31
The list of clientele was short today. So Ivan and Tiny left early. Ivan attended a meeting of his veteran's group while Tiny went to Ko'olau Farmers for a few medicinal plants he'd intended to cultivate. That left aunty Rita, who decided to stay behind and spruce up the office before she called it a day. Boy sat at his desk, finishing up his paperwork. "Where's Tabby and the Rizal Brothers, Aunty?" Boy asked.
"They're deep undercover," Rita said while wiping down the leather chairs with special oil. "We won't hear anything until they surface."
"All right," Boy replied while focusing on a few ledgers. "Are you going to vacuum? If so, I can just do this at home."
"No vacuum today," Aunty Rita sighed.
"What's that for?" Boy paused and looked up at his aunty.
"What?"
"That sigh," Boy pointed his pen at her. "That usually means you have something you want to say in regards to a subject that I don't want to discuss."
"Hanson, it's time you found someone and got married and had a family of your own," Rita paused in the middle of her cleaning. "Your uncles and I can still run the office, and we can mentor Tabby and the Rizals. You wouldn't have to worry about anything." Her reply from her nephew was a heavy sigh and silence. It's what she expected but did not question. Not yet. She moved over to the big picture window, which overlooked South King street and the new student dormitory across the way. Pizza shops, chicken places, and still another coffee house. Rita found it all to be exasperating. "I understand a lot of what is the essence of you is in this office, that won't go away," she said as she pulled and walked one mighty curtain to part to the right, and then the other one to the left. Rita climbed onto the inner ledge, began spraying Windex on the end of the dry cloth, and swathed the thick pane of glass from right to left and then up and down. "And you'll still be the boss, but it's also a good time to start grooming Tabby. I know she's young and rash, and she has her own mind, but.."
It only took Boy a second to look up and see the glint of light make a brief sparkle through the picture window and on the sleeve of aunty Rita's coat. He shot up from his desk while simultaneously throwing his office chair toward Rita. "Iho I lalo!!!" he screamed. Rita dropped to the floor just as the hollow point bullet pierced the thick glass and tore the material on Rita's suit right at the shoulder. Boy's office chair made it just in time to block the second hollow point, obliterating the leg and the arm support. Boy gorilla crawled across the floor in an attempt to get at Rita, but she was already on her feet. "Kanakapapiki!" (son-of-a-bitch!) Her arms shot out, and red flaming orbs blasted forward toward the intended target. Boy grabbed her by the back of her coat and pulled her to the floor. "Stay down!"
"No!" she screamed. "That bastard tore up my good coat! You know how much this thing cost me?!"
Kealoha had already torn the office door from the frame and used it to cover Boy and Rita. As the three made their way down the back steps, a man in fatigues with a paintball mask was already waiting. He fired off armor-piercing rounds at the impenetrable portal. Expending his ammo, the assassin paused to re-load. Kealoha took advantage of the lull and threw the door in a direct line toward the gunman and crushed his sternum, and well as nearly taking off his head. "The car boss!" Kealoha pointed. Covering Boy and Rita, Kealoha got the two into the back seat and shot the Chrysler out of the garage and onto South King. "Let me off at the Jiffy Lube," Boy said. "Take aunty Rita home and stay there until I call you!"
~
The assassin burst into the first-floor dormitory room and dispatched the occupants with a chop to the neck, cutting off the blood supply to the heads. The room faced directly at Boy's office, and the perfect opportunity presented itself. He didn't have to wait. The big picture windows were wide open. The swordsman they sent who promised that he'd get the job done was found choked to death in his high-rise condo unit. His brother would finish the job. The woman named Rita stood in plain view. He'd take that shot first. She dropped suddenly, and his first shot missed the mark. The second followed right after, but a chair appeared out of nowhere and blocked it. The older Hawaiian woman stood up and sent a flame of fire in his direction. He barely got out of the way, but not without getting singed. Time was of the essence, he'd been made, and he had to leave as quickly as he entered. He just made it to street level on University and was now headed to the corner of Kuilei when he bumped into someone he hadn't seen initially. It was his main target, Boy. The assassin had no time to react. With blinding speed and precision, Boy punched the assassin's esophagus straight up into his sternum. With a second punch, Boy struck the man's heart, causing it to stop, thereby killing him instantly.
~
"You didn't ask who or why?" Rita wanted to know while Kealoha already fitted the frame for a new office door.
"The who or why doesn't matter," Boy said. "It's the message that I send back that's important."
"Every few years, some new disgruntled group pops up that we don't know of, and somehow their agenda is to try and kill us," Rita shrugged her shoulders. "I don't get it."
"In answer to your earlier question, aunty," Boy looked at her thoughtfully. "What happened here today is why I haven't tried to find someone and get married."
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