Danny met Kono's car on Pali Highway just before the large hairpin curve that took you out of your way east before getting you back on track - at least, as far as he could see on his Smartphone's map app. Kono rolled down her window and waved her hand out of it. Danny did the same to acknowledge, then dialed her cell phone.

"You're on speaker," she said by way of answering. "Have you been able to get in contact with him?"

"Nothing. Goes to voice mail every time."

"And I'll bet you left increasingly irate voice mails every time," Chin accused.

"Not every time," Danny countered with a full-fledged pout in place.

But nobody laughed. Because each and every one of Steve's team members knew damn well this was not their boss's M.O.

"I'm sure he's fine," Kono offered as they reached the hairpin part of the Pali's curve.

"If he is…" Danny growled, feeling equal parts of anger and downright freak-out fighting like warring factions in his chest.

"You'll kick his ass?" Chin asked.

"Damn straight."

"I called the Kaneohe City Police as soon as you got us that address," Chin said. "They're sending every available unit ahead of us. They should be on-scene…any time now."

As if on cue, Danny heard Chin's cell phone ring. He listened as Chin answered the phone. He heard the tone of Chin's voice change from hopeful to disappointed to something else he'd never actually heard in the man's voice before, not even when he'd been kneeling in a parking lot with a bomb strapped around his neck.

"All right, thank you. We just got on Kamehameha. We should be there in about ten minutes." He heard Chin sigh, could imagine the look he was exchanging with his cousin. "The house is cleaned out, Danny. Not so much as a stick of furniture or a speck of dirt to the naked eye."

"What about Steve's phone?"

"Nothing yet, but they only just got there and did a preliminary search. I told them on the initial call that they needed to be on the lookout for Steve's phone."

"Hang on for me a sec, guys," Danny said. He put the call to Kono's phone on hold, switched back to his contacts list and hit Steve's number.

The phone rang four times, and then was answered.

"Detective Williams, is that you?"

Danny's heart completely bottomed out. "Yes, who's this?"

"Officer Nathan Lane, sir, at the address your man Lieutenant Kelly sent us to."

"Nathan Lane?" Danny blinked. Because…really?

The officer sighed. "Yes, sir," he droned. Apparently he got a lot of guff about sharing a name with a famous actor.

"Where did you find McGarrett's phone?" Danny asked, mind back on the much more pressing matter.

"It was lying right next to the back door steps just under a bush of some sort. I took a photo of it before I saw it was you and answered it."

"Good man. Send the photo to me and do not let that phone out of your sight. I'll be there in five."

"Yes, sir."

Danny heard his phone bing an incoming text. He looked at the photo and it was just as Lane had said – Steve's phone was lying in dirt just under the edge of a bush. Danny could see gray-painted cement steps not too far from it. He quickly flipped back to Kono's call.

"I called Steve's number. One of the officers at the scene found the phone under a bush out in back of the house and answered it. He's hanging onto it. He texted me a picture, I'll shoot it your way, Chin. See if Charlie can lift anything from it."

"You got it. So no sign of Steve, but his phone's there."

"He probably planted it," Danny said.

"If he did, then he might've left us a message somewhere on it," Kono chimed in.

"Most likely, if I know Steve," Chin agreed.

Danny didn't say a word. Steve was separated from his phone. And that meant that right now, there was no way of knowing where the hell he was.

There was some kind of…goop…covering his eyes. Goop. He snorted quietly to himself. If only Danny could hear him use the word. The reaction would either be one of incredulousness complete with raised eyebrows and slightly open mouth, or a remark along the lines of, "Is that the Army term for it, Steven?"

Come to think of it, where was Danny, anyway?

Oh, yeah. They'd had a little disagreement this morning, so Steve was in Heeia. Right. He'd gone to talk to Romney Luka after Janalyn DeVoight had named the recently relocated mainlander as a potential witness to their most recent abduction.

Steve's mind followed the trail because right now he couldn't open his eyes and while he knew on some level that should bother him, the case and the missing man were front and center on his Worry List.

Over the past three weeks, eight men had gone missing from the various islands that constituted the State of Hawaii. Two from Maui, five from Oahu and one from the Big Island. All men were between six feet and six-foot-two, with dark hair – sometimes brown, sometimes black – and dark eyes. HPD had keyed in on the similarity and then Governor Denning's morning phone call had come advising McGarrett that a man had gone missing from Diamond Head.

Mike Laszlo had been set to meet two buddies of his for a hike to the top of the crater. After that they had a day at the beach planned. But while Laszlo's SUV was parked at the Crater's parking lot, there was no sign of him and calls to his cell phone went unanswered. The friends had made the hike on their own, thinking for some reason that Mike had gone on ahead without them, but there'd been no trace of him.

That's when they'd called 911.

And why did the governor care? Because Laszlo was a twenty-one year old intern with the governor's office, that was why.

And so Five-0 had gotten the case and they'd followed leads and Danny had smelled really, really bad and that had been yesterday.

Right. So what about today?

Today Danny hadn't smelled really, really bad, but he'd been bitching about the heat already and insisted he wanted to stay in the office to do the boring side of police work himself rather than be with Steve.

And, you know, that had…it had hurt, okay? There, he said it. Er…thought it.

The biggest problem with Steve was that for the most part, the people in his life that he'd always cared about the most had sort of abandoned him or sent him away or he'd been in some other way parted from them on a long-term basis, whether through their deeds, his own actions or some external force.

He'd lost his mother.

Then he'd lost the entire rest of his family. His relationship with his father had been nearly nonexistent, then he'd been killed. Nothing from his sister until just last year. They kept in contact better now, but in the end he'd had to send her away again simply for her own safety. So once more, no family nearby.

He'd had the Navy – Naval Intelligence and the SEALs. But each mission was just that: a mission. At the end of it you went to wherever you were assigned next. Sometimes with the same personnel, sometimes not. You couldn't form too many attachments in that line of work.

And even when you did, it was difficult – just look at him and Catherine. As much as they loved each other, they were very often separated for the better part of any calendar year simply due to her still being on the move and deployed to wherever she was needed most in the world.

He had love, both from his sister and his woman, but long-distance love was just plain rough. He couldn't simply go find his sister to have a laugh or a beer with, or even get a hug from. He couldn't indulge himself in the mornings by rolling over and kissing his lover awake, making love to her at night when he needed to blow off steam after a shitty day and nothing less than her smile, her voice, her sharp mind and her body would do.

It was a little frustrating. All right, it was a lot frustrating.

He thought he had Joe, but he couldn't be sure anymore.

He'd been betrayed by friends, by officials in high places.

Trust was something he didn't easily hand over to anyone. He trusted his team, his ohana. And while his trust in Danny had been a bit shaken when he'd come to learn Danny was intending to just up and leave Hawaii to return to New Jersey, his faith had been restored when Danny had left his pregnant ex-wife and his daughter at the airport for the sake of Steve.

To the former SEAL, that kind of loyalty was…well…it meant everything. Everything.

Steve coughed, finally getting to the point where he was more awake than not, and then wondered why he was coughing.

He coughed again and felt a sharp stab of pain in his left side, just below the bottom of his rib cage. He tried opening his eyes.

Oh, right. Goop.

Goop and pain.

And a smell.

Steve realized very quickly that the smell was him and gagged.

The thick iron scent of blood. Sticky and drying, plastering his shirt to his skin.

Urine. He'd evidently pissed himself. Great. What the hell would've made him do that?

The sharp jab of pain that hit him through his side again took his breath away this time.

Focus, focus, focus.

You're trained for this.

Can't pass out.

What had he been thinking about?

Focus.

Loyalty.

Focal point.

Danny.

Zero in.

Kidnapping case.

Find the thought.

He'd been hit from behind.

Hold onto it.

He had multiple injuries.

Compartmentalize.

His team would know he was missing.

Hang on tight.

They would come for him.

He gasped as the pain hit him harder than before and one thought stuck in his mind as consciousness faded to black.

I smell worse than Danny did…