So, it's been almost two months. There are no words to convey my apologies. I cannot be more sorry. My only excuse is the horror of exams and the slight lack of episodes – and therefore inspiration – over the last few weeks.
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"Steve!" Kono's tone was one of joyful confusion, and it brought a smile to the commander's face. At her shout, Chin appeared out of his office, breaking into a smile as soon as he saw his friend back on his feet.
"How are you feeling?" He asked as they got closer.
"Better, thanks. Danny finally agreed to let me out the house," he said, shooting a mischievous grin at his partner.
"Sure, make me out to be the bad guy. I'll ground you again if I have to," he warned back, but the smile shining in his eyes told them all that it was only an idle threat. Mostly. Chin and Kono laughed at the mock glare Steve threw towards the Jersey native.
"Try. I dare you." They had reached the computer table by now, and Kono was automatically pulling up their files on the case so far to fill in the two detectives who were still glaring at each other like school children. She smiled softly at their antics, like a mother might.
"This is everything we were able to find on Dominic Eastwood and his company, Easter Trading. From what we can tell, the entire company is spotless, completely legit. All their transactions are monitored carefully by internal teams as well as privately owned banks on the mainland. Over the last few months there has been no suspicious activity. Financially anyway." Danny felt a slight sinking in his chest at this, and he was keeping a careful eye on his partner. They needed a lead soon or the ex SEAL was going to start becoming unstable.
"Did you look into Joseph Tyler?" Danny asked, glancing between the cousins.
"Tyler?" Steve questioned, out of the loop.
"Eastwood's ex business partner, according to the website." The Jersey native supplied, though he looked at the others for confirmation. Websites had been known to lie in the past.
"Yeah, he was bought out by Eastwood about nine years ago. From what we could find there was no bad blood between them, they just decided to go their separate ways. Tyler ended up with a successful lumber company in Maine.**" Chin explained, finding various scans official documents of said company on the computer table and tossing them up onto the screens. A picture of a thin, weedy man followed.
"He doesn't look like someone who made riches legally," Steve observed quietly, and the others nodded in agreement. He looked slippery, one of those people who you could never quite pin down. It was a trait common among successful criminals.
"So, do we have anything to go on?" Danny asked after a moment.
"Well, nothing solid. But Eastwood did come back to Hawaii. For someone who didn't return when his brother died, it seems a little strange to come home now doesn't it?" Kono asked, instinctively looking at Steve. He was the one that knew the guy.
"Dom hated his brother. There was an incident, years before I met him, and after they had very little to do with one another. I don't know what happened. When his brother – Nick, I think – died the police looked into Dom's involvement. He contacted me to ask for advice for what to do."
"What did you tell him?" Danny asked, slightly intrigued by the look into his partner's past.
"I told him to tell the truth. Offered support. I was half way across the world, in-" He cut himself of quickly, realising that he couldn't end that sentence. "Either way, I couldn't exactly come running to the rescue."
"Didn't you ever wonder if he had anything to do with Nick's death?"
"He told me he didn't, and he was my friend. Why would I question it?" Steve pointed out. He fell silent, staring off into the distance trying to figure out a plan. "Do we know where Dom is now?" Kono started tapping away at the computer.
"He has a room in Waimanalo. Here's the address," she pulled it up onto the screen. "I think that's the closest we can get you. Maybe the staff there will know." Steve nodded, and turned to the door.
"Keep trying to dig up something. Anything. Go through Dom's financials, any remaining family, that kind of thing."
"Do you have any idea what kind of thing we're looking for, boss?" Kono called after him, just as he reached the door.
"None at all," he called back, grinning at her, before leaving the room. With a long suffering sigh, Danny followed him.
Once he was outside, Steve breathed in the cool air, relishing in the breeze that calmed his fiery skin. He was burning up, and even in the air conditioned building it seemed stuffy and claustrophobic.
"You sure you're alright to do this, aren't you?" Danny's voice made it clear that he knew the answer to that was 'no.' But he also was aware of what Steve would say.
"I'm fine, Danno."
"Sure you are. I'm driving. I refuse to die in a ridiculous car accident because you passed out at the wheel. I'd never live it down." Steve laughed gently at that, even if he was mocking himself. It was a nice reprieve from the stress of recent days.
"Fair enough." Without argument he walked to the passenger door and slid in. It wasn't until he was sat down again that he realised his legs had begun to shake with the effort. Damn, he was tired. It didn't make any logical sense; all he had really done for the last few days was sleep. He hated being ill, it made so much of his day to day routine impossible.
"You got the address?" Danny asked as he clipped in his seatbelt. The SEAL nodded as he mirrored the action. One thing – of many – that the Navy had insisted upon was having a near photographic memory. It was an invaluable weapon when in the field, and it had saved his ass more than once.
"Head towards Bellows Beach*. Waimanalo's just south of there, on the Eastern shore."
"Sure thing babe," Danny said with a wink that had Steve laughing until it hurt.
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Pulling up to the B&B***, Danny instantly noticed the dilapidated front, the faded signs and the peeling paint on the benches that were dotted around.
"Looks... cosy," Steve deadpanned, matching the Jersey native's thoughts exactly.
"For a CEO of a major company it seems a little common, don't you think?" He pointed out. It was true; by all accounts, one thing that Eastwood was not lacking in was money. He had inherited enough from rich parents to keep him in comfort for most of his natural life, and had then made a killing with Easter Trading.
"And I'm fairly sure his mom**** still lives on the island. Why would he choose to stay here? Unless he was trying to avoid being found," Steve mused quietly. Automatically, they both checked that their weapons were where they should be. Something about this wasn't right.
"Ready?" Danny took a quick scan of his partner to see how well he was holding it together. He was actually doing a convincing job of looking healthy, and if the Jersey native didn't know him better, he might have believed the ruse. As it was, he could see the slight sheen of sweat on his forehead, he had noticed the trembling hands. But he knew that Steve needed to do this almost as much as he needed to rest up, so he kept his comments to himself.
"Let's go." With a slight lack of coordination, the ex SEAL hauled himself out of the vehicle, and eyed the building speculatively. He automatically sought out exits if anything went wrong, as well as cover should this turn nasty. He seriously hoped it didn't. He wasn't sure if he could fire on an old friend, and if Danny got hurt due to his hesitation he'd never be able to live with himself.
Entering the building felt like stepping back in time. The reception was dated, and desperately in need of renovation. The wallpaper was peeling, and the sofa to one side had some questionable stains across it. The young woman behind the desk stared at them in shock for a moment, clearly unused to having customers, before she sprung into action.
"Good afternoon gentlemen, are you looking for a room?" She smiled pleasantly at them, recovering quickly. Steve shot her a winning smile and she blushed lightly, her professional facade failing slightly as she glanced down. Danny looked at him with a knowing grin and the SEAL rolled his eyes back at him. The Jersey native kept going on about how he shouldn't be allowed to talk to women any more.
"Not exactly, thanks. We were hoping you could tell us where to find a guest of yours, Dominic Eastwood?" Steve kept the smile on his face, hoping he could beguile her into just telling them, instead of having to flash his badge. If she was clued up on the law – which he had to admit, she didn't appear to be – she may be aware that in theory they would need a warrant.
"Er," she started, biting her lip. The blush hadn't faded from her cheeks and it made her look distinctly flustered. "I'm not sure that's our policy..." She didn't sound at all certain, and Steve pounced on it.
"Not just this once? He's an old friend." Danny was trying not to laugh out loud at his partner's hilarious attempts at persuasion, but he was shut up when the receptionist began tapping at her keyboard obediently.
"Room 12. It's just down the hall," she pointed. "Don't mention this to my manager, he wouldn't like it." She looked torn.
"We won't say a word," Danny reassured her, and she appeared to notice him for the first time. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes as he turned for his partner who had already disappeared into the corridor. When they were out of earshot, he turned to Steve and muttered: "One day you're going to have to teach me how to do that."
"Do what?" He knew exactly what of course, but it was fun to wind Danny up sometimes.
"You know full well what. You are aware that you'll have screwed up whatever relationship that girl is in right now?"
"She'll be fine. I'm not nearly as destructive as you seem to want to believe, Danno." At that moment, they reached the door with a rusted number 12 nailed to it, and they cut off the conversation. Gently, Steve knocked on the door, trying to conceal the slight tremor that he couldn't lose. It took a moment but then, slowly, the door was pulled open, and Danny found himself looking at an aged version of the man on the website. Dominic Eastwood.
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Did I just make a door dramatic? I think I did. :)
**I have no clue as to the success of lumber companies in Maine. I'm not even sure if there are lumber companies in Maine. Here you can see my shocking lack of knowledge of America. Feel free to correct me with an alternative.
*This is, apparently, an Air Force station in Oahu. It's near Waimanalo, so I figured I'd throw it in there.
***Do you have B&B's in America really? (Just more proof about how little I know...)
****You have no idea how painful it is for me to spell it like that...
Wow, lots of AN this time :O
I've reread the last few chapters and I've realised I'm not really happy with them. What do you guys think? Do you think this story is dragging on a bit, or going in the wrong direction? Thanks to the massive gaps between updates I've not got a very good feel of this story, so I'm unsure. Any input would be really helpful :)
So yeah, there you have it. Sorry this took so long. I hope the update makes up for it, just a little bit. Hopefully the next gap will be nowhere near as long. Also, have you guys seen the promo pictures of the next episode? Alex O'loughlin looks AMAZING. I want one.