Chapter Text
For once, Sherlock was happy to be riding in his brother’s Mercedes. Twenty minutes had passed and already the expensive leather seats were streaked with grease and reeked of burnt chemicals. Beside him, Mycroft wrinkled his nose and edged closer to the other side of the car, widening the distance between him and his bedraggled sibling.
“I’ll have to raise taxes just to cover the cost of cleaning this mess,” the elder Holmes griped.
Sherlock leaned back and lazily dragged his dirty shoes across the back of the front seat. “Go ahead. It’s not like either of us pays any.”
“Very altruistic of you. If something doesn’t affect you, it doesn’t matter, is that it?”
“Makes sense to me.” Sherlock rubbed against the headrest, hoping that enough oil remained in his curls to make a mess.
Mycroft sighed dramatically. “I am so looking forward to the next two weeks.”
“No, you aren’t.”
******
Like most things in the life of Sherlock Holmes, it all began with a case.
Lestrade had sought his assistance in solving a series of break-ins at a toxic waste plant outside Surrey. Sherlock had pinpointed the perpetrators easily enough, but catching them had backfired because he had followed his usual protocol: rush blindly into the enemy’s camp and tell no one where he was going. Lestrade had finally traced his mobile and moved in with an armed team, but not before Sherlock’s captors had plunged his hands into an acid mixture that burned off the top layer of skin.
Because John was still at the medical conference in America, Lestrade had called Mycroft while Sherlock was being treated at A&E for the burns. The elder Holmes had come, but he clearly wasn’t happy about it. It was another mess to take care of, this time literally: Sherlock was filthy but had refused a hospital bath. His bandaged hands left him unable to wash, dress, or feed himself, so he was Mycroft’s problem until John got back in two weeks. The British Government had an army of assistants, but none of them had annoyed him enough to deserve his prat of a brother.
Once they arrived at Mycroft’s Knightsbridge townhouse, the elder Holmes hung his cashmere blend overcoat in the entrance hall closet. When he turned to face his brother, he saw Sherlock leaning against the wall, face a mask of manufactured innocence.
“I’m feeling rather faint,” was the cheeky explanation.
Mycroft didn’t need X-ray vision to know that the grimy Belstaff coat was leaving a six-foot smudge on the new paint job. Lips pressed tightly together, he grabbed his brother by the arm, pulled him forward, and roughly divested him of both coat and scarf.
“Careful, I’m wounded,” Sherlock pouted.
“Which is the only reason why I’m not giving you a forceful lesson in manners.” Mycroft left both garments on the floor and brushed them aside with his foot, scowling at their disgusting condition. “I shall have these drycleaned tomorrow.”
“Thoughtful as ever.” Sherlock began to saunter out of the entrance hall, but Mycroft’s next words stopped him in his tracks.
“That’s far enough.”
Sherlock turned around.
“You’re going to make me recuperate out here? That’s inhospitable, Mycroft, even for you.”
“Enough of your trivia.” Mycroft approached, arms crossed. “You’re positively filthy and I will NOT have my home turned into a toxic waste site. Now be still while I undress you.”
Sherlock’s eyes widened. “You can’t be serious.”
“Oh, but I am. You’re taking a bath immediately.”
The younger Holmes laughed, but it sounded forced. His eyes were still huge with... something. “A bath? Like this?” He raised his bandaged hands.
“I’m well aware that you cannot attend to yourself at the moment. So I shall assist you.” Mycroft cast his gaze skyward, as if pleading for Divine intervention. “Yes, it’s as ridiculous as it sounds, but you have a remarkable talent for needing my help constantly.”
“And if I refuse?”
Mycroft uncrossed his arms. Feeling his last shred of patience desiccate, he approached until they were barely an inch apart. “Don’t test me.”
“You like it when I test you,” Sherlock said. He’d instinctively stepped back when his personal space was invaded, but his expression remained playfully defiant “Or at least you used to.”
Mycroft hesitated. For one intense moment, the outside world receded and there was only him and Sherlock, who was daring him to remember something that he could never forget anyway. When he finally spoke, his breath scorched Sherlock’s parted lips. “Don’t test me,” he repeated. His voice was as clipped and precise as usual, but its undertone had thickened. “Is that in any way unclear?’
When Sherlock didn’t reply, Mycroft speedily divested him of everything, even his shoes and socks. Then he stepped back and beheld his younger brother naked for the first time in over fifteen years.
“Same as you remember?” Sherlock asked throatily. His pupils were expanding and his cock stirred with the beginnings of an erection.
Mycroft swallowed and kept his gaze above Sherlock’s waist. “Follow me,” he ordered, turning and heading for the spiral staircase.
But the younger Holmes remained in place. Mycroft paused, one foot on the lowest step, and looked back. Sherlock was staring at him.
“What are you waiting for?” He tried not to look at his brother’s hardening cock, or think about how his own was stirring in response. “I can’t imagine you want me to drag you, after all the manhandling you’ve undergone tonight.”
Sherlock’s tongue wet his lower lip. “I could take more, as I’m sure you remember.”