This is not what I was aiming for with this story, but this is how it came out—less sexy and darker than I intended. Constructive criticism welcome!

It was a dark and stormy night. Molly slowly opened the door to her flat, expecting the rush of a ravenous, lonely Toby yowling for his kibble and an ear scratch. She'd been away for nearly 24 hours between a long shift at the morgue and a brief stopover at 221B. Sherlock had been remarkably eager to pull her into his bed and ravage her, and though he'd initially asked her to stay the night, he'd quickly shooed her out the door when a text from Lestrade lit up his phone. By the time John had been summoned to assist in the latest case, she had on her shoes and was heading home. Molly supposed she wouldn't see him for the next day or so unless the case brought him to her morgue or lab. If she were honest, it stung a bit that the thrill of the chase was preferable to a cuddle between the sheets with her, but it was probably for the best. She was tired. She felt raw and exposed, and along with the joy of finally being with the man she loved for so long, there was the feeling of being overwhelmed by emotion, both his and hers. It was sometimes best to put a little distance between them afterwards.

How long had she pined for Sherlock? How many times had she imagined what it would be like to be in his arms, to be the sole focus on those intense, blue eyes. Be careful what you wish for, Molly smiled to herself. Sherlock had finally given her his attention, his love and it was an intense as any activity he undertook. The lovemaking had left her with a warm ache in her bones, and strange sweetness in her heart. Tears had threatened when they lay spent—naked and open to his scrutiny, she felt stripped to her very soul as he gazed down at her, dropping kisses over her cheeks, her neck, her collar bone. She felt a bit like moth consumed by the flame. It burned, but what a lovely light!

Molly closed the door behind her, turning the lock, "Toby?" she called. Odd. He would normally be all over her by this point. She flipped the switch of the table lamp in the foyer and gasped at the sight of the dark-eyed man sitting in the armchair in her sitting room, a contented Toby in his lap.

"You!" she gasps. She cannot even scream. The shock is too great. He cannot be here. He cannot. Her mouth works, but no sound comes from her throat.

"Molly?' Jim's voice is soft, pitched high.

Her heart beats rapidly in her chest. There isn't enough air suddenly and she feels sick to her stomach. No, no, no…she cannot possibly be expected to handle this.

"You can't be here. You shot yourself in the head! You can't be here!" she was whispered hysterically, trying to convince herself more than him. Though his eyes were dark and haunted, his lips quirked up sardonically.

"Well, obviously, I am here and I am not dead. I thought you were cleverer than that Molly. After all, you were the one who helped me manage it," Jim responded. Molly's eyes went wide. She was going to faint. She was. She sank to the floor, her back against the wall and put her head between her knees. Deep breaths. Deep slow breaths. Her eyes are squeezed tight against the encroaching blackness.

She heard rather than saw him stand, Toby giving a short mew of displeasure as he was dumped unceremoniously on the floor. Jim crouched before her, brushing a cool hand over her hair, stroking the back of her head as her face remained pressed against her knees.

"Hey," he is gentle, cupping her chin, "hey, look at me." She lifts her head and her warm brown eyes stare fearfully into his black ones. He smiles, still gentle, still kind, "it's just me, Jim. It's okay."

"What do you want?" she asks and can't keep the quiver out of her voice. She's afraid, so afraid, but why? She's never been afraid of Jim. She dumped Jim. Moriarty—that shadowy monster, yes, he was terrifying, but Jim—Jim who watched television with her. Jim who knew how to stroke Toby's furry tummy just right. Jim who giggled at her jokes and brought her tea and made her cheese toast the morning after he spent the night in her bed. Jim who came to her weeping, just a few short hours before Sherlock came to her, asking her to draw a bag of his own blood, asking her for a few bone fragments, asking her how to fake a head wound, how to stop the pulse. The game was too much. He just wanted to get away, Molly. Get away. I can't keep this up. Help me escape. I'll be good, I promise.

"Molly, molly…" his voice is a caress, "I need your help." No, not again. She shakes her head slowly.

"No, Jim, no. I can't. I can not. Please don't—" Molly protests as he raises a finger to her trembling lips.

"Shh. No, no. I'm not asking for anything difficult. I've missed you, Molly" and he smiles, and it's a mad smile with tinged with a genuine affection. She can feel it. He has missed her. He crouches down so he can be at her level more comfortably. Molly rears back, but the wall stops her. She's caught.

Jim's eyes are searching her face, and though he continues to stroke her hair gently, his face twists suddenly and his nostrils flare as he breathes her in. "What have you been up to?" he asks wonderingly. He breathes in again, closing his eyes. "Who have you been with? You stink of him." His eyes fly open, and he gazes down at her, a half smile forming on his lips, "No. Noooo. Really? You finally got him." He sits back on his heels and gives her an appraising look. "Well, Miss Hooper, I underestimated you… and him. Well done."

He leans in again, his lips brushing her ear and hisses with a hot breath, "and how is it? Everything you imagined it would be?"

"Don't." She cannot stop the tears in her voice, "Don't mock me. Whatever you do to me, however you want to hurt me, don't mock me."

"Hurt you? When have I ever hurt you?" he looked honestly surprised. "And I'm not mocking you. I don't like it when people laugh at other people. Ask my old schoolmate, Carl. Or don't rather. He's dead, you know." The sick feeling rolled through Molly's belly again at his little laugh.

"Dear girl, you managed to get what the most cunning and practiced dominatrix in the country could not coax from him. How did you manage that?"

"I—I don't know. Jim, please—"

"Silly question. I know how you managed it. You got me, didn't you? And I was trying to play gay. You are a very skilled professional—you know your way around the human anatomy" The grin that follows that statement is cruel, jealous, "and how do I compare to him?" Molly starts to shake.

"I—I don't know. It's different. I didn't even know who you were….then," Molly fights another wave of nausea.

"What's to know? I was Jim. I am Jim. Not gay, by the way." Jim smiled down at her, "I think you saw me very clearly. You like your men clever, strong and a little bit bad—maybe more than a little bit." His voice shifts to the goofy lilt he used as the IT worker, "Molly Hooper didn't have a lot of respect for Jim from IT. " His voice changes again to a silky purr, " but I think Molly Hooper liked James Moriarty quite a bit, and you know that."

Did she? She did. Silly Jim did not appeal, but when Moriarty had pinned her to the sofa after going through a bottle of wine and an episode of Glee, his dark eyes searching her face, reading her secrets, the rush of power thrilled her, and she responded by taking him apart piece by piece with her eyes, her mouth, with the soft warm slide of her own body against his. She was a skilled anatomist and she showed him how he was made, just like every other ordinary human being on the planet, showed him how nicely he fit with her own extraordinarily ordinary self. Yes, she'd played a little game of doctor with Moriarty—even without fully realizing it, and she almost thinks she won. Why else would he be here now?

"Is this about Sherlock?" she gave a desperate laugh. "Of course, it is. Everything is about Sherlock. Leave him alone, don't you touch him." She straightens, shoving Jim back from her. She suddenly feels ice cold. It's either shock or rage that fills her now. "What do you want, Jim? Are you going to kill me to get back at him for fooling you before? I'm pretty sure that I count at least as much as Mrs. Hudson and Lestrade—still not sure if I'm as important as John yet, but we're getting there." She stands up and he follows. She makes to break for the door, but he grasps her tightly, hauling her back to him, pinning her arms down.

"If you are here to kill me," she says with a gasping sob, gulping air, "it will be because of me. I'm not just an accessory in this game between the two of you. Just leave him alone." If he was going to hurt her, let's get it over with. She'd rather not put off the inevitable. Her body was tensed to spring again.

Jim's showed his teeth in a sudden flash of white. "For once," he says with a strained laugh, "I don't give a damn about Sherlock. Well, that's not completely true. The game was played, but it was a draw. I destroyed his world. He destroyed mine. He's rebuilding and now it's my turn to rebuild, but I'm tired Molly. Tired of spinning webs, empire building. I told you that before when I needed to disappear. I just—I think I need to stop being the spider. It's boring. In the end, even the job of being a criminal mastermind is just a grind. I think I'd like to try something simpler." He relaxes his hold on her and leans against her heavily, face in her neck.

"I sometimes thought, in another time, another place, I would very much like to put my brown-eyed babies in you, make you the missus of my little castle. Sunday roasts. Going to the park with the kids. So ordinary, but how often is that ideal attained. It's as much of a fairy tale as anything. Could take quite an extraordinary person to pull that off." He says all of this into the silky skin of her neck. She can feel his lips on her collar bone, so close to where Sherlock had branded her with his kisses just hours before. She shivered.

Molly gapes, uncomprehending, twisting her neck to look down at him. "You—You're not asking me to marry you?" He was insane. Anything was possible.

Moriarty snorts at the idea, "No. But in another life? Another story, maybe. I like to imagine the possibilities." He smiles at her again, "why haven't you screamed yet? Your neighbors would surely hear. Doesn't the elder Mr. Holmes have you under strict surveillance yet?"

Molly's head is spinning again. Why hasn't she? Even her one attempt to get away was feeble, at best.

"Mmmm, mmm, mmm. Miss Molly. I think you've missed me, too." He pulls her to the armchair where he had been sitting before and takes her onto his lap. She perches, tense, waiting for him to continue.

"I want to tell you a story. It's the story of not seeing the beauty within, underestimating a woman's potential—"

"I swear," Molly hisses with sudden unexpected violence, struggling against him again, "if you compare me to the ugly duckling, I will flay you alive. I know how to do it too." Where had that come from? Dear little Molly. She'd never been so sensitive, so aggressive before. Of course, she had not been through terrorist ex-boyfriends or faked suicide plots the last time they'd sat together like this. That could change a person.

"I know you do, darling, and that's why I love you. You'll find, however, that I'm a bit livelier than your usual victims—but no, it is a story of an ordinary girl, woman really though most were too stupid to see what a woman she was, who became a queen. " He paused for a moment, shaking his head as if trying to clear the cobwebs.

"Wait. There are so many ways to go with this. Let me start again, have you heard the story of Rumpelstiltskin?" he looks at her expectantly.

Molly nods, and tries to swallow with a dry throat.

"Settle back. Daddy's going to tell you a new version". He pulls her against his chest, gently but insistently pressing her head until rests on his shoulder. She can smell the soapy freshness of him, mixed with the natural smell of his skin. His voice is sweet as he begins. She should be kicking and screaming, but he was so familiar. She could feel his heart thundering in his chest. He was more upset than he was letting on. Yes, she liked him quite a bit once. Despite her mind screaming at her to flee, her body remembered the warm safety of his arms, the hot press of his mouth. She relaxed ever so slightly into his embrace. Logically, it was best to let him have control of the situation. It was when Jim lost the control that he was most likely to strike. And there was Sherlock, she had to keep him away from Sherlock. Keep Sherlock safe.

"There once was a beautiful young girl who was put in a very dangerous position due to the pride of a man. He forces her to spin, spin lies into gold, lies into truth. He forces her to spin the lies because if she does not, the people she loves will surely die. You see, she's a bit nobler than the original girl who just needed to save her own life. I love these old tales, so many variations on the theme."

He pulls Molly closer, his hand skimming her thigh before clasping her hand in his own. His mouth is at her ear again.

"But where is Rumpelstiltskin for this dutiful girl?" Jim's voice is rich and melodic—he would have been a talented storyteller with that changeable voice. "Who has helped her spin her golden web of lies? If it were not for him, she would not have been given such an opportunity to spin for the king. He helps her by putting the story into motion. "

Truly frightened of this man holding her in his arms, Molly still cannot stop herself from interrupting, "But, doesn't that make him the father who started the lie in the first place then and not Rumpelstiltskin? No one helped me with my lies to protect Sherlock. And if I'm spinning, doesn't that make me the imp?" She pulled back to confront him, something in the far reaches of her mind screeching that she is insane, don't encourage him!

"Does it? Maybe. Who said we were talking about you anyway? The threads of these old tales do get tangled up, don't they? Where is the beginning, middle and end? Don't worry. A spider like me is very good at keeping the threads under control. At least I used to be…" he trails off, abstracted for a moment.

She sits on the madman's lap, trapped by his arms, unwillingly fascinated as he picks up the tale again.

"The king is very pleased with the girl. She has proven herself worthy of him, and he gives her what she has always dreamed of. She is his queen, and in due time she gives birth to a handsome baby boy, when the imp comes back to claim his payment for helping her get what she had always wanted."

Molly stayed silent. What was the price he wanted her to pay? She stayed tense and still in his arms, mind spinning, waiting for him to finish the story.

"But she couldn't give up her baby boy! She begged for him to leave her boy alone, her king alone, her boy…" he trailed off as if confused, before shaking his head. "Who is your boy, Molly? Who do you want to keep?"

Molly licked her lips and whispered, "Sherlock."

"That's right. He is just a boy, isn't he? At least when it comes to love. I tried to school him. Threatened to kill his surrogate family. Let his brother torture me. Gave him the best whore money could buy. Nothing. But you, yes, you are raising your little man up aren't you?" He pressed his nose to her shoulder, her chest, "yes, I can tell how eager that boy is." Molly shuddered as Jim began to caress her waist, slipping a hand under her jumper to find the smooth, soft skin of her belly.

"Do you want to keep your boy?" Jim asks quietly. Molly nods. "Rumpelstiltskin is not without heart. He's going to give you a chance. Do you know what you need to do?"

Molly nods.

"What's my name, Mrs. Queen?"

"Is it Richard?"

"That's not my name."

"Is it Jim?"

"Mmm. Sometimes." He departs briefly from the script, fascinated with tracing her exposed navel with a fingertip.

"Is it Moriarty?"

Jim smiles, "The devil told you that." He presses a little kiss to her cheek.

"How does the story end?" she asks quietly, not wanting to break the hypnotic spell stroking her skin seems to have put on him.

"Oh, the queen lives happily ever after with the king who threatened to murder her and Rumpelstiltskin flies out the window on a wooden ladle. "

She wrinkles her nose and frowns.

"You don't like that? Other versions have the little man tear himself apart in a rage at having lost to the queen. And as I seem to have left my ladle at home, there's really only one way for this to end, but I will have my payment before I go."

"I guessed your name though, and I don't have a baby for you to take, I'm afraid." She's gone through terror and out the other side. She's almost pert in her response.

"No, but I'll settle for doing the thing that makes babies," leers Jim.

"I'm sorry, what?" Was she really so surprised by the request. The caress of her belly was clearly meant to be just the beginning.

"Well, it's not like we haven't done it before. I've missed you, Molly. I need you to help me finish my story. I'm tired. It's time to go to bed and then sleep. Sleep forever." His face fell, and his black eyes became sparkling, damp. He looked exhausted.

"Yes, the queen lives. So does the king. And the baby. It's poor Rumpelstiltskin that meets his end. At his own hand, though I wouldn't mind a little help with that. Not too keen on pain at this point in life."

Molly sits stunned. Is he truly asking her to do what she thinks he's asking her to do?

And then his mouth was on hers, his lips were soft and warm as his arms came up to cradle her. She pulls away, grasps his face and forces him to look at her. He has that grinning, manic gleam in his dark eyes as he meets her gaze.

"This isn't really about Sherlock?" She can't help but ask. Of course it is about Sherlock. Everything is about Sherlock. At least for her. She has to keep him away from Sherlock.

"No. This is about me being ready to stop, and you, you talented little angel of death." He sighs heavily in exasperation, "Look, will it help speed things along if I tell you that I'll kill him and everyone he loves unless you do as I say "

"Will you?" She's through the rabbit hole (there's another story reference for you Molly, she thinks wildly. Just stop—she didn't need any more fairy tales at the moment).

"No. I'm done with that game. Booooring!" He trills, " but if it makes you feel better about what we're about to do, okay, yeah. Sherlock's life is on the line unless you give me what I want."

"What are we about to do?" Her hands have dropped from his face and she is wringing them. She's being coy. She knows what he wants. If she's honest, there is part of her that has wanted this, too. She looks deep into the wounded, dark eyes of James Moriarty and feels a rush of pity and something not unlike love, care, concern. The poor man. Despite it all. The poor, lonely man.

"What do you want?" she asks gently.

"You."

She gasps as he suddenly catches her mouth with his own again, his tongue sliding into her open mouth, tangling with her own.

By the time they have moved into her bedroom and fallen onto the white sheets of her bed, she has tears trickling down her cheeks as she holds the broken man in her arms, grieving for his genius turned sour, sad, despite it all, to see his story ending. And then he was moving over her, moving in her and it was fire, but she was not being consumed by his flames, she was burning brightly as the golden tale he spun around her as he turned her into a queen. Burning away the dross and revealing the hard, bright metal that had always been beneath.

Molly cuddles her little girl in her arms, stroking her working cheek as she nurses enthusiastically, her little rosebud mouth stretched wide. The baby gazes up at her with warm, brown eyes—Molly's own looking back at her. A heavy gold band, set with diamonds sparkles in the light as Molly strokes her baby's smooth dark hair and presses a kiss to the dimpled little hand. Molly's heart felt a sharp, sweet stab as she gazed at her baby—a little Molly, even the nose was hers, though now at four months old, Molly could finally see that there was something of the father in the long fingers and the tilt of her eyes. No paternity tests. She'd been adamant—despite Mycroft's insistence and John's subtle, well-meaning pressure. Just to make sure—that there was no cuckoo in the nest, so to speak. Molly meets Mycroft's cold angry eyes and John's hurt remonstrating glances with a proud, stubborn tilt of her head. The old, overly compliant Molly was gone forever—died the night she helped put Jim Moriarty to bed once and for all. She was finished with bowing before men and their requests and their games. Sherlock silently obeyed Molly's wishes, standing firm against his brother and his friend. He was her knight, her king, her protector and he stood guard for her and the little damsel in her arms—what his feelings on the matter were, he wouldn't say aloud, but she knew. This would be his daughter regardless of what time may reveal, because this was Molly's daughter, and Molly was his and only his and only ever would be his, even if she had briefly belonged to someone else. He and Molly controlled the story now, whatever the cold facts may be. And they would live happily ever after.