The door to 221B Baker Street didn’t answer Jonny’s knock, so he answered it himself with a hairpin and a bad feeling crawling up his spine. The stairs groaned like an old stool pigeon as he climbed, Nurse Alex Price right behind him, her heels quiet, her eyes sharp, her London calm about to be shattered. He’d ditched Boris earlier, left his precious pug in the care of England’s most celebrated brainbox so he and Alex could tangle sheets and forget the world for a few blessed hours. What waited for them upstairs was a crime scene without the courtesy of a corpse. Holmes and Boris lay sprawled like fallen idols, arms riddled with track marks, mouths slack, eyes rolled back to places no mind should visit without a passport. A bottle sat on the table, nearly empty, its white promise betrayed. Alex didn’t need to touch them. One look told her the truth. They were flying. High as church bells on Sunday. Jonny’s heart cracked like cheap glass. “I knew it,” he howled. “I knew leaving my pug with that pipe-smoking maniac was begging for heartbreak.”
“Your deduction is unsound,” came a voice from the gloom, clipped and wounded with disappointment. Watson stepped forward, mustache stiff, eyes colder than a London fog. “This isn’t your common Soho snow. Look at the label. Seven percent is the ceiling in this city, and that concoction is strong enough to wake the dead or put legends to sleep.” Jonny’s jaw tightened as the pieces clicked together, ugly and perfect. “Van Nuys,” he said, the word tasting like rust and regret. Watson nodded. The room seemed to sag under the weight of it. Boris, sweet, stupid, brilliant Boris, had gone home for his poison and dragged Holmes along for the ride. The two greatest minds in the room were unconscious, and the dumbest truth lay naked on the table. Jonny stared at his fallen partner, praying the line between genius and grave hadn’t already been crossed.