Murder with Lens: A Sherlock Holmes Case (221B Baker Street Series) (20 page)

And if you had Sherlock’s ear, it meant you got Mycroft’s attention. Say, if you happened to have physical or ideological possession of Sherlock Holmes.

Tearing pain blasted across his torso, he pulled against a crowd of merrymakers on his ropes. Epiphany dawned that this was actually his memory he was experiencing. The tug of war that strained muscle painfully across his chest and back… it was the past. It had already happened. It was over. He felt himself breathe deeply-

He sat on his heels on a tile floor in the Yard. John had his face between his hands, and was shouting his name in a way that suggested he’d tried calling, and it hadn’t gone well. Sherlock’s hands were balled up in John’s coat. He opened his eyes, but his voice wouldn’t work. He could hear himself gasp for air. He buckled, nearly falling face-first against John’s jacket, without being able to do anything about it. Dimly he began to hear Reese’s steady voice talking. He listened to what she was saying, because she kept up a steady demand that it was crucial to his safety that he hear her. She was his epiphany. She was the one who’d talked him back out again.

For a moment, he sank into a restful darkness.

“-something he called the red house.” Reese wasn’t talking to him, but he could feel her voice vibrate. This was because his head was cushioned against hers. He tipped against the cocoa scent of her hair. “I’ve got the names of the streets, John. That will put us in the area. Let me talk to Lestrade and my team about how to go in. He’s going to need about a half hour to get back up to steam. Can you feel him shaking?”

John’s hands on the back of his shoulders.

“Yeah.”

Reese nodded, “Stay with him.”

He opened his eyes again.

“Sherlock?” John’s voice broke with relief. He stooped. John took his hands from Sherlock’s shoulders and circled around. He ducked down and pushed Sherlock’s hair out of his eyes. “Hey, are you actually in there this time?”

Sherlock reached up and rubbed his aching head. His arms felt weighted, but… he was okay. He winced up at John. “That… was extraordinary.”

Reese ruffled his hair and grinned. “You memorized the street map and traffic lights of London?”

“No,” Sherlock stretched his tender arms carefully. “But, well, yes. It wasn’t intentional.”

“Oh my God,” she laughed. “Well, whatever. You gave us directions, lights, arrows, four-way crossings. It was crazy. We can get to the general area.” She stood and smoothed her skirt. Reese looked down at him. “Sherlock… you’re something else.”

After that, she left him with John.

Sherlock blinked slowly. His head throbbed, but he could finally see the world without things being awash in vibrating colour with razor edges that hurt his brain. It was surprising that he was so winded, and so gratified at once. When he sucked in a deep breath he touched his throat. It hurt. John came to stand before him and offer a hand to help him up. He took it and got to his unsteady feet.

“You okay?

“Spectacular,” Sherlock brought his flattened hands together. “What happened?”

John’s expression clouded. “It was kind of… intense.” One moment, Holmes had been his customary – if that word could be applied to him – opinionated self, impatient and wholly disinterested. And then he’d broken apart at the seams, clearly in pain, clearly in distress. John had politely excused himself from observation and burst into the room right through the CIA guards.

At six feet plus, and well built, Sherlock was more than strong enough to snap bones. But John also didn’t want Scott or Lewis to lay a hand on his friend. To John, they looked like ham-fisted giants who would inadvertently do Sherlock harm. So he and Reese had handled it.

John rubbed a sore muscle in his neck. “You were definitely… elsewhere.”

“I’m sorry I missed it, but I was busy,” Sherlock finished unrolling his sleeves, went after his jacket, and pulled it on, even though his cuffs weren’t buttoned. “Amazing stuff, John – was talking to Ree, and the room went red. Then I realized I was in this old, discoloured hall, and it was like an overexcited cocktail party – some kind of fetish thing with a human centrepiece to play with, only that was me. A bit rough on the wrists, weren’t you John? That’s going to be bruises, for sure.”

John was still recovering from the description of the room; the party; Sherlock as a plaything in this Club’s incomprehensible game. He shook himself. “Sorry. I had to hold on to you.”

Sherlock sobered. After a few intervening seconds he asked, “Did I hurt you?”

“No.”

“Ree?”

“Close thing, but no.”

“Good.” Sherlock ducked his head and caught up the long coat. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” John zipped his jacket. His voice lowered, “Let’s not wait for this lot.”

“Uncanny,” Sherlock replied quietly, “I was thinking the same. And, by the way, did I tell her it was the Chiltern Street Fire Station?”

“Oh my God,” John said under his breath. “God. Why didn’t they just drop you home after?”

“The question, John.”

“No. I mean, your directions cut off before you got there. You were getting too hard to handle, and she just sort of – I donno – pulled you back out. Could you hear her?”

“Eventually, yes,” Sherlock dropped gratefully into a chair and closed his eyes. He joined his hands under his chin. “Could you… recon the observation room and report? I’d like to leave now.”

John did just that. He found the CIA and Met police in a nearby break room. They were trying to be quiet, though Lestrade was rather angry with the CIA. He hadn’t expected anything like what had happened. He’d expected a kind of interrogation. Well, John could understand the feeling. But now Lestrade was furious, and that John didn’t follow. Reese was busily explaining that it didn’t matter how he felt, and that she’d simply created a safe zone for Holmes to access the memory – which he’d badly wanted to do to begin with. She was frustrated with the delay.

John withdrew carefully, and helped steady Sherlock out the front doors of the Yard. A few streets over, they stopped for a container of orange juice. It seemed to replenish Holmes depleted sugars.

The skies had finally cleared, and watery, slanting, sunlight penetrated cloud cover above their heads. Sherlock leaned on the wall of the convenience store and licked sugary drink off his lips. Sarah had introduced him to this brand during the Ninth Muse case. He smiled at the bottle. “Mm. If they crystallized this and ground it up, I could cut and snort it.”

John snatched the empty bottle away. “Oh, shut up. You would not.” He chucked it in the nearby Recycling and dusted off his hands. “I think you’ve had quite enough, really. How’s your head?”

“Getting better,” Sherlock started a second drink. “Sugar.”

“Yes, I know what it is. You’re hyperactive enough, don’t you think – and don’t bother telling me no one has proven the connection between sugar and hyperactivity, either. And… and we should get moving. It’s too close to Scotland Yard here.”

“It’s certainly making you nervous.” Sherlock leaned over to his ear, “We need to wait a little longer. I need to pick up my tail.”

John’s head turned a little. “Your what?”

“The person tailing me,” Sherlock told him. He leaned back to the wall and said, “I’ve had one since shortly after the tête-à-tête with… our mystery boy, I think, among other Photographers. Of course it could just be one of my brother’s underlings. They’ve followed me around before. Do you have the Browning?” He took out his phone and began checking his mail.

“Yes, since right after you vanished, in fact. I picked it up with Reese. I honestly should just carry it with me.”

He looked up from his screen. “Why don’t you?”

“No holster, and it’s bloody illegal without a license, Sherlock. I could only get a carry permit for a revolver anyway, if I could get through the background check to begin with. I’ve been seeing a psychiatrist, remember?” John leaned closer, “This is no revolver. This is a military issue Browning in my pants.” He really needed to spring for a good holster.

Sherlock’s mouth pulled into a smile that lit his green eyes. “Oh, I see. Well, I’m well warned.” His fingers flew across the keyboard of his phone. “However… I’m police, and I believe you have good reason to possess a firearm. Do you solemnly promise to properly maintain it, and carry it without jeopardising public safety, or disturbing the peace?”

John tipped his head to loosen the tight knots in his neck. “I won’t go shooting happy faces into the walls, if that’s what you mean.”

“You won’t go blind if you play with it, John.” Sherlock made a final flourish of taps and pointed his phone at John’s reddened face. “By the way, fee paid, form filed and properly buried. You are approved. I expedited the mailing; you should have a paper copy in 24 hours.” Sherlock put his phone away and smiled down at John. “Renewable, every five years.”

John’s phone pinged. When he checked it, he found the e-mail copy of his carry permit. “Oh God, you are the devil. They let the devil in by the door of Scotland Yard.”

“Don’t be superior, John. You decided he’d be a good flatmate.” Holmes turned and walked toward the far end of the street. Clearly, he’d spotted what, or whomever he’d been waiting on.

John found he was laughing under his breath. It caught a boyish look from Holmes, almost something he’d expect out of a particularly good, definitely unruly, schoolmate. John fell in beside Sherlock with a comfortable exhalation. This was the man he knew and – frankly – couldn’t get enough of. “So we’re going to Chiltern Street? Not a long way from there to the Embankment, really.”

“Good drop site for when you’re done banging up your party favour with everything in the medicine cabinet.” Sherlock’s brows drew up. “Need to get a cab now. Carefully. Stay in full view.”

“We want to be followed.” John tried not to look around him, anxiously, and tried not to worry about the police finding them.

“Quite.”

John studied Sherlock on this. He was more practiced in setting traps than men in charge of handling vermin. In the cab, Sherlock glanced over the driver – his habit now – and the front seats, and then sighed heavily. Surprise-surprise: he actually dialled out on his cell phone. John’s brows went up.

“Yes, hello Anthea – where is he?”

Sunset sprayed the back seat golden and made Sherlock’s still face seem cut out of sandstone. He was looking for Mycroft’s help? John was surprised.

Sherlock’s lip curled in disbelief, “What do you mean who? My brother. Or did you think I was calling to ask after the Queen of Eng-” he rubbed his forehead, between his brows. “I don’t care that she’s ‘doing quite well’. Where is-” now there was a long pause, followed by Sherlock’s soft response of, “Yes. Right.”

He hung up the cell and tucked it back in his pocket. Immediately, his hand propped his chin and his gaze flew out the window. He nipped his bottom lip and rolled it out from the bite. Something was wrong. He didn’t wait for the question. “It’s Mycroft they want. Not me. Not Reese.”

“I thought everyone in the Club had to have a photographic memory,” John asked.

“Yes,” Sherlock half-turned. “What about it?”

“So you both do… aren’t those long odds?”

“It’s genetic John.” Sherlock scowled at him. “Plus, science can’t even agree that it really exists. They go about studying it all wrong, failing to understand the degree of concentration required to photo everything, not seeing that it isn’t always accident. Flawed understanding leads to flawed methods and invalid research.”

“Fair enough, so why Mycroft?”

“Because he’s in the Home Office,” Sherlock flicked his cell out into one hand and began to text his brother. “They know he’s unattainable as is, so they took me. They believed I was leverage. Only I couldn’t answer many of their questions.”

John settled back in his seat: “If it’s Mycroft, then you are leverage, answers or not. If it’s Mycroft, well, he can’t really help himself, I expect.”

But Sherlock had stopped texting to look at him. Everything about his expression was taut. He clapped the phone between both hands. “Oh, I see,” he said to himself, and then to John, “Mycroft left the office for the day, but he didn’t take the girl.”

“Anthea, you mean?”

“Yes, his girl,” Sherlock nodded. “The human algorithm he left running. She’s sitting, waiting on his timer to alarm. And me… I’ve been,” he sighed and closed his eyes, “had.”

John didn’t understand.

They took the turn onto Chiltern Street and continued until Sherlock called to the driver to halt. The firehouse was fenced in and abandoned. It wasn’t red in the sense of a fire truck, though all the doors were. The brick was a ruddy orange.

“Super-saturated colour,” Sherlock muttered as he pulled the handle and gave the door a push. John wasted no time getting out after him. He was already walking along the fence boards looking for a way in. John could already see where that would be and zagged in front of Sherlock.

“The wire’s cut,” John gave the clapboard a push and it slid out of the way. “Come this way.”

“Looks wide enough you could get a car through.” Sherlock said from inside the lot. He sized up the hole in the fence and then looked at the ground around him. “So it was Mycroft who detected the cause of the black-out. He doesn’t like people messing with his city, and he’s been having us much more closely monitored than before.” Sherlock grimaced. “The street I was on went dark, Mycroft’s people reported an anomaly, he probably checked for the cause himself. It was suspicious, so he reversed it, and then he texted me. It was less than 10 minutes afterward.” He showed John the phone. The text looked innocuous.