The Bone Field by Debra Bokur (top e book reader txt) 📕

She sighed and rose from the steps. “Aren’t we expected somewhere?”

From inside the house, the sound of whining and scratching could be heard.

“Yeah, but you’re driving, and some fresh coffee would be great with this sandwich.” He gestured toward the house with his mug. “Plus it sounds like your horse is trying to break down the barn door.”

They pushed their way past Hilo and entered the kitchen. She watched Walter as he transferred the cold, leftover coffee in the press into a glass measuring cup and placed it in the microwave, pressing the numbers on the timer’s keypad.

“Did Stitches give you any idea why we need to make a trip all the way over to her, instead of just telling you over the phone what she’s found?”

The microwave pinged. Walter removed the measuring cup, carefully pouring the hot contents into his insulated mug waiting on the counter. He tore a paper towel off the roll next to the sink and wiped down a few drops that had spilled onto the counter’s surface.

“Just that the skeleton is male, as you suspected. Said she’d fill us in when we got there. I thought we’d make better time if we took the back roads in your Jeep.”

She regarded him with a small measure of surprise. “Sure. Happy to accommodate. I’m not sure I actually remember the last time you rode in the Jeep without complaining about it the whole time, though. You know—like a little kid covered in mud, bitching about having to take a bath.”

“Yeah, funny,” he said as they left the house. Kali wrestled with the door, which was being pushed from the other side by a newly distressed Hilo, now absolutely convinced that he was, indeed, being abandoned. Walter and Kali made their way down the steps and across the yard. Once they climbed into the Jeep, Kali slipped the keys into the ignition. She revved the engine, and as it warmed up, she pulled her notes from her bag and passed them to Walter.

“You can take a look at what I found regarding pineapples.” She looked at him meaningfully. “And don’t get mustard all over the pages.”

Walter took a bite from his sandwich as Kali pulled out of the driveway and onto the road. She headed south, retracing part of the route she’d taken on her return home from the harbor. He shuffled the papers into an orderly pile, studying what she’d written.

“Native to South America. Multiple cultures, including the Spanish and Portuguese, decorated everything with pineapple motifs,” he read. “It was a sign of welcome. They liked to carve it into furniture, as well as the wood trim in their homes. It’s still used as common ornamentation in modern hotels and inns, signifying hospitality.”

Kali nodded. “The pillow covers in my room at the hotel on Lna‘i had pineapples in the design.”

“Okay, but the hospitality angle doesn’t seem like a connection to the body.”

“Agreed,” said Kali. “At least not on the surface. Lots of immigrants came to the islands, though, including the Portuguese. Big part of the current population. The Portuguese grow pineapples on São Miguel, one of their islands in the Azores. After the fruit was introduced to Europe in the mid-1600s, it eventually found its way to Hawai‘i and became a major money-producing crop in the early 1920s.”

“Right,” he said. “That’s about the time Lna‘i became one big pineapple farm.”

“The research I found said roughly seventy-five percent of all the pineapples in the world were grown in Hawai‘i during the height of production. When the last of the big pineapple companies pulled out, a lot of people lost their jobs. Then the Shandling Fruit Company swooped in and took over the empty fields on Lna‘i in an attempt to revive the industry, but that only lasted a few years before they failed, too—despite all the big promises they’d made to the workers.”

Walter was quiet for a moment, considering what Kali had said. “So there were a lot of pissed off, financially impacted people wandering around without a job to go to in the morning.”

“Yeah,” she answered. “By the time Shandling Fruit packed up and left Hawai‘i in August of 1997 to reopen with a much smaller presence in Central America and Southeast Asia, it seems safe to assume there were more than a few unhappy people. So, not a stretch to think there could be some connection. It’s more than possible that the guy who comes in to tell everyone to go home and stay there, becomes the target of some serious anger.”

“And finds himself headless and stuffed into a refrigerator?”

“Yes, except . . .” Kali looked thoughtful. She eased the Jeep over and around a series of potholes, then turned back to Walter. “Except that he wasn’t stuffed, was he?”

Walter frowned.

“His hands were folded, and it looked to me as if he had been placed inside the fridge pretty carefully.” She hesitated. “Maybe even reverently.”

Walter considered this. She waited, knowing that a thousand different scenarios were likely dancing around in his head. Outside the window, the rich green and turquoise shades of the island’s interior gleamed in the sunlight. They’d passed though Keokea and Kula, and were approaching the turnoff for Highway 37 leading toward the airport and on to Wailuku. When they were less than ten minutes from their destination, she glanced back at Walter, surprised that he’d still made no comment. His head was turned toward the window, nodding gently with the movement of the car. Kali sighed. He was asleep.

She reached over with her right hand and poked him in his thigh.

“Hey there, sleeping beauty—wake up!”

His head jerked upright. “Damn,” he said, stifling a yawn. “Sometimes I forget how mean you are.”

“You used to tell me I was sweet.”

“Yeah, when you were eight.”

That was a long time ago, she thought. Long before she realized the world was filled with thieves and bullies and killers. Long before