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Chapter Text

“God Sherlock, give me something.” DI Greg Lestrade cried turning in frustration and only being stopped from kicking the wall of the crime scene by the swift interception of DS Beth MacDonald.
“Working on that Graham” a baritone growl came from the man on his hands and knees head underneath the victims bed.
“Greg” muttered the DI with a shake of his head.
Sherlock leapt up from his previous position and gave a yell. “Out, all of you out!” His eyes closed, face scrunched in concentration.
“I can't leave you alone at a crime scene Sherlock, don't much fancy another demotion because of you.” argued Greg.
Sherlock Holmes’ eyes flew open to give him a withering glare before his long arm flew out to his side pointing at Beth. “She can stay everyone else out.”
Beth and Greg shared a look before Greg signalled all the other officers out of the door closing it behind him.

****
Greg just shrugged his shoulders and grimaced at me in apology before pulling everyone else out of the room. Once the door shut I braced myself and turned to find Sherlock, eyes yet again closed and hands moving around in front of him. I didn't have much experience of being at a crime scene with Sherlock, but I had seen him bawl out enough people in the 3 months I had been with the team to know that I would be best off if I put up and shut up.

Getting my promotion and moving to London had been the highlight of my year, but working with Sherlock was testing to say the least. It was definitely easier when John Watson accompanied him or rather acted as his minder. But, whatever you had to say about Sherlock and his acerbic nature, he got results. His ability to work out complex crimes from a sample of pollen in a mud scrape, or the fingernails of a distraught relative was simply amazing to witness.

I was interrupted from my wondering thoughts. “If you insist on thinking so loudly, at least try to narrow your thoughts to the current case sergeant.” He went back to concentration mode, this time pacing the room. I quietly watched him, my thoughts as he'd suggested back on the case at hand. This was the ninth in a string of murders of couples expecting babies. That was the only link we had between them all. The victims had started out as high profile couples but couple number 4, 5 and 8 had been out of the public eye. They had all been together less than 18 months and had come from a variety of locations across the south of England. That was why the connection between them had only come to light now, and in all honesty only because Sherlock had walked into Scotland Yard insisting there was a link that he had discovered from the news reports and demanded that we got case files from the relevant forces for him.

The first couple were murdered 2 years’ prior, a former glamour model and much younger daytime TV presenter husband, then 19 months ago a politician and his lawyer wife were found murdered. Then came the young pop star and her husband. The pattern had changed when couple number 4 were a teacher and his new wife, followed by two teachers, then a football player and his girlfriend, a model and her banker boyfriend and finally the bodies currently tied to two chairs, two young relatively unknown struggling actors married for only 6 months. There were no other links between them, they had never met to our knowledge.

I was shaken from my thoughts as the silence was broken “Now we know he records them; sees behind the façade they present to the outside world.”
“He records them?”
He flits around the room pointing to various shelves and lamps etc. “Small tacky spots indicate the location of small recording devices, insufficient evidence of whether the camera has sound recording function as well.”
I shivered a small wave of revulsion at the thought of being recorded in my bedroom. Muttering again to myself “He records them.”
He continued to explain his long fingers dancing in front of him as fast as he was talking “Well they might just watch live feeds but balance of probability suggests it would not be possible to watch them all the time, job, family, friends etc. taking up time, therefore they record them, may even edit some of the clips that make them angry to watch before meeting them for the last time.”
“The last time? Oh because he's careful he meets them beforehand to check he's got them right.”
He looked up at me then with an appraising look and a “Yes, good you get it.”

****
That was surprising! He had let her stay as she was by far the least stupid of them all, but even so he had not expected her to pick up his train of thought so quickly. He nodded at her again and gave her an expectant look.
She continued “He's clever, really clever, he sees them, meets them, watches their interactions without them batting an eyelid and only when he is sure does he act. But why is he killing them, why these couples, what’s his motive? “
Oh yes she was good, asking the right questions with no prompting. Interesting. Let’s see what she can do. I left the room, beckoning her with my hand. “Let’s attempt to answer that question.”

******
Six hours later I had something. Jumping up from my chair, I legged it for Greg’s office, grabbing Sherlock by the arm as I passed him. Shaking off my hand he silently followed me. I threw open the door of Greg’s office.
“I think I have something Sir, come see.” Greg gave a small nod and wordlessly pushed his chair back and followed me to my desk, Sherlock accompanying him. I sat down and opened it up to the internet pages I had been browsing.
Greg leaned closer over my shoulder. “You read a lot of gossip mags at work Beth?”
“No the gossip mags are our lead. Look, every one of our first three couples had articles, or passing comments made about the state of their relationship.” I pushed back on my chair to let them see the screen better.

*****
When Beth had slammed into my office like a bat out of hell I was pretty convinced it would be some Sherlock related incident. Like last month’s interruption in the middle of a conference call with the superintendent because Sherlock had made Helen cry with a brilliant deduction about her boyfriend’s new colleague and future lover. The outcome of which was that Helen had locked herself in the ladies until Sherlock left and Sherlock had refused to leave as he was thinking. I was pleasantly surprised then that this was case related. Beth was a good addition to the team. With Sally getting promoted and taking on her own team, the space it opened up had been filled well by Beth; actually it was filled better by Beth than it ever had been by Sally. Although both were competent Beth was a much better team player and worked well with all members of the team, including the unofficial ones like Sherlock.

I read on over Sherlock’s shoulder as he flicked between the open tabs on Beth’s terminal. They weren’t just articles around the couple’s marriages but articles preceding each couple meeting including a particularly juicy sex scandal involving Paul Cornall the MP victim at the second crime scene that I vaguely remembered reading about at the time it broke about 5 years ago.
Sherlock abruptly straightened up almost head butting me in the process and flew away to pace in a small circle behind both me and Beth, muttering to himself, before striding off and out of the office without a word in response to me calling out to him.

Shaking my head in disbelief at a Holmes disappearing act yet again, I went back to the job in hand. “Right this is a great find MacDonald, get a few of the others looking into the other couples. Let’s concentrate on the famous ones first see if there is a link there with these and then we can look into the others.”

*****
The next morning in Greg’s team meeting the team were discussing the findings of the previous evenings work when Sherlock strode in in his normal brusque manner talking over everyone else. “Well done Greg your team finally has a member who can carry out some simple detective work.” Greg’s response was to groan and drag both hands down his face at this backhanded compliment.
“Your sergeant was right; all the couples targeted contained an alleged cheating spouse.”
“Yep, we had worked that out for ourselves mate, in fact it’s what we were discussing when you made your grand entrance” Greg replied with an exasperated sigh. “We were gonna’ try and make a connection with the non-public eye couples today.”
“Done that.” Sherlock called over his shoulder as he plugged a USB into the PC currently linked to the projector showing yesterday’s work.
“Unencrypted USB won’t work on…” one of the team members started to call out and cut themselves off as Sherlock opened it and pulled up a document.
“You Bastard! Something else you’ve nicked from one of us.” Greg admonished.
“I prefer the term borrowed” replied Sherlock cockily before he started to explain the new evidence.

“Three of the four victims at crime scene 4 and 5 were teachers at large secondary schools. Schools are microcosms of society. They have their own gossip columns although they are more commonly found on social media than in print. A scroll through various Facebook feeds and a look at a few dozen blogs of the pupils of these two schools were enough for me to find evidence that there were at least rumours rife about these victims.” And with that he yet again disappeared with a dramatic swish of his coat.

*****
I was knackered, having spent the afternoon predominantly on the phone to various reporters trying to find out their sources and generally getting absolutely bloody nowhere, when Greg and Sherlock got back from their trip to Park View High School in Chelmsford, where Rachel Edds and Joseph Remante our fifth pair of victims had worked.
“How’d it go Sir?” I asked Greg stifling a yawn, eager to talk to anyone but a non-co-operative journalist.
“Oh, swimmingly right up until the point where Sherlock decided to shove the photo of the headmistress and Joseph Remante having sex into the face of the headmistress and demand to know why there was photographic evidence, on a pupil’s blog, of her shagging an employee 20 years her junior, whose girlfriend was pregnant. Then he pissed off when she became hysterical and unable to answer any questions leaving me to try and calm her down.” He said glaring the entire time at Sherlock who just looked on at him with an expression of indifference. He then turned to me. “I have scheduled another meeting with her tomorrow morning, having assured her that tall, dark and rude over there will not be in attendance, so clear your diary MacDonald.”

Chapter Text

Two weeks later and we were no closer to finding any more to help us find the killer. We had amassed plenty more evidence of largely unproven reports of infidelity in the case of one or both of the murder victims.

Having spent a long time in the office with very little to show for it I was understandably less than thrilled when Sherlock strode in like he owned the place. “What’s the name of the new Donovan?” He demanded.
“Beth McDonald? Christ she’s been here almost 4 months already Sherlock, learn at least one of her bloody names.”
He turned back to the door before yelling “McDonald” out of it. When Beth appeared at the door I motioned her in and Sherlock closed the door behind her before sitting himself in a chair at the desk and calmly crossing his legs. I asked both if they wanted coffee which they both declined with a shake of the head before I motioned for Beth to take the chair next to Sherlock. I shrugged in response to her questioning raised brow before I turned my attention back to Sherlock. “What is this about Sherlock?”
“Solving this case.”
“Alright, maybe a few more specifics are needed for those of us who are not mind readers.” Beth piped up rolling her eyes at me as she cocked her head at our favourite enigmatic consultant.

“We have established a link of sorts, we know they target couples based on the state of their relationships and it is a fair assumption that one or both of the victims were engaging in extramarital affairs. We know this but we are no closer to finding our killer. We do however know the two ways the killer selects victims.”
“We don’t.” Beth stated emphatically
“Yes we do.” Sherlock retorted
“I don’t. Care to share your secret deductions?” I asked the exasperation of being in the dark once again tinging the request.
“Some are found through the media stories surrounding them, others are bought to the killer’s attention by people who know the victims personally.”
“Hits?” I pondered aloud.
“I don’t believe so, I don’t think the people who volunteer up the information about the victims know that the information will be used for such nefarious means.”

“Hang on a second how do you know there are two ways that victims are selected, where’s the evidence?” Beth asked.
“The timings.” Sherlock paused before shaking his head at the vacant expressions on our faces. “Look at our MP; he has a few widely reported sex scandals under his belt, there is one hinted at in a few magazines and grumblings in some of the red tops 5 months before he and his wife are murdered. But compare that to our school teacher couple. They are not in the public eye, ok the story is on a blog, but unless you’re a student at that school you have no reason to find that story. But there is a gap of just 6 weeks between Mr Remante’s indiscretion and his death. The killer had a lot more information, there was not as much time needed to gather and check facts needed.”
I thought about what he’d said for a second “Ok say that’s true..” Sherlock rolled his eyes at that. “No Sherlock, at the moment it’s a theory. We have no evidence that would stand up in a court of law. If it is true how does this help us to find our killer?”
“We need to find how the killer communicates with their informants; it seems unlikely that they have a personal connection with them based on the geographic spread of the victims.”
“Right so we’re thinking internet again, social media, chat rooms?” Beth asked.
“Yes sergeant.” Was Sherlock’s huffed response.
Beth continued, so used to Sherlock’s inflated ego by now that she ignored his rudeness “So we just need to find the relevant sites and?”
“Slight problem being that there are thousands of them, I have got my best people on it”
“Hang on you have people?” Beth queried with a look of cautious disbelief.
“Homeless network.” Sherlock replied glancing with what I recognised as faked nonchalance at his nails.
“How do your homeless network have access to the internet?” I asked, ignoring for the time being Beth, as she mouthed homeless network to herself with puzzlement.
“Really Lestrade! Internet cafes are everywhere, Wi-Fi hotspots and a cheap phone these days and you have access to the Internet. All I have to do is provide some basic equipment and funds. Even with our combined forces I don’t think this is going to be fast enough.”
“God you’re right this could take months to sift through and narrow down suspects. Just organising a warrant to get the information from past private conversations from a chat room with a foreign IP can take weeks.” Greg gripped a handful of his hair and grimaced.

****
“Luckily for you I have another idea.” Sherlock exclaimed casually unfolding and refolding his legs so his left ankle now rested on his right knee.
“In the next few weeks, on a slow news day, a salacious set of lies will be banded about in a few rags pertaining to a figure in the public eye that has history of a previous sex scandal.”
“We cannot use an unsuspecting person as bait, it’s unethical.” Greg spoke slowly, in the way I had witnessed him do surprisingly often when Sherlock suggested something socially unacceptable.
“I am not unsuspecting. It’s my plan.”
“You? Seriously mate?” Greg asked, eyes wide, confusion written across his face.
“I am in the public eye, however begrudgingly, and thanks to the ever charming Janine I have previous. I may as well use it to my advantage.” Sherlock answered calmly.
“Ok, so that is fair enough, but you are missing one glaringly obvious key ingredient. A pregnant girlfriend or wife, and I don’t think John will be able to pull off that roll.” Greg finished, chuckling at his own joke.
“Yes I have a solution to that.” And Sherlock turned to face me with a raised eyebrow.
I felt a wave of dread roll though me before settling in the pit of my stomach like a heavy, chilled weight. How the fuck could he know? I had known for barely more than a week.
Greg started talking again then “Well done for noticing she’s a woman and a better candidate than John, Sherlock, but if this murderer is as thorough as you have led us to believe a fake relationship and pregnancy is not going to be enough to convince them.”
Sherlock hadn’t stopped looking at me questioningly at all during Greg’s argument and it was with horror that I saw his lips moving and shaping the next words he said in response. “It would only be a fake relationship.”

The room was completely silent for 15 seconds before Greg spoke again, his tone warily questioning. “Beth? Are you pregnant?” I looked at him and gave a small nod.
“Jeez Sherlock, how did you know?” then a look of confused shock moved across Greg’s face. “Is it yours?” If I hadn’t been experiencing shocked horror, the sound of spluttered disgust and the look of wounded horror that Sherlock expressed would have made me giggle, instead it spurred my anger to overtake my numbed shock.
“Actually how the fuck did you know and why on earth would you announce it to my boss you utter arse? What the fuck have I ever done to you?” and having said that I just couldn’t bear to be in the room with either of them for one more second and walked swiftly out, back straight as I fought the desire to break into a run.
****
After Beth had torn a strip off Sherlock and abruptly left I was shocked to see Sherlock looking at the door she had exited from wide eyes, his mouth gaping and his eyebrows slightly drawn in towards his nose. Shockingly he looked….remorseful? The next second his face was blank in his practiced manner. I almost doubted I had ever seen its previous expression.
“Not your best moment mate.”
“Mmm…… no it was not. You will need to talk to her Lestrade.” And with that he was up and became the second person to stride out of my office in as many minutes.

****
It was a couple of hours later when I saw Greg again. I was in the staff kitchen making a cup of tea when he popped his head around the door. “Beth?”
I looked over my shoulder at him. “Sir”
“I’m sorry you were forced into telling me something so personal. It is none of my business.” He started to walk out then.
I called out to him and he paused before taking a step back until he was back in the entrance of the door again. “Sir, do you want me to say yes to Holmes’ plan?”
He paused looking at me quietly before he replied with a deep sigh. “I hate it when he is right; this investigation is stalling and his idea may just bring an end to it quicker than we currently can but, and I can’t stress this enough Beth, this is your decision. It’s your life that this will affect. Only you and I know about this idea and you are under no pressure from me to do this. If I am perfectly honest I’m not sure that I could do it if I was in your shoes”
“Thanks Sir, I will let you know what my decision is by the end of the week.” Greg gave me a small nod and a wistful smile before he left me alone with my tea and an impossible decision to make.

****
As she had promised Friday evening found DS Beth MacDonald knocking gently on the door of DI Greg Lestrade’s office. Everyone else had left the office and they were the only two on the entire floor. She opened the door once he had indicated that she could. He glanced momentarily up at her before holding up a finger to indicate for her to give him a second, he finished typing something. “Beth” he said as he looked back up at her on finishing what he had been doing.
“I’m just heading home Greg. I just needed to let you know before I went that I have made my decision.” She paused before continuing with one word “Yes” she gave a single nod of her head.
“Ok” he responded slowly and calmly.
“Have a nice weekend Greg.”
“Yeah and you Beth.”
And with that she left the office leaving Greg quietly considering the turn of events for 10 minutes before he picked up his phone and made a call.

The first that Beth knew of Greg having told Sherlock that she was going to go ahead with his plan was when Sherlock let himself into her flat that night. Sherlock stood in the entrance to her bedroom casually leaning against the doorjamb.

She was lying on her stomach on her bed like a teenage girl. Her hair was pulled up in a high ponytail, she wore only a large slouchy hoodie and what appeared to be knickers, which he was glad to see covered her buttocks. Her legs were bent at the knees and swinging back and forth in opposite directions to each other in time to some ridiculous lovesick crooner. He would allow that the woman singing had a mezzo-soprano voice that was pleasing especially in the lower register, unlike Beth’s voice which was frankly atrocious as she sang along. She was surrounded by folders and sheaves of paper. Her laptop sat an arm’s length from her head, its fan obviously in need of a clean as he could hear it humming over the music and caterwauling. Despite all the movement and noise, she was clearly engrossed in studying the material surrounding her. She would go from reading something off one of the many sources surrounding her to writing in the notepad in front of her with a lilac biro.
“How can you concentrate on doing so much at one time?” he asked softly. Her reaction was shocked. She flinched, her head turning sharply to see him still slouched against the doorjamb. She swiftly moved to sit up pulling her knees up and the hoodie over them concealing her legs from his view.

He expected her to berate him for shocking her but surprisingly she answered his question. She waved a hand at the collection of items on her bed. “Music, dancing, unwinding it all helps me think. Physically writing down my thoughts makes me think about it afresh, assimilate the facts and ideas. I’m hoping it will allow me to see a different connection for this case.” He couldn’t help but let the look of approval settle on his face as he appraised her statement. Once again she had surprised him. He was aware of this technique and had tried it in his teens before he had built his mind palace. The look fell from his face with her next question.

****
“More importantly what are you doing here? And how the hell did you get in?” I asked aware that I needed to keep the indignation I was feeling out of my voice as much as possible if I didn’t want to be dealing with a stroppy consulting detective.
“I picked the lock” he stated nonchalantly.
“You do remember that I am a member of the police force and could arrest you for that.” He just huffed in response, his eyes casually glancing around my bedroom, deducing me to his hearts content.
“You still haven’t answered me in regards to why you are here.” He deigned to stop perusing my room to look at me again then.
“Lestrade informed me that you had accepted the terms of my proposal. I am here to get started on compiling a believable relationship.”
“I haven’t accepted any terms. I have agreed to consider it. I need far more details, but that is not something I am able to do at” I turned to look at the time on my mobile. “1.23 in the morning.”
His only response was a very quiet “Oh.”
The softness of his response caused me to really look at him then. He seemed perturbed that he hadn’t quite grasped something. It was then that I realised how tired he looked. His eyes were shrunken and red rimmed, he looked pale and what I had taken for nonchalant cocksure attitude in his leaning in my doorway I now suspected was more an action required to keep him standing.

“You had no idea what time it was did you? Have you just finished a case?” I asked softly. I was familiar enough by now with his work ethic to know that he avoided food and sleep when he had a good case.
“Yes it looked like a 7 but disappointingly turned out to be a 5.” He said with a slight pout and a furrowed brow.
“What did you think you would be able to achieve tonight in the state you’re in?”
“The state I’m in!” he exclaimed indignantly.
“Answer the question Mr Holmes. Why are you breaking into my flat in the middle of the night?”
After a few moments of contemplation, he moved from his position casually leaning against the doorjamb and pulled himself up to his full height in the middle of the doorway. “We need to appear comfortable with each other in intimate situations. The sooner we start on that the more convincingly we will be able portray our relationship to the murderer.”
I ignored the flutter I had felt when Sherlock had uttered the words ‘intimate situations’ and the flash of images my brain had pulled up to accompany them to ask “What do you mean intimate situations?” In the calmest tone I could manage.
“Domestic situations, we have to look comfortable with each other. Exchanging stories of our days, using terms of endearment” he said with a grimace of distaste before continuing “sharing space, sharing a bed” he finished with a glance at the empty side of my bed.
I looked at him as his shoulders slumped before asking gently “You came here to sleep?”
He simply replied “It was closer than Baker Street.” I wordlessly cleared the other side of the bed of the scattered case files. “Ok, I was just about to give up any way.” I said aiming for nonchalance as I shut down my laptop and placing it on the top of the pile of case files now gracing the floor beside my bed. “There’s a spare toothbrush in the bathroom cabinet if you want it.” He gave a wordless nod before walking in the direction of the bathroom before I had the opportunity to tell him where the bathroom was.

I was in the kitchen grabbing a glass of water when I heard him exit the bathroom. By the time I had finished in the bathroom and re-entered my bedroom with my glass of water Sherlock was under the duvet, only the curls of the back of his head visible in the low light of my bedside lamp. With a steeling breath I entered the bedroom closing the door softly behind me. I gently and quietly placed the glass on the bedside table before slipping under the duvet next to what I suspected was a slumbering Holmes based on the evidence of his exhaustion earlier.

Chapter Text

When I awoke to my alarm at 7.30 the next morning I was groggy and disorientated, my disorientation only grew when, having turned off my alarm and thrown myself over in bed to face the other way, I found myself face to face with a sleep dishevelled Sherlock looking at me blearily through one open eye.
“Mornin’” I uttered before having to throw my hand to cover my mouth as I yawned.
“Uhhmm” was all the throatily grunted response I got, although both eyes were now open, if not exactly focused. Seeing Sherlock so languorous was frankly a little charming. I think I was assuming that he was almost robotic; that he would go from the offline sleep mode to full deductive genius like a flick of a switch but he was like everyone else when roused from sleep. Seeing this part of him, that I don’t imagine many people have seen, made him become a lot more human to me. I couldn’t help the small smile that lifted my lips fractionally for only a second until it was lost again as his face hardened and became its normal mask of calculated indifference.

****
It was the small twitch of amusement at her lip that made me panic. I had no control; I needed to have control now, ACT. I flung the duvet off and moved swiftly, without appearing hasty or panicked, to the wardrobe to pull out my clothes from where I had hung them last night. With my back to her I was aware of her movements as she got up pulling back on the hoodie she had dropped to the floor during the night and padded quietly to the door. I made no response to her question about breakfast. Really were all their first thoughts about their stomachs, even the ones with a modicum of intellectual ability.

I had made my way to the hallway when she came back into my view with a large mug, of Columbian decaffinated coffee based on the scent and colouring of the liquid, cradled in her delicate hands. ‘Delicate hands?’ why had I noticed that in particular? She sipped coffee as she watched me put on the Belstaff and pull on scarf and gloves while I pretended not to have noticed her. It was as I was pulling on my left glove that the door to the flat opened and a large dog bounded in. A mongrel with predominantly features of the Bernese Mountain Dog and Labrador, but with the possibility of some pointer breed in there as well. (Get a DNA sample to prove I’m right and narrow it down to an exact pointer breed.) Always miss something, I believed evidence of dog pointed to a small breed, flat was relatively free of dog hair and the scent of dog was faint. The woman who followed in the dog I discerned with a quick glance was the reason that my deduction had been wrong. Short, blond woman obsessed with cleanliness, dentist all evident by the roughness of her hands and knees and the frankly alarmingly bright teeth. The look on her face as she glanced from Beth to me also provided me with another deduction.

****
Sarah’s arrival back from her morning jog couldn’t have come at a worse time, as if I wasn’t feeling awkward enough already with Sherlock’s refusal to say a single word since his grunt (actually a grunt isn’t a word) on waking this morning. So I was really surprised when Sherlock grinned a face splitting smile and held out a hand to Sarah.
“You must be Beth’s flatmate; it’s great to meet you.” As they shook hands Sarah glanced over her shoulder at me inquisitively.
“Sarah this is Sherlock. Sherlock, Sarah.” I said pointing to them each in turn. “Oh and this is Kairos.” Sherlock then dropped to a crouch, coat tails settling gracefully around him of course, to pet Kairos affectionately. It was then that Sarah realised who he was.
“Oh you’re the hat detective?” His hand stopped briefly in its stroking, before it started back up again I was sure that if his head hadn’t been lowered I would have seen the distaste for that title written across his face. He restarted his hand with an affectionate pat to Kairos before he sprung back up smile plastered back on his face.
“I prefer Consulting Detective.”
“Oh so is that how you and Beth met?”
Sherlock had moved over to me where he took my mug, taking a generous gulp of coffee before handing it back to me and replied to Sarah as he settled his arm around my waist. Leaving me to sip at my coffee to cover the confusion I was experiencing.

I zoned back in to realise that the two of them had been chatting politely for a while and were now drawing to a close with Sarah excusing herself to grab a shower and get ready for work. She walked past us to get to the kitchen, then Sherlock was pulling me up against him, and had bent his head to whisper in my ear.
“She needs to believe that we are in a romantic relationship. I have deduced that she is quite the chatterbox.” And with that one arm stayed at my waist as the other wound its way into my hair gently tilting my head back before he kissed me.

****
When Sarah came back out of the kitchen with her refreshed bottle of water, she found her flatmate firmly ensconced in the arms of the hat detective sharing a kiss. When they broke away the flustered look on Beth’s face, as she stared up at the man still holding her, spoke volumes about the passion of that kiss.
She went to her bedroom to pick up her phone. Walking to the bathroom, she began typing out a message to a few friends. ‘You’ll never guess who I have just caught my flatmate kissing!’

***
One week later and Beth had endured three unexpected nights spent with Sherlock. The first was much like his previous night spent at hers. He arrived in the middle of the night, she was already asleep and it was only the dip of the bed and his whispered ‘It’s me, go back to sleep’ that really alerted her to his presence but she was too deeply asleep to be much perturbed by him being there. By the time she woke up in the morning he was gone. The second time she got home at 1 to find him already in her bed, typing away on her laptop and when she tried to talk to him he scowled at her retorting that he was busy and huffed at her everytime she made a sound, moved or breathed, until she forced herself to go to sleep just so she wouldn’t have to murder him.

The third time she left work to find him outside waiting for her.
"Finally, I was beginning to think you were never leaving. Come on." And he strode off toward the main road arm outstretched when a taxi came into view. Beth was momentarily nonplussed by the way that he was acting as if they had a prearranged meeting and stood still, then with a gentle huff of amusement and a wry smile she followed him reaching his side as the taxi drew to a stop beside him and followed him into the cab.

“Where are we going?”
“Angelo’s”
“And Angelo is?”
“A man that I once got off a murder charge by successfully proving that at the time in question he was breaking and entering across the other side of London. He now owns a very nice little Italian restaurant on the corner of Northumberland Street.”
“Ok why are we going to see this Angelo? Does he have information on the case?”
“What… No, he does very good Stracotto al Chianti, and I never have to pay.”
“We’re going for dinner?”
“Yes. You traditionally eat around now, and haven’t had anything since a disappointing sandwich; prawn or tuna can’t quite deduce which, from the canteen at 2 this afternoon. We are both hungry and have much to discuss, may as well have good food while we do so.”
“Alright, but maybe next time ask me in advance before springing a date on me.”
“A date” he spluttered “this is a …meeting, NOT a date.”
“If we go ahead with your plan, these types of meetings will be classified as dates to the outside world. When Sarah asks why I am so late home, I’ll be telling her ‘Oh I had a date with Sherlock. He took me to a lovely little Italian. He knows the owner, got him off a murder charge once.’ You’re going to have to get used to the term being used Sherlock.”
“Hhmmph” was all the response that was received from the detective resolutely glaring out the window.

****
It was only after we pulled up outside the restaurant and got out that I realised that he had been thinking about what I’d said and was obviously running with the idea. The first inkling was when he held to door open for me and as I moved through it he placed his hand lightly at the small of my back. I had next to no time to analysis this though as a large bear of a man came towards us from the back of the restaurant smiling as widely as his arms were slung in greeting.
“Sherlock” He exclaimed on reaching us and shook Sherlock’s hand firmly grin still firmly in place. “Oh and your beautiful date.” He continued holding me at arm’s length by the shoulders before leaning to kiss each of my cheeks.
“Angelo, this is Beth.”
“Beautiful name for a beautiful lady.” said Angelo as he gave me a wink making me laugh. “I’ll get the best table ready for you, if you can give me a few minutes to prepare it.”
“Thank you.” Sherlock’s only response as we were ushered to the small bar.

True to his word just after I had taken the first sip of tonic and lime Angelo was back, directing us to a small table in an alcove towards the back of the room, complete with a tealight. I suspected that the couple that had smiled at us as they moved to the window seat a few minutes earlier had originally been seated here and Angelo confirmed it by saying.
“Had to tell the couple sitting here that it was your birthday, and that I believed Sherlock here was possibly going to pop the question.” He winked again “Always the best for Sherlock, he got me off a murder charge once.”
“Mmm he mentioned it earlier.” Sherlock interrupted at this point.
“Thank you Angelo, we will need a few minutes to look at the menu.” Angelo gave a nod and left without another word.
I followed Sherlock’s suggestions on what to order and when Angelo returned asked for the Insalata Caprese and Osso Buco with grilled vegetables. Sherlock un surprisingly was right the food was amazing and the little alcove gave us enough privacy to be able to discuss the case in-between courses.

“What do we know about our killer?” Sherlock asked me just before he took his first mouthful of Stracotto al Chianti.
“He targets couples that are expecting a baby together, who have been in a relationship of less than 18 months. All the current evidence seems to be pointing towards one or both of the victims having had an affair, although we are still trying to find more than conjecture for three of the victims. We cannot be sure what draws his attention to these victims, theoretically the media could have alerted him to those who were common gossip rag fodder, but how he is alerted to the movements of completely un related victims who have no media connection at all is still being looked into. The theories we are looking into at the moment are that there is a human link between victims, friend of a friend for instance, or that he finds them through local gossip, although locations of victims make this unlikely as victims are located from Suffolk to Somerset. The last option suggested by New Scotland Yard’s favourite consulting detective seems to be the most logical option, if the most difficult line of enquiry to investigate: That the victims were selected through some sort of cyber link. Looking into chat rooms and websites aimed at cheated on spouses, pregnancy support and paternity, but the list of those available in just those three categories is vast. We have prioritised those that came up as the first options in a Google or Bing search engine, but going through all that data and trying to narrow it down will take time. We have requested the hard drives of all the victims again to see if we have missed something from the first look we had into them.”

“You realise you are wasting time looking into all of these other options. You should be concentrating on the cyber angle, although I believe the information is not being given to the killer directly from the victims due to how they feel the need to carry out surveillance.
“So who is and how?”
“I don’t know. I don’t like not knowing. Damn it I need more data to work with. You realise you always refer to the killer as he?”
“Do I? Well statistically the killer is more likely to be a man.”
“Yes but look at the amount of emotion involved in this killing.”
“Emotion?”
“Yes the way they smooth the female victim’s hair after.”
“He smooths their hair?”
“See ‘he’ again. Yes, obviously.”
My veal was abandoned in front of me at this revelation “That’s the first I’ve heard of it. It’s not in any of the forensics reports.”
“Well I can’t be sure of the first victims, but the last few that I have seen in situ at the crime scene have clear signs. And it looks likely from the crime scene photos of the other victims that they received the same treatment.”
“How on earth can you tell?”
“Trace transfer of blood from the fingertips to the victim’s hair, positioned in such a way that would occur if they had a hand cupped at the back of their head. That is in the forensic report, but has not been interpreted in anyway by the idiots that call themselves forensic scientists.”
“Shit, how did I not see that.”
Sherlock just shrugged hands parting in front of him, clearly indicating with a raised eyebrow that I was as much of an idiot as I felt before continuing.
“It clearly happened after death because?” and he opened his hands out to me indicating I should continue. I thought about the crime scene photos that had been spread over my desk, bed, floor etc. over the past few weeks desperately trying to see what was so obvious to him. When I did see it I cursed how obvious it had been.
“Ah shit! They clearly struggled, the ligature marks are testament to that, but hair on all the victims is down and not one single strand is out of place.”
*****
Not bad with a little gentle guidance she had seen what all the other idiots had missed. The thought lit Sherlock’s face with a momentary smirk.

Chapter Text

Work for Beth continued to be tedious, the cybercrime unit had picked up the bulk of sorting through the online leads and the case had taken a back seat for the team and they were now focussing on other far more straightforward cases. The most active the office had been, being caused not by a case but a newspaper report.

The morning definitely felt autumnal with the wind whipping her hair around her head only stopping in its attempts to enter mouth and eyes once she entered the station. When she got to the office she found a crowd of people around the incident board, assuming they had made some breakthrough on one of the active cases she plonked her stuff on her desk haphazardly before making her way over there herself. She was drawn short a small distance from the crowd as it parted momentarily and she saw the blown up newspaper exert and her own face gazing back at her from the photo that accompanied the article that identified her as Sherlock Holmes mystery woman.

The hand that touched her elbow drew her attention away and she found herself quietly being led by Greg into his office. The blinds were already drawn as she entered. As the door opened she looked up to find Sherlock calmly standing with his back to her at the window, leather glove clad hands grasped lightly behind him, silhouetted by the morning light. On hearing the door close Sherlock fully turned, and she realised that Greg had not followed her into his office.
“Ah Beth. I was thinking the end of the week for moving your belongings to Baker Street. Lestrade has kindly agreed to give you Thursday and Friday off so you will have four days to organise your belongings and so on.” Beth just stood awestruck as he continued. “Will you require some form of moving service? We can arrange one I suppose If you have a lot of things to move. I have already arranged for a storage unit for large items, furniture and such like which can be removed from your flat at a later date.”
He then moved to Greg’s desk picking up a stray pen and peeling a sticky note off the pad by the phone before striding over to her holding out the paper.
“Text the number to arrange a time to complete the move, she will arrange all the fine details.”
And with that he stepped behind me and exited the room before I realised that once again he had assumed that I would do what I was told and even more annoyingly I hadn’t said a word.

I yanked the door open in frustration to find Sherlock stood not far from it and Sally Donovan a foot from him.
“Amazing the lies that they print in newspapers these days.” She then made a show of shaking out the paper in her hands and read directly from it.
“Sherlock Holmes the Private Investigator with a string of successfully solved crimes under his belt was seen Friday with his focus on something other than crime. The man whose most recent case was the swift return of the rare blue carbunkel gem, appears to have found a gem of his own. This new mystery woman has been seen in his company a few times in the past couple of weeks. As you can see from the photo above the couple seem smitten with each other.” she then laughed cattily, eyes widening in mock surprise, “Imagine the laughs I got from that over my cornflakes this morning Freak”

******

The use of the derogative term that had trailed Sherlock throughout his 36 years settled like a stone in his stomach. He could normally just brush this name calling off, but Donovan had inadvertently hit a deep, hidden even from himself, seed of discontent with his life. He immediately went on the offensive in response and used the evidence he found written across her face and actions to aid him in doing what he always did when he felt under attack.
“So sorry that your superiors are disappointed with you and your teams’ clearance rates, do let me know if you need any help. I might give you some of my time if I get desperate for something to do.” The narrowing of her eyes and the drawing up of her nose showed how his comment had hit home. He knew that part of her hatred of him was born from her need to be the best, which he understood. He knew enough of his own character to recognise this was a need for them both. He therefore knew this was the pressure point to aim for in retaliation. She closed the distance between them and stared up at him in fury.
“I almost expected you to have come back from the dead as a slightly more normal human being but you’re more of a freak than you were before. Anybody who has ever met you would never believe these lies, why would anybody want a freak like you?” The venom in her response did not surprise him, the voice that cut in before he could retort however did.

******

The fury that had fuelled her pursuit of Sherlock before he could leave was swiftly turned on its head and directed at Donovan on hearing her belittling of the man so publically in the densely populated office. The words were out of her mouth before she could think about the repercussions.
“Contain your bitterness at the fact that you are alone in your personal life and failing in your professional one. If you have to take it out on someone else to make yourself feel better kindly chose someone other than my boyfriend to spit your vitriol at.”

******

The look of shock written across Donovan’s face was intensely satisfying, without a further word Beth folded her coat over her arm, shouldering her bag before grasping my hand and we walked out of the station without a word.

We remained hand in hand, moving at pace, until we turned the corner from the station, when she dropped my hand and slowed her pace. Before stopping and turning looking around.
“Well everyone will know our cover story now, around thirty percent of your colleagues are now communicating with their media contacts to pass on that nugget of information.” My comment was met by stony silence, which was interrupted only by her message tone.

*******

The drawing realisation of what she had just done and the consequences were buzzing around her brain. Opening a message that had just arrived on her phone presented her with Greg telling her to take the rest of the day, as she had TOIL she could use. With a deep breath she finally looked at Sherlock. “I need some time Sherlock.” And she turned to walk to her car. He followed her “I..”
“No Sherlock, time!” and she left him there standing on the pavement.

The flat was quiet when she got home. Kairos greeted her half-heartedly snuffling at her feet, before abandoning that to take up his position back on the couch. After having changed out of her work clothes into leggings and a long t-shirt she entered the Kitchen to start her favourite form of therapy.
When the cake came out of the oven, and sat cooling on the side, she was still in a quandary about if she really was prepared to carry out this fake relationship, could she do it. She needed to think, with that in mind she pulled on her oversized hoodie and trainers. And her and Kairos left the flat.

*****

The carpet of golds, browns, oranges and startling reds crunched underfoot as she trod the winding pathways with a dog that frequently ran off after one of the many squirrels in the park. Having observed her for some time he picked up his pace and as they turned a curve, overlooked by one of the parks once impressive and imposing dinosaur models, he fell into step beside her. They shared a few synchronised paces before she realised his presence. He was ashamed at how close he came to dropping the pair of take away cups he held in his gloved hands, when she swiftly rounded on him. Standing in his path a hand held up to his chest baring his way, her lips were pursed as she glared at him. Slowly she removed the ear buds from both ears, the volume too low for him to discern what she was listening to, although he would admit that it was unlikely he would have known anyway; his knowledge of modern music was far from complete. The glare still hadn’t left her face when she began to speak.
“How did you know I would be here of all places in bloody London?”

*****

“You had clearly left your flat on foot, your car still being parked on the next street over where you left it on returning earlier, and judging by your choice of shoe” He said gesturing lazily in the direction of my trainer clad feet. He handed me one of the take away cups before taking the chuckit ball thrower from my hand “…the absence of the canine from the flat and the ball throwing implement made it clear that you were headed to an area large and bare enough in which to throw a ball around. The temperature of the cake on my arrival gave me an area which it would be possible for you to reach by foot within the time scale. From there it was just a question of finding the correct large space. There were three choices Sydenham Wells Park, Mayow Park or Crystal Palace Park. I surmised by the variation of vegative matter on your old well-worn trainers under the chair in your bedroom that you preferred walking in Crystal Palace Park, and here we are.” He finished holding his arms wide to indicate the space surrounding us. His eyebrows were raised, eyes as wide and he was displaying a shit eating grin that made me want to slap it right off his face. Instead I retorted.
“Impressive as that is, why are you here when I specifically asked you to leave me alone?”
“Ah yes but you failed to specify how long to leave you alone for. It has been three hours eighteen minutes, is that not a sufficient amount of time?” Her response was to give a huff and continue walking although she had slowed her pace, apparently content for him to walk unchallenged beside her as she sipped slowly at the peppermint tea he had bought her. When they entered another wide space with plenty of grass Sherlock began to throw the ball for Kairos, who tore off after it each time coming back panting and frolicking around Sherlock waiting for him to throw it again. It was only when Beth decided to take a seat on a bench and properly watched them, that she realised that Sherlock was enjoying it just as much as Kairos, his eyes bright and playful and his lips smiling softly as he watched Kairos tearing back towards him at full pelt. He threw it once more before turning to find Beth sitting and going to join her. He somehow threw himself gracefully onto the bench next to her and without a word removed a package from one of the many pockets of his Belstaff, wordlessly passing it to her.

Unwrapping the bag emblazoned with the name of the same nearby French bistro/coffee shop he had bought coffee from she found a reason to smile. She looked up at him before speaking softly.
"Your ability to deduce everything about me, which frankly I find terrifying most of the time, sometimes comes in very useful when I am hungry.” She gave a slight chuckle as she drew the ciapni pesto from the bag and took a large bite.

*****

A small glob of the melted cheese and pesto fell to her thumb and he watched as she carefully curled her tongue over it. He registered a small jolt of surprise as he felt his stomach clench a small warm ball of something he had long forgotten about, settling low in his belly. Beth noticed his surprise but he was glad to see she was unaware of its cause. “I meant that as a thank you Sherlock.” He shut out his earlier unexpected reaction to concentrate. She continued “terrifying is probably too strong a word, just unsettling maybe. I suppose I will need to get used to it.”
“So we are in agreement about my proposal. We will be going ahead?”
She took a deep breath. “I think so but let me make myself clear on this matter Sherlock. I will not let you boss me around, decide without any consultation with me what we are going to do and generally keep me in the dark about your plans.” He went to talk and she shut him up immediately.
“No Sherlock, that is exactly what you have done over the last couple of weeks, swan in tell everyone how it’s going to go. In fact, that’s just what you do full stop isn’t it. I have listened to Greg and John moan about how you always play your cards close to your chest, never share until the big dramatic reveal. You need to remember Sherlock this is not just about you. I am pregnant Sherlock it is my job to keep this baby, my baby, safe. I can’t do that if you don’t let me know what is going on, so unless you can promise me you will not lie to me or keep things from me, but will tell me everything at every step I cannot agree to this.”
“You have my word that we will do this together, I will give you full disclosure at all points.”
She nodded “Shall we walk and discuss it further.” she said standing. He stood also and they walked together in silence for a little while before Sherlock began to speak.
“I sometimes don’t speak for days, I don’t eat or sleep when on a case and I play the violin, often in the middle of the night. Would that bother you?”

Chapter Text

Her belongings and herself had arrived at Baker Street a week ago and against everything she had expected they had fallen into a routine of sorts. When she arrived or departed the flat Sherlock would always appear and give her a chaste kiss on the cheek. She would cook dinner, well shove some premade thing in the oven or come home with takeaway, and he would never eat more than a mouthful of his portion before distractedly going back to the case he was working on. She went to bed alone, luxuriating in his bed with high thread count cotton sheets and would wake up in them alone the next morning, to find Sherlock was either out of the flat, pacing the living room or sat at the kitchen table surrounded by a jungle of lab equipment meaning that she would have to grab breakfast on the way to work.

He was mostly quiet, trapped in his own mind. So it was surprising to come back from a late shift at midnight to find the soft snores of a sleeping Sherlock emanating from the bedroom. This was the first time she had seen him sleeping in his own flat he had obviously collapsed on the bed exhausted. He was laying on top of the duvet, head in the crease between both pillows with his dressing gown still tied around his waist covering the pyjamas he wore underneath. Mesmerising as she found it watching him breathing through full, parted lips, his face slack with a head of mussed curls making him appear youthful and innocent in a way he never did when awake, she tore herself away giving him some privacy and turning the lights off behind her.

She found her laptop slid onto one of the highest shelves of the living room bookcases where Sherlock had clearly abandoned it after using it earlier. Beth curled herself up in the leather armchair and trawled through Netflix, until she found something to watch with her cup of tea and the two remaining biscuits that Sherlock had left in the cupboard. She was tired and would rather have gone straight to sleep but she wasn’t as unobservant as Sherlock seemed to think she was. Other than that first night when he’d appeared in her room teetering on the edge of exhaustion, he had never slept well when they shared a bed. He had gone 5 days without sleep, that she knew of, the least she could do was give him at least another hour of rest.

Eighty minutes later she gave in to exhaustion and took herself off to the bathroom. After brushing her teeth, she left the bathroom light on and entered the bedroom through the glass bathroom door, using the soft pool of light that puddled through the glass to light her way to the chest of drawers and letting her see well enough to change into pyjamas. Looking at the bed, she left to pad out through the flat and up the stairs to the second bedroom that was filled with boxes of her belongings that didn’t have a home here. Moving a couple of boxes off of the bed she collected what she came for and moved back down to Sherlock’s bedroom. She shook the upstairs duvet out and let it fall over the bed, fluttering Sherlock’s curls before it fell over his inert body. Then after having switched the bathroom light off she slipped under the duvet to lie beside him. A minute later as she was starting into the descent to sleep, she felt him stirring beside her. He surprised her when instead of waking and leaving he pulled his body closer to hers until his cool chest was flush with her back and his icy left arm was draped over her stomach sharing her warmth. A few minutes later he was softly snoring once more his head more on her pillow now. She felt herself smiling softly before sleep claimed her.

She woke the next day to find herself alone once more in the flat. After a leisurely breakfast of dry toast, because someone had emptied the tub of spread and used it to store a heart in, Beth left the flat after checking her oyster was in her bag. She soon found herself on the Jubilee line heading to tourist London.

She had spent a nice morning strolling the Southbank, wrapped up warm to guard against the high winds of the Autumn weather. She had enjoyed watching the weekday tourists domestic and foreign with their selfie sticks enjoying the banks of the Thames, as she sipped her earl grey from pret. Strolling around the Tate Modern had been enjoyable, even though she wasn’t a great appreciator of art she’d enjoyed the variety of style and the unrushed pace of the gallery.

She popped into Brixton to see a friend for a quick lunch and catch up. After making a quick detour via a pound shop she headed home. She came in the living room to find Sherlock sitting in his chair two fingers of his left hand brushing gently over his lower lip as he stared off unseeingly. He hadn’t noticed her arrival yet. She walked over to him startling him as she dropped a kiss to his temple at the same time she dropped a large bag in his lap. His fingers moved from his lips to where she had kissed him as his other hand drew open the bag and he peered inquisitively into it.
“What are these and why are they on my lap?” he asked looking at her perplexed.
“Boxes for you to keep specimens in. I appreciate the efforts you went to in putting the heart away so I couldn’t see it like I asked but, if you’re going to throw away the food to store items and then I open the container anyway expecting there to be food in it, it defeats the object of hiding it in the first place.”
“Ah, ergo designated boxes in a multitude of sizes and opaque colours.” He finished.
“Yep, that way I won’t being having to deal with nausea of both morning sickness and gross unidentified fridge articles, and you won’t have to put up with me vomiting and shouting at you about it. Win-win” she exclaimed hands thrown open and smile wide.
“Well I also have a gift for you” he pointed in the direction of the sofa.

My eyes enlarged before turning to look at him trying to read if he was serious. “Wow does your idea of women come from the 50’s? Are you gifting me a hoover?”
“What no!” Sherlock spluttered squinting as he thought before continuing more smoothly. “Appearances can be deceiving and I suppose in truth the gift is neither exclusively for you or strictly speaking from me. My brother arrived while you were out. I have mentioned Mycroft before have I not?” I shook my head in response. “Ah, well he is practically the British government and normally a thorn in my side. His position does however have its advantages in that he has access to top grade electronics linked to surveillance techniques currently in use. He took the opportunity to sweep the flat for bugs of which there are currently none. He then left us the means to do our own undetected sweep. It is undetectable when not plugged in but as soon as it is switched on this machine” he pointed to the hoover “will scan the area for electronic monitoring devices. We also have the option of using it to kill any of the feeds that we need to using a targeted electromagnetic pulse.”
“Ok that is pretty cool and a massively useful present. Thanks to your brother and Q.”
“Q?” He asked eyebrow raised in confusion
“You know from the Bond films?”
“Ah 007.”
“Oh good you do know some pop culture references then?”
“John is always trying to make me watch the films and actually it did come up in a case once…not my most successful case but still.” He tailed off quietly.

She removed her coat and outerwear and puttered around the flat before coming back to the living room, where a fire was burning merrily, with a cup of tea for each of them. She put hers down before holding one out to Sherlock. He folded the newspaper he had been reading and threw it to the floor beside him before taking it from her with a formal “Thank you” which made her smile as she turned back to the other armchair. They sat there quietly drinking tea until she broke the silence. “You never did tell me how you knew by the way?”
“I know a lot of things what particular occasion are you alluding to?
“How did you know I was pregnant? I had only known for less than 2 weeks at that point.”
“Ah simple combination of factors, each on their own inconsequential but when seen in combination obvious. Your tastes had changed, when Lestrade offered you coffee that day you declined, but you practically always had coffee in front of you until very recently. You were increasingly fatigued which you had not shown excessive signs of before, but now seem to spend most of your afternoons yawning. The increase in progesterone causes this symptom it also causes increased tenderness of breast tissue. The bras you wore changed to reflect this, with a change from you favouring a plunge or balconette style to a more comfortable t-shirt bra. You had started to show signs of morning sickness at that point, although the name is a misnomer, you experienced it at varying times throughout the day and still do. Finally, and the most telling of all, you took to sitting at your desk with your hand on your stomach, an unconscious action I am sure.”

“Right that was… impressive. The bra bit you might have wanted to leave out, a little creepy perhaps but none the less very impressive.”
“I notice things it’s what I do. The observations are not creepy or sleezy I just can’t not see something.” he explained in an exasperated tone that I interpreted to mean he had had to explain this many times before.
“Yeah I think I get that, maybe never mention anything like that to a stranger though.”
Sherlock looked up with a snort and twist of his lip that I read as amusement. “I shall attempt not to delete that advice Miss McDonald.”

Chapter Text

We got into a routine from the arrival of the SpyVac of bi weekly hoovering of the whole flat, unsurprisingly mostly done by me as Sherlock was either conveniently in the middle of a case or a time sensitive experiment. On one memorable occasion, I had insisted that he did it as I was feeling sick and he had returned home the day before shoes caked in mud. He had paced all over the flat before I realised and made him take his shoes off. He was just starting on the living room while I made tea. I came back into the room expecting to hear more muttered utterances about ‘dust being eloquent’ to find Mrs Hudson frozen in the doorway to the flat as Sherlock continued oblivious to her arrival over the sound of the hoover. I gently steered her from the doorway to a seat at the kitchen table, gave her my cup of tea and some time to get over the shock.

During that time there were a few more pictures of us together in the gossip columns, nothing majorly incriminating, although one photo had me looking like a complete hag and Sherlock looking very suave; I quickly threw that paper out.

Sherlock was still avoiding having to sleep in the same bed and although hand holding and light touches had become common during the day both within and outside of Baker street. It shut down as the evening drew closed and he would find an excuse to avoid going to bed, we needed to have a discussion about it but every time I had tried to approach it in the last couple of weeks he had disappeared, created a distraction or just point blank ignored me.

After our hoovering of the flat was when we sat down and discussed the case, once I had fully assessed and had evidence that there were no monitoring devices in use.

“We need to do something to draw attention to our situation, draw out our killer. I have arranged for the sleezeball story to be published this week. Then we will need to make it known that you are pregnant in the next couple of weeks, while the story is still in memory but not so close in time that it is obviously a set up.”

“You mean we need a concerned friend story?” she piped up from where she had wrapped herself in a ball in the corner of the sofa. Her hair a messy pile on the top of her head a smudge of dust running from the apple of her cheekbone into her hair, transferred from her hand during her earlier cleaning.

“A what?” I questioned.

“I read a lot of gossip magazine fodder at the beginning of this case. It falls into three categories really. Direct from the participant’s mouth. A Janine style article if you will.”

“You read that?”

“Yep, research and all that. Seven times in one night!!!” She pulled a face. A facsimile of impressed, badly hiding mirth.

“Completely made up.” I deadpanned ensuring that I maintained an aloof demeanour.

“Obviously Sherl.” She retorted with an eye roll not dissimilar to those I often express myself.

“Don’t call me that either.” I am not fond of nicknames, but that one in particular has memories attached to it that i prefer not to delve into.

“Anyway back to the point, then you have the journalist has nothing to go on and claims multiple anonymous people who know the participants have given opinion and conjecture on it style article. Finally, you have the articles which are based on the evidence given by one friend (although friend is not the best descriptor for someone who will sell you up the river like that) These are a lot more detailed give a more emotive angle and can expand the story with new details.”

“We need one of these stories.”

“Yes we do, one from a good friend of mine who can expand the story by revealing that I am pregnant and harp on about the heartbreak I am going through but that I have given you another chance as you insisted that It was not true etc.”

“I’m sure one of Mycroft's agents could pose as a friend. “ I said already calling up a suitable list of those operatives known to me.

“Why bother going to all that effort, when I can just burst into tears in the middle of the office after the story is published, move into a hotel for a couple of days, then come back talk about it at work.” She added with a grin.

“Ah yes and let one of the 30% of your office in the newspapers pockets leak it for us. Shall I make you a list of all your offices informants?” I asked reaching into my jacket pocket to get my notebook

“Yes please. Tea?”

***

After a quick trip to St Barts to study the corpse Molly had in of a diabetic, 68 year old, former hard labourer, Sherlock returned in the late afternoon. Much to his delight the diabetic man had donated his body to science. A gleeful, but trying to hide it, Sherlock spent the afternoon, at what I called the kitchen table and he referred to as the home lab bench, with the former left foot of the man adding to his catalogue of observations of diabetic ulcers in the heavily calloused tissue of physical labourers. I pottered around the flat while he did his experiments, having a surprisingly restful day with no morning sickness considering the activities going on in the kitchen.

I’d been reading on the couch when I became aware that Sherlock’s experiment was finished. He strode into the living room and started a fire burning in the grate with the ease that comes with plenty of practice. When satisfied that it was burning merrily Sherlock walked over the coffee table, foot barely missing the empty mug perched there, before sitting down on the opposite side from me.

“Dinner?”

“Nothing in, Take away?”

“Thai? As you appear to have not experienced any sickness today.”

“Delicious”

“I’ll order, you have the bath you want and it should be here by the time you’re through.”

“How’d you know I wan……Oh never mind.” I stopped in exasperation “Use my card and I’ll have...”

“Ruammit baan thai and chicken phad med mamuang from the good place in Kentish Town” he interupted smugly. I would have been tempted to be petty and order something else from somewhere else; if I hadn’t been so hungry and wanted exactly the list of food he had just reeled off. I let him wander off to find his phone and order without argument and ran myself a bath.

I came back after a fairly fabulous bath. I’d found a nearly full bottle of rose and lavender bath oil behind a few half empty bottles of shampoo. After doing a quick sniff test, to ascertain whether it was as labelled or contained something strange and probably dangerous placed in it by my pretend boyfriend, I added it to the water and wallowed in it happily for the next 20 minutes.

I came out of the bedroom in clean pj's just as Sherlock came through the kitchen door with the bag of Thai.
“Straight from cartons?” he posed one eyebrow raised questioningly.
I nodded in response, and grabbed cutlery as we made our way to the sofa. Sherlock, from his seat on the sofa, pulled the coffee table closer with one bare foot before depositing our fare on it and grabbing up the remote to put the TV on. We then spent a happy hour on the couch eating and then watching (me) or critiquing every small plot hole, continuity mistake and idiotic procedural mistake (him), in a couple of episodes of an American police procedural drama. I couldn’t argue that there was no way a case would unfold in such a manner as was portrayed with all the bureaucracy involved in building a case to take to court. It did seem a bit rich though that Sherlock, the man who played by no ones rules but his own would comment on it.

"So you are aware that there are regulations? I thought you’d deleted them.”

“Oh no I am very aware of them, its part of what makes being a consulting detective the more favourable. I am under no obligation to abide by them.” He finished with a smirk.

Our evening continued as such, As it wore on the frequency of his comments decreased. When I finally noticed, I looked at him from the corner of my eye. He looked shattered, his eyes slits on his face compared to normal and his head leaning loosely slightly to his right.
Without any further thought, I reached out touching his arm. “Sherlock you’re knackered, go to bed.” He tensed under my hand and his head shot straight back up.
“I’m not tired.” He hissed.

Aware that I would not win any battles with arguing with him I reached for the remote and continued casually as I could. “I know you don’t sleep when you’re on a case, but you’re not on an active one right now, take the opportunity to recharge. I can sleep upstairs tonight so you get a full night, we know nobody is watching.”

“Yes amazing idea…..oh except we don’t know when our little serial killer friend comes in to deposit monitoring devices in homes. Say, what if he was to come tonight and find us in separate beds. Wouldn’t make a very convincing couple then would we?” His defensiveness tangible in his attempt to belittle me.

I casually continued not allowing him to move me from the subject. “Actually you have a good point, I’ll admit I hadn’t thought of that. Makes it more important than ever then that you start sleeping to give him the opportunity to do his thing.”

“Do his thing” he parodied, mocking me but noticeably had no argument to what I had said.

There was silence for a minute, no more, before I continued hopeful that his lack of argument would mean he would sleep. “I’m gonna stay up a while and read my book. I’d quite like to finish it tonight, probably take me a few hours yet. Go to sleep Sherlock I promise to try not to wake you later.”
He said not one thing as he walked from the room head high. I breathed a sigh of relief when I heard the bedroom door close.

Chapter Text

Four hours later after finishing her book, attempting a crossword, and watching a rubbish late night film she got a glass of water and slipped quietly into the bedroom. She’d dressed in her pyjamas after the bath so put the water down gently and slid into what was left of her side of the bed. She had got herself comfortable and Sherlock was sleeping on next to her breath steady and slow. She realised that she needed to charge her phone. Which unfortunately meant getting out of the warm, snug bed and plugging it into the socket on Sherlock's side.

She was proud of her abilities when she managed to get back into bed without him waking. However, settling back into the pillows, she felt the tension when he abruptly woke. The slight almost unnoticeable movement of the mattress as his muscles tensed.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you Sherlock. Please go back to sleep.”
“No it’s fine. I’ve had over 3 hours and I’ve got an experiment tha…”
“Do you remember the first night you came to my flat.” He made a slight noise to indicate yes. “Where you said we need to get used to being together, sleeping together. How are we going to get comfortable sharing a bed if we never actually share one?”
Another grunt was all I got as he moved his legs toward the edge of the bed. “I have got to know you a bit better over the last few weeks and you are a very convincing actor, but you can’t act when you’re not conscious, and you don’t like not being able to have control around others. You’re afraid to let your defences down around others, and I get that I really do, but we’ve got to try harder.”
It didn’t stop him leaving without a word, and I let him go.

I woke the next morning glad not to have a shift that day. I was somewhat surprised to find the man besides me asleep. I did want to get up. If I was honest I was hungry, but I wanted to continue to get us acclimatised to sleeping and waking up together, so I picked up my book from the bedside table and settled in.
A while later there was a gentle knock on the bedroom door, before it opened a crack and Mrs Hudson gave a whispered “Are you decent dears? Thought you might like a cup of tea and a fruit scone.” I glanced over at Sherlock still out like a light and swaddled in most of the duvet.
“Mrs Hudson your a saint. To what do we owe the pleasure?” I asked as she placed the tray down in the space I cleared on the bedside table.
“It’s no trouble dear, I made scones to take next door this morning and I though as it’s your day off, and I knew he wasn’t likely to make you breakfast, I’d bring a couple of spares up and well you can’t have scones without tea now can you.” She giggled.
“I would have come down for them, you didn’t need to come all the way upstairs with a tray.”
“Oh love, before you moved in I was up and down those stairs like a yo-yo making sure Sherlock ate and drank. He doesn’t waste a lot of space in that enormous brain of his for basic self-care. I used to bring tea up to him every day around now. Idiot man had no idea that I was bringing it, he though and I quote ‘that it just sort of happened’.” She shook her head as she looked at the duvet lump next to me with slight bemusement and plenty of mirth.
“Anyways love I’m off next door for a prosecco brunch. Enjoy the rest of your day off and just leave the plates on the dresser downstairs when you’re done with them.” And with a little wave and a wide smile she was off.

When the front door closed a sleepy voice muffled by the pillow asked, “Should I be bringing you tea in the morning?”
“How long have you been awake?”
He shifted himself up the bed so he was sitting up against the pillows beside me “I wake easily, never know who might appear. Woke the moment she entered the flat.”
I handed him a plate with a scone and turned back to pour us both a cup of tea. “So should I?”
“Sorry, what?”
“Make you tea and toast in the mornings?” I stifled a yawn and he continued “I’ve never lived with anyone else before so I don’t really know if I’m doing this right. Well obviously, I lived with John, but it wasn’t the same situation. I should be ensuring that you are happy as my girlfriend, yes?” He seemed a bit abashed at this confession, as if he had revealed more than he had meant to, but I was aware that he had to frame the question in this way as we couldn’t be sure that we weren’t being observed.

“Sherlock, if you happen to be up before me and want to make me breakfast I wouldn’t decline, except maybe with the morning sickness, but you don’t need to go out of your way. I am just as happy making my own breakfast while you tell me about your latest case, experiment or random deduction. Like that woman walking along the street the other day that you could tell had left a bag on the tube, by the way that she had another bag stacked on top of her wheeled bag.”
He looked at me “Ok, that’s good.” He gave a slight nod of his head.
I put my hand over his on the duvet before continuing. “Being there when your partner needs your help, time or support is more important than a romantic gesture enacted because it’s something you think you should do, rather than want to do. For me a relationship is more about enjoying your time together and wanting to share your day with each other.”
He flipped his hand undermine so that we were palm to palm. Without looking at me, he picked up his tea cup took a sip, before beginning. “In that case let me tell you all about the hypothesis I was working on yesterday.”

I was on my way home from another boring day at the office when I popped into the Pret further down Baker Street to just smell proper caffeinated lovely, wonderful, coffee. Nobody actually prepares you for how boring some days could be in CID, especially without the assistance of caffeine. I had spent the day sat at my computer with one of the constables, who obviously though I was stupid, trawling through CCTV looking to identify any potential witnesses or suspects in a murder of a John Doe found in an alley in Southwark. Without a clear T.O.D until autopsy, we had hours of footage from Great Guildford Street, Pepper Street and Copperfield Street to trawl through, as all gave access to the crime scene. Although none of the rest of the team knew about my pregnancy Greg did and I was increasingly finding myself sent back from crime scenes to the office to follow up leads which was only adding to my frustration.

I toyed with getting myself an earl grey but had hit my allocated, pregnant woman allowance of caffeine for the day and contented myself with a peppermint tea. At the last moment, I ordered the earl grey for Sherlock on a whim, not even sure that he was in the flat. The beautiful of earl grey from Pret a Manger is the addition of rose to their infusions; the beauty of buying it for Sherlock was that he liked to deny that he liked it but has a weakness for stealing sips of it from me. Much like when he screwed his nose up at Jaffa cakes, but they mysteriously kept disappearing from the cupboard until the day I found him shoving one after another in his gob as he paced the living room bemoaning how bored he was. His response to being picked up on the Jaffa cakes was to deny that he’d ever claimed to dislike them. After the third time I had found him drinking from my earl grey I pulled him up on it. He claimed that sharing drinks was what people in relationships did and he would rather suffer through substandard black tea to provide a convincing cover story than the herbal abominations that they classed as ‘tea’. None of this went any way towards convincing me that he didn’t like it though.

I took a sip of the earl grey before I went up the stairs to the flat. After kicking my shoes off I carried the teas into the kitchen where Sherlock was perched over the microscope. Placing the take away cup of peppermint tea on the table I pulled out the chair next to him, placed a kiss on his cheek before sitting and leaning my head on his shoulder, tea clasped up towards my chest so it would be close enough for him to discern what it was in the cup. I felt the slight movement in his shoulder as he moved his head to look at me.
“Why have you got a cup of that god awful tea when you have already consumed your allowance of caffeine for the day?”
“Had a shitty boring day. Lestrade is pulling me as soon as possible from crime scenes and sending me back to the office because I’m pregnant. I’m pretty sure that the team think it’s 'cause he thinks I’m shit at my job, if my experience with the constable who was trying to teach me to suck eggs today is anything to go on. I needed proper tea, but I know I can’t have all of it so I’m just gonna have a little bit and then switch to peppermint.” I explained pointing to the other cup.
The further movement of his shoulder as his arm moved to my waist in a half hug surprised me, only to be further amazed by a gentle kiss to the top of my head.
“You do realise that although Lestrade credentials as a quality detective are questionable his humanity, goodness and recognition of qualities in others is not. Rather than trying to put you in the background of the investigation he is trying to provide you with the ability to use your skills despite the current challenges you are facing.”
“Being pregnant is not a challenge” I stated starting to move away. Before I could finish though his grip at my waist tightened momentarily and he held me gently in place.
“Not the pregnancy itself, more the morning sickness. I saw you at the Freknam scene last week. You hid it relatively well but it took a lot for you to not contaminate the crime scene. Based in the office you can run that side in his absence while he oversees the scene. It has the advantage of him knowing that the remote evidence gathering and the foundations of analysis of evidence are being overseen by someone capable and it is easier for you to excuse yourself if need to be, allowing you more time before your pregnancy becomes common knowledge.”
I thought about the day I’d had, about the streets that had access to that alley that the constable hadn’t thought to look at until I suggested it. That we had picked up images of a few people of interest to the enquiry on those self-same streets.
“So, I’ve basically been a bit stupid then?” I asked finally being released from his hold and able to look up at his face.
“Pretty much.” He confirmed with a sympathetic grimace.
“Great, well tomorrows another day. I’m going to hit the shower and get changed.” I said as I got up.

He acknowledged me with a nod and went back to his microscope the caring boyfriend persona back in the box. I left with more cheer than I’d entered the kitchen with, half due to him putting my mind at ease about work, half since I knew that the cup placed next to the microscope would be consumed by the time I returned.

At the sound of the bathroom door closing he instantly dropped the intense peering through the microscope eye piece and his gaze fell confusedly to his own shoulder. His expression became focused as he puzzled something out in his mind while absently sipping from the takeaway cup in front of him.

Chapter Text

‘Holmes and Watson offer excellent client satisfaction’
The story broke in one of the redtops first then was swiftly rehashed in all the others and across the internet by lunchtime.

The main story had been printed across a two-page spread, with a large photo of two young women in bikinis and deerstalkers. The article claimed that the two were students that had come to 221b with a case concerning underwear going missing from their flat. ‘Mr Holmes agreed to take the case, but we explained that as poor students we would not be able to pay much. John (Watson) told us their rates were nego… you know the word I mean (negotiable) and then said that he would need a sample of what type of garments were being taken.’

"Seriously people believe this rubbish?" I asked Sherlock while I lay in the depressingly generic hotel room the phone held to my ear.
"If they had an iota of intelligence they wouldn’t; so, most people will buy it. How was your performance at work?"
"I was quite proud of myself actually. I came in head down; the whole office went quiet. I stuck it out for 5 minutes until people had started whispering between themselves again and then I ran to the ladies. I refused to leave, sobbing uncontrollably every time someone came in. Finally, Greg came in and we had a chat for a bit about the case and stuff. Then we went to his office and I showed him potential suspects and witnesses we found on the CCTV for the John Doe in Great Guildford Street. He convinced everyone that I didn’t want to go home but couldn’t take everyone staring at me so was going to be working in his office for the rest of the day. Then at the end of the day he waited it out with me until everyone else had left and dropped me off here. How was John’s day?"
“Johns?" Sherlock asked quizzically and I could imagine his face scrunching up in confusion on the other end of the phone.
"Yes John, did he decide to hide for the rest of the week until it breezes over or did he brazen it out."
“No idea I imagine he would have read about it when drinking his morning tea at the surgery, I don’t know how long he remained there. Although he spent at least a few hours here in the flat I assume waiting for me before he left."
“He did agree to this didn’t he? …Sherlock?”
“I may not have told him about it in advance which I see may have been an error now but…”
“God Sherlock, sort this right now, you could have ruined your best friend’s marriage.”
“Yes, maybe I will just pop round and clear up a few things.”

I got a text a few minutes later.
-St Mungos has an accommodation scheme on Great Guildford Street. Will put the word out with my network see if I can get you a name. John Doe often means homeless. SH
-Thanks Sherlock. Word of advice thought, focus on John first. x

John opened the door a crack before firmly shutting it again in Sherlocks face. Sherlock watched the blurred figure in dark blues walk away through the opaque glass panel of the door. He stood tall hands clasped behind his back on the doorstep until a minute later a figure in lighter hues came back towards the door.
Mary stood back as she opened the door wide for Sherlock to step through. “Rosie is asleep, try to keep him quiet. Living room” she said nodding in that direction. Sherlock gave her a short nod of agreement before he strode down the remainder of the hallway and turned swiftly through the open door of the living room, leaving Mary to shake her head in wry amusement at the dramatic swish of his coat.

John was sitting in the only armchair in the room, framed in the orange glow from the halogen light through the bay window. He looked up as Sherlock entered, his jaw set and tense as he stared at him. There was a moments silence before Sherlock began to speak.
“So, I realise that possibly it would have been good if I had contacted you earlier today about the stupid newspaper report.”
“Gee ya’ think.”
“Yes well, you did tell me years ago that the press will turn and obviously that has happened again. We will just take on a nice new case, maybe save some kittens or something and it will all be forgotten, no harm done.”
“No harm done, no harm DONE! JEEZ. Did you know about this before it was published?”
“Never heard of the women before I opened the paper this morning.”
“And you didn’t think at this point that you should possibly ring me and warn me before I saw a waiting room full of patients who had obviously seen it before I did. I only found out when a patient refused to be seen by me as she didn’t want a man like me touching her. The bloody receptionist had to get the paper out of the bin to show me”
“Of course, I wouldn’t ring you John, you know I prefer to text.”
The cloud of anger that comment evoked was so fierce that even Sherlock couldn’t miss the emotion. “Seriously though John, I had something more important to deal with at that moment. If I had realised I would have text you, but in all honesty, I am not sure what that would have achieved.”
“You could have assured my wife that we had not had some sick tryst with two barely legal tarts in your living room.” John hissed across the room as Mary entered it balancing three mugs in her hands.
“I told you earlier that that I never believed a word of it John. It’s really, well just farcical.”
“See no harm done Mary never believed it, therefore no damage to your marriage. If anything, this should finally put to rest all the allusions people have about us being a gay couple, you should be ecstatic. “
“You really don’t think about how this affects anybody else do you. You may not give a shit what people think of you, but it matters to the rest of us.”
“Actually, I do, I spent most of today trying to convince my girlfriend that it was a ludicrous lie. I even had to ask for Mycroft’s help.” Sherlock spat.
Johns whole demeanour changed at the shock of the statement almost as if the anger had been slapped out of him at the statement.

Mary had sat on the sofa after bringing in tea, whether to watch the drama unfold or to act as referee she was unsure of herself, possibly a bit of both. Sherlock’s statement had her shocked also “What?” she exclaimed, eyes wide. Sherlock turned his attention to her looking on with scorn at her reaction. “I didn’t realise child rearing had affected your auditory perception.”
“Alright, don’t deflect this on to my wife Sherlock. Is this girlfriend another woman you are lying to for a case, ‘cause we have talked about this Sherlock you can’t mess with people’s emotions like that it’s cruel. “I am not lying to her John, I am however unsure how people normally proceed in apologising for things of this magnitude.” He said as he turned tail striding to the door.
“Flowers mate.” John called out as Sherlock left his house in his normal fashion.
“Lovely I look forward to them.” Piped up Mary from the sofa.
“Hey, you never even believed it for a second.”
“Don’t see why the fact that I trust you and can see through a pile of bullshit from a mile off means I shouldn’t be rewarded with flowers.” Pouted Mary as she wrapped her arms around her husband’s waist, leaning up to kiss him.
“No, quite right.” John mumbled back looking down at her. She smiled back before disentangling himself from him and picking up her empty and Sherlock's full cup taking them to the Kitchen so she missed witnessing Johns head moving backwards and his face screwing up as he thought to himself. It didn’t make sense. Why on earth would Sherlock, his best friend who he had had to drag apologies from for things that he had done, so concerned with apologising for something that he hadn’t.

In the kitchen Mary pulls her phone from the back pocket of her jeans and thumbs out a message.
-What are you doing Sherlock? Why are you keeping us in the dark about this? Mx
Half a minute later she got a reply of sorts, which answered none of her questions.
-Dinner? The four of us next week? SH
Admitting defeat for the time being she replied.
-Thursday 7.30, you book a table. Mx

Chapter Text

I was in danger of becoming dehydrated at this rate. For the last two days I’d received flowers to the office that had required an unimaginable number of fake tears.

The first day I was shocked by what Sherlock deemed appropriate for apology flowers. I couldn’t even tell which uniformed officer had bought them to the office, the bouquet being so large that I couldn’t see anything of them above their navel. I’d hurriedly cleared the desk in front of me for the poor constable to put them down.

The card attached to the plethora of white roses and multiple coloured freesia had the name of the florist on one side and a simple ‘Apologies x’ in Sherlock's distinctive scrawl. The office was thankfully quiet when they’d arrived, only two of my colleagues in there. Everyone else had sloped off for a well-deserved lunch break, following the solution of the murder case on Great Guildford Street; thanks to a text from Sherlock pointing us in the direction of a witness from his network.

I’d just put my head on the edge of my desk in the small amount of space left so I’d look upset. Not even three minutes later I was aware of someone standing beside me. Next thing I knew there was an arm around my shoulder and a whisper beside me.

 “Poor Love, you ok sweetie?”

The sweetness and pity in Julies voice set my teeth on edge. God! News travelled quickly in this place and the biggest gossip in the entire building was Julie.

Steeling myself I’d raised my face and whispered “No” letting fat tears run down my cheeks. Next thing I knew I was enveloped in a fierce hug and a cloud of sickly sweet perfume as saccharine as her voice in my ear. She shushed me and reassured me that it would all be ok.

“Do you want to talk about it sweetie?” she’d asked gently. I’d drawn back off her shoulder and shaken my head, but at the same time said, in as small a voice as I could, “I don’t understand why he would do that to me.”

“Oh love, they don’t think with their heads sometimes; even geniuses.” At the appearance of some of the rest of the team I’d made a show of trying to pull myself together. She’d given my shoulder a gentle squeeze. “If you need me you know where to find me.”

I’d stopped her before she was able to leave the room “Julie!” She’d turned back to me. “Can you take these down to the informal interview suite, they may as well make the day a tiny bit brighter for some poor git. I can’t stand to look at them for a second longer.” And without looking at her I’d left for my favourite fake crying location, the ladies loo.

On returning to my desk 10 minutes later I found the flowers gone and the card that had come with them propped up against my monitor. I’d left it there.

The next day the same thing happened. Luckily this bouquet was significantly smaller for the poor schmuck who had to bring it upstairs, which in this instance was Greg.

“Found the constables downstairs arguing about who would bring this up to you.”

The office was slightly busier than yesterday, but not by much. I still needed to keep up the pretence though.

“Oh god, I wish he’d just listen to me and leave me alone.” I said dropping my head into my hands.

“Yeah, he’s never been that good at following requests or orders for that matter.” Said Greg as he placed the bouquet on the desk. “You have to give him marks for effort though. You realise these aren’t from a petrol station, right?” He said gently. He pulled the card from them and without looking at the message placed it face down on the desk in front of me, so I could see the florists name. “Baxter’s is bloody expensive, I mean they don’t even have a website. You have to email them, can’t even see the bloody flowers.”

“How on earth do you know that?”

“Ex-wife. She really, really wanted some for our anniversary, seen them in a magazine. Favourites of Naomi Campbell or Kate Moss, someone like that. “

“And did she get them?”

“Hell no, how are you supposed to order flowers when you have no clue about them and don’t even have a few pictures to guide you?”

“Wanna’ re-gift these to her?” I asked, trying to make the smile on my face, muted as if I was trying to see the funny side, rather than finding the fact that my ‘macho man’ boss knowing about expensive florists was hilarious.

“I don’t need that problem back in my life thank you very much” he said wryly.

“Oh well at least this lot is small enough that I can still work at my desk.” I said looking at the bouquet again. This one was a mix of colours again but whereas yesterday’s effort had been predominantly white with small dashes of colour. This was red and purples, with splashes of white.

It stayed on my desk for the rest of the day. Julie came over about two hours later with a bar of galaxy for me and a cup of earl grey tea.

“Your man is persistent isn’t he.”

“Thanks. Yep, that’s Sherlock. Like a dog with a bone.” I replied as I took the mug from her hand with a small smile.

“He has good taste too. Both your bouquets have been beautiful and meaningful.”

“Meaningful?” I asked taking a sip, of the still too hot tea, before placing it down on the desk.

“Have you ever heard of the language of flowers?” she asked from where she had pearched against the corner of the desk opposite mine.

“Yeah. God is that what this is all about?”

“I’d say so, yesterday’s white roses and white freesias both represent innocence. The coloured freesia doesn’t have any meaning, but they did make the bouquet more visually stunning.”

“So, he was trying to tell me he was innocent?”

“I assume so.” She answered with a small shrug before she took a sip of her own drink.

“What about today’s offering?” I assume that she had either seen the flowers before they were bought up to me or seen the photo that Davies had sneaked while he thought I wasn’t looking. I doubted many people could tell you the meaning of a flower without google.

“Well the red striped carnations, say that he wants to be with you. The purple hyacinth says that he’s sorry and asking for forgiveness. The orchids say he loves you and thinks you are beautiful. And the red tulips, well they are a declaration of love and a plea for you to believe in that love.”

Surprisingly after all that she just gave me a smile and walked away.

I was packing my bag, chatting with Sherlock on loud speaker as I did so.

“Davis was the only one I clocked taking a picture of the flowers but, to be honest any of them could have told them about it.”

“Yes, but there are pictures of both bouquets on the website alongside the story.”

“So definitely could be Davis.”

“Yes. Not the issue now though. Mycroft has informed me that there is a freelance photographer outside the hotel. It’s not ideal, would be better if it was daylight for a better photo and that they were outside Baker Street to see you coming back here…”

I interrupted at this point. “Good thing I bought the flowers back with me then isn’t it. “

There wasn’t even a pause for him to think about this he had picked up on it straight away. “If you hadn’t forgiven me you wouldn’t have kept the flowers. Smart. I’m on my way back now.”

“Ok see you at home soon.”

It wasn’t until both hung up that either of them realised she’d called it home.

Chapter Text

When Beth walked into 221b it was the same mess it ever had been. Other than the new hoovering campaign, 221b hadn’t really changed, there were piles of books and paperwork on any available surface and random mugs left around the flat with varying levels of tea or coffee in depending on at what stage Sherlock had got distracted. It was brighter than normal though due to the absence of the net curtains that normally hung from the tall windows in the sitting room.

Moving into the kitchen Beth saw further signs of Mrs Hudson’s presence in worktops that were suspiciously clear of crumbs and chemicals. Her intuitions of Mrs Hudson’s involvement were confirmed when the lady herself popped her head round the door of the bathroom.

“Oh, good dear, you’re back.” She positively chirped as she made her way into the kitchen. Her handy carry box of cleaning supplies in her hand.

“Yep, so you don’t need to keep cleaning up after his highness.”

“Oh, it’s not that bad.” She said with a chuckle.

“Did you take down the nets to wash?” I asked as I placed the flowers in the clear spot on the table.

“Yes, popped them in the machine with mine. Being eco-friendly and saving water.” She replied before leaning over and inspecting the flowers.

“Did he at least help you get them down?” I asked as I put my keys back in my handbag and abandoned it on the nearest chair.

“No, he refuses to let me wash them. Last time I did it he lectured me about the study he was doing on the build-up of pollutants and dirt on materials. Something to do with closed against regularly opened windows. I wouldn’t have minded so much, but it was three in the morning and I was in my nightie. As he was out on a case, so I took the opportunity to do it and was hoping to hang them back up before he came back.”

“Oh well, you’ve missed your opportunity as he’s on his way back now.”

“Well in that case I’ll just skedaddle and hope that he’ll be so happy at your return that he won’t bother to harass me about it when he notices.”

Mrs Hudson was the only person other than Greg to know that Sherlock and I were not actually together, but it seemed that she was either a fantastic actress or had forgotten this fact.

“I doubt I’ll be a massive distraction, but I promise that regardless of whether I can convince him to not lecture you or not, I will at least help you re-hang them tomorrow.” I responded before giving her a quick hug.

“Thank you dear.” She said as we drew away from the hug. It was then that we heard the door shut downstairs and the unmistakable sound of Sherlock taking the stairs two at a time in his haste. He entered the door of the flat, instantly his eyes flicked to the bare windows, but he said nothing about them, instead he walked to the kitchen with the bag of what I now realised were fish and chips from the smell of batter and the tang of vinegar that wafted from the bag. From one of the many pockets of his coat he removed a bottle of what looked like red wine and dug through the drawer for the corkscrew.

Mrs Hudson left quietly through the kitchen door while Sherlock was distracted with a shrug of her shoulders, a cheeky smile and a little wave. Turning and looking into the living room I noticed one of the curtain hooks from the nets half under Sherlocks chair. Walking into the living room; I picked it up off the floor and put it on the desk, so we could use it to put them back up tomorrow. I was surprised at hearing “Alcohol free” in a rich baritone and when I turned I found Sherlock right behind me.

Half a metre closer and I certainly would have knocked at least one of the glasses of red that he was carrying out of his hand. As it was he smoothly leant around me to put both on the desk and then, before I had the opportunity to say a word, had pulled me against him with one hand at my waist. His hand slid over my neck to settle with his thumb gently stroking my face just in front of my ear and his long fingers gently curled around my neck and into my hairline. Looking up at him I was surprised at the look of tenderness on his face before he leant in to kiss me. Expecting a kiss to the forehead or cheek as normal I was momentarily frozen in surprise when he gently brushed his lips against mine. He repeated this with slightly more force and I responded.

Gentle brushes of lips suddenly morphed into bruising kisses, to open mouthed kisses, tugging of lips between teeth, tongues caressing tongues and soft palettes. When we parted for breath it was to find that we were closely entwined with each other. The hand that had been at my waist was now on my hip his fingers encroaching onto my arse. The hand that had been at my neck was now firmly in my hair and I found that my hand was similarly buried deep in the chocolate curls of his head, my other hand having fell from his shoulder blade to lower on his back.

Neither of us had looked away from each other’s faces, and I’m sure that my face reflected the astonishment in his, his pupils were blown, and he was breathing heavily. His lips were a shade pinker than normal and slightly puffed, the cupids bow of his upper lip not quite as defined as normal. Then with a deep breathe he released me, moving slightly away from where our bodies had ended flush against each other and reached around me again to pick up the wine. Handing me one of the glasses he guided me with a hand lightly in the middle of my back away from window and towards the kitchen. By the time we were in the middle of the living room his hand had fallen from my back and he had his phone in that hand typing away on it at speed.

I followed him into the kitchen and while he threw himself gracefully onto one of the kitchen chairs I got the fish and chips out of the bag, picked up cutlery and placed his in front of him, without looking at him. To say I was confused about what had just happened would be an understatement. Taking a gulp of wine, I took my own meal and sat down in the seat opposite Sherlock. When he looked up at me the usual analytical, superior arrogance was back on his face. It wasn’t giving away anything about what had just happened.

My brain was in overdrive, did this mean that the flat was bugged already. If Sherlock knew it was bugged was the kiss his way of letting me know. But we had a code phrase to let the other know. I wracked my brain had he said ‘Mary’s threatening to hand knit booties’ while we were kissing, and I hadn’t noticed while I was getting carried away with the delicious kissing.

Focussing back in the room I looked up to find Sherlock still engrossed in his phone, eyes focussed and the lines over the bridge of his nose starting to form the more his eyes squinted in concentration. He was absentmindedly picking at his meal, having made a dent in the pile of chips and picked at the batter of the fish. He hadn’t touched the actual fish though. I was torn between commenting on this or letting it go as it at least meant that he was eating, something that I had discovered was crazily hard to get him to do.

We sat in silence for a while, once he had eaten some more and I had practically finished I said in as absentminded a tone as I could. “I’m going to run the hoover over the place, and then catch up on that Swedish drama. I missed it earlier this week.”

I got a distracted nod of acknowledgement for my efforts.

Having hoovered the entire flat I was safe in my knowledge that there were no bugs. But I couldn’t ask Sherlock what the kissing was about as he had stepped into the bathroom as soon as I finished hoovering it and I could hear that the shower was still running.

After closing the curtains, to help keep the chill of the autumn evening out, I’d settled myself down on the sofa with my laptop on the coffee table and was into the drama streaming before Sherlock came back into the living room. He was in his at home uniform of tatty pyjamas and one of his ridiculously expensive dressing gowns. This one was the blue striped silk one with the chemical burn on the right sleeve. He pulled the ever there phone out of his dressing gown pocket and sat down next to me on the sofa, close enough that his thigh was touching mine.

A few minutes in Sherlock couldn’t stop himself from commenting.

“Liar” he exclaimed, not raising his eyes from his phone.

Beth looked at him trying to work out if he was talking about the drama or about what he was doing on his phone. “Sorry” she asked turning slightly to face him.

He looked up from his phone, glancing at her before directing her attention at the laptop for the first time that evening. She leant over to pause it as she couldn’t talk to him and read the subtitles at the same time. “The boat captain, he is clearly lying, the infliction in his voice when he was talking about it. It’s obvious, all ‘these sort of things’” he gave an exaggerated rolled hand gesture at ‘these sort of things’.  “are obvious!” He finished with a roll of his eyes.

“You understand Swedish?” was her response.

“I’m not fluent and much better at understanding written and spoken Swedish than speaking it myself.” He said as he leaned closer to her to put his phone away in his pocket. “All the Scandinavian languages are fairly similar, with a common Germanic base so it’s not too hard to pick up any of them.” He continued as he settled back into the sofa placing his arm on the back of it behind her, which she noticed, and decided to bite the bullet.

“Sherlock, what was that kiss about earlier?” She asked as straightforwardly as she could. Attempting to mask how thinking about that kiss made her toes curl, and not in a bad way.

Sherlocks face screwed up momentarily in confusion. The lines across the bridge of his nose fully and deeply furrowing the gap this time. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“No, there are no cameras in here, and it’s only you and me here. Who was that little show for?”

“The paparazzi in the flat opposite.”

He looked at her amazed face. Obviously, she was not as observant as he had given her credit for. Stupid of him to forget that.

“I saw the reflection from the long-lensed camera as soon as I stepped in the room.”

“So that’s why you didn’t kick up the expected fuss about the net’s being in the wash. Taking advantage of a fortuitous situation?”

“Mmmm, sort of.” He said face screwed up and head to one side.

She thought about it for a moment.

“Oh, for god sake! You set this whole thing up didn’t you?” He just smirked at her, infinitely pleased with himself.

“How did you manage to get Mrs Hudson to take them down and wash them today of all days, without her realising what you were doing?”

“Oh easy! Every time she comes in here, the first thing she does is look at those nets. I just mentioned as I left that I had an 8 and I couldn’t see me making it back home for hours. Oh, and I ‘borrowed’ that stepladder of hers and left it set up against the bookcase. I relied on the fact that Mrs Hudson is clever enough to know a good opportunity when she sees it.”

His wide grin was joined by my own huff of laughter. There was quiet for a few seconds between them before Sherlock broke it.

“So, are we going to put in some more practice and watch the rest of this then?” he asked.

“Sure” she responded with a shrug and a smile.

Leaning back after un-pausing the laptop I found myself being pulled against his body and making a conscious effort to relax into it. I drew my feet up onto the sofa and rested my head on his shoulder. It took a while but gradually I felt him relax into it as well, and we spent the next hour like this.

Chapter Text

Now that they had successfully managed an evening curled up on the sofa together they spent the next few evenings doing exactly the same. Beth would come home from work having done her job but also talking to anyone who asked about how the newspaper reports about Sherlock were wrong and trying to make the excuses she made for him as flimsy as she could. She had to keep telling herself that it would all come out in the end that this was an undercover op. At that point she could let everyone she worked with know that she was not the woman she was portraying herself to be at the moment, but she was still finding it hard, seeing the looks of pity that were flung her way when they didn’t think she was looking.

Loathe as I was to admit it there was something somewhat pleasing about more frequent physical contact around the confines of 221b. I admit I was somewhat surprised that I found, when expectant of this contact I didn’t find it a distraction. In actual fact, there were some actions that seemed to aid my thinking process rather than hinder it as hypothesised.

Case in point would be the situation I found myself in yesterday. In lack of anything even remotely challenging or puzzling through the usual channels of Scotland Yard or the blogs, I had begrudgingly taken on ‘legwork’ for the British Government himself.  The nameless assistant had e-mailed a request for aid and turned up in the living room in 17 minutes from receipt of said aid request. I was wordlessly handed a dossier and left to it.

With only a passing thought of ‘if only all interactions with my brother could be executed without actual interaction with himself.’ I immersed myself in the information provided to me. MI6 had done MI5’s job for them and identified a spy within MI5 itself. All the information leant towards it being a senior, trusted member of a specialist team in counterinsurgency. Reading the personnel records for the suspected spies identified why this was being shipped out to external agencies to solve. All four of the identified suspects had worked previously for MI6 when younger, all had to some degree or other been involved with identifying IRA terrorists or gathering intel on planned insurgency activity in Northern Ireland during the 80’s to early 90’s. The circumstances around the movement of one agent, an Anthony Shiuld to MI5 was fraught with accusations of misconduct on Shiuld’s part and abuse of power and unfair dismissal on the part of MI6, explained why MI6 needed an independent investigation.

I’d spent hours gathering additional information on the suspects. I was vaguely aware of Beth’s return, but her movements had only registered on the very periphery of my cognizance. When I had gathered all the information I could I’d snapped the laptop closed and looked toward the wall intent on creating an evidence wall with what I had printed.  Beth was sat on the sofa reading. It had taken a split second to produce a timeline of events from her return home. She was settled on the sofa but, would want to go to bed in thirteen to twenty-one minutes time. Secure in this knowledge I’d made the decision to go to my mind palace to reassess and sort the evidence. I’d taken up my usual pose on the sofa, the only exception to normal being Beth’s thigh beneath my head rather than the usual cushion. Despite my closed eyes I’d been aware of her moving her book to look down at me, and when her attention returned to her book. I had almost been at the correct breathing cadence for entering my mind palace when her fingers had begun coursed through my hair repeating over and over at a steady pace and pressure against my scalp. A slight pause as she’d turned the page of her book and then her hand had returned. This set repeated and I’d surprisingly found it easy to slip into the mind palace.

Going to the evidence room, I’d pulled open the filing cabinet drawer and taken out all the evidence I’d gathered, pinning it to evidence boards. String printed with possible interpretations of the evidence linked separate pieces of evidence until I had multiple evidence walls that I could pull forwards as needed to add further evidence that either proved or disproved a possibility. It had been a swift and decisive process. The number of walls of possibility were rapidly cut through until I’d been left with only one.

On opening my eyes, I’d caught the tail end of my own “Oh!” of surprise and I was suddenly made aware again of my transports needs, my eyes gritty from hours spent at the screen, hunger and thirst wanting attention and my bladder in need of release. I was surprised to have found that all of these had been absent while in my mind palace. I had been aware of the fingers carding through my curls on another level of consciousness but had completely lost the other demands. A quick glance at my watch found that I had only been thinking for 4 minutes. Recalling the amount of evidence that I had trawled through in that time, I realised how efficient this session had been. Considering all the facts the stroking of my hair may have made the process more efficient in providing an overwhelming stimulus that made it possible for me to ignore the other stimulus competing for attention allowing me to focus in a way that I hadn’t been able to do before without chemical assistance. Interesting and something that I would need to test further.

I’d looked up as I felt Beth move beneath me. She’d placed her book on the arm of the sofa, but her hand rested in my curls still. She had looked at me questioningly. “Solved it then?” she asked.

“Yes” I answered in a monotonal intonation.

“Really? Just normally you’d leap up and dash off to prove it, or at the very least send a gloating text”

“Gloating? I don’t gloat.”

“Yes, you do.” She replied with a small huff of laughter as her fingers started to move once more in my curls.

“Mycroft’s fastidiousness doesn’t allow for any loose ends. I still need to collect one piece of evidence before I can categorically say that I have solved the case. Unfortunately, I cannot gain access to that piece of evidence until 8.30 tomorrow morning.”  She failed to notice my lie. It would have been the work of no more than an hour to gain access to the school and locker of Roger Young’s son right now, but I was happy where I was and happy to believe in my own lie in that moment.

After 10 minutes more of me laying there as she read her book I acted at the third yawn of hers in as many minutes. Swiftly rising to my feet I’d turned and held out my hand to her. “Bed”

“Are you going to sleep? I’ll just finish my chapter and …” I cut her off before she could finish.

“You are tired, go to bed. Finish the rest in bed if you insist.” And I’d grabbed her hand helping her to get up.

As she’d walked into the bedroom I took the opportunity to use the bathroom and after relieving myself and brushing my teeth entered the bedroom through the adjoining door. I was greeted by a split second of exposed stomach and bright fuchsia knickers before Beth had pulled the t-shirt into place. I walked past her without saying a word, with my facial expression bored and uninterested thanks to years of training. I removed all but my pants before I got into the bed, lying beside her where she was sat up in the bed attempting to read.

After a moments deliberation in the low light of her solitary bedside lamp I acted, shuffling lower on the bed until I had manoeuvred to a position to place my head next to her hand. Quick as ever she had understood. Her fingers began their repetitive action again and I fell asleep while she continued.

Chapter Text

I woke in the morning to a consulting detective free bed again. The absence of light peeking through the small gap in the curtains told me it was very, early in the morning. My attempt to snuffle back into the duvet was rudely interrupted when it was pulled off the bed, exposing my bare legs to the pre-dawn chill.

“Up” Sherlock’s command was somewhat upstaged as, through my blurry early morning vision, he looked like a small child holding tightly to a security blanket, with the corner of the duvet grasped up by his shoulder.

I managed to stifle the laugh but struggled to control the smile that my lips flashed until I managed to control it by biting my lip.

He rolled his eyes at me, as he had caught me trying not to laugh of course.

“Get dressed we have a case to finally solve.”

“I need to shower and have breakfast.” I added as he was almost out the open door.

He glared at me, then when he was certain that I would not be persuaded to leave without doing both these things he continued out the door throwing over his shoulder a disgruntled “Fine.”

I came out of the bathroom to find clothes laid out for me on the bed, which I put on just to avoid the moaning about time wasted if I picked new ones. When I stepped into the kitchen it was to find a plate of toast and a cup of tea waiting by the kettle for me. The cup was a small one, not the oversized mug I normally used in the morning but, beggars can’t be choosers and I’d had enough conversations with John to understand that this was special treatment. With that in mind I took the plate and tea to my chair taking a big bite of toast before putting them both on the small side table and going to find my shoes. Once I’d slipped them on I sat down in the chair to finish my breakfast. Sherlock was sat in his own chair, clearly in his mind palace while he waited for me.

As soon as I was done I put the crockery back down on the table where it could wait until we got back, picked up my bag and took great satisfaction in poking Sherlock in the shoulder sharply, in retaliation for his duvet removal earlier. I was not expecting the lighting speed he used to grasp my wrist in his large hand. I turned my wrist as he released his grip a little and grasped his own wrist pulling him up. Without a word we tramped down the stairs and put on our jackets. By the time I’d closed the door behind us. Sherlock had procured a Taxi out of thin air and was holding the door open for me. I slipped quickly in grateful to be out of the frigid air of an early winter morning in London. I spent five minutes in the taxi wondering if Sherlock would tell me where we were going before I reasoned that he clearly wasn’t and asked.

“Sherlock, you remember that walk in the park we had where I said that you needed to share what was going on with me blah, blah, blah. Now would be the time to spill.”

Sherlock looked blankly at me for a split second before he gave a small sharp inhalation, his face suddenly becoming animated.

“Ah, yes!” He exclaimed before falling into a fast-paced monologue of what he had deduced already.

“There is a new faction of terrorist activity coming out of Ireland that has been identified by MI6. They have also identified that there is an inside man in MI5, somebody high up the chain of command when it comes to Northern Ireland security. They identified 4 possible spies, all of whom had spent time in Northern Ireland at the time of the troubles in undercover roles. Jackie Trarn, John Keele, Anthony Shiuld and Roger Young. I eliminated the first two quickly. Which left us with Shiuld and Young. Shiuld had an axe to grind with the intelligence agencies around how he was dismissed. Young had no such problems, but he was the most recent to be posted there. The majority of his service when there had been an official end to the conflict. There were questions raised over whether he had gone native. While on assignment he had married a local girl with IRA family members on the mother’s side and by the time he returned to England they had two children under the age of 5.

I spent some time looking at both, friends they kept in contact with from the old days, activities they have attended, financial transactions, familial connections. That is where I found the leak.”

He stopped looking at me smugly.

“Which was.” I asked rubbing at my temples in frustration.

“Children. Shuild has none, Young has three.”

“And?” I asked feeling some where between exhasperated and amused.

“I looked at their internet usage.”

“And found linked to Irish terrorists?”

“No, these are the children of an at least somewhat competent spy. I found gaps.”

“Gaps which tell us?”

“Patrick Young, eldest son, has a laptop, a tablet and a mobile phone and between 12.45 and 1.45 on a school day he is never on any of them.”

I gave him the universal rolling hand signal for carry on.

“Teenagers, spend their breaks glued to mobile devices. Even when they are banned from schools, they all sneak them in. If you look back two years his phone activity was highest during this hour of the school day. Then abruptly 14 months ago it goes to practically zero overnight.”

“So, he’s at a lunchtime club or he reads or uses the school computers instead.”

“Possible but not likely to be signed up to 5 different clubs and no average 15 year old boy spends his lunch break reading. The chances of getting a computer every lunchtime for 14 months are slim also.”

“So, he has another device, a secret one that he spends his lunchbreaks on.”

“Yes, and we need to find it.” He said with an edge of steel.

“We can’t just break into a school without a warrant.”

“We’re not going to. We are going to walk into a school find the boys locker with him at it and ask him.”

“Not without an adult present.”

“I have set up an arrangement to meet a teacher there and as, while pupils are at school the teachers are in loco parentis, I believe that will be sufficient.”

True to his word when we arrived at the empty secondary school in High Wycombe we found our guide waiting at reception.

“Sherlock Holmes? Pleasure to meet you. I’m Mr Trevellian, Deputy Head, please call me Will.” He held his hand out to shake. Sherlock simply nodded at him with his hands held firmly behind his back.

When Will turned to look at me I introduced myself. “Beth McDonald.” At this point Sherlock decided to talk.

“Yes, she is a colleague.” The look that Will gave me at the word colleague, proved that he had seen some of the media coverage and knew me to be more personally involved with Sherlock.

“Yes, and girlfriend.” I added stepping closer to both Sherlock and Will as I moved to shake Wills hand so that when I stepped back I was firmly in Sherlocks personal space.

“Nice to meet you both. I follow the blog, so I must admit I’m intrigued as to what case has led you to our school. But perhaps that is a conversation better suited to a more private space. If I could just get you both to sign in here and we can go through to my office.” And he directed us over to the reception desk that was currently being polished by a tired looking cleaner.

The conversation in the office had been brief and to the point. Sherlock said there was reason to believe that one of the pupils had terrorist affiliations, although he neglected to pin point which pupil was the suspect, and we would like permission to search the school premises to see if any equipment related to terrorist activities was being stored there.

Will was happy to let us look around and lead us around the school as Sherlock searched and observed in silence leaving me to make conversation with Will despite Wills best efforts to talk to Sherlock. He seemed young to be a deputy head and I bought it up, betting that based on the slight air of smugness in our conversations so far that he would be happy to discuss his achievements and that would distract him from Sherlock and allow him to look around unhindered.

“Yes, I was pleasantly surprised when the job was offered to me last year. I was only 29 at the time and had applied just for the interview experience to be honest before I started making a concerted effort towards bumping the CV a bit. When I got it I thought why not slum it for a couple of years for the CV and then find a job back in the private sector as a deputy or maybe a head if I play my cards right.” Bingo I was right, he was completely focussed on me now and had a self-satisfied little smile on his face. The fact that he thought he was slumming it in a state secondary school, even one in a lovely affluent town in the commuter belt of Buckinghamshire said a lot about his over inflated sense of entitlement.

I smiled back at him, pretending that I found it as impressive as he himself did. “And where did you work before?” he proceeded to name seven different schools that I didn’t know, but sounded pretensious while I nodded my head retaining the impressed face I had. “Y ou must be very good to have achieved so much so quickly.” I said with such saccharine sweetness that I made myself feel faintly nauseous.

Will hadn’t even had time to utter another word in praise of himself before Sherlock swept in beside me. His hand touched firmly to the small of my back. I looked up to find a stormy face looking at Will and his “We are done here, take us to the sports halls.” was spoken as a glacial command. Will followed the command like a newly trained puppy leading us there without another word and Sherlocks hand didn’t leave me until we had arrived at the gym and we were across the other side of the large room from Will.

“What are we doing?” I whispered as we flipped through those floor mats you find in every school.

“Wasting time.” He practically hissed back.

“Do you not think it would be more useful to use this time to find out information about the suspect from his teacher?” I added having dropped the mat and come around to where Sherlock was standing.

“Maybe, if the teacher that was accompanying us was able to name even one of the pupils that they taught but ‘Will’” he sneered his name “teaches two classes per week both year seven geography and couldn’t even name half of the children in those classes let alone any other in this school.”

I put my hand on his arm to draw his attention away from the wall he was glaring at and back to me.”

“Yeah, he’s an arse, an arrogant one.” He turned his head away again but not before I caught one side of his mouth curl up into a smirk.

We dallied around the sports hall, Will sat on a bench on his phone while we arsed about pretending to look for things until the sound of shoes in the corridor indicated that pupils were coming in. Sherlock’s “Lockers” reverberated around the large room as he exited the gym and both me a Will followed him.

We found Sherlock standing in the corridor in sight of the lockers. I slid in beside him and Sherlock stepped closer to me hand around my waist. In sight of the entrance to the lockers Sherlock began to question Will about the day to day running of the school. To a casual observer it would appear that we were parents on a tour of a potential school, for our child, however Sherlock was alert and when I felt him tap my side with one finger gently I looked up at him to find him looking at the back of a tall boy opening a locker hallway down the room. Once the locker was open Sherlock stepped out grabbing my hand seamlessly to pull me with him to him.

“Patrick Young?” Sherlock asked the startled boy as he let go of my hand and placed it firmly in the middle of the open locker door pinning it to that of its neighbour.

“Um, Yes.” Said the visibly startled boy standing in front of him. The boy was only a couple of inches shorter than Sherlock, but was much thinner, his face gaunt, he looked tired with the bags under his eyes of a man three times as old as he was.

Sherlock simply put one long fingered hand into the open locker and pulled out a mobile phone from the very back.

“We will be taking this and my colleague and I will be joined shortly by some secret service agents who will be wanting to have a conversation with you about what you have been using this phone for.” He spoke softly to the shocked boy. “Now you are going to come with me, Beth and Mr Trevellian to his office where we are going to wait patiently for them away from the eyes of your classmates” He continued, before taking his hand off the locker door, shutting it and with a hand to his shoulder directing him to the office.

MI6 did turn up as did his Mother and it all came out. Patrick Rogers was an easy to manipulate youth at 13. Bullied and isolated he was angry with his absent father for pulling the family out of Ireland when he was only 5. He’d been there long enough for him to have developed an Irish accent, an Irish accent that exacerbated the bullying.

It transpired that at 13 he spent the summer in Ireland with his cousins who although not bullying him explicitly didn’t include him in their activities, leaving him isolated again. At the end of the summer they had told him that they hadn’t been able to include him in a lot of what they did because it was for the cause and unless he was a member of the IYRM (Irish Youth Reform Militia) they couldn’t tell him anything. Having returned to England and the bullying culture of school he started looking for the presence of the IYRM online with the help of a pay as you go mobile bought from another pupil from their locker-based supply and demand business.

Being the son of a spy, one that was proud of his business and discussed at length with anyone who would listen about tips of the trade, put him in good stead for covering his tracks. And within three months he was in contact with the IYRM. He in turn started using the skills his Dad had taught him when he was younger and hacking skills that were all his own to access his father’s information and pass this on.

Things had taken a bit of a turn for him though when he returned to Ireland 5 months ago to find that none of his cousins were actually affiliated with the network and he had been played. Since then he had tried to get out but under threat had had to continue to feed them information, he had however been heavily selective with what he fed them. He was clearly terrified of both MI5 and the terrorists and the whole story came out split up between bouts of apology and hysterical crying.

I left feeling that despite the fact that Patrick had ultimately potentially endangered the lives of British and Irish citizens with information he had provided, and he had to take responsibility for this, he was also a child failed by the system. I’d attending the mandatory PREVENT training for terrorism and it did make a point of saying that terrorism was not limited to one ethnic group on the one hand, but the combination of Muslim examples and the current news coverage did little in reality to dispel the notion held up in the media. Why had nobody noticed him and the potential he had for being exploited.

I’d left before Sherlock and when I heard him get back I was curled up on the bed with music playing on my phone on the bedside table next to me. When he burst into the bedroom it was with enthusiasm. The glow of a successfully completed case was in his eyes and manners, even as he moaned about the tediousness of the paperwork he’d had to complete after I’d left and the appearance of his brother. His stream of consciousness babbling ground to a halt mid-sentence causing me to look up at him. He was standing there looking at me analytically, barefooted, shirt unbuttoned and hanging open from where he had paused in the process of changing into pyjamas.

“You’re upset.” He stated not questioned but there was a hint of uncertainty to it as if he wasn’t completely sure of his deduction.

“Sorry, I’m sure it’s just the hormones.” I said from behind the hand that I was dragging down my face in frustration at myself.

“Why? I..I don’t understand, we solved the case.”

I looked at him then trying to work out if he genuinely didn’t understand why the solution of the case might not make me happy on this occasion. The momentary glint of emotion on his face wasn’t there long enough for me to form a solid conclusion but he gave me enough to probe a bit deeper.

“See I think you do understand a little. You are king of the unsubtle deduction. You don’t care who it offends you tell all to anybody who is there to listen. That’s not what happened today. You made the whole event at his locker as lowkey as possible. That child was vulnerable, others exploited that fact and now he must live with what he was manipulated into doing for the rest of his life. On top of which he will most probably be sent to a young offenders’ unit and the exploitation will continue.”

Sherlock just gave a slight nod of his head to acknowledge what I had said. After standing there for 30 seconds more, he asked.

“Can I do anything to help you feel better?”

“A hug and a nap and I’ll be feeling a lot better about it. Seriously I can normally shut down my feelings about this sort of stuff much easier; it’s the pregnancy hormones.” I said as I moved over onto my side. Sherlock said nothing just settled onto the bed in front of me and surprisingly drew me into a hug. It was a little awkward, until I moved myself to hold him back and nestled my head under his until my check was resting against his bare collarbone. He held me until I fell asleep.

An hour later I had woken and found myself alone, but I could hear Sherlock in the kitchen. The tinkling of glassware suggesting correctly that he was mid experimentation. I padded out into the kitchen putting the kettle on before he noticed me.

“Excellent timing, I ordered Thai it’ll be here in half an hour.”

“Brilliant, Tea?” He gave me a nod and went back to his experiment.

Dinner had been shared on the desks in the living room and we had each drifted back to our own activities. Re-testing his experiment for Sherlock and a murder mystery with completely un-realistic police procedure whilst curled up in my chair for me. It was interrupted by a tapping on the door. I peered my head around the chair to see the door being opened by a tall man, in a pin striped three-piece suit and the umbrella that he had knocked on the door with hooked over his left arm. He had only taken a couple of steps before Sherlock stormed into the room with a swirl of dressing gown following him.

“Mycroft! Why on earth are you here?”

“Pleasure to see you again so soon Sherlock and the opportunity to finally meet Ms McDonald.” He smiled at me with an unctuous smarmy grin that fell from his face sharply when Sherlock tried to push him out the door. With surprising speed he twisted out of Sherlock's hold and strode over to Sherlock's chair and sat on it with a similar grace to Sherlock's own although he held himself in a much tighter pose than Sherlock once he was sat. Sherlock in a grump strode past him looking pointedly in the other direction before staring out of the living room window with his back to his brother.

“Ms McDonald I just wanted to extend the governments and my own thanks to you for your aid in dealing with the small issue that had arisen. Also thought you would like to be kept abreast of the outcome that has been come to.”

Sherlock moved away from the window to stand behind my chair speaking with scorn as did so.

“None of which had to be done in person, a simple text would have been sufficient or even a phone call to placate your love of hearing yourself speak would have been preferable to the current situation.”

“This will take no more than two minutes Sherlock if you can allow me to get to the point.”

“NGH” was Sherlock's only exasperated reply and although I couldn’t see him from my position in front of him I was pretty sure that It would have been accompanied by one of the variety of eye rolls in Sherlock's repertoire. He did however stay quiet.

“Thank you. After careful analysis of the information available to Patrick Rogers and what of this information he passed on to unfriendly outside agencies, there is clear evidence that he has been selecting that with the least help to them. In particular, the information that we possessed around a planned action of theirs was not passed on. With this in mind, we are enlisting his help, working alongside his Father. You may also like to know that his father’s reaction when he was informed of the actions of his son was apologetic, but his main concern was for the welfare of his son. Anyway, in light of this it was felt that to have both working together on gathering intel for us would be too good an opportunity to be missed. Therefore, no further action will be taken against the younger of the Rogers. I expect it will be a good information source for us, both seem to have good ideas. Indeed, when I left them they were both animatedly making plans.”

I was notably trying to hold back tears when I responded, “Thank you Mycroft.”

“Yes, Thank you. You may leave now. Quickly.” Came the voice behind me, and I could no longer hold back the smile that had kept threatening to break at their childish brotherly squabbling. Mycroft stood without ceremony and left without even a goodbye.

When I had myself under control again and wasn’t about to cry. I got up, to my surprise Sherlock was still standing behind the chair. I walked around it and steadying myself with an arm on the back of the chair, got up on tip toes to drop a kiss on Sherlocks cheek. “Thank you” I whispered as I gave him a quick hug.

“What on earth for?” He asked as he turned more fully into the hug and placing one hand on my shoulder as he looked down at me.

“For asking your brother for that, for me.” I clarified before dropping another light kiss on his lips and releasing him.

Sherlock had the grace not to deny it and he just followed me to bed and allowed me to press my back into his side as I fell asleep.

Chapter Text

I had a court day. It wasn’t often the DS who attended court, the task normally falling on the DI’s shoulders, but as I had been heavily involved in the interview of the suspect, subsequent arrest and property search, I had been called. Court days involve a lot of sitting around. You can’t attend the hearing until you’ve given evidence, so I always make sure I have a book on me so that I have something to do. I was glad that I was starting to find it easier to sleep and the nausea that I had been experiencing throughout the last few weeks had started to lessen. In fact, I hadn’t experienced any over the last couple of days.

Normally police evidence is one of the first things that is called on, however today. Medics and forensics had been up first, and it was afternoon by the time I took the stand. On getting out from court and knowing I would be back the next day for cross examination all I wanted to do was get home a soak in a bath.

Checking my phone, I found a couple of texts from work, just keeping me in the loop of an ongoing domestic battery case. There was also one from Sherlock asking when I would be home and one from Mycroft. The fact that the name Mycroft Holmes had been entered in my phonebook by someone other than me didn’t escape my notice but was quickly overshadowed by the contents of the text message.

At my brother’s request my assistant has made an appointment for a combined screening test at 10.30 Monday morning with Mr James Hadley Consultant Obstetrician. Suitable arrangements have been made with your place of employment to facilitate this.

I fired off a text to Sherlock.

Why has your brother arranged me and antenatal appointment?

Oh good. When is it? SH

That’s not answering my question Sherlock?

You have not yet answered my earlier question. SH

I’m on my way home now. ETA 17.40.

?

I asked him to arrange it for us. SH

? SH

Monday 10.30 at the bloody Portland. Any idea how expensive that is going to be? Not to mention the fact that I am already under the care of a perfectly capable midwife under the NHS and am due an appointment in 2 weeks time.

I got no response.

When I got back to Baker Street I found Sherlock perched in his chair thinking hands steepled under his chin. His eyes fluttered open as I kicked my heels off and threw myself onto the sofa like he so often does, undoubtedly with less grace than he does it with.

“I don’t understand why you are so upset about the appointment being sooner and taking place in the best obstetric hospital in the country.”

“Of course you don’t. This is what I was talking about before. You can’t just make decisions for me about my baby.”

“Our baby.” I took a deep breath at Sherlock's reminder that we may be being observed.

“Yes, our baby. That includes me. You know the one bloody carrying it.”

“I arranged it as a surprise. I thought you would like to have the scan earlier.” He explained coming to sit on the other end of the sofa and pulling my feet into his lap. “Was I wrong?” I felt myself deflating with the surprising hint of uncertainty in Sherlock's question.

“No, I do want to see another scan of it, of course but it’s a lot of money Sherlock. Money that I don’t have.”

“But I do.” He said and took my right foot in his hands and pressing his thumbs into the arch. It felt heavenly after a day in heels. He continued before I could say anything.

“You both deserve to have the best treatment and I can afford it.” And I had no way to argue against it as I couldn’t bring up the key issue with his argument. That it was not his baby.

“Okay, fine.”

“Good, glad that’s settled. Now do you want me to finish the foot massage, then grab a shower, or do you want me to go run you a bath now before we go out.”

“Out?”

“Yes. We’re having dinner with Mary and John.”

I just stared at him in exasperated amazement.

“This is something else I should have told you about in advance?” He asked.

“This is something you should have asked me about in advance.”

“Noted” he said with a decisive nod.

“What time?”

“Table is booked at 7.30, so we need to leave about 7.”

“Fine, but we can’t be out for hours I’m bloody knackered and need to be back in court first thing tomorrow morning, in those bloody shoes.” I said giving my abandoned heels a death glare.

He looked at me analysing before continuing the foot rub with a single comment of “Shower then” I gave a nod before closing my eyes and enjoying the tension being massaged out of my feet.

Beth was in the shower, only having 20 minutes before she was out again I set to work. Dinner was taken care of with a text message. Opening the door and going down the stairs quietly on the off chance that it could be heard over the shower I knocked on Mrs Hudson’s door before letting myself in. Two minutes later I was back up the stairs with the required apparatus and set to work clearing space on the lab bench and after a quick search of the cupboard under the sink I found the necessary equipment for sterilising the area to the required levels. Once the lab bench was suitably equip I retired back to my chair.

Beth excited the bed room hair in a turban of towelling and her robe wrapped around her. She called out as she walked out of the bedroom

“Sherlock, where are we going for dinner? Do I need to dress up or casual?” There was a lengthy pause “Sherlock, I thought we were going out.” Trying for insouciant I walked into the kitchen and walked around her to the fridge.

“Change of plans, they’re coming to us.”

“Why?” I said nothing just reached into the fridge to get out the bottle of wine that I had appropriated from Mrs Hudson’s and the bottle of sparkling water and poured a glass of each. When I turned to put them back in the fridge I was stopped by a hug of thanks, before Beth left going back to finish getting dressed, leaving me there with a bottle in each hand and questions I wasn't ready to try and answer.

Mary was getting Rosie out of the car as I set up the pushchair before the five minute walk to Baker street from the little carpark the street over from Baker Street.

“What’s she called, this mystery woman.”

“No idea, he hasn’t said.”

Mary ducked back out of the car smile wide, eyes sparkling.

“What?”

She stayed silent grinning knowingly as she put Rosie in the pushchair, it was bloody annoying.

“Oh, the two of you are playing ‘We’re so much cleverer than John’ again are you. Yeah cause that one’s not got tired yet.” I groused as I started to push the pushchair out of the carpark. I slowed but didn’t stop when Mary wrapped her arm around my waist and pulled up beside me matching my stride.

“No, I just like to give you the opportunity to work these things out for yourself.” She added cheekily before placing a kiss on my cheek for good measure.

“God the two of you are going to be the death of me.” I muttered dragging my right hand down over my eye and cheek partly in jest.

“Nah, you love it really. Never boring.” She said nudging me.

“There is that I suppose. So, my analytically brilliant wife care to share your theory.” I raised my eyebrow, making her giggle.

“We, or at least one of us, knows her.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, I assume you have asked who she is.”

“Yeah, and every text gets ignored until I change the subject.”

“So definitely someone you know then.”

“Bloody hell, which women do I know mad enough to date Sherlock?”

“John! That’s a bit harsh.” She stopped me with a hand on my arm.

“Oh come on! You know what I mean. He’s brilliant and my best friend but it takes a lot of effort to see beneath the barrier and see the human being.”

“Not really. Not for certain types of people. I liked him from the off. So did you, maybe you couldn’t see the whole picture but you moved in with him and started running around London with him within days. On some subconscious level you got him.” She started to walk again and I followed her before falling into step beside her again.

“When you put it like that I suppose I see what you mean. But he hasn’t a romantic bone in his body. Having a lover is a different kettle of fish to having a friend.”

“Do you really think so. It’s really just a more intense friendship. The fundamentals are all there and he’s grown such a lot John emotionally. Look at how he is with Rosie now.”

“Yeah but that took months of you dumping her in his lap when the opportunity arose.”

“No, I only did that to make it clear to him that he was allowed to bond with her, love her. He was interested in her, but he was scared and trying to hide it.” The disbelieving look I gave her spurred her on to explain further. “He agreed to be her godfather and spent the entire day with his phone in his hand John. Just that little thing summed up what he was feeling. He agreed to be her godfather, you know he wouldn’t have agreed to it if he didn’t want to be involved in her life, but he was scared still, hence the phone constantly in hand, so he had a valid excuse for not holding her.”

“God I really am a blind idiot, aren’t I?”

“No you are far above an idiot.” She smiled at me and wrapped her arm though mine.

“Just not as clever as you.”

“That’s your opinion, I’m not saying anything.” She added with a toothy grin.

We spent the rest of the walk in silence, Rosie dozing in the pushchair, Mary and I each thinking about possible women I knew that could be waiting for us in Sherlock's flat.

The sound of the key in the downstairs door led to a tiny pause in Sherlock's violin playing before he picked it back up. By the time Mrs Hudson walked in the door with Johns daughter in her arms he was back in full flow.

“Look Rosie it’s Uncle Sherlock and Auntie Beth.” Exclaimed Mrs Hudson pointing at us both in turn. She turned her face from me, a stranger to her, shy and hiding in Mrs Hudson’s shoulder. She only peeped her head back out when Sherlock stopped playing. When he’d put the violin back in its case on the desk and started to walk towards them both Rosie put her arms out reaching for him. He calmly glided in and lifted her from Mrs Hudson’s grip. He seated himself in his chair. One hand holding Rosie on his lap, pulled back so she was leaning against his chest. The other long arm reached out to grab the ‘my first encyclopaedia’ that was on the shelf next to him.

“I believe we were learning about the Llama on your last visit Rosie.” His deep voice spoke to her without a hint of talking down to her or baby speak.

“Shall we have a reminder.” He opened the book to a double page spread, from my position on the chair opposite them I could see a picture of a Llama was on the right-hand page and a few sentences of information on the page opposite. Sherlock read the information out to her.

“Llama’s come from South America. A baby Llama is called a cria. Their coat can be used to make wool. It makes nice warm jumpers.”

The information continued to flow, clearly not from the scant lines written in the book. During this Rosie sat looking up at Sherlock hand in her mouth and saliva smearing across her chin enraptured. “Part of the Camalus genus,  the term llama covers vicuna, guanaco, suri alpaca, huacaya alpaca and the domestic llama. Guanacos and vicuñas live in the wild, while alpacas and llamas exist only as domesticated animals.”

I was not shocked as such, more in awe of the scene unfolding in front of me. So much so that I didn’t notice the arrival of Rosie’s parents. As I watched Sherlock telling Rosie about the moon now I missed the taken aback look on Johns face when he saw me sitting there and Mary's quick assessment of the room and clear signs of me inhabiting the space on a regular basis.

 I was made aware of their presence when John spoke up.

“So Beth, you’re the mystery woman.” I turned to find them still standing in the doorway and stood up from my chair.

“Have you met my wife before.”

“No”

“Mary this is Beth. Beth… Mary.” He introduced us, and I was surprised to be pulled into a hug by her.

“It’s so nice to meet you.”

Mrs Hudson shoo’d us all further into the room.

I offered everyone drinks and when everyone else was sorted I came back into the living room. I was about to sit when the doorbell rang turning toward the door I had taken no more than two steps before my waist was grasped gently by Sherlocks large warm hands and I was turned back toward his chair. He landed a kiss to the top of my head and said “I’ll go get it.” Then he was gone, leaving me standing in the middle of the room with one landlady cooing “So lovely to see them together” rubbing her hands together in glee; one best friend looking gobsmacked, eyes wide, mouth fish gaping; one best friends wife with a wry smile on her lips and eyes still sparkling with unexpected pleasure and one toddler climbing from one parent to another babbling to herself.

Taking as deep a breath as I could subtly I started with “Shall we take a seat in the kitchen, I expect that’s the food.” And I was proved right as Sherlock was back through the door in the next second demanding to know what we were all doing still sitting around.

Sherlock had ordered Italian and considering how quickly it had arrived I suspected it was from Angelo’s even though they didn’t offer a delivery service. Rosie was in the highchair with dough sticks while her portion of the ragu dish was cooling. She happily entertained herself tearing the bread apart, throwing half chewed bits onto the table in front of her while we chatted. It started off as a friendly chat over common ground. Tales of cases John, Sherlock and I had all been involved in. When John referred to Sherlock as the ‘taxi conjuring genie’ almost spat my water across the table, and Mrs Hudson had to pat me on the back. Sherlock contributed little to this other than to correct me or John when we got something wrong or failed to explain the most important part of the deduction to the satisfaction of Sherlocks ego. All in all, it was proving to be a comfortable and entertaining evening and Sherlock appeared comfortable and relaxed in their company.

By the time Rosie’s portion was cool enough to feed her the conversation had taken a turn towards a more inquisitorial nature.

So how did you two get together? Asked Mary

Sherlock stayed quiet. “A friendly meal after a few cases were concluded led to more dates and well here we are.” I answered calmly before popping a forkful of pasta in my mouth.

“Is that why you didn’t want to come back for dinner after the ‘seaglass soldier case’?” piped up John as he persisted in trying to get Rosie to eat from the spoon he held in front of her face.

“John, must you refer to cases by the ridiculous names you give them in your blog.” Scoffed Sherlock in lieu of answering the question.

Johns little huffed laugh was good natured, and he dropped the question. I assume thinking that Sherlock's avoidance of it was enough of an affirmative.

The glint in Mary’s eye though showed that she would not be so easy to hoodwink.

“Don’t think that this is a criticism, because it’s really not. Each to their own I say but you have moved in together haven’t you?”

“Yes” was Sherlock's simple but unequivocal answer.

“Jeez that was fast.” Piped up John, the glare he received from both Mary and Sherlock led to him raising both hands in a calming apologetic gesture before turning back to Rosie at her insistent “Dada, Daddy” call for more food.

Mary and Sherlock just continued looking at each other. The smile had dropped from Mary's face and she stared at him unblinkingly with an expectant look and lips pursed like she was his mother and she was waiting for an explanation as to how the kitchen window got broken.

He gave a shrug of the shoulders and huff before exclaiming “Beth is pregnant” with a toothy grin.

John head turned so quickly in our direction at this announcement that I thought it might snap and left a smear of tomato sauce over Rosie’s cheek from the loaded spoon that now hovered near her face. Both he and Mary remained shocked and failed to notice their daughter take advantage of this lull in attention and reach pudgy hands into the bowl. Feeding herself via her cheek, ear and hair before the small amount of food that remained finally reached her mouth. I couldn’t help but smile at the devastation that she could wreak with a single small handful, so when I finally looked back to find Sherlock smirking at me in the lopsided way he does, I was beaming.

The stunned silence was broken by a sob of joy by Mrs Hudson, and within seconds the spry older lady had me embraced in a tight hug. Tears were rolling down her face by the time she released me to turn her embrace to Sherlock who accepted and even returned it with a surprising amount of good grace. By this time the Watson's had time to get over the shock and more hugs and congratulations followed this, before the great clean-up of the smallest Watson commenced.

The night ended pretty early with Mrs Hudson leaving first for her herbal soother, that as an officer of the law I had no knowledge of. Rosie’s bedtime saw her and her parents leaving not soon afterwards. No sooner had I cleared the table than Sherlock had re-populated it with thankfully just some slides and his microscope. I left him to it and after a shower got into bed to read my book. I was asleep within the hour.

Chapter Text

I stirred from slumber to find myself with Sherlock pressed up against my back and contentedly went back to dozing, happy that he seemed more comfortable with our ruse now. I was roused again by a light kiss to the exposed junction between my shoulder and neck. “We need to get up.” Sherlock growled softly, voice still morning scratchy.

“But this is nice, I’m comfy. I don’t feel sick and my boobs don’t ache for once.” I mumbled trying to hide any reaction to the kiss, the small gesture feeling so much more intimate than any other that he had made so far.

Sherlock had rolled out of bed and wandered around the bed giving me a fine view of the surprisingly muscled chest and frankly amazing thighs; not to mention the shapely bulge of his backside and the not insignificant one at the front, showcased in tight grey boxer briefs. I buried my head under the pillow to stop my perving.

From beneath my improvised pillow blindfold I heard the muffled “I was expecting more excitement. I’d been lead to believe that scans were enjoyable experiences, eagerly anticipated” When I heard the bathroom door close, I practically shot out of bed.

The expected grey of December morning light emitted through the sitting room window was further muted by the heavy grey clouds that hung over the skyline disgorging a biblical amount of fat droplets on the grimy, gum and litter strewn paving slabs, tarmac and citizens of the city streets. Beth was standing at the window in the dark room the light levels enough to silhouette her form as she held the nets back to gaze down at the street. She was drinking from one of the abnormally large spherical mugs that she favoured in the morning.

Moving further into the room I turned the swing lamp near the fireplace on and continued to stand near her.

“Pluviophile”

“Sorry? What did you say?” She asked gaze falling from the window to me as she hugged the mug with both hands to her chest. She wore a contented look to her face, not a smile or a scowl, or a look of amusement but rather a deep calm exuded from her.

I didn’t respond verbally, instead typing the word into my phone and giving her it to read as I pulled the net back more fully and peered down on the street myself, taking my own sip of the coffee she’d left for me.

“Huh, I wouldn’t say I love it. But when you’re warm and dry inside, wearing cosy socks while the heavens open outside, well I like that.” She said still waggling one thick red scandi print socked foot at me.

“Not so fond of getting my hair wet either. I live by my mother’s advice. Always have a good hood on your winter coat.”

“Pearl of wisdom if I ever heard one.” I responded with a raised eyebrow.

“Yeah, mums not exactly Confucius, but it’s practical enough advise. Go on I bet your mother has pearls of wisdom that would put Gandhi to shame, what with all the genius in your genes.”

“I remember a few that came up regularly as a child, few that are applicable as an adult however.”

“How disappointing.”

“There is one that she said once that has stuck with me over the years. I still take it into consideration now when the occasion arises.”

“Shoot”

I looked down at her as I set my face at its most serious. “Don’t put dead things in your brothers’ shoes. It’s far too obvious that it was you.”

A smile cracked on her face seconds before she leaned her head forward giggling. I took the opportunity to turn my face from hers, hiding the answering smile on my own face, the glee I felt sharp and sweet at my diaphragm at making her laugh.

We spent the rest of the morning moving around each other comfortably until we had to leave for my appointment. When we left the flat it was to find that Sherlocks Taxi summoning magic would not be needed as a sleek black Jaguar that just screamed ‘sent by Mycroft’ was idling outside the door ignoring traffic laws. Sherlock gave a huff of indignation but opened the door for me to get in before sliding in after me. The car pulled away gracefully, with a purr befitting the name of the make. We sat in silence for a few minutes until Sherlock still gazing out of the window began to talk.

“You have questions, let’s get them out of the way shall we while we are in an environment that we can be sure is uncompromised.” He didn’t look at me while I took a moment to frame the question I wanted answered.

“Why haven’t you told your friends the truth?”

“I have.”

“You have not!” He remained staring out of the window forcing me to grab his arm and pull until he turned to look at me.

“I have not told them a lie.” I stared at him in astonishment.

“This whole thing is a lie” I said pointing between the two of us. His aloof demeaner was broken at this point and his next remark had impatience underlying it.

“They asked if we had moved in together. I said yes. NOT a lie. I told them you were pregnant also NOT a lie. All of the rest was supposition on their part based on some of the facts and tying them up in a nice societal expectation bow.”

“It was a lie by omission Sherlock and you have no way to get out of that.”

Sherlocks eyes blazed as he responded. “We still have no concrete evidence on how the killer chooses victims only supposition which is not enough to rule out any theory. It maybe that the killer gets their information from the friends and family. Beth there is something that you need to understand about John. He is incapable of lying with any degree of success, therefore until we know more about our killer’s information gathering we need him to believe to some degree. He is doubtful as it stands due to my previous fake relationship. His uncertainty as to my abilities to have a ‘relationship’ may play to our favour. Mary obviously can see through the lie, but she can’t see the full truth and will be unwilling to seek it as she will not put herself in the position where she needs to lie to John again.”

“And why Mrs Hudson? I reckon she’d be a first-rate actress able to carry off a lie.” I demanded.

“I could turn around and tell her tomorrow that all this is not true with evidence and she would still refuse to believe it. She wants it to be true therefore it is true to her.”

I looked at him sceptically “Really. She believed John and I were lovers from the day she met him, despite John denying it vehemently at every opportunity. Ask him about it when this is all over.”

We fell into silence for a while as I processed the fact that I was going to have to start lying to my friends and family. I was 14 weeks pregnant and I could see the change in my body. It wasn’t noticeable to others yet but in the next few weeks the small rounding of my stomach that had begun would become more noticeable. I’d spoken the words before I even thought about them.

“Do you find it easy to lie to them?”

“Not as much as I once did.” He answered once again staring resolutely out of the window.

Waiting rooms feel the same regardless of how posh they are. The quality of magazine changes, not a copy of chat or heat to be seen in this place and the water cooler was accompanied but not a vending machine but a coffee pod machine, hot water dispenser, milk jug and just about every type of tea bag known to man. The boredom and apprehension doesn’t change in the slightest regardless of the beverages offered. Sherlock was still in what I had now coined as ‘lock down mode’ sitting in the chair next to me ramrod straight and hands clasped in his lap. I was undecided as to whether this was due to our conversation in the taxi or his being uncomfortable in the waiting room environment, surrounded with expectant parents. Luckily, we were called through by a nurse within 5 minutes of booking in.

We were led into an office with a large desk bare of all but a computer monitor and the back of a curved glass photo frame. Behind the desk sat the consultant Mr Hadley. He seemed out of place in an environment selling itself as prestigious. He looked as if he was in his late 40’s, wore a shirt in a pale blue/mauve shade, the sleeves of which were rolled up at his elbows and he wore no tie, in fact the top two buttons of his shirt were undone. When he got up to shake our hands he was wearing light chinos and deck shoes.

It was clear that Sherlock was taking the measure of the man and that the doctor was aware of it.

“Right Miss Macdonald I have been given the notes from your last appointment so if you and your partner have no questions right now would you like to get the exciting bit done first with your scan, then we can sit down together and discuss the course of the next 5 months.”

I nodded and gave a smile as Sherlock stood still silent next to me.

“Great, if you both want to step through here.” He said holding the door to an adjoining room open for us.

Sherlock followed me into the room and was already scanning it as the doctor followed us in shutting the door behind him.

“Right if you could just hop up on the bed, lay down and just pull your top out the way for me.”

He turned to pull over the ultrasound monitor as I pulled my top up to tuck just under my bra and pulled my leggings down, so they were resting low on my hips.

The doctor settled beside me on a surgical stool and pulled the small tube of jelly from the tray.

“You’ve had one of these before, I’m afraid the jellies no colder in private practices.” He joked as he squeezed a hefty portion onto my exposed stomach.

It wasn’t until the moment the wand settled on my stomach that things I hadn’t considered until then flitted through my mind, birth defects, no baby there, a baby there but no heartbeat. I hadn’t realised I’d stopped breathing until I felt Sherlocks hand at my shoulder. Instinctively I reached up to grab his hand and took in a deep breath trying to calm myself. My consultant had also noticed as he had stilled his movements on my belly and with the foot of one out stretched leg he hooked another stool out, sliding it over to Sherlock with a nod that even I in my paranoid, panicked mind set recognised as ‘sit’.

I watched Sherlock sit without letting go of my hand and he gave it a quick squeeze as the doctor continued the exam. His attention went back to the wand moving across my stomach. My panic was starting to rise again until the screen was turned towards us and the sight of my child filled the screen, seconds later the hummingbird heartbeat was echoing in the silence of the room. Quiet tears of relief fell from the corners of my eyes to fall into my ears as I grasped Sherlocks hand tightly and he squeezed right back.

We were now sat in the doctor’s office again. The printed pictures gripped firmly in my hand.

“You didn’t perform the nuchal scan?” was the first thing Sherlock said.

“No, we’re about a week overdue for that.”

Sherlock butted in before the Doctor was able to continue. “So any additional fluid may have been absorbed into the developing lymphatic system. At what point can we have amniocentesis to test for down syndrome?”

“Well it can be done from 15 weeks, but the NS was done at the same time as the aging scans along with the blood tests. All of which came back with no problems.” He pulled up a file on his computer and then swivelled the screen to show Sherlock and I the first scan. He explained the scan, pointing out the presence of the fluid on the neck and explaining the normal range, with Sherlock posing questions and him answering them. As the conversation got more and more technical I zoned out and just looked at the picture of my child. Their limbs and face were more defined than they had been in the first scan. Just having evidence of the babies continued growth was making me slightly giddy and I realised that the hand not holding the scans was caressing my stomach. I was pulled back into the conversation when Sherlock said my name.

“Sorry”

“That’s ok, we sort of went off on a tangent.” said the doctor with an apologetic smile. “Now I’m happy that everything is going well. I was expecting that to be the case, but it’s nice when you take over someone’s care to check these things out for yourself. Now we need to sit down and discuss your birth plan, have you read any of the literature on the options that are available for you here?”

“Um, no..”

Sherlock piped up at this point. “What options are available?”

The doctor dug around in his desk drawer and came out with a few pamphlets. “These are the options and the reasons for considering each.” He said holding up the fatter of the two. “And these are the costings” He said holding up the other.” To be honest Mr Holmes you know your stuff and are more than capable of doing your own research. I suggest you both give the pamphlets a read, do your own research and then we discuss your options and choices at your next appointment, which if you don’t want any further genetic tests should be your fetal anatomy scan which you can have between 19 and 21 weeks.”

On our way out I made the appointment for the next scan and a midwife visit before then. Having done that Sherlock and I left through the main entrance. Luckily my new treasured scans were tucked away safely in my medical notes folder as we had taken less than 4 steps when some bloke stepped right into our path and started taking photos. Sherlock snaked an arm around me and moved so that I was walking next to the wall of the building and he was between me and the paparazzi. When the man blocked my path up ahead Sherlock moved in front of me shielding me from the blinding flash and stopped when close enough to him.

“Move” he hissed.

“When is it due Mr Holmes?”

“None of your or anyone else’s business. And if you hadn’t such crippling self-esteem issues due to you wetting the bed until well into your teens, you would have found a better job than this. Maybe you should discuss it with your marriage counsellor. It could help you stop your cheating.” He spat with disdain and then he stuck his hand out and as expected a taxi glided up next to us. We both got in quickly and Sherlock gave the cabbie the address as we pulled out into traffic.

“Why did you rip him to shreds like that, we want the pictures out there.” I asked quietly.

“I have reputation to uphold” Sherlock replied haughtily but the raising of one eyebrow communicated how tongue in cheek this comment was. “Our friend has returned” Sherlock said as he pulled me in beside him, closing the small gap that had been there and draping one arm around my shoulder and the hand of the other arm on my stomach. It was the first time that Sherlock had touched my stomach while awake at least, and despite the ridiculous circumstances it did warm me. I looked up at his face as I heard the bike getting close and as they drew level we stayed in that position until Sherlock had decided that they had had their fill and gave a complicated set of directions to the cabby. Within 5 minutes we had lost them but Sherlocks hand hadn’t left my stomach, despite him sending a few text messages in that time.

 The silence was broken by Sherlock with a statement that confused me by the fact that he was the one to say it. “When you really think about it this is amazing, what the human body can do with minimal mechanical assistance.” When he saw my dumbfounded expression he removed his hand continuing on annoyed. “It surprises you that I think this. I am a scientist, the mechanics of the world around us have always fascinated me, why would this be any different.”

“Shut up,” I pulled his hand back to my stomach from where it had rested on the seat between us “What you said wasn’t what surprised me it was that you said it at all. It’s unusual for you to share your thoughts on anything that is not case related.”

“Yes, well we are in a relationship of sorts and well…”

It suddenly dawned on me in flash that I hadn’t thanked him for what he had done. Organising this worked to the advantage of the case but it would have been just as easy to have done it at my last scan a few weeks ago or at my next NHS appointment. Instead he was footing the bill, if I believed what he had said before, because he wanted to.

“You’re a good man Sherlock Holmes.” I said sincerely.

“Hardly” he scoffs.

“You’re a good man to me and to your friends.” He just gazed at me nonplussed as to what to do. The timely arrival at the entrance to the ally up the back of 221 solved that for him and he jumped from the cab and walked away.

By the time I had paid the cabby and made my own way through the back by the bins and into the flat he was playing the violin, and I left him too it.

A call from John about a case on the blog pulled Sherlock from his playing an hour later and he snuck out the back to meet John. He still wasn’t back by the time I woke the next morning, so I settled for a chemistry free breakfast that morning. Realising I’d left my phone charging in the bedroom I went to get it while the kettle boiled for my second cup of tea, unfortunately a decaf one this time. As I picked it up it vibrated letting me know I had notifications. Swiping it open I was at first worried at the number of missed calls, texts, and Facebook notifications I had. Reading the first couple of texts though it became obvious what this was all about.

-congratulations xxx

-Congrats. So excited to hear your expecting. Will be nice to have a cousin for Harry to play with at the big family BBQ. Hugs from us all xxxx

Shit, I’d been so caught up in Sherlocks abrupt mood swing yesterday. I’d not done the damage limitation I’d intended and been caught out with this being reported before I had assumed it would be.

I exited my messages leaving most unread and looked at the missed call log. I had one from Mycroft, two from an unknown number, three from my sister and nine from my Mum and Dad. I was just about to go back to my messages when my phone began to ring again from the most persistent of my callers.

“Hi Mum”

“Beth?”

“Mum I’m so sorry you found out like this.” The remorse was plain to hear in my voice.

“So it’s true then?”

“Yes” I said plainly, still unsure of her reaction.

“Why on earth didn’t you tell me?” She asked and it became clear to me that she was upset.

“I ..we were waiting for the first trimester to be done and then we were gonna let everyone know.” I explained gently. She interrupted before I could continue.

“How many weeks are you?”

“Coming up for 15. Mum I had another scan yesterday.”

“At the Portland. I read the report.” And for the first time in the conversation I heard not just her upset but her frustration,

“Mum, come on! I wanted to tell you face to face. Can I send you photos of the scans I’ve had?” I asked hesitantly.

Her response with it’s warmth and gentle teasing was like a switch being flicked “Of course you can, if you don’t me and your dad will come to your flat and steal them anyway.”

“Well that would have been interesting as I don’t live in my old flat anymore. I’ve moved in with Sherlock.”

There was a huff of breath preceding her response “Ok, we’ll gloss over the fact that you’ve moved in with a boy I’ve never even met.”

“He’s a man mum. He’s 39 “(I missed out the fact that sometimes he sulked like he was 12) “and smart, really smart. His brain can see everything and extrapolate everything of importance from it to solve cases that everyone though unsolvable.”

“Yes he’s good at his job, even I know that from watching News at 10. But his job also seems dangerous love.”

“I’m a police officer at the MET mum, my jobs dangerous too.” I said trying to temper my frustration at the potential of having this conversation again.

“Sorry I know, I know, I just worry about you and now I have to worry about my grandchild too.” I could just tell that she was smiling as widely as I was at the her using the word ‘grandchild’ for the first time.

“Mum I’ll come down to see you soon. Me and your grandchild.”

“You, my new grandchild and your boyfriend will come down for Christmas young lady and I won’t hear a word said against it.”

“I’ll have to check with Sherlock mum and get back to you. But you will definitely see me and bump at some point over the holidays”

“Good, and while I’m in a demanding mood I also want regular updates from now on.” She mock teased, but it was clear that this was important to her, and I cringed at how much I had hurt her unwittingly.

“Yep will text you all my annoying pregnancy nags, so expect to be hearing a lot from me. Sherlock will love the fact that I’ll have someone else to moan to.” I joked, hoping to put her mind at ease.

I promised Mum that I would ring her later and we could have a proper chat about the last few months, but as I had a list as long as my arm of people to inform I should get on it sooner rather than later.

I had barely hung up the phone before it rang again from my sister and I began the grovelling apology all over again.

I had worked the way through all my contacts before lunch and was just getting ready to start my late shift when the flats phone rang. I answered expecting someone trying to sell PPI in all honesty.

“Hello”

“Oh, is that Beth.”

“Yes, Sorry can I help you?” I asked wracking my brains trying to work out who it was.

“Is Sherlock there?”

“Not at the moment.”

“Is he really not there or laying on the sofa signally like a mad man so he doesn’t have to talk to me.” The woman asked with wry humour. So it was someone who knew Sherlock well then I thought.

“He’s on a case, physically not in the flat I’m afraid.”

“Drat!” She exclaimed.

“Sorry who are you?” remembering my manner I continued with “I mean do you want me to give him a message.”

“Oh yes I rather forgot to tell you that didn’t I. I’m Violet Holmes, Sherlocks Mother.” And the penny dropped and I realised that I was going to have to have the wounded mother conversation twice in a day.

“Mrs Holmes. Oh. I’ll tell him you called and get him to call you back when he’s done with the case.”

She gave a sharp burst of laughter. She really did now him well it seemed.

“If you can make him do that you really have tamed him like the papers say. Too be honest I will get far more sense out of you my girl. I have just one question. Is it true that you and my son are having a child?”

I hesitated before responding. “I really think you should talk to Sherlock about this.”

She continued unfazed in the slightest “Mycroft says it’s true, but those boys of mine have such a complicated relationship you can’t trust what one says about the other even at this age when they should know better.”

I tried for a different tact “I’m sure Sherlock will want to be the one to tell you.”

“Ah ok. Well I shall wait for him to call then. I do insist however that you all spend at least some of Christmas with us.” There was a pause before she continued more gently. “We would like to get to know you.”

“Me too. I’ll let him know you called and get him to call you even if I have to duct tape the phone to his face while he’s in his mind palace and dial the number myself.” She laughed merrily at this. “Actually, hang on a minute while I get my phone and take your number.”

When Sherlock came back into the flat a couple of hours after Beth had left he found a note on his microscope.

YOUR MOTHER RANG. YOU HAVE TO RING HER BACK TODAY. We need her to make the plan work so don’t chicken out. If I have to lie to my parents, you have to do the same with yours.

P.S.

 We HAVE to spend Christmas with both our families. ALSO, not something you can get out of. Checked with Greg, he has put an embargo on MET cases for you over Christmas and John will be posting an out of office on the blog.

:0) X

Sherlock groaned and sat with his head in his hands for longer than he would ever admit.

Chapter Text

Nothing had been said about Sherlock's reaction in the days following the scan appointment by either of us. We just carried on, back to the normal practices, surprisingly more affectionate but each of us caught up in our own heads doing our own things.

Work for me was boring with lots of evidence checking and building cases to ensure they were ready for court. Sherlock however was going from one case to another. In the last 4 days he had solved two duds. The first was a one at best. The other a barely strong enough to scrape a three of the Sherlock case scale. He had however had a mildly interesting one of the theft of some baby teeth that took up two days of his time. It ended in the capture of a drugs kingpin as the theft had been by one on his young runners to try and prove that the father of that child was also his father.

The next day though I was wishing that I was back doing paperwork. The day had been horrible. Working in MIT you see a lot of domestic murders it makes up around 75% of our workload. I have seen domestic abuse, accidental murder of a spouse and children. It is horrific and that never goes away but you do become de sensitised to it.

I have never walked into a scene of such neglect before and there was no way that the many other scenes I had visited over the course of my career would prepare me for that. I managed to hold it together barely and was glad to be sent back to the office to start overseeing from there while Lestrade stayed on the scene. It soon became clear that gathering evidence for this case was going to be easy. There was evidence in every corner, of every room, in the house. The first thing I did was put a call through to the wellbeing department to request their help for our personnel and myself.

Due to the sheer volume of available evidence, the suspect being in a cell and the general mood in the department we were all sent home bang on time by Greg with a firm word that we should not be seen in the office before nine the next morning. Then, when we had all had some time to take care of ourselves, we would look at the next step.

I arrived back in baker street, and on closing the front door Mrs Hudson’s door crept open and the landlady tiptoed out.

“Oh Beth, he’s in a foul mood. He’s not been in one of these for ages. He’s pacing the flat like a caged animal. Both times I’ve been up he just yells at me until I leave.” She said wringing her hands.

“Oh hell. I’ll see what I can do.” I said to her reassuringly but thinking to myself ‘I’m really not in the mood for this shit tonight.’

I end up leaving the flat myself to stop me from climbing on to a higher surface, so I could reach his pretentious long swath of neck, wrap my hands around it and squeeze it hard.

Mrs Hudson wasn’t wrong. I found him pacing in disjointed circuits of the flat. Asking what was going on got me a sneer. Going to put the kettle on got me a rant on how people were stupid and ‘tea’ didn’t solve anything despite Mrs Hudson’s assertions. Deciding that I wasn’t dealing with his shit found me pulling the front door shut behind me 5 minutes after having walked through it. I shivered as the wind whipped around me, London was essentially a giant maze of wind tunnels, at least I’d had the presence of mind to pull my coat back on before I’d left.

After a short trip on the Jubilee and Piccadilly she weaved her way through the crowds along the tunnel before moving along with the crowds through the Cromwell entrance into the natural history museum. At 4pm on a weekday, all the school trips had left, and the main hall had a hallowed atmosphere. She slipped silently up the stairs and headed with purpose to the right along the mosaic floor to the minerals exhibition. She meandered up and down the glass display cases.

As she stood over the display of azurite she knew when he had stepped up beside her, always positioning himself just that little too much into her personal space.

“You make a habit of tracking me when I want to be left alone don’t you?” he gave no answer just looking down at the display.

“This is obviously your favourite, you have spent 25% longer at this display. Azurite is a carbonate with the chemical formula Cu₃(CO₃)₂(OH)₂, it forms monoclinic crystals that are massive, prismatic, stalactitic and tabular and has a formula mass of 344.67 g/mol.

She gave no response just continued to gaze down on the case before her.

“Why this display?” Sherlock asked the back of her bowed head.

“Nothing to do with all that information you so kindly bestowed on me.” She responded with sass, but still not looking at him. There was a minute of silence neither moving, she was staring down on the bright blue rocks before her as he analytically contemplated her.

“Why did you come here, this room specifically.” He asked in his quick-fire manner, breaking the silence.

“I don’t know.” She responded automatically.

“Yes, you do” he insisted.

She was silent, so he spoke up again starting with a deep sigh. “You don’t want to tell me. Why?”

“You won’t bloody get it.” Her fury was explosive as she turned to look at him for the first time.

“Try me” he urged, placing a hand on her shoulder only for her to shrug it off and take a step away from him. Looking away from him again. It was to her surprise that he started the conversation again, not insistent questioning again but with a gentler more hesitant tone.

 “I have also always liked this place. When I was a boy” he paused before starting again. “Our parents bought Mycroft and I to London for a week when I was 5. The two of us spent the entire day here. Neither of us had ever had so much new information to hand. I don’t think we ever had a day where the two of us spent less time arguing.” He swiftly looked down as if he had shaken off the memory and spoke again, his choice of subject matter firmly back in the factual. “This room is set up as it was in 1881. These are the original oak and glass cabinets.”

She interrupted before he could continue, surprisingly collected and firm in tone. “My job can be horrible, you of all people understand that people do the most wicked thing to each other. Some days all I can see is the filth and degradation of this city. This place reminds me that if you look deeper there is beauty to be found.” She finally turned her whole body to face him fully her stance clearly communicating that she was expecting to be mocked for her sentimentality but was ready to fight for what she had said. The slow dawning comprehension that that was not what he was doing played in her eyes as she listened to his response.

“But it is a fragile thing, Azurite for example when found its bright and beautiful, shining deep cobalt blue, but it is soft, tarnishes easily, soon losing its lustre when exposed to light, air and moisture.” He turned away grabbing her hand as he led them to the vault. At the back there are a display of multi-coloured diamonds, he led her to these. “This is a better example, of the beauty we should be aiming for. Look pretty, sparkling many colours, formed under extreme pressure pushing down on them, each of them a different hue.” The lights of the display case had changed dimming and then the gems picked up new shades of brightness. “Under UV light they change again, their story changes. Some positively glow, ethereal brightness shining.”

Their stance now had flipped he was now the one staring into the display case as the light sources slowly moved from one to another as she stared up at him. She loosened her hand from where it had been grasped within his far larger one and instead wound her arm around his waist in a half hug. A simple quiet “thank you” was all she said before turning to look back the display beside him.

“Come on, I’ll buy you a cup of tea for the journey home.” He said winding his own arm around her back.

“I thought tea didn’t solve anything.” She teased giving a quick squeeze to his waist.

“It doesn’t solve anything but the theanine in tea can cross the blood brain barrier where it mimics GABA. GABA is effectively the brains off switch. It slows down the speed of brain waves leaving you more relaxed and calmed.” He explained functionally.

“Decaf tea for two then?”

“I should think so.”

Chapter Text

We’d just finished our weekly conference call with DCI Kingley of cybercrime. The bloke was alright and took it well when myself or Beth said that we didn’t understand any of what he’d just said. Calmly talking us through processes we needed to know about and glossing over the stuff that only computer nerds needed to know. Ultimately what it boiled down to was that they had nothing for us to move forward with. They had ruled out quite a few websites and developed a new search pattern thing to make searching sites quicker but still hadn’t found anything that would help us find our killer. We were discussing what we had and what possible next steps we could take considering the other workload we had when Sherlock barged into my office like he owned it.

“Cases Grant.” He said making grabby hands at me across the desk.

“I gave you one this morning”

“Solved it, didn’t even have to leave the building.”

“Want to explain it to the police so we can arrest the guy?”

“Have done.”

“Nope, think I’d remember that mate.”

“The one with the ears, he wrote it all down, he knows shorthand. Best statement I’ve ever made. Have him take all my statements from now on. He is currently typing it up. Read it when he’s done you know how…”

“You hate repeating yourself! Yeah now I think about it you may have mentioned it before at some point.” Beth’s eyes twinkled, and her lip smirked but by the time Sherlock turned to look at her face was carefully schooled into one of attentiveness. Happy that at least one of us was giving him the attention he deserved he continued his self-important rant.

“Oh, good you finally get it. So, case? Nothing that will take longer than 8 days. Not that I imagine you have anything that good you’re investigating now or in your paltry files of cold cases.”

“You mean apart from the case of mine that you are already investigating and undercover for that has taken more than 8 days?” As Sherlock often does when you prove him wrong on something or he finally has no whiplash sharp and fast retort, he ignored me and pretended I hadn’t said anything.

“I suppose a few cases to make up that time frame would be sufficient, if I must.”

“My cases are your cases, on the proviso that you actually remember that they are mine and don’t run off solving them and try to detain the perp on your own. We all know how well that went for you in Camberwell don’t we.”

“Oh, for God’s sake. Why do you insist on bringing that up at every given opportunity?”

“I enjoy revelling in your embarrassment” I said with widest, cheesiest grim in my repertoire.

“I’m not embarrassed, that could have happened to anyone.” He stated unconvincingly around a pout.

“No Sherlock, nobody else I know would have been held at ‘gunpoint’ with a banana attempting to take in a terror suspect because they wouldn’t have gone to arrest them on their own. So, someone else would have seen it was a piece of fucking fruit and they wouldn’t have spent two hours sat in a chair with a banana to the back of their head, until big brother tracked them down and freed them from unlawful imprisonment via means of tropical fruit.”

Beth was unable to maintain the mask and her melodic laugh rang through the office as the tears streamed down her face. Sherlock was just indignant and huffy.

“I bring this up as a reminder to you not to go in gung-ho. You don’t seem to care about your own safety so I’m attempting to appeal to your sense of pride.”

“Yes, thank you for your concern, now cases.” He demanded holding out his hand across the desk once more.”

Point made I unlocked my drawer and pulled out the cold cases that everyone dumped on my desk when they had worked the case to no solution. As Sherlock's un-official handler it seemed that I had become the holder of all cold cases so that they wouldn’t have to deal with him badgering them for cases. I’d expected him to take them all away and find a spare desk as was normally his habit after years of training him to not take them home with him. Instead he just dropped to the floor in the middle of my office to sit cross-legged and proceeded to spread the files around him.

After a few seconds of watching him somewhat bemused Beth and I went back to discussing our current work load. We were making plans for next week when we were interrupted once more.

“We won’t be here Friday.”

“What?”

“Oh yeah, he’s right I’m going to a wedding Friday. I’d forgotten.” Agreed Beth holding rubbing the back of her neck. Her hand paused as she asked Sherlock. “What did you mean ‘we’ won’t be here Sherlock?”

“We are both attending the wedding. I’m your plus one” he said looking up at her from the floor with a wide grin so unfrequently seen on his face that you know it means trouble when it does appear.

“You can’t be. I RSVP’d saying that it was just me coming, they will have paid for food and done seating plans and so on. You can’t just rock up to a wedding un-invited.

“Yes I know that, planned John’s wedding remember. I rang your friend explaining that I was now available on that day and with you being pregnant I would like to accompany you to the evening do, but I understood that they had plans and I didn’t want to impose, and I understood if it wasn’t possible. She was very accommodating and I’m now coming to the whole day.”

Sherlock looked like the cat that had got the cream, Beth’s face looked like thunder. I took the opportunity to grab a coffee to escape the oncoming storm.

The trip down had been a silent one. Sherlock in his mind palace to escape my still pissed off glare. The worse thing was he was right. The more people that saw us together the more gossip. If the murdered knew I was attending this wedding it would look strange if he didn’t also attend. I couldn’t and wouldn’t fault his logic. It was the failure to keep me informed of his plans that was the rub. It seemed that he was incapable of keeping to his word and he just couldn’t see what he had done wrong. For a bloody genius he could be a complete fucking dunce about somethings. The wedding was at three and we checked into the country hotel on the outskirts of Basingstoke at twelve. We ignored each other as much as its possible to in a single room as we got ready until I decided that this was getting stupid. Asking him to help do up my dress he graciously agreed seeing the gesture as the olive branch that it was.

We walked down to the function room together and he settled his hand in the small of my back as we walked into the room. We didn’t have to wait before the act began as we had sat behind a friend of mine, Janey, that I hadn’t recognised due to the large, and I really do mean large, think satellite dish, fascinator that obscured half her head. Sherlock was all smiles and so charming that I would have thought he’d had a lobotomy since leaving our room if I hadn’t been with him the entire time. He chatted graciously with her and Harry her husband, his hand running over the curve of my stomach which was starting to show at certain angles. The empire line cut to my dress masked the small bump that had been making itself more visible over the last week, but Janey and Harry had seen the news so we spent a few minutes discussing my pregnancy and Sherlock played the excited father to be perfectly convincingly. The conversation died with the striking up of the bride’s entrance music and we spend the next thirty minutes of the ceremony hand in hand playing the part.

The standing around waiting for photos to be done and the sit-down dinner went smoothly, and Sherlock continued to play the boyfriend card perfectly attentive, chatting amicably with my friends and other guests. He was even flirty with some of the girls and I had to suppress the surprise I felt at this side to his little act. He was good and got many a coy giggle in response for his effort. Stephanie; the most practical, no nonsense of all my friends, Mum of four boys, can see if she’s being played a mile off, even twirled her hair around her finger for Christ’s sake, like a 1950’s teenage girl.

The attention he seemed to be able to give everyone and the jovial fun guy he was playing meant that by the time the evening came around, first dance done and dusted, disco in full drunken swing our table was the busiest. Sherlock had been up and down to the bar multiple times getting a round in for anyone and everyone at the table. By this point Sherlock was mildly drunk and flirting shamelessly with pretty much anything in a dress and the only reason that most of their partners were still sitting there was due to the free booze that Sherlock was paying for.

I was on my way back from the toilets when I saw that Sherlock was once again at the bar. Taking a small detour I decided to go and join him. As I drew nearer I realised that he wasn’t alone Ellie was with him. I’d be lying if I said that their interactions this evening hadn’t sparked the embers of jealousy in me. They had become chummy very quickly and I hadn’t missed the way they had taken to touching each other’s arm to get the others attention. The ember was firmly ignited when I, skirting around a table, changed the angle of my approach and saw very clearly that Sherlocks hand was now placed on the bare leg in front of him, and to my further amazement his thumb was now moving back and forth across the same area. I came to an abrupt halt in my shock. Sherlock’s thumb halted a second before he removed his hand and our eyes met. I turned tail and strode away furious.

Looking back, I saw him following me, but I had a good lead on him. Suddenly Stacey and her groom were in front of me talking to Tom. Tom is one of those men I have known for years, we share the same large group of friends and he’s one of those genuinely good blokes, the type that will hold your hair back while you throw up in mates’ toilet or a random alley, both these scenarios are tried and tested situations in our friendship. So, I knew he’d dance with me if I begged.

“Sorry you two, do you mind if I steal this one for a quick boogie. He’s been avoiding me all night. I think he’s afraid I’ll damage his tootsies.” That got a laugh from them both.

“Wouldn’t dream of depriving you of your dance partner. Whisk him off then.” Stacey moved to one side and flung her arm out to the dancefloor behind them. I grabbed Tom’s arm and dragged him with me quickly. I’d hoped to get lost on the dancefloor giving me much needed space from Sherlock to get my head sorted and remind myself that this was all pretend. Of course the plan didn’t work but Tom knew me very well and as I stated earlier he was a gentleman. Sherlock came up alongside us.

“Beth we need to talk” he said placing his hand gently on my shoulder. My reaction was to swiftly jerk my shoulder away from him. As Sherlock went to grab my arm, Tom’s arm came out to block him. He came in between the two of us and held his hands up in front of his chest in the universal ‘look I don’t want any trouble’ gesture.

“Mate, I don’t think she’s ready to talk to you at the moment and I’m sure none of us want to cause a scene at our friend’s wedding, so go get a drink she’ll find you if and when she’s ready to talk.” Sherlock looked at me over Tom’s shoulder. I glared back, and he just turned and walked away without another word.

We found ourselves a table over by the doors to the gardens and Tom just let me sit there head in hands as the frozen evening air ran over the back of my neck every time someone went in or out for a cigarette. After a while I started talking and felt Tom move closer to hear me better as I hadn’t changed positions. “He had his hand on her fucking thigh, her thigh and as if that wasn’t enough he was moving his thumb across it.”

“Whose thigh?”

“Ellie’s”

“Ah” Tom got it. Ellie and I had been friends since we were in primary school, and good friends for the most part but Ellie was the pretty girl. The girl that all the teenage boys wanted, and I was the friend, the one that others put up with on double dates, invited to parties so Ellie would come. It had fed my negative feelings of self-worth as a teenager and it wasn’t until I stepped out of her shadow and went to university while she got a job as an admin assistant in a local distribution company in the next town over that I started to feel that I had my own identity that had worth in its own right. It had been years and I didn’t even think about it anymore really. But seeing that scene at the bar had made me feel 15 again. I didn’t need to explain this to Tom, this story was old hat to him.

We steeped in silence again and I was thankful for Tom’s unassuming nature. He let me sit quietly, sorting out my thoughts until I took a deep breath and turned in my seat to fully face him

“Want me to do anything? Take you home? Ask Sherlock to leave?”

I gave him a hug. “No, even though I feel about this big at the moment” I said holding my fingers a smidge apart “I am an adult that is going to have a baby in less than six months. I would like a drink though. Would have been nice if it could have been alcoholic but a diet coke will have to do.”

Tom had just turned the corner towards the bar when Sherlock stepped in through the garden doorway and in three strides was sitting himself in the seat Tom had just vacated.

“Well that went well” he whispered. I stared at him aghast, comprehension slowly dawning. The fucker. It had been bad enough when without consulting with me he’d invited himself to the wedding and I had naively assumed that it was just because couples go to weddings together, so it was part of the cover. Oh no it was so much worse. He was using the opportunity to build the profile of him as a cheater, in front of my friends. The deep fury that I felt snuffed out the tiny snap of joy on realising that the flirting had been an act.

Tom was coming back towards the table and I saw him speed up when he realised that Sherlock had joined me. I slipped out of my seat. “One second, stay there.” I instructed Sherlock the look on my face making it clear that I meant it.

I went forward to meet Tom before he could get to the table. “OK?” he asked.

“Yeah, thanks for the drink.” I replied taking the glass from him and taking a quick gulp “I’m going to go talk to him in the garden, away from the audience.”

“Alright well let me know your ok after, and if you accidentally throw your drink in his face I’m more than happy to buy you another one.” He replied trying to get a laugh out of me.

“Thanks” I gave a small smile as he squeezed my shoulder before I turned I walked back to the table. I didn’t stop at the table just gave a simple demand “Garden” to Sherlock and he silently followed me out.

The November air bit at my exposed flesh. I walked with pace away from the smokers that were inserted alone or in small groups around two patio heaters or in the shelter that the wing of the house provided. I stepped down a few steps onto a gravel walkway that crunched satisfyingly underfoot, Sherlock's footsteps following me. I’d turned a corner before I heard him put on a burst of speed to catch up with me. I slowed to a stop but stayed facing the direction I’d been walking so he stepped around me to face me. My eyes had acclimatised to the dark so I could see him standing there in his trademarked pose; head held high, hands clasped lightly behind his back, the only thing missing was the coat and scarf.

“We had an agreement, before we went into this but I don’t think you can actually keep it.” I began, trying to keep the anger from my voice.

“You’re actually angry with me.” His response proving that I wasn’t able to hide from him so I stopped trying.

“Yes genius. I’m spitting feathers.”

“Why?”

“We are supposed to be a team, doing this together no secrets, remember that? Obviously not as your not telling me the plan, just launching in and playing me as a fool.”

There was a moments silence before he responded.

“I believed that you understood the purpose of me accompanying you here.”

“Sherlock, assume that I am stupid and have to be talked through every detail of any plan, no matter how small. You don’t normally have any issues treating people like they are stupid.”

“But you’re not.” There was a pause before he continued sounding unsure of himself as if he had never said the words before and was uncertain if the use of them was contextually correct. “I’m sorry.”

It was the uncertainty of his voice that diffused my anger a little and I tried again to be a little calmer. “If we can’t work together I don’t know if I can keep doing this Sherlock.” He just nodded his head once solemnly. Then proceeded to explain the plan for tonight.

“The plan was to portray myself as the ‘good time guy’ drink heavily, flirt heavily.”

I interrupted at this point, unable to hold back a sassy response. “Well you carried both of those off.”

“I have of course had little to drink” He explained.

“You’ve been packing them away” I disagreed.

“No, I appear to have been, hence the reason I have made most of the trips to the bar tonight. As the inebriation levels rise the flirtation and it’s level of acceptance, despite the presence of my girlfriend, have risen. The plan was to select the one woman that I though would be most accepting to take the flirtation more seriously and…”

“Fuck her”

Even in the dark of the garden I could tell he was taken aback by my venomous outburst.

“No, certainly become more tactile as you observed, maybe as far as kissing but not that far, it had to be observable by others and that act would be hard to set up in a manner that would have been visible, possible perhaps in the summer months with a large garden, but not in this season. Besides that, much was not needed, the power of suggestion is more than enough to get people talking.”

“Ok and then.”

“Others would witness the increased closeness and having made a point on introducing myself to as many of the masses as I could earlier it was a fair bet that at least a few would realise that the woman I was with was not you. Those that hadn’t would notice when you arrived and saw us together.” After a small pause, during which I stayed silent he continued.

“The next stage of the plan is the argument that we are currently having. I had factored in for us having it in the venue so there would be witnesses, but even the densest in the room will be able to conclude that we have ‘kissed and made up’ when we walk back in, dance together and spend the rest of the night in close proximity.” With that he removed his jacket in a practised smooth motion and swung it over my shoulders. I withstood the urge I had to shrug it off and kick it into the muddy lawn in favour of the warmth it afforded me. The warmth that allowed me to set Sherlock in his place rather than acquiescing to his plans that didn’t take me into account in the slightest just, so I’d be warm.

“We will not be doing that. I am not a doormat, some of those people in there are my friends. Firstly, I do not want them to see me as a weak-willed woman. Secondly, they are some of the people that know me best in the world, some of them won’t believe that I would let you walk all over me like that. So, we are going to go back in that room and you are not going to touch me as we make our good-nights to the bride and groom and leave for the night.”

I turned to walk away when he rushed to stand in front of me and block my way. “No that won’t do. Think about the victim profile; The women killed. We don’t know if some of the women were aware of their spouses cheating, but those that we do know knew about it. All of them stayed with their partner, some of them through reports of more than one affair in a very short space of time. They were, as you put it doormats, so we need to fit the victim profiles also.” I bloody knew he was right, but I was still furious that he had put me in this position, and I felt so stupid that I hadn’t realised that he would use this opportunity to further the gossip that could get back to our killer. I knew in my head that it was an opportunity to good to miss but in my heart, I didn’t want the shame and embarrassment.

“Fine, we go back we dance together, we talk to no-one else, after a dance to show everyone I’m a schmuck who has forgiven you your whoring ways we go to our room.”

“Not ideal, but it will work sufficiently” he acquiesced, and we made our way back to the house together.

Chapter Text

As promised, we stayed long enough for one dance. Luckily Ellie wasn’t to be seen. To Sherlock’s credit he was contrite and meek as we said goodnight to my friends, basically the human version of a dog after being found surrounded by a pile of foam sofa filling. It made it slightly more tolerable but only slightly.

We arrived back in the room and Beth proceeded to get ready for bed in silence while I sat in the rooms only chair and feigned being in my mind palace. Once she was in the bathroom I slipped from the room with my phone and placed urgent calls.
“Hello, why are you calling? You always bloody text. Anyway, I thought you were at that wedding? Don’t…”
“Shut up, I need Mary,” I interrupted.
“Why ring me then?”
“She didn’t answer.”
“She’s putting Rosie to bed.”
“Swap, I need her now.”
“No, but luckily for you she’s on her way down now.” There followed a brief period of hushed voices as they spoke to each other and then Mary’s voice spoke.
“Sherlock, what’s up?” It was clear that the call was now on speaker, but I didn’t have the time to berate them for it, and it wasn’t worth the bother as they would share whatever I told one with the other.
“Why do I care?” I asked biting the bullet.
“About what?” Mary’s puzzled voice responded.
“I upset Beth, why do I care about this? I barely know her. More importantly what do I do about it?”
“I need more information to help you with this Sherlock. What did you do?”
“I made an assumption that she knew why I was here and have embarrassed her apparently.”
Mary didn’t need anymore information than that to be able to understand what had happened, it was the key reason why it had to be Mary I asked, it would have taken far too much time and awkwardness to go over it with John.
“You need to apologise.”
“I have, she is still not talking to me.”
“Don’t be factual about it, explain that it upsets you that you have upset her. Tell her how you feel about it. Sherlock, I think she understands that you find this difficult, she will most probably be willing to explain why she is upset. Ask her what she would have preferred you to do and listen to her answers.”
What Mary said made sense, and Beth did understand, even when she was in midst of her upset earlier, she had begun explaining why. With a plan in his head, he hung up the phone without saying another word.
He did read the text message he got 30 seconds later though before putting the plan into action.
- You care about upsetting her Sherlock because she is your friend at the very least. Mary x

When Beth came out of the bathroom, she found the room lit by only the bedside lamp closest to Sherlock who was already in bed, but unlike normal he was neither already asleep nor on his phone. She put her own bedside lamp on, and he remained where he was, sat up against the headboard, legs under the duvet. She was aware of him watching her as she put bits and pieces away. He remained silent until she had got into bed beside him, instantly turning on her side facing away from him. She felt him move slightly and his light was turned off then he settled himself on his back. The room was quiet as they listened to the dulled noise of the party still going on below.

Just as she was about to turn off her own lamp he spoke. His voice as he talked wasn’t emotional, it was perfectly steady, but it was missing its normal self-assurance, his talking pace slower than the normal stream of consciousness she had grown to expect from him. He was choosing his words carefully; it wouldn’t have been noticeable if you were unfamiliar with his normal cadence.
“I am sorry. It was never my intention to go back on our agreement. I was short sighted, I made assumptions that you understood, which on reflection were idiotic as I had in no way even implied what my plan was.” At this point he paused turning on his side so that he was facing me and placed his hand gently on the top of my arm before he continued.
“I feel stupid that I didn’t pause to fully appreciate how this situation would be embarrassing and upsetting for you,” again there was a slight pause before he continued. “I find understanding others emotional responses difficult sometimes. You began explaining to me earlier but I would like to fully understand at some point in the future so I can try and not do the same again.”
I was not expecting an apology in which Sherlock called himself idiotic and stupid. I was thrown not quite knowing how to respond. The issue was complex, embarrassment in front of my friends was a large part of it and one that I had no problem in explaining to Sherlock. But this was compounded by the fact that it had been Ellie’s leg he was running his hand up, and more importantly, and secretly, that I wished it had been my leg.
“Thank you for apologising Sherlock.” I turned and went to give him a kiss on the cheek. I don’t know how but instead of his cheek I glanced the corner of his mouth and that was all it took for the jealousy and longing that I had been containing to come spilling out. Rather than pulling away I slid my lips to cover his more fully.
They had shared kisses before, this felt infinitely different, somehow tender but unyielding. A demanding of response from each other that slowly deepened. Sherlock's response was instantaneous, gently surging up so that what had been initiated by her was now controlled by him. When need for oxygen forces them to draw away, he doesn’t move further than he needs to be able to see her face. By the light of the solitary lamp, they study the other, and without a word they both surge back together.