Page 16 of Forgotten Promise

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Kailani locked the door from the inside. She’d worry later about the fact that John had managed to get her to say more than she should have, and between her words and what he’d heard on the call, all but pieced together the secret of the keyholders.

Kailani crouched and released the brakes on the wheels for the ceiling-height rack that half-hid the safe. The dining manager and executive chef who used this office thought they kept spare cash and physical copies of hotel records in the safe.

She carefully maneuvered the heavily laden rack away from the wall enough that she could slip behind it.

The safe had a simple, if large, combination dial, and it took her only seconds to spin the numbers and pull on the handle. As she swung the safe door open, she heard one of the men rattle the handle of the office door as they tried to open it, but she’d thrown the dead-bolt lock, which had been installed specifically for this situation.

A memory of the voice on the phone made her gut churn with anxiety, and she yanked open the wall safe.

Kailani had seen, and used, plenty of safes in her life. She knew what she should see when she opened that door—shelves and boxes, some probably lined in felt or acetate, depending on what was being stored. Instead of the interior of a secure box, she was looking at the bottom of a spiral staircase.

This wasn’t the door to a safe, it was the doorway to the waihona.

Translated to “depository,” the waihona was part of what she and her family maintained and protected as keyholders. Hidden deep within the original hotel, the waihona was a vault, the contents of which even she, as a keyholder, was ignorant of. She was fairly certain her grandmother knew, had placed things into the waihona, but Tutu never talked about it.

Kailani stepped over the lip of the opening, ducking to fit through. When she entered the stairwell, battery-operated lights clicked on, illuminating narrow spiral metal stairs.

Normally she left the door open when she came here, but there was the possibility that Benjamin—wait, Benjamin and John; she needed to mentally categorize John as dangerous too—would come through the office door, so she reached back and pulled the safe door closed, locking herself inside. She touched the matching handle and combination dial on the inside of the safe door, reassuring herself that she’d be able to get out, even as no one else could get in.

The rectangular shaft of the stairwell always made her claustrophobic, and the air was warm and stale. The walls were dark wood, the stairs black. The widely spaced emergency lighting had an odd green tint.

She started up, her shoes ringing against the metal. At the top, there was a tiny landing and another door. Kailani reached under her shirt and pulled out a thin gold chain. An ornate key dangled from it. She’d worn it every day since she became the keyholder. On the occasions when she couldn’t hide it under her clothes, she wore it on a waist chain.

She undid the clasp and fitted the key into the center of an old-fashioned lock. It had been a year since she’d opened this door, but she oiled the complex hidden lock mechanism every few months.

The lock creaked, metal scraping, and then there was the heavy sound of tumblers dropping. The sound kept going, click after click, thunk after thunk. Turning her single key had caused a chain reaction, unlocking the massive mechanical system hidden inside the hollow door.

Finally, she swung it open, revealing a small room. Like the stairwell, it was made of dark wood, and the air here was even more stale. These rooms weren’t airtight, but they also weren’t hooked up to the modern HVAC system. The entire waihona was hidden within the center of the original hotel, the two restaurants, small reception rooms, and wine bar that took up most of this building acting as camouflage to protect this secret.

Literal gold bars were stacked along the side walls, the only visible things in the room.

Kailani glanced at the door directly opposite the one she’d entered. That door was wider, nearly the entire wall. That door, and whatever it contained, was the heart of the waihona.

Instead of a single keyhole, there were three, set in a triangle in the center of the door.

She didn’t know which of the three locks her family’s key fit because she’d never been in the interior room. The contents were supposedly enough to ensure the survival of the Trinity Masters.

What she needed now was the names of the other two keyholders. Once she had their names and locations, she’d go get them, bring them back to Oahu, and then, together, they’d insert their keys into the inner door. While each of the three keys could open the outer door, the inner door’s locks were all slightly different.

And whoever’s key fit in the top lock became the acting Grand Master.

Which also meant that, until she did her duty, the secret society was leaderless.

Kailani turned and pressed on the wall beside the door. A hidden compartment popped open. Inside was a sealed letter. The position of keyholder, and the physical keys, were passed down through families. Each time the keyholder changed, the retiring keyholder notified the Grand Master. In turn, the Grand Master sent that information, via physical note, to the Hale’ekolu. The sealed envelope was then stored in the waihona. A year ago, the last time she’d been in here, Kailani had come to place a new letter in the compartment and remove the old one, which she’d burned without ever opening.

Carefully, Kailani opened the envelope.

Two names. One in L.A., the other in upstate New York.

She memorized the addresses, then put the letter back in the compartment and closed it. Her hands were shaking, her leg muscles trembling, and she exited, locking the door behind her before she descended the stairs and unlocked the vault door from the inside. She put the shelving rack back in place and finally opened the office door.

The first thing she heard was the muffled blare of an alarm. Benjamin was standing by the door, his face a hard mask. John came running around the corner, skidding to a stop.

He looked at her, took a quick breath, then said, “The hotel is on fire.”

Chapter Five

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