Fic for ladyofthelog: Baker Street Courtship
Title: Baker Street Courtship
Recipient: ladyofthelog
Author: sadbhyl
Characters/Pairings: Sarah/Sherlock/John
Rating: R
Warnings: none
Summary: Sarah knew that Sherlock would be part of any relationship she had with John. And she was all right with that. Surprisingly, so was he.
It started innocently enough.
Sarah heard them arguing as she passed John’s office door on her way to the file room. “I promised to cover Tony’s shift tonight. It’s his daughter’s birthday. I can’t just go haring off.”
“Sarah can-”
Sherlock’s resonant bass was cut off. “No. No, Sarah can’t. She gets stuck with my shifts often enough when it really is important.”
“John, I need you there. Lestrade says there’s a rash on the victim. I need your expertise to tell if it’s an abrasion or dermatological, and if it is, then to suggest possible causes. Too many allergic irritations look similar to contact poisons for me to be able to interpret the data.”
“The person’s already dead, Sherlock. Another few hours won’t make a difference.”
Sarah tapped on the door and pushed it open. “You might as well go.” She didn’t bother to apologize for eavesdropping. John wouldn’t mind and Sherlock wouldn’t care. “You know he won’t quit until you do.”
But she could tell by the look on his face that he had decided to be bull-headed about it. “No. You shouldn’t have to be responsible for my commitments.”
Sherlock seemed just as able to read his flatmate’s mood as she was. What she couldn’t read was the sudden, inscrutable look on his face as he studied her. “You’re a doctor.”
She folded her arms defensively. “Good of you to notice.”
“Sherlock, no.”
Sherlock ignored John. “Any good at dermatology?”
“Sherlock,” John warned.
She ignored John as well. “Good enough. Probably better than John. I imagine there’s less call for it on the battlefield than in a surgery.”
John gave up on attempting to sway Sherlock and turned to try to appeal to Sarah’s reason instead. “Sarah-”
Sherlock didn’t give him the chance. “Fine. Get your coat. The cab’s waiting.”
“Sherlock, be serious.”
Part of Sarah was irritated with John for trying to protect her. Part of her was curious to see more of this life the two of them led. Part of her was bored. And she could read the challenge in Sherlock now, challenging John to be chivalrous, thus giving Sherlock what he wanted in the first place, and challenging Sarah to step out of her safe zone.
Without a word, she spun on her heel and raced to her office.
“Dammit, Sarah!”
She grabbed her medical bag first, checking for gloves, swabs and disinfectant before zipping it shut and snatching up her coat.
John was in the lobby, ignoring the waiting patients. “You don’t have to do this. He’ll be fine for a few hours.”
“You don’t think I can handle a simple necrotic examination?”
“I don’t think you can handle Sherlock. You shouldn’t have to.”
“You worry too much.” Leaning in, she kissed his cheek. “Sherlock and I get on fine now.”
He scowled. “You’ve never seen him at a crime scene before.”
“What’s he going to do in front of a dozen policemen?”
“I don’t know. That’s the problem.”
Chuckling, she brushed her fingers against his cheek. “I’ll be fine. See you back at your place after?”
He seemed resigned. “Yeah, of course. But if he leaves you stranded somewhere, call me.”
“Does he do that?”
“More often than I care to count.”
****
The cab dropped them off at a car park in Castlenau. The entrance was roped off in blue and white security tape, and the third level glowed incandescent with the sodium spotlights. Police officers stood around, some looking attentive, some much more interested in their coffee.
A woman stood behind the tape, chatting animatedly with a uniformed officer. Her expression darkened when she saw Sherlock, and she handed over her coffee to move to the center of the tape, blocking their way. “Took you long enough, freak.”
“I arrived precisely when I told Lestrade I would. Excuse us.”
She didn’t move. “I see you’ve finally thrown John over. Or did he finally wise up?”
“Dr. Sawyer is John’s girlfriend.” He said the word as though it were distasteful. Sarah didn’t take it as a slight on herself. She and Sherlock had reached their own form of detente some time ago. “She’s generously agreed to share some of her expertise while John is otherwise engaged. Unless you need to see her credentials?”
The woman seemed to have caught on something else. “John’s girlfriend? Your John’s girlfriend? But I thought--”
“Did you really, Sally?” Sherlock lifted the tape, turning under it like a dance partner to hold it up for Sarah. “It must be a red letter day for you. Coming, Sarah?”
Sherlock swept up the ramp, coat billowing dramatically, and left Sarah to follow as best she could. She couldn’t help a smile as she lengthened her stride to keep up. He may be willing to tolerate her as a substitute, but he wasn’t going to let her forget that the person usually at his side didn’t slow him down. Since she had no intention of taking John’s place, she found his reaction more amusing than anything.
Greg was waiting for them at the top of the third ramp. He’d already started to turn to fall into step with Sherlock when he registered her presence. “Sarah, what are you doing here?”
“John had hours tonight, so I offered to come along. How are you, Greg?”
Sherlock looked put out when Greg leaned in for a quick peck on the cheek. “You two know each other?”
“John and I have had dinner with Greg a few times. Surely he’s told you.”
Sherlock huffed dismissively. “The body?”
“This way.” Greg glanced at her uncertainly. “You sure you want to see this?”
Sherlock was already pulling on a pair of gloves. She suspected he kept a supply at all times in the hidden pockets of that coat. “Really, Lestrade, give the woman some credit. She is a doctor. If she were squeamish around corpses, she’d hardly have completed her certification.”
“It’s all right, Greg. I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to come.”
He didn’t look any happier, but led them over to a late model Audi standing with the driver’s side door open. “His name’s Roger Gregory. He’s a barrister, Middle Temple, and by his license lives in Mayfair. He was found by another driver just after rush hour. Looks like he was beaten up pretty badly, but his car was wide open and the keys in his hand. His wallet’s still in his pocket and nothing was taken from the car.”
Sherlock was already crouched by the body, taking in details Sarah knew she would overlook. She and Greg stood back, watching silently until he stood up again, snapping off the gloves. “Dr. Sawyer?”
She joined him at the body, setting her bag down and crouching next to it to pull out her own gloves. Sherlock steepled his finger, watching. She was being tested, she knew. All right, then.
She gave the corpse a perfunctory examination, eyes, mouth, fingers, pulling up his sleeves to check his arms. It might be a bit much to perform a groin check, but she had enough to go on as it was. The brown speckled rash on his neck got more attention until finally she looked up at Sherlock. “He wasn’t beaten.”
His expression didn’t flicker, but somehow he still seemed pleased. “No, he wasn’t.”
Greg wasn’t as satisfied. “But what about the bruising?”
“At a guess, I’d say myeloid leukemia.” She pulled the dead man’s sleeve up to show him. “These aren’t defensive injuries. If they were, they’d be on the backs of his arms, not the insides. And they’re too random and diffuse. Fists leave a bull’s-eye mark, clubs or the hilt of a gun more linear ones.”
“And the marks are on both sides of his body,” Sherlock added his own observations. “Not very likely if he was backed up against the car.”
Greg stopped looking back and forth between them with a shake of his head. “So what killed him then? The disease?”
Sherlock shook his head. “Cancer isn’t a fast killer. He’d have had plenty of warning if he was getting close to his end, and certainly wouldn’t have been wasting time in a car park alone. Something else killed him. Something fast. Something he wasn’t expecting.”
“Or maybe something he took every day without thinking twice.”
At last she’d seemed to surprise him. “How do you mean?”
“Look.” She crouched back down, and he mirrored her. “See these darker patches?” She pointed out the speckled patch on his neck. “Hypo- and hyper-pigmentation and thin, cigarette paper appearance. It’s Poikiloderma vasculare atrophicans, parapsoriasis.”
“Yes?”
“Sherlock.” Her irritation was only partially put on. “You know your poisons. What does it mean?”
“Arsenic poisoning. Probably over time to have built up to this extent. But you said he took it himself.”
“His chemo.” She stood up. “Check his medical records. I’ll bet you that he had a trial of ATRA for the AML and it failed. At that point he would have gone on arsenic trioxide. It would have been ta simple matter to tamper with his prescription so he was getting a higher than prescribed dose. He wouldn’t have paid any attention to the side effects. He would have been expecting them. Until one day…” She gestured to the dead body.
“Excellent. That matches my findings nicely.” He whirled on Greg. “You’ll be wanting to talk to the secretary, then. And be sure to get tape samples from his desk. No matter how careful he was, there will still be residue on the surface.”
“Wait, how on earth did you get to the secretary? And how do you know he’s male?”
Sherlock looked offended. “You saw his organizer the same as I did. His wife’s out of town. Gone to Southampton for the week. But he has two tickets to the opera for tomorrow night. He’s not a fan; look at the CDs in the car. Sinatra, Tom Jones, definitely not a connoisseur of Puccini. So he’s going with someone else. For someone else.” As he talked, he became more and more frenetic, his hands gesturing to keep time with his thoughts. “They’re orchestra seats, so it’s someone he’s safe being seen in public with, then. A woman definitely, most likely a colleague, possibly a friend of his wife’s.” He gestured now to the planner in Greg’s gloved hand. “The handwriting in the planner is all the same but doesn’t match his signature on his license. So someone else keeps his calendar. Secretary. Obvious. There’s a small tube of personal libricant in his pocket but no condoms. If it was for a mistress, it would most likely be the other way around. So, he has a male partner who he trusts enough to be clean or who he is in a position to manipulate into getting tested, so most likely someone in his employ. Again, probably his secretary. So what are you waiting for? Go and prove me wrong. If you can.”
Sarah felt like she should applaud.
On their way back to Baker Street, Sarah glanced at him. “You’ve never done that to me. Read me like that, I mean.”
Sherlock didn’t take his eyes off the windscreen past the driver’s shoulder.
“I’ve heard about it, of course, John’s told me how you deduced everything about him before he’d ever said a word. But you’ve never done it to me.”
“John forbad me.” The corner of his mouth quirked. “Most people don’t take it as well as he did.”
“I’m not most people. Tell me about myself, Sherlock Holmes.”
At last he turned to look at her, his serpentine eyes clear even in the dark. She felt pinned in place by the force of it, her heart suddenly racing. When he opened his mouth to speak, she flinched.
“It’s too late. The data’s been corrupted.”
“Corrupted?”
“I know you.” He said it like it was a dirty thing. “It…complicates matters.”
“I’m sorry to disrupt the order of things.”
“No, it’s…fine.”
For a moment she could have sworn he looked disconcerted.
****
She seemed to have passed some sort of test, because Sherlock started to invite her on cases. Not always, and certainly not as often as John, but often enough for her to feel like she was contributing. She worried about John’s reaction until the time Sherlock asked her along to an autopsy and John looked amused and proud even as he rolled his eyes. “When did I become the wife here?” he groused.
“It’s the twenty-first century, John. Gender roles are irrelevant anymore.”
“Besides,” Sarah caressed John’s arm and brushed her lips across his cheek to his ear, “if you make any more sexist remarks like that, I promise you won’t get shagged later.”
His warm laugh was safe and promising.
****
“Sherlock, move!”
To his credit, he didn’t hesitate when she shouted at him, crouching down and surging to one side even as the china dinnerware started cascading in shattering crescendo off the shelf now falling where he had stood a moment earlier. Sarah raced around the end of the row to try to catch sight of the person who had shoved it, only to catch a glimpse of the tails of Sherlock’s coat disappearing through the front door.
She took off after him.
It was meant to be a simple investigation, just an interview to get a look at the store’s sales records to find the purchaser of a certain china pattern. Apparently they’d gotten closer than Sherlock had expected. He and John both knew better than to protect her, but that didn’t prevent him from filtering what cases he asked her to. It was the best for everyone. Sarah wanted John at Sherlock’s side in the situations that called for serious fighting, or for the gun in John’s bedside drawer.
They didn’t always get that choice.
Sherlock was half a block ahead of her and moving fast. There was no way she could catch him, but she was determined to keep him in sight. At the corner, a man was hunched over fitting a new tire to the hub on his car. Without slowing down, Sarah snatched up his wheel wrench and dashed into the intersection, ignoring the curses behind her
Ahead, she caught sight of Sherlock’s coat again, a dark banner snapping behind him as he disappeared down a little used mews. There was a shout and a crash of metal on stone before she reached the turning. She skated around the corner herself in time to see a young, athletically built man about to put a concrete planter through Sherlock’s head.
The wheel wrench whistled through the air as she brought the weight of it down on the man’s elbow. The bone crunched under the force and distention of the joint, but she didn’t stop, cracking his knee as well to bring him down just as Sherlock rolled out of the way. One third blow took him in the temple and knocked him insensate.
Sherlock caught her wrist before she could go for a fourth.
The wrench fell to the cobblestones with an echoing clatter as she sank onto the curbstone, hands suddenly shaking. Sherlock squeezed her arms with unexpected sympathy. “Are you all right?”
Breathless, she nodded. “You?”
“Thanks to you.”
Their eyes met for a moment, and Sarah wasn’t sure what she saw there. A moment later Sherlock swept away, already texting someone and examining the unconscious man at the same time, the brilliant detective in his element.
Afterwards they sat in the back of the cab on their way back to Baker Street. Sarah vibrated from the rush, the endorphins and adrenaline still warring for control of her body. This was nothing like being kidnapped. The chase, the rush, the fear was like nothing she’d ever felt before, and she’d once held a child’s heart in her hand.
When Sherlock leaned in to kiss her, the hormones won.
It wasn’t a hesitant or uncertain kiss. He kissed her like it was his right, open mouthed, hungry, possessive. His thumb under her jaw forced her to tilt into a more receptive angle, his long fingers splayed along the base of her skull to keep her from pulling away. She didn’t. Instead she surged into it, her own mouth open, her tongue submitting to his, hands clutching at his dark curls as she pressed against him. Sure of her surrender, he released her head to caress her body, cup her breast, follow her ass around to move down her thigh.
When he turned her onto his leg she didn’t resist and moved astride it. It was powerful and erotic, the rush of pleasure emphasized by layers of taboo: the cab driver watching them in the mirror, all of London speeding past the windows, looking in, the sure knowledge that John was waiting for them at home--
She’d already pressed her knee into Sherlock’s hardening erection when she regained her senses and withdrew. “We can’t.”
His luminous, feline eyes said that he knew the truth. Knew that if he ignored her, silenced her with another kiss, he could win her surrender, make her sacrifice everything for a quick, glorious fuck in the back of a cab. For a long, horrifying, incredible moment, she thought he would do just that, and already her body was preparing for it, tensing in advance of the ecstasy of erotic invasion. Then he pulled away, wrapped himself up in that great wool coat and stared out the window.
Sarah was still trembling when they got out of the cab. Sherlock didn’t touch her, hands in his pockets instead of in their usual spot at the small of her back.
She paused as he unlocked the door. “I have to tell John.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
Those eyes that could read everything in the smallest clues raked over her relentlessly before meeting hers. “I’m not.”
John was in the kitchen finishing the washing up when they reached the upper landing. “How did it go?” He seemed curious, eager as he wiped his hands.
“A bit of excitement,” Sherlock answered disinterestedly. “No injuries.” He looked cold, blank.
John saw deeper than that. Too deep. “Something’s happened.”
Sarah looked to Sherlock, letting him lead. He met her gaze, eyes unreadable, although she thought she detected a trace of something like sorrow. And perhaps a bit like fear. Without a word, he turned on his heel and went to his room.
Neither of them said anything until they heard the door shut behind him.
Even then, it was hard to find the words. Sarah didn’t take her coat off, hands shoved in the pockets. John continued wiping his hands with the tea towel, even though they must be long dry.
He broke the uncomfortable silence. "Did he get you hurt?”
“No. No, nothing like that.” Although maybe that would have been preferable. The heat of those cool lips still trembled on her mouth. “John, I… He… We,” she settled on finally with firm conviction and a small sigh, “Sherlock and I, we kissed.”
John was silent.
“In the cab, on the way home after…” The case seemed inconsequential now. “We kissed, and it could have been more. It would have been more, if I hadn’t…”
Jon’s fist clenched. “Did he force himself on you?”
“No! God, no, John, don’t ever think that. I wanted it as much as he did.” She still couldn’t look at him, eyes fixed instead on his hands, those broad, strong doctor/soldier hands she loved so much. “I’m so sorry, John. I never wanted to hurt you-”
To her surprise, he dropped the towel and stalked across the room to catch her face in those warm, calloused, perfect hands and kiss her. His mouth was warm where Sherlock’s had been cool, familiar and comforting rather than electric. Forgiving.
She sobbed into John’s mouth and wrapped her arms around him.
He swept her up and carried her to his room, no hint of weakness or hesitation, mouth never leaving hers despite the depth of the stairs. Sarah responded in kind, desperate for intimacy and comfort. She loved this man, wanted this man, and her desire for his flatmate didn’t change that. Her mother would be ashamed, but Sarah didn’t care. The world John and Sherlock inhabited didn’t have a lot of room for normal and proper. Stripping off John’s jeans, hearing his moan of anticipation, she found she preferred it here.
She forced herself not to scream a name when she came. She wasn’t sure which one would come out.
As they lay entwined together after, Sarah buried her face in John’s neck as he caressed her hair. She tried not to think about what Sherlock was doing, if he heard them. If she wanted him to have.
“I’m sorry,” John said quietly against her hair. “I thought it was just me. I thought you’d be immune.” She looked up at him, but there was no censure, no regret. Just maybe a touch of sympathy. “He gets into your head sometimes, until the only thing you can think about is him.”
She had to ask. “Do you and he…after?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Instead he pulled her closer. “It’s all right. But don’t let him take over. He needs control, discipline even then. If you don’t, he’ll eat you alive.”
“Then you don’t mind if...”
“I don’t mind.” He tightened his arms around her. “But not right now. I’m not ready to share you right this minute.”
She nestled in closer, content in the comfort of his arms.
She wasn’t sure what it was that woke her. Certainly not any sound. The room was dark, and John was still sound asleep, spooned up against her back. But she was awake and aware, listening as though for a burglar downstairs. She tried to relax and drift back off to sleep. When ten minutes seemed to take half the night, she gave up and slipped out of John’s arms, covered up in his blue dress shirt before making her way downstairs.
Sherlock stood at the window, staring out into the night, violin held loosely in one hand, the bow still in its case. If he noticed her entrance, he gave no sign.
“John says you play at all hours.”
His only response was to tip his head.
“Why aren’t you playing now?”
“I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“It’s not your violin that disturbed me.”
“Is he angry?”
In conversation with anyone else, it would have seemed like a non sequitor. With Sherlock, it was all part and parcel of the same conversation. “No. He’s a better man than either of us deserve.”
“True.”
“I notice you aren’t concerned about me being angry with him.”
He shrugged. “I had him first.”
“He’s not a possession, Sherlock.”
“No. He’s a man keeping two lovers.”
“Maybe he does deserve us, then.”
Sherlock snorted.
“Are you going to look at me?”
He lifted his chin but didn’t turn from the window. “I know what you look like.”
“Sherlock, John has a big enough heart to love us both. If what happened in the cab was a mistake, then fine, but can’t we still be civil to each other for his sake? We were friends before, weren’t we?”
“I don’t have friends. Ask anyone.”
She sighed. He was worse than a child. “Sherlock--”
“Go back to John, Sarah, before I so something we both regret.”
“I won’t regret it.”
At last he turned to glare at her, gaze shifting from anger to something darker as he took in her state of dress. Capitalizing on his sudden attention, she started undoing the buttons one by one. “Was the cab a mistake, Sherlock?” Her heart pounded from fear as much as excitement. He could cut her to pieces with his words if he wanted to. But they had to have this out, one way or the other.
He didn’t answer as she went button by button. It wasn’t transfixion. She knew very well he could observe and talk at the same time. It was a challenge. He was testing her to see how far she would go. She didn’t stop, didn’t slow, never taking her eyes off him.
As she freed the last button, he finally admitted, “No. The only mistake was letting you stop me.”
She let the shirt slide off her arms and stepped away from it. “I’m not stopping you know.”
He didn’t move, letting her approach him step by step. “You should, you know. Being involved with me is...not very good.”
“John seems fine with it.”
“John is broken.”
“No, he’s not. And neither are you.”
“Sarah--”
“Do you want this, Sherlock? John, me, you can have us. We want you. Everything you want, we want to give to you. So what do you want?”
He stared at her, and it was all she could do to keep from flinching at the intensity. When he reached out with long violinist’s fingers to caress the slope of her breast, she started breathing again.
A touch became a taste, caresses became clutching, soft gasps became animal moans. She vaguely recalled the feel of leather and buttons under her back, remembered the ecstatic stretch of straddling his narrow hips. The details were lost in an orgiastic fugue. Disappointing, really. It would have been nice to play the scene back on nights when she was alone. Although those nights looked to be rarer in her future.
When she regained her senses, she found she was sprawled across his armchair while he lay supine on the floor at her feet, both of them still breathing hard. "Well," she said, breaking the silence. "Glad we got that worked out."
He laughed. She had never heard him laugh before, a full-throated bark that sank into what could only be described as baritone giggles. It was so unexpected, she couldn't help joining him.
"Have fun, then?"
John stood in the doorway, Wrapped in his dressing gown and, Sarah suspected, nothing else. Instinct screamed at her to cover herself. Instead she let her head fall lazily against the chair back, watching him.
Sherlock propped himself up on his elbows. "You tell us. You watched most of it." He wasn't being smug or arrogant. If anything, his tone was playful, inviting.
"You were both gorgeous and you know it."
Sarah looked between the two of them. "It could have been better."
"I don't see how."
Sherlock was the one to hold out his hand, inviting John to join him.
John crossed the room, eyes locked with Sherlock’s, the connection between them almost visible as Sherlock drew him in. It wasn’t until he stood at Sherlock’s hip that he looked to Sarah. She could read hunger in his face, desperate need, but also uncertainty. Despite their conversation, he was still unsure of her reaction.
She was happy to put his mind at ease.
Reaching out, she slipped his hand into Sherlock’s.
It was that simple.
Sherlock tugged John to the floor, already rolling him beneath when John sank to his knees. He kissed John slowly, languorously despite John’s obvious eagerness, pushing the robe back off his shoulder, baring him to Sherlock’s touch and Sarah’s gaze.
She was content to sit back and watch the two of them until Sherlock wrapped a hand around her ankle and pulled her to the floor with them, grinning devilishly at her startled squeak as she hit the carpet. “Thought you might like to assist with this, Doctor.”
John’s fingers were in her hair, matching his other hand buried in Sherlock’s dark curls as he drew them in, first one and then the other, kissing them as though drinking two-fisted. Sherlock coasted his hand up her spine to join John’s in her hair, their fingers twined as they guided her into her lovers’ kiss.
It wasn’t innocent anymore. But it was perfect.
Recipient: ladyofthelog
Author: sadbhyl
Characters/Pairings: Sarah/Sherlock/John
Rating: R
Warnings: none
Summary: Sarah knew that Sherlock would be part of any relationship she had with John. And she was all right with that. Surprisingly, so was he.
It started innocently enough.
Sarah heard them arguing as she passed John’s office door on her way to the file room. “I promised to cover Tony’s shift tonight. It’s his daughter’s birthday. I can’t just go haring off.”
“Sarah can-”
Sherlock’s resonant bass was cut off. “No. No, Sarah can’t. She gets stuck with my shifts often enough when it really is important.”
“John, I need you there. Lestrade says there’s a rash on the victim. I need your expertise to tell if it’s an abrasion or dermatological, and if it is, then to suggest possible causes. Too many allergic irritations look similar to contact poisons for me to be able to interpret the data.”
“The person’s already dead, Sherlock. Another few hours won’t make a difference.”
Sarah tapped on the door and pushed it open. “You might as well go.” She didn’t bother to apologize for eavesdropping. John wouldn’t mind and Sherlock wouldn’t care. “You know he won’t quit until you do.”
But she could tell by the look on his face that he had decided to be bull-headed about it. “No. You shouldn’t have to be responsible for my commitments.”
Sherlock seemed just as able to read his flatmate’s mood as she was. What she couldn’t read was the sudden, inscrutable look on his face as he studied her. “You’re a doctor.”
She folded her arms defensively. “Good of you to notice.”
“Sherlock, no.”
Sherlock ignored John. “Any good at dermatology?”
“Sherlock,” John warned.
She ignored John as well. “Good enough. Probably better than John. I imagine there’s less call for it on the battlefield than in a surgery.”
John gave up on attempting to sway Sherlock and turned to try to appeal to Sarah’s reason instead. “Sarah-”
Sherlock didn’t give him the chance. “Fine. Get your coat. The cab’s waiting.”
“Sherlock, be serious.”
Part of Sarah was irritated with John for trying to protect her. Part of her was curious to see more of this life the two of them led. Part of her was bored. And she could read the challenge in Sherlock now, challenging John to be chivalrous, thus giving Sherlock what he wanted in the first place, and challenging Sarah to step out of her safe zone.
Without a word, she spun on her heel and raced to her office.
“Dammit, Sarah!”
She grabbed her medical bag first, checking for gloves, swabs and disinfectant before zipping it shut and snatching up her coat.
John was in the lobby, ignoring the waiting patients. “You don’t have to do this. He’ll be fine for a few hours.”
“You don’t think I can handle a simple necrotic examination?”
“I don’t think you can handle Sherlock. You shouldn’t have to.”
“You worry too much.” Leaning in, she kissed his cheek. “Sherlock and I get on fine now.”
He scowled. “You’ve never seen him at a crime scene before.”
“What’s he going to do in front of a dozen policemen?”
“I don’t know. That’s the problem.”
Chuckling, she brushed her fingers against his cheek. “I’ll be fine. See you back at your place after?”
He seemed resigned. “Yeah, of course. But if he leaves you stranded somewhere, call me.”
“Does he do that?”
“More often than I care to count.”
****
The cab dropped them off at a car park in Castlenau. The entrance was roped off in blue and white security tape, and the third level glowed incandescent with the sodium spotlights. Police officers stood around, some looking attentive, some much more interested in their coffee.
A woman stood behind the tape, chatting animatedly with a uniformed officer. Her expression darkened when she saw Sherlock, and she handed over her coffee to move to the center of the tape, blocking their way. “Took you long enough, freak.”
“I arrived precisely when I told Lestrade I would. Excuse us.”
She didn’t move. “I see you’ve finally thrown John over. Or did he finally wise up?”
“Dr. Sawyer is John’s girlfriend.” He said the word as though it were distasteful. Sarah didn’t take it as a slight on herself. She and Sherlock had reached their own form of detente some time ago. “She’s generously agreed to share some of her expertise while John is otherwise engaged. Unless you need to see her credentials?”
The woman seemed to have caught on something else. “John’s girlfriend? Your John’s girlfriend? But I thought--”
“Did you really, Sally?” Sherlock lifted the tape, turning under it like a dance partner to hold it up for Sarah. “It must be a red letter day for you. Coming, Sarah?”
Sherlock swept up the ramp, coat billowing dramatically, and left Sarah to follow as best she could. She couldn’t help a smile as she lengthened her stride to keep up. He may be willing to tolerate her as a substitute, but he wasn’t going to let her forget that the person usually at his side didn’t slow him down. Since she had no intention of taking John’s place, she found his reaction more amusing than anything.
Greg was waiting for them at the top of the third ramp. He’d already started to turn to fall into step with Sherlock when he registered her presence. “Sarah, what are you doing here?”
“John had hours tonight, so I offered to come along. How are you, Greg?”
Sherlock looked put out when Greg leaned in for a quick peck on the cheek. “You two know each other?”
“John and I have had dinner with Greg a few times. Surely he’s told you.”
Sherlock huffed dismissively. “The body?”
“This way.” Greg glanced at her uncertainly. “You sure you want to see this?”
Sherlock was already pulling on a pair of gloves. She suspected he kept a supply at all times in the hidden pockets of that coat. “Really, Lestrade, give the woman some credit. She is a doctor. If she were squeamish around corpses, she’d hardly have completed her certification.”
“It’s all right, Greg. I knew what I was getting into when I agreed to come.”
He didn’t look any happier, but led them over to a late model Audi standing with the driver’s side door open. “His name’s Roger Gregory. He’s a barrister, Middle Temple, and by his license lives in Mayfair. He was found by another driver just after rush hour. Looks like he was beaten up pretty badly, but his car was wide open and the keys in his hand. His wallet’s still in his pocket and nothing was taken from the car.”
Sherlock was already crouched by the body, taking in details Sarah knew she would overlook. She and Greg stood back, watching silently until he stood up again, snapping off the gloves. “Dr. Sawyer?”
She joined him at the body, setting her bag down and crouching next to it to pull out her own gloves. Sherlock steepled his finger, watching. She was being tested, she knew. All right, then.
She gave the corpse a perfunctory examination, eyes, mouth, fingers, pulling up his sleeves to check his arms. It might be a bit much to perform a groin check, but she had enough to go on as it was. The brown speckled rash on his neck got more attention until finally she looked up at Sherlock. “He wasn’t beaten.”
His expression didn’t flicker, but somehow he still seemed pleased. “No, he wasn’t.”
Greg wasn’t as satisfied. “But what about the bruising?”
“At a guess, I’d say myeloid leukemia.” She pulled the dead man’s sleeve up to show him. “These aren’t defensive injuries. If they were, they’d be on the backs of his arms, not the insides. And they’re too random and diffuse. Fists leave a bull’s-eye mark, clubs or the hilt of a gun more linear ones.”
“And the marks are on both sides of his body,” Sherlock added his own observations. “Not very likely if he was backed up against the car.”
Greg stopped looking back and forth between them with a shake of his head. “So what killed him then? The disease?”
Sherlock shook his head. “Cancer isn’t a fast killer. He’d have had plenty of warning if he was getting close to his end, and certainly wouldn’t have been wasting time in a car park alone. Something else killed him. Something fast. Something he wasn’t expecting.”
“Or maybe something he took every day without thinking twice.”
At last she’d seemed to surprise him. “How do you mean?”
“Look.” She crouched back down, and he mirrored her. “See these darker patches?” She pointed out the speckled patch on his neck. “Hypo- and hyper-pigmentation and thin, cigarette paper appearance. It’s Poikiloderma vasculare atrophicans, parapsoriasis.”
“Yes?”
“Sherlock.” Her irritation was only partially put on. “You know your poisons. What does it mean?”
“Arsenic poisoning. Probably over time to have built up to this extent. But you said he took it himself.”
“His chemo.” She stood up. “Check his medical records. I’ll bet you that he had a trial of ATRA for the AML and it failed. At that point he would have gone on arsenic trioxide. It would have been ta simple matter to tamper with his prescription so he was getting a higher than prescribed dose. He wouldn’t have paid any attention to the side effects. He would have been expecting them. Until one day…” She gestured to the dead body.
“Excellent. That matches my findings nicely.” He whirled on Greg. “You’ll be wanting to talk to the secretary, then. And be sure to get tape samples from his desk. No matter how careful he was, there will still be residue on the surface.”
“Wait, how on earth did you get to the secretary? And how do you know he’s male?”
Sherlock looked offended. “You saw his organizer the same as I did. His wife’s out of town. Gone to Southampton for the week. But he has two tickets to the opera for tomorrow night. He’s not a fan; look at the CDs in the car. Sinatra, Tom Jones, definitely not a connoisseur of Puccini. So he’s going with someone else. For someone else.” As he talked, he became more and more frenetic, his hands gesturing to keep time with his thoughts. “They’re orchestra seats, so it’s someone he’s safe being seen in public with, then. A woman definitely, most likely a colleague, possibly a friend of his wife’s.” He gestured now to the planner in Greg’s gloved hand. “The handwriting in the planner is all the same but doesn’t match his signature on his license. So someone else keeps his calendar. Secretary. Obvious. There’s a small tube of personal libricant in his pocket but no condoms. If it was for a mistress, it would most likely be the other way around. So, he has a male partner who he trusts enough to be clean or who he is in a position to manipulate into getting tested, so most likely someone in his employ. Again, probably his secretary. So what are you waiting for? Go and prove me wrong. If you can.”
Sarah felt like she should applaud.
On their way back to Baker Street, Sarah glanced at him. “You’ve never done that to me. Read me like that, I mean.”
Sherlock didn’t take his eyes off the windscreen past the driver’s shoulder.
“I’ve heard about it, of course, John’s told me how you deduced everything about him before he’d ever said a word. But you’ve never done it to me.”
“John forbad me.” The corner of his mouth quirked. “Most people don’t take it as well as he did.”
“I’m not most people. Tell me about myself, Sherlock Holmes.”
At last he turned to look at her, his serpentine eyes clear even in the dark. She felt pinned in place by the force of it, her heart suddenly racing. When he opened his mouth to speak, she flinched.
“It’s too late. The data’s been corrupted.”
“Corrupted?”
“I know you.” He said it like it was a dirty thing. “It…complicates matters.”
“I’m sorry to disrupt the order of things.”
“No, it’s…fine.”
For a moment she could have sworn he looked disconcerted.
****
She seemed to have passed some sort of test, because Sherlock started to invite her on cases. Not always, and certainly not as often as John, but often enough for her to feel like she was contributing. She worried about John’s reaction until the time Sherlock asked her along to an autopsy and John looked amused and proud even as he rolled his eyes. “When did I become the wife here?” he groused.
“It’s the twenty-first century, John. Gender roles are irrelevant anymore.”
“Besides,” Sarah caressed John’s arm and brushed her lips across his cheek to his ear, “if you make any more sexist remarks like that, I promise you won’t get shagged later.”
His warm laugh was safe and promising.
****
“Sherlock, move!”
To his credit, he didn’t hesitate when she shouted at him, crouching down and surging to one side even as the china dinnerware started cascading in shattering crescendo off the shelf now falling where he had stood a moment earlier. Sarah raced around the end of the row to try to catch sight of the person who had shoved it, only to catch a glimpse of the tails of Sherlock’s coat disappearing through the front door.
She took off after him.
It was meant to be a simple investigation, just an interview to get a look at the store’s sales records to find the purchaser of a certain china pattern. Apparently they’d gotten closer than Sherlock had expected. He and John both knew better than to protect her, but that didn’t prevent him from filtering what cases he asked her to. It was the best for everyone. Sarah wanted John at Sherlock’s side in the situations that called for serious fighting, or for the gun in John’s bedside drawer.
They didn’t always get that choice.
Sherlock was half a block ahead of her and moving fast. There was no way she could catch him, but she was determined to keep him in sight. At the corner, a man was hunched over fitting a new tire to the hub on his car. Without slowing down, Sarah snatched up his wheel wrench and dashed into the intersection, ignoring the curses behind her
Ahead, she caught sight of Sherlock’s coat again, a dark banner snapping behind him as he disappeared down a little used mews. There was a shout and a crash of metal on stone before she reached the turning. She skated around the corner herself in time to see a young, athletically built man about to put a concrete planter through Sherlock’s head.
The wheel wrench whistled through the air as she brought the weight of it down on the man’s elbow. The bone crunched under the force and distention of the joint, but she didn’t stop, cracking his knee as well to bring him down just as Sherlock rolled out of the way. One third blow took him in the temple and knocked him insensate.
Sherlock caught her wrist before she could go for a fourth.
The wrench fell to the cobblestones with an echoing clatter as she sank onto the curbstone, hands suddenly shaking. Sherlock squeezed her arms with unexpected sympathy. “Are you all right?”
Breathless, she nodded. “You?”
“Thanks to you.”
Their eyes met for a moment, and Sarah wasn’t sure what she saw there. A moment later Sherlock swept away, already texting someone and examining the unconscious man at the same time, the brilliant detective in his element.
Afterwards they sat in the back of the cab on their way back to Baker Street. Sarah vibrated from the rush, the endorphins and adrenaline still warring for control of her body. This was nothing like being kidnapped. The chase, the rush, the fear was like nothing she’d ever felt before, and she’d once held a child’s heart in her hand.
When Sherlock leaned in to kiss her, the hormones won.
It wasn’t a hesitant or uncertain kiss. He kissed her like it was his right, open mouthed, hungry, possessive. His thumb under her jaw forced her to tilt into a more receptive angle, his long fingers splayed along the base of her skull to keep her from pulling away. She didn’t. Instead she surged into it, her own mouth open, her tongue submitting to his, hands clutching at his dark curls as she pressed against him. Sure of her surrender, he released her head to caress her body, cup her breast, follow her ass around to move down her thigh.
When he turned her onto his leg she didn’t resist and moved astride it. It was powerful and erotic, the rush of pleasure emphasized by layers of taboo: the cab driver watching them in the mirror, all of London speeding past the windows, looking in, the sure knowledge that John was waiting for them at home--
She’d already pressed her knee into Sherlock’s hardening erection when she regained her senses and withdrew. “We can’t.”
His luminous, feline eyes said that he knew the truth. Knew that if he ignored her, silenced her with another kiss, he could win her surrender, make her sacrifice everything for a quick, glorious fuck in the back of a cab. For a long, horrifying, incredible moment, she thought he would do just that, and already her body was preparing for it, tensing in advance of the ecstasy of erotic invasion. Then he pulled away, wrapped himself up in that great wool coat and stared out the window.
Sarah was still trembling when they got out of the cab. Sherlock didn’t touch her, hands in his pockets instead of in their usual spot at the small of her back.
She paused as he unlocked the door. “I have to tell John.”
“I know.”
“I’m sorry.”
Those eyes that could read everything in the smallest clues raked over her relentlessly before meeting hers. “I’m not.”
John was in the kitchen finishing the washing up when they reached the upper landing. “How did it go?” He seemed curious, eager as he wiped his hands.
“A bit of excitement,” Sherlock answered disinterestedly. “No injuries.” He looked cold, blank.
John saw deeper than that. Too deep. “Something’s happened.”
Sarah looked to Sherlock, letting him lead. He met her gaze, eyes unreadable, although she thought she detected a trace of something like sorrow. And perhaps a bit like fear. Without a word, he turned on his heel and went to his room.
Neither of them said anything until they heard the door shut behind him.
Even then, it was hard to find the words. Sarah didn’t take her coat off, hands shoved in the pockets. John continued wiping his hands with the tea towel, even though they must be long dry.
He broke the uncomfortable silence. "Did he get you hurt?”
“No. No, nothing like that.” Although maybe that would have been preferable. The heat of those cool lips still trembled on her mouth. “John, I… He… We,” she settled on finally with firm conviction and a small sigh, “Sherlock and I, we kissed.”
John was silent.
“In the cab, on the way home after…” The case seemed inconsequential now. “We kissed, and it could have been more. It would have been more, if I hadn’t…”
Jon’s fist clenched. “Did he force himself on you?”
“No! God, no, John, don’t ever think that. I wanted it as much as he did.” She still couldn’t look at him, eyes fixed instead on his hands, those broad, strong doctor/soldier hands she loved so much. “I’m so sorry, John. I never wanted to hurt you-”
To her surprise, he dropped the towel and stalked across the room to catch her face in those warm, calloused, perfect hands and kiss her. His mouth was warm where Sherlock’s had been cool, familiar and comforting rather than electric. Forgiving.
She sobbed into John’s mouth and wrapped her arms around him.
He swept her up and carried her to his room, no hint of weakness or hesitation, mouth never leaving hers despite the depth of the stairs. Sarah responded in kind, desperate for intimacy and comfort. She loved this man, wanted this man, and her desire for his flatmate didn’t change that. Her mother would be ashamed, but Sarah didn’t care. The world John and Sherlock inhabited didn’t have a lot of room for normal and proper. Stripping off John’s jeans, hearing his moan of anticipation, she found she preferred it here.
She forced herself not to scream a name when she came. She wasn’t sure which one would come out.
As they lay entwined together after, Sarah buried her face in John’s neck as he caressed her hair. She tried not to think about what Sherlock was doing, if he heard them. If she wanted him to have.
“I’m sorry,” John said quietly against her hair. “I thought it was just me. I thought you’d be immune.” She looked up at him, but there was no censure, no regret. Just maybe a touch of sympathy. “He gets into your head sometimes, until the only thing you can think about is him.”
She had to ask. “Do you and he…after?”
He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. Instead he pulled her closer. “It’s all right. But don’t let him take over. He needs control, discipline even then. If you don’t, he’ll eat you alive.”
“Then you don’t mind if...”
“I don’t mind.” He tightened his arms around her. “But not right now. I’m not ready to share you right this minute.”
She nestled in closer, content in the comfort of his arms.
She wasn’t sure what it was that woke her. Certainly not any sound. The room was dark, and John was still sound asleep, spooned up against her back. But she was awake and aware, listening as though for a burglar downstairs. She tried to relax and drift back off to sleep. When ten minutes seemed to take half the night, she gave up and slipped out of John’s arms, covered up in his blue dress shirt before making her way downstairs.
Sherlock stood at the window, staring out into the night, violin held loosely in one hand, the bow still in its case. If he noticed her entrance, he gave no sign.
“John says you play at all hours.”
His only response was to tip his head.
“Why aren’t you playing now?”
“I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“It’s not your violin that disturbed me.”
“Is he angry?”
In conversation with anyone else, it would have seemed like a non sequitor. With Sherlock, it was all part and parcel of the same conversation. “No. He’s a better man than either of us deserve.”
“True.”
“I notice you aren’t concerned about me being angry with him.”
He shrugged. “I had him first.”
“He’s not a possession, Sherlock.”
“No. He’s a man keeping two lovers.”
“Maybe he does deserve us, then.”
Sherlock snorted.
“Are you going to look at me?”
He lifted his chin but didn’t turn from the window. “I know what you look like.”
“Sherlock, John has a big enough heart to love us both. If what happened in the cab was a mistake, then fine, but can’t we still be civil to each other for his sake? We were friends before, weren’t we?”
“I don’t have friends. Ask anyone.”
She sighed. He was worse than a child. “Sherlock--”
“Go back to John, Sarah, before I so something we both regret.”
“I won’t regret it.”
At last he turned to glare at her, gaze shifting from anger to something darker as he took in her state of dress. Capitalizing on his sudden attention, she started undoing the buttons one by one. “Was the cab a mistake, Sherlock?” Her heart pounded from fear as much as excitement. He could cut her to pieces with his words if he wanted to. But they had to have this out, one way or the other.
He didn’t answer as she went button by button. It wasn’t transfixion. She knew very well he could observe and talk at the same time. It was a challenge. He was testing her to see how far she would go. She didn’t stop, didn’t slow, never taking her eyes off him.
As she freed the last button, he finally admitted, “No. The only mistake was letting you stop me.”
She let the shirt slide off her arms and stepped away from it. “I’m not stopping you know.”
He didn’t move, letting her approach him step by step. “You should, you know. Being involved with me is...not very good.”
“John seems fine with it.”
“John is broken.”
“No, he’s not. And neither are you.”
“Sarah--”
“Do you want this, Sherlock? John, me, you can have us. We want you. Everything you want, we want to give to you. So what do you want?”
He stared at her, and it was all she could do to keep from flinching at the intensity. When he reached out with long violinist’s fingers to caress the slope of her breast, she started breathing again.
A touch became a taste, caresses became clutching, soft gasps became animal moans. She vaguely recalled the feel of leather and buttons under her back, remembered the ecstatic stretch of straddling his narrow hips. The details were lost in an orgiastic fugue. Disappointing, really. It would have been nice to play the scene back on nights when she was alone. Although those nights looked to be rarer in her future.
When she regained her senses, she found she was sprawled across his armchair while he lay supine on the floor at her feet, both of them still breathing hard. "Well," she said, breaking the silence. "Glad we got that worked out."
He laughed. She had never heard him laugh before, a full-throated bark that sank into what could only be described as baritone giggles. It was so unexpected, she couldn't help joining him.
"Have fun, then?"
John stood in the doorway, Wrapped in his dressing gown and, Sarah suspected, nothing else. Instinct screamed at her to cover herself. Instead she let her head fall lazily against the chair back, watching him.
Sherlock propped himself up on his elbows. "You tell us. You watched most of it." He wasn't being smug or arrogant. If anything, his tone was playful, inviting.
"You were both gorgeous and you know it."
Sarah looked between the two of them. "It could have been better."
"I don't see how."
Sherlock was the one to hold out his hand, inviting John to join him.
John crossed the room, eyes locked with Sherlock’s, the connection between them almost visible as Sherlock drew him in. It wasn’t until he stood at Sherlock’s hip that he looked to Sarah. She could read hunger in his face, desperate need, but also uncertainty. Despite their conversation, he was still unsure of her reaction.
She was happy to put his mind at ease.
Reaching out, she slipped his hand into Sherlock’s.
It was that simple.
Sherlock tugged John to the floor, already rolling him beneath when John sank to his knees. He kissed John slowly, languorously despite John’s obvious eagerness, pushing the robe back off his shoulder, baring him to Sherlock’s touch and Sarah’s gaze.
She was content to sit back and watch the two of them until Sherlock wrapped a hand around her ankle and pulled her to the floor with them, grinning devilishly at her startled squeak as she hit the carpet. “Thought you might like to assist with this, Doctor.”
John’s fingers were in her hair, matching his other hand buried in Sherlock’s dark curls as he drew them in, first one and then the other, kissing them as though drinking two-fisted. Sherlock coasted his hand up her spine to join John’s in her hair, their fingers twined as they guided her into her lovers’ kiss.
It wasn’t innocent anymore. But it was perfect.