[Fairytales Assignment #7: The 12 Dancing Princesses; Task #3: Write about a secret meeting point and what happens there.; Prompts: (dialogue) "I don't know why, but this whole secrecy thing turns me on a bit..."; (object) Invisibility Cloak][Chapter titles prompt: When Lovers Meet]

Here is some more Fleur/Hermione, thanks for following, favoriting and reviewing ;-)

I found it too difficult to try to add the accent to Fleur's dialogue so I omitted that here and this is unbetaed so I'll have to go over ch1 and this one later to try to make her accent sound French in the dialogue..without mangling it up too much. Cheers and please review to let me know what you think or don't like or do like. Thanks and bon soir?

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Secret Meeting

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"joie - sentiment exaltant ressenti par toute la conscience"

~o~

Hermione was feeling empty inside. That was for sure. As she sat at her desk and sipped miserably at a cup of coffee while it rained outside her London office window. It was a dreary Monday morning at the Ministry and she was well behind on a grueling stack of paperwork she had yet to complete. But that was not her primary source of misery. Hermione's thoughts were on the blonde woman she briefly kissed in the dark corridors of Gringotts.

She hadn't seen Fleur in over a week and a part of her wondered whether the blonde even cared for her at all, or whether she'd just decided that the brunette was too much trouble—and called it off.

I hope she called it off, Hermione thought to herself as she nervously bit at her nails.

She had only tasted Fleur for a little while, and it was like holding a bright spark within your hand. It couldn't last, could it? Fleur was too beautiful, too fine, too passionate and full of life for her, ordinary Hermione Granger, an Englishwoman and wife, to keep.

"What was I thinking?" She'd probably humiliated herself. Let alone what Ron would think if he ever found out.

Fleur probably only responded to her attention and caresses out of some kind of sympathy or French 'joie de vivre'.

Fleur was so unapologetically French; and it wasn't just in her accent but in everything she did, even the way she moved and greeted everyone by kissing them on both cheeks. And Hermione hated stereotyping, but you know that cliche of the uptight, emotionally tight-lipped Englishwoman and compared it to the freer, more sensually unafraid Frenchwoman? Hermione was really feeling that stereotype right now; actually she was living it. Fleur was the opposite of her: beautiful, lush, carefree. They were also both married and she shouldn't have said or done anything at all.

But as she leaned back in her office chair, and another owl from the Ministry's DMLE department arrived, Hermione Granger wasn't thinking of work. She wasn't thinking of Ron or responsibility. She was thinking of Fleur's beautiful, pink cupid lips and how good it felt to press her tongue against them to pry them open. Merlin, Fleur was so beautiful that it sometimes hurt to look at how perfect her skin was, how clear and almost translucently golden her hair was. How the French woman seemed to radiate power and sensuality.

Even her mouth tasted like rose petals and dew drops. Fleur was the essence of beauty and grace. Of course she was, she was part Veela, it was in her birthright to be beautiful and there was just no comparison to an ordinary witch. Beauty ran in her blood, and her French culture and accent only added to her allure. Her charm. The way she pronounced words like 'pardon' and 'exactly' was almost too pretty. The glimmer that seemed to float in her crystal blue eyes made you feel like she held all the answers in their depths when she looked at you. Even her hips swayed in perfect synchronicity whenever she moved so that she hypnotized everyone in a room.

Fleur had been a dancer once, and it showed. There wasn't an inch to pinch or an unformed muscle on Fleur's tall, slim form. She had a body like a ballerina, with long athletic legs, balanced out by enough curves to still be more than feminine...it was almost dizzying how perfect Fleur was physically.

Hermione knew she wasn't unattractive, but compared to Fleur, any woman, including herself, found herself feeling a bit frumpy. And that is what troubled her: is that why Fleur hadn't called her back? Did she find Hermione disappointing? Did her lips and mouth not taste as deliciously intoxicating as hers did? Did being an ordinary woman and witch not compare to the Veela's standards? Or was she just devoted to Bill and that one moment they had just a temporary blur in judgment?

"I just wish I knew what she thought." Hermione pressed at her aching temples. "It'd be easier to accept her rejection if she just told me."

She sighed deeply as yet another owl with more paperwork arrived at her desk, including a message from her boss to hurry downstairs at 12 sharp, for an important interdepartmental meeting.

Hermione quickly slipped back on her black kitten heels before heading towards the elevator.

~o~

Fleur was humming to herself as she batted the mixture to a cake in the sunny kitchen of Shell cottage. Bill was gone, and she had the day and house to herself. It was a bit selfish to be so contented in his absence. Yet things had been somewhat awkward and unusually tense since Bill had found out about what her little liaison with Hermione in the depths of Gringott's high security gallery.

She often thought of the petite brunette. Indeed, she thought specifically of Hermione's mouth as she dipped one of her hands into the lemon cake batter and licked her index finger clean.

Hermione reminded her of lemons and sugar icing and fresh, clean things. The English woman was simple, aesthetically. Hermione wasn't a great beauty and she lacked worldly sophistication and charm, where her head and overactive mind took over. But there was soemthing special about her, and she regretted that she couldn't see her again.

'I don't want you to her again.'

Bill had made it pretty clear that if she tried to see Hermione again—outside of Weasley family visits where they might run into her and had no choice to see her—that he would consider confronting and telling his brother about it.

Ron, of course, would blow up—and probably cause two divorces—if he ever found out.

For Hermione's sake, she didn't want to ruin what Ron and Hermione had together. Their marriage was much younger and probably not crumbling apart like her own. It would be selfish it she interfered with her again. Perhaps Hermione hadn't even meant what she said or did with her in Gringotts. It could've been a spur of the moment thing. When she'd been at Beauxbatons, Fleur herself had been with other girls when she was single and a teen; she'd never hidden her bisexuality from Bill either. However, she doubted that Hermione even realized what her sexuality really was or that Ron knew about it. She doubted Ron would be understanding about it either.

As much as she cared about her brother-in-law and the felicity of her own family and the Weasleys, Fleur couldn't deny that it pained her to avoid Hermione. She didn't want to wreck both their marriages or the Weasleys who had done so much for them and the war, yet...it did not dull the ache and tremor she felt whenever she thought of Hermione. She missed her, she missed her badly and it really was tearing her up inside. Of course, she was a good actress (it came with being a part Veela), so she hid her tears and Bill seemed to think she'd long forgotten about the her dalliance with the bushy-haired Gryffindor.

"I wonder what might've happened, if Hermione had gone to Beauxbatons," she thought to herself as she remembered how the girls at Beauxbatons used to practice kissing on each other since they had no male classmates. And how some of them took it further than that, again for the same reason—no male classmates and strict curfews, almost policing the sexuality of the young female students. She imagined what might have happened if Hermione had been one of the Beauxbatons girls in blue when they were both 17 and where teaching Hermione these things might have led...

She might never have fallen in love with Bill perhaps.

Fleur pulled her long blonde hair into a high ponytail, before she moodily popped the lemon cake into the oven and sprinkled some powdered sugar on top with caramel creme. She also added fresh strawberries to a batch of profiterole cream puffs and petit fours she'd made in various flavours including pumpkin.

The cake and pastries looked perfect; and would taste perfect and delicious. Lemon cake and strawberry profiteroles were one of Bill's favourites.

Only now she had the idle thought of what might happen, if she Flooed to the Ministry and dropped the decadent deserts off at Hermione's office instead.

Fleur's crystal blue eyes stared hesitantly at the clock on the wall, before deciding she had enough time—and daring—to defy all her better nature, and deliver the little treat to Hermione. She didn't want Hermione to think that she'd forgotten completely about her. She might even be hurt, and they needed to talk, and if she went to the Ministry, there were so many crowds of people there, Bill would probably never know...

~o~

Hermione's eyes opened wide in shock when she saw who had slipped into the elevator with her. She had just been on her way to the Interdepartmental Meeting when she ran head-first into Fleur. Fleur Delacour Weasley, who was wearing a blue pencil skirt and white blouse and who looked impossibly elegant as always; and whom she had sworn, after a week of waiting, probably cared nothing for her. Or else why would she have avoided and not answered any of her messages for a week.

"Fleur," she began tensely, as she tried not to look too closely at her eyes and get sucked in by their beautiful, hypnotizing Veela power.

"'ermione." A smile played upon the French woman's lips. "I was just about to drop off something for you at your office—" She held up a box and lifted the lid a bit so that she could barely glimpse some kind of exotic dessert within. Which was decorated with strawberries and cream. Lemon too from the smell of it.

Hermione frowned. Really? Hermione thought to herself. Was Fleur trying to bribe her with strawberries? Or some weird French souffle?

"It zis homemade," Fleur added calmly.

Hermione felt more confused than ever and stepped out of the elevator, so that Fleur followed her out. "I don't understand why you're here Fleur...although I do appreciate you bringing me, er, pastries..." Oh Merlin, she thought, I have a million things to say, like I don't know, 'Why on earth did you ignore for a week? Why didn't you answer the owl I sent you? Do you even like me at all? Is this reciprocated? Am I losing my mind here?...and yet here she was calmly discussing pastries like nothing at all had happened between them.

She didn't know whether Fleur was manipulative, or just incredibly innocent. Bringing her strawberry souffles? A week after she'd felt she'd had her heart ripped out and left to dry not knowing what to think?

"Fleur—" she began again, intending to tell her that she should go, clearly whatever they briefly had was a mistake.

But Fleur placed a finger over her lips and silenced her with the power of her stunning Veela eyes. Hermione was almost helpless as she continued staring at her large, ridiculously luminous eyes.

"Shh," Fleur intoned and then grabbed her hand, with the free hand that wasn't carrying the pastry box, and led her down an empty corridor in the Ministry. Then into an abandoned stairwell.

"I am sorry," the Frenchwoman said finally. "I wanted to owl you and talk to you right away, but Bill found out."

Hermione's stomach felt like it was dropping. "Did—did he?" Tell anyone, the unspoken words hung between them.

Fleur shook her head. "No. But he told me not to see you again. It was his condition for not telling Ron." Fleur's smile was for once sad, despite the incredible serene beauty of her face. Even when she's sad, she looks stunning, thought Hermione.

But wait—Bill knew. Merlin. This could lead to so many complications if Ron found out. Somehow Hermione couldn't bare Ron finding out too, and especially not Molly Weasley. Molly would probably rip her head off, and Fleur's head too, if she ever found out one of her daughter-in-laws breaking her son's heart or even stepping an inch out of line.

"Fleur we can't let anyone else find out." The brunette clasped at her aching forehead and tried to find space to breath. "And Merlin, I'm sorry my actions dragged you into this, I know now you don't reciprocate my feelings—"

Fleur chuckled and a few strands of her blonde hair fell down over her eyes as she looked down at Hermione. "'Ermione, I do. I do feel."

She held out her hand to grab Hermione's again. Her thumb pressed against her palm.

"Then why—" Oh Merlin. Why was this conversation so difficult. But then she just looked at Fleur in shock, because had this, this beautiful creature, just admitted to having some kind of feelings for her? It was almost too good to be true. "Do you really?"

Fleur nodded, the dimples appeared in her cheeks as she smirked and looked down at the box of pastry she had brought. "Taste this, Hermione, I made it for you."

Hermione found herself laughing. "Really? You turn up after a week and trying a pastry is the first thing you insist upon?"

Fleur eased upon the box so she could see it. "I was thinking of you while I made it."

Hermione stared incredulously down at the cake-souffle-like things on which Fleur had written in icing an 'H'.

"H like my name," Hermione whispered to herself. Somebody pinch me. Fleur made me deserts with my initials on them.

Fleur smiled. "I want to see you."

Oh Merlin. She should be happy that Fleur had revealed she reciprocated her feelings and this wasn't a one-off thing. But could they really end up or spend any time together without wrecking both of their marriages first? She stared at the blonde woman and tried to contain her nerves.

"Fleur. I know this is early stages and we shouldn't really be making any plans or saying that this could go somewhere or not, but I don't want you to risk Bill finding out again out, do you? I don't want to do that to you either and feel like I'm pressuring you to keep it secret—"

Fleur interrupted her and stepped forward to stared directly into her brown eyes. "Hermione we can keep this secret. Nobody needs to know. We can use an invisibility cloak next time, whenever we want to meet."

"I guess so," Hermione mumbled and wondered how she could resist such an offer.

"It will be fine," Fleur reassured her.

Deciding that was enough business and explanation—for her French sense of joy in the moment, joie de vivre—Fleur dipped her finger into the pastry and lifted some of the strawberry icing to feed it to Hermione.

Hermione wondered briefly if Fleur had lost her mind, trying to spoon fed her icing in the middle of an abandoned stairway in the Ministry, but then she opened her lips and suddenly her mouth was infused with the most delicious, strawberry flavoured piece of heaven she had ever tried. Then Fleur's lips met hers next and combined with the strawberry cream and sugar.

Hermione could barely breath when they stopped their tongue-lashing briefly to pause. "I don't know why, but this whole secrecy thing turns me on a bit..." she admitted guiltily, her cheeks rosy and her body beginning to sweat underneath her tight pin-stripe Ministry suit.

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Well? Do you think Hermione should see Fleur again? Or is this really just a flirtation while they don't really want to risk their marriages or family?

Also I know I have spag errors in this but I don't have a beta so if you want to beta this, send me a PM I could use some help and I beta too :)

Thanks

~siriusbarks