Session: One

Draco didn't look at her, sitting as far away from her as he could get on the other side of the couch. The woman in front of them was flipping open a file, writing things down quickly while giving them quick glances. Hermione could feel the tension building higher, and she was sure that it would soon break her.

"How long have you two been married?"

Hermione paused, wanting Draco to answer in a need to hear his voice. Or maybe just to know that he cared enough to have the answer on ready, without thought. He didn't respond, and she reminded herself that he came in the first place.

"Four years."

"And you've been together for?"

"Six."

"How long before you were engaged?"

Hermione hesitated, glancing over at Draco, but his eyes were still firmly connected to the far wall. "Well, a little over a year the first time," she answered, watching his eyes dart up the wall and muscle tense in his jaw.

The woman paused, a drop of ink falling from the end of her quill and splattering on the parchment below. She removed it with a tap of her wand, clearing her throat. "You were engaged more than once?"

"It was put on hold for five months. Then he proposed again."

The woman hummed, her quill moving long enough for Hermione to know she wasn't just writing down her answer. Hermione waited it out, sending glances to Draco's blankness, and wringing her hands in her lap. The therapist moved to place to the folder on the table beside her, propping her notebook against a leg, and examined the two of them. A small, fake smile twisted her lips - placating, calming.

Hermione wanted to rip her own skin off.

"Before we begin - is there something specific that has brought you two here?"

Draco finally turned his head, leveling his eyes on her with a wall of detachment she could never manage to pull off. But he was looking, right now, at this question, and he didn't need to look any certain way for her to feel it tearing through her.

2003

"And the root? It just probes around, searching, until it digs itself into the ground…"

She might have smelt him before he spoke, or perhaps his scent registered the moment he did. He wore at least three different colognes, but one was reserved for business, the other for events, and the third would periodically be used to switch it up from the norm on either occasion. But there was still a scent from him that was constant - shampoo, soap, pheromones, there every time.

"Ever the sensible one, Granger."

She turned from the desk where she had been waiting for her coat to be returned. She glanced down the empty corridor and to the open doors of the ballroom, music and conversation filtering out from the room. There was a crash of a glass breaking, making her wince. Someone was likely on their way to regretting their choice to stay after too much wine, champagne, or whatever dark liquor had been offered up in mass on floating trays.

"Excuse me?" she asked, forcing her eyes to stay on his. Malfoy looked down at her dress, and she ran her hands down the sides awkwardly as he took his time. "Are you suggesting I should have dressed like that blonde woman to attend-"

"There's a lot of blonde woman inside."

She gave him a sharp look. "And yet you know exactly which one I'm talking about."

He smirked. "Your dress is adequate, Granger. That bloke over by the bar was already drooling over you-"

"Oh, please."

"His exact sentiments, I'm sure. There's a reason he had to hide behind the ice sculpture all night. You might want to be careful." He waved his hand towards his face, lowering his head as he rocked forward on his feet. "He had…what do you call them? Stalker eyes."

Hermione rolled her eyes up but was unable to stop her amusement. The man by the ice sculpture had been freaking her out most the night. She was surprised Malfoy even noticed him. Short of stripping her clothes off, she hadn't been sure he noticed much about her beyond her brains and work.

"Well, I'm sure I can use my sensible heels to wound him." Her gaze was tracking down his form. She couldn't stop herself until she reached his shoes, and even then it was only to begin the journey up again. He was looking steadily back at her when she met his eyes, prompting a heat to form in her cheeks, and she tried to inconspicuously slide herself just a little closer to him. "If need be," she added.

"I don't doubt that." He slid his hands into his pockets, looking over her head. There was a faint redness to his cheekbones and a glaze to his eyes that told her he might have been close to crossing the line of acceptable tipsiness at company social events before deciding to leave. "You're dangerous with heels, if I remember correctly."

"If you hadn't stolen my shoe, it wouldn't have been a problem."

He huffed a laugh, his eyes bright when they found hers, and she thought they might be standing too close. "If you didn't take your shoes off while in your office, you wouldn't have lost one so far under your desk. Then accused me of stealing it while threatening to take my eye out with the other."

"And then you did steal it," she pointed out, emphasizing it with a poke of her finger into the wall of his chest.

"If you're going to accuse me and then threaten me…" He shrugged. "You get what you asked for."

"Oh, really?" She might have asked that a little too flirtatiously or not flirtatiously enough - she couldn't decide - raising her eyes to his. His left eyebrow hiked, and though she couldn't place the look he gave her, it made her blood pump a little harder. "I had to attend a meeting barefoot, you know. And you still haven't given me back my shoe."

"No?" He gave her an innocent look but it was less believable than Divination to her. He glanced at the desk, raising his chin towards it. "Where did the-"

"To help some man who wanted to speak with the head of staff."

Hermione glanced in the direction they had went, shifting on her sore feet, and gave up patience. Her feet felt like they were tearing open, and her limbs were heavy. She needed a bath, a good book, and baggy pajamas. Unless Malfoy was standing a little too close for a reason that wasn't him being oblivious. Then she might be able to deal with the heels for another ten minutes. She glanced at his bored expression as he studied the shine of his shoes and shook her head, walking towards the coat room.

"Granger…" She looked back at him as he hesitated. "Well, if you're going back there…" He held up the coin with his coat-check number and she scoffed at him.

"Give me back my shoe or get it yourself."

"I'm not going in there."

She raised her eyebrows, pausing in the doorway to look at him. "Did your mum tell you about a coat-check monster in your youth?"

She was sure there was a flash of amusement across his face, and she wondered if her joke had been correct. "It's not proper."

"To get your coat?"

His nose scrunched just a little and only for a moment, and had she not been watching him so closely, she would have missed it. His eyes flashing above her head. "It's what the staff does."

He glanced behind him, turning back with a scowl when she laughed at him. "Afraid to look improper? Break the social and event rules - oh, no! They might think you're stealing someone's cloak, and have turned into a pauper."

She shook her head, journeying into the room and looking down at her coin. Some things about Malfoy would never change. Well, most things, actually. He had lost the racism (though she knew he still held some prejudice about magical creatures, and he wouldn't trust a Ministry worker with a rock), the teenage angst (arguably justified, as it had been), and now fully looked like a man, but the rest of him was very much Malfoy. More dangerous, though.

He had been bad enough in his youth, but those traits had burrowed after the war, growing sharper and more dangerous. His intuitiveness, cunning, ambition. He was far more observant than she liked, crafty, charming, and thought quick on his feet. He was intelligent, and still had a fairly short fuse, though his anger had grown more into the silent sort that was usually undetectable and a lot more frightening. It meant he knew a lot of secrets, and he knew how to use them to secure what he wanted. With age and dedication, he had obtained power, patience, and more wealth. He might not have been willing to kill people, but he certainly knew how to destroy them. Hermione probably had some psychological damage from her youth. That deep but subtle aura of danger that radiated from him was likely a subconscious attraction.

Not that she was afraid of him. She got him angry often enough, and she could remember a few times where that sparked genuine fear in her, but she was normally more afraid when Neville walked into her kitchen.

Hermione was reading the numbers on the third row when she heard the clack of shoes enter the room. She saw Malfoy rounding the corner when she turned her head. His eyes met hers for a second before surveying the room.

"For someone who is so brave, you looked a lot like a captured animal just now."

"I did not," she said. "And even if I had, you obviously don't know the meaning of bravery." She couldn't say she was surprised.

He hummed, his head bent towards a rack of cloaks as he shot her a glare from the top of his vision. "You have to be scared first. I specifically remember talking with other Slytherins at Hogwarts about how a house known for bravery must have been scared all the time."

"Ah, while all of you were busy stomping on anyone in the path to the top? And fear doesn't matter as much as the bravery itself does."

"Of course. The fear just makes it more honorable." He stepped around the rack, tapping his fingers on one of the wooden boards that ran the height of the room. "Noble." He looked up at her mockingly. "Heroic."

"You've always been observant," she muttered, looking at the rows in front of her as he made a sound of agreement.

She must have skipped hers - he was distracting her. He had a bad habit of doing that. She clearly remembered a banquet where he sat across from her, his tongue moving a sweet around his mouth. She had no idea what the man next to her was saying until she received a research contract to sign the next day.

She looked over at him when he followed her into a row, glancing down the length of his body. His clothes were tailored, lightly tracing the very appealing shape of his body, and without a wrinkle in sight. His hair was carefully careless, his robe draped just so, and his shoes still shined even in the dimness of the room. She felt frazzled with the sight of him, and had to stop herself from smoothing her dress and trying to pat down any curls that had frizzed over the course of the night.

He really was far too attractive for her own good. Git. She wondered if she would still be attracted to him if he looked different. She had been drawn to some rather unfortunate looking men for their intelligence alone. Add in the other attractive traits Malfoy held to her… She had been screwed all around really. Somewhere out there, Fate was conspiring against her with Ichpuchtli and Aphrodite. She could practically hear them snickering at her from here.

"What's your number?" she asked, pointing to his hand.

He held up the coin between his thumb and index, looking over at the numbers along the rack to his right. She reached up, her fingers purposely skimming his hand to feel his skin beneath her fingertips, before she turned the coin so the numbers faced her. She could see him turn his head to look at her with the contact, the knuckle of his index flashing white as he pressed down. She dropped away from him slowly.

"Oh, you should be in the row…" she said, dragging out the last word as he leaned forward, his arm reaching around her, "…over…"

His chest pressed against her side, his exhale moving the curls along her neck. A shiver traveled down her spine, tightening her back. She could hear the assortment of coats, robes, cloaks, and wraps being shuffled as his scent wrapped around her head, leaving it fuzzy. His arm moved against her shoulder with every scrape behind her, and she wasn't sure if she had ever stood this close to him. Her heart was beating just a little harder as she turned her head towards his neck, seeing the fine blond hairs lit with the light just behind him.

His cloak wasn't even in this row. But even if he was really looking for something, he could have moved around her to find it. There wasn't any need for him to stand so close to her, just there, but he had. She tried to grab onto the significance of it while deciding what to do. Whatever it was, she didn't think standing there frozen was going to help her in any way.

She turned her head towards him a little more, her exhale shaky, and she saw it forge a path of goosebumps across his neck. He turned his head at the feel of it, or because he must have known that her mouth was nearly touching his jaw in all her sudden silence. Now his mouth was just a tiny distance from the corner of hers, with his eyes focused on that breath of space before slowly raising to meet her own.

Hermione didn't know the look. Curiosity? Knowing? She thought she should pull away and say something about personal space to cover up her actions. Just in case he was toying with her, or his proximity was due to the same thing that had his eyes glazed. Like he was too tipsy to notice, and if he used the excuse before she came up with her own, she would be the one looking like a fool. But it had been her idea to get here, hadn't it? Her irrational or logical plan to rid herself of the attraction. And…he wasn't moving.

It was the dropping of his arm from somewhere behind her, the tiny sway back, that propelled her forward. Her mouth touched the corner of his lips, skimming them. Soft, there, his lips. She didn't know he had been holding his breath with her until he released it heavily. His eyelids had drooped, just a sliver of white and grey peeking down towards her mouth. Try again or pull away, try again or pull away, when he pushed into her, turning her as he stepped with her.

She breathed in, her lungs burning, and saw something lavender drop from his hand at the corner of her vision - her cloak, that he must have been reaching for. She was too distracted by his hand gripping her jaw to really think about it. She only caught a flash of his eyes before hers automatically shut at the touch of his mouth to hers.

She sucked in a breath through her nose, kissing him back before her lungs were even full. Her heart slammed forward, pumping her blood out in a trembling pulse. His mouth molded to hers, pulling, sucking, and she grabbed his shoulders as her back pressed into the coats. She felt shaky and alive, his arm wrapping around her. He grabbed the pole above their heads when the coats pushed back from the pressure of their bodies.

Her stomach was fluttering as she fisted his shirt, the muscles of his arm bunching. She sucked lightly on his bottom lip, pulling it between hers. She slid a hand up, pressing her palm to the side of his neck and stretching her thumb up, feeling his jaw move as he kissed her. He pressed his mouth more firmly to hers, his fingers curling in her dress, before pulling his head back. His nose bumped hers as she breathed in his exhale.

"You've been driving me fucking mad, Granger."

What?

She felt like she didn't even know what to do with herself. She thought this had more to do with close proximity, chance, and champagne. She certainly hadn't seen it coming, building up, or thought he had been effected by her actions. He had reached the breaking point before she even knew she touched him?

"Don't look so shocked. I told you that you get what you ask for."

He kissed her before she could respond, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, pushing into him.