AN: Who is it? Who is it? Oh the mystery... Just kidding, I know you all know who it is. Don't you?

Chapter 4

A Tall Dark Stranger

A shriek of terror was drowned out by the lashing rain and heavy fog.

Hermione shrank – trembling - further into the corner as the bright light to her face was slowly lowered.

A strong hand wrapped around her elbow and dragged her off the ground. Hermione peered up between dripping strands of her hair that clung to her face and eyelashes. She could barely make out the shadowy features from beneath the dark hood drawn over the tall stranger's face.

"You shouldn't be here alone at this hour...it's not safe." The tall dark stranger told her.

Hermione just whimpered and tried tugging her arm out of his firm hold. He didn't loosen his grip, so all Hermione could do was to tremble and whimper some more and try to preserve what was left of her dignity and not burst out in tears and beg for her life to be spared – which is what she really, really wanted to do.

She heard the man sigh, as if this was a daily occurrence to him, and watched him as he pushed the hood from his face with his spare hand.

He opened his mouth to say something, but Hermione - on seeing his face in the shadowy lamplight – had violently twisted out of his grip with a shriek, jumped back and stood there in a puddle poised, like a Lioness before a leap with her wand pointed right at the man's chest.

The tall man raised his hands calmly, "Madam, please lower your wand. I mean no harm –"

"No harm, my arse!" Hermione shrieked back, not lowering her wand for an instance.

"Madam, you are disoriented and distressed –" he started, but was – again – interrupted by Hermione.

"Well I wonder why that is?" she scoffed, jabbing her wand at him some more, "I'm being kidnapped by a rogue Death Eater!"

"Now listen," he said in a stern voice, "I'm not a Death Eater. I'm –"

"Oh, yeah, sure you aren't!" Hermione's voice was dripping with sarcasm, but her mind was screaming at her to run for the hills. "Do I look like a bloody two year old to you, Zabini?" she continued, hoping that help would show up sooner or later. "Your lot has had their hands covered in the Darks Arts filth enough for ten lifetimes – I would know!"

"What the-? How do you know who I am?" the cloaked man asked, before adding on quickly, "And I'm not a Death Eater! – I'm an Auror, and a bloody good one at that!"

"You are NOT an Auror!" Hermione basically screamed at the guy, "Harry would have told me if he had a Death Eater working for him – or Ex-Death Eater, or whatever! Point is, you're trying to kill me! Well guess what honey, not tonight!"

"Wait, Potter? What? No, I'm not trying to kill you! Wait, a-are – Granger?"

"No shit, Sherlock!" Hermione said, flourishing her wand around in front of herself to keep him from coming any closer. "I still don't believe you. There's no way you're an Auror."

Zabini ran a hand through his wet hair, letting droplets fly out around him. "Seriously Granger, do you want me to call Potter here so he can write you a book about it?"

Hermione huffed indignantly before practically collapsing in a sobbing heap. This caught him by such surprise that he didn't react fast enough so as to catch her mid-fall, so Hermione hit the wet ground full-force with her knees. Blaise didn't really know what to do; he could deal with anything from rowdy Quidditch fans to maniacal banshees, but women's over-loaded emotions – not so much. He took a tentative step towards the rocking, madly sobbing woman in the puddle of grey rain water before him. Was this normal? Did all women freak out and decide to lie, crying, in the lashing rain? "Um, Granger? Are...are you, um, alright?" No response. Just sobbing. "Granger? Are you alright? Do you want me to take you back home?" he said very slowly as if talking to an infant.

"NO!" Hermione shrieked curling into an even tighter ball; the wetness of the puddle seemingly not bothering her in the slightest anymore. Blaise wasn't really surprised by this at all; he'd discovered many years before during a particularly rainy Quidditch practise that the point came when you couldn't get any wetter.

Another clap of thunder made the very air around them shake, startling Blaise back to reality. His would-be water resistant cloak was soaked through and weighed about a tonne and his eyesight was beginning to go all blurry and unfocused due to the vast amount of freezing raindrops pelting his sensitive eyeballs.

Blaise was not in the mood for this. He was wet and tired and cold...and his eyeballs were on fire. Not literally, of course. Obviously. He sighed heavily, bending down to the blubbering mess in the puddle and scooped her up in his arms. "Come on, Granger. Let's go home."

The woman in his arms didn't even have the strength to fight against him or struggle as he Apparated them both into a dingy little alleyway in West London. Blaise figured he'd let her stay at his place for just one night; you know, so she could get herself sorted out or whatever. He lived just around the corner, but preferred Apparating to and from the alleyway because it smelled like piss and people generally avoided it.

As he turned into his road, Blaise couldn't help but wonder what had happened to feisty, brave Granger to cause her to find refuge at a storefront at 3 a.m. on a night like this. He pushed back the wave of images of possible scenarios that tried to swamp his brain. No, he told himself, he would not be making any judgements. When he finally came to a stop before his light blue front door, he swore quietly under his breath. He needed his wand to get in, but he couldn't reach it as he'd stuffed it somewhere between the many folds of his robes. He didn't want to put Granger down; who knew what she'd do considering the absolutely mental state she was in.

A bolt of lightning illuminated the foreboding sky and a black cat ran hissing across the road to hide under a muggle car. Blaise sighed irritably, why had he ever thought it a good idea to bring Granger home with him? Even if it was just for a night. Damn that part of his brain that controls spur of the moment decisions. He'd have to get that door open with wandless magic – something Blaise had never been good at.

As the rain pelted them like rubber bullets, Blaise stood there with a whimpering Hermione in his arms and a somewhat constipated look on his face – trying to push the spell out through some sort of tangle of psychic brain waves. To his utter surprise the door sprang open after only a few minutes; he'd never really expected anything to happen, to be honest. Nevertheless, he somehow managed to squeeze himself and Hermione through the narrow doorframe.

Now what?

After kicking the door closed behind him, Blaise stood awkwardly dripping in the living room. His house, if you could call it that, wasn't grand by any stretch of the imagination: There was only one en-suite bedroom, a fairly large living room, another bathroom and a kitchen with a breakfast bar. He glanced down at the drenched woman in his arms and was rather amazed to find that she'd managed to fall asleep, all huddled up against his chest. Blaise scowled slightly. He supposed he'd have to let her sleep in his bed now. Great.

After a hard day's work and getting absolutely drenched, he'd been looking forward to snuggling under his nice warm duvet covers. Well, that wasn't going to happen now, was it? As he backed into his room he once again cursed his spur of the moment decisions; he really should have thought this through a bit better.

Carefully, so as not to wake her, he lay her down on top of his nice silken duvet. (He groaned internally as he thought of what the water would do to them.) Blaise looked around the room, not really sure of what to do with himself now. He hastily gathered up a week's worth of dirty, smelly clothing that littered his room and stuffed it all into the empty laundry basket. He figured she wouldn't appreciate waking up next to last Wednesday's boxers.

Blaise didn't think Hermione looked at all comfortable with her sopping nightgown clinging to hr pale skin, but didn't dare try to peel it off her in case she woke; then he'd have some explaining to do. No, so instead he crept back into the living room, grabbed a dark green blanket that was dumped on the end of the couch, crept back into the bedroom and gently covered her with it. He tip-toed over to the dresser and pulled out a set of clothes for himself and some pyjama bottoms; then he stopped to think for a moment and pulled out one of his old shirts and a pair of boxers and laid them at the foot of the bed.

Blaise crept back into the living room, cringing as the hinge on the door creaked as he closed it behind him. He swiftly stripped out of his soaking robes, leaving them in a heap in the middle of the room, and pulled on his silk pyjama bottoms. He shuffled through his desk drawers, looking for a half-decent piece of parchment, a quill and some ink that wasn't dried up whilst rubbing his dark locks with a fluffy towel he'd snatched from the bathroom floor. Once he'd gathered up the necessary equipment he crouched down on the ground and scribbled a hasty note:

D-

Emergency. Get here.

-B

He figured it would have to do and gave the note to his owl, Bob. Bob flew silently off into the night. Blaise turned around and faced his couch. It was a very nice couch, but there was no way in hell he was going to sleep on it. Ever. He didn't think creeping into his own bed with Granger still in it was worth risking his life, so he dug around in the pile of wet robes until he retrieved his wand; and with a swift flourish the couch transfigured into a king's size four-poster with lavish silk sheets and Diricawl feather pillows.

Ah, just the way he liked it.

AN: I'm sorry that I kind of fell off the face of the earth there for a while, but I was travelling quite a bit and suffering from PHPD (Post Harry Potter Depression), which definitely restricted my ability to write anything of any quality. Oh, and I've also been waiting with bated breath for my Pottermore e-mail to arrive! It STILL hasn't found its way to me. ARRGGGGG! Errol really should be retired.

So maybe you could cheer me up with a weenie, little, tiny review? Pretty please?