4 Maui Macadamia Madness (23 page)

Camilla turned on an
overhead light then closed the shack door. Her wide eyes and frantic pacing
scared me more than the gun. The girl was definitely off her rocker. Back and
forth, mumbling. I shivered and continued my search, made much easier than the
light and the fact that everything was in boxes.
Lord, help me
.

The storm seemed to
be abating, which meant my family would come searching, if they hadn’t already.
Once Malia showed up in the dining room after cleaning up the water in the
hall, they might think I’d gone to the restroom. But even that didn’t take this
long. I refused to have one of my family members shot and killed on my account.

God smiled on me as
Camilla turned and opened the door. She glanced out, and I barreled into her,
knocking her and the gun to the ground. Without stopping, I dashed through the
slow falling rain back to the main building. Camilla’s mad shrieks followed,
spurring me faster.

I reached for the
back door. A bullet smashed into the frame by my head. I gasped and wrenched
the door open. Without a backward glance, I raced into the dining room and
smack into Ethan’s chest.

He held me back at
arm’s length. “What’s wrong? Where have you been?”

I shoved against
him. “Get into the dining room and tell Joe to get his gun.”

“Summer?”

I pushed harder.
“Now!”

Ethan grabbed my arm
and we hurried to Joe’s side. I took a deep breath and shoved my wet hair out
of my eyes. “It’s Camilla. She’s the killer. She took me to a shack out back
and wanted to shoot me.”

“My
Camilla?”
Mr.
Wahine
stood. “That’s impossible. She’s a docile girl.”

“Not so much.” I
plopped into a chair. “Joe, tell me you have your gun.”

He pulled aside his
tee-shirt, revealing a weapon tucked into the small of his back.
“
Manano
?”

“I’m here. Does Mrs.
Banning go anywhere without causing a ruckus?”

A gunshot fired into
the ceiling rained plaster on our heads. “Everyone sit down!” A soaked and
angry Camilla advanced.

“Princess.”
Mr.
Wahine
held
his hands up, tears streaming down his face. “What are you doing?”

“Sit down, Dad. I’m
doing what you should have done.” She waved her gun hand at Leroy.
“You, too, you spineless twit.”

Mrs.
Wahine
covered her face with her hands and sobbed. Leroy
sat in the chair next to her, his back amazingly stiff for someone without a
spine. Camilla maneuvered until she had our group in her sights.

“Your
gun, officer.”
She must
have been talking to
Manano
, because Joe didn’t make
a move toward his hidden weapon.

“An officer doesn’t
hand over his weapon.”
Manano
put a hand on the butt
of the gun in its holster.

“He does if he
doesn’t want anyone else to die.” Camilla nodded. “Yes, I killed Jamison and
Mrs. Aldrich. Had some help with Mr. Franklin, but I guess it’s all the same in
the eyes of the law. My point is…I won’t hesitate to kill again.”

Not necessarily
true. She hesitated with killing me in the shed. Thank you, Lord. The fact that
she’d done so before, might work in our favor.

After
Manano
reluctantly handed over his weapon, she ordered
everyone to sit. I scooted my chair as close as I could to Ethan and snuggled
under his arm. Shivers had my body jerking like someone had stuck me with a
live wire. Whether from fear or cold, I wasn’t sure. Mrs.
Wahine’s
sobs filled the room, ratcheting my anxiety level to an all new high.

“Leroy, tell Mom and
Dad what you did to start all this.” Camilla leaned against the doorjamb,
reached into her pocket, then pulled out a cigarette. She lit it as if she
hadn’t a care in the world.

“I’ve done nothing,
compared to you.” His back lost all its rigidness as he slumped in his chair.

“Still not man
enough to come forward.” Camilla blew a smoke ring. “My dear brother, having
overheard Mom and Dad talk about the dire financial straits of our childhood
home, cooked up a scheme with the late Mr. Jamison, to rob some people of their
hard-earned cash. Isn’t that right, baby brother?” Without waiting for him to
answer, she took another puff on her smoke and spoke while holding her breath.

“Jamison was a
fool!” She exhaled sharply.
“Threatening to expose everything
when Mr. Meadows refused to pay up.”
She pointed the gun at Uncle Roy.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

I pushed back my chair and hurried to stand in front of him.

“Get out of the
way.” Uncle Roy pushed me aside then transferred his attention to Camilla.
“If you want to shoot me, little girl, for wanting to know where my
money would be going, then go right ahead.
I never spend a chunk of dough
like that without asking God’s direction first.
Doesn’t mean
you can go around killing people.”

“I didn’t plan to!
At first.”
She dropped the butt and ground it under her
flip-flop before lighting another.

“This is about the
mortgage?” Mr.
Wahine
asked. “We’re fine, sweetie.
Really.
Although Leroy’s scam was wrong,” he glowered at his
son. “Filling up the place was a great idea.
You killing
the folks off…not so much. Probably won’t get a single customer now.”

“What are you going
to do now?” Finally, Joe spoke.

“About
what?”

“You can’t kill all
of us and expect to go free.”

“Why
not?”
She pointed the
pistol at him.

I caught my breath
and took a step toward my cousin. Ethan held me back. I frowned at him. Sure,
my cousin got on my nerves, but I loved him. I’d take a bullet for any one of
my family. I just prayed it would be quick and not hurt too bad. I hated pain.

“Stop doing that,”
Ethan hissed out the side of his mouth.

“I can’t let her
shoot them,” I whispered back.

“Stop talking!”
Camilla’s face turned red.

Mrs.
Wahine
stood, wiped her face on the neckline of her muumuu,
and approached her daughter.
 
“You
haven’t been taking your medicine, have you?” She glanced at us over her
shoulder. “She’s schizophrenic.
Has been since the age of
twelve.”

Well, that explained
a lot.

“What difference
does it make?” Camilla’s shoulders slumped. “I have to kill everyone and burn
the place down.”

“Kind of defeats the
purpose, doesn’t it?” I hadn’t meant to say those words out loud.

Camilla transferred
her crazy mind to me. “Stop talking. This is
all your
fault. If you hadn’t meddled in things that didn’t concern you, you’d be
getting on a plane tomorrow none the wiser.”

Oh, I was getting on
a plane tomorrow.
With my family.
I couldn’t wait to
get away from these crazy people. Her stupid remark made me feel a bit like a
character in a Scooby Doo episode with those ‘meddling kids’.

I sidled up to Joe.
“Do something.”

“Not yet.” He kept
his arm around April, who apparently had decided that not speaking might make
her invisible.

“Are you waiting for
her to shoot someone first?”

“I’m waiting for the
cavalry. Stop talking.” Joe slowly sat back in his seat.

The what? Everyone
was here. I glanced around. Manuel was absent, along with Malia. All we had to
do was wait out the crazy woman with the gun.
Great.
I
glanced toward the window, relieved to see the storm had stopped. Why weren’t
the police here yet?

“What are you
looking for?” Camilla marched toward me. “Huh? Hoping for a rescue? Well, that
isn’t going to happen anytime soon. The road’s blocked.” She grinned. “I have
help, remember? Someone else stands to gain from the insurance money. I’m not
worth marrying without money as part of the package.” Tears shimmered in her
eyes. “Nobody wants a crazy woman for a wife. The insurance money is my last
hope.”

I shrugged away from
Ethan and took a step toward her. Maybe she wouldn’t listen to my message of
hope, but I had to try. “Everyone has worth, Camilla. You are as precious to
God as I am.
As your parents.
Your
brother.”

“I told you I’m a
Buddhist.”

“Didn’t he exhibit
love?” Oh, why hadn’t I studied up on alternate religions for a time like this?
Selfish and concerned with my own world, that’s why.

“He taught about the
true spirituality of the mind. Mine is tainted.”

She really had gone
off the deep end. Tears burned my eyes. “Well, I don’t know anything about him,
but I do know how my God feels about you. And He will forgive you.
Even for this.”

“I’m going to shoot
you first.” Camilla backed up and lit another cigarette.

I suppose she needed
the courage first.

During our
conversation, Leroy had circled the room, coming up behind his sister. Ethan
and Joe came on each side. With me in front, we surrounded her.

Leroy put a finger
to his lips. I nodded and stepped back. Maybe the boy had some guts after all.
I did the only thing I could do. I grabbed Aunt Eunice’s hands, and we prayed.
It didn’t take long for Uncle Roy to join us, which was a good thing. My uncle
was a prayer warrior of the greatest kind.

The three around
Camilla tackled her down.

A shot rang out.

My leg burned for a
minute before the pain turned to a raging fire. “I’ve been hit.” My eyes
widened, and I fell forward into Uncle Roy’s arms.

“Summer’s shot!” He
laid me on the floor and pressed his strong hands against my thigh. “
Eunice,
kept praying.”

Another shot rang
out and someone yelled. I thought it sounded like Leroy, but the pain in my leg
overshadowed everything else. I closed my eyes against the tears running down
my face. Strange, but the only thing I could think of was that we wouldn’t be
going home tomorrow.

Sirens wailed.

###

I opened my eyes in the hospital, mortified that I’d fainted over a
shot to the leg. All those times I’ve had a gun aimed at me, I’d never met the
bullet.

Ethan slept in a
moss green vinyl chair beside the bed, his hand covering mine. Even in sleep,
he’d never left me. This I knew without being told.

“Hey, husband.”

His eyes popped open
and a slow smile spread across his face.
“Hey, wife.”

“Who else got shot?”
My heart lurched at not seeing any of the rest of my family or April.

“Leroy.” Ethan shook
his head. “He didn’t make it. Poor Mr. and Mrs.
Wahine
lost both of their children yesterday. One to death and the other, most likely,
to a mental ward.”

“Where is everyone
else?” As if my question summoned them, Aunt Eunice and Uncle Roy, along with
Joe and April poured into the room. They circled the foot of the bed and
grinned like fools. I joined in, my face hurting from the effort. “I want to go
home.”

“Yes,
ma’am.”
Joe stepped out
of the room.

“Will they let me
go?” I glanced at Ethan.

“Probably.”
He leaned over and kissed me. “You’ve been
asleep for two days.”

“I have not.” What a
wimp. A little shot in the leg and I obviously thought I was dying. “I’ll have
to go in a wheelchair, won’t I?”

“Most
likely.”
He cupped my
cheek. “But don’t worry. I’ll push you.”

“We thought you were
dead.” April fell to her knees beside the bed.

I laughed when only
her eyes showed over the edge of the mattress. “It’d take more than a bullet in
the leg to kill me.”

“Obviously.”
She laid her head against my arm. “You’ve
got a Hawaiian honeymoon you’ll remember for the rest of your life.”

“And
a scar as a
momento
.”
I tried to sit up. “Where’s my camera?”

“In
the suitcase.”
Ethan
laughed. “You took enough pictures for five photo albums.”

“Tell me Joe still
has the copies from Mrs. Aldrich’s box, and the notes. They’ll make great
keepsakes.” I laughed.
Happy to be alive, and happy to see my
family around me.

Joe arrived minutes
later, pushing a wheelchair. “Better get dressed, cousin, because we’re busting
you out.”

“When does our
flight leave?” I grabbed Ethan’s hand. “Tell me it’s soon.”