Chapter Text
When Theseus asked Jaco for the details of Leta’s daily routine, he’d expected it to be extortionate. Each year, the Scamander siblings purchased West End season tickets for their parents’ anniversary. As a trade off for the intelligence he desired, Theseus had agreed to pay his sister’s share for the next five years, with additional season tickets for her. Despite Jaco's ruthlessness as a negotiator, he considered that it was a bargain. The information he sought was so precious that Theseus would readily have swapped it for ten years’ worth of tickets. In actuality, he would have agreed to twenty years’ worth, but he wasn’t about to tell his sister that.
The next morning, at precisely seven-ten AM, Theseus ‘accidentally’ ran into Leta at Bobby's cafe, which was opposite the station. After insisting on paying for her coffee, he accompanied her back to the station, standing outside with her.
‘So’, he began nervously. Facing the mirror in his bathroom, he’d practiced what he wanted to say, multiple times. ‘Jaco tells me that you graduated first at the academy.’
‘Yes, Sir.’
‘In every discipline?’
‘Affirmative.’
‘Including restraints and takedowns?’
‘That’s correct, Sir.’
Squinting at her incredulously, he enquired, ‘and how exactly did you manage that against guys twice your size?’
Standing upright in response to his challenge, Leta informed him, ‘I’m trained in Karate, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu and MMA. And I’m fast; I took my opponents down before they had a chance to respond.’
He frowned and nodded, impressed. ‘I’d love to see you in action…Le-ta,’ he told her, reverently saying her name.
‘I'd be happy to oblige you, Sir,’ she said, with a playful smile. Erotic thoughts about wrestling Leta on the floor immediately flooded his brain. To dampen the feeling of being carried away, Theseus cleared his throat and adopted a more solemn tone.
‘Achieving top marks must have involved considerable graft.’
‘I like to tackle challenges assiduously’, Chief Inspector.
‘You must have ambitions.’
‘I’m focusing on my career.’ Once she’d said that, Theseus had the opening he’d been fishing for.
‘I could assist you…if you wanted me to.’
‘I’d appreciate that immensely.’ She smiled broadly with her whole face. Theseus felt gladdened by the advancement of his plan, until he noticed Jaco at the window, staring at him with one eyebrow raised.
Keen to escape his sister, he looked back at Leta and said, ‘I must be holding you up.’
‘I think I’m the one doing the holding up, Sir.’ Taking his leave, he lifted Leta’s hand as if to kiss it, then thinking better of it, he shook it in a bizarrely awkward fashion, ratcheting her entire arm up and down. Experiencing a burst of electricity from their physical connection, Theseus was reluctant to let her go, despite observing Jaco laughing hysterically at him through the glass. After Leta departed, he felt the ghost of her touch on his palm, like lacey curtains floating in a gentle breeze. Forgetting all about his sister, he walked away with a sense of satisfaction; their first conversation had surpassed his expectations. To his amazement, he’d been able to talk to her without appearing like a rabid lunatic. And he’d avoided kissing her hand.
Over coffee the next morning, Theseus plunged directly into mentoring. ‘The first attribute of a good detective is meticulous attention to detail, followed closely by unwavering doggedness.’
‘Detail, fastidiousness and mongrel stubbornness, Sir’, Leta parroted.
‘Which can all be learnt. But you possess something that can’t be taught; instinct.’ Following her into the station, he stood beside her desk. The other officers were staring at the highly unusual sight of the six-foot-four, red headed DCI, drinking coffee with the short, but unbelievably attractive PC.
Quietly, so they couldn’t be overheard, Leta admitted, ‘I’m worried that the other officers will view my promotion as queue jumping.’
‘Jaco informed me that they’re delighted about your move to CID.’
‘Really?’
‘You've occasioned them to look inadequate, Leta’, he explained, charmed by her humbleness.
Monday was her first day as a detective. Meeting as usual at Bobbys, Theseus looked Leta up and down. He’d considered her stunning in her uniform, but in her pink tweed jacket and slim fitting trousers, she looked like she’d come directly from the runway.
Noticing that he was surveying her appearance, she asked, ‘do I look okay?’
‘Le-ta, you’re crime fighting perfection.’
A week passed, with Leta making astounding progress in the detective arts. As a perfectionist, she excelled at everything she touched. Her recall of interviews was word perfect and she completed reports in a quarter of the time than it took her teammates. Reluctant witnesses trusted her and she adroitly viewed CCTV tapes at triple the speed of her colleagues. Her skills were so remarkably superhuman, that Theseus was half convinced that she was a supernatural android who had descended from the stars. Leta was uniquely special and he knew that if he was to win her heart, he couldn’t leave it to chance.
Theseus was a tactician at his core. His plans were like the rings of a tree trunk, circled by “goals” and then “methods”. Usually, his schemes overflowed with detail and complexity. However, with Leta, the only strategy he could conceive of was to become her friend. He’d ruled out any further stalking; he was already doing that every morning. Not that Leta appeared to mind, judging by the wide smile that she unfailingly greeted him with. So, it was decided; he would work to become her friend. Theseus was practiced at being friends with women; his two long term relationships had started platonically, gradually developing into a sexual connection. Both partnerships ended amicably, deflating back to a state of friendship, like a degassing balloon.
Theseus’s previous attempts at romancing beautiful women had been a colossal failure. His English would dissolve into nonsensical syllables, which was ironic, given the one-hundred thousand word thesis he had penned for his Phd. His ineptitude made Theseus Scamander a stranger to passion. But after the mute embarrassment of their introduction, he had swiftly adjusted to a relaxed demeanor in Leta's presence. This surprised him; he’d expected that the volcanic intensity of his feelings for her would prove to be an impossible obstacle. However, his efforts with Leta continued on a successful path; by the end of their second week, they'd moved on from shop talk and had bonded over literature, French culture and fitness.
Their morning discussions featured an episode of Leta’s home life: she was sharing a house with her sibling Yusef, his girlfriend Nagini, and Skywalker, a seven year old Siamese cat. Disliking the way that Yusef’s significant other sneakily manipulated him, Leta had nicknamed the French Vietnamese beauty ‘the snake.’ Her brother was blind to his girlfriend’s silver tongued tactics. As a criminal defender, Nagini earned twice Yusef’s public prosecutor’s wage, yet made no contribution to the domestile’s finances. Instead, her income was expended on designer fashion and expensive nights out with her friends. Yusef's exclusion from these outings was justified by his puported dislike of crowds. One morning, Leta raced up to Theseus, excited to report a development in her domestic arrangements.
‘Yusef caught the snake in my room, trying on my new underwear.’
Managing to stop himself from probing her about the inticrites of her undergarments, Theseus countered with ‘what the actual fuck’, instead.
‘Yusef had already kicked her out by the time I arrived home. They’ve broken up,' Leta continued, trying not to laugh.
‘He put you first’, Theseus observed.
‘Always’, she replied. He smiled, gladdened that she had her brother’s unwavering support.
‘So the panty-pilfering reptile is homeless?’ he said, chuckling.
‘There’s always the zoo’, Leta replied. He threw his head back and laughed uproariously; no one else had ever reduced him to uncontrollably tearful guffawing.
Every day, the boss and his favourite DC announced their entrance into the task force’s large office by their caffeinated chortelling. Theseus had taken to perching on the edge of Leta’s desk, stretching his long legs towards her and crossing his feet underneath her chair. Leaning towards him, she would adopt an open stature. For ten minutes, he would give her his undivided attention. The team had an unspoken rule; the boss wasn’t to be interrupted during his DCLT: his Detective Constable Leta Time. Before his attraction to Constable Lestrange, Theseus had been the physical embodiment of the Met’s code of conduct; he’d never entertained so much as an inappropriate thought before. Memorising the handbook before joining the force, he was fully conversant with the edict that senior officers should refrain from conducting personal relationships with the juniors in their command. His team noticed his lapse but were understanding; Leta was undeniably brilliant and the most beautiful police member in the Chelsea region, if not the entire West of London.