Extended Family

a Hot Fuzz/Harry Potter crossover AU

by Setcheti

 

 

Disclaimer: Don’t own Hot Fuzz or Harry Potter – no money made, no infringement intended.

 

Author’s Note: This story is not part of the Tales from the Sandford PD series, but if you want to read it as though it were that would probably work out for you just as well.

 

Vernon Dursley sat in his chair and semi-glared at the slender man sitting primly on the couch opposite him.  Vernon didn’t much care for Petunia’s cousin, or for said cousin’s supposed reputation – he privately suspected that the supposedly upstanding Inspector Angel was just a jumped-up little shirtlifter who’d bottomed and blackmailed his way through the ranks.  It wasn’t an opinion he was ever going to air about, though, because things like that had a way of tainting the whole family and he had his own career and Dudley’s eventual reputation to think of.

 

 For his part, Inspector Nicholas Angel didn’t much care for his cousin Petunia’s husband – he thought the man was a bully and a braggart and quite possibly a white-collar criminal, as the car Vernon drove among other things pointed to a man living beyond his means.  It wasn’t an opinion he was ever going to air at work, though, because he was an inspector and he hadn’t any hard proof to back up an accusation of wrongdoing—and false accusations could end his career and taint his entire command.  He’d only stopped by the Dursley household in the first place because…well, he wasn’t rightly sure why exactly he had stopped and so was trying not to think too hard about it.  He had been in the area, delivering some evidence to a nearby town’s local office, and he’d gotten the idea to stop in on Petunia before he headed back home.  Maybe to see her little son, Dudley, whom he’d never met.

 

With great self control, Nick kept himself from making a face at that thought.  Dudley was not so little, although he was not quite five; he was piggishly fat, already showing signs of eventually emulating if not surpassing his corpulent, double-chinned father, and he was obviously spoiled to absolute ruin already.  And Petunia was so completely blind to her son’s shortcomings that Nick was starting to wonder if she was on drugs, perhaps some form of methamphetamines.  She was certainly thin enough to be an addict…

 

Which would doubtless explain so much about all the not-quite-right things he was noticing in the Dursley household; many of them would make entirely too much sense if Vernon was somehow involved with the local drugs dealer.  Nick shook that thought off when he heard a faint whimper, and he frowned.  Dudley was playing on the carpet, tearing apart a magazine with his fat little hands while his parents looked on without concern.  “Excuse me, did you hear something?” he asked Petunia, who was smiling at her son in a besotted, drugged-into-unreality sort of way.

 

She blinked at him, then looked at Dudley and stood up.  “Oh, it may have been Duddy’s stomach growling – poor little angel, he’s growing so fast, he’s just hungry all the time.  Duddy luv, Mummy’s going to go get you a snack.  You want a snack, right?”

 

Dudley ripped another glossy page, crumpling it into a ball.  “Choc-lit!”

 

“Mummy hasn’t been to the store yet, angel.  I’ll get you some fruit.  A banana?”  The boy threw the balled-up magazine page at her, and she was instantly contrite.  “Mummy’s sorry, Duddykins.  We’ll get extra chocolate next time so we don’t run out again.”

 

The little boy looked up at her, and Nick could see the calculation in his light, dull eyes.  “Lots of choc-lit?”

 

“Lots and lots.”  She bent over and gathered him into a hug, obviously unable to lift him off the floor.  “Mummy’s little angel shall have whatever he likes, yes he shall.”

 

“Little tyke knows what he wants, knows his mind already,” Vernon chuckled proudly.  “He’ll be a chip off the old block.”

 

“I’ve no doubt,” Nick said, and then hastened to add, when he saw the man’s eyes narrow, “He looks just like you, Vernon – I’ve no doubt he’ll be the spitting image when he grows up.”  That seemed to mollify the man, and Nick internally breathed a sigh of relief.  It was probably about time for him to leave, before he got into it with Vernon or asked Petunia if she’d considered rehab.  He heard the whimper again, and he frowned; that had definitely not been Dudley’s stomach.  “Is that a dog?”

 

Vernon made a harrumphing sound.  “Don’t have one.”

 

“That doesn’t mean one’s not in your yard.”  Nick stood up.  “It’s coming from the back, sounds like it might be injured.  I’ll just…”

 

“Sit down, it’s nothing to do with you.”

 

If Vernon had tried to give any other visitor to his home that sort of order, it most likely would have worked and the person would have sat back down at once, perhaps even murmured an apology.  But Nicholas Angel was not anyone else.  His brown eyes narrowed, and his voice became decidedly cold.  “Something sounds like it’s injured, and it’s nearby.  Do you know what it is?”

 

Vernon turned red and stood up himself.  “I do, and it’s my home and I say it’s nothing to do with you!”  Nick glared, a full-on authoritative inspector glare; Vernon realized his mistake at once and tried to correct it.  “It’s…it’s nothing, the neighbor’s…dog, yes, the people next door have a dog, it’s a noisy nuisance, wandering in an out of other people’s yards.”  He raised his voice.  “I’ll take a boot to the bloody thing if it doesn’t stop whinging!”  The whimpering stopped.  Vernon huffed and sat back down.  “See?  Little bastard doesn’t want me coming back there, does he?”

 

Nick opened his mouth…and into the space of his taking a breath to speak came the unmistakable sound of a tiny, muffled sob.  Narrowed eyes widened with realization, and then he spun on his heel and stalked toward the back of the house.  Petunia started to block his way into the kitchen and ended up cringing away from the look on his face, but little Dudley had no such understanding of what was going on; the fat little boy squealed and capered and clapped his hands in delight.  “He gonna get it nows!  He gonna get it nows!”

 

Nick stopped.  “Who’s going to get it, Dudley?” he asked.

 

The little boy capered again.  “Harry Harry Harry!  S’posed to not make a sound in the cupboard, ‘cause he’s a freak an’ nobody should know he’s there.  He gonna get it nows!”

 

Nick’s eyebrows went up, and his quick gaze went to around the kitchen…and landed on the door to a utility cupboard set under the house’s single staircase.  The door was latched shut, which might not have seemed unusual in a house with a small curious child running about, except that there were two latches and one of them was nearly at the top of the door just a few inches under a small air vent which looked to have been set into the wall by an amateur rather than by a qualified builder.  He was at the door in two steps and jerking back the bolt…which caused another whimper, this one of fright, to float out of the vent.  Nick stopped himself from yanking the door open – what he wanted to do was rip the bloody thing off its hinges – and instead opened it slowly.  There was a broom, a whisk and dustpan, a tin of polish on the shelf with some rags, and below that a tiny black-haired toddler huddled in the corner.  The little boy’s eyes were bright green, red-rimmed from crying, and hugely round with fear.  Cautiously, slowly, Nick went down on one knee, pushing the cupboard door back as far as it would go as he did; it wouldn’t do for Vernon to get the drop on him by using the door as a shield, or a weapon.  “It’s all right,” he told the boy in a very gentle and reassuring voice.  “Are you Harry?”  The boy nodded.  “Come out and let me see you, Harry, it’s all right.”

 

It took the boy two tries to get to his feet, which were bare.  The faded t-shirt he was wearing was several sizes too large for him and full of holes besides. A whimper escaped when he stood up, and he pressed one tiny hand over his mouth to stop another one from getting out.  He made it over to Nick and stood waiting, shaking so hard his teeth were chattering together.  Nick reached out to touch him, expecting the flinch he got, and wrapped gentle fingers around a thin shoulder to tug the boy closer and into the protective circle of his arms.  “I’m not going to hurt you,” he said.  “But we need to get you out of here.  Just trust me, Harry.”

 

He stood up, the still-shaking little boy in his arms, and turned to fully face the kitchen door.  Vernon was standing in it, filling it up, and he was sneering.  “Put him back in,” he ordered.  “You’ve got no authority here, Inspector.”

 

“Child protective services does.”

 

Vernon snorted.  “Tried dumping him at the local council myself, twice.  Every time he’s right back on the doorstep, once within the hour; we’re stuck with him.  So I decided that the little freak will just have to learn his place.”

 

“He’s…he’s Lily’s boy,” Petunia almost spat.  “She and that husband of hers got themselves killed, dumped him on us to raise.  We didn’t want him!  I’m not taking one drop of anything away from our precious angel to care for my sister’s spoilt little monster, I’m not!”

 

Nick wasn’t sure if he wanted to be sick right there or if he wanted to grab the broom out of the cupboard and beat them both to death with it.  He toyed with the idea of doing both and rejected it as being too messy.  “When did Cousin Lily die?” he asked.

 

Petunia snorted.  “Almost three years ago – Duddykins was learning to walk then, I was too busy to notify the family about it.”

 

The need to be sick and immediately thereafter commit a double homicide was practically choking Nick.  “And how old was Harry when you got him?”

 

“The letter that came with him said he was a year.”  This time it was Vernon who snorted.  “Left him in a basket on the doorstep right next to the morning milk, had an envelope with his papers in it.” 

 

“Do you still have it?”

 

Vernon shrugged.  “Had to keep the papers, burned the letter.”  His piggish eyes narrowed.  “Why?”

 

Nick was thinking fast, which was something he was truly excellent at.  “If I could see the papers, I might be able to take him off your hands,” he said.  “There are always loopholes in those sorts of things, custody paperwork is almost always sloppily done.  And I’m not only an officer of the law, I’m also a blood relative and I’m cleared for fostering by the local council.”  He wasn’t going to mention that they’d only cleared him for it because there’d been an orphanage fire and the local council had temporarily run out of fostering families – they’d cleared every member of the Sandford Police Department and half of the town’s business owners at the same time.  “Get me that paperwork and I’ll take him out of here, you’ll never have to see him again.”  Except possibly in the evidence pictures at the trial they’d have to convict the fat bastard of child abuse, but that little detail wasn’t important either.  “Give me everything else that was left with him too, I’ll want it for evidence.”

 

To his surprise, Petunia paled and Vernon went from red to purple.  “So that’s how it is then, is it!?  I knew that about you, all along.  You just want the bloody money, this is blackmail!  Well, you can’t have it!  Now put the brat back where you found him and get out before I call up London and tell them what you’re up to!”

 

Nick’s mouth had dropped open in shock.  “They gave you…”  The boy in his arms whimpered, and he reined his fury in.  “They gave you money to look after him?” he asked in a much softer but infinitely more dangerous voice, and had the satisfaction of seeing Petunia go even paler as she realized the mistake her husband had just made.  “Hmm, I recall thinking when I showed up here today that you seemed to be doing very well, although I suspected you were living beyond your means.  I suppose little Harry here solved that problem, did he?”

 

Vernon’s double chin lifted.  “For having to put up with the little freak?  Ten thousand wasn’t nearly enough, not even for the first year.”

 

There were several things Nick could have said to that, but he didn’t.  There were several actions he would have liked to have taken in lieu of a verbal response, but he didn’t do any of those, either.  Instead he shifted Harry in his arms, kicked out one of the kitchen chairs and sat down.  “Get me the papers, Vernon, and something to write on.  I’ll find the loophole, you’ll sign off on an agreement to hand Harry over to me while you keep the money – for your trouble – and then Harry and I will be gone from here for good.”

 

Vernon stared at him for a full minute, trying to make sense of that, but Nick stared right back and the larger man looked away first.  He stomped off and came back directly with a handful of paperwork which he slapped down on the table.  His wife already had paper there, and Nick produced his own pen and a top-bound wire-ring policeman’s notebook and got to work.  Fifteen minutes and a lot of very quick notations later, Nick wrote out some statements on the paper and shoved it across the table for Vernon to sign.  Vernon looked it over very carefully, suspicious, but what had been written down was very clear and straightforward and after a bare moment of hesitation he signed.  Nick took the paper back, checked the signature, and then pushed the paper at Petunia; she signed without reading it after a brusque nod from her husband.  Nick checked her signature as well, then folded the new paper in with the others and tucked them all into his jacket.  He stood up.  “His things?”

 

Vernon shrugged.  “We threw out the basket and all.  What you’ve got is it.”

 

“Very well.”  Nick stood back up, marched past Vernon before the larger man could heave himself up out of his own seat, and was out into the living room before anyone but little Dudley, who had already been there and so did not count.  Nick went out the front door and down the walk to the official car he was using, which he opened up and sat Harry inside of before turning to Vernon’s car and peering through the rear window.  Then he opened the back door, unfastened the child safety seat that was secured there, and moved it to his own vehicle instead; the look on his face kept Vernon and Petunia, now standing just inside the open front door, silent and motionless.  Nick fastened Harry into the seat, murmured a few words of reassurance, and then got into his car and drove off.

 

Petunia clutched her husband’s arm.  “Do you think…Vernon, could he really be gone, for good?”

 

Vernon moved her back inside, closing and then locking the door.  “We can only hope.”

 

 

Nick drove back toward London, pulling over once to put on his earpiece and dial a number into his cell phone.  “Jeanine, it’s Nick,” he said when the call was picked up on the other end.  “I need a favor.  Professional…for a personal reason.  I’m headed for London now, driving out of Surrey, can you meet me at the lab in an hour and a half?  We’ll need a technician,” he glanced back at the child seat with its wide-eyed passenger, “ and a doctor.  No, nothing like that – whoever’s on duty will be…yes, he’ll do nicely, he’s good with children.”  He sighed.  “Yes, you heard me correctly, Jeanine.  No, he’s not, although I am a relative. He’s just four.  Something was very…wrong with his last living situation, and I suspect that someone had tampered with the childrens’ protective service in the area in order to keep him there.”  He snorted.  “Money, what else?  I don’t want to talk about it over the phone, I’ll tell you everything once we get there.  Yes…yes.”  He sighed.  “Thank you.  No, of course I don’t mind if Dave comes with you.  Yes, alright.  We’ll see you in an hour and a half.”

 

He hit the button to disconnect the call, glanced into the back seat again.  “We’re going to see some…old friends of mine, Harry,” he said.  “They’re going to help me fix it so you never have to go back to Cousin Petunia’s again.”

 

 

Shocked did not adequately describe Jeanine’s reaction to the sight of her former boyfriend walking in with the tiny little black-haired boy in his arms – and not just because the boy was so obviously suffering from neglect and possibly abuse.  Not wanting to frighten the child any more than he already was, she made sure she didn’t get too close to Nick too fast or react too strongly.  “Nick, it’s good to see you.  And this is…?”

 

“This is Harry – he was my cousin Lily’s son,” Nick told her.  “Apparently she and her husband died almost three years ago, and the boy was left with her sister, my cousin Petunia.  Petunia and her husband Vernon have a little boy of their own, not quite a year older…and they apparently thought one more was one more too many.  Vernon said he’d tried dropping Harry off at the local council office on two separate occasions, and both times he was sent straight back – once within the hour.  I have Harry’s custodial paperwork and a signed statement from Vernon, but I have the feeling that if this isn’t handled quickly and quietly Harry’s going to be back in the broom cupboard by tonight.”  He shifted his hold to pull Harry a little bit closer, brown eyes darkening.  “I am not letting that happen.”

 

“We won’t,” Jeanine agreed with him.  She put out a cautious hand to touch the messy black hair; when Harry flinched away with a whimper she quickly drew the hand back.  “Harry, I’m Jeanine,” she said.  “That man over there is my husband Dave, and we’re friends of your Uncle Nick.  Nobody here is going to hurt you, I promise – it’s our job to stop people who hurt other people, especially little boys like you.”

 

The wide green eyes narrowed just a bit, and she saw a flash of intelligence; Harry was thinking about that.  Then he wiggled just a tiny bit so that he could see Nick’s face.  “Job?” he whispered, patting the front of the man’s jacket.

 

Nick smiled at him.  “Yes, it’s my job too, Harry.  But before we can go stop more bad people, we need to get you cleaned up and make sure you’re all right.  Jeanine and Dave are going to help, and we’ve got another friend coming who’s going to help us too.  Now, will it be all right if I put you down?”  Harry clung to him like a monkey, and Nick patted his back.  “It’s all right.  I know you’re frightened.  I promise I’ll stay right beside you, though, how’s that?  You can even hold onto my hand if you need to.”

 

Harry thought again, then nodded very slowly.  Nick sat him on the examination table that Jeanine indicated and held out his hand, which Harry took and clung to.  The boy looked up at Jeanine with trepidation, and she laughed.  “I’m very tall, aren’t I?  Dave is even taller.  Come here, Dave, so Harry can see how big you are.”

 

Dave pulled himself up out of his chair and ambled over, laughing when Harry looked at him in wide-eyed astonishment.  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Harry,” he said.  “Would you like a drink?  I can go get you one.”

 

Harry stared at him for a moment, then nodded very slowly; he looked like he was anticipating needing to cringe away from something.  Nick squeezed his hand.  “You can have a drink if you want one, Harry,” he said quietly.  “Dave wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t want to get one for you, all right?  And I’m sure you’re probably thirsty, we just had a long ride in the car.”

 

Dave grinned at him.  “I’ll be right back,” he said, and then went out to go let Dr. Reese know what was going on – by way of the break room, where he was pretty sure he could turn up some juice and biscuits that a little boy would like.

 

What he came back with was cold bottled water, as Dr. Reese had thought that juice and biscuits needed to wait until they’d made sure the boy wasn’t needing the hospital.  The doctor trailed in behind him, greeting the other adults in the room before introducing himself.  “You must be Harry,” he said with a smile.  “I’m Dr. Reese.  Have you ever seen a doctor before?”  Harry just blinked at him.  “Do you know what a doctor is?”  A tiny headshake.  “Ah, well that’s all right, then.  A doctor is a person who makes sure people aren’t sick, and helps to make them better when they are,” he explained. He moved closer, keeping his movements slow so as not to startle the boy.  “Would you let me check to make sure you’re not sick, Harry?  Once I make sure you’re not sick, we can get you something to eat.”  He leaned in closer and whispered, “Dave there tried to bring you a chocolate biscuit.  Have you ever had one of those?”  Another tiny headshake.  “Well then, once I’m sure you’re not sick we’ll just go get that biscuit for you so you can try it.  I think you’ll find they’re very nice.”

 

He kept up a patter of pleasantly careful nonsense as he started his examination, making comments off to the side for Jeanine to mark down on a clipboard and directing Dave when to take photos or evidence.  He was able to elicit a little bit more information from the boy, careful not to ask anything that could be considered leading – they had the tape recorder running.  The overlarge shirt had belonged to Harry’s cousin Dudley before it became too small to be put on him.  Harry had slept in the cupboard under the stairs; Nick put in quietly for the recorder that there had been no cot or even a pallet in the cupboard and that he knew the house had four bedrooms.  Questioning how various visible bruises had come to be produced a response of “Bad” or sometimes “Dud-y” and once just a whimper and a headshake – they’d taken extra pictures of that one and determined it may have been the toe print of an adult shoe.  The scar on his forehead, conversely, appeared to predate Harry’s stay in the Dursley household and was assumed to have been gotten in an accident, perhaps the very one that killed the boy’s parents. Harry didn’t know any nursery rhymes or songs, recognized only a few children’s television characters and didn’t know many of his colors, shapes, or letters.  He’d never been read a story.  He’d never slept in a bed.  It was possible he’d never worn shoes.  He talked very much less than a child his age should, because making noise was ‘bad.’  Bad meant it stayed dark in the cupboard.  Bad meant no food.

 

By the time they were halfway done, the adults in the room had decided that ‘bad’ was letting Vernon Dursley live anywhere but inside a prison cell.  Good would have been not letting him live at all. But once they were all the way done and Harry was cautiously but happily eating the promised chocolate biscuit in Nick’s lap, it was time for some real decisions to be made. “If we report this through proper channels,” Dr. Reese said thoughtfully, “there is a chance – and I hate to say it, a good one – that they’ll take the boy into custody and pop him right back into the Dursley household.”

 

Jeanine started to protest that, but Nick’s quiet voice stopped her. “He’s right,” he said. “I did remove Harry from a dangerous situation, and that after receiving verbal evidence that the local council would be less than no help, but I broke every rule in the book. And I have no way of proving that I didn’t go to their house with the sole intent of taking Harry – in fact, I have no way to prove that I didn’t threaten them to make them sign that paper turning custody over to me, or that I’m not blackmailing them over the money that was paid to them for his care. Much as I’d like to see the bastard slammed into prison for the rest of his vile life and Cousin Petunia locked into a mental ward …even a halfway clever attorney could see the case dismissed. I’ve undone cases with holes like this in them from the witness stand.”

 

“You still did the right thing, Nick,” Jeanine reassured him. “You couldn’t have left him there, not even for a minute.”

 

“No, I couldn’t have – and I’d do the same thing if I had to do it again,” was Nick’s reply. “But now we may have a serious legal problem to deal with because of the way I did it.”

 

“Perhaps, perhaps not,” Dr. Reese put in. He took out his cell phone and checked his calendar, then he looked up. “Nicholas, I know you want custody of Harry. What about your partner, what’s he going to think about it?”

 

“I already know, but let’s ask him.” Nick dug out his own phone and hit speed dial #2. “Danny, we’ve got a situation,” he said when the call was answered. “No, I’m in London. I stopped at Cousin Petunia’s after I dropped off the evidence, not really sure why…yes, that’s what I said.” He smiled wryly. “Yes, one for the record book. But she and Vernon had a child there, my cousin Lily’s son. Apparently he was given to them when his parents were killed…no, she didn’t bother to inform the family. Danny, they were…they had him in a cupboard under the stairs, like an animal. He’s just four…yes, I do have him…yes, I…Danny, he’s right here on my lap, I don’t want to discuss that in front of him. What I want to know is…how would you feel about us having custody? I know it’s…” He pulled the phone away from his ear abruptly, pushed a button and set it down, making a face. “He wanted to be on speaker.”

 

“Damn right I did,” Danny Butterman’s voice came through the tiny speaker. “I ain’t gonna yell, don’t want to scare the boy. Harry?” he asked, and Harry looked up in surprise. “Harry, this here’s your Uncle Danny. Uncle Nick’s gonna bring you home soon, okay? He’s bein’ silly right now. Who else is there? Jeanine?”

 

“Hullo Danny,” Jeanine spoke up; she actually got along quite nicely with her ex-boyfriend’s husband. “Dave’s here too, and Dr. Reese—I don’t know if you know him.”

 

“Hallo Dave,” Danny greeted happily. “Hi Dr. Reese. I’m Sergeant Daniel Butterman of the Sandford P.D. – Inspector Angel’s husband. What do we need to do to keep Harry from goin’ back to that bas…um, place?”

 

“We were just discussing that, Sergeant – Daniel. I think I can arrange something, but I needed to know what you thought about the whole thing first. Since Nicholas here acted to safeguard the boy first and thought about the repercussions after – not that I wouldn’t have done the same myself – we can’t report Mr. Dursley and his wife to the authorities without landing Harry in care and possibly right back in that closet. Not to mention that there’s obviously some corruption in the local council’s child protection service that will need sorting out, but that’s a problem for another time.” He glanced at Nick. “I know one of the family court judges, a personal friend, and he’s on call today. I can present this situation to him and get him to assign legal custody to the two of you based on the information we have. Once I show him the evidence and explain why we need it done this way, I know he’d be happy to do it.”

 

“And the problem with this is…?”

 

“We may never be able to report Vernon and Petunia,” Nick explained, holding Harry a little tighter. “But everything will be legal as long as they never complain – which I believe they won’t – and as long as we never say anything about it ourselves.”

 

“So the price for keepin’ little Harry there safe is Vernon gets away with it?” Danny wanted to know, and received a chorus of disgruntled affirmatives. He snorted. “I don’t like it either, but I can live with it – someone’ll get the bastard. Oops, sorry Harry – bad word, you don’t repeat that okay? Uncle Danny’s gonna have to clean up his language.”

 

Harry leaned forward, looking down at the phone with a frown on his little face. “Bad?” he whispered.

 

“Not you, sweetheart,” Nick assured him. “And not Uncle Danny either – he just used a word children aren’t supposed to repeat. So, Dr. Reese…”

 

The doctor stood up. “I’ll go call him – if he’s not too busy I may even be able to get him to come down here instead of all of us trooping over to his court. Just all of you wait for me right here, I’ll be back shortly.”

 

The three adults left in the room looked at each other, and then Dave leaned forward. “Danny,” he said. “You’re going to have some fun teaching Harry here everything a little boy should learn. Did you know he’d never eaten a chocolate biscuit before today?”   

 

There was silence from the speaker for a moment, and then Danny said in a horrified voice, “Now that…is absolutely criminal.”

 

 

It was late that night when the official Sandford Police Department car pulled up in front of the neat little cottage. The front door to the cottage opened, spilling welcoming yellow light across the threshold, and a stocky figure stepped out. “I called us both off for tomorrow,” Danny said as Nick got out of the car. “Told Doris what was goin’ on, she’ll be comin’ ‘round after breakfast, said one of her sisters might have some outgrown clothes the right size for Harry. An’ Tony’s got some things he said he’d bring by, his boy’s outgrowin’ the little kid toys and books now so they’ve got some to spare.”

 

“That’s good of them,” Nick replied with a smile. He took a kiss when Danny came down to the car, handing over the packet of paperwork he was carrying, and then leaned his forehead against his husband’s. “We’ve got a boy of our own now, Danny.”

 

Danny gave him another kiss and then turned to the car and peered inside. Everyone had sent him pictures of Harry with their cell phones earlier, but he was eager to see the boy in person. He smiled. “Look at him, sleepin’ like a little angel. Nice safety seat, by the way.”

 

“I took it from Vernon’s car,” Nick admitted. “It seemed like the least he could do.”

 

“Yeah, can’t argue with that.” Danny opened the car door, letting Nick get the little boy unfastened from the seat, and then closed the door again once they were both clear. He ruffled the still sleeping child’s hair gently, not waking him. “Welcome home, Harry,” he whispered. “Welcome home.” 

 

 

Albus Dumbledore opened a drawer in his desk and pulled out a battered watch, flipping open the case.  He made a point of checking on the status of Harry Potter and the blood wards that protected the boy every full moon at midnight; so far, the boy’s status had always been Sleeping and the wards had shown as Effective.  Tonight was mostly the same, although the wards had moved from Effective to a spot just before Strong.  He frowned for a moment, then put the watch away again and went to bed.  He supposed it was possible Harry’s relatives could have gained a small measure of affection for the boy, thus causing the blood wards’ power to increase by a small amount.  It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.  And even if Petunia Dursley had begun to feel stirrings of maternal affection toward her nephew, Dumbledore had no doubt that Vernon Dursley would more than make up for that as Harry got older.  He had investigated the man’s fitness to do the job very carefully before leaving Harry there with him, after all.

 

Had Dumbledore been equally careful about checking the watch, he might have noticed that the wards hand was actually not indicating a spot near Strong; it was merely stuck there, after having spun crazily for hours upon hours earlier that week in response to a tremendous surge of power from the newly transferred blood wards.  Because while Vernon Dursley had only possessed authority over his own comfortable house and yard, Inspector Nicholas Angel’s authority encompassed an entire village and quite a bit of the surrounding countryside.

 

And Albus Dumbledore’s carelessness aside, no one else in the magical world, absorbed as they were in their own concerns, had happened to notice when Sandford, Gloucestershire—and the entire area around it—had quietly and without fuss vanished from the sight and mind of every magical person in England.