Sherlock X Reader One Shots || 𝐹𝐿𝑈𝐹𝐹 + 𝑆𝑀𝑈𝑇

"Good Morning" (Part 3)

Lestrade cleared his throat and Sherlock rolled his eyes so far back into his head he probably got a very good look at his occipital bone.

"Alright, Mum, don't give me a lecture on table manners, this is my flat so if I want to---"

"I don't care about how you eat cereal, Sherlock! I care about the case! Over twenty thousand pounds of goods stolen from a hotel, and it's all from the same floor."

"You're saying that like it means something," Sherlock said around his tongue that was attempting to lick away his milk moustache.

"It does mean something!" Lestrade exclaimed. He looked like a maths teacher exasperatedly trying to educate a group of seven-year-olds on fractions. He took a sip of his tea and changed tactics, swapping his tone to a more patient one: "Only one floor was hit, the one at the top of the building. We have no clues or leads."

When Y/N and Sherlock still looked baffled he pinched the bridge of his nose between his finger and thumb.

People seem to do that a lot around Sherlock, Sherlock realised. It kind of looked like Greg was trying to recharge himself; the cradle his finger and thumb made and the way the bridge of his nose slotted into it reminded the detective of one of those hand-held hoovers you mount on a wall. He had to try hard not to giggle. "And you're telling me because...?"

Sighing the sigh of a man who was very, very tired: "I'm telling you because don't you think it's interesting? Why steal from just one floor? We checked the security tapes and there was nothing there. No one went in or out of the windows, obviously, because---well, as I said---the rooms were on the fourth level of the building. Someone would have noticed, and there's no ladder long enough to get up there. The windows were locked, there's no evidence of a break-in at all."

Sherlock narrowed his eyes as if Lestrade's point was a picture in a gallery that he knew was a painting but he didn't quite know what of. "...Okay?"

Greg was clearly irked now. "God, Sherlock, are you trying to wind me up, or are you still half asleep?"

"That was uncalled for," Y/N interjected quietly from the sidelines.

Flushing: "Yes. Yes, it was. Sorry. You just don't seem very switched on today."

"I did just wake up, what do you expect?"

"You said you hadn't been sleeping."

"I lied."

Lestrade filled his lungs with oxygen, decided that trying to be whimsical was getting him nowhere and dropped the act. "Look, just tell me what you think about the case, Sherlock, please. That's what I came over here for."

A light switched on behind the detective's eyes as the metaphorical gallery painting suddenly made sense to him. "Oh, I see! You want me to solve it for you!" He gave a little chuckle, the fact of whether it had been at himself for taking so long to figure out Greg's intentions, or that Greg needed his help, was debatable. "You should have said." Shoving the last of his breakfast in his mouth, Sherlock distractedly left his bowl in the sink and started tugging Y/N---who had got up to get something to drink---towards his room. "Obviously it was one of the staff."

"Hey, wait, you're leaving me here?"

Sherlock halted abruptly, his hand letting go of Y/N's and falling limply by his side. He turned back to the detective inspector who was watching them with his brows so furrowed they were now just one stubby monobrow of confusion. "...Yes? I thought we were done." 

'Thought and hoped,'  a little voice in his head muttered. 

"Well, you thought wrong. We also assumed it was one of the staff that did it; we're not stupid, despite what you may think. However, everyone that works at the hotel has alibis, and there was no evidence against any of them so even if it was one of them we couldn't prove it. Which is why we wanted your help. Well, actually no one wanted your help but I thought I'd come get you anyway because usually you're bored out of your mind and jump at stuff like this. I thought you'd be all over it; a classic jewellery robbery, only the rooms on the top floor, no traces left behind---"