Mele Kalikimaka Murder

by Aimee Gilchrist

  He whistled in appreciation. "Nicely done, ladies." Whatever he'd been angry with Georgie about had apparently been resolved. He was all appreciation now.

  We loaded into my car again without discussion, possibly because it didn't say Aloha Lagoon Spa and Resort on the side, like Alex's did. Possibly just because I was the last one to drive. It certainly wasn't my choice, as I was crippled by my shoes and the creaking of leather as I hobbled across the parking lot, yards behind them.

  The drive to Kapa'a wasn't short, but it was no longer than two hours. A bigger town away from the people who knew Mallory would have been a perfect escape for a young girl searching for the kind of fun she didn't want to get back to her boss. I didn't know just what sort of fun she'd been seeking, but this was a long way to drive for a good time. Alex's phone directed us to Spikers, and the name turned out to make a lot more sense once we pulled into the parking lot. Though it was clear from the thumping music and blinding lights that Spikers was definitely a hopping nightclub, the area right next to the building was also busy, with a late-night volleyball game, a full team on each side of the massive net.

  "Mallory liked volleyball," I said, the words suddenly seeming like the saddest statement I'd ever made. It reminded me why I was here. My head was filled with a giggling teenage Mallory, arms around her mother, crowing over her latest high school team victory. Those days were gone for the family. When she was alive, it was poignant memories of childhood. Now, for a long time all the family would have was pain.

  The other two seemed to feel the strange gravity of it as well and flashed me somber looks. We sat in the car, observing an unexpected moment of silence. Finally, I pulled myself together and straightened my shoulders. We were already here, and we were going to get this thing done.

  "When we get inside, split up. Alex targets the women. Georgie targets the men. I'll go outside and talk to the volleyball players."

  That seemed like the best option for me anyway. I just didn't have what it took to seduce information out of people, despite Alex's and Georgie's proclamations to the contrary. Talking to a bunch of sweaty, aggressive people was much more my speed. No one argued, and we split up at the door. It was warm outside, as it always was, but a few of the people around the net were making a nod to the season with tacky Santa hats along with their bikinis and Speedos. I didn't want to break up the game, so I headed for the sidelines.

  It was cheap of me, but I didn't want to talk about Mallory's death. If they didn't know she'd passed away, let them hear it from one of their friends. Instead, I watched the game in silence and then eventually spoke to the woman next to me. She was short, brunette, and very perky looking.

  "Do you come here a lot?" I asked, speaking loudly to be heard above the chaos.

  She nodded. "All the time. There's always a great game going, and if I'm lucky, I can hop in on the next round. Best playing in town, and great drinks and hot men inside if I get bored." She winked at me.

  "I never even knew this place was here until today, but I heard one of my friends comes here a lot. Mallory Langston?"

  The girl nodded, her curls bobbing. "Oh sure, I know Mal. She's got a mean serve. Half aces."

  I had no clue what that meant, but I nodded encouragingly. "I never knew she had all these friends I'd never met. Who else does she hang out with?"

  "I've seen her with people from Aloha Lagoon mostly. You know, she works up there."

  I nodded. "Yeah, so do I. I just didn't even know people came out here."

  "She hangs with a bunch of surfers. I think she might be dating some English dude, and I saw her once with this crazy OCD guy who works at a restaurant near the resort where she works. There are a couple of guys who live here in town who seem to like her. One's Eurotrash, but the other's another surfer. She sure likes surfers."

  "So I've discovered." She either didn't notice my wry tone or didn't make anything of it. Mallory's obsession with surfers wasn't something I knew about before the last few days, that was for certain.

  None of what this woman was saying was really of any help to me, except for the mention of Poncho, the OCD cook at the Loco Moco. Even for someone who didn't get out much, Poncho was recognizable from the short description. The rest were completely useless without names. From the way she was talking, she didn't even know their names.

  "Are any of them here tonight? Just so I can say hi?"

  I was trying for casual, but it probably didn't come across that way. Oh well. An actress I was not. She shot me a questioning look. "Well, Eurotrash is here. I saw him go in. None of the others are, that I know of."

  There wasn't much use in asking her what Eurotrash looked like. That would be a step over what would be appropriate in casual conversation. If she called him that, I could probably figure it out. Someone who looked like what the girl's nickname suggested was probably a bit recognizable compared to the rest of a small island town. Even at a nightclub.

  "Thanks."

  She nodded, returning her attention to the game. "Tell Mal hi for me."

  I wished I could.

  I went across the other side of the net and repeated the conversation with two others who didn't even know Mallory. At this point, it seemed like the only appropriate thing to do would be to go inside and look for Eurotrash or maybe Mallory's mysterious English boyfriend. The inside of the club was insanely packed. Which made sense, as it was, as far as I was aware, the only real nightclub on the entire island. I spotted Georgie in the mad crush, only from her spiky white hair. I couldn't find Alex in the sea of dark-haired men, especially when it was pitch black inside, unless one of the spotlights managed to wander my way.

  Because I didn't know who Georgie had already questioned, I decided to talk to her first. It seemed to me that if there was anything to be found out about Mallory at a place like this, there were so many people here; I couldn't imagine how we would find it. We couldn't question everyone, so the only thing to do was to strike up conversations with as many people as we could and hope they panned out.

  I had to scream Georgie's name, even when I was standing right behind her. She was at the bar, chatting up a blond man in his late thirties clad in a non-Hawaiian-like three-button suit with pinstripes. He looked as uncomfortable as I felt, and I had a pang of sympathy for him and whatever, or more likely whoever, had dragged him there. I'd been in those shoes. Usually with Georgie but also with Jared, who'd just loved having business meetings at public places like clubs and restaurants.

  She turned and smiled at me. "Charlotte, this is Niall. He's from Ireland."

  I waved at Niall and considered that he might be the person that volleyball girl had been referring to, but I simply couldn't imagine that anyone would refer to him as trash of any kind, whether he was European or not. He flashed me a relieved smile, as though he recognized me as one of the awkward ones, a member of his party.

  "Hello," he shouted, his accent heavily Irish and completely adorable.

  "I need to talk to you for a minute," I told Georgie, indicating the dance floor with my shoulder. Somewhere on the other side of the room was a bathroom. In there we might even be able to hear each other.

  She shook her head. "You need to dance with Niall. He hasn't danced all night." She laughed as though anything about this was funny, and I wondered if she'd also been drinking during the thirty minutes I'd been outside talking to the volleyball people. She shoved my awkward self with one hand and awkward Niall with the other until we were on the fringes of the dance floor.

  I eyed him. "I don't really dance," I said, mentally murdering Georgie.

  He shrugged. "Me either. I'm here with my brother, who does dance. See—he's over there." He indicated to a man who was groin grinding with some woman in a dress exactly like the first one Georgie had offered me. "Shall we be terrible together?"

  I agreed, and we headed a little farther in so we couldn't be seen being awful. "Do you come here often?" he requested, flailing his arms around. He really was a terrible dancer.
No question about that. I did my part by occasionally doing an awkward shimmy that might count for dancing if one was either very generous or very drunk. Best both, probably.

  "I don't. I'd never heard of it before today. Mallory does though. Do you know her?" It was as suave as I knew how to be.

  He frowned, his nose wrinkling like a shar-pei. "I've only just flown in today."

  I shook my head. "No worries."

  Another strikeout. Niall seemed like he was in a pretty good mood for a man dragged to a nightclub on the same day as a transatlantic flight. I would have been spitting nails if placed in the same situation. Clearly he was a good-natured man who did not know who Mallory was or whom she'd spent her time with. Which meant I was out here looking like an idiot for no reason.

  We talked about how long I'd been in Hawaii, and I suggested he visit Aloha Lagoon before leaving the island. When the music ended, I was eagerly anticipating getting back on the fringes, but it was not to be. An arm snaked around my back, and I reacted by elbowing the person, who turned out to be Alex, in the stomach. He didn't seem irritated. He just laughed and grabbed my fist so I couldn't hit him again.

  "Relax, Bruce Lee. It's just me."

  I glared at him, which seemed to have little effect on his glee. "What do you want?" I realized I was being a little ungracious, considering I'd just gut-punched him. Niall was staring at me like I'd appeared in front of him out of nowhere, so maybe I'd come across as nicer before. "Sorry about that. You startled me."

  Alex's grin was lethal. I hated seeing it. "All good. What I want is for you to dance with me." He turned to Niall. "That's not a problem, is it, mate?"

  Niall shook his head. "Of course not, Alex. I didn't realize you knew each other."

  I glared at Alex, even though he didn't really deserve it. Was there anyone he didn't know? Niall had been in town one day, and we'd been in this club for less than an hour. Alex was a social machine.

  "We work together," Alex told him. "She's my boss." He winked as though there was some hidden dirty meaning behind what was essentially a true statement.

  This time I had a good reason to glare, so I took full advantage.

  He ignored me, grabbing my hand. "Let's dance."

  I had a chance to tell Niall good-bye before Alex dragged me into a dark corner where the people "dancing" next to us were actually breaking some laws about public indecency. "I don't dance," I shouted, trying to be heard over the blaring of a speaker situated just to our right.

  "It's a slow dance. Listen. Everyone can slow dance."

  Some man was moaning along with a bluesy R&B riff, and Alex was right. The music wasn't exactly slow, but it was slower. With about as much gentleness as he'd displayed dragging me over to that spot, he slid and arm around me and spun me around so that I was the one with my back facing the wall and his back was to the crowd. His body pressed hard against mine, and I was spending every single moment trying to control my heart rate and pulse. All the individual cells in my body weren't particularly interested in the sensible opinion that having feelings, even just dirty ones, for Alex was a very bad idea.

  "Can you hear me?" he asked, mouth pressed to the lobe of my ear.

  I nodded, not trusting myself to speak. I was afraid what would come out would sound a lot like I think you're scorching hot.

  "Good. I met Niall earlier. His brother Henry is a permanent resident of Kaumakani. I think he knows Mallory. He seemed hesitant to admit it, and I think he suspected I'm really Mallory's jealous boyfriend. He doesn't want to piss me off."

  I nodded. That made sense and was really unfortunate. "I thought you were going to be talking to the women?"

  He shrugged. "I talked to everyone who got close enough to strike up a conversation. Niall is very friendly. He brought Henry over to meet me. Henry is not very friendly. Unless you're a girl."

  I shrugged, realizing that I was keeping the flow of the music, forgetting momentarily how awkward all of this was. "I'm a girl. Maybe he'll talk to me."

  He shook his head. "Have Georgie do it."

  His hands were on my hips, and I could feel the outline of every individual finger through the butter-soft leather. He was so distracting. It was awful. "I can take care of myself," I reminded him indignantly.

  He grinned. "Of course you can. You can take care of yourself better than anyone I've ever met, which is part of why you are so hot. But in this case, Henry likes himself some trashy girls. Look at everyone he's dancing with. Even in that outfit, you could never pass for his kind of girl."

  There were so many parts of this conversation I had no idea what to do with. I could take care of myself better than anyone Alex had ever met? I was so hot? Alex thought Georgie was trashy? Or at the very least that she pulled off trashy better than I did? It was all mystifying. And unfortunately, it was the last hint of me being able to pay attention to what I was supposed to be doing instead of the fact I was in Alex's arms.

  "Now let's get out where he can see us, and convince Henry that I'm not Mallory's possessive man so that he'll be ready for Georgie when she comes."

  He spun me around until we were back in the middle of the crowd, and Henry was conveniently bumping and grinding with a girl wearing a dress that looked like it was composed fifty-fifty of Lycra and duct tape. Alex pulled me in close just as the slow song came to a stop. I tried to pull away, but he didn't release me.

  "I don't dance."

  He shrugged. "You don't have to dance. Just act like you think I'm hot, and rub yourself up against me. If you can make it match the rhythm, so much the better."

  The problem was I didn't have to act. Alex was molten hot. I spent all of my time trying not to think about it. I didn't want to embrace it now, just for the sake of proving something to Henry. I was already weaker than I should be after the stupid mistletoe kiss and the way he'd been continually making it impossible to ignore that he was capable of being as nice as he was sexy. I seriously didn't need this kind of complication in my life. Which was why I'd put such a concerted effort into disliking Alex. Now he was trying to ruin it all.

  I turned off the part of myself that was eagerly reminding me over and over, Hey, did you know you're rubbing up against that guy? You know, the one you spend all your time purposely not fantasizing about? I hated that part. It needed to be put to death, just like any wayward part of me—and there were a few select ones—that were enjoying this charade.

  The thumping, monotonous song didn't even have words in English. They sounded like maybe Swedish or German. It got on my nerves for its sheer repetitiveness, but even I had to admit it had a good beat. "Brace yourself," Alex said into my ear.

  I had no idea what he could be talking about until I felt his hands move up my thighs, nearly cupping my butt. Like we did that sort of thing every day, he used the grip to guide me along with the music. I nearly elbowed him again. "You're too stiff, and Henry is watching."

  I realized indeed he was. He was right next to us and eyeing us curiously. It was now or never, which was really just a lame justification to let Alex feel me up and rub myself against his hard body. But it was totally not justification to enjoy it. I just couldn't help that part. I was almost sorry when the song and the good excuse for touching Alex was over.

  All it took to end that, though, was to remind myself that Alex and Hawaii were synonymous, and I wasn't doing either of those things.

  My brain was back, but that didn't mean my body was back under my control. My heartbeat was frenetic, and my skin was brushed with a thin sheen of sweat over the goose bumps Alex's touch had left. I needed a minute to get control again.

  Alex leaned over to speak with Georgie, and I headed straight for the bathrooms, probably my only option for escape for a few minutes. I hoped he was telling Georgie to move in for the Henry kill, because we were so not dancing again. No matter what we might learn at the end.

  I spent a good thirty minutes hidden in a stall, breathing deep and scrambling to get back my much-loved control. Whe
n I felt like my old buttoned-up self again, I decided it was safe enough for me to return to the bar and see what was going on with the others. I emerged to an energetic techno version of "Wannabe," because what could make a club visit better than a little circa nineties Spice Girls action?

  I took a deep breath and headed for Alex and Georgie, now deep in conversation. They probably thought I had issues with constipation, as long as I'd been gone. Neither one asked me anything though. When I got to their side, Alex pulled out his phone and stared at the screen. "It's really late. We better get back to the resort."

  That was a remarkably adult thing to say, and I was a bit shocked that I hadn't been the one to say it, since I'd anticipated being the mean one who made everyone go home. I could tell by Georgie's face that she wanted to object, but I was her boss now, and she was probably still trying to make a marginally good impression. She needed the money to get back to Chicago.

  We headed for the car, none of us speaking until we were safely inside and no one could hear us. I worked off the stupid shoes, wishing there was a way to get out of those pants before I died of suffocation.

  "Hey, thanks for dancing with Niall," Georgie said, shooting me a grateful look. "The poor guy was desperate for company, and he wouldn't leave me alone. It was impossible to ask anyone anything with him right there."

  That made her behavior more acceptable, but I was still slightly embarrassed about my foray onto the dance floor with Niall, who was clearly Ireland's worst dancer. I didn't need any more help looking stupid on the dance floor, thanks.

  "What did you learn?" I asked, pulling back out onto the road headed for Aloha Lagoon.

  "A girl told me Mallory was here sometimes with 'some dimpled super hottie' from Aloha Lagoon. She said his name is Keanu. How could I possibly forget that name? Do you know a Keanu? And the most important question is, does he look like Keanu Reeves? Because I'd be happy to question him if he does."