A/N: Thank you all so much for your reviews, favorites and follows! I hope that you like what I've got planned for this chapter...I am excited about it. You know we've got all kinds of ups and downs. You can follow me on tumblr (nauticalparamour) where I post sneak peeks, story updates and answer questions!

Please let me know what you thought of chapter fourteen and be on the lookout for chapter fifteen soon!

1996

By the time the end of fifth year rolled around, Draco just wanted a break from studying for the OWLs. He was grateful that Hermione had kept a very strict revision schedule for herself, otherwise, he knew that he would be far behind what he needed to accomplish. Since he was feeling so confident, he jumped at the chance to go to the last Hogsmeade weekend of the year, especially as the weather was shaping up to be phenomenal.

It did not take much cajoling to get Harry and Alphard to agree to ditch their studies. The two boys were looking for any excuse to get out of the castle, really. But, Draco wanted to invite Hermione as well, knowing that the girl was likely to go spare if she crammed one more fact in that big, beautiful brain of hers.

The trio of Slytherins caught her on the way to dinner the night before the Hogsmeade Saturday to ask her to come with them. "Hey Hermione," Draco said with a charming smile on his face, knowing that it was going to be an uphill battle to get her to agree to go with. But, he was confident that a little bit of Malfoy charm could get her to concede. "We were planning on heading to Hogsmeade tomorrow. You should come with us."

Hermione returned the smile, but shook her head. "I'd love to, but I can't," she responded, her brown eyes darting shyly towards the Ravenclaw table.

"Aw, come on, Hermione," Alphard said, wrapping an arm around the shorter girl's shoulders. "You've studied plenty. It will be good for you to blow off some steam before the OWLs."

She artfully ducked out from under Alphard's heavy arm. "Oh, I am going to Hogsmeade," she said smugly, perhaps loving that they had misjudged her plans. "I just can't go with you lot. I've got a date."

"A date?" Draco sputtered, surprised to hear that anyone had asked Hermione. No, scratch that - it wasn't that he was surprised that someone had asked Hermione, just that this was the first he was hearing about it. Didn't everyone know that he was her...well, her best friend? Shouldn't she have told him about it? "With who?" he asked, hoping his tone did not sound too accusatory.

"Duncan," Hermione answered sweetly, before giving the seventh year Ravenclaw a little wave and a sweet smile, before returning her attention to her friends. "Apparently, he's been trying to work up the courage to ask me for like two years now. He said he couldn't leave Hogwarts without knowing if there could be something between us."

Draco turned to look at Duncan Inglebee's smug face and tried not to sneer at him in return. The Ravenclaw was a formidable beater at this point, all tall and brawny. But, Draco had always thought of him as a bit of an imbecile based on the sorts of questions he asked Hermione about muggle studies. Now, though, he could admit that it might have been a smart play on his part.

"Inglebee?" Harry asked, sounding surprised as well. "Well, to each their own, I guess. See you later Hermione. Hope you have a good time." Leave it to Harry to make some kind of accidental jibe at Hermione's taste in men, only to pull them away before she could do anything about it.

Draco was grateful to Harry for finding a way to end the conversation, though. He was positive he would have said something much less charitable about the big beater. When they were in the privacy of the Slytherin table, though, Harry and Alphard were only too happy to join in on denigrating Inglebee.

"Really? Inglebee?" Alphard said pushing his dark, wavy hair back out of his eyes. "Even I wouldn't try a line like that. Poor Hermione. Do you think she knows he basically said he wants to try to get a shag in before graduation?"

Alphard's words made Draco's insides twist with dismay over the thought of bloody Inglebee putting his hands all over Hermione. "I can't believe she didn't tell us until right now," he complained to his two friends.

"Oh, I wonder why she didn't tell you?" came the smug little voice of his cousin from down the table. Cassiopeia Black took after his Uncle Regulus with her dark wavy hair and gray eyes, but the way that she acted was just like his Aunt Hermione. "Just listen to how supportive you are being," she said sarcastically.

"Shut up, Cass," Alphard frowned, thinking that the little pipsqueak first year was rather sticking her nose where it didn't belong.

"We are just trying to look after her," Draco added, feeling the need to explain himself to her.

"Well, it's not as if you are her boyfriend," Cassiopeia said with a smirk. "It's not like she needs your permission to go on a date with someone she likes."

Draco felt the beginnings of a blush on his cheeks, remembering how Weasley had accused him of the same thing, and how quickly he had acted to set the record straight. "Of course not, but I'm just her friend and I want to make sure that...that...she isn't mistreated."

"Best friends, right?" Cassiopeia added with another grin, making him wonder if she knew more than he let on.

Alphard was done with talking to his cousin. "You are too young to know what you are talking about, Cassie," he said with a frown, not liking the idea of Hermione dating Inglebee either. "And stop acting so moral. It's a wonder that you made it into Slytherin at all."

Staring back down at his dinner, Draco suddenly found that he wasn't as hungry as he'd been when he left classes. All he could think about was Inglebee trying to shove his tongue down Hermione's throat.

Harry, sensing his friends discomfort, gave him a comforting clap on the back. "Don't worry, mate," he whispered with a small smile. "We'll keep an eye on them...from a respectable distance, of course."

Draco wasn't sure if that wouldn't make it harder, to see Hermione enjoy herself so much with someone who wasn't him.