Three weeks.
They had been stuck in Paris three weeks.
Without a single breakthrough.
He was officially going insane.
"Pass me that file, Malfoy, I want to take another look at the crime scene photos" Hermione asked, not looking up from her notes.
She was sat on a cushion on the floor, legs crossed, leaning over the coffee table in the lounge part of the penthouse suite. Scribbling furiously, she jotted down anything she thought might be helpful from the documents they had finally managed to get from the French Ministry.
Draco growled, chucking the blue file to her, his aim off.
The file knocked her hand and she slipped with her quill.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" she cried.
They had spent the last two days arguing as Draco grew more and more frustrated with the petty bureaucracy he had endured trying to obtain the Trace file.
She wasn't sure who was getting the bill from the hotel for what, by the last count, amounted to:
Three throw cushions
One tv
Six bathroom tiles
Two vases (not Ming)
One occasional table
And what had been, Hermione thought, a lovely painting of Paris at night (artist unknown)
All she knew was she certainly wasn't paying for any of it.
The only certainty as far as she was concerned, was that HE would be buying her a new laptop.
Quite why he had felt the need to hex it while she went down to the lobby to fax Harry, she would never know.
And he refused to answer anyway.
"You wanted the file" he huffed, getting up from the sofa and going over to the mini bar.
He had reached his limit.
He was going to get rip roaring drunk.
Hermione grabbed her wand and cast a silencio on the suite and he groaned loudly, grabbing a bottle of vodka from the mini bar, before slamming the door shut.
And that's when the screaming started.
He didn't bother to react to begin with.
Just listed them off mentally.
English.
French.
Italian.
Spanish.
English.
Dutch.
English.
"STOP FUCKING CALLING ME FERRET" he yelled (Obviously English)
Farsi? That was new.
Spanish.
Portuguese.
Italian.
Italian.
Italian.
He had never been insulted so colourfully in so many languages. He had to admit, that was part of the appeal.
English.
English.
Russian.
...that one he wasn't sure of, but he thought it might be Finnish
Russian.
Russian.
German.
Polish.
Finnish. That one was DEFINITELY Finnish
He didn't know she was quite so fluent. It was remarkable really, how she could lapse into each language almost seamlessly. And he was fairly certain she was unaware of it.
"Wait!What? Can you repeat that?" he was genuinely shocked.
"You're not even fucking listening to me are you?!" she picked up a cushion and threw it at him. He ducked and it landed on the island in the kitchenette, knocking a glass to the floor that smashed.
Ok, THAT she was paying for.
"I was listening, but I want you to repeat what you just said" he said, wanting to be sure he heard correctly.
So she did
Parseltongue?
Seriously?
Italian.
Long speech in Italian. Thank Merlin she was nowhere near Blaise.
Silence.
She had run out of steam.
He put the vodka down next to the coffee table and walked over to the kitchette, crouching down to pick up the bits of the broken glass.
"OW! FUCK!" he hissed, crimson pooling on the floor. He winced in pain, dropping the piece he was holding to try to remove the shard embedded in his hand.
"Holy shit Malfoy!" Hermione grabbed her wand and rushed to him. "Come here and let me help you" she tried to pull him towards the sofa.
"Its o….fuck no its not" he muttered.
"Don't keep trying to pull it out like that" she said, grabbing his wrist.
"Sit down, let me take a look"
He sat on the sofa as she perched herself on the coffee table.
Gently, she took his hand and placed it in her lap. She grabbed the vodka from where he had left it next to the coffee table, and opened the bottle.
"You're going to want some of this." she said, handing him the bottle.
Without question, he took a long swig.
She carefully started to work on taking the shard of glass out of his hand.
Wincing he took another swig.
She pulled a bit more.
He hissed and looked away.
"Nearly there" she cooed as if talking to a child who had grazed his knee.
He thumped the arm rest and took another swig.
He hated vodka but they were all out of Firewhiskey.
"Done" she muttered, grabbing her wand.
He felt the tingle of her magic lick across his hand.
It was the singular most erotic thing she had done to him thus far.
Her wand caressed his skin, healing his hand and he watched her intently as she concentrated her focus on him, her fingers laced in his.
She put her wand on the coffee table but didn't release his hand.
"Better?" she whispered, looking up into his steely gaze.
He swallowed.
Hard.
Yes, he was hard alright, he thought dryly.
He gave her a small nod and tugged her gently into his lap.
Neither said a word and he continued to stare at her.
Her gaze fell to his lips and he knew he needed to act now.
Slowly, his lip captured hers, and he gave her a gentle kiss.
She responded gently kissing back.
His tongue flicked over her bottom lip and she opened her delicate mouth to let him in.
Emboldened, he touched her tongue with his and gave it a little flick.
She did the same, her hands coming up to grab his t-shirt.
He placed one hand on the back of her neck, his thumb caressing her nape.
He deepened the kiss and she responded.
He placed a hand on her back and that is when he felt her go rigid.
She gasped, and opened her eyes.
He didn't move.
She yelped and pushed back onto the coffee table.
This time she caught the hurt in his eyes just before he shuttered it away.
"We can't" she whispered.
He nodded.
She fled to her room, the door banging shut behind her.
He growled, grabbed the bottle of vodka and Owled Blaise.
Women are a fucking pain in the arse.
Where the fuck are you?
DM
Then he skulked off to bed, banging his own door for good measure.