Disclaimer: This fan fiction is not written for profit and no infringement of copyright is intended. Not beta read, so all mistakes are mine. Please note that the following story will eventually contain references to completely consensual bondage with a female domme. If this squicks you, I suggest (with respect) that you do not continue reading. If on the other hand you do… Well, us bossy ones have to stick together, now don't we?

- CLEAN-

The first time it happens, it takes him completely by surprise.

They're in St. Bart's, he's just peed in a cup and Molly has just gotten the entirely expected, entirely positive- or negative, depending on how you look at it- results of said peeing. She's not happy. Which is probably why she's just slapped him.

Hard.

Three Times.

On the face.

It's really, really, really bloody painful.

Embarrassing too- horrifyingly so- though he won't admit it. The echo of the hurt is ricocheting through his skin, making his bones vibrate slightly and oh but that is an unexpected sensation. Oh but that is wild and sharp and bright. Especially when mixed in with the effects of the narcotics and his body's own strange, jittering reaction to such abuse-

For a split second Sherlock frowns, caught entirely off-guard by his feelings. By their… giddiness. Their visceral appeal and delight. And that doesn't happen often, to a man with a mind such as his. He doesn't permit it to.

So he does what he always does: He lashes out.

Makes a sarcastic, uncaring comment about Molly's broken engagement, the better to regain the upper hand with her. The better to disavow his own reaction and force responsibility for it back onto her. Molly stares at him in disgust. Anger. Orders him to take it back. Tells him what he's going to do-

And nobody, with the exception of his mother, has ever been permitted to do that.

So he refuses her. Gives her nothing but his silence. His contempt. Watches as she throws him a disgusted look and stalks- there really is no other word for it- to the other side of the room. She seems to feel his mere nearness a contagion now. John's yammering on about being able to talk with him, about how he shouldn't have gone anywhere near the drugs. As if, had Sherlock actually decided to go back to his addiction, he would have been so stupid as to use a crack house John might turn up at.

As if he'd ever been the sort of addict who wanted to be caught.

But it doesn't matter, because Sherlock sees the way Molly's looking at him now that he's answered her back and he has to get out of there. He wants to take down Magnusson too, it's true, but more than that he wants out of that room. Out of that conversation. Out of that moment, where Molly Hooper will hit him and yell at him and make him feel… What?

Guilt? Anger? Fear? Shame?

Some useless, adolescent combination of all three?

No, the answer hits him square in the chest as soon as he exits the building: Desire. The thing he feels curling in his belly is desire. Desire Molly put there, desire for Molly herself. Desire that was ignited by the feel of that small, strong hand striking his face and the simple fact of that is absolutely confounding. Terrifying. So wholly unwelcome that he hasn't the words to articulate it, to himself or anyone else. Sherlock shakes his head, tries to calm himself. He can't stand the notion of anyone noticing how he's reacting to what she did. It's not- He's not- They're not-

This is not his area.

This is not something which happens to him, no matter what The Woman may have claimed.

But though he tells himself that it's the drugs talking, and tells himself that it's her frustration talking, and tells himself that it's the adrenaline of challenging Magnusson talking, he can't bring himself to believe it-

Eventually he manages to calm himself and heads for Baker Street, John in tow.

All the way there he feels the press of Molly's small, perfect hand against his face.

He falls into bed that afternoon, after having shuffled poor, normal, convenient Janine out of Baker Street and when he closes his eyes it's Molly's furious face he sees. Molly's furious face he wants, for all that he knows he should be focussing on Magnusson.

Lady Smallwood is relying on him, after all.

But though he knows where his attention should lie, it's Molly who monopolises it. Deep inside his Mind Palace she's telling him to apologise to the people who love him and with every strike of her hand he knows that she puts herself on that list. Puts herself at the top of that list.

It's such a comfort, being in a self-made darkness and knowing that she cares.

So Sherlock lies in his bed, feeling the slow, trickling effect of the drugs leaving his system. As he does so he replays the scene again, over and over. Every inch of his Molly's reaction slowed and stroked and coaxed into blissfully overwhelming detail. Every timbre and cadence of her voice replayed for his pleasure, his and his alone. The mixture of it feels elating, invigorating. Sin in his veins and sin behind his eyes, in his eardrums. Sin underneath his finger-nails, in the very pores of his skin.

It feels almost like a new addiction, the same delight, the same shame in it. The same danger.

And just like his other cravings, he knows this one carries the capacity for annihilation in its very DNA.

He dreams of her again, when he's under in the hospital. Dreams of her talking to him, telling him he has to fight. Taking him through his being shot again, making him work out how he's going to survive. But these dreams don't stay like the ones in his mind palace; No, these become lazy. Dizzy. Intoxicating. Safe. They feel a little like being a high and a lot like being loved and Sherlock's not entirely sure which dismays him more-

Because both might prove lethal to the man he thinks he'll have to become to keep those he loves from harm.

When he wakes they flee, dismissed and then forgotten in the light of day and the flush of Mary's betrayal and his subsequent killing of Magnusson. He doesn't try to recall them- he won't even admit to them- for all that he wishes Molly would come to see him in hospital, or that he'd gotten a chance to see her before he turned murderer and was taken into custody. He would have liked to speak to her again.

It's a funny thing to report though: the night before he's about to go into exile, Sherlock thinks constantly about John and Mary and the child they'll be able to raise in safety now. The child who will never know him. But when he closes his eyes and falls asleep, it's Molly he dreams of. Molly slapping his face. Molly telling him there were people who loved him, telling him his gifts were beautiful and not cursed…

He's always known he was a freak, but if these are the terms of his aberration, he supposes they're not so bad.

He gets on Mycroft's plane the next day with John before his eyes and Molly behind them, and he never says a word about how much he understands just what he's leaving behind.