CHAPTER NINE: STAINS
It's small. The sort of thing that John's default setting as a normal person would completely ignore, and therefore the sort of thing that Sherlock would pull a person's life story from. There seem to be too many of those, John thinks, not entirely bitterly but not too happily, either.
It's very green.
"Looks sort of like a grass stain, except…" John stares at the mark, trying to figure it out. "It's… too dark. And a bit smudgier."
"Lipstick," Sherlock reminds him. He leans over to get a better look, making good use of his magnifying glass. "Well, at least we know one thing."
John takes a moment to breathe out, breathe in. "And what's that?" he asks.
Sherlock looks at him and smirks that smirk of his. "Linda Mason had an unwelcome admirer," he answers.
John tries his best not to gape like an idiot. "Okay, and, how do we know that?" he asks, collecting himself and having a better look.
"The stain isn't just from lipstick," Sherlock explains. His voice is already getting quicker, going into the bullet train of a tone that he uses to shoot off deductions. "Traces of lip liner, which was applied all over the lips as opposed to just the edges. Only women who actually know what they're doing apply lip pencils all over as a base under their lipstick – this says that whoever left this mark wore and applied makeup regularly. The lip liner's green, a very similar shade to the lipstick – the lip pencil was bought specifically to match this seasonal shade of lipstick, but it's not the same brand. This woman didn't just wear makeup, she took it very seriously.
"Traces of skin from where her lips were peeling. There are smudges of concealer and foundation on other parts of the shirt; obviously a woman who was meticulous about her face and skin. Not the type of woman to let her lips get chapped. The lipstick had been applied after the lips were already chapped, and any woman who takes her makeup seriously would be wary of layering lip products on peeling skin, so she must have not have been planning on wearing the lipstick at first. It was a last second decision, possibly when she was already nearing her destination."
"How come you know so much about makeup?" John asks, more suspicious than curious.
Sherlock rolls his eyes. "Makeup can leave valuable marks, as I am currently demonstrating," he snaps.
Despite Sherlock's irritated glare, or possibly because of it, John starts to giggle. "Sorry," he manages, upon receiving an even darker look. "Go on, keep… deducing."
Immediately, Sherlock turns back to the corpse. "This shirt," he begins. John can see his brain ticking. "Button up, stiff collar – doesn't seem to be Mason's usual style, judging by the tan lines around her neck. Very nice brand. Not too expensive, but a bit of a splurge for someone who makes a living off of children's books." He looks closer. "It's about a year old. Been ironed and pressed twice since then. But that's not because she's lazy or can't afford it – the wrinkles are neat, she took very good care of this shirt. Probably the nicest shirt she owned. No, she's only had it pressed twice because she's only worn it twice."
He lifts up the collar, peers underneath. "This was the only presentable shirt she owned – she kept it for formal events and when she wanted to look professional, like when she went to meet with a publisher, as she was scheduled to do the day she died. Most likely going to propose a new book idea. So she must have had this shirt on the day she was sexually assaulted."
John shakes his head, trying to clear it out. "Wait, hold on. How can you know she was assaulted? How do you know she didn't just… have a date with someone? Wait, how do you even know this was left by something sexual?"
Sherlock gives him The Look, the how-can-you-be-such-an-idiot look, and John ignores it. He stares at the corpse, trying to turn his head sideways or cross his eyes or something, trying to see what Sherlock sees. All he sees is a shirt with a stain on it.
"There are still wrinkles around the collar where someone was grabbing her," Sherlock explains, pointing. "One of the buttons is coming off – again, Mason took very good care of this shirt, so it must have been someone else trying to rip it off her. The fabric is stretched here and here, so she tried to pull away, but her attacker was too strong. The makeup is smeared over her shoulder in such a way that could only have been from someone trying to get at her face – a woman, by the lip marking, shorter than Mason but taller than you."
"Watch it," John warns.
"Now really isn't the time to be self-conscious about your height, John."
John bristles. "Well, it's not like you make it any easier for me!"
Sherlock jerks back, affronted. "What do I do?"
"You're a bloody giant," John mutters, staring daggers up at him. "Just… sod it, never mind. You're right, now's not the time."
"If you really wanted to be taller than me," Sherlock snaps, "you know one very simple way to go about it."
Silence.
John's throat goes dry. He stares up at his friend, who seems to be perfectly aware of what he's just said and not about to say anything else on the matter. John's brain isn't working too properly, and he's starting to wonder whose fault that is.
His wings itch terribly underneath his jacket.
After too long of a moment, he looks away. "You know I can't do that," he says, quietly.
Another pause. "Can't," Sherlock repeats, "or won't?"
It's a stab through his temple. "Can't," he answers firmly. Things are flashing through his sub-cranium, now – goddamnit. Bullets. Falling. Swiss Army Knife clattering to the floor, covered in his blood, god damnit. Damn you, Sherlock Holmes. "Can't."
Sherlock looks like he's studying the shirt, but John knows better. It's a long while before he speaks again. "You could," he says, finally. John closes his eyes. "Can. You… you can. I know so."
The silence is growing awkward again, although not so much awkward as the presence of something that could either destroy or recreate the both of them, so John clears his throat. "Deductions," he coughs.
A moment, and Sherlock blinks. "Of course. Yes." Shaken, he turns back to the body and the stain. "This shirt's been washed three times since the stain was created, but it hasn't been worn since – further proof that the sexual advances were unwelcome. After this woman attacked her, she wanted rid of this shirt, since it held the evidence, a reminder, of her assault. However, she couldn't afford to throw it away, so she first tried to wash the stain out. She used a powerful stain remover but no bleach, probably from fear that she'd ruin the material. Still, no matter how hard she tried, the stain wouldn't come out, so she threw it to the bottom of her closet, where it's been sitting for… a month and a half."
"Amazing," John says, partly out of awe and partly out of habit. Sherlock tries to hide the glimmer of pride in his eyes, but John's spent too many years in military training to miss it.
"She only brought the shirt out yesterday, for her meeting," Sherlock continues. "That's evident in her hair – meticulously done, although the texture says that she doesn't take good care of her hair most of the time, so it must have been a really special occasion. She wakes up, gets herself cleaned up, even applies the tiniest bit of tinted chapstick, borrowed from Esme, and when faced with the prospect of getting dressed nicely, she's forced to dig through her closet and put on this shirt."
He pauses, thinking. John blinks. "So… what's that got to do with her death?" he asks.
"She was wearing a cardigan," Sherlock answers. He picks up said cardigan, which he'd peeled off and set on the counter in order to get a better look at the shirt underneath. "It's not a nice or expensive cardigan, so the only reason she could possibly be wearing it would be to cover up the green lipstick stain."
John realizes something, and what Sherlock's just said doesn't fit right. "But…" he begins, hesitantly – "why would she use this cardigan to cover up a stain, when the cardigan's–"
"When the cardigan's got stains of its own?" Sherlock finishes, smiling the smirk again. He holds up the thin fabric, so John can see the collage of food spills and grass stains and smudges of something he really hopes is red paint. It's not the messiest item of clothing he's ever seen, but it's not exactly one he'd wear if he was trying to come off as professional. "Why would she cover up a stained shirt with an even more intensely stained cardigan?"
"I… don't know."
"Because she wasn't hiding the stain from her publisher," Sherlock answers. There's a gleam in his eye – this is the thing, John thinks. The really big thing, that he's been leading up to. Sherlock tosses the cardigan away. "She was hiding the stain from Esme."
"What?" John wrinkles his brow.
"It's all so obvious, John!" Sherlock exclaims, starting to walk out the door. John follows. "Whomever attacked Linda a month or so ago, Linda doesn't want Esme to know about it. That's one of the reasons she tried so hard to get rid of the stain in the first place. She's been hiding the stain, and the shirt, from Esme all this time because she knew Esme would recognize it, due to it's very unusual green color."
John purses his lips as he walks alongside his friend. "So Esme would have been able to tell who sexually assaulted her flatmate by the color of the lipstick she'd been wearing?"
"It's not a very common shade, is it?"
"So it was probably someone who wears green lipstick a lot."
"Either that, or just eccentric shades in general, yes."
"And…" For god's sake, Sherlock, you really don't have to walk that fast. Your legs are long enough already. "For some reason, Linda really, really didn't want Esme to know this had happened?"
"Oh, now you're catching on. Is a celebration in order?"
"Good to know you're your usual cheery self," John mutters. They turn the corner, and almost run into Molly.
"Oh!" she half-squeals, as if she's done something terrible, like run over a kitten with an SUV. "Hi."
"Hello, Molly," John says with a smile. Sherlock, predictably, says nothing.
Molly gestures awkwardly at the direction they just came from. "Did you… were you, just… looking at those two? The… weird ones?"
John nods. "Sherlock's figured something out, so we're going to the crime scene."
Sherlock stands, waiting impatiently. John can tell that it's taking every smidgen of his self-control not to simply bolt down the hallway, leaving John behind.
"Um, about… sorry, just…" Molly motions toward the room they came from, where the two cadavers lie. "Are they… sorry, are they supposed to have wings?"
"Er." John stands up straighter (closer, make them invisible, please.) "Yeah. Don't worry about it."
Molly looks unsure, but she nods.
The words "Well, bye," are barely detached from John's lips before Sherlock's off down the hallway again. John follows, having to take huge almost-leaping steps in order to keep up, and it feels slightly and terribly like flying.
•••
"Don't know how you manage it," Lestrade comments as he's searching through some files on his desktop. "Me, I'd have run off by now, if he treated me the way he treats you."
John shrugs, because he's not sure what to say to that. "He can be a right git a lot of the time," he agrees. "But… I don't really mind it, I guess. I mean, some things, like when he leaves ungodly body parts in the dishes, yeah, that does piss me off." Lestrade chuckles. "But he's my friend, when the day's over. I put up with him."
"Even when he has you run all over London?" Lestrade asks, raising an eyebrow.
John sighs. "Yeah, he does do that, doesn't he?" For god's sake, he should be at the crime scene right now – but Sherlock just had to bloody change his mind, run off to the dead women's flat without him, leave him to do all the gathering-information type work, as per usual. "He sent me here to get your information on Hamilton and Mason. Have you found out anything?"
Lestrade nods. "I've got the names of all their closest living relatives. Also, the publishing company Mason had a contract with, and the website for the daycare they ran. It's all here." He hands over a freshly-printed sheet, which John looks over, folds, and pockets. Lestrade purses his lips, studying the dust on his desk a little too intently. He pauses, the way people do when there's something on their mind that's practically falling over the tip of their tongue in its eagerness to escape, but they're not entirely sure whether or not they should get it out. He waits.
"You know…" he says, slowly. "It's all been… a bit of a shock, really. I mean, in reality it's been like any other case we've had to call Sherlock in for. But, I just… can't… really wrap my head around…"
Oh, John thinks. That.
"There was this one bloke," John says. He shifts in his seat. "In Afghanistan. Good man, good soldier. He… he was the sort of man that you might not want to talk to at first, but once you got to know him and he got to trusting you, he'd always stick by you, 'til the end."
Lestrade peers at him from underneath creased eyebrows. "And he… he was one of them?" he asks.
At this point, John is becoming very, very good at not wincing. "He was a fairy, yeah." He swallows. "Good friend of mine. He'd really screwed up his life, he was trying to make things right, you know?"
"Yeah, I know."
Swallow, again. "But people were afraid of him. Just because of what he was, what he had sticking out of his back. They thought he was dangerous, so they decided to kill him. They shot him, he almost died. I watched it all happen."
Lestrade says nothing.
"I realized, then," John continues. "They're just like us, you know. They've got the same minds, same hearts. They fall in love the same way and hate the same way and die the same way. The only reason they're any different is because humans say that they are."
This silence is different – it's the bad, awkward kind. The uncomfortable kind, the kind that makes your skin not only crawl but writhe.
"I…" Lestrade begins, but falters. "God, John, I mean… your friend being shot and all, that's… Jesus, that's a bit extreme. But how can you really know for sure that they're not different? Not dangerous?" He sighs. "Can you really be sure that they're just like us?"
In the moments that follow, John wonders if it might have been easier if that bullet really had ended him. He pushes the thought away hopes that he's not going to cry. God, that would really be awful. No. He's not going to cry. Good.
Lestrade clears his throat. John doesn't move.
"We've… sent someone, to deal with the kids," he says, hesitantly.
John looks up. "What kids?"
The detective inspector shifts uncomfortably. "Mason's kids," he explains. "Two girls, twins, age eight. Off in the country, remember? Visiting an uncle."
John nods. He remembers.
"We had to send someone down to tell them," he continues. "God, I hate this part. This whole fucking part, they never tell you about it when you join the Yard. We had to send someone up to Wales to tell two bloody kids that their mum's just been murdered, they've just become orphans."
John looks at the list again, and decides not to say anything.
Lestrade sighs, rubbing his temple. "Sorry, didn't mean to… go off, there," he says. When he looks up, his eyes are tired. "You know… it's just that you're… you're a good man, you know. I thought you might understand."
"I do," John says, nodding. "Yeah, I do understand."
Lestrade nods. "I guess you'd just have to be a really spectacular bloke in order to last this long with Sherlock Holmes."
"I do my best," he answers, smiling softly. "But I know… I know how you feel. I know what you're going through. I was in the army, remember."
"Yeah."
"Had friends die right in front of me."
Lestrade nods again. "How'd you deal with it all?" he asks.
"I don't know," John answers, truthfully. "I'm not sure I did deal with it."
After a moment, Lestrade turns back to the computer screen. "Anyway. How's the case getting along?"
"Well, Sherlock's looking for a woman who sexually assaulted Mason a month or so ago. He thinks it's important, so it probably is. The woman wore green lipstick, and Mason didn't want Hamilton to know about it."
Lestrade gapes a little. "And… how'd he get all that?"
"From a stain," John answers, chuckling inwardly. Everything about today is so Sherlock, all of this is so classic Sherlock, his Sherlock. "On a shirt."
"Blimey," Lestrade breathes out. "Sometimes I wonder if he's even human."
"Trust me, he is," John answers. "I've checked."
Lestrade chuckles, oblivious to the fact that John was being completely serious. "John, I know it's not really the time, what with two women dead and all," he says, "but I'd like to grab a pint with you sometime. You know, as friends, for once."
Surprised, John grins. "Yeah. I'd like that."
"Don't really get out with mates too much," Lestrade says with a sigh.
"Neither do I. I'd like to more often, though."
"Yeah." Lestrade turns back to him, and it's almost as though he's seeing him for the first time. "You know," he begins, "I'm glad he's got you."
Again, John says nothing. He nods, but it's such a small movement that Lestrade misses it completely.
"It's hard to believe, but he really has changed, a little," the detective inspector continues. He looks at John sideways. "Since you came around. He's gotten… better. I don't know how to put it, but it's really sort of like you've made him more of a real person."
John nods. "He sort of did the same for me."
Lestrade says nothing for a while. After a sufficient amount of silent seconds have passed, he jerks out of whatever state he was in. "You should probably go find him," he says. He stands up and begins walking towards the door; John follows. "And call me up the next time you've got an hour, will you? I know a nice bar 'round the corner."
John nods gratefully. "Yeah. That'd be nice."
"Your girlfriend won't mind?" Lestrade chuckles. John rolls his eyes – he knows full well that his ill luck with women has become an inside joke with the Yard.
"I'm single, right now, actually," he answers, but something's not fitting right in his mind.
Your girlfriend won't mind? The phrase repeats in his brain, demanding his attention. Girlfriend won't mind? Girlfriend?
"Girlfriend," he whispers.
Lestrade raises an eyebrow. "What's that?"
John pushes him aside, stepping back into Lestrade's office. "Sorry, Greg, I can't go just yet." Lestrade takes his seat across the desk, and waits. John's heart is beating with the anticipation and the aftermath of an epiphany.
"There's one thing I need you to look into," he says. He smiles, despite himself.
•••
Sherlock guesses which cab John is in before said cab makes it halfway down the block. No, not 'guesses' – he never guesses. He deduces which cab contains John Watson, and he's right.
When John walks forward, there's a spring in his step. His face isn't smiling at first, but it blossoms into that lovely grin as soon as he lays eyes on Sherlock's familiar, coat-clad figure. Sherlock raises an eyebrow. What's got you so happy, John Watson?
"Find out anything?" John asks, crossing his arms against the cold.
Sherlock takes a moment to scowl discreetly at John's flimsy jacket (it's almost become a tradition by now) before answering. "Come upstairs, let me show you."
John nods, and within a minute they're standing in the flat again. Sherlock makes his way to Hamilton's bedroom, where the bodies had been found. He sees John stiffen out of the corner of his eye – no doubt remembering the confrontation between himself and Sally Donovan one day prior.
"Bed sheets," he says, gesturing with a gloved hand. "I found more stains, almost identical to the one on Mason's shirt. Same brand of lipstick, not always the same color, always with matching lip-liner. Definitely left by the same person."
"Okay, so what's different?" John looks closely, and does indeed see stains. Some are the same green, but some are varying shades of red, others are purple, and one seems to be yellow. "You wouldn't be this excited if there wasn't something different."
Sherlock's grinning an almost grin, one he knows John's used to seeing by now. "Two things," he says. "Firstly, some of the stains are older than others. Whoever left these stains has been here multiple times, covering a wide time span."
"Okay… what's the second?"
"These sheets have been washed many times, and Hamilton's tried to get the stains off with remover," Sherlock continues. "But the newer ones have never had stain remover applied. She stopped trying to get rid of them after a while, probably because she realized that they weren't going to come out no matter how hard she tried."
John looks lost, which is what Sherlock expected. "So… what's that mean?"
"It means," Sherlock grins, "that while Mason was sexually assaulted, Hamilton welcomed the same person's advances, multiple times. She didn't care about getting rid of the stains because they had no emotion or bad memories attached to them."
John nods. "Did you find anything else?"
In answer, Sherlock walks out of the room. When he passes the living room, he gestures to one of the couches.
"More stains there," he tosses out over his shoulder. John takes a look, and keeps following until Sherlock reaches the bathroom.
"Look here," he says, pointing to the dustbin. He watches as John looks, watches the bend of his back and the creasing of his brow. "Do you see it?"
John pauses. "Is that a–"
"Tube of lipstick," Sherlock says triumphantly. "Lime Crime, Serpentina."
John's eyebrows go up. "So what's that mean?"
Sherlock picks up the tube and pulls off the cap. The bullet's been completely worn down – this lipstick has been used very frequently. Most of the tip is covered in a layer of strokes; applied with brush, then. However, the very surface is irregular and full of bumps, and just the tiniest flakes of skin.
"Last applied on chapped lips," he says, grinning. "Haphazardly, without a brush – this woman wasn't prepared, she probably applied it as a last minute decision." John says nothing, but seems to have something on the tip of his tongue. Sherlock raises an eyebrow. "Okay, so, what did you get from Lestrade?"
"Nothing important," John says. A sly, innocent grin.
Sherlock's eyes narrow.
"What?" he asks.
To his irritation, John only grins again. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Teasing him, then.
Sherlock sighs. There really isn't time for this. "What did you get from Lestrade?" he repeats.
"Nothing at all," John answers, looking off into the distance and folding his hands behind his back.
Sherlock sighs again.
"Except I do know who the woman is," John adds, after a moment.
Sherlock jerks his head back. "What?" He stares at John's placidly smug face. "Who?"
John's grin only grows. "Lucy Heralds, age thirty-three. Photographer and professional make-up artist. Lives in Hackney."
For once, Sherlock can do nothing but stare. "How do you know that?"
"I bloody figured it out, you git," John grins. "You're not the only one who can deduce things, you know."
Sherlock's still gaping, just a little. "Who exactly is Lucy Heralds?" he asks.
John grins even wider (Sherlock didn't know he could do that.) "Esme Hamilton's ex-girlfriend," he answers, waiting for the words to sink into Sherlock's brain.
Finally, it's that moment of everything becoming crystal clear in one instant. This final piece that John's contributed is already being fitted into a million slots in his brain, voids that have been eagerly awaiting something solid for far too long. To say that his mind is racing would be a hideous understatement – Sherlock's brain is defying the laws of physics, breaking the light barrier, gaining infinite mass and infinite speed/inertia all at once.
"When did Hamilton break up with Heralds?" John asks, derailing his train of thought.
Sherlock glances around the flat and sees what he needs to see. "Around two months ago," he answers.
"And… Mason was attacked a month and a half ago?" John continues. "So… Heralds gets dumped, then half a month later she tries to rape her ex's flatmate?"
Sherlock nods. He starts pacing in circles around the room, nearly spinning with his hands open as if he's trying to catch something in the air. He stares at some point near the ceiling. "You said it yourself, John," he mutters. He's thinking. "Mason and Hamilton were in love, although they weren't officially dating. Most probably… Hamilton broke up with Lucy Heralds to be with Linda Mason."
"So Lucy's girlfriend dumped her for another girl?" John laughs. "That's what this is all about? Seems a bit extreme, doesn't it?"
"Heralds would have wanted to get back at Hamilton somehow," Sherlock goes on. He puts his fingers together underneath his chin – John calls it his "posh thinking pose," or something like that. "But… no, if she wanted to get revenge on Hamilton, why would she attack Mason?"
John stares at him with a tired, tired face – the same face he's been seeing his whole life from so many people, the face that made him decide to look up the word "sociopath" in the first place. It's his eternal punishment for whenever he's said something cold and emotionless and very not human, and it never had any effect until John started using it on him. When John's features contort into that hideously resigned mask of disappointment, it makes Sherlock wish that he could be swallowed by his own breath and shrivel into nothingness.
"Oh, god, I dunno," John scoffs, dry and full of sarcasm. "Maybe she cared about her or something." He looks down and sighs. "Ridiculous, right? That you might try to get revenge at someone by hurting the person they love. God, that's stupid."
Sherlock swallows. Something's tugging downward at the base of his throat, and he doesn't know why.
"Fine," he snaps, but without much enthusiasm – he knows that John'll be able to tell that he understands, which he really does. "But that can't be all of it. It wasn't just anger, John, it was jealousy. Jealousy of Linda Mason, Hamilton's real friend, the person she really loves, so much more so than Heralds. She wouldn't just want Hamilton to hurt, she'd want her to stop loving Linda Mason, the woman who took her place."
"Okay, so…" John looks normal again, and Sherlock can't help feeling relieved.
"So, she comes over a week or so after the breakup," Sherlock explains. The pieces have already fallen into place in his head, but John knows full well that it makes everything that much clearer to say it all out loud. "She tries to have sex, or something of that sort, with Mason, and tries to make it look like Mason was cheating on Hamilton."
To Sherlock's bemusement, John laughs. "Oh my god," he giggles (a giggle shouldn't sound that nice, it really shouldn't.) "That's… that's bloody ridiculous, and it's bloody genius."
Sherlock grins. "She walked here through the cold, and waited outside until she knew Hamilton was just about to come home. Hence, the chapped lips. A few minutes before, she walked inside and found Mason, who suspected nothing and welcomed her in. She must have found out that Hamilton wouldn't be coming home that night, so she had to think fast. She had to do something that would leave a lasting mark, something Hamilton would recognize – so she went to the bathroom and put on a quick coat of her trademark lipstick."
"Amazing."
"Mason probably kicked her out before Hamilton got home, so she had time to wash the marks off her face and change clothes. That's why she hid the shirt and the stain for so long, because she knew that Hamilton would recognize the marks."
"Okay…" John looks towards the bedroom, where they died. "So she took the shirt out and tried to cover it up with a cardigan. Later that day, they were murdered. So… how's this all connect? You don't think Heralds murdered them, do you?"
"If Heralds murdered them, they might actually look like they had been murdered, don't you think?" Sherlock asked exasperatedly. "Still, I don't think it would hurt to give her a call, don't you think?"
"I think that's a smashing idea," John says, smirking, and walks out the door ahead of him.
Sherlock takes a moment to stare at his retreating back, where he knows his wings are painfully bound beneath layers of knits and nylon. Without thinking, he rushes forward until they're walking side by side and drapes his arm over John's shoulder.
John jerks his head up. "Sherlock, what are you–"
"Quiet, I'm thinking," Sherlock snaps, although in reality his brain is stagnating. Not necessarily in a bad way, however.
Discreetly, he slips a hand lower until his fingertips are brushing the tiny bumps in the fabric that mark the bases of John's wings. He feels John jerk a little at the slight contact, but it only lasts a moment. They keep walking, until they're standing still, waiting for the doors of the rickety lift to open. Comfortable.
"And I wonder why people think we're a couple," John smirks.
Sherlock only smiles, and says nothing.
•••
Note: So longest chapter so far, I think? I've had some requests to make the chapters longer, so here goes. I hope y'all are enjoying this little mystery because gosh darn, is it hard to write this stuff. The story's really going to pick up in a chapter or so, so hold on to your pants! K bye.
