"I don't know what's going on with him..."
Danny stared down into his takeaway coffee cup as he and Meka leaned up against the Camaro near the beach in Waikiki with their drinks.
Detective Hanamoa rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically. "Okay, so you haven't had sex in a few days, deal with it bruh. That's marriage..."
The blonde smacked his arm distractedly. "We're far from married, Mek, so shut it. No, it's not just that... I mean, that's unusual enough in itself, believe me. But Steve's just been really distant, you know? He's working late at the garage because he wants the extra money. He talks, but he doesn't say much."
The native man took the last gulp from his black coffee before throwing it in the trash can nearby. "Listen, you said it yourself before, he's got his issues. And I'm sorry D, but really how long have you actually known the guy?"
"What is that supposed to mean?" Danny glared at his partner.
"It means what it means, buddy. I'm just looking out for you." The taller man nudged his arm with his elbow in a friendly gesture. "But ignoring the year you spent apart while he was in jail, because let's be real you didn't exactly get much face time in while he was locked up and you were on the outside... you've been together a grand total of what? Four months?"
The blonde did the mental arithmetic and nodded reluctantly. Yeah, the four weeks he was in Halawa with Steve initially, and the almost three months following his release... give or take a week or two for the few visits he'd got in over the year when Steve was still inside, he was looking at roughly four and a bit months of what someone might call a relationship. Was that time enough to get to know a person?
Anyone else, maybe not. But Steve? He'd always felt this deep connection with the man, like part of them had known each other forever. When people had talked about soul mates, he'd always thought it was cheesy sentimentality; as if some deep part of you could know there was another half out there, and just be patiently waiting for its counterpart to appear. It was a ridiculous concept... and he understood every part of it now.
"No, I know him man. He's not like this, he's open with me. He knows he can trust me." The Jersey man nodded to himself assertively and finished his latte, the paper cup joining his friend's in the trash.
"Well something's going on that he's not sharing, according to what you say..." Meka brought him back down to earth again. "Listen, don't get me wrong. I like the man, we all do. Chin, Kono and me, we can see he's a good guy who's just had a bad life of it, but none of us can claim to know him. Not even you, hoa."
Danny sighed and whipped his keys away when his partner made a grab for them. He liked to steal the Camaro once in a while and usually ended up damaging it somehow.
"I hear you, Mek... I just... I think I know him better than that. Something's up, I just hope he talks to me soon..." He walked around to the driver's side door and climbed in, the Hawaiian man taking his place in the passenger seat. "And what's this about 'that's marriage, bruh'?" He did a bad impression of his partner's surfer accent. "You and Amy having problems?"
Meka leaned back as his friend started the engine. "We're married with a little kid, D. Got no time for anything much these days..."
The blonde snorted. "Okay, I'll tell you what. I'll do you a solid and take Billy off your hands for an evening, have him round for a movie night with Gracie or something. And you and Amy can do the horizontal mamba all night long, yeah?"
The dark-haired man burst out laughing. "Yeah, right, I hardly have the energy to get out of bed these days, let alone do anything while I'm in it! But thanks, I appreciate it."
The detective pulled out onto the street. "What are partners for, huh?"
Kai pretty much left Steve to it, letting him work while wallowing in the swamp of his own self-loathing. The brunette tried to concentrate on the details of the job, thinking of it as just another car being repaired for a normal customer, but his boss would appear to check up on him sporadically, or he'd find something in a glove box which just went to show the vehicle had been taken without the owner's permission, and he would be reminded again of the illegal nature of what he was doing.
Each time he removed a VIN plate, he felt like he was prying another part of his soul away. And he'd been surprised to find out he even had a soul in the first place.
The way he'd lived his life pre-prison had been less than righteous... stealing and conning for survival had turned into stealing and conning for fun. He'd used people, hurt people... He'd had people hurt when he couldn't get to them himself...
But he hadn't come through unscathed. He'd been screwed over in his past, more than he'd care to admit, by people whom he had placed his trust in.
It was immeasurably rare for Steve to give anything away, and so when he had taken on a small crew to work with it was a big deal. It required faith in others, and he'd built a friendship with those three people. And then one of them had screwed him over. The guy had gotten caught by the cops during a scam, and he'd rolled on Steve the first opportunity he got, just to shave some time off his own sentence. No honour amongst thieves, no loyalty amongst friends.
He'd been one of the first people in a long time that Steve had invested any trust in, having spent most of his life since his parents were killed avoiding meaningful relationships with anyone. And he'd been the last. The con man wasn't about to make that mistake again. At least that was what he'd told himself.
But he had made that mistake. Kai had taken him on and given him a job, and had seemed like a decent guy. But as it turns out, even he wasn't to be trusted. His kindness had only been to benefit himself, seeing his new employee as a resource to exploit... and maybe that was some sort of universal justice? Being used just like he had used others, deceived just like he had deceived.
Steve had done some shit in his life, and he'd always told himself that he was just doing what he needed to do to survive. He'd been dealt a bad hand early on, and the world owed him now, so he was just going to take what he could and screw everyone else. No one cared about him so why should he be concerned about anything? He began to stop feeling the effects of his actions, only considering himself.
But now he felt it once more. All of the bad things he'd done, he registered them all… so apparently he did have a conscience. He wasn't sure if it was a new addition to his being, or if it had been there all along, but it had made itself known not long after a certain blonde had entered his life.
Maybe Danny had revived the withered excuse for a soul in him, or maybe he'd been given a part of the detective's own, he couldn't be sure.
What he could be sure of was that he was now soiling that fragile beauty with his current actions, and he hated himself for it. But it had become about survival again. About pride. Because he just couldn't admit that he was struggling, refused to be a useless dead weight, even if that meant paying his way with money that wasn't clean. He knew it was wrong.
How would Danny feel if could see what his boyfriend was doing? He should go to him, tell him everything... but Kai would just make out that Steve was lying, and of course his lover knew better than to believe a con man over a business man.
No, Steve would just have to get through this, do this job for his boss, and work out how to avoid doing any more. Maybe he could find a job somewhere else? There weren't many places willing to take on a parolee with his history and give a decent wage, but he'd make it work. He had to.
One job, and then it was over. And Danny could never know.
That man was perfect and wonderful and trusting... and Steve couldn't understand for one moment what the blonde saw in him. The ex-con was broken and dirty and pathetic, damaged goods beyond repair. The only place where he'd managed to succeed and become powerful was inside the walls of a corrupt prison; out in the real world he was nothing. Worse than nothing.
Danny would see that eventually; he'd see past the passion and the sex, get bored of being the saviour, and then he would see Steve for who he really was. And then the brunette would be on his own again, it was only a matter of time.
He wiped his hands on an old rag and threw it on the floor. Then he kicked out at his toolbox, wrenches and screwdrivers flying. He felt cold and numb inside. Tired. Empty.
Wherever this soul had come from, he didn't deserve any of it.
Danny decided that afternoon that he had to get Steve to open up. Usually the best way to do that was to get him into bed and buzzed from an orgasm, that was when he was the most free with his emotions and stories. But due to a lack of action over the past three days, Danny was going to have to get inventive with getting his lover in between the sheets.
So he figured it was time to earn himself a bit of punishment.
When he got home, he made some lasagne for dinner, messing up the kitchen as he went and leaving ingredients and spills and pots and pans everywhere.
Steve liked things tidy, especially when it came to the kitchen and bathroom. Everything had its place and whenever he was around, stuff got cleaned up within good time; he cleaned up after Danny, usually muttering something about his untidy habits. The cop teased him about it a lot, but had been doing his best to be tidier for his lover so that he would feel at home after coming out of Halawa. He found the need for organisation endearing.
Right now, though, he wanted to get a rise from the guy. He unmade their bed and even tipped over the laundry basket in the bathroom and skewed the mat in there so it was off centre and crooked.
Call him childish, but if it worked then he'd be a very happy man to find out what was going through his boyfriend's head. And the more riled up Steve was, the rougher he got in bed... and the blonde was more than up for that right now, after being deprived of the contact he craved.
He put on a pair of board shorts which Kono had insisted he buy so she could attempt to teach him to surf, a tight white t-shirt which he knew Steve liked to see on him, and threw himself down on the couch with a beer to watch a DVD. He'd fallen asleep by the time the brunette finally came home at almost midnight, trying to sneak in and expecting Danny to be in bed by now.
The bleary-eyed blonde sat up on the couch and startled his housemate. "Hey, you…"
"Hey," the mechanic whispered, "Sorry I woke you, I... what the fuck happened to the kitchen?" He'd spotted the mess through the archway from where he stood at the end of the couch.
The detective remembered his plan and smiled proudly. "I made lasagne, you want some?"
"Did you have to trash the place to make dinner?" Steve looked a little grumpy, but apparently didn't have the energy for anything beyond that. He just shook his head and aimed for the back of the house, pulling his grease-stained t-shirt over his head. "I'm not hungry, just gonna have a shower and sleep..."
He was gone for all of sixty seconds before he reappeared. His eyes looked a little darker now, brow creased. "When the fuck was the tornado, Danny?"
The cop shrugged his shoulders innocently and relaxed back into the couch. "I don't know what you're talking about, babe."
The brunette hooked a thumb back over his shoulder toward the bedroom and bathroom beyond it. He'd already been in a bad mood, spending the afternoon over-thinking his way into oblivion, and now his irritation levels were rising further. "Did you do this on purpose?"
Danny's heart rate picked up a little more, thinking his plan might come to fruition. "So what if I did?"
He braced himself, excited, but his boyfriend just sagged and turned back to the bedroom.
"I'm going to bed," he mumbled wearily.
What the fuck? This was not what he'd hoped would happen. This was not Steve. And a tiny voice that had sat in the back of his head for the last couple of days and that he'd tried desperately to ignore once again reared its ugly head. And he had to know, had to ask the question.
Danny darted off the couch and grabbed the taller man's arm as he turned away, dragging him back to face him.
"Steve, what's going on with you? Are you..." he faltered, but then squared his jaw and crossed his arms over his chest. "Are you seeing someone else or something?"
The ex-con's eyes widened. "No! Fuck, Danno, why would you think that?"
The blonde spread his arms wide. "Uh, let's see. Late nights, low sex drive, no emotional connection to speak of... I've seen it before with other people, babe. The signs are there!" He didn't believe it, not really. He knew deep down Steve was as loyal as they came, but Meka's words had gotten to him and he was starting to doubt his people judgement skills. How well do you really know the guy?
"There is no way I'd cheat on you, Danny. You should know that!" He looked pissed off now, but not how the cop had wanted him. It wasn't the simmering kind of hot anger that led to sex; it was different, a frustrated, exhausted kind of anger. At least he was getting a reaction out of him other than bland indifference and weak excuses.
"Then what the hell is it, Steve? Because you're drifting from me and I wanna know what I've done wrong!" He splayed his arms out in a deep shrug, waiting for an explanation.
"You?! You've done nothing, Danny. It's..." The taller man trailed off, exasperated, and scraped his hands back through his hair. "It's complicated, okay?" He turned and headed through to the bedroom.
The Jersey man followed. "No." He said firmly, and Steve turned back to look at him. "No, that's not okay. You don't just get to say 'it's complicated' and walk away, it's not good enough!"
The mechanic snapped. "Will I ever be good enough for you, Danny?" Steve's voice broke a little as he yelled that, anger and fear spilling out of his eyes, the emotions he'd been going through in private for the last few days attempting to breach the surface and leak through the cracks. He had to contain them.
The blonde stopped in his tracks. "What? What in the hell are you on about? Of course you're good enough!" He reached out to cup Steve's face, but the brunette grabbed his wrist and pushed him back into the wall, holding him there with his other hand on his chest and his arm against the plaster.
"You're a fucking cop, Danny!" The ex-con shouted in his lover's face, the frustration and thoughts of hiding his activities from the man now finally boiling over, because no, he wasn't good enough. How could Danny even believe that? "And I'm just a criminal. Low-life scum! Why the fuck are you even with me?"
The blonde gazed up at him, stunned. He couldn't understand what had gotten into this man. He was normally so confident, a force of nature, but something had obviously been eating at him just like Meka's words had wormed their way into Danny's head. He didn't doubt Steve, he doubted himself, and that's exactly how the ex-con must be feeling. He didn't think he was good enough? Fuck that...
He brought his free hand up to gently slide over Steve's cheek, causing him to hitch his harsh breathing. He kept his voice soft and low. "Because I love you, you idiot..."
The taller man's brow creased, and he searched Danny's face for anything that showed contrary to his words, but those blue eyes held his gaze and spoke silently of love and trust and honesty. Fuck... he really meant it.
The next second his lips were crashing the detective's, and he closed his eyes tight and kissed him hard and desperately, pressing him again the wall. The Jersey man sagged against him and sighed, opening his mouth to invite his lover inside, and their tongues tangled in heated passion, trying to reassure each other and communicate their love. Steve moved forward and rocked his hips against Danny's, making them both gasp and moan.
He released his grip on the cop and tugged at his t-shirt, pulling it up over his head, their mouths only parted for a second before they collided back together again. Danny's hands were all over his torso, fingers grasping at his waist and nails scratching down his back to make him growl against the shorter man's lips.
"Fuck, Danny..." It came out as a needy whine, and he didn't care. Because he did need him. All of him; body, heart and soul.
The detective shoved them away from the wall, not breaking their kiss, and they pulled at one another's clothing until Danny's shorts and Steve's cargo pants were falling to the floor, followed quickly by their boxers, as they made their way uncoordinated across the room.
They landed on the bed with Danny on top, and he immediately began his work; assaulting the mechanic's neck with his teeth, pinching his nipples lightly to make him cry out with pleasure, hips dipping to rub their hard cocks together as he straddled the taller man.
The room was filled with their combined gasps and breathy moans as passion took over and they had to show each other what they meant, how much they wanted one another.
Steve grabbed at his lover's hair and ass, pulling him down into him, needing to feel skin on skin. "Danny... oh god... need you to fuck me..." he gasped out, and the blonde raised his head from where he'd been nibbling his boyfriend's collarbone to meet his eyes, hair gloriously messy.
"Jesus… Move back, back against the headboard..." he whispered, not missing out on this opportunity, and then he was tugging the drawer open and pulling the lube out.
The brunette backed up to the bedhead and stuffed some pillows behind him, chest still heaving, and he spread his thighs with his knees up and soles of his feet on the bed for Danny to kneel on his haunches between them.
The cop drenched his fingers with the slippery liquid, closing his mouth on Steve's again as his first finger slipped inside the mechanic's tight ring. The ex-con moaned and locked his hands into his lover's hair as he began to own the blonde's mouth, biting his lips and invading with his tongue.
Two fingers pushed into him, stretching him open and pumping slowly and gently. He wanted that man inside him so badly, needed to give himself. It seemed like it was only with Danny that he felt he could allow someone that power while still remaining in full control himself. He trusted him - loved him - so unbelievably much.
One of his hands moved to fold around Danny's throat, squeezing lightly as he bit away from his mouth and along his jaw to his ear, taking the lobe in between his lips and grazing his teeth on the soft flesh. The detective made an indecent noise and used his free hand to pinch Steve's sensitive nipple again and then grip at his hair.
The brunette moved his hand from his boyfriend's hair to scrape nails down the back of his neck, and the Jersey man groaned and curled his fingers around inside him. Lighting shot up Steve's spine as his sweet spot was caressed, and he bucked and swore loudly.
Danny repeated his actions before pressing a third finger into his lover and pulling their mouths back together to wrestle for dominance with their tongues, both knowing full well that the ex-con would win, and relishing it. Steve reached for the lube and dribbled it onto the blonde's straining dick to signify he was ready, and still with one hand around Danny's neck, he used the other to guide that gorgeous, thick cock into his entrance.
The cop took it slowly, inching into him carefully as it had been over a month since he'd bottomed.
"Oh god, Steve..." he gasped and pulled back from the kiss, needing to steady his breathing as he pushed in all the way, burying himself inside his lover. They both looked down between them to see where their bodies met, the sight of the detective fully sheathed inside the brunette was glorious. Their eyes met again, so intimate and intense in their current state.
"Why the actual fuck did you ever think you weren't good enough for me?" Danny kissed his boyfriend's lips hard, following up with a string of pecks to his cheek and forehead.
"Danny, I..." Steve paused and refused to meet his gaze when the blonde looked at him again, so Danny grasped his jaw and forced him to look him in the eyes.
His voice was rough with the effort of holding back, full of lust, but insistent. "You, Steven, you will always be the only thing I ever need... do you understand me?"
The brunette contemplated him for what felt like hours, the emotions running through his mind swirling and mixing and colliding with each other. Eventually he nodded, knowing he had to tell his lover everything. Knowing he could.
"I love you, Danny."
He sighed, relieved. "I love you too, Steve." And with that the Jersey man was drawing back out of him to drive back in, forcing him back into the headboard as Steve cried out in ecstasy from the sensations firing up into his brain.
Danny slipped his arms under his lover's knees, lifting his legs over his shoulders for a better angle, and gripped the bars of the headboard before thrusting forward into him again, hard. He hit the ex-con's prostate like a bullseye and Steve gasped and squeezed his hand tighter around the blonde's throat. Their eyes met again, and they couldn't break the gaze as Danny continued his delicious pattern of a slow withdraw followed by snapping his hips forward to tear a moan from his boyfriend.
He was gorgeous, dark hair sticking up at all angles, sheen of sweat covering his skin, intensifying the colours of his tattoos and accentuating the flexing muscles in his chest and shoulders. The way he drew in a sharp breath every time Danny drove up into him and how he gazed at him with hazel eyes full of heat under long dark lashes was beautiful, and watching his face added to the detective's arousal as the coil of his orgasm wound tighter in his belly.
The ex-con slipped his other hand onto Danny's shoulder for the extra support, massaging and gripping, nails digging into the taut muscles there as the shorter man used all his strength to hold their position as he fucked him. He was completely unable to look away from those hooded blue-grey eyes, golden lashes low and fluttering with the sensations rolling through him. The bed beneath him creaked every time he was pounded back into the pillows, and with the emotions running high he found himself reaching his release quicker than he'd thought.
One of the cop's hands dipped between them, stroking his erection with long, firm swipes and flicking his wrist as he reached the tip, and it was only a few seconds before he was erupting over his lover's hand and painting their chests with his cum, shouting Danny's name with his eyes screwed shut.
The blonde let out a long, wanton moan as the mechanic clamped down around him, and he plunged into him faster and harder until his climax rolled over him like a wave.
His wordless shout was muffled by the brunette's lips sealing over his, and he whimpered into his mouth as his body vibrated and tingled from the release, and the circuits in his brain stopped shorting out. Steve's long arms snaked around his back and he let the man's legs fall to the bed either side of him as he extricated himself from his boyfriend and pressed their chests together.
He could feel Steve's heart thumping against his chest at a speed to match his own, and he had to uncurl his fingers from the bars so he could wrap his arms around the taller man.
They let their breathing slow, pressing their foreheads together, and the mechanic's thumb drew little circles on Danny's cheek. The detective finally found the energy to move, and he flopped down onto his back on the mattress, Steve joining him to curl into his side and lay his head on the cop's chest.
They were silent for several minutes, just enjoying the heat and feel of one another's bodies, until Steve finally built the courage to speak.
"Kai is getting me to refurb stolen cars..." He screwed his eyes shut and waited for the backlash of rejection that part of him was still convinced would come.
Danny's brain was still trying to work out what he'd just heard, pulled from his blissful post-coital haze by something so off topic and shocking, he had to process it properly before he replied.
"What the actual fuck?" He wasn't angry, just confused as hell.
Steve leaned up on his elbow and fixed his eyes on his boyfriend, and they were full of fear at how the detective was going to react. He waited until the blonde pushed up onto his elbows and met his gaze before continuing, and then it all came out in one rushed explanation.
"That's why he's been making me work late. I... I should have told you straight away, but he said he'd fire me and make it look like I'd been stealing... He planted money and drugs with my stuff, and he said... you wouldn't believe me, no one would, and you'd drop me... and I'd go back to prison..." He felt like it was the poorest excuse in the world, but even as he said the words he prayed they weren't true.
Danny opened his mouth to speak, wanting to know why the hell Steve would do something like that, dip back into crime so easily after he promised he'd stay clean... but he closed it again, rethinking his reaction. Because, for all his confidence and dominance and physical presence, Steve was still vulnerable. He was fresh out of prison and had been taken advantage of by his new boss, someone whom he'd trusted... hell, someone who Danny had trusted! He'd known Kai for a while, using that garage to have his car fixed whenever it got damaged, and the place had been recommended to him by the HPD!
"Motherfucker..." The Jersey man hissed, and scrambled to his feet, rage surging through his veins.
"I'm sorry Danny, I'm so sorry... I understand why you hate me, but I can fix this..." Steve began, reaching out to the shorter man as he paced the room and scrubbed at his stubble.
Danny stopped abruptly and looked at him. "Hate you? No Steve, I meant Kai! He's the motherfucker! I'm gonna fucking kill him for doing this to you!"
He marched out of the room to find his cell phone, bringing up Meka's number on the screen as he stomped back into the bedroom. But he paused as he looked over at the bed, because Steve was still sitting there, and hot tears were winding their way down his cheeks.
He walked right up to him, dropping the phone onto the sheets, and slid his hand under the man's jaw to make him look up into his face.
"Babe… why are you crying?" He had to fight to keep his own soft voice from cracking, because his heart broke to see his boyfriend like this.
The brunette sniffed and swiped the tears away, embarrassed at his show of emotion. "Because you... you believe me... I didn't think…"
"You didn't think what?" the cop pressed.
Steve shook his head as it filled with a multitude of answers to that question; that I'm worth it, that I can be fixed, that anyone could see me the way you do…
Danny smiled and bent down to kiss his lover tenderly and sweetly, seeing that he was finding it difficult to express his thoughts.
"You goof, I will always believe you..."
Steve grabbed him around the waist and pressed his face into the blonde's chest, breathing in his scent. He couldn't believe he'd ever doubted his faith in that gorgeous man. He'd saved him already in so many ways, and he was starting to understand that Danny was never going to stop rescuing him.
"Thank god..." he whispered, almost to himself. Then his voice became firmer, more decisive. "I'll go in tomorrow and tell Kai where to shove his VIN plates..."
The detective snorted, thinking a little clearer now. He loved the idea of his man marching into that garage, tracking down his boss, and inserting metal items where the Hawaiian sun didn't shine... but it could be bigger than just one man.
"Hold your horses, babe," he grinned down at him, "Did he say he'd had the cars stolen, or is he working for someone?"
Steve released his hold and met his boyfriend's gaze as the man sat next to him on the bed and picked his phone up again.
"He said something about a customer... he doesn't say much, he's careful. But yeah, he's working for somebody else. And there might be more cars after these by the sounds of things."
Danny hit his partner's number and raised the device to his ear, hoping Meka wouldn't mind being called after midnight seeing as it was a case. His fingers and thumb brushed his lover's jaw while the phone rang. "Don't you worry, babe. We're gonna take these bastards down..."