Chapter 23 #2
“Oh, Savannah,” I groan, my heart sinking because hearing her actually admit it makes it real in a way it wasn’t before. “You need to tell Detective Hale exactly what you just told me.”
“The hell I am,” she growls, her whole demeanor shifting from gentle garden coordinator to something fierce and cornered. “And if you know what’s good for you and this cheesy resort, you won’t say a word either. I’m taking off for good. Give me until morning, and you won’t ever see my face again.”
She turns to leave, walking quickly toward the parking lot with purpose.
“Savannah, wait—” I start after her, reaching out to grab her arm.
She yanks away from me with surprising strength, and I do the only thing I can think of—I stick my foot out.
Savannah trips, stumbling forward, and lets a string of curse words fly that would make a sailor blush. But instead of going down, she catches herself and whirls on me with eyes filled with fury.
“You stupid girl,” she hisses, and suddenly we’re grappling, sand flying as we struggle.
For someone who spends her days gardening, Savannah fights like she’s had practice, her grip iron-strong as she tries to push past me. I grab onto her muumuu, she grabs my arm, and for a few seconds we’re locked in the world’s most awkward standoff.
She finally breaks free with a violent shove that sends me stumbling backward into the sand, and takes off running—not toward the parking lot this time, but straight for the dessert table at the luau.
“Oh no, you don’t!” I shout, scrambling to my feet and taking off after her in flip-flops that were not designed for high-speed pursuit of murderers, or anything else, really.
Savannah, despite being in her late fifties, moves through the party like someone who’s spent decades outrunning plant diseases and aggressive weeds, and maybe the cops.
She leaps over a cooler, dodges her way around startled guests, and somehow manages to clip the corner of the dessert table on her way through the melee.
Guests scream.
Chickens squawk.
A few cats yowl at the moon.
The entire buffet goes down like a sugary avalanche. Cinnamon rolls the size of dinner plates roll across the sand, haupia pudding splatters like edible confetti, and malasadas bounce with the resilience of deep-fried rubber balls.
The sound of our feast hitting the beach sends every cat and chicken within a five-mile radius into complete chaos.
Spam appears from nowhere and launches himself onto Savannah’s back with the precision of a furry missile, his claws finding purchase in her muumuu while she tries to shake him off without breaking stride.
“Get off me, you ridiculous cat!” Savannah shouts, spinning in circles while Spam rides her like a very small, very determined rodeo cowboy. And something tells me he’s done this before.
Ruby and Lani materialize from opposite sides of the beach, moving with the coordinated precision of women who’ve clearly discussed emergency protocols for situations exactly like this.
“Box her in!” Ruby shouts, positioning herself between Savannah and the parking lot.
“I’m on it!” Lani responds, blocking the path to the beach access road while brandishing her wooden spoon like a weapon. I knew it’d come in handy for something.
Savannah manages to dislodge Spam, who lands in the sand with offended dignity before darting past me. But watching that cute fat cat has given me ideas about unconventional takedown methods, and I launch myself onto Savannah’s back.
“This looked a lot more fun when the cat did it,” I shout.
It does not look fun when I do it. And speaking of backs, mine is about to go out.
I wrap my arms and legs around the woman as she shrieks and spins like a demonic carnival ride.
We go down in a tangle of limbs and flying sand, rolling across the beach like the world’s least graceful wrestling match. Savannah is stronger than she looks, and I’m discovering that my amateur detective skills don’t include any actual combat training.
“EVERYBODY FREEZE!”
A voice cuts through the chaos with the authority of a police officer who’s trained to be heard over gunfire and natural disasters.
Detective Koa Hale stands at the edge of our luau disaster zone, weapon drawn, trying to process whether he’s witnessing a crime scene or the world’s most dangerous beach party.
“She confessed,” I shout from my position half-buried in sand with Savannah’s elbow in my ribs. “She admitted to killing Nolan Nakamura!”
Loco and Shaka appear beside their brother, looking as if they’ve helped wrangle a suspect or two before.
And within three seconds flat, they hoist me off the woman and haul Savannah to her feet while she mutters something about protecting the community that sounds a lot less noble when you’re covered in sand and cinnamon roll debris.
Koa cuffs the woman while reading her rights in a husky voice that carries across the beach. He hands her off to the uniformed officers before marching over to where I’m dusting myself off under a full moon, surrounded by twinkle lights and the scattered remains of our dessert buffet.
And cats. Lots of cats. And chickens pecking at fallen pastries. But still, it’s surprisingly romantic in a completely chaotic way.
“Are you okay?” he asks, pulling me close enough that I can smell his cologne mixed with ocean air and the faint aroma of malasada. “What were you thinking, confronting a killer like that? You could have gotten yourself killed, or worse.”
I scoff, trying to brush sand out of my hair. “What’s worse than getting killed?”
His features sharpen as he takes me in. “You are infuriating,” he growls, before pressing his lips to mine and kissing me hard and senseless under the starlit sky.
WOW.
Just WOW.
The world narrows to just this—his lips on mine, his hands in my hair, the taste of him mixed with salt air and adrenaline and enough chemistry to qualify as a controlled substance.
Soft lips, hard body, have I mentioned that this man is the total package?
It doesn’t hurt that he’s packing heat.
And boy, are these kisses ever packing some serious heat.
We pull apart, and his expression is somewhere between exasperated and apologetic. “I don’t know what came over me,” he says.
I bite back a smile, still feeling the warmth of his lips on mine. “You mean you don’t smooch all your infuriating amateur detectives under starlit skies?”
He shoots me a wry look that’s half-amusement, half-promise. “We’ll talk. I need to get down to the station.”
“Wait,” I say, catching his arm before he can leave. “What about May? Are you going to arrest her for the fake identity? The hit-and-run? All those felonious sins Savannah told us about?”
Koa’s mouth quirks into something that might be amusement. “Turns out, those rumors weren’t true.”
“What? But Savannah said—”
“Savannah spread a lot of convenient stories to keep suspicion off herself. May Leilani is her real name. She’s from Orange County, and she did flee to Hawaii to escape her past, but not because of vehicular manslaughter.”
“Then what?”
“Her ex-boyfriend was a fitness influencer who went viral for a particularly intense burpee challenge. When she broke up with him, he started a social media campaign claiming she was spiritually toxic and blocking his gains. He had two million followers. They started showing up at her yoga studio, her apartment, her grocery store—all filming her for content, asking if she’d ‘healed her toxic energy’ yet. ”
I stare at him. “You’re joking.”
“I wish I were. She moved to Kauai and started over. Completely legal, completely understandable, and honestly? I don’t blame her. That guy’s still posting videos about the one who got away from his optimal lifestyle.”
“So, she’s not a criminal, she’s just a woman who escaped an influencer ex-boyfriend?”
“With two million witnesses to her breakup. Modern romance at its finest.”
“I would have done the same. In fact, I sort of did, but with a lot fewer witnesses.”
“We live in interesting times.” He steps closer again, and that heat is back in his eyes. “I’ll be back. I need to get down to the station.”
He turns toward his truck, but not before I catch the hint of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.
Ruby and Lani cackle and whoop as they dance their way over to me, stepping carefully around scattered pastries and offended poultry.
“Well,” Ruby says, grinning like someone who’s just witnessed the best entertainment of her life, “I’d say this luau was a complete success.”
I look around at our destroyed dessert table, the sand-covered guests, the chickens pecking at fallen cinnamon rolls, and Spam, who’s sitting on a cooler washing his paws with the dignity of a cat who’s just saved the day.
“Next time,” I say, “we’re hiring professional hula girls—and maybe a couple of ninjas.”