Mahu Vice Read online

  The Lobster Garden was a festive place on the upper level, decorated with framed Chinese calligraphy and red paper lanterns, and it was usually full of tourist families resting after a day’s trek to Pearl Harbor, Diamond Head, or Hilo Hattie’s aloha shirt factory store. The centerpiece of the restaurant was a huge fish tank filled with live lobsters, their claws banded together. I empathized with them; I felt like this case had my hands tied in the same way.

  The woman behind the podium was in her mid-forties, and the frown on her face contrasted sharply with the smiley-face name tag which read Hi, I’m Mae.

  I showed Mae my badge and asked if she remembered a girl who’d worked at the restaurant a few years before. “Her name is Treasure Chen.”

  If possible, Mae’s frown deepened. “Bad girl. Hard to get good staff today. Pretty girls, they only want flirt with customers. Ugly girls, they work for while, then get better jobs.”

  I resisted suggesting that the Lobster Garden improve their pay, and waited for Mae to continue. “I work here many years. Nine years soon. Year ago, my husband buy, when owner go jail.”

  A sunburned haole family came in, the youngest boy dragged along by his arm like a recalcitrant puppy, and Mae seated them. When she returned, she said, “Treasure work here long time ago. She mixed up with bad man, friend of owner, and he get her job.” She pursed her lips together as if she was smelling something bad. “But this job not good enough for Treasure. She stay maybe six months, then quit. One day. No notice. Just no come back to work.”

  “You have any address information on her?” I asked.

  Mae shrugged. “Maybe in office.” She called a waitress over and asked her to watch the front, and then led us past the big tank full of lobsters waving their antennae and crawling over one another.

  The office was a tiny room, barely enough space for a desk, a file cabinet, and a time clock on the wall with extra rolls of toilet paper stacked under it. Mae looked through a couple of drawers of the cabinet before she pulled out Treasure’s employment application.

  I wrote down the address, noticing that her only previous work experience had been at the lingerie shop that Norma Ching managed. I wondered if Treasure had left the Lobster Garden to return to work for Norma—and in what capacity.

  The address Treasure had put on her application was a cheap rental near downtown, and as we drove over there I called Karen Gold, a woman I knew over at Social Security, and asked her to see what she had on Treasure.

  The apartment manager told us that no one of Treasure’s name or description lived there. He was new, and didn’t remember her or have any forwarding information. “Another dead end,” Ray said, as we drove away.

  “I say we pass by the pharmacy one more time,” I said. “See if Louis Cruz is willing to tell us anything more about Treasure. Norma says he was a customer.”

  “You think he’s kept in touch?”

  “I think if Treasure’s set up shop somewhere new, she might be contacting her old friends to let them know.”

  “Good idea as any,” he said, and turned on the engine.

  Luck was with us: Lorna Cruz was running an errand, leaving Louis alone in the pharmacy. As soon as he finished dealing with his client, a heavyset Hawaiian woman buying diabetes testing strips, I asked if he’d been in touch with Treasure since the fire.

  He looked alarmed. “No, no touch.”

  “Come on, Louis, we know you were a client at the acupuncture clinic,” Ray said. “And not for shots, either. We’re not looking to jam you up, tell your wife or anything. We’re just trying to find Treasure Chen.”

  “I swear, detective,” Cruz said, putting his hand on the ornate gold cross around his neck. “I haven’t spoken to her.”

  I handed him my card. “If you do, will you find out where she is?” I asked. “And then let us know?”

  He nodded, pocketing the card quickly. When we got back to the station, I called the garage to see what was wrong with my truck. When the mechanic told me, and then quoted me the price to repair, my mind went blank.

  “I gotta tell you, detective, I wouldn’t fix this if I was you,” the mechanic said. “You can get a grand, maybe, if you junk it. I’d just buy something else.”

  I thought about the money my parents had promised as the advance on my inheritance. “You may be right.”

  I hung up and called my parents. My father answered and I told him the situation with the truck. “So I was wondering…you said you’d be giving us each some money. When were you thinking of doing that?”

  “I can write you a check today,” my father said. “The law says we can give you each eleven thousand dollars tax free. What kind of car you want to buy?”

  “I’m thinking maybe a Jeep,” I said, surprising myself. I’d always had a thing for the Wrangler, with those flaps you could roll up when the weather was good—which was pretty often in Hawai’i. I could throw a surfboard in the back, or any other kind of athletic gear. I liked the picture of myself, tooling around Honolulu like that.

  “You want me to go with you?”

  I’d never bought a car before. Everything I’d driven had been owned by my father first, then handed down. I was nearly thirty-five, and I ought to be able to handle buying a car—but it would be fun to hang out with my dad.

  “Sure. Can you pick me up after work?”

  He agreed he would, and I turned back to Ray, who asked, “You got any other ideas on how to track your Mr. Hu?”

  I shrugged. “We have a last name, which Norma thinks wasn’t his real name anyway. The only address we have, for the mansion in Black Point, leads us back to Wah Shing.”

  “Hold on. I’ve got an idea.” He turned to his computer and started typing. A moment later, though, he said, “I thought I could see if we have anything in the system on a guy named Hu. Turns out there’s a lot more than I expected.”

  “It’s a common name,” I said. “Without a first name you’re screwed.”

  “Though not by him,” Ray said, and laughed.

  “Ouch,” I said, but I laughed along with him. “I wish we knew more about the boy. I mean, we don’t even know if Jingtao was his real name.”

  “I think the boy was just collateral damage. He happened to be in the back of the salon when they were burning the acupuncture clinic. Just bad luck.”

  “Yeah, but what if he ran away from the clinic, and that made the owners want to burn it? Did he threaten somebody? Did he know something? And how did he get here, anyway?”

  “Good questions. You think up any answers, you let me know.”

  I thought that if Norma or Treasure could tell us when Jingtao arrived in the United States we might be able to track him through INS, and I made a couple of notes. A few minutes later, Lieutenant Sampson called me into his office.

  “Have a seat, Kimo,” he said.

  My mind was racing through my recent cases. Was there a problem with one of them? I remembered my visit to Dr. Riccardi at the STD clinic. Maybe he’d complained? But that was foolish—because I’d simply reveal why I had gone there, and Mike would be the one to suffer.

  “I’ve had a request for your services,” Sampson said. Today’s polo shirt was a light blue, with a penguin crest. “From Vice.”

  I nodded. “I spoke to Lieutenant Kee this morning.”

  “I’m worried that Kee is not telling you the whole story. I don’t like anybody holding out on my detectives—not even another lieutenant.”

  My heart started racing again. Had Kee recognized me from the photo and just not told me?

  “Do you know what it is?”

  He shook his head. “I didn’t want to know. But I told him that if he didn’t give you everything he’s got, then I’ll pull you off the assignment.” He smiled. “He’d like to see you downstairs as soon as you’re free.”

  I stopped at Ray’s desk to tell him I was going back to Vice. “What do you think he’s holding back?” Ray asked.

  I shrugged. “I’ll know soon enoug
h.”

  Down at Vice, Juanita was at her desk. “Back again. You just can’t stay away from us, can you?” She smiled. “The Lieutenant is expecting you. Let me tell him you’re here.”

  When I sat across from Lieutenant Kee, he said, “Your lieutenant is a very persuasive guy.” He pursed his lips in a frown. “What I’m going to tell you is confidential.”

  I was baffled, but I kept my mouth shut.

  “A hustler used your name. We were running a sting in Ala Moana Beach Park, and he offered a blow job to one of my guys. He was jonesing for his next fix, and he was so strung out he didn’t realize that he already had a couple of rocks until we searched him.”

  He sat back in his chair and steepled his fingers. “He bragged that he’d had sex with a lot of important guys. He gave us a couple of names, among them yours. We weren’t sure whether to believe him or not; could have been the ice talking. He bonded out, and one of my guys made an appointment to meet with him the next day to get more details. He didn’t show for the meeting.”

  I could feel the sweat dripping down my back, pooling under my arms. I was right; one of the hookers Mr. Hu had hired had recognized me. But that had been part of the power Mr. Hu held over me—the danger that what he forced me to do not only humiliated and degraded me, but could bring down my career.

  The last time I went to Mr. Hu’s mansion at Black Point, the night that drove Gunter to take me to the emergency room, Mr. Hu had told me after the fact that he’d paid the man who had fucked me so brutally. But did taking part in the act make me as guilty as either of them?

  “I wouldn’t dignify his allegation except that after you left this morning I was trying to remember where I’d heard that name before, the one your blackmail victim mentioned, Mr. Hu. This hustler also mentioned him.”

  “Can you tell me the hustler’s name?”

  Kee turned to his computer and punched in a couple of keys, two-finger typing. After a moment he said, “The guy went by the name Lucas.”

  That was the name Mr. Hu had called the man he’d paid to fuck me. Kee turned back to me. “Recognize the name?”

  I nodded.

  “How did you come in contact with him?”

  I sat there for a moment, collecting my thoughts, considering how much to say. “I met a guy through a gay hookup Web site, and I met Lucas through him.” I took a deep breath. I had to make it clear that I was not a guilty party. “I did have sex with Lucas—but I didn’t pay him for it.”

  He nodded. “I have no evidence to the contrary, detective. If I had, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

  DATING DRAMA

  My father picked me up just after four and we drove out toward the airport. Gray rain clouds clustered over the tops of the Ko’olau Mountains, but down on the Nimitz Highway it was sunny and breezy. “I made a couple of calls for you. We need to ask for Jerry Kaneali’i,” my father said, pulling into a used car dealership.

  “You know him?”

  “Better. The boss and I, we went to UH together. Long time ago.”

  As we were getting out of his truck, my cell phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number but I answered anyway. It was Dr. Phil.

  “I’ve got a late shift tomorrow,” he said. “Want to catch an early dinner?”

  I’d almost forgotten about Dr. Phil—our one date had been so long ago. But I didn’t want to get into all my romantic complications on the phone, and certainly not in front of my father. “Sure. Tomorrow would be great.” He had to be at The Queen’s Medical Center after dinner, so we made plans to meet at a steak house near the Aloha Tower.

  The dealership was playing KINE, Hawaiian 105, in the background, and the two receptionists at the front desk wore fragrant leis of red carnations. Jerry Kaneali’i was a big Hawaiian guy in his late fifties, and he seemed pleased to see us. “The boss said to take good care of you,” he said, shaking my hand vigorously.

  He led us around the lot, showing us the Wranglers he had, and he was just explaining the horsepower on a dark blue one when my phone rang again.

  The display said the call was coming from Haoa’s office. “Hey, brah,” I said.

  “Hey to you, too,” Sergei said. “How’ve you been? I had a great time with you last week—but you still owe me a tour of the bars of Waikiki.”

  “Sure. When did you want to meet up?”

  My dad was listening earnestly to Jerry explain about cylinders and torque. I was trying to understand, but I’d always just taken what I’d been given when it came to vehicles and I’d never paid much attention to what was under the hood.

  Oops, I guess I was gay all along.

  “I’m thinking Friday,” Sergei said. “You and me, having some fun.”

  His voice was so loud that my father looked up. “Sure, that would be great,” I said. “I’ll talk to you Friday, okay?”

  I hung up and said, “This one looks good. I’ll take it.”

  “Kimo!” my father scolded. “We haven’t even gotten a price yet.”

  “Don’t you worry,” Jerry said. “Like I said, the boss told me to take good care of you. Give you the special UH price.”

  Yeah, I wanted to say, tell me another one. But I’d seen the sticker price on the Jeep’s window, and the figure Jerry quoted us when we went inside was a few grand less. I guess there’s something to be said for that old boys’ network after all.

  There were a million pieces of paper to sign. My dad pulled out a check already made out to me in the amount of eleven thousand dollars, and I endorsed it over to the dealership as my deposit. I was in the middle of filling out the loan papers for the rest when my phone rang a third time.

  “Sorry,” I said, seeing it was Mike. “I need to take this.”

  I turned away from the two of them and said hello. Mike said, “Hey there, handsome. We said we’d get together and catch up. You free tonight?”

  His voice boomed around the small room. I had to figure out how to lower the volume on the damn phone. I looked at my watch. “Sure. Say seven o’clock?”

  “I’ll bring dinner. See you.”

  I hung up, feeling red faced. We finished the paperwork and Jerry went off to get the keys. “Busy social life,” my father said.

  “It’s not like that. Mike and I are working on the arson at the shopping center.”

  He raised his eyebrows. “I have three sons, remember? Your brother Haoa, he dated two, sometimes three girls at the same time, until he met Tatiana. Then, no more. Just her.” He looked at me. “Is it like that with you and Mike?”

  My immediate impulse was to protest. “Mike? No, not at all. I hadn’t seen him for a year before the fire.”

  “He’s a nice guy,” my father said.

  Fortunately, Jerry came back with the keys to the almost-new Jeep before I was tempted to reveal anything uncomfortable about my relationship with Mike.

  Jerry had rolled up the flaps so the Jeep was completely open, and I hugged my dad and thanked him again before jumping in. Cruising down the Nimitz Highway was so cool—my first new car, even if it had been gently pre-owned for a year or so before I got it. The sun was just setting, but the air was still warm and the breeze whipped around the inside, bringing the smell of salt water that I always associated with my best days.

  I took my time driving back to Waikiki, enjoying the ride. I kept the radio on Hawaiian 105, not minding the traffic, the fantail palms swaying in the light breeze, the hills glowing with the reflected light. A wild bougainvillea by the side of the road was a bright purple accent in an otherwise green landscape, highlighted by the last rays of the setting sun. I pulled into my parking space just as Mike stopped on the street in front of my building. “New wheels?” he asked.

  “Yup. My dad drove me down to the dealership to pick it out.”

  “Pretty sharp. Give me a hand with the food.”

  He’d brought takeout from Raimundo’s, the Italian restaurant where we’d had our first date—a family-sized platter of chicken parmig
iana, garlic knots, a vat of salad drenched in oil and vinegar. We carried it all upstairs and laid it out on my kitchen table, then dug in.

  I remembered when we’d eaten at the restaurant, and how we’d shared a bottle of red wine. Would we never be able to do that again? Would he have to avoid wine and beer, and would I always be watching to see that he did?

  “So what have you got?” I asked him, spearing some of the lettuce and a couple of croutons.

  “Nothing much. Like I said before, the guy was a pro, whoever he was. No trace evidence, just that piece of potato chip bag you found.” He ate some salad and then broke apart one of the garlic knots. “Unfortunately, a lot of guys use chips that way. So it’s not much of a lead.”

  I told him about the UH student, and he pulled out his battered steno pad and made a couple of notes. “Think the guy could pull someone out of a lineup?”

  I shook my head. “It was dark, and his mind was on getting back to his wife without getting caught. I don’t think he got much of a look at the guy. Couldn’t say more about the car other than it looked like a BMW or a Mercedes.”

  “So we have nothing?”

  “Well, we might have something.” I told him about Norma Ching, and that the prostitution at the acupuncture clinic was connected both to the lingerie store in Chinatown and the massage parlor in Waikele.

  Mike whistled. “That is a lead. I’ll look at those fires again. Maybe there’s something in one of them that would tie us to a particular arsonist.” He started cutting into the chicken. “You ought to talk to Vice, too.”

  “Well, actually…” I hesitated. Mike and I were delicately moving toward starting something up again, and I didn’t want my past mistakes to screw that up.

  I sighed. “This guy came to me yesterday. A guy I had sex with, a few months ago. We didn’t know it, but we were videotaped, and he’s being blackmailed. I went down to talk to Vice about it, and Ray and I did a little investigating. Turns out the house where I went for sex is owned by the company that leased the acupuncture clinic.”