It had been dark for hours when things finally fell into place. He emerged from his Mind Palace to find himself sitting on Molly's sofa, a single lamp lighting the room. A mug of cold tea sat in front of him on the coffee table, untouched. She was curled up in one of her chairs, sleeping, her sketchbook and pencil on the floor beside her. She had been drawing Violet's face again. She did it from memory.

He had the name of a place. A long shot, perhaps, but a definite place. He considered waking her, but decided against it. He would let her rest until he knew something concrete. So he scribbled a note before he left, propping it against his mug on the table where she would hopefully see it immediately.

I think I've got it. Will call you when I know more. Does Montauk ring any bells?

Sherlock

He messaged Mycroft his suspicions on the way and instructed John and Lestrade to meet him at their headquarters.

"Montauk?" John said when they had gathered. "That's a place?"

"Somewhere in the States, isn't it?" Lestrade said. They stood in the conference room. Sherlock pulled up a map of the United States on the flat screen.

"Yes, on the eastern most end of Long Island in New York State. It's sometimes referred to as 'The End.' It also boasts a defunct military base called Camp Hero. It also fits with what Aisling remembered about a tower and a creaking giant. The tower is the lighthouse, and the creaking giant is the disused radar reflector moving in the wind. They must have taken Aisling there at some point in her programming."

"Sherlock, couldn't Moran have been referring to something he thinks Molly will do?" Lestrade asked.

"Of course he was, but he was also leaving a clue. You know they've wanted us to find her all along." He had forcefully put aside his suspicions about the message's other implications regarding Molly. "There's still over a week until Memorial Day in the States, when tourism will pick up, so it should be relatively quiet—"

His phone rang. Why the hell was Ainsworth calling him?

"This had better be good," he said.

"Now Sherlock, I was just calling to congratulate you. She's a beautiful baby and I did guess correctly. Though they said I wouldn't get my exclusive for a week. But it should be worth it. They're gonna send me Molly's journal from when you were on your adventure. I'm sure it's full of other small details you lot left out of the official story."

"How did they contact you?"

"All via Craigslist. In code, of course. Can't have someone else scooping me even if I do get the exclusive. The posts are gone now but I suppose you have ways of getting them if you're interested."

"What would it take for you to hold off on breaking the story at least until you get the journal?"

"A nice little sit down interview with the both of you will do, and a guarantee you won't deny that what she wrote is true. "

"Fine. Done. Contact me when you receive the journal."

His phone rang almost as soon as he ended the call. "Mycroft, your man has been deployed I take it?"

"He boarded a plane to La Guardia fifteen minutes ago. He'll be posing as a nature photographer. It's a popular area for bird watching. Your papers have been in order for weeks. You can leave as soon as we get verification."

"We've got a week before things get more complicated," Sherlock said. He related his conversation with Ainsworth.

"I should have had that one embedded in Afghanistan when he first came to my attention," Mycroft sniffed.

"Someone else might not have been as eager to bargain with me."

"Very true, he does seem quite taken with you. Your fan club grows more illustrious every day. What next, a South American dictator?"

"Your friends have never liked me, Mycroft. Text me the second you have more information."

He ended the call and his phone rang again.

"Molly—"

"I'm outside and I don't have one of those swipe cards. Let me in."

"Molly I said I would call you."

"Yes you did. And I'm here. Let me in."

He sent Lestrade downstairs to meet her as he commandeered the laptop, sitting in the darkened room opening tab after tab of information on Montauk, the military base, the light house, topography, and tourism. He knew when she came in the room but he focused on the information in front of him.

"Is that where she is? Montauk?" She asked. He looked up. She stood inside the doorway. Her hair was a mess and she wore the same wrinkled clothing she had been sleeping in, with a man's cardigan (her father's) thrown on over it all. She hugged herself tightly, her hands disappearing in the sleeves even though they were rolled up.

"I believe so," he said and explained how he'd come to that conclusion, and about his conversation with Ainsworth.

"Why didn't you wake me?"

"I wanted to be sure," he said.

"Sherlock—"

"What?" he said, turning and looking at her with his most condescendingly impatient look. He hadn't used that one on her in what felt like years. She winced.

"Nothing," she said and turned to leave. He turned back to the computer.

She came back into the room a few seconds later. "Only yes, there is something. I can help you, Sherlock. Maybe not with all of this," she gestured vaguely around the room, "but—never mind." She turned and left again. He soon heard her speaking quietly with John and Lestrade.

There was nothing to do but wait for news and discover as much as he could about the seaside town. It would take five hours for Mycroft's man to reach New York. Another two hours by car to the end of the island, and it would be the middle of the night there when he arrived. It could be days before he spotted them, if they were there at all.

He looked into the other room, which was brightly lit by fluorescent tubes. Lestrade was showing Molly something on another laptop. John came out of the break room with three mugs of coffee. He set two down at the desk where Molly sat and then wandered into the conference room. He set the third mug down next to Sherlock and sat down on the edge of the conference table.

"What are you doing, Sherlock?"

"I think it's apparent, John."

"So what, you're going to spend the next few hours, days, whatever until we hear anything sitting here on the computer?"

"I need to be prepared for any eventuality."

"Yeah, and you could easily process any information you need while you're flying over the Atlantic. So why are you avoiding Molly?"

"I need to focus."

John lowered his voice. "Did you sleep with her?"

"That is what got us into our current situation, John."

"No, I mean, since you've been back."

Sherlock opened a webpage devoted to the radar conspiracy at Camp Hero and ignored his friend. John got up and closed the door.

"That's it, isn't it? You had sex with her. With Molly. And now you can't handle it and you're acting like some stupid kid, running away from it."

When Sherlock didn't answer, John abruptly shut the laptop, nearly catching Sherlock's fingers between the screen and the keyboard.

"Don't you think," John said, "that she's been through quite enough without adding this into the mix?"

"It was her idea."

"I'm not talking about the sex, Sherlock. That was bloody inevitable. What she doesn't need is for you to go all—Sherlock on her."

"And yet, since I decided to distance myself from her I've made the first major breakthrough we've had since the beginning."

"With her help. Do you think you'd be anywhere without her having put herself through the hell of bringing up all those memories of being tortured? Do you think you'd be holding it together half as well as you have if she hadn't been around?"

"I can't think about that right now. I'll sort it all out when this is over."

"And you think she'll just be there and you'll say you're sorry and everything will be bloody lovely, do you?" John laughed and shook his head. "You can be one of the stupidest people I know, did you know that?"

"Are you finished?" Sherlock said.

"Seems like it," John said. "But I want you to know that you're on the verge of fucking up the second best thing that's ever happened to you."