All characters belong to JKR
Chapter 2 – Lies:
Hermione went home that night and tried not to think about Draco Malfoy, which only made her think about him more. She was certain that he was flirting with her tonight, or in the very least he was 'coming on' to her, and what was with the hand holding?
He was her boss, for goodness sakes! That could be construed as sexual harassment…even if it did feel somewhat nice to think that he might like her.
Oh goodness, he didn't like her! What was she, a child? Did people on the verge of 30 years old like each other? Not likely.
She packed for her weekend trip. She was now granted a whole extra day off from work by her new boss, so she had decided to leave directly from work on Thursday. She called the resort and asked them if she could up her reservation by one day, and they said that was doable.
After she packed, showered, and got ready for bed, she decided to call Ginny.
"How did your first three days of work go?" Ginny asked.
"It was odd, and to tell you the truth, I still don't really know what I do," she said. Ginny laughed. "I called to confirm some things about my blind date."
"Oh, Hermione, can't you just relax?" Ginny asked.
"They are just standard questions!"
"Which you've probably already asked me, but go on," her friend said.
"Okay, now, you say that on Friday evening he'll meet me in the lobby at seven o'clock, right?" Hermione heard Ginny yawn. She took that to be a yes. "And you say that he'll have on a white rose, and that I'm to have a white rose in my hair, right?" she tried to confirm.
"You already know all of this!" Ginny wailed.
"Fine, just tell me, does he have a job?" Hermione expressed.
"I told you he does, although why he has to be employed for you to have a blind date with him is beyond me. It's not like you're marrying him, but still, I know you wouldn't want to date anyone unemployed. What do you take me for, an idiot? Would I fix you up with a loser?" she asked.
"How well do you know him?" Hermione asked.
Hermione heard Ginny sigh but then she said, "I don't know him, alright? Don't be angry. I know some things about him, but I've never met him."
Hermione was so outraged that she had yet to speak. Ginny hastened to add, "But my good mate from work knows him really well, and when she told me all about him, I knew he'd be perfect for you. He's intelligent, hardworking, good-looking, and he's never been married."
"What's wrong with him?" Hermione asked.
"What do you mean?" Ginny asked through the phone.
"How old is this phantom man whom you lied about knowing?" Hermione prodded.
"I was told he's your age!" Ginny clipped.
"Then why isn't he married, or at the very least, with a woman?" Hermione barked into the phone.
"Why aren't you married, or at the very least with a man?" Ginny countered.
Hermione almost hung up the phone, but instead, she saw that Ginny had a point.
"Do you at least know his name?" Hermione finally asked.
Ginny sighed, for the second time and said, "Can't you just go with the flow, and be excited about the mystic of having a date with a mystery man?"
"No," she answered truthfully. "Please tell me."
"His name is Evan. That's all I know. My work mate never told me his last name, but she talks about him all the time, because they grew up together, and it's always 'Evan this,' and 'Evan that' with her. Please, just try to have fun. The new Hermione would try to have fun. Perhaps she should have the blind date, and not you."
"Very funny, Ginevra!" Hermione hung up her phone.
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Finishing up some last minute details in her office, though she didn't know if they were important to her new job or not, Hermione was on her knees, behind her desk, reaching underneath for a Muggle pen that she had dropped when she heard a voice say, "Hey, Granger are you here?"
She popped her head up. "You scared me!" She placed her hand on her chest.
"I've heard that from many people," Draco said back with a smile from the doorway.
For some reason, she stayed on her knees. Draco Malfoy sauntered into the room, a smug smile on his face and he said, "I know you worship me, but seriously, you don't have to grovel on your knees in front of me. I except money, as well as groveling." He held out his hand.
She placed her hand in his, surprising them both, and she said, "Help me up."
"Is that a command?" he asked.
She looked up at him and said, "It's a request."
"Then what's the two magic words?" he asked. He was still holding her hand. She looked at their clasped hands and thought it was odd that in the space of two days he had held her hand. This time though, she had offered it to him willingly.
She asked, "Is one of them please?" That was the only one she could think of, so she looked at him confused.
"Think harder," he said. He sat on the corner of her desk, still holding her hand.
She frowned and asked, "Hurry up? Are those the two magic words? Because my knees hurt." In addition, she felt rather odd, and thought she was in a precarious position, and it would be a hard position to explain if a fellow employee walked by.
He said, "They are, 'Please Master'."
She pulled her hand from his, used the chair for purpose, and hoisted herself up. She threw the pen on the desk and pushed her chair in. She started to put papers in her briefcase, and noticed that he was sitting on one of her folders.
"I need to take that folder with me," she said. She pointed at the folder under his rump.
He moved slightly to the side, and she pulled it out from under him quickly. She blushed as she pushed it into her briefcase. She turned to him and said, "Why are you here?" She sounded annoyed.
He shook his head and said, "Must I remind you daily that I'm the boss, and I deserve respect?"
"Apparently so," she said seriously.
However, that statement made him laugh. She was being disagreeable, just as he had remembered her being, and he liked that. Too many people here were sickening sweet to him, and others were borderline terrorized. She was neither, and he wouldn't tell her this, because it would give her an advantage over him, but he liked it when she was surly and brisk. He liked it when she said smart remarks to him. It reminded him that he was just a normal bloke, like everyone else. It reminded him not to take himself too seriously.
He popped off the desk and while she was placing one more file in her briefcase, she was extremely conscious of the fact that he was standing right behind her. She felt slightly off kilter having him so close, and she wasn't sure why. He walked around her and sat on the other side of her desk! She felt even more confused. What did he want?
"Thank you for giving me tomorrow off work," she suddenly said, just to have something to say.
He looked at the carpet. He felt slightly distracted by her, and suddenly uncomfortable, so he pushed himself off her desk again and said, "Anytime." He walked around her desk as she got her purse out of the bottom drawer. He asked, "Are you ready for your four-day weekend?"
When she started to answer, she noticed that he was sitting back on her desk, on the same side as he was on originally. She didn't know what to make of his actions, except that he was acting almost as if he was a caged animal, and she was about to be his meal! He crossed his legs at the ankles, and folded his arms tightly in front of him.
Instead of answering him, she said, "Wouldn't it be nice if all work weeks only consisted of four days of work, to be followed by a four-day weekend?"
He regarded that statement only briefly and said, "That's eight days, and a week only has seven days. Please tell me that I didn't hire an imbecile."
She was about to say something scathing to him, but instead she said, through clenched teeth, (which he found rather amusing) "I have to remember that you're the boss, so I can't call you a name back, can I?"
"Oh, go on, I dare you," he said, challenging her, although he looked serious. "If you can't think of a proper name to call me, at least say something scathing back to me."
"Very well, I would have said that I'm surprise that you can count as high as eight, but that wouldn't have been very nice of me, would it have been?" she asked. "However, mummy must be so proud that you can count that high, and you don't even need to take off your shoes and socks."
He wanted to laugh, but instead he cleared his throat and said, "Must I remind you that I'm the boss, and that you should show me respect?"
She looked indignant for a moment and said, "Must I remind you that you told me to go at it, and also, you called me an imbecile, and I don't think that a boss is allowed to do that." She pointed her finger right at his chest. He looked down at her finger, and then back at her face, with one eyebrow raised in a challenge.
What he was challenging, she would never know, but she withdrew her finger quickly.
"Look at the employement contract you signed. I can call you all sorts of names," he joked. She looked down and began to fiddle with one of the fasteners of her briefcase. She couldn't get it to close. He stood up, again behind her, again throwing her off balance just by his nearness, which again confused her because dammit, he didn't like her, and she didn't like him, in fact, she sort of found him annoying. He reached around her with his right hand, and closed the fastener.
She turned to say thank you, but he was altogether too close, and she forgot how to speak. She turned back toward the desk, which was a stupid thing to do, because he was even closer now, if that was possible. She felt his breath on her neck. The room was oddly quiet, sans for their breathing, which was synchronized and harmonized. He looked at the side of her neck, though her hair covered most of, and saw that it was taut and strained, and he could tell that she was unnerved by his nearness.
Well, good for her, because for some reason he was unnerved, too, and he didn't like it any better than she appeared to, because he surely didn't really like her. He might desire her, sure, because she was a beautiful woman, and he was a beautiful man. He looked down her back, and his right hand came up from the briefcase and stroked her arm and he saw her go rigid. He didn't even know what possessed him to touch her like that. Could it be temporary insanity? If she sued him in court, that's what he would claim.
His fingers went lightly down her arm, which was covered by a lilac jumper, of the softest material he had ever felt. His eyes went down her back, to her bum, to her legs. She had dark black pumps on, and a dark grey pencil skirt and he swallowed down the knot that was suddenly in his throat.
What to do, what to do. He could stay here, and continue to feel her arm, which would be idiotic, but then again, she wasn't exactly doing anything about it either. The sound of her breath quickened, and mingled with her quicker pulse, and he swore it matched his own. She started to turn around again, but he said, "Don't move."
"Malfoy," she tried to warn.
"Really, don't move," he whispered. The button on his French cuff snagged on her sweater, near her shoulder. He said, "I'm stuck."
She turned her head slightly, not knowing what he meant, but then she noticed that his gaze was to her shoulder, so she looked at her shoulder quickly. He wasn't kidding. He was stuck.
"It's a new jumper, Malfoy, so please, don't make a hole."
"Making a hole was not my intention," he snapped back.
She wondered why he sounded angry. She turned her head away from him and frowned. "What was your intention?" she blurted out.
He didn't want to answer that, because he hardly knew his intention. He did know one thing: if he wasn't so damn close, and feeling her arm, this wouldn't have happened. "There's only one way to solve this problem. Take your shirt off." Then he laughed, because he felt they both needed some levity about now.
She turned back around and said, "You take your shirt off!"
"Must I remind you…" he started.
"You're the boss, blah!" she finished. She said, "Use magic, oh master."
He laughed at her again, and he took out his wand and the small piece of yarn, which was attached to his button, unraveled, however it did make a small snag. Her hand went to her shoulder, and she said in disappointment, "I liked this, too."
"I'll get you a new one," he said matter of fact.
"Forget it. Listen, I have to go." She moved around the other side of the desk, picked up her purse and briefcase, and started toward the door. She placed her things on the chair by her door as she slipped her jacket on, and he was busy enjoying the scenery, which was Hermione Granger herself, when she turned back to him and added, "I'll see you Tuesday."
He walked around to the front of the desk and said, "Tuesday, right. So, who did you say was getting married?"
"What?" she asked. She had forgotten that she told him that lie about going to a wedding this weekend.
To an inexperience liar, her little 'what?' wouldn't have meant a thing, but to a liar of Draco Malfoy's caliber, it was very telling. He walked closer to her and reminded her, "You said you were going to a wedding this weekend."
"Oh," she said, sounding surprised. She tried to cover it with a laugh and she added, "Of course, well, it's my cousin's wedding."
Draco thought she was digging her own grave, because she really was a terrible liar. "Aren't you Muggle born?"
"Draco Malfoy, you spent seven years of my life making sure I was always reminded that I was a Muggle born, so you know the answer to that," she scolded.
He thought, 'Well, ouch,' but he said, "What I meant was, isn't Serpent Cove a magical resort?"
OH NO! She didn't know how to cover this blunder. She licked her dry lips, which caused him not only amusement, but also a slight twinge of something slightly more wicked, and she said, "She's marrying a Wizard."
"Right," he said slowly, drawling out the word. He thought she seemed more confused than ever, and her confused countenance caused him to take pity on her. He said, "Well, have fun." He knew he was going to have a blast. He now knew two things…she wasn't really going to a wedding, and he was going to have fun surprising her this weekend. The only thing he didn't know, and the thing that made him more curious by the second, was why did she have to lie about going to a wedding? What were her real plans for the weekend, and why did she have to lie about things? It seemed there was more to this "New Hermione Granger" than he originally thought.
He leaned out the door of her office as she practically ran down the corridor. He smiled and decided that he had better go home and pack for his four-day weekend.