Watching Jack's agile figure disappear into the dense forest, Danny let out a silent sigh.
The last time he had seen this "nephew" of his, Jack had still been a sickly teenager. In just a few short years, he had completely transformed into someone Danny could hardly recognize.
"I'm heading back to the courthouse," Kono said, her face still flushed. She was barefoot—her outdoor boots had been taken by Jack and packed into his bag, because the guy said that since Julie had fled in high heels, he didn't want to end up having to carry her all the way back.
Though she had the face of an Asian woman, Kono had grown up by the beaches of Hawaii, so something like this wasn't enough to make her blush—at least not over someone seeing her wearing cartoon socks with holes so big her toes poked out, and still being unwilling to throw them away after taking off her boots.
Okay, maybe if it were Danny, this old man, or Cheng Hao, her cousin who was more than a dozen years older than her, it really wouldn't matter. In their eyes, she was just a wild girl who was good at fighting.
But when it was someone around her age—and good-looking at that—smiling faintly as he stared at her exposed toes in a daze, that really was embarrassing.
It made Kono feel like one of those bullied boys in TV dramas, whose pants get pulled down in front of their crush, exposing their cartoon elephant-print underwear. Absolutely mortifying.
"I remember you said Jack is your brother's son, right?" Cheng Hao asked with a mischievous grin.
Danny didn't understand why he was bringing that up out of the blue, but nodded instinctively.
"Then shouldn't Jack be calling Kono 'Auntie'? After all, you and I are practically brothers, and Kono is my cousin."
Danny, still baffled by what Cheng Hao was trying to get at, nodded again reflexively—until he saw Kono walking away, flipping them off with her middle finger raised high.
—
Jack, of course, was completely unaware of this little episode. At this moment, he had fully released his senses, doing his best to search for clues in the jungle.
The distinct footprints left by high heels, branches that had been accidentally broken, faint sounds coming from afar, even the subtle traces of perfume and blood lingering in the air.
As previously mentioned, Oahu, being the most developed of the Hawaiian Islands, didn't really have any untouched primeval rainforest.
Compared to the coastal mangroves in Mexico that he had once trekked through for an entire night, or the small islands of Southeast Asia, the isolated environment of Hawaii was actually quite manageable.
Aside from the annoying mosquitoes, there were no pesky snakes or any large animals.
The only animals on Oahu that were bigger than humans were the horses and cattle at the Kualoa Ranch, so all the trails in the jungle had been formed by locals and tourists trampling them over time.
Jack was currently at the northern tip of Oahu, where even backpacking hikers were rare. Adventurous tourists typically chose the less developed Big Island or the more culturally native Kauai.
So as long as he extended his senses, finding signs of someone having passed through the woods two or three hours earlier wasn't all that difficult.
After walking through the jungle for nearly an hour, the high heel prints had already vanished half an hour ago, and the boot prints that followed them had veered off to a different fork in the path.
But by tracking loose pebbles and small, faintly damp indentations, Jack's pace gradually picked up—until he finally stopped in front of a giant banyan tree.
Circling around the tree, Jack slightly flared his nostrils, catching a faint scent of blood. A smile appeared on his face. "Smart girl."
Julie, who had fled into the forest, had long since removed her high heels and carefully stepped only on loose stones to cover her trail. The assassins following her had completely lost her trail as a result.
Those small, dislodged stones and slightly damp patches among the dead leaves were Julie's real footprints—and now that those signs had vanished, it meant the girl was hiding nearby.
Jack circled the massive banyan tree, whose trunk was so wide it would take seven or eight people to encircle it. He was looking to see if there were any signs someone had climbed it.
The tree bark was covered in slippery moss and fungus. Even he would have a hard time climbing it without tools. So Jack brushed aside the many hanging aerial roots of the banyan and looked downward while steadying himself against the trunk. The sound of trickling water reached his ears.
Even tropical jungles had rivers. These rivers appeared and disappeared like those in deserts. When it rained, they flowed; when it didn't, they shrank into creeks or vanished entirely.
The difference was that desert rivers might only appear once a year or disappear within days, leaving behind dry riverbeds or going underground.
In the jungle, though, rivers surfaced much more frequently—sometimes on a daily basis. Especially in tropical island climates like Hawaii, where it rains year-round. Some months had less rainfall, others saw heavy downpours.
Beneath the giant banyan tree was such a stream. It hadn't rained today, but there was still just enough trickling sound to be heard.
The stream had eroded a large cavity around the banyan's roots, and the numerous hanging aerial roots had formed a thick curtain over the opening—making it a pretty good hiding spot.
Jack jumped down directly, his feet making a light noise as he landed. The jungle was far from silent—full of insects and birds chirping noisily—but the subtle sound of his landing still caught the attention of someone hiding inside the hollow.
Heavy breathing revealed that the person was under immense stress. Jack cleared his throat. "Julie Masters?"
The breathing grew heavier and more rapid. Jack had to add, "Come on out. You're safe now. I'm a cop."
The only reply was more hurried breathing. After a long pause, a tense female voice finally responded, "So were the last two."
Jack was speechless. He turned on his flashlight and shone it inside. A girl in a pale yellow shirt was clutching a shard of glass, her wary eyes peering toward him.
She was soaked head to toe—it was hard to tell whether from sweat or water. Her arms and sleeves were stained with blood, and fresh blood was still dripping from the hand holding the glass.
"If I were a bad guy, I'd have just shot you already. The assassins were clearly sent to kill, not to kidnap."
Jack made an effort to be reasonable. When dealing with rational women, he was usually willing to talk a bit more.
As he spoke, he pushed aside some vines and slowly crouched to enter the hollow, found a clean rock to set down his backpack, and pulled out Kono's outdoor boots. "I figure you could use these right about now, right?
There might not be any venomous snakes in Hawaii's jungles, but there are still things like centipedes. So I suggest you put the boots on first, and then I'll take care of that wound for you."
______
(≧◡≦) ♡ Support me and read 20 chapters ahead – patreon.com/Mutter
Every 100 Power Stones = 1 extra chapter on Saturday.
Every 5 reviews = 1 extra chapter on Saturday.