The next day, Krum showed up on Malfoy's doorstep before dawn.

He gave Bones an irate look before digging mountains of files out of his satchel. It must have had an undetectable extension charm on it. No way would that many files fit without one. "Could this not have waited until business hours?" he asked as he stacked the sheaves on the hallway table.

Shaking her head, Bones picked up the nearest pile. "Sorry, no."

Krum didn't look convinced. He raised an eyebrow at her. "Really?"

Bones looked up from the folders for the first time. His eyes were a bleary red, mouth a hard line that probably meant she would have to shower him with expensive chocolates and coffee beans with unpronounceable names before he would forgive her. She gave him a severe look. "It's vitally important to my case that I have these files."

He glowered at her. "Those files are about Malfoy."

"I'd hope so," said Bones. "If you'd got the wrong ones, I'd have sent you back again."

"Malfoy, who you are determined to believe is on our side," Krum pointed out.

"Ye-es," agreed Bones, still flicking through the sheaves.

Krum sighed, digging out more files and adding them to the piles. "So why are you asking for files on him? Our case is the Burrow attack now. Which, I might add has become a slightly bigger situation than 'Burrow attack'."

"Hm?" Bones abandoned the sheaf she had and began poking through the stacks Krum had put down.

"Are you actually listening?"

Bones blinked before turning to him. "Not really. Sorry."

"Get me a coffee," said Krum. "With extra coffee. And extra sugar. Probably extra milk. Actually, just get me two coffees. You need to know what's going on with the attack and I'm not in any state to tell you right now."

Bones stroked the manila folders wistfully. "You could not tell me?" she suggested. "Maybe you could work your way up to it and tell me in, say, two days?"

"Two days?"

"It will give me a chance to finish up my current investigation."

Krum stared at her. "You have no current investigation. You closed the Revenirs before Christmas. If you mean that Icestarter case, it's not a priority."

"Not exactly," said Bones.

Krum looked from her to the stack of files and back to her. "You're investigating Malfoy?"

"Yes!" She smiled. "Good. Glad that's out in the open. Let the others know I'll join the Burrow case in a few days and…"

"Bones, you're living in his damn house," snapped Krum. "Are you mental?"

"Oh, I'm not investigating him for anything criminal. Just something weird is going on, and I'd like to figure it out."

Krum rubbed a hand over his face. "Get me three coffees," he growled. "You can tell me what's going on while I drink them."

She lugged the mass of files to the kitchen, put a pot of coffee on and set the sugar bowl beside him as they sat at the floating bar. As she explained, he steadily added sugar to his coffee before systematically draining the mug and refilling. He didn't speak until she finished.

"You are insane," he said, swiping a finger around the bottom of his third mug. He licked the sugary sludge up. "You've always been insane," he added contemplatively. "I mean, Hermione and the twins say that you used to be sane, but I doubt it." He shrugged as though it didn't much matter either way. Which, it probably didn't. "You have a crush on Malfoy."

Bones considered the matter. "I did let him kiss me," she admitted. "Twice."

"There." Krum peered into his mug and drooped a little when he came up empty. Bones pushed the jar of coffee beans toward him. "Perhaps this investigative obsession is your way of caring about someone."

"But I don't care," said Bones. "It's not my thing."

For a while, Krum was too busy chewing beans to answer. Finally, he put the jar down. "And yet, you're here. Staying in Malfoy's apartment because you were afraid that if Hottie was targeted, he might be too."

Bones leant on her hands and frowned at him. That… was kind of true. Generally, if she was worried about someone's safety, she organised a security detail for them. Hottie might not have been able to cover it, but she had Ministry resources at her disposal. "So, I don't care about family or friends but if it's a hot guy…" She shook her head. "This is a side of myself that I really could have done without."

Krum laughed. "I can't say I'm loving this part of you either."

"But all the stuff he knows about me…" said Bones.

"He's a spy. You think he doesn't stash information that most people don't even notice?"

Bones sighed. "Okay, I guess you better take the Malfoy files back and give me a run-down on the latest Burrow attack news."

"Make me more coffee," said Krum. "I'll tell you what's going on while you put those files back into order."

Bones glanced at the counter-top. The files were spread out in a haphazard mess. She sighed again and went to refill the pot.

Halfway through the briefing, Krum stopped speaking.

Bones looked up from the almost-sorted stacks of files. "Hottie and various Auror groups thwarted four separate attacks after the attack on the Burrow. Most of them aimed at high-profile political figures. We managed to protect Scrimgeour but the Sawhills were killed. I'm paying attention. Really."

"No." A deep furrow creased Krum's brow. His eyes were fixed on the pile of files. "That." He pointed to the tallest one. "That's the information you've compiled?"

Bones glanced down. "Yeah."

"That?" asked Krum. "The stack that is easily triple the research that anyone else has compiled?"

The other stacks were significantly shorter than Bones'. She frowned. Of all the Hottie members, Hermione had the most comprehensive files on any given person of interest. Unless the person in question was linked to a case that someone else was investigating, Hermione's notes were always the most thorough. And Bones had never investigated Malfoy.

"Have you done a lot of research on him since he became our go-between?" asked Krum.

Bones shook her head. "I haven't kept tabs on him since the end of the war."

Krum pulled Bones' files across and began to flick through them. "But so many tabs during the war. Even after we realised that he was a spy and cleared him. What did you suspect him of?"

Nothing. After Wicksworth – after Bones didn't kill Malfoy and he didn't turn her over - she had never suspected him of anything. When Hermione and the twins were adamant that he was up to something, she'd uncovered Malfoy's contact in the Aurors and settled the question of his loyalties. She shook her head again. "I don't know. I mean, I kept tabs on him, but I don't know why." She broke off and rubbed a hand across her face. It had just been something she'd done. She hadn't questioned it. Hadn't even realised how much time she had put into it. Hours, days, weeks, months, if the stack was anything to go by. But why?

"Because the Ministry was pushing for you to watch him?" asked Krum, shoving aside some files and pulling others closer. "Malfoy had some of the closest familial ties to You-Know-Who. Scrimgeour would have wanted him watched…"

He broke off when Bones shook her head. "I've never worked that way, Krum. Hottie didn't watch anyone for what their parents or aunts or siblings were doing. I never broke those rules, not for anyone. Once his contact cleared him, I considered him clear."

"Why then?" asked Krum.

Bones leant back on her seat. "I don't know."

Krum rubbed the back of his neck. "This is weird, Bones. How can you not know why you put this much work into someone?" He restacked the pile, frowning at her. "He was buried so deep during the war that I don't even know how you got some of this stuff. I mean, sightings, rumours of where he was, who he was running with. Hermione and I didn't find half this stuff when we were working his case."

Bones flicked her tongue across her lips.

Krum looked up from the folders. "And you didn't share your findings with us."

"No," agreed Bones.

"You protected him, Bones. You protected him from us. When he'd murdered Dumbledore and let Death Eaters into a school. Why? Did you have a crush on him even then?"

Bones considered the question. No. She didn't think so. She barely remembered Draco from school. Could remember avoiding him well enough. Trying to duck out of the way whenever he was around. To keep her promise to stay away from him. She vividly remembered the guilt that twisted her stomach in knots whenever she succeeded in evading him; though it had never been difficult. He'd always looked through her. "I lied about Wicksworth," she said finally.

Krum's brow furrowed. "Wicksworth. That's where you took down the Five? Alone? That's where Malfoy had the chance to kill you but didn't take it?"

Bones shook her head. "He never had the chance to kill me. I had a clear shot on him. I didn't take it. He saw me and I walked away."

Krum braced his fists against the table. "That's not how you said it happened."

"Obviously. If I told you how it happened, I'd have to tell you why I didn't kill Malfoy when I had the chance."

Krum's jaw set, as though he really didn't like where the conversation was headed. "And why didn't you?"

"I don't know," said Bones. "I mean, maybe I do have a crush on him. Maybe I had a crush on him even then. I don't know."

Krum shook his head. "No. You'd have killed him. It wouldn't have mattered how attractive he was. You'd have done what was right."

Bones chewed her lower lip. She wasn't trustworthy. Hadn't been since the new war had broken out. But even if she couldn't trust herself to be a good friend, sister or daughter, she'd always thought that she would sacrifice anything to keep the world safe.

Krum caught her hand, squeezed it so tight that it hurt. "I know you, Bones. You're mental, but you do the right thing. Always. No matter how hard it is."

"Then why didn't I kill him?" asked Bones. "If he'd told You-Know-Who about me, it could have exposed all of you." Krum had to remember how desperate they were in those Wicksworth days. Aurors and their families falling daily and no one knowing who the Death Eaters were, where they were. They'd materialise and disappear like mist, leaving a trail of bodies in their wake. "If Hottie had gone down then, it would have turned the war."

Eyes dark, Krum nodded. "It doesn't change anything. I know you."

"I don't even know myself. I…" Bones shook her head, staring at the stacks of files. "I don't know who I am, Krum. I was fucking distraught when Dumbledore was murdered. You'd think if given the chance to avenge him…" She broke off, heart stuttering over a handful of beats. She pressed a hand to her mouth. "Oh, shit."

Krum glanced from her to the files and then back again. "What?"

Bones shook her head, teeth grinding into her lower lip. "It wasn't Dumbledore. Fuck."

Krum blinked. "It wasn't…" He jerked upright. "You were distraught when Dumbledore died." There was a sharp, weighing quality to his voice, as though he knew where this was going and wished that he could change course. "But back then you thought Malfoy had killed him."

Bones nodded. "George said it," she said. "He said that I fell apart because Malfoy killed Dumbledore. Not because Dumbledore died. But that's ridiculous. I don't know Malfoy. Why would I care?"

"Every member of the Malfoy family for six generations have been dark," said Krum.

Bones shook her head. "That's not how Hottie works. We don't accuse someone based on their family."

"I'm accusing him based on himself," said Krum. "Your character changed in the last few years of Hogwarts. Your feelings for Draco Malfoy are not natural. And he has a library of dark magic at his fingertips."

Malfoy couldn't have cursed her. There was nothing that malevolent about him. Bones bit back a protest. She couldn't be trusted. Facts could. And Krum had laid out the facts. "Do you know of a spell that could do this to me?"

Krum shook his head. Dark magic wasn't like the others. It was hidden; most spells and curses were family heirlooms, passed secretly from one generation to the next and improved upon as they went. "An amalgamation of Amortensia and something that would last more than a day, perhaps. It's not based on the Imperius curse."

Bones nodded. If she was under a modified form of Imperio, it wouldn't hurt this much. Instead of this desperate callousness, she'd feel vaguely happy. "You need to make sure he doesn't have a chance to touch the others," she said.

"Why? Where are you going?"

"To figure out what he's done to me."