DISCLAIMER: Teddy Lupin, Victoire Weasley and all the other Harry Potter characters are property of JK Rowling, not me; no copyright infringement is intended.

A/N: I didn't intend to have Bill Weasley come up so quickly, but sometimes the characters just get a mind of their own :P Sorry for the delay – I had some stuff on. Thanks so much for all the lovely reviews :)

The Art of Being Subtle

Chapter Nine – Bill

Shell Cottage – 23rd July – 6:12pm

When Fleur had told her husband, back in April, that she had to spend some time in Switzerland during the second week of the kids' summer holidays because of her work in the International Department at the bank, and she was unable to rearrange it, he had smiled benignly at her and told her not to fret. Honestly, he was Bill Weasley. He had spent his twenties fighting the toughest curses known to wizarding kind in Egypt, and then, on his return to England, Dark Wizards and of course Lord Voldemort in the second wizarding war.

His own job at the bank always required the utmost diplomacy with his dealings with the goblins, and there had been more than one occasion when things had become rather nasty, and he'd ended up in St. Mungos, with bright green tentacles sticking out of the top of his head, or something equally as embarrassing. He still did some curse breaking as well, and although the curses were not as severe as the ones found in Egypt, the slightest errors could result in very nasty consequences – most notably, that time when he'd woken up to find . . . well, he really didn't want to go into it. Suffice to say, though, his job didn't just involve sitting in an office and counting money.

Then there was the fact that he was the oldest of seven children raised by the indomitable Molly Weasley. He'd seen his mother go through the whole teenage thing with six other kids, and he'd sometimes ended up mediating between the twins and their mother, when the three of them had been arguing exceptionally badly. He'd had experience of teenagers. How hopeless did his wife think he was?

Fleur had smiled in a rather worried way, and assured him that, if she could possibly, possibly rearrange things, she would. In the event, she hadn't been able to, and so, four days previously, she'd left for Switzerland, with an enormous suitcase and a slight feeling of foreboding in her heart. It wasn't that she didn't think her husband would be able to cope with their three kids for four days and three nights . . . except that it totally was.

And in the end, it had been Bill who had been wrong, and his wife who had been right, as usual.

On the first day that she left, Victoire and Dominique had gotten into a massive argument about something (he had no idea what), and he'd ended the day yelling at both of them and sending them both to their rooms as though they were five again.

He'd gone to bed, thinking that if his wife had been here, she'd not only have known what was going on between them, she'd have fixed things so that neither of them were angry at each other anymore, and the issue would never arise again, and probably managed to secure world peace whilst she was at it. As it was, he'd risen with trepidation the following morning, fully expecting to spend another day from keeping his daughters from tearing each others' hair out, and attempting to complete a report on the latest treasures that had come in from Argentina, whilst preventing sororicide.

Hearing raised female voices, he made his way wearily down to the kitchen, whereupon he found his two girls, united for once, in their common mission against their brother, who had somehow managed to trick both girls into using a shampoo that had turned their hair green (Bill made a mental note to advise George not to let his son have too many Wheezes' product, else he'd be the one scraping Louis's remains off the carpet). The pair of them had not forgiven him and spent the rest of the day hexing and jinxing him, and Louis had responded in equal measure, so by the end of the second day, the house looked as though a reducto curse had hit it.

On the third day of his wife's trip, Molly, Lucy and Roxanne had come over in the morning which resulted in long periods of shrieking punctuated by peals of laughter, and almost as soon as they'd gone, James and Freddie had come round, which resulted in periods of prolonged silence punctuated with the odd loud bang and cry of shock. Somehow, this was much more terrifying than a gaggle of over excitable teenage girls.

There had, amazingly, been no arguments that day – indeed, the end of the day was positively peaceful with a delicious spaghetti bolognaise cooked by Victoire, and a late evening game of Quidditch (Dominique and himself vs. Victoire and Louis – he and Dom were alright, Louis was pretty good and Victoire was hopeless so they were pretty evenly matched).

All the same, he was looking forward to his wife coming home – obviously, because he missed her, but also because every little thing with the kids became ten times as stressful when she wasn't there to handle things.

The owl arrived at around half past seven on the morning of the twenty third, and Bill recognised his wife's handwriting with a sinking feeling. This cannot be good, he thought, opening the letter.

Bill—

The man I was supposed to be meeting yesterday came down with food poisoning, so we had to postpone our meeting until today. To cut a long story short, this, and various other things that depended on this, mean that I won't be home until late this evening (they wanted me to stay for a fifth day, but I told them I had to be home by tomorrow). I'll be in around nine thirty/ten o'clock tonight. I'm sure you're coping well, though.

Give my love to the children, & please ask Victoire and Dominique if one of them took my pink top from my suitcase – I'm sure I packed it.

I miss you.

All my love,

Fleur xx

He sighed and rolled over. Today was going to be a long day.

It hadn't been that bad, he reflected, at six o'clock that evening. Everyone was still alive, with all the correct limbs in all the correct places, which was a definite bonus.

Except . . .

Except, he really wanted to know what was going on with Victoire. She'd been so . . . good all day, and he couldn't quite put his finger on what was going on. In the morning, she'd been sunny and cheerful (which, in a normal person, wouldn't have been something worth commenting on, Bill supposed, but given his daughter's usual surliness in the mornings, it was on a par with Fleur waking up ugly, or Harry not being famous), sorting out the stuff for breakfast and fixing and argument between Dominique and Louis (he'd somehow managed to turn her hair green again, and she'd been ready to kill him, but Victoire had somehow managed to smooth out the whole situation without it resulting in World War Three). She'd spent the rest of the morning cleaning and dusting the house (without being asked!!) and then made everyone lunch.

In the afternoon, she'd gone out into the garden, taking her school books and several stacks of parchment, and had worked through the afternoon, disappearing inside at around four o'clock. There were bath running-sounds coming from the bathroom, and then pretty much silence coming from upstairs.

Some people would say that that was a good thing. A perfectly behaved daughter, who cooks, cleans and makes herself scarce when she's not doing something useful. Anybody who said that would not have been someone who had had children. Perfect behaviour plus near silence always equalled Up To Something.

The question was, what?

He'd left his office (Shell Cottage had been extended over the years, rather like the Burrow, to cope with children, and both his and Fleur's need to work from home sometimes) and wandered into the kitchen, spotting his younger daughter cooking. "Hey, Dom, smells good," he said. "What you got cookin'?"

She pulled a face. "Just reheating something Maman left," she said. "I'm not much of a cook, and Vic isn't around to help today."

"Where's she gone?" he asked.

"Nowhere, yet," she replied. "But she's heading off later with—oh, here she is now. You can ask her yourself." He turned and saw his eldest daughter in the doorway.

"Wow, Victoire, that's almost a skirt you've got on!" he commented dryly. His daughter made a face at him.

"It's fine, Dad. It's just the light that makes it look shorter," she dismissed, tugging on the hem a little. He raised an eyebrow.

"The light?" he asked. "And anyway, where do you think you're going?"

"Out?" she tried.

"Out? With whom?" he asked.

"Oh, just a bunch of people from school," Victoire said. "Remember my friend Beth? And Molly, of course. And . . . you know the Woods, right? Evan, and Jess, his twin. And . . . um . . . Beth's boyfriend, and . . . just some general people, really."

"How many boys will there be?" he demanded.

"Relax, Dad," she said. "We're just going for a barbeque on the beach. Most of the boys already have girlfriends. And anyway, Teddy's coming, he'll make sure no one gets their hands on me, I'm sure!" she said. Behind him, Dominique appeared to be chocking on something. He turned around and asked her if she was OK.

"Fine, fine," she said, rather blithely.

"Well, just as long as—" he began, addressing Victoire, but was cut off by a knock on the kitchen door, and they looked up to see Teddy. "Ah, Mr. Lupin," he said. "I'd like to request that you keep an eye on Victoire tonight." He narrowed his eyes.

"Of course I will," said Teddy, winking at Victoire, who smiled and looked away, as though remembering some private joke.

"Now, young lady, we really need to discuss that skirt – or lack of it," Bill began. He was interrupted by a loud shriek from behind him, and a great crash as Dominique and the three plates she'd been carrying, crashed to the floor in a heap of broken cutlery and tangled limbs. "Great Merlin, Dom! Be careful! Are you OK?" he helped her to her feet, and demanded to see her hand, which she was holding tenderly as she sobbed loudly. It was bleeding, though not badly, and he hurried to find their first aid box.

"We'll just be going then," Victoire said.

"I—yes, whatever. Don't be out too late," he said distractedly. He didn't turn around as she and Teddy left, which was probably a good thing, as he'd have seen Dominique's wink directed towards her sister, Victoire mouth "thank you" and Dominique mouth "you owe me" back at her.

All the same, though, he couldn't help thinking, once the kitchen was back to it's usual state, he wished he knew what the joke was between his eldest daughter and a certain Mr. Lupin. There was definitely something going on between them, but he couldn't quite put his finger on what . . .