Dead On Arrival (A Malia Fern Mystery) Read online

  Help Me. A shudder ran through my body with the memory.

  This was going to be easier than I thought. “Yeah, I’m the one who found him.” Again, I wore a casualness I didn’t feel.

  “No way! Gnarly, dude.”

  I’m not sure who said it, as the group of the regulars began to circle around me. Some of the surfers were native to the island, some were transplants. Others were working stiffs or college students taking a much needed break from it all, like me. Then there were the few lost souls who only follow the direction of the next wave, like Moa.

  I told the group my story, leaving out the fact that I was too stupid to keep my hands off the body, which left the tale without much gusto. But believe it or not, that was my plan. If I made it too interesting then no one else would make it more fascinating. I needed someone to amp my story and make it totally rad. I needed to find a missing link.

  I’m smarter than you thought, huh?

  Moa asserted himself in the crowd, pushing to maintain his position next to me, which I thought was interesting since his nickname meant ‘chicken.’ He wasn’t the brightest bulb, but he survived on shore just like he did when catching a wave. In other words, if things got a little out of control, he disappeared. He avoided fights and dropped off the backside of the big waves. In my book, he wasn’t chicken, he just played it safe.

  “Yo, brah, I heard it on the news that he was a business man with a habit. Liked the local flavor of meth too much and drowned.”

  Now how in the hell could the news report that? Wasn’t it a little slanderous?

  “Brah, I saw him doing a hand-to-hand with some of the construction workers at the new condos in Poipu,” chirped in Mutt, a guy with a permanent buzz and the shaggiest hair you’ve ever seen. Seriously, his hair isn’t long, but it’s a mess and it smells like a wet dog most of the time. Whoever nicknamed him wiped out his real name a long time ago. I’m not sure anyone knew him by anything but Mutt.

  “No way. Did you score at the site?” Moa’s eyes lit up like a shark with its meal within striking distance. Maybe that’s why he called himself shark — it had nothing to do with his talent on the water and everything to do with his ability to smell out new dealers.

  “Nah, brah. I just saw ‘em last week. I was running late, so I took a short cut through the lot. There was definitely an exchange of cash.” Then Mutt’s eyes began to roam the crowd suspiciously, like maybe he’d given up too much information. Or wanted to buy his next high.

  “Maybe I should check it out.” Moa’s eyes lit up with the prospect of scoring new dope, which left me compelled to point out the flaw in his plan.

  “Moa, the guy Mutt saw making the buy, ended up dead.”

  “Ohhhh, riiight.” He drug out the two words like a kid learning phonetics. “Thanks for watching my back, salty sis.” He gave me a solid appreciative smack in the middle of my shoulder blades, and sent me forward a few steps.

  The group began to break up, giving me the perfect opportunity to pull Mutt aside.

  “Mutt, can I talk to you a minute?” I asked while lightly touching his arm to stop his progress toward the water.

  Mutt’s gaze traveled from my breasts to my toes and back again, as if my wanting to talk to him meant I was ready to get busy. Geez, can’t a wahine just talk to a guy without him thinking she wants to get in his pants?

  We walked up the beach, our feet sinking in the lush white sand and stopped under a couple of palm trees. As I turned toward him, I noticed he’d already stood his board in the sand and was coming at me like an octopus. Somehow, in the past ten seconds, he’d grown more hands than the average guy. I hastily shoved my board in the sand between us.

  “I need to talk to you about the guys at The Garden of the Gods.”

  “Oh.” His light bulb turned on and his octopus arms disappeared.

  “I think my little brother is working at the condo complex you were talking about. He’s been in some trouble lately and I really hope he’s not mixed up in this.” My lie wasn’t too big, since my younger brother Kionni was a construction worker, but I had no idea what site he was working at, and I was pretty sure the only trouble he’d been in was for being late for dinner at my parent’s house. “Can you describe the guys to me? I really need to know if he needs my help.”

  “Dude, anything for Ohana. It was two guys, one a local. Big guy. Pro wrestler type, well over six-foot and close to three hundred pounds. But this guy wasn’t fat. He was pure muscle, and the way he walked, dude, he could break you in half. He was definitely there to show force. If his size didn’t make him stand out, he had this trim goatee and a ponytail hanging down to his waist… so, wow, y’know?

  “The other guy had short brown hair, a full goatee, and a tattoo on his forearm. It was big and red. Maybe a lizard?” Mutt was fairly certain of what he’d seen, and basically, it pointed toward a drug buy.

  Still, I couldn’t accept it as a dope deal. Lizard tattoos were a dime a dozen on the islands. Everyone had one, including my boss. So finding a brown haired guy with goatee and a lizard tattoo wasn’t exactly the best description to launch a manhunt.

  The big guy was the best place to start.

  “Surely, one of those guys ain’t your brah?” Mutt looked me up and down, using the lack of resemblance between the two dopers and me as an excuse to check me out again.

  I think the closer inspection of my body was making Mutt change his mind, because once he started seeing all of my flea bites, he took a step back like he might catch something from me.

  “No, they don’t sound like my brother. You’re sure no one else was there?” I wasn’t letting him get away yet.

  “Nope just those two guys and the dead guy.”

  Mutt’s mention of Peter Johnson was all it took for me to be sure that he knew much more than he was saying.

  “How do you know it was the dead guy with them?” I watched Mutt shut down on me. His eyes completely glazed over in what appeared to be fear. He’d given me more information than he wanted to and Mr. Helpful no longer felt the need to assist a fellow surfer. Or get laid.

  “Ah…Moa said it was the dead guy. Look I gotta go catch some waves. They’re totally righteous.” Mutt hastily pulled his board out of the sand, spraying sand all over my legs and ran for the surf before I could even finish thanking him.

  I stood there for a few moments thinking about the case, wondering what Mutt was hiding. This morning when John asked me to ‘give him a hand’ on the case, I didn’t hesitate. Sure, my brother was a smartass, and I wasn’t getting paid, but I had the inside track when it came to information on this beach — it was definitely my beach — and John needed my help to solve this case whether he believed it or not. In addition, I was starting to believe Peter Johnson’s “Help me” plea was the real thing. That he somehow chose to communicate with me long after his death.

  Needing to clear my head with a couple of good waves, I grabbed Paradise headed out into the surf in Mutt’s wake. I couldn’t help the grin spreading across my face. Not only was I heading out to hang ten in the most glorious place on earth, I’d gotten some good information on the case that the police couldn’t possibly obtain.

  Eat your heart out, Officer Smarty Pants.

  And, no. I was not thinking of Officer Natua.

  Chapter Eight

  Catching a wave and feeling its power build under your feet as you ride the mounting surge is comparable to, well, really good sex. Getting lost in the passion while you focus on nothing but the climax. Then gliding down the slope into a foamy aftermath of joy. Your toes tingling with the pleasure of an orgasmic achievement. It definitely ranks up there with the best ride of your life.

  Bless the Duke for making this sport what it is today. No, I’m not talking about John Wayne. I’m talking about the father of surfing, Hawaiian native Duke Kahanamoku, an Olympic swimmer who popularized modern day surfing in the early 1900s.

  Rolling comfortably in the hills of water while straddling my b
oard, I watched over my shoulder for that last perfect wave of the day. Waiting, watching — is that it? No. I let several smaller ones pass me by.

  Don’t let anyone tell you size doesn’t matter. It does.

  Finally, I spotted Mr. Right among the crowd of waves heading my way. Watched him build and back build, my body humming with anticipation. Timing was everything. I laid flat on my stomach and paddled for all I was worth as the surge caught up with me. My hands palmed the surface of my board and I hopped to my feet, joining a slew of other surfers determined to put their autograph on this particular wave. It was heavenly. The swell built higher and higher — bigger than I should try, but I was on the top of the world without a care. There were warning signs alerting me to exit — but I ignored them. The sheer power building under my board as I weaved back and forth across the roaring surface beckoned me to follow, and I couldn’t let go. Normally, I would have fallen off the backside, or at best, rode out its length, never tipping over the precipice. Played it safe like Moa did with a wave this size.

  Not today. Today, I needed the surge of life to flow through me. My body demanded the adrenaline only an experience outside my comfort zone could bring. I had to prove I was worthy to continue on…when Peter Johnson could not.

  I crested the swell and began riding the biggest wave of my life. Other surfers appeared in front of me, dotting the surface like barriers on an obstacle course. Riding low with my weight toward the back of the board, the fingertips of my left hand skimmed the wall as I grasped my board with my right and pulled inward, zigzagging around my buddies. My balance was shaky, but I hung on for dear life as the wave began to enclose over me. Crouching even lower, I leaned forward to gain speed inside the curl. I looked down the tube, and my heart skittered as it started to close.

  The pure roar of noise left me alone in the universe, encapsulated within the wave. Just me — the ocean — and God.

  This wasn’t just your average four footer. This was a double overhead and then some. Concentrating on survival, I squatted down so low my butt touched the surface of the board. My left arm now fully extended, as I balanced my board against the crashing wave. The exit funneled tighter, leaving the smallest door of escape.

  In that instant, I knew I wasn’t going to make it, but I wasn’t giving up either. My adrenaline stoked and I headed for the exit. Where I got the guts…or the stupidity, I have no idea. I just followed the rush, which was leading me to certain doom.

  Water crashed down on my head, making my legs wobble, but I refused to give in. Too late, I realized the door ahead of me had closed. I caught a glimpse of Paradise flipping up in the air before being swallowed up whole. The velcro strap around my ankle tugged, and then released under the pressure as I went down. Nature crushed and rolled my body, flipping me over and over till I didn’t know what was up or down.

  This was it. The end, I thought, before my back scraped across coral reef, identifying where the bottom was. The nerves along my spine woke up with pain. I’d pay the price for that hit, but it gave me hope. I continued to relax and go with the flow, my lungs feeling smaller and smaller. Tighter and tighter they squeezed. Thoughts of a riptide entered my mind — I pushed them away, along with the panic trying to catch me.

  Finally, a rainbow of color splashed in front of me. The sun filtering through the water, leading me toward the light. Fighting my way to break the surface, I sputtered for air. Desperately, I caught a breath and dove back in as another wave crashed down. This time, better prepared, I body surfed with it at an angle and let the swell break in front of me. Again, I surfaced.

  Turning around to look in the general direction where I lost my board, I spotted it dipping in the waves a short distance away. Moa was almost alongside it.

  That’s what it’s like in the surfing community. No matter how different you are on shore — when you’re out catching waves, your brah’s got your back. Grinning, I swam toward him, enjoying the rush of water across my body with the afterglow of success.

  “Dude, that was awesome! You gotta go for it!” To say I was totally stoked was an understatement.

  Moa’s eyes orbed like saucers as I approached. Moa’s eyes never open wide. He’s one of those sleepy looking dudes. He wasn’t looking at my face. He was looking…lower...where I was feeling incredibly free in the water as the waves splashed against my chest. My bare chest.

  “Ay!” The water swallowed my yelp as I went under. More panicked now than when the force of the ocean tumbled my limp body to an uncertain destiny, I swam underneath Moa and came up behind him.

  “Don’t turn around!” I blurted as I surfaced.

  He turned around.

  “Moa!” I splashed water in his face and he turned away.

  “Sorry, brah. I can’t help it. When there are boobs in front of me…I look.”

  “They’re behind you!” I practically screamed.

  “Right. I look there too.” The grin in his voice was evident by his tone, but I chose to ignore it.

  “Do you see my suit?” I grabbed my board, ready to splash him again if he dared to take another peek. Another swell pushed us closer toward shore. Anticipating the surge, I repositioned my board before Moa made a fatal error of looking a third time.

  “No…” To his credit, he was looking for my top in the water. “Wait, I see it!”

  “Where?” Frantically, I spun around looking for it, wondering how a sports bra could come off without my knowledge. The abrasive scraping across my back had left it raw, but still...

  “Uh…5-0’s standing on the beach holding it up.”

  My stomach sunk deeper into the depths of my embarrassment. I didn’t have to see the officer to know who the officer was holding up my top. I looked anyway, hoping against hope…but there he stood. Officer Natua. My pink top swayed in the breeze like a sign of my surrender next to his chiseled mocha face.

  “No frickin’ way!”

  It’s bad enough to expose oneself twice in a twenty-four hour period, but to the same guy? I bobbed in the ocean, hiding my naked breasts from my fellow surfers and stared at model white teeth reflecting the sun. Bag of Toys’ song Smile So Wide played in my mind.

  “I’ll tell him about a stash of weed down by the water breaker if you want to make a run for it.” Moa’s voice was resigned in solemn sacrifice.

  “You’d give up your weed for me?” Touched by his loyalty, I couldn't believe he would give up the stash he valued like gold.

  “You saved me from making a fatal error by chasing the wrong dealer. It’s the least I can do.”

  At that moment, I debated letting Moa distract Natua. His gallantry was selfless, and he definitely needed help with those delusional ideas about me saving his life.

  “Thanks, Moa, but I can handle Natua.” My voice carried more confidence than I felt as I held my board in a death-grip against my chest.

  “No problemo, brah.” His shoulders slumped with relief, Moa shrugged off his knightly armor. “How you going to get your top back?”

  “I’m going to walk up to him and take it.” Moa was looking at me skeptically. It sounded delusional to me, too.

  “Won’t he arrest you for like indecent exposure or something?”

  “No, we go way back.” Way back to this morning when he tried to push me out of the men’s restroom only wearing paper coconut pasties. Surely, my board counted as more clothing than wet paper towels molded to my breasts.

  I slid onto my board, scrunching my chest against the rough surface, not sure if the abrasive contact felt good on my bites, or hurt like hell.

  “Brah, I need to surf with you more often.” Moa’s eyes were wide open again, and he wasn’t making eye contact.

  “Thanks, Moa.” I felt my face heat up but tried to act carefree.

  Would I surf this beach tomorrow? Hell no! It’d be months before I recovered my dignity. But no one, except me, was going to know the extent of my humiliation.

  I rode the waves in on my stomach, catching a few
looks and whistles as I passed the guys. My hands cut through the surf with more strength than I thought possible while I plastered my chest to my board and kept a steady gaze on Officer Natua’s ear-to-ear grin. Reaching the shoreline, my hands grasped the sand and stopped my advance. Steadying the board against the waves is easy if you’re lying on your back basking in the sun, but this wasn’t a nude beach, and there were little kids everywhere. My boobs stayed plastered to Paradise.

  Natua smiled. Arms folded across his chest, eyes hidden behind aviator sunglasses, he waited for me to get up and walk out of the water. I bit my tongue, thinking the good manners his mother had surely taught him, would defeat his gloating male mind.

  “What happened to your coconuts?”

  So much for manners. Maybe he wasn’t born. Maybe he was spawned.

  My bravado began to slip. “Are you going to arrest me?”

  “Why would I arrest you? Did you kill Peter Johnson?”

  I ignored that and shot him full of bullets with my eyes.

  Fine.

  I started to stand up, and his etiquette finally kicked in. Head tilted down and cocked to the side, like he wasn’t peeking over the top of his sunglasses, he raised his hand to halt my entrance onto the sandy shore.

  Do cops direct boob traffic at nude beaches?

  I stopped and smooshed my chest to the board again, wondering what his next stunt would be. He turned and walked toward a woman and her kids playing in the sand. I don’t know what he said, but she looked at me, tossed him a hotel towel, then scurried her kids away in the other direction.

  Natua came back to the water’s edge, still sporting that toothy grin, and bent over to take off what looked like expensive combat boots. His eyes didn’t leave me as he rolled up his uniform pant legs, showing off muscular calves. Then he actually walked into the surf and stood in front of me, holding up the towel like a dad ready to wrap up his little girl in a warm embrace.