Murder at Turtle Cove

by Kathi Daley

  “Are you sure he’s not a runaway?”

  “No,” I admitted.

  Mom stirred some honey into her tea before responding. “The first thing we need to do is confirm what he told you. It’s possible he does have a parent or legal guardian he ran away from for some reason, and if that’s the case we absolutely can’t harbor him. We could both end up in jail.”

  I sighed. “I guess you’re right.”

  “I don’t suppose he mentioned a last name?”

  “No. I didn’t ask, but I have a feeling he wouldn’t tell me anyway. I wish I could stay home and look in to things, but I have a shift today and I know one of the other WSOs is going to be out, so calling in isn’t an option.”

  “Just leave it to me.” Mom patted my arm. “I raised six children. I’m a master at getting kids to talk.”

  “And then what?”

  “I don’t know. I guess we’ll see.”

  “I promised him no cops.”

  “I’m not a cop and I think I can handle whatever turns out to be the truth. You can’t be the wife of the police chief and not get to know a few people. Let’s see if we can convince Tommy to come home with me. He can stay in one of your brothers’ rooms until we straighten this whole thing out.”

  “What about Dad?”

  “Dad’s on Maui visiting with your brother for a few days, so we don’t need to worry about him. Let’s give Tommy some breakfast and discuss things with him.”

  Mom greeted Tommy with a maternal hug he seemed to respond to. She took her time and got to know him while she made pancakes for all of us. After Tommy had eaten she presented the idea of his going home with her for the day because I had to go to work. Tommy was leery at first, until we explained that Mom had both a swimming pool and a PlayStation she would be happy to give him unlimited access to. He seemed even more interested in the idea after Mom brought up the pulled pork she had cooking in her Crock-Pot. She assured him it would be just the two of them in the house and she would keep my promise not to call the cops. Of course she glossed over the fact that her husband was an ex-cop and all five of her sons were current cops, but they wouldn’t be around, so it wouldn’t be an issue. At least for the moment.

  Mom also agreed to let Tommy bring all three kittens with him to her house, which absolutely amazed me because I’d begged for a pet as a child and always been turned down because animals were both messy and expensive. The fact that Mom was willing to go so far out of her way to help Tommy indicated to me just how lonely she’d become, or possibly what a good person she really was.

  I packed Tommy and the cats into Mom’s car and waved them off after promising to call later that afternoon to check on things. It occurred to me that helping Tommy was giving Mom a new lease on life. I just hoped things would work out for everyone.

  ******

  I was assigned to the surfing beach that day, which was my favorite of all the tower assignments. It was a beautiful day, the sun bright, without a cloud in the sky. I was in the dispatch office taking a break after completing the first two hours of my shift when I got a call from Jason. I’d meant to call him the previous day to find out what was happening with the arm on the beach, but I’d become distracted by Vince Kensington and Shredder and had allowed it to slip to the back of my mind.

  “Hey, Jason. What’s going on?” I asked.

  “Have you seen Komo Kamaka?”

  “Not since last week. Why?”

  “I went over to his food truck to ask him some questions about Blaze Whitmore, but he wasn’t there. I went by his house and he wasn’t at home either.”

  I frowned. “That’s odd. Komo always opens his truck unless the weather’s bad. Did you ask around? Maybe one of the other food truck vendors knows where he is. Or maybe he mentioned something to one of his regular customers.”

  “I asked a couple of the other vendors, but they all said they hadn’t seen him since yesterday.”

  I glanced at the clock. Komo served breakfast and lunch and was usually open by seven. It was after eleven.

  “Maybe he had an appointment. He might be planning to open later,” I suggested.

  “Maybe. I need to talk to him and plan to check back, but if you see him will you call me?”

  “Sure. No problem.” I leaned on the corner of one of the desks used by the resort’s clerical staff. “What’s so urgent?”

  Jason hesitated, as if he wasn’t sure he wanted to fill me in.

  “Jason?” I pushed.

  “I’m afraid Komo is the number one suspect in Whitmore’s death.”

  “What?” I screeched. “Why?”

  “Not only was he seen threatening Whitmore on Monday afternoon but we found a knife with blood on it in the trunk of his car. We don’t have the body, so we can’t know how he died, but death by stab wound is pretty common.”

  “Is the blood on the knife a match for Whitmore’s?”

  “We don’t know yet. We’re having it tested.”

  “Komo wouldn’t kill anyone,” I insisted. “Maybe someone is setting him up.”

  Jason sighed. “Maybe. But the knife, combined with an eyewitness account of him threatening to ‘feed Blaze to the fishes’ is enough for us to bring him in for questioning. It’s probably enough for us to hold him too, unless he happens to have an alibi.”

  “He used those exact words?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  I hated to admit it, but things really didn’t look good for Komo. He was a big teddy bear, but he’d been extremely vocal about his feelings toward the man who had been causing so many problems. “If you do track Komo down please give him the benefit of the doubt and the chance to explain things. We’ve both known Komo for most of our lives. You know he wouldn’t kill anyone.”

  “I know.” Jason sounded tired. “I really hope he can explain things. The last thing I want to do is lock him up, but I have to do my job.”

  “I can’t help but worry.”

  “The best thing that can happen right now is for me to be able to find him and offer him the opportunity to explain things. Like I said, if you see him, call me.”

  “I will.”

  I returned to the tower and tried to get my head in the game. The waves were huge, as they often were at this time of the year, which meant the water was packed, requiring my full attention.

  Unfortunately, I didn’t have my full attention to give. Not that I was ignoring the water or in any way acting in a negligent manner, but I couldn’t help but find my mind wandering to Komo and the mystery surrounding his disappearance. It bothered me that no one knew where Komo was. He always opened his food truck; not opening on a beautiful day like today was a very un-Komo thing to do. It also bothered me that he didn’t seem to be home, yet no one had seen him around. If the knife had been found in the trunk of his car, that meant he hadn’t taken his car when he took off.

  There wasn’t a lot I could do to look for Komo while I was supposed to have 100 percent of my attention on the water, but I had a lunch break coming in another hour, and if I timed things right I should be able to head over to the beach where a food truck owned and operated by two brothers named Buddy and Bobby was usually parked. They’d been friends with Komo for a long time. I figured if he’d confided in anyone it would likely be them.

  “Tower two to base,” I said, using my radio to contact the supervisor on duty.

  “Go ahead,” Brody Weller, a friend and fellow WSO, answered.

  “There are three women just beyond the break line. They arrived on a boat but transferred to surfboards. It appears they’re wearing mermaid outfits. Do you know anything about that?”

  “Yeah. They’re shooting a commercial. They wanted to do it as close to the shore as possible so they’d have the beach and the visitors in the background.”

  “Do you have a way to contact them? Two of the three mermaids are awfully close to the break. One early wave and they’ll go under for sure. Real mermaids can swim, but I think the costumes the wo
men are wearing will hinder their ability to do so.”

  “I’ll contact the boat to let them know they should move farther out.”

  “Ten-four.”

  I watched as the women continued to float closer and closer to the danger zone. It seemed from where I was sitting that the people on the boat were more concerned about getting the perfect shot than making sure their models were safe. I used my binoculars to get the best visual I could. There was no doubt about it: the two mermaids closest to the shore were going to get caught in the breaking waves when they cycled through once more.

  “Tower two to base,” I radioed once again.

  “Go for Brody.”

  “Did you get hold of the boat? If I’m right, the two mermaids closest to the beach are going under in about thirty seconds.”

  “I told the person I spoke to on the boat to move them farther out. I guess they ignored my counsel.”

  “I’m going in. Send backup.”

  Sure enough, by the time I jumped down off my tower, ran across the beach, and hit the water, a large wave had toppled two of the models. Even if the women were strong swimmers the outfits they wore were sure to fill with water and act as lead weights. I swam as fast as I could toward the last place I’d seen them. I was a strong swimmer and able to cover a lot of territory in a short amount of time. I just hoped I would be fast enough.

  The first woman I came to had been frantically trying to get out of her water-filled tail. She had been submerged close to a minute by my calculation, so I needed to act fast. Luckily, I’d thought to grab the pocket knife I kept in the tower and was able to cut her free before she lost consciousness. Once we reached the surface, I told her to swim for the boat, took a deep breath, and went looking for victim number two. Unfortunately, enough time had passed by that point that it was likely I’d find her unconscious. Every second that passed decreased the likelihood she would survive, so I searched as quickly as I could. The water was clear today despite the surf, so I should be able to see her, yet I’d already turned in a full circle and she was nowhere in sight. Where could she have floated off to? I surfaced once again and took several deep breaths before diving back under. As I swam toward the ocean floor, I noticed the sun reflecting off something in the distance. The outfits the women were wearing had sequins to catch the sun, so I headed in that direction. By the time I reached the woman more than three minutes had passed.

  I used my knife to cut her out of her tail, ignoring my own body’s demand to breath. I grabbed her under the armpits and pushed off the bottom. By the time I reached the surface I was gasping for air. Fortunately, Brody had made it out to join me and was close enough so that I could hand her off. He performed mouth-to-mouth while we had her loaded onto the boat.

  “There’s an ambulance waiting at the boat launch,” Brody informed the driver after we climbed on board. Brody and I continued to work on the woman until we were able to safely hand her off to the emergency medical technicians.

  As I watched the ambulance speed away, I turned to the man who still held a camera. “What in the world were you thinking? Brody told you to pull back.”

  “I just needed a couple more shots. I’m a professional; I know what I’m doing. I’ve done dozens of shoots like this. That wave came out of nowhere. How was I supposed to know what would happen?”

  “You should have known what would happen because Brody told you, you arrogant bastard. That girl might die because you figured you knew more about the behavior of the sea than men and women who have been trained to read the waves and make decisions accordingly. I pray that girl pulls through, but if she doesn’t it’s all on you!”

  With that, I stormed away. I had executed hundreds of rescues in my years as a WSO. Many of the situations requiring rescue were the result of bad luck or unfortunate timing, and I could deal with that. But to put a woman’s life in jeopardy for a lousy picture? There was no excuse for that.

  When I returned to my tower another WSO had arrived. “Brody wants you to take a break. He said things got pretty intense out there.”

  “Yeah.” I tossed my knife onto the counter that ran along the back of the lifeguard tower. “There comes a point where my tolerance for idiots reaches its limit. I have lunch in thirty; if it’s okay I’ll add that to my sixty and be back in ninety.”

  “That’s fine. Take the time you need to unwind.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it.” Heading down the beach to interview two brothers about a missing friend was exactly the distraction I needed to get my head on straight.

  ******

  Buddy and Bobby were transplants from Los Angeles. They’d grown up on the Southern California coast, and in many ways I considered them the quintessential beach boys often pictured when describing the California beach culture. They were both blond, with long hair, dark eyes, and deep golden tans. They spoke in the colloquial dialect that included more than the average number of yo dudes and gnarlys and when they weren’t selling Dune Dogs and Buggy Burgers you could find them on the water chasing the next big wave.

  “Yo Lani. How’s it hanging?” Bobby greeted me when I arrived at their window.

  “It’s hanging fine. I wanted to talk with you and Buddy about Komo.”

  “Buddy’s in the water. The waves are the bomb. You should head out.”

  “I’m working today, but I’m on my lunch hour. Have either you or Buddy seen Komo lately?”

  “He was around a couple of days ago. Guess it must have been over the weekend. We didn’t really talk. Heard the burger-for-a-buck guy ended up shark bait.”

  “You heard right, but it’s Komo I’m worried about. He hasn’t opened his truck today. That isn’t like him.”

  Bobby shrugged. “I did see him hanging with the pack a while back. Not here; over near his truck. I don’t know what they were jawing about, but associating with that group could have something to do with his disappearance.”

  By the pack, I knew Bobby was referring to a group most locals considered bad news. “Do you have any idea why Komo was hanging with the pack?”

  “Naw. I guess he might have needed a job done.”

  A job like killing a man and tossing his body in the ocean?

  Chapter 6

  I still had thirty minutes left of my lunch hour when I returned to the resort, so I decided to head over to the lobby to chat with Kekoa. Talking with Bobby had helped to relieve the anger I’d been feeling toward the idiot on the boat, but it had also fueled my worry about Komo.

  I had just found a place to park under a large tree when my mother called.

  “Hey, Mom. Do you have news about Tommy?”

  “Some,” Mom answered. “I had one of the women I know from HPD pull missing persons reports and there’s nothing fitting his description.”

  “That’s good. I guess we can rule out kidnapping.”

  “Then I checked with social services to see if there was anyone fitting Tommy’s description in the system. They’re still checking, but the woman I spoke to assured me that no one meeting Tommy’s description has been reported as a runaway.”

  I got out of my car and locked the door. “Are you sure you should have called them? I promised Tommy I wouldn’t call the cops.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ve only contacted people I know personally will want to help. If Tommy isn’t already in the system I’m going to petition to be his temporary foster mother while we sort everything out.”

  I paused. “Are you sure? That’s a big responsibility.”

  “I know. I’ve done it before and I know how difficult it can be. It’s been a while since your father and I have fostered a child, so I’ll need to renew my license, but I know people high up and am quite certain I can have things expedited.”

  I stopped walking, pausing under another large tree. “Speaking of Dad, have you filled him in on all this?”

  “Not yet, but I will. I’m going to call him after I get all the details worked out.”

  I hesitated. Mom would be an
excellent foster mother for Tommy, but I wanted her to be sure. “The last time you fostered a child Dad was still working and you had a couple of your own kids at home. Things are different now. Are you sure you want to be tied down?”

  “I know most people look forward to retirement. They’re happy when their children have moved out and are living their own lives. But I’m not most people. I’ve been miserable since everyone has been gone. I thought it would be better once your father retired, but it’s been worse. For both of us. I raised six children and loved every moment of it. I don’t want the luxury of free time or travel; what I want is to be needed. I didn’t realize how much until you called me this morning. It appears Tommy has no one. He needs me. I want to do this.”

  “And do you think Tommy will want to stay?”

  “I haven’t talked to him yet, but he seems happy so far. The poor thing hasn’t had anyone to rely on.”

  “Okay, but promise me you’ll talk to Dad before you say anything to Tommy. I’d hate for him to get his hopes up and then have things fall through.”

  “I promise. The last thing I want to do is hurt the little guy.”

  I hung up the phone and continued to the lobby. I understood what Mom was saying and it did seem Tommy needed someone; I just hoped neither of them would wind up getting hurt.

  “I heard what happened with the mermaids,” Kekoa said when I arrived at the front desk. “You okay? Brody said you were pretty shaken up.”

  “I’m not sure shaken up is the right term, but I’m okay. I spoke to Jason earlier. He told me that he wanted to speak to Komo about Whitmore’s death, but he hadn’t opened his truck and wasn’t at home. Brody told me to take an extra thirty, so I went over to the beach to talk with Bobby. I thought maybe he might know where Komo was, but all he could tell me was that he saw Komo with some of the pack a few days ago.”