The Private Journal of Sherlock Holmes
April 11 (continued)

I closed the door behind us and told Irene to wait while I crept downstairs and flipped the main breaker off. The lights Mrs. Hudson had left on in her haste to leave went out. I led Irene up the stairs and made her stand in the hall while I ducked into the flat and pulled shut the blinds. When I was satisfied, I went to rustle up a few candles from under the sink. I lit them and set them on the coffee table.

Irene stepped across threshold, careful to avoid the blood soaked patch on the carpet. I took my coat off her shoulders and tossed it over a chair. Irene took a seat on the sofa, stiff at first, then she turned and lay back on it, filling in the dent I usually occupied. I dragged my chair around so I faced her.

"There are bullet holes in your wall," she remarked. The candles illuminated her dark skin, throwing her shadow on the wall.

"Therapy," I said by way of explanation.

"Where's your friend?"

"Out."

Irene propped herself up on her elbows. "Did you have a fight?"

"No."

"Uh huh."

I leaned back and rolled my eyes at the ceiling. "You can take my bed if you want. I don't sleep in it much."

"I knew it." She grinned at me.

"You've got it all wrong, Irene."

"Oh, really."

I licked my lips and grinned. "I'm not really John's type."

She rolled her head back, trying to loosen her tense muscles. "So that's why he's out?"

"I don't know. I don't really play for any team, Irene. I just am. Best left alone."

She snorted. "You're a liar. You don't have to be Freud to guess what you were thinking when you were pointing that gun at me."

I leaned forward. "Don't flatter yourself."

"You don't like women, do you?"

"They're tedious."

"If I cared about your opinion, I might be offended." She lay back down, head turned to look at me.

I worried a little at a blood stain on my sleeve. "You know what I don't understand? The thing for married men. It's just not your style."

She laughed, a low sound in her throat. "You're right, it's not."

"Norton is a half-wit."

"That's unfair." She paused, looked at me, a twinkle in her eyes. "To half-wits."

"Is it because of the Preston Fund?"

"You know about that?" She sighed. "Of course you know about that. The short answer is, Geoffry loves me. Loves me enough to do something truly asinine."

Now I was interested. I leaned forward. "Elaborate."

"The Preston Fund is a repository for the Syndicate. You've probably already figured that out. Geoffry administrates it. You could say that he acts as something of an accountant for the organization."

"He's that involved? Did he start skimming off the top?"

"Oh no. More ambitious than that. He was very, very jealous of Caleb. Not just because of me. Here, he had access to all this money, and if he touched any of it, he'd get knocked off."

"You didn't just act as defense counsel, did you, Irene."

She looked at me like I was slow, and I felt a little jangled. She turned and spoke to the ceiling. "I acted, more or less, in the capacity of consigliere. I oversaw the transfer of funds, acted as an adviser, streamlined the delivery systems. I was even a shoulder to cry on. You don't really think Caleb could have managed something as complicated and intricate as the Syndicate alone, do you?"

"So why Norton, then? Were you planning on stealing the money together?"

She shook her head. "No. He was planning to steal the money. I wanted no part of it. Truth be told, he was just rebound. But he started to get obsessive, just the way Caleb did. You saw all those roses. I get those every few days."

I put the tips of my fingers together and pressed them against my mouth. "Norton did it. He shot Caleb and made it look like a hit so it wouldn't come back on him, because he wants to take over. But why would he shoot at you?"

"He bugged my house. I would hazard a guess that he heard you on the recording and got the wrong idea. Like I said, annoying."

I pulled out my phone, and sent a text to Lestrade, then replaced it in my pocket.

"Will he try to run? Empty the account and leave?"

"Not yet," she said contemplatively."He thinks he's smarter than a cop like Lestrade. He knows you by reputation, but doesn't understand that it's going to take more than planting a corpse in your living room to scare you off."

I watched her wordlessly. It was impossible to tell how much she knew. I didn't want to take for granted that I had in my custody the one person who was capable of bringing down the Syndicate. Not just pieces of it, but the entire network. I had to do whatever I could to make her an ally.

"It was Lex, wasn't it?" she said softly.

I sat bolt upright. "How do you know that?" I demanded.

She smiled, a smug, self satisfied smile that I dearly wanted to tear off her face. "Baby, of course I knew. He wasn't a franchiser, he was one of ours. Even Caleb knew about your little hobby. Of course Geoffrey would choose Lex."

I sat back and contemplated for a moment the gross error I had committed. I was in a very compromising position, and she could reveal the fact that I had been purchasing Syndicate cocaine at any time. The notion of strangling her suddenly occurred to me as a viable possibility. Then I relaxed. If it came back on me, I'd just say that buying was a cover. Or I'd bully Mycroft into smoothing it over.

"Subtle, Irene." I said softly.

"I thought I was tedious." She reached into her overnight bag and pulled out a silver cigarette case. She tapped one out and bent over to light it on a candle.

I stood, stepped over the table and sat down next to her. "You're different. I've seen you in court, you're a firebrand. It's your passion. Why waste your time with a business so far beneath you? With lovers so unworthy of you?"

"You're a sweet boy," she purred. "But a lady can't give up all her secrets. You're just going to have to wonder."

I gave her a sideways look. No one had ever called me a "sweet boy". "I'm a lot of things, Irene, but I am not sweet. Brilliant, yes. Sweet, never. Don't insult me."

"I've got no other recourse when the opposition starts flirting with me."

I took the cigarette from her and pulled off it, then flicked it into an empty coffee cup. "I am not flirting. I am protecting my interests. I've been working to unravel the Syndicate for years. You're a means to an end."

She cocked her head. "You're cute when you're mad."

"Who said I was mad?"

"Maybe you can't get off unless you've got a gun in your hand."

I leaned in, and used my most silken voice, "If I pistol whip you, will you shut up?"

"With this old thing?" She snatched up John's L9A1 from the side table. I arched a brow, and felt a twinge of annoyance that I had been careless enough to leave it there. She slid off the sofa and circled around, the gun leveled at me. To tell the truth, I was a little relieved. She'd been making me uncomfortable, which was no mean feat.

"Not so fun, is it?" she purred, and straddled me, pressing the muzzle under my chin. I smiled and licked my teeth.

"Actually..."

She arched an eyebrow. "Are you just a total masochist?"

"No, I just have a very high threshold for violence."

"I will shoot you," she warned.

"I know. Get on with it."

She jerked the trigger. It clicked. I smiled.

"Next time, check the chamber." I swiped the gun out of her hand and tossed it out of reach. She snarled in frustration, but the sound was cut short as I grabbed her around the throat and squeezed, hard. "Cheeky girl. You even got my heart racing a little."

I release her and she went down on her knees, gasping for breath. "You're deranged," she panted.

"Yes, I know."

"I nearly shot you, and you still like me."

"Even more for the fact that you could and would kill me, given the chance. But I also know that John, while he keeps his service weapon loaded, doesn't chamber a round. Unlike me, he doesn't take unnecessary risks."

She put both hands on my knees and pushed herself up. "You like me because I'm a threat to you."

I let my head loll back, and looked up at her. "I like you because you're brilliant, maybe as brilliant as I am. Elegant, economic. And yes, because you're dangerous. Beautiful, and dangerous. Dangerous because you're beautiful. And you like me, because I'm the only man who has ever appreciated that fact."

She met my eyes, and licked her lips. "You used to get beat on a lot, didn't you?"

Impressed though I was by her intuition, I wasn't fazed. "So were you. And what did you learn, Irene?"

Her expression was hard, mouth set. "Always be willing to do what the other person won't."

We locked eyes. Impulse seized me. I put my hands on her lower back and jerked her into my lap. Her nails went into my neck. If she was fighting me, I didn't care. I slammed her down on the couch and brought my mouth down on hers, rough, merciless.

She shoved me away, chest heaving, her eyes blazing and accusatory. "What the fuck, Sherlock."

I stared blankly at her. "Tell me to stop."

She hesitated. It was all I needed. I slid a hand down between her legs, pressed the heel against her and moved it in slow hard circles. She inhaled sharply. Her body arched involuntarily, her eyes glassy and unfocused. I bent down and kissed her again, softer this time, dipping my tongue into her mouth. She tasted coppery, salty, like meat done bloody rare. She was still for a moment, allowing me quarter, breathing through my mouth. Then her hand slid into my hair, her legs wrapping around me. Her spine went rigid as she came. I could feel the tension releasing, rippling through her. She went limp, gasping in breath through her slack mouth.

I put my hand on her cheek, which was flushed with heat. "Your verdict, counselor?"

She turned her head, and captured my thumb in her mouth, and sucked on it. I shivered.

"You said you had a bed. Sofa's uncomfortable."

"Can you walk?"

She shot me a look. I offered her my hand, and pulled her up. Her knees shook a little, and I lifted her in one arm. She put her arms around my neck, and I carried her up the stairs. At the landing, she slid out of my arms and looked between the two doors. "Which is yours?"

"The left. But John has a double bed. Mine's a single."

"That's not very considerate."

I pushed the door open. "He won't mind. It's not like he's using it."

John's room was neat and warmly decorated. He had a few framed pictures, mostly of his platoon. He had medals, I knew, but he kept them in a drawer. The Ikea desk, dresser and nightstand were simple and unoffensive, and he'd added an antique love seat, over which was draped his tartan bathrobe. His bookshelf was filled with some fiction, a lot of Tom Clancy, some Kurt Vonnegut, and a host of medical journals, editions of Gray's Anatomy, the latest DSM, and a stack of periodicals.

Irene took the initiative to close the blackout curtains, and flipped on the lamp by the bedside table. She went over to the photographs, and looked up at them. "Afghanistan?"

"Yes. Army doctor. Decorated, even."

"You seem unlikely friends. A decorated army doctor."

"Yes. He hasn't yet told me the circumstances of his valour."

She turned to me, a ghost of a smile on her face. "Maybe he's a hero for putting up with you."

"Don't use words I don't understand," I said coldly.

She pulled her tee-shirt over her head, and tossed it aside, then stepped out of her sweats. She leaned back against the wall and watched me. I perched on the edge of the perfectly made bed and waited for her to come to me. She did, pacing slowly towards me. She took my hands and put them on her body. He cocoa-coloured skin was velvety, almost iridescent. I moved my hands down her flanks. She'd put a lot of effort into tooling her muscles, which were taut under supple skin.

Her fingers found my shirt buttons. She swiftly undid them, and pulled my shirt off, then splayed her hands on my chest, dark on pallid flesh. They trailed down to my trousers, unsnapping and unzipping.

"My turn," she said in a husky voice. She slid her hands into the sides of my boxer shorts, and in one quick motion, she pulled them and my trousers down around my ankles. I kicked them off, and lifted her into my lap.

She engulfed me. The physical sensation washed over me. The gears of my clinical, obsessively analytical brain came to a grinding halt. It was like a muscle I didn't know was seized had released, and the pain of it was dull and throbbing. It was a relief, really, to find that it was possible for something so base and animal could overwhelm the torture of eternal heightened consciousness.

I pressed my face into her breasts and grasped the ample flesh of her rear, leaning into to her as she rode me with almost mechanical precision, each stroke a deliberate and controlled action. I could feel the muscles of her core flexing, her breath coming hot and fast. I put my mouth on her skin, tasted the salty tang of her flesh.

She seized my hair and tugged my head back, watching me intently, the same way a predator surveys the herd for the weak and sick. She tightened around me and sucked at my lower lip, then thrust her tongue into my mouth. I came, my body jerking as if I'd been strafed with bullets. I groaned into her mouth. She swallowed the sound and sat back on my knees, looking satisfied.

I was winded, but managed to stay upright by wrapping my arms around her. I rested my cheek against her skin, and caught my breath. "That was...that...was..."

"Amazing. The word you're looking for."

"I can see how you do keep them hooked. Addicted."

"Had enough?" she asked, a coquettish smile all over her face.

"Oh, no." I grinned. "I haven't started."

With that, I flipped her on to the bed on to her stomach, and pinned her there with my body. She took a deep gasping breath as I slid into her. She seized the bars of the headboard, holding herself arched and tense. I drove into her, my teeth working at the space between her shoulder blades. My hands ran along her ribs to her breasts, cupping them and squeezing roughly. She was soft for someone so deadly.

It didn't take long to bring her to the edge. Not only was she panting, she was starting to make little whimpering sounds. Not the annoying forced efforts of some one-night-stand slut, but involuntary and all the more delectable for that.

I withdrew and sat back on my haunches. She rolled over and looked at me with a furious glare and an adorable pout. She didn't need to speak for me to know that she was demanding to know why I'd stopped.

"That's for trying to shoot me," I scolded. Her hand came up in a flash, but I'd anticipated it. I caught her by the wrist and bit hard into her flesh. Sharp intake of breath. She quivered under me, and I could tell she had almost come right then.

"Fuck you."

"Mm, exactly." I settled back between her legs, teasing. "I think, deep down, for all your control freak tendencies, what you really want is to be held down. Just like the first time."

Her eyes widened, and the blood surged to her face. The rage took a moment to register, and then she tried to drive her nails into my face. I took the opportunity to seize her other wrist, and pinned both her hands above her head. Then I pressed back into her, thrusting hard, leaning down to lick up the single tear that had slid down her cheek.

Her whole body buckled as she came. She stopped fighting me, and I could feel her tightening inside like a vice. I released her wrists and slid my hand down, not letting up the pressure. She seized, wrapped her arms around me, clinging as the wave hit her again, probably so intense it as to be almost painful.

The muscles encasing me constricted, forcing me to climax. I pressed my face into her neck, gulping in air like a drowning person breaching the water's surface. She was still holding on to me for dear life. After a moment, she relaxed, peeled herself away, and fell back into the pillow, saturated with sweat. She looked up at me, her eyes half closed, her mouth swollen. "You are so cruel. You have to prove everyone wrong. You can't look at a wound without salting it"

I pulled away from her and rolled on my back. "When I first found out you were defending the Marcel family, I did extensive research into your background. Very extensive."

"Sinclair," she said, sitting up. "That's why you said that, because you found out about Sinclair. That is fucked up, Sherlock."

"Hmmm. You're sixteen. Your step-father abuses you, mommy doesn't believe you, you run away. But it gets better." I grinned at her. Sinclair disappears, and they never find his body."

She stared at me, then looked away. "I don't see your point."

I propped myself on one elbow, put one hand on her cheek, and turned her face towards me. Her expression was as hard as granite. I put my lips to her ear. "Well done."

She held my gaze, measuring me. I beckoned her with one hand. She flowed into my arms, tucking her head under my chin. I stroked my fingers over her shoulder.

"You've been waiting fifteen years to hear that, haven't you?"

She let me hold her for a few minutes, then pulled from away from me, slid off the bed and stood up. "Stay there. I need a cigarette."

Naked, she padded down the stairs. I stretched out, feeling several vertebrae and joints cracking. The cool air felt absolutely delicious on my damp skin. After a moment, Irene returned with the silver case in hand. She pulled out a cigarette, and lit it. "I tried the nicotine gum."

"The gum is worthless." I showed her the patch on my arm. "It helps. Usually takes two or three."

She blew out a cloud of smoke, and looked at me with appraising eyes. "You're not bad with your shirt off, paleface."

"You're very...symmetrical." I sat up against the headboard and considered the lines of her body. "Are you familiar with Da Vinci's Leda and the Swan?"

She took a hard drag on her cigarette. "I hate you."

"I know. Come to bed."

She wedged the fag between her teeth and crawled over towards me. She took a deep pull, and then pressed her lips to mine. I opened my mouth to hers, inhaling the smoke, a spicy custom blend of expensive Cuban tobacco, and flakes of Sativa strain cannabis. I exhaled through my nostrils.

"The pot's a nice touch."

"A girl has to relax somehow." She offered the rest of the cigarette, and I took it, tapping out a bit of ash in John's water glass.

"So what's your damage?" she asked, leaning back on the headboard next to me. "How did little Sherlock Holmes plunge through the ice and turn cold?"

"You have a lovely turn of phrase." I took another hit off the stag, and blew smoke at the ceiling. "Since you ask, it was secondary school. I was thirteen."

She rolled her head to look at me. "One of the teachers?"

I nodded. "Head of our house. I was at boarding school from age five, you should know. That sort of thing happened quite often. Still does."

"You told?"

"Naturally. He was sacked, of course. No one ever believed him when he said I seduced him."

She cocked her head. "You did, didn't you? Seduce him."

I looked away, and shrugged. "I told you. I get bored."

"You really are a psychopath."

"I could be your Geoffrey Norton, with the dowdy wife and two little crumbsnatchers kids, desperate to be important. Cheating, embezzling, doing anything for power. I could golf, go to church on Sundays, fill out paperwork all day, dream of a corner office. And inevitably, I could eat my pistol and leave a bloody mess all over wifey's Italian bathroom tile." I yawned. "Is it really better? More restful? I suspect that everybody is as bored as I am, they're just so bound by conventions and good manners that they never admit it."

"If you're such a nihilist, why aren't you a criminal?"

I examined the cherry end of the fag before taking another pull. "I've asked myself that, and honestly, I would still get bored. Murder, theft. It's such a messy business and it requires very little creative thinking. Crime for crime's sake is implicitly stupid, and crime for the object of gain is just tawdry. On the other side, there's challenge. Mystery, surprise. Unpredictability. The forces of good have a much harder time of it because they have to abide by a rule book. Crime is common, logic is rare."

"That's what keeps you from eating your pistol." She was thoughtful. "It's the hunt. If you weren't on the side of justice, you'd have ended up the most successful serial killer in history."

"That's quite the inference, Madame Prosecutor. You'd like to try the case, wouldn't you?"

She smirked. "Absolutely."

I looked away. "You should sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a long day for you."

"I can't. I'm too wired."

"Suit yourself." I handed her back the last of the cigarette.

She smoked it down to the filter, then flicked it away. She blew smoke into my face, making my eyes water, then crawled on top of me. "We still have some time to kill."

"Are you going to try that again?" I said with a wide smile.

"Maybe."

"I should be keeping watch. I am supposed to be protecting you, after all."

"Do you really think it's going to make any difference?"

I rolled her over and nestled between her thighs. "No. But don't come crying to me if you die."