The Ambitious Orphan (12 page)

“Oh, I'm just the
brother-in-law. These two are the couple.” The younger Holmes
grinned and flicked Amelia a wink the receptionist didn't see.

“Enjoy your stay,”
she chirped despite the late hour, and then all three of them were
making their way to the lifts.

Only two minutes
later they stood in the living area of their room. It was a little
worse for wear and decorated far too garishly for Mycroft's tastes,
but he planned on spending so little time in it he doubted it would
matter. As he placed his laptop on the table, Sherlock opened the
nearest bedroom door and glanced in.

“Ah, the master
bedroom. I'll allow you two to keep our cover up by sharing that
one,” he said as he moved onto the next one.

Mycroft rolled his
eyes, despite having his back to his brother and Amelia. If it
wasn't the most logical way to appear when on some kind of mission,
he would have his secretary reprimanded for the booking, but even
he knew it was the most inconspicuous way for a mixed group to
travel.

“I can sleep on
the sofa, if you wish,” Amelia said quietly as she came up and
started laying out the equipment she would need beside his. With
his younger brother out of the way in his own room, Mycroft allowed
himself a moment to show a little care towards Amelia.

“No, take the bed.
What little opportunity we'll have for sleep, you will find you
need.”

“I take it that
means even if you do decide to share it with me, I won't get to
enjoy it as much as I'd like. Shame, really.” She walked away,
swinging her hips just a little more than usual.

As she reached the
bedroom door she glanced over her shoulder and slowly lowered her
eyes. It was text book allure, and not the sort of thing Mycroft
usually found enticing at all, but the grin that flicked across her
face let him know she was aware of that. She was teasing him as
much as his brother did. Only, in her case, he didn't find he was
irritated.

After taking half
a second to consider what might make a good lesson, he picked up
the small bag containing his own clothes and followed her into the
master bedroom. The soft click of him closing the door alerted her
to his presence and a brief look of surprise crossed her
features.

Wanting to see how
she'd respond, he walked right up to her, slid an arm around her
torso and pulled her up onto her toes so he could passionately kiss
her. She didn't put up even the slightest bit of a fight, but
didn't come back for more when he stopped and lowered her back onto
her feet. Inch by inch, he pulled her tighter again, seeing if
she'd be totally willing or think through what was happening.

After a few
seconds she placed a hand against his chest and pushed back. It was
a feeble gesture at best, but it grew stronger when she broke their
gaze.

“I didn't mean
it... At least not right now. We've got work to do, right?” There
was little confidence in her voice and she searched his face for
his reaction, but he hid everything again, showing her nothing and
letting her go.

“Good. I hope your
head will be clear of other ideas from now on.”

Hanging her head,
she nodded. Satisfied, he walked away until she spoke again, not
even trying to suppress the grin on her face.

“But... Uh...
after, when this is done, if you want to make use of this bed too,
I'm more than willing.”

He didn't satisfy
her with a response even if he might actually take her up on the
offer. The last thing he wanted to do was encourage her teasing him
in a similar manner to Sherlock.

As his younger
brother emerged from the second bedroom, Mycroft gave him a nod and
picked up his torch and jacket. It was time to get started.

Despite being in
the Caribbean, a shiver rippled through Amelia's torso. At night
time it wasn't as warm as she'd expected, and she'd left the hotel
inadequately dressed. Neither Holmes brother had much more on, but
they never seemed to show signs of feeling anything.

She found herself
wondering if it was somehow related to their immortality, but
snapped herself back to the present before she could fully explore
the thought. Now wasn't the time.

“Come,” Myron
whispered for the third time in an hour. Doing as she was bid, she
followed him as he walked silently down the next branch of the
pontoon. When they reached the end they both crouched again, and he
once more pulled out the night-vision goggles.

After holding them
up to his face and looking for several minutes, he stopped and
handed them to her.

“Tell me if you
see the right yacht,” he said for the second time, not letting her
know if he'd spotted it himself this time. It was part of her
training, even if it had slowed them a little. She pictured the
yacht she'd seen in the photo and then looked through the
goggles.

Until tonight,
Amelia had never used anything like them, and she would have been
the first to admit that they took some getting used to, but Myron
seemed to think she should be good enough to spot the right yacht
anyway. She only hoped he was right.

Trying to stick to
the instructions he'd given her, she found the boat she'd last seen
on her left and, moving her focus up and down, she worked from left
to right. There were a lot of large boats in the harbour, several
of them moored farther out, as Krylov's was meant to be, but she
could easily discount the first few she saw for having the wrong
number of masts.

A little over half
way, Amelia stopped at a boat that looked promising. It appeared to
be rigged in a similar manner, had the right number of masts, and
the right overall shape.

“Is that it?” she
asked as she pointed.

“What do you
think?”

“I think so.”

“Good. It is.
We'll confirm it in the morning if we can, but we can't be sure he
won't sail out to sea during the daylight hours for privacy.”

“Right,” she
replied, knowing he was only saying this for her benefit.

“Come.” He took
the goggles off her, pocketed them, and then walked quickly but
quietly back the way they'd come.

As she followed
him back, she realised her stomach felt a little strange. It felt
like it was sloshing in time with the water lapping at the edges of
all the boats and the sway of the pontoon.

Trying not to show
that she wasn't feeling so great, Amelia kept pace with Myron
anyway but she couldn't quite stifle her sigh of relief in time,
once she stood on solid ground again. Myron glanced her way so she
smiled and looked as if she was eager for her next instruction. She
could only hope it was convincing enough.

Before he could
command her, Sebastian came around the corner of some kind of shed.
She jumped and stifled a gasp with her hand. He gave Myron a brief
nod but neither of them spoke. If they hadn't been out in the open
she'd have asked what it meant. Instead, she waited and
watched.

“Back to the
hotel,” Myron said a few seconds later. No one argued, and ten
minutes later they were stood in a group underneath the rope they'd
let down from the third-floor balcony.

As Amelia looked
up it, she fought back her nerves and concentrated on her
breathing. It hadn't seemed so high on the way down. Now she had to
climb back up.

Sebastian motioned
for her to go first, so she grabbed the rope with both hands. After
taking a deep breath, she jumped and pulled up with her hands,
moving them one over the other as she tried to grip the rope below
and push up with her feet.

By the time she
passed the window on the next floor her shoulders and arms were
starting to burn. To keep going, she focused on the rope only a
foot above her and moved hand over hand.

The next window
came into view, and Amelia knew she couldn't manage the climb in
one go. She wrapped the rope around one leg and put her weight on
it, wincing as it dug into her flesh through the thin material of
her trousers. Maybe she'd not picked the best clothes when she'd
woken, but when she'd gone to see Myron to ask where the situation
stood, she'd not foreseen such an activity in her future.

It didn't take
long before one of the men below her tugged on the rope to
encourage her to continue. She obeyed the gesture and took her
weight on her arms again to haul herself the rest of the way. A few
minutes later, she grabbed the balcony railing with her arm and
used her feet to walk herself the last little bit up the wall.

When she tumbled
over and landed ungracefully on the ground, she silently thanked
the world that she'd gone first and the men hadn't seen that. She
then thanked Tom for all the training he'd done with her. Several
months earlier she'd never have managed the climb at all. As it
was, as she lifted an arm to wiggle the rope and let them know she
was done, it shook with over exertion.

Sebastian came
next, taking less than half the time she had.

“He'll take a
little longer,” Sebastian said referring to his brother, as he
pushed past her and went inside. For a few seconds she waited on
the balcony, but the breeze blowing on her and sticking the
sweat-soaked top to her skin made her change her mind.

The younger Holmes
was nowhere to be seen, so she went through to her bedroom and
yanked the already smelling garment off over her head. She was
rooting around in her suitcase for the spare top she'd brought with
her when the door opened behind her.

“Oh,” Sebastian
said, not taking his eyes off her semi-naked torso. Before Amelia
could grab something to cover herself with Myron appeared behind
him, puffing a little with the effort of climbing.

“I can see why you
like her.” Sebastian gave her a wink and walked away, leaving her
alone with the elder Holmes.

“Your brother
doesn't seem to know how to knock,” she said, wondering if she
needed to clarify. A moment later she thought she saw Myron visibly
relax his shoulders a fraction, but she couldn't be sure.

Without replying,
he shut the door on her. Feeling heat in her cheeks, Amelia fetched
fresh clothes and changed quickly. So far, this mission wasn't
going very well. Not only did she feel like she was a spare wheel
in what would normally be a well-oiled operation, but she was also
making an embarrassment of herself on a semi-regular basis.

Decent again, she
left the room and avoided looking at Sebastian as she went over to
the table. On it Myron had already spread out a map of the
harbour.

While she stood
beside him, he marked on it the mooring position of Krylov's boat
that night. He then marked where they would swim from.

It occurred to her
that it might be easier to just hire a boat and get closer when she
realised it was going to be farther than the distance she'd swam
back to shore on her very first adventure with Myron. Before she
could voice the thought she realised the idea had probably already
occurred to the Holmes brothers. She followed the logic with
several reasons why they might have rejected it. For starters, it
would be noisier, and it also meant someone might remember they'd
hired the boat. This way, they could come and go unseen.

By the time Myron
had marked all the details on the map, Sebastian stood on his other
side and all three of them were studying it.

“I'm going to
sleep until breakfast,” Sebastian said less than a minute
later.

“Good. We'll have
it up here.” Myron pushed the map over to be fully in front of her.
“Memorise it.”

She nodded, took a
deep breath and focused on the details. There was a lot to take in,
but after a few minutes she lifted her gaze to find he'd been
watching her the whole time.

“You need to be
able to remember it. Can you guarantee you can?”

She nodded. Ever
since the time she'd almost forgotten the address of the hotel
Myron had put her up in, she'd been working on her memorisation
techniques. It was unlikely she'd be as good as the Holmes
brothers, but she felt confident she'd beat most other people.

“Are you
sure?”

“Yes. I'll
remember it.”

“Good.” He picked
up the map, pulled a lighter from his pocket and took it out to the
balcony. Once out there he held one corner near the bottom and lit
it. It went up quickly and he hissed his breath through his teeth
as it caught his fingers.

A fraction of a
second later he let it go and the last remaining fragment blew into
the air, engulfed by the last of the flame. Nothing but a few
specks of ash remained. If she didn't remember it now she'd be in
big trouble.

“Get some
sleep.”

“What about you?”
she asked when he didn't follow her through to the bedroom.

“There are still a
few things to prepare,” he said, not even looking at her, but going
back to the table. It really was all business at the moment.

When she emerged
from her room almost four hours later to eat breakfast, Myron was
still in the place she'd last seen him, at the table on his laptop.
Making sure she didn't cause enough noise to disturb him, she
settled herself into one of the other chairs and spent the next few
minutes recalling as much of the map as possible.

For a few seconds
she panicked that she'd forgotten a small part of it, but her
barely awake brain gave her a rough shape and the rest fell into
place in her mind. No sooner had she completed this when there was
a knock at the hotel door.

“Room service,” a
muffled voice called. Myron finally looked up from his laptop and
met her eyes. It didn't need to be prolonged for her to realise he
wanted her to let the waiter in.

She tipped the
helpful man and shut the door behind him when he'd finished laying
out their breakfast. Not two seconds after the door was shut,
Sebastian appeared from his room, dressed and ready for the
day.