Chapter 3.
"Lucius Malfoy's accomplices?" Potter raised his eyebrow, shaking his head. "Skeeter is absolutely crazy."
"But, Harry. It said that the muggle-born family disappeared yesterday," said Ron, not stopping from the newspaper, and put the oat biscuits into his mouth. "It... can't... be, anyway."
Harry took the newspaper away from his disturbed companion, leaning over the table, and folded it in half.
"I've read it. It said that it's early to sound the alarm. And there's no evidence that they were killed by someone and that someone continues Lucius' work. And no one could find evidence that Malfoy has something to do with it."
Weasley was chewing grimly and looking at Harry from under his thick red bangs. Loudly swallowing the biscuits, he turned to Hermione:
"Tell him, Hermy. Though, Rita Skeeter is rare chatterbox but she wouldn't mobilize the Prophet for no particular reason."
"They're just out of useful news," Harry took his glass with pumpkin juice, "I don't want to believe that some Death Eater kidnaps muggle-born families of wizards in London. For what? Blackmail? Or..." he slowly looked at Hermione. The girl sat silently, staring at her plate.
The boys looked over with each other. Then they realized a silent dialogue with their looks.
"What with her?"
"Ah, God only knows..."
"Hey..." Potter easily pushed her elbow, and she flinched, looking up.
"What?"
"Something happened? You're so thoughtful today," Harry examined her face captiously, trying to find the cause of her thoughts which were shielded her from the outside world.
"Is this because of the Prophet?" Ron immediately put in, instantly catching a reproachful look from his friend.
"No," Hermione was digging up her plate with fork abstractedly, "I'm just a little sleep deprivation."
"What did you do last night?" Potter sipped some juice from his glass and set it back on the table, looking as she became confused.
Hermione bit her lip.
Really, what did she do last night? Except laying and looking at the ceiling with dry eyes until the morning light flooded her room with gray haze. Until Malfoy moved in his bedroom. If you listen hard, she discerned how he was opening cabinet doors.
Then Malfoy went to the bathroom and the sound became closer.
He went his bare feet on the floor, then turned the water on in the sink and cleaned his teeth.
Hermione tried not to imagine how he looked after sleeping. Was his always perfect hair disheveled? Were his eyes drowsy? Were his lips squeezed as usual?
In her naughty mind, he was in pajama pants, without shirt and barefoot. Leaning over the sink and washing his face. And water was trickling down his arms to his elbows. On his neck, accumulating in the deep of his collarbone. His wet hair adhered to his forehead and temples. He spitted the water and dried himself. He looked at himself in the mirror. He turned his head one way first, then the other to check whether his skin was still perfect.
Of course, perfect.
It's fucking Malfoy.
Then he threw the towel over his shoulder roughly, turned the water on in the bath and pulled down the elastic band of the pajama pants, from what remained the light print on his white skin of his neat belly. She wanted to run the tip of her finger over it, feeling the prominence.
And this print suddenly became perfect on his body, too.
"Hermione!"
The girl jumped up, spilling pumpkin juice on her hand. Quiet horror from her own thoughts almost made her hair gray.
"Merlin! You've fallen asleep with your eyes open?" Ron looked at her as if she stopped to understand English. "What's happening?"
Crap. Some crap was happening to her!
"I'm thinking...about...patrol. Today we have the first patrol with Malfoy," Granger said, wiping her hand with sharp movements and looking at Weasley, "Joint."
"Damn," redheaded looked haggard, knowingly shaking his head, "it sucks, of course," he stated.
"I don't know what to do. We're..." she raised her eyebrows, diligently trying to throw image of Malfoy out of her head and cursing herself, "We... almost don't communicate with each other."
"Seriously? Still?"
"What's strange about that, Ron? You don't need to wonder."
"Well. Just you're both prefects and... that's unusual."
"I don't communicate with him. And I'm quite comfortable," she put down her napkin and went back to the breakfast.
"And of course, you know," Harry muttered, looking at her with a strange suspicion, "he's our enemy. He'll stay the same."
"I know that," she was staring at Potter in his eyes, slightly bowing her head and squeezing her lips, not keeping the irritation, "thank you for reminding me."
"Harry, don't be stupid," Ron frowned, "Hermione should at least try to find a common language with him. After all, they live together. Or he would put her out of the world."
Harry rolled his eyes, shaking his head and staying in his opinion. Weasley looked encouragingly at her.
"You can communicate normally if you'll want it."
"Exactly, Ronald."
"But, probably, you'll have to harden yourself, eating dragon shit every day."
"Such a wonderful metaphor, Ronald."
"And what about the Prophet..."
At this moment, Hermione's look stumbled upon damn Malfoy who just came in the Great hall.
Pansy was mincing behind him, clinging to the sleeve of his cloak with her fingers. Hermione's heart stopped for a moment. Granger looked aside hurriedly, forcing herself to look at her friends, who started some stupid argument about Rita Skeeter. The corner of her eye she saw that Draco went to the usual place at the Slytherin table and sat down.
She even thought he looked at her. But, glancing at him, Hermione was convinced that she was going crazy finally. Malfoy was sitting in his usual royal manner, listening to what Pansy was muttering in his ear. His gaze wandered at the plates, lingering on one, then on another dish.
He didn't even notice Granger sitting in the crowd of Gryffindors.
So why?
Don't think that I wanted to do this...
From these words that rang in her head, she almost choked on a piece of bacon and eggs, which she was just carefully chewing.
Damn him.
He didn't answer.
And when Granger came down to the living room later, the chair and the tea table were turned over. There was the broken vase on the floor. That wasn't difficult for her to clean up, using Reparo. But to realize that he was so mad because of that disgust that appears every time he looked at her...
Damn, it's Malfoy! It's just nothing special.
And yesterday too, it was nothing special. When he looked into her eyes, and Hermione thought that his eyelashes will flattered and he'll bend to her and... Gosh!
She needed to be distracted.
She snorted to herself, glancing at the boys so they didn't accuse her again of sleeping. What are they arguing about the whole morning?
"...if you don't understand, the last wave of death that swept among muggle-borns, also started with one family!"
She choked with omelet again.
"What?!" Hermione stared at Ron, "What did you say?"
Harry sighed irritably, took off his glasses and covered his face with his hands.
"You didn't read it?" Weasley pointed a finger at Harry, "He took the newspaper away from me. Take it and see what it said on the front page."
Hermione glanced at Potter who, without looking, pushed to her the Daily Prophet. The girl quickly opened it, running her eyes over the words.
Lucius Malfoy's case has been reopened?
"What?.." she read quickly the small text, announcing the loss of the muggle-born family of George Bellow that was actively wanted by the authorities.
She looked up at the boys who was intensely silent.
"But Malfoy's dead," she said, clutching the pages of the newspaper so that the paper was creased instantly, "At the end of the last year, he died in Azkaban, and those who worked for him...were executed. This information was in all newspapers. This is the information confirmed by the Ministry and..."
"Listen," Harry looked up from his palms and looked at her, "what's written in the article is wrong. There're no Lucius' accomplices. Maybe, it's just coincidence?"
"Really?..." Ron snorted, "This wouldn't have been written in the Prophet."
"Shut up you, or not?"
"Harry. I'm witch. My parents are muggles," Hermione picked up the newspaper, "if this is true, then..."
"It's going to be okay. Lucius is dead. His case about destruction of... half-blooded families is closed."
Hermione gazed into his eyes, as if trying to find a disproof to all written.
And even more...
Harry spoke so confidently that she calmed down. However, her hands still remained cold.
After all, the Ministry was now really paying much attention to that. To catch everyone who was even slightly close to Eaters' affairs. And these leaders had been dead for a long time.
A few more seconds, she looked at Harry and then nodded because he was waiting for reactions to his words. Then he nodded, too. He looked at her again and returned to his breakfast, starting the conversation with Ron, in what she didn't want to take part. She folded the newspaper. Then raised the glass of pumpkin juice to her lips, glancing towards the Slytherin table again.
What did she expect? She really wanted to believe that nothing. But the complete lack of reaction to what had happened seemed strange.
Malfoy put a hand over Pansy's shoulder lazily, allowing her to feed himself with slices of apples. He looked at Crabbe and Goyle, who were mumbling something and sitting opposite him, and specially didn't notice the Prophet that lay before him on the table.
Judging by Crabbe and Goyle, they couldn't wait to read the news, but they avoided Malfoy's reaction.
Hmm. He looked too calm for the person, about whose father was written in newspapers after that scandal. Perhaps, it was only a mask, of course. And, yes. Probably, it was usual because, moving her gaze towards Slytherins, sitting a little distance away, Hermione made sure — almost every student was watching in his direction constantly. They took a look and then turned away, leaning over the neighbor's ear and whispering something.
Of course, Malfoy wasn't shy. From childhood he gets used that the name of his family often heard on the lips of crowd and featured in the Ministry. In particular, over the last couple of years. It seemed Lucius tried to slander him deliberately but the Malfoys remained respectful and crowned to this day.
She didn't want to go deep into it. Publicity wasn't alien to Draco, so it could be assumed that his coolness was absolutely sincere.
Hermione looked away, thinking about, what Pansy was feeling now. He threw his arm around her. Probably, it was warm? ..
Or not.
Cold. Bitter cold.
If Malfoy was ever as close to Hermione, she would have instantly turned into an iceberg. From his look and icy skin. Hermione touched her neck with her fingertips, remembering his cold hand.
His only touch to her. Practically, the only one in her life. Full of hatred and anger.
And then she slightly closed her eyes, remembering what she had felt when he moved to her so close yesterday. He didn't touch her, only with his breath. And something was in it. Malfoy looked at her lips then. And it meant that he was thinking about to kiss her?
She wanted to laugh out loud. God, what a nonsense.
Hermione sighed and started eating. Switching her thoughts the other way — she had to send a warning letter to her parents. It would be better for them to spend evenings at home, not walking the streets. Maybe, Harry was right, and there was nothing particularly wrong with the family of George Bellow.
But, safety is paramount.
The worst occupation for Hermione Granger was waiting. And now, she was sitting in her bedroom and waiting.
The evening came quietly, despite the fact that the last hour she spent in the library, glancing at her watch. Deciding to be late for patrol, as if it could wound Malfoy some way.
Most likely, he'd be angry to the fact that he had to wait for her a few extra minutes.
In the end, Hermione wasn't late and arrived earlier, sitting in her bedroom in front of the mirror and mesmerizing the enchanted diary with her gaze, which was seen from the corner of the desk drawer.
After that day, when Malfoy grabbed her by her throat, the second diary was gone from the living room. Hermione was interested, if he took it. And so, during transfiguration's class, she opened the diary on the first page quietly and wrote quickly: 21:00, in the living room. Patrol. And biting her lip, she glanced at Malfoy, who was sitting on the next row.
He met her gaze and grimaced.
She slightly lifted the diary, showing him that she made a note.
His upper lip quivered angrily. He put two fingers to his throat, pretending that he was sick.
She rolled her eyes and turned away. Their meaningful dialogue ended this way. He didn't answer her but when Hermione turned again to him, she noticed that the diary was lying on the edge of the desk.
Clearly, he had been read her message.
And for some reason, she almost smiled, thinking that he brought it with him.
Stupid. Silly. Idiot.
She shut her eyes.
Why it happened that Malfoy started to take more and more thoughts in her head, crowding out the others? For example, poitons' test, progress of junior years and even, sorry Merlin, thoughts about Harry and Ron. How many unnecessary questions were spinning around in her head?
How did this happen?! And — the most important — how to stop it?
Her eyes fell on the watch. 20:55.
The patrol would be very long. Very unpleasant.
She sighed, feeling her heart started to prick. She stood up and rubbed her cold hands together. She wasn't afraid of him, of course. And she wasn't nervous absolutely. She grabbed her wand from the bedside table and held her breath for a moment.
Absolutely no nervousness.
But somehow, she opened her door very quietly and went downstairs silently, stopping at the last step. She squeezed her lips and stepped into the living room.
Malfoy stood back to her, holding newspaper and rocking from heel to toe. Interestingly, he decided to read about Lucius during the whole day for the first time? Somehow, Hermione thought that he didn't allow himself to touch the Prophet while he was in full view of others.
The fire outlined the contours of his body.
Malfoy was without his cloak in a light black sweater that stretched on his tense shoulders. His trousers were perfectly ironed.
Hermione watched his jaw muscles were moving. Was he angry? At her? Maybe, not at her because his look slips through the lines somehow... heatedly. Frankly, she didn't want to face with him.
So that Granger felt, as all was compressed from mild panic inside her. In the next moment, she heard the crackling torn and crease of paper, and the girl shuddered, barely catching some air with her lips. Damn.
With a noisy exhalation, he crushed the Prophet in a small paper snowball and threw it into the fire, leaning against the mantelpiece with his elbows and lowering his head. Hermione didn't dare moving, knowing that she was watching something very... personal?
Her eyes were chained to his hands which he buried in his hair.
Slim, beautiful, with slightly protruding knuckles and knotted veins on his wrists.
Hermione watched in fascination as they clenched into fists, flowing the hair through his fingers. Platinum, shining in the light of the fire. Nobody had such hair. And now, for some reason, she was definitely sure — if she would touch them, it'll be like silk.
His shoulders were raising from the heavy breathing. The sweater fitted Malfoy's body as if it was a second skin. But not white. And completely black.
She squeezed her lips.
She couldn't bring herself to shuffle her foot or move to give away her presence.
"You tramp like fucking elephant. I've heard you on the stairs, Mudblood," his muffled voice pierced her like a balloon that had released all its air with plop.
It became even a little easier.
"Is everything okay?" she asked as if nothing had happened. And squeezed her wand in the pocket.
He turned his head. The fireplace's light jumped on his profile so it seemed that his skin wasn't so cold at the time. His stone face was showing no emotion.
"You've decided to mock at me?"
Really. Why did you suddenly decide to ask Malfoy if he was okay?
Hermione gave herself a mental slap in her face. If she tried to behave herself "as usual", then it was very bad.
"Not at all. I thought you're... excited."
Please, shut up, Hermione. It's not necessary to make things worse.
With bated breath, she watched as he turned to her. She felt his gaze on her old chemise, worn jeans and sneakers. She wanted to cover herself with something. But something made her to jerk her chin with indignation.
He squeezed his lips.
"What, Malfoy, it's not for you?" she said, and there was no her care which usually was when she talked to her boys.
"Shut up, Granger. We'd better to finish it. I'm not in the mood to tolerate you for too long."
"Oh, trust me, it's mutually."
He snorted and left the room silently.
A few seconds, she watched him on his back. Well, of course, only Malfoy could curse her without saying a word. Just turning around and putting his back under her violently and powerless glare.
Hermione walked behind him, clenching her teeth and forcing herself not to look at him.
Minute, one more minute.
Ten. Fifteen. They were silent. He was walking a little ahead of her. She was behind him.
Patrol wasn't so bad. When they finished with the first floor, Hermione had completely relaxed, devoting herself to the examination of favorite walls and portraits, glancing at Malfoy's shape from time to time, almost merging with the darkness.
Only his hair stood out with bright spot.
When she got tired of staring in the dark, she again glanced at Draco, noticing that his shoulders, even though they were straight, were stooping more and more.
He put his hands in his pockets, staring straight ahead of him, all in his own thoughts. His jaw muscles revived.
What he was thinking about?
Of course, it didn't interest her. But, it was weird to see Malfoy upset. So much so that even such possibility as general patrol alone wasn't used by him to crush her mentally with his insults and stupid jokes.
As it was last year.
Now he was just... patrolling.
Silently.
She looked away and forced herself not to look at him at all. Isn't she supposed to be happy? He didn't care about her. The Prophet trumpets about his father. Maybe, someone started Lucius' work. And maybe, he hoped that this was so. Or he thought about if newspapers remembered about his father, it will affect him.
Such tyrant, as Draco, always will care only about his own skin. Even if it will touch his own blood.
The Malfoys' blood. Crystal clear.
Hermione grimaced. She was disgusted and, therefore, she felt herself in safe. Yes. Here was what she felt about him always. And she will feel it.
Disgust.
Detestation.
She was so happy that she even almost smiled at her thoughts.
"You're tramping so fucking loud!" he growled suddenly, turning around sharply.
Subdued with clenched jaws and low fury, his voice made her jumped up.
"I go quietly as a mouse," Hermione rested against his look stubbornly.
Darkness and raised feeling of disgust, turned entirely on him, gave her support and strength to ignore the icy needles of his cold gray irises. He narrowed. He turned and walked on, squeezing his lips.
What's wrong with him?
He didn't answer her for the second time tonight. He allowed himself to remain silent for the second time.
Why?
The feeling that everything was going wrong, pushed her irritation on that level, where usually only a thin thread breaks. And the man loses patience.
Apparently, that was why her feet stamped on the stone floor abruptly. Advisedly. She heard his muffled breath. He stopped.
"What's wrong?" she blurted out before he turned around.
"Granger. Don't exasperate me."
"Answer me!" she passed him and stopped, "I know you, Malfoy. I know you most of my life. What's happening?"
He looked at Hermione, squeezing his lips.
"Fuck off, okay?"
No, damn it! This isn't the answer! Maybe, the problem was in the fact that Malfoy was acting weird. What attracted her attention. And if there was a chance to stop it, then it would be silly to miss it.
"You're not as usual and if it's the one of your stupid attempts to irritate me or Harry and Ron, then..."
"You stupid idiot."
He resumed his step but before she had time to stop him, she grabbed his elbow.
"Malfoy!"
He froze. And she froze, too.
He turned his head so sharply that his platinum hair tumbled over his forehead and eyes.
"Take. Your fucking hands. Away," he hissed, escaping from her fingers.
Hermione's heart stopped for a moment. Hermione was still touching soft sweater's fabric and looking at her palm as if she touched a hot firebrand and not get burned. She looked up in his eyes.
"Is this because of your father?"
Something very bad was on Malfoy's face for a second before he roared:
"Stay out of my life, bitch!"
The echo ran down the stone corridor.
She recoiled from him as if he'd slapped her in the face. But he didn't.
He had an aversion to it.
The anger mixed with irritation and sympathy in her, and that damn sympathy made her eyes burn. Sympathy is not what she should feel to him. He won't have sympathy for Draco Malfoy. He didn't deserve it.
"Look at you! You're so pity!" she blurted out, making an involuntary step ahead, "What are you? What? Besides your eternal mockeries, your... stupid jokes. Your exaggerated self-importance. Your supposed power that was bought by your father. What. Are. You?!"
He growled, baring his teeth.
"You know nothing, Granger. Don't you dare open your filthy mouth. My father and I are totally different. Completely. You don't know us! Don't even think to say something about him. I won't let you."
"What would you do? You won't touch me anymore. After you throttled me. But your fingers even didn't clench. Merlin, Malfoy! It's absurd!"
Draco sighed and straightened out his sweater.
"I still want you dead. Every second," he hissed, destroying her with his look, "I'd like you and everyone like you don't pollute this fucking world. That there were no more Mudbloods in the damn Ministry and this school. You're everywhere. You're multiplying like cockroaches. Around the world. But for every cockroach... for every, Granger, there is sole which will crush it."
"But this sole is you, isn't it?" she jerked her chin, feeling her knees were shaking, "You can't do anything with your own hands. Even those idiots, like Crabbe and Goyle, you're using as pawns. Why? You imitate your father, who never did anything by himself?"
"I told..." he almost roared again, however, he clenched his teeth, swallowing a growl. His voice was very loud in the corridor, "I told you. How you dare. Talk about him."
How this bastard dares shut up her mouth?
She wanted to express all her indignation out loud but...
Suddenly she realized that this idiot smells chocolate. And this smell grabbed her by the scruff, throwing to yesterday. To the corner of their living room. To his expanding pupils and heavy breathing.
...So why are you trembling?..
Her lungs were twisted.
Why he was so close to her? What the damn ability to block all around suddenly — and even herself.
He towered over Hermione with trembling from rage lips and eyes, which could, apparently, kill her. Now. To kill her right now, in this corridor. But she wasn't afraid.
It was one more challenge. Loud and furious.
"The truth hurts, am I right?" she whispered, stopping her urge to stand on tiptoe to say this, looking at his face, and not from below upwards. But then she would probably touch his chin with her nose, "You're a big boy, Malfoy. It's time to take it. Even if this is the bitter truth, you know?"
He took a step towards Hermione, driving her in the stone corner.
She took a step back. She saw his thin nostrils became swollen and his jaw clenched.
What the hell she was doing? What did she want? Malfoy was furious — she saw it. And he continued to approach her, so the little hairs started to move on her body.
"What's your truth, Mudblood?" Malfoy spitted out, "That this ideal world will take everyone even such poor as you and your family? Only idiots believe in it. Or freaks."
"Shut up, you have no right to say so."
"Really?"
He took another step. She moved a little sideways but his hand run into the wall near her head immediately, cut off her path of retreat.
"Or your truth is that dirty blood disposes to pity?" he smiled a little. Nastily. He was only who does it so, "I'm not sorry for you. I feel disgust. When you pass by me. When you stare at me in the Great hall," her heart froze and the breath was cut short, "When you sit next to me. When I try to sleep in my bedroom and realize that you're behind the wall. Behind the fucking wall, I hate this feeling. Do you think that these thoughts about you will cause pity? Hardly."
Hermione gasped, looking at him. She choked with her tears, which, she swore, he won't see. However, her eyes were burning, and she wanted to look away because this situation was disgusting-unnatural. Malfoy was unnecessary here. He and his words.
Dirty. Dirt.
"My family loves me," her voice screamed hoarsely. It gave herself away, and Malfoy understood that. Because his eyes lighted up, "And no matter what blood they have."
"Am I a kid, Granger? Your arguments are just incoherent mumbling."
"No!"
"My family loves me," he mimicked her and clenched his teeth, meeting her puzzled look, "Such nonsense. Unimaginable nonsense, Granger. You don't understand."
She didn't understand another thing — why he came so close to her? It spurned her. It disturbed her to breathe and think normally, leaving only a sense of his own smell and awakened anger.
"This not my fault, Malfoy, that you can't boast the same."
His heart was broken.
"What did you say?"
"No one loves you. It proves once again how you behave yourself," he was looking at her. He didn't believe her words, "It's not you."
"What the fucking attempts to get into my head?" he hissed, his look remained cold and tense.
"No. And it's not your fault," she swallowed, "that your father has never..."
Before she could finish the sentence, he slammed his hand on the wall. Granger blinked but continued drilling him with her look. Her eyes were burning but she couldn't turn away now.
"Don't you dare say anything with your filthy mouth!"
"That's your anger, right?" she whispered, sliding with her gaze, muddy from heavy tears, on his pale face, standing out in the dark, "You're jealous of me."
His look was trembling. He was trembling.
"Granger," he hissed menacingly, "It's not like that, okay?"
A little prickly fear added to the quiet perseverance.
"You'd like to change your... blood for father and mother who will love you and..."
"I said shut up!"
Let this stupid whore shut up. Just because she doesn't understand what she's talking about. She squeezed her lips and swallowed again that her thin neck strained.
"I'd like you were dead," he said, "You and your blood. Disappeared."
Shut up, Hermione. Better shut up now.
And she was silent, feeling pity and anger for this man. He had no family. Not now, when his father was executed and his mother almost went crazy. He had never had family, and everyone was trying to do the same with Draco.
The same pompous nothing.
And they did.
"But you can nothing," she looked up and prayed to Merlin for not to cry. Her voice didn't tremble, "Your pawns aren't here."
"You don't know what I can, Granger. And I don't suggest you to tempt your fate," he pushed away from the wall abruptly, meeting Hermione's eyes. Took a step back, he looked at her as if she was an insect. Big, fat bug in the middle of the table, "One family of Mudbloods has already gone. I'm sure your family is the next one."
Her heart thumped in her chest, and he turned away. He just turned away, intending to continue the patrol. To leave Hermione with flying heart and burning entrails. And treacherous tears on her eyes.
It was too much.
"You're not better than your father, Malfoy!" her desperate cry hit his back . Hermione froze when she realized what words slipped from her lips, however, it was too late to return them. The resentment lashed her in the ribs with whip.
His light skin seemed to have become even more ashen shade as he turned and made this: a step toward her.
Stop. Please stop.
"I'm better than he," he growled through his teeth, pausing a few inches from her face, and it made her to feel it again.
Rainy morning, chocolate. And if he doesn't draw back, everything will go to hell.
She felt that she heard something that she wasn't supposed to hear. Something that broke out from the depths of Draco Malfoy's cold soul. Something that he wanted to believe in.
"Why are you better?" she said. Breath out.
She could have sworn that she succeeded. She drove him crazy finally. Now he'll swing his arm and punch her. However, there was something completely different.
"I'm better because I'm alive."
She looked at Malfoy's face, absorbing the emotions that came alive in him for a moment.
Despair. Hope. Fear.
Hell, it was a panic. And he was so fucking close to the edge. She wanted to grab Malfoy so he didn't fall into the pit. And not to wonder — what the hell she did.
"I'm alive," he breathed into her face, suddenly gripping her shoulders with his cold fingers.
Shaking her as if she didn't understand the obvious. Shaking her again and again, and her head went back, touched the wall.
"I'm fucking alive!"
Suddenly there was hard to breathe from his strangled cry.
His madness captured her. His smell. His hands. His closeness. He stopped shaking her, almost touching her nose with his nose. He continued to kill her with his glance.
The pain from compressed fingers on her shoulders was practically nothing compared to what Hermione saw in his gray eyes, that looked at her. Unbecoming-deeply. His look drilled two wounds in her.
"What the fuck are you looking at me like that?" Malfoy's voice was quiet and low, slightly strangled, as if he uttered this phrase mentally, "When will you shut up at the goddamn right moment?"
She opened her mouth, afraid to say a word. Fearing to frighten off his hand that was burning her through the fabric of her chemise, suddenly seemed to her so strong. Not aristocratic. Strong, holding. And... he's warm.
This discovery shocked her.
He's really warm, warmed up by his own anger.
"I..." she looked at his mouth.
"You'll die, Granger. And I'll just look at it," he said it quietly. Almost without moving his lips. The words beat against the walls of her brain and scattered. Losing their own stinking sense. There was only his forbidden smell.
There was only his forbidden warmth and squeezing fingers. It was he, and there weren't his words. They seemed to settle on him. They paved deep wrinkles from the delicate wings of his nose to corners of his lips. Almost against her will, Hermione tried to raise her hand to erase them but he only squeezed her tighter, just above the elbow, not allowing to touch him.
And she couldn't shake off the cloud of this stupor.
"Can you hear me?" soundlessly, "You'll die..."
The inch frozen between them. Merlin. It's Malfoy.
And her back shivered from this awareness. And before Hermione realized what she was doing, she raised her head closer to his lips. Forcing him to freeze. It wasn't her. His smell did it with her.
Malfoy shook her shoulders lightly again. As if he guessed what she was going to do.
"No," he said it even quieter than the previous one. But his look was lost as her own. Almost scared.
"Okay."
The cutting feeling of déjà vu disappeared. All thoughts in his head shrunk to one solid point when Hermione raised herself a little again.
When she barely touched Malfoy's lips with her own. When — and it was the worst terrible — he didn't move. He only hardened even more. And it seemed his lips became icy and burning at the same time.
Merlin, Hermione... Maybe, this is the end. Because her legs were lead from the feel of warm breath on her cheek and fixed mouth on her own. The quiet limp exhale, some kind of moan, broke from her chest, she just didn't have time to keep it.
One second. One heart beat and his hands tightened immediately, as if he was going to push her away. Of course, he'll push her away. He didn't even close his eyes.
He was looking at her in mute bewilderment and didn't move.
And she was looking at him and feeling his icy stare reads these unspoken pleading phrases in her eyes — don't push me away, not now, please — and didn't move. As if he was... allowing?
Hermione made a promise to herself to die after that. Immediately. And looking down, she slowly opened her mouth and gently rubbed on his tightly squeezed lips with her own. Not thinking about it, hearing only the roar of her heart in the ears.
It didn't mean anything. Nothing.
It was perfect.
The lightest and hot touch in her life, which sent a current throughout over the body, turning her entrails. She had kissed before, of course. Victor kissed her twice, deep and wet. Then she thought about how long he was going to torment her mouth about hygiene and the level of acid-base balance in the mouth.
And now... She had no thoughts.
She froze when he exhaled gently. When his mouth opened suddenly and Malfoy's hot tongue slid on her lower lip, a big amount of fireworks exploded in her head.
This moan broke away from her chest again. And suddenly, Hermione had felt that he touched her only with his lips and hands. Involuntarily, she bent her back, as if trying to feel his chest. His belly. She wanted to feel him closer. She wanted to kiss him as Pansy did. Deeply, burying her fingers in his soft hair, which touch she could feel on her forehead.
His hard hands descended on her shoulders and stopped just above the elbow, squeezing harder, not allowing her to move.
It lasted only one second. And then he stopped. He stepped aside and stared at her. Hermione opened her eyes, looking at him. Feeling with all her being the border on which he balanced. He'll push her away.
Now.
And it'll be right.
Here it is. Resistance. Squeezing jaws.
"Bitch," he growled to her lips. Loud hoarse voice. She felt like his exhale pushed in her mouth, "Your buddies didn't even teach you how to kiss."
He pushed her away, releasing her shoulders, so she hit against the wall with her back, looking at him with her big eyes.
What?..
"Are you the same in bed? Boring and wooden," he grinned, taking a step back.
Hermione didn't move, feeling the fire on her lips. Her under lip was still damp from the imponderable touch of his tongue.
Malfoy was looking at her as if she fell in his eyes even lower. Lower than the underworld in which she was at the moment. He raised his hand and wiped his mouth with his sleeve, wincing in disgust.
Then he turned away and spitted out.
"I don't know who fucks you, Weasley or Potter," he said, taking a step into the darkness of the corridor, "but I even feel sorry for them. If I were in their place... I'd choose someone more attractive. Who has more sexuality than book shelve has."
She opened her mouth, looking as he was leaving. Feeling his taste.
Unable to find words for the first time in her life. To offend him.
And he was rushing down the corridor and counting his heart beats.
Turn. Turn. One more turn. Fucking endless Hogwarts. Only at the thirty-fourth heart beats he allowed himself to stop, clenching his fists. She didn't follow him. Perhaps, she was still standing at the wall.
The taste of her lips forced him to close his eyes. He put a hand to his mouth, swiping across it with his fingers.
He kissed her.
"Damn," he wheezed out and punched the stone wall, not restraining himself.
That feeling of imponderable gliding... She reached out for him. She.
His dick was so tense that he felt the pain. Damn. He had the cock-stand because of that half-kiss. Because of her huge eyes. Her uncombed hair.
Fucking Mudblood. How she committed that?
How could she let THAT happen?
"Damn..." he began to wipe his lips frantically with his hand again, feeling that they still have her taste.
The taste of mint and cinnamon. Probably, she added it in her tea.
He hated cinnamon.
He hated her.
He hated her with all that lived in his soul. With all that he was. With all his being.
And he swore to Salazar that his heart was crashing in his throat, and his lips were still feeling her mouth. And he began to rub them furiously again.
Nevermore.
Never. More.
Whenhe came across her in the corridor and didn't look at her, Hermione didn't believe herself.
Everything happened spontaneously. She was racing to transfiguration's class, and Malfoy was coming out from around the corner. It was extremely undesirable meeting. And extremely... unexpected. She just buried in his green-and-silver tie with her face. She had no time to open her eyes when she realized that it was him. His smell with slightly faint note of eau de cologne.
She squeaked out something, and Draco just pushed her to the side with one sharp motion and passed by her. Hermione came to her senses and looked after him when he was already twenty meters from her. What was this? He said nothing? He didn't call her clumsy, awkward, and Mudblood...
He just pushed her aside.
It wasn't the greeting that she had expected after what happened yesterday. She expected anticipated anger, irritation... at least something. She thought that they came across in the living room in the morning and gnawed each other's throats. She thought he would do at least something... somehow... But he wasn't in the living room. And Hermione's mood was spoiled because...
There were previously prepared phrases in her head. There were so many phrases!
She wanted to poke a finger in his arrogant face and say quietly and with dignity: You're nasty, disgusting, loathsome asshole! Yesterday's kiss was the worst I've ever felt in my entire life! I'd better swallowed the damn snake than to feel your body next to me. Just like this.
And nothing else.
Calmly and with dignity.
Despite the fact that those words rattled with screams, tearing the eardrums inside.
But he. Silently. Moved her aside.
Who fucks you...
Boring and wooden...
Book shelve...
Her fists clenched themselves.
"Go to hell, you bastard!" she shouted and shuddered from how loud was the echo, bringing these words to his ears.
With quiet horror she watched as he stopped. He turned around. She didn't see his eyes but she guessed his eternal indifferent facial expression.
"Such a great deal, Mudblood bitch. To throw words in my back," his ironic voice sounded very quietly but she heard every word. She knew that the transfiguration's class had already begun. But her feet seemed adhered to the floor. There was an alarming bell in her head.
"I can tell you this to your face forever! Believe me, I have something to say!" her voice was oddly thin. And it amused him.
He didn't believe? Well, okay!
Fucking okay!
She darted off and went toward him with confident step, and the sound of her own shoes echoed in her head with rhythmic march:
You're nasty, disgusting, loathsome asshole! Nasty, disgusting, loathsome asshole!
When she got closer to him, there was crooked grin on his lips. He really didn't believe! She clenched her teeth, feeling like everything was burning from anger inside her.
Nasty, disgusting, loathsome asshole! Nasty, disgusting!.. Nasty!
He was close enough, and her steps became smaller and quieter.
Nasty...
She stopped and stared at his face.
"Bastard," she mumbled, noticing how his eyebrows raised.
Again. He laughed at her.
His grey eyes were looking with disdain, from what she wanted to tear her hair out.
"That's all?" he asked, folding his hands on his chest.
"You're... nasty and disgusting. Loathsome asshole," Hermione blinked. Bitten her lip. It was still not as impressive as it sounded inside her. She took a deep breath, "And, by the way, I'd rather swallow... the snake. Than to kiss you again..."
She shut her mouth because his face was suddenly dangerously close to her. His grin disappeared.
Malfoy's lips squeezed.
"There was nothing."
Hermione barely restrained a hysterical laugh, taking a step back.
"Well, Malfoy. Of course."
"Listen, Granger bitch," he licked his lips with swift movement, and Hermione put all her moral strength not to observe this movement with her look. She remembered his taste and felt a trembling feeling in lower belly, to her own horror. Merlin's beard...
She'll never let him kiss her. Never.
"The fact you accosted me yesterday... it means nothing."
"I accosted you?!" Hermione felt the saving wave of anger again, jerking her chin, "You pressed me to the wall!"
"Shut your fucking mudblood mouth," he growled, sharply turning his head to the right and looking at two students from Hufflepuff. When there was silence in the corridor again, he looked at her with scornful look, "I don't want this loathsome rumor spread in Hogwarts. I swear, Granger, if you could share this absurd with someone, I'll kill you."
"Yeah, I've already heard it," she answered maliciously, turning away from him.
He grabbed her chin with his icy fingers. Then he turned her head to him. There was a fear in her eyes and her pupils dilated.
"Did you understand me?"
"Fuck off, Malfoy," she turned away again, trying to free herself but he pulled her back, and Hermione thought she heard a crunch.
He nearly dislocated her jaw.
Her eyes were filled with tears that she quickly blinked away with evil, feeling how her eyelashes became wet, looking straight at him. Feeling his breath on her face.
She didn't understand what it was but she was full of something undefined. Full of everything at once — and completely empty at the same time. Because of him. Not because of what he was saying. The feeling, when she touched his body at least with the tip of the finger, gears began to spin inside her, which didn't move before.
The first, second, third... and they've already driven the blood so that it seemed that the vessel will burn now.
And it didn't matter that he could really kill her.
How is this even possible?
She raced downstream, desperately trying to stop, but her legs just rested on the bubbling water that brought her deeper and deeper. Further.
"I swear," he hissed, bending forward to her, "I swear, you'll regret about it. If you. Don't forget."
Her heart was beating her ribs.
Listen what he said. Listen, you idiot.
"Damn coward," she whispered through clenched teeth, feeling that Malfoy's fingers compressed harder. Pain. Again rush of tears. Again furious blinking. He watched her eyes with a grim pride.
"I can break your jaw," he said, "with my own hands, Mudblood."
"Find something to be proud of."
"I hope you understood what I wanted to inform you."
"You wanted to inform me about nothing. Another ungrounded..."
"Fuck you," she almost sobbed when his hard fingers released her chin, and Malfoy walked down the corridor quickly, as if there wasn't any squabble.
For a second, he turned over his shoulder and said:
"I had the bad nightmares all night, Granger. So don't ever approach me."
And then he went away.
She stood and breathed heavily with opened mouth, looking at his back.
Freak.
Arrogant bastard.
She turned and ran to the class, realizing that she was late. And not understanding why she didn't care what surprised McGonagall was going to say. All her thoughts were focused on fucking Malfoy.
Get out of my head.
Get out.
GET OUT.
Blaze were sitting in a chair in front of the fireplace and reading the Daily Prophet when Malfoy came in. He just nodded, threw his bag on the table and fell on the couch gladly, looking at the stone Slytherin living room's ceiling. However, his tired eyes closed quickly, despite the fact that there was the middle of the day.
"We have guests. How are you, sir?"
"You don't have to stand up, Zabini. But I accept your laurels."
Blaise snorted, reaching for the basket with apples and choosing the biggest fruit. Malfoy turned his head, looking at him.
"Will you go to transfiguration's class?"
Zabini glanced at the watch.
"Yes. I'm waiting for Daph. I think we won't be late. We have another twenty minutes."
"Hmm."
Zabini glanced at him again.
"Will you go with us?"
"I don't know," Draco stretched himself with a crunch, putting his hands behind his head. Closing his eyes.
It was strange not to spend evenings here. Not to feel the coolness of the dungeons. Not to come down here every day. Even the native stone was beginning to seem cold and alien. To his own dismay, he realized that he was already used to prefects' tower. In fact, he almost didn't care where to live. It was important that the conditions were much better than in a small room with one bathroom for everyone. However, the realization that Slytherin living room was almost unusual for him pressed his ribs unpleasantly. As if he had betrayed. Everyone.
Blaise turned the page of the newspaper, biting off the green apple.
"Do you know how is it?"
"It?"
He raised his eyebrows questioningly, chewing and not looking aside from the Prophet.
Malfoy grinned. After his appointment as prefect, Blaise often made fun of him — at first. And then he just ignored any mention about it. Dumbledore had two candidates for head of boys' post but he chose Draco. And he guessed why.
It was idiotic attempt to pull him by the ears out of the shit that fell down on his head. But, probably, this post belonged to Zabini rightfully. But in his dark eyes there wasn't a shred of envy. Just a persistent concern. After all that had happened.
And Malfoy was thankful for the fact that his "advancement" didn't affect their friendship.
On one second, he thought about if Blaise would live with Granger. Somehow it seemed to him that they would be on good terms. Despite the arrogant Zabini's nature and Mudblood's tiresomeness. Yes, they would be on good terms definitely.
Malfoy didn't please this idea.
He shouldn't be on good terms with her. He should educate her. She's too pretentious. Damn egghead. Stubborn, proud, everywhere with her poisonous tongue.
She was always near.
He became to notice her very often. Her stupid shaggy hair. Her fucking expressionless lips that had the taste of mint and cinnamon.
Fucking cinnamon.
He clenched his jaw and closed his eyes for a moment. Zabini's voice reminded him of the existence of the interlocutor.
"How is it - what?"
Ah, Yes. What he's talking about.
"To have your own bedroom. And living room."
"Ah," Zabini said, throwing a quick glance at Malfoy, "I thought you asked how is it to live with Granger. Have you already fucked her?"
Her moan. The movement of her body — to him. But he stood, feeling an irresistible urge to rub her with his pulsing dick.
Draco's face lost its carefree expression immediately. He raised himself on one elbow.
"What the hell are you talking about?"
Zabini bit off the apple again. Slowly chewed.
"Come on, Draco. It was just friendly joke."
"Such crappy joke," Malfoy got a surprised look and added quickly: "I've almost barfed."
He frowned, lying back on the coach.
The silence in the living room began to stress.
"What's new going on here..."
"Oh. No, Malfoy... It can't be."
Zabini looked at him with a mixture of horror, surprise and ridicule. Draco stared at him with cold indifference.
"What "no, Malfoy"?"
"You really fucked her?"
"Are you crazy?" Malfoy laughed, running his hands across the face and staring at the ceiling again, "What do you take me for? If I fuck everything that comes under my hand, it won't be me."
"But you fuck everything and..." Blaise stopped, having met with a cold stare, and turned back to the newspaper.
"I choose the best one. And I don't pick up what was lying on the floor, useless."
"Don't worry, Draco. I'm fooling. But your face was like..."
"Just... shut up, okay? I hate her. I came down here to relax. And not listen to your nonsense," his anger made him clench his fists, "She maddens me," Malfoy growled, "She's fucking mudblood idiot."
In the living room again fell silent. Blaise coughed. He ate his apple. Then he put down the newspaper and sat up straight, leaning his elbows on his knees.
"How is... Narcissa?"
"I don't know," Malfoy cut short.
"You're not interested?"
"Malfoy Manor is safe, and all this nonsense in the newspapers... it's a fucking waste of time, nobody would believe it."
"One family has disappeared, it stressed the Ministry."
"Damn, they think that deceased is guilty of this disappearance," Malfoy sat up abruptly, running his hands through his hair, "Is it normal?"
"It doesn't say that it was your father. It says about the accomplices."
"What the fuck, Zabini? Stop bothering me with such issues."
Blaise squeezed his lips.
Malfoy sighed heavily.
"Even if it's true. If some psycho decided to continue what my dad had started... my mother is in safe. After they erased her memory, she couldn't have some meaning even for Voldemort. All she knew..." Draco shook his head. He didn't want to raise this issue. Even in his own thoughts he did without the names of the parents.
He just didn't know how to think about them.
How to think about his father who already dead?
Should he respect him for what he did for Draco? Or rather, for himself, of course. But for Draco it had considerable influence. Should he fear him as in life?
No. Malfoy was tired to fear. That's all changed. HE had changed. He needed to make decisions himself.
No one else.
Lucius was dead. And Narcissa...
Draco remembered the empty eyes of his mother after Obliviate. Her uncertain smile, presented to his son, and a slight tilt of her head to the direction of a magician, sent by the Ministry, to erase her memory.
"Who is this young man, Mr. Thompson?"
"He is your son, Narcissa," official was clearly embarrassed and didn't dare look up at the frozen Draco, who felt nothing at that moment. Even beats of his own heart.
He just looked at her, trying to recognize his own mother. But he couldn't.
It wasn't her.
As if she was broken. As if she was... toy. Funny replacement.
Falseness.
"Nice to meet you. I have a very handsome son," her smile was another's for Draco.
Such another's that something began to prick in his eyes and nose suddenly.
And then his heart stroke in his chest so hard that since then it became impossible for him to feel the pain. As if something shrank under his ribs and never unclench. He will never feel nothing...
...Though, he didn't want to feel.
Except persistent contempt that flowed in his veins instead of blood. Except the anger against all the world that pricked under his skin with needles. All around was guilty that he was left alone. Completely alone.
But he didn't care.
"Okay, sorry," Zabini reached for the fruit basket, "Maybe, apple?"
Malfoy raised his head. A few seconds he was looking at his friend distantly. Then he nodded.
He caught the fruit that was threw for him and smiled, immersing his teeth in a crispy rind.
Anyway.
Hermione felt that the book on the top of the pile in her hands could fall on the floor.
Come on, just a little more. She was almost there.
She overcame the last step, when she realized that the potions' textbook was falling. She closed her eyes, waiting for the unstable pile will collapse in her hands, but nothing happened.
She opened one eye hesitantly and stared up at warm brown eyes with rays of wrinkles at their corners.
"Hi Hermione, the girls' prefect," white-toothed smile and roguish expression. Hair, tied in a short tail with a few unruly strands of hair falling on the forehead. He kept some of the books and the damn potions' textbook.
"Kurt!" Hermione laughed happily, "Thank you," she took the book back, "What are you doing here?"
"I was at the professor Flitwick's class," Miller removed most books from the pile, "Let me help you."
"Thank you," she tried to force herself to stop smiling, "I thought I'm going to fall with this pile right on the steps."
"Books don't listen to you lately, don't you think, Hermione?" he also smiled, his eyes were shining, "Well, I'm glad to act as your Book Savior. Where are you going?"
"This way," Hermione walked down the corridor leading to the portrait with Yellow lady. For some time, they were silent but it was quite friendly and bearable silence. It was nicely to be silent with him, exchanging glances with him from time to time.
"Do you have problems with spells?" she asked him, calling the password and let Kurt inside. He entered first, looking around with interest.
"Yeah..." he said, stopping and spinning around, "Wow, this is nice."
"I'm already used to this living room for two and a half weeks," she closed the door, pointing on the table with her free hand, "Put it over there, please."
After putting the books on the table, Miller began to turn around again.
"It looks like our living room, only smaller."
"Yes," Hermione hugged herself, also looking around and feeling herself suddenly insecure, "This is... also mini-living room. Small."
She squeezed her lips, frowning.
What are you talking about?
"Sit down," she woke up, noticing that Kurt had finished the examination and now looking at her.
"It's comfortable in here," he said. He walked around the coach and sat down, taking a pillow and laying it aside.
Hermione sat down in the chair, folding her hands on her knees, desperately trying to think of a topic for conversation.
"So... what about you, with professor Flitwick?"
Miller frowned slightly. Then snorted suspiciously, covering his mouth as if trying to hide a snicker.
"We're just... teacher and student, thank Merlin," he said in a trembling voice. For some time, Hermione was looking at Kurt in surprise, and then she threw back her head and laughed.
While he was admiring her smile, she tried to calm down and in the end, blotting the corners of her eyes with fingertips, said:
"Sorry, I'm such an idiot."
"You're very cute when embarrassed," he said, "I was just joking. I won't do it anymore," he bent a little towards her and whispered conspiratorially: "I have some problems with the latest theme that we're studying."
"And what are you studying?" Hermione turned serious immediately, interlocking her hands before her.
"Water spells. I have... some problems with the pronunciation."
"Oh! There's nothing complicated!" Hermione's eyes lit up, "Water magic requires the special concentration because the liquid is not solid substance and..."
"Listen," he raised his hand, and she froze, interrupted in mid-sentence.
Damn. Well, now he'll stand and say that he is not interested. That she's a geek. She needs to apologize.
"I'm sorry, I didn't want to..."
"I would like to ask you to help me with this."
They said it almost simultaneously and froze.
"What are you apologizing for?"
"To help you with this?"
Again at the same time. And they laughed again.
"You first."
"No, you first. Why did you apologize?"
"When it comes to studying..." Hermione waved her hands vaguely, "I can take a great interest, and it's... not always interesting to listen to."
Kurt shook his head so the fiery rays of the fireplace danced on his dark hair. She remembered the blond hair that became golden in the light of the fire, and she scolded herself mentally.
"I like girls on whom I can rely."
"Oh... Do you think I'm that kind of girl?"
"You're good girl. I would be very grateful if you could help me."
Hermione nodded happily.
"We could meet in the library, for example," she suggested enthusiastically, "Maybe... tomorrow at four o'clock?"
"Perfectly. I have classes end at half past three," Miller clapped his hands, rubbing them, "Thank you."
"You can thank me tomorrow."
"So... I'll go?"
When she nodded again, he stood up, looking around and making a few steps toward the door.
"You're lucky."
"Really?" Hermione was in front of him.
"They say you have a separate bathroom," he said quietly like it was a terrible secret. The girl laughed, nodding.
"Yes. It's not so bad to have your own bedroom. Though ..."
The door opened before Hermione had time to touch it.
Oh, shit.
She squeezed her lips, immediately feeling her smile slid from her face. Malfoy was standing on the threshold.
Tall, blocking up the doorway with his broad shoulders, his hands were in his trousers' pockets. He was gorgeous as always.
For a second, it took her breath away but she forced herself to frown.
His platinum hair was falling over his forehead, his face lowered slightly. His eyes filled with anger. He looked at Kurt with cold glare. Then he looked at Hermione. She wanted to look aside. From his nasty, ironic and interrogative look. And his compressed jaw, almost to a crisp.
"Hello," apparently, Kurt didn't notice the ocean of resentment that had just hit them on their heads because he held Malfoy a hand with a smile.
"It's undesirable for guests to be here at this time," his voice was toneless as if he muttered his words that were addressed to her. He didn't even turn to Miller.
Kurt looked at Hermione with question. She easily took him by the hand, pushing to the door and forcing Malfoy to step aside a little.
"See you tomorrow," she forced herself to smile but her smile wasn't so sincere, like it was before.
Miller nodded and raised his eyes, looking at Draco over her head. Before the door closed, Kurt and Malfoy were stubbornly staring at each other.
A quiet click and Yellow lady closed with creak.
Hermione allowed herself to lean against the door with her forehead for a moment and then straightened her shoulders and turned to Malfoy who stood, looking at her and squeezing his lips. As if he demanded an explanation silently.
"Could you be more kindly with guests?" she said, tossing up her hands in impotent anger.
"What the fuck he was doing here?"
She felt uneasy from his tone.
"He helped me to bring the books."
"What books?"
"Those that are on the table."
He didn't even look to that direction. Instead of it, he looked at the cushion which was on the other side. Not where it usually was.
"You were fucking on the coach?" he threw it roughly, rocking from heel to toe and staring at her, "Did he get some splinters in his cock, miss fucking Piece of Wood?" he added mockingly, watching with enjoy how her cheeks became red.
"Stop these jokes, or I'll have to..."
"I'm not kidding."
"Malfoy. Don't be a jerk."
She passed around him and went to the table. She needed to prepare for the herbology test. And to put the books.
He watched her from the doorway, not looking up.
"Run, run. As usual, Mudblood."
"I'm not running."
"You can't be with me in the same room."
She heard a smirk in his deep voice, shifting the books from the table to the bookshelf.
"I don't care if you're here or not. In Hogwarts, in England, in this world..." Hermione shrugged her shoulders, "I'm running not from you. I need to study."
"Of course."
"I can do it here."
"Well, not really."
"Why?" Hermione turned to him, folding her hands on her chest, "Maybe, is it you can't be with me in the same room? And I'm "running as usual"."
"You're right," he said suddenly, "I have a splitting headache when you're around."
"Why. Am I. The reason of it?"
"The way you look. My eyes can't stand it."
She sighed as if she didn't expect the other answer. She turned away again, throwing her hair to one side, and he was watching her tense shoulders and vertebrae, protruding on her neck, when Mudblood bent her head. Her brittle bones attracted him. He wanted to touch them with his fingertips, feeling their soft, warm waves beneath the skin.
His consciousness tossed the feeling of delicate hands immediately, which he clutched yesterday, holding them in place. And then - her soft chin under his fingertips. He didn't need it in his head.
Draco looked away, clenching his teeth. Just let her go to her diggings. He didn't want to be like her, watching her until she didn't see it.
It was disgusting.
"Damn, hurry up."
"What's wrong?" she asked innocently, leaning over the table and looking for something in the drawer.
Her cloak outlined the line of her hips and rounded ass. Her thin, barely noticeable strip of the projecting spine.
To hold it by his hand, slightly bending and pushing on her neck...
His jaw almost creaked.
"Fuck, you enrage me, Mudblood."
She turned to look over her shoulder, noticing his face expression and straightening herself up. Her thin eyebrows raised.
"Problems, Malfoy?"
She. She was the problem.
Draco came closer to Granger and felt how his upper lip strained, and there was some prickling under his skin from irritation.
"Get. Out."
Her hot look of brown eyes came into his icy eyes, melting the retina.
"No," her voice trembled, and he had to bend down to her, so her breath froze in her chest.
"I'll destroy you."
Her breath out. He felt it on his tongue. Alarming bells in his head signaled that he'd better get out of here.
Mint flavor with a response of cinnamon. Malfoy rolled it on his tongue while she was stubbornly staring at him.
"Do you want to prove something to me?" his voice was thick and low, he didn't recognize it, only inhaling her scent greedily, which enveloped him from head to toe.
"I want to prove that it's just your weakness, not mine."
He laughed. It was too sharp and unreal sound.
"I have no weaknesses, you fucking idiot."
Hermione lifted her long lashes and looked at his lips as if she was trying to measure the distance between them.
"So, why you're standing so close to me? Again."
She uttered the last word barely audible.
He looked at her Gryffindor tie, which was tightened around her neck, as if he hoped it would revive him again, and then he raised his eyes on her. Granger's lips were too close not to think about them.
Red and gold were lost in the cacophony of smells and sensations.
"Malfoy."
He knew: she'll say something that'll make him feel rage. Again the rage. But now, so close to her, he didn't feel it. Only the sudden desire to penetrate into her dirty mouth. To move with his tongue into it. So tight, so moist. So responding. To him, not to some fucking Kurt Miller. To him.
She'd dug her fingers into his shoulders or buried in his hair. She'd nestled up to him, feeling his cock-stand, that was already in his pants. From these thoughts. Just from thinking about how she's going to exhale in his mouth. And then she'll buckle. And he'll let her do it.
I'm fucking crazy.
I-want-Mudblood.
"You said that I must forgot about what has happened yesterday," her trembling voice. She was breathing noisily and deeply. Draco wanted she liked his smell.
He knew she loved it.
Her words penetrated in his brain. The anger came back for a moment.
"Do you think I'm going to kiss you? To spitted out my entrails?"
She clenched her teeth silently but said nothing.
"He's good, isn't he?"
"Who?"
"Miller."
"What are you talking about?"
"Damn, answer me. Is he good? Did he put his tongue into your dirty mouth? Or maybe into somewhere else?" he growled in her face.
Hermione looked confused at him, not understanding why he said those nasty things. Why he cared about it and why she invited Kurt to their living room of prefects.
And when the meaning of the words reached her, she whispered:
"You fucking asshole, don't you dare say such things about me."
"I forgot that you're frigid bitch..."
Her slim hands pushed him in the chest, and he took a step back, and she rushed to the stairs. His wild gray eyes caught her a second earlier before his fingers closed down on her thin elbow.
Why did you stop her?! His subconsciousness yelled.
And the same question was in her screaming and burning eyes as she turned her head to him, desperately breathing with her opened mouth.
I don't know. I don't know.
"... don't know."
It didn't mean anything.
Completely. He almost felt nothing.
She raised her head to him first again, he could swear. Of course, she did it first. He couldn't do it first.
Just...
Just his lips slammed into her with force. With all the force she aroused him with her small, wet, warm mouth, sliding a few inches from his lips and maddening, and driving him crazy — yesterday, today, always. Imperceptible and therefore hateful, desired, essential.
He felt she was trying to resist. She tried to avert her face. He didn't let her do it.
He was stronger.
It made Mudblood suffer, he knew it, pressing in her lips, hoping this pain will sober him and her up. But it didn't sober. It didn't sober, but aroused him more. Her lips were hot and so wrong-delicious.
He stopped almost with a groan. He raised his head, looking at her. In her eyes.
At her reaction that was immediately.
"No, Malfoy!" she snatched her arm out his fingers, opening her eyes in horror, intending to take a step back, but he abruptly pulled her back, squeezing her shoulders, feeling as his brains disconnected, "Let me go, stop it! Malfo..."
He kissed her again. He kissed her moving lips, closing his eyes and exhaling quietly, feeling the taste. Her taste.
He needed it. Because it was yesterday. He thought that it seemed to him — but no. Now again.
The demons shut up under his skin. They calmed down. And his heart beat in his chest with such force, as if it was about to burst. This beating was in the silence of his head and of the room. And he was kissing, licking, drinking it to the bottom, sucking her lower, then upper lip.
Since when such cruel kiss had become so comprehensive? It was something that blocked the air. It didn't allow him to let go her shoulders, trying to nestle up closer, or to recoil.
No, Granger. A little more.
Let-me-feel.
Draco didn't realize that her next movement wasn't a protest, until it repeated. Awkwardly, cautiously. How long she hadn't resisted? She moved her lips in response, easily caressing his mouth, making a hot wave swept back, and the hairs all over his body stood on end.
His kiss was returned. And again — this time revealing. Meeting her tongue and trying to suck it in himself.
He quietly growled and nestled up to her little body against his will, tearing, biting. Sucking. Without removing his hands from her shoulders which now he was pulling on himself, not allowing her to touch him.
Not to go crazy right here.
Although he had already gone crazy.
He caught her full lips with his teeth. He growled. He drew out with his tongue, barely restraining himself not to moan aloud from the sensations that provoked the cock-stand in his trousers.
Stop it. Enough.
Damn, he wanted it deeper.
Malfoy let go her shoulder and lifted his hand to her burning face. He presses down on her tiny chin with his thumb, not stopping kissing her, feeling how her lips opened obediently. He penetrated inside her with his tongue.
Deeply. Hot. Wetly.
Her strangled moan. She bent her back, nestling up to him.
Merlin.
If you don't stop squirming and rubbing up on me, I'll fuck you right here.
And in that moment, when Granger reached her released arm to bury in his hair, his own words flashed in his mind.
...I don't pick up what was lying on the floor, useless...
These words appeared in his head suddenly and seemed so alien, that he felt fear. For a second Draco thought that these words were said by his father. And it caused him to raise his head sharply, opening his eyes.
Reality came down on him, choking.
Her brown, wide open eyes were looking straight at him. And she was shivering. With all her body.
"What..."
Her swollen lips, biting and covering with kisses almost with bruises, were trembling.
Malfoy pushed her away, taking a step back. She continued to look as if he just committed murder. The terror in her eyes was indescribable. He thought even for a moment that he was scared.
"What... the fuck? Why you didn't stop me?" his voice was hoarse and strange.
She was silent. She put her hand to her lips. Her stunned look made him to look confused.
He licked his lips, feeling her taste. He cursed.
Okay. It didn't matter. He needed a cold shower.
He abruptly turned and went to his bedroom, listening for footsteps. Feeling like his heart was beating and how it was narrowly in his pants.
Did it happen? Did he want it?
It had happened.
He wanted it.
His hands were shaking when he opened the door. His stomach tightened.
Malfoy barely arrived at the bathroom and bent over the toilet, groaning from a pressing pain in his pants, choking with air in his throat.
He wanted to spit Mudblood out of himself if it was possible. Out of himself. Out of his mind. Out of his head.
But there was only the air.
And her taste on his tongue.