The Scam by Janet Evanovich Read Free Book Online

find my dad.”
    “No way am I staying behind. He’s your father and my friend. We’re all family. Besides, how many regimes has he helped overthrow in his career? He might be plotting a revolution. Hawaii could declare its independence if we don’t do something.”
    —
    The private jet carrying Nick and Kate landed at Van Nuys Airport at midnight. Nick was met by a chauffeured Rolls-Royce and motored away into the darkness for parts unknown. Kate drove to her apartment in Tarzana, packed a bag, booked a seat on an 8  A.M. flight out of LAX to Honolulu, and stole a few hours of sleep. At 6  A.M. she called Jessup on her way to the airport. “I need to take a couple personal days. I’m having trouble contacting my father in Hawaii. I’m worried something is wrong.”
    “I’ll alert the TSA you’re traveling and notify our field office in Honolulu. If there is anything else I can do, just let me know. All I ask is that you please take care of yourself, limit the property damage, and try to avoid killing anyone.”
    “I’ll do my best,” Kate said.
    —
    Her plane landed in Honolulu a little before noon. Kate rented a Jeep Wrangler and headed for the North Shore, following the directions to the Kahuku police station on her phone’s map app.
    The freeway snaked up through the mountains, lush with palms and pines, then descended on the other side, passing through vast pineapple fields that led to the sleepy beach town of Haleiwa, the heart of the North Shore.
    Haleiwa had a pleasant laid-back, hippie vibe. Oceanfront homes ran along the coastline, buffered from the two-lane highway by groves of banyan trees. There were a few parking lots for public access to the sand and the rocky shoreline. The beaches were stunning, and the waves were huge. On the south side of the highway there were some bungalows, an occasional small restaurant or shop, and beyond that, the thick forest leading back up to the jagged green mountain range.
    Kate continued to follow the Kamehameha Highway for a few more miles, and finally came to an old sugar mill. The blackened wreckage of what must have been some sort of vehicle was parked in the lot. She assumed this was Harlan’s food truck.
    The Kahuku police station was just up the road from the sugar mill—so close that the cops could have arrived at the crime scene faster on foot than in their cars. It was a significant fact to Kate. If the explosion
wasn’t
an accident, someone had either big cojones or the cops in his pocket. Neither prospect thrilled her.
    Kate parked beside the lone police car, got out, and walked into the station. She flashed her FBI badge to the desk clerk, a bored Hawaiian woman doing paperwork, and asked to see Lieutenant Gregg Steadman. The clerk nodded in the direction of the door behind her. Kate walked through the door into a cramped squad room that looked like a storage unit for surplus office furniture, old files, and obsolete computer equipment. Sitting in the middle of it all, behind a gray metal desk, was a slim, slightly rumpled guy in his thirties.
    “Lieutenant Steadman? I’m Special Agent Kate O’Hare.” She offered him her hand.
    He stood up, shook her hand, and cleared some files off the seat beside his desk. “It’s Gregg, and you don’t need to play the FBI card. I’m going to help you all I can, and since you’re in law enforcement, I’m going to be more candid with you than I would be with a civilian.”
    “I appreciate that. All I’m interested in is finding my dad and making sure he’s safe.”
    “I don’t know where he is, but I doubt he’s safe. Harlan Appleton operates a food truck in the old sugar mill parking lot. He makes some tasty barbecue and gets a long line at lunchtime. This doesn’t please the locals running the shrimp trucks. I don’t have proof, but I suspect Harlan’s food truck was blown up because he refused to pay protection money to Lono Alika’s gang. Now Harlan’s in the hospital, and the next thing