Page 95 of Pallas & Kawehi

"No buts. You're signing it. We can drag this out and go to the house or you can just sign it here and go back to your date."

He looked over her shoulder at the dark expanse of water at the end of the runway. Going through the courts at all could take forever. Standing there with the bay stretching behind her, he realized that there were easier ways of dealing with this issue.

SIXTEEN

KAWEHI

She saw him look over her shoulder and saw the smile on his lips.

She knew that Kaneohe Bay was behind her.

It was a not so inside joke in her family that she was useless at the beach not because of her aversion to glaring sunlight, but because she could barely swim. It had taken her three times to pass the swim test in high school so she could graduate. A fact that Nick knew.

Given his dark look, she worried that he might be remembering that fact at that exact moment.

She wasn't sure what she'd be able to do to defend herself if he decided to get violent with her.

And that thought brought up another one.

If she was dead, he wouldn't have to worry about her signing anything.

He'd be free to do anything he wanted and not have to worry about her.

"Look," she swallowed and tried to make her voice as calm as possible, "I don't want to argue. If you want to talk. Let's talk. I can't read anything in the dark. We can talk here and then go back to my house and look at the documents you brought."

"You mean our house." He pulled her in close and smiled. The moonlight made his expression look sinister. "Remember, Hawaii is a community property state. What's yours is mine, too."

She tried to smile to ease the mood. "Right. Our house."

She knew she couldn't avoid this conversation, but she had to figure out a way to get some help because the more Nick talked, the more she thought she might be in some real trouble.

"Can we just sit down somewhere and talk?"

He shrugged. "Fine by me."

"Can you..." she looked down at their hands, "can you let my hand go for a while."

His jaw tightened and she recognized the tension building up again.

"If we're going to sign something, I'm going to need some blood flowing in that hand to be able to write."

She watched his expression change as he thought through her words. Kawehi knew that if she got her hand free, she might be able to make a call on her phone if she was lucky and had a signal. It wouldn't be a call that she could talk on, but someone might be able to hear her.

She'd just have to use the speed dial and hope.

He lifted their hands between them and turned so pain shot through her wrist before kissing the back of her hand. "Don't fuck with me, Kawehi. I'm not in the mood for any bullshit."

Well good, she thought, neither am I.

She nodded and he let go of her hand.

MAILE

She pushed through the crowd and tried to shout out her apologies as she moved, but she couldn't exactly care whose toes she was stepping on. She'd dropped her purchases when she saw Kawehi walking down the hallway and she'd seen a man in uniform with her, but instead of looking like Dom or any of his friends, she knew that tight-legged stride anywhere.

Nick.

Nick was back and he was taking Kawehi out of the hangar to God knows where.

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