Chapter Ten:
Kamekona's phone buzzes five times before the big man answers it. Shortly after a muttered conversation in pidgin, he leaves the room, the soap opera he'd been watching still running.
Steve's still asleep, curled on his side. The doctors keep shifting his position, but even with the painkillers, Steve still tosses and turns.
Mary has a whole stack of Harlequins waiting to be read, but right now, she can't stop watching her brother. He's covered in sweat and moaning softly, a sound like a wounded animal.
Another nurse drops by to inject something in Steve's IV to "lower the fever." Mary doubts her, a new face in the lineup of other caregivers who stop in every other hour or so, but Steve's face smoothes, pain lines he hasn't been without for at least a week disappearing almost instantly. His moaning also eases.
"He should sleep better now," the nurse assures Mary, already on her way out the door, the biohazard waste hidden in her shirt.
"Steve?" Mary hisses a few minutes later when it's obvious whatever the nurse gave him did not help with his fever. "Steve, wake up." Her hand brushes his shoulder and he sits up, eyes wide but glazed.
"Danno?" he whispers, staring at the door. When nothing happens, he turns to her, his movement jerky and mechanical. "Mary?" His hand shakes when he pushes a strand of her hair over her ear. She clasps it firmly, shocked by the lack of heat in his fingers. He's still covered in sweat with flushed cheeks. That nurse definitely gave him something bad.
Steve's face slowly turns from a blank mask into a frightened one—mimicking her, she's certain—as she jabs at the call button. Fear, cold and roiling, swells in her stomach as she watches two bright spots of color surge in Steve's cheeks while his face pales and his eyes gleam wetly even though they're still glazed over.
Another nurse enters the room, takes one look at Steve, and shouts for a medical team. Mary is shoved across the room while more nurses and a few doctors surround Steve.
"Mary!" Kono—where the hell did she come from?—grips her arm and drags her out into the hall. "Mary, what happened?"
"This nurse, she injected something into Steve's IV. Oh, god, what if she poisoned him?" She took the syringe with her."
Kono nods, and then she pulls out her phone, ducking down so Mary hides her while she dials.
"Chin, keep an eye on Danny, and don't let any medical personnel in to see him. Yeah, McGarrett was injected with an unknown substance. I'll get a sample to give to Fong. Bye, cuz."
She leaves Mary huddled against the wall while she slips back into the room. Mary starts crying. This whole month sucks. First, she was fired from her stewardess job, then Steve was attacked, then Danny, and now Steve's been poisoned. Kono returns and holds her against the wall as the medical team rushes toward the elevator, Steve on his wheeled bed in their midst.
"They need to identify the substance, but they think he'll be all right."
"What the hell?" Mary rounds on Kono, following the officer when she heads to the stairwell. "They think he'll be okay? He's been poisoned!"
"But they caught it quickly, thanks to you."
Mary droops, weight she wasn't ready to shoulder pressing down on her. She blinks away another sudden wash of tears. "I want Steve to be okay," she sobs into Kono's shoulder. "Is that too much to ask?"
Kono shrugs silently, guiding them toward the stairwell and trudging down the steps with a heavy tread. Mary steps lighter, but their footsteps echo around them, and Mary feels finality, Steve's mortality, with every clop. They sneak into the recovery room for Steve, and Mary catches sight of Steve's face, shocked at the gray, waxy look of his skin and those infernal blots of red. His eyes are open but unseeing. There are no nurses in here, and Kono forces her into the cupboard.
"I'll get someone to stay with him at all times and update us on his condition," she says. "I'll be back soon, I just need to get the sample to Fong. I'll have him send a sketch artist your way, and I'll look at the hospital's security tapes."
Then, Kono glides out the door leaving Mary still crouching in the small armoire
Ten minutes later, right when Mary thinks she's really been abandoned, Kono returns, an HPD officer on her heels. It's the same one from Steve's office, the one who promised her he'd help protect her.
"This is Officer Samuel Kale. He helped us rescue Steve. We can trust him."
The young man nods briskly, carrying a chair to the entrance of the room. He sits silently, not even a rustle of clothing. Kono salutes him, and he returns the gesture. He closes the door behind them when they leave.
The elevator they use hums quietly as they ascend, and Mary starts crying again.
"Let's go wait in Danny's room," Kono suggests kindly, one hand clutching Mary's shoulder so she can steer her when the elevator stops with a ping and the doors open on another sterile hallway. "Grace is in there too."
Mary nods, scrubs at her eyes, and draws in a deep breath. Then she shakes off Kono's hand and straightens her spine. She will not scare Danny's child any further, no matter how she wants his support for Steve's wellbeing.
At Danny's door, Chin pulls Kono away, already whispering in her ear, so Mary goes in alone. There is a pretty girl, crayons and papers on a tray over her lap, on the bed next to Danny's and a strange woman sitting in a chair near the window.
"Hi, Mary," Danny says. His smile is tight and pinched, and she realizes Chin already told him about the attack on Steve. "For what it's worth, they caught her."
"Is Uncle Steve going to be okay?" the little girl climbs down from her bed and goes to Danny. She grabs her father's hand.
"It's Steve," Danny says calmly, using his other hand to trace Grace's hand, "he'll be up and about in no time."
"What about you?"
Danny draws her into a hug instead of answering.
The woman by the window checks her watch. "Danny, we need to go. We promised to meet Stan for lunch."
"I don't want to go," Grace says. "I want to stay with Danno."
"Grace," the woman sighs. "No. We will come back tomorrow."
"Danno!" Grace cries, and Danny hugs her again. Then he holds her away from him so he can use a gentle thumb to wipe away a tear.
"Go with your mom now, Grace. I'm not going anywhere, and in fact, I'll probably be released day after tomorrow."
Rachel—Mary finally remembers her name from one of Steve's emails—grabs Grace's hand and drags her out of the room without bothering to collect the crayons and paper Grace was using. Mary does it for her, setting the small backpack she finds by the foot of the bed on the chair Rachel had been sitting on.
"Do you really think Steve's going to be okay?"
"Chin told me they found the antidote and the person who tried to kill him."
"Who was it?"
"One of Wo Fat's lackeys—a groupie, if you will. Chin and Kono have gone to interrogate her. So, now, since my oh-so-lovely ex-wife stole my lunch date, would you eat with me so I don't feel lonely?"
Mary can't help but smile even though she is frightened something will happen to Steve if she isn't watching him. She thinks of Kale's conviction that he'd do everything in his power to keep her safe. She realizes that his exchanging of salutes with Kono is the same promise, just nonverbally. Appeased, insomuch as she can be right now when she's still on edge from the most recent attack, she settles onto Grace's bed while Danny calls the kitchens to order the "good stuff."
"So," he says when that's done, "twenty questions. Go."
"Animal?" she asks, accepting his distraction.
"No."
ooOoo
The Coffee is cold, but Chin drinks it anyway. The suspect, thirty-six year old Annetta Hainey, is already in the blue room. She's terrified, has already given up the information that she's in love with Wo Fat. Not so in love, though, that she thinks he'll rescue her. So far, she hasn't asked for a lawyer, but that could change once she's fully aware of all the charges Chin intends to throw at her.
He squares his shoulders, takes a deep breath, and enters the room again. He lets the door fall shut but doesn't step any farther into the room. He also doesn't speak, letting Hainey watch him watch her.
"Please don't kill me," she finally says. "I did it for love. Can't you understand?"
"No," he says. "Love is not an excuse to try killing someone. I do not have to understand you because what you did makes no sense."
"If someone was hurting your loved ones, wouldn't you do everything in our power to help them or make that threat go away?"
"How did Wo Fat give you the poison? How did he communicate with you that Steve McGarrett was the target?"
"I don't know. Wo Fat never actually spoke to me. I got in contact with one of his men." Hainey pauses to sniffle, shaking her handcuffs too. "He told me this was the best way to get Wo Fat's attention."
"Who was it?"
"I don't know his name, but I can describe him."
"Good," Chin says, opening the door. Hainey blinks in the sudden light.
"Am I still going to prison?" she calls after him as the door swings shut again. Chin doesn't respond, his phone out, already dialing a number.
"Hey, Duke, Kelly here. I need your best sketch artist now. We may have a direct line going back to Wo Fat."