Chapter 1

Danny blamed the weather for his foul mood. It was just too damn nice outside. Any desire to commit a crime must have been dampened by the return of a fresh Hawaiian spring, when green things got greener and somehow, the sun got sunnier. Unlike everyone else on the island, though, Danny was borderline homicidal. No new crimes meant that the Five-O team was tackling their biggest foe-the pile of backlogged paperwork that had been sitting on their desks for months. Everyone had addressed it in their different ways-Kono was by far the most focused team member, but she was hampered by her ability to lose the most important form in her pile of papers, and she frequently had to stop and dig through it. Lou and Chin, both long-time cops, were used to the paperwork and knew how to file things away in the right order so that when they returned to the files it was easy to pick back up. Steve's time in the military meant that he too was used to overcoming a paper mountain, but as the boss of the team, his mountain was Everest compared to everyone else's. Danny's desk was littered with files that he picked up, glanced through, and put back down in search of a more scintillating file that had the potential to keep him awake for the remainder of the afternoon. "I need a case!" He slapped his current file down on his desk. "I'm dying."

Lou leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms behind his head, taking a break from his own paperwork. "What's up Danno? You getting bored of Five-O?"

"Just getting bored of you." Danny slung back at Lou.

"Ouch." Lou covered his heart mockingly. "That one hurt."

Danny rolled his eyes, closed the file he was working on and stood up. "I'm taking an early lunch." It was only ten AM but the only thing Danny had thought about since getting in this morning was leaving for lunch, and it was driving him crazy.

As soon as Danny's hand was on the door, Steve's voice echoed through the atrium. "Danny, hold up. We got a call."

Danny groaned and stalked back to his desk as the team geared up. "Why? Why did you have to wait until I was hungry?"

"Isn't this what you've been begging for all day?" Lou asked.

"Not exactly begging," Danny said, trying to defend himself.

"And not exactly all day...more like all week." Kono added. She whacked Danny's shoulder as she walked past him, letting him know it was meant in jest.

Chin Ho rolled he eyes and grabbed the keys to their SUV. "What are we looking at, Steve?"

Steve was scrolling through the report on his phone. "Early this morning there was a home invasion, gang involvement, one suspect dead."

"A biggie," Danno said. The rest of the team mumbled a response, but the mood had shifted as they all got into an appropriately serious mindset. As always, Steve slid himself into the driver side, slipped on his sunglasses, and began anxiously tapping the wheel with his fingers until Danny got in. The duo was quiet as Steve pulled out of the parking lot, and Steve looked lost in thought. Danny, who had been watching the world go by, looked back at Steve. "What's eating you?"

"This case already seems unusual. Gangs haven't been a problem in that neighborhood since it got gentrified a couple of years ago. What kind of housewife can take down a gang banger? There's got to be something else going on."

Danny had pulled out his phone and was reading the details that Steve had forwarded to the team. "Do you think it's Yakuza?"

"If it is, it's gotta be low-level. There's been no chatter." Steve wasn't an anxious person, but Danny had learned to read his mood through the tension in his knuckles on the steering wheel. Steve spoke again as he pulled off the highway, "I don't know of any other gang on this island that would be secure enough to leave their territory."

"Doesn't look like HPD made any progress on motive either-turn left up here." They pulled up to the crime scene, parking behind a mess of black and whites and the Medical Examiner and CSI vans. In a neighborhood of two- and three-story homes, the small bungalow would not have attracted the attention of thieves looking to make money, so there had to be another reason for the break-in. The rest of the team pulled up behind Steve and hopped out, taking in the scene. On the front porch of the house, Duke was milling around with some detectives, and through the front door, the team could see a CSI tech snapping pictures of some evidence.

Steve pulled out his notepad and pencil as he surveyed the area. "Chin, Kono, take a look at the primary crime scene. Lou, check out the rest of the house, keep an eye out for anything strange. Danny, talk to the Medical Examiner, get her first impressions on the body. I'm going to talk to Duke, then interview the homeowner, get her side of things. Sound good?"

Kono and Chin nodded and went back to the SUV to grab what they needed, and the other three headed towards the house. "Duke!" Steve called out, waving him over. "Anything new?"

"Homeowner kept a Glock 17 for self-defense. She heard the glass break on the front door, pulled the gun, and shot him just after he got in. She said there were two others behind him, but they turned and ran after their buddy went down."

"Was she able to give a description?"

"Detective Mackey is talking to her in the backyard."

"Did you get an ID on the perp?" Steve looked up from his notepad.

"You'd have to ask the M.E., she was waiting for the print to run."

"Thanks Duke." Instead of moving towards the house, Steve went to the sidewalk, making notes as he walked through the crime in his head. The intruders had entered from the front, as evidenced by the broken window, so it would make sense that they arrived at the house from the street or sidewalk. There weren't any tire tracks, but it didn't mean that they hadn't used a car. But it also could have been a bike, skateboard, or even their own two legs. There was no physical evidence to rule out anything.

Walking up the cement path to the door, Steve kept his eyes on the ground. There was a drop of something brown, and Steve called over a tech to swab it. "Can you catalog and test this?" He continued down the path to the door and thought he saw another drop.

"Commander?" Steve turned around to the tech, who held up the swab in a reaction vial. "It's not blood. We can look at it more in the lab, but to me, it just looks like oil of some kind. Maybe a lawnmower?"

"Thanks," Steve answered in disappointment. Stepping onto the porch, he did his best to avoid evidence markers that had been laid out. The men had broken in the window on the door and reached in to unlock the door. Chin walked outside to join Steve in looking through the doorway. "It was tempered?" Steve asked, referring to the tiny, blunted shards of glass.

"Yes, which is odd to see in a residential home," Chin stated, looking at his notes.

"They had to know the glass was tempered, otherwise they wouldn't have been able to break it."

"It would have been loud, so they either knew she would be here and thought they could overpower her, or they expected it to be empty."

Steve was silent as he rolled the information over his head and stepped further into the house. Aside from the glass and the body, the house looked...empty. The front room held an armchair, an old wooden desk, and a TV. There was an empty wine glass next to the chair and a knitted afghan strewn haphazardly on the floor, but no signs that the struggle had continued any further into the house.

The intruder that lay on the floor was a young man with deep tan skin and dark hair that indicated native Hawaiian heritage. There were two bullet wounds, one through his sternum, and one slightly higher, above his left collarbone. Either one would individually be hard to survive but the pairing of the wounds would have killed anyone. Even so, a blue kitchen towel was strewn to the side; it looked like someone had used it to stop the bleeding. Danny made his way into the room to stand next to Steve and Chin. "M.E. said it's likely that a major vessel was torn, he bled out in seconds."

"Two shots, two hits?" Steve confirmed, not seeing any other bullet holes.

Danny nodded. "HPD already processed the casings."

"What do you guys think?" Steve asked Chin and Danny. "Luck or skill?"

Danny folded his arms. "Skill. The intruder didn't even get further than the threshold before she got her shots off."

Chin agreed. "He has a gun tucked in the back of his pants, didn't even have time to pull it."

Steve continued through the front room, into the kitchen in the back of the house where Kono was looking around. He could see a young woman through the window, sitting in a patio chair and clutching a glass of water. "That her?"

Kono nodded. "Emma Frasier, age 29. Unis that were first on the scene said she was trying to stop the victim's bleeding when they arrived, and she was pretty shaken up."

"Kono," Steve said, staring out the window, "Sit in while I talk to her, I want to make sure she's comfortable."

"You got it, boss."

The two walked outside and approached the woman, watching her expression and behavior carefully. "Ms. Frasier? I'm commander Steve McGarrett with Five-O, this is Officer Kono Kalakaua. We'd like to talk to you about what happened."

The young woman straightened her back so she wasn't slouching. "Please have a seat, commander," she said, indicating the other deck chairs. "I gave a statement to Detective Mackey, but I can run through it again with you." Facing her, Steve amended his evaluation of her-she didn't seem all that rattled, just...tired.

"Please, call me Steve. Go ahead and start when you're ready; I might interrupt with some questions."

"You can call me Emma," She said quietly. She picked her water glass back up and turned it around in her hands, the first sign she had shown of nerves. "It was about oh-three-hundred, I was sleeping when I heard the glass break in the next room. I grabbed my phone and dialed 911, and I got my gun from the safe in the hall closet and I could hear them opening the door. I drew my weapon, told them to freeze, and put my phone down on the counter so I could use both hands to hold the gun. I made a mistake and looked down for a second... it was stupid, I know I should have kept watching them, but the one in front kind of came towards me and I just reacted. I shot twice, and I saw him go down, then I froze. The other two turned and ran out the door, they didn't even stop to look at the other one." She lapsed into silence.

"Are you the one that attempted CPR?" Steve prompted.

"Yes, I tried to stop the bleeding, but that didn't work, so I was trying to do CPR like they taught us in..." She cut herself off and thought for a beat. "...in a class I took one time."

Kono and Steve made eye contact, seeing that the other one also noticed the lie. It was barely visible, but Steve could see tension in her brow that wasn't there before. He leaned forward. "Emma, have you ever been trained as a police or security officer? Or in the military?"

"What? No!" She stammered. "Why would you think that?"

"Just the language you used," Steve started. "You said the time was oh-three-hundred, you, quote, 'drew your weapon'."

"I used to have a friend that was a cop, I probably got it from him."

"Did he teach you how to shoot?" Steve asked.

"I have a gun and I practice with it so I can defend myself." Emma was getting defensive, and Kono put a hand on Steve's forearm to tell him to back down. He sat back in his chair, going over his pages of notes.

"Emma," Kono started. "When did you move here? It doesn't look like you've settled in much."

Emma relaxed when Kono changed the subject. "I bought the place about four months ago, but I haven't had a ton of time to buy furniture." Kono opened her mouth, but Emma continued. "I used to live on the mainland, but I wanted something new." Steve was developing a feeling in his gut as he listened to their conversation. Her account of the break-in seemed sincere and reliable, but the minute they started asking questions about her background, she had been lying or ducking the question. Steve didn't get the impression she was all that comfortable with lying, but she was good at it.

The conversation was ending, but Steve had held some questions back. "Thank you, Emma, you've been helpful. We'll let you know when we have any updates." He and Kono walked away to where Danny, Lou, and Chin were waiting.

"Something's off with her. When we get back, Kono, check her out. Lou, look into the house...figure out why it has tempered glass. Danny and Chin, reach out to gang division and get some more info about our banger. Let's get a better picture of what motivated them to break into a house in suburbia." As Steve walked back to the car with Danny, he shook his head. "This case should be open and shut. There's just small things that don't fit."

"Every case has something hinky." Danny reminded him.

"There's just something different...everything about this case is straightforward. So why does it feel like we're missing something?"

The car pulled up to Five-O headquarters, but the two men didn't get out. "Let's go inside, sit down, and sort this all out. By the time you go home tonight. we'll have some answers."