Hermione was sitting at the dining table, enjoying a nice (late) breakfast with her husband. She was having a hard time keeping the grin off her face. The reconciliation between herself and Lucius went much better than she could have ever hoped. Truth be told, she was quite tired from being up all night.
She felt great.
It hadn't taken Lucius long at all to catch up with her. When he did, he scooped her up into his arms and carried her the rest of the way to their bedroom. They made it there in no time at all. In fact, it had been a long time since she had seen Lucius move so fast. As soon as they entered the room, Lucius went straight for the bed and laid her down gently. As soon as she hit the top, he immediately stood back up and started to remove his clothing.
She couldn't hold back the giggle that escaped from her lips. Hearing that, he stopped his process and gave her a look of uncertainty.
"Eager, are we?" she teased. Hearing the teasing tone to her voice, he smirked at her and continued on in removing his clothing. Much more slowly. He had her rapt attention as she found she could not bring herself to look away. Before long, he was standing before her completely nude, cock standing at attention. Merlin, her husband was gorgeous, and she missed looking at him.
"You are overdressed, wife."
She had begun to undress when she felt his hands heed for progress.
"Allow me."
She allowed her hands to fall away as his replaced hers. He took his time, allowing his hands to touch every inch of skin he uncovered. When his hands brushed lightly over her breasts, she couldn't take it any longer.
"Lucius, please."
"Please what, Hermione?"
"Lucius, please. Fuck me. Now."
She loved hearing his low moan at her words, knowing it turned him on to hear her talk that way. She was so worked up from just his few touches that she nearly came the moment he entered her. This was bliss.
This was home.
"Lucius, could you pass me the paper, please?"
After he handed it over, she absentmindedly read it over as she ate her breakfast. She continued to enjoy the quiet morning with her husband when she came across an article that had her dropping the piece of toast she held.
"Lucius!"
"What is it, love?"
"This... this... what is this, Lucius?"
Lucius took the paper from her hands and read the article she was pointing to.
Ronald Weasley was recently transported to St. Mungos from Azkaban. He will have a permanent room in the Janus Thickey ward. At this time, there is no further word on the reason for this transfer.
"Such a shame. Obviously he just could not handle being confined in Azkaban."
She narrowed her eyes at him, knowing that he knew something about this.
"Explain."
"I am sure I do not know what you mean."
"Lucius!"
"I may have heard some rumblings around the Ministry. It seems a Boggart had somehow found its way into poor Mr. Weasley's cell. No one is quite sure how long it was in there, but it must have been for some time if this was the result."
"What? How is it possible no one heard him screaming?"
"Ah, yes. Quite odd, that. By some means, a silencing spell was placed upon his cell."
She looked at him sitting there, the picture of innocent, and instantly knew he was behind this. She wasn't sure if she should be upset or... not upset.
"Lucius, what did you do?"
"Love, I'm hurt. I really am that you would think so poorly of me. Of course I had nothing to do with this. Nothing at all."
She bit her tongue as to not point out that he was protesting too much. Instead, she let it go, knowing he would never admit to any wrong-doing in this instance. If she was being honest, it wasn't exactly like Ronald didn't deserve it anyway.
A few weeks later had her coming across yet another article that caused her concern. This one was much worse than the first, in her opinion. It was as short as the one about Ron, but this time it stated that Ginny had somehow escaped from Azkaban. Taking a deep breath so she did not panic, she ran (waddled) outside to where Lucius was feeding his pet peacocks.
"Lucius, did you see the paper this morning? Why didn't you tell me Ginny escaped? We have to do something, strengthen the wards! She's going to come after us! Maybe we should go into hiding."
"Calm yourself, Hermione. Stress is not good for the babies."
"Calm myself?! Have you gone utterly insane, Lucius?"
"There's no need to worry, love," he said in a low, completely calm voice.
"What's happened to Ginny?"
"I cannot say I really know, but I have no doubt that you have nothing to worry about," Lucius replied. She rolled her eyes at him, and they landed on the birds as they eagerly ate their food.
"It seems like they are enjoying their feast more today than they usually do."
"They do, do they not? I thought I would try something new, give them a bit of a treat," Lucius said, smirking as he scattered more food across the ground. Thinking their reactions were odd, she turned to go back to the house. But before she left, she turned her head back and said, "Lucius, take this no further. It's not the rest of the Weasley's fault they had two bad eggs. Especially George, he's gone through enough."
"Whatever you wish, love."
Happy with his response, she went back inside.
Life with Lucius went quite well from then on. It had taken some time, but eventually they slipped right back into the relationship they enjoyed before Ronald and Ginny took it upon themselves to try to ruin their lives.
The arrival of the twins certainly shook things up a bit. It took some adjusting on both their parts in order to handle having two infants, but thankfully Lucius was a wonderful father. Draco and Luna could often be found at the Manor, giving the children a chance to grow up together. Harry was also a frequent visitor, after he got over his guilt at not realizing what Ronald and Ginny were up to.
She watched her children grow up into fine adults. She was even able to watch her children's children grow up, and she enjoyed every last second of it. If there was any lesson she had come out on the other side learning, it was to not waste a single minute of your life. It was too short, and once that minute was gone, you could never get it back.
As she watched her husband struggling to keep up with their youngest grandchild, she couldn't help the swell of love she felt for him. Her love for him had never, ever wavered, even throughout the bad times. Many people had told her she would regret marrying Lucius, regret marrying a Death Eater.
She held no regrets.
AN: This is un-beta'd as I had a deadline I didn't want to miss.
And there we are, the end of Betrayal. A one-shot I had no intentions of continuing turned into 11 chapters and is up to 132 reviews. I can't thank all my readers enough for sticking with me and I hope you enjoyed the ride. I know I did. I also hope you all catch just what happened to Ginny. You can all blame Liza for that bit, it's completely her fault. :)
Special thanks to erbkaiser, Liza, and Raybe for all their help on this story.
Please review!
