Authors Note: Thank you all for being patient, I got a ton written today so chapters should stay pretty steady (I hope!) Trying to show the softer side of Draco here, so I hope you all enjoy. As always, comments are so very much appreciated. I'm working to write about anything you guys comment on or ask questions about so keep em coming!

Standard disclaimer: As always, I own none of this, it's all JK Rowling's.


Hermione pushed back from the table and groaned.

"That was quite possibly the best home cooked meal I've ever had," she said, "and I'm stuffed to bursting."

"The best home cooked meal?" Draco asked, standing up slowly.

"Well, yes. That's quite a compliment. I've had some good home cooked meals before."

"But not the best meal you've ever had?" He asked, his silver eyes sparkling with a dangerous glint as he stalked towards her.

"I've spent time in Paris," she said, laughing nervously, watching him prowl around the table. "My parents once took me to this Michelin starred-eep!" His hands landed lightly on her bared knees. "We had, ah, roast lamb at Epicure," his hands slid higher, "And poached lobster from Guy Savoooooy!" his hands had slid much higher.

She murmured on incoherently, eventually simply making the delightful little noises Draco enjoyed so much. Twenty minutes later, she felt like a pool of melted butter and he was sitting on the floor with a cocky grin and mussed hair.

"Well, Granger, I don't know about you but I enjoyed my meal better than I would have any of that poncy French food."

She muttered something that could have been reproach or approval before her eyes fluttered closed. Draco chuckled.

He stood slowly, he was getting too old to crawl around on his knees, but it was worth a bit a stiffness to see her this blissfully exhausted. He straightened out his clothes and cleared the table. When he'd finished casting a spell to make the dishes scrub themselves, he came out to find Hermione exactly where he'd left her, asleep in the chair. He shook his head, that did not look comfortable in the least. Very carefully, he scooped her up in his arms. He looked to the couch, then down the hall to his bedroom. They'd spent many nights together, but neither of them had ever actually slept over at one of their places. They both had jobs that required early wake ups, and a month seemed early to give someone a drawer. He rolled his eyes just thinking that. They weren't young twenty somethings just starting to date. They were old enough to know what they did and didn't want, without feeling pressured to move faster or slower. He should just send a drawer to her place tomorrow and hope it didn't come back empty. Regardless, he wasn't going to wake her up and send her home now. It would ungentlemanly. At least, that was the reason he kept repeating to himself as he laid her gently on his bed.

He had to hand it to her, Hermione could sleep through anything. She hadn't so much as fluttered her eyelashes when he'd carried her to his room, not even when he hit the doorframe with her foot. He'd cringed, but she'd slumbered on.

"Like a bear in hibernation, I swear," he muttered under his breath as he unbuckled her stiletto sandals deftly. It certainly wasn't the first time he'd readied a woman for bed, he'd dealt with passed out drunk girlfriends, drunken Pansy, and in recent years, his mother. Narcissa had taken to falling asleep on the chaise lounge in front of the library fire instead of facing the carved antique bed she had once shared with Lucius and Draco had carried her up to a guest room on the nights he'd found her there.

This time was different though. His previous experiences had been quick and efficient, trying to get the women in bed without waking them and then heading to his own room. This time, he noticed the sensuality of it. This time, he paid attention to the way she breathed, the way her nose and eyes moved with minute expressions from dreams, the way her skin smelled. He put her in one of the silk shirts from the pajama sets his mother was always buying for him. He only ever wore the pants anyway so it was good someone was finally getting to wear the blissfully soft shirt. She made a noise and wrinkled her nose and he realized some of her hair had drifted into her face. Draco gently smoothed the hair away and tucked it behind her ear, cupping her cheek just to touch her after. She smiled and nuzzled his hand.

There.

Right there, in that moment, his heart stopped, then started pounding. A subconscious movement in her sleep and she had knocked down the remnants of the walls he'd built around his heart. He knew then, in that moment, that she was it. He was done. He'd been attracted to her for nearly two decades, but this was the moment when he realized that he would move heaven and earth to have this women with him for the rest of his life. She was the one, and no one else would ever do.