Peak's out nervously: Hey you guys! How's it been? *duck's when rotten tomatoes and potatoes are thrown* I know! Im sorry! RL has been a harsh task maker lately and for some reason I got seriously blocked on this chapter but in return I made it longer! Well this story should be over soon, I think another two chapters before we move on to Series Two of Sherlock! Dont forget to vote on the poll on my page! Please vote on my page and not through reviews! :D

In other new's: WHOSE EXCITED ABOUT SHERLOCK SERIES THREE FINALLY COMING OUT? FOR THOSE OF US IN THE USA WE ALREADY KNOW WHEN IT'S COMING OUT! YAY JANUARY 19TH!

Dream/Memory:

It was a pretty summer day and Riley had just finished with her last final. She and Jayden were laughing about some of the looks on their hated teachers face because the two finished the twenty page final in a shorter time than the man said anyone would.

"Hey Jay, here's your notes." They heard a voice say behind them. They turned and saw a brunette with dark blue eyes striding up to them in a short summer dress.

"Thanks Jess, were they any help?" Jayden asked the girl, Jessica St. Patrick.

Jessica nodded once and smiled at the short pixie haired girl. "Yea they were thank you so much! I would have failed otherwise. Do you want to go grab a bite to eat?"

Jayden glanced at Riley then looked at Jessica and smiled sheepishly, "Riley and I already planned to celebrate with a big dinner tonight. You can come with if you want,"

Dark blue eyes turned to glare at Riley as Jessica's smile became strained on her pale face. "Uh, I can't. I have things to do. You can't do anything right now?"

Riley noticed that Jayden was going to say no and, seeing Sherlock coming toward her across the quad, she interrupted Jayden. "You should go, Jay-D," Jessica openly glared at the nickname Riley had given Jayden since Riley knew Jessica hated that she called Jayden 'Jay' when they first met and Jessica had sneered at her when she did. Riley ignored the other brunette and said, "Sherlock looks like he wants something so I'll see you back at the dorm?"

Jayden nodded with gratitude and relief in her eyes at not having to deny Jessica's offer. Riley nodded once to her and started forward to meet Sherlock when she heard Jessica say lowly, "Slut,"

She paused for a moment before deciding that the girl wasn't worth bringing her mood down and continued toward Sherlock. When they reached each other, Riley leaned up slightly to kiss him on the lips; he returned the kiss but broke away. He then grabbed her hand and started to lead her back the way he had come.

"Sherlock? What's going on?" She asked as he continued to drag her behind him.

He didn't answer just continuing to drag her along and a few minutes later he stopped. Riley looked around and noticed that they were at a little park that was near the college. The two had found this park after one of their dates and Riley came here a lot when she needed to think or if she and Sherlock had one of their infamous fights.

He turned to her and asked, "Is this a good place?"

She was confused, "Good place for what? What the hell are you talking about?" She hated when he did stuff like this. He would ask her a question or say something as though they had paused in a conversation just a few minutes before when in actuality it was an hour or day before.

He sighed as though she was being stupid. She crossed her arms and glared, he knew that she hated being treated as though she was a nimrod. Seeing her glare, he said, "In our last discussion-,"

Just to be contrary she interrupted, telling him, "You mean fight," The last 'discussion' he was talking about was one of their worst, and Riley thought for sure they would be done after a fight like that. They were still together though but the past few days have been slightly strained between the two.

Used to her rebellious, stubborn, sometimes childish, ways, he continued on as though she hadn't spoken, "You made a remark about how I didn't care about your feelings and I didn't know what romance was. You were wrong."

Riley uncrossed her arms and clenched her fist at her sides and said sharply, "I thought you didn't want to talk about 'past discussions'. And no im not wrong! I think the only time you cared about my feelings was when we first met!" My god the man drove her crazy! She thought as she felt the familiar rushing through her veins that usually flowed through her when she was getting ready for a fight.

Sherlock took a step closer to her so they were toe-to-toe and said crisply, "Romance is a romantic spirit, sentiment, emotion, or desire."

She threw her hands up and remarked sarcastically, "Give the man a prize! He knows what the meaning of romance is but he clearly doesn't know the concept!" With some glee, she watched as his jaw clenched. He also hated being treated as though he were a nimrod, especially since he was a genius.

He suddenly reached up and cupped her face between his hands, "You hardheaded woman! Will you let me explain?" He didn't allow her to speak as he hurried on, "You think I don't care about your feelings but you are so terribly wrong. I don't just care about your feelings…I love your feelings. I grew up being taught that feelings were a weakness, that they were meaningless against logic. But meeting you showed me that that idea was incorrect. Being with you has taught me the strength and effectiveness of utilizing your emotions. You help me to feel. And that's what I love about you. You're the emotion to my logic and though I may not show it very well, I need you."

Riley stared at him in shock, barely noticing as one of his hands left her face and disappeared into his pocket. A moment later it reappeared clutching onto something. The thumb on the hand that was still grasping her face drew lazy circles on her cheek bones as Sherlock leaned forward to press his forehead to hers. They stared into each other's eyes as Sherlock said softly, "That's why I want to marry you…so is this a good place to ask you to marry me?"

She gasped as he pulled away slightly to show her the engagement ring nestled in a little black box. It was beautiful; three blue diamond's sat in the middle with white diamonds on either side of the three blue. She looked back up at him and saw that he was waiting for an answer and was starting to look slightly wary at her lack of response.

"…Yes. Yes, you egotistical jerk, I'll marry you." She told him with a teary smile. Sherlock's face light up with a bright smile and he kissed her happily before pulling away slightly and sliding the ring on her finger.

She stared at it for a moment before leaning up to kiss him again, throwing her arms around his neck.

…Beep…

Beep…

Beep…

Riley's eyes fluttered open as she tried to figure out what that stupid noise was. She found herself staring up at a white ceiling for a moment before she heard a voice to the left of her say, "Riley?"

She turned her aching head toward the voice and saw Sherlock sitting there staring at her. His hand was clasped with hers, looking around she noticed that Tony was asleep on the other side of her bed.

She looked back to Sherlock and asked softly, "What happened?"

"Do you remember anything?" Sherlock asked instead. It became clear to her as her memories rushed back to her.

"You mean when I got my ass handed to me by a chick that fought like a pre-teen? Yea I remember that. I remember everything up until the ambulance then that's it." Riley responded semi dryly as she shifted slightly.

Sherlock's lips twitched in a smile as he responded, "You passed out in the ambulance and was going into semi-shock, but the paramedics were able to give you enough fluids to help until we arrived here. The doctors say that you lost a lot of blood and they gave you transfusions. You have a small concussion and the cut on your neck should heal with minimal scarring. The cut on your arm didn't hit any muscles or tendons like John thought and they were able to take out the glass easy enough without more scars."

Riley nodded and looked the room over more closely now that she was more coherent. The room was huge, bigger than any room she had ever been in when she was admitted to the hospital. There were balloons and a big teddy bear sitting in the window seat to the right of her.

Staring at the balloons, she said to Sherlock, "This room makes a girl feel like royalty." She glanced back at Sherlock as he answered with a roll of his eyes, "Mycroft has apparently been following the both of us very closely and arranged for you to have this room so you could be more comfortable. The bear and balloons are from him."

Riley nodded, slightly stunned that Mycroft seemed to actually care about her since when the two were in the same room, the tension was thick. Although once she thought about it, Mycroft was more emotionless then Sherlock was. She turned back to Sherlock and something nagged at her in the back of her mind, she asked Sherlock "Was there anything at the bar from Moriarty?"

Sherlock frowned deeply, "No. The others think that he's playing with us. Officer David hinted that Adam is probably not even alive."

Her hand squeezed his almost unconsciously at the thought. If Adam was dead…she didn't know what she would do. Giving herself a mental head slap, she reminded herself that that wasn't apart of Moriarty's game. Killing Adam this early would defeat the purpose of completely hurting her and Sherlock. Moriarty would know that killing Adam now would just leave the couple in anguish, and the game would be entirely over. Dragging it out, making them follow along with his sick game, and watching the two of them slowly fall apart was Moriarty's MO.

Riley told Sherlock this and he had a proud look on his face as he nodded in agreement with her. "Exactly what I was thinking," he remarked as he, in one of his rare moments of tenderness, lifted her hand to softly press a kiss to her knuckles. Her breath caught in her chest as he stared up at her with his clear blue eyes. She was reminded suddenly of her dream-memory-how he had stared down at her with his intense blue eyed stare. In that one look Riley had known that Sherlock, though he didn't show it a great deal, loved and adored her. She had fallen for the man that proposed to her during one of their famous arguments, and though events around them tried to tear them apart, she still loved the man sitting before her.

This man went through hell. He almost died taking drugs in the effort to calm his always working brain, losing her and Adam do to said addiction, struggled to get clean with only Mycroft and sometimes Lestrade for aide. Then when he was finally clean and he asked her to come back, literally asked her, her fear and stubborn pride wouldn't allow her to agree.

He could have given up after he asked that first time. She would have deserved to lose a great man like him after what she put him through. Logically she knew that even after she had asked Sherlock to stop taking drugs and he ended up still continuing, that he needed to want to stop for himself and not just for her and Adam. Logically she knew that leaving was the only course of action in order to have Sherlock focus on quitting.

But logic didn't stop the guilt that ripped through her as soon as she stepped onto that plane 6 years ago. Logic was nothing compared to emotion. Hell, she worked better using her emotions than focusing on logic. She was the emotion in the face of Sherlock's cool logic, and he was the logic to soothe her emotions.

She allowed logic to rule her and look what she put the love of her life and her son through the past few years. Look what she put herself through. They worked better together then apart, were stronger with the other at their side. It had been staring at her in the face all this time and her brain stubbornly didn't connect the dots until now.

And for the first time, Sherlock Holmes figured out the matters of the heart before her. He continued to persist, everyday for the past six years asking her to come back to him.

She stared back at him with suddenly watery eyes, softly saying, "Sherlock,"

His eyes studied her for a moment before he gave her a small, understanding smile and again kissed her hand. He understood what she couldn't put into words at that moment. The tension that had been steadily pressing against the two since he arrived in DC eased slightly. For now they would focus on their son, but as soon as they found him they would be having a long talk.

Sherlock straightened slightly, "While I was waiting, I was thinking on other reasons why Moriarty didn't leave another note." Riley nodded and sat up to focus on him more, glancing at Tony. She raised an eyebrow seeing that Tony's breathing was off. Working with someone for so long gave you a great deal of insight on their sleeping patterns and Riley knew Tony's like she knew Adam's and Sherlock's. That insight told her that Tony wasn't sleeping and hadn't been for awhile and probably awoke shortly after she had woken up.

She turned her attention back on Sherlock, allowing her 'older brother' to continue his charade. Sherlock was idly playing with her fingers as he thought with a furrowed brow. After a moment of silence, Sherlock started to speak, "Moriarty wants to destroy us. That is his game. All of this is about us, but mostly about hurting me. The only wild card is Jessica."

Riley knew where he was going, "Moriarty may have manipulated her into joining him but he can't manipulate how she would react to the thing she hates the most. Like me being in the same room with her and not seeing her as she comes at me for an attack."

"Exactly," Sherlock nodded, "He may have thought that he had her complete loyalty. So her attacking you messed up his entire plan. For now all we can do is wait for him to contact us," The thought clearly bothered Sherlock as much as it bothered Riley.

For a moment they sat in silence, both thinking about the situation, looking over things they may have missed. Riley finally became tired of over-thinking the past few days and decided to give herself a reprieve. She grabbed an extra pillow next to her and threw it at Tony. Sherlock looked at her in mild confusion and amusement as Tony yelped and jumped almost completely out of his chair.

Riley simply watched with a small smirk. Tony looked up at her and asked indignantly, "What the hell was that for?"

Instead of answering she replied with a drawl (sounding eerily like her father), "Enjoy the conversation, DiNozzo?"

Tony rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, "How long did you know I was awake?"

"Awhile," Riley responded with an eye roll. Sherlock raised an eyebrow and watched silently as Tony pouted before reaching over and ruffling Riley's hair.

Riley slapped the hand away with the hand that wasn't still holding Sherlock's. In return Tony grabbed her hand and held it in his with a smirk of his own.

Sherlock watched as the two had a stare down. Tony's green smugly staring into Riley's glaring blue. Tony then leaned forward and kissed the side of Riley's head and squeezed her hand.

To an outsider the two would have looked as though they were madly in love with each other. But Sherlock knew that the two only considered the other siblings. Adam would talk nonstop about his 'Uncle Tony' and how funny him and Riley were when they were around each other. The two's dynamic was wildly speculated throughout the agency.

The bickering the two did on a daily basis along with the endless pranks the two pulled on each other caused others to think the two had some unresolved sexual tension with each other. Or that the two were child-like in showing their feeling for the other in the sense that they picked on each other like a boy would pull a girls pigtails on the playground.

But the two never felt that way to each other, even when they first met 6 years ago. Tony may have a mask that portrayed him as a womanizing dumb jock, but he was very observant. He only went after woman who he knew weren't looking for a monogamous relationship (only a few times he misread a woman in his life) and who weren't deeply scarred. He may seem like he was an ass with all of the women he bed but he knew how only the slightest of marks on already tarnished of psyches could screw you over even more.

So when he first met Riley, he readily admits he found her very attractive. A blind man could see how beautiful Riley was, what with her long dark hair, blue eyes that simply shined out of tanned skin. Tony had also seen the looks Riley garnered when she had to wear skirts for court. Runner legs that seemed to go on for miles and those skirts just showed off her curves even more than her regular office attire. The confidence and her unconscious sexiness she seemed to emit from every pore of her body just wrapped the whole package with a nice bow.

But Tony saw the hidden emotions in those lovely blue eyes. Saw the hurt and scars left on a once whole heart being concealed behind a wall of confidence and indifference as high as his own carefully structured walls. However, Tony had years to build up his wall and masks in front of his heart that were stronger than any steel on planet earth while Riley's had cracks slowly spider webbing from walls that were hastily built.

So he unconsciously decided that he would help her. Instead of flirting he was friendly and got to know her. The two became close friends and soon Riley was inviting him over to her house for dinner. Tony met Adam and instantly loved the boy, said boy instantly attached to him as well and started to call him Uncle Tony. Throughout the years Tony got closer to both of them and learned the reason why Riley was so hurt. In return she learned why he was also hurt.

This made them closer then before, and in another life they may have actually became a couple, but they just became Tony-the big brother who would tease her and prank her but was there to kick anyone's ass who so much as mentioned the name 'Sherlock' or the wedding ring still sitting on her ring finger even though she clearly only lived with her son. While Riley became the little sister that would make dry and joking comments on all the movies he watched and roll her eyes every time he came into work with another story about the woman of the night but would turn scarier than her father on a child case when people so much as made a passing remark about his 'spoiled' upbringing and when someone was so surprised that he could actually be more than just a Physical Ed major when it came to cases.

This also led them to becoming an efficient team on cases. So much so that if the probie's of the team didn't need to be taught and have a senior agent constantly with them or if they needed someone to be brought in quickly Gibbs purposely put the two together.

"How are you feeling?" Tony asked as he pulled out of his thoughts.

"Im good, considering," Riley responded, squeezing his hand once more before pulling her hand free to run it through her messy hair.

Tony only nodded in understanding before looking at her with a serious expression, "We'll find him, Riley. Alive." She gave him a small smile in thanks.

The door to the room swung open and a nurse came walking in with a package in her hand. She smiled at Riley, "You're awake! How are you feeling? Any pain?"

Riley plastered a fake smile on her face, "Im good. And no pain…do you know when I can get out of here? Im kind of on a case at the moment,"

The nurse didn't answer as she laid the package on her bedside table and looked over the monitors that woke Riley up earlier.

"Hmm," the nurse then took a penlight out and shined it into Riley's eyes to check her pupil reaction. Once done she turned the light off and said, "Well your pupil's are responding normally then when you arrived. Any nausea or a headache?"

"Nope," Riley said impatiently. Sherlock smirked slightly and squeezed Riley's hand to calm her but his wife ignored him and was focusing on the nurse that only nodded to Riley's response and wrote a few things on her chart.

"Everything looks ok, but the Doctor wanted to check on you himself before he would let you go. He should be around in an hour or so. I'll have some breakfast brought in for you while you wait." The nurse headed for the door before Riley could protest; clearly this woman had had patients like Riley who were antsy to leave. As the woman started to close the door she peaked back to look at them, "Oh, the package is for you. It came just this morning." With one last smile the door snapped closed behind her.

Riley huffed and Tony teasingly said, "She showed you. I wonder if she heard from others about Gibbs and deduced you were his daughter." This caused said Gibbs' daughter to scowl and retaliate to Tony's teasing by pinching his hand that was still lying on the bed.

"OW!" Tony shouted as he violently flung his hand away from hers.

Sherlock chuckled at Riley's smug look and told her, "You just have to wait for the doctor, Riley. Eating something and getting the rest you need is better than you wearing yourself down to passing out."

She really wanted to argue but knew it would be pointless when she had Sherlock and Tony teaming up on her, because she could see Tony gearing up to lecture her also. So she released a breath and remarked in defeat, "Eating the hospital food will make me pass out."

Tony gave her an olive branch as he grasped the package and handed it to her as he said, "How about I'll call Abby and ask for her to bring something over and you open this while we wait."

Riley took the package and ripped open the envelope, tipping it upside down so the contents could spill out onto her lap. A DVD and a note dropped out.

She could have sworn she paled or something with the way Sherlock and Tony were suddenly on their feet and looming on either side of her. She stared down at the note as she felt Tony grasp her hand in reassurance and Sherlock wrap an arm around her shoulder's as he suddenly sat himself down next to her on the bed.

She knew they were both looking at the same thing she was. The note had fallen delicately on top of the DVD and written for everyone could see were the words that Riley would never soon forget,

To King Genius and Commoner Riley

May you enjoy this Interlude to our fairytale as much as I had making it.

With love,

King Moriarty