A/N: I do not own or profit from Harry Potter. I don't think this is as good a chapter (just like the last one), but here we are, finally, at…
Chapter 7: Breakthrough
"No secrets at all?"
"Nothing." Audrey affirmed. It seemed the thousandth time they'd chased the murder in circles, and even she was beginning to go a little mad.
He sighed and rubbed his hand over his face.
"Did he seem strange, distant, do anything out of character in the months up to his death?"
"No." Audrey said. "It very sudden, nothing we looked back on and thought was out of place. And trust me," she added, "I did look back and think about it."
He threw down his pencil and looked away. They had abandoned the coffeeshop to talk outside on a park bench. Audrey regarded him through the steam of her hot chocolate.
"Tell me something."
"Once again, you may inquire of me as to any question you like, I merely reserve the right not to answer them all."
"You're going to close the case, aren't you?"
"No." He looked at her. "Maybe I should. But I don't want to."
"Oh?"
"No."
"May I ask why?" Her idea that he was sparing her and her mother had seemed feasible enough earlier, but when she was around him it sounded silly even to herself. He probably didn't want it to mark up his resume or something.
"Because..." He ran a hand through his hair, again struggling to speak two languages at once without giving anything away. "Because I know how these people operate, and I know there's something here, something really obvious that I'm a moron not to catch. The motive...it's so there, I can almost touch it. It's like when you have a thought and then you forget it and can't remember it again, but it's still right there." He looked at her. "These people...this organisation...they're not subtle. They love bodies on the floor and blood on the walls, they'd have to leave something behind, even if they didn't want to be caught, they'd still leave something...something to keep me guessing."
She watched him, and not for the first time wondered just what this 'Deathly-Eater' group was. They brainwashed new recruits with religious ideas that had something to do with demonism. They killed people out of boredom. They were not well known, yet dangerous enough to merit their own 'special investigation'.
Very dangerous, from what she'd gathered.
"So you think you can solve it?"
"I didn't say that." Percy replied, a slight undertone of bitterness in his voice. "But I am going to try."
By doing what? She wanted to ask, but bit the question back. "And your other cases?"
"All wrapped, but one, and that's only a matter of paperwork." He looked at her wryly. "I find myself with nothing to do, other than try and rack your brains for some seemingly minor tidbit that is in fact crucial."
"You think I know something?"
"You or your mother. Like I said, these people are not subtle. They come, they kill, they go, and they're finished in minutes, gone forever, but still," He looked down at empty drink in his hands, "There is a reason, related to your father. You are related to your father. If they'd left some tantalizingly obscure clue, they'd leave it with you, or at the scene."
"But you checked the bakery."
"I know." He said heavily.
Audrey regarded him for a long moment, taking in his bright hair. "Well. Don't you think it more likely they would have left it with my mother?"
"Possibly." He shrugged.
"Ugh." She rolled her eyes and stood, uncrossing her legs. "Come on, we'll go talk to her."
He looked up at her in surprise.
"Unless you have something better to do." She looked down at him. "Which you just said you didn't."
He pinched back a smile and rose with her, tossing his empty cup in a trash can. "Copacetic."
"What does that even mean?" They began walking down the sidewalk.
"It means..." He paused. "It means fine, excellent, that will do, agreeable."
"Why not just say fine?"
"Why just say fine?"
She had to concede his point.
.
Lucy glanced up as the door opened. "Audie?"
"Me, Mum!"
"Your little friend Davis came by." Lucy called in the general direction of the foyer.
"Oh, he did, did he?"
Percy glanced at Audrey as she set down her school bag with a heavy thump that reminded him of his own school days, and led him forward into the kitchen. "You and Davis are...close?"
"Mm, very." Audrey saw her mother turn as she heard Percy's voice. "I managed to get one of my friends to go out with him and he's eternally grateful enough to keep bugging me now that she's abroad." She joked.
"Why, Percy, what a surprise." Lucy rose and came forward to greet her daughter. "Or, do you truly prefer Mr. Weasley?"
"Percy is fine." He assured her as Lucy turned her eyes on her daughter.
"I just thought we'd pop in, you know, some for the case, and some because it's close to dinner." Audrey gave her mother a look she hoped Percy didn't notice. Lucy immediately returned the look and then covered it quickly.
"Of course! Percy, would you mind taking this," She handed him a basket of the bills she'd been paying, "And leave it on the desk in the front room?"
"Certainly, madam." Percy was no idiot, but he knew how to act like one. He took the basket and left.
He wasn't properly gone before both women turned to one another.
"Oh, so he's staying for dinner, is he?" Lucy crossed her arms over her chest, a shrewd and mocking grin teasing at her mouth.
"Mum, it's not like that. I feel sorry for him. I don't think he has anywhere else to go. I mean, no family, so..."
"You feel sorry..." Her mother cocked her head, the smile coming full force now. "And, what else do you feel, Audrey?"
Audrey swatted at her with a dish towel, and her mother muffled a giggle.
"Shush, you don't want him to hear you!" Audrey glanced back toward the doorway.
"Oh, for heaven's sake, Audie, he's no idiot. He knows we're talking about him. It's not like it isn't obvious." She leaned forward conspiritorially. "And you know, I don't think he'd mind it. He's probably flattered."
"Mum! I brought him here because we were talking, and I don't think he has any family, and you love company, and I know screwed up dinner last time, so it's just...er..."
Her mother raised a brow, waiting for her to complete her sentence.
"Just that I feel sorry for him." Audrey finished in a rush.
One eyebrow came down on her mother's face, and she stepped around Audrey to check a dish on the counter. "All right, Love."
"All right."
"But I think he's very nice. I'd marry his father."
"Mum!"
"I'm only kidding, darling, now would you go tell him we've finished talking about him behind his back and he can stop pretending he got lost on the way to the front room?"
Audrey slapped a palm down on the counter and left both good-naturedly and with annoyance, hearing her mother say behind her,
"Get your own boyfriend, my dear daughter, or I shall find one for you."
She turned the corner and stepped past the dining room. And paused in the open doorway of the front room. Percy was leaning on the desk, arms crossed. Waiting for her. His face showed he was perfectly aware. "Er...sorry...about that." She tucked her hair back.
"I have a mother." He said, not moving except to shrug. "She does that often."
"Ah."
"Is is safe for me to come out?"
"Yes." She was blushing a little as she led him back. "I just had to explain..."
"I understand." He said as he entered. "And if I am any inconvenience…"
"Not at all." Lucy interrupted him pleasantly. "Unfortunately, Audrey chose o bring you on a day when we were having leftovers. I hope you don't mind."
"Not at all." He replied in his turn.
"I didn't think so." She raised a brow as Audrey reached for the plates. "Judging from the looks of you, you wouldn't know the difference between fresh-cooked, leftovers, or a frozen dinner."
"I wouldn't." He admitted openly.
"What do you usually eat?"
"Whatever's at hand." He replied, stepping in to help set the table.
"I thought as much." Lucy nodded knowingly.
"Which is code for, you don't eat. Much." Audrey added.
"Essentially." Percy agreed.
"Your work keeps you busy?"
"I try to make it so." Percy replied as the food was set and they all slipped into their chairs.
Lucy kept the conversation light, intentionally straying away from serious discussion of the case. Percy didn't mind it in the least, but paid close attention, his ingrained work ethic not allowing his brain to shut off…almost to his annoyance, actually. He wouldn't have minded relaxing again as he had last time, but tonight he was tense.
Audrey had only to glance across the table to see the wheels grinding in Percy's head. She had figured by now that he was the sort who never really stopped working, and she had realized in the past few minutes that he was delicately trying to steer the conversation away from himself and toward the two women and their lives. She smiled and complied, allowing her mother and he to talk on about his work, a topic which morphed quickly into her work...which morphed into her past employment...the story of how Michael and Lucy met...and finally, Michael.
Lucy abruptly turned the tables when she paused with her glass halfway to her lips and asked, "What about your parents, Percy? What does your father do?"
Percy swallowed slowly. "Madam?"
"Well, you know all about the man of our house, it's only fair we know about yours."
Percy smiled faintly...and almost, a little tightly. "I am the man of my own house." He said, almost to himself, before adding casually, "My father is in government."
"Oh? What department?"
"Er...law enforcement." A partial truth. He rubbed his eyebrow and noticed Audrey's gaze fixed on his finger. He had to train himself not to do that, it was a dead giveaway in moments when lying was fairly crucial.
"Ah. And your mother?" Lucy must have caught the eyebrow-rub as well, but was pretending to be pleasantly oblivious.
"She..." Percy thought a moment. "Never had a career." Being the sporadic annihilator of sadistic psychopaths did not count as a career. At least not to Percy's mind. Even if it had been, he wouldn't have been able to explain it to these two women in their clean house with their clean lives.
Lucy was pulling the topic around to his family, and he struggled to swing it back away from himself and fix attention on these two. Conversation had always been such a pickle to him.
Audrey, however, seemed to get his drift, and, hijacking her mother's line of pressing, began chatting about her own career in the making. There was a lot about sciences, most of which Percy didn't understand, but he nodded pleasantly and pretended for the time being he knew something about it. He was slightly appeased to notice that most of what was being said was going straight over Lucy's head as well.
Dessert came, and Lucy insisted that Percy remain seated as she and Audrey rose to get coffee and clear plates.
"What are you doing?" Audrey hissed once they were within the confines of the kitchen.
"I'm only making conversation."
Audrey gave her a look. "You're acting like Dad did that time I brought Jimmy Dempsey home from school."
"I am not! I am only trying to pull some information from him, about his background, his family, his job..."
Audrey shut her eyes as her mother filled the mugs. "Mum, what did you eat before we came? Or did Davis say something? You've only got one thing on your mind tonight..."
"And it's an enjoyable evening." Her mother replied slightly saucily before turning to go.
.
Percy again offered to help clean up and again the two accepted.
"May I ask you a question, Percy?" Lucy reached for a dish towel.
"You may ask any question you like; I merely reserve the right not to answer those of my choice."
"Not about the case."
"Oh." He seemed apprehensive as he waited.
"Did you really grow up on a chicken farm?"
Percy unsuccessfully stifled a smile. "Yes, Madam."
"That's...unusual."
"Did you work on the chicken farm?" Audrey asked. "Or did you just own it?"
"I worked."
"Hmmm...I can't quite imagine you cleaning out chicken coops and collecting eggs."
"And devising ever-new ways to kill the chickens, I suppose you can't see that, either."
"No, to be honest." Audrey admitted. "I can't. Especially not that."
"You'd be right." He put away the dishes this time as she washed them. "That was actually my brother's department." He didn't mention that he had actually not worked much with the chickens, at least not as much as the rest. His mother had preferred him to do housework because of his penchant for keeping clean clothes.
"How many brothers?" Audrey asked.
"Five."
"Five?" She looked up at him quickly, her hands slipping a little on a soapy dish. He caught it before it could fall and turned to put it away. "Well, I suppose you never got lonely."
You have no idea... Percy began in his head. In the open, he simply fit the dish into the odd rack-inside-a-box that these Muggles seemed to like putting their new-washed dishes in, and gave a shrug. "Well, there was always a lot going on." He replied noncommittally.
"Are you the oldest?"
"No. Third of seven."
Lucy bit back a laugh. "Seven children and a farm. Your mother must be quite a woman."
Again, you have no idea.
"Yes, madam, she is. Though I don't think having the children was as intentional as having the farm was."
"I believe it. I can't imagine." Lucy said, finishing her cleaning and taking a seat again.
"Why couldn't I have had some siblings?" Audrey tossed back at her mother.
"You can have half of mine." Percy said drily, ignoring the fact that she'd accidentally splashed him a little with the faucet.
"I'll take them." Audrey said readily. "You two should have adopted, Mum."
"We did, Love." Her mother reminded her.
"But more. Davis has three siblings, and Colleen has four, and now Percy has six."
"And some of them were likely adopted." Lucy fired back good-naturedly. "Were they, Percy?"
Percy rubbed his neck. "Well...no, actually. Though we have taken in several since. My mother, she likes strays."
"Maybe she'll adopt you, then, Love."
"Maybe." Audrey replied, keeping her eyes on the sponge and the soap suds, not sure if her mother was simply jesting or dropping a hint. "But I think once is enough for a lifetime."
Percy paused, his eyes flicking between the two of them. Lucy's mousy brown hair, now graying, her tanned skin, and her dark grey eyes. Audrey's hair black, her complexion fair, and her eyes a pale grey...
"You're adopted."
"Oh, yeah." Audrey replied. "A long time ago."
Something seemed to constrict somewhere in Percy's brain.
"Your real parents..." He tried to sound casual, but he knew his urgency slipped through a little onto his words.
Audrey shrugged, still washing dishes, still oblivious. "I don't know. We never knew, they just dumped me the day I was born, and Dad said he knew the minute he and I looked at each other that I was his." She cast a casual glance up at the tall redhead beside her. "Mum and Dad couldn't have children of their own."
She stopped. He had a peculiar expression on his face as if he were being choked.
"What is it?" Lucy asked from across the room.
"Why didn't you mention that before?" Percy's words fell out in a rush, harsh and demanding.
Audrey jumped a little, dropping a spoon. "I...Why should I have?"
Idiot. Percival Ignatius Weasley, you complete and utter moron.
"Because that's motive!" He said almost without realizing it, his legs moving of their own volition, carrying him quickly out of the kitchen and to the foyer. His briefcase, his files...
Audrey threw down her sponge and followed him, Lucy right behind her. "What? What's...How is that motive? How is that important?" She could begin to form some sort of scenario even through her questions, but still she was desperately begging him to make it all clearer.
"She's a squib!" Percy seemed to be swearing at his jacket as he pulled it off the wall. Abruptly seeming to realize they were still there, he turned. "The police. There must be some sort of record of it, some sort of...investigation..."
"They never found the real parents, they never knew." Lucy stammered.
"Have to go." He snatched up his briefcase. "Thankyouverymuch, IhavetogotoTheHallofRecords!" He threw open the door and immediately shut it after him hard.
Audrey jumped at it as it closed, hearing a slight pop which she assumed was one of her joints cracking. Grasping the door handle and throwing open the door, she stopped and stared out at the doorstep, the walkway, the front lawn, the street.
Nothing.
He was nowhere to be seen.
Lucy was beside her. "Where did he go?"
"I don't know." Audrey replied, her voice reeking of bafflement.
Lucy pulled her inside and shut the door. The two women faced each other.
"Is that it?" Audrey whispered. The time seemed appropriate for whispering. "Is it because of me? Am I...motive?"
Lucy was staring fixedly into the distance.
"I have no idea."
