Chapter Fifty Two
Lestrade was just exiting Bart's Morgue as Stan loaded the bodybag into the back of a van when Mycroft called him again.
Lestrade glanced once at the caller ID and rolled his eyes. "Yes, Mycroft I've got the body. Just relax, okay?"
"I have a new objective for you." Mycroft told him soberly, a tinge of genuine concern in his voice.
"What, Mycroft!" Lestrade huffed. "Let me finish a job before giving me a new one, yeah? Slow down!"
"Sherlock is currently a fugitive." Mycroft informed him concisely. "A warrant has been issued for his arrest, he and Dr. Watson have escaped and are on the run. They are avoiding the CCTVs, quite logically, I need as many men on the ground as we can afford. Sherlock is armed and I cannot guarantee that the police will not shoot them on sight."
"Alright. I'm on it." Lestrade banged the side of the van twice with a gloved fist and Stan took that as a signal to leave without him. "I'll put a few feelers out. Stan will bring the body back."
"Thank you."
"And Mycroft?"
"Yes, Lestrade?"
"Deep breaths."
"I will keep that in mind, thank you."
"Well, I found Sherlock." Lestrade reported to Mycroft dutifully as he drove past Kitty Riley's flat.
"Where is he?" Mycroft asked him hastily.
"On the move again." Lestrade sighed. "I followed a hunch."
"Yes, but where are you?" Mycroft repeated, slightly more impatient.
"Doesn't matter. Sherlock and John are on their way to... Bart's, I think." Lestrade mentally filtered through every other possible location Sherlock could be moving toward in the direction he had spied Sherlock's cab drive off.
John had hailed another cab and set off in the opposite direction, but Lestrade had him set in a lower tier of priority. But that was the life of a double agent who juggled Britain's brightest and most malicious.
"A sound decision." Mycroft sighed. "If only they'd stop moving for one moment, I could allocate them to a safehouse."
"You try telling them that, they took off the moment Sherlock saw my car." Lestrade lied.
"Keep on them." Mycroft instructed. "And have your informants heard anything from Moriarty?"
"No." Lestrade lied again. "Believe me Mycroft, if I see hide or hair of the fucking bastard, you'll be the first to know."
"Very well. Keep in touch." Mycroft grunted and hung up.
Lestrade slid his phone back into his pocket and placed both hands on the steering wheel.
"Naughty boy." Moriarty cooed from the shotgun seat, running a hand through his mussed-up hair. "Do you kiss your mother with that mouth?"
Lestrade scrolled his eyes over toward him with the most disdainful look.
"No." Moriarty conceded absently as he began picking lint off his cardigan. "I guess you wouldn't."
Lestrade snorted and shifted gears.
John was sitting in a chair in the Diogenes Club, waiting for Mycroft, when the government agent walked in.
"She has really done her homework - Miss Riley – things that only someone close to Sherlock could know." John opened, flipping though a file.
Mycroft quietly shut the door behind him. "Ah."
"Have you seen your brother's address book lately? Two names: yours and mine. And Moriarty didn't get this stuff from me." John went on. Mycroft could hear the calm in John's voice pulled taught over the accusation like a violin string so close to breaking.
Mycroft prepared himself for walking on eggshells with the soldier.
He strode over to the chair directly opposite John and seated himself. "John-..."
"So how does it work, then? Your relationship." John spoke over him. "Do you go out for a coffee now and then? You and Jim?"
Mycroft opened his mouth to explain but John stopped him before he could defend himself.
"Your own brother, and you blabbed about his entire life to this..." John glanced down at the papers in his hand, tearing his gaze away quickly when the sight of Moriarty smiling innocently up at him in a profile picture sent fire racing up and down his veins "... maniac."
Mycroft shook his head. "I never inten-..." His eyes fell on the sheets of paper crumpled in John's hand.
His eyes skimmed the upside-down words of their own accord, a habit that Mycroft had gained quickly in the intelligence business.
Several words, several lines, jumped out at him as being unfamiliar. A ball of ice dropped into the pit of his stomach like something had made the Earth shift seven degrees on it's axis.
Something was wrong.
"I never dreamt ..." he tried to regain his composure, his brain struggling with the idea his instinct spat out at it. Trying to reason - justify - why this was happening.
John gestured angrily toward the papers in question. "So this-... this- ...is what you were trying to tell me, isn't it: 'Watch his back, because I've made a mistake'."
A mistake indeed... but not one - Mycroft thought - that was entirely his.
The stories written in Kitty Riley's articles were true, that much was obvious. But some of them weren't his.
Mycroft remembered every word, every fact and anecdote about Sherlock that he had told to Moriarty. He had kept track of them meticulously. But even Mycroft Holmes had things he wished people would not know about his brother.
And yet, here everything was, neatly scripted, organized, laid out for the world to see. Even the things he glossed over, hidden, downright ignored.
Moriarty knew more about Sherlock Holmes than what Mycroft had told him.
John leaned forward. "Moriarty wanted Sherlock destroyed, right? And you have given him the perfect ammunition."
The muscles in Mycroft's jaw clenched. If only the ex-military man knew the truth.
Not only had Mycroft personally delivered the bullet, he had loaded and cocked the gun, as well.
"John-..." he spoke at length, as the doctor stood. "I'm sorry."
John let out a disbelieving snort. "Oh please!" and walked away.
Mycroft watched him go. "Tell him, would you?"
John stalked out of the room, leaving the door hanging ajar behind him in his anger.
Mycroft reached into his pocket and called Anthea.
The PA picked up on the first ring. "Sir?"
"Have you seen your brother's address book lately? Two names: yours and mine. And Moriarty didn't get this stuff from me." Mycroft could hear John's voice still ringing righteously in his skull.
But John had not counted on one other who knew every detail about Sherlock Holmes. The one man who moved in and out of 221b Baker Street without suspicion. The man who was always around when things happened, seemingly by coincidence. The man who cared for Sherlock for longer than the consulting detective even knew John Watson and yet never registered in Sherlock's mind as someone important.
"Get Sherlock, and keep an eye out for Moriarty." Mycroft growled, picking up one of the files John had left behind him.
"Of course, but Lestrade-..."
"Is a threat." Mycroft snapped. "We were played."
