A/N: This chapter starts post the actual kidnapping. The next chapter details what happened before. You can flip-flop the chapters, or read them in this order, it doesn't matter, but this is the order that I wrote them in and I think it's interesting to read this way.

By the way, tiny spoiler for TSiB, just a passing reference to when Irene drugged Sherlock at her house. -Bree

Disclaimer: I don't own anything recognizable

Anyways, enjoy!

Chapter 1- Sherlock

I groggily opened my eyes. A hood was pulled over my head, so I couldn't see anything, but I could feel that I was tied to a chair. My mouth was duct taped shut. My left temple throbbed and that side of my head was sticky with blood.

Suddenly the hood was tugged off my head, and I was momentarily blinded by the brightly lit room. It was a lavish room; small, but clearly owned by someone rich, judging by the furniture. In front of me stood the two guards from before and between them was a woman. She was about my age, but short, with long dark hair. She had an imposing air and was wearing an expensive dress; she must be the guards' employer.

"This is him?" her voice was silky, and it made her sound young.

"Of course, Victoria." One of the guards replied.

Victoria came forward, putting two fingers under my chin and tipping my head back, forcing me to look at her. "What a pretty gift you've brought me." Her hand brushed my hair off my face, her fingertips tracing my jaw, my cheekbones, and finally, she gingerly touched the bridge of my nose. I was surprised to find that it hurt, and guessed that the guard's knife had slashed it earlier instead of missing it as I'd thought.

Victoria pursed her lips. "That's a nasty gash you gave him."

"Just making him cooperate, ma'am." stated one of the guards.

"Well, it was unnecessary." She spoke so sharply that the guard actually flinched. "I'm going to fix him up. Excuse me." She purred, back to her harmless, sweet tone, and left briefly before returning with a bottle filled with some kind of liquid and a cloth.

The guards exchanged glances as she poured some of the fluid onto the cloth and proceeded to gently clean the wounds on both my nose and my temple. Once she was finished, she stepped back to admire her work. "Now doesn't he look better, Andy?"

The guard who she had scolded for cutting me answered stiffly. "Yes, ma'am."

"Glad you think so." Then she leaned toward me and whispered in my ear, "This is going to hurt." Without any other warning, she ripped the duct tape off my mouth. I winced at the sudden pain.

"There." Victoria crumpled the tape into a ball and tossed it away.

"Ma'am, are you sure that was-" started Andy, who was clearly the mouthpiece of the two guards.

Victoria glared at him. "Well, who else is going to tell me what his name is?"

Andy shrugged. "I don't know."

"I don't know what?"

"I don't know, ma'am."

"That's right." She turned again to me. "Who are you?"

I hesitated, trying to come up with a viable alias.

"Please do skip the false name. I'll find out if you're lying anyway, and it's quicker if you cut to the chase. Come on, speak up, I don't bite." She sounded impatient, so I complied.

"My name is Sherlock Holmes."

Victoria whistled. "Interesting name you've got. Let's see if you're being truthful." She turned to the guards. "Andy, Flynn, look him up for me." They wordlessly walked out of the room.

Once they were gone, I looked at Victoria. "Why bother with that? You already knew who I am."

She smiled. "'Course I do. They don't know that I do, though." She paused. "How did you know that I recognized you?"

"Easy. When they pulled the hood off me, the look on your face was enough, coupled with your glance at the newspaper on that desk over there afterward and the guards' confusion at your behavior towards me. You wouldn't act like this for any old hostage, no, you expected someone different. You thought they'd just kidnap any random suitable man off the street, not someone as well-known as I am. You're being nice to me because you know they'll find me here and if I've been mistreated, that's just more condemning evidence on you. So you decided to play the part of the savior, maybe even call the police yourself, and rat out your guards. You never liked them anyway, as they were always condescending. You'll bribe me to stay silent about your actual role in this. You can kill two birds with one stone; get rid of your annoying employees and get yourself out of danger." I stopped, realizing I'd said far too much. I cursed myself for wanting to show off.

Throughout my speech, several different emotions flashed across Victoria's face- first shock, then irritation, and, lastly, odd surrender. "You're right. You're right about all of it. Except that it's all been done before. I did kidnap a mildly famous man, among lots of other ordinary ones, a time ago. You might remember it. It was all over the news: how I had heroically rescued the poor man from his vicious captors." She laughed. It was a shrill, high-pitched laugh. "I gave him a nice bit of cash for his trouble, obviously, and that was all there was to it."

"Why go through all that expense, though, just to get me?" I was honestly curious.

"I was simply prematurely clearing my name with that first guy, removing all suspicion. You're the real prize, Sherlock." She drew out my name, rolling it on her tongue. "You were the target from the beginning. I need you. Not for ransom, not to solve a crime. You're just going to stay with me for a while."

"And what does that entail?" I asked tentatively, not sure if I wanted to know the answer.

"Oh, don't look so scared. I'm not going to have sex with you or anything." Seeing my relieved look, she went on. "You'll be my protection in two ways. One: if the police do catch up on me, as I'm sure they will eventually, I'll threaten to kill you unless they give me what I want."

"And what is that?"

"Freedom from conviction, and relief from my debt."

"You do realize that's an incredibly flimsy and overused plan." I pointed out. "It doesn't have a chance of working."

"That's where the other way that you're my protection comes into play. You'll be my personal bodyguard. I've got a select line of work, and sometimes I need to get my hands dirty, come in contact with killers, that kind of thing. My other guards are far too aggravating to do something like this, and I think you're the best man for the job."

"I'll never agree to that, you know." I replied stubbornly.

She sighed. "Well, the other option is to drug you the whole time you're here, and I promise that won't be fun."

I shuddered at the memory of my initial meeting with Irene. "In that case… I'll reconsider."

She nodded. Clearly she'd anticipated this. "I thought you might. In the meantime, I'll explain why I needed you in particular, before you ask." She started ticking off her fingers. "You know self-defense, which is crucial in a bodyguard; you're clever, and I won't be associated with someone stupid; you're relatively prominent, so you'll be missed but not too much; you're good at what you do, and that means, had someone else been in your place, you'd probably find me sooner than the police can, and you can't exactly do that now; perhaps most importantly, you're physically attractive."

The last item on the list threw me for a loop. "You kidnapped me because you think I'm good-looking?" I questioned, incredulous.

Victoria huffed. "For the record, I do think you're beautiful, but that's not solely the reason I picked you. Anyway, I'm guessing you've already made your decision about accepting my terms of your stay."

She made it sound like we were making a business deal. "I'll be your bodyguard, if that's what you want. I'm not sure I have much of a choice in the matter anyway. It's a rather unusual demand for an abductor to make."

"Well, I'm not your usual abductor, am I?" She arched a thin eyebrow.

"Point taken." I paused. There was more to this than she was telling me. People didn't kidnap other people just to get a bodyguard. "You could have just asked me in the first place."

Victoria pursed her lips. "You would have said no. This is easier anyways. Less of a hassle." She walked behind me, where I couldn't see her. Her hands brushed at the back of my neck. I tensed.

"Relax." She breathed, but I couldn't.

"What are you-" my question tapered off in a gasp as fingertips pressed on either side of my neck, squeezing hard. It hurt more than I expected. Stars exploded in my vision. I must have blacked out for a time, because the next time I opened my eyes, I had been released from the chair and was lying in a large bed, still in the same room.

Victoria stood by me, the ghost of a smile on her face. "Pressure points. Thirty seconds and you pass out. Another half-minute and you'd be dead."

I sat up. "Kind of you not to kill me when you had the chance." Sarcasm dripped from my voice.

The harmless look on her face was back, as if she was pleading with me. "Oh, don't be like that. I need you, remember? You were only even out for five minutes. I just didn't trust you not to run when I untied you, and, besides, I thought you should try out this bed. You'll be a guest here for a while."

I swung my legs off the bed and stood next to her, the top of her head not even reaching my shoulder. "And you trust me not to run now?"

In response she held up a gun. "I took the precaution of grabbing this while you were unconscious."

Inferring from her earlier comment about her job and my own observations, I was sure that she had experience with the weapon. "It's not likely you'll kill me. That wouldn't end well for you. Tranquilizers, then?"

She nodded. "And there are always a few bullets if it comes to it."

"It won't."

"I figured you'd say that." She shifted the gun to a hip holster: more evidence of her skill. "I already sent Andy and Flynn off so they won't bother us and we can get onto business. You seem willing enough to cooperate- given the alternatives –so this shouldn't be too difficult. My profession is, like I said, unusual. To be specific, I keep the cops off of convicts' backs. Lots of people can get the job done, but only some of them can do it smoothly. I help with that, and, as you can see-" She gestured around the expensively decorated room. "-I am paid rather well, because people will do anything to stay out of jail." She shrugged, like it was a total accident that she ended up as the clean-up crew for criminals.

"You do realize that assisting felons is a crime, and that you just told me, a detective, all of that?"

She waved the question away. "Of course I knew what I was getting into. Besides, you won't be able to tell the police anything for a good while, will you?" she smiled sweetly, and I realized with some horror that I had no idea what I was getting into.