Hot-Blooded (32 page)

Cheek rippling, he nodded for her to go ahead. She opened the book to March and read aloud.

March 21

I met Leilani today with the keiki. It was so nice to get away for a few hours. Since it was Sunday, the beach was very crowded, but we found a quiet strip of sand by the shore where Keahilani, Kai, and Manō built sandcastles with Lui.

He’s such a sweet little boy. Round and jolly and as beautiful as Leilani. We joked about Lui and Keahilani marrying one day. What an ‘ohana that would make.

I worry about Leilani. I noticed more bruises on the backs of her legs. She tried to hide them by tying a sarong around her hips, but I caught a glimpse of angry black marks I’m certain weren’t there the last time we met. Her husband beats her. Maybe Lui too, though I haven’t seen any evidence on him.

It’s hard for me to hold my tongue, but I hinted to her today that there are plenty of places for a woman to go should she find herself in trouble. Leilani laughed it off.

I ache for her and that sweet boy. It’s not my place to pry, but the next time I notice bruises, I’ll invite her and Lui to stay with us for as long as they need to. I’ve become accustomed to dealing with three little ones on my own and would welcome their company for both charitable and selfish reasons. Friends like her are hard to come by. I want to be there for Leilani as much as she’s been here for me.

She evaded my vague questions about her home life. I understand that. Sometimes it’s easier to sweep rotten things under the rug than to deal with the stench. Thankfully, Leilani’s husband travels a lot. Maybe he’ll leave again soon.

Keahilani paused and laid the journal in her lap. A faraway look clouded Lui’s usually lively face.

“This is my mother’s diary. Do you remember us?” She vaguely remembered him. Bits and pieces, unclear snapshots, but he felt … familiar.

A faraway look swept over his face as if he were grasping for the same fragile wisps of shared history she was. “A little.”

Keahilani dared to lay a hand on his arm. He stared at it. She didn’t intend to stir up bad memories. Rather, she wished to reestablish their previous connection in hopes of convincing him to help her.

His round cheeks pinked. Keeping his focus on her fingers, he said, “He killed her. Clobbered her face with one of his tools because I left some crayons on the hood of his car. I’d used them to draw him a picture of the three of us. The crayons melted in the sun and ruined his paint job. He was furious. Came after me with a wrench. She fell to the ground defending me, hands open, tears in her eyes. Begging.

“He swung the metal. It landed on her face. Her blood colored the family portrait I’d made.” He laughed bitterly. “Guess I didn’t need those damn crayons after all. The blood made a prettier picture.” Clenching his jaw, he picked at a loose thread on his shirt.

Keahilani’s blood chilled. “Lui, I—” She was sorry? She wished she could make it better? She knew how he felt?

Nothing she could say would ease the pain he’d buried under tons of dirt and filth and murder of his own. The son became the father. Just as she’d become her father.

Lui tugged himself back to the present and smiled. “It’s all right. Daddy made me the man I am today.” He slapped his jiggly belly. “Where would I be without him?”

Keahilani lowered her gaze. “Our mothers were good friends.” She paused, then held out her hand. “I’m Keahilani Alana. My makuahine was Mahina, and she loved Leilani like a sister. Like ‘ohana.”

They locked eyes for a long moment. Distrust melted into uncertainty. Cautious understanding passed between them. Lui accepted her hand, limp wristed, and shook it. A flurry of emotions flashed across his face—desire to pour out his heart to a stranger-turned-friend, yearning for his lost mother, regret at not being able to help her, and maybe even some sadness at what his lot in life had turned him into. Keahilani experienced the very same feelings.

Neither shared their stifled memories or desires. No, they both left them in the pits of their black souls to continue festering and inflicting invisible damage along their respective paths to hell. So alike, yet so different.

Lui sighed and returned his gaze to the sea. “I suppose you want to renegotiate a distribution deal. Got me by the balls with added details to the sob story of my past, so now you’re diving in for the kill, right?”

“Right.” She smiled and bit the inside of her cheek. “There’s more about Leilani. Do you want to read it?”

Lips pressed together in a thin line, he shook his head. “I’ve heard enough. I live with her past every day in here.” He rubbed his chest. “She’s the only reason I don’t go apeshit crazy and open fire on a building full of snobby private-school kids for the fuck of it.” His sadistic gaze pried open her soul, dropped a bomb inside, and zipped it up with a smile. “And believe me, I think about it. Every single day.”

No doubt. “I need a distributor I can trust, Lui. You work for Scott, don’t you?”

He didn’t answer.

“He killed my brother this morning.”

A flicker of emotion crossed his face, but it wasn’t pity. More like a click of recognition. “I see.”

Keahilani cocked her head. “You don’t trust Scott.” Now her own light bulb triggered a rapid-fire series of understandings. He wanted to get back at Scott for something. He got screwed over too. This might be the in she was looking for. Team up, turn Scott against Lui, and she might have a chance.

“I can’t help you directly. Scott could trace your weed through my buyers back to me. But I have someone on my payroll Scott doesn’t know about—not the typical demographic. I could put Pāhoehoe out through that dealer.”

Keahilani’s stomach twisted with excitement. “I have a lot of weed I need to move very fast. A couple millions’ worth in two weeks or less. Can he handle that much?”

“Considering
she
deals for Hawaii’s richest, most bored housewives, you’ll get at least a quarter above your retail price. Those bitches have nothing better to do than blow through their husbands’ money and fuck their way through underage pool boys while their men are on vacation. They pay their boy toys for silence with weed, and their appetites are voracious. Selling won’t be a problem. Though, I’ll require a handling fee, of course.”

Careful not to make her salivation obvious, Keahilani faked mild displeasure with a combination frown/arm-cross. “How much?”

“Ten percent.”

“Five.”

“Ten. I’m doing you a favor, Pele.”

“Yes, but you want Scott to suffer almost as much as I do. And we’re ‘ohana if our mothers had anything to say about it.” She resisted the urge to bite her lip.
Please buy it. Please.

“Eight percent. It’s my final offer.” He cut the air with a hand swoosh.

She let the number settle between them for a few seconds and feigned irritation. “Fine. Eight percent.” Inside, she heaved a huge sigh of relief. If this dealer came through for them, they’d have all the money due in a few weeks plus extra for the next payment. Finally, something went right. “I’ll send details over tonight so she can start immediately.”

He nodded, stood, and dusted off his sandy hands. She got to her feet beside him. Their eyes met and held on a level playing field.

“I’m sorry for your loss,” he said without emotion.

“And I’m sorry about your makuahine.” She lowered her head. “I lost mine several years ago. Different circumstances, but still …”
Painful
.

He continued as if he hadn’t heard her. “This meeting never happened, Pele. I don’t know your real name, your pretty face, or your family, and you don’t know my daddy issues.” He sashayed to his car, wide hips swinging, uplifted arm waving left and right. In the brief moment before he drove away, he faced her, and a mutual understanding bloomed between them:
I feel your pain. I respect you. No harm will come to either of us.

A small smile lifted the corner of her lips. That’s all she could’ve asked for.

Chapter Thirty-One

Blake had been brutalized physically, mentally, emotionally. Though his brain was addled to the point where cohesive thoughts devolved into fleeting blips on the radar, a single phrase pulsed on repeat with the throb of blood between his ears:
Get out of here.

Gunshot wound aside, the crazy fever dreams—at least, he hoped they were dreams—had assured him his life was in danger. Blood loss and a possible infection packed all the sting of mosquito bites compared to the threat Kea and her brothers posed.

Kea had sent Manō in to break his fingers one at a time. He vowed he wouldn’t stop until Blake gave up Scott’s location. So far, Manō had smashed three digits with a hammer and promised to return shortly for round four. Blake had seen Death’s scythe poised to slash in Manō’s black eyes. For the first time, he was truly afraid for his life.

His only hope of escape was the window. Kea had pulled the duct tape off his wrists sometime in the night. When he heard Manō coming shortly after she stormed out of the house, he loosely reattached his bonds as best he could. Affixing the tape to one had been easy, but he couldn’t tighten the other with only one hand. Manō hadn’t checked the security of the left wrist after having his way with Blake’s right fingers. Keeping his ears open for movement in the hall, he went back to work on loosening the tape on the left side.

Twist. Yank. Pull.

This whole situation was beyond fucked up. Between the madness of his own head games and those of his captors, Blake wasn’t sure which way was up, and he sure as hell didn’t know who to trust. If he could bust out of this place, he’d try to get back to Oahu. He had no phone, no money, no car keys. And thanks to the hole through his leg and a useless hand, his chances of sneaking off the Alana family property alive were about fifteen percent. Manō would have no qualms about putting another bullet in him. And he doubted Kea would, either.

Blake continued tugging despite the bloody sheaf of skin hanging off his wrist. Survival trumped pain. Footsteps in the hallway plodded toward his room, and Blake halted all movement, rolling his head to the side and closing his lids.

The door opened. Someone entered. The thick, dark scent told him it was Manō. A hand grasped him by the sweaty hair and swiveled his head front and center. “Wake up.” No anger in his voice, just command.

Blake’s eyes fluttered open. He winced and squinted and grunted. Most of that wasn’t for show. Felt good to verbally let out some of the pain. “Let me go, man,” he begged. The whimper he tacked on wasn’t planned.

“Tell me where I can find Scott, and I’ll end this quick.” Manō’s dead eyes gave away nothing, but the echoed promise of death in his words assured Blake he meant business. He exuded the same power Blake had sensed in his hallucinations about Kea. Its flavor was an all-encompassing blackness, growing, spreading like a virus.

Blood is thicker than water. And it extends far beyond the boundary between life and death.

He was going to die. Soon. Question was, would it be a martyr’s death for Scott or a selfish one to avoid prolonged torture?

Blake had always been a rogue who cared for nothing but himself—with one exception. Scott. The brother he never had, the stand-in for a family long lost and forgotten, the lifeline who bailed him out of hell, Scott was the only constant in Blake’s life.

Women came and went. Friends were few and far between. But Scott had been ever-present. And the bond they shared, though very different, was much stronger than the one he shared with Kea.

He owed her nothing. She’d been an awesome lay, and she’d tricked him into caring about her. Maybe even loving her. But she wasn’t family. Not like Scott.

The voice in his dream had told him to choose. The remaining minutes on his countdown clock, and possibly the determination of the path to his afterlife, all came down to this decision.

Family or pussy?

He faced Manō without fear. “I don’t know where Scott is.” And they wouldn’t be able to locate him through Blake’s phone. He used an untraceable dial-in number he’d memorized to access Scott’s personal line. For a hefty fee, Jezzy made sure all call logs and texts between them were deleted nightly. She had magic powers, that one.

Manō ripped the duct tape off Blake’s right wrist, held his hand down, and smashed the hammer onto his ring finger. Blake jerked, but he held on tight to the tape on the left wrist through his scream. No way he could let Manō know he’d gotten it loose enough to escape. Tears leaked and rolled into his hair. He babbled incoherently about letting him go. He pleaded for mercy, swearing he didn’t know Scott’s location.

Manō ignored his protests and re-taped the bloody wrist in place, its mangled, blackened fingers dangling uselessly.

The pain in his hand was unbearable, so the tears weren’t hard to fake. Manō only stared down at him with detached interest, the shark unsure of how hungry it really was. Debating. Maybe deconstructing and strategizing his next move. With cold apathy, he picked up his hammer, left Blake to his cries, and exited.

Between calming huffs in through the nose and out through the mouth, Blake went back to work on the left wrist, staging whimpers and blubbering whines every few seconds. He sprinkled in some agonized shouts. Within a couple minutes, the left arm was free. He gingerly got busy on the right wrist. A few more moments passed, and both arms were loose. He untaped his feet, timing the rips of the silver tape in perfect sync with a few long, pain-filled shouts that he hoped served as adequate audio cover.