Prologue: A Letter in the Night
It was 3:45 am when Hermione Granger was awakened by a faint tapping sound coming from her bedroom window. Groggily, she got up and went to investigate the cause of this most unwelcome wake up call. She opened her window and a large and majestic eagle owl flew though it. It came to rest on the perch Hermione had set up to accommodate her own eagle owl, Mercury. She warily walked over to the brown intruder, who was at that moment affectionately hooting at Mercury, and untied the letter attached to its leg.
"What has Kingsley got for me this time Hermes?" she asked the owl, giving it one of Mercury's treats. Slowly she broke the Ministry seal on the envelope and unfolded a short letter from Kingsley Shacklebolt.
Hermione,
There has been a murder in the wizard business district of London. The victim is one Cecilia Carroway. She was found dead in her office little under a half hour ago. She appears to have been tortured and given the killing curse. You are now under direct orders to come straight to the scene of the crime. I trust that your connection to the floo network has been restored after that unpleasant situation with the unknown follower ended? If so, all you have to do is say 'Malfoy Industries Headquarters' before you enter the fire. They will be expecting your arrival shortly.
Sincerely,
Kingsley Shacklebolt
Minister of Magic
Hermione, at the mere age of twenty two, had risen through the ranks of the Ministry's Department of Law Enforcement, to become their head Investigative Auror. In short, she had become the Ministry's answer to Sherlock Holmes. She had not yet been presented with a case that she could not solve and was revered in the wizarding world for cracking down on illegal activity. Lately, she had been taking on high profile murder cases and solving them with hawk like precision.
Now, she was being called on to solve a gruesome murder which had been committed at Malfoy Industries. True, Draco Malfoy had managed to clean up the mess which his father had made after Harry Potter had defeated Voldemort, but that didn't mean that the company was completely legitimate. After all, no matter how business savvy Malfoy was, he could never have pulled the company out of its downward spiral which began after his father was exposed as an embezzler, not to mention Voldemort's right hand man, without making a few less than wholesome transactions.
Hermione sighed, but went into the bathroom of her luxurious one bedroom flat and splashed some cold water on her face to wake herself up. She warily made her way to her wardrobe and retrieved a dark blue robe. She wrapped herself in it and made her way to the fireplace in her living room; she took a pinch of silvery powder from the flower pot on the mantle, stepped into her fireplace, and pronounced her destination.
"Malfoy Industries Headquarters"
With that raging green flames enveloped her and she felt the familiar dizzy feeling one gets while traveling by floo powder. After a few seconds of traveling and passing somewhere around fifty grates, she finally reached her destination and was spit out of the network.
TEASER: Dead bodies. Mysterious communiqués. Disappearances. Crazed stalkers. Horrifying howlers. Death threats. Draco Malfoy. Hermione Granger. Romance? Keep reading The Crime of Passion to understand how they all fit together.
AN: For all returning readers, if you didn't get a chance to read the author's note I left before I deleted the chapters, please read my author's page.
Review please.
-rlcs