“Only in your dreams,” she said, shooting him a glare.
“Every night.”
She rolled her eyes.
“Do you buy all your company?” she said, her voice sweet and her expression condescending. He didn't even blink.
“I enjoy professionalism,” he said blandly, staring up at the ceiling as though he were reciting a mantra. “Clear lines. No drama. I'm not obliged to pretend that I care.”
He sneered at the last word, as though caring were the most offensive concept known to man.
“Of course. How very you.”
“Quite,” he agreed with a thin smile.
There was a silence. Hermione wanted to tell him he was vile, but she was certain he already knew. She felt tired and it made her want to be cruel.
“Do you talk to them and cry, telling them about how sad and lonely your life is? Or just bend them over without a word?” she asked, her voice lilting with the taunt.
His eyes flashed.
“Want me to show you?” His voice was sharp and cold as a splinter of ice.
Hermione's near run-in with the werewolves had the adrenaline still spiking through her. She was used to the high stress of the hospital ward, but it was always someone else's life. She felt high on the rush from her near brush with death. She understood Harry suddenly. She felt like she could do anything.
A sudden thought came to her at Malfoy's threat.
She stared up at him, raising her chin.
“You won't.”
His eyes got cruel, but before he could respond she continued. “It would be too real for you. Doing it with someone you know. Someone you'd see again. It would mess with those clear lines.”
“Testing me, Granger?” His voice was low and caressing.
She stared at him.
“I suppose I am,” she said coolly, but her heart was beginning to pound at the realisation of what she'd just done.
He leaned down, his eyes hard, until his face was centimetres from her own.
“Strip.”
Hermione didn't waver and neither did he, so he stepped slowly closer until she shuffled back. He loomed over her. His eyes glittered.
“It's killing you, isn't it? Wondering. You expected me to do this to you right off. So waiting — trying to guess when I might get around to it — that bothers you more than the thought of actually having to fuck me.”
He sneered. “Well — you have my attention. Strip.”
Hermione stared up at him, feeling her face grow hot even as the rest of her body became increasingly cold.
“You don't even want me. Why did you include me in your demands? What is the point?” she asked. Her voice was angry and confused.
He smirked. “You're right. I don't want you.”
It shouldn't have hurt to hear him say it, but somehow it did. Especially set with the vindictive mockery in his expression as he stared down at her.
“However, owning you is never going to get old. 'Now and after the war.' I can't wait to see how bitterly I can make you regret those words. So, strip.” His voice dropped low. “Or did you want me to do it for you?”
Hermione's hands went up to the collar of her shirt and she gripped it defensively. She was terrified and enraged to the point she thought she might start crying. He did own her. She'd agreed to it. Her jaw trembled and her hands started shaking.
“Power gets you off, doesn't it?” Her voice shook with rage as she forced herself to unfasten the top button on her shirt. “Hurting someone who can't — or won't — fight back. Using what people care about to torture and cage them, and force them to do things. You are just the same as Voldemort.”
The malice in Malfoy's expression abruptly vanished and he paled. The check on his rage suddenly disappeared and darkness and magic poured off of him in waves, filling and writhing through the air.
The ice-cold fury that appeared in his expression was staggering. His eyes turned black, his lips curled in a snarl, and he kept getting paler and paler as he stared at her.
Hermione's eyes widened in terror and she cringed away, bracing herself.
There was a tidal wave of fury rising up around him.
“Get out!” he snapped.
She stared at him, unmoving. Like an animal petrified by fear.
He snarled with rage. Suddenly the door to the shack slammed open so violently the hinges snapped and it plummeted to the floor.
“GET OUT!” he roared.
Hermione did not need further invitation. She bolted for the door and apparated the second she felt herself clear the wards.
When she got through the door at Grimmauld Place, she collapsed onto the floor of the foyer, shaking with terror.
Stupid. Stupid. Stupid. She berated herself, trying to force herself to breathe. She felt like she was having a panic attack.
She couldn't understand what had prompted her to try provoking him. If it weren't the middle of the night she would have banged her head into the floor with frustration over her idiocy.
After all the countless times she had scolded Harry, warning him about the consequences of his stupid thrill-seeking; she might have him beaten.
She was an idiot.
She pressed her hand over her pounding heart and dropped her face into the crook of her elbow. She whimpered quietly.
Draco Dormiens Nunquam Titillandus.
Except she hadn't tickled a sleeping dragon. Her actions appeared to have been more in the realm of waltzing up and smacking it upside the head with a beater bat.
They needed Malfoy. They desperately needed him, and a bit of adrenaline made her lose her head.
He was right, she couldn't handle the dread. The constant anticipation. Exhausting herself wondering about what it was he wanted. What he intended to do to her. Constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. It was eating her alive.
If he was going to hurt her or fuck her, she just wanted to know and have him do it.
Going to him every week, uncertain of what he might do to her next—
It was breaking her to pieces.
She bit down on her lip as she huddled against the door. She tried not to burst into tears as her rush of norepinephrine lost its hold on her, and she found herself sharply dropped low. She was awash in horror and despair.
She buried her face in her hands and sobbed quietly.
Her anxiety had quite possibly just cost the Order the war. Or at least countless lives.
She had to find a way to fix it.
She wrapped her arms around herself, and tried to calm down and think.
Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
When her chest finally stopped stuttering, she stood up and brushed away the tears.
She made her way up to her potion supply closet, she stored the fluxweed and spent several minutes trying to organise her thoughts and force her hands to stop shaking.
She went on to her room.
The door was ajar. Which was odd, because both she and Ginny were generally fastidious about keeping their door shut and locked. Grimmauld Place wasn't broadly accessible to the Resistance, but there were occasionally nosy individuals with little respect for privacy or personal possessions.
Hermione peeked in and then jumped back in surprise.
Ginny and Harry were half-naked and, if they weren't already, they appeared mere seconds from shagging.
Hermione cast a quick privacy charm on the door and hurried away. On the landing of the steps she paused and hesitated. Grimmauld's rooms were crammed currently. A number of the older children from Caithness had been brought there.
The parlour downstairs was currently occupied by all the insomniacs. There weren't many places left to sleep.
She was so tired. Her bout of crying left her feeling internally hollow.
She crawled into a window seat and tried to drift off, but her mind wouldn't quiet itself. She kept replaying her conversation with Malfoy. Fretting over the potion she needed to brew. Re-living the moment all the rage poured off Malfoy and he roared at her.