CHAPTER 1 NEW BEGINNINGS
(A/N: I decided to update and continue with this story, as the idea haunts me and I've come to want to update my WIPs. Hope you enjoy the (hopefully) better story and please leave a review!)
"Stella, I told you to give me a call when the new documents arrived!" she said, pointing at the stack of papers on the desk of her new secretary.
"I'm sorry Ms Granger, I just don't know how these weird Muggle communication machines work! I type in the numbers but when I put the thing next to my ear, I can't hear anything!" she apologized and showed Hermione the contraption.
Since Hermione started working at the Ministry she had decided, with Arthur's help, to incorporate some Muggle contraptions in the office. This came with some protest of course, but after a few weeks, they knew not to cross the brightest witch of her age and accepted the new Muggle changes at the Ministry. This was her only victory of the last few years since she had worked here, though. Hermione had started working here with the idea of changing the wizarding law but so far she had only accomplished to lessen the growth of the stack of papers on her desk. "That's because you have to plug it in," Hermione said, finding the plug itself.
"Plug?" Stella sputtered.
"For God's sake," Hermione muttered and bent over to find a plug under Stella's desk.
On her hands and knees, she was fumbling around in the dark, casting a quick Lumos. Trying not to get electrocuted, she put her hands against the wall to find the damned thing and finally grasped it.
She started regretting taking Stella as her new secretary, but as her former one decided she wanted to take her career further, 'I can't blame her', Hermione grumbled, there were not many witches up for the job as her secretary.
With the threat of Lord Voldemort gone, many of her old schoolmates and generations after that decided to take up careers that they actually liked as well as the demand for Aurors and the like to lessen at the Ministry. The other option for a secretary was a smelly, drunk-looking old man who nonetheless tried to hit on her, Stella was definitely the better option.
When she crawled back from under the desk, still on her hands and knees, she heard Stella gasp and ruffle through some papers on the desk. Just as she was about to ask who was there she heard a familiar drawl.
"Nice skirt, Granger."
She bumped her head against the desk as she recognized the voice and rubbed the back of her head. She slowly crawled back further from under the desk, dusting off her skirt, and lifted her face to meet the man.
Draco Malfoy.
Perfect. "
"Malfoy," she sighed. "What can I do for you? Are you lost?" she crossed and uncrossed her arms in front of her chest to try and not look intimidated by him. Because boy, he had grown up. The scrawny tall boy that she had known at Hogwarts was now…. a man. He had developed quite the muscles and now wore suits that reminded her of expensive brands such as Dolce and Gabanna. To simply say it, he turned hot.
"Granger," he nodded. "I'm fine, thank you for asking," he drawled and Hermione could only roll her eyes at this. "I'm not lost actually, I am simply looking for a certain Miss Grey."
"That's me!" Stella squealed from the desk and she pushed herself forward to him.
Hermione laid a hand on Stella's shoulder and stepped in front of her, glaring at Malfoy and trying to look through the cocky grin he was showing them now.
"Before you run off with my secretary, what is that you actually want with her?" she questioned him. Even though Malfoy looked as good as he did now, trust was still something he had to earn. The Daily Prophet and Witch Weekly alone made at least one article a week telling their readers about the infamous bachelor Draco Malfoy and his conquests. What if this was one of his ploys to get a nice-looking girl to share his bed with?
Malfoy just laughed and shook his head at her in disbelief.
"Calm down Granger. I'm looking for Miss. Grey because she would give me a tour of the department. I'm the new intern."
Hermione's eyes widened. Weeks ago, she received a letter from the Cursebreaker department, asking if she'd accept a student to do an internship at her office because they had a problem with housing everyone. Hermione had accepted, it wasn't like she had anything better to do.
When she applied for the job as Curse-expert, she'd expected a full adventure. Helping Aurors, going on adventures and travelling to foreign countries. Unfortunately, the opposite was true. Okay, she was head of the department. But that's the only thing good about the job. Instead of going on dangerous adventures, she was sitting behind a desk sorting out papers. Her job was to find islands or places Voldemort left with a curse or hex and then she has to break it. The problem was, the moment she found such a place, the Aurors were on her back and found it in 0.1 seconds. All she did was find the places on a map, but she never went to them.
She begged the Aurors to take her with them, but they'd always shake their head no. She wasn't an Auror.
"I-Intern?" she stammered and gave a furious look at Stella, who was now getting red in the face and looking down. Hermione was now seriously contemplating calling back the drunk applicant for the job as her secretary. Draco Malfoy was her new intern and nobody told her about this?
"Yes, Granger. Intern. You know what that means, don't you? I'll be here for the next couple of months, following you around and learning all the shit you do, watching you solve the shit-"
"That's quite enough swearing for today, Malfoy. If I could have a word with you Stella?" she said as she turned her furious looking eyes to the blushing young girl.
Stella nodded simply and Hermione grabbed her arm making a beeline to the other end of the reception, making sure they couldn't be overheard by Malfoy.
"Why didn't you tell me the intern was coming today? And why didn't you tell me it was Draco fucking Malfoy?!" she hissed, trying to whisper.
"I thought I told you! I dialled your number on the phone-thing and left a message."
"Stella, it's your job to listen to messages that are sent to me by phone."
"Right."
Stella was biting her lower lip and rubbing her forearms swiftly. Hermione lessened her grip on Stella's shoulder because it was almost too much seeing her in this shameful state. Even though she may not be the best secretary, she knew that Stella would never not tell her the information on purpose.
"Okay, doesn't matter. It's not like we ever have a busy day at the office. But did you know it was Malfoy?" she questioned looking her in the eye again.
"No! But he's handsome, isn't he?" Stella gushed and her whole state of body changed as she turned around and twirled her hair and smiled at him. Hermione grabbed her by the shoulders again.
"Stop that! If Draco Malfoy is really our new intern, you certainly can't be flirting with him. I know he might be handsome… to you, but his reputation with women is terrible! You will be one of the thousands!" she tried to get through Stella but she wasn't sure if she was actually listening to her.
Stella looked back over her shoulder again and Hermione followed her gaze. Draco was leaning over the counter of Stella's desk and lazily rummaged through their papers. He looked positively bored.
"Can I trust you to give him a tour of the department?" Hermione asked sternly and Stella nodded. "Give him a tour, leave him in the cafeteria and make sure he doesn't look into important documents. Can you do that?"
"Yes, Ms Granger."
Stella swiftly turned around and introduced herself properly to him. She quickly invited him to go with her and within the minute they were out of the door. Hermione grinned slightly as she was silently glad she had Stella as her secretary.
Hermione ran a hand through her hair as the door closed and turned back around to her own room.
At least she couldn't say it was another boring day at the office.
While twirling a quill in her hand, she was watching the clock ticking by. The hands moving every second, but she felt like time was standing still.
Hermione was woken up from her trance by a knock on her door. She quickly ruffled her hair, straightened her skirt and opened the door of her office.
Draco Malfoy barged in with a pair of documents in his hand.
"Granger, Voldemort has never set foot in Canada so you won't find any curses or hexes there to break," he said as he threw the documents in the trash.
"H-How..?" she sputtered.
"For the Department of Defence, the defences on your works are rubbish."
Hermione sighed and went to sit behind her desk again as Draco followed her in. She threw her head on her arms and started to groan.
"I worked on that Canada case for 4 weeks." she sighed and set fire to the trashcan, leaving only dust in the bin.
"May I ask a question, Granger?" he said after a minute of silence and sat down across from her desk.
"No."
"Why are you even doing this job? I thought you, Scarface and Weasel would be Aurors and the three of you would save the world from bad guys every other day."
Hermione sighed and rubbed her forehead. That was the plan.
"Well, Ron decided he was tired of fighting and joined a Quidditch team instead. Harry really had a reason to be tired of fighting and is now a DADA teacher. And well, I'm here."
And the fact that nobody is stupid enough to pursue a career in catching bad guys because there are almost zero bad guys left. But Hermione left that out.
"But why?" Malfoy asked taking a pen from her desk, twirling it between his fingers and putting his feet on the table.
"Why are you here?" she asked, not wanting to answer his questions anymore and entranced by his fingers
"I'm good with goblins." he grinned, "And because brother-Weasel sent me here."
Despite the situation, Hermione started to chuckle at the idea of Malfoys working with any member of the Weasley member.
"You work with Bill Weasley? Must be hard for you, isn't it?"
Malfoy's grin disappeared and he stood up from his chair, leaning with his hands on her desk, looking her right in the eye.
"Actually no, Granger. I am a professional in my job and so is Weasley. The war has been over for a while and my prejudices have died with the death of Voldemort," he said and sat down again with a huff. Hermione was taken aback by this. She didn't expect for Malfoy to have his answer ready and was surprised by his professionalism. Walking around her workplace, facing him, she leaned on the front of her desk and sighed.
"I'm sorry. It's just that I'm so stressed and-"
Malfoy raised a hand to stop her from talking and Hermione saw this as some sort of accepted apology. He stood up again and opened her file cabinet, full of already solved cases by the Auror Department. Him going through her files and writing and she walked up to him and closed the drawer.
"So why exactly did Bill Weasley send you to my office to be an intern? If you're so good with goblins, why aren't you at Gringotts by now?"
Malfoy's mouth corner lifted, to reveal his infamous smirk. "Do I make you nervous, Granger?"
Hermione huffed and went to sit behind her desk again, opening the case that she was working on and grabbing a pen. Another Muggle change to the office, the spill of ink had ruined too many cases.
"You haven't answered my question, Granger," he asked from the corner of the office.
"What question?"
"You know very well what question, but I'll repeat it for you; why are you here?" he challenged.
Hermione closed the case again and looked him straight in the eye. She could lie and tell him that this was her dream job, but she knew he would not believe her for a second.
"Because I literally don't know what else to do, Malfoy. Happy now?" she huffed.
"I don't even get why you're bothering with all this paperwork. Shouldn't you be in these places, these foreign islands, these realms, fighting vampires, werewolves, giants?"
"Every time I find something, the Aurors take it over and break the hex themselves. It's still delicate because they feel like they are still fighting Voldemort."
Hermione sighed ruffling through her papers, finding the page she was working on at the moment.
She looked up at Malfoy, finally down with him now, "You may go."
"No. It's time you fight your battles."
He snatched the paper from her, scanning it quickly.
"Malfoy, what are you-"
"Do you know what is wrong with this particular island?" he asked. He looked almost deranged looking through this file.
"No, I received it yesterday. I haven't really worked out the details yet, but-" she tried to get the case back from him but he was too strong for her.
"Then it's time to figure that out." he grinned, put the paper in his pocket and grabbed her outstretched arm.
"Malfoy, STOP!"
But it was too late. They had Disapparated.
