depression story and persuaded Makela and Watanabe to back up the conspirators’ false alibis. Thereafter, he’d used Makela to bribe Na‘auao and controlled Watanabe’s career with bribes, plum jobs, and coercion.
Through the years, Gommes made a fortune through his dirty development deals. He’d bought the KonaWili development to extend his wealth. Whether he learned about the fumarole before the purchase, Koa didn’t know, but before the development proceeded he’d ordered the fumarole filled in with rocks, then sold the parcel to the DOE, and finally arranged for Boyle to cover the volcanic vent in concrete, oblivious to the risks to children who would go to school there.
Over the years, Gommes must have sensed Witherspoon’s bouts of conscience. From the search of Witherspoon’s office, Koa guessed the architect had told Gommes he’d secreted a confession. Gommes must also have known of Boyle’s depression. With wealth beyond measure, Gommes could easily have doled out forty thousand dollars in cash to Leffler. A master planner and enforcer like Gommes could have hired Leffler, buying himself an insurance policy long before Pele wrecked the KonaWili school. That could explain why Boyle had been killed so soon after the disaster.
It hung together like the flowers on a lei, pointing to Gommes as the man who’d paid Leffler to kill Boyle and Witherspoon. There was just one insurmountable problem. Leffler had tried to kill Gommes.
But if Gommes hadn’t hired Leffler, that left only two contenders—Na‘auao and the governor. Koa supposed either of them could have tired of living under Gommes’s thumb and turned on him. They had money, so forty thousand dollars would have been no impediment, but neither of them shared the history of violence Watanabe and Makela attributed to Gommes.
Koa wondered if he could get Leffler to talk. Maybe the man would trip up and drop a clue, shedding light on the mystery. He had the jailers bring Leffler up to one of the interview rooms, and asked Basa to join them. Basa had an uncanny ability to read people, and Koa needed every edge he could get with Leffler.
Before they began, Koa and Basa watched Leffler through the glass observation window for several minutes.
“That’s one ugly scar,” Basa said, studying Leffler’s face.
“Yeah,” Koa responded, “his service record says he got it in Afghanistan but not in the line of duty.”
“Maybe when he raped one of the local women,” Basa suggested.
“Maybe.”
They entered the interrogation room together. Leffler, again chained to the table, glared at them with hostile eyes.
“You ready to tell us who hired you?” Koa asked.
“I ain’t no snitch.”
Koa pulled out a copy of the hit list taken from the safe in Leffler’s girlfriend’s apartment and laid it on the table. “Who gave you these names?”
Silence.
Koa slowly read the names: “Boyle, Witherspoon, Makela, Watanabe, and me.”
Silence.
“And someone gave you another name—one that’s not on the list—didn’t they?”
More silence, but this time Leffler blinked twice in what Koa read to be confusion or surprise. He wasn’t sure.
“Come on, Leffler, who told you to go after Gommes?”
There it was again, but this time Leffler’s whole body seemed to tense. The man appeared surprised they knew of his attempted hit on Gommes.
“How’d you do it, Leffler? That’s a nearly impossible shot. Downhill in a crosswind from 1200 yards.”
Leffler’s eyebrows narrowed, as though he were confused. Koa could almost see the wheels turning in Leffler’s head as he tried to work out some puzzle.
Koa tried again. “What weapon did you use? The DesertTech SRS A-1 sniper rifle?”
Leffler opened his mouth to say something but then retreated into silence.
Koa tried several more times, but he’d hit a wall. Leffler wasn’t going to talk.
On Koa’s signal, the two police officers stepped outside. “Did you see his eyes when I asked him about Gommes?” Koa asked.
“Yeah,” Basa responded. “The eyes, his facial muscles, and that ugly scar.”
“He seemed surprised we knew about his attack on Gommes,” Koa guessed.
“Maybe,” Basa responded, “but I think there’s more.”
“Like what?”
“He kinda acted like the whole thing was news to him, especially when you started asking about the gun and the sho
t itself.”
For a second Koa wondered if someone else had fired at Gommes, but then another thought struck him.
“Come on,” he said to Basa and hurried toward the police evidence room, where they’d stored the evidence taken from Leffler’s Mauna Kea cabin hideaway.
Koa knew a lot about guns. He’d qualified as an expert with a variety of weapons during his Special Forces days. He’d never been a sniper, but he knew how they operated. The scene at Gommes’s place had puzzled Koa, and he’d wondered how Leffler had made the nearly impossible shot. The pu‘u from which the shot had come stood at a considerably higher elevation than the house, so the shooter had been firing downhill. The bullet would nevertheless have followed a curved trajectory, requiring the shooter to point the rifle above his line of sight so that the bullet would fall in a long arc toward the target. At over 1000 yards, even with high-powered ammunition, the drop would be measured in feet, not inches, and even a small error in estimating the distance would produce a clean miss. Wind velocity and angle, humidity, temperature, as well as the characteristics of the ammo, would affect the trajectory. Getting everything perfect on the first shot without a range finder and wind measurement tools was nearly impossible. Expert snipers typically attempted such a shot only with match-grade or specially crafted ammunition and used tools like a Kestrel applied ballistic calibration system.
The Army had trained Leffler, putting him through various specialized training, including the tough Q course, but he’d been rejected for Special Forces and become a supply sergeant. Leffler’s military service record showed no sniper training, and the rogue soldier had never served as a military sniper. While the search of Leffler’s cabin hideout had turned up a DesertTech SRS A1 sniper rifle, the police had found no ballistic calibration system. True, Leffler could have performed basic ballistic calculations with a smartphone app, but range finder apps on smartphones without a laser attachment were close to worthless at long distances. And Leffler’s smartphone wouldn’t have given him the wind speed or direction.