* * *
Three blocks down, they turned left. Another block over and all hint of an inebriated wobble disappeared. The couple released each other as “Charlie” grew several inches, rising to his full six feet of height—six and a couple of inches, given the additional height added by the heels of the cowboy boots.
Skye’s dually pickup was hidden in an alley. They climbed in, Skye started the ignition, and they eased out of the alley. At Holmes’ direction, she detoured along several streets, doubling back and driving several miles out of the way, before he finally allowed her to turn for home.
Once they were on Highway 24 headed up Ute Pass, Skye turned to Holmes. Briefly she wondered why his face appeared flushed, but decided it was a trick of the dim moonlight.
“Well?” she demanded.
“‘Well’ what?” Holmes wondered, seeming preoccupied.
“What did they say?” Skye exclaimed in exasperation.
“Oh,” Holmes responded, shaking himself out of his reverie. “They discussed a vehicle Thompson is overhauling for Harris. Delivery is to be made in one month, give or take.”
“Hm. And if you believe that, I got this bridge in Brooklyn for sale…”
Holmes stared at her oddly, but said nothing.
“Oh,” Skye grinned, recognizing his confusion. “There’s an old joke about a gullible person trying to buy the Brooklyn Bridge…never mind.”
Holmes’ face remained sober, but the grey eyes twinkled.
“Well, I should say we did a good night’s work, Susie darlin,’” he remarked, dropping into cowboy lingo partway through the statement.
“I reckon, Charlie,” Skye snickered, falling back into her own character. “I expect, after all the kissin’ we did in that booth, nobody’s surprised to see us goin’ home t’gether, neither.”
“My compliments for following my lead so well and so swiftly. I am afraid I gave you little warning, but I had to devise a plan quickly when I saw Harris walking through the door.” Holmes gave an uncomfortable laugh.
“Please don’t take offense, but it was kind of fun,” Skye admitted, then blushed despite herself. She shrugged, then shot him an apologetic grin. “It’s been awhile since anybody…well. We’ve already had that conversation. But I bet you’d be a good kisser in real life.”
“I…have been told so, yes.” Holmes promptly averted his face, but Skye could see the dusky red flush creeping up his neck, even in the dim lighting of the truck.
“Oh?” Skye wondered, intrigued.
* * *
“Er, yes,” Holmes admitted, discomfited. “I have occasionally had to assume disguises in which I courted unwitting women, I am afraid.”
“Oh, that’s right. I won’t ask any more embarrassing questions. Sorry.”
“I shall be glad to get this spray colour out of my hair,” Holmes changed the subject, poking at his offending thatch. “It is becoming positively disagreeable.”
“But it looked good, at least in the low light in the bar. It washes right out, so jump in the shower when we get home. I’m gonna be busy peeling my skin out of this greasepaint mask…”
* * *
That night, Skye dreamed of being kissed by firm, gentle lips while held in a warm embrace, of being cradled against a lean, hard body, and of being called “Darlin’” in a cultured English accent. She sighed in contentment and sank deeper into sleep.
* * *
Across the hall, a slumbering Holmes found his dream-self pressed against a curvaceous, yielding form, while soft lips caressed his own, and warm hands roved his bare chest. He moaned yearningly, but never woke.
Chapter 9—Never Theorize Without All the Data
HOLMES AND SKYE SPENT THE ENSUING days pondering the calendar, trying to ascertain what significance the delivery timing of the retooled “vehicle” might have. Nothing came to mind, however, and at last they filed the information away, notifying Jones of what they’d found.
On Wednesday, Skye and Holmes were headed to the cafeteria for lunch when they rounded a corner and almost literally ran into Bob Harris. He looked even more startled to see them than they did to see him.
“Oh! Well, hey there, Bob,” Skye greeted him in a friendly tone. “I haven’t seen you in awhile. I’ve been looking for you.”
“Really? What for?” Harris wondered smoothly. “I’m sorry I missed you. That temporary assignment came through, and I’ve been busy. I spend most of my time in another building now.”
“Oh, wonderful. And it was nothing important. I just remembered you said you had a trip planned, and I wanted to ask you about it. I’m thinking about taking a vacation sometime during the summer and bringing Holmes with me, letting him see the country, you know? But I can’t decide where to go. So I’ve been collecting ideas from friends and co-workers.”
“Ah. I really wouldn’t know, Dr. Chadwick. I’m just going to visit family next month,” Harris said.
“Oh? That sounds nice. When are you leaving?” Skye queried with genial interest.
“Um,” Harris hesitated for a moment, “the twenty-seventh of June.”
“Cool.” Skye noted that this time Harris met her eyes; he was telling the truth. “Enjoy your trip. But seriously, any interesting ideas where I can take Holmes?”
“You might try L.A. or New York, I suppose. Or Vegas. Some big city where he can see the complete modern culture, that kind of thing. By the way, how’s the rehabilitation coming, Mr. Holmes?”
“Rehabilitation?” Holmes’ eyebrow rose.
“Yeah, Doc here told me how she’s retraining you to fit into society,” Harris said blithely, unaware—or uncaring—of the impression his wording was giving. “Teaching you how to be useful, get a real job. Gotta be a pain in the ass, not being able to do anything, not knowing the technology and stuff. Hell, you don’t even know the history of the last century, do you?”
Holmes’ expression did not change, but Skye sensed the sudden tension in the tall form beside her.
“Oh, he’s doing great, Bob,” she interjected, before Holmes could respond. “The computer training is going fantastic, and soon he’ll be able to set off on his own. In fact, he already could, if he wanted to.”
“Well, that’s good. Not much use for old-fashioned 19th century detectives anymore, is there? It’s a scientific age now. Good luck,” and Harris hurried off.
As soon as he was out of sight and earshot, Skye leaned against the nearest wall and put her hand to her forehead in aggravation.
“Lord have mercy, I don’t know whether to laugh or wring his neck.”
* * *
“Might I inquire as to what that was all about?” Holmes requested, struggling to control his offense.
“Aw, geez, it sounded awful, didn’t it?” Skye apologized, face squinched into a pained grimace. “The last time I ran into him was when we found out he’d forged the assignment papers. He turned my questions around and asked me what I was still doing here. I had to think fast, because I realized his story was off, and I didn’t want him knowing what we were really doing. So I made up some nonsense about Morris asking me to train you for a ‘modern’ career. He sorta went off on it, like we’re so almighty superior or something, because of the time difference. I played along, but I’d completely forgotten it until he said something. I’m sorry, Holmes.”
“But is that not really what you are doing, Skye?” Holmes sighed, discouraged.
“Huh?” Skye glanced at him in confusion as they resumed walking.
“Training me to be ‘useful’ in modern society.”
“Oh, good grief. No. You already know how to be useful. I’m pointing out how my society differs from yours, and smoothing the transition.”
“Ah. A distinction. I see,” Holmes said blandly.
But, somewhere inside, he wondered how much of it she believed.
Somewhere inside, he wondered how much of it he believed.
* * *
Thursday night, Holmes, having long since
finished Skye’s quantum mechanics textbook, two world history books, a year’s worth of the Astrophysical Journal, and three forensics texts from her home collection, went in search of some light reading to occupy his leisure time. He looked through Skye’s bookshelves, and chuckled when he ran across the large tome containing the collected stories of his adventures with Watson. Thinking fondly of that worthy, he took the volume down, moving to the armchair nearby to enjoy an opportunity to reminisce about his old friend through its pages.
How I do miss Watson, he thought wistfully, flipping open the book and skimming its table of contents. My, he became quite prolific, it seems.
But something caught Holmes’ eye. His brows furrowed. Then his eyes narrowed. He flipped to the latter half of the book and began to read. Soon the expression on his face deepened to a glowering scowl.
* * *
When Skye came in from the barn after feeding the horses for the evening, Holmes met her in the den. He stood before her, his back ramrod straight, his countenance livid with anger.
“Would you care to explain this, Dr. Chadwick?” he asked coolly, handing the volume of mysteries to her and pointing to the open page.
Skye glanced at the words beneath the long, narrow fingertip: The Adventure of the Empty House. Perplexed, she looked at Holmes’ face, dark as thunder.
“You said if I went back, I had to die, or risk destroying the continuum,” he noted in a brusque, clipped voice. “Perhaps you would care to explain how Watson came to write up all these cases which took place after my supposed demise.”
“Oh,” Skye said flatly, grasping the problem. She moved to the sofa. “C’mere and sit down and I’ll explain,” she said, patting the cushion beside her invitingly.
“I prefer to stand, thank you,” Holmes said coldly, his fury almost palpable.
* * *
But what Skye could not see was how much pain he was in; he had trusted her, and the detective considered himself an excellent judge of character due to his observation and deductive reasoning. He did not understand how his reasoning could have failed as completely as this development seemed to indicate. Moreover, when he had told Skye they were friends, he had meant it. It was akin to waking up of a morning to find Watson holding a loaded, cocked revolver on him. He noted that Skye flinched at his harsh response, but she nodded.
“Holmes, remember that first day, in my office? How I told you we’d found nearly a hundred and fifty alternate universes already?”
“Yes,” Holmes barked.
“Do you also remember I told you many were similar, but they all had some variation, something making them different from all the rest? And that I’d found you in a number of different continuums?”
“Yes,” he said, but quieter, suspecting where this might be going.
“Conan Doyle’s later stories evidently chronicled a different continuum than yours. Best my Timelines team and I could tell, it was Continuum 108. Believe me, we gave matters a lot of study before we settled on your continuum for observation. You’ve been scrutinized across multiple universes more times than we can count. My team and I watched you for hours, in—I hesitate to say all, because I don’t know if we found ‘em all, but probably most of—your many incarnations.” Skye shook her head.
“For hours? But what about…” The implications disturbed Holmes. His voice faded as heat crept into his cheeks.
“Oh,” Skye said, joining him in his blush. “Not…all the time. We didn’t follow you into the bathroom, or while you were getting dressed, or sleeping, or anything like that. That would’ve been…just wrong.”
“Very well. But can you prove these stories came from another continuum?” Holmes demanded, satisfied—by her involuntary reactions—that his privacy had not been invaded.
* * *
Deeply hurt, Skye nodded again, staring down at her hands for long moments as she sought her voice. Finally she murmured, “Tomorrow when we go down to the base, I’ll dig out the video logs of our observations and let you review them. All of them, if you want to, but that’ll take awhile. Each one has a time-tag in the lower right corner of the screen, containing not only the date and time of the continuum being observed, but also our notation of which continuum we were looking at. The time-tag was computerized, so it was automatically added.”
“How do I know the tag wasn’t falsified?”
That was too much, even for Skye’s understanding nature.
“You DON’T, dammit!” she shouted, leaping to her feet, all the hurt and anger produced by his distrust finally pouring out. “If you want to suspect me of nefarious purposes in yanking you from your world, you go right the hell ahead! But answer me this, MISTER Holmes: What possible motive could I have for doing this? You’ve already seen all that was left of one of my friends when the damn tesseract malfunctioned. You’ve seen me reprimanded and my life’s work shut down. Why would I throw away his life and my career just for the opportunity of bringing you here, when I was already seeing you in action on your own turf? WHY, when all I had to do to prevent all this aftermath was sit back and watch. You. DIE?” Her voice cracked, and she resumed her seat and fell silent, glaring at him with tear-filled eyes.
* * *
That rocked Holmes back on his heels. It hit him that Skye was right; she had no reason to bring him here, and every reason to have left him be. Thinking back to the instant she had appeared on the ledge over Reichenbach, he brought the image of her face into the forefront of his mind.
She was pale, and her eyes were dilated; her movements were almost jerky, and her expression was horrified. Except for, perhaps, the expression, all were automatic responses, beyond the ability of conscious thought to control. She was reacting on instinct.
Which comprehension forced Holmes to grasp that subconsciously he had latched onto the stories in hope of being returned to his own time and place; he was still grieving his loss, and had lashed out unjustly without thinking the matter through. He also suspected Harris’ recent jibes regarding his place in Skye’s world had struck his pride harder than he had realized.
His current behavior was, he thought in no little consternation, a very uncharacteristic reaction for him. He sat down on the couch near Skye, rested his elbows on his knees and put his head in his hands.
“I have done you a grave injustice, my dear,” he murmured from behind those long fingers. “You are absolutely right, of course. I fear some part of my mind has not yet accepted…what has happened to me. I…would be indebted to you if…you would accept my sincerest apologies.”
There was a long pause, during which Holmes wondered if Skye was the type to hold onto her anger; he had seen her irritated, but he had seldom seen her truly angry—and even then, never directed at him, not until now—and was uncertain. A gentle hand laid itself on his shoulder and squeezed.
“Apology accepted,” Skye murmured in his ear. “It’s hard not to grasp at straws when you’re thrown into a nightmarish situation. And that was more like a tree trunk than a straw. I forgot to explain those stories, and I’m sorry; I should have, so you wouldn’t misunderstand. But I’m gonna confess something, Holmes. You are, and always have been, one of my heroes. There’s no way I would betray you, at least not deliberately. This situation’s eating me up inside as it is.”
Holmes knew a sudden urge to hug his companion, not only in gratitude for her understanding, but in solace for her own pain. He slew it at once, but its ghost remained, and he raised his head to give her a soft, reproving glance.
“Release it, Skye. I have already told you, you did the best you could in the circumstances.”
“Maybe when I stop seeing you in pain—if I ever do—I can manage it,” she whispered, looking away. “And when I stop seeing the look of terror on Chad’s face before he…died. I’m afraid I’ll have a lot to answer for, one of these days, Holmes,” she murmured, rising and going to the windows to look out on the darkening land. “Whether in this world or the next, I don’t know. But there’s a m
odern saying: Payback’s a bitch.”
* * *
The next morning in their office on the base, while Holmes made coffee, Skye unlocked her safe, opened the bottom drawer, got on her hands and knees and dug around. After several minutes of shuffling through CD cases, she extracted a stack. Plopping them on her desk, she went to the corner opposite the coffeepot and turned on a TV/DVD player combination unit sitting there; it usually went unused, but it was there for just such a reason as she had now. Then she locked the office door, retrieved one of the CD cases and opened it, popping the DVD it contained into the player.
“Here. Continuum 114, early June 1891, Baker Street, London. These,” she plopped down half the stack, “go through 1895. These,” she waggled the others in her fingers, “are from 108.”
“Skye, you do not have to do this. You pointed out my…failure…to consider the matter dispassionately, last night.”
“I know,” she answered with a wan smile. “But I…how can I put this…? I want you to know, to see for yourself it’s true. The confirmation of the deductive theory, if you will.”
* * *
That was when Holmes understood she needed him to see it, needed to prove herself. His accusations had disturbed her deeply, he realized uncomfortably, and she feared she had lost his trust and wanted to regain it. Without another word, he sat himself before the television and spent the morning watching Watson and himself on the various DVDs—although on the first few it was merely Watson, and a grieving Watson at that. It was coming lunchtime when he finished the last one.
Rising, he ejected the DVD and turned off the unit, then glanced at Skye. While he watched the videos, she’d worked at her computer, answering emails and doing paperwork, but he had been well aware of her anxiety; it was practically palpable. Now Holmes smiled and offered, “Shall we find a bite to eat, my dear Skye?”
* * *
“I don’t know,” Skye admitted honestly, gazing at him solemnly. “I’m…not very hungry.”
“Skye, I never invite anyone to dine with me that I suspect of nefarious designs against me.” Holmes moved to the desk and crouched beside her chair. Grey eyes twinkled in a somber face. “It would simply be foolhardy. I may do many things, both good and bad, but I have never been guilty of that.” He stood and held out a hand. “Now come. At least keep me company while I partake.”
The Case of the Displaced Detective Page 30