Don't Stop Me Now

cissab​:

Benjy presses her for the information that Narcissa doesn’t feel too keen on sharing. It’s nothing personal; she’s a private person going through an emotionally turbulent time. She’s exhausted with the secret keeping, sure, but that doesn’t mean she’s ready to start blurring the lines of personal and professional. Narcissa has always prided herself on keeping who she is at her core out of her business. Sure, her values and her beliefs are a part of what makes her firm so successful, as is she, but none of her clients are exactly people she would consider to be friends – not because she doesn’t like them or because she wouldn’t want to be, simply because she has intentionally excluded them from knowing her. 

So when Benjy presses and looks for her rings, she nudges some papers over and turns her chair toward her computer, working on pulling up his file. If he’s going to stay, they’re going to work. Maybe, just maybe, she will feel emotionally exhausted enough by the end to cave into the drink Benjy will inevitably offer. She could use it and, at the end of the day, she does like his company. 

“We’ve been separated for a year, but only recently decided to inform our families.” This is as much as she wants to get into this right now. The complications of why they got married in the first place and why they’re only physically separating now are lengthy, and discussion of them absolutely crosses Narcissa’s invisible boundaries. 

It’s Benjy’s offer to leave that finally manages to snag Narcissa’s attention. She sighs softly and rolls her shoulders before leaning back slightly in her chair. “If you’re here to work you can stay, but I’m not exactly in the mood to talk about my marriage with my client right now.” She’s blunt, but her tone has lost the vicious edge from earlier.

“I forgive you, Benjy. Stopped wearing that kicked puppy look; it doesn’t suit you.” It does suit him. He’s very good at it, and it’s pathetic enough to make Narcissa feel a bit guilty for her snappy outburst earlier.

“I’m not wearing anything.” Benjy pouts, crossing his arms over his chest and settling in the chair across from her desk. 

“I’ll drop it after this, but uh, my mum left my dad you know, and uh-they’re both much better for it. So-”

He smiles softly before shurgging, leaving his sentence unfinished. He hands over the Witch Weekly issue with his grinning face on it, an older photo from last year’s press tour. The magazine is crumpled and creased from being in his fidgeting hands. 

“Did they reach out to you about this before publishing it? I’d like to do an interview or something, get newer pictures and push the team a bit more-hate for MacGurdy to accuse me of being self centered again, despite how true it is.”

“Or they could even, I dunno, come do it during a practice? Take some pictures of me actually flying and doing my thing instead of just talking about my hair products-they got it wrong by the way, if that matters. But that’s what I was thinking about on the way over, cause you’re always on about how we have to shift focus away from my er, personal life-”

He catches her eye and almost flinches-the intensity of Narcissa’s full attention is something that Benjy still isn’t used to. He wonders then if Narcissa’s aggressive approach of presenting Benjy as more professional had anything to do with what she’s going through. Probably not. But it doesn’t take a genius to recongize personal affairs are important to her. 

Something sinks deep inside him, a mix of dread and excitment and sadness, as he realizes Narcissa is single now. She’d never go for him-even if he wasn’t her client. Lucius Malfoy was everything Benjy wasn’t, save for wealth, and even then Benjy had aquirred his in a way that most men of Narcissa’s caliber would look down their nose at. Excitment because his dick thinks faster than his brain, and both of them are stupidly confident. Sadness wove between the two, realizing how much pain she must be in, remembering how sad his mum was despite how happy she ultimately was with the choice to leave Benjy’s father. He’d lied to her a moment ago; the divorce had made his dad much worse,  Benjy hadn’t seen him in years. He had enough tact to keep that to himself, at least.

There’s something else there, something dangerous and stupid, a thrill like Benjy has never known. The possibilty of her, actually tangible, however fleeting, does something to Benjy’s heart that he can’t look at too closely. He was supposed to be done fighting losing battles-though he’d always been quite shit at doing what he was supposed to do, particularly when it came to chasing a thrill.

Benjy knows Narcissa would be far more than a pasisng thrill, and perhaps that scares him and excites him the most. He loudly clears his throat, looking away and willing himself not to do something truly stupid, like blush.

Devil: is there anything you're addicted to?

"Alcohol. Got the soberity chips to prove it."

Rhiannon: Have you ever been betrayed?

"By my own shit judgement? Absolutely."

akingsransom​:​

Kingsley dodges his co-worker’s paper missile and chuckles. “Thank Merlin, we’re saved.” He stands and claps as he walks over to Benjy’s desk and bows. “London is a safer place with you back, mate.” He sits in his desk chair and rocks back and forth. Honestly he was thrilled to have Benjy back in action, the Auror’s office had saddled him with a rookie in his absence and the boy was certainly slowing him down. “I’m not sure I could’ve lasted another day with Hines, kid isn’t ready. A massive liability, if you ask me.”

He pokes at Benjy’s plant, watching its leaves sway back and forth. “You ask as if you haven’t been keeping tabs on everything that’s been going on here since you left. Weekly reports don’t just go missing, you know.” Kingsley smirks and crosses his legs. “But, now that you’re back, you can accompany me to this building on Downing Street. Spotted some characters coming in and out. Couldn’t investigate with the boy.”

“Hey, they wanted him to learn from the best but he was on Desk Duty, so they stuck him with you.”

Benjy chuckles and pulls his coat back on. 

“Downing Street? Smugglers probably. Is this an investigate, investigation or a knock skulls on pavement investigation?”

“Wait, actually don’t tell me, I don’t want them to stick me back behind the desk this oon, your ass is taking the fall this time, Shackelbolt.”

Of course there was the obvious option of sticking to the rules and not getting into trouble, but Benjy was under no delusions. 

cissab​:

Narcissa considers herself a fairly patient person. She has to be, given her line of work. Her work with Benjy never would have come this far if she couldn’t withstand so much – that’s how it is for most of her clients. Often, the most difficult ones are some of the most successful and it takes a certain type of person to help them reach even higher peaks. 

And yet, when Benjy uses her ex-husband’s name despite the fact that she *never* took it – not really, the very thin thread of patience she’d been holding onto for the past year snaps. 

“Not a missus anymore, Benjy, and I’ve never been a Malfoy.” There’s a bite to her tone that is cold but venomous, a sort of angry that she so rarely lets out. 

“If you’re going to be snide, at least get your facts straight.” She grabs her tea and heads toward her office, pushing past him when he doesn’t immediately step aside. “If you’re not interested in getting work done you can take your leave. I’m sure my mother would appreciate it if I picked Draco up early.”

The anger in him dies like a flower after the frost as she pushes past him. 

“Nars-” 

Narcissa doesn’t glance back, just continues on her way to her desk. Her perfume is clean, floral, expensive, and it lingers, sinking into Benjy like the regret filling up his stomach. He approaches her office door, leaning against the frame, watching her in silence for a moment.

“Okay, look I was out of line. I’m sorry.” The apology weighs heavily, blanketing more than just his piss baby attitude.

She doesn’t respond and he doesn’t expect her to. Benjy sighs.

“Why didn’t you-” He stops himself. He knows why Narcissa wouldn’t tell him, she’s the most private person he knows. 

Benjy studies her, watching Narcissa look anywhere but at him. He sees it now, the signs he was too wrapped up in himself to see. Bags under her eyes poking through her makeup, the extra cups of coffee on her desk. He glances at her left hand and wants to bash his own head in. She wasn’t wearing her wedding ring, nor the massive engagement ring...how the hell had he missed that? She senses him, she must, because Narcissa pointedly moves a stack of papers in front of her. 

“Hey.” Benjy says, chucking a balled up wad of paper over the cublicle wall at Kingsley’s head. 

“They’re letting me off early for good behavior.”

Benjy puts the box of his personal things back on his old desk. “Cleared for the field, mate. You think they’d know better than to give me the standard evaluation as if I haven’t had the responses memorized.”

He sets the plant Seamus got him for father’s day back on his desk. He’s digging around for the commemorative bobblehead of himself that he found in a charity shop and keeps talking.

“What’d I miss?”

“And yet Im the idiotic that keeps trying to get him to help me.” Alice mused, rolling her eyes. She honestly just thought that maybe just maybe one time he’d give in and help her. But, she probably should just admit defeat, and come to terms with the fact that he was really not going to help.

“Yeah….” Alice had read through the files enough to know all the nitty gritty details. She’d wrote them out on post it notes, and spent hours trying to tie them altogether. Something in her gut was just telling her that they were connected. She just needed someone other than herself to see it too. “Makes me no wanna go out after dark….” Luckily it seemed that she was the wrong gender for this one. But, who knew.

“Look at the names….” She murmured, leaning over a pointing at the three surname in general. “All sacred 28. I’m surprised they aren’t kicking up a fuss actually….” She mused, a little absentmindedly as if she didn’t think it was that important. “If it was only two I’d have said it was a coincidence…. but three? I think someone is targeting them.”

-

Benjy raises his eyebrows, having not noticed that yet. 

“It is a decent coincidence, sure.” 

He starts to crack his knuckles one by one, thinking, his brain working too fast to verbalize his thoughts. 

“So-in order for that to be the case, that would require so much survelience...it’d be more than just a single person. Or it’d have to be a person who has no commitments outside of murder. Sounds like pureblood bullshit to me. No offense.” He adds, not particularly caring if he does offend but needing to maintain some shadow of professionalism. 

He pulls out a parchment and writes down the names.

Rosier. Fawley. Burke.

“Half of Azkaban is full of Rosiers, they’re all bad news. Burke is that book store in knockturn, so I could see the connection-but the Fawleys? They’re pretty upstanding...I arrested a nephew or something for vandalism early on in my career but-”

Benjy waves his wand and  three stacks of files shoot out of different cabinets from all across the bull pen, landing neatly in three seperate stacks on his desk. The smallest pile being that of the Fawley family arrest records. Benjy goes past the file in his own family, glancing at the remaining few. 

“A bit of fraud thirty years ago and what looks like a bad seed/domestic murder even before then, but that’s it. I mean-” He gestures to the obiously much more hearty stacks next to them. “What’s the connection beyond the Sacred, eh? They could just be killing at random-I don’t have the numbers but I’m sure there’s more wizards with these sacred names or whatever the hell than not. Why....” He faces her, handing her the piece of parchment with the names, each now underlined thrice. 

“Why would anyone want to kill these three men, specifically? Why target their families-or is it just....” 

Benjy sighs as he runs the probability numbers in his head and knowing it doesn’t look good.

—

“Pretend to be nice?” Emma mused, a smirk on her face as she looked at him. “If it results in you finding me hot I might stop doing it.” Although, she had a feeling if she was mean to him that he would find that equally as hot. He was a frustrating person, and she honestly would do anything in her power to avoid him. It was a shame she couldn’t do that right now.

“I could take you down with just my fist Fenwick” She assured him, a smirk on her face. And she hadn’t missed how he’d checked her out. “But join me if you wish. If it’ll stop you getting even more wasted”

--

He grins lopsidedly at her.

“Was that an invitation? I’d love uh, to show you what I can do on my knees.” 

He moves to touch her hand but her glare stops him short. Benjy stops and faces Emma on the street. 

“Alright-obviously if you’re not...” He trails away as his eyes look Emma up and down. Benjy tries again, softer, meaning it, knowing she’ll kick him in the balls if she needs to and hoping to avoid that.

“You mean to tell me you haven’t wondered? Not even a little bit? Hmm? You think this thing we have, this...energy between us doesn’t mean what I think it means?” 

He grins at her, sweet actually, no malice. 

“I never said you couldn’t handle yourself, darling.That’s never been a question. What is a question, and what I am curious about how you would uh, handle me. Given the chance.”  He raises his eyebrows, just shy of depserate.

cissab​:

Unsurprisingly, Benjy reacts to her obvious distress instantly. He fusses and perhaps at another time Narcissa would appreciate it. She does now – but it’s a complicated thing. She doesn’t want to get into this with her client, but she knows she’s one more significant push from spilling her heart out. 

It’s been a long year. 

Narcissa feels a flash of irritation despite Benjy’s best intentions. She raises a brow, purses her lips just slightly. “What makes you assume this is about you at all, or that I’m in trouble?” There’s a bit more bite than she intends when she says, “Not everything is about you, Benjy.” 

She gives that a moment then a long, tired sigh. “It’s all personal, nothing you need to concern yourself with. If you stopped just randomly showing up at my office it wouldn’t be a discussion point at all.” She’s not trying to be dismissive of his concern; she does appreciate it. Narcissa works hard to keep her professional and private lives very far apart. 

“Thank you for your concern, but give me a few minutes and I’ll be just fine. You wanted to talk about the Witch’s Weekly spot?” Narcissa sounds tired despite the enthusiasm she tries to muster up into her voice.

He rolls his eyes.

“Oh come off it. You’re being ridiculous.”

Benjy chances a glance at her and can’t repress his smirk when he sees more irritation creep onto her face.

“I thought it wasn’t all about me.” He says, lifting his chin and eyebrows, trying and failing to not think for the 19284th time what it’d be like to kiss her. He never would-he’d never be able to live with himself if he broke up a family. Benjy’s heart keeps him steady, but that doesn’t mean his buldger addled brain doesn’t conjure up unhelpful thoughts of what she’d feel like pressed up against him.

“You know what, Mrs. Malfoy?” 

“Forget it.” 

-

It’s been a long day, a long year. Non-contested or not, divorce didn’t get any easier. Draco had questions, always so many questions, when the two of them finally moved out. When she told her parents and her elder sister, questions just seemed to double until everyone was yelling. 

This entire thing was a mess, and the phone call from her aunt had left Narcissa wondering if this was the right call at all. 

Time slipped from her after Walburga had given Narcissa a front-row seat to her mythical temper tantrums. Narcissa stepped away from her computer, leaving her heels tucked under her desk. She rented a single office space with a small conference room, office and break area. There was no one here to impress but herself. Well – until Benjy breezes in. 

Narcissa glances over at him, knowing she must look grim. “I’m – you’re early for your appointment,” she corrects. Narcissa pushes off from the kitchen counter she’d been leaning against and grabbed her tea. “Come on, I can run you through it in my office.”

@seekingbenjy​

“Narcissa.” Benjy says, his voice serious. He touches the side of her arm to get her to look at him. Her face is neutral, but Benjy knows better. 

“Don’t do that. Turn it off for a second, yeah? It’s me, the amount of toilets-literal and metaphorical-you pulled my head out of, you seriously think you still have to...”

Benjy trails off, he resists the urge to take her hand. He stands between Narcissa and the door, trying to prevent her from breezing past him and glossing over the problem, like always. She’d been his publicist for almost four years and the longest professional relationship he’d ever had-Benjy knew he wasn’t an easy client, and he knows just how much he owes to the blonde in front of him. He plays with his fingers, cracking his knuckles one by one and messing with the silver ring on his thumb as he speaks.

“If you’re in some kind of trouble, Nars, please. Let me help. Or if I did something, I mean, for fuck’s sake, let me fix it before you go all Business on me, yeah? Talk to me.” Benjy bites down on his bottom lip-he’s not usually...confrontational isn’t exactly the word, but Narcissa isn’t someone who does well with being told what to do, and Benjy tries to respect that boundary. 

“Or I mean, do whatever you want, but you don’t have to act like I’m some Joe Wankoff from the street.”

Benjy breezes into her office, not even bothering to see if she was in a meeting. Narcissa hated when he did that, and Benjy got to enjoy the show that was her threatening to break his contract. Or his knees. Either way, it was usually a great start to his day.

“How’d you swing this one, eh?”

He presents the Witch Weekly magazine that features a moving paparazzi shot of him grinning. Benjy grins in the exact same way. 

“Quidditch’s sexiest catch?”

“Do you think I’m sexy, Nars?”

Benjy finally sees her face and freezes.

“Are you okay?”

“Bastard.” She cuffs him lightly in the back of the head and grins when he snickers. “I’m waiting for the kettle.”

Right on cue, the kettle emits a low whistle and Cleona crosses back to the stove to take it off the burner. She flicks her wand towards the rack of mugs mounted to the wall and summons two to her hand. Both happen to be works of art by their son presented on their respective birthdays. Cleona’s has “Mama” scrawled in big loopy purple paint strokes made legible with some guidance from Benjy. Benjy’s has “Baba” painted in green with similar aid from Cleona. Both have a smattering of multicolored dots and swirls and Shay still gets excited whenever he sees the two of them using them. Which is why Benjy just keeps his here. They don’t need to acknowledge any further implications there.

She drops a teabag in each mug and pours water over them, Benjy quietly munching on his eggs behind her.

“You want anything else?” she asks, setting his mug in front of him but still not sitting down yet herself.

He raises an eyebrow at her, still chewing on a large bite, and shakes his head. “This is perfect, Cleona.”

She smiles in spite of herself, her cheeks suddenly a bit warm. “It’s just eggs, Benj.”

That same eyebrow shoots up again and she drops it, finally settling in the chair across from him. She watches him over the rim of her mug, his expression falling slightly as he stares down at his eggs.

“Benjy? 

“Hm?” He looks up with a new forced lightness in his tone.

She leans forward in her chair, resting her chin in one hand while keeping her other hand still wrapped around her mug right over her son’s clumsy but heartfelt lettering. “Do you-do you wanna talk about it?”

Benjy sighs, looking down at his mug as he wraps his hands around it, letting the warmth fix what his missing gloves had caused.

“Do I ever?”

“Benj...” He smiles at the mug, noticing for the first time that he has Chai and she has Earl Grey. His ex wife keeping his kind of tea at her house shouldn’t fill him with more warmth than the tea itself. He makes eye contact with her-needing her to know.

“Er...kids saw you know, the worst thing you could imagine. Robbery gone wrong we think. Nothing you know, ‘out of the ordinary’. They were uh...hiding. They’re at Mungos but you know they’re going into the system if their family can’t....”

Benjy clears his throat, looking away from her. 

“I gotta get better at uh, leaving this at work. I’ve gotten a lot better at it, Lo. But sometimes...” He sighs, his hands coming to his temples and pushing his glasses up onto his head. 

“I never want to drink again. I’m never going to. But days like today...” 

He glances at her, she’s blurry and he can’t read her expression. 

“It’s nice to see him.” And you. “Shay you know...my reason. For sobriety, catching bad guys, all that.” And you. 

“Just...thank you for letting me-I get to see him when I need to, Lo. I don’t think you know how rare that is when it comes to divorced dads in the aurory department.”

Benjy smiles at her, he hopes she can see the true genuine emotion in it through how tired he is. He takes a big sip of tea and starts to relax-he knows she put a little bit of the calmness draught he likes in it-he can taste it. His love for her is suddenly overwhelming, it explodes in him like a lightning storm-he knows she can feel it; his ears suddenly feel hot. Benjy clears his throat, hoping to god he control himself and knowing that that’s never been a possibility when it comes to her. His mind wanders to the most recent example a few months ago and he digs his fingernails into his own palm to keep those thoughts at bay.

Cleona tucks a strand fallen from her ponytail behind her ear as she moves to the side to let her ex-husband inside. An urge, still familiar after all these years, to brush the snowflakes from his hair comes over her but she ignores it for both of their sakes.

“He hasn’t been down for too long,” she tells him as she lets the door shut behind him and holds out her arms for his coat. “Bathtime went extra long tonight and then he insisted on a story and you know I couldn’t tell him no.”

Benjy cracks another smile at that as he hands over his coat. “Of course not.”

Cleona hums, brushing the snow from the shoulders before pulling out her wand and sending the coat to the front closet.

“Have you eaten yet tonight?”

Originally posted by saracamerons

The guilt that clouds his expression is answer enough. “Cleona-”

She is already heading off to the kitchen, wand held aloft to set the kettle boiling, as he calls after her. 

“Go see your son,” she cuts him off not unkindly as she turns her head to look at him over her shoulder. A beat passes as they both can’t seem to tear their eyes away from each other. This impossible magnetism between the two of them is torture all on its own, but when Benjy once broached her about finding ways to break it so she could move on, she didn’t speak to him for a full day. From the beginning, she has known that the connection between them was not meant to be broken, no matter what form their relationship ever decided to take. Cleona breaks eye contact first this time to pull down a pan from the cupboard over the sink.

“You’ll feel better,” she adds, quiet enough that she’s not sure if Benjy hears her or not but satisfied when she hears his footsteps on the stairs towards Seamus’ room.

He thinks about arguing but know better-and the way Cleona said “your son” warms his chest enough that he’s able to forget about the cold. He walks softly down the hallway, avoiding the creak in the floor and headed towards Shay’s room at the end of the hall-the faint glow from the orbs of light Cleona always casts into his room so he doesn’t get nightmares.

Benjy isn’t surprised to see a very mischievous and very awake three year old smile when he opens the door.

“You-” Benjy says softly, crossing the room and sitting on his bed with the purple dragon duvet “Are supposed to be in bed.”

“I am, baba!” 

“Don’t get me on a technicality, Seamus Atlas.” 

He smoothes his son’s curls back down but they pop right back up. 

“Sorry I’m here so late, Shaybaby.”

“It’s okay, Momma read me the story about the cackling stump.”

“Babbity Rabbity?” Benjy says, his eyebrows raised, his grin coming easily as Shay nods enthusiastically. 

“Well-I’ve heard that sleeping makes you strong and cool, so you think you wanna give it another try?”

Shay sighs dramatically and Benjy has to hide his smile. “I guess. Will you sing?” 

Something in Benjy’s heart pulls. He gets off the bed so Shay can wiggle down as he nods. Benjy starts to sing softly, the same song he would sing for Cleona’s stomach-it started as a joke, but now it was far from funny. 

Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral Too-ra-loo-ra-li Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral Hush now, don't you cry Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral Too-ra-loo-ra-li Too-ra-loo-ra-loo-ral

“Sweet dreams, Shay. I love you.”

“Love you, baba.” He says, sleep clinging to his voice. Benjy keeps going until his eyes close fully.

Over in Killarney, many years ago My mother sang a song to me in tones so soft and low....

Benjy leaves Seamus’s room silently, casting a charm on the door on the way out to keep the noise out.

Cleona is at the stove when he makes the way into the kitchen, dancing slightly to whatever is on her muggle radio. Benjy watches her for a minute in the doorway, letting out a big sigh of relief as he sees the proof that the evilness he had to fight today didn’t even come close to touching the two people who matter the most. She must have heard him, cause she turns around, smiling as she shows him the pan of eggs. 

“Those better be Florentine or I’m not eating them.” 

Cleona rolls her eyes and gestures for him to sit

“Shut up.”

She waves her wand and the eggs appear on the plate she’d already set on the table.

There was only so much human interaction that Emma could take after a long day training on the quidditch pitch. She was pretty much an extrovert, but there was only so much talking she could do, especially when it was with a group of women all day. So, she tended to just go straight home on days when she’d been training all day. But her team mates had managed to convince her to come have a few drinks at the leaky. So, she’d done that, but now she was totally over any conversation, and had excused herself.

Only to practically walk straight into Benjy. “Oh you have to be kidding me” The brunette murmured with a roll of her eyes. “Good evening Benjy” @seekingbenjy​

“Gotta get home before sunrise or you turn into a bat, eh, Vanity? It’s hot when you pretend to be nice to me, you should do it more.”

He’s just drunk enough to look her up and down boldly.