Chapter 14

Steve went along with Danny to his apartment to have a chat with Myriam, to clear things up and hopefully she was up to it. Myriam had had a rough day, and he wanted to know if she was alright, too. However, what they came back to was quite the surprise.

Myriam and Gracie were passed out on the couch with a black and white movie on the television running. The makings for Shirley Temple drinks and empty maraschino cherry bottles all over the counter, but a bottle of wine and empty wine glass positioned securely beside Myriam’s side of the sofa. It appeared that the two took a walk down the street for their little spree and went crazy the rest of the night, knowing that any form of responsible adult supervision would not come any time soon.

“Well, at least Gracie didn’t drink?” Steve tried not to snicker as Danny’s face was set to murder. “Bruh, it’s Shirley Temples, come on. Gracie probably was the adult one to keep it more controlled. It’s been a long day for everyone.”

Danny managed to get Gracie off the couch and brought her to her room to continue to sleep. “I’ll make some coffee; you wake up the princess.”

Making his way over to the couch, he wasn’t sure how waking the woman up would go. Picking the bottle of wine up and inspecting the label for its alcohol content, it wasn’t as bad as far as wines could go. He’s had far stronger ones himself. He tried shaking her shoulder to start, but she only curled herself up more.

“Go away, Cole. I have a day off for once,” she muttered. “Go entertain your floozies yourself.”

“I’m sure he’d love that,” Steve snickered. “Would you please wake up?”

She buried her face into the cushion and grumbled incoherent words and something slipped about her father before she relaxed again.

“Danny’s making coffee.”

The scent had started making its way into the living room, as the man arrived at the doorway to watch the scene smiling. “Coffee?” she repeated as she took a sniff, lifting her nose to confirm the delicious odor.

“He actually has decent coffee too; I think it’ll be to your liking.”

“No one likes New Orleans coffee but New Orleans,” she replied as she sat up rubbing her face. “You have to go to New York for the good shit. And I’m not talking the Starbucks crap.”

“He has it imported,” Steve snickered. “How are you feeling?”

She glared at him. “Tired as fuck. You just woke me up. How the hell do you think I feel?” she shot at him as she stood and looked around with a grimace. “I have to clean this shit up. Your partner is going to kill me.”

“Nah, it’s fine,” Danny said from the door. “And you can sleep later, but we have a few burning questions for you that came up through our research.”

Myriam looked over as she picked up some discarded things during her and Gracie’s movie binge and was concerned by his tone. “Well, that doesn’t sound promising. Why do I get the feeling that I’m not going to like the sound of this and am I going to have to get a lawyer or something base on the look in your eye? Because I’m pretty certain I haven’t done anything illegal. My brothers – I don’t know.”

“Oh no, if our working theory is correct, you and your brothers need to be in protective custody,” Danny quipped as he came in with a garbage bag to help clean up.

“Protective- what? What the hell for?” she snarled as she turned to face him. “What the hell are you talking about? I already figured that Cullen likely planted something because I had her boyfriend sent back east to have our bosses deal with him. I later fired her because of her attitude about it and refused to do her job so what? She plants something?”

Steve then told her about the Cullens and Parsons. And how they believed that Pride’s shooting was a red herring to get Myriam back to New Orleans and her brothers back in the picture. Then her post to Hawaii. And how Tesla was another red herring.

Myriam blinked, not quite believing it. “She was working for a politician who hated Pride from the beginning. He was a local boy like Pride. New Orleans, as big and populated it is, locals take a lot of pride in its culture and no matter what, you never really leave there. Pride practically ousted Barlow and ostracized him to the point that he changed his name.”

“Is it possible that this Barlow guy knew your parents?” Danny asked carefully after returning with the coffee.

“Everyone knew my family,” she replied, a little calmer. “It was kinda why when I was brought in to cover Pride, I didn’t go out on what cases came in. I didn’t want to hinder them. If we needed something darker done, I could get things moved using my name with other networks for information.”

“What if all of that was orchestrated? What if everything that happened with Parsons is all a part of a bigger plan orchestrated by someone who doesn’t like you or your brothers very much?” Steve asked.

She rolled her eyes. “So they planned and worked with my brothers to have one fake the other’s murder and take the fall for it? Come on now, McGarrett.”

“No, your brothers did what they did, but it all started with Barlow and Parsons,” Steve replied. “I know it sounds out there, and maybe like a fantasy but what if we’re right? What if this is all a ruse to get you and your brothers out in the open so your father can finish what he started?”

Myriam sat and thought about how the NOLA team knew someone in the government had it out for Pride, but they just didn’t know who, which set up all their troubles. The IRS on LaSalle that she couldn’t even figure out a way to help because his father did screw things up himself. Letting out a sigh, she shrugged. “I don’t know, maybe? If it is, I don’t know anything about what my father might be up to. My brothers, if they kept in touch with anyone might know, but if they’ve been truthful with me when they said they haven’t, they shouldn’t know. However, knowing Nick, he’s a paranoid asshole like our father. He always had eyes on his back because he was terrified of him and what he could do. He’d know more about what he’s capable of than I would.”

“Call them. Tell them to come here.”

Sighing, she went over and picked up her cell phone. Dialing Cole first, she let it ring until he picked up. He was annoyed at the interruption until she said it was important and gave him the address to meet her. The next call was more difficult. “Nick, I need you to meet me. Cole is on his way, but 5-0 has a theory, and you’re the best to shoot ideas off regarding it.”

“Can’t it wait?”

“Um, not really if you are to agree with their theory,” she murmured, glancing at the two. “They pieced together some of my case from New Orleans, and these here and they believe that um… that our dad may be behind it.”

Nick sighed. “Very well. I’ll come over, and I’ll bring over my own information as well. Where do I go?”

She quickly gave him the address. “Can you bring me more wine from the collection too? I think this is going to be a long night.”

“She does not need more wine!” Danny shouted.

“Ignore him,” she hissed into the phone before hanging up and glaring at him. “Trade families for a day and you’ll be at the bottom of Jim Beam sucking his -”

Steve wrapped his hand around her mouth before she could finish her statement. “Alright now. You two calm down. I know you two are friends. Or at least friendlier than you are with the rest of the team so let’s just take a step back and chill out. And not over alcohol. Got it? Let’s focus on your case since apparently, now you are it.”

As soon as he removed his hand, he remained close to her, eyeing her reaction. “Well, I’m a lot more fun when I’m loaded. Just saying.”

“You’ve had enough for the night,” Danny replied and pointed at her coffee. “Drink up.”

“Coffee,” Myriam slithered over to seat and took a sip. While she didn’t prefer her coffee black, she wasn’t about to start complaining after all the drama she stirred up for the two.

“Did you and Gracie have fun?” Danny asked as he sipped his coffee. “She usually doesn’t take to strangers very well, but when I introduced you, she was quite happy.”

Myriam looked around and shrugged. “Things went fine. There wasn’t much around here to do so we took a walk down to the store for snacks and found some old movies on TV to watch. She certainly had a lot to share about you and your team, so I suppose it was good.”

“You weren’t supposed to go out.”

“It’s not like she was left unsupervised. And this was before either of us knew of what was going on,” she pointed out. “We went up the street and came back. Next time I’ll order Uber Eats or make arrangements with a liquor store to deliver for me. So, what did you find at the scene?”

“Ha, nice try,” Steve took a sip of his coffee.

“It was my office!”

“And it’s our case.”

“And your partner working your case looks like he’s about to shit himself about my office,” she replied. Glancing between the two, she narrowed her eyes. “What the hell is up? Or do the two of you not even know what you two are doing?”

It was quiet for a moment before Danny sat down and spoke up. “So uh…I offered you to look into your brother, right?”

“Right?”

“This morning I found him and Tani uh… exploring the outdoors without any clothes on,” he replied. “As it turns out, she had no idea who he was in the beginning, and when she offered Steve to look into your brothers herself, she realized what was going on.”

Myriam sat back in her chair, her coffee in front of her, staring at the cup as she was instantly sobered. “So you were looking into my brothers while chasing me down McGarrett?”

“No, that decision came after you sent the lieutenant on my ass,” he replied. “Besides, with your family history, I wanted to know for myself if they were on the up and up as you said. Why did you have Danny look into your brother?”

She nodded, understanding the reaction. “Same reason. So my brother and your officer are shacking up? That’s what he’s been hiding?”

“I don’t know; I feel that he’s not telling her everything. We’d only know for sure if we’d raid his lair where he supposedly keeps go bags for you guys.”

She grew quieter as she heard that and her eyes rose to look at them. “If he has to go bags for us, then he believes there is still someone after us.”

“Look,” Steve said as he gently placed his hand on her knee and squeezed it. “I think your brother knows more than he lets on about things and I sincerely hope that he’ll come clean tonight. You’re not alone in this. And I truly believe that he’s not doing anything illegal, either. He even told Tani that it was expected and alright that we were looking into him and that he didn’t have anything to hide. Apart from what he might know. He likely didn’t want to endanger you.”

“He came out of hiding because the history of our family came knocking,” she said as she looked at them without giving the gory details that lead to the reassignment in Hawaii. “If it weren’t for him and Cole, I wouldn’t be sitting here, breathing. So even if they are treading lines, I still would find the best lawyer I could to protect them now. They are all I have.”

“And we know that. Even if we’d come up with something while looking at your brothers that were borderline illegal, we would be alright with it as long as they wouldn’t hurt people around them. Your family is important, Myriam. The moment you set foot on the Island and started to work here, you became Ohana. Family. One of us. And that will remain so until you decide to leave or when NCIS reassigns you again,” Steve explained kindly. “You three don’t have to do things alone anymore.”

She tried to smile at him, but she didn’t have the energy to put into it. Thankfully for her, the doorbell rang, causing her to look over her shoulder. “Probably one or both of them.”

“Stay here,” Steve said as he took out his gun and headed for the door. Peering out of the spyhole he saw two unamused men stand in front of the door. He let them in and made sure that they were alone before following them into the living room. Nick was carrying a satchel and Cole looked drunk, so Danny got them some more coffee.

“We’re here, now what?” Cole said as he sat down next to his sister where Steve had previously sat. “Couldn’t it have waited?”

Nick sat down quietly and didn’t say anything. It was almost as if he was trying to find the right words to say but couldn’t find them. “We’re here because everything that Myriam and her friend Pride has gone through is connected, isn’t it? Even that politician and the dead sailor from a couple of weeks back.”

“Commander McGarrett and his team suspect that, yes,” Myriam replied, feeling a little uncomfortable as she watched her brother after recently learning of his relationship with the man’s employee. “Though I wonder if your girlfriend told you any of this?”

Cole’s eyes grew as he turned to stare at his brother. “Girlfriend? When was this? Why haven’t I heard about it? Who is she? What’s she like? Is she hot? I was hoping that we could set up with this set of twins I met this morning down at the beach. Man!”

“Now is not the time, Cole!” Nick shot at him. “And I’m afraid to say that he’s right,” he said as he nodded towards Steve while getting a stack of papers out of his bag. “I did my own investigation and used some of my sources,” he said as he threw them on the coffee table. “Our parents are still alive, and they want us dead.”

Myriam was confused and angry. “What for?” she asked as she launched herself for the papers. “I was only fifteen when all of that went down. Hell, I wasn’t even there when the police raided the house!”

“It was likely because we three were always together and Cole and I tipped off the police anonymously,” Nick replied with a sigh. “I don’t know. Father was always a murderous bastard. Perhaps they want us dead because we refused to follow in their footsteps and yet enjoy the fruits of their labor, which is owed to us.”

“Yes, pain and suffering,” she scoffed. “While Dad was out doing god knows what, Mom was having that affair with – oh, what’s his name?”

“Sheppard.”

She looked up, and recognition came to her. “Motherfucker. I thought he was familiar, but I just couldn’t place him…”

“Your partner?” Steve asked. “He’s called Sheppard, right?”

“Yeah. Jon Sheppard. He told me he had a falling out with his parents for not following in his family’s law practice and going into law enforcement instead. He left and went as far away as he could get. He even mentioned going to New Orleans a time or two, but I didn’t make the connection,” she answered. “I mean, the Jon I remembered when I was a kid was a scraggly thing and miserable during the visits, but I never stuck around. I was out of the house and went to the sticks where I hung out with some of the shadier groups I’d become friends with but not for drugs or anything. They used to have some music runs amongst themselves, and it paid to have them as friends to hide when Dad came looking because no one saw nothing when a Mikaelson was looking.”

“Yeah I don’t remember him either,” Cole shook his head.

“I do, but I didn’t know that your new partner was him. But I do know that him being here is purely accidental. He’s the avoidance kind of person,” Nick replied before letting out a sigh. “I do have to admit that I didn’t find a connection between the mayor of New Orleans and Parsons.”

“If you’re talking about Taylor, the bitch that tried to have me killed, then I doubt she would have anything to do with her. My money would have been on Hamilton. He was in office for fucking years and had a judge in his pocket to turn a lot of deals in his favor,” Myriam pointed out. “I found out a lot of shit before I went back to that city and while he painted a pretty picture, it was done in blood.”

“No, I think her beef with you was personal, that’s why she asked her dirty brother to take you and do what he did,” Nick shrugged. “I have no idea why maybe Pride can get that out of her. But it’s unrelated to all of this. You see, I wanted to help Pride just as much as you did, so I started looking. Digging. And I thought the information I received wasn’t solid, such as with your dead body, until we came to Hawaii and that became your first case. Over the years I’ve amassed quite the network of… acquaintances who keep an eye out for me and one managed to inform me that our parents were spotted in France about a year ago. Parsons was in France about a year ago.”

“Okay, fine, but why didn’t you tell us, Nick?” Cole asked as he looked at his brother. “We deserved to know what you were up to.”

“Because I’m your older brother and it’s my duty and responsibility to take care of you, to make amends! We should never have faked my death and put you in jail to keep ourselves safe! We should have stuck together instead!” he shot at his brother before looking at Steve. “You’re friends with Joe White, aren’t you? Thanks to his digging around our parents know that we’re here. Because you couldn’t allow yourself to get the information organically, you had him look into our family, and you gave them a roadmap.” He then looked at his siblings again. “I don’t know about you two, but I think we need to leave Hawaii as soon as we possibly can and disappear.”

Myriam listened to her brother’s words, and she could understand where he was coming from. But she was tired of running. “I lost four people today. Two of them are still in the hospital. I’m tired of people being collateral damage because of our family. I’m tired of people being manipulated because of our family. This ends. Now. Let them come.”

“But we will lose, Myriam!” Nick blurted. “Granted, you’re a cop, and we know how to shoot guns, but they will win, it’s best to take our chances and leave. You hate it here anyway.”

“I can’t do that, Nick. I need to see this through for us. For the people, I’ve lost. I don’t care how we’re going to win or even if we’re going to win, but we need to try at least to stop them. Enough is enough.”

“And you’re not alone,” Steve added.

“You won’t allow us to kill them,” Nick said. “In jail, where they belong after we three gave our testimonies, they’ll have an even bigger reach. They need to be dealt with.”

“Off the record, we’re no strangers to go off book and to do what it takes. Your parents have proven to want to kill you. You’re citizens of Hawaii and thus under our protection. I say that warrants us to do everything in our power to make sure that doesn’t happen.”

Myriam turned to look at Steve, bewildered at his response, unsure of how to deal with it, so she just internally shut down. “Um…uh…” she blinked as she turned back to her brothers.

“How about you all just relax for tonight? I don’t know if your parents are going to try to pull another move so soon, but it seems unlikely if they know that we’re onto them. They are going to wait to see what our next move will be, or yours.”

“You’ve got three stressed out Mikaelsons here. There won’t be any relaxing done,” Nick said as his brother had become unusually quiet, just like his sister. “But I’ll take them home.”

Steve nodded. “I’ll have one of my team come over and have some HPD units patrol your area more frequently. Probably put an unmarked outside as well.”

Danny decided to chime in. “Yeah, and it won’t be Tani. You’ll get to meet Junior.”

“I don’t want to go home,” Myriam muttered as she had squeezed herself in the small area of the couch that she was on, her head now on the headrest and her feet in Cole’s lap. She was trying to make sense of what she felt, but all she could identify was numbness. Overloaded.

“Yes, come on,” Nick said as he lifted her off the couch. “You’ll be safer at home.”

“I don’t want to be alone,” she whispered.

“You’re not alone. I’ll take care of you. You and Cole. Now, let’s go home. Say goodnight and thank you, Myriam.”

“Goodnight and thank you, Myriam,” she sleepily parroted.

Steve smiled and waved to the three as they left. As he closed the door behind them, he looked at Danny. “So, this whole tough agent act, is just a defense mechanism? Those three are terrified.”

Danny nodded. “I saw a glimpse of that when I spoke to Myriam that afternoon on the beach. She grew up not to trust anyone, just like her brothers. They don’t have anyone else to look out for them but themselves because while Myriam has made some friends over at NCIS, I don’t think they’d like to get their hands dirty on this one.”

“Well, then it’s a good thing that the three of them have us now,” the 5-0 fearless leader smiled and prepared to go home, sleep for a few hours and then to get back to work.

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