I had finally returned to my flat after a few more fast paced cases with Bass. Most of them in Russia and Europe. I felt like I hadn't taken a breath since we started. Bass and I had been working together for nearly a year now, and we made surprisingly great partners. I had barely unpacked my bag when I heard my doorbell ring and Bass' voice over the intercom.
"Adelaide, it's me. Gonna let me up?" He asked.
I sauntered over to the intercom and pressed my finger to the button to reply.
"Should I?" I asked.
"Me ringing the bell is really just a formality. You and I both know I could pick this lock in 5 seconds." He joked.
"Yes, well you've always been slow. The inconvenience is tempting though." I joked, finally pressing the buzzer to let him in.
Before he made it up the stairs I took my letters to Sherlock out of my duffel bag I was unpacking and stuffed them into a drawer on the TV stand. I was better. Nearly a year and a half had passed and I was able to say his name now without breaking down. I thought that was progress. My life just felt empty now, even though I was barely alone.
When I was in London between assignments I had tea with Mrs. Hudson at least once a week. She hadn't let 221B out, and I couldn't bear to possibly enter it. I'd met John once for lunch since, and he was clearly still not okay. Compared to him I was doing well. Of course he had no idea what I was doing now, though he did know I had quit my job at Scotland Yard. I tried to keep an eye on him, but I was so busy. I had found out that he was seeing someone now and it was pretty serious. I was happy for him. As for me, not much had changed. I worked. It was the one thing I could do to keep my mind off of him.
Bass walked through the door, and after a snide remark about the state of my flat, he made his way over to the couch.
"You know what we need to do tonight?" He asked, putting his feet up.
"Remove your feet from my coffee table?" I asked, and he huffed and moved them back onto the ground.
"We need to go out tonight. Maybe a pub or something?" He said and I rolled my eyes.
"You've got nothing better to do than take a recovering alcoholic to a pub?" I asked.
"Well you don't have to drink, but I need to." He whined.
"Fine, but we should go now, I've got things to do and I'm not staying out all night with you." I argued.
"I know just the place." He stood, grabbed his coat, and lead me outside. We both hopped in a cab and headed to the pub. I was okay being around alcohol, and I would probably be okay drinking it. It just brings me back to a bad time in my life, one that I don't want to remember or repeat.
"No, no, no a blonde drug smuggler who was exposed by an abbot with unusual powers of observation and deduction." I heard as we entered through the door of the pub, Bass behind me.
"A blonde woman hiding amongst bald monks, that wouldn't exactly take Sherlock Holmes." I heard another voice return and quickly whipped around.
"Adelaide?" Anderson asked, and my eyes grew wide in surprise.
"Anderson? Greg?" I asked, surprised to see them both here.
"God, how've you been?" Greg asked, hugging me.
"Busy." I smiled, Charles now standing next to me.
"Who's this?" Anderson asked politely. He had really let himself go: overgrown hair, beard, frumpy sweater. He must have gone downhill after he was fired from the Yard.
"Charles Bass. Friend of Adelaide." He smiled, shaking their hands.
"Colleague." I corrected him.
"It's been nearly a year, I think we can be considered friends now." He joked, and I smiled to him.
"Charles this is my old boss Greg Lestrade, and an old colleague Phillip Anderson." I formally introduced them.
"So you're doing well. New job and all. What exactly do you do?" Greg asked.
"We kill people for money." Charles said casually, and I laughed, panicking inside.
"He's joking, of course. We work at the Natural History Museum. I run tours and we work on restorations and curations." I smiled and lied.
"That sounds interesting, I didn't know you were interested in that kinda stuff." Greg smiled politely.
"Lifelong passion of mine." I smiled, looking down to the table and the map Anderson had been showing Lestrade.
"What's this?" I asked more seriously now. I heard the conversation as er were entering, I knew exactly what this was about. They both stared at me, almost afraid to talk.
"Phillip, he's dead. Trust me, I wish he wasn't. Don't you think of all people I'd know if he wasn't." I said, looking to Anderson who seemed unconvinced.
"Well then how do you explain this?" He flipped the map. "Signing number 2, The Incident in New Delhi."
"You haven't been titling these, have you?" I asked, slightly concerned for Anderson's mental health.
He then continued to explain how their police inspector had solved a case by measuring the depth of which a chocolate flake had fallen through an ice cream cone. Which in all honesty sounded ridiculous and made up.
"Clever man, Inspector Rajesh." Greg said, and Anderson scoffed.
"What police inspector could have made that deduction." He argued, and Charles and I had pulled up a chair.
"Well thank you." Greg said sarcastically.
"You know how Sherlock never took the credit when he solved all of your cases." Anderson began.
"He didn't solve all of my cases," Greg said defensively.
"He's out there, he's hiding, but he can't stop himself from getting involved. It's so obviously him, if you know how to spot the signs." Anderson rambled, and I shook my head in disbelief. If Sherlock was out there, solving inconsequential cases out in the world, he would have told me, but none of that mattered. You don't jump off a building and live.
"Klein Brothers, the Tower House thing." Lestrade began listing cases he had solved on his own, or with moderately little help from me.
"The Kensington Ripper." I helped, adding another.
"You got Tower House wrong." Anderson stated and Lestrade argued while he flipped the map again.
"Sighting 3 The Mysterious Juror." Anderson said, and Greg banged his head on the table.
"I'm gonna need a drink." Charles said, standing to head to the bar.
"Make that two." I rolled my eyes. What had happened to Anderson? He used to hate Sherlock, now he's obsessed with him.
I tuned out of this story but according to Anderson, Sherlock swayed some murder trial in Copenhagen. Because obviously in his free time, when he's not being dead, he's on jury duty.
"It had to be him! There's no one else it can be, don't you see?" Anderson asked as Charles handed me a beer.
"Phillip, I see that you lost a good job fantasizing about a dead man and him coming back to life, and I know why you want that to happen. I want it to happen, but it's just not gonna." I said honestly, but something told me he wasn't going to stop.
Anderson and Greg eventually left and Charles and I now sat at the table by ourselves.
"Has he always been like that?" Charles asked.
"Oh God no. He was an ass and he hated Sherlock. He helped take Sherlock down, planting the doubt in everyone's mind that he was some sort of killer. Now he's obsessed. He came and visited me in the hospital and I could tell he felt guilty, but I didn't know it was this bad." I answered, I noticed Charles was looking down at his watch.
"Sorry, am I boring you answering your question?" I asked rudely.
"No, I'm seeing if we have time to grab dinner. Hungry?" He asked. I smiled and rolled my eyes. I seemed to be doing that a lot lately when I was around Bass.
"I suppose, but nowhere too nice I'm not dressed for it." I told him, and he smirked, clearly knowing a place.
The two of us walked down the street, apparently the restaurant was close by or at least walking distance. We chatted before we were interrupted by someone calling my name.
"Sergeant Gregson?" I heard behind us and turned to see Kitty Riley, the reporter from the SUN. I stopped and she ran up to us.
"Sergeant Gregson, I've been trying to find you for a while now." She began and I cut her off.
"Then you're not a very good investigative journalist. And I don't work for Scotland Yard anymore so you don't have to call me Sergeant." I told her.
"I wanted to apologize. After everything with Sherlock Holmes I tried to find you, but you sort of went off the grid. You quit your job, weren't in your flat, or the country it seemed-" She said and I cut her off again.
"Is there a point here Kitty?" I sped her along.
"If there's anything I can ever do for you, I'll do it." She said, clearly repentant.
"Clear his name." I said.
"What?" She asked, shocked.
"Recant your story. Clear his name. Paint Moriarty as the manipulative villain who even got to you and forced Sherlock to his death after smearing his name. He was an innocent detective who saved lives and solved crimes that even the police force couldn't. I think we owe him at least that." I said, and Kitty nodded somberly.
I began to walk away and I felt Charles grab my hand. What I didn't know was that Kitty took a photograph. I also didn't know that it was going to be published in the SUN tomorrow with the headline 'Hello Detective: Gregson Returns and Who's Her New Arm Candy?".
"Can you believe this? That bitch!" I yelled, throwing the paper down on the coffee table, Charles trying to calm me. He had slept on my couch last night after having a little too much to drink.
"Well think of it this way. Normally women are objectified in these kind of papers, and I'm the arm candy and you're the smart, powerful lead. I'd take that as a win for the feminist movement." He said, and I didn't know whether to slap him or not.
"Like I give a damn about that! I'm an international assassin, I can't have my face plastered on Page 6 everytime I leave my flat!" I ranted.
She needed to be taken care of. No, I wasn't going to kill her. There were worse things I could do. I had to see Mycroft, he would have this taken care of. I didn't care if he paid her off or got her fired, but Kitty Riley needed to learn her place. As an undercover government asset, this threatened the safety of not only myself but of the nation.
I threw on a dress and stepped outside my flat to call a cab to take me to the Diogenes Club when I saw a black car pull up. I rolled my eyes, did he always have to be two steps ahead of me?
"Hello Giles, it's been an age." I said, sliding into the car.