Chapter Text
Steve was a little bit confused.
See, he figured that a large part of why Danny was so angry and ornery all the time was that he desperately needed to get laid. Between the type of guy Danno was, and the fact that he and Rachel hadn’t been divorced for altogether that long, Steve had an idea that Danny probably hadn’t had sex in a good, long while. As ugly as the divorce had been (by all accounts), and seeing how Danno had been in Hawaii for six months before Steve ever met him, Steve was calculating it’d been no less than one year, and possibly as many as two (unless, of course, Danny and Rachel were the type to have angry sex in the latter months of their marriage going to hell).
So Steve was happy as a clam when Danny fell all over himself trying to speak to one Dr. Gabrielle Asano. He’d never seen his partner have so much trouble making words come out of his mouth because, hello. This was Danno he was talking about. So it was highly amusing but also something Steve was glad for, because with any luck, Danny would start getting laid soon, and on a regular basis.
He watched his partner carefully. Listened to his words and tone of voice. Noted his body language.
And three months after the first time Danny asked Gabby out for coffee (at Steve’s insistence – yes, he is that meddlesome when it comes to his partner), not one damn thing about Danny’s general demeanor had changed.
Not one.
Steve thought perhaps he needed to reassess his original hypothesis about Danny’s problem being lack of sex.
After the whole Steve-gets-arrested-and-thrown-in-jail-then-escapes-and-is-on-the-run-from-HPD incident, Danny conceded ties. That was good for a variety of reasons, not the least of which was that it meant Steve saw more of Danny’s neck and chest than he was used to.
But really, that was all that had changed. He still wore footwear that was largely questionable, still wore dress slacks, and still wore nice button-down shirts.
Once Danny had finally learned how to surf reasonably well, and Steve had started asking him to join him for a few waves now and again, Steve even got to see his partner in nothing but swim trunks and hey, that was a major win.
In fact, Steve discovered, it was even better than that. It was huge. Fantastic. Awesome. Kick-ass. Why? Well, because during all the months Steve had spent contemplating his partner’s sex life, he discovered something about himself: he liked Danny.
No, no. Liked. As in liked. A lot. In a big way.
The first time he saw Danny in board shorts, he was struck by how hairy the guy was, and the tips of his fingers itched to feel whether the hair was coarse or soft; whether it was different over his pecs than it was in the line down his belly. If his arm hairs felt different than the always-perfect hair on his head.
The second time, when the two of them were becoming ‘surf buddies’ as Mary put it (and oh, that Danny would never find out precisely what that phrase meant on the North Shore, for the love of Pete), Steve realized as he watched Danny paddling out to where the waves were breaking, how muscular his partner was. Well, he’d known Danny was strong, of course, but with all those clothes on, he’d never caught a glimpse of the muscles in his arms or the ones in his legs. Just like he’d never seen his six-pack or his nipples.
And oh, his nipples. The whole time Mary was there in the house with them not drinking the cup of coffee Steve brought her, he was having a difficult time concentrating on the conversation simply because he could not get Danny’s nipples out of his mind’s eye. His lips itched with the desire to wrap around the tiny little buds, his teeth ached wanting to nip them just to see if Danny would gasp, cry out or silently arch into him.
The shit of it was, now that Danny was seemingly becoming more comfortable in his own skin, and more comfortable with the fact that he was going to be in Hawaii for a while…just as it seemed he was moving away from Rachel and moving on with Gabby…just as it seemed that the partners were becoming closer and closer in terms of sharing their feelings, well…all hell broke loose.
Shelburne was Steve’s not-dead mother.
Rachel was moving to Las Vegas, taking Grace (Danny’s only reason for being in Hawaii to begin with) with her.
Chin’s wife died.
Kono was still dating Adam Noshimuri and being hardly cordial to her cousin in light of the decision he’d made.
So now it was the summer, and rather than it being what Steve had been planning it would be – namely a fun time where he and Danny and Grace would go surfing together every weekend Danny had her, would have barbecues together at Steve’s house, and where he and Danny would grow even closer – it was a nightmare.
As Steve fought to understand who his mother really was, why she’d faked her own death, and to comfort his very upset sister.
As Danny fought to keep Grace (and therefore himself) in Hawaii.
As Chin fought desperate grief and rage and the angst of his cousin’s confusion and sadness.
As Kono realized once and for all that Adam was still a crook and she couldn’t see him anymore without compromising her own principles, as well as trying to get over her hard feelings that Chin had chosen Malia over her and it’d made no difference in the end.
They were torn completely apart, the four who’d grown so close over two years’ time.
Danny was even more cranky than usual, and Steve found out he’d stopped seeing Gabby altogether, truly believing he’d never win the case to keep Rachel from taking Grace to Vegas. And Steve didn’t have a spare moment for a whole month to try to help his teammates in any way thanks to Five-0’s caseload and trying to deal with his mother and sister.
But then something started to happen for their ohana.
By the time the end of the summer was near, Doris McGarrett and Joe White were gone, supposedly for good this time. Mary returned to Los Angeles, and a new job.
Rachel and Stan didn’t move, meaning Grace (and therefore Danny) was remaining on Oahu.
Chin found the inner strength to deal with the loss of his wife, and the inner strength to approach Kono about the choice he’d made.
Kono came to terms with the fact that she’d fallen in love with a criminal, and slowly began to heal from the pain of the loss. She also found her own inner strength to listen to Chin, to accept why he’d done what he’d done and to start healing that relationship which had always been unbreakable before.
When, on a Monday morning, the four convened in the Five-0 bullpen, it was under a blanket of silence. So much had changed for each of them over the past few months and yet here they all were, still together, still working, still existing.
Kono and Chin hugged. Left over, maybe, from some conversation that occurred over the weekend.
Danny wasn’t waving his hands around or giving Steve shit for anything as he brought two coffees for himself and Kono, and two Chai teas for Steve and Chin. He left the bag of malasadas were anyone could grab one if they chose.
Instead of heading to their own offices, they sat around the table in the conference room where once they had all sat watching reruns of CHiPs. They drank their coffees and teas, but still no one said a word. At one point, Danny looked up at Steve. And when Steve returned his partner’s gaze, he saw in blue eyes that maybe the things he’d come to realize about Danny, were things that Danny had also come to realize about him, in the months before the shitstorm rained down on them.
He wondered. And he decided to test his theory out.
So before the day of doing mostly paperwork with a few follow-up calls to witnesses from their previous case thrown in was over, Steve invited Danny over to his place for steaks and beer. Danny readily agreed. It was a date.
At least, in Steve’s mind it was.
He left the office early to stop and pick up the steaks and the beer, and to get home and get things tidied up before Danny’s scheduled arrival at seven. Before leaving he’d briefly spoken to both Chin and Kono, separately, and received hugs from both, with promises to attend a Team Barbecue at Steve’s place this coming Saturday, just the four of them.
So all in all, Steve was very happy by the time he’d finished marinating the steaks, picking up stray crap from here, there and everywhere, and showering. Danny was due in fifteen minutes, and so Steve fired up the grill. He felt as nervous as any guy might feel on a first date, and yet he was sure his partner wasn’t thinking of this visit in that way.
Danny was probably just thinking hey, buddy time…bro time. Friendship time. Probably not wanting to be alone after having had Grace with him the entire weekend. Probably thinking about free food and beer, and some good-natured bantering and fighting over which Summer Olympic event to watch.
But Steve had plans. He was going to seduce Danny tonight, he vowed to himself, at least to the point where his partner allowed a kiss.
He wanted it to go further, but didn’t know if it would.
He wasn’t sure about any of this, but he was sure about the look he’d seen in Danny’s eyes at the conference table that morning.
So Steve was going to stick his neck out. He was going to work his way into this thing with Danny, ease them both into it. Prove to Danny that he was worth investing his heart in, as Steve had already – without realizing it at first, of course – invested his.
Yes, he wanted to make love to Danny.
But more than that, he wanted to give Danny what he so clearly had been lacking for so long. Steve didn’t think it was just getting laid, not anymore. He thought it was that combined with something else. Something guys don’t talk about a whole lot. Something he thought Danny needed even more desperately than Steve did.
Love.
Love and acceptance of who you were and what you were, very nearly unconditionally.
Danny could give love in spades. Steve had witnessed this repeatedly between the man and his daughter.
Well, Steve could give it, too.
He just hoped Danny would be open to receiving it. And he hoped that Danny would stop being wound as tight as a new snare drum, because of it.