Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

It’s not right. 

Danny stops outside the house. It doesn’t feel right. Steve’s face—

He looks up—the Camaro, glinting in the now orange-slanted sunlight, among shades of green and flowering hibiscus, through another flawless island afternoon coming to an end. The car looks cleaner than usual. Did Steve get it cleaned? He does that sometimes, unprompted, makes something warm burst in Danny’s chest. 

That face, when Steve thought Danny wasn’t looking. He’s seen that face before. When or where is out of his reach, but the feeling of impending doom, that’s securely lodged in the base of his throat. That face, wherever or whenever it showed up, portended no-good all-bad things. He’s irrevocably sure about that. 

No. He’s making it up; it’s all in his head. They just had a talk about Steve's plans, a nice one, about destinations and how Steve's been doing since his mom died. If there was more, Steve would’ve said. Danny should just keep going, call Grace, see where she wants to hang out. She may have chosen to stay on the island, but Steve's right; soon, she won't have as much time for him anymore, too busy with her college life. 

A step forward, and it comes to him. 

North Korea. 

He’s seen that face before North Korea. And Japan. And when Junior disappeared, when Joe was missing. Right before Doris, before he went to Mexico. 

That asshole. 

Danny turns on his heel and marches back in. 

Steve’s at his father’s desk—why is that thing still there, why won’t he get rid of it, why is the lack of his father’s dead body one of the very few things that’s different about this house since the first time Danny walked into it—he’s shuffling through papers, like he’s looking for something. When Danny barges in, he jolts up. 

“No,” Danny says. He points his finger toward the middle of Steve’s face, for good measure. “No.” 

Steve blinks, a rapid fluttering of his long lashes. “No?” 

“I said no.” 

He exhales. “I heard you, Danny. Want to give me a little more context here?”

Danny leans on the desk with both hands, looms over it, pinning Steve with an unblinking stare. “No, you are not allowed to leave. You cannot leave like you usually do, with a whimper in the middle of the night and a Dear Danno letter on my desk. No. Absolutely not.” 

Steve rears back, his lashes working overtime again—he casts his eyes down, just for a split second, just a flick—but Danny’s looking for it, and there it is. 

“You were!” he says, rearing back himself. It’s like a free fall, a plane plummeting into nothing. “I thought we were over this, Steve, I thought you wouldn’t do it again, I thought you knew—”

“I wasn’t just gonna disappear!” Steve yelps. “I was—gonna talk to you. I am, I’m talking to you, aren’t I?” 

“A vacation! You’re making it sound like a vacation, but—” Now Steve shifts, like his clothes are too tight on him, but that stupid t-shirt he’s wearing is loose, he doesn’t wear tight clothes anymore, not since that time Danny made fun of him, you look gay, stop wearing gay clothes, and why is his brain choosing to bring that up right now, eight years later, in this context? 

Is that what this is about? No. How could it be? Steve wouldn’t leave because of that, not after ten years— 

But look at his face. He looks so—guilty. So confirming of that all-bad no-good feeling in Danny’s gut. 

“It’s not a vacation, is it?” Danny says. “You’re looking to leave. Like, for good. Like, leave me on this sad, wind-beaten rock—” 

“You like it here! You said it yourself, you like it here now, and it is not a sad wind-beaten anything—”

“Whatever it is, I’m still on it! This isn’t part of the deal, you asshole, you made me stay, you made me like it—”

“I did nothing of the kind! It’s not hard to like it here, Danny, it’s tropical paradise, maybe it’s you who’s the problem—”

“—and now you want to leave me? You just want to up and leave me?” 

They stare at each other, breathing hard. Danny’s chest is tight. 

“You always do this,” he continues. “You say you’re in but then you’re not. You did it with the restaurant, you did it with Grace that time, and now you’re doing it with me—” 

“This has nothing to do with the restaurant—”

“I’m not saying this has anything to do with the restaurant, I’m saying it’s precedent! It goes to your patterns!” 

Steve’s eyes flash. They are iridescent green at the moment, glittering with fury. “My patterns? And what patterns might those be, huh, Danny?” 

“You insinuate yourself into situations and insinuate yourself into people’s lives and you make them depend on you, you make them—” love you, he almost said, but that’d sound too touchy-feely, “—you make them count on you, and then you go and pull some shit like this. This is what you do. I don’t know why I even bother anymore.” 

Somewhere during that last part, Steve switched on the thousand-yard stare. Irritation washes through Danny, leaves him quivering inside. Steve snorts. “Well, you won’t have to, soon.” 

He slams his hands onto the desk. Steve jumps—and so does Eddie, still in his bed in the corner. “No! Stop that! Why, huh? Why would you do this! Why would you do this, tell me!” 

Steve’s gaze skitters away again. “You know why. My dad, and Joe, and my mom.” A second’s delay, “It’s just—a lot, okay? I never meant to stay here beyond my father’s investigation anyway.” 

For a second, Danny’s hurt, he’s devastated—his father’s fucking investigation, after all these years, after thick and thin, the Wo Fats and Marco Reyeses and livers and lungs and radiation poisonings, that’s what he claims he stayed for? That fucking asshole—but no. This is deflection 101, Steve at his purest. “No! Don’t give me that bullshit! Your parents’ deaths are weighing on you? Move out of their tomb! Sell it! Renovate it! Go to therapy! You don’t have to abandon your whole life to deal with grief!” 

“It’s not that easy.” Steve’s eyes light up, like he just had a brainwave— “And, uh, Catherine! Catherine left.” 

Something bitter and stony, familiar, lodges in his stomach. “That’s whom you’re gonna go after? Catherine?” 

Steve’s eyes shift away, then back to him. “Maybe. Yeah. Maybe I will. I’ll look for her.” 

Bullshit. He’s so full of shit; he’s deflecting with all his might. Why? It must be—no, there is no way. Not Steve, not for him, not like that. How presumptuous would that be, to think Steve would leave his home, his life of ten years, his friends and family for—some silly crush he has on Danny? “Wow, okay. When did that 180 degree pivot happen, then? Three weeks ago, when Lou mentioned her and you said, and I quote, ‘that ship’s sailed’? Are we going to unsail it now?” 

Steve animates suddenly, flicking his shirt away from himself with both hands. “What do you want from me, Danny, huh? What do you want from me? You want me to sit here, in this holding pattern, can’t move on, can’t move past, just suffer? Is that what you want me to do?” 

Danny’s stomach drops. “Are you—you’re not—that’s not why. Tell me the truth.” 

Steve exhales. The fight drains away from him, his shoulders droop, his eyes flicking up again with that earnest aquamarine color that always, always hits Danny right where it counts. “It just—it aches.” 

Fuck. It’s still so hard to wrap his mind around it, nearly impossible. “Me. It aches to be around me.” 

Steve swallows and looks away. 

Danny’s heart is pounding. “I thought—you said you could handle it. I thought you were handling it, I thought that’s what you said, isn’t that what you said?” 

He sighs again. “I—I was. Am. I thought I could. But I—guess, with everything else, I’m just—I just need to not see you. For a while.” 

“So this is my fault, huh? That you’re looking to leave, that you’re looking to get away—” 

“It’s not your fault, Danny, you can’t make yourself feel something you don’t—” 

“I’ve been trying to help. I got you all those dates—” 

“All women.” 

Danny’s heart lurches. He couldn’t have—there can’t be other guys. Women, sure, but guys—that’s—different. “Well, you said—” 

“I know what I said.” 

Steve’s face—sags, like he aged ten years, like he’s—suffering. That’s not what he told Danny. That’s not what they talked about. Would Danny have let him live like that, for an entire year, if they had? “This is bullshit, okay? You’re—you can’t leave, not because of me. Let’s—talk about this. We can figure it out. We can figure out a way, okay? Let’s just talk about it.” 

Steve blinks back at him, looking bone-tired. He sinks down into the chair. “I thought we weren’t going to talk about it ever again. I thought we’d put the conversation in a vault, or, what was the other one? A capsule. I thought we’d buried—” 

“Well, I changed my mind,” Danny snaps. He sits too, in the chair in front of the desk, and crosses his legs. “Dig out the capsule, open up the vault. Let’s talk about it. If it’s making you want to leave, obviously we have to talk about it.” 

Steve starts worrying the corner of his lip and looks away again. 

Danny leans forward to capture his gaze. “Tell me what you want, huh? What exactly do you want? Let’s break it down and see if there’s something we can do about this.” 

Steve scowls. “What do you mean what exactly do I want? Do you want me to draw you a picture or something? Because I’m pretty sure you can find that online.” 

Danny rolls his eyes. “So what, that’s all it is? You just want to—fuck? That’s what all this is about, just a fuck?” 

Steve huffs, cheeks pinking up. God, that he blushes, with those eyes, too. Danny can see the appeal, he can. It’s just—he’s not like that. “Of course not, Danny.” 

“Then what? What do you want? A relationship? Marriage?” 

Something wistful slips across Steve’s face. He presses his lips together. “Maybe something like that.” 

“Because it’s just the sex I have a problem with,” Danny says. “And let me tell you, sex is only a part of marriage. It’s not the end-all be-all, okay? It isn’t the sole driving force of a solid relationship, it isn’t essential.” If it were, he and Rachel would’ve made it, but that’s neither here nor there. “Besides, no matter how you start out, people get old, they get sick. They don’t feel like it anymore sometimes. If sex were the only thing that kept people together, no one would stay married, I’ll tell you that.”

Steve’s frowning, equal parts curiosity and mistrust. “So what are you saying? You want to marry me?” 

“No.” Jesus, work with the guy here. Besides, that’s not true. He would, actually. He would marry Steve. “Yes. Maybe. I’m just saying, maybe we can come to a mutually acceptable agreement here. Some kind of arrangement.” 

“Arrangement.” 

“Yes. What do you need? Like, what is your absolute must-have?” 

Steve looks helpless. “You, Danny,” he says. Danny’s heart lurches again. God, he loves Steve too, he does.

Focus. “Okay, but does it have to be my dick? Or your dick in my ass?” 

Steve rolls his eyes. He colors, bright pink, all the way up to the tips of his ears. “Well, it’d be nice—” 

“I’m not asking if it’d be nice. I’m asking does it absolutely have to be?” When Steve still fails to respond, Danny continues: “Let’s say in some fictional universe, I was gay, and I was all over you, and we had all the athletic gay sex you can imagine, and some more after that, and then I was in an accident and couldn’t get it up anymore, or lost my asshole or something, you’re saying we’d be done? You’re saying you’d leave me?” 

Steve’s face spasms. “Jesus, Danny, of course not—” 

“You really think going out there, you’re gonna find someone you’ll love more than me, hell, like more than me, someone you’ll get along with better, someone who’ll take the time to learn your baggage, someone you’ll want to invest the time in to explain it, especially at your age, do you truly believe that?” 

Steve drops his gaze. “No.” 

“Okay, so what’s there to lose, then?” 

Steve’s still worrying the inside of his bottom lip. It makes his mouth twist. “You. Us.” 

“Which you won’t if you leave? But it’s okay if you’re the one to give it up? What, it has to be on your terms, is that what it is?” 

Steve huffs again, but wait—that little furrow in his right eyebrow—that one means he’s actually considering it. 

“Look,” Danny presses. “If I could—give you everything you want, I would. I swear, Steve, I would. But maybe you don’t need everything, and maybe I can give you what you absolutely have to have, and maybe this’ll work. Shouldn’t we at least try? Instead of you stealing away in the middle of the night like a thief?” 

“I wasn’t going to do that,” he retorts, but it’s half-hearted at best. His eyes have lost focus, tracking back and forth over something only he can see. He exhales and throws his head back. “How’s that gonna work, Danny? It’s not gonna work.” 

“Okay, why isn’t it gonna work? Use your words, please.” 

“I can—so what, we’re gonna be ‘together’ but I won’t—I can’t touch you? How is that gonna work?”

His heart in his throat, Danny gets up. Without taking his eyes off Steve’s, he gestures for him to stand also, and rounds the desk to come to a halt before him. “Who says you can’t touch me? You can touch me. You touch me all the time. I touch you all the time. I’m just saying, let’s not stick anything in each other’s asses—”

Steve bristles. “What is your obsession with things in asses—” 

“I don’t have an obsession with—I’m just saying, okay?” He takes Steve by the shoulders. “Come here, huh? Come here. Give me a hug. Come on.” 

Steve’s conflict is obvious in his eyes, in the way he wavers about lifting his arms. Heart hammering in his chest, Danny steps into his space, touching him in encouragement to wrap his arms around his shoulders, pulling him down into his neck. Steve’s whole body is tense as a wire, the cords of muscle on his back taut. Danny strokes him with his palm, up and down, slowly, like once upon a time he used to do for Grace. 

Almost on the dot of five seconds, Steve attempts to break apart. Danny doesn’t let him. “It’s okay. Stay.” 

Steve—does. He stays. Danny shifts closer, bringing their entire chests in contact—not their groins, okay, he still has rules about this kind of thing, that’s exactly his point—scoops Steve in with one arm across the expanse of his back, and squeezes. 

Steve’s air trickles out of him. Like a slow fall, his body relaxes, inch by inch. The next time he inhales, he does it in the crook of Danny’s neck, filling his lungs, his breath quaking in his chest. 

“It’s okay,” Danny says again. He cups the back of Steve’s neck. “We’ll figure it out.”

Chapter Text

The rules of the arrangement come to be thus: 

1. There will be no sex of any kind. 

There is a lot of debate around that particular rule, because, it’s true, what actually constitutes a sexual touch? Because don’t get Danny wrong, he likes to be touched, he likes to be touched by his friends, his family, the people he loves, all categories Steve belongs to, but he’d rather do without anything that could be considered gay foreplay, thank you very much. 

“It’s the intent,” Danny says. “But I trust you. I know you won’t do anything I don’t want, take advantage. I know you won’t.” 

As an answer, Steve stares back at him from where he’s now sitting, behind the desk, and looks exhausted. 

“Okay. Other than that, you want to hug me, hug me. You want to lay on my shoulder, do it. I’m okay with that.”

Steve worries his bottom lip, gaze cast far away. “What about kissing? I assume no kissing.” 

“Obviously not on the mouth.” He gets a look that seems to mean What about any of this is obvious? but Steve doesn’t argue. “But cheek is fine. Forehead. Temple. You get my drift.”

“I might have—thoughts.” 

Danny narrows his eyes. 

Steve’s pink again. It’s—oddly endearing, the sight, leaves Danny a little breathless. “Look, it’s no secret I want you. I might have—impure thoughts.” 

“I’m okay with that.” 

“Are you?” 

“Yes. They’re just thoughts, Steven, thoughts can’t hurt us. I know you won’t—take advantage of me or something. I know you’re not some kind of weird creeper. If you’re okay with having thoughts that must remain thoughts, I’m okay with you having them.” It is, really, the least he can do, if you think about it. 

Steve doesn’t look thrilled, but he tilts his head in agreement. 

2. Sex with other people is allowed. Dating other people is not. 

“So basically you want this to be an open relationship?” Steve asks, forehead furrowed. 

“Yes. Basically.” It doesn’t feel right, this rule. Oh, because—it hits him out of nowhere: “Except, we both get the right to veto. If someone’s obviously not good for the other—”

“Rachel,” Steve says conversationally, of course he does. 

“Catherine,” Danny counters without missing a beat. They’ve been over this a hundred times. “With three objective reasons—”

“One, lied to you about your own son; two, cheated on her husband with you; three, only calls you when she wants to feel good about herself.” 

“That’s—” Really, what can you say to that? “Fair.” He counts his points off on his fingers: “One, left you to die in Afghanistan; two, showed back up with no warning and then disappeared just as suddenly lying about where she was going; three, had the gall to tell you she would’ve said yes to your proposal three years after the fact, not that I understand why anyone in their right minds would ask—”

“I wanted to know, okay? It’s called closure, Danny, but like you said, not that you’d understand—”

“Oh, that I understand, I understand very well, but that’s not closure, my friend, that’s the concept of stringing someone along, trust me, I understand—”

“Having been the strungee for a decade now, I’m sure you do—” 

“Strungee? What does that even mean? That’s not a word—”

“You know what I mean, you’re the one Rachel’s—”

But that’s not what Danny wants to know. “How does she fit in?” 

Mouth already open to counter, Steve stalls at the non-sequitur. “What?” 

“With this—thing you have, for me. Because now you’re making it sound like—”

“Like what?” 

“Like—like your feelings were kind of—strong.” 

Steve looks tired again. “You can have strong feelings for two people at once.” 

Why does that make him think of the time he and Rachel produced Charlie? Also—if push came to shove and Steve had to pick, who would he pick? 

Catherine, of course. What kind of a dumb train of thought is that? 

Unless Steve were gay. But he said he isn’t. It doesn’t make any sense, but asking him is out of the question. Just thinking about it pours concrete in his gut, dense and unyielding. He doesn’t need to hear it confirmed. 

Eddie, now lying sprawled sideways on the floor next to Danny’s feet, has no answers for him, just a sleepy blink. 

Move on. “Okay, no Rachel and no Catherine. Okay?” 

Steve rolls his eyes, arms crossed on his chest. “Fine.” 

“Fine.” 

3. They will sleep in the same bed. 

Steve’s rule; Steve wants that. Danny almost asks him about the hotel room in DC, it’s at the tip of his tongue, about when Steve was so vehemently opposed to the idea that Danny ended up sleeping on the floor—almost. Because like a lightning bolt to the brain, it comes to him—if it had been Danny in his place, he probably wouldn’t have wanted his unrequited—whatever to share his bed in the immediate aftermath of his mother’s murder either. How stupid was Danny to even bring it up then? What the hell was he thinking? 

Of course Steve wants to leave now, if that kind of profound obliviousness is all he can look forward to—so profound it borders on cruel, especially if one were to remember the other small fact that Danny was on the phone with him, bragging about his bar conquest while the man’s dog was in the throes of PTSD—fuck. 

Anything. Steve can have anything; Danny owes him. “Okay,” he says. 

Steve looks completely incredulous. “Even snuggling? You’re gonna be okay with snuggling?” 

Danny huffs. “Of course I’m gonna be okay with snuggling. Snuggling is the best part of a committed relationship, Steven, not that you would know, having lacked loving physical contact as a child and then always dating these skinny women—”

“As if you—” Steve flares up, but cuts himself off with a sigh. “But there might be—contact,” he says instead. “You know, inadvertent—I can’t be held responsible for, I don’t know, gravitating toward you in sleep—”

“Of course you will,” Danny says, and unfurls his spine to its proudest extent. “I’m a delightful bedmate. I don’t snore and I’m perfect for snuggling. I’m warm when it’s cold out, cool when it’s hot. You’re lucky to have me in your bed, I’ll have you know.” 

Steve’s eyes light up briefly, but sadly, the smile Danny’s been holding his breath for doesn’t appear. Instead, Steve says, “What I’m trying to tell you is, I can’t exactly leave my dick on the nightstand—” 

“I’m not afraid of your dick, Jesus. I have nothing against dicks. Dicks, contrary to common opinion, are nice, friendly organs. The most they’ll do is nudge someone. Much like guns, which by themselves, are generally harmless; it’s the person using them for the heinous crime who’s the malfeasant.” 

“Malfeasant,” Steve mouths to himself, shaking his head. 

“Unlike pussies, which in their many-layered, damp depths often harbor horrors the kind—” 

Steve exhales. “Jesus Christ, Danny—”

Danny stops talking, but there it is, the smile he wanted. Steve’s trying to hide it, but he can’t un-crinkle the corners of his eyes. It’s adorable. “What I’m saying, Steven,” he carries on, “is I am aware you have a dick. I have nothing against your dick as long as you, as the dick-wielder, aren’t trying to wedge it into my asshole.” 

“You and your obsession with assholes,” Steve mutters, rolling his eyes at the ceiling. 

Danny gives him a pass. Clearly Danny has no such obsession—though, if so many people are doing it, there probably is something to it, he’s just saying. It’s just—clearly not for him. Clearly. 

Now, if Steve wanted Danny’s dick to be—

But no, Steve said he’s not gay. That’s not what he wants. So this whole train of thought? Is moot. Shake it off. “I’m saying you want us to sleep in the same bed? Then we’ll sleep in the same bed and we’ll snuggle. Deal?” Danny says. 

“Fine, yeah. Deal.” 

4. In all other matters of significance, they will behave like people in a long-term committed partnership (especially when it involves momentous decisions to change one’s address, especially Steve’s).

“Which, let’s face it, we do anyway,” Danny says. “Except, obviously, when you decide to leave me high and dry—”

Steve rolls his eyes, tacking a huff on it. “I said I’m not leaving.” 

Danny perks up. “What was that?” 

“You heard me.” 

“No, please, say it again for those of us in the back—”

“I’m not leaving,” Steve repeats, enunciating like an asshole, but his eyes are all a-twinkle. Something giddy in Danny’s chest answers. “Okay, Danny? At least for now—we’ll give it a try.” 

He can’t hide the grin anymore. It’s so wide it’s hurting his cheeks. “Yeah?” 

Steve smiles back like he can’t help himself either. “Yeah.” 

Thank fucking god. Danny would do anything—literally anything—to stop him from leaving. He’d even touch a dick. That’s his secret weapon, if all else fails: a handjob. Objectively, it may not sound like much, but Steve will know. He’ll see the gesture for what it is; he’s good like that. 

What would Steve look like if Danny did touch his dick? Would he like it?

Stop it—Steve’s looking at him all squinty-faced. “What?” Danny asks. 

“So what are we gonna tell people, then?” 

People—Danny starts, looking up. It’s dark, it’s gotten dark— “Fuck.” 

“What?” 

“I forgot to text Grace.” He pulls out his phone. Sure enough, two texts and a missed call from her. Fuck him, he’s a terrible father. He touches her name. 

She picks up on the second ring. “Danno, where are you? You ghosted me.” 

“No, babe, I’m sorry. I was—in the middle of something. Are you okay? Did you get food?” 

Wherever she is isn’t quiet. “Yeah, I figured, so I did, yeah. I’m just hanging out with my friend Jackie. You remember Jackie?” 

Jackie—her classmate. “Of course I remember Jackie, babe, say hi to her.” 

Grace, giggling, passes on the sentiment. “She says hi back. We’re gonna go check out this kid’s party in Kahala. I’ll come stay with you after, how’s that?” 

“Yeah, that sounds good.” As Danny’s going to end the call, his eyes pass over Steve—who looks like an impatient puppy. “Grace, babe, you still there?” 

“Yeah, Danno, what?” 

“Here, talk to your Uncle Steve for a second,” Danny says, and passes the phone on. Steve looks—befuddled, hopeful, normal, in rapid succession, and then, at Grace’s voice, open delight breaks on this face.  

What are they going to tell people? The truth. Of course.

Steve hangs up. Danny says, “Why do we have to tell them anything at all?” 

Steve blinks, confused for the second it takes him to catch back up with the conversation. “I’m assuming we’re going to be a package deal. So when someone asks you if you’re available or coming to dinner or their party or whatever, what are you gonna say? Let me talk to my—friend?” 

“Yeah. Why not?” Except, the animal has a point. “I’m gonna tell them we’re in a, in a—” It hits him like lightning: “Monogamous friendship.” 

Steve stares at him blankly and tilts his head. “They’re all gonna assume we’re having sex.” 

“I will explain to them that we are not.” 

“They’re not gonna get it.” 

“Then I will explain it to them in a way they do, Steven. I am a very patient man, I am a man in excellent control of the English language, I have every confidence that I can make myself understood appropriately.” 

Steve twists his lips down. “Well, you can practice with Grace, then, because I’m gonna want my monogamous friend to sleep in my bed tonight.” 

Something—odd jolts through him—not quite discomfort, not interest, just—anticipation, maybe, not in a bad way—it would be nice to sleep in the same bed. He has no objections to that. “Yes, fine. Of course. Why wouldn’t I?” 

“I don’t know, Danny,” Steve says, and stands. There’s underhanded challenge in his currently green eyes, one of Danny’s favorite looks on him. “Why wouldn’t you?” 

Danny sees that challenge, and raises him one. The odd thing bubbles a little, like it’s pleased. It’s weird. It’s been a weird day, and now he has a… husband? “In that case, I assume you wouldn’t have any objections for me to move my stuff into your room too? It’ll save me a lot of time not to have to iron shirts individually every morning, which is what I’ve been doing since I lack the closet space to properly hang them up.” 

Something like faint annoyance flashes across Steve’s features. But, just like Danny thought, Steve will see this game of—sexless gay chicken? Gayless sex chicken? Cohabitation chicken?—to the end. “Of course not, babe. What’s mine is yours.” 

They fake-smile at each other, but it’s only half-fake, at least Danny’s is. As Steve is passing by on his way out of the room, Danny, with great care and delight, not only smacks his cargo-clad ass but leaves his hand there, gropingly possessive. On that full, firm globe of muscle that fits his palm as if—

Steve’s face twists into this brand-new, absolutely awesome expression of scandalized surprise—instantly addictive. Oh, if he’s going to react like this, Danny’s gonna cup his dick next time and watch his head explode—they used to do that to each other all the time in high school baseball, joking about jock straps; that’s not gay. He steps into Steve’s space, face tilted up, as close to Steve’s lips as he can get without going up on his toes—because he has standards, okay?—to say: “Bring it on, babe.”

Steve looks at him down his nose, eyebrows twisting—then snorts softly and steps aside, out of reach. “Did you see the envelope Doris’s cipher came in?” 

Okay, whiplash, thy name is McGarrett. “What? No. Why?” 

“I could’ve sworn I put it right here,” Steve says, patting a clear corner of the desk. “It’s like it disappeared.” 

“Was the actual cipher thing in it?” Did Danny even see the envelope it came in? He doesn’t recall. 

Steve takes it out of his back pocket, folded up. “No. I wouldn’t leave that lying around.” Frowning, he scans their surroundings, slowly rotating in place. Just as Danny’s opening his mouth to point out the fruitlessness of that particular action, Steve freezes. In two lunging steps, he’s at the window that faces the side of the house, bent down to peer at the seam. He shoots Danny a look of alarm over his shoulder, then proceeds to lift the pane with no resistance whatsoever. “This was locked.” 

Danny joins him, examining the window himself. “Are you sure?” 

“Yes.” 

“So what are you saying? We got robbed? Of an envelope?” 

Steve scowls at the window. “I don’t know.” 

Danny huffs. “I think you’re deflecting.” 

Steve’s gaze whips to him. “I am not!” 

“Okay, fine, do you want me to call Eric then? Come check for fingerprints or something?”

Steve exhales. “Yeah, fine.” His eyes light up. “You can practice on him too.”

A middle finger describes very well what Danny thinks about that. He texts Eric since no one of that generation ever picks up a phone unless forced at gunpoint. Eric’s confirmation comes almost instantly. 

“He’s on his way,” Danny announces, tugging at Steve’s sleeve to stop him from poking at the window and contaminating potential evidence. He walks away, toward the fridge, for another beer now that he doesn’t have to drive. Steve trails after him obediently. “I still think you’re deflecting, babe, but guess what? It’s happening. It’s time my shirts had the space they deserve. Not only that—”

He goes on about the items in his wardrobe that are in dire need their own real estate and Steve listens, occasionally interjecting with a tease or a joke, eyes lit up from within like they haven’t been in a long time. That odd feeling, the one Danny can’t name beyond anticipation-like, settles in Danny’s chest, and sends a wave of warmth out like it’s happy to be there. 

Chapter Text

And yet, he doesn’t tell Grace—or Eric—anything, not that night. 

He has his reasons, okay? Good reasons. First of all, Eric is in a rush when he shows up, chattering the whole time about some ‘lit party’ he has to ‘split to’ on the North Shore, whirlwind-dusting the study for prints and hurricane-sweeping for fibers only to conclude it’s inconclusive and promising to call tomorrow. Secondly, Grace doesn’t even get in until after eleven, and though she’s her usual chipper self at first, she fades fast, and within half an hour of the grilled cheese sandwich Steve delights in making for her, dozes with her head propped up on her fist, in no shape to have doomsday conversations about her father’s relationship status. They send her to bed, Eddie in tow.

“I’m tired too,” Steve says. He looks—completely normal, that insensitive asshole, while Danny has what feels like a horde of meth-crazed butterflies in his stomach. “I think I’ll go to bed.”

Danny nods. Except— “Where’s Junior?” 

“With Tani.” 

Makes sense; it’s the weekend. He nods again. 

Steve raises his eyebrows, superior smirk in place. “You ready, babe?” He says babe apparently as an attempt at sarcasm, but all it does is make him sound uncertain. That odd thing lurches in Danny’s stomach again. 

“Of course,” he says, and his own attempt at bravado is vastly more successful, if he may say so himself. He makes a flowery gesture with one hand toward the stairs. “Lead the way, babe.”

They trudge up, in silence. The butterflies accelerate, to the point where they leave him wondering if they are in fact bats, with mean little spikes on their wings. 

“Do you want to move your stuff today?” Steve asks quietly. 

Danny stumbles on the top step. He would have fallen on his face too, if it wasn’t for Steve and his freakish cat-like reflexes catching him mid-tumble, his forearms warm and sturdy under Danny’s flailing grasp. 

“You okay?” Steve says. 

His voice is—different than Danny’s ever heard it, kind of gravelly, quiet—Jesus. Danny prepares to let go—but his whole point was that it’s okay to touch. So instead, he leans more into Steve, lets go only to slip his arm around Steve’s waist. 

Steve hesitates—a split second of stiffening muscles—then, wrapping his own arm around Danny’s shoulders, pulls him in like he’s never done before, flush into his side. He presses first his nose into Danny’s hair, then a kiss—it feels like the ground gets away from Danny again, but Steve’s got him, he’s solid—so freaking tall—up close like this, he’s not his usual hulking self though, with his narrow waist just kind of lanky, certainly taller and stronger than anyone else Danny’s held like this, but not so big that Danny couldn’t—handle him, and his shoulder is right there to rest his head on—

Just—it’s nice. That’s all he’s saying. 

They make it into the bedroom. Steve flicks on the overhead light, grimaces, flicks it back off. He lopes around the bed and goes for the bedside lamp instead, apparently satisfied with its softer glow. “Okay? Want to use the bathroom first?” 

Sure. A quick stop in his room to grab some clothes and Danny strides right in. 

When he’s done, in shorts and t-shirt—yes, he sleeps in his underwear, usually, but he’s feeling oddly self-conscious and for tonight, he’s going to roll with it. Similarly dressed, Steve’s already in bed, the side closer to the door, on his back with his hands clasped on his belly.

Like—they pose dead people in caskets. Danny’s stomach lurches unpleasantly. 

Steve opens his eyes, tracks Danny’s progress around the bed, which doesn’t help the feeling of self-consciousness. Danny drops the pants he changed out of on the chair and slides under the covers, his back to Steve. 

The mattress shifts, the light is turned off. “Good night, Danno.” 

“Yeah, good night.” His heart is still thundering away; it’s quiet in the room, can Steve hear? He doesn’t seem to. His breathing evens out, too quickly to be from actual slumber, that Navy ninja shit that helps him fall asleep quicker, maybe Danny will finally let him teach him. 

After a few minutes of that, Steve’s breathing changes again, becomes noticeably deeper. He’s asleep. Slowly, carefully, Danny shifts to his back, where he can see Steve, study him unobserved.

Rachel rear-ended him on purpose and he had no idea for ten years. Once she did, though, he recognized the twinkle in her eyes, the way she laughed at his jokes and played with her hair, and he did his part, asked her out. It’s not hard to imagine how he could have been so deeply oblivious to Steve’s feelings—for one, Steve was so much subtler than Rachel. Signals, he’d said, what signals? Besides, how was Danny supposed to know his hyper-masculine hyper-male partner had any interest in other men? All he saw was the infuriating, inconsiderate, arrogant asshole who commandeered him for his own personal vendetta—

Jesus, that? Was that his way of rear-ending Danny? Or, even—

Did Steve stay for him all those years ago? 

No, no way. It was for Danny’s skills as an investigator, nothing but his dogged need to bring to justice the man who engineered his father’s death. That’s crazy. Guy like Steve, for him? No way.

But then Wo Fat was taken care of, and he still stayed. 

He must have stayed for Catherine. But—that was after Afghanistan, right after, so Catherine was gone. He was still waiting for her though, so that’s probably what it was, see where she’d end up. It wasn’t for Danny, couldn’t have been.

Steve face, slack in sleep except for that one little furrow between his eyebrows, provides no answers. He’s still in that goddamn funeral pose, making the skin on the back of Danny’s neck crawl.

Regardless of why, this time he was really going to leave. For good. Maybe not tonight, but soon. Even if he didn’t—yeah, he looks better now, he’s filled back out after the Mexico debacle, but the radiation poisoning, like a ticking bomb inside of him, waiting for the worst moment to strike. All the other injuries he’s sustained through the years too, they’ll take their toll eventually. His tortured soul, his childhood trauma, his difficulty expressing himself—he’ll end up alone out there, either gut-wrenchingly lonely or taken advantage of, and with his pure, beautiful heart, he deserves better, he deserves the absolute fucking best that this world has to offer. 

He wouldn’t even agree with that. He’d claim he’s just doing his job, his duty, the right thing; he’d never think to say I deserve better, like he never did for ten years with Danny, like he isn’t now. And Danny feels it every day, that gnawing, sometimes paralyzing worry that because of all that, Steve will end up sad and alone and sick somewhere, with no one to properly take care of him. He feels it deep in his chest, not always on the forefront of his mind, but always, always there nevertheless. 

Steve snoozes away next to him, blissfully unaware. To Danny, sleep seems unattainable, his mind too agitated, and yet, possibly hypnotized against his will by Steve’s even breathing, he drops off before he knows it. 

—

He opens his eyes. It’s light out, mid-morning? 

It comes to him in backwards snippets. So—they’re—married now? Kind of? Unofficially? 

He whips around. The bed is empty, but it’s Steve’s. He slept in Steve’s bed, for—

Nine uninterrupted hours? What the fuck? The last time he did that was in his mother’s house, two decades ago. 

And where is the animal he stupidly, but effectively, attached himself to? 

Not in the kitchen, he confirms, when he staggers down the stairs, showered and dressed. Grace is, though, leaning against the rickety little kitchen island, a bowl of half-eaten cereal before her and her phone in her hand. 

Danny’s pulse kicks up. “Good morning.” 

Grace half-glances at him. “Hi, Danno.” 

He should tell her. They should talk. Did Steve tell her already? Where the fuck is he anyway? He’s made the coffee, it looks like—he may like to pretend he isn’t, but Steve’s thoughtful, always—and Danny pours himself a generous cup. 

“Are you okay?” 

Danny looks up. Grace has half-lowered her phone. “Yeah, babe. I’m fine.” He nods toward the window. Maybe there’s a speck out there, way too far in the ocean. A tendril of the familiar worry snags his chest. “Is that your animal uncle out there, making like a whale?” 

“Maybe a dolphin and yes.” She tips her head, still studying him. Good god, did her phone break? What has Danny done to deserve scrutiny like this? “Are you two, like, fighting?” 

Danny blinks, mid-sip. He swallows before he answers. “No. No, we are not. Why would you think that?” 

“Well, something’s wrong with you.” 

He bristles. “Nothing’s wrong with me. What makes you say that?” 

“Well, for one, you, like, ghosted me last night.” She twists her lips down. “And then didn’t even tell me not to drink or drive carefully. When I got home, you didn’t bitch one word about it being past eleven. Something’s up with you.” 

Should he be proud or disturbed? How did she learn to do that, was it from him? Also—he probably should take the opening she just generously gave him, his smart, perceptive daughter. “Well—yeah. Okay. Yes, something is up, you’re right.” 

“Oh, no,” she says, genuinely alarmed. “Is something wrong with him? Is he being deployed?” Danny’s face must’ve done something, because in response, hers twists into abject horror. “Danno, is he—is he sick?” 

“What? No,” Danny says firmly. “Babe, he’s healthy as an ox—” And at about the same level intellectually—he should bring that up later, when Steve’s there to appreciate it. “Could he be swimming ten miles out there in that god-forsaken swill otherwise? Would I let him? Come on.” 

“What is it then?” Grace says, not the least bit reassured. 

Danny sucks in a bracing breath. “Okay. It’s nothing bad. But yes, he and I, we, uh, we’ve come to an agreement.”

She narrows her eyes. “About what?” 

“About, uh, about us. Our—friendship. Relationship.” 

Her expression shifts into unbridled joy so fast Danny’s head spins. “No—really? For real? You’re together now? Finally?” 

The fuck? “Well, kind of, yeah—” 

“Oh, I’m so happy!” she crows, clapping her hands and doing a little hop, like she used to do when she was his little princess, like she hasn’t in years. “Danno, finally! I’m so happy for you, I can’t even tell you! I mean, I’m happy for me too, but I’m way more happy for you—and Uncle Steve, he’s—” Her features melt into understanding. “That’s why he was in such a good mood this morning!” 

So many things to address in that statement, but for some reason Danny’s brain elects to go with: “He was?” 

She smiles. “Yeah, he was! Almost like the way he used to be when we first met him? You remember, he used to be all Fun Uncle Steve and goofy and stuff, did all kinds of things to make me laugh? Like, like—” She pauses, and something wistful hushes across her expression. “Like when you guys were young. You’d mess around all the time and he’d be so happy. Remember?” 

The same longing slips inside of him too. His throat feels sticky. “Yeah, babe, I remember.” 

She dances around the island and flings her arms around him. Danny clings to her, finding her shoulder to hide his face in. “I’m so happy for you, Danno. Really.” 

So many things, there are so many things— “Are you—you’re not—why aren’t you surprised?” 

She lets him go, hands on his shoulders—way too close in height, they are, he should’ve known better than to feed her everything organic. “I don’t know. Well, I am, maybe, a little. You—well, you’re a surprise. A little.” 

Danny frowns. “I’m a surprise? What’s that supposed to mean?” 

“I mean, you’re just—” She shrugs, pulling an apologetic face. “You’re always so uptight, I didn’t think you’d ever admit you were, like, in love with a boy.” 

“Okay, hold on, hold up there—I’m not in love with a boy, Grace, Steve and I, we just—” 

He can’t go on. She stares back evenly, then says, “You just what?” 

Words. He knows words, just put them together— “We, uh, we rearranged the rules of our friendship.” 

She wrinkles her nose. “What does that mean?” 

“Well, it means we’re going to—you know, depend on each other, we’re not going to date other people—” He has to clear his throat. “Sleep in the same—” Still can’t say bed, fuck him, “Room together, and, you know, grow old together, but we’re not in love.”

Grace’s scowl has reached epic proportions. “What?” 

“We’re not—there will be no—intimacy.” 

“Between you and Uncle Steve?” 

“Yes.” 

She looks at him like he’s having a seizure. A seizure of stupidity, specifically. “Danno, I don’t think there are two people on this world who are closer to each other than you and Uncle Steve. You’re saying you’re going to be less close?” 

“No, I mean—” He swallows dry. “Physical. Intimacy. None. Will be had, I mean.” 

She peers at him, wary. “Do you—you mean—” She makes a face like she bit into something sour. “You’re not having sex, you mean?” 

Embarrassment kicks heat up his chest, into his neck. Steve better appreciate the humiliation he’s putting himself through here, that animal.

God, not that it matters—Danny was serious before; he really would do anything to make sure Steve stays. This is nothing. This is his daughter; she’ll love him even if he makes a fool of himself. “Yes. Exactly.” 

Grace’s face ripples through puzzlement, disbelief and then settles on a very particular mixture of revulsion and determination he is sadly still very familiar with. It catapults him back to nearly fifteen years ago, to that one dreadfully grey Jersey winter that left her vitamin D-deficient and Danny tasked with administering the vile concoction that was to correct it. 

But the thing about his incredible, amazing daughter is that even at four, she soldiered on, and took her medicine because she knew it was necessary. She does the same today—she grimaces at the kitchen island and mutters, “Ugh, I can’t believe—” Then she draws in a deep breath and fixes him with that half-disgusted, half-exasperated stare. “Okay. Why not?” 

Danny yanks himself out of his usual fatherly longing for when his baby was tiny. “Why not—why not, she asks, because, because—” He circles his hands around the air, hoping that will attract the missing words. “I’m not gay, babe. But everything else, I’m here for.” 

Her expression doesn’t change. “That doesn’t really explain it.” 

Embarrassment and high blood pressure vie for the title of ‘Cause of Danny Williams’s Sudden Death’. “What do you mean that doesn’t really explain it?”

“Because it’s not really relevant,” she says, gesturing out with both hands. 

“It’s not—relevant that I’m not gay when we’re talking about—” No, nope, call him old-fashioned, call him just old, he can’t use that word, not with her. “Relations with another man—” 

“Being gay is an identity. It’s about more than just who you’re attracted to.” Her frown deepens. “Why—wait. What do you think being gay means?”

“What do I think—well, it means, you know—” Liking things up one’s ass? Definitely not saying that. “Having certain—tastes that I don’t share, and, and you know, preferring to go to the theater instead of watching sports, and wearing clothes that aren’t necessarily my first choice, and just looking—not like someone you’d expect to look like—you know, a man’s man.” 

Grace’s expression is either intense concentration or befuddled disbelief. “Uncle Steve likes men. So where does he fit in that? Does he look like that?” 

“No, he does not. Because, and I quote, he’s not.” 

Her expression flattens in glee. “I knew it! He’s got so much more, like, substance than he lets on. He’s pan, isn’t he?” 

“No, he’s a skillet?” Danny spreads his hands, accepting that words have left him, in that absolute way that happens very infrequently, except, apparently, when he agrees to enter a sexless marriage with his best friend. 

Grace now regards him with unmistakable, undiluted pity. “Oh, Danno. You really, like, need to part with the nineties mindset and join us in 2020. Yeah, sure, the outfits were fire, but their stereotypes kinda really sucked.” She pats his forearm with a twist of her lips down, collects her cereal bowl and phone, and walks away. 

What the fuck? And how does Grace know Steve likes men? Danny didn’t know Steve likes men until a year ago. And what’s that thing she said, the cookware—

Steve appears at the doorway, wearing nothing but his little swim trunks so low on his hips they’re barely an afterthought, looking as usual like he was sculpted by Poseidon himself in worship to the perfect male form and thrust out of the depths of the ocean for all to see. Several drops of water are still in the process of making their way down from his hair, along the long column of his throat, to the chiseled planes of his chest. 

“Hey, Danno. Where’s Grace?” he asks. 

The frying pan on the stove, Danny has half a mind to grab it and shove it into Steve’s hands—here’s your pan, babe. He clutches his coffee cup to his chest and shoves his way past Steve’s perfectly sculpted pecs. “Go put a fucking shirt on, you fucking animal.” 

“Good morning to you too, babe,” Steve calls after him, wildly unperturbed. 

Danny flips him off without looking back. “Stop calling me that.” 

“Whatever you say, sweetheart.”

Jerk. 

Chapter Text

Gay, what does gay mean? Gay means back in high school, gay means the soft-spoken theater kids who were disappointed to grow a beard and flounced around and wore tight pants and girls’ tops and refused to play sports, and you know what? That was okay, totally okay. Just, Danny wasn’t one of them, not that there was anything wrong with it, which he believed wholeheartedly even then and proved again and again by physically protecting them from the many and assorted bullies on an almost-daily basis, often instead of the teachers who preferred to turn a blind eye to it. 

He’d do that now, too, as a police officer, protect everyone equally, those who can’t protect themselves a little more equally—he does it, day in, day out. He hasn’t thought about that word since then, secure in the knowledge he’d figured out who he is and how to live his life, but apparently, that was his mistake. 

Yes, he’s very well aware of the existence of this thing called the internet, thank you very much, and that he could easily use it to fill these apparent gaps in his knowledge base, but he has a busy life with lots of responsibilities and he forgets, and it doesn’t occur to him again until they’re in bed that night, Steve on his back once more with his hands clasped over his stomach, giving Danny the heebie-jeebies. 

“Danny,” Steve groans. “I love you, man, but can you please stop thinking so loudly? I can’t sleep.”

How could he even—oh, whatever. “What does it mean to be a pan?” 

Steve holds his breath for a confused second. “You mean like the kitchen tool? I guess it means being flat with a handle?” 

Thank you, that’s what Danny thought. As if the English language is out of words to describe things. “No, I mean—what you are. Are you that, pan, or whatever it is? You said you’re not gay.” 

More silence, then a cautious inhale. “I guess, yeah, you could say I’m pan. Pansexual.”

Well, okay, that makes more sense than the kind that belongs next to a pot. And why was Danny background-mulling all day if pans needed lids like pots and whether that was what he should aspire to rather than being a pan himself? “Yeah, that. What does that mean?” 

“I guess, to me, it means that who someone is and the kind of connection I have with them is more important than the kind of equipment their body comes with.” 

There is—a staggering amount of beauty in that, Danny will give it to him, unexpected as it is profound, but then again— “Chaos. That’s what that means, that’s what you’re the agent of, you and the likes of you. Chaos.” People who are absurdly and unfairly beautiful, like Steve, with their long lashes and strong thighs, saying they’d sleep with anyone if they had the right connection—that’s enough to entice anyone into any kind of sexuality, break down the rules of society—look at the animal, his broad shoulders, his sculpted arms—who wouldn’t want to sleep with him, especially if they knew they had the slightest breath of a chance?

Steve chuckles. It’s kind of—nice, in the dark, the bed almost warmer for it. They’ve never really done this before; whenever they shared sleeping quarters, in the infrequent times it happened, they were either too hurt or too exhausted to hold a real conversation. 

Danny continues. “Because—society depends on rules, okay? And the rules are a man and a woman, that’s what’s normal. It’s what’s been normal for hundreds of years, and just because it’s now easier to live publicly with any—” abnormality sounds too harsh, and it’s absolutely not what he means, “—difference from that doesn’t mean it’s not one. A difference, I mean.”

Steve’s breathing stays even. “I agree with what you said about societies needing rules to function, but I disagree with what’s normal. It ever occur to you that there might be better rules than what we’ve been living with?”

Danny huffs—the world functions just as well with the rules they’ve been given, rules that have worked for hundreds and thousands of people before, for his parents and his grandparents; why mess with something that’s working? He opens his mouth to say so, but Steve’s snuffle preempts him. 

He peers at the animal. In the low light of the moon, he looks, just like Grace said, younger, and for once, completely carefree. Even the little furrow between his eyebrows, the one that in the beginning used to show up at the mention of his family and only lately became permanent, even that one is gone. 

Danny settles back down. They’ll argue—tomorrow. When they go to bed together, tomorrow, again, and every day for the rest of their—lives? 

He’s still fiddling with the odd joy that accompanies that thought when he drops off. 

—

He has the cancer dream that night. 

In it, no one tells him Steve has cancer; no one has to. He knows it, in that space between his heart and his lungs, that space that pulls tight when Steve does something stupid, or aches when they haven’t seen each other for a while. That space that belongs wholly to Steve, that place hurts and twists with the knowledge that Steve’s going to die, he’s going to die terribly, and he’s going to die soon.

He’s in the hospital, Queens, but the hallways are much longer and brighter than they should be. No staff are to be found. He errs around, trying to open doors that won’t obey, frantically and fruitlessly searching for Steve. 

He opens his eyes, face wet. It’s still dark.

Steve’s right there.

He’s on his belly, face smushed into the pillow, his mouth slack in sleep. The lump in Danny’s throat swells, pushes more tears out of his eyes.

Steve’s snoring softly. They said touching is fine. Touching is fine.

He places the flat of his hand on Steve’s back—warm, sturdy, Steve’s heart thumping away strong and gentle under his palm. Steve’s lids flutter and open, the muscles under Danny’s palm tensing.

“It’s okay. Go back to sleep,” Danny whispers.

A breath of puzzlement, then Steve recognizes him and relaxes again, dropping back off instantly. Danny keeps his hand on Steve’s back until his arm aches, and then he shifts closer so he can rest his elbow down and leave it there. Steve smells good in sleep, that warm musk of his with the undercurrent of clean skin and a touch of sandalwood. He smells like home. 

The lump in his throat dissolves. He falls back asleep.

—

Telling the team collectively, which was Danny’s idea, turns out to be a disaster.

“I don’t get it,” says Tani, eyebrows knit together. “You’re—you want us to know you stopped boning? But you’re still together?”

When Danny glances at him for help, Steve, leaning against the tech table with his arms crossed, shrugs his eyebrows very much unhelpfully. “No, no,” Danny says. “We’ve—we don’t ‘bone’. We’ve never—done that. We were friends, but now we’re—more.”

“But you’re still not boning.”

Danny inhales. “Yes. Exactly.”

Tani scrunches up her face. “Why not?”

“Tani,” Junior hisses. “I—we’re happy for you, sirs. That’s great.”

“Unh-hunh,” Lou drawls, like it’s very much not great at all. From the moment Danny uttered the words ‘monogamous friendship’, Lou turned his hole-boring glare on Steve and started staring, unblinkingly, which he’s still doing. Steve, for his part, seems unfazed. 

“Do you understand what he’s saying?” Tani hisses back at Junior.

“No, I don’t, but that doesn’t matter. It only matters that it makes sense to them.”

“They can hear you,” Danny growls.

Junior jerks to attention. Tani rolls her eyes. Junior says, “Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.” 

“I don’t need to be here for this conversation,” Quinn announces, sketches an awkward smile and backs away.

“Oh, definitely, me neither,” Lincoln Cole says, and edges toward Steve’s office. Why is that guy still here, again? “I’ll wait for you here. About the cipher?” 

Steve waves him off while Danny’s busy throwing up his hands. Cole disappears into Steve’s office and closes the door. 

Adam. Adam will get it. Danny whips around to look at Adam, and finds a frown of utter mystification on Adam’s face. “Adam. You get it, don’t you?”

Adam pulls a face. “I’m sorry, I wish I could say yes, but no. I don’t.”

Lou snorts.

Danny turns back to him. “Did you have something to say?”

Lou’s still staring at Steve. Steve’s still neither returning nor acknowledging it. No one speaks. Danny focuses on Adam.

“What’s there not to understand?” he says. “Steve and I, we’ve agreed to be each other’s committed life partner in every aspect except the bedroom. You know, joint bank accounts, raising the kids together, chores, everything. Except for sex. We’re not going to be having sex.”

“Yeah, I guess that’s what I’m having trouble understanding,” Adam says. “Why not?”

“Because we’re not gay,” Danny says.

Adam’s face spasms with something that reminds him of Grace yesterday. “I see.” But he chews his lower lip like he very much does not see. 

“What?” Danny asks, because Adam is a dear friend, and, fuck him, but he cares what his dear friends think. “What?” 

“Did you think this through?” 

“Yeah, yes. We did.” 

Adam nods. “Okay. Then—what if you meet someone?”

Danny twists his lips down. “What if I meet someone? You mean someone who I can get along with better than him—” with a thumb hooked in Steve’s direction, “someone who gets me better, who’ll have my back like him, the patience and interest and, and fortitude to learn about the incredible excess of baggage I have and accept it? Someone I’ll like better, my kids will like better? At my age? No, really, what do you think are the chances?” 

Adam nods slowly. “I see what you’re saying. I think.”

“Also, I’ve already had my big love. We both have. No matter how much I like to downplay it at times, me and Rachel, while it was good, it was epic, okay? Like him and Catherine. You don’t get that more than once, the vast majority of people don’t. Besides, this goof—” He glances at Steve, finds him staring back with an unreadable expression, one Danny hasn’t seen in a long, long time. Something—weird tightens in his belly. “This goof’s—in many ways, what we have is much better. He’s—like I said, he gets me in a way that Rachel never could, no one could, and of all the people in the world, truly all of them, he’s the one I trust the most. I trust him to have my back, I trust him to keep his word, things that I’ve always struggled with when it comes to relationships. What, I shouldn’t promise him to—to have his back for the rest of his life too just because he was born with the wrong parts? No.”

Adam’s expression has transformed from perplexed to bemused. He tips his head. “That—actually makes sense, yeah.”

“Unh-hunh,” Lou neighs again, sarcasm so heavy it’s a miracle it doesn’t materialize out of the ether and start dripping down the walls. “What if you meet someone?” he, directly and exclusively, asks Steve.

Steve makes a dismissive face. “Won’t happen.”

“And who decided you weren’t gonna have sex, then?” Lou growls. Like he knows something. Does he know something? Did he know before Danny did? If that’s the case, Danny’s gonna be furious—

“We did,” Steve says, without batting an eyelash. “Together. Danny and me.”

That—catches him off-guard. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he’d been convinced Steve would throw him under the bus the first chance he got, make relentless fun of his prudishness, like he always does, like even Grace did a little. He pushes through. “Yes. Yeah, that’s what we did. Together, mutually.”

“Unh-hunh.”

Adam glances at Lou. “I think what Lou’s trying to say is we’re happy if you’re happy.”

“We’re happy,” Danny says, though if he hadn’t snarled it, he might’ve come across as more believable. He grabs Steve’s wrist and drags it out from under his other arm, takes his hand—he’s held Steve’s hand before, hasn’t he? He’s liked it, that broad palm, his long fingers; he likes it now. Steve’s sturdy; he’s never had to worry about accidentally hurting Steve like his female partners. He lifts their joined hands up. “We’re very happy. Thank you. Aren’t we?”

Steve doesn’t respond, but he grips Danny’s hand back. When Danny looks, he finds Steve staring at him, a wry smile on his face, eyes a clear blue. The impulse to kiss Steve’s hand swells—before he can work out if he’s allowed, if he should do that in public, Adam and Lou have drifted away.

Steve ducks his head and grins, squeezes Danny’s hand and lets go. He straightens, that odd expression still there and—and steps closer to cup Danny’s face with both hands, just to look, apparently, just look at him, but with such overwhelming fondness it steals away Danny’s air.

“Cheek is okay, you said?” Steve asks quietly.

Danny’s heart stumbles. “Yeah. Yes. Sure.”

Steve kisses him—not on the cheek though, the fiend misdirected—it’s more on the side of Danny’s nose he presses against, to land on the soft skin under Danny’s right eye. He lingers there, with his silky lips, his warm breath, the thrill of his stubble prickling over Danny’s cheek. He presses another kiss to Danny’s temple, then lets go and steps away, disappears into his office.

Danny stands there for a long time, heart pounding, not quite trusting his knees to carry him.

—

His parents don’t fare much better than the team. 

“Daniel, are you a homosexual? You can tell us. Even our pastor says it’s okay now,” his ma repeats, five times verbatim, another four times in roundabout ways. Just as Danny’s patience kips over, strong hands on his shoulders stall him, knead the tension—and the rant—right out of him. 

“No, Ma,” he says, purrs. “I might marry him though, just so you know.” 

Steve laughs quietly above him. Danny looks up to see it on his face, but disappointingly, Steve’s already on the move. 

“I’m happy for you?” Bridget says, voice lilting uncertainly, and thankfully Danny has to run through it only twice for her to grasp.  “Though, Danny, it’s kind of weird. Just fuck him already, what’s wrong with you?” 

Stella takes it from there, with many of the same words. “What the fuck is wrong with you, D-bag? I swear you weren’t like this when you were little. Literally nobody cares who you fuck. We just want you to be fucking happy, is that too much to fucking ask?” 

Charlie, after Steve presents him with a brand-new football and Danny stumbles through the eight-year-old version of what’s going on—Uncle Steve’s gonna be around even more—is enthusiastically on board. Rachel, not so much. 

“I don’t understand you, Daniel,” she says, at her kitchen table where they’re sipping lukewarm tea while outside Steve and Charlie throw the new football around. “A man? I wasn’t aware you harbored homosexual tendencies.” 

“I don’t, Rachel, have you heard a single word I said?” And off they are, in a half-hour round and round argument about their greatest hits. 

At least that’s what he thinks is going to happen, but a minute in, Rachel stops, frowns, and says, “I must say, I find it rather cruel what you’re doing to him.” 

“You find it—cruel? What the hell do you mean?” 

Rachel rolls her eyes. “The man is utterly besotted with you, Daniel. I daresay he’s been like that since the first time I met him—you never saw his expression when you were in my neighbor’s house, about to be set upon by those bank robbers. Don’t you think it’s awful to dangle everything he wants but can’t have right before his eyes on a daily basis?” 

The way those words land, on his chest heavy like a concrete slab, it takes him several seconds to come up with a response. “He’s fine with our arrangement. Okay? We talked about it. He gets almost everything he wants, and so do I.” 

“So you’ve sworn sex off for the rest of your life, then?”

“No, just sex with you,” he retorts, and stands, effectively ending the conversation. 

Of course Rachel would know, and not tell him. Of course she would. 

Entertaining Charlie eats up the rest of the evening. Danny doesn’t really get to talk to Steve until they’re in bed that night, but he is profoundly soothed by the certainty that he’ll have the chance simply by getting through the day.

“—just grating, you know, all these people, saying things about something that doesn’t really affect them, doesn’t hurt them, all these negative opinions about something that other people have thought about at length, very thoughtfully fleshed out the details of, and made sure no one will get hurt. It’s infuriating. Am I wrong?”

The bedside lamp is on, this time the one on Danny’s side. In its low light, Steve’s eyes are a deep slate, soft with encroaching sleep, or maybe it’s his gentle smile that makes them look that way. He’s lying halfway on his side this time, as if thinking about curling up, but too comfortable to move. That’s better, so much better than him on his back in that funeral pose. “No, Danno, you’re not wrong.” 

“I know I’m not. Thank you.” Danny flicks off the light and lies down. In the dark, the many thoughts that have been chasing him take heft. Steve’s forearm is right in front of him, and without thinking, he fits his hand around the warm solid mass of it. “Are they right? Are we stupid to think this is gonna work?” 

He counts two of Steve’s breaths before Steve moves. He shifts fully to his side and, leaving his arm where it is, cups Danny’s jaw with his other hand. “Forget what they said. Are you—happy? With the way things are now?” 

Some unacknowledged, needy thing is writhing in the pit of his stomach, but it’s not unhappiness, no. What’s the alternative? Steve gone? Steve somewhere away from him? His space in Danny’s chest curled with constant dread, helpless longing? Compared to that he’s ecstatic, he’s bursting at the fucking seams with joy. “I’m happy. Very happy, actually.” 

Steve leans up and kisses his forehead, and he does it well: not just a flighty peck but a nice, long, dry press of lips, accompanied by a wave of that unique sunshine-sandalwood scent of his. It stops Danny’s heart for a second, and then melts warmth in that Steve Space in his chest. “Then definitely forget what they said.”

He settles down and evens out his breath. Danny counts six of those, while he gathers himself up to ask, “Are you? Happy?”

“Yes. I’m very happy,” Steve says. Simple, final, no room for second-guessing—that’s nice. This is exactly what he means, that Steve gets him, better than anyone else on this planet.

“Okay, good.” What else haven’t they had a chance to talk about? “What did Cole have to say?” 

Steve hums. “Nothing. His contact he thinks can work the cipher is out of town. There’s someone else he can reach out to, he said, he came to update me.” 

Of course he wasn’t going to let the stupid cipher thing rest. Just as Danny’s going to preen about just how right he was in his predictions, Steve sighs and says, “And then we talked a little. About, you know, the SEALs. His mission gone wrong, some of the shit we’ve seen.” 

The Steve Space swells with tenderness. Danny doesn’t nuzzle Steve’s slack hand where it rests between them, he definitely doesn’t, it just happens to be there when he shifts closer in an attempt to show support, and it feels comforting against his face, so he just stays where he is. Steve sighs again, apparently content too. 

He can’t get over how easily Steve had his back with Lou. Steve used to be like that in the beginning too, wholly devoted, always there for him—he used to pick up Danny’s calls in the middle of firefights, for god’s sake, didn’t hesitate to drop everything and come to his aid at the barest hint of a request, who did that? Such a far cry from his behavior over the years, when he was arrogant and inconsiderate, almost mean sometimes, to the degree that his sharp edges left Danny bleeding inside more than once. 

He must have gotten frustrated, waiting for Danny to get his head out of his ass, understandably so, or worse, hurt, because Danny just wouldn’t. Who wouldn’t have lashed out a little, over the course of a whole decade spent like that? Fuck Danny and his obliviousness. He’s hurt Steve for years, and never realized it. 

No dreams come, not that night. Danny keeps his hand around Steve’s forearm anyway. 

Chapter Text

Sworn off sex for good, she says, which is absurd, okay? He has not done that, sworn off anything. Besides he’s allowed to have sex with other people if he wants, and so is Steve—that’s not a good thought, not at all—but Danny was the one to bring that up, he was the one to want that in the arrangement, so Rachel? She’s wrong, completely and utterly off the mark, as usual. 

Never mind that he’s never liked sex without feelings—that last time, in the bar bathroom—god, he hates thinking about that—he didn’t even come, it was so uncomfortable, and it kind of smelled awful—he just helped her get off, and then got rid of the condom before she could see, and wasn’t what happened after one of the greatest arguments against casual sex that’s ever existed? 

So fucking stupid, and phoning Steve, like his nose needed to be rubbed in what he couldn’t have, like Rachel said—why did Danny do that, what the hell was the matter with him? Was he trying to force a reaction out of Steve? What reaction would’ve made him believe Steve was as gone for him as he had to be to endure ten years of his oblivious bullshit? Fuck, he’s sorry, to Steve and her both, so fucking sorry. He wishes he could take that whole day back, this whole year. What an idiot he’s been.

At least he knows now. He’ll be careful, he’ll be decent. He’ll take care of Steve, like he promised. 

He was one-hundred percent serious about what he said to Adam—what are the chances he’ll meet someone he’ll fall in love with, get along with better than Steve? And as for sex—well, he’s pretty good at that by himself, to be honest, to the degree that since Melissa left, he's kind of stopped looking for someone to do it with. 

Yeah, so, it might sound kind of pathetic, but it’s not, not really. Sue him, but he likes to masturbate. Since thirteen years old, while his peers maligned it as a halfway measure to tide them over between conquests, he recognized it for what it was: the purest and most accessible form of self-care available. He enjoys it, he takes his time; he knows what he likes best, and he is under no delusions that the orgasms he can give himself aren’t better than those supplied by at least ninety percent of one-night stands out there. 

Except, it’s not accessible, not at the moment. The bed is his preferred venue, but a week in Steve’s bed isn’t enough to make it feel like his, and going back to the guest room just to beat one out seems even worse. So the shower it is, leaning against the tile like he’s back in his twenties, sharing a Hoboken two-bedroom with Alex Donnely, the dorky grad student with the swimmer’s body, while trying to get his dick, which is used to aromatherapy lube and 900-thread count Egyptian cotton, to cooperate before the ancient water heater turns his shower into a cold water immersion drill. 

“Listen, if I’m supposed to live here long-term, we need to do something about the water heater,” he announces, striding into the kitchen. Steve, in the process of frying eggs, acknowledges him with a glance. “Because, I love you too, darling, but I’m not retraining myself to 3-minute Army showers at my age, I absolutely am not.”

“Navy,” Steve says, but it’s half-hearted. “What if—” He breaks off, huffs, and turns with one hand on his hip. 

He doesn’t go on. Danny’s intrigued. “What if what?” 

Steve, gaze wandering, refocuses it on Danny’s face. “What if you got out of your lease and I sold the house and we pooled our money and bought something new, together?” 

Danny’s heart trips. Steve’s looking so uncertain, so tender—he never thought Steve could look like that. “Yeah. Let’s do that.” 

Amazement widens Steve’s eyes for a second. “Yeah? For real?” 

“Yeah.” They look at each other, the pan—that fucking pan again, sizzling away serenely next to Steve’s hip like it’s trying to tell them something. “I told you, I’m all in. Let’s buy a house together.” 

Steve nods, looks down—lips quirking up, then higher, in a smile he seems unable to control. He turns back to the stove, but his grin is visible in profile, the tips of his ears tinged red. Something very satisfied settles into the Steve Space in Danny’s chest. 

His coffee poured, Danny strides over to the counter, patting Eddie’s head as he passes him by, and pulls himself up, choosing to direct his answering grin into his mug. 

“And—the restaurant thing—” Steve says. Danny looks up. “You know, me backing out of the restaurant?” he tells the pan, of course the fucking pan, staring into it with his arm braced on the vent fan, “it wasn’t because—of what I said then. I mean, it was, but not entirely. It was more because of why I was gonna leave.” While Danny’s chewing on that, he chances a glance over his shoulder, his expression just as delicate as before. The Steve Space pulls taut. “You know what I mean? I’m all in too, Danny. I just—couldn’t be, before, like this.” 

Of course he couldn’t. “Yeah. I get that.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” 

Steve returns his attention to the eggs, his shoulders square, but no longer tense. Something giddy is visiting the Steve Space and it’s hard for Danny to control his face, so he slips off the counter. He’ll just dip into the living room for a second, grin stupidly to himself there, get it out of his system. 

Steve steals a glance at him, his huge eyes some striking shade of blue Danny wishes he was gay enough to know the right word for. Regardless—without thinking, he puts his mug down on the island and hooks his hand under Steve’s elbow—warm, soft skin, did he know Steve’s skin there was so soft?—tugging him around, directly into his arms. 

Different from their usual back thumping, tip-touching hugs; for this one he slips his arms around Steve’s waist, presses his face into Steve’s neck, feels Steve’s breath hitch in his chest. A second later, Steve’s arms settle around his shoulders, his body curving down to fit Danny’s.

Why do they ever do that anyway, pound each other as hard as they can as if it’s not a demonstration of affection but a show of force, where did Danny even learn to do it like that? Was it Matt who made fun of him for ‘hugging like a girl’ or was it him making fun of Matt, like there’s something wrong with the way girls do stuff? It wasn’t from their dad, their dad always hugged with his heart, for as long as he wanted, as tight as he could, like he loved them so much he wanted to pull them back into his being again for a few seconds. He never slapped their backs. It must have been later then, maybe high school? Not college—the Police Academy?

Also—where the hell was Danny’s mind that he never noticed how slender Steve’s waist is, or how well Steve fits against his body, how vulnerable he can feel with his head resting on Danny’s shoulder? Just like the skin on the inside of Steve’s elbow, he had no idea Steve could be soft like this, quiet—such a far cry from his unyielding, rough demeanor these past few years. But he just said it, didn’t he, what Danny was thinking too—he couldn’t be like this, not before Danny got his head out of his ass, not if he didn’t want to be found out, or get hurt even worse. The Steve Space churns, full of emotion, protectiveness and affection and—something else. 

Something that feels so dangerously like— 

His face is hot. He ducks it down, loosening the embrace—Steve gets the message immediately and collects himself, turning away, hiding his own expression behind the hand he swipes past his nose. 

“I, uh, I’ll be right back for the eggs,” Danny manages, striding out. 

“Yeah, five minutes,” Steve says, and sniffs. 

Just inside the living room, before he even gets a chance to catch his breath, his phone rings. Eric.

He has to clear his throat, scrub a hand over his face—his heart’s still thumping like he sprinted a mile. Fuck. “Yeah. Eric.” 

“Yo, Uncle D,” Eric says, “looks like your man McG was onto somethin’, ‘cause yours truly just found a hair that ain’t yours, his, the pooch’s or the kid’s. We’re talkin’ foreign follicle invasion here, you feel me?”

Danny closes his eyes. It’s too fucking early for this. “So you’re saying someone did break in?” 

“Yeppers. Took me a hot minute because we’re swamped here, total chaos energy, as usual no staff and no dinero, but you know how that is, being a fellow public servant and all. Got confirmation there was someone else in the mix, and based on what I’m seeing with this hair sample, whoever it was dropped it within a day of me collecting it.”

No one they know was in the study in that timeframe. “Okay. Did you run it through the system?” 

“Bet, first thing I did. Zero matches, sadly. But check it—did some science magic on it, and I’m, like, ninety-nine-point-nine percent this perp’s got Asian ancestry, most likely Chinese.” Something clatters in the background. “Oh, shit. Okay, I gots to yeet, Uncle D, catch you later. Stay fresh.” 

And he’s gone in a beep of end-call tones. With another deep breath, Danny reverses his route, back to the kitchen, to inform Steve. 

—

Turns out Steve hasn’t been quite as detail-oriented in setting the alarm prior to the break-in, apparently so deep into his nihilistic streak that he feels, “does it even matter, Danny, whoever wants to stroll into this house does it fucking anyway.” They argue about it the entire drive to HQ, up the stairs, down the hallway and through the door, Danny’s heart singing, Steve’s eyes dancing with mirth, like they should, like they always should—and there she is. 

Catherine, herself, as if the universe sent her to fuck with Danny’s mind. Gorgeous as ever, her black lustrous hair cascades down her shoulders, and her big brown eyes immediately latch onto Steve. 

Steve honest-to-god misses a step. Danny grits his teeth, the Steve Space in his chest erupting with something hot and angry. 

“Hey, sailor,” Catherine purrs, and Danny almost buries his fist into the nearest wall. 

Steve aborts a glance in Danny’s direction, shoulders stiff. “Catherine. What are you doing here?” 

“I called her,” Lincoln Cole says, and why, why is that guy still here, why isn’t he in a military prison somewhere, or better, in inpatient therapy, dealing with his goddamn PTSD? Why? 

“Hey, Danny,” Catherine tries. All Danny can dredge up is a fake smile and a half-hearted wave; he can’t even make himself slow down his march into his office. 

“Wow,” he hears Tani breathe, before he shuts his door. Does not slam it, mind you, he closes it, carefully, with a snick and not a bang, just so no one can claim he slammed it, okay? He has a ton of shit to do; no one in this godforsaken office seems to have any interest in actual police work, no one seems to know that paperwork is where convictions are secured, so as usual it is up to him. He is not avoiding, he’s not. He’s there for five minutes before Junior comes to collect him to help with the cipher. 

Of course Catherine’s still the full package, did Danny ever have a doubt? She makes short work of their problem, the pinnacle of competent and attractive as ever, the long, wistful looks she shoots Steve’s back when she thinks he’s not looking reverberating in Danny’s Steve Space like gunshots. 

Within three hours they’re hurtling to the cemetery, to Doris’s mausoleum, finding crowbars and emptying stacks and stacks of money from its hollow walls, Steve’s expression set in that mulish kind of determination that means the world has let him down once again. Danny itches to touch him—when did that happen? Wasn’t Steve supposed to be the one wanting to touch? Wasn’t this a favor Danny was doing so he wouldn’t leave?

And why is Catherine following them home, why is Lincoln Cole—isn’t this supposed to be Danny’s house too? Isn’t he allowed to be petty, just once, not let them enter his home, their home, their living room, the kitchen where they almost, where Danny almost—

A box, right in his face, and he veers, flattening against the hallway wall. The box swings away and Junior appears behind it, wide-eyed in alarm. At least the rest of them have proceeded through, the scrape of chairs indicating they’ve made it to the lanai. 

“Sorry, sir, didn’t see you there,” Junior says. 

Danny swallows the sudden spike in blood pressure. “It’s—what the hell are you doing?”

Junior flushes. “Uh, moving out, sir.” 

“Moving—why?” 

Junior stares at him, open-mouthed, for a few heartbeats. “You and the commander, in—you know, your new relationship, I figured you’d need the space. For the kids.” 

That’s—unimaginably sweet of him, actually. “Where, um, where are you going?” Danny asks. 

Junior brightens. “I got a little apartment, three blocks down from Tani’s house.” He fidgets as if to reach for his phone, realizes he still has the box in his hands. “I’ll show you later. If you lean over a certain way in the bedroom you can see the ocean.” 

Affection stronger than any he’s so far felt for Junior wells up. “I’m—very happy for you. Do you need help moving?” 

Junior smiles. “No, sir, I’m okay. I actually got most of it over the past week.” 

Sneaky little shit. Or maybe Danny was a little preoccupied. “Did you tell Steve?”

Junior’s face tightens. “No. Not yet. I will, though. He was just—so much happier than he’s been, you know. I didn’t want to—make him think I’m uncomfortable or something, because that’s not why at all.” 

Danny nods, letting Junior slip past—Junior can’t stay for dinner, he and Tani have plans—and heads to the powder room, as he initially intended. Good for Junior he’s moving on with his life. If only Catherine were inclined to do the same. 

The build-up to the meal proceeds normally, or as normally as it possibly could. Steve grills, Catherine commandeers the kitchen for salad and sides like she’s never done before, and Danny feels intensely out of place out in the yard, most of his energy spent not fidgeting or binge-drinking while trying to make conversation with Cole. 

Who is looking a little shifty. “How’s your—thing going? With McGarrett?” 

Danny sucks in his upper lip and bites down hard, nodding slowly. “Fine. Just fine.” 

“Good. Good.” Cole points a thumb toward the kitchen. “I was trying to help him out. Didn’t realize he and Rollins knew each other.” 

Oh, they know each other, all right. Danny nods again. He can control his face better than his words, always could. Most of the time anyway. 

“What I’m trying to say is, I’m sorry if I stepped in something,” Cole says.

Danny studies him. Is he fishing? Or is this truly some kind of underhanded apology for raining on Danny’s parade? 

Steve drops off the platter with the steaks and lopes away, into the house. Too aware of Cole’s attention, Danny grits his teeth and keeps his eyes on the sunset, even though it’s still so bright it almost hurts to look at. Kind of like Steve, when he smiles that one way, like—this morning, in the kitchen. That was a good smile, not unfamiliar, no. Just very rare. 

It takes him a blink or two through the purple dots in his vision to convince himself she’s real—Grace, coming out of the house, hand held up to shade her eyes while she scans the backyard, and spots him at the picnic table. She scurries over, and once she’s close enough, makes a face of exaggerated surprise, mouthing what the fuck at him. 

Danny hides his grin and steals a glance at Cole, who looks absorbed by the view. “Monkey, what are you doing here?” 

She sits and slips in under the arm he’s holding out for a hug. “I had a free evening and came to hang out. Since when is Catherine back?” 

“Since this morning. She’s helping Steve with something.” He introduces Cole to Grace, and while they shake hands, sips his beer. 

She leans in. “New stray?” she whispers in his ear.

Thank god she’s here. “Yeah.” 

“Yours too now.” 

For how long? The Steve Space contracts with something like fear. “I guess.” 

“Are you okay?” 

Danny nods. Of course he’s okay. Why wouldn’t he be okay? 

She gives him another hug and skips away. To prevent any further awkward conversation, Danny launches into Grace’s life story, the parts suitable for public consumption at least, and if Cole’s eyes glaze over while Danny’s in the process of extolling her grade school drawing talents, he can’t be bothered to feel much regret. 

Of course the truffle risotto Catherine off-handedly whipped up out of Danny’s pantry is Michelin-level good, and the salad classy and tangy, the perfect accompaniment to Steve’s expertly seared meat, as if it’s not obvious enough that Catherine is the flawless lid to whatever kind of pan Steve is. It makes it look so laughable, what Danny was trying to do, so fucking ridiculous, that if Grace weren’t there, he might’ve stomped off and sulked in his room like a disgruntled toddler. 

He sees the dinner through, then, when Grace leaves, excuses himself and heads—Jesus, should he sleep in Steve’s bed? Would that be—out of turn? What if things happen with Catherine, what if they—

Impotent fury boils his blood. He’ll sleep in their bed, thank you very much, if Catherine wants to seduce Danny’s—what? Monogamous friend? What the fuck was he thinking, in what world is his make-believe house-playing gonna outshine what she and Steve could have—was Danny delusional? Drunk?—but regardless, Steve agreed to it, and if she wants to seduce her—almost-fiancé, fuck, how does that stack up against a ‘monogamous friend’?—she can do it on the couch. Or the beach, or in the ocean—really, anywhere, having the athletic, gorgeous sex that he could never hope to—

The door to the upstairs lanai sticks. He jiggles it, carefully, and, manages to open it without making too much of a racket. Stupid, so stupid what he’s doing, huddling on the grimy floor in the t-shirt and shorts he’s been sleeping in, still sucking toothpaste off his gums, trying to eavesdrop on his—Steve. His Steve? Catherine’s Steve. Fuck. 

Cole’s leaving, but Catherine is not—should he go down there, should he barge in on their little reunion—what is this, how did this happen, just this morning they were talking about buying a house together? And now here he is, feeling like he’s fifteen again, insecure and awkward—no, more importantly, helpless to do anything about it.  

Though one thing it’s clarified—that odd, unsettled feeling he’d always get in Catherine’s presence, the one he never could name before? It was just jealousy, plain and simple. Good to know, now, years too late. Excellent detecting, Detective. Gold star.

He can make out words. Cole’s gone; Steve and Catherine are reminiscing about something at the Naval Academy. He works out his phone from his shorts pocket, to tap out a text to Grace. 

Where might one go to learn all this pan and skillet stuff 

Her typing bubble pops up. 

“—sorry I didn’t tell you what was going on, you know, after Kono’s wedding,” Catherine’s saying, and Danny locks his phone and jams it back into his pocket. “It was just—I was new, and it was hard enough leaving you without having to listen to all the very good reasons why it was a very bad idea. You know?”

“No,” Steve says. Danny smiles despite himself. 

Several seconds of silence; Steve must’ve caught her off-guard. She continues about her job, without ever using the name CIA, gives a good overview of what she does, and even Danny catches the gist of it, broken up by the ocean as she occasionally is. 

“All the missions you participated in, where they were conceived, what is important enough to—” The roaring of a wave, “—this new group I’m working with does. All around the world.” A beat of silence, a wave serendipitously in it. His phone vibrates in his pocket, for the third time. Catherine continues, “How long have you been here now? Has it been ten years?”

“Yeah. Ten years.” 

The ocean again, swallowing up some of what she says in response. “—thought you’d stay still for so long?”

“I have—reasons,” Steve says. Another wave. 

“Well, if you were looking for a new challenge, maybe, would you consider doing what I do? I need a partner—” Another wave. Danny clenches his fists. “—traveling and really making a difference.” 

Why is the ocean so angry with him, is it the many years he spent hating this island? If so, he’s deserved it, no question. Steve’s answer is completely swallowed up by the waves. 

Catherine laughs. “—a lot of those when it comes to you, Steve. It never sat right with me how we left things.” 

Wave, then Catherine murmuring, “—miss you more than you can—” wave again, and then them, laughing, together. 

Fuck. His eyes sting; he rests his forehead on his fists. 

“—really cold, huh?”

“Yeah, let’s go inside,” Steve says, and their voices fade away. Danny gives them another minute, then crawls up to his achy knees and slinks back inside. 

And no, he can’t hear them from the loft. 

Chapter Text

That night, huddled into himself on his side of the bed, he has several dreams, all centering on Steve leaving. He wakes up and it’s light outside. His hand is numb.

It’s numb because Steve’s lying on it, his cheek nestled into the palm Danny must’ve flung out in sleep, his long fingers curled around Danny’s wrist like he’s afraid Danny’s going to take his hand away. The way Steve has his arm bent bulges out his biceps, teasing the tattoo on his shoulder into a slightly different shape. 

In sleep, Steve looks—vulnerable again, and apparently that’s Danny’s undoing, because that new-old-new thing that feels like that, that hot thing twists into his gut, pours into his groin, shimmery and insistent. Breath held, he rests his fingertips on the ink, plays them across Steve’s warm, smooth skin, fits them around Steve’s triceps, pressing the tattoo with his thumb to watch its faded lines distort. 

Heteroflexible and bicurious and—what was the other one, not liquid—fluid. All these words he’s never heard before, every single one as distant from him as he’s kept the seminal, and yeah, there’s something to be said about others having similar experiences—a 55-year-old man whose supposed statement struck a particular chord with him, about having been happily married to a woman for thirty years and then falling in undeniable love with a guy he met at work—but it’s all just strangers’ words on the internet. Who’s to say they’re even real, who’s to say it isn’t all made up? How does he get past this feeling of otherness, how does he make whatever word’s supposed to correspond to him feel like it belongs? 

A rush of breath. Danny looks up—Steve’s eyes are open, green-hazel in the early morning light, his pupils big black orbs in the middle, staring at him. His grip on Danny’s wrist tightens. 

Fuck. Heat sears up his neck, into his face—he should let go, move back—but Steve beats him to it, flinging himself out of bed. 

“Overslept,” he mumbles, and disappears into the bathroom. 

Danny rolls on his back, head in his hands—fuck. What must Steve think Danny was doing, touching him while he was asleep, like some kind of creeper? Though they did say touching is okay. Was that okay? 

The water runs in the bathroom.

His morning wood is rapidly deflating—one less thing to worry about—fuck, is Catherine still here? Did she stay over? What happened last night after he gave up and went to bed? 

Steve emerges from the bathroom, now shirtless in his board shorts, his impossible-to-miss erection a thick, full line against the thin green fabric—and that, with the bare planes of his chest on display like that, jolts Danny’s own dick back to full in the space of a heartbeat. Fuck. He bends one knee up to hide it in the covers. 

Not that Steve would see; he’s already loping toward the door. 

“You’re gonna be late,” Danny says. 

“Twenty minutes. If you make the coffee.” 

Whatever. But— “Is Catherine still here?” 

Steve pauses just long enough to shoot him a frown. “No. She went back to her hotel.” 

“Okay. Good. Wouldn’t want to scar her for life.” 

No response, just Steve’s heavy footfalls down the stairs. 

“Be careful!” Danny hollers after him. They just had someone break in, and there he goes, leaving the house by himself in nothing but those little shorts, looking like that—downstairs, the lanai door slides open, then shut. Danny exhales. 

Why was Steve in such a hurry to get away from him? Did he notice—Danny’s state? But that shouldn’t be—bad, that should be good, Steve should think it’s good, shouldn’t he? 

Catherine—it must be related to her, the offer she made him, he must want to take it—who wouldn’t, in their right mind? Who’d rather stay here, with a short, angry, forty-one-year-old Jersey jackass who apparently skipped the part about figuring himself out in his twenties and is now trying to sift through cookware to see if he’s a pan or a skillet or a lid, when they could have the beautiful, intelligent, competent woman who probably knows exactly what kind of kitchen utensil she is and how to handle a pan like Steve? 

Entirely unconcerned with the identity crisis its owner has descended into, his dick continues to jut up stupidly, demanding attention. With a frustrated growl, he pushes his shorts and underwear off, shrugs out of the t-shirt—warm, soft linen against his skin, pure bliss after a week in the frigid shower. 

He runs his hands in his practiced pattern, over his face, the tips of his fingers around his ears—that one time, Steve had done that, at the Hilton, sent goosebumps down the tender skin of his neck. Steve, with his bare chest, rivulets of water caressing the column of his throat. Danny follows that path with his own hands, down his own chest, a short detour to his nipples—he’s always liked it, his nipples being played with, but couldn’t tell anyone out of embarrassment. Only Rachel, and only after many years—was he right to be embarrassed? Did that mean something? Did that mean he was—coded for not being straight, whatever else he ends up being? 

He trails his fingers over his V-line, the cut of his hips—call him vain, but yeah, he likes those, stays off carbs three days a week and does those murderous Russian twists just to keep them nice and sharp like that; Steve has them too, wears his shorts low, to show them off—the bed smells like him, his spot is still warm. With a groan Danny shifts to Steve’s side, pressing his nose into Steve’s pillow, inhales Steve’s musk, and palms his own thighs, down the outside of them, then up the inside, kneading with his thumbs, like—like Steve might, if he was going to—to take Danny in his mouth. 

Fuck, he’s not gonna last long, not with that line of thought—one hand around his shaft, the other gripping his balls, he strokes—Steve has nice hands, bigger hands; they would feel—different, hot—Steve’s lips, stretched taut around him, eyes closed in bliss—does Steve like that, does he like giving head? Would he like Danny’s cock, Danny’s always been secretly proud of it, used to check out the other boys in high school when these things mattered. None of the girls he slept with ever complained, some warned him to be careful—what do guys want? What does Steve want? What does he like, does he like using his hands, his mouth, does he like—god, Steve’s ass, how would that feel, tight and hot around him? Girls like anal, some of them do, Melissa used to—she’d offered to show him how it felt, but he’d refused, claiming he didn’t like it, but truthfully was just terrified what it might mean if it turned out that he did. 

“A finger up your ass isn’t gonna make you gay,” she’d laughed, “you’re so uptight sometimes, Danny.” 

He’d begged to differ, so sure he was right—but he wasn’t, he was so far from it. Even then, Steve used to pop into his thoughts randomly, what he liked in bed, what he’d look like fucking, if he’d let Catherine do that to him—was it always there, this hot, dangerous thing he’s reluctant to name, did he just not know how to recognize it? 

Because the truth is, when he saw Steve’s picture in John McGarrett’s file, the first thing that zipped through his mind was how unrealistically handsome Steve is, and then, in the garage, when he had every reason and a gun pointed in his face not to notice, how the verdigris of Steve’s irises changed hue with the light, and fuck, Steve’s long torso, his full pecs, the planes of his abs, how slender his waist was in the circle of Danny’s arms yesterday, how it would feel if Danny gripped it with both hands and nudged Steve’s thighs apart—

He comes with a shudder, a wink in and out of existence, barely managing to keep the spill contained in his cupped hand. Breathing hard, muscles slack—god, he’s never been this untethered, this fucking confused—is this permanent, how has he thought himself into this—thing? Has he always been attracted to Steve or is this some kind of proximity effect, ignited by Steve’s new, willing vulnerability? Who has the answers? 

Certainly not the websites Grace sent him, his own eighteen-year-old daughter who knows more about sexual identity than he, a man who used to pride himself on his open-mindedness, and not anyone in his close circle either. Should he go back to therapy, do they make therapy for this type of thing?

Fuck, if only he had a sign, some help, a way through. He’d fucking give anything for it.

—

They go to work, twenty minutes late as predicted. Though there is plenty of opportunity, Steve doesn’t mention Catherine’s offer, and Danny can’t bring himself to ask, not while he can’t even look at Steve, the quiet, woodsy scent of Steve’s aftershave enough to keep him uncomfortably close to another hard-on. He just—needs a little time, okay?

Catherine is at HQ when they arrive, as is Cole, along with Ellie Clayton who apparently wants to talk to Steve about the money. Whoever broke in and stole the cipher envelope has not resurfaced, and with the money now safe at the DA’s office, it looks like they missed their window. In spite of that, Danny can’t help but feel they haven’t heard the last of it. 

While Steve hashes that out, Danny gets to run point on this robbery homicide in Kahala that the kids have well in hand. Around lunch, Chin calls him. 

Chin does that, every few weeks, call him, and give him a quick overview of what they’re up to, he and Abby and Sara, their little family. He’s done it since he left, and keeps it up even when Danny forgets to return the favor sometimes. 

“And Sara,” Chin says. “She’s discovered a passion for theater, you won’t believe. Abby’s worried the acting classes are going to make it easier for her to lie to us when she gets older. So I sat Sara down and we had a conversation about superpowers and using them for good.”

Danny laughs. “You are a smart man.”

“I try.” A pause. “Kono misses you.” 

“I miss her too.” Unlike Chin, he and Kono talk maybe once every six months, but within minutes, they’re back on track like no time has passed, like there aren’t thousands of miles between them. But Chin’s right; it’s been a while. He should call her.  

“What’s new with you?” Chin asks. “How’s Steve?”

He flails, for a whole five seconds. 

“Danny? You still there?” 

“Yeah.” Hoarse. He clears his throat. “Yeah, I’m here. We, uh, we’re trying something new.” 

“Yeah? What?” 

“We’re, uh, we’re—gonna be each other’s—significant other. Officially. But without sex. You know what I mean?” 

“You mean like a platonic partnership?” 

Huh, look at that. “Is that what it’s called?” 

“I think so. I have a high school friend who did that with her best friend. They even got married, once it became legal. They’re both straight so they date men, but they have a house together, and kids. They’re very happy.” 

That someone else has done it before—he should be reassured, but, like the new words from Grace’s websites, that doesn’t seem to fit right either. “Yeah, we’re—uh, we’re doing something like that.” 

“You and Steve?” 

“Yeah.” 

So quiet on Chin’s end, Danny can hear his own breathing. “He—uh, he agreed to that? A platonic marriage?” 

“Well, we’re not married—“ 

“Partnership, I mean?” 

“Yes.” 

“And Steve agreed to it?” 

Yeah, Danny’s all aflutter and anxious, but he’s still a goddamn police detective, and the question Chin’s chosen to repeat isn’t exactly hard to detect. “You knew about it?” 

Chin stumbles over a word, then comes out with, “About what?” 

Danny’s stomach drops. “Don’t give me that. Him—his—orientation.” 

Chin sighs. “That never came up.” 

His heart is pounding. A knock on his door, Junior sticking his head in—Danny waves him off, shaking his head empathically. Junior retreats. “What do you mean it never came up? What did come up then, that he had—these feelings, for me, and no one, not you, and not he, and—” Let’s face it; she knew fucking everything, what are the chances she didn’t know this? “And not Kono, no one chose to tell me?” 

Another long pause. “It wasn’t our secret to tell.” 

“Well, he almost left,” Danny barks. “He almost left because of it, and I—” His air goes out, like a valve burst open in his chest.

“You went into a platonic partnership with him? So he’d stay?” 

God, the lump in his throat, he swallows it down. “Something like that.” 

“And he’s okay with that?” 

“That’s what he said!” 

“Okay, okay. I—get why you’re upset. I do. And I am sorry, Danny, but you have to understand, it wasn’t our place. Steve certainly didn’t want us to do anything. Because we offered.” 

He pinches the bridge of his nose. “Yeah, he wouldn’t.” 

“How did you find out about it anyway?” 

“He—” Well, Steve didn’t really tell him, did he? “I—kind of figured it out.” 

“I see.” 

There’s movement outside. He should rejoin the team. “Anyway. That’s what happened and this is what we’re doing.”

“Okay. I’m happy for you?” 

Should he be? Catherine out there, asking Steve to be her partner—god, has Danny ever been this wrong? About anything? “Yeah, thanks.” 

“So it’s going well?” 

“It’s just been a week, so I don’t know, okay? I know we haven’t killed each other yet.” He should sound a little kinder. This is still Chin, one of his favorite people. “Look, it’s—complicated. And I have to go.” 

Chin confirms. Just as Danny’s about to end the call, he says, “Danny.” 

Danny stops with his hand on the door handle. “Yeah?” 

“Be gentle with him. Steve, he—” Chin inhales, deeply. “He’s had those feelings for you for a long time. A very long time.” 

Anguish shocks through him. “And whose fault is that, huh? Why didn’t anyone tell me, can you tell me that? Do you think I would’ve let it go on for this long—” He cuts himself off. They breathe together, heat creeping up Danny’s neck. “Yeah. Fine. Fuck.” He hangs up. 

The murder turns out to be drug-related, some kind of state-of-the-art Chinese designer powder that’s been brought in by a new player, and Danny specifically partners up with Junior so he’ll be left alone. Tani runs point. 

The drug is a nasty thing. Even though it’s not easy to overdose on, it has deadly side effects if the user misses a vein, accidentally injects into muscle, or even takes it by mouth. Noelani informs them it’s some kind of synthetic opioid-upper hybrid that gives a nice mellow high and then a boost of energy, almost the best of the best of the two major drug groups, which explains its rapid rise to popularity. They arrest several people, all low-level suppliers, and adjourn the interrogation to the next day. It’s past ten he heads home. 

Breezing down Kalanianaʻole, he thinks a big, dark SUV may be tailing him, but then they’re gone, and when another pulls up behind him, can’t tell if it’s the same car or a different one. He almost veers into a random neighborhood to see what they’ll do, but his gaze is caught by the red and blue of police lights, down the road. 

At the intersection of their street with the highway sits a black-and-white, alongside an ambulance. Danny flashes his own lights in greeting as he pulls in, eyes on the rearview, but the SUV behind him keeps on the highway, accelerating on eastward, completely uninterested in what he’s doing. Just healthy paranoia then; he can live with that.

He rolls his window down, bringing the Camaro to a halt by the patrol officer standing next to the cruiser. “Everything okay?” he asks, flashing his badge.

“Yes, sir,” the kid says. He looks all of twenty. “Old lady fell and broke her ankle; neighbor called for a wellness check. They’re taking her to the hospital now.” 

Fuck, talk about sad. He’s never met that old lady; he knows the neighbors immediately around Steve’s house, but he hasn’t ventured this far up the street yet. He’ll check on her when she gets back from the hospital, bring her food or something. 

As if he willed it into being, the smell of baked chicken and tangy tomato sauce is what greets him at home—Steve, in the kitchen, just in the process of throwing in a heaped-full plate into the microwave. Danny’s heart clenches—it’s for him. Steve made dinner, for him. Is it to let him down easy? To ease the blow when he says he’ll be leaving after all, and with Catherine, no less? 

Steve tips his head at him, the smile in his eyes. “Yo. Hungry?” 

That tender thing slips in him again. “Yeah. Starving.” 

Steve lets the smile show. “Everything go okay?” 

“Yeah. The drug dealer did it.” 

Steve snorts a laugh. “They’re in custody?” 

“Yeah. Thought you’d join us, after you were done.” 

Steve shrugs, busying himself with the microwave. It beeps, and he removes the plate from it. “I had a meeting with the governor, and you said you had things in hand, so I came home. Felt like cooking.” 

“Yeah? Didn’t we have leftovers?” Fucking Catherine, in his kitchen, cooking for his—fuck. He heaps food on his fork—stuff his mouth, stop himself from spewing something truly inane. 

Steve shrugs again. “I just felt like cooking.” 

The chicken is—exquisite. Danny has to close his eyes for a second, overcome by the buttery tenderness of it. Even the dread takes a beat. “A decision I support wholeheartedly, I mean—wow. You should, you should do this every day. Cook every day.” 

Steve smiles, one of those that make Danny’s stomach swoop sweetly. They both look away. Steve says, “Hey, you know I’d make a great trophy husband.” 

For whom? Catherine? The swoop becomes a sickening lurch, and Danny grits his teeth, wagging his head side to side. “I don’t know about that. Maybe if you stayed at home full time, you know.” 

Steve falters for a second, hand on the fridge door. “Yeah, huh. That’d be something.” 

Danny’s about to follow up on that but Steve beats him to it. He asks how they connected the murder to the drug dealers, and the resulting conversation takes them to bed. 

“—and then this low life tried to take the poor security guard hostage, but Quinn was there with a baseball bat, I’m not kidding you, and she took him down, just like that.” 

Steve’s lying halfway on his side again, his head on his pillow, the corners of his eyes all crinkly. “Good for her. And him.” 

This moment with Steve before sleep, warm and mellow, after the world’s left outside—this moment’s rapidly rising to the top of Danny’s favorite things in life list. Of course that should mean he won’t get many more of them. The dread returns, slams into him full force. “Are you going to tell me?” 

The crinkles turn confused. “Tell you what?” 

“What you said to Catherine.” 

Steve blinks, drawing back. “Said to Catherine about what?” 

“Come on, Steve, she offered you a job. A life, didn’t she offer you a life?”

The crinkles are gone. Danny feels their loss like a knee to the gut. “How do you know about that?” Steve asks, voice neutral. 

Danny licks his lips. “I eavesdropped on you last night. I was curious.” 

“Then you heard what I said.” 

“No, I didn’t. I’m not very good at eavesdropping. That’s why I’m asking you. What did you say?” 

A muscle jumps in Steve’s jaw. “What do you think I said, Danny? I thought we had an agreement. Arrangement. Call it what you want, I thought we promised each other something.”

“We did. Of course we did.” He almost lets out a growl. Where do all those stupid words go when he needs them? “That’s not what I’m saying. Look, when we—when you agreed to this, she wasn’t in the picture. We didn’t think she’d ever be in the picture, at least I didn’t, that’s why I—you know, that’s why I said what I said. I would never stand in the way of real happiness for you. I’m sure a wife, a family, kids—wouldn’t that be better than this weird thing we’re doing?” 

Steve doesn’t answer. In the low light, his eyes look almost black. “I see.” 

He says it with finality, with meaning. It sets loose the bats in Danny’s chest, but these ones have teeth now. “You see? What do you see?” 

“I see you’re not really all-in after all, Danny. I see you think this is just some kind of last-ditch compromise, a little consolation prize for not being able to score the right woman.” He rolls to his back, scrubs his hands over his face. While Danny’s still flailing for the right words, he flings the covers off and launches himself out of bed. 

Danny lifts up to an elbow. “Steve, don’t—”

“Don’t what?” He disappears in his—their—closet for a second, then reappears in different shorts. “I’m going for a run. Don’t wait up.” 

“It’s almost midnight, we just got robbed—” Undaunted, Steve’s almost through the door, so Danny shouts, “At least tell me what you told her!” 

Steve doubles back, his handsome features distorted with fury. “What do you think I told her, Danny? I said thank you, I’m flattered, but I promised I’d stay. But obviously—obviously I’m the only one who took this seriously, so maybe I should reconsider, huh? Maybe I should take her up on her offer, because she at least never lied to me about being all in!”

Danny sits up. “That’s not fair! That is not fair! I’m trying to look out for you, I’m trying to give you an out, if you’re having second thoughts, if you’re having regrets, which would be normal, okay, it would be understandable—”

“Would it? Because you’re having them, you mean?” Steve backs away. “It’s okay. It was too good to be true anyway.” 

Like being kneed in the gut again. “Steve—”

Steve’s gone before he can form another word.

Chapter Text

Between catching his breath and stumbling down the stairs after Steve is at most a minute, but that’s apparently all Steve needs to completely disappear down the street. Danny trudges back into the house, toying with the thought of chasing him down with the car—but that’s ridiculous. Let Steve run off some steam. They’ll talk when he gets back. 

He sits on the couch and turns on the TV, mutes it. I don’t want you to go, first thing he’s going to say, I never want you to go anywhere I’m not, but I want you to be happy more than I want me to be happy. That should be clear enough, that should put Steve at ease enough to maybe go back to bed together, explain everything to him, warm and soft under the covers. That’s where they should talk about stuff like that, always—a handful of nights is all it took for sleeping next to Steve to become vital, absolutely essential. An atrocity it took him ten years to find that out. 

The cancer dream, the hospital, looking for Steve’s room—he opens his eyes. It’s light outside; he’s still on the couch, listed sideways with his head bent at an odd angle against the armrest. He has the throw tangled around his legs and his neck hurts like a bitch. 

The lingering panic from the dream weighs on his chest. “Steve?” he calls. No answer—fuck, it’s barely six. He rubs a hand over his face, the knots in his neck—he didn’t pull that throw over himself before passing out. Steve must have, when he got back. 

He makes his way upstairs, finds the bed made—no Steve. The keys to the Camaro are gone too, as is the car when he checks through the window, Steve’s truck the sole occupant of their driveway. Stomach twisting unhappily, Danny calls him. Steve sends him to voicemail. 

A text follows: Go back to sleep. Talk later. 

What’s that supposed to mean? When did Steve leave again, has he been gone all night? He calls once more: voicemail, again. Did Steve spend the night with Catherine? Fuck. Steve wouldn’t do that. Everybody keeps telling him how Steve’s had these feelings for him all this time—one stupid thing out of Danny’s mouth isn’t going to change that. Is it?  

He can’t sit still; he dresses and drives the truck to HQ. Steve’s not there, but despite the ungodly hour, Junior is. Danny makes him call too—voicemail as well. 

“Sorry, sir,” Junior says. He frowns at his phone. “He texted. Says he has to do something, that he’ll be late.” 

Great. Pissed off and unbalanced, Danny totters into his office. His phone goes off. He lunges for it, but it’s not Steve. 

Kono. You up? 

He calls her. “Hey.” 

“Hey, Danny,” Kono says. 

At her voice, his throat knots. He drops into his couch. “Did Chin tell to you call?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Did he tell you what’s going on?” 

“He did.” 

They listen to each other breathe. “Then you know,” Danny says, because he wants to hang up, he wants to call Steve again. He doesn’t want to get into it this early in the morning with her, not before talking to Steve. “What’s new with you?” 

“Nothing, same shit different day,” she says. “My partner’s a nutjob and we do great work. Oh, wait—you know how that goes.”

Their last takedown, of a human trafficking ring that used a daycare as its front, made the national news, though evidence of Kono’s superhuman efforts was limited to a partial newspaper photo of her and her new chin-length bob, and the celebratory phone call to him she had to be tipsy to make. “Great. Good for you.” 

More silence. Just as Danny’s drawing breath to say goodbye, Kono says, “There’s one thing I don’t get though.” 

Of course she’s not gonna let him off the hook. “What’s the one thing you don’t get?” 

“Why no sex?” 

His stomach lurches. “Why no sex, she asks. Well, Kono, it’s because—” I’m not gay, but how true is that now? Can he say that straight-faced—funny—when less than twenty-four hours ago, he very gleefully got off to the mental image of a man, a very manly man? Not to mention the irony, when once he threw that at Steve—they truly have come full circle, haven’t they? “I don’t know.” 

“Because, and I might be totally wrong here, but I always thought you were attracted to him too. At least to some degree.” 

His breath escapes. “You did, huh.” 

“Yeah. I kept telling him to just get you a little drunk, you know, after another one of those near-death experiences you two kept getting into all the time, then lay one on you, leave, and let you simmer on that. I would’ve bet my paycheck you’d’ve come around within a day.” 

The aftermath of the bomb, Steve’s hot, sweaty body shaking against his—that wasn’t one of their so-called manly hugs. Steve fell into his arms, completely undone—more like the recent one in the kitchen than any other embrace they’ve shared. How wrong, wrong it felt, leaving Steve on the street, walking away from him. Danny almost went to see Steve after the dance, but then talked himself out of it—Catherine would’ve been there, after all. He didn’t want to see her all over Steve then either, didn’t understand why, never questioned it. 

Kono’s right. It would’ve worked. 

“You told him, huh?” he says, can’t quite keep the bite out of his voice. “You told him, and Chin told him, and you all talked about it, all these years, and no one, no one saw fit to tell me, huh? Was Lou in on it too?”

“No.” She sounds neutral. “That’s not what we did, and I personally never discussed it with Lou.” 

He exhales, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I just really, really wish you’d said something.” 

“It wasn’t our place, Danny.” 

“Wasn’t it, though? All of you took great pleasure in telling me everything I got wrong about Hawaii, constantly, you couldn’t have mentioned that, oh, I don’t know, it is possible to like people of the same sex even though one is not gay?”

“Wait. That was your hang-up? That’s why it never happened?”

“No. I don’t know. I have no fucking idea.” 

“Danny, you’re—forty-two. Forty-three?” 

His blood boils. “Forty-one!” 

“Well, you were thirty-something then, and you made it look like you knew what you were doing. I didn’t realize you needed the rookie to tell you about the birds and the bees.”

“It wasn’t really the birds and the bees, though, was it, it was more like how a bee likes birds all of the time, but this one time he likes his best bee in a different way—”

“Well, then, I’m sorry I assumed having a college education meant that you were aware of how human sexuality works. Even most high school grads have a fairly good grasp of it.” 

“High school—well, sadly enough, the East Side High sex ed curriculum didn’t include terms such as fluid or flexible nor touch on Queer Theory, Kono, you either were a fag or you were not, and I spent my entire high school career being very careful to be not, okay?” 

That word, he shouldn’t have used that word, it felt like a mouthful of sand coming out, but like he said, sometimes he really can’t control his mouth as well as his face, and right now he’s failing on both counts, he’s failing on all counts that matter. Is Steve with Catherine now? Is that why he’s not picking up? 

Kono is—still silent, ominously so, this time. Dread coils in his gut. 

“Okay, first of all, Danny, you know I love you, but if you ever, ever use that word again, I will never talk to you again, okay?” 

“I know. I know.” Fuck, why is he unraveling like this, why is he fucking up everything? 

His call waiting beeps. He glances at it—Steve. Fuck—did it have to be this exact moment? He’ll call him back, in just a second. “I deserved that. You know I didn’t mean it, though, you know I was just making a point.” 

“Use other words,” Kono snaps. Then, softer, she asks, “Danny, are you okay? You don’t sound okay.” 

He snorts. “Understatement.” He chews the inside of his lip—like Steve does. God, he misses Steve, so fucking much—he’ll call him back in just a second. “All your adult life you think the world is one way, you think you’re one way, and then, just when you think you’ve got everything figured out, something like this happens, and it turns out you don’t know anything, you don’t even know who you are.” 

“I don’t know if that’s true. You’re the same person. You just see nuances now that maybe you didn’t know to look for before. Maybe it’s just your vocabulary that’s changing.” 

“My vocabulary, huh? Can you tell me what the right word is for what I am? Because none of them seem to fit.” 

She thinks for a few seconds. “How about straight with an exception?” 

The laugh hurts his throat barreling out. “I’m pretty sure that’s not a thing.”

“Why not? If it feels like it describes you then it is a thing.” She makes an impatient sound. “Also what does it matter what you are? Why can’t you just be you and want him?” 

“Look—I can’t go off half-cocked, okay? I can’t—risk it, I can’t hurt him. I don’t want to hurt him, starting something when I don’t understand what’s going on, because if you’d asked me last year, I would’ve told you I don’t want him like that. But now I do? I did, all this time? What if next month I don’t again? Next year? Is it fair to start something and then have to tell him, hey, buddy, sorry, whatever queer energy got into me has now left and I don’t feel that way about you anymore?” 

“How is that different than any other relationship?” 

Danny inhales for patience. “Weren’t you listening, Kono, I’ve never actually been attracted to a guy before—” 

“No, what I’m saying is, are you attracted to all women you meet? No, you’re not. When you start a relationship with a woman, you take on the risk of it ending, and that includes the possibility of your sexual attraction fizzling out. It happens in most long-term relationships anyway. So why is it different just because Steve happens to be a man?” 

Okay, yeah, she has a point. Besides—doesn’t he already have the answer to that question? Isn’t that how all this began? “You know what—” 

His door bursts open. Junior, looking defcon-one. “McGarrett’s in trouble.” 

—

The Camaro is burning. 

Sideways across the eastbound lanes of Kapiolani it sits, driver’s side door gaping, flames licking out of its cabin. Danny’s in the truck, then on the ground, Junior’s arms around him—he has no recollection of flinging himself out, none whatsoever of calling for Steve—but his throat is raw, like he’s been screaming, and Junior tosses him toward the curb, shouting at him to stop. 

Junior wrangles the flames, with a fire extinguisher that’s appeared out of nowhere. “He’s not there,” he calls. “He’s not in it.” 

Relief loosens his knees, makes him sink down on the curb. He calls Steve’s phone again, lands in voice mail, for maybe the thirtieth time. He’s not in the car, so where is he? He calls Tani next. “Ping his phone. Can you ping his phone again?” 

“It’s still off,” she says, voice taut. It’s been off, since five minutes after his call to Junior.

God, that’s why he called, because he was in trouble, and Danny sent him to voicemail—would it have changed anything, if he’d picked up—he should’ve known something like this would happen, he had plenty of warning with that weird burglary, of course Doris couldn’t fucking die and leave Steve in peace—fucking get it together. 

He looks up, scanning—there. “Video cameras,” he tells Tani. He sounds like a dick. Get it together. “There are cameras everywhere here. Pull the traffic cams. Call Duke, tell him to send everyone. Junior and me, we’ll start the canvass. Have someone watch the board at all times, in case his phone shows up.” 

“Copy,” she says, and ends the call. 

His legs still feel loose. Too bad. He drags himself up. “Junior.” 

Junior, busy talking to another motorist, ends his conversation and jogs up. 

“What exactly did he say?” 

It’s the sixth time, if not more, that Danny’s asked and he’s answered, but to his credit, Junior shows absolutely no indication of impatience. “He said three black SUVs were on his tail, unmarked, that they were being very obvious about it. He said he turned around to head for HQ.”

That—that’s new. “As opposed to?”  

Junior shrugs. “He didn’t say.” 

“Did he say anything about plates?” 

“No, sir.” 

The fire truck finally arrives. His phone goes off—a video, from Tani, but before he can view it, she calls. 

“Traffic cam on the corner of University shows Steve boxed in by three black SUVs, plates obscured. Several masked perps forced him out of the car at gunpoint, shot him with what looks like a tranq gun, and hauled him into one of the SUVs. Then they took off southbound on to Kalakaua, driving a defensive pattern. I have nothing after Kapahulu.” 

Shot him—his knees threaten to go again. “Are you sure it was a tranq gun?”

“Yes, positive. You can see the dart in the video.”

Thank god. So they’ll make demands, soon. Also—why the hell was Steve out and about that early? “IDs?” 

“No way. We have heights and weights, but no faces.” 

Nothing after Kapahulu—that’s Kapiolani Beach Park. Public parking, it has public parking—

Junior’s drifted away again, talking to the firefighters—the fire is out. Danny strides toward the Camaro—maybe a clue, something left behind—

“Sir, you can’t—” 

He pushes past the fireman, reaches to open the driver’s side door. Someone clamps their hand around his wrist, body-checks him away from the car. Junior again. “It’s still hot, sir. There’s nothing in it, just burnt out groceries.”

Danny stares, dumbstruck. “Groceries?” 

Junior shrugs. 

They’re not making any progress. Do something different. “Okay. Let’s—go.”  

Junior follows. “Where are we going?” 

“Kapiolani Beach Park.” 

Sure enough, in the eastern parking lot of the park, three black SUVs sit together in a cluster, two parked in one row and one in the other. That car, yesterday, the one he thought might have been following him—they look awfully similar to it. Junior screeches the truck to a halt in front of them; Danny leaps out before they come to a complete halt. 

The sound of a camera shutter—Junior, already on it, photographing the plates with his phone. “Look like rentals,” he says, peering inside of the closest SUV. 

Fuck procedure. Danny draws his gun, flips it around, and shatters the passenger side window. Using the butt, he clears out the rest of the glass and unlocks the car. Junior says nothing; he gets in the driver’s side to help look. Nothing, just the car manual and registration, no sign of which rental company. 

Junior’s phone goes off. “Tani, you’re on speaker.” 

“All three are rentals,” she says. “Rented last week at the airport by the same guy for a corporation that doesn’t exist. He’s a pro; he did not show his face to the cameras. The driver’s licenses are fake.”

“But these are the three SUVs that took him?” 

“Yes. That’s confirmed.” 

Junior makes short work of the second SUV, the same way Danny did, so Danny heads for the third. In the back, Steve’s shirt, his old blue one, bloodied and torn. Danny’s stomach drops again. “Junior! Send this for blood typing, DNA.” Junior zips over, an evidence bag in his gloved hands. 

Danny scales every inch of the park but there are no functioning video cameras, nothing that would’ve captured the cars the kidnappers might’ve switched into, no eyewitnesses who recall seeing anything suspicious. It’s like they’ve vanished. His hands shake. 

They tuck tail and return to HQ. God, he thought it was bad before, when Steve was in danger? This new state he’s in, every breath is short, every beat of his heart amplified, full of fear. 

Catherine, at HQ, looking the perfect mix of professional and concerned, effortlessly exuding that calm competence that is completely out of reach for him. He forces his gaze away. 

“Blood type matches McGarrett,” Tani says in greeting. His stomach drops again; it’s been doing that so much he feels queasy. But no. Figure it out now, fall apart later. It’s always worked before, he just needs to—center himself. Find something useful to focus on.

Catherine, there—Danny turns to her. “Can you do anything? Satellite footage?”

She nods, eyes soft for him. Danny wants to shove her. “I’ve already requested it.”

Of course she did. “How—how long?”

She droops with regret. “It’ll be a few hours. At least.”

His phone vibrates, he scrabbles for it—Kono. McGarrett ok? Text me. 

On the overhead screen is a video, taken inside a grocery store by what looks like a security camera. The timestamp declares it twenty-three past six a.m., this morning. In the shirt Danny found and the shorts he left last night, Steve appears, pushing a small cart, browsing through the produce section. Danny’s throat knots up. 

“This is from the Green Foods in Kahala,” Tani says. “Looks like he was shopping there early this morning. No indication that he was in distress or being followed. I have his credit card receipt too.” She projects it to the other screen. 

Receipt printed at three minutes to seven a.m., right about when Danny was making Junior call him. Oat milk, various and sundry fruit, bell peppers, mushrooms, eggs, cheese, bacon.

Breakfast? He was shopping for breakfast at the crack of dawn?  

“How about we pull together any social media videos posted from the vicinity of the park within the right timeframe?” Tani says. “We can use the geotags.”

“Do you know how to do that?” Adam asks. 

His phone already in his hand, Danny doesn’t listen to Tani’s sad admission that no, she does not. He touches Jerry’s name. 

“Yello,” Jerry answers. It takes a few run-throughs of their situation, but within minutes, he’s on it at home, feeding the videos he finds to the tech table where Tani, Junior and Adam start sifting. 

“This is not going to be quick either,” Catherine remarks. 

No, it is not, thank you, thank you so very much for stating the obvious. Danny grits his teeth and turns to Lou. “Start calling the hospitals for a John Doe that matches his description. If he’s managed to free himself, he might be hurt.” 

Lou nods. The low-level antagonism he’d been pelting Danny with over the past week has vanished—he even lays a large hand on Danny’s shoulder, for several seconds. “Yeah. I’ll look into it.” 

Tani, Junior, and Adam swipe through what seem to be endless social media posts. Danny forces himself to stay still, following along with his gaze. 

“Wait—there.” Junior touches Tani’s forearm. “Look, that grey van. It shows up in three different videos.”

“This one, right?” Tani says, blowing up a still of an elderly man and woman, both in aloha shirts, smiling, posing against the ocean. Behind them, apparently heading east on Kalakaua, the grey van is visible. “I can’t see a make or model, but it’s the same van.”

“Yeah, that’s the one,” Junior says. He pulls up a video. “They’re not driving as aggressively on this. Probably trying to keep a low profile.” 

“Look, there it is pulling out of the parking lot,” Tani says, casting another video to the bigger screen. In it, a young woman is warbling about vacation, her big, ridiculous sunglasses reflecting the distorted image of whoever’s holding the camera—but behind her, Tani’s right, is the grey van, in the process of pulling out of the same lot where Danny and Junior found the SUVs. Those are in the video too, behind the van, parked and inert.

“Can we get plates?” Danny asks. 

Adam manipulates the image. “Just a partial, but yeah, here I’ll run it,” he says, fingers flying over the controls. The search comes up on the screen. 

Danny’s hands are still shaking. Hard to believe he’s done this countless times—Steve disappears on a routine basis, sometimes against his will; Danny’s borne the fear, the panic, he’s risen above and solved it, rescued Steve in one piece, several fucking times. Why does it feel like none of that ever happened? Why is he so fucking scattered, terrified now, like some kind of useless amateur? They haven’t even kissed and Danny’s a wreck.

They haven’t even kissed. 

“Here,” Adam says. “A hundred and nineteen vans match the description and the partial. Eight were reported stolen in the past six months. I’ll start making calls.” 

Someone’s set a clock, presumably from Steve’s phone call. Three hours, fifty-nine minutes, fifty-seven seconds, eight, nine—four hours. 

Danny’s phone buzzes. Probably Kono again—but no, a cascade of alert tones follows, everyone reaching for their hip or pocket. He pulls out his phone—one text, unknown sender, no number. It’s an image, a partial of—a person. 

Danny’s hands are cold, numb; the phone almost slips from his grip. The photo—the back of someone’s head, short, dark hair matted with sweat, dried blood. Arms—muscular arms, male?—raised up, like they’re tied to the ceiling. The fragment of a tattoo, on the man’s shoulder—Danny’s chest seizes.

He looks up. Junior is the next to get it. He jolts up too, and makes eye contact with Danny. “That’s—”

“It’s him.” The words scrape his throat. “Call Jerry. See if he can trace it.” 

“Yeah,” Tani says, thumbing through her phone. Within minutes, Jerry is on a video call, on the left-most screen, wearing a headset, face set in frantic concentration. He types away for several minutes, during which Danny gives up and starts pacing tight circles in front of Steve’s office—the whiff of Steve’s scent that he catches on each turn spiking the fear, the longing, the regret, but he keeps doing it to himself, the least he deserves.

Ten years. Ten years, he wasted. They haven’t even kissed. 

Finally, Jerry huffs out a breath. “I’m sorry, I can’t trace it. Signal’s bouncing through multiple proxies. Whoever sent this knows what they’re doing—it’s routing through at least six countries. It would take weeks to track it down.”

Sixteen minutes since the image came through—but no follow-up, no demand. Nothing. They’re trying to set them on edge, clearly, ratchet up the pressure. 

Adam looks up. “I’ve narrowed it down to about a hundred vehicles. I have three of Duke’s teams starting to check them out.” 

“Tani, stay with Jerry on the social media, the traffic cams, see if you can locate where that van went. Catherine, stay on the satellite imaging. The rest of us, let’s help Duke’s people.” Without waiting for an answer, he pushes off from the table and follows Adam out. 

Chapter Text

Adam drives, in his souped-up sedan. He has the list of addresses, the names; he gets out, leads the way to houses, shops, warehouses. He knocks on doors, asks questions, studies registrations, inspects vehicles. Danny walks, stands, moves with him, mind in disarray. There’s a woman, a dirty grey Chevrolet van, then a man, a Honda. A younger man with a RAM. The phone is heavy in his pocket, with the picture he couldn’t bring himself to delete. 

“That’s the eighth one on our list,” Adam says. Danny jumps. “Not this one either.”

This van is parked on the street, still and innocuous. They pull out, back into traffic. 

Their phones go off in unison. Danny’s stomach lurches unpleasantly; he sees it mirrored in the sudden glance Adam cuts at him. They pull over. 

Another picture, a close-up, Steve’s stubbled chin and half of his slack mouth, resting down on his chest like he’s unconscious. A bruise on the quarter of his right shoulder that’s visible, black and blue, angry. Danny’s chest pulls together painfully. Is this what he’s going to have to do? Watch them take Steve apart piece by piece on a phone? 

He slams it down on Adam’s dash. Its case shatters, leaves a big gash on the car’s plastic. Unable to control himself, he punches the dash too, once, twice, three times, sharp pain shocking up his arm. 

“Danny, stop,” Adam’s saying, seatbelt unclipped, scrabbling to get between him and the dash. “This is exactly why they’re doing this. Don’t let it get to you.” 

Too late. He rubs his hands over his face—shaking, damp, sweat, everywhere, fuck—

Adam’s phone goes off. “Lou,” he announces, and answers. No luck with hospitals. Of course not. Duke’s teams have cleared the industrial district. No missing vans. It’s a dead end, they’re chasing after a dead end. Adam hangs up. 

He studies Danny; Danny can feel the weight of Adam’s gaze, his compassion. He wants to hurl himself out of the car. “Do you want to keep going or go back to HQ?” A pause. “Maybe home? Get something to eat?” 

Food. Yeah, right. It’s dark. When did it get dark? 

He doesn’t want to go home. Steve was home yesterday when Danny got back, last week a couple of times, or came home shortly after Danny. He doesn’t want to go home if Steve’s not there, if Steve’s not going to come home too. 

“Danny, you need to rest,” Adam says, in that gentle tone he himself has resorted to more times than he can count. It makes him want to punch something, again. His hand throbs dully. “They will make demands or we’ll figure out where they are. When that happens you need to be fresh. On top of your game.” 

Fine. Fuck. 

—

Danny’s sense of time is completely shot, apparently, because it’s past ten when they get in, Adam unlocking Danny’s door, both of their weapons drawn. They clear the house together, finishing in the kitchen. Adam’s hand on his shoulder. 

“It’s okay,” Adam says. “It’s going to be okay. All the damage they’ve inflicted, it’s—painful, but not vital. Do you see what I’m saying?” 

Does Danny see what he’s saying. “Shower,” he mutters, and backtracks to the stairs. Compartmentalize, asshole; Steve needs him to compartmentalize. How the fuck did he do this before, was he just stupid, naive? Steve was gone for two months this year. How did Danny fucking bear it, how did he not lose his mind? 

Painful but not vital, he says. That’s supposed to make him feel better? Steve felt it, he felt the pain. And here Danny is, useless and shallow. If he hadn’t said the wrong thing last night, Steve wouldn’t have left by himself this morning. He wouldn’t have been taken, or they would’ve been taken together—either way, an improvement. Ever since they started this arrangement thing, Steve’s been following him around like a puppy again, like he used to those first few years of their partnership. What a profound lack in his life it’d been, unnoticed until he had it again. 

Clothes off, hands still shaking, he gets into the shower on autopilot, refusing to look beyond the tip of his nose, think beyond the next ten seconds. He’d learned this from Steve in Colombia, taking a shower as meditation. 

“Five hours until we have to leave for the airport,” Steve’d said, standing in front of the creaking motel door outside of Medellin, where they’d holed up for the duration. Where Danny was so close to a panic attack he wanted to claw his own skin off. “Take a shower. Top to bottom, methodically. Just think about getting clean, nothing else.” 

He does it now. Shampoo, twice, body gel, top to bottom. Get clean. Nothing else. 

When he leans down to wash his legs, his gaze trips on Steve’s flip-flops, visible through the glass door of the shower. Slippahs, Steve would’ve said, and Danny would’ve bitched about how no self-respecting adult should let themselves be seen wearing anything that sounded like an involuntary exclamation. 

To think that he could’ve reached out and touched Steve last night, that he just simply chose not to. Last night and every night for the past week, the past ten years, failed again and again, with no concept of how deeply. And for what? He’s confused? Fuck him. Fuck him. He should be shot for taking Steve granted; everything always hangs on the thinnest thread, about to implode in a second, every second of normal he gets is borrowed from grief, has he learned nothing yet? He wanted a sign? Have a sign, Detective, eat it and choke. He wanted to worry about the shades of gay, bellyache over picking one for himself? What kind of entitled, out-of-touch asshole does that? He’ll do anything, he’ll be anything, anything, just let him have Steve back. He’ll do anything.

He’d cried in Colombia. Turned on the water to maximum, leaned against the tile with both hands and hung his head, letting the stupid tears drip out of his eyes uncontested, for Matty, for himself, even for Steve. Thinking about Steve used to make him sad then, was he absorbing Steve’s unrequited feelings? How callous he’s been, how tone-deaf, how fucking oblivious: it’s a miracle Steve stuck around this long. 

The water turns cold. He shuts it off and climbs out. 

Adam’s made food, what looks like grilled cheese sandwiches, and orange juice. Danny eats half of one, just so he doesn’t have to listen to Adam’s gentle prodding, then grunts that he’s going to bed. At the stairs he falters—that bed, does he really want to lie in it without Steve there?

It will smell like Steve though, and there were times when he didn’t see Steve for days on end, and yeah, he missed him then too, but nowhere was it visceral like this, like he’s been raked raw, an entire body made of abraded, bloody skin. He caves and crawls up the stairs, into the bedroom where it smells like Steve’s aftershave, into the sheets that smell like Steve, like them both. He presses his face into Steve’s pillow and breathes. He’s not gonna be able to sleep, not a chance, but at least he’ll lie in the dark, let his brain reset or whatever it’s called. Adam’s right about one thing—Steve does need him at his best.

On the nightstand, his phone rattles. He jolts up, heart racing in the darkness. Another picture. He manages to click into it. It’s one in the morning. 

A hand, held in front of half a blurry face that’s distorted in agony, unquestionably Steve’s. Three of the fingernails are missing, their beds a red bloody mess. Even behind the spiderweb of cracks on his phone screen, he can see every detail of it.

He drops the phone, hands shaking, covers his mouth with one, digging his fingers into his jaw until it hurts. He’s going to kill them. Every single one of them, every one who was involved in this, he will tear them apart, limb from limb, and he’ll lose exactly no sleep over it. They’re all dead. They just don’t know it yet. 

He swallows and picks up the phone again, zooming into the picture, peering into each corner for something, anything, a distinguishing feature, a clue. When he’s on Steve’s face, he bites through his lip; when he gets to Steve’s hand, he has to punch the bed to keep going. He loses the thread—he makes himself do it again, heart pounding in the back of his head, blood rushing in his ears. 

Nothing. Do it again. Pay attention. Fucking pay attention. 

A knock on the door. “Danny?” Adam. 

No. One more time—there, the bottom corner of the picture, where Steve’s ribs are visible behind his hand, two dime-sized, slightly raised spots of scarlet, like rose-colored petals. They look familiar, in that sickening, stomach-twisting way, where has he seen them before—

Jesus. 

He launches out of bed, stumbles in the darkness just as the door opens, and Adam, not expecting to find him on the other side of it, leaps back in fright.

“Who’s at HQ?” Danny demands. 

To Adam’s credit, he only has to blink twice before he catches up. “Tani and Quinn.” 

Danny dials Tani’s number. “Pull Wo Fat’s file,” he barks over her curt greeting. “He died in 2015, Steve killed him, but whoever took him now is related to Wo Fat. This is related to Wo Fat. Check his associates, any family members, check anyone we think has a connection with him.”

“On it,” says Tani. Danny ends the call. 

“How?” Adam asks quietly. Adam should know Wo Fat, shouldn’t he? He was around then, if not part of the team, then by association through Kono. Not to mention his father. 

“Those marks. Cattle prod,” Danny says, showing him the zoomed-in version of the photo. 

Adam takes it and peers at it with a frown. “Are you sure?” 

“Am I sure—of course I’m sure, Adam, there’s only so many times you have to be shown the evidence of a cattle prod used on a human for it to be etched into your memory forever. I can see it when I close my eyes, always could.” 

Adam’s got his hands up. “Okay. I’ve got you.” He gestures toward the bed. “You should try to get more rest. I’ll let you know if they come up with anything.” 

Danny nods dully and holds out his palm for his phone. 

Adam starts to give it back to him, but stops. “Let me keep it,” he says. 

Zero to a hundred again, Danny’s enraged enough to tear the house apart with his bare hands and Adam along with it. He can barely make himself sound normal. “Why?”

“In case there’s another text. They’re doing this to mess with us, Danny, but especially you. I’ll wake you if there’s anything new, but you need to rest. Steve needs you to be fresh tomorrow, he needs you at your best.”

He’s not—wrong, but Steve’s suffering, he’s in pain, isn’t the right thing to do to suffer alongside him, the pictures at least, let the impotent rage ravage him? Then again, it’s worse to leave the phone in a way, to be distanced even from the small proofs of life he’s allowed to have. So that’s what he does, waves away the phone, and slogs back to bed. Behind him, the door closes quietly. 

Danny’s up again just as dawn is breaking, how much he’s actually slept unclear. Adam’s asleep on the couch when he trudges down the stairs, both phones on the coffee table. He picks up his own; three new messages.

He never answered Kono. He should answer Kono.

He swipes into the messages—more pictures of Steve, sent every two hours, just like Adam predicted—he studies them, one by one, like he did the two before, but other than more bruises and more blood, more agony on Steve’s face, there isn’t anything. His body below his shoulders isn’t visible in these, almost like they knew the cattle prod would give them away. Or is he reading too much into it? 

Steve, in his arms in the ambulance, after Wo Fat worked him over for the last time, weeping into Danny’s collar, doing it so quietly that the whole way to the hospital, he didn’t realize Steve was crying, thought the infrequent spasms were pain, or involuntary muscle contractions. Only after they took Steve away did he realize what soaked his shirt wasn’t blood or sweat but tears. 

Limb from limb, Danny’s going to tear them. He’s going to annihilate them. 

While he stares at the last picture through unseeing eyes, his phone rings in his hand.

Unknown caller.

At the tone, Adam lurches up and into sitting, scanning the coffee table, then locating the source in Danny’s grasp. Danny nods at him, and Adam lunges for his own phone.

It’s might be the hardest thing he’s ever done, letting the call ring four, five, six times until Adam’s secured the trace with Jerry. His chest churns, roils, but no, he cannot, he cannot be weak, Steve needs him to not be weak.

“Go,” Adam says and Danny hits the green button, on speaker.

“Williams.”

“Detective.” A woman, cold, the hint of an accent. Asian, maybe Chinese? Is he letting himself buy into the Wo Fat theory too much? “My name is Daiyu Mei. You knew my husband.”

Maybe not. Cold permeates his body, pools in his limbs. His stomach twists. “You married Wo Fat? My condolences, you clearly have very poor taste in men.”

She chuckles, throaty and chilling. “You’re the one to talk. I have someone that belongs to you.”

“What do you want?”

“The money Doris McGarrett stole from my husband. I want it back.”

A million dollars? That’s all? That’s why they’re here? Danny’s going to shoot her just for that. “That can be arranged. If you prove to me that McGarrett is alive and well.”

His phone beeps—call waiting. He glances at it—the same number, requesting a video connection—then at Adam, who shakes his head and makes a spooling motion with two fingers. Danny accepts the call.

Dark, a corner, bare walls, grey concrete. The camera, and a floodlight, both swing over—Steve, arms bound up over his head, bloodied and bruised. He turns his head away from the light, blinking miserably.

Danny wants to squeeze himself through the little brick in his hand, be where Steve is—he’s never wanted anything more. The helplessness makes him quake. “Steve? Are you all right?”

“He can’t hear you,” Daiyu Mei says. Fury swells, boils. Calm down. She’s dead. She just doesn’t know it yet. “You can have him back, Detective, all you have to do is give me my husband’s money.”

“Fine, I said,” he spits. “Stop hurting him. I’ll get you your money. The DA has it, so it might take me a few hours.”

“You have until ten. After that, I start cutting his fingers off, piece by little piece.”

Danny inhales, very carefully soundless. “You hurt another hair on his body, I will make it my life’s work to find you and kill you. I will not rest, until you’re in the ground. Do we understand each other?”

“Ah,” she says, and the bitch is grinning, “I knew it would have been more entertaining to have you as my guest. Too bad Commander McGarrett was driving your car yesterday.”

What? He stumbles over his first attempt and has to clear his throat. “Are you saying you meant to kidnap me?” 

“What can I say, Detective? I got tired of waiting. Be ready at ten. You will receive further instructions.” She ends the call.

Danny whirls on Adam, who is listening to his phone. He looks up and shakes his head. “Something about VoiP and foreign servers again.”

Fuck. Danny rubs a hand over his face. “Okay. Let’s go to HQ. See if the satellite images came through.”

—

They have. Through them, Tani and Quinn have located the grey van: an hour or so after leaving the beach park, it drove under the H1-Kamehameha underpass and never came out the other side. The HPD patrol Tani dispatched found it abandoned on the side of the street, no prints, no fibers, just Steve’s blood again.

Danny learns all this from Tani, on the phone, while Adam drives. The scratch he left in the dash looks dull compared to the rest of the shiny plastic. “The van was clean but not the SUVs,” she says. “Eric matched the hair from your burglary to one of those in the car. There’s no doubt it’s the same crew.” 

Great. Tell him something he doesn’t know. He manages to end the call without saying that. 

They push through the doors into their office, and at the sight before them, Danny almost misses a step.

A woman, again, with a familiar silhouette, her back to him, tall and slender, her dark hair coiffed straight in a chin-length bob.

The lump springs to his throat; his eyes prickle. Lou, who’s facing Danny, nods at him in greeting. Seeing that, Kono turns.

Her expression softens. “Hey, Danny.”

“You—” That’s it, that’s all he can produce, before he has to clamp his mouth shut and ride out the sudden swell of emotion. Kono motions toward him, but his face must do something, because she holds off.

“I’m here. Let me help,” she says.

He grips the table, head tipped down. Out of the corners of his eyes he sees her reach for him. “Don’t, uh, don’t touch me. Not right now.”

“Okay,” she says. 

When he’s wrangled himself back in control, he scans the offices, taking stock. Lou is at the tech table, with Tani, Junior and Kono—god, Kono, he loves her so fucking much, she came, she came to help—going through traffic cam footage to see if they can identify the vehicle the kidnappers switched into below the underpass, but truly, it could be any of the several dozen that pass through after the grey van pulls in, so that’s again a dead end. 

Jerry is in Steve’s office, hair still short, looking strong and trim—he looks good, good for him, the post-law enforcement life agreeing with him—scowling at the two additional screens that now sit in a row next to Steve’s previously singular one. Quinn and Catherine behind him do the same over his respective shoulders, and in front of them sits—surprisingly and maybe not, Lincoln Cole. Steve and his strays. His heart clenches.

Adam has joined them behind Jerry’s chair while Danny was greeting Kono; now he leans forward, pointing at something on Jerry’s screen. Adam and Kono—Danny cuts his eyes to her. He missed their interaction, if they interacted at all. Kono appears completely placid, unsurprisingly. 

“HPD put out a request for witnesses and dashcam footage from travelers who drove through that underpass yesterday, but that’s a long shot at best,” Lou says. “Ellie Clayton is working on the money now. She said she should have it ready by nine at the latest.”

Danny nods.

“Any indication where they might want to do the exchange?” Kono asks. “We could look at the map and try to strategize for a few possible locations.”

Danny nods again. A ploy to distract him, of course it is, but maybe they’ll get lucky.

Luck. That’s what they’ve been reduced to. 

“Yeah, let’s do that,” Lou says.

“Here, I brought coffee from the good coffee cart. I’ll go get yours,” Kono says, and flits away, toward the break room.

Danny scrubs a hand over his face. His eyes are still gritty. “Who told her?”

“Me,” Lou says. “She called me yesterday when she didn’t hear from you. She said her mother’s been sick; she’d been meaning to visit anyway.”

That makes sense. The lump rises to his throat again, tries his eyes. Then, as he breathes, it falls back. He swallows. “She’s—something.”

Lou nods, his hand settling on Danny’s shoulder again. “Between her, two SEALs, Catherine—we’ll get him back. You’ll see.”

Chapter Text

Ellie Clayton shows up at eight-thirty, carrying a briefcase in each hand, trailed by three burly guys in cheap suits and ear pieces. Danny, Kono and Lou, at the tech table, watch them progress down the hall and into the bullpen.

“Here’s the money, unmarked, as requested,” Clayton announces, setting the briefcases down in front of Danny.

“Thank you,” Danny says, and means it.

Clayton looks torn. “You really ought to reconsider the tracker. The newer models are indistinguishable from real bills—”

“No. They’ll know. It’s too risky.”

She draws up her eyebrows. “This is Steve’s inheritance. Once the paperwork is finalized, and it will be, it’ll be his—”

“He doesn’t want it,” Danny cuts her off. “He wanted his mother, not her money. He just wants to be back with—” me, he almost says, but how presumptuous would that sound, “with the family he’s got left.”

She presses her lips together. “All right. Keep me posted. And for god’s sake, be careful.” 

While Clayton and her posse are walking out, a flurry of movement in Steve’s office—Adam bursts out, closely followed by Catherine. At their hopeful faces, Danny’s heart dares to quicken. “Danny—you have to look at this,” Adam says. 

The overhead screens change, into satellite footage of what appears to be the middle of nowhere. The middle of nowhere, that is, with a house in it. Jerry joins them. 

Adam gestures at the screen. “This is a property that belongs to one of the companies my father’s held for Wo Fat in the past. When you said it was connected to Wo Fat last night, I had Jerry go through records to pull all those that were left, and Catherine’s been matching the satellite footage—”

Several stills of the area, apparently taken ten to fifteen seconds apart. A blue minivan, harmless and slow, meanders up the gravel road and parks a few yards away from the house, next to four more SUVs like the ones that took Steve. Out of the minivan spill four ant-sized goons, who then drag another tiny dot out of its back. In the last still, the wispy cotton of a cloud obscures the bottom corner. 

His heart picks up. “When was this? Where is it?”

“Here,” Jerry says, pulling up a map. A purple pin sits east-center in the Makua Valley, somewhere several miles from civilization. “This was about nine-thirty yesterday morning. We can track that minivan back to the overpass. As far as we can tell no one’s left the house since then.”

“All right,” Cole says, punching his palm. “Let’s take them down.”

“No,” Danny snaps. “What’s to stop her from putting a bullet in his head the moment she catches a whiff of your approach? Absolutely not.”

“She won’t,” Tani says. “She needs him, to get the money.”

Danny whirls on her. “This isn’t about the money! This is about revenge, about making him suffer! You don’t know what this rabid bitch’s husband put Steve through, the amount of cruelty—she wants him to watch us get gunned down, me, the entire team, take everything from him—this is not about the money!”

He means every word—why else would she have initially planned to kidnap someone Steve’s close to if hurting him wasn’t the endgame—but fuck, he should’ve kept his composure. Tani didn’t deserve to be yelled at like that, made to look embarrassed and pale, especially since it’s not at her he really wants to be yelling. 

“Yeah, sure,” she mutters, glancing away.

Fuck it, he’ll apologize later. “Can we get real time satellite imaging on that house?” he asks Catherine.

She shakes her head. “Not reliably. There is significant cloud cover in the area.”

“We don’t need it,” Junior says, leaning over the map on the surface of the tech table. “Sir, Cole is right. He and I can take them by surprise—”

“And what if they have spotters? Cameras, around the perimeter? What happens if they see us coming, huh?” Is this not obvious to the rest of them? What the fuck. 

Junior stares back, eyes flicking to Cole. Catherine, arms crossed on her chest, tips her head. “Danny’s right. We can’t breach without putting Steve’s life at risk.” 

“With all due respect, ma’am, but I disagree,” Cole says. “Junior and I, we can perform a surgical strike, extract—”

Why is that guy still here? Why? “I said no,” Danny growls. “We are not breaching. We go through with the exchange. Once she tells us where she wants to meet, we can use an alternate route and set up out of sight, before they get there.” 

“We need eyes on the house, then,” Adam says. Junior and Cole are looking at each other. Danny’s blood pressure climbs. One more word out of their mouths—

Adam continues, “If they leave before we’re ready—”

“I could get a drone in the air,” Jerry says. “We could keep it high, since we only need to know when and if they leave, so it’s unlikely to be spotted.” He turns his mouth down. “I mean, the quality of the video wouldn’t be great, but does that matter for our purpose?” 

“No, no, it does not.” Danny gestures at him absently. “Do that. Let’s do that.” They nod and scatter, at least most of them do. 

Catherine, Kono and Lou hang behind. Great, more scrutiny, more compassion—exactly what he doesn’t need. 

Just as Junior and Tani are slinking away, Cole falls into step next to Junior, their heads bending together to confer. Junior went to Mexico, didn’t even think to inform Danny, ask permission, whether Danny would like to go with—fool him once. “Lou. I swear to god, if they go behind my back, I will shoot them both. I swear to god I’ll shoot their kneecaps out.” 

“Leave it to me,” Catherine says, and pushes away from the tech table. Lou and Kono watch her go, then turn identical stares of pity on him, one or the other obviously about to say something inane. 

To preempt it, Danny says, “Pull up some maps. Let’s see if we can predict any possible sites for the exchange.”

Kono nods and takes over, manipulating the tech table with ease like she’d never left. The map comes up again, with the purple pin for the house and several smaller ones for where Steve was taken, the beach park and finally the overpass. 

They all study the terrain quietly, Danny absently worrying the inside of his lip—no. No way. That can’t be right. “Do you—”

Lou, mouth slack, points at what Danny was talking about. Kono doesn’t need to be told either; she’s already zooming in on it. A dirt road leading past the house, into a valley, an abandoned mine shaft at its end. No significant cover; barely any trees except at the periphery, enclosed by cliffs on three sides. The dirt road runs so close to the house, anyone trying to pass by would likely be picked up by whatever perimeter surveillance they already had to have set up—smart and efficient. 

“This is too obvious,” Danny says. “Isn’t it too obvious? Maybe us figuring out where they are is part of her plan?”

“If you hadn’t picked up the Wo Fat connection last night, I doubt we would’ve been able to do it this fast,” Kono says. “I think it’s much more likely she underestimated you.”

“The question is,” Lou says, studying the map with deep furrows in his forehead. “Are we confident enough to put all our eggs in one basket?” 

—

Daiyu Mei calls at ten sharp. Only Jerry remains at HQ with Danny; no further pictures have come. 

“Detective. Do you have my money?” 

Danny clears his throat. “Yes.” 

“Good.” His phone vibrates in his hand. Cloned to the screen as it is, the text shows up there too—coordinates. Jerry plugs them in. 

Danny exhales—quietly.

“This is where you’ll meet me,” Daiyu Mei purrs. “Once I have the money, I will give you Commander McGarrett’s location.” 

“Excuse me?” Danny steps back from the tech table, bending at the waist. “You will—no, you will not. You will do no such thing. You will bring him with you, or there is no deal.” 

“You’re not exactly in a position to negotiate, Detective. If you want him to survive, these are my terms.” 

“And if you care about getting this money, you’ll agree to mine.” He holds still for a second, for impact. His heart is racing; it’s taking all of his focus to keep his voice from wavering. “Also, let’s not pretend I don’t know what this is about. You want him to suffer for killing your husband, right? I’m sure cutting him up is giving you a nice thrill, but we both know you can’t break Steve McGarrett with plain old pain, not the way you want. If you want him to suffer, you’re going to have to hurt the people he loves, and isn’t that what you’re planning to do? What are you gonna do, transmit real-time video of shooting me, make him watch? No. You can shoot me in front of him instead. You bring him to the exchange or there is no deal.” 

Nothing. He holds his breath. “All right,” she says, at last. “In that case, I have a counter-demand.” 

It’s her turn to pause for impact. Fucking ridiculous. “I’m listening.” 

His phone goes off again. He glances up at the screen—the same pictures of Steve ravaged by torture, the ones he’s already seen—in a group text. 

With Grace. 

“We both know you want him at the exchange so you can make an attempt at freeing him, Detective. As insurance that you won’t try anything too stupid like call in SWAT or the military, I would like your daughter to be present as well.” 

His line beeps. Call waiting.

“Go ahead, take the call, Detective. I’m assuming it’s Grace?” 

Cold pours into him, fills his veins, weighs his limbs down. Jerry’s eyes are huge, rounded with terror. “Don’t go anywhere,” Danny growls at Daiyu Mei, and puts her on hold. “Grace.” 

“Dad. What’s going on? Is that—are those pictures of Uncle Steve? Is he in trouble? Is somebody hurting him?” 

He pinches the bridge of his nose. Fuck. “Someone we—someone who’s connected to someone we arrested a long time ago, babe, it’s—he’s—” 

“Dad, it says ‘only you can save him’. Is that true? Can I do something?” 

“Grace, no, you can’t—”

“Yes, I can! He’d do it—he’s done it for me, how many times has he done it for us? I’m eighteen, you can’t stop me.” As if he could when she was younger. “Are you at work? I’m at the mall. I’ll be there in—” 

If he can get her here, he can—lock her in his office? No, she’ll break the glass and get out. Rendition? He could probably lure her in—the betrayal, in her eyes, when she realizes what he’s done—god, he can’t do that. He can’t. 

Grace snorts. “No, you’ll just lock me up there. You come pick me up. I’ll send you my location.” 

His eyes prickle. If he could get her into a car, any car— “Babe, I can’t, but Jerry will—” At his name, Jerry turns his huge eyes at him. Danny looks away. 

“No! I won’t get in the car with anyone else. I swear to god, Dad, I have Mom’s car, I’ll go myself. I’ll fucking go myself, I swear on Charlie’s life.” 

Call HPD on her? Have her arrested? Go himself, send someone else to the exchange? Then Steve will die, and he’ll have to tell her, watch her crumple in grief—

He can’t do any of that. He can’t. “Grace, please, listen to me—”

“No, Dad, you listen. If you don’t let me help, I’ll hang up now and text them back. Is that what you want me to do? Is it?” 

“No! Don’t you even think about—”

“Then pick me up in ten or I’m texting them.” She hangs up. 

He knew it was too good to be true. The moment Daiyu Mei sent the coordinates, he knew it was too good to be true. 

He pauses, just for a second, for a breath, hands on his head, whole body shaking. Grace is headstrong, she’s smart, she’ll absolutely do what she said, he has no reason to disbelieve her.  

Steve’s going to kill him. If Rachel leaves him alive, if he doesn’t kill himself first. Fuck. 

“Hey, you okay?” Jerry. 

Danny waves him off and reconnects Daiyu Mei’s call. “Are you there?” 

“I’m here, Detective,” she purrs. That bitch. His whole body hurts with rage.

Easy. She’s dead. She just doesn’t know it yet. “Fine. I’ll bring her.” 

“Very good. I will see you and Grace at the coordinates in thirty minutes, then. Alone. Don’t be late.” She hangs up. 

“That’s gonna be close,” Jerry says, and pulls up a different map, the one with traffic. H1 is red all the way across. 

Narrowly overcoming the urge to punch the tech table, Danny shoves himself away from it and dashes out.

—

Grace taps the passenger side door with her fingers, tension growing with each mile they dive deeper into the bush. She looks bulky in the body armor Danny made her put on underneath her clothes, deceivingly adult with the thousand-yard stare she’s perfectly adopted from Steve. More vests, un-buttoned, line the footwell of the passenger side, for her to pull over herself when the shooting starts. 

“Let’s go over it again,” Danny says. 

She exhales, but doesn’t complain. “I’m going to stay in the car. If there’s shooting, I’m going to duck down and reverse the car out of there.”

“Yes. What aren’t you going to do?” 

“Get out of the car.” 

Danny’s chest seizes. Is it too much to ask that one day they will recount this experience to each other over family dinners and marvel at how he finally beat Steve in recklessness?  Please let her make it through this in one piece. Her and Steve. The team. Please.

The road turns into a dirt path. He pushes forward, the truck navigating the loose ground easily. Shit, he should’ve apologized to Tani before they left, just in case. To her credit, she acted like nothing happened, but Danny knows her, knows it smarted. He’ll make it up to her too, he’ll make it up to all of them, he swears.

“Visual confirmed.” Jerry’s voice in his ear, the tiniest of tiny comms he’s ever seen, courtesy of Catherine as well. His pulse ratchets up. “I have eyes on the package—I mean I think it’s him. One hostage and six hostiles.” 

A picture comes through to his phone, from Jerry’s drone, said hostiles tiny ant figures on the shrub-and-grass-dotted ground. No cover, for several hundred feet, nothing more than a few medium rocks. The tree line is too far away. 

A thrill over the back of his neck, a twist in his guts—he’s missing something. What is he missing?

It comes to him like the hand of fucking god—hold back now, and they’ll all die, including Grace. He stomps on the brake. 

Grace jumps. “What? What’s wrong?”

“Change of plans,” Danny says. He meets her eyes. “Switch with me, babe.” 

—

The goons are still in the same formation, three of them almost in a perfect row to their left. Grace brings the truck to a rolling stop, twenty or so feet away.

“Okay, you got it, Monkey?” Danny asks her, one last time. 

She swallows. “Yeah. I think so.” 

“Okay. What’s the most important thing?”

“Ducking down.” 

“Okay.” He waits for her to make eye contact, and manages a smile. “We’re going to be okay. All of us. Okay? I promise.” 

She nods. He squeezes her shoulder. “It’s time,” he says, into the comm.  

“Copy,” Jerry says. “Good luck.”

He pops the door, draws a breath, and steps out. The briefcases are in the footwell; he takes them. 

Held upright by the fourth goon, Steve’s present, wearing a—a fucking ball gag, one that Danny’s going to shove down Daiyu Mei’s throat so very soon. His arms are tied behind his back, he has no shirt on; his grey running shorts are spotted with blood, his bare calves and feet caked with dirt. But that’s not all—something’s wrong with him. He sways like he’s on a boat in choppy water, knees bent, looking flimsy like the slightest breeze could fell him. Concern grips Danny’s throat for a second.

They probably tranqed him again. They would do that; even hurt, Steve’s formidable. It’s not brain trauma, it’s not internal bleeding. Just drugs, just so he is in no fighting shape. It has to be. 

“Stay in the car,” he tells Grace, through the open window, as discussed. It’s on. 

“Okay, Dad.” 

Danny steps forward carefully, the briefcases held away from his body. Like he thought, all four of Daiyu Mei’s goons have their light machine guns trained on him; only the fifth is aiming at the car. All of them, however, are watching him.

“Will your lovely daughter not be joining us, Detective?” Daiyu Mei calls. 

Danny sets his jaw, careful where he puts his foot. Don’t rush. Don’t trip. “She’s going to stay in the car.” 

Daiyu Mei smiles like she knows something he doesn’t. Hatred spikes in him. “Very well,” she says. 

He comes to a halt about ten feet away from them. Daiyu Mei is a petite woman, looking like she’s in her forties, with long black hair in a sleek knot on the back of her head. Color him crazy, but the lines of her face give him chills. Can you tell someone’s a psychopath just by looking at them? 

He could, with her husband. Apparently whatever kind of deranged, murderous pot Wo Fat was, he still managed to find his perfect lid. How blood-curdlingly adorable. He can’t wait to reunite them in hell.

She flicks her hand and one of the goons lets his rifle drop into its harness, steps forward. Danny holds still, lets himself be patted down, then relieved of the briefcases. He keeps his hands up. 

Steve’s looking at him, but can’t keep his eyes open. Danny catches him flick his head a few times, like he’s trying to wake himself up. Definitely drugged, then, and that explains why he hasn’t fought his way free. Soon, he tries to communicate, with a look. Steve will get it. Steve will be ready. 

“You’ve got your money,” Danny says. “Now let him go.” 

Two of the goons have the briefcases open on the hood of one of their two cars, another black SUV, counting the bills. Lazily, Daiyu Mei glances at them, then nods at the guy holding Steve up. He removes his hands for a moment—Steve falters forward, knees buckling—before he can crumple to the ground, the goon yanks him back up by his shorts. Danny’s heart lurches, his muscles seize with the need to intervene—no. Wait. He has to wait.  

“He’s a bit indisposed at the moment,” Daiyu Mei says. As if a joke, she holds out her hand toward the nearest goon, and is handed a sidearm. She unlatches the safety and takes aim, squarely between Danny’s eyebrows. Danny holds himself still, but Steve can’t—he staggers as if to lunge for Danny, but is restrained again. Keeping him in the periphery of his vision, Danny intentionally drops his arms. 

Daiyu Mei continues, “You were right, Detective. I did want him to watch you and Grace die. I’m impressed—”

The engine, behind him, revved up—Danny’s coiled, ready to leap, as soon as—all of them jerk their gazes over to the truck. Danny thrusts himself forward. 

He comes in low, flinging his arms around Steve’s thighs and picking him up over his shoulder—Steve’s big, but not so big that Danny can’t handle him—letting their combined momentum barrel them over the guy guarding Steve. Behind him the roar of the car, gunshots, endless gunshots—god, let the truck hold up, the vests, let them protect her—the sick crunch of bones breaking, a hard thud—he stumbles—watch Steve’s head at all costs, don’t let him hit it on anything—they tumble together to the ground, Danny’s hand cupped around Steve’s skull. 

“Stay down,” Danny barks—not that he needs to, the tackle seems to have flattened Steve—then flips around to survey the scene. A gun, right next to him, thank fucking god—he scoops it up, checks the magazine, getting his feet beneath him. True to form, Daiyu Mei and one of the money counters are the only ones standing—latter crumples to the ground, with no warning or explanation, red blooming across his chest. Kono. 

Day Mei swings toward him, saying, “You can’t—”

Danny takes her down with three shots center mass, clustered together; he could probably get the headshot too, but he’s not here to take chances. As she falls backward, her shot rings out, falls much, much too wide, harmlessly lost in the woods behind him. 

Grace—the truck is smoking, the windshield shattered, resting on two of the henchmen, the third a crumpled mess in its wake. Adrenaline roars through him—his whole body feels rubbery; torn between her and Steve—

“Bravo Team on scene,” Jerry says in his ear. “They have McGarrett.”

He lurches forward, not daring to breathe—he can’t see her, not from this distance, so he lunges on toward the car, stumbles on a rock, catches himself on the passenger door. 

“Is it over?” Grace asks, huddled in the footwell of the driver’s side seat, holding a vest over her head like a shield. Broken glass studs her hair, but no blood anywhere, she’s blinking and alert, in one piece—thank god. 

Relief loosens his knees—he has to hold himself up by the door, suck in air. “Yeah, babe. Just—” The truck is littered with bullet holes; the gas tank could catch. He looks up, around—Junior is working on freeing Steve from his restraints, Quinn is checking Daiyu Mei, and Tani the goon Grace ran over. He drops to his knees and feels for a pulse on one of the guys under the car. Nothing. The second guy has one, faint and thready as it is. Danny kicks away anything that could be used as a weapon from his vicinity. 

“Are we clear?” he calls. 

“Clear,” Junior answers. 

“Clear,” Tani confirms. 

“Clear,” Kono says, in his ear. She’s lost nothing of her edge—she made that shot hanging from a harness off the eastern rock face, almost three quarters of a mile away, through decently dense forest. They could’ve never done this without her. 

“You’re clear,” Jerry says. “Alpha Team confirms clear also. Nice job.” 

He leans his forehead on the warm metal of the passenger door for a second, just a second—they’ll get Steve a new truck, Danny a new Camaro, they’ll go together, argue about trims, colors—they’re okay. Everyone’s okay. 

He shoves himself back to his feet and clears his throat. He opens the door. “Grace, get out of the car. Come on, this way.” 

Limberly she slips into the passenger side and flings herself out, stumbling, into his arms. Danny guides her into his chest, her line of sight away from the broken bodies left by the car. “Did I do okay?” she asks. “You knew it, Danno, you knew they’d never guess you’d let me do that.”

“You did incredibly well,” Danny says, pressing a kiss on her sweaty head. “Like a pro, babe, you did it like a pro. You did so good.” 

“Where’s Uncle Steve?” she asks. 

Danny lets it come, the relief, that giddy feeling—the nervousness, a pleasant one—all he has to do is tell Steve what’s been going on with him, and Steve will understand. They’ll be okay. He’ll get to hold Steve again, soft and quiet like in the kitchen—fuck, maybe even kiss him— “Over here. Come on.” 

They’ve made it more than halfway when Junior jolts up, face twisted in alarm. “Detective!” 

His stomach drops. Letting go of Grace’s shoulders, he accelerates, sprinting the rest of the distance, and falls to his knees in front of Steve’s supine form.

“He says she gave him something,” Junior reports. 

“What? Steve, what did she give you?” 

The gag is gone. Wrapped up in Junior’s over-shirt, Steve’s fighting for consciousness. All of his movements, his breathing, even his blinks look slowed down. His pupils are pinpricks. “I don’t—know. She. Said—” He breaks off, eyes sliding shut. 

Danny grips his arms, gives him a shake. Steve’s lids flutter open. “What? What did she say?” 

He finally manages to focus on Danny. He looks—defeated. Danny’s insides coil up in response. 

“No antidote,” Steve rasps. “She said—no antidote.”

Chapter Text

Kono floors the gas, sirens blaring, as they hurtle down the dirt path back toward the highway. Grace is in the passenger seat, every few minutes turning to look at them, face lined with miserable worry. 

Steve’s in the back seat where Danny dumped him, loose-limbed and weak. Every curve runs the risk of toppling him over and after the third, Danny shifts closer and slings his arm around Steve’s shoulders to hold him up, hold him steady. 

Steve’s head lolls back. Danny jostles him again. “You have to stay awake, Steve. Stay with me.”

“Tired,” Steve says. His eyes are falling shut. “Danno.” He manages to lift his hand a couple of inches, but not any further. 

“What?”

A smile plays across Steve’s lips. “Let me—”

Let him what? “Anything. Babe, anything. What?” 

Almost grinning, Steve lists into him, sliding down the seat so he can nuzzle into Danny’s neck. He inhales deeply, then sighs in contentment, as if going to sleep. He smells like sweat and blood, never better. Danny wraps his arms around him, his throat closing up.

“Okay here,” Steve murmurs. 

Like something’s ripping out Danny’s guts, turning him inside out—Steve can’t hold himself there, though; boneless, he continues to slide down. Fuck this—Danny pushes him back upright, despite the moan of unhappiness Steve emits, and then turns him over, helping him stack his legs on the seat, lowering his head into Danny’s arms, his lap. Steve opens his eyes—realizes what Danny’s done, and smiles. 

“Good?” Danny gasps.

Steve nods. God, he’s—happy, the closest to it Danny’s ever seen. His eyes slip shut again. 

“No,” Danny says, and jostles him. Make him talk. Keep him conscious. “Wake up. Wake up and tell me—” Tell him what? “Tell me what the hell you were doing at six in the morning at Green Foods.” 

Steve swallows. “Breakfast. For you.” 

“For me? You were going to make breakfast for me?” 

Steve nods minutely. “Was—sorry. Overreacted.” 

Fuck—like a fist to the gut. “I’m sorry too. I was—an idiot. Such an idiot. I don’t want you to leave. I don’t want you to go with Catherine. I’ll do anything for you to stay, anything, okay? I’ll fight for you, I’ll fight Catherine for you, okay?” Steve’s lips quirk up, and heartened, Danny continues blathering. “I mean, I might lose, I’ll probably lose, but I’ll do my best, okay? I’ll fight.” 

Steve twists his mouth down. “You won’t. Lose.” 

Danny’s eyes prickle. He strokes Steve’s hair, carefully away from any wounds he can locate. “I won’t?” 

“No.” Steve’s breath whispers out. His eyes, tracing Danny’s features over and over again like he’s trying to memorize them, fill. He blinks and two big tears roll down the corners of them. “My big love? Not Cath. You. Always you.” 

Danny’s vision blurs too. He finds Steve’s cold hand and brings it up, staying away from raw skin, the bloodied nails, touches his lips to each fingertip, clutches it against his cheek. “Listen—listen to me. I think I was wrong. I think you’re mine too.”

The furrow appears between Steve’s brows. “You do?” 

Danny has to swallow down the tears. Keep him conscious. “Yes, but, I can’t tell. I can’t tell because you haven’t kissed me. I can’t tell if it’s my big love without kissing them, can I?” 

Steve shrugs, the tiniest movement against him. “I could.” 

Kono takes a curve hard; Danny tightens his hold on Steve, keeps him steady. “Yeah? You could tell or you could kiss me? Which one?” 

The dopey grin comes back. “Both?” 

He kisses Steve’s forehead, his eyes, and, heart pounding away, his dry, chapped lips. Steve tries to reciprocate, pursing them a little, but can’t. “That—” Danny’s voice breaks.

Steve waggles his eyebrows, a pale sketch of his usual cockiness. His eyes, however, soft and uncertain, give him away. “What. Do you. Think?” 

He looks so close to conscious, so desperate to know, the effort it must take—it’s breaking Danny’s heart all over again. “I think—” He has to swallow before he can force the words out. “I think I’m in love with you too. Like—the ordinary way. The old-fashioned way.” 

Steve looks—amazed. “You are?” 

“Yeah. I’ve been, uh, thinking. A lot, I’ve been thinking a lot, I just never got the chance to tell you. But, but, see, you have to fight, because I don’t know what I’m doing. I have no idea. You have to help me figure it out.” 

Steve’s eyes slip shut again. But he doesn’t lose consciousness; he just smiles. “Are you—” His smile turns goofy. Danny’s heart catches. “Danno, are you. Trying to give me your heart this time? So I live? Like—your liver?” 

Danny’s nose starts to run. “I, uh, I, yeah, yes. Yes, I am. But it doesn’t work that way, this doesn’t work that way. You have to be alive. You have to stay alive and keep it safe. Okay?” 

Steve’s still smiling. “Mine? Is yours. Always been yours.” He cracks open his eyes. “You know?” 

Keep him talking. “No, I don’t. Explain it to me. Wake up and explain it to me.” 

“Like—this week? Best week.” Steve lets his eyes close again, grinning dopily. “Best week ever.” 

It takes him a second to work the words free. Steve’s muscles slacken, and panic kicks him into gear. He jostles him, once, twice, harder, until Steve cracks open his eyes again, looking puzzled. “No. No. It wasn’t. Okay? It wasn’t the best week. Not even close.” 

The furrow reappears between Steve’s eyebrows. “Wasn’t?” 

“No, that—that, my friend, was only the first week. Okay? It was only the first week. You’re gonna fight this, you’re gonna fight this and we’re gonna have so many weeks together, and then, years later, then you can decide which one was the best week. You understand?” 

The saddest smile Danny’s ever seen on Steve’s face—no, that’s not true, he saw it, something like it, in the plane, just before Steve lost consciousness. “Danno. No antidote.” 

“I don’t care,” Danny snaps. “You’re stronger than this. You can do it. You’ve gotten through worse, Steve, you just have to fight.” He loses it, for a second, and a sob twists out of him. “Please, Steve, please fight. For me, can you fight for me?” 

Steve presses his lips together. “Do anything. For you.” 

“Me too,” Danny says. “Me too.” 

Steve starts to smile, but it twists into something else. “Danno.” He starts shivering—his eyes, when they find Danny’s, are full of terror, lurch the same in Danny’s chest. “Cold.” 

“No. No, you’re just—it’s the air conditioning.” Danny shifts him up, tucking his face against his neck, wrapping arms around his spasming body, as much of him as he can cover. “Better?” 

He can feel Steve’s smile against his skin. “Yeah. Always.” 

Another sob rips through him. “You’re gonna be okay.” 

“It’s okay. Like this.” 

It’s not. It’s not okay. 

Grace is crying quietly in the passenger seat. Kono’s eyes are red-rimmed when they meet his across the rearview. 

Nothing’s okay. 

—

Queen’s is barely controlled chaos. As soon as Kono screeches the car to a halt, the doors fly open and scrub-clad people help him move Steve out, carefully, onto the waiting gurney. They secure him to it with belts and rush inside, Danny trying to keep up, Kono and Grace on his heels.

“What did he take?” someone shouts; another starts taking Steve’s vitals. 

“We don’t know yet. We have a team going through the place he was held.” 

“Do you know what else they did?” 

“Assault, restraints, a cattle prod.” At the last, several heads turn toward them, incredulous. “Just—torture.” 

“Any medical history?”

Steve’s eyes are still open, his shivering now so violent it looks like he’s seizing. Danny lunges into the opening between two staff members and manages to grab his hand. “Yeah, uh, liver transplant four years ago. He’s still on low-dose tac—tacrolimus for that. He was exposed to high-dose radiation about—” fuck, has it been that long? That too draws glances, “three years ago. He gets a rash with penicillin and he had his tonsils out when he was six.”  

He walks alongside the gurney, glances back—Grace is okay, Kono’s got her—either the staff forget about him or take pity, but there they are, in the trauma bay, and no one’s throwing him out. A kindly-looking nurse even pushes a stool at him so he can sit and stay out of the way. 

Steve’s hand is slack, ice-cold. The monitor they’ve attached him to counts his heart beats, far too few to be normal. The doctor in charge rattles off orders; six or seven people scurry to carry them out, attaching lines, administering medications, cutting away Steve’s clothes—

Steve’s eyes glaze over. Danny’s heart drops. 

The monitors go off, the too-slow rhythm now a scribble of tiny little waves—the flurry of activity devolves into complete chaos. Someone’s hand on his shoulder— “You need to step out,” the nurse who gave him the stool says. “I’m sorry.” 

He can’t fight her; he wants to, so much. But he can’t distract them, he can’t take up valuable attention, time—despite every instinct, every fiber of his being, he follows her out, back to the waiting room. 

It’s like walking underwater, his body numb—Kono, still in her camouflage outfit, black paint under her eyes—she looks like some high-tech version of the soldiers in the Vietnam movies he grew up with. Grace—safe, whole—is by the vending machines. Danny goes to Kono, lets her enfold him in her arms. 

—

They huddle in a corner of the waiting room, Grace under his arm on the oversized chair, Kono in the single one next to him, shoulder leaning into his. Somewhere near his ankle, the third coffee Grace brought him is cooling down. Lou and Junior sit in the chairs across from them, heads resting on their fists. Tani and Catherine went to get food. The rest of the team are on their feet, further away, by the door. His right knee throbs dully from his uncontrolled drop on it earlier. 

“He had his tonsils out when he was six,” Kono says, apropos nothing. 

Danny frowns. Grace stirs and sits up. He lets her go. “He did,” he says. 

Kono’s smiling. “That’s adorable.” 

His temper pings, but he has no—energy. It turns into embarrassment, annoyance. “What if they—what if they have to check his tonsils for something and they look and they look and they can’t find them, huh? What then?” 

“Could happen,” Grace says. 

“No, I mean, you’re adorable,” Kono says. “You’re right, you’ve loved him too, for ten years, and we all knew. This new thing you came up with—it was just the two of you catching up to the rest of the world.” 

His eyes burn. He presses his thumb and index finger into them, fighting the sudden implosion in his chest. He can’t fall apart yet; they might have more questions.

Kono lays her hand on his arm and squeezes. 

—

“Nothing yet?” 

Adam. Danny straightens. His right leg is asleep and his knee now just feels stiff. Kono and Grace went to the bathroom. “No.” How long has it been? It’s still light out, but not for long, it looks like. 

Adam has one of Jerry’s big tablets. He offers it to him. “CSI found a vial at the house they were holding him. It looks like it’s the same Chinese designer drug that we arrested the suppliers of last week. Eric said if injected into muscle at high doses, it causes—” He stumbles over the words: “Multi-organ failure.” 

Danny grits his teeth. “Did you tell the doctors?” 

“Yeah, first thing. It looks like they kept him drugged the whole time, so he wouldn’t free himself. Do you want to see the photos?”

Does he? He takes the tablet. 

The house is the same bare-walled dump he saw in the video call, dilapidated and grimy, peeling paint and rotting wood. The room where they kept Steve, stains on the concrete floor, dark under the flash of the camera. There are restraints, manacles connected by a silver chain, hanging off a bar in the ceiling, blood spatter beneath. And on the pockmarked, discolored linoleum floor, rests the damn cattle prod.

Several shots of Daiyu Mei, dead, on the ground, on a gurney with the body bag open to show her face, then another still of her on Noelani’s table, her skin mottled and grey, Danny’s bullet holes three almost-innocuous red welts in the center of her chest. Those pictures are undoubtedly for Danny’s benefit, but instead of giving him relief, all they do is make him feel utterly helpless. 

The next set is of the backup goon squad she’d left at the house, meant to box in him and Grace from behind. Cole and Catherine’s Alpha Team took them out, all four still alive. Someone’s going to have to interrogate them—

Not him. He’s done. Enough. 

He hands the tablet back to Adam, who sinks into the chair Kono was occupying moments ago. Danny would make a comment about the way they’re carefully dancing past each other, he would, but he’s too exhausted to find the words. 

“If anyone can beat it, he will,” Adam says quietly. “You know that.”

Danny doesn’t react. He has a sore on the inside of his lower lip, from gnawing on it too much. He doesn’t do that, chew on his lip. Steve does. He does it now because it’s a connection, however feeble, the most he can have.

Adam’s hand on his arm. “Danny.” 

Danny looks—his stomach lurches. A woman, local, late forties maybe, her hair in a neat bun, in green scrubs and white coat, making a beeline toward them. 

“Family for McGarrett?” she asks. He can’t tell by her expression how bad the news is. He can tell it’s not good. 

Danny’s on his feet in front of her, Adam at his elbow, Lou and Junior on the other side. “I’m his partner.” 

She nods. “I’m Dr. Kawena, CCM. I’m treating Commander McGarrett in the ICU. He’s—stable, for now, but not awake. He needs a tube to breathe and medication to maintain his blood pressure, but he’s stable.” She gestures at Danny’s chair. He sits, and she takes the one over from him. “The trauma team scanned him for his injuries related to the assault, and didn’t find anything other than superficial soft tissue trauma. That’s a relief.” 

Danny nods, bracing himself. He’s had enough doctors talk to him in these situations to know the distinct flavor of shit sandwich they tend to serve. 

“As for the poisoning—it’s basically a drug overdose, with the so-called MX-18, a newer synthetic opioid that has some stimulant effects engineered into it. It doesn’t have an antidote, per se, and I believe what they meant by that is that it doesn’t respond to naloxone. If administered intravenously, aside from its addictive properties, it is mostly harmless. However, Commander McGarrett received a large dose intramuscularly. This route of administration causes an exaggerated immune response, which in turn causes tissue damage, mainly in the heart and kidneys, leading to multi-organ failure. As the drug has infiltrated into the muscle, we can’t extract it from his system. We have to wait for it to be broken down and cleared naturally by his body, but until it is, the tissue damage continues. Are you with me so far?” 

Danny draws breath to affirm, but Grace—when did she get back?—speaks first. “But if his kidneys are hurt, how is he going to get rid of it?” 

Kawena looks up at her. “That’s precisely the problem. But we will help him with fluids and dialysis, give him medications to keep his blood pressure up and his heart beating, support him while his body gets rid of the drug. Other than that, we have to wait.” She turns back to Danny, expression grave. “I’m afraid the prognosis is guarded at best.” 

Danny’s shivering. It’s fucking cold, what kind of sick fuck would choose to blast the fucking AC in a fucking hospital waiting room? “Is there any chance he’ll be okay?”

Kawena pauses. It’s a very noticeable pause, one that tightens his chest into a knot. “There’s always a—chance.” 

His temper flares. “Level with me, Doc. Has anyone made it?” 

Her eyes flick away from his. His stomach lurches. “I haven’t treated anyone exactly like him, but survival rates are low.” 

Translation: no. He bites down on his lower lip, clamps down his leg muscles so he stops fucking shivering. 

Her hand on his arm draws his gaze back up. “He is young and relatively fit. That should give him a fighting chance.” 

Danny’s nose is running. He swipes his hand across it. “Look, I—” He has to clear his throat. Of course the entire team, all of them, including Catherine and Cole, are watching him lose it, of course they are. “I’m not saying he’s any more important than the rest of your patients or anything, but he’s—” He has to stop and breathe. “He’s just—he’d risk his life at the drop of a hat to save people. He’s done it, countless times, saved this island, people—so many people. That’s what he does. He’s just—this world’s a better place because he’s in it and he doesn’t deserve to die like this. Please, just, please do your best. Please.” 

He doesn’t say he has to make it up to Steve for ten years of grief. He doesn’t say he’s just figured out how, he doesn’t beg her to give him more time, just a little more time, please. Please. 

Her expression sets into determination, and kudos to her, the pity is very faint around her eyes. “I swear to you that I will do everything in my power for him.” She waits for him to nod, then says, “They should be getting ready to let you sit with him. One of the nurses will come find you.” 

Kawena leaves, passing by another woman entering, familiar—Rachel.

He frowns, getting to his feet—when did he sit down? Rachel approaches, her quick steps carrying her around the empty chairs, the rest of the team, a duffel clutched to her chest—his bag, from the house. She drops it in a chair and offers him a hug. Danny accepts it. 

Her familiar scent almost shoves him over the edge. “I just heard, Danny. I’m so sorry. Do you know if he’s going to be all right yet?” 

He manages a head shake. 

“I’m so sorry,” she says again. She gestures at the duffel. “I brought you a change of clothes. I reckoned you’d want to stay—”

He doesn’t listen to the rest, can’t. Grace comes to his rescue, then Kono. Catherine’s in his periphery too, keeping tactfully back with Cole. He’s sure he’s glimpsed Nahele at some point, Kamekona, Flippa, Odell, even Hirsch—all the usual suspects, here to lend support, run errands. It makes him feel even more claustrophobic, it makes him feel like he’s buried under a building again, suffocating to death not quickly enough. 

If only he could go back to that moment. Under that rubble, covered in dust and bleeding out of his side, he’d grab Steve’s neck and yank him into a kiss, a real hug, he’d never let him go again. He’d change everything, he’d do it all differently. Even if it did end like this, they would’ve had—time. Memories, more of them, better ones. 

The nurse comes to get him. The ICU room is a glass-walled private, just large enough for the bed, the array of monitors on each side, and one of the newer reclining chairs that Queens invested in about three years ago. They’re reasonably comfortable, according to Steve; he’d slept in one for several days following the quarantine debacle, too stubborn to leave Danny’s side. 

It takes him a moment to steel himself for the sight. Steve, unconscious in the bed, pale as death. Eyes shut, breathing tube in his mouth, whatever’s visible of his chest and arms swathed in the gauzy burn dressings Danny’s all too familiar with. A monitor alleges Steve’s alive, the beats it records slow and irregular.

It’s—wrong, he’s wrong. He can’t do this; he shouldn’t be allowed to do this. “Excuse me,” he mumbles, and reverses out of the room, ignoring the nurse’s question, hurtles down the hallway, to the visitor stairs that don’t need an ID card, down to the lobby, out the door—

He doesn’t have a car. The burnt-out husk of the Camaro rots in a junkyard somewhere, waiting to be scrapped—and Steve’s truck was shot to hell, they couldn’t even start it—but the olive green Jeep parked in the first row, in one of the spots reserved for first-responders, it looks familiar—

The Jeep Kono drove them in because they couldn’t be sure the SUVs weren’t booby-trapped—he tries the passenger door; it opens. He climbs into the seat, hardly able to breathe through the knot in his throat, no space for air in his concrete-filled chest. 

This is his fault. He did this. He should’ve predicted she’d have one last card up her sleeve. He should’ve listened to Cole and Junior, breached the house as soon as they had the location. Multi-organ failure. No antidote. He let her poison him; this is his fucking fault. 

Steve’s chapped lips—he didn’t even get to taste them, not really, neither of them got anything out of that kiss, other than some insolent part of him tightening sweetly—he did that too. For ten years, tortured Steve with what he couldn’t have, didn’t realize what was going on, didn’t let him—

The driver’s side door opens. He starts violently, grabbing for the gun that’s still at HQ—

Catherine climbs in and closes the door. Shaking, he wipes his hand over his face—it comes away wet. Fuck. Why her? Why is she here? Where’s Kono, Grace, Adam—he’d even take Junior. Where’s he?  

Catherine doesn’t speak. They sit there, staring at the wall the truck is parked in front of. 

“I’ve never seen him that happy,” she says, at last.

He understands the words, he does, he just doesn’t get the connotation. What did she come for, play twenty fucking questions? He clears his throat. “Excuse me?” 

She smiles. “This past week? You should’ve seen his face when he told me how you’d made him promise not to leave.”

The lump returns to his throat, his nose runs. He sniffs and looks away. “He’ll die happy, is that what you came to say?” 

“No, I don’t think he’ll die. I think he’s going to be okay. If anyone can, it’s Steve.” 

“That’s the problem though. Didn’t you—didn’t they tell you what she said? She said no one lives.” 

“That’s not what she said. But regardless—I came to say you did the right thing. I saw the house, the way they were set up. They would’ve killed him for sure if we’d breached.” 

“Would they?” He sounds like an asshole, but apparently he can’t stop. “Because from where I’m standing, they still did.” 

“Look, Danny, you’re too experienced to do this to yourself. You made the best decision with the information that was available to you at the time. You knew they’d underestimate Grace, so you let her lead the charge, you gambled on the exchange site and set it up right so no one else got hurt. You made all the right decisions. If Steve were awake—once he wakes up, he’s going to tell you the exact same thing.” 

He would, he would do that, probably. She’s right about that. He wipes his eyes with the heels of his hands. “Thanks. I’ll stop being sad now. Great job.” 

“I’m not telling you to stop being sad. I’m telling you to stop wasting your time like this and go take care of him. Because that’s what he’d want. You, taking care of him.” 

Steve never knows what’s good for him, does he; did Danny need more proof of that? Jaw set, he stares out the side window, seeing nothing.

He should’ve let Steve go. Chances are he’d be okay now, if he’d left. Danny should’ve just kept his stupid mouth shut. 

“You know,” he says. “If Cole had called you a week earlier. If Doris’s lawyer had brought that cipher a week earlier.” His air runs out like his lungs sprung a leak.

Catherine waits patiently for several seconds. When Danny still can’t go on, she asks, “What then?” 

“He would’ve gone with you.” He should’ve gone with her. 

“Maybe.” She breathes a laugh. “But even if he did, he still would’ve come back to you, Danny. It’s—” When she breaks off, Danny glances at her, catches what looks like genuine wonder skittering across her face. “I thought—things like that, feelings that strong, they happen in movies, in books. Not in real life. I didn’t think it was possible. I don’t think Steve did either. Until he met you.”

And Danny couldn’t believe it either, so he wasted it, between his obliviousness and preconceptions, he squandered their time away. Now they get nothing, and after all those years, all he could give Steve was one lousy week of confusion. 

They haven’t even kissed.

He can’t hold it back anymore—it twists out of him, pours out, barely muffled by the hand he has across his face. Catherine’s kind enough to not stare at him directly, just her hand on his shoulder while he shakes and fights for control.

Chapter Text

Grace is sitting in the recliner by Steve’s bed when Danny, freshened up and changed into the Newark PD sweatshirt Rachel returned, limps back to the room. She is holding Steve’s hand, her head pillowed on her elbow, staring unblinkingly at the monitor that’s counting Steve’s heartbeats. It makes Danny’s gritty eyes blur again. 

Kono’s leaning against the wall on the other side. When she sees him, she pushes off and meets him just outside the door. She rests her hand on his shoulder. “You good?” 

“Yeah.” 

He must not have sounded very convincing because her face falls and she pulls him in for a quick hug. “They don’t want more than two people in his room at any time. I’ll be outside. Do you need anything?”

He shakes his head. “How’s your mom?” 

Her expression grows even more sorrowful. “Not good. She’s been deteriorating slowly for the past few months, you know? I figured this was as good a time as any to come visit her too.” 

“If you need anything—”

She’s kind enough not to laugh at him or point out where they are. “I know. Same to you.” 

“I know. I don’t know how I can—” 

“If the next word out of your mouth is ‘thank’ we’re gonna have a problem.” She nudges him on. “Go sit with him. I’m sure he’s missed you already.” 

Danny’s missed him too, so much. Not trusting himself to speak, he nods and strides in. 

Grace lifts her head, studies him for a second. Her face twists. “Hey, Danno.” 

“Hey, Monkey,” he says, standing next to her so he can run a hand over her hair. “How—uh, is he—”

“No change,” she says. “The nurse comes every so often and checks on him. She’s nice. Her name’s Meleana.” 

Danny studies her. Grace looks—fine. “And you? Are you okay?” 

“Yeah. Just tired.” She breathes a laugh. “Really tired. Like, I can barely keep my eyes open, but I’m too wired to sleep? You know what I mean?” 

“I do. That’s what happens after an adrenaline burst, babe, that shaky-weird feeling?”

She rolls her eyes. “I know, Dad. I’ve been through it before.” 

Of course she has. He glances at Steve on instinct, looking for reassurance, for support—jolts to find the tube there, Steve’s face slack—he looks almost frail in the bed, covered in those dressings; at least the evidence of the cattle prod isn’t readily visible anymore. There’s an IV in the back of his hand, but a patch of skin by his elbow looks whole. Danny reaches for it, hesitates. 

Before he can make up his mind, the nurse bustles in. She’s Hawaiian, small and plump, with a kindly face and grey-streaked hair. She smiles. 

“Go ahead, touch him,” she says. “Touch is good. You won’t hurt him. It might even help.” 

Danny nods absently, playing his fingertips over Steve’s skin, where it’s soft, on the inside of his elbow. He’s cool to the touch but not cold; he’s alive. He’s still fighting. Do anything, for you. Danny’s throat convulses, some straggling tears pushing their way out of his screwed-shut eyes. Grace notices and wraps her arm around his waist, presses herself into his side. 

In another life, he might’ve felt self-conscious like this, clutching Steve’s elbow, stroking his hair, leaning down to breathe hesitant kisses to his brow, his temple, press his face against Steve’s as gently as he can, but not anymore. Fuck identity crises and those fancy words—they never needed them. This is it, this is all that counts, all that ever counted: him and Steve, together. 

If only he could’ve reached this realization, this state of being sooner. If only he’d had the capacity to see it earlier, a decade, years—one year ago, preferably the day he found out about Steve’s feelings for him. 

—

A completely unremarkable day it’d been, a week or so after Jerry got shot. Assuming Steve was beating himself up for the incident, that weekend, Danny showed up at the house unprompted and uninvited to give Steve his usual unsolicited pep talk. 

He never got around to it. When he slogged down the beach to their chairs, he found Steve already spilled into one, the sand by his feet studded with at least three beer bottles. That was enough for Danny to forget why he was there, and whatever tact he’d intended to approach Steve with. 

“What the fuck are you doing?” he yelped.

Steve jumped like Danny had never seen him jump. At the sight of Danny, the alarm on his face twisted into pure panic, then, with a hand scrubbed across, got flattened into SEAL face #1: the absence of emotion. “Trying to have a quiet night, Danny. Would you be so kind and let me, please?” 

Would Danny be so kind and let him? “Are you out of your mind? You’ve had a liver transplant! You can’t drink like this, you could get tissue damage, you could reject the liver, you could die, you fucking idiot, what is the matter with you? What the fuck is wrong with you?” 

Steve grimaced and twisted away from him. “I’m fine. Just leave me alone, for one night. Can you leave me alone for one night, Danny?” 

“No, I can’t, not if you’re trying to kill yourself by Longboard, what the fuck is the matter with you—” 

Steve pushed himself to his feet, weaving subtly. He was a lightweight now, of course, because he didn’t drink, because he wasn’t supposed to drink—or had he had more before Danny showed up? Three was probably okay, but if he’d had more—Danny’s stomach twisted. 

Steve tried to loom but he wasn’t doing a good job. He looked like a good flick would flatten him. “Nothing’s the matter with me, Danny, at least it wasn’t until you showed up. So could you be so kind and just fucking go home? I can’t deal with you tonight.” 

At the contempt in his voice, Danny’s insides pulled together painfully, into a ball of rejection. As always he wrapped it as thickly as he could in anger. “No.” 

The way Steve’s eyebrows shot up, at least, was rewarding. “No?” 

“I said no. I’m not going home. Whatever this is—” He waved his hand, encompassing Steve and his tantrum, “you clearly need help, a—an adult, an adult to supervise you, because who knows what brain-amputated scheme you’ll get in your mind, what mess you’ll cause in whatever this is—”

“I don’t. All right? I don’t. Least of all you. Just fucking go home.” 

Least of all him? “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” 

“It’s not supposed to mean anything, Danny, can you just for once in your life leave it alone and go away? Can you?” 

“No.” Danny drew himself to his full breadth and crossed his arms. “I’m not going anywhere. Not until you tell me what the fuck is wrong—”

With an eye roll, Steve thrust himself toward the house. 

“Are you—oh, my god.” Danny gave chase, slipping and stumbling in the sand, the same sand that with his annoyingly long legs, Steve seemed to just float across. “Are you serious right now, are you actually doing this, how childish do you have to be, how immature—”

Steve swung around, fury twisting his face. “Immature? I’m immature? That’s rich, coming from you, when you are literally chasing me down, when I’ve asked you to leave—”

“When has that ever worked, huh? When have I ever backed off when you were being prickly, when has you being your pure, undiluted self ever driven me away, huh, Steve?” 

Steve’s face fell, crumbled into something else—he turned away, the fight in him gone. “Danny, please go. Please. I’ll—call you tomorrow, all right? I promise. I’ll call you tomorrow. Just go, now.” 

Please? The Steve-fueled roller coaster of emotions took a dive down the panic loop, sickening gut twist included. “Did you actually say—you said please? Not a chance. You might as well have said ‘lock me in this house and interrogate the hell out of me, Daniel’ because that? That, my friend, just ascertains that in no way is there gonna be any going away happening—” While talking, Danny stepped closer, reached out to take Steve by the shoulders. 

Steve flung himself away from him, violently, like he was terrified he’d catch something lethal—ironic, that, when the last time Danny actually was lethally contagious, Steve had followed him around like a puppy, completely unbothered by any signs of diseasedness. The sudden lurch made Steve lose his balance for a wild second, in an uncharacteristic display of gracelessness, and he had to catch himself against the outer wall of the house to avoid falling. 

It hurt. Danny pulled back. “You—you really don’t want me here. Why not? What’s wrong?” Maybe he had an idea—Steve had almost dumped Catherine over lying to him, the one thing he couldn’t stand, people lying to him. Could this be—but that was different, this didn’t involve him at all, this was Danny’s personal life, him and Rachel on Kauai instead of New Jersey. Why should Steve care that much? “What did I do, huh? What’s wrong?” 

Steve looked—defeated. There was no other word for it. “Nothing. You didn’t do anything. It’s me. It’s—my head. I’ll—get it back on the right way. By tomorrow. I promise. Just go, Danny.” 

“No.” Danny pointed a finger in his face, trying to get Steve to perk up, react—nothing. Steve just took it. “No, see, I have a different theory. I think you want me to stay. I think you want me to stay and make you say whatever it is you’re all twisted up about, you want me to poke and prod at you until you decide you have no other option but, and tell me what it is that’s got you like this, and that, my friend, that’s the theory I’m going to operate under, okay? I’m not going anywhere. Not until you tell me what the hell is going on.” 

“You’re wrong.” 

“Am I? Then how do you explain the little fact that you’re here, in your house, the first place I would check? If you truly didn’t want to talk to me, you would’ve gone somewhere I would have no hope of finding you. Are you going to stand there and straight-faced tell me Steve McGarrett, Lieutenant Commander Commando Supreme, doesn’t know how to disappear for a few hours so he isn’t found? No, you can’t. You cannot.” 

At least some of the fury came back, gave Steve life. “I didn’t think you’d have time, all right, Danny?” 

“I wouldn’t—why wouldn’t I have time, see, there you have it, you know very well that I don’t have Charlie this weekend, I know you know, so—” 

“Does it even matter anymore?” 

The way Steve said it, tired and defeated, made Danny pause. “What do you mean does it matter? Of course it matters. It’s a custody agreement, it always matters—” 

Steve threw his head back and exhaled, leaving the impression that he’d rather have shouted his frustration toward the heavens. “I mean with you and Rachel back together, does it even matter whose weekend it is, Danny?” 

Triumph shot through him, sweet but short-lived. “So let me recap—you didn’t think I’d come look for you when you’ve been in this weird mood all week because Rachel and I are back together—hey, stop, stop right now—” Steve moved, side-stepping around Danny toward the house. Danny followed, still talking, “—which we are not, mind you, Rachel and I are most decidedly not back together, at least not yet, so that’s why you stayed here even though, and I quote, I’m the last person you want to see right now? So what, this is about Rachel? You have a problem with me and Rachel seeing each other again?” His stomach sank—no. No way. It couldn’t be true. How often had they even seen each other in the past years, at pick-ups and drop-offs at best, exchanged a handful of words—but it would explain— “Oh my god, it’s—is this about Rachel? Do you have a thing for Rachel, do you have feelings for her—”

Steve must’ve stopped in his tracks because Danny ran into him, full-on barreled into his motionless bulk in the middle of the living room. The force of the impact sent Steve flailing forward a few steps while Danny bounced off, barely caught himself from falling. 

Steve had whirled around, his jaw slack. “Are you—are you kidding me right now? Do you—did you—do you hear what’s coming out of your mouth?” 

Danny righted himself slowly. With the utterly horrified, wrecked expression on Steve’s face—one he’d seen before, yes, he remembered very clearly now—the last piece in this impossible to believe puzzle fell into place. “Oh my god.” 

Shock chased regret on Steve’s face, got closed off. He exhaled, head down, his hands on his hips. “Fuck.” 

Danny couldn’t believe it. He couldn’t not believe it. “Me. You—you have feelings for me?” 

Steve pinched the bridge of his nose. “Please, please don’t do this. I—just go. Danny, just leave. I think I’m a little drunk, all right? I’ll be okay tomorrow. We’ll be okay.” 

“Steve! Answer the question!” 

Steve looked like he was watching his whole life fall apart. “Yes.” 

“Like, romantic feelings?” 

Steve rolled his eyes. The lanai light was throwing streaks of gold across his face and chest while leaving the rest of him in darkness. “That’s usually what’s meant by ‘feelings’, Danny.” 

“Stop being glib! Answer the fucking question! Do you mean romantic feelings?” 

Steve’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “Yes.” 

“How long?” 

Steve looked away. 

“The whole time? The whole time?” 

A muscle jumped in Steve’s jaw. 

He shouldn’t have done it, but in his defense, he’d never had anything like this happen to him. He closed the distance between them and shoved Steve in the chest with both hands. It made Steve waver back a couple of steps. “I said talk!” 

“Yes, Danny. The whole time. Is that what you want me to say? Since the day we met. Are you happy now?” 

“You’re gay?” 

“No.” 

“Then how—”

“I don’t know. It just happened.” 

“Because I’m not. I’m not gay.” 

Steve exhaled, a tired sound. “I know that, Danny.”

“Have you ever—other guys—”

“Yes.” 

“So you are gay.” 

“Look, it’s not that—” 

“Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“I tried. You didn’t—take me up on it.” 

Danny reeled back. “I didn’t what? When did you—what did you—”

“When we met. I—tried to get to know you. I took you out on dates. I—I took my shirt off all the time. Touched you, all the time.” 

“That was flirting?” 

“It wasn’t flirting. It was—signals, all right, Danny? It was 2010, Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell was still in effect. I could’ve been fired, so I couldn’t exactly come out and ask you to dinner. It’s called a signal. I was giving you signals.”

“And the signals were—dates? When did you take me out on a date?” 

Steve didn’t answer, just stared back helplessly. He didn’t have to—a dozen such occasions burst into Danny’s mind like flashes of light in one’s vision after being bludgeoned in the head.  

“And the touching?” Danny said. “I touch you all the time too. That doesn’t mean anything.” 

“I know that now. Back then, I thought maybe it did, but then you went and slept with Rachel.” Steve scoffed softly, shaking his head. “Which you did. Again. Kind of. Now.” 

Like a dying man, his—their life flashed before his eyes—the first year of their partnership, at least—Steve’s gaze, always lingering a little too long, the touches, his bare chest—his face, that face when Danny strode into the office after the sarin debacle, you and Rachel, when were you going to tell me? “You thought I liked you too.” 

Steve just gazed back at him, exhausted and soft. 

“But I—don’t. Not like that. I’m not gay.” 

“I know that, Danny.” 

“So then what’s your endgame? Are you hoping one day I’ll just discover some hidden gayness in me and ask you to put your dick in my ass, is that what?” 

Steve’d flinched before he even finished. “Jesus Christ, Danny—no.” 

“What then? What, huh?” 

Steve looked away. In the darkness, Danny couldn’t be sure, but his eyes looked—bright. Was he tearing up? “I don’t have one.” 

“What do you mean you don’t have one? What do you do, just—what, talk to me in the morning and then come home and—” He grimaced at the thought, disturbing and intrusive and—not thrilling. It wasn’t thrilling. It wasn’t. “Jerk off thinking about me?” 

“Jesus, Danny, no, of course not.”

“No? Why not, am I not attractive enough for you, if you’re so—gone on me, if you claim you have feelings for me, why wouldn’t you—”

It was true. Steve did look like he was on the verge of tears, his big eyes and the shape of his mouth—Danny’s chest flared with answering pain, instant regret— “Of course you are—what do you want me to say, Danny? What do you want me to say?”

“I want you to tell me what you thought was gonna happen!”

“Nothing, Danny. I didn’t think anything was gonna happen.”

“Is this why—you made me stay, you tried to get me to stay, you latched on to everything I ever do—what were you hoping for? What the hell did you think was going to happen?”

“Nothing, Danny. I just—like to be around you. Seeing you happy—is good. The kids. You know.” 

Someone had turned on the corner lamp so there was a little more light. Danny had ended up on the couch and Steve leaning against the sideboard, his arms wrapped around himself like he was cold. 

“I don’t—I’m not like that,” Danny repeated.

“I know, Danny.” 

“So, this—it’ll never happen. You know it’ll never happen?” 

Steve’s face spasmed with something Danny couldn’t name. He kept staring at the floor between them. “I know it’ll never happen, Danny.” 

“Okay.”

“Okay.” 

So they stayed, motionless. Danny didn’t know what was going through Steve’s brain, didn’t have the capability to guess, not while every mental faculty of his was dedicated to examining every little second of their life together.

Until Steve said, “Are you—”

Danny looked up. “What?” 

Steve was worrying the inside of his lip, the furrow between his eyebrows as deep as Danny had ever seen it. He looked—fine now, in control. It felt like a loss, like Danny had just lost something, something precious. “Are you going to be able to handle this?” 

Danny bristled. “Am I—are you? Are you going to be able to handle this? Because from where I’m standing, it doesn’t look like—” 

“I’m fine,” Steve cut him off. “I’ve done it for nine years, Danny, and you had no idea. I would’ve been fine this time too if you hadn’t come here tonight. I’m asking you, can you handle it?” 

He was right. Not once had it ever even occurred to Danny. His best friend, his partner, the guy he considered family. 

What was he going to do, quit? Change jobs? Move away, not see his kids? Not see Steve, cut him off? Of all the unlikely things that could have happened, that was the most impossible. “I’m gonna have to, aren’t I? What else am I gonna do?” 

Steve looked at him, still unstoppably chewing on his lip. “I—okay. How—uh, where do we go from here?” 

“Right.” Danny leaned back on the couch and gestured absently. “Where do we go? We don’t go anywhere. We go back to the way we were. We pretend I never came here tonight, we pretend we didn’t have this conversation. We pretend we’re in a vault, and once we’re done talking about it, we’re going to lock up this vault and we’ll never let it see the light of day again.” 

Steve stared back, blank-faced and mute. That feeling of loss raked across Danny’s chest again. He shoved it away.

“Or—or pretend we’re putting it in a capsule and burying it. Yes, that’s better.” He mimed opening the capsule, with the side of his palm scraped the conversation into the imaginary capsule, then locked the lid and pushed it into the ground. “Never to be dug out again.” 

Steve’s eyes—they were flat. His whole face was flat. It tore at Danny’s guts, but he didn’t know what to do, what else to do. “Okay,” Steve said.  

“Okay.” Danny licked his lips, stole a glance down Steve’s body. Even though his shirt was loose, his biceps, his pecs were noticeable, swells of muscle—all of him, six feet something of him, that face and those eyes, his big brain and his myriad skills, he liked Danny? He’d liked Danny all those years? That wasn’t right. It couldn’t be.

“Also—probably part of this is that you’ve been by yourself too long, because, you know, I—I don’t know why—you—” Fuck. His head, hot, he felt like he was about to start boiling—Steve, with that body—he’d let Danny touch him, he’d let Danny do—things to him. It was—insane, in the way winning the lottery must be insane, the way near-death experiences left you exhilarated, invincible— “You can’t spend your life wishing—I was something I’m not. Why would you even do that? I’m nothing special, I’m not even—”

“You’re wrong,” Steve muttered, looking away. 

“—well, I’m not, okay? You—this is—it’s because you’ve been alone too long. I bet—I bet—” Something stony lodged in his gut—he shoved through it. “You weren’t thinking about me when Catherine was around. Or—or, Lynn. Lynn was great, wasn’t Lynn great? You didn’t ask me on anything while Lynn was around.” Yes, he was ignoring the day at the hotel. That had been a coincidence. Goosebumps were not chasing down his neck now at the memory of Steve’s thumb, flicking his ear, with the new context, his sun-warmed skin when they’d walked down the beach arm in arm, shirtless. “So, what we need to do is get you someone you like and it’ll solve the problem. You’ll move on.” 

Steve peered at him, his expression betraying nothing. That he still could do that with Danny when he put his mind to it was disheartening, but this whole conversation was surreal, so what the hell did Danny know? After all those years, did he know Steve at all? 

Of course he did. What kind of bullshit thought was that? He wasn’t just saying it; this changed nothing. It couldn’t. 

“Okay,” Steve said at last. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.” 

“Of course I’m right. And—and I’m gonna—help you with that. There’s this mom at Charlie’s school, Brooke, she’s—nice. I’m gonna set you up.” He pushed himself to his feet. “I’m going home. I was never here. Nothing happened tonight. Okay?” 

“Yeah, buddy. Nothing happened.” 

“That’s right.” Danny strode on, toward the door, his path taking him close to Steve. Level with him, he froze. “And you’ll stop drinking, right?” 

Steve squinted, apparently at a total loss. 

Danny gestured toward him. “Stop drinking. Right the fuck now, please.” 

Still puzzled, Steve made a shrug-nod combo gesture. “Yeah, okay. Fine.” 

“Good. You promise?”

Steve rolled his eyes, looking—reassuringly close to normal. Something that had clenched in Danny relaxed a little. 

Something else pulsed with disappointment—that feeling of loss, again. He didn’t have any mind left to pay it. 

Steve nodded. “Yeah, Danny, fine. I promise.”

Satisfied, Danny left. Steve never brought it up again, didn’t let his eyes linger, didn’t crowd up against him, and Danny refused to acknowledge that strange feeling of loss that wouldn’t let him go. He talked Steve up to Brooke like his life depended on it, got her to agree to the date, and Steve went. Like nothing had happened. 

For a whole year.

Chapter Text

They throw Danny and Grace out around ten p.m. when Steve’s heart flips into an arrhythmia. With the rest of the team gone, the two of them huddle together in the empty waiting room, terrified of worse news. All Danny can do is keep up the litany of please-please-please, lost in the years he wasted, the wrong decisions, replaying that conversation a year ago again and again in his mind. 

Maybe he can forgive himself the first nine years, eventually, because he didn’t know, he really had no idea, and Steve didn’t say anything either, so maybe that can be on both of them. But once Steve came out with it, once Danny found out, the way he reacted, the way he behaved, there is no excuse, absolutely none. 

He can stop lying to himself about it now, because even then he knew, deep down, that it wasn’t about being gay or a lack of attraction. He was just scared, plain and simple, couldn’t wrap his mind around it, that someone like Steve could have those move-mountains kind of feelings for someone like him. Danny talks a good talk and he walks a good walk, but underneath all that bluster, he’s still the same soft insecure fourteen year-old he spent his life pretending he isn’t. If he’d let himself believe and turned out to be wrong, he would’ve never recovered; there would’ve been nothing left of him.

So he didn’t let himself think about it. Like when he went undercover, like he made himself forget the dirtbags he was working were dirtbags and that he wasn’t one, he did the same thing to Steve. It wasn’t hard at all, hiding behind the half-learned labels and behaviors of his youth, he didn’t even have to try very hard. 

In bed sometimes though, in that same warm space before sleep that now he can’t imagine without Steve, he’d take it out and fiddle with it, let that incandescent feeling swell in his chest, fill the place he’s started calling the Steve Space. Steve, wanting him all those years, carrying a torch for him? How was Danny not supposed to feel like a peacock with that, how was he not to feel that thrill? Kono’s right, if he’d known he might’ve tried something with it that first year of their partnership, but now, with every fiber of his being carefully braided around Steve like this, if they tried and Danny fucked it up, if they tried and Steve realized Danny wasn’t worth it anyway, what would have happened then? And that hurtful derision Steve could call up on a moment’s notice, the dismissive comments, the sniping—didn’t that make Danny’s case for him? Didn’t that mean Steve’s feelings couldn’t be that deep? Why had it never occurred to him that it was a defense mechanism, the oldest in the book, not until it was too late?

You won’t lose, Steve said. My big love, he said, and if Danny had known that, if he’d had any idea, he would’ve never done what he did. He would’ve grabbed Steve and pulled him into a kiss instead. That day, the next, the week after. Instead, he outwardly encouraged Steve with those women and then felt weird about it, inwardly hoped it wouldn’t stick and Steve wouldn’t move on, realized he was being a bad person, but couldn’t stop—the disregard, the flippant way he acted around Steve, he wanted to push Steve to the brink, either prove himself right that Steve’s feelings weren’t that deep after all, or, rather, get Steve to finally react, to say stop, Danny, stop hurting me, so he’d finally dare believe they were. Stupid, how stupid he’s been—if only he’d said something, if he’d communicated like an adult instead of pulling Steve’s pigtails like a preschooler, they could’ve been together. They could’ve had a whole year together. A whole year. 

Around midnight he has Junior pick Grace up and take her home. Twice more that night, arrhythmias, and then around five a.m., all hell breaks loose, alarms blaring, people in scrubs swarming in—Steve’s heart has stopped. Kawena rushes past him still in her street clothes, and twenty minutes later returns to the waiting room to report they were able to restart it, but she doesn’t know how much more of this Steve’s body can take.

Her features grave, she tells him, “If there are—other family members who might want to see him before—” She breaks off on a grimace. “It’s time to give them a call.” 

Anguish shocks through him, steals his air, the strength out of his legs. He sinks into the chair closest to him, head in his hands.

He would give his heart, he would, so Steve lives. He would give anything, do anything, fucking anything, please, please, please let him live. 

“Hey.” 

Quiet, cautious—Tani. Danny blinks, wipes his face. She’s sat down next to him. “Hey, Tani.” 

“I just wanted to let you know we’ve got Eddie, okay? You don’t have to worry about him.” 

God, Eddie—Danny almost breaks down. “Thank you.” He has to suck in air. “And—and listen, I’m, uh, I’m sorry.” 

She frowns. “Sorry? Why are you sorry?” 

“For yelling at you. I’m sorry.” 

Her expression clears. “Oh my god, don’t worry about it. It wasn’t even that bad.” 

“You didn’t deserve it.” 

She twists her lips. “It was pretty dumb, what I said, so maybe a little.” She shrugs. “Though not as dumb as how Junior and Cole acted.” 

Danny grimaces. “They were just trying to help.” 

“Junes was,” she says. “I don’t know about the other guy. Why is he even here still?” 

That’s a good question, but Danny doesn’t have any energy left to expend on it.

As if sensing his sudden exhaustion, Tani pats his arm. “I’ll go on a coffee run, okay? I’ll be right back.” 

She flits off, leaving him with the call he has to make. He didn’t forget. He meant to call her, he did, but by the time he was in any shape to talk yesterday, it’d gotten very late in LA.

“Hey, Danny,” Mary answers. She’s grinning, he can hear it in her voice. “I’ve been meaning to call and congratulate you, and, you know, let you know there are no take-backsies. He’s yours now, I’m not taking him back.” 

He didn’t even know Steve had told her. The lump burns in his throat. He swallows through it. “Mary.” 

A beat of silence, then, “Oh, no. Oh, no. What happened? Is he dead?” 

“No. No, he’s not.” Fuck. He thought he had a handle on it, but the naked grief in her voice pushes him right back to the brink, his eyes blurring—he presses his thumb and index finger into them. “But he’s—not good.” 

“What happened?” she asks. Danny opens his mouth to answer, looking for the right words—she exhales, impatient. “You know what, it doesn’t matter. Should I—how bad? Should I get on a plane today or—do I have time to sort—” 

“Today.” 

She makes an anguished sound, quickly cut off. “Okay. I’ll—let you know. Okay?” 

“Okay.” 

She doesn’t end the call. “Are you—is there someone with you?” 

Him? “Yeah—” He has to clear his throat. “Of course. The team’s here. Grace’s coming back in a bit.” 

“Okay, good.” A sniffle. “Listen to me, don’t be alone. Okay? You promise?” 

He has to grit his teeth and wait for the urge to sob pass. “Yeah, okay.” 

When Meleana returns for her shift, Danny’s leaning against Steve’s bed again, their temples pressed together. She tries to hustle him out, let Lou and Grace take over the watch, but Danny refuses. She pats his back and leaves him alone. 

“Listen, Danny,” Lou says, at the foot of the bed where he’s come to stand, “I’m sorry I wasn’t—supportive. It’s just—Steve puts up a good front, but he’s—a sensitive guy. I was worried he’d get hurt. I thought maybe you hadn’t thought it through, what you were getting yourself into.” 

Danny doesn’t look at Lou. He’s found a patch of healthy skin just under Steve’s left pec; there he’s been resting his palm, feeling Steve’s heartbeat, fluttery and weak like a bird’s, but still there. He’s still here. “You were right,” he says. “I had no idea.” 

He stays where he is the whole time during the doctors’ rounds, flicking off the self-consciousness whenever it threatens to come over him. Kawena and her entourage, professionally solemn all of them, scan the monitors and scroll through their wheeled computers. After Kawena listens to one of the young residents tell her about Steve’s vitals and the arrest overnight, how his blood pressure has been dropping and he’s made no urine, she and Meleana hold a gaze that’s as indecipherable as it is unsettling. 

Once the doctors clear out, Meleana comes over to him. “Here,” she says, and guides him back so she can lower the railing around Steve’s bed. “You can lie down with him, hold him. It’ll be good for both of you.” 

Danny stares at her, finds nothing other than kindly concern. “Are you sure? It won’t hurt him?” 

“No, it won’t,” she says. Leaning over, she straightens up some of Steve’s lines, makes sure the contraption sticking out of the side of his neck isn’t kinked. “You never know, it might even help. I used to work in the NICU. It helped the babies.” 

Self-consciousness rattles through him again—but it’s just Grace here, now. Lou’s gone. 

All Steve wanted in the car was to be held. And Danny dares to waste a second on his own petty discomfort? Fuck him, fuck him and his stupid hang-ups. 

Meleana waits next to him, no sign of impatience in her expression. He nods, and as carefully as he knows how, settles his hip next to Steve’s. She helps him scoot closer, his side pressed up against Steve’s good shoulder, his head propped up on the elbow he rests next to Steve’s head, their faces touching. He finds Steve’s heartbeat again with his fingertips. 

—

Three more arrhythmias throughout the day, and then, just as Mary gets to the airport, on standby for a ten p.m. flight, another cardiac arrest. It responds to resuscitation, barely, Kawena tells him in the hallway outside of Steve’s room, off her shift for at least an hour and still managing to look like she has all the time for him, but they’re maxed out on the pressors and she doesn’t know if Steve will respond if he arrests again. 

On shaky legs, Danny returns to the room. Meleana is back for the night shift; she lowers the railing for him again. Danny lies there until he starts falling asleep, and too afraid of hurting Steve, adjourns to the recliner, sending Grace home.

More arrhythmias overnight, dialysis, a transfusion—no urine, someone says again, checking the pristine bag hanging off the side of the bed. Steve’s blood pressure dips to the higher fifties, then up to the lower sixties. Mary calls. The flight got cancelled; there’s nothing until noon today. At the end of her shift, Meleana tries to bully him to go home again, but no, Danny won’t. He will not. The next time they roll in the cardiac cart for Steve’s arrhythmia, he refuses to leave, watches them defibrillate Steve, teeth gritted so hard his jaw aches afterward. Grace shows up around nine again, the third day, accompanied by a faint wave of worry about her missing so much school—but no. Of course she’s here. Where else would she be? 

In twos Five-0 visits, solemn but hopeful when they float in, rattled and feigning positivity when they float out. Meleana isn’t there that day, but Kawena is, sitting at the computer station across from Steve’s room with her hands steepled together, watching his monitors. 

A young, blond nurse with carefully styled hair and flawless makeup is on shift, who seems to do everything she’s supposed to, while exuding the clear message that he and Grace are in her way. When Danny moves to lower the railing again, she stops him. 

“You really shouldn’t do that,” she says. 

Danny’s temper flares. “Your colleague seemed to think it was all right.” 

“Yeah, but infection risk,” she says, with a nervous giggle. It grates on him like nails on a chalkboard. 

Grace too rears herself up. “Did that just happen? Because it was okay this morning.” 

“Ashley, hey. Problem?” Kawena, at the door. The nurse, looking irritated, steps out. 

“She’s annoying,” Grace says. 

“She’s just trying to help him.” Danny grimaces, running his thumb over Steve’s temple. The little furrow between his brows is still there. Is that a good sign? “But yeah, she is.” 

They can’t hear what’s being said, but it’s clear from the nurse’s expression that she doesn’t like what Kawena is telling her. After they’re done, Kawena herself steps in to lower the railing for Danny.

“Are you sure it’s okay?” Danny asks, despite himself. “She said infection—”

Kawena nods. “I promise. I’m not worried about that kind of infection.” 

Gently, he lies down next to Steve, leaning against his good shoulder, inhaling his hair behind his ear. 

Steve’s still pale and cool to the touch, smells like antiseptic and dried blood. His heart’s still delicate under Danny’s palm, the skin of his temple tacky when Danny presses a kiss there. 

“Listen to me,” he says, quietly, into Steve’s ear, “Don’t be an asshole, please. It would be a real asshole move to make me gay for you and then die, okay? I’m pretty sure there are laws against that. Not to mention that I’ll probably never love again, because, you know, like I said, I’ve been thinking, and I figured out that maybe, just maybe, I was attracted to you this whole time too. That explains why I was so emotionally unavailable for everyone else—those doomed relationships—I mean, when Gaby broke up with me, I was relieved. And I thought I liked her; who’d be relieved if the girlfriend they liked broke up with them? And Melissa, whom I dated for four years, I couldn’t tell her that I loved her, that wasn’t normal. And do you know what would go through my mind, what I would think about when I tried? You. I would think about saying it to you, and how that felt, and how it could never feel the same with her, and—”

Steve’s eyes are open. 

Danny’s breath tangles in his throat. A reflex, like he’s been told before, people in comas do that—but no, Steve’s eyes move, they flick to one side, then toward him—they settle on him. The lines around them soften, the furrow between his brows disappears—

“Steve?” 

Steve blinks, once, sluggish. His eyes are that iridescent green-blue again, red-rimmed, and they’re tracking—the smile crinkles, at their corners—the machine exhales for him, and his lids sink back down. 

The monitors keep recording Steve’s heartbeat—but the blood pressure, where it said sixty-something, it’s ninety-three now. That’s good, isn’t it? That should be good. He looks up, but Grace stepped out—he catches the nurse’s gaze, waves. She comes at once. 

She checks Steve’s monitors, the still-empty bag by his bed, and, infuriatingly, doesn’t utter a word until Kawena joins her. 

She reports what Danny said to Kawena in a quiet voice, adds, “I think it was terminal lucidity.” 

Kawena flicks a glance at Danny. “Can’t be sure.”

“No, but he’s objectively worse now. And still no urine.” 

“Fluctuations can occur,” Kawena says. She makes eye contact with Danny. “Hard to say what it means. We have to wait and see.”

He’s shivering again, trembling hands hidden in his pockets. He’s heard that before, terminal lucidity. Where has he heard that before? 

Beside him, Grace—she’s back, texting, rapid-fire, her forehead twisted into a scowl. Kawena touches his elbow, then retreats, back to her spot at the desk. 

“What’s wrong?” Danny asks Grace. 

She shakes her head. “Mom’s saying Charlie’s losing it. I guess he heard Uncle Steve’s in the hospital.” She looks up. “She’s asking if there’s any chance she can bring him by to see him. Or if you could talk to him or something.” 

Out of the question. Steve wouldn’t want this to be Charlie’s last memory of him. 

Steve hasn’t opened his eyes again. His blood pressure is now in the 60s. It’ll get dark soon, and it’s always in the middle of the night that bad things happen. If he wants to talk to Charlie, this is his chance. 

Terminal lucidity. He’s definitely heard that before. He can’t ask the doctor, he doesn’t want to bother her, and this nurse, he doesn’t want to talk to her unless absolutely necessary. Where has he heard that before?

Steve would want him to reassure Charlie, especially if—he’d want Steve to do it, if the situation were reversed.  

“Tell your mom I’ll drive over,” Danny says. When he’s back, he’ll crawl into bed with Steve and figure out a way to really hold him, like he wanted to be held in the car. He’ll refuse to leave. The nurse can go fuck herself; they all can. He’ll get Kawena’s phone number, he’ll ask her to yell at all of them.   

His trepidation must’ve shown, because Grace snuggles in under his arm, gives him a sideways hug. “It’s okay. I’m here. I’ll take care of him. It’s official now, he’s my stepdad. Isn’t he?” 

Danny’s nose is running again—he sniffs and kisses the top of her head. “He is.” 

Still, he tells Steve, whispers in his ear just in case, “Don’t die. Do not die. I’ll be right back, I swear.” Not enough, that’s not enough. “I love you,” he adds, and punctuates it with a nice forehead kiss, like Steve did to him that time. 

Charlie, bless him, takes the bullshit Danny serves alongside the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches Rachel made for them with a few big tears and a brave sniffle. Just as Danny’s hurrying out, Mary calls—they’ve landed, at last. 

It’s barely a detour. He swings by the airport to pick them up. Parked outside the arrivals gate, it finally comes to him. 

His nonna had been in the ICU for two weeks before she died. On her last day, she woke up, had some jello, and told them how much she loved them before peacefully passing away. Terminal lucidity, the staff had called it, told them it happened a lot, one last rally before death. 

His insides twist. One last time to see the color of Steve’s eyes. One last time to see the crinkles around them when he recognized Danny. That’s what that was. Danny has to get back there, he has to get back there now. 

Thankfully Mary and Joanie lurch out shortly after. Accepting the risk of looking like an asshole, he rushes through the greetings and hustles them and their luggage into the car, panic clipping his movements. 

His phone rings just as he gets into the car. Queens Med Ctr, the automatic caller ID says. His stomach drops. 

He shouldn’t have left. Why the hell did he leave, what the fuck is wrong with him? That’s all Steve asked for, that Danny would hold him when—he wasn’t there, he fucked up, again; he would’ve done anything, would do anything just so Steve wasn’t alone, and still, still—

He picks up and chokes on air. “Hello.” 

“Is this Mr. Williams?” 

“Yes.” 

“This is Jackie, the admin assistant in the ICU? We just wanted to let you know that your husband’s awake and asking for you.” 

The ground slants. He latches on to Mary’s arm. Gasps in air, chokes again. “Are you sure?” 

“Mr. McGarrett, in 407? Yes, sir, he’s awake and asking for you.” 

He’s gripping Mary much too tightly. He loosens his fingers. “Are you—are you sure?” 

“Yes, sir. I’m looking at his nurse who asked me to call.” 

His phone vibrates against his temple, once, twice, three times. “Okay. Yeah, I’m on my way. I’ll be there in ten minutes. Thank you. Thank you so much.” 

“What?” Mary asks, terrified. “What’s going on?” 

Danny can’t answer, staring at his phone—texts, from Grace. Danno Uncle Steve’s better! He’s awake!! He’s asking where you are, can you get back? His breath hitches. “He’s awake.” 

She stares, looks exactly like he’s feeling, incredulous and gut-punched. 

—

They find Steve sitting up in bed, sucking on a straw from the cup Grace is holding up for him, still looking like death, but breathing on his own, by himself, awake. His blood pressure is a respectable 101/68, announced by the monitors in proud green numbers, and the bag hanging off the side of his bed is now a quarter full with the coveted urine—weird-colored, but there. 

Mary barges in, Joanie in her wake, but Danny falters at the door. Where Dr. Kawena and Meleana are standing together, staring at Steve. 

“He’s doing much better,” Kawena says to him. “Very robust stress response.” She frowns. “Has he ever been—hurt like this before?” 

Danny has to unstick his throat to answer. “You mean tortured?” 

She nods, looking intensely uncomfortable. 

Danny snorts. “Yes. Worse than this, actually. Five—uh, five years ago.” He won’t even count the thing with the pool and Britney Spears’s red latex suit, that was barely a blip compared to what Wo Fat put him through.

“I’m guessing that’s what built up his resistance.”

Danny gapes at her. “Are you serious?” 

She shrugs. “I have no other explanation. If you looked at his chart, he should’ve been dead yesterday, but somehow his body knew what it had to do to pull through. Almost like it had done it before.” 

Almost like— “He—so he’s gonna be all right?” 

“Yes, he is,” she says, pats his arm, and moves to leave.

Danny catches her elbow. “I’m—thank you.” He includes Meleana in the next. “Thank you all so much.” That blond nurse too, he could kiss her sour face, give her a hug, buy her a house. Anything, they can have anything. 

Kawena looks surprised for a second, but then allows a small smile. “Our job. Your partner is very strong.” She leaves. 

Meleana shrugs her eyebrows at him. “I think it was you,” she says, pointing at him. She winks and bustles away. 

Danny steps forward, hands in his pockets, shaking, again. Steve’s gaze latches onto him as soon as he crosses the threshold, his face still drawn and haggard, but his eyes light up like they always do. Danny’s insides jolt, the tears claw at him again. 

“Hey,” Danny manages, and then, because he’s a complete idiot: “You okay?”  

“Okay,” Steve rasps. 

Danny almost loses it—his lungs feel like they collapse, force a choky sound out of him. He can’t make words, can’t do anything—he should do something, touch Steve, hug him—it’ll hurt though, if he crushes him to his chest like he wants to. He keeps shaking, quaking with need.

Mary sucks in her lips, eyes twinkling. “Here, we’ll give you two a minute. Come on, Joanie, let’s find you some chips.” 

“Yay, chips,” Grace says, and grinning, follows them out. 

Danny approaches the bed, Steve’s eyes never wavering from him, and terrified of accidentally causing Steve pain, leans over him to brace one hand next to his hip, his other elbow above Steve’s head, balancing his weight. With the back of his thumb, he strokes Steve’s temple, he leans in to press his lips to Steve’s cheekbone—his skin is still tacky, tastes plasticky, but warm, alive—he’s so indisputably alive—then the corner of Steve’s mouth, as close to his lips as he dares—his poor lips, split from dehydration, the tube; it’d hurt if Danny kissed him properly right now. Maybe just a peck, just a little one—but he can’t, he can’t cause Steve more pain. Absolutely not. 

Steve’s too weak to hug back, but he turns his face into Danny’s, gets his hand on Danny’s wrist. “Danno,” he whispers. 

It builds up inside of Danny, wants to pour out—but just as he’s inhaling the air to make the words, a clatter behind him—Lou and Junior, the rest of the team in tow. Panic flares— “They said only—”

“They’re making an exception for the happy occasion,” Lou announces, ambling in. Danny moves back so they have a little more room for their stuffed animals and flowers and balloons, stamping on the instinct to square up in front of Steve, shield him with his body. 

They’re happy and raucous, exuberant in their relief. It feels like the same relief cut Danny’s strings, like he’s going to slide down the wall and puddle on the floor, insensate. He can’t go, though, he can’t stop looking at Steve—what if this is all contingent upon him having actual eyes on him, what if he worsens again if Danny looks away? 

Steve, for his part, keeps craning his neck every so often, gaze searching for Danny, like he feels the same way. It has to hurt, that movement, and sure enough, the third time he does it, discomfort twists his face, quickly hidden behind a wobbly smile, but Danny doesn’t miss it, and moves to the other side of the room, into Steve’s line of sight. 

It brings him closer to Catherine. Who looks him up and down, smug as all get out, and says, “You know—”

“Thank you,” Danny barrels over her, “everything you did, sticking around, the satellite stuff—”

She smiles. “Will you shut up and let me enjoy saying I told you so?” 

Her eyes are alight with the joke, her arms held out. Danny shuts his mouth and submits to the hug. “You did tell me so.” 

“Don’t break his heart,” she says, just for him to hear. 

Any response that occurs to him in the moment feels deeply inane, so he says nothing, and, after they part, offers a smile. “Sorry you didn’t find a partner.” 

“Oh, but I did,” she says, and leans forward pointedly. Danny follows her line of sight—to Lincoln Cole hovering outside in the hallway, Quinn next to him. Well, would you look at that—Danny’s big mind-blowing miracle came with a fun-sized friend. 

Then Steve finds his gaze again and smiles, and Danny’s stomach does that sweet swoopy thing and he’s already forgotten about the other people in the room.

Chapter Text

Danny doesn’t let anyone near Steve for his official statement until their tenth day in the hospital, the third out of the ICU. While Lou and Junior are confirming what happened immediately before Steve was taken, Danny double-checks the three pills the nurse has brought—ever since they offered Steve a banana despite the renal diet he was supposed to be on, Danny’s faith in the institution has severely flagged. 

“They kept up with those tranq darts,” Steve’s saying. The nurse, when Danny glances up to nod, is hiding a smile, and skirts around him to place the small pill cup on Steve’s nightstand. She disappears. “Every six hours, on the dot. Never let me out of sight, didn’t make any mistakes. She didn’t dose me with the actual drug until just before we were leaving to meet you.” That while rubbing his right quad, where she injected him, the muscle damage that’s going to take weeks to recover. 

“How much do you remember of the exchange?” Junior asks, leaning heavily on the footboard of the bed with both hands. Danny moves over to slouch against the wall, in Steve’s direct line of sight.

Steve pulls a face. “Bits and pieces. I know Danny was there. I know she—” He falters, glancing at Danny. “I know she had a gun on him at some point. I know I couldn’t move, not the way I wanted.” 

He can’t remember? Danny’s pulse picks up. “What about after? The car?” 

Steve’s forehead furrows in effort. “Bits and pieces,” he repeats. “I remember you. I remember being safe.” He makes a face. “I don’t know how much of it’s real though, because I’m pretty sure I was hallucinating. I thought Grace was in the car too.” 

Danny stiffens. Lou glances at him, scowling. “Oh, she was,” Junior says, grinning gleefully, entirely unaware of what Lou or Danny’s faces are doing. “She drove that truck over three of those guys, just like a pro. Couldn’t have done it without her.” 

Steve’s shock is almost comical. He finds Danny with his gaze, pins him in place. “I’m sorry, what? You’re wrong. You have it wrong. Danny?” 

Lou’s finally drawn Junior’s blithe attention and unceremoniously hustles him out. Danny’s left alone to recount the rest of the story, not quite daring to come any closer to Steve lest the laser glare he’s pelting Danny with melts brains at close range. 

“Look, there was no other play,” he repeats, for the third time. Steve glowers back, livid. 

God, he’s hot when he’s worried about Danny’s kid. Danny wants to climb him like a tree, run his hands over those bulging arm muscles— 

Stop. They’re in the hospital. Getting thrown out for lewd behavior is the last thing Steve needs him to do, not while Danny seems to be the only defense between him and the hospital’s secret agenda to kill. It’s just that with every passing day, despite the assortment of yellowing bruises and scabbed wounds Steve’s sporting, it’s getting harder and harder to keep his hands off of him. 

Steve doesn’t remember, though. Now, in hindsight, Danny realizes he shouldn’t have assumed. One thing at a time. 

“There just wasn’t another play,” he repeats, once more, “they would’ve never expected me to let her—”

“What do you mean there was no other play! You could’ve literally done anything else, Danny, how could you—” 

“She wouldn’t let herself be sent away, okay? What was I supposed to do, lock her up in rendition while we tried to rescue you and got everyone killed?” 

Steve’s bottom lip pokes out in a pout. Danny has to bite his own so he doesn't grin. “Yeah! That would’ve been preferable!” 

Danny twists his mouth down. He knows just the words to explain himself; he's heard them enough before. “Well, I assessed the risk using my training and my past experiences, and I thought it was acceptable. So there.” 

Steve gapes at him. “I hate you,” he says. 

Danny grins. “And I love you, babe.” 

Steve twitches—the tiniest of spasms, like his poor, battered little heart tripped over the words—his eyes widen, his brows pull together. 

“What bits exactly—” Danny starts. 

“Knock knock.” 

They both whirl toward the door. “Chin Ho!” Steve is first to exclaim. 

Abby is peering over his shoulder, both of them beaming. Between them, they have a small gift shop worth of items. “Can we come in?” Chin asks. 

Of course they can, and the knowing looks Chin casts him notwithstanding, they don’t leave until the respiratory therapist comes, and then the nurse chases Danny out because family members aren’t allowed to stay overnight here, and the next morning after rounds they immediately whisk Steve away for a kidney scan—but he’s recovering beautifully, the eighth doctor, whose name Danny can’t recall, says, expect a full recovery—and then it’s Kamekona’s turn, then Hirsch for a whole three hours, during which Danny fears Steve’s going to lapse back into the coma just to get away. 

Over the next few days, Danny makes three more attempts to broach the subject, but when he sucks in the air, the words vacate the building, and he ends up waffling until a medical professional conveniently interrupts. It’s hard, because being finally reassured his heart won’t end up minced meat doesn’t equate to knowing what to say to a conscious Steve. No longer worrying Steve will turn around with his patented sneer that for years Danny saw more of than that genuine, heart-twisting smile and say “Gotcha—in what world would you ever think I could be in love with you, Danny?” doesn’t mean Danny lacks the infinite potential to fuck it all up—as he’s demonstrated, again and again. 

“Hey, Danny?” 

Hospital day eleven. Danny’s in the chair next to Steve’s bed, which is in the process of leaving a permanent impression on his ass. He looks up. “What, babe?” 

Steve’s face changes now when Danny calls him ‘babe’, softens minutely, almost imperceptibly. Danny can’t tell if it’s always done that or if it’s new, or if it used to try before and Steve wouldn’t let it. The Steve Space pulses with something tender and sweet, wants Danny to crawl into bed with Steve, hold him again. 

Steve, unaware of all that, tilts a look at Chin, visible through the door, talking to Kono in the hallway. “I’m gonna ask him to take over.”

Danny’s stomach lurches. “Take over how?” 

“Completely,” Steve says easily, holding eye contact. “That was the plan all along, kind of, you know, Chin would go get some leadership experience in San Francisco, and then come back to take over.” 

“Really. I didn’t know that.”

Regret twists Steve up for a second. “Yeah, it wasn’t—official or anything. Just, you know, something me and Chin talked about before he left.” He worries the inside of his lip. “Sorry I didn’t tell you.” 

Danny’s heart catches. Chin never mentioned it either, so maybe it was more an attempt to ease the goodbye than an actual plan. “You told me now. Hey, it’s okay, it’s no big deal.” 

Steve’s expression softens again. “And then,” he says, “I thought maybe I’ll take some time off, rest. Figure out what’s next.” 

Take some time off—Danny’s fucking up again, he should’ve said something, he should’ve told Steve, he should tell him every day, every hour— “But here, right? Like—because you promised. You promised you’d stay.” 

It comes out tense, upset. Steve’s lips quirk up, but he stops them. “I mean, that would be my preference, but if you really want me to, I could ask Cath if the CIA job is still available—” 

“Well, I don’t,” Danny snaps. “Besides, that job’s gone, my friend. Cole’s swooped it up, so you’re fresh out of luck. You’re stuck here, with me.” 

Steve doesn’t even blink, his infinitely amused, endlessly—azure, his eyes are endlessly azure at the moment, Danny did know the word for it, all along, but like he’s realized, he doesn’t need it. He only needs one: beautiful. Steve’s eyes are beautiful, and he loves the way Steve looks at him with his beautiful eyes. 

“With you, huh?” Steve says. “Maybe—”

And as has been the rule, before they can get any further, Charlie bursts into the room, launching himself clear across, straight into Steve’s lap. 

—

The PT is a pushy motherfucker, and yeah, sure, Danny can see the benefit of that kind of attitude in someone with his job, but that is not what Steve needs, absolutely not. If anything, Steve needs someone level-headed to pull him back, make sure he’s getting enough rest, enough water, the right kind of nutrients. 

Kono bears witness to the discussion Danny has with the guy about stairs. “I think he’s ready,” Mike the PT says. “Besides, they won’t let you go home unless you clear stairs.” 

Danny’s very aware of that, thank him so very much. “I understand that. I just want to make sure you understand that him tumbling down said stairs head-first is definitely going to push back discharge, so I really think you should work on level ground one more time—” 

Mike, that little shit, dares to turn his back on Danny and squarely ask Steve, “Do you feel ready?” 

And Steve, lounging in bed with his arms crossed behind his head like an underwear model advertising hospital gowns—successfully, Danny would buy one—answers, with no trace of irony at all, “Hey, man, look, I was really out of it when they brought me in. So Danny, my partner, he has a much better idea than I do on what I’m ready for, all right? We’re gonna do what he says.” 

That sweet twisty thing glows so bright in the Steve Space, it steals Danny’s air for a second. Before he can respond, however, Kono groans, “Oh my god. No. Enough. You—” pointing at Steve, “go work on the damn stairs. You—” at Danny, “it’s been two weeks. He’s fine. Cut the cord, brah.”

Using Danny’s indignant pause to his advantage, Mike thrusts the crutch at Steve and ushers him out of bed. Still Steve stops at the door, still he looks back, and won’t go until Danny, under duress by Kono towering over him too close, finally gives him an eye roll-nod combo. 

When Danny tries to follow them out, Kono blocks him. “Seriously. Sit down. Your co-dependence has gotten out of hand.”

Danny sinks into the ass-impression chair, suddenly exhausted. He wants to sleep for a month, but with Steve. Always with Steve. Kono thrusts a bottle of water at him, and out of fear she’ll waterboard him with it if he doesn’t drink voluntarily, he takes it. 

Co-dependence, she says. He almost died; of course Danny’s going to keep him in his sights, every second of every day. That’s not co-dependent, that’s just relieved. Grateful. 

“Are you okay?” Kono asks, plunking down on the foot end of Steve’s bed. 

Danny opens the bottle and takes a few sips out of it, pleasantly cool. He places it on Steve’s nightstand. “I’m fine. Totally fine.” 

“Yeah? Because it sounded like you’d figured it out, at last.” When Danny looks at her questioningly, she adds, “I mean what you said in the car.” She narrows her eyes. “You meant it, right? It wasn’t just because you thought he was dying?” 

“God, Kono, no, of course not. I meant every word.” 

“Good. Because it was nice. You did good.” 

Danny snorts. “Yeah, he doesn’t remember it.” 

Kono’s eyebrows rise. “He doesn’t?” 

Danny shakes his head miserably. Before he can say more, the medicine resident and physician assistant poke their heads in, both strikingly beautiful women in their late twenties who have been doting on him and Steve. 

“Hey, Danny, we’re running down to the coffee cart. Can we grab you your latte?” the resident asks.

Ignoring Kono’s near-sputtering face, he smiles at them. “Don’t go to any trouble, ladies.” 

“Oh, it’s no trouble,” the PA says. “The usual for your husband too?” 

“Decaf,” Danny says. He gave up correcting people the day Steve woke up. “He can have decaf. Just make sure they don’t write it on the cup, though.” 

They confirm and leave, aww-ing and giggling, and Kono almost falls over in her mirth. “Yeah, okay, sure, laugh it up,” Danny says, waving his hand at her. It took him shamefully long to realize the female staff’s affection is solely based on how cute they find him and Steve as a couple. The irony, that he’s received the greatest amount of feminine attention he ever had after he stopped pretending to even himself he’s interested. 

And Steve may not even know that. He hasn’t brought up anything about their relationship either. Though Danny gets it; almost dying is hard fucking work. 

Kono must read it off his face. She gently knocks his knee with her ankle. “Hey. It’ll be okay. Just tell him again.” 

“I’m going to. It’s just—hard.” He waves his hand around. “People—always people, in here.” 

“You know what would help?” 

He looks up and makes an inquisitive sound. 

“Him clearing PT so you can take him home.” 

Danny rolls his eyes. 

“And stop overthinking it, Danny.” She taps his knee again. “Steve’s been gone for you for years. You can’t mess it up. I promise.” 

You can’t mess it up, she says, and okay, fine, in hindsight, maybe it was inevitable they’d end up here, his year-long kicking and screaming notwithstanding, but that doesn’t make it easier. Forget the guy thing, Danny’s never felt like this before, his heart clenching at the mere thought of Steve, heat lurching low in his stomach, so infatuated it makes his hands shake. It’s like some secret floodgate’s opened and all the attraction he ever felt for Steve came roaring out, taking him under in a cloud of lust and affection stronger than anything he ever thought existed in real life, just like Catherine said. She and Cole left about a week ago for Afghanistan together, on to their new adventure.

Steve, overachiever that he is, of course clears the stairs and gets slotted to be discharged the next day. That last evening, just half an hour before visiting hours end, Eric shows up, and then he and Danny walk out together. 

In the parking lot, Eric turns like he just remembered something, patting Danny’s chest rapidly with the back of his hand. “Oh, Uncle D, I forgot to say, by the way, congratulations?” 

It only goes to show just how out of it Danny is that he doesn’t get it. He's been not-sleeping on the couch, the bed still too empty without Steve. “What the hell for?” 

“You and my man McG, a thing now? My ma told me, which, you know, is kinda weak, Uncle D. I thought we had a thing going, you know, you and me—” This, zipping his index finger between them, “like, the island brotherhood or whatever, but no, I had to hear it from her, I guess.” 

Danny pinches the bridge of his nose. “Yeah. Sorry. Thank you.” 

“She said you’re keeping it PG-13?” He shrugs his eyebrows. “Well, she said she’ll pay me a hundred bucks if I can get photographic evidence to the contrary, but that felt sus. I’m not doing that, see above, island brotherhood. Me and my Uncle D, we tight.” 

Fucking Stella. Danny rolls his eyes. “Why, thanks, nephew.” 

Eric grins back in a manner very reminiscent of Eddie. “But she right? Why you do that? You ace?” 

Danny blanks on the word for one second, before it comes to him, like distantly remembered from a previous life. “I’m not, Eric, it’s complicated.”

“Why?” Eric asks. “You like him you like him, you want to jump his bones you do. You don’t, you don’t. No shade here, Uncle D. The heart wants what it wants. And if you ever need advice about guy stuff, just let me know.” He grins. “I’ve been around, you feel me?” 

For a second, Danny almost lets it go, too used to dismissing Eric. “Are you saying you—” he says instead with a lewd-adjacent shrug of his eyebrows. 

Eric’s grin acquires an enigmatic tilt. He produces his phone, scrolls a little, and finds a picture—of himself, in front of what looks like the beach at the Pipeline, shirtless and arm in arm with a strikingly handsome Asian man. “Marcus. Mad smart, total snack. Met him during that undercover op I helped you with, remember? At OSU? He was the TA in my fake biology class. Straight fire, Uncle D, almost caught feelings. But then he got this fellowship at Stanford and we had to ghost. I woulda introduced him to you otherwise. I mean, don’t get me wrong, girls are lit, no cap, but there’s something to be said about getting off with your bro, too.” He disappears the phone, still grinning.

Danny’s flabbergasted, yes, but in a good way, he’s proud to say, a really good way. “So your ma knows?” he asks, genuinely interested.

Eric nods, dismissive. “Yeah, of course. She doesn’t give a shit, just wants me to be happy. Woulda loved it if Marcus had stuck around.” He pats Danny’s chest again. “So, Uncle D, I’m saying, if you’ve caught feelings for my main man McG, that’s valid AF. No need to friend-zone yourself. We’re all on board.” 

Danny’s so surprisingly charmed, he doesn’t even think to remark that that was his main concern, his idiot nephew approving of his love life. “So what are you, then? Pansexual?”

“Huh. Dunno, never thought about it. I like to do, not think, Uncle D. Besides, labels are for soup cans, we're a little too complex to be restricted by them, you feel me?”

With that, he sweeps Danny into an entirely unsolicited hug, one he drags out for a few extra seconds, and most definitely does not make Danny’s eyes prickle with it, before slouching off. 

—

Steve’s hospital discharge generates twice the amount of paperwork at half the speed of booking a perp, but about the same amount of frustration. It’s past four they make it home, and there is dinner on the table. 

It’s nice to see Steve eat a whole meal for the first time in days—Danny’s frozen lasagna reheated lovingly by Grace and Mary. But he fades fast after, his blinks growing sluggish. 

“Let’s get you to bed,” Danny says, the crutch Steve’s supposed to use in his hand. 

Steve looks like he’s going to wave it off, but then glances at Danny’s face and meekly accepts it. With its help, he hobbles across the living room, up the stairs, into the bathroom while Danny tries not to hover and miserably fails.

Steve limps out of the bathroom, still in shorts and t-shirt, and crawls under the covers that Danny pulled back for him. Red to the tips of his ears, he asks, “Are you—” 

“Yeah.” Danny sours his face. It’s not just Steve he’s failed to talk to. “I need to check in with Grace. I haven’t had a chance to talk to her, with you in the hospital.” 

Steve looks up, instantly concerned. “She’s okay though, right?” 

“Yeah, she is. I promise, I’ll make sure. Okay?” He smooths the covers around Steve’s shoulder, lets his palm linger on its curve. “And—and I need to talk to you too.” 

Dread takes over Steve’s face, instantly. 

Danny almost laughs. “It’s nothing bad, Jesus. Don’t look like I just summoned you to a court-martial.” 

Steve relaxes a little, but not completely. “Okay. Yeah, okay.” 

He still looks ready to pass out. Danny runs his hand down his shoulder again, unable to stop touching him. “Or, or just sleep. We’ll talk in the morning, huh?” 

“No, no,” Steve says, vehement. He lifts up on his elbow, twists around to rifle through his nightstand. He scoops up the Tom Clancy paperback that’s lived there for as long as Danny’s known him, and brandishes it, triumphant. “I’ve been meaning to finish my book. I’ll just—I’ll wait. All right?” 

God, has he always been this—this adorable, or is this new? Too fearful he won’t be able to stop if he goes anywhere near Steve’s mouth, Danny kisses Steve’s hand. His wrist is still yellow and green, the fading bruise from the restraints. Steve’s mouth parts, his breath held. Danny does it twice more. “Okay, have at it. But it’s okay if you fall asleep. Okay?” 

Steve nods. He curls toward his night light, punches up his pillow, and starts to read. Still smiling to himself, Danny kills the overhead lamp, and closes the door after himself. 

Mary and Joanie’s flight isn’t for another week. School, they said, is out in another week, and nowadays kids can attend over the internet. Mary’s job, the swanky bakery she co-owns with a friend she met at rehab, apparently doesn’t need her back in person as much as it needs her to do publicity work on social media, so they've been able to stay. 

They’re in the living room when Danny comes down the stairs, Joanie reading a book on the coffee table and Mary scrolling on her phone, the TV on in the background on some version of Real Housewives. 

“Is he down?” she asks, as though Steve were an unruly baby. Danny grins. 

“Yeah.” Mostly. “Did you see Grace?”

Mary gestures with her beer. “Yeah, she went outside.” 

Grace is down by the water, gazing out over the ocean from Steve’s chair, her phone nowhere to be seen. Concern flares in Danny’s chest. With the one beer he’s allowing himself in his hand, he shuffles through the cold sand to her. 

“You okay, Monkey?”

“Yeah,” she says, and lets him kiss her head. “Are you? Is Uncle Steve?”

“Yeah, babe, we’re fine.” He sinks into his chair. The beer is cool and hoppy-fresh on his tongue, the breeze from the ocean perfect. He sends a little, wordless prayer of gratitude, to whomever wants to claim credit. 

“Are you sure you’re okay?” he asks. 

“Yeah, I promise,” Grace says, flashing him a smile. 

“Because that was a lot, back there. It’d be very, very understandable if you, you know, had thoughts or questions or similar, you know?” 

She worries the inside of her lip. It hits him in the gut—just like Steve does. “You do stuff like that all the time, huh?” 

“Not quite like that,” Danny says. “The stakes aren’t usually that high and Kono hasn’t been around for a while.” 

“Yeah, it was so nice of her to come.” She falls silent, gaze swinging out over the ocean again. It's quiet today, the waves tiny. 

Everything inside him wants to press her, but in this, she’s like him—she has to come out with it in her own time. 

“I guess there’s one thing, like, I’ve been thinking about,” she says. 

Danny shifts toward her. “Yeah? What’s that?” 

She sucks in a deep breath. “I’m still low-key terrified of what would’ve happened if you’d dug in and said no. Because I would’ve done it, texted them. I wasn’t bluffing.” 

The mere thought spikes his blood pressure. “I know you weren’t bluffing. That’s why I let you talk me into it.” 

“I don’t know what I was thinking.” She sighs. “It’s almost like—I think I felt like I could do what you and Uncle Steve do. You know what I mean? Like, the thing with that Rick guy and the winter formal and the accident, I somehow started thinking I’m good at it too? Like you?” She sighs again, impatient. “It sounds stupid when I say it out loud.” 

“It’s not stupid, babe.” 

“And then all that happened and—did I—do you know if I actually killed any of those guys?” 

The scene was chaos. “Maybe one.” 

She nods. “Who was he? Do you know?” 

Danny does. In fact, he makes it a priority to always know whom they’ve hurt. “A guy from Japan. He was a small-time career criminal, the kind that starts young and doesn’t try to be better. He had a long rap sheet, a bunch of assaults, a murder. Rape.” 

“That’s gross,” she says. “But—did he, like, have any family?” 

“Not that we could find. But criminal organizations like those tend to go for kids who don’t have families, you know, kids in the system who’re just looking to belong somewhere?” 

Her expression turns down. “So he was just an orphan who wanted to belong?”

“There are other ways to do that, babe. You have a big, huge, beautiful heart, but don’t make him into someone he’s not. He was a dirtbag and he hurt people for a living. Given the slightest chance, he would’ve hurt us too.” 

“I know, I know. I just—”

She doesn’t go on. Danny prompts, “What?” 

“I just—I thought I’d feel worse, you know? About hurting someone. I’m trying to—feel worse. But I would’ve done anything to save Uncle Steve. If it happened the exact same way again, I would do the exact same thing, every time.” She pauses. “Do you think that makes me—selfish? A bad person?” 

“No,” Danny says. “Of course not. Wanting to protect the people you love doesn’t make you a bad person, babe. It makes you—” It doesn’t truly make one a good person either. He should know. “Human.” 

She nods, breaking into a smile. “You know he gave me a hug and said thank you for saving me?” 

Danny smiles back. “Steve did?” 

She nods. “He got all red and everything. It was so cute.” 

Danny laughs. “Well, good. The least he could do.” He reaches over and takes her hand, waits for her to look at him. “Thank you for saving him, babe.” 

She beams and squeezes his hand back. “Anytime, Danno.” 

“I’m insanely proud of you,” Danny says, tugging at her hand. “You’re right, you can do this. If you put your mind to it, you’d be better at it than me and Steve, than all of us combined. That’s not why I didn’t want you to have any part in it, okay?”

She smiles, her eyes soft. “I know, Daddy.” Her expression grows a little playful. “I’m really proud of you too.”   

Heat creeps up his neck. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. What you said in the car was really nice.” 

Too bad Steve doesn’t remember. Danny will tell him again, he will. In just a minute. “I’m sorry I let you be involved, babe.” 

“I didn’t really give you a choice.” 

Danny tilts his head. “There’s always a choice. Never let yourself off the hook saying you had no choice.” 

“Deep, Danno,” she says, laughing. She gets to her feet and leans down to kiss his head. “I’m glad you did, though. I’m glad I got to help and I’m glad he’s okay.” She snorts a laugh. “But come on—how good were my driving skills? Honestly, now?” 

Danny chuckles. “Top-notch, babe. Excellent.”

“That’s right.” She strikes a pose and leans the back of her hand against her chin. “Call me instead of Ansel, next time you need a getaway driver.” 

What? His cluelessness must show, because she cackles. “You’re adorbs,” she declares, and sets off for the house.

Chapter Text

Danny pauses outside the bedroom, his hand on the door handle. Even though he didn’t linger much outside after Grace, it’s still been a good twenty minutes; no way Steve’s still awake. But that little fire of anticipation in the Steve Space, delightful and impatient; Danny can’t wait to talk to him, see what will happen when he does, if Steve will—

What, exactly, is going to happen? He’s never done this before, with a guy, a guy with guy parts; has he ever even watched gay porn? That would’ve been helpful. Why didn’t he do that? He has no idea what he’s doing, he has no clue. 

Steve does, though. Steve knows. Just like anything else they’ve done that Danny’s trusted him to see them through—yelling and screaming, yes, but ultimately, trusting him like he’s trusted no one else in his life, on this world. Steve always, always has his back, he always comes through; Steve would never let him fall. 

It would be so selfish to wake him up, though, after everything he’s been through. Danny can’t do it. He leaves the door alone and trudges on, to take care of business in the guest bathroom. 

He was right. When he creeps in, ready for sleep, he finds the bedside lamp still on, the book on the floor. Steve is sprawled on his belly, out cold. As quietly as he can, Danny picks up the book, places it on the nightstand, and turns off the light. He pads around the bed to his side and eases himself under the covers, carefully pulls them up around Steve’s shoulders. Steve doesn’t stir, snoring away softly.

His back is a wide expanse of muscle in the dark, rising and falling gently with his breaths. Up for a few moments, then down, a pause, up again, then down. Every time he pauses, Danny holds his breath with him. Every inhale and every exhale, he has the overwhelming need to match. 

He can’t stop. He’s so tired his eyes burn, his body feels like he’s bruised head to toe, but he can’t stop. Touching is okay. He pawed Steve all day every day in the hospital—here too, just now—every time he could remotely get away with it, and Steve didn’t bat an eyelash. Touching is still okay. 

He shifts closer, and, as carefully as possible, places his palm between Steve’s shoulder blades, where it’s warm and his t-shirt soft, where Steve’s heartbeat is, strong and regular again. His eyes prickle. He inches forward a little more, until he can rest his head on Steve’s shoulder. 

Like that, he doesn’t even have to try. Sleep takes him within seconds.

—

The cancer dream. But it’s the ICU, the same one, and Meleana tells him it’s his fault for leaving. It’s the same room, but the door is gone, and it is now a cage of glass he can see through but has no hope of entering. On the monitors Steve’s blood pressure slowly wanes. Danny pounds the glass with both fists, but it doesn’t break. He whirls around, frantically looking for a tool, a chair, anything, but there is nothing. 

A hand on his neck, a thumb swiping across the angle of his jaw—he flings his eyes open. It’s still dark, but that scent, he’d know it anywhere. He’s home, safe. 

Steve whispers, “Hey. Danny? You okay?” 

Loss burns in Danny’s chest, all the grief and helplessness he wadded up and stuffed away somewhere, ripping free of their confines, revealing the cracks inside him he’s feared his soul would seep into, the fault line fear left behind, the missing pieces years of loneliness and anxiety chipped away from him. His breath catches on their ragged edges, hitches in his throat. It’s stupid—it was just a dream. Steve’s fine. He’s right here. 

He’s right here. 

He grips Steve’s t-shirt and tugs, sliding forward at the same time. Steve comes easily, like he’d been waiting for just this, like for years he’d been coiled for this exact moment, and pulls Danny in, into his chest, their legs tangling together. Pressing his face into the crook of Steve’s neck, Danny inhales hungrily—Steve, his musk, sunshine and the ocean and that little twist of sandalwood, warm, alive—his breath contorts into a sob. Steve tightens his arms around him, lifts up to press his lips to Danny’s temple, his hair. His heart thrums under Danny’s ear, strong and steady. Danny loves him, he loves him so much, he wants to pull Steve into himself, cover him completely, keep him safe. 

He’ll tell Steve what’s going on, in just a second. He will. In just a second, after just another lungful of sunshine and sandalwood and home. 

— 

The alarm goes off. It’s still dark, and—and Steve’s still wrapped around him, warm and gorgeous. Danny can’t lift his eyelids.

Steve’s face next to his, inhaling deeply, a kiss to his temple—and then Steve moves, disappears. The alarm shuts off. Danny can’t make words, he’s so fucking tired; all he can do is curl into the warmth Steve’s body left, where it smells more like him. 

The water runs in the guest bathroom, a glass filled up. Pill bottles, opened, rattled, closed. 

He wakes to the flush. Then the door opens again, and Steve’s soft, uneven footsteps, around the bed, by the closet—

“No,” Danny finally manages, growls it into the pillow. “Leg.” 

Steve’s breath, a soft chuckle. He pads back, lies down, the bed dipping with his weight. Something sweet coils in Danny’s stomach—any second, now, he’ll shift closer, take Danny in his arms again—the room is cold, the chill just before dawn, as cold as it ever gets in Honolulu, Steve will feel so good—

He settles in what feels like miles behind Danny. Instead of Steve’s warm body, all Danny gets is a shy hand on his shoulder, still careful, still hesitant. 

Because he doesn’t remember the car. Or maybe he thinks Danny just told him what he wanted to hear in kindness, because he was on death’s doorstep. Danny has to tell him again. Right now, he’ll tell him right now. 

“I love you,” he’ll say. “I’m in love with you. Come here. Hold me.” He’ll have to pause, look into Steve’s eyes. Then he’ll add, “Make love to me.”

Steve will smile, that special one of his that lights up his whole face. Maybe Danny will kiss him, maybe he’ll kiss Danny—that stubble of his, Danny remembers, even in what was one of the worst moments of his life, he still felt that thrill, that tingle up and down his spine. He wants to feel it again, that soft rasp against his, it’ll feel so good. 

So good. 

—

It’s light outside. He’s warm. Something heavy, firm—draped across his back, an arm around his chest. 

Danny did that, pulled Steve over himself like a blanket, he remembers that. Did he say what he meant to say too? Steve feels nice behind him, big, strong. Firm. 

Consciousness hits with a pang of arousal, or maybe the arousal is what jolts him awake. Before he finishes breathing out, he’s so hard it aches. 

Steve, his broad chest pressed up against Danny’s back, his arm across Danny’s middle. Still breathing deeply, evenly—still asleep. 

Danny should let him sleep. Just stay still, enjoy this new feeling, that primal thrill in the base of his spine, that sweet coiling in his gut. Let Steve wake on his own. 

He can’t help it. It’s like his body craves more contact, inching back almost on its own, pressing against Steve’s chest. More heat zings through him, makes his cock jump. Fuck, he’s never been this hard, not in his life. 

Steve catches his breath. 

Is he awake? Danny does it again, presses back, the shock of pleasure that follows no less potent for being expected. He almost moans, manages to turn it into an exhalation, still loud in the silence. He shifts back more, wants to leave no space between them, slot their hips—but nothing. 

Steve must be holding himself at an angle, worried Danny will freak out if he feels—fuck, he must be hard too. Danny almost shivers. But Steve won’t make the first move, not if the way he ran off last time is any indication; he’ll bolt, any second now, unless Danny does something—

He curls his fingers around Steve’s wrist, gently, above the bruise. With his thumb, he caresses the tender skin on the inside.  

Steve’s breath comes out in a rush, right next to his ear. Danny’s cock jumps—he’s leaking, he’s going to come, with the barest touch. When has that ever happened? 

“Danny,” Steve whispers. “Are you awake?” 

“Yes,” Danny says. He should twist back, look at Steve, kiss him—

Steve tightens his hold around him, crushing him snug against his chest. This time, Danny moans, couldn’t help it if his life was at stake, leave alone other people in the house. 

Steve noses at his ear, the hair behind it. “Is this okay?” he whispers. 

“Yes,” Danny rushes to say. Steve chuckles, the vibrations thrilling through his ribcage into Danny’s body, breaking sweet, hot warmth low in his gut. He traces the inside of Steve’s wrist again, the strong cords of tendons there, slips his thumb into his palm. “Please.” 

Soft, closed-mouthed kisses, Steve’s lips velvet, his stubble prickling contrast against the back of his neck, down to the collar of his t-shirt—wasn’t that stupid, sleeping in clothes, he’ll never forgive himself for it—god, Steve’s so big, so strong, but his touch is so delicate, so careful—pleasure comes in waves, threatens to take him apart too soon, so bright it makes him screw his eyes shut. 

“Steve, please,” he whispers again.

“Danny,” Steve says, sounding just as helpless. “Danny, can I touch you?” 

“Yes,” Danny says. That’s the word he was looking for, the plea he couldn’t form. “Please, please touch me. Please.” 

It hits him with a second’s delay that he’s literally admitted he was wrong, begged for something he swore he wouldn’t—he’s never cared about anything less, even when Steve rubs it in, makes fun of him, he’s deserved it, he’ll take it— 

Steve won’t. He doesn’t. He shifts, gently, slipping his other arm under Danny’s neck, along the shoulder he’s lying on, to find his hand and tangle their fingers together. Steve’s long, beautiful fingers—the hurt one, this is the hurt one. Careful with this one. 

Danny leans forward a little, accepting the loss of contact, just so he can kiss those fingers, the ones with the missing nails—it doesn’t hurt, Steve said, days ago, but it hurts Danny to see it, remember it—

Steve follows him, his free hand swiping over Danny’s hair, trailing over his jaw, turning him gently. With his fingertips, then the back of his knuckles, he traces the bones of Danny’s face one by one, his eyebrows, the line of his jaw, his chin. Danny’s lips, with the pad of his thumb, pressing gently into the swell of the bottom one, methodically, leaving no point untouched, what little of Steve’s face Danny can see while he does set in absolute reverence.

“Steve,” he pleads. His entire body is a live wire of need and if he could fit himself into Steve in his entirety, it still wouldn’t be enough. It would be a start, but not nearly enough. 

Steve pushes the covers down, down to their thighs, and Danny kicks them lower. Steve’s shaking—how does he look like that and be this adorable? He strokes down Danny’s shoulder all the way down to his wrist, bringing up Danny’s hand to kiss and nuzzle. It makes Danny’s t-shirt ride up; next, Steve fits the hollow between his thumb and index finger into the sliver of skin so revealed, chasing goosebumps all over Danny’s body, burrows under the fabric to flatten his palm on Danny’s stomach. 

It’s close but so tantalizingly out of reach; Danny still thrusts into air, helpless. Steve only teases under his waistband with the tips of his fingers, then reverses direction, gently scratching up through the hair to Danny’s chest, groping his pecs. He swipes a nipple with the edge of his thumb, and Danny arches, a bow of pleasure. 

“Oh, fuck,” he whispers, while Steve, with even more interest, starts playing with the tight nub. More kisses along the neck Danny’s bared, the pleasure-pain from his chest—Danny’s never ridden the edge this close, this long. Is Steve feeling this too, are they together in this? Danny needs to know, he needs to know like he needs the air in his lungs. 

He reaches blindly, finds Steve’s hip and holds him still, shoves himself back to bring their bodies into firm contact, top to bottom. Fuck, yes, Steve’s hard, a thick, hot line—Danny may never have done this before, but he has guy parts, and he knows what feels good, oh, does he ever. 

But when he tries to slip his hand lower, Steve catches his wrist and guides it back to his hip. Words still scattered, Danny whines; taking leverage from the bed, he shifts back even further, leaving no space between them at all, fitting Steve’s cock firmly between his ass cheeks. 

Steve hisses, twitches, an abandoned thrust of his hips toward Danny—the sparks of pleasure go wild, chasing up and down his spine, pooling heat, the orgasm curving inside of him like the ocean. With his free hand, Steve tugs on Danny’s shorts, one side at a time, trying to pull them down. 

It would go much faster if Danny helped him, but he can’t decide which contact he can stand to give up—the death grip they have on each other’s fingers, or the warm, firm swell of Steve’s hip. When Steve gets the garment to the top of his thighs, Danny gives up and goes still, lets him do it, picking up as soon as he can kick it off. 

Steve strokes up his thigh, makes him lift it, follows the valley on the inside, to his cock. When his fingers close around Danny for the first time, Danny writhes against him; with the second stroke his world narrows to Steve’s touch, and with the third, he’s gone. Head pressed back into Steve’s shoulder, he comes, riding the wave, almost aching at its intensity. 

Steve eases him through it with soft strokes, cups his balls like he needs to know how they feel, like it’s unacceptable that he doesn’t know every bit of Danny’s body in detail. He spreads his hand over Danny’s lower abdomen, holding him close, his rock-hard cock still searing-hot against Danny’s ass. 

In a second, just a second, Danny will take care of him—as soon as he stops panting like he just ran a mile at full tilt. His muscles are little mounds of goo, defying every motion except sucking in big lungfuls of air, trying to get his brain to rev up. 

Steve exhales behind him, wriggling back minutely, his hand leaving Danny’s stomach to slip between them—Danny lunges back and catches his wrist. 

“A second,” he mumbles. “Just—a second. Don’t you dare.” 

Steve rumbles a strained chuckle and sends yet another zing of pleasure through him. Danny just came but he still needs, he needs so much his skin is lighting up again, his balls feel full like just they didn’t just shoot what felt like their largest load to date. He edges away a little, twists around, just in time to watch Steve’s face shift into wonder, and getting his hand around the back of Steve’s neck, yanks him down, at last, into a crushing kiss. 

Steve gasps. Danny matches the shape of his mouth, licks into it—sweet, he tastes sweet, first thing in the morning without even brushing his teeth. Danny crowds him back, sinks a hand into his hair, holding him still while he drinks it out of his mouth, teases it from his tongue. Stubble, scraping across Danny’s scruff, slick heat inside Steve’s mouth—fuck, that’s hot. Danny had no idea how hot that would be, none at all. 

Steve breaks it off, eyebrows pulled up, looking punch-drunk and shattered. Danny kisses him again, big, deep sweeps with his tongue, little nips to Steve’s now-healed, silky lips—why has he deprived himself of this for so long? Has he ever kissed anyone more intoxicating? 

He pushes Steve’s t-shirt up, baring his chest—the big yellow-green bruise the CPR left, right in the center, his stomach lurches to see it. Another minor miracle: no broken ribs, despite the multiple rounds of compressions. 

“It’s okay, it doesn’t hurt,” Steve whispers, and Danny leans forward, presses his lips to Steve’s sternum, making him shiver. Steve’s skin is warm, his chest hair soft—Danny kisses his pecs, his nipples, every bruise or wound in the process of healing, the line down toward his flat stomach, finally, finally gets to caress the abs he’s secretly ogled, the cuts of Steve’s hips. Warmth rolls over him with each touch of his lips to Steve’s body; the cracks inside of him start mending, the pieces he thought were missing turn up and, one by one, slip into their places. 

Steve’s shorts are in the way, and he’s still lying at an angle, away from Danny. He hooks his forearm under Steve’s knee—the good one, this is the good one, it won’t hurt—and hauls him closer. Steve’s big, but not so big that Danny can’t handle him—Steve shivers again, pupils blown with lust. So he liked that, he likes being manhandled? Danny can do that, he’s here for it—fuck, if he’s not getting hard again, defying the rules of biology. 

He cups Steve over his shorts—he arches into Danny’s touch, eyes closing, mouth slack. Danny kisses him again, tugging and shoving at his shorts, and Steve gets the message and helps kick them off. 

Steve’s worried—the furrow is there, Danny saw it, but he can’t look away from the rest of him to reassure; he’s so gorgeous, Danny’s completely enthralled. Steve’s pubic hair is short, groomed recently—did he do that for Danny, when they started sleeping in the same bed? Danny will get back to that later, not now, not while Steve’s cock is full and red, leaking furiously, a bead of pearly fluid forming while Danny watches. He has the sudden, overwhelming need, something so visceral that it’s almost instinct, to experience it with his mouth, taste Steve, fit his cock between his lips and swipe his tongue—

Steve catches him, panicked. “No,” he gasps. “Don’t—”

Danny cuts a look up at him, alarmed. He freezes in place. 

Steve looks wrecked, like he’s in pain. “Hair trigger,” he grinds out. “I can’t—”

Fondness breaks warm in Danny’s chest—he wants to taste Steve, he wouldn’t care, but this isn’t about him. He gathers Steve up, guides his face into the crook of his neck, dropping kisses wherever he can reach. “Hand okay? What’ll make you feel good, babe?”

“Yes,” Steve says immediately, almost a sob. “Your hand. Please.”

Danny kisses the bridge of Steve’s nose, his lips, and, with his hand, traces the line of muscle down the inside of Steve’s thigh, to cup his balls, lift the delicate skin of his sac. Even tightened with his erection, Steve’s scrotum is softer than his own, almost silky—Steve inhales again, curling his fingers around Danny’s wrist like he’s falling, like he needs to hold on or he’ll fall. 

Danny traces the big vein on the underside of Steve’s cock—a nice size, a bit thinner than Danny’s, a little longer, Danny likes it—rubs the underside of the head with the pad of his thumb—Steve keens, shuddering—and Danny stops teasing, takes him in his hand. Steve wasn’t kidding—with a single stroke he falls apart, a tiny shout spilling from him, a quiet “Aah,” like it hurts, his grip around Danny’s wrist spasming, his body curling in toward Danny’s chest like he’s falling, like the ground gave out and he’s falling. 

That’s okay. Danny won’t let him fall either. 

He spills over Danny’s hand, stripes his forearm with the way they’re twisted into each other, making a mess on his own stomach. Danny watches, riveted—he’s never seen anything hotter, there couldn’t be anything hotter—still gently jacking him through his orgasm. 

They come to a rest tipped into each other, faces pressed in to breathe the same air. Steve twitches on the next stroke, so Danny lets go of him, cups his hip instead. 

The Steve Space throbs, with tenderness, with joy, flooded with the kind of completion he’s sought all his life, kind of sensed it was here, in Steve’s arms, just never knew how to reach it. His throat constricts. 

He has no idea what’s going to come out of his mouth, but he opens it anyway. “I love you,” he says. That last piece of him falls into its place and slots in perfectly, the last crack disappears. “It’s you. It’s always been you. I love you. I’ve loved you all this time and I had no idea. No idea.”

Steve turns into him, burrows into the crook of his neck, the mess between them intermingling. Steve inhales, the sob hitching through him. “Me too. I love you too, Danny. So much.” 

He’s out of breath, how often has Danny heard Steve out of breath—fuck, he got discharged from the hospital less than a day ago—his hand. Danny draws it up, inspecting the missing nails. “Are you okay? God, Steve, we shouldn’t have—”

“I’m fine,” Steve says, playfully irate. “I would’ve checked myself out three days ago if it wasn’t—”

He breaks off. “If it wasn’t what?” Danny prods.

“If I didn’t think you’d worry,” he says, mumbles it into Danny’s neck. 

Danny grins, wide and uncontrollable—his face hurts with it. “You stayed in the hospital for me? That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever done for me, Steven.”

Steve laughs quietly, tilting his head back to watch Danny kiss his poor fingers, one by one. “I thought this was nice.”

It’s astounding how giddy Danny feels. “It was nice. It was very nice.” 

Steve shifts closer, his breath damp where it whispers past Danny’s neck. “I might’ve—violated the terms of the arrangement.” 

What arrangement—oh, right. Danny tips his head side to side. “I don’t think that arrangement is serving us well. I think it needs to be revised.”

“Oh yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Like how?”

“Like obviously the no-sex clause needs to go.”

Steve snorts a laugh. “Yeah?”

His voice lilts on the word. That, and the other thing, the grooming— “Did you know?” 

Steve cocks his head back so he can see Danny out of one brightly aquamarine eye. “Know what?” 

“That I was—gone for you too? The ordinary way?” 

Steve scrunches up his face. “I wouldn’t say—I knew. I thought—maybe. When you offered to be my ‘monogamous friend’ so I’d stay, I thought maybe there was something there after all.” 

At a complete loss for how to express the layers of his indignation, Danny chooses to pinch him. Steve wriggles and grabs his wrist, grinning. “Did you threaten to leave so I would? Was it a bluff?” 

The amusement drains away from Steve’s face. “No, Danny. Of course not. I never lied to you. I was fine with our arrangement.” He sweeps his warm palm up Danny’s side, chases goosebumps over his skin. “Belonging to you was fine. That’s all I truly needed, like you said.”

Of course not. Steve doesn’t play games. He didn’t even try to seduce Danny, not once, the whole time they slept in the same bed. Danny strokes up Steve’s arm, over the tattoo to his shoulder, and pulls him into a kiss. Steve’s mouth—fuck, he tastes so good, so incredibly perfect— “I wish I’d done this a year ago. I wish I’d grabbed you and kissed you then. I’m so sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” Steve says. He grimaces. “You were right. That night? When you said I wanted you to find me, press me until I told you what was up? You were right. I did. I kept thinking if you knew, maybe—”

“Maybe something would happen?” 

Steve nods. “Then I thought maybe if you thought about it for a while, maybe you’d—” He exhales. “I waited for a year, and then Joe and my mom and—you know, and I just—couldn’t, anymore, Danny. I just couldn’t. I’m sorry.” 

“Hey, stop.” Danny cups his cheek, makes him look up. “Stop. Don’t you dare apologize. How did you do it for so damn long? Ten years. I can’t even imagine—” 

Steve just peers back at him. While Danny watches, his eyes fill, like they did that day in his house, when Danny yelled at him that nothing would ever happen. 

This time, he yanks Steve closer, gathers him up again, as tightly as he dares without hurting him. “Why didn’t you just tell me? Before? Why did you wait so long?” Because Danny checked, while he was reading up on pans and skillets. DADT got repealed in 2011, so that can’t have been all of it. 

Steve sighs, warm against Danny’s neck. “I was always—afraid you’d feel betrayed or something if you found out. I should’ve told you early on, and I didn’t, and DADT was only part of the reason. I was—” He exhales. Danny strokes his arm. “Back then I was constantly terrified you’d finally find a reason and leave, Danny.” 

To think that Steve existed with that uncertainty for years, when Danny couldn’t take it even for an hour. “Well, guess what, genius? I’m not going anywhere, and neither are you.” 

Steve tips his head back again. The smile has returned, nice and wide. “Good to know.” 

Danny smacks him on the hip. “The irony, also, if you had. Me, the only one left, with the rest of you gallivanting about the mainland—” 

“Well, Chin’s coming back, so you wouldn’t be alone—”

“I will smack you again—”

“And Kono said she might be too, since her mom’s going to need full-time care soon.” 

This is true; Kono’s said it to him as well. “I mean, if the whole gang is back, maybe we could—”

“Hang around for another year or two?” Steve asks, eyebrows high. “Part-time, though, right? After maybe—a month off?” 

“Six weeks, and then we go back just two days a week, and absolutely no more field duty.” 

“Agreed.” Steve nods once too, formally, like he’s giving report in his khakis and not wearing only a t-shirt rucked up to his armpits, stained with their combined spunk. He smells good too, debauched and sleep-warm. To think that Danny will get this for the rest of his life—  

He kisses Steve again, moving his hand to Steve’s jaw, pressing gently with his thumb to have him open his mouth. Steve obliges with that soft sound of yearning again, and yep, Danny’s hard again, just like that, in record time. 

“That’s not the only thing we need to change,” Danny says. 

“No?” 

“There’s another clause that needs to go.”

Steve glances up, through his unreasonably long lashes. He’s so hot, he should be illegal—Danny needs to get off again, hands were good, Steve’s hands again, and maybe once more, after that, and then maybe they could try, god help him, mouths— “Which one?” Steve asks. 

“The one about—about it being okay to have sex with other people. That one has to go.”

Steve pretends to think, that mannerless brute. Danny threatens to pinch him again, makes him burst into laughter. “Okay, yeah, I agree. It has to go. Unless—”

“Unless what?”

“Unless you, you know, wanted to—explore this side of you more.”

“You mean—with other guys?”

Steve shrugs. 

“I may not have been in full awareness of my—preferences previously, but I can tell you, with the kind of confidence built up over a whole decade, babe, that I have absolutely no interest in anyone else, male, female or other.”

“Copy that,” Steve says, sounding reasonably normal, but the way he grins, uncontrollable and wide, makes warmth burst in the Steve Space. And, now that he can freely, Danny leans down and presses a kiss on that grin. It tastes like sunshine and a hint of the ocean, and that sweet thing he’s rapidly learning to associate with Steve—

Pure, unmitigated happiness.

Chapter Text

So, it turns out, no, it doesn’t have to be Steve’s dick in Danny’s ass. But, like Danny once said, dicks are nice organs, friendly ones, and Steve’s is certainly the nicest Danny could imagine, so when it asks nicely, it turns out, Danny’s not opposed to the idea at all. 

It started with Steve’s tongue, obviously. One blow job a couple of weeks into their new-old-now-ordinary thing turned heated and Steve finally forgot to tiptoe around Danny’s perceived boundaries—it took a few more weeks for him to believe Danny he’d shed them as dead weight right around the time he had to take on the very real fear of losing Steve—straying behind Danny’s balls and sweeping it across his hole and nearly making him lose it. That tongue was the apparent gateway body part, because it then led to a couple of long, skilled fingers, a smallish, vibrating toy that Steve acted like he was on a stealth mission to acquire, and then, eventually, Steve’s nice, friendly dick. So yeah, they’ve had this conversation—they’ve had many conversations—and Danny’s aware that many men who enjoy sex with men don’t engage in much anal intercourse whether it’s pitching or catching, but he’s not one of them. And, by the way, he knows the technical terms, okay? He does. It’s just, from this enlightened corner he’s managed to drag himself into, he’s realized many of his experiences in the baseball locker room were indeed very, very homoerotic, and he likes this new corner of his, so he likes to refer back to it as much as he can. 

And yes, fine, all right? He’s man enough to eat his crow with his head held high. He particularly likes it on a bed of white rice with two fried eggs over easy and brown gravy on top, a side of mama’s mac salad to go along. He’d even have pineapple as dessert, after. It’s fine. It’s worth it. He can handle it. 

What he can’t handle, not with his heart nearly bursting every time it occurs to him, is how Steve didn’t, doesn’t, not once, shove it in his face. Not a single bitter word out of his mouth, the entire time. Eight months into this thing and there are still moments where an expression of pleased incredulity takes over Steve’s face and he’s left staring at Danny, apparently helpless, eyes soft and mouth parted. So when that happens, Danny takes him in his arms, like he did that first time in the kitchen, and kisses him, again and again, as deep and and as intense as he knows how, to see if he can make up for the years they missed. 

Steve’s very—generous with his tongue, talented too, and, by his own admission, thoroughly addicted to the sounds he extracts from Danny during these applications. Such as the low keening whine currently dragging out of him, barely muffled by the pillow he’s shoved his face into. 

“Steve—oh, god, you’re killing me, you’re—” And then, with his tongue shamelessly inside Danny’s body like that, the fiend has the audacity to cup his balls, tugging on them gently—Danny’s gonna come, that’s what’s gonna happen, and then the joke’s gonna be on him—

As if he sensed how close to the edge Danny is, Steve exchanges his tongue for his thumb, tracing the edges of Danny’s rapidly relaxing rim, dipping in gently with the pad. He plasters himself against Danny’s back, chin hooked over his shoulder, a kiss pressed to his ear. “Okay?” 

“Yes, it is, very okay, so okay, can you please, just please, find the kindness in you to just put it in, please—”

“Danny,” Steve growls quietly—god—and nips at his shoulder, smoothing the sting with his tongue. “Be patient. This is the best part.” 

This isn’t how their anal adventure started, obviously; selfless as Steve turned out to be in bed, of course he offered to catch first. Their first time was an unmitigated disaster, at least to begin with. Danny’s hands shook so much he spilled lube all over the sheets, he was convinced the prep Steve did on his own wasn’t nearly enough and he was hurting Steve when he slid in, so sure in his mind that he was doing it wrong that he ended up losing his erection. 

He was mute with mortification, face flaming, the flush down to his belly—until Steve, laid out next to him with his hands around Danny’s wrists, told him the story of how once, at the Naval Academy, Catherine invited him to an orgy and then promptly failed to show. 

“The hottest people I’d ever seen,” Steve said, eyebrows high. “Twelve of them, all mid-twenties, maybe early thirties, every single of them, gorgeous.” 

But despite that, and despite desperately wanting to participate, he just could not, for the life of him, get it up. 

“Nobody was using any protection,” he continued. “Nobody was talking about having been tested. I got it in my head I was gonna catch AIDS and I couldn’t do it. I was so fucking embarrassed. All these attractive people, down to fuck, and I’m there soft as a marshmallow.” He shook his head, grinning ruefully, and Danny fell in love with him again, plopped right in like a rock into still water. “It was sad, Danny. This one guy, he was the hottest guy there, he said he’d fuck me if I’d wanted, with a condom, and I was like, hey, better than nothing. First and only time I ever came soft. It was weird. Really weird.” He shrugged, then his grin grew delightfully filthy. “You want me to jerk you off instead?” 

God, yes, Danny did, always does; he loves it, lying back against Steve’s chest, the sloppy kisses they exchange. Steve’s hands on his body, Steve’s big thighs cradling his hips, his hard cock in Steve’s callused palm. He craves it. Self-care has its moments, of course it does, but Steve knows him as well as he knows himself by now, in some ways better, and this thing they’ve got going is better than anything Danny’s ever experienced, better than anything he could’ve imagined. 

“The best part, he says, the best part for—nngh—” Two fingers now, deeper, curled in—right on that hungry spot inside of him that he didn’t know existed—yes, entirely his fault, he admits it, can they please get on with it now—

“Can I ask you something?” Steve says, the blunt head of his cock finally nudging in. He always feels unimaginably huge in this moment, and it’s rapture to Danny to feel his own body open up for him, let him in. He lies slack in Steve’s arms, lets him rearrange his limbs where they need to go, ready to be taken care of. 

The first time Danny was catching didn’t go quite smoothly either. After what felt like hours licking and fingering him open, before he even had a chance to get used to the weird new sensation, as soon as Steve was sheathed in Danny’s body, he came, shuddering and groaning like a steam engine. It was his turn to be mortified, for the second it took Danny to burst out laughing, Steve’s turn to be reassured by a story Danny offered—and he had several to choose from; he wasn’t exactly known for his longevity in his youth—and then Danny’s turn to be sucked off with great enthusiasm—yes, Steve does like giving head, with a passion; could make a career out of it, indeed, not that Danny needs to go on a mass murder rampage, thank you very much—massaging Danny’s prostate expertly with two fingers like he put it there himself, making him come so hard and for so long it felt like he was turned inside out. 

Kind of like how he wants to come now. Discomfort, when Steve presses through his rim, just a flash of it; Danny exhales. “Mmm?” 

Steve bottoms out and they sigh together. He guides Danny’s cock down, stroking it and his balls against his other thigh. Fuck, that feels good too. “Remember when you were trying to talk me into the monogamous friendship?

There, the burn gone, just heat, fullness—Steve, everywhere, his cock splitting him open, his arms around him—that sweet thing, like Danny can taste it in the back of his throat. “Mmm.” 

“When you said people might get older, hurt, not be able to have sex over the course of a long-term relationship?” 

Sparks now, hot, shimmery sparks, up his spine, down his legs—how is Steve still capable of building complex sentences? If Danny wasn’t feeling so blissed out, he’d be offended. “Maybe?” 

“You said what if you’d lost your asshole.” He rolls his hips shallowly—more sparks, oh, fuck— “I just—how did you even come up with that? I can’t figure it out.” 

That’s the subject he wants to discuss, in this position? While mulishly holding still too, when Danny’s ready to be plowed— “Will you—seriously? This is what you want to talk about? Now?”

Finally, Steve thrusts in, still not forceful enough, but it’s something. Danny moans, just to encourage him, but Steve stills again. “Yeah, it’s been bothering me since then.” 

“I don’t—know—” Another thrust, and yes, just like that, just—fuck. “I was trying—to make a point. Can you move, please, you’re—unbelievable—” 

Steve leans his weight over him, a hand in the angle of his knee bending it higher, his other arm threaded around Danny’s chest, crushing him to his chest like he owns him—and fuck, that’s incredible too, he had no idea—and yeah, he can handle Steve, but boy, can Steve handle him—hips pumping, not fast enough, not deep enough, that fucking tease—his lips in the crook of Danny’s neck, his teeth on the tender flesh of his shoulder—Danny’s whole body quakes with pleasure. “And what point was that, Danny, a guy wonders, you know?” 

At least he has the decency to be out of breath, that animal. Danny has no words for him, just a warbling groan—he hasn’t come untouched during anal yet, but the way the pleasure is pooling in his belly, hot and thrilling and incandescent, this might be it— 

“Because—” Steve grunts. “I think—” Another grunt— “Maybe you weren’t making the point you thought you were,” and he accelerates, finally, mercifully, railing Danny into the mattress with the entire might of that gorgeous body—how did Danny not claim him for himself the moment he laid eyes on him, how did he let other people touch Steve, so hard to believe—

Steve takes him in his hand and he’s gone, soaring, splitting into his colors, iridescent and beautiful, into shapes breath-taking and abstract, pleasure rebuilding him into something more than his parts. His whole body convulses, as if it wants Steve to become one with him entirely—he can feel the spasms milking Steve’s cock, hear him gasp, feel him seize—Steve’s pleasure flooding into him, catapulting him higher—perfect. 

Just perfect. 

Steve’s on top of him, both of them breathing hard, Steve’s nose nestled right behind his ear—his muscles wet-noodled, all the tension gone—fuck, so good. Danny kind of knew, instinctually, even before all this, that Steve loves to cuddle. More than that, the man is a veritable octopus, taking great delight in wrapping all of his appendages around Danny, even making sure his cock is nestled between his ass cheeks, like the cro magnon Neanderthal he deep down is. Like he gets, every time he remembers no one else’s ever had Danny like this, and the answering thrill low in his stomach Danny’s only too familiar with. 

He’d felt it the strongest when the brute drove his truck into a house to save Danny’s life. He made Danny want to collapse in his arms and let himself be walked out, safe in Steve’s embrace—he did it, eventually, after the winter formal dance, with the kidnappers. Back then, he’d spent months wondering, on and off, what it was about the ape that turned everyone on notable occasions, even Jersey tough guys very secure in their masculinity, into swooning damsels of distress. 

And then on other nights, he’ll come snuggle in under Danny’s arm, his long, lanky body curved to fit perfectly there, kiss his neck soft and breathless and ask to be held. Whatever he wants—Danny will do it. He’ll never take him for granted, do his best to never hurt him again. Just like he promised. 

They float on the border of sleep like that, content and sated, until Danny’s phone goes off on his night stand. He grabs it without dislodging Steve, silencing the alarm— “It’s time to get up.” 

“Don’t wanna,” Steve whines. 

Danny elbows him gently. “People are gonna be arriving in less than five hours, Steven, and I still don’t know where all my stuff is—”

Steve groans. “In the box. It’s all in the box.” 

Which is the most helpful comment, really, since there still are dozens of boxes they need to open, having moved only a week ago. 

They found the contemporary island cottage after four months of open houses and showings, and used the time to do renovations on Steve’s parents’ place to nearly get ten percent more than Steve’s initial appraisal. Their new abode is the first house on the next beach over, slightly more spacious and newer by several decades, three bedrooms and two-and-a-half bathrooms and an additional covered upstairs lanai where Danny can sit and read without turning into a lobster while Steve swims. Their kitchen is a work of art, new stainless steel appliances and white quartz countertops, opening up into a spacious family room with high ceilings and humongous panoramic windows showcasing the spectacular view. Their new garage is detached also but almost twice the size of the old one; it came with a home gym and enough room to park both of their new cars. 

Oh, and, most importantly, a state-of-the-art water heater that works perfectly for even the obscenely long showers they take together. 

Car-shopping went exactly as Danny had hoped for, bickering over colors and trims, and they ended up with a navy Silverado and a red Camaro with a white racing stripe down its center because Steve’s a fiend and Danny would do anything to make him smile. Charlie likes it too, and with Stan back to develop land on the Big Island and his romance with Rachel rekindling, he’s been living with Steve and Danny nearly full-time, and Grace stops by almost every weekend too. 

The first time Steve overheard Grace call him her dad, he froze in the middle of the kitchen with the softest, most gut-punched expression that Danny had ever seen on his face. She does it routinely now, and Charlie, too. They’ve both taken to calling him exclusively Danno, and Steve Dad, and so many months into it, every time it happens, Danny can feel how Steve’s heart still trips sweetly to hear it. 

Eddie whines outside the closed door and Steve at last comes alive, swinging his long legs out of bed. “Eddie, down. Down, buddy. You’re gonna scratch up our nice new house.” 

Danny catches his hand before he can get up. “Well?” 

Steve breaks out into one of those beautiful grins of his, the ones that make Danny’s stomach swoop. These days, Danny makes sure he gets one of those at least once a day, at the very least. ”Yeah, this one was the best.” 

Danny beams back. “Yeah?” 

Steve crawls back to kiss him, slow and soft. “Every week is better than the last.” 

“Something we can agree on,” Danny says, and smacks his ass, groping it shamelessly. Steve rolls his eyes, chuckling, and kisses him again, then crawls out of bed. 

That, they realized when they talked, was the only thing Steve actually remembered from the car, Danny’s promise that they would have many, many more weeks together, and he’d get to pick his favorite. It was part of the odd dream state that he found himself in, Steve said, when he could finally bring himself to talk about the coma. 

“I was on our beach, behind the old house,” he said, not too long ago. “I was sitting in our chairs, but you were on the lanai. You were wearing your tie, like before, and you had your hands in your pockets and I knew you wanted me to come inside with you. You kept saying ‘Weeks, Steve’, and I knew what you meant.” 

Next to him, in the other chair, he said, was Wo Fat. 

Wo Fat kept him company, showed him memories of his parents that Steve had never heard before but rang close enough to the truth to make him uncomfortable, told him things he didn’t know that he later verified to be true. Like the fact that he was there, the day Steve’s dad was killed, that he’d been the one to order the hit because he’d finally pieced together who Doris was and what she’d done to his own family. 

That, with what the doctor said, gave Danny chills, even though Steve said it was probably Daiyu Mei, talking at him while he was captive and drugged, his brain using the coma state to work through the new information. He’s probably right, but it’s still eerie. 

With Chin running Five-0 better than ever—by Steve’s own admission, which Danny loudly agrees with given Chin’s deep grasp of procedure and lack of fascination with explosives—and Kono working four days a week, they’ve been able to do what they said: gone down to two days a week of work. Danny has, that is, Steve has elected to work one-and-a-half days, because he likes to go home early to wait for Danny on that one day, make him dinner. They’ve been talking about trying the restaurant again once they’re done with Five-0, but before they take on more stress, Danny intends to go on a nice, long vacation, maybe for a couple of years even. 

Before they start unpacking, Danny runs over the casserole he made for Aunty Lani, the old lady who broke her ankle and unwittingly saved him from being kidnapped that night—whether it was for the better is a matter of debate (Steve thinks so; Danny disagrees), but whatever it is, it’s certainly not the poor old lady’s fault. She lives alone because her only daughter works on the mainland, and with Doris’s money, which Junior and Quinn collected from the scene and returned to the DA’s office, which eventually made its way back to Steve, they had a chair lift installed in her house to help with her healing ankle. 

That was only the start of what Steve intended to do with that money; he set it up as an interest-less, unlimited-time revolving fund for members of Five-0 and their ohana to use. It came in handy for Chin’s moving expenses, for all the medical bills Kono had to pay for her mother, and, most recently, as a partial downpayment for the little house Quinn wants to buy. 

She invited Five-0 to see it before she made the offer, and there, in the cute little backyard with the setting sun lighting the tips of Steve’s lashes gold, Danny couldn’t resist and pushed him into a private corner to stick his tongue down his throat. 

Tani, of course, caught them, and with great glee, said: “Okay, you’ve failed to update us, I see, that now, you are indeed boning.” 

Danny matched her energy easily. “Yes. Three times a day, if I have my way, thank—” 

“Danny!” Steve exclaimed, scandalized. 

Danny just grinned and kissed his hand. 

The other thing Steve said he remembered from the car was being safe in Danny’s arms, content to fall asleep there, even if it really was for the last time. 

Danny gets that. He wants nothing else, for himself, when it’s time. Many, many, many years from now, when they’re small and old, with hundreds and thousands of sunsets below their belts, that’s how he wants to go, too. 

When Danny gets back, Steve’s already started, cutting the tape off one of the bigger boxes that belong to the kitchen. He’s dressed in the stained grey tank top whose arm holes hang down to his waist, through which Danny slips his hands to stroke his sides, kissing him hello. 

Once Danny has updated Steve on their erstwhile neighbor’s well-being, they work in silence together, something mellow playing from the speaker in the living room. Danny catches himself staring at Steve several times, smiling like a fool. 

“Hey,” Danny says. Steve looks up from the box he’s slouching over. Behind him, through the huge windows, Danny can see all the way down to the beach, to their chairs that stand together in front of the ocean, where they belong. “Do you remember how Rachel hit me with her car all those years ago because she had a thing for me?” 

Steve’s already narrowed his eyes at the mention of Rachel. They’re friendly now, but Danny gets it—he feels his hackles rise the same way anyone mentions Catherine. To think that they ever entertained the idea of an open relationship—that might’ve been the most misguided part of the whole affair. “Yeah?” 

He’s attempted to ask this question a few times before but always chickened out at the last second. Not today. “When you drafted me to your little task force, was that your way of hitting me with your car?” 

Steve’s eyebrows shoot up. He flushes, pink and gorgeous, up his neck, high over his cheekbones, to the tips of his ears. He looks away. “Maybe,” he mumbles, and dives into the box in front of him. 

Love bursts bright in the Steve Space. Danny bites his lip, grinning uncontrollably himself. 

“Here,” Steve says, and reappears. Danny looks up. Cheeks still rosy, he hands Danny the big, heavy-duty, lidded stainless steel frying pan Grace gave them as a moving-in present. She and Danny giggle over it every chance they get, to Steve’s dismay and curiosity—Danny will tell him, eventually, but so far it’s been just too entertaining to watch him be puzzled about what exactly it is that amuses them so much. “Isn’t this the one you were looking for?” 

Danny beams at him. “Yes, it is.” Sliding the pan on to the counter, he grabs Steve’s stupid tank and pulls him down for a kiss. 

Yes. This is the one he was looking for, no question.