Fic: The Adventure of Kitty Riley - Sherlock/John - 1/3
Title: The Adventure of Kitty Riley
Rating: PG-13
Category: Sherlock/John, Sherlock/OFC
Length: ~11,000 words in total
Alternative link: AO3
Disclaimer: The show Sherlock and that incarnation of its characters belong to the BBC, the show’s writers and its actors.
Warning: Rated for non-explicit naughty bits. Post-Reichenbach.
Summary: Kitty Riley has started using her position as a tabloid journalist to blackmail people. After his return, Sherlock decides to do something about it.
Note: This is a reasonably faithful rendition of The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton, but based on an idea by Zinelady. It was originally written for her to use in a fanzine earlier this year but that unfortunately didn’t happen, so I thought I would post it before Season 3. Any resemblance between this Kitty Riley and any red-haired journalists with disreputable working practices is purely fortuitous. Probably.
The air was cold but dry and still, which made a nice change from the usual regime of cold, wet and windy at this time of year. Sherlock and John had been for a walk; not an oh-let’s-just-go-and-look-at-a-corpse walk, but a pointless meander along the Embankment. John had no doubt that there was some ulterior motive at play, but none was apparent even by the time they came home.
Sherlock was at his most charming; energetic, enthusiastic about some scientific experiment he felt compelled to describe to John in excruciating detail. It reminded John why he had desperately missed Sherlock while he was gone. And why somehow missing him had turned John’s affectionate feelings for him into something more.
John pushed that thought to the back of his mind. It was strange enough that he had fallen in love with a man, but being in love with Sherlock was just bizarre. There could be little doubt that the man who knew everything must have noticed, but love wasn’t Sherlock’s area, and John was content to just gravitate in Sherlock’s orbit. Platonic walks along the river were good enough, and Sherlock didn’t seem to mind John’s gaze occasionally lingering a little longer than was necessary.
“Bugger.” Sherlock checked his phone and shoved it into his pocket angrily as they reached 221 Baker Street. “We’re going to have company, John.”
“Mycroft?” asked John with amusement. The Holmes brothers had been involved in a text sparring match for the last few days over some topic John couldn’t remember. But even the thought of watching Sherlock and Mycroft engaged in a verbal pissing contest didn’t dampen his good mood.
Sherlock just grunted, his earlier cheerfulness completely gone; he shrugged off his coat when they entered the living-room, and went over to turn on the gas fire. John watched him with concern.
“Sherlock, tell me what’s going on.”
Sherlock straightened up and tapped his fingers on the mantelpiece, his brow furrowed. John expected him to do his usual passive-aggressive act, throwing himself about and huffing as if John should be able to read his mind; but Sherlock just stood by the fireplace and pulled out his phone again.
John had given up waiting for an answer and was about to make himself a cup of tea, when Sherlock lifted up the phone to show him the message.
“‘Be around in 10 minutes, Kitty... Kitty Riley‘,” John read out. “What the hell? Why is she coming here? She destroyed your reputation! Even now, half the people who recognise you still think you’re a fake. The inquest proved you genuinely solved all the crimes you’ve taken credit for and that ‘Richard Brook’ never existed, but people only remember what she wrote. That you invented, even committed, crimes to make yourself more interesting. That you are a fake.”
“Well, I am a fake,” said Sherlock in a calm voice belied by his drumming fingers and the tension in his angular features. “I faked my own death, didn’t I?”
John gritted his teeth. “You had reasons. So what, you’re going to let bygones be bygones? I’m not. I’m bloody well not. You weren’t here. You don’t know how that woman’s lies gradually crept into everyone’s mind till I couldn’t even mention your name without people giving me funny looks. Pitying looks.” He swallowed hard. “Please tell me you’re not going to work for her.”
“I’m not going to work for her.” Sherlock’s face creased into a smile that only lasted a moment. “Kitty Riley is a snake, John. No, frankly, that’s an insult to snakes. She was a junior reporter hungry for recognition when Moriarty used her, and I suppose he can take the blame for feeding that hunger. But I can share the blame. I saw her for what she was, Moriarty’s tool, but I underestimated her own thirst for power. That story got her the attention of her bosses and she was able to capitalise on it. It took months for the inquest to establish that my talents were genuine and that I had not in fact kidnapped those children, and by then, she had built up a reputation for exposing the seedy side of politics and show business. The paedophile witch hunt in the wake of the Jimmy Savile revelations gave her an opportunity to worm her way into the very heart of the Murdoch empire.”
“Trust me, I know who she is,” said John coldly. “Now stop arsing about and tell me what she’s coming here for.”
“She’s found a new outlet for her ambition. At some point, she realised that a lot of people will pay good money to stop their secrets being revealed in the media. And of course, it’s always useful to have someone owe you a favour.”
“Blackmail.”
Sherlock smiled sourly. “Yes. And we’re not just talking about dodgy politicians and TV presenters who would rather no one knew they groped a few underage girls back in the seventies. Compromising-looking photographs or innocent messages that could be easily misconstrued can also be used provided there is a shred of truth behind them.”
“Why doesn’t-” John sighed and dropped into his chair. “Yeah. Naive question. Why doesn’t anyone go to the police? I think I know the answer to that one.”
Sherlock voiced it anyway. “Because even assuming the policeman they report her to isn’t already in her pocket, their little secret will be in The Sun first thing the next morning. Or, if it is legally unpublishable, circulated on the twittersphere to create an even more insidious destruction of their reputation.”
“So why is she coming here?”
“I’m a go-between. One of her current victims is an old school friend.” Sherlock hesitated a split second. “His name is Evan Brackwell. He’s standing in the Orpington by-election in two weeks’ time and someone has given Riley emails he exchanged with a young man in his would-be constituency. They’re totally innocent, but they don’t necessarily read that way. Evan isn’t so worried about the election, though the emails could spell the end of his political career because the young man is a Labour activist. But he adores his wife. They have two children and she would be devastated if she thought he was gay or seeing anyone else behind her back. He is afraid she’ll leave him... Anyway, Riley is asking for an exorbitant amount of money, and I’m negotiating a lower price.”
“You should be thinking up ways of making her stop!” said John angrily. “If anyone can do it, you can.”
“Yes,” said Sherlock with a hint of amusement. “Trust me, I’m-”
He interrupted himself and looked out of one of the front windows. John walked over to the other one and saw a dark car pull up outside.
“Jaguar XKR-S with 5.0 litre AJ-V8 GEN III Supercharged Petrol engine,” commented Sherlock. “Showing off to her male competitors.”
Riley got out of the car with the peculiar twist and rise motion of a woman wearing a short skirt, and the Jaguar pulled away. She looked up at the building, the streetlamp catching the look of satisfaction on her pale features. She looked much as she had at the widely publicised inquest into TV presenter Mark Lorrimer’s apparently accidental death; expensive suit, red hair worn loose like a young girl. For that matter, she’d looked the same at Sherlock’s inquest.
“You might want to go for a walk,” said Sherlock; when John looked over at him, he saw the twinkle of amusement in the detective’s eye. “Wouldn’t do to murder the woman in our home.”
Looking down, John realised his hands were fisted. “I’m all right,” he said. “I can control myself.”
He questioned his own resolve when Riley entered their flat, though. She greeted Sherlock politely - he ignored the greeting - and then stood by the doorway looking around the living room with a sneer, taking in the mismatched furniture and scattered possessions; for a man recently resurrected, and whose belongings had mostly been given away or put into storage, Sherlock had certainly managed to refill their flat since he moved back in. John frequently complained about it, but he felt possessive of it too; if Riley said one word about the mess, John was ready to smack her down.
But Riley instead fixed her eyes on John and raised a finely groomed eyebrow.
“Does he have to be here?” she asked Sherlock.
“Yes.”
Riley smiled sweetly. “I thought your friend Brackwell might prefer to keep things secret. That’s why he’s employing you, isn’t he? After all, the point of the exercise is that no one gets to know about his little secret.”
“John is perfectly trustworthy.”
“Shame the same can’t be said about you.” She smiled. “Look at you. Sherlock Holmes, back from the dead. I nearly lost my job over your little stint, you know. Lucky I’d had time to write a few more articles while the coroner got the inquest together and came to the conclusion that ‘Richard Brook’ had lied. I must admit, I still find it hard to believe that he was the criminal mastermind.”
“You still think I am the criminal?” asked Sherlock.
‘Rich Brook’s’ death had preoccupied the press and police for quite some time after Sherloch’s ‘suicide’. The common assumption at the time had been that Sherlock had murdered Richard Brook and then committed suicide. Fortunately, Moriarty had been involved in enough different crimes that eventually, realising he was really gone, some of his former associates had started to bargain the truth in exchange for more lenient sentences when they were caught. But in spite of this, it was apparently impossible to counter the lies Riley had originally published, and Sherlock’s return had only fanned the ill-informed rumours on the Internet.
“You have to admit that was all very strange,” said Riley, eyebrow raised in interest. “Out of the blue, a criminal mastermind known among his associates for his discretion decides to break into three institutions, goes through a whole trial, fabricates the entire Rich Brook story and then commits suicide. And meanwhile, you fake your own death, which isn’t exactly the action of an innocent man. Then a couple of years later, up you pop, fresh as a daisy and not as dead as your friend here thought.” She gave John a falsely concerned look. “The poor man was beside himself with grief, and all the time, you were hiding out God knows where and probably having a good laugh at his-”
“Evan Brackwell is not a rich man,” said Sherlock. “Seventy thousand is too much. I’ve asked you here to get you to lower your price.”
“He’s a Tory councillor in one of the wealthiest parts of Kent,” said Riley coldly. “I’m sure he can persuade some of his rich friends to ‘fund his campaign’ and then cover up the gap with a little creative accounting. His wife’s family is rather rich too. It would be a shame to lose their patronage if their daughter leaves him and takes the children with her, all because he quibbled over a sum of money that is a fraction of what he earned as a barrister.”
“He can give you twenty thousand,” said Sherlock. “It’s the best he can do.”
Riley pulled out her phone. “The emails are quite interesting, you know. Anyone who didn’t know better would think he wanted to shag this young man. I suppose you two would know all about that,” she added, wrinkling her nose in disgust. “I can’t imagine anyone wanting to go anywhere near a man’s arse, but then luckily, I’m not a gay man. Your friend Evan, on the other hand, is, and I’m sure his wife would be grateful to know that.”
“He isn’t gay,” said Sherlock.
“Aw, did he turn you down?” said Riley with mock concern. She raised her phone to show them a picture of a well-groomed, handsome young man. “You have to admit this young man is just the kind your sort goes after. The emails are interesting enough, but when you see who he sent them to, things take on a new dimension.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Sherlock. John was observing Sherlock for a signal and sprang into action when he saw it. He slipped between Riley and the door. “Your phone, please.”
He grabbed at Riley’s phone, but she backed away towards the door and unbuttoned her jacket, revealing an unnecessary amount of cleavage and a Beretta in her inside pocket.
“I know how to use it too.” Riley smiled as Sherlock took a step back. “You don’t think I’m stupid enough to only have a copy of my evidence on my phone?”
“Of course not. You have it in some secure cloud storage. Maybe even somewhere as common as DropBox, Google Drive or Box.” Sherlock’s eyes narrowed. “I was merely curious as to which one might keep your data safe enough. After all, your victims won’t pay if they think anyone else has the information too.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I keep the evidence well protected. Well, I must be going,” said Riley with a laugh. “I’d say it was nice meeting you both again, but I’m sure the pleasure was all mine.” She looked John over. “It’s sad, really, to see one of our brave heroes reduced to this. You must really love this creep to let him crawl back after what he did to you.”
She turned her back on John; his hand closed on the back of the chair beside him and he was sorely tempted to whack her over the head with it. But Sherlock caught his eye and shook his head, a smile on his lips.
“Well, that went well,” said John, flopping into his chair when Riley had left.
Sherlock just grunted and dropped into his own chair by the fire. John knew that look; Sherlock’s mind was busy working something out. Sensing that he wouldn’t get any further conversation from his flatmate that evening, John went to finish off his cup of tea and headed up the stairs towards his own room. He had a locum placement in the morning and might as well try to get some sleep, even though he knew he would probably spend an hour or two plotting imaginary revenge against Riley for what she had done and what she had said about Sherlock.
He was halfway up the stairs when Sherlock suddenly burst into the corridor and strode into his room. He crashed about in there for a few minutes. Curious enough not to care how curious he looked, John stayed on the stairs, sipping his tea and waiting for Sherlock to reappear.
It was worth the wait. Sherlock emerged wearing a pair of tight jeans, a loose T-shirt and a set of imitation designer trainers. He pulled on a thick waterproof jacket and a woolly beanie hat. He looked up at John when he noticed him watching.
“You’re working tomorrow,” he said, frowning as if trying to remember.
“Yeah, Croydon,” said John, though he was surprised Sherlock had remembered.
“Right.” Sherlock adjusted the beanie so it was low on his forehead, his curly hair entirely concealed. He looked very ordinary like that. Very young too. John’s insides twisted as Sherlock looked up at him again. “I’ll see you when you get back tomorrow, then.”
He went down the stairs and John went up to bed, relieved that he wouldn’t be up all night and compromising his good standing with the placement agency, but equally disappointed that Sherlock hadn’t insisted that he come with him.
In some ways, Sherlock had returned from the grave a different man. Well, not entirely different; he was still insensitive to John’s feelings about using the kitchen as a lab and experimenting on John’s possessions, and complained endlessly about the petty, low-profile cases he’d been taking-mostly at Mycroft’s instigation-since his return. But the fact that he was taking them at all was proof that something had changed.
John sometimes wondered if he should ask Sherlock about his ‘Hiatus’ as one newspaper sarcastically called it. But Sherlock was back now and John didn’t want to disturb their new life. John had been pissed off and had shouted at him for an hour when he came back, but once that was out of his system, he had clapped his friend on the back and made him a cup of tea, and everything was fine again. Back to normal. Mostly.
There was no sign of Sherlock in their common rooms when John got up early the next morning, though Sherlock’s bedroom door was closed. With a sigh, John ate his breakfast and went to catch the Northern Line for his long commute out to Croydon where a dreary day as a locum GP awaited him. It was a bit of a come down compared to his life with Sherlock when the latter had an exciting case. Not that there had been any of those recently.
However, John could tell Sherlock was on a new case when he came home that evening, and an interesting one at that. Sherlock was back in his own clothes and humming contentedly as he switched between his laptop and his iPad, swiping through websites and typing at lightning speed. The contrast with his subdued reaction to the cases he had taken recently was striking. He didn’t acknowledge John’s presence at all when he came in and said hello loudly. John went upstairs to his room to change out of his suit, feeling as though the world was back to normal at last.
“So,” said John as he made himself a cup of tea a bit later. “What have you been up to? You obviously have a new case. Anything interesting?”
Sherlock looked up. “You’re working in Croydon.”
“Only during the day. They let me come home at night,” said John. “I even get a lunch break. So, what’s the case?”
Sherlock’s eyes lit up with excitement. “I’m tackling our friend Ms Riley. I haven’t had much success tapping into her online accounts remotely, but I’ve managed to gain access to her property by posing as a plumber and I’m hoping to learn enough about her habits and equipment to get my hands on her computer. Then I’ll be able to crack her passwords and destroy any evidence she might be intending to use against any other would-be victims.”
He paused, frowned, and then added, “And how was your day? Any interesting patients?”
John had only had a couple of jobs since Sherlock’s return-to be perfectly honest, the pay was good enough now he had a decent CV that he didn’t need much more-and Sherlock had asked him the same questions each time. John had assumed the solicitude was born of boredom, but apparently, it was something Sherlock felt he should ask even when there was something more interesting going on.
“Not really,” he said dismissively. “The usual coughs and colds, and old people waiting two hours to see a doctor just for a bit of company.”
“Yes, lots of people get sick in the winter time,” said Sherlock gravely. He seemed to be making an effort to concentrate on the conversation, even though his eyes kept drifting to the computer screen beside him. “It’s been very cold.”
John stared at him a moment, uncertain whether to continue this awkward conversation or burst out laughing. “Are you practicing your small talk on me?”
“I’m just asking about your day,” said Sherlock, his defensive tone suggesting that he had indeed been conducting the conversation deliberately. “I want to know how your day went. It’s what friends do.”
There was something awkward about Sherlock’s body language that made John think he was probably better off putting up with the small talk in future. It still made him wonder what had happened during the Hiatus, and he was about to try a direct question to find out more about that when he remembered what Sherlock had just said.
“Wait a minute. You’re posing as a plumber to gain access to Riley’s property. How on earth is that supposed to work? Riley knows what you look like, Sherlock.”
“I’m really quite good at disguises, you know. Even you didn’t... Anyway,” he said, interrupting himself, “her employees are all recent immigrants who don’t know me at all.”
John let the reminder slide. Their actual reunion hadn’t exactly been a high point in John’s life; not only had he initially failed to recognise Sherlock after obsessing over him for months, but he had then passed out, and all but punched Sherlock when he came to, before finally giving him a not quite manly hug. It was quite possible that he might have actually snogged Sherlock if Mrs Hudson hadn’t come in and started the whole shouting bit all over again.
“And her staff are daft enough to buy that you’re a plumber?”
“I’m a very good plumber,” said Sherlock with pride. “Shezza Escott is Peckham’s finest. Besides, since I’m the one who sabotaged their boiler, I’m best placed to repair it as well.” He smiled. “Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing. The only person I’ve met so far is Riley’s maid, and she’s a student from Senegal-I could tell by her accent and the braiding of her hair-who has never heard of Sherlock Holmes and doesn’t have a very high opinion of her employer. I know you’re busy with your job this week, and this is the boring bit. I’ll let you know as soon as things get exciting.”
Much to John’s disappointment, it took a few days for things to get exciting. And when they did, it wasn’t exactly what he had had in mind. He had just come home from work the following Wednesday and was making himself a cup of tea in the kitchen, when Sherlock came bouncing in wearing an untucked striped shirt and casual trousers quite unlike anything John had seen him wear before.
“John, does this look suitable for a date?”
“A date?” repeated John a little stupidly, standing in the middle of their kitchen with a pint of milk in his hand.
“Yes, I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept,” said Sherlock impatiently. “I’m going on a date with a young lady tonight and I want to know if this looks like the kind of thing I should be wearing. We’ve been out to lunch a couple of times, but I thought I should make an effort for dinner.”
“Right. Er, congratulations. I mean on the date,” said John. “You look ... fine.”
Given that he had kept his feelings secret ever since Sherlock’s return, John didn’t think this precise moment would be a good time to say that he not only thought Sherlock looked “fine”, but also bloody sexy. Still, this was unexpected; one of the main reasons John hadn’t made a pass at Sherlock was that he believed he was asexual and wanted to respect that. Obviously, if Sherlock was an ordinary bloke who went out with girls, that put a different spin on things, albeit one that still precluded romantic advances of a homosexual nature. John returned to his tea making in an effort to look like less of a prat.
“Also, I’d like to know if you can come along.”
“You want me to come along,” John repeated. “You’re going on a date with a ‘young lady’ and you want me to come along. You weren’t kidding when you said this wasn’t your area.”
“No,” admitted Sherlock. “But Riley’s maid asked me out and I thought I might as well go along with it. Agathe has been a very useful source of information.”
John was ashamed to find himself breathing an actual sigh of relief. “Oh, it’s for the case,” he said, before his brain caught up with the situation and he regarded Sherlock with horror. “Wait, no, you can’t do that, Sherlock. You can’t just go out with a girl because she is involved in a case. It’s unethical!”
Sherlock looked puzzled. “People in detective movies do it all the time. I don’t see the harm. Anyway, it isn’t as if she’s in love with me. In fact, I believe she has a fiancé in France.”
“Oh, so she’s cheating on someone with you. That makes it all right, then,” said John sarcastically. “That and the fact that she probably thinks you’re a twenty-something plumber from Peckham as opposed to a posh private detective who is pushing forty.”
“I’m not pushing forty,” said Sherlock with a pout.
“You’re thirty-eight. That makes you pushing forty and if she’s a student as you said, you’re probably a good fifteen to twenty years older than her. You should call the girl and cancel.”
Sherlock sighed. “I can’t. I’m hoping she will let me into Riley’s house tonight so I can put an eavesdropping device into the living-room. Fixing the boiler is all very well, but it is in a different part of the mansion so it has been difficult to collect the kind of data I need. Anyway, that’s why I need your help. I’ve borrowed a surveillance van from one of Mycroft’s minions-it’s done up as a plumber’s van, whence my disguise-and I need you to sit in it and keep a lookout for Riley in case she comes home early. You won’t have to sit around in it all evening. I’ll text you when we’re on our way back to Riley’s place.”
John thought it sounded like a stupid plan. Given that Sherlock already had access to the property, he didn’t need to go on a date, and given that he was going on a date, he didn’t need to have John there and anyway, why did Sherlock need this girl when he could have John? He left that last bit out of his protests, and it made no difference anyway. Two hours later, he was sitting in the back of a van full of surveillance equipment and a little bit of token plumbing paraphernalia, keeping an eye out for Riley’s return.
Rating: PG-13
Category: Sherlock/John, Sherlock/OFC
Length: ~11,000 words in total
Alternative link: AO3
Disclaimer: The show Sherlock and that incarnation of its characters belong to the BBC, the show’s writers and its actors.
Warning: Rated for non-explicit naughty bits. Post-Reichenbach.
Summary: Kitty Riley has started using her position as a tabloid journalist to blackmail people. After his return, Sherlock decides to do something about it.
Note: This is a reasonably faithful rendition of The Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton, but based on an idea by Zinelady. It was originally written for her to use in a fanzine earlier this year but that unfortunately didn’t happen, so I thought I would post it before Season 3. Any resemblance between this Kitty Riley and any red-haired journalists with disreputable working practices is purely fortuitous. Probably.
The air was cold but dry and still, which made a nice change from the usual regime of cold, wet and windy at this time of year. Sherlock and John had been for a walk; not an oh-let’s-just-go-and-look-at-a-corpse walk, but a pointless meander along the Embankment. John had no doubt that there was some ulterior motive at play, but none was apparent even by the time they came home.
Sherlock was at his most charming; energetic, enthusiastic about some scientific experiment he felt compelled to describe to John in excruciating detail. It reminded John why he had desperately missed Sherlock while he was gone. And why somehow missing him had turned John’s affectionate feelings for him into something more.
John pushed that thought to the back of his mind. It was strange enough that he had fallen in love with a man, but being in love with Sherlock was just bizarre. There could be little doubt that the man who knew everything must have noticed, but love wasn’t Sherlock’s area, and John was content to just gravitate in Sherlock’s orbit. Platonic walks along the river were good enough, and Sherlock didn’t seem to mind John’s gaze occasionally lingering a little longer than was necessary.
“Bugger.” Sherlock checked his phone and shoved it into his pocket angrily as they reached 221 Baker Street. “We’re going to have company, John.”
“Mycroft?” asked John with amusement. The Holmes brothers had been involved in a text sparring match for the last few days over some topic John couldn’t remember. But even the thought of watching Sherlock and Mycroft engaged in a verbal pissing contest didn’t dampen his good mood.
Sherlock just grunted, his earlier cheerfulness completely gone; he shrugged off his coat when they entered the living-room, and went over to turn on the gas fire. John watched him with concern.
“Sherlock, tell me what’s going on.”
Sherlock straightened up and tapped his fingers on the mantelpiece, his brow furrowed. John expected him to do his usual passive-aggressive act, throwing himself about and huffing as if John should be able to read his mind; but Sherlock just stood by the fireplace and pulled out his phone again.
John had given up waiting for an answer and was about to make himself a cup of tea, when Sherlock lifted up the phone to show him the message.
“‘Be around in 10 minutes, Kitty... Kitty Riley‘,” John read out. “What the hell? Why is she coming here? She destroyed your reputation! Even now, half the people who recognise you still think you’re a fake. The inquest proved you genuinely solved all the crimes you’ve taken credit for and that ‘Richard Brook’ never existed, but people only remember what she wrote. That you invented, even committed, crimes to make yourself more interesting. That you are a fake.”
“Well, I am a fake,” said Sherlock in a calm voice belied by his drumming fingers and the tension in his angular features. “I faked my own death, didn’t I?”
John gritted his teeth. “You had reasons. So what, you’re going to let bygones be bygones? I’m not. I’m bloody well not. You weren’t here. You don’t know how that woman’s lies gradually crept into everyone’s mind till I couldn’t even mention your name without people giving me funny looks. Pitying looks.” He swallowed hard. “Please tell me you’re not going to work for her.”
“I’m not going to work for her.” Sherlock’s face creased into a smile that only lasted a moment. “Kitty Riley is a snake, John. No, frankly, that’s an insult to snakes. She was a junior reporter hungry for recognition when Moriarty used her, and I suppose he can take the blame for feeding that hunger. But I can share the blame. I saw her for what she was, Moriarty’s tool, but I underestimated her own thirst for power. That story got her the attention of her bosses and she was able to capitalise on it. It took months for the inquest to establish that my talents were genuine and that I had not in fact kidnapped those children, and by then, she had built up a reputation for exposing the seedy side of politics and show business. The paedophile witch hunt in the wake of the Jimmy Savile revelations gave her an opportunity to worm her way into the very heart of the Murdoch empire.”
“Trust me, I know who she is,” said John coldly. “Now stop arsing about and tell me what she’s coming here for.”
“She’s found a new outlet for her ambition. At some point, she realised that a lot of people will pay good money to stop their secrets being revealed in the media. And of course, it’s always useful to have someone owe you a favour.”
“Blackmail.”
Sherlock smiled sourly. “Yes. And we’re not just talking about dodgy politicians and TV presenters who would rather no one knew they groped a few underage girls back in the seventies. Compromising-looking photographs or innocent messages that could be easily misconstrued can also be used provided there is a shred of truth behind them.”
“Why doesn’t-” John sighed and dropped into his chair. “Yeah. Naive question. Why doesn’t anyone go to the police? I think I know the answer to that one.”
Sherlock voiced it anyway. “Because even assuming the policeman they report her to isn’t already in her pocket, their little secret will be in The Sun first thing the next morning. Or, if it is legally unpublishable, circulated on the twittersphere to create an even more insidious destruction of their reputation.”
“So why is she coming here?”
“I’m a go-between. One of her current victims is an old school friend.” Sherlock hesitated a split second. “His name is Evan Brackwell. He’s standing in the Orpington by-election in two weeks’ time and someone has given Riley emails he exchanged with a young man in his would-be constituency. They’re totally innocent, but they don’t necessarily read that way. Evan isn’t so worried about the election, though the emails could spell the end of his political career because the young man is a Labour activist. But he adores his wife. They have two children and she would be devastated if she thought he was gay or seeing anyone else behind her back. He is afraid she’ll leave him... Anyway, Riley is asking for an exorbitant amount of money, and I’m negotiating a lower price.”
“You should be thinking up ways of making her stop!” said John angrily. “If anyone can do it, you can.”
“Yes,” said Sherlock with a hint of amusement. “Trust me, I’m-”
He interrupted himself and looked out of one of the front windows. John walked over to the other one and saw a dark car pull up outside.
“Jaguar XKR-S with 5.0 litre AJ-V8 GEN III Supercharged Petrol engine,” commented Sherlock. “Showing off to her male competitors.”
Riley got out of the car with the peculiar twist and rise motion of a woman wearing a short skirt, and the Jaguar pulled away. She looked up at the building, the streetlamp catching the look of satisfaction on her pale features. She looked much as she had at the widely publicised inquest into TV presenter Mark Lorrimer’s apparently accidental death; expensive suit, red hair worn loose like a young girl. For that matter, she’d looked the same at Sherlock’s inquest.
“You might want to go for a walk,” said Sherlock; when John looked over at him, he saw the twinkle of amusement in the detective’s eye. “Wouldn’t do to murder the woman in our home.”
Looking down, John realised his hands were fisted. “I’m all right,” he said. “I can control myself.”
He questioned his own resolve when Riley entered their flat, though. She greeted Sherlock politely - he ignored the greeting - and then stood by the doorway looking around the living room with a sneer, taking in the mismatched furniture and scattered possessions; for a man recently resurrected, and whose belongings had mostly been given away or put into storage, Sherlock had certainly managed to refill their flat since he moved back in. John frequently complained about it, but he felt possessive of it too; if Riley said one word about the mess, John was ready to smack her down.
But Riley instead fixed her eyes on John and raised a finely groomed eyebrow.
“Does he have to be here?” she asked Sherlock.
“Yes.”
Riley smiled sweetly. “I thought your friend Brackwell might prefer to keep things secret. That’s why he’s employing you, isn’t he? After all, the point of the exercise is that no one gets to know about his little secret.”
“John is perfectly trustworthy.”
“Shame the same can’t be said about you.” She smiled. “Look at you. Sherlock Holmes, back from the dead. I nearly lost my job over your little stint, you know. Lucky I’d had time to write a few more articles while the coroner got the inquest together and came to the conclusion that ‘Richard Brook’ had lied. I must admit, I still find it hard to believe that he was the criminal mastermind.”
“You still think I am the criminal?” asked Sherlock.
‘Rich Brook’s’ death had preoccupied the press and police for quite some time after Sherloch’s ‘suicide’. The common assumption at the time had been that Sherlock had murdered Richard Brook and then committed suicide. Fortunately, Moriarty had been involved in enough different crimes that eventually, realising he was really gone, some of his former associates had started to bargain the truth in exchange for more lenient sentences when they were caught. But in spite of this, it was apparently impossible to counter the lies Riley had originally published, and Sherlock’s return had only fanned the ill-informed rumours on the Internet.
“You have to admit that was all very strange,” said Riley, eyebrow raised in interest. “Out of the blue, a criminal mastermind known among his associates for his discretion decides to break into three institutions, goes through a whole trial, fabricates the entire Rich Brook story and then commits suicide. And meanwhile, you fake your own death, which isn’t exactly the action of an innocent man. Then a couple of years later, up you pop, fresh as a daisy and not as dead as your friend here thought.” She gave John a falsely concerned look. “The poor man was beside himself with grief, and all the time, you were hiding out God knows where and probably having a good laugh at his-”
“Evan Brackwell is not a rich man,” said Sherlock. “Seventy thousand is too much. I’ve asked you here to get you to lower your price.”
“He’s a Tory councillor in one of the wealthiest parts of Kent,” said Riley coldly. “I’m sure he can persuade some of his rich friends to ‘fund his campaign’ and then cover up the gap with a little creative accounting. His wife’s family is rather rich too. It would be a shame to lose their patronage if their daughter leaves him and takes the children with her, all because he quibbled over a sum of money that is a fraction of what he earned as a barrister.”
“He can give you twenty thousand,” said Sherlock. “It’s the best he can do.”
Riley pulled out her phone. “The emails are quite interesting, you know. Anyone who didn’t know better would think he wanted to shag this young man. I suppose you two would know all about that,” she added, wrinkling her nose in disgust. “I can’t imagine anyone wanting to go anywhere near a man’s arse, but then luckily, I’m not a gay man. Your friend Evan, on the other hand, is, and I’m sure his wife would be grateful to know that.”
“He isn’t gay,” said Sherlock.
“Aw, did he turn you down?” said Riley with mock concern. She raised her phone to show them a picture of a well-groomed, handsome young man. “You have to admit this young man is just the kind your sort goes after. The emails are interesting enough, but when you see who he sent them to, things take on a new dimension.”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Sherlock. John was observing Sherlock for a signal and sprang into action when he saw it. He slipped between Riley and the door. “Your phone, please.”
He grabbed at Riley’s phone, but she backed away towards the door and unbuttoned her jacket, revealing an unnecessary amount of cleavage and a Beretta in her inside pocket.
“I know how to use it too.” Riley smiled as Sherlock took a step back. “You don’t think I’m stupid enough to only have a copy of my evidence on my phone?”
“Of course not. You have it in some secure cloud storage. Maybe even somewhere as common as DropBox, Google Drive or Box.” Sherlock’s eyes narrowed. “I was merely curious as to which one might keep your data safe enough. After all, your victims won’t pay if they think anyone else has the information too.”
“Oh, don’t worry, I keep the evidence well protected. Well, I must be going,” said Riley with a laugh. “I’d say it was nice meeting you both again, but I’m sure the pleasure was all mine.” She looked John over. “It’s sad, really, to see one of our brave heroes reduced to this. You must really love this creep to let him crawl back after what he did to you.”
She turned her back on John; his hand closed on the back of the chair beside him and he was sorely tempted to whack her over the head with it. But Sherlock caught his eye and shook his head, a smile on his lips.
“Well, that went well,” said John, flopping into his chair when Riley had left.
Sherlock just grunted and dropped into his own chair by the fire. John knew that look; Sherlock’s mind was busy working something out. Sensing that he wouldn’t get any further conversation from his flatmate that evening, John went to finish off his cup of tea and headed up the stairs towards his own room. He had a locum placement in the morning and might as well try to get some sleep, even though he knew he would probably spend an hour or two plotting imaginary revenge against Riley for what she had done and what she had said about Sherlock.
He was halfway up the stairs when Sherlock suddenly burst into the corridor and strode into his room. He crashed about in there for a few minutes. Curious enough not to care how curious he looked, John stayed on the stairs, sipping his tea and waiting for Sherlock to reappear.
It was worth the wait. Sherlock emerged wearing a pair of tight jeans, a loose T-shirt and a set of imitation designer trainers. He pulled on a thick waterproof jacket and a woolly beanie hat. He looked up at John when he noticed him watching.
“You’re working tomorrow,” he said, frowning as if trying to remember.
“Yeah, Croydon,” said John, though he was surprised Sherlock had remembered.
“Right.” Sherlock adjusted the beanie so it was low on his forehead, his curly hair entirely concealed. He looked very ordinary like that. Very young too. John’s insides twisted as Sherlock looked up at him again. “I’ll see you when you get back tomorrow, then.”
He went down the stairs and John went up to bed, relieved that he wouldn’t be up all night and compromising his good standing with the placement agency, but equally disappointed that Sherlock hadn’t insisted that he come with him.
In some ways, Sherlock had returned from the grave a different man. Well, not entirely different; he was still insensitive to John’s feelings about using the kitchen as a lab and experimenting on John’s possessions, and complained endlessly about the petty, low-profile cases he’d been taking-mostly at Mycroft’s instigation-since his return. But the fact that he was taking them at all was proof that something had changed.
John sometimes wondered if he should ask Sherlock about his ‘Hiatus’ as one newspaper sarcastically called it. But Sherlock was back now and John didn’t want to disturb their new life. John had been pissed off and had shouted at him for an hour when he came back, but once that was out of his system, he had clapped his friend on the back and made him a cup of tea, and everything was fine again. Back to normal. Mostly.
There was no sign of Sherlock in their common rooms when John got up early the next morning, though Sherlock’s bedroom door was closed. With a sigh, John ate his breakfast and went to catch the Northern Line for his long commute out to Croydon where a dreary day as a locum GP awaited him. It was a bit of a come down compared to his life with Sherlock when the latter had an exciting case. Not that there had been any of those recently.
However, John could tell Sherlock was on a new case when he came home that evening, and an interesting one at that. Sherlock was back in his own clothes and humming contentedly as he switched between his laptop and his iPad, swiping through websites and typing at lightning speed. The contrast with his subdued reaction to the cases he had taken recently was striking. He didn’t acknowledge John’s presence at all when he came in and said hello loudly. John went upstairs to his room to change out of his suit, feeling as though the world was back to normal at last.
“So,” said John as he made himself a cup of tea a bit later. “What have you been up to? You obviously have a new case. Anything interesting?”
Sherlock looked up. “You’re working in Croydon.”
“Only during the day. They let me come home at night,” said John. “I even get a lunch break. So, what’s the case?”
Sherlock’s eyes lit up with excitement. “I’m tackling our friend Ms Riley. I haven’t had much success tapping into her online accounts remotely, but I’ve managed to gain access to her property by posing as a plumber and I’m hoping to learn enough about her habits and equipment to get my hands on her computer. Then I’ll be able to crack her passwords and destroy any evidence she might be intending to use against any other would-be victims.”
He paused, frowned, and then added, “And how was your day? Any interesting patients?”
John had only had a couple of jobs since Sherlock’s return-to be perfectly honest, the pay was good enough now he had a decent CV that he didn’t need much more-and Sherlock had asked him the same questions each time. John had assumed the solicitude was born of boredom, but apparently, it was something Sherlock felt he should ask even when there was something more interesting going on.
“Not really,” he said dismissively. “The usual coughs and colds, and old people waiting two hours to see a doctor just for a bit of company.”
“Yes, lots of people get sick in the winter time,” said Sherlock gravely. He seemed to be making an effort to concentrate on the conversation, even though his eyes kept drifting to the computer screen beside him. “It’s been very cold.”
John stared at him a moment, uncertain whether to continue this awkward conversation or burst out laughing. “Are you practicing your small talk on me?”
“I’m just asking about your day,” said Sherlock, his defensive tone suggesting that he had indeed been conducting the conversation deliberately. “I want to know how your day went. It’s what friends do.”
There was something awkward about Sherlock’s body language that made John think he was probably better off putting up with the small talk in future. It still made him wonder what had happened during the Hiatus, and he was about to try a direct question to find out more about that when he remembered what Sherlock had just said.
“Wait a minute. You’re posing as a plumber to gain access to Riley’s property. How on earth is that supposed to work? Riley knows what you look like, Sherlock.”
“I’m really quite good at disguises, you know. Even you didn’t... Anyway,” he said, interrupting himself, “her employees are all recent immigrants who don’t know me at all.”
John let the reminder slide. Their actual reunion hadn’t exactly been a high point in John’s life; not only had he initially failed to recognise Sherlock after obsessing over him for months, but he had then passed out, and all but punched Sherlock when he came to, before finally giving him a not quite manly hug. It was quite possible that he might have actually snogged Sherlock if Mrs Hudson hadn’t come in and started the whole shouting bit all over again.
“And her staff are daft enough to buy that you’re a plumber?”
“I’m a very good plumber,” said Sherlock with pride. “Shezza Escott is Peckham’s finest. Besides, since I’m the one who sabotaged their boiler, I’m best placed to repair it as well.” He smiled. “Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing. The only person I’ve met so far is Riley’s maid, and she’s a student from Senegal-I could tell by her accent and the braiding of her hair-who has never heard of Sherlock Holmes and doesn’t have a very high opinion of her employer. I know you’re busy with your job this week, and this is the boring bit. I’ll let you know as soon as things get exciting.”
Much to John’s disappointment, it took a few days for things to get exciting. And when they did, it wasn’t exactly what he had had in mind. He had just come home from work the following Wednesday and was making himself a cup of tea in the kitchen, when Sherlock came bouncing in wearing an untucked striped shirt and casual trousers quite unlike anything John had seen him wear before.
“John, does this look suitable for a date?”
“A date?” repeated John a little stupidly, standing in the middle of their kitchen with a pint of milk in his hand.
“Yes, I’m sure you’re familiar with the concept,” said Sherlock impatiently. “I’m going on a date with a young lady tonight and I want to know if this looks like the kind of thing I should be wearing. We’ve been out to lunch a couple of times, but I thought I should make an effort for dinner.”
“Right. Er, congratulations. I mean on the date,” said John. “You look ... fine.”
Given that he had kept his feelings secret ever since Sherlock’s return, John didn’t think this precise moment would be a good time to say that he not only thought Sherlock looked “fine”, but also bloody sexy. Still, this was unexpected; one of the main reasons John hadn’t made a pass at Sherlock was that he believed he was asexual and wanted to respect that. Obviously, if Sherlock was an ordinary bloke who went out with girls, that put a different spin on things, albeit one that still precluded romantic advances of a homosexual nature. John returned to his tea making in an effort to look like less of a prat.
“Also, I’d like to know if you can come along.”
“You want me to come along,” John repeated. “You’re going on a date with a ‘young lady’ and you want me to come along. You weren’t kidding when you said this wasn’t your area.”
“No,” admitted Sherlock. “But Riley’s maid asked me out and I thought I might as well go along with it. Agathe has been a very useful source of information.”
John was ashamed to find himself breathing an actual sigh of relief. “Oh, it’s for the case,” he said, before his brain caught up with the situation and he regarded Sherlock with horror. “Wait, no, you can’t do that, Sherlock. You can’t just go out with a girl because she is involved in a case. It’s unethical!”
Sherlock looked puzzled. “People in detective movies do it all the time. I don’t see the harm. Anyway, it isn’t as if she’s in love with me. In fact, I believe she has a fiancé in France.”
“Oh, so she’s cheating on someone with you. That makes it all right, then,” said John sarcastically. “That and the fact that she probably thinks you’re a twenty-something plumber from Peckham as opposed to a posh private detective who is pushing forty.”
“I’m not pushing forty,” said Sherlock with a pout.
“You’re thirty-eight. That makes you pushing forty and if she’s a student as you said, you’re probably a good fifteen to twenty years older than her. You should call the girl and cancel.”
Sherlock sighed. “I can’t. I’m hoping she will let me into Riley’s house tonight so I can put an eavesdropping device into the living-room. Fixing the boiler is all very well, but it is in a different part of the mansion so it has been difficult to collect the kind of data I need. Anyway, that’s why I need your help. I’ve borrowed a surveillance van from one of Mycroft’s minions-it’s done up as a plumber’s van, whence my disguise-and I need you to sit in it and keep a lookout for Riley in case she comes home early. You won’t have to sit around in it all evening. I’ll text you when we’re on our way back to Riley’s place.”
John thought it sounded like a stupid plan. Given that Sherlock already had access to the property, he didn’t need to go on a date, and given that he was going on a date, he didn’t need to have John there and anyway, why did Sherlock need this girl when he could have John? He left that last bit out of his protests, and it made no difference anyway. Two hours later, he was sitting in the back of a van full of surveillance equipment and a little bit of token plumbing paraphernalia, keeping an eye out for Riley’s return.