Harry

I let my breath out in a controlled exhale after I shut her door behind me. I can't hear anything from the other side of the wood, but I know when her eye hits the peephole, and the tightness in my chest lessons some when I hear the deadbolt click into place.

I take the stairs back down to the bottom level, needing the activity to burn some excess adrenaline out of my system before I hit the pavement again.

She's feisty, that one. And strong. I've been doing this a long time, and was in the military before that. It takes a special kind of person who can look death in the eye and keep on trucking like she did tonight. She seems to be focusing on the fact that she wasn't able to help Peter. She's not realizing that she could have just as easily died too.

Is that because that's how her mind is wired? Was it automatic to worry about the health and wellbeing of those around her before herself? Or if, when the bullets stopped flying and the blood appeared, she made a conscious decision not to consider how it could have been hers.

I make note of her building; at the lack of a doorman, but the keypad at the entrance. It would be easy to get around. Her door is wood, which means it would take one kick to bust it down, deadbolt be damned. Of course, to someone not as obsessed with security as me, her building is probably the safest on the block. I walk around the corner, and see the ramp to the parking garage, open and unsecure.

Her building doesn't have a CCTV system either. Which makes perfect sense. She doesn't live in the ghetto, but that doesn't mean her neighbours want their activities caught for prosperity.

I don't bother to contain my eye roll.

Pulling out my mobile I hit the speed dial for Neville.

"Sup, Boss?" he says, smacking his gum in my ear.

My eyes slip closed in exasperation, and I suck in a breath to settle my annoyance.

"The scene is yours. I have an errand to run. I'll meet you guys back at the station when you're done."

His stuttering is loud through the dimness of my car, and despite my best efforts, a grin splits my face.

"You're leaving me in charge?" he clarifies, disbelief thick on his voice.

"Are you not a big boy?" I mock him.

"Yes," he replied, offence warring with disbelief.

"Do you need me there to hold your hand?"

"No."

This time is voice holds the baseline of surety.

"Ron will be with you in case you need help. You know what needs to be done. This is a big deal, Neville. As soon as word gets back to the Death Eaters, they're going to hit the street looking for answers, if they didn't do the job themselves. We need to get them first."

"Understood boss, I won't let you down."

"I know," I say, and I try to let my confidence in him shine through. I drop the line, before anything else can be said.

I start the car, but then, on second thought, send Ron a text.

Me: Keep him on a short leash, but let him take the lead. Meet you at The Lair

I sit in the driver's seat for a moment, my gazing wandering over her building. I latch my stare onto where I imagine her flat must be inside the building.

What do you want to bet she walks back to her car tomorrow, instead of calling a tow truck?

It's not your problem, Harry. She's not your fucking problem.

I squeeze my mobile tight in my grip, before I make a decision, and bring it to my ear again.

"Dung, heads up." I say when the disgruntled voice answers after two rings.

"Potter, you bastard. It's almost four a.m. Some of us have to sleep."

"Yet you answered without hesitation, Dung. Doesn't seem like you were asleep to me."

He huffs in amusement, and I hear him moving around on his side of the mobile.

"Are you ever going to stop calling me Dung?" he asks, a conversation we have at least once a quarter.

"Have you found a time machine? Because the only way I'm going to stop calling you Dung is if they take it off your arrest reports."

He grumbles into my ear, but it's not as disgruntled as he wants me to think it is. Mundungus Fletcher, aka Dung, used to be the prominent car thief in the Hogsmeade district. He'd drive over to the Eastside, swipe a supposedly unstealable car, lead local police on a merry chase until he lost them, and then strip the car for parts.

Now he runs a small auto shop on the edge of town and keeps an ear on the underworld for his friends. And since I pay his CI check, that makes me his friend.

"I need a favour," I say, pulling into the empty road back towards the crime scene. I take a left at the first intersection, easily bypassing the blockade.

"What kind of favour? The kind that gets me paid, or the kind that gets me killed?"

Sometimes, depending on the situation, those can be one and the same.

"Neither. The kind that has me owing you one."

That gets his attention, and I can almost picture his ears perking up, like a basset hound catching a scent.

"What kind of favour?"

"Well, not the kind that has me lying on the stand for you, but the kind that you can call in at your convenience."

"The Boy-Who-Lived, in my debt. I'd be a moron to pass up that opportunity. What do you want?"

I hate that nickname.

I take the last turn, pulling into the first entrance available for the hospital.

"Meet me at the employee parking lot for Hogsmeade Memorial. 2006 Impala. Bring your tools. And something to hotwire the car."

"What the—?"

I end the call before he can ask questions for which I don't have the answers myself.

"Okay, people. Give it to me from the top."

My team is still trickling in from the crime scene and whatever their tasks were afterwards, but the core of my squad is all here.

We're in our conference room in the bowels of the downtown precinct, aka The Lair. I want to blame the slang on our proclivity for watching superhero shows, but truth be told, I inherited the place, and the nickname came with it.

Our department is the basement of one of the most prominent buildings downtown. It was state of the art in its time. Only it's time was forty years ago. Now it's stale, damp, and falling apart around us. They've promised us an upgrade, but I'm not holding my breath. That promise is another thing I inherited.

The only good thing about it is it holds all of our local government's administrative portions in one spot. So, if I need to talk to a barrister, I only need to go up four floors, go up one for court, and the lunch ladies in the cafeteria adore me, so I always get my crisps cooked hot.

The room we use for meetings is spacious, but in the way an abandoned basement is spacious. Sure, there's room to store all your shite, but without any windows, crappy lighting, and poor ventilation, it's not exactly our favourite place to be. Unfortunately, when I'm not on the streets, it's where I spend most of my time.

There are long picnic-like tables stretched out in the middle of the room, with a rather epic mismatching of chairs. A few of my guys have brought in reclining office chairs. Others sit in simple straight back kitchen-esk seats. Ron, with a doctor's note and a little manipulation, finagled an ergonomic high-backed throne, as he calls it, that he drags between his desk outside and the meeting room in here. Nev, like the devout millennial he is, uses an exercise ball. Claims it keeps his core tight.

It's also why he has a plant on his desk. For fresh oxygen.

A shudder runs through me every time I think about it. My core is plenty tight, thank you very much, and I certainly don't use some bleeding exercise ball to do it.

Silence settles around the room and all eyes turn to look at me, perched on the edge of the front table. My eyes skim the crowd, and then the whiteboards covering our walls. Every board holds pieces of a different ongoing case. But all of those can wait. The murder of Pettigrew just jumped to the front of everybody's to-do list. My lead tech girl is standing behind me, taping pictures of the scene from last night on the empty board behind me.

Neville clears his throat before grabbing his tablet off the table.

"Victim is Peter Pettigrew, white male, 61. Grew up in the life, he worked his way through the trenches until he became number two in the Death Eaters. Killed at approximately 1:43 a.m. this morning at the corner of Hogwarts Avenue and Diagon Boulevard, in an apparent drive-by shooting.

"The ME hasn't finished processing the body, but it looks like our hot doc was right, and between the bullet wounds and the casings we found in the street we're looking at six shots, with five hitting their target.

"The techs have finished processing the scene, but it was too early to start banging on doors. We'll do that this morning."

"Video?"

"We're pulling street CCTV footage in a two-mile radius, just waiting for the email that it's ready, and when we hit the streets, we'll grab all the footage from the neighbourhood that we can without a warrant."

Silence engulfs our group again, until someone on the crime scene team has the courage to ask "So, boss. Did you do it?"

I keep my gaze steady and look our young videographer in the eye.

"Trust me, Creevy. If I'd have killed him, there'd be nothing left to find." Ron sniggers under his breath as Colin pales and swallows thickly. "I certainly wouldn't leave a witness," I add.

One of my plain-clothed officers raises their hand with a shit-eating grin on his face.

"Question. Who is the hot doc, and is she single?"

Neville snorts out a laugh, and I have to dig my fingers into the edge of the desk I'm perched on to keep from flexing them into fists.

"Dr. Granger was on the scene last night, witnessed the murder. You'll have to ask to find out her availability. Her relationship status didn't come up in our investigation."

Neville's eyes flick to me briefly, before back to his tablet again.

I rise from my perch, grabbing a red marker from the table beside me.

Walking to the whiteboard, I write the letters WHY? in big capital letters and underline it twice.

"On top of the usual who, what, when, where, and how, we have an additional question we need to answer. Probably the most important. If we can answer that, we'll be able to answer the rest. Why was Pettigrew in that neighbourhood last night?

"He was killed forty-five minutes outside his territory. In a neighbourhood where gang activity is slim to none. Find out what Pettigrew was doing there, and we'll find out who killed him.

"Reach out to your CI's, have them reach out to their CI's. Tom Riddle, the Death Eaters number one, is not going to take this lying down, people. If we don't handle this quick and clean, Peter Pettigrew isn't going to be the last body that drops. I refuse to let a gang war break out in my city over this—quick and clean guys, quick and clean.

"Do we have an ETA on the autopsy?"

Neville rechecks his tablet before answering.

"The body is scheduled to be examined at two this afternoon."

"And where are we on ballistics?"

My tech girl, Hannah, takes this one.

"Give us a few hours, boss. The labs didn't even open officially until twenty minutes ago. We're putting a rush on everything Pettigrew, but it's still going to take a little time. What I can tell you is that the rounds were 9mm, and the shots were spread out. I know it's hard to shoot from a moving vehicle, but even so, I'd wager our shooter wasn't a pro.

"Tire marks indicate they were going the speed limit on their way past Pettigrew, then flipped a bitch and peeled out passing him when they opened fire. Tires were Firestone P225/45R18 by the skid marks on the ground."

Ron speaks up from the peanut gallery.

"Dr. Granger is planning on dropping by the station, to look through pictures of cars, see if she can't pick out the make and model."

"Hold off on that," I say. "We may still get lucky with surveillance video."

I toss the marker back onto the table, watching it roll several inches before slowing to a stop.

"Top priority, people. I want this closed as quickly as possible. Ron, take Tonks and Teddy. Hit the streets. Gather all the video you can, knock on doors. Somebody saw what happened. Find out what Peter was doing in that neighbourhood.

"Nev, we're heading into Knockturn, see if we can't grab a meeting with Riddle. We need to give them some answers before they start asking the questions themselves. Or, we need to figure out why Tom would take out his own lieutenant.

"The rest of you reach out to your contacts. Start putting out feelers. Was there a conflict between the crews that we don't know about? What sort of problems is Pettigrew's death going to cause? We need to get ahead of this thing."

I take the time to let my gaze travel over the members of my team. I meet them eye for eye, hammering home the importance of finding those involved with Pettigrew's murder.

"A man was killed on our streets. It's our job to catch the men who did it. Alright, let's move."

"Remind me again why we don't just scoop them all up and throw them in jail?"

Neville stops the 4x4 in front of the Knockturn's local hangout and lets the car idle rather than turning it off. The brick of the building, once bright and robust, is now dilapidated and sunbaked. Lack of care combined with years of cigarettes being put out and beer being poured against the hardened clay has made the atmosphere dreary and bland.

The neighbourhood is rough. The kind that finds you checking your door locks if you get stuck at a red light driving through it. Or, in reality, the kind where you go five kilometers out of your way so that you avoid crossing the threshold.

But that's only an outsider perspective. To those that live here, this neighbourhood is home.

It's barely 9 a.m., but I'm not worried we won't find them inside. Things like liquor laws and hours of operation don't exactly matter much in this part of town.

"Well, Neville, there are several answers to that question. One, we have nothing to hold them on. That's why men like these have underlings; to go to jail for them. If we could get them locked up, it would only be a matter of time until they're back on the streets, running their crews.

"Second, and more importantly in my opinion, for all that Riddle is a criminal, he runs his streets with a moral code. Of a sort. His product is clean, and for the most part he keeps it out of the hands of children. Riddle thinks of himself as a benevolent lord. The God Father of Knockturn, even if he's a pathetic and slightly unbalanced one."

"And that's good for us, how?" Neville asks.

"Better the devil you know then the devil you don't. Besides, we could never get rid of him entirely. Even if we shot him point blank, he'd probably just rise from the grave and start over again. The man seems to be impervious to death."

Ironic, since I got my nickname on the street for the same thing.

I grab the handle on the passenger door, and Neville pulls the keys from the ignition, and follows me onto the sidewalk. His hand reaches to touch his gun, and I place my hand on his, gently pushing it away. They've had eyes on us since the minute we hit the hood. Even with the shield on his hip, they won't talk kindly to him touching his weapon.

The inside of the pub doesn't quite match its exterior. Neat and tidy, everything is in its place, even if it is well used. There are one or two old-timers at the bar, a kid that should be in school lining up a shot at the pool table, and Riddle and his entourage, sitting at a corner booth.

One of the goons at the table starts to rise, but at a slight gesture from Riddle, resumes his spot.

"Harry Potter, long time no see. To what do we owe the honour?"

His tone is flippant, bordering on bored, and I get a sinking sensation in my gut. I feel more than sense Neville's eyes flick in my direction, but I can't risk giving him confirmation either way until we're out of the snake's den.

"We've come to offer you our condolences."

He doesn't react with any visual confirmation, but the thug twitches in his seat.

"Condolences? What's wrong, Boy-Who-Lived ?" Riddle mocks. "Someone kill your puppy?"

I hate that nickname. I've had it since before I became a cop. Before I started primary school. When I survived the slaughter that killed my parents.

"No," I say, and send a silent prayer that this doesn't go to hell. "Someone killed your rat. Peter Pettigrew's dead. Watched them put him in the body bag myself. Someone is speaking to his mother at right this moment."

The room freezes, the very air held in stasis. The earth's rotation stops, before they collectively take a breath.

As one, every person in the building turns to look at Riddle. To take their cue from him.

"I apologize, sincerely, Tom. I thought you would have known by now. I didn't realize I'd be the one breaking the news."

He picks at the wrapper of the bottle in front of him, and I give him a moment to collect himself.

"How?" he asks, his voice bland and lacking emotion. His face is an unreadable mask. The emotion is in his hands, and the way they tremble as they pick, pick, pick, at that label. He wraps his fingers around the neck of the bottle, and I tighten my muscles in anticipation of him throwing it across the room.

"That's what I came to ask you."

His gaze jerks up to meet mine as he shoves his way out of the booth, anger radiating from his every pore. The bottle flies through the air, the weight of the half gone liquid giving it heft, whizzing arse over end before smashing against the wall.

My eyes flick to the side, and the person behind the bar reaches behind them and comes back with a sawed-off shotgun sitting on the countertop.

"You think I had something to do with this? Think I killed my own man. My best friend? Fuck you, pig! Get the fuck out of my pub. We'll handle this ourselves."

Neville rocks on his feet next to me, but I tuck my hands deeper into my vest, setting my toes into my boots.

"Peter was by the river, Tom. Hogwarts and Diagon. What was he doing there at one in the morning?"

"Do I look like his keeper?"

I let the moment stretch between us, feeling the air go heavy and stale.

"As a matter of fact, Tom, yes, you do. No one does anything without your say so around here. No one makes a move without your knowledge. So, I gotta think, if your number two was in that part of town at that time of night, you gotta know something about it."

He stands a little taller, pulling his shoulders back and finding his equilibrium. The people in the bar squirm in their seats, not wanting to acknowledge the truth of my words. And what it must mean for them that Pettigrew is now dead.

I speak, before he has a chance to respond.

"Let the police handle this. Let me do my job. Dead bodies dropping on the corners while you look for the person to finish isn't going to do anyone any good."

I take a step forward into his personal space. He takes a step back, but looks me in the eye.

"I promise, I'll find the son of a bitch who killed Pettigrew, and I'll make sure he spends the rest of his life in prison. No matter how long that life may last. But don't take matters into your own hands Tom. Not yet. Give me a chance to find who did this, and punish him properly."

"They deserve to be dead."

"Isn't death too quick a punishment?"

"Who said it would be quick?."

"Stay out of it, Tom. If you find anything, you call me. Don't get in my way."

He's silent for a heartbeat before he gives a small jerk of his head.

"Get out of my pub," he growls.

I turn on my heel, and follow Neville out of the building. The itch between my shoulder blades spreads into a burn. I've never liked giving my back to an enemy.

We've barely hit the sidewalk before Neville's mouth is on the move.

"Think he did it, boss?"

I wait for him to unlock the car, before dragging myself into the 4X4.

"Nope. I don't."

"Think he'll leave it alone."

He starts the car, and the air conditioner blows warm air onto my face.

"Not a chance in hell. We're officially on the clock. We have to find whoever did this before they do, if we don't want any more bodies in our morgue. Let's hit the street."