Danielle was at war with herself.
Does she get involved with a problem that she really has nothing to do with? Should she interfere, tell those involved the cold hard consequences of what their actions will be if they continue?
Or does she let Paul text Felix of his own will?
A real dilemma, Danielle pondered. She was certain other elder siblings had as well. Though she only met him twice, Danielle could imagine Mycroft running interference between Sherlock and a made-up third sibling (hopefully a sister, because a third Holmes brother would no doubt be as insane as the first two).
She was staring at their phone as they drove up to the bank. She had typed in Paul's number, wondering if she should even write a text to rough draft at him. Then again, Danielle knew how annoyed people had gotten when she'd interfere in personal things. On the other hand, this was her family, how much more personal did it get than that?
The taxi stopped before Danielle could decide. 'Dammit.'
She followed after John out of the taxi. Danielle had realized she had no idea where they were, so she looked up at the buildings. Her jaw dropped at the large building, more so when she saw Sherlock walking towards the revolving doors. The building was only more impressive on the inside. Or at least more fancy looking.
"Yes, when you said we were going to the bank-" John remarked.
"Is this the right place?" Danielle asked, glancing at a sign with the name of the bank on it.
Sherlock didn't answer either of them.
Danielle figured it was just their new life now, really. Asking questions to Sherlock and waiting for him to feel like showing off.
She and John followed Sherlock. The consulting detective scanned the whole of the lobby, looking at the employees that milled about as they went about their business. Even as Sherlock moved towards the escalator, he scanned everything he saw.
Danielle wondered why it was important to come to this bank. It looked...really important. More important than she had any credit walking into.
Sherlock walked them towards the main check-in desk. "Sherlock Holmes." He prompted.
The secretary signed them in.
==NKMHLY==
Danielle and the two men were escorted upstairs. Sherlock guided them- ignoring the secretary trying to guide them to an office. Sherlock seemed to know his way like he'd been there a million times.
They waited in that office for maybe five minutes before a man walked in, dressed up in a fancy suit. Danielle watched the man hold out his hand for Sherlock to shake.
"Sherlock Holmes." He grinned, like he was seeing some old friend.
"Sebastian." Sherlock replied, with less enthusiasm.
As they shook hands, Sebastian clapped his other hand over Sherlock's for a proper professional greeting.
"Howdy, buddy. How long's it been? Eight years since I last clapped eyes on you?" Sebastian asked, which made Danielle realize they weren't such good friends after all.
If she hadn't known before, she would know from the cold flat look on Sherlock's face. He took his hand out of Sebastian's grasp. He gestured towards John and Danielle. "This are my friends, John Watson and Danielle Nolan."
Sebastian turned to Danielle and John in surprise. "Friends?"
"Colleague." John corrected.
"Neighbor." Danielle corrected too.
"Right." Sebastian nodded, as though coming to an understanding that nobody wanted to be friends with Sherlock. Danielle now wanted to hit him. He couldn't defend himself, as he was shaking hands with John. "Right."
Sebastian glanced over his shoulder to Sherlock, probably wondering if Sherlock had hired them to pretend to be his friends to make Sherlock look good. Danielle especially hated him now. When the banker turned to Danielle, he gave her a...friendly smile before taking her hand. She put on a pleasant smile that wasn't too forced, glaring at Sebastian's back when he turned away.
She exchanged a look with John. Both of them seemed of one opinion of Sebastian.
"Well, grab a pew." Sebastian offered. "D'you need anything? Coffee, water?"
Sherlock shook his head. John denied the request. Danielle didn't trust anything Sebastian offered without some kind of ulterior motive against Sherlock or herself.
"No?" Sebastian looked to his secretary. "We're all sorted here, thanks."
They all took their seats, Danielle choosing to place herself between Sherlock and John. Neither protested, if anything going with it.
"Sorry, do I know you from somewhere?" Sebastian asked Danielle, once the door to the office shut. "I've heard the name Nolan before."
Danielle blinked in surprise. "You have? I don't know how. I mean...I guess maybe my brother- he works in a bank, he said, can't remember which-but I doubt Paul works here-"
Sebastian snapped his fingers, a smug grin on his face. "Yeah! That's it. You're Paul Nolan's sister!" He started clicking his fingers again, trying to figure something out. "Which one was it; the boring landlady one or the uppity fashion one?"
Danielle tried to keep the distress off her face. She ended up looking down at her hands. See, this is why she liked meeting the people before her family did. Or not meeting them at all. "...the landlady."
"Huh." Sebastian blatantly gave Danielle a once over. Danielle didn't appreciate being stared at like she was a piece of meat. "You're much prettier than Paul said. I don't know what Paul was talking about."
Danielle looked away, not sure what to say in response to that. There was a lot that could be said. A lot of loud, mean things to be said. A lot of sad things too, that included some tears and definitely loud sobbing. She'd not do anything about it though. Not here. Not with friends of her brother...before she could talk to said brother.
John looked at Sebastian in barely restrained fury. He liked Danielle, she was much nicer companion than Sherlock half the time. She didn't deserve to be spoken to like that. By anyone, much less a coworker of her brother.
"So, you're doing well. You've been abroad a lot." Sherlock began.
Sebastian seemed surprised by the question. "Well, some." He stated, before looking at Danielle with a friendly smile again.
"Flying all the way round the world twice in a month?" Sherlock pointed out.
John frowned, confused. Danielle was actually excited now. Finally Sherlock would start showing off. Maybe they'd get some answers to all of this.
"Right. You're doing that thing." Sebastian leaned back in his chair, grinning at Danielle as though he had just realized a clever trick. "We were at uni together. This guy here had a trick he used to do."
"It's not a trick." Danielle replied. She didn't see Sherlock look at her in mute surprise.
"Don't buy it. He could look at you and tell you your whole life story." Sebastian cautioned her.
"Yes, I've seen him do it." John added, coming to his friend's defence. Because they were friends...or at least working towards it.
"Put the wind up everybody. We hated him." Sebastian went on.
Danielle decided, there and then, that she without a doubt hated Sebastian. Call it the Hufflepuff in her, but she was thinking up some creatives ways of scolding the banker so he'd never think of being so cruel ever again.
Then she remembered she was in public.
Apparently you weren't supposed to be 'cruel' or 'mean' in public.
Well...maybe Lestrade would give her a pass. He seemed to like Sherlock. He'd give Danielle a break if she did something too bad to Sebastian.
"You'd come down to breakfast in the Formal Hall and this freak-" Well now Danielle knew the police would be no help. Maybe Mycroft could make him disappear. That's what the government did sometimes, yeah? "-would know you'd been shagging the previous night."
"I simply observed." Sherlock spoke in too soft a voice. Danielle could barely tell he'd spoken!
"Go on, enlighten me." Danielle's ire only rose. "Two trips a month, flying all the way around the world- you're quite right. How could you tell?" Sherlock opened his mouth to speak, only to be interrupted. "You're gonna tell me there was, um, a stain on my tie from some special kind of ketchup you can only buy in Manhattan."
He grinned at Danielle, like his destroying of her friend was the best show. Danielle smiled tightly, planning a murder in her mind.
John was smiling also, more for the imagined scene of Sherlock saying exactly that to Sebastian to knock him down a bit.
"No, I-"
"Maybe it was the mud on my shoes!" Sebastian finished with arrogant flourish.
"...I was just chatting with your secretary outside. She told me." Sherlock lied.
Danielle glanced at Sherlock, confused. Sherlock hadn't said a word to the secretary. John behind her wore a matching expression. Sherlock would never do small chat with someone. Danielle doubted he even knew what that was!
Sebastian started laughing without laughing. Sherlock smiled thinly back. "I'm glad you could make it over. We've had a break-in."
Ah, now it was making sense.
==NKHMLY==
Sebastian walked them out of his office. He showed them towards one of the offices.
Danielle was keeping in mind to stay behind them, but she was also searching the desks around them. She was hoping beyond hope that Sebastian had it wrong. That Paul didn't work here...but how else would Sebastian know about Lilly? Or that Danielle was a landlady?
God she hoped she was wrong...
She was disappointed soon enough.
"Sir William's office– the bank's former Chairman. The room's been left here like a sort of memorial. Someone broke in late last night." Sebastian was explaining to Sherlock.
"What did they steal?" John asked.
"Nothing. Just left a little message." Sebastian answered. He let them into Sir William's office.
Danielle saw the message. It was a definite...message. Just not in anything that made sense to her.
Sebastian walked them back to his office, showing Sherlock the security footage of that office.
"Sixty seconds apart." Sebastian stated. Danielle watched as one minute, the wall was clean. The next, yellow was everywhere. "So, someone came up here in the middle of the night, splashed paint around, then left within a minute."
"How many ways into that office?" Sherlock prompted.
"Well, that's where this gets really interesting." Sebastian remarked.
He brought them down to reception. Sebastian showed them a security screen.
"Every door that opens in this bank, it gets logged right here. Every walk-in cupboard, every toilet." Sebastian explained.
"That door didn't open last night." Sherlock stated.
"There's a hole in our security. Find it and we'll pay you – five figures." Sebastian promised. He pulled a check from his jacket pocket. "This is an advance. Tell me how he got in, there's a bigger one on its way."
"I don't need an incentive, Sebastian." Sherlock spoke the name like Harry Potter would say Malfoy. He sauntered out of the security desk.
Danielle joined him, John a moment later.
"Come on, then." Sherlock prompted as he walked back to the elevators. "Let's go see."
Danielle grinned in delight.
John was still finding a good enough pocket for the check.
==NKMHLY==
It wasn't long after Sherlock started his investigating, that John realized how odd it looked from the outside. That and he weren't sure what Sherlock was doing, so it seemed silly to help.
John had noticed that Danielle had walked off not long after they arrived on this floor. Come to think of it, she hadn't gone back to Sir William's office at all.
John glanced around for Danielle. He found her walking towards the office water cooler. He went to join her, seeing little point in following after Sherlock right now. John could hear what one of the workers was saying, typical water cooler talk that while John always found uncomfortable.
"And she's great, lads." The auburn haired man, in a work casual blue suit, was saying to his grinning colleagues. Danielle was marching right up behind him, not pausing in her gate until she stood behind him. "Like really. If you could see the size of them-"
Danielle paused behind him, glaring at his back. John caught up just in time to hear her say "Hello, brother of mine." It made him stumble on the last step. This was the brother that had talked about his sister to Sebastian, which made John raised up his hackles.
The worker turned around, startled at the voice of his apparent sister. John tried to see any resemblance between them. While the man's hair was darker, it was still clearly some kind of ginger. His eyes were a matching blue to Danielle's. The man was taller than Danielle too.
The man seemed uncomfortable with her presence. John would be too, if his sister caught him talking like that. Though for John, it's because Harry was likely to join in. He was smiling anyway, a show for his co-workers. "What are you doing here?"
"Sebastian Wilkes called my friend. He brought us." Danielle answered in a voice way too clipped compared to normal.
"Oh! About the break in?" Her brother scrunched up his face his confusion. "What are you doing helping with a break in?"
"I don't know, Paul, what are you doing telling your friends that Lilly is the uppity fashion one?" Danielle challenged before she could stop herself. "Do I even want to know what they call Felix?"
Paul laughed, awkwardly. Danielle didn't care if she was embarrassing him in front of his work friends. The reputations of her baby siblings were on the line. "You know how it is between the blokes."
"Yeah I do." Danielle replied flatly. She narrowed her eyes, putting her hands on her hips. "Why hasn't Felix heard from you since he left home?" Danielle asked sternly.
John was suddenly reminded that old stereotype about angry ginger women. Paul Nolan seemed to remember it as well, wincing at the tone of his elder sister. He also was frightened at the idea of being called out at work, like a child being scolded by his mother.
"I haven't had the chance." Paul excused, weakly.
"If you have time to have two girlfriends, you have time to call your brother." Danielle countered.
Paul startled at the accusation, his coworkers as well. John himself couldn't believe Danielle had said such a thing. "W-What?"
"Yeah, two. There's the one you've been bragging to these blokes about- which is disgusting, by the way-then the one whose number you got by the landline on your desk." Danielle explained.
John stared at Danielle, now shocked at a sudden idea in his head. She sounded exactly like Sherlock right now- whenever Sherlock got in one of his deduction rants.
"How do you know it's my desk?" Paul asked, his skin going pale as Danielle kept going.
"Are you joshing me?" Danielle asked. "You still have that rubbish pen you got from year five. The one with the Star Trek engineering symbol on it."
"I- I don't have two girlfriends." Paul denied, and John could see where it was going but could only stare.
Danielle pointed off at what John assumed was Paul's desk. "You've got a picture of Natalie on your desk- clearly on a date. I remember her from the holidays, got her number on my phone. The number had the same code as a thing on Doctor Who so I remember it really well. The note by your phone with the kiss mark on it? Gotta be a second girlfriend. Did I mention I had Natalie's number on my phone, and that I took a picture of your desk complete with lipstick note? Oh and I'm totally sending her a quote of, what was it you said? 'You should've seen the size of them'?"
Paul swallowed.
"Call Felix. He misses his brother." Danielle scoffed in disgust. "I know what blokes are like, Paul. Don't be a tosser like them."
Danielle walked away at that.
John was still stood there. Somehow, he kept a stunned expression on his face. He took a step closer to Paul. He had a lot he wanted to say, about Danielle and whatever just happened, and maybe even how Sebastian had treated Danielle back in his office. "I didn't know she could get mad like that." John decided to say instead. "Better watch yourself. Good day then, sirs." He nodded goodbye to the innocent(ish) bystanders.
Not waiting to see what Paul said in counter to that, John went off after Danielle. She hadn't gotten far, just making her way towards the lifts.
"That was a bit scary." John admitted. Danielle paused in her steps, finally seeming flustered as the events caught up to her. "I don't even think Sherlock's ever done that when he got in his rants."
Danielle blushed. "Oh god, could you not tell him I did that? That was...humiliating. Don't know what got away with me, back there. It's just...Paul is the next kid after me, and he's the eldest boy, and he's supposed to be there in support for Felix in stuff that I can't. Or at least be better than he is. I would be there for Lilly but that girl might as well be speaking German. Which Paul speaks, but that's just because he's a show-off."
"How many siblings do you have?" John asked. "I can barely handle the one."
"Just three. Paul, Lilly Kelly, and Felix." Danielle listed. She worried her lip under her teeth. "Is...is three a lot?"
John laughed, giving her a half awkward half assuring face. "Someplaces, yeah."
Danielle let out a sigh. "I knew I should've left well enough alone. Lix said he was fine- that everything was fine- just that Paul hadn't called him since Mum kicked Lix out-" She grunted that time. "And that just annoyed me-"
"Your mum kicked out your brother?" John asked. "Why?"
Her cheeks went pink like her hair. "My mum doesn't want us talking to Felix." Danielle explained. "I think I'm the only one who's had a long chat with him since he got kicked out."
"What did he do?"
Danielle looked away. "Same thing your sister did." She walked away from John, not wanting to look back at her brother's direction. She might try to apologize.
==NKMHLY==
Soon enough, the three met up at the lifts.
Sherlock was walking to the escalators down. Danielle fell in behind John, trying her best to forget that she had stuck her foot in it this time.
"Two trips around the world this month." John pointed out to Sherlock. Danielle snapped to attention, remembering Sherlock's remarks in Sebastian's office. "You didn't ask his secretary; you said that just to irritate him."
Sherlock smiled.
"Which I fully support." Danielle chimed in. "That was perfect."
"How did you know?" John asked Sherlock.
"Did you see his watch?" Sherlock asked them both.
"His watch?" John asked.
"It was shiny?" Danielle guessed.
"The time was right but the date was wrong. Said two days ago." Sherlock clarified as they rode down the escalators. "Crossed the dateline twice but he didn't alter it."
"But how'd you know he'd done it in a month?" Danielle asked.
"New Breitling." Sherlock answered. "Only came out this February."
"Huh." Danielle hummed. She stepped off the escalators, following them both towards the revolving doors.
"Okay. So d'you think we should sniff around here for a bit longer?" John wondered.
"Got everything I need to know already, thanks." Sherlock remarked. John hummed in confusion. "That graffiti was a message for someone at the bank working on the trading floors. We find the intended recipient and-" He paused.
"...they'll lead us to the person who sent it." John finished.
"Obvious." Sherlock agreed.
"Ooh, that's clever." Danielle mused. "But there was a lot of people up there. Nearly three hundred, Sebastian said. It could be anyone!"
"Pillars." Sherlock pointed out.
"What?" John asked.
"Pillars and the screens. Very few places you can see that graffiti from. That narrows the field considerably." Sherlock explained. "And of course the message was left at eleven thirty-four last night. That tells us a lot."
"Does it?" John asked.
"Oh! I know that!" Danielle gasped in delight. "Paul works with German trading in the bank- he was complaining at Christmas that he had to work odd hours because he'd have meetings set but they had to work with the hours in Germany, which I think is rubbish because it's not that big a time difference, but apparently my brother is an idiot, so whatever. But if he has to work odd hours, then other people in the bank must too!"
Sherlock grinned appraisingly at Danielle. She went pink at the smile. "Correct." She went a darker pink. "Some trade with Hong Kong in the middle of the night. That message was intended for someone who came in at midnight." Sherlock stated for them both, walking through the revolving doors.
He held up the name card, showing off.
"Not many Van Coons in the phonebook." Sherlock pondered.
Danielle beamed at him.
John smiled in awe at his friend, amazed at the way his mind worked. He smiled at Danielle too, who had suddenly frowned.
Danielle had remembered her brother's face when she told him not to be a tosser.
"Taxi!"
==NKMHLY==
AN: Tada! I've been excited about this bit for ages! Did you like it? Did it seem too forced, I hope not. I always liked the idea of Danielle going all ape-shit on somebody for being rude to someone she cared about. Wasn't it?!
Thanks to yellowroseofthenw, MaddyHatter6911, PaperWorld, angelicmuseofnature, Brigitte uwu, Magic126, and DiamondHuskey05 for favoriting
Thanks to MaddyHatter6911, garbolaughs39, angelicmuseofnature, Arianna21, Brigitte uwu, Magic126, and DiamondHuskey05 for following