AU: Trope Minefield

[haole_cop]

He's pretty sure this goes against his contract.

Actually, he's sure it goes against not only his contract, but also the various non-harrassment papers they all have to sign every time some aide in the Governor's office gets a little twitchy.

Like after Lori left. And after he and Gabby...

Well.

So maybe he hasn't made the best choices in the world, in the last few years. Maybe things have been a little extra rough, for him and Steve and the rest of the team, between Doris and Kono wandering around looking for Adam and --

(he doesn't think about Reyes, or about Matt, unless he has to, and he doesn't have to, tonight, so he just skips, like a record needle scratching)

-- well, that building. With the bomb. (And Amber, who -- speaking of bad ideas. Good kid. But a kid.)

Anyway you slice it, they deserve a win, Five-0. All of them do. It's been a hard few years, and they've all taken their lumps.

So when this got served up to them, it seemed too good to be true. Right? Straightforward. Sleek facade concealing sleazy underhanded deals, that first came across Duke's desk for possible fraud and tax evasion, now linked to not one, but two murders -- which means it's theirs, now.

Danny was even happy about it, until it turned out they'd be going in UC, until he's the one pulling open the door, stepping into a wash of air conditioning and dim lighting from Hawaii's sultry Saturday night, until this plan started looking less like recon and more like a heist.

At least this suit still fits.

Comments

[haole_cop]

He hates everything about tonight, but he especially hates the way that Steve stepping back feels like he's slit Danny's stomach and all his guts have come spilling out, sudden and irreplaceable. It leaves him off-balance, his hands left in the air, where they got pulled from Steve's hair and his waist. He's a stumbling idiot, and gravity just flipped on its own head, and Steve is smiling at him.

Not at him. Or for him. It's for the perp. For the job. To make it look good, and Steve is doing a good job, a great job, too good a job at selling the world on thinking he wants Danny, which should be impossible, because it is. Would always be. Doesn't even work in Danny's head, when he lets himself wonder, sometimes, after Steve has given him too long a hug, or that unreadable but warmly affectionate look he gets sometimes, when they're out on the beach in the chairs and Steve is feeling especially content. The glances he sometimes catches through their office windows, that are only because Steve's desk faces his. Nights out, that got filled with more friendly back slaps and arms slung around Danny's neck than usual.

Everything Steve does, when Steve cares about a person, without wanting that person. But trusting them. Caring. Sure. Loving.

All of just Steve, being Steve. Probably how he was with his Navy buddies, back in the day. Comfortable in physical affection, without worrying about it being weird, or unwanted. Danny knows those looks, and those touches, and he's almost managed to stop being gutted by them, when they come by surprise.

It's these he's got no strategy for, because Steve's eyes are dark and his face is flushed and his hand in Danny's vest is insistent, even while he's reminding Danny of the reason they're here, confusing the biological, lizard-brain impulse deep in Danny's skull to pause in confusion, about how this feels and looks and what it really is. "I got him."

He does. Is keeping track of him, even as Steve's dragging him towards that open door, and the inside of Danny's skull is a roaring wash of white noise. "He's watching."

Waiting, maybe. To see what they'll do. If it's enough to pique his interest.

Danny hopes so. Fervently, maybe even to the point of prayer, because he's not sure he can take making it look any better.

[thebesteverseen]

He needs Danny to stop looking at him like this. Like he's been plugged into a light socket and blown. His edges all singed, and his face a riot of. Steve doesn't even know. He can't stare at it. He can't parse it. He can't stop and figure it out. He only knows certain seconds of it as it catches under his feet, while he's dragging Danny and Danny is following, relating more. Every single sign that Danny was wrong. That Danny is in over his head. That Danny takes it back.

This is why it was a lie, broad stroked. I would have gone with the gay thing.

He probably would have when there was a closed door, and no one had to see them. As the cover of words. When Steve didn't have to throw himself at Danny like a cheap suit -- even if this suit, and this place -- is nothing like cheap. Even if it feels it right now. When his hands are pulling on Danny by the now-unbuttoned sides of his vest. Like he's supposed to. Like he's allowed. Like nothing is wrong except that even this room has more going on in it than Steve wants.

Like he can't tell. That something is very, very, very wrong.

The way he knows, with one look, when everyone else just think Danny's being a miserable grump.
Which is the look Danny has right now. When he doesn't even pretend as they're walking. It's going to be bad.

"Good," he says, forcing himself to keep the loose, caustic smile he pulled out. Like Danny said something perfect to him.In another conversation, between two other people neither of them will ever be.

Like Danny isn't drifting further and further from him in this education he didn't need. This plan that they could have found some other way to go about handling. He should have stopped it. Shouldn't have taken Danny at his word. All bravado and jokes. Everyone laughing and saying it would be a walk in the park. When it was everything but. He's an asshole for enjoying any second of Danny's hands. Or that kiss. Not stopping himself when he should have. Before he fucked everything over without thinking. Like Danny is always screaming at him about.

The hallway isn't too long, but there's definitely less lighting, Steve can see, the closer they get. Even if Steve wants to drop his hands, wants to tell Danny something along the lines of you're doing good or it's fine, they're too far in now. They need him him to be interested in them, or to just choose a mark. One Steve would rather was them. Because it would be cleaner. Because he wants that now. Something to break for everything he's broken. Still breaking.

He hates himself. That guy. The night. The year, maybe. Especially when pulls Danny to one side to be able to see the guy, again before, he pushes Danny into the door frame like he'd gotten impatient, with not being able to touch him, pulling him across the room. Needing to not vanish in a puff of smoke entirely down the hallway, but keep the guys attention. On them. Over here. Give him something to chase down, already headed somewhere dark and private. Away from the crowd.

Steve feels sick with himself, for the way his chest is out of air and not gaining any back.

Remotely. "Only a little longer now." Maybe it's supposed to be an apology. Or a promise. He doesn't know if it's to Danny for hating him for tonight, or himself for that same thing. Especially when he leans in to kiss Danny again. Thinking it was never supposed to happen, but it was never supposed to be like this. He'll be pretending for weeks to Danny that this was nothing, nothing but doing the job, and he'll be trying to drown it every other second.

Because finding Danny's mouth again is like stepping into lava and expecting to somehow be able to keep standing.
Which he will. He has to. For Danny. For Danny he has to be better than even he'd be for the case. For Danny.

[haole_cop]

He hates this perp, he hates this place, he hates this night, he hates himself, and he hates the look on Steve's face, that's half a bandit smile and half wrapped in yellow CAUTION tape, shuttering in on itself in that way no one else in the world ever seems to see, except Danny, who can never understand why they don't.

Because it's not Steve. That easy-going, surfer-boy aloha waggle of his fingers and quirk of his mouth, lazy blue eyes, relaxed shoulders. It can be, at home, at the beach, with the team, with Grace and her friends. But not when it's out in the world. Not when Steve's smiling, but his eyes have gone distant.

Danny should check in with him, say, who knows. God. Something. Any one of the million words he always has at his fingertips that have always worked to relax Steve before, make him laugh, haul him back from teetering into the minefield of his own mind. Apologize, or make a joke about how Steve's so good at this he's almost got Danny fooled, which would make everyone laugh and relax a little and only burn off an inch or two of his own skin with turpentine.

But he can't, because they're still on the job, and he's trying to keep eyes on their guy, which is almost impossible to do when Steve's hauling him around like this. On any other day, he'd relieve the tension a little by bitching about it, complaining that Steve can't give him a task and then make it impossible for Danny to actually do that task, except he does it all the time, God forbid Danny spend a single day on this job jumping through zero hoops, but he can't do that, either. All he can do is let Steve pull him, like he would if he were the person he's pretending to be, and Steve were the person he's pretending to be, until Steve stops, and then gives Danny no time to question it, before he's being pushed, back, feet catching and his hands on Steve's wrists to steady himself, until his back hits something solid hard enough to push the breath out of his chest.

Or maybe that's just the look on Steve's face. This one he doesn't know, and can't parse: wild and a little desperate and cagey, as strange as his whispered words are, that Danny opens his mouth to respond to -- say it's fine, or something like it, anything to wipe that face off Steve's face, but then Steve leans in and it all goes up in flames.

Everything. Hits like a match to a bubble of gas, punched straight through him, from his feet right through the top of his head. He feels like a marshmallow left in a microwave: expanding in fast-forward and exploding everywhere, leaving sticky, messy bits of his heart all over this room.

Because it is his heart. This ache. This explosion. Not his brain, that's been strangled right out of existence, or even his instinct. His stupid, clumsy heart, that's making him push back into Steve, and shove stupid, clumsy fingers into Steve's hair to drag him down, while the other hand fists in his jacket, lets go, slides under the fabric along Steve's side.

Some alarm, somewhere beneath the drowning and the choking dust, screaming that this isn't making it look good, it's taking too much. Everything he can't have, shouldn't want. Nothing that's on offer.

Steve kissed him for the job, but Danny can't seem to convince his body of it, because all it wants to do is kiss Steve back.

[thebesteverseen]

Steve, who is admittedly, no matter how many times he rolls his eyes like Danny is exaggerating to the moon, a tank, went for gentle. Professional. The job. A thing he didn't do. Didn't even want to do. But he could do. This time. This time, for the guy watching, if he was ready for it. Knew it was coming. Could brace. He could make an effort to make it look good, without losing his head and forgetting entirely not to swarm Danny like he was actually asking for it. He can shut all the lights down and the heat off.

Just an action. Like cocking a gun and firing. Like breaking a bone. Leaping off twelve stories.
It can be the motions and the case. It's the reason he says the words. So Danny knows. It's almost over.
He won't have to put up with all of this too much longer. He can make it just show. Reinvent his skin as accessory.

It even works. For about three seconds. His eyes are actually closed this time. Because he doesn't want to see it. He doesn't want more of Danny's eyelashes, and his skin this close. He can't erase the rest, but he could choose not to over-inundate the moment. At least he could have before Danny decided that punching him in the teeth with his mouth was the answer to Steve actually making an effort. Because Danny doesn't just lean back and let it happen.

Danny pushes up into him suddenly. Solid bulk, and bumping chests. Hands, Steve can't even keep track of suddenly. In his hair, pulling him hard, down, in. Mouth open and kiss solid. Hands. Lips. Hard friction. Down his neck. Fisting his jacket. Suddenly pushing up under his jacket. Everywhere. Danny's hands are suddenly just everywhere, and everything else is just gone. Because Danny's is dragging him in, and he's leaning into the buck of Danny's body into him, like he could push Danny straight into the wall with his own.

Not even like that. Fuck. Like he was one of these people.

Like he wanted every inch between them gone. Wants to cover every inch of Danny's body with his own. Every scrap of cloth and lie. Because the lie burns more than the clothes or the touch. Than this kiss that is blistering the inside of his mouth, while he can't not meet Danny like Danny is the only source of air left anywhere. Like he hasn't dreamt of this, ached over this, like an idiot, like he hasn't caught every light kiss Danny ever gave out to girlfriend in his presence, for years.

He doesn't want more half-lies and half-truths in his head, in his bed, in his dreams that are always nightmares.

Not with Danny's face. Not like this. Danny is the one place he's safe.

Usually.

Except nothing about this is safe. Feels anything like it.

Nothing about the way he pushes, tries not to rutt, straight into the hand palming sharp warm straight through the thin dress shirt and the stomach pressed to him. When he's can't even form the lies he'll need to sell for everything his body is saying. Doing. Not stopping himself from doing. Because he isn't. Because somehow. He doesn't even remember. But his fingers are pushing into Danny's hair and he's kissing Danny's head into that wall, angry and apologetic and disgusted, and everything is falling out of his hands, because nothing else fits if Danny is in them.

[haole_cop]

There's not enough of his sanity or sense of self-preservation to wonder if he's gone too far, to try and figure out what he'll say about this, when Steve asks him later, and how he could possibly try to lie when the truth is so obvious. There's nothing in his head except a loud buzz, drowning out all thought, killing itself on the taste of Steve in his mouth, filling up his nose.

Steve, who curves into him like the tide, and the closest comparison Danny can come up with is that it's not unlike the times Steve has body-checked a perp into a brick wall, or oncoming traffic. He's never seen Steve kiss anyone like this. He has seen Steve hit people like this.

With everything he has. Throwing every ounce of effort into it, every pound of muscle and bone. Bending all his willpower into it.

Doing exactly what he would be doing, if Steve were the guy Steve demonstrably isn't. One who would come here.

But Danny can't even think that clearly, when Steve's kissing him into the doorframe, and Danny's hand is fisting in Steve's shirt, material too thin to not sear his hand on the heat radiating off his skin. He can't not feel it, and he won't be able to forget, not if he sticks his head in the sink and runs the cold water tap over it for the rest of the night, or stands in a cold shower, or dumps ice over his head. Steve's hot against his hand, and Danny wishes he didn't know it, almost as much as he's desperate to know what it would be like with no fabric in the way at all. Each contraction of the muscle his fingers are against like a kick to the chest.

It's madness. He needs to pull back, but there is no place to pull back too, because Steve's blanketing him, and the doorframe is at Danny's back. His lungs are burning. Heart hammering, fast enough to make him dizzy. Or it could be the lack of oxygen. Or it could be Steve.

He needs to get eyes on the perp, before he comes up and drugs one of them to drag off, or gets the drop on them. He needs to get his hands everywhere on Steve that he can. He needs to get his hands right the fuck off of Steve, before it's too late, before this stops being something they'll be able to work past, or ignore.

Before he ruins it. As if he hasn't, probably, already ruined it. Fear and longing mixing sour and sharp in his throat, while Steve's dedicatedly trying to melt Danny's brains out of his ears. Giving it all he's got. Maybe punishing Danny the only way he can, right now.

It's too much. It's not enough. It's so wrong. Everything he needs to stop.

But he can't take his hands off Steve. And pulling back feels like ripping duct tape off his own skin, even when there's no room to go.

[thebesteverseen]

It's pressure storm swelling and swelling behind his breastbone. A warning about the lack of air, or one about the fact he's finally going to just explode. Which Danny's hair against his palm, curled into his gripping fingers. He doesn't know. He doesn't want to know. Danny's hand hard and hesitating on him. He knows it somehow. Without looking. Without being able to focus. Somehow. In the way Danny's gripping the cloth under his jacket and against his stomach, side, like a lifeline, a rope off a cliff. So hard. Nearly shaking. With.

Steve might want it to be anything else--

A stutter step before those hands were just as reckless as they were a second ago. Shoving his jacket aside. His shirt. Maybe even his pants. Until Danny's fingers were on his skin, like a brand, like another tattoo he could never remove, and not a layer of cloth that seems so trivial that it being gone would make him burned even

-- but it's like having a ice shoved at him.

Because it's not. Danny's not. And he needs to take it for what it is. Pay attention. Stumble back from the brink of full out insanity. Like he can tell. Listens. Knows. The way he's seen Danny's hand clench the door frame when the car is going too fast. Shakes and holds hard. White knuckled. Loud. Refusing to give in, even when terrified. Pissed as fuck. Disgusted. And today Steve is the car. The car Danny always, and never, yells about Steve driving.

An today Steve is the car, and there is no always or never here. Because it's not real.
Because Danny needs him to stop, needs him to get off. Because Danny can play well, if he has to.
But doesn't want this. Not anymore than the car going over a hundred, Steve with a gun, instead of a seat belt.

Steve nearly groaned, teeth wanting to snap, shatter, melt, with the rest of him, black as the shame and anger that smacks through him, when he drags his face back. Half an inch. An inch at the most. Trying to find air. Trying to find sanity. Trying not to find Danny's eyes. And failing. Desperately trying not to be drown by the need to just tip his head and touch Danny's mouth again. Light. Once, or twice. Or not. Not, just back into the wall. He hates himself. He is the worst kind of man right now. Heart pounding, focus splintered, pants so much tighter, every inch of skin alive. Bad. Actively. Boss. Partner. Best friend.

The world is still burning around his eyes, around his voice. Around the small, thin, desperate pull of air in while his mouth is still all but right back against Danny. What does it say about him that he just wants to close his eye (to Danny, to the case) lean into it again. Take what he can. Demand it from the world. Put something into that ugly, jagged thing in his chest that has been there for months. That no one can touch. That leaves him alone, except at night, in that empty bed.

That's alive and screaming in his chest. Petulant and insane. A cajoling, tempted, whisper to invade every shred of sanity.

"Good enough?" He means for the guy, but he can barely get those words out. Tries to ignore for the both of them the freezing tension that threatens to snap, shivering through his body, at only garnered for seconds, when his lips brush Danny's for the words. He means the guy. He means. They have to. The case. His voice is black as he feels whatever's left of his soul probably looks. Low. Bottom of the barrel. Scraping for real, for sane, and finding only this. Liquified remains. Swallowing through a desert and having to nod, barely that way, shift his eyes without shifting his head. For back there. Back where he'd been.

That guy. The only reasons he was ever allowed to, required to, touch Danny. Taste him. Burning alive.

He has to believe Danny understands. Desperately needs him to. Because Danny always understand him. (Usually.)
Has to trust that Danny will understand this, too. Will believe him when he blows it off. When he blow off Danny when this ends.

[haole_cop]

Steve pulls back, but not far enough for Danny to do anything like breathe, or get his act together, or get a grip on his own rebelling mind, the rising, steel-plated bubble in his chest, because Steve is. Looking at him. Close enough to kiss. Close enough his lips still brush Danny's, when they move. Close enough that Danny would only have to tip his chin, and they'd be right back there.

Right back to exactly what he didn't need to know, which is how well Steve fits, when he shouldn't. When it should be impossible. Height. Breadth. Bumping chests and long arms. He's nothing like Rachel, Gabby, Melissa, all petite and tiny, fitting perfectly against him, delicate with soft curves. He could wrap his arms around them, and hold them close, and it never felt like trying to hold onto a plane as it takes off.

The way his arm is wrapped around Steve, now. Under his jacket. While Danny's just realizing how tightly his fingers are clenched in his shirt, at the same time as he's realizing that Steve's not pulling away from him, either. Leaned in. Pushed in. Pushed him back. Like. Except it's impossible. It's just Steve doing what he does. Maybe an extension of how he touches Danny anyway, fond and often. How he doesn't mind hugging Danny, or sitting next to him on the couch. Moments that were never, but were so close there were times when Danny drove himself into insomnia and the bottom of a bottle or his bloodied knuckles on some perp's jaw trying to convince himself that it wasn't, trying to remember it.

It's hard to remember right now, when Steve is so close, and looking at him like this, and it feels so real. Like he means it. Wants it. Like maybe it could be possible, after all, and Danny's fingers tighten a little further, when Steve's lips brush his, and his eyes go half-lidded, until that voice comes.

And those words. And everything they mean.

Washing out that lead balloon in his chest with a rush of dread, while he blinks, and feels like Steve just poured ice water over his head after a three-day bender. Like he's just remembering, now, where he is. What they're doing. Why.

Because maybe he is just remembering, and that's why his fingers let go, clench into a fist so tight he feels like the bones and tendons might snap, but it would be better. Preferable. To break his own hand, rather than put it back on Steve, who doesn't want it, who just reminded him. Good enough?

Because it was supposed to look good, but that was. It was. Too. And Steve doesn't want it. Is reminding Danny, maybe ordering Danny, to pull it back.

Except it comes out raw and hoarse in a way Danny hasn't heard, before, and Steve's face is blown wide open. Sounding like he's been gargling tar. Like each of two words had to be pried loose with pliers.

When Danny has never lied to Steve, and never wants to lie to Steve, but, in this moment, right now, cannot tell the truth to Steve. That it's too good. That Steve's selling it too well, because Danny's starting to believe it, let alone their perp. And Danny can't believe it, because it doesn't exist, and if Danny says he wants it, everything they've done and built and lived through in the last five years will be gone in a breath of dust.

Too many people lie to Steve. Danny won't. But he has to. But he can't.

Leaving him, tongue darting to lick his bottom lip, feeling like the smoking wreckage of a car, all twisted pieces of metal and the ghost of pain. Searching for what he should say, would say, if this weren't like willingly dousing himself in gasoline and setting himself on fire. "Yeah."

His voice isn't working right. His hands aren't. (They should be on Steve. He can't keep them on Steve.) Lungs aren't. Heart hasn't, in years. Nothing's working right, and he needs it to, can't lose it all, doesn't want to see as well as feel Steve's distaste. "Very convincing."

[thebesteverseen]

His eyes are blown black, with the thinnest rim of the brightest blue that Steve has ever seen in Danny's face. It's so electric he can't look away, and it feels like licking a socket just to look at it. While Danny licks his lips, and Steve can feel the shift in the air against his own lips, without actually getting the friction. Even when it feels like he's pulling his muscles off his bone, not to lean what can't be more than the whisper of a breath of space and catch Danny in the middle of that movent.

Danny, who is still staring at him with those eyes, but whose hand suddenly jerks off his shirt. Off of him. Like Danny couldn't get off him fast enough, at least in the only way he could. Since the rest was Steve pressed to him. Whose back tightens up as he wants to suddenly pull away. To get the hell off Danny who doesn't want him there. When he's invading Danny's space. Danny's skin. Danny's body. In a way that is so wrong he can't even quantify it. It's just a falling swoop.

When Danny says those words. Three of them. Short.

Like Danny would rather not say a single thing about this already.

Danny. Danny, who had a million words every single day and every single situation. Who had a hundred to throw at the guy at the bar throwing himself, actually, at Steve, rather than the one sentence that could just tell Campbell to take his hand off Danny's property. He gives Steve three words, with those wide dark eyes, and his fist that isn't touching Steve and has his jacket awkwardly out from his body to keep it that way.

Steve makes himself swallow every feeling, dry dust down his throat. Shattering cold seeping out from somewhere in the pit in his stomach and his ribs. Because those three words hit like high power ballbearings lodging in his skin. Too few, and reading as too much. Convincing. Like that was all it was, and Steve has to remind himself that's all it's supposed to be. Ever can be. That he should be grateful Danny is only saying he can lie and show off well.

(That it shouldn't feel like Danny stuck a night between his ribs and got his lung,
because it wasn't like Danny even knew. But still. There's a hollow, hungry pain, wide awake.

The one that knew Danny shouldn't know. Couldn't know. Didn't like. Had an operating line of beautiful girls.
That even Danny, of all people, couldn't, wouldn't want hm. A thousand logical answers, known, but it still stung.)

He makes it cold, himself, to be able to make more words word. Rusty voice. Even when he rolls his eyes, like he's not shoving his hands and his head in lye. "Not you." As though this is nothing. Somehow could ever be. Like all those moments. Except with every inch of his skin caught in Danny's teeth. But it's fine. Absolutely fine. If he can take nearly bleeding death, trekking through frozen cold, carrying two other people. He can take this. He can let Danny know he knows. It's nothing. It's just the job. Sometimes it pushes them too far. Often. But it's still that. Just the job.

His throat is raw. Like his skin. "We should split." Like every nerve ending, when he shifts, tilting his head like he might have dropped it to do what he thought of early. What he's thought of a million times. What he couldn't even think straight enough to consider two seconds ago. Let's his mouth whisper the words next to Danny's jaw, like he was busy there. "See if he'll follow you." Unless Danny had a better plan. Any plan.

Something that wasn't the world throbbing, edged in red, still begging for him to just let. Give in.

Find Danny's mouth, again, hard and heavy, and just ruin the only truly, reliably good thing left in his life.

[haole_cop]

There's something that shutters closed across Steve's face, but before Danny can amend his statement, say -- fuck, anything, anything at all that even remotely sounds like his usual self -- he's rolling his eyes, and insulting Danny. Like he always does. Like it's easy. Like Danny wasn't just breathing his air, or gripping his shirt so tightly it was about to rip between his knuckles, or hadn't dragged Steve down, like he definitely did not need to do to make it look good.

Which is all this is. Making it look good.

That's what Steve's doing, when he tips his head, and Danny's chin jerks between the instinct to tip his own and catch Steve's mouth, and the over-correction of not. Molars grinding down on each other, while Steve keeps going, soft breath into Danny's skin, making this suit, perfectly tailored to him, feel suddenly far too small.

Without his hand in Steve's shirt, he's got no handhold. It's not like the Camaro, when he can hold onto the frame of the car and yell his displeasure over the wail of the sire. He can barely even hear his own voice, or Steve's over the alarms going off now.

How dangerous this still is. How he desperately needs Steve to believe that wasn't convincing, because if it didn't convince Steve, Danny's still safe, and he doesn't need to keep lying. Not anymore than he has for months. Years. From whenever this started, that was probably a lot sooner than Danny has any real gauge for.

Nodding, and licking his lip, that feels too dry, and that tastes like Steve, which is something he's not allowed, but can't keep from reaching for. It's already a ghost. Already gone. Never happened, and never will. "Good."

It means getting away from Steve, which can only be a good idea, right now, so Danny is all for it, even if he hates it, too. One more thing to add to the burning pile. He tips his chin up, lets the hand at Steve's head slide carefully back to his shoulder. Careful, careful. Aware any second it might betray him, and try to bury itself in those short brown strands again. "There's a back door over that way. If he thinks you're headed back in, ten to one he'll follow me."

He needs to. It has to. Because Danny can't stand here and resist this, while Steve is pressed against him, for very much longer.

[thebesteverseen]

Danny jerks hard, right next to his head, so he can't miss it in the slightest and Steve's teeth nearly snap together at the bricked tension in Danny's jaw suddenly. He can't let himself get stuck in it, but he swears he'll pay for this. For every second. He'll find a way. To make it up to Danny. For pushing him here. For letting him think he could. For letting it happen at all. The case. The UC. For whatever is going through Danny's head. For even hating Steve if he needs to hate Steve for a little while.

He can have his space. Days off. Anything. They just have to get the guy and then.

Then, Steve will never touch Danny again if that's what he wants.

The thought is a distant pain, like a blinding light, as he's listening to Danny find more words. Like it's easier this time. If he doesn't let himself. Feel it. The damage. Just get Danny back to the path. Back to the job part of the job. Bringing in the bastard who made this necessary in the first place. (Like it wasn't Steve, suddenly shoving Danny back into the bar. Into the wall. Into the door. Never. He was never touching Danny again.)

(It felt like he was just giving up the air. Or the sea. His hands. Being a SEAL.)

Steve steps back like it's nothing. Head coming up with that plastered, cocky, crooked smirk, again, when he lets himself laugh and lean back into the space behind where he had been. Voice loud, like the laugh. Mocking and taunting. "Make up your mind already. First you don't want the wine. Now you do."

He doesn't want to freak out Danny anymore than he has already, but he makes himself drop the hand on the wall by Danny's decidedly disheveled hair and plaster it wide on Danny's chest. Pushing him into the wall, like it's a teasing shove. "Get a room." Or the hallway. Or the backdoor. Or lead him wherever, Steve doesn't say. He's never needed to say it. He's never needed to say a lot of things. Never needed to check a lot of things. But he will now. Does. Can't. Will soon. Even if he's still broad, and he's all leisurely lines.

Thrumming tension and promise, even as he steps back from Danny, with a look across all the people to the door. "I'll get the glasses."

[haole_cop]

Steve doesn't say anything, because Steve is a creature of action, and now Danny will never able to un-know how true that is, how physical up close and personal with Steve is, can be, but he still doesn't expect, stupidly, the sudden, complete dissolution. Steve steps back, and air floods into the space he was standing in, leaving Danny's hands adrift, without his shirt or shoulder to anchor him.

Cutting him loose, like a surgeon amputating a dead limb, and its so disconcerting. Cracks too much of his equilibrium. Already missing Steve's warmth, and the weight of his body, and the way his breath puffed against Danny's skin. It's never going to happen again, and it was too fast, and not fast enough, should never have happened to begin with, and Danny hates himself a little more for wanting it back. Steve doesn't. Didn't. Made that clear, and Danny would never, he'd never. Not for his own selfish reasons.

Even if he wants to be selfish. Even if his hand comes up, instinct, to wrap fingers around Steve's wrist, when Steve's hand is suddenly on his chest, and all Danny wants to do is grip harder, tell him this is all wrong, that they're finally getting it really wrong, because if this were real, he'd never send Steve back for wine.

He wouldn't let go of Steve at all. Would break the fingers of anyone who tried to make him.

But Steve's easy, laughing, taunting, and Danny smiles, even though it feels like his face is cracking from the strain of trying to make it easy, flashing, predatory. "If you're gonna complain, you shouldn't have made me so thirsty."

Which is true enough, even if it's not Steve's fault. It's Danny's. All of this is on Danny. He's the one who needs to get a grip, so his fingers tighten, and he makes them let go of Steve's wrist.

It feels like letting go of the last fingerhold on a cliff, the only thing keeping him from the fall.

And it feels like a fall. Pushing off the wall, and walking away. Forcing himself to keep it casual. Not to look back. It's not that kind of liaison.

Heading towards the doors in the back, and watching, out of the corner of his eye, the shadow that detaches from an alcove, to follow.

[thebesteverseen]

The ring of heat is still on his wrist when he's walking away. His back to Danny. Hands straightening his jacket back correctly, even if he doesn't go as far as to retuck the rumpled parts of his shirt under it. Does note as he's smoothing the lines that his rose is completely messed up now. Missing petals and mashed up against itself. Them. Only the ribbon looks unfettered by what just happened. Steve's wished to be a lot of things in his life. A ribbon wasn't ever one of them.

Steve'd rather start carving strips of his skin than let his mind wander. Except it won't stop. The taste of scotch and Danny is like an echo in his mouth, even when he can't taste it on his tongue or his teeth. It feels like there's the heat of a sunburn loitering over too much of him. Shoulder, back, stomach. He'd like to find an ice bucket and shove his hand in it, so he could relieve the rest of his reaction to what just happened. Make it stop before it was noticed.

He's supposed to be a cop. Even if he isn't. A SEAL. No matter who or where he is.

He is not, within any realm or regard, supposed to look like one of the perverted patrons of this place.

There is no place to headbutt a column. There's really no place to go, and no place to spend thinking about all of this. Because he never goes out the door either. He does open it. But he doesn't step through. Gives the suited bouncer barely a look, before looking over his shoulder. Back to where Danny is already gone, and there's the shape of someone following. He meant to say, Nevermind.

But it never came out.

Because he's waiting. Only the pause of handful of heartbeats. Only enough to watch the man slip through the same opening where Danny must have gone, before he's following. Only one of two people even looking up as he crossed. Busy with themselves. One of them may have tried to say something but he barely registered the voice even, as he was crossing the space. Soundlessly specific, following after both of them.

The weight of his gun in his pant leg welcome shift of focus from any other part of his clothes. But he needed to wait. They needed this to go down right. Incriminating. Toss the book because it's too easy. Not just him decided to fly after the guy and deck him into the wall. The floor. Not just because Steve needed someone to take out the fierce, heavy darkness suddenly surrounding everything in his head.

[haole_cop]

He can feel it, humming under his skin. The wrongness of it, even now that it's back to being right.

Steve should be walking away. They should be working the perp. It's their job. And soon, they'll make the collar, and everyone will go home, and never speak of this again, maybe.

(Even if Danny knows that's already a lie. He'll have to talk about it. Apologize for it. Try to find some way to explain, that will somehow, miraculously, veil the truth.)

He might even pass the clean-up off onto HPD, too. Call them in on the place. Leave it swarming with cops, and just take off.

They're so close. He can hear the man's footsteps behind him.

Leaving him to pause at a door, as if considering it. Not turning. Not looking. Leaving himself out as bait. It won't take --

Iron fingers circle his arm. A sudden bulk next to him, that's not as large as Steve and Steve's familiar shape, and a voice that isn't Steve's comes low into his ear, while Danny allows himself to startle, to look scared.

He mostly just hopes there won't be any concussions, this time around. "I'd decide to take a pass on this one, if I were you."

It's low and rough and angry in his ear, and Danny tests the grip by tugging, only for it to tighten further. "Hey, hey, hey," he says, protesting, his other hand coming up. "I'm just here to have a good time. I don't want to step on anybody's toes, okay? If he's yours --"

The fingers go tighter, and the voice sounds throttled, now. "As if I would debase myself like that. Perverts. Throwing around money. Owning people. You should be in hiding. You should be dead."

"Hey," Danny starts, again, his hand lifting a little further, but it stops dead, when he feels the prick of a needle against the skin at the back of his neck.

He can almost hear the shark grin. "It's alright. You'll be a nice little reminder of why people should behave. Or, you will, when they find you. Now move."

Shoving Danny towards that back door, the one that leads to the alley, with a low laugh, that's probably supposed to be a threat, but, frankly, Danny is feeling pretty fed up with this whole situation, and they have what they need.

"I am so glad you said that," he says, moving toward the door -- they may as well take this outside, keep the disruption to a minimum before they can call HPD -- and opening it, at the man's urging. "Seriously, you just made my whole night."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve waits until he's at the hallway, eyes on the retreating duo, the man strong arming Danny toward the door, to lean down and pull out the gun on his calf holder. Safety off. Not stopping more than seconds before he's following them with quick steps. Everything else forgotten, but the most important. The reason.

Following the sound of the burble of Danny's voice suddenly spiking high enough to make Steve want to rush but he doesn't. He's got faith in Danny's abilities, and he's right here. Following along the wall. Shoulders nearly to it, gun up, but not far enough up someone coming up behind him would see it.

Though right now would be a very bad time for anyone to come this direction. For him to need to handle anyone else.

When that door is swinging behind them and Steve shoves a foot between it and doorframe. Watching it catch on the rubber soled side of his boot without much noise, while the man scoffs. Repugnant disgusts and intensity in that voice that still reaches him through the slice of space. "Your night would have been best spent somewhere else. Anywhere else. It might have saved your life."

The man even laughed at that, rough and thin. "But you won't be able to make that mistake again."

[haole_cop]

Despite his bulk, Steve is pretty good at sneaking up on people. He might not be hiding under forest cover right now, his face streaked with mud and paint, but he's still barely a shadow.

Still, Danny knows he's there. The door doesn't swing quite all the way closed, and his new friend doesn't notice it, but he should. Without knowing it, he's already lost. "You say that," he says, hands still up and careful, moving into the alleyway with the guy right behind him, "but of all the mistakes I've made tonight -- and there have been a bunch, I promise you, there was a whole lot of not thinking and poor choices made -- I think yours is still worse."

"Yeah?" There's a push at his back, and Danny finds himself facing the man, who's lifting his needle -- that drug Max identified, the one that keeps the victims from running -- and advancing again. "What mistake is that?"

"That you fell for it."

A mistake they share, maybe, because there's still that roiling, confused part of Danny's chest that doesn't want to admit that it was nothing more than a cover, that it was just making it look good, but he doesn't have much time to worry about it, when the guy lunges, and Danny has to block the arm coming down, needle glinting in the dim alleyway light.

There's a scuffle. His hand is around the guy's wrist, and he's getting pushed back, which would be fine, until he steps on a trashcan lid that rattles under his heel and makes him lose his balance.

Which is not great, but that's what Steve's for, right? "Any time, now," he yells, focusing on keeping the other guy back. "That would be just stellar."

"What?"

The guy steps back, looking shifty. "You got back up? You're a fucking cop?"

Except it's kind of a rhetorical question, because that's right about when he turns, and starts to run.

[thebesteverseen]

Danny rambles, using whatever he needs to grab at for it, and Steve doesn't listen. Does. Because Danny can shoot his mouth off for hours, and even go erratic with what he's saying, the examples he uses. But one thing is always true. Danny doesn't. Even when part of Steve is saying he has to be. Still. Like he....was. Except it sounds exactly like a follow up on that 'was' when he's mouthing off to the guy.

The mistakes he made tonight, a lot of not thinking and poor choices made. That all sounds about right for what Steve's already figure out.

Even if Steve doesn't get the time to think about it, because suddenly there's the sounds of scuffle and Danny is calling out to him (instead of calling him out) and the door gets a good shove, while the guy's voice is suddenly panicking, which is all Steve needs. It's not like they need more than what's already happening, when Steve's getting out. The guy with the needle jumping, back, looking around.

Shifty, asking that question and turning on his heels, just as Steve shouts, "Five-0! Hands where we can see them!"

Not that he's going to listen. He wasn't already before the words were out. Throwing the syringe and jack rabbiting off.

Not that Steve says it for anything more than show, and the official required announcement, because he's already three or four steps in, pushing through the space he just dashed away from next to Danny. It's a crowded alley of dumpsters and boxes, for all the establishments and the guy, obviously, hasn't had to run down it before. Hadn't considered it now. Because he panics in a way that announces itself like head lights.

He knows which way he's going, doesn't hesitate in that, but he's sloppy. Looking over his shoulder and catching sight of Steve, only to almost go crashing into a pile and losing steps for it. Sending bags toppling, something metal skittering, and he's trying to figure out what it is. Which brushes off seconds and gives Steve all the motivation he needs to throw himself, with a vicious lack of care and itching want for the worst, at the man's back and send them down in a solidly jarring tumble of limbs and shouting.

[haole_cop]

They never listen, and they always run, and, just like every other time this happens, Danny thinks Steve enjoys it too much.

The chase. The panic in their perp. And, of course, bodily throwing himself at another person who may or may not be armed. "Hey!"

He twisted his ankle a little, but it's fine when he puts his weight on it, jogs down the alley to where Steve and the guy are a tangled pile of limbs, his own sidearm in hand. Not that it's needed, when Steve's clearly got this under control, by way of being a landslide of a person guaranteed to hit like a mountain coming down, and Danny's already dropping his gun by the time he gets close, shaking his head instead, even if he's not totally sure what he's most exasperated about: Steve, going in without a tac vest, the perp, for being a sick piece of human garbage, or himself, for...everything, tonight. "You know bringing him in will get delayed if he has to get checked out for internal bleeding, right?"

It's something he'd say any day, he's sure. He's always annoyed at Steve, when Steve pulls shit like this, tackling dirtbags into garbage cans and brick walls, without giving a damn about what might happen on the way down.

It's got nothing to do with everything still humming under his skin, twisting in his stomach, anxious and sharp. He's a fucking professional, okay, and he won't let it affect his job or the performance of his duty.

(Any more than it already has.)

[thebesteverseen]

It's a blistering kind of relief, a different kind of blasting through brimstone and accelerant, as the itch in his skin explodes into heat. A reddish flash covering his vision more than anything like pain that needed focus or recognition or attention, as the man flattens in shock only long enough to lose his breath, before he's struggling under Steve's girth. A rat trying to escape a ship wreck, a body shuddering under the collapsed shower of bricks.

Steve's jaw is tight, but it's almost a smile.

A vicious glee and flash of expected annoyance.

Because he has to pull back. Only enough to get to his knees, weight still hard as battering ram on the man's back and waist. Before Steve moved whip crack fast, getting a knee on his spine and hearing the oof of breath that fled him again. Body caving forward, while Steve grabbed one arm, jerking it backwards and forcing the opposite shoulder into the ground, through a stream of winded, gasping threat even while the first cuff latched tight. "Pigs. Dirty pigs. Even you. I saw you, both of you. Enjoying your--"

"Hands behind your back," Steve said sharply. Hands harder than necessary as some part of him responded with ice sharpness at the truth in those words. Steve's mind flashing only too unhelpfully to the hand under his jacket. Fingers fisted in his hair. The noises. The taste on his tongue.

Fake. Fake, except where he hadn't been entirely. Tried to be, but couldn't.

Because Danny never lets him keep his lies. Not even in this.
Even if he can never know. How true it was.

He had enjoyed it.
Blistered. Burned. Wanted.


The second clicked under his fingers. Absolutely still digits that wanted to dig into this man .Violent for the trespass. To crack his jaw. Bash his teeth. Make sure he could never speak a single word. Never make anyone hear it, and need him to lie about one of the things he learned most to bury down and make a lie, except in the darkest night or deepest bottle. There's a hard glance toward Danny, because this was his part. Always his part. When Steve is snapping upward, fast as a shot, deadly fast, followed by a stillness of shoulders that said nothing about ease, while dragging the staggering man to his feet.

Pushing him, without mercy toward his partner. "Book'em, Danno."

[haole_cop]

He's half-bending to re-holster his sidearm in the ankle holster he had to use with this suit, these pants, when Steve's up and the guy's getting shoved in his direction, like Steve's the one running now, and the perp is a garbage can he's tossing in Danny's way to slow him down.

Which might be an accurate read of the whole situation, when what comes next are those words, that Danny hates, that sound nothing like they should. That aren't grinning and triumphant, with the smug certainty that Steve can get away with it, that it's become Steve's thing, after Danny fought against it for so long, never allowed, only accepted it wasn't going away.

It's too terse, too blank, and Steve doesn't look satisfied, the way he usually does when he's gotten to bodyslam some jerk into the pavement. He's pushing the guy at Danny hard enough Danny has to catch him to keep him from losing his balance, while straightening.

All of which is easy enough to read, even if Danny wishes it weren't: he's not forgiven, and Steve doesn't want to talk about it, and Steve just wants to get the job done.

They can do that. Get the job done, and talk about it later, because it's going to have to be talked about, because Danny needs to get this off his chest, the guilt and the disgust and the horror at himself, at everything he did, allowed himself to do. "Call it in," he says, instead, before grabbing the guy by the collar, and pushing him towards the end of the alley, towards the car and the real world.

To book him. And get rid of him. Because that's what they do, right? Clean the world of another bad guy. At any cost.

Even this one.

[thebesteverseen]

Danny still doesn't look certain. He even, Steve doesn't want to start extrapolating the obvious reasons, looks guilty. Disgusted. Remote. Which cinches it entirely, doesn't it, when Danny only has three words for him, again, and doesn't even start calling the guy a smuck, insulting his choice of life calling, or even reading him his rights immediately.

He just gives Steve three words. Tells him to do his job, while taking the guy away.

Leaves him with only that to do. Call it in. Call everyone in. Because he can. Take it all down tonight. The guy in Danny's hand, being shoved toward the car and the place they are just now outside of, that exists for all the best and worst reasons. That needs to come down brick by brick, because it costs more, breaks more laws, than any amount of solace it grants anyone.

The solace that he can understand just a little too well taking his sharp look to the wall, when the idea slides around the back of his mind, getting into the gears and sliding like a shaft of light from a crack door, a groaning locked crate, oily and years old. He could find someone. Who looks too much, and absolutely nothing really, like. Take it out on them. Break himself on it.

Except it doesn't sound good. It's sour bile in the back of his throat. He didn't do it when Cath left, and he doesn't want it anymore tonight than he ever did then. He didn't want someone he has to look at. Lie to. Even talk to. The idea of the ruse is exhausted. Depraved. Makes him even worse than everything he's already shown himself to be. Danny would be even more disgusted in him. In what he was willing to do. To Danny. To someone else. To himself.

Steve dug in his pocket, pulling out his phone and hit the speed dial for Lukela.

"Yeah." Is brusque, only just making him realize he's half out of breath. Throat still dry. "We got him. Got everything we need. Bring everyone you've got that's available to be pulled."

Steve looked toward the car. Still and steady. Toward the impossible to miss register of Danny's voice down the way. There was a breath in Steve's nose, before he headed that way, gun still in one hand, while he shoved his phone back in his pocket, and made himself keep going. Keep doing the job. Not needing Danny to tell him how to do the only thing he seemed to be able to do without making a mess of.

[haole_cop]

In a strange twist, this guy won't stop talking.

Even after Danny gets to everything you say can and will be used against you, he's still spouting off. He almost sounds relieved about it, like their sting lanced some ugly boil, and all the infection is coming pouring out.

"-- gotta clean the streets," he's saying, "somebody's got to do it, and I was right, wasn't I, you two are just as bad as any of them in there, sick. I saw you. Both of you."

"Shut up," Danny suggests, with a shove, but the guy won't, just keeps talking, and it's just plain kismet that they've reached the car, and Danny can push him into the frame, and get a satisfying oof, that might not settle everything coiling and tense in his stomach, but does provide some slight, edged relief.

Probably not a good sign.

Which only means it's worse when he starts up again. "You pigs, you disgust me. It's not right."

Danny shakes him, hard. "Shut up. You're the worst, you know that? The worst. You don't get to take the law into your own hands. You don't get to decide what's right or wrong, okay, we will do that for you, we are literally paid to do that for you, so scumbags like you don't get to take those decisions on and do what you did. People are dead because of you."

There's a knife-edge glint to the man's smile. "And you would be, too, on any other night."

Making something in Danny's gut freeze, solid, and shatter. Because he wouldn't. He wouldn't be there on any other night.

Except there were nights when he might not have been able to say that. And nights when it could have. Maybe not this place. But one maybe not too unlike it.

Which just means he leans his weight against the guy, while blue lights flash in the distance, and turns his head so he's forced to see them coming. "Not anymore."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve makes it halfway down the alley before he turns back, looking to the right and then the left, making himself walk back through his memory the way he always has. Does. Eyes squint toward a half dozen piles and he moves off there. Danny in the background, a comfort he shouldn't be listening to. Letting distract him when he starts tossing boxes and bags. Toeing a foot against broken crate pieces. Careful but specific.

Until there's a tink and he stills, studying the ground, letting his eyes find it.

A syringe with a long glinter silver needle.

He doesn't have gloves in his pocket. They hadn't thought they'd need them here tonight. They weren't here to case someone's place and make sure nothing got changed. There's a consideration about it only half a second before he reaches up and starts tugging his tie off. A little rougher than he needs to, but it comes off, and he puts it over his own fingers. Fingertip pad and the insides. Picks it up carefully with it, even though it's slick inside of it.

Then headed back toward Danny at the end of the alley.

Lights were catching everywhere, blue lights chased by shadows and blue again, thrown on the wall, the camaro, and the two men waiting, as people were coming up to him.

"I need an evidence bag over here," Steve called out to one of them. Stern and straight forward as he was walking out. Catching the eye of Duke, working his way through the storm of his people, night dressed but just as focused as ever, running orders for groups that are manning up for the doors, while he was coming toward them. Talking to the Sergeant, even as he was depositing both of the things in his hand into the bag someone held open for him. "It's all yours now."

[haole_cop]

The guy just laughs, and Danny snaps, a little. The thing under his skin crackling, every breath aching. "What did any of them do to you, huh? What did they hurt? Did they spill coffee on you, or make you lose money? Huh?"

He's shaking the guy, and pushing his face into the side of the car, harder than he should. As hard as he was pulling Steve towards him. As hard as he should have pushed Steve away. "What did we do that pissed you off so fucking much that you decided I needed to die? Who gave you the right?"

There's no response, which is just as well, because a squad car is coming streaking down the alley, slowing to a crawl about twenty feet away and parking, just in time for Danny to lever the guy off the Camaro and start pushing him towards the uniform that gets out. "Here," he says, "take him. Get him away from me, if I see his face again, he's not going to look much like himself in his mugshot."

His anger has never been cold -- even with Reyes, it was scalding hot and immediate, full of the promise of violence, begging to be set loose. Everything the rules tell him not to do. Every reason he depends on them, listens to them, needs them.

Like tonight.

He needed them tonight. Needed to remember them, instead of set them on fire and watch them burn. Needed to obey them first, and his instincts second. Should never have thought he could bend them. That never works out, and it's never a good idea, and it always screws him over worse than actually playing by them would have, to begin with.

All of which is crystallizing itself into perfect clarity, when he's watching Steve talk to Duke. Hand him an evidence bag. Turn away.

Away. Not towards Danny, like usual. Not to slap his shoulder and enjoy the success of a job well done. Not to suggest they celebrate, or unwind, or shoot the shit for a while to calm down, cool off.

Not tonight. And Danny can't blame him, for walking away, for avoiding him, but he can't let it happen, either. Everything that went down tonight -- what he did, what he demonstrably didn't do -- it needs to be atoned for. If he can. He needs Steve to know he's not another one. One more person to take advantage of him, use him, and never talk about it again.

And then Steve can walk away, if he needs to. But not before. "Hey."

Walking, quick steps towards Steve's side, like usual, one hand in his pocket, the other swinging by his hip, with a tilt of his head towards the now swarming collection of blue lights and uniforms. "Looks like they got it under control."

[thebesteverseen]

Steve watches the crowd. It's not that he isn't specifically watching other things -- other people, persons in specific -- but it might be that it's a bit convenient, too. Watching to see anyone tries to come running out the front, the back, the sides. The rat holes for the sinking ship as the sounds of the ship cracking on the rocks go up in half a dozen voices from all sides of the building. With people starting to be led out.

HPD is good at its job. It's not their first bust. Or even hundredth. But he watches anyway.

Had only turned to it, when Danny was suddenly calling out to him. Making him look suddenly, before the impulse was even a thought to figure out if he wanted to listen to his eyes were on Danny. Struggling as though pulling up his own nails to make sure his gaze did not wave. Did not drop to Danny's mouth. Neck. Shirt. Anything at all below the bridge of his nose. Even if he had this sudden delirious notion maybe none of it was real.

Except it was, and he couldn't pull it out of the world any more in this second than he could ten minutes back. He wishes he'd smashed the guys face into the ground. Or broke some of his ribs. Accidentally. He's going to be paying for the hours before that few minutes of takedown for a lot longer than that guy will even remember to think of them.

They won. He isn't supposed to care about the cost. He's supposed to be willing to take any cost to stop the darkness that exists out there. Any sacrifice. Any choice. Any necessity. He swore it. Before God and Country. But this one makes the insides of his guts whine with the tension of the knots in them that are refusing to budge in his still hold. Because the whole concept is one that he can't let start. Because it does. If it starts. He doesn't know how to stop it. Where it would. What would go. What would be left.

So, he nods, sweeping his gaze back to the HPD leading out men in nice suits.

Some looking genuinely shocked, others arguing. "Yeah."

[haole_cop]

Steve looks at him, finally, but it's not even a second's passing glance before he's looking away again. Which is. Great. That's great.

If Danny were a smarter man, he might just leave him alone. The warning signs are all there: the tension in his frame, how he's holding himself. The way he watches HPD, when on a normal day he wouldn't notice them any more than he would worker ants. The tight nod. The monosyllabic answer.

Nothing like the reassurances whispered into the side of Danny's neck, that Danny wishes he couldn't remember like they're scratched on an un-ending record in his head. All of it a sign painted in blood-red, to back off, and leave him alone.

But Danny can't. Not yet. If he does now, he'll just be playing into Steve's expectations. Being one more person Steve trusted, who abused that trust. Who lied. One more reason for Steve to simply not trust anyone, ever again.

So he pushes forward, as if this were normal and his insides didn't feel like someone lined them with silica and took a blow-drier to them, leaving him desiccated and hollow. "I guess we can call it a night, huh?"

Let HPD do their job. Go home. Get this night over with, so they can come back in on Monday, in a couple of days, and have things be something like normal.

Maybe with forty-eight hours to work it over, Steve will have time to cool off and forgive him. Maybe Danny can convince him.

Maybe pigs will fly and tomorrow morning, Danny will wake up loving Hawaii. Stranger things have happened.