Chapter Text
The problem is she thinks deep down she knows. How many times has her Dad told her that the second something feels wrong it’s cause it probably is. But then again Casey Luna McGarrett is seven and so when her Grandpa doesn’t pick her up from school that afternoon or send his very nice but very sad ex-partner to do it then she knows deep down that something is wrong.
But she is seven and not stupid so instead she just walks herself home, she checks all the streets and doesn’t stop and doesn’t speak to anyone and she finds her key at the bottom of her bag and wonders if she might be able to call Dad tonight and tell him that she walked home all the way home from school and that she didn’t have to do any evasive moves.
Which is a shame really, Casey loves doing evasive moves. Daddy taught her the hug and roll once and she loves doing that, though Grandpa insists she doesn’t do it in the kitchen anymore after the…incident…where he claimed he was too young to die and too poor to redo the kitchen.
“Grandpa” she shouts shoving her bags to the side as she opens the door and kicking her shoes off relishing the feeling of carpet on her bare feet. “Grandpa! I did it! Walked home on my own and all! Not sure if this was a test or something but—”
She moves to go to the kitchen but she has to walk through the living room to do that and someone gets in her way.
Casey blinks, he’s tall, dark haired with the bluest eyes that she had ever seen and he smiles down at her and he reminds her of a shark and she barely has time to notice that he has a gun in his hand (her father is a Navy SEAL and her grandpa is a cop, if there is one thing Casey knows it is guns) and then.
“CASEY RUN!”
She doesn’t know if it’s the tone of Grandpa’s voice or the way his entire body is straining on the chair but she doesn’t wait to be told twice. She turns and runs but a hand comes out and grabs her by the hair.
Casey twists like this is tag and she falls to the ground. He grabs her leg but her Grandpa starts screaming and he turns and that’s all she needs to push herself up off the ground and run. Something explodes behind her and she slams into her closet shutting the door fully shaking and shivering. She feels both hot and cold and scared and she wants…
She wants her Dad.
She knows that he’s on a mission, knows that when he is on a mission she is not supposed to want him. She knows that, she knows how this works. Grandpa has explained multiple times that Dad has to go on missions to make this country safe, to help keep the bad guys away from Hawaii but it doesn’t stop her from missing him. She and Grandpa do pizza night and they watch the game (though Casey doesn’t know what is happening or who is winning) and he helps her with her spelling but he’s not Dad. When Dad is back the whole house lights up and Casey gets to spend time with him and go swimming and he gets to read her school reports and most importantly she feels safe. She feels safe and secure and loved and she doesn’t know what has happened to her Grandpa but she gets that the banging isn’t good.
But she also knows that she cannot leave this room. Even if she wanted to, she can’t make her legs move. She doesn’t think she can move again.
And so she stays and she waits.
Nobody comes to get her. Grandpa doesn’t rip open the door and tell her she was a good girl and that they should go and get ice cream now while his friends work the case.
That in hindsight was her first warning.
He hates this island. He hates it, he hates it, he hates it.
He hates the sun and the sand and the constant pineapple and he hates the bugs and he hates his shitty apartment and he hates working in the HPD.
Okay so that one is a lie, mostly. The last one. HPD is not New Jersey granted but it’s a good department, his partners so far have been good so far and his case load quite interesting.
Case in point here.
He’s asked to take the John McGarrett case by his boss. Fresh eyes they call it. John McGarrett was a cop who knew half of those on the force by name and they mourn his loss deeply. Danny can get that, can respect that. He’s lost only one partner and he still wakes up at night the scream in his throat trapped as he thinks about the way Grace’s hair falls over her face and the way the black smoke rises as every cop headed to New York desperate to help and having no idea what to do or what they could do and having no idea of the sheer nightmare that was the next days to come.
Danny remembered.
Oh Danny remembered well.
They tell him that Steve McGarrett is the victim’s son and that it shows that he was on the phone with him when it happened. The governor turns up in her high heels and her pant suit and pulls him aside to tell him that Steve McGarrett is a Navy Seal was on duty due to a classified assignment and that he is coming home.
“Have you found his daughter?” she asks quietly.
“John McGarrett’s daughter?”
She clicks her tongue at him as if he is being particularly dense and then says in a patronising kind of tone that reminds him of Rachel at what he thinks was her worst but looking back was really her best.
“Steve McGarrett’s daughter Detective” she says simply. “He has a seven year old Casey, have you found her yet? When I spoke to his Commander he told me that McGarrett Jr was close to going AWOL because nobody could get a lock on his daughter—and he wants her in protective custody. Which you will arrange”
As a father Danny understood. He really, really did.
As a cop he thought that, that was just another thing that he didn’t need today.
“Do you have in mind someone?”
“You” the Governor said fiddling with the clasp of her crocodile skin handbag in a way that reminded him of his mother in law when she had peered at Grace as a baby and remarked in a dismissive tone that she was cute.
Oh how Danny wished that he could stab that bitch in the eye with a plastic fork.
His mother in law not the governor.
“Me Ma’am?”
“Yes Detective you, you have the lead on this case, you find the Lieutenant Commander’s daughter, you make sure that she is safe until her father gets home and you make sure that you find the man that did this. John McGarrett was a very good friend of mine and he was a very well respected police officer. Make sure that you find the bastard that did this, I want an update on something before his son gets home in the next forty eight hours”
And then she was gone leaving Danny open mouthed staring at her in her wake.
There was a pat on the shoulder and he turned to see Duke smiling at him.
“She does that” he said quietly, “She means well but…we want to remove him do you mind?”
“Did we search the house for the granddaughter?”
“Not yet, there’s no body and bar a bag there’s no evidence she was ever here, we’ll give it a good search once we’ve moved him out but…” he trailed off and Danny got why, it was clear that the men of the HPD did not want to go through their respected friends house while he was lying in a pool of congealed blood and brain matter on the floor.
“Look” he said, “Why don’t I go through the upstairs while you move him? No disrespect intended but we gotta find this girl, gives you and your boys a chance to grieve if I do it”
Duke nodded his face tired and wan.
“Duke you know this kid?”
“Know both of them, guess I still remember when Steve and Mary were kids. Casey’s a bit of a wild card. No mother, not that Steve would say anyway, he was away on a deployment or a tour or something and he came back with a baby clinging to his hip, John hit the roof trying to find out where she came from but Steve wouldn’t tell, just said that the sweet girl was there to stay and that was the end of that. And John…all the bitching and the moaning aside he loved being a grandfather. I think it was single handed the most important thing in his life, he lost so much time with his own kids that he got back with Casey—” Duke sighed softly.
“Detective if this bastard has hurt so much of a hair on this kid’s head—”
“You’ll be the first one left alone in the room Duke”
Duke smiled at him.
“Think that might be his son who gets first whack” was all he said and then Danny nodded moving upstairs so they could do their job in peace.
Casey McGarrett’s room was very clean for a seven year old. Danny had one just like it and no way was Gracie’s room that clear. It was a nice kind of grey purple with a well loved big bed, fluffy comforter. There was even books scattered around and he noticed with a wry kind of amused sadness that she was reading Harry Potter like Grace was.
The door to the closet was shut and he moved to open it but he felt a weight at the end of the and he knew.
Call it a fatherly thing but he just knew.
“Casey?”
No reply.
“Okay, Casey my name is Detective Danny Williams from HPD. I am here to get you and take you somewhere safe until your Dad gets back. Now I know that you’ve been told not to trust strangers cause your Dad is a Navy Seal and your grandpa is a cop, you see, I’ve always told my daughter that she is supposed to ask for a badge if she gets stopped by a cop. So…if you want you can open that door, not all the way but you can open it just enough to see my badge if that makes you feel a bit more comfortable?”
There’s a pause and then Danny sits down on the floor. He’s prepared to wait and so he looks around the room and sees a photo of what he suspects is Casey with her Dad.
His first thought is not that of a seasoned detective, his first thought he has to said is that of the fifteen year old that he was when he realised he liked men and woman, his first thought therefore is sweet lord a mercy this man is good looking.
And then he reminds himself that this man is a Navy Seal that could kill him with one glance and also that he Danny Williams, is a professional thank you very much.
But clearly Steve McGarrett was not hiding behind the door when the Good Lord was passing out the good looks.
He put the photo down as the door opened a crack and he saw a pair of brown eyes stare at him. He smiled as the door opened a little more and he saw a mass of brown hair and snot and tears. He held out his badge and a small hand reached out and grabbed it running small fingers over the ridges and the letters.
“I know” Danny began as the brown eyes snapped back up to him, “That you’ve had a real terrible time of it. I know that your Grandpa loved you very much, my guess is he told you to run and hide and you did which is good, but we gotta find out who did—”
“Is he dead?”
It was a shockingly simple question from a child who should never have to ask the question and Danny bit his lip and nodded.
“Yes” he said quietly.
“Is Dad dead?”
“I don’t…know I don’t think so he’s on his way coming back to be with you. But until then your gonna come and spend some time with me, were gonna grab some pizza if you want and then you can when your ready tell me what you saw.”
Fuck. He hated, he hated interviewing children, speaking to children. He never knew if he was doing it right. All he knew was what he would want someone to do if it was Grace that was here in this girls place.
Casey watched him for another long second and then she nodded pushing open the door and Danny helped her pack some pyjama’s and some clothes and her hair brush and he threw in the bent paperback that was the first Harry Potter and he put the photo back on the chest of draws as Casey sniffed a little.
“Hey” Danny said reaching out and touching her on the shoulder gently. She reared back her eyes filled with tears and eyed him suspiciously.
“There’s a lot of…evidence on the floor, do you mind if I carry you to the car?”
“I’m not a baby”
“I know your not. But it would be a big help to me to catch this guy who did this if you didn’t step in the evidence and kept your eyes closed.”
She looked at him again and then jerked her head in what Danny was going to take as a nod. She didn’t take the photo of her Dad nor did she take the bear on her bed and he didn’t want to press her though he thought the entire thing indescribably tragic.
He carried her out to the car and she said nothing the entire way back to the station.
God he hoped her Dad was easier than this.
Danny didn’t think he could take if the other McGarrett was a brooder like this one.
Good looks he knew, only got you so far after all.