Chapter 16 #2
Picking up the cane by the bed, she brushed her hair while looking in the small mirror on the wall and wandered off to go find wherever Sherlock was.
She found him fairly quickly sitting at a table in the parlor.
A cup was already poured for her, and it looked fresh, judging by the steam rising from the liquid. He must have heard her get up.
Collapsing into the chair across from Sherlock, she picked up the cup and sipped it.
It was the worst coffee she’d ever had in her life.
It was somehow both bitter and watered down.
It took her a second sip to realize it wasn’t coffee, it was tea—and that somehow made the situation even more miserable.
Picking up the milk and sugar from in front of her, she decided she was going to make it a tea-flavored glass of sweetened dairy if she could help it.
Sherlock was reading the newspaper across from her in silence.
Time to apologize. “About last night.”
“You weren’t yourself. It was nothing.” He turned the page on the newspaper, clearly dismissing the whole topic. Fine. Sure. She supposed she understood that. From the character’s point of view, his straight male friend had just launched himself at him in a drunken and drug-inspired frenzy.
Best to just write it off to chemicals and ignore it.
Rubbing a hand over her face, she thought about her next steps.
Virtue had told her to just sit tight and wait until Vile and Sasha made their move.
But…that was a great way to wind up on the losing side.
No, better to catch the villain unaware, wasn’t it?
She needed to find her sister. She needed to talk to her.
To come up with a plan where they both got out of this alive.
If Sidney were to put money on it, Sasha was already scheming, and Sidney knew that would either work out very well or very poorly for her.
She’d like to know which it’d be ahead of time.
“I’ve been thinking,” she started.
“Mm?” Sherlock seemed a million miles away as he was reading the paper in front of him.
“We shouldn’t just sit around and wait for Moriarty to do something.
We should go after him first.” She tapped her finger on the table.
“And I know it’s about being able to prove it.
And he’s too good at covering his tracks.
But he has to have associates, right? Henchmen.
Goons. Sidekicks. People around him that do his busy work.
The shit he doesn’t want to deal with. We just have to find them. Find their weak spots and movements.”
Hunting down Moriarty’s associates meant one of them was Sasha.
“Normally, I would mock you for suggesting something I had already thought of and dismissed outright, as Moriarty does not associate with others for any length of time. However.” He folded the newspaper in a particular way and passed it over the table to her.
“How charmingly prescient you are this morning, through what I imagine to be a rather roaring headache.”
Taking the newspaper with a furrowed brow, she read the headline of the article that he had featured for her. “Prima Donna Seen With Professor—The American Returns, This Time For Love?” It made no sense until she read along a little farther.
She looked up. “Irene Adler.”
Sherlock winced. “The woman.”
That rang a bell. Wasn’t there some femme fatale lady in Sherlock’s fiction? She honestly didn’t remember the details. Oh, that was charming. She got stuck with a bum leg, limping around in pain with Mister-Lack-Of-Empathy Himself, and her sister got to be a beautiful opera diva.
Who has to deal with Professor Moriarty. Who is probably an old, evil troll of a man. “We should find her. Talk to her. She might be our link to whatever’s next.”
“After our last interactions?” Sherlock scoffed. “I highly doubt she’ll agree to speak to either of us, old boy. We did try to extort her out of that scandalous photo of her with the Grand Duke.”
Whatever hints Virtue-by-Sherlock was trying to feed her about the current state of the plot was going straight over Sidney’s head. She hadn’t read any of this nonsense. It didn’t matter. “Let me talk to her. Alone.”
“Without me?” Sherlock sat back, looking mortally offended.
“That’s what alone means, yes.” She rolled her eyes.
“You don’t do emotions, or feelings, buddy.
That’s not your vibe. I can just talk to her.
See what she’s got going on with this Moriarty guy.
” She knew she wasn’t matching the period language and she couldn’t give any less of a flying rat’s ass about it.
She didn’t ask to be here. The least they could do was put up with her anachronisms.
Sherlock looked away, debating. “She outwitted us once. Yes, perhaps you’re right. A more direct approach…shows respect. And you are more likely to leave the conversation without a bullet wound than I am.” He smirked. “Very well. We will call on the diva this afternoon and you may have your chat.”
“Good.” Glowering down at the hideously disgusting cup of not-coffee in front of her, she forced herself to drink it. She needed the caffeine. Hope bloomed in her heart.
Sasha would know what to do.
She always knew what to do.
They’d both get out of this alive. Somehow. Because that’s how stories worked.