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By now—
The countdown is ticking faster than her heart.
And she knows it is because the tension through the air is palpable. Her fists are clenched; stuck to her side—and so, so sweaty. She can feel any grasp on reality slowly fade because her heartbeat is thundering through her body, fusing through her veins, reaching her toes, rooting her and every potent emotion racing in her blood to the ground until—until she sees Malfoy, senses him really if she's being honest with herself and—
Hermione inhales.
His calculating silver eyes are already trained on hers from across the Atrium as if he wants her, craves her, maybe even needs her to just look at him. Just have her be there for him. Just have her be next to him, not his slender, sleek-haired fiancée, who's busy gushing over his Minister for Magic campaign portrait like a schoolgirl exchanging secrets with her friends.
Now, her snug navy knee-length skirt and blush blouse feels like worthless fabric compared to Padma's designer robes—personally stitched with the Malfoy emblem as of last week when their engagement had been announced. And, sure, maybe Hermione had been the one to set him and Padma up, but watching Padma's hands trail over his forearm still hurt.
He hadn't liked the whole idea of 'a leech on his arm'—as he so graciously called it—when Hermione not-so-subtly handed him a list of eligible witches in Britain. He hadn't agreed, yes; but the people needed a trustworthy Wizard, man, and husband. So, she'd dolled him up, minus the gel, and sent him a whirlwind romance with Padma Patil, which spanned the papers and the people's hearts.
"Nervous?" a voice asks from behind her, so she pulls away from Malfoy's eyes and clutches the flute of bubbly tighter. She finds Blaise Zabini's warm brown eyes blinking back at her. "Don't be. He told me that with you on his side, he'd have any election in the palm of his hands."
A quick glance at the poll numbers projecting near the ceiling of the Lobby puts Draco Malfoy as number one, with McLaggen not even coming in a close second at the speed that Malfoy's garnering attention. Hermione scoffs before taking a careful sip of her drink. "Merlin, the Prophet yesterday morning said it was because of his luscious hair and his smooth skin that have people swooning."
"Well, it's sure as hell not his familial background." Hermione gives a tight smile at that. And Blaise reaches out to grasp at her bicep and give a small squeeze, "Seriously, Hermione, you're the reason he's made so much progress. Without you, he'd still be the gaunt fellow I knew at nineteen—someone who could barely chalk up an interview for a proper job. I didn't think Malfoy had it in him; to be a decent person, that is. You've changed him."
She brushes off his praise with a slight flush on her face, "I can't bring out something that's not already there in a person."
"Remember that conference last month in Glasgow? It really worked wonders with the people," Blaise comments. Hermione hides the fact that her face is heating up quite a bit by letting her head hang down—because yes, she did remember, a lot. "He's holding them by their ears now. It's all a matter of living through this night without seeing Padma claw his shirt off."
"I suppose." Hermione shrugs before glancing back up at the polls, watching the plethora of numbers diffuse into a moving picture of Malfoy slightly turning his lips up. She'd spent an hour going over the proper pose to juxtapose his campaign—he'd meant to be regal, confident, humble; all at the same time. And looking at him now—well, now he's so beautiful, it hurts.
The next ten minutes pass in unabridged silence.
People's hearts are too busy in their throats while waiting for the next Minister for Magic to be announced. It's no surprise when Malfoy's name booms through the Atrium and confetti rains down in blue and gold. He'd been the front contender for months.
Hermione watches Padma kiss Malfoy on the cheek before the onslaught of photographers blind the couple with their photos.
"Minister Malfoy—Malfoy—over here!—look over here!" The sound of the camera temporarily stuns him into another bout of silence followed by a smile that Hermione believes resembles more of a grimace on him than anything.
She can feel her eyes glaze over as she's hit with a plethora of people swarming around her. And she has the urge to rub her eyes dry—until she realises that her smokey eye makeup, which took the better part of an hour, would be ruined underneath her hands. So, she smiles for Malfoy.
His hand rises to wave at the crowd of people bustling into the banquet hall, and an imperceptible wave of sounds roar up from his gesture. Hermione shifts uncomfortably in her skirt, adjusting the top of her blouse that keeps slipping down her creamy skin.
Then it's Malfoy with practically everybody as a mass of people congratulate him on his win. Hermione stays long enough to watch Harry pat him on the back in a cool exchange before she's swerving through the crowd of people to escape the thunderous cheers in the Ministry.
A minute later, she finds herself walking down a long strip of hallway before entering a dimly-lit room. Her eyes squeeze shut, and Hermione lets out a long, winded sigh. Studying the room, she shifts herself around enough until she meets an empty desk beside a potted plant.
It could've been minutes or hours the next time she as a cogent thought because of a ruffling of fabric outside the door. Her shoulders tense briefly.
Her ears perch when she hears the soft opening of a door and—
She hears him before she sees him, but Hermione had to have known he followed her even before his shoes scuff on the dark wood floors. It's muscle memory by now—knowing how he walks, strides, clambers, saunters even.
A few sounds of charm work ring through. Locking and silencing spell, she's sure of it, and a part of Hermione flickers out right then and there.
Hermione bubbles up something to say before he speaks what's on both of their minds, "Congratulations Minister."
Malfoy makes a sound at the back of his throat—sort of, kind of a whine mingled with a voice of regret—and it speaks volumes. His feet edge closer to where Hermione is lingering by the mahogany desk.
"Yeah?"
Hermione shifts her body to face him slightly, keeping her stance stuck exactly where she was. She licks her lips—his gaze follows—before continuing, "Your parents would be so proud."
His eyes glaze over. And he scoffs. "They wouldn't feel shit."
"Don't say that."
"Don't patronise me, Granger. I know where they would stand in this situation. And they wouldn't have stood in an Atrium that's not filled with Voldemort's loot scattered about."
Hermione traces her fingers on the edge of the desk and glances toward her nude heels. "Maybe not. But they would've been proud of the man you've become. Someone who can lead people, no matter what the cause is."
Malfoy doesn't say anything for a while—not that she expects him to—and Hermione's so sure that she's stepped the line enough to have him be closed off from her entirely until he steps closer and says—
"And you?"
She looks up. And meets his eyes with a tantalising slowness. "And me?"
"Are you proud of me?"
Her voice morphs into a mumble. "I am. You know I am." His eyes soften into something resembling deep pools of regret, and—and she knows she has to say something before it happens again. "Don't look at me like that. For Merlin's sake, Malfoy"—a nervous laugh erupts from her mouth—"I'm allowed to be proud of my friends—"
"Friends?"
A long pause seeps through.
"Friends."
He laughs sardonically. And repeats, "Friends?"
Hermione hums from the back of her throat, affirming his question again with a unspoken yes. And his features harden again. He shoves his fists into the pockets of his trousers and manages to edge closer to her, and she lifts her eyebrows, just barely, and raises her hand in protest.
"Stop right there, Malfoy."
And when he leans back on his heels before raking his eyes over her, with his body only an arm's length apart and his heart beating next to hers, she says more confidently, more heartily, "Right there."
"Why?"
"You know why."
"So I can't even—"
"No."
He raises both his hands in mock resignation, but his face doesn't give up any of the battle. "Isn't this a bit childish, Granger?"
"Concerning you, no."
"Afraid you won't be able to keep your hands off of me?" A faint smirk lines his lips, and Hermione, astonished, lets out a small gasp. Malfoy allows himself to walk closer.
"Malfoy! That is entirely inappropriate conversation between a newly-appointed, engaged Minister and his campaign manager in an empty bloody conference room as hoards of people are waiting for your acceptance speech just outside—"
And when Malfoy surges forward to grasp Hermione in his arms and tuck her right into his chest, her words dive into silence. He turns her around and splays his hands right over her stomach. His chin finds a place by her shoulder. And Hermione—with the pounding of her heart in her ears—remains a stationary doll when concerned with his erogenous movements. Because if she makes one wrong move, she'll be a pile of goo by his feet in a moment.
"Would you just shut up and let me hold you, Granger?"
The sound she makes out of her throat comes out as a strangled groan of protest, but when he pushes his hips closer to her bum, the sound morphs into a barely-concealed moan.
"I missed this," he says. "Just let me hold you for a moment. Please."
His breath feels like a kiss on her neck, and Hermione flutters her eyes close for a second—time is futile, really, honestly, truly at this point because they know—before she shifts her hand clenched at her side to graze her fingers over his.
"Granger," he whispers; caresses. His chest pushes further into her back, and his nose brushes against her jaw. And then more softly, a broken breath on the edge of his lips, "Hermione."
"Please, Draco." She doesn't know what she's pleading for at this moment. For him to stop. For him to continue. And maybe just—just more. Just more.
He edges his fingers closer toward hers until his palm is wrapping around hers completely, wholly; Hermione feels her hands tingle with energy as his body becomes flush against her back. Now, Malfoy's hot breath is against her neck is having her practically become rosy with embarrassment and excitement combined. It's like her body knows what it's like to be in this position, to have him over her, to have his arms wrapped around her.
"I can't stop, Granger." His voice is like gravel. The sound of his gruff tenor cuts straight to the spot below her abdomen. "I can't—can't stop thinking about you, lusting after you"—he pauses, and a soft kiss is dropped on her neck and Hermione shutters; he hitches his breath before mumbling into her skin in a tone absent of his usual impassiveness—"loving you."
A small voice of sanity breaks through the feeling of being engulfed in his warmth—and it shouts at her, stop, he's engaged, he's the Minister, and after everything he's worked to bring up his name, would you want him to give up everything for you? Stop being so so so selfish.
"Tell me it's wrong," his voice brings her back to reality. "That we're wrong. That everything between us is a mistake. A fucking mistake made by the most clever witch I know. And I'll stop."
"Draco."
"You don't make mistakes, Granger. You mend them. You turn utter messes into something—someone worth love." A pause. And then, "You fix them like you fixed me."
"Draco."
"I've never felt like this before, do you know that?" he whispers, slowly. His grip around her fingers tighten. "It's fucking mad—feeling this way about you. Like my chest might implode or some bull like that, you know? You work me so fucking hard."
"You're engaged."
"And it's a sham."
"Do you really mean—?"
"Hermione."
He sounds like he's in pain by the sound of her name, in a whirlpool of uncertainty. Malfoy is oozing vulnerability—something she's never experienced with him—and it takes everything in Hermione's heart not to turn around and embrace him right then and there.
"You're a part of me. You don't understand. You're—you're the fucking beat to my drums"—and when she laughs, it's choked with tears—"the blood in my veins, the whisper on my throat, the sunset on my cheeks, Granger." And then more softly, more hesitantly, "Fuck, Hermione, you're my everything."
"Draco, I—" Hermione squeezes her eyes shut. Her eyebrows dip together, and by now, her knees are shaking so much that she's holding onto the desk with a white-knuckled fist.
"So—just tell me. Were we? A mistake, that is?"
She's spent weeks pondering this. Hours upon hours of wasted opportunity. Hermione Granger spent her pathetic months yearning for a man she could never be with, but she's never pictured it—them—as a mistake.
They're the furthest from it.
But then there's a bit of her wanting more than hidden romps in parlour rooms or steamy kisses in secret hotels. She wants to hold hands in the street, all clammy and sticky and tangled together. She wants to share messy picnics under the glades. She wants someone to bring to Australia to meet her parents. And she wants someone to come home to and find them already snoring in bed with drool on their pillow. She wants cold feet on calves in the mornings and snogging sessions after brushing their teeth at night. She wants children, lots of them. And she wants to grow old—together.
And he—he can't do that with her. Not now. Not ever. They both have responsibilities, and her holding onto something fragile and delicate and watching it slip through her fingers was not something she wishes to do. She's more than that. More than what he gives her.
So, she lets him go.
She breathes a shaky, "Yes."
His reactive movement behind her isn't instantaneous; and maybe a part of Hermione has her hoping that she didn't actually say it out loud or he didn't actually hear it. Maybe he'll ask her again, and the answer lingering at the edge of her lips will burst out into flames. No. And no. No.
But then Malfoy loosens his grip on her fingers, and the warm weight of his body is released from her back, so much so that she can wiggle away from the desk and the wood isn't crushing into the top of her thighs.
"Okay," he whispers. He whispers with finality. And he releases her fully. There's another part of her wishing he'd protest, make a change, say something, anything, but Draco Malfoy was always one for cowardice. "Okay."
Hermione turns around to watch him adjust the lapels on his black suit before he smoothes out the front of his robe in tantalising ease. Her body is so close to his that she can still feel the warmth emanating from it, but she knows their hearts are an ocean's breadth apart already.
He finishes adjusting his robes before glancing up and giving her a subtle, curt nod. It's the last thing she'll get. And when he walks away with the silent footsteps tracing his tracks, she'll watch him. And when the soft click of the door mimics his retreat, she'll hear him make his way back down the hallway. And when he's finally left her alone, she'll feel the prickle of tears burn at the back of her eyes—and she—
And she—
She exhales.
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