~.~.~
9:41 P.M./b/center
~.~.~
Annnnd he's back.
"Be honest with me, Granger," Malfoy says, eyeing the lovely Norns across the room with something akin to distaste. This time he's drinking something purple out of a martini glass, chewing on its blackberry and strawberry garnish. "Am I simply being too picky, or are all blondes really that talkative and tedious?"
"You tell me," Hermione replies, giving his perfectly styled hair a significant sideways glance.
He totally ignores the jab, takes a long draw off of the purple concoction in his hand, and then jabbers on. "For Salazar's sake, is it too much to ask for a mouth to be put to a better use?"
"Maybe the problem isn't their mouths."
Waving her off, he whinges on about being shot down. "It's your Muggle feminism infecting our world, Granger. I knew it would be a bad thing."
"You mean for a woman to actually be able to tell you 'no' and you having to respect that? Yes, I can see how that might crimp your style."
"No, I mean, when did it become fashionable to have an interview card for a one-off? A witch does not need to know my entire sexual history to decide to let me take her home!"
"Well, a woman's got to have some standards, Malfoy…"
"To fuck or not to fuck," he growled in a low voice, so as not to be overheard, "that is the only bloody question that matters!"
"Er, I doubt William Shakespeare would approve of the misquote."
With an emphatic finger, he points across the room at the gaggle of giggling, gorgeous ladies. "Don't they understand? The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to me!"
"Technically, the line is 'to yield to it'," she sighs, realizing she's talking to someone totally tone deaf and blinded by his own misogyny. "Listen, Malfoy, maybe their rejection is a sign that it's time for you to hang up your hat and hit the long, green pasture."
Apparently, the cheap shot at his age works to get his attention. He turns his head and glares at her. "Are you implying that I'm old?"
She shrugs.
"If the shoe fits."
He raises an eyebrow at that and takes another sip of his foo-foo girly drink.
She covers a smirk with the lip of her glass. "I'm just pointing out the obvious: that the excitement of pub crawling is usually relegated to those under twenty-five…and it may have escaped your notice, but you're no spring chicken anymore."
He sets his glass down on a nearby passing waiter's tray. "No? Then what's your excuse, since you're technically almost a year older than I am, Ms. Spinster?"
"I am not crawling. I am looking to pull." She takes a sip from her newest alcoholic concoction and has her socks knocked off. Wow, the bartender has really outdone himself this time—tequila and apple cider are a potent combination. "There's quite a difference, you know."
"Do tell."
"Crawling involves drink, drool, and the empty promise of a Floo-call after the fact. Pulling is an art. It requires scoring a willing partner whose conversational skills are not sum-totaled by his ability to simply be able to recite his A-B-Cs and 1-2-3s."
Point made, she takes another sip of her own cocktail and makes a noise of intense enjoyment, drawing Malfoy's full attention. "What is that god-awful looking concoction you're sucking down faster than sperm?" he asks, eyeing her beverage. "It's smoking worse than the last one!"
"What was yours?" she fires back.
"Some ridiculous thing called a 'Good Witch's Heart'. Blaise said I needed one."
Since he was so good as to tell her about his drink, she offers hers to him.
"Here, try it."
Swiping it from her hand, he dives in for a taste and hums in approval. "Not bad. What is it?"
"Blaise called it 'Your Mother's Ruin'. Ironically, he said you'd understand what that meant if I told you about it."
He sputters and spits it out all over his shoes.
Her laughter rings through the room, drawing attention to them. Draco does not seem amused as he shoves the glass back at her.
"Come on, it was funny," she offers.
With a wave, he cleans up the mess he's made of his costume. The stains are erased like magic. "You're an evil wench, dressed appropriately for once."
That gives her pause. Is he playing with her? He doesn't seem it. In fact, he looks downright irate. "You're not seriously upset? It was a joke."
He glares at her. "I expect an appropriate apology, Granger."
Hermione opens her mouth, about to offer one…
"If you decide to grovel on your knees, can you suck me while you're down there?" he asks with a hopeful grin.
Rolling her eyes, filing away her intended apology, she takes a large gulp of her drink, trying to keep that particularly yummy vision out of her head. "You're repugnant," she states instead, because she knows it's expected of her.
"You like it." He tosses her a wicked grin. "Regardless of my advancing age."
"Do not."
He takes the drink from her hand once more, downs what's left of it from the side where her lipstick mark rests, and hands her back the empty glass. He licks his lips a few times, as if he really enjoyed her drink.
"Do too."
With that, he turns and walks away again, leaving her to stare at her glass, wondering if she'd taste him back if she pressed her mouth to the same spot he just had.
~.~.~
10:27 P.M.
~.~.~
With Malfoy gone, no doubt already out the door with some other witch he's managed to finagle out of her knickers, Hermione's just about worked up the nerve to go talk to Viktor Krum, after staring at him for the last half-hour. It may have been twelve years since they'd last been together, but she can recall that one night well, and by the look of him, he's aged like a fine wine. She's willing to bet his technique has only improved, too.
And why shouldn't she have some fun? Clearly, Malfoy doesn't have any problems reveling in his bachelorhood after his divorce, so why shouldn't she? After all, her life didn't end at twenty-two when she and Ron had finally called it quits and the rings had come off. Yes, it had felt like it at the time, but she's since mourned that one and put it to bed, and she's moved on with gusto. So, talking to her ex-lover, Viktor, shouldn't be so terrifying.
Right?
"Just go up to him, Hermione," she mumbles under her breath, giving herself the pep talk. "Say 'hello'. What will it hurt? You didn't part on bad terms."
Despite the inspirational pitch, she hesitates, and when she stops to examine why with a more critical eye, the picture becomes clear: Viktor is a beast in bed, yes, but he isn't stimulating outside of it. They have nothing in common, really. So, although she can certainly find physical release tonight, it won't be mentally or emotionally satisfying. It could even end with strained feelings, possibly resentment by one or both of them. Using someone always did.
The longer she stands in her corner, the more she considers the idea…and the more disinterested she becomes. Really, if she needs to get off, her vibrator can do exactly the same job for her, with less mess and zero awkwardness.
If only Viktor had even a tenth of Malfoy's wit and intelligence, then perhaps she wouldn't waver so in her desires! Oh, but that isn't a fair comparison to make, as Viktor is perfectly lovely, a real gentleman, and Malfoy is…an irritating git. Despite being a duck out of water when off his broom, her Bulgarian ex-lover treats women with kindness and his old-fashioned streak of chivalry doesn't come off as condescending, either. He is affable, handsome, fit, a generous lover…
Maybe he isn't so disinteresting after all?
Girding her nerve to go with the plan before her, she takes a big sip of her Black Magic Galaxy cocktail that Blaise pressed into her hand not ten minutes ago. The drink is truly a thing of mixology genius, and it does the trick in giving her a booster shot of courage.
"Off I go," she announces under her breath. "One midnight partner coming right up!"
Before she can take a step in Viktor's direction, however, Malfoy slithers up alongside her once more and then moves directly into her path, heading her off at the pass. In his hand is a topped-off glass of an expensive and dark Firewhisky that smolders like dragon's breath and smells of cinder and spice. He sips from it, staring down at her with a wicked twinkle in his angel-grey eyes.
"What?" she demands with an impatient and resigned sigh, knowing he won't leave her be until he's said his piece. "Out with it."
He points one elegant, long finger at her. "Granger, I find you to be simply too splendiferous for a party this sedate."
Hermione's jaw drops open and she glances down at the costume she's spent the better part of two weeks fretting to put together, hoping he'd finally see her…and maybe even consider taking her home from one of these god-awful events for once. It seems that effort has paid off! "Well, thank you, Draco. That's very nice-"
"I mean to say you're far too shiny," he interrupts and indicates her devil-red sequin-covered dress with a wave of his hand. "You're blinding the whole room with the bling."
Her delight instantly turns to ash. She should have known his civility was too good to be true. "Blast, you've found me out," she says with a pinch of sarcasm. "That was my sole intention when I chose this costume for tonight's gala: to permanently ruin your eyesight."
He looks her over again, head to toe, smiling as he teases, "Dear god, you're like one of those Christmas tree baubles that flashes at you incessantly until your eyes are watering!"
"I'm wearing a She-Devil costume," she says with a sigh. "That's about as far from Yuletide joy as one can get."
"Yes, we all get that you're in the Halloween spirit, Granger, but we're at a Ministry event, too…one that requires us to donate precious time and large sums of money to some street urchin cause before we'll be released for the night. You need to be less hopeful, more tragic—like a teenager."
"I was never a tragic teenager."
"Your hair certainly was. Thank god Blaise fixed that for you."
She gasps in habitual outrage. "Better to have had bad teenage hair than to be a grown man stuck in his teenage years," she snarls back. "Why don't you stop bothering me and look to yourself, Malfoy. Chasing the skirts of women half your age?" Okay, so it's an exaggeration, as there doesn't seem to be any females in room younger than twenty-one, but still… "Worse, you're dressed like that when we both know you're definitely no angel! That's false advertising!"
He's laughing at her behind the rim of his glass, his shoulders shaking with mirth. "Oh, Granger, you are always so much fun to rile up. Just wind and release." He takes a quick drink and smoke blows out from between his lips as he exhales. "It's decided: we need to fix this wardrobe malfunction of yours immediately."
Before she can counter his move, he waves his wand down her body and her costume transfigures from red to…
Hermione gasps in outrage.
"Now I look like a Christmas tree!"
"The outfit is infinitely better in Slytherin colours, love." Her tormentor eyes her with appreciation. "Yes, a definite improvement."
"She-Devils don't wear green!" she points out the obvious.
He smirks. "They do when they're as jealous as you are."
"Jealous?" She blinks up at him. "And why, pray tell, would I be jealous…and of whom?"
He glances down at her, all boastful, smug satisfaction. "You know perfectly well the 'who' and the 'why', my catty, little sex bomb." He gloats, wiping an imaginary piece of lint from his suit. "You want me. We both know it."
Of course she does, but she has no intention of actually telling him that and giving him a head so fat, he wouldn't actually be able to fit out of the door at the end of the night. "You're delusional," she says instead, and turns to her shimmery, dark drink to hide the nervous twitching of her bottom lip. It takes downing half of it to give her the daring to meet his eye and bald-face lie to him. "You're high on your own methane."
Rolling his eyes, he again steals her drink from her hand and sniffs it. "No, I'm not." He takes a sip of the black concoction and hums in appreciation. "Like the Devil, you're just too prideful to admit it." He hands her drink back to her and steps into her until she can feel his cinder-scented breath on her cheek. "About the only thing you ever choose right at these Ministry shindigs are the cocktails."
With that, he saunters off.
It is only after she's calmed down and changed her dress back to red that she realizes what that little interlude with Malfoy was all about: distraction.
Viktor is gone. He's left the party…with two of the triplets.
Blast that slimy Slytherin! Malfoy's prevented her from taking home the best catch of the night! Now she was back to square one: dateless, desperate, and devilishly horny.
TO BE CONTINUED...