John blinked hard, doing his best not provide her with any visible reaction.
"Relax," Sherlock said evenly, "she's going to help us."
"Such confidence." Alexa stood up and moved over to give Sherlock his share of the lap dance. "What makes you so sure?"
"Several things," Sherlock said, stroking his hands up her back. John tried to keep his mouth shut as he goggled at the detective and the prostitute. "First of all you arranged these chairs, which are normally on the other side of the room—I can tell from the impressions in the carpet—so that from the camera's angle the bedpost is blocking my face and you're mostly blocking my partner's when you move in front of him." She spun around so her back was to him, almost sitting in Sherlock's lap but continuing to move to the music. "Second, you wouldn't speak until you turned on the music. It's loud enough to cover the audio. The camera won't pick up anything intelligible from our voices."
John was staring at Sherlock in amazement.
"Clever cop," she said, raising herself up off of his lap.
"How do you know we're cops?" John asked a bit defiantly.
She gave him a sultry smile. "My job requires the ability to read people as much as yours." She moved back over to his chair. "Our clients are a certain type of men, and neither of you are it. You"—she grasped John's knees and pulling them apart and moving to stand between them—"you're the type who looks for the wires in the theatre. You don't trust, and it's no good if you know it's fake." John kept his eyes on her face as she reached for his shirt. She unbuttoned it, taking her time. Unbidden, the memory of how fast Sherlock had done it the night before sprang to his mind.
"And you," she said, looking over at the detective, "well, you don't belong here at all, do you?"
Sherlock didn't respond. She finished unbuttoning John's shirt and spread it open.
"And you're not, erm, bothered at all, if we are with the police?" John asked, doing his best to stay focused. He glanced over and saw one of Sherlock's many bored expressions, the one which meant already knew the answer. It was probably a good thing there was a bedpost blocking his face.
"Why should I be? The police do not trouble us about our work or our papers. My boss sees to that. No, you are here for a different reason."
"You know why we're here." Sherlock's voice drifted lazily from beside John. "You wouldn't have let us through the doorway if you weren't going to tell us what we need to know. So let's be quick."
John was surprised to pain flash across her face before she replaced it with what was probably her standard-issue sexy smirk.
"I loved Karina. She was like my sister. We came here to England together. I assume you're here about her."
Sherlock gave a curt nod.
"I don't know what happened." She stepped from John's chair to stand in front of them. "But I believe she was killed." She removed her bra, and John was forced to notice, despite the inappropriateness in the context of the conversation, that she had nice—he cleared his throat—very nice breasts.
She turned around and bent over, fingers grazing the floor. "One night, two weeks ago, she didn't come home." She raised herself slowly. "She always comes home. I haven't seen her since."
"Why would someone want to kill her?"
"There is no reason." She knelt down in front of Sherlock, pushing her hands up his thighs and spreading his legs. "She was an angel. It's true some clients become angry, or jealous, but we have good security."
Sherlock's face was blank. "Who owns the club?"
"Mr. Moran. Sebastian Moran. We are forbidden to tell anyone this, but I will tell you."
"What do you know about him?"
"I've met him only once. He is not often here. He owns many businesses in London."
"The kind of businesses that sell kitchen appliances or the kind that sell drugs?"
She grinned and stood up. "Both. He is a powerful man."
"Did Karina know him?"
She walked over to a set of drawers at the side of the room. "She met him only once, like me. He was polite, professional. It's not so bad to work here." She pulled open a drawer. "We are well paid, there's good security, our clients are screened for their health." She turned and John saw she was holding a long knife in her hand.
"This was Karina's specialty," she said, moving across to John's chair. She dragged the knife gently down his chest where she'd opened his shirt.
Right, he thought, to each their own angel.
"But I know how to use it too." She raised an eyebrow suggestively. "Many of the girls here can; it's very popular now."
"Do you know any of these men?" Sherlock asked quickly, holding his phone down under the table where they'd placed their empty drink glasses. He swiped through the pictures of David Rodgers, Neil Parker, Brandon Riley, and Tony Bauer. John knew the pictures would be necessary for Alexa to recognise them if the men didn't use their real names for 'appointments.'
"Yes," she said. The skip of her eyes toward the phone had barely been visible. John couldn't help feeling like he was in one of those dreams where you're on stage in the middle of a play and you're the only one who doesn't know the lines. She flicked aside half of his shirt with the knife and teased him with the blade. Perhaps Lestrade had a point. There had to be a better way they could conduct interviews.
"Except the last one they were some of Karina's regular clients," she said. "I saw that last one once. He liked the knife too." She rested the blade against John's inner thigh. His military training had taught him not to squirm, and he didn't.
"Tony Bauer," Sherlock clarified. "Are you aware that all of them, except Mr. Bauer, have died very recently? They were poisoned."
She paused and John knew she was trying to keep her face still in front of the camera.
"I did not know."
"We believe the poison was administered on the night of Friday, October ninth."
"We were both working that night," she said. "But Karina did not kill them. She would never do that. I knew her better than anyone."
"It's probable she didn't know she was doing it." Sherlock reached out and took hold of her wrist; he touched the blade in her hand. "The knives could have been coated in the poison without her knowing."
"Why? Why would someone do that? Why Karina?"
She turned on her heel and went back to the drawers.
"She was unlucky," Sherlock said. "It seems likely that she was chosen randomly for an experiment to test the poison. They might have killed her after to cover up the evidence."
She set the knife down and picked up, John was surprised to see, a tube of lip gloss. She applied it slowly, set it down, and walked back.
"Who could be so evil?"
John knew from Sherlock's expression who he was thinking of.
"We'll find him," Sherlock said.
She nodded. "I'm very sorry, gentlemen, but the time is up. If we continue any longer without sex it will look suspicious."
John wondered which security guards got the job of watching the women have sex all night.
He looked over at the detective and was dismayed to see The Look on his face. The 'we both know what's going on here' look. It was John's more diplomatic (and shorter) name for the 'I'm very annoying (with my designer shoes and my poncey, curly hair), and I'm about to get us both into really deep shit' look.
Alexa stood in front of John's chair and reached out her hand. He took it uncertainly and allowed her to pull him to his feet. She gave him a coy smile before stepping forward.
"We don't, erm, we don't actually want—" John whispered.
"No?" Her lips were almost brushing his. "Perhaps I can change your mind."
She kissed him. He froze as she wrapped her arms around him beneath his unbuttoned shirt and deepened the kiss. Knowing he had to play his role for the camera he placed his hands on her waist and kissed her back.
He was just beginning to wonder if anyone here (especially a certain mad scientist who insisted on getting him into scrapes) had any kind of plan at all, when she was suddenly jerked out of his arms. John's eyes flew open, shocked to see Sherlock roughly forcing her back. He shook her and John automatically stepped forward to intervene. Sherlock brushed him off, shaking her again. He raised his hand to hit her and John nearly yelled out when he heard her say quietly, "Find the bastard who hurt my Karina. Kill him."
The door burst open and two security guards rushed in. John's arm was forced around behind his back and he was pushed forward, Sherlock in the same predicament at his side. They were taken swiftly down the corridor, down the back stairs and held in front of a back door. A third guard arrived with their coats.
"Blacklisted, you understand?" the guard said roughly. "Come here again and you won't be walking when you leave."
They were shoved out the door into an alley, their coats thrown out after them. Sherlock, dexterous tosser, caught his before it hit the ground. John's landed just a centimetre from a puddle. It had been raining all night and John felt the drops falling lightly on his shoulders. Fortunately it was a warm evening for October. He picked up his coat and went to re-button his shirt, but Sherlock grabbed his arm.
"We have to get out of the camera's range," he muttered, steering him around the corner.
Sherlock let him go when they were a safe distance away and John went back to work on his buttons. He was feeling a bit numb, which was odd considering he'd only had one drink. He attributed it to the hangover that was probably still lurking beneath his consciousness.
He laughed, giddy from the excitement of the night. Going undercover to meet a prostitute, getting thrown out of a brothel—his nights with Sherlock... Well, he was never bored.
"Shame about being blacklisted," John said, doing up the last of the buttons. "They had a good Scotch."
Sherlock grinned. "I can tell you the brand, if you want to know."
John looked up. "Really?"
Sherlock folded his arms. "I glanced at the bar on the way in."
"And you read and remembered all of the alcohols on the shelf."
"It's hardly one of the more impressive of my accomplishments."
John threw his coat on. "You're really incredible, you know?"
Sherlock glanced away and there was a pause.
"Were you really going to hit her?" John asked, a bit awkwardly.
"I correctly estimated how tight the security would be," was apparently a sufficient answer.
"Well, I guess that was one way to get out of there," John said, rubbing his arm where the guard had gripped it.
Sherlock shrugged. "The other was to receive the… services we paid for. I assumed this way would be preferable to you as well."
John smiled. "Preferable, yeah." It was the understatement of the century.
Sherlock started walking and John followed. It was a twisting labyrinth of alleys but unsurprisingly Sherlock seemed to know where he was going. The rain was falling a bit more heavily now, nothing an Englishman wasn't used to, but tonight his skin seemed hypersensitive, and he could feel the drops on his neck and face with an unusual awareness.
"She's smart. She knew what I was going to do," Sherlock mused as they walked. "I didn't expect her to kiss you though. She added a bit of drama to the scene."
"Actors are always dramatic," John muttered.
"You didn't seem to mind," Sherlock said offhandedly.
John shook his head, thinking of the cameras and the security guards and the money paid. "That's not how I want to be kissed."
He looked over and was surprised to see Sherlock glance at him with what almost looked like uncertainty. But it was gone from his face almost as soon as he'd seen it.
"Wh—" John didn't get to finish the word.
Without warning the detective turned and shoved him hard up against the building lining the narrow alley. The stones dug into his back where Sherlock was pressing his shoulders into the wall. John's left hand instinctively flew up to grasp Sherlock's right wrist, to pull it off, but he didn't get that far.
What the hell are you—? The question died on his lips as the detective's burning eyes raked over him. John barely had time to breathe before Sherlock kissed him. Hard.