by Toby Neal
Stevens finished his sorting and looked up as his small team filed into his office.
“Hey, guys. I have Omura’s new assignments for you.” He read off their names and new assignments, allowing the groans and teasing that erupted at some of the assignments. “Just pack your personal stuff. Department furnishings are going into storage.”
The group was returning to the main room, grumbling side conversations going on that Stevens pretended not to hear, when Brandon Mahoe, one of his trainees now doing a turn at the watch desk, knocked on the doorjamb.
“Someone here to see you, sir. Says she’s your mother.”
Chapter 2
Lei jotted down the names of the two rescuers in her spiral notebook: Barrett Sharkey and Ipo Gomez. They were both mid-twenties, muscular and tan, and had known the victim for years.
“We were stoked Makoa was home for the weekend,” Sharkey said. “He lives on Oahu now, on the North Shore. Lives with some other team riders at the Torque house at Pipeline.”
Lei noted this. “So he was home for the weekend. I take it he stays with his parents when he’s home?”
“Yeah, or at his girlfriend’s.” Sharkey pointed at the girl in the towel, whom Lei had already noticed. The girl had collapsed in the sand, her head on arms looped around her knees. Her friend was pressed close to her next to the plastic barrier tape. “Her name’s Shayla Cummings.”
Lei made another note. “Okay. Why don’t you tell me exactly what happened.”
Gomez took the lead this time. “We were both paddling out, so we saw Makoa take off on a big set wave. Then this kook dropped in on him. Guy we’ve never seen before.”
“Not the guy on the green board? The one the lifeguard’s chasing?” Lei asked, frowning.
“No. He was short and dark like that guy, but he was on a white board,” Sharkey chimed in.
Could the aggressive surfer have changed boards somehow?
“Anyway, that guy dropped in late, and they tangled. Looked like a mean wipeout. And then the white water from the set hit us, and as we were trying to get through it, I saw the guy on the white board paddling in. Makoa’s board was floating.” Gomez pointed to it, a white board with red stripes and a lot of sponsorship decals, set on the beach. “But Makoa never came up. So I yelled to Bear, and we paddled for the board. I got it, and Bear used the leash to follow it down to Makoa. He was underwater.”
“Was he stuck on something?”
“No. He was just deep underwater. Must have had his lungs really full, and he’s got just about no body fat, so…” They all looked over at the surf star, now being lifted by Dr. McGregor and Tanaka into a long black bag.
Sharkey hung his head and rubbed his eyes. “Damn,” he whispered. “Never thought it could happen to someone like Makoa.”
Gomez shook his head. “Neither did I.”
With the help of the remaining lifeguard and a couple of the uniforms, McGregor and Tanaka carried the bagged body up the beach. The group carefully lifted the young man into the back of the ME’s van. The girls wailed, and Lei saw friends try to comfort them.
She pulled the witnesses’ attention back to her. “Did you see any sign of foul play?”
“No. Unless you call dropping in on a guy and crashing into him foul, which I do,” Gomez said. “That bastard bagged out of there because he knew he did wrong.”
Another disruption pulled their attention away as the lifeguard arrived back at the beach on the Jet Ski with the runaway surfer dragging behind him on the flotation sled. Lei and the two rescuers watched as the lifeguards both lectured the guy as he got out of the water. Lei, following a hunch, held up a hand to Sharkey and Gomez. “Wait here a minute.”
She gestured for one of the uniforms to follow her and walked down to the water, her black Nikes sinking into the soft, deep yellow sand, the sun hot on her hair. Sam Napua had a hand on the surfer’s shoulder as he said, “You’re off the beach for a week.”
“Whatevahs,” the man said. “Plenty of other places to surf.”
“I wonder if you could explain what you’re thinking when you drop in on somebody,” Lei said. “It’s not just rude. It’s dangerous. Someone drowned here today after getting stuffed in a wave.”
The young man, lean and dark with well-defined muscles moving easily, picked up his board from the water’s edge and raked her with a contemptuous glance. He couldn’t miss the badge on her belt and her weapon in the shoulder holster, let alone the uniformed officer beside her.
“I’m born and raised on this island, and if I want a wave I’m going to take it. My family been here longer than all these haoles.”
“So you think being a local entitles you to something.” Lei narrowed her eyes at him. “I think it entitles you to a citation for disturbing the peace. With a side of reckless endangerment.” She gestured to the officer beside her. “Ticket him, please.” She didn’t usually carry a ticketing pad but had learned that there was often a need when responding to calls at the beach. The officer wrote the ticket and ripped it off, holding the slip of paper out to the angry surfer.
“Happy to meet you in court,” the officer said. “I saw the whole thing. And you disobeyed the lifeguards and cost the county money and time bringing you in. I can write you up for that, too. You can take me to your vehicle so we can check your ID.”
Lei saw the young man’s eyes flicker and his jaw tense as he bit back angry words. He took the ticket, daring a “stink eye” glare at them as he broke into a trot for the parking lot with the officer behind him.
“Glad you cited him. Guy like that needs a smack down. He just doesn’t get it,” Sam Napua said. “Those kind of attitudes are no way to live aloha.”
“Thanks for all you do,” Lei said sincerely to Sam. She’d always felt lifeguards were underpaid and underthanked. Sam glanced at her left hand, and she was glad she was wearing the simple, channel-set wedding ring from her wedding to Stevens not so long ago. Pono rejoined her with a stack of witness statements, and they went back up to the two young men she’d been interviewing.
“You did what you could to save Makoa,” Lei said to them. “I may need to talk to you again.” She handed them each cards. “I’m sorry you weren’t able to get to him in time.”
“He must have hit his head or something,” Sharkey said. “I don’t know why else a guy with skills like Makoa would have drowned from a simple wipeout.”
“I’m sure the medical examiner will have more on that. Now, since you know her, can one of you introduce me to his girlfriend?”
Gomez knew the girlfriend better, so he led Lei over to the distraught young woman crying with her friend. Lei felt the grief pouring off the girls in palpable waves and tried not to let it activate her own emotions.
“Shayla. This is Detective Texeira,” Gomez said, his hand on the girl’s shoulder. “She’s trying to find out what happened to Makoa. Can you talk to her?”
Shayla lifted huge brown eyes to look at Lei. She was one of those women who simply couldn’t look ugly, even with a red nose, eyes streaming, and hands filled with hair she’d pulled out of her own head.
“I’m sorry to have to ask you questions right now,” Lei said, feeling her hands prickle with sweat as she thought of her own extremity of grief not so long ago. She knew she’d been ugly in it: her freckled, olive-skinned face blotchy, eyes swollen to slits, curly hair matted. No, she wasn’t one of those women who looked pretty crying.
“It’s okay if it helps you find the man who did this,” Shayla rasped.
“So you don’t think it was an accident?” Lei asked, adding, “Can we go into the shade a bit?” A nearby beach naupaka tree cast lacy patterns over the yellow sand, and the girl, her friend, and Lei moved into the pool of shade.
“I think that bastard who stuffed him might have done something
.” Shayla groped for something to wipe her face with. Her blonde friend pulled off a T-shirt, revealing a tanned, toned body in a fuchsia bikini. The blonde handed the shirt to Shayla, who wiped her eyes and blew her nose on it. “He’s been getting threats at the Oahu house.”
Lei’s attention sharpened. “Did you see where the guy went when he came in?”
“Yeah. I was watching Makoa surf. I always do when he’s home. So I saw the whole thing. I didn’t realize Makoa was in trouble, but I watched that guy come in because I’ve been concerned about the threats. He was maybe five-eight, and tanned with dark hair. Wearing black Quiksilver board shorts and a black rash guard. He got out of the water, grabbed his board, and ran up to the parking lot. I thought he was leaving because Makoa’s so popular. The guy knew he’d have the boys after him for dropping in on Makoa.”
Shayla sat up straight, golden-brown eyes flashing, and pulled waist-length, sun-streaked brunette hair back and braided it quickly as she spoke. “He got in one of the Sports Maui rental vans. You know the ones they rent in Kahului for windsurfers? He had one of those.” She straightened the strings of her bikini, a cream-colored crochet that revealed as much as it concealed. “He roared out of here. Then I looked back out and saw that Bear and Ipo were looking for Makoa in the water.”
Her eyes filled again as she looked out at the turquoise ocean, the breaking waves. The scene was timeless and unchanging, as if her world hadn’t just been shattered.
Lei knew that feeling too well. Shayla was bright and observant, in spite of her grief. A credible witness.
“How long was it between when the guy took off and when he drove away?” Lei asked gently.
“Maybe ten, fifteen minutes.”
“Did you get a license plate?”
“No. I stopped looking when the van began pulling out. I just noticed it because I could tell the guy was in a hurry to get out of there.”
Lei’s mind was already clicking ahead to the next steps. With Makoa’s high profile, any allegation of foul play had to be definitively ruled out before a statement was released to the public, and they were a long way from that with this kind of testimony.
“What can you tell me about the threats he was getting?”
“They were e-mails from different addresses. Telling Makoa to throw the contest or ‘we’ll make you pay.’” She made air quotes with her fingers. “He had some threatening letters in the mail, too. And someone called his cell phone, left messages from a blocked number telling him to go home to Maui. Makoa just thought it was other competitors with sour grapes.”
“Anyone in particular?”
“Yeah. He has some rivals.” She gave Lei three names, all pros Lei recognized from the circuit. “You should also check out the guys he lived with at the team house. Makoa said Bryan Oulaki was especially bitter when he won the last event. Thought it should have gone to a North Shore guy like himself.”
“Thanks.” Lei took down that information as well. “If I need to question you further, what’s a number I can reach you at?” Shayla gave her a number.
“I need to talk to his parents,” Lei said. At the mention of that, Shayla hung her head. “What are their names? We need to speak with them as soon as possible.”
Shayla had begun to sob again, and this time the friend, barely controlling her own tears, gave Lei the names and address of Makoa Simmons’s parents.
Lei stood, brushing sand off her black jeans, and tucked the notepad into her back pocket. There was pretty much nothing she hated more than going to break the news of a child’s death to parents, but it was an important interview that couldn’t be passed on to others. She walked over to Pono, who was gathering witness statements from the other officers who’d helped with the canvassing.
“Ready to go on our favorite kind of home visit?” Lei asked.
Pono put all the witness statement papers he’d gathered into a file folder. “I wish we could fast-forward this part,” he said.
“Me too.” Lei sighed.
* * *
Stevens stood slowly, feeling his face freeze into an expression he hoped was socially acceptable as he turned to the door. By the puzzlement in his subordinate Brandon’s expression, he didn’t think he’d quite pulled it off.
“Send her in.” His lips felt stiff. He hadn’t seen his mother in five years. Not since he’d left the LAPD and transferred to a series of posts in Hawaii, in fact. And there was good reason for that.
His mother, Ellen Rockford Stevens, stepped into the doorway. “Hello, son.”
Of course she led with reminding him of his obligation to her. Her voice was sanded with years of drink and smoking, but he’d have known it anywhere. She’d made an effort to clean up. Her hair was bottled blonde and brushed, and she’d been a good-looking woman in her prime and still stood taller than most. But her once-bright blue eyes were faded and watery, and she was so thin that skin hung off her bones. She’d always been slim, but this was alarming.
“Mom.” He came around from his desk and hugged her. It felt like gathering a bundle of sticks for firewood. She smelled of stale cigarettes and the alcohol making its way out of her pores. She clung to him, hiding her face.
“I have nowhere to go,” she whispered. Her voice was a rasp. He had to tilt his head to hear her even as he shut his office door on the silence that had fallen over his staff out in the front room.
Stevens’s stomach hollowed as he led her to one of the plastic chairs in front of his desk. “How’d you get here?” he asked, walking back around to sit behind his desk, taking the last few items he’d been packing and setting them in the box, finding comfort in the simple little movements.
“Took a plane, of course.” She gave a snort of a laugh. “One-way.”
“Oh.” Stevens pulled out a drawer, rechecked that it was empty, gathering his thoughts.
He’d known this day might come. His mother was a progressive alcoholic, and when he’d moved from Los Angeles five years ago, she’d already spent time on the streets after being kicked out of bars. He’d gotten so sick of being called to come get her or bail her out he’d come all the way to Hawaii to get his own life going.
She must have run through everything their father had left her.
“I can tell you aren’t happy to see me. Haven’t had so much as a Christmas card from you this year.”
“I gave up after you couldn’t make it to our wedding,” Stevens said, narrowing his eyes at her. “I sent the ticket and everything.”
“I wasn’t feeling well.”
“Well, it looks like you still aren’t feeling well.”
“I’m ready for a new start. I think being here could help.”
“That’s good, Mom.” He swallowed all the things he wanted to say. “Where are you staying?”
“I don’t know.” She blinked, and her eyes overflowed. He continued packing so he wouldn’t have to look at her. “I was hoping to stay with you.”
“Have you contacted Jared?”
“He didn’t leave me any numbers.” She sounded hurt. “What kind of sons are you, moving six thousand miles out across the ocean? Not even letting me know where you are.”
“We wanted to have our own lives, Mom.” Stevens dropped a pile of manuals off a shelf into a box with a thud. “You have your life, and it’s in a bottle. Until that changes, we don’t have much in common.”
She sputtered indignantly. It sounded like an angry kitten.
Sorrow sliced through him in a way that stole his breath. He owed Ellen life. He owed her respect, whatever her addiction. She was his mother, and she was desperate. He looked up at her.
“I’ll take you out to our house. You can spend the night, but you’ll have to be in the tent in the yard. We’re squeezed into a tiny cottage with Lei’s dad and my son while we work on o
ur house. It’s not the best time for guests.”
“You have a son?” Her face brightened, eyes widening. She smiled, and he glimpsed the beauty she used to be and felt that sadness again. “I have a grandchild?”
“His name is Kiet. He’s my son with my ex, Anchara.”
“Oh. You didn’t invite me to that wedding.”
“No, I didn’t. I’ll call Jared and let him know you’re here.” He didn’t want to get into any of this painful history. He reached for his phone and pressed a number for Jared.
His younger brother, a firefighter at Kahului Station and recent transplant to Maui, picked up right away. “Hey, bro!”
“Jared, Mom’s here.”
A long pause. “Shit,” Jared said.
“That was my thought.” Stevens cut his eyes over to his mother. She was groping through a backpack on her lap. He could tell by the trembling of her hands that she needed a drink or a cigarette—maybe both. “I’ll put her in the tent at our house tonight, unless you have a better idea?”
“You know I only have a one-bedroom apartment.” Jared had taken over the lease on Stevens’s bachelor apartment in Kuau. It was close to the ocean and work, he’d said, and so far he’d seemed happy there.
“Well, she’s gonna have to be out in the tent,” Stevens said. “We’re tight as sardines in the cottage, and the house needs another couple of weeks before we’re ready to move in. Anyway, can you come over tonight? Join us for dinner?”
“I don’t think so.” Jared’s voice was bitter.
Stevens turned away from his mother and hissed into the phone, “Come on, bro. You can’t leave me holding the bag on this.”
