Laying Low

Laying low was one of Remy’s specialties. It was the reason why she could manage to stay in one place for any given amount of time before anyone found out either of her dangerous little secrets. And she had been staying in this part of London for a significant time now, having joined the Death Eaters, gotten a steady job, and made enough contacts to ensure that her nights were full and her needs satisfied.

But of late, being a Death Eaters had been more of a hinderance than a help. They were the reason she was currently laying low, after lying about her involvement in the Battle of Hogwarts and nearly being caught for it. Grindelwald had come to her defense, but he hadn’t spoken to her since, which made Remy believe he was still skeptical. For now, Remy’s best shot at being able to stay in the comfortable scenario she had created was to keep her mouth shut and her head down, and to stay as far away from any Death Eater-related business as she could while still doing enough to scare away further speculation of her loyalties.

Part of keeping a low profile was maintaining a routine, and Remy had been more than busy enough at Satan’s to make a routine of it. The other bartender that worked Remy’s opposite nights had gotten married recently – which had come as a shock to Remy, because she couldn’t fathom who would ever want to marry anyone that poor or unattractive – and was requesting a lot of time off to be with his new bride. Needing the money and the distraction, Remy had made it easy for him to take vacation by stepping in to fill his hours, which is how she found herself behind the bar on a Thursday night, the unofficial start to the weekend.

It was still a bit early, only 9:00pm, so the bar wasn’t busy. Currently, everyone sitting at the bar had a full drink in front of them, and none were interesting enough that Remy was pursuing conversation with them. She hoped, however, that someone would arrive to change that scenario, because she hadn’t scratched a particular itch in a while and she was getting restless. Every few minutes, Remy’s eyes would dart over to the door to see the new arrivals, but the continually disappointing prospects were starting to desensitize her.

This is going to be a long night… Remy thought, pushing a hand through her dark hair and letting a frustrated sigh slip from between her lips.

Angus had been on the trail tonight of a foul, murderous man. One he'd battled many times in Paris. They were getting to know each other's habits much too well. And once again, he tailed him through the darkness and, tonight, the heavens had seemed to open and pour down a cold autumn rain. He had dressed entirely in black to help him from being seen. And he had tossed on his long black leather duster coat and a black leather wide brimmed hat to keep the rain off. He detested wizard cloaks. He much preferred the agility that his duster coat had when he needed to fight. His wand was drawn as he saw his quarry try to ditch him by ducking into Knockturn Alley and then into a Knockturn bar. He knew of the bar but he'd never been in it. He hoped to track this man down, though and, if he had his own way, leave him dead in his wet tracks.

Angus dashed after him, his black boots making splashing sounds on the brick streets as he ran. He saw the man disappear into the bar, and as Angus looked at the sign above the bar, he sighed heavily. How fitting that a murderer would run to a place called Satan's. Well, maybe Satan would hide him and maybe he wouldn't. Angus didn't give up easily.

He followed him into the bar and saw his quarry shove his way through the bar and out the back door. He followed only a step or two behind, but when he got out the back door, the man had apparently apparated out because he was completely gone. He sighed heavily, cussing at missing him yet one more time. He took off his hat angrily and slapped it against the brick wall of the bar, slapped the hat back on his head and headed back in the bar. He was cold and right now the warmth of a firewhiskey sounded too good to pass up.

He headed to the bar and drew a couple sickles out of his pocket. "Got any top shelf firewhiskey?" he asked. He hated the cheap crap so many bars tried to pass off as good firewhiskey. He knew the difference between the good stuff and the imposters. Firewhiskey was one of the few things in he knew well enough to not cut corners on. Decent food was another. Well, maybe there were a couple more, but right now, he just wanted to forget he'd screwed up and missed again. He told himself he would just let him live to fight another day.

And just when she was beginning to believe that she would have to entertain herself all night with watching how long it would take the busy woman in the tube top to have a wardrobe malfunction, Remy Devaul’s attention was quickly drawn to the door as it slammed open violently. The tinkling of bells above the door was drowned out completely by the bang as the swinging door hit the wall behind it and a man, looking highly disheveled and mostly out of breath, darted into the bar and skillfully maneuvered – read, pushing - his way through the decent crowd of people milling around Satan’s. At first, Remy couldn’t determine what his rush was, but a moment later, another man appeared at the front door, breathing heavily but looking more well-kempt. The pursuer seemed merely to be following his target, but unfortunately for him, the pursu-ee seemed to know where he was going, because within seconds he had made it all the way across the bar and out the back door. The second man was only a few steps behind him, but judging from his reaction when he reached the back exit, his intended target had succeeded in avoiding capture.

In all of 20 seconds, the bar had gone from a dull night to a buzzing crowd of gossips, wondering who the men were. Some of the bar patrons were trying to be discreet in their analysis of the situation, while others were blatantly asking the room at large what the hell was going on. The few people that had been shoved to the ground were grumbling some, but they were more excited by the prospect of having something to discuss than they were physically hurt by their involvement in it.

Personally, Remy was intrigued by the situation. She always liked the intrigue of a good chase, as all this excitement was likely to be good for tips. Aside from the financial benefit of it, however, Remy was beginning to see another potential positive as the man who had been pursuing the unknown suspect approached the bar, tossing a couple sickles on the counter and asking about high-quality firewhiskey.

Despite his disheveled look from having been in pursuit, the man standing across the bar from her was immediately interesting to Remy from a physical standpoint. He was wearing a coat and hat that made him look like something out of the Indiana Jones movies her muggle foster-parents had enjoyed so much, and his long dark hair fell like curtains around his face. His tan skin was slick with sweat, and Remy’s mind couldn’t help but wander to other activities that might make him look equally disheveled…

“Plenty,” the dark-haired bar tender responded with a smile, shaking her own hair back over her shoulders as she turned to reach to the very back of a collection of bottles to pull out a bottle still nearly full with firewhiskey. This brand was expensive, so it wasn’t called very often, and she poured a generous portion into a glass with two cubes of ice. After replacing the bottle on the shelf, Remy picked up the glass and turned back to her newest customer, setting his drink in front of him.

“That’ll be twelve sickles, unless you’d like to start a tab,” Remy said, sliding the glass toward him as she leaned forward, her elbows on the countertop and her eyes on his, hoping he wouldn’t down the drink and leave. What would be the fun in that?

“So I’m guessing subtle isn’t really your style?” Remy asked shrewdly, her voice taking on a tone to suggest that this comment was directly related to the scene she and the rest of Satan’s had just witnessed.

"I've never found anything subtle about magic," Angus laughed, ante-ing up the rest of his tab and laying more sickles on the bar. "But all that aside, I toss all of that out when I go after a murderer. Wizards cloaks are just a pain in the arse. Bloody useless in a pursuit. And especially in a wet one." He took a drink of the whiskey. "Decent whiskey. Thank you for that. Have you seen that man in here before? Its important for me to find him."

Angus had chased him to several different countries. He had wounded the man once in Austria. The man had wounded him once, rather badly, in Paris. Angus had come into an alley just in time to see him finishing a messy murder, and he had been chasing him since. He had tried to erase the indelible details of the killing out of his mind, but they had never quite gone as far to the backreaches of his memory as he would have liked. He didn't even give much thought anymore to the sectumsempra that had nearly taken his life and had left him in a pool of his own blood. He had been found by a friend and taken back to a healer who had managed to heal him without so much as leaving a scar. At least not physically.

The bartender was attractive. No doubt about that. It wasn't as if he hadn't noticed. He wasn't sure that he liked that he had caused a scene in the bar itself, but if the bartender was lucky, it might boost her business on what was looking to be an otherwise dull evening. "Is this your place?" he asked her.

Remy laughed along with the dark-haired bar patron, though she hadn’t found his comment overly-amusing. It was true to an extent, but not particularly funny, but that wasn’t really what dictated Remy’s laughter. There was no internal, emotional force that made Remy act one way or another; for her, it was all a mental, strategic game, and in these situations, it was always best to play along with whatever the attractive, mysterious man thought amusing, especially if it was something he himself had said.

As the man continued speaking, Remy allowed her laughter to die away with his. She kept her eyes attentively focused on the man as he mentioned a murderer, but not for the same reason most people did. Usually the word murderer is associated with the fear response, but not for Remy. There had been… times, when Remy herself had been guilty of the very crime that would have earned her that title, but in her opinion, the situation had always been one of self-defense. To Remy, that category was very broad: anyone who would be a threat to her wellbeing (financially, mentally, physically, or otherwise) needed to be eliminated. But she had always been careful to cover her tracks, killed only when she had to, and had certainly never let it get to the point of being actively pursued through a populated bar. Though having this man chasing after her might not be the worst scenario…

Remy nodded to show her agreement with the statement about the wizarding cloaks, though she had no idea about the practicality of said clothing, pursuit or not pursuit. She hadn’t worn one since her graduation from Hogwarts, and had no intention of ever wearing one again if she could help it.

“Not that I can recall,” Remy answered her customer after taking a few moments to think back to the fleeting image of the man she had seen pushing through the crowd, “But then again, my view of him was mostly obstructed by the crowd, and it was a brief glance I had at that. But if you stick around, I’ll continue to give it some thought throughout the night, see if I can’t come up with something,” Remy added with a winning smile, trying to give the man a reason and a hint to stay.

Interrupted momentarily by a man who had called for her attention to get in a request for three pints, Remy pulled away from the counter to pull the dark ales, exchange money with the gentleman, and then returned to her present interest just in time to hear his inquiry.

“Ha,” Remy laughed aloud, a quick smile rising to her face, “I can be a bit devilish, but no, Satan’s does not belong to me,” she quipped with a coy smile, her right arm moving in large circles on the bar top as she wiped it down with a clean rap.

“The bar belongs to a man named Vito. I am merely one of his many minions,” Remy added, by way of explanation. The man must not be from around here if he didn’t know the owner of Satan’s by name.

“I’m Remy, by the way,” she added, dropping the rag into a laundry bin and extending her arm toward the stranger, making sure to lean over just far enough to give him a subtle, but intentional view.

"I'm Angus," he smiled. "Nice to meet you, Remy. And, yeah. I could hang around. Doesnt' look like my chase is going to continue. Not at the moment anyway. A bit devilish, are you? Well, that merely makes you interesting. So, Remy, tell me about yourself. What does a beautiful woman like you do for fun?" He didn't comment on his hobbies. There were some that made him feel masculine and then some that perhaps hobbies that those who prided themselves on being a 'man's man' would not so easily own up to.

His attention was momentarily drawn away by loud shouting at a table midway across the room. Clearly one of the patrons, a man taller and, well, wider than Angus had had a couple too many drinks and was becoming loud and threatening just because he felt he could dominate the other men at his table who were all considerably smaller. Angus just watched. He had not been called in to be a bouncer, but neither would he back away from a brawl if it came his way.

"Well, isn't he charming?" Angus said sarcastically.

Remy’s hand closed easily around her new companion’s as he extended it over the bar. She could feel the slight calloused nature of his skin, which wasn’t surprising considering his brief description of his employment. Remy hadn’t imagined that he would have the smooth palms of a desk-clerk, but she couldn’t help imaging how those callouses might cause some friction as they were running over her….

Less imagination, more conversation, Remy reminded herself as she released the man’s hand after lingering a moment too long, as was her custom with attractive men. That’s how you make fantasy into reality.

“I’m glad to hear my devilishness won’t be an obstruction to our getting to know one another,” Remy said coyly, regaining her full upright position as she smiled at the man sitting across the bar. Angus seemed to be responding well to her flirtations, which was a good first step. And he had used a flattering adjective in addressing her, though that could just be force of habit. Remy knew she was attractive, but she also knew that that wasn’t enough to cajole every man into her bedroom.

“Oh you know, the usual things….” Remy said, being intentionally evasive, “Go out, occasional dancing. I’m rather fond of kick boxing and hiking,” she added, not mentioning that most of her lifetime hiking had been done when she was on the run from some authority or another and needed to remain unseen for a while. That probably wouldn’t go over well with the criminal hunter.

Just as Remy was attempting to think of a witty way to return Angus’ question to him, an outbreak of shouting across the room drew the attention of both dark-haired individuals at the bar. Angus watched with mild interest, though he made no move to intervene as a rather large, ungainly man started poking at the other patrons at his table, throwing his not-inconsiderable weight around in an attempt to look more powerful than he was. Remy saw this all the time, and she did not suppress a roll of her eyes at the sight and Angus’s assessment of the situation.

“I’ll be right back,” Remy said quickly, pushing her long hair back from her face and quickly removing the short black apron she had been wearing behind the bar.

It was too early for a bouncer yet, so Remy begrudgingly moved away from Angus and slipped through the opening in the bar counter, striding confidently across the room to the man who was causing a ruckus. This wouldn’t be the first time Remy had to deal with an unruly patron, and it certainly wouldn’t be the last. It was far from an ideal situation, especially considering she would much rather be finding a way into Angus’s sexual graces, but it wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle.

“Oy,” Remy interrupted, still a few meters away from the table, “You. Yes, you. If you wanted another pint, all you had to do was ask. There’s no need to be making a scene out of it.”

“I’m not ordering another beer, you minx,” the enormous man leered, staggering a step or two in Remy’s direction as he licked his lips at her. Disgusting pig. There wasn’t nearly enough money in his bank account or power at his control to make Remy even consider the prospect.

“Then I think you ought to take a seat and make my job a little easier, don’t you think?” Remy asked, intentionally looking directly at the man and using the ‘I’m a helpless woman and you’re just really inconveniencing little old me’ charade. “You don’t want to get me in trouble with Vito, now do you?”

“Vito wouldn’t hurt a sexy thing like you,” the man said after turning Remy’s words over in his alcohol-laden mind a few times.

“You know Vito as well as I do,” Remy said calmly, relieved to see that although the man was putting up a charade at protest, he had already lowered his voice and was moving back toward his chair, “And he doesn’t discriminate based on looks. When it comes to his business, he tortures everyone equally.”

“I see your point,” the man begrudgingly admitted after a long minute of deliberation, his words slurring together as he collapsed back into his chair, “And besides, I wouldn’t want Vito carving designs into that fine ass of yours.”

“Well I appreciate your concern,” Remy said, with all the forced gratitude she could muster. She would have preferred to just pull out her glock and pop this guy, but that would create problems on so many levels, it wasn’t even a remote option. “You just let me know when you need a refill.”

The situation now de-escalated, Remy turned and strode back to the bar, shaking her hands free of the situation as she walked. If only she could deal with things the way she wanted to and still have societal approval. But she had already learned the hard way several times that things don’t work out when you don’t play – at least roughly – by the rules.

“So where were we?” Remy asked briskly, taking back her place across from Angus as she tied her apron back in place over her low-riding blue jeans.

“Ah yes, you were about to tell me what you like to do for fun,” Remy said, segueing easily back into the conversation as though the intervention had never happened. All in a day’s work.

"I have never been turned off by the occasional devilishness," Angus smiled. She was beautiful, and it hadn't gone unnoticed on his part. "You know, I do like being a bit...out of the ordinary myself at times. But I'm sure you figured that out. You're a very bright woman. Not every auror comes through here dressed in black leather. I really do hate wizard cloaks though. They're a huge pain in the ass, and they're not very useful in keeping dry or warm either one." He brightened when she talked about her hobbies. "I think we might get on quite well," he said. "I like women who like active hobbies. My best friend is very athletic and its sort of grown on me. I love sailing. Any sized ship. Deep sea fishing. Mountain climbing, hiking, weight lifting, horseback riding, running....and don't laugh, but I honestly am a certified executive level chef. I love gourmet cooking. I sometimes work freelance for restaurants helping them rebuild their menus and rework their recipes in order to attract a wider client base with lower cost. I know, its an odd thing for an auror to be into, isn't it? But sometimes, when one is doin a bodyguard assignment, I find its far better to be a jack of all trades.

"Donohue!" A voice bellowed as the door to the bar flung open rather violently. Angus looked at Remy, annoyed by yet another interruption. Then he turned his head rather lazily in the direction of the door, leveling his wand already in the direction of the angry voice. He bristled at the figure in the doorway.

"What the hell do you want?" Angus snarled. "Cheeky bastard."

"Leave my man alone," the man warned. Angus knew the man well. And Angus had been solely responsible for the hideous scar that ran from the the man's hairline all the way down the side of his face, down his neck, disappearing below his collar. "Bear off!" the man commanded Angus.

"Or you'll what?" Angus laughed bitterly. The man in the doorway lived tonight simply because Angus hadn't killed him in their last skirmish.

"You'll find I am not the pushover I was last time," the man threatened.

"Oh, go away," Angus laughed. "I am quite busy just now."

"Then perhaps I ought to get rid of the distraction," the man said, pointing his wand towards Remy. Without thinking, Angus apparated deliberately behind the bar, placing himself between the monster in the doorway and the stunningly beautiful bartender.

"I suggest you rethink that," Angus said quietly,

"Do you plan to bear off my man?"

"No," Angus said firmly. "Now get out." The man moved further into the bar, towards Remy, and Angus flicked his wand, transfiguring the man into a cockroach. He motioned the roach over to him and turned his firewhiskey glass upside down on the floor over the roach to keep it captive. "Any chance I can get a fresh glass, Remy?" he asked. "I'll take that small inconvenience with me when I leave. He can be added to the insect collection that a friend of mine has. They come in quite handy in potions work."

Remy’s grin broadened as Angus flirted back, though whether he was aware of his flirtation or not was uncertain. Men tended to flirt unconsciously when they were interested in a woman, whereas women were nearly always flirting consciously. All the women in bars and clubs she had seen claiming not to know when they were leading a man on, saying they were “just being friendly” – what a load of crap. Women were the more manipulative of the two sexes (though men believing they were innocent on this account was just as foolish), and accordingly they were also the sex that made the greatest attempt to hide their power. What else could explain why Remy was so good at what she did?

Angus’ flirtation came by the way of compliments, and with each successive one Remy knew she was making exactly the kind of impression she wanted to on Angus, if not an accurate one. He had pinned her as being bright, which she certainly was – just not so much by wizarding definitions. Remy was cunning, clever, and willing to use these abilities to get ahead; that counted as bright in her opinion. But the fact that he was giving away so much of his position as an auror meant to Remy that Angus wasn’t reading her as well as he thought he was; if he was seeing her clearly, he would be playing this situation much closer to the chest.

As one of the waitresses brought over a tray full of dirty glasses and napkins, Remy slid it across the bar and started sorting it out, garbage into the rubbish bin and glasses onto a rack to be cleaned. She would let the bus boy do the cleaning (she claimed, because it was his job, but in actuality, because she couldn’t do it with magic and would look conspicuous cleaning them by hand). All the while she was doing this, Remy continued listening to Angus, smiling up at him while she leaned over to stack the glasses, peering through a curtain of dark hair to give him a flirtatious grin when he listed off the things he liked to do, including cooking of all things.

This guy really is a blabbermouth. It would be annoying if it wasn’t so useful, and he not so damn good-looking…

“Then we really will get on well,” Remy responded, smirking as she dropped the last of the glasses and stood up, wiping her hands on the bar rag, “I can’t cook a meal to save my life. I mostly just eat simply, or occasionally grab something downtown.”

Oh yes. Remy: the helpless. It might seem counterintuitive, but it was always good to make a man feel needed, and this particular need might get her an in with the man across the bar, who seemed more and more interested by the minute, and Remy found herself getting more and more impatient to leave with him.

Unfortunately, the good rhythm the two of them had going was interrupted when the door to Satan’s was once again flung open violently. Now, this wasn’t an unusual occurrence in this establishment, but if it happened any more tonight, Vito was going to be inquiring of Remy if she was unfit for her position, and anything that threatened her income was at the top of Remy’s list of annoyances (only just below threatening her life).

In what Remy considered good fortune, however, Angus seemed equally annoyed and anxious to return to their conversation, because he wasted no time confronting the new intruder with both his wand and his words. Remy was gripping the edge of the bar with one hand, and letting one hand dangle by her side, just in case it needed to make a quick move for the pistol in her waistband. The conversation between the two men was getting heated quickly, threats passing both ways. Remy’s eyes darted from man to man as the conversation continued, much to the oblivion of other patrons, who were too interested in the strippers in the far corner of the room to be bothered by a few men having a shouting match.

Remy, however, was invested in the conversation because it was happening in her workplace, but then she very quickly got even more invested in the conversation when the man in the doorway, whose name still hadn’t been stated, abruptly turned his wand away from Angus and onto Remy. Instinctively, Remy’s arm snaked around her back and gripped the handle of pistol in her waistband, but before she could pull it out, she heard a pop and was forced to take a step backward as Angus appeared in the narrow space between herself and the bar, directly in the line of the scarred man’s wand.

Remy was stunned, to say the least, and she quickly dropped her hand from the pistol before anyone noticed her gripping it. She checked subtly to make sure her tank top was covering it again, all of this done hastily while Angus and the threatening man exchanged another set of threats. Where the hell is the bouncer....? Remy’s subconscious demanded, wanting to be indignant about being protected by a relative stranger, but also not wanting to die. When it came down to pride or life, Remy chose life.

And as it turned out, Angus was better equipped to deal with the man anyway, as he proved all too quickly when, with the briefest jolt of red light, the man that Remy could just barely see from behind Angus’s tall form suddenly disappeared. Or rather, that is what Remy had believed had happened, but a second later Angus was ensconcing a cockroach inside an overturned glass, which allowed the bartender to put the pieces together.

The brunette rarely found herself struck into silence, but this situation had definitely done it. She had just been threatened and defended by two complete strangers (or relative strangers, in Angus’ case), and the man in the long coat was now conversing with her as though nothing had happened. Remy had always had a way of making men do things for her, but getting them to stand in the line of fire for her? That was new, even for her.

Shake it off, Remy’s subconscious demanded, not wanting her to look like a blathering idiot.

“Um, yeah…” Remy said, blinking away her disbelief, “One fresh firewhiskey, coming right up.”

The few minutes it took her to fetch a fresh glass of the top shelf liquor gave Remy the time she needed to calm down and get back into her groove, so when she slid the drink across the bar to Angus, she had the self-awareness and situational consciousness to let her hand linger just a moment when her fingers brushed his next to the glass.

“Thank you,” Remy said, her eyes connecting with Angus’ intentionally, figuring she could use what just occurred as an excuse to convey a closer relationship than two strangers that had met only an hour ago in a bar, “For, well… for doing what you did. It was… above and beyond the call of duty,” Remy added, faking an appreciative smile with an unintentional hint of “let’s get out of here, shall we?”

Keep your pants on, Remy…. At least while you’re still at work.

"No," Angus said, "It wasn't." Angus was putting himself in check very quickly. He had a very firm policy about not getting involved or...even worse,...attached. And Remy was making him rethink that whole 'involvement' clause. The little voice of his conscience started to argue that policies really were more just guidelines anyway. Guidelines could be broken. A lot like New Year's resolutions that never got off the ground to begin with. And denying Remy much of anything was going to be hard, if it came to it. Wait...did his thoughts just go there? He wanted to headslap himself for letting the testosterone part of his personality try to rev up.

However, in point of fact, he had had no intention of letting Remy be used as bait to try to draw out his cooperation. Angus never played those games. "I had no intention of letting him use you. Im sure you're quite capable of handling yourself, but I enjoy annoying that particular wizard to no end." It made him wonder, though. For the 'cockroach' to turn out within a moment or two to try to warn Angus off was rather intriguing to Angus. Made him wonder if the 'cockroach's' stooge had something interesting he'd either been doing or procuring. If he had been, it might have made it worth Angus's time to be dashing through the rain tonight. That, and he wasn't denying that he'd have gone out in the rain to meet Remy just for that reason alone. He shook his thoughts back to business once more. He made a mental note to check Borgin & Burkes in the morning. Why the hell wasn't he focusing since he'd met her? And right now, there was a filthy cockroach on her floor. There was something in that, that just wasn't right.

He decided to rid himself of the glass on the floor in order to save himself from having to battle to get the bug back from some drunk later on. There was, after all, the outside chance that Angus might find a logical reason to turn him back into a human rather than dunking him in a potions cauldron. He picked up the glass, his hand over the top. He turned the glass right side up, causing the insect to fall upside down, kicking helplessly. He took his index finger and drew a ring of light around the rim of the glass. It was a restraining shield. The bug might crawl up the side of the glass maybe but he wasn't going penetrate past the glowing shield Angus'd drawn. He tucked the glass in his pocket and laid some extra galleons on the bar to pay for the glass.

"Sorry about that," he told Remy. "But I presume you dont really want to serve a customer out of that glass now anyway. At any rate, that should buy you a new glass to replace this one.

"Now, where were we? Oh yes. You were saying you can't cook. You actually eat downtown? The only thing I've found edible there, honestly, is a couple of passable fish and chips places. What could you possibly find down there worth the effort? You can't tell me you wouldn't rather have something decent." Wait...again.. That sounded an awful lot like a dinner invitation. Was he ready for that again? And did he mean it to come out of his mouth like that as much as he thought he had? Smooth, Schoolboy, real smooth, he critiqued himself.

Angus really wasn't a food snob. He actually preferred simple fare, but he liked simple foods prepared truly well. It was part of the heritage he had inherited, but most of the places in the wizarding world used magic as a shortcut to cooking, and Angus hated it. He made it a firm rule to treat every single ingredient by hand. No magical shortcuts. Rules. He seemed to be breaking a lot of those tonight. At the rate he was going, he'd end up at a muggle fast food place or one off those restaurants at the other end of Diagon Alley that simply conjured their food and raked in endless profits from customers that never quite felt satisfied. He was equally as sure that some of the less 'righteous' thoughts that hadn't risen up in his mind in a very long time were being uprooted by the brunette behind the bar. Part of him cared, and part of him was feeling like he'd checked his list of self imposed rules at the door when he'd dashed in here tonight.