Lokahi Read online

  Table of Contents

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  Books and Plays by Edie Claire

  Excerpt from Hawaiian Shadows, Book Four: The Warning

  HAWAIIAN SHADOWS

  Book Three: LOKAHI

  Copyright © 2016 by Edie Claire

  This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental.

  All Rights Are Reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author.

  Cover design by Cormar Covers.

  Dedication

  For all the Oahu locals who have seen me wandering around carrying bird-watching binoculars and a notebook and wearing my hair in a braid with a visor perched on my head looking like a total loser tourist person — and who have nevertheless managed to smile, or at least politely ignore me.

  Thank you for sharing your home.

  Chapter 1

  [Author’s Note: This is the third book in a series. You’ll really enjoy it much, much more if you read the books in order. So if you didn’t start with Book One: Wraith, you really should return this one and go get that one. Seriously. You’ll be glad you did!]

  Lokahi: A Hawaiian word meaning “harmony” or “unity”

  My exhausted muscles screamed in protest as I pulled myself out of the water at the shallow end of the community pool, dragged my feet across what little grass still survived on the lawn by this point in August, and collapsed on top of my beach towel.

  “You go, girl!” my friend Lacey hooted from her perch on the lifeguard’s chair. “Are we shooting for the Olympic trials now, or what?”

  “Next year, maybe,” a cheerful male voice rang out. Zane was smiling down at me, his wet blond curls glinting in the sun and his green eyes laughing. He gave his head a shake and sprayed me with water droplets.

  “Nice try,” I moaned. “But I am never moving again.”

  He dropped down onto his own towel with a chuckle. “You’re doing great, Kali. I’m proud of you.”

  “Thanks,” I said dryly, feeling my muscles twitch like I was being slowly electrocuted. It’s not like I was in bad shape. I was seventeen and I’d been dancing since I was six. I was limber. I was flexible. I was fit. But doing sixty thousand laps in four different strokes could take it out of a person. Particularly when they’d only just learned to swim two months ago.

  “I’m pretty wiped myself, actually,” Zane admitted, although he wasn’t even breathing hard. “I’ve still got a long way to go.”

  “Only because your goals for yourself are insane!” I protested between pants. Only five months had passed since he’d nearly bled to death in a car accident, and he knew perfectly well that you didn’t bounce back from massive internal injury and a prolonged coma overnight. His doctors had warned him that it could take a year for him to fully regain his strength. He was already progressing way ahead of schedule, but nothing short of his former peak-condition, eighteen-year-old body was good enough for him. “You’re too hard on yourself,” I repeated for the fortieth time.

  And you’re too hard on me, I thought but didn’t say. I knew I shouldn’t say it. He’d helped me get over my fear of drowning and taught me how to swim after every other swimming instructor on the planet had long since given up. Of course, it helped that he was drop-dead gorgeous, not to mention the fact that splashing around in the water with your boyfriend was a whole lot more fun than being a kid taking lessons from some random dude at the Y. Still, to give Zane credit, he was a really good teacher. It’s just that once he’d gotten it into his head that we should go surfing together on the shores of Oahu, he’d turned into the personal fitness trainer from hell.

  Unfortunately for my aching muscles, I was madly in love with him anyway.

  I turned sideways on my towel. It took effort.

  “You said that whenever I hit Goal #8 we could spend a whole afternoon on the beach and then eat dinner at La Ola,” I reminded him. “And that we wouldn’t have to swim laps the whole next week.”

  He turned his head toward mine with a smirk. “Dream on. I agreed to the beach and La Ola, no more.”

  I sighed. “It was worth a shot. Next week is the last week of summer, you know.”

  I cringed to hear the words out loud. They were so darned sad. Not that I wasn’t looking forward to starting my senior year at Frederick High School in Honolulu. I was. And technically, once Zane moved into the dorms at the University of Hawaii he would be living closer to me than he did right now. But still, I didn’t want summer to end. These precious weeks of vacation with Zane had been far too amazing. Too fun-filled. Too warm. Too cuddly. Too blissfully carefree.

  Way, way too short.

  With my only job being to fix up the family’s house in Honolulu and Zane’s taking the summer off altogether to recuperate, we’d had a heavenly amount of time to spend together, even if he did live all the way out on the North Shore. Half the time that I’d been pulling up carpet, wiping away grime, and repainting walls he’d been by my side helping me, even though he refused any pay himself. In my free time we’d swum at the pool, toured the island, or just relaxed on the beaches near his place, catching up on a lifetime of dumb stuff from our childhoods, puzzling out how to solve the world’s problems, and feeling our way through the whole “relationship” thing one lazy, dreamy day at a time.

  Now we had only one more week. Then it was back to English Lit and Calculus.

  Ugh.

  Zane threw me a sexy smile that showed his dimples — the smile that still got to me every time. My tall, boyish figure and unruly crown of dark brown curls might not be society’s idea of female perfection, but when he looked at me like that, I couldn’t help but feel beautiful. “Don’t look so down,” he chastised. “Senior year is a happy thing, remember? I’m the one who should be depressed. I’m the one who has to leave the North Shore just when the surf starts pumping!”

  “I know,” I admitted. “I shouldn’t be so bummed. I’m not even sure why I am, really. I do like school. I think it’s just that the summer’s been so great, and also that…” my words trailed off as bittersweet memories swamped my brain. Last day of summer. Back in Wyoming my best friends Kylee and Tara and I had always celebrated in style just like the last day of school, with a little bit of craziness, a lot of laughs, and extreme amounts of junk food. I missed them both terribly.

  “You miss Kylee and Tara, don’t you?” Zane asked. “Even more when you think about starting school again?”

  I smiled at him. “You are creepy perceptive for a guy, you know that?”

  He shrugged and lay back flat on his towel. “It’s a gift.”

  I propped myself up on an elbow. “It better not be that kind of gift!” I teased. “You and I are gifted enough already, thank you very much. I do not want you reading my mind.”

  He looked at me out of
the corner of his eye, then closed both his lids against the sun. There was something in his expression that rang an alarm bell in my brain. He looked almost halfway… guilty.

  “Zane?” I asked sharply. “You can’t read my mind. Can you?”

  His eyes flew open. “Of course not.”

  We stared at each other a moment.

  He was definitely hiding something.

  Crap!

  My heart began to pound. Ever since Zane’s near-death experience in March, he’d been able to see ghosts. Four of them, that we knew of. A guy in his rehab hospital in California, my grandmother Kalia, a former neighbor woman here in Honolulu, and then just last month the ghost of an Australian tourist girl in Haleiwa. He’d been able to help all of them in one way or another, which made his gift maddeningly more useful than either of mine. I could see shadows of the past — explained to me as “residue from bursts of intense emotional energy” — and I could feel the emotions of everyone around me, both the living and the shadow people, too. But the first had made for a freakish childhood and the second would have driven me insane had Kylee’s grandmother not taught me a way to shield myself. My “gifts” were a mixed blessing, at best, but at least I had more experience in dealing with them. Despite the fact that Zane had actually been through an out-of-body experience himself, the idea of bumping into another lost soul in the middle of an ordinary day still freaked him out. If he did feel something else going on, something even more weird, he might not want to admit it. Even to himself.

  The more I thought about it, the more suspicious I got. Every day, all summer long, I had felt my own abilities increasing. I could see more and feel more, but I also got better at blocking things out. Gifts like mine, I had been told, blossomed with maturity. They also drew strength from the intensity of a person’s emotions. And there was no question that every day I spent with Zane, I was falling more deeply in love with him.

  Did he feel the same way about me? And if he did, was something else going on with him? Something new?

  The idea was as exciting as it was terrifying. Because, now that I thought about it, I had noticed that his mind seemed to be wandering more often lately. I would look at him, and his thoughts would be elsewhere, and I would have to get his attention. When I asked what he was thinking about, he never gave a real answer.

  Then again, everyone did that sometimes. Was I making something out of nothing?

  Lacey cried out suddenly, startling me. I sat up and looked toward where she sat on her lifeguard’s chair, but it was clear that no one was drowning. She didn’t look distressed; she looked giddy with happiness. I followed her eyes as she glanced toward the pool’s front gate. Then I exhaled with annoyance.

  “Rebound guy’s back,” I mumbled to Zane.

  “Austin!” Lacey called, twisting in her chair to wave at the tall, lean blond-headed guy who waited outside the entrance. “I’m on break in two minutes! Hang on!”

  “Don’t count on it, Lace,” I grumbled under my breath.

  I’ve never been the meddling type. Really, I haven’t. But watching Lacey, who had just gotten her heart broken at the beginning of the summer by a faithless longtime boyfriend, fawn over such an obvious player was seriously painful.

  “He bailed on her three times last week, you know,” I whispered to Zane bitterly. “Three times!” Lacey had been “dating” Austin half the summer now, which as far as I could tell meant that whenever he was actually with her, he treated her like she was his girlfriend. The problem was that when he wasn’t with her, he might or might not answer texts and he completely ignored phone calls. They would talk in vague terms about getting together in the future, but when it came to making actual plans, he would get cagey. Whenever Lace did pin him down to doing anything it was usually only a couple hours beforehand, and even then, half the time he would cancel at the last minute for stupid reasons or no reason at all. What made me crazy was that whenever he actually did show, Lacey acted like he was doing her a favor.

  The guy was cute, there was no question about that. And he could act very sweet. But I hated the way he treated her and I hated even more the fact that she put up with it.

  “She should know better!” I continued to bemoan. “Particularly after what happened with Ty. Can’t she see that he’s just not that into her? She’s going to get herself hurt again.”

  Zane cracked open an eye and looked at me, but made no comment.

  “What does that look mean?”

  He smirked. “Can’t you read my mind?”

  “You know I can’t!”

  “It means,” he said mildly, “matchmaking never works. Let it go, Kali.”

  “Let what go?”

  He threw me another look, and this time I suppose I could read his mind. He knew there was another reason why Lacey’s infatuation with rebound guy got under my skin. She was supposed to be with somebody else. She and our mutual friend Matt were perfect for each other. Unfortunately, neither one of them seemed aware of this obvious truth. So what if I was anxious to… well, help fate along?

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I replied with a smirk of my own.

  One of the lifeguards stepped up to relieve Lacey and she jumped down out of the chair. Lace was short and slightly on the plump side with naturally blond hair and friendly blue eyes. The smile she flashed at Austin lit up her whole face, and as she practically skipped off toward the pool gates, she looked dazzlingly pretty.

  No, Lacey! I secretly begged her. You’re too good for him!

  She kept going anyway. Austin met her with a showy hug followed by a PG-13 kiss, and I turned my head away and flopped flat on my towel again.

  “Just give me five more minutes to catch my breath, okay?” I said to Zane. “Then how about we go to Turtle Bay and do some snorkeling? We could walk north up the beach, too, toward the bird sanctuary. I like it up there. It’s practically deserted… so peaceful.”

  Zane made no response that I could hear, which I decided to take as agreement. His eyes were closed, and I closed mine also, and we both lay still, soaking up the sun. The moment was surprisingly restful. The pool wasn’t nearly as loud and chaotic as it had been at the beginning of the summer. The littlest kids were still coming, but most of the older crowd had already bored of the summer routine and gone back to staring at screens all day. Personally, if it weren’t for missing Tara and Kylee, I wouldn’t care if I never saw a screen again.

  I walked my fingers across the grass between us and onto Zane’s beach towel. My hand brushed his, and the amazing sensation of warmth and happiness that I’d become used to now — but still loved to feel every time we touched — spread up my arm and put a smile on my face. Oh, yeah. Who needed screens? The real world suited me just fine.

  My fingers curled around his. But he did not hold my hand back. His own fingers were limp.

  Was he asleep? I propped myself up on an elbow and looked at him. His eyes were closed. His head was tilted slightly away from me. “Zane?”

  He made no response. My heart skipped a beat. I sat up, put a hand on his shoulder, and shook him gently.

  His head wobbled a bit, but his eyes didn’t open.

  I totally panicked.

  “Zane!” I cried. I patted his cheek, but he made no response. I pried open his lids, and one beautiful eye stared back at me. Blank. Unseeing. I jiggled him by the shoulder again. He was warm. He was breathing. What was wrong with him?

  My body went cold as ice. All at once it was as though this whole, magical summer had never happened, as though every incredible minute of it had been nothing but a dream. I was back in that long-term care home in Nebraska, looking at a Zane who was sickly pale and comatose and barely alive, and I didn’t know if I had gotten to him in time, if he was too far gone already, if he would ever wake up again…

  “Zane!” I pleaded at a near-scream, my voice frantic as I put both my hands on his shoulders and shook him again, hard.

&
nbsp; “What?” he cried out gruffly, pulling himself up onto his elbows with a jerk. “Kali, what is wrong with you?”

  I let go of his shoulders, then sank slowly back on my heels. My whole body trembled. If I didn’t love the guy so much, I would definitely kill him.

  “What’s wrong with me?” I sputtered. “You were… like, in a daze or something. I couldn’t wake you up!”

  He stared back at me with confusion. After a few seconds, his expression turned grim. Then he looked at me apologetically. “I scared you, didn’t I?”

  I nodded. There wasn’t much point in denying it. My breath was coming in ragged gulps.

  “I’m sorry,” he said sincerely, sitting up. “Why don’t we head on out to the beach?”

  My heart fell. I wanted a hug. I needed a hug. But it didn’t look like I was going to get one. Zane had always insisted that the intensity of the physical vibe between us was way beyond natural, and because of that, I guess, he was always a little guarded. But over the summer I thought we’d managed to work that out. He knew when I wanted to be held, and he could handle that now. He could handle kissing me, too — as long as I didn’t push it when he needed to back off. But right now, we were clearly out of sync again.

  He stood and pulled up his towel.

  I rose on my own still-shaky legs and did the same. We dried off and slipped back in our clothes and shoes, and I kept trying to catch his gaze, but couldn’t. He was intentionally avoiding my eyes. “Ready?” he asked finally, looking off toward the parking lot as he dangled his keys in his hand.

  There was definitely something wrong with him. “Those don’t work in my car,” I reminded.

  He looked down at his keys with a dazed expression, then dropped them back in a pocket. “Oh, right. What I meant to say was, ‘I’m ready. Let’s roll!’”

  His attempt at a smile was beyond pathetic.

  I frowned at him. “I’ve seen better acting in those commercials where a car dealer just stands there screaming at the camera.”

  Zane frowned back at me. His mother had been a professional actress, and ordinarily he was very talented himself. I knew my jab would get to him, and I felt bad about that, but I was determined to make him look me in the eyes, which he did without thinking. And the instant our gazes connected, my body felt like ice again.