Primitive Secrets by Deborah Turrell Atkinson Page A

questions stampeded her mind. O’Toole had to have informed Sakai before he’d copied his chart and shown it to Hamasaki. If he hadn’t, O’Toole would be betraying his patient-physician confidentiality, and that didn’t sound like old Dr. O’Toole. O’Toole must have gone ahead and told Sakai about getting treatment not covered by the HMO, too, or Sakai would never have gone to see Hamasaki. Perhaps the doctor had suggested the visit, perhaps not. O’Toole was certainly walking a minefield of personal, moral, and legal uncertainties.
    Just whom had Hamasaki contacted on Sakai’s or O’Toole’s behalf? Where had he asked his questions? The theft of Hamasaki’s file from her living room floor stuck in Storm’s mind like a raspberry seed in a molar. O’Toole’s name had been scribbled in it, but nothing else, she was sure.
    The announcement came for passengers to prepare for landing. Storm rubbed her burning eyes, then slipped the file back into the briefcase. She wrestled it under the seat, raised her seat back, and gazed out the window at Hilo Harbor. The fragility of life was particularly apparent to her at that moment. Usually, takeoffs and landings were nail-biters for her. Storm watched the ground approach with a thrum of anxiety that, this time, had nothing to do with the aircraft.
    She wondered again about the incidents of the last few days. The letter in the briefcase might be what the thief was after, and this person was someone with enough clout to hire thugs to do the dirty work. There was a chance that Hamasaki had stroked out over the stress of keeping the secret, but Storm didn’t think so. The man thrived on secrets. So had he been killed for threatening to reveal the details of Tom Sakai’s sad story?
    Storm yawned to pop her ears and clear her mind. None of this made sense. The HMO treated thousands of people; Sakai wouldn’t be alone in this struggle. Health maintenance organizations would have their legal eagles lined up to defend the company against many of these lawsuits. And Hamasaki would have known this.
    She stared out the window. She was still missing a large chunk of information. Information that someone might have killed to find.

Chapter 13
    When the plane banked to make its approach, the sun on the water sparkled like rare jewels on blue velvet, a reminder of beauty in the world. Storm tried to dispel the cold breath of eternity prickling her neck with a wish for dry weather on the serpentine two-lane highway that ran from Hilo to Pa’auilo.
    That particular drive demanded a person’s full attention. There are wetter places in the Hawaiian Islands than the northeast coast of the Big Island, but Storm hadn’t seen many. Weeks could pass when one didn’t see the sun peek through the clouds and mist. But when the sun shone, the emerald green of the tropical foliage against the matte black of ancient lava flows startled with its splendor.
    Hilo was surrounded by waterfalls, plants with leaves the size of her VW that bore flowers as big as her head, and orchid farms whose exotic blooms were extolled worldwide. If one were to wander from the well-traveled paths, the silence and aroma of jungle were omnipresent. Decomposing leaves, fragrant blossoms, and lushness so thick that walls of plant growth confronted the explorer. It was not hard to believe in menehane, or the Hawaiian version of leprechauns.
    Hilo itself was a city of about forty thousand people, populated with families who had been there for generations. In the past, many had worked in the sugar cane industry. The last several years, people switched to farming various products like macadamia nuts and coffee. Because of its rainy climate, tourists came through Hilo on the way to Volcano National Park, ate a fast lunch, then hightailed it back to Kona on the sunny side of the island.
    Storm, however, found Hilo’s water-blurred edges more conducive to