I thought for a minute. The only incriminating thing I had was my laptop, with my notes about the murders, and I had that with me. All Dario would find at Hibiscus House was a pile of books, dirty laundry and sports equipment. I dug the key to my room out of my pants pocket, and handed it to him. “Thanks, Dario.” I transferred everything else to the pockets of the new board shorts.
My erection had finally started to go down as Dario came back around the desk again. “I can’t leave here until I close at nine,” he said. “So you probably won’t see me until ten.” As he passed, he slid his hand under the drawstring and tried to cop a quick feel, but I grabbed his wrist.
“Uh-uh-uh,” I said.
Dario smiled and shrugged. “Can’t blame a boy for trying.”
I struggled, as I left The Next Wave for my truck, to bring my focus back to the case, but I just couldn’t. My brain was still buzzing from Dario’s overture. I gave up the case for a moment and tried to figure out how I felt about Dario as I drove to meet Ari. Did I want to have sex with him? Or was my dick just responding to any old stimulus?
It was a complicated situation, all tied up with the past as well as my new sexual emancipation. Had I subconsciously wanted to have sex with Dario all those years ago, but kept pushing it below the surface until he finally made the move? He wasn’t a bad-looking guy, and his figure was trim. I knew now that he had a shapely, smooth ass, and an average-sized, uncircumcised dick. He was a passionate kisser, and his body made mine feel good.
I couldn’t have done it at his office. Even with him pushing his ass up against me, then ripping open the condom wrapper for me. The way the whole situation had played out was like some rape scenario from a porn movie, and I didn’t like that. He’d raped me, all those years ago, because I was powerless to resist, and trying to get me to act out the situation again, in reverse, wasn’t going to make the past go away. And I couldn’t do anything as long as I still had a case to investigate, and as long as there was any indication that The Next Wave, or possibly Dario himself, could be involved.
I wasn’t opposed to a power struggle as part of a sexual situation. A pair of tongues vying for dominance, a little wrestling, one person taking the lead. All of that was good, it was part of the fun. But there was something weirder about our situation, and I would have to think about it for a while to figure it out.
The address Dario had given me was up in the hills above Hale’iwa, and dusk had just begun to fall as I left the Kam for a narrow, climbing road. I had to stop before an iron gate and a big sign which welcomed me to Cane Landing. Through the bars I saw a winding street, lined with tall royal palms, and a series of big houses set back from the road in a swale of landscaping. Almost as soon as I arrived, Ari pulled up behind me. He left his car running behind my truck, got out, and walked up to my window.
“Here’s the opener,” he said, handing me a black remote control. “And here are the keys. It’s the third house on the right, and the code for the alarm is two-five-one-five.”
“I don’t know that I can afford to stay in some place so fancy.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Ari said. “We’ll make an arrangement about the utilities. Most of these places sit empty forty-eight weeks a year. The owners rent them out for a week or two at a time and make enough to cover their costs.”
“Jesus.”
“Nice to have money, isn’t it?” he asked. “Anyway, make yourself at home. You should be pretty safe from the press back there.”
He turned away, but I got out of my truck and called, “Hey, Ari, can I ask you a question?” He turned back to me, framed in his own headlights. “You told me you saw Brad at Sugar’s on Sunday night, before I got there.”
“Yeah. He was pretty steamed.”
“How’d he meet that kid-Tommy Singer?”
The night was quiet but for the low hum of both of our engines, and the chirp of a cricket somewhere behind us. I saw Ari close his eyes, trying to remember. “I was sitting there with Jeremy when Brad came in. He didn’t even stop for a drink first, just came right over to us. He told Jeremy something like, ‘You were right. He really is a sleaze ball.’”
I felt an emptiness in the pit of my stomach. “That would be me.”
“Yup.”
“So Jeremy’s the one who told George and Larry I was at the Drainpipe, and then he told Brad that I’d gone off with them.”
“Jeremy’s a sad guy.” Ari leaned back against his car. “Don’t blame him too much. He gets off on manipulating people because he doesn’t have much of a life of his own.”
I shook my head. He’d manipulated Brad right into his grave. “So what happened after that?”
“Jeremy went up to the bar and got us all a round. When he came back, he told Brad he’d seen a cute guy up at the bar. We all looked around and we saw that boy, Tommy. He was wearing a motorcycle jacket, trying to look tough, but you just had to look in his eyes to see he was scared stiff.”
I knew that feeling well.
Ari shifted around. “We talked for a couple of minutes, and Jeremy encouraged Brad to pick the guy up. Not really Brad’s usual type, as you know, but Jeremy kept insisting it would be good for him. That old get-back-on-the-horse routine after you’ve fallen off.”
“So Brad took his advice?”
“Brad bought the next round. He chatted the boy up while he was at the bar, and after he brought Jeremy and me our drinks, he went back up there. Rik came in a little later, said hello to Brad and the boy, then came back to our table. He was telling us a story about something he saw at the park-some couple having sex in a tree, if I remember correctly-and the next time we looked up, Brad was gone. Jeremy and Rik left a little later, and then shortly after that you showed up.”
He looked at his watch. “I’ve got to go. Take care, Kimo.”
He got into his car, and I pressed the remote to open the gate. I drove in, and the gate closed behind me as Ari made a U-turn and headed back down the road.
I drove into the third driveway. The house was vaguely Mediterranean in style, white stucco with a sloping tile roof. I picked up my laptop and my cum-stained shorts and boxers and walked up to the front door. The big square key opened it, and I immediately punched the four numbers Ari had given me into the keypad right inside. The system beeped softly and showed a green light.
I closed the door behind me and began to explore. I didn’t get more than a few feet, though, before my cell phone rang. I checked the digital display and recognized my oldest brother’s cell number.
“Hey, brah, must be real convenient for you having a source you can exploit right in your own family.”
“Hey, Kimo.”
“You could at least have called me, you know. Let me know I was hitting the news again.”
“Things were crazy around here. It was just before air time when I saw a picture of the two victims and I recognized the guy you were talking to at the park.”
“And let me guess. Now you’re calling because you want to set me up with an exclusive interview with Ralph Kim.”
“I always said you were the smartest of the three of us.”
I walked over to a plush leather sofa and sat down. “No, you always said you were the smartest. What’s in it for me? Why should I spill my guts for Ralphie?”
“Family loyalty?”
I laughed, stretched my legs out to the coffee table, and then made a buzzer sound. “Try again.”
“What do you want?”
“How about a little respect,” I said. “Family loyalty. Think of us before you think of KVOL.”
“You’re sounding like Mom.”
“Jesus, insults upon insults,” I said. “Listen, Lui, you’re my brother, I love you, you’ve been there in the past when I needed you. Just try and be a little more considerate in the future?”
“I will. Can I give Ralph your cell number?”
“No. I don’t want everybody in the world to have it.” I looked outside, through sliding glass doors that led to a lanai edged with hibiscus and bougainvillea. It was already dark. I stalled for time, trying to think of a way to turn this situation to my advantage, to move forward my investigation. I knew that the press would hound me until I gave them something, and if I wanted to be able to investigate without having a reporter trailing me looking for a story, I would have to take control of the situation.