Disclaimer: Yeah, I wish.

Chapter 3

"P-P-Professor," Ron sputtered, and looked into her eyes. Hermione and Harry looked at each other as if to say 'what did we just go over?'. It was silent for a moment, until Professor Viores broke eye contact with Ron.

"Ronald, I'm not going to punish you or your friends, I was just curious to see what you knew. I was coming up to the library to see if I could find any information on myself, and to see how easily it would be found." She looked at the rest of the trio.

Hermione stood up for herself, "I was just curious. I don't like you."

"I know you don't like me, Miss Granger, but there is no reason for it. I have been completely honest with everyone in this school, I've just left a little bit of my past out to let you figure it out for yourself. Give me a try, I'll try to be on time for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and every class. But, please understand," her voice became more gentle, "this is so different for me, I just want to do it right. And there's other things on my mind, some of which I may be taking assistants for in the near future. You, Hermione, are my top choice."

"Professor, I don't know you yet. It's hard to make a judgment of your character," Hermione answered truthfully.

"You'll get to know me. Even better when Mister Potter figures out my secret." She turned to Harry, "any ideas yet?"

"No. Not really Professor." He hadn't really thought of it since class, and being put on the spot made him forget everything she told him.

Lauretta smiled, "Ask Ron, I think he may have it figured out. At least that's what I got when I took a glimpse. Nighty, night!" She left the library, leaving a slightly frightened and relieved trio of students in her midst.

"Ron?" Harry and Hermione both looked at the red-haired boy.

"Yes."

"You know what her old job was don't you?"

"I have an idea," Ron said, "but I'm not sure I'm right." He was visibly uncomfortable.

"Didn't you hear her Ron? She said you were right." Hermione was itching for information. She needed to get to know this person better.

"Oh I guess she did," Ron said.

"Well?"

"I thought she was a spy, you know for the Order. There was always someone elsethey were getting information from, and I thought I had seen her before late at night at a meeting." Harry and Hermione were giving him a strange look "I thought she looked familiar?"

"I think she lied to us when she said Ron knew," Hermione commented.

"Me too," Harry said.

"But, she said I was right!"

"I think she's a good liar."

After the first week of classes, the students of Hogwarts were ecstatic when the weekend arrived. They had all been terrified by the new Defense Professor, and the first years had been terrified by Professor Snape, but everybody expected that. With a load of homework to do, they all put if off to take a little time for themselves. And it all started with breakfast.

"For a new teacher she certainly knows how to give out homework. She gave us more than Snape and McGonagall combined," Ron complained.

"She expects a lot out of us. Weren't you listening yesterday?" Hermione asked.

Ginny joined the conversation, "No. I know what Ron was doing. He was too busy staring at what Professor Viores, or should I say Lauretta, was wearing weren't you Ronny? Though I must say her sense of style is impeccable."

"She's not as threatening as I thought she was, in fact she's really funny." Hermione had warmed to the Professor a little in the past week, and found that the knowledgeable woman had a lot to offer her in the area of academics.

"I like it when she makes fun of Ron," Harry snickered.

"That's only because Ron didn't listen when we told him not to make eye contact with her, and she knows it. Although why anyone would want to read Ron's mind is beyond me, probably for entertainment."

As if on cue the Professor walked by the table. Ginny caught her attention. "Professor Viores?"

"Yes Ginny." The Professor stopped and sat down with the students, looking like a student herself in a pair of jeans and a tee-shirt. "I think I'll try something new and sit here, see what the student perspective is. Oh, look, the head table looks like a table for lords up there all imposing and stuff. Definitely different here."

Ron was beet red with embarrassment, he knew what Ginny was going to ask the Professor.

"Professor, I've heard that you always read Ron's mind in class, why? It's not like you'll find the secrets of the universe or anything."

"Well, I'd have to say for entertainment." She looked over at the boy in question and snickered, "he does tend to have rather…interesting thoughts when he's in my class."

"Really?" Hermione was interested to learn the dirt on her friend. "What kind of thoughts Professor?"

Ron cut in, "Please, don't Professor. Please."

"Oh, Ron do grow up," Hermione said. "We all have an idea of what you think of, we just want the idea solidified."

"Do tell Professor," Ginny goaded.

"Well, the most recent incidence was just yesterday, you remember, when I started laughing when you guys were working," she looked at Ron, "or were supposed to be working. Let's just say that Ron had been indulging in a thought that involved me wearing a lavender thong." She was amused by the humiliation that seemed to come over the boy, and the outrage that his sister displayed.

"Ron! That's disgusting!" Ginny exclaimed so loudly that other students looked over at the exchange.

"She's our Professor!," Hermione said.

"Can you blame me! She's hot!"

"Ron please, get a girlfriend and stop fantasizing about someone you'll never have," Ginny said. They weren't aware of how much attention they were attracting to themselves.

"She's right Ron—," Lauretta was cut off.

"I don't find it hard to believe that you are the cause of this ruckus Miss Viores." The formidable Professor Snape it seems, wasn't only resigned to putting down students.

Lauretta visibly angered, "I'm not your student anymore Professor, so I would prefer that you didn't address me like that."

Professor Snape only walked away, leaving a seething Lauretta at the Gryffindor table.

"That man makes me so angry, I could just…I don't know…kill him."

"He makes everyone angry, it's his job," Harry commented.

"Yeah, I know, I just wish he'd address me like a colleague," Lauretta said. She got up from the table. "Well I'll see some of you later."

As she walked away Ginny said, "That woman always leaves with the strangest comments."

"She and Snape seem to have a history, he did address her as a student," Hermione said. "But there's no record of her ever attending Hogwarts."

"I don't know," Ron said. "She confuses me."

Later, in the common room Hermione and Ginny found two letters addressed to them.

"What are these?"

"Open it Ginny," Hermione said.

Ginny opened her letter and read what was written. "It's from Professor Viores. It says 'You want to know a little bit more about me, so come to my rooms for a girls night. Eight O'clock. The room on the fourth floor, Hermione will know what painting.'"

"Girls night? With a professor? Isn't that a little odd?" Hermione asked.

"Well she is a little odd."

"I don't know what painting she's talking about."

"I think she wants you to figure it out, you know like a mystery," Ginny said.

"We might as well give it a try."

"I think it sounds fun," Ginny said. "Don't tell Ron though, he'd be tailing us."

Lauretta was talking with Albus and Minerva about her 'girls night', making sure that everything she was doing was alright. They were in Dumbledore's office sipping tea.

"Is it alright that I'm having some of my students over for the night? There all girls," she asked the Headmaster.

"Perfectly alright Lauretta. This is a good idea, and from the list you've given us it looks like you've picked some of the brightest witches at this school. Any reason?"

"I'm choosing a few of them to help me with some research I'm conducting. I want to know them a little better if I'm going to be spending so much time with them. And I want them to know me too. This seemed like a logical way to go about the search."

"You didn't tell them what room?," Minerva asked lo king up from the sample of the letter she was reading.

"I thought I'd try Hermione's memory. She is my top choice."

"May I ask what you are working on Lauretta," Albus ventured.

"That, my friend, is a secret. But, you will find out in due course," she answered. "And I can promise you it will be very entertaining."

That night when Hermione and Ginny came to the top of the steps on the fourth floor they were met by a group of girls, all from different houses. They all looked at Hermione expectantly.

"That would be your cue," Ginny said.

"Oh, right, I don't really know where her rooms are," she said addressing all the girls. They all groaned.

"Well let's get looking," one of them said.

The girls all filed down the hall looking at the paintings they passed, stopping once in a while to look more closely. Hermione was looking for something that would stand out to her in the painting. As she passed by a portrait of a dark haired man, something caught her attention: he had lavender eyes. A relative.

"I found it." She looked directly at the man, who nodded. The portrait swung open, and the group of girls entered the Professor's quarters.

"It's beautiful. It looks like somewhere she would live." The rooms looked like something taken from the eighteenth century, ornate furniture and silk covered walls. Lauretta herself looked out of place when she came to greet the girls wearing jeans.

"Hello girls. It's nice to see you all showed up, maybe I'm not to scary after all. Please come in, make yourselves comfortable." She motioned them deeper into her rooms into what appeared to be a library with a leather couch and numerous leather chairs. "I put the drinks over on my desk, and there's food in the kitchen just around the corner."

"I've brought you all here tonight, to get to know you, and to let you get to know me. You are all candidates to work with me on a little research, and I wanted to get to know you better before I had to work with you. But, I also wanted to have a little fun."

Everyone had made themselves comfortable, and Lauretta sat down in a leather chair.

"So any questions?"

Hermione spoke up from the couch, "Professor, why didn't you come to Hogwarts? You would have been here while we were."

"Ahh, Hermione jumps right to the good part of the story. My family," she explained, "doesn't like to have their children get too exposed, I believe some of you know why, so we are all homeschooled. I started my schooling at the same age you did, only I had a private tutor, that visited once or twice a week, I taught myself a lot of the time."

"Who was your tutor?" was asked from the crowd.

"A man who isn't very nice," she answered angrily.

"I know who it is," Ginny whispered in Hermione's ear.

"Who?" Hermione asked.

"You can answer for me Ginny," Lauretta said, "after all it's not a secret."

Ginny answered timidly, "I think it's Professor Snape."

"He was your tutor?" someone asked.

"That's horrible."

"Yep, good old Professor Snape."

"Is that why you hate him so much Professor?" Hermione asked.

"Oh Hermione, I don't hate him." Then she added quietly, "For some reason unknown to me I've been in love with him for years."

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