fic: Can You Feel My Heart (1/3)
Title: Can You Feel My Heart
Author: stellarmeadow
Fandom: Hawaii Five-0
Paring: Steve/Danny
Rating: NC17
Summary:Danny tries to figure out why Steve's acting weird. The answer is not what he expected.
Notes: Yeah...I don't know how to explain this. Drugs, maybe? It's complicated...but I hope you enjoy it!
Huge thanks to @ignemferam and @fim40 for the cheerleading and to @fim40 for the awesome beta job! :)
"Aren't you hungry?" Danny asked.
Steve looked at Danny's burger as if it was roasted rat. "No. I'll eat later."
Danny paused in his enjoyment of what was, for Hawaii, an excellent burger, to look closely at Steve. He looked pale, with shadows under his eyes, as if he hadn't slept. Which for Steve, who liked to think that sleep was for wusses, was saying something. "You okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine." He was almost convincing. "Just a little under the weather."
"I thought SEALs weren't allowed to get under the weather," Danny said. "I thought it was against the rules."
"Sorry. They taught us how to fight a lot of things, but viruses weren't one of them."
Danny studied him for a moment longer before shrugging. "Okay," he said, as if he was going to let it go. If Steve didn't realize he was being watched, he'd be more likely to give something away.
Steve's phone rang, and he answered, listened, and said, "On the way."
Danny looked down at his burger, only half eaten. "I'm taking it with me," he said, grabbing it and his soda and following Steve to the car.
"Really?" Steve said, splitting his attention between Danny and the road. "You're eating that horrible smelling thing in the car?"
"Okay, a, there is something wrong with you? Because this burger smells delicious. And b, yes, I am eating in the car. Or, more specifically, my car. It is my car. I will eat in it if I want to. If you want to drive it, you'll have to deal."
Steve made what was almost a low growl in the back of his throat, but he said nothing else as he took a curve so fast Danny's head hit the window. He wasn't sure if he was proud or worried that he was so used to it he didn't even drop his food.
"Besides," Danny said, "the way you drive, any meal could be my last, so I might as well eat it in the car that will eventually be my tomb."
Steve glanced at him. "I thought you said I was going to get you shot to death."
"That was Wednesday. This is Friday."
He saw the corner of Steve's mouth quirk up. "What am I going to do to cause your death on Thursdays?"
"Freak grenade mishap."
Steve laughed, and Danny relaxed just a little. He couldn't be that bad off if he was laughing, right?
He still watched Steve carefully all the way to the crime scene.
***
Investigating homicides generally included blood, but fortunately most scenes weren't nearly as disgustingly gory as the ones in movies. Unfortunately, this one was.
Despite the ability to ignore the scene and focus on solving the crime that every detective hones, even Danny felt a little ill at the sight that greeted them. Four bodies lay strewn around the floor, full of holes, much like the walls and furniture around them. There was no way to tell where one body's blood ended and another began.
Chin came up to them, face grim. "Looks like there's a war brewing," he said.
"Great. Just what we need," Danny said. "But this definitely looks like a battlefield."
He glanced at Steve, but instead of his usual businesslike demeanor, Steve was staring at the scene with a look that was vaguely familiar. It took Danny a moment to place it, because he only saw it rarely, maybe a couple of times a year, when Steve was more on edge than usual.
Steve swallowed carefully before averting his eyes from the scene to look at Danny and Chin. "Yakuza?" he asked.
Chin nodded, and Danny sighed. "If these guys are Yakuza," Danny said, "then I don't want to know what the retribution to the people who did this is going to look like."
"It's not going to be pretty," Chin said.
Danny looked at Steve, but he was looking at the scene again with that face. "Hey, Steve?" When he didn't answer, Danny snapped fingers right in front of Steve's face.
Steve jumped like Danny had slapped him. "Sorry, what?"
"You okay?"
He gave a little shudder and scrubbed a hand over his face. "Yeah, I'm just...I need some air. I'll be back."
Danny watched him leave the room a little unsteadily, almost like he was forcing himself to go. "Did that seem odd to you?" he asked Chin.
"It's Steve," Chin said, and Danny turned to see him shrugging.
"Even for him that was odd." Danny looked back at the scene. "We're not going to get much from here are we?"
Chin shook his head. "CSU might have better luck, but finding evidence without contaminating the scene would be hard for us. We did, however, ID one of the vics." Chin held up his phone, showing a mug shot and rap sheet for Hikuru Sato.
Danny scanned the list. "That's a long list for a low-level Yakuza."
"Which is why I'm thinking he's a little higher than that," Chin said.
"And the higher the victim..."
"The higher the body count in retaliation," Chin finished. "Kono's already tracing his movements the last few days back at HQ. We can start there while we wait for info from CSU."
Danny nodded. "I'll get Steve and meet you there."
He went outside and looked around until he found Steve, standing alone and off to the side, looking out at the water. Danny crossed the grass until he was close enough to put his hand on Steve's shoulder.
Steve whipped around, grabbing Danny's wrist in a hard grip. "Danny?"
"Hey," Danny said quietly, staying still. "It's just me. You wanna loosen up the grip there, Superman?"
Steve blinked a few times and let Danny go. "Shit, sorry. I'm just...."
"Yeah, I get it," Danny said, even though he didn't. But he wasn't going to touch whatever this was in front of HPD at a crime scene he thought might've triggered it in the first place. "Maybe you should go home for a little while."
"No, I'll be fine. We need to get through this case. I'll take a day tomorrow if I need to."
Something else he only did maybe once or twice a year, when he was more on edge than usual. Danny trampled the urge to dig until he got answers. He may have only dealt with this a few times, but he recognized the pattern. Steve would probably actually take the day off and then he would probably be his normal self again--or as normal as he got anyway.
"Okay," Danny said carefully, because for all that Steve wanted to get through the case, he was tense, and seemed to be twitchy. Like every sound was something to be checked out and defended against. He reminded Danny of a German Shepherd he'd had as a kid, constantly cocking his head and twisting his ears, alert to every sight, smell and sound as a possible threat.
Steve cleared his throat. "Let's go."
Danny fell into step beside him, staying close all the way to the car, just in case.
***
Danny spent most of the drive back to HQ trying to decide if he wanted to bring up the weird reaction Steve had to the crime scene. On the one hand, they couldn't afford to have Steve zone out like that in a firefight. On the other, Steve probably had some kind of shrink on base with some high level clearance that he talked to about shit like this.
Maybe that's where he went when he took his days off. Maybe once they got through the case Steve would go see whoever he saw when he disappeared, and deal with this, and he'd be back to normal until the next time.
Danny wasn't stupid. He knew Steve had seen some stuff Danny couldn't possibly imagine, for all that he'd seen on the job. And he knew about PTSD. One of his former colleagues in Jersey, Art Showalter, had been ex-Army. One day he'd gone into a crime scene and zoned out like that.
The next morning they got a call to his house for his suicide.
So, he'd make sure Steve went to his shrink the next day and it would be fine. That's all he needed.
***
The case turned out to be a series of dead end leads. Not a lot of difference between the ongoing fight with the Yakuza in Hawaii and the ongoing fight with the mob in Jersey. The accents and temperatures changed, but the never-ending fight didn't. Danny would wonder at the futility of it, except he looked at it like cockroaches--you'd never get rid of them, but if you didn't control the population they'd take over the earth.
With no more leads to follow, they left at a relatively early time for them on case days. Steve pulled up to his house in the Camaro just before midnight, turning to Danny. "I think I'm going to take the day off tomorrow unless something urgent comes up," he said. "Night."
He got out without another word. Danny got out, watching Steve all the way into the house before jogging around to the other side of the car, getting in and adjusting the seat, and heading home.
***
Danny slept in on Saturday. They were waiting for information to come in on the scene the day before, but CSU had said it might be Sunday or Monday before they had anything conclusive. HPD had surveillance running on the usual hot spots and was going to notify 5-0 if any activity started brewing.
With Grace at Rachel's for the weekend, Danny would normally be heading to Steve's once he was up and about and had checked in with Grace. He waited until lunchtime, though, to call and check in with Steve, since he hadn't been feeling well.
Steve didn't answer.
By three, Danny was worried. Even if he wasn't planning to work, Steve had said he would if something was urgent. And even if it wasn't, he didn't usually duck Danny's calls.
Maybe it hadn't been a psychological thing after all. Maybe he was sick, and he couldn't get to the phone. Or worse.
Danny remembered Showalter again.
"Fuck it."
He put his shoes on, grabbed his keys, and hurried out to the car.
***
Steve's house was quiet. His truck was right where it had been when Danny had left the night before. Danny tried the door, but it was locked--at least he'd done that.
Using his key, Danny walked into the house. "Steve?" he called, not wanting to scare the guy. "Hey, Steve!"
He checked the back, but the door to the lanai was locked, so Steve wasn't out swimming. He went carefully up the stairs, calling out again, but there was no answer. There was also no sign of Steve when Danny entered his room.
The bathroom door was ajar, though, the light on. Danny approached it carefully, pushing it open enough to see Steve, lying on the floor, a towel around his waist, a knife and a small silver box lying next to him.
"Steve!" Danny knelt down beside him. He was ice cold and practically grey, and when Danny checked his neck, there was no pulse. "Steven, come on!"
Danny started to lie him out flat, but before he could, Steve gasped for air, his eyes opening, their color altered to almost white. He looked around, sniffing the air, before he focused on Danny's face. "Danny?"
He sounded odd. "Yeah, it's me. What happened?"
"I, uh," he looked around, spotting the knife and box, and lifted his hand to his mouth. "Uh...shit."
Danny slipped a hand around Steve's wrist. "Hey, you want to get off the floor maybe, huh? It's cold down here. You're cold."
Danny gripped Steve's wrist tighter, frowning when something felt wrong. He focused for a moment and then realized what it was. "Uh, Steve," he said, his fingers feeling for the thick veins just below Steve's wrist, "I don't want to alarm you, but I can't find your pulse."
"Fuck," Steve said, jerking his hand out of Danny's. He picked up the box and knife and stood, pushing past Danny and into the bedroom, looking awfully steady for a dead guy.
Danny rubbed his eyes and looked again, but Steve was still upright. He put the box and knife on the nightstand and sat down, elbows on his knees, before dropping his head into his hands. The pose left the towel around his waist open just enough that Danny had to avert his eyes--the last thing he needed was his libido in the way of all...this. Whatever this was.
Grabbing the edge of the vanity, Danny pulled himself to his feet and joined Steve, sitting down beside him on the bed. "So..." he said, after a moment, "anything you want to tell me?"
Steve sighed heavily, showing an impressive set of lungs for a dead guy. "I really never found an easy way to say this," he said, turning his head just enough to meet Danny's eyes. "I'm a vampire."
"Right, because the way you soak in the sun like a special sun sponge screams vampire. Also, I noticed how you go around biting everyone on the neck." Not that Danny would complain if Steve bit his neck, but actually breaking the skin and drinking his blood wasn't really what he had in mind. "What's really going on?"
Steve just gave him a steady look. "I," he said carefully, "am a vampire."
"Okay, really, is whatever going on so bad that you have to resort to this as--"
In a flash, Steve's eyes went white and he made some kind of noise between a growl and a hiss as he flashed a set of--holy fuck, fangs, at Danny. Danny scrambled back and fell off the bed, landing in an ungainly heap on the floor. "Jesus!" he said, grabbing at his heart. "Fucking warn a guy, would you?"
Steve's mouth was closed, but his eyes were still that strange whitish color, and his expression...forget his old German Shepherd. Danny had been with a team back in Jersey that had broken up a dog fighting ring, and the dogs who'd been there a while had that same expression. Wary, their heads twitching at every little sound--even the ones no human could hear, smelling the air for any sign of danger.
Like Steve had been at the crime scene after--fuck, after all that blood.
Fuck. Fucking, fucking fuck.
"You're not kidding," Danny said, slowly, "are you?"
Steve shook his head.
After a moment, Danny pushed himself up off the floor and sat back down beside Steve on the bed. "Okay."
Steve's ultra-confused face looked a little odd with the white eyes in the middle of it, but it was still Steve. "Okay?"
Danny shrugged. "Okay."
"I tell you I'm a vampire and all you have to say is 'Okay?'"
"No, dumbass, that is not all I have to say. That is where I start, though. Okay?"
Steve blinked, and the white eyes turned back into his normal, decidedly more attractive, eyes, and his face looked more normal. "Okay."
"So what's the story?" Danny asked. "How is it that you walk around fooling everyone--even the Navy and the doctors--into thinking you're human?"
"Because I am."
"You just said you're a vampire."
"I am."
"How can you be both?"
Steve picked up the box off the nightstand and handed it to Danny. "With this."
Danny frowned, opening the box to see what looked like traces of thick blood, or something. It was all he could do not to drop it. He handed it back to Steve as quickly as he could. "What is that, exactly?"
"A cure." Steve's mouth twisted up. "But only a temporary one."
"Looks like it's almost gone."
Steve nodded. "I've been waiting as long as I possibly could to take it each time. This time I waited a little too long, and...." He waved a hand at his face.
"So, what, if you don't take that every six months or so you turn back into a vampire?"
Steve cocked his head, brow furrowing. "How'd you know it was six months?"
"Because about every six months you act like you have been the last couple of days, you disappear for a day, and then you're fine. I'm a detective, you schmuck." He smacked Steve against the back of his head. "And that's for not telling me sooner. Though it probably didn't even hurt, did it? No wonder your fucking skull is so thick."
"Will it make you feel better if I tell you it hurt?"
Danny rolled his eyes. "You're not any better at lying as a vampire than you are as a human."
"Danny...." Steve had that confused look again. "You're taking this really well."
Danny laughed. "I'm really, really not, Steven. I am so not taking this well, you have no idea. I promise you, when I have actually had time to realize this is not a bad hallucination or some form of torture where a bad guy has drugged us, that I will have a complete freak out, all right? But right now I just need to know--what happens now?"
"The cure goes into my bloodstream. I cut myself and put some in there, and I'm human."
"I hear a 'but' at the end of that sentence."
Steve sighed. "I've been trying to have someone replicate the cure. A friend back on the mainland has been helping me--"
"--and by friend you mean vampire friend?"
"Yeah."
"So this friend wants the cure, too?"
Steve laughed. "God, no, Josef would rather be burned alive than be human." His smile faded, and became softer, and Danny felt a twinge of jealousy at the fond look. "But he knows how much it means to me. So he's helping."
"Well, good, the more the merrier."
Steve's eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"
"You don't think I'm going to just walk away from this, do you?"
"Danny, you don't know what you're getting into. The people who created this cure don't want it replicated. And they're very dangerous."
Danny shrugged. "I've saved the world, Steven."
"This is not the same thing."
"Seriously, saved the world. Super virus. Gonna kill off the human race. And I did it without you."
"Danny, this is not--"
"No, Steven. It's not the same thing." Danny rose and started pacing the floor. "Let me guess, these are big, bad vampires who could, what, break my neck? Kill me? Compel me to kill other people?"
Steve got up, standing in Danny's way until Danny had to stop in front of him. "Yes, they could break your neck before you even saw them coming a mile away. And seriously, I told you to stop watching that vampire diary thing--it's ridiculously inaccurate."
"Grace likes it. And you mean you don't have a diary stashed around here somewhere from the 1800s?" Danny raised an eyebrow. "I'm horribly disappointed." A sudden thought cheered him, "Oh, but I bet you have pictures from the seventies! Where are they?"
Steve made a lower version of that weird growl that Danny swore to himself was not even remotely hot even as his dick said otherwise. There was a burst of wind, and Steve was gone, then he was there again, only his eyes were white once more, and he had a knife against Danny's throat.
"You see how fast that was?" Steve growled out.
Danny was seriously going to have to have a talk with his dick about finding all this so incredibly hot. Because, come on, knife to the throat here. But Steve, with the growling and that insanely intense look on his face, even with the white eyes...Danny was having trouble remembering the problem.
The metal pressed a little harder, and Danny remembered, a moment before he realized the metal was kind of blunt. "Is that a butter knife?"
Steve blinked. "You don't think I'd actually hold a knife on you that might hurt you, do you?"
"How do I know what vampires might and might not do? You just told me that show was wrong."
"Dammit, Danny, you do not get how serious this is!"
"Yes, I do, Steve." Danny wrapped his hand around Steve's wrist, lowering it from Danny's throat, but not moving away. "You're very fast. I get it."
Steve shook his head slowly. "I'm weak right now compared to all but the newest of vampires. And the ones who created this cure are the oldest, strongest vampires in existence. They could snap your neck and not even be a blip on the best camera in the world if you were standing right in front of it."
"And a sniper could kill me with a rifle from even farther away with no warning," Danny said calmly. Because he needed Steve calm, and he needed Steve not to run, which he was apparently very fast at doing. "There are a million ways for me to die, babe," Danny said quietly. "And unless you're the one who takes my life deliberately and knowingly with your own hand, none of them are your fault."
Steve swallowed carefully, his eyes closing. When he opened, they were back to normal. "Okay. You can help, on one condition. You do what I say."
"That's a pretty broad condition."
"When I tell you to run, you run. When I tell you to hide, you hide. When I tell you to stay, you stay."
"I'm not a dog."
Steve stepped even closer, and Danny had to struggle to stand his ground. Steve's legs were brushing against his, and Danny realized that Steve had apparently lost his towel in his run for the knife. "I'll know the danger's coming long before you do, and you have to at least let me try to protect you. I need to know you'll listen in that kind of situation."
"Of course. Don't I always?" At Steve's raised eyebrows, Danny said, "When you have an actual reason other than your self-sacrificing martyr complex, I listen."
"Okay." Steve let out a long breath. "Okay."
Danny nodded. "Good, now that that's settled, we need to figure out our next steps. And I think the first of those should be you putting some clothes on."
Steve's eyes widened, and Danny would swear he'd have blushed if he...well, if he could have. "Uh, yeah, good idea." Steve stepped back, turning his back to Danny as soon as he could, but not so quick that Danny didn't get a glimpse of about the only part of Steve he didn't strip off and show on a regular basis.
The glimpse did nothing to help Danny's problem with his own dick, and he willed it to just stop right now. As Steve chose that moment to bend over to get clothes out of his drawer, Danny's dick didn't listen.
When Steve was dressed, he sat back down on the bed. Danny sat down beside him. "Okay," Danny said. "So, when I came in, you were passed out on the floor. You said you were about to take that," he nodded at the box on the nightstand, "but you hadn't yet. Why?"
"I'd been trying to wait as long as I could, but I knew I couldn't wait any longer. So I was trying to decide if I might have better luck getting more cure if I stayed a vampire. And then I passed out."
"Why did you pass out?"
Steve licked his lips, and wouldn't quite meet Danny's eyes. "Hunger."
"See? You should've eaten earlier."
"No, not that kind of hunger."
Steve met Danny's eyes at last, and Danny realized what he was talking about. And that Danny was the closest food truck on the island. And that look in Steve's eyes wasn't just his usual look that Danny had yet to figure out if he was undressing him in his head or what. "Oh."
"Yeah."
Danny clamped down on the sudden urge to offer up a vein. "So, uh, how do you, I mean...where did you...eat last time?"
Steve shook his head. "I haven't fed in years. I've been human, remember?"
"How long have you been human?"
"Twenty years." Steve glanced down. "It's a long story."
"I've got time."
Rubbing at his neck, Steve shifted back on the bed a little more. "You might, but I don't."
"You have somewhere you need to be?"
"No." He met Danny's eyes once more. "I'm hungry, remember?"
Oh. Right. Danny had been trying to forget that, because he was trying to forget all the images it put into his head, and how it made him want to shove Steve back on the bed and practically impale his neck on Steve's teeth.
He was never, ever letting Grace watch that stupid vampire show again, because clearly it was warping his brain. Who knew what it would do to hers long term, especially now that he knew there were actual vampires out there.
Holy fuck.
Steve was a vampire.
Holy. What. The. Fuck.
"You're a vampire."
Steve ducked his head a little, getting closer. "We covered that."
"You're an actual, living, breathing vampire."
"Well, not so much on the living part, but--hey, Danny, you okay?"
Danny put his head in his hands, but that didn't stop the dizziness. He felt Steve pressing on his neck, pushing his head down between his knees, and after a moment, the dizziness passed.
"Danny?"
"I'm okay. I just..." He sat up, finding Steve's face, studying every aspect of it. Apart from the lack of his usual tan, it was the same stupid face he'd been trying to get the courage to kiss for a while. "You're a vampire."
Steve nodded slowly, and that kicked puppy look was back again, like Steve was ready to bolt at the first sign that Danny wasn't okay with it. And that look was wrong on that face. He hated it every time it showed up, hated that anything put it there.
He reached up to touch Steve's face, watching as little muscles just below the skin twitched in different places as Danny ran his hand down the side of Steve's cheek. Steve still looked like was afraid Danny was going to slap him. "Show me," Danny said quietly.
"You saw."
"No. Show me."
For a moment he thought Steve was going to refuse. But then he got that resolved look, and in a second, his face changed. Danny looked closely and realized his eyes weren't white. They were more of a light ice blue. They also looked like he hadn't slept in a week, from the red skin around them. He wondered if that stayed like that, or if it would fill in if Steve fed.
He wondered if Steve would let him find out.
He ran his thumb across Steve's lips. They looked chapped, and were a little rough under his thumb, making him wonder what they'd feel like on his.
Danny leaned in, his hand sliding to Steve's neck, intent on finding out, but a strong hand on his chest stopped him. "Danny, don't."
He paused, studying Steve's face and making a determination. "You want it, too."
"That's not why I'm stopping you."
"Then why?"
"I'm hungry."
Right. That was a bad thing. He wasn't supposed to want Steve to.... "You know what?" Danny said. "I don't care."
He tried to lean in again, but apparently that thing about vampires having superhuman strength was true. "I do."
And he was right to care, Danny knew. It just didn't stop Danny from wanting. But he sat back, taking a deep breath. "You were trying to decide if you wanted to stay a vampire to help your search for the cure, right?" At Steve's nod, Danny said, "So what was your decision?"
"I hadn't made one before I passed out."
"How will it help?"
Steve made that impatient noise that Danny was far too familiar with. "There's a small group of islanders who live in the forests. They move around a lot. Rumor has it they know about supernatural beings and might actually have something that can actually bind the cure."
"What?"
"Every time we tried to replicate the cure, it wouldn't work. For some reasons the ingredients wouldn't bind together right, no matter how great the scientists were, no matter how cutting edge their research or abilities. So finally we realized that maybe we didn't need the latest scientific ability. Maybe we needed something old."
"And this group has it?"
Steve shrugged. "Maybe. The rumors said something about a plant--holei. Very rare--thought to be extinct. But these people may know where to find it. And supposedly they respect spirits. They revere demons. And I'm about as demonic as they come."
"Don't say that."
"You don't know me."
"I do," Danny insisted. "I know you. Whatever you may have done a hundred years ago, that's not important."
Steve licked his lips. "I'm not a hundred years old yet," he said.
"Oh, so you're a baby vampire, then," Danny teased. "How old are you?"
"Ninety...ish."
"Cradle-robber."
Steve finally laughed, but it didn't do much for the tension in the rest of his body. "You're really okay with this?"
"Yeah." Whether he was crazy or in shock, Danny wasn't sure, but he couldn't be anything other than okay with Steve in any form. "I know you, remember? Your physiological make up doesn't change who you are."
Some of the tension seeped out of Steve's shoulders. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. So, these islanders. You think if you go to them as a vampire, you might stand a better chance of getting what you need?"
"Yeah, it's just...I don't want to be this. Even for a day."
"But if being this for a day means you never have to be it again...."
Steve's eyes closed. "You're right," he said, hanging his head.
"It's just a day, Steven."
"I know, it's just...." He glanced up at Danny through his lashes. "If I'm going to be this for a day, I have to feed. And soon."
Danny licked his lips, not missing the way Steve's eyes snapped to Danny's mouth. Just like he didn't miss the way Steve's eyes drifted back to Danny's neck. "You have to feed, Steve, you said it yourself."
"I can't."
His protest sounded weaker, though, and he couldn't take his eyes off Danny's neck. "Hey," Danny said, putting his hand on Steve's cheek again, forcing Steve to look him in the eye. "It's no different than anything else we'd do for each other. We're partners, remember?"
"Danny...."
"What, is there some sort of forbidden rule about this?" Danny blinked. "Wait, it's not going to turn me into one, is it?"
Steve shook his head. "No."
"Then what's the problem, babe? Because from where I stand it's either me, or I go get Mrs. Kapule's cat next door, and I'm pretty sure she could take down a vampire if it hurt that cat."
Steve managed a smile at that. "The last time I fed off someone I...cared about, it didn't end well."
"What, did they leave?"
He shook his head again. "Not willingly."
"What happened?"
"She died."
Danny thought about that for second. "Did you kill her?"
"No. It was...she was helping me try to get a cure, and...they killed her."
"The vampires you were talking about who didn't want anyone to have this cure?" At Steve's nod, Danny said, "So we know what they're capable of, then. We'll be careful."
"Danny--"
"Steven. You're going after this cure. And you're going to have to feed to get it." Danny put his other hand on Steve's other cheek, framing his face. "I'm right here. And I'm not going anywhere."
Steve stared at him for a long moment. Danny wondered if they sat there long enough if Steve's instincts would take over. If he'd have no choice. "How much longer can you last?"
"Not long," Steve said.
"Then either you do it now, while we're both in control, or we sit here until you're not in control, right?" Steve didn't deny it. "So what's it gonna be?"
Steve closed his eyes, and Danny could see the second he made up his mind. Steve took off his watch and handed it to Danny. "Twenty seconds," Steve said. "If I don't stop in twenty seconds, you make me."
"Okay."
"Danny." Steve gave him a long look. "I'm serious. No more, all right?"
"Okay. Twenty seconds, got it." Danny set the timer on the watch. "So, uh...how do you, um...."
He couldn't figure out how to ask, so he tilted his head, pushing the collar of his shirt aside to bare his neck. Steve looked hungrily at it, but shook his head and took Danny's arm. "Wrist," he said. "It'll be easier for you to stop me."
Danny nodded, watching as Steve lifted his wrist to his mouth. Danny braced himself, but Steve didn't bite just yet. He ran his nose along Danny's wrist, inhaling deeply, like the smell was intoxicating. The sight of it made Danny's dick press uncomfortably against his zipper.
Steve looked up at Danny through his lashes, his lips moving against Danny's wrist as he said, "Twenty seconds" in a low growl that went straight to Danny's dick.
Danny hit the timer button and Steve's fangs flashed a second before Danny felt them sink into his skin. The pain was sharp, but gone in an instant, replaced by something good. Really good. It made its way up Danny's arm, nerve endings tingling as it spread through his body.
It was all so good, that feeling, the way Steve looked as he sucked hungrily at Danny's wrist, he never wanted it to stop. But he wanted more. He slid closer to Steve, his arm going around Steve's back, his lips tracing their way down the side of Steve's neck.
He'd been cold, but he was warming up a little as the blood flowed through him. Danny's blood, moving through Steve's body, keeping him alive. It was a powerful feeling, better than sex, he thought, but he wanted to try that too, just to see.
The watch timer startled him, the beeping loud in the near silence that had surrounded them. Danny pulled himself off Steve with difficulty. "Steve. Time's up."
Steve blinked at him for a second before he stopped sucking and pulled his teeth out of Danny's wrist. He licked at the wounds one more time and Danny shivered at the feeling. "Hang on," Steve said, his voice thick, as he got up and went into the bathroom.
Danny watched him, want pulsing through him, need crackling through every nerve in his body as Steve came back to the bed, his eyes and face back to normal. He put a bandage over the wounds on Danny's wrist, running a finger over the bandage when it was done before he looked up at Danny.
The lust in his eyes was staggering, and Danny surged forward, pushing Steve onto the bed as he captured his lips in a kiss. He'd barely managed to get their lips together when he found himself on his back, Steve over him on all fours.
For all that his face was normal once more, the look on it was still feral, pulling an answering feeling out of Danny. His hips thrust up, looking for friction, needing Steve against him, but Steve was too far above him. Danny pulled at Steve's hips, but he couldn't move him.
Steve's eyes were moving rapidly all over Danny, like he wasn't sure where to start. Then they focused on Danny's chest. It wasn't until Danny heard the sound of buttons flying and unmistakable ripping sounds that he realized his shirt was literally being torn off him.
When the shirt was gone, Steve bent his head, slowly making a line with his tongue from Danny's collarbone, down the middle of his chest to his waistband. Steve looked up at him, nostrils flaring. "Do you have any idea how good you smell?" he asked, his voice even more of a turn on, deep and gravely, like the animal inside of him was leaking out a little through his vocal chords. "How good you taste?"
Danny's hips pushed up, Steve's weight on his thighs keeping them from moving too much. The motion drew Steve's eyes to Danny's hips, though, and he reached for Danny's fly, making quick work of the pants without ripping them, but only just. He got rid of Danny's shoes and socks in the process.
Steve stripped his own clothes off so fast Danny could barely see it. He was fine with that, though, because he got a good look at naked Steve, in all his glory, as he pulled something out of the nightstand drawer and tossed it on the bed beside Danny.
Then Steve was back on the bed, kneeling beside Danny, looking down at him for a moment before his hands traced their way down Danny's thigh to his knee. Steve moved one of his legs over to sit in between Danny's, then the other, pushing Danny's legs apart.
Steve dipped his head down and took Danny's dick in his mouth, and Danny couldn't help but thrust into him. He'd woken from his fair share of dreams about this, always disappointed to realize it wasn't real, but this was real.
Okay, so it was a little more fantasy than reality in some ways, but as long as Steve had his mouth on Danny's dick, he wasn't going to complain.
He whimpered when Steve let him go, only to have to bite back a curse as Steve's mouth moved lower, sucking on Danny's balls. "Fucking...fuck, yeah, keep...fuck!" He didn't want to know who Steve had learned this technique on, didn't want to think about anyone else getting this, because this was amazing and Danny never wanted anyone other than him to have it again.
Steve lifted Danny up, his tongue delving further still, licking around his hole before slowly sliding inside. Danny pushed into it, dying a little every time Steve's tongue pushed in. "God...fuck...Steve...don't...just, keep, yeah, um...fuck!"
Steve raised his head, and Danny glared at him. He couldn't gather the words to tell him to get the fuck back down there right now, but then he saw Steve reach for the stuff he'd tossed on the bed. Lube, Danny realized, as Steve put it on his fingers a second before he pushed two fingers inside Danny.
It was good, almost as good as Steve's tongue, but nowhere as good as he knew Steve's dick was going to be. Danny pushed up, impatient to get Steve inside him, and Steve gave a dark chuckle. "Danny, do you have any idea what you look like?"
Danny bit his lip, trying to read Steve's face and failing. "What?"
"Hot," Steve said, pulling his fingers out and coating his dick with lube. "Like sex come to life," he added, as he lifted Danny's legs up on to his shoulders and lined his dick up against Danny's hole. "And absolutely and completely mine," Steve said as he thrust inside.
"Fuck!" Danny pushed hard, wanting Steve as deep as he could get, wanting to feel him everywhere, inside and out. He knew Steve could feel Danny coursing through his veins--literally--and he wanted as close to that as he could get.
Steve set a relentless pace, but Danny matched him stroke for stroke. Steve's hand gripped Danny's dick, moving in time with their bodies, harder and faster, until Danny came, seeing stars as his eyes scrunched shut. It was like Steve feeding off him all over again, but better, the link between them connected, going both ways now that he knew what Steve felt like inside of him.
Steve thrust hard a few more times, then stilled. Danny opened his eyes just in time to see Steve in the throes of his orgasm, looking as beautiful as if he'd been sculpted out of marble. He committed the image to memory, in case he never got the chance again.
After a shuddering breath, Steve collapsed onto Danny, a solid, heavy weight. He lay there for a minute before sliding off to the side, one arm and leg still draped over Danny's body, his mouth close to Danny's ear.
"Did I hurt you?"
Steve's voice was barely a whisper. Danny shook his head, turning onto his side to face Steve without dislodging his arm and leg. "I told you you couldn't hurt me," Danny said. "That was so far from hurting me I can't even remember what pain feels like."
Steve studied Danny's face for a long moment. "Why isn't this freaking you out?"
"Who said it wasn't?"
And really, his confused as hell face was still adorable, even now. "You seem to be taking it pretty well."
"What choice do I have?" Danny slid a leg between Steve's, inching himself even closer. "I've always been adaptable."
"Right. Because the way you bitch about every little change screams flexible."
Danny smacked him on the shoulder. "Bitching is how I adapt," he said. He ducked his head in a little more, lips close to Steve's. "And if you're nice to me, I might even show you how flexible I really am."
He took a second to appreciate what the thought of that did to Steve's face before he closed the last of the distance between them, capturing Steve's mouth. He wasn't lying; there was a part of his brain that was still completely freaking out over everything that had happened this afternoon. It was the same part that freaked out over things like chasing down a terrorist bomber or human-race ending viruses. It was the part he couldn't let keep him from doing what needed to be done.
Navy SEALs didn't have a monopoly on compartmentalization.
And, vampire or not, this was Steve. The guy could have a gun to Danny's head and he wouldn't be able to find it in himself to be scared. Because he knew that Steve would turn the gun on himself rather than shoot Danny. He'd bet his life--literally--that vampire Steve wasn't any different.
Though, was he actually vampire "Steve"?
"Hey," Danny said, pulling back just enough to see Steve's face again. "What's your name?"
One of Steve's eyebrows quirked up. "You always sleep with people before asking them their name?"
"Once, in college," Danny said, trying to hide his amusement at the dark, jealous look that flickered across Steve's face at that, "and that's not the point here."
"Right. Sorry." Steve sighed, settling into Danny's arms a little more. "My name is Steve McGarrett now," he said. "Legally. Dad--John McGarrett--was my son."
"Wait, what?" Well hell, no wonder he'd had that much grief over John McGarrett's death. He hadn't lost a father, but he had lost a son. "Man...I'm sorry, babe."
Steve shrugged, but Danny didn't miss the way he swallowed hard, or the pain on his face. "Being a vampire...you come to accept that everyone around you will grow old and die."
Even if Danny hadn't known better, Steve's tone was easy to read. "Yeah, because you're all about accepting the inevitable," Danny teased. "So, McGarrett was your name?"
Steve shook his head. "My wife's maiden name." He swallowed, and Danny marveled that memories from so long ago could still be so painful. But then, that was Steve. "She was pregnant when I enlisted in the Navy after Pearl Harbor," he said quietly, his eyes on Danny, but his mind clearly elsewhere, seeing something Danny couldn't. "She died giving birth, and John stayed with her parents while I fought in the war."
"Where were your parents?" Danny asked.
"They died when I was a teenager."
"I'm sorry."
One of Steve's shoulders lifted in a half-shrug. "It was a long time ago."
And it was, before Danny was even born, but he could see that Steve still carried it with him, the way he carried all his loss and what he saw as failures. Danny had never met anyone who carried all that around and still used it to do good the way Steve did. It was hard to watch, but it made Danny want to do more. Be more. "So what happened after the war?"
"John had been raised by her parents for a few years," Steve said. "It didn't make any sense to uproot him. So they adopted him. I mean, he knew I was his father, and I saw him occasionally until...well, once I was turned, he was a pawn that could be used against me."
"You were searching for the cure even then?"
Steve shook his head. "No, but my...my wife at the time would've used him. So I did my best to make sure she didn't know he existed." Steve sighed. "Unfortunately, she found some letters from him when he was twelve."
And from the way Steve said it, it didn't sound like that turned out well. "I'm guessing she wasn't too happy about that."
"Oh, no, she was ecstatic. She thought a child was just what we needed to be happy." Steve's mouth twisted up. "Vampires can't have kids. Which is for the best. But Coraline wanted to be a happy family. So she lured John out to California with letters saying she was me, and surprised me one night."
Steve swallowed against the pain that Danny could feel in the tension in every inch of Steve's body. "She was going to turn him, so he could be our kid forever."
Danny tried to imagine being twelve for eternity. Growing, learning, but never getting any older, having people treat you like a kid for centuries. "That's sick."
"Yeah, well, that was par for the course for Coraline." Steve shuddered a little, and Danny wondered what memory had caused it. "She had reasons for turning out the way she did. Not that it makes anything she did okay, but...we all have our crosses to bear." He focused on Danny's eyes again. "And the longer we bear them, the heavier they get."
"So...what happened? Obviously she didn't turn John."
Steve shook his head. "No. I stopped her."
He sounded so resolute, so determined about being okay with whatever he'd done that Danny hated to ask. But. "How?"
"I staked her, set the house on fire, took John and ran."
"You staked her and burned the place down? Isn't that overkill?"
"A stake doesn't kill us--though you can see why we'd be okay with that legend, since people generally think they're done if they stake us. It just paralyzes us. But fire. That will kill us."
It sounded so strange to hear Steve referring to himself as part of the vampire community, even after all Danny had seen and experienced. "Good to know," Danny said. "What else will hurt or kill you?"
"Why, planning to make your escape?"
He tried to play it off as a joke, but Danny could hear the fear behind it. Steve was still convinced Danny wouldn't stay once he realized all this was real. The lack of trust would've hurt, if Danny didn't have an idea of the almost 100 years of reasons Steve had to expect it. "No, you schmuck," Danny said, smacking Steve again. "But if I'm going into the forest with you, I need to know what to look out for."
"You're not going."
"You think I'm going to let you go alone? You're crazier than I thought."
"If something happens, I can move faster without you."
Danny raised an eyebrow. "And you can't move just as fast if you're carrying me if something happens?"
He could see Steve was looking for another reason to stop Danny from going with him. "We don't know what kinds of abilities these people have," Steve said.
"Exactly. They know so much about demons and spirits, they might know a dozen ways to incapacitate you that you can't combat. You need backup."
Steve's jaw was set. "I don't need backup."
"You do." Danny was not prepared to back down on this one. "And I will listen to you when we're there, I swear. You say run, I run, etc. But if you go in there alone, I will go in there on my own to look for you. Do you want me out there alone at night?"
The guilt that flashed across Steve's face told him he'd been right--Steve had been thinking of sneaking out and going alone. "All right," he said finally. "I'll take you with me."
"Thank you," Danny said. "And while you're being so agreeable, maybe you could answer the question I asked like half a year ago?"
"Which one?"
Danny rolled his eyes. "What was your name?"
"Oh. Mick," he said. "Mick St. John."
Danny considered the name for a moment. "It doesn't really suit you."
That got a smile out of Steve. "I've grown very fond of Steve McGarrett," he said. The smile faded. "I took it from Celia's brother. He was the Steve McGarrett who went down on the Arizona."
"Celia?"
"My first wife. John's mother."
"What was she like?"
Steve shook his head, pulling Danny against him with one leg. "I'll tell you all about her sometime," he said. "But right now, we have about 2 hours until sundown. And as we need a little time to plan, what do you say to a little...relaxation before we get to work?"
Danny smiled, his hand moving up Steve's back to the back of his neck. "I think that's an excellent idea."
***
Part 2
Author: stellarmeadow
Fandom: Hawaii Five-0
Paring: Steve/Danny
Rating: NC17
Summary:Danny tries to figure out why Steve's acting weird. The answer is not what he expected.
Notes: Yeah...I don't know how to explain this. Drugs, maybe? It's complicated...but I hope you enjoy it!
Huge thanks to @ignemferam and @fim40 for the cheerleading and to @fim40 for the awesome beta job! :)
"Aren't you hungry?" Danny asked.
Steve looked at Danny's burger as if it was roasted rat. "No. I'll eat later."
Danny paused in his enjoyment of what was, for Hawaii, an excellent burger, to look closely at Steve. He looked pale, with shadows under his eyes, as if he hadn't slept. Which for Steve, who liked to think that sleep was for wusses, was saying something. "You okay?"
"Yeah, I'm fine." He was almost convincing. "Just a little under the weather."
"I thought SEALs weren't allowed to get under the weather," Danny said. "I thought it was against the rules."
"Sorry. They taught us how to fight a lot of things, but viruses weren't one of them."
Danny studied him for a moment longer before shrugging. "Okay," he said, as if he was going to let it go. If Steve didn't realize he was being watched, he'd be more likely to give something away.
Steve's phone rang, and he answered, listened, and said, "On the way."
Danny looked down at his burger, only half eaten. "I'm taking it with me," he said, grabbing it and his soda and following Steve to the car.
"Really?" Steve said, splitting his attention between Danny and the road. "You're eating that horrible smelling thing in the car?"
"Okay, a, there is something wrong with you? Because this burger smells delicious. And b, yes, I am eating in the car. Or, more specifically, my car. It is my car. I will eat in it if I want to. If you want to drive it, you'll have to deal."
Steve made what was almost a low growl in the back of his throat, but he said nothing else as he took a curve so fast Danny's head hit the window. He wasn't sure if he was proud or worried that he was so used to it he didn't even drop his food.
"Besides," Danny said, "the way you drive, any meal could be my last, so I might as well eat it in the car that will eventually be my tomb."
Steve glanced at him. "I thought you said I was going to get you shot to death."
"That was Wednesday. This is Friday."
He saw the corner of Steve's mouth quirk up. "What am I going to do to cause your death on Thursdays?"
"Freak grenade mishap."
Steve laughed, and Danny relaxed just a little. He couldn't be that bad off if he was laughing, right?
He still watched Steve carefully all the way to the crime scene.
***
Investigating homicides generally included blood, but fortunately most scenes weren't nearly as disgustingly gory as the ones in movies. Unfortunately, this one was.
Despite the ability to ignore the scene and focus on solving the crime that every detective hones, even Danny felt a little ill at the sight that greeted them. Four bodies lay strewn around the floor, full of holes, much like the walls and furniture around them. There was no way to tell where one body's blood ended and another began.
Chin came up to them, face grim. "Looks like there's a war brewing," he said.
"Great. Just what we need," Danny said. "But this definitely looks like a battlefield."
He glanced at Steve, but instead of his usual businesslike demeanor, Steve was staring at the scene with a look that was vaguely familiar. It took Danny a moment to place it, because he only saw it rarely, maybe a couple of times a year, when Steve was more on edge than usual.
Steve swallowed carefully before averting his eyes from the scene to look at Danny and Chin. "Yakuza?" he asked.
Chin nodded, and Danny sighed. "If these guys are Yakuza," Danny said, "then I don't want to know what the retribution to the people who did this is going to look like."
"It's not going to be pretty," Chin said.
Danny looked at Steve, but he was looking at the scene again with that face. "Hey, Steve?" When he didn't answer, Danny snapped fingers right in front of Steve's face.
Steve jumped like Danny had slapped him. "Sorry, what?"
"You okay?"
He gave a little shudder and scrubbed a hand over his face. "Yeah, I'm just...I need some air. I'll be back."
Danny watched him leave the room a little unsteadily, almost like he was forcing himself to go. "Did that seem odd to you?" he asked Chin.
"It's Steve," Chin said, and Danny turned to see him shrugging.
"Even for him that was odd." Danny looked back at the scene. "We're not going to get much from here are we?"
Chin shook his head. "CSU might have better luck, but finding evidence without contaminating the scene would be hard for us. We did, however, ID one of the vics." Chin held up his phone, showing a mug shot and rap sheet for Hikuru Sato.
Danny scanned the list. "That's a long list for a low-level Yakuza."
"Which is why I'm thinking he's a little higher than that," Chin said.
"And the higher the victim..."
"The higher the body count in retaliation," Chin finished. "Kono's already tracing his movements the last few days back at HQ. We can start there while we wait for info from CSU."
Danny nodded. "I'll get Steve and meet you there."
He went outside and looked around until he found Steve, standing alone and off to the side, looking out at the water. Danny crossed the grass until he was close enough to put his hand on Steve's shoulder.
Steve whipped around, grabbing Danny's wrist in a hard grip. "Danny?"
"Hey," Danny said quietly, staying still. "It's just me. You wanna loosen up the grip there, Superman?"
Steve blinked a few times and let Danny go. "Shit, sorry. I'm just...."
"Yeah, I get it," Danny said, even though he didn't. But he wasn't going to touch whatever this was in front of HPD at a crime scene he thought might've triggered it in the first place. "Maybe you should go home for a little while."
"No, I'll be fine. We need to get through this case. I'll take a day tomorrow if I need to."
Something else he only did maybe once or twice a year, when he was more on edge than usual. Danny trampled the urge to dig until he got answers. He may have only dealt with this a few times, but he recognized the pattern. Steve would probably actually take the day off and then he would probably be his normal self again--or as normal as he got anyway.
"Okay," Danny said carefully, because for all that Steve wanted to get through the case, he was tense, and seemed to be twitchy. Like every sound was something to be checked out and defended against. He reminded Danny of a German Shepherd he'd had as a kid, constantly cocking his head and twisting his ears, alert to every sight, smell and sound as a possible threat.
Steve cleared his throat. "Let's go."
Danny fell into step beside him, staying close all the way to the car, just in case.
***
Danny spent most of the drive back to HQ trying to decide if he wanted to bring up the weird reaction Steve had to the crime scene. On the one hand, they couldn't afford to have Steve zone out like that in a firefight. On the other, Steve probably had some kind of shrink on base with some high level clearance that he talked to about shit like this.
Maybe that's where he went when he took his days off. Maybe once they got through the case Steve would go see whoever he saw when he disappeared, and deal with this, and he'd be back to normal until the next time.
Danny wasn't stupid. He knew Steve had seen some stuff Danny couldn't possibly imagine, for all that he'd seen on the job. And he knew about PTSD. One of his former colleagues in Jersey, Art Showalter, had been ex-Army. One day he'd gone into a crime scene and zoned out like that.
The next morning they got a call to his house for his suicide.
So, he'd make sure Steve went to his shrink the next day and it would be fine. That's all he needed.
***
The case turned out to be a series of dead end leads. Not a lot of difference between the ongoing fight with the Yakuza in Hawaii and the ongoing fight with the mob in Jersey. The accents and temperatures changed, but the never-ending fight didn't. Danny would wonder at the futility of it, except he looked at it like cockroaches--you'd never get rid of them, but if you didn't control the population they'd take over the earth.
With no more leads to follow, they left at a relatively early time for them on case days. Steve pulled up to his house in the Camaro just before midnight, turning to Danny. "I think I'm going to take the day off tomorrow unless something urgent comes up," he said. "Night."
He got out without another word. Danny got out, watching Steve all the way into the house before jogging around to the other side of the car, getting in and adjusting the seat, and heading home.
***
Danny slept in on Saturday. They were waiting for information to come in on the scene the day before, but CSU had said it might be Sunday or Monday before they had anything conclusive. HPD had surveillance running on the usual hot spots and was going to notify 5-0 if any activity started brewing.
With Grace at Rachel's for the weekend, Danny would normally be heading to Steve's once he was up and about and had checked in with Grace. He waited until lunchtime, though, to call and check in with Steve, since he hadn't been feeling well.
Steve didn't answer.
By three, Danny was worried. Even if he wasn't planning to work, Steve had said he would if something was urgent. And even if it wasn't, he didn't usually duck Danny's calls.
Maybe it hadn't been a psychological thing after all. Maybe he was sick, and he couldn't get to the phone. Or worse.
Danny remembered Showalter again.
"Fuck it."
He put his shoes on, grabbed his keys, and hurried out to the car.
***
Steve's house was quiet. His truck was right where it had been when Danny had left the night before. Danny tried the door, but it was locked--at least he'd done that.
Using his key, Danny walked into the house. "Steve?" he called, not wanting to scare the guy. "Hey, Steve!"
He checked the back, but the door to the lanai was locked, so Steve wasn't out swimming. He went carefully up the stairs, calling out again, but there was no answer. There was also no sign of Steve when Danny entered his room.
The bathroom door was ajar, though, the light on. Danny approached it carefully, pushing it open enough to see Steve, lying on the floor, a towel around his waist, a knife and a small silver box lying next to him.
"Steve!" Danny knelt down beside him. He was ice cold and practically grey, and when Danny checked his neck, there was no pulse. "Steven, come on!"
Danny started to lie him out flat, but before he could, Steve gasped for air, his eyes opening, their color altered to almost white. He looked around, sniffing the air, before he focused on Danny's face. "Danny?"
He sounded odd. "Yeah, it's me. What happened?"
"I, uh," he looked around, spotting the knife and box, and lifted his hand to his mouth. "Uh...shit."
Danny slipped a hand around Steve's wrist. "Hey, you want to get off the floor maybe, huh? It's cold down here. You're cold."
Danny gripped Steve's wrist tighter, frowning when something felt wrong. He focused for a moment and then realized what it was. "Uh, Steve," he said, his fingers feeling for the thick veins just below Steve's wrist, "I don't want to alarm you, but I can't find your pulse."
"Fuck," Steve said, jerking his hand out of Danny's. He picked up the box and knife and stood, pushing past Danny and into the bedroom, looking awfully steady for a dead guy.
Danny rubbed his eyes and looked again, but Steve was still upright. He put the box and knife on the nightstand and sat down, elbows on his knees, before dropping his head into his hands. The pose left the towel around his waist open just enough that Danny had to avert his eyes--the last thing he needed was his libido in the way of all...this. Whatever this was.
Grabbing the edge of the vanity, Danny pulled himself to his feet and joined Steve, sitting down beside him on the bed. "So..." he said, after a moment, "anything you want to tell me?"
Steve sighed heavily, showing an impressive set of lungs for a dead guy. "I really never found an easy way to say this," he said, turning his head just enough to meet Danny's eyes. "I'm a vampire."
"Right, because the way you soak in the sun like a special sun sponge screams vampire. Also, I noticed how you go around biting everyone on the neck." Not that Danny would complain if Steve bit his neck, but actually breaking the skin and drinking his blood wasn't really what he had in mind. "What's really going on?"
Steve just gave him a steady look. "I," he said carefully, "am a vampire."
"Okay, really, is whatever going on so bad that you have to resort to this as--"
In a flash, Steve's eyes went white and he made some kind of noise between a growl and a hiss as he flashed a set of--holy fuck, fangs, at Danny. Danny scrambled back and fell off the bed, landing in an ungainly heap on the floor. "Jesus!" he said, grabbing at his heart. "Fucking warn a guy, would you?"
Steve's mouth was closed, but his eyes were still that strange whitish color, and his expression...forget his old German Shepherd. Danny had been with a team back in Jersey that had broken up a dog fighting ring, and the dogs who'd been there a while had that same expression. Wary, their heads twitching at every little sound--even the ones no human could hear, smelling the air for any sign of danger.
Like Steve had been at the crime scene after--fuck, after all that blood.
Fuck. Fucking, fucking fuck.
"You're not kidding," Danny said, slowly, "are you?"
Steve shook his head.
After a moment, Danny pushed himself up off the floor and sat back down beside Steve on the bed. "Okay."
Steve's ultra-confused face looked a little odd with the white eyes in the middle of it, but it was still Steve. "Okay?"
Danny shrugged. "Okay."
"I tell you I'm a vampire and all you have to say is 'Okay?'"
"No, dumbass, that is not all I have to say. That is where I start, though. Okay?"
Steve blinked, and the white eyes turned back into his normal, decidedly more attractive, eyes, and his face looked more normal. "Okay."
"So what's the story?" Danny asked. "How is it that you walk around fooling everyone--even the Navy and the doctors--into thinking you're human?"
"Because I am."
"You just said you're a vampire."
"I am."
"How can you be both?"
Steve picked up the box off the nightstand and handed it to Danny. "With this."
Danny frowned, opening the box to see what looked like traces of thick blood, or something. It was all he could do not to drop it. He handed it back to Steve as quickly as he could. "What is that, exactly?"
"A cure." Steve's mouth twisted up. "But only a temporary one."
"Looks like it's almost gone."
Steve nodded. "I've been waiting as long as I possibly could to take it each time. This time I waited a little too long, and...." He waved a hand at his face.
"So, what, if you don't take that every six months or so you turn back into a vampire?"
Steve cocked his head, brow furrowing. "How'd you know it was six months?"
"Because about every six months you act like you have been the last couple of days, you disappear for a day, and then you're fine. I'm a detective, you schmuck." He smacked Steve against the back of his head. "And that's for not telling me sooner. Though it probably didn't even hurt, did it? No wonder your fucking skull is so thick."
"Will it make you feel better if I tell you it hurt?"
Danny rolled his eyes. "You're not any better at lying as a vampire than you are as a human."
"Danny...." Steve had that confused look again. "You're taking this really well."
Danny laughed. "I'm really, really not, Steven. I am so not taking this well, you have no idea. I promise you, when I have actually had time to realize this is not a bad hallucination or some form of torture where a bad guy has drugged us, that I will have a complete freak out, all right? But right now I just need to know--what happens now?"
"The cure goes into my bloodstream. I cut myself and put some in there, and I'm human."
"I hear a 'but' at the end of that sentence."
Steve sighed. "I've been trying to have someone replicate the cure. A friend back on the mainland has been helping me--"
"--and by friend you mean vampire friend?"
"Yeah."
"So this friend wants the cure, too?"
Steve laughed. "God, no, Josef would rather be burned alive than be human." His smile faded, and became softer, and Danny felt a twinge of jealousy at the fond look. "But he knows how much it means to me. So he's helping."
"Well, good, the more the merrier."
Steve's eyes narrowed. "What are you talking about?"
"You don't think I'm going to just walk away from this, do you?"
"Danny, you don't know what you're getting into. The people who created this cure don't want it replicated. And they're very dangerous."
Danny shrugged. "I've saved the world, Steven."
"This is not the same thing."
"Seriously, saved the world. Super virus. Gonna kill off the human race. And I did it without you."
"Danny, this is not--"
"No, Steven. It's not the same thing." Danny rose and started pacing the floor. "Let me guess, these are big, bad vampires who could, what, break my neck? Kill me? Compel me to kill other people?"
Steve got up, standing in Danny's way until Danny had to stop in front of him. "Yes, they could break your neck before you even saw them coming a mile away. And seriously, I told you to stop watching that vampire diary thing--it's ridiculously inaccurate."
"Grace likes it. And you mean you don't have a diary stashed around here somewhere from the 1800s?" Danny raised an eyebrow. "I'm horribly disappointed." A sudden thought cheered him, "Oh, but I bet you have pictures from the seventies! Where are they?"
Steve made a lower version of that weird growl that Danny swore to himself was not even remotely hot even as his dick said otherwise. There was a burst of wind, and Steve was gone, then he was there again, only his eyes were white once more, and he had a knife against Danny's throat.
"You see how fast that was?" Steve growled out.
Danny was seriously going to have to have a talk with his dick about finding all this so incredibly hot. Because, come on, knife to the throat here. But Steve, with the growling and that insanely intense look on his face, even with the white eyes...Danny was having trouble remembering the problem.
The metal pressed a little harder, and Danny remembered, a moment before he realized the metal was kind of blunt. "Is that a butter knife?"
Steve blinked. "You don't think I'd actually hold a knife on you that might hurt you, do you?"
"How do I know what vampires might and might not do? You just told me that show was wrong."
"Dammit, Danny, you do not get how serious this is!"
"Yes, I do, Steve." Danny wrapped his hand around Steve's wrist, lowering it from Danny's throat, but not moving away. "You're very fast. I get it."
Steve shook his head slowly. "I'm weak right now compared to all but the newest of vampires. And the ones who created this cure are the oldest, strongest vampires in existence. They could snap your neck and not even be a blip on the best camera in the world if you were standing right in front of it."
"And a sniper could kill me with a rifle from even farther away with no warning," Danny said calmly. Because he needed Steve calm, and he needed Steve not to run, which he was apparently very fast at doing. "There are a million ways for me to die, babe," Danny said quietly. "And unless you're the one who takes my life deliberately and knowingly with your own hand, none of them are your fault."
Steve swallowed carefully, his eyes closing. When he opened, they were back to normal. "Okay. You can help, on one condition. You do what I say."
"That's a pretty broad condition."
"When I tell you to run, you run. When I tell you to hide, you hide. When I tell you to stay, you stay."
"I'm not a dog."
Steve stepped even closer, and Danny had to struggle to stand his ground. Steve's legs were brushing against his, and Danny realized that Steve had apparently lost his towel in his run for the knife. "I'll know the danger's coming long before you do, and you have to at least let me try to protect you. I need to know you'll listen in that kind of situation."
"Of course. Don't I always?" At Steve's raised eyebrows, Danny said, "When you have an actual reason other than your self-sacrificing martyr complex, I listen."
"Okay." Steve let out a long breath. "Okay."
Danny nodded. "Good, now that that's settled, we need to figure out our next steps. And I think the first of those should be you putting some clothes on."
Steve's eyes widened, and Danny would swear he'd have blushed if he...well, if he could have. "Uh, yeah, good idea." Steve stepped back, turning his back to Danny as soon as he could, but not so quick that Danny didn't get a glimpse of about the only part of Steve he didn't strip off and show on a regular basis.
The glimpse did nothing to help Danny's problem with his own dick, and he willed it to just stop right now. As Steve chose that moment to bend over to get clothes out of his drawer, Danny's dick didn't listen.
When Steve was dressed, he sat back down on the bed. Danny sat down beside him. "Okay," Danny said. "So, when I came in, you were passed out on the floor. You said you were about to take that," he nodded at the box on the nightstand, "but you hadn't yet. Why?"
"I'd been trying to wait as long as I could, but I knew I couldn't wait any longer. So I was trying to decide if I might have better luck getting more cure if I stayed a vampire. And then I passed out."
"Why did you pass out?"
Steve licked his lips, and wouldn't quite meet Danny's eyes. "Hunger."
"See? You should've eaten earlier."
"No, not that kind of hunger."
Steve met Danny's eyes at last, and Danny realized what he was talking about. And that Danny was the closest food truck on the island. And that look in Steve's eyes wasn't just his usual look that Danny had yet to figure out if he was undressing him in his head or what. "Oh."
"Yeah."
Danny clamped down on the sudden urge to offer up a vein. "So, uh, how do you, I mean...where did you...eat last time?"
Steve shook his head. "I haven't fed in years. I've been human, remember?"
"How long have you been human?"
"Twenty years." Steve glanced down. "It's a long story."
"I've got time."
Rubbing at his neck, Steve shifted back on the bed a little more. "You might, but I don't."
"You have somewhere you need to be?"
"No." He met Danny's eyes once more. "I'm hungry, remember?"
Oh. Right. Danny had been trying to forget that, because he was trying to forget all the images it put into his head, and how it made him want to shove Steve back on the bed and practically impale his neck on Steve's teeth.
He was never, ever letting Grace watch that stupid vampire show again, because clearly it was warping his brain. Who knew what it would do to hers long term, especially now that he knew there were actual vampires out there.
Holy fuck.
Steve was a vampire.
Holy. What. The. Fuck.
"You're a vampire."
Steve ducked his head a little, getting closer. "We covered that."
"You're an actual, living, breathing vampire."
"Well, not so much on the living part, but--hey, Danny, you okay?"
Danny put his head in his hands, but that didn't stop the dizziness. He felt Steve pressing on his neck, pushing his head down between his knees, and after a moment, the dizziness passed.
"Danny?"
"I'm okay. I just..." He sat up, finding Steve's face, studying every aspect of it. Apart from the lack of his usual tan, it was the same stupid face he'd been trying to get the courage to kiss for a while. "You're a vampire."
Steve nodded slowly, and that kicked puppy look was back again, like Steve was ready to bolt at the first sign that Danny wasn't okay with it. And that look was wrong on that face. He hated it every time it showed up, hated that anything put it there.
He reached up to touch Steve's face, watching as little muscles just below the skin twitched in different places as Danny ran his hand down the side of Steve's cheek. Steve still looked like was afraid Danny was going to slap him. "Show me," Danny said quietly.
"You saw."
"No. Show me."
For a moment he thought Steve was going to refuse. But then he got that resolved look, and in a second, his face changed. Danny looked closely and realized his eyes weren't white. They were more of a light ice blue. They also looked like he hadn't slept in a week, from the red skin around them. He wondered if that stayed like that, or if it would fill in if Steve fed.
He wondered if Steve would let him find out.
He ran his thumb across Steve's lips. They looked chapped, and were a little rough under his thumb, making him wonder what they'd feel like on his.
Danny leaned in, his hand sliding to Steve's neck, intent on finding out, but a strong hand on his chest stopped him. "Danny, don't."
He paused, studying Steve's face and making a determination. "You want it, too."
"That's not why I'm stopping you."
"Then why?"
"I'm hungry."
Right. That was a bad thing. He wasn't supposed to want Steve to.... "You know what?" Danny said. "I don't care."
He tried to lean in again, but apparently that thing about vampires having superhuman strength was true. "I do."
And he was right to care, Danny knew. It just didn't stop Danny from wanting. But he sat back, taking a deep breath. "You were trying to decide if you wanted to stay a vampire to help your search for the cure, right?" At Steve's nod, Danny said, "So what was your decision?"
"I hadn't made one before I passed out."
"How will it help?"
Steve made that impatient noise that Danny was far too familiar with. "There's a small group of islanders who live in the forests. They move around a lot. Rumor has it they know about supernatural beings and might actually have something that can actually bind the cure."
"What?"
"Every time we tried to replicate the cure, it wouldn't work. For some reasons the ingredients wouldn't bind together right, no matter how great the scientists were, no matter how cutting edge their research or abilities. So finally we realized that maybe we didn't need the latest scientific ability. Maybe we needed something old."
"And this group has it?"
Steve shrugged. "Maybe. The rumors said something about a plant--holei. Very rare--thought to be extinct. But these people may know where to find it. And supposedly they respect spirits. They revere demons. And I'm about as demonic as they come."
"Don't say that."
"You don't know me."
"I do," Danny insisted. "I know you. Whatever you may have done a hundred years ago, that's not important."
Steve licked his lips. "I'm not a hundred years old yet," he said.
"Oh, so you're a baby vampire, then," Danny teased. "How old are you?"
"Ninety...ish."
"Cradle-robber."
Steve finally laughed, but it didn't do much for the tension in the rest of his body. "You're really okay with this?"
"Yeah." Whether he was crazy or in shock, Danny wasn't sure, but he couldn't be anything other than okay with Steve in any form. "I know you, remember? Your physiological make up doesn't change who you are."
Some of the tension seeped out of Steve's shoulders. "Thank you."
"You're welcome. So, these islanders. You think if you go to them as a vampire, you might stand a better chance of getting what you need?"
"Yeah, it's just...I don't want to be this. Even for a day."
"But if being this for a day means you never have to be it again...."
Steve's eyes closed. "You're right," he said, hanging his head.
"It's just a day, Steven."
"I know, it's just...." He glanced up at Danny through his lashes. "If I'm going to be this for a day, I have to feed. And soon."
Danny licked his lips, not missing the way Steve's eyes snapped to Danny's mouth. Just like he didn't miss the way Steve's eyes drifted back to Danny's neck. "You have to feed, Steve, you said it yourself."
"I can't."
His protest sounded weaker, though, and he couldn't take his eyes off Danny's neck. "Hey," Danny said, putting his hand on Steve's cheek again, forcing Steve to look him in the eye. "It's no different than anything else we'd do for each other. We're partners, remember?"
"Danny...."
"What, is there some sort of forbidden rule about this?" Danny blinked. "Wait, it's not going to turn me into one, is it?"
Steve shook his head. "No."
"Then what's the problem, babe? Because from where I stand it's either me, or I go get Mrs. Kapule's cat next door, and I'm pretty sure she could take down a vampire if it hurt that cat."
Steve managed a smile at that. "The last time I fed off someone I...cared about, it didn't end well."
"What, did they leave?"
He shook his head again. "Not willingly."
"What happened?"
"She died."
Danny thought about that for second. "Did you kill her?"
"No. It was...she was helping me try to get a cure, and...they killed her."
"The vampires you were talking about who didn't want anyone to have this cure?" At Steve's nod, Danny said, "So we know what they're capable of, then. We'll be careful."
"Danny--"
"Steven. You're going after this cure. And you're going to have to feed to get it." Danny put his other hand on Steve's other cheek, framing his face. "I'm right here. And I'm not going anywhere."
Steve stared at him for a long moment. Danny wondered if they sat there long enough if Steve's instincts would take over. If he'd have no choice. "How much longer can you last?"
"Not long," Steve said.
"Then either you do it now, while we're both in control, or we sit here until you're not in control, right?" Steve didn't deny it. "So what's it gonna be?"
Steve closed his eyes, and Danny could see the second he made up his mind. Steve took off his watch and handed it to Danny. "Twenty seconds," Steve said. "If I don't stop in twenty seconds, you make me."
"Okay."
"Danny." Steve gave him a long look. "I'm serious. No more, all right?"
"Okay. Twenty seconds, got it." Danny set the timer on the watch. "So, uh...how do you, um...."
He couldn't figure out how to ask, so he tilted his head, pushing the collar of his shirt aside to bare his neck. Steve looked hungrily at it, but shook his head and took Danny's arm. "Wrist," he said. "It'll be easier for you to stop me."
Danny nodded, watching as Steve lifted his wrist to his mouth. Danny braced himself, but Steve didn't bite just yet. He ran his nose along Danny's wrist, inhaling deeply, like the smell was intoxicating. The sight of it made Danny's dick press uncomfortably against his zipper.
Steve looked up at Danny through his lashes, his lips moving against Danny's wrist as he said, "Twenty seconds" in a low growl that went straight to Danny's dick.
Danny hit the timer button and Steve's fangs flashed a second before Danny felt them sink into his skin. The pain was sharp, but gone in an instant, replaced by something good. Really good. It made its way up Danny's arm, nerve endings tingling as it spread through his body.
It was all so good, that feeling, the way Steve looked as he sucked hungrily at Danny's wrist, he never wanted it to stop. But he wanted more. He slid closer to Steve, his arm going around Steve's back, his lips tracing their way down the side of Steve's neck.
He'd been cold, but he was warming up a little as the blood flowed through him. Danny's blood, moving through Steve's body, keeping him alive. It was a powerful feeling, better than sex, he thought, but he wanted to try that too, just to see.
The watch timer startled him, the beeping loud in the near silence that had surrounded them. Danny pulled himself off Steve with difficulty. "Steve. Time's up."
Steve blinked at him for a second before he stopped sucking and pulled his teeth out of Danny's wrist. He licked at the wounds one more time and Danny shivered at the feeling. "Hang on," Steve said, his voice thick, as he got up and went into the bathroom.
Danny watched him, want pulsing through him, need crackling through every nerve in his body as Steve came back to the bed, his eyes and face back to normal. He put a bandage over the wounds on Danny's wrist, running a finger over the bandage when it was done before he looked up at Danny.
The lust in his eyes was staggering, and Danny surged forward, pushing Steve onto the bed as he captured his lips in a kiss. He'd barely managed to get their lips together when he found himself on his back, Steve over him on all fours.
For all that his face was normal once more, the look on it was still feral, pulling an answering feeling out of Danny. His hips thrust up, looking for friction, needing Steve against him, but Steve was too far above him. Danny pulled at Steve's hips, but he couldn't move him.
Steve's eyes were moving rapidly all over Danny, like he wasn't sure where to start. Then they focused on Danny's chest. It wasn't until Danny heard the sound of buttons flying and unmistakable ripping sounds that he realized his shirt was literally being torn off him.
When the shirt was gone, Steve bent his head, slowly making a line with his tongue from Danny's collarbone, down the middle of his chest to his waistband. Steve looked up at him, nostrils flaring. "Do you have any idea how good you smell?" he asked, his voice even more of a turn on, deep and gravely, like the animal inside of him was leaking out a little through his vocal chords. "How good you taste?"
Danny's hips pushed up, Steve's weight on his thighs keeping them from moving too much. The motion drew Steve's eyes to Danny's hips, though, and he reached for Danny's fly, making quick work of the pants without ripping them, but only just. He got rid of Danny's shoes and socks in the process.
Steve stripped his own clothes off so fast Danny could barely see it. He was fine with that, though, because he got a good look at naked Steve, in all his glory, as he pulled something out of the nightstand drawer and tossed it on the bed beside Danny.
Then Steve was back on the bed, kneeling beside Danny, looking down at him for a moment before his hands traced their way down Danny's thigh to his knee. Steve moved one of his legs over to sit in between Danny's, then the other, pushing Danny's legs apart.
Steve dipped his head down and took Danny's dick in his mouth, and Danny couldn't help but thrust into him. He'd woken from his fair share of dreams about this, always disappointed to realize it wasn't real, but this was real.
Okay, so it was a little more fantasy than reality in some ways, but as long as Steve had his mouth on Danny's dick, he wasn't going to complain.
He whimpered when Steve let him go, only to have to bite back a curse as Steve's mouth moved lower, sucking on Danny's balls. "Fucking...fuck, yeah, keep...fuck!" He didn't want to know who Steve had learned this technique on, didn't want to think about anyone else getting this, because this was amazing and Danny never wanted anyone other than him to have it again.
Steve lifted Danny up, his tongue delving further still, licking around his hole before slowly sliding inside. Danny pushed into it, dying a little every time Steve's tongue pushed in. "God...fuck...Steve...don't...just, keep, yeah, um...fuck!"
Steve raised his head, and Danny glared at him. He couldn't gather the words to tell him to get the fuck back down there right now, but then he saw Steve reach for the stuff he'd tossed on the bed. Lube, Danny realized, as Steve put it on his fingers a second before he pushed two fingers inside Danny.
It was good, almost as good as Steve's tongue, but nowhere as good as he knew Steve's dick was going to be. Danny pushed up, impatient to get Steve inside him, and Steve gave a dark chuckle. "Danny, do you have any idea what you look like?"
Danny bit his lip, trying to read Steve's face and failing. "What?"
"Hot," Steve said, pulling his fingers out and coating his dick with lube. "Like sex come to life," he added, as he lifted Danny's legs up on to his shoulders and lined his dick up against Danny's hole. "And absolutely and completely mine," Steve said as he thrust inside.
"Fuck!" Danny pushed hard, wanting Steve as deep as he could get, wanting to feel him everywhere, inside and out. He knew Steve could feel Danny coursing through his veins--literally--and he wanted as close to that as he could get.
Steve set a relentless pace, but Danny matched him stroke for stroke. Steve's hand gripped Danny's dick, moving in time with their bodies, harder and faster, until Danny came, seeing stars as his eyes scrunched shut. It was like Steve feeding off him all over again, but better, the link between them connected, going both ways now that he knew what Steve felt like inside of him.
Steve thrust hard a few more times, then stilled. Danny opened his eyes just in time to see Steve in the throes of his orgasm, looking as beautiful as if he'd been sculpted out of marble. He committed the image to memory, in case he never got the chance again.
After a shuddering breath, Steve collapsed onto Danny, a solid, heavy weight. He lay there for a minute before sliding off to the side, one arm and leg still draped over Danny's body, his mouth close to Danny's ear.
"Did I hurt you?"
Steve's voice was barely a whisper. Danny shook his head, turning onto his side to face Steve without dislodging his arm and leg. "I told you you couldn't hurt me," Danny said. "That was so far from hurting me I can't even remember what pain feels like."
Steve studied Danny's face for a long moment. "Why isn't this freaking you out?"
"Who said it wasn't?"
And really, his confused as hell face was still adorable, even now. "You seem to be taking it pretty well."
"What choice do I have?" Danny slid a leg between Steve's, inching himself even closer. "I've always been adaptable."
"Right. Because the way you bitch about every little change screams flexible."
Danny smacked him on the shoulder. "Bitching is how I adapt," he said. He ducked his head in a little more, lips close to Steve's. "And if you're nice to me, I might even show you how flexible I really am."
He took a second to appreciate what the thought of that did to Steve's face before he closed the last of the distance between them, capturing Steve's mouth. He wasn't lying; there was a part of his brain that was still completely freaking out over everything that had happened this afternoon. It was the same part that freaked out over things like chasing down a terrorist bomber or human-race ending viruses. It was the part he couldn't let keep him from doing what needed to be done.
Navy SEALs didn't have a monopoly on compartmentalization.
And, vampire or not, this was Steve. The guy could have a gun to Danny's head and he wouldn't be able to find it in himself to be scared. Because he knew that Steve would turn the gun on himself rather than shoot Danny. He'd bet his life--literally--that vampire Steve wasn't any different.
Though, was he actually vampire "Steve"?
"Hey," Danny said, pulling back just enough to see Steve's face again. "What's your name?"
One of Steve's eyebrows quirked up. "You always sleep with people before asking them their name?"
"Once, in college," Danny said, trying to hide his amusement at the dark, jealous look that flickered across Steve's face at that, "and that's not the point here."
"Right. Sorry." Steve sighed, settling into Danny's arms a little more. "My name is Steve McGarrett now," he said. "Legally. Dad--John McGarrett--was my son."
"Wait, what?" Well hell, no wonder he'd had that much grief over John McGarrett's death. He hadn't lost a father, but he had lost a son. "Man...I'm sorry, babe."
Steve shrugged, but Danny didn't miss the way he swallowed hard, or the pain on his face. "Being a vampire...you come to accept that everyone around you will grow old and die."
Even if Danny hadn't known better, Steve's tone was easy to read. "Yeah, because you're all about accepting the inevitable," Danny teased. "So, McGarrett was your name?"
Steve shook his head. "My wife's maiden name." He swallowed, and Danny marveled that memories from so long ago could still be so painful. But then, that was Steve. "She was pregnant when I enlisted in the Navy after Pearl Harbor," he said quietly, his eyes on Danny, but his mind clearly elsewhere, seeing something Danny couldn't. "She died giving birth, and John stayed with her parents while I fought in the war."
"Where were your parents?" Danny asked.
"They died when I was a teenager."
"I'm sorry."
One of Steve's shoulders lifted in a half-shrug. "It was a long time ago."
And it was, before Danny was even born, but he could see that Steve still carried it with him, the way he carried all his loss and what he saw as failures. Danny had never met anyone who carried all that around and still used it to do good the way Steve did. It was hard to watch, but it made Danny want to do more. Be more. "So what happened after the war?"
"John had been raised by her parents for a few years," Steve said. "It didn't make any sense to uproot him. So they adopted him. I mean, he knew I was his father, and I saw him occasionally until...well, once I was turned, he was a pawn that could be used against me."
"You were searching for the cure even then?"
Steve shook his head. "No, but my...my wife at the time would've used him. So I did my best to make sure she didn't know he existed." Steve sighed. "Unfortunately, she found some letters from him when he was twelve."
And from the way Steve said it, it didn't sound like that turned out well. "I'm guessing she wasn't too happy about that."
"Oh, no, she was ecstatic. She thought a child was just what we needed to be happy." Steve's mouth twisted up. "Vampires can't have kids. Which is for the best. But Coraline wanted to be a happy family. So she lured John out to California with letters saying she was me, and surprised me one night."
Steve swallowed against the pain that Danny could feel in the tension in every inch of Steve's body. "She was going to turn him, so he could be our kid forever."
Danny tried to imagine being twelve for eternity. Growing, learning, but never getting any older, having people treat you like a kid for centuries. "That's sick."
"Yeah, well, that was par for the course for Coraline." Steve shuddered a little, and Danny wondered what memory had caused it. "She had reasons for turning out the way she did. Not that it makes anything she did okay, but...we all have our crosses to bear." He focused on Danny's eyes again. "And the longer we bear them, the heavier they get."
"So...what happened? Obviously she didn't turn John."
Steve shook his head. "No. I stopped her."
He sounded so resolute, so determined about being okay with whatever he'd done that Danny hated to ask. But. "How?"
"I staked her, set the house on fire, took John and ran."
"You staked her and burned the place down? Isn't that overkill?"
"A stake doesn't kill us--though you can see why we'd be okay with that legend, since people generally think they're done if they stake us. It just paralyzes us. But fire. That will kill us."
It sounded so strange to hear Steve referring to himself as part of the vampire community, even after all Danny had seen and experienced. "Good to know," Danny said. "What else will hurt or kill you?"
"Why, planning to make your escape?"
He tried to play it off as a joke, but Danny could hear the fear behind it. Steve was still convinced Danny wouldn't stay once he realized all this was real. The lack of trust would've hurt, if Danny didn't have an idea of the almost 100 years of reasons Steve had to expect it. "No, you schmuck," Danny said, smacking Steve again. "But if I'm going into the forest with you, I need to know what to look out for."
"You're not going."
"You think I'm going to let you go alone? You're crazier than I thought."
"If something happens, I can move faster without you."
Danny raised an eyebrow. "And you can't move just as fast if you're carrying me if something happens?"
He could see Steve was looking for another reason to stop Danny from going with him. "We don't know what kinds of abilities these people have," Steve said.
"Exactly. They know so much about demons and spirits, they might know a dozen ways to incapacitate you that you can't combat. You need backup."
Steve's jaw was set. "I don't need backup."
"You do." Danny was not prepared to back down on this one. "And I will listen to you when we're there, I swear. You say run, I run, etc. But if you go in there alone, I will go in there on my own to look for you. Do you want me out there alone at night?"
The guilt that flashed across Steve's face told him he'd been right--Steve had been thinking of sneaking out and going alone. "All right," he said finally. "I'll take you with me."
"Thank you," Danny said. "And while you're being so agreeable, maybe you could answer the question I asked like half a year ago?"
"Which one?"
Danny rolled his eyes. "What was your name?"
"Oh. Mick," he said. "Mick St. John."
Danny considered the name for a moment. "It doesn't really suit you."
That got a smile out of Steve. "I've grown very fond of Steve McGarrett," he said. The smile faded. "I took it from Celia's brother. He was the Steve McGarrett who went down on the Arizona."
"Celia?"
"My first wife. John's mother."
"What was she like?"
Steve shook his head, pulling Danny against him with one leg. "I'll tell you all about her sometime," he said. "But right now, we have about 2 hours until sundown. And as we need a little time to plan, what do you say to a little...relaxation before we get to work?"
Danny smiled, his hand moving up Steve's back to the back of his neck. "I think that's an excellent idea."
***
Part 2