It is only old, old ideas that bring Holmes to the thief. They seem hazy as things that may never happened, though the time itself, between then and now, is not so very great at all. Why, he saw Mies not four days before he sadly passed away.
She waited for him, at Baker Street, when no one else was home and smoked three of those vile, old man's cigarettes she likes so much. And when John had asked him later if he'd cheated, skipped the nicotine patch that afternoon, he had to say yes. Couldn't explain who'd really brought that stench, what she was doing there. The lie was easier and kinder for all involved.
The smell was intentional. He knew that then and knows it now. She left it behind so he'd remember her, so the nicotine craving would kick in and craving would be matched in his head with her presence. Cheap, vicious trick.
Waiting in her flat, repaying the favour, he smells her cigarettes again. He sets about making coffee, both to mask it and to kill the craving with. Wants to kill the craving because he doesn't want to think about her the way she was before. But he looks around while he waits for the machine to do its work, and this is a mistake, because his hand reaches automatically and entirely without him having to look to the top left cupboard over the sink and finds a mug with the handle turned out and brings it down and he remembers. He remembers everything. Coming here was no good idea.
The flat is small, essentially a hoarder's cave stuffed full of things she doesn't actively want to walk away from. He sits waiting with his back to the iron spiral staircase. The rail is hung with scarves that are meant to be there and underwear that isn't, and at the top there's a mezzanine no bigger than a prison cell and a queen-sized divan. He's seen it all quite a few times and, given the ceiling shows no signs of ever having supported a complex pulley system, has never been able to figure out how the bed got up there.
A long time ago, and his inside left arm was full of tiny, self-inflicted wounds, he lay there too ill to move, and Danielle made soup. Dreams, false memories, they're never that simple. Anyway, he remembers dying, or feeling damned close to it, and strong arms that held him in this world.
Of course she had her own motives for doing it. She must have. 'Selfless' isn't a word that would ever spring to mind.
That day before he died, he'd come home to find her standing near the window, swaying in front of the music on the stand, one finger toying with the tip of the violin bow. She looked caught then, and turned too quickly. Holding herself. The paper rustling in the rush of her turning. Needy and vulnerable and all of this perfectly calculated. That's all that's in her. He forces himself, here, now, waiting for her, forces himself to keep that fact continually in mind. She is a manipulator. The emotions of those around her are her greatest weapons.
Where there are no pre-existing emotions to toy with, she is quite expert in arousing them.
Before he died, with the whole game in full swing, she came to him. And when he asked her what the hell she thought she was doing, she said, "Come away with me."
"I beg your pardon?"
"Or run away with Doctor Watson. Do something, I don't care, just disappear forever and never return."
Oh, God, he wants this to stop. But the memory isn't playing like a video, it all came back to him sudden and perfect, one great gasp, and now he has no choice but to remember. She looked desperate and she'd placed herself in grave danger to even visit. And he, taking her seriously for a moment (like a fool, that's all it was, just foolish, just her wicked mind, that's all), asked what was the matter, what she knew.
"That you're ruining my life," she said. "That you're destroying the only thing I really give a damn about. Do me a favour and just vanish. Or, even better, die in an accident, because that's the only way he gets out of this intact."
That was about as selfless as Danielle Mies ever got.
"Excuse me?"
"You thought the last game was good, this one'll blow your mind. And if you win, it will crush him. And if he wins then… what's left? It'll be Paradise Syndrome and where does that leave him but still crushed?"
"You're not serious." And he started to laugh. It was cruel and it was genuine too. "Dani, have you come here to plead with me for Moriarty's sanity?"
The laughter got to her. She broke, said too fast and too loud, "No, for mine! Either way, one of you dies and whichever one, I lose. So if you were to suddenly find yourself in Nicaragua with a new name, that would help me out very much."
Of course, he couldn't help her. And nobody else could either. But that is her own unfortunate casualty; a long time ago, they both chose sides, and knew from there on out they could never exactly expect to win again.
On the bright side, she seems much more chipper today when she comes through the door. She's got high heels on and an armful of shopping bags, and with a smile on her face she crows, "Evening, gorgeous." Like he's meant to be here. That sets him on edge, throws him off replying. She eyes him, tosses her head, "Come on. I knew you'd remember where to find me."
"And how did you know I'd come?"
Laughing, heel-clicking past him to the coffee pot, she slides between him and the worktop, too close before he can step away, a drift of smoke and perfume and, "Ask me that question again in an hour."
"Afraid not."
"Spoilsport."
"Don't you have a job on?"
"Yes, but not until almost dawn, so I've got time." Not the answer he was expecting. For a moment he could almost believe that was a slip of the tongue, but it's too precise a detail for her not to mean it. And when she turns back to him, reaching in just the same way he did for a mug, her eyes are on fire. "It's a diamond job. I'll write the address down for you."
She does it while she settles at the breakfast bar, right opposite him. Beneath, he hears her shoes drop to the ground. A second later her toes ease over and worm under the cuff of his trouser leg, looking for skin contact. He refuses to flinch. Pulls back just as easily as she reached. "Big, film star diamonds," she goes on. "The security's utterly bloody gorgeous, though, state of the art. I wouldn't follow me inside, if I were you. My way out is a work of minor genius and I don't think you'll spot it. I'm not questioning your intelligence, not at all, but you're not a thief. You're not saying an awful lot, dear. Are you feeling alright?"
"What's the game, Danielle?"
"Four of us, one of you. Hadn't you caught that?"
"You're telling me all about your heist. What's your game?"
"Same as anybody. Catch me if you can."
Her smile is rich and unashamed. He knows he shouldn't, understands what's happening to him even as she does it, but he begins to smile back. Begins to enjoy it. Her honesty is a brand new challenge. Her bravery is what he remembers of her when he forgets who she loved and with what devotion. 'Game', he settled before, is the wrong word, and he must be so careful what he allows himself to enjoy. But it's more and more difficult to remember that Molly was almost killed, that Milverton had a victim, that a racist politician is in hospital. She makes it difficult. Somehow, she knows what he truly wants to feel, whether it's true or not. And like a field full of poppies she lulls him, makes it alright, makes desire necessary.
"You're feeling confident," he says, and her foot comes back to his leg. He has nowhere to pull away to now and won't give her the pleasure of making him shift, so he lets it stay there.
"I am. Deeply confident. I'd bet everything I own on it."
That's a trick. A long time ago, in all that far away mess when he knew her before, she told him she didn't consider herself as really owning anything. That no criminal should and a thief absolutely couldn't. A thief must be willing and ready to turn and run at any given moment and leave no regrets to call them back.
"And do you own anything, currently?"
"Nothing I don't carry with me. You know that." She slides two fingers beneath her shirt and produces a playing card from her bra. The Queen of Hearts is a sick joke in her hands, the user, the heartbreaker. Manipulator. She makes a mockery of sex and a god of pleasure. The only creature she ever could have loved is dead. He reaches out for the card, but she puts it away again. "No. Earn it. Or come round here and get it. You can have it if you come round here and get it." As her hand pulls back it tugs just too hard and the first button pops open. Not indecent, nothing shows, but the act itself is all she needs. Whether she sees any effect whatsoever, these thoughts have crossed his mind. That's enough of an intrusion already.
No. The only way to make a loss certain and complete would be go and get it.
She sees she's not getting anywhere and sighs. Sinks in on herself like she's just heard the memory of a voice calling her, the kind that comes back clear as any new sound in the room. For a moment, it almost looks genuine. If Holmes were the sort to suffer her tricks, this might be the one that would melt him, that would make her difficult to hate the way he needs to. But he knows, forces himself to know, nobody ever sees a real expression on Mies's face. Never did. Not when she'd been beaten and he hauled her to her feet, which happened more than once, that wasn't real. Not when she was alone and never meant to be and only wanted to talk, that wasn't real. Not when he was sick and she pretended, pretended, mind, to take care of him here.
He can't quite figure out why she decided to fake that. Certainly she's never used the incident against him. She's never breathed a word to anyone so far as he knows. But it couldn't have been real. There is no real Mies. He tells himself that, over and over, like a mantra, there is no real Mies, there is no real Mies, there is no-
"I've missed you, Sherlock."
"No, you haven't. You've missed Moriarty."
"Him too. Him more. But I've missed you. I didn't think both of you would end up dead. I thought you'd leave me with someone. You do know nobody else has ever been able to keep up, don't you?"
"You're not that bad."
She laughs. Abandons her coffee and stands up. She comes around behind him, and seems only to walk slowly, and yet he can't get away from her. Her left hand trails across from one shoulder to settle on the other, and the right matches it. She leans in, breathing into his ear, "I meant with you. Or him, but you, gorgeous." He doesn't turn his head, but stretches up, cupping the back of her head closer, fingers weaving into her hair. He feels her smile and go on, encouraged, "I've made you work for it a few times now, haven't I? And you never can catch me. That means I'm faster than you."
"You really are feeling confident."
"And you really can avoid all of this. We don't have to face off at all if I don't have any cards to play."
"And you'll honour that, will you? I play along here and now and the heist's off?"
"I hate diamonds anyway. They're so cold. I'm not about cold. You know that." She breathes against him, repeats this last. The moment her lips brush his neck the fingers in her hair claw shut and drag her around yelping. Just by standing, he presses her back against the counter. She hisses profanity at him for a second or two, but relaxes again. The grip he has on her, to struggle is to suffer. She falls still and cuts her eyes up at him. Waits for him to speak. He knows what he wants to tell her. Says nothing. She watches him a while before she grins. "Charlie was right, warning me. You're right in it now, aren't you? Welcome to villainy, Detective. I've always thought you'd like it here…"
"You're going to prison, Danielle." She laughs, bright and honest. The laughter gets to him and he pulls his arm back, dragging them both up almost standing, before throwing her head away from him. His hand comes back with long black hairs between his fingers, brushes them off on his jacket. Then looks thoughtfully down at where they were. "I know you're very careful, but nobody's perfect. If they get a DNA swab from you, how many crime scenes does that link you to? Ten, fifteen?"
"Oh, more than that, love," she laughs. "Look at me; there's too much of it. I shed like a Persian."
She's confident.
He runs through in his mind all the countries that still have hangings. There are more than he would have originally estimated when he starts adding it up. She must have stolen from one of them. He turns on that thought and heads for the door. "So I'll see you tonight?" she calls after.
"No." Tersely smiling in from the hall, she's watching him go and he lets her, "But I'll see you."
"All I needed to hear," is the basking whisper that follows him out, "All I needed to hear."