by Eva Chase
“I trust Sherlock,” I said in a mild tone. “Isn’t that what really matters?”
Garrett scowled but didn’t argue, and John looked chagrinned. The comment shut down their doubtful comments and made Sherlock stand even straighter, so that was a win all around.
Sherlock craned his neck. “Here he comes now. Right on time. I agreed to having you all here to ease your minds because of the enormity of the scheme we’re putting together, but Neville is used to me working alone. I trust that you will let me do the talking and at least put on the appearance of a united front?”
I raised my chin. “Once I say I’m in, I’m in.”
“Just pretend I’m not here,” Garrett muttered.
John set the end of his walking stick firmly on the ground. “You know I’ll stand with you through anything.”
The man Sherlock had indicated was skirting a stone planter dotted with small shrubs. He was built rather like a shrub himself, short and portly with a sprig of curly dark hair down the middle of his head. Perhaps he’d sprout flowers later in the springtime too.
“Sherlock,” he said with a hint of reverence when he reached us. His gaze slid over the rest of us. “And colleagues.” He turned back to Sherlock. “We could have simply met at my office, you know.”
“I wanted to avoid any visual record of this meeting, traffic cams and security videos and so on,” Sherlock said, as if that were a perfectly normal concern for an everyday meeting. “For your sake at least as much as mine. The subjects I’d like to get your input on are rather… sensitive.”
Neville raised his eyebrows. “Well, you’ve got me intrigued, that’s for sure. Go ahead.”
Sherlock fished in the pocket of his trench coat and produced a slip of paper. “First, could you tell me whether you know of any ways to break the code on this particular type of lock?”
He held the paper out so Neville could read it without Sherlock actually handing it over. The expert’s eyebrows lifted higher. He scratched the corner of his jaw, his forehead furrowing.
“That’s a top of the line system,” he said. “With the newest models, you won’t find many who could crack it. I could, with the right equipment, of course, but it wouldn’t be terribly fast—at least a few minutes. Why do you want to know that?”
“It’s better if you’re not involved beyond the imparting of information and skills,” Sherlock said. “And pointing us to the right equipment, unless you can lend me something that wouldn’t be traceable. I’d like you to teach me how to use it.”
He’d told us this was the plan when we’d discussed the meeting earlier. This is our case. We can make the decision to take the necessary risks. I want to avoid all possible collateral damage. No one else should have to put their livelihoods on the line.
“I’d say it’s not the sort of thing I could teach very quickly, but I know what your mind is like. I could take you through the paces whenever you want.” Neville cocked his head. “Is that all?”
“No.” Sherlock flipped the paper around. “I also need to know how one would handle a motion sensor security system of this type. To shut it down, or at least avoid setting it off.”
The other man hesitated. I balled my hands in my pockets, holding back the urge to jump in and steer the conversation myself. Sherlock knew this man, and I didn’t. I did trust him at least as far as knowing what his allies would and wouldn’t tolerate. A stranger jumping in might throw off a delicate balance I didn’t fully understand.
Even if I did decide intervention was necessary, I’d let Bash handle that.
“It’s pretty much impossible to tackle motion sensors of that type once they’re running,” Neville said slowly. “The only way you can disable them is if you can get at them before they’re turned on or if you can cut the power.”
“Then it is possible,” Sherlock said. “Excellent, excellent.”
“Sherlock… I’d really feel more comfortable if you told me what this was all for. I wouldn’t even be talking about subjects like this with, well, almost anyone other than you.”
“It’s for a good cause. The best of causes, really.”
Neville gave him a skeptical look. “How good a cause can it be if you can’t tell me about it for my own protection?”
I held myself from shifting my weight restlessly. Garrett glanced at John surreptitiously with an expression that seemed to say, I told you this was a bad idea.
Sherlock simply gave the security expert a calm smile. “You remember Canterbury, don’t you, Neville? I keep my cards close to my chest for a variety of reasons, but you can always be sure there are reasons. Consider: Sometimes to foil a criminal you must understand their potential methodology.”
Well, that was a bald-faced lie. He was implying that we were trying to stop a break-in rather than plotting to commit one ourselves. Not that I hadn’t seen Sherlock lie before, but it’d always been to people he disdained. He considered this man a trusted associate.
There was very little he wouldn’t bend in pursuit of his victory, was there? Lucky for me. How many steps were there between criminal mastermind and crime-fighting consulting detective anyway? The things we could do together if he ever adjusted his morals completely…
His gambit worked. Neville visibly relaxed with a sigh of relief. “Of course. I’m sorry. Caution comes with the line of work, you know—it’s difficult to turn that instinct off.”
“And that fact does you credit,” Sherlock assured him. “I won’t keep you from your prior commitments any longer. When would be the soonest we could meet up for a lesson or two? The matter is rather urgent.”
“My evening is free.”
“Perfect. I’ll call you when I have my own plans more settled, and we can arrange an exact time and place.”
My hands unclenched. I eased them from my pockets as Neville ambled off.
One more piece of the puzzle was in place. We were getting so close I could almost taste my own victory.
“The motion sensors will require some thought,” Sherlock said quietly. “The security company controls them and monitors the whole gallery from an external site. But we can work through one problem at a time.”
“I have some experience with pressure sensitive devices,” John said. “I can refresh my—"
He cut himself off just as a waft of deeper cold and the scent of parched rot washed over me. My stomach flipped. John’s head had jerked up—and Sherlock’s and Garrett’s followed. I wrenched my own head back to see what they were staring at just above me, but the back of my neck was already prickling like a warning.
Bog floated there, filmy fabric drifting around it even more freely than usual, swaying up and down with an oddly stilted rhythm that jarred in my mind as I took it in. Ice shot down my spine.
My hand darted up in an instinctive gesture to try to ward the shrouded one away. I caught my arm at the last second and yanked it back down. Then my heart lurched for a completely different reason.
I’d caught my hand by my chin. From a distance, Bash might think I’d given him the signal to charge in. Shit.
“What the—” John said hoarsely, and Sherlock’s gaze dropped from whatever he could make out above me to my face. Garrett took a step back. I didn’t have time to juggle all of their reactions. If Bash rushed in with his ploy now, he could inadvertently throw off everything I’d gained—even more than it was already thrown off thanks to the creature fading away above me.
“Custard!” I snapped out, loud enough to be sure my voice would carry beyond the trees and hedges around us.
The apparently random word at least had the effect of interrupting the bewilderment of the men around me with a different sort of confusion. Sherlock knit his brow, still peering at me. “Custard?”
Bash and I had picked a code word that meant “Abort!” ages ago. In ideal circumstances, I’d have found a way to at least somewhat naturally work it into conversation. There was nothing ideal about this moment.
I swiped at my cheeks a
s if trying to wipe away a blush of embarrassment, raising their color as I did. “I just— I saw the weirdest thing— I must have eaten too much custard at lunch. There is an amount of sugar that can mess with your brain.”
“I saw something too,” Garrett said tersely. “I didn’t eat any custard—or whatever. We all saw it, didn’t we?”
I widened my eyes. “You saw it too? What exactly did you see?”
“It looked,” Sherlock said with a frown, “like a ghost out of some sort of horror film. Pale and faded and vaguely humanoid.” He swiveled on his feet, taking in the fountain, the path of hedges, the trees, as if trying to determine whether any of them might have been responsible.
Bog hadn’t shown itself completely, but the shrouded one had revealed a lot more than a strange wavering of light. My fingers itched for one of my sugar cubes. This felt too familiar. It felt too much like that hopeless flailing sensation years ago when I’d discovered my expected fate. Panic trickled up through my chest.
“That’s what I’d have said it looked like too,” John said. “All sort of… streamy? Just floating there.” He shook his head and touched his temple.
“It was fucking eerie,” Garrett said.
Sherlock paced around me, studying the clouds overhead. “It was right above you, Jemma. Did you feel anything?”
“No,” I said, grasping for some way, any way, to regain control here. I needed Sherlock focused on the gallery heist, not on supernatural beings following me around. I needed Garrett not to connect this spectacle to whatever oddity he’d witnessed from Bog in the doorway the other morning.
An idea clicked into place. I grabbed Sherlock’s arm. “Maybe we should call off this heist idea. If our nerves are getting to us so much that we’re imagining weird spirits—”
His ego kicked in before I had to go any farther. Sherlock Holmes didn’t succumb to nerves.
“No,” he said firmly. “There’s nothing wrong with us. It had to be some sort of natural phenomenon. A sliver of sunlight cutting through the clouds at an odd angle, perhaps. We surely wouldn’t all have seen the same thing if it hadn’t been there.”
And the last thing Sherlock would ever believe in was something beyond the world of the concrete and scientific. I’d read enough accounts where he scoffed at the idea of ghosts and spirits to be sure of that, thank all that was holy.
I exhaled slowly as if gathering myself. I’d gotten him back on course. This wasn’t a catastrophe.
“You’re right,” I said. “We were probably all a little tense after this meeting.”
“Easy to jump to an eerie interpretation when we’re already keyed up,” John said, although his expression was still wary.
Garrett motioned toward the path. “I don’t know what the hell that was, but at this point I don’t care. Can we just get out of here?”
“Yes,” Sherlock said. “There’s still much to be done.”
But he kept frowning as he moved to walk away.
The second my hotel room door clicked shut behind me, I spun on my heel, glaring around the space.
“What the hell was that, Bog?” I said, raising my voice as loud as I dared, hotel walls being what they were. “If you want to give me a message, give it to me directly. Aren’t you embarrassed to turn yourself into some kind of schlocky horror carnival trick?”
I hadn’t known for sure that the shrouded one had followed me back here, but after the show Bog had just put on, I’d figured it’d want to watch my full reaction. The air near the window shimmered. The pale sunlight seeping through the glass partly solidified into Bog’s wavering form.
“You seem very upset, bloodling. How unlike you.”
I aimed my glare at the impenetrable mist of Bog’s face. “I just can’t believe how stupid you’re being. How many of your kind’s laws did you just break? You have business with me, not with anyone else around me.”
“And yet your business with them seems so urgent as your days creep toward their end.” Bog drifted over the table. “Very strange.”
“I should be able to do whatever I want with those last few days, seeing as I still belong to myself for that time.”
“I haven’t prevented you from doing anything. You move about perfectly freely.”
I gritted my teeth. “You know you’re disrupting the human world. Do you really want me to report this to the rest of the shrouded folk? What will they do with you?”
The shrouded one made a sound like a creaky chuckle. “If they realize who you are, it will be just as bad for you as for me. If they don’t, nothing they inflict would interfere with contracts already drawn. I doubt we will find out, will we, bloodling? You’re in no hurry to place yourself before the ones you were once so desperate to escape.”
The words made the back of my neck twitch. “There are ways I can tip them off without them knowing who pointed them in the right direction,” I said. “Maybe I’d like to see justice carried out whether or not it affects what I owe you.”
“Maybe,” Bog said with hollow amusement. “Or maybe you would refuse to take even that chance.”
It vanished like a streak of light swallowed up by a shadow, there and then gone. I stood scowling at the place where it’d been for several moments longer.
Maybe you would refuse to take even that chance. Bog was calling my bluff. A finger of cold prodded my stomach.
It was a bluff. I’d be worse off if the rest of the shrouded folk turned their attention on me than I was right now.
In the grand scheme of things, Bog was small potatoes. The only reason I’d been able to convince it to make the deal was that it’d never have gotten its maw on a human sacrifice in ten thousand years otherwise. What it’d said was true: If the higher folk found out Bog was the one that’d stolen their prized lamb, they might sever our contract, sure, but only so they could devour me for themselves.
There were certain lines Bog wouldn’t cross. If it went too far, the shrouded folk would notice its antics on their own. But what it’d done already was bad enough. How many times could even Sherlock dismiss strange lights and figures he’d never seen before I’d come into his life as a mere coincidence?
There was nothing I could do to stop it. If I’d known a way to contain Bog, I wouldn’t have been here in the first place.
Chapter Seventeen
Garrett
One of the best things about Thompson was his predictability. He worked the same shift that ended in the mid-afternoon as often as he could get it, and after every shift he went straight to the pub down the road from the station for a beer before he headed home for dinner. He even had a favorite booth.
I spotted him there through the window—alone today, thankfully. Trying to divert more of my colleagues so I could have this conversation would have tied my stomach in twice as many knots.
Sherlock probably would have come in with a subtle ploy, pretending he’d just happened to pop in for a drink and, oh, why not stop by to chat with that coworker who coincidentally was in the same place? Deception wasn’t really my style. The fact that I needed to do any at all had prompted those knots in my stomach. Normally Sherlock and John carried out their schemes while I looked the other way, and that suited all three of us just fine.
I pushed past the door into the pub. It wasn’t a bad place, really—sure, the booziness in the air mingled with smell of frying oil from their famous wings, and as soon as you moved beyond the front windows it was rather dim, but the amber lighting created a warm atmosphere and the oak tables gleamed with recent polishing. Sprightly folk music played over the wall-mounted speakers.
When I reached his table, Thompson glanced up from the sports magazine he’d been flipping through. “Lestrade!” he said, a grin that looked a little too eager splitting his doughy face. “What brings you here? I thought you were all busy with that fancy conference.”
Thompson had already been with the department two years when I’d started on. Three later, I’d become the youngest cop in Scotland Yar
d to earn detective inspector. Another three after that, Thompson was still on regular constable duty but chomping for the chance.
To be fair, he’d been friendly enough when I’d started. But that friendliness had ramped up several notches as I’d proven myself and then caught Sherlock Holmes’ attention enough for me to start working with the consulting detective regularly. One time, I’d spent an hour recounting the not-particularly-sensational events of a two hour dinner at Sherlock and John’s shared flat thanks to Thompson’s avid questioning.
He played nice right now because he coveted what I had. The second he saw a chance to step in front of me, no doubt he would.
“Duty still calls,” I said in a casual tone I had to force. “I’ve been looking into some things on the side. Do you mind if I join you for a few minutes?”
Thompson drew his elbows in, his gaze sharpening. He wasn’t the swiftest bloke on the force, but he wasn’t stupid either. And he kept his ear to the ground.
“Sure,” he said. As I slid onto the opposite bench, he turned the beer glass in his hands and tilted his head to one side. “I heard you were hassling the chief for a warrant for the Richter exhibition.”
“That’s actually why I was hoping to talk with you,” I said. “You’ve been assigned to the security detail keeping an eye on the gallery, haven’t you?”
“I have.” Thompson shifted in his seat, clearly unhappy with the fact. “Seems like Richter is more worried about being the victim of a crime than avoiding being caught for one. What got you all itchy about him?”
“It may not be him at all,” I said. Lie number one. “Sherlock Holmes mentioned some concerns related to one of the relics, which are handled by various people, that I was hoping to follow up on. But the chief has to make his decisions as he feels is best.” I spread my hands.
The mention of Sherlock automatically perked Thompson up. “This is one of Holmes’ theories, is it?” he said. “What’s he on the scent of?”