I put my lot all in. He was right. Sentiment did get involved, but he really was impervious. Just as that other one. Moriarty – he knew what price he was exacting. I found later what he had just done. Pulled him back from the brink at the poolside to play with him a little more, string him up like his marionette. Playing the Holmes boys as I had called them – no – that was suggested too – as HE had called them, against each other.
I was so transparent, all the while. I thought I had him under my thumb and it felt good. A great power play against two of the smartest men alive. Three, if you counted that at that moment I thought I had gotten the wool over on Moriarty at the same time.
Then that masterful flip. I was humiliated and thrilled at the same time – not that I am a stranger to the mixture there, I just typically deal the mix, not receive it. But then, his eyes – I had gone much too far. Moriarty had it wrong, this was the Holmes who could play it ice cold.
Bereft of my protection, my life was simply hung out to dry. He absolutely and precisely knew what he was doing. It was only a matter of time. I did not beg lightly or for no reason. Much, much too far indeed.
As I knealt in the sand a few weeks later, I was astonished that an infidel and woman such as I was granted a last request, but even a desert warlord can have his softer side. I sent the text, a quick goodbye. My first thought was that I was doing it to drive a knife in him and let him know that this was ultimately his doing. But it really wasn't. It was my doing, as it always had been. I really, truly wanted to have one last connection with that astonishing man who had finally bested me.
And for only the second time, he replied.
A/N: Inspired by the song "Hang Me Up to Dry" by The Cold War Kids