A/N: I'm looking for a beta that would be able to proofread each chapter quickly or periodically as I write it out. If anyone's interested, please PM me, it would be super helpful as I have noticed some small mistakes when re-reading chapters that I missed when writing and re-reading the first time. Enjoy!

Hermione found a table to sit at while Draco went to the front counter to order their drinks. He got their usuals that would normally be purchased from the atrium coffee cart (latte for her and a long black for himself) and two muffins for the both of them, and brought it all over on a tray to the table she'd picked out. It was towards the back of the cafe, which would have been the table he'd picked out too if he had the choice. Hermione had just put her wand into the small bag she had on the floor by her feet and by the looks of her hair and shoulders, she had just cast a drying spell on herself. He took his own wand out and did the same on his shoes and the bottom of his trousers.

"How have you been?" Hermione asked as she took her coffee and muffin off the tray after he'd sat down and placed it between them. He spotted the pile of papers she had in front of her as well which she must have also taken from her bag.

"Can't complain," he responded and tore off a small bit of the top of his muffin off and popped it in his mouth. "You?"

"Good," she said brightly — too brightly it seemed and he could tell there was a reason for her now chirpy mood. He didn't question it and nodded down at the papers in front of her. "Ah yes, these are the notes that the Minister gave me about things that should be included in the letter."

She passed him the first piece of paper which he read over and was glad to see only a minimal amount of suggested corrections. "Easily fixed," he said. "I can make corrections tonight and give the next draft back to you tomorrow."

"You don't need to work on your night off," Hermione said to him.

That statement made Draco snort. "And do you truly have days and nights off work?" He asked. Her look was all the answer he needed. "See? So yes, I'll make the corrections tonight, I don't have any other plans."

"I'm going to see my godson tonight," she announced with a smile.

"You can call him Albus. Like I said, I'm not going to combust if you do."

"I know that, Malfoy," she said. "I just enjoy brandishing my title."

"You're just known by your titles now," Draco said with an amused smirk. "The Brightest Witch of Our Age, the head of your department and now godmother… What's next?"

"Only time will tell," Hermione laughed softly and took a sip of her latte. "What will you be doing tonight?"

"Other than the letter?" Draco shrugged a shoulder. "Nothing. Now, I have been doing a lot of research on the certain insurances that should be looked at for the exchange students, because of their age and the distance between schools."

"I'll jot some notes down," she said and leaned down to pull out a pen from the bag at her feet, and turned one piece of parchment over to write on the back. "Fire away."

—

Over the course of what turned out to be four hours, they had gotten a pot of tea delivered to their table which they'd been drinking cups of as time passed. They spoke deeply about the project and Draco provided many opinions, ideas and solutions for her questions. Together, they managed to write out a comprehensive plan on things that needed to be addressed, how they could do that, and who could help. In that plan it had been decided Hermione would travel to both Beauxbatons and Durmstrang at some point over the next few months to speak with the headmasters of each school. Who would accompany her on the trips was still undecided and would be figured out as the project wore on.

"Would you look at that; you don't have a cup full of sugar in your tea," Draco said when he watched her pour another cup of tea and add milk but no sugar.

"Funny," Hermione said dryly and took a sip then let out a satisfied sigh. "I really think we did well today," she said.

He lifted his wrist to look at the time on his watch and found it to be almost five o'clock. "I didn't expect it to last this long," he said honestly.

"I'm sorry, if you were planning on anything—"

"You don't need to apologise, Granger," Draco brushed off. "We did a lot, this meeting was needed and it sets us right on track for the next couple of weeks."

"It does," she smiled then leaned down to pick up her bag. "I'll give you the documents I was telling you about before," she said and started to rifle through everything contained inside. Draco waited and watched some people leave their tables and head outside. Over the course of the past four or so hours, many people had come and gone, some only having drinks, some having lunch or just a snack. A lot of people took their things to go. He always enjoyed observing people go about their daily business and often times wondered if other people watched just as intently as he did and ever saw him and wondered what he was doing. He was broken from his reverie by Hermione sighing and muttering, "Shit," under her breath.

"What is it?" He asked, turning back to her.

"I didn't put the papers in my bag," she said in frustration. "I can get them from home and floo to your house? Sorry, I really thought I had them with me."

"Why don't I go home with you and get them?" Draco suggested since he knew she was going to be busy with the Potters afterwards.

"You wouldn't mind?"

He shook his head. "It's really not out of my way. Do you want to leave now?"

"If that's okay," Hermione nodded and stood up, taking a purse out of her bag.

"I've already paid, Granger."

"You have?" She furrowed her brows. "Let me give you some. You've done nothing but help me this last week it's the least I can do."

"No," he shook his head firmly and picked up the notes they'd written. "You don't owe me anything." She seemed to have sensed his tone and didn't argue. He hated when people thought that they owed him something — with anything, not just money. "I'll have to side-along, I don't know where your house is," he said, changing the subject.

Hermione nodded and once she had everything in order, she put her hand on his forearm and a few seconds later she apparated them both to her home. Draco preferred using the floo network over apparating as the latter never failed to make him feel nauseous and had done since he'd first learnt how to do it. He looked around where they had apparated too and saw that they were standing in her living room. The furniture was simple but comfortable looking and the whole room looked homey and inviting, with several picture frames on the mantle of the fireplace and a few different artworks on the walls. "I'll just go get the things for you," she said and dropped her hand from his arm and headed out the archway leaving him by himself in the room.

He had never really been to such lived-in homes. At the Manor, artwork was priceless, furniture was expensive and bought for decoration rather than comfort. The only family pictures that adorned the walls was in one corridor of the house with individual portraits of the head Malfoy men of the family, stopping at Lucius and Draco had been determined that would be the last portrait to ever grace that wall. So far his determination had paid off and his mother never brought it up. He didn't want to poke around her things or sit down on the couch as he didn't want to seem like he was making himself too much at home or invading on her personal space. He jumped slightly (but would never admit it) when something jumped onto the coffee table he was standing next to and he looked down and saw a tabby cat staring up at him. He'd known Hermione had owned a cat before but figured it was long gone by now as the last time he'd seen it he had been in his sixth year at school.

Draco held his hand out to the cat which sniffed his fingertips then rubbed its head against his palm. He smiled slightly and scratched the cat behind its ears. "I see you've met Taurus," Hermione said as she came back into the living room with a folder.

"Was Sagittarius too much of a mouthful?" He drawled and patted the cat once more before taking the folder when she handed it to him.

"Funny," she rolled her eyes with a smile and looked down as Taurus jumped off the coffee table and trotted past her and out the archway.

"Nice home," Draco complimented, looking around to break the silence between them. "I've only seen one room albeit," he chuckled.

"Would you like a tour?" She offered.

The question had taken him aback as he hadn't thought his tone had been insinuating he wanted to see the rest of her house. "No, it's fine," he said. "You have god-motherly duties to attend to, I best be off. Mind if I use the floo?"

She shook her head and walked forward a step as he went to her fireplace. "Thank you for making the time to have the meeting today," she said to him and gave him a small smile. "It's nice to finally have someone on my side with this project."

He took a handful of floo powder from the jar on the mantle. "Someone would have done it eventually," he told her. "It's a fine project, Granger. Your passion for it is guaranteed to make it work." Her smile brightened at his comment and the corner of his lips curved up into a crooked smile. He couldn't count the number of times she'd made him involuntarily smile that day and he didn't know how to feel about that fact.

"Thank you, Malfoy."

"It's never an issue, Granger," he gave her a nod and then stepped into the fireplace and dropped the powder, calling out the address of his house.

It was only later when he opened the folder to start working on it that he found a small money sack and a note inside.

For lunch today. You really don't think I'd let you get away now, did you?

The small piece of parchment made him roll his eyes and he put the money on his desk and the note into the top drawer before he picked up a quill to start editing the letter once more.

—

"Malfoy, do you want to tell me why I didn't have to pay for this coffee?" Hermione asked as she came to sit across from him at their usual table outside the coffee cart.

Draco smirked and lifted his cup up and took a sip. "I saw that little surprise you left me in the folder," he told her. "And don't complain otherwise I'm leaving the project." He was joking of course and she knew it and fought off a smile as she started pouring her three sugars in. "I took the liberty of handing in the letter to the Minister this morning," he told her.

She stopped as she began to stir in the sugar and looked at him. "Really? Did he say anything? When will we hear feedback?"

"You'll hear it right now," he told her and put his coffee down. "I waited around for him to read it and he loves it. He thinks it will work and doesn't see any need for change."

He watched her smile grow into a grin and she clapped her hands once. "This is brilliant! Gosh, it's all really coming together now, isn't it? My…We need to start thinking about so much more now; start implementing our plans."

"We do," he agreed. "You should start scheduling some meetings with the directors of education to work out some of the issues we weren't sure of."

"I'll need to," she nodded and let out a breath before taking a drink of her coffee. "I have a busy week ahead…"

"I thought you knew that when you signed up for your position," he said which made her laugh softly and nod.

"Unfortunately I also need to prepare for the holiday ball," she said. "Ginny and I are going shopping today and tomorrow after work. Don't tell anyone but I really hate going shopping with her. I love her to death but Merlin she tries to put me into some questionable outfits."

Draco chuckled. "How did your night go yesterday with the baby?"

"Good," she nodded. "Well, I did get spit up on once which wasn't the most pleasant thing I've experienced."

"I'd be worried if it was."

"They're not the most considerate, babies," she joked.

"Potter has another kid, yes?" Draco asked and was given a nod in return. "Why weren't you named godmother of that one?"

"Harry and Ginny always knew they were going to have more than one child, so they named Ron the godfather of James and promised me the title of godmother with their next child," she said. "Harry only had one godparent too and Ginny didn't have any so they didn't really think it was crucial for the kids to have two."

"That makes sense," he nodded. "And I bet you're glad you're not teamed up with Weasley."

"It would be awkward if that was the case," she laughed. "Maybe if you asked me that ten years ago I would have been happy with the idea, but not now." It had been common knowledge that when the war concluded and things were righted a little more, Hermione and Ron had a relationship for three years from when they were nineteen.

"Ten years, doesn't that make us seem old," he said and took a drink of coffee.

"Tell me about it. I'm turning thirty next year. Thirty, Malfoy."

"You're truly going over the hill now. Better start planning your retirement," he said sarcastically.

"I better. My will too. Know anyone good to help me with the documents?" She joked. Draco only rolled his eyes and laughed.

—

"Stand straight, Draco, you're going to get poked with the pin."

Draco straightened his back and looked straight ahead at the full length mirror in front of him. Himself and his mother, who was currently sitting on a chair by the window, were in Madam Malkin's robe shop organising his suits for the two upcoming Christmas balls he had to attend. He had plenty of suits and dress robes at home and in his closet at the Manor, but he always liked new garments for upcoming events. At present, the length of his trousers were getting fixed to best accommodate his height. The suit was dark grey in colour and he knew he had a suitable dress shirt, tie and cufflinks at home, but for the sake of the fitting he was wearing his white work shirt under the suit jacket.

The shop assistant who was doing the necessary adjustments stood up once the bottom of his trousers were pinned and stood back to let Narcissa come over. The Malfoy woman looked her son up and down before stepping forward and pointed at the sides of his suit jacket. "This needs to be taken in slightly." The assistant nodded and got straight back to work and Draco let out a bored sigh, adjusting his arms so the assistant could start pinning, and he diverted his attention to the window and the outside where Diagon Alley was quite busy for a Wednesday afternoon, but then again, it was the holiday season. He sacrificed his lunch break to have this fitting since it was really the only time he could do it. His workload had increased with people putting in applications for his help that he would review over the holiday period and assist on once work was back to normal in the first week of January. The Ministry Ball was in two days and the ball being hosted at Malfoy Manor by his mother, was on Sunday night. Three days after that, it was Christmas Day.

Along with his general workload increasing, he was striving to get a lot of work done for Hermione so that they would have a lot to go off of the next week when they'd both be at work while many people took time off. Since the letter was done and was being reproduced onto more formal looking parchment with all adequate signatures to be sent to the three Wizarding Schools targeted (for the time being), they were more concerned about now working on the insurance that would cover potential exchange students and after that, they would have to work out payment options. Even though he had nothing else to do in his personal life that required immediate attention, the thought of how much work he had to do for his job gave him a headache. He knew he'd be able to do it however, and it was that thought that ceased any added stress.

"There we go," the shop assistant said and stood back after the pins had been added to the jacket. Narcissa walked forward to look at it and then smiled.

"Perfect," she said and brushed her hands against his shoulders to straighten out the jacket. "Doesn't it look wonderful, Draco?"

"Smashing," he responded dully as he was now officially past the point of boredom.

"We'll take this one," Narcissa told the assistant. "Draco, go change into the other one. It's in the dressing room you were first in."

He felt the need to salute to his mother as he walked to the dressing rooms in the robe shop and shut the door. He'd been to Madam Malkin's countless times over the years to get his formal attire and was very familiar with the process of getting his suits and robes tailored to fit just right. He hated an ill-fitting suit and was told that he was quite similar to his father in that respect. Thank Merlin that was the only comparison he got these days. He carefully took off the suit jacket and hung it up and then did the same with the trousers and double checked the pins to make sure they hadn't moved from their places.

A few minutes later he came out in the new suit, a dark olive green one this time. His mother had chosen the colour to break up his typically monochrome coloured wardrobe and he was surprised at how well it looked. He was staring at the mirror again as the shop assistant came up to start tailoring and five minutes in he looked at the reflection of the door when it opened. "Fancy seeing you here, stranger," Draco smirked when Pansy Parkinson strode through the door.

"Draco! I'm surprised you aren't living at the Ministry these days," she drawled and then saw his mother who had just finished paying for the suits. "And Narcissa too, I haven't seen you both in so long," she said and walked to Narcissa to give her a hug and a kiss on the cheek.

"Are you getting a dress for the ball?" Narcissa asked the raven haired witch.

"Yes," Pansy nodded with a smile. "For your ball and the Ministry ball as well."

"Wonderful," Narcissa smiled. "I can't wait to see your dress on the night."

"I thought you didn't like the Ministry ball?" Draco asked Pansy and clenched his jaw slightly when the bottom of his leg was touched by a pin but he didn't say anything as he didn't want his mother to start attacking the young assistant who was doing the tailoring.

"I'm still not a fan," Pansy said, walking closer to him and looked him up and down. "Nice colour," she complimented the suit and he nodded. "Blaise insists that I attend with him this year."

"Makes sense," Draco said. It had only been in March of the current year that Blaise and Pansy announced their engagement. They had dated on and off for around four years until Pansy decided they were either going to be serious or be nothing at all the year they were twenty-four. Ever since then, they had worked as a couple and worked out the issues that caused them to separate so often. It had only been a matter of time that one of them brought up the idea of marriage, and Draco had actually been the one that Blaise told first and he'd helped him buy an engagement ring that would appease Pansy. That ring had turned out to be covered in a substantial amount of diamonds, very expensive, and very noticeable to anyone that looked at her left hand.

Pansy had wandered away from him back to Narcissa. "So have you got a wedding date set out yet?" The latter asked.

"Yes, finally," Pansy nodded. "I had to threaten Blaise with a few nasty curses to get him to actually sit down and help me plan. It will be this coming June. I've already been looking at dresses."

The last question was enough to make Draco tune out and look back into the mirror. His mother had told him that he needed a haircut but he wasn't too fond of the idea. The length of his hair suited him — at least he thought — and it managed to sit just nice with the help of a small amount of product; no where near the amount of gel he used in his school years. It wasn't long but it was what his mother liked to refer to as 'scruffy'. He was also told by her to shave the stubble on his face as, in her words, he would "look more like a woodchopper if it grows anymore."

He looked at both his mother and Pansy in the mirror as they were both now looking at what he figured was Pansy's dress to the Ministry's event as he knew both women wanted their dresses to be a surprise on the night of the ball at Malfoy Manor. He had known, and always known, that Pansy and his mother were the two most important women in his life. At one point, Astoria had been in the ranks too, but that had changed as the years wore on. Pansy's family had been close friends with the Malfoy family for many years, with her father and his being school mates and friends and their wives subsequently becoming close as they got older. Draco couldn't remember a point in his childhood where Pansy hadn't been there. They'd gone from being in nappies together, to embarking on their first train ride to Hogwarts together, and had been close through all the years. Although neither saw each other as much anymore, they still remained good friends and attempted to get together whenever possible.

"All done, Mister Malfoy," the assistant said and stood up. "Shall I check with your mother?"

"No," Draco shook his head and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked at all the alterations that were to be made and said, "It looks good. These have been paid for already, yes?" The assistant nodded. "Very well," he said. "Thank you for your help."

"That's okay, Mister Malfoy."

"I'll need to go back to work now," he said as he got to his mother and Pansy.

"Keep the pins in. Make a statement," Pansy smirked which made him roll his eyes and head to the change rooms. Fifteen minutes later, he was back in his office and saw a note on the floor by the door where it had been slipped under and he recognised the familiar handwriting.

I won't be at work tomorrow so don't feel pressured to get me any documents on the project. Maybe I'll see you at the ball? Don't worry though, I won't be looking for you.

H.

He remembered back to one of their conversations the other week where her last line applied and he smiled and took the note to his desk and slipped it into the drawer, joining the other notes from her.

A/N: I hope that it doesn't bother people when I leave out large chunks of business-talk. I personally don't know a thing about insurance between countries and I don't think it would be all that interesting - hence leaving it out. Hope you guys don't mind! Another thought is how would you guys enjoy seeing some sections or full chapters from Hermione's P.O.V. It will happen eventually. Hope you enjoyed this chapter, please leave reviews! Thanks!