Moriarty is back. Or maybe he isn't, but as of right now Sherlock is too tired to work out as much.

He's not quite sure why he chooses Sussex as his temporary hideout; all he knows is that he needs some space, away from his brother and his concerned friends – even John and Mary.

Janine stares at him in silence, and he can't tell whether her first instinct is to slap him or embrace him; probably both, and she herself cannot decide between the two options. It's only later, as she's making him coffee and he's looking out of the window, that he voices the question which has been tormenting him ever since that fateful evening at Appledore.

"Magnussen said you let him flick your eye. Was he blackmailing you as well?"

She pauses, looks him in the eye for the briefest of moments. "Doesn't matter now. He's dead, thanks to you."

Some confused emotion stirs deep inside of him – it has something to do with caring, though it's not quite the same thing, and he doesn't dare to put a name to it.

"Stay the night?" she asks conversationally, stirring milk into her cup. Her tone seems to suggest his lies have been forgiven, if not forgotten, and he experiences the same pang of longing that pokes him every time he dares to hope he may get to dance after all.

"Probably not a good idea," he replies at length, but she gives him that smile – the one that says she knows what kind of man he is, and she doesn't mind.

And maybe she really doesn't, he muses somewhat idly as their clothes hit the floor of her bedroom not half an hour later. A beguiling selkie now devoid of her skin, and he's glad to be at her mercy at last.

"You're wrong about yourself, you know?" she murmurs lazily as she curls up beside him and drifts off gently towards slumber. His last thought before succumbing to sleep is that she might be right after all.