Chapter 3 #2
It should also be noted that approximately forty beauty queens are all watching Koa in turn. Not that I can blame them. The man has a body that could stop a bullet, and don’t get me started on those lips or we’ll be here all night.
Halea nods my way. “Pickles has spent thirty years coaching in the pageant circuit,” she’s quick to inform me. “She’s quite the legend among us beauty queens.”
“Thirty-two,” Pickles corrects cheerfully.
“I keep threatening to retire and then someone too interesting to ignore shows up and I can’t help myself.
” She glances at her friend as if Vera’s a hurricane she has learned to live with.
“Speaking of interesting people.” She raises a hand and waves toward the crowd. “Charlotte, honey! Come say hello.”
A woman detaches from the outer edge of the party like a yacht leaving a marina, no visible effort, no wake, all money.
She’s young and gorgeous and a documented health hazard to men over sixty, and I say that because three of them have already stopped breathing in her general direction.
She’s tall, with ash-blonde hair that touches down at her shoulders and seems oddly impervious to the sea breeze.
The pearls nestled against her throat come in three different sizes, and her ice-blue eyes are conducting an inventory of every person in a fifteen-foot radius without appearing to focus on any of them directly. It’s a talent. I’d ask for lessons, but I have a feeling the tuition is steep.
She moves across the sand in heels that make Vera’s look like flats, and she walks like every surface she’s ever crossed has considered it a privilege. A man in a linen blazer watches her cross the beach, and his drink is forgotten, and his wife is definitely not at this party.
“Jinx Julep,” Pickles says. “Meet Charlotte Ashby-Wells. Jinx is the head honcho around here.”
Charlotte offers her hand. Her grip is brief and precise.
“What a beautiful property,” she says, and lets her gaze travel slowly across the resort in a way that takes in the banner, the chickens, and Spam’s ongoing shrimp situation without her expression changing even slightly. “It’s all so charmingly rustic.”
“Thank you,” I say. “We love it.”
In pageant dialect, I’m fairly certain rustic is doing a lot of quiet work in that sentence, but, like I said, the deposit has cleared, and I am nothing if not consistent about my priorities, and keeping myself employed.
“Speaking of people you’ve gotta meet—” Pickles cups her hands around her mouth. “Kali! Come say hello!”
A brunette breaks away from a cluster of contestants near the tiki bar.
She’s gorgeous and appears to have achieved it entirely without assistance, which feels important to note given the current crowd.
She’s sun-bronzed and athletic with a long dark braid, and oddly, she’s wearing gloves at a beach party, paired with a sarong dress in tropical pink and orange.
I can’t help but notice the dark circles under her eyes that a very committed concealer is working overtime to hide.
She smells like mango and sunscreen, which at the Miss Mango pageant is either genius marketing or a coincidence.
I’m genuinely unsure which, and I’ve decided to respect it either way.
“This is Kali Akoni,” Pickles says with a touch of pride. “Kali is our local hometown girl this year. Kali, meet Jinx. She runs the resort.”
“It’s so beautiful here,” Kali says, and unlike Charlotte’s version of those same words, this sounds like she actually means it. “My grandmother used to bring us to this beach when I was little. I have so many great memories.”
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” I say, and I like her immediately.
Which is a problem, because at my resort, everyone I meet is either a future friend or a future suspect, and the ratio has not been kind.
I leave out the part where someone has to play the part of the body.
The Grim Reaper never lets me choose who goes next.
But he sure loves to have me be the first to admire his selection.
Halea beams and squeezes Kali’s arm. “This local girl is going to be in the top five, I can feel it.”
“How lovely,” Charlotte says, with a smile that leans heavily into scowl territory.
Her eyes move over Kali quick and thorough, and I can tell she already has very strong opinions about her.
“Vera, you must adore having an authentic island girl in the lineup.” Charlotte bares her teeth as if she just issued a threat. “You do love a redemption arc.”
Did she say redemption?
Vera turns and looks at Charlotte as if she’s been tolerating her for years and is actively reconsidering. “I love a winner, Charlotte. I always have.” She wields the trophy in her hand until it catches the tiki-torch light. “You used to be one. Wasn’t that fun?”
Halea and I gasp. Pickles and Kali remain entirely unfazed, which tells me this is not the first round of this particular match. It might not even be the fiftieth.
Charlotte’s smile doesn’t move a single millimeter. Kali watches the display as if she’s watching two sharks circle each other and she knows to stay very still. Same, honestly.
Vera turns to her left. “Kali.” She says the woman’s name as if she’s had complicated feelings about her for a while and hasn’t quite finished processing them. “I wasn’t sure we’d see you this week. You’re resilient. I’ll give you that.”
“Mahalo,” Kali says, with a tight smile that is actually saying more than her words ever could.
A part of me wonders if there are other definitions for the word mahalo, something like up yours, or get a life, or you’d better watch your back, I’ve got a knife I’d like to stick in it.
What can I say? I’ve seen my fair share of homicides around here. It does things to a person’s imagination.
Vera’s eyes drop to the gloves and come back up slow. “Smart choice. The judges notice everything at this level. And I do mean everything.” She turns the trophy once in her grip, easy and deliberate. “This isn’t the North Shore farmers market, sweetheart. Every last detail matters.”
“I know exactly what this is,” Kali says like a threat.
“I’m sure you think you do.” Vera narrows her eyes on the tropical beauty and tightens her grip on that trophy as if she were contemplating using it as a weapon.
Again, with that whole I’ve-seen-one-too-many-homicides thing.
“You have something real, Kali. I genuinely believe that. I just hope the rest of you can keep up with your ambition.” She pauses, and it’s as warm as a paper cut. “It’s going to be a long week.”
“I’ve had longer,” Kali says.
Vera glares openly. “This will be your longest yet.”
Something tells me she’s going to make sure of it herself.
Halea and I exchange a glance.
Charlotte snaps up a drink from a roving waiter, something pink and frozen. “Vera, you’re such a devoted mentor,” she laughs, a little too loud as she says it. “It’s genuinely one of your most redeemable qualities.”
Redeemable? Someone’s not afraid of getting on Vera’s dark side. And it’s not me.
Vera pivots to Charlotte as if she’s been waiting for exactly that opening.
“And you’ve always been so devoted to men, Charlotte.
” Her smile doesn’t waver. “How is Forsythe settling in? He looks well.” She lifts her drink toward the man in the linen blazer who’s been watching the exchange from a distance, and he grows still.
Charlotte’s drink stops halfway to her mouth. Just for a beat. Then it completes the journey, and she takes a sip, and when she lowers the glass her smile is back and fully operational, albeit manufactured. “He’s wonderful, thank you for asking.” She nods my way. “He’s my manager.”
“I’m sure he is,” Vera says warmly. “You always did have excellent taste. In some things, at least.”
Pickles belts out a hearty laugh. “You girls have already got the claws out and the sun hasn’t even officially set on the very first day.
Speaking of which,” she smacks Vera in the arm so hard she nearly sends that trophy sailing, “why don’t you say a few words and welcome everyone to this mango-shaped nightmare.
” She winks my way. “It’s all in fun. We’ve been doing this for so long, we need to shake things up every now and again with a zinger or two. ”
“I’m partial to zingers myself,” I say. “It’s basically how I’ve managed to get through the last year alone.”
Halea nods. “Sarcasm is more or less her love language. And murder,” she mutters that last part, but I shoot her the side-eye regardless.
Vera wastes no time stepping onto the platform near the tiki bar, belts out an obnoxiously loud whistle, and raises the trophy above her head. The Hawaiian country music fades. Even the chickens, for approximately four seconds, pause.