Razor Rocks Read online

  “Well, never is a long time, especially in Hawaii. I’m calling about a human trafficking operation out of Kahului that we’ve uncovered. I’m hoping you’re still working on steering the family business in healthier directions.”

  “I am always working toward that goal, yes,” Terence agreed cautiously. “Tell me what’s happening over there on Maui.”

  “I’m hoping you know.” Lei described the situation with the pirate attacks and the victims being sold through a Chang warehouse on Maui, as well as the separate runaway recruitment ring. “Our witness has a powerful incentive to tell the truth about this. Can you tell me anything about a trafficking operation on Maui?”

  “Things have changed a lot in how we operate. I am basically in charge of the family operations, and as you’ve heard through the ‘coconut wireless’, I am moving us toward legitimate enterprises. That said, not all of the family went along with my new direction. Some of my cousins continue to operate independently, running women, drugs, meth labs and the like. We at Terence Chang Enterprises Incorporated have nothing to do with them.”

  Lei rolled her eyes. “That’s too easy, Terence. I need more. A name. An address. I don’t want women and kids being kidnapped and shipped like cattle off of my island.”

  “I’m hearing a lot about what you want, and not a lot about what will make it worth my while to betray a family member. Quid pro quo, Lei. What’ve you got that I want?”

  Lei sat back in her creaky old office chair. “I’ll owe you a favor, Terence. You can cash it in anytime, when you need it . . . and even though you’re trying to go legit, there are a lot of Changs still out there that are bombs waiting to blow a hole in your plans. If we take out the cousin who’s doing business over here, it could make room for you to expand a legitimate operation out of Kahului Harbor.”

  “I like the idea of a straight cop owing me a favor,” Terence said. “All right. I’ll play along. My cousin Harold Chang has a warehouse and shipping operation on Maui. It’s supposed to be an import/export business—koa wood furniture.”

  “Perfect,” Lei said. “I owe you, now. Call me when you need to, at this number.” Lei hung up.

  She stood up. Did a few jumping jacks in the narrow confines of her office. Hung her head upside down to get circulation going, then took out her regular phone and called Stevens.

  Her husband’s voice sounded crisp, like he was right in the next room. “Hey, Sweets. Was wondering when you’d find time to call.”

  “Sorry, honey, it’s been nuts. I’ll tell you more in a minute—but how’s my grandpa?”

  “Holding up pretty well. We just got him home and settled, and Sabrina came over.” She could hear Stevens walking. “I’m going in the guest bedroom so I can speak to you privately.”

  “Thanks. Who’s Sabrina?”

  “She’s one of Marcus Kamuela’s nieces. She’s a nursing student and was hunting for a job in the field. Worked out perfect.”

  “Oh, that’s great.” Lei sat back down in the chair and it gave a protesting squeak. “I’m so glad it worked out that you were off and could handle all of that.”

  “And don’t forget, it still wouldn’t work if Ellen and Wayne hadn’t stepped up to handle the kids,” Stevens reminded her. “We owe them. Big-time.”

  “I know we do.”

  “So, I talked to Soga about coming over to Maui. Told him we wanted to be closer to him, but we understood he had a commitment to the lantern making and the Shinnyo Temple. The Temple is happy to have him work long-distance, so he agreed to come. When we got to the house, he wanted to show me all his personal papers: his will, his accounts, etcetera. He’s not hurting for money, and if he sells his house, he will have plenty to purchase a tiny house and put it on our land with more to invest in long-term care if he needs it.”

  “A tiny house! I love it.” With the high cost of living and building in Hawaii, small prefabricated houses mounted on wheeled trailers were becoming a viable alternative for seniors and others seeking to build a low-cost home without a lot of infrastructure and permitting costs. “How long are you going to be over there?”

  “Now that Sabrina’s set up and coming in to be with him daily, I think I could leave tomorrow. I don’t want to push him, but I might be able to get a realtor in to assess the house and get the ball rolling for his transition soon.”

  “That would be awesome. I could come over on weekends and bring Kiet; we could help him pack and clean out.” Lei smiled. “I can’t wait to have Grandfather Soga closer. Thanks so much for stepping up to handle that situation!”

  “That’s what family is for.”

  “I love you.”

  “I know. Now catch me up on the case!”

  Lei filled him in on recent developments and yawned hugely. “I have to get home, pick up the kids and get some rest. Today was endless.”

  “Keep me posted,” Stevens said. “I should get home tomorrow. Stay safe, Sweets.”

  “I’ll try.”

  He snorted. “You always do, and it doesn’t always work.”

  She had no answer for that.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Bunuelos knocked on the doorframe of Lei’s cubicle the next morning, his wiry body vibrating with excitement. “I got a hit on a fingerprint from the cave! Captain says we need to go by the last known address of this perp and grab up anyone that’s there.”

  Soon they were out the door, taking Lei’s Tacoma, and fifteen minutes later, they pulled up at the address.

  “Do you really think anyone who lives here has anything to do with the Pirate King?” Lei asked as they parked, facing a tidy fifties-era plantation house built on the edge of Happy Valley, a small community that struggled with drugs and poverty in the shadow of Wailuku, Maui’s capital.

  “I just follow the evidence, and that evidence is a fingerprint belonging to a guy who has a record for B&E, whose last known address was this house,” Bunuelos said.

  Lei glanced at the house again. Dark green paint, white trim, a cute little porch with pots of orchids, flowered curtains in the windows. “Let me see his record.”

  Gerry handed over his computer tablet. Lei touched the photo of the guy whose fingerprint they’d found, opening it to details. “Name: Keo Avila. Ancestry: Filipino/Hawaiian. Age: twenty-six.” She expanded the photo: a handsome young mixed-race man with dimples. “He looks like a charmer . . . I’m betting this is his parents’ house.” She frowned thoughtfully. “Didn’t our witness Nisake mention someone of that name?”

  “I don’t know, I wasn’t at that interview,” Gerry said.

  Lei dug her spiral notebook out of her pocket, thumbed to the page. “Yes! I videotaped the interview, but I jotted down any names he mentioned. I just haven’t had time to run them down. According to Nisake, someone named Keo is the one who lures runaways into the containers, then Nisake and Steele imprison them. This is a Chang operation, by the way—Felipe Chang is in charge of the actual trafficking operation and was Nisake’s boss, but a Harold Chang owns the warehouse and containers. Behind a corporation front, of course.”

  “No shit.” Bunuelos scowled. “As a father of five, I particularly hate people like this Keo guy.”

  An older woman dressed in an aloha print shirt and capri pants came out onto the porch holding an old-fashioned aluminum watering can. She wore a pair of cordless headphones, and was bopping along to a song as she watered the plants.

  “I think we’re about to ruin her day,” Lei said. “I bet that’s Keo’s mama.”

  “Ah, crap. I bet you’re right.”

  They got out of the vehicle at the same time. Lei hung back, letting Bunuelos approach the woman first as they both held up their cred wallets. “Hello there. Can we have a moment of your time?”

  The woman slid her headphones back so they encircled her neck, and Lei could faintly hear “Stayin’ Alive” by the Bee Gees as she smiled down at them. Dimples showed in her cheeks. “Sure. What can I do for you?”

  “
I’m Detective Bunuelos, and this is Sergeant Texeira of the Maui Police Department. We’re looking for someone named Keo Avila.”

  The woman’s face fell and her smile disappeared. “Just a moment.” She fumbled in her pocket and turned off the music player. “Keo is my son. Why don’t you come up and sit for a moment, and tell me what this is about?”

  Lei and Bunuelos ascended the steps. They took seats on a worn rattan loveseat as the woman sat down across from them in an equally weathered rocker.

  “What’s your name, ma’am?” Lei asked. She wished she knew the woman well enough to call her “auntie” as was done as a title of respect in Hawaii, but this wasn’t a time for such informality.

  “I’m Pohaku Wasabe. Keo is my son from my first marriage.” She seemed to steel herself, straightening up and squaring her shoulders. “What’s he done now?”

  “We don’t know that he’s done anything.” Lei smiled with as much warmth as she could put into it. “We just want to ask him some questions about a case we’re working on, and this address was on his driver’s license.”

  “Oh.” Wasabe visibly relaxed, almost sagging in her chair. “I was so afraid . . .”

  “What were you afraid of, Ms. Wasabe?” Bunuelos smiled too. “I’m a father of five, so I know how these kids can get up to no good, no matter who their parents are.”

  “That’s Keo. He was raised to be a good boy, but he was always getting into trouble.” Wasabe set aside the watering can she was still holding, clearly eager to unburden herself. “I don’t understand what went wrong, but he’s always been . . . not like other kids. He could smile as sweet as the sun coming over Haleakala, but still lie and steal without ever being sorry for it.”

  “I’m sorry you’ve had all that pilikia with your boy. If it helps, we just want to talk with him about a very important case. We think he might have some information that could help a lot of people,” Lei said.

  “Yeah,” Bunuelos said. “I take it he’s not actually living with you. Do you know where we might be able to find him? Just to talk?”

  Lei and Bunuelos got on the road toward Lahaina, and the address Mrs. Wasabe had given them as a “hangout” where her son could be found.

  “I don’t think Keo’s going to be there,” Lei said as they drove past the courthouse onto Highway 30, leading out of Wailuku. She always enjoyed driving down this picturesque avenue, bracketed by lawns surrounding the public buildings of the older part of Wailuku, and nestled beneath spreading monkeypod trees that provided much-needed shade. “I think he’s part of the Pirate King’s crew.”

  “I’m guessing he’s the connection between the pirates and the Chang human trafficking operation. If we can get a lead on his whereabouts, maybe we’ll get a lead on the Pirate King’s latest hideout,” Bunuelos said.

  “That’s a stretch. And are we really calling this perp the Pirate King? It’s not only cheesy, as Torufu said, it romanticizes him. That Manifesto video was a total crock.” Lei’s neck heated up as she remembered the man’s rant on YouTube. “This guy is capitalizing on the suffering of his people and painting himself as a cultural hero—and he’s nothing but a murderer and a rapist wearing a costume.”

  “Tell that to the fan group that’s made him his own Facebook page.” Bunuelos shook his head as he worked his phone. “They call themselves the Pirate Horde.”

  “These guys are literally cutthroats,” Lei said. “I think we need a press conference or something. We need to talk about how this perp brutally murdered Chaz Kaihale, who’s Kanaka Maoli, as well as Peterson, Janssen and the captain from the Golden Fleece.”

  “Maybe some of the ladies would be willing to share what happened to them on-air,” Bunuelos said. “The women saw and experienced way too much. Perhaps Ms. Gutierrez. She was raped and almost died, and she’s part Hawaiian.”

  Lei frowned. “That’s something that bothers me. If he’s doing this for some misguided cultural payback, why would he kill Chaz? And rape Gutierrez, not just the haole women?”

  “Rhetorical question, I hope,” Bunuelos said. “I’ve got no freakin’ idea.”

  Lei glanced ahead and to her left—the graciously planted community entrance to Wailuku Heights, Harold Chang’s neighborhood, was just ahead. “I want to swing by an address before we go to Lahaina.”

  Harold Chang’s house crowned one of the Wailuku knolls like an ancient Chinese temple. Curling, traditional rooflines marked each corner of the sprawling edifice, and a garden of elaborately trimmed hedges and plantings set off statues of Chinese dragons.

  “He’s not bothering to hide his wealth,” Lei said as they pulled up a curving turnaround made of bricks inset with poufs of velvety grass. “This is pretty fancy.”

  “You’ll get no argument from me. That Buddha alone cost more than I make in a year.” Bunuelos pointed to a life-size black marble statue placed beside the flight of stairs leading to double front doors done in scarlet and black lacquer.

  They ascended the wide stone steps, and Lei pulled a silken tassel that protruded beside the doors. Chimes rang musically deep inside the house. A moment later, one side of the door opened, framing a pretty young woman dressed in a traditional black-and-white maid’s uniform, complete with a ruffled cap. “Yes?”

  “We’re here to speak with Mr. Harold Chang,” Lei said. She and Gerry held up their cred wallets. “Maui Police Department.”

  “I’ll be a moment.” The maid shut the door.

  Lei glanced around and spotted the dome of a surveillance camera in the ceiling above them. “Someone’s watching us.”

  “That’s no surprise,” Bunuelos said out of the side of his mouth. “Got to be all kinds of security at a place like this. What are you trying to do with this stop-by, anyway?”

  “Shake the tree and see what falls out,” Lei said.

  Bunuelos rolled his eyes.

  The door opened again. This time a short, portly Asian man dressed in a long, plum-colored smoking jacket over black satin pajama pants stood in the doorway. “Can I help you?”

  Lei and Bunuelos held up their IDs. “We sure hope you can. Are you Mr. Harold Chang?” Lei gave her sweetest smile, complete with dimple. “I love your outfit!”

  “Oh.” Chang shuffled his feet and she spotted fuzzy slippers. “I’m not dressed for guests.”

  “We won’t take but a moment of your time,” Lei gushed. “Please, Mr. Chang. We need your help!”

  “Well, of course, anything I can do for the Maui Police Department,” Chang said, tightening the belt of his robe.

  “We just need to talk with you about a warehouse. I’m sure it’s some mistake, but someone said you were the owner?” Lei rattled off the address of the warehouse where the container had been altered to ship the women overseas.

  Chang’s face drained of color. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.” He grabbed the frame of the door to steady himself. “You’ll have to contact my attorney for any further questions.” He stepped back inside the house and slammed the door so hard the bell pull was jostled, and the door chimes pealed.

  Lei glanced at Bunuelos, and the smile that curved her lips was very different than the one she’d shown Chang. “Bingo.”

  “Well, something’s sure rattled now that you shook that tree,” Bunuelos said. “Hope we didn’t spook him into making a move.”

  “I hope we did,” Lei said grimly. She could feel a spot burning between her shoulder blades as she walked down the steps.

  She could always tell when someone had a gun on her.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  The house that Keo’s mom said he hung out at was an address adjacent to a run-down park on the south end of Front Street, Lahaina’s busy thoroughfare.

  Lei and Bunuelos had picked up some takeout and checked in with Captain Omura and Torufu en route about their progress. Torufu was on his way to try to pick up Felipe Chang for questioning, and a couple of uniforms had been dispatched to surveil the Chang warehouse for any activit
y.

  “Those Minit Stop spam musubi are so ono.” Bunuelos wiped his mouth with a paper napkin as Lei drove along the Pali Highway, sneaking peeks at the ocean.

  “Yeah. That’s the problem.” Lei patted her stomach. “I’m going to have to get in a run after this.”

  “No problem for me.” Bunuelos flexed a wiry arm. “I’m all muscle.”

  “Ha. Your wife must appreciate it, or you wouldn’t have so many kids.”

  “Tell me about it.” Bunuelos shook his head. “I’m trying to talk her out of number six.”

  Lei drove past the dilapidated building, casing the place, and parked a few houses down. “Let’s watch the address for a little while, see who comes and goes.”

  “Roger that.” Bunuelos took out a small pair of binoculars from the glove box and scanned the property.

  Lei donned a plain cotton ball cap, tugging the brim down to shade her eyes. “Anything moving?”

  “No, but I can see the back door opening and shutting. Some kind of gathering is going on in the back yard.”

  Lei took out her computer tablet and launched a search on the address. “The property is owned by the same corporation that owns the Chang warehouse. Harold Chang is behind whatever’s going on in there.”

  “House is a dump,” Bunuelos said. “Roof’s got a baby tree growing out of the gutter, weeds everywhere, peeling paint . . .”

  “Well, they wouldn’t want it to look too nice on the outside. I bet this is an interim spot where they let the kids hang out and get comfortable—groom them. Let’s go see what we see.” Lei checked her weapon, made sure her badge was clipped in plain sight to her belt, and shouldered her small backpack as she got out of the truck, beeping it locked. Bunuelos did a similar ritual.

  “Let’s just split up and go around the house to where the people are in back,” Lei said. “Don’t give them too much time to disappear.”

  “Roger that.”