Dark Secret

For the Dads and Daughters Challenge set by AsterLea.

Disclaimers: I own nothing you recognize.

"Sir, you have a visitor." Draco didn't even look up; he just waved his wand at the door to open it. Quiet footsteps approached his desk and he heard the person sit down in the chair across from him.

"One moment please," he muttered, hurrying to sign the last paper before looking up. A teenage girl was staring at him, her arms crossed, one leg bouncing slightly. He took all this in along with her dark clothing (Muggle clothing he also noted) and messy hair. All of her seemed messy, really; her clothes looked like they'd been slept in.

"Are you sure you are in the right place?" he asked. She nodded in answer, pointing to the name on his desk.

"You're Draco Malfoy right?" He nodded, too, wondering what was going on.

"I am; who are you?"

"Maura, Maura Cole." She gave him a look, like she expected a specific reaction.

"What can I do for you, Miss Cole?" he asked, wondering what a teenager wanted with a financial advisor, she certainly didn't look like anyone with money worth talking about.

"It's just Maura, and I'm trying to contact someone, someone important." This was getting very strange, he couldn't shake the feeling that she was waiting for him to say or do something that he obviously wasn't doing or saying.

"Well, I don't really know how to help you; I work with money, not people." Maura sighed and yanked something out of her pocket.

"This is my mother." She said, snapping a picture down on the desk. Draco glanced at the photo.

"I haven't seen her before, why don't you try asking for help at the Auror's office?" The girl seemed to contemplate this.

"I'm not looking for my mother, I know where she is." This was said with a slightly angry tone. "I'm looking for my father." Draco blinked, why on earth would someone he'd never met be asking him for help in finding their father? Unless - no - she couldn't think - it wasn't possible. He cleared his throat in a slightly nervous fashion.

"You don't think I'm your father, do you?" Maura tilted her head and smiled slightly.

"I don't think so, I know so, and I have proof."

"No, that's not possible; there have never been any other women than my wife." His father had made sure of that.

Maura reached into her other pocket and pulled out four sheets of parchment. Laying them down on the desk she pointed to each one.

"That's my birth certificate and that's my mother's paternity spell results, she had it cast three times, just to be sure.

"It's not possible." He repeated, but as he looked over the papers he knew he was lying to himself. Draco felt his blood go cold. He looked from Maura to the family picture on his desk. Taken last year it showed him, his wife and son, the perfect pureblood family. Now this-this girl was waltzing into his life, ready to rip apart everything he'd worked so hard to build back up.

"Let me see that picture." Maura handed it to him. Draco studied it closely, the woman looked somewhat familiar but she also looked like Maura so maybe he was getting them confused. "And the birth certificate." There was his name, not that that meant anything, anyone could sign his name. His eyes moved across the page, searching for the mother's name.

"Saoirse Cole?" The sound of her name brought back more memories than a picture ever could.

Draco twitched as two wizards entered the pub, even though his family had been pardoned he still couldn't shake the feeling that everyone was out to get him. He hunched over his drink and pulled his hood even more forward.

"Care to buy a girl a drink?" The playful tone made him look around in confusion, no one talked to him like that anymore.

"I'm talking to you, you know." A woman a few years older was standing next to his elbow. She had dark blonde hair and red lips that Draco couldn't help watching.

"Two firewhiskeys please." He told the bartender, feeling a bit more like his old self. The old man looked him over and shrugged before handing him two bottles. Draco finished his within minutes, he'd been drinking a lot since May and was already near out of his mind drunk.

"My name's Saoirse," she said, sitting down on the stool next to him.

"I'm-" He stopped; he didn't want to risk telling her his real name.

"Draco Malfoy, right?" He nodded. "I know who you are." She continued, looking sidelong at him. "And I like it."

Forty-five minutes later, they were leaving the bathroom, both rumpled with smiles on their faces.

"She never tried to find me?" Draco asked, wondering how he could have forgotten something like that, he hadn't been that drunk had he?

Maura shook her head.

"She told me she played tough in that bar but once she got pregnant she didn't want anyone to know that the father was a famous ex-Death Eater, even with her family background that was considered bad." The girl, his daughter, leaned against his desk.
"Look, I don't want money or to live with you or anything, I just want to see you once in a while." Draco glanced again at his family picture, this would ruin his family's reputation, he didn't want to think about what his father or wife's reactions would be.

Maura caught his gaze and picked up the picture.

"Is this your family?" He nodded, allowing himself a small smile.

"Yes, Scorpius started Hogwarts this year."

"I have a brother, huh? Looks just like you." The bitter tone didn't escape his attention; he'd been a very sullen teenager, thanks to his own father.
"I don't want to ruin your reputation, I get that you're kind of important, I can be the dark secret, with families like yours if you ask me, that's how it is and ever shall be. I just want to be able to see you." Her voice cracked slightly, but she ignored it and so he did too.

"Maura, I can see you're a smart girl, you know how my world works." She looked at him with eyes that threw him back to the past; he couldn't see any of himself in her but her mother was all over her face. Secretly he'd always wanted a girl, a daughter.

"If you ask me to I'll walk out that door and be gone forever. I can take care of myself, that's how it is back home, you stick out your elbows and hold yourself up." Draco was suddenly struck with how much she was like him inside, he'd felt the same way his whole childhood.

"No, I want to see you, too." He decided to do something he'd never done before. Make a choice all on his own. "Come home with me, it's the holidays, your brother's home." Maura looked at him with apprehension.

"They won't mind?" She asked. Draco smirked and began to pack his things.

"They will; something tells me you like that idea, though." Maura grinned and grabbed her own bag.

"I get that from Mum." She told him, walking out the door. Draco shook his head at her, thinking to himself.

"You certainly didn't get it from me; I always did care too much what my family thought. Maybe you can change that."

A/N: So my first time writing Draco, not as bad as I thought it would be. Thanks to my beta: Just Your Above Average Malfoy.