A/N Thank you to TheRimmerConnection, not only for Beta'ing, but for being a huge resource of information for this yank. I lucked out!
I am only playing in the Harry Potter world, J.K Rowling owns HP. Many thanks to her for dreaming up HP!
Hermione stared at the letter in her hands. Ginny, who was now Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, called her 'favor' in. Hermione shook her head. She had tried to leave the Ministry so many times in the past seven years. Each time, it sucked her back in. "Ginny, Ginny, Ginny. I hoped you'd ask for an emergency baby-sitter while you went on holiday; dog sitter; anything else."
The etched photo of Ginny at the bottom of the letter smiled. Ginny cocked her head to the left and stuck out her bottom lip.
"It's going to work with me Gin." Hermione cracked a smile, recognizing that pout. "I'm going to tell mum that you taught Maggie that."
Ginny chuckled. "Mum taught it to me." She sighed. "'Mione, I know you want to stay out of the Ministry, but I need you on this. Harry is up to his neck with his new posting in the Department of International Magical Co-operation. France and Bulgaria are still bickering over the whole Eiffel Tower incident. I've exhausted all of my options here. Trust me; I didn't want to ask you. I hate to cash in my favor like this, but I need your help with this one."
"Why can't you ask someone from your dad's old department?"
"I tried out two of the fellows there. They crashed and bombed. It will be a failed investigation with wasted time and lives. I'm sorry Hermione, but I have to warn you, I'll formally pull you out of retirement if you won't do this for me. That's how badly I need you to do this for me."
"What about Maggie?" There was no way she would leave her daughter for an unknown amount of time, without knowing Maggie was in safe hands. It was the main reason she had left the Ministry. Too many close calls, too many threatening letters, too many late nights triple-checking wards when she had lost her head when a tree branch hit the window. She wanted a safe life for her daughter and she couldn't get that when she worked for the Ministry.
"Mum will watch her. 'Mionie, she'll be safe. She'll be enrolled and processed with the Unspeakables. I already sent her file over. She'll be safer than any of us." Hermione looked at her dresser, where Maggie's photo sat. She felt her heart break.
"Fine. When will the crew be here to take care of my place?" Ginny let out the breath she was holding. She hated to put her dearest friend into such a spot, she wasn't credited with cleaning up the Ministry by being nice, but the last thing she wanted was to play hard ball.
"They will be there the night before you're to be here. Thank you. Thank you so much, I owe you."
"Yes you do. I don't mean 'cup of sugar' owe, I mean 'new line of clothes' owe or 'new car'. Hell, a flipping 'new pony' owe!"
Ginny laughed. "See you in a week." Hermione nodded as the etched Ginny at the bottom of the page bled into the seal of the Ministry.
Great, the Americas, she thought ominously. She grinned when she realized she would have to gen up on yank talk.
Ginny leaned away from her desk. She pinched the bridge of her nose. "I'm getting a headache," she whined.
"Not my problem." She pinched her nose a little harder before reopening her eyes. It didn't matter how much she bitched at Draco when he walked into her office unannounced, he still did it.
"Draco, I would have hoped that you would have learned your place by now. Me boss, you not. So shut it you idiot." She sat up and signed the orders for Hermione Granger and Draco Malfoy to go undercover in the Americas. She stamped the two orders and when the wax hardened and was absorbed into the scrolls, she handed them over to Draco.
"I still don't know why you can't send your weasel of a brother."
"My decisions are not open to your questions. You demanded the best person didn't you? Take the orders and go. Orientation is in one week, get your affairs in order before then, or Merlin help me Draco, I'll hex you from here to kingdom come."
"Touchy, touchy. I'll be here, don't get your knickers in a bunch." She watched Draco walk out of her office. How he had risen to his position with that attitude was beyond her, but he was a damn good wizard. He had shaped up the Department of Mysteries since his posting. She scoffed, remembering his refusal of the head position. He wanted to be in the field with the head position's pay and that's exactly what he got.
Draco walked to his office, orders in hand. He wanted to read over the fine print before taking them to his boss. He sat in his chair and charmed his tea warm. He had been working at his post a little more than two years, and in all that time had never finished a full cup of tea. He opened his scroll and read his orders word for word. He has been working this case for six months and had a mountain of evidence against the witch and wizard in the Americas, but he needed better evidence. Solid evidence: which you only got when you went undercover and collected.
He set his orders down and looked curiously at Granger's. He hadn't been thrilled when Ginny dropped Granger's name, but after he had spoken to some Aurors who had worked with her in the past, he got over it.
"Granger has been living more muggle than witch the past few years. Rumor has it her husband left her and she paid him back by raising the kid muggle," Blaise told him one night while they were at a pub last week. "She probably is still a know-it-all, but if you gotta go undercover in the muggle world to snoop out some rogue wizards, she'll be the one to have at your side."
Draco took a long drag of his smoke and groaned. He called Blaise to have a pint and listen to him piss and moan about Ginny suggesting Granger. He had been pissed off when he and Ginny watched Daphnia Greenwater cock up the trial in muggle London today. She had screwed up paying for a paper, pulling out 'play money' as the street vendor called it. Acted like an idiot when she tried to use a cell phone and ended the day with getting clipped by a car. When they got back to the Ministry, Ginny told him she was going to call Hermione.
"Gotta pose as a couple. Live together as a couple. Fucking live together, Blaise. That'd be hard enough if it was someone other than her, but…shit." Draco slouched in his chair.
"You want to close in on the wizard couple that is running that ring?" Blaise asked before taking a drink of his butterbeer.
"You know I fucking do." But he was still in limbo, Granger could refuse. He suspected that Ginny would beg and eventually play hard ball to get Hermione to come out of retirement. He had no love for the Weasleys, but he respected Ginny after seeing what she had done with the Ministry. She turned it into a damn honest, respectable organization again.
"Then tuck it in and do your job. You're a grown man, she's a grown woman. Current and former professional wizards. Just do your jobs and be done." Blaise grinned. He knew a one-liner that would get his buddy in a better mood. He waited until Draco took a drink. "Besides, she probably got fat."
Priceless, Blaise thought as he watched Draco spit, choke, cough and then laugh so hard he held his ribs.
Draco looked at Hermione's orders, almost eager for next week. He felt bad about her having to be away from her daughter for an undetermined amount of time. He couldn't know how that would feel: his marriage fell apart before their first anniversary. He hadn't seen Granger for six years. He had seen her in passing in Diagon Alley just before she left the Ministry, but that was only for a moment. He wrapped up the orders and took a sip of his tea, sneering at his cup: it was cold again.