"Well, Mr. Holmes, aren't you glad to see me?"
Sherlock's eyes were flinty as he stared her down. "Don't make me repeat myself, Irene."
She sighed dramatically, her chest heaving with the play she was making. "She's safe, dear. That's all I can tell you at the moment." She smiled slyly up at him. "Anger looks sexy on you."
He released her and walked away, towards the house, ignoring her as she got up and brushed herself off. "Aren't you going to invite me in, after laying me out like that?", she called out, and he kept walking. She pouted slightly, and stopped, crossing her arms over her chest. "You'll never see her again if you don't."
He stopped, not looking back, and she smirked slightly. "Really, Sherlock, I thought we had more of a connection than this."
"You were to stay in America," he growled, turning and advancing toward her.
"Honey, I'm home," Irene drawled in her best midwestern accent, and Sherlock seized her arm menacingly. She looked up at him with a slightly surprised, albeit calculating, look. "I've never seen you like this. To be honest, I don't know that anyone has," she remarked.
"Honesty looks fake on you. Tell me where she is," he replied in a low voice, "and you will live to tell the tale of when Sherlock Holmes was discomposed and desperate over a woman." She began to smile and Sherlock continued. "Don't tell me, and you will wish I had left you to be executed in Karachi."
The smile faded from her lips. "You're really no fun anymore, Sherlock. Did she really have so much power over you, that she turned you into this serious sap?"
"Last chance."
"I don't know where they've taken her," she sighed again, free hand on her hip. "But I can find out."
"Do that."
Irene rolled her eyes and pulled her arm away, getting her phone out of her pocket. As she stood at a shielded angle and tapped the screen, Sherlock smirked ever so slightly. "Changed the code, I see." She scowled at him and pressed a final button, bringing the phone to her ear, waiting a beat before speaking into it. "Yes, I've made contact. He understands what he has to do. Where's our next confab to be?" Sherlock strained to hear the voice on the other end, but couldn't make it out. He stared at Miss Adler and her mouth twitched slightly. "I understand."
"Start talking," he growled as she hung up, slipping her phone back into her pocket before looking around. "We really should discuss this indoors."
Sherlock watched the woman over the table he rested his elbows on. She sat straight, chin up. She was confident, though less so now that he'd been so unusually aggressive with her. As she began to talk, he stopped watching her and started staring at the wall to his left, choosing a focal point for his gaze in the floral wallpaper as he absorbed information.
"He's taken your pathologist, because he knows what she did. Originally she was to die for helping you, only he figured out your little game. So he's dealt himself in, to make you pay your dues.
"He's very angry that you didn't live up to your deal, Sherlock. Or rather, that you did live up to it. You were supposed to jump off that roof."
"I did jump."
"You weren't supposed to survive, obviously," she retorted, rolling her eyes. "Anyhow, he feels quite cheated, understandably."
"I could feel the same," Sherlock snapped. "He supposedly shot himself on that roof! He didn't play his part either."
Irene smiled coyly and shook her head. "No Mr. Holmes, not James. He's dead and buried."
The detective blinked, leaning back into his chair. "Moriarty is dead."
"As a doornail."
"Who am I dealing with now?"
She leaned across the table, a glint in her eye. "His brother."
