Between Hello and Goodbye(24)

“You’ve been all over Hawaii, then?”

“Sure. The flight to Honolulu is only half an hour. I need a dose of action from time to time.”

“There’s hope for you, yet,” Faith said. “But what about your brother? How’d you convince him to join you in your hermitage?”

“Morgan came here first, actually, about ten years ago. He was barely eighteen and working on becoming a photographer.”

“And he just decided to stay?”

“Meeting Nalani was strong motivation. They got married three months after they met, and my nephew was born nine months to the day after that.”

“You have a nephew?” She waved a hand. “No, you mentioned him yesterday. What’s his name?”

“Kaleo.”

“Oh my God, your face just now.”

I frowned. “What about my face?”

“I can tell he’s special to you.”

“Well…he’s my nephew.”

“Mmh hmm.” Faith smiled. “So you followed your brother out here to be close to him?”

“Something like that.”

I felt Faith’s eyes on me and waited for her to probe further into territory I didn’t want to revisit. But she nodded to herself.

“That’s sweet,” she said finally. “I don’t have any siblings. Must be nice to have a partner in crime.”

“Yes and no,” I said. We’d pulled into the drive of my brother’s bungalow. “Sometimes I want to kill him. Like now.”

Faith looked to the front porch of the maroon house with white trim, and her hand flew to her mouth, stifling a laugh.

Morgan, Nalani, and Kaleo were standing on the steps as if posing for a family portrait, all wearing bright smiles and waving.

I killed the engine. “That asshole.”

Faith laughed. “Oh, this is gonna be fun.”

I strode around to the passenger side to help Faith out. She crutched past me, straight up to my idiot brother. “Hi, I’m Faith Benson.”

“Aloha, Faith! It’s so nice to meet you, you have no idea,” Morgan said, ignoring my death glare. “This is my wife, Nalani, and our boy, Kaleo. He’s not playing hooky; it’s Spring Break at school this week, and he’s very excited to meet you.”

I intensified my death glare but Morgan only smiled innocently.

“Aloha, Faith,” Nalani said. “Welcome.”

“You rode in a helicopter!” Kal said.

“I sure did,” Faith replied, smiling down at him. “Actually, riding in the helicopter would have been nice. I rode more on the outside of it. Dangling from a cord, specifically.”

“Was it scary? I bet it was scary.”

“A little.” Our eyes met and she shot me her trademark, suggestive smile. “But your uncle was on the ground, ready to catch me if I fell.”

Kal’s big dark eyes wheeled to me, and I felt Nalani and Morgan’s stares digging in.

“Were you, Uncle Ash?”

“It’s hot out and she needs to sit,” I said.

“We’ll get the full story later.” Nalani put her hand on Faith’s back. “Come in, come in. Let’s get that foot up.”

They went inside, Kal scampering ahead, leaving Morgan and me to follow.

My brother slapped me on the back. “Holy hell, man! She’s a stunner.”

“I’m not blind, you moron.”

“She’s got great energy too. You know how you get a vibe about someone where you like them instantly?”

“Yeah, I get it,” I said. That pretty much summed up Faith—she was instantly, frustratingly likeable. “She’s also not staying.”

Morgan chuckled. “Maybe she just needs the right motivation.”

We stepped out of the thick heat of Kauai in April, into the coolness of the house. Ahead, Faith was making her way through the cozy living area, crutching over the hardwood floors, and remarking to Nalani on the family portraits and various works of local artists that she and my brother had collected through the years.

“You have a beautiful home,” she said as they passed through the kitchen where scallops were sizzling in a pan, out to the lanai. “And this view. Are you kidding me?”

Faith stared out over the yard and its overgrown grass to the tops of the lush forest, then out to the ocean far below. A rooster crowed from inside the branches of a lime tree. She turned to Kaleo who had been stuck to her side since the moment she arrived. “Do you have a rooster in your tree?”

He nodded eagerly. “We have six! And a bunch of chickens.”

“What’s with all the chickens, anyway? That was definitely not in the brochure.”

“There are wild chickens all over Hawaii,” Nalani said. “But they seem to like Kauai best.”

“They have good taste,” Morgan put in. “Here, Faith. Sit.”

They got her situated in one chair with her foot propped on another, and then Nalani went back into the kitchen while Morgan served up some lemonade.

“Does it hurt?” Kaleo asked, inspecting Faith’s ankle that was wrapped in an Ace bandage. “It doesn’t look so bad.”

“Your uncle has been taking excellent care of me.”