Chapter 10
“We came for the journal,” Victor Chang said. “Hannah Chang’s journal. And it’s got nothing to do with you, Pua.”
“Nonsense. She was my grandmother too,” Pua snapped.
“I have a legitimate claim on it as a family document, and I’m here to get it from Mrs. Yamamoto,” he persisted, still calm—but with a glint in his eye that reminded me he was a cutthroat businessman—and a Chang, after all.
“Your grandmother gave it to Pearl, not you, Mr. Chang,” I said. I needed a way to de-escalate the situation and ensure Pearl’s safety; if Madison had put away her gun, I would too. I ostentatiously slid my weapon back into its holster and clicked the snap shut, maintaining eye contact with Victor.
Pearl had finished her origami; another crane.
She made thousands of them and gave them as good luck gifts at weddings and baby showers.
Apparently she was stockpiling for the Apocalypse this time; the box she stored them in was overflowing.
“You might want to speak to your grandmother yourself about why she gave me the journal,” Pearl said.
“Hannah was fully in her right mind when she came to see me, and she gave me the journal to, and I quote, “right a great wrong” that was done her brother. She made her intentions clear. She chose what happened to that journal—and thus, the archive her brother hid.” She set the origami crane on the side table with deliberate care.
“The journal contains information that belongs to our family,” Victor said. “Information that could damage legitimate business interests.”
“And it contains your grandmother’s account of the choices she made,” Pearl said. “Including a detailed account of what happened to her younger brother, Ikaika Moku, in 1961.” Her gaze moved to Madison. “It makes for disturbing reading.”
“Where is the journal now?” Madison asked—and nope, her lips hardly moved—and neither did the rest of her face.
“It’s safe,” I said. “With copies made and distributed.” Partly true; Lei had the journal in evidence.
It was wishful thinking about the copies.
“Meanwhile, you’ve got bigger fish to fry.
There’s an ongoing investigation that is scrutinizing your business.
” I hoped I wasn’t jumping the gun in warning him, but I didn’t see how he could prevent Lei’s raid.
Both Changs stared at me. Finally Victor spoke. “You’re mistaken; there’s nothing to find.” He shook his head sorrowfully. “What a shame to waste county resources.”
“Victor.” Pua spoke up from the doorway. “I need you to hear me about something.”
Madison rolled her eyes. “Oh, Cousin Pua. Always the second-class citizen with a chip on her shoulder.”
“Nobody’s talking to you, Chinese Barbie,” Pearl snapped. “Take your toys and go back to the day care.”
“Pua,” Victor said. “Let’s keep this civil. After all, we’re family, even if we don’t always see eye to eye.” He smiled the way a shark does—like it’s coming close to take a bite.
“You have a habit of listening to words and not meaning,” Pua said. “I need you to really listen this time.”
Outside the windows: the shushing of the sea, the trade winds in the trees, the faint sound of lawn maintenance going on somewhere in the Heritage Garden.
I’d rather listen to those things than this, but here I was anyway.
I braced internally—and so did Victor, by the sucking-a-lime expression he wore.
“All right, Pua, have your say.” Victor picked up his Panama hat and twirled it in his hands. “I’m listening.”
“The decree tracing ownership of Awawakapu back to the monarchy is real,” Pua said.
“The authentication is already in process. Whatever you’ve been hoping to do—you can’t make it go away.
It’s in the hands of lawyers and law enforcement.
Soon, the Valley is going to be protected.
Your development will fail. You cannot stop it. ”
The silence on Victor’s end had the quality of a man recalculating.
“Maybe. But you don’t understand what’s in those archives still hidden in the caves,” he said. “They have to stay hidden.”
“I understand enough,” Pua said.
“If those documents become part of the public record . . .” he swallowed . . . “our family’s land position is going to—”
“We don’t know anything yet,” she said. “And that archive is still lost. I’m not disagreeing that it’s a good thing for the Changs at the moment that it hasn’t been discovered.
But meanwhile, Victor, you employed men to kidnap, assault, and abandon a respected archaeologist to die of thirst in a deserted warehouse.
You stole artifacts from a protected site.
You vandalized Pearl Yamamoto’s garden.” She kept her voice level.
“Whatever the archive might reveal about our family’s past, your behavior in the last six months is on you.
You made those choices. You.” She spared a glance for Madison.
“With your daughter aiding and abetting.”
Madison snorted and turned away, having none of it. “There’s no proof of any of those accusations, Pua.”
Pearl went on to folding her next crane, imperturbable. “We’re building a solid case,” I said, though I was still pretty worried about several aspects of it. Didn’t matter; none of the Changs paid any attention to me.
“Uncle Raymond said you had become difficult,” Victor said, narrowing his eyes at Pua. “Disloyal.”
“Uncle Raymond can jump off the Ohia Pier for all I care,” Pua said.
I decided to make use of the moment to try to herd these cats toward the law enforcement corral. “Victor. Madison. Come to the Hana Police Department with me,” I said. “Turn yourselves in. It will go a long way toward lowering the charges that will be coming against you.”
Madison snorted. “We’re a locally based development company trying to bring some progress to this backwater. See that beautiful parking lot we created in Ohia? Built at our expense! Everything you’ve brought up is circumstantial.”
Pua’s gaze was fixed on Victor. “A version of this situation is still possible where you cooperate, and your attorneys negotiate something. You get a slap on the wrist the way rich guys do.” Her silver-streaked bob swung, catching the light.
“And there’s another version, where you run and the cops have to chase you.
It’s embarrassing to the family. It adds to the charges against you and makes everything worse.
You’re a smart man, cousin. Choose what serves you better; know when to cut your losses. ”
Victor already had his hat in his hands; he clapped it on his head and pushed away from the sideboard. “I’ve heard your pitch, Pua, and it’s a no for me. Come, Madison. We have business to take care of. So unless you’re making a citizen’s arrest, Ms. Smith, we’re leaving.”
I opened my mouth, wanting to yell at them to stop, that they were under arrest—but Victor Chang was right.
We didn’t have anything concrete tying them to . . . anything.
Madison stood up and smirked. The two brushed past us, walking through the dining room and out the door. A moment later we heard the roar of the big Escalade’s engine as it peeled out.
Pua slumped suddenly into a chair and dropped her face into her hands. “I tried,” she said. “I had to. They’re family.”
“You sure surprised me, showing up like that.” I patted her shoulder. “You made a solid attempt. What about the post office? What’d you do? Throw a closed sign on the door?”
“Yes. I overheard your phone call. I had to try to persuade Victor to turn himself in.”
“Meanwhile.” Pearl set aside her latest golden crane. “For a moment there, I thought Kat and Madison were going to shoot up my place like the O.K. Corral.”
“I’m not sure what Madison had in mind, pulling a gun on you,” I replied, “But it helped that mine was bigger.” I turned to Pua. “You said what needed to be said to someone who needed to hear it, even if he didn’t listen. That counts for something.”
“Yeah. That I’m a traitor to the Chang family.” She shrugged her slim shoulders. “Not that it’s news to any of them.”
“But you’re true to yourself. And to our town,” Pearl said. “And I’ll make sure everyone knows it.”
My phone buzzed on my hip; I tugged it out of my pocket and answered when I saw it was Lei. I put her on speaker. “You’ll never guess who tried to strong-arm Pearl, Lei.”
“You’ll have to catch me up later,” Lei said, her voice tinny with wind in the background. “I’m about to breach that warehouse in Kahului with my team. Want to watch the raid through my button cam to an app on your phone?”
“Heck yeah,” I yelled. “I want to be there!”
“Next best thing thanks to modern technology,” she said. “I’ll text you a link.”
“As long as Pua and Pearl get to watch too,” I said.
“Fine with me,” Lei said. “Let’s go get those petroglyphs!”
The call ended. I hurried to drag a chair over between Pua and Pearl. We gathered close around my phone, Pearl in her wheelchair, Pua and I seated too—and then my phone dinged with the incoming text. The raid on the storage facility was about to begin.
The video link from Lei’s button cam opened on a jolting, fish-eye camera view of a gravel lot baking under the Kahului sun. Pua, Pearl, and I leaned in over my phone, watching like gamblers cheering a horse they bet on coming around a turn.
“Turn it up,” Pearl commanded from her wheelchair. I thumbed the volume to its highest setting.
Lei’s button cam rode somewhere around sternum height, so the world tilted and swung with her stride: cracked asphalt, a chain-link fence sagging under a riot of bougainvillea, and ahead of her, the backs of four officers in tactical gear moving in a tight, practiced formation toward a corrugated metal warehouse the color of an old nickel.
No signage; a roll-up bay door, rusted shut, with a man-sized steel entry point beside it marked with faded lettering and featuring a hasp and a heavy padlock.
“That’s the name of the shell company Sophie traced,” I murmured. “Pacific Heritage Collections.”