All characters belong to JKR

Chapter 4: Pre-Date:

Relaxing in the bath, Hermione heard someone knocking on the door to her suite. She sat upright, abruptly, and wondered for one millisecond if it was Malfoy at the door. Then she wondered for a half a millisecond why she cared. Surely, she didn't want Malfoy to interrupt her bath. Surely, she didn't want him to show up expected at her door. Except for some reason, she did, and she half-expected it. She heard another knock, stood up from the tub, wrapped herself in a robe and padded to the door.

She opened it slowly, peeked out the crack, and saw one of the bellhops. For a quarter of a millisecond (and no more), she was disappointed that it wasn't Malfoy.

"I have three packages for you, Miss Granger," the pimply face young man said with a smile. He looked her up and down while she turned to retrieve a galleon from her purse, she handed him the tip and he placed all three parcels on the sofa in her sitting room. The boy left and Hermione sat on the couch and examined all three packages.

The first one was expected. It was a clear, long container, with a single white rose. Hermione placed it on the end of the sofa and opened the next box. It was from the dress shop. She already feared (rejoiced?) at what it might be. It was the dress. She shook it from the box and smiled. Okay fine, she'll keep it. There wasn't a note, but she already knew that it was from him.

She went to hang it up in the small bedroom and then went back out to the main room and opened the last box. Inside were a dozen red roses, and a note that read: "Looking forward to our date."

Hermione had hoped they were from Malfoy, but then reasoned that she should have known better. Well, that was nice of her blind date. How did he know she was staying at the resort? For all he knew, she could just be meeting him here. She decided not to question things, and just be happy that she got roses. She was a different woman nowadays, and the New Hermione wouldn't question such things. She would just be happy that things were.

She arranged the flowers in a vase that sat on the small round table by the balcony doors. She looked out at the late afternoon sky. She needed to get ready for her date. She went to get dressed.

At 6:45 pm, she decided to go wait for her date outside. They were supposed to meet in the lobby at seven, but she was a bundle of nerves, so she decided to wait for him outside. She knew she was early, but perhaps he would be early, too.

She walked down the long wrap-around porch of the large hotel, which started as a portico around the front, and wrapped around to veranda at the end of the dining room. That end overlooked the beach, and had a wonderful view of the cove and the lagoon. She could see boats out on the sea. She leaned against the railing and took a deep breath of the sea air. She still felt anxious.

That was when she realized that something was terribly wrong. She wasn't anxious to meet her date. She was anxious to see Draco again. She must be crazy. She walked back down toward the front doors. On one of the deck chairs, by the front of the hotel, she saw HIM. He had on a beige coloured suit, an off-white shirt, a cream coloured tie, and she thought he looked dashing.

It was Draco, not her date.

She thought he looked dashing. She would tell him that, but he would probably tell her that she was using an old woman word again, and tell her that her employment contract prohibited her from calling him anything but gorgeous, handsome, beautiful, etc.

She almost approached him, because a small part of her wanted him to see that she had on the dress that he bought, and that she looked nice, and would that be so wrong? She decided that it would. She was supposed to meet her date tonight, and Draco didn't fit in the equation. Besides, he would probably find fault in her somehow. He would say that her hair should be down, that her shoes were ugly, or that the white rose on her chest looked stupid. He would tease her about her blind date, and make a comment about how it was a good thing the man was blind so he wouldn't have to see her.

As she pondered these dark thoughts, she felt a bit ashamed for thinking them. He wasn't the same mean, spiteful, pureblooded bully that he was in school. Did she really expect that sort of action from him now? Hadn't he already shown that he was marginally nicer? He was still a git, but he was no longer a spiteful arse.

She retreated through a side door, which led to the dining room. She didn't want to see him any longer, and she wasn't sure why. He turned from his deck chair just as she turned and slipped inside the door. He only saw her back. He wondered if she had seen him? He hoped not. He was waiting for her date to arrive.

He sat back down just as a tall, thin, pointed nose man with a white rose in the buttonhole of his lapel walked up the main stairs toward the door. Draco sprang into action. He felt inside his jacket pocket for his own white rose. It was still tucked safely inside.

Draco thought to himself, 'Showtime,' and he walked toward the man, feeling slightly sorry for him, but only for a moment. After all, all was fair in 'whatever the hell he felt for Hermione' and war.

Before the man walked through the doors, Draco approached him and said, "Excuse me, but I think you're just the chap I was waiting to see. My name is Draco Malfoy."

The man looked at Draco with an air of indifference and said, "Listen Mister, whatever you're selling, I'm not interested."

He thought Draco was some sort of solicitor! "Well, you're a rude bugger," Draco said aloud, though he meant only to think it. He no longer felt sorry for the man, and he was now glad that he was saving Granger from such an arse-hole. He was performing a public service by dismissing this man. He continued, "I'm not selling anything, at least nothing that you could afford." He pointed to the white rose on the man's jacket and said, "Are you meeting a woman for a blind date tonight."

The man gave Draco a smarmy glare and said, "What's it to you, Mister?"

"Listen you overgrown, lanky, stupid, greasy-haired git," Draco said. "Do you have a date with Hermione Granger tonight or not? Because if you do, I need to tell you that she had to cancel."

"Merlin's sake!" the man responded, ignoring all the names Draco had just called him. "My date is with Hermione Granger?"

"Well not any more, but it was," Draco retorted.

"What happened to her?" he asked.

"She had to work this weekend. Her boss is a prick and made her work straight through the weekend, so she sent me to tell you that she couldn't make it," Draco explained.

The man reached over for Draco's hand, began to pump it up and down, and said, "Oh my, well, too bad, rotten luck and all, I mean for her, but damn lucky for me I guess."

Draco pulled his hand from the man's and asked, "What do you mean?"

"I mean you saved me, old boy," the idiot said. "If I had known that my friend fixed me up with Hermione, the queen of the Mudbloods, the famous Know-it-All, One Third of the Golden Trio, Granger, I never would have agreed to go. My friend must have thought it was right funny to set me up with her. I bet she's having a good old laugh about now. Then again, she might not know this, but I can't stand that woman!"

"WHY?" Draco demanded. He was going to yell at the man for calling her a Mudblood, but hell, he had called her that name most of their lives, so he would let that one pass.

"Why? I went to school with them. The golden trio, that is. They were three years younger than I was; in fact, I think I remember you, too. The thing is that I could never stand any of them. Most of the people in my house thought they were a bunch of self-righteous harpies."

Draco felt like slapping the man upside his head. He said, "For your information, she really canceled the date. She found out the date was with you, she remembered that you were the biggest prick in Ravenclaw, and she cancelled!"

"I was in Hufflepuff!" he stated.

"HA!" Draco laughed and said, "Then that's probably the sole reason she stood you up!" Draco hated this man with a passion. What was wrong with Hermione Granger? She was good enough for Draco to like, so that meant there was nothing wrong with her. He felt utter contempt and loathing for the man. He even took the rose out of the man's buttonhole, threw it on the ground, and smashed it with his foot.

The man turned around and huffed off, as Draco said, "Hufflepuffs are all whores and has-beens!" A man walking into the doors turned to look at Draco, and Draco said, "Well, they are."

Draco turned to walk in the lobby and he found Hermione immediately. She was wringing her hands and staring at a big grandfather clock, which stood in the corner of the massive lobby. The clock read 7:17 pm. She probably thought she was stood up.

Draco walked over to her and she stood up. His frown softened and he smiled as he approached her. "I like your dress," he said.

She looked down at her dress and said, "I think it's nice. Thank you, by the way."

He smiled. She looked back at the clock. He said, "When's your blind date arriving?"

"I think maybe he stood me up," she said. She started to remove the flower from her right breast. He stunned her when he reached up to still her hand.

"Don't," he commanded. "Keep it on. It looks nice." He released her hand, and then he reached in his pocket, pulled out his rose, and placed it in his boutonniere. Her mouth came open in bewilderment. He held out his arm and said, "Shall we?"

She shook her head. "No…you aren't my date."

"I think I am," he protested. "I even sent you roses today. Did you like them?" He would never tell her that her real date didn't want to meet her. It was his intention all along to bully the man into leaving, and to take his place, but now that the truth was that the man didn't want to date her anyway, well, it made Draco feel differently. He wasn't sure what he felt, because he didn't feel sorry for her. It was impossible to feel sorry for someone like her. There was no reason for it. The truth was though; he wanted to spare her feelings, now. Even if the bloke had really stood her up, he would have wanted to spare her feelings. He held out his hand and said, "Shall we go to dinner?"

She backed up against the wall. "Did you know?"

He walked up to her, close as could be, and looked down. "Did I know what?"

"Did you know that your blind date was with me all along, because, I was told mine was with someone named Evan," she explained.

"I knew," he said, which really wasn't a lie. He knew that he had intended to be her date tonight, even if that wasn't the original plan that she knew.

"Why didn't you tell me?" she asked.

"Would you have gone?" he asked, seriously.

"You should have told me," she said without answering. "This isn't some joke, or an elaborate plan to make fun of me, is it?"

That statement angered him and he took a step back. "Hermione, is that what you really think of me?" He seemed more hurt and angry.

She felt slightly bad. She looked down. She said, "I'm sorry. This is just a shock." She looked back at him and sat on a small loveseat by the fireplace. He sat beside her.

"A bad shock or a good shock?" he inquired.

"Draco, we can't date, not even one date. I work for you," she said.

He shook his head and said, "I could fire you for the night. Rehire you tomorrow."

She couldn't help but giggle at that statement. "Ginny Weasley is in so much trouble," she finally said. She reached up for her rose again and removed it from her dress. She fiddled with it, moving it from one hand to the other, and then stroking one of the pedals with a finger.

He reached over and covered her hands with one of his. She didn't have the resolve to look up at him. She actually leaned toward his body. He said, "We both have to eat, right?"

She nodded, but kept her eyes downcast. He took one of her hands and put it between both of his. She looked over at their hands. He seemed captivated by her hand. The thumb of his right hand traced the veins on the back of her hand, as it lay in his left hand. Then he closed it tightly in both of his and said, "Let's just go eat. It's just dinner, not a date."

She removed her hand from his. He looked over at her and noticed that she was looking toward the front desk. He turned toward the front desk too, just as one of the desk clerks was pointing toward Hermione. Her blind date stood in front of the desk, and followed the line of the man's hand. He walked over to Hermione and Draco. Draco quickly stood, with Hermione standing a moment later.

He looked at Draco and as he approached the pair he said, "I really do recall you now, Malfoy. You always were a little bastard." He turned to Hermione Granger and said, "Listen, Granger, I'm Evan Baxter. I was your date tonight, and I was about to leave, but I decided to call my friend Marcy first, and ask her why she set me up with a woman like you, who didn't even have the nerve to cancel the date on her own."

Hermione was beyond confused. She turned to Draco. He shrugged his shoulders, to denote that he didn't know what the crazy man was saying, and he leaned over to whisper in her ear, "Let's get away from the mad man, Hermione. Once I buy this place, I'll screen all people to prohibit lunatics from entering." He tried to pull her away but she remained firmly in place.

She shook her arm from Draco's hands and said to the man, "Who are you again?"

The man held up a squished rose, which he must have picked up from the ground, and said, "I was your date! How dare you cancel on me! I called Marcy to give her a piece of my mind, but she assured me that you had changed, and that she knew that you were staying here this weekend! Well, you know what? No one makes a fool out of Evan Baxter!"

Draco leaned toward Hermione again and said, "Except for Evan Baxter, apparently."

Hermione pushed Draco away from her so hard that he landed back on the loveseat.

She said to Evan, "I was stood up by you! Well who cares, no, wait…" She turned to Draco. "You said you were my blind date!" She stomped her foot, as she was apt to do, and she turned back to Evan and said, "You were relieved that I stood up you, aye? Well bully for you! I remember you from school! You were a rotten piece of work back then, and you still are, so go away! You're bothering me!" She reached for Draco's hand and said to him, "Come, Malfoy. I have to eat so I might as well eat with you!"

She marched with him toward the dining room. Once out of sight of the other man, Hermione rounded on him and said, "What are you playing at, Malfoy?"

"Listen, I saw the man out front, I saw his white rose, and I heard you tell the desk clerk that you would know your date from a rose, so I knew he had to be your date. I told him that you canceled."

"Why?"

"Hey listen, Granger," Draco tried to defend, "he was maligning your character before! He said all sorts of things about you to me! He even said you were a Mudblood! He said he couldn't stand you and if he had known the date was with you he never would have shown! Besides, he was in Hufflepuff, for Merlin's sake!"

Draco immediately knew he had said too much.

Hermione backed away and said, "Goodbye." She started toward the lifts. She pushed the button for the third floor just as Draco ran into the lift.

"Listen, Granger!"

"Please…I don't care anymore. I try to change, but still, I guess it's no use." She leaned against the wall.

He leaned along with her and he pulled out his wand and once again stopped a lift, just as he did that day at his office. He said, "Why do you want to change everything so much, Granger?"

She turned her head toward the wall and said, "I don't know."

"Yes you do," he reprimanded. "Tell me."

"Because of people like him." She sat down on the floor, her legs crossed at the ankles. Draco sat down beside her. "Because of people like you."

"Why do you say that?" he asked. He was now the one that looked away.

"Okay, here goes," she said. She turned to face him and she tapped on his shoulder. He looked at her. "If you had seen me again on the street somewhere, not in the lifts at your company, would you have come up and talked to me? Would you have flirted with me?"

He said nothing.

"If we were passing each other in Diagon Alley, would you have held my hand, like you did in the conference room the other day? You know you wouldn't have. You might have said hello to me, sure, but you wouldn't have said much else. That man out there had a preconceived notion about me, and he's not too far off the mark, but just as I'm sure its not easy for you to be Draco Malfoy sometimes, it's not always easy to be Hermione Granger, either."

"Same question to you, Granger," he said. He reached over to the hem of her dress, and played with the material, which she found odd. "If you had seen me at a restaurant a month ago, and I had asked you to have a drink with me, and don't look at me like that, it might have happened, but what would you have done? Would you have laughed at my face? Would you have said, 'thanks, but no thanks,' or would you have made an exception, thrown out your old theories about me, and accepted me for who I am now?"

He was right.

Hermione said, "We'll never know now."

He hurried to stand and he said, "Get up."

"What?"

"Get up!" He held out his hand to help her to stand. She slowly placed her hand in his. He pulled her up. He rubbed his thumb back and forth on top of her hand. They had held hands more times than she could count this week, and each time felt different, but exhilarating. She felt the hair on the back of her neck bristle at the experience of her hand in his. She looked up into his eyes, as if in slow motion. She heard the steady sound of his breathing. His eyes were so intense…silver, or grey, with perhaps a bit of blue. She felt hot. He was so different, and she was pleased. He was still Draco Mafloy, after all. Was she insane?

He wanted nothing more than to pull her to him and kiss her all night. What lunacy was this? He had desired women before, even lusted after them, but this was different and he didn't know why. He wanted to touch her every moment he was with her. He had since he stepped on her foot last Friday in the lifts at his office. As he held onto her hand, he knew that she was different. She was different, but not because she was the 'new Hermione' but because she was different from all the other women that he had ever known.

He let go of her hand and the magic between them was lost, but only for a moment.

He placed his hand on her shoulder and pushed her toward the back of the car. He said, "Pretend you don't know who I am."

"What?" she repeated.

He flicked her forehead with his finger. He said, "Just stand there, is that too much to ask?"

He started the lifts again and when the door opened, he said, "Stay there." He exited the elevators. She stayed there. The doors immediately opened again and he walked on the elevators. He pushed a button and turned to face the wall. She stood there, confused. A split second later, he looked behind his shoulder and he said, "Is that who I think it is? Why, Hermione Granger? You look wonderful. I haven't seen you in years. Imagine us both being in the same hotel at the same time."

She stifled a smile and she said, "I would have recognized you anywhere, Draco Malfoy. How are you?"

"Pretty good, and you?"

"I'm great," she said.

"Excellent. See much of Scarhead these days?"

"Yes. Are you still working for your father?" she asked.

"Heavens no, I have my own business." The doors opened and he said, "I'm going to the dining room, I don't suppose you would like to join me, would you?"

He held the lift doors open. She thought for a moment. She walked up to him and placed her hand on his shoulder. In earnest she said, "Let's pretend that just for tonight, that this is who we are now, okay? There's no boss/employee relationship, there's no blind date mix up, or anything. We haven't seen each other in years, okay?"

He leaned forward and felt her forehead. His hand lingered there and he said, "Are you delusional? What is this boss-employee nonsense? What blind date? I just wanted to have dinner with you, Granger, but if you need to see your psychotherapist instead, I understand." He removed his hand slowly, letting his fingers skim down her cheek, to her jaw, to her neck. He let it rest on her shoulder. Now they were both touching the other person's shoulder, and the magic between them was back.

She bit her bottom lip, grinned and said, "I would love to join you for dinner." He pulled her toward him, and was about to kiss her, but once again, he changed his mind. They had all evening for a kiss.

"Excellent." He held out his arm for her. She placed her hand in the crook of his arm, and they walked arm in arm toward the dining room, reminiscing as old friends often do.