Hello everyone. I'm sorry for the long wait, but I have been extremely busy. Hope you enjoy this chapter. Especially Sherlocked until death. Xxx

I should warn you that this chapter is rather short. Sorry :)

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When Irene woke up a few hours later, Sherlock wasn't next to her anymore. Her first instinct was to panic, because she felt safe with him, and now he wasn't here. As silly as it sounded, she did now sort of regard him as her protector.

Her second instinct was to immediately supress any fear she might have felt. She closed her eyes ad counted to 5, and when she opened them again, her mask was on.

And yet, if anybody walking by had cared to look a little closer, they would have noticed that Irene Adler was scared. The way she twitched occasionally, the way her eyes darted to and fro, how she took everything in slightly nervously were all things that gave her away.

She leant sank back into the bed, but the second she closed her eyes she relieved scenes from her kidnapping. Rest hadn't been easy this night, and she had had terrible nightmares. She wasn't sure if Sherlock noticed (though knowing him, it was more than likely) and she felt almost ashamed for showing weakness like that. And yet one sentence he had uttered had calmed her to such a huge extent the night before: "You don't have to act brave for me".

Saying that was practically like saying 'I love you', coming from him. It meant that he knew that she had this weaker side, and that it didn't repel him, but that he thought highly of her if she chose to act weak instead of brave.

She sighed to herself, and looked around, wanting to see if she could find a clock. Sherlock had told her the previous night that the interrogation would start in the morning, and she wanted to find out how much time she had left.

But there was no clock anywhere in the room (She had a private room all to herself – probably the courtesy of the Holmes brothers) and the kidnappers had taken her watch.

She sighed again, in exasperation this time, and wished Sherlock would come. She wasn't even sure where he was – possibly just getting coffee, or back in Baker Street. But she was somehow reassured that he wouldn't leave her. She trusted him, and if he had wanted to leave then he would have told her openly.

Instead of groaning about her current situation, she busied herself with thinking exactly what she would tell Sherlock. She had already decided not to lie to him, but she was scared that the second she told him the kidnapper's names he would take off and try to find them. She wanted justice, and knew that the kidnappers would need to be punished for their crimes (she was sure that they hadn't only kidnapped her, it was a whole organisation after all, and they had to make their profit somewhere else), but selfishly she wanted Sherlock to remain with her for now. Mainly because she needed him, he was the only one who knew her strengths and weaknesses and could help her get through this. But she was also terrified that if he went after kidnappers, they would be alerted and capture him too. And she was terrified about what they might do to him.

She saw Sherlock in the hallway then (her door had been left ajar). He was standing with Lestrade and holding a cup of coffee, talking to the DI in a low voice. Lestrade was nodding and making gestures with his hands, but Sherlock was shaking his head adamantly.

Irene watched the two of them carefully, trying to figure out what they were talking about from their body language. Sherlock seemed pretty firm on something, while Lestrade was doing his best to look sympathetic and understanding. He wasn't quite managing it though, and part of him looked rather exasperated.

After a while however, Lestrade finally left looking resigned and Sherlock pushed the door open to go in.

Irene knew that it was now too late to conceal the fact that she had been watching, and that pretending to be asleep was fruitless. And so she simply watched Sherlock enter the room. He didn't seem surprised to see her awake.

"What did he want?" Irene asked, not bothering with a greeting. Sherlock sighed.

"He wanted to start the interrogation now. I told him that was out of the question before I spoke to you privately."

Irene smiled. That was nice of him. "Thank you".

Sherlock's eyes softened and he put his coffee cup on the table.

"How are you feeling?" he asked, walking towards her.

Irene sighed. Sherlock took that as an answer.

"Are you hungry?" he asked, and although there was a small flash of mirth in his eyes, it disappeared as quickly as it came. But Irene shook her head.

Sherlock frowned. "You haven't had any proper food for days" he told her, suddenly playing the part of the stern adult. "You need food."

He pressed a button by the side of her bed, and a nurse came in, almost as if Sherlock had arranged her to be there at that precise moment. She set down the try she was carrying, and smiled at Irene, who couldn't quite smile back.

"Hello dear" she said, and although she was only in her early forties, she spoke to Irene in a tone that suggested she could be her grandmother. Sherlock smiled into his coffee.

The nurse walked around inspecting some of the monitors, and taking notes on a clip board. She smiled at Irene once she finished, and wished her a good morning, giving her some pain killers to swallow.

Irene ate her breakfast quietly and without complaint, but Sherlock could see that she was being deliberately slow. He sighed inwardly.

Of course he knew that Irene wanted to avoid talking to him, and he wasn't offended. But it was new to him. He had always known that Irene had a slightly more vulnerable side, he had begun seeing it after Karachi, but he had never witnessed her like this.

Stripped of all confidence.

He would have to tread gently.

"Irene" he started out, when he saw that she was taking smaller and smaller bites of her bun. Irene sighed and knew he saw through her efforts.

Sherlock leant forward in his chair. "Irene, the police have agreed to let me talk to you first, but they have given me a limited time. After that, they insist that they take over. If you don't want to tell me I understand, but you will have to speak to the police either way."

Irene looked down but nodded, her hair covering her face. She would rather talk to Sherlock.

"What happened?" he asked, and he had to admit that his tone could have sounded gentler. He bit his lip as he saw Irene flinch.

"They abducted me on the street when I was leaving the house. I suppose they had been keeping tabs on me for some time."

Sherlock nodded. He was mad at himself for not being able to protect Irene more, but there was nothing that could be done about that now.

"The injected me with drugs right after that" Irene continued, still not looking at Sherlock "and I have no idea where they took me. I suspected the somehow illegally got me out of New Zealand, because I don't remember any sort of travelling after that."

"Did you recognise the kidnappers?" Sherlock asked, and his hand found Irene's. She shook her head.

"They wouldn't tell me their names either."

"What happened after that?" he asked in a softer voice, and he watched Irene bite her lip. She took her time with replying.

"They…kept me in a cellar somewhere."

Sherlock's free hand curled into a fist. "And then?"

Irene said nothing.

Sherlock closed his eyes briefly. He remembered Lestrade showing him the medical report while Irene had been asleep.

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"She has several broken fingers, and burn marks across her stomach and shoulder. One of them has become infected. Other than that she has a badly sprained ankle, cuts and bruises, and has probably had numerous concussion several times."

Lestrade watched nervously as Sherlock's hands curled into fists, until the knuckles were white. He knew very well that Lestrade hadn't finished yet.

The DI took a deep breath before continuing.

"Obviously she's been abused, and injected with several drugs to make her weak and unable to defend herself."

He swallowed, watching Sherlock's eyes grow more and more dangerous. Sherlock knew that there was still one thing Lestrade hadn't mentioned.

"She was raped. Repeatedly."

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Sherlock's voice was cold, hard and dangerous.

"Who did this?"

Irene gulped. "I didn't see the kidnappers" she said, and her voice wobbled very slightly.

Sherlock gritted his teeth.

"The kidnappers weren't the only ones who did all this to you. They were only acting on the orders they had been given. Who arranged it?"

Irene took a deep breath before she answered. A tear rolled down her cheek.

"Moriarty".

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Thank you very much for reading.

I have to admit, that I was rather disappointed by the amount of reviews I got for the last chapter. Reviews play a huge part in motivating me to write, so please review. Any suggestions, negative or positive feedback or requests are welcome. (Though I can't necessarily promise to work them into the story, seeing that a lot of it has already been planned out.)

Anyway, I don't really like to ask for reviews, so I am not going to. Instead, I am going to be slightly more evil and tell you that the next chapter is already written, and that the time I will post it depends entirely on the number of reviews.

Hahaha, how mean of me huh? xD

Anyway, hoped you enjoyed, and please review!
Laura xx