Thank you for reading! I don't own any of Harry Potter! Please let me know if you enjoy! Updates every Saturday!
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The Minister for Magic routinely made appearances throughout the Ministry, but Tom frequented the Auror Department far more than any other in the weeks following Harriet's return.
Harriet had never been very skillful at recognizing romantic advances.
She saw the chats Tom stopped to have with her and the lunch hours they shared as nothing more than old friends reconnecting after years spent apart.
Tom had a plethora of stories to tell about his days spent working as an apprentice in the Ministry.
Harriet had more than a few adventures to relay that she had experienced during her travels, to all of which Tom eagerly listened.
He heard the words his beloved spoke, but as she talked, he couldn't stop marveling at her emerald eyes or her perfect, pink lips.
A day never passed where he hadn't spent his time with Harriet wishing she would drop her inhibitions and let him place a kiss on her soft mouth.
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The Head Auror and the Minister for Magic both enjoyed eating lunch together.
In fact, a month after Harriet's return, it became a widely accepted fact that the two dignitaries would pass the noon hour in one another's company.
Sometimes they ordered in and sometimes they went out.
One day, ten minutes till noon, Tom walked into the Auror Department, ready to collect Harriet and accompany her to lunch.
Every day, he attempted to pay, and every day, Harriet refused.
He had brushed that evidence aside, but as he walked down the hallway that morning, he found Harriet talking with Ronald Weasley at his desk.
The smiles on their faces ignited Tom's fury.
As Ron uttered some sort of joke Tom failed to hear, the hair on the back of his neck prickled as Harriet tossed her head back and gave a hearty laugh of genuine amusement.
On the verge of flying into a murderous rage fueled by jealousy, Tom slipped into Harriet's office and watched them both by raising a single slat of the blinds that covered her window.
His dark eyes narrowed as they continued their harmless conversation for a moment before Harriet slowly began to back away.
Tom spied Ron's wedding band and Harriet's bare ring finger before she turned around and left.
Ron waved to her in friendly fondness before he focused on his work once again.
Tom growled as he heard Harriet's approaching footsteps.
Quickly, he sought to disguise his true purpose in her office as he sat in her chair and opened a drawer, intent on feigning an alleged need.
What he found in her drawer widened his dark eyes.
As Harriet's footsteps drew closer, Tom lifted a small bottle filled with oddly-shaped pills as he read the label:
Prenatal Pasties - Designed for the Expectant Witch
Assists with Fetal Development, Maternal Health, and Stability
Take Daily for Best Results
As the doorknob turned warningly, Tom hurriedly stuffed the pills into the pocket of his robes while a thousand, nauseating questions raced through his mind.
Had Harriet found a mate?
Had she……Had she married?
Was she having an affair with Weasley?
If not, then who had sired-
Determined to find answers, Tom smiled charmingly at Harriet as she entered the room, "Hello, Harriet. Forgive my intrusion, but I've come looking for the dossier on Delinenan. I don't see it anywhere…..Do you care to give it to me?"
"Oh……of course not, Tom." Harriet blinked before she smiled, walked over, and retrieved it from a drawer on the opposite side of her desk, "There you are."
"Thank you." Tom nodded as he took the useless files. He used every ounce of self-control he possessed not to scream as he calmly asked, "Are you ready?"
"Yeah, I am." She said as she yawned and grabbed her sweater, "Let's be off, then."
As they traveled to a small cafe in Diagon Alley they had agreed to visit earlier that morning, Tom couldn't understand what had happened.
He had passed by many expectant mothers before on the street, in social situations, even during Ministry meetings.
The scent of a pregnant omega was very distinct, yet he couldn't detect that same smell from Harriet at all.
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"So then, how's your day?" Harriet asked as they ate their meal a few moments later.
"My day's been perfectly fine." Tom lied, "How is yours, Harriet?"
"Fine too." She shrugged nonchalantly.
Instead of risking her detection by reading her thoughts with a silent bit of Legilimency, Tom cleared his throat and asked, "Any news?"
"News about what?" Harriet blinked as she looked up from her plate.
"Oh, anything really, I suppose." Tom goaded, "Professionally, personally……in the paper."
Harriet shrugged again as she took another bite, chewed, swallowed, and said, "I haven't gotten a chance to read the paper yet, but I haven't heard much. Is there something I will? What happened? Was it a crime?"
Her expression changed to determined concentration as Tom cautiously held up a hand and said, "No, I……Not to my current knowledge, I was only wondering. I've been busy this morning and haven't had time to glance over The Prophet at all. My aides haven't brought any urgent matters to my attention."
"Ah." Harriet nodded, "Brilliant…..that's good, I suppose. A slow day is a safe day for the public."
"Yes." Tom said as he narrowed his eyes at his darling while she looked down at her plate to scrape the last bit of her lunch onto her fork.
Harriet failed to realize her cryptic words only put those closer to her in more danger.
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If Harriet had not become a trained Auror, Tom would have read her thoughts at the table.
He was unable to push aside his own intrusive imagination during the hours that followed.
Tom worked through his assigned tasks with a l
bitter snarl on his face before the hours of the business day gradually came to a screeching halt.
Ten minutes till five, Tom made certain he went to the Auror Department and bid Harriet goodnight as she went home for the evening.
After Harriet left, Tom slipped into Harriet's office and watched the other aurors file out the door.
Where were they going?
To their families?
Tom gnashed his teeth as he lurked in Harriet's darkened office and thought.
If only she hadn't been sent away, then they could have already had a family……..
He peered through the blinds on Harriet's windows and waited for his prey to emerge from the cubicle at the farthest left point in the department's hallway.
He and Harriet could have married and-
From his stealthy perch inside Harriet's vacant office, Tom watched Ron stand from his chair and pull his coat on.
Thinking he was the last one left in the abandoned Auror Department, Ron yawned casually as he collected his bag and began to walk from the cubicles towards the door that led to the Ministry's main lobby.
Tom slipped out of Harriet's office as stealthily as death itself.
Ron didn't even realize a dark curse had been cast against him until his wrists were pulled together by a black, magical bond and his shoes lifted from the floor.
"In a hurry, are you, Weasley?" A mirthless chuckle called out as Ron gasped.
"W-What?! W-Who are you?!" Ron cried as he struggled.
Although he was a professional auror, Tom still managed to make Ron uneasy by restricting access to his wand.
Ron's eyes widened as Tom calmly stepped out of the shadows with an arrogant smirk on his handsome face.
"Tell me, Weasley……" He sighed as he walked up to Ron and laid a hand on his leg, "What is it like…….touching her? Kissing her? Being beside her?"
"M-Minister! W-What are you talking about?!" Ron sputtered.
"Don't play daft with me!" Tom roared, "THIS!" He cried as he retrieved Harriet's bottle of pastilles from his cloak's pocket and shoved the container into Ron's sight.
Ron blinked as he tried to balance his disbelief and terror while simultaneously reading the bottle the Minister for Magic had pushed in front of him.
"...What?" Ron scowled as he glanced from the bottle to Tom.
"These belong to Harriet Potter!" Tom snarled as he yanked the bottle away and stuffed it back into his pockets, "I saw you with her all the time years ago, Weasley! I can only assume you two have struck up some sort of mating arrangement right under my nose! How dare you show the-"
"-Harriet doesn't have a mate!" Ron interrupted.
Tom stopped talking as he narrowed his eyes.
"And if she did, it wouldn't be me, anyway!" Ron snapped, "It's never…..Harriet and I have never been more than friends!"
"...She has no mate?" Tom glared.
"No!" Ron shouted. He frowned as he asked, "Now would you mind putting me down so I can go home?"
"If she has no mate, then why is she with child?" Tom demanded, "Why does she have these?!"
"She-She wants to be a Mum!" Ron cried as Tom lifted him higher, "She told me she's getting ready……Maybe those are part of it? I don't know! Those are the sorts of things we don't discuss in detail!"
"Then how would you know her desires?!" Tom shouted as he lifted Ron towards the department's tall ceiling.
"Because she said 'I want to be a Mum, Ron. I've consulted the healers at St. Mungo's.' Please! Put me down!" Ron cried as his eyes widened in fear.
Tom clutched his wand in his hand and pointed it at Ron while he thought.
His captive's cries for mercy were drown out by his own contemplative thoughts as he considered the situation.
It was quite a rarity for an unmated omega to seek parenthood by themselves, but Tom understood Harriet's headstrong nature better than most.
As Ron pleaded and writhed above him, Tom's jaw went slack as he envisioned Harriet roaming around, looking for a suitable father for her unborn baby.
He could easily sire a child.
A wicked smirk spread across his handsome face.
Yes, he decided he would do his best to sweep her into his bed, his home, and his life.
"Minister, please! I've told you everything I know!" Ron bellowed.
His cry snapped Tom out of his brooding trance, who scowled up at his hostage and freed him with a single slashing motion of his pale wand.
"AAAAAGGGHHH!" Ron shouted as he instantly hurtled towards the ground.
While he watched his own death rush towards him, his survival instincts kicked in as he blurted out, "Arresto Momentum!"
Tom casually walked away while Ron narrowly escaped his own grizzly end behind him as the impact of his fall disappeared just before his body touched the floor.
Content with making calculated plans for the next day, Tom smiled to himself while he left the Auror Department.
After he had gone, Ron staggered to his feet and clutched his racing heart.