Game ON (An Ozzie Novak Thriller, Book 2) (Redemption Thriller Series 14) Read online

  I wasn’t sure she believed me, but she gave me a single nod.

  “Okay, let’s just call the police and get their resources on this.”

  “Are you kidding me?” She pushed me in the chest, although she was the one who went backward a step. She probably weighed less than half of my two hundred ten pounds.

  “What? What did I say that was wrong?”

  “You haven’t listened to me,” she said, poking herself in the chest. It was so violent I felt certain she was bruising herself. I tried not to stare at her chest, which in the past might have been an issue. Now, not so much.

  “Denise, I’m here for you…for Mackenzie. Which is why we need to call the cops.” I pulled out my phone. Before my thumb could punch the nine, she slapped the phone out of my hand.

  “What the hell are you doing?” I bent down and picked up my device. Scowling, I looked it over. The screen wasn’t cracked, but there was no telling if any internal damage had been done.

  “You can’t call the cops.” She smacked one hand into the other three times. “They’ll kill her, Oz.” A gasp, as she put a hand to her face and fought back more emotion. “Do you hear me? They will kill my precious little Mackenzie.”

  Her voice seemed to echo—I wasn’t sure if that was my hearing aid or an actual reverberation. Her sobs ceased, and there was a moment of silence. We just stood there and looked at each other. For the first time since she’d walked through the door, her face, while blotchy, gave no indication of what she was thinking. Me? I had no clue which way to take this or how to fix it, how to bring back a girl I didn’t know, a girl who had my blood in her veins.

  At least a minute passed, and as I stared into her eyes, my mind couldn’t help but shoot back to prom night, when I’d borrowed my father’s Cadillac, walked up to the door of her home, and rang the doorbell. Her mom had answered, and, before I could ask if Denise was ready, she swung back, and there her daughter stood. The lighting hit her just perfectly. She looked angelic. My heart had kicked into another gear, and I’d just gawked at her like boys at that age are prone to do. I remember not being able even to speak. She wasn’t just beautiful, though. She had this graceful confidence about her, as if I were about to take the arm of a princess. It had sounded cheesy running through my head even as I was thinking it, but that didn’t negate the butterflies fluttering in my stomach. Was it love? It was difficult to pinpoint, actually. Lust, certainly. But, for one night, we’d connected on a level I’d never experienced before that moment, as if we had this perfectly aligned energy. We ended the night in a hotel room, making love. That must have been when Mackenzie was conceived. The next morning, with birds tweeting and the sun peeking through the trees, I had kissed her goodbye. A week later, we graduated and, like most high school couples, knew it was time to move on, to experience college without trying to juggle a long-distance relationship. I think she was headed out of state, but I really couldn’t recall.

  She sniffled, and I let out a sigh.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.

  “I…” Her eyes momentarily found the floor; then she looked at me, her lips pressed together. “I was just confused. I didn’t know what to think. I found out when I was here, in Hawaii.”

  I tilted my head.

  “I visited my aunt and uncle here on the Big Island. It was all part of a big graduation present. I planned on staying here a month. But that’s when I found out I was pregnant. I struggled with what to do, whether to call you, or whether to even have the baby. I couldn’t make the decision, and then the next thing I know, my aunt is taking me to the doctor, and I’m hearing the heartbeat. I connected with her at that moment.”

  “Wow. Sounds powerful.”

  “You don’t have kids?”

  I followed her gaze to my left hand. I was still wearing my wedding band. I twisted it on my hand, feeling a bit awkward. “No kids for me.”

  Her mouth opened, but no words were spoken.

  Then I replayed what I’d said. “I’m sorry. I just meant that I have no kids with my… Well, I guess she’s still my wife.”

  Something crossed her face, just for a split second. It was the smallest hint of the girl I’d taken to prom. Maybe she thought there was something there for us to rekindle. My stomach felt like it was trying to push its way into the back of my throat. I had so many emotions and thoughts waging an internal battle.

  “You know I can’t just sit here and not do anything to find Mackenzie.”

  “That’s why I reached out to you, Ozzie. You always seemed like you had a good head on your shoulders, like no moment was too big for you.”

  I wasn’t sure whether to thank her or be pissed at her for not telling me about my daughter. Again, the competing emotions. The knot in my stomach only grew larger.

  “But that was when I was just scared. Now, they’ve taken her. I don’t know what to do. But the yakuza has people everywhere, including the police department. That’s a known fact on this island.”

  An idea, one that might not go anywhere, came to mind.

  “I need to make a call.”

  She reached out and touched my arm.

  “It’s okay. I’m not calling the cops.”

  Not on the island, anyway.

  5

  I kept my promise, although Denise wouldn’t stop chattering about the potential risk we were taking through the entire two-hour drive over to the east side of the island, essentially retracing the path I’d taken earlier when I’d flown into Kona. We were on our way to meet a retired police officer from the Hawaii County Police Department.

  A new friend of mine, Detective Brook Pressler with the Austin PD, had taken my call on the first ring. Within minutes, she’d pulled in her pal from San Antonio, Detective Stan Radowski. Stan and I had met earlier when I almost took a case for his friend. Long story. Anyway, Stan had just returned from taking a dream vacation with his wife to the Big Island. Cops, I learned, were like geese. They flocked together, or sniffed each other out, even if they were on vacation or retired. Apparently, Stan and his wife Bev had met a colorful former Hawaii police officer while here, and they’d hit it off.

  Stan made a call and got back to me. His contact would meet with us, but we had to go to him.

  “You’re still not grasping the reach of the yakuza,” Denise said.

  I wiped my face, a bit tired of hearing how unfamiliar I was with crime, even organized crime. I’d studied plenty about it during my law-school days at Georgetown and had even done some side-reading once I’d passed the bar. I had to admit, though, that my knowledge of the Japanese mafia was limited at best. But what made her think she was the preeminent source?

  “You never told me why you think the yakuza took Mackenzie,” I said, glancing at her in the passenger seat.

  Just then, she slammed her foot into the floorboard. “Look out!”

  I whipped my head around to see the back side of an eighteen-wheeler almost on top of us—we were closing in on him at the speed of light. I punched my foot into the brake. The minivan swerved; the brakes squealed like I’d just run over a pig. I checked the speedometer. We were still at seventy, zipping down the east side of a mountain, actually the dormant peak of Mauna Kea.

  Denise shrieked as I gripped the steering wheel with everything I had. The back end of the minivan pulled left and then right. I took my foot off the brake for just a second. We increased speed, but the vehicle righted itself. We were clear of the truck but still moving fast. I tapped the brake again. The car vibrated, slowing only ever so slightly. I could smell burning rubber.

  “Is this how it’s all going to end?” she yelled, her back pressed into the seat.

  I ignored her. My eyes caught a curve at the bottom of the hill. At this rate of speed, we’d plow right through the median. If we didn’t hit another car going in the opposite direction, we’d probably go airborne over the side of the cliff.

  I couldn’t jam on the brakes. They might completely give. I had to be patient
…in the span of about twenty seconds. I gently applied pressure. At the hint of a squeak, I lifted my foot.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to live to make our meeting with the cop,” I said, my voice strained. I went through the same process—braking just a bit, then lifting my foot—four times in the next few seconds. When the speed dipped below fifty and we were close enough to see the angle of the curve, I took a breath. The road flattened out, and I pulled off to the side of the road and stopped the car.

  “Brakes need to cool,” she said, before I put it in park.

  I used my T-shirt, which portrayed a Johnny Cash concert at Folsom Prison decades ago, to wipe sweat from my face.

  “You still have a six-pack?” She snorted.

  I glanced down, realizing I’d been exposing my belly. “Eh.”

  “Do you still swim every day?”

  “Not every day. But it helps me relax.”

  “Cool.” She looked toward the side of the road. Wispy clouds clung to the top of the mountain. Straight ahead, off in the distance, the sun shimmered off the ocean. It seemed too picturesque for words.

  “Let’s find Mackenzie; then, hopefully, you can have one of your relaxing swims in the ocean.”

  I nodded. “That would be cool.” The eighteen-wheeler we’d passed zoomed by us, rocking the minivan. “Hey.” I put my hand on top of hers for a second until she looked at me. “How are you connected to the yakuza? Why would they want to take your child?”

  She searched my eyes and then said, “Because I threatened to go to the chief investigator from the Attorney General’s Office—that’s why.”

  “For what? Did you have something on them?”

  Her jaw jutted out, and then she nodded. “The last ten years…” She looked away again, shaking her head. “The last ten years have been tough, Ozzie. My aunt and uncle both passed away, and I was left to take care of Mackenzie on my own.”

  I wanted to ask why she didn’t come back to the mainland and reach out to me, but she didn’t need me peppering her with more questions.

  “I’ve been through a rough time, Oz.” A deep, long sigh. “I have demons in me that, if they come out, I turn into a different person.”

  It was beginning to sound like I’d been sucked into a predictable horror flick. But I knew this was no joke. This was her life, or what was left of it. “And?”

  “Ever heard of Ice?”

  I shook my head.

  “It’s crystal meth. You smoke it. Hawaii has been a breeding ground for that shit since the ’80s. Well…” She paused again as tears welled in her eyes. “I turned to prostitution to make ends meet. I experimented with Ice and got hooked. Bad.”

  I knew where this was headed, why her guilt was eating her up. Where there was heavy drug trade, organized crime was usually very close by.

  “And Mackenzie?”

  She shut her eyes for a moment, took in a deep breath. “She watched me crumble. I wasn’t there for her. I wasn’t always a good mom. Sometimes, I’d wake up, strung out, not know where I was. Then I’d find my way home, and she’d be there, coloring, or already in bed. She’s an amazing little girl.”

  Tears streamed down her face, but she wasn’t breaking down. Maybe she had a line that she wouldn’t cross, or couldn’t cross, when it came to her addictive past and breaking down about it. It was a different story with her daughter, of course. She had broken down plenty already. “I’ve been sober for almost three years now.”

  “That’s great, Denise. You should feel proud.” It didn’t sound right, those words, since her addiction had brought this yakuza group into her life.

  “So, if you didn’t have a relapse, how did it happen? Was it some type of drug debt they’re trying to collect?”

  She pushed her chin out again. I thought she was about to go off on me. She swallowed, then said in a controlled manner, “The drug world is behind me. Like I said, I’ve been sober for almost three years. I went to junior college, got my associate’s degree. I worked as a waitress most of that time, which paid the bills. Barely. But we got by, and I stayed clean. We were happy. And then I got my dream job.”

  She paused.

  “Where? Doing what?”

  “Accounting.”

  “So you’re a numbers person.”

  “Who would have thought it, right? Certainly not our trig teacher, Dr. Copley.” A brief smile. “I got a job at this real-estate development company, Palm Tree Dreams.”

  Sounded like it could have been a brothel, but I kept my strange thoughts to myself. “How long have you been working there?”

  “About three months, which was long enough to see something weird going on in their books.”

  “Like?”

  “It’s rather complex to describe, but essentially, I believed they were laundering money.”

  I started the car and put it in drive. “And what did you do with this information?”

  “I went to my boss and told him. He acted like he didn’t believe me, so then I showed him.”

  “How so?”

  “There are basically three stages of money laundering: the placement of the dirty money, the layering of said cash, and the integration of the cash. It’s rather involved, but I found a trail.”

  “Did you convince him?”

  “Reluctantly, he agreed. But I didn’t think he’d do anything about it, so I said if he didn’t share this with someone he trusted higher up in the company or someone from the board, then I’d be forced to go to the Attorney General’s Office.”

  Her story sounded like one of those movies set on the East Coast, maybe Boston or Brooklyn. But I wasn’t naïve. The tentacles of organized crime were everywhere. “Was your boss connected to the yakuza?”

  “I didn’t think so. But I got a cryptic email a couple of days later that warned me if I went to the Attorney General’s Office, then they would hurt me or my daughter.”

  “Did you do it? Did you turn them in?”

  She shook her head. “I never made the call.”

  Those words hung in the air the rest of our trip to the Four Seasons resort.

  6

  Sipping on a frozen drink with a wedge of orange stuck to the lip of the glass, Keo Iwalani seemed to be enjoying the moment. He’d just walked off the eighteenth green at the famous Hualalai Golf Course. It was a Jack Nicklaus-designed course, according to the dozen or so placards on our way through the Four Seasons resort over to the clubhouse. The clubhouse, unlike any I’d visited on the mainland, was mostly outdoors. We sat in the shade near an open-air bar as a nice breeze cooled us off. An infinity pool was just below us, the pristine golf course surrounding our setting, and the majestic waters of the Pacific glowing from the setting sun.

  “Thank you for coming all the way over here,” Keo said before slurping in another mouthful. “You sure you don’t want something else to drink?”

  I glanced at Denise. We’d both gone with ice water. “We’re good, thanks,” I said.

  Keo wore reflector sunglasses and a wide-brim hat. He looked like a tourist, a very wealthy one at that. I wondered how a retired officer could afford to not only play this course, but even get through the front gate. For now, I stayed focused on the task of trying to learn how we could get Mackenzie back.

  “How long have you known the Radowskis?” he asked.

  “I worked with Stan just briefly a few months ago. Met his wife at a small concert, but that didn’t end up well.”

  Keo, who couldn’t have been more than five-six, which would be eight inches shorter than my height, sat up straight in his chair. “You were there at the Belmont bombing in Austin?”

  I nodded. Denise turned to look at me, but I stayed focused on Keo.

  He said, “I just read an online story that said they have a suspect in the bombing and that he’ll likely be charged.” He waited a moment, but I didn’t respond. “And it said the motive for the bombing might not be connected with terrorism after all.”

 
; He had no idea of my virtual proximity to the person he was discussing, an egomaniacal prick named Calvin Drake who’d essentially brainwashed my wife into providing the would-be bombers access to the concert venue. But the last thing I wanted to do was rehash that painful chapter of my life.

  I flipped the conversation. “Stan said you still had connections.”

  “After thirty-four years on the force, you’d hope so.” He smiled, took another pull on his drink.

  Neither Denise nor I smiled back.

  He set a hand on his knee and rubbed his face. He looked like he had a thin five-o’clock shadow, although this one was salt and pepper. “I need to know everything about this abduction.”

  Denise started in with her story. Not half a minute later, Keo set the palm of his hand on the table. “You must keep your voice down.” He turned his head slightly as if he were looking for eavesdroppers. I had no idea exactly who or what he was looking at since his eyes were hidden behind his shades. “The people you speak of,” he continued, “they have ears everywhere.”

  Denise gave me a knowing glance, then continued sharing her story. With light background music and the din of bar activity around us, I had to watch her lips to pick up what she said. I wanted to ensure this version matched what she’d told me. Was I having trust issues? And was it because of what she’d shared about her addiction to Ice, which, she admitted, had led to poor decisions with Mackenzie? A lot had changed in ten years, and that included my experiences as an attorney—where abuses, self-inflicted and otherwise, had made twenty-year-old girls and guys look like someone thirty years older and where lies or “variations of the truth” were just a part of a normal day. I just knew I couldn’t take any chances.

  Denise recounted the same information she’d told me. Amazingly, she kept her emotions in check, only once needing to wipe a tear from her cheek. My eyes volleyed between her and Keo, but it was impossible to get a read on a guy whose eyes were invisible.

  He rubbed his stubbly chin after she finished. “Hmm.”