General Disclaimer

Thanks to Maureen for the encouragement and the welcome! So here is the next bit....

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"Oh, so the game is afoot, is it?" Holmes said as he saw the mischievous twinkle in her eyes. He realized she needed a game to keep the commissioner off her mind, and decided to play along.

"C'mon, Holmes, show me what you got -- show me that two hundred years in honey hasn't slowed the world's greatest detective down --"

"I suggest you be very careful what you ask for, my dear Lestrade," Holmes said as he reached down at his left side, and Lestrade again dangled the phones before him. As she playfully swept out her foot, Holmes jumped over it, and then she saw the crook of his cane slip under. She toppled off balance and flipped over onto her hand to toss the phones over his shoulder. Holmes snagged the videophones with the end of his cane and whisked them as Lestrade suddenly shouldered into his knees. He flipped back and brought up his hand to block her playful cuff to his chin, and then they were standing apart, breathing as they stood in fighting stances.

"Not bad, but can you beat this?" Lestrade laughed as she flipped forwards, and her leg shot out towards him. Holmes ducked and then spun his cane around to land almost inches from her head as she landed again, and her hand flashed out to counter. Grabbing the end of his cane she thrust her arm forward and Holmes blocked with his hand, but Lestrade still held the end of his cane. Their eyes locked and he smiled, excited by the sparring.

"Aren't you forgetting something?" Holmes asked.

"What?" she asked. "Got anything else that you have from two hundred years ago --"

"Your major bane -- er -- boss is expecting you," said Holmes with a wry grin as Lestrade still held the end of his cane and he twisted it around again out of her grasp. Tension breaking they parted, and faced one another to see what move the other would make. Lestrade anticipated as Holmes held his cane back and his hand forward and she mirrored his movements, leaping onto the sofa as he swung round, and then she thrust her hand forward. Holmes leaned in as she leapt forward, and the cane lightly passed under to trip her off balance.

"Yeow!" Lestrade gasped as she sailed forwards and almost ended up a heap on the floor. The rug slipped on the hardwood floor, and Holmes slid forwards onto his backside in an undignified heap, with Lestrade pinning him down.

"Whoolf!" Holmes got out as they lay in a tangle together, the breath knocked out of both of them. She lay across his lean, muscular body, and suddenly felt the warmth under her, her heart pounding a mile a minute as she struggled to press her hand against the floor.

"I say, Holmes, there is someone at the door to see you --" came Watson's voice, and both Holmes and Lestrade came to their senses.

"Oh zed, sorry --" Lestrade gasped as she lifted herself off of Holmes and he lay there, partly stunned.

"I'm dreadfully sorry," he gasped, feeling extremely awkward with Lestrade's body pinning him down. Nervously he squirmed under her and she quickly rolled off of him, seeing the flush come to his cheeks.

"I'd uh -- better get to the Chief Inspector before he has my butt -- er, me -- for breakfast," said Lestrade.

"Quite," Holmes nodded as he scrambled to his feet with the aid of his cane and extended his hand to help Lestrade up. She took his hand in her gloved one, and was glad of the material between them, because she felt her palm sweating.

"Holmes, there is a lady caller -- she says she's the owner of the Bonnie Prince Charlie," said Watson. "And she was referred to you by Lestrade --"

"Um that's the.. Um --" Lestrade got out, pushing her hair out of her face as she turned around quickly.

"The lady whose solar yacht had a rather unfortunate accident -- namely, that it never got out of the space dock," Holmes answered for her. "Rather, it was the failure in the solar sail?"

"Right," Lestrade nodded.

"Shall I let her in?" Watson asked.

"Yes, do," said Holmes, taking out his handkerchief and dabbing the sweat from his forehead.

"I'll see you both later," Lestrade said quickly as she moved past Watson, who seemed a bit surprised at her haste to leave. "Can't keep the Chief waiting, you know -- heh heh --"

"What the deuce is wrong with Lestrade?' asked Watson as he turned and faced Holmes, his metallic body gleaming in the light of the overhead chandelier. "My metabolic scanner picked up an elevated heart rate and --"

"We were -- practicing some sparring moves," Holmes got out, before he realized how silly that sounded. "Don't ask, Watson. Rather, let us meet our new client -- and we can see how much you've learned from me in the process of deduction --"

"Indeed," said Watson as he moved off to answer the door. From the window Holmes could see the buzz of cars whirring about at both street and multi levels. The hum of hover engines had replaced the clopping of hooves on pavement and the occasional snort and neigh of a carriage horse or hansom, and it was a sound he missed sorely. As he pulled back the curtain, he saw Lestrade walking quickly to her hovercar parked on the side of the street, and he heard the honking of an impatient cab driver as he shook his fist and leaned out the window at Lestrade. She shook her fist back at him and whipped out what appeared to be a citation pad, which she filled out and showed to the impatient driver before leaping into her hovercar with a slam of the door. He turned at the sound of footsteps on the seventeen steps leading up to his office and reception room, and realized the lightness of the steps indicated a woman's pace, followed by the heavier vibrations in the floor from what must be Watson's stance. Pulling out of his momentary distraction about Lestrade's odd behavior as of late, he turned to face the middle-aged client that stood and peered at him intently from over Watson's shoulder.

"May I present the Countess Lorraine D'Armanda-Stuart?" said Watson. Shrugging off his pursuit of Lestrade's sudden clumsiness, he turned to greet his client. Time for business again.