Myriam had to admit, her day out with Steve had been something she’d needed. She couldn’t help but feel guilty for what happened to Auggie, especially since the bombing was connected to her and her family, but the way he dealt with it – at least in her presence – made her feel a bit better too. He was really happy with the poke that she brought him when Steve and she were on the way back to her house.
Auggie had always been so very strong, taking everything with a joke. Getting hurt on a job? Joke. Getting himself nearly killed during an undercover op? Joke. Losing his eyesight? Joke. She wasn’t sure how he did it, but she hoped it would be a family trait and that his sister Joan wouldn’t be too pissed off at Myriam for this. Especially since Myriam got him nearly killed during a past undercover op.
After dinner, Myriam went to bed with a bottle of wine and crashed. The next morning, however, she was awoken by a pale looking Cole. “What?”
“You need to get dressed and come downstairs. Like… now. Or they’ll come upstairs.”
She stared him bleary-eyed and confused. “What the fuck are you going on about?” She asked, pulling herself up. “I had a good fucking dream. Why you have to go and ruin it?”
“Myriam, please. The HPD officer that’s watching our house didn’t stand a chance, and Nick let them in before they’d kick in the door. It’s Pride with whomever the other one is.”
She let out a groan and jumped out of bed, stumbling to her closet and pulling on a pair of jeans as she yanked a shirt off a hanger. “Why didn’t you just start off with saying that Pride was here you dick!?”
“I thought you would have anticipated this.”
“He’d better have brought some gumbo with him,” she scowled as she got dressed. “Coffee.”
“Nick’s already on it.”
“No, I want spiked coffee,” she sighed.
Cole smirked and shook his head. “I think you might have a drinking problem sister.”
“And I think you might have a sex problem, brother,” she shot at him before making her way down the stairs.
“You get locked up for fifteen years,” he snipped. “Plus there are too many gorgeous women here. I’m going to enjoy myself. Just get your ass downstairs. And don’t hide.”
“I am not hiding!” She stormed into the kitchen to get her coffee and looked at their two guests who patiently waited until she had some coffee inside of her. “You didn’t have to come.”
Pride held his arms out and shook his head. “You think we wouldn’t show up when we caught wind of what was going on here? When your new station explodes? You got to be a special kind of crazy!”
Nick let out a laugh from the couch. “She is, but I think it pairs well with the local officer she has her eye on.”
Myriam glared over at her brother. “I do not,” she then looked over to the two men who’ve been keeping an eye on her for so long. “I wasn’t there. Two of my team and two techs died. One has a broken shoulder and the spare tech… Auggie…” she sighed then. “He lost his eyesight.”
“Auggie?” Gibbs blinked. “CIA Auggie?”
She nodded as she took another sip of her coffee. “Local LEO’s are working the case, and since their working theory is that everything is connected, I gave them all that we had on Parsons and the shit that she’s pulled.”
“This is an NCIS matter.”
“It is,” Myriam nodded. “But I’m too close, and the only two who are still alive are injured. I trust 5-0 to be as meticulous as I would be. And it’s not because I wanted to hand it over, it’s because we don’t have an office here anymore.”
“Well,” Pride smiled at her. “How about we pay them a visit to see what progress they’ve made so far?”
“And then you can also check out the local officer she likes,” Nick grinned. “Must have been a pleasant dream sis, both Cole and I-”
“Nick.” Cole kicked him.
“What?!” He complained. “You heard her too! She goes on about Tani and I. Why can’t I say something about her and McGarrett?”
“Because you and Tani are actually fucking each other,” Cole rolled his eyes at his brother. “The only one of our family who’s not getting any is her.”
“Hey!” Gibbs barked. “Language!”
“And far too much information,” Pride added as he looked at Myriam who looked like she could shoot someone. “Done with that coffee?”
Myriam poured her coffee into her to-go cup and went to the safe to get her badge and gun out. “Yeah, let’s go, let these two idiots do whatever,” she replied as she headed for the door before realizing what she said and turning back. “No parties at the house!”
“Where are you going, Myriam?!” Nick jumped after her. “You are not leaving us with your fed friends! That is not fair!”
“Tough! You shouldn’t have brought up McGarrett, and I’ve only mentioned Tani to you once, and that was last night with people who are involved with this shit!” She walked out the door and realized her car was still at the base. “Motherfucker!” she walked back inside. “I need to use your car.”
“No! You can walk!”
Pride put an arm around Myriam and steered her back towards the door. “Relax, we got a rental.”
She let out a whimper, knowing she wasn’t going to get out of being stuck with the very men she dreaded seeing that week. “Can we make a stop along the way? I think I’m gonna have to make a peace offering and a bit of sacrifice for what I’m bringing to these people,” she muttered as she began her slow walk to their car.
She made them swing by Kamekona’s truck for food and coffee, and she also asked him to give Steve a head’s up. She really needed to get Steve’s number for situations like this. Gibbs and Pride were going to eat him alive or rip the team apart because they weren’t working fast enough for Myriam’s sake.
Myriam was relieved to find Steve waiting for them outside upon arrival with a big smile on his face. “You brought breakfast!”
“I brought you a headache,” she replied, glancing over her shoulder. “The food is the apology for them. We did anticipate this though yesterday.”
He nodded as he took the food. “Mahalo, I’m Commander McGarrett,” he said as he lead them inside the building. “I take it you’d like an update on the case?”
“Yeah,” Gibbs slowly answered as he sized the man up. “That’d be nice.”
“Not a problem,” he said as he headed to the elevators. “You’d be pleased to know that we have one of the suspects in custody and we’ll hand her over to NCIS when we’re done so she can get her due process.”
Myriam tensed as she looked over at him. “Who?”
Steve grinned at her. “Isabella. Great tech, not good at hiding. Jerry ran into her last night.”
“Show me to her. I want five minutes,” she replied, turning to look for wherever their holding might be. “I have some things to go over.”
“Nope,” he said as he nudged her into the elevator to go to the offices. “Our case. Even they don’t get to see her, just hear and see what we’ve collected so far, and of course, hear our theories.”
“She killed my team. You think you’d be able to keep yourself back in my position?” Myriam questioned as she pushed ahead of him, angrily pressing the elevator call button. “Somehow I doubt you’d step back from a case if it were personal. Danny told me enough about your past with Wo Fat. So I know you are full of shit up to your eyeballs. In fact, they are floating around in your hair you are so full of it.”
He sighed. Oh, she was right. Of course, she was, he’d want the same, and he’d get physical about it. “Fine, five minutes, after we’re done telling your two friends everything we know.”
Myriam crossed her arms and smiled at him, rebelling in her success at his caving to her request. “Thank you,” she replied, much calmer. “Now, McGarrett, this is Gibbs and Pride. The ones I told you about. And I forgot to ask. Did anyone think to bring me gumbo?”
“Your brother already put it in the fridge,” Pride nodded. “Of course, I know how much you love your gumbo.”
“I would have brought steak, but rules,” Gibbs shrugged.
“Cole wants to open a true New Orleans style bar and restaurant here in Hawaii,” she told Pride. “All the other places here are fakes.”
“What if you get reassigned again?”
Myriam shrugged. “I don’t know yet. I hope not. I mean, I had a good team for a few weeks, what’s stopping me from building one again? I mean, this place isn’t so bad, apart from the food, but Nick got us a New Orleans cook, and it’s fine.”
Steve nodded, lost in thought for a moment as he lead them to the 5-0 offices. “Here we are. Home away from home. Anything you need, you can use. My office is yours while you are here.”
“Don’t let them get spoiled. They may not leave,” she hissed.
“And this is an investigation that we don’t mind working with NCIS for, just not you or Shep because you’re too close,” he winked at her. “You can work another case if it pops up.”
Myriam pouted as she looked around, impressed by the technology. Her eyes narrowed on the female officer she assumed was Tani. “So where is Danny? I’m surprised he’s not here to help me annoy you. I’m disappointed now. He let me down.”
“His son got into trouble in school, he’ll be late,” Steve replied, a playful smile on his face as he handed her one of Kamekona’s breakfast plates. “But feel free to sit at his desk and eat your breakfast.”
She looked back at him confused, holding her container. “He has a son too? I only knew about Grace. When did this happen?”
“A couple of years ago,” Steve laughed, shaking his head. “He travels back and forth between here and the mainland to his mother. Grace doesn’t want to; she’s fine where she is.”
She still stared at him. “He wasn’t there two nights ago.”
“Sleepover.”
“Sounds to me he’s like your dog. Everyone forgets about him,” she said as she sat down in Danny’s chair and started to eat. With Pride and Gibbs in the room, she couldn’t refuse, or hell would rain down on her. “Tell them what you know so they can learn things,” she said as she motioned to her two friends.
Steve grinned as he tapped the table in front of him and things started to show up on the screens around them. “Junior made a timeline with all the evidence we’ve got, feel free to take your time,” he told Gibbs and Pride.
“You know, Patton would get a kick out of this place,” Pride looked at Myriam.
“I will have my own hacker whenever he gets out of the hospital, and I can get approval for the proper equipment,” she glared. “Of course he will need to learn Braille.”
“I thought you wanted to send Auggie back after he appeared into your office like that?” Gibbs blinked in surprise. “At least that’s what Leon told me.”
“No,” she said as she pushed a spoonful of food in her mouth. “I later decided to keep him around. He likes it here. And what better team is there than a team of misfits who are good at their job?”
Gibbs shook his head at her avoidance, knowing that after all that happened, she was merely clinging to something familiar. “So what do you have besides Cullen? If she is as annoying as I understand, I doubt she’s very cooperative.”
“She is, actually,” Junior said. “She knows about our reputation, and she’s shivering in her boots, but all she’s doing is confirming what we already suspected. She only knows what she was supposed to do, and nothing else.”
“She has confirmed that she acted upon her anger, but that was manipulated by Parsons to leave a farewell present,” Tani added. “She fully knows that her future is doing time, but she doesn’t regret doing it.”
“Did you say, Parsons?” Pride said as he finally turned to look at the screens where everything was in chronological order. The trouble in New Orleans, the case of that dead sailor that had stalled, and the bombing. The relationships that were confirmed towards Parsons that she was the dead sailor’s ‘girlfriend’ and in a threesome with the two Cullens. “That Edward, he’s back on the mainland, isn’t he?”
“As far as we know sir, yes he is,” Tani nodded. “He was picked up by the FBI in New York on suspicion of domestic terrorism. Mainly due to his ties to his wife and Parsons.”
“Good, we’ll get him transferred into NCIS custody,” Pride replied as he continued to look at the screens and then turned to Myriam. “They think your parents are involved?!”
Myriam nodded as she continued to eat her food, choosing to remain silent. The idea was so far out there, but it was a solid one.
“The night after the bombing, my partner Detective Williams and I had a sit down with Myriam and her brothers. As it turns out, her brother Nick was doing his investigation into Parsons, and he had come to the same conclusion as us,” Steve said reluctantly. “He also said that I might have made it worse.”
Gibbs snapped his head towards Steve. “How?”
“Look, she wasn’t very forthcoming when she came to the island, and NCIS had a habit of giving us their cases. I wanted to know who I was working with so I had someone with eyes and ears everywhere do some digging,” Steve admitted. “He already told me that he likely raised the interest of their parents, but I chose to ignore it.”
Myriam could tell that Pride was showing an immense restraint, but Gibbs was closer to Steve and punched him in his face.
“Yeah, I deserved that,” he said as he rubbed his jaw. “But even so, without my digging into Myriam and her brothers through my friend, their parents would have found them eventually anyway. Parsons works for them. Our working theory is that everything that has happened, including your partner’s firm being investigated by the IRS and your shooting, was all a set up to get Myriam right where they wanted; back in New Orleans, where Myriam was taken, and her brothers came out of the shadows.”
“Vance might have suspected something,” Pride replied. “Because after that, her reassignment papers came in quite quickly. I wasn’t even fully operational yet.”
“Or, he didn’t want to have them stay in New Orleans for too long. One Mikaelson means trouble; three means hell could break loose,” Gibbs pointed out. “But fair point, we’ll have to ask him that.”
Pride was quiet for a couple of minutes as he absorbed everything. “Your theory holds, I suppose. But why would Elijah and Antoinette go after their children after all this time?”
“Because for fifteen years they believed their son Nick was killed by their son Cole who was safe in prison and they couldn’t get to him. And Myriam was on her own, making a career while being looked after by you two,” Danny said as he walked in and looked at Myriam who was eating at his desk. “If you spill food on my keyboard, I’ll make you clean it with your tongue.”
Myriam looked up at him innocently before curling her legs under herself to make herself more comfortable. “You only make me want to take that as a dare. You know that?”
Danny turned to point his finger at her. “Do not, I repeat, do not make me lock you in a room with my son because after the last hour I had; you will be begging to be going back home to spend quality time with your brothers. You hear me? Now, who the hell are these two schmucks? Steve. You bringing in strays again?”
“Actually, these belong to Myriam,” he smiled, trying not to laugh as Danny tried not to pop a blood vessel while he looked over his shoulder at her.
“Don’t look at me like that. It’s not like I invited them,” she mumbled and turned back to her food. “I’m supposed to be decoration here, remember?”
He just waved her off, deciding that she wasn’t worth the argument. “Grover still on vacation with his kids?” He asked as he took note of who was in the office.
“Yep,” Steve confirmed as he picked up a file and flipped through it. “He should be back next week. He will be upset about missing all this fun.”
“Nah, babe. He’s just gonna be upset at not seeing the mating ritual you and Agent Crazy here have going on,” Danny replied. “But don’t worry. I’ll be sure to update him later.”
“So, aside from having the female Cullen in your custody and the other one is with the Feds, how far are you with finding Parsons?” Pride questioned as he kept his eyes fixed on the screen. “We couldn’t find her.”
“She’s on the island, just went underground. However, she isn’t making friends for her cause with the locals if what their source says,” Myriam replied as she continued eating. “My bet is my parents are here; she’s hiding with them.”
“But there’s no record of your parents entering Hawaii,” Junior replied.
Myriam shrugged. “My parents are good at what they do. Of course, there’s no record of them entering Hawaii. I mean, this isn’t Nick’s first visit to Hawaii, but you won’t have a record of him entering the first time, either,” she set down her now empty carton and got up from Danny’s chair to join the rest of them. “They know we don’t have a lot to go on; we can’t exactly put pressure on them because we don’t know where they are. Hawaii is an island, but it’s still big, what do you want to do? Knock on every door? Walk every mile in the wilderness to see where they might be?”
Steve pulled up a map of the islands before zooming in on Oahu. “The forests are pretty dense and a great place to hide. But they can be dangerous if you don’t know how to navigate them.”
“Wait, so, you want to walk every mile?”
“No, but not every area is easy to get to. I doubt they are used to living very low. Take your brother for example. For someone who is supposed to be dead, he certainly has some high-end tastes and lifestyle. Not exactly hiding,” he pointed out. “I doubt your parents can shake those old habits either.”
“So, we keep an eye on large purchases,” Jerry said as he walked in. “Hi, I’m Jerry,” he continued as he sat down. “We cast a wide net and see what’s out of the ordinary. Granted, there are many people in Hawaii with money, but this should give us something to work with.”
“Do you remember any of their aliases?” Gibbs asked as he looked at her.
She gave him a wide-eyed shrug. “No. I barely knew shit about that end when I was sent to you. I just knew enough that when certain people showed up, to get the hell out of the house and I went to hide out in the ninth ward with some friends, or across the water in Algiers. Wherever they weren’t and the opposite end of town.”
“Do you think Nick might know?”
“Depends on how much our dad keyed him in on before he went to Pride,” she admitted. “We didn’t want anything to do with the business. He said he wanted to get enough information for the police to have a solid conviction and us be free of them.”
Pride then looked at Gibbs. “Hey, wasn’t there a federal case on them at some point? But they were able to get off because their lawyers were good at what they did and the feds’ case wasn’t airtight?”
Gibbs sighed and nodded. “I’ll make a few calls, that way I can also ask the Feds to release the male Cullen into our custody.”
Myriam moved over to study the aerial map, curious. “If it were me, I’d go somewhere high with a view of anyone that is approaching. Along the woods would provide good cover to escape and disappear into, but I remember my dad never wanted to dirty his hands. Always with a hanky in his suit pocket.”
“Last night I started to look for abnormalities in transactions,” Jerry replied as he kept typing away on his laptop before swiping it up to the big screens. “But, I thought there was another way. How unusual is it for a small group of people to rent out an entire floor of a condo complex unless they’re famous rock stars or actors who want their privacy?”
Steve looked at Jerry. “You found them?”
“I might have.”
“Why couldn’t you say that, to begin with?!” Danny shot at him.
“Because you were all in the middle of talking and giving good ideas and such.”
Myriam looked at the address, snorting as she looked at the area when she got the assignment before Nick admitted to having a property already. “The thing is, it would be hard not to be seen. It’s highly populated. Granted they will have their entrance, but they still need to go and get food. The doorman and building security would see them.”
“Nick got you a cook, and I think you even have someone who cleans up after you, why wouldn’t they do the same?” Danny pointed out.
She pouted at him. “I can buy my fruit. You give me a list, and I can do go the stuff on it. But I’m fairly certain Nick hired the cook legitimately. That makes me want to double check when we get home now…”
Danny snorted. “Don’t worry; they’re both legitimate.”
“Yes, but I’ve never seen the cleaner.”
“Because you’re usually out.”
“But still!”
“Well, then they don’t touch my room because my shit is all over my floor still and I can do my laundry like a grown up thanks to this asshole,” she nodded to Gibbs.
Danny looked back at her for a moment. “Huh. Is that so? Maybe this isn’t such a match made in heaven after all. Considering Steve is such a neat freak.”
“Jesus fucking Christ,” Myriam cursed, throwing her arms up and rolling her eyes, annoyed by the no longer hidden hints.
Gibbs quietly looked from Myriam to Detective Williams and then Commander McGarrett before taking a few steps towards Danny and slapped him on the head. “Let’s go and check out that building,” he said as he looked at Steve, ignoring Danny’s complaints.