Chapter Three
"You're too nice to everybody." Donovan decided one day as she and Lestrade sprawled halfway over each other on the couch watching TV in their pyjamas and sharing a bag of chips like a pair of teenagers. "That's why you don't get any dates. All the girls think you're dating someone else."
Lestrade could only shift his leg from under hers in an attempt at a kick only because his hand was holding a cigarette. "They probably think I'm dating you. I live with you." he grumbled.
"Yup, they don't love you like I do." Donovan nodded sagely.
Lestrade kicked again. "Get up, I'm going to make some coffee, you want?"
"I want!" Donovan exclaimed eagerly like a child.
Lestrade scoffed as he disentangled himself from her, extinguished his cigarette in the ashtray on the coffee table and walked into their second floor kitchenette. "You are such a kid on your days off."
"I just want to stay in my pyjamas all day and roll around like a lazy arse until bedtime." Donovan raised her hand in a lazy 'peace' sign.
"You're so weird." Lestrade laughed, then happened to glance out of their small kitchen window.
He stopped and stared.
"Um, Donovan." he began. "Hold the thought. You might want to get changed."
"Why?" Donovan whined.
"I think someone's trying to steal Mr. Bunter's laundry." Lestrade looked at her, completely deadpan.
Donovan dashed over. "Mr. Bunter is the bloke two houses down?" she asked, pushing him aside and peering out of the window.
Sure enough, someone was scaling the water pipe to the second floor porch where Mr. Bunter's laundry was hanging out to dry.
"What the bloody Hell?" Donovan cursed under her breath and dashed off to change.
Lestrade, who's sleepwear was loose drawstring pants and a T-shirt, simply stuffed his feet into some shoes, and jogged across the street to the house in question.
He stood under it and looked up. "Um, excuse me?"
The would-be thief paused his climbing and looked down. "What?" he hissed.
"Holy shit, Sherlock?" Lestrade gaped.
"Hello, Lestrade." Sherlock responded casually, panting slightly from the exertion of climbing up the water pipe.
"What the Hell are you doing?" Lestrade asked him sharply.
"I need to take a look at Mr. Bunter's shoes." Sherlock told him matter-of-factly.
"You need a what?"
Donovan finally caught up to them. "You need to get down here right now, is what you need to do!" she shrieked.
"Just a moment." Sherlock said. "This is a matter of life and death, you see?"
"How...?" Donovan threw her hands up. "You know what? I don't care. I'm going to call for someone to bring a car around, you're coming down to the station with me!"
"First off, why don't we tell Mr. Bunter someone's trying to break into his flat?" Lestrade suggested calmly.
"Don't be ridiculous." Sherlock said. "Mr. Bunter's been in a holding cell down at the Yard for the last four hours."
"How was I supposed to know that?" Lestrade frowned up at him. "Do I look like a cop to you?"
"No, but she is." Sherlock nodded his head in Donovan's direction.
"You said it was a matter of life and death?" Donovan asked.
"Yes, see I was hired by Mr. Bunter." Sherlock told them as he continued his upward ascent. "He was caught up in a murder case. The police think he committed a murder he didn't commit and the evidence of his innocence happens to be on the bottom of his shoes in the form of mud. If I get those shoes, I can prove he wasn't at the crime scene at the time of the crime. He's lucky it rained."
"I'll get the police on it." Donovan called out. "Get down, you git."
"I told them they were missing a vital piece of evidence." Sherlock complained as he disappeared over the edge of the porch momentarily before poking his head back over with a pair of sodden sneakers in hand. "The idiot in charge didn't believe me."
Lestrade looked from Donovan to Sherlock. "Which idiot?"
"Some detective inspector named Dimmock." Sherlock told them, bagging the shoes.
Donovan let out a noise of disapproval. "That's my governor you're talking about!"
"He's a fool." Sherlock told her.
"You...!" Donovan seethed, then she yelped when Sherlock dropped the bagged evidence down at them. "Hey! Watch it!"
But Sherlock was already climbing back down the way he had gotten up.
"Oh yeah, because that's not dangerous at all." Lestrade said dryly. "You know that water pipe is older than Methuselah?"
Suddenly, there was a creaking noise of rusty metal bending and suddenly Sherlock came raining down on them.
Lestrade just managed to step forward and stretch out his arms fast enough to break his fall and both were sent crashing to the hard ground.
Both men yelled in pain.
Sherlock rolled off Lestrade, groaning and clutching his left shin. "Cheers, Lestrade." he grumbled through gritted teeth.
Lestrade cradled the arm that had been pinned under Sherlock's weight. "If I'd known it would happen, I wouldn't have said it."
"Both of you are idiots!" Donovan yelled, already snapping out short, curt phrases on her phone. "Are you two okay?"
"Fine." Sherlock replied quickly. Too quickly.
"I'll live." Lestrade ground out.
Donovan rolled her eyes. "Boys." she sighed, exasperated. "I'm calling an ambulance."
"Well, this has been an experience." Lestrade deadpanned as he sat on a hospital bench, his arm in a sling. He was still in his pyjamas.
Sherlock, who was sitting on the other end of the bench with his foot in a cast, grunted.
"This has actually never happened to me before." Lestrade continued. "This is weird."
Sherlock grunted again.
"Sherlock?" a voice called out and both men turned. A fleshy man with glasses stood a short ways down the hall looking flustered. "Getting into trouble again?"
"Mike." Sherlock nodded curtly.
"I was just visiting a colleague when I thought I saw someone familiar." Stamford smiled sympathetically, then, he belatedly noticed Lestrade almost hidden from view behind Sherlock's towering frame. "Oh, hi there."
"Hi, I'm Sherlock's accident-mate." Lestrade extended his non-sprained hand. "Greg Lestrade."
"Mike Stamford." Stamford introduced himself and took his hand, shaking it. "What happened?"
"This idiot climbed up a water pipe." Lestrade said, pointing at Sherlock. "And then he fell down."
"You jinxed me." Sherlock retorted, crossing his arms.
Lestrade moved to cross his own arms, remembered his sling, and instead crossed his legs. He grinned cheekily at Sherlock, Sherlock glared back. "It's all in your head. Jinxes don't actually work."
"They do, if done correctly." Stamford and Lestrade jumped at the new voice.
"Mycroft! What are you doing here?" Sherlock groaned.
"Come to pick you up, brother dear." Mycroft replied smugly. "I am your next of kin, after all. Really now, at your age and still needing to be bailed out of trouble."
"I can take care of myself." Sherlock snapped.
"The legal system thinks otherwise." Mycroft responded coolly.
"It thinks what you want it to." Sherlock seethed.
"Wait, you have a brother?" Stamford asked. "You never told me that."
"There are many things Sherlock doesn't flaunt." Mycroft smiled at him politely. "I am at the very top of that list. We do not get along." He held out a hand almost primly. "Mycroft Holmes, and you must be Mike Stamford."
"Uh, yeah." Stamford stammered, shaking his hand.
Mycroft turned his icy gaze on Lestrade. He stopped still, taking in Lestrade's sleepwear. "And you are?"
"Greg Lestrade." Lestrade shook his hand as well and smiled. "I discovered your brother in my garbage spot."
Sherlock rolled his eyes.
"Oh... how very..." Mycroft blinked, momentarily at a loss for words at Lestrade's frankness. "Well, I hope he wasn't too much trouble."
"Not that time, no." Lestrade shrugged with a smile.
Mycroft smiled and released his hand, inhaling softly. Then, he turned and raised his eyebrow at Sherlock. "Tomatoes." he murmured under his breath.
"None of your business." Sherlock hissed back quietly.
"Sorry, what?" Lestrade asked.
"Nothing." Mycroft smiled politely. "I'm afraid my brother has inconvenienced you both dearly. Thank you for bringing him in. Mister Lestrade, I pray for a speedy recovery." He nodded at them. "Good day."
Then he turned and walked off, Sherlock trailing reluctantly behind him.
Lestrade wrinkled his nose a little and looked at Stamford. "Do I smell like tomatoes?" he asked self-consciously.
