AN: I see I have a few Scandinavian people enjoying my story. Can some of you tell me about how life is out there? I recently found out that I'm 21% Swedish, and I would love to know more about the country and its neighbors!
Don't forget to R&R, but please keep your hate and death wishes to yourself. If I receive one more, I swear I will be deleting everything I've written from this site and moving on to another site.
I'll more thank likely update this fic on a bi-weekly basis. I just wanted to give you all a taste of what the rest of this story entails :) .
The Next Morning
Bright and early, at around 8 am Tom began to make his way over to Hermione's home — grateful that Dumbledore texted him her address — or he would have his hands full trying to explain how he already knew where she lived. Ever since their last encounter, Tom would be remiss if he didn't admit that he had been so thoroughly enthralled by the feisty young woman, that he had purposefully sought her out. Some might call it stalking, but he preferred to use the term hunting, because that's exactly what he was doing - he was hunting this beautiful woman down, and enjoying the chase while he did so. Tom wanted to know all of her secrets, her wishes, her aspirations, and most of all, Tom wanted to see her in her rawest, darkest form - the one he knew was just lying beneath the surface. He stood outside of her door, the very same door he had been watching for the past two days before he finally reached out and gave it two firm knocks, before stepping back to patiently wait for her to open it. After a moment he heard a rustling on the other side of the door before it slowly began to open. Tom tried to keep his lecherous thoughts at bay as he was greeted with the wondrous sight of her curvaceous little body wrapped in a small thin satin robe. At her questioning look, he immediately emptied his head of all the less than pure thoughts he had been having and lifted up his hands to reveal to her the two cups, thermos, and small thermal food storage bag he brought with him.
"Good morning, Hermione." Tom greeted her with a smile before continuing, "I come bearing gifts. May I come in?"
Hermione stood there staring at him, until she opened her mouth to speak, "Where's Dumbledore?" she asked, completely ignoring his question.
"Dear old Dumbledore is currently deposed in court. The adventure will be yours and mine today." Tom said with his smile still plastered on his face, "Now, may I come in?" he repeated.
With that she gave him a final look before stepping aside to let him into her small apartment. Tom looked around as he walked inside, taking note of her minimally furnished apartment as he walked to where he assumed the kitchen to be. He made his moves as slow and methodical as possible, knowing that he was still on shaky ice with her from their last meeting, and it wouldn't do, to have her suspicious of him. Not before he could manage to make a copy of her house key with the mold he had hidden in the pocket of his suit jacket. Shaking his head, he busied himself with opening his food storage bag to begin setting out the tupperware containers on top of her table's two place settings and gently placing coffee mugs beside the two containers. He smiled to himself at the sight of the beautifully presented breakfast for two. As they both sat down at the table, Tom moved to peel the lids off of the containers before moving to pour freshly brewed coffee into their two cups.
"What's this?" Hermione questioned as she picked up her fork to push around some of the food.
Tom chuckled softly at her question before answering. "It's breakfast. A little protein scramble to start the day. Some eggs, some sausage. And I'll apologize in advance if this isn't the type of breakfast that you're used to. I'm not sure if I mentioned this the last time we spoke, but I'm very careful about what I put into my body. Which means I end up preparing most meals myself." he said before motioning for her to try a bite. Tentatively, she stabbed some of the food on to her fork and slowly moved it up to her mouth. She closed her small mouth around the fork hesitantly, and Tom had to suppress a groan at the sight. He could almost imagine himself sliding between those full pink lips of hers, pushing his cock all the way to the back of her throat and feeling her throat contract around it. Shaking his head free of those thoughts, he looked at her expectantly. Imploring her to tell him what she thought of the food.
As she began to chew her bite of food, she noticed his curious glance and opened her mouth to speak after swallowing, "It's quite delicious Dr. Riddle. Thank you."
"My pleasure." Tom said, while trying to hide the genuine amusement he felt at her comment on their meal. "I would also like to apologize for my analytical ambush the other day, but I'm pretty certain that I will soon be apologizing to you again and you'll eventually tire of that, so I think I should probably also consider using these apologies sparingly."
Hermione looked at him for a moment with an unreadable expression before simply saying; "I accept your apology Thomas. Just try and keep it professional from now on. I don't need anyone trying to psychoanalyze me." in a short no nonsense tone.
Tom wasn't thrown in the slightest by her rebuff, in fact he had somewhat expected it of her. But he wasn't going to let her push him away again. "Or," Tom said thoughtfully, "We could try socializing like adults, I mean god forbid we actually become friendly with one another."
"I'm sorry but I don't find you interesting enough to be friendly." she said dismissively before shoveling another forkful of food into her mouth.
"You will." he said seriously as he looked at her before changing the subject. "Agent Dumbledore tells me you have a knack for the monsters."
Hermione scoffed before eating another forkful of her food and washing it down with a little coffee, "That's a superstition." she said before taking another sip of coffee. They sat in silence for a moment before Hermione opened her mouth to speak again, "I don't think the Harrier killed Lavender Brown."
Lavender Brown, the name bringing to his mind the very first session he had ever had with the girl.
"— I just feel like he's in love with her, and I don't know what to do. And I know its stupid and insecure of me — I mean they've been friends since they were children for God's sake-" she said with a sad sigh. "But I just can't shake the feeling that there's more to those feelings then that of simple friendship. We've been together for two years and whenever she's around, I just can't help but feel like some kind of interloper or something."
Finally, something for me to latch on to.
"Who is this woman that you're speaking about?" he asked in a tone that he hoped sounded interested.
"My boyfriend's best friend. Well, she's one of them anyway. He has two, and they all grew up in the same neighborhood as one another."
"Is that so? Don't you think that in that case, that they should be rather close? Unless there's something about her that makes you think that there is something more to their friendship?"
"It's just, every time we have a discussion, it's 'Oh, Hermione said this the other day.' Or 'Hermione did that.' Or my favorite is, 'There was this one time that Hermione did blah, blah, blah..' And I know it's stupid, I really do, especially when you consider the fact that they've known each other for years. But it's just with him constantly bringing her up and constantly talking about the memories he has with her, it starting to make me feel like it's her that he would rather be with."
"Hermione," he said slowly, drawing out the syllables of her name, as he tested it with his mouth. What an unusual name, he thought to himself. He wondered idly if she was named after Shakespeare or whether she was named in honor of Greek mythology. "Do you feel that her presence presents a threat to your current position in his life?" he asked her, coming back to the subject at hand.
"Well, yeah... sometimes..." she admitted in a somewhat shaky voice. "But it's stupid, isn't it?"
If he had known then, that this was the exquisite creature that his patient had been talking about, he would've surely attempted to make her his long before now.
"The Harrier?" Tom questioned after a pause, remembering what she said, and feeling unfamiliar with the pseudonym.
"Yeah, that's the name that vile Skeeter woman gave the killer." she said with a disgusted roll of her eyes.
"The devil is in the details. Never mind that reporter, what about this murder was different?" he pressed, "What gave it away? What didn't your Copy Cat do to the girl in the field?" Tom asked her with poorly hidden curiosity.
Hermione paused for a moment while she thought, and then answered truthfully. "Everything. Literally none of what I saw in that field yesterday afternoon, is even vaguely reminiscent of the previous crime scenes. It's almost like this Copy Cat had to show me a negative so I could see the positive." she said in obvious frustration, "That crime scene was practically giftwrapped for us." she glowered.
"The mathematics of human behavior and all those ugly variables. There's some bad math with this harrier fellow." Tom said before pausing, thinking of the right words to say to draw her in. "Are you reconstructing his fantasies?" he asked her in curiosity. "What kind of problems does he have?"
"I could easily think of a few." she said sardonically.
"Have you ever had any problems, Hermione?" he asked.
"No." she said mockingly, while she laid a hand over her heart as if he offended her. "Never."
"No." Tom repeated bemusedly before continuing. "Of course you don't. You and I are just alike. Problem free. Nothing about us to feel horrible about." he said with a smile, pausing in his response before continuing on. "You know what, I think Grandfather Dumbledore sees you as little more than a fragile little tea-cup. A tea cup made of the finest china and only to be used for extra special guests. But a tea cup nonetheless."
Hermione laughed airily at his summation of her colleague, before asking, "How do you see me?" as she fixed him with a curious look.
Tom took a moment to think about what to say, before setting her with a serious look, "I see you as the honey badger I want in the brush when the snakes come slithering by." he said with a smile before motioning to her bowl with his fork, "Now finish your breakfast."
Once they were finished eating, Hermione disappeared into her bedroom, leaving Tom to peruse her apartment at his leisure. After five minutes, Tom walked over to her bedroom door and listened to the distant pitter patter of water from her shower, before turning to fully investigate her apartment. He walked around her living room, stopping every now and again to inspect everything he could about her apartment, before remembering her key dish. Tom quickly approached her front door where he had earlier noticed her key dish sitting on the side table, he looked over his shoulder to ensure that he was still alone before pulling out the key mold had hidden in his pocket. Pressing the most worn looking key on the ring into the clay, he closed the mold around it tightly in order to make sure he had the best possible mold for his copy. He opened the key mold and slowly removed the key from the clay before inspecting the impression it made. Satisfied, he placed her keys back in the dish and began to investigate her apartment once more. As he looked around, Tom noticed that she had her mail bin tucked away on the bar that separated her kitchen from the living room, which Tom thought of as something that was quite curious, because normally people kept their mail bins either in their entry hall or in their living room - as a matter of convenience. But with all things considered, he supposed that she might be keeping her mail in this area, so that she could easily catch anyone that decided to look through it. Tom thought for a moment, whether or not he should look through her mail, since she'd obviously gone to such lengths to discourage nosy onlookers before deciding to just go for it - when would he ever get another opportunity to catch her unaware like this. With a shrug, Tom reached forward and began to thumb through the envelopes and quietly noted that the majority of her mail consisted of bills that read "OVERDUE" printed in large letters and written in bright red ink. Tutting quietly to himself at her poor money management skills, he placed the mail back into the bin and began to walk around her apartment once more. He saw that along one of her walls, she had installed a floating shelf, so he walked over to look through its contents. Upon reaching it, he saw that there were a few books adorning the shelf, accompanied by a new picture of her and two boys; one was short with glasses and black hair that was so messy you would think the fool had never seen a comb or brush in his entire life, and the other was a tall ginger. Angrily, he noticed that the red head had his arm thrown over her shoulder with a goofy lopsided grin on his stupid freckled face as he looked down at her.
Slowly, he reached for the photo and removed the frame from the shelf before looking at it's occupants more closely. It was Hermione alright, but who the hell were the other two? he thought angrily. And why in the hell was the red head so fucking close to her? Were these the other people that his former patient had told him about? If so, one of them was just a regular friend and the other was the girl's former boyfriend. . . The same boyfriend she had suspected had feelings for Hermione. This would never do. He wasn't about to fight for her affections with another man. Tom would much rather kill him, and be done with the competition, long before it even got started. And he had no doubt that it would, especially with the boy's new single status now that Tom had done away with his girlfriend. He saw the way that the boy looked at her in the photo, and he knew that his former patient's suspicions were not borne from jealousy, rather than basic observation. Even he could see the red head's obvious interest in the little firecracker in the next room over, and he was only seeing it through a photo. A sudden thought struck him then, what if the boy already made his move on her, and if he had, was she receptive to it? Tom felt himself become enraged by the thought. He didn't think he would be able to handle that information if it were true. No. He couldn't let these thoughts get the better of him. Even if she did show interest in the ginger, that still wouldn't be enough to stop him from pursuing her. After all, Tom Riddle always got what he wanted at the end of the day, and she certainly wasn't an exception to that rule.
A soft cough from behind him snapped him out of his thoughts and he turned to see a freshly washed and dressed Hermione. She looked absolutely ravishing in the dress she chose to wear. It was another Diane von Furstenberg wrap dress, that stopped just above her deliciously toned legs. It was cut low enough to offer him a wonderful view of her breasts while not appearing too vulgar or risque. And it also looked to be made entirely of silk just like the previous Furstenberg dress he saw her in, but instead of a woodgrain pattern, this time her dress featured a red and black giraffe spot pattern. He also noted that this dress included a belt to accentuate her tiny little waist, though it did have longer sleeves than her previous dress. She was wearing an alluring pair of black pumps to go with her dress. Her pumps made her legs look endless, and he had a hard time not imagining them being wrapped around his waist as he plowed into her. He slowly drew his eyes from her legs and up the expanse of her body, just imagining what it would be like when he would finally be able to peel clothing like this, off of her curvaceous figure. Allowing him the chance to taste and devour every inch of her. Slowly Tom turned back and placed the frame back on the shelf, before facing her once more.
"Why were you looking at that picture?" she asked with a look of annoyance on her face.
"Curiosity, I suppose." he said with a shrug of his shoulders. "Friends of yours?" he inquired hopefully.
"Shall we get going then?" she asked, ignoring his question completely.
"Of course," he said, walking to the front door and opening it up before stepping out into the hall. "Where are we off to?" he asked as she joined him in the hall and closed her door behind herself. After she locked the door, she turned and smiled at him.
"Give me your car keys and you'll find out." she said, with a smile still plastered on her face.
"My car keys?" he asked, lifting his eyebrow in curiosity.
"Yes, now hand them over so I can drive us over to where we need to go!" she said in mock exasperation, as she stuck her hand out towards him.
"Okay, why not," he said with a shrug as he reached into his pocket and pulled out his car keys to hand them over to her.
As soon as the keys hit her hand, she turned on her heel and strutted down the hall to her building's elevator, with him following closely behind her.
Hermione threw the car into park as they pulled up to the medium sized shop and began to unbuckle her seat belt. Tom smiled at her waning excitement, as she attempted to ready herself to go inside and speak with whomever was there, when she suddenly turned her head and caught him smiling at her.
"And what exactly are you smiling about, Thomas?" she asked, with a wry expression on her face.
"I'm just enjoying the experience of peeking behind the curtain. I've always been curious about how the FBI goes about its business when it isn't kicking in doors." He said jokingly as he released the catch on his seat belt as well.
"We're lucky we're not doing house to house interviews." She said with a laugh before continuing. "We're here because we found a small wooden chip in the clothes Hannah Abbott had on. Our crime scene investigators say that the chip came from a Pond Pine tree, which to my knowledge, only grows in a few places around the state. Though majority of them can be found closer to the coast. And I also think that its a good chance that the chip came from the inside of a wood chipper. Which means, our killer is probably a landscaper that specializes in tree trimming."
"Ahh," Tom said, "So we're here to look for our killer then?" and at the question she nodded in the affirmative.
"I know it's not a lot to go on, but with the type of wood it was, as well as the size of the wooden chip itself, I just know it came from a professional grade wood chipper." she said in the most confident tone he'd heard from her since the first time he met her in Dumbledore's office.
"Albus Dumbledore wants me to make sure you're of sound mind and body... so we can look for wood chippers?" Tom joked and Hermione gave him a slight smile at this before responding.
"Well, that's between you and Albus." Hermione said with a shrug before opening up her car door and closing it behind herself. Once Tom stepped out of the car, he looked at her over the roof of the car.
"Must be hundreds of landscaping shops all over Virginia, what's so special about this place?"
"Certain kind of wood from a certain kind of tree. A tree that only grows in certain areas of the state.. so we're looking at the landscaping shops that are located around the areas where these trees grow." Hermione said as they began to walk to the camper trailer located in the center of the field.
"And what exactly are we looking for?" Tom asked in curiosity.
"At this stage, anything really. But mostly anything peculiar." Hermione said with a shrug as she lifted her hand and knocked on the door.
A moment later the door opened to reveal a flustered looking secretary. After a few minutes of Tom laying down his signature Riddle charm. With a few flattering comments and a couple of glares from his little beauty, the secretary Harper was more than happy to grant them access to their files and paperwork. Just as Harper came over to try and ingratiate herself to him, Hermione whipped out a resignation letter from one of the drawers and held it up to her. Stopping the simpering little girl dead in her tracks.
"Xenophilus Lovegood." she said, looking at the secretary with a silent question in her eyes.
"Oh, he's one of our company's tree trimmers. He resigned Wednesday of last week. That drawer is where we keep all of our resignation letters." she said distractedly, keeping her eyes on him the entire time, while she simultaneously coiled a strand of her dull hair around her finger.
"Did Mr. Lovegood have a daughter?" Hermione asked, drawing the secretary's attention back to herself.
"Might have." she said with a shrug, before turning her eyes back to Tom.
Her obvious dismissal did nothing to deter his little beauty, and she continued to ask the stupid bint questions. "She would be somewhere around eighteen or nineteen years old," Hermione said, "Somewhat windchaffed? She would've appeared to be plain but still pretty? She would have dirty blonde hair. And about this tall." she continued, indicating with her hand, how tall she believed the girl to be.
Harper, slit her eyes at Hermione for a moment before speaking in a sharp, annoyed tone. "Maybe. I don't know. I don't keep company with these people."
Tom turned to Hermione before asking, "What is it about this Xenophilus Lovegood character, that you find so peculiar?
"I just thought it was curious that in his resignation letter, he left his phone number. But didn't leave an address." she said with a shrug.
"Ahh, I see." Tom said thoughtfully before continuing, "So because he didn't leave his address, you believe he has something to hide?" Hermione shrugged in response and Tom knew it was because she did'nt want to put too much weight on the matter.
"After spending the past few minutes going through all of these files, one thing was made glaringly clear, everyone else that recently resigned, left an address to reach them at." Hermione said to him before turning back to the secretary. "Would you happen to have an address for Mr. Lovegood?"
The woman nodded in response and stepped around the both of them, purposefully rubbing herself against Tom's front as she did so. This was the final strike for Tom personally. He couldn't believe that she would even deign herself worthy of his affections, let alone be forward enough to actually invade his personal space in this manner. But the rage that shot across Hermione's face at her actions, made a pleased smirk cross Tom's face. So she was jealous... Now this was interesting. He let the annoying little bint fish around in the drawer before him, until she finally pulled out Mr. Lovegood's employee file and handed it over to Hermione.
"Can I have the rest of his employee information as well as the employee info of all the other tree trimmers, both currently employed by this company and those that have recently resigned as well." she said through gritted teeth.
After some shuffling around on the secretary's behalf, Hermione, Tom, and Harper began to haul file boxes from the makeshift office building and to the trunk of Tom's car. On impulse, Tom accidentally knocked over a file box from the trunk, scattering papers.
"Oh damn it," Tom exclaimed, shocking the two women with his language as he bent to go retrieve the papers. Harper instantly dropped down to help him as he expected, and with a roll of her eyes, Hermione bent to help him as well.
"I got it." Hermione said dismissively as she motioned for him to get up, "Just go get the last box of files, and I'll get this up." she said before leaning over to whisper, "If you stay out here doing this, then this idiot will never let us be, just go get the box so we can go see the Lovegood man and see if he's a suspect." With a nod, Tom stood and went back into the office as Hermione and Harper picked up the pages.
After Tom entered the office, he stopped to listen to the creaking of the door hinges as it swung and latched closed with a resounding CLICK. He peeked out the window and saw Hermione and the secretary still cleaning up the mess that he made outside. Satisfied, Tom walked over to the abandoned secretary desk and picked up the phone with his sleeve. He pulled a pen from her writing supply cup, and typed in the number he saw on the resignation letter he saw earlier. He waited patiently for someone to answer the ringing telephone.
"Hello?" he heard a girlish voice say, once the phone had been answered. She sounded dreamy, almost like she was floating in a constant state of somnolence.
"Hello, is your father home?" Tom asked, not wasting any time.
"Yeah," the voice said before continuing. "Just hold on a second and I'll get him." and then Tom could hear her calling out to her father, "Dad!" she exclaimed, voice sounding like an elevated form of a whisper. "Phone for you!" she sing songed at the end. After a small rustling sound a much harder tone met him on the other line of the phone.
"Hello?" the man said.
"Is this a Mister Xenophilus Lovegood?" Tom asked, making sure he had the right man on the phone.
"Yes." The man said, confirming his identity to Tom.
"Good," Tom said, with a smile on his face, "Mister Lovegood, you don't know me and unfortunately I suspect that we'll never properly meet. But regardless of this, I decided to give you this is a courtesy call. Now I need you to listen to me very carefully." Tom said before pausing to let his words settle in before making sure the man heard him. "I hope I have your attention Mr. Lovegood, are you listening?
"Yes..." the man said hesitantly.
"Good." Tom said, before pausing for dramatic effect. "They know." he finished and then hung up before the man could respond.
Tom turned and grabbed the last box of files and happily strolled out of the door and to the car where Hermione was putting the last few papers back into their file box. She popped the lid onto the top of the box, and stood up and met Tom's eyes.
Tom looked at her with a smile on his face before switching the box over to one hand and reaching into his pocket to remove his car keys to pass them back over to her.
"Get in and start it up, I'll put the rest of this in the trunk," He said, gesturing to the box in his arm and the box on the ground that she just sealed. Hermione took his car keys and turned to get in the car. He popped the two boxes into the trunk and closed it with a dull thud. Tom could barely hide his smirk as he walked around to the other side of the car, and climbed into the passenger side. Eager to see what his phone call had wrought. Hermione looked at him once, sharing a cautious smile with him, as she put the car in drive and pulled off.
They arrived at Xenophilus Lovegood's house after a silent thirty minute drive. After putting the car in park, she dug into her purse and pulled out a small bottle of aspirin. She dumped a few out and popped them into her mouth, as she silently sat behind the wheel of the car. Tom unbuckled his seatbelt on the passenger side with a hint of excitement and a smile on his face. Deciding to lag behind, Tom watched Hermione get out and begin making her way over to the house, before turning to slowly exit the car himself.
Tom watched in gleeful amusement when halfway to the front door, it burst open to reveal a bloodied blonde haired woman. Hermione ran to the bleeding, wheezing woman. The woman fell down the porch steps in a heap, the door slamming shut behind her as she fell. Tom thought for a moment that her alabaster skin was in sharp contrast to the crimson liquid pouring out of it. Even from where he stood, he could see multiple puncture wounds across her torso and arms. He watched as the woman tried to grasp the front of Hermione's dress, streaking and staining the silken material with her blood.
"TOM!" he heard Hermione scream from across the yard and hurried across the grass to kneel next to Hermione over the woman. He reached out and grabbed a hold of her hand as well as the disgustingly cold hand of the woman lying at the bottom of the stairs. He looked at her and hoped he sounded as distressed as he needed to as he frantically told her that he would handle this and to go inside and check for the suspect.
The moment he locked eyes with her he saw how frantic she was as she fearfully squeezed his wrist in her free hand, and he knew right then and there that this would be a make or break moment for her. He watched as her hand tentatively reached beneath her dress and pulled her gun from the lace thigh holster she had hidden there. He was surprised by this, he already knew from what Dumbledore had told him, that she had never used her gun before. So he watched in mild astonishment as she stood and shot out the lock of the door knob before pushing the door open and walking inside. The moment Tom lost sight of Hermione, he looked down into the eyes of the woman beneath him as he pried her slick, red fingers from his wrist; relishing the look of hurt he saw in her eyes and savoring her last few flickers of pain and fear as they flitted across her face. He watched with a smile as her last breath finally left her mouth, and her unseeing eyes stayed trained on him.
Once he was certain that she had died, Tom stood and dusted his clothing off before strolling casually into the house, barely sparing a second glance at the lifeless body of the woman lying on the ground. He deliberately stepped over her, only coming to a halt once he got into the front hall, and began listening closely.
"THIS IS THE LAST TIME THAT I'M GOING TO SAY THIS! DROP. THE. WEAPONS!" he heard her scream, before the sound of gunshots rang out. BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!
At this sound Tom became worried. Did that Lovegood idiot have a gun? Was he trying to shoot his woman?
Tom ran into the kitchen and was shocked by the sight laid before him; lying on the floor in a pool of blood were father and daughter- both suffering from multiple gun shot wounds and holding.. were those knives? Tom wondered as he noticed the light catching the objects that were gripped in their dying hands. He looked at Hermione and saw just how shaken she was and Tom knew that this was the moment that he had been waiting for, this was the make or break moment. He could let her allow this moment to ruin her, or he could use it to propel her deeper into his own dark life.
"Hermione, come here." he said, motioning for her to cross the room over to where he stood. "You're okay." Tom assured her as he pulled her trembling form into his waiting arms, "Everything is going to be okay." he said, hiding his smirking face in her curls as he spoke, and relishing in the feel of her closeness as she clutched on to the fine material of his personally tailored suit.
AN: Sooooo. Is this story interesting enough for you guys to want me to continue it? Let me know with a comment.