"Madison, you need to clean your room before we go back to see Grandma." Mrs. Lee stood with her hands on her hips, glaring at her daughter from the doorway of their house. "Five more minutes, and then you need to come inside. And don't even think about pawning your work off on poor," she said, shifting her gaze to Grace for a moment before retreating into the kitchen.

Maddy rolled her eyes and flopped down onto the grass next to Grace. "Ugh. I don't even know why she's making us go with her every time she wants to see Grandma. That tiny apartment isn't big enough for two people, let alone for four or five of us."

Grace said nothing. She would have loved to see more of her grandparents, but her mom's parents were long dead and the Williams lived back in New Jersey. She got to see them even less than she got to see her dad, because they never travelled to Hawaii.

Of course, she wasn't exactly seeing a whole lot of her dad while he was out here, either. She was barely even hearing from him now that he was working the Sang Min case or whatever, and she wasn't about to reach out again. Not after he had ignored her last three calls.

She had never felt so alone on the islands since Danno had moved back to New Jersey. As much as she hated Mrs. Lee's description of her, she was starting to become rather pathetic.

"Do you think we'll get to see Ethan again?" Maddy asked after several minutes of silence. "Now that his mom's in jail and everything?"

"We only saw him like twice before, Maddy," Grace said quietly. "He's a year below us, remember?"

"But will he still go to our school, do you think?" Madison was practically bouncing at the prospect of discussing such a tragic situation. "And what about all of his friends? I bet they all go to our school, too, and that's going to make it really hard for him if he doesn't get to come back, isn't it? I bet-"

Grace was saved from the onslaught of her friend's gossip spree when Mrs. Lee came back out. Maddy groaned, but she wasn't the one Mrs. Lee had come for. "Grace, somebody's on the phone for you!"

Danno! She was up and running towards the house in an instant. Mrs. Lee handed her the portable phone with a big smile on her face, and she grabbed it hungrily. "Danno?"

"No, sweetheart." The sound of her mother's voice almost made her collapse. "How are you, Grace?"

"I'm…" Grace found herself at a loss as to how to answer. Not only did she not know the answer, she had also never expected her mom to call her. Her mom never contacted her while she and StepStan were on vacation somewhere.

Her mother didn't seem to notice. "I've only just gotten in touch with your father. The connection down here has just been awful, and I wasn't getting any of his voicemails or anything. Grace, sweetheart, are you okay?"

"I'm fine. It's just my arm," she said lamely. Mrs. Lee and Maddy both came back into the kitchen, and she retreated into the pantry so she could have some privacy.

"No, of course it's not just your arm! You could have been killed! That man died in front of you, and now you're all alone-"

"I am not," Grace said, though without much enthusiasm. "I'm here with Maddy."

"Yes, of course you are, and I'm quite grateful for that, but you don't just need a friend. You need a parent. Now, your father and I have had a long talk-"

"Is he coming to get me?!" Grace interrupted, joy flooding through her.

There was a pause. "No, sweetheart, at least not just yet. He's quite busy with this case."

Another silence lingered in the air as the joy flooding Grace rapidly receded. "Oh."

"However, I'm coming home just as soon as I can. There was a storm, and the airport got all backed up, but Stanley and Charlie and I will be home just as soon as we can get on a flight. I'll call to let you know when that is, okay?"

Grace murmured her assent, although she wanted to scream and throw the phone against the stack of canned vegetables. She didn't want her mom. She definitely didn't want to deal with StepStan awkwardly hovering around.

She wanted Danno.

"Sweetheart, I love you so much. You take care, okay?"

"You too," she said distantly. The line clicked off, but she continued to stare at the can of peas in front of her.

Your father and I have had a long talk. So Danno had time to talk to her mom about her, but didn't have the time to actually talk to her? She wanted to scream. She wanted to cry. She wanted to curse and punch and kick and curl into the fetal position and never get up again.

She just wanted to know what was going on.

Despite her firm decision to not be the one to reach out again, Grace found herself dialing the familiar number of Danno's cell phone, using the Lee's home phone instead of her own cell. Sometimes oaths needed breaking.

It took four rings for him to answer. She had almost decided that he could tell that it was her on the phone when he finally picked up. "'lo?" he said blearily.

Grace looked at her phone's screen. It was nearly 1:00, and her dad had been sleeping when he was supposedly working. And as it turns out, he was willing to answer when it wasn't her number on the screen.

"Hello?" he said, more clearly this time. "This is Detective-"

"Danno."

"Grace!" His voice seemed to get brighter and tighten at the same time. "Is everything okay?"

"I guess so. Mom called."

"Good, good," he said. "Has she caught a flight yet?"

"Not yet. Can I come stay with you until she's back?" she asked, though her question sounded flat even to herself. The silence on the other end of the line was answer enough, but she pressed on regardless. "I like Maddy and her family, and they've all been really nice about it, but we keep having to go to her grandma's apartment and it smells weird there. Danno, I wanna come home. I want to be with you."

He sighed in response, and it was so heavy that Grace practically felt it hitting her. "Monkey, we talked about this. This case is really important-"

"Your old Five-0 cases never took this long, and even then you at least called me once in a while!" she said loudly, trying to ignore the tears that had just begun streaking down her cheeks. "What's the big deal with this one?!" Her dad didn't answer, and she lost all control of which thoughts she verbalized. "Is it that this is a tough case, or are you all just too stupid to figure it out without Uncle Steve?!"

She immediately gasped and clapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide. A shadow moved across the crack beneath the pantry door. Her father said nothing in response, and after several long seconds she lowered her hand. "Danno, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean-"

"How did you know that Five-0 was back together?" His voice was calm, calmer than she thought it should be, and definitely colder than when he usually talked to her. It reminded her of when he was fighting with her mom, and after most of those arguments he'd go out back and punch the side of the garage. "Answer me, Grace."

"I…Maddy's mom was talking about it yesterday," she whispered.

"I see. Grace, as you so accurately summated, I am involved in a very tough case that I seem to be too stupid to solve, so I cannot take care of you right now or for the foreseeable future. Your mother understands this, Mrs. Lee understands this. You need to understand this." His voice was still unnaturally cold, and she began crying harder. "I need to speak to Mrs. Lee."

"Okay." Her voice, which had been furiously working to explode from her for days, seemed to have almost disappeared. Her emotions were another story altogether. She turned and started to open the door to the kitchen.

"Just so you know, I will be telling Mrs. Lee to keep you away from the news. Clearly it's upsetting you, so this seems to be for the best." She nodded, forgetting that he couldn't see her. "Do you promise to stay away from it?"

"Yes." Mrs. Lee was standing by the table, stacking some papers and trying to pretend that she hadn't been listening at the door the whole time. "My dad wants to talk to you," she said quietly, holding the phone out to her friend's mom.

"Aren't you going to say goodbye?" Grace shoved the phone into her hands and ran outside as the dam on her tears finally broke completely. She tried to reach the farthest corner of the yard, the copse of trees she and Maddy used as a secret base, but she collapsed just before she made it and opted to curl up right there in the grass and sob.

Grace had said many terrible things to her dad over the years, most of them recently, but he'd always stayed calm and stoic and they'd always worked things out.

But this was different. What she had just said was unforgivable. She'd called him stupid. She'd brought up Steve.

More importantly, he had addressed the statement without forgiving it or acknowledging her apology. He'd just turned cold.

Danno was never cold to her.

"Grace?" Someone laid a hand on her shoulder, and it took her a moment to realize that it wasn't Maddy or Mrs. Lee talking to her. "Grace, is everything okay? What's going on?"

She uncovered her face and turned to see Maddy's neighbor sitting next to her. Even though his brow was wrinkled with concern, Caleb was still just as cute as he had been the last time she had seen him and she found herself beginning to blush through her tears. "Hi," she said blearily, looking away and wiping her eyes.

"What's going on?" he repeated, still holding her shoulder comfortingly. She chanced another look at him. He was watching her carefully, but something about him looked so welcoming…before she knew it she was sobbing into his chest and he was hugging her tightly. Her story came tumbling out in between gasps for breaths and sniffles, and he let her talk as his hand stroked her hair. Eventually her tears began to dry up, but he didn't push her away.

Until then, she hadn't realized how much she needed a hug.

When she finally backed away from him to wipe her face again, he looked at her with something like understanding. "I didn't realize your dad was Five-0. That explains why you looked so familiar, though."

"Huh?"

"You didn't break your arm cheering. That one dude who tried to kidnap you did it." Grace flushed but nodded. Caleb smiled sadly. "That really sucks. Also, that cop was Five-0, too, yeah?"

"What cop?"

"That one who almost kicked it. He was on TV when they talking about that crazy Sang Min guy." He furrowed his brow. "Kupua? King? No…Kelso? Wait-was it Kelly?"

"Kelly?!" Grace squeaked.

"Yeah, that's it! Captain Kelly. Someone almost iced him, and then there was this crazy nurse who tried to kill him again. It's been all over the news." Grace felt all of the blood drain from her face. "Grace, you okay?"

"That's my Uncle Chin Ho."

"Oh, what?! I had no idea you actually, like, knew him." Caleb tried to hug her again, but she pulled away. "You don't look so good…did you not know?"

"You said it was on the news?" He nodded, raising an eyebrow.

How did you know that Five-0 was back together?

I will be telling Mrs. Lee to keep you away from the news.

Her dad was trying to figure out who had shot Chin.

Five-0 was down two members at least.

Chin had almost died.

And her dad didn't want her to know anything about it.

"I'm not allowed to watch the news right now," she said, her voice somehow clear and strong again.

Caleb scoffed. "That's bullshit. You deserve to know if this all affects the people you love. I know I'd want to know."

"Yeah." Her head was spinning. She knew her dad didn't like her to know everything about his work, but this was a whole new level of secrecy.

Suddenly, she didn't feel so bad about exploding at him before.

With a sigh, Caleb climbed to his feet and offered Grace a hand, wrapping his arm around her shoulders when she was standing. "If it was my dad, I'd do anything to figure out what was going on." Grace nodded vaguely. "Do you think Mrs. Lee will let you watch the news?"

"No. My dad told her not to let me watch."

"Well, if you can get out tonight…" Grace looked up at him. "I mean, I always watch Channel 5 at 11. They've been having regular updates."

It took a while for his implication to sink in.

I'd do anything to figure out what was going on.

Do you promise to stay away from it?

Grace turned and smiled up at him. "I'll be there."

Sometimes oaths needed breaking.


A/N: Aloha!

I am so sorry for the delay in publishing. The past month has been more than a little crazy with work and other obligations. I can't promise that I'm going to be back to weekly updates immediately, but I'll try to be a little more timely at the very least.

Many thanks to all of you readers, and especially to the fabulous Forest Rose for her editorial work!

Until next time, aloha.