The Last of August (Charlotte Holmes #2)(63)

Personally, I’ve often thought that Watson and I had all the trappings of a standard romantic relationship—absolute exclusivity, obsessive intensity, constant arguments, crime-solving—and have been confused as to what more he wants. Sex, of course, but that’s a small thing. An unwieldy, impossible, giant small thing.

(My last romantic relationship wasn’t categorically romantic, per se, but it certainly also involved crime. Carload of cocaine, local constabulary, etc.)

Watson still hadn’t stirred. By my count, I had three more minutes before I should begin dismembering an armchair.

Looking down at him, at his closed eyes and battered face, I began to think. I thought perhaps Watson had a brain injury. Perhaps there was a chance that he wouldn’t wake up, perhaps I would be left in this basement, alone, and then killed, or even worse, rescued by my omnipotent asshole of an older brother and then left to contend with August Moriarty, Human Conscience, alone, and if so I wouldn’t ever see Watson again do the thing where he almost trips over a curb when crossing the street and overcompensates by windmilling his arms, and if that was the case I would certainly never again be able to say his name, Watson, in the way I say it to him, with affection and also a certain kind of despair, and then I forbade myself from thinking any more about Watson at all.

The best way to help him was to disregard him for the time being. I’ve often found this to be the case.

The basement was sparsely furnished, and I took the likeliest-looking chair and broke off its legs by bashing it against the floor. Taking the sharpest-looking piece of wood, I tested it for length and weight and then knelt again next to Watson on the floor. I checked him over. He was still breathing, his eyelashes beginning to flutter, but he didn’t respond to either my touch or my voice. With luck, in another two minutes, he would be ready to go.

I reviewed what I’d gathered about our situation.

This wasn’t Hadrian and Phillipa’s primary residence; no self-respecting bon vivants would live in the warehouse district, and the walls were cinder block under their paint. We’d been taken to some secondary property.

From the mix of preserving chemicals in the air, I assumed that we were in a facility where they falsely aged the art they produced.

Even if I broke us out through the window well, I’d still have an incapacitated Watson and an empty road in the middle of nowhere. Milo was in Thailand, and while I know he kept a tail on me most times, I wasn’t sure how or how quickly he’d respond to my texts. (Before they’d taken my phone, I had sent a contingency message to an old friend, asking for aid and transportation. I would wait on that.)

Any bug Milo had placed on me had been hacked by the Moriartys, most likely after Hadrian’s bodyguard regained consciousness and called his boss. That car had come at my request. (I took the next twenty-seven seconds to locate that bug—he’d had it sewn into the sleeve of my jacket—and then crushed it with my boot.)

Really, this was August’s fault as much as anyone else’s. If my read on him last night was correct (one untied shoe, his keys nearly falling out of his back pocket), August had immediately ditched Nathaniel and gone to Hadrian for help in finding Leander. August, like me, was never that untidy. August, even when driven to his absolute limits, would never threaten to kill a man’s parents. August would assess the situation and go to his brother to attempt to broker a deal.

Milo had called it exactly. He’ll go to Hadrian, he’d said in my ear, right before he left, and when the dust settles, we’ll know exactly how he’s involved. Just bide your time. Who, indeed, needed money and resources when one had a Moriarty with a heart three sizes too big?

I couldn’t blame him, really. Families were complicated animals.

Through the thick walls, I could hear a banging sound upstairs. It had the hollow ring of someone battering a wooden door. August, most likely, in full martyr mode. I hadn’t quite forgiven him either for bringing Watson to that party. Boy problems, I thought to myself, and when I tapped Watson’s shoulder again this time, I did it rather harder than I needed to.

His eyes flew open. “Holmes,” he said. It was a horrible croaking sound. His mouth was swollen; his jaw, too. And his eyes. And his nose was broken.

Looking at him, I began deciding which of Hadrian’s fingers I would stomp on first.

“Don’t talk,” I told Watson, because I didn’t want him to strain. “Listen to me. I’m about to scream. I’m telling you so that you don’t physically react. There will be a body. I’ll remove it. We’ll haul you up the stairs, and one or the other of them up there will give us an address, and then my contact will help us arrange transportation to Prague.”

This was more information than I usually gave, so I was unsurprised by Watson’s apparent confusion.

“Ready?” I asked.

He blinked, which I took for assent.

I made my preparations. With my fingers, I streaked the blood on my forehead down my face. I coated my hands in it. I hefted my makeshift club, feeling something like a warrior god, and positioned myself behind the locked door.

Then I began to cry. Softly at first. I turned up the volume slowly, as one would a dial, letting the tears call up a corresponding thickness in my throat. When I began to keen, I wanted the sound to be genuine.

“Jamie,” I whispered. He turned his head to look at me. I could tell it hurt. Not you, I mouthed, and said his name again. “Jamie—oh God, Jamie. Please don’t. Please—please breathe.” (This part was necessary; I didn’t know if anyone was standing on the other side of the door.) “You can’t be dead,” I said, and took my voice louder, higher in pitch. I hunched my shoulders and brought my hands up over my face. “You can’t be. You promised. You promised me London, you— God, could you just breathe? Please, start breathing again. I’ll do anything, I don’t care what I am to you, I’ll be anything, do anything, please, please—”