Kauai Temptations

by Terry Ambrose

  She watched me, self-satisfaction etched into the lines of her smile. “Good, so you’re going to stop feeling sorry for yourself and get your skinny butt in gear tomorrow, right?”

  “Right. I’m going to find that woman. I’ll check the papers. I’ll visit the spa; they’d have given some kind of personal treatment. They’d know her.”

  CJ nodded. She stood. Her eyes were a bit glazed from the wine as she gave me a loose nod. “Great. So you’re working the case for a couple more days, right?”

  “Yah, I’ve got some ideas.”

  “Good.” She teetered away, talking over her shoulder. “Then you better start thinking about what you’re making for dinner tomorrow night.”

  Half in the bag myself, I watched her leave. After she closed her bedroom door, I stared at the table, the dishes and the almost-empty wine bottle. It would have been so much easier to let Najar bust me. At least in jail I wouldn’t have to cook and wash dishes.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I awoke early the next morning to the gurgling of CJ’s coffee maker. The aroma hung in the air, inviting me to rise and face the day. Outside, palms danced, roosters crowed, the sky grew bright. I got out of bed, dressed, and met CJ in the kitchen. I was ready to get back on track with my investigation by finding the woman in the photograph. What better place to start looking than through recent newspapers at the library?

  The little galley kitchen was typical of small “homes” with a stove and refrigerator on one side, a dishwasher and sink on the other. There was barely enough space between the cabinets on opposite sides of the tiled floor to pull out the stove or refrigerator for maintenance. CJ’s fridge still had its original shiny, white finish; the stove was equally pristine. Their condition made me wonder if she’d bought them new when she moved in. I supposed she could be a buff-your-fridge kind of girl, you know, the ones who give everything a good spit shine, but that seemed out of character.

  CJ stood in the middle of the kitchen, on the opposite side of the counter from where I parked myself. The “bar” counter space was limited to room for two barstools. No big parties here. She pushed a dark blue mug with the image of a hula girl rising like a genie from a steaming cup at me. Below the image were the words “Kauai Coffee” in red and gold sunset-colored letters.

  “They’re really here?”

  She nodded. “They grow millions of pounds every year. You can visit the plantation if you want. It’s out past Poipu. South side.”

  I took a sip. “It’s good. I’ve seen the brand, but didn’t realize it really was from Kauai. I thought it was grown in Peru or Costa Rica, then shipped in.”

  “You gonna avoid the subject or what? You staying or going?”

  “I’m finishing what I started.”

  She raised her mug. “Okay. Then you gotta get me to work. Finish that up and let’s get out of here. By the way, if you go out to the plantation for coffee, they got free samples.”

  An hour later, I was back at CJ’s condo having breakfast. The library wouldn’t open until 9:30, so I had plenty of time for food and relaxation. I found a section in yesterday’s paper with reports of recent arrests. Without a doubt, the library back issues would have the same sections. Today’s weather was going to be a typical 82, partly cloudy with trades between 10-15 mph. Kauai’s weather patterns were very close to ours in Honolulu. Sure, there was a difference of one or two degrees, but the reports seemed like they were always the same—mix of sun and rain, temps in the 80s.

  After about a half hour, the silence began to annoy me. From the time I’d left the mainland I’d been surrounded by people and chaos. Even while alone, I’d felt the presence of others. That presence, unfortunately, included the identity thieves. It’s bad enough to have something stolen from you, but it’s truly amazing how creepy it is when that something is your identity. Here, I felt protected, but alone. It was too quiet. No ocean background noise, no apartment manager duties, nothing but silence. Damned silence.

  L. A. memories tugged at the corners of my mind. A woman and a boy I’d hoped to find. What I’d found was a trail gone cold. Tears welled in my eyes. I sniffled and straightened my back, then shook my head.

  “Time to move on, McKenna.” I spoke to the walls. To nobody. Liar. To me.

  I busied myself around the condo until it was time to leave. Then, I gathered up my portfolio notebook, which contained a standard yellow writing tablet, a slick, but cheap throwaway gel pen, along with a manilla envelope. I’d learned my lesson yesterday. The last thing I wanted was a repeat of the incident at Island Electronics. I’d carry proof of the crime and my identity with me. In the envelope were copies of the bounced checks, a couple of letters I’d received from merchants or their attorneys, and my passport.

  In addition to proof I was the real me and not the female impersonator, I’d added her picture to the file. I locked the door on my way out. Halfway to the car, paranoia set in. I returned to the front door to test the lock. Creepy, I’d never been like this before.

  At the library, I grabbed the most recent edition of “The Garden Island” newspaper and asked the librarian to get me the two previous weeks from the back. Copies in hand, I planted myself at a nice big table right in front of the rest of the newspapers. I had plenty of room to create a “to be viewed” stack, a “done with these” stack, and still spread out the one I was reading. My goal was to find some lead to my impersonator.

  What should I call her? Lady was too nice. Woman, too generic. Bitch, on the other hand, seemed so harsh. I wasn’t feeling quite as hostile as yesterday, nor was I in a particularly charitable mood. Willow would have to do for now.

  Skip tracing had taught me one thing. Any tidbit of information could be the gem that brought you to a breakthrough. How many identity theft cases occurred here? There had to be a lot. If I did find something, I could follow-up with the other victims.

  I worked my way backwards through the dates, searching for stories or patterns about identity theft. How often did it occur? Who were the victims? Unfortunately, I didn’t have a lot of luck. The first story to grab my interest was about two teenagers who drove by a McDonalds and fired shots from a gun. Okay, it wasn’t identity theft, but it did display colossal stupidity.

  What did they think was going to happen? They’d drive to another island? It only took about an hour for the cops to find them speeding on the south side. An officer stopped the car, spotted the gun and the box of ammunition on the floor. He immediately took the kids into custody. From Kauai, they were transferred to Oahu’s detention facility. Now, the story was transforming itself into a social debate over deplorable Oahu jail conditions. The reporter, a Wellington Lim, maintained a well-balanced perspective and presented both sides of the argument. Too bad Beef Wellington’s parents hadn’t been a little kinder to him in the name department. Anyway, perhaps it was my own close call with the law at Island Electronics, but I almost found myself feeling sorry for the little buggers.

  Then again, these kids could somehow be involved with my stolen checks gang. They’d had a guy at the post office. Who would suspect kids of being involved? I made a note to myself to watch for incidents where kids could have been the ones to actually steal the IDs. I considered my initial sympathy for them. Nah, let the little bastards rot in jail.

  In the Tuesday edition, there were a couple of good-news stories. One was about a hula teacher whose class was headed for a national competition. The other was about a local eighth grader who was now on her way to a national spelling bee. I turned my attention to the next edition. On the front page, the lead story was about a woman who had died in a meth explosion. As an apartment manager, this one was a little too close to home for me.

  On Monday, Oct. 8, the body of Morah Wilkerson, 23, of Kapa’a was discovered by Kauai Fire Department after responding to calls about an explosion and fire in a Kapa’a apartment. A preliminary investigation determined the victim may have been cooking methamphetamine. Several methamphetamine precursors were di
scovered. One source indicated that a hot plate may have been used to cook the drug.

  I shook my head, then reread the article. Another one. The islands were becoming dangerous. Kids shooting guns, meth labs. I sympathized with the apartment manager, but why hadn’t he seen the signs? There would have surely been indications. Hadn’t there been complaints from neighbors? If this was a problem, why hadn’t the manager called the cops or evicted sooner? Talk about blowing it.

  A man with short, graying hair sat about midway between the reference librarian and me. The librarian, a short, dark-skinned woman kept her voice low even when the man went rambling on. His deep tones carried throughout the open space and I found myself thinking of him as Big Mouth. Obviously, he didn’t understand the quiet-area concept. Finally, the librarian put her index finger to her lips. When she turned to face me, I knew what was coming next.

  I pulled the paper up between us seconds before he turned his attention to me. “Hey, brah, how’s your day goin’?”

  Fine without you, I thought. I shook my head and kept my face buried in the paper. More island news. Nothing of any value. But there was a follow-up on the meth victim. I wasn’t having much luck in focusing on the task at hand, so I decided to follow the Wilkerson story. Arguably, it was something I might face in the future. Maybe I could learn something to avoid making the same mistakes as this landlord. Hmpff. Imagine that, me learning from someone else’s mistakes. Like the guy who wouldn’t shut up.

  The headline read, “Meth Lab Victim Has History.”

  Morah Wilkerson, 23, of Kapa’a, died in an apparent meth lab explosion two nights ago. Wilkerson was on probation for her involvement in a drug-smuggling ring in 2005.

  According to court documents, Wilkerson was arrested as a co-conspirator when police uncovered a plot by her boyfriend, Robert O’Dell, 29, of Los Angeles, to smuggle heroine from the mainland to Kauai. Wilkerson maintained her innocence at the trial. At trial, she pled guilty in exchange for a reduced sentence and probation.

  Wilkerson was due to be released from probation at the end of October. She had no other arrests according to public records. Neighbors indicated that Wilkerson had held several jobs during the past two years. One also described her as a “free and easy spirit.”

  Finally, Big Mouth got it—I think. I heard what sounded like someone packing up, but wasn’t about to take a chance on engaging him. I kept reading.

  Wilkerson’s neighbors expressed disbelief upon learning of police conclusions. One neighbor who wished to remain anonymous said, “We never had anything like this on Kauai before. Besides, Morah was a nice girl. She got shafted on that drug charge, and now she’s dead. She’d just come into some money and had started pampering herself a bit—you know, spas and a nice weekend at a resort. Why would she be making meth? Morah had learned her lesson and said she’d never be involved in drugs again.”

  An investigation of the explosion at Wilkerson’s apartment has confirmed the presence of methamphetamine precursors. Cause of death is pending results of an autopsy. One source indicated that Wilkerson may have become ill from inhaling chemical vapors inside the apartment.

  Manufacturing methamphetamine requires handling highly volatile chemicals, which may cause health problems if inhaled or if they come into contact with skin.

  Wow, she’d had them all fooled. She’d come into money? Oh, please. Smart-ass McKenna, the little devil who likes to plop himself on my shoulder and mouth off did just that. He said, “Give me a break, you moron! How gullible could you be? She started treating herself to spas? Resorts? Hardly. She was snorting the money. How many ex-cons treated themselves to a spa? What did she do? Book a room at the Marriott? Maybe order a $200 massage?”

  I glanced both ways to make sure nobody, including Big Mouth, was looking at me. Thank goodness my mouth hadn’t channeled Smart-ass, otherwise Big Mouth and I would both be kicked out. What spa had she gone to? What resort? I thought about the list of bad checks as I moved on to the next day’s paper, searching for additional articles about Morah Wilkerson. Better yet, I wanted a photo. I’d probably need her obituary for that. I waded through odd ones like the old man who had a heart attack while surfing, and drowned. Or, the bicyclist who ran a red light and got hit by an ice cream truck. He died a week later due to internal injuries he refused to have treated. Then there was the ever-classic stoned man who shot himself while cleaning a gun. He bled to death because his phone had been disconnected and he couldn’t call for help. Sheesh. Why couldn’t anyone die from natural causes anymore?

  Then I found her obituary in today’s paper. My eyes widened as I stared at the image. I pulled out the copy of the Island Electronics photo. It was the same girl.

  Morah Wilkerson, 23, of Kapa’a, died on October 8, 2012, in an explosion at her apartment. Wilkerson was most recently employed as a waitress at the Tropical Breeze Bar.

  She is survived by her sister Lu Tawana. A memorial service will be held at Meddle’s Mortuary and Chapel on Friday, October 12, 2012 at 10:00 a.m.

  I tried to swallow, but my throat was dry. The hair color in the black and white newspaper picture was light, probably blonde, just like that of the woman in the Island Electronics photo. Same nose, same eyes. My mind wandered off to some faraway parking place where it could idle until my emotions caught up. No doubt, it was the same woman. I’d found my impersonator. And she was dead.

  I reread the obituary. No mention of burial or cremation. That probably had something to do with the autopsy. She was only a waitress in a bar and not a crook, but a mixed-up girl who’d gotten caught up in the wrong crowd. Numb, I rounded up all three articles, made a copy of each, and finally returned the papers to the librarian.

  “Did you find what you were looking for?” Her smile was quick, her demeanor professional. I nodded, still not sure what to say. Only after I’d watched her put the newspapers back into date order did I realize how much of a mess I’d made. “Oops, sorry about that.”

  “No problem.” She smiled again. “Part of the job.” To me, it looked like she enjoyed what she did for a living. Too bad more people didn’t.

  “I made copies—I hope that was okay.”

  She nodded her belated consent. “No problem.” When she stood to return the papers to their assigned library location, I remembered CJ’s comment about this being a small island. “Say, I was reading about a woman who died in an explosion earlier this week . . .” I let the words hang in the air. Hopefully, she’d fill in the blank with some information of her own.

  “What about it?” She gazed at me with raised eyebrows.

  So much for strategic communications. “Well, do you know where it happened?”

  “Sure. It was an apartment on the East side. In Kapa’a. Big talk all over the island.”

  “Really? For a fire?”

  “You must be new here, yes?”

  I nodded.

  Apparently satisfied, she continued her explanation. “Nobody I know remembers us having an actual meth explosion on Kauai before. Besides, the fire department woke up half the island getting there.”

  “What time was the explosion?”

  “Around midnight. And we’re not like Honolulu with all the night life. We’re laid back. Here, people are friendly.”

  “Do you have an address?”

  She eyed me like I was some sort of pyro-pervert. “Why would you need that?”

  Uh oh, small island. Maybe she knew Najar. I decided it was better to keep this quiet. I shrugged and gave a half laugh, “You know how people are, morbidly curious.”

  Her smile returned. “Sorry I couldn’t help.”

  “That’s okay. You have phone books, yah?”

  She pointed to her right. I spotted them, waved my thanks and meandered toward the directories. It took everything I had to walk nonchalantly so that the librarian lady wouldn’t become suspicious. Who knew a trip to one library would put me on the verge of finding the woman who’d been impersonating me? Even if she was dead. S
mall island, indeed.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Hawaii. Land of beauty. Land of incongruities. The beauty fascinates me. The incongruities bug me. Maybe they fascinate me, too.

  For instance, the Menehune. Hawaii’s “Little People.” Had these legendary construction masters really existed? Or were they a myth to hide something far more mundane than a mystical race hard science couldn’t explain?

  Just like the Menehune, Morah Wilkerson’s death had its own incongruities. I couldn’t remember the entire recipe, but cooking meth required ingredients you’d buy in a hardware store—tubing, Muriatic acid, Coleman fuel, acetone—and a drug store or market—Contact 12-hour-time release tablets, bottles of Heet, and rubbing alcohol. In all of the bounced checks I knew about, there hadn’t been one to a hardware or grocery store and unlike the old days, you couldn’t just order those ingredients and have them shipped to Hawaii. So where had the stuff come from? Morah was my Menehune myth.

  Why the cops had been working the identity-theft case for a year without results didn’t make sense. Had they deliberately covered up their inability to find the gang? Were the cops the equivalent of Hawaii’s ruling class and, like the ali’i, making up stories as part of a cover up? It couldn’t possibly be as elaborate as the ali’i legends for the dam known as the Alekoko Fishpond and the Menehune Ditch. Naysayers argued that the ali’i created the Menehune myth to avoid giving credit to the commoners. Whereas the legends claimed the race of miniature super-builders constructed everything overnight using something like an old-time fire brigade—a twenty-five mile fire brigade, no less.

  The cops had no reason to lie that I knew of, but conspiracy theories were clinging to the back of my mind like cobwebs in an abandoned house. Believers say the seaward end of the dam was left unfinished by the Menehune, but why had it been left that way for generations? It wasn’t until the 1800s that rice farmers finally got fed up and closed two holes that kept the dam from holding water. Common sense dictated that the ali’i would have forced common laborers to finish the project long before those rice farmers.