Locked (8 page)

Wait.

What?

“How the hell did you know that?” squeaks August.

“Girlfriend?” I say.

“I know many things,” Sherlock says terrifyingly, “including the fact that you’re never, ever going to bother Irene Adler again.”

“
Girlfriend
?” I repeat.

He pulls me closer. So close I can hear his heartbeat. More evidence against the
heartless
theory. Although
bastard
is still up for debate. “Yes, girlfriend. Irene Adler is my girlfriend. And if you don’t delete that photo of her from your computer—” He smiles. “I’ll know.”

“Yeah. Yeah, whatever.” August rubs his arm, possibly remembering that Sherlock is three to one when it comes to fights. “Come on, guys.”

“I’m not your girlfriend,” I say when they’re gone.

“I’m aware.”

“Good, because I just wanted to make it super clear that I’m not. Your girlfriend.”

“I’m
aware
. I thought I told you I loathe repetition.” He scowls. “Let me explain, because I’m not one of those people who doesn’t have reasons for the things I do. I’m helping you.”

“By pretending to be my boyfriend? Which you’re not?” I rub my wrist.

“Ethan’s girlfriend gave me the idea. She doesn’t want people to know you’re Ares because that would be so interesting, it would eclipse the photo. So I came up with something else interesting. Congratulations, Irene, you’re now dating the universally disliked but apparently attractive—people really need to refine their standards of beauty—new British student.” While he’s talking, he reaches out, briefly inspects my wrist, then lets it go. It’s so subtle that I almost don’t notice it happening.

“You think everyone’ll forget about the photo if they’re convinced I’m your girlfriend.”

“Correct.”

“But I’m not your girlfriend.”

“Should I write that on my forehead so you don’t have to worry I’ll forget? Maybe I’ll have it put on a T-shirt. Less likely to smudge in the shower.”

I half-smile. My heart is still beating fast, but slower than before. “So how did you know all that stuff about August?”

“Simple,” he says, obviously pleased that I asked. “He was wearing one of those military dog-tag style necklaces, but on closer inspection I saw that it was actually a dog tag. Ringo. The tag was bent and battered, like it’d been run over by something heavy. The porn one is always easy, just look to see if one of their forearms is more muscular than the other. The last one was obvious from the watch.”

“The watch?” I hadn’t even noticed August had been wearing one.

“Yes, the watch, what else? Expensive watch, very expensive. Obviously a gift. The inscription—
For August
, the date, and
kisses
. Clearly his mother—too expensive for a aunt or girlfriend and the father wouldn’t have put
kisses
. But she got the date of his birthday wrong. She put July, but he’s wearing a class ring with his birthstone and it’s not the ruby. It’s amethyst. January.”

“That’s incredible.” I shake my head. “You really are an actual genius.”

“You’re just now noticing?”

“A humble genius.”

“We don’t have time to discuss the finer points of my modesty. Now come with me.” Sherlock strides off down the hallway at top speed.

I want to stop him. Ask him why someone like him would bother helping someone like me. Tell him I’m still reeling from it. But things with Sherlock always move too fast. “Where are we going in such a rush?”

“We have to start investigating,” he yells back. “We’re going to find out who Ethan’s girlfriend is. Ex-girlfriend now, most likely.”

“What for?”

He turns around and cocks his brow.

“Revenge, obviously.”

“You have low standards for people liking you.”

|||

(scribbled on a page torn from a biology textbook)

Irene asked why I care. Don’t “care.” Obviously. Caring = waste of time and distraction from all that is effective. To care = to cease to function correctly. Must explain to Irene. Helped her because I wanted to. Because she is a useful distraction to me. Because an event like this could intensify her depression. Not because I
cared.

Have significant problem, though: I like Irene. Or rather: I do not dislike her. Have never not disliked someone before. Have been making jokes for her. JOKES. Perilous situation. Must find a better distraction and cut this off. Will interfere with brainwork.

Have theory about the truth behind who contacted Ares about Ethan Thomas. First, must uncover identity of Ethan’s ex-girlfriend. Simple matter. Should take less than five minutes once armed with list of Irene’s Facebook friends. Was not serious about revenge. (Mostly.) Want to see if I’m right about theory. Need ex-girlfriend’s name first. Always want to see if I’m right.

Hope picture debacle isn’t having too strong an effect on Irene. Will check in with her later. Stronger than she thinks.

|||

It’s a strange kind of calm, knowing every single person at school has seen me naked.

“You and Ethan Thomas have fifty-nine mutual friends,” Sherlock is saying. There’s finally a chair in his living room, and he’s sitting in it. A rusty lawn chair I stole from my basement. He’s bent over, typing so hard it’s like he’s playing a miniature version of Whack-A-Mole. “Twenty-nine of them are female.”

“I don’t care.” I’m leaning against the wall, ordering a pizza online. Or trying to.

“Twelve of them are potential candidates for our over-sharer.”

“Sherlock, I don’t care.” I hover the mouse over the empty check box next to
pepperoni
. “Do you want pepperoni again?”

“Didn’t you say you had her Twitter account name?” He glances up.

“I don’t care about her Twitter account. The only thing I care about is whether or not you want pepperoni on your pizza.”

“I told you caring is risky. See: now you can be blackmailed. I’ll trade you my pepperoni preferences for this girl’s Twitter handle.”

“I’m just going to order pepperoni. For the sake of my sanity.” I type Sherlock’s address into the pizza place’s website, click
Create Order
, and shut the laptop. “Are you really going to pretend to be my girlfriend?”

“Doubt it’s Karen Sorensen, she’s been dating someone named Dan for three months,” mutters Sherlock, absentmindedly picking rust off the armrest.

“You’re going to have to hold my hand. In public. At least once.”

“Chelsea Pickard—oh. Not her. Lesbian. Obviously.”

“And kiss me. Possibly kiss me.”

“And then there were ten.” He stretches back in the lawn chair. It groans underneath him, threatening to give out. I should probably get a camera to film the moment when Sherlock Holmes crashes to the floor atop the remains of a lawn chair. “This would go a lot faster if you gave me her Twitter handle. And stop smirking for no apparent reason.”

“You’re always smirking.”

“I only smirk for reasons that are apparent.”

“Have you ever kissed anyone?”

It’s a blunt question, not the kind I’m in the habit of asking, and it escapes from some small part of me that I hadn’t known existed.

He straightens, impossibly elegant as always, even on a lawn chair in the middle of an unfurnished room. He never looks like he belongs. I try to think of a place where he might look like he belongs, and the only thing I can come up with is a museum.

“I’ll tell you if you give me her Twitter handle,” he says.

It doesn’t matter. It’s so stupid.

“Dangergirl.”

He smiles. “Don’t you want to know first if I’ve ever held someone’s hand? That was your first criteria for pretending to be your boyfriend.”

“Sure, whatever.” I’m blushing now, I can feel it. This is the world’s dumbest conversation. I shouldn’t have relinquished the valuable topic of pepperoni.

“No. I haven’t.” His gaze flicks over the screen hungrily. He speaks so distractedly that his voice gets quieter. “I’m not interested in that kind of distraction.”

“You’re telling me you’ve never even held hands with someone? Or—someone’s held
your
hand, at least. Your brother. Or parents. When you were little.”

“I’ve got an excellent memory.” He scrolls faster, the blue light reflecting on his face. “Oh, don’t sit there looking at me like that. You’ve never dated anyone either. And I’ve had considerably more opportunities than you.”

“I used to be asked out a lot,” I say fiercely. “I used to be…”

Pretty.

He stops scrolling. For a second, I can’t tell if his stare is burning or freezing me, and I think he’s about to say something I’m not sure I want to hear, but instead, he says, “Daphne Brown.”

“I did not used to be Daphne Brown.”

“Daphne Brown,” he declares, “is the one who sent out your photo. I’ll save you the trouble of asking how I figured it out and just explain it to you. Tricky, as her location’s hidden and her name’s not used. But Dangergirl was always a clue.”

“She…likes danger.”

“No. You like danger. Daphne Brown likes
Danger Girl
, a comic book series started in 1998. And guess which one of your and Ethan’s mutual friends has this profile picture.” He swivels the laptop to face me. I blink at the little square image of a dark-haired comic book heroine.

“I told you it would be faster,” he says. “As I said. Never wrong.”

“So you’re a comic book nerd.” I fold my knees against my chest. “More things I know about you.”

“Not a comic book nerd. Just observant with a good memory. Have you?”

“Have I what?”

“Kissed anyone,” he says.

“You just said I never dated.”

“Just because you’ve never dated doesn’t mean you’ve never kissed anyone.”

The doorbell rings. I stand up. We’ve been sitting there, talking about whether or not I’ve ever kissed someone, for longer than I realized. Time goes quickly when I’m talking to Sherlock. The pizza guy’s hat is bobbing in the door window.

Sherlock slams the laptop shut—he always slams it, he probably has to replace the screen every month—and grabs his coat.

“That enthusiastic about the pizza, are we?” I say.

“Pizza? What pizza?” he says. “We’re going to have a chat with Daphne Brown.”

By the time I make it to the door after him, he’s halfway down the road, the pizza guy staring bewilderedly after him. I swear, shove some money at the guy, drop the pizza on Sherlock’s floor, and take off after him.

“I really ought to steal Mycroft’s car,” Sherlock is saying when I catch up to him, which takes a little while, considering his ordinary stride is almost as fast as my run. “He loves that car more than anything. Meaning I’d have to crash it at least once.”

“Sherlock, I don’t want this,” I say loudly, jogging so I won’t fall behind.

“She only lives four blocks away. She’s president of the comic book club and they meet at her house. The address is on the Facebook page.”

“No, that’s not what I meant.” I try to dart in front of him, but it’s like standing in front of a tornado. A very tall, handsome tornado. “I don’t want revenge. I don’t want you to go in there and yell at her—”

“I won’t yell, then.”

“Sherlock. You’re not
getting
it.” I’m out of shape, haven’t jogged since the accident, and now I’m panting and Sherlock won’t walk any slower. I grab his sleeve, jerking him back. “I don’t want—”

“Of course you do,” he snaps. “Everyone does. Someone wrongs you, you want to hurt them. It’s human nature. It’s how people work.”

It’s amazing how fast he can switch from amazing me to annoying me. “And you’ve conducted how many studies on that?”

“Personal experience is my study.”

“You’re a big revenge-seeker, then.” It’s windy and my hair is blowing over my face. I should cut it all off.

He smiles again. That odd smile he uses whenever he says something that would make an ordinary person sad. “I motivate revenge-seekers.”

“How could anyone take revenge on you?” I say, half-joking. “You don’t care about anything, so no one can hurt you. Remember? No risk.”

There’s a silence. A car drives past and turns around the corner.

“Bit jealous of that, actually,” I say awkwardly.

Sherlock fastens the top button of his coat.

I sigh. “I don’t want revenge because I don’t want the attention. People stared at me all the time even before the photo. Grief makes people interested in you. Not in a good way. And now with the photo thing, I don’t need Daphne telling people around school that I came to her house and freaked out—”

“Fine.” He abruptly starts walking again. “We’re not doing this for revenge.”

“No?”

“We never were.”

“Then why are you so interested in Daphne Brown?” I ask, hurrying after him.

“Because she wasn’t the one who contacted Ares.”

“Okay…? Then I reiterate my first question.”

“But she was the one who sent the photo out.”

“So you’re saying there’s a third person involved? And we’re going to meet Daphne to find out who this person is?”

“That’s secondary. Mostly I just want to see if I’m right. I’m ninety percent sure that I am.”

“Uh huh,” I say as we turn a corner into a residential neighborhood. “That’s two more things that I know about you—you’ll do anything to prove you’re right.”

“What’s the second thing?”

“And anything to find out why you’re wrong, if you are.”

“Exactly. That’s how we started—” Sherlock stops, frowns, and waves a hand between the two of us. “Whatever this is.”

“This?”

“Insomnia,” he says. “I got it wrong.”

“No, what did you mean, whatever this is?” I say, amused. “You mean friendship?”

And then I pause. Because it’s true.

How long have I been friends with Sherlock Holmes?

And Christ, why? He was callous, invasive, and cold. Then again, he’d defended me at school. Pushed me out of the way of a car. Been the first not to dance around the topic of Carol. Been the first to see my broken side and treat me like a human being anyway. So I guess there were reasons.

“I’ll give you something else to know about me,” he says curtly. “I don’t do friendship.”