Chapter 10

A/N: I know, I know. Mean Frosty, how could you just leave it there! *Grins* I'm sure you'll all be glad to know that I can write kiss scenes without having to close my eyes. Hooray! I did, however, have to roll my eyes several times.

Thanks to everyone who reviewed! And to everyone who favourited, etc. Thanks to arrandomness for betaing this!

At the moment, the stats page is working... Sort of. But you could still review to let me know what you think?

~Frosty

Hermione tensed up, unsure what to do and bewildered that Malfoy would actually want to initiate any sort of contact with her. One second she was trying to figure out what his expression went, the next his mouth was covering her own. When he started to move his lips against hers, she gave up thinking and relaxed against him, sighing with something akin to contentment.

As soon as she responded, she found herself back in the position she had been in when she regained consciousness, except this time, there was a Malfoy on top of her. The strange part was, she liked him there. A lot. After her initial surprise at the sudden change in position, she went with it and brought her arms up around his neck, moving them over his shoulders and pulling him down closer to her.

His mouth moved down to her neck alternately nipping and sucking. He gave a low chuckle when she threw her head back and gasped as he hit a particularly sensitive spot. His mouth was so distracting that she failed to notice when the hand he wasn't using to hold himself up had somehow found its way to her leg.

When his hand on her thigh started to move upward, it jolted her back into reality. The reality where he was Malfoy and she was Granger and these things weren't allowed to happen. She used all of her strength to push against his chest, causing him to fall off of the couch onto the floor. This was bad.

"What the hell Granger?" Malfoy growled from the floor. He obviously wasn't pleased to have been unceremoniously dumped onto the floor.

She could feel heat rush to her cheeks as they undoubtedly turned bright red in mortification at what she'd done. Her breathing quickened, verging on hyperventilation. Sure he hadn't been up to his usual evil standards lately, but underneath it all, he was still Malfoy and she needed to stop forgetting that!

You know you enjoyed that and will do it again given the chance, her brain told her. It was such a know-it-all!

Hermione jumped over the back of the couch and backed away from him with wide eyes. This was very bad. The kind of bad Harry and Ron could never hear about. "I- I have to go," she squeaked as she rushed towards the fireplace, dodging his hand when he reached out to her and ignoring his calls of her name.

Her heart was pounding in her chest as she came out into her own flat and slid down the wall beside her fireplace, one had pressed to her lips while the other waved her wand to adjust the wards to keep everyone out. She needed some time alone.

Draco wanted to bang his head on the wall. Partly because he had given into temptation and listened to the voice when it told him she was attractive, but mostly because she'd just fled. Where was that Gryffindor courage when it would be useful instead of just encouraging her to throw herself into life-threatening situations?

He briefly contemplated going after her, but running after girls who shoved him away was not a Malfoy thing to do. Initiating contact with Muggleborns was not a Malfoy thing to do either! What had he been thinking? He hadn't been thinking with the logical part of his brain, that was for sure.

"Bloody Griffindors," he muttered as he finally picked himself up off of the floor and went in search of a cold shower.

He couldn't help but picture her face before she'd fled. That was a blow to the ego; girls didn't usually flee from him. Scratch that, girls never fled from him, Granger was the first. Then again, she was Granger; she'd never done things like other girls.

The freezing water wasn't much of a distraction from his raging thoughts. Who did she think she was, pushing him away like that? There was no doubt that she had been enjoying their... activities just as much as he was.

The sobering thought of the reaction his parents would have should they ever find out what had just happened between him and a Muggleborn passed through his head briefly, but that wasn't something he wanted to contemplate long, so he shook his head to clear it and stepped out of the shower.

The simple solution would be to never allow anything like that to ever happen again. Ever.

A week later, he was once again in the shower – though a much warmer one – when he heard a voice call him angrily from somewhere else in the house. He frowned, his parents weren't supposed to be home for a while and his father sounded angry.

Towel around his hips, Draco walked in the direction he guessed the voice had come from, sensing that the time it would take him to get dressed would only anger his father further.

"Draco," the frosty voice of his father met him when he grudgingly walked into the older Malfoy's study.

"Yes, Father?"

"Why is there a book missing from the library?" Draco cringed. He had never been allowed to remove a book from that room, and he knew that neither of his parents ever did either, meaning that Granger still had one at her flat.

"I... know where it is," Draco sighed, rubbing a hand through his dripping hair. Granger was going to pay for this.

Lucius gave him the icy stare that had once reduced Muggles to puddles of pleading goo. "Get. It. Now."

Draco didn't argue, he left the room and headed to the fireplace, only to remember that perhaps clothing might be more appropriate than just a towel.

Having changed clothes and gone through the Floo system, he disappeared in a whoosh of green flame. He was pleased that she hadn't changed the wards to block him out, banging against an invisible wall would have put him in a spectacularly foul mood.

He stumbled out of the fireplace just in time to see the beginning of another one of Granger's fits. She was starting to sway slightly and once again, she turned sheet-white. A pang of genuine worry made itself known in the pit of Draco's stomach as he rushed forward and caught her.

She was going to kill him if she woke up in his arms after making it clear she wanted nothing more to do with him the night before. He needed to put her down, quickly.

"Hermione!" Came synchronised shouts from the kitchen as the rest of the trio rushed into the room to save its fallen member. Grey eye rolled to the ceiling as he gently set the woman on the nearest couch. Wait for it... 5, 4, 3, 2,

"Malfoy!" They both spat, once again at the same time, pulling their wands. It was like they only shared one brain between the two of them – most of it seemed to reside in Potter's skull.

"What did you do to Hermione?" The Weasel demanded, turning a disturbing shade of red.

Draco was actually surprised; Granger was rapidly running out of time, and as moronic as they were, she needed her friends. Now she had him thinking almost complimentary thoughts about the Wonder Twins! Something was seriously wrong with him.

"I didn't do anything to her Potter, give her a minute and she should wake up," Draco snapped, watching the brunette intently for some sign of movement. Whatever the two morons were going to say in response to his truthful statement was interrupted when Granger's eye fluttered open.

"You haven't bloody told them yet?" Draco demanded angrily, not quite sure why he was so upset with her; he shouldn't care whether she lived or died, right? But it seemed he did, rather a lot, actually.

"Told us what?" The boy-with-the-annoying-hero-complex demanded, looking from Draco to Granger and back again.

"She's not human," Draco snapped, glaring at the still pale brunette on the couch. When he looked back to Potter, he found a wand in his face.

"Take that back, Malfoy! Just because she's Muggle-born doesn't make her not human!" Draco was taken aback by Potter's reaction. What was he on about? His eyes widened slightly as he realized what Potter assumed he was saying.

"Don't get your knickers all in a twist Potter; I'm over that blood purity nonsense. She's actually not human," he tried to clarify, but it seemed to make Scarhead even angrier.

"Harry!" Granger snapped from the couch. "He's not insulting me; I'm really not entirely human!" She seemed to be as fed up with Potter's quick – and wrong– conclusions as Draco was getting.

Harry looked from his friend to the blond ferret that had actually seemed to help her, possibly even show genuine concern for her well-being. "Explain," he told the two of them, holding Ron back from attacking the blond. He was referring to both the news and the strange interaction between the two of them. Hermione didn't seem at all surprised to wake up with Malfoy leaning over her, and that warranted an explanation.

Draco looked longingly to the fireplace, but the look Potter and Weasley were giving him made it very clear that they weren't going to let him escape until they had an explanation that their tiny little minds could be content with. He slowly made his way into the kitchen, making it clear he didn't plan to escape. He started opening cupboards and rifling through the contents there.

"Malfoy, what the hell are you doing?" The comedic relief portion of the trio demanded, obviously fed up with being ignored like the unimportant person he was.

"Fortification," Draco muttered, continuing to rifle though cupboards. He would have ignored the idiot, but he had a feeling that the Weasel would have been persistent with the stupid questions.

"Cupboard above the fridge," Hermione called absently, thinking she might need some as well – provided Harry and Ron stayed to make sure things didn't get... out of hand like they had last time.

Malfoy retrieved the bottle of Firewhiskey that she kept – mostly for guests – and brought it back to the sofa with him. He sprawled out on the opposite end from Hermione, careful not to get too close, and conjured two glasses. "Are you going to sit like civilised people, or are you going to loom over us like a pair of miffed cattle?" He finally demanded without looking at either of the other men, he was focused on pouring a generous amount of liquid into both glasses.

Hermione was impressed Harry and Ron both listened to what the blond suggested and sat in the chairs. Malfoy being there after what happened last night was mortifying, and she wanted nothing more than to run and hide, but his presence in the face of her friend's anger was oddly comforting. When the blonde handed her the second glass he had been pouring, Harry and Ron both lunged to their feet, as if to save her from poison or something.

She hesitantly took the glass from his hand, noting the way he refused to look at her and glad for it; eye contact would be too uncomfortable. Alcohol obviously wasn't something they should consume in the presence of the other, but with Harry and Ron hovering over them and jumping to their feet at the tiniest interaction between her and the former Slytherin, she felt one glass wouldn't hurt.

"Sit back down," she ordered sharply. Her eyes narrowed when neither of them listened to her. How come they did what Malfoy told them even though they hated him, but they completely ignored her, when they were supposed to be her friends? It wasn't fair- not that much in her life had been fair recently.

Ron crossed his arms and scowled at Malfoy while Harry stepped forward and started pacing in front of the sofa. "Hermione, we've been worried about you lately, you've been hiding out in your apartment and avoiding everyone for a while now," Harry explained, not pausing in his pacing.

Hermione hesitated, unsure of where to start. To stall for time, she took a big drink of the Firewhiskey that she'd been holding with a death-grip since Malfoy had handed it to her. Swallowing and looking back up at her friends, she opened her mouth to say something... but nothing came out. She just wasn't sure where to start or what to tell them.

Noticing her hesitation, Draco rolled his eyes; this was ridiculous. He had places to be, an angry father waiting for the return of the book that was still sitting innocently on the mantle, and a business to run! He didn't have time for this type of nonsense. Not to mention the situation was frightfully similar to the incident with Granger earlier in the week and it was making him distinctly uncomfortable – primarily because he wouldn't mind a repeat, minus the being shoved onto the floor thing and that was bad. He shouldn't want anything to do with her!

"I'm... um... well – that is," Granger so eloquently started. He raised an eyebrow at her when she shot him a desperate look; was Granger actually asking him for help? Yes, yes she was. Her eyes were most definitely pleading with him to say something. He found himself unable to resist her pleading face.

"She's going to keep fainting like she just did until she doesn't wake up and will eventually die on her birthday. This is because she's not human and needs to find a body of water or something." He waved his hand in the air nonchalantly, giving the impression that he didn't really care either way.

Hermione wasn't sure whether it was because she'd been spending way too much time with him recently or if he was having a bad day, but she noticed the slight tightening around Malfoy's eyes at the mention of her death. Was it possible he was actually concerned about her?

Harry had gone pale and Ron had turned even redder, looking furious.

"Liar!" Ron shouted, lunging forward with his wand raised, ready to do some damage to the man who dared to claim Hermione was in danger.

Harry grabbed his friend under the armpits and heaved him into the nearest chair, conjuring ropes and tying him there. "Sorry Ron, but I actually want to get to the bottom of this without having to worry about stopping you from killing Malfoy," Harry muttered as he turned once again to face Hermione and Malfoy.

Before Harry could even open his mouth, Malfoy found it necessary to add his own comment. "Potter, you missed his mouth, we can still hear him," he complained. An evil smirk spread across the slimy bastard's face as he watched the enraged redhead try and escape his bindings and tackle him. Harry scowled at him and silenced Ron with a warning look.

None of them had been paying attention to Hermione, who had been growing more and more distressed as she realized just how dire her situation was. Tears were welling in her eyes and threatening to spill over before she even noticed they were there. Furious with herself for her weakness, she wiped angrily at her eyes and held out her glass to Malfoy for a refill.

Draco glanced over at her when her glass came into his field of vision. What he saw tore at his heart; she looked so desolate and scared, but at the same time, determined. "Granger," he sighed sadly, knowing she wouldn't want any comfort from him, and not sure he wanted to deal with the implications of actually offering it to her.

His uttering of their friends' name brought the attention of the bickering pair back to Hermione. Harry immediately rushed forward to hug her, but she stopped him with a look.

"I need to explain before you can comfort me, otherwise I'll just end up crying uselessly," she explained apologetically.

Harry nodded in understanding and motioned for her to explain. Ron had gone quiet and was watching her intently, also waiting for her explanation. "Malfoy wasn't lying, it's all true," she said sadly, deciding that blunt was probably the best way to tackle her explanation.

Harry frowned at everyone in the room; his hero complex was kicking in with a vengeance and he wasn't sure how to help his distressed friend. He wasn't about to make Hermione repeat anything, when he had a rough idea what was going on – from Malfoy of all people – since it was obviously distressing her. He gently took the glass from her hand and hugged her, ignoring the strange look Malfoy was giving him.

"Hermione, you can't just disappear for weeks on end, not with that vigilante group taking people who fought in the war," Harry scolded into her bushy hair as she clung to him. He felt more than saw the tiny nod she gave in answer.

"This is all very touching and any number of other nauseating Gryffindor things, but I should be getting back; I'm going to have to hex someone after all of this touchy feely shite. Thanks for the drink Granger." Malfoy grabbed the book off of the mantle, and disappeared into the fireplace.

Harry moved as if to go after him, seemingly genuinely worried that he was going to hex someone, but Hermione stopped him.

"Don't pay attention to him Harry, he's just making himself feel better about not making me feel worse," she explained, surprised that she understood what was going through that twisted blond head of his.

"You're stressed Hermione, you need a break," Harry said worriedly when she let go of him.

"Bloody right she's stressed; she just had Malfoy in her flat and didn't hex him." Ron added from his chair, still struggling against the spell Harry had placed on him. Harry noticed this and waved his wand to free the redhead. Hermione rolled her eyes at the two of them, but smiled, she had missed them.