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Chapter 35: Accusation:
"Did it ever occur to you," Draco started, "that if you had come right back here and told me that there wasn't a contract, that things might have been different?"
Without lifting her head from her desk, she said, "That doesn't sound like a confession. That sounds more like an accusation to me." She lifted her head and said, "Let me ask you a couple of things."
"Go on with it then," he mocked her from a moment ago.
"Did you ever consider the fact that Adrian might have fired me in the beginning, the way he did those other two girls, if in fact, there was a contract?" she asked.
He took a couple of quick breaths and said, "I considered that. I thought it might happen, if he found out."
"Did you ever consider," she began again, "if you had been honest with Adrian in the beginning, about your feelings for me, that none of this would have happened, that he would have told YOU that there was no contract, and I would have been none the wiser and we wouldn't have faced so many hurdles this weekend."
He grimaced and said, more to himself, "Time for confessions." He sat upright and said, "That's the thing, Hermione. I think I was honest with him in the beginning. I wasn't harbouring some secret crush on you, some deep seeded unrequited love. I didn't feel an undying need to be with you. In the beginning, I really did see it as a challenge, as I've said, but more than that, it was a game, something new, because it was you. It also didn't hurt that I now found you attractive."
He stood up and walked over to her. Her expression hadn't changed, and he didn't know if that was good or bad. She was the epitome of apathy. "Remember how you said you changed your job, your hair, your car, and all of that because you wanted a challenge, right? You were stuck in one place. I felt sort of like that, too, it's just that you were my challenge. I mean, if I could get my former archenemy to fall for me, wouldn't that be something. You were so open and engaging that day in the lifts, that I thought it would be easy. I thought Adrian would be sort of impressed, because I not only pulled one over on him, bested him at his own game, but I bagged you, Hermione Granger, as well."
"Bagged me?" she asked. She felt tears begin to sting her eyes, but she WOULD NOT cry. She felt this was her just rewards. She wanted the man to be honest with her, so she couldn't fault him now.
He paused, because he could tell by her current expression that she was upset, which wasn't his intent, well, not fully. Mostly, he wanted to be honest for a change. Maybe he wanted a different life, too, just as she did.
He stood behind her chair, so she couldn't see his face. She stared out into the empty office and waited for more.
"Adrian knows me a bit too well," Draco continued, "I wanted to prove to him that his little contract couldn't stop me from something I really wanted. I wanted to sleep with you, rub it in his face, and if you got hurt or fired in the process, that was an added bonus."
She looked down at her lap. Her shoulders started to heave. She said, "I'm such a fool."
His hands came down on her shoulders, and she didn't have the fortitude to shrug them off. "Those were my honest to goodness intentions in the very beginning, and that's my confession to you. Only it was just in the very beginning, though. Only when I first hired you. It all changed after I got to thinking about you more and more, and then after you actually started work last Monday, it was no longer about that."
She put her arms on her desk again, and cradled her head on them. "If he had told you in the beginning that he wasn't going to have me sign the contract, what would you have done?"
He brought a hand up to her hair, and began to stroke it, as if it were the most natural thing in the world. He seemed nonplussed when he answered. "If he had told me that very first day, after I hired you in the lifts, that he wasn't going to have you sign it, because he just admitted to me in his office that was his intent from day one, then I probably wouldn't even have pursued you. What would have been the point?"
His hand went back up to the crown of her head, and he brought it back down slowly. "If he had told me on your first day of work, who knows? If he had told me after the staff meeting, after I held your hand after the meeting, I would still have planned to follow you to that bogus wedding. I would have still pretended to be your date, and I would have been determined to show you a nice birthday, and I am completely certain I would have still fallen in love with you."
He leaned down and kissed her exposed neck, from where he had just moved her hair. He whispered in her ear, "Somewhere along the way, I fell in love with you, Granger, and that's all that matters at the end of the day."
Without sitting up, with her head still on her arms, and her voice still weary, she said, "Adrian mentioned to me that you were looking at a news clipping about me, after you hired me. Why?"
"I didn't know Adrian saw that," he admitted. He knelt beside her chair. He put his arm across her back, his face close to hers, and although her eyes were closed, he saw tears. He said softly, "If he had bothered to read it he would have seen that it was about you getting your job at the Ministry, right out of Uni, all those years ago."
She opened her eyes, but didn't raise her head. "Why did you keep something like that?"
"Because I was up for the same job." He stood up again. He sat on the edge of the desk. He reached down for one of her arms, and pulled her to stand between his legs. She placed her head on his shoulder, her hands on his chest. He stroked her back, up and down. "I kept it because I swore that someday I would have some big payback for you, because if I had gotten that job, I might have been happy. I'm sorry, but that's the truth. I'm petty. I'm selfish. I'm self-centered and bitter. But I hope all of those things have diminished, and I'd like to think that I'm becoming a better man now, that I truly have changed, because of my love for you, and your love for me."
She was too numb to speak. He got his payback, all right, ten fold. She began to move her head side to side. She looked at him and said, "Is all of this the truth, and everything that happened this weekend, the lie?"
"No," he said, desperately, for the first time raising his voice. "Haven't you heard a word I've said? Please, not everything. You have to know that. Have you misunderstood? I felt something when I held your hand in the conference room, which was the start of this. I swear."
He held her arms, pushing her slightly away from him, and he stood up from the desk. "When I followed you to the resort, my intentions had already changed. Were they still slightly shallow, yes, because instead of seeking revenge against you, or my need to best Pucey, my intentions at that time were totally my own and selfish still. You intrigued me, I thought you were pretty and smart and witty. I wanted to know you better, and possibly sleep with you. If I had known how to recognize an honest emotion back then, I might have even realized that my feelings were something more the moment that I stepped on your toe, if truth be told."
She tried to move from his grasp, which caused him to tighten his hold. "I know when I really decided it was different," he said.
"I don't want to hear anymore," she pleaded.
"You damn well, will," he said, raising his voice again. "When I sat next to you on the blanket, when I first arrived at the resort, I knew I wanted more. What that entailed at the time, I didn't have a clue. When you tried on that dress, and I walked in the dressing room, I swear, you were so beautiful and I wanted to kiss you so badly that I almost spontaneously combusted!"
"When that bloke that was your blind date maligned your character, and said all those nasty things about you, I wanted to punch him in the nose, although now that I know how much it hurts to hit someone, I will probably use magic in the future."
She looked down. He placed his thumb under her chin, to force her to look back up. "Even though everything he had said about you were feelings I had felt at sometime in my life for you, I knew in that moment that I didn't feel that way anymore. I wanted to defend you against him. It's one thing for me to think such things, but no one say's anything unkind about Hermione Granger, but me." He tried to smile. He wanted to lighten the mood. He was doing a terrible job of it.
"As I said, maybe if I had known how to recognize honest emotions earlier, I might have honestly fallen in love with you sooner than that," he ended.
"What do you want from me?" she asked, her voice cracking. "What do you want me to say? Do you want me to forgive you and go on, even though a moment ago you said that you wouldn't forgive me?" She walked away from him, and continued, speaking so softly that he had to strain to listen. "I don't know what you want me to do. I can't…I can't work here. Now that there's no contract, I know if I quit I can seek other employment. First thing tomorrow, I'll see a solicitor about signing the resort back over to you. I can't keep it now."
"It's yours!" he said desperately. "That's what was written on the last note! I gave the resort to you. I even put the whole thing in your name, instead of keeping half for myself. I don't want it back. The note said that I bought it for you to solve our problems."
"I know, Draco!" she shouted. "I lied when I said I hadn't read it! I lied! I read it!" She sat in her chair again and repeated, "I lied."
He wanted to continue to try to convince her, but he didn't want to beat a dead horse. He said, "One last thing. Everything I told you, about the way I feel for you now, and everything that happened from our date Friday night, to before Adrian's confession, was the truth, and damn you to hell if you don't believe me."
He turned to go, walked out the door, reached the hallway, but somehow, he couldn't go any farther. He was a coward if he left it like this. He heard her crying. He didn't know if he could repair the damage that he had done. He shouldn't have told her the truth. He should have come in here, forgiven her, because after all, he forgave Pucey, and he didn't even like Pucey half as much as he loved her. He should have kept his little confession to himself, and buried it deep inside. She would never have been the wiser.
And she wouldn't be crying right now. He leaned against the hallway wall, and continued to listen to her cry for the longest time. He had a feeling that she had to know he was still out there. She finally stood up, shut off her light, and closed her door. She walked right past him. He followed. She walked to Adrian's office, opened the outer door, and slipped something on his secretary's desk. Draco slipped in behind her, and saw that it was a letter of resignation, effective in two weeks, also known as a 'two week notice'. How dare she. Well, he would make her last two weeks heaven, or hell. It was totally up to her. He placed her letter back on the desk and ran out into the hall to catch her.
She was in front of the lifts, and she pushed the button.
Draco walked up behind her.
She got on the lifts, and he got on as well. She looked ahead, he looked at her. He took his wand, and stopped the lifts.
He walked around to face her. His eyes were gleaming brightly. He pushed her toward the wall, with one hand. He cupped her neck with the other, his thumb on her jaw. He leaned down and kissed her hard on the mouth. He kissed her, and forced her mouth open under his. He lifted his face from hers once, then bent his head again, and placed his mouth back upon hers, gentler this time.
He kissed her tenderly, sweetly, and passionately. He rested his forehead against hers. "You wanted the truth, and now you're running away, what does that say about you?" he accused.
She placed her hand, dispassionately, on his face and said, "Remember when I told you that I was hurt once by a man, but that once was enough? Remember when I told you not to hurt me, and you said that you wouldn't? You lied about that, too, didn't you? You've hurt me, more than I thought possible. More than that man did."
"Why did you stop seeing him?" Draco asked.
She threw her arms around him, which surprised him. Then she said, "He was a liar, Draco. He lied to me, and I could never trust him again." She pushed away from him and said, "If for no other reason, thank you for a nice birthday. It was still the best I've ever had." She reached in her purse, and handed him the last, little triangle-note. He had forgotten about it. "Here, I won't need this now." She stuffed it in his jacket pocket.
She used her wand to start the lifts. As soon as the bell dinged, and she reached the lobby and disapparated away, without a single glance back.
He stood in the lobby and realized that he deserved the pain he was feeling, because he had promised her he wouldn't hurt her, and he had, although at the time that wasn't a lie. He never set out to hurt her, not really.
He also knew that the truth was a load of shite. Lying was definitely easier to deal with, and easier to face. It hurt him less to lie, and it would have hurt her less if he had continued to lie. Starting tomorrow, he would win her back, with truths or lies.
He looked at the last note, and even though he knew what it said, he opened it.
His mouth flew open in shock when he read what was now written on the note. She had changed it, somewhere along the way, probably before their confessions. She had changed it! He folded it back neatly, stuffed it in his pocket, and began to formulate a plan, right then and there, of how he would win her back.
He thought it was time to up the ante; make her realize that she couldn't quit either him or the company! It might even be time for drastic measures. For that, he had to call someone he hadn't spoken to in a long time, Ginny Weasley.
A/N This was to be the second to the last chapter, but after I wrote the last chapter, I found myself drawn to my computer and I wrote a chapter to go between this one and the last, which means there will be two more. Thanks. I'll post again soon. (I sent a PM to the person who is to pick my next project, but haven't heard back yet. If I don't hear back from them, I'll pick myself. Thanks!)