It was in the way the girls licked their lips that he knew it didn't bode well for the rest of them. They huddled around Granger's car – and he still didn't know how she came around that gorgeous piece of Muggle mechanics –.
It was in the way Pansy shot a look at Daphne who smirked – and any Slytherin knew this wasn't good, but as always, Theo shut his mouth and chewed on his cheek, leaving Draco and Flint and Zabini deal with the trouble that was brewing.
Theo look at the Gryffindors who had also been invited to the party shut up, you know we must pretend to get along with everybody now, deal with it and the cowering, the hunched shoulders, the nervous looks shot in Granger's direction raised the red and black flags around his head.
Oh.
No.
Pansy was nowhere to be seen, Daphne was talking on the phone – how could the Muggles create something as ingenious as this – in hushed voices. Something told Theo – in the way experience spoke, in the way I went to the kitchen and called my elf and we have whiskey and I'm bored and show me that tattoo Zabini told him that they were royally fucked
These witches didn't need wands to terrorize them.
"Rowle, Goyle" Theodore looked at the free-gorgeous-brown haired girl.
She leaned against the wall with a casualness that would make Draco proud but it only made him fucking nervous, what the hell.
"Princess?"
He nearly choked on his beer.
"I recall when you fucked your way out of Hogwarts and you said – let me remind you" That smirk on her red lips sent butterflies in his stomach. "'I'll get you, witch'"
Rowle smirked, leaning against the fence that surrounded the cottage the Gryffindor princess lived in nowadays. "How about we make it a challenge? I'll give you anything you want"
Every man held their breaths and the girls snickered and this wasn't good, this wasn't good! "Anything I want?" The way his eyes fucked her told the crowd everything.
Potter, Saint as fucking always hissed and puffed and hawed but for once the Weasley held him back.
"Yes. If you beat me to a car race"
The men laughed and it was genuine and it was cruel but Theodore didn't miss the flicker of amusement in Granger's eyes. She looked at him and chuckled and it was worthy of any Snakes – was she really a Gryffindor? Maybe she spent too much time with Pansy and the Greengrass girl.
Her girls stood beside the car, their hands in various types and sizes of pockets. Pansy, always wearing make-up, raised a neatly manicured eyebrow in her general direction. Dahpne was walking around the garage, muttering to herself, flickering her wand in the air. "Are the wards done?" Hermione asked casually.
The Slytherin nodded. "We'll know if they try to break in with a wand or not"
"So… are you going to race with this car?"
Hermione snorted, shook her head. "It's a lovely car but it's not what exactly I had in mind. The boys, they have the money, the resources to get whatever car they want and they'll pick the fastest, the quickest, the easiest to drive. They'll think it's like flying – which isn't false per say –"
Pansy laughed suddenly. "But they weren't born to it"
The smirk on the Gryffindor's face told everything. "They weren't born to it.
It was her father and she's dirty secret. She learned to drive too early, too young and her father, the simple, studious, serious man around the house, became a mechanics during the weekends. She recalled – not without the pain, the choking of air in her throat, the way she sat on the high bench with a hotdog in one hand, and binoculars in the other, looking at these men racing at the highest speed on the private tracks. She recalled, not without the guilt, the sorrow that always accompanied it, the way he had held her hand the first time she switched the gear in his racing car, or the way he told her "now" to press on the pedal, when she had grown enough for her to sit in the driver's seat.
And so she learned to drive at ten and she was going at fixed speed on the tracks and their weekends remained the same and she remained the same girl covered in mud, who enjoyed the smell of motor oil surrounding her, or the grease that splashed on her clothes when she mixed with the mechanics in the pit.
She recalled that, as she stood in front of the machine she wanted.
And it was stupid, at some point, that she choked on a sob because this was his car in some way. The dream he had always wanted to drive but had never been able to.
No, instead, she had stripped his memories – everything that made these weekends a reality, every laugh, every wink, every "turn sharp now, turn easy, 90 degrees turn! Go! Spin it!" rushed in her ear as she learned to lose control on this car. She recalled him catching her kiss the enemy's son between tool boxes and oil cans and in the way he told her "You'll always be my princess"
And there was something that hurt so much when she had heard that nickname from Rowle's lips that she knew now that the war was over, that years had passed in a way they were older, better, but still scarred and broken from a men's games – she knew that it was time to seek her vengeance.
She was born to this car; no money could buy the raw talent or the raw desire her father had breathed in her veins every weekend for years.
"What was that!?" Rowle screamed as he shot out of the car, the new, shiny protective clothe hiding nothing from her view and so she left her own smoking, warm car, facing him.
He got distracted and she wanted to laugh. Instead, she patted the hood of her car and popped it open, letting Nott check on the engine.
"Nothing's been modified"
"Heard the official, kitten?" Granger whispered, smirking.
She wore her father's protection and his helmet. Red, red and white, with Granger stamped on it and they must all think it was hers but if they knew the truth, the truth!
"I want… the better of 3!"
She laughed then, shaking her wild, wild hair and he shut his trap – finally!
"Oh no, Mister Rowle. You give me what I want, since I won."
"How-"
She walked to him and from the corner of her eyes, she saw how Harry and Ron walked back. And it was hilarious – they were well trained. Parkinson rubbed her hands behind her back. Of course, Hermione knew the Queen of the Slytherins wanted to sink her claws in Harry – this was the moment.
Hermione stood in front of that Viking of a man, smirking. She put a gloved hand to his cheek, forcing his eyes to her and he cowered. Her reputation preceded her. What she didn't expect was him leaning on her hand a few seconds, a gaze of pure want, lust, I need you I need you I need you echoing in his eyes and she wanted to give him. She shook her head.
"Come to dinner with me, maybe I'll teach you how to drive this jewel you bought yourself" She whispered and smirked.
Ron swallowed painfully.
Of course the blonde, gigantic man in front of her only nodded.