Upon arriving at the bank, they took the escalator up to the second floor, and while it slowly carried them upwards John noticed both Cora and Sherlock looking around; taking everything in. He smiled in some amusement as they finally reached the top and began walking to the front desk that had Shad Sanderson written all over it at different points.
Sherlock smiled coolly at the woman sitting there. “Sherlock Holmes, and my two colleagues,” he introduced them, and with a nod the woman picked up the Telecom and said, “Sebastian Wilkes, your clients are here- Sebastian Wilkes to the front.”
After about five minutes wait in between which time John could tell Sherlock was getting bored and had to keep asking questions about Mr. Wilkes and such, the very man came around the corner. He smiled at them, and his eyes lingered a little longer on Petrichor. Sherlock noticed, and wondered what about her was so special.
But then he noticed Sebastian noticing him and shook his hand with that same cool smile. “Sherlock!” Sebastian grinned. “How you been, buddy? What’s it been…eight years since I last saw you?”
“This is my…friend John Watson,” Sherlock answered, as if the concept of Friends was still a bit new to him, “and my colleague Petrichor Skye.”
Sebastian shook hands with both of them respectively and then paused at John. “Friend?” he asked, surprised himself.
“Also a colleague,” John replied a bit stiffly. Petrichor just stood and hid a smile as Seb looked at both Sherlock and John and said finally,
“Right. Well then. I’ll grab the Que.” Mr. Wilkes ushered them into his office where three chairs awaited beside his desk, and he pulled out Cora’s especially.
“Been a bit busy?” Sherlock inquired coolly.
Sebastian looked up at him like he hadn’t heard what he had said.
“Must’ve,” Petrichor looked over at Sherlock and he nodded.
‘Sorry?” Sebastian asked, still not getting it.
“Well you’ve been around the world twice in one month!” Sherlock continued. “You must have been busy.”
“Okay, tell me how you knew that,” Mr. Wilkes demanded. “Was it my clothes, or some special kind of ketchup you can only find in New York, or what?”
Sherlock sat for a moment in silence, and then said slowly, “No…I was just talking to your secretary. She told me.”
Seb sat back, (possibly a trifle awkwardly) and laughed. “Right. You’re doing that thing again.”
He turned to Petrichor and John, sitting in silent amusement of the whole thing. “We were in UNI together,” he explained, “he had this trick he’d do.”
“It’s…not a trick.” Sherlock tried, but Seb was not to be cut off.
“He had this thing where you’d come down the next morning and he could tell you’d been out the last night shagging.”
“Really?” Petrichor murmured; the picture of innocence.
Sherlock glared at her and Watson stifled a laugh.
“I’m sure he was just being…” here she paused as if searching for a word, then found one: “Observant.”
“Yes, quite so.” Seb laughed again. Then he turned back to Sherlock. “She’s pretty and clever,” he smiled a bit patronizingly. “Where’d you pick her up?”
“On a murder-crime scene,” Sherlock answered just as deprecatingly, taking sweet revenge on the secretly irritated Petrichor.
“Well anyway, to business,” Sebastian straightened his tie. “We’ve had a break-in last night at the office of Mr. Frank William; former Chair Office. You’ll probably want to see.”
He got up and gestured for them to follow him. The trio did so, John, who was the last whispering to Cora,
“I told you…he’ll do anything to get the last word.”
“Indeed.” She answered, aiming to get the final stab. (She was only human, and a woman at that; so we mustn’t be too hard on her.) “Quite amusing.”
Sherlock just scoffed as they reached the office cubicles and Seb continued, “The break-in was made late last night.”
“What was taken?” Inquired John.
“Nothing,” Sebastian shrugged. “Just left a little…message.”
They advanced until they reached the very last cubicle, in front of which was a portrait of a man with strange yellow symbols sprayed across his eyes, covering them over and more of them beside the picture on the wall.
“Sixty seconds apart;” Mr. Wilkes informed Petrichor, who was clicking the buttons on the Computer Security Footage.
“So very simply,” Cora gathered, “Someone came up here in the middle of the night, sprayed paint around, and left within a minute?”
Sherlock nodded. “It would seem so.”
“How many ways come into that office?” John asked quizzically.
“Well that’s actually where it gets really interesting,” Sebastian had a funny look on his face.
“No doors opened were logged into the system; and we have alarms on every one. There’s a hole in our security. Find it and we’ll pay you…handsomely.”
He held out a cheque to Sherlock, but his voice was cold as he retorted,
“I don’t need an incentive…Sebastian.”
There was a moment of awkward silence, and then Sherlock asked Petrichor,
“Fancy a look around?”
She grinned. “Love one.”
Just before she walked off with Sherlock, she turned and handed Mr. Wilkes back a piece of paper; one side having his number and the other saying in bold black letters,
Never going to happen.
Sebastian was speechless with surprise as she flashed him a cool smile, and daintily turning round walked away with Sherlock, talking about different observations they had made.
As they walked off together, leaving John with the unfortunate Mr. Wilkes still awkwardly holding the piece of paper, and said,
“Of course he was kidding…um, mind if I hold onto that?”
Sebastian nodded shortly and handed the cheque to John who then with a grateful second nod walked off to find the Detecting Duo.
-=-=-=-=-=-
