Page 29 of Just My Luck

She spun on her heel and stalked back to the Mercedes. The back of her elegant cream linen pantsuit was spattered with raindrops.

Buzz Lightyear gave Zara one last warning glance. “Stop following us, understand?”

When she nodded, he followed after the woman and a moment later the Mercedes roared away.

Link? She scoured her memory for anyone named Link and came up empty. She knew a Bink from high school. He sold fresh coconuts to tourists now, along with a side hustle of weed. Her father was a steady customer of the latter. And then there was Tink, a surfer whose parents had unfortunately named her Tinkerbell.

Link? Nope. Nothing.

She tried Jim’s phone again. This time, he answered. “It’s Zara, I’ve been trying to reach you. Where have you been?”

“My phone died and I couldn’t find the charger.”

Or a place to charge, she imagined, since he probably didn’t have a secure place to stay.

“We have to talk,” she told him. “But I need to get home right away. Can you meet me there in ten? That’s ten minutes, island time,” she added. Which could mean anything from a little late to an hour from now.

14

Lincoln had used the pretense of applying for a gardening position to lurk inside the Kona Queen Resort and learn what he could about Tanaka’s situation. All he’d been able to figure out was that Tanaka and his extended family had booked out the entire third floor. Both his sons were with him—the infamous playboy and the stodgy family man—their wives, four grandchildren ranging in age from three to ten, two nannies, and a five-man security team.

Tanaka hadn’t spotted him even though the family had trooped past him on their way to dinner, while he pretended to mulch an anthurium. He looked like a staff member, after all, and Tanaka didn’t pay attention to those.

Once, a long time ago, he’d asked his father about his relationship with Tanaka.

“Tanaka was my close friend,” his father had explained over bibimbap in a Seoul noodle shop. “But he betrayed me on the orders of his family. He’s a tool, not a visionary. I learned a hard lesson.”

“Why does he still send you presents?” Bottles of sake, a nesting doll box, a priceless Japanese figurine, all had shown up at KiYun Chun’s door.

“I don’t know. Guilt, a wish to make amends, or to repair the friendship. Or to mock me. I do not forgive.”

Lincoln was sure that part was true, it was written all over his father’s stern face.

“Maybe it’s on some kind of automated schedule that he’s forgotten about,” Lincoln suggested. “His assistant gets the notification, finds a gift and sends it off, and Tanaka is none the wiser.”

“Perhaps.” A rare smile from his father, which quickly disappeared. “He is vengeful. Be wary. He might hurt you to get to me.”

Which was exactly what had happened. Tanaka was behind most of the traumatic things that had happened to him in the jungle.

And now he was mere feet away from the man.

The family was shown into a private room at the back of the restaurant, out of Lincoln’s sight. He sighed, knowing only guests would be allowed into the restaurant, or the upstairs corridors, or the bar, or any of the places where he might be able to overhear something useful. He’d studied Japanese in college, and used it frequently in his business dealings. Since no one would know that from looking at him, he hoped that would give him an advantage.

He had to figure out another way in. He slipped into a restroom on the lobby level and changed into the much nicer outfit he’d brought along. Maybe he could hang out at the bar for a while and say he was meeting a guest there.

He’d turned off his phone so it wouldn’t attract attention, but here in the quiet men’s room, he reactivated it. He’d missed several calls from Zara, and was just about to dial her number when she called.

“We have to talk,” she said tensely.

Something had happened. His Tanaka reconnaissance mission would have to wait.

“On my way,” he told her.

Outside the Kona Queen, he flagged down a taxi that had just dropped off a guest, and gave him Zara’s address. The rain was coming down harder now, fat drops that plunked a hypnotic tune on the roof of the cab. The air temperature was warm enough to keep him from chilling down, but occasionally a gust of wind would turn the rain into something more like a fire hose.

Zara’s orange Beetle huddled under the carport next to her house. He’d call it a bungalow more than a house, with a metal roof and a lanai cluttered with skateboards, roller skates, an old dollhouse, and a planter that could barely contain an exuberant rosemary plant.

A month ago, he wouldn’t have been able to distinguish a rosemary from a tomato plant. How quickly things could change.