Primitive Secrets (7 page)

Storm swallowed hard. Still, tens of millions of dollars would be at stake if Sakai started a lawsuit. Juries like to side with people like Sakai. Sadly, if Sakai died in the middle of the proceedings while being refused treatment by the HMO, the family could get even more for the anguish they'd endured.

If they knew about it, the executive board had to be very nervous. Storm had a bad feeling that they did.

She looked again at the letter. O'Toole wrote that the palliative treatments, the methotrexate for chemotherapy and rodding of the bone fractures, were not working. Sakai was in pain and growing weaker.

The next couple pages in the file were photocopies of Sakai's medical history. He was thirty-five. Storm's stomach flip-flopped; he was so young. He had gone to see a general practitioner at the HMO, the one running the clinic that day, because he had recurrent pains in his thighs. It had grown so bad that he couldn't continue to throw a ball with his seven-year-old son. The GP punted Sakai to O'Toole, who was the next level up in terms of specialists. O'Toole called in the oncologist.

O'Toole and the oncologist supervised a round of chemotherapy for a year with decent results. Then Sakai relapsed. His wife was three months pregnant.

Storm checked the date on that note. Eight months ago, so she'd had the baby. O'Toole's last written comments were that the patient was seeking traditional Hawaiian therapies. O'Toole was encouraging it, as long as Sakai also continued his chemotherapy.

The final paper in the file was a confidential letter from the HMO board to O'Toole. He was reminded not to discuss the possibility of treatments not offered by the organization with Sakai or his wife. The bone marrow transplant was out of the question. The last sentence said that perhaps when the HMO underwent their planned expansion and had their own cancer treatment center, they would be in a position to help Sakai.

Storm shook her head sadly. Except that Sakai would be dead. A bunch of MBAs had handed down a death sentence to a thirty-five-year-old father. The file drooped in her grip while questions stampeded her mind. O'Toole had to have informed Sakai before he'd copied his chart and shown it to Hamasaki. If he hadn't, O'Toole would be betraying his patient-physician confidentiality, and that didn't sound like old Dr. O'Toole. O'Toole must have gone ahead and told Sakai about getting treatment not covered by the HMO, too, or Sakai would never have gone to see Hamasaki. Perhaps the doctor had suggested the visit, perhaps not. O'Toole was certainly walking a minefield of personal, moral, and legal uncertainties.

Just whom had Hamasaki contacted on Sakai's or O'Toole's behalf? Where had he asked his questions? The theft of Hamasaki's file from her living room floor stuck in Storm's mind like a raspberry seed in a molar. O'Toole's name had been scribbled in it, but nothing else, she was sure.

The announcement came for passengers to prepare for landing. Storm rubbed her burning eyes, then slipped the file back into the briefcase. She wrestled it under the seat, raised her seat back, and gazed out the window at Hilo Harbor. The fragility of life was particularly apparent to her at that moment. Usually, takeoffs and landings were nail-biters for her. Storm watched the ground approach with a thrum of anxiety that, this time, had nothing to do with the aircraft.

She wondered again about the incidents of the last few days. The letter in the briefcase might be what the thief was after, and this person was someone with enough clout to hire thugs to do the dirty work. There was a chance that Hamasaki had stroked out over the stress of keeping the secret, but Storm didn't think so. The man thrived on secrets. So had he been killed for threatening to reveal the details of Tom Sakai's sad story?

Storm yawned to pop her ears and clear her mind. None of this made sense. The HMO treated thousands of people; Sakai wouldn't be alone in this struggle. Health maintenance organizations would have their legal eagles lined up to defend the company against many of these lawsuits. And Hamasaki would have known this.

She stared out the window. She was still missing a large chunk of information. Information that someone might have killed to find.

Chapter 13

When the plane banked to make its approach, the sun on the water sparkled like rare jewels on blue velvet, a reminder of beauty in the world. Storm tried to dispel the cold breath of eternity prickling her neck with a wish for dry weather on the serpentine two-lane highway that ran from Hilo to Pa'auilo.

That particular drive demanded a person's full attention. There are wetter places in the Hawaiian Islands than the northeast coast of the Big Island, but Storm hadn't seen many. Weeks could pass when one didn't see the sun peek through the clouds and mist. But when the sun shone, the emerald green of the tropical foliage against the matte black of ancient lava flows startled with its splendor.

Hilo was surrounded by waterfalls, plants with leaves the size of her VW that bore flowers as big as her head, and orchid farms whose exotic blooms were extolled worldwide. If one were to wander from the well-traveled paths, the silence and aroma of jungle were omnipresent. Decomposing leaves, fragrant blossoms, and lushness so thick that walls of plant growth confronted the explorer. It was not hard to believe in menehane, or the Hawaiian version of leprechauns.

Hilo itself was a city of about forty thousand people, populated with families who had been there for generations. In the past, many had worked in the sugar cane industry. The last several years, people switched to farming various products like macadamia nuts and coffee. Because of its rainy climate, tourists came through Hilo on the way to Volcano National Park, ate a fast lunch, then hightailed it back to Kona on the sunny side of the island.

Storm, however, found Hilo's water-blurred edges more conducive to tranquility than the blades of sunlight reflected from the white sands of Maui or O'ahu. Standing at the covered, open-air luggage claim, she took a deep breath of the humidity. Water dripped from the eaves of the building onto blooming anthurium plants. Men in rubber slippers slapped one another's backs and women hugged each other. All around her, people smiled. Storm relaxed; this was the Big Island, where everyone knew someone who knew you or your parents. She could unwind now.

Becky rushed by. “I'll meet you here in fifteen minutes. I've got to check out.”

Storm had time to pick up a car at the rental booth, then call Fujita to tell him that she'd found the appointment book with its entries about Hamasaki's activities the days before his death. She struggled with whether to tell the detective about the briefcase, but then realized she'd have to reveal Sakai's medical issues and O'Toole's conflict of interest. She decided not to mention it yet, because of the potential damage to both Sakai and O'Toole. She'd talk to O'Toole first.

Sure enough, Fujita wanted to see Hamasaki's appointment book. An officer would meet Storm at the airport, package it, and send it back on the next flight. “Don't leave, now. He'll be there in ten minutes,” Fujita said.

Storm looked at her watch. Nearly seven-thirty. He couldn't be too late; the last plane to O'ahu left in an hour. The small, outer-island airports tucked in early, just like the rest of the businesses, except for the bars. She and Becky would have no trouble finding a cozy place to have a bite, especially if it had good beer on tap. Local folks liked their happy hour.

The police officer, who turned out to be a no-nonsense woman, showed up before Becky arrived. Hilo is not a big town, but she must have been only a few blocks away. She pulled her squad car to the curb, got out, walked to Storm as if she were the only person standing around, and gave Storm a receipt for the notebook with an efficient thank-you.

“Tell Fujita that I'd like it back, eventually. Please?” Storm called after her.

The officer turned with a half salute and a nod. “Will do.” And she disappeared into the terminal area.

Storm phoned Aunt Maile to tell her that she'd be late, threw her bag and Hamasaki's briefcase into the trunk of the car, then leaned against the door to wait for Becky. She wondered if Becky had access to passenger lists. Storm knew from experience that airline personnel wouldn't usually release passenger information to the general public. She felt a pang of guilt at wanting to check up on Aunt Bitsy. Did it matter if the flight time Hamasaki had written didn't jibe with when she had arrived? Storm wasn't sure, and the loose end bothered her.

She caught sight of Becky, who had changed into jeans and was dragging a small bag on wheels.

“Oh, good,” Becky said when she saw Storm's car. “I was hoping I could bum a ride from you. My fiance can pick me up at Haunani's Grill.”

“Sure. I have a favor to ask.” A story spun out of Storm's mouth before she could reconsider. “My aunt lost her trifocals on a plane from Hilo last Wednesday. I thought we could look for them.”

“What flight was she on?”

“I'm not sure. Can you find out?”

“I think so.” Becky led Storm into the terminal. Except for helping a straggler trying to make the last plane, the attendants were beginning to close up. Becky asked a clerk whose computer terminal was still lit to check the passenger lists for Elizabeth Hamasaki.

He typed, then waited a few moments. “She was on flight twenty-eight, the two-forty. Let's see…lost glasses.” He looked at Storm. “What color were they? We've got two pairs.”

“Two in the afternoon? From Hilo? Uh, they're blue.”

“No, twenty-eight leaves from Kona. Hmm…One's gold-rimmed and the other pair's green, it says. Kona sent them over. Wanna see ‘em? Green and blue could be mixed up. Heck, some of the baggage guys wouldn't know the difference.”

Storm had to force her mouth closed. “Er, no thanks.” She showed her teeth in what she hoped looked like a grateful smile. “I'll call her first. They're probably in the bottom of this huge purse she carries. She loses them twice a week in there.” Storm hoped she didn't look as flabbergasted as she felt. Her mind whirled. Why Kona? Bitsy's sister lived in Hilo. It was a winding, arduous drive of at least two hours from one town to the other.

The clerk returned her smile, and Storm backed away before he could notice her lips quiver.

Chapter 14

Storm tried to focus her attention on Becky's happy chatter. Fortunately, Becky rambled on about her fiance and Storm could savor the chicken long rice and spicy tako, a raw octopus dish, without having to do much more than nod and grunt in the right places. The food was great and Storm was ravenous despite her preoccupation with the Hamasakis.

Becky had taken her to a local tavern known for its homemade Hawaiian food. When Storm had lived on the Big Island, she was too young to be allowed inside, though in high school she'd used a fake ID a couple of times. The place looked different now, but the changes were due to an adult perspective, that of one who wasn't as fixated on checking out the construction workers' tight jeans.

Though no longer exciting and forbidden, the Grill was still dark, woody, and filled with the yeasty odor of beer. It was just what Storm needed, a departure from the Caesar salads and double lattes of the city. The single room was comfortably dim. The tables, which filled the floor adjacent to a bar crowded with the same type of guy she'd ogled a decade ago, were lit with those candles in the plastic net-covered globes. The one on Storm's table was faded red and gave Becky's cheerful face a ruddy glow.

Storm relaxed and drank the beer she'd allowed herself with dinner. Becky was on her second, but the beloved Donnie was picking her up.

By the time Donnie showed up, the women were up-to-date on life after high school. All their old friends had been discussed; who'd had how many babies and divorces. Storm pushed her plate away with a contented sigh and ordered haupia pudding for dessert, even though she'd have to work off all that coconut milk tomorrow. Becky and Donnie shared Keoki coffees and nuzzled each other. The jukebox had gone from a ballad by the Cazimero Brothers to a Willie Nelson love song.

It was time to hit the road; this romantic stuff was making her lonely. She thought about Hamlin's legs in his running shorts and how he had seen the police cars at her cottage and dropped by to see if she was okay. It seemed like a long time ago, now.

Storm excused herself and went to the women's room. She passed down the narrow hallway lined with a couple of pay phones. A lean, muscled fellow let his eyes run down her body, then turned his back to her and cradled the mouthpiece in one hand. He wore low-slung, baggy jeans. She could see a hint of the crack in his bottom. Ten years ago, she might have enjoyed his flirtatiousness, but tonight she kept her eyes straight ahead, thinking that she'd rather anticipate someone's unclothed physique than see it slouching in a bar.

When she returned, Becky and Donnie were nearly sitting in each other's laps. It was definitely time to go. Storm gave Becky a hug and told her to call when she was on O'ahu.

Storm started her rental car, a metallic blue tin can with an engine. At least it didn't have any holes in the floor, which is more than she could say for her own car. It also didn't have cockroaches that dove for cover when the interior lights went on, which wasn't bad for a Hawai'i rental car. The air conditioner and defroster appeared to work well, too, for which she was grateful. Rain had begun to fall and the night was as dank and murky as the inside of a just-swilled Budweiser bottle.

Storm hadn't driven Highway 19 along the northern coast of the Big Island for several years. Laupahoehoe, Pa'auilo, Honoka'a: all were scenic post office crossroads with the majority of their inhabitants on welfare since the sugar refineries had closed. Big Island people were rich in spirit and culture, but hurting economically.

Headlights glimmered about a half-mile behind her. Though it was nice not to feel alone on the highway, it would probably be safer to maintain her distance from the driver behind if he'd been drinking with his friends. This road, with its blind hairpin turns and narrow viaducts, was known for deadly accidents. Most of them involved people who had been drinking.

Storm wished it were day, or at least a moonlit night. She would be able to see the depth of the chasms she crossed and the ubiquitous waterfalls that crashed into the streams hundreds of feet below her. Now, the only way she could tell that she was on a bridge was by the glowing guardrail and the impenetrable void beyond the scope of her headlights.

The lights of the car behind her flashed in the rearview mirror. Storm gave her own car a bit more gas; the driver had gained on her while she'd been peering into the dark and slowing down on the muddy curves. She was almost to a straight part of the road, though by the solid double yellow line and the vanishing guardrail, she knew it wouldn't last long.

The driver behind crept up steadily. Storm slowed down. Maybe the idiot would just go around her.

He gained ground. Soon he was just a few feet behind her, his lights blaring into her rear window. The car seemed larger than hers, some kind of full-size, older sedan. She squinted. There was no way she could see its color, let alone the driver. Storm reached up and flicked the rearview mirror to the night setting. Better in terms of glare, but she still couldn't see into the car. She waved her hand in a drop-back motion.

The jerk. Hurrying on a road like this doesn't get you there faster. It gets you dead. Storm steered into a curve marked only by the sinuous path of the double yellow line and the flash of guardrail reflectors on her right. The reflectors disappeared to the left in a sharp curve, then flickered through the mist.

The rain fell harder. Storm slowed to a crawl. The driver behind flashed his high beams directly into her car.

Storm drew in a sharp breath. His bumper was mere inches from hers. This was not only stupid and dangerous, it was pissing her off. Storm reached for her cell phone, which was in her purse. It would take the cops a half hour to reach her, but dialing 911 would make her feel better. And maybe seeing the phone at her ear would make this moron back off. At the same time, she rolled down her window and yelled into the night, “Pass me, asshole!”

His bumper thumped hers. At first she couldn't believe it; she thought she'd driven over a rock in the road.

He bumped her again, hard enough to jolt her car toward the edge of the narrow road.

“Jesus,” Storm whispered. She dropped the phone onto the seat. With cold fingers, she grabbed the steering wheel with both hands. Slowly, she lowered her foot on the accelerator.

Her own headlights revealed only a few feet of slick black pavement ahead, but she couldn't help glancing into the rearview mirror for a glimpse of the car behind. His bright headlights were not weaving, as she expected a drunk's would. Their brightness flooded her car with the intensity of a searchlight. She could barely see the road ahead.

She sped up. The tailing car sped up, too. Storm went faster; the car came within inches of her bumper, then fell back a foot or two. For a second, she reached out with one hand for the phone, which had moved across the seat toward the passenger side door.

A low silver guardrail glinted ahead at a right angle to her path. The road veered sharply to the left, making another hairpin turn over a chasm. Storm could hear her own tires wail on the pavement. She seized the steering wheel and struggled to ease it into the turn. The rear wheels slid toward the guardrail and she clenched her teeth and prayed. Her foot lifted instinctively from the gas pedal and she felt the car respond to her control. She let go of a pent-up breath.

The pursuer's engine raced toward her. Oh, God, I can't take another hit, she thought. The guardrail's a foot from my outside fender.

The car butted her bumper. Storm's body jerked forward against the restraint of the seat belt.

Her rental compact hopped ahead, its wheels out of contact with the road. The phone fell with a tiny thunk into the space between the seat and the passenger door. “No!” she screamed, her voice thin and lonely.

Afraid to slow down and too petrified to speed up, she drew close to the sharp turn on the other side of the gorge. Her hands clenched the steering wheel like a lifeline on a sinking ship. Cold sweat trickled down her torso and seeped from her palms. Her breath rattled in her throat.

The little car gripped the road again and Storm whimpered with relief. The road straightened for a hundred yards, then the double yellow line veered right. Another bottomless abyss loomed beyond the scope of her headlights like a black wall filled with the confetti of falling raindrops.

The bright lights behind filled her car as the big sedan shot toward her. With a moan of terror, she jammed her foot onto the accelerator and prayed that the curve ahead was a gentle one. She was too afraid to breathe. Her sweating hands slipped on the steering wheel.

She gained a car's length on the sedan and sped toward the turn. The road glistened; mud blurred the yellow lines. Her windshield wipers batted ineffectually at the water streaming across her vision. She couldn't see more than five feet in front of the car's hood. She had to slow down.

Storm tapped the brakes. Once, then again, as she followed the weak flicker of the guardrail reflectors around a steep curve. Her own headlights bounced back to her from the falling rain, unable to penetrate the black night. When the sedan slammed her, Storm's head whipped forward. Instinctively, her foot played the brake pedal despite the confusion of all her senses. Brakes squealed, and she couldn't tell if they were hers or those of the car on her tail.

Storm gasped with terror and stomped on the accelerator. With a shudder that carried through the car, the little car's tires screamed on the muddy road. Her hands clutched the steering wheel like a hawk's talons on its prey. The car fishtailed toward the cliff. Storm strained at the steering wheel, willing the car toward the yellow line, away from inky oblivion.

Behind her, the big sedan sped up, then rammed her again. Closer to the rail at that moment than Storm, he grazed the outside corner of her bumper. Pushed by the mass of the pursuing vehicle, Storm hurtled across the lane for oncoming traffic, fighting now to keep her car from smashing into the wall of glistening rock on the other side of the road.

She overcompensated and skidded back across the road into the path of the sedan. His engine roared, and then his car crashed into her left rear fender.

Storm lost control. For a moment, time slowed while she cranked the wheel and stood on the brake. Her tires howled and the car pounded the guardrail, then ricocheted and spun. Storm screamed.

The sound of tortured rubber and the snarl of the sedan's engine sped toward her.

She leaned into the car door with every fiber of her body and mind, trying to force the wheel away from the cliff. Her car had spun to face the other car, which careened across the road in front of her. Storm punched the accelerator so that her car hopped closer to the cliff in a last-ditch effort to avoid a head-on collision. Two inches from the vertical wall, she swerved into the oncoming lane, then overcorrected in a skid that rammed her front fender into the sedan's rear quarter panel.

The sedan slammed into the bent guardrail. The rail had held against impact once, but the second time and the bigger car were too much. The metal tore with a shriek that shredded the fabric of night. Then all was quiet. Silence and blackness closed over the road.

Storm let her car crawl to a stop. She turned off the key and sat with the car straddling the yellow lines, unable to move from the middle of the road, gasping softly while her headlights pointed two feeble beams out over the ocean.

It was a while before she heard the surf beating the cliffs below. A sliver of moon peeked through a gap in the clouds. Rolling waves glinted faintly out at sea.

The rain had stopped and the night was silent but for the sound of her own ragged breathing. If the broken edges of the guardrail hadn't swayed gently against the night sky, she would have wondered if she'd lost her mind.

Terrified of the edge of the cliff, Storm's eyes strained into the blackness beyond the guardrail. She put on the emergency brake as hard as it would go and forced herself to get out of the car. One step at a time on quivering legs, she tiptoed toward the gaping hole in the rail. Nothing was beyond; no little ledge with a branch like in the movies. Clouds covered the moon again. She could see no further than a few feet below her, a view that was as unfathomable as the depths of space.