Henchgirl (Dakota Kekoa Book 1) (38 page)

“I know a lot of things,” he said.

“Alrighty. Well, I think we need to talk to my grandfather,” I said.

“No.”

“Will you stop saying ‘no!’ Really, how are we going to find her if you keep saying no to everything,” I said.

“What is the point of finding her if I’m just going to put her in greater danger by exposing her identity to dracons who will use her existence against me for the rest of her life? I need to protect her not only from the situation she is in right now but also from any future danger.”

“Then don’t expose her identity, we won’t give any more information than you already revealed.” I did not bother trying to convince him that my grandfather wouldn’t use Honua against him; I would only make myself a liar. And if I told Bobby what was going on my grandfather would know the moment after we left him.

“It’s too big of a risk at this point,” he said.

I closed my eyes, knowing that really, he had a point. If we were assuming that she was still alive, which, I really felt she was, if we told my grandfather when we found her, her life would constantly be at risk. “How about…other deaths,” I said. “Are there any other deaths from the past week?”

After a minute he said, “An overdose, on Monday.”

“What does it say?” I asked.

“Ama Iona, age forty-six, single mother of daughter Kamalei Iona, died Monday of an overdose, Nurse Practitioner at Mabi Memorial Hospital, honored member of The Mabiian Heritage Society—”

“Senator Hale is one of the leaders of that,” I said, looking up at him. “This could be something. If Senator Hale is involved, it might not be a coincidence that a woman from his organization killed herself three days after girls across the island disappeared or died. Can you find either Ama or her daughter’s address on the internet?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said, after typing something into his tablet, he scrolled with his finger. “Ama and Kamalei Iona, they lived together. I have it here.” He stood.

“I have another thought,” I said. “If Ama was in the heritage society, her daughter Kamalei had to at least be partially Mabiian; it’s possible Kamalei might have been one of the island girls who was kidnapped. While I drive, you find out everything you can on Kamalei Iona.”

“I thought you can’t drive a stick-shift?”

“We’ll take the sedan,” I said.

“When is the last time you drove?” Wyvern asked, suspiciously.

“My…driver’s license exam,” I said.

“No one has let you drive since then?”

“It…I just haven’t driven, it’s not that no one’s let me drive. You really are in no place to judge,” I said.

He handed me his tablet. “I’ll drive and talk you through the research.”

“Can you go five minutes without being a total jerk?” I asked.

“I think you like me just as I am,” he said, and then he leaned down and kissed me. He kissed me just as if it was nothing, as if he kissed me regularly every day. It still felt like it lit my whole body on fire, a good fire, just from the press of his lips against mine.

I swallowed and it took me too long to come up with a response to have it have any believability. “Well, you’re wrong,” I said.

We took the Vervari, which was flashy and stupid to take, but I could not make myself wipe off that little boy smile he had on his face when I insisted on the practical sedan.

Seriously. I was becoming such a sucker.

As we drove, Wyvern gave me his pass-codes and talked me through the ways to get information from different background checking websites that he had access to.

My grandfather had access to sites that I thought were pretty decent but if I previously had access to Wyvern’s sites for my jobs, I would barely have had to do any in-person reconnaissance
work.

“Well, she’s not a teenager. She works at Mabi Memorial where her mother used to work. As I remember Mabi Memorial is ‘humans only’ and has a water-ward,” I said as I dialed the number listed for Mabi Memorial. I continued to read as I listened to the dial-tone. “She’s twenty eight and has been working at the hospital for the last two years.”

“Mabi Memorial,” a man’s voice said when the call went through.

“Hi, I’m calling back a nurse, Kamalei Iona; can you connect me to her extension?”

“I can connect you with our general nursing department,” he said.

“She said to specifically call her back,” I said, “and that she had an extension,” I made up.

“Our records show that Kamalei Iona no longer works for this hospital.”

“That’s not possible, I just talked to her,” I said, a little heatedly.

“Her resignation was turned in Monday morning,” he said. “I’ll connect you with the general nursing department.”

I hung up.

“Well she wasn’t kidnapped,” I said, “The girls all disappeared on the weekend and Kamalei resigned from her job on Monday. It makes sense, she resigned the day her mother killed herself. Hopefully she’s at home.”

I glanced over the rest of Kamalei Iona’s information, when something caught my eye. “She has a police record,” I said. “But it’s nothing major, she was just arrested for public intoxication inside a club in Vangolas. How do you get arrested for being drunk
inside
a club?” I said to myself. “It looks like she lived on the Mainland, in Vangolas, for seven years, then moved home two weeks after being arrested in this club. Hey isn’t Vangolas where you’re from?” I asked, but what I meant was, isn’t Vangolas one of the cities you own?

“Yes,” Wyvern said.

“Have you ever heard of Club Morte?”

“No, but it sounds like a vampire club,” he said.

It was a vampire club according to its website. “Do you think Kamalei was infected?”

“Check the Draconic Census Bureau,” Wyvern said.

“Can I use your pass-code? I can only access the statewide information with my grandfather’s codes.”

As he gave me his pass-codes, I burned them into my memory. He would likely change them in the future but until he did I was using his access for all my jobs. Unfortunately, after this one all those jobs would be for my half-brother Deagan for the next three months. Deagan amazingly had not called me to be his ‘gofer’ slave yet, but he would. With these pass-codes I could just zoom through everything Deagan gave me.

“She is a vampire,” I said. “Kamalei Iona made a report to the Vangolas Draconic Order of Law Enforcement against Victor O’Neil for a non-consensual turning three years ago in Vangolas three days after she was arrested. She never pressed charges though and asked to have the record be removed.” It actually had been removed I saw; I really loved Wyvern’s access. “But Kamalei never registered as a Vampire in Vangolas or with the Mabi Draconic Bureau when she returned home.”

I looked at him. “Mabi Memorial is surrounded in a water ward. Unless there is some other way that I don’t know about, she must have had to use a dampener, a water charm, to pass the wards at her work. What if she was one of the ones who died?”

“It’s possible,” Wyvern said as we parked in front of a nice but modest house that overlooked the ocean from a small cliff.

The house was surrounded in a water ward.

“Lame,” I said. I had left my dampener at home, as much as I had fought with Wyvern so I could wear it, having it on me made me feel like I was holding a bomb. There was a car in the driveway. The doorstep had several bouquets of flowers and what looked like some trays of food. “According to this, that’s Kamalei’s car.” I said. “So she’s a vampire, but she lives and works in places surrounded with water wards. And Ama, her mother, was part of an organization that thinks all vampires should be killed. I would bet money that Kamalei wore a dampener and hid that she was a vampire from everyone.”

I stared at her house; it had a porch swing on the front deck and three homemade wind chimes tinkling in the breeze. “Yesterday morning, Monday morning, that water witch said that every person who she had made a charm for had died during the weekend except me. And that receptionist from the hospital said that Kamalei’s resignation was turned in Monday. Someone covered up Kamalei’s death.”

“If she really is dead,” Wyvern said. “We should keep moving. I will get a human over here to see if Kamalei is home and if not, to break into the house,” Wyvern said.

“How long will that take? Wait Wyvern, look, there’s no mailbox or mail slot inside the water-ward, that’s something. It probably means that there’s a neighborhood mailbox down the road.”

And I always carried my lock picks on me.

We rolled forward, finding the box at the end of the cul-de-sac. The locks were standard five-tumbler-pin locks.

“It’ll take me forty-five seconds to pick it, park right in front, blocking the view of me as much as you can.”

The disadvantage of the Vervari was that everyone in the neighborhood would notice this unfamiliar car; the advantage was that their first thought probably wouldn’t be, ‘is that billionaire breaking into mailboxes?’

I looked around to see if anyone was out before I climbed out of the car, as scanning the street would be too obvious after. Thankfully it was one in the afternoon on a Tuesday and I did not see anyone out.

Wyvern parked so close I had to squeeze out and be very conscious not to elbow the car while picking the lock. Thankfully these boxes were numbered with the street address and not just one-through-ten.

First I tried my skeleton key but did not force it when it stuck. Using two picks, I did the delicate operation of lifting the pins to their correct position while applying pressure to the lock’s plug. I heard the very quiet click, then turned the pick. And I was in.

“Hello?” A woman called.

I grabbed the three letters that were in the mailbox, closed the mailbox, turned the lock and stowed the picks.

“Excuse me,” the woman called again.

I stepped out from behind the mailbox to find an older New-Anglo Mainlander looking woman walking from her house which was thankfully behind the mailboxes.

“Hi,” I said, waving the mail at her.

“Do you live around here?” She asked hands on her hips as if she knew I did not. Wow. I had just found the neighborhood patrol.

“No, sorry,” I said, “I’m Susan Iona, my cousin, Kamalei, lives down the block.” I made my eyes well up with tears and my lip tremble. “I’m helping her out right now.” I knew I was taking a huge chance that if Kamalei was dead, her death truly was covered up.

The woman, who looked like she might be wearing a nightgown, or possibly a floral tent, crossed the distance between us with a lot of effort. Up close I would say she was probably eighty. Her soul told me she was as human as they come.

Somewhat surprising me she wrapped me in a hug. I was enveloped in loose skin and lavender smelling soap.

“I am so sorry,” the woman said. “I really liked your aunt; she was such a nice island person. I was going to leave something for Kamalei but I noticed while I walked Rocky that Kamalei had not brought in any of the flowers or food.”

“She’s staying with us for a couple of days,” I said, though I knew I had to cut short the lying because I did not want to trip myself up not knowing how well Kamalei knew her nosy neighbor.

“We should probably get back to Kamalei,” Wyvern said from right beside me.

From the way the older lady jumped, she obviously had not noticed him come up either.

“Hello,” she said hoarsely, staring at him with wide eyes. I could not fault her for it. But now we were definitely going to be remembered by face, at least he would. I probably just looked like a ‘nice island person’ to her.

She just smiled, said, “You take care now,” and stood by the mailboxes as we drove away.

I looked through the letters. Mabi electric bill. Car loan bill. And, “Jackpot,” I said, looking at the last letter, “A letter from the Mabi Heritage Society.”

I opened the letter, and said, “This really is the Jackpot, it’s dated Sunday. It must have arrived today. It says: Dear friends, family and congregation,

“Today is a day of great success and should be celebrated. Through our combined efforts we have protected some of the most important and vulnerable members of our society from a fate worse than death.

“There is no great act that can be accomplished without a small amount of regret, however. But, take heart, a deception put on to save the lives of those deceived cannot be wrong and will be forgiven. Soon, the dragon threat will be eliminated and society will not only return to how it had been, it will be better. At this time every member of our society will walk in the light and not need to fear the night.

“Our actions had an unforeseen victory, that of exposing and ridding us of the enemy that had infiltrated our communities and even the Mabi Heritage Society itself. The families that hosted these fiends and imposters shall not be held accountable for being deceived. They are the victims and will be treated as such.

“On a brighter note, we want to thank all those who fundraised the money to make our now-protected society members fed and as comfortable as possible in these trying times…”

I looked up at Wyvern saying, “And then there is a long list of names and notes saying they thank all these people for running can food drives and clothes donations. They also thank several people for donating board games. Senator Hale’s signature at the bottom of the page was done by a copier, figures. But there’s a personal note on the back— not from him. It says:
Ama,
Thank you for all your help. The girls are doing great. Even though your Kamalei has been gone for some time and an impostor has been living in her place, we know that does not make your grief any less painful.
Our hearts are with you, Lani Alana
,” I said, “That’s Mele’s mother.”

This meant Mele’s mother was involved, very involved.

I looked up at Wyvern, and said in a rush, “Mele and her mother don’t—”

“I trust Mele,” Wyvern said.

I exhaled, nodded and turned my attention back to the letter. “I think this means Honua’s alive,” I said. “It sounds like they think they’re protecting her, keeping all the girls in relative comfort.”

“Yes, it does.” Wyvern exhaled slowly.

“That explains how so many disappeared so quickly,” I said, “They had a whole organization behind it. This is why no one reported it too; the parents of the missing girls on the west-side were in on it.”