The Spy Who Left Me (9 page)

She still had six full days in Hawaii. She was going call her lawyer and ask him to send the papers. She fell back onto her pillow. She couldn’t have the papers sent here to Big Auau. Plus she wanted everything unquestionably legal and done by the book. Her lawyer had contacts everywhere. Surely he had a lawyer pal in Lahaina he could send them to who’d make sure everything was in order. She’d simply have to find a way to pick them up.

First, though, she had to find a phone she could use without being detected. Ty still had hers.

She glanced at the door. Carrie had an unlimited-minutes plan. If she borrowed her phone to make a quick call, Carrie wouldn’t mind.

*   *   *

A quick shower, an unauthorized entry into Carrie’s room, and a hundred-and-fifty-dollar billable call to her lawyer later, Treflee came down to breakfast feeling slightly peevish about inadvertently obeying half of Ty’s absurd command. She
was
wearing ridiculously Daisy Duke–short pink and black floral board shorts. She wouldn’t have been wearing the shorts if she’d had anything less revealing and waterworthy on her. Or time to run to the local surf shop.

At least she wasn’t wearing that black bikini top he liked. And yes, it was in her suitcase. Instead, she wore a skintight, short-sleeved, pink rash guard she’d bought for Hawaii back when she thought she’d need the sun protection. And that maybe attracting an appreciative male look or two might perk up her spirits while she waited for her divorce. Unfortunately, the rashie, being nearly as formfitting as a wet T-shirt, left less to the imagination than her string bikini top.

She heard Carrie and company laughing and talking as she came down the staircase and crossed the koa wood floors toward the dining room. What a gorgeous view of lawn, beach, ocean, and the hills of Lanai in the distance. So tranquil. So peaceful. Who could imagine someone had tried to kill her here last night? In the sparkling morning light, the whole thing seemed like a bad dream.

Surprisingly, her stomach growled. Fighting off death was hard exercise. Ah, a delicious breakfast of Belgian waffles soaked in coconut syrup was just the thing. No one ever had to call her twice where anything coconut was involved. But, wait a minute—was that hamburgers she smelled?

“Hey, sleepyhead! About time you’re up,” Carrie called to her as she lifted a forkful of gravy-laden something to her mouth. Carrie, of course, lived on military time. She’d probably done more before breakfast than most people do in a day. “Come have your loco moco, the breakfast of surfers, dude!”

She laughed at her own surfer imitation. “Seriously. This is awesome. Plenty of great protein to keep you on your feet and in the curl.” She went back to shoveling it in.

Laci sat next to Carrie. “Whoa!” she said when Treflee got close enough for her to see her bruised neck. “What happened to you? You look like you’ve been in combat.”

Before she could answer, Ty came in behind her. “Treflee, good to see you up and about.” For the benefit of the table of women looking on, he appeared to give her shoulder a sympathetic squeeze, but she felt the warning in the way he pinched her unnecessarily hard.
Stick to the cover story.

“Feeling any better?” He sounded completely concerned, the concern of an impartial and courteous stranger whose job it was to look after her. He gave her a quick shoulder rub and released her.

How in the world did he do that, affect that casual tone?

“Fine,” she managed to croak in her newly found deep voice.

Carla put down her fork, put on her nurse’s demeanor, pushed back from the table, and came over to Treflee for a closer look. “My gosh! It looks like someone tried to strangle you! Is that a flower-shaped bruise right there?”

Carla leaned in, breathing down Treflee’s neck.

Ty leaned in, too. “That does look like a flower. Weird.” He gave her shoulder another squeeze. “She had a run-in with a clothesline last night,” Ty helpfully supplied for her. “Over on Sugar Love Plantation.”

Tita ambled around the corner just then, carrying a plate of the suspicious-looking loco moco. “What! What am I hearing? Who was hurt?”

Ty repeated what he’d just told the group.

Tita upbraided him with a look. “And no one told me?”

“Why should I disturb your beauty sleep,
wahine
? I had it under control.” Though Ty was behind her, Treflee could just picture him grinning and shrugging.

Tita set the plate down at an empty place at the table and indicated Treflee should sit, pulling out the chair for her. Carla returned to her seat. Ty let Treflee go. Tita patted her shoulder as she sat and shook her head at Ty, obviously forgiving him like a patient mother amused at his antics.

She made a grunt of disgust and put her hands on her hips, mumbling something in Hawaiian. “That Mrs. Ho and her clothesline! She does not embrace the spirit of
aloha
—compassion, love, and care for all.”

Mrs. Ho isn’t the only one with a lack of
aloha
spirit.

Tita shook her head. “She only thinks of herself. Always trying to one-up and outshine everyone else. She is not
ohana.
”

“Family,” Ty translated.

Tita made an elegant, graceful gesture reminiscent of the way a hula dancer describes a wave. “She thinks the ocean breeze is best there at the edge of our properties. She hangs the clothesline for her own linens and those of her special guests. She does not care for the safety and enjoyment of anyone else. I think she forgets to take down the line when the clothes are dry
on purpose.
She wants to hurt my guests.”

Ty laughed. “Don’t be a conspiracy theorist, boss.”

Tita snorted. “She’s very private and secretive. She doesn’t believe in sharing.” Her tone clearly indicated this was an affront to her personal belief system.

Tita inspected Treflee. “How are you feeling,
ipo
?”

Carla cut in using her no-nonsense tone. “Treflee needs to see a doctor.”

Ty shot her a lazy look and winked. “Took her last night. Spent two hours in emergency.”

“What! Where were we? Why didn’t we know about your late-night run to the doctor?” Carrie’s expression said she expected nothing less than disaster from Treflee.

Beside her, Laci looked decidedly unhappy with the bit of intel about Ty taking Treflee to the emergency room and spending so much time alone with her. You could almost see the wheels turning—how minor an injury could she withstand so Ty would have to play knight in shining armor to her damsel in distress?

Treflee knew of a strangler who might be available to accommodate her.

“It was late. I couldn’t sleep and went out for a walk. You all were in your rooms. Ty came to my rescue and insisted I get checked out. There was no reason to wake any of you. The doc says I’ll be fine.” Treflee picked up her fork and picked at the loco this-can’t-be-breakfast moco. Rice topped with a hamburger patty, covered with brown gravy, topped with a runny egg, sunny side up, and sprinkled with green onions, which floated unattractively on the yellow ooze.

Raw eggs? Not for her. Salmonella poisoning? No, thank you. Because of raw eggs, she never even ate raw cookie dough or cake batter and you knew those had to be delicious. She picked around as unobtrusively as she could and took a bite of rice as Tita watched.

Seeing her struggle, Tita took pity on her. “Your throat! Of course. Let me get you something softer from the kitchen. What would you like?”

“Scrambled eggs?”

“Coming up.”

The doorbell rang. Tita frowned, then hefted her girth toward the door, mumbling about the presumption of early-morning guests. A young Chinese man stood on the lanai, carrying a large woven basket filled with an assortment of Hawaiian goodies generously sprinkled with plumeria flowers. Treflee had to crane her neck to see him.

“You have guest here by name of Tleflee Miller?” he asked in a thick accent.

“In the dining room,” Tita said. “What do you want with her?”

Without answering, the young man sidestepped past her to the dining room. “Miss Tleflee Miller?”

Treflee raised her hand.

“From Mrs. Ho.” The young man held the basket out to her. “She very sorry to hear of your accident and hope these gifts may help you as you heal.”

The hair on the back of Treflee’s neck stood up.
How did Mrs. Ho hear of my “accident”?

Carrie shook her head. “News certainly travels fast.”

“Mrs. Ho always knows what goes on on her property,” Tita said. “She never misses a trick.”

Ty seemed unconcerned and unsurprised by the arrival. Which made Treflee wonder what he had to do with this sudden care-package delivery.

When Treflee didn’t reach for the basket, Ty jumped up and took it for her. “Mrs. Miller doesn’t have much of a voice this morning, but she thanks Mrs. Ho for her thoughtfulness.”

The Chinese man nodded and departed before anyone could reply or question him further.

Tita shut the door behind him and came up to stand next to Ty, inspecting the goods. “Coconut oil, coconut soap, guava coconut lip balm, and Mrs. Ho’s prize candied pineapple. She’s very proud of that candied pineapple.” She snorted. “Her cook makes it for her.”

Treflee studied Ty. Boy, he was good! She was now
convinced
he was involved with the arrival of the basket. She should have been so proud of her husband. Somehow, in the middle of the night while waiting for her in emergency, he’d managed to convince Mrs. Ho the “accident” had occurred, in the first place, and was her fault, in the second. And had gotten her to send a gift basket as verification of the story. Or sent one himself.

Though the basket sounded like coconut heaven to Treflee, it brought up a tsunami of guilt. Unless Mrs. Ho had sent the strangler, she wasn’t responsible for Treflee’s injury and had spent a pretty penny for nothing.

Ty was staring at her, trying hard to telepath her cover story to her. His eyes pleaded with her to say something, for heaven’s sake!

Oh, yeah, she should probably play along. “How thoughtful.”

Tita waved a hand. “Thoughtful?” She shook her head. “No, Mrs. Ho thinks only of harmony and avoiding a lawsuit. You got hurt on her property. Her harmony is out of balance. For her own sake, she owes you something to make you whole. She should have come herself to make sure you’re okay, not sent a boy with a basket.”

“Speaking of the basket, I’ll just take this upstairs for you.” Ty turned.

“Wait! I’d like a look.” Treflee tried to stop him.

“It’ll be in your room.”

This was the problem with being married to a spy. They were suspicious of everything. He was probably going to paw through it looking for bugs or who knows what. And she’d just bet he’d take the good stuff for himself.

Treflee let him go. She’d find out what he was up to later. She smiled at Tita. “Even so, I’d better write a thank-you.”

“First, you eat. Or you’ll never make it through your surfing lesson today.”

CHAPTER SIX

Back in Treflee’s room, Ty ran his handheld bug detector over and around the basket and its contents. NCS had been watching Mrs. Ho since before George’s death. The marriage-mart matron was the head of RIOT’s Hawaiian operations.

Unfortunately, the dragon lady Mrs. Ho’s happy wedding establishment had so far proven to be impenetrable. NCS hadn’t been able to get as much as a delivery boy in. The Agency was sure she was buying the Pinpoint Project software from their rogue analyst Hal Rogers byte by byte and sending it to the Chinese branch of RIOT from Sugar Love. But NCS hadn’t been able to intercept it. Or get an invitation to tea.

The best NCS had been able to do was feed Hal bad code and data. NCS had been trailing Hal for nearly a year now. The guy was a low-level geopolitical analyst for Langley. Flags went up when his bank accounts suddenly unaccountably grew.

Hal worked on the Pinpoint Project, an analysis tool that used both open-source and intelligence data to pinpoint the location of enemy fleets, satellites, and missiles, and predict possible outbreaks of terrorism, violence, and even war. Since RIOT’s mission was to cause war between nations, in their hands, the tool would be a nightmare.

Last night, Ty had sent Greg, his fellow “tour guide” and NCS agent, over to stage an accident with the clothesline and complain to Mrs. Ho about Treflee being injured. Despite Greg’s best efforts, she wouldn’t let him any farther in than the entryway. He’d gotten few particulars about the layout of the place. The lobby looked pretty much like Big Auau’s, a great place to hold a wedding reception.

As a result of Greg’s encounter, Ty was staring at a basketful of Hawaiian body care products.

His bug detector lit up.

Bingo! An enemy bug was stuffed beneath the wood excelsior shred that filled the bottom of the basket. He swore to himself, removed the bug, and disabled it.

It was Chinese, of course.

There was no way to determine if it was from the MSS, the Ministry of State Security, China’s intelligence agency. The U.S. and China had been “cooperating” to bring down RIOT. But neither side trusted the other. China wanted the Pinpoint Project, too, and was certainly working on their own version. But it was always easier to steal the Americans’ technology. And nice to know your adversary’s technology and capabilities.