A/N: ARGH WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPENNNNNNNNN D: Sorry about the last horrible chapter. So short and ick. In fact sorry about these next couple of short, icky, weird, Mary-centred chapters. We will return to our boys very, very soon. And our boys will return to what they do best... SHAGGINGGGG And, ya know, detecting things... xD To a far lesser extent...

Thanks so much for your reviews. I really, really appreciate them. It's makes me real happy to know people are enjoying my 'story' (aka porn...).

And I hope people had a lovely Easter :o)

Disclaimer: Not mine. Not mine at all :(

Chapter Eleven

Mary stared in disbelief at the street sign. Baker Street. She was in Baker Street. How had she not realised it sooner?

She felt a fool for not seeing it. She felt ridiculous tailing her husband in the dark, thinking he would lead her to some dark, dangerous secret and instead finding herself back at Holmes's doorstep. Her husband still felt drawn to his old home and his old partner. She couldn't help but feel vaguely guilty that she had driven him to such lengths to continue the work he obviously felt he needed to do.

Of course her husband would feel compelled to aid Sherlock Holmes still. He had helped him for so long, it was part of his nature to want to continue. Mary felt a little cheated and affronted that he had not told her the truth and had acted so deceivingly as to wait for her absence before returning to Baker Street, but she was relieved. She could not deny that.

Sighing, she loosened her grip on her shawl, watching as her husband stepped away from his cab and disappeared into Holmes's domain. The cab pulled away and disappeared into the darkness. She gazed after it. She wished she hadn't been so rash. She wished she had trusted her husband's integrity and honour. She wished she hadn't felt so jealous of his friendship with Holmes. After all, she couldn't expect to have John Watson entirely to herself. His friendship and partnership with Holmes was deeply important and precious to him. Her attempts to fence their life away from Holmes's erratic, peculiar dealings were fruitless; Holmes was too much a part of his life and his person.

With a sigh, she turned to go back to her cab, intending to go home and pretend that her 'second-cousin' had become ill overnight. She wouldn't even mention it. She would pretend that she had no idea of her husband's midnight escapade.

But then again...

She paused, glancing back at 221b. She was sure now that John's distance and his unhappiness had been a product of her disapproval of his friendship with Holmes. Perhaps if she made it clear that she accepted his need for Holmes in his life he would be himself again?

She hesitated, glancing from the waiting cab to 221b and back again. She could go up. She could surprise them. Tell them that she did not disapprove of their completing cases together, that they had her blessing to resume their partnership. John would be proud of her class and her maturity. He would return to her arms, enchanted by her act of selflessness and understanding. He would no longer feel he had to hide his true nature from her.

But, then again, that would require her having to admit that she had lied and that she had followed him. Would he be angry with her? Or would he understand her suspicion and her unease? She wasn't certain. Perhaps, he would simply be embarrassed that he hadn't told her of his involvement with Holmes.

She bit her lip, staring at 221b and clutching onto her shawl with one hand.

Then, quite suddenly, she made up her mind.

She began up the street, towards Holmes's domain. She would come clean. Even if John was cross with her he would soon calm down and see why she had acted thus.

She crossed the road, never taking her eyes off 221b.

She found that the door had been left unlocked, which was very unlike her meticulous husband but she thought nothing of it as she stepped inside and closed the door behind her, glad for some shelter from the bitter early morning cold.

She went up to Holmes's rooms, listening intently for her husband's voice and rehearsing in her head what she would say when she came face to face with him. She would tell him the truth. She would tell him she understood. She would even tell Holmes that she understood that her husband needed his company. And then John would forgive her and they would be as they had been when they had courted.

She approached the door. It had been left very slightly ajar; there was a single slither of light cutting through the darkness in an eerie yellow slit. She went to walk straight in and then she faltered just as her hand was on the knob. She wondered if she ought to knock. After all, it was private property. She wouldn't have liked it if someone had walked into her house without knocking, even if it was Holmes and even if he was likely to do just that.

She paused, catching her breath. Her heart was beating rapidly in her chest. She was still a little anxious of what she was about to do. Holmes always made her feel clumsy and unwanted. She felt silly bursting in on them. She hoped she could drag John away for a few moments to explain without having Holmes's sharp, knowing eyes watching her like some ill-tempered little animal.

But it was at that moment, as she pondered this that she suddenly heard something which made her heart stand still. She heard a shout from beyond the door. She couldn't tell if it had been John or Holmes but it certainly sounded as though they were in pain or in distress.

She felt a flutter of panic go through her. She hurried forward and, without thinking, pushed the door open, forgetting about knocking or announcing herself.

The door swung forward and Holmes's rooms appeared before her eyes.

And then her mind went blank. She physically could not move. She physically could not think. The shock was too great. The shock was almost painful. She had never set eyes on anything so utterly repulsive. Her limbs felt like they were paralysed.

The door had only opened halfway but she could see the room clearly, well lit by oil lamps and candles. Across in what she knew to be Holmes's claimed chair were two entangled bodies, moving roughly, desperately in sync with each other. For a few moments, her mind refused to put the pieces together. Her mind didn't want to recognise that flaxen hair, that slim figure, that tanned skin and broad shoulders. Her mind did not want to recognise what he was doing, half-dressed and moving so violently against Holmes, half obscured behind her husband's heaving mass.

He was crying out. He was cursing and moaning and saying Holmes's Christian name again and again and again until it had no meaning. Until it sounded like a foreign word. And he threw his head back. He threw his head back in total abandonment. In total bliss. The look of loss on his face, the look of utter completion was something new to her. She had never, ever seen it on her husband's face before. And that realisation brought a shard of agony into her being that shook her forcefully out of her state of shock.

She stumbled back, she closed the door. They had not seen her. They did not know she had seen them.

She turned and walked down the stairs, out of the front door, across the road and to her cab. She told the driver, in a voice which didn't sound like her own, to take her home.

She sat in the confines of the carriage, totally numb. Her breathing seemed laboured, as though her body had forgotten how to function.

The journey seemed to take a moment. She paid the driver everything she had on her person and then went up to her house and knocked on the door, hardly knowing what she was doing. Not even considering that someone wouldn't answer or what she would say about appearing on the doorstep at this hour of the morning.

The housekeeper was astonished to see her and in her deadened mind she was just aware of her concerned questions and offers to call for the doctor. She deflected them with a jerk of her head and went up to her own rooms.

She thought that perhaps she would cry as soon as she shut the door, but no tears came.

She began to undress, even though she didn't know where her nightgown was. She let her dress fall off of her, she didn't care how roughly she undid the stays. She tore the pins from her hair. She yanked off her underclothes and her shoes. She ripped her sleeves from her bodice and threw her skirts over her head. She pulled her petticoat off of her and flung it to the floorboards.

She stood in her corset, undoing the ribbons, struggling with them, not able to untie them. Finally, they gave. She undid them. She felt the tension loosening on her ribs. She felt her stomach beginning to release. Her breasts rose out of their tight stays.

It was then, as her body was finally removed from its restraints and the corset slid loosely down her hips, that she looked down at her stomach. And crumpled to her knees.

To be continued...