Chapter Eight.

Cassia Ingram marched down Baker Street, lips clamped together in a fine line, fists clenched furiously at her sides as she rounded the corner at the end of the street, and marched up to the petrol blue and white Mini parked illegally at the curb.

She was fuming.

It was a marked contrast to how she had felt when she had arrived on the same street not so long ago.

She had felt numb.

Totally drained emotionally, and beside herself with anxiety.

Now she was so angry, she felt like she was going to explode.

In fact, she didn't know how she had stopped herself punching Sherlock Holmes, except that she would probably have cut her hand to ribbons on those perfectly sculpted cheek bones!

Damn the man!

She yanked open the passenger side door and slid into the Mini, slamming the door behind her, rocking the little car violently, as the driver turned the ignition on, depressed the clutch with her foot and selected first gear.

She was, however far more angry with herself.

Cassia had been in this exact same position many times before, and knowing that on this particular occasion she was walking into a lion's den, she had resolved to keep her cool and not rise to his bait.

She had failed miserably.

She hadn't had enough control over her emotions.

Last night's dream had been the most vivid and terrifying yet, she was still feeling overwhelmed and more than a little violated, and she simply couldn't put the images out of her mind.

Then he had started to attack her, belittle her gift.

She had only just held on to her composure long enough to leave without embarrassing herself completely and she was furious with herself.

What exactly had she accomplished?

Bugger all!

Why did it always have to be so difficult?

"I won't ask how it went," the driver, a young brunette woman, similar in age and size to Cassia Ingram quipped, indicating to pull the little car out into the flow of traffic and releasing the handbrake.

"I don't need to be a psychic to know that he blew you off. Your face is a picture, love. It says it all."

"Just drive, Maddie," Cassia hissed, not trusting herself to say anything polite at the moment. "Please."

"Where to?"

"Back to your place, for now. If you think you can stand to have such a misery for a houseguest."

"Okey dokey. Your wish is my command, oh great one."

"Shut up, Maddie, l'm really not in the mood."

"So I see."

Cassia threw her friend a cold, withering, warning look, one that she knew well. It politely asked her to back off and give her time.

"Ok, this is me shutting up."

After several minutes of negotiating heavy London traffic, Maddie, The Honourable Madeleine Fitz-Patrick, to be exact, finally broke the silence, for she could tell that her oldest friend was finally feeling a little calmer.

"So, is he as gorgeous in person a he is on the telly and in the newspapers?"

"Oh yes, but he has absolutely no idea how attractive he is. Don't get your hopes up, Mad; he's as sour as a lemon and completely sexless. A sexual in fact, and the only thing on his vastly superior mind is solving crime and making sure people know just how smart he is and how stupid they all are."

"Pity. Such a waste," Maddie chuckled. "So, he gave you a hard time."

It wasn't a question, but a statement of fact.

"Don't they always?" Cassia sighed heavily. "I expected it, of course I did. I just wish it didn't always have to be that way. This is hard enough without having to face people's scorn and cynicism and ridicule. Oh, I know its human nature to debunk things that we don't understand, but he was really enjoying himself."

"It would be nice, just for once, to find someone with an open mind, someone who is at least receptive to the possibilities. Lord, that man has a mouth on him!"

Cassia leaned back in her seat and closed her eye, recalling the nasty expression on Sherlock Holmes handsome, sculptured face as he had tried to make her feel like something nasty on the soles of his shoes.

"And he's magnificent when he's full flow!"

A soft smile began to tug at the corners of her lips now.

He really was the most beautiful man she had ever laid eyes on, but unlike most women, the beauty she saw was not just physical, it also radiated from his heart, and his soul.

His aura was beautiful, vibrant flowing colours, but like the man, it too was ever so slightly flawed.

It told her that all was not well with Mr Holmes.

But that was a different matter altogether.

Or was it?

Was that what the message hd been about?

This too shall pass?

Sherlock Holmes was going to be a challenge, but, she was up for it.

She had to be.

"Easy, tiger." Maddie chuckled.

"No fear, Maddie. You'd get more reaction from a brick wall. The man is an emotional iceberg. You'd get freezer burn! He's a pompous, arrogant, supercilious clever dick, full of his own self confidence and self importance, he's smug, cruel and hateful and oh so superior, in fact, he's a real tosspot!"

This elicited a giggle from Maddie Fitz-Patrick.

"We've known a few of those in our time, old duck," she chuckled.

"He's also beautiful, inside and out, complex, IQ off the scale, brilliant and instinctive but uncomplicated. He says exactly what he thinks, and doesn't care how it sounds or what reaction he gets."

"I think he likes to shock, he definitely likes to insult and belittle anyone he feels is beneath him, which is about ninety nine percent of the population of the world in his view! What you see is exactly what you get. You either love him, or hate him, and believe it or not, he inspires a lot of respect and admiration and affection from those closest to him, even if he doesn't reciprocate. But there is no middle ground with him."

"Charming. He made quite a first impression."

"He's a good man, Maddie, a man with a good heart and a strong sense of right and wrong, trying to do the right thing. He would die for what he believes in, and, I believe he would kill for the same reasons, but has no idea about the social niceties and social graces."

"He doesn't have feelings, or at least he denies to himself that he has any, because whilst that used to be the case, it isn't now, and that's thrown him, and he doesn't know how to deal with emotions in others."

Cassia sighed softly.

"And, like it or not, he's all I've got."

She winced as Maddie took the corner leading to her swanky apartment in one of the best parts of town, a little too quickly and the rear wheels of the Mini briefly made contact with the curb.

"I've got to find some way to convince him that there is more to this life than he thinks he knows."

"But you told him about your dream, didn't you? Couldn't he see how it affects you?"

"Sort of. Actually, I didn't get much chance to tell him any details. He was far too pleased with himself for outting me as 'one of those poor unfortunates who claim to see beyond the veil'," Cassia quoted verbatim.

"Oh boy."

"I've been called worse things. The point is, from the moment he deduced that I was claiming to be a psychic; he shut down on me, closed his mind and stubbornly refused to entertain any notion that I might have something of value to say. He was having too much fun trying to insult me and make me feel like the lowest form of life on Earth."

"As ever it was, so shall it be ..." Maddie intoned, bringing the little car to a halt at the curb outside her apartment building with a screech of tyres and yanking on the handbrake as she cut the engine.

"Yes," Cassia replied forlornly. "But that's what I'm talking about. Why does it always have to be a battle?"

"So, what are you going to do now?"

"Keep chipping away. I have to suffer, so why shouldn't I make him suffer too?"

Maddie nodded knowingly.

She and Cassia had been friends since boarding school, sharing the same dorm, and she had borne witness many times over their years of sharing sleeping quarters, to the dreadful 'psychic' dreams and nightmares that sometimes consumed Cassia, and not always in the dead of night either, and how they took over physically and emotionally, often making her ill until she got to the bottom of them.

"I'll find a way to convince him. I have to. I know it won't be easy. He's so hostile, resistant, but, I think I may already have found a tiny chink in his armour."

"Oh?"

"I gave him a little something to think about, planted a seed of doubt. I'll have to wait a while to see if it germinates, of course, but he knows as well as I do that I won't give up. I can't. I simply can't. Lives are at stake, Maddie. I know it, and if the police won't take me seriously, I have to find a way to make Mr Sherlock Holmes at least stop ranting long enough to listen to what I have to say."

"Good luck with that."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Well, you said he was stubborn. You are equally as obstinate and pig headed my old love, so we could have a serious case of the immoveable object meeting the irresistible force! There is going to be a helluva bang!"