She nodded. “The earth holds so many secrets. It’s my job to tease them out, to coax the stones and strata into revealing our past and how the earth came to be.”
“I don’t think I’d have the patience either. I just turn to the Bible and know that God created it all.”
She leaned her head back against the smooth, black wall. “It’s exciting to see how the Bible lines up with science.”
“It’s science’s job to line up with the Bible.”
She blinked. “Uh yeah, sure.”
He wondered what her spiritual life was like. He knew her family attended church, but science had always been more important than anything else to the Tagama family. He started to say something else, but Annie held her finger to her lips.
“Shh.”
“What is it?” he whispered.
“I heard something. It came from the back.”
They both got up and crept to the back opening of the lava tube. It was barely large enough to crawl through. A thud came through, faint and to the left of the lava tube. “Let’s check it out,” Mano whispered. He wiggled through the opening, then helped Annie step out of the tube. “I think it was this way.”
Annie’s breathing quickened, and he knew she was scared. And no wonder. The light was going now, fading fast with the coming of twilight. The sound of the waves crashing on the rocks beyond the hill sounded like a dragon gnashing its teeth. Hardly anyone ever came out here. It was Tagama land, though they never would have stopped a casual tourist from strolling the grounds.
This didn’t sound like a tourist. The noise was a furtive, dragging sound, as though someone didn’t want to be heard or seen. Mano wasn’t sure why he was certain of that fact, but he was. He clasped Annie’s hand and wished he’d brought his gun. Or a knife. He stopped and picked up a sharp rock. It was better than nothing.
“Maybe we should call Sam,” she whispered.
Mano shook his head. “No time.” He released her hand. “Stay here. I’ll be right back.”
“I’m coming too.” She stayed close to him.
He didn’t argue. The sound had stopped now, but the air had a watching and waiting quality. There was no telling what they would find behind the line of scrubby shrubs. It was now or never, though. The last of the light would be gone in a few more minutes.
He grabbed another rock and tossed it into the darkness of the trees. There was a sudden whoosh of wind, and he heard the sound of someone running away. “Hey. You there! Wait.” He plunged into the cool shade of the palms, then stumbled as his feet contacted something in the path. It was too soft to be a rock.
Annie uttered a cry and put her hand over her mouth. He stared down into Noah Sommers’s face. Mano knelt and touched him. Too late. From the coldness of the body, he knew the man had been dead awhile. Dog tags lay beside the body. He didn’t touch them but could see the name engraved on them. Tomiko Tagama. “Call Sam,” he said.
Sympathetic friends and family filled Jillian’s small house. Annie sat with Heidi in the lanai. Green and white cushions on wicker furniture crowded the narrow room. Plumeria bloomed outside the screened-in area, and their fragrance drifted in, though she couldn’t see them in the dark. She and the little girl sat on the wicker loveseat. Heidi hadn’t cried yet. Annie thought it probably hadn’t soaked in yet that she’d lost her father. Mano was with Jillian in the living room, and the low tenor of his voice drifted through the door. The sound comforted Annie.
No one wanted Heidi around while Sam was asking Jillian questions. It probably didn’t look good that Noah and Jillian were estranged. Jillian would never have killed Noah, but Annie knew the police would be investigating the whole situation. Where did Tomi fit in? She refused to believe her brother could have had anything to do with the murder.
She picked up Heidi’s hand. “Want to play a game?” she asked.
Heidi shook her head. “Can we pray for my dad?”
It was a little late now, but Annie didn’t point that out. She was pretty rusty at the praying thing.
“I asked Jesus into my heart last year,” Heidi confided. “He’ll take care of my dad.”
“I was your age when I asked Jesus too,” Annie said. She remembered the frilly red dress she’d worn that day and how her heart pounded so hard she thought she could see it bounce against her dress. She’d pressed her hand over it to keep it in place, and her teacher thought she was getting sick.
Where had that excitement gone? Little by little, other things had crept in. It hadn’t helped that her parents cautioned her not to let religion take too strong a hold on her life.
Heidi tugged at her hand. “You want me to pray?”