Burning up the Rain (Hawaiian Heroes) (15 page)

And besides, what good did it do to be able to bring a little raincloud around once in a while? She wouldn’t exactly be a hit at outdoor parties.

She’d wanted Jack. Just to play with her, distract her. Not because she thought he actually cared about her, or because she cared about him. He was fun, that was all.

She broke into a run, flying down the lawn toward the beach. She was fine on her own, just fine.

Chapter Nine

Lenny Liho’o lived at the top of a long-ass trail up through the tropical forest. By the time Jack reached a clearing with the small, red-roofed house Malu had described, he was light-headed, puffing like a steam engine, with sweat rolling off him in rivulets that soaked his T-shirt and shorts. Shit, he’d thought he was in better shape than this. Of course, he had last night’s booze to sweat out.

Hands on his hips, he turned to enjoy the view for a moment and catch his breath. He could see Nawea below, the dock with its thatched shelter poking out on the Kona side of the bay. From up here, the surf was a thin white tracing between the edge of the bright turquoise sea and the black rocks. The palms looked as small as the ones they used to make the little fruit spears at his favorite tiki bar on the beach at Santa Barbara.

He swallowed. He could nearly taste the sweet, tartness of the mai tais, smell the fruity scent laced with rum. Had he really been thinking about quitting? Never drink another mai tai? Another beer? No way in hell.

“Aloha.”

Jack nearly jumped out of his skin at the soft voice behind him. He blew out a calming breath and turned. A short, wiry Hawaiian in a faded tank and shorts stood on the slope above him. His silver hair was pulled back away from his lined, dark face. He had a short goatee and mustache, but it was his eyes, dark and almond-shaped in his wrinkled face, that caught Jack. His gaze seemed to pierce right through Jack’s skin, through his psyche.

“I’m Jack,” he said. “Ah, Malu’s friend.”

“I’m Lenny.
E hele mai,
Jack. Come on up.” The man turned and climbed back up the crooked path through a patch of short banana trees and other shorter plants Jack didn’t know but could tell were part of a garden.

They reached a small patio, thankfully in the shade of a thatched roof and several bushes and trees. His host indicated one of the battered metal chairs beside an ancient wood table. “Come, sit.”

“Mahalo.” Jack pulled off the small canvas pack he’d strung over his shoulders and handed it to Lenny. “Leilani’s malasadas. Don’t worry, they’re in a plastic dish.”

“Ah,” Lenny said with satisfaction, accepting the pack and setting it carefully aside. “Ono.”

He reached for the pitcher sweating on the table and poured some of the amber contents into a glass, handing it to Jack. Jack accepted it, sniffed it and then took an uncertain sip as his host poured more into a mismatched glass. Iced tea, he was pretty sure.

“Mahalo.” He drank thirstily. Whatever, it was cold and wet.

“So, Malu send you up
mauka
, up the mountain to see me.” The Hawaiian sat back in his chair, radiating peace and pleasure in the morning.

Jack pulled his damp shirt away from his chest. “Uh, yeah. He said you…” What had Malu said—that the guy was some kind of mystic or something. What the hell was he doing, telling his troubles to a total stranger? One who lived in a ramshackle house on the side of a mountain, apparently without electricity?

“He says I am
kūpuna
, yeah?”

“Pardon?”

Lenny smiled. “I am Hawaiian priest.”

“Really?” Jack stared at him. Maybe that explained that far-seeing gaze.

“I am also like you,
kanaka ‘ona
. A drunk.”

Heat roared up through Jack, firing his face, his throat and chest. He choked on humiliation and rage. Looking sharply away from Lenny Liho’o, he fought the sense of betrayal that flayed him.

“He…said that?” he choked. Malu had called him a drunk?

“No,” Lenny said calmly. “I say dat. It’s whatchu are, yeah? You can call it alcoholism if you want fancy words, but it’s da same, my friend.”

“Jesus,” Jack muttered. He felt as if he’d blundered into some horrible parody of his own life. He blew out a hard breath, unclenching his fists, and stared down at his feet. “Yeah. I suppose it is the same.” Except that he wasn’t a goddamn alcoholic, for chrissakes. He just needed to slow down.

He drained his glass of tea and set it down on the table. Then he eyed his host warily. “So…you got any words of wisdom?”

Lenny nodded. “Yeah, stay off da sauce, or you no good to anybody. Now, you want anuddah glass of tea? ’Cause I got something to show you.”

He rose expectantly. Jack stood slowly. He wasn’t going to be expected to pray in front of some little lava rock altar or something, was he? He didn’t mind Malu’s blessing, but he wasn’t up for any woo-woo shit.

What he was shown was as far from his imaginings as possible. Lenny led the way up around the house, along a path lined with more shrubbery and up the hill through a thick stand of evergreens. As they broke out once again into the open, he stopped and turned to Jack.

“Dere. Look at that.”

Before him lay an open sweep of mountainside, with a paved road curving along above through the green meadows. The Mamaloa Highway, headed for a series of tiny towns on the way to Volcanoes National Park.

But below the road on this downhill side, the thick grasses were torn and muddied with the tracks of the large yellow Caterpillar tractor that squatted on the slope. Beside it lay a pallet of bundled stakes and flagging material. One long line of stakes had already been driven in, from the road down to a point just above the trees. Small neon orange flags waved jauntily in the breeze.

Jack stared, aghast. “What the hell?”

“TropicSun.” Liho’o spat in the grass at his feet. “You tell da Ho’omalus we got no time to waste, yeah?”

Outrage barreled aside Jack’s own concerns. “This isn’t supposed to be happening,” he told Lenny. “They’re not even through the hearing process.”

“How dey work, from what we hear,” Lenny said. He stood, legs planted on his island
’s soil. “I dunno, I’m just a simple kūpuna. You da big-shot Realtor. Whatchu gonna do to help?”

“I’m gonna do plenty,” Jack swore, straightening his shoulders. “This is bullshit, and they’re not getting away with it.”

He turned back into the trees, ready to go. “Thanks for the tea. Talk to you later.”

“Come back,” Lenny called after him. “Bring your nani wahine next time. She can help.”

Jack frowned over his shoulder. “Who—you mean Lalei? She’s not—”

Lenny gave him a look. “She’s Ho’omalu, yeah? Bring her.”

So Lalei was a Ho’omalu—that didn’t make her qualified to help with this. But Jack wasn’t going to stand around and argue. He had things to do.

He jogged back down the mountainside, his mind racing ahead. He needed to get on his computer, bring up the local office of WorldWide and get in to see whoever the broker was, enlist his help with Hawaiian land use law. When Malu got back, they could compare notes and decide the next step.

As for Lalei, Jack might want to get down and dirty with her the very next chance he got, but he didn’t see how she could possibly help with this deal.

Back at Nawea, he ran past the house, toed off his shoes on the beach, ripped off his sweat-soaked T-shirt and dove into the bay. He swam out to the reef and then across the bay, settling into a slow crawl, letting his body temperature cool and his mind run.

He’d call Malu, let him and his lawyers know the bastards were jumping the gun, already on site. Then maybe he should call the local cops—did they have a sheriff or police here?—before he headed into Kona.

He swam three laps of the small bay until he was tired and then waded out onto the shore to find Lalei toweling off by the shower. She gave him a cool stare, and he nodded with exaggerated politeness as he walked by to stand under the cool spray himself.

When he turned off the spray and swiped the water out of his eyes, she stood there, holding out a beach towel. She held her own wrapped around her shoulders, her head and bare feet peeping out of the brightly hued terry.

“Thanks,” Jack said, surprised. He took the towel and began to swipe the water off his body. He smiled at her because she was so damned pretty in her fluffy shroud, and because she was watching him with an irritated, baffled look in her black, heavily fringed eyes. Ho’omalu eyes.

“How was your visit?” she asked, as if she couldn’t care less. He bit back a smile. Oh man, she was jealous.

“Great, thanks.” Her face darkened, and he gave in to the urge to put a smile back on her face. “Friend of Malu’s up on the mountain. Lenny Lee-ho-somebody.” There, that did it. Her tight mouth softened.

“What are you doing for the rest of the day?” he asked, just to keep her talking for another minute.

She shrugged. “I don’t know. You?”

“Headed into Kona. Malu gave me the keys to his truck.”

“Oh, good. I’ll ride with you.” Without waiting for his answer, she turned and hurried up across the lawn, her towel flaring behind her like a cape.

“I’m leaving in thirty minutes,” he warned, grinning to himself as he caught a glimpse of her ass with her little bottoms riding up between the full cheeks.

“I’ll be ready, don’t worry, haole boy.”

And to his surprise, she was. Lalei emerged from her bedroom in a snug chocolate miniskirt, matching halter top and those sexy little barely there sandals, a big, soft turquoise leather purse over her shoulder, just as he walked out of his own room.

She’d twisted her damp hair up into a knot on the top of her head, her sunglasses perched in front of it. With the flat heels of her sandals, her topknot was just at the level where it would tickle his face if he leaned over and nuzzled the tender nape of her neck.

She checked him over too, and Jack was glad he’d donned his gray shorts and his favorite shirt, a snug turquoise rayon polo with the blue WorldWide logo on the left sleeve. His assistant said it made his eyes really blue, and Tyler’s latest boyfriend had fluttered his lashes at Jack and said it showed off his muscles and made him look like a broker stud-muffin. Tyler had nearly busted a gut laughing at the horror on Jack’s face.

Lalei merely gave him that little smirk of hers, but his body responded to the sultry heat in her eyes as her lashes drooped slightly. He winked at her. “You made it on time, which entitles you to one free ride to Kona Town.”

She snorted. “You’d probably get lost without me.”

“Would not.” He followed her out onto the lanai and around to the garage that Malu had recently had built behind the house when the driveway was brought in. “The truck has a GPS on board.”

She was smiling as she climbed into the truck. So was he, as he closed the door behind her and walked around to get in. It was a beautiful day in paradise, and he had important things to do, with a gorgeous wahine by his side.

“What are you going to do in Kona Town?” she asked as he drove up the steep curve of new asphalt, lined with new plantings of bougainvillea, plumeria and local plants he didn’t know.

“Going to visit the local branch of WorldWide and pump the broker about Hawaiian land use laws. See if I can come up with anything useful for the court case.” Which he probably wouldn’t, but he had to do something.

“Do you mind if I go to the realty with you?”

They stopped at the turn onto Mamaloa Highway. A huge truck roared by, belching diesel, followed by an old station wagon with surfboards protruding from the back window.

He looked at her in surprise. “Might be kind of boring,” he said. “Thought you’d want to go shopping or something.”

“Oh, you mean girl stuff?” Her sugary voice made him wince. Reminded him of her mother. Spotting a break in the traffic, he pulled out onto the highway, revving the truck’s big engine, and kept his eyes on the road.

“Believe it or not, I do have a brain,” she went on. “I’m worried about the proposed development too, and I know a thing or two about Hawaiian laws.”

“Yeah?” He glanced over at her. “The brain I already kind of figured, smartass, but how’d you happen to get interested in law?”

“My father was a lawyer. And I’ve always been interested in how our islands are divided up and why. For example, our house in Honolulu—we have a lifetime lease on the property, supposedly. But now the land has been sold to a corporation that wants to build a big high-rise condo on the property. The neighborhood association is fighting it, but…nobody really thinks they’ll win.”

“And you and your mom probably can’t afford to buy a house outright,” he guessed. “I know property values are priced out of most people’s range here.”

“That’s right. So if they win, we move into a little rental. My mother is not pleased.”

“Huh.” He slowed as a tourist transit van ahead signaled a left turn onto Keala o Keawe Road, headed down toward the City of Refuge. They rolled along in a line of locals and shiny rental cars. “That why she’s pushing you at Choy with both hands?”

He felt her look and turned to see her smiling wryly. “Yup, she sees Benton as my—our ticket to future security.”