Note:

Thank you to the lovely reviewer who pointed out that I did a typo on Ginny's name! My bad. I had to fix it on this chapter so sorry if this posts twice! If it does then… my bad, again.

Also, I had an issue with this website and line breaks. I am a silly person. Apologies for any formatting issues that I have not yet noticed!

I will aim for approximately weekly updates, but may occasionally take a little longer because, you know… life.

I'm back! Hope you enjoyed Chapter 1, and here's hoping you like Chapter 2! Thank you to everyone who stopped by and left comments – it is very much appreciated.

Disclaimer: No I do not own Harry Potter.

Rating/warnings: Please note the rating. This story is rated M for language and sexual content. There are also mentions of violence.

Chapter 2: Not this, again.

Hermione's tongue felt as though it was stuck to the top of her mouth. Somehow the only thought that could penetrate her mind was oh no, not this. Not this, again.

Through her haze of shock, she was somehow incredibly aware that her facial expression belied one of calm and mild interest. It was an ability she had cultivated during her… adventures at school, and later on during her work with the MLE. Hermione knew that as a brazen Gryffindor, her emotions were too often painted clearly on her face. It had seemed to her advantage to learn how to conceal her thoughts from prying eyes.

But perhaps this was not the best strategy when dealing with a retired master spy.

Snape had been watching her closely during the silent moments of Hermione's racing thought processes. After a few moments of silence, he leaned back heavily on the uncomfortable, Ministry-issued chair and exhaled. "You don't believe me."

"I do." I do? Hermione paused to gather her thoughts. This was Severus Snape, not some paranoid wizard returned from Bulgaria with a painting he suspected was a fake, raging at the MLE to just bloody get things sorted! (Yes, this had happened before… twice). She knew Snape – his instincts for danger had been well-developed to the point of paranoia in the two decades he served as Dumbledore's spy. "Prof-, I mean, Mr Snape. There must be more if you came to us. The potions… you know that it could just be a coincidence. They could just have been ordered by a few people somewhere out there who just happened to need Calming Draught and Dragon's Breath. But clearly something convinced you that it is not."

She met his eyes and thought she caught a flicker of amused pleasure there at her quick deduction.

"Tell me what it is."

Snape blinked and looked away from her suddenly. His fingers rested in a steepled pose, and Hermione found herself wondering if she ought to cultivate that habit. Her own hands tended to shake when she felt nervous, and as a child and young adult she had taken to sitting on them to prevent others noticing her anxiety. He seemed to be thinking carefully.

"Payment for my services is provided directly into my vault at Gringotts. To my clients, this suggests to them that I would find it impossible to trace the source of their money given the Goblins' notorious sense of discretion and secrecy. However, when my suspicions were first aroused… I resolved that I had to know who these clients were. The easiest method to do this would be to find out where the money was coming from… which given the… ah – favours owed to me by several of the employees at Gringotts, proved relatively trivial."

"Wait – the goblins owed you favours?"

"Yes, Miss Granger, but that is hardly the point…"

Goblins. Owing favours. The very idea seemed absurd. Hermione's calm exterior threatened to crack with an unprofessional giggle. Not strange to Severus Snape, no doubt.

"At first I imagined that our purported criminal had been careless, thinking that Gringotts would provide the anonymity that they desired. I thought that these incriminating orders could have come from the same person, using different names, paying from the same vault. This would have made it easy to track them down. Unfortunately, this proved incorrect."

Snape paused, and in the ensuing silence Hermione could not help but notice that he seemed slightly… nervous. Snape? Nervous? This seemed more absurd that even the concept of goblins and favours.

"Although it now seemed that our potential bomb-maker could in fact be several unsuspicious non-bomb-makers each wanting an exceptional level of calmness, dreamless sleep and very warm fireplaces… I could not displace the feeling that something was terribly wrong."

"I collected on yet another favour and found that these suspicious vaults at Gringotts were in fact all secondary stores that could be linked to an account named to a single person. This person was… is known to me. Their identity came as something of a shock." The nervous expression had faded and now Snape looked… almost sad.

Hermione leaned closer. "Who is it?"

He met her eyes, his dark gaze boring so deep she felt that he could see into her very soul.

"Narcissa Malfoy."

Narcissa Malfoy.

The first emotion that Hermione could identity amongst the haze of feelings that arose at the sound of her name was… regret. Sadness. Bitterness. And then shock. Incredulity.

Narcissa Malfoy. Immediately visions of the beautiful woman, the beautiful sad woman, swam into Hermione's vision. Narcissa had abruptly stopped leaving her home after the sudden demise of her husband, Lucius, not yet four years prior. In Hermione's adolescence, Narcissa had always seemed beautiful, albeit haughty and cold. Now that beauty was etched with terrible grief.

She knew Snape was watching her carefully. What is he thinking? "I confess… well, this is quite a surprise to me." Hermione managed to say. "As far as I know, Madam Malfoy has not left Malfoy Manor in several years. I can hardly imagine her planning something of this scale. She has been in mourning since Mr Malfoy's untimely death."

"Yes, indeed, that is what I thought myself." Snape looked curiously at Hermione, probably wondering why she had kept such close tabs on the Malfoys. "I have known Narcissa for many years, and although she is a Slytherin through and through, her methods are far more direct and less… convoluted than the apparent crime in progress we have here. And as you say, she has been in deep mourning since Lucius' passing, and has seemed hardly able to make a pot of tea for herself, let alone plan a scheme of this magnitude."

"Do you think she is being framed?" Hermione blinked, realising that she had used a Muggle phrase in her excitement. "I mean, do you suppose somebody…"

"I am aware of the meaning of the expression, Miss Granger." Snape interrupted. Of course, he was raised in a Muggle home. "And to answer your question, yes, I do. To me this is the clearest indication that there something very dangerous is about to happen."

Not this, again.

Quite against her own volition, Hermione felt her eyes start to sting with moisture. Sitting here, speaking to Severus Snape about imminent danger… well, she thought she had left that all behind her, eight years ago. Suddenly needing some air, she rose abruptly from her seat, turning her face away from Snape. She didn't notice that he had risen as well, lifting a hand as if to reach out to her.

She wasn't a coward. She just needed some air.

"Pr- Mr Snape," Hermione began, clearing the tears away as hastily as they had suddenly come. "May I interest you in some tea?" Yes, tea. The last bastion of defence in every crisis situation, protecting its drinkers from harm and mental incapacity…

"Yes… please." Snape lowered his hand just as she turned around to face him. "But, Miss Granger - perhaps you have had enough shocks for one morning. I can return later to discuss…"

"Not at all, sir – I mean, Mr Snape. I mean, not that I have had enough shocks. Er- I mean…" Hermione felt uncharacteristically flustered. Something about seeing Snape, swathed in his billowing black robes and combined with his confident intensity, made her feel strangely unsure of herself. Even though he now said "Miss Granger" in a tone startlingly dissimilar to how she remembered it from her school days… back then his voice was laced with a scowl, a threat to take away five points from Gryffindor, and generously topped with deep dislike for her and her friends. Now, there seemed to be a layer of affection there that she had never heard before. Where had that thought come from?

"The very idea that a terrorist is threatening our world again… and at the same time trying to cast suspicions onto old Death Eater connections… well. I think I need a good strong Darjeeling before I can even begin to comprehend how we should proceed with the investigations."

This time Hermione knew that she didn't imagine the half-smile that breezed over his face.

"Very well."

"Hermione! How very nice to see you so soon…!" An uncomfortably familiar voice (last heard moaning ahh… ahhh… in her ear just a few hours previously) startled Hermione as she gathered the tea things.

Eyes widening, Hermione cast a surreptitious look behind her to make sure that Snape was still lingering outside the cramped room that housed their filing cabinets. To a new recruit, it might have seemed a curious misplacement that the MLE's wonderful Instant-boiling Tea Kettles were situated in the same room as the towering filing cabinets, but Hermione knew better. She knew that Harwood had intentionally arranged the office in this manner to discourage his staff from skulking off to tea every hour. She had to admit it was rather effective – hardly anyone was happy to endure the constant barrage of charmed parchment whizzing over their heads (and occasionally onto the aforementioned heads) as they made a cup of tea. It certainly cut down on the number of tea breaks they had versus the number they wished they had.

Snape's back was to them, but Hermione didn't want to risk him overhearing her conversation. She replied in a soft hiss. "Oh, Ernie! Er- good morning. Look, I -"

"So, babe... I thought maybe we could meet up tonight for a little bit of sweet, sweet loving…?" Urgh. The way he said sweet, sweet loving made her want to gag. And babe. Ew.

"Um –Ernie, I don't think so… also I'm working, and I really, really shouldn't be discussing this right now…"

"Come on babe… last night was great, wasn't it? We should have a repeat performance…"

"To be very honest, I didn't enjoy it all that much, Ernie. So maybe not." Hermione winced inwardly as she saw his crestfallen expression.

But he recovered quickly, and retorted with a wink. "Look, maybe we focussed a bit too much on me last night. But tonight we can focus on you! Every part of you…"

Ew. Ew. Ew. Well they had certainly focussed solely on Ernie last night, but right now the thought of him touching her breasts again made Hermione want to gag.

"No, thanks, Ernie. Look – I'm sorry to disappoint but I really have to go…" Hermione clutched the kettle to herself, filled with cool water that would heat to boiling the instant she said the charm. Everyone knew that tea needed to be made with freshly boiling water, after all.

This time Ernie grabbed her shoulder and gave her a little shake. "C'mon Granger… you know you want me."

Why do blokes say things like that? Whoever thought this was the surest way to access what was underneath a woman's knickers?

Unfortunately Ernie's "little shake" turned out to be rather too forceful for Hermione's already tense nerves, and she ended up sloshing a good amount of the water onto her chest. She yelped, cursing herself for her clumsiness and Ernie for being, well, Ernie. "Oh bugger. Look what you've done!"

"Miss Granger -?"

A deep voice interrupted whatever tirade she was about to launch into. Snape had poked his head into the room, obviously to investigate the racket, and had come face to face with yet another former student. Although she was the one who was literally damp and red in the face, Hermione thought that nobody could have looked as shocked and terrified and embarrassed in that moment as Ernie did then. Ernie was staring at Snape like Snape was a banshee. Or a dementor. Or… like a Professor Snape, perhaps. There were probably legends told in Hogwarts of the dreaded Potions Master Severus Snape, whispered in the same hushed tones used to discuss banshees and dementors…

Snape's eyes narrowed. "I know you." His voice held the same silky, dark quality that Hermione remembered from Potions classes, all those years ago. Somehow this time it made her want to snicker instead of quickly checking on the status of Harry and Ron's potions, one hand covering her mouth to whisper instructions, whilst the other hand focussed on chopping her own pungent honeysuckle roots carefully.

"Er – Professor Snape! Um – er…"

"Mr MacMillan… I remember you." Snape drew himself to his full height and crossed his arms. With his long robes and intense glare he certainly looked like the angry professor of her memories. "What do you suppose is going on here?"

"Fifty points from Hufflepuff!" Hermione felt like adding. But she controlled herself. More humiliation for Ernie was really unnecessary.

"Er – nothing, Professor. Er – I'd best be going now… er, sir."

Snape acquiesced with a shallow nod, and Ernie shuffled past him looking very much like a chastised student who had just been given detention. Probably something nasty, like cleaning the toilets under the sulky supervision of Mr Filch.

Hermione beamed at Snape, noticing belatedly that she still had water splashed all over the top of her now very clingy work robes. And without a bra too! She grimaced at the sight of her obvious nipples, erect from the cold water. She cast a quick wandless cleansing charm and passed the kettle to Snape. As she turned to face him, she could have sworn that she saw a strange expression on his face. He tore his eyes from her chest to her face, and to her surprise she noticed spots of colour high on his cheeks. That was… odd.

"Er - shall we?"

- Later that day – in the evening. -

"Ginny, I think I'm defective at sex."

Ginevra Potter née Weasley snorted indelicately and muttered a charm on the lamb stew bubbling over the stove, lowering the heat down to let it simmer nicely. The redheaded witch had not exactly inherited her mother's incredible skill at cooking magic, but supper at the Potters' home never disappointed. The delicious fragrance of lamb stew and rice made Hermione's eyes water – now, if only a man could delight her as much as a good meal did…. "Another disappointing beau, I suppose?"

"Very much so. And I had such high hopes for Ernie's penis, too..." Hermione stopped to coo at the little bundle in her arms. Widdle James Potter, the adorable munchkin, at only three months old, rarely did anything but blink and stare open-mouthed at her, but Hermione thought that he was so very wonderful. As his godmother, it was probably expected of Hermione to fuss over the little cherub, but fortunately for her it took little effort to fall completely in love with his chubby face, framed by a shock of dark hair… and his squishy pink ears... Oh and his little fists…! Hermione cooed at him again.

Ginny smiled at the sight of Hermione fawning over her son. Like mothers everywhere, she thought her son the most beautiful, perfect little man in the world. It hardly surprised her that her friend would think the same. "Well, how is Ernie otherwise? Is he at least interesting? Nice? Intelligent?"

"I'm not looking for a boyfriend, Ginny." Hermione snuggled the littlest Potter closer to her as he yawned. Oh, his yawn was so sweet. "I just want a man who can give me an orgasm. Maybe even two! I've heard that it's possible. Anyway, Ernie turned out to be a bit of pushy jerk."

"Wait – so you've never gotten off during sex?" Ginny stared at her, open-mouthed. She probably didn't even hear the second part of Hermione's rant about Ernie.

"Nuh-uh."

"Have you considered that maybe… you're not into men?"

"Yes, considered it, and tested it. Had one… no two one night-stands with women. Neither was particularly enjoyable. Actually, the second time was just to make sure. You know – scientific rigour and all that." Hermione shrugged and rearranged her robes as James Potter began to snore in her arms, adorably, of course.

"Oh." Ginny was almost lost for words. Almost, but not quite – because growing up as the youngest child and only daughter in a boisterous clan of seven made one impervious to ever running out of things to say. "Well, perhaps you need to be a bit more adventurous during sex! You know, different positions, that sort of thing."

"I thought the same, Gin. I tried every position that I could make out from the weirdly-translated copy of the Karma Sutra I got at Flourish and Blotts – I think maybe some of the illustrations were incorrectly copied too... Er – and yes, well, I have also convinced several of my partners into trying the… shall we say non-conventional positions? You know what I mean."

Well, it wasn't a sure thing that Ginny knew what she meant. But some things just didn't need to be verbalised.

"Huh." Now Ginny seemed stumped. Oh no, she was just gearing up to something she thought was important but didn't think Hermione would approve (Hermione recognised the determined look in her eyes). "Okay – so I know you say you don't want a boyfriend, and you know, I respect that." Hermione braced herself as Ginny took a deep breath before continuing, "But maybe… just maybe you would enjoy sex more if it was more… intimate. Like, with a lover. Not a one-night stand."

"Oh, Ginny… I tried that." Hermione tried not to look crestfallen but knew she was failing at least a little bit. "Remember me and Ron?"

Ginny grimaced and patted Hermione's arm sympathetically. Hermione almost flinched, but controlled herself. She didn't want sympathy! She was over Ron!

"Ginny…! I'm most definitely over our relationship – I'm not pining over him or anything like that. But we had a fantastic companionship. We were great mates, and we loved each other. But despite that, I have to say, and I'm sure Ron would agree with me – the sex was certainly nothing to write home about - so loving each other didn't make it more enjoyable for either of us."

Ginny was trying hard not to think about her best friend having sex with her brother. She winced and shook her head to rid herself of that unsavoury image. "I'm not saying that great companionship equals great sex, Hermione. I'm just saying that maybe you would enjoy sex more if you genuinely cared about the person you were taking to your bed."

"Oh." Hermione considered this. "Well I suppose you and Harry…"

Ginny blushed and smiled – she looked both embarrassed and pleased. "Harry is a very… generous lover."

Of course he was. Dear Harry, dear sweet Harry. Whatever faults he had, and after months of traipsing in the wilderness with him, the gods knew that Hermione was aware that he had faults - selfishness was certainly not one of them. Hermione always looked back on those days with a mixture of anguish and bittersweet nostalgia. That tall, scrawny messy-haired boy with the constantly crooked glasses… he was certainly one of the best people she had ever known, and he had grown into one of the best men she would probably ever know. Harry had been willing to die to defeat Lord Voldemort, had been willing to lay down his life to ensure their survival.

If he had been ready to do that, then well, it didn't surprise Hermione that Ginny had no complaints in the bedroom.

"Speaking of Harry, I think your wards just tingled."

"Oh – just in time! The stew should be ready now…" Ginny patted her hair unconsciously, smoothing it down like a nervous girl going on a first date. Hermione smiled to herself, she thought it was sweet that the Potters sometimes still behaved like teenagers in love.

Anyway, at least Harry's arrival let her off the hook. It was bad enough that Hermione's mother took a rather keen interest in her love life, always bemoaning the lack of grandbabies. Her father was the same, just rather less vocal about the whole thing. Goodness knows she didn't need Ginny to start joining the "Let's find Hermione a boyfriend!" club.

"Hermione…" Damn, spoke too soon. "Look, you've tried having sex with all these people who you really don't even like, and it hasn't been great. Maybe you just need to put the 'love' in 'lover', if you take my meaning." There was a clicking noise as Harry stepped through the front door and reset the wards. "Just think about what I'm saying… okay?"

Hermione was spared from responding by the arrival of Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Lived-to-make-it-in-time-for-supper. He grinned boyishly at her and gave her an affectionate peck on the cheek. Hermione made to hand over the baby to Harry, but he shook his head and winked at her. He knew how much Hermione adored baby James, so she had his leave to cuddle his son however much she wanted. Harry wandered over to the magical stove and gently placed a hand over his wife's waist, murmuring something in her ear. Even from a metre away, Hermione could see Ginny's cheeks suffuse with colour.

As Harry flicked his wand absent-mindedly to set the table, his Auror robes flapped in a manner not unlike ones she had seen earlier draped over Snape. Severus Snape. The pleased glow on Hermione's face flickered to a thoughtful expression. Thinking about him made her mind dance back to earlier that day…

- earlier -

They had sat back down in the meeting room, fresh parchment spread out over the table, piping hot tea sitting in front of them. Snape had pulled out the notes he had brought with him detailing his investigation into tracing the origin of the suspicious Gringotts' vaults. The first thing Hermione had wanted to do was to confirm the trail of Galleons back to Narcissa Malfoy. Not that she didn't trust Snape. She was just… thorough.

"That was an interesting… altercation." Snape interrupted her thoughts suddenly. There was a ghost of the familiar smirk that Hermione remembered from his years teaching at Hogwarts. This time, she was sure it was now mirrored on her face, along with traces of embarrassment at having given her former teacher an eyeful of her drenched bosom. She also thought she could detect a trace of uncertainty in his voice. That was odd. She had never known Snape to be uncertain – intense, unpleasant, sarcastic, certainly. But his voice had always held a surety in everything he had said.

"Oh. Well I suppose you don't want excessive details… you always did ask me to stop saying too much in class." Hermione couldn't resist saying pointedly. Snape had the grace to look slightly chastened. Only very slightly. "Suffice it to say that Ernie and I work well in a professional capacity, and that's as far as it goes. He proved himself rather too clingy for my taste."

For a moment, Snape looked utterly stunned. Then he looked crestfallen. And then… furious. Utterly furious. Hermione almost flinched with the power of his emotion, until she realised suddenly that his anger had not been directed at her, but at… himself?

"You… Weasley…?" Snape seemed at a loss for words. "I am sorry. I didn't know."

"Oh." Hermione stared at him in surprise. "I thought everybody knew. It was all over the Daily Prophet for what seemed like weeks. I stopped reading the papers after that."

"I stopped reading the Prophet after I got out of St Mungo's." Snape said, still looking chagrined. He didn't seem to want to say anything more, but Hermione had the urge to comfort him. Who would have thought that she would feel so affected by the kicked-puppy expression that Snape was currently wearing?

"Don't worry about it, Prof- I mean, Mr Snape. It wasn't working out between Ron and I. And it was years ago. I'm not horribly heartbroken or anything like that. To be honest it was a bit of a relief when it was over – we could both stop pretending that we were happy in the relationship."

Snape ran a hand over his face and seemed to recover. She reached out of pat his arm, and to her surprise found it trembling. Hermione was startled at how much the revelation of her and Ron's break-up had affected him. To be fair, the news that she had split with Ron seemed to have shocked everyone, with the exception of the now-former couple. There had been a lot of talk about "soul-mates" and how "it was meant to be!", particularly from Molly Weasley… But this seemed to be an uncharacteristic show of emotion from her formerly sarcastic, surly professor.

Of course, back then he had been playing a part, embodying an unpleasant persona to detract attention from who he really was. Perhaps she didn't actually know him at all.

Perhaps now she would actually have a chance to do just that.

Hermione gave him a small smile. "Shall we continue?"

To her great surprise, he smiled back.

:)