Coming down the trail, Lila had pointed through the clouds to the small rise she said was their destination. Later, on the floor of the crater, she gestured and said, “There’s our cone, Pu’uo Maui.”
Lassiter’s broad shoulders sagged. “But that’s a mountain. It didn’t look that big from above.”
“You get no sense of perspective from on top,” Lila said. “There’s nothing down here recognizable to compare to the cones, so they all look small. I’ll try to remember where Keaka and I camped. It was away from the trail so we couldn’t be seen.”
The cone was a miniature volcano itself, rising nine hundred feet from the floor of Haleakala, with an indented crater of its own on top. Lila was puzzled. “I remember there were bushes and pili grass nearby.”
They found an area on the far side of the cone with patches of ‘ ohelo berries. “It could be around here,” she said.
Could be, Lassiter thought, knowing it was futile. There was no way they could just jam a shovel into the red sand and come up with a million bucks. It was getting dark, and the temperature was dropping.
Lila kept looking for familiar landmarks. “Problem is, it’s constantly changing in here. Look at the ripples in the sand. New plants grow and die. Others are covered by the blowing sand. We used to camp anywhere we wanted and now looking around, the size of this place, I just don’t know. I’m sorry, Jake.”
“Don’t worry. It doesn’t matter.”
And it really didn’t. He wasn’t sad about the money. He thought about it and figured he didn’t care about the bonds after all. He’d really come for Lila, it had just been hard to admit on the way out here. After Tubby was killed, there had been another purpose, revenge, and with Keaka dead, it seemed like it should be over.
Darkness came quickly, and with it the mountain air grew cold. Then the sky lit up. The clouds disappeared and the stars blazed, thousands of them, more than he’d ever seen, sparkling against the black velvet sky, a king’s ransom in gemstones. They set up camp in the twinkling light, zipping their sleeping bags together, making a comfortable nest for two. The heavy sweaters came off and so did everything else.
They made love, the crisp night air outside, their bodies warm in the sleeping bag. And this time it was different. Maybe it was the place — the stars and the rocks that were born so long ago, a universal silence except for their own murmurs — maybe it was him, maybe it was a million things, but what did it matter, because Lila responded as she had not be fore, her breathing quickened, and then her breasts heaved and her body shuddered, then rested and shuddered again, and she gave out a short cry, and then another. They both lay there, bathed in each other’s sweat, and this time Jake Lassiter didn’t ask because he knew, and Lila opened her eyes and dewy tears ran down her sculpted cheeks and Lassiter kissed each salty drop.
Jake Lassiter looked toward the heavens, and in the clear, thin air, it seemed he could touch the stars. The entire world sparkled, the thousand-foot cinder cones etched in relief against the night, the flickering suns burning with fires of antiquity, the woman whose legs entwined his. If only this moment could be frozen for eternity like the bed of an ancient lava stream. Lila was his and he had only one goaclass="underline" to get her out of Maui and home with him. To hell with the bonds, he thought, and he slept like a man with no enemies and a future as bright as the sky.
CHAPTER 31
They could see their breath in the morning air. They could also feel the mist, cold droplets from the clouds. The outside of the double sleeping bag was soaked.
Lila was up, puttering around the campsite, while Jake lay there in the warmth she had created. “Jake, look at this!” Her voice rose with excitement, and at first he thought she might have found an old landmark, a key to the treasure he had all but forgotten. But Lila stood motionless in front of a four-foot tall plant, sleek gray leaves at its base, a burst of purple flowers pointing upward, leaves shimmering, nearly white.
“Silversword,” Lila said. “In full bloom. Take a good look. They only bloom on Haleakala, nowhere else on Maui, nowhere else in the world.”
He pulled himself out of the sleeping bag, and hopped into his undershorts. “It’s breathtaking.”
“But sad, too.”
“Why? It’s glorious. A plant flaming out of the rocks and sand, it’s almost unearthly.”
“Sad because it won’t last,” Lila Summers said. “The silversword grows for twenty years without blooming, just a bush in the desert. Then it blooms, but only once, a brief flash of colors, then dries up like an old kitchen mop and dies.”
They stood there, absorbing the beauty of the plant, struck by its splendor against the stark landscape. Tears came to Lila’s eyes. What was she thinking, Lassiter wondered in the silence, looking at the plant, so beautiful, so near death.
Such a strange reaction. When she butchered her former lover, not a trace of emotion. Now, on the lunar landscape, tears for a flowering bush. What did it mean to her, he wondered. Was the realization sinking in? That she had to leave the island, now and forever, this was her last time in the crater, the last glimpse of a silversword in bloom?
Still looking at the shimmering plant, she said, “Will you always remember last night?”
“For the rest of my life.”
“Remember the silversword, Jake. Remember it and think of me.”
“I’ll think of you all the time, especially if we’re sharing the same sleeping bag.”
But she just shook her head sadly and began gathering up their belongings.
By the time they ate their papayas and gathered their gear, the sun was sizzling over the rim of the crater. Lila paced around the base of the huge cone, but even in the morning light, she had no idea where to look, no way to guess where Keaka had buried the treasure. She scuffed at a few rocks, then gave up. You could dig more holes than Con Ed and have nothing to show for it but a ton of sand and rocks.
It was time to get off the mountain, to get away before Mikala set out to avenge his cousin’s death. Which is what Lila predicted he would do. He’s a killer, she said, not up close with his own hands like Keaka, but more of an assassin, a methodical professional. Lassiter remembered the talk in the police station, the pride Mikala took in the slaughter in Vietnam.
After the long climb up the trail to the observation building, they loaded their gear in Lila’s old pickup and started slowly down Crater Road. Six miles below the summit, behind a sharp bend in the road at the eight-thousand-foot level, a few cars were pulling into the entrance to the Halemau’u Trail, which led to the rim of the crater. As they passed the parking lot, it pulled out behind them, a 1979 Chevy Blazer with a reinforced steel bumper, a row of spotlights, and a rumbling engine. Two tons of terror, a nightmare on wheels.
CHAPTER 32
Lila Summers hit the gas, hut the engine backed off — the Mazda could have used a tune-up — then revved and tore around the next curve. The Blazer closed the distance, its fortified front bumper drawing a bead on them. Then it just hung there, a foot or two feet behind, taking every curve with them. Lila slowed, the Blazer slowed; she sped up, the Blazer sped up.
“They’re toying with us,” Lassiter said. “Do you have any weapons in here?”
“Nothing here but the windsurfing gear in back,” she replied, never taking her eyes off the road.
He remembered Tubby, deja vu, and he figured he wasn’t doing any good this time either. “I’m going back there,” he said, opening the door and watching the pavement streak beneath him. Lila didn’t say a word. No meek feminine protests — don’t do it, Jake — not from Lila Summers. She was calm, her athlete’s reflexes taking care of the driving. If he could help out, fine. If not, just stay the hell out of the way.