Swimsuit

“Think of JonBenet Ramsey. Natalee Holloway. Chandra Levy. I hope Kim is safe and that she's found fast. But whatever happens, you're going to want me with you. Because I'm not going to fan the flames and I'm not going to make anything up. I'm going to tell the story right.”

Chapter 32

Marco watched until Hawkins and the McDanielses passed between the koi ponds and entered the hotel before he put the car in gear, eased out onto Wailea Alanui Drive, and headed south.

As he drove, he felt under the seat, pulled out a nylon duffel bag, and put it beside him. Then he reached behind the rearview mirror where he'd parked the cutting-edge, wireless, high-resolution, micro-video camera. He ejected the media card and dropped it into his shirt pocket.

He had a thought that maybe the camera had slipped during the drive back from the police station and the angle might have been off, but even if he just got the crying, he had his sound track for another scene. Levon talking about bad hands? Priceless.

Sneaky Marco.

Imagine their surprise when they figure it all out. If they ever do.

He felt a rush as he added up the cash potential of his new contract, the thick stack of euros with the possibility of doubling his take, depending on the vote of the Alliance on the project as a whole.

He would thrill them to the roots of their short hairs, that's how good this film would be, and all he had to do was what he did best. How could a job possibly be better than this?

Marco saw his turn coming up, signaled, got into the right lane, then entered the parking lot of the Shops at Wailea. He parked the Caddy in the southernmost section of the lot, far from the mall's surveillance cameras and next to his nondescript rented Taurus.

Hidden behind the Caddy's tinted glass, the killer stripped himself of all things Marco: the chauffeur's cap and wig, fake mustache, livery jacket, cowboy boots. Then he took “Charlie Rollins” out of the bag. The baseball cap, beat-up Adidas, wraparound shades, press pass, and both cameras.

He changed quickly, bagged the Marco artifacts, then made the return trip to the Wailea Princess in the Taurus. He tipped the bellman three bucks, then checked in at the front desk, lucking out, getting a king-size bed, ocean view.

Leaving the desk, heading for the stairway at the far end of the marble acreage of the lobby, Henri as “Charlie Rollins” saw the McDanielses and Ben Hawkins sitting together around a low glass table, coffee cups in front of them.

Rollins felt his heart kick into overdrive as Hawkins turned, looked at him, pausing for a nanosecond – maybe his reptilian brain was making a match? – before his “rational” brain, fooled by the Rollins getup, steered his gaze past him.

The game could have been over in that one look, but Hawkins hadn't recognized him – and he'd been sitting right beside him in the car for hours. This was the real thrill, skating along the razor's edge and getting away with it.

So Charlie Rollins, photographer from the nonexistent Talk Weekly, jacked it up a notch. He raised his Sony – say cheese, mousies – and snapped off three shots of the McDanielses.

Gotcha, Mom and Dad.

His heart was still pounding as Levon scowled and leaned forward, blocking his camera's-eye view of Barbara.

Ecstatic, the killer took the stairs to his room, thinking now about Ben Hawkins, a man who interested him even more than the McDanielses did. Hawkins was a great crime writer, every one of his books as good as The Silence of the Lambs. But Hawkins hadn't quite made it to the big time. Why not?

Rollins slipped the card key into the slot and got the green light. His door opened onto a scene of casual magnificence that he barely noticed. He was busy turning ideas over in his mind, thinking about how to make Ben Hawkins an integral part of his project.

It was just a question of how best to use him.

Chapter 33

Levon put down his coffee cup, the porcelain chattering against the saucer, knowing that Barb and Hawkins and probably the entire gang of Japanese tourists trooping by could see that his hands were shaking. But he couldn't do a thing about it.

That damned bloodsucking paparazzo pointing the camera at him and Barb! Plus he was reeling from the aftershocks of his out-of-control fight with Lieutenant Jackson. He still felt the shove in the balls of his hands, still felt a flush of mortification at the idea that he could be in a jail cell right now, but hell, he'd done it, and that was that.

The bright side: maybe he'd motivated Jackson to bust his ass on Kim's behalf. If not, too bad. They weren't going to be relying entirely on Jackson anymore.

Levon felt someone coming up behind him, and Hawkins was getting out of his chair, saying, “There he is now.”

Levon looked up, saw a thirtyish man coming across the lobby in slacks and a blue sports jacket over a bold Hawaiian-print shirt, his bleached-blond hair parted in the middle. Hawkins was saying, “Levon, Barbara, meet Eddie Keola, the best private detective in Maui.”

“The only private detective in Maui,” Keola said, his smile showing braces on his teeth. God, Levon thought, he's not much older than Kim. This was the detective who found the Reese girl?

Keola shook hands with the McDanielses, sat down in one of the richly upholstered rattan-backed chairs, and said, “Good to meet you. And forgive me for jumping right in, but I've already got some feelers out.”

“Already?” Barb asked.

“As soon as Ben called me, I reached out. I was born about fifteen minutes from here and I was on the force for a few years when I got out of school, University of Hawaii. I've got a good working relationship with the police,” he said. He wasn't show-offy in Levon's opinion, was just stating his credentials.

“They've got a suspect,” Keola added.

“We know him,” Levon said, and he told Keola about Doug Cahill being Kim's ex-boyfriend, then went over the phone call back home in Michigan that had cracked open his universe like it was a raw egg.

Barb asked Keola to tell them about Carol Reese, the twenty-year-old track star from Ohio State who'd gone missing a couple of years before.

“I found her in San Francisco,” Keola said. “She had a bad-news, violent boyfriend and so she kidnapped herself, changed her name and everything. She was powerfully mad at me for finding her,” he said, nodding his head as he remembered.

Levon said, “Tell me how this would work.”

Keola said he'd want to talk to the Sporting Life photographer, see if he might have filmed some bystanders at the shoot, and that he'd talk to hotel security, see the security tapes from the Typhoon Bar the night Kim disappeared.

“Let's hope Kim shows up on her own,” Keola went on, “but if not, this is going to be basic, shoe-leather detective work. You'll be my only client. I'll pull in additional help as needed, and we'll work around the clock. It's over when you say it's over and not before. That's the right way to go.”

Levon discussed rates with Keola, but it really didn't matter. He thought about the hours posted on the door at the police station in Kihei. Monday through Friday, eight to five. Saturday, ten to four. Kim, in a dungeon or a ditch, helpless.

Levon said, “You're hired. You've got the job.”