Chapter 3

"Why were you at Borgin and Burkes?" Scorpius says, asking the first of many questions, eyebrows wrinkled in distaste.

"'Cous I'm badass," I reply, wincing when he prods my knee with his finger.

"Yeah, and you look really badass now," he says sarcastically, nose wrinkling at the sight of my mangled knee.

I thwach the back of his head, hard, whilst he complains loudly.

"Gee, thanks. I saved your arse like a freaking knight and this is how you repay me," he says, annoyed.

"You didn't save my arse, Malfoy," I snap, "just my virginity. And I know you did that so you could have it yourself," I say. I don't expect any respose: it was a joke, after all. But soon, Malfoys sickily pale complection takes on some shade of magneta, telling me that I've hit the spot.

Okay, I wouldn't describe Malfoy as sickly, per se. All the girls at school are tripping over themselves to get his hands on him, and he plays along with it, a new girl cradled on his arm every week. His eyes are a pasty grey, skin unordinarily pale and… well, I'd say that he has some muscle, but I guess that's from playing Quidditch.

"Why were you there anyways?" I ask, curious. I know that Malfoy's Dad was a Death Eater, but I didn't know that his son carried the same trait.

Considering this, I shuffle away from Malfoy slightly.

I know my parents were killed by revenging Death Eaters who still wanted Voldermort in power, but could one of them have been Scorpius' Dad? Don't be silly, Rose, I tell myself. The people that killed Mum, Dad and Hugo were captured, remember? But that inkling that it could have been Malfoy's Dad has me on edge.

I sigh, brain worn out from the slight amount of thinking, rubbing my hands over my face tiredly.

Malfoy competeley ignores my question. "You're going to have to go to St. Mungos."

I outright ignore that idea, and to show him that I can walk, I push myself out of the chair and take a step forward.

Bad move.

I end up tumbling forward, and to take the attention off myself, ask Malfoy another embarrasing question.

"Were you stalking me?"

He shakes his head.

"Are you good with wandwork?"

He smirks. "Whatcha after, sweetheart?"

"Fix my fucking leg." He groans, a hand running down his face.

"I can't do that."

I sigh, looping one of my arms around his waist. For some weird reason, I feel like crying. My life's gone to shit and I wanna cry. How stupid.

"Do your hands hurt?" I inquire as Scorpious pulls me closer.

He shakes his head.

I laugh a tinkling laugh. "You're far too manly for that, right?" I say, moving my hand from his waist before slapping his arse.

He turns to face me, lips holding a smirk. "You're a handful, you know that, right?" I grin, then go and bury my face in his shoulder.

"Hurry. My leg hurts like a bitch," I whisper before breathing in his amazing scent.

Finally remembering the task at hand, Malfoy begins his journey to the hospital which is apparently not too far away.

"Can we sit down somewhere for a bit?" I ask ten minutes into the trip. We'd just reached Diagon Alley and I felt so damn tired.

I could feel him shaking his head from where my neck was hidden. "You're bleeding too much," he explains. "You've lost enough blood as it is."

Well, that was true. Currently, the only heat source was Malfoy as having no blood made you very cold.

"Damn it, Malfoy, just put me down!" I wiggled my way away from him so he'd loosen his vice-like grip on me, but to no avail.

He shook his head again. "Listen, give me another ten minutes and-"

"Do you want me to beg? I'll beg." I announce. "My leg feels like it's been gnawed at by a hypogriff so I'm pretty sure I deserve a break." When his only response was picking up his speed, I mumbled, "You need a break too, Malfoy. You're not invincible and I'm not as light as a feather."

"Malfoys don't take breaks. We're too busy wreaking havoc." I chuckled at his crappy joke, glad that the tension had dissipated.

I won in the end, though. I told Scorpius that I was tired and my leg was bleeding too much. He caved in, sitting me on a café seat as he sat on one parallel, placing my leg over him. If I wiggled my toes they would come in contact with his chest. I concealed the wicked grin blooming on my face.

The wizarding world was proabaly used to young males saving damsels in distress so they gave Malfoy a wide berth to do whatever he pleased. Were they trying to ship us? Damn them.

I was wearing shorts, so my bloodied knee was on full display. Rather than focusing on the pain, I focused on Scorpius (who was gnawing at his lower lip in confusion at what to do).

"You look cute like that," I said. He looked up at me, eyebrows curling in confusion.

"And like that." Of course, at that moment he flashed me his signature I'm-gonna-get-into-your-pants grin, which ruined it all.

"But not like that," I said, pulling a disgusted face. He let out a low chuckle.

"You think I look cute?"

"Sure," I replied, wiggling my toes so they'd touch his chest. I hid my wince and continued cheekily, "I want all of this."

The way he was looking at me made me realise that he wanted all of me, too. Damn him. Even though that was supposed to be a joke I was happy as hell that my leg was a barrier between us or that might have possibly made things very awkward.

While I was in a very serious staring match with Malfoy, I heard a gasp of, "Rose!" Like a meerkat did I turn to the person who called my name.

"I win," Scorpius said before we turned to face the person.

Standing before me was Aunt Ginny, Uncle Harry and the kids, minus Teddy. I recognised the previous voice as Lily.

"What's up, Lily?" I said, suddenly finding being caught with Scorpius awkward but not really caring.

"What happened to your leg!? What did he-" an accusing point in Malfoy's direction "-do to you!?" Aunt Ginny stood their expectantly.

"Scorpius was just helping me. Anyway, what's the big deal? Isn't Albie friends with him?" I said mockingly.

Albus was giving Scorpius the dirtiest look fathomable and I had to try as hard as I could to contain my laughter. I turned to Uncle Harry. "Could you fix my leg? Pretty please?" I said, batting my eyelashes for the extra effect. He rubbed a hand across his forhead.

"Ginny, could you please take Albus and Lily?" He said, pulling a chair up for himself before turning to James. "And James, could you get me a nice, strong coffee?" Everyone but James followed his orders.

"If you just kept me here so I could do coffee runs for you, you can think again," he said, turning to follow his mother.

"James," Uncle said, the threat readable in his tone. James sighed – although he had just finished Hogwarts, he was still following his father's orders.

Then Uncle Harry turned his attention to me and my leg. I had always been closer to him than to Ginny – probably because he knew what it felt like to lose everyone – but today, he was oddly quiet as he looked between me and Scorpius.

"I'm going to fix your leg. Then you're going to tell me what happened," he looked at Scorpius, "and you're going to go when you know she's okay. Understood?" Malfoy nodded but I merely remained silent.

Just as James came back with the coffee Uncle Harry had finished the spell and my leg was fine. He took a deep gulp of the scalding drink before sending Malfoy a meaningful look.

The trouble was, I still had my leg on his lap. I moved it, standing up just as he did. I took a step forward and kissed him.

Almost as if he was expecting it, one of his hands curled onto my hip, his tongue attempting to pry my lips apart. I pulled away.

"Thanks for the help, Malfoy." He nodded, smiling slightly before turning and walking off onto the busy high street.