I looked around wildly and saw my dad’s head pressed into the rug of the hallway as they cuffed his arms behind his back. I saw a shamefaced DS Day glance up at me and then look away as he hauled my dad up with the help of another officer and started for the door, the other officer reciting cautionary rights, as if DS Moriarty wouldn’t know them by heart.
“We might not have made it in time, you know, if it weren’t for . . .”
“Sherlock.” I saw him before Mallory could finish, but it took me another second to put it together. He’d gone to the police. Despite what I’d said, he’d called them. And his expression was a mix of relief and guilt and pain. I’d never seen him emote like that. I idly wondered if anyone ever had.
In the next moment I was barraged by medics and an oxygen mask, which I tried valiantly to wave off. “I don’t need it.”
My voice must have been too muffled, because the medic closest to me acted like I didn’t say anything.
“Just lie down, and we’ll get you out of here shortly. Do you have any allergies?”
I shook my head and pulled the mask off my face. “This isn’t necess—”
He pushed it back down. “There now, breathe nice and deep for me.”
I tried to sit up again, but before I could, I was lifted up and placed on a gurney. They draped me in a blanket and strapped me down before I could think to get up, everything but my arms. And then I was unceremoniously tilted up. Not one of the policemen or techs buzzing around my house would look at me as they wheeled me out of the house and down the front steps. Then, even the second medic toddled off toward one of the police cars, while mine pulled me backward through all the official people standing around.
I got another brief glimpse of Sherlock and tried shouting for him. He might have heard me, because he looked back at the house, obviously thinking I hadn’t been brought out yet, and between my infernal mask and the distance, I couldn’t correct that thinking. I didn’t see him again until I was jerked up into the back of the ambulance. He was talking to a very interested Mallory, staring at the doorway to my house while answering questions, his face once more the blank I knew best.
The medic climbed up and got in my way again, only to start flipping on various machines, pinching my finger with a sensor, and prepping an IV bag.
“Honestly,” I said, pulling the mask from my face again. “This is all extremely unnecessary, and”—his hand started coming toward the mask—“I swear to you, if you mash this plastic monster back onto my face one more time, I will shove it down your throat.”
He stopped short, then gave in to a half grin. “Well, you’ll be feeling better then.”
“Quite better. If you could just unstrap me, thank you.”
“Sorry, miss. Orders of the inspector. We’re to take you to hospital to be looked over.” I sighed, which didn’t faze him in the least. “Now, if I could just see your arm.”
He lifted a needle into the air, and I might have moved onto my next threat, which involved that needle and his arse, but the radio in the front of the truck went off, and he swore under his breath.
“Be right back.”
The whole ambulance rocked back and forth as he trudged up to the front, giving me a clear view of the outside once more. I couldn’t find Sherlock—couldn’t have found anyone, really. The street was a barely controlled chaos, all of it centering around the police car where my dad sat, a medic inside, tending to his superficial wounds while DS Day looked on. Thankfully, no one thought I needed any attention just then.
In fact, no one was looking my way at all. It was my one chance. I freed myself of the gurney buckles, slid the oxygen mask all the way off my head, and with one more look around me, I ran from the ambulance down Baker Street, toward the only place I knew where I could be alone. I just needed to be alone with my thoughts. I needed a new plan. I needed something.
x x x
I heard him coming. I probably could have disappeared into the park if I wanted, but I was so tired. I couldn’t be bothered to move.
He sat down next to me in the shadow of the bandstand, but not close enough that he was touching me. I wasn’t sure if I wanted him to touch me or not. I was very sure I didn’t feel like talking. He seemed to know it, though his jerky movements and his trouble sitting still told me he couldn’t keep silent for long. He tried lighting a cigarette, but I coughed before he would do more than make the tip glow, and he put it away. Finally, I reached over and laid my hand over his. We both sighed and stilled for a few seconds.