She threw her briefcase on the couch and placed the bottle of Colombard on the island in the kitchenette. Grumbling something about shopping bags and women, Malfoy came through the door and dumped the packages on the coffee table.
Hermione chose to ignore his complaints.
It was his fault that they had to go buy a laptop in the first place.
The fact that it had provided an excuse for her to spend a couple of hours at Carrousel du Louvre was just happenstance.
Carrying her bags was, she had decided, an apt punishment for his behaviour earlier.
"You got over your little strop yet" he groused. He hated shopping, he hated moody women and he hated carrying shopping bags.
She opened the wine and poured herself a glass. A large glass.
"I was not in a strop" she hissed.
"No? Then what the hell was all that about at the Ministry" he asked her, his eyebrow raising as he watched her finger the stem of the glass.
"That odious, insipid little man! He practically tossed us out on our ear" she started, rage bubbling under the surface. Her passionate nature was so much more alluring when it wasn't directed at him.
"So you took that out on me because?" he questioned casually. He wasn't actually trying to pick a fight with her this time. He genuinely wanted her to see she had been unreasonable.
"I didn't take anything out on you!" she hissed, her cheeks starting to flush.
"So what was that little display of petty jealousy about then?" he smirked, eyes holding her gaze.
She drained her glass and chuckled.
"What? When you were chatting up the girl at the Apple Store?" she scoffed, pouring herself another glass.
"No" he casually replied. She was trying to avoid looking at him, but he continued to focus on her.
"When you were chatting up the girl at L'Occitane?" she muttered, coming across to the couch, sitting down and taking off her kitten heels.
"No" he replied, staring at her creamy calves.
"When you were practically drooling over the waitress at Le Café Richelieu?" she glared at him.
"No" he replied, still staring at those calves.
She frowned and thought for a minute.
"Oh!" she cried, draining her second glass of wine before placing her glass on the coffee table "When you were all over Monsieur Bernard's little harlot" she laughed derisively.
"So what was all that about?" he asked her, his tone even.
"What was what about?" she asked, grabbing the bag with the laptop in.
"Your little scene?" he genuinely wanted to know but he equally didn't want to provoke her fiery temper. It was a dangerous road to go down and he knew it.
"I didn't make a scene" her tone laced with disdain as she unpacked the box.
"No?" he chuckled, loosening his tie.
"I just think" she sighed "that you need to concentrate on the fact that we need to sort out travelling to Berlin and that red heels are highly inappropriate for an office environment. I mean after all it is a place of business. Serious business. Governmental business in fact. And her footwear screamed 'Red light district' more than 'important Ministry business. It certainly wasn't jealousy though." The flush to her cheeks a deeper shade of red now. "Plus it's so cliche" she muttered, frowning at the package in front of her.
"But no jealousy, Granger?" he chortled, looking across at her.
"Don't be ridiculous" she sighed "Why would I be jealous?" she turned and looked at him.
"You tell me" he quietly replied, reaching to brush a finger across her forearm.
Hermione grabbed the laptop and charger and scurried to the kitchenette in a fluster.
"What are you doing? He asked, confused by her sudden flurry of activity.
"The battery will be flat so it needs to charge for a few minutes before we can use it, but even then we will need to use it plugged in. We can't leave it too much longer. I told you we should have gone to an internet cafe!" she was starting to feel stressed.
"Harry said no exposure, so no internet cafe" he reasoned, coming over to the kitchenette and seating himself at one of the bar stools around the island. He pulled the laptop towards himself and switched it on. That much he had got the hang of. She pulled it back towards herself and he furrowed his brow in confusion at her action.
"It needs to be set up the first time you use it" she explained, tapping the keys quietly while he helped himself to a glass of her wine since she obviously had no intention of offering him any.
After a few minutes, she pushed the laptop towards him, the screen showing Google.
"Figured you needed the practice" she winked, stepping out of the confined space to grab her glass from where it sat on the coffee table.
"Hotels, Berlin, 5 Star...yes?" he was concentrating so hard she almost looked for steam from his ears.
"Yea" she casually replied, pouring the last of the bottle into her glass. She knew she should have bought two.
He tapped and clicked for a few moments.
"Ok..Lux 11 Berlin-Mitte?" he looked at her. She visibly paled.
"Veto" she said, draining her third glass in less than an hour.
"Why?" he asked baffled, feeling a sense of Déjà vu.
"Because" she muttered, as though that was the only explanation needed.
"Because?..." he prodded.
"Leave it" she whispered, bracing her hands on the Island.
He turned his attention to the next one on the list.
"Grand Hyatt Berlin?" he stole a glance at her. She was shaking. He grew concerned.
"Seriously, why do you keep vetoing…"
"I don't want to talk about it" she said, eyes screwed shut.
"Hey, it's ok" he whispered, reaching out to touch his finger to hers.
She relaxed a little.
"Hotel Adlon Kempinski Berlin?" he quietly asked, watching her for a reaction.
She relaxed a bit more.
She bit her lip, thinking.
He tried to ignore the twitch of his cock; he knew she was thinking.
"I can't remem….." she started "let me have a look" she spun the laptop round, squinting at the pictures.
"No." she muttered "Yea that one is ok" she felt his gaze but refused to make eye contact, instead opening the mini bar to see what was left.
Shutting it, she felt like they were turning into alcoholics and the sense of Déjà vu was unnerving. In two weeks they had drained the mini bar no less than four times. And she had brought back wine every other night. Granted, you didn't get much in a mini bar, even in a penthouse suite, but even so, the level of consumption was starting to concern her. It was too much like before, especially considering the amount of times they fought.
But this was different.
They mostly fought because they were both frustrated with the case.
And, after the incident with the broken glass, she had to admit there was unresolved sexual tension. She didn't want to admit it but she had felt a twinge of jealousy each time he had openly flirted with women in front of her.
Not a lot, just a twinge.
A smidgen.
Not a stab.
Ok, a stab of jealousy. But nothing more than that.
Ok. Fine. She wanted to hex each of those girls into the next century.
"Mita vittua?!" she suddenly declared, eyes wide.
Malfoy stared at her. She was swearing in Finnish again.
"What?" he said, a little concerned she was about to go into one of her linguistically colourful rages.
"Nothing" she quickly said.
"Im just falling for Draco Malfoy" she thought.