Hermione raced into the restaurant, apologies on her lips.
Finding her date was a simple matter; he waited for her in the foyer and chatted with the host, partially turned away from her. She took a moment to catch her breath, as huffing and puffing through her introduction would be needlessly embarrassing. Hermione was pleased to find that Bole was as handsome as Pansy described, at least from this angle. He was tallish, albeit slightly stocky of build, with medium brown hair that had been mussed into artful disarray.
"Bole?" She said, catching the wizard's attention once she thought she could keep from making a fool of herself. 'Bole' was an odd name, she thought, though she supposed she could hardly judge with a name like 'Hermione.'
The wizard turned to her with a smile, his forest green eyes lighting in recognition, and Hermione resisted the urge to smooth down her inevitably frizzed hair or wrinkled skirt.
He couldn't have looked less like Lucius than if she'd given a list of preferred opposite characteristics to Ginny and Pansy. It was excellent, really. Though with a roguishly broken nose that hadn't been magically set and beater's build, she was reminded of her very brief interlude with Cormac McClaggen. But that was fine. The important thing for this evening was that he was the utter antithesis of a particular Malfoy man.
"You must be Hermione," the man said, his eyes sliding quickly down, before meeting her own. "You look lovely. Shall we?"
He offered his arm, and Hermione took it with a smile, surreptitiously checking Bole out in return. She was looking for dinner and a partner for activities, not the love of her life, so she didn't let herself feel too badly about it.
Bole was avidly leering down her blouse as they made their way to their table. So, clearly, he was of much the same opinion.
"So sorry I'm late, Bole," she tittered nervously, once they were seated and left to their own devices, "I had a very trying meeting that ran over time."
"No worries, luv. And all my mates call me Bole, but you can call me Lucian."
Hermione heard a strange, groaning, creaking noise and belatedly realized it was coming from her.
Oh, for fuck's sake! This could not be her life.
She quickly silenced herself and tried to smooth her features into the approximation of a smile. The restaurant was loud enough with other diners that she prayed her date didn't notice.
"Right. Lucian. Fantastic," she returned inanely.
This wasn't going to work.
No, Hermione decided firmly. It was silly. Beyond silly. Lucian was just a name. Lucius Malfoy assuredly didn't have the monopoly on names that began with L. Or Luci-. Lucian couldn't help that he shared the majority of his name with the absolute prat of a wizard she was trying to pretend didn't exist. His name may annoyingly run counter to that aim, but did she really even have to call Lucian anything?
She could still make this work. No, she would make this work. She would have a nice dinner, and hopefully some halfway decent sex, and Lucius Malfoy wouldn't factor in to that. At. All.
Only… Lucian.
Lucian who was now picking at his teeth with his fingernails as he ogled areas below her face.
Lovely.
It had seemed like innocuous enough behaviour upon their initial meeting, but his continued direction of attention grated uncomfortably. Her breasts really couldn't be that interesting.
Lucius had certainly never— she cut that line of thought off before it could fully form.
Hermione's cheeks were starting to ache from trying to hold a smile that suddenly felt like it had been plastered on for too long. It probably had been. She angled for a more neutral expression.
"So, what do you do for work, Lucian?" she forced herself to ask after the prolonged, painfully awkward silence. She knew, of course. It had come up when Ginny and Pansy were compiling their shortlist of "Get Hermione Shagged Within an Inch of her Life" suitors. Or G.H.S.W.I.L. The acronym admittedly needed work.
In fact, the only details Hermione had received about Lucian were his vague description and that he was a beater for the Tutshill Tornados.
"Parks didn't tell you? I'm a beater," he grinned, loudly sucking his teeth and waggling his eyebrows in a manner which he clearly thought was enticing but Hermione found was quite the opposite. "For the Tornados."
The sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach advised that continuing this date was a uniquely terrible idea, and she'd be better off cutting the evening short now, but Hermione was nothing, if not bullheadedly tenacious when it came down to proving a point.
She wasn't exactly certain to whom she was proving this particular point or what the point was, but that was immaterial. It was a point to be proven, and she was in it for the long haul.
"Ah, that's right," Hermione said, as though she had a sudden epiphany, "Come to think of it, she did mention it. How's the season?"
Lucian Bole went into a play-by-play of his latest exploits, making himself sound like the heart of the team and the best beater in the entire league. He had an entire extended, tedious, monologue.
Hermione's eyes glazed as she settled in to her chosen doom.
She was forever cursed to be romantically involved with either overbearing arseholes or quidditch players, and she couldn't quite decide which was worse.
This endeavor was absurd.
He was a Malfoy. He shouldn't be skulking in the far corner of a frankly terrible restaurant— truly, it was barely a step above a quidditch bar— simply because he had the forethought to discreetly gemino the open page of Hermione's day planner.
But then what sort of silly chit wrote out dinner plans with exact locations if she didn't want interested parties to know about them and, perhaps, tag along? Honestly. It had been as good as an invitation.
Her choice of paramour, however, left much to be desired. He was roughly her own age, passable in appearance perhaps, but openly and obviously staring at her breasts. Lucius felt offended on Hermione's behalf.
But Lucius resolved to let it play out for now; theirs was clearly a first encounter. It would also be a last encounter and proceed no further than the front door of the restaurant, if he had anything to say about it. He would have plenty of opportunity to thwart this misadventure without even revealing himself if he so chose. Though, if the imbecile continued as he was, Lucius may not even need to lift a finger.
Hermione had obviously noticed the leering and pretended it was fine, though he could clearly see awkward tension rolling from her in waves. It was wholly different from the tension he caused her, Lucius realized with some satisfaction. Lucius made her blush. This man, however—
His reflections were cut short because the little bastard grabbed her hand.
The lighting flickered, and a wave of magic rolled ominously through the restaurant.
"Did you feel that?" Hermione wondered aloud, looking around for the source of the magical surge, but not finding an obvious one. No one else really seemed bothered, either. Strange.
"Feel what, luv?" Lucian asked, stroking the back of her hand with a curiously sticky thumb.
She eased her hand away under the pretense of taking a large gulp of her wine. She rested it below the table to prevent a repeat offense.
Her dinner was half gone, and Hermione was decided: she was not going to have sex with Lucian Bole after all. He was just… annoyingly, frustratingly wrong.
And if he called her 'luv' one more time, she might forego her own vow of non-violence and punch him in the face. It was almost alarming how quickly she wanted to resort to violence these days. At least with Lucius, her violent impulses were oddly melded with inexplicable desire.
Lucian, on the other hand… Lucian kept staring at her breasts. Blatantly. Leering. Hermione almost wished she'd opted for her normal, conservative robes or prim muggle office-wear.
Earlier, she thought she might be able to forgive him his unfortunate name—he couldn't help that after all, but as the evening wore on, Hermione discovered that his personality—his entire attitude—was just wholly and utterly repulsive. It was as though someone had combined the worst traits of Gilderoy Lockhart, Cormac McClaggen, and Ron Weasley and rolled them into one odious human-shaped lump of dung.
She knew this date was supposed to be a lighthearted exercise in relieving tension, but Hermione, apparently and unfortunately, had standards. She sincerely doubted he'd be competent enough to even get her off if he could manage to arouse her in the first place. Any warm feelings she may have harbored upon their initial meeting had taken a sudden, icy nosedive alongside her libido once the tedious boasting started.
She drained her glass once more during her ruminations and Lucian's continuous self-aggrandized droning. Hermione was somewhat pleasantly surprised to find the night much farther along than expected when she glanced at the clock. Had she really been listening to this pillock drone on about himself for two entire hours?
Lucian said something to draw her attention back to him.
Oh. Her head felt a bit. Swimmy.
She may have nursed her wine a bit too much. There had been multiple, multiple, glasses, after all. But she had long since resolved to pay for her own meal, so it wasn't like she was leading him on.
It was probably time to end things before she was too drunk to let him down gracefully. This farce had already gone on for far longer than she intended. Hermione almost wanted to curse her initial stubbornness into trying to make the unworkable work. Two hours of her life wasted.
"Lucian, it's been lovely," Hermione lied, "but it's getting rather late," it was barely past eight, "I think we should just get our checks and call it an evening." To be fair, the wine made her inordinately sleepy, and she would definitely be seeking her bed for sleep rather than sex as soon as she got home.
The man in question interpreted her graceful dismissal completely wrong.
"Excellent. Can't wait to get you back to yours," he smirked.
Hermione felt the combined acidity of wine, dinner, and stomach acid creeping up her throat. He tried to reach for her hand again, and she surreptitiously leaned back.
"A separate evening. I'll be going home alone, Mr. Bole," she said, gathering her satchel. "Cheers."
Forget flagging down their server, she would settle up at the bar. His eyes widened comically as she made to stand.
"Wait! Parks said you were looking for a fuck!" he exclaimed far too loudly.
How had she ever thought this could work in the slightest?
"Yes, well, as it happens, not with you." Hermione smiled blithely.
"What's all this been for, then? I'm not paying for you."
Great, they were devolving in belligerence. Her head began throbbing.
"And I wouldn't expect you to in the first place," she replied calmly. "In fact—"
"Ah. Hermione. What an interesting surprise," a third voice cut in.
Lucian bit back whatever he was going to say, confused at the interruption.
Hermione cringed, before staring uncomprehendingly up into the cold grey eyes of the man she was most trying to avoid. Her brain suddenly felt even more slow and mushy; she must have really overdone it on the wine.
She blinked, and Lucius Malfoy was unfortunately still present when she reopened her eyes. He stood beside her in his typical show of ridiculously resplendent-yet-somehow-understated elegance. Had he seriously changed robes after work to go out to dinner? Of course, Malfoy was coincidentally out for dinner in the same restaurant as her terrible date— a restaurant she highly doubted that he frequented.
In a way, Hermione found herself unsurprised by Lucius's poorly timed appearance. She should have known better than to ever open her mouth about her evening plans back in her office, even if it had been the slightest bit gratifying to watch him clench his jaw at the time. Fat lot of good her momentary amusement did her now.
But observing how he presently gripped the head of his cane—as though he were mere seconds away from unsheathing his wand and cursing her awful date—was, admittedly, kind of sexy.
Definitely too much wine. And leave it to Him to bugger her quick escape.
"Mr. Malfoy," Hermione acknowledged. "I was just leaving."
"Oh, before you introduce me to your little," Lucius eyed the other man dismissively, "friend?"
His voice was silk and danger and all around lovely—no. Supercilious, imperious, pureblood tosser.
Then her mind caught up to the present. Was he, Lucius Malfoy, jealous? Had he not just heard what Hermione was saying before he interrupted? If she were a tad more sober and not three-hundred percent sure Bole would take it the completely wrong way and be very annoying to deal with, she could have had some fun with that notion. But as it stood, she'd best not.
"Mr. Malfoy," Hermione enunciated carefully, not even daring to chance his first name lest history repeat itself, "This is…"
"Lucian Bole," the other man stood, offering his hand, eager to again be the center of attention.
Damn. She'd been intending to introduce him as Bole. Idiot.
Malfoy's eyes glinted peculiarly as they flitted from her erstwhile date back to her. Within a heartbeat, Lucius's lips slid into a sharp, vaguely terrifying smile. She thought he looked much like she imagined a shark might when cornering its prey.
He ignored Lucian's hand.
"Charmed, Mr. Bole, but if you'll excuse us, I need to speak to Hermione in private. Ministry matters, you see. She shan't return, I'm afraid."
Lucius gallantly held out a hand to help her stand, and weighing her options, she reluctantly took it. The devil you know and all. Annoyingly, Malfoy didn't let go once she was vertical.
Hermione registered Bole's dim, open-mouthed realization that he and she really weren't leaving together. On the bright side, Lucian seemed just smart enough to not try to pitch a fit or try to fight with Lucius effectively stealing her away.
"Good evening, Mr. Bole," Lucius said with an air of finality, and Hermione nodded once, trudging alongside him to settle her bill and escape this travesty of a night out.
The wine really must have pickled her brain because they were halfway to the apparition point before Hermione realized that being escorted home by Lucius Malfoy ran precisely counter to her best laid plans.
Hermione tottered along beside him, pretending to be much more sober than she actually was.
Lucius had to admire this attempt, because if she didn't cling to his arm and mutter her step counts under her breath, he might have almost believed her to be merely tipsy based on her surprisingly coherent speech. Well, the other prime indicator that she might be more indisposed than she let on was the fact that she allowed him to take her side-along to the apparition point nearest her little hovel in muggle London without the slightest protest.
They were suitably removed from the restaurant when he felt safe to strike.
"Lucian, hmm?"
Hermione winced quite visibly, even under the glow of the streetlights.
"It was a blind date," she defended. "The odds of his name bearing an uncanny similarity to yours were astronomical."
"You didn't think to get a name beforehand?"
"I did. Just didn't know it was his stupid last name," she groused, scuffing her shoes along the pavement. "Stupid quidditch players."
Lucius 'hmmed' with mock consideration. "It could simply be fate divining your path, don't you think?"
He could see her annoyance clearly as it spread across her face.
"Divination is complete bunk," she gesticulated wildly with her free hand, "We control our own destinies. Tea and, and, and cloudy old balls can't predict anything."
Lucius held back a chuckle, but couldn't resist leading her to expound. "Are you so sure? I could say it was kismet that I was around to rescue you from your chosen dullard."
That return had the desired effect and Hermione ranted quite cogently for five minutes. Her rapid-fire drunken observations and derisions against divination as a subject were rather entertaining. Her tirade stopped abruptly as they reached the outer building doors to her flat.
"You're having me on," Hermione realized out loud.
Lucius hmmed noncommittally, escorting her inside and calling the lift for the third floor.
"That's really annoying, you know," she pouted.
He turned his vision steadfastly ahead to the reflective metal doors. Hermione was unfortunately far too inebriated for him to move forward any of his best laid plans of seduction; he'd only absconded with her to get her away from that little miscreant and see her safely home. That being said—
"I'm sorry, my dear, I have no idea to what you are referring," he said with convincing innocence as the lift whirred up. She clung tighter when the contraption jostled to a stop at their destination. Rickety muggle thing.
"That! Precisely that! You say something to make me go off on a tangent, and—and distract me, and then you just let me argue my point until I'm blue in the face," Hermione gasped, affronted realization flashing in her eyes. "You're doing it right now!"
His lips quirked in the ghost of a smile, but Lucius made no comment one way or the other.
"It's infuriating! You're infuriating!"
"While you are ever so charmingly blunt, inebriated as you are, it would be prudent to keep your voice down, pet. You have muggle neighbors and it wouldn't do to disturb them. Now, are you capable of disarming your wards, or must I remove them?" Lucius inquired.
It would be a tedious process, but he was confident it was doable. Wards on such transitional housing as this were simply not as strong as their multi-generational, densely layered counterparts.
"Don't have any," she yawned.
They reached Hermione's flat, and Lucius found this to be true. There was not the first trace of protective magic to prevent him or anyone from opening the door and storming her flat.
"You have no wards against intrusion? At all?"
"Just the advanced locking charm," Hermione replied. She was very far gone and nuzzling distractingly into his biceps. He couldn't even relish this dubious progress, as he was both too baffled and annoyed by her complete lack of precaution.
He may have grumbled about little idiots having no regard for their own safety. She naturally took offense.
"It's muggle London, Malfoy. I don't need them. Besides, it's prohibited. See Wizard-Muggle Relations Code 6539. Section E. Improper Magic for Dwellings in Urban Magicfree Zones."
Did she have the bloody book memorized?
"I honestly can't discern if you are truly drunk or not," Lucius observed, peering down at her for further clues, but finding her eyes shut.
"Think I might be," Hermione replied after a moment's deep consideration.
Lucius rolled his eyes fondly. "Keys," he demanded.
"Oh. Right."
She let go of the death grip she had on his wand arm to rifle through her magically extended satchel, surrendered the keys to his care, and took his arm in both hands, using him for balance again. It was quite the novelty to find her reaching for him.
Not for the first time this day, he found himself disquieted that his simple endeavor to exorcise boredom from his life seemed to be spiraling horribly awry. However, Lucius could not find himself concerned enough to change course.
"I wasn't gonna go with him, y'know," Hermione mumbled, her eyes drooping again as he fumbled with the door. "You smell nice."
"Really, now?"
"You do. It's distracting."
That was entirely not the point he intended to comment on, but far be it from him to correct her. They could discuss her ill-fated date and how she ought not seek out further suitors aside from him once she was fully in control of her faculties, but while she was in an unguarded, garrulous mood—
"Do tell, what else about me distracts you?"
Hermione regarded him seriously, scrutinizing him from below her lashes.
"Well, your voice is nice, and your handsome, poncey, punchable face is nice, and your stupid hair is perfect, and I hate your guts," she declared, finishing with a nod.
Lucius chuckled, "Better. More in line with my expectations. Now, in you go."
Sunlight speared through the open curtains. Her head thundered with a herd of at least a million erumpents stampeding carelessly through. Hermione peeled her eyes open blearily.
From what she could see of him, Crookshanks peered down at her, offering her a disdainful mrow before presenting her with his bumhole and hopping off the bed to stalk away.
She was in her own bed, which was good. She was fully clothed, which was better. The gown she was wearing was not anything she owned, which was mildly alarming.
There was something annoyingly stuck to her forehead.
With monumental effort, Hermione reached up to tug the offending paper away.
A sticky note?
The little yellow slip of paper had been magically elongated to contain the missive scrawled out in offensively gorgeous, looping handwriting. She knew that handwriting. A shiver of something—Dread? Misplaced desire? The vestiges of her sanity?— raced down her spine.
Best to see what the note said before she jumped to any conclusions.
You're quite charmingly forthright whilst inebriated, Hermione. I did so enjoy learning which of my positive attributes endear me to you the most. I look forward to your future notes on the subject.
Before you rush headlong into anger and panic, I merely transfigured your robes. Don't fret. I didn't look.
This time.
-L.M.
P.S.: I am aware that you trend toward unreasonable stubbornness. You must know by now that I have only the most honorable of intentions with regard to you. Take the potion. You'll need it.
The nerve of that- that- complete and utter. Overbearing! Arsehole!
She crumpled the note and tossed it away, trying to turn over in bed only to find herself stuck.
"What the-"
Did Malfoy put a sticking charm on her? No matter what she tried, her left side was quite literally glued in place, and she found herself unable to roll over at all.
That idiot! He had.
Hermione reached blindly behind her on her nightstand for the wand that she hoped was actually there. Her fingers closed around an unfamiliar vial first, which she let go in favor of the wood she brushed beside it.
She sat up after a hasty finite.
The fancy little vial contained a hangover potion.
Lucius Malfoy had both made sure that if she became ill in the night, she wouldn't accidentally drown herself on her own sick, and he'd even left a remedy for her poor decision making.
He'd tucked her into bed.
Some strange emotion flared up from her belly and her eyes pricked, but Hermione was in no mood to analyze or appreciate it. She grabbed the little bottle, tipping back the potion in one gulp before she could second guess her decision.
Was it really only a few weeks ago that she would have tossed the potion and suffered the consequences rather than accept the slightest hint of kindness from Him?
This wasn't accepting anything, really. It was merely practical. And at this point, she sincerely doubted he would actively poison or harm her when he seemed to derive so much joy in driving her completely—
"Shit!"
It was Tuesday morning. The sun was up and shining its late summer heat into her bedroom.
She was late. More well-rested than she'd been in weeks, but so, so late for work.
Hermione scrambled, making it to the door in record time, to her elderly cat's hissed displeasure. She dashed back long enough to dump his morning pâté onto a plate before rushing off again.
"Sorry, Crooksy! I'll be home on time tonight, I promise!"
She stumbled through the door when unexpected magic washed over her. Wards? Why? How? But Hermione simply did not have time to stop and examine them.
The only bright point in her morning disaster was that she wouldn't have to see Lucius Malfoy at all today.
She had half-expected an annoyingly perfect, blond mane to greet her when she slipped into her office at a quarter past ten, and Hermione couldn't define whether she was grateful or disappointed to find her expectations unmet.
Grateful, she finally decided three hours later after she had Sebastian apologetically rescheduled her missed morning meeting, and she sat dutifully through two more.
The perk of being the boss was that, unless Kingsley himself came down to chastise her, no one mentioned a thing about her tardiness. It was a strange taste of power, and she felt terrible for being relieved about not having to answer for her lateness. She resolved to imbibe no more liquid courage during dates for the foreseeable future as penance.
Aside from her egregiously late start, it turned out to be an almost perfect work day. And apart from an unwelcome surprise in her desk drawer, there was no Malfoy in sight. If history were any indication, his latest present meant she wouldn't have to suffer his presence until the following day.
It had admittedly lulled Hermione into a false sense of security.
She shouldn't have been at all surprised by the scene that greeted her upon opening her flat door. He had her address now, after all, but for some reason, she had not fathomed the possibility that he might willingly terrorize her on her home turf in muggle London. But there He was, sitting at her kitchen table.
Her small table was set for two, and something smelled absolutely delectable, though she could not yet see what. Finding Lucius Malfoy engaged in a battle of wills with her elderly cat would have been normal and expected. However, she found Malfoy leaned down, petting the grizzled mop of fur and eliciting purring audible from her entryway. She thought it might be a sign of how far gone Crookshanks must have been in his old age that he was actively trying to snuggle against Malfoy's leg and hand.
Crooks had never liked any man she'd brought home before. Her poor boy had finally gone senile. That alone was alarming, though it was not the most pressing issue by far.
There were a great many things that Hermione wished to harangue Malfoy about, ranging from stalking her on her date the night prior to the ostentatious quills and ink she had discovered in her desk drawer late this afternoon. They cost more than her weekly salary as head of the department. She'd checked.
But the sight at the far end of her table gave her pause and forestalled her well thought out diatribe: a tiny infant lay strapped into a very muggle-looking baby carrier, wriggling and cooing happily.
Hermione thought it was several seconds into her perplexity at the strange, domestic scene in her dining area that Lucius noticed her. He stood up to escort her to the table, those weirdly chivalrous manners in full force.
"Ah, Hermione. Finally."
"Lucius Malfoy, did you steal a baby?"
A/N: Lucian Bole's existence is canon! And he was a Slytherin three years ahead of the trio! It was just too perfect. You can only imagine the delight I had in finding him when I was plotting out who Hermione's mystery date should be.