While Blaise is in the fic with Granger, Confunded, I'm openly on edge. Snape has to tell me three times to calm down with increasing irritation, but it feels like this is taking forever.

Snape sent them to the same generic kitchen she was in with me. Blaise also took in the Calming Draughts and I told him to make sure one was available to her before he got started. I told him what I did and how to mimic it, and finally they both told me to shut the bloody hell up.

I'm pacing the little cubicle and obviously annoying Severus, who is standing against the wall with his arms folded. This space isn't large and it seems like his extensive robes take up half the room. He clearly feels the same about me, since I'm only able to walk three steps before having to turn around.

"Did it take this long with me?" I ask impatiently.

Snape considers. "Probably," he drawls, which doesn't help me at all. I don't know why I asked.

Finally, he seems to notice some sort of signal I don't and moves over to the pad on the wall. He pokes at it twice and Blaise reappears in the chair in front of us. I don't have time to figure out how that works. I don't really care.

"Well?" I prompt, forgetting what a head trip the Confunded fic was for me and not giving Blaise much of a chance to acclimate back to normal people speaking to him properly.

He looks up, shaking his head as if to clear it. "That was fucked up." He puts a hand over his eyes for a minute to rub his temples and I want to shake him.

"Yes, we all agree it's fucked up. How was she?"

"Well, she's sort of what I meant," he starts, and Snape physically moves a hand at me to stop me from interrupting.

"Start at the beginning," Severus says firmly, gesturing at me to stay out of it. I feel like his student again and it infuriates me.

Blaise heaves a gusty sigh. "She was just standing there in the kitchen, looking straight ahead. But when I moved in front of her, she didn't seem to register that I was there. I waved a hand up and down in front of her eyes and she finally noticed the movement, I think. She'd respond to basic communication, like you said."

He nods to me and I'm vaguely reassured so far.

"So I set down the Calming Draught," another nod in my direction, "and good thing I did, because when I did touch her, she freaked again. She backed up until she hit the wall and started crying."

Snape's eyes narrow sharply and my stomach sinks. "How'd you get her out of it?"

Blaise looks at me. "I backed up too, as far as I could get, but the kitchen was small. I pointed to the vial on the counter and said, 'Take that, it'll help.'"

I wince. I don't know if I would have said that. It still implies that it came from him, but then again, she had seemed programmed to follow instructions. Maybe it was clever.

"Did it work?"

"Actually, yeah. She took it, anyway. And she did get calmer. After a few minutes she looked at me -"

"On her own?" I interrupt and Snape shoots me a nasty look.

But Blaise nods. "Yeah, she looked at me. All of her movements were slow, like she was underwater, even when she was afraid. But she looked at me on her own and finally said, 'You didn't hurt me, did you?'"

Now Snape starts to talk and I shush him instead.

"Do you think she was remembering the bookshop?" For some reason, I feel funny about this. This should be a good thing, right? But somehow I liked that she only recalled me, me not being the one to hurt her. Never hurting her.

He nods again. "Yeah, I do. I really do. There's nothing else she could be referring to."

"Well, this confirms it," Severus says finally, "if there was any doubt left before. She's clearly remembering things. The Occlumency plan might be the best we can do, Draco."

Blaise gives me a puzzled look and I realise I haven't told him about that yet. I fill him in quickly, but he looks sceptical.

"I know it's a long shot," I say in frustration, "but that's all we can think of. It's all we have."

He sighs heavily again. "What about Ginny?"

"What about Ginny?" says Snape sharply, and we tell him about the Ron and Quidditch scenario.

"Limit her too, Severus," I tell him firmly. "Tell Dolohov it's the same sort of experiment I'm running with Granger to drive up her price, or - hell, tell him Zabini is requesting more of her time. Whatever will work."

Snape starts to speak and I stop him. "Is there a way we can sideline Dolohov from the financial side? He's bollocks at it, anyway. Can we put him in charge of research and development, or something, and keep the books away from him entirely?"

"Well, to do that," Snape says snidely, "you'd have to allow some research and development."

I give him a pointed look. "Give him something harmless to do. Something relatively cheap. Maybe he can work on brushing off a few more of the original fic locations. Developing some other inexpensive alternatives of our more popular expansions could be a good use for him and won't cost us a lot."

"I don't know why you think I'm in charge of Dolohov," says Snape in irritation, "so instead, you can come up with something and tell him at our financials meeting tomorrow evening."

And that's when I realise that in the span of the last six weeks or so, this is somehow becoming my park. I'm the single largest investor.

As abhorrent as I see that, as much as my brain rebels away from it, I can use it.

Snape returns to our now extremely crowded cubicle with a dose of original Polyjuice and one of Weasley's red hairs. He hands it to Blaise, who looks at me miserably.

"Please?" I ask quietly. "I wouldn't ask anyone else."

"Yeah, I'm flattered," Blaise snaps with a grimace and downs the Polyjuice quickly. After a moment, Weasley stands there, patting down his robes. "I won't try to scare her though."

I hold my hands up in defeat. "That's fine. Just… do regular boyfriend stuff with her and see if she baulks, if any of it ever sparks some sort of bad association. If it does, back off. Do the regular boyfriend apology bit then."

"What's that like? How's it go?" Weasley smirks at me and I have a bizarre double flash of Zabini's confident Casanova underneath.

"Shut up, you tosser." I wish I had something to throw at him, like another of my balled-up dirty socks. "And I won't get hacked off if you get to snog her. I promise."

Weasley and Snape share a droll look that would be hilariously odd under other circumstances. I'm not amused.

"It won't be 'getting to snog her,'" Weasley says, "it'll just be 'snogging her.' I 'get' to snog Ginny, thank you very much," which sounds horribly gross coming from Ron's mouth.

He stands and looks at Snape. I think he's about to tell Snape to get on with things, but he has a parting shot for me now, too. "At least he's sort of admitting he wants to snog her, eh? Finally?"

Snape smirks, too, and fidgets with the pad. Weasley vanishes, leaving me red-faced and annoyed with no one but my original Occlumency instructor.

As he turns to face me again, I feel a crawling dread.

I try to slam my Occlumency into place but I've been too agitated tonight. There are cracks all through my walls and he finds a way in without much effort.

It's embarrassing, and that's not all that is.

After a minute or two, I stop trying to throw him out. I couldn't anyway. And it's a bit of a relief - not that I'd ever admit it to him - to have someone see everything. Know everything.

Severus spends a lot of time on the past two days, the time I spent with Granger as Harry, my jumble of miserable elation afterwards, and my preoccupation with it today.

He moves backwards to my other recent fics with Granger, scrutinises the one with Blaise that we were just referring to, and reviews the fear responses she'd shown with me - and how I dispelled them.

The mention of Horcruxes stops him, and he watches the first time from the beginning again, paying particular attention each additional time they come up. Thank God Granger brought them up the very first time. I'm off the hook there.

Severus needed eye contact to get in but not to stay in, and I can't look at him as he sifts through things twice, three times. Finally, I feel my mind alone again. I still can't look up.

"Draco."

"What?" I mutter sullenly to the carpet, something I'd have never dared do as his student.

"Draco, this is serious."

As if I don't know that. I cover my face with my hands in mortification. "I know it is, Severus. Obviously, I do."

"I don't think so," he says softly. "I still don't think you're admitting to yourself what's going on here. So why don't you tell me what you think is?"

Taken by surprise, I do look up now. He's studying my face intensely, and I don't know why. I don't know what could be on my face that wasn't in my mind for the last fifteen minutes of agonisingly specific perusal.

Also, what the hell does he mean? I know perfectly well what's going on here.

"Granger is remembering. You've seen it now, too. Ginny might also be starting to remember things. And I have no way to keep awful things from happening to Granger that she's now going to remember. The entire point of the Obliviation was to keep them useful by making them forget. Keeping their minds sound."

Snape is still scrutinising me, but he has something to add. "Another large factor of the Obliviation was to make this as… humane for them as possible. Many people didn't care about that part, though. Most people didn't."

His eyes are narrowed as he watches my face. I had really been fairly indifferent to that as well.

"No, you weren't," he says quietly, and I realise too late he's back in my head. Bloody eye contact.

"It was important for the optics of the park, of course, but trying to lessen any lasting pain and suffering was a goal for… some of us." He's looking at me so intensely I can tell he's telling me that he was among this group.

Well, fine, good for him.

"You stopped coming when Dolohov rolled out the Confunded option. Obliviated afterwards or not, you were never comfortable with the outright rape and abuse."

I scoff a bit and say almost defiantly, "I don't mind cursing Potter, do I?"

Snape can't help a small smile. "No, but no one could blame you for that. But you don't go in with other captives to inflict sadistic harm on them. Plenty of people do. Plenty of them don't even care who it is."

I know that, and he nods. "I know you do. But it's another reason why you'd rather the park shift entirely to simulated companions. It's why you don't mind me selling the ones who don't produce. Being sold to one family is better than being endlessly abused here, isn't that your thought?"

Severus knows it is, and he's irritating me on purpose. He smiles again. He knows I know that, too.

"But you also don't mind the lowest-value captives being killed if they can't be sold."

Isn't death better? I think directly at him. Wouldn't you rather be dead?

And he nods, a tiny shift, but I see it. He starts to say something else and stops. "I'm getting off topic, believe it or not. I want to make you face what's going on with Granger."

"I'm facing what's going on with Granger! I'm the only one who noticed anything, for fuck's sake!" I burst out, suddenly pressed beyond endurance.

"Well, to be sure, you and Zabini are the only two spending this much time with a specific captive this frequently. If anyone is going to notice anomalies in behaviour, it will be the two of you."

Standing up suddenly, I start to pace again. I realise how long Snape has been working me over and I wonder where Blaise is. He's been in there forever. What the fuck is going on?

Snape smiles again and I realise he's still hearing me. "You're practically shouting it at me, Draco."

I smack the wall with the palm of my hand in frustration. "Get out of my head, Severus. You've been in there long enough. Give me some bloody privacy."

"In a minute," he says smoothly and I want to hit him instead of the wall. "I'm not sure how to say this but you seem loath to come upon it yourself, so I'm obligated to try. Everything you need is in there and you poke around the edges of it from time to time, but you're being needlessly stubborn about it. You're refusing to put it all together."

I shoot him a vicious look. "Just get to it, already."

"You're so worried about Zabini in there because you do care what he gets up to with Granger. You wish she looked at you like she looked at Harry, and you're savagely proud that she's internalised that you mean her no harm."

Turning to face the wall, I rest my forehead against it. I'm giving it my most withering look but it'll do just as much good here as if it were aimed at Severus, and I don't move.

"You like her hair this long and you like it best down. You like that you guessed her favourite meal by accident and you want to keep giving it to her. You're worried when she's upset, you want to fix it for her, you're distressed when she's distressed."

"So?" I whisper. "So what?"

"Well, that's the point, Draco," Snape says with a hateful sense of satisfaction. "You're in love with her."

I whip around at once, sputtering indignantly, "I am not!"

He's giving me a pitying look, one I saw on Blaise's face about six weeks ago. "Draco, you haven't once thought about fucking her."

"Exactly!" I say, aghast. "I do not love her! Yes, I'm concerned about her. No one should remember what happens to them in this park, and -"

Severus shakes his head. "No, this is what sets her apart from the women you've dated. You find her interesting. You find her conversation and her company engaging. You enjoy spending time with her. You're not counting down the minutes to the end of the night when you can parade her through your Manor to impress her, and then shag her before throwing her out when the sun comes up the next morning."

I'm speechless, mouth gaping open and closed like some stupid dying fish.

"You hold her entirely differently in your mind and you're refusing to see it. So now I've told you; take the information and do with it what you will."

He breaks off the mental connection of his Legilimency and I hardly notice as he moves over to the wall again, prodding the pad.

And then Weasley reappears, looking… dishevelled.

I can feel my still-horrified expression, and the condition of his robes - and face - don't help. He immediately backs up, hands raised. "We didn't, Drake. I wouldn't do that."

My mouth is still opening and closing, and Snape subtly moves more towards the middle of this excruciatingly tiny cubicle.

"Draco has been facing some uncomfortable truths about himself, Zabini," he says evenly. "Forgive him his… stunned surprise. Do tell us how it went."

"Yes, do tell," I croak, and Snape shushes me.

He rustles in the pocket of his robe and withdraws a small vial, tossing it to Weasley. He uncorks it and downs it in one, and I'm forced to wait until my best bloody friend reappears before he starts to speak.

I can feel my eye twitch.

"Well," Blaise says awkwardly, "she'd just taken a Calming Draught."

Snape and I both groan. That was physiological. Of course it was still in effect, even after the Confundus Charm was lifted. One of us really should have considered that.

"So she wasn't afraid. At all, at any point. I don't know that she would have been anyway, though. It was a little like Ginny the first time -"

And my mind screams back to the first time Ginny had sex with Blaise, not the very-obvious first time he's referring to instead, "- and she could tell I was acting a little odd. Not quite like Weasley. But she didn't really care."

I'm grimacing and trying not to. Blaise is hesitating now, clearly wondering how much detail to provide.

He edges towards secure footing along the route of self-preservation, which is wise. "She was never afraid. She was perfectly happy to do… whatever."

I cringe openly. Can't hide it.

"Nothing seemed to spark anything negative, though, which is good. That's a good thing. Then I asked to be brought out."

Snape has one eyebrow raised and he has to be wondering what I am - would Granger have wanted to shag Blaise if he hadn't left? I'm very grateful he keeps it to himself.

Fuck. I'm a mess. Maybe Snape was right.

I have no problem at all in our financials meeting the following day after work.

I continue to smother Dolohov's mediocre contributions and feeble attempts to keep up, and easily make his reassignment seem like a good thing.

I tell him to lead the research and development division, with an emphasis on increasing the number of lower-cost options, and the variety of fully-simulated companions - including simulated versions of the highest-value Resistance captives.

As I continue to limit Ginny and Granger, I'm going to need a suitable alternative to offer.

In a stroke of genius, I assign his most capable underling - something Vaisey, but it doesn't matter - to lead the tracking of visitor analytics and analysis, reporting directly to Dolohov.

This strokes Dolohov's ego, will help occupy his time away from additional research that I don't want to fund, and ensures that I will get quality metrics on which to base decisions.

As an afterthought, I tell Dolohov to make sure Vaisey attends these meetings so I can get any of those numbers I want firsthand. I don't want to rely on him prepping Dolohov to report on them - at all - so I say it's because I might have additional questions and I want him there to pepper if I feel like it.

After that bit of housekeeping, I get us down to business.

Numbers in the companion division are moderately better. Snape has cut two more of the lowest-performing companions, helping the bottom line for the division as a whole.

The most popular Polyjuice is the four-hour, which is both good and bad, in my opinion. Longer ones bring in more revenue, since they all cost us the exact same amount to make. But the longer ones give me the creeps.

I don't have any illusions that most people act like Blaise and want a date.

I'm slightly surprised, though - the witches who are coming in want the longer Polyjuice. They, evidently, largely do prefer the extended time. Fine with me; I'm quite certain the male companions are benefiting from those fics. No harm done, there.

Witch visitor numbers are up in general, again, and I tell them to continue pushing the advertising. After a slight pause, I tell them to increase the advertising budget by 10%.

The simulation division numbers are better than I expected, even being optimistic.

We're now at nearly a 60/40 split on incoming revenue from simulations to companions, and our revenue growth is up 8% from last month. It's not a ton and I need more than one month to show a trend, but I like it.

Next, I ask about the location analysis, and I'm told that people are utilising the lower-price, lower-quality expansions. This is excellent, as those cost us nothing. I tell our little team to add those to the advertising campaigns, too. That'll give purpose to the increased budget for advertising.

Blaise volunteers to oversee the advertising, and I approve. He's good at this. His people skills are better than mine, although it pains me to admit it.

I use confidence, power, and authority. I don't much care if people like me; they'll do what I need either way. Blaise, on the other hand, uses an easygoing sort of charm, which helps in the marketing and advertising arenas.

Finally, tapping my quill absently on the table, I present my ideas for recurring revenue.

My primary target is Hogwarts, for now. I'd like to convince them to utilise our duelling fics - with simulated opponents, differing skill levels - in their Dark Arts classes, and I'd like to present the Quidditch training options as well.

The goal would be monthly recurring revenue for use of the simulations after they purchase the physical fic locations. They'd have to, to ensure they always had access to the locations when they wanted or needed them.

I delegate this to Blaise. He's excellent for marketing but I'm confident he will be just as successful in sales.

It's great to feel competent at something.

I decide this almost unconsciously after another night spent not sleeping. Two in a row should be chafing on me, but I feel more at peace after last night. Snape would probably have loads to say about that, but I'm refusing to think about him.

Last night was spent entirely thinking about Granger.

Snape said the marker of my pure, true, honest interest in Granger's affections is that I haven't thought about fucking her.

Well, I'm more than capable of proving him wrong there. I'll show him.

Not literally, though. I'm also determined to rededicate myself to Occlumency practise. I've had more than enough of Severus combing through my mind at will. No more of that.

First thing this morning, I told Ilse to block sixty minutes for me every morning and ninety every afternoon, wherever she can squeeze it. If I can't fit all of that time, she's to find something, somewhere.

I'm going to practise. Meditate. I've let things go and it's unacceptable.

In the meantime, I'm determined to prove that I'm perfectly able to imagine Granger in my bed.

Snape was right - it was unusual that I haven't. So, fine. Helping matters is the fact that I haven't had a shag in several weeks.

It's a little difficult starting off, though.

Not that I've ever thought about it, but ordinarily, I would probably have imagined taking her in the Hogwarts library - like half the interested male population, apparently. So that's out.

But the bookstore is good. Same idea, really, and no schooltime overtones. Which is better, if anything.

I shuffle down under the covers of my bed and reach into my drawers.

I feel a little out of practise at this, in fact. When I was a teenager, like any teenage boy, I wanked rampantly - as often as I could. Now that I'm a solid adult who can get a good shag anytime I like, I prefer the real thing.

But it has been a couple of weeks, after all, and I think about a deserted bookstore, a long mane of wild brown hair, big brown eyes looking up at me.

I slide my hand down, and pull up with a slight tightening twist at the top. A curvy set of hips with a good arse in tight denims, leaning over to grab something off a lower shelf. I can imagine those denims off - or just down, maybe, showing her arse.

Down around her knees, and -

Slide down, pull up, and twist.

It throbs in my hand and I can see her eyes close to mine, looking at me through long lashes, and now it's her hand sliding up and down. She moves closer to me, slipping her other hand down to cup me and she rolls them in her fingers and -

Fucking hell. I jerk twice and I haven't come this fast since I was thirteen.

I should get out more. It's been too long since I had a shag, Blaise was right. And I've been under a lot of stress, to say the least.

I lay there in my own bed, breathing a little hard.

Okay, yes, apparently I like her hair. Down. And she's got a great arse. I guess. I hadn't really been noticing it all this time, but it looked right, and -

And she was looking at me like she wanted me there.

I must doze in and out a bit because the next thing I know, at least an hour or two have gone by. And I'm uncomfortably hard again, and I curse. It is like I'm thirteen.

Maybe I should call Eloise this weekend. I'm just deciding to do this as I reach my hand back into my drawers, almost on reflex.

But what I picture isn't a willowy blonde with shorter, wispy hair. She isn't slender and trim, and nearly my height in heels.

It's full tits under a regular shirt, not a blouse designed to show them.

It's my hands sliding down to grip an arse I can pull into me, up, legs around my waist.

It's a mass of brown curls falling over my face as I sit down hard in a bookshop chair, her knees on either side of my hips as her face comes down to meet mine.

She works her tongue into my mouth as she wriggles in my lap, creating a delicious friction.

She slips down my body like a wraith, eyes never leaving mine as she frees my cock from my pants.

She bites her lower lip as she looks me up and down, hungrily, and takes me in her mouth, deep, hot. Wet.

I'm trying to last as long as I can, but it's a shite experiment and I can't stand it.

When I blow way too early, she delicately licks her lips and swipes a tiny bit from the corner of her mouth before climbing back up my body on the chair.

She leans into my ear, her full lips against my skin here, too, and whispers, "I miss you. Come back soon, alright?"