Because Torture means 'to Twist'
A series of murders is related by an unsettling factor; Sherlock and John unravel the mystery whilst deciphering their own innermost workings. Could the murders be hitting closer to home than they thought? Johnlock.
Rating: Blanket rating of M for references to murder, torture, sexual intercourse, and violence.
Pairing: Sherlock Holmes/John Watson
Nothing belongs to me; characters and universe belong to the BBC production of Sherlock. This is written purely for enjoyment, no infringements on copyright are intended and no profit is being made from this story.
ALL BOW TO THE AMAZING BETA: Nostalgic-Romance. Thank you! :3
A/N: Thanks so everyone for the reviews, alerts and favourites! I can't tell you how wonderful it feels to see a new review waiting in your email inbox; it's really lovely. :)
Chapter Two: West End Thespian
There was one yellow-shaded bulb hanging in the middle of the corridor; it was swinging slightly from the breeze blowing in through the open window.
Just beyond the oval of light, two figures hunch against the wall, one standing up with his back to the other, kneeling at a door, making odd scrabbling noises.
"Are you bloody done yet?"
"Oh stop complaining, you know my best set was pocketed by Lestrade."
"And thank god he didn't arrest you, you idiot."
"Psh, the evidence was circumstantial at best."
"If you don't hurry your arse up I'll tell you exactly how 'circumstantial' the evidence of our arrest will be."
There was a smooth click.
"There; we're in."
John sighed with relief and toed through the doorway, the long shadow that was Sherlock on his heels.
The apartment was rather bohemian, John assessed. The beam of his torch drew over a dark wooden demi-lune; keys cradled in a grey beaded basket, large, multi-coloured rugs that seemed to be made of rolled ropes of thread, with the uneven dye patches and frayed edges of something hand-made. The walls were bright yellow between large framed posters; most of which were replicas of artworks and advertisements for dramatic productions.
Sherlock muttered his way around, nudging at the rainbow of book spines that lined the walls of what appeared to be a sitting room, the TV rather an afterthought, shoved into a nook with a patterned throw over it, and a roughly pottered blue vase squatting on top, complete with sprigs of lavender protruding stiffly, a parody of an antenna.
Sherlock disappeared around the corner. John turned in the opposite direction and scoped out the kitchen and bathroom. Nothing he could identify of significance except, he smiled wryly, a notable lack of any cosmetics, let alone one that smelled of oranges.
"In here!" He heard Sherlock's excited hiss from the recesses of the flat. John found him in the bedroom, eyes rifling through the contents of a white dressing-table drawer.
John's eyes roved over the rouge-coloured room; a black oriental paper lamp shaded the hanging globe, and on the edge of the quilt-covered bed sat a laptop that Sherlock had already booted up and hacked into. The dressing table that Sherlock loomed over was crowned with jewellery, a mixture of gaudy cheap costume and shimmering slivers of delicate chains.
"The reason I used your hand on the body." Whispered Sherlock softly but triumphantly, holding a plastic baggie aloft. It seemed to be... rather luridly pink.
Sherlock just waited, his eyes fixed on John, the only glint of radiance in a matte blur of obscurity. A moment of nonplussed consternation pulsed by.
"What is it?" John said.
Sherlock sagged dramatically, sighing lowly.
"Dental dams, John."
"Oh!" John said, understanding dawning, then fading." No way, how could you have gotten to that from the weird powder I scooped up?"
Sherlock stepped closer, the bag of amusingly pink dental dams back in the drawer, a one sided smile tugging at his right cheek.
"It wasn't a powder," Sherlock[13] said, "It was her skin, flaking off because of an allergic reaction."
John grimaced and peered with displeasure at his own appendage - gloved also - as a precaution against leaving accidental fingerprints.
Sherlock carried on with his explanation.
"She displayed an allergic reaction, but the affected area was extremely localized."
Sudden spindly fingers crept around the back of John's hand and pried the absently curled grasp open. John struggled down a jolt at the sudden invasion of personal space.
Sherlock flattened out john's acquiescent hand.
"Here and here," He said as he brushed a touch over the tips and the wrist. "And at the corners of her mouth. Meaning, of course, that whatever she reacted to she had only handled, and also, well..."
John nodded. One of Sherlock's hands dropped away, but the leather-fingered circlet around the middle of his palm remained.
"An allergy of this sort is commonly caused by an aversion to a metal alloy or a plastic. The area of the reaction means it was unlikely to be a metal, Localized to the fingers and wrist, but not the palm, particularly? So it was latex, which of course has just been confirmed."
John was registering the words a few seconds after they were spoken, trapped in the crackling intensity of Sherlock's musings.
"That, and the 'hidden' literature, 'hidden' pornography folder and certain correspondence with a Miss Gloria Meadows on her Facebook account all tell us that Miss Veronica Dalton was a lesbian."
John's eyes crinkled as he grinned. The heat from his brown-clad hand was seeping into the black-clad fingers Sherlock still had looped around him.
"Amazing..." He breathed.
"Naturally," Sherlock replied slowly, mirth toying at the dimples in his face.
A loud clang and an indignant 'Mraow!' broke the tension and shot them through with adrenaline.
They wrenched away from each other and into the curves of the deeper shadows. Nothing happened for few jittery, panicked seconds. Eventually John broke the silence.
"Have you got what you need?" He asked in a mutter.
Sherlock nodded then voiced a 'yes' when he remembered John couldn't see a nod in the dark.
"Then let's get out of here."
Not a soul except for two scraggly alley-cats saw them creep down the fire escape and hurry away from the building.
Back in the cosiness of 221B, Sherlock was languishing across the couch and John snug in the red squashy armchair; tea in front of them both. John fell into a study, his glance flitting across the prone Consulting Detective.
"John, you're staring."
John blinked and refocused on the detective's face.
"You need to eat more." He said finally.
"Hmm... dull." Sherlock heaved a long-suffering sigh.
John sipped his milky tea and mentally rolled his eyes.
"So what do you figure? Any leads, do you think?"
"Well, you already know the most important nugget of information, John."
"That she was gay? Is that Gloria you mentioned her girlfriend then?"
"It's more complicated than that," Sherlock brought his hands together beneath his chin, frowning. "They're sleeping together, but she was hiding it, that's for sure."
"Oh?"
"Yes," Sherlock said almost absently. "Various books on 'coming out' and other such titles were slipped into false dustcovers, her Facebook proclaimed 'interested in men' and then of course the conversational allusions to 'keeping things quiet' in her replies to Miss Meadow's messages. I suspect it's to do with her hiding her sexuality because her parents would disapprove."
"How did you find the books? No, wait, don't answer that- what did you discover about her parents?"
"Deduce, John, not discover," Sherlock drawled lazily. John merely huffed.
"Well," Sherlock said, "that quilt on her bed was hand-made, and at least as old as she is. She keeps it on her bed but it doesn't quite fit with the decor of the rest of the flat- it has sentimental value. Usually people have no such qualms about leaving mementos from their childhood behind- but not her. Why?"
John shrugged. "Maybe she's just sentimental; it reminds her of something happy."
"Perhaps, but look at the jewellery on her dressing table; everything was haphazard, except for one crucifix: it was lying in a velvet box, placed reverently- must have been a gift, then- but it showed no signs of wear. It was obviously given to her by one or both of her parents, and at an early age if she still keeps it, but she doesn't dare wear it. Why?" Sherlock's eyes were dancing now; he had sat up and was gesticulating with his hands and elbows, prodding at the air, tracing invisible threads of connection.
"She feels guilty? They're traditional; maybe wouldn't deal very well with her being gay?"
"Exactly, John."
"I can understand that, I suppose..." John frowned, gnawing on his bottom lip in thought.
"You're right to wonder, there is more to it."
John raised his eyebrows.
"There was an envelope on a side table in the sitting room, addressed from a Mr and Mrs Dalton, very fine stationary. The letter itself was gone, but judging from her clothes- all genuine brands and all of high quality- and the evidence of overseas travel- the Chilean rugs you surely noticed, as well as the murano glass and the Indian throws- well, it's obvious that her parents have money, and Miss Dalton has been allocated a substantial portion of that money as an allowance, so it seems."
"The letter was some sort of cheque then? Was she killed for her money do you think?"
"Doubt it; the body was placed far too... personally... for it to have been a boring and simple motivation like greed."
John coughed a little laugh.
"Only you would think greed is a 'boring and simple' motive."
Sherlock ignored the comment.
"She is obviously dedicated to the arts, and yet she is a chemical engineer."
"That's not particularly unusual."
"Not a single book on chemistry? No science journals? Not even a New Scientist magazine lying about? She was hardly interested in chemistry as a career. But yet she persists, well into her life, with something that doesn't make her happy."
"Loads of people are saddled with shit jobs, Sherlock. There's always the pressure to make money, not to mention all the pressure from your family who 'just want you to do well for yourself'...oh, I see...her parents pushed her into it?"
Sherlock grinned as John came to the same conclusion he had done.
"They did indeed. Miss Dalton liked her creature comforts too much to give up on her parents' approval. That and she was too cowardly to make her own way in life."
"Sherlock!" John said, appalled.
"What?"
"You can't just call somebody a coward- especially not just 'cause she's trying to shield her folks from what she knows they won't like- she needs their approval, what's so bad about that."
"It's stupid.'
"It's what people feel!"
"Well then obviously people are stupid."
John hung his head in defeat.
"You're a bloody child, you know that?" He said, but his voice held no malice, only a mix of exasperation and affection.
Sherlock stood up and shoved his hands deep in his trouser pockets. John stood up and yawned.
"Get some sleep, Sherlock." John patted him absently on the shoulder as he turned to trudge to his bedroom.
It was a long moment before the slender pillar of Sherlock moved, frozen by the arbitrary contact of John's warm hand.
A/N:
West end thespian: The cockney term for lesbian. You can see it rhymes. I discovered this word and was utterly delighted; it is just too darling. (You can so tell I'm not British)
Dental Dams: Squares of plastic that are meant for safe sex- really they are only used if your partner has genital warts... I was absolutely tickled when I pulled them out of the random (embarrassing) safe sex packs they handed out at my first gay pride parade...they were really absurdly neon pink.
Bulltoast alert: I made up the thing about the allergy to the dental dam plastic. I have heard of allergic reactions to condoms and so it follows that there should be one to dental dams but I have no clue as to what the reaction is. Just roll with it? (sheepish grin)
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