Surfing Detective 00 - The Making of Murder on Molokai

riding
next to him in his car, and his using surfing as a metaphor for
life and a way to solve problems and cases. But his ever-present badge of belonging as a surfer is the crescent of sixteen welts on his chest. He was attacked, as he tells us, one morning at Laniakea. A tiger shark bit him once and swam away. Kai unveils his shark bite in each book, typically in intimate moments. Below is one of those moments–cut from chapter twelve of
Murder on Moloka‘i–
in which Kai accompanies his client, Adrienne Ridgely, to her room after drinks at the Halek
u
lani Hotel. Following this is the sequel to the scene where he reminisces about his evening with her.

(cut from)
twelve

    Sometime during that evening, I forget exactly when, we ordered from room service Mumms champagne and a
pupu
platter of seared
‘ahi,
fried mozzarella, and sesame chicken in ginger sauce. Emboldened by the Mumms, Adrienne explored with tentative fingertips the crescent of pink welts on my chest. Each of the sixteen raised teeth marks she touched slowly, methodically–one at time.
    “Oh, you poor thing!” She stood back and gazed at the half moon-shaped bite. “You
poor thing.”
    I let it pass.
    Adrienne wasn’t the first woman to touch my shark “trophy,” but her warm, soothing caress penetrated like deep heat–down to that dark secret place where I had filed away and forgotten the attack. Her touch on those scars felt more intimate than our love making.
Why?
I had no wish to relive that morning at Laniakea. Being able to remember is a useful skill; being able to forget is better.
For real.
Otherwise, how could I ever surf again?
    After the champagne and
pupus
, I left the Halekulani at about three, stumbling back to my apartment through the drowsy, moonlit streets of Waikiki.
    Five hours later I dragged myself aboard a crowded DC-10 bound for Los Angeles. It was Monday, October 9. Booking the flight only the day before, I found myself sandwiched in the cramped middle section of the coach cabin.
Bummahs.
Every time I tried to snooze, another passenger crawled over me to stretch or use the lavatory and I awoke with an aching head and a guilty conscience.
    My Technicolor dreams featured gauzy images of slender, supple Adrienne, her baby soft skin luminous in the buttery Waikiki moonlight. I tasted again her sweet, coconut milk kiss–her deeply passionate kiss. This cool, crisp, headstrong woman from Boston had shown yet another side.
    Two aspirin eased the throb at my temples, but did nothing for my nagging conscience. Here I was only hours from seeing Niki and I’d just slept with another woman.

VIII: Chapter Twelve: La Casa Nova

    Later in chapter twelve, after interviewing witness and suspect Emery Archibald at his Glendale, California travel agency, Kai visits the apartment of his girlfriend, Niki, in Marina Del Rey, near the Los Angeles airport. Niki is not at home, but her other boyfriend is–an airline pilot named Jacoby. This is a sad revelation for Kai, but his just desserts, as he himself admits. Since he has just spent the night with his client, he is in no position to blame Niki for seeing someone else. The scene of his encounter with Jacoby that runs two pages in the published novel, extends to nearly six in the earlier drafts and contains numerous details and nuances cut from the book. Why was the scene cut? Perhaps because it develops Kai’s character more than it contributes to the solution of the crime.

twelve
(longer version)

    By ten that morning I was driving down Glenoaks Boulevard back to the Red Lion hotel. I gathered my things, checked out, and headed for L.A. International, retracing my path on the now less choked Ventura and San Diego Freeways. My flight to Honolulu departed at two, so I had plenty of time to surprise Niki and, if she was home, call the airline to extend my stay another day. Having gained little from the business part of this trip, I would at least redeem the
pleasure
part.
    Mid-morning freeway traffic barreled along at seventy-
plus
. Some
l
o
l
o
maniac in a Buick cut in front of me, nearly forcing my rented Taurus onto the shoulder.
    L.A. freeways always shatter my nerves. I scanned the radio for some soul-soothing Hawaiian music–Brothers Cazimero, Makaha Sons, Iz, Sistah Robi, Keali‘i Reichel, Cecil & Kapono, and
da kine–
predictably finding none. I settled instead for a call-in talk show hosted by an eloquent British man. Coincidentally, the topic was raising the California