Author's Note: I own no person, no place, no thing – except the plot! If you recognize it, it probably belongs to Ms. Rowling or some other awesome super-human.

P.S.: Smut Alert. What can I say? They like each other. ajc

Chapter 20 Perfect

Hermione stretched her arms up into the air as she flexed her legs and arched her feet, relishing in that hazy, early morning pleasure of rousing from a night of deep, restorative sleep. She'd dreamt about the War last night, but unlike so many other nights, it hadn't been a nightmare, just flashes of memories from when she and Draco had been tied up and beaten during the final battle. She realized with a sudden shock that it was in that tower that she'd first held Draco's hand. They'd clung to each other for more than two hours before help finally arrived in the form of Nott Senior's death somewhere out on the grounds of Hogwarts, which instantly dissolved their invisible bindings. Hermione had crashed to the floor, startled by the agonizing snap of her ankle. That damned Death Eater was a sociopath, but fortunately for Hermione, her companion was not. Draco managed to swing himself under her, and she'd collapsed onto his chest instead of the stone floor.

That was where her dream cut off, because she couldn't really remember anything after that. Her injuries compounded with the sudden change in blood pressure managed to knock her out for the next few hours. When she'd awoken, Harry was gone, Draco was under house-arrest, and she was in St. Mungo's.

Draco's right arm reached up into the air to catch her right hand and drag it down to his mouth so that he could kiss the inside of her wrist. Hermione smiled and rolled in the direction he'd tugged her, and draped herself across Draco's chest.

"Good morning," she said to her sleepy boyfriend. Draco, as usual, only had one eye open. It blinked a couple of times, then gave up and slid shut.

"Morning… Girl," he mumbled. His arms came up and wrapped around her, and he tugged her further up onto his body. "Mmmmm…" he moaned as he rubbed his naked hips against hers.

Hermione giggled. "Draco, you're not even awake yet."

"Mmm… awake enough…" he mumbled, and reached down to pull her thighs apart for easy access. Hermione wiggled and squirmed around just enough to get the tip of his erection at her entrance, then rolled her hips, and voila! He was in. Hermione gasped at the delicious stretching of her inner muscles, and tried to sit up, but Draco locked his arms around her back to keep her pinned to his chest.

"Don't move," he commanded, so Hermione relaxed against him and laid her head on his shoulder. She couldn't help but wriggle a little, craving the friction of movement where their bodies were connected. Draco grunted, and his eyes snapped open to glare in faux irritation at his girlfriend.

"Do you mind?" he said. "I'm trying to sleep in comfort here."

Hermione smiled innocently. "Oh, so sorry, darling. I was just trying to get comfortable." And she wriggled again, pushing down against him as she rocked her hips, once, twice. Draco hissed and grabbed her hips. He ground his pelvis into hers, and Hermione groaned as he bucked against that most sensitive spot –

"Oooh…" she whined as a jolt of pleasure shot through her.

"You like that, don't you?" he whispered in her ear as he pushed against her again.

"Oh, God yes," she panted, and grabbed his shoulders to hold on as he rolled their bodies so he could lie on top of her.

"My favorite way to start the morning," Draco whispered against her mouth as he flicked his hips forward and back a few times. Hermione nodded her head in agreement, and closed her eyes so she could concentrate on the spikes of heat and lust that were coursing through her to the beat of Draco's thrusts.

Draco rose up onto his knees and dragged Hermione's hips up with him. "Don't close your eyes, Love. I want to see your eyes," he panted. Hermione opened her eyes wide at his declaration, and gazed in surprise at Draco. "You have such beautiful eyes, Hermione. I love your eyes," he said by way of explanation. He dragged his thumb across his lip as he watched Hermione turn pink with an aroused flush that spread across her face and down her neck. He licked his thumb, wetting it thoroughly, then reached down and stroked her tiny clit. Hermione arched her back and bit her lip to hold back a moan of agonized pleasure.

Draco backed out of her, leaving her body entirely so he could tease her into her orgasm. He opened her legs as wide as they would go and rubbed at her center, spreading her slickness around and around with his thumb as she groaned and shuddered.

"Look at you, my beautiful Girl," he whispered. Hermione locked eyes with him, and his heart tripped at the half-crazed lust and deep love he saw reflected there. "Look at how much you want me," he said as he rubbed at her slippery heat. He gathered the wetness against his fingers as she watched, and then stroked his erection with his slick hand. "Look at how much I want you," he continued. Hermione threw her head back and wailed as his thumb circled faster and faster, bringing her to a frenzied release just as Draco plunged himself deep inside her.

"Do you know how much I love you?" he whispered as he leaned back down to kiss her. Hermione grabbed his face and kissed him passionately as he rocked into her.

"At least… ohhh… at least as much as I love you," she said against his mouth.

"Yesss… Love. I love how much you love me. Nobody… has ever loved me like you do," Draco whispered urgently in her ear as he sped up. He was so close –

"Nobody… will. You're mine… Draco! Oh, please!" Hermione begged as she wrapped her legs tightly around his backside. The pleasure built up to that delicious peak of liquid fire and she came… so hard…

Draco gasped as her body tightened around him, and let go of his restraint so he could follow her.

Quiet moments later, Hermione stroked her fingers through the sweaty hair of the head that rested on her belly. Draco was stretched across the bed, using her stomach as a pillow.

"You're right, you know," Hermione said quietly.

"Naturally. What about?"

Hermione sighed as she curved her fingers around his ear and down his neck. "Nobody has ever loved me like you do. And I love that. I love the way you love me," she replied. Draco lifted his head so he could see her face.

"And nobody ever will. You're mine too, you know. I'm not going to stop loving you, Hermione. You're perfect for me. This is it, Little Girl." He rose up and leaned over her so he could kiss her. "You and me. We're IT. You know that, right?"

Hermione's heart jumped into her throat, and she gasped as his words detonated inside her brain. Two tiny tears streaked out of the corners of her eyes as she nodded her head.

"I know. I've known for a while, Draco," she whispered.

Draco searched her face in wonder as her words sank into him. "When did you know?" he asked with a small smile. He rubbed at the tears that ran into her hair, and leaned in for another kiss.

Hermione sighed against his mouth. "The first time you kissed me," she confessed. "It was like… I don't know. We just fit. Like a puzzle piece that I'd been missing finally fell into place. You're perfect for me. It was like we were made for each other. You kissed me and I knew I'd never kiss anyone else ever again." She met his eyes, and was surprised to see that he was smirking.

"What?" she asked.

"That's when I knew too. Same thing exactly. It took me a while to figure out what it meant, but it was like my entire fucked up life finally made sense. You're right. You're perfect for me, Hermione Granger. And I got to thinking, you know. I think we made ourselves perfect for each other a long time ago." Draco pushed her wayward hair off her forehead and kissed her again before he settled onto his side, facing her. She rolled onto her side so that she could face him as well.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Well, if you think about it from here, it kind of seems like we spent our entire childhoods trying to one-up each other. Academically, that's obvious. I never would have even cared about being top of our class if it hadn't been for you busting my balls every step of the way. But there's the other little things too, all the dumb shit we did just to get each other's attention," Draco mused as he absently wound a lock of her hair around his index finger.

"Well," Hermione began thoughtfully. "I grant you the academic part freely. I've never met anyone that can keep up with me like you can. You don't even seem to mind when I blather and babble about one odd thing or another."

Draco smiled as he tapped the end of her nose. "No, I don't mind, Love. I think it's cute."

"Well, there you go. I think most people find me to be rather annoying."

"I don't know about that, Hermione. Maybe when we were kids, but not now. All of our friends here adore you," Draco pointed out. "And besides that, I was rather annoying as a child as well."

Hermione grinned. "Yes, yes you were."

Draco rolled his eyes. He pointed at her. "Pot." Then he pointed at himself. "Kettle." Hermione giggled.

"Seriously though, then there's Quidditch," Draco listed.

Hermione frowned. "What about Quidditch?"

"Well, I wouldn't have cared that much either way about being the absolute best Seeker Slytherin House had seen in a hundred years if it hadn't been for Potter. And he was just an extension of you, the witch I was absolutely determined to outperform in every aspect of school life. Since you weren't a flier –"

Hermione chuffed. "Obviously. It's bloody un-natural."

"Ahem. As I was saying, since you were born with stone limbs that are incapable of flight, and Potter had already gone out of his way to piss me off numerous times, I simply had to beat him to prove that Purebloods were better than you. And of course I wanted your eyes on me while I did it. In the end, all I succeeded in doing was making myself strong enough to fight side by side with you. And then there's my personal library. Don't tell me you haven't noticed that the bookshelves are groaning under the weight of our combined collections. I never would have begun collecting books if it hadn't been for all that time I spent in the Library at school, trying to keep up with you. Which brings me to the idea that I never would have considered taking a job as a Librarian if it hadn't been for your influence. And I happen to know that you find my profession rather appealing."

Hermione blushed. "Well, you have me there, Malfoy. I do find it very ironic and charming that you are a Librarian. But I never would have thought of the Quidditch thing with Harry. You're right though. I wouldn't have given a hoot about Harry's flying if it hadn't been for you. Because of YOU I went to all those ridiculous matches. And I watched you the entire time to make sure you didn't do anything nasty."

"I know you did. I could feel your eyes burning holes into the back of my uniform at every match. Don't think I didn't get a cheap thrill out of that. And I probably wouldn't have done half the crazy stunts I did on the field if it hadn't been for you."

"Showing off?" Hermione asked as she cocked an eyebrow.

"I wouldn't have admitted to that back then. If forced, I would have said that I was proving irrefutably that I was better than Potter. Because I wanted your eyes on me, not on him. You know, I probably wouldn't have given Potter such a hard time in school in general if it hadn't been for you being his best friend. Well, you and the damn Weasel. God, I hated him. And you were just this small, wild and angry thing, spitting and hissing every time I got close to you. As a child I was not used to being denied anything. And I couldn't have you. So I had to hate you with every fiber of my being. And then there's the thing with the girls…" Draco trailed off with a wicked smirk.

Hermione stiffened. "What do you mean, the girls?"

Draco shrugged one shoulder casually. "Only that all my girlfriends in school were the exact opposite of you. Dumb, pliable, straight-haired purebloods. I'm surprised Blaise and Theo didn't jump up on the dining table in the Great Hall and shout 'Thou doth protest too much, methinks!' or some such nonsense. I do recall Blaise especially would roll his eyes every time I went on a rant about you. Hmm…"

Hermione's eyes drifted vacantly as she pondered Draco's words. She tapped her fingers on her hip as she considered, and then blurted out, "One of the things that I liked best about Ronald was how much you two hated each other. He was the opposite of you. Ron was the anti-Draco! Damn it!" She groaned and slapped her hand over her eyes as she continued. "I was always trying to get a rise out of you. I knew how much you hated it that I was better than you in class, and it drove me to push even harder in my studies. And I loved goading you! I knew you were listening every time I showed my good grades to Harry and Ron. And when you joined the Order, I think the main reason why I befriended you when the others wouldn't was because I just knew it would piss you off."

"Oh, it did. But then we got teamed up together all the time because no one else wanted to work with me, and you finally realized how damned charming, brave and devastatingly sexy I am. Then you gave up your magic to be with me and tracked me down here in Little Whinging and just sauntered into my Library like you didn't know I was there…" Draco drifted off as Hermione sat up straight.

"I did not!" She cried indignantly.

"Didn't what? Find me attractive when we were in the Order or didn't follow me to Little Whinging?"

"Neither! Both! Ugh, Draco! I didn't give up my magic to follow you, and I didn't come out here looking for you. I told you before, I thought you'd gone to Europe. I settled here to be close to my parents, and because of Harry." Hermione said as she poked Draco in the chest. Draco grabbed her hand.

"Love, that doesn't make a lot of sense, you know. You settled your parents in Sussex, not Surrey. And by your accounts, Harry hated it here. So there must have been some other reason," Draco insisted.

Hermione shook her head. "There was no reason, Draco. Of the safe places on the map Mafalda showed me, this just jumped out. I guess you could say I acted on instinct and sentimentality. I just wanted to be here while I healed and decided what I really wanted to do with my life. Funnily enough, I didn't really start thinking about leaving the Wizarding Community until after you were gone. But once the option presented itself to me, I never looked back. I brought my parents back from Sydney and bought this place within a month after your trial was over. I tied up the last of my loose ends with the Ministry and the Wizengamot and just left it all behind. But honestly, I didn't even consider checking out the Library here until the waitress from the place around the corner mentioned it." Hermione shrugged. "I guess you could call it divine intervention or something. Whatever it was, I am glad I'm here with you now."

Draco sighed and tugged his girlfriend on top of him as he rolled onto his back. "I'm glad you're here with me too, but doesn't it seem strange when you look at it all like that? Like fate or whatever was guiding us, quite forcefully, to this point? Not that I mind, Love, I just wish we hadn't wasted so much time hurting each other, you know?" He nudged her legs open with an upraised knee, and nestled his cock into the heated curls between her thighs.

Hermione gave a little shudder as he slid into her. "You're not hurting me now," she pointed out.

"No, I'm not," he grunted as he bucked his hips. "That's because we fit perfectly together," he said.

"Yes, we do," Hermione whispered. She kissed him as she tangled their fingers together on either side of his head. "You were made for me," she sighed happily against his mouth.

"No, you were made for me," he replied.

Hermione sat up and stilled their bodies as she shook her finger at him. "Ah, hate to pull the age card, dear, but I am nine months older than you. So, you see, the night I was born, God looked down at me and said 'Well here's an odd little duck. It's going to take quite a unique male to make a compatible partner for her.' And thus, you were obviously conceived solely for my benefit." She smiled winningly and flipped her hair over her shoulder.

"All right, granted. You are an odd little duck, and I am most definitely a unique male. It's rather gratifying to hear you admit it so freely. I also find it very amusing that you made God's caricature voice sound a great deal like Professor Flitwick." Draco grinned at his girlfriend, whose expression suddenly turned gray.

"Hey, what's wrong?" he asked.

Hermione shuddered in horror. "Draco, that's… just… disgusting. Ugh, I can't believe you just mentioned Professor Flitwick while we're like THIS!"

Draco shrugged, sat up and tried to lift her off of his lap. "Well, if you're no longer interested…"

"Wait! Draco…" Hermione whined and wrapped her arms around his neck. She wriggled against him, trying to push him back down before their bodies could disconnect. "I didn't say I wanted to stop," she said. "You just can't ever mention You-Know-Who while we're naked. Biggest turn off ever."

"Says the woman who just accidentally mentioned the nickname of the evil villain who ruined both our lives, while we're naked. I see your biggest turn off ever, and raise you tenfold. Yuck, Girl. Just, yuck."

Hermione groaned and dropped her face into her hands, conceding defeat.

/…../

"What time are they coming?" Draco asked as he poured himself a cup of coffee. Hermione was standing at the stove, frying bacon and singing along with the music coming from the living room.

"Cause nobody loves me

It's true

Not like you do"

Draco groaned and shook his head. Hermione and her music. The littlest things would set her off, and she'd start linking words and phrases together, and before he knew it, she'd be singing along with a CD from her vast music collection. Occasionally she'd even pop over to the storage room and uncover her Mum's piano. He'd come home to her playing in there more and more as Christmas got closer.

"Who am I, what and why

'Cause all I have left is my memories of yesterday

Oh these sour times"

Hermione flipped the strips of bacon over as she sang "they'll be here in ten minutes, will you pour me more coffee please?" to the tune of the Portishead song. She suddenly squawked and jumped backwards as a bit of bacon grease popped and burnt her arm.

Draco picked up her mug as he flipped the burner to a lower setting.

"You're going to burn that bacon cooking it at such a high temperature, Girl. Ellie and Rosie are not going to die of starvation if you don't have food on the table as soon as they arrive."

Hermione stuck her tongue out at him, so Draco smacked her bum before turning to refill her coffee cup.

Twenty minutes later, Draco and Hermione waved goodbye to Shaun and Sue, who were going to spend the day getting their Christmas shopping finished sans fairy girls. Ellie and Rosie each sat on a book-boosted chair at the dining table with their napkins tucked into the necks of their shirts. They sang, "Bacon is to bweckfist! Bacon is to bweckfist!" as they banged their forks on their plates.

"All right girls, who wants bacon and eggs on their plates, and who wants a manky old sock instead?" Draco asked as he brought the platter of breakfast to the table. Two little blondes and one brunette called for bacon and eggs as he sat down in his usual space at the head of the table. Hermione smiled slyly at him as he scooped scrambled eggs onto Ellie and Rosie's plates. Draco rolled his eyes. Hermione had made it very clear that she found his interaction with the fairy girls very appealing, and he had no doubt she'd be attacking him before the day was over. It was a good thing the fairy girls still took naps, he mused to himself.

After breakfast was finished, Draco and the girls stood in front of the Christmas tree that he and Hermione had purchased and dragged upstairs the previous afternoon before they'd parted ways for Winnie's baby shower and Draco's evening of confessions at Renny's house. The tree had seemed like a monstrous thing in the stairwell, but now it stood modestly in the far corner of the living room, not quite able to reach the ceiling.

"Okay girls, who wants to help me open the boxes of ornaments while Draco puts the lights on the tree?" Hermione asked as she sat down on the floor out of Draco's way.

"Um, Hermione?" Draco asked.

"Hmm?"

"Need you to wizard this down for me, Love," he said as he looked at the cardboard boxes of white fairy lights Hermione had laid out next to the tree. Hermione's head snapped up in surprise, and realized with a bit of shock that of course Draco had never done this sort of thing before.

"Sorry! I keep forgetting this is all new to you," she said as she hopped back up to help Draco open and unravel the lights. They took turns passing each strand from side to side around the tree as Ellie and Rosie played Easter Hunt with a handful of brightly colored ornaments.

An hour and a half and only three squashed ornaments later, "you shouldn't have hidden it under the couch pillow, you silly girl. They're not Easter eggs!" Draco stood back to take in his very first completely hand-decorated Muggle Christmas tree.

"It looks good," Hermione murmured as she leaned into his side and slid her arms around his waist. Draco looked down at his beautiful girlfriend, then over at the toddlers jumping up and down on their couch, and finally back to the tree.

"No, Little Girl. It looks perfect," he replied, and kissed the top of her head.

/…../

"Oh Lindy, they're perfect!" Hermione squealed and clapped her hands together in excitement.

"They are, aren't they? I'm just glad you want them both, it would have been hard to split them up now," Lindy replied happily.

"You must thank your Mum for me. These are exactly what I was looking for. Are you sure you don't mind holding on to them until Christmas Eve?" Hermione asked as she set the smaller one down so that she could lift and inspect the larger one.

"Not at all. Hey, do you want me to bring them at night once he's asleep? Make it a real surprise?" Lindy asked.

"Oh, that would be wonderful! We can hide them in my storage room until morning if we bring them up through the garage. Are you sure you don't mind? It might have to be eleven or later," Hermione mused.

"No, that's absolutely fine with me. Just make sure to take a picture of his face when he sees them! I'll meet you at your garage door at eleven thirty on Christmas Eve," Lindy replied, and laughed as Hermione jumped up and down and clapped her hands again.

/…../

Ginevra Weasley leaned across Mafalda Hopkirk's secondary office desk and gazed in shock at the framed Muggle photograph that sat discreetly next to a stack of folders. The laughing couple in the photo was bundled up for winter and had their arms wrapped tightly around each other. Their heads were slightly down, so Ginny couldn't see their faces with complete clarity, but she'd know those earrings anywhere. The tiny clusters of sapphires in the shape of five petaled flowers had been a gift to Hermione from her parents for her seventeenth birthday.

"Miss Weasley! What a surprise- Oh dear," Mafalda walked into her office to find a very distraught young woman holding a photo of two people that wanted their new lives kept away from their old Wizarding friends. Mafalda never would have left the photo sitting out in her main office, but down here in her private office, where she kept all of her correspondence from her young Muggle charges, she'd thought she'd be safe to leave it out. Hermione had just sent her the framed picture as a Christmas gift, and Mafalda was thrilled to see the two young people so completely happy together.

"It's her, isn't it?" Ginny asked as she held the photo out. "You know we've been looking for her for months, that we need to find her! And you know where she is?"

Mafalda sighed. "I'm sorry Miss Weasley, but it was Miss Granger's choice to keep her whereabouts private. I can't tell you-"

"You will tell me!" Ginny screeched. "Are you blind, woman? Look at me! I haven't got much time left! I need her! Now you tell me where she is!"

To Be Continued.