Surfing Detective 02 - Wipeout

water, a few were now coming in, while others were just paddling out. I looked around hoping to see someone I knew. Cousin Alika on his yellow board was still in the water. I scanned the faces on the beach.
    “Ham!” I said, seeing Alika’s surfing buddy who’d made us those deli sandwiches in Hale‘iwa. “Get off work fo’ check out da surf?”
    “Kai, bruddah,” Ham said and shook my hand local style, the Polynesian tattoo on his bicep dancing.
    “Yeah, I wen’ make sandwiches fo’ da lunch crowd, then I dig out.”
    “Ham, you do me one favor?”
    “Shoots,” he said, tossing his sun-bleached dreadlocks.
    “One
haole
guy in da lineup on da orange board—see um?” I pointed.
    “Yeah, brah,” Ham squinted. “Jus’ one orange speck way out dere.”
    “Dat’s him, da California surfah named Corky, you know, da guy dat wipe out Christmas Eve. Tell him come in. If he no come, you round up Alika and da boyz and encourage him, o.k.?”
    “He alive? Da surfah dat wipe out stay alive?”
    “Yeah, his wife
hapai
and jus’ deliver one
keiki
at Kahuku Hospital. I goin’ drive him down dere.”
    “Dis guy goin’ come in.” Ham’s serious face looked determined.
    “Tanks, ‘eh?”
    “No mention.” Ham mounted his board and paddled into the boiling surf.
    I sat on the beach and waited. For the first time since this whole twisted case began, I actually felt peaceful. Summer was alive and well, and so was her baby girl. And Summer’s estranged husband, by some miracle I might never understand, was also still alive. I wondered how he might react. Would he believe the child was his? Would he care?
    A half hour went by before I saw the orange gun coming in. The closer he got, the more he looked like the photo Summer had brought to Denny’sin Waikiki that rainy Monday morning.
    Straw yellow hair. Boyish face, and now that blond beard. Not until he walked up the beach could I see his green eyes clearly and understand how both Summer and Maya might have fallen for him. Something about his churlish expression said, “I’m cool.”
    He scanned the beach with the board under his arm and a totally pissed look on his face.
    “Corky McDahl?” I approached him. “Your wife has just given birth to your new daughter.”
    “Says who?”
he blustered with boyhood bravado.
    “Kai Cooke.” I replied. “I’m the private detective she hired to find you.”
    “The kid ain’t mine.” Corky was all attitude. “You got no right to pull me out of the water on such a good day.” He turned back toward the waves.
    I reached for his arm, but he was already trotting down the beach, heading for the shore break. I ran after him and grabbed a rail of his surfboard.
    “Chill!”
He yanked away the orange gun. As his toes touched the water, from my khakis I pulled my own gun—the Smith & Wesson.
    “Hold on.” I pointed it at his head.
    “Piss off.”
He kept walking into the water.
    I aimed at his board and fired, ripping a hole through it the size of a silver dollar.
    He peered back at me. “You’re f–k’n
crazy,
man!”
    “Let’s go.” I pointed the smoldering Smith & Wesson toward my Impala in the parking lot. “I won’t hurt you enough to get charged with anything serious, but if I were to drop my gun, say, and it accidentally discharged into your foot, you could miss a lot more than one day of good surf.”
    Corky scratched his blond mop with the hand that wasn’t cradling his damaged board. Then he started walking with me toward my car. A small crowd had gathered around us and followed behind. I figured someone had already dialed “911” by now, so we needed to move fast.
    I gestured to the racks on my Impala’s teal roof: “Strap your board up there and be quick.”
    Without snarly comment or surly retort, Corky lifted his surfboard onto my racks. I could see blue sky through that silver dollar-sized hole.
    “You drive,” I said, as much as I hated turning over the wheel to anybody, especially this guy. “I’ll make sure we get there.” I held the gun level. Corky climbed into the driver’s seat. I shut the door behind me and glanced over my shoulder. No police escorts yet.
    Corky didn’t say a word during our brief ride. So I decided to break the ice.
    “DiCarlo isn’t the father, according to your wife. The baby is yours.”
    Corky didn’t respond, his green eyes fixed on the road.
    “Look. You and your wife can sort it out. But right now she needs you.”
    “Like I really