Murder at Waters Edge (Sand and Sea Hawaiian Mystery Book 6) Read online

  Murder at Waters Edge

  by

  Kathi Daley

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Copyright © 2017 by Katherine Daley

  Version 1.0

  All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

  Books by Kathi Daley

  Note to Readers

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Recipes

  Mauna Loa’s Brandy Slush

  Swedish Nut Cake

  Chocolate Mud Pie

  Butter Pecan Cake

  The Shadow Preview

  Books by Kathi Daley

  Giveaway:

  I want to thank the very talented Jessica Fischer for the cover art.

  I so appreciate Bruce Curran, who is always ready and willing to answer my cyber questions, and Peggy Hyndman for helping sleuth out those pesky typos.

  And, of course, thanks to the readers and bloggers in my life, who make doing what I do possible.

  Thank you to Randy Ladenheim-Gil for the editing.

  Special thanks to Connie Correll, Martie Peck, Vivian Shane, and Elizabeth Dent for submitting recipes.

  And finally I want to thank my sister Christy for always lending an ear and my husband Ken for allowing me time to write by taking care of everything else.

  Books by Kathi Daley

  Come for the murder, stay for the romance.

  Zoe Donovan Cozy Mystery:

  Halloween Hijinks

  The Trouble With Turkeys

  Christmas Crazy

  Cupid’s Curse

  Big Bunny Bump-off

  Beach Blanket Barbie

  Maui Madness

  Derby Divas

  Haunted Hamlet

  Turkeys, Tuxes, and Tabbies

  Christmas Cozy

  Alaskan Alliance

  Matrimony Meltdown

  Soul Surrender

  Heavenly Honeymoon

  Hopscotch Homicide

  Ghostly Graveyard

  Santa Sleuth

  Shamrock Shenanigans

  Kitten Kaboodle

  Costume Catastrophe

  Candy Cane Caper

  Holiday Hangover

  Easter Escapade

  Camp Carter – July 2017

  Zimmerman Academy The New Normal

  Ashton Falls Cozy Cookbook

  Whales and Tails Cozy Mystery:

  Romeow and Juliet

  The Mad Catter

  Grimm’s Furry Tail

  Much Ado About Felines

  Legend of Tabby Hollow

  Cat of Christmas Past

  A Tale of Two Tabbies

  The Great Catsby

  Count Catula

  The Cat of Christmas Present

  A Winter’s Tail

  The Taming of the Tabby – June 2017

  Seacliff High Mystery:

  The Secret

  The Curse

  The Relic

  The Conspiracy

  The Grudge

  The Shadow – June 2017

  Sand and Sea Hawaiian Mystery:

  Murder at Dolphin Bay

  Murder at Sunrise Beach

  Murder at the Witching Hour

  Murder at Christmas

  Murder at Turtle Cove

  Murder at Waters Edge

  Road to Christmas Romance:

  Road to Christmas Past

  Writer’s Retreat Southern Mystery:

  First Case

  Second Look – July 2017

  Tj Jensen Paradise Lake Mysteries by Henery Press

  Pumpkins in Paradise

  Snowmen in Paradise

  Bikinis in Paradise

  Christmas in Paradise

  Puppies in Paradise

  Halloween in Paradise

  Treasure in Paradise

  Fireworks in Paradise – October 2017

  Note to Readers

  As of the date this book will be published, several of the locations mentioned are closed due to flooding. It’s uncertain when they’ll reopen so please be sure to check ahead of time if you’re planning a trip to Maui and are considering a visit to any of the places mentioned in the story.

  Chapter 1

  Saturday, April 29

  “For those of you who are just joining us, I want to welcome you to the halfway point of the final leg of the Amazing Brains and Brawn Race for one—million—dollars,” a portly man in a red-and-white Hawaiian shirt said to the crowd. He spoke through a megaphone that not only amplified his voice but added to the air of anticipation as he paused between each word when announcing the amount of the grand prize. “As those of you who have been following this event know, a hundred teams entered the contest four weeks ago. During those four weeks, the teams with the lowest scores have been eliminated and now all that remain are the top-ten teams. Today is the halfway point of the finals, so we’re taking a break to enable the contestants to regroup before making the push to the finish line. The teams with the lowest scores will be eliminated every day from this point forward. The final two teams in the running at the end of the week will compete next Saturday for all that money. The winner will be announced on Sunday, May 7.”

  I tried to pay attention to the announcer, who I was certain would say something I’d end up wishing I’d paid more attention to, but all I could think of was conspiracy and death. My name is Kailani Pope, although everyone except my paternal grandmother calls me Lani. I’m a resident of Oahu but am currently on leave from my job as a water safety officer for the Dolphin Bay Resort to participate in the Amazing Brains and Brawn Race being held on Maui. Participating in the event isn’t something I’ve always aspired to and most likely never would have entered; I was there as a substitute for the sister of my good friend Bethany Halderman, who’d called me on Thursday night to tell me her sister Cammy, a contestant, had been killed in a terrible accident earlier in the evening. According to Bethany, Cammy had called her the morning before her broken body was found at the bottom of a cliff near the resort where the people competing for the million dollars were staying. Cammy had shared with Bethany her suspicion that there was more going on with the hacks the contestants were being asked to complete each day than met the eye. Bethany believed her sister, who was very bright and a computer geek, had discovered something someone didn’t want revealed. This, she reasoned, was the real impetus for Cammy’s accidental tumble from the cliff onto the rocks below, rather than the excess alcohol her teetotalling sister supposedly had drunk.

  Bethany and I decided I would enter the competition as Cammy’s replacement. This would allow me to snoop around from the inside and hopefully find out what really had happened to Cammy. The rules provided for the selection of replacements should one or more of the contestants be unable to continue due to major injury or death. Cammy’s team partner, Stone Silverman, had also been her fiancé. He, understandably, had been so devastated by her death that he’d dropped out and returned home to the mainland. That left Cammy’s team still missing a player and with an
additional problem. Those of you who know me are aware that although I’m only five feet tall, I’m fit and strong and can most likely handle the brawn part of any team, but the brains part—the part where you hack your way into a website to obtain the first clue of the day—is just a bit out of my wheelhouse.

  My boyfriend, Luke Austin, was pretty good with a computer. Unfortunately, he was in Texas, meeting his brand-new niece. Cammy’s body was found on Thursday evening, after she had completed her tasks for the day, and today was Saturday, so I’d already missed any points Team Honu—the name Stone and Cammy had come up with—would have received from competing yesterday. Fortunately, today, day seven of the fourteen-day finals, was a day of rest, so as long as I could compete tomorrow, when the eliminations began, I should be good to go.

  I needed brains to go with my brawn and I needed them fast. Initially I’d had no idea where I was going to come up with someone on such short notice; then I’d remembered my new friend, superhacker and software magnet Zak Zimmerman. Zak was one of the best hackers in the world, so I’d asked him and his wife, Zoe, if they’d be willing to come to Maui for a week to help me uncover a conspiracy. Zoe, who’s even more into sleuthing than I am, promised to be on the next plane west. Actually, they were arriving by private plane, but I got the idea.

  “Excuse me,” I said to a tall woman with long dark hair who was sitting at one of the booths that had been set up to answer whatever questions the contestants had as they headed into the final week. “My name is Kailani Pope. I’m the replacement for Cammy Halderman.”

  The woman looked at me with soft eyes. “I heard about what happened. I spoke to Cammy on several occasions. She was such a sweet little thing. Her accident was such a tragedy. Were you and Cammy friends?”

  “Sort of. I’m friends with her sister, who asked me to fill in. I’m afraid I’m not sure how to proceed.”

  She typed a series of commands into a laptop computer. After a moment she paused and looked back up at me. “According to my notes, Cammy’s partner, Stone Silverman, has also left the completion.”

  “Yes. He was her fiancé and was obviously very distraught. I have a replacement for Stone who’ll be here later this afternoon. I hope that’s okay.”

  She nodded. “Given the circumstances, that will be fine. At the end of the day on Thursday, Team Honu was in second place. I’m afraid that after missing yesterday’s competition and not receiving any points, it’s now in ninth place out of ten teams, although we haven’t yet entered the elimination round. That begins tomorrow, and the two teams with the lowest point total will be eliminated at the end of the day. Points are cumulative, so it’s important for your team to score high enough to bring your total standing up to eighth place at a minimum if you want to continue.”

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Okay. Thank you for explaining that. How exactly does the whole thing work?”

  She reached under the table and pulled out a briefcase. She opened it and took out a folder that contained several documents. Then she handed me what I assumed was an orientation packet. “Every morning at six a.m. local time, a clue will be emailed to each team. The email contains a link that provides a starting point for you to hack into the website specified and retrieve the information asked for. Keep in mind that this is a hack, not an easy entry, so I hope the brains part of your team is up to the challenge in this final round.”

  “I’m sure that won’t be a problem.” Based on what Luke had told me and I had observed, Zak could hack into anything given enough time, so I wasn’t worried about that aspect of the contest at least. “Can any computer be used?”

  “No. Each team has been provided with a computer that must be used throughout the competition. I’ll have to find out what became of the computer assigned to Team Honu and have it brought to you as soon as possible.”

  “Does the hack occur in a centralized location or does each team handle it from their own room?”

  “You’re free to work from wherever you like as long as you use the assigned computer. Once the information is provided to the event coordinators, a clue will be revealed that will lead the team to a location on the island. If the clue is decoded correctly, and the team arrives at the destination intended, the team will be provided with a second clue that will lead to a second destination, followed by a third destination. Once the team reaches that final destination it looks for a phrase or set of numbers that must be entered in the computer. The first team to correctly post the message to the event site is awarded ten points for the day. The second team receives nine points and so on. Point totals are cumulative, so if a team receives ten points the first day and four the second, it would have a cumulative point total of seven. But, as I said, at the end of the day tomorrow the two teams with the lowest cumulative points will be eliminated. Do you have any questions at this point?”

  “No.” I glanced at the crowd that had gathered to meet the contestants. “I understand rooms are provided to the contestants.”

  “Yes.” She typed several commands into the computer. “Team Honu was assigned to room 122. You can find it on the ground floor of the main wing.”

  It seemed to me the contest was a pretty sweet deal even for the teams that were eliminated early. All twenty contestants had been provided an all-expenses-paid stay at a luxury resort for the entire two weeks of the event, regardless of how long their team remained in the running for the money. “Zak and I aren’t a couple, so we’ll need a second room.”

  The woman frowned as she typed additional commands into the computer. “I’m afraid all our standard rooms are booked. Hold on; I’ll call over to the reception desk to see what we can do.”

  I waited while she spoke to someone on the phone. After a couple of minutes she hung up and returned her attention to me. “It looks like the resort has bungalows available, but I’m afraid the upgraded rooms will need to be paid for because they aren’t included in the competition package.”

  I’d visited the huge lakeside mansion Zak and Zoe lived in and knew that paying for a beachfront bungalow wouldn’t be an issue for a man who, Luke had indicated, had made a lot of money in the software industry, so I asked the woman to reserve one in Zak’s name. Luke could stay with me in my room when he arrived on Monday, unless he too wanted to foot the bill for a bungalow. Even though Luke and I had been dating for almost a year, we’d never discussed finances, though based on what I’d observed, a beachfront bungalow wouldn’t be an issue for him either should he decide he wanted an upgrade.

  I did wonder about the lack of supervision as the contestants played the game. It didn’t seem to me the event coordinators really cared whether the contestants had help. Given that the hacks could be accomplished from the privacy of your own room, I didn’t see a way for the coordinators to monitor how many people were in a room when the hack was being accomplished.

  It also seemed odd that, as a resident of the islands, they didn’t have a problem with my acting as Cammy’s substitute. It seemed they would realize I would have an advantage when it came to following the clues due to my familiarity with the area, although there could be locals competing and Maui was a popular vacation spot, so there could be others who’d spent time there. I supposed there wasn’t an easy way to calculate how much time a contestant had spent here, so they hadn’t made it an issue.

  With all my questions answered and the team computer located, I headed to my room and called Luke. He’d only been gone for a week, but I really missed him. His trip hadn’t been planned; his sister had suffered complications during the birth of her first child. We’d been on the mainland on vacation, so when he got the hysterical call from his mother he’d decided to go home for a few days before coming back to the islands. He’d invited me to go to Texas with him, but I hadn’t wanted to meet his parents for the first time during such a stressful moment, so I’d flown home to Oahu while he made the side trip to Texas.

  “How are you holding up?” Luke asked. I assumed he was refer
ring to the fact that someone I knew had died, might very well have been murdered.

  I sat down on a patio chair that had been provided on the lanai. It was a beautiful day and the view of the ocean from my room, while not quite that of a bungalow, was breathtaking. “I’m fine. I feel so bad for Bethany, but I didn’t really know Cammy.”

  “You met Bethany on Oahu?”

  “Yes. Bethany and I met at the Dolphin Bay Resort a few years ago. She grew up in Seattle but decided she wanted to move to the islands, so she got a job working in the surf shop at the resort. We met during an employee meeting and started to hang out from time to time. By the time she moved back to the mainland two years later we were good friends.

  I felt my throat tighten as I glanced out over the lawn that separated the hotel from the white sand beach in the distance. The resort where the contestants were staying was in southwest Maui, which tended to be both hotter and drier than other parts of the island.

  “And Bethany seems certain that her sister’s accident wasn’t just that? An accident?” Luke asked.

  I put my bare feet up on the short wall in front of me as I willed myself to focus on the conversation rather than my confused emotions. “Bethany says Cammy never drank and there would have been absolutely no reason for her to start now. She also told me Cammy was concerned about something she’d discovered during the hacking part of the competition. Bethany is certain Cammy stumbled onto something she shouldn’t have and was killed because of it.”

  “Like what?” Luke asked.

  I sighed. “Bethany didn’t know. I think it might be a good thing I was able to bring Zak on board. I’ll need help from someone with the expertise not only to figure out the clues but to dig deeper to find whatever it was that had Cammy so freaked out.”

  “Are Zak and Zoe arriving today?”

  “Yeah. They said they should be here by around six. Zak wants to get a feel for the computer that’s been provided and maybe check around a bit with his own computer. I did find it sort of odd that at no point did the woman who explained the rules to me make any sort of statement about not having other people helping the teams. I think I’m going ask around about it just to be sure.”