Holmes

Shelley Holmes is a Europol consultant detective on vacation to Edinburgh. Trouble follows and along the way she finds her Watson.

Inspired by various Sherlock Holmes modernisations.

***

"Shelley Holmes, huh? Are you meant to be some kinda female Sherlock, lass?"

"I'm not a private investigator, I'm a consultant detective," Holmes pulls the badge from the policeman's hands. "Europol. Says that right here."

The squinting Scot in the high-vis jacket peers bemusedly at the woman. "Europol, eh? What feckin' jurisdiction you got here? This is Edinburgh. We can handle our own business, thank-you-very-much lass."

"No jurisdiction whatsoever, Constable. I'm here to advise and observe. I wouldn't be here if we did not have reason to suspect the crime scene may have international implications," the woman explains, gradually becoming exasperated. The rain-slick street of identical, dour, semi-detached little grey houses was hardly the most cheerful sight. One particularly unremarkable one amidst the lot was now surrounded by police tape, a couple of squad cars perched against the curb just outside. Add to that an increasingly stubborn Scot, and Shelley Holmes' day was hardly looking pleasant.

"What feckin' international complications? Wee biddy shot her fella. Domestic homicide, happens all the feckin' time around these parts. The lads dinna have much else ta do 'cept rough up the poor lasses. Every now an' then one of 'em gets fed up. S'practically routine. The scene was called in b'the quine 'erself jes' two hours ago. What possible international consequences are you feckin' goin' on aboot?"

Without actually stepping into the house, the best Shelley can do is jam her palms against the doorframe on either side of the Scot and lean her head in over his shoulder. "Inspector Grisley, your fucking constable is getting on my fucking nerves. Will you get the fuck down here and let me in?"

Willard Grisley's appearance at the top of the stairs, behind the Scot, demonstrated a facial expression that was more the result of a conflux of a fairly wide variety of emotions rather than any one reaction in particular.

"Shelley Holmes," he clears his throat, gesturing for the woman to step inside. "Do come in. To what do I owe this unexpected..." he lets the sentence trail on.

Deciding to follow Grisley's approach to the situation and flat-out ignore the Scotsman, Holmes dutifully follows the invitation, squeezing past the rotund man in the high-vis. "Not the best sort of day to catch up, is it Grisley?" she looks up, folding away her umbrella and taking his hand for a firm shake, even though it was not offered as such.

The diminutive Europol consultant wears a fashionable and somewhat expensive-looking tweed jacket, now rather wet from being caught outside. The last time Grisley had seen her, the lanky little redheaded woman was a novice trainee at Scotland Yard, a mere four years ago, not overly long before he relocated his business to an adjacent country with, amazingly, even more mediocre weather than London.

She had never quite left the man's memory. Not least because of that memorable photo he still kept for keepsakes, wearing just undergarments and a deerstalker, an oversized magnifying glass cheekily pointed over the superintendent's crotch. It had been taken at the one staff Christmas party he'd caught her at before he left and, he strongly suspected, he was not the only officer of the law to still keep that picture around.

But Shelley Holmes now looks rather different to the perky young trainee his memory led him to believe he remembered. She's put a little meat on her bones, the clothes suggest a pay grade approaching his in only a fraction of the time it took the man himself to climb the ranks of the Met and, above all else, she's found a hair stylist that manages to work miracles on her notoriously unkempt curls.

"No," she tells him with a smirk.

"What?" Grisley's train of thought snaps back to the matters at hand, his gaze meeting the woman's eyes again.

"You're contemplating an affair with me to get back at your wife for cheating on you. It's a terrible idea, she's never had an affair herself, she just wanted to make you jealous. You drag me into bed, you'll ruin your own marriage like you fucked things up with Lindsey," the consultant detective sighs. "She's crying out for attention, for fuck's sake - not scorning you. Now... let's go see the damned body already."

Grisley takes a few moments to answer. "Good God, Shelley. You've really been practicing your Sherlock Holmes shtick after all, haven't you?" he mutters, stepping back to let the young woman past. She hurries along up the stairs, ignoring the remark. When he finds her, the woman is already stepping over the dead man's corpse, surveying the bedroom.

The place would have made Marquis de Sade squeal like a schoolgirl at a Bieber concert. An entire wall is decorated with implements of pain and pleasure, most of them the former. Many leather things, but some of them metal. Some of them metal and pointy and outright scary-looking.

Then there is the matter of the bed. Restraints - leather and metal both - had been affixed in every conceivable position. The traditional cotton sheets supplanted with a tight latex cover. By the foot of the bed stands a large metal kennel, its bottom padded with fluffy pillows and a dog bowl just in front, reading 'CUNT' in blocky letters.

"So hang on, whatcha doing here anyway?" Grisley wonders, leaning against the doorway, watching the woman work and staying out of her way for the time being. "Hell, where are you working these days? Didn't you leave the force?"

The woman leans down, smelling the latex sheet over the bed, her eyes darting around the room, scouring over every detail she can make out. The inspector's question does not rank high on that particular list of priorities, so she answers about a minute later, tossing her Europol badge at him.

"Huh, okay. Europol..." he turns it over in his fingertips. "Wait, okay... what?"

"The deceased, Martin Collins, presumed killed by his longterm partner, Patricia Ferguson, correct?" Holmes straightens up, pulling a pair of latex gloves out of her jacket.

"Yeah. We've got her in custody. She's pleading self-defence. Girl's in quite the state... so what's Europol..."

"Have your guys gotten you a background check on the happy couple yet?"

"Ah, no. Not yet. You know how it is, the amount of shit we have to take care of in a city like this... it's just a domestic homicide, we can let the courts take care of this one, no? Who cares what the two did for a living," he slides his hands meekly into his pockets.

"Well, you should have demanded it all the same. We got the notification about this case as soon as you lot updated the crime database," the redhead sits on the bed, legs crossed and flashing Grisley a stern, reprimanding look. "Ms. Ferguson is a government employee - Ministry of Defence, to be specific. But Collins, he is your real problem here. His death is not going to remain a small matter for the courts to settle, Inspector. I'm afraid I am to be only the first bearer of bad news for you today."

"What do you mean?" Grisley's eyes narrow, flicking from Shelley to the corpse, then back to Shelley.

"This body is of one Sergei Kostyakov. Former Russian media tycoon. He requested asylum and a new identity in the United Kingdom about eight years ago. The full details have not yet been disclosed, but it is needless to say the man has had... enemies."

"Fuck Holmes, you mean to say I may well have another Litvinenko on my hands?" at this prospect, the Inspector seems to grow rather more pallid, his brows furrowing with growing alarm.

"And killed by a Ministry of Defence official? Your investigation will make the evening news internationally - if not tonight, then tomorrow."

"But surely... how many people can possibly know this guy's real identity? If he's been hiding from the Russians for this long..."

"Oh Grisley, the press have their ways. And in a case like this, I imagine they'll get tipped off by someone pretty quick. They always do. You know how it goes."

The man has to look around carefully to find a seat on the crime scene he could occupy safely while he processed this information. "I need to escalate this, then," he remarks, giving Holmes a weary look.

"This has been escalated already, Grisley. It's what I'm here for," the woman retorts, walking back across to him and retrieving her Europol ID from the policeman's hands. "If you think you need more men to cover this..." she presses her lips together, "then fine, whatever. But give me a chance to get through the house without tripping over a dozen more Mr. Grumpies like the chap downstairs, alright?"

The nude man sprawls face down amidst the floor of the playroom, collapsed lifeless amidst a pattern of his own blood and brain matter. His physique is average - pale skin, late-to-middle age, balding hair and a chubby demeanour. Rather unusually for a man his age, he appears to be entirely hairless below the neck.

The physical details of the crime itself are easy for Shelley to reconstruct. The bullet entered the back of Kostyakov's skull, tore a fatal chunk out of his grey matter and proceeded to escape through his forehead. With no evidence of the body having been moved, it appears that he had been shot from the direction of the bed, the murder weapon having been left neatly on a nightstand: a tiny revolver with six empty chambers.

Police markings, numbers, chalk little crosses and circles are lazily strewn about the room, highlighting both the obvious and the mundane. The forensic investigators - or more likely investigator, singular - seem to have been in a hurry, eager to get done with the scene and move on. To more interesting cases or, more likely, lunch. Holmes has a feeling they will want a second look once someone breaks the news to them.

"So you got two nine-one-one calls. First from the neighbour at the sound of a gunshot, then half an hour later, from Ms. Ferguson herself, admitting to the murder - is that correct?" the redheaded woman inquires.

"Yes."

"And she claims self-defence."

"Something like that."

"He was playing Russian roulette with her. He overstepped his bounds - perhaps pulled the trigger twice when she only allowed him a single shot, endangering her life against her will. She was pissed off, so when he finally turned to leave, she grabbed the gun and pulled the trigger on him... except that this time, the bullet was in the chamber. Does that sound about right?"

"You figure that out just from the empty gun?" Grisley laughs. "Yeah, that's pretty much her version of it. Well, except for the first bit. She said he forced the whole Russian roulette spiel on her altogether. Pushed the gun to her head and pulled the trigger. She was terrified, and that's what he wanted. Yadda-yadda-yadda. You know what these freaks are like."

Shelley frowns, reaching for the gun, picking it up carefully between her latex-covered thumb and index finger - sniffing the tip. "No, that's definitely bullshit. She's cleaned the tip of the pistol, but it wasn't pressed up against her forehead, that's for sure."

"What are you getting at, Holmes?"

"There's more than one way to play Russian roulette. This game was of the penetrative variety, Grisley."

"Good lord, who would do such a thing?" the inspector looks down at the body, aghast.

"Well I suppose the thrill is rather intense. I can see the value of such a threat in certain relationships, certain moods, certain power exchanges - though of course actually putting one's life on the stake is..." she clenches her jaw slightly. "In any case, she was not overpowered."

"How do you mean? She voluntarily let herself be... penetrated, in this way? The woman's an MoD official, why would she ever..."

"That has no relation on her private life, inspector Grisley. At any rate though, Patricia was the dominant partner in the relationship." The look on Grisley's face is priceless enough that Shelley can't help but flash a modest smile. "The man was a sub, that much is obvious. This isn't even his house, Grisley - again, obvious. I mean, it's a second residence for the both of them, a little bondage retreat, but she's the one that looks after it and pays the bills - there was a stack of those on the stairs. That's not even Holmesian dedution, it is literally elementary, inspector..."

"Well, we did pick that detail up, yes Holmes. But that doesn't mean..."

"The most damning piece of evidence would have to be the strap-on," Shelley sighs, walking across to the wall, demonstrating the rather thick toy, cast in shiny, black latex. "The toy collection in general is heavily skewed towards anal play, in fact, with a lot of rather phallic tools. Men's toy collections tend away from featuring quite so many penetrative toys, most feel on some level that their manhood is threatened if they don't use their innate tool. And needless to say if he was the dom here, he wouldn't have use of the strap-on. And then there are the smaller things - he's completely waxed, for one. For another..." she leans down and carefully spreads the dead man's asscheeks apart, "There's the anal bruising. I can't believe you left that to the coroner to find?" she looks up at Grisley. "That's why you need more women in plain clothes up here, you chaps just can't bear to ogle a man's ass. Or queer detectives, for that matter. That would help too..."

"You've made your point, Shelley, thanks..." the man grits his teeth. "But that doesn't make sense. Are you saying then that he overpowered his... his mistress? You think she was the one that did something to piss him off?"

"Of course not. But it is a game she has played several times with him in the past. If you look very closely, there are traces of older faecal matter near the trigger guard on the revolver. It may not have been actual Russian roulette, mind you, it's quite likely she merely fucked him with the..."

"Oh get to the point, Holmes, God... you have no idea how much I don't want to hear all the grisly details..."

"You never did live up to your name," the redhead chuckles. "Alright. I'll spare you the workings-out if you insist. She was the domme, no question there, but she... she allowed him this. Perhaps as a privelege, likely just as a reward. Who knows, maybe she was feeling submissive. My original point stands - she was pissed off that he took it too far, pushed his prerogative. Maybe she allowed him to fuck her with it, but forbade him from pulling the trigger. He pulled it and that pissed her off. Matter of fact, I bet she made him take it. Made him turn around and hold still when she pressed the gun to the back of his head and, as it turned out, blew his brains out with the loaded bullet. The one time they played for keeps, they got unlucky."

The man's aghast, so Shelley picks up a nearby cane to demonstrate. "Observe the blood splatter on the far wall. It's clustered at the median, only about four feet off the ground." She uses the cane to draw an imaginary line. "Now, blood exiting the cranium after a gunshot wound can be expected to drop off, but not that far. Had he been standing up, we would see it at head height for the victim - at around six foot. The man was either kneeling or shot at a pretty extreme angle, which the exit wound suggests he wasn't. I'm sure your forensics will figure it out eventually."

"Well, it's going to be a fucking hell of a headline. Russian Tycoon Dead in Russian Roulette with MoD Mistress. The Daily Mail will have a fucking field day. So what, we charge the woman with homicide?"

"Self-defence won't cut it if she killed him in cold blood," Shelley nods, "no matter what the odds are."

"Pulling the trigger on someone is attempted murder, even if there is only one bullet in the chamber." Grisley rubs his eyes. "Goddamn senseless waste," he frowns, looking down at the body. The redhead gives the deceased one last look and heads for the door, when the inspector holds out a hand to stop her. "Listen, thanks for coming out Holmes. You've always had great insight, it's good to see you around and cracking cases again. But moreover, it's nice to see you again - full stop. I hadn't realised you were working for Europol now. How about we catch up tonight... it's been a while, you know? And I know what you're about to say," he smiles a little, "I won't hit on you, I promise."

Shelley takes a deep breath. "It was good running into you too, inspector. I appreciate your offer, but I cannot. I already have other plans for tonight." She pauses for a moment and shrugs, "And spare the flattery. There's nothing here you wouldn't have gotten in a day or two after the forensic investigation went through its due process. I'm just speeding things along. Ah! And while I remember," she hands her business card out to him, "call me if any other details pop up in the investigation. Anything... unusual, okay? I'll be in Edinburgh all week on personal affairs. So don't hesitate to call. If I'm unavailable, leave a voicemail, or text or... just, you know. Get through to me."

"Huh, sure. Why, you think there might be something more to this?" Grisley smiles.

"You know, one thing I've always liked about you Grisley," Holmes replies with an amused look up into his eyes, "is that you don't waste time second-guessing me. You never care about your ego as much with me as some do... you know my judgement is good, you trust it. You don't try to prove an untenable position just to contradict me. So many guys do it. Especially as a Europol consultant, every man I meet is determined to show me personally just how useless and redundant they feel my job is," she bites her lip.

"Nature of the game. You know how territorial us bulldogs tend to get. The dog's got a bone, he's not gonna let anyone else grab a bite of it. Sure as hell not Europol. Alright then Holmes. Thanks again for dropping by. I'll let you know anything we get."

"Good, keep your eyes peeled Grisley."

***

"M," announces the baritone voice on the intercom after a minute's wait.

"It's Holmes," Shelley replies, cursing herself for the nervousness in her voice. In the space of time it has taken her to cross to the other side of the city, it has gotten dark. Though at least the rain has eased off. Still damp, the woman stands before a non-descript door at the bottom of a small flight of stairs that lead down from street-level to the hidden entrance. An unremarkable door in an unremarkable alley off an unremarkable street.

"You're late. By thirty-three minutes."

"Yes, I know, M," her heart skips a beat. She grinds her teeth a little at the far-too-enjoyable feeling of exhileration that accompanies it.

"Do you remember what I said will happen from now on, every time you are late?"

"Yes, M."

"Then why are you still clothed?"

Holmes takes her finger off the intercom as the voice on the other end goes quiet. The underground recess is deep enough, at least, that she would not be seen from the alley if she did strip. Above all, she did agree to this as a fair and just punishment at the time - even though being diverted by an unexpected call from work was hardly a fair point, one might argue, to put the blame on her for.

Without other options presented, the small redhead quickly proceeds to divest herself. First the coat, then the shirt. The shoes, the jeans, the underwear. The cold Scottish autumn sends goosebumps across her nude, pale skin. She gathers up her clothes and presses the button again. This time there is no response, only an impersonal click as the door is unlocked electronically.

It is no warmer in the small hallway past the door than it had been outside. Her toes squirm with every step across the bare, frigid concrete. Once she has closed the door behind her, the door ahead slides open, spilling light across her nude figure. She steps through and M takes the clothes from her arms - careful to separate the woman's handbag from the rest. The much larger room she finds herself in now, is a basement. All cinderbrick and concrete, once connected to the building upstairs, but then at some point walled off and rented out as a separate property. Not to live in, of course. But the kind of place that would make a good workshop, or extra storage space, for a person needing some on the cheap. And it did have the basic facilities - a sink, a toilet, even if no walls to guarantee one's privacy.