Chapter 16

The motorcycle sped along Turnpike Road at a sedate pace, no suicidal dash for him this time. Severus reminded himself yet again to concentrate on the road. Diana's arms around his waist and her long legs continuously brushing against his thighs were proving to be quite distracting. In the face of the whipping wind, he smiled. I had her seduction all planned. Then she turns the tables on me. Perhaps, muggle women do things differently. Severus shifted gear and accelerated. He could see the hotel in the distance.

Hermione's thighs instinctively squeezed against his legs as she felt and heard the motorcycle growl louder. He had insisted that she wear the helmet though he himself went bare-headed. Inside, with the noise of the road and the cycle muffled, she was alone with her thoughts. You have to tell him, her conscience insisted. A part of her wanted to continue the playacting, the fantasy. Not yet. I want to know more about him. He's so different from what I remember. You are not thinking with your head, her conscience retorted. Absolutely not! Instinct all the way! Her conscience was stubborn. She dismissed its last comment - you have a tiger by the tail, a dark one, with very sharp teeth, beware.

Seated for a late luncheon at an elegant table with a clear view of St. Michael's Mount, Severus and Hermione finished giving their order to the waiter. The restaurant of the Mount Haven Hotel boasted delicious local fare and the menu had not disappointed.

Severus sipped his wine and fought down the nervous flutters in his stomach. Until he had registered for a room under his real name, while Diana was freshening up, he had treated the whole thing as a lark, part of his annual mystery vacation. This year he had the mystery, the vacation and Diana. He knew how to handle the first two well enough. Diana was a different matter altogether.

"So, you know I'm a teacher. What do you do?" Severus began.

"In real life, I'm a psychologist at a large hospital."

"London?"

"Thereabouts. I do freelance consulting when I'm asked."

"Do you like what you do?"

"It's challenging. Every day is different. Every patient is different."

Severus noted the light that came to her eyes when she began discussing her work. Her passion for it was obvious. "What drew you to that profession?"

"My parents are dentists so I was around medical types my whole life. I developed an aversion to the sound of the drill so dentistry was out."

Severus laughed softly. He had gone to get his teeth cleaned before the event. He could sympathize about the drill.

"After leaving Ho-, er, school. I went to university and tried a million different majors. Healing people's minds was very appealing to me."

Healing people's minds. I didn't realize muggles saw it that way. "It sounds very demanding."

Hermione smiled at him. "Oh, it is demanding but rewarding, too. It may take months to help a patient but when he's cured and healthy again, it's the best feeling in the world. I imagine you would feel the same way when you see your students succeed."

Severus was saved from making a response by the arrival of their appetizers. "I don't teach at the university level, so the ... the criteria of success is different."

"True but the teaching, the imparting of knowledge, isn't that rewarding in its own sense?"

"You don't know the students I get," Severus chuckled. "I get them when they are very young about eleven. They shuffle through their years at the school, learning enough to finish, then they go off to start their adult life. How successful they become I don't know."

"You don't get letters about their progress?"

"Now, tell me, Diana, how many teachers do you correspond with after you leave school, any kind of school? Hmm?" Severus stirred his soup. "In all the excitement one feels being at university, does one remember where they came from, who they left behind?"

Hermione had the grace to be embarrassed. "One. I still write to my favorite teacher."

"That teacher is very fortunate and I am sure she appreciates your letters more than you know."

"You don't meet any of your former students?"

"No. Not in any social context. Besides, I have had hundreds of students I don't know if I could recognize one after a few years out of school."

"Out of sight, out of mind."

"Exactly."

The conversation lulled for a while as they enjoyed their appetizers. Capering about St. Michael earlier in the day had given Hermione quite an appetite. Severus wondered more and more about Diana Stevens. She had a knack for turning the conversation away from her and back to him.

Severus tried a different tack. Subtlety, boy. She's a mind healer. She's probably psychoanalyzing you. "How are you finding the mystery so far?"

"Not what I expected."

"Too mundane, unimaginative?"

"No! Definitely not!" Hermione laughed.

Severus gave her what he hoped was an open, pleasant expression. One to invite confidences not repel them.

Hermione leaned back against her chair and gathered her thoughts. "My parents gave me this as a birthday gift last year, my twenty third. I kept putting it off until this year I decided to take it."

Twenty-four! I'm almost twice her age!

"Work has been brutal. I just got promoted to assistant head of the department." Hermione sighed. "My superior threatened a forced vacation if I didn't take one voluntarily. I was driving everyone around me crazy. So here I am."

"Twenty-four. That's ah, er, quite unusual for a head of a department. You carry yourself as someone much older."

"I'm a classic overachiever."

"Obviously," Severus took a healthy drink.

"My age bothers you. I can see it does." Hermione pushed her plate away. "Am I too young? Maybe you think I'm too close to being a student."

Severus took a minute before answering. "If there's an age problem, it's mine. I'll be forty-five this year. And I don't see you as my student. You're obviously an adult."

Hermione swallowed. "Let's say hypothetically, that I WAS one of your students, would you have a problem with that, with us?"

"I don't believe I would. It's not like you're fresh out of the school room. You've lived an adult life and know your own mind."

The waiter arrived with their main course. They had both opted for pasta and salads.

As soon as they had some privacy again, Severus resumed. "And what about me, Diana? I find it hard to believe that you would be lacking for companionship."

"My work has always been first for me. I'm not entirely anti-social but wild parties or bars are not my style." Hermione quirked an eyebrow at him. "And everyone who knows me can attest to my preference for older men."

Severus felt insensibly cheered by that comment. He tucked into his house salad with gusto.

His renewed enthusiasm did not go unnoticed. "Emily informed me that you were a regular at these events. Why do you do this?"

"Isn't being a teacher a kind of role?" Severus wiped his mouth. "When I'm in the classroom, I am the students' teacher. I'm not their parent, their friend or anything else but their teacher. I have to maintain an environment for them to learn and that includes discipline. If I behaved as their friend, I doubt that I could do my job correctly."

"I never thought of it that way." Hermione replied.

"My superior introduced me to these events. He actually forced me to attend my first event. I fought against it but in the end I capitulated."

"And you found you liked it?"

"I found that it's a kind of relaxation for me. Being another person I mean."

"A form of escape. Taking on a persona for a temporary period of time."

Severus nodded. He looked up when Hermione started laughing.

"You're playing!"

"I beg your pardon? I take this very seriously. My preparations are very thorough."

"The higher the intelligence, the higher need for play. Through play, one can free the conscious mind and thereby reach a form of relaxation."

"I suppose that could said to be true." Severus admitted grudgingly.

"Our normal lives are so intense, full of expectations and pressures, that the only way to cope is to have these ... these getaways from reality."

She did it again turning the conversation back to me. She's very good. "So, all this is just playacting for you?"

Hermione sensed his change in mood. "It was. It's not anymore."

Severus smiled. "Long term signal received."

The rest of dinner passed in good company. They found many things in common and few differences. After dessert, it seemed the most natural thing to lock hands and go up to their suite and continue their evening in private.

Severus loosened the buttons on his shirt while he slipped out of his shoes. He could hear Diana splashing about in the shower. He had tried to elicit information about her real self during dinner. She had deflected all his carefully worded questions. She's keeping to the rules of the mystery, to the letter. Minx. Off his shirt went. Severus caught his reflection in the mirror. His salon-acquired tan was paling but only just. He had lost a few pounds with all the mystery activity. Not young but not old either. It will have to do. Off went his trousers. She'll either like what she sees or not. Off went his boxers. No better time to find out than the present. Off went the socks.

Severus padded to the bathroom. The room was hot, misty with steam. He paused in the open doorway observing the very feminine silhouette Diana presented against the sheer shower curtain. His body reacted. How could it not? Severus stepped into the bathroom then slipped into the shower behind Diana. "Need help?"

Her body glistened wet. Soap bubbles slid down the curves and planes of her back. He bowed his head to kiss her shoulder. "If you don't want this, Diana, tell me now."

Her arms reached behind her seeking him. They twined around his neck and head. She leaned against him. "I want you."

With a grateful sigh, he cast his doubts to the past and concentrated on the present. He placed his hands under her arms and trailed his fingers in the bubbles' wake. "Any specific requests?"

"There are some areas needing more attention than others." She swayed her hips teasing the desire, his desire, that pressed insistently against her back.

"Then I shall proceed when ready." He nipped her earlobe playfully.

"I thought you were ... very ready."

With one hand lathering her inner thigh and the other hand on her belly keeping her still against him, he whispered. "Remember, what I said about the finer pleasures?"

"Y - y - yes." His thumb grazed, barely, that part of her that pleaded for his immediate attention. Her legs parted wider on their own accord. Her invitation was clear.

Her invitation was ignored. "How long did I say I charged for?"

"Hours," Her fingernails raked across his buttocks. "I ... I also said I was hard to please."

Severus turned her around in his arms. He found her lips with his. He kept the kiss light, not giving in to her demands for more. He dropped kisses on her shoulder, her breast and her navel as he dropped to his knees. His hands cupped her rear. He looked up at her. "I believe it is time for Finer Pleasures 101 to begin instruction."

Hermione gasped as she was lifted high and pressed against the tiled wall. Her thighs lay splayed on his shoulders. Her hands grappled for something to hold on to, to clasp tightly. There was nothing to hold on to as she felt the first nudge probing into her. Flick. Lave. Jab. Suckle. Thrust. She arched her back and surrendered.

The water drizzled down on them. More steam fogged the mirrors. Her whimpers gave way to moans. Their night had only begun.

Hermione woke up. Next to her Severus was twisting in his sleep. His movements woke her. She turned on her side. She smoothed down his hair and crooned, "A bad dream? Shush, you're safe, go back to sleep." As a psychologist she knew the right things to say. As a woman, she knew the right things to do. She put an arm around him and stroked his shoulder and arms. Her gentle touch lulled him back to a deep slumber.

She watched him sleep. She fingered a strand of his fair hair. He's had it colored like I did. This is a nice change but I prefer the long dark hair. Her lips and hands had felt and explored his body earlier no less than he had hers. She had kissed his fingertips and hands. She had stroked, fondled and caressed him. She had revelled in their passion but never once had she called out his name, not David, not Severus. Severus had said her name again and again.

I'll tell him tomorrow. I'll tell him everything.

Author's Note: There is no magic in this story, so no glamours are in use. The changes to their appearance is due to muggle things like - hair coloring, tanning, a better hair cut, contact lenses. On a rewrite I will make it clearer that this is set many years after the war and after Hermione's has left Hogwarts. As anyone who has ever gone to their school reunions will know, a lot can change in even five years or ten years.

Two chapters left to wrap things up. I am a long time sufferer of the dreaded WIP-itis and trying to do an intervention by completing one story right after another. So, next chapter, do you think she'll tell him BEFORE he finds out? play ominous music

Enjoy and my thanks to all reviewers!

mavidian