Chapter Thirty Eight
"Are you hungry?" Draco asked Hermione.
"Absolutely famished," Hermione replied, she hadn't had the chance to eat a proper meal all day, the last time she had eaten had been a pre-packaged sandwich she picked up at the airport.
"Gianni," Draco shouted to the man behind the bar, who came bustling over, he wore a white apron over his rather large stomach, from which he took out a little notepad, and he took a pencil from behind his ear,
"Ahh, Signor Draco," The barkeeper said, with familiarity, "It is great to see you again. How are your parents? And who is this beautiful lady?"
"Gianni this is Hermione, Hermione, Gianni." Draco introduced them, "I've been coming here for years," he told Hermione, Gianni serves the best food in all of Venecia. Isn't that right Gianni." Gianni pretended to blush.
"You are too kind Signor," he said and then he took hold of Hermione's hand and kissed it, "hold on to this one signor, she is the real belle."
"I intend to." Draco said looking at Hermione who smiled coyly back at him. Then Draco made an order for both of them in fluent Italian.
"What did you order?" Hermione asked, impressed by Draco's linguistic prowess.
"Just a Tapas taster menu." Draco told her, "and of course of bottle of vintage chianti."
"Sounds fabulous," Hermione said and Draco leaned across the table and took both of her hands in his.
"It is a dream to be here with you Hermione," he said "but please explain to me about what exactly happened to you in London."
Hermione explained exactly what she had been told about her attack to Draco and he looked anxious, "I wouldn't have heard anything about it, being in the U.S, we don't really have a cohesive wizard community there yet, I mean, it's growing all the time but we are lacking any organized public services, so there is no Daily Prophet, no cross Atlantic Owls and word of mouth is severely impeded by most British wizard's fear of telephony and the internet." Draco explained, "I mean, if I had just stayed one more day, I would probably have learned of your attack, but you weren't found by McGonagal until the day after I left." Draco looked as though he was being eaten up by guilt.
"Actually, you probably wouldn't have found out until after I had woken up anyway." Hermione reassured him, "Minerva ensured nobody advertised my whereabouts in case my attacker was still looking for me, and even if The Daily Prophet had caught wind of my attack, Rita Skeeter wouldn't have dared to print it, after her stint as a dung beetle!"
Draco was relieved to hear this and the two of them laughed happily together as Hermione related the whole story of how the irritating journalist had come to end up in a glass jar for almost a whole year.
Gianni interrupted the couple as they laughed and drank some very expensive and potent Italian wine, having already polished off the whole bottle of chianti, laying a huge tray a delicious looking tapas on their table.
"Enjoy signora, signor." Gianni said and the hungry pair thanked him heartily.
Draco picked up a little titbit of food off the plate and held it out for Hermione to taste. "Try this," he said as she opened her mouth.
"Mmmmmmm." Hermione said with her mouth full of the tender morsel of food.
The meal went on in this way with Draco feeding Hermione with his selection, before eating the same thing himself.
By the time they had finished the couple were full and warm and very comfortable in each other's company, they spent another hour, just chatting and laughing and flirting, getting very tipsy with all the wine Gianni kept serving them.
"Are you ready to go back to the hotel now gorgeous?" Draco asked with a sexy smile.
"Let's go," Hermione replied, her eyes sparkling.