Julia laughed again. “Bruno. He's a Rottweiler.”

“I knew that,” Henri said, sitting back as the waitress brought his salad and asked Julia for her order, grilled chicken and a mai tai.

“Even if I were to stay over another night, I never date photographers,” she said, eyeing the camera resting on the table facing her.

“Have I asked you out?”

“You will.”

Their grins turned into laughter, and then Rollins said, “All right, I'll ask you out. And I'm taking your picture so the guys in Loxahatchee won't think I made this up.”

“Okay, but take off your sunglasses, Charlie. I want to see your eyes.”

“Show me yours, I'll show you mine.”

WHOOOOOOO,” Julia screamed as the chopper yawed into the coral-gold sky. The little island of Lanai grew huge, and then they were dropping softly to the tiny private heliport at the edge of the vast Island Breezes Hotel's greener-than-green golf course.

Charlie got out first and helped Julia to the ground as she held the collar of her windbreaker closed, her curly hair parting, her cheeks flushed. They ducked under the rotor blades and ran to a waiting car.

“You've got a great expense account, buddy,” she said breathlessly.

“Our dream date's on me, Julia.”

“Really?”

“What kind of person would expense a date with you?”

“Awww.”

The driver opened the doors, and then the car rolled slowly over the carriage road to the hotel, Julia gasping as she entered the lobby, all velvety teal and gold and burgundy, dense Chinese carpets and ancient statuary. The sunset streamed through the open-air space, almost stealing the show.

Julia and Charlie had their twin massages in a bamboo hut open to the ocean's rhythmic pounding on the shore. The masseurs quartered the plumeria-scented sheets that covered them as their strong hands massaged in cocoa butter before proceeding to the long strokes of the traditional lomi lomi massage.

Julia, lying on her stomach, smiled lazily at the man she'd just met, saying, “This is too good. I don't want it to ever stop.”

“It only gets better from here.”

Dinner came hours later at the restaurant on the main floor. Pillars and soft lighting were the backdrop for their feast of shrimp and Kurubuta pork chops with mango chutney and an excellent French wine. And Julia was happy to let Charlie lead her in conversation about herself. She opened up to him, talking about her upbringing on an army base in Beirut, her move to Los Angeles, her lucky break.

Charlie ordered a dessert wine and the entire dessert menu: zuccotto, pralines and milk, chocolate mousse, Lanai bananas caramelized by the waiter at the table. The delicious fragrance of burnt sugar made him hungry all over again. He looked at the girl, and she was a girl now, sweet and vulnerable and available to him.

Four thousand dollars had been well spent, even if he stopped right now.

But he didn't.

They changed into their swimsuits in a cabana by the pool and took a long walk on the beach. Moonlight bathed the sand, turning the ocean into a magical meeting of rushing sound and frothing foam.

And then Julia laughed, and said, “Last one in the water is an old poop, and that will be you, Charlie.”

She ran, screamed as the water lapped her thighs, and Charlie snapped off some quick shots before putting his camera back inside his duffel bag and setting it down.

“Let's see who's an old poop.”

He sprinted toward her, dove into the waves, and surfaced with his arms around her.

After a quick dinner out with Keola, I returned to my hotel room, checked for messages, had no new calls from the woman with the accent, or anyone else. I cranked up my computer, and after a while I sent a pretty fine seven-hundred-word story to Aronstein's in-box at the L.A. Times.

Work done for today, I turned on the TV and saw that Kim's story was headlining the ten o'clock news.

There was a banner, “Breaking News,” and then the talking heads announced that Doug Cahill was a presumed suspect in the presumed abduction of Kim McDaniels. Cahill's picture came on the screen, fully uniformed for a Chicago Bears game, smiling at the camera like a movie star, all 6 feet, 3 inches, and 250 pounds of him.

Anyone would have been able to do the math. Cahill could've easily picked up 110-pound Kim McDaniels and carried her under his arm like a football.

And then my eyes nearly jumped out of my head.

Cahill was shown in a video clip that had been shot two hours earlier. While I was having pizza with Eddie Keola, the action had taken place right outside the police station in Kihei.

Cahill was flanked by two lawyers, one of whom I recognized. Amos Brock was dapper in his pearl gray suit, a New York criminal defense attorney with a history of representing celebrities and sports stars who'd gone too far over to the dark side. Brock had turned into a star himself, and now he was defending Doug Cahill.

Station KITV had cameras trained on Cahill and Brock. Brock stepped to the microphone, said, “My client, Doug Cahill, hasn't been charged with anything. The accusations against him are preposterous. There's not a speck of evidence to support any of the allegations that have been going around, which is why my client hasn't been charged. Doug wants to speak publicly, this one and only time.”

I grabbed the phone, woke Levon out of what sounded like a deep sleep. “Levon. It's Ben. Turn on the TV. Channel four. Hurry.”

I stayed on with Levon as Cahill stood front and center. He was unshaven, wearing a blue cotton button-down shirt under a well-cut sports jacket. Without the pads and the uniform, he looked relatively tame, like a kid in a Wall Street management training program.

“I came to Maui to see Kim,” Doug said, his voice shaking, thick with the tears that were also wetting his cheeks. “I saw her for about ten minutes three days ago and never saw her after that. I didn't hurt her. I love Kim, and I'm staying here until we find her.”

Cahill handed the mic back to Brock: “To repeat, Doug had nothing to do with Kim's disappearance, and I will absolutely, unequivocally bring action against anyone who defames him. That's all we have to say for the moment. Thank you.”

Levon said to me, “What do you make of that? The lawyer? Doug?”

“Doug was pretty convincing,” I said. “Either he loves her. Or he's a very good liar.”

I had another thought, one I didn't share with Levon. Those seven hundred words I'd just sent to Aronstein at the Times?

They were old news.

I e-mailed my editor, told him that Doug Cahill was going to be chum for the media feeding frenzy and why: that a mystery witness had seen him coming on strong with Kim, and that Cahill was being represented by Amos Brock, the current champion bully of defense attorneys.

“Here's an updated version of my article,” I wrote Aronstein. “If nothing else, I'm fast.”

And then I called our sports chief, Sam Paulson. He keeps odd hours, and I knew he'd be up.

Paulson likes me, but he doesn't trust anyone. I said, “Look, Sam, I need to know what kind of person Doug Cahill is. My story isn't going to mess with yours.”

It was a wrestling match that went on for fifteen minutes, Sam Paulson protecting his position as the sports world's premiere “in” guy, while I tried to get something out of Paulson that would tell me if Cahill was dangerous off the playing field.

At last Sam gave me a tantalizing lead.

“There's a PR girl. I got her a job working for the Bears. Hawkins, I'm not kidding. This is off the record. This girl's a friend of mine.”

“I understand.”

“Cahill got this girl pregnant a couple months back. She's told her mother about the baby. She also told Cahill and me. She's giving Cahill a chance to do the right thing. Whatever the hell that might be.”