Chapter 12

Tonks left for work on time and relentlessly walked down to where Kingsley gave the tiniest twitch of a smirk on his lips to indicate a teaser tone. He always teased her whenever there was a meeting to degrade the lower of the Auror department. She hated feeling like her work meant nothing, but knew that those who really knew her knew that she meant something to something much more bigger than they knew.

"Kill me now," she muttered to herself catching up to his long quick strides. Being like a million feet taller than herself she felt like she would always be catching up, but knew that was an excellence to strive too.

Because it was so busy that day, to the news yet not to reach her ears he said, "Good morning Nymphadora Tonks."

"Wotcher Kings-" she was knocked from behind by someone who also wasn't watching where they were going, but also going to fast with the traffic of people traveling every which way.

"Watch it!" she shouted at the hurrying man.

The man turned around and gave her a very rude gesture. She wanted to go after him and give him something rude to think about but Kingsley's thick hand grabbed her wrist gently.

She broke away when she knew that she was not going to go after the man. She'd "accidentally" trip him when she saw him out and about.

"Come to my office and I'll inform you on what I know so far."

She followed him and took her favorite place perched on his desk where she always liked to sit while he took his chair. She never liked chairs and was frowned upon for sitting on things that weren't meant to be sat on. But with Kingsley she'd sit and get information she wouldn't get anywhere else.

She looked down at the Daily Prophet on his desk and saw that she wasn't gracing the front page, or anyone she knew. It was just a boring story about someone finding the Prime Minister's face on a piece of candy.

"I know 'we'," she emphasized the 'we', "have a meeting today about how incompetent we are, and how we aren't living up to our expectations, and all that other nonsense they can say because they don't do nearly half the shit we do, but tell me now what's going on?"

"Remember how your aunt, so sorry, your 'favorite' aunt escaped prison?"

She gave him a look. He continued on anyways, "as much as she's been in hiding the rumor mill is buzzing that she is actually missing."

Tonks didn't see the point in this as being of a huge importance. She didn't care about the woman.

She smiled though, because to her it was good news, something to bring up her spirits for the day because nothing else was. "Good, let her stay that way," she commented dryly.

But that couldn't be all. She narrowed a suspicious look. "But there has to be more. That can't be all. I don't think the buzz would be this big if it was only that." She crossed her legs at the ankle and stretched back, said, on a higher note, "I'd expect parties, you know where people dance in the street? There'd be songs about witches being dead and streamers and fireworks. There has got to be more, a reason why everyone is running around like chicken's without heads."

"A few bodies were found on Withering Lane in the London country side, unidentifiable, and one can possibly be her." He watched her face for reaction and the only thing that happened was her mouth went from a smile to a straight line. Could it actually be her?

But then Tonks had to think of her family. Her family members weren't ones to go down so easily. When they were going down they went down with a fight. She knew it because half of them were in league with the Dark Lord.

She shook her head. The thin line of her lips turned into a frown. "One of them isn't her. As much as I don't want to admit it she's very crafty at what she does and won't be caught in a plot that involves her demise- as much as I want that to be."

He gave her a look that made her feel like he was second guessing her again. He knew the truth, but she could see the uneasiness in his dark eyes. She didn't mention this to him. If he wanted to do that again she was just going to stand back and let him think whatever he wanted. She wasn't going to waste energy on his opinion and whether or not he was going to change it.

"Well it looks like my week isn't over yet," she said getting down off the desk, "see you at the meeting. I'm sure I'll be demoted so low I'll be flat as a pancake." She walked away feeling her mood sour like milk. It was getting to the point that she didn't even want the job anymore. They were just going to find ways of making her out to be a bad guy because of a gift she was gifted with, but make it bad and fire her or lock her in a cell in Azkaban.

She thought back, did a three sixty and went back to his office and just stuck her head back in. "I still love you," then she disappeared. She checked her tasks for the dayand set out for them with her partner. It wasn't Kingsley, which she was feeling iffy with, but it would be better to be him because some of them, her current partner really needed that meeting and a crash course in everything.

Kingsley was strong and she drew her strength from him, and she knew he knew it too.

Friday afternoon seemed impossible to finish on a beautifully weathered day. Throw in another meeting to criticize work ethics in one week just made it feel like it wasn't going to end. And it had to be at the end of the work day.

The bodies were found to not have been foul-play. They were from a fire started in the kitchen of a party at a residential.

She liked that he lost the look in his eyes, but hated that wall with cracks in it when it came to relationships; not wanting to deal with anymore tension.

She found Kingsley and put her arm through his thick muscular one.

"Are you ready for the lecture on how we stink?" she asked him with a smile that made it to her face by force of her mouth muscles.

"If you think that is bad wait until they start breathing down your neck, watching your every move, questioning your every movement," he said under his breath for only her to hear.

"Like they don't already," she said to him. She took her arm away and they went to the meeting where he was praised for his steady work habits through consistency while a lot of them, her, were referenced of vague insults that made her feel like she once again didn't matter.

Some of the people, she could pick out who were indeed over their head. She hated that they labeled her in there, even if they didn't say it. She wanted to put a few people in their places. Her want hand was itching and she really wanted to scratch it.

After the meeting she was about to split when Hestia came up to her.

"Wotcher Hestia, are you ready for detention?" She laughed when her friend smiled and burst out laughing along with her.

"Yeah, I'm saying." She leaned in closer and whispered, "I feel like I'm in school again. I'm too old to be talked down upon. It just gets ridiculous after a while."

"We should round up a group of friends and do it like they say," she gave her a knowing look which they both totally understood was in their second lives.

"We can complain about every single thing we do. It'll be like when we were little kids. It'll be like playing house."

"Let's bail now," Tonks suddenly thought up, "Let's get Kingsley and start the weekend early."

Her friend's sudden drop in excitement mellowed her mood. Hestia said, "I have work to complete, but if you'll wait a few I'll be done and we can start the weekend then."

A smile came back to her face. "Sure thing, I'll make myself busy until I find you again," Tonks said.

"Sure, thank you." Hestia gave Tonks hand a squeeze before heading back to do her work. Tonks could learn something from her but then remembered what they expected of her and knew that she wasn't going to give her best to someone who would never see it even if it was in front of their face.

She headed down the long hall of those leaving for the day and bumped into Arthur Weasley, Charlie Weasley's father and also another member of the Order of the Phoenix.

"Wotcher Arthur," she greeted matching his stride and following him to his destination.

"Hello Tonks, how is your day going?" she greeted back brightly.

"Like hell, but you know it's almost over so it's going to get better once I leave this place."

"Yeah, I can feel that today as well, this place is a circus."

She saw that he looked real ruffled and tired. He like her was looking for exits. She didn't want to be there as much as he didn't want to be.

At the junction for their departure, and after explaining the horror of her week he put a hand on her shoulder. "Don't let it get you down, it was just a bummed week," he said reassuringinly.

"Thanks, I'll remember that when it happens again next week," she joked with him.

They parted on good terms and soon enough she found
Hestia who ws free to leave with her. They went with Kingsley to the Leaky Cauldron to start the weekend off right.

Late that evening she changed out of her work robes at home and apparated to Snape's home and crawled into bed. There was no other contact from Remus and it didn't make her sad anymore- it made her mad. She hated the fact that she was the only one in the relationship who wanted to be together. And even though he wrote her and was out there making a difference she felt like he didn't care about her even with the reassurance from him that he was coming back.

Then, to add to that, she was in bed with someone else, which made it all the more difficult. She didn't do anything to trash her life, which made her only feel the hint of a bit better.

But not really.

She didn't feel like doing anything else for the night, even if it was a fine night to be in town and out and about. She had nobody else; not the one she could be with every day and every night. She didn't have anything that was real. She hated that, and just when her life had started to move forward it stopped, turned around and went back.

Tonks woke up on Saturday morning in Snape's arms, something she never thought would happen. She used to have nightmares about him when she went to bed at night, and now she was in his bed.

It was weird and she'd never tell her friends.

She didn't remember when he came home, but was glad that he was there and she wasn't alone like she was afraid to be.

"Wotcher," she whispered to him even though she thought him to be asleep.

She squeezed his hands in hers.

"Thought you not to be a morning person," he commented mildly insulting.

"Hm?" she thought. She always hated getting up in the morning, it was always too bright and early; especially on work days. But today was no exception as well.

"I am not a morning person at all. You can tell by my lack in on time accomplishments at work. I'll still be in bed for a whole while longer." She said it with confidence like nothing was wrong with it, but then her brain caught up with her and she realized that she couldn't take it back or stammer or stutter.

She cringed inwardly.

"Well if you put it that way," he said with the evilness and taste in his eyes. She knew that evil from anywhere and anything else. She had verbally challenged it the prior year.

"I didn't mean it exactly like that," she placed together the words preciously, but no matter which way she did it, they never came out of her mouth the way she wanted them to.

"Exactly?" he questioned with the upper hand, as always, "what did you mean?"

She turned on her back so she could see his face. It was no fun talking like that when she couldn't see his face and engage his reaction.

She smiled.

"Do you mean what you said?" he asked head on his arm.

"Not exactly," she wavered.

"So you don't mean anything you say exactly, yet you kissed me, though you said you had drunk too much."

"I was," she claimed, though she only knew she drank a little.

"You knew what exactly you were doing, so admit the truth to yourself and admit it aloud."

She toyed with a piece of hair that was hanging in his face. "I kissed you, I admit that." She had no shame in that.

He gave a slight nod but had the look that said she didn't answer his question. He said, "admit you did it on your own will and," he had a slight elevation in his mood when he finished and said, "and you liked it."

She knew he was trying to get an act out of her. She knew that for sure she wasn't going to give him the rise he wanted. He always wanted to be on top, but she wasn't going to let that happen.

And she liked that when he was surprised at something she said. She said, "I did on my own free will, big deal. I liked kissing you and I will do it again." She grinned proud that she could keep herself up and calm and not admit any true feelings that would have consequences.

"Oh yeah? Is that so?"

She kissed him and then let go. They both locked eyes and then suddenly became engrossed with eachother. They kissed with arms around eachother, hands free to explore on their own. The kisses grew deep and even passionate, both hearts racing a million miles a minute.

He moved away from her lips to her neck and she broke away. She felt the horror because she was losing control. She was in bed with the devil.

"Had enough?" The evil smirk on his face proved he was a jerk, that he toyed until he got what he wanted.

He wanted her.

She wanted him.

It was something that wasn't suppose to happen.

She wasn't one to give up and not have the last word unless she was wrong, or atleast knew that she was wrong.

"No," she answered. She knew she'd regret it later when she was alone and her inner voice over powered her head, but she did it anyways. She leaned over and started making out with him again, each gropping until she pushed him away again realizing that she wasn't as strong as she wanted to think she was, that she was actually wrong in the situation.

"I better leave now."

"If you know what's good for you," he advised with victory crawling in his tone.

She didn't look back. She grabbed her sandals and left not remembering taking them off when she went to sleep the night prior.

She just knew that she wasn't going back and that she didn't know whether or not she was glad that Remus wasn't there, only that the voice in her head kept from not forgetting him, and not forgetting the him that was still in bed.