Page 35 of Hidden Falls

Right beside a tennis court and a small driving range for golf was the large cement X of a helipad. “Guess we know how he left.”

“But does he have a pilot, or did he fly himself?” Marcella put her hands on her hips as she surveyed the area, empty but for a few grease stains where the chopper had been. “Let’s find out what’s registered in his name.”

Jenkins was already on his phone, calling Dispatch.

Marcella looked off into the distance, toward the ocean. “I bet he went to Lana?i or Moloka?i. They’re the closest islands. Let’s check to see if he has property over there, or a boat.”

17

Two hours later, Marcella, as a senior agent, sat beside the pilot of the FBI chopper in the front, thus relegating Jenkins to the bumpier back seat with less visibility. Per usual, the trip across the ocean channel between Maui and the tiny offshore island of Lana?i was made unpleasant by gusty wind. The chopper bounced and yawed like a stone skipped over the surface of the sea.

Marcella kept her eyes fixed on the horizon line, hoping that the acupressure wristbands she wore would help head off nausea. Evening of a very long day encroached, and suddenly golden rays burst from behind the wedge-shaped island, shadowing the arid landscape with lavender in the foreground.

Behind her, Jenkins groaned in misery. “Not sure I can hang onto my lunch until we get there.”

“Sorry about the rough ride,” the pilot said into their helmet comms. “There’s always a lot of air moving in between the islands.”

“Water, too,” Marcella said. “I’ve been on the ferry between Maui and Lana?i, and that wasn’t much easier.”

She and Jenkins had been in rapid deployment move mode ever since the raid on Paulson’s house. MPD had sent a female detective trained as a rape counselor to interview the teen girls at the hospital, hoping to get more information about Paulson’s MO and operation, while Marcella had used the intervening time updating Waxman and getting authorization for the aircraft that was now whisking them to Paulson’s most likely destination—his second home on Lana?i. Paulson had not filed a flight plan with the local air traffic control tower, however, and might have made a run for it in some other direction. This run to Lana?i was their best guess.

To that end, they had alerted the Coast Guard as well. Agent Aina Thomas, the primary investigator for the Guard, was speeding his way to Lana?i in one of their cutters to impound Paulson’s yacht, supposedly harbored in Manele Bay.

Marcella had last been to Lana?i five years ago, attending a golf fundraiser for her favorite charity. She and Marcus had made a rare getaway weekend of it, exploring the island’s rough dirt roads in a rented jeep, and walking the immense deserted beaches of the small, privately owned island. She was not a regular golfer, but she and Marcus had enjoyed playing an impressive course laid out around the upcountry Lodge at Ko‘ele resort, all the way down to the ocean.

Lana?i’s history as a pineapple producing island had left a good deal of it uninhabited by anything but windswept grasses, blowing red dirt, and scraps of black plastic left over from when pineapple cultivation ceased. The beaches on one side of the island were surrounded by an extensive barrier reef, creating a sheltered bay; rough, heavy surf on the other side was unguarded by reefs. Other than the Cook pines that had been planted on the higher elevations to help wick moisture from passing atmospheric clouds, there was little vegetation on the arid island; its beauty lay in wide-open scenery and rich cobalt ocean vistas.

Marcella pointed to the GPS where Paulson’s address had been plugged in. “There. Behind the town.”

Lana?i City had originally been a village built for pineapple field workers and was designed around a central square. The old houses were small plantation style wooden dwellings with painted, corrugated aluminum roofs, a distinctive style persisting from Hawaii’s agricultural era.

Lana?i Vista Estates had an entirely different design: a planned development on a ridge above the old town. The neighborhood of mansions followed the meandering edge of the upland golf course, and each house was larger than the last. They were designed in distinctly different architectural styles as if chosen from a catalog.

After seeing Paulson’s first home with its pseudo-Balinese architecture style, Marcella thought she was ready for anything she might see: nonetheless, she wanted to bleach her eyeballs when she spotted the poured cement Gothic monstrosity the pill-peddling doctor had built on a knoll above the rest of the development.

“Holy hideous, Batman!” Jenkins exclaimed as the chopper lowered toward the gargoyle-bedecked wannabe castle. “This guy gets a prize for bad taste.”

“In more ways than one. Freakin’ child molester.” Marcella couldn’t wait to take Paulson in, hopefully with a hint or two of brutality to spice things up. She wasn’t usually so violent but discovering those girls in his bed really had her blood boiling. Though the two had denied seeing anyone who matched Malia’s description, Paulson could well have hidden the girl elsewhere or forced her to go with him when he fled.

“Good sign. Paulson’s ride is here,” the pilot said as the FBI chopper settled to the ground a safe distance from the doctor’s Bell Jet, shackled to the tarmac to protect it from wind gusts.

“Even so, I bet he’s not here. If I were Paulson, I’d have flown here, and then made a run for the boat and tried to get somewhere in that to hide. Maybe Moloka?i. If his yacht is a big enough craft, he could make it to Oahu. Lots of places to disappear there. Loads of ways to get off the island and head for wherever extradition is weak.” Marcella took off her helmet and tightened the French twist holding back her hair.

“Not disagreeing,” Jenkins said. “But this is the place to start. Maybe he brought Malia here.”

Marcella shook her head. “I’m thinking—why? Why not abandon her at the other place?”

“I’m still hoping she’s alive, I guess.” Jenkins’s eyes were hidden by his mirrored lenses, but his voice was flat. “It’s not looking good at this point.”

“I won’t give up unless we find a body.” Marcella held the door of the chopper open for Jenkins, and the two hopped out. “Cover his chopper in case he comes out of the house and makes a run for it,” Marcella told the pilot, also an FBI agent.

“Copy that, Special Agent Scott.”

Marcella and Jenkins trotted under the slowly whirling blades and approached the back of the mansion, their weapons drawn. Marcella marveled at the grotesque statues perched on the corners of the steeply pitched copper roof, their mouths open as rainspouts. “He probably spent a fortune on this.”

“Some people have so much money it’s criminal.”

“Or too much criminal money. Shall we follow the same plan we used at the last place? Only I’ll take the front door this time, and you can cover the back?”

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