Paige stirs awake the next morning after spending twenty-four amazing hours with Severus to her stomach growling and the smell of something delicious cooking from down the hall. She sits up from his bed alone with only a black silk robe laying at the foot of the bed for her. She gets out of bed and slips the robe on then quietly leaves his bedroom and makes her way down the hallway towards the smell of the food. Severus is sitting at his small kitchen table facing the doorway and reading the newspaper with a cup of tea in front of him as breakfast is cooking itself in the kitchen.
"Good morning." Paige says quietly as she enters the kitchen.
Severus lowers the newspaper to look at her.
"Did you sleep well?" he asks her as he folds up the paper and places it on the table.
Paige just nods as she sits down across from Severus.
"I sent your clothing to out to be washed. I am afraid to ask why they smelled like you rolled around in rubbish." He comments before taking a sip of his tea.
"Yeah, there's only so much freezing river water will wash clothing I suppose." Paige replies with a smirk. "Thank you, for doing that."
"Its not a problem. Hungry?" He asks her as he points his wand at the pan cooking pancakes.
"Starving." Paige replies as a French press with hot coffee floats over towards her and starts pouring coffee in a cup in front of her.
"You managed to find the man you were looking for pretty quickly with all things considering." Severus comments as a plate of food floats towards Paige and gently land in front of her.
"I'm glad Dumbledore's information was good, then the rest was luck." Paige replies as she cuts into her pancakes and shoves a piece of it in her mouth with her fork.
"You don't give yourself enough credit." Severus replies as Paige moans with her mouthful of pancake.
"What are in these pancakes?!" Paige asks as she cuts another piece.
"It's a secret."
"So good."
"I know what you're doing." Severus replies with a smirk.
"You mean eating the best pancakes I have ever had in my life? Should I be calling you Detective?" Paige says sarcastically.
"You're deflecting."
"Ah, you caught onto that did you?"
"Yes, so let's talk about the mission."
"Um, there isn't much to tell." Paige replies before taking another bite of her pancakes.
"Paige." Severus says sternly.
Paige shoves more pancake into her mouth and shrugs her shoulders.
"What are you hiding?"
Paige slowly chews the food in her mouth to hopefully buy her time in that he would change the subject, but he just stares at her intensely until she swallows the food in her mouth.
"You're not going to let me change the subject, are you?" Paige finally says to him.
"No."
"Okay fine, you want to know the boring details of the mission then be my guest. We split up and I went to a Factory in Trinec where this man fed me stale crackers. Then I met up again and Lieutenant Ripley who had a lead on a man, so I stayed with him in Zlin. We followed the man for a bit before talking to him, then when we did approach him, he fled." Paige says rapidly, trying to just get the information out so she can change the subject.
"Then what did you do?"
"Ripley and I got drunk, then got jumped by the three 'muggles' as you call them, then decided to head back to the Factory and break into it at night to look at the files. We got caught by the night guard who turned out to be the man we were looking for."
"How convenient."
"Yep, sure was."
"So, what do you know about the man?"
"Dan Draider? Um, not too much you know. He used to be an Auror for MACUSA, his rank was a Lieutenant…and he was also onmyparent'steambeforetheydied." Paige says as her sentence gets progressively quieter and more jumbled.
"I'm sorry I didn't catch that last part."
Paige sighs, not wanting to discuss this information over breakfast.
"He was on my parent's team in MACUSA. Apparently, my father was a Captain, and he was his second in command." Paige explains, just giving into Severus.
"And you didn't want to talk about this because…?" Severus asks her in confusion.
"Because I don't know how to feel about it." Paige replies honestly.
"I would think you would be excited to have someone tell you what your parents were like."
"Oh yes, I would love to hear about the parents I never got a chance to meet." Paige responds sarcastically.
"So, you are jealous of the time he got to spend with them?"
"I guess that's one way of saying it."
"They are still apart of you. You should try and get as much information about them from Mr. Draider before you miss your opportunity."
"I will think about it. Now can we please discuss something else, like for real what are in these pancakes that make them so irresistibly good?"
"I'm sorry, but I need to keep some secrets from you." Severus replies with a smirk.
"I will pry your secret from you one day Severus Snape." Paige says before taking another bite of her pancakes.
Severus only smirks as he takes another sip of his tea then puts his cup back on the table before he unfolds the paper and starts reading it again.
"How's Hogwarts doing? Still having to deal with the Ministry Professor?" Paige asks him as she sets her cutlery down on her plate.
"She is insane. A tyrant. I am afraid it's all chaos." Severus replies not looking away from his paper.
"If you need someone to take them out Severus, I can make a little trip to Hogwarts." Paige says with a wink.
Severus glances at her with a smirk then goes back to reading the paper.
"I'm sure that won't be necessary my love." Severus replies.
"Your call." Paige comments as she picks up her cup of coffee and takes a sip.
"On the topic if Hogwarts, I unfortunately have to go back this afternoon, but I will be able to come back for a week or so around the holidays." He informs her.
Paige sets her cup down as her stomach instantly tightens, throwing her appetite out the window. Severus folds down his paper in her silence.
"It's getting more and more difficult to leave you Severus." Paige admits as she stares down at her food.
Severus folds up the paper again and places it back on the table. He moves to the empty chair beside her and grabs her hand.
"I know it's difficult right now, it's hard for me as well to be apart from you." Severus says as he squeezes her hand tightly. "But I promise you when this is all over, that I will never leave your side again."
"So, I am just supposed to live in pain without you until then?" Paige whispers as she leans into his lips to kiss him.
He pulls away from her slightly to reply.
"You're a cunning and cleaver woman, I'm sure you will manage a while longer." He replies with a smirk. "Which reminds me..."
He suddenly pulls back from her and gets up from the chair. She watches him as he moves to a drawer in a kitchen counter next to the stove. He pulls out a dark green bottle with a dropper attached as the lid.
"I have one demand while you're gone." He continues as he sits back down next to her.
"You aren't getting the cloak back, I only had it for like one day Severus…" Paige whines to him.
"I wouldn't dare do anything to upset you like that." He replies as he unscrews the dropper from the bottle.
"Oh. Well, good. I am up for any other demands then." Paige comments with a sigh of relief.
"You mustn't pleasure yourself while being apart from each other." Severus says as he fills the dropper with the liquid from inside the bottle.
"Okay, if you insist, I will reconsider you taking back the cloak." Paige replies with a smirk.
"You would rather me take back the cloak then not touch yourself?" Severus asks her quizzically.
"Severus. Thinking about being with you right now is already making me hot. I do not know how I'm going to survive for God knows how long." Paige comments with a slight chuckle.
"Well, you better find a way to control yourself my dear because I will know if you do indeed decide to take matters into your hands." Severus replies.
He grabs her hand with her palm facing upwards and squeezes the liquid onto her hand. He gently massages the mysterious liquid all over it and repeats the process on her other hand. It leaves no tint or smell as it absorbs into her skin.
"Please tell me that was just something for dry hands." Paige comments as he twists the cap back onto the bottle.
"I'm not going to tell you. Just know that the punishment will be severe if you disobey my order."
"Severe you say?" Paige replies with a smirk on her face.
"Try me."
Paige says nothing, trying to get a read on him. Severus leans back in his chair smugly.
"There's no way you would possibly know." Paige finally says, calling his bluff.
"No, you're right. It's not like you're a terrible liar or anything." He replies.
"I'm only a terrible liar around you." Paige admits.
"That doesn't sound like it's going to work in your favor."
"Hm, you're right. I might have to rethink this."
"Yeah, I would too if I were you. In the meantime, I believe we have enough time before I must leave back to the school."
"Enough time for what?"
He grabs her hand and pulls her up from the table.
"For another session Miss Asher." He whispers to her, and her lust instantly flares up at the mention of the word session.
"Yes Master." Paige replies before he presses his lips against hers.
After there intimate session and a heartfelt goodbye with Severus, Paige returns to Grimmald place to reunite with her team.
As she walks down the hall to the dining area, she can hear chatter coming from the room. She stops to listen before entering.
"I would really rather wait for Captain Asher to get her option."
"Do you know when she will be back?"
Paige enters the room and sees her team and Dan standing around the table with Remus, Tonks and Sirius sitting in his usual place at the head of the table.
"Ask and thou shall receive." Paige says with a smile.
"Wow, that timing was impeccable." Remus says with a smirk.
"I like to make dramatic entrances." Paige jokes as she walks further into the room. "What's going on?"
"We wanted to see if we could borrow a couple of your team to help us with a stake out operation. We could use your skills on this one." Tonks informs her.
"Whatever you need, me and my team are here to assist you." Paige replies.
"Our informants have told us that there has been suspicious activity happening in Liverpool at the Museum. Death Eaters are constantly visiting there and we would like to know why." Tonks says to her.
Tonks then brushes papers aside revealing a map of the area around the Liverpool Museum.
"We have the Brasco Lounge to the north-east, across the street which is a good viewpoint of Museum. There is also the Mann Island Apartments to the North of the Museum we can use to as well." Tonks says, pointing at the buildings she is talking about.
"We could use two of you to come along with us and decide the best strategy going forwards." Remus says as he leans over the chair in front of him.
Sirius suddenly gets up from the table and leaves the room abruptly. Paige raises her eyebrow and looks over at Remus who just gives her a faint smile.
"Captain I'll go. I'm sure you might want to rest up a bit longer." Ripley says as he looks over at Paige and ignoring the odd behaviour of Sirius.
Paige looks over at Ripley and knows he would do an excellent job on the mission, but he would want to bring Hernandez who is great on the offence but might be a little shaky with the recon. She looks over at Bobcat who would make a great look-out and sharpshooter, but if they need to go inside a building, he might not be the best choice. She then looks over at Dan who is looking down at photos of the museum on the table.
"No, it's alright Jack, I can go." Paige replies.
"I'll go with you Captain." Bobcat says.
"Actually, I was wondering if Lieutenant Draider would like to accompany me on this one." Paige says as she continues to look at Dan.
Dan looks up from the table in surprise at her.
"It would be my pleasure, Captain Asher." He replies with a smile.
"Hey now, don't go thinking you can just replace me like that." Ripley says with a smirk.
"Calm down Rip, I wouldn't dream of replacing you." Paige replies with a smirk of her own.
"Excellent. We can leave tonight when the museum is closed to try and get a good look at the area." Remus explains.
"Works for me. I just need to resupply then I will be ready to go." Paige replies. "Lieutenant Draider, can I have a word with you in the hall for a second?"
"Of course, Captain." Dan replies.
Paige walks with Dan out of the room and down the hall a little way for privacy.
"I just want to apologies for my abrupt departure yesterday morning." Paige says to him.
"No need to apologies Captain. Bobcat let me know most of the situation and Lieutenant Ripley filled in the rest when him and Hernandez returned." Dan explains.
"Thank you for understanding."
"Thank YOU for choosing me to come with you."
"I want to see what you have out there, see if your washed or not. I also may or may not have questions. It would be handy to have you close by."
"I will prove myself out in the field Captain and I'll try and answer as many questions as you'd like."
"Okay. Well, get your bag packed. We have extra supplies upstairs if you haven't been shown them yet." Paige says to him.
"Yes Captain." He replies as he turns to head down the hall to the staircase heading up stairs.
Paige looks towards a now open door in the hallway as Dan walks up the stairs to pack a supply bag for the mission. She pushes the door open fully and sees Sirius standing over a fireplace with a small fire that barely warms the room.
"You good Sirius?" Paige asks him as she enters the room.
He glances back at her for a second before looking back at the fire.
"Yeah. It's just frustrating to be locked inside this house and not being able to help the Order with anything." Sirius admits.
"Well letting a bunch of random strangers like myself into your home is a tremendous help." Paige replies with a smirk.
"I want to do more." He says now turning to her.
"I understand. I would have a tough time sitting on the side-lines, but we need you to not be in prison Sirius."
"I don't know what the difference would be. I feel like I am still in prison in this very house."
"Well like most jail sentences, there is a time limit on them. Once this war is all over you can walk the streets a free man with your name cleared."
"And if they don't believe my side of the story like last time?"
"I have a secluded cabin by the lake in Alaska I will give you. It's not much, but it's hidden and less dark and depressing than this place. Well maybe not in the winter, but that's a different type of darkness."
"They would never let me have my God-Son, Harry."
"It wouldn't be hard for the chosen one to get on a ferry to the States to come visit you. Don't be blinded by your pity."
Sirius smirks at her.
"You are wise and too kind to me Captain Asher."
"Sometimes people need some kindness in their life."
"I might take you up on that offer then if things head down that route."
"Good, glad to hear it." Paige replies with a warm smile. "Now, if you excuse me, I need to go prep for another mission. I'll be thinking of you while I'm out there freezing my ass off."
Paige just hears him chuckling as she exits the room, happy to at least give him comfort in these dark times.
