Shimura Trouble

28

“I’M SORRY THAT you had to hunt me down,” I said when Michael found me, a few minutes later, sitting in the hotel’s lower garden underneath a massive banyan tree.

“I’m trained to hunt,” Michael said, smiling slightly. “Well, at least you had something to occupy you. I know I took a good while longer than nine minutes.”

“But you look wonderful,” I said. Michael was wearing what looked like raw-silk trousers with a green and brown patterned aloha shirt-the first Hawaiian gear in which I’d seen him.

“You were here for the phone reception, I’m guessing?” Michael’s eyes went to the telephone still in my hand.

“Josiah Pierce called me. It was quiet a conversation.”

“Let me guess: he wants to see you to discuss something he’s found out about the land deal? When you were in the hospital, he phoned me, using the state department number. He asked me for your phone number because, as he said, he didn’t want the truth to be inadvertently filtered.”

“He really does trust me, then,” I said.

“Yes. And I’m dying to hear everything, but we’d better get on our way to the restaurant first.”

We drove slowly out of Waikiki, sandwiched in long double lines of luxury cars and tour buses. I would have felt claustrophobic if it weren’t for the canal on our right, where a few golden lights still floated in the darkened water.

“Do you know anything about that?” Michael inclined his head toward the water.

I explained what I’d learned about Hawaii’s Japanese population marking the end of the obon season, offering the lighted boats to lead their ancestors’ spirits home. “I was regretting not having had the chance to send lights for Harue and Ken, but now I realize a candle was lit tonight, because JP found something in his father’s diary.” And this was the perfect time to begin with the sad story of Ken and Harue, with all its twists and disappointments.

“So Harue rehabilitated a guy with problems,” Michael said at the end of everything, when we were pulling into the garage at Restaurant Row. “That sounds familiar, doesn’t it?”

“She turned a stranger with a penchant for drinking and fighting into a family man and labor activist. But they died separated, which is what’s unusual-and so sad.”

Michael shut off the car and looked at me closely. “Now that you and Josiah Pierce are so chummy, do you think he’s off the list of suspect poisoners?”

“I don’t like to think I’d change my opinion based on a conversation,” I said slowly. “However, I like him, and I don’t think my brain would allow that to happen without some kind of intuition. I’d like to see him in a few days to look at the documents he found.”

“Rei, I’ll be gone by then. I still can’t help feeling anxious about him, after your poisoning. It hit me pretty bad, Rei. I’m still dreaming at night that I’ve lost you.”

“Maybe I’ve lost you,” I said. “I saw Hugh this afternoon, and I talked to him. Does your ultimatum still stand?”

“Of course not!” Michael exclaimed. “I regretted the words the instant I hung up. But you know how I am: I run away when I think I’m at risk.”

“Hugh had a driver bring him to the townhouse mid-afternoon. We talked a little bit about the land deal and Braden. He told me that Sendai, his old employer in Japan, collaborated with Mitsuo Kikuchi for some real-estate purchase.”

“Really? Does he know him?” Michael pressed the button to pull up the convertible’s whiny-sounding roof.

“By reputation only. He said Mitsuo Kikuchi was a hard bargainer, which we already know. It’s what Hugh told me about Kikuchi’s son, Jiro, that’s creepy. Hugh says there was a rumor a few years back that Jiro assaulted a woman. That’s why he’s here, tucked away at Pineapple Plantation. Hugh tried to scare me about him, but as you know, I’m already steering a wide berth.”

“You and your sailing metaphors,” Michael said, taking my hand. “I regret never having the chance to get you on Four Guys on the Edge .”

“I don’t regret it,” I said. “I don’t regret anything about this visit, even having to face Hugh. He was kind enough to give me a ride into town, and we had a light bite at his hotel and said a pleasant goodbye. It’s really over, Michael. Nobody kissed or cried or screamed.”

We walked out of the shadow of the garage and on to the street. A mix of emotions passed over Michael’s face, and finally he said, “I’ve been so stupid.”

“I would never say that about someone I love.” The words came quickly, before I could take them back. And now, under the streetlight, I could see that Michael’s face was as flushed as mine.

“Rei.” Michael’s voice cracked slightly, and then he kissed me, a long, sweet kiss that I’d been waiting for, all day long. After we broke apart, I waited for the words I wanted to hear him say, but he remained quiet. Still, I felt like a weight had been lifted, having finally had the courage to express what had been plaguing me for months.

THE RESTAURANT’S ATMOSPHERE only seemed to heighten my feeling of having crossed into a new world. Michael held the door for me as I stepped into the first of a series of airy rooms with blue-green walls.

I’d eaten so little with Hugh that I was hungry again. And, after reading the menu, I decided that if I didn’t eat seafood soon, I might develop a phobia. I ordered carefully, choosing butterfish grilled with miso. Michael shared with me a more delicate fish called moi, which floated in an intense broth made from fresh local tomatoes and the Japanese seaweed, hijiki. For dessert, we shared a pot of jasmine-flavored green tea and sparred over a single bowl of haupia lemongrass crème brûlée.

The drive back to Waikiki was quick, since it was after eleven, and after we parked at the Hale Koa’s garage, it seemed only natural to walk for a while. As we walked along Lewers Street, the trade winds blew fiercely, whipping my silk dress.

“Too bad I can’t drink, because that looks like the perfect place for a fancy cocktail,” I said, inclining my head toward a small hotel that looked like a white jewel box surrounded by all the high rises.

“There’s always coffee, tea or me,” Michael said, and I smiled at him as we walked up a few steps into the Halekulani, admiring its small emerald-green courtyard lawn before finding a bar called the Lewers Lounge. It was a little dark art deco paradise, where we found a banquette in a dark corner. I decided tea wouldn’t cut it, so I ordered an alcohol-free version of the passion fruit and ginger cosmopolitan.

“This is the best night I’ve had since I’ve been here,” I said, marveling at how everything had turned out; that I was having cocktails with Michael, cuddled in a cozy banquette, listening to romantic jazz standards.

“I still feel terrible for what I said to you; for forcing you to chase me down, for this to happen. The more I think about it, you put yourself at risk for me-how were you going to get back to the Leeward Side, anyway?”

“Maybe I would have taken the bus, or paid for a night’s stay at one of the cheaper hotels around the corner. My father would have understood if I stayed out-as long as I called.”

“Would he?” Michael looked at me intently. “Would he understand if you called him at this hour and said you weren’t coming home tonight?”

“But…” I was taken aback. “You share a room with Kurt. How could we?”

“I was thinking about this hotel, not the Hale Koa. I’ll go out to the lobby right now and ask if they have a room, but only if you’re willing to stay the whole night-and tomorrow morning, as well.”

“Are you sure?” I asked carefully, my heart thumping under my dress.

“Of course I’m sure. But your response makes me wonder if I’m rushing you?”

“No. It’s just that this seems like a very expensive hotel. I didn’t lure you in because I expected to stay overnight.”

“But after what you said to me on Restaurant Row, don’t you want to?”

I was glad the darkness hid the color that rose on my cheeks. “The thing I noticed was what you didn’t say to me in return.”

“Rei.” Michael’s voice softened. “If you don’t realize that I love you too, you’re truly in the wrong line of work.”

“What?” I paused, not believing what I’d just heard. The world just seemed to have shifted ten degrees on its axis.

“I’ve loved you forever,” Michael went on, taking my hand again and drawing me close to him on the banquette. “But there are so many reasons why I’ve thought this is the world’s most impossible romance. There’s the matter of professionalism, but even if that wasn’t a factor, I’m just a simple American guy.”

“It’s true that I’ve never dated an American,” I admitted. “But that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t try, and you aren’t simple, you’re complex! Don’t you realize how sexy spying is?”

“I’m not James Bond; it’s clear from my lack of an English accent and my less than glamorous drink.” Michael tapped the Bud Light he’d insisted on drinking from the bottle.

“I was trying not to notice.”

Michael laughed. “I am insane about you, Rei. Will you reform me, the way Harue did for Keijin?”

“No, I won’t reform you. I want you just the way you are.”

Michael gave my hand one last squeeze, stood up, and headed out of the lounge.

I knew what he was about to do. And in the meantime, there was a very difficult phone call that I needed to make.