Tuesday, February 17, 1998
I feel like I've been at the Manor more often than Hogwarts these past few weeks. Severus wakes me once a week and instructs me to get dressed because I have been selected for a mission.
That's how I find myself here tonight, playing Exploding Snap with Looney Lovegood.
She flips over a Toad Card on top of mine, and my arms jumps, chest seizing to slap my hand down before hers—
Slap!
She's beaten me, giggling.
"Fuck."
"I think that's eighteen to fourteen, yes?" she says, shuffling the cards again. The cards have only exploded twice so far.
"You cheat," I say, childish even to my ears.
"You're the one with the wand," she says. "Mr. Ollivander usually beats me. He's quite quick for an older gentleman."
I glance over to the empty space beside a stone pillar, rumpled blanket and spare socks next to a book.
"They took him yesterday," she says, without needing me to ask. I don't need to ask much with her. She just supplies. "How is school?" she says.
"Awful." I take the cards she deals me and stack them neatly. "The Carrows have moved onto Imperio."
She nods. "But you can resist that, yes? As an Occlumens?"
My eyes snap up to her. She flips the first card. And waits for my turn. She looks up at me and her blue eyes are almost white.
"Yes," I whisper. "It can be easier. Are you...?"
She tilts her head at me.
I stare into her eyes, sending my thoughts forwards.
A Legilimens.
I watch the words slide on a silver thread between our eyes, slithering into her pupils and disappearing inside.
She bites the inside of her cheek. "Mm. I don't think so."
I laugh. A barking sound full of relief and mirth. She literally just read unspoken words from my mind.
She leans in, like she's about to tell me the secrets of the world. "I just know how to keep the wrackspurts away."
She winks. And I'm about to laugh at her, about to flip my card over when the door to the dungeon bangs open.
I stand, pulling my wand.
Ollivander's pale, thin body crashes down the stairs, hitting step after step on the way down. Lovegood moves to go to him, and I grab her elbow.
Two pairs of boots follow, and then Dolohov and Rowle are there. Rowle kicks Ollivander's side, but Dolohov stops when he sees us. His eyes scan to the apple cores and playing cards. He slides his thin black eyes up to me, and smirks.
"Are we interrupting something, Malfoy?"
Rowle looks up, catching sight of me. His feet trip and replant. He might be drunk.
I take a breath, and everything locks into place.
"Not at all. Just keeping watch over our prisoner," I say. "Per my father's instructions."
Dolohov smiles, and moves lazily towards us. "So, old Lucius thinks this little bird needs a private guard?" His eyes rake over Lovegood. "She special? A locking charm on the door won't keep her?"
Rowle gives a wobbly laugh. Ollivander lays still and silent at his feet.
I lift a brow at them, give a long-suffering sigh, and say, "Well, to be honest, Professor Carrow is testing us tomorrow on the Imperius Curse." I glance at Lovegood. "I've been practicing. Winning card games and making her jump around a bit."
I look back at them, shrugging. And that should be it.
But then Dolohov's lips part, crooked teeth devious.
"Let's see then."
I feel a cold sweep through my limbs, and any hope of leaving the dungeon easily drains out of me.
I turn to Lovegood, my wand crushed in my grip. I raise my arm, and look into her eyes.
She gives me that small grin that I remember from months ago, when I had my wand turned on her in a classroom, ready to sizzle her nerve endings.
"Imperio."
She sways on her feet. And then hops onto one. And I don't know if I'm actually cursing her or if she's reading my mind.
She hops to the other foot. And then – something I did not ask her to do – she does a jumping jack.
I drop my wand and she relaxes. I look back to Dolohov.
His eyes glitter an ugly color and he says, "Is that the best you've got, Malfoy?"
I shrug. "I'll probably pass the exam."
Rowle hiccups, leaning on the stone wall. "You wanna—you wanna really see if you're good at it, you should have her strip."
He laughs into his chest, head lolling to the side.
There's an icy shard digging into my lungs that tastes like fear. I feel Lovegood's heat next to me. She's still.
Dolohov raises a brow at me, waiting.
I sneer at him, looking over Lovegood briefly before snipping at him. "She's barely fourteen," I exaggerate.
Dolohov smiles at me, like he sees right through me. Rowle says, "Even better." He laughs and stumbles a bit.
"Not very inventive, either of you," Dolohov says, stepping forward, challenging me. "I'd test my skills by having her on her knees, sucking me off." He stops in front of me. He's reaching distance from Lovegood. I stare into his eyes, breathing slowly. "That's a real fun game. 'Cause if you let up on the Imperio, if you get too... distracted," he says, chuckling, "she might bite your cock off."
He chuckles. His eyes slide over to her, and I see the same expression he had looking at Granger in the paper, talking about an Auction. The same expression he'd worn a few weeks back when we broke into a Muggle jewelry shop on one of our many missions to look for a tiara, but he'd told me to wait outside while he "dealt with" the shop girls.
"The risk's a bit too high then," I say, pulling his eyes back to me. "I'll stick to hopscotch, thank you." I look to Rowle and Ollivander. "You've delivered your prisoner. I'll ask you now to leave my house."
Dolohov takes one step closer to me. I'm as tall as him, so his breath hits me right in the nose.
"I'll be watching you, Malfoy." He smiles. "You're weak, like your father." He reaches up and straightens my collar. "You'll make a mistake one day, and I'll be there. I'll make sure the Dark Lord knows how much of a coward you are. And I'll enjoy watching him end you."
I give him a small grin and say, "Looking forward to it, Antonin."
He steps back, looking over Lovegood once more, and drags Rowle up the stairs.
I'm steadying my breath still when Lovegood runs to Mr. Ollivander, pouring water into his mouth and asking what the weather is like outside.
I watch the two of them for a bit as I clean up the cards and slice up the apple I brought down for the wandmaker.
"You did very good, Draco," Looney says.
I frown at the floor, about to head upstairs again. I want to lighten the room. I don't want to leave them in the heaviness.
"What colors are they, do you suppose," I say, nodding upstairs to where the two Death Eaters disappeared.
I expect her to say puke green, or neon-spotted maroon.
"Hm." She looks up at the ceiling. "They don't have any." Her fingers twist around a curly strand. "My colors shy away from the darkness."
~*~
Saturday, February 19, 2000
There was something that wrapped around my heart, something that still clung to the belief that she would never. That Lucius was lying.
And that something unravels and falls away like a scarf in the wind when I see her sitting at a café table, ankles crossed, coffee cup hovering over a saucer as she sips.
And everything feels raw. The sun is too bright. The people are too loud.
I recognize the man from a handful of meetings with Mother years ago. He might have even been the one to redecorate the drawing room—
And I hear her screaming, cutting above the buzzing street. I see her writhing on the floor, and I think of how soft she's made me. How years of my soul stretching to touch hers has pulled me too thin.
Weak for her.
And as I approach the table, as she looks up at me in terror. As I smile at Monsieur DuBois, I think of all the little ways she's lied to me.
I guide her around the gate, escorting her out, and I wonder why she wouldn't tell me about her trip to Azkaban when I asked. How many times did I have to beg her to tell me about it.
What else is she keeping from me?
"Draco—"
"How long have you been plotting with my father," I snap, trying to make sense of all this. Trying to figure out how...
What part of this relationship is even real.
It's not a relationship, really. She's allowing me to fuck her.
We're stopped at a crosswalk, and I feel her next to me.
I win.
She's never told me that she wanted me. Never said she has ached for me for as long as I've wanted her. She said, I win.
"You say it like we're working together," she says, hissing at me.
"Aren't you?"
The signal changes and I plow through the street, a vague memory of where the Apparition point is.
"What did he tell you?" she demands. "If he defines it as anything other than blackmail then he lied to you—"
"You're not the only one who had a deal with him, Granger. You shouldn't have gotten involved in this."
She's jogging to keep up with me, and I just want to get her alone. Just get us to a private place where it's just the two of us and I can force her to start from the beginning. To tell me everything.
She asks me how I found her, and I tell her about going to the teashop.
The way Madame Michele had eyed me, knowing exactly what I was there for. Like she expected me weeks ago.
Because I should have known. I chuckle. Because it was so simple.
"You're done with those classes," I bite out.
"What about the money, Draco? The next three installments?"
We're a block away from Apparating. And I feel the clouds condensing above us.
"I told him to shove them up his ass." Essentially.
"We need that money, Draco," she pleads. "Malfoy Consulting is barely afloat as it is. I need to keep going to those classes—"
The idea is so abhorrent to me, that she would continue playing his game. I grab her and pull her into an alley, pointing a finger in her face. "You are not to step foot in that tea room again, do you hear me, Granger?"
She looks at me with wide eyes, and says, "The business is more important than some insane classes, Draco!"
I grab her arms and hiss, "Nothing is more important than you." I hear the skies crack apart, like bricks falling from the sky.
She breathes against my face, seeing me. Seeing all of me.
I've said too much.
I've done too much.
Father at least had the sense to keep his cards close to the vest with her. I've just laid all mine out, hoping she'll bet on me.
I kiss her, just so she'll stop looking at me that way, like I'm some kind of gentleman. Some kind of hero in a story.
And I press my body into hers, like no gentleman would do. Like no student of Madame Michele's Charms and Manners School would be allowed to do.
Her hands are on my waist and my tongue tangles in her mouth.
So much I need to know. So much we need to discuss. But this part is mine. She's let me have this already, so I know I can have it.
Echoes call back to me, something vile as I claim her. The ways I've won her from them all piece together in my head.
We could have split her down the middle. In more ways than one!
I think it's time you found a new bookshop, Malfoy.
Do you think she'll ever moan for you after she's screamed for me?
I pull my lips off her, hands pawing at every part of her and mouth sucking at her jaw.
"Did he ever touch you?"
"N-no. Nothing like that," she gasps, and I pull her hair until I have her neck.
"Have you been to see him since you went in November?"
My hips press into hers, begging to let me back inside.
"No, we've written – He's written letters. Threats."
I suck at her skin, marking the spot that always screams that she belongs to someone. That someone has kissed her and fucked her and wants her.
"Tell me about the letters. Tell me what he said to you."
I sink into her neck, and then she's pulling my face back, holding my head softly, looking into me with anxious eyes.
"I know what you're doing, Draco, and stop." She rubs her thumb across my cheek, calming me. "This... what we have is very special to me and you're turning it into something ugly."
She's right. I close my eyes and breathe in her scent. I press a soft apology against her lips, and ask her the question that has been slowly killing me for months.
"What did my father say to you in Azkaban?"
Please. Please, Hermione. Just answer it.
Her eyes flicker between mine, and then she does.
"He gave me a list of things. To work on."
I stare at her, waiting for more.
A list?
"For what?"
"To be..." she stutters, "to be seen with you. To be worthy of you."
In November? By that time, he'd made it quite clear that I was to stay away from her so why...
"You weren't even with the company yet," I say, looking down at the cloud-darkened stones.
"Yes, but we were being pictured together so often," she says, lashes fluttering so pretty. "And... and he knew about the Auction."
That fucking Auction.
I knew he told her. I knew it.
I wait for her to put me in my place. To spew into me the correct way to have handled this. To give me notes on my behaviors.
I wait.
She just looks at me with open, trusting eyes.
"He knew that you'd gone to Narcissa's mother." And now she does too. I wonder if she truly understands what it would have meant...
And then:
"He knew that you would have saved me."
Saved her. Funny to phrase it that way when I would have kept her locked away in her pretty little room. But her face is begging me for something, and she continues.
"He thought we were together. Had been for ages. I – I corrected him, of course," she says, looking away.
Yes, of course, please do correct him. We weren't together then and we hardly are now. Would she even classify it in such a way? With no hopes towards a future?
And then she's telling me she's seen the photographs of the alley way where I almost touched her, almost pinned her beneath me and ravaged her.
She breathes heavily, and there's rain on her cheeks. She tells me about the blackmail. The classes for the inheritance. But all I can think about is the beginning of all this.
"What was on the list?"
She speaks the words from memory, and I feel a weight crushing me with every item.
"Graceful, with table manners, skilled in hosting," she says, and I think of Mother, "witty, charming, social leader," and I think of Pansy. The list goes on, and as she stutters over "level headed" and "obedient" I try to imagine her that way. I try to think of a boring life with a boring wife who would put up with me. Not even Mother can compare to this impossible list. And Father knows it.
"He said the only thing he could part with was pure-blood."
I feel a grin split my face.
So, it's a joke then?
He says I can have her, but only if she strips it all away to be someone un-her.
He says stay away from her, but do use her, son, if at all possible.
How are things progressing between you two?
She's so much more like this, don't you think? Much more like a Malfoy wife.
Pushing me into this, even as I try to crawl away.
I'm laughing. I'm cackling into an alleyway with half a Golden Girl about to cry.
"Why did you do this, Granger."
It's barely a question because I know it's him. It's him who served her to me on a platter, a shell of her.
"I'll finish these next three weeks, Draco, and then you'll be done with him," she says. "You'll not owe him anything. You'll be rid of him."
"No, no." I rub my face, feeling my skin buzz with the rainstorm. "I'll never be rid of him. He's got his hooks in you, now." I look at her and confess, "I'd seen it, but I ignored it. You're different. The way you drink your coffee is different. The way you walk. The way you dance." I touch her to remind myself that she's real, that she's still here. "You're changing. And now every time I see you lift your saucer with your cup, I'll think of him. Think of this. When you curtsey. When you shake hands."
She cries, this Pygmalion doll of mine.
"Why did you do this," I whisper against her lips.
"It was the right thing to do," she says, painting across my skin.
There she is.
Her brown eyes flicker between mine, searching for justice and equality, fighting for herself, fighting for others, fighting for me.
Maybe she's still in there. I lean into her mouth, wondering if I can breathe her back to life.
~*~
She tells me she has to get back to Cornerstone, and everything besides the two of us comes back to me as I pull away from her lips.
We Apparate to Diagon Alley, and when we arrive in a downpour, I transfigure a large umbrella for us. She looks like she'll say goodbye when I open the door for her, but I just dry us both with a spell and say hello to Morty. He grins at us with a secret smile that I remember from years ago, sitting high behind the counter.
She goes back to work, and I find a few books, planting myself in a large chair with a view of the counter, and cast Oculus Dolus.
I spend an hour watching her. Watching the way she moves. It's still her. She still fumbles with quills and parchment, like she's trying to decide the quickest way to write down her thoughts. She still shifts her weight from one hip to the other – and I wonder if she's used cushioning charms on her feet; she really should use them if she's going to insist on standing for sixteen hours on Saturday and Sunday. She still sucks on the end of her quill, even without the blue sugar to tempt her. Her lips still pull tight on the end of the feather, cheeks straining, and eyes on the paperwork in front of her.
And most important in all this, she still watches me.
Still, she lifts her eyes and finds my location in a room. Still, she looks away too quickly, even though I'm not "looking back" at her. Still, she tilts her face to the counter and lets her lashes flutter up, thinking she's the sneakiest of spies while her eyes graze over me.
Watching me at the Ministry. Watching me at Hogwarts even. I never used to think she looked at me. Never thought she'd glanced at me when I wanted her to, but maybe it's been a dance for years, spinning to different partners and turning heads away from each other.
I want to ask her what she meant when she said, "I win." How long has she been watching me.
She grabs a few books and marches into the fiction section to reshelf them. The way she walks... It's not that different, is it?
She passes the hag that's been wandering for an hour or so, steering clear of me. She smiles brightly at it. The hag jumps and turns, waddling over to a different section.
I watch her eyes come to me again, resting on me while I pretend to read. She drinks in my hair and my face, sliding over my body in a way she really shouldn't do in a place of business, but then finally resting on the book in my lap, tilting her head to try to figure out what I'm reading.
Hermione Granger and books.
I release the charm on my eyes, and when she brings her gaze back to my face, making eye contact, she jolts and blushes, turning away. I feel a grin blossoming on my lips, and she looks back at me. She smiles back, like I've just asked her to dance.
Maybe I have.
And I decide not to use Oculus Dolus any longer. No need to deceive her of anything in the future.
The hag pokes its head around a book stack again as Granger walks back to the counter, a little sway to her hips. The hag looks directly at me and pulls back when it meets my eyes.
I'd seen it here before, browsing but never interacting with her. I hear it shuffle to the other side of the stack, and I watch as it pokes its head out again, jumping, and retreating.
I've never seen it buy anything.
I've never seen it communicate with anyone.
But it's kept its eye on her. And on me.
A thick sludging feeling pours over my chest as I watch it pull a book with a bony hand, waddling down another set of stacks.
Granger's busy with a customer. I close my book, placing it on my chair, and move to the stacks, sliding down the shelves until I'm just behind the lumpy creature.
I see it look through the gaps in the shelves and jump when it finds me gone from my chair. It spins to go on a search for me, and it finds me directly behind it, like some kind of horror story.
It lets out a startled "meep" sound, and I glare down at it with all the Lucius Malfoy I have left in me.
"Your service to my father is complete. Leave this store and never return. If I find you within one hundred meters of Hermione Granger again, I will eviscerate you slowly with all the Dark Magic I have in me. Is that clear?"
Its black eyes gape at me. Then it drops the book and scrambles to the exit.
I listen for the door opening, and Granger says a "Stay dry!" as the shuffle of flat feet tumbles out the door.
I release my shoulders, feeling relief and anxiety swirl together. I hear my father's smug voice.
I've been having her watched since the moment she left Hogwarts.
I don't remember how many times I've seen that hag here. It was inconsequential to me. But I'm suddenly positive that every visit I've paid to Cornerstone Books has been carefully documented. Even months ago, when I couldn't stay away from her, flirting over giftwrapping.
And Lucius just asks me softly, How are things progressing with you two?
When he knew.
He'd known before her visit to Azkaban. Before the list.
I shake my head, trying to dispel some of the aches that trying to outthink my father create. I reshelf the dropped book, wondering if Lucius knew he couldn't control me any longer, so he went through her.
Graceful. Table manners.
I grab up a few more books with no intention of reading them.
Skilled in hosting. Witty. Charming. Social leader.
Moving back to my chair, I drop back, and the movement pulls her eyes to me, like she's been wondering where I'd got to.
Beautiful. Fashionable. Level headed.
She smiles softly, still speaking to the woman at the register.
Financially knowledgeable. Obedient. Trained in décor.
I watch her fingers flirt with the ledger book.
Practiced dancer. Intelligent. Cool tempered.
And something worse twists itself around my head, some small idea voiced with an aristocratic hiss and a lilting sigh.
You can have your Mudblood. But I want ten weeks.
Perhaps... Perhaps there was truth there. I could have her. I could marry her, even. But he needed to ensure that she had the proper training to handle the job.
Don't botch the proposal, Draco, he'd said, joking.
She looks over at me again when the customer leaves, and she busies herself once she's seen I'm already looking back at her.
It wasn't that simple. There is always something else with Lucius Malfoy. I let go of any hope for my father, remember that only this morning he stabbed me with words he didn't need to use. Just to make me hurt.
I clear my mind, pushing Lucius behind a wall now, and bringing Hermione forward.
By the time the shop is closing down I'm thinking of all the different ways I can touch her again. We can go to hers or mine, and I can lap at her again, begging her to teach me about the house elf wars or some rubbish.
She's saying goodnight to the final customer, and I've come to stand at the stacks, waiting. Watching her as she squirms under my gaze. I don't hold back anything, sending my desires forward in ways I haven't been able to for five years.
She flips the sign to Closed, and turns to me with a smile.
"We're closed for today, Mr. Malfoy," she says. "Is there anything I can put on hold for you, for tomorrow?"
Shopkeeper roleplay? Whatever else are you hiding from me, Granger?
I move to lean on the counter, gravitating closer to her. "Are you quite sure there's nothing on reserve for me back there?"
"I can check." And she turns, leans forward, and those tight denims pulls so deliciously close to her skin as she wiggles her arse for me. What a vixen she is.
She says something, but all I'm focused on is the dip of her back under her shirt, the round cheeks pressing forwards to me. And I feel my cock harden when she turns her head to look back at me, just as if I had her bent over my desk.
We haven't discussed those positions. I didn't want to frighten her off with how badly I wanted to see her bent over, or bouncing on top of me, or on her hands and knees—
I look up at her, and she's grinning. "Mind if I take a look?" I say.
She nods. "Be my guest." And she stays there. Ready for me.
I need to learn a spell to disappear denims. I'm sure Blaise knows it.
I slip behind the counter, and slide into the space behind her, my hips cradling hers as my cock pushes against her arse. I bend over her, pressing my hot breath against her ear, and sliding my hand along her ribs.
"How strange. I could have sworn something back here was mine."
She laughs, and presses into me, like agreeing with me. Mine.
Oh, we better fuck in this bookshop, Granger.
I glide my hand higher, cupping her breast and feeling for her hard nipple. She gasps and I press forward, letting her feel my cock, starting a slow roll against her backside.
I lean forward to kiss her neck, and she turns her head and says, "I think we could find what you're looking for in the non-fiction section."
There's that fire in her eyes that always spells disaster for my self-control, and I smirk back her and say, "The customer service here is impeccable."
She straightens, pressing up against me, and takes my hand, leading me around the counter to the right, towards a walled-off non-fiction section. The windows are covered with book shelves, and if anyone wanted to look inside, they would be hard-pressed to see anything in the darkness.
And then she dims the lights down.
Oh, what a saucy girl.
She turns and wraps herself around me, pressing our chests together, and slamming us back into a bookshelf, and I almost laugh into her mouth at the reverse of my own fantasy.
She tilts her head up to me, moaning as my hands slither down her waist to grab at her arse – the same arse she'd just presented to me, like it belonged to me.
She slides her hands down my chest and grabs for my belt, and I breathe heavily against her mouth as she unbuckles me like we only have ten minutes in her office before lunch arrives.
My eyes slide over to a comfy armchair in the corner, and I pause her hands on my buttons.
"Can we... Can I try something? And if you don't like it, we can stop?"
She pants against my face, and says, "Okay." And I kiss her like a man dying of thirst because she trusts me. Because she doesn't hesitate with me. And she makes me feel like I'm going to be different than my father in that regard.
I drag my tongue through her mouth, drinking from her and memorizing her tongue against mine. When I pull away I grab her hands and take her to the chair. I spin her to face the arm, and my hands reach around her hips to work open her jeans. She slides her hands up and down my wrists.
She helps me by shimmying out of the denims, but I don't let her get them past her knees before pushing my hand into her knickers, slipping through her and searching for her clit. She gasps, and her hands search for something grab, landing on the back of the armchair.
I swirl designs on her, slipping down to press inside of her, finding her perfectly wet and already squeezing me as my fingers slip inside. I groan against her ear.
"I want you to bend over this armchair," I hiss into her ear.
She tenses, breath catching.
And I say again, "And if you don't like it, we'll stop."
She nods, and I grip her knickers, pulling them down to her knees. She breathes heavily as I guide her slowly to lean over the arm of the chair. I pull the decorative pillow to rest on the seat, guiding her down to her elbows.
I pull back, looking down at her perky bum pressing up to me. I'm already leaking in my trousers.
I slide my hands along the skin of her back, rolling up her t-shirt, slipping over her arse. Her body is tense, but I massage circles into her cheeks. I hear a moan and I think it came from me.
I pop the last of my buttons and take my cock out of my trousers.
"What's... What's different about this?" she asks quickly, voice high. Probably wondering what my intentions are with her arse in the air.
"Nothing," I say. "It's the same as we've always done, just with you turned a different way."
Though, of course, as I say it I am stroking my cock, looking down at her arsehole.
"Alright," she whispers.
I reach between her legs and press my fingers into her again. "Just like this."
"Alright."
I push my cock between her legs, pressing forward, and she sighs into the pillow. I watch myself disappear inside of her and I mutter, "Fuck."
"What is it?" she says. This loss of control, loss of seeing everything, isn't really her cup of tea, I know.
"I just watched my cock slide into you, Granger," I whisper, pressing further. She gasps. "And I've been dreaming about this arse for years. Watching your hips all throughout school."
She squeaks when I push further, my hands gripping her hips tight.
I start a slow rhythm like this, watching as I enter her, feeling how tight she is like this. I ask her several times how it feels and she just responds with a breathy, "Good."
I move my hands to her waist, planted right on top of the arm of the chair, sliding my fingers along her skin, following the dip of her waist to her full hips. Her backside is so soft and full against my hipbones.
I press down, changing the angle a bit. She moans, and I thrust faster, snapping my hips into her, her body unable to wiggle against me while I push on her waist.
"Oh, Merlin, Granger..."
"Is it good?" she whimpers.
"It's fucking perfect," I hiss, slamming my cock inside of her, feeling her clamp down on me with every thrust. "Can I go faster—"
"Please."
I drive into her. Hermione Granger, bent over a chair in a bookshop, with her denim jeans around her fucking knees.
I watch her fingers curl in the pillow, her head turning into the fabric.
"Turn your head," I say.
She waits a few thrusts before complying. She faces out, hair falling over her neck and cheek. I reach forward and move her curls, twisting them softly and feeling my cock pulse.
"Look at me."
She turns back, panting. And I have to close my eyes to keep from coming.
"Oh, god..." I hear.
When I open my eyes, her mouth is open in a silent scream, and her cunt grips me as I fuck into her. I can hardly get back inside like this, but I try to stay still for her as she gasps.
Fuck I love you so much.
Her muscles start to release, and the warm wetness starts to flood between us, and I know she's not fully done but I can't wait—
I lean forward, gripping her curls in one hand, pressing her waist down with the other, and I fuck her with grunting gasps, cock sinking deep and barely leaving her heat before slamming forward again.
I look down at her arse one last time before I let go, and then I'm gazing into her eyes again as she breathes little sighs into the air, watching me come.
I tug at her hair, and squeeze at her skin, and stay buried inside of her for what feels like hours until I can breathe again. My legs tremor as I bend over, pressing kisses against her back, folding over on top of her to kiss her lips.
I feel her cunt clench me as I rest my weight on her, dipping my tongue into her mouth and smoothing my hand through her hair.
She's still in there. And she's mine.
~*~
I Apparate home, landing on the soft grass just beyond the gates of the Manor. I walk against the February wind, tugging my cloak tighter around myself. The gates admit me, and I pace my way across the path to the large front doors which open at my approach.
I find Mother in the new drawing room, glaring down at her book coolly.
"I almost sent out a search party," she says, eyes on the page.
I was supposed to be home for lunch. The Selwyns were coming over.
I lean on the doorframe, looking down at the new carpets that cover the spot where her blood is still etched into the stones.
"Tell me again about the day she went to see Lucius."
She closes her book and looks up at me. She considers, looking toward the new fireplace, and says, "He agreed to release your inheritance if he could meet her. I must admit that he already knew of your feelings for her. And I feel that agreeing under those circumstances was my mistake."
She looks at me, waiting for a reaction. I have none to give.
"Hermione went to see him... She was very nervous. And when she returned she was quite out of sorts."
I feel my teeth grind together. I nod for her to continue.
"Her first priority upon returning was making it clear to me that the two of you were not courting." I feel the sting, but I was prepared for it. "She was convinced you would not want that, though I am unsure if your father was the one who planted that idea..."
No. It was probably me. With my acid and ice. With talks of Auctions and virginities. With Katyas and Noelles.
Mother pauses. I narrow my eyes at her.
"And I asked her. Quite bluntly. And she said she had no interest in marrying you."
The words close my throat, but I've heard them before.
No interest in marrying me. No interest in becoming Father's idea of a Malfoy bride. Until the inheritance was tied to her. Then she stepped forward like a knight with a shield, facing down the fires.
"Have things changed?" she asks, softly.
She's eyeing me with a strange hope in her eyes, and I see a ballet of grandchildren spinning above her head.
"We, uh..." I clear my throat. "We have made some... progress."
Mother smiles an obnoxious grin, and I roll my eyes at her.
"I do hope you're being safe."
"Mother!" I sputter.
"Or, actually," she ponders, "do be unsafe, won't you? Just be engaged by the time the little one is born."
"Mother, that is quite enough out of you."
She bounces on the loveseat like a child and says, "Can we please have her over? Next weekend?"
I roll my eyes, and say, "Fine." She smiles. Then I press my lips together hating to ruin this lightness, and say, "If it's no matter to you, I'd like for you to play your last move with Father." I look at her, and find her brows drawn together. "He has been sending her to Madame Michele. I found her today with Monsieur DuBois, learning about Renaissance architecture."
The smile fades from her face, and she is still as a statue when she says, "Did you now."
I nod. "He told her the inheritance wouldn't be released to me unless she conformed."
My mother is an absolute vision when she's angry. Most people flush, fire igniting in their eyes, blood boiling. But Mother ices over.
"Draco, darling," she says, gazing out the window at the night sky. "Your father and I are getting a divorce. I hope that won't disturb you too greatly."
She plucks up her book and resumes reading.
~*~
Sunday, February 20, 2000
My Italian is a bit rusty, but I'm able to find my way to the correct villa. I knock at the door, and an old elf immediately pulls it open.
"Draco Malfoy to see Miss Parkinson," I say.
He says something back in Italian, and I recognize schedule or appointment. He looks me up and down. Elves can translate any language, so this one's just being an asshole.
"I do not have an appointment."
He frowns at me and gestures for me to wait in the entry hall. It's a small cottage, with large windows and ivy on the exterior walls. I'm examining the sitting room from its doorway when I hear heels on stairs.
"To what do I owe this surprise?"
I look up and Pansy descends the stairs in a dressing gown, her hair not fully combed, but her face already on. It's been maybe eight years since I've seen her without makeup.
She sees it in my face, stopping on the last two steps, the light leaving her eyes.
"What's wrong?"
I jump right to it, feeling a similar fire from yesterday deep in my chest.
"Have you been in contact with my father?"
Her brows meet her fringe.
"Recently? No. Why? Is there something the matter?"
I slide my hands into my pockets to stop this ache to squeeze something.
"And what about 'not recently?"
She blinks at me, eyes searching mine, dancing over my tight shoulders and closed jaw.
"He saw my design on the Argentinian Minister last June, and wrote to me from Azkaban." She crosses her arms over her chest, in a rare motion of insecurity that draws my eyes. "He... he's followed my work. Sending me congratulations, or..." She swallows. "He put me in contact with several people—"
"And you never mentioned this?" I snarl, losing whatever ounce of control I thought I had over this.
She snaps her mouth shut, eyes narrowing in a way I remember.
"Perhaps I did. It might be in one of the sixty-seven letters I sent to you while you were away."
"It wasn't." I laugh. "I read them all."
Her cheek twitches and she looks away from me.
"What does this have to do with anything?"
I prowl to the bottom of the stairs, looking up at her. "And what of 'The Modern Business Witch?" I hiss. "Did my father have anything to say about that?"
"Of course," she snaps. "He loved the design—"
"And what did he have to say about the model?"
Her lips close, and something darkens her eyes. "What did he say to you now?"
I pace, looking away from her, trying to remember who she is. Who we are. "Whose idea was it to use her?"
"Mine," she snaps.
"Really?"
"Yes," she straightens. "All decisions regarding my line are made by me. If it has my name on it, I stand by it. I'm sure you can appreciate that, Draco."
I look up at her, inches taller than me on the stairs. And I wait. She draws a careful breath through her nose.
"He wrote to me last month. After the New Year's party," she says. "He included a Prophet clipping of Granger, in her white dress and elegant styling, and suggested her." She laughs, and I wince at the sound. "I told him there was no universe in which Hermione Granger would consent to that kind of torture from me, but thank you. Then he let me know about her new position at Malfoy Consulting. And he reminded me of the needs she might have in the future... outside of her employment."
She looks at me, eyes catching on my scowl.
"The decision was mine, Draco. Lucius only gave me a boost of confidence that if I asked, she might say yes. If you asked," she said, "she might say yes."
My throat is closing, trying to decide if I need to hit something or cry.
"You used her—"
"We're all using her," she says, shrugging. "That's what we do, Draco." She bites her lip, smearing her lipstick. "And I won't apologize for keeping in touch with your father. He's the only Malfoy who would talk to me, and he's the closest thing to a paternal guardian I ever had. He always treated me like family."
I look away, chewing on my cheek, sniffing, and feeling the icy chill of useless anger.
"Because you're pure-blood, pure-bred, and flawlessly beautiful," I bite back, sneering at the qualities.
"What else is there?" she snarls.
I look back at her, and she's lifting a brow at me, asking me, a glistening sadness in her eyes that I haven't seen in years.
She steps down off the stairs, and comes to stand in front of me, smaller now. "He asked me to make her one of those three things," she whispers. "And I know you never needed all of that to see her as 'flawlessly beautiful..." Pansy smiles wetly at me. "But you dragged her into your world without even thinking of how difficult it would be for her. To be lacking in those three weapons."
She straightens my shirt collar, like we're on our way upstairs to a wintery Great Hall in our formal robes.
I swallow and say, "Lucius sent her to Madame Michele."
I wait for her to scowl, to ask, to react at all.
"I know."
My eyes snap to her, rage building again.
She continues, "It was obvious. To me, at least." Her hands brush my shoulders, dropping to her sides. "She was such a commoner at school," she chuckles, "It was clear to me that she had been working with someone."
I step away, grinding my teeth, glowering at her sitting room.
"If you want her in your world, Draco, there are things she needs to learn," she hums next to me.
I close my eyes, thinking of the list.
"If she's willing to learn them, that says something too," Pansy says at my shoulder.
I turn my head to see her looking down at our feet.
"Why would you consent to that insane idea?" I ask. "I know how you feel about her. The Pansy I used to know would rather toss her business model in the rubbish than assist Hermione Granger's career or personal life in any way."
She looks out the window. "People change, Draco." And then flatly: "I'm referring to her, of course. I'm as perfect as I've always been." I smile. "And it wasn't her I was helping." She looks up at me. "You may remember my feelings for her, but you must have forgotten my feelings for you."
Her eyes shine up at me, and I feel a pressing weight behind my eyes. She threads her arm through my mine, turning to stare into the sitting room with me.
"There's still a small group of us who would do anything for you," she says. "Quite irritating really."
My eyes find the window, and I stare off, trying to figure out what I can contribute to this.
"Why did you never answer any of my letters?" she whispers. "You read them, and never wrote me back. Once a week I wrote to you, for fifteen months."
A bird lands on the branch outside. He shivers his wings.
"After the first few month in Azkaban, I stopped believing that I would be released. I didn't want you hoping for anything."
She huffs a small laugh. "Contrary to your ego, Draco Malfoy, I did not spend the past two years longing for you." I feel her flip her hair over her shoulder, posturing. "I've had a grand time, thank you very much." And then she adds, "I had a torrid affair with Theodore."
My brows pull together. "Theo? He's..."
"Yes, I know that now. Let's not discuss it."
She pulls her arm from me, turning to go fetch us tea as long as I'm visiting. I feel a grin tugging at me with this new information.
"Does Blaise know?" I call after her.
"Oh, for Merlin's sake, please don't tell him."