“That went well.” Stevens gestured Lei over. “You okay?”
“Worried about HIV, but yeah.” Lei put her hands in her uniform pockets, missing the cowry.
“Shit.” He seemed at a loss, finally went on. “So much for the female officer breaking the news strategy. Let’s canvass these neighbors since we’re here, maybe she’ll be calm enough to answer some questions later.”
“Okay.” She followed him as they went to the next house and worked their way down the street.
The neighbors were voluble on the subject of Nani, Haunani and the younger brother Alika, a high school freshman. Nani, a known drug addict, had been turned in to Social Services multiple times over the years and the neighbors had given up doing much besides feeding the kids when they came by. One witness alluded to Haunani being picked up and dropped off by someone in a “dark Toyota truck.”
Stevens shut his notebook after the fifth house. “We’ve got some leads here. Let’s head back to Nani’s and see if she’s ready to talk.”
Chapter 6
Stevens’ cell rang as they walked back through untrimmed grass along a cracking asphalt road that had never seen a sidewalk. Various barking dogs marked their progress.
“Yeah, come down,” Lei heard him say. “We’re heading back for another run at the mother. She didn’t take the news well, got a little belligerent.”
That was one word for it, Lei thought, looking at the band-aid on the back of her hand. She could still felt the shocking wet of spittle on her face. She put her hand back in her pocket. No cowry. She bent and picked up a kukui nut out of the grass, slipped it into her pocket with an immediate feeling of relief.
He slid the Blackberry back into a holder on his belt. “Jeremy’s on his way with your partner; he’s swinging by to pick you up after we talk to Nani.”
Lei didn’t answer. He gave her a sidelong glance, a quick blaze of blue that seemed to see more than she wanted him to.
“Stay back from her.”
“I have more experience with her type than you think.” She couldn’t help the bitterness that crept into her voice. Her mother’s face flashed into her mind’s eye, dreamy as she pushed down the plunger of a syringe.
“She got you good with that cigarette. You may not be able to make this any better for her, but I appreciate that you tried.”
They reached the stoop and Stevens banged on the plywood door. He had to bang twice before Ohia’s face appeared, eyes like raisins pushed into rich brown dough.
“She lying down. She high.”
“Let us in.” Stevens pulled the door further open, and brushed by Ohia into a dim interior that smelled of mildew and rotting food. A living area furnished with futons on the floor and a TV with rabbit ears opened into a bedroom. Lei followed Stevens in and stood over a mattress on the floor.
Nani lay in the center of the bed on a quilt that had once been beautiful, handsewn in a traditional Hawaiian pattern. Her legs were together, her arms crossed on her chest. She laid perfectly straight, eyes closed. The glass pipe and red Bic were set on an upturned coffee can beside the mattress, along with an empty twist of foil.
“Nani. Can you answer some questions? We need to know anything we can about who Haunani was seeing, who might have done this to her.”
No reply.
“Nani.” He reached down, nudged her shoulder. Her body went loose then, wobbling with the force of his shaking, and her head dropped to the side, mouth falling open.
He put two fingers on her neck. “Still got a pulse, but she’s too far gone right now. We’ll have to come back.”
Lei turned to Ohia, who stood behind them, a bulky shadow.
“Can you keep an eye on her? Maybe get some friends in to clean up a bit?”
“She nevah get any friends.” Still the woman backed up, headed toward the sink piled with pots and pans.
“Thanks,” Lei said. “We’ll be back to talk to her again.”
They pushed out into sunlight that felt blinding, air that tasted sweet. Lei rubbed the kukui nut. Its ridges were soothing under her fingers. The Crown Victoria, with Pono behind the wheel and Jeremy in the passenger seat, pulled up on the lawn in front of them. Stevens reached into his pocket, handed her his card.
“Call me if you think of anything else. Thanks for helping.”
“You know I’d like to work on the case full time.”
“I’m holding out for more detectives. I may still be able to use you though.”
“Okay. I guess.”
She headed for the Crown Vic and passed Jeremy, who deliberately avoided eye contact. He must resent her replacing him, however briefly, she thought as she got into the cruiser beside Pono. She glanced back at Stevens and Jeremy as they pulled away. They were looking at his notebook and discussing something. Stevens gestured to the houses they had already canvassed.
She turned her eyes away.
“How’d it go?” Pono had his Oakleys down but she could see concern in the deep line between his brows.
“Not well.” She held up her hand with its band-aid and gave a brief summary. Pono rubbed his mustache, shook his head.
“Fucking tweekers.”
“She’s still a mother whose child was killed.” Lei wished she could forget the way Nani had arranged herself like an effigy on the bed.
They drove in morose silence on a beat of downtown Hilo, which Pono called his “hood.” The cruiser rolled past the corner of a warehouse in the industrial section, and Lei spotted several teenage boys with paint cans tagging the side of a building.
Pono hit the siren and lights, and the Crown Vic roared forward. Lei snorted a laugh at the way the kids jumped about two feet in the air, dropped the cans, and ran. The squad car chased them down the alley until they scattered in different directions.
“Feel like running?” Pono asked.
“Oh yeah!” Adrenaline surged through her, the perfect antidote to angst, and she jumped out of the rolling vehicle to chase one of the miscreants. Pono continued after the others in the cruiser.
She charged after the teen until he ran into a chain-link fence, and grabbed the back of his shirt as he began to climb. She peeled him off the fence and slammed him down, her knee in the middle of his back as she cuffed him. He spat curses at her but shut up when she gave his arms an extra upward wrench. She walked him back toward the main road with a hand on the back of his neck, the buzz of adrenaline singing along her veins.
Pono had caught another of the kids and they took them down to the station and walked them in.
“You Chang boys getting in trouble again?” Sam at the watch desk frowned when he saw the teens. “I going call your grandma. She going give you lickins.”
The kids hung their heads as he berated them, following them into the station. Lei spotted Stevens filling up a plastic water bottle from the water dispenser. She hurried across the bull pen toward him.
“Stevens-how’d it go after I left?”
“You look hot.”
“Yeah.” She brushed sweaty curls back from her forehead. “Chasing some taggers downtown.”
“Get your man?”
“Of course.” She gestured toward Pono and Sam at the booking desk with the boys. “So how did the canvassing go?”
“Didn’t get much more than when you were there.” He screwed the top back onto his water bottle. “We have some leads with Haunani’s cell phone, which that neighbor Ohia found at the house. We also have a shitload of stuff to process from the campsite.”
“What about talking to Kelly’s parents today? Need any help?”
“No, Jeremy and I are handling that. You can get back to… whatever you do.” He made a vague gesture that encompassed her sweaty hair, crumpled uniform and the hangdog teenagers at the booking desk.
“You know what? Forget it. Good luck with the investigation.” Lei spun away, a hot prickle of rage sweeping up to her hairline, knowing she was over-reacting and no longer giving a damn. She stomped back over to Pono. “Let’s go, Pono. I think we missed a few.”