Broken Ferns (Lei Crime ) Read Online Free PDF Page B

roofing over ivory stucco, a portly bronze of President McKinley holding court at the entrance. Lei walked briskly under great spreading monkeypod trees to the entrance and up worn but immaculate steps to the office.
    The staff were prompt and responsive to her badge and no-nonsense demeanor, and revealed that Tyson Rezents had dropped out of school earlier that year.
    “He just stopped coming.” Principal Tavares was a blocky ex-jock in a polo shirt with a McKinley High logo. “No paperwork filled out.”
    “Any behavior problems?” Lei asked. “Anything you can tell me about him as a student?”
    “No, not really. Poor grades and attendance, the kid works a lot out at Paradise Air. Baggage handler, I understand.”
    “Okay,” Lei said. “This last address—was this with family?”
    “I think that’s with his mother. They lived together.”
    “What about Tom Blackman?” The principal confirmed he’d graduated a few years ago, and had nothing to add to that and no current address. Lei headed out, and one of the office ladies touched her arm.
    “I knew Tyson. He one good boy, but so much sadness happened to him with his mother. Is he in trouble?”
    Lei looked into kind eyes in a round face. The woman’s black hair was wound up and pierced by chopsticks decorated with air-dried clay plumerias, a popular local craft.
    “No—we jus’ like ask him a few questions.” Lei let her voice slip into the gentle rhythm of pidgin English, the creole dialect that quickly established trust and belonging among Hawaii residents. The fact that Lei was from here and looked the part continued to open doors for her as an investigator.
    “Well, I know the principal he wen’ give you that old address. But Tyson, he stay living with friends after the mom, she went back to using.” The woman drew Lei around the corner of a rack of mailboxes, away from prying eyes.
    “Where they stay?” Lei took her spiral notebook out of her pocket.
    The woman flipped through a file and produced a card. “Here’s his last address with his mother, but I’m not sure if he’s still there. He also spends a lot of time with his girlfriend.”
    Lei’s attention sharpened as she looked up from writing down the address. “Do you know where the girlfriend lives, what her name is?”
    “She’s a student here, that’s all. I don’t know her name.” The woman seemed to have used up her goodwill, and a nervous glance in the direction of the principal’s office confirmed this.
    “Well, thank you. I may need to call you again.”
    “I jus’ want things to go better fo’ that poor boy.” The woman shook Lei’s hand self-consciously as they said goodbye, and Lei brushed through the waist-high swinging door and out of the administration building.
    Lei’s cell rang as she climbed into her Tacoma. As always, she checked the caller ID—Ken Yamada was returning her call.
    “Hey, partner. Get my message?”
    “Yes. Wanted to let you know we’ve got some employee interviews lined up down at Paradise Air.”
    “Okay. The boy I came to follow up on, Tyson Rezents, dropped out this year. There’s another one, Tom Blackman, and he graduated a couple of years ago. I have two others, young adults fired for stealing and insubordination.”
    “Sounds worth tracking down. Any of them still working at the airline?”
    “Only Rezents. He’s the youngest, only seventeen.”
    “If he’s still at the airline, should be pretty easy to interview him there. Bring in those files and we’ll focus the interviews a little more, try and get to the ones that really look like they might be connected with the hate letters.”
    Lei navigated out of the parking lot onto busy South King Street, a quadruple-lane artery that led through the heart of Honolulu. She clicked over to the Bluetooth. “Sounds good.” She angled over a few lanes. “So anything back from Waxman?”
    Lei was still nervous around the acerbic, immaculate special agent in charge. Marcella