Diamond Head (17 page)

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Authors: Charles Knief

BOOK: Diamond Head
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K
ate drove and I was grateful. I also was grateful to be out of her apartment. People speak of rock fever, the fear of being trapped on a tiny island in the middle of the Pacific. I'd been trapped in a small apartment on a tiny island in the middle of the Pacific for two days and I was beginning to go stircrazy.
The boat yard was west of downtown in the industrial district of Kaka'ako and traffic was heavy all the way from Waikiki. It was rush hour. Distances are close in Honolulu, but there are many impediments to traveling in a car on an island where there are more vehicles than people. The crush of automobiles was compounded by street closures, barricades and traffic cones, proving the old saying that in Honolulu the shortest distance between two points is always under construction.
By the time we arrived on the western side of Kewalo Boat Harbor the sun was going down. Silhouettes of party boats glided across a mandarin orange horizon. Explosions of white light sparkled across the party craft like strobe lights as tourists memorialized the event.
Kate parked the Mustang and we walked together to the warehouse offices. There was a void in the previous intimacy that I understood as the rebuilding of her armor. My weapon
preparation, which she had inadvertently witnessed, had affronted her sense of justice. It was an abrogation of some undefined pact we had made that we were out to get Thompson arrested. If there was some kind of pact I had not been aware of it. My mission was to get the evidence first, and then place Thompson in a position where MacGruder's daughter would not be an issue. If he went to trial, she was certain to become an issue. I could not risk that in order to see him tried in a court of law.
As we climbed the exterior stairway of the warehouse I noticed
Pele
alongside the repair dock across the water. Workmen were finishing their tasks, hurrying before the sun completed its own daily travel. The repairs to
Pele
must have been inconsequential to have been completed in one day. I felt disappointed. Next time I got the chance I would hurt Thompson a little more.
Once inside we joined a small group of men and women who were intent on the big white yacht across the harbor. I recognized Captain Yoshida, and I thought I saw a couple of familiar HPD detectives, but most of the others were unknown to me. They had that confident look of law enforcement types who could not be fired regardless of how badly they screwed up. I assumed them to be feds.
Yoshida was standing in the middle of a group of people, all wearing identical expressions of self-importance. He glanced in our direction as we entered and frowned when he saw me. He waved Kate over, making a small production of ignoring my presence.
I strolled over to a window and watched the activity on
Pele
and the sudden realization of the scope of my failure hit me with the force of a tidal wave. My mission was to destroy any evidence that could implicate MacGruder's daughter and I had led a federal task force to the source. With all this official interest my mission had foundered.
I had hoped to dart into the open jaws of the situation, recover
and destroy whatever evidence there was, and then nimbly leap out before the jaws snapped shut. That was the plan, but I found I wasn't nimble enough. There was too much heat now. The official minions of the law would take it from here, seizing Thompson, his thugs, his boat, his houses and all his tapes, rendering my cause hopeless.
I didn't like failure. What was worse was the possibility of seeing a good man lose his career for something his daughter had done.
Across the water two men boarded
Pele.
Something was exchanged with one of the workmen, who left the boat, lugging tools and electrical cords. One of the two men went below while the other went to the flying bridge. A puff of blue smoke discharged from the exhaust and the water below the stern roiled from the spinning propellers.
Twenty hands brought twenty cellular phones and radio sets to twenty mouths at nearly the same instant. If stares really did have weight Pele would have sunk then and there. The big yacht moved away from the dock, making for the breakwater and the open ocean through a bright, tropical sunset.
It was over, I thought. Thompson was out there somewhere, expecting his men to pick him up and take him to the next port. With the craft properly provisioned, Thompson could make the mainland or he could make Tahiti.
But
Pele
was not properly provisioned. Kate's contact at the boat yard had reported only minor repairs. She had not mentioned provisioning. And none of that mattered anyhow, because the feds would swoop down and pick them up before they entered international waters. And a thought hit me.
Thompson was merely evil. He wasn't stupid and he wasn't a fool. With someone like me nosing around, he must have known that something was going to happen, and that serious heat would soon follow.
Pele
was the bait, a queen's gambit, the magnet that would draw all of the official attention. On this planet there is nothing more controlled, taxed, licensed, inspected
and surveyed than an ocean-going vessel. A big yacht is slow, and on the ocean it presents a target profile similar to one of those stationary Iraqi tanks that were annihilated during the Gulf War. If Thompson expected any kind of official interest,
Pele
would be the last place he would be found.
I looked for Kate. She was in deep conversation with her boss, her face a study in beauty and passion in motion. It was not a good time to interrupt.
I watched and waited. Kate left her group and stood next to me by the window.
“They hit his house in Haleiwa this afternoon,” she told me. “No one was there but they found tire tracks that might match those found at the MacGruder scene. It looked as though Thompson had packed and left the house in a hurry.”
“They expect him to be aboard
Pele?”
“They expect he'll meet the yacht once it's left port.”
I nodded. They would expect that. But he wouldn't be there.
“Thompson has no chance of getting off this island,” Kate continued. “The airport is blanketed. Are you all right?” Her dark eyes were shining, the passion there reminiscent of the night before. This woman was a warrior, in her own element, closing in for the kill.
“I'm fine,” I said. “I just thought it would turn out differently.”
“You're still worried about those tapes.”
I nodded.
“This will ruin MacGruder.”
I nodded again.
“And you don't want that to happen.”
“No, Kate, I don't.”
“It has to be this way. You understand that, don't you?”
I shook my head. “I understand that you think it has to be this way.”
This time Kate nodded, impatiently, biting her lower lip. She was looking at this from her own perspective. There wasn't
room for another. “I've got to get back to the others. I made a mistake bringing you here, I can see that now. I just didn't want you to get in the way. There are some heavy people out there looking for Thompson and you could get caught in the crossfire.”
“I'll get by,” I said.
“That wasn't what I meant! You get in the way and there's no way I can help you. You'll be looking at serious felony charges if you obstruct this investigation in any way. They know why you're here! I explained that to my boss, that I brought you here to keep you out of the way. He didn't buy all of it, but you've got to help yourself now. I can't help you anymore!”
She returned to the official group of Thompson-hunters without another word, her back held tense and absolutely straight by the depth of her feelings. I'd seen that before, recognized it from previous desertions. I had become excess baggage. She was angry with me for not accepting this as the proper and logical conclusion of the chase. If things turned out my way there would be a miscarriage of justice.
There's more than one kind of justice.
While the full force and might of the City and County of Honolulu, the state of Hawaii and the United States of America prepared to descend upon the hapless crew of
Pele,
I slipped from the warehouse. I knew I wouldn't be missed. I also knew where I could go to get a lead on where Thompson might be found.
I made my way through the dying tropical summer day to a waiting taxi stand and climbed into the back seat of the first one I found. I gave the driver the address of the old Young Street police station. I had the keys Kate had given me and I would need my Jeep to find Thompson.
My wounds were healing and I was rested and ready. It was time to come out of hiding and try to salvage this thing if I could.
 
 
N
o one stopped me when I walked to the middle of the impound yard at the old police station, peeled the pink impound sign from the windshield of my Jeep and drove off. I didn't even consider my next step. There wasn't another choice.
I parked in the tow away zone in front of the restaurant. I didn't think the Jeep would get towed again. Not in front of Chawlie's place. It was early for his usual appearance but I knew he'd show up as soon as one of his people called him. The hit order on me would be no secret in Chinatown and I wondered just how fast the news of my invasion of his headquarters would carry back to him. There would be a reward attached and I didn't think it would take long.
A waiter reluctantly took my order, probably worried I wouldn't live long enough to tip him. The kitchen was unusually slow delivering the food and when it came Chawlie still hadn't arrived. I sat with my back toward the restaurant's entrance to demonstrate my disdain for the threat to my life. It was my way of gaining face while simultaneously insulting Chawlie. I wasn't afraid of offending him. He'd already threatened to kill me. I ate my hot and sour soup, hoping it wasn't poisoned.
When I finished the soup I asked for my bill. The waiter smiled, went to the front desk and came back with a plastic tray that was empty except for a single fortune cookie.
“Boss say no charge for you, Mr. Caine.”
The waiter bowed and backed away from my table. I took the fortune cookie and opened it and read the note. It said, A GREAT FORTUNE IS IN YOUR FUTURE. I had expected a cryptic message like, KISS YOUR ASS GOODBYE, ROUND EYE! but that was apparently beyond even Chawlie's capabilities. Threats in a fortune cookie were a little too subtle even for him.
No one approached my table with verbal cryptic messages, either, the way they used to in the old movies where the mysterious Oriental delivers the warning out of the side of his mouth. My own waiter didn't return. I finished the rest of the pot of tea and waited. I'd been there forty-five minutes, long enough for Chawlie to arrive, but he wasn't showing and I wondered again if I'd made a mistake.
I got up and threw a couple of bills on the table. The waiter smiled at me the way you'd smile at a person who was dying of cancer—warm, meaningful, ghastly. I smiled back, hoping to scare him. I left the restaurant and nearly ran Chawlie over, stumbling before I walked into his chair in the foyer. There was another orange plastic chair across from him and he motioned for me to sit.
“You let Australian devil shoot you. I told you, too many people shoot you.”
“Good afternoon, Chawlie.”
“You stupid, or what?”
“I need your help.”
“Help? Help you? Not you. My son is dead because of you.”
“You set him up! For the honor of the family!”
He looked at me, blueberry eyes alive with emotion, but trying desperately not to expose the passion there. “I told you I'd kill you if you come here again, John Caine.”
“You said a lot of things, Chawlie. Most of which was total crap.”
“You did not believe me?”
“Of course not. You need me and I need you. My job is to destroy Thompson and his evidence. You just want him destroyed. He ruined your son even before he killed him. You used a little spy to infiltrate his company. She got tossed to the sharks. You used your son, you used me and you used her, too! Don't deny it. Now Thompson knows everything your son knew and everything Jasmine knew, too. Thompson's a torture freak. They would not have lied.”
Chawlie said nothing. He didn't change expression during my speech. He just sat there and listened and aged twenty years.
“You can't deny it. Thompson told me all about it just before he killed me. Or tried to.”
“It is difficult to kill you.”
“Don't you ever forget that, Chawlie.”
Chawlie stared at me, betraying nothing. He had conquered the emotions boiling within him. I waited, knowing he was considering his options and trying to pick his best one. I already knew what it was but I wanted him to find it on his own.
“You are not afraid to die.”
He was beginning the negotiations with the hard sell. If that was his opener he had already lost.
“Not me. But anyone you send better be ready.”
Chawlie nodded. “What do you want?”
“The police have already raided his properties and offices and come up empty. Thompson must have another home here, somewhere the cops don't know about. He's someplace on this rock and he probably owns the property and it's probably under the name of a cutout or a shell corporation he controls. You know it. You know where it is. You've known it since the day he bought the place. You know everything that goes on
here that affects you. I need that address and I need it now.”
Chawlie shook his head. “It is very difficult—”
“Cut the crap, Chawlie! You know where it is! Don't lie to me!”
“I'm not sure there is another—”
“Look. You owe me. If not for what you did to me, then for what I did for you. And if that's not good enough, then for what Jasmine did for you! And for what you did to your son! You want to destroy Thompson? I'm your man. No charge. Just give me the address! Now!”
“Property under the name of a Nevada corporation, officers all foreign nationals. Devil Thompson thinks no one can find out. I know before he put the check in the bank. Broker my nephew, bank president my cousin.” Chawlie gave me the location of the only other piece of property Thompson owned on the island. It was on a ridge above Haleiwa, surrounded by cane fields.
“Anyone else know this?”
“Only me. Now you.” Chawlie would not look me in the eye. This had cost him a lot of face. “What are you going to do?”
“Take him out. Any way I can.”
Chawlie looked at me. The passion was coming back. “You got cause.”
“Yeah,” I reminded him. “And so do you.”
I got up to leave, keys in my hand.
“John Caine!”
I stopped and turned back toward Chawlie. He had not moved from his chair but his head was turned toward me, his mouth open as if he were struggling with himself. I don't know which side won. “My nephew, a contractor, built a basement under this house. Be careful. He has secret entrance to basement from house. You would not find it if you didn't know it was there.”
“You're sure?”
“Yes. Sure. He make his movies there. People scream and no one hear them.”
“Where is it?”
“Don't know. You could ask nephew, but he's on vacation. You look. You'll find it. Small house.”
“Thank you, Chawlie. It helps.”
“You don't have to worry about having to die anymore, John Caine. I no kill you now. Thompson do it, I think.”
In the reflection of the neon lights in the windows of the shops along River Street I watched the old man watching me as I got into my Jeep and drove away.

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