Walking in Fire: Hawaiian Heroes, Book 1 Page 6

  Melia took another gulp of coffee.

  After a while, Leilani got down and went to the big refrigerator. “Well, might as well make breakfast,” she said. “I gotta do something but sit, yeah?”

  Melia nodded, and Leilani came back to plunk a knife in front of her. She waved a hand at the huge basket of tropical fruit on the sideboard. “You wanna do the fruit?”

  Melia chose a pineapple and brought it back to the island. Whack! The top fell off. Whack! The bottom fell.

  Leilani turned and looked at her. A grin spread across her face. “Some big man betta watch out.”

  Melia snickered. It felt good, a release valve for the tension compressed inside her. She was worried and scared and really, really angry at the whole situation. She wanted Malu to walk in safe and sound and say that he’d found Cherie, who’d simply gotten lost, or something. And that they had not been making hot hana ai in the woods all night.

  Leilani began to crack eggs into a bowl. “The Ho’omalus are one of the oldest families on the island,” she said. “Descended from chieftains. Well respected here.”

  “Ho’omalu?” Melia repeated, fascinated. “So that’s his last name?” She wasn’t sure why Leilani was volunteering information about Malu, but she was dying to hear it.

  “Yup. David Ho’omalu.” Leilani looked over at Melia, that knowing little smile on her lips. “He’s an artist. He painted those pictures you like so much.”

  Melia knew her mouth was hanging open, but for a moment, she could only stare at Leilani. “Malu painted those?”

  Leilani nodded. “Been drawing in his sketch books since he was a keiki. Went off to college, played football for the Rainbow Warriors. Got a degree and a job with one of da family businesses. Surprised everyone when he quit to paint. Everyone except his ohana—his family.”

  “Football, wow, he probably could have gone to the NFL.” He was certainly big enough. And he’d been to college and apparently well brought up. She’d already noticed he turned his “island boy” speak on and off at will.

  Leilani shook her head decisively. “No. Ho’omalus never leave the island for long. They travel, but they always live here. My family the same. Been Leluas on the Big Island as long as the Ho’omalus.”

  Melia accepted this change of subject with a certain relief. She needed time to process all this information about Malu. David. His name was David.

  “So who’s Daniel?” she asked.

  “His brother,” Leilani said. “Wish he was here now. He’d find Malu right now. But he’s not, so…” She shrugged.

  Malu had a brother. Melia wondered if he was as drop-dead gorgeous as Malu. Okay, drop dead—not the best expression she could have come up with.

  “Does your family live here?” she asked to change the subject.

  “Up on Mamaloa Highway.” Leilani chatted about her family, and Melia listened as they worked. But half of her mind was on Malu. He was the artist.

  She paused, the knife in midair over the pineapple as she realized that the sketchbook she’d found must belong to him, as well.

  And the sketch of the woman—no wonder she was familiar. She must be of one of them. But was it Cherie, or Jacquie…or her?

  And what did it mean? That he admired the woman, or that he watched, waiting for a chance to do more than admire?

  Chapter Six

  Recipe for disaster—take one injured tourist, one missing Hawaiian, and cast blame.

  Melia stayed in the kitchen with Leilani, drinking coffee and creating a huge fruit salad. It sat on the platter untouched until Leilani put a bowl and spoon in front of Melia.

  “Betta eat something to balance all da coffee,” she said. “Or you get da jitters.”

  Melia filled her bowl and nibbled on succulent pineapple, mango, banana and papaya. It might as well have been cardboard. She watched Leilani working and struggled to keep her own thoughts here in the bright kitchen instead of on dark imaginings.

  Dane and the twins came back first, sweaty and grimy.

  “We found nothing,” Dane said shortly. “Just like I figured. You got any more of that coffee?”

  He waited only for Leilani to fill his mug, and then stalked out onto the lanai. The twins paused to fill bowls with fruit salad. Leilani offered them malasadas from a tray she set beside the salad. Melia noticed she didn’t offer to take one to Dane. They took their food outside onto the lanai.

  Just when dawn was beginning to turn the sea outside the windows to silver, Frank appeared in the doorway. He looked tired and grim, his face wet with sweat.

  “I found the girl,” he said.

  At the look on his face, Melia dropped her spoon into the bowl of fruit she’d been eating, her stomach clenching in a knot. “Is she…?”

  He shook his head. “She’s alive, but she needs a doctor.”

  Leilani let out a low sound of distress. “What happen to her? She fall?”

  “No. Pepehi—beat up, real bad,” Frank said. He grabbed a kitchen towel off the counter and wiped his face.

  Melia put her hand over her mouth, swallowing hard as the coffee and fruit tried to come back up.

  “You found her?” It was Jacquie in the kitchen doorway, still in her sexy nightie, her eyes red from crying.

  Frank nodded. “You get hold of Keone?” he asked Leilani. “I need some help carrying her out. My back won’t hold up.”

  She shook her head, and he shrugged resignedly. “Where are the guys?”

  “Just got back. They’re out on the lanai, drinking coffee.”

  “I’m coming too,” Jacquie said. “Wait for me to get dressed.”

  “You don’t need to come,” Frank said soothingly. “Why don’t you stay here, be ready to help when we get her back?”

  She nodded dolefully, and then disappeared.

  Melia looked at Frank. “Malu?”

  Frank shook his head, scowling as he took a cup of coffee from Leilani. “No sign of him.”

  “I’ll go get the guys,” Leilani said and hurried out.

  Frank stood, gulping his coffee, then walked over and grabbed a sweet roll and took a huge bite.

  Dane erupted into the kitchen, followed by the other men. “You found Cherie but not Malu? My God, he must have attacked her and then taken off.”

  Melia pressed her hand tightly to her mouth. Frank knew Malu; surely he wouldn’t believe Dane’s accusation.

  Frank shook his head, his mouth full. As Leilani came back in, he held out his cup, and she brought the coffee pot to fill it again. He took a drink of coffee and gave Dane a hard look. “Malu had no part in this thing.”

  Melia made a sound of relief. Dane looked over at her, and she looked away, knowing raw hope was probably written all over her face. Along with fear—because if Malu hadn’t done it, who had? Could it have been one of these three men? Her mind shied away from that—surely it was some stranger lurking in the forest.

  “Would you like me to come up with you?” she asked Frank.

  He shook his head, wiping his fingers on his shirt and setting down his cup. “No. You stay here with Leilani and the other wahine, call 911. We need to let them know we got a pu’e kolohe, attacker on da loose. If they can’t send a boat right away, we’ll take her in mine.”

  Melia and Leilani watched from the back lanai as the men set out to get Cherie. Frank had a folding stretcher, unearthed from first-aid supplies in a storage shed, that they could carry between them.

  Dane stalked alongside Frank, gesturing angrily. “It had to be Malu. There’s no one else around for miles. I mean, how well do you really know the guy?”

  Frank shook his head and said something Melia couldn’t hear. She hoped he was defending Malu. Could Clay or Jimmer have slipped away and done it? The two had been snickering with Dane earlier about what Malu and Cherie were doing alone in the woods, but in the morning light, they were quiet and subdued, looking very young.

  “I’ll call 911,” Leilani said when the party had disappeared into the
trees. “Then we betta get dressed and get the boat ready to go.”

  Melia nodded, grateful to be included in the preparations. She’d go crazy if she had to sit and think. David Ho’omalu, where are you? Crazy, indeed—she barely knew the man, yet she was nearly beside herself with worry.

  She waited while Leilani called the emergency hotline. It seemed to take a long time to go through the procedure. After several moments, Leilani shook her head, frowning. She clicked the phone closed.

  “Police can’t send a boat right away. Got some kind of trouble in Kona.”

  “What about a helicopter?” Melia asked. She’d heard the craft crisscrossing the island since she arrived. They seemed to be used a lot here.

  “No room to land one here,” Leilani said. “Too wild. There’s a place well up the mountain, but it’s on a lava flow. They can’t be hauling the girl clear up there. Well, let’s get busy.”

  “But…Malu?” Melia blurted. She pressed her fingers to her lips as Leilani turned back, her dark eyes haunted.

  “Don’t know,” the other woman said starkly. “He…he better be okay. We…” Her voice trailed off, and she turned sharply away. “We can only deal with what’s before us, yeah?”

  It was the truth, no matter how unpalatable. An injured woman needed their help. They could do nothing to help Malu, not for the moment.

  The air felt hot and close when Melia stepped out of the shower, her skin damp despite her brisk toweling. She slipped on a pair of panties and the blue batik sundress she’d found in Kona. She’d seen the dress fluttering in the breeze that first day and bought it on the spot. That carefree shopping trip seemed so distant now. She just wanted something cool and comfortable.

  Putting the last of her things away, she left her duffle on the bed and went to help Leilani. As she passed Jacquie’s room, she saw the woman curled on her bed once more.

  “Should we get her up?” she asked Leilani.

  Leilani looked at her. “You wanna listen to her cry?”

  Melia shook her head guiltily. They packed a cooler with lunches, another with cold drinks, and carried them down to the boat.

  “Even in trouble, people got to eat,” Leilani said. “I’m going to start the boat up, make sure everything running okay. Then when they get down here with that girl, we ready to go.”

  The boat would not start.

  Frowning, Leilani checked the gauges, opened a hatch and peered in, then tried again. The big motor sputtered once and stopped.

  “Great,” she said in disgust. “Well, Frank have to look at this. I don’t know what’s wrong.”

  Melia looked back along the dock. She saw movement, the men emerging from the trees. Her heart leapt with hope, but no tall, broad figure strode into the hot sunlight. It was the twins, bearing a stretcher between them, with Frank and Dane on either side.

  “They’re here.”

  Frank, tired and harassed, scowled darkly when confronted with the news about his boat. He hopped aboard and dove under the engine cover, with one of the twins at the wheel as helper.

  Leilani looked after Cherie, who had been laid on her bed in the stretcher. Melia, who’d only had a glimpse of Cherie as they carried her into the house, gasped in horror. The redhead lay still, her face and limbs covered with horrific bruises, her hair and brief sarong stained with dirt and blood. She was lucky to have survived, Melia realized. Whoever had attacked her seemed to have wanted her dead or simply not cared whether she lived or died.

  Jacquie flung herself onto the rattan lounge by Cherie’s bed and burst into tears again.

  Leilani shook her head. “Dis bad,” she said. “Never happen in Kau long as I been here.”

  “Do you think she was…raped?” Melia’s stomach lurched again.

  “Oh God, no,” Jacquie moaned.

  “Oh Pele, I hope not,” Leilani answered. They shared a look of feminine understanding. “But maybe. Doctors have to tell that.”

  “Why can’t we go right now?” Jacquie demanded thickly. “What if she dies?”

  “She’s not gonna die,” Leilani said firmly. “She’s breathing, no blood coming from her mouth or nose. She be fine. Frank has to get the boat running.”

  Melia doubted if Leilani was quite as certain as she sounded, but Jacquie calmed down.

  “Well, her things need to be packed,” Leilani said. “Can you do that while I finish up in da kitchen?”

  Glad to be helping somehow, Melia packed Cherie’s two huge bags. She felt odd going through her private items, but Jacquie was no help. After listening to her weeping for several more moments, Melia turned to her.

  “Jacquie, go take a shower and throw your stuff in your bags,” she said firmly, using the tone Leilani had taken with the woman earlier.

  “Okay.” Jacquie trailed off, and Melia breathed a sigh of relief as she returned to her task. Everything Cherie owned seemed to have metallic bling or peek-a-boo accents of some kind and smelled of her perfume.

  Leilani returned to check on the woman. Melia wheeled Cherie’s bags down to the boat. Frank was shaking his head over the catamaran’s engine as it sputtered roughly. She watched for a moment and then went back to make sure Jacquie was ready. As she walked back up the path, she slowed, scanning the shadows at the edge of the lawn. Seeing no one, she returned to the house.

  Finally, Frank sent Jimmer to say the boat was running and to bring Cherie down.

  “All right,” said Frank when Cherie had been laid carefully on a bed of cushions under the awning, a blanket over her. “The rest of you get your things and get back down here.”

  “What about Malu?” Leilani asked, voicing Melia’s thoughts.

  Frank looked off into the darkness, then shook his head doggedly. “Malu knows this land like da back of his hand. And we can’t find him in da dark. We gotta get this woman to the hospital. He’d say the same if he were here.”

  “Where the hell is Dane?” he barked irritably.

  “I’ll get him,” Melia offered quickly, suddenly remembering she hadn’t grabbed her own bag, either.

  She found Dane in the hallway, bag in hand. His face was still taut, even angry.

  “They’re ready,” she told him. “I just have to get my bag.”

  Looking along the shadowed hallway, Melia shivered. Despite the humid heat of the Hawaiian day, her sundress suddenly seemed too little covering. She wanted to dash out of the guest house and down the path to the dock where the others waited. But she wasn’t leaving without her things.

  “Coming?” Standing at the foot of the broad staircase, Dane gave her a derisive look, sun-streaked blond hair falling over his eyes. “C’mon, I’ll hold your hand.”

  Blushing as she realized her hesitation was obvious, Melia shook her head. “Thanks, Dane, I’m fine. Just let me grab my bags.”

  As she walked into her room, she eyed the open window. Logically, she knew whoever had attacked Cherie wouldn’t be hiding right out there in the lush vegetation, but she felt uneasy, as if danger lurked close by. The open, airy house was no longer a lovely haven.

  “I’ll protect you from the wild Hawaiian killer,” Dane drawled behind her.

  Melia flinched, glad her back was turned. Wild Hawaiian maybe, but killer, no, she wouldn’t believe it. She closed her eyes in frustration and sorrow at how this impromptu trip to paradise had gone so wrong. But instead of blackness she saw Malu’s face. Surely a man who smiled like that couldn’t have beaten Cherie? And anyway, why would he attack Cherie when he could’ve had her with a crook of his finger? The vivacious redhead had hung on him like a lamprey. Unless he’d wanted her to do something so kinky she wouldn’t, and then…he’d forced her.

  Ugh. She shuddered. No, she couldn’t believe that. But if he hadn’t beaten Cherie, who had? And where was Malu?

  Anyway, lately her judgment wasn’t that great when it came to men. Maybe Dane was right.

  Purse over her shoulder, Melia took one last look around the little room.

  “I s
’pose you wish he was in your bedroom,” Dane said behind her.

  Startled, Melia swung around to find him leaning against the window frame only a foot or two away, hands shoved into the pockets of his camouflage shorts. Silhouetted against the window, his face was shadowed, but there was an odd set to his bare shoulders. Uneasiness skittered over her skin.

  “No, I just wish he was here, safe,” she said.

  “He’s not interested in you,” Dane said now, his voice as tight as his stance.

  Melia glanced toward the door. Dane was attracted to Malu. Was it possible he was so jealous he would attack any woman in whom Malu showed interest?

  Her conscious mind floundered. Dane was just a wealthy beach bum, intent on the next laugh, the next party. He’d admitted it cheerfully.

  “You would’ve gone, though, if he’d asked you,” he said slyly, watching her.

  “No,” she retorted, stung. “And he didn’t ask.” Not unless she counted his teasing.

  He shrugged. “’Course not. You didn’t shove your tits in his face like she did. Anyway, to protect you, I told him you came to buy.”

  “Buy what?” she asked blankly.

  He shook his head. “Jeez, are you as innocent as you act? Drugs, baby, drugs.”

  Melia gaped at him, ignoring his sneering tone. “You told Malu I wanted to buy drugs?”

  He snorted. “Plenty of people come to Hawaii to make a buy. They do some snorkeling or diving, some partying.”

  “Well, I came just to snorkel,” Melia snapped. “And while I appreciate your misguided attempt to protect me, you had no right to lie about me.”

  “I do what needs to be done.” He shrugged as if her protest meant nothing.

  Anger knotting in her belly, Melia turned to grab her duffle bag from the bed.

  “Come on,” she snapped. “We have to get Cherie to a hospital. That’s what’s important now.”

  Chapter Seven

  Recipe for violence—take one Hawaiian left for dead and mix with attacker. Stir well.