With you in my Arms

7. "You are kidding! Right?"

She didn't see that he sighed in relief as she didn't ask who exactly the Slytherin was, he had been talking about.

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Harry arrived at the Ministry a bit earlier than usual. He wanted to make sure, that his fellow aurors who had agreed to help him with Rita Skeeter were ready and knew, what should be happening.

Neville Longbottom was normally the specialist for everything related to herbology within the Auror Office, but it had turned out that he had a rather strange ability when it came to interviewing suspects. He had managed to get confessions out of some of the most hardened Death Eaters without even saying a word. Even Kingsley Shaklebolt, the Minister for Magic, had been impressed.

Neville would be waiting for the interviewee today.

A Daily Prophet was lying on his desk, as Harry entered his office to check his schedule. His glance fell on the headline.

Malfoy Heir Missing!?

A special report by Rita Skeeter

He picked up the paper and stared reading the article.

We have received the disturbing news that Draco Malfoy, heir to the Malfoy name and fortune, has not been seen now for a week. There was no answer when our reporter, Rita Skeeter, had been trying to get an interview with the elusive wizard. Mr. Malfoy had been becoming rather reclusive lately, but it seemed he had decided to cut all ties with the world.

We then received news from a close friend of Mr. Malfoy, Miss Pansy Parkinson, who hinted that she would be able to shed some light on his eccentricities of late. She indicated that his withdrawal from public life was due to his upcoming nuptials with Miss Parkinson. She smiled as she recalled him being busy with the preparations. Asked, since when she and Mr. Malfoy were engaged she held up her hand and indicated, that it was four month already.

There is the suspicion that he has gone off somewhere to prepare for their honeymoon and will be returning shortly.

We congratulate the happy couple and wish them all the best.

Harry felt physically sick. This was worse than anything this person had been writing so far. Then he suddenly realised what would happen, if Hermione got hold of a newspaper. This headline would knock the bottom out off her world. She would think of him as the ultimate traitor. Engaged and still fathering a child with her. He sat down, rested his elbows on the tabletop and held his head in his hands.

It was going to kill her! Then he stopped for a moment and thought about it a bit more. He was in St. Mungo's because he had read the newspaper and thought she had found somebody else. How was that making any sense, when he was engaged and should regard Hermione as just another conquest? It didn't make any sense.

He looked at it from different angles, but it always came back to the fact, that he had reacted rather emotional to the news, Hermione would be with another wizard. If he had not been sincere with her, he wouldn't have done anything as drastic as he did. So, Malfoy had a soft spot for his best friend, who was going to be the mother to his child. And the witch in question? What was her take on things? Did she feel something for the ferret? He assumed she did as she hadn't considered, not even for an instant, not having the baby.

The bottom line was they were going to have a child together and both seemed to be having feelings for each other. He would need to talk to Ginny about this mess.

Ginny!

He wrote a quick note, begging her to make sure their friend didn't read the paper.

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