Ho'ike
by Sammie
All notes in first part.
Thanks to everybody for reading and for reviewing! I'm glad the Billie-Steve interaction is working for all you reading. :-)
"I hate Mondays," Danny groused as he went up the steps to Holden's office, snapping on a pair of evidence gloves.
"And what happens on the weeks where we get Mondays off, too? Like Labor Day?" Steve commented.
"It's even worse, because it just makes Tuesdays into Mondays." Danny looked around.
Danny opened the 5-0 office laptop on top of Holden's office desk and sat down in the chair. "All right. Security video for the Star-Advertiser, specifically for this office, for the last week. What are we looking for?"
"Something. Anything. Let's see who tried to come in here, go through Holden's files. Our evidence against Lonoehu's not completely solid; let's see if we can get something off this video."
"When do we want to start?"
Steve paused. "Night of the murder."
"What? We know Holden wasn't there. He was too busy getting killed at home."
"Just - just start on the night of the murder, then go backwards in time from there."
Danny shook his head, then carefully clicked through the videos.
"Right there, right there! Stop, stop, stop," Steve nearly shouted as he pointed at the screen.
"Take it easy," Danny exclaimed, holding up his hands. "I can do this."
"Clearly not!"
"Do you want to do this? Here. You do it." Danny got up from the chair and let Steve sit. Within a few minutes, Steve was navigating the video. "Look." Both men leaned forward, watching as a hooded figure came into the bullpen area, then headed for Holden's office. He stood there a minute, playing with the lock, and then he was in.
He moved around, opening the filing cabinets and flipping around and going through the desk. He crawled under the desk for a couple seconds, then looked around some more. Finally, giving up, he left.
"What were you looking for?" Danny murmured to the man onscreen.
"Are we even sure the missing papers are here?" Kono asked doubtfully as she looked around Holden's house, pulling on latex gloves as she did so. "We've been here all morning."
"It wasn't in his office or his bank safety deposit box," Chin replied. "And we can't know those papers are permanently missing until we've looked through everything."
"That's our only reason for looking here?" Kono asked.
Chin paused and set down the binder he was looking at. "He spent the last week here with his daughter," he began. "His intern said he was working from home."
Kono grinned, nodding slowly as she caught on. "So it's highly likely everything's still here."
"Somewhere, yes." Chin set the binder back on its shelf, then looked around the house. His eyes fell on the Goodnight, Moon book, still on the couch from a few days prior, and frowned.
"Chin?" Kono asked.
Chin turned silently and headed straight for the kitchen. He stopped in front of the refrigerator, his cousin looking over his shoulder.
He reached up and plucked one of Billie's drawings off its magnets, then flipped it over. Chin then held it up to Kono, an amused look on his face.
"It's one of the faxes," Kono said wonderingly. "She drew on the back of them."
"She doesn't ask permission to use paper," he repeated her words back to her.
"The date's correct," Kono murmured, looking over the numbers the fax machine had printed at the top of the sheet. "That's the missing page from the second fax."
"The fax number matches the ones we found in Holden's office," Chin replied, then grinned at his cousin. "We just found that missing information."
"The missing sheets from the bank faxes were hanging on his refrigerator," Chin announced as he and Kono strode into headquarters, holding up the sheets they'd located.
"What?" Danny turned, leaning against the computer. "Nobody noticed?"
Kono held up one sheet, fax side out, then turned it around to reveal Billie's drawing. Danny chuckled in understanding.
"What do they say?" Steve asked.
"That's what we can't figure out." Kono handed him a set of sheets.
Steve pored over them, Danny looking on next to him. "What do these columns of numbers mean?"
"We have no idea. We can't make heads or tails of the numbers. We're going to try Mrs. Holden first, see if she recognizes any of these numbers." Chin nodded at them. "You get anything from Lonoehu's office?"
"Some guy broke in the night of the murder. Rifled through the papers."
"You get a name?" Chin asked.
"Donnie Morris. Down in - Kalihi," Steve read from the slip in his hand.
"Kalihi," Danny muttered. "Just want I want to do - spend my day down in that neighborhood. My Monday just got infinitely better," he said sarcastically.
"I'll go," Kono volunteered. "I'm feelin' twitchy."
"That's good news for me," Chin said dryly.
"Danny, get over to Livy Holden, see if she can figure out these faxes her husband was getting," Steve said as he pulled his weapon from his desk and stuck it into his side holster. "Chin, I need a legal way to search Lonoehu's house, office, everything. Check Dnnie Morris's background; see if there isn't any way we can tie him to Lonoehu - phone calls, emails, whatever."
He turned to Kono with a grin. "Ready to put that twitchiness to good use?"
"You sure our guy in the hooded sweatshirt is around here?" Kono asked, hopping out of the cab of Steve's truck and looking around.
"Last known address," Steve commented as he climbed out and locked his door. "Donnie Morris."
Kono looked around warily at the neighborhood. "693 is over there." She adjusted her flak vest and pulled her gun, following her boss across the street.
Steve banged on the door. Nobody answered. "Morris!" There was thump, and then running footsteps. Steve directed Kono around the back, then kicked down the door himself.
He ran through the house, catching only a brief glimpse of the fleeing man, coming out at the other end to find Kono running ahead of him. "Five-0!" Kono shouted, but to no avail.
Morris kept running, pulling down garbage cans behind him to try to block Kono. She jumped over them, still running.
Steve veered off, taking a right. Running past laundry and children playing, he finally stopped short at a fence, then climbed it quickly and dropped to the other side just to hear a single shot fired.
As he came around the side, he came upon Kono, cuffing a whining young man. "She shot me in the butt! What kind of person goes around shooting people in the butt?"
"You were running from the police," Steve replied unsympathetically, looking down at him as he holstered his gun.
Kono turned him around and sat him down on the ground, right on his rear. "Ow!" he howled. "My wound's getting dirty," he whined.
"You'll live," Steve commented, crossing his arms.
"If she shoots me in the rear, this hottie should be required to tend to me, too!" Morris huffed.
Steve glared. "Call her that again, and I'll call her cousin to come over here with his shotgun."
"OK, OK," Morris said, wide-eyed, starting to lift his hands in a sign of surrender before remembering he was cuffed. He looked at Kono's stony expression back to Steve's feral one, "C'mon, man. Look at her! She's a little hottie packing heat," he attempted to appeal to Steve's sympathy. "You can't tell me you haven't looked!" When that didn't get a response, he switched tacks, exclaimed, "This is inhumane! Police brutality!"
"Detective Williams!" Livy Holden looked surprised to see him, but she smiled politely and let him in to her hotel suite.
"How is the protective detail working out?" Danny asked gently.
"Um, all right," she replied, giving a tired smile. "It's a little rough, but I understand."
"'Lo, Uncle Danny!" Billie came running from the bedroom, and Danny smiled and crouched down to receive her hug. "Can Gracie pway wif' me?"
"Sorry, kiddo," Danny replied with an amused smile, looking at the little child tenderly. "Gracie's got school."
"Oh," she said, clearly disappointed. She thought about it, then asked hopefully, "Can Auntie Kono pway wif me?"
"Auntie Kono? Right now she's chasing bad guys." Danny thought about it, then added, "Most likely literally."
"Oh," she said, with that earlier tone of disappointment.
"Billie, honey, Mommie needs to talk to Uncle Danny. Can you wait for me in the bedroom? Why don't you draw a picture for him to take back?"
"'K." The little girl bounced off.
"Kono came yesterday to play with her when we got home from church services," Livy explained with a small smile. "Billie was pretty happy."
"She seems happy," Danny commented to the child's mother. "She still getting nightmares?"
"Yes." Livy Holden looked tired, but then smiled and said, "What can I do for you?"
"These, were, uh, some faxes your husband was getting." Danny showed them to her, and she scanned the sheets, which just had varying columns of numbers. "We do know some of the numbers are dates." Danny pointed at the first sheet, the first column. "Look. 11 for 2011. Month, day."
"And some are repeated," she replied, looking at the second column."8327. Here, here, and here. And 1936 here, here, here, here, and here." She frowned. "Identification numbers?"
"The third column, the numbers go up, but not by any pattern." Danny looked at her from the side. "Do you understand any of this?"
Livy Holden paused. "Travis was working on this?" she asked.
"Yes."
She paused, looking over the sheets again and again. "This is financial information."
"We believe so."
"But he already finished his financial research for his current series on the Mexican drug wars," Livy replied, looking at the detective. "And the date on this - this is recent."
"We talked about Miranda Akina the last time we met," Danny said. Livy nodded. "What exactly was he looking into?"
"To be honest, he wasn't sure. He simply said there had been problems with permits and deeds and different kinds of zoning issues. He didn't intend to propose that side investigation as an article series, though - he was just researching on the side."
Danny's eyes moved from side to side as he contemplated this; he then looked up with an expression which said he was forming an idea. "Thank you, Mrs. Holden."
"My rear's killing me!" came the holler from inside the interrogation room. "When am I gonna get to see a doctor, huh?"
Outside in the hallway, Kono checked her weapon, looking at it very hard, as if contemplating something, then reholstered it.
"I'll bleed all over your chair. It'll stain and stink - blood does that! You don't believe me, don't you!"
"I believe you," Steve retorted back into the door. "Now, shut up."
"Get anything out of your witness?" Chin asked as he and Danny approached, amused expressions on their faces.
"He lets out enough hot air to fuel a week's worth of balloon rides, but he hasn't said anything of use," Steve replied. "You?"
"Can't find anything," Chin replied. "No cyber-contact between Lonoehu and Morris, anyhow."
"Lonoehu clean electronic house?" Danny asked.
"You realize even cleaning house won't get the blood out of this chair!" came a shout from the inside.
Steve rolled his eyes.
"He's been like this the entire car ride back here," Kono explained to the two others. "And then we got stuck in traffic."
"Oooh." Danny winced in sympathy.
"We know he's got an alibi for the night of Holden's death," Steve began. "He was busy breaking into Holden's office."
"But is he guilty of trying to murder Billie Holden?" Chin replied.
"Y'all ARE going to be guilty of murder if I don't get some medical care! I know how I'm supposed to be treated, and it's not like this!"
"You did inform him of his right to remain silent, didn't you?" Chin asked dryly.
"Yes." Kono looked exasperated. "Repeatedly. It's the first time I've ever wished somebody would invoke his Fifth Amendment rights."
"If he blabs that much, he's got to say something," Chin replied. "Let's see if we can get him to slip."
"Please," Steve waved towards the door. "He's all yours."
Chin turned to Danny, who was nearest the door. "After you."
"Oh, joy," Danny muttered. He schooled his face into a non-descript expression, then opened the door and went inside.
"Hallelujah!" Morris exclaimed when the door opened, then stopped when two unfamiliar faces came in. "Where are the two cops who picked me up?" When Steve appeared, full aneurysm face on, he cheered. "Hey, it's Mc-Glare-tt!"
"That's actually pretty good," Danny chuckled in acknowledgment. Steve, well, glared.
"It is, isn't it?" Morris grinned, then looked around. "Where's the hottie who shot me?" When Chin narrowed his eyes and turned a full stare on him, he swallowed hard and looked at Steve. "Is that the cousin you were warning me about?"
"Champion high school quarterback, too, so cool your jets," Steve intoned.
"Hey, Motormouth," Danny said, lightly slapping/patting (depending on who was telling the story) Morris' face. "Right here," he said, pointing to himself.
"I think slapping's police brutality," Morris commented.
"Just be glad that Frick and Frack who caught you aren't doing this interrogation," Danny replied. He crossed his arms. "Why were you in Travis Holden's office?"
"That's going to cost you some food."
Danny tossed a Saran-wrapped spam musubi at him. Morris looked disappointed. "That's it?"
"Start talking," Chin shot back.
"Hey, hey, take it easy. I wasn't there to cause trouble."
"Says the guy who broke in to a newspaper office after hours," Danny pointed out. "We have you on tape rifling through his cabinets."
"I was looking for food. I was trying to stock up in case I was shot in the butt and taken to a blue hellhole of an interrogation room where cops feed me only spam musubi."
"OK, let me tell you how this plays out, OK?" Danny held up his hands. "We drag you in here because you ran from the cops. You stall us, so we start by charging you with running from police, destruction of public property - "
" - they said you did a lot of damage to the homes nearby as you ran," Chin agreed.
" - being a punk, then being a loudmouth, bleeding on the floor."
"That ain't gonna stick in court." He looked smug.
"Then we show them the video of you breaking into a newspaper office, and we add breaking and entering to that," Danny continued.
"Then we tell the judge that you were breaking into the newspaper office of a noted local reporter and going through his files, and we add felony theft." Chin tilted his head to one side.
Danny added, "Not misdemeanor, of course. Felony. Because the guy whose office you broke into was investigating everything from drug wars to corrupt officials. The value of the thing stolen lifts it from misdemeanor to felony."
Morris' eyes widened slightly.
"Tack on obstruction of justice for trying to hide information from us and then attempted murder of minor," Chin finished. "Sound good?"
Morris looked horrified. "But - "
"Sounds good," Danny interrupted, answering Chin for Morris. "I'm sure the DA can drum up a few more charges."
"Or the HPD," Chin suggested brightly. "HPD won't like to hear that their friend's office was broken into or that their friend's kid was threatened."
"Whoa, whoa! I didn't threaten any kid!"
"Why were you there in Travis Holden's office?" Danny repeated his question.
"I got a call to go in," Morris replied.
"What did this person sound like?"
"Man," Morris said. "He had a deep voice."
"Like mine," Steve said from the doorway.
"Um, no, not really," Morris replied after thinking. "A big, deep, booming voice."
"Like mine," Steve repeated even as Danny smirked.
"No, not at all. I mean, a big, deeep, booooming voice," Morris said, imitating the voice.
"OK, I got it," Steve groused even as Danny and Chin grinned in amusement. "Deep voice. What did he tell you?"
"He said he had a little job that he'd give me three thousand dollars for. He'd leave me a swipe key card to get in at some location."
"What were you supposed to look for?"
"Anything with a 'Hawaiian National Bank' logo on it."
"How hard did you look?" Steve commented.
"I looked really hard," Morris protested.
"Clearly not, because one of us found a fax with a huge logo on it two days later," Danny retorted.
"OK, perhaps not that hard," Morris sighed. "I was hungry."
"Do you always think about food?" Steve groused.
"When cops are starvin' me to death, yes!"
"Lonoehu's got a deep voice," Chin informed Steve as the four made their way to their office. "A baritone, in the least. Even a bass."
"We'll get a voice recording of Bruce Lonoehu," Steve instructed as the four entered their office. "Maybe Lonoehu was there, but one of his cronies pulled the trigger - a right-handed one. Play the guy's voice for Morris, confirm it was him. Take it to Billie, too, see if she recognizes it."
"Are you sure that's wise? Can we just ask Morris first?" Kono protested.
"We need to know if that's the man who was at her house that night," Steve insisted.
"She's three. She's lost her father, she's been threatened by a disembodied voice which threatens to kill her mother," Danny disagreed. "Now you want to play the voice of her father's killer for her to listen to? How is that not going to traumatize her?"
"Then do it in a way that won't," Steve replied. "It's better for her to be scared now than to grow up without her parents. Get a recording to her, see if she recognizes the voice."
"Fine. Fine. OK. How do we put Lonoehu at the scene of the crime?" Danny replied. "It's all still circumstantial."
"He wears expensive, size thirteen shoes and he's heavy set, like Fong told us," Steve started. "He's got a wedding ring on his left hand. When we get Morris and Billie to confirm his voice, we'll have him."
"It's still circumstantial," Danny insisted. "Billie's three years old. Even if she could remember his face, her testimony might not be admissible."
"You saw her ability to recall," Steve retorted, cutting in.
"And you're still ignoring the evidence which seems to indicate Lonoehu's not involved," Danny continued, as if Steve had not spoken at all. "That contact lens cleaner in evidence, Lonoehu's alibi."
"Fine, fine. So what do you suggest we do?" Steve asked, crossing his arms.
"We leave Lonoehu's evidence to the side for a minute. We need to go back to what we know. We need a size thirteen dress shoe, worn by a tubby guy with a ring named Bruce. We get his exact shoe, the one he wore at the murder," Danny said, clapping the back of his right hand against the palm of his left to emphasize his point. "The shoe's most likely got blood on it. That will clinch our killer - and if it's Lonoehu, great. If it's not Lonoehu, we press him with our new evidence until he cracks."
"But our killer most likely dumped his shoes the day after the murder. We can't even prove Lonoehu bought those shoes - if he is the killer," Kono said in frustration.
"About that." The three others looked at Chin, who had a trace, enigmatic smile on his face. "I have an idea."
The door to the small, upscale shop dinged to announce customers, and the clerk looked up. A young, tall couple came in, everything they wore dripping with money. He had on a pale blue, button-down linen shirt with double-button barrel cuffs. The relaxed top covered loose, white, straight-leg linen pants, which ended in cream colored boat shoes. He was clean-shaven, and his dark hair was partly neatly - as much as such short hair could be parted. As he entered, he pulled off his sunglasses and hung them on his shirt.
She wore a pair of light leather sandals, comfortable for walking, and a light ruffle silk front dress in cobalt blue with white swirls. It hung loosely on her, as it should, but accented her height and athletic build. Her straight, black hair was swept up loosely, clipped in the back with a large banana clip. A small, expensive purse hung on one shoulder, and her husband had her free hand clasped securely in his own. The clerk could see the expensive engagement and wedding rings she wore. As they came in, she set her large sunglasses on the top of her head, revealing a pair of dark, lively eyes.
Her husband whispered something in her ear, and she smiled, her full lips pulling back to reveal a nice line of teeth and deep dimples appearing in her cheeks.
They both looked around appraisingly as he approached. "Hello," the clerk greeted as genially as possible. "Welcome to Noble House. How may I help you?"
"My wife," the man replied with an affectionate, indulgent tone as he glanced at the woman next to him, "thinks I need a new pair of shoes."
"No, your wife knows you need a new pair of shoes," she corrected in a cheeky tone. Her husband grinned. "We heard you were the premier high-end shop around here. You do custom tailoring?"
"Yes, we do," the clerk smiled. "Hong Kong tailors send custom tailors here every once in awhile. This is one of the few places where they don't take appointments at their hotel but do it in the shop, right here."
The husband smiled. "Sounds great. I may have to come here later." He paused. "What about shoes?"
The clerk smiled. "Ah. Well, you're welcome to look at the sample collection we have here. We then order in from the mainland. Is there something specific you're looking for?"
"Wears well. I prefer black."
"Excellent." The clerk directed them to the nearby displays.
They wandered some of the displays, and the clerk noted the conversation. "What about this one?"
"I thought you wanted a pair of boots or shoes with laces."
"I do."
"Then let's look at something else."
"This one?" He held up an ankleboot and flipped a finger over the laces.
"For a suit?" she asked doubtfully.
"Good point."
"We have a catalog too," the clerk interjected, "if you would like to order from there, and we'll measure you to get the exact shoe."
"Brilliant."
They took another ten minutes, lingering over the shoe catalog, the wife taking her time in looking at every page, murmuring over some and disapproving of others.
After a while, the husband, thinking, pointed lightly back at her. "You liked the shoes Bruce was wearing the other day when we met for dinner."
"Oh, those were great. The Gucci ones. The leather and the stitching were just brilliant. They were fairly new, I think he said."
"Bruce?" the clerk asked.
The woman laughed. "Bruce, you know. A little heavy set, but brilliant taste in clothing."
"Bruce...Bruce!" the clerk grinned. "Oh, I apologize. Of course I remember. He's the only Bruce we have as a customer who fits that description." He chuckled. "He's got a special affinity for Ermengildo Zegna and Gucci shoes."
"That's the one," the husband smiled. "You wouldn't happen to know the type of shoe he bought, right?"
"Oh," the clerk looked a little disappointed. "Um - "
"You keep records, right?" the wife suddenly said suddenly, as if the light bulb just went on in her head. "Do you think you could let us see his record, so we get that exact shoe?" She looked at her husband with an affectionately chastising look. "My husband doesn't believe that a Gucci shoe can look that good on a man."
The clerk chuckled. "And what do you prefer, sir?"
"Burberry," he replied.
"Oh." The man nodded. "Burberry - and Ozwald Boateng - great designs. Unfortunately, we don't do British designers here. They've got a man down the street, though," he offered helpfully.
"Well, thank you," she replied. "Do you mind if we get the specs on the Gucci first?"
"Of course! I've got his card and order right here." The clerk turned to his computer. "He's a friend of yours?"
"Oh, good friends." The husband gave a knowing grin, with a small wink.
"I didn't expect to see you back so soon," Livy Holden commented as she opened the hotel room door again to see Danny standing there.
"One thing we wanted to clear up," the blond replied as he came into the room.
"H'llo, Uncle Danny." Billie waved from the couch, where she had a large book in her lap and was play-act-reading to her panda and to her lion.
"Look what I got," the detective began, then pulled out a small box of coco puffs.
"Coco puffs!" The little girl smiled happily, climbing off the couch and coming. Her mother cleared her throat, and Danny noticed the woman send a gently meaningful look sent to Billie. The little girl instantly said, "Fank you, Uncle Danny."
"You like 'em, huh?" The detective smiled. The little girl beamed and nodded. "Me, too," he whispered to the child. "They're my favorite."
"Me, too!" she agreed brightly.
"I need you to help me with something, OK, Billie?"
"OK," she agreed readily.
"I know it's going to be a little scary, so I'm going to ask your mama to be with you." He paused, looking at the little girl's face. "I'm going to play a voice for you, and I want you to tell me if it sounds like the bad man who hurt your daddy, or the mean man who scared you while you were eating Cheerios."
He pulled out a small snack box of Cheerios, opened the bag, and poured out some on a napkin. "You want to sit here at the table?"
Billie obediently climbed into a chair.
"You were eating Cheerios, right?" he asked, sliding the napkin over to the child. She nodded. "All right. Now eat your Cheerios, and I'm going to play a voice. Don't turn around, just tell me if it sounds like the man you heard."
"'K."
Danny played a tape of Bruce Lonehu's voice, a full thirty seconds, before he paused it. "Billie? Is he the one?"
Billie shook her head. "Nope."
Danny frowned. "Billie, listen carefully. He won't say the same things on the tape as he said to you. But does the voice sound like the man who said mean things?" He hit play again, and the tape continued to roll.
"Nope."
"This doesn't this sound like the man who was with your dad, or kepolo?" He brought up another recording. "Listen carefully."
Billie waited this time, then shook her head. "Nope."
Danny's brow furrowed as he sat back and turned off the recording.
"Bruce has got great taste," the clerk said as he continued working on the computer. "Conservative, as befitting his career, but great taste in material. He buys the Italian silk and gets it tailored. The shoes he got here, too."
"Clothes make the man," the man replied with a smile.
"Indeed," the clerk smiled. "Here we go." He turned the computer monitor around, then pointed at the customer record. The couple leaned in together towards the screen. "He bought a Gucci lace-up shoe in black suede. Dark palladium hardware and a goodyear welt construction leather sole."
"We understand that the verification of authenticity comes printed on the shoe," the wife made her question in the form of a statement.
"Serial number's printed on the leather lining," the clerk confirmed. "We also keep a record of that serial number on our customer records."
The husband raised his eyebrows ever so slightly, looking rather happy at the news. "Do you mind if we take a look? Make sure we get down the specifics?"
"Of course. I can also get you a photo and description from Gucci themselves. That's in the back." The clerk turned the monitor around to the couple, then gave them a bright smile. "I'll be right back."
As he left, the husband quickly pulled out his iPhone and snapped a few pictures of the computer screen. He turned to his wife, his jaw working tensely, and turned the screen so she could see it, too. She looked at the screen, then at him, her smile disappearing; she looked back at the screen, then read off the name in a disappointed whisper: "Bruce Hoffman? The housing commissioner?"
TBC