Fight for Me

Chapter 86

The first thing Lydia became aware of when she awoke was the searing pain in the back of her head. She attempted to lift her hand to feel what was wrong, but found her hands secured to a chair with rope. She swore under her breath and began trying to wiggle her hands free, determined to get out of there before Sherlock needed to come save her.

"Oh good, you're finally awake," a voice spoke as a man, about her age, walked over to her with a vest of explosives in hand.

She eyed him warily as she asked, "who are you? Why are you doing this?"

"This? This is revenge, my dear. I do apologise that you had to be brought into it, but I needed someone that Sherlock cares about."

Lydia snorted at this remark, despite the tension in the room. "If you wanted someone Sherlock cared for, you should have gone for John Watson. Hell, he probably cares about our landlady more than he cares about me."

"Don't try to play games with me," he growled, securing the best of explosives around her. "I know that you're his girlfriend, I did my own research after seeing it in the papers."

"Ex-girlfriend," Lydia corrected, ignoring the pain in her heart as she spoke the words. "He called me insignificant right before you kidnapped me, so good luck getting him to come save me."

"Then you better convince him to help you because I have no qualms blowing you up the way he did my grandmother."

"Your grandmother? What happened?" Lydia inquired, hoping to get enough information that she could talk him out of using her as revenge.

But the man refused to comply with her questioning, instead pulling out a cheap mobile and moving a laptop in front of her. He then instructed her, "you are going to read off of the script provided, do not stray from it, do you understand? If you do, I'll have no choice but to kill you."

"I'm telling you, he's not going to go for it and honestly I don't want him to come save me. So you might as well just kill me now."

"The blast radius of that bomb will cause the entire block of flats to explode, do you really want to be responsible for the number of innocent lives lost?"

"I wouldn't be responsible," she growled at him, but knew her resolve was chipping away. No matter how angry she was at Sherlock, she knew she would have to do this for the others in danger. "You would be."

"Not if you do what I ask," he corrected, typing a number into the mobile. "I don't wish to kill you, I just want Sherlock to realise what it feels like to have someone he loves in danger, to imagine what I went through when he killed someone I cared about. So just be a good girl and do what I asked so no one has to get hurt."

He pressed call and turned on speakerphone, directing her attention to the laptop with the script for her to read. It rang a few times before Sherlock finally answered, his voice sounding oddly hoarse.

"Sherlock Holmes."

The vest of explosives came to life, lighting up as the bombs were activated, but Lydia tried her best not to concentrate on that. Instead, she stared at the script, the black letters becoming jumbled and meaningless as her thoughts were elsewhere. The pause made Sherlock grow impatient, figuring that someone had rung him up as a prank.

"If you think this is funny, then it's not. I will track you down if you call this number again."

"Wait," Lydia cried out in a panic, noticing how her kidnapper's finger inched closer to the detonation button. "Sherlock Holmes, I have a small puzzle for you. Not like the ones you're used to, of course, but don't worry you'll have a nice murder to solve if you don't figure this out in an hour."