The latest message really got to me, so much so that I slipped out of bed beside Bayley and headed into the living room of 221B. I wasn't surprised to find Sherlock up in the middle of the night. I noticed he had my phone still in his hand. I forgot about it until just now.

"Insomniac too, huh?" I asked nonchalantly as I sat on my dad's chair's armrest. "I'm a favorite contact of his, apparently."

"It's because he knows he can have fun with you," Sherlock murmured. "He knows how to mess with your mind. He did it once before."

"That was different. He played an entirely different person. This...this is the real him."

"You sound so positive that he's truly back."

"You don't think he is?"

"Oh, I believe that he is. Who else would know what this number does, about the wedding, and about your connection to John?" He put his hands in front of his face.

I sat more in the chair now, crossing my legs. "You should sleep, Sherlock."

"Sleep is weakness."

"So is sleep deprivation," I pointed out. "Even someone like you needs a few hours to run efficiently." I rubbed my eyes and yawned. I looked around the apartment, noticing the yellow smiley still on the wall above the couch. "I remember the first night I stayed here. I was afraid you were gonna shoot that wall while I tried to sleep." I smiled. "You were so paranoid about me being his spy..."

"Why do people reminisce?" Sherlock groaned. "The present and the future are what need more attention."

"Sometimes I like to look back on the good times," I said defensively, messing with the ring on my left hand. "But this place holds some bad ones too."

"Rachel, I already apologized—"

"I buried that, Sherlock," I told him. "It seems like you haven't. Do you still feel bad about it? I forgave you."

"You never said those words, all I did was offer an apology to you."

I sighed. "Are we really having this debate in the middle of the night?"

Sherlock's laptop beeped. I heard his fingers click away, and I saw the screen change. I noticed his expression did too.

"What is it?" I got out of the chair, hovering over his shoulder.

In the email were attachments, pictures. My eyes widened as I realized what they were. They were of Sherlock and myself, of our brief affair, experiment, whatever anyone wanted to call it. Me wearing his deerstalker hat, us cuddled in a chair, kissing. Us kissing, him in the bedsheet.

"Wha...?" I couldn't even get the full word out. Who took those pictures? How could they have? We searched this place. "I-I don't understand..."

Another email came in, this one with no attachments, only words.

My, my, you've both been very naughty. It would be a shame if these fell into the wrong hands...

I can only imagine what the future husband and the pet blogger would think if they got their hands on these darling photographs.

These pictures were already in the wrong hands.

"He knows about this too?" I squeaked. I put a hand on my forehead. This was slowly spiraling out of control. "I'm tempted to type back an email and see if we get an answer."

"Not likely," said Sherlock.

"There's no demands, so why show us this?"

"To prove that he can. To prove that he can ruin our lives, all with these."

"There has to be a way to get rid of them."

"Rachel, this is through the Internet. Odds are they're stored somewhere that we can't find them or get rid of them easily."

I felt sick to my stomach again, only this time I wasn't puking. Yet. "We're not enough to deal with this. Get Mycroft to help, get his people on this."

"He'll probably dismiss it. If it's not national importance, it won't be looked at."

"But this is serious. Jim Moriarty is a national threat!" I exclaimed. "He had him locked up once to try and get answers out of the man! He wouldn't pass up the chance to get Moriarty into custody again. If nothing else, he should step in to help his little brother." Sherlock and I locked eyes. "Please, Sherlock. You and I both know what those pictures can do."

"I don't get why you're so worried. We never had anything."

"But the people who would see those wouldn't see it like that. They'd jump to the worst conclusions before we could explain ourselves! Don't you see, Sherlock? Even if it was never real, it sure as hell looks real in those pictures." I hastily grabbed my phone back from Sherlock.

"Where are you going?"

"Back to bed, and to Bayley. Maybe I'll wake up and forget this ever happened."

As I headed back to the bedroom, I stopped halfway, biting down on my lip. I unlocked my phone and found the number. I ran a lot of words through my mind before my thumbs tapped away.

You listen here, whoever you are. You're messing with the wrong person. If this is some sort of prank, it's not funny at all.

I got a fairly quick response.

Oh, Rachel, I'm hurt that you don't think it's really me. *sigh* I guess the only way to prove it is if I make a special appearance in your future ; )

I didn't send a response; I shut my phone completely off before I entered the bedroom. I saw Bayley's figure sitting up in bed.

"You too?" he asked sleepily.

"Are you surprised?" I retorted, sliding under the covers. I grabbed his hand in the dark. "This is all so surreal. We're wedding in London, my dad is the blogger of a famous consulting detective. I have a baby half-sister, and I'm marrying the man who shot me all those years ago." I chuckled. "What kind of life am I living?"

"One that likes to challenge you and everyone around you." His lips blindly found my ear. "Just think, in a few months, we'll start our new chapter together."

If none of us die before then. "I'm glad you're thinking positive in all of this."

"Someone has to."

"I'm glad that someone is you."

"Come on, love, back to bed." We both snuggled under the covers, and I felt his hand cover mine, tracing the top of my fingers. "Were you talking to someone? I heard you."

"Sherlock," I sighed. "He was up."

"I worry about him, especially now."

"I do too."

"I worry about all of us, with what's cropped up recently."

"Like you said, just think, we'll be married soon. We can leave this whole crime business behind and start a family."

"That's the first time I've heard the word 'family' come out of your mouth since we got engaged."

"Well, it's the endgame, isn't it? For us to have children and become parents, and then grandparents, and so on and so forth?" I nudged my head under his chin. "I can see that with us, Bay. I can see that with you."

"This talk right here is one of the many reasons why I love you, Rachel Watson." Bayley kissed the top of my head. "Sometimes you have the most beautiful way with words."

The message kept replaying in my mind, in his voice. Oh, Rachel, I'm really hurt that you don't think it's me. I guess the only way to prove it is if I make a special appearance in your future. He already did with that damn message that we saw just as Sherlock was being shipped away via a private plane.

I wanted that video message to be the last visual I ever got of Jim Moriarty.