Black Sands (3 page)

Mano glanced at the cane-backed chair under the window. “Okay if I sit down? This may take a little while.”

Her father thrust out his chin. “We have nothing to say to you.”

Trying to hide her limp, Annie went to the loveseat. “I have plenty to say. Sit down.” She tried to adopt a nonchalant attitude by crossing her legs, but her leg trembled and gave away her agitation, so she uncrossed them and steadied her tremors by pressing her heels into the ground. She hoped he didn’t see how much his presence affected her.

Mano’s U.S. Navy uniform fit him superbly. Impeccably pressed and spotless, he was the epitome of a spit-and-polish officer. His white mess jacket over navy pants hid the muscles she knew lurked under the fabric. He was a wrestler. Leilani and Annie used to go to watch his matches on the base with their brother. She averted her eyes. It was best not to think about what used to be. She swallowed and tried to compose herself.

Her father gave a disgusted snort, then moved to the sofa and perched on the edge. “I will hear this if I must. Then you are no longer welcome in my home.”

Mano took a deep breath. “I’m sorry I missed Tomi’s funeral, but I was—” He glanced away as his words died.

“You killed him,” Annie said. Her voice trembled as much as her limbs, but she forced herself to meet his gaze. “And by killing him, you killed my mother.”

“I’m sorry about your mother,” Mano said. The muscles in his neck moved as he swallowed. “It seemed so out of character for her—” He stopped at Annie’s glare.

“You will not mention my wife,” Edega burst out.

Mano’s gaze slid back to Annie, and she read the desperation in his face. She took pity on him, though she knew he deserved every bit of her father’s anger. “Why are you here, Mano?” She wanted to get rid of him and talk to her father about Leilani.

He squared his shoulders. “I have your brother’s belongings. I wanted to bring them to you.” He hesitated. “I have something else to talk to you about too. Is Leilani here?”

An ache spread from Annie’s center outward. Leilani was always the one men noticed. Annie had gone on one date in her life, a mercy date for the bash her family threw her when she got her PhD. Leilani had arranged for one of her castoffs to escort her. Mano was one of those now too.

Maybe Mano wanted to try his luck again. The pain that rippled through her at the thought surprised her. “She’s not here,” she said shortly. She thought she saw disappointment on his face. And why not? Leilani was beautiful and vivacious, while Annie was a brown, colorless Eurasian sparrow.

“I really wanted to talk to all of you together.” Mano turned toward the door. “Let me get the stuff from the car.” He went to the door and stepped outside.

As soon as she heard the door slam, Annie sagged against the loveseat. She wouldn’t cry, not until she was safely in her room. Her father would demand to know what she was upset about, and he wouldn’t understand. She didn’t understand herself. The lump that formed in her throat was as acrid as the smoke from Kilauea. Her eyes burned. She didn’t know if she was ready to go through Tomi’s belongings.

“Leilani should be here,” her father said. His voice trembled. “We should present a united front.”

Leilani. Annie put down Wilson and her hand went to her pocket. She pulled out the pendant. “Have you talked to her today?”

“She has not shown her face since yesterday, the silly girl.” Edega stood and paced. “She has been out since then?” Annie nodded. “We shall have a most stern talk with her when she gets home.”

Annie sighed. She opened her fist and showed her father the locket. “I found this near the Kalapana Trail.”

The anger left her father’s eyes. “She never goes to the volcano. You don’t think—” He gulped and choked back his words.

Annie hadn’t wanted to even consider suicide, but she realized the thought had hovered at the back of her consciousness. “Surely not,” she whispered. “She would never kill herself, especially not there.”

“She’s been acting strange since she joined that club.” Her father sounded fearful. “Secretive and sometimes despondent. You should have put an end to it, Annie.”

Annie exhaled slowly. She should have, but Leilani was so headstrong. She glanced out the window. Mano was still unloading the trunk of the car. He seemed to be taking his time. Maybe he was less self-assured than she first thought.

She grabbed the portable phone on the table beside her and called the shop where Leilani worked. Her sister had not shown up for her shift. Annie dialed CeCe but couldn’t reach her. Annie called the police next. The dispatcher promised to send out an officer. Annie clicked off the phone and let her eyes return to Mano as he hefted three stacked boxes and started toward the house. She let her gaze linger on his dark hair. In her daydreams, she used to imagine plunging her fingers into that thick thatch. No more. Mano Oana had destroyed her family as surely as if he’d sent a cloud of choking ash to smother them all.

Two

M
ano hoped Annie would see him coming with the boxes before he reached the door. After landing in Hilo, it had been all he could do to force himself to drive the familiar road out to the Tagama house. The lava fields stretched out on all sides of the winding road, and the memories assaulted him. Things were so different the last time he was here. Regret left a bitter taste in his mouth.

Knocking on the Tagama door today had been the hardest thing he’d ever done, which was sad considering how much he’d always loved coming here. Their home blended their Japanese heritage and the American culture they’d adopted as their own. Edega had emigrated from Japan when he was in his teens and married a Japanese American girl who treasured her American upbringing. Edega had insisted on a Japanese name for his son, and her mother had demanded an American name for Annie. Leilani had been a compromise, a Hawaiian name to celebrate their new home. The conflict was typical of the cultural tug of war that went on throughout the marriage. That was what had made coming here so lively.

Edega seemed different—more remote and austere. And Annie—she seemed smaller. She’d always been withdrawn, but now she was almost like a ghost. His cell phone rang, and he set the boxes down to answer it.

“Hey, big guy, where are you?” his sister, Kaia, said.

“On the Big Island. I came to see the Tagamas.”

The phone went silent. Kaia finally cleared her throat. “That’s got to be hard. It’s the first time since—” She broke off.

“Yeah, it is. But it has to be done.” He thought about telling Kaia what he suspected but bit back the words. She was in the middle of wedding plans. No sense in dragging her into this.

“Well, guess what?” Her tone lightened. “I’m here on the Big Island too. I’ll find a place to get you fitted for a tux while you’re here. I came to do some planning with Jillian. And to bring Nani for a while. She followed the boat here.”

Jillian was Kaia’s soon-to-be sister-in-law. “Nani? What’s up with that?” He hadn’t thought Kaia would let the dolphin out of her sight. Since Kaia had bridged the communication gap and begun to “talk” with the dolphin via a device that translated words into clicks and whistles, Kaia had been even more obsessed with her work. Maybe the upcoming wedding had divided her attention.

“Jillian asked if Nani might help her for a few weeks. She and a coworker want to check some underwater lava flow, and it’s too deep for comfortable diving. I figured Nani might enjoy seeing Heidi again too. Besides, the reporters are still hounding us, and Nani needs a break. I’m taking off a few weeks to finish wedding preparations anyway.”

“I’ll stop by and take you all to dinner later. How’s Jesse dealing with the prewedding frenzy?”

Kaia laughed softly. “He seems to be taking it in stride.”

They chatted a few more minutes; then a police car pulled up behind his car, and an officer got out. The man’s gaze met his, and recognition flooded his face. Mano’s smile faded. Sam Briscoe. He said good-bye to Kaia.

Sam stopped. “Oana. I didn’t know you were here.”

Mano gave a curt nod. “I heard you’d moved back here after your stint in the navy. I had no idea you’d joined the force though.” Stupid to get his hackles raised like this. He and Sam had been friends once—before Leilani Tagama had come between them.

“Yeah, once action gets in your blood, it’s hard to settle for a normal job.” Sam turned toward the house. “I’d better get inside. You coming?”

Sam obviously thought he knew all about why Mano was here. Surely Annie hadn’t called to have him escorted off the property. Sam knocked on the door, and Annie opened it almost immediately. Her full lips tightened when her gaze flickered over Mano’s face. She was petite, only about five-two. He remembered a time when her face got as red as a hibiscus when he appeared. She’d adored her “big brother” Mano once upon a time. So much for hoping a small part of her former admiration still existed.

He carried the boxes into the living room. A part of him wanted to leave the boxes and not speak to the Tagama family any more, but he knew he had to stay. Besides, he wondered what was going on with the detective’s arrival. The tension and fear in the room left him uneasy.

Sam took out a notepad from his shirt pocket and uncapped his pen. “You say Leilani is missing?”

Mano was kneeling by the boxes, but he jerked up his head and looked at Annie. “Leilani is missing?”

Sam raised his brows. “You didn’t know? I figured that’s why you were here.”

Mano shook his head. “I brought Tomi’s belongings.”

Sam’s face clouded as he looked back at the Tagama family, and he tapped the pen against the paper.

Annie ran her hand over her hair with a distracted air. “You have to find Leilani, Sam. She didn’t come home last night. I thought maybe she spent the night with friends, but they haven’t seen her, and she didn’t show up for work this morning. I found her necklace out at the volcano. She never goes there. She’s terrified of it.”

Mano leaned against the wall. He’d just listen. Maybe he could help at some point. A part of him wished he could play the hero and maybe salvage his relationship with the Tagama family. It was probably a pipe dream. He watched Annie. She had always been a steady, albeit invisible, sergeant who kept the family running smoothly. The bright polish on her toenails was the only color she ever wore, and her toe ring the only ornamentation. Even that bright spot was missing today and work boots covered her feet. He’d noticed her limp. Maybe she’d twisted her ankle.

“You’ve called all her friends?” Sam asked.

Annie nodded. “Her closest. No one has seen her since Thursday afternoon around five.”

Sam glanced at his watch. “It’s just now twenty-four hours. Not that it matters as far as we’re concerned. There’s no time period to wait. I’ll put in a report, and we’ll see what we can track down. Could I take a look at her room to see if there’s a note or any clues there?”

“How stupid of me! I didn’t think of that. I just checked to see if any of her clothes were missing. Everything seems to be accounted for.” She and her father went down the hall. The officer followed.

After a slight hesitation, Mano went after them. Annie lowered her thick, long lashes, then glanced away without raising an objection. Mano’s gaze swept the room. Leilani appeared to be just as careless and haphazard as always. Shorts and tops hung over the rice-paper screen in one corner, a pile of books had fallen over on the left side of the bed, and Leilani’s makeup lay in a jumble on the gleaming black-lacquer dresser. His gaze locked on the bright blue tip of a notebook that peeked from the tumbled covers at the foot of the bed.

No one else seemed to have seen it. Sam was rifling through the closet, and Annie was on her knees peering under the bed. Mano stepped into the room and plucked the notebook from its hiding place. He flipped it open and frowned when he recognized it as some kind of religious manual. Chicken skin rose on his arms. “What about this?”

Annie’s head came out from under the bed. Her gaze zeroed in on the notebook. “That’s the handbook for the new group she’s so interested in.” She scrambled to her feet as Sam joined Mano. She held out her hand. “Let me see.”

Mano handed the notebook to Annie. “What group?” Her frosty expression thawed. The gratitude in her eyes made him try a tentative smile. The warmth in her eyes cooled immediately, and he looked away and clenched his teeth. She had every right to blame him.

She flipped open the notebook. “I’d call it a cult. They claim to be a Hawaiian cultural group, but worship of Ku is at the heart of it.”

Ku was an ancient Hawaiian god of war, a bloody god who demanded human sacrifice. Mano grimaced. Some natives were bringing about a resurgence of Hawaiian culture, including religion, though in this case it would have been better left in the past. He’d read the old stories and stood at the sites of some of those sacrifices. The evil in the air had been a palpable presence.

Annie sat on the edge of the bed and began to leaf through the pages. Sam peered over one shoulder and her father over the other. Mano wished to do the same, but he knew better than to get too close to Annie. She was uncomfortable enough with him just being here.

“I can’t believe she’d belong to something like this,” Annie said. She tossed the book onto the bed. “It’s a bunch of bunk about having power with Ku. Leilani knows better than this.” Her dark eyes burned with an inner fire.

Sam picked it up. “I’ll take it to headquarters and look it over.” He went back to the closet and began to sort through the jumble of shoes on the floor. “You’re sure nothing is missing?”

“Not that I can tell.” Annie joined him. “I’ll go through it. Leilani wouldn’t want you looking at her personal things.” She stood and went to the dresser, where she began to put the cosmetics in order.

Mano had to hide his grin at the emergence of her old bossiness. The real Annie was still in there somewhere. He took the opportunity to study her again. Her short, dark hair flipped up in a carefree way that was kind of cute. The cut skirted her shoulders and suited her long, graceful neck and slim frame. She had the longest eyelashes he’d ever seen. Thick and lush, they framed large expressive eyes that always told exactly what she was thinking. Her hands had always fascinated him. The fingers were long, like a pianist’s, and he’d often teased her for having “monkey hands,” because they were never still. They almost seemed to have a mind of their own. When she was sitting idle, they would roam around whatever was close by, picking up an ornament on a table or playing with the fringe on her cutoff jeans.