Steve Martini - Undue Influence

I turn the page, nothing more.

Up front Dana has her back to me, pressing more buttons on the phone. I think maybe she’s having trouble getting a hotel.

When I look up again, she’s coming down the aisle.

‘I think you’ll like the place,’ she says. ‘I stayed there once with my husband, years ago.’

‘I’m sure it’ll be fine,’ I tell her. This is no vacation.

She swings into the seat and buckles up.

One hand is in my sport coat pocket. I feel the photograph of the little church, now wrapped in a plastic cover — what I have kept back from Dana.

My eyes are still running over the paper. At the bottom of the page there is something of interest, speculation on a federal court vacancy in Capital City, Dana’s name mentioned prominently on a short list of candidates. The lady has juice.

I show it to her, point with my finger at her name.

She makes gestures of modesty.

‘The press,’ she says. ‘Once on their “A” list you never get off. They have to have something to fill in around the ads,’ she says.

But I know better. Dana’s in the power set in Capital City. Well-thought-of and a serious contender for higher office.

We talk for a while, doze on and off. My head is spinning. The blast from this afternoon, the pressure of the cabin, the droning of the engines, all combine to make for fitful sleep.

By the time we do the interisland flight it is nearing midnight Hawaiian time. Stars so bright you want to reach out and grab them as we do the last few miles on the road to Wailea and our hotel. I’m driving the rental car as Dana navigates.

I would have slept in some fleabag near the airport, but Dana insists that we will both need a good night’s sleep for the road to Hana in the morning.

‘You’ve been there?’ I say.

‘Once.’

‘What’s it like?’

‘Everyman’s dream of paradise,’ she says. ‘Azure seas, blue skies, puffy clouds, and the hills are green, very, very green.’

She smiles. ‘And then there is the road to Hana,’ she says.

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘You’ll see in the morning.’

The highway suddenly comes to an end and I make a sweeping right turn down a winding drive toward the sea. We dead-end at the driveway to a shopping center, upscale. I see signs with arrows in every direction, golf courses and clubhouses at every point of the compass.

‘You want to go left,’ she says.

I turn, and about a hundred yards up the road I see the sign for the hotel.

We turn in and stop at the kiosk. A woman in a flowing silk sarong greets us.

‘Welcome to Grand Wailea. Are you staying with us?’

‘The reservation’s under “Colby,”’ says Dana.

‘Of course,’ she says. ‘We got the call.’

The woman gives me a parking pass and sends us through, down the broad curving driveway, past cascades of water backlit by colored lights. We turn and stop under the massive carport at the front entrance. A car hop gets the keys. A bellboy takes our bags. If they had six stars, this place would get them all.

We are lei-ed about the neck as we enter the lobby, something from Elephant Walk — open air and lush vegetation, a reflecting pond larger than some lakes, and an enormous covered bar in the center, its blue-tiled roof floating on concrete spires fifty feet in the air. We are greeted by a girl in starched white livery at reception, a white tunic with gold buttons, Asian eyes, and an accent that rings with intrigue.

They are doing impressions of our credit cards, and I am wondering how mine will hold up.

Dana leans in my ear. ‘Not to worry. I got us a good rate,’ she says.

The girl at the counter smiles.

Great. Three hundred a night, I’m thinking.

They bring us hot hand towels and little glasses of papaya juice. The girl hits the bell twice and our luggage appears on a cart. We follow the bellhop to the elevator, and outside, under stars and flickering tiki torches, past giant banyan trees and a sea of bamboo, palm fronds clacking in the trade winds.

He stops with the rolling cart in front of a door, glossy white enamel with brass fittings, and with the card key opens it. He shows Dana in, drops off her bags, and takes me to my room next door.

I tip him and he’s out the door.

The place is palatial but muggy. I open the plantation louvers and the sliding door behind them, walk out on the balcony overlooking the sea, surging white surf on a curve of beach shimmering in the moonlight.

I hear knocking.

It’s Dana at the adjoining door.

I unlatch my side and she comes in.

‘Like it?’ she says.

‘What’s not to like? The government rate must be a little better than when I worked for the DA,’ I tell her.

‘Pulled a few strings,’ she says. ‘Some people in Honolulu owed me a favor.’

‘Who’s that?’ I say.

‘Some people. Relax,’ she says. ‘Enjoy the evening. Tomorrow comes… the road to Hana.’ She makes it sound ominous, then smiles at me.

It’s a warm night, but the breeze off the ocean carries its own chill. I shiver, more from exhaustion, leaning on the railing at the balcony.

‘Do you want to order something in the room to eat?’

I shake my head.

‘So this is how the other half lives,’ I say. A world away from the gray-cast skies and freezing ground fog of Capital City in the winter.

‘The place really is something, isn’t it?’ She’s reading my mind. ‘You must think I’m awful. The pampered woman. Tagging along and demanding only the best,’ she says.

‘Why?’

‘I should have let you make the arrangements,’ she says. I turn and look at her. A smile. ‘Why would I think you’re awful? Because you have good taste?’ She is shimmering hair, and the magic gleam of night light dancing in amethyst eyes.

‘Now you’re patronizing,’ she says. ‘Believe me, if this trip had taken us to any other place, it would have been government per diem and a travel allowance. Like I said, tonight is a special deal.’

‘Why?’

She looks at me, strokes my face with the side of her hand. ‘You had a rough day. I thought you needed something… special,’ she says.

‘Your husband took you to nice places. He must have been well-heeled.’

‘You sound jealous.’ She winks. A schoolgirl’s grin. ‘You never took Nikki anywhere like this?’

I shake my head. ‘The anxiety attacks waiting for the bill would have stolen all the pleasure,’ I tell her. ‘We’re both blue-collar, down to the third cervical vertebra. Vacations, the few times we took them, were a rented mountain cabin that belonged to a friend, meals in, and vacuum before you leave.’

I turn to the railing. She is behind me, the contour of her body pressed to mine, shielded against the breeze of the trades. I feel her knee in the crook of my own.

‘My husband’s family had money.’ She’s musing, almost talking to herself, leaning on me, her chin nestled on the back of my shoulder.

‘Problem was, Darrel only knew how to spend it. He would have been the prodigal son, except he never really left home. Never grew up,’ she says.

‘Sounds like you had a child to raise after all,’ I say.

‘You could say that. Oh, as a woman I always felt good on Darrel’s arm. He wore the right clothes, made all the proper gestures, he was tall, good-looking in a charming sort of way. He had the kind of humor that can make a woman forgive a lot, and a first impression that lasted longer than the crease in his pants.

‘It took me the better part of the first year to figure out where all the money was coming from. Darrel couldn’t hold a job if he owned the place. Daddy kept buying him businesses, and Darrel kept treating them like hobbies.’