Sherlock Holmes was dead.
She was sure of it now. Her contract was to kill John Watson if Sherlock Holmes returned, and she had got close to John, looked outside and inside the man. There was no way that John was faking his grief. Sherlock Holmes was definitely dead.
The whisper on the street was that Moriarty was also dead. Honest to God dead! What was she to do now? If she didn't have to be here, then she could just leave this place and start another life. This wasn't her idea of excitement, being a nurse in a two-bit surgery, dealing with patients problems and cleaning vomit off of couches. She was so much more than this.
Then again, she had worked for over a year on the Mary Morstan identity. She remembered those first few months when she had seduced little David just to see how well she could keep up the act. It was easier than she had thought. No one ever suspected a receptionist and nurse of being an assassin. But pretending to be ordinary had consequences. David had never let go of her, and as a normal person, she wasn't allowed to kill him or to run away. She looked at her phone to find another text.
[Just wondering if you are OK. Tea? - David]
She sneered, then she looked up to make sure that no one had seen. David was ordinary. She hated him. He was boring and a coward. She didn't want to let him touch her again, but Mary Morstan wouldn't text back to tell him so. She wouldn't spit in his face and toss him off a roof to be impaled on a metal spike. Mary wouldn't even think of such a thing, because Mary was a nice girl.
John Watson wasn't boring, despite the way he looked. She could see his thoughts in the curl of his lip, and the slant of his eye. He wouldn't flinch at a good impaling. She smiled. In many ways, this life was good. There was none of the dirt and pain of hiding in cramped spaces to avoid those sent to kill you. There wasn't the constant moving, the constant suspicion of everything and everyone. There was the anonymity of life among the masses where you looked just like any other person. Where you didn't constantly have to fear that there was a gun pointed at your back. And there was the odd pleasure of having hobbies again. She had taken up baking in her spare time, and brought breads to the surgery. Strange. She would have never imagined liking this, but something about beating the dough and rolling it tight comforted her. Who would think that a woman who had bored into a diplomat's skull with a cork screw would enjoy making pastries in her spare time. It was hilarious.
She laughed, and that was something worth noting. She never used to laugh, not before she met John. He was funny in a quiet understated way. He made sick jokes that she couldn't help but appreciate. He would tilt his head down after he said them, as if he were ashamed to make fun of a man being gored to death in the stupid horror movie that they had attended on their fifth date. She had burst out laughing then, drawing stares, and he had smiled at her. That was when she had first thought that it might not be so bad if this was how she ended her life.
She thought of him now, funny, sad, handsome John. She could have him. If her job was done, and she didn't need to kill him, then maybe she could keep him. She could remain Mary Morstan. Take the occasional job somewhere far away just to keep her hand in things, and then come home to this place, and John. And maybe, years from now, when she was old and thinking of retiring, she might tell him about what she had done for a living. He might even like it. Would probably like it, although he'd say that he hated it at first. He might even ask her to wear her tight black catsuit and pretend that he was her target, she would let him tackle her, and the sex would be magnificent. She could imagine him licking his lips as she approached, gun in hand. She sighed.
"I can keep him. Why not? Who is there to stop me?"
She erased David's text message and sent one of her own.
[John. Fancy seeing another movie? The Glendale Garroter is showing?]
A few minutes later her phone beeped in reply.
[Great. After work then.]
She smiled down at the phone and then looked around to make sure that no one had seen. She might... she could... she would keep John as her own, and if anyone tried to stop her... well, that's what bullets were made for.