"But… I don't understand," the girl sobbed in front of me while simultaneously attempting to wipe the wet streams from her face. It was just a never-ending cycle of crying and mopping up the tears. "Why would he ch… ch… cheat on me?" The last question brought a new wave of tears that started the out of control hiccupping which, in turn, wracked her shoulders.
This whole situation is why I decided that I couldn't get emotionally attached while heading Malfoy Private Investigation. Well, this and my first assignment.
"I can't answer the whys, Kinlan. I only know the facts that you see before you," I reminded her as I pointed to the moving photographs of her unfaithful boyfriend, though soon to be ex, I was sure.
In the first photograph, he was walking down the hall, glancing over his shoulder suspiciously. During the second scene, he pulled back a tapestry in a third floor corridor and stepped into a hidden hallway that shall remain unknown (because one never knows when a secret alcove will be needed). The third picture is where it gets really juicy. It's framed by a piece of the tapestry on the right side, but anyone can clearly see Farrah Kinlan's boyfriend of seven months, Leonard Boulstridge, snogging an unknown girl. The fourth frame shows the bird to be a seventh year Ravenclaw by the name of Hestia Mustow, who is a bit—oh how do I put this nicely—well, she gets around.
Other photographs crowd my desk, all of the same pair caught in the heated act of infidelity.
Kinlan continued to weep while sitting on the chair in front of my tidy desk.
I brought my hands together on top of the wooden desktop and casually checked my watch. This meeting was going later than expected. Already Kinlan had cut into fifteen minutes of my break, which only lasted for another fifteen. I was starved for lunch.
"If you'll be so kind," I said to her in a formal voice. "Could you take yourself outside? You are now…" I peeked at my watch again. "…sixteen minutes overdue, so unless you want to pay me more for overtime, I suggest you depart."
The blonde-haired crier looked me in the eye for the first time since she had bought my services.
"I'm taking too much of your time? You want me to leave after you told me something like that? Where is your heart, Scorpius?" she asked incredulously, gripping the edge of my desk until her knuckles turned white.
Dead, like my soul. I chuckled internally.
"It's Malfoy," I reminded her. First names were too personal. "If you think that I'm supposed to baby you, you are sorely mistaken. As you might recall, two weeks ago, you hired me to find out if your boyfriend, Mr. Boulstridge, was cheating, which in fact he was. Nowhere in your contract does it require me to provide a therapy session, nor do I advertise such ridiculous things. I was being polite before, but now you should leave, before I order you to be taken out by security." I pointed to Nikolai Yolkov, the brawn of my operation.
As the son of a Russian wizarding world liaison, who worked as a go-to man between our world and muggle leaders, Nikolai was under constant threat by those who opposed contact with muggles in any form, though they were fewer during recent years. His father and muggle mother from China both agreed that Hogwarts was not only one of the safest, but a school of the highest educational value, and so he was sent here at eleven years old.
Sorted into Hufflepuff, unlike myself, Nikolai ended up becoming one of my best friends along with two of my other employees, fellow Slytherin, Albus Severus Potter, (though don't call him that under any circumstances, for understandable reasons) and Midna Creevey, my other non-Slytherin mate, as she was sorted into Ravenclaw.
Kinlan turned and stared at Nikolai with trembling lips as if she hadn't seen him there before, which was highly improbable considering he was 6'3" and 212 pounds of pure muscle with a thick and intimidating Russian accent. He seemed like he might be a bully at first, but a second look reveals a teddy-bear-at-heart kind of guy with wide naïve eyes, chocolate brown hair with a beard to match, and a thick neck that was vaguely reminiscent of a small tree trunk.
His security guard stance was all for show. He stood at the door during the reveal meetings just so that my clients don't go berserk. In reality, Nikolai's job was research. If any of my cases involved finding information without using living sources, he was the bloke I called. His intimidation side-task displeased him, especially in cases like this one, but we both knew it was necessary.
"I'll just go," she whispered with a nod and briskly left the room. I waited a few minutes before speaking.
"You guys can come out now," I announced and both Al and Midna stepped out of the wardrobe in the back of the office. I always kept them around during the confrontations as Nikolai was practically a pacifist. If intimidation didn't work, a little hex or two would.
"You're late," Al complained. "Look, I know you extended that closet, but it's not as big as you think. I was squished up against little miss pixie." I rolled my eyes. As much as he complained, I shouldn't put up with the tosser I call my best mate, but he had the loyalty of a Hufflepuff and a humorous wit that kept the whole team on the floor laughing. Plus, it helped that he was an expert in the art of interpersonal communication.
Al basically charmed people for his occupation and not with a wand, but with his messy black hair and signature smirk that made girls fall at his feet and blokes worship his power to make them do so (which included myself at times). If I needed any information whatsoever out of people, he could pry it from their all too willing lips no matter how much of a secret it was supposed to be.
I also kept him around because no matter how much I grumbled about his whining or his incessant jabbering, he was a great friend.
"I'll try enlarging it more, but in the meantime it'll have to do," I told him.
"What do you mean 'you'll try enlarging it more'? I was the one who eventually made that wardrobe into the room that it is. Taking credit for my work? The nerve of some people," Midna sniffed with her nose in the air and a glare at Al for the pixie comment. I could see a faint grin working its way onto her face though, despite her best efforts.
"My apologies, Creevey, now get your arse back to work," I ordered, but the sides of my lips were tugged upwards by the invisible force known as laughter.
"Oh the abuse I endure!" she joked as she grabbed the photographs off of my desk. She gazed at them thoughtfully. "You know, these really are very wonderful photos. I might just have to frame these ones."
"Really, Midna?" Nikolai sighed. "How can you keep photos that ruin peoples' lives up on your wall? Isn't that a little creepy and a huge slap to the face of the victims of these circumstances?" "Oh, Nik," mimicked Al in Midna's high-pitched voice with a feminine wave of his hand. We had made several shots at her for keeping the photos that she took of our jobs, but she always came back with the same excuse, which worked every single time. Al now had her speech memorized.
"My photos aren't about the scandal or the gossip. These photos are real moments, history that would have been forgotten, but I have captured these memories in beautiful frames that most would call art and they deserve commemoration."
Midna narrowed her eyes at Al, putting her tiny hands on her hips. She would be frightening if she didn't have the appearance of a mythological nymph. Platinum blonde hair that seemed to go on forever hung in waves down her back, shoulders which, as the widest part of her body, weren't very large at all (If Midna turned to the side, she almost vanished.), and blue eyes that often narrowed in a less than menacing glare as we picked on the only girl in our bunch.
"No need to mock me. Keep this up and I quit," she pouted. We all mumbled half-hearted apologies, knowing that she didn't really mean it; she spoke about leaving about once or twice a week.
"Well, we now only have…" I studied my watch. "… ten minutes to eat, so get moving people."
We ate in silence, as we were busy stuffing our faces before the next appointment at one o'clock sharp.
I was apprehensive about this one.
I received a note, slipped under my door in the early morning, two weeks ago stating the time and date that the appointment was to be made. The hastily scribbled on parchment paper gave no other details until, and I quote, 'it was dubbed time for further instructions to be given safely'.
These 'further instructions' kept a strict confidentiality clause (although that was already my specialty) only allowing for my team to know the details of this arrangement. There was a contract with a nondisclosure agreement for each member to sign that bound us to secrecy for fear of boils. Though it wasn't completely horrible, as Madam Pomphrey could clean up our faces in an instant should we choose to blab, I was of the opinion that whoever this bloke/bird was, he/she was extremely paranoid.
Cautious, but intrigued, I made room for it, bumping one of my other clients back to tomorrow, which was something I hadn't done before. Schedules were business promises and I kept my promises, but I was just so curious about this next meeting that I couldn't resist. Reyna Edeson's reveal meeting, which would be less than pleasant considering her best friend had indeed begun dating her long time crush, Sam McLaggen, would have to wait.
The rest of the crew was interested as well, and for the first time since we started the business (though Hogwarts officially calls it a club) I let them sit in on the meeting instead of filling them in on the essentials later on. You never know who will walk in that door.
We sat around my desk with baited breath as we watched the brass door knob turn. None of us could hold in the gasp of surprise when none other than Al's favorite cousin walked in to the office; Rose Weasley.
"Damn it, Rose," said Al. "I hoped to Merlin that it wasn't you. What have you gotten into with that bloody smuggling ring?"
This may take some explaining.
Rewind to four years ago, and you'll be in our third year where a new rule was instated. Previously, not all Weasley's Wizard Wheezes products were banned. In fact, only about half of them were, but able to be easily carried in pockets very shiftily through the entrance and past cranky, wheezing Filch. Come third year, however, the administrative staff and the governors thought that they distracted from the learning environment and caused undue bodily harm. Their solution for this 'problem'? Bar and confiscate all Weasley gags, candy, etc., and use specialized detectors to stop them from entering Hogwarts.
By the middle of fourth year, Al's uncle, George Weasley, and his son/assistant Freddie, were being run out of business in Hogsmeade because of lack of patrons. All students came to the conclusion that if they couldn't be used, they shouldn't be bought. Why waste the money?
Rose was very aware of her uncle's distress over losing the first shop he ever built, the one he started with his departed twin, and so she became the very first professional Hogwarts smuggler. It took off in a heartbeat, business booming, for both herself and her uncle, whose shop is doing better than ever. She owned the largest 'club' (as it was officially called a book club) in Hogwarts history and she was coming to me for help. I could see the publicity now.
"Merlin, Alby, how'd you guess it was little ole me?" she asked with a cheesy southern belle accent and faux innocence.
"You slipped up, Rosie Posie," he fired back with another heinous nickname. "You used Aunt Hermione's jinx on the contract…" he trailed off as realization dawned on his face. "… which you used on purpose to let me know." Rose just smirked.
"Nice deductive skills."
"Bloody hell, Rose. I told you that you should stop that business while you can. Eventually, you're going to get caught and end up in a world of trouble. I don't want to see you get expelled," he pleaded with his cousin.
"You know I couldn't do that if I wanted to, Al," she reminded him. "Uncle George needs me. Would you like to be the bloke to tell him that the one place that he feels close to his twin will be lost forever?" Al pinched the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.
"I know. I know. Just be careful, yeah?" he told her. She winked playfully at him.
"I always am, Alby."
"So, what's wrong with your choice career?" Al questioned with burning curiosity.
"Nothing. My work is fine, Al. You worry too much, dear cousin. My problem is not my industry, per say, but my employees," she explained.
"That doesn't make sense, Rose. You employ family. Look," he sighed, sounding annoyed. "If someone is driving you barmy, don't come crawling to us. Be a big girl, Rosie, and handle it yourself." Rose's fists clenched.
"Albus Severus Potter, you ignorant twat," she said. I rolled my eyes. Although it doesn't seem like it now, Al and Rose are best friends. They fight all the time, practically like siblings. "Do you really disapprove so much of what I do, even if I do it to help family, that you insult my ability to do it? I know what I'm doing," she spoke tersely. Rose took a deep breath and calmed down. She looked vaguely upset, but I couldn't get a good read on it.
"At least, I did know what I was doing. There is a traitor in the ring, Al, and it's one of our own. That's why I need your help and your discretion." She was watching me now, gauging my reaction to the bomb she just dropped.
Midna was the first to react. "What do you need us to do, Red?" she asked with a pop of bubble gum. Midna was the only one who could get away with calling her that nickname. I tried it once and she nearly broke my fingers.
Rose smiled ruefully.
"Catch the bloody relative that's selling me out."