A/N: Instead of reading I did this! Be impressed and then tell me off because I need to read and have to pass and pretend to succeed at life while being a closet fangirl

"Miss Hooper." A gruff voice pulled Molly from the darkness. "Oi." It sounded churlish and she wrenched her eyes open. Molly was confused. Where was she? Who was the voice? After the confusion, panic set in. It was dark and from what she could see by the sparsely placed candles she was in a shepherd's hut. There was no shepherding buildings on the Holmes' land. Molly looked blindly around, eyes struggling to adjust and her panic only increased as she realised her wrists and ankles were bound and she was unable to sit up.

"Stop squirming. The rope will only hurt more." The same voice came from a corner and a match was struck illuminating the man before her. His voice was light, polite even as though tying up people was a norm for him. That thought chilled her more than she thought it would.

"Please." Her voice croaked from disuse. "Please God don't…"

"Don't what? Don't hurt you? If they were my orders you'd been awake a long time ago." His voice still held that weird polite threatening tone to it. "My orders were to obtain you and nothing more. So far." He smiled and Molly stared at the man propped in a corner. Grey eyes stared at her. Stared and not leered she noticed. Long fair hair was gathered at the nape of his neck in a dirtied ribbon and there was stubble but not quite beard length. A long lean body stretched out before, a body she estimated to be at six foot when he stood. She knew a soldier when she saw one.

"Orders?" Her voice cracked.

"Well, I think I've got your fate sorted so you might as well know…" Still conversational about her impending death. "Mr Moriarty hired me. Junior I should add… I believe you're well acquainted." He had picked up a pistol and her heart stilled before he started to clean it. Then his words hit home. Molly Hooper knew James Moriarty. She'd been courted by him, engaged, practically up the aisle. Her parents had given consent the dress was all but made, the cake all but ordered. She knew now that Lord Holmes had intervened but when he vanished without a trace before they'd finalised the wedding she'd been heartbroken. Furious at his disappearance but ready to forgive, ready to find him and possibly elope thinking it was his father stopping them.

Naturally all that changed when she watched, crouched and hidden, as said fiancé murdered her pleading mother.

"I know him." The words tasted bitter in her mouth but she swallowed and for the first time her captor smiled.

"Thought you would remember him." He grinned wider and then put the pistol aside. His leonine movement startled her for it was so swift that he was before her in an instant helping her upright. She struggled for all she was worth but his lean strength held her steadfast and he pinned her into place and fixed her with a stare.

"What are you doing?" She hissed as he carried on examining her features.

"Feeding you." He said it as though it was the most simple thing in the world. "You've been out cold all day and ether tends to make you hungry." His manner was almost gentlemanly and Molly couldn't wrap her thoughts around it that this man was the final piece into her demise. She wanted to argue against him but her stomach seemed to agree with him most loudly. A wry smile crossed his features and he fed the bread and cheese to her in small pieces, chuckling when she tried to bite his fingers. Eventually Molly ate sensibly; she resolved she'd need the strength to escape and she ignored the amused expression adorning his face. When she was finished, he laid her back down and moved back to his corner, picking up his pistol once more. Molly took the time to just stare at him. He stood restless for a moment, staring out of the window before walking around. His favoured his left leg but only slightly, noticeable to someone who was also used to hiding injuries around others. Molly spotted it quickly, feeling her wrist twinge as it protested at being bound for so long.

"Why do this?" She whispered and he stilled for a moment and sat heavily in the corner.

"Do what?" One candle was snuffed out with his bare fingers.

"You're nothing more than a mercenary, a soldier for hire, services to the highest bidder. I've been led to believe they're a little rougher than you are." She arched an eyebrow and his gaze raked over her.

"Needs must. Manners don't cost a thing." His answer brooked no argument and he stood once more. Molly shrank back, she'd felt the undercurrent of emotion beneath his demeanour but he surprised her once more by throwing a rough blanket over her prone form. "I'll be keeping watch. Don't try to run away. I run a lot faster." Two more candles were snuffed out, leaving only the one by him alight, plunging Molly into almost darkness. "Goodnight Molly Hooper."

. J.M .

"That Hooper fortune would've been mine if you let me marry the wench." James whined.

"It's not like we required their pitiful fortune." His father reminded him as they sat in one of the opulent studies in their London Townhouse.

"But still…"

"James." His father was suddenly serious and the younger man turned expectantly. "James, the net is closing around us a little tighter than I had imagined. While we believe Moran has the Hooper girl detained we must work through a few things.

"When we reach the Holmes' Manor I want Moran to search for the papers our men could not find in the debris of the Hooper House." James looked confused at his father's words and Andrew continued. "They are not only treasonous papers but there are also documents that relate to the crimes Benedict has been trying to link me to. They would secure our execution let alone imprisonment. We know the girl must still have them because we are still here." He gestured to the house around him.

Andrew looked at the flames, a grimace marring his features.

"I had no idea that Lady Hooper had been building up the documents her husband was supposedly storing for us securely. Then the stupid woman tried to blackmail me with them. She was no fool and almost succeeded but it seems that Molly had inherited her wits from her mother and not her insolent dolt of a father. Such an ugly characteristic for a woman." Andrew sneered.

"What do you want me to do father?" James pressed his fingertips together, a maniacal grin curling up the corners of his lips.

"I want those papers well and truly destroyed and I want that girl interrogated. She knows too much, not to mention that nasty engagement staining our family name." A similar look crossed both men's features. "A stipulation from her very foolish father. Well he lost the papers to his wife, heaven forbid if Benedict had really thought of searching the Hooper house."

"So papers that will bear…"

"A simple red wax seal with my fingerprint on them no crest."

"Papers destroyed, Hooper line ended, allow me to toy with the youngest Holmes; I do love to see an emotional man break!" James' voice had taken on that insane Irish lilt once more and his father nodded.

"We need to leave for Elderflower. Send word to Moran."

. S.H .

"Sherlock!" His Father bellowed. The youngest of the clan had been pacing, cursing that he never gave chase but he panicked. He murmured and occasionally threw things. His mother had already wrestled a gun off of him to save her poor walls and furniture.

"Doctor Watson is dealing with the servants." Mycroft slid into the drawing room and Sherlock broke.

"Why aren't we saving her?!" He shouted "Why aren't we out there?! Why didn't I go after her?" His voice caught and he sat down heavily "She needs us. Molly needs us." Not even Mycroft felt like making a jibe at an unusually emotional Sherlock's expense.

"It's Moriarty…" His father began.

"I don't give a damn who it is! I want them dead! I want them strung up, if they've hurt her…!" Sherlock roared and was stopped by his furious lioness mother stood.

"Sit down." She commanded. "The Moriartys' will come to us. The letter arrived as expected, it was nailed to the fence post at the edge of the drive. Molly will be alive when she's brought back here by the men who took her." Violet brandished the paper.

'Ahh Holmes!

So you're missing a servant, very careless I think. We'll bring her back in one piece…maybe. It depends how helpful she is… Lady Hooper has something of ours stored in your house. We'll find it then we'll leave her with you.

Thank you for your hospitality

Moriarty.'

"They'll bring her back Sherlock." His mother wrapped his lanky frame into her arms and felt him break down, silently crying into her shoulder.