Organised Chaos - Sherlock x Reader

XIX • 19

"Do you have any idea what that was about?" Kenzie sounded concerned.
"None." You responded, still staring after Sherlock. He had left so abruptly.
"Well anyway, his voice is bloody amazing." She grinned, trying to lighten the mood.
"Isn't it?" You grinned back, deciding to ignore Sherlock's behaviour. It wasn't uncommon after all.
"His hair too." She continued.
"I know..." You trailed off.
"So what's he like, when he's not like that?" She asked.
"Ugh, he's really very sweet. It just takes a special kind of person to love him."
"But you do."
"Yeah. I really do." You stared wistfully at the door.
"Well then go after him."
"What?" You turned to look at her.
"You heard me. Go get him."
"Oh please Kenz. I'm not gonna leave you here alone while I go chase after him. I've been along on every other outing for this case. He can do without me once."
"Maybe he can, but you want to go. Trust me, (N/N), I'll be fine here." She smiled and shooed you with her hand.
You looked guiltily at the door then back to Kenzie. She was entirely serious.
"OK fine! Don't let Bo get into too much trouble. I'll be back."
"No worries." She smiled.

You pulled on a coat and stepped out into the street to hail a cab. You knew where he was.
"Hickman Gallery." You instructed the cabbie, then sat back. You grabbed your phone and shot a quick text to Sherlock.
'I'm coming.'

He replied a couple of minutes later.
'Van Gogh'

Got it.
The cab pulled up to the Gallery, and you paid your fee and hopped out.
You found your way to the Van Gogh exhibit and saw him, browsing the paintings as though he were any other visitor.
"The men at Emmaus." Sherlock whispered.
"What?" You looked at him quizzically.
"The painting. It's an interesting case. It's not a copy of a Vermeer per say. It was painted by an expert fabricator in 1937. It is famous in its own right. But it is most definitely not a Vermeer."
"I see." You continued browsing the paintings.
"How're you gonna get in this time?" You asked, looking at him.
"Lestrade owed me a favour. He can get us in long enough for me to prove its a fake." He didn't look back, continuing the act of innocent gallery goer.

Within several minutes, Lestrade and Donovan arrived. Sally gave an exaggerated sigh when she saw Sherlock, who completely ignored her.
"Ah, it's good to see you Gavin. Actually it's really not, but thank you for getting me in."
Lestrade gave him a threatening look. "It's Greg, and if you're going to be a git you can forget this favour."
Sherlock rolled his eyes but said no more.
Lestrade spoke to the curator and she brought us into the room that you and Sherlock had snuck into earlier.
As soon as she saw Sherlock stride confidently into the room her face twisted up and she growled in her heavy Czech accent. "You again!"
Sherlock ignored her and Lestrade rolled his eyes and muttered, "I don't even want to know."
Sherlock took several steps towards the painting, then clasped his hands behind his back and leaned forward, examining every square inch of the canvas, walking around it to see it from every angle.
As he inspected the painting, he spoke, rattling off facts.
"Vermeer himself didn't create very many works, only 34 paintings can be firmly attributed to him today. This particular forger, Han van Meegeren, actually created an entire time period in Vermeer's career that never existed."
At this point, the curator was glaring at him angrily, Lestrade looked a bit bored, and you were still dumbstruck at how Sherlock could possibly know all this.
He stopped and pointed at the right side of the canvas.
"Come." He commanded. "Look at the canvas straight on from the side. What do you see?"
"It's bent. Warped!" Lestrade stared at it in wonder.
"Exactly. Do you know why?" Sherlock looked at him pointedly.
"No idea."
"Bakelite."
"What?"
Now you piped up. "I've heard of that! I learnt about it in highschool chemistry. It's a early plastic, right? Formed from a condensation reaction of phenol with formaldehyde."
"Good." Sherlock glanced at you with approval.
He continued, "van Meegeren mixed Bakelite plastic with his paint to give his canvases an aged look. Now that technique causes canvases to bend." He gestured toward the bent painting. "Like so."
"Secondly, he would paint on canvases that had already been painted on. They were cracked and aged, so this gave his paintings an even older appearance" He looked pointedly at the curator. "Need I continue, or are you ready to tell us the truth?"
She looked down, her hands shook slightly. When she looked back up, guilt was splashed across her every feature.
"I thought so." Sherlock muttered. "What're we looking at, inspector?"
Lestrade looked up, glad to finally be useful. "Well er, criminal conspiracy, fraud, accessory after the fact, at the very least."
"OK!" The curator held up her hands in surrender. "I never wanted to hurt anyone. I just wanted my share. 30 million."
Sherlock continued to stare at her, waiting for her to go on.
"I found a young man, purely by accident. Bright young thing." She took a deep breath, "We got to talking, and it came out that I managed the art gallery and I was in need of a few more pounds. He made it sound so easy. He told me where to find the painting, told me that they had gone unnoticed, passed as genuine Vermeers for decades. I thought why not? I could get several million pounds out of this."
"And his name?" Sherlock prodded.
She looked down again, as though she was fighting tears. Finally she whispered, "Moriarty. James Moriarty."
You took a sharp breath as three separate things suddenly connected in your head.
A bright young man. Stumbled upon him purely on accident.
"I'm Jim, by the way."
"I really don't trust him, (F/N)"

You shook your head to clear it. It wasn't possible. James was a fairly common name.