He shrugged. “You care about our history. Bane does too. I don’t think you’d willingly allow any damage. So what about it—did you see anything down there that might hold the bones?”
“There is a cave.” She bit her lip. “It may not matter for any of us, Pete. A seamount is forming. I saw the lava with my own eyes. It’s getting too dangerous to even go down.”
Pete stared, his eyes growing wide. He sighed. “Maybe Pele is protecting the dead in her own way—keeping them from desecration—but I’d hoped to find the cave and seal it with an explosion from further erosion. We don’t want these bones exhumed by the sea.”
She’d always known Pete adhered closely to the old ways, but she hadn’t realized he took it so far as to believe in the ancient gods. At least her parents had made sure she learned about the one true God, even if she wasn’t sure she could trust him anymore. “God may be protecting them,” she corrected.
The smile Pete flashed was full of amusement. “You don’t really know where you fit, do you, Leia? A little of your dad’s Hawaiian beliefs, a little of your mom’s Swedish stoicism, and none of the passion for our spiritual heritage from either. This land belongs to us, not the haoles. Pele will protect her people from the rape of the land.”
He’d put his finger close to the truth about her beliefs, but she refused to let him rile her. “Well, Pele hasn’t done such a good job of that in the past. I’m as Hawaiian as you are, Pete. Your grandmother was Asian. Pele didn’t stop the kingdom from being ripped from us.” She stopped short of telling him he was praying to the wrong god. He was smart enough that he would get her inference.
“I went to church with my aunt a few times. Who wants to fol-low a god who passively submits to whatever comes his way? I want a warrior, a god who will help me fight this battle.” He turned toward the door. “Keep your eyes open for a cave and let me know if you find it. I know you love our history too, Leia. You won’t want it destroyed any more than I do.”
He was right about that. She felt a connection with her culture and her people with an ache that went clear to the bone. Could the cave above the sunken ship hold a burial site? Though she knew it wasn’t safe, she longed to find out. Pete was right—it needed to be sealed off for protection from the sea. Maybe God would use the volcano to do just that, but if not, she owed it to her heritage to help take care of it.
Where are we going?” Leia shouted over the sound of the wind. He was captaining her boat.
Bane grinned and shook his head. “I’m not telling,” he shouted back. He’d spent all afternoon making the arrangements. It hadn’t been easy to get a beach dinner catered. She stuck her tongue out at him, and his grin widened. This was going to be a great evening, he could feel it. The wind whipped her hair around, and a long strand touched his face. He focused his thoughts and drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. No talking just yet, he reminded himself. They’d have a nice dinner, and he’d woo her again. Once she’d mellowed, maybe he could get her to open up about the real reason she’d broken their engagement.
“Did you hear the news?” he asked. “I called Ono to check on the investigation, and he said they’d found the missing drugs at the hospital. The initial inventory was wrong. If the toxicology report comes back with that in Tony’s blood, the murderer had to have gotten it somewhere else. Your mother is off the hook.”
She closed her eyes. “Thank God,” she said. For the first time in quite a while, she realized she meant it. She shut off the engine, and he dropped the anchor overboard. “Here we are,” he said.
She looked around at the deserted beach. “What do you mean, here we are. I thought we were going for dinner.”
“We are.” He nodded toward the beach. “Our restaurant, madam.”
A smile teased the corners of her lips. “What a romantic idea. Did you come up with it yourself, or did Kaia suggest it?”
“It was all hatched in my own brain.” He hopped out of the boat, and they strolled to a table covered with a white tablecloth. The server in the van parked by the sand waved to him and began to haul out the food. Pleasure suffused her face with color. She squeezed his fingers. The pink-and-white sundress she wore fitted her figure perfectly and showed off her shoulders and arms. He could barely take his eyes off her.
The warm caress of the trade winds was like a touch of heaven. He seated her at the table. The server brought drinks and rolls, and the entertainment arrived. Within a few minutes the live entertainment—three singers and a bevy of hula dancers—began to per-form. The sound of the slack-key guitars set the mood, and he could see Leia relaxing.
She fingered the tiny, adorable scar on her lip, but her eyes smiled at him. “I’m impressed,” she said. “This is wonderful. But, Bane—”