Hot-Blooded (34 page)

Yet, he felt damn familiar.

He smiled and offered his hand. She stared at it, her internal freak-o-meter going haywire. “Do I know you?”

His smile took a smug turn and punched her with a life-changing
kapow
. “Scott Harris.”

And the runaway imagination skidded to a painful, bleeding crash landing into the slopes of Haleakalā.

No. No
fucking
way.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing here?” she demanded in a hushed tone. In her peripheral vision, Manō tensed. Must’ve smelled her rising frenzy.

Scott withdrew his manicured hand when she didn’t shake it and smoothed his tie down the front of his designer shirt. “Paying my respects to my half-brother.”

Her heart shot up the inside of her chest and slammed her voice box so hard, she couldn’t speak. Couldn’t breathe.

Air. She needed air. And an emergency supply of blood pressure.

“Excuse me?” she eked out.

Manō darted in for the kill, appearing at her side, poised for attack without so much as a muscle flex. Scott tried the handshake on him, and he also refused with a cold stare.

“My condolences on your loss. I didn’t know him, but I just learned he was family.” Scott’s gaze sawed through the thick tension between them.

Fuck this bullshit. Keahilani balled a fist and pulled it back to clock him. Manō caught her hand before she could throw the punch and didn’t let her go. So, she attacked Scott with the only other weapons at her disposal—words.

“How
dare
you. How fucking
dare
you show up at my brother’s funeral after you murdered him in cold blood, you pig!” Venomous rage stinging her veins, she struggled under Manō’s airtight muscle.

She’d attracted the attention of the few remaining attendees, and Kai shot over with Ret in tow. Keahilani turned to her. “This is the piece of shit you need to be checking out. He’s the one who smothered Bane at the hospital.” She spat in his face. Her shoulders heaved as she tried in vain to catch her breath. All she saw was red.

Ret stepped between Scott and her, and studied him as he wiped away Keahilani’s fury with a fancy handkerchief. “I think you should leave. You’re upsetting the bereaved. I’d be happy to escort you to your hotel.”

“No need for that. I’m heading to the airport momentarily. But before I go, there’s one more thing I’ll say.” He nudged Ret aside and leaned within six inches of Keahilani’s face. He smelled of expensive cologne and minty mouthwash, yet her stomach roiled at his proximity. His face clouded with the shadow of the monster lurking beneath the surface. Same as hers. She recognized its addictive darkness. She tested Manō’s grip around her arms and snarled when she didn’t budge.

“Bane got what he deserved,” Scott breathed over a low growl. “I only wish I’d been the one who’d done it. See, I’d have drawn it out and made it hurt. Just like he did to my Lori and our unborn child. He didn’t tell you that part, did he? It’s the inconvenient truth no one wants to face. Your brother murdered an innocent woman and her baby. Live with that,
sister
. I hope the weight of it drowns you as it does me every day of my life.”

“No.” She shook her head. “He didn’t do it. He was a good man.”

“He was his mother’s son,” Scott hissed.

Manō reacted faster than Keahilani could. His thick arm flew past her shoulder like a poison-tipped dart and connected with Scott’s face, knocking him backward several steps. “Yes. He was,” Manō said.

Kai and Ret jumped in front of Manō, and the stragglers surrounded the flaring tempers with eager interest. Scott worked his loose jaw between a thumb and index finger and dabbed at the fresh blood easing down his chin. Manō’s nostrils widened as if he smelled it, and a sinister haze overcame his face.

A rumble roused the sky in the distance.

Ret grabbed Scott by the upper arm and flashed her badge from her purse. “Time to go.”

“Get your hands off me,” Scott seethed, jerking his arm away as he sauntered toward the exit. He tucked in his shirt and readjusted his rumpled suit. “This is only the beginning, my brothers and sister. Justin Jacobs’s legacy will live on.”

A freezing mist gobbled up Keahilani’s flesh as Scott left the church and hopped into a waiting limousine. Jaw trembling, she faced her brothers. The weight of Scott’s threat weakened her legs. One thing was certain. Life just got a hell of a lot more interesting.

As the car sped off, Keahilani shot daggers at her yet-to-be-confirmed half-brother and began plotting his demise. “Let’s get out of here.”

Chapter Thirty-Three

Keahilani, Kai, and Manō parked at the Haleakalā Visitor Center an hour before sunset. A horde of rental cars from uppity tourists lined the lot. People wearing jackets with cameras strapped around their necks trudged up the last few hundred feet to the lookout for the best view of the nightly death of the sun.

Clouds swaddled the Martian-red landscape, and fierce wind made the cold temperature even more frigid. Standing at a height of over 10,000 feet posed new challenges for those accustomed to the significantly warmer climes of the lowlands and beaches. Breathing was hard up here, though Keahilani suspected a good chunk of her lungs’ heavy laboring had more to do with the task that awaited the ‘ohana after sunset than the elevation.

Since Bane’s death, her nightmares had taken on life when the sun went down. She dreaded the inescapable pull of the dormant volcano dragging her closer to its center and the inevitable darkness that was slowly suffocating her soul.

She stole glances at her grim-faced brothers on either side of her. They felt the pull too. Neither had breathed a word about anything out of the ordinary, but she
sensed
the same eclipse of light inside them.

The same one she’d sensed in Scott earlier today.

The three of them huddled together as one, perched on a rocky outcropping amid
oohs
and
aahs
from nearby tourists. The natural spectacle before them had played out millions of times before today, yet the display was no less sacred. Perhaps it was more so with such a big crowd of visitors bearing witness to the sun’s greatness.

Camera shutters clicked on constant repeat as the bright yellow orb made its slow descent into night. Keahilani’s heart dropped with it.

When the solar climax lost momentum and faded like lulling endorphins into the blood of the air currents, the people headed to their cars, eager for hot chocolate, heaters, and shelter from the wind. They’d return to their hotels or condos, loaded with pictures documenting a natural wonder. Eventually, those photographs would end up in drawers at home, waiting to be resurrected through sparked memories of
that vacation they took to Maui
, only to be stuffed back into their dank, dusty boxes when they outlived their shine.

Bane and Mahina would
never
be like those forgotten photos. They would live on, ever-present in her heart.

Keahilani clasped Kai’s right hand and Manō’s left. They leaned into her and squeezed amid their shivers.

“It’s time to go,” Kai said softly. His dreadlocks whipped around his face with a sudden kick of wind. Reminded her of snakes. Smiling, she caught one and playfully tugged it.

She stood, dusted off, and offered her brothers two hands up. They accepted. The trio walked back to the car in silence. She stuffed her cold fists in her pockets, and found a folded piece of paper.

Lui.

Once inside the car, she switched on the light and read the note aloud:

Problem solved. You’ll have your money on the full moon.

I am with you.

Thank you.

—L and L

“L and L?” Kai asked.

“Lui and Leilani, I assume.” She smiled tightly. “His mother.”

She flipped off the interior light, and that weird …
thing
happened again. The three of them lost form and diluted into the darkness. Holding her breath, she waited for their shadows to gather back into the humanoid shapes they never should have misplaced. It took longer this time—a few seconds.

Nobody addressed the elephant on the mountain. Or under it, as it were.

Because they all knew. No one had to say a word. They knew.

Bad blood traveled through the tunnels of their veins. And those tunnels were rooted to the heart of this ancient volcano.

Keahilani started the engine.

“We’re being followed,” Kai said. His voice had changed in the last week. Deepened. Gained more confidence.

“Yes,” she replied, wishing she could leave the headlights off as they headed down the twisty-turning road.

“Pull off and meet me there,” Manō said behind her.

She glanced in the rearview. Manō was nowhere to be found.

Beside her, Kai reached into the backseat and patted the empty leather. His line of sight collided with hers, and understanding passed between them. At the next overlook, she parked the car, undid her seatbelt, and slipped low in her seat. Kai did the same. She clutched the urn full of Bane’s ashes to her chest. They waited for the parade of passing headlights to wane and pure darkness to resume. When night curled around them, they slid into its
barrel
like riding a wave.

* * * *

Gravity seemed thicker here at the foothills of Haleakalā. Denser. Possessive. Keahilani tightened her arm around the urn.

“This place is cursed,” Kai said dryly.

“Yeah,” she agreed.
And so are we.

“Let’s get this over with.” Kai stepped aside and gestured for her to lead the way.

Keahilani navigated the familiar, night-drenched landscape toward Mahina’s garden. The warmth of her brothers’ bodies behind her provided a little comfort along the way, until they stumbled upon an abandoned car that reeked of death. Her heart lurched. “Someone’s here.” Shit. She scanned the vegetation for signs of an intruder. Finding no one, she spun to face Kai and Manō. If it was Scott or one of his people, they were fucked. “Do you know anything about this?”

They shook their heads and split up to investigate. After a few minutes of trudging through the underbrush searching for someone who wasn’t there, the three siblings came back to the car. The foul stench rolling off it told Keahilani something bad happened here. Something they needed to dispose of before anyone else came calling.

Manō circled the car a couple of times and then returned to Keahilani and Kai who stood upwind. “Pretty sure there’s a body in the trunk.”

“Great. How the hell do we get rid of it?” she asked.

Electricity filtered into the air like an answer to her question. The three of them looked at each other.

In the hazy space between dreams and reality, where everything was a shade of blackness, a trail of bodies with tiki heads filed down from the mountain, each one a segment of a malevolent caterpillar. Vague drumbeats resounded. Dim torches glowed with eerie, light-sucking luminescence.

What the hell?
huaka‘i pō
—the Night Marchers—come to pay their respects? If her life hadn’t taken a drastic turn for the supernatural over the last few weeks, she wouldn’t have believed it. As it was, she was less shocked than she should’ve been.

Keahilani, Kai, and Manō backed up as a few of the figures broke off from the main procession and surrounded the car. The drumbeats deepened and increased in tempo. The ground rumbled beneath their feet. The tikis circled the vehicle, moving counterclockwise, faster, faster, faster, until a mighty crash fractured the rock below them. The earth groaned and spit and resettled, the sound deafening. The rushing figures slowed, revealing a massive sinkhole where the car had been. They trudged away, falling back into place in their deadly cavalcade.

One of the ghostly apparitions watched Keahilani from behind its mask. According to legends, meeting a Night Marcher’s eye portended the demise of the onlooker or one of his or her close family members.

Keahilani no longer feared death. She saw no reason not to welcome its cold hand if it dared to darken her door. Holding the spirit’s gaze, she stared it down until it passed.

All evidence of the car gone, she exchanged smiles with Kai and Manō. Nothing else to do but accept the unacceptable and be grateful for the help.

She and her brothers continued on to Mahina’s old garden. The tiki spirits lined up in a square surrounding them. Silence fell.

This was where it all started. The beginning of their lives as drug lords. Their first taste of luxury. Their first dip into hell.

A butterfly alighted on the urn. Keahilani coaxed it on to her finger. Even without light, she made out the insect’s eyes. Compound mosaics with excellent vision. All-knowing. Ever watchful. Like the waxing moon gazing down at them.

Wings flapped, sweeping her skin with dusty orange scales. The caress stirred up memories of Mahina pushing a young Keahilani’s hair out of her face, and the soft kiss on the forehead that always followed.
Darkness is a part of you, but don’t allow it to fully eclipse the light. ‘Ohana comes from both sides. Separate, but equal.

The butterfly launched gracefully into the air and hovered for a few seconds before the night swallowed it.