JoAnn Bassett - Islands of Aloha 07 - Moloka'i Lullaby

MOLOKA’I LULLABY

JoAnn Bassett

(Front matter goes here)

Same as the other books in the Islands of Aloha mystery series.

Publication date: April 1, 2015

ISBN 13:   978-158887898

ISBN 10:  1508887896

This one’s for Emily K, a ray of sunshine in an often rainy world.

Thanks for taking such good care of the boys: Tom and Jack.

CHAPTER 1

Just looking at her, you wouldn’t peg her as a liar. No averted gaze, no twitchy smile. And I never once saw her twist the many-carat diamond solitaire around her ring finger as she spoke. But as twenty-something Amanda Ward prattled on in my Maui wedding planning shop that Monday morning in early April, I had a hunch I wouldn’t be doing a “do you take this woman; do you take this man” sunset beach special. Nope, this girl was gonna make me work for it.

I’m usually pretty gung-ho about putting on lavish, or even outlandish, affairs. After all, people who come all the way to Hawaii to get married aren’t likely to scrimp on the niceties. And, since I charge a fifteen-percent commission on everything, the bigger the bash, the fatter my wallet. But this time I was only weeks away from getting married myself, and quite frankly, if there were any outstanding vendors to line up, or gorgeous flowers to nab, I was selfishly coveting them for myself.

Before I get into the sad details of how neither of us laid claim to any of it, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Pali Moon. It’s actually a chosen name. Nothing about my name is familial, or probably even legal, but I figured it’d all get ironed out when my fiancé and I went to the Department of Health to apply for our wedding license.

I own and operate “Let’s Get Maui’d,” a boutique wedding coordination business in Pa’ia, Maui. I like to use the word “boutique” rather than “one-woman” or “small-time” for obvious reasons. I’ve been doing this for almost five years now, and I pride myself on being good at my job, even if I’m not franchise-worthy.

“Your fiancé couldn’t come with you today?” I said.

I like to get the lay of the land with my brides even before we sign a contract. If it’s going to be a “bride’s way or the highway” affair, where all the groom’s required to do is show up at the right place and time, that’s fine with me. I get a lot of those. But if it’s going to be an “I need to run this by my fiancé, because he’s got the final word, but he’s way too important to bother coming to the wedding planning sessions,” then that’s another story.

“No,” she said. “But he’s really excited about the wedding. He promised he’ll come next time.”

Huh. So, the jury was still out on where I should place the phantom groom on the wedding organization chart. I was willing to wait until our next meeting, since the bride might just be interviewing planners and not ready to commit. Not too many guys are willing to sit through more than one sales pitch, and I can hardly blame them.

“So, what kind of ceremony are you looking for?”

Her eyes locked on mine in a blank stare. Then she said, “Duh. A
wedding
ceremony.”

Okay. So, that’s how she wanted to play it. I figured my friend, Farrah, the queen of everything woo-woo, might size her up as a typical über-literal Capricorn, or maybe a bossy Aries. I sized her up as a beautiful, but somewhat dim-witted, diva.

And beautiful she was. Long, dark auburn hair, bright topaz-blue eyes, and a luscious figure that undoubtedly took discipline at both the dinner table and the gym to keep from getting pudgy. She was wearing very high-cut white shorts and a tight yellow tank top with a plunging V-neckline that left me wondering if she ever got cookie crumbs stuck down there. But then, she probably never ate cookies.

“What I’m asking is: are you hoping for a formal wedding ceremony, or a somewhat more casual affair?”

Her eyes narrowed, and for a second I was left wondering if she’d misunderstood my use of the phrase “casual affair.” Thankfully, she didn’t leave me twisting in the wind for long.

“Oh, we want something casual,” she said. “Because we won’t be in a church or anything. We’re getting married at Moloka’i. I hope you can do that.”

“Moloka’i?” I said. “You mean, the
island
of Moloka’i?”

“Yeah. I think it’s an island. Or, maybe it’s part of this island? You know, like Hana?”

“It’s a completely different island. And how do you know about Hana?”

“’Cuz that’s where we stayed when we first got here. Now we’re in Waylay, or something like that.”

“Wailea?”

“Yeah, that’s it. But when we get married, we’re going to be staying at Moloka’i.”

I hadn’t done a wedding on Moloka’i before. To be truthful, I’d only been over there once. Moloka’i isn’t on a lot of people’s radar because it’s kind of a locals-only place, far afield from the tourist hot spots of Waikiki and Ka’anapali. But, along with the island of Lana’i, Moloka’i is part of Maui County, so technically it’s within bounds of my “Let’s Get Maui’d” business zone.

“Certainly we can do your wedding on Moloka’i,” I said. “No worries.”

But I
was
worried. Getting topnotch vendors to agree to take the two hour rock-and-roll ferry ride across the rough waters between Maui and Moloka’i, or to plop down some serious coin for a plane ride over there wasn’t going to be easy. Not only that, an off-Maui wedding would require me to do at least one reconnaissance mission myself before the actual event.

If I wrote up the contract with Amanda, it would be my final job before my planned time off from my business. I’d scheduled three idyllic months, May through July. Plenty of time to have my own wedding, go on a two-week honeymoon, and then consolidate my fiancé’s and my households into one. So, I figured, what the heck? Why not take on this off-island wedding and go out with a bang?

***

That night my fiancé, Hatch Decker, came to my house up in Hali’imaile for dinner. He’d been doing that a lot lately. I think he was trying to make the point that he’d be expecting us to sit down to dinner together every night after we were married. Thankfully, he wasn’t as old-school as it sounds. First, he’s only home two nights out of three since he’s a firefighter and his shifts run twenty-four hours every third day. And second, we’d both agreed—along with everyone else who knows me—that I’m a pretty lousy cook, so for now, my roommate prepares the bulk of the meals. Hatch’s contribution is he pays for groceries. I’m pretty competent with throwing together a green salad or warming a loaf of French bread, but beyond that, if you expect me to cook, you’d better have ready access to an ample supply of Pepto.

“How was your day?” Hatch said as I came through the back door to the kitchen. He’d beaten me home, which was not uncommon.

“It was good. Are you here by yourself?” I asked.

“Yeah, Steve left you a note.” He handed me a message scribbled on the back of a piece of junk mail. It read, “350 for 30. Save some for
moi
.
Merci!
”

Sure enough, my housemate, Steve, had prepared a casserole. It looked like tuna noodle, but you never know with Steve. He was always trolling the Internet for new recipes.

“I signed up my final client today,” I said. “So maybe I should say my day was great.”

While we waited for the oven timer to ring, we each took a glass of wine out to the wide wrap-around porch, commonly called a
lanai
in the islands. Unlike Hatch’s secluded almost-beachside bungalow, my house is in an upcountry working-class neighborhood. Sitting out front before dinner always requires interrupting our conversation to offer “Hey, bruddah’s” and thumb and pinkie
shaka
signs to homecoming neighbors. But I didn’t mind. After I finished doing Amanda Ward’s wedding, I’d have Hatch Decker all to myself for three whole months. And, if everything went as planned, we’d be spending the rest of our lives together striving to be the best couple, and maybe even the best family, we could.

As I sat on the lanai, sipping my wine and admiring my soon-to-be-husband’s tanned, well-muscled arms, it never once dawned on me that the edgy feeling I’d had when I’d first met Amanda Ward wasn’t about her making me sweat blood to earn my fee. That was obvious. What wasn’t so obvious was the complicated relationship I was about to make legal, and the deceit and scheming nature of the parties involved.

In fact, this “one for the road” wedding I’d just agreed to do on Moloka’i was about to turn what I’d imagined would be a blissful stroll through my final weeks of singlehood into a teeth-clenching journey to some very dark places.

CHAPTER 2

When I told Hatch I needed to make a quick trip to Moloka’i that weekend, he immediately offered to go with me. If this was what married life was like—a pal alongside when facing the unknown—then sign me up. It wasn’t as if I was afraid to go over there by myself. After all, I’d faced way scarier things than
stink eye
from “no trespassing” locals. But having Hatch along allowed me to turn a mere scouting trip into an adventure.

Maybe we’d ride the mules down to Kalaupapa, the site of the infamous colony where victims of leprosy (now correctly referred to as “Hansen’s Disease”) were cast off to die in intolerable conditions. Maybe we’d lighten it up a bit and discover a totally deserted beach. How great would it be to strip off our bathing suits and go commando until we’d completely fried our “naughty bits?” Yeah, having Hatch by my side was bound to make my quick jaunt to “The Friendly Island” feel a whole lot more friendly.

I had only three more work days until I left for the weekend, so I needed to get crackin.’ There was more going on in my life than just a couple of upcoming weddings.

On Tuesday morning, I stopped in at La Gadda da Vida, the grocery store next to my shop in Pa’ia. My best friend, Farrah Kingston (née Milton), was stocking shelves when I came in. I should mention she was very
slowly
stocking shelves because the woman was about eleven months’ pregnant. I didn’t know a person’s lower half could stretch that far without bursting, but then again, I’d seen some of the beer bellies on Ka’anapali Beach, so she still had a ways to go.

“How’s it hangin’?” Farrah said.

“That’s what I should be asking you. How are you?”

“We’re good.” Farrah had taken to using the royal “we” ever since she’d seen the ultrasound of her twins. The babies were so entwined it had been impossible to determine gender, but Farrah had a history of not keeping gender straight, so no biggie.

“Any developments?” I gestured toward her midsection. Farrah was due in late May, about three weeks after my wedding date. Multiple births often come early, but she’d promised to pack the twins along—inside or out—and had insisted on still honoring her pledge to do all the preparations for my wedding as her wedding gift.

“Oh, yeah,” she said. “Lots of groovy stuff. I got your invites from the printer and they’re the bomb. You want Ono and me to send them out, or do you want to do it?”

“The bride and groom usually do that,” I said.

“Cool. And I also got—” She winced and gripped her bulging middle as if she’d been zapped with a cattle prod. “Sorry about that. Seems the kids are shooting hoops in there, and one of ‘em just missed.”

“C’mon, let’s sit down for a minute,” I said. I took her by the elbow and steered her toward the two stools behind the front counter.

“We have a tough time sitting down when we’re here all alone,” she said. “We sometimes miss.”

I piloted her behind the counter and jockeyed a stool into place. “Okay, sit straight down.”

“Ahh,” she said, as she expelled a long breath. “That feels good. Can we hang out here all day?”

“I don’t know why you’re still working. Didn’t the doctor say you were supposed to take it easy?”

“We
are
taking it easy. Dude, have you ever seen us take two
hours
to stock the cereal aisle? We’re totally chill here at the store. If we go upstairs, we think of a zillion things that need doing, and then we haul back down the stairs. Those stairs will be the Grim Reaper of us, big-time.”

She had a point. The rickety wooden stairs in the back alley that led from the grocery store up to Farrah and Ono’s illegal attic apartment were challenging even for an ordinary person. For a woman who hadn’t seen her feet for the past two months, they were beyond treacherous.

“I think I should take over the wedding planning,” I said. “You’ve got way too much going on.”

“No way, José,” she said. “You promised.”

“Okay, then how about door number two? I’ll agree to let you finish getting everything set up for the wedding if you and Ono agree to come live up at my place until the babies are born. Steve can cook for us, and Hatch can check your vitals every night to make sure everything’s okay.”

“Steve will cook?”

“Sure. He’d love to.”

“He’s a bad-ass good cook,” she said. “And we’ve got the munchies, like, twenty-four seven.” 

“What do you say?” I stuck out my hand. “Deal?”

“Deal.”

We shook on it and then hugged. I left the store wondering what it was going to cost me to get Steve to agree to sign on as chef for five—no, make that
seven
with the twins—hungry mouths.

***

Steve Rathburn is my housemate, at least for the short term. He’s been with me, through thick and thin, for almost three years now. He’s my muse, my friend, and my guiding star in all aspects of style and fashion. If Steve sniffs at a wedding idea of mine, it means it didn’t pass his “oh, honey, puh-leeze” test. I trust myself to get things done, on time and on-budget. I trust Steve to make sure I keep the style
faux pas
to a minimum.

Steve is my wedding photographer, my back-up bridal hair stylist, and the only one in our household who can cook anything worth eating. Hatch is slowly rising to the occasion by apprenticing with a guy down at the fire station who won “Best in the Firehouse” for his four-alarm chili at last year’s Maui firefighters’ chili cook-off. But Hatch pretty much has the palate of a five-year-old. For him
,
the blue-plate special is always hot dogs, mac ‘n cheese, and white bread. At least he drinks good wine with his chili-cheese fries. But when he’s cooking, if I want anything healthy to eat I’m pretty much on my own.

That night I got home at around five and went in through the back door. Steve was in the kitchen, apron-clad, standing at the stove. The aroma of caramelizing onions greeted me like a welcome-home kiss.

“Boy, that smells good,” I said. “What’re you making?”

“Ratatouille. It’s a new recipe I found online. With Japanese eggplant, Maui sweet onions, and heirloom tomatoes.”

I wondered what Hatch was going to eat.

“Oh, and I’m thinking of making a lovely gruyere and prosciutto soufflé for Hatch,” he said. Steve was like that, both in reading my mind and being solicitous of Hatch’s epicurean proclivities. “I’m gonna tell him it’s scrambled eggs and ham.”

“Good idea.”

I got to work cleaning up the kitchen. As I bagged the garbage and arranged a new bag in the empty wastebasket—Steve was fussy about the new bag being carefully “collared” around the top of the receptacle—I dove into my plea.

“Have you seen Farrah lately?” I said.

“Not for a couple of weeks. I bet she’s ginormous by now.”

“She is. In fact, she’s so big, it’s pretty dicey for her to be going up and down those back alley stairs.”

“Are they planning to move down to the boat?” he said. Ono Kingston, Farrah’s husband, captained a catamaran moored in Lahaina Harbor. The boat had skimpy, but adequate, living quarters below-decks, and Ono had lived aboard prior to marrying Farrah.

“No, Farrah can’t live down there. Remember, she doesn’t drive, and she’s got to get to the store every morning.”

“Why doesn’t Ono bring her up?”

“Because he’s got snorkel trips pretty much every day now. It’s Spring Break for two more weeks,” I said.

“Huh. Well, why don’t you let them stay here? We’ve got room,” he said. “Seems to me you should offer to move upstairs and let the two of them have your room. After all, she’s your best friend. She’ll probably name one of those kids after you; even if they’re both boys.”

I stepped over to hug him, but he put up his hand in a “halt” signal.

“No PDA until you’ve washed those paws,” he said. “I run a certifiably clean kitchen.”

“How can I ever thank you?” I said.

“Well, you can start by getting your fiancé to try my ratatouille,” he said. “I’m tired of having to come up with a kid’s meal menu every night.”

“I’m afraid you’re going to have even more challenges with Farrah,” I said. “She’s gone vegan.”

“Vegan? I thought she was vegetarian.”

“Vegan, vegetarian—what’s the difference?” I said.

“Well, vegetarian means you don’t make animals die on your behalf. With vegan, you don’t even want them to make an effort. You know, no milk, no eggs, no animal products, dead or alive.”

“Do you think cows mind being milked?”

“I doubt it. What else do they have to look forward to every day?” he said. “So, how is Farrah getting enough protein in her diet?”

I started to answer, but he threw up his hands in revulsion before I could get it out.

“OMG, don’t even say it. The four-letter-word of the culinary world?”

“’Fraid so,” I said.

“I won’t have that item in my kitchen. I’m not willing to look at those sad white bricks of gastronomic horror every time I open the refrigerator.”

“So, how about you and I make a deal? If I can get Hatch to eat the ratatouille—”

Steve interrupted. “Not just
eat
it, rave about it.”

“Okay, rave about it,” I said. “If I do that, would you be willing to try your hand at working with tofu?”

“I shudder at the thought, but yes. For our dear procreatingly-challenged friend I would walk over hot coals.”

“And maybe grill some tofu on them while you’re at it?”

“Ha, ha. Don’t push it, sweetie.”

Hatch knocked twice on the front door; then walked in. We were in that twilight period of our engagement where we still felt the need to acknowledge each other’s space, but we’d moved from waiting for each other to answer the door to just announcing our arrival.

“We’re trying something new tonight,” I said, after giving Hatch an especially lingering kiss. “It’s called ‘ratatouille.’”

“Wasn’t that a cartoon movie?” he said. “About a French rat?”

“Yeah, but it was just a play on words. Ratatouille is actually a very yummy casserole.”

“With noodles?”

“No noodles.”

“How about meat? Does it have meatballs or sausage or something?”

“No.”

He twisted his mouth from side to side. “There’s something in play here, isn’t there?”

“Yeah.”

“Is it a bet? Are you betting Steve I won’t eat it, or is he betting you?”

“No bet. It’s bigger than that. I need you to put on your everyday hero face and eat Steve’s casserole. It’s for Farrah. She’s coming to live here and Steve won’t cook tofu for her unless I can get you to ooh and awe over his vegetable casserole.”

“You two are nuts, you know,” he said.

“I know.”

“But you also know I’d do anything for Farrah.”

“I was banking on that,” I said.

“Okay, then,” he said. “Bring on the French rat.”